The magnet-gloves hummed against the sheer, dark glass of the Panacea Protocols tower, a low thrum of defiance against the storm. Each placement was an act of faith, a commitment to the magnetic field that held him to the two-kilometer face of the spire. Wind tore at him, a physical force trying to peel him from the building. Rain, thick and acidic, slicked the surface and ran in cold rivulets down his neck, under the collar of his worn tactical gear. Below, the Sprawl of Saint Protagoras was a smear of neon and sodium light, blurred into abstraction by the layers of smog and driving rain. Their goal was the apex, the broadcast hub lost somewhere in the churning clouds above.
Sabine was ten meters to his left, a compact shadow moving with a spider’s unnerving grace. She guided their path, her face illuminated by the green glow of a small, armored data-slate strapped to her forearm. On it, the schematics provided by Echo pulsed, showing the patrol routes of security drones as a web of shifting red lines. Her expertise was the only thing keeping them from becoming a brief, anonymous smear on a security feed. Croft’s job was simpler: follow, provide the muscle, and not look down.
He focused on the rhythm. Place the right hand, feel the glove lock with a solid thud. Place the left. Pull the body up. Repeat. The parasites in his head were quiet, their usual cacophony reduced to the same low hum as the gloves. They were engines at idle, waiting for a signal. For the first time, he felt like the one giving the orders. The vertigo was a physical presence, a pressure behind his eyes. He fought it by picturing the floor of the REM Diagram, that infinite, stable grid of pale grey light. The map was gone, but the memory of its stability was an anchor.
— Junction 4-gamma in thirty seconds, — Sabine’s voice crackled in his ear, clipped and functional. — Drone patrol converges. We hold.
He found a maintenance outcropping, a small ledge barely wide enough for his boots, and pressed himself flat against the cold glass. The wind howled, trying to find purchase. He watched Sabine do the same, her small form almost disappearing against the immense black wall of the tower. They were two insects clinging to a monument of corporate certainty, armed with a plan born from desperation and chaos.
A hidden port slid open a hundred meters below them, a seamless section of the tower revealing a dark maw. A security drone, a sleek, manta-ray-shaped machine, emerged. Its single, blue optical sensor cut a sharp beam through the rain, sweeping across the face of the building. The light crawled upwards, methodical and patient. It was a predator’s gaze, and it was heading directly for them. Detection was imminent.
The beam washed over the ledge below them, painting the glass in a stark, clinical blue. Croft held his breath, his muscles tensed. The Patriot-Primal parasite in his mind stirred, a low growl demanding action, violence. The Equity-Aggressor countered, calculating the social injustice of a corporate entity having its own private air force. He silenced them both with a thought. His fight, his choice.
The drone’s light crept closer. Ten meters. Five. Just as the beam was about to touch Sabine’s position, her arm snapped up. A small, wrist-mounted launcher, a piece of scavenged tech he hadn’t seen before, hissed. A tiny, dark projectile, a data-spike, shot through the rain. It was a needle hitting a moving target in a hurricane.
The spike struck the drone’s optical sensor with a faint, almost inaudible crack. The blue light flickered once, then died. The drone’s engines sputtered. It hung in the air for a silent second, a dead thing, before tipping forward and falling. It made no sound as it vanished into the thick, soupy smog below. One hostile neutralized. But the system would register the drone’s failure. Their stealth was now on a timer.
— Clear, — Sabine said, her voice perfectly calm. — Move.
They started climbing again, the rhythm re-established. Up, up into the storm. The air grew thinner, colder. He could feel the burn in his shoulders and legs, a clean, physical pain that was a welcome change from the psychic agony he was used to. They were a single organism now, their movements synchronized. Her brain, his muscle. Her strategy, his power.
A sudden gust of wind caught a loose panel above them. It rattled, and a sheet of slick, cold water cascaded down, directly onto Sabine’s position. He heard her sharp intake of breath as her glove lost its grip on the rain-slicked surface. She slipped, her body swinging out into the void, held only by her other hand.
Without thinking, Croft shifted his weight, his own gloves groaning under the strain. The parasites roared to life, not with ideology, but with pure, focused power. He felt the familiar surge of adrenaline, but this time it was his to command. He reached down, his fingers closing around the strap of her gear, and hauled her back towards the tower. The weight was immense, a dead-pull against the screaming wind. For a moment, he thought his own glove would fail, but it held.
He pulled her up onto the small ledge beside him, her body trembling from the shock and cold. She pressed herself against the glass, her breath coming in ragged gasps. He held her there for a second, shielding her from the worst of the wind, their shared warmth a tiny point of defiance in the cold, vertical desert. Their trust was now absolute, forged in the shared terror of the fall.
— Junction 5-alpha, — he grunted, his voice rough. — Your lead.
She nodded, not looking at him, and began to climb again. Their communication was a shorthand of shared experience, a language built in the tunnels and warehouses below. Every clipped phrase was a paragraph of trust. Every shared glance was a chapter of their story. He was no longer just a host, a vessel for a war he didn’t start. He was a partner.
They climbed for what felt like an eternity, the city lights shrinking to a distant, diseased-looking patch of glowing fog. The hum of the tower grew louder, a deep, resonant thrum that vibrated through the glass and into his bones. It was the sound of power. Raw, industrial, city-spanning power.
Finally, through the swirling clouds, he saw it. The antenna array. It was a forest of chrome spires, some as thick as ancient trees, others as thin as needles, all pointing at the storm-wracked sky. Blue and red warning lights pulsed in a slow, steady rhythm. Arcs of static electricity, born from the storm, crackled between the spires, lighting the scene in brief, epileptic flashes. The air smelled of ozone and hot metal.
They hauled themselves over the final ledge and onto the service platform that surrounded the array. The platform was a grated metal ring, slick with rain, vibrating with the energy of the hub. They had made it. They were at the apex of the Sprawl, the heart of Panacea’s cognitive empire. The weapon was aimed.
Sabine was already uncoiling an interface cable from her pack, her movements quick and efficient. The physical part of their impossible plan was over.
Now he had to survive the part that would happen inside his head.
