Sensing the tension building as soon as they entered, Rider offered to deal with the talking to which there were no objects.

Giving the Desk Pony a smile she begins to explain “Hey, your Boss is expecting us, we have a particular object he would love to get his hooves on”

The Desk Pony simply raises an eyebrow “And what is this object?”

Rider shows the storage drive hoping the Desk Pony would get her meaning, to which the pony simply points at an elevator before stating plainly “Top floor, go nowhere else.”

Rider nods then waves over her friends who follow her over to the elevator which opens as soon as she hit the call button, the elevator while clean was far too small for the four of them and they ended up pressed up against each other.

Thankfully the awkwardness was short lived as they found themselves on the very top floor of the tower, the elevator opening to a long and wide white painted steel corridor. Towards the end was a set of glass sliding doors.

Leaving the elevator the crew slowly walks down the corridor, now acutely aware they were being watched by a heavily armored guard pony visible through the glass.

“Overcompensating much?” Titus mocks.

“Don’t be an idiot or we die” Access states coldly.

The Armored Pony pulls open the door with his magic as the crew approaches, gesturing towards a set of four seats at one end of a board table.

“Mr Sun will be with you shortly, please sit.” the Armored Pony says with a hint of aggression.

The four sit in the chairs without protest and they each begin to slowly look around the room, it was full of trophies, awards and various statues, no doubt the achievements of this Mr Sun.

Among the various awards were weapons and sets of armor in glass cases, including some none of the crew had seen before, likely prototypes or display pieces, clearly this pony liked his shiny toys.

Another set of glass doors on the opposite wall slides open without warning and out strode a well manicured yellow-maned Pegasus Stallion, this must be the pony they were to see.

“Well, I assume some congratulations are in order then?” the stallion spoke with an upper-class educated eloquence.

“We have your property” Rider says, removing the storage device from a pocket then pushes it across the table.

“Ah, excellent!” the stallion says with a pleased look on his face.

The stallion looks over the contents of the drive with one of the terminals set out on the board table, upon being satisfied that everything is present, he begins to speak once more.

“My name is Bright Sun, I am the CEO of Equi-Tech but I suspect you knew that already, you have not only completed the task we gave you to a satisfactory level but you have also passed our test too.”

“Test?” Access asks in confusion.

Access began to think about his contact, Sheet Rock, was she involved too? Or was that merely coincidence, he dared not ask since if he was wrong about her involvement Equi-Tech would likely have her hunted down.

It was very likely that she was involved however, things aligned just a little too well for her not to be.

“Oh yes, You must have noticed how easy things seemed, this was because we were testing you not for skill but for willingness to do what was asked of you.” Bright Sun explained.

Anger began to bubble in Rider, Had this pony really staged the entire job and nearly got one of them killed?

“Furthermore, you were in no real danger as every guard onsite were notified of your arrival. I trust nobody was hurt?”

This comment made Rider explode in anger which even surprised the normally aggressive Titus Steel, for her it was out of character.

“Are you aware Access nearly died because of a Cyberdeck overload that your security caused, something in that system nearly fried him!”

“Nothing to do with us, what security are you referring to?” Bright Sun asks with a dismissive tone to his voice, which earned him an angry glare from them all.

“Some sort of avatar, glitched and shifting as if it couldn’t keep a particular shape or form” Access blurted.

Bright Sun sat back in his chair and stared down the table for a few moments, deep in thought for moment he spoke again in a hushed tone.

“Did it say anything specific?” Bright Sun now looked a little uncomfortable and the atmosphere had become somewhat tense.

Access began to explain as best as he could remember “It called me an intruder and demanded I left the system and when I didn’t it sent my Deck into overload, which nearly killed me.”

“What I’m about to tell you stays between us, it’s existence cannot be allowed to get out.” Bright Sun said with a stern look.

“Just what is that thing?” Red Star asks.

Bright Sun sighs “Nobody knows for sure, our best guess that it’s a decommissioned AI gone rogue, normally these things are kept on short leashes but someone dropped the ball on this one.”

“Hold on a moment, doesn’t this mean that anyone who uses the Net is at risk of this thing?” Titus asks.

Bright Sun responded quickly “No, The only attacks so far have been on your friend and some of our elite Netrunners.”

“So why would it target me?” Access asks with some worry on his voice.

“It’s possible that it saw you as a threat, which regrettably caused its assault on yourself.” Bright sun asserts.

Anger, Worry, Sadness, Guilt, A number of different emotions welled up in Rider as Bright Sun was speaking, she could have lost Access forever if that thing had gotten its way.

None of them could do anything about it though, they knew too little and had too much to lose trying to fight something many orders of magnitude stronger than them.

That was assuming they weren’t being lied to again, which they thought was likely but had no real proof to the contrary. They’d have to believe Bright Sun for now.

“For now, all four of you should lay low and enjoy your reward, further I would request you don’t disclose anything we’ve discussed” Bright Sun said with what passes for an apologetic look.

The crew looks to each other nodding in agreement.

“Fine, assuming you don’t screw us” Rider spat.

“Heavens above why would I do that!” Bright Sun said with feigned offense.

Four Eurobit chits are taken from a nearby briefcase and pushed across the table to the four crew members.

With a wink Bright Sun says “I trust this will be adequate compensation for all the ugliness involved, expect to be contacted in a weeks time.”

The crew get up to leave after each grabbing their Eurobit chits, They had their rewards and couldn’t wait until they were free of this entire mess, as they were leaving Bright Sun calls out to Access.

“Access, Go to the reception desk and ask to be taken to Doctor Brandy Snaps, they’ll understand my meaning, He’ll take care of your medical needs.”

Heading back down to the lobby the crew try to process what they were just told.

“Can we trust this guy?” Titus asks.

“You can never tell with ponies like him.” Red Star says.

“I’m willing to give him the benefit of the doubt for now.” Access states.

“Yeah I agree, I think we should go and think this out for a while, we have money and time to think” Rider says happily.

“You guys go, I gotta go find this Doctor he mentioned” Access says as he rubs the back of his head.

“Yeah man, seeya later” Titus says as he turns to leave.

Red Star simply nods and leaves with Titus, Rider contemplated staying with Access but opted to leave with the others.

“Don’t stay too long, let me know when you’re done here” Rider says with worry.

Access nods and heads back up to the reception desk to get some directions, he’d rather not go wandering around a corporate HQ.

Hopefully this Doctor could help, Access felt helpless without his implants.

Author's Note

Another chapter done!

Seems our motley crew is getting some answers, though not to the real important questions.