Max's voice was low, controlled. "Then we make it scream."
V grinned from the back, loading a mag. "You're getting predictable, choom."
Jackie chuckled, checking the charge seals on his cutter. "Predictable gets you alive."
Lucy stayed quiet, already spinning her code—no theatrics, just focus. The deck purred under her fingers as she wrote the next bait: something ugly, something Root couldn't ignore. She'd learned by now—it didn't need to be perfect, it just needed to sting.
Mary's tone softened through the van's speakers. "I detect active Netwatch presence near the south relays. They're scanning for your last footprint."
"Let them scan," Max replied. "We'll give them something worth finding."
He looked out at the skyline—the exchange tower rising like a shard of glass through the fog. Lightning flashed across the storm-washed sky, painting its surface in flickers of light and shadow. "Root's spine runs under that tower. All data roads converge there. It's the heart, not the head."
Lucy's eyes flicked up. "Meaning?"
Max turned to her. His expression didn't change, but his words carried a quiet edge. "We can't kill Root in the net. It's built to survive that. We pull the spine—it bleeds into the open, and then we end it."
Jackie flexed his fingers. "So, we're cutting the main artery."
"Exactly," Max said. "Root's survival depends on mirrored redundancy through two host nodes. We already crippled one—Node Five's feeder. The last one lives under the central exchange. The physical backbone that syncs all its ghost copies. That's where we cut."
Lucy frowned. "That's locked behind Militech custodial firewalls. Bio-auth gates. Sensor traps. We touch that wrong and Root will throw the whole city grid at us."
Max didn't blink. "Then we touch it right."
They left the van two blocks out. The rain hadn't let up—if anything, it got heavier, smearing the world into moving reflections of color. The air tasted of static and ozone.
V moved ahead, silent, scanning corners. Jackie followed, massive frame hunched low, his steps somehow soundless. Max walked in the middle, Eidolon's blue silhouettes flickering faintly around him like ghosts—constructs mapping movement, heartbeat signatures, EM noise. Lucy trailed last, eyes half on her deck, half on the dark city around them.
When they reached the first security gate, Max gestured. "Lucy."
She nodded, crouched beside the panel, and wired in. "Give me ten seconds."
Eidolon bent the local feed, mirroring signal echoes from thirty seconds ago—enough to fool Root's watchers that nothing had moved. Lucy bypassed the gate with surgical precision. The door slid open with a tired hiss.
Inside, the exchange sub-grid sprawled like a steel maze. Banks of conduits hummed with quiet, restrained power. The floor was slick with condensation.
"Two host signatures," Mary whispered. "One above, one below. Both are tethered to the central node. The lower one is stronger—it's the active backbone."
Max nodded. "We go down."
The descent was quiet. The only sound was the faint vibration of machines and the whisper of rain leaking through cracks.
They reached a service pit lined with heat exchangers. The air shimmered. Lucy checked her readout and frowned. "It's alive down here. There's an active control daemon running. It's not human-coded."
"Root," Max said simply.
Jackie raised his cutter. "You want me to make an opening?"
"Not yet." Max knelt by a junction plate. Eidolon pulsed blue, scanning. "This is where Root's physical relay feeds into its mirror. We sever the relay, Root loses its sync. But it'll feel it the instant we start."
V adjusted her pistol, a faint grin playing on her lips. "Then we'd better be faster than its temper."
Lucy set the deck down. "I'll feed a ghost signal—something that looks like a system calibration. It'll keep Root from recognizing the cut until it's too late."
Jackie crouched by the relay, gripping the cutter tight. "On your mark."
Max exhaled, just once. His voice stayed flat. "Lucy, start the ghost. Jackie, hold. V, cover."
The tunnel filled with the soft crackle of Lucy's code unraveling across the relay feed. Her fingers danced—measured, mechanical.
For a moment, everything worked.
Then Eidolon's tone sharpened.
"Contact. Root has initiated an intrusion thread."
Lucy froze. "It's inside the local hardware. I didn't even see the handshake—"
The relay lights flared red. A mechanical whine rose from the far end of the pit as panels split open, unfolding into segmented frames. Machines climbed out—sleek, arachnid drones with mirrored optics and Root's signature flickering across their chassis: /// ROOT WATCH — AUTHENTICATED
Jackie rose, servos hissing. "Looks like it noticed."
V drew her pistol and smirked. "Good. I was getting bored."
Max stepped forward. His eyes gleamed cold under the emergency lights. "Eidolon—contain."
Blue fire streaked across the air as Eidolon's constructs came alive, weaving light into motion. The drones surged forward, mechanical limbs slamming into the metal floor. V moved first—fast, deliberate shots bursting through their sensor clusters. Jackie caught one mid-leap, crushing it against the wall with a single strike.
Lucy worked through the chaos, voice steady. "Almost there—ghost feed is holding. Relay is vulnerable."
"Cut it," Max ordered.
Jackie didn't hesitate. The cutter ignited with a flash of molten orange, slicing through the conduit in one brutal arc. Sparks flew, spraying the walls. The entire chamber shook.
The drones froze mid-motion—Root's connection stuttered. Then the red lights dimmed.
Lucy's deck chimed:
NODE 6 — BACKBONE FEED: DISCONNECTED
ROOT ALERT — PARTIAL SYNC FAILURE
For a breath, silence.
Then Mary's voice broke through, urgent. "Root has rerouted! It's moving its core to a hidden mirror outside the city net—one physical vault left. You've forced its retreat."
V laughed breathlessly. "We just made it flinch."
Max turned to them, face unreadable. "No. We made it cornered."
Outside, the exchange tower's lights flickered—once, twice—then steadied again. The city didn't know it, but a ghost in its veins had just lost half its body.
Lucy unplugged the deck, shaking her head. "One host left. After that—Root itself."
Max's voice was calm, almost quiet. "Then we finish this. No more ghosts, no more mirrors."
***
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