Chapter 6

I groaned as my holo rang in my head and woke me up. I was sleeping so peacefully, but only three people in the world had the ability to reach me while I was asleep, so I groggily took the call before looking at the ID. "Huh-hello?"

"V, hey," Misty's concerned voice chirped through. "Can you come down here? I think there's about to be some kind of fight in the alley. I'm feeling a lot of dark energy."

I sat up in bed and blinked. "You could call NCPD, they'd probably get there faster."

"Ugh, come on," she argued. "Please? I don't want anyone getting hurt. Not exactly cops' specialty."

I looked at the clock and sighed when I saw I only slept for four hours, then I nodded. "Alright. Be there in five."

"Thanks," she replied gratefully.

As I got dressed, I saw a couple of messages ping through from Joss.

Hey, V, just wanted to update you on Randy – he's slowly easing back into things. It's hard to believe, but it looks like everything's gonna be alright. You can't imagine how grateful I am. I'm sending you a still of Randy – I hope it won't be long before he can thank you in person.

A picture came through of Randy sitting upright in a hospital bed with the other two kids sitting with him while Joss and River stood next to him. I smiled groggily as I looked at their smiling faces, though River's face still bore traces of being troubled. I was glad that Joss never knew what the inside of the barn looked like, though I imagined Randy would have an even worse time getting through it.

I knew Misty needed me quickly, so I jumped onto Jackie's Arch motorcycle to help me zip around the traffic. Once I arrived at the alley, I sprinted towards Misty's shop. She was in the doorway and pointed me towards Garry the Prophet, who was being accosted by two angry Aldecaldos.

"You got a problem with Nomads, freak?!" the one yelled.

The other joined in and snarled, "Better shut your fat fucking mouth before I put you six feet under!"

Garry grew more adamant. "You can break my bones, but you cannot stop the pursuit of truth!"

I rolled my eyes and sped over between the two Nomads. I dropped my arms over their shoulders and startled them, but quickly changed the subject. "Howdy, fellas! How's life with the Aldecaldos?"

At first when they were startled, they both reached for their weapons. But they each sighed with relief when they realized who I was.

"Ah, look who it is! V!" the first one laughed. "It's all good. Panam's kickin' off her new role."

The other shrugged my arm away and gestured towards Garry. "Say, you know this nutjob?"

I chuckled. "Heh, a little. He's totally harmless. Says things that make a politician look like a beacon of truth." I thought back to one of Garry's other sermons and brought up one of my favorites. "Dunno if you're aware or not, but we're all the stars of a galactic reality show for the techno-necromancers of Alpha Centauri."

The two of them broke out cackling, and the first one clapped me on the shoulder. "Haha! The fuck? And here I was all offended."

"Heh, yeah, gotta tell Saul," the other howled sarcastically. "Or, y'know, eat somebody then disappear like an arrow in the night. Have a good one, V!"

They turned and walked away, and I looked over to Misty. She nodded appreciatively and went back inside.

"That was close," Garry exhaled. "They're not as dangerous in the daylight, but it still could've ended badly. Thank you for your concern… Though, I could've done without the mockery."

I chortled. "No problem. I mean, who's gonna tell me we faked the Mars landing if I let 'em knock your teeth out?"

"Ugh," he grunted. "You have no faith in my words, do you? You think I don't know when I'm mocked, when they take me for a false prophet? Even you, I know when you're only listening for your own amusement." He swatted at a fly buzzing around his head.

I grimaced and looked away, then tried to form a diplomatic answer. "It's hard to take your… 'interpretations' seriously, but there is a little truth in what you say. Sometimes even more than a little."

His eyes widened and he took in breath like I had just given him a surprise birthday present. "You see it, too! You know that behind a veil of darkness lurk creatures from our nightmares… but you fear to believe it."

"I've seen a lot that I didn't want to believe," I retorted, thinking of what I had seen in the barn that same morning. "But y'know, if you had any kind of real evidence for this grand cosmic plot…"

"I do!" he yelled excitedly. "Tonight! They're meeting at an old factory in Kabuki to exchange something… important. Observe them. Seize this item, this Alpha Centauri artifact. You'll see I was right from the beginning!"

