You wake to the soft murmur of the wallshade dissolving - light filters in, not golden, but cool, sterile blue. Simulated morning, configured for optimal cortisol response. The glass pane darkens slightly as your eyes adjust, offering a filtered view of the skyline. Even from here - thirty floors above street level - the pulsing lights of Sovereign City never really fade.
The apartment isn't large, but it isn't a box either. It breathes. Barely.
A single room, smart-partitioned. Efficient space design: smooth walls with embedded utility drawers, modular furniture that folds and adapts with whispered servos. The desk near the window still holds your mother's old glasswork - delicate sandblown sculptures sealed under dust-proof plating. One shaped like a crane. Another, a slow-turning sphere filled with micro-orchids she used to prune every Saturday night before she left for her second job.
You haven't touched them. Not in a year.
You stir, groggy, on the edge of sleep - until the stim injector finds your neck with all the tenderness of a tax audit. Pssht. A chemical slap to the brainstem later, and you're bolt upright, eyes wide, heart negotiating with gravity. Morning achieved. Consent questionable. A soft chime blinks from the medical console in the corner - your vitals are within range, but stress spikes have triggered a health suggestion: "Consider mindfulness. Would you like to play a 60-second breathing exercise?" It chirps.
You ignore it.
Your jacket hangs by the door, collar half-folded. You pick it up, flick the lapel once, and a faint violet shimmer activates just above the shoulder seam - a personal holochip, sputtering to life like a firefly inside a glass.
A second later, Saren's face appears above your collarbone - grainy, then stabilizing.
"You…look like a firmware update gone wrong."
You smirk, stretching as your spine realigns with a few reluctant pops. "Nice to see your morning cheer survived another overnight shift."
Behind him, construction cranes groan and lift; synthetic loaders hum through steel channels. He leans against a stack of ion couplings and wipes sweat from his temple with a sleeve. Same old yard. Loud, relentless, always one weld away from disaster.
"So? You gonna tell me what the hell happened last night?" Saren asks with a hint of envy in his voice.
"I met with Cutter."
Saren whistles. "The man himself. Did he offer you a free leash and a smile?"
"Gold Dyns, actually."
Saren's grin is immediately wiped from his face. "You're not thinking about saying yes?"
You shrug. "I'm thinking about not starving in ten years."
Saren shakes his head. "Whatever you do, just remember what your mom taught us. Nobody gives you a ladder unless they get to decide where it leads."
Before you can reply, the holo sputters - his face shivers and dims. Time's up. The unfortunate reality of buying tech with Grey Dyns. Perhaps not for much longer.
You run your hands down your face, jaw tight, and make your way over to the wash chamber for a two-minute rinse. The smartglass steams, music starts automatically, something soft, orchestral. She used to play this in the mornings, and it still loads from her profile. You haven't deleted it.
You stare at your reflection, water tracking down the faint scar at your temple. You've changed. The apartment hasn't. And somehow that's worse. You dry off, dress, zip up your jacket - collar snapping back into place with a small magnetic hum. A soft click follows as the door disengages, and after a time, you step out into your personal descent pod. You step in, the door seals - quick input for the street level into the PDP interface, and you're off. The familiar sounds of the acceleration dampeners and kinetic balancers to start your day, as you descend to the lobby. Gravity seems to take a break for a moment… you're not falling, but floating downward, deep inside the interwoven bowels of your apartment complex.
Thirty seconds later, the pod kisses the ground-level cradle with a soft magnetic sigh. The door folds away, revealing the lobby's familiar, welcoming embrace. The city meets you with a high-frequency buzz - not from sound, but from presence. Pedestrians stride across high-gloss platforms, corporate logos glowing on jackets, contact lenses, artificial limbs. Fashion here isn't an accessory. It's an identity contract. Even the street vendors are brand-licensed, peddling microdoses of engineered energy, nutrient pills, skin mods.
