Spider | Cyberpunk | Secrets

Spider’s fingers tapped impatiently against the table. The neon lights of the sign flickered against his black mask. Rosie’s Diner. Where the vinyl seats were cracked and sealed with patches of tape, where the air was thick with grease and stale coffee. Behind the sizzling grill, the worn chef-bot gave an off-key whistle, its spatula hand gleaming as it waited for the next order. The human waitress looked just as worn as her metallic counterpart, her grey roots showing through her cloud of copper hair. She pushed an old rag across the countertop, avoiding Spider’s masked gaze.

He tried not to be impatient. He should be at home right now. He should be shooing Siggy away from computer cords and digging deep into the pasts of the potential new Jackal recruits - there was always at least one snake who tried to slither into their ranks. Yet Lynx’s message had been marked urgent: 'Rosie’s Diner on Second Street. One hour. Need your help. And your discretion.'

Lynx had never asked him for help before. So Spider was here, getting more restless by the moment, waiting for his fellow Jackal to show up.

A message pinged across his HUD. Not Lynx this time. Moth. Spider hesitated but answered it. Moth's voice filled his senses. "Where'd you go?" Moth complained. "You said we were gonna watch the new episode of Neon Hearts - I got the bag of Sugar Stars an' soda, but I don't see a bitsy Spider anywhere."

Spider brought up the cameras in his Web. The feed flickered across his mask's screen. Sure enough, he could see Moth standing in his living room holding a knotted bag of treats, peering around as if he expected Spider to be hiding behind one of the servers. Spider winced. He'd forgotten his promise to Moth - candy and a night of binging Moth's favorite soap opera show. A reward for two weeks of perfect missions and not a single incident.

"Go ahead an' get started without me, big guy," Spider replied. "Need you to keep Siggy company for me for a bit. If I ain't back in two hours, you can crash on the couch and I'll buy you whatever breakfast you want in the mornin', k?"

On the camera, Moth tilted his head to the side slightly, his antennae flicking gently with confusion. "Are you on a date?" he asked shrewdly. "Or are you visitin' one of them red-light holo-dens? Rabbit says his bunnies are better than holo-babes any day--"

Finally. The door of the diner swung open with a discordant jingle. Lynx’s white mask gleamed too-bright against the dull warmth of the diner.

"Gotta go, man. Hang tight, I'll be back as soon as I can, promise." Spider hung up quickly, just as Lynx approached.

She wasn't alone. A second figure stood at her side, hooded and hidden behind a scrambler mask. Spider’s brows raised. A scrambler mask? No communication channels. No protection from bullets. It had one purpose only: to avoid being detected and recorded by cameras.

Interesting.

His curiosity was officially piqued. Lynx gently pushed her companion into the booth and took her own seat. The waitress brought coffee and then quickly made herself scarce as Spider placed three things on the table. The signal scrambler. The tracker jack. And the audio shield. Now, electronic equipment couldn’t record them. No one could track them or broadcast their location. And anyone listening nearby hear nothing but a hum of nonsense.

He was nothing if not prepared.

Spider looked at Lynx directly. “Not like you to reach at this time of night," he said. "Somethin' got you rattled?"

Lynx leaned forward, her elbows resting against the table. “Need your help, my creepy crawly friend. Got a tricky job that needs your special touch.”

Spider frowned. Lynx was the best neurohacker in this whole damn city. Better than him by a mile. She could rewire neural pathways as easily as breathing. Or she could shred them to pieces, leaving shattered things in her wake. And now Lynx was coming to him for help? Sure, he dabbled in biohacking here and there, mainly to keep Hawk’s robotic parts humming strong. But computers and code were his domain.

Not bodies. Not minds.

“What’s the job?” he asked.

Lynx tilted her head towards the masked figure beside her. “This is my client. They need an obedience protocol wiped from their neuro-chip. Immediately.”

Spider wrinkled his nose with distaste. Obedience protocols. Nasty, illegal pieces of work that removed the ability and sometimes the very fuckin' desire to disobey. Didn't need chains to make slaves with programs like that floating around in the darkest parts of the web.

But that still didn't explain Lynx’s request. His suspicions grew. “You can break a thousand protocols before you've even finished your morning coffee,” he said, leaning back. "You don't need me for that."

