Thursday, January 26, 2096
4:35 am
Near Busan, South Korea
Yesterday was Chinese New Years (year of the Fire Dragon). The crew of the Black Flea has been stuck inside of Jageda Industries overnight after the facility went into lockdown. What triggered the lockdown is unknown.
RP: I'm hungry. Does anyone have food?
WU: Sure, we had a whole tray of potstickers on the burner 10 hours ago. I'm sure they're still good, let me go down to the reception area and grab some.
RP: Grab the whole tray, will you?
WU: (whacking Red on the arm) Baka!
SM: (whacking Wu-chan on the arm) Don't hit Red!
S: (whacking Shoko on the arm) Only I can hit Warui!
RP: (whacking Syvil on the arm) Only I can hit Shoko! Wait, that didn't come out right.
WU: Let's go over this again. What happened?
S: After 15 minutes of trying to find the right room, we found the prototype shell. We had no problems getting in after disabling the locks and remotely putting the surveillance cams into loops.
SM: While you and Red were bored staring out the window, we were able to force load the malware package into the air-gapped system and access the data. We copied the entire local storage remotely into Meri's extra drive. Thanks, Meri.
Meri: Wuf!
S: We grabbed you bozos to leave and just before we could open the door, the alarms went off and every door was locked.
WU: And there were no sentinels roaming on the air-gapped system?
SM: If there were, it would have triggered while we were downloading, not 5 minutes later.
S: Did you guys see anything weird going on outside?
RP: No. I mean, at the time, no.
SM: What do you mean, “at the time?”
RP: About 10 minutes after the alarms went off and we were in lockdown, I saw an air ambulance fly towards the roof landing zone, and then after another 15 minutes I saw it fly away.
S: Wait, what? Why didn't you mention this earlier?
RP: Oh, well, no one asked.
Syvil, Shoko, and Wu-chan all whack Red on the arm.
RP: Ow, hey!
Syvil pulls up the news on her AR lens.
S: Aww hell.
SM: What?
S: The GEO of Jageda suffered a fatal cerebral aneurysm and his BrainCopy was corrupted. They suspect an assassination.
WU: Aww hell. I knew it was bad luck. Shoko and Red were born in the year of the Dog, which is incompatible with the year of the Dragon. We should have done this the day before the new lunar year!
S: Oh come on, you don't actually believe in that horoscope stuff, do you? If that's the case, why do you and I get along so well?
WU: It takes a lot of work.
S: (whacks Wu-chan on the arm) Urusai!
SM: You know, you two are sometimes hot and cold.
RP: Fire and ice.
SM: Oil and water.
RP: Shark and dolphin.
SM: Proton and electron.
S: Okay, okay we get it. Sheesh.
WU: So here's my plan. We're going to dismantle the dilapidated haunted house and rebuild from the ground up, after we have the site blessed. That should get rid of any obake, right?
RP: ...
SM: ...
S: Warui! We're stuck inside Jageda and you're thinking about the house in Shirakawa-go?
WU: Uh huh.
S: Are you crazy?
WU: What? All we need to do is get outside, right?
RP: You make it sound so simple, Cap.
SM: And how are we going to achieve that through a lockdown?
WU: Easy. We exit through the interstitial ceiling and use Meri's laser to cut a hole through the corrugated roof panel. According to the structural plans, it's not a composite deck, so there's no concrete to worry about. We'll have to cut a tiny hole first, to launch a microdrone to confirm if the roof is clear, but then it should be relatively quick to cut that hole for us to pass through. Once on top of the roof, Syvil will remotely pilot the Baby Black Flea in stealth mode. You'll have to use the VTOL to bring it in nearly vertically from about a kilometer above the facility, but you're really good at this. Just remember to keep the lights off and turn on the NC transmitters. We can't do anything about the gust from the VTOL but at least no one will see or hear the Baby Black Flea landing. Don't forget to turn off all of the microship's alarms, Syvil.
S, RP, SM: ...
WU: What?
S: Did you have this plan in your head the entire time and held back from sharing, or did you just think this up?
WU: I mean, I didn't have all the details in place until about two hours ago, but it was stewing in my head for the last eight hours. Why?
Syvil, Shoko, and Red all whack Wu-chan on the arm as Meri sneers at Wu-chan.
S: Warui! We could have been out of here two hours ago!
SM: (giving the stink eye to Wu-chan) You're treating us to Korean barbecue.
RP: Real meat, not the fake stuff.
Meri: Wuf!
WU: Guys, is that any way to treat your Dear Leader who came up with an impeccable escape plan?
S, SM, RP: YES!
Meri: WUF!
— The Warubozu Usagi