The week after Rebekah's death was, to put it ever so lightly, a shitshow. As I said before, Eclipse never had Titan's scope of resources. A cloak and dagger was our only weapon and currency. And no matter how fast we tried to do damage control, hiding a battle that included a set of crazy pictures, a woman firing at a crowd of people, and a shotgun blast was impossible.
Despite her snideness, Zhi always kept an aura of control and elegance in everything she did. She looked at life like she was the queen, and we were all the pawns on a chess board. However, this entire scenario brought out a side I would've become very familiar with as the years rolled by, the side shown when she didn't get her way.
In days, Zhi pulled every string she had in Eclipse and scoured Rebekah's hotel room so well it might as well be bleached. Even though she communicated faceless calls and letters, I could tell she was sacrificing sleep and sanity over this. Leaving my acquisition of her fabled Mcguffin all the more stress-inducing as I got shuffled to the sidelines.
The damn thing was smaller than a pen, and yet the heavy implications of it created a gravity so dense that it pulled me in. Every second I left it unattended or unanswered meant I was courting a death far more painful than anything Rebecca got. Still, I couldn't let it go unanswered. So, I decided to use Zhi's obsession against her and finally find some truth in the shadows.
After a pressing letter, I drew her out and found her location. I discovered my superior utterly rundown in a base dissimilar to our old stomping ground. With the many pictures and screens around her, I couldn't tell if this was her private quarters or an investigation room she called her own. Either way, I was greeted with dozens of recordings of our night out in Luxembourg City.
However, seeing Rebekah's corpse again was probably most disturbing, this time autopsied and picked clean as if a flock of vultures beset her. A chilling reminder of what my gambit could lead to. Zhi wasn't much worse for wear, either. Her evergreen bun was now slightly frayed, alongside deep sunken eyes burrowing into my skull upon entrance.
"Make it quick, Taotie, 'cause if you're looking for a quick mission, you're not getting any till this is done."
"No, it's nothing like Zhi. I was thinking about how I can help this case along."
"And that is?"
Nervously, I cleared my throat.
"I know we haven't found Rebekah's drive,"
"Yet. We can't find it yet. And we don't speak that traitor's name," she said, staring colder than a glacier.
"Right, yet. Then, we should shift our focus to more pragmatic measures. Stop the fire before it spreads."
"Get to the point."
Her constant counters made my already anxious frame worse, making my risk all the worse. Whether in a war of words or a battlefield, I knew better than anyone that Zhi would fester through any crack if there were one. Then again, I spent a decade lying to myself, compared to that fooling one person was easy.
"I want to hunt down this Nexus myself, kill them before they can do whatever they were going to do with the drive. That way, when we secure it, we don't need to worry about anyone trying to take it."
Zhi scoffed.
"Hmph, you couldn't even handle the traitor earlier, and if this Nexus has more people on her level, then you're going to die."
"Maybe, but I don't know what we're hunting for. So even if I get captured or tortured, this Nexus would never be any wiser to our operations. Hell, we'll move out of this base in a week anyway. Nothing to lose, everything to gain."
Zhi's face then wavered, realizing I was making at least some semblance of sense. Still, she waved her head.
"No, that still took much of risk, getting the drive-"
Predicting what she would say next, I reeled Zhi in with one last plea.
"But isn't that what you brought me in for?"
Zhi's light amber eyes perked up, gauging the next scathing insult for interrupting her while I kept going.
"You could've killed me at that diner or any time since I came to Eclipse, but you saw something in me. A wild card that not even your superiors saw until it was too late. And that was before I got trained. Whoever and whatever this Nexus is, there is a target at the end of the day. So let me be your Taotie. Let me hunt."
Zhi studied every subtle inflection and microexpression I had, searching for any ulterior motive or potential flaw. However, I already knew I had given her an offer I couldn't refuse. My reasons to hunt and finally find the truth were so intertwined they couldn't be separated. With the smokescreen of her achievements thrown back at her and her visible exhaustion, Zhi slacked her strength.
"Fine, but don't disappoint me Taotie," Zhi said as I immediately got to work.
