I struggled with this chapter because I had *nothing* written in my storyplan. I started writing, had a 'I'll figure this out later' moment and… well, time passed. Also, engagement for this story has dropped off the edge, so… yeah, it's hard to want to write when no-one seems to be reading. Not a criticism, just a fact.
But, hey-ho, I wanna at least finish this story.
Union St., Corpo Plaza, City Centre
12:05, 3rd May, 2090
Kali's boots slapped the wet pavement, a rhythm that was oddly comforting in the chaos of Night City. The air was thick with the scent of burnt oil and CHOOH2, the greasy undercurrent of a place that never stopped churning. It was midday, but the towering skyscrapers in the City Centre cast their permanent shadows, keeping the sun's reach just out of sight. The sun had no place here anyway – only the harsh glare of corporate ads and the flickering neon from the endless billboards.
She stood outside the building she'd tracked HEX to the last time in the NET – a gleaming monolith of steel and glass: Arkham Tower. A place built to house the corporate elite. Every floor, a maze of corporate interests and power plays. Kali spit on the sidewalk and adjusted the collar of her leather jacket. A bad taste in her mouth lingered, not from the city's usual filth, but from the hunt.
The last time she was in the NET, she had been so close to HEX, so damn close to getting her scratch back. Now Kali was the one on the run – not from HEX, but from a fucking Hellhound.
Hellhounds usually prowled a datafort and never left it. But this one had. It shouldn't have happened, yet somehow it was now lurking in the dark corners of the NET, just waiting for Kali to dip back into the system. That's how the daemons worked – they weren't people who could be exhausted – she had to derez the Hellhound or hide from it – and she'd never heard of anyone except maybe Bartmoss and a few others who'd actually faced down a Hellhound.
But Kali was in meatspace – she had her hands free here. The daemon didn't exist outside the NET. It was only when she plugged in that it would find her, teeth bared, claws at the ready. For now, she was safe, and she'd have to keep it that way if she wanted to survive.
Taking a deep breath, Kali turned and scanned the street. Cameras above her head, a few media drones – the usual stale corp surveillance. The city was so damn paranoid, she could practically feel it in her bones. A pair of badges stood in front of a nearby street corner, accompanied by a gargantuan mech loaded with cannons for arms, watching the crowds. They didn't look like they were here for any reason but to look important. Kali wasn't exactly in the mood to mess with them, not today. Everyone hated badges – just the biggest gang around. And Kali in particular hated everything about Night City without mentioning the law and the rules that choked her. But if badges weren't looking for trouble, she wouldn't give them any.
Her eyes flicked toward the front entrance of Arkham Tower. The glass doors were heavy, sleek, and clean, reflecting the towering skyscrapers around them like some polished illusion of safety.
It'd been a while since she had to infiltrate in meatspace. Knowing that a quickhack – any quickhack would draw the Hellhound to her like a fly to shit, that connecting to the NET at all ran the risk of bringing it down on her… it made CorpSec guards look bigger. It made their guns actually look dangerous.
But she wasn't going to back out now. She wasn't going to let that bitch HEX get away with her eddies. Her way out of this fucking hellhole.
One foot in front of the other. Don't stop. Don't get caught up in the tension. Just walk.
A couple of people eyed her as she walked into the lobby. A few suits. Probably just another round of high-stakes deals, shady investments, or God-knows-what-else the corpos had going on. She could practically feel their eyes on her – the way they sized her up, the way they looked at her like a problem. She'd dealt with worse.
She moved past the polished marble floors, ignoring the concierge's fake smile and the soft hum of the overhead speakers pumping some generic jazz track to keep the rich gonks calm. The elevator doors slid open with a soft, corporate hiss. A single security guard – too clean-cut, too polished – stood next to the elevator. His eyes flicked to her for just a second. No recognition.
She stepped into the elevator, keeping her eyes locked forward. The doors shut behind her with a faint chime. She tapped the button for the 13th floor. That's where HEX's datafort was.
The elevator ride was slow – too slow. Stopping for every other floor, watching people come in and press for the 8th floor, the 10th, the 12th. She hated it. The lack of control. Even the hum of the elevator sounded like a trap closing in. Her fingers twitched in he pocket around the chip, checking it was still there. She couldn't help herself. The Hellhound was still in the back of her mind. She could practically feel its claws scraping against the edges of her thoughts, a constant reminder of what was hunting her.
The elevator finally stopped, and the doors slid open.
Floor 13.
Kali stepped out into the hallway, immediately scanning for cameras. Her mind worked in overdrive, glancing up and down the hallway. Fuck, what she'd give to have access to a layout of the building…
She knew this floor had multiple corporate tenants, all operating under the illusion of their own independence. But HEX's datafort wasn't far. She just had to find it.
