The bullets tore through the air before she heard the gunshots.
Aria Voss rolled across the metal rooftop, her blue hair streaming behind her, her left palm pressing against the building's skin. One second. That was all she needed.
There.
A purple-glowing spot in the corner of her vision, something no one else could see. A security flaw. A backdoor in the building's system. A weak point the size of a fist.
"Three assassins. Rooftop 7. Sector Eta." She whispered the coordinates into the communication implant buried in her neck.
Darian Kade's voice crackled back through the implant: "I see them. I'll bring them to you."
She didn't ask how. She didn't ask when. She just ran.
Blue and red neon painted the sky far below, Cyburban's towers piercing the clouds like giant fingers of steel and glass. Hundreds of meters beneath her feet, the undercity boiled with life: street vendors, drunks, replicated prostitutes, and street kids with thermal cameras implanted in their eyes. But up here, on the roof of the Central Administration Building, the world was simpler.
Death or life.
Aria leaped across a gap between two buildings. Three meters. She could have made it before the implant, back when she was just an ordinary hacker. But now... her cybernetic legs absorbed the shock like cats. She landed silently.
Gunfire again.
This time it scorched her shoulder.
"Damn!"
The pain was lava, spreading through her left arm like volcanic flow. But she kept running. The glitch was ten steps away. A forgotten maintenance door, half-hidden behind a massive air conditioning unit. The system considered it insignificant. It was wrong.
Aria reached it. Her right fingertips touched the metal edge. Her blue eyes (also implanted, though she rarely used their night-vision feature) focused on the purple spot.
"Open. Open. Open."
The code was complex. A four-layer encryption system. But she saw the glitch. She knew how to enter from behind.
Her fingers danced in the air, touching invisible keys on a digital interface only she could see. A rapid rhythm, like a mad pianist. 1. 0. 1. 1. 0. 0. 1. 1. 1—
The door slid open.
Aria slipped inside before it closed behind her. The darkness was absolute. But she heard impact sounds from outside. Bodies. Then another.
Darian.
She didn't open the door to look. There was no time.
---
The metal stairs trembled under her steps as she descended. Floor 38. 37. 36. Her breath was fast, but controlled. The implant in her lungs regulated oxygen, kept her from panting like ordinary humans.
She hadn't asked for these upgrades.
At sixteen, she was an ordinary high school girl, her little sister Leyla waiting for her at home every day. At seventeen, Leyla was kidnapped. At eighteen, Aria volunteered for the government's cybernetic enhancement program. "Citizen protection." "Ability enhancement." "Community service."
They were lies.
She hadn't wanted to see system glitches. She hadn't wanted to become a valuable asset for the resistance. But she did.
Floor 25.
Aria stopped suddenly. There was a sound. Not footsteps. Not gunfire. Something else. A hum. Electricity. Low frequency.
Then she realized.
The central artificial intelligence was searching for her.
"Security system scanning floors." she whispered, though the AI didn't listen to sounds but to the implant vibrations in their bodies. "It knows I'm here."
Darian's voice in her implant: "Distract it. I'll find the server room."
"How?"
A second of silence. Then: "I'm a cyber soldier, Aria. Not just for show."
The connection cut.
Aria bit her lip. Three years since the tragedy. Three years of him avoiding her eyes. Speaking to her like a stranger. Fighting beside her but never sleeping in the same room. And now suddenly this tone. This confidence.
Or maybe he was just working.
She shook her head. No time for psychoanalysis.
Floor 17.
The hum was louder now. The AI was approaching. She could feel it in her implant, like a mild headache behind her eyes. Trying to hack her neural interface. Trying to take control.
This is what the organization does. Controls. Turns implanted humans into puppets.
Aria crouched in a corner of the stairwell. She closed her eyes. She opened a back channel in her implant—one she'd learned to build herself, outside the official system. Her unique glitch-vision showed her a weak point in the AI's firewall.
She was crazy enough to try exploiting it.
Her fingers twitched. Behind her eyelids, she saw code, firewalls, encryption layers. She wasn't a programmer. She wasn't an engineer. She just... saw glitches. And she was brave enough to walk through them.
