Corpo Age

Chapter 229: Conflict by Choice

We decided we would wage war against Aurora Corporation if they proved responsible for the experiments that got Thorne and Claire’s family captured. To start, we would dedicate some of our resources to investigating the enemy.

Just because we had decided to take action didn’t mean we would immediately stroll up to their front door and start shooting. We didn’t even know where their headquarters were, or who specifically was responsible for the experiments.

“Revenge is revenge, but we won’t be blindly carrying it out,” I stated.

“I understand,” Thorne replied. “I don’t mind thoroughly investigating first. I only want to pay back those who are responsible, not the random employees. My mother wouldn’t approve otherwise.”

“You guys are making it more difficult than it has to be,” Claire chimed in. “Just target all their executives like you’ve done before. If you ask me, they’re all guilty.”

I shook my head, despite knowing Claire was unable to see me through this call. The entire conversation was taking place internally within our SAIDs.

“We can’t always go with the hammer. Precision strikes are something much more productive. If someone in Aurora Corporation is responsible, then their entire company may share that responsibility, but to punish them doesn’t mean indiscriminately attacking them all. We’ll want to repeat what we did with Astro Forge, making them sign agreements beneficial to us.”

After discussing how we should approach this incident, our call was ended. Thorne and I resumed our identities as Shake and Echo, who had just returned to Soluna, ready to finish our job.

The docking procedures were long done during our discussion, so we disembarked right away, bringing along our passengers. There were almost a hundred people cramped into our cargo bay. Thirty-eight of them were corpos we saved, so they required no restraints. The fifty-seven pirates were the only problem, but all of them were bound. We just needed transportation.

After hailing a car, we soon made it to the rendezvous point our QG provided. It was in a remote area of town, where several warehouses were. As expected, someone was there, ready to receive us.

I walked up to a woman who resembled the waitress at the bar, who was our main contact with the enigmatic QG. We found her sitting casually on a sofa inside a spacious commercial storage unit.

I greeted her by throwing the two prisoners I had brought along with me.

“The job is complete. I’ve got another fifty-five of these guys on my ship. Do you want me to bring them here as well?”

“No need. We’ll send someone to your ship to take them off your hands.”

“What about the captives we rescued? They should be showing up here shortly. Do our employers still want them hand-delivered to their doorsteps?”

“Only for the ones who belong to Aurora Corporation. I’ll send you the location they provided. It’s just one of their branch offices. The others can disperse as they see fit.”n/ô/vel/b//in dot c//om

A good half of the captives were from Aurora Corporation. I quickly sent them each an update. They all had their corporate cybernetics with them, so they had their SAIDs to receive my message.

After sending them their new instructions, we took the opportunity to tag along. It was a good chance to learn more about this company. I doubted anyone important would be there to receive some low-level workers, but having a legitimate reason to visit their facility was too good to pass on.

Having the advantage of a car, we arrived at the scene first.

After learning of their name, we did some preliminary research about the company. We learned that they were a B-Class corporation that specialized in terminals. However, they had even expanded into the SAID business in recent years, after not being satisfied with just being hardware suppliers to the cybernetics market.

I deduced that this expansion was what prompted them to enlist the help of various research companies to carry out their human experiments.

We strode into their branch office, a fifteen-story building located within downtown Soluna.

“Welcome. How may we help you?” the green-haired receptionist greeted.

“We’re here about the return of the captured employees.”

“Right, I’ve been notified about that matter. I’ll get someone from human resources out here.”

The receptionist was eerily emotionless, not caring about the plight of her fellow workers. While we waited for someone to come out and the rescued corpos to arrive, I left a projection of myself behind while I turned on my Shade to investigate the area.

There weren’t many places I could go as everyone further into the building was blocked off by glass walls and turnstiles. Naturally, my target was the receptionist before me.

I glanced over her shoulders, observing her screen before discreetly plugging into her terminal. Even so, I didn’t dare do anything in their systems, opting to leave passive surveillance programs.

B-Class corporations weren’t something I was confident in fighting against yet. Not without severe casualties. There would be a lot of preparation needed in order to pull anything.

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We stayed for an hour while the corpos made their way here. After getting their staff from human resources to sign off on the gig, our business was over.

We returned to our lodging, where I continued to monitor the Aurora Corporation receptionist.

The only thing I could see was through the eyes of the terminal, but as the first contact of their branch, it should net plentiful information in multiple areas of their business. A lot of it was mundane calls from vendors and suppliers, sprinkled in with a few interviews or maintenance appointments.

I made sure to copy down everything I saw, especially the contents of the emails.

“So, find anything?” Thorne asked, trying to sound casual.

I could tell he was anxious inside. He wasn’t one to be so impatient when dealing with important matters like this.

“Not yet. I plan to use the access to the receptionist’s terminal to sneak in.”

“Hmm, to sneak in as interviewees?”

“Interviewees have too many eyes on them and are asked too many questions. Let’s go with this instead,” I explained as I sent over one of the emails I found.

Having read it over, Thorne chuckled.

