It took a while but No.6 eventually complied, we all did. It was like, once again, working with strangers. The entire crew, without the hazmat masks on, felt like a whole different team. The virtual visor and voice manipulating tech really did a great job of masking everyone’s identity. It turns out that we all sounded like the direct opposite off what we all actually looked or sounded like. No.6, 9 and 2 all had black dragon tattoos at the left part of their faces followed by buzz cuts baring their serial numbers, could only mean they were sleepers (killers for hire). No.8 was more slender, scrawny even. He looked like he hasn’t had any sleep in days, I suspect he’s an addict. No.10 was the normal looking one amongst us. He had no tattoos or body status that made him seem like a punk. He was an average looking guy, he was the driver, but I still couldn't wrap my head around how he got himself into a situation like this.

  Everyone except for No.4 took off their masks. He seemed to not have any interest in revealing his identity.

  "What about him?" No.6 asked pointing at No.4. "Isn't he gonna take his off?"

  "He's less important in this case." No.1 replied sharply, trying to avert any further questions. "You two are with me, the rest of you will..."

  "What the fuck is that supposed to mean?" No.6 asked, his voice reverberating throughout the hall way. "Why does he get special treatments, huh?"

  "We all took off the masks, risking our ID's. It'd be fair if we all shared the risk." No.10 spoke out with a slight hesitation in his voice.

  "If am getting fucked by the authorities or CLAW, everyone should share in the consequences," No.6 added. "So you better take off the mask or I'll do it myself." said No.6 pointing at No.4. I don't know if it was just purely based on instinct or a well calculated strategy, but No.4 pulled his gun out on No.6.

  No.6 immediately draws his in response. No.1 followed also, but pointing hers on 6. The two other sleepers pulled out on both No.1and 4. It was only a matter of time before everyone had their guns out. It was basically a Mexican standoff. I had no idea who to pull out on, so I just stood there, cluelessly staring.

  "Put the gun down." Said No.1 through clenched teeth."

  "You know I have no problem dying right?" No.6 responds.

  "I won't tell you again." said No.1flipping the safety switch.

  "Then why don't you tell him to do that first?" he said nudging his head towards No.4's direction. No.1 knew it would cause more ruckus if she allowed No.4 keep his mask on.

  "Take it off." No.1 said, her gun still pointed at No.6. No.4 still stood, his gun pointing at No.6. "Take the fucking mask off, now!" No.1 yelled once more.

  Hesitantly, No.4 puts his gun back in its holster, everyone did the same. No.4 unzips his hazmat hood and takes it off.

  "What the fuck?!" No.6 commented.

  It was like staring at a mirror. No.4, for some reason, looked exactly like No.1. She was the absolute flawless copy of her.

  "What the fuck is this thing?" No.6 asked in amusement.

  "She's my sister," No.1 replied defensively. "So everyone should back off with the questions."

  It took us a while before everyone recovered from the unexpected surprise, but we all still stared. I've seen identical twins before, but this just seemed beyond that. No.4 and 1 seemed way more identical, almost like a perfect clone.

  "No.8, 6, and 9 will come with me towards the roof. No.4 will go with 3 to the vault. the rest of you will be on crowd control." No.1 ordered. "Any questions?" she asked. No one seemed to oppose, the plan seemed ok to some point.

  "Sooner or later, that door's gonna get stormed by either CLAW or the cops. Our top priority is buying more time for No.3 to break into the vault. The sooner we're done, the quicker we can get out of here." No.1 further elaborated.

  "If the door gets blocked, then how are we gonna get out?" No.6 asked.

  "I'm already working on that." No.1 replied.

  "Working on that?" said No.9. "So, there was no escape plan to start with?"

  "In case you forgot," No.1 responds. "I've also got the same stick up my ass, if you haven't noticed. You think any one of us wanna get caught?" No.9 stays silent.

  "Alright then boys," she added. "Let's get to work."

  No.4 and I headed straight for the vault. I hacked through the first door then disabled the electrical counter measure for the vaults entrance. The room was poorly lit with a greenish hue that seemed to glow periodically. There were so many deposit boxes covering all walls, all in hexagonal shapes, it was like a bee hive.

  "Help me look around," I said to No.4. "See if you can find any port-hole."

  She nods in response. I began searching on my side. We looked around for what seemed to be over 10 minutes.

