In an abandoned building, a person could be seen walkingnup and down in frustration.
Zane knelt beside a cluttered makeshift workstation made from a stolen crate and a busted vending machine frame. Sparks popped as he twisted two frayed wires together, muttering to himself.
"Come on, you overpriced eye ornament... play nice."
The red-glowing visor — looted from KGBeast — sat upright on a mannequin head wearing an old baseball cap, its lenses inactive save for the ominous red glow. That glow was the only thing it would do so far.
A month of trial and error, and all he could do was get the thing to light up... and occasionally record blurry footage like some radioactive GoPro.
"I've seen toasters with more user-friendliness," Zane muttered.
He clicked a custom switch hooked into thr visor. With a mechanical click, the visor lit up — then flashed a mocking error code.
ACCESS DENIED: Retinal Match Failed.
Again.
Zane groaned and yanked the cable out of the device with a pop of static.
"Maybe I should just wear it as a glorified fashion statement. Call myself Robo-Cop or something."
From the behind him, a rustling noise caught his attention. General Crunch peeked down from a pipe with something suspiciously shiny in its mouth. Papa Roach was curled up by the heating pipe, snoring.
"Crunch, if that's another power cell, please don't chew it. I need it for the death laser... or at least the coffee machine."
The raccoon hissed in defiance.
"Yeah, yeah."
.....
Zane adjusted the oversized novelty glasses perched over his nose, a bushy fake mustache dangling just above his lip. The disguise was ridiculous — part Groucho Marx, part bargain bin Halloween — but it did the job.
"You know," he muttered to himself, pacing outside a dingy rooftop water tower, "this whole 'mystery man' thing would be a lot easier if I didn't look like a thrift store exploded on my face."
He tapped the visor again. Red light. No interface. Just static and a pulsing glow like an angry toaster.
Footsteps.
Zane turned just in time to see Artemis land with a practiced crouch, her bow already slung casually on her back. She gave him a long, slow look — her eyes trailing from his fake eyebrows to the pink bathrobe draped over his shoulders like a cape.
"...Seriously?" she asked, blinking.
"You mock what you don't understand," Zane replied, dramatically flipping the robe. "This look is iconic. Peak urban ninja."
"More like peak delusional. What's with the cosplay?"
"My mask is malfunctioning, it cant even work as a go pro anymore, so i had to improvise. It's for public safety."
She smirked, but her eyes flicked to the visor. "You still fiddling with that thing? You've had it for, what, a month? It ever do more than flash 'ERROR'?"
"It records my shame in glorious 480p," Zane muttered. "And occasionally tells me I'm not Russian enough. I really wish I had some tech superpower."
At that, Artemis raised an eyebrow. "Russian?"
"Yeah. Took it off some psycho with a gun arm. You know — thick accent, lots of scars, zero personality. Went by... KGBeast."
Artemis's eyes widened.
She took a step back, as if seeing the visor for the first time. "Wait. That's KGBeast's visor?"
Zane paused, then slowly nodded. "Uh... yeah?"
She looked him up and down. "You've been wearing it in front of me this entire time."
"Fashion knows no fear."
"I thought it was some weird tech toy from a pawn shop!"
Zane shrugged. "To be fair, I found it in a dead guy's tech bag. So... close enough."
Artemis pinched the bridge of her nose. "You realize KGBeast was on the League's international watchlist? Like, do-not-engage-without-backup level. And you stole his visor?"
"Technically I looted his corpse. There's a difference."
"You're insane, what if some russians come after you?!" Artemis sounded genuinely concerned.
"I prefer resourceful, thank you. Besides, he was a lone wolf, lone wolves dont have people that care about them. '"
"You've got a death wish," She sighed exasperated.
Zane leaned forward, fake mustache twitching. "Nah, I'd win".
Artemis's lip twitched as she looked at her mentally impared friend.
"Besides — the visor looks good on me."
"It glows red and does nothing."
She sighed, rubbing her temple. "One day, this is going to explode in your face."
"Already did. Twice. I wear a jockstrap now. Just in case."
He looked back at the visor. Its red glow pulsed one more time — mocking him.
"...Still worth it."
