Jayne’s shoes slid on the polished stone floors of the Solus Corp Basement level, skidding to a stop just before she hit the wall. Her red eyes nervously darted over every detail of the nearly empty hallway. No signs of cameras or concealed turrets, she thought tenatively. Whatever, I can take whatever they’ve got. Jayne’s feet pushed off of the ground, launching her into a full sprint. Her short, red hair shone slightly in the sickeningly bright artificial lights, igniting the walls in crimson reflections; the red blurring as Jayne raced even faster. Long, thin legs pumped with an inhuman stamina as she shot down the hallway; her chest heaving rapidly under her black chest wrap and translucent crimson shirt. Jayne tensed her thin, red spaded tail tighter around the belt loops of her black, short cargo shorts. She disguised it as a belt when on stealth missions, for an obvious biomodification such as that would only end with the phrase “kill the mutant” and a wall of bullets.
Jayne’s legs began to slowly grow weary as she continued to run for what seemed like a minute straight. It was an obscenely long, strait corridor, she thought. Surgically clean, blank white paneled walls extended as far as the eye could see. It felt like the hallway would keep going into an artificially lit infinity. Out of the corner of her eye, Jayne suddenly spied a break in the panels. It was almost unrecognizable from the rest of the walls, save for a slight glowing light emanating from the crack.
Idiots, she scoffed, pushing her fingers into the thin break in the panels. Thought they could hide this room from me?
Jayne flung the panel back and dashed into the new room. Just before she was able to fully assess her new location, the room went black. Jayne turned to leave, but the panel slid closed with a solid thunk.
“Son of a Corporate whore!” Jayne shouted into the darkness. She slammed a fist against the panel, trying desperately to bash it open.
“Let me out you pansy ass fucks!” she growled. “I know you can fucking hear me! Show some balls for once dammit!”
From the corner of the room, Jayne heard a door sliding open. It was too quiet; too quiet for a human to hear. A smile broke its way across Jayne’s thin, pale face. They had no idea who she was.
“Hands up intruder, we have you surrounded,” called a harsh, synthesized voice from the door. This kind of anonymity was something only a corporate drone could be low enough to commit to. No, if you kill someone, they should know it was you, thought Jayne as the cybernetic perception implants in her ears flicked on. She held her breath as she focused completely on the sound in the room. Jayne heard the beating of 2 hearts: hers and the person by the doors. A gleeful smile stretched across her face as she calmly raised her hands.
“Let’s dance,” she chuckled under her breath.
In the blink of an eye, Jayne dropped down, turned herself towards the person at the door and dashed towards the gaurd. Jayne felt her hand connect with the person’s chest armor, then shove through. A synthesized scream shot out as hot blood began to pour out of the man’s chest. Jayne felt the man aim his gun down at her, to which she responded by twisting her hand deeper into the man’s chest till she grasped his spine. Bullets rattled off wildly in the darkness, pinging off of metal this and stone that. Jayne pulled hard, snapping the man’s spine with a decisive jerk. The gun ceased firing.
The man’s body fell limp, then crumpled to the floor, dragging Jayne’s hand down with it. Jayne continued to hold onto the spine; her fingers feeling up and down his back . The tingling came slow at first; small sparks jumping here and there like fleeing memories of the life that used to be. Suddenly, the electricity concentrated and surged into Jayne’s arm. She felt her entire body tingle as the electricity reawakened her latent bionetic modifications all throughout her body. Her muscles flexed and swelled, then snapped tight. Her tail twitched and unravelled from around her waist, snapping a few times to regain blood flow. An especially sharp surge forced Jayne to snap her eyes shut. When she opened them, the room glowed in a vibrant array of in-frared colors. She looked around.
The room was small, about twice the size of a household closet, but much better stocked. The entire wall to Jayne’s left was covered with all manner of high grade gadgetry from simple combat rifles and pistols to cloaking shields and crystal powered refractor rifles that fired concentrated beams of heat. In the corner of the room, on a metal table sat a data slate; a tablet used to house dozens of different data cards at once. Jayne eyed the slate thoughtfully before turning to look at the wall of equipment. she leaned on her left foot and crossed her arms before her. Her tail swished back and forth playfully.
“Well now, which one of these little joys will make those corporate nutjobs the most pissed,” she snickered, raising her left arm to her chin.
She scanned the dozens of trinkets of every shape and size before something finally caught her eye. It was a small, circular metal device easily carried are more easily concealed. A glassy ring encircled the center of the device. Two clips hung off of the back for easy attachment to a combat belt and 3 wires protruding from what Jayne assumed was the side. Jayne lifted the device off the wall and hooked it onto her belt. she lifted up the back of her shirt. She plugged the wires into the Universal Cybernetic Import slots in her spine. A chill ran up her spine as she felt the device power up. The ring on the device slowly began to glow green.
She let her shirt fall back down, and turned back towards the man on the ground. With her vision finally enabled, the man glowed a light blue, with occasional splotches of orange fading to reds. At his sides, were the handles of some devices. Jayne walked over to the man and pulled them out of their holsters. Jayne’s eyes lit up as she withdrew a pair of fully charged glassrend refractor pistols. They functioned in most senses like the old slugthrower pistols, but could fire of nearly a thousand shots before a new crystal was needed. And if one had a personal charger...
Jayne flipped the man over.
“Jackpot!” she cheered, pulling a crystal charger from the man’s ammo storage pack.
She let the man flop back onto the stone floor as she placed the pack into her own ammo pouch on her right thigh. Without a second look, she raised the pistols and snuck out the door.
