A couple of big security heavies met them at the checkpoint: two Militech graftees with the combined muscle-mass of a Biotechnica protein farm. Their faceplates were molded from rigid polymer, each painted in a skin-tone that didn't quite match the rest of them. The heavies stared at them with all the crushing gravity of Jupiter, their Kiroshi oculars filigreed with coppery traces of nanocircuitry.

"One moment," the one heavy said, the microlights in his oculars flashing blue. "It's them," he said to his partner, who seemed the silent, stoic type, standing there like some huge, bulky machine. V thought, specifically, of a S.C.S.M; his partner was the exact height and shape of one.

"Those SIDs Luce got are fuckin' preem," said Ayako suddenly, materializing like a screen-artifact that slowly resolved into a slender woman-shape, then into a slender Ayako-shape. "Got forged biometric data and everythin'. Must've gotten 'em in Tycho. Techies out there are some of the best your eddies can buy."

The graftees led them through the checkpoint, ran some more scans. Clean. The graftee who talked—he'd given his name as Richards—informed them that they needed to make a quick stop at the security office, he needed to get their clearances so the DHC wouldn't flatline them. His partner lumbered off to somewhere else. "Turing System got tripped," explained Richards, as they walked down a hall paneled in welded, green-painted steel, MILITECH stenciled in yellow across the wall on their right. The floor was tiled in slabs of reinforced quartz-glass, lit from underneath by bile-colored LEDs. "Not too long after some shit went down at Event Horizon. You all hear 'bout that?"

"Yeah, but nobody seems t'know what happened," said V, fishing for information. She wanted to know what Militech knew.

"Nothing you gotta concern yourself with," said Richards, expertly evading the bait. "You just gotta worry about debugging our network, make sure this shit with the Turing System ain't just a glitch. We been having problems with the network, our hardware."

"Your in-house netrunners ain't determined the situation?" asked V.

"No in-house netrunners on the Crystal Palace. Cuttin' costs," said Richard. "DHC takes care of everythin', more cost-effective than retainin' buncha overpaid netheads. But the DHC ain't been able to determine the problem, so we had to contract your team, get some human eyes in there. Came highly recommended."

"Luce is still really good at writin' malware, I see," said Ayako, walking alongside her. "Real subtle kinks. Arasaka really trains their netrunners."

"Lucy worked for Arasaka?"

"Not so much worked for as bein' put to work," said Ayako, shrugging. "Not too much different from what they were doin' to me, except I was in Japan, in a company-funded black clinic."

"Was she a Shinobi?"

"Not that I know of," said Ayako.

"Been meanin' t'ask," said V, and looked at her. "What was the most satisfyin' hit y'did as a Shinobi?"

"Was this politician, guy named Hiroyuki Morita, who wanted to block some pro-corpo legislation Arasaka had been lobbyin' for. Morita regularly tapped into this XBD site, one featured kids, on the Deep-Net; I ambushed him there, fried his fuckin' brain. And I was fuckin' happy to do it, the sick motherfucker. Crashed the fuckin' site, too. Vaporized its fuckin' data." She frowned, then said, "But not all the people I killed deserved it. Some just fell outta the corporation's favor, embezzled money or somethin' to feed their families." Ayako shook her head, her expression somber. "I ain't proud of those hits."

"Not like y'had a choice," said V.

"Doesn't excuse what I did, Val," said Ayako, looking at her. "Don't change the fact I killed those people for a buncha corpo-fucks." She paused, then said, "Probably why I ain't minded goin' behind the Blackwall, despite losin' a piece of myself every time I deep-dived. Almost felt like penance, y'know? For killin' people never deserved to be killed." She shook her head. "Me gettin' fried on that run was just karma comin' to collect on my ass."