Zane leaned down toward the visor again, fiddling with the wiring cluster snaking out the side like the world's angriest spaghetti.
"I swear, this thing's just one step away from becoming sentient and insulting me in Russian."
Artemis watched him warily from the edge of the rooftop. "Maybe it's waiting for you to say the magic word."
He gave her a look. "Please?"
ACCESS DENIED.
"Yeah, didn't think so," he grumbled.
Then General Crunch scurried up beside him, dropping the shiny thing he'd been carrying — a half-melted Cadmus biometric pad with just enough spark still left in it.
Zane blinked.
"…Crunch, you genius little freak."
He immediately jammed a wire from the pad into the visor's neural cable. There was a sizzle, a spark, and then—
BEEP.
A new display flickered to life inside the lens.
[OVERRIDE ENABLED: FALLBACK NEURAL SYNC MODE ENGAGED]
[WARNING: BIOSIGNATURE INCOMPATIBLE — INITIATING ADAPTIVE BINDING]
"What the hell does that mean?" Artemis asked, half drawing an arrow just in case.
"I think it's syncing to me. Sort of a handshake. Maybe a really aggressive handshake."
Zane twitched as the visor pulsed, he quickly took off his 'disguise ' while turning his back to Artemis, before puting on the vidor.
Instantly he felt it, his temple tensing with the sudden rush of warmth and static. Inside, data spiked across his vision — heat maps, movement pings, threat radars — it was all there, in pieces.
[KG-PROTOCOLS TRANSFERRED]
[USER ID: ZANE // PROXY MODE ACTIVE]
Zane blinked, and the world changed.
Lines tracked Artemis's movement as she shifted her weight. Her bow glowed faintly in thermal. The HUD snapped to high-resolution, filtering light and scanning depth.
Then a small holographic reticle hovered at the corner of his eye. Zane laughed.
"Holy crap. It's working."
Artemis raised both eyebrows. "Wait. Seriously?"
He turned toward her, and a targeting marker hovered on her chest.
"…Okay, maybe don't look directly at me with that thing on."
Zane turned his head away quickly. "Sorry! Still calibrating! You're not a threat unless you try to take my snacks."
She gave him a small smile. "So what does it do, exactly?"
Zane was already cycling through modes. "Thermal, night vision, targeting assistance, trajectory prediction—" He paused. "Wait. There's one called "Adaptive Reader? What the hell does that mean?"
"Nothing good," Artemis muttered.
He glanced at her, the red glow of the visor dimming slightly as it adapted to his body. "Looks like it needed a few weeks to accept a new host. KGBeast must've locked it tight — but without his life signs, the system defaulted to proxy."
"So you basically glitched your way into a Russian assassin's helmet."
Zane spread his arms proudly, bathrobe flapping. "Like a king."
"An idiot king," Artemis corrected. "But yeah… that's impressive."
He smirked under the visor. "Thanks. I think I'll call it Razorback Mode."
"Please don't name it."
"Too late. I already named it. It's canon now."
She laughed — a rare, quiet one — and stepped closer. "You're lucky that thing didn't melt your brain."
He tapped the side of the visor, which gave a pleasant chirp in response. "If I didn't have brain damage before, I probably do now."
"Pretty sure you always had brain damage."
They stood there for a moment, the city lights blinking beyond the rooftop. Wind tugged at Artemis's hood and flapped the hem of Zane's ridiculous bathrobe.
Then Artemis said, "You're not planning to sell that thing, are you?"
He tilted his head. "What, this priceless international death visor with custom Russian spyware? Nah. I'm gonna wear it to the grocery store."
"Of course you are."
She nudged him with her elbow.
"Still… good job, tech-wizard."
Zane flashed a grin under the mustache. "Wizard now? I like that. Zane the Grey."
"More like Zane the Slightly Burned."
He held a hand up to the sky. "One day I shall return… as Zane the White, in fashionably upgraded armor."
General Crunch screeched behind him. Zane pointed without looking. "Crunch gets it."
Papa Roach let out a sleepy grunt from the heating pipe behind the water tower.
Zane exhaled through his nose, visor humming softly now — synced, alive, and finally his.
"Okay," he said. "This thing will be a huge help."
Artemis muttered, "When do I get a upgrade."