  "Over here." No.4 yelled; I rushed towards where she stood. She was somehow able to pry open a floor board, and concealed beneath it, was a port-hole.

  "Whoaw!" I explaimed silently. "How did find that?" I asked. "No one could have seen that."

  "The floor felt empty under here when I stepped on it," she replied blankly.

  I put down the tool box and took out My Jackbox.

  "How long have you been doing this?" No.4 asked.

  "For as long as I can remember, I guess." I responded.

  She stared quietly as I setup the gadget with the port inlet.

  "So, you and your sister," I said a bit careful on my next words. "You've done bank jobs before?"

  "Not really, no." she replied.

  "So this your first gig then?" I asked again.

  "You could say that." she replied hesitantly. Her response gave me hints on how I was over stepping my bounds, I had to stop with the questions.

  I successfully set up everything, what's left was to Jack in.

  "This thing must be running with tons of data per second" I mumbled.

  "Is that a bad thing?" No.4 asked.

  "Sort of." I replied. "I have no idea what's in there, so I've gotta be really really careful."

  The Jackbox whined as I switched it on. It took a bit of a minute to give the green light, I never thought about it, but I was invading an unpredictable mainframe so it took me a while to mentally prepare myself. I tried to control my trembling hands, but failed at all efforts. Not from fear though, but from excitement.

  "Hey," No.4 said. "You ok?" she asked.

  "Yeah." I replied with a nod.

  "You got this." She said reassuringly. I connected the headgear then put it on. It was all black at first, then a sudden jolt dragged me in, as if pulling me out of my body and drowning me in a deep dark ocean.

  I looked at my transparent hands just to be sure I jacked in successfully. There wasn't much activity going on, there were a couple of strings intertwined, moving wildly at different angles. There was nothing above or below, but the data string went all the way downwards. I had to Jack deeper. Jacking can be quite dangerous at times. You'll come across security protocols and commands stationed to restrain direct access into a database. The entire process made use of signal transmitters wirelessly connected directly to your brain. Depending on the type of head gear you're using, you were limited to how deep you jacked in or what you did in there— go too deep, and that can lead to you exceeding your device's limit and then bricking your brain. Bricking either means you'd go mental or probably die, it's like loosing your mind to the deep web, there was no way of recovery after being bricked.

  I jacked a little deeper, then a glint of light sparkled from a far distance. I jacked in a bit towards the glinting light. It was the most rarest thing I've ever seen, spider-network. A spider-network was considered a gem in the world of cyber space, gain access to one, and you gain access to data beyond imagining. For an individual or organization to own one, you'd have a lot of dirty work you want to keep hidden, things that can never be found except by you. A spider-net is well secured due to it's ability to change encryption codes at an instant while simultaneously transferring data at high speed. The entire net was quite more unpredictable than I thought. I reached in closer, but the more I did, the strands kept pressing towards me. it seemed like a defense mechanism of some sort. To me, it only meant one thing, I have to avoid the the strands of strings else, the consequences could be dire. I didn't know what it would do to me, but it sure as hell would hurt. I scanned the entire mainframe for a pathway, or maybe a small crack I could slip through. The gaps were too small for me to go through, even if I tried a compression program in the Jackbox's virtual utility tool, it still wouldn't work.

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  I analyzed the network of strings and made an unexpected discovery. There was a pattern, but there has to be an external stimuli for it activate. I tried several viruses and bots but they didn't seem to do much effect to it. It was a smart system, what ever program it was that controlled the entire system. I'll have to trick it into thinking I was trying to breach in, without having to breach in myself. I accessed the Jackbox's utility and made a bot infused with a short AI code. It's a little trick I once used. although I got shut off using it, but this time, there was a bit of a modification to it. The idea of it was to trick the computer into thinking that I was striking from the front while I sneak in through the back. It previously failed because of the AI codes running through the bot. The security AI was able to identify my decoy as a fake and imediately pulled a safety switch shutting down all systems. Now, in the newly improved version, I ran a short line of code. The code was written in an old programing language called 'JAVA', it was considered a big deal back during it's age - now, it's just a bulky load of laggy trash.

