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Beep!
An unyielding stream of call requests...
Over and over... and over and over... and over and over... and over and over again.
Ever since the fall of the Executioner... an individual by the moniker of "Dot" has been dialing his number. Call after call, ringing out nearly endlessly with no answer. Chouko and Shortcake simply endure the sound as they drive, drowning it out with country music.
But with every dozen rings, each attempted call...
... enough time passes for another step in Dot's grand plan.
Ring... Ring... Ring...
"... what in the...?"
While this phone remains unanswered, the phone of another is alerted elsewhere. The phone of a man, a mercenary, one that was currently drinking in one of the Underworld's various bars.
The mercenary looks at his phone to see an encrypted notification, his eyebrow raised at this. Usually, the encrypted messages he receives are under a different contact, instead of some girl named "Dot". Regardless, he... opens the message and reads the message— spitting his drink out onto the bar counter upon reading the mission's reward.
"F-FIFTY MILLION DOLLARS?!" he shouts at the top of his lungs, in sheer disbelief. "HUH?!"
At that moment, he realizes... this was a job posting given to- to him, specifically, rewarding him $50,000,000 for just one girl. The opportunity of a lifetime handed to him on a gold platter, something that will have him set completely for life...
Ring... Ring... Ring...
... but it was not, in fact, given to him specifically.
Phones are setting off in the bar, and other mercenaries around him are starting to get the message as well. The job posting is spread throughout the rest of the mercenaries.
More mercenaries start to get the notice, with the one right next to him getting the same notification a mere minute later than he does.
The first mercenary looks around as phones are set off, the shock and disbelief beginning to fade as more people are being invited into his jackpot.
Everything went quiet for him upon a mercenary sitting next to him—reading the exact same notice—is astonished as well. The reward flashes in his eyes, the light of the phone screen reflected off of his eyes. "F-Fifty million?! Is this guy serious?!"
"Seems like it..." the first mercenary responds.
"Woah... this is some sorta jackpot, the opportunity of a lifetime! Hey, if we split this, we get twenty-five million, and..."
The first mercenary stares at this mercenary, tuning out the words as he tightly grips the handle of his beer glass...
Ring... Ring... Ring...
"A-AGH!"
The glass smashes against a man's head, breaking into hundreds of pieces. Beer splashed over the body, with the first mercenary glaring down at the now knocked-out body. Before this poor guy even knew what happened, he was out like a light, blood oozing out of the shard-covered head wound.
An act of violence was taken to protect his lifetime meal ticket, with 50 million dollars on the line. A mixture of pure wrath melding with greed, this first mercenary did what was needed to lessen the competition.
However, in that bar, as other mercenaries read the same message... the smashed beer mug is the instigator of paranoia. This is a 50 million dollar reward. People will kill each other for the entire value.
So, out of survival instinct, they begin to target this man, to target each other, and to break out in utterly unorganized chaos.
Ring... Ring... Ring...
Job listings of this magnitude needed to be regulated. The higher-ups of the Underworld needed to verify the reward and adjust it as necessary before anything was set in stone.
So, without a clear reason why it wasn't regulated, whoever is responsible for letting this job through has single-handedly caused the entirety of the Underworld to crash.
The first few minutes had the Underworld breaking into a sweat. Many mercenaries that were undergoing mere hundred or thousand dollar jobs had their priorities realigned, with informants and messengers actively jumping onto the Anti-Ashford bandwagon. Who exactly would turn down fifty million to simply capture a single girl?
All hands were on deck. With coordinates to the last-sighted office building, mercenaries were lured to this beacon of money.
Ring... Ring... Ring...
However, by the time many of them arrived, all they could find was what Dot predicted: a building full of now-confirmed dead mercenaries, with not a clue on how to find Ashford. The first mercenaries on sight swept the building, finding mercenaries that had some recognition in the Underworld, with an unrecognizably maimed corpse on the top floor.
"Man. One girl did all of this...?"
"Indeed, we should just let the police handle the cleanup, and— ... do... do you hear that?"
With the sound of sirens in the distance, law enforcement arrived sooner than expected. The information got to the police, who were notified that there was a building full of dead people. Indianapolis deemed it a crime of the highest priority, with countless officers arriving at the scene of mercenaries.
This very well came off as a job that simply lured mercenaries to a stakeout, with some mercenaries apprehended. In situations like these, it was best to let the police apprehend them, as the Underworld has measures to protect these men and discreetly retrieve them.