Holograms bloom above the mag-lines, advertising Tier Ascension Packages and emotional recalibration suites. One billboard reads:
"Upgrade Yourself. Become the Future."
You adjust your collar and start moving, the familiar rhythm of the city swallowing you whole. Corporate drones drift overhead like absent-minded gods, and somewhere in the distance, a rhythm of jackhammers plays counterpoint to the steady hum of urban decay.
Your collar pings - holochip activation inbound. Saren's face flickers into life, slightly grainy, lit by the jaundiced lighting of whatever ductwork-adjacent break room he's hunkered down in now. His eyebrows are already raised.
"Took you long enough. What, the city roll out a red carpet for you this morning?"
You smirk. "No, but I did get blessed by a vending machine that actually dispensed my coffee."
"Miraculous." Saren retorts. "Next thing you'll tell me is your stim injector didn't jab you in the jugular."
You hold up the faint red dot just above your collarbone.
"Oof. Sovereign tech strikes again. We really are living in the future."
You shift your footing as a corporate enforcer walks by, their shoulder-mounted scanner whirring with interest before moving on.
"How's our benevolent cyberpharaoh treating you? Thought you were gonna let Cutter's goons embed a corporate tracking implant while you slept."
"They tried," you deadpan. "I told them my blood type was proprietary."
Saren snorts. "Careful. Cutter probably has a patent on sarcasm too."
You roll your eyes. "He hasn't had me decapitated yet. So... better than the Yelp reviews implied."
"Wow. High praise. Have you decided to accept that Dyn upgrade, or are you still rocking that sad little Gray card like the rest of us peasants?"
You pause. Then flash a smirk.
"Wait. No. No, you didn't."
You can feel his disbelief mounting. "I did."
"You son of a -! You could buy an apartment window with that thing."
"Half a window."
"Still better than my current setup, which is an actual hole."
You both laugh, and for a moment it feels like none of this matters - Dyns, deals, debts. Just two idiots trading punches across a comm link.
Then Saren sobers slightly. "Hey. Seriously though. You haven't said yes, right?"
"Not yet."
"Good. Because once you do, you don't come back the same. I've seen it, man. The smile they give you when you sign is the last honest expression you'll ever get from them."
You nod, slowly. The laughter fades, replaced by a silence that feels a lot like loyalty... and warning.
"Anyway," Saren continues, "just don't go getting assassinated before we finish that synth-beer bet. You still owe me a drink."
You raise a brow. "I distinctly remember winning that bet."
"You remember wrong."
The line goes static for a moment. His image warps, then vanishes. Just like always.
Almost immediately, your collar springs back to life. "Holocall incoming – Maxim Cutter." You accept the call.
A familiar golden flare sparks to life midair.
Maxim Cutter appears - clean, poised, always slightly backlit like someone edited him for gravitas in real time. His chrome-lined eyes study you not like a person, but a prototype. The kind he hasn't decided whether to invest in or scrap.
"You've taken your time." He says.
"I've been thinking."
"Dangerous habit, that."
You exhale. "Gold Dyns. Debt forgiveness. Lifetime upgrades. All very... shiny."
"But?"
"But I've seen what happens to people who say yes too easily."
Maxim smiles thinly. "And yet you showed up. That tells me you're either smarter than most - or already halfway mine."
You cross your arms. "You talk like the world is your chessboard."
"Correction. It was my chessboard. Now it's my IPO."
He stands, turning slightly. Behind him, the skyline glows like a trophy case. "Do you know what most people do with a Gold Dyn, the moment it lands in their lap?"
"Frame it. Get robbed."
"Close. They waste it trying to feel like they're in control of their lives again. You, on the other hand... have the chance to actually be."
You stare at him. Long enough to make the silence uncomfortable.
"Let's say I bite. What's the catch?"
Maxim taps something just offscreen. A contract unfurls between you - golden threads of data shimmering like spider silk.
"No catch. You'll do a few tasks. Help stabilize some volatile interests. Maybe keep a few inconvenient truths from reaching the wrong ears."
