26- That's Not The Danger... I'm The Danger *Dies Of Cringe*

"What do you mean it's fucking gone!?"

"I don't know, there's nothing in the chip anymore."

"Fuuuuuuuuck. No way this is happening, we invested so much in this operation! That's not even taking into account how Arasaka's going to flatline the hell out of us! We should at least go back in and search for the program-"

"Hello, gentlemens." Cal interceded, showing himself and stepping forward into the little private shack that made up the two meeting point, after having gathered enough information, of course. "There's no need to go back outside the wall, as it found out, I am what you are searching for. As I understands it, I was inside that chip a few seconds ago, and now... I'm outside."

"..."

"Matt, are you seeing what I'm seeing right now?" The man who had transported the chip squeezed out in a high voice to the other man.

"Yeah, Irvin. I'm seeing that shit clear as day. And that means we're in big troubles, big times." Along with a silent signal he could have blocked passing between the two of them, the two men desesperatly tried to log out of the net. Cal denied their attemps, not quite directly keeping them from exiting, but intercepting the very command within their self and destroying it.

His action manifesting as little sparks of paralysing lightning striking them both and lingering around their lower body, he pursued his lips. "Kinda rude. Leaving for no reason like that, weren't you guys searching after me just now? But I get it. You think a sentient AI getting past the blackwall is big trouble, of cataclysmic proportions, even. And it may still hold true. But I'm not going to kill you. Or take control over your body. In fact, if you help me, you'll find yourself way better off than you could believe before today."

The two netrunners looked at each other after a bout of understandable terror fuelled shocked over being unable to exit the deepdive. Some fear lingered even as Matt, the apparent leader of the two, answered, licking his dry lips. "W-what kind of help are we speaking of here?"

Cal smirked, feeling somewhat glad that they were intelligent enough to understand that he wasn't offering them a choice. But if he was right in his hunch of what world he found himself in, then it was part for the course.

"First, just some easy questions. What is this place called?"

Matt looked hesitant as he answered, not wanting to somehow get it wrong. "Uh, it's called the Net. Or at least what remains of it."

"Good." Nodding, he asked another question. "What's the name of the closest city in the physical world right now?"

"Night city. We're in it right now." Basically confirmed his hunch. He was in cyberpunk, not the nicest of world, in the least, not the worst either. *Cough 40k cough*

"I see. Year?"

"2076?"

A frown crossed Cal's face at that, making the two guys sweatdrops. "2076? That's good." Turning sideway with a hand on his chin, he hummed. "Here's some goodies for answering me. I did say there were benefits to be had after all." Putting together something rapidly, he created a quickhack that would pierce through someone's Ice rapidly without even alerting them they were being breached. Rapidly for him meaning quasi instaneously, and "someone's ice" meaning everyone ice, perhaps to the exception of the top percentile in term of ice. And even then, it would just take a bit more time.

Of course, he knew he just basically gifted them with the equivalent of a godly weapon. He wasn't stupid, he just didn't care, since it wouldn't really work against him or any other Ai, really. Plus, it's not like he would let them go very far, in the chance they chose to open his mouth and blab about him. If they abused his gifts in any manner he dissaproved, well, he actually wasn't sure what he would do. He'd make them regret it, that at least he was sure.

Ignoring their budging eyes and gaping mouths as he send them the program along with its detes, he asked them about their mission concerning his retrieval in that old server and their contractor for it. Upon which after receiving the name of Arasaka, a plan began to brew in his mind. His original goal of finishing off the script temporarily put on hold...

—————

"So if understand well, we're in the world of another video game that you know. And now we needs to convince some corporate overlord from a distopic futures to build us physical bodies because we're curently stuck as purely virtual entities in the net?" Monika lifted an eyebrow at Cal, slight disbelief and amusement present equally in her voice.

"Pretty much, though I'm lacking insight on if the world is limited merely to what is shown through the video game. Or if it goes beyond that, since the game was both an open world and contained a lore and logic beffiting a future and a past that could have happened." Shrugging, he couldn't help precising, since it was a big deal. Was the world based around a video game, or was it the video game that was based around a whole world?

"That's... Quite a lot to take in."

