Before they could reach the vents from where she sneaked in, the facility shook, windows were smashed, her HUD is filled with alert pop-ups, Mikaela peers over Rina's shoulder as the sound of heavy turbines fills the air.
Mikaela: "Uh... is that bad? Because it sounds bad."
Rina glances at her, scowling.
Rina: "Not bad. Complicated."
A massive drone descends from the sky, flanked by a swarm of smaller, lethal-looking aerial bots. From its underside, an elite assault squad clad in servo-armored exosuits deploys with precision, landing heavily in a tactical formation.
Mikaela: "Complicated? That looks like overkill. Are they after us too?"
Rina shakes her head, gesturing for Mikaela to stay behind her.
Rina: "Not us. Them."
She nods toward the facility as the squad advances, their weapons humming with energy as they sweep through the area. In their wake, the swarm of drones follows, penetrating every nook and cranny, scanning, recording, and preparing to neutralize any remaining threats.
Mikaela (leaning in): "Wait, are these... your backup?"
Rina (snorting): "More like the cavalry after I've done all the heavy lifting. If insurance corpos don't mess around when you're flagged as a gold tier insurance... imagine the Citadel Militarized Police! Once the bioweapon files report were uploaded, they must have gone all out; it now involved the Citadel's security obligations, and these don't fuck around with general risks; the insurance stakes are in the hundreds of bitcoins to keep things tidy inside."
Mikaela (epiphany): "Oh... Oh no. It was the stupid joke! I was poking around his tablet—just curious, you know? They had all this high-tech equipment, way too advanced for processing meat or whatever. So I said something like, 'What is this, a designer virus lab?' I thought I was being funny! Next thing I know, their 'friendly' security team wasn't so friendly anymore."
Rina (rolling her eyes): "A joke? You're lucky they didn't shove you into one of their experiments."
Mikaela (defensive): "How was I supposed to know they were actually running a bioweapon lab?! I'm just a girly girl—well, was. (makes a gun hand gesture with both hands while leaning her back on the wall)"
A deafening explosion rattled the ground (Mikaela, scared, crouches back behind Rina) as one of the larger drones launched a missile into a warehouse corner, neutralizing the last pockets of resistance.. The servo-armored squad advanced with methodical precision, their every movement broadcast authority and power.
Mikaela (watching in awe): "They're terrifying."
Rina (nodding): "That's the point. The Citadel doesn't mess around when it comes to this level of crime. Your missing here flagged us, but the lab? That's a straight-up declaration of war on them."
As she begins to walk down the corridor.
Rina (mutters): "Let's get out of here. Relax. They know about us. They had to go through InsurLink first."
Mikaela: "That... doesn't make me feel better."
Rina smirked as they began making their way toward the extraction point, the chaos of the assault fading into the distance behind them.