By David C. Daoust
Maile Purloin made short work of actually finding the server room; moving inconspicuously through buildings wasn’t noth’n she’d ever had problems with. Yet, factoring in the handy sign that read ‘Arachnoid server room’, pointing to the door… this was especially helpful at making it such short work.
When she spotted the single guard hanging out in a surveillance room, dedicated to watching said server room, she figured, ‘meh, no problem’.
As it turns out, this single guard actually managed to rope a woman from the convention above, to come and keep him company while he was on duty. She guessed she could see it; he wasn’t so bad looking. Maybe a little slimier than she may find attractive, but, you know, it is the Consortium.
The problem, Maile didn’t actually find out about the woman until –after- she knocked out the guard, used the keycard she’d lifted off her new friend, Theo, and headed into the server room. The charismatic thief spotted the woman jet from the room, just as she closed the door behind her.
This led to several more guards being called in, which, in turn, led to Maile having to barricade herself in the room while she tried to figure out how to actually bring the server down. Her major problem, throughout the dilemma, was figuring a way to bring it down, without them being able to just come in and flip it back on.
This meant Maile was going to have to cause property damage.
The sounds of multiple guards, beating on the sealed door, did not bode well.
Maile’d been in tighter situations than this, she was sure of it. She couldn’t think of any at the moment, but she was sure… she always made it out, one way or another.
One after another she began pulling the two inch server crystals from the liquid and shattering them against the ground, against a wall, she even whipped a few at the ceiling. It was actually kind of fun.
In reality, it was probably only one of the tiny crystals that acted as server to the entire game… but she didn’t know which one. They’d all have to go.
The last crystal shattered against a vent…
Maile smiled.
The ceiling had a vent!
Maile stomped her narrow heels on the crystals, shattering them further, as the guards tried to force the door open despite the chair pried up under the knob, she made her way to a desk and quickly positioned it under the vent.
The vent had key card reader!
Lucky!
She slipped her borrowed card through– The vent dropped open an inch and slid to the right…
One last act of vandalism, she kicked the whole vat over onto the shattered crystal from her vantage point on the desk. That liquid was not as kind to the crystals exposed core, as it was to its outer surface. The fragments sparked and popped, like shattered light bulbs, and then turned completely black. She was confident the servers were unsalvageable as she pulled herself up into the ceiling.
Maile expected a narrow chute she’d have to crawl through; instead she found it surprisingly spacious. She could stand up, easy; a slightly taller person may have to duck, but Maile’s height had always been in her heeled boots.
The problem- the energy bands that surged periodically from one side of the hall to the other. Like sudden bolts of lightning striking from one side to another. At first it appeared sporadic, but after a moment of study, it was a clear pattern.
Maile felt like she could navigate the pattern, easy. She wasn’t sure what, exactly, would happen if she got caught in the middle of such a surge- she doubted it could be good.
Boy, was she right; hit her like a truck.
Maile awoke in a cell some time later. She felt pretty well rested. She checked for marks, scorches, or, you know, flayed skin.
She appeared intact.
Maile had no way to know how long she’d been unconscious. There was always a chance she’d been healed already, and slept off the aftereffects of the healing tech. She felt her hair, it was A LOT shorter, she made kind of a ‘ew, not good’ face.
When the room suddenly flickered, and the hologram depicting a courtroom appeared around her, followed by her name being called from the docket… she had to assume she’d been out for a really long time, to get such a prompt arraignment, from the bloated and overworked justice system.
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