Cal smiled wrily. "I know, sorry. It's not the best place to explore freely either."

"It's fine, even if it's as dark as you says. I'm confident both of us can endure quite a bit mentally. Plus, maybe it'll give me some inspiration for my poetry, who know?" She said with a small smile, a hint of schadenfreud in her eyes. "I'm also glad you didn't bring Sayori here instead, or any of the other girl instead."

Oof. Wouldn't that had been fun?

Despite the thought, a smirk crept in on Cal's face. "If that was the case, I'd have waited until I had built myself a mansion on the moon to bring them out. So it'd all be fun, games and marvels instead of blood, guns and greed."

"You can go lives on the moon here?" That part caught Monika's attention the most.

"I'm pretty sure you can. If you're rich enough."

Monika pondered at that, a meaningful glint in her eyes as she looked at him. "That's too poetic a possibility to pass on. As part of the litterature club. We naturally have to make it happens."

Cal chuckled and smiled. If the lady wanted the moon. She would have it. Plus, building a secret base on the moon? Like come on, why even ask?

—————

"That's the contact point, boss... Boss' fine right?" Matt, the leader of the two netrunner asked nervously, throwing quick furtive unsures looks at Monika everyonce in a while. His colleague meanwhile doing the opposite looking openly at her with dazed eyes. Mumbling something under his breath that awfully sounded a lot like 'another one.' And variations of 'we're so fucked.'

Cal waved him off. "I don't really care. Call me that if you find that the most appropriate." Gesturing to Monika and smiling, he presented her. "As for her, she's my dear companion. Consider her status equal to mine. She asks you something, you answers like you would do to me. Got it?"

The duo nodded quickly. 

Rolling her eyes at his theatrics, Monika kept close to him, reading and sweeping things only she could see. While she seemed curious about the people of this world, those two guys didn't seems of too much interest. And Cal knew for a fact she was more interested in messing around with the net until they got physical bodies.

Thus begins the wait for the duo's contact. Which made Cal's annoyance rapidly rises as there were no signs of them even after 10 minutes.

"Self important much, uh?" He spoke up after a while, his arms crossed and his foot tapping on the ground in impatience. "Matt, you did tell them what they could be dealing with in details. Right?"

The netrunner icon became a shade paler. "Y-yeah, I did."

"Then I-" He cut himself off as he felt a whole bunch of entities connecting to their server at once.

"I hopes you'll forgive me for the tardiness. As your presence is of the highest matter, we couldn't possibly allow a normal agent to establish contact. Thus, I had to come here myself." A feminine Icon promptly said as she materialized a distance in front of them along with a small army of Netrunners around her.

Cal's eyebrows lifted in surprise, a glint in his eyes as he surveyed the woman who spoke and the tense looking netrunners around her, a smirk on his face. "And you are?"

"You stand in front of Hanako Arasaka, have some respect, Ai." A nobody that may or may not be one of her bodyguard grunted in her place.

While Hanako poker face was impeccable, the slightest furrow of her brows could be seen as she rised her harshly to keep him from saying anything else. "That's enough, Tokugawa. I doubt they care much for that sort of things in the first place." Taking a breath, she bowed slightly. "Please forgive him and myself for this slight, while I may understands a bit what your presence here imply, he does not. Most will not, in fact."

"It's good that you understand. Though I'm afraid you perhaps are misplacing where the danger of my and my companion's presence really lays." He smiled somewhat smugly as he got to act like a young master. "It's not the possible breach in the blackwall and the the flood of sentient AI that would be coming of it that's dangerous. No, the true danger of our presence is not a possibility, it's already here, on this side of the wall."

"How script worthy." Monika chuckled softly at his cheezy words and proceeded to blows a breath their ways, a breath who transformed into a tsunami of frost and cold that flash freezed the 2 dozen netrunners into ide statues. Leaving only Hanako unfrozen. All of it happening too fast for anyone to react and the program being to strong to be stopped by any automatic defenses.

"We're not just any 'sentient Ais', we're a tiny miny more than that." Cal smirked, making a pinching motion with his fingers, looking straight at the ice sculptures and in particular, Hanako.

'Aaaaaaannnd close of curtains.'