Bannerman, at least, was true to his word. With the coup against Mattise's short-lived reign in full effect, a brief, raging chaos engulfed the academy. In that time, they left the dead kill team where they'd dropped, and slipped away to a hidden cruiser, tucked away at a subsidiary tunnel that Piper didn't even know existed.

Piper didn't know how many people would die as the board re-asserted itself, and she also realised that she didn't care. She didn't give a fuck anymore. Thoughts of Hadrian South, the presence out there in the datastreams, and the slaughter at the docks filled her mind. That was what mattered.

But here she was, on the run for her life all over again because Hadrian's corporations just couldn't help themselves. Mattise tried to put a leash on the worst of it, and they killed him for it. She clenched her hands into fists. Whatever her differences with the man, Mattise was one of the few people who at least seemed to give a damn about something bigger than himself.

She smouldered in the back seat as the tunnel spat them out onto the fringes of the corporate heart – the sleepless, blinding mass of Hadrian's central district. Skyscrapers soared out of view on all sides, lathered in colour and light. Adverts the size of houses blazed down from them, extolling the virtues of products and treatments she could only dream about.

People flooded the streets, all elegant dresses, glittering tech-body art and sleek suits. Piper glowered at them as they slid past. They had no idea of the shadow war raging beneath their seat.

Or maybe they did? She wondered, how many of these faceless, simpering spivs held a thread of her life? How many of them funded AmpCore, inadvertently or not? If you weren't up to your eyeballs with the corporations, you didn't live here – period.

"Is everyone alright?" Bannerman asked from the driver's seat, his expression grim as he turned a corner, watching for any sign of pursuit.

"Just terrific," Arrow murmured, leaning back against the headrest.

"No, I'm not alright," Toran said coldly, sitting in the passenger seat up front. "You understand a civil war just started in Hadrian, don't you?"

"Not necessarily."

"Oh, very necessarily."

Odiye shook his head. "Toran..."

"I don't wanna hear it, Tambo. You know what has to happen now. I'm not going to debate about. You and your boys at Vector just be ready to come running when I call."

"I don't tell them what to do."

"You'll tell them what I want them to do. And Arrow, you best remind Ardenne who's been covering their asses for the last six months. We'll need all the subsidiaries moving fast, and I want people leaning on any cowardly bastard still sitting on the fence." He glanced at Bannerman. "Get us to a Skiltron safe house. I need to speak with my father."

His visor flashed briefly and she saw Bannerman twitch. The man nodded once, and they took a lazy, looping right hand turn off the main thoroughfare, gliding into a street filled with neatly planted and symmetrically trimmed trees. Honest to God, green trees. She could barely believe her eyes.

Nobody else seemed to notice, Toran kept talking, his words spilling out in a stream that he didn't seem to be able to control, sketching out counter-moves and strikes against half a dozen rival corporations in the city.

"Fucking hell," Piper scoffed. "It's like you've been waiting your whole bloody life for this to happen, eh, Toran?"

"I just know how this works, Piper." He looked around at her, his eyes hard with resolve. "This ends one way, and that way is bloody. If you want to be on the right side of this, stick around."

"Like I've got a whole lot of options."

"He's right, Piper," Odiye sighed, rubbing his eyes. "If we allow Vinder to-,"

"I know, I know, I'm not a moron. Blood for blood, eye for an eye, two wrongs make a right – let's just get to your fucking safe house, alright?" She rolled her eyes and slumped against the seat, a thick, dark cloud settling over her.

Are you okay, Piper?

I've been better, Cassie. How are you?

I feel frustrated. Though, I believe that might be your frustration.

You feel what I feel?

At least in part. I am rather... close to you. The corporations do love their wars.

We don't have time for this.

I very much agree.

"Piper? You okay?"

Her eyes snapped open and she looked to her left, finding Odiye looking at her. "I'm fine." She narrowed her eyes, hoping he'd get the message.

