The council room dedicated exclusively to meetings of the Inner Circle of The Lane Hackers appeared merely as a storage entrance from the outside hallway, deep in the innermost corridors of the Mactan Base asteroid. Inside, it was almost cozy because the majority of the space was dominated by a central table embedded with the cutting edge of Lane Hacker technology and servers. Holographic projectors lined the walls, enabling distant Hackers to attend meetings remotely, routed through the Spyglass Network.
Infrequently used, but vitally important to enabling all of the central decision makers and operatives of The Lane Hackers to collectively discuss vital matters to the faction, the council room was impervious to electronic snooping, and guarded by lethal security systems that only the highest access codes could deactivate.
The security door to the council room slid open and an aging man entered silently. Hidden scanners immediately zeroed in on his infrared signature and matched his bioscan to a database, before deactivating the automatic countdown that would have otherwise terminated the man's life without mercy.
He moved to the head position at the table, typed in his alpha-numeric access code, and held his gaze steady while his retina was scanned for a match. When the holographic display lit up in front of him, he activated several functions before settling back into the comfortable chair to wait. He did not have long to wait before several other Lane Hackers entered the room and took their places at the table, each submitting to the same security protocols. Several more holographic displays activated, revealing the forms of operatives located across Liberty and the Independent Worlds. When each position at the table was filled, Senior Professor Moriarty allowed himself a slight smile, startling the nearest Hackers who had never before witnessed such a display of pleasure from the man known throughout the faction for his calm, though lethal, demeanor.
"Hackers, let us begin. I am delighted to witness this day in the history of our movement, a day long awaited by your predecessors who have passed from active service to our Roll of Honor. Today, The Lane Hackers are ascendant in Liberty, and Ageira is fraught with disunity, impending disaster, and impotent rage against us, though this last is entirely usual.
"Due to your vital efforts, we have recently completed multiple operations designed to marginalize our enemies, strengthen our alliances, and enhance our technological and financial resources. The deployment of the Vindicator fighter is a triumph of our research and development divisions, and further innovations are awaiting final testing.
"Our ranks have swelled with impressive and accomplished recruits from the deepest echelons of Liberty's corruptocratic, monopolistic corporations and government institutions.
"In short, today is the finest day to be a Lane Hacker that I have yet had the privilege to witness. I now invite each of you to submit a verbal report of your recent activities, missions, or accomplishments in order to establish a complete picture of our recent triumphs. Once everyone has delivered their input, I have a crucial announcement about the future of our faction.
"I suppose I shall go first, Professor," said Niall Dunne, who began to lean in on the table, her arms placed on the table and her legs crossed. She bowed from her sitting position to him, signifying her thanks.
"First off, I'd like to personally say that I thank you all for giving me such a warm welcome into your ranks. As I have gotten the chance to explain to most of you, recent events for me didn't turn out so well in the past couple of years, and had in fact gone a way that was the worst possible. I am very lucky and grateful to have been welcomed here, not only for refuge and safety, but for the well-being of Liberty. I have seen what corrupts it in my quasi-lawful travels, but at first gave it no attention, assuming they had intelligent people in their government and they would properly fix it later. It seems I was wrong in my belief, but I have found a greater place here. In such dystopian times, one could never be so happy with where we are currently at today. I too am happy and proud to be a Lane Hacker, Professor. It is indeed a very impeccable time."
"Though I haven't particularly had the recent time to be active in most of these events going on in the glory of the Lane Hackers, I have gotten the chance to participate in quite a few cla Lockdowns in my time here, as well as furthering my own career. I quite flourished in my first requirements, unsurprisingly. Though recently, with the coming of changes, I haven't had as much time to continue, which I will attempt to amend next year, if not before the end of this one."
She breaths in a hefty but quiet breath, sighing gracefully.
"As for other things, I believe we are headed in the right direction. We have taken many good steps towards the ruin of the corporate oligarchy. Yet it is still far from over. We have a long battle ahead of us, but we will conquer it, my fellow Lane Hackers, with our unparalleled intellect and strategic might. In my rather brief time here, I have seen and experienced many things, and to no surprise, I found you all to be very capable of changing things here in Liberty for the greater good. We here all know that Liberty is sick. We may well be the only ones who can truly fix it. It may be our actions winning the battles, Professor, but it is you and the well being of Liberty that leads us, motivates us, makes us do better and better every time because we gain experience."