  I crossed my semi translucent fingers, hoping it works. I wrapped the bot in a code similar to my virtual form. The Trojan decoy sailed closer to the webbed walls of the system. It touched a strand and the entire system's strings all concentrated and wrapped around the decoy, leaving enough space for me to pass through from the back. Upon successful entry, I immediately came across an anti-malware bot. I froze still, trying not to attract its attention. I accessed my Jack box utility tools and scrolled as fast as I could, looking for something I could use, anything.

  If I was caught by this malware bot, it could mean the end of the line for me. With immediate urgency, I applied a code around me, a false identity. Remember the code I stole from the receptionist? Yeah, it was a life saver. The anti-malware bot immediately identified me as a staff and ignored me. It would have been easier and safer if I just used the I D code from the very start to just get in, but there was a problem with that technique. If I did succeed in doing so, I might trigger suspicion from the system's main server seeing that I'm using an identity that wasnt given deep access to the database, which will later on pull a failsafe on me. But since I'm already in the system's core. it'll just do a recognition scan rather than a permission scan. Easy right?

  All the strands of data flowed to a central inner circle. The core of the computer's mainframe.

  If anything, I could just tap directly from it, but that would be way too risky, and stupid. I enabled a medium to link myself and the mainframe so as to tap from it without having to overload. A medium is more of like a stabilizer, it regulates the amount of data you access directly to you. Think of it as a step-down transformer regulating electricity. If you get too much power, you die. It usually isn't advisable, as at so many instances, mediums tend to be faulty.

  The moment I tapped from the mainframe, instantly, a sharp jolting pain ran through my head.

  It was the worst I've ever come across. Usually, connecting into a mainframe came with a minor discomfort before it gradually recalibrates within a few seconds. This one didn't seem to be regulating anything. The entire place gradually glowed red, I didn't know what that meant, but I sure as hell knew it wasn't a good sign. I checked the Jackbox status, I had my suspicions but I needed to be sure about it. I was right, the Jackbox was over heating, it was being pushed beyond its limits trying to regulate data flow, but it just couldn't keep up. Meanwhile, my head kept frying. I tried as much as possible to maintain my sanity and get the access codes before the Jackbox gives out. Fortunately, it was easy to get. At first, I was hesitant on what it was, but then it became even more clearer. This safety deposit box we were trying to open carried the most powerful and most dangerous object ever known to exist within the 30th century.

  They were Chroma-rocs, powerful tiny crystals, when fused together, make a big ass reactor capable of powering the largest blaster(nuke) to ever exist. I've only heard about it, but have never seen one before, and not to even mention how there were so many gathered at a spot. I didn't have enough time to think it through, so, I just pried it open. Then I caught a glimpse of something else, I immediately knew what this was, it was a shorter. It just turns out It came at the most convenient moment it could ever. I turned it on and scanned around for tiny signals within the bank, it was like a more specific form of an EMP. It wasn't at all hard to use, so, it was successful, time to ball out.

  The strings were up again. It's like I thought. getting out was going to be harder than I thought. I tried my old decoy trick again, but it just didn't seem to work. I was running out of time, I needed to Jackout as soon as I could, my brain was already frying at this point. I used the medium once more, the pain was far worse than before, I triggered the fail safe, but this time, giving me a 10 seconds head start. Immediately, the spinning web froze still. I dashed out as quickly as I could. It was the fastest I had ever swum. I focused more on reaching the top than bothering about the consequences of triggering the fail safe. The entire strings started to snap. Little by little, the Spider-net began crashing. I successfully reached Porting range then immediately Jacked out. I hastily took of the helmet and fell to the ground; my vision was blurry.

  No.4 wasn't there. there were loud muffling sounds. They sounded like gunshots, and lots of it. I tried to sit up. The little i could make out were the few dark drops on the now white tilled floor. I felt a bit of wetness on my nose. it was blood, and it didn't seem to stop flowing. I looked around, the Jackbox box was at the exact corner where I left it, only that there was a faint flickering flame on it. I wasn't sane enough to understand everything, but I could tell there was a lot going on. I crawled towards the door, barely reaching the main hall. The banging got louder. The jolting pain kicked in again, blood streamed out of my nose once more.

  I fell to the ground, surrendering to what seemed to be a forcefully induced sleep. I could see lots of heavy boots clopping, approaching me, some surrounded me, touching me. I couldn't make out everything, but they were the last thing I saw.