The Tokyo skyline was set ablaze with city lights as the military helicopter took Kelly and Rebecca from the Fuchu Airbase towards the GCSD base of operations. Kelly left the side door open as they glided over the radiant skyscrapers. She munched on a chocolate bar and let the glow light up her face, catching her red hair with streaks of scarlet blue.
‘Beautiful, isn’t it,’ she said, with a mouthful of chocolate. ‘Enjoy it while you can.’
‘It looks so different from up here.’
Kelly nodded. After a while she said, ‘When we arrive we’ll eventually be meeting with Jean Fey.’
‘The CEO of Nexus Corp?’
‘That’s right. She has some information that I’m sure will be useful.’ Kelly must have caught the slight look of disregard in Bec’s eyes. ‘I understand you and Nexus have a history,’ she went on. ‘Try and behave. We need her on our side.’
The chopper descended over a building in the midst of the radiant ocean of city and landed on a helipad. Kelly disembarked and Rebecca followed, and two men in security uniforms saluted them as they went inside. Rebecca entered a fairly luxurious room. Modern, spacious, and, given the circumstances, relatively cosy. A large holoprojector displaying a map of the world occupied the centre of the room, and this was surrounded by leather couches. Nearby, a glass screen served as an interface for making notes and plans. A counter separated the main room from the kitchen, or more notably, the bar. A hallway led off into several other rooms that Rebecca would soon become very familiar with.
‘Welcome to headquarters,’ Kelly announced. ‘This safehouse is our base of operations for the duration of the mission. Crew’s quarters are down the hall. You’ll find your bunk and personal workspace there. All the clothes and tech you’ll need have already been delivered. If you need anything specific just let me know and I’ll make a request.’ She crossed the room and opened the elevator. ‘Come on.’
Kelly and Bec descended one floor down, the elevator doors slid open and they entered a room full of exercise equipment: treadmill, weights, wrestling mat and the like.
‘Training facilities,’ said Kelly, stepping into the room. ‘Gym. Over there are the VR decks for training sims.’ She punched a code into a keypad and opened a sealed door. ‘And in here – R&D department and firing range.’
The R&D department mostly consisted of a table scattered with computer parts, pieces of weaponry and other little devices – it reminded Rebecca of the computer shop she worked in as a teenager, her first job. This was a quiet space, out of the way and well stocked. Peaceful. It annoyed Bec that there were already a few ideas brewing in her mind on how she could help these people, assuming the captain gave her permission to work freely. As crappy as her situation was, she experienced a reluctant tug of anticipation as she glanced at that untidy work desk. She figured that working here might not be terrible after all.
They found Connor Delaney testing his marksmanship at the firing range. In fact, they heard him first, the muffled crack of his firearm. Kelly collected a set of earmuffs and safety glasses and Rebecca and herself, then swiped her access card to open the door. When Kelly tapped Connor on the shoulder he set the pistol down and turned to face her.
‘You already know Connor, our medical officer,’ Kelly told Rebecca.
Connor shook Rebecca’s hand and she found that his skin was calloused.
Rebecca looked around the room.
‘Where’s the rest of the team?’ she asked Kelly.
‘We got two guys in Moscow – Boris and Yuri – plus Akira, she’s here in Tokyo, currently on a mission. You’ll meet them soon.’
Kelly made her way back to the elevator. The tour was short and sweet. Bec liked that.
‘You probably want something to eat,’ Kelly said, indicating for Bec to return to the elevator. It definitely was not a question. ‘Let’s go.’
The R&D table carried the aroma of steamy chicken noodles and metallic gunpowder as Rebecca ate her lunch and worked simultaneously. She wore standard VR goggles rather than the Immersion device so she could eat while watching training videos on tactical operations. It must have been quite the sight, her sitting alone in a darkened room, goggles covering the upper half of her face, strings of noodles dangling from her mouth.
There came that distinct ding of the elevator opening and Bec lifted the goggles to see Kelly approaching.
‘Rebecca, Jean Fey just arrived. Briefing’s in ten.’
Bec packed her things and followed the captain to the elevator.
‘How’d you get the CEO of Nexus Corp to come meet with us?’ she asked.
Even when no one was around the captain stood with her back straight and eyes forward, always focused; as opposed to Bec, who often slouched and whose hands were always moving, twirling a pen or playing with the zipper on her jacket.
‘Fey has a personal interest in shutting down Nexus Rogue, for obvious reasons. Even though she admitted to the public that the hacker group originated from her company, I suspect she knows more than she’s letting on.’
Connor was already in the briefing room when Rebecca and Kelly joined them. A tall woman with an escort of two guards stepped from the helicopter outside and crossed the landing pad. Jean Fey seemed older than she appeared, the streaks of grey in her dark hair told Rebecca plenty about her age, but the green eyes magnified by her glasses were young and mechanical.
Jean held her head high as Kelly shook her hand.
‘Mrs Fey, it’s a pleasure to meet you, ma’am,’ Kelly said.
Jean looked Kelly up and down.
‘Captain Jade. I’ve heard about you. Youngest female special forces operative in history.’
‘Just doing my duty ma’am.’ Kelly led Jean Fey to the centre of the briefing room. ‘These are two members of my team: Connor Delaney is our medical officer and Rebecca Marshall runs tactical support. The rest of my team are currently in the field so I hope you’ll forgive their absence.’
‘Of course,’ said Jean as she took a seat on the leather couch. She used her watch to upload a file to the holoprojector. ‘Given the nature of your investigation I’m not surprised that you have questions for me. Shall we begin?’
The others joined her, including the security escort.