"I believe here, with our combined strength, we can truly make Liberty a better place for all of us. Not just us, but for Liberty herself. The people are coming to us more and more these days, and I estimate that we could very well become a dominant force here within time. We are the Lane Hackers, and I fully believe we can morph Liberty into something immaculate."
With that being said, Niall leans back into the indeed comfortable chair, and nods, implying that she had finished with her input for the time being, with a smile on her face, of comparable stature to Moriarty's.
"Well said miss Niall" said Chang leaning back in the chair his face half masked in shadow.
"I myself am grateful that I was alerted to the fact that I was in danger and welcomed into the inner circle with such warm open arms but the safety that we provide for each other is not the only reason I'm here as I personally back our motives of pushing the corrupted oligarchy out of our home land out of liberty the so called law enforcement would rather see that the rich get richer and the poor get poorer as all lane hacker's before me I vow that as long as I am able I will weaken this oligarchy as much as I can. now I feel truly alive and as if my actions are making a difference professor"
"as the spyglass network show's I have been somewhat busy with making plans and reports I haven't had the ability to assist in some of our operations even with the delay of being able to help my fellow brothers and sister's in arms I exceled as expected though my first set of exams and test's. I had the chance to assist in multiple lockdowns and successfully led my own lockdown, I believe that because of our actions the primary branch of Ageria has had to replace three ships that we've recently split into little more than atomic particles over there own pueblo base to add insult to injury we stole well over a total of 4250 metric units of trade lane parts for research and reverse engineering."
"As for other things, I believe we are headed in the right direction. We have taken many grand bounds towards the ruin of the corporate oligarchy. Yet it is still far from over. We have a long war ahead of us, my fellow Lane Hackers, with our unparalleled intellect and strategic might backed up by our advanced technology. In my rather brief time here, I have seen and experienced many things, and to no surprise, I have learned that we all have our own unique skill set's which we help us liberate liberty from her corrupt master's like I said it's gong to be a long war but we will emerge graced in victory.
" I have observed our numbers since I realised my mistake of working with Ageria and we have swollen twice fold every new recruit bring their useful skill's to the playing felid for example Mr Grave's is a born leader. We will rise up and over throw the so called law enforcers with our ever growing number's. While Ageria keeps treating it's employees the way they treated us under paid and under apprenticed for our hard work they will be the perfect breeding ground so to speak for new recruits."
"That is all my fellow's" Chang said readjusting his arm's to feel more at home. also what was visible of his face was contorted into a wide smile.
A seemingly new member of the Lane Hackers leaned forward from his chair, putting his hands on the table, one onto the other. His head follows his eyes as he looked from the right to the left, seemingly for everyone to recognize his face. "Initiate Golgov -- I've already come to talk to some of you."
"Similar to Miss Dunne and Mister Chang, I've received a warm welcome by the Lane Hacker's Inner Circle. Even though I had issues getting used to Liberty's underground, I've learned a lot and passed the required examinations. Several combat missions have helped me to improve my piloting skills. Currently I'm visiting every Lane Hacker and Liberty Rogue base, in order to submit my first report in the Internal Comms."
"I've been aware of the corruption of Liberty, their government and their incorporated police force. For too long I remained silent, ignoring the corruption and lies, I feared to lose my job.
It was this one day at which I've been told that Deep Space Engineering wouldn't pay for my son's illness, although their shoddy working conditions caused it. It frightened me, and no longer was I willing to serve libertorian corporations."
"Necessary contacts to plan a defection from Ageira weren't easy to find. It took me some time to prepare everything, and as you can see, it worked. This was my very first step into the underground of Liberty. I did something they would call a crime, although they're the actual criminals in this case. I'm glad to be here, to call myself an Initiate of the Lane Hackers. Finally I found people who truly understand me, the Lane Hackers are the right place for me."
Mister Golgov takes a breath and slowly leans back into the chair. Once again he looks into the circle, waiting for the next one to speak."
