The night was thick with fog as Arthur's footsteps slowed near the skeletal frame of the old Creedence Steelworks. Once a roaring forge of industry, now a rusted monolith of iron and broken glass, it stretched tall against the dim city glow. The distant buzz of failing neon signs flickered erratically beneath cracked windows and creaking columns of steel.
Arthur observed the location for a long minute, standing before this huge structure. The bitter chill bit through his thin jacket, but his mind was focused, calm beneath the icy air.
This was the venue decided for his meeting with the Conclave. It was their home ground. But he had come prepared, for if the situation turned south, leaving here in one piece would turn out to be quite difficult. Nevertheless, he was prepared for all scenarios.
The factory's winding exterior corridors hadn't changed much — pipes twisted like skeletal veins overhead and fractured staircases disappeared into shadow. As he made his way through the structure, metal squeaked softly, a haunted echo of the boisterous past this place had. Yet behind the facade of ruins, concealed behind camouflaged panels and illusions, lay the headquarters of one of the most dangerous organization in the Northern Sector.
Near the fallen pillars in the center, surrounded by rubble and broken concrete, lay the true heart of the place: a sealed hatch descending to a soundproof chamber humming with the pulse of hidden technology.
As Arth pushed through the hatch, the industrial decay gave way to glowing data panels and gray tones. The smell shifted—from dust and rust to ozone and recycled air. His eyes swept the dimly lit room, walls lined with black glass reflecting ghostly holograms, floor covered in black stone and black painted metal beams supporting the ceiling. He carefully stepped down.
As he descended, the details of the job that had appeared before him ran through his mind. Address to Data servers to uncover, encrypted pathways to navigate, key players involved. Stakes high, risks higher. There was no room for error.
----
The secret meeting chamber was a stark contrast to the decaying factory overhead. It was a long, rectangular room with polished black stone floors, high ceilings crisscrossed with very old steel beams, and walls partially covered with worn concrete and black digital panels—the old world fused with new tech. At the far end a large curved table sat under suspended lights, flanked by a handful of seats arranged in a semi-circle.
Arthur's sharp eyes scanned the room as he stepped in quietly. Spotless, sterile, but with an oppressive weight. His mind could already map escape routes and vulnerabilities—ventilation ducts, lasers and traps.
He arrived before the table, taking his seat in the center. He was the presenter and the main character for this meeting, so naturally he had to take the center stage. In the package he had received, he was also briefed upon the nature of their meetings in the future, so he was not completely unfamiliar with his surroundings either, having seen them in videos before.
His hand slid smoothly over the console embedded in the tabletop, activating a brief hologram in front of his face. He followed the guidelines to confirm his identity, before taking out a standard USB from his pockets. Inserting it into console, he waited for the pipeline to finish running, integrating with the systems as soon multiple holograms popped around the room.
The data panels on the wall all lit up like Diwali, with details of the job and steps he had planned on full display: data breaches to orchestrate, surveillance nets to bypass, several key players tangled in politics and power struggles waiting to be exploited. As his entire plan surfaced before him, he slowly absorbed the stakes and risks in seconds, storing every tiny detail. There was something else that only he noticed among the flashing screens, but it went past quick for no one to notice.
Now who would be observing him in this room full of nobodies?
If you thought that just because of the lack of physical presence, his every steps were not being monitored, then you would be grossly incorrect. Arthur was aware that he had been under strict surveillance ever since he had accepted that package. The value of the details that package alone contained would be enough to set him for an easy life, so it was only natural that the Conclave would ensure that he wasn't going to double-cross them.
And right now inside this room, even though there was no human present other than him, slowly holographic models started popping up. Figure covered in shadows with blurred facial features lined around the curved table, taking note of the data panels and information surrounding them. They all remained silent, observing and perhaps passing judgement? But no voice.
Arthur did not interrupt or elaborate either. He was waiting as well.
Soon, he heard the unmistakable sound of the hatch opening again, and this time finally people started walking in. They were all dressed as if going for a ball, dresses and suits, slowly filling the room and taking up the seats that were arranged in advance.
But Arthur noticed more. These people, he observed them very closely and could tell they were not people he expected to meet. Even if they seemed to act the part perfectly, he could tell they had no inkling of the plans he had come here to discuss. Gears spinning, Arthur was tensed.
The meeting began with careful, measured exchanges, mostly him explaining and sometimes the hologram audience questioning. Those present in person almost seemed like statues. He was ready to move when-
Suddenly, with no warning, the doors sealed with a hiss, and the room plunged into red emergency lighting. The concealed trap was sprung.
