The roll-up door lifted high enough to show faces. A guard already had his rifle up, sight fixed on the four figures stepping out of the deluxo.
He did not know they had watched him on the way in and chosen to walk straight at him anyway.
He eyed the formation. In front stood a man in a tailored suit with a bigger man in a black jacket on his shoulder. Behind them, a twin-tailed cyberpunk girl and a young guy with the green look of someone new to real firefights. The mix annoyed him. The two in front looked like they came to do business. The two in back looked like they came to play.
"This is not an amusement park. It is not your family day. Stop, or I will put a hole in your head."
He triggered the site alarm on his comm and called for backup as he barked it. Silence answered. His signal had already been cut.
Four on one, with his lifeline dead. His finger trembled on the trigger. Habit and Maelstrom's native madness made the choice for him.
"Go to hell."
Flame lit the muzzle. Bullets hissed through the entry like a zipper.
Smoke cleared. The four were still walking. No blood. No bodies. Only boot steps and the clink of brass skipping across concrete.
He slammed in a fresh mag and fired again—same result. Every round wilted and fell short as if the air had turned to glue around them.
The four reached him steadily, like people finishing a hallway instead of crossing a killing lane. The guard never lifted his finger off the trigger.
The man in the suit, Rocky, reached out, covered the spitting muzzle with his palm, and plucked a bullet out of the air between two fingers. What should have been a lethal slug sat in his hand like a peanut.
"Thanks for the donation," Rocky said, polite and calm, and the charge inside him climbed another notch.
He held the bullet up in front of the guard's eyes and opened his fingers.
The slug leapt as if a hidden barrel had fired it. It punched through the guard's forehead. Blood sprayed. The body went backward and fell to the floor.
Rocky had not come to negotiate. Ascension Technology could not buy respect here with a name alone. No one would sell out a major backer for a young company's cash, and Maelstrom had a sponsor behind this job. The plan tonight was simple—Break Maelstrom's courage. Take the intel. If they refused, erase them.
They kept moving, deeper into the plant.
The corridor kinked twice, then ended at a narrow service door. Rocky pressed it open. The shop floor spread out in front of them, a vast hall full of pallets and machinery. Cameras watched. Maelstrom patrols paced the upper catwalks.
The moment they crossed the threshold, the sentry on the high platform spotted them.
"Enemy in the workshop."
Sirens snapped on. Every crew inside All Foods got the same alert.
This time, Rocky let the network chatter run. He wanted everyone to know they had company. Hunting them room to room would waste time. Better to bring the pack.
Maelstrom lifted rifles and opened fire without a word. Fast reaction. Not fast enough.
Rebecca moved first. She sprinted, hit the wall, climbed quickly, and popped to the second level with a tidy two-step. Her pistols barked. Targets near the landing zone dropped.
The rest of Maelstrom swung muzzles toward her. She was already gone. The Pilot mobility rig kept her in motion, bouncing her along walls and railings, sliding when the angle was right, double-jumping to switch direction mid-air. Her petite frame and clean timing turned her into a problem their sights could not solve. She skimmed the plant like a swallow and harvested anyone who lagged.
David saw fire pull away from the ground and took his shot. He lit his Sandevistan, locked to a lane, and started clearing what Rebecca's pattern left standing. The speed kept his hands ahead of his nerves. He was not fast compared to her, but he was fast enough to make a count tonight.
"What is she? I cannot hit her."
Panic cracked a voice on the catwalks. It spread. When it took Rebecca to cross the shop again, the floor's firepower had thinned to almost nothing.
Inside the elevator control room that faced the workshop, Brick watched the slaughter on a wall of surveillance feeds and felt his jaw set.
"What is this? Someone tell me."
A small crew had just walked into his factory and started killing, and his people had no answer. The analyzer finished its match. Names and affiliations scrolled past. Ascension Technology.
"Move. Get Militech on the line. I want support. If they do not help, that girl will wipe the floor."
He had taken Militech's money to steal Ascension's stimulant formula. He had not expected a fresh company to show up with muscle, trace the job back to Maelstrom, and come knocking this hard. He had not seen a fight like this before.
On the net, Maelstrom's hacker took the order and reached for Militech's handler.
His stomach went cold. Every route out to the city was dead. No outside line carried signal.
"No passage ahead."
In the local cyberspace, Lissandra's avatar filled the sky. She looked down like a god standing with both feet on their digital ground and delivered the verdict without heat.