The hallway stretched out in front of her, clean and white, the kind of place that made her want to puke. The polished walls gleamed under harsh overhead lights. Everything screamed corporate control – as if the walls were designed to make people feel small and insignificant.
Kali's boots echoed down the hallway. The building was too clean, too sterile.
She counted the cameras as she walked, tracking each one in her mind. Three. Four. Five. She'd have to avoid them somehow – either turn them off or loop them.
And then she remembered: she couldn't.
She could worry about it later, she needed to keep moving. If she accessed HEX's datafort manually, she could slot in the chip and leave a virus. She could derez the Hellhound, get her eddies back – and take everything else HEX had.
Kali's gaze caught something in the corner – a figure standing too still. A woman in a suit, looking out a window. Not a tenant. Kali could feel the heat rising in her chest. Nope. Not today.
The woman turned, looking directly at her. Kali's lip curled into a sneer.
"Sorry, madam, can I help you?" The woman's voice was too sweet, too sugary. People like that? They pissed her off.
"Nope," Kali replied flatly.
She didn't stop. Didn't flinch. Just kept walking like she owned the place. The woman raised an eyebrow, but didn't say anything more. Kali didn't care. They were just background noise. They didn't matter.
She was on the edge now – closer to where HEX's datafort was. It had to be her home – it had to be. The building felt emptier the further she walked. She'd caught sight of a few people here and there – employees, maybe – but no one who seemed like they could pose a threat.
The quiet felt oppressive.
Kali turned the corner, stopping in front of the door. A touchpad, a small vent above her that dipped slightly – she could perhaps break it open if she had to. But she didn't need more than one way in. She reached into the carryall strung over her shoulder and unzipped it just enough to slip out a small service key she'd spent too many eddies on from the tech wizards up in Kabuki.
She flicked a glance at the hallway, checking for any sign of movement. Nothing. No one in sight. Her fingers twitched, itching for the familiar hum of quickhacking. Keycard spoofing, biometric lock bypass… In the digital world, things were easy. But no netrunning here. Not now. Not with that damn Hellhound looming over her every move in the NET. No quickhacks. No dive. Just meatspace.
She took out a cable plugged the service key into the keypad at the door. It had a standard security system: keycard swipe and a biometric scan. No heavy encryption – just something to keep the riff-raff out. A quick spoof of the keycard would work.
She let the service key work its magic, trying to spoof a valid keycard signal. The key buzzed with the hum of its internal processor, running a series of commands, attempting to mimic an RFID signature.
The green light blinked once. Twice. A flicker. Then... nothing. Her heart sank. She cursed under her breath, her mind already racing through the other options.
Of course; HEX wouldn't leave something that easy. She had layered it up. Even without deep-diving into the system, Kali knew that HEX was one paranoid bitch. Not the first time Kali dealt with that shit.
There was a narrow gap around the touchpad – as if it had been removed before. She slapped the service key back into her jacket and pulled out her knife. If it wasn't going to be clean, it was going to get dirty. The old ways were still the most reliable in situations like this.
Her fingers worked fast – familiar, mechanical, smooth. First, she detached the outer panel of the door's security system, the black plastic casing revealing the delicate wiring beneath. Kali didn't need to see the full wiring schematic; she had enough experience to know which wire did what.
She inserted the small knife into the access panel, feeling the tension in the panel as she pried it out of the wall and began looking at pressing the knife's edge into the wiring, careful not to sever anything. A slight twist. Just a light fraying on the wire that made the screen flicker and die.
"Shit." Really?
She felt the frustration bubbling up, but kept her cool. Kali was good at this – way too good to let one stubborn lock ruin her day. She was the best deckhead in the city. She could handle a simple fucking lock! She rolled the frayed wires between her thumb and forefinger, hoping power would be restored to the touchpad.
"Come on, come on..."
The touchpad flickered back to life and let out a ringing that sounded a little too loud for her liking. She froze for a second, holding her breath, listening. The quiet of the hall hung thick in the air. No footsteps. No sounds of life.
It was just Kali and this fucking lock.
But then came the worst sound of all – a faint buzz from the system she was trying to hack in meatspace.
Kali cursed softly. It wasn't a security alarm, but it was something. The building was aware of her presence – someone was monitoring the system. She tried to tinker with the next wire, trying to short-circuit the system just enough – just for a second so the lock would default…
The touchpad changed: Error:404 Please Contact the Building Supervisor.
"Fuck you," Kali cursed at the lock, pocketing the knife and pressing the touchpad back into the wall.
