Subverting The World [Cyber] - Chapter 26

The grenade landed with a thud, releasing a cloud of thick, inky smoke. It wasn’t meant to kill—just to blind.

The choking fog spread quickly, blinding cameras and scrambling standard sensors. Only infrared still functioned, but the prison’s budget constraints meant few bionic units were equipped with such tech. In this hallway, just one had the scanner active.

But when that lone bionic switched to infrared, all it picked up was a searing, concentrated heat signature blooming at the center—

—A real grenade had followed the decoy.

The resulting explosion tore through the bionics clustered nearby, shattering the corridor’s metallic frame, scorching the walls black.

Hidden in a storage closet tucked at the edge of the corridor, I had ducked out of sight. Using the last of my administrative access, I sent myself a backdoor unlock code and triggered the utility room’s door.

Just before stepping out, I dropped a second grenade at my own feet.

To her, the bomb’s effective radius appeared like a pulsing color wheel—she could “see” the explosion’s reach, strength diminishing outward. All the data flowed into her mind in the most intuitive, instantaneous way.

By the time she walked out, the prison’s bionic forces had dropped by a full quarter. Seventy-seven were offline due to network failure, nineteen obliterated outright by the blast.

Shi Xu stepped from the shadows and continued toward her objective.

She had disconnected.

Morgan, watching remotely, already understood where she was heading. What followed would be brutal, and Morgan was preparing her defenses in real time.

But hackers—real ones—don’t win by defense.

So Shi Xu struck before those preparations were done.

She didn’t bother hiding anymore. She walked boldly into the open, drawing attention by design.

Outside the corridor, a formation of ten bionic guards stood waiting, weapons leveled.

Shi Xu could see their lines of fire—each red trajectory projected from their weapons like a web of lasers.

[Bionic Guard #1: opening volley in 3 seconds. Remaining rounds: 7. Predicted pattern: …]
[Bionic Guard #2: opening volley in 3 seconds. Pathing: …]

She was cornered. Left, right, forward, behind—even overhead. Every possible escape vector had been calculated.

Could she get out?

She could.

This wasn’t about reflexes—it was pure computational precision. At the outer edge of human possibility.

So she stopped thinking.

She trusted her instincts.

A bullet is too fast for the eye, but she wasn’t dodging what she saw—she was evading what she knew would happen. Three seconds’ notice was all she needed.

And as the barrage opened up, Shi Xu moved.

Moments earlier.

One of Morgan’s bionics lay ruined—half a torso dragging across the floor, legs gone.

“She’s insane…” Morgan muttered, watching the final flicker of data fade from its digital eyes.

She jolted awake in a chilled bath, disoriented but alert. Wasting no time, she synced into another unit and re-entered the prison system.

She knew Shi Xu’s next move: heading to the power grid.

Cutting the power would be her last resort. When network disruption failed, isolation was the fallback.

The power plant was detached—still accessible through a narrow gap leading from the control station to the generator entrance. Once inside, the plant offered plenty of nooks to hide.

Morgan sent the closest available bionic unit toward the clearing.

She saw the “white bear”—its fur now smudged gray by smoke and ash. It stood still, avoiding direct shots, weaving through chaos.

Morgan grabbed a weapon and began her calculation. In seconds, she plotted every possible dodge path Shi Xu could take and opened fire in three precise waves.

Her first bullet shattered the door controls behind Shi Xu, trapping her.

The second grazed her heavy coat, nicking a wall beyond in a clean arc.

Then she saw something—Shi Xu made a motion.

Clink!

Something struck the ground. Suddenly, the bullet meant for Shi Xu’s chest veered just enough—missing by inches, whistling past her shoulder.

Coincidence?

No.

The third bullet aimed at her ankle failed. Shi Xu moved with eerie precision, almost as if she had calculated the collision points of the incoming shots.

She turned, and two bullets intended to converge simply disrupted each other—scraping her cheek as they passed harmlessly in opposite directions.

Despite the massive polar-bear-like silhouette, her movements were graceful—effortless.

