The cargo hold hums under the joined circuit of 2-6 and Jax. Amber threads flicker between their hands, and the drop-point map blooms brighter inside the stream. Across the deck, Kest braces by a crate stack, watching the ship’s registry numbers stutter.
Jax
It is live. If we push now, the whole route line lights up.
Kest
Do it wrong, and you burn both of you out. Stand down, 2-6. Hand over the link.
2-6
The map is already keyed to the corporate hub.
The red pulse in 2-6’s wrist rig steadies, then syncs with Jax’s chest light. The ship’s cargo lights dim as if the hold is holding its breath. Amber code pours through the shared link, waiting on one final command.
Jax
We can expose them, or let them keep breeding ghosts in clinics and cargo holds. Your call.
Kest shifts half a step forward, one hand hovering near his rig, the other empty. The registry seal on the terminal flashes amber, then white, as if it knows 2-6 is the missing piece.
“"We need to go deeper and know more. We make the drop as directed"”
SUCCESS (Superb Hacking, rolled -1)
2-6 sends the amber packet deeper into the network. The route map flashes once, then vanishes into the cargo hold’s registry stream.
The ship answers with a clean, flat tone. Not alarm, not refusal, just acknowledgment, as if the system has accepted a delivery it was waiting for.
Jax
There. It is out. The drop point has the full chain.
Across the deck, Kest’s wrist rig spits a burst of red static. His triumphant posture collapses into a hard stare at the terminal seal.
The Courier
That route goes straight to the harvesting office. The records are live now.
Kest
You just lit the whole line. Every receipt, every subject, every transfer.
Amber numbers cascade through the hold display, pinning the clinic, the logistics office, and the cargo chain together in one visible route.
Quest Complete
Expose who is harvesting them as test subjects
Attribute Upgrade: Willpower Good→Great
Amber code washed the cargo hold in a steady pulse, the route map burning bright between their rigs.
Kest
You just lit up the whole chain. Gods, what did you do?
2-6
What had to be done.
Jax
It sent. That is enough for me.
Kest's rig spat static and died in his hand. From the shadows, The Courier stepped into the spill of light and stared at the stolen map like it had finally learned to bleed.
The network carried the truth out into the city, and the harvest line lost its cover. 2-6 and Jax stood linked in the afterglow, changed by the sync and no longer easy to own. In the hold, only silence remained where compliance used to live.