No sooner had the doors slammed shut behind him than the room erupted into motion. The apparent business partners and stakeholders lunged, their steps synchronized and deliberate. Arthur barely ducked beneath the table, feeling the rush as their limbs swiped where his head had been seconds before. Hiding beneath, his mind calculated at incredible speeds.
There first actions seemed to confirm something he had been pretty sure about, they didn't seem intent on killing him—capturing alive, perhaps. The thought sharpened his focus. As he slid to the center beneath the table, onto the cold floor, a soft metallic click whispered beneath the table. A hidden compartment's door slid open—a narrow tunnel just wide enough for one.
Arthur's mind raced as he noticed that someone was already kneeling behind him, reaching out to grab his legs. Pushing himself across the floor with his hands, he quickly entered and closed the secret exit behind him. Thinking back, He'd activated it earlier when inserting his USB into the console, a silent nod to his foresight. With a sharp breath, he dove toward the opening and scrambled inside, the world constricting to a tight, dark passage.
Suddenly, he pressed a worn rotary phone mounted unnaturally on the tunnel wall—an anachronism in this tech-cloaked fortress. The receiver twisted easily in his grip before smashing it against the hard steel. Sparks flew—the move seemed nonsensical in the chaos, but a low hum vibrated from the walls shortly after, signaling the activation of his hidden countermeasure.
The narrow corridor opened back into the factory's steel jungle—the maze of rusted girders, catwalks, and fractured walkways sprawling above. Mercenaries poured out from hidden vents and side stairwells, flinging nets of tangled wire and releasing bursts of smoke grenades meant to trap or disorient him.
Arthur moved deliberately, sliding along girders, pressing emergency overrides with a small device clipped to his belt to deactivate electrified fences blocking his path. His body wasn't built for athleticism, but his calm mind guided every breath and step, avoiding hazards with elite precision.
A weighted net soared, just missing his shoulder, tangling instead around a support beam. Another trap released a concussive blast shadows away, sending shards of glass raining.
The mercenaries shouted orders, their footfalls echoing in the cavernous space. Arthur used the chaos, propelling himself onto a narrow catwalk, balancing like a tightrope walker above the carnage.
He could already make out the situation. This was a band of misfits, a huge collaboration between bounty hunters out for his head. But none of them was capable of working with each other, as seen with how they seemed to interrupt others actions more often than Arthur dodging them. But this wont last long, because while they seemed intent on claiming him alive for some reason, if he looked like he could escape, they would be after his blood like hyenas.
Arthur moved quickly, climbing high along the steel structures, trying to find some peace so he could think of a way to escape. Right now, he realized that the mercenaries imagined him to be trapped, like dead chicken on the chopping board. So they would interfere and create the chaos, but if he showed any action to escape or even capability, they would definitely kill him. His appearance and actions earlier had them all underestimating him. And that would allow him to leave this den smoothly.
Arthur's boot scraped metal, as he continued to ascend the steel beams and corridors, he was reaching the crescendo in his plan. He pulled the simple device clipped to his belt, the one he used to deactivate the electric fence earlier. Behind him, a few guys were already leveling up to him, tens of meters away.
Arthur turned around to smile at them, as he took a step back into nothingness.
Behind him, the structure abruptly ended, as he fell to his death, hard cold floor waiting to meet him. All of the mercenaries, now rushing to reach him watched him fall, when suddenly loud music, the kind that made you clutch your ears started blasting.
A split second later, when everyone looked below, Arthur was nowhere to be found. No blood spots or anything on the floor. Just vanished. But before they could make any racket, the steel structure started creaking, trembling. And then it crashed!
----
At the complex's edge, he paused briefly—a clean salute to the crumbled cathedral of industry and danger behind him—before a sleek hovercar roared to life beneath. Sliding effortlessly in, he melted into the night.
Now completely racked in chaos, no one paid any attention as he disappeared from the scene.
Just before he pulled in to his new safehouse, he dialed a number, "Thanks for the quick work in weakening the structure of that steelworks factory. As agreed, the payment has been delivered."
"Hahaha, pleasure doing business with you, Magician. The payment has been received on our end. Let's continue to interact in the future as well."
The voice was hard to figure out. It wasn't robotic, but you couldn't gender it either. Arthur simply smiled and cut the call. Tonight had been eventful, but everything had gone exactly as he had planned.
Back in his safe haven, nursing the light wounds with practiced care, a slow smirk spread across his face.
"Mission successful," he muttered, already weaving the next threads of his game.