## Chapter 1 — Rogue’s Booth Afterlife did not get quieter when Rogue was angry. That was one of the first things Ace had learned about the place. Anger was cheap in Night City. It leaked out of people every hour of every day, splashing across streets, booths, bar counters, shard exchanges, and bloodstained stairwells until nobody bothered naming it anymore. People shouted because they were afraid. They threw bottles because they were broke. They pulled guns because they had nothing else that made them feel large. Rogue Amendiares did none of that. When Rogue was angry, Afterlife kept breathing exactly the same. Music moved under the floor in a low, predatory pulse. Mercs laughed too loudly at tables where half the drinks had gone untouched. Fixer reps made promises they could not afford. Someone near the bar was trying to look dangerous while wearing a jacket that cost more than their last three jobs combined. Claire moved behind the counter with her usual practical rhythm, pouring drinks, reading faces, deciding who needed alcohol and who needed water. Everything normal. Which meant nothing was normal. Ace felt it before they reached the booth. Not as an anomaly. Not as one of those crawling, wrong pressures that made the back of reality buckle and whisper. Nothing like that. This was human. Social. Territorial. The kind of tension Night City made in its sleep. Her Shadow Aura sat close to her skin, quiet but not absent, folding itself into the angles of her small frame like a predator pretending to be furniture. Light behaved slightly badly around her shoulders. Reflections in polished metal arrived half a second late and then corrected themselves, embarrassed. Nobody nearby looked directly at it for long. Mai noticed, of course. Mai always noticed. She walked half a step behind Ace and to the left, silver hair catching the barlight in clean, controlled lines. No cover identity tonight. No red dye. No accent. No contact lenses. No forced smile manufactured for idiots who thought beauty made a woman less dangerous. She was simply Mai: centered, precise, eyes already collecting geometry from the room. Shammy drifted beside them with the tall, unhurried grace of weather deciding whether a city deserved rain. At one hundred ninety-five centimeters she did not need to try to be visible. She simply was. Her silver-white hair moved faintly with air currents that did not exist. Static whispered once against the metal trim of the booth wall as she glanced across the floor, curious rather than alarmed. Ace muttered, “Nobody’s shooting.” “Yet,” Mai said. Shammy tilted her head. “That is usually your category.” Ace gave her a sideways look. Shammy’s mouth curved just enough to become a problem. Mai did not smile. Her eyes did, faintly. Rogue’s booth waited at the far side of the room like a courtroom that sold better liquor. Rogue was seated with one arm along the backrest, grey hair falling in controlled waves around a face that had watched Night City devour generations of ambitious men and still found most of them badly prepared. She had a drink in front of her. She had not touched it much. That was the second warning sign. The third was that she did not look up immediately. She let them arrive. Let them stand. Let the silence settle. Then she said, “Sit.” Ace slid in first without asking where. Mai followed. Shammy took the outer edge, long legs arranging themselves with surprising economy, though she still looked like the booth had been designed by people who had never considered storm systems might need seating. Rogue finally lifted her eyes. “Got a problem.” Ace leaned back. “That’s a broad category.” “It’s Night City,” Rogue said. “Everything’s a problem. This one started thinking.” Mai’s expression sharpened. Rogue pushed a shard across the table with two fingers. Mai picked it up. Ace watched Rogue instead. She looked calm. That was the ugly part. Rogue calm had weight. Rogue calm meant the conclusion had already happened somewhere behind her eyes, and everyone else had merely been invited to arrive at it. Mai slotted the shard into her agent and let the display bloom low between her hands. The light touched her face in pale blue planes. “Mason Creed,” she said. “Mid-level fixer,” Rogue said. “Westbrook roots, Watson ambitions, Santo Domingo contacts when he can afford them. Started as a broker for dirty courier work, small crew extractions, cleanup jobs nobody wanted tagged to a real name.” Ace looked at the floating profile. Man in his late thirties or early forties. Clean jawline trying too hard. Good coat. Expensive enough to signal ambition, not expensive enough to signal taste. Eyes tired in a way the posed image failed to hide. “He looks like a man who owns three motivational posters,” Ace said. Shammy leaned slightly closer. “What is a motivational poster?” “A threat printed badly,” Mai said without looking up. Ace nodded. “Usually has a mountain.” Shammy absorbed this with genuine seriousness, then looked at Mason Creed again. “He does look like he would own a mountain threat.” Rogue’s mouth moved almost invisibly. Not a smile. Almost worse. “Creed has spent the last seven months being cute,” Rogue said. “At first, I let him.” Ace’s eyes returned to her. “Cute how?” “Taking leftovers. Jobs I turned down. Clients I didn’t want. Crews too messy for my tables. That’s normal. Everybody eats. Then he started approaching people directly.” “Your people?” Mai asked. “People who know better.” The temperature in the booth seemed to drop by a degree. Shammy’s hair lifted once near her shoulder. Static clicked softly against the table edge. Rogue continued, voice even. “He’s been offering better cuts, faster payouts, priority placement. Telling younger mercs Afterlife is old gravity. Saying the city’s changing. Saying new blood needs new channels.” Ace stared at Creed’s image. “He said that out loud?” “Several times.” “Embarrassing.” “Very.” Mai scrolled through the file. “This has been escalating?” “Last month he intercepted a Biotechnica retrieval job meant for one of my crews. Week after that, a data courier vanished between Kabuki and Charter Hill. Turned up alive, minus the shard and plus a very stupid explanation. Three days ago, two of my regular contractors were approached in public by Creed’s people.” Ace’s fingers rested against the table. Not tense. Ready. “Approached how?” “Politely,” Rogue said. Mai’s gaze lifted. Rogue took her drink at last, though barely more than wetting her mouth. “That’s the issue.” Ace understood. Night City had rules. Most people pretended it did not because pretending made them feel free, but the city was built out of rules stacked under violence. You could steal. You could lie. You could betray. You could even survive doing all three if you understood the shape of the room. But walking up to Rogue’s people in public and making polite offers was not business. It was a declaration. Not loud enough to answer with bullets. Too loud to ignore. “Who’s backing him?” Mai asked. Rogue looked at her. “That’s one question.” “And the other?” “Why he’s still alive.” Ace looked back at the profile. Mason Creed smiled out of the captured image with all the confidence of a man who had practiced confidence in a mirror and forgotten mirrors also showed fear. “People tried?” Ace asked. “Three attempts I know about. Maybe more.” Rogue tapped ash from a cigarette she had not lit. The gesture seemed old enough to outlive the need. “One car bomb failed because he switched vehicles six minutes before departure. One sniper missed because Creed changed meeting floors at the last second. One net hit fried a decoy address that had been active for less than an hour.” Mai’s fingers moved. “That is not luck.” “No,” Rogue said. “Skill?” “Not his.” That settled between them. The music kept breathing. Somewhere behind them, a merc barked a laugh and someone else answered with the flat, empty sound of a person agreeing because refusal might become expensive. Ace studied Rogue’s face. “You want him dead?” Rogue looked faintly offended. “If I wanted him dead,” she said, “we’d be having a shorter conversation.” “Good.” Rogue’s gaze narrowed by a millimeter. “Good?” Ace shrugged. “I don’t like cleaning up other people’s stupid wars.” “That makes two of us.” Mai turned the display slightly so Ace could see the movement map. “Creed’s route behavior is abnormal. He doesn’t maintain a base long enough to establish secure territory, but he’s making territorial claims. That is contradictory.” Shammy looked at the map as if reading weather. “He is moving too much for someone trying to become a center,” she said. Mai paused. Ace turned her head. Rogue watched Shammy now. Shammy did not seem to notice the attention at first. Her eyes traced the route fragments: Watson, Japantown, Charter Hill, a brief Santo Domingo contact, back to Northside, then a scatter of brief appearances that looked less like expansion and more like a man trying not to sleep in the same place twice. “He keeps circling places,” Shammy said. “Not claiming them. Checking them.” Mai’s expression shifted into that focused stillness that meant a conclusion had found a door. “He expects something to happen.” “Or someone,” Ace said. Rogue leaned back. There it was. Not satisfaction. Not surprise. A tiny acknowledgment that the Triad had reached the first useful layer. “He’s a climber,” Rogue said. “But climbers plant flags. Creed’s running around like a man trying to outrun his own shadow while telling everybody he owns the sun.” Ace grimaced. “That metaphor hurt.” “Good. Remember it.” Mai continued scrolling. “What exactly do you want us to do?” Rogue did not answer immediately. Claire passed nearby, glanced once toward the booth, and kept moving. Smart. Claire read rooms better than half the fixers in Night City and poured accordingly. Rogue set her glass down. “I want Mason Creed brought here.” Ace waited. “Alive.” Mai waited. “Quietly.” Shammy watched the surface of Rogue’s drink. “No open gunfight,” Rogue said. “No bodies in the street with my name written on them. No crews deciding this is the week they pick sides. No public humiliation video. No dramatic rooftop bullshit. No message carved into anyone’s forehead.” Ace looked mildly disappointed at the last one. Mai said, “She added that because of you.” “I know.” Shammy leaned toward Ace. “Have you carved messages into foreheads?” “No.” Pause. “Not words.” Mai closed her eyes very briefly. Rogue ignored them, though the corner of her mouth betrayed that she had heard every syllable. “If Creed vanishes visibly, his people panic. If he dies visibly, his backers get what they want. If I drag him here with a convoy, half the city smells weakness or war depending on how stupid they are.” “So he needs to disappear,” Mai said, “without appearing taken.” “Exactly.” Ace looked at Creed’s profile again. “And then?” “Then he and I have a conversation.” “What kind?” Rogue’s eyes settled on her. “The educational kind.” Shammy’s gaze moved from Rogue to Creed’s image and back. “Does he know you want to teach him?” “No.” “Will he enjoy learning?” “No.” “That seems inefficient.” Ace snorted. Mai’s face softened despite herself. “Some lessons work better that way.” Shammy considered this. “Night City has strange schools.” “Worst graduation rate on earth,” Ace said. Rogue let the banter run exactly three seconds before cutting through it. “There’s one more thing.” Mai’s attention sharpened again. Rogue tapped the table. The display shifted. Another name appeared. Not a profile. Not yet. Just fragments. Old job references. Shell companies. Dead contact chains. Three fixer aliases from twenty years ago, two burned, one possibly still active. No photo. No clean record. No boasts. No branding. Ace liked Mason Creed even less now, because suddenly he looked smaller. Mai read silently. Then she said, “Silas Vane.” Rogue’s face did not change. “That name still works,” she said. “Sometimes.” Ace looked from Mai to Rogue. “Old friend?” “No.” “Old enemy?” “Worse.” Rogue took her glass again. “Professional acquaintance.” Shammy blinked. “That sounds more dangerous than enemy.” “It is,” Mai said. Rogue’s voice remained level. “Vane was fixing before half this city learned how to spell ambition. Quiet operator. Never wanted a throne. Never needed one. He made money cleaning up after people who did.” “And he’s behind Creed?” Ace asked. “I didn’t say that.” “You implied it.” “I implied I don’t like coincidences.” Mai kept scanning. “Creed’s shell debt traces could route through Vane’s old infrastructure.” “Could,” Rogue said. “Do they?” “That’s why you’re here.” Ace leaned forward slightly. Around her, the light misbehaved just enough that Mason Creed’s image flickered over her fingers and briefly made them look clawed. Rogue noticed. Of course she did. Ace said, “You want Creed alive because he might be bait.” “I want Creed alive because dead men don’t explain who handed them a shovel.” “And if Vane is using him to start a war?” Rogue’s eyes turned colder than the drink in front of her. “Then I remind him why professionals don’t waste my time.” That was the fourth warning sign. Rogue did not say territory. Did not say money. Did not say respect. Time. That was the insult. Mason Creed had not threatened Rogue’s empire. Not really. He had interrupted her schedule with sloppy ambition and forced her to acknowledge a man she clearly considered unfinished. In some ways, Ace thought, Creed would have been safer if Rogue hated him. Mai removed the shard and passed it back across the table. “Operational boundaries?” “You get access to the records I’m giving you. You talk to who you need to talk to. You don’t burn my contacts unless they deserve it. You don’t start a district incident. You don’t let Creed’s crew know I sent you until after it no longer matters.” Ace raised one finger. “Define district incident.” “No burning buildings.” “Fine.” “No exploding intersections.” Ace lowered her finger. Mai looked at her. Ace said, “What?” Rogue stared. Ace sighed. “Fine.” Shammy raised her hand slightly. Rogue looked at her. “No weather?” Shammy asked. Rogue hesitated for half a second. Ace stared at the table. Mai’s mouth tightened. Rogue said, “No weather unless necessary.” Shammy nodded, pleased by the clarity. Ace muttered, “She gets conditional weather.” “You get conditional intersections,” Mai said. “I do not.” “You absolutely do not.” Rogue finished the drink. The booth went quiet again. Then she slid a second shard across the table. “Creed is meeting someone tomorrow night.” Mai picked it up. “Where?” “Old service lounge under Goldsmith Street. Private space. Bad exits. Too obvious for a real negotiation, which means either he’s desperate or stupid.” “Or both,” Ace said. “Usually both,” Rogue said. “But not always.” Mai studied the data. “Who is he meeting?” “That’s the part I don’t like.” Ace’s eyes narrowed. “You don’t know?” “I know who the invitation claims to be from.” “And?” Rogue looked toward the floor of Afterlife, where mercs drank under the dead legends of people who had thought violence made them permanent. “Me.” The silence after that had teeth. Mai’s hand stopped moving. Shammy’s atmosphere stilled so completely that the booth seemed cut away from the rest of the club. No static now. No curiosity. Just that deep, impossible quiet that happened when she stopped letting the air lie to itself. Ace felt her Shadow Aura stir. Not flaring. Not yet. But waking. “Someone invited Creed to a meeting using your name,” Mai said. Rogue nodded. “And Creed accepted?” “Yes.” Ace’s voice went flat. “He’s either desperate or dead.” “That,” Rogue said, “is why you’re going.” Mai looked at the data again, already rebuilding the shape of the job. “You want us to observe first.” “I want you to understand the room before you touch it.” Ace exhaled through her nose. That was not a no. But it was close. Rogue noticed. “Problem?” “If someone is using your name to pull him into a bad room, waiting might get him killed.” “If you rush in and it’s staged, everyone sees me protecting him. That gives the wrong people the wrong story.” “So we let him walk into the knife?” Rogue’s eyes met hers. “No,” she said. “You keep him alive without letting the city understand why.” Mai’s voice was calm. “That is a narrow corridor.” “That’s why I’m not sending idiots.” Ace looked at Shammy. Shammy was still watching Rogue’s drink. “What?” Ace asked. Shammy blinked once, as if returning from a distance. “He thinks the meeting is real,” she said. Mai turned. “Creed?” “Yes.” “How do you know?” Shammy pointed gently toward the shard in Mai’s hand. “His route changes before dangerous meetings are different. They become sharper. Smaller. Like someone stepping around broken glass. But this one…” She frowned. “He loops twice. Then stops moving for four hours.” Mai checked. Her eyes sharpened. Ace leaned closer. “And that means?” “He was afraid before,” Shammy said. “Then something made him hope.” That was worse. Hope got people killed in Night City faster than stupidity, because stupidity at least sometimes came armed. Rogue looked at Shammy for a long moment. Then she said, very quietly, “That tracks.” Ace sat back. The job had changed shape already. Not bigger. Not louder. More precise. Mason Creed was not just a climber anymore. Not just prey. Not even just bait. He was a man walking into a room because someone had convinced him the queen he had insulted might be willing to talk. And if he died there, everyone would believe Rogue had done it. Clean. Elegant. Cheap. Ace hated it immediately. Mai’s thumb rested against the shard. “We start with the meeting site.” “You start tonight,” Rogue said. “Creed’s people are already moving. If Vane’s hand is in this, he’ll have observers near the room before the meeting. Maybe not his own. Maybe not people who know what they’re watching.” Ace slid out of the booth. Mai followed. Shammy rose last, brushing a strand of silver-white hair back from her face. A faint spark jumped from her fingertip to the booth rail and died there without drama. Rogue looked at Ace. “Alive,” she said. Ace nodded once. “Quietly.” Mai nodded. “No street war.” Shammy smiled faintly. “We will try not to invent one.” Rogue stared at her. Shammy’s smile widened by perhaps one dangerous millimeter. Ace grabbed the edge of Shammy’s sleeve and tugged her away before Rogue decided weather should have been prohibited outright. They crossed Afterlife under the dead eyes of legends. Near the bar, Claire looked up. “That bad?” Ace said, “Normal bad.” Claire’s eyebrows rose. “So bad.” “Yeah.” Mai’s agent chimed softly as new data packets unlocked from Rogue’s shard. “We have three addresses, eight names, two dead drops, and a meeting room pretending to be a confession booth.” Shammy looked pleased. “That sounds educational.” Ace pushed through the club’s outer door into the damp Night City dark. Rain had started while they were inside. Of course it had. Neon bled across the pavement in smeared pinks and blues, turning trash water into something that almost looked holy if you were drunk enough or new enough to believe the city had ever meant well. The air smelled of wet concrete, exhaust, cheap noodles, burned insulation, and somebody’s bad decision leaking from an alley half a block away. Normal. Beautiful, in the way a knife could be beautiful if it had not decided where to go yet. Mai stepped beside Ace and opened the route map. Shammy tilted her face toward the rain. Ace glanced up at her. “You doing that?” “No.” “You sure?” Shammy considered. “Mostly.” Mai did not look up from the map. “No weather unless necessary.” “It is already weather.” “That is not the loophole you think it is.” Shammy sighed, but softly, with affection in it. Ace looked back toward Afterlife’s entrance. Behind them, Rogue’s empire kept breathing. Calm. Loud. Dangerous. Built on reputation, patience, and the kind of violence that did not need to advertise. Ahead of them, Mason Creed was moving through Night City under someone else’s hand, thinking ambition had finally earned him a seat at the table. Poor bastard. Ace started walking. “Let’s go see what kind of idiot hopes Rogue wants to talk.” Mai fell in beside her. “Technically, Rogue does want to talk.” “After we kidnap him.” “Professional distinction.” Shammy followed, rain sliding off her hair like it had been asked politely to behave. “Night City schools are very confusing.” Ace’s Shadow Aura stretched once across the wet pavement, longer than it should have been, thin and patient and hungry. Then it folded back under her feet. No anomalies tonight. No monsters. No cosmic pressure. Just people. Which, Ace had learned, was usually where the real mess started. --- ## Chapter 2 — First Look The first rule of investigating a fixer was simple. Do not ask the fixer. The second rule was more useful. Ask everyone who had been disappointed by him. Night City remembered disappointment better than kindness. Kindness got blurred by survival. Disappointment stuck. It picked up details. Names. Smells. Weapon models. The exact shade of somebody’s jacket when they failed to pay on time. The way a man smiled when he lied about a cut. The restaurant where a meeting went bad. The alley where someone had been promised protection and received a voicemail instead. By midnight, Mai had built a skeleton of Mason Creed’s last three months from resentment alone. They did not go back to Safehouse immediately. Ace preferred that. Safehouse had become a real place in her head, which meant she did not like dragging fresh job filth through the front door unless there was a reason. Watson had enough ghosts already without inviting another fixer’s bad decisions into the kitchen. So they took the car through wet streets, parked two blocks off a Kabuki side-lane where the neon had lost the war against old grime, and let Mai work from the front passenger seat while Ace leaned against the hood with a herbal cigarette she had not lit. Shammy stood under a narrow awning beside them, watching rain fall from a broken sign in uneven streams. The sign said _LUCKY FIVE_. Only three letters were alive. Ace eyed it. “That feels targeted.” Mai did not look up. “The sign is not insulting you.” “It says lucky.” “It says U K.” “Still rude.” Shammy studied the sign with great care. “Perhaps it is asking if you are okay.” Ace turned her head slowly. Shammy looked innocent. Too innocent. Mai’s fingers paused on the portable deck. Ace pointed at her. “You taught her that tone.” “I absolutely did not.” “You enabled it.” “That is more defensible.” Shammy smiled at the rain. For one small second, the job felt normal in the good way. Then Mai’s display filled with Mason Creed’s failures. “There,” she said. Ace pushed away from the hood and came around to the passenger side. Mai projected the data low, keeping the light shielded from the street. Names, job fragments, transaction chains, dead drops, coded meeting tags. Not clean evidence. Fixer work rarely left that behind. More like stains on wet concrete. “Mason Creed has handled at least forty-seven jobs in the last six months,” Mai said. “Possibly more. Twelve were clean enough to be boring. Eight were messy but survivable. Five ended with crews refusing to work with him again. Three generated direct threats.” “Only three?” Ace asked. “Direct threats. Everyone else probably just fantasized.” “Healthy.” Mai ignored that. “He pays fast when he can. That is consistent across reports.” Ace frowned. “That doesn’t match the idiot climber profile.” “No. It does not.” Shammy leaned over the open passenger door, too tall for the angle, hair slipping forward in silver-white sheets. “He wants people to like him?” “Maybe,” Mai said. “Or he understands unpaid mercs become armed creditors.” “That is also liking, but with knives.” Ace glanced at her. “Your definition of liking worries me.” “I am learning Night City.” “That worries me more.” Mai tapped three entries and enlarged them. “These are more interesting. Creed overpaid three crews after failed jobs.” Ace’s frown deepened. “Why?” “The public explanation: danger bonus.” “And the real one?” “Fear,” Mai said. That word changed the air faster than thunder. Rain tapped the hood. A Tyger Claw bike screamed through the intersection two blocks away, engine howling, tires hissing through water. Somewhere above them, a window opened and a couple argued in sharp, tired voices until one of them slammed something breakable. Shammy’s expression had gone quiet. Ace looked at the three entries. “Who were the jobs against?” Mai rotated the list. “Not Rogue. Not directly. A warehouse recovery in Northside. A courier interception near the docks. A blackmail cleanup in Japantown.” “Sounds normal.” “Until you see the outcomes.” Mai opened the first. The warehouse recovery had been simple on paper. A container of stolen cyberware. Creed brokered a team to retrieve it from a small booster outfit that had already lost half its people to internal fighting. Easy job. Dirty, but easy. The crew got there and found the container empty. Then someone sealed the exits and pumped smoke into the building. Not poison. Not enough to kill. Enough to panic. Enough to make armed professionals fire at shadows. Two wounded. No deaths. Creed paid triple. The second job had gone worse. Courier interception. The target switched routes twice. Creed’s crew adjusted. Then an anonymous tip led NCPD scanners straight across their path at the exact wrong moment. Nobody died. Everyone got arrested, then released after somebody paid through three layers of false legal cleanup. Creed paid all legal costs. The third job was the ugliest because nothing had happened. Blackmail cleanup. Japantown. The crew arrived at the meeting place and found only a chair, a turned-on camera, and a printed photo of every member’s apartment door. Creed canceled the job. Paid anyway. Ace stared at that one longer than the others. “Someone’s training him,” she said. Mai nodded. “Or correcting him.” Shammy’s fingers rested lightly on the car roof. Tiny beads of rain trembled near her hand but did not fall. “That is not training,” Shammy said. Mai looked up. Shammy’s eyes were distant, not unfocused. There was a difference. Shammy did not become vague when she sensed something. She became very precise in a direction nobody else had noticed yet. “That is a leash,” she said. Ace felt the Shadow Aura stir under her boots. It slid along the wet street in a thin, dark seam, not visible enough for a passerby to name, too wrong for the eye to ignore. It reached toward the data light and stopped. Mai watched the distortion for half a breath, then returned to the file. “Agreed,” she said. “The pattern punishes Creed when he attempts independence. But never completely. It wounds his credibility, drains money, and keeps him moving.” “So Vane squeezes him,” Ace said. “Possibly. But we need proof.” “We need Creed.” “That too.” Shammy glanced down the street. “Someone is watching the watchers.” Ace’s hand moved without drama toward the inside of her jacket, then stopped because she was not carrying a sidearm. Old reflex from Night City rubbing against her actual habits. Her weapons were less polite. Mai did not turn her head. “Where?” “Opposite roof. Third level. Heat behind broken vent.” Ace looked without looking. The building across the street was a tired stack of concrete and exposed piping with vending machines dead in the ground-floor entrance. Third level. Broken vent. Good angle over the lane, poor angle on the car interior. Amateur if the target was them. Professional if the target was anyone who approached them. Mai dimmed the projection. “Rogue’s contact?” Ace asked. “No,” Mai said. “Rogue would have told us.” “Creed’s?” “Maybe.” Shammy closed her eyes for a second. “Nervous.” “The watcher?” “Yes.” Ace’s mouth tightened. Nervous watchers were messy. Messy watchers made choices. Choices made noise. She said, “I’ll talk.” Mai gave her a look. “Define talk.” “Words first.” “And second?” “Depends how they answer.” Shammy brightened slightly. “That is almost diplomatic.” “Don’t sound so surprised.” “Almost,” Shammy repeated. Ace pointed at her without turning fully. “You are getting worse.” “I am becoming locally fluent.” Mai’s expression suggested she was trying not to laugh and resented the timing. Ace crossed the street alone. No sprint. No crouching. No theatrical disappearing act. Just a small woman in dark clothes walking through rain with her hands loose at her sides. That was often enough. People expected danger to announce itself with size. Night City loved that mistake. It made funerals more varied. The building entrance smelled of rust, old noodles, urine, and a cleanser strong enough to suggest guilt rather than hygiene. Ace went up the stairs. Second floor: quiet. Third floor: a hallway with three dead doors, one open utility space, one vending machine that hummed like it wanted to confess something. Ace stopped before the broken vent. The watcher was not behind it. Of course not. The vent was bait. Ace shifted her weight one centimeter. The man came out from the utility space with a compact pistol and the kind of fear that made fingers too tight. Ace moved before the barrel finished rising. Not katana work. Too narrow. Too loud. She stepped inside the line, trapped his wrist against her shoulder, drove two knuckles into the nerve cluster below his jaw, and hooked his ankle. Krav Maga was not pretty. It did not care. The man hit the floor hard enough to lose interest in dignity. The pistol clattered. Ace pinned his wrist with one knee and pressed two fingers against the side of his throat, not choking, just informing. “Words,” she said. His eyes were wide. He was young. Too young for the expensive optic in his right socket. Too young for the old scar under his ear. Too young to think he was good at this and old enough to know he wasn’t. “Don’t,” he wheezed. “That’s my line.” “I’m not here for you.” “I know.” That frightened him more. Good. Ace leaned closer. Around her, the hallway light buzzed once, and her Shadow Aura gathered behind her in the corner where the bulb did not reach. It did not form a shape. It did not need to. The man’s eyes flicked toward it anyway, pupils shrinking. “Who sent you?” Ace asked. “Nobody.” Ace pressed slightly. He hissed. “Try again.” “I’m watching the lane. That’s all.” “For who?” He swallowed. “Creed.” Ace paused. That answer felt wrong. Not false. Wrong. “For Creed or because of Creed?” He did not answer fast enough. Ace lifted his hand one degree past comfort. “Because,” he said through his teeth. “Because of Creed.” Ace released the pressure. “Explain.” He stared at her like explanation was a language he had not budgeted for. Ace waited. Waiting was one of Mai’s skills, not hers, but she had learned the value. Violence made people react. Silence made them fill rooms. The young man breathed hard. “There’s a bounty,” he said. Ace’s eyes narrowed. “On Creed?” “Not official. Word-only. Quiet. Find where he is tomorrow, pass it up, get paid.” “To who?” “I don’t know.” Ace looked at him. He shook his head quickly. “I don’t. I swear. Chain’s cut. We send through a drop.” “What drop?” “If I tell you, I’m dead.” Ace tilted her head. The hallway seemed to lengthen behind her. “No,” she said. “If you do not tell me, you might be wrong about that.” The young man made a small sound. Not quite panic. Close. Ace held his gaze for another second, then reached into his jacket and took his agent. He tried to tense. Her knee reminded him he had bones. She tossed the agent toward the stairwell without looking. Mai caught it from below. The young man stared. Mai’s voice rose from the stairs, calm and terrible. “Thank you.” Ace almost smiled. Almost. The watcher whispered, “You’re Triad.” “Yeah.” “I didn’t know.” “You know now.” “I’m not with Vane.” Ace froze. There it was. A name he should not have volunteered. She leaned closer again. “I didn’t say Vane.” The young man closed his eyes. A beautiful little collapse. Not physical. Structural. He had just watched his own survival math fail. Footsteps approached from below. Mai entered the hallway with the agent in one hand, expression clean and unreadable. Shammy followed behind her, ducking slightly under a broken overhead pipe. The air came with her, softer and heavier at once. The watcher looked from one to the other. His face worsened when he saw Shammy. People often reacted that way when the room suddenly contained weather with eyes. Mai checked the agent. “Drop address is burned. But recent routing metadata remained cached.” The watcher groaned. “No, no, no.” Mai looked down at him. “You are bad at deleting things.” “I paid someone to—” “You paid badly.” Ace glanced up. “Name?” “Drop routes through a broker called Glass Finch,” Mai said. “Low-level information handler. Not Vane directly.” The watcher said nothing. Shammy crouched near him, which still left her looking unreasonably tall. He tried to shrink into the floor. She studied him for a moment. “What is your name?” she asked. The question broke him more effectively than Ace’s grip had. “…Tobin.” “Tobin,” Shammy said softly. “You are very afraid.” His mouth twisted. “No shit.” Ace said, “Watch your tone.” Shammy lifted one hand slightly. “It is all right.” Ace stepped back half a pace, but her eyes stayed on Tobin. Shammy’s voice remained gentle. Not soft like weakness. Gentle like a blanket placed over broken glass so nobody bled more than necessary. “Are you afraid of Vane?” she asked. Tobin stared at her. Then, because he was young and frightened and Shammy had the unfair ability to make the air less hostile without making it safe, he nodded once. Mai’s gaze sharpened. Ace crossed her arms. Shammy continued, “Why?” Tobin laughed once. It came out wrong. “Because I like breathing?” “Many people like breathing,” Shammy said. “Most do not watch rainy streets for men they do not know.” “I know Creed.” Ace looked at him again. “You work for him?” “Sometimes.” “Doing what?” “Eyes. Errands. Message runs. Nothing big.” “Then why sell him?” Tobin flinched like she had hit him. Shammy’s expression changed. Ace saw it. So did Mai. There was shame there. Real shame, sticky and sour. Not the theatrical regret people performed after getting caught. The kind that had already been eating him. “He told us to,” Tobin said. Mai went very still. “Creed told you to sell his location?” Tobin nodded. Ace stared at him. “That makes no sense.” “I know.” “Why?” “He said if anyone asked, if any quiet channels opened, we were supposed to feed them tomorrow’s meeting route.” Mai’s fingers tightened slightly around the agent. “He is baiting the people hunting him.” “No,” Tobin said. “He’s trying to find which of us they reach.” Ace looked at Mai. Mai’s eyes were already moving. Shammy said, “He is testing his own cage.” That landed. Hard. Mason Creed was not simply being hunted. He knew enough to suspect the hunters were inside his own network. So he had started poisoning his own routes, watching who drank. Stupid? Maybe. Desperate? Absolutely. But not brainless. Ace looked back down at Tobin. “Did you report the route?” Tobin hesitated. Ace’s Shadow Aura thickened behind her. He swallowed. “Yes.” “When?” “Ten minutes before you got here.” Mai checked the agent again. “Message sent. Acknowledgment received. No sender identity.” “Can you trace?” “Not fast enough from here.” Tobin looked up quickly. “You have to move. If you’re near this drop, they’ll know somebody cracked me.” Ace crouched again. He shut up. “Who is they?” “I don’t know.” “Wrong answer.” “I don’t!” His voice cracked. “Nobody knows! That’s the point! You take money, you do one thing, you don’t ask where it goes. Everybody knows Glass Finch is dirty but nobody knows for who. Creed thought maybe Finch connected to Vane, but he didn’t have proof.” “Why not tell Rogue?” Mai asked. Tobin laughed again, this time with disbelief. “Because he spent seven months spitting on her name.” Ace’s mouth flattened. Fair. Stupid, but fair. Tobin continued, words spilling faster now. “Creed thought if he came with proof, maybe he could bargain. Not forgiveness. Not that. Just— I don’t know. Not dying.” “Tomorrow’s meeting,” Mai said. He nodded. “He believes Rogue invited him.” “He wants to believe it.” Shammy’s eyes lowered. There was the hope. Ugly little thing. Glowing in the dark like bait. Ace stood. “Mai.” “Already copying the agent.” “Tobin comes?” Tobin went pale. “No.” Mai considered. “Too risky. If he vanishes now, the network reacts.” Ace did not like it. Shammy looked at Tobin. “Can you act normal?” His expression said no. His mouth said, “Yes.” Ace snorted. “Convincing.” Mai removed a sliver from Tobin’s agent and tossed the device back to him. “You will go downstairs. You will leave through the north exit. You will buy food somewhere visible. You will complain about the rain. You will not contact anyone for forty minutes.” Tobin stared at her. “And after forty?” “After forty, you will receive a message from Creed’s network asking whether anything changed. You will say no.” “How do you know that?” Mai gave him a look. He shut up. Ace leaned down once more. “If you warn them, I find you.” “I know.” “No. You don’t.” The hallway light buzzed again. This time the Shadow Aura moved wrong enough that Tobin’s breath stopped for half a second. Ace’s voice stayed quiet. “Now you know.” Tobin nodded too fast. Shammy touched Ace’s sleeve lightly. Ace stepped back. Tobin got up in pieces, checked himself as if surprised he still owned all limbs, and moved toward the stairs. He stopped once beside Shammy. “I didn’t want him dead,” he said. Shammy’s answer was immediate. “I know.” That almost made it worse. Tobin fled. For several seconds, nobody spoke. Rain filled the building’s broken throat. Somewhere below, the vending machine hummed its confession again. Mai looked at the copied data in her hand. “Creed is more aware than Rogue’s file suggested.” Ace said, “He’s still an idiot.” “Yes. But not a useless one.” Shammy stood slowly. “He is trying to become visible to the person who can kill him cleanly.” Ace understood that sentence and hated it. Mai did too. “Because he thinks Rogue may be safer than whoever owns his leash,” Mai said. Ace rolled her shoulders once. “Then tomorrow’s room isn’t just a trap.” “No,” Mai said. “It is also a plea.” Shammy looked toward the broken vent, where Tobin had not been hiding, and then toward the rain beyond the stairwell. “Will Rogue hear it?” she asked. Ace started down the stairs. “She heard worse.” Mai followed. “That is not an answer.” Ace glanced back. “No,” she said. “It’s Night City.” They returned to the street. Tobin was already gone, or pretending well enough to be useful. The opposite roof was empty. The sign still said U K in dying neon. Mai opened a secure channel. Rogue answered after one pulse. “Talk.” Mai