The rain hit him immediately — cool, sharp, cleansing in a way nothing else in Night City ever was. It beaded across his coat, catching the neon reflections from the holo-ads overhead: BUY. BELIEVE. OBEY. The words flashed across his face for an instant before fading, leaving only the faint, metallic tang of the storm.
The street was alive. Hovercars screamed past in bursts of blue light, pedestrians hurried beneath transparent umbrellas, and the air buzzed with the static of countless transmissions. Night City didn't sleep — it just shifted tempo.
Max slipped into the current of the crowd, moving with the kind of casual confidence that made him invisible. He'd learned that long ago — to walk like he belonged, even when he didn't.
"Mary," he murmured, voice low enough to be drowned out by the noise. "Feed me updates on the anomaly. Any movement?"
"Still active," she said. "But whoever's behind it is good. They're using old Militech encryption keys — ones that shouldn't exist anymore."
"Which means someone with clearance," Max said, turning down a narrow side street. "Either a ghost from the inside… or someone playing with their toys."
"Your kind of people, then."
He grinned faintly. "Unfortunately."
The alley led him toward the lower transit lines — a maze of dripping pipes and flickering signs, far from the polished chrome above. A place where the air was thick with oil and static, where reality smelled like ozone and burnt circuits.
A group of low-tier scavvers huddled around a makeshift vendor booth, their augments flickering dimly in the rain. One looked up as Max passed, eyes glowing dull amber.
"Yo, choom. You lookin' for chips, chrome, or trouble?"
Max didn't even slow. "Already have all three."
They laughed, though one of them muttered something sharp under his breath as Max turned the corner.
"Mary," he said, "patch into city maintenance systems. I want a route to District 12 that won't ping any corporate eyes."
"Working on it. There's an old freight magline that runs under the south sectors. Decommissioned five years ago after a 'containment leak.' I can unlock the hatch from here."
"Perfect."
He reached a junction point — a massive steel gate half-buried under holographic graffiti. The tag pulsed when he approached, shifting from chaos into a single glowing symbol — the stylized 'M' of Militech.
Max froze.
"Mary," he said quietly, "tell me that's just coincidence."
"Checking… No. That's a live signal tag. Someone's been here recently — and they want it known."
He crouched, brushing his hand along the steel. The symbol flickered, reacting to his biometric field, and a faint hum filled the air.
"They're baiting someone," he murmured.
"Probably you."
He smirked, straightening. "Then it's working."
The gate clicked, metal shifting as it unlocked from within. Steam hissed from the seams as the massive doors slid open, revealing a dark stairwell lit by the glow of distant machinery.
"Mary," he said, stepping forward, "keep my signature masked. No traces, no echoes."
"Already done. You're a ghost, remember?"
He descended, boots echoing softly against the steel steps. The air grew colder, the sound of rain fading until all that remained was the rhythmic hum of the undercity — a place where the rich never walked and the poor didn't come back.
Pipes hissed. Lights flickered. The faint outline of an old mag-rail stretched into the dark like a scar through concrete.
At the end of the platform, something flickered — a small drone, hovering motionless, its lens aimed directly at him.
Max stopped. "Mary?"
"It's transmitting, but not broadcasting. Local recording only."
"Someone's watching."
He raised his wrist rig. The drone buzzed, jittered — then fell from the air with a soft pop as its circuits overloaded.
"Not anymore," he said.
He walked past the smoking drone and climbed into an old freight pod, dust and grime coating the seats. "Power it up, Mary."
"On it."
The pod shuddered, then came alive with a low hum. The lights flickered green, and the rails beneath glowed faintly.
"Destination?"
"District 12. Let's go see who's been poking ghosts."
The pod lurched forward, accelerating into the dark — metal screaming against old tracks. The tunnel lights blurred past, white streaks in an endless black.
As he leaned back against the cold seat, Mary's voice returned — quieter now, almost hesitant.
"Max… I ran deeper scans on that anomaly."
"Yeah?"
"It's not Militech."
He frowned. "Then who?"
"The encryption pattern is… yours."
Silence.
Then he laughed softly — a sound halfway between amusement and disbelief.
"Well," he said, "either someone's stealing my face… or something of mine woke up."
"Either way," Mary replied, "District 12 just got a lot more interesting."
The pod screeched to a halt, momentum jerking Max forward slightly before stabilizing. The old freight doors hissed open with a rush of stale air — the scent of rust, ozone, and something faintly chemical.
District 12.
He stepped out into a tunnel lit by sickly amber lights, flickering against concrete walls layered in grime and graffiti. The deeper sections were lost to darkness, punctuated by the occasional hum of a generator or the drip of leaking coolant.
Mary's voice returned in his ear."Signal triangulation puts the source less than fifty meters ahead. Looks like a dead comms hub — Militech shell structure from the old urban control days."
"Perfect place for ghosts," Max muttered.
He moved quietly, hand brushing the butt of his pistol out of habit, senses tuned sharp. The further he went, the more obvious it became that someone had been here recently — fresh boot prints in the dust, faint warmth radiating from power conduits that shouldn't have had current in years.
Then, a voice.
"Didn't think you'd actually come."
Max stopped. Ahead, in the glow of a hanging light, a figure stood leaning against an old server rack. Young — maybe mid-twenties — messy hair, an off-brand jacket modeled after one of Max's old ops uniforms. Even the pattern on the arm plating was identical, though the fit was off, like a cheap replica.
"Mary," he said quietly, "scan."
"No weapons detected. Nervous heartbeat. No augment latency — he's fully human with netrunner implants. And… Max, he's broadcasting your biometric signature, but it's artificial."
***
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