It was about two AM when we finally left Rocky Ridge, heading to our first Wraith target. Our defensive perimeter was fully staffed with fifty-six fully armed shades manning the hard points and walking around behind the Hesco barriers. I was confident that even as I took all of our team out into the field, our home was now finally adequately defended. Looking back as we drove away, the town now cut an impressive visage, looking like a heavily defended military base than a simple town.
During our planning sessions, after some discussion, we decided our first target would be the built in the broken and abandoned cement factory. The Wraiths had set up shop there a few years ago and had been running some of their business through it, including using it as a staging point for their work in Night City. It was not their primary stronghold, but it was their most well-known. I vaguely remembered it from the game, though I don't think I quite ever made it to that mission, so I must have watched a video about it or something. Still, it was a well-known location, so Dakota was able to provide us with images, which made planning for the raid easy.
Our first task was finding the perfect position for Kaytlyn, so she could do the most damage with her sniper rifle. In all likelihood, Riggs, Jackie, and I could have bulldozed through the base ourselves, but not taking advantage of apparent opportunities when you had them was an excellent way to get yourself killed. This opportunity existed because the abandoned factory was set down in a terminating gulch, with rocky cliffs all around it, which was basically a sniper's dream. Kaytlyn had laughed when she saw the pictures, promising it would be like shooting fish in a barrel.
Our second task was getting the rest of the team around the back of the factory. While Kaytlyn would be in front, we would attack from the back, pinching them between a high-powered sniper hard place and three heavily armed rocks.
As we approached our destination, we stopped far from it. Jackie and I hopped out of one car while Riggs and Kaytlyn stepped out of another. A third car, the Emperor, was filled with five MRVNs. Once we cleared the place, they would help us grab anything worthwhile, as well as enacting our psychological attack and driving any extra vehicles home.
Slowly but surely, we silently walked closer to the factory, stopping at the final turn before it became visible. Kaytlyn gave us a mocking salute and a nod to Riggs before activating the cloaking tech I had gifted her, her backpack turning on as she vanished from view. Out of all of us, she was the most vulnerable since she would have to wait in position for us. Letting her use the cloaking tech, especially since no one would get close enough for her to really identify it, was the best way to keep her safe. We could see her footprints in the sand as she walked away, her cat Nova following behind.
We counted down for a few minutes before using our jump jets to quickly jump on top of the nearest cliff. From there, we stayed low, making our way around the gulch until we arrived at the back. Technically, it wasn't exactly the back, but it was enough to keep the Wraiths between Kaytlyn and us. Once we were in position, we settled in to wait for Kayts signal, keeping low on the rocky high point overlooking the factory. From there, we could see the, including the processing plants behind and next to the warehouse. Honestly, to me, the plant looked more like a quarry than a factory, but what did I know?
Finally, after waiting for several minutes, over the factory itself, we see a blinking light before four drones fly up into the air, easily getting lost in the darkness. They were the drones that fit into, and once they were in good positions, they would feed tactical information back to the cat, who would interpret it into a 3D layout for Kaytlyn.
The three of us stood, all of us leaning forward, preparing for the final all-set signal. When we received it, in the form of a simple radio click, we were off like greyhounds after a rabbit. Together, all three of us dropped down to the platform below us, running full tilt towards the main warehouse. Most of the facility was surrounded by a barbed wire-topped fence that sat on top of a concrete wall. Thankfully, with our own jumping abilities and the jump kits, each of us could easily clear it, especially when we ran, one after the other, up a large pile of gravel, vaulting up off of it like a ramp. Our jump kits kicked in, and one after another, we dove through a decent-sized window on the side of the factory.
The sound of smashing glass echoed through the area as Riggs entered the window first, but that was quickly drowned out as Kaytlyn opened fire, no doubt taking out her first target in the
As we passed through the window, we landed on a walkway on the far side of the building. Each of us quickly rolled to the side to make room for the person after us, save for Jackie, the last one in. By the time he recovered enough to pull out his pistols and sight in his first target, Riggs and I were already laying down fire across the broken down, overgrown interior.