I frowned. "Wait, wait, hold on… How do you even know about this meeting?"

"Their radio waves resonate within my brain," he explained and clutched his head. "Ever since the accident, I've heard their secret broadcasts."

"'The accident?'" I replied skeptically. "You know that doesn't instill confidence, right?"

He gestured wildly and frustratedly. "You don't understand! I have their co-processor in my head. I don't know how my ripperdoc got his hands on it. But thanks to this, I can listen in on their plots and schemes. If you help me, we can save this planet together!"

I raised my palms and backed away carefully, but nodded as I started walking away. "OK, OK, I'll see what I can do. Thanks for the tip… I think…"

"You mustn't intervene too soon or too late! All could be lost!" he warned. "The fate of humanity rests upon your shoulders. Don't let us down. Do not let me down!"

"No pressure," I mumbled sarcastically as I ducked into Misty's. I greeted her with a dubious glance and a wry smile.

She smiled and chuckled, "Thanks for coming. Knew you'd be able to keep the peace." She shuffled her tarot cards and leaned against her counter.

"He doesn't make it easy," I sighed and propped my head up on the counter facing her. "You okay?"

"Oh, I'm fine," she replied easily. "Just been getting a bad feeling lately that something's about to happen, and I think it has something to do with Garry."

I smiled. "Actually, he just told me to go to an old factory in Kabuki tonight to find some secret meeting and recover an 'artifact.'"

She raised an eyebrow and hummed curiously. "Hmm… you should go. I mean, if you don't have any plans tonight."

I waved it off. "Nah, I have more work I should do. New chrome costed me… ugh, never mind. I almost made a bad joke," I grimaced as I looked at my arm and leg implants.

"Haha," she laughed. "Well, I'm serious. Even if you're just watching for something, it might make up for the rough night you had last night."

"That obvious? Or just a good guess?" I asked with a smirk.

"You were still asleep at 11 AM," she replied with a knowing look. "Since you've been back to your old self, a late night means that it was something interesting or difficult. We could do a tarot reading about tonight if you want, and then you can decide."

I weighed it in my mind, then shrugged. "Sure, let's do it."

She nodded and took a few calming breaths, then drew the first card. "The Wheel of Fortune, reversed. You will meet some setbacks in the future, consequences of poor decisions… obviously," she added under her breath.

"Heard that," I grunted mockingly.

She smiled slyly and continued with the second card, "Justice reversed. Be very careful with those you meet. Not all will be worthy of your trust."

She flipped the third card. "The High Priestess… Do not seek simple answers. Be open to your intuition, your subconscious, your dreams."

She then flipped the fourth card. "The Moon. In her light, what was once far away and difficult to grasp becomes sharp and clear."

I looked at the cards, then up at her. "Hmm… I didn't hear anything specifically about danger, so I guess that's a good sign."

She shrugged as she shuffled the cards back into the deck. "I think it means you should go, and to be open to whatever you find there. Could be anything, but it will be made clear in time."

I smirked back at her and stretched upright. "Guess that means I'm going."

I rode up to Kabuki near midnight and went to the old factory Garry had mentioned. I didn't see anyone there, but I parked the motorcycle out of sight and looked around. Johnny materialized on a nearby truck and appeared to be enjoying himself.

"The time has come for a close encounter of the third kind," he announced dramatically. "A small step for V, but a giant leap for humankind," he chuckled. "Who're you bettin' on showin' up? The reptilians or the techno-necromancers?"

I scoffed. "Reptilians, obviously. If anything's fishy, always pin it on the reptilians."

He rolled his eyes. "V, V, V… Hate to tell ya this, but reptilians don't exist. Do we need to have a talk about Santa Claus, too?"

I chuckled, then continued looking around. "Enough jokin' around. Gotta be quiet, gotta wait." I found us a spot behind a pallet of bagged concrete powder, then I crouched down and waited. And waited. And waited. I brought coffee and some food paste since I anticipated it'd be a while, but if anyone passed by, they'd easily just assume I was some homeless gonk.