said, “Creed knows he is compromised. He may be using tomorrow’s meeting to identify the leak.” A pause. Then Rogue said, “That little shit.” Ace could not tell if that was irritation or respect. With Rogue, those were sometimes neighbors. Mai continued, “He may also genuinely believe the invitation came from you.” “I didn’t send it.” “We know.” “Do you?” Mai’s eyes narrowed slightly. Ace leaned closer. “Rogue.” Another pause. Then Rogue exhaled. “No. I didn’t send it.” That mattered. Not because they doubted her. Because in Night City, facts needed to be nailed down before somebody used them as a coffin lid. Rogue asked, “Any trace to Vane?” “Indirect. Glass Finch as broker.” “Finch is a sewer rat with perfume.” “Accurate,” Mai said. “We have cached routing, but not enough.” Rogue was quiet for a moment. Then: “Finch drinks at a basement bar in Little China when he thinks nobody knows where he is.” Ace looked at Mai. Mai was already mapping. Rogue said, “Don’t kill him unless he insists.” Ace smiled faintly. “Define insists.” “No.” The channel clicked dead. Shammy looked between them. “We are going to meet a sewer rat with perfume?” Mai opened the car door. “Apparently.” Shammy considered. “Night City animals are complicated.” Ace got behind the wheel. “Wait until you meet corporate wolves.” “I have met those.” “No. You have met corps. Corporate wolves are worse.” Mai settled into the passenger seat. “That category does not exist.” Ace started the car. “It does now.” Shammy folded herself into the back seat with the long-suffering patience of someone negotiating with inadequate human vehicle design. “Do they also wear perfume?” “Usually cologne,” Mai said. “Same sin,” Ace said. The engine growled awake. They pulled into the rain. Behind them, Tobin bought food somewhere visible and probably shook so hard the vendor assumed he was on cheap stimulants. Ahead of them, Glass Finch waited in some basement, unaware that a quiet professional evening had already begun turning into an educational disaster. And somewhere deeper in the city, Mason Creed kept moving. Not like a king. Not like a conqueror. Like a man inside a trap, tapping the bars to find which one rang hollow. --- ## Chapter 3 — The Atmosphere Around His Crew Little China had a habit of pretending decay was atmosphere. The basement bar sat under a noodle shop, a ripper-adjacent tattoo stall, and two apartments where nobody looked out the windows after midnight unless the screaming changed pitch. Its entrance was a narrow stairwell between stacked plastic crates and a faded advertisement for synthetic eel that showed a smiling woman holding a bowl like she had never known disappointment. A hand-painted sign above the stairs read: **THE BLUE LANTERN** The lantern itself was red. Ace stopped in front of it. “Already lying,” she said. Mai checked the alley. “Branding inconsistency is not evidence.” “It is spiritually evidence.” Shammy leaned down to inspect the lantern. “Maybe it wanted to be blue.” Ace looked at her. “Don’t make me sympathize with signage.” “It seems lonely.” Mai passed between them and started down the stairs. “Both of you are why people underestimate us.” Ace followed. “No. People underestimate us because I’m short and Shammy looks like she belongs on a religious mural.” Shammy ducked under a pipe. “Do I?” “Yes.” “What kind?” “The kind that gets banned.” Mai made a small sound that could have been a cough if nobody knew her. The basement smelled of spilled alcohol, wet fabric, cheap incense, and old panic baked into concrete. Lights hung too low. Music played too softly, which meant conversations mattered here. Not loud merc boasting. Not joy. This was a room for people who wanted to be forgotten while they made decisions that would later require lies. The Blue Lantern had fourteen customers. Mai counted exits first. Ace counted hands. Shammy counted moods. The bartender looked up once, saw them, and immediately decided polishing glasses was a meaningful life path. Good instinct. In the back left corner, four people sat around a circular table beneath a dead wall fan. Creed’s crew. Not the inner circle, probably. Working hands. Street-level fixers-in-training, drivers, eyes, message carriers, maybe one shooter who had enough chrome to be either useful or broke. They noticed the Triad almost at once. That was not surprising. What mattered was how they noticed. Not aggression. Not swagger. Fear first. Then calculation. Then exhaustion. Shammy leaned slightly toward Ace. “There.” “I see them.” “No,” Shammy said. “Feel them.” Ace hated when that made sense. The table did not have the energy of people riding a rising power. No bright arrogance. No predatory excitement. Nobody enjoying proximity to a man challenging Rogue. They looked like people who had been awake too long, paid irregularly despite the records saying otherwise, and told too often that everything was about to become worth it. One woman with shaved sides and tired eyes kept turning her glass without drinking. A broad man in a patched coat watched the door in six-second intervals. A skinny kid with gold nail implants tapped a rhythm against his own wrist, stopped, noticed himself doing it, then started again. The fourth, older than the rest, sat with her back to the wall and the particular stillness of someone who had survived by not making first moves. Mai murmured, “They’re expecting trouble.” Ace said, “Everyone here is expecting trouble.” “Not like this.” Shammy nodded. “They are waiting for permission to run.” That was a brutally useful sentence. Ace walked to the bar. The bartender looked at her height, then her eyes, then the space around her where shadow did not quite agree with light, and wisely decided not to make the first mistake. “What can I get you?” “Glass Finch.” His hand stopped on the rag. Mai slid onto the stool beside Ace, calm as a blade in velvet. Shammy remained standing slightly behind them, too tall, too noticeable, too serene. Several customers began considering whether their drinks could be finished elsewhere. The bartender recovered badly. “Don’t know the name.” Ace said, “Sure.” Mai placed a small stack of eddies on the counter. The bartender looked at the money. Then at Ace. Then at Shammy. The money lost. “He’s not here.” Mai added another stack. The bartender swallowed. “He was here.” Ace smiled without warmth. “Progress.” “Left twenty minutes ago.” Mai said, “Why?” “Because he saw them.” The bartender nodded toward Creed’s crew. Interesting. Ace did not turn. “He afraid of them?” “He’s afraid of everybody.” “Professional hazard,” Mai said. The bartender leaned closer, lowering his voice. “Look, I don’t want trouble. Finch comes here because people don’t ask things.” Ace said, “We’re asking.” “I noticed.” “Good.” Mai’s tone stayed polite. “Where did he go?” “I don’t know.” Ace stared. The bartender started sweating. “I don’t,” he said quickly. “He has exits. Back hall, old service tunnel, maybe up through the tattoo stall if the lock’s busted again. Finch is a rat.” “With perfume,” Shammy said. The bartender blinked up at her. Shammy looked pleased to be accurate. Mai slid the money back toward herself slightly. “What did Finch do when Creed’s people arrived?” “Got nervous.” “Specifics.” “He was fine, then the big one came in—” the bartender nodded toward the patched coat man “—and Finch went pale. Checked his agent. Stopped drinking. Left through the bathroom.” Ace glanced at Mai. Mai’s eyes had already shifted. “Bathroom exit?” she asked. “Old maintenance panel.” Ace looked offended. “Your bathroom has a secret exit?” “It’s Little China.” “Fair.” Mai stood. “We need to talk to Creed’s people.” The bartender’s expression made it clear he preferred the bathroom rat chase option. Ace turned toward the table. The four had gone still. The broad man’s hand had dropped below the table. The older woman noticed Ace noticing and gently put two fingers on his wrist. Good. Someone smart. Ace approached without hurry. Mai came beside her. Shammy followed, and the table’s stress level rose so visibly that Ace almost told her to stop being tall. Almost. The older woman spoke first. “Booth’s taken.” Ace stopped at the edge of the table. “We’re not sitting.” “Then you’re looming.” Ace looked up at Shammy. Shammy looked down at herself, then at the table. “I am sorry. This happens.” The skinny kid with gold nails made the mistake of almost laughing, caught himself, then looked like he expected punishment from the ceiling. The older woman’s eyes moved to Shammy with reluctant curiosity. Mai said, “We’re looking for Glass Finch.” “Then look somewhere else.” “He ran when you arrived.” The broad man said, “Good.” His hand was still low. Ace looked at him. “Move that hand higher.” He stared at her. The older woman said, “Dax.” Dax lifted his hand slowly. Empty. Ace appreciated that he did not pretend he had not been reaching for a weapon. The older woman leaned back. “Finch owes people money. Maybe he remembered.” Mai studied her. “Name?” “No.” Ace said, “That’s a bad name.” The woman’s mouth twitched despite herself. “Vera,” she said. “That’s all you get free.” Mai nodded. “Vera. You work for Mason Creed.” Vera’s eyes hardened. The other three reacted in different directions. Dax with protective anger. Gold Nails with panic. Shaved Sides with fatigue so deep it looked like surrender wearing eyeliner. Vera said, “Sometimes.” “Tonight?” Mai asked. “No.” Ace pulled a chair from the next table and sat without asking. Vera’s expression sharpened. “Thought you weren’t sitting.” “I adapted.” Mai remained standing. Shammy hovered in a way that made hovering look atmospheric rather than awkward. Ace rested her forearms on the table. “We’re not here to kill Creed.” Dax laughed once. “That what people say before they kill someone?” “No. Usually they say less.” Gold Nails whispered, “Fuck.” Vera silenced him with a look. Mai placed Tobin’s copied data sliver on the table. Vera did not touch it. Smart again. “Tobin was watching a drop lane,” Mai said. “He says Creed seeded tomorrow’s route to test leaks.” Vera’s face did nothing. Too much nothing. Ace saw it. “Good,” Ace said. “You knew.” Shaved Sides closed her eyes. Dax muttered, “Tobin talks too much.” “He talked enough,” Ace said. Vera looked at Mai. “Who are you?” Mai held her gaze. “People trying to keep tomorrow from becoming a massacre.” Gold Nails looked at Shammy, then Ace, then Mai. His face drained. “You’re Triad,” he said. Dax swore under his breath. Shaved Sides whispered, “Rogue sent you.” Ace said nothing. The table took that as answer because sometimes silence was generous. Vera looked older all at once. “Of course she did.” Mai’s tone sharpened by half a degree. “Creed believes Rogue invited him.” Vera looked away. That was enough. Ace leaned closer. “Why?” Vera’s jaw tightened. Shammy spoke before Ace could push harder. “Because he needs one adult in the room.” The whole table went silent. Ace turned very slowly toward Shammy. Mai did not, but her eyes softened in that dangerous way they did when Shammy accidentally cut through six layers of human nonsense with one sentence. Vera stared at Shammy. Then she laughed. It was not a happy sound. It was rusty, exhausted, and almost grateful for the insult. “Yeah,” Vera said. “That’s about right.” Dax looked furious now, but not at Shammy. At the table. At himself. At Mason Creed. At everything. Vera rubbed one hand over her mouth. “Mason’s an idiot.” Ace nodded. “We agree.” “But he’s not stupid.” Mai said, “We’re beginning to notice.” “He thought he could build something clean.” Ace stared. Then she laughed once, short and sharp. Vera pointed at her. “Yeah. That’s the usual reaction.” “Clean?” Ace said. “In Night City?” “He meant cleaner,” Shaved Sides said quietly. Everyone looked at her. She opened her eyes. They were red from exhaustion, not drugs. “Fast pay. No selling crews to corps after extraction. No cutting medical coverage. No using rookies as bullet screens unless they knew the job was bad.” Ace looked at Mai. Mai’s expression had gone unreadable. Vera said, “He was naive. Not innocent. There’s a difference.” “Big one,” Ace said. “He wanted Rogue’s shadow without Rogue’s history,” Vera continued. “Thought if he paid better and moved faster, people would come.” “They did,” Mai said. “For a while.” “And then?” Vera’s mouth tightened. “Then somebody found him.” “Vane,” Ace said. Dax’s hand twitched. Gold Nails flinched. Shaved Sides looked at the table. Vera did not move. Again, too much nothing. Mai said, “We are past pretending.” Vera leaned back. “You say that because you have Rogue behind you.” Ace smiled faintly. “No. We say that because your people are tired and your boss is walking into a fake meeting with a woman he insulted because he thinks she might be less dangerous than the man holding his leash.” The table went dead. Even the basement music seemed to step away. Vera’s eyes locked on Ace. There it was. Truth. Ugly, wet, and breathing. Dax said, “You don’t know shit.” Ace did not look at him. “Then correct me.” Nobody did. Shammy sat down carefully on an empty chair from the adjacent table. It complained under the concept of her height but survived. “What does Vane want from Creed?” she asked. Vera rubbed both hands together. “Access.” Mai’s eyes sharpened. “To Rogue’s routes?” “To people around her. Smaller fixers. Neutral crews. Supply lines. Old contracts. Anything Mason could touch by being loud enough to draw attention.” Ace said, “So Creed makes noise.” “Vane watches who looks.” Mai nodded slowly. “And who moves.” “Yeah.” Vera’s voice had lost its defensive edge. Not trust. Not yet. But she had crossed the point where lying cost more energy than speaking. “Mason thought he could turn it,” she said. “Use Vane’s pressure to build faster. Let the old bastard think he was shaping him while Mason built enough protection to break away.” Ace stared at her. “That is the dumbest plan I’ve heard this week.” Mai glanced at her. Ace added, “And it has been a strong week.” Gold Nails made a strangled sound that might have been agreement. Vera said, “I told him.” “Did he listen?” “He said everyone says no until someone does it.” Ace closed her eyes for one second. There was ambition. Not cartoon ambition. Not villain ambition. The worse kind. Young enough to still believe exception was a strategy. Mai said, “What changed?” Vera did not answer. Dax did. “People started getting hurt.” Shaved Sides looked at him. Dax’s voice was low. “Not killed. That would’ve been cleaner. Jobs went bad. Homes got tagged. Families got messages. Accounts drained. Clinics refused treatment. Quiet stuff.” Shammy’s expression dimmed. “Leash,” she said again. Vera nodded. “Mason tried to pull back. Vane tightened. Mason pushed harder because he thought if he looked weak, Vane would finish him. Then Rogue’s name showed up on the invite.” Mai said, “Who delivered it?” “Encrypted packet. Rogue’s old signature markers. Good ones.” “Too good?” Mai asked. Vera looked at her. Mai continued, “A forgery made by someone showing off often becomes cleaner than the original.” Vera’s face changed. She had not considered that. Mai had. Of course Mai had. “Can you tell?” Vera asked. “Possibly.” “Then tell him.” Ace said, “Where is he?” “No.” Ace’s stare hardened. Vera matched it. For a moment, they were two very different kinds of dangerous sitting across from each other in a basement that suddenly wished it had been built somewhere else. Vera said, “You want him alive? So do I. That doesn’t mean I hand him over to three people who walked in here under Rogue’s flag and expect us to clap.” Mai’s voice remained calm. “Reasonable.” Ace looked at her. Mai ignored the look. “We do not need his current location yet. We need the meeting route.” “No.” “We already have one version,” Mai said. “If Creed is poisoning routes, we need to know which one he intends to use.” Vera’s eyes narrowed. “Why?” “Because if we protect the wrong decoy, Vane gets the real one.” That landed. Vera looked at Dax. Dax looked unhappy. Gold Nails looked like he wanted to evaporate. Shaved Sides whispered, “Vera.” Vera shook her head. “No.” Shaved Sides leaned forward. “We can’t keep doing this.” “Lin—” “No.” Lin’s voice cracked, then steadied. “We are not winning. We are not building anything. We are watching every door and pretending Mason has a plan because if he doesn’t then we did all this for nothing.” The table went still. Lin wiped her face angrily, furious at the moisture there. “Tobin sold the route because Mason told him to. Fine. What about Kel? What about Ro? What about Jensen? How many little tests before somebody fails and gets a bullet? How many times does Mason almost die before we admit Vane already owns the board?” Vera looked away. That was the sound of a crew beginning to fracture under truth. Ace did not enjoy it. She had seen groups break before. Cults. teams, crews, families, things that called themselves families because the word crew felt too honest. The breaking always had a smell. Not physical. Emotional. Ozone and rust. The moment people realized loyalty had become a room with no exits. Shammy felt it too. The air in the basement eased around the table. Not enough to soothe. Enough to let breath happen. Dax stared at Lin. “You want to hand Mason to Rogue?” “I want him to survive tomorrow.” “You think those are the same?” Lin pointed toward Ace. “If Rogue wanted him dead, why send them?” Dax had no answer. Gold Nails said very quietly, “Because she wants to make a point.” Ace looked at him. “Name.” He blinked. “What?” “I’m tired of calling you Gold Nails in my head.” Mai’s mouth twitched. He looked at his hands as if remembering the implants. “Eli.” “Fine. Eli. Rogue always wants to make a point. That doesn’t mean she wants him dead.” Eli swallowed. “Does she?” Ace considered lying. Didn’t. “I don’t know.” Vera let out a bitter laugh. “Great.” Ace leaned forward. “But I know this: if Vane wanted him alive, he wouldn’t be pushing him into a room under Rogue’s name.” Nobody answered. Mai placed both hands lightly on the table. “We need to prevent Creed’s death without making Rogue appear to protect him publicly. That means we need cooperation from inside his network. Minimal. Quiet. Specific.” Vera stared at her. “And after?” “After, Creed speaks to Rogue.” Dax said, “That sounds like death with extra steps.” Ace shrugged. “Could be education.” Eli looked ill. “I hate this city.” “Healthy reaction,” Shammy said. Vera looked at Shammy again. Something in her tired eyes shifted. Not trust. But perhaps recognition that Shammy was not there to win the room. That mattered to people who had spent too long around men trying to own every conversation. Vera exhaled. “Three routes,” she said. Dax swore. Vera lifted one hand. “Shut up.” He did. Good command voice. Vera looked at Mai. “North route is bait. East route is counter-bait. South route is real until Mason changes it, which he will, because he never trusts the real route after giving it to anyone.” Mai nodded once, as if that nonsense made perfect sense. It probably did to her. “Change window?” “Twenty minutes before movement.” “Who knows the final change?” “Mason. Me. Dax if he drives. Lin if comms stay clean.” Eli raised his hand slightly. Vera glared at him. He lowered it. “I mean, technically I prepare decoy pings.” Ace said, “Congratulations. You’re relevant.” Eli looked unsure whether to be proud or terrified. Mai asked, “Can you feed us the final route when he changes?” Vera shook her head. “If Mason finds out, he bolts. If Vane finds out, he dies. If Rogue finds out too loudly, same problem.” “Then we don’t ask Mason,” Mai said. “Who do you ask?” Mai’s eyes moved to Eli. Eli’s soul visibly attempted to leave. “No,” he said. Ace smiled. “Yes,” Mai said. “No, no, absolutely no.” “You prepare decoy pings.” “Badly! I do it badly!” “Not according to cached network behavior,” Mai said. Eli looked betrayed by competence. Shammy leaned toward him. “Sometimes being useful is unfortunate.” “That is the nicest horrible thing anyone has ever said to me,” Eli whispered. Mai pulled a blank shard from her coat and placed it on the table. “You will not send us the route. You will send a decoy ping with a timing error of three seconds. I will watch for the timing error. That tells me which route was invalidated last. From that, I can infer the real path.” Vera stared at her. Dax said, “You can do that?” Mai’s expression was almost offended. “Yes.” Ace said, “Careful. She hates when people sound surprised she’s terrifying.” Mai glanced at her. “I do not hate it.” “You catalogue it.” “That is different.” Shammy nodded solemnly. “Mai keeps excellent emotional receipts.” Mai looked at her. Shammy smiled. Even Vera almost smiled that time. Almost. That was something. Mai pushed the blank shard closer. “Take it or don’t. But tomorrow’s meeting is designed to kill Creed and make Rogue wear the blood. If that happens, your crew becomes kindling.” Vera looked at the shard for a long time. Then she took it. Dax leaned back, angry but beaten by math. Lin closed her eyes again, relief and fear crossing her face together. Eli whispered, “I hate being relevant.” Ace stood. “Get used to it.” Vera looked up at her. “If you betray him—” Ace’s Shadow Aura shifted behind her, subtle but immediate. The basement lights dimmed for half a blink. Several people at other tables suddenly found their drinks fascinating. Ace’s voice stayed flat. “If we wanted to betray him, you would not have gotten this conversation.” Vera held her gaze. Then nodded once. Good enough. They left the table without handshakes. Handshakes would have been insulting. At the bar, the bartender pretended harder than anyone had ever pretended that he had not listened to every word he could catch. Ace stopped beside him. “Bathroom.” He pointed. “Secret exit?” He pointed differently. “Thanks.” Mai said, “We are not chasing Finch through a bathroom exit yet.” Ace frowned. “We’re not?” “No.” “Why?” “Because he ran from Creed’s crew. Now Creed’s crew knows we are looking. Finch will hear that within fifteen minutes. If he is frightened, he will contact whoever frightened him more.” Ace looked at her. Mai’s smile was small and cold. “Then we follow that.” Shammy looked delighted. “We are letting the rat run through the walls.” “Yes,” Mai said. “Efficient.” “Unpleasant, but efficient.” Ace pushed open the bar door. Rain air rolled down the stairs. Behind them, Creed’s crew remained at their table, less united than before, but perhaps less doomed. Vera held Mai’s blank shard in one fist like it might burn through her palm. Dax watched the door with hate and hope fighting behind his eyes. Lin breathed like someone had finally admitted the room was on fire. Eli stared at his gold nails, apparently grieving his promotion to useful. Outside, Little China shimmered wet and sharp. Mai opened a tracker window. “Finch’s old exit path leads into a service tunnel network. I can seed a listener into the routing cache from Tobin’s data and Vera’s shard handshake. If Finch pings his handler, we may get directionality.” Ace nodded. “How long?” “Minutes.” Shammy tilted her face toward the alley mouth. “Someone is already running,” she said. Ace looked. A man in a pale coat burst from a side passage half a block away, slipped in the rain, caught himself on a noodle stand, and kept going with the frantic dignity of someone trying to sprint while pretending not to. Even from this distance, Ace could almost smell the perfume. Mai sighed. “So much for minutes.” Ace was already moving. Glass Finch looked back once. He saw them. His face collapsed. Then he ran harder. Ace smiled despite herself. Not because of the chase. Because for the first time all night, something was simple. --- ## Chapter 4 — Talking to Survivors Glass Finch ran like a man who had spent his life arranging other people’s emergencies and had never properly trained for his own. Which was to say: badly, but with conviction. He slipped twice in the first twenty meters. Recovered once by grabbing a vending machine, once by colliding shoulder-first with a trash stack that complained loudly in three languages. His pale coat flared behind him, too expensive for the alley and too visible for flight. Perfume cut through the rain in sharp chemical layers: citrus, metal, panic. Ace did not sprint at first. That would have been rude. Also unnecessary. Finch was built for corners, not distance. His survival strategy depended on vanishing into old service spaces, bribed door locks, forgotten maintenance shafts, and social blind spots. He knew the city the way sewer rats knew warmth. A straight chase favored Ace. A clever chase might favor him. So Mai killed the clever part. “Left is sealed,” she said through comms. “He thinks he has access through the laundromat basement. Lock is dead.” Finch hit the laundromat door half a second later. It did not open. His entire body expressed betrayal. Ace almost felt bad for him. Almost. He twisted right. Mai continued, calm and surgical. “Right route leads to a kitchen alley. Two workers outside smoking. He won’t want witnesses.” Finch saw the workers, saw the glow of their cigarettes, saw one of them already lifting an agent to record the richly dressed idiot running through the rain, and changed direction again. Shammy’s voice came next, softer. “He is choosing the smaller dark.” Ace glanced ahead. Narrow service gap between two buildings. Bad lighting. Broken pavement. Pipes low enough to punish anyone tall. “Sorry,” Ace said. Shammy sighed behind her. “I am becoming used to architecture’s hostility.” Finch dove into the gap. Ace followed. The city narrowed around her into wet concrete, rusted pipes, and old heat bleeding from building walls. Her boots struck puddles without splashing much. The Shadow Aura stretched thin behind her, sliding over brickwork and pipe joints like it remembered older alleys than this. A rat vanished into a crack before either human reached it. Smart rat. Finch looked back. Bad idea. People always wanted confirmation that fear was still behind them. It cost him speed. Ace caught him at the far end of the gap, just before he reached a chain-link service gate with a manual latch. He had one hand on the metal when she stepped onto the lower crossbar, used it to rise, and planted one boot gently but firmly between his shoulder blades. Finch hit the gate face-first. The chain-link rattled. “Good evening,” Ace said. He made a thin, strangled noise. She dropped back down, caught the collar of his pale coat, and pulled him away from the gate before he could injure himself more creatively. Finch spun, one hand diving inside the coat. Ace caught his wrist. Something small and black slipped from his sleeve into his palm. Not a gun. A panic trigger. She crushed his hand around it before his thumb found the switch. Finch yelped. “Don’t,” Ace said. “I have insurance!” Ace looked at him. He reconsidered tone and volume simultaneously. “I mean— I have professional arrangements.” “Worse sentence.” Mai entered the alley behind them, dry-eyed despite the rain, because Mai had a gift for looking composed in places designed to punish composition. Shammy followed more slowly, ducking under a pipe with visible dislike. Finch’s gaze flicked over them. Recognition bloomed. Then dread. “Triad,” he whispered. Ace smiled faintly. “Everybody keeps saying that tonight.” “That means the brand is strong,” Shammy said. Mai looked at Finch’s hand. “Open it.” “No.” Ace squeezed. Finch opened it. The panic trigger sat cracked in his palm, dead. Mai plucked it free between two fingers and examined it. “Short-burst locator. Not lethal. Sends position to a listener.” “Which listener?” Ace asked. Finch swallowed. Mai turned the device slightly. “Custom casing. Cheap core. Expensive encryption wrapper.” Shammy leaned in. “It smells like fear and oranges.” Ace glanced at her. “The device?” “No. Him.” Finch looked offended and terrified, which was a complicated expression on a man with expensive cheek implants. Mai slipped the trigger into a shielded pouch. “Glass Finch.” “That is not my legal name.” Ace said, “Do we look like law enforcement?” He shut his mouth. Rain tapped against the narrow alley walls. Somewhere nearby, a kitchen vent coughed steam into the night. The service gap amplified small sounds, making Finch’s breathing seem loud enough to be evidence. Mai said, “You routed bounty messages on Mason Creed.” Finch tried to recover dignity. It was painful to watch. “I route many things for many clients. Information has no moral alignment.” Ace blinked. “Wow.” Shammy looked curious. “Did that sentence help?” “No,” Mai said. Finch lifted his chin slightly. “I am a broker. I don’t create conflict. I facilitate transactional clarity.” Ace looked at Mai. “Can I hit him for that?” “Not yet.” Finch’s eyes widened. “Not yet?” Mai stepped closer. “You ran when Creed’s crew entered the Blue Lantern.” “I dislike awkward social intersections.” “You ran because you knew they were connected to the route bait.” “I don’t know what that means.” Mai held up his cracked trigger. “You carried a panic locator keyed to a listener you refuse to name. You fled before anyone approached you. You chose a service route with no cameras. You are not ignorant, Mr. Finch. You are frightened.” Finch’s face tightened. Shammy watched him. Ace saw the moment he registered Shammy’s attention and disliked it. Not because she threatened him physically. Because Shammy had a way of looking at people as if all the little atmospheric disturbances around their lies were visible to her. Sometimes Ace wondered if they were. Finch said, “Everyone in this city is frightened. The healthy ones admit it.” Mai nodded once. “Good. Start there.” “I want protection.” Ace laughed. Finch flinched. Mai said, “From whom?” “You know.” “No,” Mai said. “We suspect. You confirm.” “I cannot.” Ace stepped closer. Finch pressed himself against the chain-link. “Not because of loyalty! Please don’t mistake me for principled. I am being practical.” “That is the first honest thing you’ve said,” Mai said. Finch breathed through his nose. “If I speak that name in connection with current activity and it travels through the wrong channel, I become a lesson.” Ace said, “You’re already in an alley with us.” “Yes,” Finch said desperately. “A flexible lesson.” Shammy tilted her head. “Flexible?” “Negotiable. Survivable. Potentially bruising, but not symbolic.” Ace looked at Mai. Mai said, “He means Vane kills people narratively.” “Of course he does.” Finch squeezed his eyes shut. The name hung in the alley now. Silas Vane. Nobody thundered. Nobody appeared from shadow. The city did not react because Night City had heard worse names and charged rent to all of them. But Finch reacted. His shoulders collapsed half an inch. Mai’s tone softened by exactly nothing. “You are routing for Vane.” “I am routing for someone who routes for someone who can plausibly be assumed to connect to historic Vane infrastructure.” Ace stared. “Do you practice being annoying, or is it natural?” “Natural talent refined by terror.” Shammy gave him a small look of appreciation. “That was almost brave.” “It was not. Please do not assign me brave traits.” Mai folded her arms. “What does Vane want with Creed?” Finch swallowed again. “Creed is useful because he is loud.” “We know that much.” “Then you know enough to leave me alive and uninvolved.” “No,” Ace said. Finch looked at her. Ace’s voice stayed level. “You helped put a man in a trap.” “I help lots of men enter traps. Most pay in advance.” The Shadow Aura stirred. Finch’s mouth snapped shut. Mai said, “Careful.” “I cope through language.” “You will cope silently if needed.” Finch nodded quickly. Shammy stepped slightly closer. The air in the alley changed—not pressure, exactly. Gentleness with gravity inside it. Rain softened around them, not stopping, only seeming less eager to strike the ground. “Mr. Finch,” she said. “Mason Creed’s people are afraid. Tobin is afraid. Vera is afraid. You are afraid. That is a large amount of fear moving in one direction.” Finch stared at her. “So,” Shammy continued, “what is at the center?” For once, Finch did not answer immediately. His eyes moved away from them, past the chain-link, past the alley, toward some private mental corridor where better versions of himself had probably died years ago. Then he said, quietly, “A debt ledger.” Mai’s attention sharpened. “Creed’s?” “Not only Creed’s.” Ace’s fingers flexed. Finch saw it and spoke faster. “Vane doesn’t own people with direct threats anymore. That is crude. Expensive. Loud. He owns dependencies. Medical balances. Legal cleanups. Family relocations. Failed job penalties. Addiction management. Trauma care. Funeral advances.” Ace felt something cold move under her ribs. Funeral advances. Night City could turn even grief into leverage if given a payment plan. Mai said, “Creed borrowed from him.” “Creed borrowed from intermediaries that were not visibly Vane,” Finch said. “To build fast. Pay crews properly. Buy loyalty. Cover losses. Very noble. Very stupid.” Ace said, “He wanted clean money and borrowed dirty.” Finch nodded. “Most reformers begin by underestimating plumbing.” Shammy’s expression dimmed. Mai asked, “How deep?” “I don’t have the full ledger.” “Partial.” Finch hesitated. Ace leaned. He spoke. “Eight point six million across visible instruments. Possibly twelve to fifteen with concealed obligations.” Mai’s eyes narrowed. “That is too much for Creed’s scale.” “Yes.” “So the debt was designed not to be repaid.” “Yes.” There it was. The trap under the trap. Creed had not simply made bad financial decisions. He had been allowed—encouraged—to make them at a size that guaranteed control. Every overpaid crew, every danger bonus, every legal cleanup, every attempt to build “cleaner” fixer work had become another chain link. Ace hated Night City most when it made decency stupid. She could handle cruelty. Cruelty was at least honest if you scraped off the perfume. But this? This was the city punishing a man not for being good, exactly, but for being naive enough to think better habits could be bought on credit. Mai’s voice was very quiet. “Tomorrow’s meeting.” Finch looked ill. “The invitation using Rogue’s name,” Mai said. “Did you route it?” “No.” Ace watched his eyes. Truth. “Did you know about it?” “Yes.” “Before or after?” “After.” “How long after?” “Fourteen minutes.” Mai absorbed that. “And you did not warn Creed.” Finch laughed once. Wet and weak. “Warn him how? ‘Dear Mr. Creed, the suicide invitation you received may be less legitimate than hoped, please disregard and also forgive my months of assisting the men financially vivisecting you’? Professional language failed me.” Ace said, “Cowardice helped.” “Yes,” Finch said. “It often does.” That admission took some of the pleasure out of judging him. Annoying. Shammy asked, “Why run from Creed’s crew tonight?” Finch rubbed his face with his free hand. Ace still held the other wrist. “Because Vera scares me.” Ace glanced at Mai. Mai looked faintly amused. “Vera specifically?” “She has honest eyes. I dislike being seen by people with honest eyes.” Ace stared at him. Finch sighed. “Also she threatened last month to remove my spine through a tax loophole if I sold Mason bad routing again.” Shammy blinked. “Can she do that?” “No,” Mai said. Finch whispered, “Not legally.” Ace decided she liked Vera a little more. Mai held out one hand. “Ledger access.” Finch recoiled. “Absolutely not.” Ace tightened her grip. “No, no, listen—listen. If I had it on me, I would already be a corpse wearing perfume. I have fragments. Enough to show structure. Not enough to burn Vane.” “We need enough to keep Creed alive tomorrow,” Mai said. “That is different.” “Then give us different.” Finch looked between them, calculating again. That was his true resting state. Not calm, not fear, but calculation under fear, like a rat measuring the distance between boots. “If I help you,” he said, “I need something.” Ace said, “Your bones stay arranged.” “A generous opening position, but insufficient.” Mai’s tone cooled. “Do not overplay this.” “I am not.” Finch swallowed. “If Vane thinks I gave you anything, I need to disappear.” “Night City is large,” Ace said. “No. Night City is small when old men own quiet infrastructure.” Mai asked, “What do you want?” “Rogue.” Ace’s eyes narrowed. Finch hurried on. “Not a meeting. Not a favor. A line. One sentence through a channel Vane respects. Enough to mark me inconvenient to touch for forty-eight hours.” Ace laughed softly. “You want Rogue to shelter you?” “I want Rogue to make harming me temporarily impolite.” Mai looked at him for a long moment. Then she said, “That may be possible.” Ace turned. “Mai.” “We need the fragments.” “We don’t sell Rogue’s name.” “No,” Mai said. “But Rogue may decide a temporary courtesy costs less than losing visibility.” Finch nodded eagerly. “Professional courtesy. Exactly. Beautiful phrase. Very old-school. Excellent branding.” Ace said, “Keep talking and I’ll change my mind for her.” He stopped. Mai opened a secure channel. Rogue answered with, “If you’re calling because Finch is dead, I’m annoyed.” Finch mouthed silently: _Please don’t say my name._ Ace smiled. Mai said, “He is alive.” “Shame.” Finch looked wounded. Mai continued, “He has partial ledger fragments connecting Creed’s debt structure to Vane-adjacent infrastructure. He wants temporary protection.” Rogue was silent. Finch seemed to age during the pause. Then Rogue said, “Put him on.” Mai held the agent out. Finch stared at it like it was a loaded weapon. Ace said, “Congratulations. You wanted a line.” Finch leaned toward the agent with the careful horror of a man approaching a shrine known for biting. “Ms. Amendiares,” he said. Rogue’s voice came through clear and dry. “Finch.” He flinched at the recognition. “I have always admired your efficiency.” “No, you haven’t.” “I have often feared it.” “That I believe.” Finch swallowed. “I may be able to provide material useful to avoiding an unfortunate escalation involving Mr. Creed.” Rogue said nothing. Finch continued, sweat mixing with rain on his temple. “In exchange, I request forty-eight hours of professional discouragement against symbolic retaliation.” Ace mouthed, “Professional discouragement?” Mai lifted a hand: wait. Rogue’s reply came after three heartbeats. “If your material is good, anyone making a public example of you in the next forty-eight hours will be considered rude.” Finch exhaled like his knees had almost resigned. “Thank you.” “Finch.” “Yes?” “If your material is bad, I’ll be rude personally.” The line clicked dead. Finch stood very still. Shammy said, “That was very clear.” Ace released his wrist. Finch rubbed it, then reached slowly inside his coat. Ace watched every millimeter. He pulled out a narrow data sliver sealed inside