However, the time-sensitive 50 million dollars hung over the heads of these mercenaries...
... so, all hell breaks loose once a sniper shoots the first officer's brains out.
Ring... Ring... Ring...
One dead officer is the catalyst for everything to break into a violent fit. There are dead bodies in that building, and now there is a gunman who has killed an officer of the law. So, naturally, force is authorized.
The police and the mercenaries sprawl outward into a gunfight, an impromptu war that adds more to the body count. The police call for more reinforcements to apprehend these men, and the mercenaries simply fight for their survival against the officers.
With the police fearing further loss of life, the human officers are ordered to retreat...
... and several combat androids are deployed to the scene.
The subsequent presence of androids is enough to get those with cybernetics into a violent rage. The fires of war ignite. Caliber Company androids are ordered to be shot down, to be taken out of the sky, and scrapped for metal, with active means to take these artificial buckets of bolts down.
With the cybernetic mercenaries in charge, one action leads to another, and the street ends up engulfed with fire, the remains of human corpses and robotic scrap scattered all over the scene...
Ring... Ring... Ring...
This was utterly horrifying, and—from minute one—news helicopters were on the scene to capture all of it. This was a story meant to be broadcast, to inform the public and rile them up. The people in those helicopters, from the safety of the skies, were ready to broadcast this sight across the country.
Only for them to find that the connection between the aerial reporters and the stations is cut off.
None of the footage at Indianapolis could reach a single news station. The technology on the helicopters, on the signal towers, on everything, all of it just faced interference and noise. Everything was completely overloaded to the point where technology itself simply slowed down.
The bloodshed and the fire that resulted near this office building would become public attention... long after the fact, long after the carnage between the Indianapolis police force and the impulsive mercenaries on the scene.
Instead, every single news outlet—traditional news channels for radios and televisions, as well as all social media feeds—will be plagued by different news:
Stolen novel; please report.
Terrence Gardner.
Ring... Ring... Ring...
That's all that would be reported that morning. Terrence Gardner, CEO of Sedimate LLC, age 36, and found dead in his home.
It should already be old news, as Sedimate LLC is a lesser company. No media should care about this man whatsoever. However, that's all people were talking about.
News stations could ONLY report on this news, with all other news being wiped clean and replaced by Terrence Gardner, Chouko Ashford, and an infamous "Stalker". All of this especially spread through Target News after the station's Ohio branch had a recent call encounter with the possible killer.
At best, news stations had paper copies of what they needed to report, but these were drowned out by the airwaves being congested and plagued with "BREAKING NEWS!" about Gardner and Chouko. The moment they intend to report on anything else, their broadcasting technology malfunctions and is promptly replaced by a higher-priority Gardner report. All stations across the nation are forced to broadcast this news for the next few days.
To those who tried to escape the news and use their phones and such technology, they found no luck. Millions were left confused as to why their entire social media feeds were plagued with either "Gardner Explained" videos or fictional sightings of his killer. Sharing in the turmoils of this incident, people only added further fuel as they began sharing and posting this very topic and how broken the platforms are.
With ONLY the Gardner information spread through these mediums, this news infects real-life talk. A person is either talking about what was happening, or they were promptly shut up as nobody cared about their morning breakfasts or whatever. All media is being hijacked by nonsensical news.
Ring... Ring... Ring...
"... are you seeing this?"
"Yes, quite interesting, isn't it...?" a masculine voice responds.
On the phone, after his bath, a man in a fancy bathrobe stares at one of his many flatscreen televisions. His hair is soaking wet, drooping down to his shoulders and dripping from his faint chin stubble. His eyes are locked onto a screen, watching as the news broadcasts the investigation shots of Gardner.
"A nobody, an upstart, making national news..." the man calmly speaks, stretching his arms and groaning. "Quite the occasion."
"What? No, Pylon, Not the news! Did you check your email?! The names got leaked!"
"Huh?"
"The one who iced Gardner, a list of her clients got sent out! Every single name of someone who enlisted the help of 'the Stalker'!"
The man squints his eyes. "I... see. What does this have to do with—"
Promptly, the phone is pulled out of his hand and thrown aside.
The man is put into a headlock by a man with a thick ginger beard covering his entire face, and his bare feet are grabbed by a man with a cocoa-brown beard over his face.