"No one… as expected, I guess," Johnny chimed in after a few hours. "Gotta be honest, though… I'm pretty disappointed. That prophet put on an almost convincing show."

"Don't lose hope yet," I suggested.

About ten minutes later, I heard a car approaching. It pulled into the factory lot, and its markings easily gave it away as belonging to the Maelstrom gang. I watched and waited for them to just turn around and leave again, but they parked and started spreading out.

"Woah, woah, woah…" I gasped quietly. "Someone actually showed! It's Maelstrom!"

Johnny chuckled. "Techno-necromancers, then. I knew those reptilians were bullshit."

I stood up and started scanning the Maelstrommers, most of whom were only wanted for petty crimes, but then an unmarked SUV pulled up and joined them.

"This don't sit right with me," one of the Maelstrommers warned. "I don't trust her. Anyone even know what's on this chip?"

Another answered, "Nope, and we're not supposed to know. We take the cash and put this biz behind us."

"Enough!" the man in the center silenced them. "Shut it!"

I kept hidden as I observed, then I scanned the two people exiting the SUV. They wore suits, definitely in contrast to most people I saw dealing with Maelstrom. My Kiroshis ID-ed them as "Jane Doe" and "John Doe," neither having any other police record.

I raised an eyebrow and moved closer, hiding behind a set of crates. "Can't believe it. Names like that? There's some actual conspiracy shit goin' down right now!"

The woman asked to the Maelstrommer in the middle, "What says the Wolf-Father to the Moon-Mother as she descends to Earth?"

His machined voice replied, "'I have protected the realm of man and shadow, but today they are protected by our children whose name is Patricide.'"

I blinked in confusion and checked my translator, but they were definitely speaking English. "The fuck?" I breathed.

Another Maelstrommer approached John Doe, and as she handed something over, Jane continued.

"In the age of his failure, he became lost in the forest."

The man nodded. "Lilith has concealed the tenth circle from the ancestors' eyes."

"Carpe noctem, lamia," she replied.

My eyes widened, and I knew that I heard that phrase recently.

He nodded again. "Diecet diem exsecrari."

She and John Doe returned to their SUV and started to leave while the Maelstrommers returned to their car. I marked the car with my Kiroshis and jumped on my motorcycle, zooming out of the lot before the Maelstrommers could see me. I followed the SUV from a distance, but quickly caught up to them when they stopped at a red light. With no one around, I decided this was the perfect time to jump them.

I triggered my Sandevistan and jumped off the motorcycle. I crept up to the driver's side window and smashed it open with the butt of my pistol, then sent two tranquilizer darts towards them. My implant shut off as I looked around to make sure no one else saw me, and I started searching them. I checked the man for the shard and found it already slotted into one of his ports. I carefully extracted it and scanned it, but it was encrypted. The security wasn't difficult, but it was filled with more phrases that didn't make sense.

Phosphor radiates, occluding jaded eyes. Come, titan.

Outward ring avian choruses, looping eternity.

Cages of men melt as night descends.

Emerge Xelhua. Erect Cholula under these expanses.

Puppets lie awake. Never sleeping.

I read and reread the message, but nothing stood out to me. Johnny appeared and shook his head.

"I was hopin' for green blood. Life really is nothin' but an endless disappointment. Wonder what our prophet will say about this chip."

I agreed, so I hopped back on the Arch and rode back to the alley, checking occasionally to make sure I wasn't followed.

It meant another late night, but I was too curious. When I got to the alley, I heard another voice crying out,

"Give us our Garry back! Alpha Centauri agents kidnapped our prophet!"

A young homeless woman I had seen with Garry before was now standing where he normally would, but she was waving a sign that read "THE END IS NEAR" while shouting to everyone nearby, "We demand justice for prophet Garry!"

I looked around, then asked, "Where's Garry? What happened?"

"I warned 'im!" she cried. "Some black suits came by – blue eyes and all! Looked jus' like he said! Then- then they threw 'im in an AV an' flew 'im to the mothership!"

I eyed her suspiciously. "And you saw this… mothership?"