an old-fashioned metal case, the kind of physical paranoia that suggested he had not survived purely by being annoying. He handed it to Mai. “This contains partial routing markers, debt instrument shells, and three proof-of-life transaction echoes.” Mai took it. “Proof-of-life?” Finch nodded. “Payments made after failed attempts on Creed. Not to assassins. To monitors.” Ace frowned. “Monitors.” “People paid to confirm whether Creed survived.” The alley seemed to narrow. Mai’s voice sharpened. “Vane wanted him alive after those attempts.” “Yes.” “Then the attempts were pressure events.” “Yes.” Shammy’s eyes darkened. “He was teaching the leash to hurt.” Finch looked at her uneasily. “That is poetic and unfortunately accurate.” Ace turned away for a second because she wanted to put her fist through the chain-link gate and the gate had done nothing wrong. Mai slotted the data into an isolated reader. “This is enough to map possible monitor positions tomorrow.” “Possible,” Finch said. “Not guaranteed.” “Good enough.” Ace looked back at him. “What about the invitation?” Finch hesitated. Ace’s patience thinned. Finch saw it. “I have one signature anomaly. The packet used Rogue markers, but the timestamp discipline was wrong.” Mai looked up. “Too clean?” “Yes. Rogue’s old authenticated traffic from pre-Blackwall fragmentation has drift. Tiny irregularities. Human routing residue. Whoever forged the invitation scrubbed it too well.” Rogue had been right. Mai had been right. Forgery made by someone showing off. “Can Creed verify that?” Mai asked. “If he sees comparative proof, maybe. But he wants to believe.” Ace said, “Hope makes people stupid.” Finch looked at her. “So does fear.” Nobody argued. Shammy glanced toward the alley entrance. “Someone noticed the chase.” Mai removed the sliver and wiped the reader. “How many?” “Two near the noodle stand. One pretending not to record.” Ace looked at Finch. “You have another exit?” He looked offended. “Of course.” “Use it.” Finch blinked. “You’re letting me go?” Mai said, “For forty-eight hours, harming you is rude.” “I meant from you.” Ace shrugged. “You were useful.” “That is not comforting.” “It shouldn’t be.” Finch adjusted his pale coat, tried to recover some fragment of style, and failed because one side of his collar was bent and his face still had chain-link marks. Before he left, Shammy said, “Mr. Finch.” He stopped. “If you keep helping men like Vane, eventually no amount of professional courtesy will make you feel safe.” Finch looked at her. For once, no joke arrived. “I know,” he said. Then he opened a maintenance panel hidden behind a rusted sign, slipped through sideways, and vanished into Night City’s plumbing. Ace stared at the panel after it closed. “I hate that he’s alive.” Mai sealed the data case. “No, you don’t.” “I mildly resent that he’s alive.” “More accurate.” Shammy looked pleased. “He is terrible, but shaped interestingly.” Ace turned toward her. “Do not collect sewer rats.” “I was not planning to keep him.” “Good.” “Maybe observe from a distance.” “No.” Mai began walking. “We need to move. If Finch’s material is accurate, tomorrow’s meeting has monitor positions, not kill positions.” Ace fell in beside her. “Meaning?” “Meaning Vane may not intend Creed to die before reaching the room.” Shammy followed, stepping over a puddle that reflected her as something taller than even she was. Ace did not like the sound of that. “He wants him inside.” “Yes,” Mai said. “To kill him there?” “Possibly.” “Or?” Mai’s face was lit by passing neon, silver and blue and cold. “Or to make sure Rogue appears to have had the chance.” Ace understood. A dead Creed in an alley was a murder. A dead Creed after walking into a room under Rogue’s name was a statement. Even if Rogue had never touched him. Especially then. Shammy’s voice came from behind them, quiet beneath the rain. “He is not trying to kill Mason Creed.” Ace looked back. Shammy’s eyes were fixed on the wet street ahead, distant again, reading pressure in places nobody else could feel. “He is trying to place the body where the story becomes useful.” Mai stopped. Ace did too. The rain filled the silence. Then Mai said, “We need to talk to more of Creed’s survivors.” Ace glanced at her. “Survivors?” “People from the failed pressure events. The warehouse, the courier arrest, the blackmail room. Finch gave us enough names to find two before morning.” Ace rolled her shoulders. The simple chase was over. Back to the ugly part. “Fine,” she said. “Let’s go disappoint some disappointed people.” --- The first survivor lived above a closed braindance repair shop in Northside. His name was Kell Armitage, though the old job file had listed him as **KELL//ARM** because Night City loved making human beings look like damaged software. He had been on the warehouse recovery job, the one where the container turned out empty and smoke filled the building until professionals began firing at ghosts. He answered the door with a shotgun. Not pointed directly at them. Close enough. Ace respected that. Kell was big in the way former heavy laborers were big: not sculpted, not stylish, just dense and tired and difficult to move. His left arm was synthetic from elbow down, older model, practical maintenance plating, no decorative chrome. His right eye had a burst blood vessel that had never quite healed cleanly. He looked at Ace. At Mai. At Shammy. Then back at Ace, because Ace was the one standing in front. “No.” Ace said, “We didn’t ask yet.” “No.” Mai said, “We’re here about Mason Creed.” Kell’s face changed. Not anger first. Pain. Then anger. “No.” He started to close the door. Ace placed one hand against it. Not hard. Just enough. Kell looked at her hand. The door stopped moving. For a second, he considered making an issue of it. Then Shammy spoke from behind Ace. “We are trying to keep him alive.” Kell’s eyes moved to her. That was the thing about Shammy. Her height made people prepare for intimidation, but her voice often arrived without teeth. It disarmed the wrong expectation. Not always safely. Sometimes people tried to fill the gap with aggression. Kell did not. He looked exhausted enough to understand exhaustion in others. “Why?” he asked. Ace answered honestly. “Rogue wants to talk to him.” Kell laughed. Then coughed. Then laughed again, worse. “Jesus,” he said. “Kid really did it.” Mai tilted her head. “Did what?” Kell looked at the three of them for a long moment. Then he stepped back. “Five minutes. No weapons out. Tall one watches her head. Ceiling’s bad.” Shammy looked up. The ceiling was indeed bad. “Thank you,” she said. Kell’s apartment was clean in the way survival spaces were clean: paths cleared, tools organized, no excess softness, every object either useful or too emotionally heavy to throw away. A child’s drawing was magnet-fixed to the fridge. The colors had faded. The name at the bottom was unreadable except for the first letter: M. Ace noticed. Did not ask. Mai noticed. Definitely did not ask. Shammy noticed and became very gentle around the room. Kell set the shotgun on the table within reach but not in hand. “Talk.” Mai stayed standing. “The warehouse job. Creed paid triple afterward.” Kell’s jaw tightened. “He should’ve paid in blood.” Ace leaned against the wall near the door. “What happened?” “You read the file.” “Files don’t cough smoke.” Kell looked at her. Then, reluctantly, he nodded once. “Job was shit-simple. Stolen cyberware container. Booster crew dumb enough to brag. We go in, grab, leave. Creed said low resistance. He was right.” Mai said, “Container was empty.” “Container was bait.” Kell rubbed the back of his neck. “We opened it, building sealed. Smoke came through vents. Not poison. Irritant, maybe. Hot. Metallic. Couldn’t see. Comms went crunchy. Someone fired first.” “Who?” He looked away. “You?” Ace asked. “No.” Then, after a beat: “Maybe. I don’t know.” That cost him. Ace said nothing. Kell continued, “Everybody says they didn’t. Doesn’t matter. Bullets started. Juno took one through the thigh. Mateo lost two fingers. I put three rounds into a forklift because it looked like a man moving.” His synthetic fingers tapped once against his leg. “After?” Mai asked. “Creed came himself.” Ace looked up. Kell noticed. “Yeah. Not a call. Not a proxy. Came to the clinic. Looked like shit. Paid everybody. Apologized.” “Did you believe him?” “No.” “Do you now?” Kell took too long. Then: “I believe he was scared.” Shammy’s eyes softened. Mai asked, “Did he say anything unusual?” Kell frowned. “He asked if anyone contacted us before the job.” “Had they?” “Juno got a bonus offer.” Mai sharpened. “From who?” “Unknown. Someone offered her double to send route confirmation before we moved. She thought it was Creed’s QA paranoia.” “Did she send it?” “Yeah.” Ace exhaled. Mai said, “And Creed asked after.” “He already knew something was wrong. Or suspected. He looked like he wanted us to hit him.” Kell’s mouth twisted. “I almost did.” “Why didn’t you?” Shammy asked. Kell looked at her, surprised by the question. Then he glanced toward the fridge drawing. “Because he paid the clinic before apologizing,” he said. “Men who only care about looking sorry do that in the other order.” That landed quietly. Ace looked down. Mason Creed became slightly less easy to dismiss. Annoying. Mai took notes. “Where is Juno?” “Gone south. Family outside city. Creed paid relocation.” “Mateo?” “Dead.” Silence. Kell’s face closed. “Not from the job,” he said. “Two weeks later. Hit-and-run.” Mai’s eyes changed. Ace straightened. Kell laughed without humor. “Yeah. Funny city.” “Was Mateo contacted before the job?” “No idea.” Mai’s fingers moved. “Did Creed investigate?” “Creed paid for the funeral.” “Not what I asked.” Kell looked at her. Then nodded. “Yeah. He investigated. Quiet. Asked too many questions. Got scared again.” Ace asked, “Scared of what?” Kell rubbed his synthetic hand with his real one, an old self-soothing gesture worn into him. “Not what,” he said. “Who.” “Vane?” Kell’s face did not change much. But his hand stopped moving. Good enough. He looked at the shotgun on the table. “If I say that name, does my apartment explode?” Ace said, “Not tonight.” “Comforting.” “We’re doing our best.” He actually smiled at that. Small, brief, miserable. Then he leaned back. “I don’t know Vane. I know people stop laughing when his name shows up. Creed said once that old fixers don’t kill dreams. They finance them and collect when they fail.” Mai went very still. “That sounds like Creed?” “Yeah.” “When?” “Clinic. Thought nobody heard him. He was looking at Mateo’s hand.” Shammy whispered, “He knew.” Ace looked at her. Shammy’s gaze was on the faded child’s drawing, but her mind was elsewhere. “He knew the clean thing was becoming dirty,” she said. Kell looked at Shammy like she had opened a window in a room he had forgotten had walls. “Yeah,” he said. “That.” Mai closed the file. “Thank you.” Kell snorted. “For what? Trauma tourism?” Ace pushed off the wall. “For not shooting us.” “Bar’s low.” “Night City.” He nodded because that required no further explanation. At the door, Kell spoke again. “If you get him to Rogue…” Ace turned. Kell’s expression fought itself. “Tell him he still owes Juno an apology she might believe.” Mai nodded. “We will.” Ace did not promise. Promises were expensive. But she remembered. Outside, the hallway smelled of dust and old electricity. Shammy had to duck again. Ace waited until they were down the stairs before speaking. “He came to the clinic.” Mai nodded. “Paid first.” “Yes.” Ace hated that too. Mai glanced at her. “Your opinion of him is changing.” “No.” “Ace.” “It’s becoming more irritatingly specific.” Shammy smiled sadly. “That is changing.” Ace muttered something unkind about emotional accuracy. They got back into the car. Mai marked the next survivor. Courier interception. A woman named Sera Vale. Currently working night inventory at a black-market med-supply depot near the edge of Santo Domingo. Ace started the engine. No one said the obvious thing. They were no longer investigating whether Mason Creed deserved saving. They were investigating how many people had already been hurt by the machinery built to make him useful. And the number was growing. --- Sera Vale did not greet them with a weapon. She greeted them with a clipboard. Somehow that was worse. “No visitors,” she said. The depot behind her was a low concrete structure disguised as a legitimate cold-storage unit and protected by the universal Night City security system of bored men with rifles pretending not to notice bribes. Inside, refrigeration units hummed. Stacks of medical crates sat under false inventory codes. The air smelled sterile enough to be suspicious. Sera was thin, sharp-faced, and moved like every joint had filed a complaint years ago. Her hair was shaved close on one side, braided tight on the other. One eye was natural. The other had a cheap replacement lens with a persistent calibration twitch. Mai showed her a token from Rogue’s shard. Sera stared at it. Then at them. Then at the clipboard. “I’m on shift.” Ace said, “Take a break.” “I don’t get breaks.” Shammy looked past her into the depot. “That seems illegal.” Everyone stared at her. Shammy frowned. “Is it not?” Sera’s mouth twitched. “You new?” “No.” “Then that was a philosophical joke?” “Maybe.” Sera studied her for another second, then sighed. “Loading bay. Three minutes.” The loading bay was colder than outside. It had plastic strip curtains, two broken chairs, and a coffee machine that smelled like it had committed several crimes against water. Sera did not sit. “What about Creed?” she asked. Mai said, “Courier interception. NCPD scanners crossed your route.” Sera’s face went flat. “That.” “You were arrested.” “Briefly.” “Creed paid legal cleanup.” “He caused the need.” Ace leaned against a crate. “Did he?” Sera’s eye twitch clicked twice. Calibration or irritation. Hard to tell. “That job was clean,” she said. “Too clean. We had route, target, scanner windows, backup alley, dead drop. Then everything shifted. Target changed route. We changed with it. Then NCPD rolled through like they smelled us.” “Tip-off?” “Obviously.” “From inside the crew?” Sera’s jaw worked. Mai said, “We are not here to prosecute you.” Sera laughed. “That supposed to be comforting?” “No.” Ace liked that answer. Sera crossed her arms. “I got contacted before the job. Unknown sender. Asked for confirmation when we began pursuit. Paid five thousand.” Ace asked, “You took it?” “Yes.” No shame. No excuse. Mai said, “Why?” “Because Creed always had redundant route monitors. I thought it was his channel.” “Was it?” “No.” “What happened after?” “Creed found me.” Ace straightened slightly. Sera’s expression changed in a way that was not simple. “He angry?” Ace asked. “Very.” That fit. “Did he hurt you?” “No.” That fit less, or perhaps more. “He came alone,” Sera said. “Idiot. Walked into my place like he’d misplaced fear somewhere. Asked why I sent the ping.” “What did you say?” “The truth.” “Which was?” “That his operation was a mess and I couldn’t tell his paranoia from his process anymore.” Mai’s expression sharpened. “How did he respond?” Sera looked toward the refrigeration units. “He sat down.” Ace blinked. “He what?” “Sank like someone cut his strings.” Sera’s mouth tightened. “Asked me to show him the contact chain. I did. He looked at it for maybe ten seconds and then asked if anyone in my family needed medical coverage.” Shammy’s expression softened again. Sera noticed and looked irritated by it. “My brother,” she said. “Kidney failure. Bad insurance. Worse luck.” Mai said, “Creed paid?” “Creed arranged. I’m still paying. Just not to people who break fingers.” Ace was silent. Sera continued, voice harder now, defensive against her own memory. “He was not kind. Don’t write that down in your little hero ledger. He was pissed. He told me if I ever sold one of his crews again, he’d make sure nobody in the city trusted me with a grocery list. Then he fixed the coverage.” Ace said, “That’s annoyingly decent.” “Yeah,” Sera said. “I hated it too.” Mai asked, “Did he mention Vane?” Sera’s natural eye flicked toward the door. “Not directly.” “Indirectly.” “He said there are men in Night City who don’t buy loyalty. They buy the moment loyalty becomes unaffordable.” That was the second good line from Creed. Ace was starting to get genuinely irritated. Mai recorded it. “He was learning.” Sera snorted. “Too late.” “Maybe.” “No.” Sera stepped closer. “Listen to me. Mason Creed is not some secret genius. He’s not Rogue in training. He’s a man who thought he could outwork rot. That’s it. He found bad systems, tried to build a better one using worse money, and now the rot has receipts.” Mai held her gaze. Sera continued, “If Rogue sent you, then he’s already at the end.” Ace said, “Rogue wants him alive.” Sera stared. Then she laughed once, disbelieving. “Fuck.” Shammy asked, “Is that surprising?” “Yes,” Sera said. “No. I don’t know. It’s Rogue.” Ace nodded. “Common issue.” Sera looked at Mai. “Tomorrow’s meeting?” Mai did not ask how she knew. “Yes.” “Mason wants it to be real.” “We know.” “No,” Sera said. “You don’t. He really wants it. Not because he thinks Rogue forgives him. He’s not that stupid. He wants one person who understands the game to look at the board and tell him he wasn’t crazy.” That struck harder than Ace expected. Not forgiveness. Not rescue. Witness. Mason Creed had built himself into a trap so complicated he needed the woman he had insulted to confirm the walls were real. Mai’s voice lowered. “Did he say that?” Sera shook her head. “He didn’t have to.” Shammy looked down. “He wants judgment from someone who can see the whole wound.” Sera gave her a strange look. “You talk like that often?” Ace said, “More than is convenient.” “It is accurate,” Mai said. Sera looked between them. Then her posture shifted. The hard professional shell did not vanish, but a seam opened. “Can you keep him alive?” she asked. Ace answered before Mai could make it conditional. “Yes.” Mai glanced at her. Ace did not take it back. Sera saw that and nodded once. “Then tell him Sera says he’s still an arrogant prick.” Ace smiled faintly. “And?” Sera looked away. “And thank you for the kidney thing.” Shammy’s eyes warmed. Sera pointed at her. “Don’t.” Shammy lifted both hands slightly. “I did not say anything.” “You looked.” “I do that.” “Do it less.” “I will try.” Ace pushed off the crate. “Anything else?” Sera hesitated. Then: “If Vane is behind this, Creed is not the only target.” Mai stopped. “Explain.” “People who took Creed’s money. People he helped. People he overpaid. People he relocated. If he dies under Rogue’s name, all those debts turn political. Vane can scoop them up. ‘See? Rogue kills anyone trying to build outside her table. Come to me instead.’” Mai’s eyes sharpened. Ace felt the shape change again. Not just Creed’s body. Creed’s network. His wounded, compromised, half-loyal, half-terrified people. Vane was not only placing a corpse where the story became useful. He was placing a future. A whole small ecosystem of frightened people ready to be collected. “Thank you,” Mai said. Sera nodded once. “Break the story.” Ace looked at her. Sera’s expression had gone cold. “Not just the plan,” she said. “The story. That’s what old fixers sell.” Mai’s mouth tightened with approval. “Yes.” They left the depot through the side exit. Outside, dawn had not arrived, but the night had thinned. The rain had faded into mist. Santo Domingo’s industrial edges rose around them in hard silhouettes, power lines and stacked structures and distant furnace light staining the low clouds. Ace got into the car and sat for a moment without starting it. Mai did not push. Shammy leaned forward from the back seat, forearms resting gently on the front seats between them. Finally Ace said, “He’s still an idiot.” Mai nodded. “Yes.” “He made half this mess himself.” “Yes.” “He spat at Rogue’s name.” “Yes.” “He borrowed from predators.” “Yes.” “He endangered his crew.” “Yes.” Ace gripped the steering wheel. The Shadow Aura curled around her hands like black smoke remembering claws. “And he still doesn’t deserve this.” Mai’s voice was quiet. “No.” Shammy touched Ace’s shoulder with two fingers. Outside, Night City kept glowing like a wound pretending to be a skyline. Mai’s agent chimed. A new ping. She opened it. Eli. Not words. A decoy route marker with a timing error of three seconds. Mai went perfectly still. Ace looked at her. “Already?” “Creed changed the movement plan.” “Meeting isn’t until tomorrow night.” “Yes.” Mai’s eyes lifted. “He’s moving early.” Shammy’s hand tightened slightly on Ace’s shoulder. Ace started the engine. The car came alive under her like an animal glad to have a direction. “Where?” Mai projected the inferred path. “Watson.” Ace laughed without humor. “Of course.” The Safehouse district. Their ground. Rogues’ old gravity. Creed’s unstable orbit. Vane’s invisible hand. Everything circling back where it could hurt the most. Mai’s voice was calm, but the calm had blades in it. “If my inference is right, he is not going to the meeting site.” “Then where?” Mai looked at the map. “To a clinic.” Ace drove. --- ## Chapter 5 — Mai Sees the Pattern Watson before dawn looked less like a district and more like a machine someone had forgotten to turn off. Steam crawled from broken vents. Neon signs buzzed in languages the rain had partially erased. Delivery drones moved between towers like tired insects. Somewhere deep in the vertical mess, someone screamed once, stopped suddenly, and was absorbed by the hum. Normal. Ace drove fast, but not loud. That was a specific skill. Night City rewarded noise until the wrong person heard it. The car cut through slick side streets and under elevated structures, engine held low, tires whispering over wet pavement. Mai kept the route projected in compressed layers on her agent, one hand braced lightly against the dashboard whenever Ace chose a corner with more confidence than friction. Shammy sat in the back, folded into the seat as well as physics allowed. Her gaze stayed on the windows. Rain and sodium light slid across her face, making her look briefly unreal, then painfully young, then unreal again. Mai said, “Creed’s route is unstable.” Ace kept her eyes on the street. “You said clinic.” “I said inferred destination. The route suggests a clinic, but he is masking the approach through decoy medical pings.” “How many?” “Four.” “Of course.” Shammy tilted her head. “He is hurt?” “Unknown,” Mai said. Ace’s fingers tightened on the wheel. “Could be someone else.” “Yes.” “Could be bait.” “Yes.” “Could be him panicking.” “Also yes.” Ace glanced at her. “Very useful.” Mai’s expression remained serene. “Reality often has poor manners.” Shammy leaned slightly forward. “The route feels wrong.” Ace checked the mirror. “Define wrong.” “It does not feel like escape.” Mai’s eyes flicked to the rearview reflection. “What does it feel like?” Shammy was quiet for a moment. Outside, the city opened into a wider road, then narrowed again under an unfinished pedestrian overpass where two men warmed their hands over a barrel fire and did not look at the car. Smart men. Or tired men. Often the same thing. “Guilt,” Shammy said finally. Ace did not answer. Mai’s gaze returned to the route. “He may be visiting someone connected to the failed jobs,” she said. “Before walking into his own execution?” “People do strange things before they believe they might die.” Ace knew that too well to argue. The Shadow Aura sat close in the car. Not large. Not spilling. But present in the dark places beneath the seats, in the rearview mirror where the back seat reflection bent around Shammy’s shoulder, in the windshield where streetlight smeared a little too long across Ace’s hands. Mai noticed, but did not tell it to settle. Sometimes Ace needed the pressure nearby. Sometimes telling it to behave was like telling a wound not to ache. The clinic sat under a half-dead apartment block in northern Watson, not far from where legal medicine stopped pretending it served everyone and street medicine started pretending it had choices. Its sign read **MORROW COMMUNITY CARE** in tired blue letters. Two letters were out. Someone had tagged the front shutter with a cartoon skull wearing a nurse cap. The clinic was supposed to be closed. It was not. A narrow line of light cut through the side entrance. Mai dimmed the route projection. “Creed’s car stopped two blocks east, then moved again without him.” “Decoy driver,” Ace said. “Likely. Two other pings continued north.” “His crew?” “Maybe.” Ace parked around the corner beside a delivery bay that smelled of old disinfectant and damp cardboard. No one got out immediately. That was another rule of Night City. Arriving was not the same as entering. Mai scanned passive channels. Ace watched reflections. Shammy closed her eyes and listened to air that no sensor could map properly. After fifteen seconds, Shammy said, “Fear inside. But not many people.” Mai asked, “Violence?” “Not yet.” Ace opened the door. “Then we’re early.” They moved on foot. The clinic’s side door had an old electronic lock, recently bypassed and then relocked by someone with decent hands. Mai looked at it, looked mildly offended, and opened it in four seconds. Inside smelled like antiseptic, old coffee, plastic curtains, and human exhaustion. Clinics all smelled the same beneath the branding. Real hospitals tried to hide fear under polish. Street clinics did not have the budget to lie that well. Fear lived in the corners, under counters, inside cabinets where supplies ran low and people still kept asking. Ace entered first. Not with weapons drawn. Hands free. Shoulders loose. Small enough that a frightened amateur might mistake her for the least dangerous thing in the room. The hallway beyond the entrance was narrow. Reception desk to the left. Treatment rooms to the right. Blue floor tape guiding patients who probably ignored it. A vending machine hummed in the corner, stocked entirely with water, pain bars, and one suspiciously cheerful grape drink. A woman in green clinic scrubs stood behind the desk with both hands visible. She was not alone. Mason Creed stood near the back hallway. No entourage. No bodyguards. No impressive entrance. Just one man in a dark coat that had been expensive before three nights of rain and stress ruined the line of it. His face looked worse than the profile image: eyes hollow, beard shadow untreated, hair controlled by habit rather than success. He held himself like someone determined not to shake in front of witnesses. Beside him, sitting on a treatment chair, was a girl of maybe sixteen with a bandaged shoulder and a face pale from blood loss. Ah. Guilt. Ace stopped. Mai entered behind her, quiet as thought. Shammy came last and immediately had to lower her head under the doorframe. Creed’s eyes flicked to her, widened slightly, then returned to Ace. He knew. Of course he knew. Mason Creed looked at the Triad and laughed once under his breath. Not amused. Ruined. “Rogue sent you.” Ace said, “You are very popular tonight.” Creed closed his eyes for half a second. The clinic worker said, “No violence in here.” Ace looked at her. The woman looked back. Good eyes. Tired, scared, but planted. “No violence in here,” she repeated. Ace nodded. “Fine.” Creed looked almost insulted by the ease of that. Mai’s gaze moved to the injured girl. “Who is she?” Creed said, “None of your business.” The girl said, “Nia.” Creed turned. “Nia.” “What?” she said weakly. “They’re Triad. If they wanted us dead, you’d be bleeding on the floor already.” Ace looked at Mai. “I like her.” “I noticed.” Creed rubbed his face with one hand. “Fantastic. Great. Wonderful. Everyone bond while the city chews through my ribs.” Shammy stepped a little closer, careful with her size in the cramped hallway. “She was hurt because of you.” Creed’s mouth snapped shut. That one landed deep. Nia looked at Shammy. “Not directly.” Shammy nodded, accepting the correction without surrendering the point. Mai said, “What happened?” The clinic worker answered before Creed could choose a lie. “Drive-by. Forty minutes ago. Two bikes. Suppressed fire. They aimed at the apartment door, not the people. She was inside.” Ace’s gaze shifted to Creed. Creed looked away. Nia lifted her uninjured hand slightly. “My brother works courier routes for him.” “Name?” Mai asked. “Paulo,” Creed said. “He fed one of the decoy schedules. Someone decided to send a reminder.” Ace’s jaw tightened. Vane again. Not killing. Correcting. Hurting the edges until the center moved as instructed. Mai’s voice went cold. “You moved early because of this.” Creed looked at her properly for the first time. He studied Mai’s face and seemed to understand, quickly, that lying to her would be like trying to bribe a wall. “Yes.” “You changed tomorrow’s route.” “Yes.” “You invalidated Eli’s decoy pings.” Creed went still. There it was: the sudden fear of a man who had just discovered the room had more windows than expected. “How do you—” Ace cut in. “Your people are tired.” Creed’s face hardened. “My people are loyal.” “Some are. Some are scared. Some are both. That’s the problem.” Creed took one step toward her. Mai did not move. Shammy did not move. Ace did not need to. The clinic worker cleared her throat. Creed stopped. No violence in here. His hands curled, then relaxed. “Did Vera talk?” he asked. “Enough,” Mai said. He closed his eyes again. “Goddammit.” Nia said, “Mason.” He turned toward her, and for one second the fixer disappeared. Not fully. Night City did not release people that cleanly. But some other version of the man surfaced through the exhaustion: worried, guilty, furious at himself and trying to convert it into procedure because procedure was easier than grief. “You should not have been there,” he said. Nia rolled her eyes. “It’s my apartment.” “You know what I mean.” “No, I know what you want to mean. Different.” Ace’s mouth twitched. Creed looked like he wanted to argue and had no safe ammunition. Mai approached the treatment chair. “May I?” Nia looked at Creed. Creed looked annoyed by that too. Then Nia looked back at Mai. “Sure.” Mai checked the bandage without touching first, then with careful permission. “Through-and-through graze. Painful, not catastrophic.” The clinic worker nodded. “She got lucky.” “No,” Creed said quietly. “They aimed that way.” Everyone looked at him. He swallowed. “They wanted her alive.” Ace felt the Shadow Aura stir, black pressure coiling beneath the reception desk shadow. “Message,” Ace said. Creed nodded. Mai straightened. “Who was the intended reader?” “Paulo. Me. Anyone with enough fear to understand.” Shammy said, “You came because guilt moved faster than caution.” Creed’s laugh was almost a cough. “Do you always talk like weather giving therapy?” “Yes,” Ace and Mai said at once. Shammy looked pleased. Creed stared at them, then shook his head like the world had become too strange even by his standards. “Look,” he said. “I don’t know what Rogue told you—” “Enough,” Ace said. “No. Not enough. If she sent you here, then she thinks I’m either bait or stupid.” Mai said, “Both remain viable.” Nia snorted, then winced. Creed pointed vaguely at Mai. “See? That. That is why I didn’t go to her earlier.” Ace leaned against the reception desk. “Because she might be accurate?” “Because Rogue doesn’t forgive weakness.” Mai’s expression changed. Small. Important. “No,” Mai said. “Rogue does not forgive waste.” Creed looked at her. Ace did too. Mai continued, voice measured. “You have confused those things. Perhaps for months.” Something in Creed’s face flinched. Not visibly enough for most people. Enough for them. Shammy’s gaze softened. Creed looked away first. The clinic worker said, “Nia needs rest.” “I paid,” Creed said. “I did not ask if you paid.” That shut him up beautifully. Ace liked her too. Mai turned toward the clinic worker. “Can she be moved?” “No.” Creed immediately said, “No.” Mai nodded. “Good. Then she stays. We need to ensure this clinic is not hit again.” Creed’s head snapped up. “It won’t be.” Ace stared at him. “You know that because?” “Because they made their point.” “No,” Ace said. “You hope they made their point.” His jaw worked. Mai looked at the clinic worker. “Do you have security?” The woman laughed with her entire tired soul. “Door lock and bad coffee.” “Contacts?” “Local. Not enough.” Ace looked at Mai. Mai nodded. Ace opened a channel. Rogue answered faster this time. “You found him.” Creed went pale at the sound of her voice. Ace looked at him while speaking. “Yes.” “Alive?” “Yes.” “Clinic?” Ace glanced at Mai. Mai’s eyebrows lifted slightly. Of course Rogue knew. Ace said, “Yeah.” Rogue exhaled. “Who got hit?” Creed looked like someone had placed a knife very carefully between his ribs. Mai answered. “Nia. Sixteen. Sister of Paulo, Creed’s courier contact. Wounded, stable.” A long silence. Then Rogue said, “Mason.” Creed did not move. Ace held the channel in the air between them like a blade. Rogue’s voice came through lower now. “You listening?” Creed’s face hardened around fear. “Yeah.” “Good.” He waited. Everyone waited. Rogue said, “You stupid son of a bitch.” Creed closed his eyes. There was no anger in Rogue’s voice. That made it worse. “You should have come to me when the debt turned teeth,” Rogue said. Creed’s voice was rough. “I didn’t think you’d care.” “I don’t.” A small sound escaped him. Rogue continued. “I care that someone is using my name to arrange corpses.” Mai’s gaze stayed on Creed. Ace watched Nia. Nia watched Creed. Shammy watched the air between all of them. Creed swallowed. “The invitation. It’s fake?” Rogue said, “Yes.” His breath left him. Not surprise. Confirmation. The last weak hope snapping exactly where it had already cracked. He looked older afterward. Almost relieved. Almost destroyed. “I thought…” He stopped. Rogue waited, merciless enough to let him hear himself. Creed’s voice dropped. “I thought maybe you wanted terms.” Rogue laughed once. Not cruel. Dry as old bone. “Terms? You’ve been pissing on my floor for seven months.” Nia whispered, “Mason.” Creed looked down. Rogue said, “But no, I didn’t invite you to die under my signature.” Mai said, “The signature was too clean.” Rogue replied, “Of course it was.” Creed looked at Mai. “Too clean?” Mai explained, because Mai could be kind in ways that felt like being dissected by a patient surgeon. “The forgery lacked routing drift. It imitated authority, not habit.” Creed stared. Then he laughed. It came out broken. “I checked the credential weight. Encryption depth. Historical markers. I didn’t check the dirt.” Rogue said, “Because you’re new.” That hurt him more than stupid. Good. Stupid was insult. New was diagnosis. Ace asked, “What now?” Rogue was silent for a moment. Then: “You still bring him in.” Creed’s face tightened. Nia tried to sit straighter. “Wait—” Creed lifted one hand. “No. Don’t.” Rogue continued, “Not from the clinic. Not now. If Vane has monitors, this place is already part of the board.” Mai said, “Agreed. We secure the clinic, then extract Creed separately.” “How much does he know?” Mai looked at Creed. Creed looked back. Then he said, “Enough to get people killed. Not enough to stop it.” Ace appreciated the honesty. Rogue said, “That may be the first intelligent thing you’ve said in months.” Creed’s mouth twisted. “Nice to hear your voice too.” Oh. There he was. A little spine under the fear. Rogue’s tone sharpened by a hair. “Careful, kid.” Creed looked like he regretted existing. Ace almost smiled. Almost. Rogue said, “Triad decides how to move you. You follow instructions. You do not improvise. You do not test loyalty. You do not leak routes. You do not try to outsmart the people currently keeping you breathing.” Creed looked at Ace. Ace looked back. He said, “Understood.” Rogue ended the call. The clinic felt smaller afterward. Creed leaned both hands against the edge of the reception desk and breathed once, carefully. Nia said, “You okay?” He laughed. “No.” “Good. Maybe that means you’re learning.” The clinic worker muttered, “Children heal better when adults stop collapsing nearby.” Mai nodded. “Correct.” Creed looked at the worker. “Dr. Morrow—” “Don’t Dr. Morrow me. You brought fixer politics into my clinic.” “I paid for—” “I will sedate you.” Ace’s eyebrows rose. Shammy looked impressed. Creed shut up. Dr. Morrow pointed toward Nia. “She rests. He leaves. You people make sure no one shoots my windows. That is the entire conversation.” Mai said, “We can arrange temporary protection.” Dr. Morrow’s eyes narrowed. “From who?” “Not uniforms,” Mai said. “No visible affiliation. Quiet watchers.” Ace knew who Mai meant before she said it. Not orbit. Not this time. No dragging Marco or Lena or Reyes into the middle of an unfolding fixer trap unless absolutely necessary. Keep the normal job normal. Keep the circle tight. Rogue had people. Old people. Quiet people. People who could sit in cars and make the wrong bike turn around without anyone ever writing a dramatic song about it. Mai opened a text channel instead of voice. Rogue responded with three names and one sentence: **Already moving.