He nodded; turned away. Arrow smiled thinly. The car carried on, creeping away from the chaos of AmpCore, and out to a quiet stretch of the heart, where several glittering high rise offices dominated the space. Bannerman drove them into the thickets, through increasingly narrow streets until they safe house came into view.

The car slid to a halt.

Piper breathed deeply, doing her best to stay calm as she opened her door and stepped out into the late night air. Smelled better here at least, all grass trimmings and botanics – no hint of grease and oil and blood. The datastream sizzled all around her, making her implants twitch. She could see lights in many of the office windows – plenty of functionaries burning the midnight oil – but the street itself remained pretty quiet.

Then she turned, and was faced with the second corporate safehouse in as many days. This one looked a little better equipped than the Ardenne bolt-hole that Arrow had led them to out in the docks at least, with a big, red Skiltron logo planted front and centre above the main door. Although she couldn't see any overt security, she could feel it. Webs of vicious firewall code covered the building, and the presence of several strong AmpCore operatives within made her implants crackle.

"Let's go," Toran grunted as he took the lead. "We've got a lot of work to do."

Piper cast a way glance around, then stuffed her hands into her pockets and followed, bringing up the rear of the group. The guards at the Skiltron facility seemed well-aware of events already, allowing Toran passage without a word of challenge. Doors and firewalls parted around them like water.

Inside, she could feel the franticness of the Skiltron operatives. Messages zipped back and forth all around her, too fast and fluid for her to catch. The implants of the other AmpCore agents they passed trembled with anxiety. The attempted takeover at the academy was sending shockwaves through Hadrian's ecosystem. They descended two levels, and two armed guards led them into the nerve centre of the place.

They emerged into a large rectangular room, well-lit and filled with the scent of lavender and mint. Shining screens lined the walls above dozens of monitoring consoles, all mixed together with elegant indoor plant arrangement, plush, dark-upholstered couches and armchairs and polished wooden desks. It looked, to Piper's eye, a little cushy for a safe house. Skiltron AmpCore operatives and security personnel were everywhere, together with a dozen men and women in sleek white assistant uniforms.

"Alright," Toran grunted as they entered, gesturing to the seating. "Everybody take a beat. Grab a drink and sit down. Bannerman, get onto comms with the Ventris divisional heads and get them to contact Senior Executive Conan Knox immediately with readiness reports."

Bannerman nodded, peeling off from the group with one of the Skiltron agents. Piper and the others were ushered towards the couches and chairs, and she had to admit that it would feel good to sit down on something comfortable, at least for a little while.

Almost as soon has her backside hit the cushion, Piper found a neatly dressed young woman in a sleek white administrator's dress at her side, a tray of drinks balanced delicately on one hand.

"Ma'am?"

She grimaced at the formality, but the woman looked so earnest that she couldn't find her usual snide reply. Instead she nodded, and scooped up a glass off the tray – some kind of crystal-blue spirit in a large wide glass, packed with ice.

Piper sipped as the others descended around her. It tasted good, smooth and floral, maybe some kind of corp-infused gin. Toran grabbed something off another tray without even glancing at the attendant, his mouth still motoring with orders.

She tried to block it out, sinking deeper into the chair and drinking. Bits and pieces slipped through her attempts at apathy. Status reports, casualty counts, cost-benefit analysis – it dripped unwanted into her head. The coup at AmpCore had been a short one; its main objective had been the removal of Mattise.

Vinder and his supporters had risked the cover of the confusion to try and settle their own score.

But they'd failed. And now the board of AmpCore was reinstated – a tangled mess of enemies of enemies of friends. It made her head spin just listening to it. Odiye and Arrow spoke in hushed tones about their own sponsors, their delicate positions within Hadrian's filthy ecosystem.

The gloss fell away from her eyes as she watched the two of them – the pair she'd come to consider as actual friends in AmpCore. Friends or not, they couldn't extract themselves from the claws of the corporations. They just dealt with what was in front of them, falling into line to pursue the latest corporate turf war without even considering the absurdity of what they were doing.

Far too deep, that's what they were. Too deep to be of any use to her.

