#First Strike
#017
The old black zone felt like a graveyard of forgotten wars.
Dust floated in shafts of broken light. The walls sweated rust, and every door creaked like it was remembering screams from decades ago. Somewhere beyond the battered walls, the city raged on, a war of memory and control.
Asher adjusted the analog comms rig Eden had jerry-rigged from scrap. The signal was scratchy, but isolated. No Bliss interference. That was their only advantage now.
Eden tightened the last strap on Juno's copper-lined helmet, her hands steady despite the tension in the air. "He's stable, for now," she said, voice low. "But he lost more than we thought. Whole sections of memory look burned."
Asher crouched beside Juno, who sat limp in the corner, shivering slightly. "Can he talk?"
"He can," Eden answered, "but every question feels like tearing stitches."
Veyr entered, wiping blood off his knuckles with a rag that used to be a resistance flag. "We lost Deep Access Route B. Bliss units sealed it. They're running sweeps."
"How long before they find this place?" Asher asked.
Veyr hesitated. "Hours. A day if we are lucky. They are not playing anymore."
Asher looked around the dim bunker. Old tech hummed quietly, ancient and stubborn, like the spirits of those who fought before them. "Then we strike first."
Eden frowned. "Strike? With what? We have no army."
"We have truth," Asher said. "And maybe... fear."
Veyr tossed the rag aside and leaned against a rusted terminal. "You thinking what I am thinking?"
Asher nodded. "We show the city what Bliss is doing right now. Not memories of the past. The live horror."
Eden's eyes widened. "Stream the mind burns?"
"Yes," Asher said. "Force everyone to see what Bliss calls 'peace enforcement.' No edits. No propaganda. Raw and ugly."
Veyr whistled low. "It will tear the city apart."
"Good," Asher said. "It needs to."
The room fell silent except for the buzzing of old machinery. Eden chewed her lip, then grabbed a stack of yellowed schematics from a crate.
"There's a way," she said. "The Riot Days left behind an old uplink. Completely isolated from Blissnet. If we can patch into it, we can broadcast without being filtered."
"Where?" Asher asked.
She pointed to a dot on the map. "Sector G-9. Underground. But it is deep inside Bliss patrol zones."
Asher's jaw tightened. "We move at night. Two teams. One to get the feed running. One to keep Juno safe."
"I am not sitting this out," Veyr said immediately.
"You won't," Asher assured him. "But we need Juno alive too. If they get him, if they wipe him completely, we lose everything."
Eden's fingers tapped a steady rhythm against the crate. "We are running out of time, Asher. They are already rewriting the streets. You saw it. They are stitching lies into the cracks before people can even think."
Asher nodded grimly. "Then we better make our truth loud."
They set out at midnight.
The streets had changed again. Walls once splattered with graffiti now shimmered with Bliss slogans. Drones floated silently above, scanning every movement. Crowds moved like sleepwalkers, their faces dull, memories overwritten with manufactured calm.
It was colder too, a deep unnatural chill. Asher pulled his jacket tighter, motioning for the others to split.
Veyr and Eden would take the uplink.
Asher would stay with Juno.
They moved quickly through alleys and maintenance tunnels, the map etched into Asher's mind like a lifeline.
Juno stumbled beside him, muttering fragments under his breath. Asher kept a firm grip on the Recorder's shoulder. They had to make it. Failure was not an option anymore.
Halfway to the fallback point, the air vibrated with the low hum of an approaching drone swarm.
Asher ducked behind a rusted barrier, pulling Juno down with him. He peered through a crack. The drones were not patrolling anymore. They were hunting.
One of them hovered close, sleek and black, scanning the street with thin beams of sickly blue light. Asher recognized the model instantly. Neural stinger units.
He held his breath.
Juno whimpered softly, a sound almost too small to notice. But the drone's sensors twitched, and it shifted toward their hiding spot.
Asher cursed under his breath. He glanced around, searching for an escape route.
Nothing but dead ends and walls.
The drone drew closer, a soft mechanical hiss in the silence. Tiny needles unfolded from its sides, glittering under the city's false moons.
Asher had no choice.
He slammed his fist against the old barrier, sending a sharp clang echoing down a side alley. The drone snapped around and darted toward the sound.
Asher pulled Juno up and bolted the other way, heart hammering.
They did not stop until they reached the fallback shelter, an abandoned train station buried under layers of collapsed concrete.
Inside, Eden was already working, fingers flying over old manual switches, rewiring cables, splicing life back into dead circuits.
Veyr stood guard near the entrance, pulse rifle ready.
"You good?" Veyr asked without turning.
"Barely," Asher said, helping Juno into a seat. "You?"
Veyr grinned. "They are dumb without a full hive connection. Old tricks still work."
Eden flipped a final switch. A deep, vibrating hum filled the room. The old uplink systems came to life, screens flickering, speakers popping with static.
"We are in," she said, wiping sweat from her brow.
Asher stepped forward. "Patch the live feed from the city cams. All sectors."
Eden hesitated. "It is going to be brutal."
"Good," Asher said. "Let them see."
The screens lit up one by one.
The city unfolded before them, raw and unfiltered. Fires in the slums. Protesters being cut down with neural stingers. Families dragged screaming into transport vans. Children staring hollow-eyed at monuments they no longer remembered building.
And at the heart of it, Bliss units marching like machines, faces cold and untouched.
Eden tapped a final command into the console.
The feed surged outward.
Every hacked screen, every unlocked device, every hidden terminal in the city flashed alive with the truth.
No edits.
No scripts.
Only the raw violence of a system trying to erase the soul of its people.
Asher watched as the first screams echoed through the airwaves. Drones scrambled. Bliss agents cursed into comms. But it was too late.
The truth was out.
And for the first time in years, the city remembered what it meant to feel.
Asher turned to Eden and Veyr, a fierce light in his eyes.
"This is just the beginning."
Outside, the first explosion of true rebellion lit up the night sky.
The first strike had landed.
And Bliss would never be able to unwrite it.