Chapter 7 — Cat and Mouse Game
"It's done."
Sasha stepped out of the bathtub full of ice water, steam rising from her breath.
Maine, seated in the room, stared upward at a 45-degree angle — expression unreadable, but pressure filling the room.
Pilar was missing, probably buried somewhere in his workshop, tinkering with chrome junk again.
Dorio draped a coat over Sasha's shoulders. Everyone waited in silence.
Diving into cyberspace was the fastest way to chase clues — but also the quickest way to die.
Hackers helped their crews in real-time, but if a corporate netrunner caught you off guard, they'd fry your brain without hesitation.
Rebecca lay stretched out on the smooth windowsill, arms behind her head, eyes closed, trying to relax — but her jaw was tight with irritation.
"That idiot Ghost Hound really called my name… Rox, right?" Rebecca scoffed. "Gutsy bastard. Even has a hacker covering his tracks."
Sasha laughed and squinted — her cheeks decorated with cat-whisker chrome that made her look like a lazy kitten.
"The name matches. Rox. Weird guy — his data is always shielded. Someone's defending him from the net."
Rebecca shot upright and leaned so close to Sasha their noses nearly touched.
"You sure you're not confusing him with someone else? Who the hell knows a Rox from Dogtown?"
Maine grabbed Rebecca by the back of her jacket like she weighed nothing and placed her onto the bed like a stuffed doll.
Rebecca folded her arms and buried her face into the collar of her oversized coat, sulking.
Sasha continued:
"Ghost Hound doesn't have any logs about him doing recon. But another weird detail — this Rox got kicked out."
"Normally Hansen wipes out the whole squad afterward — gamblers, drinkers, even their drinking buddies. Full cleanup."
"And yet this Rox is alive."
A silent heaviness crept across the room.
Maine finally spoke.
"Is Dogtown easy to get into?"
Nobody answered — because the answer was obvious.
Dorio exhaled. "We'll need a fixer. There's a route through the outer wall, but it'll take time."
Rebecca punched her fist into her palm. "Screw waiting. We fix this ourselves."
Sasha shrugged. "I'm fine with that. Ready whenever."
They didn't know what Hansen was thinking.
They didn't care.
But one fact was certain:
Rox being alive was a problem.
---
Meanwhile —
Five hundred eurodollars.
That was how much Rox paid for fifty rounds of sniper ammo.
Every bullet hurt more than getting shot.
The only consolation was the sniper rifle wrapped in a case on his back — Nekomata, Tsunami Arms.
Rox checked his stat panel:
> Name: Rox
Body: 9
Reflex: 6
Technical Ability: 2
Intelligence: 4
Cool (Composure): 5
+1 Body? From where?
Not Hansen.
Then he remembered — the bloodied gloves from Seno, still in the washing machine.
No time to dwell on nostalgia.
Rox walked the long road from Dogtown checkpoint up the mountain ridge, dodging drunk Animals gang members and watching a bare-knuckle brawl break out in the street.
He tried calling the hacker Hanz mentioned — still no answer.
Finally, Rox reached the meeting place — an abandoned motel.
Beep—
A distorted doorbell tone.
A security camera scanned him instantly, tightening into a red beam.
"Hello?" a hoarse voice asked.
"Hanz sent me."
The door opened.
Inside, the hallway was stacked with trash and overturned tables. Turret mounts hidden in corners locked directly onto Rox the second he crossed the threshold.
The voice echoed from hidden speakers:
"Third door left. Turn right. There's an underground hatch. Go down. Close it behind you."
Not welcoming.
Not friendly.
But cautious — exactly what Rox expected.
The tunnel below was lit only by emergency lights — a sickly green glow that made everything look like hell. Heat rose off the machines like a furnace.
When Rox crawled out of the pipe, he found himself standing on a maze of reinforced cables and industrial cooling vents.
Dozens of servers surrounded a reclining netrunner chair, where a skinny, grey-eyed man lay plugged into cyberspace.
So this was Hamster, Hanz's hacker contact.
Rox couldn't help but whisper to himself:
"If I ever get a netrunner OS, maybe someday I'll deep-dive into cyberspace too…"
Hamster's voice drifted through the room without him even opening his eyes:
"Did Hanz tell you what you're supposed to do?"
Rox lifted the sniper case. "I'm supposed to stop the Edgerunners when they come."
Hamster burst into laughter — uncontrollable, hysterical laughter.
"Ohhh, that's cute. You make it sound so easy. Like you're just grabbing drinks at Clouds."
Rox didn't answer. Intelligence score 4 or not — he knew sarcasm when he heard it.
"What am I supposed to do," Rox asked dryly, "tell the Edgerunners to put their guns away, make peace, and go grab a synthetic meat lunch special?"
He said it just to provoke him — and it worked.
Hamster laughed even harder.
"All right, hotshot. Listen up. I'll negotiate with their hacker. Hanz cares about this. I'll upload false data. But if their strike team goes for your throat—"
Hamster pointed a finger without looking.
"Your job is to stay alive until the Ghost Hounds hear the noise and show up."
Rox blinked.
"Me? Alone?"
Hamster didn't even try to soften it.
"What else? This is a cat-and-mouse game.
You're the mouse. Try not to let the cat catch you — for a little while."
He continued:
"Hanz will contact the ripperdoc at the Stadium. You'll get a small face adjustment afterward."
"More people in the middle just means more risk."
"You get your surgery. I get my payment. Then we pretend we never met."