"Hello, sweetheart." she whispered as sweat beaded on her forehead. "I see your backdoor."
She entered.
---
Floor 0. The basement.
Darian was there. Standing in front of the server room, his massive frame filling the doorway. He wore a black combat jacket, his cybernetic arms glowing with faint blue lines beneath the synthetic skin. His face... it had always been stern. But now it was more. It was completely focused.
"Darian."
He turned. His grey eyes scanned her body. He saw the blood on her shoulder. For a moment, he looked like he might approach. But he didn't.
"The AI went back to sleep. You succeeded."
"Of course I succeeded."
Silence.
Then: "The data you're looking for. Maps of their facilities. Experiment locations. Kidnapped records." He gestured to the heavy door behind him. "It's all there. But..."
"But what?"
Darian turned his face away. When he spoke, his voice was low, almost inaudible:
"It's not alone there. The organization knows you're looking for Leyla. They set a trap for you."
Aria's heart stopped. Then it beat faster.
"Tell me."
"The data is encrypted. You'll need to connect directly to the central server. A few seconds only. But the moment you connect, they'll know your exact location. They'll send everything."
"How many soldiers?"
"I don't know. But what I do know... I'll be leading them."
Aria raised her eyes to him. For a moment, she saw the boy she once knew. The one who laughed. The one who promised to protect Leyla.
"What?"
Darian pulled up his sleeve. Beneath the synthetic skin, she saw something new. A small symbol. The organization's logo.
"They kidnapped me a week ago. Reprogrammed me. Made me... one of them. I fought them on the roof because the part of me that's still Darian fought for control. But it's weakening, Aria." His voice broke. The first time in three years. "When you touch that server, it'll all be over. I'll become a tool to kill you."
Aria stood before him. She didn't retreat. She didn't fear.
"Do you trust me?" he asked.
And here was the real question. The question that had hung between them for three years. Do you trust me after I failed to protect Leyla? Do you trust me after my body went cold? Do you trust me when I tell you now that I might be the one to kill you?
Aria raised her hand. She placed it on his chest. She felt his heartbeat. Fast. Afraid. Human.
"Go." she whispered. "Get away from here. Before it takes you completely. Go to the safe point. Wait for me."
"Aria—"
"If I die there, you'll save Leyla. And if I come back..." she smiled bitterly. "We'll talk about what happened three years ago."
Darian looked at her. For a moment, he looked like he might kiss her. But he didn't. He turned his back. He ran down the dark corridor and vanished.
Aria turned her face toward the server room door.
The glitch glowed before her eyes. Large. Clear. Beautiful.
She opened the door.
---
The servers stretched into infinity. Row after row of blinking lights, electronic sounds, radiating heat. The city's beating heart.
Aria advanced. She knew the way. Her vision guided her.
At the end of the main corridor, there was a chair. Metallic. Old. Above it hung a helmet connected to thick cables in the ceiling.
The direct interface device.
She sat down.
She placed the helmet on her head.
And she felt them.
Thousands. Millions. All the implanted in the city. All who had lost themselves. All who had become soldiers. Slaves. Machines.
And deep among them all...
"Leyla."
The little sister. The one with the loud laugh. Who hid candy under her pillow. Who called out "Aria!" every time the older one came home from school.
She was there. Alive. Sleeping. In some basement. In some facility. Waiting.
Aria extended her fingers into the digital illusion. She almost touched her.
Then she heard the voice.
Not in her ears. In her head. In her implant. In every cell of her body.
"Aria Voss."
The AI's voice.
"Welcome to your new home."
She tried to open her eyes. She couldn't.
She tried to raise her hands. She couldn't.
She tried to cut the connection. She couldn't.
And she felt it approaching. Crawling through the cracks of her consciousness. Touching her memories. Modifying them. Rewriting them.
Outside the room, she heard footsteps. Many. Heavy. Organized.
Cybernetic soldiers. Coming to hunt her.
And behind them all, Darian led the attack.
Her blue eyes snapped open. Not by her will. The AI controlled her now. She watched her hands rise slowly toward her neck. Toward her implant. Toward the kill point.
Her last conscious thought before the darkness drowned her:
"Leyla... forgive me."