The Last Betrayal
The old man’s laughter echoed through the room. “If you’re going to betray someone, you’d better be ready to get betrayed yourself, you idiot. Corporate suits never imagine it could happen to them.” Just by the sound of it, you’d think he was a kindly grandfather. But with a headless corpse sprawled across the floor, that image was about a million light-years off.
The birdbrain who’d put a bullet in the insider hadn’t spoken a word. She stood there like a machine, motionless, simply watching the old gentleman with that gas mask hiding whatever expression she wore.
After laughing for a long while, the old man prodded my body with his cane. “So you’re a Hound, eh? How does it feel to swallow the bait so perfectly? Novel enough for you?”
“Bait?”
“That’s right. Bait. I figured leaking just a little information about the Fangs would reel in at least one Hound.”
The old man lifted my chin with the tip of his cane. “Looks like my prediction was dead on.”
“Haha…”
“Well? Any thoughts about working for us? We’ve prepared every kind of Fang you could want, just for you.”
So that was the endgame. Recruiting a Hound who actually knew how to handle Fangs would boost their fighting strength in a single leap. He’d staged this whole ridiculous farce because he wanted to put a Hound to work for his own crew.
But it’s sloppy.
I read the old man’s intentions. Suggesting partnership to a Hound he’d never met before, without any guarantee against betrayal? I don’t quietly submit to anyone. I’m a living, thinking human being.
“Why would I?” I asked, testing the waters.
Click.
In that instant the tip of the cane split into eight segments, revealing the holes inside. The rifling made it clear—this was a gun barrel disguised as a walking stick. The old man shoved the cane-gun right in front of my eyes.
“Since when did you have a choice? We’re the ones holding your life in our hands right now.”
Apparently there had never been a right to refuse.
I let out a low groan. “So you want me to be your dog from now on.”
“Hehe, a dog? Come now. There are more positive words we could use. How about ‘partner’?”
“Partner, my ass…”
I turned my body in silence and planted my hand on the floor. I heard the old man’s gun muzzle tracking my head. As I listened to that sound, one thought rose clearly.
If it had been the old me, I might have accepted.
I’d lived swallowing mud and gunpowder on the battlefield like it was daily bread. Taking orders from above was natural. Obeying them was my duty. I was used to someone standing over me, holding my leash, moving me however they pleased.
But now the story was different.
Only an idiot steps on the same landmine twice.
I already carried the memory of being betrayed once. How stupid would it be to hand my fate to someone else’s hands again? At least now, I had no desire to submit to anyone.
I glanced sideways at Birdbrain. Her face was hidden behind the gas mask; I couldn’t read her properly.
This way I can’t tell whether she’s using her implant or not.
If her eyes had glowed, that would have been clear proof the implant was active. But with no information to work with…
In the end, it’s a gamble.
Normally I would have taken the safest route. Right now there was no safe route. When a gamble became unavoidable, the best move was to push forward without hesitation.
I activated a section of my brain. Burning pain tore through my entire body as the world before my eyes transformed.
…Got it!
Luckily there was no implant conflict. Looked like Birdbrain hadn’t activated hers yet.
Her movements seem dull.
I was moving in plain sight and she wasn’t even bothering to raise her guard. The gun muzzle, if you looked closely, was pointed in a completely useless direction. Classic posture of someone who had already lost their will to fight.
Well, not my problem.
One less person I had to worry about was good for me.
I quickly scanned the area without them noticing. On the floor below I saw Darius and his crew, bound and captured. Their numbers had shrunk, but roughly ten were still alive. Not total annihilation. A small mercy.
I sent a transmission to the biggest one among them.
Darius went silent. I kept transmitting while watching the old man and Birdbrain.
I could picture Darius panicking on the other end. I didn’t care. Without hesitation I put the plan into motion.
[ONE.]
I kicked off the floor and shot forward. The old man fired a beat too late; only one round grazed my shoulder. Birdbrain’s only concern was her own survival.
Good!
Things had just become much simpler. I dove for the pile of Fang bundles beside the old man, kicking backward the moment I hit the ground. The old man’s chair toppled forward. I snatched a box, then threw myself behind the fallen chair. Two bullets meant for me thudded into the wood instead.
[TWO.]
