Evo

Cyberpunk 2097

Chapter 1 – "Ctrl+Alt+Del Society"

Neon dripped from the sky like the city itself was bleeding RGB. The air smelled like burnt plastic and corporate lies. Somewhere between the glowing billboards for brain implants and the latest dopamine-optimized streaming service, a rogue hacker named Zero was about to make the worst (or best) decision of his questionable life.

He crouched in a back alley, fingers dancing over his cyberdeck, hijacking a nearby corp-drone to spy on a convoy rolling through Neon Bastion, the dirtiest part of Nova Nexus City—which was saying something, considering the entire city was built on layers of failed utopias. The convoy carried something big, and when megacorporations tried to be sneaky, it usually meant they were hiding a new way to ruin people's lives.

Zero grinned under his hacked-together breathing mask. "Alright, let's see what fresh corporate hell we're dealing with today."

The drone's feed flickered onto his retinal HUD. Inside the armored truck was a containment pod, humming with security protocols. The label? "Project Overmind."

"Well, that sounds like a totally not-evil name," Zero muttered.

Then the feed cut out.

"Oh, that's not good."

Before Zero could even react, his cyberdeck screamed a warning: INTRUSION DETECTED. TRACKING SIGNAL LOCKED.

"Motherbo—"

A sniper round obliterated the trash can next to his head.

Zero hit the ground running. Behind him, a second sniper round shredded the air where his head had been.

"Okay, okay, I get it! You don't want me looking at your spooky corporate secret! Message received!" he yelled, dodging into an alleyway.

His cyberdeck pinged: Threat Level: Oh, You're So Screwed.

"Wow, thanks. Super helpful."

A squad of CorpSec heavies was closing in, their HUD visors glowing like angry fireflies in the rain. Zero's brain ran through his usual options: Fight? Nope. He had a gun, but he was more of a hack-your-way-out guy. Run? That was Plan A through Z.

But before he could sprint, something blurred past him—fast, silent, and deadly.

THUD.

The first CorpSec soldier's head separated from his body. The others barely had time to react before the blur became a shape—a woman in sleek, cybernetic armor, moving like a glitch in reality. Her monomolecular blades cut through the remaining guards in a blink, leaving them crumpled on the rain-slick pavement.

Zero just stood there.

"Holy shit," he said, finally. "That was… beautiful. Also terrifying. But mostly beautiful."

The assassin turned. Her piercing red cybernetic eyes scanned him, and for a second, Zero felt like she was deciding whether to add him to the body count.

Then she smirked. "You're in my way, hacker."

Zero put his hands up. "Fair point. But, uh, I think we both just pissed off the same people. So maybe don't murder me?"

Her gaze flicked to his cyberdeck. "You tried hacking Overmind, didn't you?"

Zero blinked. "You know what that thing is?"

"Let's just say I've been trying to kill it."

The CorpSec alert sirens started blaring. Reinforcements were coming. The assassin sighed.

"Fine. You live. For now."

Zero grinned. "That's the nicest thing anyone's said to me all week."

She turned and sprinted. He had a choice: stay and get obliterated by CorpSec, or follow the deadliest person he'd ever met.

Zero sighed. "Yeah, this is probably gonna get me killed."

Then he ran after her.

Zero sprinted after the assassin, weaving through back alleys as the city roared with alarms. CorpSec drones zipped overhead, scanning for movement.

"Not that I'm complaining," Zero panted, "but do you always decapitate people before introducing yourself?"

The assassin didn't even glance back. "Only when I'm in a hurry."

"Cool, cool. Totally normal assassin thing."

They reached a dead end—a massive steel gate, locked by a biometric scanner. Zero groaned. "Welp, that's a problem."

The assassin didn't even hesitate. She took a deep breath, and suddenly, the air around them went dead.

Zero's HUD flickered. His cyberdeck crashed. The nearby streetlights fizzled out. The drones overhead dropped like flies, slamming into the pavement with dead circuits.

"Whoa. What the hell was that?" Zero muttered, shaking his deck.

The assassin pressed her palm against the gate. Sparks danced around her fingers as the entire lock system shorted out, forcing the door open with a heavy clang.

"I disrupt electromagnetic fields," she said simply. "Anything running on electricity? Not anymore."

Zero whistled. "That is both insanely cool and extremely unfair."

She smirked. "You rely too much on your toys, hacker."

Zero was about to respond when the wall behind them exploded.

Through the dust and debris, a CorpSec heavy trooper stepped forward, clad in power armor that hummed with energy. His helmet visor glowed like molten steel.

"You're both dead," the trooper rumbled, raising an arm-mounted plasma cannon.

Zero swallowed. "So, uh… you got a plan for that?"

The assassin flexed her fingers. The air shimmered as her EMF field expanded.

The trooper's plasma cannon whined, flickered… and died.

The glow in his visor vanished. The servo motors in his armor locked up.

The assassin tilted her head. "Yeah. I have a plan."

Then she ripped the guy's helmet off and stabbed him through the throat.

Zero blinked. "Okay. You are officially the coolest, scariest person I've ever met."

She wiped the blood off her blade and turned to him. "And you're officially out of time. If you're serious about surviving this? We need to disappear. Now."

Zero looked back at the burning wreckage, then at her.

"Yeah, alright," he said. "I guess I've got a new best friend."

The assassin raised an eyebrow. "We're not friends."

"Give it time."

They vanished into the neon-lit depths of Nova Nexus City, hunted and on the run.