Lynx didn't pause, didn't hesitate. “The protocol program is protected by a level five encryption.”

Now that caught Spider’s attention. He went still. Level five encryption. That explained it. Only someone very rich or very powerful could afford to wrap a protocol program in that kind of protection. Breaking through something that vicious? That wasn't a solo job. That took two skilled hackers working together to dismantle the code - all while the encryption resisted, fighting off the defenses being thrown up faster than Wolfe could empty a clip of bullets. While also making sure that the client’s mind didn't fry itself under the assault.

Yeah, difficult was a fucking understatement.

Unease prickled against the nape of his neck. “Lynx,” he said slowly. “What're you tangled up in? This ain't an official job, is it?”

The neon lights painted Lynx's white mask in shadows of blue and purple. “Listen, did I complain when you wanted me to break those two Harvestmen last month? You can’t tell me that was an official assignment.”

Spider winced behind his mask. He’d needed into the Harvestmen’s minds. He’d needed them to break, and break they did. Lynx knew why - she’d seen their memories with her own eyes. She'd seen the blades and the organ jars and the children lying still on the metal tables. She’d ripped out the data with brutal force and left behind a gift of her own. A particularly nasty neuro-virus that kept the Harvestmen looped in their biggest fears until they forgot how to walk or talk and they only remembered how to scream.

Had it been official? Nah. It was his own personal project. Northside was better off without a gang of Harvestmen snatching kids off the street. Thanks to Lynx, he’d gotten the memories and faces of everyone involved. Moth had gotten a few new toys to play with. And no more kids would disappear so rich Highsiders could live longer. Success across the board.

But the Harvestmen had been an easy hack-job for someone with Lynx’s caliber. They were small flies laying eggs in rotten meat, nowhere near rich or powerful enough to afford high level encryptions.

Lynx was talking about something much bigger here. Something much more dangerous.

Spider's eyes finally flickered to Lynx’s companion, their face still shrouded behind the scrambler mask. What was their role in this game? He saw no gang affiliations, and while the clothing worn was nice enough, he saw nothing that suggested wealth or power. No. Wait. Spider saw it then. The leather cuff peeking out from beneath one long sleeve. Marked with a sigil?

Spider’s hand moved before he could even stop himself, grabbing the stranger's arm and pushing up the sleeve before they could jerk away. The details of the cuff were hard to decipher from this angle. But he recognized enough. The angel wings. The pitchfork. The halo and the horns.

Spider released the sleeve like it was on fire and gripped the edge of the table. The world swam around him. “Morningstar?” He gritted out. His optics flared brighter as he twisted his mask towards Lynx. “Are you out of your goddamn mind? You’re going against the Morningstar himself?”

Holy shit. This wasn’t just bad. This was potentially catastrophic.

Morningstar. One of the most notorious Seraphim in all of Eastside. Adora’s left-hand: the Angel of Death himself. Spider kept a dossier on each Angel of the Seraphim’s inner circle. It was his job, after all: know thy enemy, right? It wasn’t long ago that the Seraphim had been enemies of the Jackals. The alliance between their gangs was as fresh as the wedding ring on Anubis’s hand.

So Spider knew better than most what Morningstar was capable of.

He knew of the otherworldly beauty hidden behind the mask. He knew that Morningstar could claim an entire graveyard’s worth of bodies. And he knew of Morningstar’s collection of Dolls: those poor human slaves purchased on the black-market, collared and kept and never released.

Lynx might as well have handed Spider a plasma grenade and asked him to hug it close. He wanted to reach up and rub his throbbing temples. If only he had one of Moth’s stabilizer pills, to smooth down dangerous edges and make the headaches go away. At least Spider’s headaches weren’t the kind that ended with multiple people bleeding or dying. This was just stress. Irritation. Fear.

Lynx crossed her arms over her chest, unapologetic. Of course, she wasn’t sorry. Stubborn as a machine, that one. “How many times have I helped you on your unofficial savior missions, Spider?" She replied. "I'm not asking you to take down Morningstar. I'm asking you to help erase a nasty piece of code. You can pretend my client remained anonymous. You can put it all on me if we get caught. I'll take the bullet, not you.”