** Creed saw Mai’s face. “She had people close.” Ace said, “Of course she did.” “Then why send you?” Mai looked at him. “Because she needed the room understood before it was touched.” Creed absorbed that. Slowly. Painfully. He had spent months mistaking speed for control. Now he was standing inside the machinery of someone who did not need to move fast because she had never stopped being present. That was its own lesson. Shammy stepped closer to Nia. “May I?” she asked, gesturing toward the girl’s hand. Nia blinked. “Uh. Sure?” Shammy took her fingers gently. No glow. No magic. No weather miracle. Nothing that would turn the moment into a story people could misuse later. Just warmth. Air pressure in the room eased. Nia’s shoulders dropped half an inch, and the tension around her mouth softened. Dr. Morrow noticed immediately. So did Creed. Ace watched him watching Shammy. Watched his expression shift from confusion to suspicion to something like grief. Not because he understood Shammy. Because he recognized care happening without leverage. That could break people in Night City if they were already cracked. Nia whispered, “You’re tall.” Shammy smiled. “Yes.” “Like, really tall.” “I have been told architecture resents me.” Nia gave a weak laugh and then winced. “Ow.” “Small laugh,” Dr. Morrow snapped. “Sorry,” Shammy said. “I meant her.” “Oh.” Ace leaned toward Mai. “She is going to collect every injured person in Watson.” Mai whispered back, “Only if you keep making them laugh.” “I made no one laugh.” “You introduced the architecture issue earlier.” “That was factual.” “Many disasters begin as facts.” Creed looked at them. For the first time, some of the fear left his face and bafflement replaced it. “This is Triad?” he said. Ace turned slowly. “Careful.” “No, I mean—” He stopped. Smart. “Never mind.” Mai said, “Better.” Dr. Morrow returned to Nia’s bandage. “Everyone not medically required, out of my treatment room.” Creed hesitated. Nia saw it. “Go.” “I—” “Mason. Go. You being guilty at me is making my shoulder hurt.” “That is medically unlikely,” Dr. Morrow said. “Emotionally true,” Nia said. Dr. Morrow considered. “Allowed.” Creed looked like he had been outvoted by a court he respected too much to ignore. He stepped into the hallway. Ace followed. Mai and Shammy came after a moment. Shammy gave Nia one small wave. Nia returned it with two fingers. In the hall, Creed looked smaller. Not physically. He was average height, maybe a little above, still dressed like a man trying to look like the future. But the shape around him had shrunk. No crew. No table. No performance. Just Mason Creed, standing under flickering clinic light with the consequences of his ambition bleeding in the next room. Ace said, “We need everything.” He nodded. Mai said, “Not the version that makes you sound competent.” His mouth twisted. “That version’s been losing market share.” “Good.” Creed leaned against the wall. “I wanted to build a fixer network that didn’t eat people as default process,” he said. Ace did not laugh this time. Mai did not interrupt. Shammy stood quietly, too tall for the hallway, hands folded before her. Creed continued, staring at the floor. “Rogue owns the top. Wakako owns her corners. Padre’s got his faithful. Dino, Dakota, Muamar, all of them have gravity. I thought there was space under that. Better cuts. Faster pay. Cleaner crew protections. Medical pools. Legal contingency.” Mai said, “You financed it with debt.” “I financed it with what was available.” “You financed it with debt.” He looked up, angry now. “Yes. Fine. Yes. I thought if I scaled fast enough, revenue would outrun terms.” Ace closed her eyes. Mai looked almost pained. Shammy said, “That sounds like jumping from a roof and hoping the ground negotiates.” Creed stared at her. Then he laughed, and this time it was almost real. “Yeah,” he said. “Yeah. That’s… yeah.” Mai said, “When did Vane appear?” Creed’s humor died. “After the warehouse.” “Directly?” “No. That’s not how he works.” “We know.” Creed rubbed his eyes. “A man called Harker approached. Old suit, old manners, no visible chrome. Said my losses had attracted attention from parties who admired ambition.” Ace made a face. “That sentence should be illegal.” “I was tired.” “That is not a defense.” “No,” Creed said. “It’s context.” Good answer. Mai nodded. “Continue.” “Harker offered consolidation. Cleaner debt. Better terms. Access to old channels. I said no.” Ace raised an eyebrow. Creed noticed. “I’m stupid, not brain-dead. The offer smelled like a basement full of teeth.” “Then?” “Things got worse. Jobs failed. People got hurt. Existing creditors started selling positions. Suddenly the consolidation looked like the only way to stop the bleeding.” Mai said, “Designed dependency.” “Yes.” “And you took it.” “Yes.” Shammy’s voice was quiet. “Because you thought taking the leash might let you hold it from the middle.” Creed looked at her for a long moment. “Do you do that on purpose?” he asked. “Yes,” Mai and Ace said together. Shammy looked between them. “Sometimes it is simply visible.” Creed exhaled. “Yeah. I thought I could manage the leash. Feed Vane enough movement to keep him patient while I found a way to cut loose.” Ace said, “Instead he used you to reach Rogue.” “Yes.” Mai asked, “Why escalate against her publicly?” Creed looked sick. “Because Harker said Vane respected gravity. Said if I stayed under Rogue’s shadow, she’d ignore me until I was useful, then absorb what I built. If I challenged her, I’d force recognition.” Ace stared. “That worked.” Creed flinched. “It also nearly got you killed,” Mai said. “Repeatedly.” “Repeatedly,” Mai agreed. Creed looked at the treatment room door. “By the time I realized the point wasn’t winning, I had too many people tied to me. If I folded, Vane collected them. If I ran, same. If I went to Rogue with nothing, maybe she killed me, maybe she laughed, maybe she let me hang. I needed proof.” “Tomorrow’s meeting,” Mai said. “I thought if she actually sent the invite, then she already knew enough to talk. If it was fake, I thought I could use the route to expose Vane’s people.” Ace said, “Instead a sixteen-year-old got shot.” Creed’s face changed. Good. Let it hurt. “Yes,” he said. No excuse this time. Just yes. Mai looked down at her agent as a new message arrived. “Rogue’s watchers are three minutes out.” Creed nodded. “Heavy?” “Quiet.” “Good.” Ace looked at him. “You’re not in charge here.” His mouth opened. Then closed. He nodded again. Progress. Mai said, “We need to extract you without confirming to Vane that Rogue has you.” Creed frowned. “He may already know.” “No,” Mai said. “He knows Triad found you. That is different.” “How?” Ace said, “Because we’re weird.” Mai did not dispute this. “Triad intervening can still be read as investigation. Rogue taking custody becomes alignment.” Creed nodded slowly. “So I leave as myself?” “No,” Mai said. Ace immediately said, “No peitehahmot.” Mai looked at her. Ace pointed a finger. “No. Not this soon. Not after Maeve and Amber. I am not dyeing anything.” Creed blinked. “What?” Shammy’s lips pressed together with sudden, suspicious innocence. Mai said, very calmly, “No one is dyeing anything.” Ace lowered her finger. Creed looked like he had just glimpsed a conversation he was not emotionally prepared to enter. Shammy patted his shoulder once. He looked up at her. “It is better not to ask,” she said. “I wasn’t going to.” “Good survival instinct.” Mai continued as if nothing had happened. “You leave through the ambulance bay in a body bag.” Creed stared. Ace smiled. There it was. A plan with teeth. Creed said, “Absolutely not.” Mai looked at him. He sighed. “Right. Not in charge.” “Correct.” “You know how bad that looks if anyone sees?” “Exactly,” Mai said. “If Vane’s monitors see a body removed after a clinic attack, they will assume Nia died or one of the clinic’s emergency cases failed. They will not assume Mason Creed was smuggled out by Triad in the least dignified possible way.” Ace said, “Also funny.” Creed pointed at her. “To you.” “Yes.” Dr. Morrow stepped into the hallway behind them. “I have body bags.” Creed turned slowly. “Why was that so immediate?” “It’s Watson,” Dr. Morrow said. Nobody had an answer. Mai nodded. “We need one with thermal masking.” Dr. Morrow gave her a look. Then sighed. “Storage.” Creed whispered, “I hate this plan.” Ace patted his arm with no gentleness at all. “You’ll live.” “That feels conditional.” “It is.” Shammy smiled. “Educational.” Creed looked at all three of them. For the first time, despite the fear, guilt, and exhaustion, he seemed to understand the shape of his immediate future. Not saved. Not forgiven. Not safe. Handled. There was a difference. And perhaps, if he survived long enough, he might learn why that difference mattered. --- The body bag was black, heavy, and smelled faintly of plastic and terrible necessity. Creed stared at it on the gurney. “No,” he said again, weaker this time. Dr. Morrow snapped gloves onto her hands. “In.” “I am alive.” “Then cooperate while it’s still voluntary.” Ace leaned against the wall, enjoying herself more than the situation deserved. Mai checked the ambulance bay camera loop. Shammy stood beside the gurney, sympathetic in a way that only made Creed look more miserable. “It will be temporary,” she said. “How temporary?” Mai said, “Eleven minutes.” Creed stared. “You calculated?” “Yes.” “Of course you did.” Ace said, “In.” Creed looked at the ceiling like it might offer an appeal process. It did not. He got in. Dr. Morrow zipped the bag halfway, then stopped. “Panic?” Creed said nothing. Dr. Morrow looked at Ace. “He panics, he moves. He moves, he dies?” “Possibly,” Ace said. Dr. Morrow pulled an injector from her pocket. Creed sat up halfway. “No.” Dr. Morrow smiled for the first time. It was terrifying. “Then don’t panic.” Creed lay back down. The bag zipped. Shammy watched with open discomfort. Ace noticed. “You okay?” Shammy nodded slowly. “I do not like pretending people are dead.” That sobered the moment. Ace’s amusement faded. Mai looked up from the camera loop, expression softening. Creed’s voice came muffled from inside the bag. “For what it’s worth, neither do I.” Shammy touched the outside of the bag lightly, near where his shoulder probably was. “Then breathe and remain inconveniently alive,” she said. A pause. Then Creed said, quieter, “Okay.” Dr. Morrow muttered, “That was weirdly effective.” Ace said, “Happens.” The ambulance bay opened into a rear service lane where one of Rogue’s quiet watchers had already arranged a vehicle that looked like an underfunded medical transport and probably had more armor than most gang vans. Two attendants waited. Not real attendants. Too still. Too old around the eyes. Rogue’s people. One nodded to Mai. No names. Good. They rolled Creed out. No drama. No gunfire. No sudden betrayal. Just a body bag on a gurney moving through grey dawn mist while Night City failed to notice one more shape being taken from one bad place to another. Ace walked beside it. Mai walked ahead, monitoring cameras. Shammy followed near the rear, her atmosphere tucked in close, forcing herself not to change the weather even though every line of her body wanted to make the air kinder. Halfway to the transport, Mai said, “Camera on the corner moved.” Ace did not turn. “Monitor?” “Yes.” “Armed?” “Unknown.” One of Rogue’s attendants kept rolling. The other adjusted his sleeve. Ace said, “No.” He paused. “We’re not starting this here,” Ace said. The attendant glanced at her, then gave the tiniest nod. Professional. Mai’s eyes stayed on the feed. “Monitor is not engaging.” Shammy whispered, “Watching the story.” Ace looked toward the corner then, just enough to catch a reflection in the ambulance bay glass. A figure under a hood. Still. Recording? Maybe. Reporting? Definitely. Ace smiled at the reflection. Not friendly. The figure stepped back into mist. Good. Let Vane hear this version: A girl was shot. A body left the clinic. Triad was present. Nobody knew whose body. Let him decide what kind of story he was watching. The transport doors opened. They loaded Creed inside. Before the doors closed, Mai leaned in and unzipped the bag just enough for his face. Creed sucked air with admirable restraint. “I hate all of you,” he said. Ace nodded. “Bonding.” Mai held up one finger. “Listen carefully. You are being taken to a secondary holding site, not Afterlife.” Creed frowned. “Rogue said—” “Rogue said we bring you in. Not immediately. Not stupidly.” He looked like that distinction had offended and reassured him at once. Mai continued, “You will stay down. You will not contact your crew. You will not send signals. You will not improvise.” Creed looked at Ace. “What happens if I improvise?” Ace’s Shadow Aura moved in the dim transport interior, darkening the ceiling corners until the small space seemed deeper than it was. “You become less educational.” He swallowed. “Understood.” Shammy leaned into view. “You did well.” Creed stared. Then, from inside a half-open body bag, Mason Creed said in a voice full of exhausted disbelief, “That is the worst compliment I have ever received.” Shammy smiled. “But still a compliment.” The doors shut. The transport pulled away. No siren. No escort. No spectacle. Just another ugly vehicle vanishing into Watson’s morning. Mai watched the route until it split into three false tracks and disappeared under Rogue’s network. Ace exhaled. Dr. Morrow stood in the ambulance bay doorway with arms crossed. “Are you people always like this?” Ace said, “No.” Mai said, “Yes.” Shammy said, “Contextually.” Dr. Morrow looked at them. Then shook her head. “My clinic gets shot again, I send the bill to Rogue.” Mai nodded. “Reasonable.” Ace glanced toward the corner where the monitor had stood. Mist. Empty pavement. A smear of reflected neon in dirty water. Vane had seen something. Not enough. Maybe too much. Good. Mai’s agent chimed again. Not Eli. Not Rogue. Unknown channel. Text only. **BODY COUNT BEGINS WHEN SHE CLAIMS HIM.** Ace stared. Mai’s expression went cold enough to frost steel. Shammy’s atmosphere changed. Not storm. Not yet. Pressure. The kind before a front breaks. Ace looked toward the waking city. “There he is,” she said. Mai saved the message, isolated the channel, and sent one copy to Rogue. Rogue replied after six seconds. **Cute.** Then a second message. **Now we teach him manners.** --- ## Chapter 6 — The Body Doubles The secondary holding site was not impressive. That was how Ace knew it was good. Impressive places existed for people who needed to believe security had an aesthetic. Black glass, polished concrete, biometric locks glowing like expensive jewelry, armed guards standing where cameras could admire them. Night City loved that kind of theater. Corps built it into lobbies. Gangs copied it badly. Fixers avoided it unless they were selling fear to amateurs. Rogue’s site looked like a failed appliance warehouse behind a dead service road in Watson. One side of the sign still claimed **KAWAMURA DOMESTIC SOLUTIONS**. The other side had been burned away years ago, leaving only **MURA DOM** in blackened plastic. Ace stopped the car outside the perimeter gate and stared. “Cozy.” Mai checked the passive scan. “Structurally sound. Low external interest. Good sightlines. Poor branding.” Shammy leaned forward between the seats. “What did it sell?” “Domestic solutions,” Ace said. “That sounds ominous.” “It means washing machines.” “Oh.” Shammy considered this. “Still ominous.” Mai opened the gate code Rogue had sent. The chain-link gate rolled aside with a reluctant metallic groan that sounded exactly like it had been retired from caring. Inside, the lot contained three vans, two dead forklifts, a stack of broken refrigeration units, and one man sitting on a plastic chair beneath a rusted awning with a thermos in his hand. He did not stand when they arrived. He did not reach for a weapon. He simply looked at their car, looked at Ace through the windshield, and lifted two fingers in greeting. Ace liked him immediately. “Rogue’s?” she asked. Mai nodded. “Name listed as Hollis.” “Hollis what?” “Just Hollis.” “Good name.” Shammy tilted her head. “Is it?” “For this job? Yes.” They got out. Hollis took one slow drink from the thermos and rose with the careful motion of an older man whose knees had filed legal objections some time ago. He was broad once, still broad in outline, but age had taken some of the unnecessary mass and left the useful parts behind. Close-cropped grey hair. Weathered face. Brown coat. No visible chrome except an old knuckle reinforcement in his right hand. He looked at Shammy, blinked once, and said, “Tall.” Shammy smiled. “Yes.” He nodded as if confirming a warehouse inventory item. “Door’s open.” Ace glanced at Mai. Mai’s eyes said: professional. They followed him inside. The warehouse smelled of dust, machine oil, dead plastic, and recently brewed coffee. Old appliance shelving had been rearranged into visual barriers. Tarps hung in strategic positions. A central office block had been reinforced from within but left ugly outside. Good. No one had cleaned away the building’s failure. They had simply hidden competence under it. Mason Creed sat in the old dispatch office, no longer inside a body bag, though the body bag had been folded with dry cruelty on the table in front of him. He looked at it like it had personally betrayed him. Two of Rogue’s people stood nearby. Not guarding him theatrically. Existing in positions where action would become inconvenient for him. Creed looked up when the Triad entered. “You kept the bag.” Ace said, “Sentimental.” “It smells like plastic death.” “Then don’t bond with it.” Creed rubbed his face. “I liked you less when I was unconscious.” “You were never unconscious.” “I was emotionally unconscious.” Shammy brightened. “That is a useful phrase.” Creed looked at her. “Please don’t keep it.” Too late, obviously. Mai stepped inside and placed her agent on the table. “We need to review your doubles.” Creed’s expression shifted from embarrassment back into work stress so quickly that Ace saw the fixer under the wounded man again. Not gone. Not fake. Just buried under layers of recent humiliation. “How many do you know about?” Creed asked. Mai looked at him. He sighed. “Right.” He stood and moved to the wall display Hollis had apparently allowed him to use under supervision. The display showed six different movement profiles, three vehicle trees, two false clinic exits, and a layered route map that looked like a paranoid spider had tried urban planning. Ace stared. “You did all this?” Creed looked defensive. “Some of it.” Mai stepped closer. Her face went still. That was never casual. “This is not amateur work,” she said. Creed did not relax. Praise from Mai had edges, and he seemed smart enough to notice. “I told you,” he said. “I’m not stupid.” Ace said, “We are still evaluating.” “I noticed.” Mai examined the route trees. “You use body doubles only for visible transit?” “Mostly.” “Mostly?” Creed pointed at two profiles. “Dax drives primary decoy sometimes. Body profile close enough from exterior cams if he wears my coat. Eli spoofs agent proximity on old channels. Vera handles human confirmation when needed.” Ace’s jaw tightened. “You put your crew in your coat?” Creed flinched, then anger lit under it. “They volunteered.” Ace took one step toward him. The room changed. Not dramatically. Worse. The light behind Ace thinned around her outline. The Shadow Aura gathered close, dark pressure bending the corners of old glass in the dispatch office door. For a second, the dust motes in the room seemed to stop falling. Creed stopped talking. Mai did not intervene immediately. Shammy watched both of them with quiet concern. Ace’s voice stayed level. “People volunteer for bad ideas when they believe the alternative is watching someone else die.” Creed swallowed. “I know,” he said. Ace stared. He did not look away this time. Good. Pain had made him less slippery. “I know,” he repeated. “Dax took my coat twice because he said I was more useful alive than him. I told him that was stupid. He told me to stop making it true.” Ace felt the anger remain, but its shape changed. Mai said, “That is a crew problem.” Creed laughed once. “That is a leadership problem.” Another good answer. Damn him. Ace stepped back. Shammy’s shoulders eased slightly. Hollis, who had been leaning against the doorframe, took another drink from his thermos. “Fun group,” he said. Ace glanced at him. “You always this helpful?” “Mostly worse.” Rogue’s people had texture. Ace appreciated that. Mai tapped one of the route trees. “Vane’s monitor message suggests he knows Rogue has not yet publicly claimed you. He is pushing for visible custody.” Creed nodded slowly. “If Rogue hides me, he says she snatched me. If she displays me, he says she’s escalating. If I die anywhere near her people, he says she executed a rival.” “Correct,” Mai said. Ace crossed her arms. “So we break the frame.” Creed looked at her. Mai did too, but with interest. Ace pointed at the wall. “He needs one Creed. A body. A story. A direction. We give him too many.” Creed’s eyes narrowed. “Flood the board?” “Body doubles,” Ace said. “All wrong enough to be doubted, right enough to be chased.” Mai’s expression sharpened. “Multiple simultaneous Creed sightings.” Creed stared at the map. Then his tired eyes woke up. Not with hope. With strategy. “Vane’s monitors have to report upward,” he said. “If they report conflicting sightings, handler layer has to classify. If classification fails…” Mai finished. “They reveal priority by response.” Creed looked at her. “Yes.” Ace looked between them. “That sounded like agreement. I hate it.” Shammy leaned toward Ace. “It means the rats show which cheese matters.” Everyone looked at her. She blinked. “Is that wrong?” Hollis took a drink. “No.” Mai’s mouth twitched. “Crude, but accurate.” Creed stared at Shammy with something like reluctant awe. “That was actually better than how I would have explained it.” Shammy smiled. “Thank you.” Ace pointed at Creed. “Do not encourage her into operational rodent metaphors.” “It worked.” “That’s the problem.” Mai pulled up the data from Finch’s ledger fragments. “We have possible monitor nodes at six positions. If we create three Creed movements and one false body transfer, Vane must choose which version to follow.” Creed shook his head. “Four.” Mai looked at him. “Three living Creeds, one dead Creed,” he said. “Vane already saw a body bag leave the clinic. Keep that thread active.” Ace glanced at the folded bag. Creed noticed. “No,” he said immediately. Ace smiled slowly. “No,” Creed repeated. “Absolutely not. I am not getting back into the corpse sack.” Mai said, “It is tactically useful.” “You too? Really?” Shammy looked sympathetic again. “You survived it once.” “That is not an argument for repetition.” Hollis lifted the thermos. “Kind of is.” Creed turned to him. “Whose side are you on?” “Rogue’s.” “Right. Horrible question.” Ace leaned against the table. “You don’t have to be the dead Creed.” Creed paused. Then understood. His expression darkened. “No.” Mai watched him. “Dax?” “No.” “If he already served as your double—” “No.” Ace said, “You just said we need four.” “I’ll use a dummy.” Mai shook her head. “Thermals will flag false.” “Then spoof thermals.” “Not against close monitor work.” Creed snapped, “I’m not putting Dax in a body bag.” The room went quiet. There it was. Not arrogance. Fear. Specific, personal, immediate. Ace studied him. Creed looked furious with them, with himself, with the plan, with the entire moral geometry of needing people to risk themselves because he had built a machine out of debt and good intentions and watched it become teeth. Shammy spoke carefully. “Would Dax agree?” “Yes,” Creed said. “That is the problem.” Ace glanced at Mai. Mai’s expression had softened almost invisibly. Creed continued, quieter. “He’d agree before I finished asking. Vera would hate it and let him. Eli would panic and still do his part. Lin would pretend she was fine. And then if one of them died, everyone would tell me they chose it.” He looked at Ace. “You were right. People volunteer for bad ideas when the alternative is watching someone else die.” Ace said nothing. Because yes. That was exactly what she had said. And unlike most people, Creed had apparently listened hard enough to bleed from it. Mai folded her hands. “Then we do not use Dax.” Creed’s head turned toward her. “Or Vera. Or Eli. Or Lin,” Mai added. Ace raised an eyebrow. “We need bodies.” Hollis cleared his throat. “Rogue has bodies.” Everyone looked at him. He shrugged. “Alive ones.” Ace decided she liked him more. Mai said, “Rogue’s people as doubles?” “Not inner circle,” Hollis said. “Old contractors. Owe favors. Good at being seen wrong.” Creed looked suspicious. “Why would they risk themselves for me?” Hollis stared at him over the thermos. “They’re not risking themselves for you.” Creed shut up. Hollis continued, “They’re risking themselves because someone forged Rogue’s name and tried to make a mess in her house.” Ace smiled faintly. That was the cleanest explanation anyone had offered all night. Creed absorbed it slowly. Again, the lesson under the job: Rogue’s network did not move because Mason Creed mattered. It moved because the board mattered. Because reputation mattered. Because if someone could place a false story under Rogue’s signature, every old professional in her gravity had a reason to be offended. Mai began building the model. “We need four signal paths.” Creed stepped closer despite himself. “Five.” Ace groaned. “Of course.” Creed pointed to the map. “Vane expects me to run, hide, or plead. He expects Rogue to hide, punish, or display me. He expects people around me to panic. So yes, four visible outcomes. But the fifth path should be boring.” “Define boring,” Mai said. “Paperwork.” Ace stared. “What?” Creed’s tired eyes sharpened further. “Debt assignment filings. Legal shadow instruments. If Vane’s people think I’m dead or captured, they’ll start moving to collect obligations. If one false channel suggests my debts are being transferred—not erased, transferred—they may expose who expected to receive them.” Mai went perfectly still. Ace looked at her. “Good?” “Very.” Creed watched Mai’s face like a man waiting for a verdict. Mai said, “That is not bad.” Creed exhaled. Ace leaned toward Shammy. “That means excellent.” Shammy nodded. “But emotionally constipated.” Mai looked at them. Ace pointed at Shammy. “Her phrase.” Shammy looked unrepentant. Creed whispered, “I am too tired for whatever this is.” Hollis said, “You get used to it?” Ace shrugged. “No.” Mai ignored all of them and expanded the model. “Five threads. Living Creed northbound, living Creed eastbound, captured Creed moving under Rogue-adjacent custody, dead Creed body transfer, and debt transfer paper trail. Each touches a different Vane-adjacent monitor set.” Creed nodded. “Whichever one triggers strongest reveals what Vane values most.” “Body, custody, public story, or assets,” Mai said. Ace crossed her arms. “And actual Creed?” Mai and Creed answered together. “Stationary.” They looked at each other. Creed seemed startled. Mai seemed annoyed by the synchronization. Ace smiled slowly. “Oh, no.” Mai said, “Do not.” “You two just shared a fixer-nerd moment.” Creed’s face twisted. “Never say that again.” Shammy looked intrigued. “Fixer-nerd.” Mai pointed at her. “No.” Hollis took a drink, shoulders moving once in silent amusement. For half a breath, the room almost warmed. Then Mai’s agent chimed. Rogue. Voice this time. Mai answered. Rogue said, “Tell me.” Mai summarized in clean strokes. Four visible Creed threads, one debt-transfer trigger, actual Creed held stationary under old warehouse cover, controlled exposure to force Vane’s handler layer to reveal priority. Rogue listened without interruption. When Mai finished, there was silence. Then Rogue said, “Who came up with the paperwork thread?” Creed looked like he wanted to disappear. Mai looked at him. Ace smiled. Mai said, “Creed.” Another silence. Rogue said, “Huh.” Creed looked wounded. “That sounded worse than an insult.” “It was surprise,” Rogue said. “Don’t get used to it.” Ace bit back a laugh. Rogue continued, all business now. “Hollis.” Hollis lifted his head. “Here.” “Call Wren, Bosco, and Little June. They owe me ugly favors. I want them visible by noon.” “Done.” “Mai, send me the model. I’ll have my people ghost the debt thread.” “Already packaging.” “Ace.” Ace looked at the agent. “Yeah?” “If Creed tries to leave, break something educational.” Creed muttered, “I am in the room.” Rogue said, “I know.” Shammy lifted one hand. “What should I do?” Rogue paused. That was rare. Then she said, “Watch the weather.” Shammy’s expression softened into something pleased and serious at once. “I can do that.” “I mean people-weather.” “I know.” Rogue ended the call. Creed sat down heavily. For the first time since they had met him, he seemed to run out of motion. Not collapse. Not theatrics. Just a man whose nerves had been burning too hot for too long and had found a chair before the floor became involved. Ace watched him. “You need food,” she said. He looked up. “What?” “Food. You’ve been running on guilt and bad coffee.” “I’ve had protein bars.” “That is not food.” Mai said, “Correct.” Shammy looked at Hollis. “Is there food here?” Hollis considered. “Vending machine.” Ace grimaced. “That is also not food.” Hollis shrugged. “Domestic solutions failed years ago.” Creed laughed despite himself. It was small and ugly, but real enough. Then he put both hands over his face. For a second, no one moved. The laugh had broken something loose. Not enough to spill. Enough to show cracks. Creed’s shoulders shook once. He forced it down. Ace looked away. Not because she was uncomfortable. Because he did not need an audience for every fracture. Shammy stepped toward him. Mai caught her wrist lightly. Shammy stopped, looked at Mai, then understood. Not every wound needed immediate touch. Sometimes dignity was the last bandage a person had. Creed lowered his hands after a few seconds. His eyes were wet. He hated that. Everyone politely pretended not to inventory it. Except Ace, who said, “You look terrible.” Creed stared at her. Then laughed again. Better this time. “Thank you.” “You’re welcome.” Mai’s voice softened, though only by her standards. “You made bad structural choices.” Creed wiped his face. “Comforting.” “But not all of your instincts were wrong.” He looked at her. That landed harder than insult. Mai continued, “You identified actual failures in fixer practice. Payment abuse. crew disposability, medical neglect, legal abandonment. Those are real. Your error was assuming better ethics could be scaled faster than predatory systems could weaponize your funding.” Creed stared at her like she had just read his obituary and corrected the grammar. Ace murmured to Shammy, “That is Mai for ‘you tried.’” Shammy whispered back, “It was beautiful.” Creed said, “I can hear you.” Ace said, “Good.” Mai ignored them. “If you survive this, you will need to decide whether the lesson makes you smarter or just bitter.” Creed’s mouth tightened. “Night City usually prefers bitter,” he said. “Yes,” Mai replied. “That is why smarter is useful.” Silence. Hollis cleared his throat. “Vending machine has noodles too.” Ace looked at him. “You said no protein bars.” “Are the noodles older than Creed’s fixer career?” “Probably.” Creed muttered, “Everything is.” Ace pointed at him. “Eat anyway.” “I’m being hunted by a fossil with debt magic.” “And if you pass out, I’m putting you back in the bag.” Creed stood immediately. “Noodles sound great.” Shammy beamed at him. Mai’s agent chimed again as the model upload confirmed. Outside, the day finally began, grey light pressing weakly through the warehouse windows. Watson did not become kinder in daylight. It merely showed more stains. But the board had changed. For the first time, Vane would have to respond to more than his own plan. And Mason Creed, idiot climber, failed reformer, debt-owned almost-corpse, was eating suspicious noodles from a cracked vending machine while Rogue’s oldest favors began moving through the city. Ace watched him fumble with the plastic fork. Normal job, she thought. Absolutely normal. Then the noodles came out in one solid brick. Creed stared at them. Shammy whispered, “Domestic solution.” Ace laughed first. Mai followed despite herself. Even Hollis made a sound. Creed looked at the noodle brick, then at all of them, then finally gave up and laughed too. It was brief. It did not fix anything. But for one fragile moment inside a dead appliance warehouse, nobody was dying. That counted. --- By noon, Mason Creed had died twice, fled once, been captured once, and transferred three million eddies of debt instruments through a shell entity that did not legally exist. All without leaving the warehouse. Mai made it look elegant. That was the problem with Mai. She could take a filthy mechanism and arrange it so cleanly that people forgot how ugly the parts were. The five-thread operation unfolded across Watson and nearby districts in controlled pulses. Thread one: Wren, an old solo with Creed’s approximate build and the kind of walk cameras believed when paid badly, crossed a Northside market in Creed’s coat. He paused deliberately at two vendor stalls, argued visibly with a driver, then vanished into a service elevator. Three monitor pings followed him. Thread two: Bosco, broader than Creed but wearing posture correction tech and a hood, entered a rented sedan in Kabuki under a spoofed agent signal. The sedan drove east, changed plates twice, and let itself be seen by exactly the wrong traffic camera. Two monitor pings followed. Thread three: Little June, who was neither little nor June as far as Ace could tell, staged a half-visible custody transfer near a shuttered clinic annex. Rogue-adjacent old contractors moved around her with enough discipline to imply importance and enough sloppiness to imply secrecy. Five monitor pings followed. “That one’s winning,” Ace said, watching the feed over Mai’s shoulder. Mai shook her head. “Not necessarily. Quantity is not priority.” Creed stood behind them, arms folded, trying very hard not to hover and failing completely. “What about the dead thread?” Mai opened another window. The body bag from Morrow Community Care had been transferred again, this time by a medical disposal service with credentials so depressing nobody wanted to verify them deeply. Inside was not a person. Not even a dummy. Thermal baffling, blood residue packets, and enough bureaucratic sadness to make cameras look away. Vane’s monitors barely touched it. “Interesting,” Creed said. Ace glanced at him. “Because he doesn’t care if you’re dead?” “No,” Creed said. “Because he knows I’m not.” Mai nodded. “Or because the dead-Creed story is only useful if publicly attached to Rogue. An anonymous medical disposal does not serve him.” Shammy watched the fifth thread. The paperwork. No bodies. No cars. No staged fear. Just a shell debt assignment file seeded through two broker systems and one legal ghost network Finch’s data had exposed. The file suggested Mason Creed’s obligations were being consolidated after his incapacitation by an unknown third party. For eight minutes, nothing happened. Then the entire hidden layer lit up. Mai sat forward. “There.” Creed moved closer. “What?” “Priority response,” Mai said. “Debt transfer triggered the fastest high-level authentication challenge.” Ace looked at the lines on the screen. “Meaning?” Creed answered, voice grim. “Vane doesn’t care where my body is.” Mai’s face was cold. “He cares who owns the debt.” Shammy’s expression darkened. “Because the people are attached to it.” Yes. There it was. The real shape. Not Mason Creed as rival. Not Mason Creed as corpse. Not even Mason Creed as bait. Mason Creed as a node connected to dozens of frightened people through money, favors, medical coverage, legal cleanup, and desperation. If Vane owned the debt, he owned the ecosystem. If Rogue appeared to seize Creed violently, Vane could inherit anyone afraid of her. If Creed died, the debts ripened. If Creed lived but broke, the debts could still be harvested. Rogue’s voice came through the open line. “Mai.” “I see it.” “Send me the authentication signature.” “Already done.” Creed stepped toward the display, pale. “Can you trace it?” Mai’s fingers moved. “Not to Vane directly. But to a handler node.” Rogue said, “Name.” Mai waited two seconds for the decryption layer to resolve. “Harker.” Creed closed his eyes. Ace saw his hands curl at his sides. The man in the old suit. Old manners. Basement full of teeth. Rogue’s voice changed. Barely. But enough. “Harker works out of Charter Hill now.” Mai asked, “Known location?” “Three. One real. Two vanity.” Ace smiled. “Vanity?” “Men like Harker always keep rooms where they think betrayal looks good on camera.” Creed whispered, “He likes the Tollen building.” Rogue went silent. Mai looked at Creed. Creed opened his eyes. “Private floor. Not officially his. Legal consultancy front. He took me there once to show me how invisible he was.” Ace said, “That was a sentence he said?” “Almost exactly.” “Embarrassing.” Rogue said, “Tollen is real.” Mai mapped it immediately. Charter Hill. Mid-rise corporate service building. Legal, financial, and consultancy tenants. Enough security to feel respectable. Not enough to repel serious trouble. Perfect for a man who did not want to look like a gangster. Rogue continued, “Harker will bolt if he knows we found the debt node.” Mai looked at the live signatures. “He does not know yet. His challenge is automated.” “Then we move now.” Creed stepped forward. “I’m coming.” Everyone looked at him. Ace said, “No.” Creed’s jaw set. “He knows me. He may talk if—” “No,” Ace repeated. Mai said, “You are stationary.” “I can help.” “You already did.” “That’s not enough.” Ace turned fully toward him. “You being alive is the point.” “My people are tied to that debt.” “Yes,” Mai said. “Which is why you do not hand Vane the central asset by walking into Harker’s office.” Creed looked at Shammy, perhaps hoping for gentleness. Shammy looked back at him with regret. “No,” she said. He laughed bitterly. “Unanimous.” Hollis, from near the door, said, “I also vote no.” Creed glared. “You weren’t asked.” “Still no.” Rogue said, “Creed.” He went still. Not obedient. Attentive. Rogue’s voice came through the room like old steel. “You want to be useful? Sit down. Stay alive. Let professionals cut the wire you wrapped around your own throat.” Creed’s face tightened. For a second, Ace thought he might argue. Then Nia’s bandaged shoulder, Kell’s clinic memory, Sera’s brother, Tobin’s shame, Vera’s exhausted eyes—all of it seemed to pass behind his expression. He sat. Not gracefully. But he sat. Rogue said, “Good boy.” Creed’s head snapped up in pure outrage. “Excuse me?” The line clicked dead. Ace lost the fight and laughed. Mai turned away too late to hide her smile. Shammy covered her mouth with both hands and failed completely. Even Hollis coughed into his thermos. Creed stared at all of them. “I hate this entire educational process.” Ace wiped one eye. “You’re learning so much.” “Against my will.” “Best kind.” Mai collected the active operation package and transferred command permissions to Rogue’s network. “Hollis, keep him here.” Hollis nodded. “That was the plan before he got ideas.” “I had one idea,” Creed muttered. “One too many,” Ace said. Shammy gave Creed a gentle look as they headed for the door. “We will try not to make things worse.” Creed stared. Mai said, “Do not promise that.” Shammy considered. “We will try not to make things worse accidentally.” Ace nodded. “Better.” Creed put his face in his hands again. They left him there with the noodle brick, the folded body bag, Hollis, and the rapidly dawning horror that being rescued by professionals did not feel nearly as dignified as stories suggested. Outside, Watson had become daylight ugly. Ace opened the car door. Mai was already sending the Tollen building plan to her agent. Shammy looked back once at the warehouse. “He wants to go because guilt is louder than fear now,” she said. Ace got in. “Good.” Mai glanced at her. Ace started the car. “Fear kept him running. Guilt might keep him honest.” Mai accepted that with a small nod. Shammy folded into the back seat. “Are we going to Harker?” she asked. Ace pulled out of the