Corpo Age

Chapter 229: Conflict by Choice

Chapter 229: Conflict by Choice

We decided we would wage war against Aurora Corporation if they proved responsible for the experiments that got Thorne and Claire’s family captured. To start, we would dedicate some of our resources to investigating the enemy.

Just because we had decided to take action didn’t mean we would immediately stroll up to their front door and start shooting. We didn’t even know where their headquarters were, or who specifically was responsible for the experiments.

“Revenge is revenge, but we won’t be blindly carrying it out,” I stated.

“I understand,” Thorne replied. “I don’t mind thoroughly investigating first. I only want to pay back those who are responsible, not the random employees. My mother wouldn’t approve otherwise.”

“You guys are making it more difficult than it has to be,” Claire chimed in. “Just target all their executives like you’ve done before. If you ask me, they’re all guilty.”

I shook my head, despite knowing Claire was unable to see me through this call. The entire conversation was taking place internally within our SAIDs.

“We can’t always go with the hammer. Precision strikes are something much more productive. If someone in Aurora Corporation is responsible, then their entire company may share that responsibility, but to punish them doesn’t mean indiscriminately attacking them all. We’ll want to repeat what we did with Astro Forge, making them sign agreements beneficial to us.”

After discussing how we should approach this incident, our call was ended. Thorne and I resumed our identities as Shake and Echo, who had just returned to Soluna, ready to finish our job.

The docking procedures were long done during our discussion, so we disembarked right away, bringing along our passengers. There were almost a hundred people cramped into our cargo bay. Thirty-eight of them were corpos we saved, so they required no restraints. The fifty-seven pirates were the only problem, but all of them were bound. We just needed transportation.

It would be too much of a fanfare to bring all of them along, so I opted to just bring two captured pirates with me, leaving the rest on the ship. As for the freed corpos, I would just give them enough credits and they could take the transit themselves. They knew I was bringing them to their employers, so none dared to run off.

After hailing a car, we soon made it to the rendezvous point our QG provided. It was in a remote area of town, where several warehouses were. As expected, someone was there, ready to receive us.

I walked up to a woman who resembled the waitress at the bar, who was our main contact with the enigmatic QG. We found her sitting casually on a sofa inside a spacious commercial storage unit.

I greeted her by throwing the two prisoners I had brought along with me.

“The job is complete. I’ve got another fifty-five of these guys on my ship. Do you want me to bring them here as well?”

“No need. We’ll send someone to your ship to take them off your hands.”

“What about the captives we rescued? They should be showing up here shortly. Do our employers still want them hand-delivered to their doorsteps?”

“Only for the ones who belong to Aurora Corporation. I’ll send you the location they provided. It’s just one of their branch offices. The others can disperse as they see fit.”

A good half of the captives were from Aurora Corporation. I quickly sent them each an update. They all had their corporate cybernetics with them, so they had their SAIDs to receive my message.

After sending them their new instructions, we took the opportunity to tag along. It was a good chance to learn more about this company. I doubted anyone important would be there to receive some low-level workers, but having a legitimate reason to visit their facility was too good to pass on.

Having the advantage of a car, we arrived at the scene first.

After learning of their name, we did some preliminary research about the company. We learned that they were a B-Class corporation that specialized in terminals. However, they had even expanded into the SAID business in recent years, after not being satisfied with just being hardware suppliers to the cybernetics market.

I deduced that this expansion was what prompted them to enlist the help of various research companies to carry out their human experiments.

We strode into their branch office, a fifteen-story building located within downtown Soluna.

“Welcome. How may we help you?” the green-haired receptionist greeted.

“We’re here about the return of the captured employees.”

“Right, I’ve been notified about that matter. I’ll get someone from human resources out here.”

The receptionist was eerily emotionless, not caring about the plight of her fellow workers. While we waited for someone to come out and the rescued corpos to arrive, I left a projection of myself behind while I turned on my Shade to investigate the area.

Just as I got my restrainers ready and was about to slap them onto his ankles, his feet blurred and vanished from sight. I then saw the man and the car getting smaller—no, I grew further apart from them.

A split second later, I began to feel the pain in my chest.

And of course, the guy was combat-proficient with high-spec cybernetics. Just our luck.

I quickly regained my bearings and found that Thorne was locked in a struggle with our target. He still had him in a chokehold, but the man unnaturally flailed his feet around, as if his spine didn’t exist. Thorne was getting pelted by kicks, but it only spurred him to tighten his hold more.

Not wanting to allow this to go on any longer than it had to, I charged back into the fray with a stun baton in hand.

I swung down at the man, who wasn’t able to resist amidst his struggles, striking him on his collarbone. The electric current rang through his body, but he only let out a quiet groan.

That was when I realized the man was more of a cyborg than I thought. His appearance was that of a completely organic human, so I may have underestimated him for a bit. However, I quickly corrected my mistake.

I drew my gun and unloaded a clip of EI rounds into the man, despite Thorne on his back. The bullets stuck to his skin like it was magnetic. Instead of reloading, I holstered the gun and threw myself on top of the man, trying to subdue him with Thorne.

A moment later, my SAID notified me I established a connection to his systems, so I began to administer the takeover program.

“Hold him down for a little longer!” I called out.

“What else do you suppose I do? Just let him go?”

A minute later, the man’s struggle finally weakened. I took the chance to reach for my restrainer bracelets and slapped them onto the man’s ankles and wrists.

I then searched through the files in his SAID to get an understanding of his body before plunging a syringe into a good spot. It knocked him out within a count of ten.

“This guy almost overpowered me, a cyborg in power armor! What’s up with that?” Thorne exclaimed.

“Hmm, at least this was the riskiest part of the plan and we got past it. This guy’s from the consortium, so I doubt anyone from Aurora’s branch office would be as strong.

“Hmm, we still have a ways to go.”

“We can dwell on that later. Come on, we got to go!”

Then, before emergency services came to service the vehicle, I quickly canceled the error messages I forced into the system and got into the driver’s seat. We booted up the vehicle and rejoined traffic.

We were already quite close to Aurora’s office, so we arrived after a few minutes. When we did, we found a dozen well-dressed corpos waiting for us in the driveway. They all bowed in unison as we approached.

Seeing there wasn’t much time left until showtime, I cleared my throat as I adjusted my voice and donned the holographic disguise of the man we had just captured. My finishing touch included connecting the man’s SAID settings to my intel department, so they could fidget with his memories while I took on his identity.

Through all the research we did with the cassettes, we learned a lot about the brain. It wasn’t enough for us to brainwash anyone, but imparting memories was close enough to knowledge that it was doable. The man’s highly augmented body worked to our advantage in this regard. It wasn’t perfect, likely making the man more confused than believing the narrative we installed into him, but it was better than nothing.

After confirming my intel department could take it from here, I hopped off the guard, leaving Thorne behind to watch over the physical body of our captive.

Right away, a middle-aged woman came up to be respectful.

“Thank you so much for coming, Inspector! Please allow me to show you around.”

I took a moment to regard the people who came to greet me before nodding to the woman.

“Lead the way.”