She didn't waste a second. Kali gave one more quick glance around to confirm that the hallway was still clear before reaching into the carry-all to take out the crowbar from the carry-all.
Time to use the vent. This fucking door wasn't going to stop her. It was the kind of vent you could find in any aging building from before the time of RED – a perfect way in when all else fails.
The crowbar slipped easily into the space between the vent cover and the wall, but as she twisted it, a nasty screech echoed through the hallway. She bit down a curse. That noise was way louder than she'd intended. She froze, waiting for anyone to come running, but the seconds stretched on and no one appeared.
Her pulse quickened, and she gave the crowbar another twist. The vent cover came loose with a loud clatter, dropping to the floor below with a heavy thud.
"You're fucking killing me here…" she hissed.
She pulled herself up into the vent opening. The narrow shaft was tight, old, and awkward. No one had thought about cleaning these ducts in ages. Still, it was her best option. With a grunt, she wiggled her way inside, feeling the cold metal scrape against her clothes.
The vent smelled of mildew and dust, the air musty and thick. She cursed as the heat from her body began to build up, the air circulation non-existent. Crawling through the narrow vent was slow work, but she couldn't afford to stop. Every minute she spent here was another minute HEX might see her coming – if she didn't already. She pulled herself forward, her muscles burning with the effort, but she didn't dare stop. She couldn't. Not now.
The shaft twisted ahead of her, curving at odd angles like a maze that didn't make any goddamn sense. Kali's mind raced – her thoughts were already on the next part of the plan, calculating her next move.
Get in, grab the creds, flatline HEX, and get out. Easy.
She reached a junction in the vent. Ahead, she could see a control panel peeking out from behind a metal grate. It wasn't the ideal entry, but it would do. A bypass panel – something old, the kind they used to manage maintenance. Nothing fancy. No flashy tech. But there was a small grate next to it which, if Kali was right, led to HEX's apartment. It was her way in.
But when her hand reached out to touch the vent's rusty metal surface, her finger caught on something – a shard of jagged metal that sliced open her palm. A sharp sting ran up her arm. Kali hissed through her teeth, her temper flaring, but she bit it back. This wasn't the time to bleed all over the place.
She reached down into her carry-all and wriggled until she pulled out a latex glove and forced it over her hand. It pulled tight against her knuckles with a snap, masking the slow bead of blood welling up from the slice. The damn vent's edges had been jagged as hell. Slowly, carefully, she undid the vent's latch and pulled it aside, revealing a maintenance panel with a keypad.
She rolled over to the side and reached into her pocket to pull out the service key, still with the cable plugged into it. She plugged the other end of the cable into the keypad - a relic from some previous system. The panel blinked, the display flickering to life.
Access granted.
With a soft click, the grate next to her slowly lowered, and Kali could see the darkened room with a showerhead on the other side. Kali exhaled a breath she hadn't realized she was holding. This would be it – her entry. She crawled forwards, wincing as her gloved hand clasped the edge of the vent. She ducked out of the vent and dropped as silently into the bathtub.
It was cold beneath her; a hard, curved basin of porcelain slicked with dust and grime, its clawed feet sunk into cracked tiles like an animal crouching in wait. The vent above rattled faintly behind her, the last echo of her entry closing like a whisper on the air. Kali sat with one leg crooked, her spine bowed over her lap as she worked a clean latex glove over her other hand. The other was already snug, stretched over slender fingers and stained from climbing through forgotten ductwork.
The latex clung to her like a second skin. She rolled her wrist once, testing the grip, and reached into the zip compartment of her bag.
Out came the Kenshin pistol, whirring at her touch.
Compact. Polished to a soft steel sheen. She checked the mag by feel alone – smooth and silent – and slowly, quietly, racked it once, the muted click of the chambered round barely audible over the hush of the empty apartment. She stood slowly, knees creaking with strain, and pushed open the glass door with the barrel.
The bathroom beyond was clean. Too clean. No water rings. No steam stains. The towel bar was empty. The sink had no soap, no toothbrush. No life.
She stepped out barefoot onto cold tile, every sense alive. The place smelled faintly of industrial cleaner and long-dried electronics. The lights were on, dimmed to a lazy amber glow from recessed bulbs, but it didn't feel lived-in. It felt curated.
Kali padded through the apartment, silent as breath.
The hallway gave way to a wide living space – a lounge with clean white walls and modular furniture. A couch with sharp corners and no cushions. A coffee table holding a single book, spine unbroken. One plant by the window, real enough, but half-dead and thirsting for attention.
No wires. No cables. No deck.