Rigg started by slamming a kick into an unsuspecting Wraith barely a few seconds after he dove in. I had only just arrived in time to see the man slam into a crate behind him hard enough to visibly break his spine. He didn't suffer for long, though, as Riggs immediately double-tapped him as he drew his first pistol. After watching Riggs, I turned around, hosing down a Wraith coming at me with one of those weird. Before he even dropped, another Wraith turned and opened fire with a small submachine gun. I tanked three rounds before I could drown him out with my much higher rate of fire and larger caliber weapon.
Once we were all inside, we quickly moved forward. Riggs leaped over the side of the walkway, dropping down with a burst from his jump kit, landing easily on the ground. There was a fair bit of mess and, but Riggs landed safely beside a train car full of trash and vines.
While Riggs jumped, I walked left, and Jackie walked right, both of us moving down the catwalks on either side. I saw a pair of Wraiths pop out of the door on Jackie's side, only for him to blur and continue on, leaving his ax buried in one of their skulls and the other with a crumpled face. As I scanned back, I raised my weapon and fired down the catwalk, taking down a man armed with a pistol as he stepped out of a control room at the far end of the warehouse.
Before the first man could even hit the ground, a second man stepped out, this one significantly more chromed up than the first, armed with a machete. I fired the rest of my magazine, my gun clicking empty as the wounded man continued to charge me. I dropped my submachine gun and pulled out my pistol, firing as quickly as I could line up my shots. The first one hit his shoulder, and then the second skipped off his cyberware arm. The third and fourth hit his chest, but he must have had subdermals because they barely even slowed him down. He swung his machete at my hand, probably looking to take it off, only for my layers of armor to block it easily. It was hard enough to knock my pistol from my hands, however, and open me up to a follow-up punch to my face.
Again, my armor stopped there from being any damage, the man's chrome knuckles sparking off my helmet. I stepped back from the blow, lessening it somewhat, before reaching behind my back. I quickly pulled out my unlit fusion, getting them ready with a flick of my wrists. Before the Wraith could prepare, I lunged forward to slam them both through the man's reinforced stomach and chest. He stumbled back, reaching for both weapons.
Before he could manage to grab them, most of his torso exploded into chunks, spraying along the wall.
I looked down and spotted an inch or so-wide hole in the catwalk's guardrail systems. I took a peak over to find Riggs there, holding his mag cannon. He gave me a two-finger salute before turning around and firing his large weapon again, this time eviscerating a woman with a pair of.
"I had him!" I shouted, picking up my submachine gun and sliding my pistol back into my holster. "Better not have broken my daggers…"
Despite wanting to see if my fusion daggers were intact, we were still in a combat area, so I ignored them for now and charged down the rest of the catwalk, kicking the door open and starting to step inside. I just happened to catch a shadow from the corner of my eye, and my body reacted without thinking, throwing myself backward as a Wraith tried to cut my head off with a. The swing missed me completely, but due to my undersuit and enhanced strength, my back slammed into the wall behind me hard enough to dent it. I cursed loudly but raised my weapon and fired into the wall beside the door.
The control room was clearly designed as a place for higher-ups to hide away from the dangerous dust and equipment, somewhere they could watch their subordinates toil away in the Badlands heat in pleasant, climate-controlled conditions. It was not designed to protect them from anything more than some dust. What that meant for the Wraith who had swung at me was that they were hiding behind the equivalent of tinfoil and cardboard, meaning the entire clip I dumped into the wall they were hiding behind made it through the wall and into them. They collapsed in a bloody mess on the other side of the wall, chewed to pieces by my bullet.
After a moment to reload my weapons, I stepped in again, this time checking both sides before finally clearing the room completely. Even as I did, Jackie stepped in the opposite side, weapon at the ready.
"All clear?" He asked, looking around for himself even as he did.
"Unless they somehow fit in that locked, yeah, all set."
He nodded, and we both made our way out of the control room, passing through the door he had entered through. As we left, he put two rounds into the locker, just in case.
Once the control room was clear, we rushed to check the rest of the building, specifically heading through the set of doors that two Wraiths had come through, which Jackie had killed with a burst from his sandy.
