# Chapter 12: Ghost in the Machine
The voice, calm and measured, slithered through the metal conduit like oil. It was followed by a single, sharp scream that was cut off as if by a switch. The silence that rushed back in was heavier, more absolute than before. Konto froze, one hand braced against the vibrating wall of the service tunnel. The air, already cold and sterile, now felt like ice in his lungs. The sound hadn't been loud, but in the enclosed space, it had been intimate. A private execution.
He pushed the thought down, burying it under a layer of professional detachment that felt thinner than usual. The mission was the mission. Get the data, get out. He keyed the subvocal mic tucked into his collar. "Liraya, you copy?"
"Loud and clear," her voice replied, a crisp, clean signal in his ear. "I'm in position. The cafe has terrible coffee, but excellent Wi-Fi. I'm inside their network, running a ghost protocol on your location. You're a maintenance bot on a diagnostic loop. What's your status?"
"Inside the sub-level," he whispered, his gaze sweeping the darkness. His synesthetic perception painted the environment in strokes of psychic energy. The ley lines running beneath the facility were thick, vibrant rivers of gold and blue, their power siphoned into the building's systems. But coiled around those healthy conduits were sickly, pulsing veins of a deep, bruised purple—the residue of the Nightmare Plague. "It's quiet. Too quiet. And I heard something."
He described the voice and the truncated scream. On the other end, Liraya's typing stopped for a beat. "That's not good," she said, her voice losing its casual edge. "The vehicle's occupants are still inside. Internal schematics show a series of high-security conference rooms and private labs on the sub-level where you are. They're not just visiting; they're overseeing something."
"Tell me something I don't know," Konto muttered, moving forward. The grated floor of the conduit clanked softly under his boots. He followed the map Liraya had projected onto his retinal display, a faint, translucent overlay only he could see. The path led him toward a larger junction, a hub where several conduits intersected. The air grew warmer, thick with the smell of hot metal and ozone. Steam hissed from a dozen pressure-release valves, creating a disorienting, white-out fog that clung to the floor.
"Alright, I'm at the junction," he reported. "The maintenance hatch for the shipping and receiving level should be ten meters ahead. Can you loop the sensors on it?"
"Working on it," Liraya said. "The security here is multi-layered. Physical, magical, and digital. The physical lock is a standard mag-seal, but it's tied into a pressure plate and a thaumaturgic ward that's keyed to personnel Aspect signatures. I can't disable the ward without tripping a silent alarm, but I can spoof the pressure plate and feed it a loop of the last authorized user's bio-signature. You'll have exactly three seconds between the pressure plate disengaging and the ward recognizing you as an intruder."
"Three seconds," Konto repeated, reaching the hatch. It was a square panel of reinforced steel, flush with the wall, a glowing blue rune etched into its center. The psychic energy of the ward was a sharp, prickly sensation against his skin, like standing too close to a static-filled screen. "I've had longer to defuse bombs."
"Just be ready," Liraya warned. "On my mark… three… two… one… mark."
The blue rune flickered and died. The air around the hatch lost its electric charge. Konto didn't hesitate. He jammed the tip of a multi-tool into the mag-seal's housing, twisting it hard. The lock released with a pneumatic hiss. He shoved the heavy panel open and slipped through, pulling it closed behind him just as the blue rune flared back to life, brighter and more angry than before. He'd made it.
He found himself in a cavernous, steam-filled corridor. The air was warmer here, smelling of sterilizer, cardboard, and the faint, sweet scent of chemical preservatives. Overhead, fluorescent lights hummed and flickered, casting long, dancing shadows. Massive pipes, thick as a man's torso, ran along the ceiling, dripping condensation onto the concrete floor below. The sound was a constant, industrial drone—a symphony of humming machinery, hissing steam, and the distant, rhythmic thud of heavy equipment.
"Status?" Liraya's voice was a welcome anchor.
"I'm in," Konto breathed, pressing himself against the cold, damp wall. "Shipping and receiving. The air tastes like bleach and bad decisions."
"Cameras are on a five-minute loop. You have a four-minute window to get to the records office before the next data refresh. I've marked it on your map. It's at the far end of the corridor, past the main loading bay."
Konto moved, his steps silent on the slick concrete. He stayed in the shadows, a wraith in a world of steel and steam. As he passed the open maw of the loading bay, he risked a glance inside. It was a hive of activity. Automated forklifts zipped back and forth, their electric motors whining, stacking crates and pallets with chilling efficiency. A handful of workers in sterile white jumpsuits supervised the operation, their faces blank, their movements listless. Konto's synesthetic sight showed him their auras were muted, the vibrant colors of life and emotion leeched away, replaced by the same sickly purple he'd seen in the conduits. They weren't just workers; they were early-stage victims, their minds already being hollowed out by the ambient corruption.
He pressed on, his heart a cold knot in his chest. The records office was a small, glass-walled cubicle tucked into a corner, overlooking the chaos of the loading bay. The door was locked, but a simple electronic tumbler was no match for Liraya's remote skills. A green light blinked on the keypad, and the lock clicked open.
Inside, the air was still and cold. The room was dominated by a single terminal, its screen glowing with a login prompt. Filing cabinets lined the walls, their labels neat and precise. "I'm in the office," Konto whispered, sitting at the terminal. "Ready for the data dump."
"Plug in the data slate," Liraya instructed. "I'm initiating a direct bypass. It'll look like a routine system diagnostic from the inside. They won't see a thing."