She stepped to the kitchen – empty cupboards. The fridge was humming, its door magnet-sealed, but inside, Kali found only bottles of filtered water and a single protein pack with no label. Not a smudge on the countertop. No dishes. Not even a fingerprint.
This wasn't a runner's den.
No nest of wires, no fibre-optic spiders hanging from ceiling mounts. No keyboard worn down at the edges. No netrunning chair bolted into place like a throne. Just generic minimalist art on the wall and that strange, soft smell of sterilization.
Kali's eyes narrowed.
But there were signs – subtle ones. A coat still damp from rain hanging by the door. Mud on the heels. Not the kind you get from walking through the City Centre's gutters – this was clay, baked dry and cracking, from outside the walls. The Badlands, maybe. The border zones. A pack of cigarettes half-finished on the windowsill, unlit, and next to them, a matchbook from the Overlook Hotel. A place that burned down five years ago.
She moved to the desk. Old-school, woodgrain, low-profile. A minimalist data terminal sat at the centre. No visible ports. Just a touchscreen, dark and still. Nearby, a notebook sat open. Pages of hand-written notes scrawled in looping, fast script, the ink already fading.
Kali bent to read it. Fuck, knowing Spanish would've been real handy right about now.
The screen lit up with a whispering flicker of static. Lines of code. Ghostlight on her face. And then, a voice:
"Took you long enough, Kali."
Her pulse jumped, but her hand was steady. The pistol tracked left, then right. Nothing.
She straightened slowly, eyes on the screen. The voice wasn't live. It had a strange compressed flatness to it, like a memory scraped from a corrupted file. Put through a modulator, for sure, but she could still hear the personality: smooth. Confident.
"You're about as dumb as you look."
Kali said nothing. Her eyes narrowed at the screen. Data flickered across the display – strings of numbers, maps, shards of old code. Her face lit in blinking reds and whites.
Then it began to change.
"You don't get it yet, do you?"
Her gut twisted.
"You're not chasing me."
Kali stepped back from the desk, suddenly aware of how quiet it was. How much attention she'd given the clues. The desk. The vent. It wasn't that she'd found her way in.
It was that she was meant to.
"I'm leading you."
The screen bled red.
All at once, warning symbols burst across the display. Her face. Her gait profile. Criminal profile. Pictures of Esma, Casamir, an obituary of her mother, Jun. Heat signature. Pulse. An image from a security feed two floors down. Then another from the building's lobby. Her biometrics. Every trace of her – packaged, encrypted, and flung out into the digital dark like chum in a shark tank.
"No, no, no – shit – shit!" she hissed, already moving.
She slapped the console, tried to kill the power, but the screen didn't even flicker. Her name blinked in red at the centre, pulsing in sync with her heartbeat.
Then a dull klaxon rang from somewhere deep in the building's systems.
The screen flickered one last time. A new line blinked into view, slow and taunting:
"See you soon."
The screen cut to black.
Kali's pulse pounded in her throat. Her skin crawled. She took a step back from the terminal, grip tightening on the Kenshin, eyes darting across the room.
And then… a click.
The soft shift of a door being unlocked.
Kali dropped instantly, boots skidding on tile as she threw herself behind the kitchen counter. The Kenshin came up in both hands. Shallow breath. Heart like a jackhammer.
The front door slid open.
Someone entered, heels tapping softly on the composite flooring.
"Ms. Arashiro…" the voice was sweet. Syrupy. Like spun sugar stretched over a blade. "Chica? Or do you prefer Kali? B3DBUG is reserved for fixers and cyberspace, isn't that right?"
Kali's eyes went wide. The woman from the hallway. The one who stood by the window too long, too still. Her face hadn't turned, hadn't moved. Fucking HEX. That fucking cunt and her games…
"Why don't you come out," the voice continued, "and we do this like professionals?"
The clack of a weapon being drawn echoed across the space.
Kali's mind was racing. She knew the name B3DBUG. That wasn't just from a leak –
she used it like she owned it.
She pressed her back against the kitchen cabinet, sweating under the soft collar of her blue jacket, pulse thudding in her ears. She could feel her deck warming under her shoulder.
Could she quickhack?
She bit the inside of her cheek. No good. He fucking deets had been leaked. That Hellhound would find her, she would bet her life on it. She was betting her life on it. If HEX was in control of this system, jacking in now would be like diving headfirst into a shark tank.
'Kali, think. Think.'
The woman's footsteps were slow. Measured. Each one rang out like a countdown.
Kali reached a hand into her pocket and found her knife. She pulled it out, knocking the service key onto the tiled floor with a clatter. She gritted her teeth and turned to her right to see the barrel of a Unity pistol poking out towards her.
