Ghost in the City: Early Chapter 72 (Patreon)

I drove by the corporate owned building. Microtech had been one of the big NUSA corporations for decades. They were like the Microsoft of the Cyberpunk world.

They weren’t quite as powerful now as they had been in their heyday, but they were still going strong.

Jackie’s gig was simple on the outside. Wakako wanted the schedule for incoming shipments. She was probably just a go-between in this case, getting the info for someone who wanted it rather than something she would use herself.

But Microtech wouldn’t just leave the data laying around, and Jackie wasn’t exactly an infiltrator.

He hadn’t gotten the gig done yet, so he either didn’t have the skills to complete it, and was trying to hire someone to do it for him, or he was trying to come up with a plan to do it himself.

That was where I came in.

I was going to look around, get an idea of what defenses this place had, and hopefully be able to guide Jackie into getting the data.

I didn’t want to just do it for him. One that would be insulting, I was very aware that I was still a kid to most people I interacted with and Jackie wanted to be an edgerunner. You don’t jump into a profession like that without having an ego, and second…

Jackie needed to do this. If Wakako was ever going to trust him with future gigs, which would let him build a rep.

So I was just going to look around, figure out the weak points in the defenses, and pass along some intel. Maybe make him pay for it with a few eddies, just so everything was square.

Of course I was thinking that as I pulled into a small strip mall. A few food shops and things right across the street from the building.

But that was when I noticed none other than Jackie Welles himself sitting at a noodle bar, slurping down a bowl of ramen and staring at the building across the street.

Huh. I guess he was working on getting that intel afterall. I considered walking up to him, but I figured it would be best to let this one go.

Besides, I wasn’t wearing my normal gear this time.

I didn’t exactly want to mess with a full fledged Corporation in my usual.

So I was wearing a mix between the armored suits I had bought for my Chooms, and a set of Techgogs that I had picked up from V3L’s loot. It was an old school piece of netrunning gear, but it covered the top of my face and would give me a little additional ID protection if someone actually saw me.

I would already be covered from recording devices, but people could still see my face, and if they could ID me that way, it didn’t matter if the corp doesn’t have a recording.

I slipped out of the Quadra in a quiet corner of the parking lot. And made it across the street without any problem. The corporation's building was set up in a private lot, this wasn’t really an office or anything, it was a shipping hub. A warehouse with a small attached office for the corporation.

They had a much larger HQ in City Central.

The security here would be pretty good though. Warehouses were hot targets.

But that was just details to me.

I jumped the fence climbing onto some trash that was building up against the outside walls and I was in.

My eyes flashed as I scanned the area for security.

Cameras covered the corners of the building. Robotic guards wandered around, and human workers were moving around driving forklifts moving packages around.

I sent a quiet ping into the camera system, and as I expected, it slipped through the security without too much problems. This place wasn’t big enough for a netrunner to manually run the security. The grounds were quiet and covered in loose trash and refuse that the warehouse had collected over the years.

It was obvious this place wasn’t well taken care of.

But that just meant there were plenty of places for me to hide. I slipped into a stack of old pallets hiding within them while giving me a perfect sight of the camera on the corner of a building.

After I confirmed the lack of any direct attention in the network I started breaching. The Camera’s security didn’t last more than a few moments, and I was able to slip into the main network as well, as the cameras weren’t properly partitioned.

I started looking through all the cameras. Outside the robot guards followed a static path, seemingly uncaring about the large gaps in the security.

They were more for intimidation than security I realized. They would definitely keep out the most common street thugs.

Then I looked inside and the warehouse was certainly not empty.

Unfortunately for me I was only sneaking around and planning to get some data, because I noticed quite a few preem pieces in the warehouse I would love to take home with me. A few of those servers, or computer systems would be really nice to have.

Instead I focused on the security. Just like outside there were robot guards, along with a few workers hauling around the large shipments. I noted down numbers, and positions, literally filling a digital map with where everything was for Jackie to use.

It wasn’t even difficult, my Breaching skill had reached the point where stealthing into systems, even through a camera was doable with a bit of work.

I made a note of all the rooms I could see, and if I could figure out what was inside them.

I also noted the room that would have the shipment information. It was an office in the back of the warehouse that had a camera right outside it. Meaning it was one of the most secure locations in the entire warehouse.

Someone didn’t want someone getting in there.

I marked it on the map disappointed that there wasn’t a camera inside. Instead I altered my focus accessing the systems the camera was connected to, trying to see what I can find on the security systems.

Unfortunately the connection was protected, and unless I wanted to spend a lot of time out here, or make it obvious someone had hacked in, I would have to access the security directly.