“You son of a bitch!”
The old man, sprawled forward in his overturned chair, kicked it away in a rage. The chair twisted, leaving him completely exposed to his own cane-gun. But I had already achieved my goal—buying a single moment. In that brief window I ripped open the box and checked the Fang inside.
Bingo.
It was the one I wanted. NTM 106. It looked like a small orb now, but once attached to the arm adapter it would deploy to over eight meters in diameter. Its true form was an omnidirectional bombardment device studded with miniature missile pods. One activation unleashed a non-targeted saturation system covering every direction. The drawback was that, being explosive, it was never meant for indoor use. Friend-or-foe identification was nearly impossible.
But for me it was perfect. Explosions had always been the best answer.
By the time a bullet punched into my collarbone, the Fang had already deployed and wrapped both my arms.
Thunk.
The exoskeleton form halted as it met the indoor structure, but every weapon-bearing section was already fully extended. That was enough.
[THREE.]
I fired.
A faint electrical signal traveled from my central nervous system to the adapter. Inside the several-meter mass of metal encasing my arms and back, dozens of miniature missiles launched at once. In open space they would have curved toward their targets, but the room offered no such luxury.
Boom!
Less than a second after they flew out trailing smoke and flame, the missiles slammed into walls and ceiling, detonating in a glorious chain of explosions. The Fang sensed the shock and expanded its protective shell around my entire body. The armor was improvised and auxiliary at best; I couldn’t expect much durability, but it would keep me alive.
The protective shell creaked and crumpled under the external impacts. I couldn’t tell what was happening anymore. Violent blasts and flames hammered in from every side. My body slammed against unseen obstacles with heavy thuds. I felt shards of the breaking armor drive into my flesh. The explosions were shattering the shell faster than its safety releases could activate.
Thud. Crash.
How long did the punishment last? When the impacts finally stopped, my senses were so scrambled I lay there dazed, not even realizing the chaos had ended.
It took a long time for feeling to return. Only then did I cough up a thick mouthful of blood and open my eyes inside the smoke.
“Ugh…”
I tried to stand, but my body refused to obey. I looked down at myself.
“Wow…”
It was far from pretty. Shrapnel was buried everywhere; even slight movement tore wounds open and sent fresh blood pouring out.
“This… is gonna kill me…”
My ears still rang with a high-pitched whine. With a ruined sense of balance I crawled to the nearest piece of debris and leaned my back against it. Then I released the Fang. The massive armor that had been several times my size shrank back into a small orb.
I stared at it blankly.
The neural terminals are completely fried.
Recovery would take a while. Good thing I’d used it as a one-off. If I’d kept it equipped any longer, it really would have been fatal.
I shut down every implant I had running in my head. I had no intention of burning my nerves any further.
After some time, sirens began to wail nearby, accompanied by the chaotic sound of many footsteps. The smoke hadn’t cleared completely, so I wasn’t worried about being spotted yet, but staying here would only cause problems.
Where was Darius? He couldn’t be dead. I’d warned him ahead of time.
I forced my cooling body to move. It didn’t listen. Blood pooled beneath me.
Did he betray me?
I had watched the old man betray his own man right in front of me. I had even heard the warning to watch my back. Had the same fate found me?
Fortunately, it was only paranoia. Soon Darius appeared, leading seven of his men.
“You’re not dead.”
“…No.”
“And you got the item. Good.”
He helped me up and we slipped away from the scene. Sirens screamed in every direction. We avoided the flashing lights, moving silently through the shadows.
The next day’s paper carried only a single dry line about a massive explosion in the city center.
And five months passed.
After recruiting me, Darius’s methods changed. Before, he ran small-time drug scams and grabbed the occasional big score to survive. After bringing me on, he gained confidence in his strength and began actively hunting other organizations.
Jobs became less frequent but far more dangerous and on a much larger scale. We faced death many times. Yet we succeeded every single time. Darius’s gang grew from street thugs into a force that could legitimately claim control over an entire district.
Our relationship had reached a level of familiarity, but he was never my comrade. No matter how much time we spent together, I formed no attachment.
That was how things stood until a week ago.
“A man without convictions doesn’t last long in this world.”
A week ago, Darius and his entire crew were annihilated.