"Buncha them are getting iced, too...! You gotta get out of there, they know about Montana!"
The voice on the other end of the phone desperately shouts as the recently bathed man, a man who is—in fact—on that list, is forcibly taken out of his home and abducted.
Ring... Ring... Ring...
Amid the barren lands of all this chaos, another seed has been planted.
Rumor has it that Kuroiwa, the Stalker, has been spread through private channels alongside documents and data confirming Terrence Gardner's death. The recipients of these are the very clients that she has worked for across these nine years.
Names have been recorded. Names were kept private. Names that should be inaccessible... are suddenly sent out. Clients that have employed the Stalker's services are now being leaked and spread, all in a span of a few sudden minutes.
Some wise individuals put two and two together that the 50 million dollar reward for Chouko Ashford is also for the Stalker. Every client potentially has priceless information that they could be coerced into letting out. If one of the Stalker's clients claims the body before Dot does, they will obtain more power and influence over the rest of the clients.
So, with identities leaked, traffic through the criminal underground's channels increases with a few curious job postings to kidnap, interrogate, and maybe even execute these requesters.
Pylon Stench is one of the many CEOs caught in the crossfire of this. His information is put as one of the earliest reports, being the one that hired the Stalker to log the identities of various whistleblowers in his companies. Their subsequent deaths weeks or months after this job posting put a big, red target on his back, and someone has captured him.
His fate, to this very day, is completely unknown.
Ring... Ring... Ring...
Following his disappearance, a job posting appears in the Underworld, publicly from... the CEO of Sweet Bots.
Of all companies, this one is the most unexpected. With the 50 million dollar bounty on Chouko, an additional 100 million dollars is added to the pool by the android manufacturer, specifically requesting the Stalker's head on a plate to be sent to California.
100 million... an interesting number, which is bumped up to 200 million by an unnamed CEO requesting the body be escorted to Oregon. A surplus of bounties is on the table, with countless mercenaries lured to the job postings and countless CEOs starting to gamble and auction off the money for the Stalker.
As this is happening, a certain individual is keeping track of this information.
Ring... Ring... Ring...
Made aware of the Executioner's failure, and the death of him and his men... a certain figure beholds the start of the resulting fallout.
All of this information is at his fingertips after the Executioner's failure is brought to his attention. Last he's heard from them, they've captured Chouko Ashford... the Stalker, and the impostor. And with Dot's involvement going unimpeded, it all but confirms that they are dead.
It's an interesting plan... one he's made aware of, from the very second it has started. A parasite's claws cling to the media, spreading its influence throughout all channels. Even if only 1% of this country's 300 million witness it, that still leaves 3 million people with active eyes on this situation. Mercenaries, law enforcement, civilians, CEOs, and the government itself.
The man can see the fire spreading from here, gazing down on this from up above. The name of the Stalker is on fire, spreading Ashford all around. A blazing inferno attributed to the death of his men.
Order is gone, and chaos breeds in its wake. The rising number of dollars being thrown into this endeavor awakens this country's reserves of greed and wrath. All forces are active in this wasteland of growing anarchy.
... and Sun Tzu put it best. Roughly translated, "the supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting."
Confrontation with Chouko is a death sentence. No, the best course of action... is to make sure she has nowhere to go.
Ring... Ring... Ring...
"... is it done?"
"Yes."
Standing in a bedroom, two men dressed in inconspicuous clothing are rummaging through the room itself. One of them holds a phone to his ear, staring down at a bunch of unorganized notes sprawled all over.
"Is there anything of value?"
"Yes, but not to you. Only a bunch of figurines. Could probably sell these for thousands."
The man on the phone holds a boxed figurine, a "Momochi #45". A Japanese cartoon character with neon blue hair with cat paws for hands and feet, dressed in some sort of schoolgirl's uniform.
"I see. Does he possess any other androids?"
"No. The only one he had is out for delivery."
"Very well. Leave the area. Make sure there are no witnesses."
"Understood, sir."
The two walk out of the bedroom and leave it uninhabited. Not a single living soul was left in that room.
No, all that remains is a dead man...
"... so, where to next?"
"Mmm..." one of the men noise, before looking across the street... narrowing his eyes and seeing a boy looking at them from the window.
