Port

Two in the morning, I hated it. A beautiful night sky artfully dotted with stars in a spiderweb of wires. And yet below, the den of secrets and proffered hope in dark times. One felt like a thick blanket to hug the other for warmth.

I disagreed on many things with the Orthodoxy, but the Basilica was a useful and good place, needed by the people. If I’m right, it’ll be like B said, I’ve stained an important pillar tonight. But the scales have the lives of Louise and everyone else in this town on them. Why did I have to put them on to see if they were balanced?

There was no balance.

I didn’t know the outcome. All I carried was hope. Hope that the night ended in a positive course.

Fixing the relic to my hand, it was time to face the ruin. I swallowed tightly. This wasn’t like before. My whole body knew it. It raced. Sweat tried to soak through my clothes. Damn. I’m not even inside yet. “Get a grip, girl…”

“Good luck.”

I glanced down seeing B rubbing my shirt a little. “Thanks.” It helped a little. Flipping my gaze to the window, I controlled my breath to pace myself. I needed to be calm, as I could at least. This part was the easy side too and it felt like I had to climb to the top of Perdido just using my hands.

Bracing on the roof, I launched forward remembering what happened last time. I put in a little extra strength through my exo-clothes to close the gap. My familiarity landed me cleanly with the window. A short hack to render me invisible again and I had the run of the place once more.

However, the goals were different this time. I popped up to the roof and looked around. With the map I got in more detail, I found the dock for the Basilica. No time could be wasted in this run, I only had one chance at all of this. I sprinted for the location.

The roof at least kept me out of the eye of the patrols. However, the dock wasn’t so fortunate. And damn the thing was big. I know I saw it on the map, but seeing it in person made all the difference in scale. Felt like I was looking at a major freight hub.

It had three floors of decks and an entire roundhouse of ships. Each port housed one of their ships that I saw flying around the skies. Shit, they really are the power of the town, not the Corpus. This would be something I’d expect to find in the Corpus. How’d they get this powerful? Was it because they were the Orthodox or something else? No, questions had to wait.

I crouched low on the roof judging the port. It was built separate from the Basilica, but had a connecting bridge to the lower floor. There was probably an elevator that ran up the center to all of the floors. And the bridge had two guards. Worse, this wasn’t a landing pad, but a whole structure which likely meant they had a night crew working inside.

All I needed was a data port or terminal to access. The whole thing was probably on the Basilica’s grid, but they should keep local files in the port that get transferred to the main servers. My hope was that the port had lighter security. A backdoor.

“All or nothing now…” Waiting until the guards reached the far end of the bridge, I tapped on a small red pin attached to my jacket. A quick shimmer ran in rings from the pin across my clothes. Thanks to the circuitry within them, the relic pin could interact with it.

Though my appearance didn’t change, it created an optical camouflage that only affected cybernetics, which thankfully most people had. Hardly a perfect cover, at a distance, it’d scramble my image enough that I’d look like an error or dust rather than a person.

I jumped down, throwing out my whip. It attached to the underside of the bridge swinging me over. Swaying side to side, I heard my heart thumping knowing that in time the guards began their approach. The night and relic gave me good cover, but I needed to rush.

Pulling in the whip. I secured myself to the underside. Pipes and beams ran the whole length. It likely supplied fuel and network connections to the Basilica. Not the friendliest place to crawl across on, but better than dealing with guards.

Slowly I worked across trying not to count the time that I wasted doing this. But I wasn’t one of those super spies that I read about in books that could effortlessly jump and climb anything that they wanted. I was just a normal human with a slight bit of help. Though I could do with some of their athleticism. Farm work and self defense didn’t prepare me for espionage.

Bemoaning my shortcomings mentally passed the time well enough. I finally reached the end. Latching on with the whip, I climbed up the side out of sight of the bridge. A moment paused on the massive port gate that sealed away the ship tempted me, but the security probably was too much trouble. Not to mention, I didn’t know who was on the other side.

Above me, I saw a small vent to exchange air. That didn’t have tight security on it. I peeled the hatch back and slipped inside.

It wasn’t a pleasant fit. This didn’t work like I thought it would. I felt my body squeezed and pressing on the thin plating of the vent piping. Only thanks to my small frame could I actually move my arms around. Please, I didn’t want to get stuck inside here and die!

With the aid of my whip to pull myself through, I squeezed through like jelly from a tube. It wasn’t a good feeling. My jacket protected me from what I thought would skin me alive. Though I think it also made the whole thing worse. Just let it all be over soon!

Light broke up ahead of me in a series of lines, an exit! Oh thank Sol, I’m not stuck. Mentally whispering tiny prayers, I wormed forward. A couple times I thought I got stuck or snagged on something, but freed a moment later. I think I was half my weight in sweat at this point.

But I could see the vent and outside into the dock. Impressive, as expected, it reminded me a lot of the Corpus though with a different condescending air to it, which I didn’t think was possible from technology.

It had clean lines that ran to the main pillar. An access column both to the lift and equipment. The crew stations fit neatly there. Above, I saw what looked like a marble carved façade, though I could only imagine it too wasn’t real marble like the Basilica. But it ran long spires out like the center of the lift was the sun and it lit everything. Latin poems and doctrine detailed every trim and molding of the port.

The thing felt like an over indulgent waste of artistry, it was supposed to be practical. Not a center of worship. But I guess that was how the Orthodox thought. Whatever, time for the mission.

I glanced around for anyone that might be working. Each pad housed a ship dividing itself with partitions. However, it wasn’t a solid wall, but columns and framework. Enough to divide, but still allow teams to pass through. I’d be seen if there was anyone.

Dammit, I could see at least three over in the distance working on a ship. They had their back turned at least, but it was still a risk. Either way, I didn’t see anyone else. Now was going to be the only time I had.

Pushing out on the vent, I did a final check and saw no one else. Nothing beneath me, but the security ship. A slight pop came as I got my hips through and I felt my body getting taken over by gravity. I threw out my whip fast to get a hold of the ceiling. Before my feet lost their hold on the vent, I secured myself a soft landing.

The distance to the ship felt a little deceptive in how close it was, but I crawled up to the back side quickly. At the rear, I kept myself on the opposite side of a fin so that the crew couldn’t see me. Ahead I saw the stations they used. Each looked appealing, but I scanned for more signs of people. Nothing still.

I lowered myself down and crept along the partition working towards the pillar. They still hadn’t noticed me. I checked around under the ships for any feet, still nothing. This side would be safe. Just need to keep aware of them.

I picked two pads down to stay completely out of their sights. The alcove station had countless tools I could only guess at their use. But more importantly a terminal I could access the network.

Time to see if I could live up to the name they all gave me, Hacker.