Richards stopped, connected his personal link to a microbank mounted beside an electronic door. His oculars flashed, and the door slid open. The security office was small, had wall-to-wall monitors. Computers whirred, the smell of coolant in the air. A tired, distressed-looking woman in a Militech uniform was sitting at the security console, listening to a radio. V caught something about Phoenix in the radio-chatter, something about Biotechnica and a missile.

"You good, Williams?"

"We're fucked," said the woman named Williams. "So, so fucked." She glanced at Richards, turned up the radio.

A newcaster spoke. "A Militech hypersonic missile was fired just hours ago at Biotechnica Phoenix by a group of Nomads known as the Rattlesnakes. Casualties are high and still climbing. Biotechnica representative Leonardo Benuzzi has made a strong condemnation of the attack, vowing that the corporation will respond in kind, while Militech representatives have denied any involvement in the attack on Biotechnica Phoenix and claim Arasaka funded—"

Richards switched off the radio. "Shit. Fucking shit."

Panam looked like someone had slapped her across the face, but she was doing her best to train her features into something approaching neutral. "Does this mean another Corporate War?" she asked, finally.

"What the fuck do you think?" snapped Richards. He took a deep breath, shook his head, rubbing his faceplate. "Fuck it. We got our own problems right now." He pointed at the connection port on the security console. "Connect your personals so we can get you those clearances."

They took turns connecting their personal links, got cleared and herded out of the office, Richard escorting them down to the DHC's mainframe. V asked Ayako, "What the fuck is goin' on?" She watched Ayako's engram in the corner of her eye. "Y'told me Trevor took care of it."

"Wasn't Trevor," said Ayako, and looked at her. "Someone else."

"Who?"

"Some netrunner who made a rash fuckin' choice," said Ayako, sounding annoyed and disappointed at the same time. Then, "But we can't focus on that shit right now. Worry 'bout it when we get back down the orbital well. We need to reach Sam. Gotta take it out before its hardware dies; once it does, it'll activate any sporeware managed to slip through the cracks into the Earthside Net."

Richards connected his personal link to another microbank, the light on the little machine flashing. The door slid open, and he gestured them inside. "Get to work," he told them. "I got some things I have to figure out. I'll be back later to check on your progress." He turned and lumbered off down the corridor, gone.

The door shut behind them. Judy said, "This is fuckin' wild. Lookin' at a potential Fifth Corporate War, if it ain't started already."

Panam frowned. "They need some kind of proof before they do anything, don't they? Something concrete that proves it was a corporation behind the attack."

"Maybe," said V, frowning.

The DHC's control room was dark and cold, air hazy with coolant mist. The walls were lined with server-racks, with monitors displaying a dozen different data-feeds. A sickly greenish-yellow light radiated from the LED strips running along the walls. V found the mainframe's access-point, slowly extruded the length of fiber-optic cable from the plastic housing inset in the heel of her palm.

A moment later, V heard the door open, turned to see some Militech grunt step inside. He dropped a duffle bag on the ground. "Your gear," said the guy, his voice garbled by the modulation of his helmet's external comms. "Alarm is about to go off. They know who you are now." The man left.

Myers appeared on her holo, her window unfolding in the visual field of V's Kiroshis. "You are fucking dead, Valerie," said the president of the NUSA, very matter-of-factly. Then Myers was gone, CONNECTION TERMINATED flashing across her vision.

Judy went to the door, opened a control panel on the wall and started reconfiguring the wirework. "Gonna jam the door," she told them. "Pretty similar to Clouds', this fuckin' lock-system. I got this."

Lucy came up on her ocular display. "Myers told them about the op," she said. "Sold you out now that she doesn't have her fucking leverage anymore." She snorted. "So much for stealth. Probably thinks you're behind that Phoenix shit. Gonna do what I can for you on my end, but you're still gonna have to disable the DHC to reach the Sam facility."

"I got it," said V, jacking her personal into the mainframe.

A cascade of data slowly occluded her vision. Then V was in, her digital ghost riding a gridline down into the system's visually-rendered code.