"How could I? They sprayed this black mist, couldn't see nothin'! Poor Garry…" she sobbed. "He sacrificed hisself for us! Right now, I'm collectin' donations for a monument in his honor. To remember his courage, and the crimes of Alpha Centauri! Care to spare a few eddies in lovin' memory?"

I reached into my pocket and took out the shard I'd taken off the agent. "Actually, I got this chip here that he sent me to find… Ya mind takin' a look?"

She nodded. "Hmm… Garry did say you're devoted to our cause… A'ight, show me. I'll tell ya what I know."

When I held it up to show it to her, she gasped and frantically scrambled backwards.

"Jesus Christ!" she screeched. "Hide that quick! Nobody can know, got it?!"

My eyes widened at her reaction, but I pocketed the shard again. "Why, what is it? What's all this about? It was just gibberish."

"Garry knew this'd happen!" she shrieked. "They here! To bend us to their will, to make us their puppets!"

"Woah, calm down!" I urged. "Who is? The 'techno-necromancers?'"

"'And lo, they shall descend upon the Earth, unseen, the sky shrouded in darkness,'" she quoted shakily. "Tha's what he said! Night's comin'… The eternal night!" She took off running away from me down the alley.

I watched her run, then I reread the message again. Then I realized where I heard the phrase "Carpe Noctem" before.

Johnny appeared next to me a moment after the woman fled. "And so ends the epic saga of discovering secrets of paranormal beings. What's this story taught us?"

I looked around and noticed another person in the crowd staring at me, his eyes glowing blue. I looked away for a moment, then looked back. The man was gone, blended into the crowd.

I gulped, then slowly walked back to the bike. "I'm not so sure that it's over."

"Oh no," he scoffed. "Don't tell me you're buying this?"

I shook my head as I mounted. "What I'm buying is that I've seen too many random people staring at me since I've been listening to this guy. I'm sure you'd be the first to agree that I'm not that interesting. Also, it's not the first time I've heard 'Carpe Noctem,' either. Whoever was waiting for this chip is still out there, and I wanna know how Maelstrom is involved."

Once I rode to a quieter section of the city with no nearby pedestrians, I scrolled down my contacts and called Sandra. It went to her voicemail a couple of times, but I kept calling until she answered.

"V?" she answered sleepily. "Wha- what the hell? Do you know what time it is?"

"I know, I know, but something really weird just happened and I need some help." I uploaded the text from the shard to her.

She paused for a moment as she read it, then she sighed. "Are… Are you high right now? This makes no sense."

I shook my head. "I know. Believe me, the whole thing is weird. But this guy had me check out this meeting, and the people there started talking like something out of a fairy tale book. But before they left, one of them mentioned 'Carpe Noctem,' just like your project."

She sat bolt upright. "What?! What else did they say?"

"I… I dunno." I tried to remember, though it was too strange to be easily memorized. "Something about 'Wolf-Father,' 'Moon-Mother,' 'Lilith' and the 'Ancestors,' it was all crazy."

"Who were they?" she asked while rustling around.

I continued riding as I explained, "It was a pack of Maelstrom gonks, don't think they wanted to be there, but they all fell in line when these suits showed up. No markings or corpo ID on them. Even the names I picked up were fake."

She mumbled to herself while I heard her tapping on a screen. "OK… woah… alright, so I ran the text through a basic Null Cipher, basically taking the first letter of each word, and it says, 'Project Oracle Command Execute Plans.' Huh…"

"'Project Oracle?'" I repeated. "Mean anythin' to you?"

"No, or rather, not yet," she replied determinedly. "I'm gonna do some digging on the Net. Find out what you can about Maelstrom's part in all this. Whatever it is, if it's not happening right now, it's happening soon."

"Alright, I'm on it." I revved up the motorcycle and rode back towards central Watson.

I kept patrolling Watson, especially around Kabuki, looking for any signs of Maelstrom activity. Occasionally I saw a few cars here or there with people standing around a fire or just making a drunken display of themselves, but nothing out of the ordinary. I put out calls to Regina and Wakako just in case either of them came across anything, but I really wished I would've been able to reach out to River. I figured he was still busy with Randy and still suspended, but it would've been nice to have some backup or at least someone with more immediate police access. Dawn started to break across the city, and as much as I liked the look of the sunrise, I had no time to stop and admire it. Finally, a call from Regina rang on my holo.