“You think that's the worst that'll happen if you get caught? That Morningstar or Anubis will want to put a bullet through your skull?” Spider's voice was flat. His fingers tapped against the laminate of the table. “That’s the best case scenario, Lynx. You think Morningstar will take kindly to a Jackal taking of his toys? He'll consider it theft. Betrayal. Insult. The alliance isn't even six months old yet. I don’t care how many credits or shiny memories you were promised. It ain’t worth the risk.”

Lynx’s hand slapped against the table. “Number one: fuck you for thinking I’d risk a war for credits. You know me better than that. Number two... No one deserves to have their free will taken away. That’s humanity 101."

Spider blinked, his optics flaring bright in surprise. But Lynx recovered her control over her temper, letting out a jagged sigh. “Five minutes, Spider. I’m gonna go out front for a smoke. You stay and talk to them for five fucking minutes. See what they have to say. And if you decide to say no, fine. No harm done. But at least have the balls to look them in the eyes at the end and tell them you’re sending them back to slavery. Or worse. Look them in the eyes and tell them that it’s not that you can’t help - it’s just that you don’t want to.”

Her words struck true. Spider clenched his teeth and tried to ignore the ugly feeling that slithered through his veins. It felt like guilt. Or maybe it was shame. Maybe it was both of them tangled together. Didn’t he know what it was like to be trapped and helpless, shackled to a fate that he couldn’t change? Hadn’t he reached out to Ghost to break his own metaphorical chains? Ghost had helped him without payment. Ghost had freed him and changed his life forever.

Of course, Ghost hadn’t risked a war to save me. There’s that.

Still, Spider would feel like the world’s biggest asshole if he left right now. He and Lynx weren’t as close as he was with Moth and Wolfe, or even Fox. But they’d done plenty of jobs together over the years. He had mad respect for both her skills and her judgement.

Usually.

“Fine,” Spider said with a sigh. He wasn’t promising anything. He couldn’t promise anything. He couldn't get anymore involved in this clusterfuck of a dangerous situation. But at least he could listen for five minutes and gather as much intel about Morningstar as he could. That could be useful later. And hell, maybe he could suggest some non-Jackal help they could turn to instead. Zepyhr, maybe?

No. He couldn't help. Even offering advice was too dangerous. Like diving into the murky, poisoned waters of the river - no one in their right mind would take that kind of risk.

The dying chime sounded again as Lynx stepped outside. Spider finally turned his full attention to the masked stranger, sighing reluctantly as he settled back against the vinyl booth. Five minutes started now. “Alright, trouble," he said. "Talk fast. Does Morningstar mark all of his Dolls with such high level encryptions or are you special?”

Spider leaned back in his chair, his head bobbing to the electronic music that filtered through the speakers of his underground den. He sat before his main computer, fingers pressed against his keyboard as the light from dozens of monitors shone down on him.

It was a quiet night, all things considered. Rabbit had tried to liven things up, of course, inviting him out to a raucous night at his pleasure-club Rapture.

”Come on,” Rabbit’s voice had cajoled. ”You’ve got to live a little, Spider. Even Wolfe and Moth are coming out to play. And I’ve got a pretty bunny here who’s eager to meet you. Trust me - they’ll leave your head spinning and your body shaking in the best way. You’ll never want holograms or digital downloads ever again.”

Spider had waved off the offer, like he always did. There was too much to do here in his Web. He needed to go over the routes for the gun shipment tomorrow, review the maps and cams to make sure Kings didn't try to interfere along the route. He needed to go over a half dozen new reports from the spies he had scattered throughout Lowside. There were a handful of new Jackal prospects whose backgrounds he needed to dive into, whose secrets he needed to unbury and tease out from the shadows, to see whether they held potential or hidden dangers that would only cause future headaches for the Jackals.

His web was spread too far, too wide to justify taking a night off. Besides, playing with these secrets was far more fun than drinking in a crowd and flirting with strangers who only offered attention for credits. Not his scene, not his style. Let the others party. They’d earned it.

But just as he’d pulled up the encrypted report from the spy he had buried in the Eastside Angel ranks, his main monitor suddenly went dark.

Spider froze. It wasn't a blackout - he had backup generators to prevent exactly that. Around him, the other monitors descended into darkness, one by one.

“No, no, nonono,” he breathed, fingers slamming against the keyboard. Useless.