It all came together, and Piper decided that she had simply had enough. She stood up from the chair, gulped down the last of her drink and placed the empty glass down firmly beside her.

"I think," she declared, "that I'm done here."

Toran looked at her in amusement. "You're 'done'?"

"Yeah. Done." She sighed, an odd feeling of peace washing over her as the words left her mouth. She turned to leave, and couldn't suppress the faint smile that flickered over her face.

"Okay, okay, Russell," Toran chuckled, motioning to the guards at the door. They moved to bar her path as he strode over to stand in front of her, a glass of potent smelling whisky in one hand. "I really do not have time to play psychologist right now, and none of us have time for one of your tantrums. Will you just get a leash on whatever this is and sit back down, for fuck sake? We'll deal with Vinder and Karga and everyone else. I promise you that."

"I really don't care about Vinder." She tried to step past him, but he moved to block her way, his expression darkening.

"Piper, would you stop and think for five seconds?" he snapped. "This isn't the time for any of us to run off half-cocked. If we want to get control of AmpCore again we need-,"

"I don't want control!" Piper screamed, lashing out and smacking the glass from his hand. It sailed across the room and shattered against a nearby console as she continued. "I'm done. You hear me? All of you? Done. Finished. Fuck you and fuck AmpCore. I've had enough."

"Piper, stop." Odiye scrambled over to them, firing a Toran an irate glance before he turned to her, all earnest and serious like always. Always playing diplomat. Always trying to fit a futile sliver of morality through Hadrian's sieve.

"I know you're angry, but-,"

"Stop!"

Piper turned on him with a roar, ripping her amplifier from its sheathe. She felt Cassie's presence in her bones, the passenger feeding into her boiling anger, giving tacit approval to her actions. She bared her teeth, looking from one face to another, daring anyone to challenge her. Arrow rose slowly from their chair, amplifier in hand, but they kept well back, not risking a word.

"You know, once, just for a little bit, I thought maybe we could do some good," Piper hissed, hate dripping from her voice. "I bought it. Fuck, I bought it just for a minute there. But here we are again. On the run, another gang of filthy god-damned spivs out for blood just so someone can win the corporate dick measuring contest at the end of the quarter. Nothing has changed!"

The walls of the safehouse groaned. The backwash of her emotions spilled out into the room, making monitors flicker with static and lights stutter. Arrow's amplifier shone gently as they tried to counteract the effect, stabilising the local datastream as best they could.

"Piper, you have to stay calm," Odiye urged desperately, braving a step towards her, keeping his hands up, and empty.

"I'm way past calm." She pointed her amplifier at him. "You know, I like you, Odiye, but if you try and stop me, I swear to God I'll rip your implants right out of your chest. I am not spending another second in this place. Go and have your civil war, but you can do it without me!"

The echo of her voice reverberated around the room for a few seconds. The staff of the safe house shuffled away towards the walls, exchanging fearful glances. Arrow said nothing, just looking at Piper with a kind of resigned sadness.

With the deliberation of a traversing turret, Piper turned back to face Toran. She looked him in the eye, her skin glowing all over with hot orange light as her implants continued to heat. Sparks and haze began to flicker around her.

"What's it going to be, Knox?" she hissed. "Going to get out of my way? Or do you want to see how much damage I can do inside this place?"

"Fine," Toran said, his voice cold. He took a single step to the side, nodding to the guards at the door. "If you're not going to help, then get out. And good fucking luck to you, because you're going to need it."

"Yeah, put it on a billboard." Piper didn't even look at him as she walked away.

Her amplifier pulsed. She didn't break stride, not even as she tore the door from its hinges before it could be opened, tossing the hunk of metal contemptuously aside. She stalked through the hallways of the safe house, past nervous-looking guards and baffled operatives until she hit the frigid, night-time air of Hadrian.

Stepping out into it, Piper breathed long and deep, closing her eyes for a moment. Despite everything, despite her rage and frustration – even with AmpCore in turmoil and the factions clawing at each other's throats – there was one silver lining.

She was finally free to just do something her way.

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