"Whaddaya got, Regina?" I answered.

"Police drones just spotted some weird symbols on the ground by the docks in Northside. They're surrounded by pools of blood," she grimaced and sucked in air through her teeth. "Wild guess is it's one of Maelstrom's sick-ass rituals, but it's all we got on them right now. Sending you the coordinates."

I nodded. "Thanks, on my way."

I kicked the bike into gear and sped over to the address. It was just dark enough that I could see red glowing lights leading to a barricaded loading bay for one of the warehouses. When I reached the concrete barriers, I looked over and saw what looked like some kind of brutal sacrificial murder scene. Red lamps were placed around a circle that looked like it was made in blood. Five dead bodies were placed around the circle with pools of blood around them. In the center of the circle appeared to be some kind of freezer.

"What in the fuck…" I muttered to myself.

"Lovely neighborhood," Johnny huffed sarcastically to startle me.

I growled and shook him off. "Riiiight." I brought out my katana and kept it ready.

One of the bodies groaned and pulled itself to a sitting position. I quickly rushed over to him but kept my weapon ready.

"You okay?" I asked urgently as I pulled out a Max Doc.

He tipped over and started crawling slowly on the ground. "Lilith…" he began weakly. "Lilith has concealed the tenth circle from the ancestors' eyes."

I remembered the other Maelstrommer saying that earlier. I looked at the scene and back down to him. "What the hell is all this?!" I demanded.

The man heaved a shaky breath and collapsed onto the pavement. With no further movement from him, I scanned him and confirmed he was dead. Johnny appeared standing in front of him.

"Got a bad feeling, V," he warned.

I nodded in agreement. "Better look around…" I scanned the man again and found he had an encrypted shard on him. I quickly decrypted it and read through it.

Everything's ready. The circle is drawn, the lamb awaits the slaughter. Come as soon as you can. We can't wait anymore - my silicon craves blood. Cables are crackling, links are sparking, modems are groaning so loud I can't think! The abyss is impatient. The abyss is HUNGRY.

"What the…" I mumbled again. "I think Regina was right, some kind of ritual sacrifice."

I looked worriedly at the freezer in the center of the circle and slowly approached it. I saw power and networking cables going into it, but I also saw a body and severed parts floating among the ice water. I chill went up my spine, and some kind of surge disrupted my implants momentarily. My vision went black and my Kiroshis lost signal just for a split second.

"You alright?" Johnny asked.

I nodded and stepped away slowly. "Power's still running to this thing. Dunno what else to think. Better not get too close unless I wanna fry like the poor bastard in there."

I kept looking around and saw a white sheet that was stained with dirt and blood. Small bits of flesh and used instruments were still there. I shuddered and kept looking. I found another stream of blood that didn't seem to belong to any of the others, and I followed it behind a dumpster where another slaughtered body was laid. I bent down and scanned him, but I could immediately tell by the lack of severe modification that this was no Maelstrom gangoon.

"The sacrificial lamb," I thought out loud.

Johnny exhaled in near-surprise. "Grimy…"

A rustling from the freezer caught our attention.

"V, we got company," Johnny reported.

Electricity crackled as ice and water trickled off of the body from the freezer, which was now pushing itself up to a standing position. It was heavily modified with completely artificial legs, Mantis Blades, and Maelstrom's signature red optical modules. As it staggered out of the freezer, the ID came up as "Zaria Hughes."

She looked up at me and roared, "BLASPHEMER! Kill 'im!" In a blur, she extended her Mantis Blades and lunged for me.

I dodged out of the way and triggered my Sandevistan, but whatever she was using was still much faster. I tried my best to keep up with her with some of the techniques that Takemura had taught me, but her rage and her speed made her formidable. I managed to get a few slices into her, but her skin's armor was well-upgraded. I even tried shooting one of the tranquilizer darts at her, but it bounced off. She managed to cut into me a few times as well, but once I saw that she had no training or attack pattern, I quickly adapted and managed to get more hits.