You raise an eyebrow. "So espionage. Intimidation. Enforcement."
"Business."
You sigh. "And if I say no?"
"Then your debt remains. And we both pretend this conversation never happened."
His voice lowers. Not threatening, just final.
"The world won't wait. But I will - for a little while longer."
You stare at the contract.
At the number.
At the life that number represents.
Then, slowly... you nod.
"I'm in."
Maxim's image vanishes mid-transmission. Replaced almost instantly by a thinner man with a body like a suggestion: long fingers, gaunt face, hair sculpted into corporate perfection.
"Jeremiah Kode. Executive Asset Coordination. Welcome to the operational tier, Agent."
You barely have time to speak before he overlays a projection in front of your eyes - sleek, clean, spinning blueprints and logistics in real-time.
"Your first assignment is classified under Asset Contingency Recovery Protocol 51."
He says it like it means something to you.
"One of our biotech couriers - Theta-Six - was intercepted en route to the R&D vertical at Grid 305. Hostile actors presumed to be freelancers with known Purist sympathies."
"What's the payload?"
"Prototype neuro-lattice regenerators. If stolen, they could be reverse-engineered into open-market limb autonomy solutions. Unsanctioned competition."
You realize he's not talking about medicine. He's talking about monopoly.
He continues. "Intercept the hostiles. Secure the package. Neutralize if necessary. Collateral damage... is frowned upon. But not prohibited."
You nod once, pulse picking up. "Anything else?"
"Survive. Gold Dyns don't collect interest if their owners die."
The holo closes.
And you're alone again.
But not really.
Because from this moment forward, you belong to the system.
Following the coordinates you were given, the location is an abandoned freight platform, rusted over and half-reclaimed by graffiti and shadow. Drones flicker above, scanning autonomously but sluggish, as if they've been hacked into idleness.
You hear it before you see it.
Two figures locked in brutal motion. One in Sovereign red-black tactical gear - lean, enhanced with carbon-weave musculature and glowing oculars. The other-whom you assume to be the freelance shock trooper, is broader - wearing reinforced mesh armor marked with white hexes. No visible augments, but every move hits like hydraulics.
Blades extend from the Sovereign's forearms - shimmering vibra-steel edges that sing with each slash.
The shock trooper's shield ripples with electromagnetic light, absorbing a strike - then retaliating with a kinetic pike that hums on impact.
You duck behind a crate, pulse hammering, breath caught in your throat.
The fight is a dance of death.
The Sovereign lunges, flips mid-air, blades carving arcs of plasma-tinged fury. The Purist rolls, slamming a boot into the ground - detonating a shockwave pulse from his heel mod. Sevceral laser bolts flash - deflected by an energy shield, but the feedback fries part of the shock troopers bracer. Sparks fly as their weapons clash. Blood, not oil, hits the floor. The shock trooper appears to human, perhaps unaugmented, but still bleeding.
The Sovereign kicks off a wall, diving in with a scream distorted by voice mods, blade angled for the kill.
A misstep.
The trooper pivots, slamming the pike through the Sovereign's midsection. A gargled hiss escapes the attacker's modded throat. They twitch, drop their blades, fall.
Dead.
But before you can even exhale, the agent looks up. Sees you.
You freeze.
Then - a flash. A holo-smoke grenade detonates, warping the light in a burst of refracted color. You cough, stumble forward -
and when it clears, he's gone.
Silence settles.
Only the corpse remains, metal still humming with residual charge. You step forward, heart racing, breath ragged, and realize: this is what war looks like. Not broadcasts. Not billboards. This. The result of clashing ideologies brewing war.
Sovereign against Purist. Flesh and chrome colliding in a city that doesn't blink.
Your chip blinks.
Another message.
Cutter, again.
"You're still alive. Impressive. Consider that your orientation."
You don't reply.
You're too busy looking at the blood on your hands.