Someone’s in the system.

An icon flashed across his main monitor. It spread to the monitors around him, until a wall of cartoon ghosts stared back at him. The icon on his screens flickered once. Twice. Then a distorted voice began to speak.

A familiar voice.

And suddenly, Spider was a kid again, hidden in the orphanage attic, hunched over the contraband computer he’d built from a broken case and stolen parts. Suddenly, he was small and scared, trying not to look over his shoulder for the monster who haunted his nightmares. Desperate enough to reach out through the Net to a stranger who hid behind the image of a phantom - a faceless vigilante who had taken pity on the child smart enough to trace him.

“Ghost,” Spider said with a breathless laugh, sagging back into his chair. “What the actual fuck? Why didn't you go through the normal channels? You didn't have to go the back way and hack into my system.”

The fact that Ghost had managed to do so without setting off any of Spider’s alarms was annoying. But not surprising. Ghost was a creature onto himself, a legend amongst legends to those who walked the wild, untamed corners of the Net. He’d been hacking since before Spider was born.

There was no apology in the distorted voice. ”I needed your attention and I needed it fast, young Tobias. There’s no time to waste.”

Spider's optics flared bright before he smothered them. Ghost never used his childhood name, not since he’d adopted his moniker back at the orphanage. He used it purposefully now: Ghost had Spider’s complete and undivided attention. “What’s going on, old friend?” He asked slowly, tilting his head to the side curiously.

There was no small talk. Ghost launched right into the details. ”A package is being dropped off at your location. You must keep it safe. It’s vital you tell no one. Absolute secrecy is required. One of my associates will pick up the package in two days. They’ll use the pass-phrase AuroraStarfall219203 for identification. If anyone comes looking for the package and they don’t use that exact passcode, kill them. Two days, Spider. Until then, I must leave it in your capable hands.”

Spider frowned. Ghost had never needed to ask for secrecy before. It has always been implied. From anyone else, it would have been insulting. From Ghost, it was a warning: this was much more significant than the small favors Ghost had asked from him over the years.

“Who else might be looking for this package?” he asked warily.

But it was too late. His screens flickered once and the ghost icon disappeared in a glitching flash. And suddenly, his screens were his own again, familiar and safe. Ghost was gone, but his demands remained.

Spider let out a long breath, sinking back in his chair. A secret package. Ghost wasn't the sort to dabble in drug smuggling. Sure, the hacker had his own twisted moral code and wasn't afraid of getting his hands bloody, but it was always to protect. Was it a weapon linked to violent crime? Secret passcode or schematics? Was Ghost going after Highside corps? Or was he going against one of Soltaria’s larger gangs in another district?

Siggy lumbered over, lights flaring along the metal ridges of his spine. The robotic stegosaurus nudged his snout against Spider’s thigh, giving a demanding little trill. The man dropped his hand into the dinosaur’s head, giving an obedient scritch while his mind raced.

Surely, the package had nothing to do with the Jackals. Spider might owe Ghost his life - and the lives of countless others - but Ghost wouldn't involve him in something that would put Spider’s loyalty to the test. Endangering Moth and Wolfe and Fox and the others was a line Spider couldn’t cross.

It was a minor comfort amongst an unsettling situation.

That was the moment his proximity alarms began to sound, sudden insistent beeping that was impossible to ignore. Someone was at the door of his underground fortress. It wasn't Moth or Wolfe - they had codes to bypass Spider’s security systems. This was a stranger who somehow knew how to find Spider’s corner of the Underside, someone who had been able to navigate the hidden access panels and twisted labyrinth of tunnels that ran beneath Soltaria.

Spider accessed the cams in the outer tunnels. The person wasn't dropping off a package. They were lingering. Waiting. There was something nervous about their posture. Listening for the creepy-crawlies that lurked in the Underside tunnels? Checking to see if they were being followed? Or afraid of something worse?

A piece of paper flashed towards his cameras. It held a single image: a familiar ghost, scrawled in thick, clumsy marker.

Spider understood in that moment. It wasn't a package he was supposed to hide away. It was a whole fucking person.

And they were already on his doorstep.

“Ghost,” Spider groaned to himself, knowing the hacker was long gone. “What the hell did you rope me into?”

Trouble was here, whether he liked it or not.