lot. “Yes.” “To kidnap him too?” Mai’s eyes stayed on the building plan. “No,” she said. Ace smiled. “We are going to make him talk.” Shammy considered. “With words first?” Ace looked at her in the rearview mirror. “Mostly.” --- ## Chapter 7 — First Contact Charter Hill knew how to make corruption look climate-controlled. The streets widened. The trash became less visible. Security drones moved with cleaner flight patterns. Buildings wore polished skins and transparent lobbies and carefully lit reception areas where plants grew under full-spectrum lamps better than most people in Watson grew under the sun. Ace hated it on principle. Not because Charter Hill was richer. Rich was just another kind of weapon. She hated the specific lie of it — the way the district pretended violence became civilized when it wore glass, when the blood moved through contracts instead of gutters, when men like Harker could sit twenty floors above the street and call predation “risk consolidation.” Mai drove this time. That was not usual, but it made sense. Ace had too much pressure under her skin. Her Shadow Aura kept pushing against the edges of the car interior, not wild, not out of control, but awake in a way that made reflections in nearby windows hesitate when the car passed. Better to let Mai handle traffic. Ace sat in the passenger seat, arms folded, watching the Tollen building approach. It looked boring. That was the insult. A mid-rise corporate service block with tasteful stonework at street level, a lobby that glowed warm but not welcoming, and tenant signage arranged in careful rows beside the entrance. Legal consultancy. Tax architecture. Dispute mediation. Asset protection. The soft vocabulary of people who stole with punctuation. Shammy leaned forward from the back seat. “Why do the dangerous buildings here look calmer?” she asked. Mai slowed at an intersection. “Because calm is expensive.” Ace said, “And because screaming ruins client confidence.” Shammy considered that. “So they hide the screaming.” “Mostly in invoices,” Mai said. Ace glanced at her. Mai’s expression did not change. Beautiful. They passed the main entrance without stopping. Mai turned into a service lane behind the building, where Charter Hill’s clean face became pipes, vents, delivery ports, and bored private security trying not to look bored because cameras were watching them too. A trash compactor hummed behind a metal enclosure. Two delivery drivers argued quietly over access codes. A maintenance drone bumped once against a wall and corrected itself with corporate dignity. Mai parked under a loading canopy. “No weapons visible,” she said. Ace smiled faintly. “So just us.” “Exactly.” Shammy looked at her hands. “I do not usually have visible weapons.” “You are visible weather,” Ace said. “I was asked to watch people-weather.” “And you’re doing great.” Shammy smiled, pleased enough that Ace immediately regretted being nice in an operational context. Mai opened the building schematic. “Harker’s floor is officially occupied by Sable Meridian Advisory. Tax restructuring, offshore legal routing, litigation avoidance.” Ace stared at the tenant name. “Every word in that should be shot.” “Not legally actionable.” “Spiritually actionable.” “Focus.” Mai brought up the security layer. “Public elevators require tenant credentials above floor eight. Service elevators require rolling contractor tokens. Internal stairwells are alarmed but not heavily monitored between twelve and eighteen.” “Harker’s floor?” “Seventeen.” Ace looked at her. “You already have a route.” “Yes.” “Of course.” “It is not difficult.” “Mai.” “It is a building designed by people who believe access control is the same as security.” Shammy leaned closer. “Is it not?” Mai’s eyes stayed on the schematic. “No.” Ace said, “That was a happy no.” “It was professional satisfaction.” “That’s your happy.” Mai ignored her harder. They entered through a side maintenance door behind two legitimate HVAC contractors whose badges Mai had borrowed digitally with the gentle violence of competence. The contractors never noticed. Their access opened the first layer. Mai opened the second. Shammy ducked under a camera mount that really should have been higher if the building wanted to avoid offending meteorological beings. The service corridor smelled like industrial cleaner and recirculated air. Sterile. Ace disliked it immediately. Her Shadow Aura disliked it too. Not because anything anomalous pushed back. There was no anomaly here. No old god residue, no cursed artifact, no signal rot from places outside the world. Just human systems polished until they forgot they were made of people. Sometimes that was worse. They took the service elevator to twelve, then the stairs. Mai moved first in the stairwell, listening through the building’s network. Ace followed close enough to pass her if violence appeared. Shammy came last, careful and quiet despite architecture’s continuing vendetta. On floor fifteen, voices drifted from the landing above. Mai stopped. Ace froze. Shammy stilled the air around them without stopping it completely. A soft quiet gathered, not silencing, just making the stairwell feel less interested in carrying sound. Two men on sixteen. Security, by cadence. One was chewing something. The other said, “—heard Harker’s pissed.” Chewing man answered, “Harker’s always pissed. He looks polite because his face forgot how.” “Not like today. Saw three calls go up. Old channel. Real old.” “Means nothing to me.” “Means stand where told and don’t get curious.” Chewing. “Already my religion.” A door opened. Closed. Footsteps faded. Ace looked at Mai. Mai lifted one finger: wait. Thirty seconds. Then they moved. At seventeen, Mai did not open the stairwell door immediately. She placed two fingers near the seam and watched her agent. “Hall camera cycles through a blind correction every nine seconds.” Ace said, “That sounds incompetent.” “It is likely intentional. A micro-gap for known movement.” “Harker’s?” “Yes.” Shammy whispered, “He keeps holes in his walls.” Mai nodded. “Useful phrase.” Ace looked back at Shammy. “Don’t encourage her. That’s my job.” The camera dipped into its correction cycle. Mai opened the door. They entered. The seventeenth floor of the Tollen building looked like money pretending to be discretion. Grey carpet. Soft wall panels. Frosted glass. No loud logos. No reception desk. No obvious guards. Just a corridor lined with closed doors and enough hidden sensors to reassure nervous clients that their sins would remain professionally categorized. Mai led them past two empty conference rooms and one occupied office where a woman in an expensive suit shouted silently at a holographic financial model through soundproof glass. At the end of the hall, a door bore the words: **SABLE MERIDIAN ADVISORY** **PRIVATE CLIENT STRUCTURING** Ace stared. “Still shootable.” Mai opened the door. Inside was not a lobby. It was a waiting room designed to make rich people feel they had already won by arriving. Low chairs. Dark wood. Abstract art that looked expensive and emotionally avoidant. A water feature whispered along one wall, recycling the same clean stream forever. A man stood from behind a side desk. Not young. Not old. Polished. Augmented eyes too subtle to be street work. Suit dark enough to imply he did not need color. “Appointments are by—” Ace walked past him. He reached for a silent alarm. Mai said, “No.” His hand stopped because the screen under his palm went black. He looked at her. Mai looked back. Something in his professional face decided escalation was above his pay grade. Good. Shammy paused beside him. “Where is Mr. Harker?” “I can’t disclose—” Ace called from the inner door, “Found him.” The man closed his eyes. Harker’s office was exactly what Creed’s story had promised. A vanity room. Not because it was gaudy. It was worse than gaudy. It was curated. Floor-to-ceiling windows overlooked Charter Hill and the lower district haze beyond it. A long desk of dark glass sat before the view. Shelves held physical books nobody had opened in years. Two old photographs rested on a side credenza: one of Night City decades younger, one of men in suits standing beside a dead industrial site as if they had buried something profitable there. Harker stood near the window with an agent in one hand. Old suit. Old manners. No visible chrome. He turned as Ace entered, and his face did not change enough. That was the first thing Ace hated about him. Not fearless. Practiced. He had expected someone eventually. Maybe not them. Maybe not now. But men like Harker lived in rooms built around eventual confrontation and congratulated themselves for not blinking when it arrived. “Triad,” he said. Ace stopped in front of the desk. “Suit.” Mai entered behind her. Shammy followed, filling the doorway with quiet height. Harker’s eyes flicked to Shammy. A fraction too long. Not desire. Not awe. Calculation failing to classify. Good. He smiled. “Rogue’s taste in contractors remains dramatic.” Ace said, “Your taste in offices makes me want to bite furniture.” Harker’s smile paused. Mai moved to the side, already reading the room. Not just devices. Furniture positions, exit angles, concealed panels, the reflexive half-shift of Harker’s left foot when he noticed her notice the desk edge. His real panic exit was not behind him. It was probably under the side wall near the credenza. Shammy looked out the window. “High rooms make people think the city is quiet,” she said. Harker’s gaze returned to her. “And what do low rooms do?” “They tell the truth.” Ace almost smiled. Harker did not. He set his agent on the desk. “I assume this is about Mr. Creed.” Mai said, “You confirmed the debt transfer challenge too quickly.” Harker looked at her. For the first time, the politeness sharpened. “That is a very specific accusation.” “Yes.” “Specific accusations usually arrive with evidence.” Mai’s expression remained calm. “We are not in court.” “No,” Harker said. “You are in a private office without an appointment.” Ace leaned one hand on the desk. The glass did not crack. It sounded like it considered the option. “Then stop acting like paperwork can save you.” Harker turned his attention back to her. “Violence is a poor argument.” Ace’s Shadow Aura moved behind her, climbing the desk reflection without touching the actual surface. In the dark glass, her silhouette looked larger than her body, wrong in the shoulders, patient in the head. “Only when badly used,” she said. Harker’s fingers twitched once near the agent. Mai said, “Do not.” He stopped. Again, the room shifted. Harker was not a fighter. Not physically. But he was used to rooms obeying him through systems. Silent alarms. legal threats, social pressure, hidden guards, recorded leverage. Mai had removed enough of those that he had to stand in the room as a person. He disliked that. Good. Shammy walked slowly along the window wall, studying the city below. “Mason Creed thought you were helping him.” Harker gave a soft sigh. “Mr. Creed is ambitious. Men like that often mistake structure for support.” Mai said, “You mean leash.” “I mean structure.” Ace tilted her head. “We can ask Mason.” Harker’s expression did not change. But his eyes did. Tiny movement. There. First contact. Not with Harker. With fear. “He’s alive,” Ace said. Harker smiled faintly. “For now?” Ace stepped closer. Mai said, “Ace.” Not warning. Measurement. Ace stopped just before the desk. Harker continued, voice smooth. “If Rogue has him, then I imagine his survival window depends on how charmingly he apologizes.” “You expected her to kill him,” Mai said. “I expect Ms. Amendiares to protect her reputation.” Shammy turned from the window. “No. You expected her to act like you.” Harker looked at her. That one touched something. Not deep. Men like Harker rarely kept deep places where people could reach them. But it scratched the polish. Mai placed her agent on the desk and projected a stripped model of the five-thread operation. Harker’s face remained controlled. Too controlled. Creed had said the Tollen building existed so Harker could show people how invisible he was. Mai had brought a map of his hand and laid it on his own glass desk. Thread one. Thread two. Thread three. Dead Creed. Debt transfer. Authentication challenge. Handler node. Harker’s signature pattern. No direct Vane line, but enough proximity to make denial expensive. Harker looked at the projection. Then at Mai. “You are very good.” Mai said, “Yes.” Ace loved when she did that. Harker’s smile returned, thinner now. “Then you understand this proves very little.” “Legally,” Mai said. “This city still has laws.” Ace laughed. Harker ignored her. “It also has reputational mechanics. You break into my office, threaten me, and wave around incomplete debt architecture. That does not hurt me. It confirms Ms. Amendiares is nervous.” Mai tilted her head slightly. “No,” she said. “It confirms she sent people before sending herself.” Harker’s smile faded. There it was again. Rogue as weather he did not control. Ace leaned forward. “Where’s Vane?” Harker looked genuinely amused now. “Do you think I know?” “Yes.” “Then I’m flattered.” “You shouldn’t be.” He folded his hands behind his back. “Silas Vane is a historical name attached to many anxieties. People require ghosts. Ghosts make failures feel larger.” Shammy moved away from the window. The air in the office thickened. Not storm. Pressure. The water feature along the wall began to sound too loud. “I do not like that,” she said. Harker looked at her. “Which part?” “You speak as if people are only useful when they become afraid of stories.” Harker smiled. “People are most useful when they understand consequences.” Shammy’s eyes cooled. Ace felt it. Not anger like hers. Not sharp. Not immediate. Shammy’s displeasure arrived like the sky noticing a fire. Mai said, “You used Creed’s debts to identify people in his orbit who could be harvested after his fall.” Harker sighed. “Harvested. Such dramatic vocabulary.” Ace said, “Nia got shot.” “A regrettable pressure event.” The office became very still. Ace moved before the last syllable finished breathing. She crossed the desk without going around it. One hand planted on the glass, compact body vaulting over with clean, violent economy. Harker tried to step back. Too slow. She caught him by the front of his perfect suit and drove him against the window hard enough to make the reinforced pane boom. Not crack. Boom. The city spread beneath them. Harker’s face changed now. There was the man. Not polished. Not invisible. Not structure. Man. Ace held him against the glass, feet barely needing leverage, strength concentrated into a frame people kept misreading until the hand was already at their throat. Mai did not stop her. Shammy did not either. Ace’s voice was quiet. “Regrettable is when coffee tastes bad.” Harker’s breath hitched. “Nia is sixteen.” His hands lifted slowly, not fighting. Showing compliance. Calculating survival. “She was not meant to die.” Ace slammed him once, shorter, harder. The window boomed again. “Wrong answer.” Harker swallowed. His pulse moved under the skin at his neck. Good. Let him feel the low room. Mai’s voice came from behind Ace, calm and merciless. “You are not protected by usefulness right now. Adjust.” Harker’s eyes flicked toward her. Toward Shammy. Toward the inactive agent. Toward the side wall panic exit Mai had not yet touched. Every system that usually saved him had become distance. Ace said, “Talk.” Harker breathed once. Twice. “Creed was never the objective.” Mai said, “We know.” Harker’s mouth tightened. He disliked losing the reveal. “His network was,” he said. Mai recorded silently. “Medical obligations, crew loyalties, small contractors, emergency legal instruments, unofficial family protections. He built connective tissue. Poorly, but sincerely. That made him vulnerable.” Ace’s grip tightened. Harker continued faster. “If he died publicly under Rogue’s shadow, half his people would scatter and the rest would look for shelter. If Rogue took him openly, same. If he vanished, same. Fear creates liquidity.” Shammy said, “That is disgusting.” Harker looked at her despite Ace’s grip. “It is accurate.” “No,” Shammy said. “It is both.” Harker had no answer ready for that. Mai stepped closer. “Vane intended to absorb Creed’s network through debt enforcement.” “Vane intended nothing,” Harker said. Ace pulled him one inch from the glass and slammed him back. The boom shook one of the physical books from the shelf. Harker’s voice broke slightly. “I intended to transfer distressed obligations to interested parties.” Mai said, “Name them.” He laughed despite himself. “No.” Ace smiled. Not wide. Harker saw it and stopped laughing. Mai said, “We do not need all of them. We need the next move.” “There is no next move.” Ace shifted her grip upward, bunching expensive fabric under his jaw. Mai said, “Harker.” He looked at her. “You already know the debt-transfer trigger was compromised. Your automated challenge exposed you. Rogue will have that signature within her trusted circles before sunset. If you vanish now, guilt. If you deny, weakness. If you escalate, panic.” Harker breathed shallowly. Mai’s voice remained clean. “You have one useful option.” He stared. “Trade upward.” There. The old predator behind his eyes understood that language. Ace hated that Mai was right to use it. Harker said nothing. Mai continued, “Give us the immediate handler layer above you. Not Vane. Not his myth. The operational node for Creed’s debt harvesting. In return, you walk out of this office embarrassed instead of broken.” Ace looked at Mai. “Embarrassed?” Mai did not look away from Harker. “Professionally.” Harker’s mouth twitched, even pinned against glass. “You learned from Rogue.” “Yes,” Mai said. That answer had no vanity in it. Which made it heavier. Harker looked at Ace. “And if I refuse?” Ace’s Shadow Aura rose behind her along the window reflection, taller than both of them, a black pressure silhouette with emerald fault-lines trembling where the glass caught city light. It was still part of Ace. Always part of Ace. Not separate. Not a creature. Her anger given environmental grammar. Harker stared at the reflection. For the first time, he looked genuinely unable to price what he was seeing. Ace said, “Then we stop using words.” Shammy’s voice came quietly. “Words first was the agreement.” Ace did not look back. “Still first.” Mai said, “Harker.” He closed his eyes briefly. When he opened them, the old manners returned, but damaged now. Bent at the corners. “Ormond.” Mai’s fingers moved. “Full name.” “Celeste Ormond.” Ace looked at Mai. Mai’s eyes sharpened. Harker continued, “Debt litigation specialist. Private arbitration background. She handles enforceable transitions when Vane wants distance.” Mai searched through Rogue’s packet and Finch’s fragments. “Ormond appears twice in shell recovery documents.” “Yes.” “Location?” “She moves.” Ace tightened her hand. Harker hissed. “But she has a live arbitration this afternoon. Remote, probably. Uses a secured suite under the old Petrochem mediation annex.” Mai mapped it. “Heywood border.” “Neutral territory,” Harker said. “Whose neutral?” His smile returned slightly. That was answer enough. Ace said, “Vane’s?” “Vane has no territory,” Harker said. “Only arrangements.” She slammed him again. Boom. “Old Petrochem annex,” he said quickly. “Lower floors. Suite C-9. She will not be there long.” Mai saved it. “What is the next move against Creed?” Harker’s jaw tightened. Ace said, “Don’t get nostalgic now.” He looked furious at that. Good. “Public contradiction,” he said. Mai stilled. “Explain.” Harker swallowed. “Creed will be reported alive in two incompatible locations by evening. One version as Rogue’s prisoner, one version as fugitive. Both will carry partial evidence. His own crew will not know which is true.” Mai’s face went cold. “Goal?” “Fracture loyalty. Force internal confirmation attempts. Identify remaining loyal nodes.” Ace said, “So Vera, Dax, Lin, Eli.” “Yes.” Shammy’s atmosphere darkened. Harker looked toward her and seemed to regret doing so. Mai asked, “Has it started?” Harker hesitated. Ace did not move him this time. She just smiled. He spoke. “Yes.” Mai checked her agent. No new Eli ping. No Vera contact. No Rogue alert yet. That did not mean safe. It meant quiet. Quiet was where knives grew. Mai said, “Channels?” “Creed’s old encrypted crew mesh. Two injected proofs. One showing him being moved by Rogue’s people. One showing him abandoning the crew.” Ace said, “Can you stop it?” “No.” “Can Ormond?” “Yes.” Good. Finally. Ace released him. Harker sagged half an inch, caught himself, straightened his jacket automatically, then realized the gesture made him look ridiculous and stopped. Ace stepped back over the desk rather than around it. Harker rubbed his throat, eyes on her. Mai collected the projection. “You will remain here.” He laughed. “Will I?” Mai tapped her agent. Every screen in the office lit at once. Not with evidence. With calendar invites. Dozens. All from phantom clients. All urgent. All overlapping. All attached to corrupted document packets large enough to freeze his office system for the next several minutes. Mai said, “Yes.” Harker stared at the screens. Ace looked at Mai with open admiration. “You trapped him in meetings.” “Only digitally.” “That is the most Charter Hill violence possible.” Shammy looked impressed and mildly horrified. “Can he escape?” Mai opened the office door. The outer assistant stood in the waiting room, pale and silent. “Harker can physically leave,” Mai said. “But his professional infrastructure currently believes he has accepted thirty-seven urgent client consultations, three compliance audits, and one wellness seminar.” Ace stared. Mai added, “The wellness seminar is mandatory.” Harker whispered, “You monstrous woman.” Mai smiled faintly. “Words first,” she said. They left him standing in his office while the screens chimed with polite devastation. In the hallway, Ace waited until the door closed before speaking. “I love you.” Mai’s composure fractured for half a second. Shammy brightened. “That was very romantic.” Mai said, “It was operational appreciation.” Ace grinned. “No. That was love.” Mai walked faster. Ace followed. Shammy looked delighted enough to power half the building. Behind them, somewhere inside Sable Meridian Advisory, Harker’s systems began auto-confirming attendance for a guided corporate mindfulness session titled: **BREATHING THROUGH ACCOUNTABILITY.** Ace laughed all the way to the stairwell. Then Mai’s agent chimed. Unknown channel. This time audio. Mai stopped laughing before she started. She opened it. Vera’s voice came through clipped, strained, and trying very hard not to panic. “Mai? If this is still your channel, answer now.” Mai answered immediately. “Here.” Vera breathed once. “They got into our mesh. We have two Creeds. Dax is gone. Eli is freaking out. Lin says one proof is fake but can’t tell which.” Ace’s amusement died. Mai said, “Do not move.” “Too late.” A thump sounded on Vera’s end. Then a man shouting. Then Vera, voice colder: “Dax went after the prisoner video.” Ace was already moving toward the stairs. Mai said, “Where?” “Old Kiroshi service lot. Kabuki edge.” Shammy’s eyes changed. People-weather breaking. Vera said, “If the video is fake, it’s bait.” Mai’s voice was calm. “Vera. Listen to me. Both videos are bait.” Silence. Then Vera whispered, “Fuck.” Ace hit the stairwell door hard enough to make it rebound from the wall. Mai followed. Shammy ducked after them. Words first was over. Now came the part where Night City tested who had learned fast enough. --- ## Chapter 8 — Following the Money The stairs became a vertical tunnel of bad choices. Ace took them three at a time. Mai followed with impossible composure for someone moving that fast in boots not designed for emergency descent. Her agent stayed in one hand, active windows layered and shifting as she pulled Vera’s channel, Harker’s admission, Rogue’s network feed, and Creed’s crew mesh into one living map. Shammy came behind them with less speed than either of them wanted and more grace than the stairwell deserved, one hand on the rail whenever the ceiling tried to punish her for existing. Vera’s voice stayed open on comms. “Dax is not answering.” Mai said, “How long?” “Four minutes.” “Direction?” “Kabuki edge. Old Kiroshi service lot. The prisoner video showed Mason being moved through there by Rogue’s people.” Ace hit another landing hard enough to make the metal grate ring. “Not Rogue’s people.” “We know that now.” Vera’s voice snapped on the last word, then immediately tightened again. She was holding herself together with wire. Ace respected it. Mai said, “Where are Eli and Lin?” “With me. For now. Eli wants to run. Lin wants to chase Dax. I am preventing both badly.” “Stay visible to each other,” Mai said. “No solo movement. No confirmation attempts. No calls to Creed.” “Creed’s channel is dead.” “Yes. Keep it dead.” “Is he alive?” Mai did not answer immediately. Ace glanced back. Mai’s face remained calm, but the hesitation had weight. Then Mai said, “Yes.” Vera breathed once, hard. “Do not tell anyone else,” Mai added. “I’m not stupid.” “You are under pressure. That makes everyone stupid.” Vera laughed once, sharp and exhausted. “Fair.” They reached the service floor. Mai cut the elevator alarm loop again, and they exited into the loading corridor. Charter Hill’s underbelly looked uglier now that they were running through it: pallets, polished steel doors, fragrance machines trying to erase human labor from the air. Ace pushed through the service exit into the lane. The car was where they left it. No obvious watchers. No obvious threat. Which meant nothing except that whoever watched here had better manners. Mai took the driver’s side again. Ace did not argue. “How long to the lot?” “Seven minutes if laws matter.” “They don’t.” “Four.” Shammy folded into the back seat as Ace slid in. The door barely closed before Mai had the car moving. Charter Hill blurred behind them. Clean glass became wet concrete. Service lanes became tighter streets. The district boundaries thinned from polished wealth into the more honest grime of Kabuki’s edges, where Night City stopped pretending crime was paperwork and let it become neon again. Mai drove like calculation had gotten angry. Not reckless. Worse. Efficient. She threaded traffic through gaps that opened because she had already predicted which driver would flinch, which drone would rise, which pedestrian would step back from a car with the wrong kind of silence moving around it. Ace watched the road, one hand braced against the dash. Her Shadow Aura had woken fully now. Still controlled. Still hers. But no longer tucked politely against her skin. It pressed against the windows in dark, fluid angles. Reflections from passing shopfronts stretched around the car, showing something inside that was smaller than a monster and worse than a warning: Ace’s pressure, sharpened by the thought of Dax walking alone into a fake proof because loyalty had outrun sense. Shammy’s atmosphere changed with it. Not storm. Not yet. She had become very quiet in the back seat, eyes half-lidded, listening to people-weather across the city through channels no one else could name. The interior air felt charged but held. Like she had both hands around a breaking glass and refused to let it scatter. Mai said, “Vera.” “Here.” “Describe the videos.” “First one: Mason in restraints. Two men moving him through the Kiroshi service lot. One has Rogue-style old contractor coat. Bad angle. Looks like hidden camera.” “Audio?” “None.” “Second?” “Back stairwell somewhere. Mason alive, alone, removing his own tracker and saying he’s done carrying dead weight.” Ace’s mouth flattened. “Dead weight,” she said. Vera’s voice went colder. “Yeah.” Mai asked, “How did Dax react?” “He believed the first one. Thought Rogue had him and someone was going to execute him quietly. He said he knew the coat. Then he ran.” “Did he take weapons?” “Of course he took weapons.” Ace said, “How many?” “Enough.” “Vera.” “Shotgun, pistol, flash charges. Maybe a knife. Dax likes knives when he’s angry.” Ace almost smiled despite the situation. “Practical.” “He is going to get himself killed,” Vera said. No bitterness there. Just fear. Shammy spoke for the first time since the car left Charter Hill. “He thinks he is repaying a debt.” Vera was silent. Then, softer: “Yes.” Mai took a corner hard enough that the car drifted for half a second and corrected like it had been offended by physics. “Creed put Dax in the coat twice,” Mai said. Vera’s breath caught. “Yeah.” “Dax believes Creed survived because of him.” “He did survive because of him.” “Then Vane’s proof was designed for Dax specifically.” Vera swore. Ace said, “This was not broadcast random.” “No,” Mai said. “Harker gave us Ormond because Ormond controls debt enforcement. But this fracture attack was already staged. Personalized pressure.” Shammy said, “They know where each string hurts.” The car went quiet except for engine and rain. That was the difference between cruelty and professional cruelty. Random violence scared people. Specific violence moved them. Vane, Ormond, Harker — whatever layer wore the hand today — had not simply injected fake videos into Creed’s crew mesh. They had built videos around known emotional weak points. Dax’s protective guilt. Vera’s command pressure. Eli’s panic. Lin’s exhaustion. Each thread pulled where it would tear fastest. Ace felt the anger settle into her bones. Good anger. Useful anger. The kind that did not need noise. Mai’s agent chimed. Rogue. Mai opened the channel into the car. Rogue said, “Harker is locked down in his own building by three compliance audits and the wellness seminar.” Ace smiled despite herself. “Good.” “He gave you Ormond?” “Yes,” Mai said. “Petrochem mediation annex, Suite C-9. But Creed’s crew mesh attack has already triggered. Dax is moving toward Kiroshi service lot.” Rogue’s voice cooled. “The prisoner proof.” “You know it?” “I know the coat.” Ace looked at Mai. Rogue continued, “Bosco’s coat from our staged custody thread. They scraped it from the feed and repurposed it fast.” Mai’s jaw tightened. “So they have active monitor processing on the five-thread operation.” “Yes.” “Then Ormond is live-managing, not only enforcing.” “Likely.” Ace said, “We get Dax first.” Rogue said, “You get Dax alive.” “That was implied.” “No. With you, I say things twice.” Ace made a face. Mai said, “And Ormond?” “I’ll put eyes on Petrochem. No entry yet.” “Good.” Rogue was silent for half a beat. “Creed?” “Still at warehouse.” “Hollis says he tried to stand up once.” Ace asked, “What happened?” “Hollis looked at him.” “Effective.” “He sat down.” Shammy’s mouth curved faintly. Rogue continued, “Creed knows something happened. He’s not being told what unless necessary.” Mai said, “Agreed.” Ace disagreed, but only partly. Mason Creed’s guilt was already sharp enough to cut through common sense. Tell him Dax had run into a personalized trap and he would try to become useful in the stupidest direction available. Rogue said, “Dax matters.” Ace glanced at the comm light. Rogue’s voice did not soften, exactly. But something older moved under it. “Not strategically,” Rogue said. “Strategically he’s one crew heavy with bad judgment. But if Dax dies trying to save a Creed that isn’t there, the crew breaks. Vera breaks different. Lin stops trusting her own read. Eli runs. Creed tries to trade himself. Then Ormond gets her harvest.” Mai nodded once. “We see it.” “Good. Break the story.” The line clicked dead. Ace looked at Mai. Mai looked back for one fraction of a second. That phrase had come from Sera. Break the story. Rogue had absorbed it instantly. Of course she had. That was why Rogue was Rogue. Not because she stood at the top and killed challengers. Because she heard the useful sentence, sharpened it, and handed it back as doctrine before anyone else finished bleeding. The Kiroshi service lot appeared ahead as a dark industrial wound between half-used infrastructure and old corporate storage blocks. Once, it had probably served legitimate supply chains. Now it was a graveyard for obsolete signage, stripped delivery vans, cracked loading bays, and cameras that still worked because someone had found use for them. Mai killed the headlights before turning in. The car rolled behind a dead cargo stack. Ace was out before the engine fully settled. Mai joined her, agent in hand. Shammy stepped out and immediately looked toward the center of the lot. “He is there.” “Dax?” Ace asked. “Yes.” “Alive?” Shammy closed her eyes. The air around her tightened, then spread. “Angry. Afraid. Moving.” Mai opened a local scan. “Three heat signatures near the false prisoner route. One large, likely Dax. Two unknown. Another two positioned above, second-level service gantry.” Ace smiled without warmth. “Trap.” “Yes.” “Creed fake?” Mai checked. “Thermal dummy in the van, probably. Movement track repeating. They want Dax close enough to commit.” “Shooters?” “Unknown.” Ace rolled her shoulders. The Shadow Aura slid outward along the wet pavement, black pressure folding under the cargo stack shadows. It did not race ahead. It tasted the angles. Light from a broken security lamp bent around it and came back weaker. Shammy touched Ace’s shoulder. “Alive,” she said. Ace looked at her. “Dax?” “And the others if possible.” Ace gave a small nod. “Words first?” Shammy’s face tightened. “Words fast.” “Good distinction.” Mai pointed. “Dax is approaching the van from the east side. Shotgun out. He has not seen the gantry.” Ace said, “Then we remove the gantry.” Mai said, “Quietly.” “Mostly.” Ace moved. The lot opened around her in pieces: broken vans, waist-high concrete dividers, stacked Kiroshi crates with old labels peeling away, puddles reflecting dirty light. She crossed the first exposed strip low and fast, not a blur, not supernatural, just too quick for the human brain to file under normal. Her Shadow Aura trailed close enough to confuse cameras but not enough to blind them fully. They still needed the story. Just not Vane’s version. Dax appeared between two vans thirty meters ahead. Broad shoulders. Patched coat. Shotgun tight to his chest. Moving with more emotion than discipline. Not amateur, but compromised. He believed Mason Creed was in the van ahead, restrained and about to be executed by Rogue’s people. That made him brave. That made him stupid. That made him predictable. Above him, one gantry shooter shifted. Ace saw the weapon angle. Not at Dax yet. At the van door. They wanted him to open it. They wanted his body position clean, his intent visible, his death readable. Of course. Ace went vertical. A stack of crates gave her the first rise. A rusted pipe gave her the second. She reached the gantry without drawing steel, caught the railing, and came over low. The shooter turned too late. Ace drove her elbow into his throat—not crushing, just shutting him down—stripped the weapon, kicked his knee sideways enough to fold him, and slammed his head into the railing once. He dropped. Alive. Unhappy. The second shooter pivoted at the other end of the gantry. Ace threw the stripped weapon at his face. He ducked. Good reflex. Wrong job. She crossed the gantry as he recovered, slid under his aim, and drove her shoulder into his center mass. He hit the grated floor, rolled, came up with a knife. Ace caught the wrist, turned with it, and made the elbow understand regret. He screamed. Below, Dax heard. His shotgun swung upward. “Creed!” he shouted. Oh, idiot. Ace pinned the second shooter with one knee. “Dax! Down!” Dax fired. Not at her. At the van door. The blast tore the handle apart and triggered the dummy inside. The van lights flared. A recorded voice screamed Mason Creed’s voice badly enough that it might work on a man already terrified. Dax lunged toward the door. Mai’s voice snapped over comms. “Flash charge!” Dax had already pulled one. Not to attack. To breach. Ace swore. If he threw it into the van, the dummy’s secondary system would probably trigger, maybe fire outward, maybe explode, maybe simply record him looking like the aggressor. It did not matter. Any version served Vane. Ace vaulted off the gantry. For half a second, gravity owned her. Then the Shadow Aura surged beneath her like darkness remembering impact before impact happened. Not lifting. Not flying. Not a rescue power. Just pressure hitting the wet pavement with her, making the landing wrong enough that puddles jumped outward before her boots touched down. She hit between Dax and the van. Dax’s eyes widened. He tried to stop. Too late. Ace stepped inside his line, caught the wrist holding the flash charge, and drove the heel of her palm into his sternum. Not enough to break. Enough to empty his lungs and freeze his arm. “Fake,” she snapped. Dax wheezed. His eyes stayed wild. “Move,” he rasped. “Fake.” “Move!” Ace twisted the flash charge from his hand and kicked his knee—not damaging, just dropping his base. He went down hard, shotgun clattering, and tried to rise anyway because loyalty had apparently eaten his survival instincts. The van’s side panel opened. A turret unfolded. Tiny. Ugly. Automatic. There it was. Mai’s voice: “Ace—” Ace threw the flash charge into the turret housing and kicked Dax flat. The flash detonated inside the mechanism. Light punched through the van seams. The turret spasmed, fired three rounds into the pavement, and died with a sound like an angry insect choking. Dax was still trying to crawl toward the van. Ace grabbed him by the back of his coat and slammed him against the ground. “Dax.” He fought. She drove her knee between his shoulder blades. “Dax.” He froze, breathing hard. Ace leaned down near his ear. “Creed is alive.” He stopped moving. “He is not in the van.” His breath came ragged. “That is not him.” Dax’s fingers flexed against the wet pavement. “Proof,” he said. Mai approached through the lot, weaponless but with the kind of focus that made weapons feel redundant. Shammy came behind her, eyes on the remaining unknown heat signatures. One had fled. One had not. Mai crouched in front of Dax and held up her agent. Creed appeared on screen. Live. Warehouse background. Bad lighting. Folded body bag on table. Noodle brick visible in frame because Night City had a sense of humor cruel enough to become art. Creed looked furious and terrified. “Dax,” he said. Dax stared. Creed’s voice cracked. “You stupid bastard.” Dax made a sound that was almost a laugh and almost a sob. Ace eased the pressure on his back but did not fully let him up. Dax whispered, “You’re alive.” Creed’s face twisted. “No thanks to you charging a fake van with a shotgun like romance made a bad tactical decision.” Ace looked at Mai. Mai mouthed: romance? Shammy whispered, “Operational romance.” Ace almost lost focus. Dax closed his eyes. “Thought they had you,” he said. “I know,” Creed said. The anger fell out of his voice, leaving something worse. “I know. I’m sorry.” Dax’s forehead touched the pavement. Not dramatic. Just unable to hold itself up. Mai let the live feed run for two more seconds, then cut it. Enough. Not so long that Creed could try to command anything. Ace helped Dax sit up. He looked wrecked. Big man. Shotgun man. Coat-double man. Loyal idiot. Crying silently in a Kiroshi service lot because the person he came to save was not there and the trap had been built specifically out of his love. He wiped his face angrily. “I’m fine.” Ace said, “No.” “I said—” “You’re alive. Different category.” Dax glared. Then, because he was not completely stupid, he accepted the distinction. Shammy turned suddenly. “Mai.” Mai looked. The unknown heat signature that had not fled was moving under the lot, below grade. “Basement access,” Mai said. “Old maintenance corridor.” Ace stood. “Monitor?” “No,” Mai said. Her eyes sharpened. “Uploader.” Dax looked up. “Uploader?” “The fake videos had to sync from somewhere local after the mesh injection,” Mai said. “If they stayed to confirm Dax’s reaction, they may still have the active kit.” Ace smiled. Now that was useful. “Stay,” she told Dax. “Like hell.” Ace looked down at him. He stayed. Shammy crouched near him. “Please stay.” Dax looked at her. His expression went through several stages of resistance and failed all of them. “…Fine.” Ace pointed at him. “Unfair.” Shammy smiled faintly. “Yes.” Mai was already moving toward a half-collapsed maintenance hatch behind the van. “Ace.” “On you.” They descended into the underlevel. Concrete stairs. Flickering utility light. Old Kiroshi labels. Smell of water, mold, hot electronics. The uploader heard them by the second landing and ran. Good. Ace liked runners. This one was small, fast, and knew the underlevel. Not a fighter. Tech runner. Wore a hood with signal dampening fabric and carried a compact rig against her chest like a child. Mai said, “Alive.” Ace sighed. “You keep saying that.” “Because you keep needing to hear it.” Fair. The runner cut left through a service room. Ace followed straight. A normal person would have gone around the old machinery. Ace went over it. The runner slammed a door behind her. Ace hit it shoulder-first. The door opened by becoming less attached to the wall. The runner yelped and threw a shock disc. Ace ducked. The disc hit the wall, discharged, and made the lights flicker. Ace closed distance. The runner tried to pull a data spike from the rig. Mai’s voice cracked down the corridor. “Do not let her wipe it.” Ace caught the rig strap, yanked hard, and separated runner from hardware. The runner spun with the motion, surprisingly graceful, and kicked Ace in the side. Good kick. Ace respected it. Then she kicked the runner’s ankle, swept her, and put one knee on the rig instead of the person. Priorities. The runner froze, breathing hard, one hand under her jacket. Ace said, “Don’t.” The runner said, “You don’t know what this is.” Mai arrived and immediately took the rig. “I will shortly.” The runner’s face changed. Fear. Not for herself. For the rig. Interesting. Shammy appeared in the doorway behind them, having followed with less speed but perfect timing. The underlevel seemed to lower its voice around her. The runner stared at her. “You’re not supposed to be here,” she said. Shammy tilted her head. “Many ceilings agree.” Ace said, “Name.” The runner shut her mouth. Mai connected the rig to an isolated interface. The runner lunged. Ace caught her by the hood and set her back against the floor with enough force to remove enthusiasm. “Name,” Ace repeated. The runner glared. Shammy crouched. “You are younger than I expected.” “Don’t.” “Than what?” Mai asked. The runner’s eyes flicked to her. Too late. Mai had the thread now. “You were told Triad would not intervene personally,” Mai said. The runner looked away. Ace smiled. “Bad day.” Mai continued, “You expected Rogue’s old contractors, Creed’s crew, perhaps local monitors. Not us.” No answer. Mai’s fingers moved through the rig’s locked structure. “This is Ormond’s operational kit.” The runner flinched. Ace saw it. “Ormond sent you,” Ace said. The runner’s jaw clenched. Shammy said, “Not Vane.” The runner laughed once, bitter. “Nobody sends from Vane.” “Celeste Ormond,” Mai said. “Suite C-9, old Petrochem mediation annex.” That broke the runner’s face more than any threat. “You already know?” “Yes.” “Then why are you here?” Ace leaned closer. “Because you hurt Dax.” The runner looked genuinely confused. “He lived.” Ace stared. Mai’s voice chilled. “That is not the same as harmless.” The runner looked at her, then at Shammy, then at the rig. “She said no deaths,” the runner said. “Ormond?” Mai asked. “She said fracture, not body count. Body count starts later.” Ace felt the message from earlier burn again behind her eyes. **BODY COUNT BEGINS WHEN SHE CLAIMS HIM.