Page 29
Story: Cyborg's Heart
I hesitated for a moment, then nodded. "Alright. But be careful. If you're caught, there's no telling what they'll do to you."
"And Team Three?" Jax asked, though I suspected he already knew the answer.
"That'll be me and Clover," I said, meeting her gaze. "We're going after Syntax-7 directly."
A hush fell over the room. It was the riskiest part of the plan, and everyone knew it. Syntax-7 wasn't just a skilled diplomat; he was a dangerous adversary with decades of covert operations experience.
"Are you sure about this?" Clover asked softly, her blue eyes searching mine for any sign of doubt.
I nodded, my resolve firm. "It has to be us. We're the only ones with the combined diplomatic and combat skills to face him on his own turf."
The room erupted into a flurry of discussion and debate. We spent the next several hours refining the plan, accounting for every contingency we could think of. As the artificial dawn broke outside, we finally had a solid strategy in place.
"Alright, people," Clover said, her voice carrying the weight of command. "We move out in twelve hours. Get some rest, check your gear, and be ready for anything."
As the others filed out of the room, I felt a nagging sense of unease. Something wasn't quite right, but I couldn't put my finger on it. I ran a quick diagnostic, wondering if my recent captivity had left some lingering damage to my systems.
"Goernx?" Clover's voice pulled me from my thoughts. "What is it?"
I shook my head, trying to clear the fog of suspicion. "I'm not sure. Just a feeling. Something about this doesn't add up."
She frowned, moving closer. "What do you mean?"
I lowered my voice, suddenly acutely aware of the possibility of being overheard. "The information I gathered during my captivity, the backdoor into their systems all seemed too easy. Like they wanted me to find it."
Clover's eyes widened slightly. "You think it might be a trap?"
"Maybe," I admitted. "Or maybe I'm just being paranoid. But we need to be prepared for the possibility that they're expecting us."
She nodded, her expression grim. "We'll double-check everything, run through every scenario again. But Goernx, if you really think this might be a setup, we need to consider scrapping the whole plan."
I shook my head. "No, we can't afford to do that. We might not get another chance like this. But we need to be smart about it. Maybe add another layer to the plan, something they won't see coming."
Clover was quiet for a moment, her mind clearly racing. "What if... what if we feed them false information? Make them think we're going for one target when we're really aiming for another?"
I felt a surge of pride and affection. This was why we made such a good team. "That could work. But we'd need someone on the inside, someone they'd trust implicitly."
As soon as the words left my mouth, a chilling realization hit me. I looked at Clover, seeing the same dawning horror in her eyes.
"A traitor," she whispered. "You think one of our people is working for them?"
I nodded slowly, my circuits humming with tension. "It would explain a lot. How they've always seemed to be one step ahead of us, how they knew exactly where to find me when I was captured."
Clover ran a hand through her hair. "But who? We've been so careful about vetting everyone."
I pulled up the personnel files on the holographic display, scanning through them with my enhanced vision. "We need to look for any inconsistencies, any unexplained absences or communications."
As we pored over the data, a pattern emerged. It was subtle, easy to miss if you weren't looking for it. But once we saw it, it was impossible to ignore.
"There," Clover said, pointing to a series of entries. "These data transfers, they're always happening at odd hours, when everyone else is asleep or off-duty."
I zoomed in on the information, my processors working overtime to analyze the pattern. "And look at the encryption signature. It's similar to the one used by the Cyborg High Command, but with slight variations."
"Clever," Clover murmured. "They've been hiding their tracks by mimicking our own communication protocols."
As we narrowed down the list of suspects, I felt a growing sense of dread. The evidence was pointing to someone we'd both come to trust implicitly, someone who'd been with us from the beginning.
"It can't be," Clover said, her voice barely above a whisper. "Not after everything we've been through."
Table of Contents
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- Page 28
- Page 29 (Reading here)
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