Disclaimer: I do not own Watch Dogs

Chapter 3: From Death, Life is Begotten

Laura was out like a light. Her dreams were fragmented, and she tumbled through them. She heard voices drifting through her dreams.

"Are you sure….saved her?"

"She knows the ctOS inside out… great help…"

"Her clothes…all torn…"

"Get Tobias…buy some new…"

"Get into…database…start changing…"

Laura awoke on a thin mattress, still dressed in her torn and tattered dress suit from the car crash. She lay flat on the mattress as her sight returned. Sitting up, she noticed she was in a dimly-lit, barren room, the walls made up of corrugated steel. The air was cool, and she could faintly hear the whir of cooling fans, and it reminded Laura of the server rooms in the ctOS centres around Chicago. The basic digital clock next to the bed read 08:26.

Looking around, she noticed the room was sparsely-decorated, but on a chair nearby lay a set of fresh clothes, set out for her.

Laura got up, feeling sore in places she didn't know could feel sore, and hobbled over to the chair. There was a note. It read:

"Ms Brendan, these clothes are for you. Once you wake up and get changed, please head downstairs and find us.

~V"

Laura set the note down, and checked out the T-shirt and jeans that had been set out for her. Her gun was in her shoulder holster, draped over the back of the chair, and a leather biker's jacket was slung over the chair's backrest as well.

A few minutes later, clad in the new clothes, and looking surprisingly fashionable, with her hair tied up in a ponytail to fit the look, handgun tucked comfortably in its holster, Laura headed out of the room. What she saw blew her away.

On the far wall, a bank of screens was mounted. The screens showed scenes from what Laura assumed was the streets of Chicago as seen from the ctOS security cameras. In the middle of the cavernous room was a set of tables laden with heavy-duty computer hardware, with numerous wires and cables snaking out and criss-crossing over the floor. As she descended the stairs, she caught sight of a massive bank of servers lined up against the walls, soft blue lights blinking gently as their cooling fans whirred on.

The Vigilante was currently at the table, perched over a computer while T-Bone was busy typing away at his station. At her approach, T-Bone looked up and nodded to her before returning to his frantic typing. Aiden completely ignored her, continuing to work at his station.

Laura peered over his shoulder. Aiden seemed to be working on some kind of 3-dimensional face model. Strangely, it reminded Laura of herself, but something seemed off.

"What are you doing?" she asked.

Without turning to face her, he replied, "I'm changing the database facial recognition files for you. To the world, you're already dead, so if you're going to be of any use to us, the cameras on the street mustn't be able to pick you up."

Laura blinked. "What do you mean, I'm dead to the world?"

The Vigilante waved to T-Bone. "Ray, show her."

The dreadlocked man nodded and typed a few commands into another laptop.

The large bank of screens flickered and changed, showing a news report. There was no sound, but Laura could read well enough.

"BLUME SECURITY CHIEF KILLED IN TERRORIST ATTACK, DEDSEC CLAIMS RESPONSBILITY", the headline blared, accompanied by a video of firefighting crews extinguishing her burning wreck of a car.

Laura was stunned. She stared at the words "Blume security chief killed". She could hardly comprehend this sudden turn of events.

Laura was snapped out of her reverie when Aiden turned to Ray and asked, "Have you swapped the DNA data?"

Raymond nodded and replied, "Aye, the DNA data's all good, now it's just the facial recog system left."

Laura was confused. "Wait, what's going on?"

T-Bone proceeded to explain for her. "So what's happened is that after we left, the Dedsec fixers approached the car, but they couldn't find us, so they grabbed one of their own dead, dumped him in the car, and set it alight. We got hold of the camera footage and identified the dude they dumped in it, and we've swapped the DNA data so when the police do DNA tests to identify the body, the data will point to the body being yours, even though it's not. But, judging from the burn temperature recorded by the ctOS cameras, its likely there won't be much left to identify. Dedsec also wiped the memories of the cameras in the immediate vicinity and planted a false video of your car exploding then catching fire. We were barely able to retrieve the original video before they broke into the local mainframe."

Laura didn't know what to say. This was all a little too much. She slumped on a nearby chair, trying to process everything. Her supposed death, the swapping of DNA data, changing of facial recognition files. Her thoughts turned to her current predicament.
"So what am I supposed to do now?" Laura asked.

Aiden turned to face her. "Now that you're officially dead, we can train you to be a hacker."

Laura blanched. "A what now?" A hacker. Laura, former security chief at Blume, was to become a hacker, the very thing she had spent her entire career defending against.

Aiden turned to face her. "We will train you here, not only in hacking, but also in combat. Only me and T-Bone have access to this island, and the cameras are blocked to everyone else, so we have total and absolute privacy."

Raymond snickered. "Not only that, we hacked the Wikipedia database to say that the island was haunted, and we erased every trace of the island ever being a ctOS test site. We also compiled a series of blackmail against Charlotte Gardner to ensure she took an early retirement and never spill about this location."

Laura's eyes widened. "Charlotte Gardner? I thought she retired because of health issues!"

Raymond let loose a hearty laugh. "Well, you thought wrong, missy. I installed a bug in her phone when she was checking out the Bunker way back after that blackout. We found out she had some rather shady dealings, so we stalked her to a meeting, and recorded the whole exchange with some drug dealers and corrupt coppers. After she left, we went in, shot the place up, and we confronted her with the blackmail. She agreed to whatever terms we had, and that was the end of that."

Laura sat back in her chair. "Wow," she breathed. She was genuinely impressed. These two men, despite their ragged appearance and obvious personality contrast, were an efficient and effective team, able to stand up to Blume and Dedsec.

Aiden finished his typing and slammed on the enter key. He leaned back as the computer screen flashed a series of random-looking sequences as the system booted out of the ctOS databases. He stood up, pushing his chair back, and turned to Laura.

"Well, that's the facial recog system dealt with. Ms Brendan, its time to start your training." He said.

"Are you ready to become that which you have fought against for so long? Are you ready to defend the ctOS from Dedsec?" His eyes were steely.

Laura looked up into his eyes, the eyes of a man who has seen too much, done too much, yet ready to continue fighting for justice.

"Yes."

A/N hey guys, third chap of this story is up, hope you enjoyed it. i just wanted to get this chap up so that i can get started on the next chap of my star wars fic, i've left that one for too long. term tests are coming, so it'll probably take a little longer, but it will be up in good time.

as always, feel free to leave a review commenting on my writing, and don't forget to enjoy the story!

to all my chinese or asian readers, Happy Chinese New Year!

stay awesome guys

Peace, Darkrai