The rain in Neo-Kyoto was a symphony of interference. It wasn't just water; it was a cascade of data, a trillion liquid pixels washing the endless advertisements and news tickers that bled down the skyscrapers. To Kaito, hunched in the driver's seat of his beat-up sky-cab, it was just noise. The kind of noise that made the static in his head worse.
He was off the grid, running on forged cred-sticks and a deep-seated aversion to scanners. His cab was a relic, a hulking petrol-burner with manual controls, a roaring beast in a city of silent, magnetic gliders. It attracted a certain clientele. The ones who didn't want to be tracked. The ones, like his current fare, who smelled of ozone and old fear.
"Just drive," the man had rasped, sliding into the back seat, his coat collar pulled high. "The Kiso District. And no log."
Kaito had grunted, punching the coordinates into his rust-spotted nav-computer. He didn't ask questions. Questions were billable hours he couldn't afford, and attention he couldn't risk.
He'd been a different man, once. A promising neuro-acoustic engineer for Aethelred Industries, a subsidiary of the ever-present Quorum. His specialty had been "resonance dampening"—designing the sonic fences that kept the newly Awakened from "disturbing" corporate zones. He'd been good at it. Too good. He'd been on the team that developed the prototype for the Soliton Lance.
Then came the Aviary. The liberation. The public fallout. He'd seen the data-feeds of the freed "assets," their hollow eyes a stark contrast to the Quorum's press releases about "voluntary contributors." He'd designed a surgical tool; they had built a scalpel for the soul. He'd walked out that night, taking nothing but the guilt and a persistent, high-pitched whine that had taken root in his inner ear—a psychic scar from working too close to the technology he helped create.
Now, he was a ghost, haunted by the silent screams of his own inventions.
"The static is bad tonight," the man in the back seat murmured, almost to himself.
Kaito's hands tightened on the wheel. "It's the rain. Plays hell with the old comms."
"No," the man said, his voice clearer now. "Not that kind of static."
A cold trickle, unrelated to the rain, traced its way down Kaito's spine. He glanced in the rearview. The man had lowered his collar. He was younger than Kaito had assumed, with intense, dark eyes that seemed to see the world in a different spectrum.
"Who are you?" Kaito asked, his voice low.
"A concerned party," the man said. "You are Kaito Kurosawa. Formerly of Aethelred Project: Silencer."
Kaito slammed on the brakes, the cab skidding to a halt in a spray of oily water in a deserted underpass. He turned, his old, illegal pulse-pistol leveled at the passenger.
"Who sent you? Quorum? Isley's hounds?"
The man didn't flinch. He simply looked at the gun, then at Kaito, with a kind of weary pity. "The Quorum thinks you're dead. Isley's people have you filed as 'non-operational, low priority.' I am neither." He leaned forward. "My name is Kenji. And I am here because the static you hear… I hear it, too. But I hear what's causing it."
He reached into his coat. Kaito tensed, finger on the trigger. But Kenji only pulled out a small, crystalline data-chip. It glowed with a soft, internal light.
"This is a recording," Kenji said, placing it on the seat between them. "From a place they call the 'Echo Vault.' It's not a prison for people, Kaito. It's a prison for songs. They're not just suppressing the Awakened anymore. They're harvesting the raw frequencies of the Weave itself. Bottling magic. And the byproduct… is the static in your head."
Kaito stared at the chip, his heart a frantic drum against his ribs. The whine in his ear seemed to sharpen, to coalesce into a million tiny, agonized voices. It wasn't a malfunction. It was a symptom.
"Why me?" Kaito whispered, the gun lowering slightly.
"Because you built the lock," Kenji said, his gaze unwavering. "And a ghost is the only one who can walk through walls. We need you to help us break it. Not for revenge. For silence."
Outside, the neon rain continued to fall, painting the world in lies. Inside the cab, the ghost of a man who had helped break the world sat listening to the static of his own sins. And for the first time in years, he heard a purpose within the noise. It wasn't about redemption. It was about turning off the damn alarm.
He picked up the data-chip. It was warm.
"Where," Kaito asked, his voice rough, "is this Echo Vault?"
A faint, grim smile touched Kenji's lips. "It's where all the bad ideas go to be perfected. It's in the one place no one ever thinks to look."
"Where?"
"The basement," Kenji said, "of the Aethelred Industries headquarters. Your old office."