** Not Harker’s phrasing. Ormond’s? Mai asked, “What is Ormond’s next move?” The runner smiled weakly. Too weak. Too late. Mai looked at the rig. “Oh.” Ace hated that tone. “What?” Mai’s fingers moved faster. “The mesh attack was not only video injection. It mapped response behavior. Dax chasing the prisoner proof. Vera holding the group. Lin attempting analysis. Eli instability. It is building individualized pressure packages.” “For when?” The rig completed a file transfer attempt to a dead channel. Mai blocked it. Then another window opened. Countdown. Twenty-two minutes. Mai said, “For the debt enforcement trigger.” The runner whispered, “You can’t stop it from there.” Mai looked at her. The runner’s smile had returned, more broken now. “If Ormond validates the obligations, Creed’s entire support network becomes collectible. Medical contracts, relocation debts, legal balances, emergency funds. All of it moves.” Ace’s voice went flat. “To Vane.” “To parties with interest,” the runner said, and sounded like Finch for one awful second. Shammy stood. The underlevel air thickened. “Where is Ormond?” she asked. The runner did not answer. Shammy stepped closer. Not threatening. Worse. Present. “People will be hurt,” Shammy said. “Not as pressure. Not as numbers. People. Nia. Kell. Sera’s brother. Dax. Vera. Eli. Lin. Others you do not know because someone made sure you only saw categories.” The runner’s face tightened. She was young. Not Tobin young. Older than that. Mid-twenties maybe. Old enough to choose. Young enough to have been taught the wrong language by people with better suits. Mai said, “Ormond moved.” The runner looked sharply at the rig. Mai nodded. “Yes. She triggered remote validation, then left C-9. Where?” The runner closed her eyes. Ace said, “We can do this the hard way.” The runner opened them and looked at Ace with sudden, tired contempt. “You think pain is hard?” Ace stopped. The runner’s voice shook. “Pain is simple. Pain is honest. You know what’s hard? Watching your mother’s care contract become collateral because your father died owing the wrong mediator. Watching every extension come with one more task. One more route. One more upload. One more harmless fracture.” Shammy’s expression changed. Mai’s did too. Ace did not soften. But she understood the shape now. Another debt node. Of course. Ormond did not recruit through loyalty. She recruited through obligation dressed as procedure. The runner laughed without humor. “You want to threaten me? Get in line.” Mai crouched in front of her. “What is your name?” The runner looked away. Mai waited. The runner whispered, “Talia.” Mai’s voice was precise. “Talia. Ormond’s validation will not save your mother’s care contract. It will make more people into you.” Talia’s eyes shut hard. There. That one went through. Shammy said softly, “You are also on the ledger.” Talia nodded once. Ace crouched too, but differently. No comfort. No cruelty. Just closeness. “Then help us break it.” Talia breathed in. Out. “The annex was a shell,” she said. “Ormond uses moving arbitration suites. Today she’s in a transit conference unit. Armored van. Legal mobile office. She likes irony.” Mai’s eyes sharpened. “Location.” “Route changes every six minutes.” “Current.” “I don’t know.” Mai lifted the rig slightly. Talia looked at it. Then said, “But the validation signal needs line-of-sight handshake through old Petrochem arbitration relays. Three possible uplinks.” Mai’s fingers flew. “Show me.” Talia hesitated. Ace said, “Now.” Talia showed her. Three uplinks appeared on Mai’s map. One near the Petrochem annex. One above a disused parking tower. One in the old Kiroshi service infrastructure. Mai froze. Ace saw it. “What?” Mai said, “This lot is one of the uplinks.” Talia nodded miserably. “The trap was also infrastructure placement.” The countdown hit nineteen minutes. Above them, Dax was alive. Creed was hidden. Rogue was moving. Vera’s crew was fracturing. Ormond was about to turn debt into a weapon at scale. And they were standing in the basement of the first uplink. Ace smiled. Sharp. “Then we start here.” Mai looked at the rig. Then at Talia. “You are going to help me poison the validation.” Talia’s face went white. “Ormond will know.” “Yes.” “She’ll cut my mother’s contract.” “No,” Mai said. No hesitation. Ace looked at her. Mai’s face had gone still in the way it did when structure became personal. “No,” Mai repeated. “She will attempt to. Rogue will block the provider chain.” “That’s not possible.” Mai opened a channel. Rogue answered instantly. “Talk.” Mai said, “We have Ormond’s runner. Name Talia. Her mother’s care contract is leveraged through Ormond’s ledger. I need it protected now.” Rogue said, “Provider?” Talia whispered the name. Mai relayed it. Rogue was silent for four seconds. Then: “Done in ten.” Talia stared. “That’s not—” Rogue’s voice cut through the agent. “Kid, I was burying vultures in medical billing before your first school taught you debt was normal. Sit down and help Mai.” The line ended. Talia stared at the dead comm. Then she started crying. Not loudly. Not performatively. Just one hand over her mouth, shoulders shaking once before she strangled it down. Ace looked away again. Shammy did not touch her. Mai did not either. But the air gentled. The countdown hit eighteen minutes. Talia wiped her face with the heel of her hand, furious at every tear, then pulled herself toward the rig. “What do you need?” she asked. Mai’s eyes sharpened. “Access to the validation preface layer.” Talia nodded. Ace stood. Shammy stood beside her. Above, the false van still smoked lightly from the destroyed turret. Dax sat in wet pavement, alive and humiliated and probably rethinking every life choice that had involved coats. Below, Mai and Talia bent over Ormond’s rig as the first real strike of the endgame began. Not with bullets. With debt. With routes. With people reduced to obligations and obligations turned into chains. Ace looked up toward the ceiling, toward the city above it, toward the invisible lines connecting Creed to everyone who had believed in him just enough to be punished for it. “Normal job,” she muttered. Shammy glanced at her. “Still normal?” Ace’s Shadow Aura coiled behind her in the dark. “Unfortunately,” Ace said. “People are horrible enough.” --- ## Chapter 9 — Rogue Already Knows The countdown made the basement smaller. Not physically. The old Kiroshi underlevel remained the same ugly rectangle of concrete, mold, exposed cable trays, and corporate infrastructure abandoned just long enough to become useful to criminals. Water dripped somewhere behind the wall. A broken ventilation fan ticked every seven seconds like it wanted to participate in the tension and lacked rhythm. But the numbers on Mai’s agent compressed everything. Seventeen minutes. Forty-two seconds. Forty-one. Forty. Talia worked with the rigid speed of someone whose fear had finally found a shape small enough to attack. Her fingers moved over the rig’s interface with practiced familiarity, but now Mai’s structure sat over her like a second skeleton: clean, exact, refusing panic. Talia opened layers. Mai isolated them. Talia identified Ormond’s markers. Mai stripped their assumptions bare. Ace stood near the stairwell entrance and listened upward. Dax was above them with Shammy. That was safer than it sounded. Probably. Dax had tried twice to stand and make himself useful. Shammy had apparently discovered that placing one large hand on his shoulder and saying “please remain alive in one location” worked better than threats. Ace respected the unfairness of that. If Ace said it, people argued. If Shammy said it, people reconsidered their entire moral architecture. Mai did not look up from the rig. “Ace.” “Yeah.” “Call Creed.” Ace turned. “No.” Talia’s fingers paused. Mai kept working. “Yes.” “You just told him nothing.” “That was before Ormond began validation. Creed may know debt-side identifiers we do not.” “He’ll try to leave.” “Then Hollis looks at him.” Ace exhaled through her nose. “You’re enjoying Hollis too much.” “Hollis is structurally useful.” “That’s your version of a crush.” Mai finally looked up. Even under basement light, with a debt weapon counting down in front of her and Ormond’s trap unfolding above them, she managed to aim a look at Ace precise enough to count as a thrown blade. Ace smiled. Talia stared between them with the horrified fascination of someone discovering that legendary mercs still flirted during financial warfare. Shammy’s voice came from the comm. “I think it is sweet.” Ace looked toward the ceiling. “You’re supposed to be watching Dax.” “I am watching Dax. He also thinks it is strange.” Dax’s voice came faintly behind her. “I said suicidal.” Shammy said, “That was less sweet.” Ace opened the channel to the warehouse. Hollis answered. Not Creed. “Hollis.” “Yep.” “Need Creed.” “Figured.” There was a small shuffle. A distant voice saying, “What happened?” Then Hollis, closer to the mic: “Before you talk, he is sitting.” Creed’s voice cut in. “I am right here.” Hollis said, “Sitting.” Creed snapped, “Yes, thank you, the room has grasped my posture.” Ace could hear the strain under it. He knew something was wrong. Not details, but enough. Men like Creed lived by reading vibration through channels. Silence was its own report. Mai spoke without pausing her work. “Ormond is validating the debt enforcement package. We have one of her uplink rigs and her runner cooperating. We need identifiers for obligations connected to medical, legal, and relocation instruments.” Creed went silent. Then: “How long?” “Sixteen minutes.” “Shit.” Hollis said, “Still sitting.” Creed ignored him. “Which layer?” Mai glanced at Talia. Talia whispered, “Preface layer. Enforcement pre-validation.” Creed heard the voice. “Who is that?” Ace said, “Focus.” “Is that Talia?” Talia froze. Mai’s eyes flicked to her. Talia looked suddenly younger. Creed’s voice changed. “Talia Marr?” She whispered, “He knows me?” Mai repeated, “Talia Marr?” Creed swore softly. “She did two routing jobs for Ormond. I tried to buy her out.” Ace stared at the comm. Talia’s face went rigid. “No, he didn’t.” Creed heard that. “Yes, I did,” he said. “Your mother’s care contract. St. Eligius provider chain. Ormond blocked the transfer.” Talia went white in a new way. Mai’s fingers stopped for half a second. Ace did not move. Talia whispered, “That was you?” Creed’s voice became rough. “I didn’t get it done.” “That was you?” “Talia—” “You sent the anonymous payment attempt?” “Yes.” Her mouth opened. Closed. She looked at the rig like the machine had become less comprehensible than human behavior. Ace hated Night City again. Not for the cruelty this time. For the way it made people mistake failed kindness for absence. Creed continued, quieter. “I thought if I could get Ormond’s smaller debt nodes loose, maybe I could weaken the enforcement layer before it closed around my people. Your mother’s contract was one of the test cases.” Talia covered her mouth again. Mai’s voice cut through, not unkind, but firm enough to keep the room from drowning. “Then you may know the blocked transfer identifiers.” “Yes. I kept copies.” Ace closed her eyes. “Of course you did.” Creed said, “Paranoia was one of my few growth areas.” “Send them.” “I need access to—” Hollis said, “No.” Creed snapped, “Not outside access. My local archive. The blue case.” Hollis was quiet for two seconds. “The one you told me was personal medication?” “It is emotionally medicinal.” Ace almost laughed. Mai said, “Hollis.” “Opening.” A moment later Creed came back. “I have them. Sending isolated packet through Rogue’s relay.” Mai’s agent chimed. Incoming. Mai caught it, sandboxed it, scanned it once, then twice. Her expression shifted. “Good,” she said. Creed’s breath came through the comm. “Good how?” “Good as in useful.” “That is emotionally insufficient.” Ace said, “Welcome to Mai.” Mai ignored her. “These identifiers map to Ormond’s leverage contracts beyond your network. Talia’s mother, Sera’s brother, Juno’s relocation, three clinic protection balances, two funeral advances, and several legal cleanups.” Creed said nothing. Talia stared at the list as Mai unfolded it across the agent display. Names. Not many. Enough. The hidden skeleton of Creed’s failed attempt to build something cleaner with dirty money. Not just his crew. Not just his debt. He had been trying to cut small knots everywhere he found them and had failed often enough that nobody saw the effort from outside. Shammy’s voice came softly through comms. “Mason.” Creed exhaled. “Yeah?” “You should have told someone.” He laughed once. It hurt to hear. “That list is basically an itemized record of me failing to save people.” “No,” Shammy said. “It is a map of where you tried.” Silence. Even Hollis did not ruin that one. Mai said, “We can use this.” Talia wiped her face, anger returning because anger was easier to operate through. “If we inject these into the validation preface, Ormond’s package has to reconcile pre-existing contested transfers.” Mai nodded. “And if it cannot reconcile?” “It stalls.” “For how long?” Talia looked at the countdown. “Maybe ninety seconds.” Ace said, “That’s it?” “Ninety seconds in a validation chain is a heart attack,” Mai said. Talia nodded. “It forces manual review.” “By Ormond,” Mai said. “Yes.” “And manual review reveals her active suite if she wants the package completed.” Talia looked at Mai with sudden understanding. “You don’t want to stop it here.” Mai’s eyes were cold. “I want her to touch it.” Ace smiled. There was Mai. Not just blocking the knife. Making the hand holding it visible. Creed said, “If Ormond touches manual review, you can locate her?” Mai said, “Possibly.” Talia said, “If she uses primary authorization.” “Will she?” “She has to. No subordinate can validate contested human collateral across medical and legal instruments without her key.” Ace looked at Mai. “Human collateral.” Mai’s mouth tightened. “Yes.” Creed’s voice was barely audible. “God.” Ace wanted to say something cruel. Something like _now you notice?_ But he had noticed. Too late, badly, through arrogance and debt and panic, but he had noticed. That was the problem with Mason Creed. He kept being guilty in the correct places. It made him much harder to dismiss. Mai packaged the identifier injection. “Talia, route.” Talia nodded and bent over the rig. The countdown hit fourteen minutes. Above, Shammy said, “Ace.” Ace turned toward the stairwell. “What?” “Dax wants to speak to Creed.” “No.” Dax’s voice came through, hoarse. “I can hear you.” “Then hear no.” Creed said, “Put him on.” Ace stared at the comm like it had personally betrayed her. “This is not a family call hour.” Mai did not look up. “Thirty seconds. It may stabilize Dax.” Ace hated when emotional logic became operationally valid. “Fine. Thirty.” A shuffling sound. Then Dax, breathing like he had been punched by more than Ace. “Boss.” Creed snapped immediately, “Do not call me that right now.” Dax gave a short, broken laugh. “Yeah. Fair.” “You absolute idiot.” “Yeah.” “You went alone?” “Yeah.” “With a shotgun?” “…yeah.” “And flash charges?” Dax was quiet. Creed’s voice sharpened. “Dax.” “One.” “You took three.” Dax muttered, “Didn’t use all three.” Ace looked upward. “I’m starting to like him.” Mai said, “Of course you are.” Creed exhaled. “Are you hurt?” “No.” Ace said, “Emotionally stupid.” Dax said, “That is not a medical condition.” Shammy said, “It might be.” Creed made a sound that was almost a laugh and almost a collapse. Then he said, “Listen to me. No more solo saves. No more coats. No more being me because you think I’m more useful alive.” Dax did not answer. Creed’s voice dropped. “I need you alive more than I need to be important.” The basement went very quiet. Dax’s reply came rough. “Took you long enough.” “Yeah.” “Vera’s gonna yell.” “She should.” “Lin too.” “Probably.” “Eli might cry.” “Eli cries during invoice disputes.” Dax laughed. Real this time. Brief, wrecked, alive. Ace looked away again, but less sharply. Creed said, “Stay with Triad. Do what Mai says. If Ace tells you to duck, duck before asking why. If Shammy asks nicely, assume it’s urgent.” Dax said, “Yeah.” “Good.” Ace cut the channel before anyone could get sentimental enough to impair the operation. Shammy’s voice came through anyway. “That was rude.” “Thirty seconds.” “It was forty-eight.” “I gave them a discount.” Mai murmured, “That is not how discounts work.” The countdown hit twelve minutes. Talia completed the route. Mai inserted Creed’s identifiers into the validation preface. The rig accepted the payload. For three seconds nothing happened. Then the display filled with red procedural objections. Talia whispered, “It took.” Mai’s eyes sharpened. “Manual challenge?” “Waiting.” Ten seconds. Twenty. Thirty. The basement held its breath. Then one line appeared. **PRIMARY REVIEW REQUESTED.** Mai said, “There.” Talia leaned closer. “She has to key in.” The line blinked. **AUTHORIZATION PENDING.** Ace realized her hands were curled into fists. Shammy came down the stairs quietly, leaving Dax above under instruction to remain alive in one location. She appeared in the doorway and looked at the rig. “Is Ormond touching the wire?” Mai nodded once. “Almost.” **AUTHORIZATION ACCEPTED.** Mai moved. Not physically much. Just fingers, eyes, intent. But the whole basement seemed to pivot around her. “There,” she said. A location resolved. Not the old Petrochem annex. Not the parking tower. A moving point. Three blocks west of the annex, slow-moving, shielded, running under a municipal arbitration convoy tag. “Armored van,” Talia said. “Transit conference unit.” Ace was already heading for the stairs. Mai grabbed the rig. Talia stood, then hesitated. Ace looked back. “You coming?” Talia stared. “What?” “You know the kit.” Mai said, “She is useful.” Talia looked terrified. Shammy said, “You can stay here with Dax.” From above, Dax called, “I am not emotionally qualified to guard anyone right now.” Ace sighed. Talia swallowed. “If I come, Ormond sees me.” Mai said, “Ormond already owns you if we fail.” That settled it. Talia picked up the rig. Her hands shook. She followed. --- Rogue already knew. That became obvious before they reached the surface. By the time Ace, Mai, Shammy, and Talia emerged from the underlevel into the wet service lot, the air around the operation had changed. Not Shammy’s doing. Human weather. Rogue’s weather. A black car sat at the far side of the lot that had not been there before. No engine noise. No visible driver. Just present. Dax sat on a concrete divider with his shotgun unloaded beside him and one of Rogue’s old contractors standing close enough to stop him doing anything heroic. His face was a mess of rain, shame, and relief. He looked at Talia. Talia looked at him. Dax said, “You the one who made the fake video?” Talia froze. Ace moved half a step. Dax raised both hands. “Asking, not shooting.” Talia lifted her chin through visible fear. “Yes.” Dax stared. Then he looked away. “Good fake,” he muttered. Talia blinked. Shammy’s mouth curved softly. Ace shook her head. “Everyone in this city is damaged.” Mai said, “Move.” They moved. The black car’s rear window lowered as they approached. Rogue sat inside. Of course she did. Not at Afterlife. Not hidden behind ten calls. Here, close enough to the board to touch it, far enough that the city still did not know she had moved. Grey hair. Dark glasses despite the weather. One hand resting on a cane Ace had never seen her need and suspected she carried because some warnings deserved props. Rogue looked first at Dax. “You’re alive.” Dax stood immediately. “Yes, ma’am.” “Try to keep doing that. You’re bad at dying quietly.” Dax looked down. “Yes, ma’am.” Then Rogue looked at Talia. Talia almost stopped breathing. Rogue’s gaze was not kind. It was worse. Assessing. “You helped Ormond,” Rogue said. Talia nodded once. “Yes.” “You’re helping Mai now.” “Yes.” “Good. Keep doing the better thing.” Talia looked like the sentence hit her harder than judgment would have. Rogue’s eyes moved to Mai. “Location?” Mai sent it. Rogue checked something on her own display. “Municipal arbitration convoy. Cute.” Ace said, “Everyone keeps being cute.” “Annoying, isn’t it?” “Yes.” Rogue tapped the window frame once. “Ormond is moving toward the Petrochem annex after all. Not to use it. To pass near it. She wants validation attached to old neutral infrastructure so any intervention looks like an attack on arbitration services.” Mai nodded. “Then we do not hit the van publicly.” “No.” Ace stared. “We’re not hitting the van?” Rogue looked at her. Ace said, “I know, I know. Alive. Quiet. No street war.” “No,” Rogue said. “This one is simpler.” Ace waited. Rogue smiled faintly. “We invite her to a meeting.” Talia whispered, “She won’t come.” Rogue turned her eyes to the young runner. “She will if she thinks she’s winning.” Mai understood first. Of course. “The validation,” she said. “We let her complete enough to believe the debt package has survived manual review.” Talia stared. “But poison the transfer destination.” Mai nodded. “Not block. Redirect.” Rogue’s smile sharpened. “To me.” Ace felt the shape snap into place. Beautiful. Horrible. Professional. Ormond was building an ownership transfer. Vane’s system wanted Creed’s network through debt enforcement. If they blocked it, Ormond would retreat, rebuild, try again. If they destroyed it, everyone scattered. But if they let Ormond believe she had won and redirected the harvested obligations into Rogue’s hands— No. Not hands. Custody. Visibility. Rogue would not need to claim Creed. Ormond would deliver the leverage package to the very woman she was trying to frame. Mai said, “Then Ormond must respond. She cannot let the transfer stand.” “She will call,” Rogue said. Ace smiled slowly. “And you answer.” “Professional courtesy,” Rogue said. There was the title, sitting in the mud with a knife between its teeth. Talia shook her head. “She’ll cut the line before full destination resolution.” Mai looked at her. “Can you delay her?” Talia swallowed. “Maybe.” Rogue said, “Not maybe.” Talia flinched. Shammy stepped closer, not between them, but near enough that the air softened. Talia took one breath. Then another. “Yes,” she said. “If Mai handles destination camouflage, I can make the resolution look like a Vane-approved intermediate custodian for maybe thirty seconds.” Mai said, “Thirty is enough.” Ace looked at Rogue. “Where do you want Ormond?” Rogue’s smile vanished. “In her van.” Ace frowned. Rogue continued, “Ormond lives by distance. Let her feel the walls she brought with her.” Mai said, “You want to force a remote confrontation while she is inside the transit unit.” “Yes.” “And if she bolts?” Rogue looked at Ace. Ace smiled. “Then we discuss mobility.” Rogue nodded. “No dead bodies.” Ace sighed. “You used to be more fun.” “I used to clean up more messes. It got old.” Fair. The countdown had changed now. Not stopped, but infected. Mai and Talia worked from the hood of the car, rig connected through three isolated relays Rogue’s people produced from cases with no labels. Shammy stood beside Talia, not touching, simply present. Ace watched the service lot edges. Dax sat exactly where he had been told, jaw clenched, hands empty. It looked painful for him. Good. Learning often did. Rogue remained in the car, speaking into channels older than half the city’s current legends. Creed was not on comms now. Hollis had probably made that decision using thermos-based authority. The validation package advanced. Talia whispered through each layer. “Preface objections suppressed. Contested transfers marked reviewed. Medical obligations moving. Legal cleanup moving. Funeral advances moving.” Her voice shook on that one. Mai said, “Continue.” “Destination custody masked.” Mai inserted Rogue’s shell. Talia layered Ormond-compatible formatting over it. The screen displayed a destination name: **MERIDIAN THIRD-PARTY RECOVERY HOLDINGS** Talia said, “That’s fake.” Mai said, “Very.” Talia almost smiled. “It’s good fake.” “Thank you.” Ace looked at Shammy. “Fixer-nerd bonding.” Shammy nodded solemnly. “Under financial combat conditions.” Mai did not look up. “I hear both of you.” “Good,” Ace said. The transfer progressed. Eighty percent. Eighty-five. Ninety. Talia’s face tightened. “She’s checking.” Mai said, “Let her.” Ninety-three. A new authorization touched the chain. Not automated. Human. Ormond. Mai caught the signal and wrapped it in the false custody layer. Talia kept the handshake breathing. Ninety-six. Ninety-eight. The transfer completed. For one second, nothing happened. Then every active line on the rig inverted. Destination resolved. Not Meridian. Not Vane. Not Ormond. A Rogue-controlled dead shell under Afterlife’s old financial umbrella, clean enough to hold, dirty enough to be believable, old enough that Ormond should have recognized the smell and did not until too late. Talia whispered, “Oh my god.” Mai leaned back half an inch. Done. Rogue’s phone rang. Not her agent. A physical phone. Old. Black. Ridiculous. Terrifying. She looked at it. Let it ring twice. Three times. Then answered. “Ormond.” The service lot went silent. Even Dax stopped breathing loudly. Rogue listened. Her face did not move. Then she said, “No, you didn’t lose it.” Pause. “You delivered it.” Another pause. Longer. Rogue’s smile was small enough to be surgical. “Professional courtesy,” she said. “I’m letting you notice before I make it public.” Ace felt the hair rise at the back of her neck. Not from fear. From admiration. Rogue listened again. Then her eyes shifted toward Mai. “Threatening medical contracts after the transfer? That’s rude.” Talia gripped the edge of the hood. Shammy placed one hand over hers. Rogue’s voice cooled. “Try it and every provider, arbitrator, and debt clerk who touched your package learns you lost chain integrity to me.” Another pause. “Exactly.” Ormond was talking. Fast, probably. Rogue did not care. “You wanted a meeting under my name,” Rogue said. “Now you have one.” Ace smiled. There it was. “Stay in your van,” Rogue continued. “Triad is coming to escort you.” Ace’s smile faded into something sharper. Ormond said something. Rogue laughed. Not loud. Worse. “No, sweetheart. That wasn’t a request.” She ended the call. For half a second, nobody moved. Then Rogue looked at Ace. “Bring me Ormond.” Ace nodded. “Alive,” Rogue said. Ace rolled her eyes. “I know.” “Quietly.” “Yes.” “No street war.” “Getting repetitive.” Rogue’s gaze sharpened. Ace smiled. “Professional repetition,” Ace said. Rogue almost smiled back. Almost. Mai disconnected the rig. “Ormond’s van stopped.” Talia looked at the map. “She’s locking down.” “Good,” Ace said. Shammy’s atmosphere settled around them, no longer merely holding glass together. Now the pressure had direction. Dax stood. Ace pointed at him. “No.” He sat back down before Shammy could say please. Smart man. Mai picked up the rig. “Talia stays with Rogue.” Talia’s face went pale. “What?” Rogue’s window lowered fully. “You’re safer with me than running,” Rogue said. Talia looked at Shammy. Shammy nodded gently. “She is frightening, but accurate.” Rogue looked at Shammy. Shammy smiled. Rogue said, “I’ll take it.” Ace and Mai got into the car. Shammy joined them. The van location pulsed on Mai’s map, stopped near the old Petrochem annex route, surrounded by traffic, cameras, municipal tags, and every legal fiction Ormond had thought would keep her untouchable. Ace cracked her knuckles. Mai drove. Shammy watched the people-weather ahead. And somewhere inside an armored mobile arbitration suite, Celeste Ormond had just learned that professional courtesy could cut both ways. --- ## Chapter 10 — Professional Courtesy The armored arbitration van looked exactly like the kind of vehicle that should not exist and therefore existed in Night City by the dozen. Matte grey. Municipal registration. Reinforced windows. Low-profile armor hidden beneath corporate modesty. A small official emblem on the side claimed it belonged to an approved dispute mobility service, which was a poetic way of saying that rich people could now take predatory paperwork on the road. Ace stared at it from two blocks away. “I hate that van.” Mai kept the car idling behind an abandoned utility truck, eyes on the feeds. “You hate many vehicles.” “This one has a legal department.” “That is a reasonable distinction.” Shammy leaned forward from the back seat, studying the street beyond them. The old Petrochem mediation annex rose on the right side of the block, a dead institutional slab from a previous age of corporate compromise. Its lower windows had been shuttered. Its upper floors showed scattered lights, some real, some left on to suggest occupancy. The armored van had stopped across from the annex beside a row of inactive curbside service ports. Traffic moved around it with mild annoyance and no curiosity. Night City had trained people not to ask why armored legal vans parked near abandoned arbitration buildings. Probably wise. Mai brought up the local map. “Ormond’s van is locked internally. Two security personnel in the front cabin. One driver, one armed escort. Ormond and at least one legal technician in the rear suite. Unknown internal compartments.” Ace said, “Street cameras?” “Too many.” “Witnesses?” “Enough.” “So no punching through the door.” “Correct.” Ace sighed. “This normikeikka has become hostile to my hobbies.” Shammy smiled faintly. “Words first.” “Words are doing a lot of work today.” Mai’s agent pulsed. Rogue had sent one short instruction. **Make her step out by choice.** Ace read it and looked offended. “By choice?” Mai’s mouth curved slightly. “Professional courtesy.” “I am going to start hating that phrase.” “No, you are not.” “No, I’m not.” Shammy’s gaze stayed on the van. Her silver-white hair lifted faintly at the ends, not from wind. There was very little wind on this block. The air here felt boxed in by buildings, cameras, and legal threat models. “She does not want to leave the van,” Shammy said. Ace glanced back. “Understandable.” “No,” Shammy said. “Not fear of us. Fear of being seen outside the room where she is strongest.” Mai nodded slowly. “The van is her office, court, shield, and stage.” “Then we take the stage away,” Ace said. “Without touching the van,” Mai replied. Ace hated when the answer was implied and still inconvenient. Mai opened a channel to Talia through Rogue’s relay. “Talia. Can the transit suite receive arbitration challenge notices while locked?” Talia’s voice came back tight but steadier than before. Rogue’s presence apparently had gravitational effects even over comms. “Yes. It has to. Mobile arbitration units are legally required to accept emergency contest filings during active enforcement.” Ace stared. “Of course they are.” Mai said, “Can we file one?” Talia hesitated. “Technically, yes.” “Practically?” “You need standing.” Rogue’s voice cut into the line. “I have standing.” Talia made a small sound. “Yes. She has standing.” Ace smiled. Rogue continued, dry and close through the car speakers. “Ormond delivered the obligation package into my custody. I can contest irregular transfer attempt and demand immediate in-person clarification.” Mai’s eyes sharpened. “If she refuses?” “She admits procedural weakness.” Talia added, “And if she accepts, she has to designate a neutral clarification point.” Ace looked at the Petrochem annex. Mai did too. Shammy said, “The dead building.” “Exactly,” Mai said. Ace leaned back. “So we invite her into the building she meant to use as legal scenery.” Rogue said, “Now you’re getting it.” Ace muttered, “Words first people are exhausting.” Mai was already building the filing. Rogue provided credentials. Talia supplied the procedural frame. It was grotesque and elegant: an emergency contest notice wrapped in the same arbitration standards Ormond had intended to exploit, now carrying Rogue’s legal weight like a knife in a velvet envelope. Mai sent it. For twenty seconds, nothing happened. Then the van’s side marker lights blinked. Talia whispered, “She received.” Mai watched the response field. Ormond did not accept. Did not reject. She delayed. Ace smiled. “Stalling.” Mai nodded. “Thinking.” Rogue said, “Let her think fast.” A second filing went through. This one simpler. A notice of chain-integrity preservation with time-stamped acknowledgment that Ormond’s unit had received dispute challenge and failed to respond. Talia let out a breath. “That’s nasty.” Rogue said, “That’s paperwork.” Ace said, “Same thing.” The van’s side door did not open. But a response arrived. **CLARIFICATION ACCEPTED. NEUTRAL POINT: PETROCHEM ANNEX, ROOM 3B.