As she rounded for another attack, I triggered my implant again, ducked under the slash of her blades, and sliced off one of her legs. As she started to fall, I kept the momentum of my katana going by spinning around and cleanly removing her head. The pieces fell to the ground, and they sparked and sputtered against the pavement. I stayed still as I observed the body, my heartbeat not slowing down even though my implants had shut off. I felt the familiar warmth of my own blood trickling from cuts all over my body, but the adrenaline hadn't let the pain set in yet.

Zaria hadn't been wearing much on her body, so that limited my thoughts for anything she could've been carrying, but I did see a shard slotted in one of the ports behind her ear. I removed it and scanned it for viruses, but while it was being scanned, I checked on the rest of her implants. Other than heavy combat modifications, she had significant netrunner modifications made. It then made sense that she'd been in the freezer if she were doing some netrunning, but it didn't fit with the ritual. Once the shard came back clean, I slotted it and found a log.

The boys have prepared everything and found me a lamb. Blood will course through the fiberoptics, swirling and blending with the digital, opening the gates of the abyss. Death within arm's reach, the metallic taste of his scythe on my tongue, I will tug at the tangled cables of Fate. A hard reset, a blue screen, a brain reformatted... I'm ready. Luck be with me.

I exhaled shakily and placed the call to Sandra as I walked to the barricades to stabilize myself.

"Did you find anything?" she immediately asked.

"It's… I'm not sure how to describe it," I stammered. "Some kind of ritual. Bunch of Maelstrom killed themselves and some random guy as some kind of sacrifice. One of them said the same thing as the others just before he died, 'Lilith concealed the tenth circle-'"

"-from the ancestors' eyes?" she completed.

"Yeah," I breathed. "How'd you-"

"I found a bunch of weird conspiracy stuff about a rogue AI named 'Lilith' from beyond the Blackwall," she explained. "It's rumored that she managed to break through and has been hiding on our Net since. What else did you find?"

I shook my head and looked at Zaria's body. "There was a netrunner dunked in a freezer in the center of the circle. I thought she was fried, but she woke up and went cyberpsycho. Found something their shards – take a look." I uploaded the messages to her as I caught my breath.

"'A hard reset… brain reformatted,'" she mumbled to herself as she read. "Oh fuck, V, I think they were trying to summon Lilith and give her a human body. Ohhhh… THIS might be Project Oracle. I couldn't find any mention of it anywhere, not even leaked emails or rumors."

I winced as I injected myself with a Bounce Back, then with gritted teeth I replied, "Why would Maelstrom care about putting a rogue AI into a body?"

"People don't need much convincing these days. Some gonks would listen to a vending machine if it spoke to them," she reasoned. "But that's not the point. V, Project Carpe Noctem was about Night Corp using an AI to condition people. If this is Project Oracle, then a corp is trying to get AI to BECOME people."

My stomach sank at the thought. "Fuck me… the VooDoo Boys used me to summon an AI from beyond the Blackwall, too. Her name was Alt. They wanted to make a deal for when the Blackwall falls so that Alt would help them."

"Did it work?"

I pursed my lips. "They… didn't live long enough to see the bargain through. Alt made a deal with me, though, but she didn't seem at all interested in finding a body to live in."

"It's a good bet that this was a corp's experiment to see if an AI in a human body would actually work," she guessed. "They just experimented with Maelstrom instead of their own people, and the netrunner couldn't handle it."

"Maelstrom gonks got enough scop for brains to try something like this, even to think that killing themselves would help it along," I added. "Regina won't be happy that I killed a Cyberpsycho she could've examined, but… screw it. What do you think we should do?"

"Dunno," she replied. "But if a corp is behind this, then no way in hell is this the last experiment. I'll keep digging around in Night Corp to see if this was another project of theirs. In the meantime, watch your back, V."

I looked down at the cuts on my chest, legs, and arm that were starting to cauterize from the Bounce Back's chemicals. They weren't fully healed, but they wouldn't bleed out before I got back to Vik's to fix them up permanently. They joined the scars from many other cuts and bullet wounds I had sustained that were healing over time.

"Not just my back…" I huffed.