Late in the days, closing in fast on the mid of night, there is very little activity in the residential Area of the metropolis that is City. All of the night's life takes place in the Entertainment District, a buzzing part of City that never sleeps, never stops providing any form of diversion from the peoples' daily lives made possible by modern technology or simple, timeless forms of stress release.
Its intensely bright lights, sent out by enormous floodlights, illuminating some event or another, are visible from any high spot over the entirety of the megacity, even out toward its outer rims. Had any one of those seeking thrill or relief in the lively end of City decided to go home early, and had they been sober enough, they might have seen the half dozen shadows emerging from a nondescript transport unit, hushing down a side-streets and up the emergency stairs of one of the buildings.
At this time, though, no one is there to notice. No one who could notice heavily equipped figures creeping through the night. As quickly as they arrived, they vanish from the streets.
Now, five sets of eyes are looking at the spectacle at the far end of City, from atop a building, unremarkable by itself, inside the living areas. The sixth pair of eyes hides behind a visor, its function set to binoculars. The target of the viewer: the home of one M.U. Lunastra, across the street.
"That whole building seems to be empty, boss. All the lights are out." The man with the visor says, turning around to the others. All six of them are dressed in all-gray combat wear, fitting perfectly with the environment. Except for their weaponry. Black small arms, easily fitted into a holster, which again is white, on their thighs. They don't expect to need them, but being prepared for most conceivable circumstances is common sense for these people.
A tall, sinewy man walks over to his electronically bespectacled companion. "Yeah, well, there's still a few people in it. Some of the inhabitants are on night shift, the rest is split on going out or staying in. All we need to do is stay silent. We have the override for the emergency elevator out back, so we're not likely to run into anyone. It's cloudy, too, so not much light anywhere back there. I'd say something about luck, but then I don't have wood to knock on."
"So, what are we supposed to be searching for anyway? 'Everything abnormal or suspicious' isn't really descriptive, you know. Besides, what's abnormal? They just said this is the house of a businesswoman, so we shouldn't have to expect any trouble - nice downplay there - but it really does seem they already have some kind of idea what we're going to find." A third man, this one not as tall as his colleague, but a lot more muscly, joins the other two. The other half of the team, two men and a woman, follow along behind him silently, while they still observe the play of lights on the clouds that are gathering over their position.
"Well, if they know, they didn't tell me what it is, so we'll just look everywhere in there and take anything out of the ordinary with us. They did tell me I am to remind you, politely yet insistently – their words, not mine - that you keep your fingers off of any valuable loot. We've worked together before...well, most of us have." he says, throwing a weary look over to a smaller, stocky man. Him being a replacement for their usual sixth member, who had been caught up in an accident earlier in the week.
With a meaningful stare towards the newcomer, he continues his short elaboration "Never heard of or saw any of you stealing stuff, and I hope it will stay that way, but anyway, here I have told you what I was supposed to." A murmur of agreements, a nod from the temporarily new member, and a snort at that insinuation passes through the group.
The tall man, previously called Boss, takes a look at the small, dimly lit screen, sewn into his clothing's sleeve. He checks its indicated time and notices he doesn't have to adjust it on his old fashioned, sturdy looking mechanical wrist watch.
"You still have that thing? What, this little thing isn't reliable enough for you?" One of the so far silent characters inquires, tapping on his own sleeve computer to indicate what he's talking about.
"Yes, I do. From experience, I can tell you, it is never a bad thing to have a reliable substitute to a mission-essential device. Of course, we're not on a tight schedule here; if this woman hasn't returned yet, she certainly won't, until way after we're done. She's much too far away for that." the Boss explains. Standing up and facing his teammates, he adds "Well, it's time. We will stay here," he says, pointing to the other tall man he just conversed with and another of his still silent peers.
A bald, broad shouldered man grumbles an agreeing sound into his beard, adjusts his backpack to take it off and sets it down on the ground, taking out a device that resembles a video camera. He places it on a tripod at the edge of the roof, facing the team's target building. A small holographic picture appears between the legs of the tripod, showing a crystal clear enlargement of what the electronic eye of the camera sees.
As he taps the hologram, it calls up a menu at the side of the picture, on which he adjusts to a split-screen, one side with a night-vision setting and the other with thermal imaging. The latter shows him the presence and position of the people – and animals – inside the building. Two floors lower down and one in the middle apparently empty, the rest shows about a dozen red spots of where people are laying in their beds or moving around in their homes.
Meanwhile, the obvious team leader continues with his instructions "you three go in." while handing the woman a small device, not even the size of her hand, a little antenna sticking out from it. "You know how to work this. Head up the emergency staircase, wait for my signal at the top. They said 2200, so we'll go exactly then." He proceeds to have the teams adjust and synchronize their times, which is rarely necessary with the wrist computers, but, him being a cautionary man, he likes to stick to the motto of rather safe than sorry.
After a last check of their equipment, the three designated team members start heading down the building and arrive at ground level. Hidden in the shadows of the narrow side-street, they observe the area by eye and confirm with the other team, who are scanning the area with a second heat signature camera, that there will be no one who may remember shadowy figures rushing through the area.
Once across the street, again taking shelter from onlookers in another dark alley, they circle around the building they intend to climb and reach the door for the emergency staircase. The woman takes out the small device she received, programming it with the few buttons it has, sticks it to the locking mechanism of the door and takes a step back. A few seconds later, the device comes alive and, with a quiet whirr, lasers a hole through the lock. Automatically scanning for the inevitable alarm, seeing how this is an emergency exit, the device implants a secondary circuit to the alarm system, preventing it from going off in what would usually be a loud howling siren to alert the inhabitants, as well as send an emergency code to the local fire and police departments.
The door swings open silently, indicating that the device did its job properly and the small group enters and ascends the staircase. Adjusting their breathing to the stale air, they have to illuminate their way with flashlights, as the staircase doesn't feature any windows. A dusty ascent of almost two dozen floors later, passing a door leading onto the building's floor's respective hallways on each level, they arrive at the instructed 23rd floor. In front of yet another simple door, behind which lays the hallway leading to their destination.
Not far behind the two team members now waiting at the top, behind the door, is the new addition to their team. The two in front of him don't seem to think much about his presence, certain that he wouldn't have been chosen by their higher-ups if he couldn't do the job proper. They don't, however, see him taking out a small device from his backpack and checking it over, tugging slightly on wires, to see if they're still in place and adjusting a timing device mounted on top of the thing. He sets it to his desired time and, without activating it, puts it back into his pack.