** Mai looked at the map. “Room 3B has three exits, two camera lines, no basement access.” Ace’s eyes narrowed. “Too clean.” “Agreed.” Shammy looked toward the annex. “She picked a room she can leave.” Mai nodded. “But so can we.” Rogue said, “You go in. I stay out. If she sees me early, she hides behind procedure.” Ace opened the car door. Mai caught her wrist lightly. Ace looked at her. “No improvising into a public incident,” Mai said. Ace smiled. “You make that sound difficult.” “It is you.” “Rude.” “Accurate.” Shammy stepped out behind them, ducking from the car with that strange mixture of elegance and resentment toward vehicle design. “What should I watch?” Mai’s gaze moved from the van to the annex. “Pressure. If Ormond is like Harker, she will try to make the room obey her before speaking.” Shammy nodded. “Then I will listen to the room.” Ace looked at her. “That sounded creepy.” “It did?” “Very.” Shammy looked pleased again. They crossed the street without hurry. That mattered. If they ran, the van won. If they skulked, the van won. If they entered like attackers, Ormond got her story. So they walked. Ace in front, small and dark and impossible to mistake for harmless if anyone had sense. Mai beside her, silver hair controlled, face composed, every step saying the building had already been mapped and found lacking. Shammy behind them, tall enough that two pedestrians openly stared, then decided eye contact with weather was above their pay grade and moved on. The annex doors opened with a tired mechanical complaint. Inside, the lobby was a museum of failed corporate neutrality. Old reception desk. Dead directory screens. faded floor lines leading to mediation rooms where companies had once pretended disagreement could be settled before someone sent mercs. The air smelled of dust, damp paperwork, and disinfectant from a decade ago. Ace paused. “Low room,” she said. Shammy looked around. “It tells more truth than Harker’s office.” Mai checked the schematic. “Room 3B.” They moved through the lobby and up one short flight. No guards. That was not reassuring. Room 3B waited behind a frosted glass door with old lettering: **FACILITATED RESOLUTION SUITE**. Ace read it. “Shootable.” Mai said, “You are developing a theme.” “It’s been a day.” Inside, Celeste Ormond waited at the far side of an oval table. She was not what Ace expected. Harker had looked like old manners preserved in a suit. Ormond looked like precision weaponized until it forgot the original target. Late forties, maybe early fifties. Black hair pulled back without softness. Dark suit, no jewelry except a thin silver pin shaped like an abstract scale. Her face was pale and controlled, with the stillness of someone who had trained every micro-expression to bill hourly. A legal technician sat to her right, young, nervous, eyes locked on a portable terminal. Two security men stood near the side exits. Not street muscle. Private arbitration security. Less swagger, better posture. Ormond looked first at Mai. Not Ace. Not Shammy. Mai. That told Ace plenty. “Ms. Mai,” Ormond said. Mai’s expression did not change. “Celeste Ormond.” “I was informed Triad preferred less formal forms of negotiation.” Ace pulled out a chair and sat backward in it. “Depends how annoying people are.” Ormond’s eyes moved to her briefly. “Ace.” “Congratulations.” “On?” “Knowing the short one’s name.” The legal technician made the mistake of almost reacting. Ormond did not. Her gaze moved to Shammy. “And Shamaterazu.” Shammy looked at her for one long, quiet second. “You say names like property labels.” The room changed. Not dramatically. Just enough. One of the security men shifted his weight. Ormond’s expression cooled. “Names are identifiers.” “No,” Shammy said. “Names are invitations.” Ace leaned back slightly. There it was again. The way Shammy could take a room built out of systems and say one human thing that made the machinery sound suddenly obscene. Ormond looked back to Mai. “I assume Ms. Amendiares is listening.” Mai said, “Assume what you can survive.” Ace smiled. Good line. Ormond folded her hands. “The emergency contest filing is procedurally valid, if theatrically timed.” “Your enforcement package is invalid,” Mai said. “No.” “Yes.” The answer came so flatly that Ormond paused. Mai stepped to the table and projected the chain map between them. Not all of it. Only enough. Creed’s obligations. Medical dependencies. legal instruments. relocation balances. funeral advances. contested transfer identifiers. Ormond’s manual authorization. Rogue’s custody shell. Ormond watched without visible fear. But the legal technician did. Ace saw his throat move. Ormond said, “A temporary destination anomaly does not invalidate underlying obligation.” Mai said, “It does when the destination anomaly exposes coercive aggregation across protected care contracts.” Ormond’s mouth curved faintly. “Protected. That is a generous category in this jurisdiction.” “Rogue disagrees,” Mai said. That was not a legal argument. It worked better. Ormond’s eyes sharpened. “Ms. Amendiares is not a court.” Ace said, “Neither are you.” “I am an arbitrator.” “You are a debt butcher with a mobile office.” The technician looked down very hard. Ormond’s expression remained controlled. “Colorful.” Shammy walked slowly along the side of the room. The security men tracked her with increasing uncertainty. She did not threaten them. She barely looked at them. That made it worse. People trained for threat recognition disliked being irrelevant to the most unusual thing in the room. Ormond continued, “Mr. Creed entered obligations voluntarily. Poor strategy does not erase debt.” Mai said, “No. But coercion changes enforceability.” “Prove coercion.” Mai looked at Ace. Ace reached into her jacket and placed a small recorder on the table. Harker’s voice filled the room. **Fear creates liquidity.** Short. Clean. Enough. Ormond did not flinch. The technician did. One of the security men glanced at her. Ormond said, “Mr. Harker is prone to ugly metaphors.” Mai played the next line. **Public contradiction. Creed will be reported alive in two incompatible locations by evening. One version as Rogue’s prisoner, one as fugitive. Fracture loyalty. Force internal confirmation attempts. Identify remaining loyal nodes.** Silence. Ace watched Ormond’s hands. Still folded. Too still. Mai said, “Your mesh attack is also traceable through Talia’s rig.” Ormond’s eyes shifted a fraction. There. Talia mattered. Not emotionally. Operationally. Ormond said, “A compromised debtor employee is not reliable.” Shammy stopped walking. “Employee?” Ormond looked at her. “Contracted technical support.” “Her mother’s care was collateral.” “Her mother’s care was funded through structured relief.” Shammy’s atmosphere went cold. Not storm cold. High-altitude cold. The kind that made breath feel like evidence. Ace turned slightly toward her. Mai did too. Shammy’s voice was calm. That was the warning. “You made help into a hook.” Ormond regarded her with professional patience. “Every society is built on obligations.” “No,” Shammy said. “Every cage says that.” For the first time, Ormond’s control faltered enough to show irritation. “Philosophy does not dissolve contracts.” Mai said, “No. Chain corruption does.” She expanded the map. Rogue’s shell opened—not fully, but enough to show custody of the transferred obligations had settled under Afterlife umbrella control. Ormond’s face tightened. Mai continued, “You completed the transfer. You manually authorized the contested package. You delivered every obligation tied to Creed’s network into Rogue-controlled custody.” Ormond’s voice sharpened. “Temporarily.” “Currently.” “That distinction matters.” “Yes,” Mai said. “More than you wish.” Ace drummed her fingers on the chair back. “So here’s the fun part.” Ormond looked at her. Ace smiled. “You wanted Creed’s people to think Rogue was taking them. Now Rogue actually has the paper.” Ormond said nothing. “And unlike you,” Ace continued, “she can decide not to use it like a knife.” Ormond’s mouth tightened. “Sentimental framing.” “No,” Mai said. “Strategic. If Rogue freezes enforcement and publicly marks the package as contaminated, anyone trying to collect through your chain inherits the contamination.” Ormond looked back at Mai. There it was. Not fear yet. Recognition of damage. “You cannot make that public without exposing Creed’s entire network,” Ormond said. Mai nodded. “Correct.” “So you have nothing.” Rogue’s voice came from Mai’s agent. “No, Celeste.” Ormond froze. Just slightly. Rogue continued, unseen but unmistakably present. “I have discretion.” Ace watched Ormond absorb the difference. Public exposure would hurt Creed’s people. Quiet custody could protect them. Rogue did not need a press release. She needed the right people to know that the debt package was dirty, traceable, and currently sitting in her shadow. Ormond understood. That made the room better. Rogue said, “You wanted a body in my name, then a network in your hand. You got neither.” Ormond sat back slowly. “If you freeze those obligations, you inherit their costs.” “Yes.” “That is expensive.” Rogue laughed softly through the agent. “Sweetheart, you just tried to steal from me using paperwork. Don’t explain expensive.” Ace grinned. The legal technician’s face had gone pale. Ormond glanced at him. Mistake. Mai saw it. Ace saw Mai see it. Mai asked, “What is your technician’s name?” Ormond said, “Irrelevant.” The technician looked even worse. Ace turned her chair slightly toward him. “Hey, Irrelevant.” He swallowed. Ormond’s voice cut. “Mr. Vale will not participate in this conversation.” Vale. Ace’s eyes narrowed. Sera Vale. Mai’s did too. Shammy turned fully. The technician closed his eyes. Mai said, “Relation to Sera Vale?” Ormond did not answer. The technician did, barely. “Brother.” Ace stood. The chair legs scraped the floor. For once, nobody made a joke. Sera’s brother. Kidney failure. Bad insurance. Worse luck. Creed had arranged coverage. Ormond had kept the line. And now the man was sitting beside Ormond inside the machine built from that same debt. Shammy’s expression became unbearably gentle. “What is your name?” she asked. He stared at the table. “Jonas.” Ormond said, “Mr. Vale.” Ace’s Shadow Aura moved across the floor. The room lights dimmed half a breath. Jonas flinched. Not from Ace. From Ormond’s voice. Ace looked at Ormond. “You brought collateral to a meeting.” Ormond’s face hardened. “Jonas is a qualified legal technician.” Mai said, “And leveraged.” “Everyone is leveraged.” Rogue’s voice went cold. “Wrong room for that sentence.” The security men finally moved. Not much. Enough. One shifted toward Ace. The other toward Shammy. Mai said, “Do not.” They did. Professionals, but not smart enough. The first reached for a restraint baton. Ace crossed the distance before the baton cleared its housing. She caught his wrist, turned under it, and drove him face-first into the table edge with controlled brutality. Not lethal. Not kind. He dropped to one knee, and she put him fully down with a knee strike to the thigh that made standing a future project. The second tried to draw on Shammy. The air snapped. Not lightning. Not a blast. Just pressure changing so suddenly his balance betrayed him. His weapon hand lifted too high, his shoulder overcorrected, and Shammy stepped in with surprising calm, took his wrist in both hands, and guided him into the wall like she was helping a drunk friend sit down, except the wall arrived with authority. He slid to the floor, conscious, confused, and no longer enthusiastic. Shammy looked at him apologetically. “You should not have done that.” Ace looked over. “Nice.” “I used words internally first.” “Counts.” Ormond had not moved. But her room had. The security layer was gone. Jonas was staring at Shammy like he had just seen physics choose sides. The legal frame was cracked. Rogue’s voice still occupied the air. Mai looked at Jonas. “Can you void the active enforcement templates?” Ormond snapped, “He cannot.” Jonas whispered, “I can.” Ormond turned. That was fear. Not of violence. Of a tool remembering he was a person. Jonas looked at Mai, then at the projection, then at the transfer chain. “I can’t erase obligations,” he said. “But I can mark enforcement review compromised by custodial conflict and coercive dependency.” Mai nodded. “What does that do?” “Freezes execution. Forces individual review. Breaks batch collection.” Ormond’s voice turned lethal. “Jonas.” He flinched. Shammy stepped beside him. Not touching. Just there. Jonas breathed. Then he said, “My sister said Mason was an arrogant prick.” Ace smiled faintly. Jonas continued, voice shaking. “She also said he helped.” Mai placed her agent in front of him. “Then help better.” Jonas began typing. Ormond stood. Ace turned toward her. Ormond stopped. Smart. Rogue said, “Celeste.” Ormond looked toward the agent. “You are done with Creed,” Rogue said. Ormond’s mouth curved with cold contempt. “You cannot protect every stray debt in Night City.” “No,” Rogue said. “But I can make this one poisonous.” Jonas worked faster. Mai monitored every line. Talia’s voice came through the relay, suddenly. “Jonas?” His hands stopped. He looked at the agent. “Talia?” “I’m here,” she said. “Rogue fixed my mother’s provider chain.” Jonas stared. Talia’s voice cracked. “Do it.” Jonas swallowed. Then hit execute. The projection shifted. Red enforcement lines froze one by one. Medical contracts: review locked. Legal balances: batch execution suspended. Relocation debts: contested. Funeral advances: custodial conflict. Crew obligations: individualized review required. Creed’s network did not become free. Night City was not that generous. But it stopped being collectible as a single bleeding animal. Mai exhaled softly. Ace realized she had been holding breath. Shammy smiled. Jonas looked like he might faint. Ormond looked at the projection with the expression of someone watching a knife rust in her own hand. Rogue said, “There.” Ormond’s voice was low. “You think that ends this?” “No.” Rogue sounded almost bored now. “I think it makes you expensive to stand near.” Mai closed the file and copied the freeze confirmation to Rogue. Ormond looked at Mai. “You have no idea how many systems sit behind this.” Mai met her gaze. “I know enough to know you are not the top.” “Then you know you have only delayed consequence.” Ace stepped closer. “That’s the funny thing about delays.” Ormond looked at her. Ace smiled. “They give us time to find the next person.” For the first time, Ormond did not have a prepared answer. Good. Rogue said, “Bring her.” Ormond laughed once. “To Afterlife?” “Yes.” “Alive, I assume.” Ace sighed. “Everyone keeps assuming at me.” Rogue continued, “Celeste. You can walk out with Triad, or you can leave this room after I make chain corruption visible to every neutral broker you still use.” Ormond’s face tightened. Rogue added, “Professional courtesy.” The phrase landed like a slap with gloves on. Ormond looked at Jonas. Jonas did not look back. That decided it more than any threat. Celeste Ormond adjusted her jacket. “I will walk.” Ace nodded toward the door. “Good choice.” The downed security men groaned. Shammy helped the one near the wall sit in a less awful position. Ace stared at her. “What?” Shammy asked. “You are helping the guy who tried to pull on you.” “He fell badly.” “He fell because you made air bully him.” “He still fell.” Mai’s mouth twitched. Ormond watched that exchange with visible disbelief. Good. Let her see it. Triad was not a clean category. Not mercenary, not moral symbol, not Rogue’s pet weapon, not soft-hearted rescue unit, not execution squad. They were themselves, which was much worse for people who needed everyone filed into leverageable boxes. Jonas stood slowly. Ormond’s eyes cut to him. “You understand you have ended your career.” He looked at her. Then at Shammy. Then at Mai. Then, finally, at Ace. “No,” he said, voice still shaking. “I think I just changed employers badly.” Rogue’s voice came dry through the agent. “We’ll discuss your résumé later.” Jonas sat back down very quickly. Ace laughed. Even Mai smiled. Shammy looked delighted. Ormond looked as if the entire city had become vulgar. Which, to be fair, it had been all along. They escorted her out through the annex lobby and into daylight that had gone grey-white over the street. No handcuffs. No public struggle. No theatrical humiliation. Ormond walked under her own power, flanked by Ace and Mai, with Shammy behind her like weather that had decided to attend a legal proceeding. The armored van remained parked outside. Its driver stared. Ace looked at him. He looked away. Smart. Mai opened the rear door. Ormond paused. “I assume I am not being returned to my vehicle.” “No,” Mai said. “Then where?” Ace smiled. “You got your meeting under Rogue’s name.” Ormond’s face went still. “Now you get the real one.” For the first time, something like actual fear crossed Celeste Ormond’s eyes. Not panic. Not collapse. Just the quiet, precise realization that she had spent the day moving pieces on a board without understanding who had owned the table. --- ## Chapter 11 — Building a Death Celeste Ormond rode to Afterlife without handcuffs. That was not mercy. It was worse than mercy. Handcuffs would have given her a role. Prisoner. Victim. Captive professional taken by street mercenaries. A woman forced from a legal proceeding under threat. Something clean enough to argue later. Something with posture. Instead, she sat in the back of Mai’s car between Ace and Shammy with her hands folded in her lap and her freedom intact in every meaningless way. She could speak. She could breathe. She could look out the window. She could even try the door if she wanted to discover exactly how fast Ace could become educational at arm’s length. Ormond did not try. Smart. Mai drove. Calm. Silent. Silver hair controlled. Eyes tracking traffic, cameras, and the invisible argument moving through Night City ahead of them. Ace sat on Ormond’s right, one knee angled toward the door, small body relaxed enough to be insulting. Her Shadow Aura filled only the lower corners of the car, dark pressure tucked under the seats and along the window edges. It did not touch Ormond. It did not have to. Shammy sat on Ormond’s left, which made the seating arrangement ridiculous because Shammy had too much height for the back seat and too much presence for any small enclosed space. She handled both problems with quiet patience, knees arranged carefully, silver-white hair gathered over one shoulder to avoid brushing Ormond’s suit. That politeness seemed to bother Ormond more than Ace’s darkness. Good. Ace watched her notice it. Ormond’s face remained controlled, but the rhythm of her breathing had changed since leaving the annex. Not panic. Not regret. Recalculation. She was already building future versions of the story. Ace could practically hear it. Triad coerced a neutral arbitrator. Rogue unlawfully interfered with private obligations. Creed’s network remains contaminated by delinquency. Harker’s statements were decontextualized. Talia was an unreliable debtor. Jonas acted under duress. All of it neat. All of it plausible enough for people who wanted the truth to stay expensive. Mai glanced at the rearview mirror. “Do not bother,” she said. Ormond’s eyes lifted. “With what?” “Drafting the appeal.” A small pause. Ace smiled. Ormond looked at Mai’s reflection. “You overestimate your leverage.” “No,” Mai said. “You underestimate Rogue’s patience.” “That is not a legal resource.” “It is in Night City.” Shammy looked out the window as Kabuki’s wet geometry slid past. “You keep saying legal as if legal means clean.” Ormond gave her a thin look. “Law is often the only difference between order and predation.” Ace laughed. The sound filled the car with no warmth. Ormond’s jaw tightened. Shammy turned back to her. “You used care contracts as hooks. You turned funeral money into chains. You sent videos designed to make friends hurt themselves. That was not order.” Ormond’s voice cooled. “You are emotionally simplifying a complex debt ecosystem.” Ace leaned closer. “Say ecosystem again.” Ormond looked at her. Ace’s smile did not move. “Go on.” Ormond chose silence. Good. The city outside shifted as they approached the older gravity around Afterlife. Traffic thickened with the afternoon’s ugly middle: delivery vans, rideshares, private security, street vendors packing and unpacking as if the act itself could count as progress. It was not yet evening, not yet the hour when Afterlife became its full mythology. That helped. Less crowd. Less theatre. Fewer people to notice Celeste Ormond being delivered under her own power to a meeting she had tried to counterfeit. Mai turned into a side approach instead of the main drop-off. Ormond noticed. “Not the front entrance?” Ace said, “You wanted discretion.” “I did not request this.” “Should have. It suits you.” The side door opened before they reached it. Not automatically. Claire stood there. She looked at the car. Looked at Ormond. Looked at Ace. “No blood?” Claire asked. Ace opened her door. “Not yet.” Mai said, “No blood.” Ace sighed. “Fine.” Claire stepped aside. “Rogue’s booth.” Ormond exited carefully, smoothing her jacket as if fabric alignment could restore authority. Shammy unfolded herself from the back seat with visible relief and one quiet breath that made loose dust near the door shift away. Ace got out last. Claire watched Ormond. “Lawyer?” “Arbitrator,” Mai said. Claire made a face. “Worse.” Ormond’s eyes sharpened. Claire did not care. They entered through the side corridor. Afterlife sounded different before evening. Not empty. Afterlife was never empty in the way normal rooms were empty. It held echoes like old alcohol held stories. But the daytime pulse was lower, more skeletal. Staff moving crates. A cleaner wiping tables that would be dirty again before midnight. Two mercs in a corner nursing drinks too early for either of them to be celebrating. Someone near the bar arguing quietly over a job payout with the doomed confidence of a man who had not yet noticed Rogue’s people listening. The legends on the walls looked worse in daylight. Less glamorous. More dead. Good. Ormond walked between Ace and Mai, Shammy following, and kept her face neutral. But Ace saw the room working on her. Afterlife was not a legal room. Not a court. Not a corporate mediation suite. It was not clean enough to be dismissed as criminal either. That was its power. It belonged to the city in a way Ormond’s van never would. A place built from reputation, bodies, failures, favors, and the stubborn survival of people who had seen too many systems claim to be neutral while pricing human organs by debt category. Rogue waited in her booth. Of course. Same posture as before. One arm along the backrest. Drink in front of her. Grey hair like old smoke under the low light. No weapon visible. No need. Hollis stood nearby with Mason Creed. Creed had been brought in after all. Not through the front. Not publicly. Not as prisoner, exactly. He looked terrible. Better fed, which was something. Still exhausted, still wearing the same dark coat, though someone had apparently forced him to wash his face and stop looking like guilt had been living rent-free in his pores for a week. He stood, not sat. A small thing. Rogue had allowed it. Dax stood behind him with Vera, Lin, and Eli. Dax’s cheek was bruised from the service lot. Vera looked like she had personally threatened sleep and lost. Lin had one arm folded tight around herself, eyes moving between Creed and Ormond with fierce exhaustion. Eli looked like he wanted to hide behind a table but had decided relevance required upright posture. Talia stood near the opposite edge of the booth, close enough to Rogue’s people to be protected, far enough from Ormond to breathe. Jonas Vale was there too. Sera was not. Good. No need to drag her into this room physically when the debt chain had already used her family enough. Jonas looked pale but steady. He had probably arrived under Rogue’s protection from the annex after Ormond’s security was contained. He did not look at Ormond. That seemed to bother her. Rogue gestured toward the booth. “Celeste.” Ormond stopped. “Ms. Amendiares.” Rogue smiled faintly. “You tried to borrow my name.” “I received a procedurally valid contest notice and responded.” Ace looked at Mai. Mai looked at Ace. Shammy looked disappointed. Rogue’s smile did not move. “You’re going to do that here?” Ormond’s chin lifted slightly. “Precision matters.” “Yes,” Rogue said. “It does.” The booth went quiet. Rogue did not invite Ormond to sit. That was the first cut. Ormond noticed. Mason Creed definitely noticed. His face tightened with the miserable recognition of someone who had recently learned seating arrangements could become doctrine. Rogue picked up her glass. “Let’s build the death properly.” Creed’s eyes flicked toward her. Ormond’s did not. Mai’s expression sharpened. Rogue looked at Ormond. “That was the plan, wasn’t it? Mason Creed dies, or appears captured, or appears to run. Any version works as long as the story makes people move.” Ormond said, “Mr. Creed’s instability created many possible outcomes.” “Cute.” Ace smiled. There it was. Rogue leaned back. “No, Celeste. We are past possible outcomes. I want the intended one.” Ormond remained silent. Rogue looked at Mai. Mai projected the chain against the booth table. Not too high. Not dramatic. Afterlife did not need holographic theatre. The data hovered low, like a card game with knives. “Stage one,” Mai said. “Creed accumulates debt through disguised intermediaries. He believes he is financing growth. Actual result: dependency.” Creed’s jaw tightened. Vera looked down. “Stage two,” Mai continued. “Pressure events. Failed jobs, targeted injuries, controlled scares, message attacks. Not enough to kill Creed. Enough to exhaust his network and increase reliance.” Kell’s name appeared. Juno. Mateo. Sera. Nia. Paulo. Others. Creed looked at the names like each one hit him separately. Good. Let it. “Stage three,” Mai said. “Forgery using Rogue’s name. Invitation to false meeting. Intended psychological effect: Creed believes judgment or negotiation is possible.” Rogue’s eyes remained on Ormond. “Stage four,” Mai continued. “Contradictory proof injected into Creed’s crew mesh. Goal: fracture loyalty and generate confirmation attempts. Dax was targeted specifically.” Dax’s mouth tightened. Creed looked back at him. Dax did not look away. “Stage five,” Mai said. “Debt enforcement validation. Once crew loyalty is destabilized and Creed’s status uncertain, obligations move as a batch to Vane-adjacent recovery structure.” Ormond’s expression was still. Too still. “Stage six,” Mai said, voice colder. “Narrative harvest. If Rogue appears responsible for Creed’s death or capture, frightened dependents reject her gravity and accept alternate custody. If Creed appears to abandon them, same result. If Creed survives but loses credibility, same result.” Shammy’s voice was quiet. “Every path made fear useful.” Rogue looked at Ormond. “There,” she said. “That’s the death.” Ormond’s hands were folded before her. “A compelling fiction,” she said. Ace made a sound. Not a laugh. Something sharper. Ormond looked at her. Ace said, “You really think the room needs you to keep lying?” Ormond’s eyes narrowed. “I think rooms like this often confuse certainty for evidence.” Rogue lifted her glass slightly. “This room has buried people with more evidence than you.” Silence. That was not a threat. Not exactly. It was history leaning forward. Ormond did not reply. Rogue nodded to Jonas. Jonas stepped forward. His voice shook slightly at first, then steadied as he looked at the projection instead of Ormond. “I executed the enforcement freeze. Before that, I handled portions of Ormond’s validation structure. The package was designed for batch collectability. Medical contracts were included despite dependency protections. Funeral advances were marked as recovery-priority instruments. Relocation balances were cross-tagged to crew loyalty nodes.” Ormond said, “Jonas.” He flinched. Talia stepped closer to him. Not much. Enough. Jonas continued. “Talia’s runner kit was used to inject personalized fracture proofs into Creed’s crew mesh. I did not build those videos, but I saw the response model. Dax was tagged as protective-response probable.” Dax’s face went hard. Eli whispered, “And me?” Jonas looked at him. “Panic-dispersion probable.” Eli closed his eyes. “Great.” Lin asked, voice small but steady, “Me?” “Analytical contradiction loop. You were supposed to distrust both proofs and isolate yourself verifying.” Lin looked like she wanted to vomit. Vera said, “Me?” Jonas hesitated. Vera’s eyes sharpened. “Say it.” “Command-burden overload,” Jonas said. “You were expected to hold the group together until failure, then accept outside arbitration to preserve remaining people.” Vera laughed once. Deadly. “Outside arbitration.” Ormond said nothing. Creed turned toward his crew. His face looked stripped. “I’m sorry,” he said. Vera’s eyes cut to him. “Not now.” He stopped. Good. Vera understood timing better than he did. Rogue watched that exchange with faint interest. Then she looked back at Ormond. “You built a clean machine.” Ormond’s voice remained smooth. “You are letting debtors explain debt.” Rogue’s mouth curved. “Celeste.” Ormond stopped. Rogue’s voice lowered. “You delivered the package to me.” That mattered more than every accusation. Ormond’s face hardened. Rogue tapped the table. Mai shifted the projection. The custody transfer opened again. Not details. Not enough to expose private people in the room. Just the structural fact: the obligations had completed into Rogue-controlled custody, then been frozen under contamination review. Rogue said, “You can argue motive. You can argue language. You can argue every little legal category until the city gets bored and shoots itself for entertainment.” She leaned forward. “But you cannot argue chain custody.” Ormond’s eyes held hers. “No,” she said finally. “I cannot.” There. The first admission. Not moral. Technical. Rogue accepted it as such. “Good.” Creed looked at Rogue. “What happens to the debts?” Rogue did not look at him yet. “Frozen.” “For how long?” “As long as needed.” “That costs money.” Now Rogue looked at him. Creed shut his mouth one second too late. Rogue said, “I know what things cost.” He nodded once, chastened. But he did not retreat fully. “Some of those people need the services attached.” Mai said, “Freezing enforcement does not cancel service continuity. Rogue’s custody shell preserves payment flows while suspending collection escalation.” Creed stared at her. Eli whispered, “Can she translate that?” Lin said, “People keep care. Collectors stop biting.” Eli nodded. “Thanks.” Mai looked faintly pained but allowed the translation. Shammy smiled at Lin. Lin blinked, then looked away, embarrassed by warmth. Rogue looked at Ormond again. “Now we discuss courtesy.” Ormond lifted her chin. “Do we?” “Yes.” “You are holding contaminated obligations you do not want, a failed fixer whose credibility is damaged, and testimony from leveraged individuals. That is not victory.” Rogue’s eyes narrowed. “No,” she said. “It’s cleanup.” Ace felt the line settle. There was Rogue’s core in this story. Not triumph. Cleanup. No big speech about justice. No heroic banner. Rogue had not saved Mason Creed because he deserved a ballad. She had prevented a mess from becoming a war, a debt harvest, and an insult under her signature. Professional. Cold enough to work. Human enough not to be Ormond. Rogue continued, “Here’s what happens. Harker’s node is burned. Your enforcement package stays frozen. The people tied to it stay under service continuity until each obligation gets reviewed one by one. You will sign chain contamination acknowledgment.” Ormond laughed softly. “I will not.” Rogue said, “You will.” “No.” Rogue looked at Mai. Mai placed another file on the table. Ormond’s face changed before the file opened fully. Ace saw it. Fear, finally. Not large. But real. Mai said, “This is the pre-transfer internal memo from your suite. Talia’s rig did not contain it.” Talia stared. “It didn’t?” “No,” Mai said. Ormond’s eyes moved to Rogue. Rogue smiled faintly. “Rogue already knows,” Mai said. Ace glanced at her. Oh. So that was what this chapter had been building toward, whether anyone named it or not. Rogue already knew. Not everything. Not all the pieces. But enough to have set quiet hooks before sending Triad. Enough to have old eyes near clinics, debt brokers, provider chains, Harker’s office, Ormond’s technician layer. Enough that when Mai found the structure, Rogue’s shadow already had fingers around parts of it. Rogue had not been waiting for proof because she was ignorant. She had been waiting for proof that could be used without burning the people tied to it. Ormond understood that now. The file opened. Internal language. Not dramatic. That made it worse. **CREED NETWORK POST-CLAIM CONSOLIDATION** **DEPENDENCY RESPONSE PROBABILITY** **AMENDIARES ATTRIBUTION RISK** **BATCH RECOVERY OPPORTUNITY** Ormond’s name was not on the header. Her authorization marker was in the metadata. Mai said, “This was pulled from an archival mirror tied to your van’s prior arbitration packet. Not today’s. Three weeks ago.” Ormond looked at Rogue. “You had this.” Rogue’s expression was unreadable. “I had a smell.” “You let it proceed.” “I let you show me which people you were willing to hurt.” Ormond’s voice sharpened. “Moral theater.” Rogue’s eyes went flat. “No. Risk management.” That was more frightening than moral outrage. Rogue nodded once toward the file. “Sign the contamination acknowledgment. Or I distribute the memo quietly to every broker who currently trusts your chain hygiene.” Ormond said nothing. Rogue added, “Not public. Quiet. Professional. The kind that makes people stop answering calls.” Ace watched Ormond calculate. The room let her. Nobody rushed. Even Creed held still. That was important. He was finally in a room where his need to do something was not useful. Maybe he was learning. Maybe exhaustion looked like wisdom from the correct angle. Ormond looked at the acknowledgment file. Then at Jonas. He did not look away now. Then at Talia. She did not either. Then at Mason Creed. That look was different. Contempt, still. But also irritation that he had not collapsed correctly. Creed met her gaze. He looked afraid. He looked ashamed. He also looked present. Ormond looked back to Rogue. “Your courtesy is expensive.” Rogue smiled. “So was yours.” Ormond signed. Not with a flourish. Not with drama. Just one precise authorization that damaged her more than any bullet in the room could have done cleanly. Mai verified it immediately. “Valid.” Rogue took a drink. For the first time since Ormond arrived, she seemed almost relaxed. Almost. “Good,” Rogue said. “Now get out of my club.” Ormond blinked. Ace did too. Creed looked up sharply. Rogue continued, “You walk out. You return to your van. You leave this district. You do not touch Creed, his crew, the frozen package, Talia, Jonas, Sera, Nia, Morrow’s clinic, or any provider tied to this mess.” Ormond’s eyes narrowed. “And if I do?” Rogue leaned back. “Then I stop being courteous.” That was enough. Ormond looked like she wanted a better line to leave with. She did not find one. Ace stepped aside. Mai did too. Shammy remained very still. Ormond walked past them. At the edge of the booth, she paused and looked at Creed. “You will fail again,” she said. Creed flinched. Not much. Enough. Then he said, “Probably.” The room shifted. Ormond’s eyes narrowed. Creed swallowed, then continued. “But next time I might fail cheaper.” Ace barked a laugh before she could stop herself. Dax grinned despite the bruise. Eli whispered, “That was almost good.” Lin said, “Don’t encourage him.” Vera’s mouth twitched. Rogue looked at Creed with something that might have been grudging approval if one were drunk enough to risk saying so. Ormond had no answer for that either. She left. No escort. No handcuffs. No humiliation beyond walking out alive with everyone knowing exactly why. That was Rogue’s mercy. And Rogue’s insult. When Ormond was gone, the booth remained silent for several seconds. Then Creed said, “I honestly thought she was going to get shot.” Ace said, “Working through disappointment.” Mai said, “You are not shooting her.” “I said disappointment, not plan.” Shammy sat down carefully at the edge of the booth, finally letting herself occupy space. “That was the death?” Rogue looked at her. Shammy gestured toward the table, the files, the frozen obligations, the people standing around it with fear still drying on them. “The death you built. It was not a person. It was the story.” Rogue watched her for a long moment. Then raised her glass slightly. “Yeah,” she said. “Something like that.” Creed sat down without being invited. Everyone looked at him. He immediately stood back up. “Sorry.” Rogue stared at him. Then, slowly, she pointed at the seat. “Sit down before you fall down and make me feel responsible.” Creed sat. Dax leaned toward Vera. “Does that mean he’s alive?” Vera whispered back, “For now.” Eli said, “That is our general operating condition.” Lin gave him a tired look. “That is everyone’s general operating condition.” Shammy smiled. Ace leaned against the booth rail beside Mai. The room had not healed. Not even close. Debts were frozen, not erased. Ormond was wounded, not destroyed. Harker was humiliated, not gone. Vane remained a name behind distance and arrangements. Mason Creed still had a crater where his fixer career used to be, and half the people around him had every right to scream at him for putting them near the blast. But the death had been built. Then broken. Quietly enough that no street war had started. Loudly enough that the people who mattered would hear. Rogue turned her eyes to Creed. “Now,” she said. He looked at her. “Let’s have that conversation you wanted so badly.” --- ## Chapter 12 — Extraction Mason Creed had imagined this conversation many times. That became clear in the first ten seconds. Not because he spoke well. He did not. He sat in Rogue’s booth like a man who had spent months rehearsing speeches in mirrors, alleys, cars, clinic waiting rooms, and insomnia, only to discover that every prepared sentence had died somewhere between the doorway and her eyes. Rogue did not help him. She sat across from him with her drink in one hand and history at her back, saying nothing. Afterlife moved around them. Not loudly yet. Still too early for the full night crowd, but the club had begun shifting toward evening. More mercs at tables. More voices. More boots on the floor. Claire moving behind the bar. Staff pretending very hard that they were not aware one of Night City’s failed rising fixers was sitting in Rogue’s booth looking like judgment had finally found an address. Ace stayed standing at the booth rail. Mai beside her. Shammy sat at the outer edge, because the booth had suffered enough architectural indignity for one day and she had decided to negotiate gently with it. Creed’s crew remained nearby but not inside the booth proper. That was Rogue’s choice. Again, seating as doctrine. Dax, Vera, Lin, and Eli were close enough to hear most things if voices rose. Far enough that Creed had to face Rogue alone. Talia and Jonas had been moved to a quieter side table under Rogue’s protection. Jonas looked hollowed out but functional. Talia looked like someone had cut the collar off an invisible leash and she did not yet trust her neck. Hollis had disappeared. Or possibly become furniture somewhere. Ace suspected he could do that. Rogue finally said, “Talk.” Creed inhaled. Exhaled. “Ms. Amendiares—” “No.” He stopped. Rogue set her glass down. “If you start with polished bullshit, I’m going to send you back to the body bag until your