Chapter 13: The Way In

Chapter 13: The Way In

“Rollo, are you free right now? We could really use your help.”

“Flo? What’s going on?” I put the car back into auto drive to focus on the call.

“An idiot on my team got picked up a few days ago, and we finally located him. The problem is that he is being held in some corp facility, so we can’t just go in guns blazing this time.”

“I’d love to help Flo but I don’t think I can go against some corporation even you’re hesitant to antagonize...”

“Look, they aren’t some big untouchable corp. They are just some fucked up startup specializing in human experimentation that other corps outsource to. If we went guns blazing, they would activate their fail-safes that would dispose of all their ‘subjects’ for some bullshit confidentiality contract. Can you take a shot at sneaking in to disable it?”

“Fine... I’ll try, but no promises. You guys already have a plan?”

“Great, we’ll owe you one. Come on over to Haven and we’ll go over the details.”

They filled me in on the plan in one of the private rooms inside Haven. There were glass windows in the room that looked out to the rest of the bar, though we set the windows to be opaque.

By the time we finished, the sun was just setting.

We headed out right away, driving circles around a small but normal-looking office building with only a dozen floors and a loading area in the back.

I ensured I had everything I needed before getting out of the car.

“Test, test. Can you hear me alright?” A woman’s voice rang out in my head thanks to my SAID.

“Yeah, loud and clear.”

“Okay, you can respond by text once you’re in, but our connection will break up once you pass into the jammed area and you’ll be on your own. Once you get in, you should be able to disable it.”

“Yeah, yeah. We just went over it.”

“Just wanted to remind you that once you’re in, you’re on your own. You better do exactly as I instructed, because your shitty intern-level hacking skills ain’t going to do shit in their system.”

I sent a thumbs-up emoji through my SAID and observed the people going in and out of the building.

The girl was a hacker they brought on for the rescue called Lana. She was apparently the one who tracked down our target, her friend, Leo, who was the hacker for Flo’s team.

I waited until the loading area was clear and casually walked as close as I could without entering the camera’s view. Once I was in position, I aimed my Suri and shot right at the base of the camera.

*You should get a connection soon.*

“Okay, I’m in, but as we expected, their security systems are air-gapped from the cameras. I’m looping the camera feeds now. You should be good to go, ”Lana responded almost instantly to my text, with a symphony of clicking and clacking noises in her background. I couldn’t believe someone still used mechanical keyboards when she could do it through her SAID.

I walked up to the door and pried into the panel covering the jack for technicians. Once I plugged in, I didn’t have to do my usual hacking and could sit back while Lana did the job for me.

Before long, the door’s lock clicked open, and I made my way into the building. I headed for the staircase where the call connection I had with Lana started breaking up as I descended.

I went as far as I could until I reached a floor that required an ID card to access, so I made my way back up to the previous floor. I made my way through the mechanical rooms, searching for the one that was responsible for this building’s HVAC.

Before I could find Leo, the person we were rescuing, the console in front of me made a ding noise, informing me of the program’s completion. A familiar voice then spoke out to me within my head.

“Can you hear me, Rollo?”

“Yeah, loud and clear.”

“...I’ve got full control of their system now, but I can’t disable the fail-safes remotely. You’ve got to go to the head researcher’s room and do it from his terminal. I’ll send you the floor layout with real-time information on where everyone in the facility is.”

“Okay, got it, but you do see how many people are in there, right? Do we even have enough transportation to get them all out?”

“No, we’re only here for Leo. The rest of them are going to have to find their own way once they’re out.”

“Really? At least half of them are going to die or get caught again.” I took a deep breath and sighed.

“We aren’t charity workers. They can stay there if they want, but if they do, they’re guaranteed to be dead within a year or two. A slow and painful death too. We’re already giving them a chance to escape. Come on, focus on what we came here for.”

She was right, there was no profit to it even if I could save them all. I could only do so much.

I placed the real-time layout in a corner of my vision like a minimap. I then made my way to the head researcher’s room after I swapped into the guard’s uniform.

With the help of the minimap, it was practically like cheating. I effortlessly hid in the blind spots or avoided anyone in my way. It was really annoying how each set of stairs that led further down was located somewhere different on each floor, but I eventually managed to arrive at the door to the head researcher’s office.

I hate whoever designed this place, security be damned. It must suck, having to go through this maze every day to get to work.

I scanned my security card, but the scanner turned red, denying me access.

Seeing no one within earshot, I called out to my helper.

“Hey, I need help getting into the researcher’s room, plugging you in now.”

“Where’s the please?” She sighed, “Give me a second...and you’re in.”

Entering the room, I found the terminal at the head researcher’s desk. I repeated the same steps I went through in the security room, plugging in the chip, and then waited for the program to do its job.

“Okay, the program is done. Can you deactivate it now?”

“That terminal doesn’t respond to remote commands, so you will have to be the one to deactivate it.”

Following Lana’s instructions, I eventually found the command to disable the fail-safe. Even so, once the test subjects escaped, they would still need to visit a cybernetic clinic to remove the physical chip that was forcibly installed in their heads...

I then searched the files on the subjects within this facility and downloaded what they had into my SAID. The information included a file on Leo and where they kept him.

“Okay, I found him, and the fail-safes are off. It’s time for you guys to do the heavy lifting.”

“Gotcha, Flo’s team is coming in hot now. Go secure Leo before the chaos spreads down to you.”

Within ten seconds of her words, the entire place violently shook, almost throwing me off my feet.