‘Why don’t you start by telling us everything you know about Nexus Rogue.’ Kelly voice was polite but to the point. ‘Anything you may have… withheld from the press.’
‘I’ve always hated that name,’ Fey began, ‘It encourages the public to think that those terrorists still have any association with us.’
Not an entirely ridiculous idea, thought Rebecca.
‘It’s not a lie that we tried to keep it quiet,’ Jean went on. ‘Until now we thought we could solve the matter internally.’ She stopped abruptly, and chose her next words with care. ‘You must understand that my entire company is at risk, but Nexus is not the sole target in all this. I’m afraid that… Nexus Rogue… may be the same hacker organisation responsible for the attacks in 2020, as well as the subsequent attacks following.’
‘I don’t understand,’ said Kelly. ‘The entire world’s been looking for the culprits of that attack for over a decade. Why decide to help us now?’
Jean took a deep breath. ‘Because until now Nexus Corporation has never disclosed the identity of the man responsible. He is the unofficial co-founder of Nexus – Sato Yamasaki.’ The holoprojector displayed an image of a middle-aged Japanese man. ‘Sato and I were close, once. While I ran the company publicly, he and his team would ensure our security and prosperity using.... less conventional methods.’
‘Hacking,’ said Rebecca. She promised herself she wouldn’t criticise Jean Fey but it slipped out. They ignored her remark.
Jean went on. ‘Three years after we started the company some of Sato’s projects became a little extreme, bordering on fanaticism. He was no longer protecting our interests. He split away from Nexus. Those who know about it started referring to him and his associates as Nexus Rogue. The name stuck, I suppose. First, Sato targeted Nexus, then he moved on to other exploits.’
‘Respectfully, ma’am, that still doesn’t answer why you’ve only come to us now,’ said Kelly.
Bec spoke out of turn again. ‘It’s because having a known cyber-terrorist in your ranks is bad for business.’
‘Rebecca,’ Kelly snapped.
‘No, it’s okay, she’s right,’ said Jean. ‘An internal crisis like this would have been bad publicity. As I said, we’ve worked tirelessly to resolve this ourselves. However, we have reason to believe that Sato is staging another attack. We have no choice but to reach out to the UN before this situation gets any worse.’ Another face appeared on the holoprojector—a Japanese man, black-and-grey stubble, intuitive eyes. ‘Nexus Corporation featured an R&D department here in Tokyo responsible for developing new technologies for the Japanese military. The department was headed by this man, Hiroshi Inoue, who went missing some years ago and who we presume to be dead.’
‘What makes you say that?’ Kelly asked.
‘It’s simple, he was opposed to Sato from the very beginning. They never got along. On the day that Sato left, the R&D department was robbed and Sato made off with several very important files, including weapon schematics. We believe Sato had Hiroshi murdered.’
Kelly nodded slowly in contemplation. ‘Other than Sato, are you aware of any other members of Nexus Rogue that are currently operating.’
‘There was one,’ Jean replied. ‘I don’t know his real name, and he’s been off the grid, so to speak, for several years now.”
‘Do you have an alias or something that could lead us to him?’
‘I do know an alias. Sato referred to him only once as the White Rabbit.’
Rebecca paled. ‘No fucking way,’ she whispered. She looked around. No one else appeared to recognise the name.
‘Do you know him?’ Kelly asked.
Bec hesitated, but she had to tell the truth.
‘Robb’s Electronics. His name was Robert Teach. He owned a computer store, small-time business. I used to work for him.’ The memory of Robb made her nauseous. She didn’t want to remember.
‘Excuse me.’
She stood up and left the room.
Rebecca laid on her bed and stared at the ceiling, trying desperately to force the image of that night out of her mind. Her old boss, a member of Nexus Rogue. It couldn’t be, she thought. But the more she recalled from those final days at the computer store the more it seemed to make sense. The secret jobs, those long unexplained absences. Robb had been protecting her from something, maybe from himself. Rebecca used to have so many questions about who Robert Teach actually was, questions no one could answer. After all this time Nexus Rogue was who he had been. White Rabbit.
Rebecca knew that it was more complicated than that. Was Nexus Rogue the reason he pushed her away? She always felt that he was running from something, like he was afraid. No, it couldn’t be a coincidence, she decided.
The thought that she’d been working for Nexus Rogue these past few years reignited her hatred for them. She sat up and punched her pillow, and the cushion barely softened the force of hitting the wall. Her knuckles throbbed as she stared at the floor.
After a while Kelly opened the door and stepped inside. She crossed her arms and leaned against the wall.
‘Care to explain?’ she demanded.
Bec didn’t respond.
‘During the briefing you said that his name was Robert Teach,’ Kelly went on.
‘Yeah…’ Bec sighed. ‘He was a good guy. I worked for him at the computer shop for a couple of years, he taught me to code and build – anything I couldn’t teach myself I learned from him – and eventually he introduced me to the Syndicate.’
‘What happened, Bec?’
‘I went to the shop, went into his office and saw him lying in a pool of blood, his fucking brains all over the wall. The revolver was still in his hand.’
Kelly didn’t speak for a while. This was the kind of thing that didn’t warrant an easy response. She sat next to Rebecca on the bed.
‘Did you ever suspect he was involved with Nexus Rogue?’
‘No.’ Bec shook her head. ‘I mean, I suspected something but I had no idea he was with them. After all these years I never figured out why he did it.’
Kelly stood up and moved to the door.
‘Once we find Nexus Rogue, who knows, maybe you’ll get your answer.’
She left Bec alone for a while after that.
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