With everything marked out, and the workers, and robot guards pinged, it was child's play to rise up out of the mess of pallets and move towards the warehouse.

With a bit of a fun trick I would just have the camera pan away from me as I approached a side door that the camera was supposed to be keeping an eye on. Letting me slip inside the door and close it just as the camera panned back around.

Making it seem completely natural despite it being entirely under my control.

With that I was inside, and movement through the warehouse was even easier. I stalked up the stairs through the empty break room and then down a catwalk towards the office. The camera there was controlled the same way. Panning away as I walked up under it, and then letting it pan to the way I had just come, giving me access to the office door.

It was locked, but that took only a few moments to work through and the door opened. I slipped inside and closed it behind me just as the camera panned back.

The office was what you would expect from a warehouse manager.

It was nicer than the rest of the building, and it was surprisingly well soundproofed, cutting down the noise of the warehouse. There was a small laptop set up and I slipped over, quickly slipping through the ICE with a few moments of work and I was in.

I found the data that Wakako wanted…

I made a copy, quietly slipping the data into a shard and putting it away. I wasn’t going to just hand it over to Jackie, but if something bad happened, it was insurance.

Then I moved away to the actual security server.

Unlike the laptop it was set up in the corner of the room, and didn’t have any monitors, or anything.

It was a Mircotech Security Server. Meant to be set up through a different system, Laptop, or direct access through neural cord, and then take care of the security concerns all by itself.

It was also shit if you wanted real security.

Corpo nonsense at its best.

I plugged in, quickly bypassed the password request that if failed would send out a ton of ICE, or even Black ICE to kill the hacker.

It took all of five minutes to breach the security and have full access to the Warehouses network. With a little smirk I even set up a backdoor. I rarely got to use the knowledge Wallbreaking gave me, but who knows I might need to access this system again in the future.

It was setting up the backdoor that made me realize something was off.

There was an intrusion in the system.

And it wasn’t me.

I wasn’t alone in the system.

I considered responding, but I wasn’t supposed to be here either after all, and I doubted the intruder expected to have a netrunner come in from the other direction. So I simply stepped back, let the system's autonomous security fail at its job and watched mostly from what the system wasn’t seeing, what the netrunner was doing.

They were accessing the security records. I watched the Servers memory usage go up a few blips as systems were accessed.

Could this be something Jackie set up? I know he doesn’t have the skill himself, but he had known T-Bug. Or maybe he just knew another Netrunner?

Either way. It wasn’t my problem…

As long as the runner didn’t sound an alarm.

After the runner got the security records, they looked around. Poking at connection points, and it took me a while to realize they were trying to see if they could access the foreman's computer.

Unfortunately that system wasn’t connected.

This had to be Jackie then… Right?

I was considering pulling out letting the runner finish their little dive when I saw it. A massive increase in server usage.

The runner noticed I was watching! If this was Jackie’s netrunner, they might bail on the server if they thought security was on to them! The amount of Black ICE an admin could drop on the head of a discovered runner wasn’t worth considering.

So I had to move fast.

I set up a few solid ICE walls that I knew would save me a few seconds in case they attacked, and then sent out a prompt through to the runner.

It was just a text log, although I did have to think of a good pseudonym in a rush.

Ghost: *Would appreciate, if you didn’t set off an alarm.*

The log was quiet, no response given, but I could practically feel the frantic activity of the runner. As they double checked their defenses. The server spiking as Programs and Daemons activated to protect the runner.

But I didn’t attack. Just waited.

Blank: *Who are you?*

Ghost: *Ghost.* I replied with a smirk the complete non answer would be doubly amusing.

Blank: *You are at the security server… What do you want?*

Ghost: *I want you to not set off any alarms. Noticed you wanted to access the Foreman's computer.* I took a moment to look over and take a picture of it, and added that into the chat.

I didn’t get a response for a while, but I was patient.

Blank *You offering?*

Ghost: *Maybe. I know you aren’t here against my own gig. But you could interfere, so let’s make a deal.*

Blank: *I’m amiable to a deal.*

Ghost: *I don’t like working with a Blank. That’s requirement one.*

Blank: *And I’m supposed to believe you are Ghost?*

Ghost: *That’s the name I picked.*

No response came for a bit before finally the message came through.

T-Bug: *What else.*

Oh I was right! If that was T-Bug it meant it was far more likely she really was working with Jackie.

Ghost: *Nice to meet you bug. If I’m right, just to confirm, You are working with Jackie Welles at the moment to retrieve the Microtech Shipment schedule for the next month.*

Once again it went quiet, She was still there, but I got the feeling she was probably thinking about ditching.