Morgan realized something chilling: this wasn’t improvisation.

No ordinary hacker could pull this off.

To manipulate bullet patterns like this, you’d need to perform calculations at speeds beyond any unmodified brain—unless your brain was no longer fully human.

This was beyond human capability.

It wasn’t a battle anymore—it was a demonstration.

Morgan could only watch as the warden—Shi Xu—walked straight through the storm of bullets, stopped in front of her, and calmly said:

“Hello, Morgan.”

“I’ll give you three minutes to stop me,” she added, smoke clinging to her fur-lined coat. “Otherwise… I win.”

And with that, she disappeared into the power plant.

If Shi Xu had any cybernetic enhancements, weapons, or even basic remote triggers, this would all make sense.

But there was nothing.

Morgan was up against someone who played outside the system.

She suppressed the tremble in her hands, cut herself off from every other connection, and funneled all her processing power into a single unit—herself.

Then she entered the plant and sealed the door.

Dust showed a trail. One footprint deep in the corridor.

The surveillance feeds? Gone. Shi Xu had destroyed them only after confirming no bots were tailing her. Until then, she left them alone—an intentional mislead.

Now she didn’t need the misdirection.

Morgan pulled up the facility map and began the chase.

Her only advantage? She had expendable bodies. Shi Xu did not.

She followed the trail until—click—a trap. A mine with two seconds on its timer.

She retreated fast, only to realize—her foot was stuck. Industrial glue.

“You’ve got to be kidding me!”

Boom. Seconds later, a new body entered. The last one—only legs remained.

At the end of the corridor stood the polar bear again.

Shi Xu rolled another grenade—an EMP.

Morgan ducked into a side room.

Snap. Another trap.

New body. Number three. This one with heavy arms.

She opened fire with suppression rounds.

But the warden stopped playing.

Shi Xu bolted, slipped through a door, vanished.

Morgan didn’t follow—she fired into the walls.

Wrong choice.

Another door opened. The polar bear poked its head out, mockingly waved, and disappeared in another cloud of smoke.

There was no explosion this time.

She’d already moved.

Morgan cursed and sprinted forward.

Trap after trap—now she recognized their pattern. The warden’s arsenal wasn’t unlimited. After decoding a few setups, Morgan could anticipate the rest.

She pressed onward—until she reached the generator core.

The door stood open.

Inside, the warden faced the main controls.

“I bet you’re wondering why I waited until now,” Morgan called out from behind.

“In ten seconds, thirty minutes will have passed,” she said. “And if you fail, I’ll unlock every prisoner in the system.”

“Five seconds left. You can’t pull the main switch in time now.”

“You’re right.”

Morgan froze.

That voice—it wasn’t hers.

It wasn’t the warden’s.

It was a standard male bionic unit.

“Playback complete,” Unit 666 announced. “Message from the warden: I found you.”

“Mission successful.”

Then he pulled the lever.

Click.

The lights died.

Every camera, every circuit in the prison plunged into shadow.

Morgan sat up in her tank, breathing hard, the moon casting a cold white glare across her window.

Everything was silent, save for her own breath and the soft pulse of her neural circuits glowing pink.

Knock, knock.

A soft rapping at the door.

“Open up, Morgan.”

She turned slowly.

That voice.

The one every hacker dreads.

Squeak—

The door creaked open. The warden stood there, eyes like glacial fire.

Shi Xu slipped the master key back into her coat.

She had traced Morgan’s signal back through every bionic proxy. That’s when she decided: no partial win.

She wanted a total checkmate.

Unit 666 had executed her plan perfectly. Now it was time for the finishing stroke.

Boots echoing, Shi Xu stepped to the tub, leaned in, and unplugged the data feed from Morgan’s neck.

Then, gripping Morgan’s chin with steely fingers, she stared into her with eyes colder than steel.

“Had enough?” she asked, her voice calm but blazing with victory, her white uniform stained with soot, carrying the heat and smell of war.

And then, almost like a verdict:

“General Morgan.”