While Riggs was securing the first floor, Jackie and I pushed down a hallway, a bridge over the grounds. As we did, I peeked out the window, smirking slightly when I spotted several bodies that Kaytlyn had already taken down. She had been firing the entire time we had been clearing out the warehouse, and now she was silent, probably scanning for more targets.
There was a door into an empty room along the hallway, but past that, it terminated into a small, single-car garage. A Wraith-colored Coyote was sitting on a car lift with most of its wheels removed. As we made our way down, a mechanic covered in grease and wearing a crappy pair of overalls stepped out from under the car, brandishing a pistol. Both Jackie and I shot him before he could even finish drawing a bead on either of us.
We cleared the rest of the room before I finally took out my radio.
"Kaytlyn, Riggs, we cleared the garage, and more we missed?" I asked, releasing the radio to wait for a response.
"My drones are picking up a pair of-"
The sound of Riggs' mag cannon echoed through the gulch twice, cutting Kaytlyn off. After a moment, Kaytlyn spoke up again.
"Scratch that. My drones are now reading an all clear."
"Great. Signal the MRVNs to come in. Everyone, keep your eyes open for anything valuable."
Over the next twenty minutes, Kaytlyn, Jackie, Riggs, and I looked over for anything worth taking back home. In all honesty, that category boiled down pretty quickly to grabbing anything made of valuable materials or rolls of eddies hanging around. We also drove all the vehicles, with some help from my keyphone hacking program, out past the walls.
Meanwhile, the MRVNs dragged the Wraith corpses to the very, only a dozen or so feet from the main entrance. There, they scanned the body and tore out the cybernetics with their bare, metallic hands before stuffing the remains in sealed bags. When the bloody corpses were properly wrapped up, the robots basically throwing them into the Emperor.
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.
Between Kaytlyn and the interior team, we killed twenty-five Wraiths in total, each of them having several different implants and cyberware. By the time the MRVNs filled the Emperor and we started stuffing the corpses into the extra cars, we had a good knee-high pile of limbs and internals. By the time the MRVNs were done, it was up to Kaytlyn's thigh, a bloody pile of motors, wires, and the clumps of human flesh that clung to them.
The very last thing that we did, before piling into our cars and leaving the factory behind, was use an artificial liver to paint "The Ridge Stands" over the large blocky "WRAITHS" That was painted over the warehouse's main entrance.
"Should we be drawing attention to ourselves like that?" Jackie asked as we watched a MRVN, standing on a crouched MRVNs back, paint out the words. "Can we take the heat?"
"Well, I'm much more confident in our defenses than I was before," I responded, my arms crossed. "With as much firepower as we have laid out around the perimeter… I don't want to jinx us, so let's just say the Local Wraiths only have so many resources to play around with. You'll probably sleep through the next time someone attacks."
"Probably," Jackie admitted with a shrug, continuing when I gave him a look. "What? I really am a heavy sleeper, Genio."
When the MRVNs finished up, we left the factory behind, heading directly home. While most of us just wanted to sleep, I stayed up a bit longer to make sure the MRVNs could handle getting rid of the bodies. Samwise had whipped up an Elerium-powered plasma furnace, so all they had to do was dump a few bodies in, flip on a switch, and wait a few seconds. Then it was just rinse, literally, as the ashes needed to be cleaned out, and repeat.
Duke, who I had left behind because we weren't sure if our companions would be of any use in such a quick mission, met me as I made my way back to my trailer. He followed behind me diligently, even as I took off my armor and laid back in bed. It didn't take long for me to fall asleep, finally feeling a bit more relaxed about the attack, feeling a bit safer and more in control. I should maybe feel a bit bad that killing nearly thirty people was making going to sleep easier for me, but I couldn't bring myself to care.
The next morning, I woke up and looked up at my ceiling. Today was finally the day, my new tech tree was finally on its way. I could feel the mental timer clicking down, and I resisted the urge to roll over and go back to sleep until the numbers were even lower. I was excited to get my new tree, but just as the low countdown meant I was closer to getting something new to play with, it also meant I was down to the wire to prepare for it.
I rolled out of bed and made my way to the workshop, where Samwise was waiting, tablet in hand.