She twisted from cover swung the barrel of her gun at the woman's face. It was caught immediately by the woman's hand, twisted out to the side. Kali let out a yelp and thrust the knife forwards, cracking into the woman's shoulder. She turned away, blood spraying across the apartment in a horrendous jettison. Kali didn't wait.
She bolted.
Her boots hit the floor like thunder, slamming down hallway tiles as the woman shouted something behind her, sugar turning to venom. A gunshot rang out with a crack, slamming into the wall beside the doorframe, throwing up powdered drywall and plaster.
Kali hit the corner and skidded, momentum flinging her shoulder-first into the door on the other side of the hall. She pushed off and sprinted for the elevator at the end of the hall, the doors gleaming like salvation.
"You're not getting outta here!"
Another shot chased her, ricocheting off metal trim. She ducked low and slapped the call button three times.
"Come on, come on, come *on*—"
The door slid open.
She threw herself inside and hit 'Ground Floor' with a palm as she raised her Kenshin and began to squeeze the trigger.
Bolts of blue streaked down the hallway. The first was wide, shattering a potted plant by a doorway. The second hit the window at the end of the corridor. But the woman ducked back into the apartment. Kali fired a third shot, stabbing a gloved finger at the 'Close' button repeatedly.
She continued firing and, thankfully, the doors closed.
Silence. Just the low hum of motion.
Kali staggered back against the mirrored wall, one gloved hand gripping the rail. The other still clutched the Kenshin, her finger trembling over the trigger guard. Her breath tore in and out like she'd run miles.
She paced the elevator like a caged animal.
That was HEX. That motherfucker. She was still alive. She still had her fucking money. She'd leaked Kali's fucking data – what were the odds a fucking fixer was going to be setting up a hit for her? She'd hacked 6th Street, a few start-up corps… could she have left a trace? Had there been a moment she'd been so fucking stupid as to leave a taunting message? Shit, she couldn't remember…
Kali stopped mid-step. Looked up at the floor indicator.
14… 13… 12…
Could she jump out?
She hovered over the emergency stop, thinking. Eighth floor. Maybe she get out and circle around? Maybe HEX was still upstairs…
No. No. Kali had a head start. The longer she stayed in this building, the more dangerous it was. She glanced up, checking for cameras. None in here… shit, the carry-all… that could draw attention on the way out. They'd heard the gunshots… motherfucker…
Kali stuffed the Kenshin down the waistband of her aramid-weave slim-fit pants and opened up the bag, checking if there was anything that could be evidence: a crowbar, a spare set of gloves, a roll of duct tape, her braindance wreath…
She set about placing the gloves and duct tape in her pockets, and hung the braindance wreath around her neck as her eyes tracked the glowing panel, watching the numbers tick down.
5… 4… 3… 2… 1…
The elevator dinged and the doors slid open to the lobby.
Bright lights. Polished chrome. Two bored-looking security guards behind a marble desk, half-watching an old rerun of Chop City on a recessed screen.
Kali walked out fast, posture rigid, tension in every limb.
One guard glanced up. The second guard raised an eyebrow but didn't move. As Kali approached the doors, she heard another ding.
She was already past the scanners by the time the first one stood.
The city air hit her like a slap – cold air, wind sweeping off the rooftops. The sky was soaked in pale haze, blurred pinks and cyan dripping down the facades of megablocks. The street hummed with light traffic, the occasional AV skimming low overhead like buzzing flies.
Her Kusanagi CT-3X stood half a block away.
Sleek. Black. Waiting.
She sprinted.
Kali's boots struck puddles, scattering rainwater into the street as she crossed the pavement, vaulted a low divider, and skidded to the bike.
She slung one leg over the saddle in a single, practiced motion, engine already snarling to life beneath her.
The Kusanagi growled like a beast stirring from sleep, then launched forward with a roar. Tires screamed. Neon streaked past in long, hot lines. She ducked low, weaving between cabs and cargo haulers, eyes flicking between side mirrors and rearview displays.
There was no sign of pursuit. But HEX was following. She had to be following.
The city unravelled in front of her – alleys and roads, sharp turns and blind intersections, the endless hum of life and chaos.
Kali veered onto a ramp to take the high road, climbing toward the outer lanes where the sprawl looked like a circuit board from above. Red warning symbols still floating in her mind. Her biometrics, her face, her gait, her whole life dumped into the world.
Her hands gripped the bike's handlebars tighter, jaw clenched. She was tagged now. Marked. The name B3DBUG wasn't just a handle anymore, it was a target.
Goddamn, this was a long'un. But, I sat down and stuck it out, so, regardless of whether this gets any hits, I'm proud of it.
R.