The young boy that helped E out, previously acting as a paid lookout for the guy... having only just now woken up. He stared out the window to see two men just walking out of E's house, raising an eyebrow at the two. An unfortunate, unlucky moment.
Seeing this, the two men look at each other, before one of them crosses the street to his house.
No witnesses.
Ring... Ring... Ring...
As the morning sun rises and shines in Pittsburgh, all of America has been plagued with some sort of story connected to Chouko in some way, shape, or form. Hours upon hours of non-stop broadcasts about Gardner, about Chouko, and—once the overload of Gardner news dies—about Indianapolis.
Reports have gathered together in this amount of time, painting a massive- MASSIVE target on Chouko's back. She's the one hunted by an entire mercenary group. She's the topic and cause of a country-wide media hijacking. She's the one responsible for countless deaths in a short matter of time.
Everywhere she goes now, she runs the risk of being identified. The long, lost Apple-Eyed genius is back as a beacon of chaos. Dot's plan has effectively set the country on fire over Chouko, an unyielding carnage of chaos and destruction to follow the land that Chouko walks.
Chouko is a walking hazard stand for, and - thus - the reward has been increased substantially. A cooperative effort to pool as much as they can to incentivize all mercenaries to go for it, with the collective rewards being requested for Chouko's head being a cumulative...
"... what the— FIVE... FIVE BILLION?! You kidding me?! Holy... w... wow!"
"Yes, yes..." a gruff man responds, staring at the job posting with bewilderment. A thick foreign accent behind his every word, Serbian in nature and dialect.
At the current moment, he has a laptop out and is using an encrypted network to witness all of this. He bites into his morning burger as he keeps up with this situation, bits of beef chunks getting stuck in his thick, black beard. "All that money if we find her. Play our cards right and we claim big money for ourselves."
"Huh... so we gotta actually kill her, kill her? That... hm. Well, she did take out a buncha guys, didn't she? Guess it's justified if we go after her?"
"Right... right. Should be simple enough. I predict she is in the area." The man lets out a sigh, wrapping his half-eaten burger up and pocketing it. Standing up and starting to leave. "Come, now. Finish your breakfast and we should be off, Yumi."
"Aight, pops. Just gimme a sec."
"Mm. I shall be outside until then."
The man walks out the door, stretching his arms out as he stands on the front porch of a mansion. A disappointed look is on his face as the sun glares straight into his eyes. Following this, he notes the sound of morning birds being drowned out by the cocking of guns around him.
Slowly, he looks away from the sun and looks around to see the surrounding men around the front of the mansion, ever so contently gazing at their suits. Security staff, belonging to the mansion in particular. All of them are responding to a call that intruders have broken in, pillaging whatever they could.
"... gentlemen, gentlemen," the gruff man calls out. "To what pleasure do I owe you?"
"Put your hands up, right now!" one of the security guards exclaims, lifting up his rifle at the man. "You're under arrest for trespassing. The authorities are on their way!"
"Oh? Arrest? Very well. Hands up it is."
The gruff man slowly raises his hands into the air, wiggling his fingers for just a moment...
... as his palms light up, and a massive flash of light spreads outward. A blinding light almost enough to power the sun, its scorching and searing light enveloping the visions of the security guards.
Every guard standing before this gruff man lets out agonizing screams, before- one by one, they all fall unconscious, their eyes sizzling and burning as the light has effectively fried their very brains with the smallest of glimpses. Many of them started to gargle on their own saliva, all motor functions and thought processes erased and burned out of their heads, leaving them in critical condition- possibly left to die and perish.
"Aw, pops, what'd you go on and do all THAT for? Ain't they just doing their jobs? You could've at least let me handle 'em..."
"Pssh. You were getting ready. Plus, these men are not good enough for you, Yumi," the man responds, looking over his shoulder with an annoyed look. Staring back at his... "Yumi"... with a calm, reserved demeanor. One that acted as if he didn't just kill several men with a lift of his hands. "Save your strength for Ashford, when it actually earns us money to get her..."
"Ugh... well, aight, then! So we ready to go?"
"Yes, yes. Let us be off."
Walking past the very much brain-damaged security guards, leaving the mansion behind...
... two individuals now on their way to collect their reward. They get into a stolen and luxurious white Sedan and drive off. Just another pair of mercenaries on their way to apprehend Chouko.
It's only a matter of hours before the Underworld's mercenaries close in on where Chouko is...