"This going to be an every morning thing?" I asked, spotting a plate of food cubes, mostly fruit with some chunks of protein, on my table. "I appreciate all the effort, Samwise."
"You're welcome. To be honest, Jackson, I most likely should have already been preparing briefings for you in the morning," He admitted. "I am your assistant, after all."
"Well, it's a good idea. I'm glad we are doing it now," I said, chewing on a chunk of peach with the texture of a potato. "S,o how was the night?"
For about half an hour, Samwise updated me on what had happened while I was asleep. The MRVNs had finished disposing of all of the bodies, burying the ashes in a hole dug far outside the town. Production-wise, they finished the shade replacement program. The remaining functioning specters were stored away. They could be scrapped, should the need arise, but until it did, there was no reason to throw away working robots.
The next run of MRVNs was also done. At the moment, most of them were helping move and tear down the trailers in the soon-to-be guest section of the town. So far, seven trailers had been moved, with five more in good enough condition to be worth moving as well. Eight of the trailers were intact enough that they could be used as storage but weren't suitable for people to live in for one reason or another. Once he explained that, I radioed Noah that he had the go-ahead to drag the storage-ready trailers to a different side of the area for later potential use.
Samwise also explained that the scrap yard was in overdrive, preparing resources and scraping material to build a buffer. They even created a surplus of the liquid used in the molly makers so that we could run at a higher speed for some time. Eventually, we would drain the surplus, but it would boost our production speed by something like twenty-five percent until we did.
The last thing we discussed was that we were due for another meeting with Sable. It wasn't urgent quite yet, assuming we trusted her with some extra time to herself, but she had mentioned that soon she would eventually want more items to patent and sell, though she had claimed that would take multiple weeks, and it had only been one since she last visited.
"It would be nice to check in with her, but it's not important," I eventually concluded. "Maybe another week and we can have her stop by, assuming she doesn't show up unannounced."
Samwise nodded in agreement, marking something on his tablet. After that, he went over the process of turning the second floor of the Shack into a biology-focused lab for Frank to work in. Apparently, now that we had slowed down on the frantic build-up of shades and our defenses, actual progress was being made.
"We have reinforced the already repaired flooring and stripped down the personal booths," Samwise explained. "Two of the spaces were turned into a sealed rooms, one a freezer and the other simply a sterile, sealed storage room. The third one has been cut down to make more room. Of course, most of the lab space will be created as we cover up the balcony that looks down at the first floor. Once that is filled, with accompanying supports on the first, we can begin to fill it with lab equipment. That process is on hold until your next tree is revealed."
"No, don't put it on hold. Just schedule it to end before midnight," I said. "I assume this won't take any rare resources?"
"Just standard materials. Steel, plastic, aluminum."
"Then keep building parts and getting it ready, assuming the scrap team can keep up. The sooner the Bio lab is working, the sooner Frank can start doing serious work on the fake borg brains and fixing the textures for the food cubes," I requested. "Actually, it's doubly important because there might be a biological component to the next tech tree. We missed out on that in the Titanfall tree because I was focused on other stuff, but depending on what we get, it could be a big thing going forward."
"Very well, I will get someone on it," Samwise said with a nod. "Is there anything else, Jackson?"
"No, I think I am good for now. Thanks for the report, Sam."
My AI assistant nodded and put away his tablet before heading off to get the Bio-Lab started. It wasn't long before he returned with a cadre of MRVNs, the production addition quickly becoming busy as they got to work.
While they did, I called up Chuck and put in another order for some of the rarer elements we were struggling to get through the scrap yards. He wouldn't deliver by halfway through the week or longer, but that was the idea. We had plenty of stuff for now, but who knew what we would be running low on by the end of the week.
I also cut out a good-sized chunk of eddies for Frank. While I had a lot of Titanfall medical tech crammed into his room, most of it was more colony-specific, multipurpose doctor equipment. It was all potent and significantly past what the rest of the world had, but it wasn't exactly what he needed. Thankfully, he could buy a lot of it through Robin, the second acquisition specialist the Dakota lent us.
If this tech tree ended up having a large biological aspect to it, I would convert the first floor into a temporary Bio lab until we could finish the second floor.