Unfortunately, like most things, practicing what I preached is easier said than done. Unlike now, I didn't have the intricate connections I had now. That came later. So I had to rely on some prior knowledge plus the limited information Zhi would give me on Rebekah. Unlike my targets, most of the "traitor's" missions consist of undercover fraternizing with gangs and mobs worldwide.
Some of these operations would be so long that she would have to submit regular reports and letters to Zhi. After looking back at them obsessively, she noticed the most significant change in behavior, word choice, and syntax came when she went to the most vile den in all the world: Silicon Valley.
Specifically, San Jose, where she was running an operation to destabilize a gang war between the MS-13 and the Nuestra Familia a few months back. With the wounds and rumors still fresh, I found a lead talking about how, alongside territory and money, both sides were trying to get a leg up through blackmail and information. And in the marketplace of secrets and cover stories, the same symbol Rebekah had in her hotel room reigned supreme: The Nexus.
A digital boogeyman that, for the right price, can filter and dig up info on even the most elusive souls. Or worse, spread false rumors to the wrong people as "fact". Using this notoriety, Rebekah sowed chaos across the city to impose a parlay from the backseat. All with most of the town still thinking they were an urban myth.
After a month straight of info gathering, interrogation, and surveillance, I finally found where he lived. Compared to the high-tech highrises choking most of San Jose's urban sprawl, seeing Nexus laid in a barely put-together house on the city's outskirts was both humbling and disappointing.
At least, that's what I thought before sneaking into the house. However much like a frayed wire, things were a lot more complicated than they seemed on the inside. The entire setup of the place felt like a neon-infused Neverland, complete with elaborate portraits of street art, noxiously sweet rows of incense candles, and cashmere fabrics.
Blaring lo-fi music and the rows of LED lights made the place feel like a 24/7 gaming cafe and eased my weary frame so severely that I nearly missed out on the various sensors I tripped. Only by noticing a shifting shadow did I get to avoid multiple rounds from a flagrant pistol behind a kitchen counter. Bits of chipped marble reigned on my back like hot coals as my shooter shouted above the music.
"I don't know what you want, but I'm not afraid to stain my oak floorboards if need be! You'd be surprised how fast the cleanup comes around these parts!" a male voice stated.
Even above the loud melodies, I could tell through voice alone that whoever he was, he wasn't exactly a hardened criminal. I knew faux flexing and an itchy trigger finger when I saw it. Something I took full advantage of as I took a piece of debris and threw it over my shoulder. While he was attending to that, my real weapon, a deployed flashbang, went off without a hitch, introducing a storm of radiance that blinded the gunman enough for me to close in, disarm, and bring the man to his feet.
When he finally processed what happened, he groggily woke to a gun barrel staring at him. I watched every inch of his Adam's apple deliver a massive gulp while holding onto whatever composure he had amidst his hyperventilating.
"Whatever you do, just know my people will have you dead by morning."
"Then it's a good thing for both of us that I'm not here to kill you. I need your services," I say while pulling out the broken hard drive.
"Girl, you have a funny way of showing it," the man said sarcastically.
"Well, you aren't exactly an easy man to find. And if you don't help me find exactly what's on this drive to my laptop in a couple of hours, you won't be able to find anyone else who wants to find you. I can ensure that," I said with a dead glare through my mask.
A brief battle of wills happened between only glances until the man eventually relented.
"Fuck, fine, I'll help, but only because I just got this place."
I then helped the infamously elusive Nexus up to his feet. As we walked through the house and turned on proper lighting, I got a better look at him. Nexus was an African American about six feet tall but still plenty lanky. His attire consisted of a light purple hoodie, black track pants wuth purple stripes.
Paired with his short purple-tipped dreadlocks, angled face, and light green eyes, he was fashionable in a basement dweller way. Eventually, we entered what felt like a simple broom closet before Nexus put his hands right by the wall, revealing a hidden panel that scanned his fingerprints. Once, the door reveals a small staircase downwards, opening to god knows what.
Needles worth of goosebumps then started to line my arm, remembering my time as Asad's prisoner looked all too similar to this. Fortunately, before I could get sidestepped to hesitation, my hostage got cheeky.
"Ladies first?"
I then promptly nudged him to the staircase as we descended.