Professor Nicole Hunter's holographic projection emerged at the end of the table directly opposite of Professor Moriarty's chair. She made a silent nod to the senior professor and the professor in spe Goro Yoshida. While her emergence captured attention of all participants of the meeting, Nicole raised her hand slightly and while gesticulating she enabled several large holographic projections one after another. Suddenly a dimm room became alight with over a dozen graphs, reports, designs and charts floating over the long table.
- Dear Hackers! You can certainly be proud of our achievements this year. With Mactan and Spyglass Networks reaching their full potential, combat deployment of Vindicator very heavy fighter, almost 29% rise in the number of recruits this year and over 88% increased presence we can safely say that the Lane Hackers are stronger than ever.
To illustrate professor's words a series of graphs showing increase of recruitment results, three-dimensional design of the new fighter craft and reports on completion of several new modules in the software infrastructure of the organization emerged enlarged from the pile of holograms floating over the table.
- However long, the list of our achievements should not make us blind to the challenges still lying ahead of us, one of which is our outdated fleet.
A series of failed designs and prototypes of modernized gunships and bombers quickly swimmed over the table.
- However, the greatest challenge that we are facing now lies strictly within ourselves. The pleasant era of indolence that plagued our enemies within Liberty in the times after Admiral Hale's resignation has come to an end almost a year ago. The reemergence of the traitorous Hellfire Legion as stronger than ever, successful reforming of the Bounty Hunters Guild as competent mercenaries and unexpected strengthening of the Liberty Navy has once again raised the difficulty of our operations to the level unseen for years. The holidays are over.
A series of reports concerning failed operations, causalities, lost ships and equipment, intelligence notes and threat assessments replaced previous images.
- Our enemies onslaught paired with the most important side effect of our recruitment drive - the percentage of our senior operatives got as low as 31% - easily explains the significant overall decrease of efficiency of our organization and almost tripled worth of lost ships and equipment in the last three months. Which brings me to the main question...
Nicole Hunter's paused and her holographic projection looked around going from one Lane Hacker to another one by one. Holographic charts, reports, notes and designs disappeared magnifying the effect of the silence. Only when it became unbearable professor addressed the young Hackers in the chamber.
- Do... you... have... what it takes to complete your training and become unstoppable or will you fail like so many before?
"I shall do everything in my power to make it so. I'm not willing to let the motives of the Lane Hackers die down due to low superiority. I will rise in strength here and excel in all the talents a Lane Hacker can have. I am not willing to fade into the dust of this history vacuum that so many pilots succumb to. I, and along with the others sitting here right now, I believe we all shall be the ones to lead the Lane Hackers to victory, and lead Liberty into a new age of healthiness and perfection."
Niall said, inspired by Nicole and Moriarty's words. Her tone of voice is enthusiastic and ambitious. It is easy to tell that she is very confident, from the position that she is in on her chair. Legs still crossed, but her hands connected at her hips, sitting up straight and paying close attention to all in the room as well as Nicole's holographic projection.
"As long as we remain strong and better than the rest of Liberty, as long as we have this passion in our hearts to continue our struggles... I believe we can truly make it together."
During all this, Gustav Graves had sat silently with his legs crossed, listening to the others talk with crossed arms. It was all rather quaint how the other Interruptors treated all this, though he had to admit that it almost sounded like a kindergarten group having a get-together with their new pedagogue. He couldn't help but sneer inwardly at his new name. Gustav Graves. They said it was for their own safety to assume these aliases in order to not not wake up anymore some day — the pawns of Liberty's shadow government knew no limits — but he found it to be highly ridiculous. It irked him to no end that he couldn't use his real name at all anymore as well.
To be fair, this meeting wasn't all that bad, all things considered. It was the first time Graves got to see the Senior Professor, and there simply was something authoritative about him that had an ephemeral, almost eerie character, he felt. Moriarty radiation an air of ownership that was as natural as breathing to him. This man owned every last one of them, and he seemed to relish it. Graves wasn't used to not being the one in charge. Before he joined the Lane Hackers, drug pushing had been his specialty, and he had been exceptionally good at getting cold hard numbers onto paychecks.
