In Hard Times, Family Is All You Can Trust 3
They didn't even bother pretending anymore. They just came right out and said it.
"So, where'd you hide the shares? Inside your robot girlfriend's belly too? Come on, tell us."
"ACS is not fully destroyed yet, Master William. But if you don't cooperate nicely... we might have to get a little rough with the analysis?"
I could even hear Dan chiming in: "That's our specialty!"
I suddenly wondered how pathetic I'd looked, all excited to see him.
Betrayal. It boiled up inside me like my guts were twisting, and violent impulses made me grit my teeth. My fists trembled on my thighs.
The emotion control program warned of rising stress levels and recommended a stabilizer injection, but I refused. Rage was the best catalyst for action, and right now, helplessness was the furthest thing from my mind.
Thinking that way calmed me a bit.
"Fine. Harold, I've got two things to tell you."
"Hm? What is it?"
I tilted my head back to look at them both. Multi-scan and targeting correction kicked in simultaneously, analyzing the physical weak points of these people I'd once thought were my allies.
Harold was just your standard middle-aged build with computational augmentations and medical implants. Catherine, being an office type, didn't have standout armor either.
A quick glance at the floor told me Dan was nothing to worry about.
Whoosh—thwack!
"Gahk!"
I sprang up and uppercut Harold's jaw. His hefty, unguarded body floated in the air for a moment before crashing down and rolling across the living room floor. He rolled right into where Bell had fallen and—bad luck—got zapped. He flopped around like a fresh catfish before passing out.
"Pointless resistance...!"
Catherine yanked a pistol from her holster. She'd probably load armor-piercing rounds for modded opponents like me—not easy. But she was too close.
Thud—!
Before her gun could line up on me, I dove into her arms. No need for neural acceleration. The flustered intel officer tried to shove me off, but a full-body cyborg like me didn't budge.
I hooked her over my shoulder and charged straight into the wall.
Bam!
Just as planned. Sandwiched between me and the wall, the intel officer gaped and gurgled. One more punch to the face to fully neutralize her. She crumpled to the floor, foaming at the mouth from her half-smashed jaw as she blacked out.
"Hoo... I said I had something to tell you, right?"
I turned to look behind me. Dan, stunned by the sudden chaos, finally aimed his gun at me.
"First off, even if I've lived far from fights, I'm a cyborg with over 90% artificial body. You shouldn't have assumed zero combat ability."
"Shut up!"
Dan rudely cut me off. Too bad—he needed to hear the next part. He seemed to be aiming an EMP round at me, like the one he'd used on Bell, but I stayed calm and watched him squeeze the trigger.
Flick—
I toggled off targeting correction and blinked. No electromagnetic pulse fried my circuits and shut me down.
Because a projectile from somewhere had pierced Dan's lower jaw straight through to the back of his neck, turning his head into a mosaic mess.
With half his head gone, Dan slammed into the wall behind him and thudded to the floor.
Meanwhile, my loyal bodyguard, who'd been down, popped right back up and reattached her smoking forearm.
I addressed the now-unhearing trio one last time.
"Second, Bell can't be taken down with one EMP. She's guarding someone important—of course she has countermeasures."
The detailed catalog was classified, but even intel not knowing was surprising. Well, Bell's smoke-and-mirrors act wasn't in the catalog anyway.
Proving my point, she peeled the EMP device off her head with one hand, crushed it with raw strength, and dropped it to the floor.
Then she turned, gave me a thumbs-up with just the corner of her mouth quirked under her expressionless eyes.
I smiled back and returned the gesture.
At that moment, Anastasis Group's trackers were lying in wait around the villa where target W—William—was holed up.
Recon drones swarmed the sky like a flock of birds, monitoring the entire Acton Town operational zone. Large tactical vehicles equipped with radar, electronic warfare gear, or autocannons idled on the outskirts.
"All units, stand ready to respond immediately if you spot the target. No complacency as briefed—capture alive if possible."
""""Yes, sir!""""
Civilians had mostly been evacuated, leaving the streets eerily silent. Meanwhile, the comms channel buzzed with identical synthetic voices relaying orders.
They had ocular implants or goggles for visibility through the smog, plus beetle-shaped surveillance bots scattered in alleys. No shortage of eyes.
And their hands were no slouch either. Accounting for William and Bell's defenses, nearly everyone carried special rounds for cyborgs, and vehicle-mounted EMP emitters were primed.
Solid prep. But they were jittery too. The obsession with "no failure this time" infected the whole channel, gnawing at their composure.
"Yep! Don't worry, Chief! We'll complete this mission for the honor of Strategic Intelligence Bureau...!"
On the village outskirts, inside an armored vehicle, the commander affirmed this to someone in the dark over a call. It sounded resolute, almost dramatic, but he voiced one doubt.
"But Chief, why can't we destroy B too? Target W's a noble, sure, but once we nab him, the shares are just trash anyway."
"The... Heart? An artificial organ implant? Why treat it like it equals Elson's controlling shares?"
With that, the intel chief cut the line abruptly. Tension didn't leave the commander's body, not even a sigh escaped.
The top boss, holed up in Stockholm, personally interested? Curiosity and greater fear welled up, making him shiver slightly.
Failure meant his career ended here. Success? A golden path ahead.
"...Huh? What the—?"
As he refocused, he spotted anomalies on the vehicle's biosignal detector screen. Green dots for friendlies were blinking out or vanishing—agents dead or hacked.
No reports or signs reached him, the one in control. Weird.
"What the hell? Something wrong on site? Team leaders, status report!"
Comms were dead. Only static garble now and then.
"External interference? No way—this city's crawling with our forces. Who'd dare?"
But his doubts vanished fast. An explosion swallowed him whole.
Boom—!
Armored vehicles stamped with the Strategic Intelligence Bureau—S.I.A.—logo erupted in flames and smoke.
Unidentified snipers watched from afar, picking off survivors fleeing the infernos one by one.
This played out across Anastasis's operational zones. Net-masked armed troops with glowing red eyes appeared behind agents fixated on the villa, unleashing merciless fire.
Among these shadow assailants, one stood out. Clad in a tight bodysuit under a jumper, a long black ponytail whipped behind a demon-masked display helmet.
In the darkness, her purple-glowing greatsword flowed like a single wave. Each swing left screams and mangled corpses.
Unlike the netted soldiers fixated on objectives, her movements had a different purpose. The violet ripple cut through smog-choked streets like wildfire, heading straight for the villa housing Elson's heir.