By the time we were done with the morning review and I had finished talking to Frank about his new budget, as well as the plans for the Bio-lab, I got to work preparing for my new tech tree. First, I cleaned and reorganized my workshop. I had learned a bit about efficient workspace design since I first set the place up, and some tweaking would hopefully make the construction process more efficient. At this point, with the production addition at my beck and call, focused on what I was working on, I could produce things at an astonishing rate.
What had once taken three or four hours for the molly makers to print and complete could now be done in a quarter, or even a fifth of the time. I had dozens of small molly makers just waiting to print out individual parts for me to assemble. Unless this next tech tree required a level of precision that the molly makers weren't capable of, or the scale was too big for my production to get a grip on, I was primed to really get the most out of whatever came next.
When I was done setting up everything, I made one more trip around the town, inspecting the defenses, taking a look at everything, and talking to everyone. The AIs were preparing as well as they could as well, fully aware that I would likely be working hard for the next few days, getting a grip on the new tech tree. Jackie was spending time in the city, but considering he promised to come by tomorrow morning to check in, he knew something was up as well. Kaytlyn had clearly picked up on the fact that something was going on, connecting it to my previous mention of "Inspiration" pretty easily.
"So it's happening soon, then?" She asked, watching as MRVN units scrapped most of car wreck, moving faster than usual. "I didn't realize it was going to work like this, like everyone is waiting for a countdown."
"Midnight tonight," I explained. "Unless it's a complete dud, I'll likely be pretty busy for at least a week, probably two."
"Strangest things I've seen," She said. "It wasn't like this last time, was it?"
"Well, we were still hiding it from you," I pointed out with a wince. "And this one… with the production addition, the finished defenses, and everything else…it feels different."
"A tipping point?"
"Maybe. It's certainly going to be interesting," I said, rubbing my hands together.
We chatted for a bit longer before I headed back to my trailer. It was three o'clock in the afternoon, and even if I wasn't tired, I wanted to spend the rest of the day sleeping so that I would have as much energy as possible at midnight. Thankfully, the Auto-Pharma had three saved sleep aids that would put me right out, and Frank was nice enough to leave it by my bed.
I woke up ten minutes before midnight, almost jumping out of bed. I got dressed and walked quickly to the garage, where Samwise, Noah, Frank, and Riggs were already waiting.
"How's everyone doing?" I asked, chewing my lip as I paced around the garage, eyes flicking up to the clock Samwise had installed on the wall at some point. "Ready to rock?"
"I believe we are ready," Samwise responded. "Half of our MRVNs are paused and waiting in the production facility, and all production is stopped. We are ready to receive your designs."
"Good, good…" I said, looking internally, shaking off the encroaching nervousness. "Two minutes left."
I climbed into my chair, spinning around before leaning back and closing my eyes. Just as it had before, as the countdown shrunk, the connection pulled back, and after a few seconds, the new one connected.
A rush of information flowed through my mind, flashes of tech almost overwhelming me. I saw robots, clunky and crude-looking, yet somehow effective in ways that were hard to imagine. Scientific developments that had no right to be built from vacuum tubes and tape decks. I saw a world where SCIENCE! had long since triumphed over common sense, creating a world that had lasers, AI, miracle drugs, demented chems, plasma cannons, conscious brains in jars, robots, and fucking teleportation and fusion generators, despite the fact that they didn't develop transistors or integrated circuits until 2023.
"Well… I guess that's about as good as I could hope for," I said. "Kinda poetic justice to get this after the Wraithss attacked us, and then we basically declared war on them."
"Why is that?" Samwise asked.
"."
For a moment, I sat in my chair, a smirk on my face, just a bit giddy, and I managed to get the quote in at literally the perfect time when Samwise spoke up.
"I suspect that was some sort of reference, Jackson." Samwise guessed. "Unfortunately, I do not believe any of us are familiar with the media in which you are referencing."
"Sounds like a bit of a stretch anyway," Riggs added with a shrug. "We aren't really at war with the Wraiths."
I glared at both of them, shaking my head.
"Really? You have to rain on my parade?" I asked, looking at both of them. "You guys are jerks."
