NOVGO.NET Chapter 41: Nothing To Sign
Chapter 41: Nothing To Sign
The stairs rattled beneath their sneakers, vibrating with the hum of high-voltage conduits running behind the walls.
Red warning strobes swept the walkway, painting the utility pipes in crimson bands.
"Thorne is cycling the mainframe purge protocols," Ruby whispered, checking the descending data lines on her handheld.
"The director is trying to erase his invoice before inspectors arrive," he replied.
’A bureaucrat with an incinerator switch is more dangerous than an open gate,’ he thought.
A reinforced partition blocked the upper landing, humming with magnetic seals that locked the suite from inside.
Fin planted his right sneaker against the seam with his reinforced leg braced beneath him.
The locking pins sheared with a sharp snap, throwing the double panels inward against the stops.
Dr Aris Thorne spun away from the main terminal, clutching a data cartridge.
"You should have died in the drainage runoff on the loading-dock break night," the director hissed, glaring through crooked spectacles.
"My shift ran long that night, so I decided to keep walking," he answered.
’Weeks of overtime and a second chance at life just to listen to this speech,’ he thought.
"You survived an E-rank gate break through a clerical glitch," Thorne sneered, backing toward an emergency chute.
"Glitch or not, you owe this district an explanation for the meat hooks downstairs," he replied.
A mutated synthesis goliath stepped out from the secondary bay, venting green vapor from intake vents along its collar.
Spliced predator bones bristled across its torso, flanking two long shock-blades that crackled with violet electricity.
"Kill these two stray rats and compress their remains into the bio-waste hopper," Thorne commanded.
"Hold the exit seam," he told his partner, preparing to engage his burst skill.
"Clear the floor before the director burns the hard drives," she warned, raising her silver kite shield.
[ Active skill: Overclock initiated ]
[ Stamina: 60 → 20/100 ]
[ Agility: 78 → 234 (temporary surge) ]
’Twelve seconds to balance this account before the director slips down the chute,’ he thought.
Fin accelerated across the polished floor, his speed tripling as forty points of stamina vanished from his ribs.
The goliath swung its right shock-blade in a horizontal arc, tearing the air with lightning.
’Too wide, too slow, and telegraphing the strike like a drunk rookie,’ he thought.
Fin ducked beneath the sweep, driving his reverse hatchet spike upward into the creature’s unarmored knee joint.
The fibrous tendon severed with a dull pop, forcing the armored monster down onto one knee.
"Agh!" the beast snarled through its respirator grill, attempting to swing its secondary blade toward his collar.
He pulled the hatchet free, storing it before drawing both daggers.
He pivoted along its blind flank, driving both matte-black daggers through the neck seam beneath the jaw.
The carbon blades pierced the pulsating mana core, releasing pale fluid that sizzled across the floor.
Fin twisted both hilts with sudden torque, shattering the artificial core into jagged crystal shards.
The synthesis goliath collapsed face-first onto the deck, its shock-blades clattering across the tiles as the vents died.
[ Genesis synthesis goliath downed ]
[ EXP reward: +28,500 EXP ]
[ EXP: 170,900 / 2,500,000 ]
"Twenty-eight thousand points on the voucher," he noted, watching the golden numbers tick upward.
’The two-million wall still looks like a mountain, but every dead brute is a payment,’ he thought.
Thorne reached the emergency console near the chute, hovering a finger over a glowing red detonation switch.
"Stay back, you unranked parasite!" the director shrieked, pressing his back against the wall with bloodshot eyes.
"One touch on this breaker will ignite five thousand liters of solvent, incinerating this facility within thirty seconds!"
"You really love threatening people with fire when your shift falls apart," he said.
Fin closed the five-meter gap in a fraction of a second, clamping his palm around the director’s wrist.
The delicate bones of Thorne’s forearm cracked beneath golem density, forcing the man’s fingers away from the switch.
The red key dropped to the floor, sliding under the server racks where its flashing beacon died.
"You do not get to burn the evidence when the bill comes due," he said softly.
"The High Council will pay you fifty million credits," Thorne stammered, sweat pouring down his pale cheeks.
"We can issue you an executive grade card, private estates in District One, and unlimited pristine artificial cores!"
’Fifty million credits from people who stitch orphans to lizard scales,’ he thought.
"You put my childhood neighbors into glass jars," he answered, twisting the master data cartridge free from the console.
"Those boys were expendable trainees who never had a future on the streets," Thorne spat, clutching his broken wrist.
He put the daggers away, bringing the hatchet back into his hand.
"They were idiots from my block," he replied, raising the poll of his hatchet.
"The money was never the point, director... the roof was," he added, striking Thorne’s temple with the flat metal.
The director collapsed unconscious, allowing Ruby to bind his wrists and disable the detonation controls.
Ruby stepped up to the terminal, sliding an Association cipher key into the auxiliary port.
"I locked the emergency dampers and activated the fire suppression systems," she reported, downloading the backup registries.
"The patient feeds are stable. Independent medics have the location and copies of the evidence," she added.
They waited until the medical team accepted custody of the victims and the restrained director.
Ruby recorded the transfer, retaining a copy beyond the reach of the facility’s administrators.
"Let the inspectors explain why their own tags were hanging on those cages," he replied.
’Corrupt bureaucrats will probably try to blame a rogue janitor, but the paper trail is ours,’ he thought.
They descended through the ventilation shafts into the freight yard, slipping between two idling coal cars.
Steam whistles blew across the rail junction as an outbound train began rolling east.
The freight train lurched along the spur, carrying them away from District Two beneath a blanket of fog.
Fin leaned against the vibrating wall of the boxcar, watching industrial smokestacks recede into the morning mist.
"Your sister is probably sitting by the window with her ledger," Ruby noted with a tired smile.
"Jolly does not sleep when an audit is pending," he replied, feeling the morning draft blow through the door.
’If we missed the five o’clock bell, she will bill us for overtime tea,’ he thought.
They reached the Halden Street walk-up at five in the morning, climbing the three flights of stairs without noise.
Apartment 4B was warm, smelling of toasted sesame oil and boiled barley tea simmering atop the burner.
Jolly sat at the table with spectacles perched on her nose, her student laptop glowing with an open spreadsheet.
She looked up from the screen without surprise, evaluating Fin’s jacket for fresh bloodstains with forensic calm.
"You took three hours longer than the rail timetable projected," she stated, sliding a steaming mug across the table.
"We resolved an unexpected billing dispute with the facility manager," he answered, setting the master cartridge on the table.
’Three hours of train jumping and a broken goliath, and she greets us like a late delivery,’ he thought.
Jolly slotted the data cartridge into her portable drive adapter, her fingers flying across the keyboard.
"Names, bank routing codes, and shipment manifests for seven municipal districts," she whispered, her eyes widening behind her lenses.
"Every person who signed an order for those incubation cages is listed on this drive," Ruby added, sitting by the stove.
"This is not just a police report," Jolly noted, scrolling through columns of council signatures.
"This is a list of people who owe our district for four years of stolen lives," he replied.
Jolly opened her black ledger notebook, uncapping her red ink pen to draw a horizontal divider line across the page.
She wrote the title in bold block letters across the top margin, pressing the pen tip firmly: Halden House.
Beneath the title, she added the first permanent operational rule for their household, underlining the words twice.
"We do not sell the roof," she read aloud, looking at her brother with a rare smile that softened her face.
Fin looked out through the kitchen window as the morning sun crested the rooftops of District Four.
The Pacific leviathan continued its approach beyond the distant horizon, but under this small roof, the family line remained unbroken.