Ding. The elevator stopped. Floor twenty-one. As Karl stepped out, he was greeted by an expansive, open-plan level still under renovation. O
Ding.
The elevator stopped.
Floor twenty-one.
As Karl stepped out, he was greeted by an expansive, open-plan level still under renovation. On the left side, between unfinished walls, a staircase led upward.
"T-BUG, is this floor unoccupied?"
Karl scanned the open space. Not a single person was present—not even the construction workers who should've been handling the renovations.
"It was supposed to have a resident," T-BUG replied. "But the newly appointed NCPD Commissioner used his authority to suspend the work, citing 'potential security threats.' I checked the records. The previous resident gave up the lease, and the plan is to move in loyal subordinates the commissioner brought with him from his former corpo job."
"I see. Trying to play emperor, huh? Surrounding himself with handpicked palace guards. Can't believe a damn NCPD commissioner gets to play that game."
Karl surveyed the vast, eerily silent open floor. Its spaciousness seemed designed solely for one man's protection. In contrast, Captain Johnson's more modest apartment floor was compact but alive—with warmth, harmony, and neighborly trust.
Wide, sterile, paranoid versus cramped, lively, and secure.
The contrast made Karl shake his head.
How ironic.
One man was the overly cautious Commissioner, living only on the topmost level of a luxury triplex, flanked by security layers. The other, a captain who rose through the ranks, lived side by side with other officers' families in harmony. The difference was night and day.
A grassroots leader couldn't rise, but some corpo dog got parachuted into the top seat? Yeah, no thanks.
Luckily, Karl believed in evening the scales.
He drew his pistol—Night's End.
He always explained its name in Chinese: the gun that ends the night. It spun deftly in his hand before settling into a steady grip.
A flick of the wrist to check the slide. Ready.
He started toward the stairs.
His footsteps echoed faintly. But before he got far, he noticed a vent above the stairwell rattle—and then suddenly burst open.
Down tumbled two dusty, disheveled figures—rolling onto the floor in a loud thud.
Thud.
Covered head to toe in grime, Jack and Oliver landed in a heap, trailing clouds of dust behind them. Karl glanced at their mess, then looked at his own still-pristine clothes and asked with genuine confusion:
"Why the hell did you two choose such a ridiculous route? We just needed to avoid being seen. Once we're inside, you could've taken the elevator like I did."
As if to underscore his point, the elevator doors reopened behind him.
Out stepped V, dragging a limp body. From across the room, he spotted Karl and waved—then caught sight of the two soot-covered blobs on the floor.
"Huh?"
V blinked, pausing to process what he was seeing. Slowly, he recognized their faces.
"Oliver? Jack? What the hell are you guys doing?"
Oliver, calmly dusting himself off, replied without a hint of shame:
"Just testing alternate infiltration routes."
"Bullshit!"
Jack, now so dusty he looked more charcoal than Latino, let out an exasperated shout:
"This bastard insisted we crawl through the vents! I told him we should've just come up like normal. But no, he said we had to experience infiltration properly—promised there'd be no grease or smoke. And sure, no grease, but the dust? Holy hell! He made me go first too—almost got buried alive! Felt like crawling through a desert! Haven't eaten that much dust since the Mexican border—I'm full, man. FULL."
"You can't say I was wrong about the grease though," Oliver muttered.
"I said this wasn't a bar or kitchen, so no grease," Oliver added. "I never promised there wouldn't be ten years' worth of dust."
Watching them bicker, both reduced to indistinguishable black blobs, Karl nearly laughed. If not for their body sizes, he wouldn't have known which one was which. And neither had the sense to back out once they realized the mess—they'd basically cleaned the vent with their bodies.
"You two are killing me."
Karl chuckled. "Let's just borrow the commissioner's shower later. I'm sure he'd agree."
"You think that's safe?" soot-Oliver asked, hesitating. "We might leave hair or something behind. These days, DNA's enough to trace people. Hair's a big deal."
"If it risks exposure, we can tough it out," soot-Jack added.
"No worries," Karl said. "Mr. Johnson's on his way."
"Johnson?" Oliver perked up, visibly relieved.
"Well then, what are we waiting for? Let's go."
With Johnson involved, they had nothing to fear.
If he showed up, even if there were matching ballistics, fingerprints, DNA—hell, even if Karl was holding the smoking gun—Johnson could spin the story. They were backup. They were assets. Witnesses. Whatever was needed.
Once the full crew regrouped, clearing the top floors was a breeze.
Identity-locked iron doors? Only five centimeters thick. Auto-turrets, motion-sensing mines? Barely a speed bump.
Meanwhile, the Commissioner lay deep in a braindance session—immersed in some virtual ecstasy. His body twitched as he moved with the simulation.
Then the door alarm screamed.
He snapped out of the fantasy world—just in time to see the door crack open.
And what greeted him through the gap… was the black void of a gun barrel.
One moment, he'd been lost in paradise.
The next—staring death in the face.
He couldn't even figure out how they'd gotten so close without triggering earlier alerts.
But it didn't matter.
The bullet was already out of the barrel.
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🔥 Cyberpunk: The Relentless
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