Konto slotted the thin, flexible data slate into the console's port. Lines of green code began to scroll across the screen as Liraya worked her magic. While she did, Konto turned his attention to the filing cabinets. He pulled open the one marked 'Requisitions – Hazardous Materials.' Inside were neat rows of folders. He flipped through them, his eyes scanning for keywords. Chimera. Sedative. Bio-reactive.
His fingers stopped on a file labeled 'Project Morpheus.' He pulled it out. Inside was a single sheet of paper, a shipping manifest. It detailed a custom-ordered batch of a bio-reactive agent designated 'Chimera-7.' The quantity was small, but the potency rating was off the charts. And at the bottom, in the 'Payment Authorized' section, was the name of a shell corporation: 'Aethelburg Urban Renewal Holdings.' It was a ghost company, a paper front designed to launder money and hide ownership. But it was a lead. A real, tangible thread.
"Liraya, I've got it," he said, his voice tight with excitement. "A physical manifest. Chimera-7. Paid for by a shell corp called Aethelburg Urban Renewal."
"Copy that," she replied. "I'm pulling the digital transaction records now. It's a complex trail, but I'm following it. The payment came through an offshore account, routed through three different dummy corporations. This is professional-grade obfuscation. They're not just hiding from the Wardens; they're hiding from someone with real resources."
On the screen, the download progress bar crept slowly toward completion. 78%... 79%... Konto's eyes were glued to it, his entire being focused on that sliver of digital hope. This was it. The proof they needed. The key to unraveling the whole conspiracy.
Then, the world exploded.
It wasn't the sharp, blaring alarm of a security breach. It was a deep, gut-wrenching klaxon, a sound that vibrated up from the floor and shook the very bones of the building. Red lights flashed, bathing the entire corridor in a hellish, strobing glow. The automated forklifts in the loading bay screeched to a halt, their safety systems engaging. The listless workers looked up, their vacant expressions for the first time replaced by a flicker of genuine fear.
"Konto, what's happening?!" Liraya's voice was sharp with panic in his ear. "That's not an intrusion alarm! That's a containment breach! Level 5! It's coming from the sub-level labs… the same area where the vehicle went!"
The download bar stalled at 94%. The screen flashed red: 'NETWORK CONNECTION SEVERED.'
Konto was on his feet, his mind racing. The mission had just gone from stealth infiltration to a potential catastrophe. The voice, the scream—it wasn't a meeting. It was an experiment. And it had just gone horribly wrong.
"Liraya, I'm cut off!" he yelled over the blaring siren. "The network is down! I'm blind in here!"
"Get out of there, Konto! Now!" she commanded. "The lockdown protocols have initiated! All bulkheads are sealing! You have less than two minutes before that section becomes a vacuum!"
He didn't need to be told twice. He ripped the data slate from the terminal, shoving it into his jacket. He burst out of the office and into the chaos. The corridor was a nightmare of flashing red light and deafening noise. Workers were screaming, running in panic. In the distance, he heard a new sound. A sound that didn't belong. A wet, tearing sound, like fabric being ripped apart, accompanied by a low, guttural growl that seemed to come from everywhere at once.
He sprinted back the way he came, his lungs burning. The bulkhead doors were already beginning to descend, massive slabs of steel crashing down from the ceiling. He slid under one just as it slammed shut, the impact shaking the floor. He was in the junction again, the steam thicker than ever, the air tasting of panic and something else… something ancient and wrong.
He scrambled for the service hatch, his mind a whirlwind of adrenaline and fear. He could feel it now, a psychic pressure building behind him, a malevolent presence that was clawing its way into reality. The growl was louder now, closer. It was accompanied by the sound of metal groaning, of pipes bursting.
He reached the hatch, fumbling with his multi-tool. The lock was fused, the magical ward flaring with so much raw energy it was visible as a crackling, black aura. He was trapped.
"Liraya!" he yelled into the mic. "The hatch is sealed! The ward is overloaded! I can't get it open!"
"Stand back!" she shouted back. "I'm going to try to overload the conduit! It might cause a power surge, but it's the only way to blow the lock!"
Konto threw himself backward as a surge of raw power, visible as a blinding arc of blue lightning, shot down the conduit and slammed into the hatch. The mag-seal exploded in a shower of sparks. The ward shattered with a deafening shriek of psychic energy. The hatch was blown clean off its hinges.
He didn't wait. He dove through the opening, landing hard on the grated floor of the service tunnel. Behind him, the sound of the creature's roar was eclipsed by the screech of tearing metal as it began to force its way through the bulkhead.
He ran, not caring about the noise he made. The mission was over. Survival was the only thing that mattered. He scrambled through the tunnels, his only guide the map on his retinal display and the pounding of his own heart. He could hear the creature behind him, its unnatural howls echoing through the metal labyrinth. It was fast. And it was hungry.
He burst out of the service tunnel and into the storm drain, the cold night air a shock to his system. He didn't stop running until he was a block away, collapsing in a narrow alleyway, gasping for breath, his body trembling with exhaustion and adrenaline. He pulled out the data slate. The screen was cracked, but the file was there. 94% of the data. It would have to be enough.
He looked back in the direction of the lab. The sirens were still wailing, but they were joined now by the sounds of battle—shouts, gunfire, and the inhuman roar of the thing that was now loose in the industrial heart of Aethelburg. He hadn't just found the cancer. He'd accidentally cut it open, and now it was spreading.