The next morning, we headed straight back to Aurora Corporation’s office building. However, this time, we weren’t dressed in our mercenary get-up but wore shiny corporate suits.

We didn’t immediately enter the building, choosing to park off to the side where we had a good vantage point. We were just checking to see if the security measures were the same as yesterday while we waited for the appointed time.

Not long after we arrived, an alarm on my SAID rang, and we started up our rental car again.

We drove out a short distance toward the city center. With traffic flowing smoothly thanks to the healthy population of aeromobiles, we were able to spot every car driving by.

We soon found a match, an official vehicle belonging to the city, which in turn, was part of the consortium. It flew through the air above us, seemingly about to land. We tailed them after for a brief moment, and once we confirmed their heading, I rolled down the windows and fired.

An electronic intrusion round fired from my trusty Suri, hitting right on the front bumper. The occupants could definitely hear the metallic clang, but it didn’t matter. There was a lot of background noise from the rest of the traffic, and they would likely attribute it to hitting a rock on the road.

Even if they got suspicious, it was too late. I fired again, this time with a jamming round. It landed on their hood and began jamming any signals in the vicinity. Now, with no possibility of calling for reinforcements, I breached into their car’s systems before simulating a malfunction.

The autopilot was engaged due to the critical error, and the vehicle was forcefully grounded by the computer and pulled over off the main highways. I then ensured the doors were locked shut while we veered off in the same direction. We parked a distance away and closed the distance under the cover of our active camouflage.

Inside, I found a lone man sitting in the back seat, and I let out a breath of relief, seeing how a lone person was easiest to deal with.

I glanced over at the outline of Thorne and nodded.

“Let’s do this.”

On the count of three, we unlocked the doors and rushed the confused man in the car. The side of the car over by Thorne was closest to him, so he grabbed him by the neck while I reached for his legs.

Just as I got my restrainers ready and was about to slap them onto his ankles, his feet blurred and vanished from sight. I then saw the man and the car getting smaller—no, I grew further apart from them.

A split second later, I began to feel the pain in my chest.

And of course, the guy was combat-proficient with high-spec cybernetics. Just our luck.

I quickly regained my bearings and found that Thorne was locked in a struggle with our target. He still had him in a chokehold, but the man unnaturally flailed his feet around, as if his spine didn’t exist. Thorne was getting pelted by kicks, but it only spurred him to tighten his hold more.

Not wanting to allow this to go on any longer than it had to, I charged back into the fray with a stun baton in hand.

I swung down at the man, who wasn’t able to resist amidst his struggles, striking him on his collarbone. The electric current rang through his body, but he only let out a quiet groan.

That was when I realized the man was more of a cyborg than I thought. His appearance was that of a completely organic human, so I may have underestimated him for a bit. However, I quickly corrected my mistake.

I drew my gun and unloaded a clip of EI rounds into the man, despite Thorne on his back. The bullets stuck to his skin like it was magnetic. Instead of reloading, I holstered the gun and threw myself on top of the man, trying to subdue him with Thorne.

A moment later, my SAID notified me I established a connection to his systems, so I began to administer the takeover program.

“Hold him down for a little longer!” I called out.

“What else do you suppose I do? Just let him go?”

A minute later, the man’s struggle finally weakened. I took the chance to reach for my restrainer bracelets and slapped them onto the man’s ankles and wrists.

I then searched through the files in his SAID to get an understanding of his body before plunging a syringe into a good spot. It knocked him out within a count of ten.

“This guy almost overpowered me, a cyborg in power armor! What’s up with that?” Thorne exclaimed.

“Hmm, at least this was the riskiest part of the plan and we got past it. This guy’s from the consortium, so I doubt anyone from Aurora’s branch office would be as strong.

“Hmm, we still have a ways to go.”

“We can dwell on that later. Come on, we got to go!”

Then, before emergency services came to service the vehicle, I quickly canceled the error messages I forced into the system and got into the driver’s seat. We booted up the vehicle and rejoined traffic.

We were already quite close to Aurora’s office, so we arrived after a few minutes. When we did, we found a dozen well-dressed corpos waiting for us in the driveway. They all bowed in unison as we approached.

Seeing there wasn’t much time left until showtime, I cleared my throat as I adjusted my voice and donned the holographic disguise of the man we had just captured. My finishing touch included connecting the man’s SAID settings to my intel department, so they could fidget with his memories while I took on his identity.

Through all the research we did with the cassettes, we learned a lot about the brain. It wasn’t enough for us to brainwash anyone, but imparting memories was close enough to knowledge that it was doable. The man’s highly augmented body worked to our advantage in this regard. It wasn’t perfect, likely making the man more confused than believing the narrative we installed into him, but it was better than nothing.

After confirming my intel department could take it from here, I hopped off the guard, leaving Thorne behind to watch over the physical body of our captive.

Right away, a middle-aged woman came up to be respectful.

“Thank you so much for coming, Inspector! Please allow me to show you around.”

I took a moment to regard the people who came to greet me before nodding to the woman.

“Lead the way.”