With Professor Hunter's sudden silence, Graves blinked, having lost himself in thoughts and thus hadn't listened to what was said before him. Recalling the initial request of the Senior Professor, Graves cleared his throat while shifting his position to a more upright one. It was simply the proper thing to do while addressing an audience such as this. "While this was all rather quaint," he began, doing his best to not let his disdain for the words of the other Interruptors show, "it does seem like we are in some sort of support group if we all start with lauding ourselves, thus I'll skip it." He nodded towards the Senior Professor in a respectful manner. "We all know there couldn't have been a better choice made, thus it is redundant anyways."
There had been a moment of deliberation whether he should attend digitally like Professor Hunter did, though Graves had ultimately decided against it, given that the Senior Professor was supposed to attend as well. "Besides the training, which hardly warrants more mentioning here, as it is a prerequisite, I intend to use those skills that made me quite a lot of credits during my, well, 'old' life." He did airquotes with his index and middle finger. "Gotta admit, I'm not one of those societal higher-ups. Never was. I did my thing in distributing substances that Liberty'd rather not see. Cardamine, Nox, the occasional weapons, both chemical and conventional." Shrugging, he let the sentence hang in the air, not remembering everything that he'd deal with. "Those things work according to a certain scheme. Don't ask questions, respect the business partners and pacta sunt servanda, else they slit your throat. Not that I necessarily worry about that anymore."
Lifting his hands to signify he was through with his piece, he folded them in his lap. "Guess there isn't much more to say, really. I'm not one to give promises, since it'll make me seem like it's the only thing I stick to. This is for me as well. Everybody wins." It wasn't like he could tell them that he had cheated and intended to cheat with several of the promotion criteria. Nobody said some slyness couldn't be used to get ahead, and Graves was a man who honored a contract according to its word. This just so happened to have none prohibiting him from using his brain.
"If I am to fade to the void it will be in the image we have set for liberty. I plan on taking as many of the corporate scum and corrupted law enforcement as I can with me if I am to die an early death my motives upon this are clear and unfazed we shall taste victory but the cost has already been high and I am sure that the death toll is still going to rise. We will lose many more skilled and wise pilots before this war is over but not one of us will ever be enslaved and tortured by the blinded so called law enforcement".
"on a better note we have been thriving even though our goals are hard to achieve we are making progress in making some loyal Ageria employees change how they see us as some don't see us as much as blood thirsty terrorists and more like those making the right choice's for our future but this is only two people we need to try to sway the rest or split them atom by atom".
Chang glance's at one of the graphs that miss hunter has on her holographic display.
"We lost triple the normal and expected number of ships in the last three months something tells me that while our skill's are some of the best some of our commitment seems to be lacking and maybe we need some refresher course's in combat like situations as those number's are mostly made up of recruits and interrupters from what I can tell"
Chang's face when from his beaming smile to a face of intense thought before deciding he has spoken more than enough for now "Whom ever is next your up" Chang said
Grant, who had so far been silent was sitting on the other end of the table. She was visibly quite nervous to be in the presence of the seniors for the very first time, albeit just their holograms. She made a cough before speaking up. "Well, honored collegues, senior professors. Ill begin by stating that it truly is an honor that you saw me fit to be counted amongst this elite. Most other hackers can only dream of attaining such a honor. The law surely tries their best to take us down permanently, but each time we slip through their net. We are the only ones so far that have been cunning enough to evade them over and over and over again, and we shall keep doing so, for we are Liberty's only hope of ridding them of the corporate scumbags infesting their ranks. Many losses have we incurred upon the shysters known as Ageira, many credits were stolen from the hands of the Interspace, and most of all, the Police sure know that we are the most dangerous people operating in this part of space."
She crossed her legs. "That aside, we do face a menace known as the Bounty Hunters Guild. While perhaps not as intelligent, they do seem to outperform us in combat manouvers, making life hard for anyone who is trying to inflict damage upon our enemies. These people only live for the kill, the sheer pleasure of injuring not only us, but our friends, our long lost family, and everyone else that calls him or herself a free spirit. While most of our losses are the lowly recruits, or people fully unattached to the Inner Circle, some of the losses have indeed been ours. I'm of an opinion, alongside Mister Chang here..--" She nods to the man. "--.. That we need to freshen up on our combat skills, for when the need arises that we should fight them." She then sat back again, waiting for a reaction, if any.
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