vocabulary improves.” Ace smiled. Creed closed his eyes briefly. “Rogue,” he said. “Better.” “I fucked up.” Rogue looked at him. “Congratulations,” she said. “You found the lobby.” Creed’s mouth tightened. Not anger. Humiliation. Good. The correct kind. He tried again. “I thought there was room under your level for something better than the usual meat grinder.” Rogue leaned back. “There is.” That visibly hit him. He had expected scorn. Rogue continued, “There’s always room for better. Night City eats better every day because ambitious idiots keep serving it on clean plates.” Creed looked down. Mai’s expression remained unreadable, but Ace could feel her attention sharpen. This was not Rogue dismissing the idea. This was worse. Rogue was separating idea from execution with a scalpel. Creed said, “I wanted crews paid fast. Medical coverage attached. Legal cleanup guaranteed. No rookies thrown blind into jobs veterans wouldn’t touch. No delayed payouts because fixers wanted leverage.” Rogue nodded once. “Good list.” Creed looked up. Rogue’s eyes were cold. “Then you financed it like a drunk corpo with a startup deck.” Ace laughed once before she could stop herself. Creed flinched. Rogue did not. “Debt from unknown intermediaries,” she said. “Growth before trust. Public claims before infrastructure. You bought loyalty with money you did not own and called it reform.” Creed’s jaw worked. “Yes.” “No argument?” “I have used them all already. They aged badly.” That got the smallest reaction from Rogue’s mouth. Almost approval. Almost. “Good,” she said. “You’re less stupid than when this started.” Creed gave a broken little laugh. “That is a low bar.” “Most education is.” Shammy leaned slightly toward Ace and whispered, “Night City schools again.” Ace whispered back, “Worst graduation rate.” Mai murmured, “Both of you are audible.” Rogue ignored them with the practiced focus of a woman who had decided Triad background commentary was now an environmental condition. Creed looked toward his crew. Rogue snapped, “No.” He froze. “You don’t look at them for permission,” she said. “Not here.” Creed turned back. His face had gone pale again. Rogue continued, “You used them as shield, mirror, proof, conscience, and excuse. Maybe not on purpose. Doesn’t matter. Right now you look at me.” Dax shifted behind him. Vera put one hand on Dax’s arm. Good. Creed swallowed. “You’re right.” “I know.” “I didn’t mean to use them that way.” Rogue’s voice hardened. “Intent is not a receipt you cash after damage.” That one landed everywhere. Not just Creed. Ace felt it in herself, in the old places where good intentions had been too late to matter. Mai’s gaze lowered for half a second. Shammy’s fingers rested gently on the booth edge. Creed nodded. Slow. Sick. “Yes.” Rogue let the silence breathe. Then she said, “Why my name?” Creed looked up again. That was the real question. Not the practical one. They knew Ormond forged the invitation. They knew Harker, Vane’s arrangements, debt pressure, story placement. Rogue was asking something else. Why had Mason Creed believed, even for a moment, that Rogue Amendiares might invite him to speak after seven months of public irritation? Creed looked smaller. “Because I needed someone who could see the whole thing,” he said. Rogue watched him. “I thought if the invite was real, maybe you already knew. Maybe you’d decided I was useful alive. Maybe I could bring enough proof to make you…” He stopped. “Make me what?” “Not forgive me.” “No.” “Not help me.” Rogue waited. Creed’s voice roughened. “Believe me.” There it was. Not negotiation. Not ambition. Witness. Sera had been right. Creed did not want Rogue to absolve him. He wanted one person with enough history to look at the board and confirm he had not imagined the trap closing. Rogue looked at him for a long moment. Then she said, “I believed the trap before you did.” Creed’s face changed. “Then why—” “Because belief is not enough,” Rogue said. “Not if you want to save the people attached to it. If I moved too early, Ormond hid the chain. Harker walked. Vane kept distance. Your crew scattered. Your debt package stayed invisible. Everyone who took your money stayed collectible.” Creed’s hands clenched. “You used me.” Rogue’s eyes sharpened. Ace went still. Mai did too. Shammy looked at Creed with sudden worry, because there were sentences that became cliffs the moment they left the mouth. Rogue leaned forward. “Yes.” Creed stopped breathing for a second. Rogue did not soften. “I used your noise. Your fear. Your mistakes. Your little reform project. Your enemies’ assumption that you were easier to manipulate than me. I used all of it.” The booth seemed colder. Then Rogue added, “Difference is, kid, I was trying to keep people breathing.” Creed looked like he had been slapped without contact. Ace did not move. She agreed with Rogue. She also understood why that answer hurt. Night City did not offer clean rescue. Sometimes the person saving you still used the handle sticking out of your back. Rogue sat back again. “You wanted to play fixer. That’s fixing. You use what’s there. Bodies. debts, lies, timing, fear, mercy if it’s available and doesn’t cost more people than it saves. You don’t get to keep your hands clean by wanting better outcomes.” Creed’s voice was barely audible. “I know that now.” “No,” Rogue said. “You’re beginning to know it. Don’t flatter yourself.” Creed closed his mouth. Good. Rogue looked toward Mai. “Status on the frozen package?” Mai answered immediately. “Stable. Enforcement blocked as batch. Individual review required. Rogue custody shell holding service continuity. Ormond’s contamination acknowledgment valid.” “Who can contest?” “Ormond can attempt procedural appeal. Harker’s node is compromised. Vane-adjacent handlers will likely avoid direct contest until they understand how much exposure exists.” Rogue nodded. “Translation,” Eli whispered from behind Creed. Lin said quietly, “We’re not free, but we’re not dinner.” Eli nodded. “I like your translations less every time.” Dax muttered, “Still alive.” Vera said, “For now.” Creed flinched slightly at the crew voices. Rogue noticed. “Your people,” she said. Creed looked at her. “You don’t own them.” “I know.” “No. Say it.” Creed stared. Rogue waited. He turned slightly—not fully toward them, because Rogue had told him not to seek permission, but enough that the words were not only for her. “I don’t own you,” he said. The crew went quiet. Creed’s voice grew unsteady. “I built obligations around you and called them protections. Some were. Some became chains. I thought if I carried enough of the risk, that made it okay when the risk spilled over.” Vera’s face tightened. Dax stared at the floor. Lin’s eyes filled and she looked furious about it. Eli stopped fidgeting. Creed swallowed. “I was wrong.” Nobody rescued him from the silence. Good. He had to sit in it. Then Vera spoke. “You were.” Creed nodded. Dax said, “You should have told us.” “I know.” “No, Mason.” Dax’s voice sharpened. “You should have told us before I wore your coat. Before Lin started sleeping with a pistol under her pillow. Before Eli built decoy pings while shaking so hard he broke two nail implants. Before Vera had to be the spine because you were too busy pretending the body still stood.” Eli whispered, “I did break two.” Lin wiped one eye angrily. “Not the point.” Dax did not look away from Creed. “You should have told us.” Creed’s face crumpled for half a second. Then he pulled it back together. “Yes.” That was all. No defense. Finally. Vera stepped closer. She looked at Rogue first. Rogue gave the smallest nod. Vera entered the booth edge, not sitting, standing over Creed with exhausted authority. “You don’t get to lead us after this.” Creed looked up. For a moment, raw fear crossed his face. Not fear of death. Fear of losing the only thing he had convinced himself made the damage meaningful. Then he nodded. “I know.” Vera seemed ready for argument and did not know what to do with absence. “You know?” “Yes.” “Just like that?” Creed laughed softly, broken. “No. Not just like that. I hate it. It feels like someone cut my ribs out. But yes. I know.” Vera studied him. Then: “Good.” Dax stepped beside her. “We’re not abandoning you.” Creed looked at him sharply. Dax lifted one hand. “Don’t look happy. I’m still pissed.” “I wasn’t—” “You were about to.” Creed shut up. Dax continued, “But Vera’s right. You don’t lead. Not now. Maybe not ever. You want to fix debts, clinics, crew protections? Fine. Do the work. Not from the top. Not with people wearing your coat so you can stay alive and feel guilty about it.” Creed’s mouth tightened. “Yes.” Lin stepped forward next. “I want out,” she said. Creed closed his eyes. Vera looked at her, but not with anger. Lin continued, voice shaking but firm. “Not forever maybe. I don’t know. But I want two months where no one sends me contradictory proof of someone I care about dying. I want sleep. I want to not analyze every wall.” Creed nodded. “You’ll get it.” Lin’s face hardened. “Not from you. From the frozen package. From whatever Rogue’s shell does. From me leaving.” Creed absorbed that. “Yes,” he said. Eli raised his hand slightly. Everyone looked at him. He lowered it. Then raised it again because apparently relevance still hurt. “I want out too, but maybe not totally out. Like… adjacent out.” Ace stared. Mai said, “Define adjacent out.” “I don’t want to run routes. I don’t want to lie to people with guns. I don’t want to be panic-dispersion probable, which is a phrase I am going to have nightmares about.” “Valid,” Shammy said. Eli nodded gratefully. “Thank you. But I can do signal cleanup. Decoy audits. Maybe help Mai— not with her, obviously, I’m not insane, but like under guidelines that don’t involve me being bait.” Mai looked at him. “You are competent.” Eli looked horrified. “No, please don’t say that.” Ace smiled. “He hates being useful.” “It keeps happening,” Shammy said sympathetically. Rogue watched the exchange with a look that suggested she was already placing Eli somewhere in her mental infrastructure whether he liked it or not. Poor bastard. Creed looked at each of them. Vera. Dax. Lin. Eli. Then at Rogue. “What happens to me?” Rogue took her time. “You stop being a fixer.” Creed’s face went still. Not surprised. Still hurt. “For how long?” Rogue’s gaze hardened. “That question is why.” Creed flinched. Rogue continued, “You are thinking in comeback timeline. Reputation recovery. Re-entry angle. How long until I can stand at a table again?” Creed looked down. “Yeah.” “At least you’re honest.” He swallowed. Rogue said, “You do not fix. You do not broker jobs. You do not recruit crews. You do not hold debt. You do not speak for people. You do not build a new table under another name.” Creed nodded slowly. “What do I do?” Rogue looked at Mai. Mai’s expression shifted with faint surprise. Ace caught it. Oh, interesting. Rogue said, “You work under review.” Creed looked up. “Not for me,” Rogue said. His mouth closed. “Don’t look relieved. This is worse.” Ace smiled again. Rogue continued, “You wanted better crew protections? Medical pools? Legal cleanup? Fine. You know the broken parts because you stuck your hands into them and got bitten. You build documentation. Quietly. Under Vera’s oversight if she agrees. Under my audit if I care. You do not command.” Vera stared at Rogue. “Me?” Rogue looked at her. “You have spine.” Vera laughed once. “That is not consent.” “No. It’s an observation.” Vera looked at Creed. Creed looked back. Something passed there. Not forgiveness. Not restored loyalty. More like two people standing on opposite sides of wreckage and acknowledging there might still be tools worth saving. Vera said, “I’ll think about it.” Rogue nodded. “Good. Thinking beats volunteering.” Dax muttered, “Recently learned that.” Ace looked at him. “Did you?” “I said recently. Not completely.” “Fair.” Shammy smiled at him, and Dax immediately looked away like warmth had become tactical pressure. Rogue turned back to Creed. “Your public story,” she said. Creed stiffened. “Dies tonight.” Ace’s eyes sharpened. Mai’s did too. Creed whispered, “What?” Rogue lifted her glass. “Mason Creed, rising fixer, challenger to Rogue, new blood with new channels — that man dies.” Creed looked sick. Rogue continued, “No body. No execution. No martyr. Just collapse. Word goes out: Creed’s network failed under debt contamination. Rogue intervened enough to prevent a dirty collection event because someone forged her name. Creed is alive, unavailable, and under professional review.” Ace glanced at Mai. Mai nodded faintly. Good story. Not flattering to Creed. Not threatening enough to start war. Strong enough to warn predators. Merciful enough to keep his people from becoming open carrion. Creed asked, “Who tells it?” Rogue smiled. “Everyone.” Then she looked toward Ace. Ace frowned. “No.” Rogue said nothing. “No.” Mai’s mouth twitched. Shammy leaned slightly forward, delighted already. Ace pointed at Rogue. “I am not giving speeches.” Rogue looked at Claire. Claire, from the bar, called, “You kind of are.” Ace turned. “Traitor.” Claire shrugged. Rogue said, “Not a speech. A walk.” Ace narrowed her eyes. Mai understood now and looked amused in that controlled, terrible way. Rogue continued, “You, Mai, and Shammy walk Creed out through Afterlife’s main floor later tonight. Not dragged. Not hidden. Not honored. Moved. Everyone sees he’s alive. Everyone sees he is not in charge of the room. Everyone sees Triad is calm. Then he disappears into review.” Creed looked as if he might prefer the body bag. Ace said, “Public humiliation?” “No,” Rogue said. “Public correction.” Shammy said softly, “A death without killing him.” Rogue raised her glass toward her. “Exactly.” Creed closed his eyes. This time nobody mocked him. Because that was real. The death of a self could hurt worse than the body if the self had been all that kept you moving. Ace did not like him enough to pity him easily. But she respected the fact that he opened his eyes again. “Okay,” he said. Rogue nodded. “One more thing.” Creed waited. Rogue leaned forward slightly. “If you ever use my name again without permission, I will not send Triad.” Creed swallowed. “Understood.” “No,” Rogue said. “You don’t. But you will remember.” “Yes.” Rogue sat back. The conversation was over. Not solved. Over. There was a difference. For several seconds, nobody moved. Then Shammy said, very gently, “Does anyone need water?” Ace looked at her. Mai looked at her. Rogue looked at her. Creed stared. Dax whispered, “I kind of do.” Eli raised his hand. “Me too.” Lin said, “Everyone does. We are all dehydrated and emotionally concussed.” Vera rubbed her face. “That is the first useful operational summary today.” Claire called from the bar, “I have water.” Shammy brightened and stood. Ace caught her sleeve. “You are not turning this into a hydration mission.” “It seems necessary.” Mai said, “It actually is.” Ace stared at her. “You too?” Mai’s expression stayed calm. “Most of them have been under acute stress for eighteen hours.” Rogue muttered, “For fuck’s sake.” But she did not stop it. So, absurdly, the next five minutes of the great Mason Creed fixer collapse involved Shammy distributing water glasses through Rogue’s booth while Afterlife staff pretended this was normal and several mercs on the main floor tried to understand why one of Night City’s most feared rooms had become a trauma recovery corner with hydration protocol. Ace stood aside with Mai. “Normal job,” Ace said. Mai accepted a glass from Shammy and handed it to her. “Drink.” Ace looked at it. “Mai.” “You have also been under acute stress.” “I am not part of the hydration collapse.” “You are now.” Shammy handed Mai another glass with visible satisfaction. Mai drank. Ace stared at both of them. Then drank, because refusing would only make Shammy happier and Mai more correct. Rogue watched this over the rim of her own glass. “Triad,” she said dryly. Ace lowered the water. “What?” “Nothing.” But Rogue’s mouth almost smiled. Almost. That counted too. --- They waited until Afterlife became loud enough for the correction to matter. Evening arrived slowly, then all at once. The club filled in layers. First the regulars. Then the hungry middle ranks. Then the young mercs who wanted someone to see them inside Afterlife more than they wanted a drink. The music grew teeth. Laughter turned sharper. Deals formed and dissolved in corners. Claire worked behind the bar like the only sane person in a room full of expensive bad decisions. Word had already begun moving. Ace could feel it. Not through any anomaly. Through eyes. People looked toward Rogue’s booth too often, then looked away too quickly. Some had heard Creed was dead. Some had heard Rogue had him. Some had heard he ran. Some had heard Vane’s old ghosts had moved. Some had heard nothing and were annoyed by being behind. Good. Stories were hungry. Time to feed them something indigestible. Rogue stood first. The booth quieted around her before the room did. Then Ace moved. Mai beside her. Shammy behind. Creed between them. Not restrained. Not supported. Not free either. He walked under his own power, and that mattered. His face was pale. His jaw set. He did not look at the room like a man claiming it. He looked straight ahead like a man walking through the corpse of his own reputation and trying not to step wrong. Dax, Vera, Lin, and Eli remained near the booth. Visible. Alive. Not following. Also important. The main floor noticed in waves. First the nearest tables. Then the bar. Then the booths. Conversation dropped in uneven patches until the music seemed briefly too loud for the room. Ace walked small and dangerous on Creed’s right. Mai calm and surgical on his left. Shammy behind them like weather escorting a verdict. Creed’s eyes flicked once toward a group of young mercs who had probably repeated his “new channels” line two weeks earlier. They looked away. Good. A man near the bar whispered, not quietly enough, “Thought he was dead.” Ace turned her head. The man discovered immediate interest in his drink. Another voice, older, said, “Rogue got him?” Mai answered without stopping. “No.” That single word did work. Not Rogue got him. Not Creed escaped. Not Triad captured him. No. The room did not understand yet. Perfect. They reached the center of the floor. Rogue had not moved from her booth, but her attention was on them. Everyone felt it. Creed stopped exactly where Mai had told him to stop. Ace stepped half a pace aside. Mai did the same. Shammy remained behind him. Creed looked at the room. His throat moved. For one awful second, Ace thought he might try to explain. He did not. Good. He had learned at least that much. Mai spoke instead. Her voice did not rise much. It did not need to. “Mason Creed’s network was compromised through contaminated debt instruments and forged attribution. A collection event using Rogue Amendiares’ name has been stopped.” No drama. No flourish. Every fixer-adjacent ear in the room sharpened. Mai continued, “Obligations tied to that event are under frozen review. Attempts to collect, enforce, purchase, or retaliate through those instruments will be considered participation in the contamination chain.” A silence. Then someone muttered, “Fuck.” Yes. Exactly. Rogue’s voice came from the booth, cutting through the room with old authority. “Creed is alive.” Everyone looked to her. Rogue lifted her glass. “Unavailable.” A small pause. “Learning.” The room did not laugh. Not quite. But the word landed exactly where Rogue wanted it. Not prisoner. Not ally. Not rival. Learning. A demotion so precise it made execution look lazy. Creed stood through it. His face tightened, but he did not break. Ace respected that. Then Rogue added, “Anyone using my name without permission should consider today’s courtesy educational.” That was all. The room understood enough. The rest would spread. People began talking again, but differently. Quieter at first. Then louder. Story finding new shape. Vane’s clean death had been spoiled. Ormond’s collection had been poisoned. Creed’s rising-star myth had been killed without giving anyone a martyr. Extraction complete. Not of Creed’s body. Of the story. Ace leaned closer to him. “Still breathing?” Creed whispered, “Unfortunately.” “Good.” Mai said, “Walk.” They escorted him to the side corridor, not the main door. Again, exact balance. Seen, then removed. Not hidden at first. Not displayed too long. When the door closed behind them, Creed leaned against the wall. For a second, all the strength went out of his legs. Dax moved as if to go to him. Vera stopped him. Creed looked at them. “I’m sorry,” he said again. Vera crossed her arms. “We know.” Dax said, “Still pissed.” Lin said, “Still leaving.” Eli said, “Still adjacent.” Creed laughed softly. Then nodded. “Okay.” Rogue’s voice came from behind them. “Good. Now all of you get out of my corridor before this turns into group therapy.” Shammy brightened. Rogue pointed at her. “No.” Shammy’s mouth closed. Ace had to turn away. Mai failed to hide a smile. Rogue looked at Creed. “Hollis takes you back. You start tomorrow.” “Doing what?” “Inventory.” Creed stared. “Inventory.” “Yes.” “I was a fixer.” Rogue looked at him. Creed corrected himself. “Inventory sounds good.” “Learning already,” Ace said. Creed pointed weakly at her. “I hope your water was warm.” “It was refreshing.” “Damn.” Vera gave Creed one last look. “Tomorrow.” He nodded. “Tomorrow.” Dax clapped him once on the shoulder, too hard. Creed winced and accepted it. Lin did not touch him. Eli gave an awkward half-wave, then seemed embarrassed by having hands. Then Hollis appeared from nowhere. Ace actually startled. Slightly. She hated that. Hollis looked at Creed. “Ready?” Creed sighed. “No.” “Good enough.” They left through the service hall. Mason Creed, rising fixer, challenger of Rogue, dead man who kept breathing, disappeared into professional review and probable inventory work. The corridor emptied slowly. Rogue stood with Triad for a moment. No one spoke. Then Ace said, “Inventory?” Rogue shrugged. “He wanted infrastructure.” Mai nodded thoughtfully. “Inventory is infrastructure.” Ace looked at her. “Do not make that sound profound.” “It is true.” Shammy smiled. “Night City schools have practical coursework.” Rogue gave her a dry look. “Something like that.” Ace leaned against the wall. “So Vane?” Rogue’s face changed. Not much. Enough. “Not tonight.” Ace expected that. Still disliked it. Mai said, “He is deeper than Harker and Ormond.” “Yes.” “Will he move again?” Rogue looked toward the club, where the story was already mutating under control. “Eventually.” Shammy’s expression sobered. “He will dislike being made visible.” Rogue nodded. “Good.” Ace looked at her. Rogue’s eyes were colder now. “This was never about finishing Vane,” she said. “Not in one day. Old things don’t die because you found one room. You cut the reaching hand. You make the next reach cost more.” Mai said, “And you let everyone know the hand can bleed.” Rogue raised her glass slightly. “Now you’re learning too.” Ace made a face. “Please don’t include us in Night City school.” Rogue almost smiled. Almost. “Too late.” --- ## Epilogue — Professional Courtesy Afterlife did not become peaceful after the correction. Peace was not one of the services offered. The club simply resumed being itself. That was almost more impressive. Ten minutes after Mason Creed’s public unmaking, the room had already begun metabolizing the event into usable rumor. Mercs leaned closer over drinks. Fixer reps looked at their agents without appearing to look at their agents. Younger crews tried to understand whether they had just witnessed mercy, punishment, or some older category their vocabulary had not yet earned. Claire poured, listened, judged, and supplied no free explanations. Rogue returned to her booth. Not triumphantly. That would have cheapened it. She sat down the same way she had been sitting before, as if the last twenty hours had been an inconvenience handled between other tasks. Drink in front of her. Grey hair under low light. Eyes moving through the room with that terrible relaxed precision that made people forget she was watching until they discovered they had already been understood. Ace, Mai, and Shammy did not sit immediately. For a while they stood near the booth rail and let the room settle around them. Ace felt the residue of the job under her skin. Not adrenaline. That had burned off hours ago. This was the slower thing afterward: the body catching up to the fact that no one had died, the mind refusing to trust that as an ending, the Shadow Aura still awake enough that the floor near her boots seemed darker than the light allowed. Mai stood beside her, too composed to look tired unless one knew where to read her. The angle of her shoulders. The slight delay before she blinked. The way her fingers kept touching the edge of her agent and stopping before opening another window. Shammy watched the main floor with unusual stillness. No delight now. No playful curiosity. Her atmosphere was calm, but not light. The room had been full of fear all day, and she had carried more of it than she would ever bother itemizing. Ace nudged her lightly with one elbow. “You alive?” Shammy looked down at her. “Yes.” “Emotionally alive?” Shammy considered this with such seriousness that Ace immediately regretted giving her a new category. “Mostly,” Shammy said. Mai’s mouth softened. “Mostly is acceptable after today.” Ace looked at her. “You too?” “Mostly.” “That is not as reassuring as you think.” “It was not meant to be reassuring. It was accurate.” “Ah. Romance.” Mai gave her a sideways look. Shammy smiled faintly. Rogue, without looking at them, said, “If you three are going to process feelings, do it somewhere that sells cheaper liquor.” Ace slid into the booth opposite her. “You invited us.” “I hired you.” “Same thing with worse paperwork.” Mai sat beside Ace. Shammy took the outer edge, negotiating with the booth one last time and giving the furniture a look of polite apology. Rogue’s eyes moved to Shammy. “You did good work today.” Shammy blinked. Then smiled, slower than usual. “Thank you.” Ace watched Rogue over the table. That had not been a casual compliment. Rogue did not waste those. Especially not on the obvious parts. She had not praised Ace for violence or Mai for structure. Those were expected. She had praised Shammy for the invisible work: keeping Dax from moving, holding Talia together, making Jonas remember he had a spine, reading rooms before they fractured. Shammy understood enough of that to look quietly pleased. Ace liked that. Mai did too, though her face barely betrayed it. Rogue took a drink. “Creed made it to the warehouse.” Ace raised an eyebrow. “Inventory start already?” “Tomorrow.” “He’s going to hate it.” “Good.” Mai said, “He may also learn from it.” Rogue gave her a dry look. “Don’t ruin a punishment by making it pedagogical.” Shammy brightened. “Night City school.” Rogue pointed one finger at her. “No.” Shammy folded her hands. Ace leaned back, smiling despite the ache settling into her spine. The job had been absurd in the way normal Night City jobs often became absurd when no one was allowed to solve them by shooting the obvious person. Body bags. noodle bricks, debt poison, wellness seminars, fake deaths, legal vans, hydration protocol. A whole day of people nearly dying because someone had discovered fear could be refinanced. Normal job. Horrible city. Rogue looked toward the main floor. “Word is moving.” Mai nodded. “Controlled?” “For now.” “That will degrade.” “Everything does.” Ace said, “People know Ormond walked out?” “Yes.” “And?” “Good.” Ace studied her. “You wanted that too.” “I wanted enough people to see she left alive.” “Mercy?” Rogue’s smile had no warmth. “Maintenance.” Mai nodded faintly. “If Ormond disappears, Vane can use her as another story.” “Exactly.” Ace sighed. “Everyone keeps being infrastructure.” “Welcome to fixing,” Rogue said. “No thanks.” Rogue’s eyes returned to her. “Smart girl.” Ace made a face. “Do not say that like I just passed a class.” “You did.” Shammy whispered, delighted, “Graduation.” Mai lowered her eyes, but the smile escaped. Ace pointed at both of them. “No.” Rogue ignored the exchange. “Vane won’t answer this immediately.” Mai’s attention sharpened. “He loses if he reacts visibly,” Rogue continued. “Harker is damaged. Ormond is contaminated. Creed’s network is frozen under my custody. The debt package is too dirty to touch openly. He’ll wait.” Ace said, “And rebuild.” “Yes.” “Then we didn’t finish him.” “No.” Ace expected the answer. Still disliked it. Rogue leaned forward slightly. “You don’t finish old systems by dragging one person into a room. You cut their reach. You make their next move cost more. You let everyone nearby smell blood.” Mai said, “And you preserve the people who would otherwise become fuel.” Rogue looked at her. Then gave the smallest nod. “Yes.” Shammy’s gaze lowered to the table. “Creed’s people are not safe.” “No,” Rogue said. “But safer.” “For now.” Shammy accepted that, though not happily. Ace understood the discomfort. She felt it too. The story had ended in the room, but not in the lives attached to it. Nia still had a shoulder wound. Sera still had a brother whose care had been used as a handle. Talia’s mother still needed treatment. Jonas still had to live with the fact that he had helped operate the machine before breaking one piece of it. Vera had to decide whether leadership after collapse was duty or punishment. Dax had to learn that loyalty without sense could be used by enemies. Lin needed sleep. Eli needed a role that did not turn him into bait. And Mason Creed had to inventory whatever Hollis put in front of him tomorrow while trying not to think about the empire he had built out of other people’s trust and borrowed teeth. No clean ending. But no street war. No body under Rogue’s name. No debt harvest. Sometimes Night City gave you only the shape of disaster avoided, and expected gratitude for the absence. Claire arrived with three waters and one drink for Rogue. Ace stared. “Again?” Claire set a glass in front of her. “Hydration protocol.” Ace turned slowly toward Shammy. Shammy looked innocent. Far too innocent. Mai accepted her water without complaint, which was betrayal dressed as health. Rogue looked at Claire. “You too?” Claire shrugged. “Tall one made points.” Ace muttered, “She has a name.” Claire looked at Shammy. “Tall one with points.” Shammy seemed delighted. “I accept this.” Mai sipped her water. Ace looked at hers like it was an enemy with poor ambition. Rogue said, “Drink before Mai starts explaining acute stress response.” Ace drank. Mai looked almost smug. Ace pointed at her afterward. “This is emotional coercion.” “No,” Mai said. “It is care with evidence.” “Worse.” Shammy leaned closer. “Every cage says that?” Ace stared. Mai actually laughed. Not a controlled exhale. Not a polite mouth movement. A real laugh, small but bright enough that Ace felt the entire day shift half an inch away from her ribs. Shammy lit up immediately. Rogue watched them for a second over her glass, then looked away in the manner of someone refusing to be caught appreciating anything. Too late. Ace caught it. Filed it. Would weaponize later, probably. The booth settled into a quiet that did not belong to the job anymore. That was important. Rogue checked one message, answered another, ignored three. Mai finally put her agent face down. Shammy watched droplets slide down the outside of her glass. Ace leaned back and let the room’s noise return around them without entering her bones. Then Rogue spoke. “Creed asked about you.” Ace opened one eye. “That sounds unwise.” “Asked if Triad always operates like that.” Mai said, “Like what?” “Argumentative, dangerous, weirdly compassionate, and logistically irritating.” Shammy smiled. “That sounds accurate.” Ace said, “Compassionate is doing heavy lifting.” Rogue looked at her. “He said you could have killed Dax’s trap team and didn’t.” “Mai said alive.” “That all?” Ace looked toward the floor. Her Shadow Aura moved once under the table, then quieted. “No.” Rogue waited. Ace sighed. “Dax was the target. The shooters were tools. Killing tools sometimes helps. Sometimes it just proves the person using them understands you.” Rogue’s gaze sharpened. Mai looked at Ace with quiet warmth. Shammy’s fingers brushed Ace’s sleeve under the table. Rogue said, “Good answer.” Ace frowned. “Stop grading me.” “Stop passing.” Mai sipped water to hide a smile and failed. Ace leaned back farther. “Terrible school.” Rogue’s mouth moved almost invisibly. “Worst graduation rate,” Shammy said. That time even Rogue made a sound that might have been amusement if the room had proper forensic equipment. A few minutes later, Vera approached the booth. Not timidly. Not confidently either. Carefully. Rogue looked up. Vera stopped at the edge. “Creed’s crew is leaving.” Rogue nodded. “Good.” “Lin has somewhere safe tonight?” “She will.” Vera’s eyes narrowed. “That means yes?” “That means yes.” Vera accepted it after a second. “Eli?” Rogue glanced toward Mai. “Mai may have thoughts.” Eli, standing several steps behind Vera, looked like a deer who had just heard his name in a hunting regulation. Mai turned slightly. “Signal cleanup and decoy audit work can be useful if structured away from field pressure.” Eli closed his eyes. “Why does useful keep happening to me?” Ace said, “You were born cursed.” Shammy said, “Competence curse.” Eli nodded miserably. “Feels right.” Vera looked at Dax next. Dax stood with his arms crossed, pretending his bruised face did not hurt and failing. Rogue said, “Dax rests.” Dax opened his mouth. Rogue looked at him. He closed it. Ace smiled. “Learning.” Dax muttered, “I hate school.” Shammy brightened again. Vera’s attention shifted to Ace. “He really was alive?” Ace knew who she meant. Creed. “Yeah.” “Was he trying to come after us?” “Yeah.” Vera closed her eyes. “Idiot.” “Yeah.” “Thank you for stopping him.” Ace shrugged. “Hollis did most of that.” “Hollis looked at him?” “Apparently enough.” Vera smiled faintly despite everything. “That tracks.” She turned to go, then stopped. “Rogue.” Rogue lifted her eyes. Vera’s voice was careful. “I’ll think about the oversight thing.” “I know.” “That does not mean yes.” “I know.” “And if I do it, Creed does not command.” “No.” “And I get final say on crew-facing protections.” Rogue’s mouth curved. “There she is.” Vera looked irritated by the approval, which made Ace like her more. “I said maybe.” “Maybe is more useful than panic.” Vera nodded once, then left with the others. Dax gave Ace a short nod on the way out. Ace returned it. Eli almost waved again, then visibly decided against having hands. Lin looked at Shammy and said, “Thank you. For the water.” Shammy’s expression softened. “You are welcome.” Lin hesitated. “And for… making rooms less awful.” Shammy blinked. Then her smile turned very gentle. “I can try to keep doing that.” Lin nodded and left before emotion could become public enough to embarrass her. The corridor swallowed them. The room kept breathing. Mai looked down at her untouched agent. “Tomorrow will be complicated.” Ace said, “No.” Mai looked at her. “No tomorrow talk,” Ace said. “Not for five minutes.” Rogue raised an eyebrow. “You ordering my booth now?” “Yes.” Mai’s eyebrows lifted. Shammy looked delighted and mildly scandalized. Rogue stared at Ace. Ace stared back. Then Rogue leaned back. “Five minutes.” Ace nodded. “Professional courtesy.” Mai closed her eyes. Shammy covered her mouth. Rogue looked at Ace for a long, dangerous second. Then she laughed. Quietly. Once. But enough. Ace smiled like she had won something deeply stupid and therefore valuable. For five minutes, nobody discussed Vane. Nobody discussed Ormond. Nobody discussed frozen obligations, contaminated debt, legal review, crew restructuring, or whether Mason Creed would survive inventory without trying to reorganize the shelves into a moral framework. They drank water. Rogue drank something better. Afterlife grew louder around them. And the Triad sat in the booth of the most dangerous fixer in Night City like people who had earned the right to be tired. Eventually, Shammy leaned into Mai’s shoulder. Mai allowed it immediately. Ace leaned into Mai from the other side because if a structure existed, she believed in testing load distribution. Mai sighed. “You are both heavy in different ways.” Ace smiled. “Emotional infrastructure.” Shammy murmured, “Domestic solution.” Mai laughed again, softer this time. Rogue looked at them over her glass. “You three always like this?” Ace said, “Worse at home.” “Good.” Mai looked at Rogue. “Good?” Rogue’s gaze moved toward the floor, where another new merc was telling a story too loudly near the bar, already trying to become more than he was. “City needs things it can’t price,” Rogue said. No one answered immediately. Because that was almost sentimental. And because Rogue knew it. Ace let the silence hold just long enough to be rude. Then said, “Careful. That sounded like philosophy.” Rogue’s eyes narrowed. “Inventory.” Ace straightened. “What?” “I can assign you inventory too.” “You wouldn’t.” “Try me.” Shammy whispered, “Night City school has electives.” Mai finally lost composure enough to laugh into her hand. Ace pointed at Rogue. “This is abuse of educational authority.” Rogue smiled. This time not almost. Small. Real. Gone quickly. But there. The night moved on. Somewhere in Watson, Mason Creed probably stared at warehouse shelves and wondered whether counting obsolete appliance parts was punishment, mercy, or infrastructure. Somewhere in Charter Hill, Harker was still untangling compliance audits and possibly breathing through accountability. Somewhere in a mobile legal van, Celeste Ormond recalculated the price of standing too close to Rogue Amendiares. Somewhere deeper, Silas Vane heard the city whisper that one of his hands had been cut and did not yet move. Not tonight. Tonight, the street war did not happen. Tonight, the body did not land where the story needed it. Tonight, the debts froze instead of becoming teeth. That was enough. Not clean. Not kind. Enough. Ace looked around Afterlife, at the legends, the mercs, the bad deals, the neon, the old ghosts pretending to be decoration. Then at Mai. Then Shammy. Then Rogue, who was already pretending she had not relaxed. Ace lifted her water glass. “To professional courtesy.” Rogue gave her a look that promised future inconvenience. Mai raised her glass anyway. Shammy did too, solemn as a storm blessing a roof. After a second, Rogue lifted hers. Not high. Just enough. “Professional courtesy,” she said. They drank. And Night City, rude and hungry and briefly denied one more disaster, kept breathing outside.