Ghost: *I am asking for confirmation. I often work with Wakako. I don’t want to ruin his gig.* I added, hopefully the last bit would make me sound less threatening.

T-Bug: *I was hired by Welles to get security access, and find him a path to the foremans office.*

Ghost: *Then stand by for access.* I added stepping over to the foreman's laptop and quickly having it access the Security server, considering I had already breached both systems it didn’t take more than a minute.

I walked back over to the server and plugged back in.

Ghost: *Once you have what you came for go ahead and get out quietly if you would. Please wish Jackie luck on his future work with Wakako. It will be nice to have another merc to tap for work.*

A few minutes later I noticed the T-Bug took her time accessing the laptop as if she was afraid it was a trap.

Once I was sure she was good I stood up and started making my way out of the warehouse.

I used the same trick on the cameras to simply move around the vision of the one outside the door, although just as I was about to walk completely away I noticed it.

T-Bug was snooping. I smirked as she took control of the camera and started quick panning it back at me.

But I already had the full layout of the warehouse. Despite being on the catwalk on the second floor I simply leapt over the edge. Disappearing far below the camera’s line of sight before it could have spotted me.

Then I was gone. Sneaking out through the side doors, avoiding the cameras without touching them this time, and climbing up the pallets I had hidden under before and leaping over the edge of the barbed wire fence.

I rolled as I hit the ground stepping back up and wiping the dust off, before casually walking down the street. That had almost been bad. I hadn’t expected T-Bug to be able to notice me snooping from the security server.

She was better than I had thought. Like really good. I would have to be more careful, but in the end I was satisfied.

Gig complete… Sorta. It just wasn’t me that was going to complete it.

I did check in on Jackie as I walked to the car noticing that he was leaving the noodle joint, I smiled as he seemed like he was in a suddenly super good mood as he raced away.

Considering…

I smirked and jumped into the Quadra heading home. I would change into my normal outfit, and wait around, because I had a feeling Wakako would be sending me a message soon.

—--

I was on point.

An hour later as I was lazing around on the couch, I got a text from Wakako.

*Jackie Welles completed the gig. He is coming in for a meeting now.*

I grinned that Wakako actually did follow through with our deal. I jumped off the couch, rushed out the door, still fighting my boots as I hopped into the elevator.

Ignoring the look of my neighbor who had stepped into the elevator just before me as I fought my boots on my feet, and then rushed out the elevator as soon as the doors opened on the ground floor.

I only slowed when I hit Jig-jig street, and sauntered happily into Wakako’s parlor.

The look she gave me told me she was in no mood for my nonsense and she pointed to a chair and I quickly sat in it.

“I’ve been given the report of what happened already. Mr. Welles hired a Netrunner he is acquainted with to get him into the building, only they didn’t need to, as another netrunner had already infiltrated the building.” Wakako started speaking suddenly and I kept my cool not letting myself show any sign of nervousness.

Wakako was a tiger after all. They could smell nervousness.

“So since you decided to get involved in the gig. Tell me why you think I should allow Mr. Welles into my employ. If he can’t complete a gig on his own?”

I winced.

“First. It’s rude that you immediately assume that someone with the coolest net handle of Ghost is me. Even if it was totally me.” I offered, pointing upward with a chrome finger. “Second. Jackie realizing he wasn’t going to be able to finish the gig on his own and getting help using his connections, is the exact kind of thing you want for a merc. If you just want someone who will rush in guns blazing almost guaranteeing they will end up dead on an important gig, then yeah. You don’t want Jackie.”

Wakako took a drag of her cigarette and nodded agreeing with my reasoning.

“Also I wasn’t originally going to help out, but Jackie hired a seriously good netrunner. T-Bug knew her stuff and noticed I was there. So I had to get involved.”

“Very well. I expected something like this when I gave you the information regardless. The gig is complete, and I have the information my client wanted.” She offered, tapping out the ash casually into the ashtray.

“I’d like to work with him on some gigs. Either right away, or later.” I mentioned, and this made Wakako react.

“I don’t think he will fit your style very well.”

“Not directly, but every infiltrator needs to be prepared for getting caught. Jackie’s a good solo, and I could use him on some of my gigs just as backup. It would be nice to know that if I screw up, I won’t be alone in the firefight for my life.”

“If you wish to bring him along on any gigs you take, that is up to you. As long as the gig is completed, I don’t care about your methods.” She said but didn’t say anything about me going along on Jackie’s gigs.

I let it go, and noticed that Wakako seemed more than ready to ignore me, instead watching the small TV set she kept in the corner of the room.

I turned around in the seat to look and ended up actually falling into the pit of weekday afternoon TV.