Ch.133Work Record #020 – Ep 2. Uprooting Dandelions (2)

Footsteps are heard from the direction of the building’s rooftop… then they stop. Has the sniper given up on escaping? No. Having recognized me as an enhanced human, they’ve decided to aim for a single, lethal shot.

Conveniently, they were holding an anti-materiel sniper rifle, and this building likely had only one path to the roof. They must be trembling while aiming at the entrance to the rooftop, waiting for me to appear.

I heighten my auditory sensitivity. I track their position by following their breathing and heartbeat. I leap lightly upward, grabbing the second-floor windowsill of the four-story commercial building, then climb the wall using my Type 4 grip strength.

I approach silently. Their heart is beating almost one and a half times per second. Their breathing trembles as they try to take deep breaths. Slowly, very slowly, they begin to calm down.

I grab the third-floor windowsill and throw myself upward, my shock-absorbing body muffling any sound. I grasp the rooftop railing. I can see the sniper wearing civilian clothes with body armor underneath.

The sniper is now perfectly focused, aiming at the door leading to the rooftop. They’re gritting their teeth, ready to blow the door apart at the slightest hint of movement.

The only problem is that an enhanced human who makes no sound has climbed up behind the railing they’re leaning against and is watching them. A minor issue. So far.

Cameras are greedily capturing the scene. The composition would work well—a renegade sniper concentrating with all their might, preparing for confrontation, and Gardner watching them.

I slip my hand through the railing and grab their throat. Holding their carotid artery, I slowly pull them toward me. Their struggle against the sudden grip and blood flow restriction isn’t very strong. It gradually subsides.

After about ten seconds, they completely lose consciousness. Only then do I jump over the railing. A message appears on my HUD indicating that Ms. Serena’s operational area is within direct line of sight from here. As expected.

Shortly after, a trailer with the H-Enter logo—etched in negative relief as if even displaying the logo was embarrassing—arrives. A man with a face modified from the lower jaw up steps out.

He looks at me with half a face of smooth metal where dozens of dots are embedded, making it impossible to tell where his eyes are. With his hands neatly behind his back, he says:

“Gale Hammond, Section Chief of Information Extraction Team 1, Information Processing Department, Heroism and Hope Corporation… Are these two gray matters the ones requiring information extraction?”

I summon Gardner’s voice. Gardner is accustomed to such procedures. Unlike when dealing with criminals, he speaks in a businesslike tone:

“That’s right. I look forward to the results of the gray matter information extraction.”

He examines the renegade sniper in my hand and the renegade I captured in front of Chance’s Smogpiercer, then walks into the open trailer. He detaches his arms, already replaced with machinery.

Up to the upper arms they were like normal human limbs, but below that were prosthetics with hands so large they could hold a human head. Each prosthetic had a hollow cylinder attached to the center, like a stake from a file bunker. At the end of the cylinder visible on his palm was a bone cutter. One of the tools for collecting gray matter.

He grabs both people and enters the trailer. The door closes… and a click, bang sound like a file bunker being fired echoes twice. The information will come out.

I mount the Smogpiercer. With one taken care of, it’s time to handle the other. I connect to the communication channel with Ms. Serena, which is monitored in real-time by H-Enter. This channel is also being broadcast live.

Gardner is the type of human driven by a sense of superiority. He must be someone intoxicated by the fact that he’s a gardener, that the garden is beautiful, and that only he can tend to it. I deliver my line:

“Serena Vanderbilt. You seem to be having difficulties tending to the garden. I’m coming now.”

The voice that comes through the communication channel isn’t Ms. Serena’s. It belongs to the Guardian of the City.

Usually, she speaks with a weighted voice filled with profanity that doesn’t match her face, but now her voice is almost refreshingly light:

“I don’t understand what you mean… I refuse your support. I can handle the scene cleanup on my own. This is disrespectful…”

“It’s quite tiresome when there’s no one to share foresight and garden planning with.”

I respond in true Gardner fashion and unilaterally cut the communication. It was characteristic of Gardner but also terribly rude.

Should I apologize for this at the penthouse? No need to get too immersed. This is a conversation between characters, not between me and Ms. Serena. Still… it might be better to ask.

I head toward Ms. Serena’s operational area where Chance has secured the renegades’ tactical vehicles, riding the Smogpiercer. I leave the driving to Chance and draw my high-frequency blade.

Chance’s voice begins to sound in my head. I lightly rise up, holding the Smogpiercer’s handle with just one hand while crouching on the seat.

“The targets have started moving. I believe they are heading into Ms. Serena Vanderbilt’s operational area. Is it against the rules to intrude on each other’s operational areas?”

After connecting with the handler, I relay Chance’s question. The handler answers without hesitation:

“Rather than a rule violation, it would be more accurate to call it a collaboration. Callsign Gardner, I authorize your intrusion into Ms. Serena Vanderbilt’s operational area. However…”

‘I’d like to ask how much experience one needs to say “looking forward to what scenes will unfold.”‘

I hear the handler chuckle. He draws out his characteristically gloomy power and says:

“In the entertainment industry, we don’t care about experience. There’s only one standard: how much profit you generate. Since Callsign Gardner is sufficiently profitable… you may say that.”

Terribly performance-driven. At least that gives me some breathing room. An industry where it’s easy to soar but just as easy to fall. It reminds me of K’s Icarus story.

What killed Icarus wasn’t the sun or humidity—it was the ancient people’s limitation of not knowing that wax wouldn’t melt at that altitude. Don’t be confined by limitations. Whatever you do, go all the way. Maintaining the status quo is the worst.

Maybe I’ll discover a new talent. I decided to embrace this opportunity too. Behind the veil, mask, and bulletproof face shield, I might even be smiling.

‘Then please look forward to what scenes will unfold.’

“I will be looking forward to it, Callsign Gardner.”

Given that they used the word “collaboration,” Heroism and Hope Corp probably wanted me to intrude and create a confrontation between Gardner and Ms. Serena.

Though what they would say next would probably just be not to directly clash. Both Gardner and Ms. Serena need to be protectors of the city. There can be opposition, but it must remain ideological.

As we drive further, Ms. Serena’s operational area begins to appear in my vision, marked in light pink. We pass through. Gunshots start ringing out. Gardner’s targets are always the renegades.

Have they realized their special unit was taken down and decided to act directly? But that seems too straightforward. The best way to draw out Ms. Serena would be to attack citizens, yet they didn’t.

Why such an obsession with Ms. Serena? Clearly, one of the renegade snipers was targeting Ms. Serena. Lobringer’s lover was killed just to make Ms. Serena feel powerless.

Opening the gray matter will provide answers. By now, the information extraction team should be administering hippocampal stimulants and reading their minds, so I just need to capture them. In the distance, I begin to see a repainted DPD vehicle.

“Assessment: I will approach from the side. Based on the vehicle’s size and durability, I’ve determined this device cannot cause significant damage.”

‘Don’t worry, Chance. You’ve helped enough by helping me catch one.’

The Smogpiercer accelerates to reach the side of the DPD vehicle. Enjoying the sensation of the surrounding scenery rushing by, I jump from my seat and land smoothly on top of the vehicle. There wasn’t much shaking.

I grip the high-frequency blade in reverse and power it up. A soft humming sound resonates around me as I strike down at the top of the vehicle with the blade’s tip. It pierces through easily.

The vehicle wasn’t sturdy enough to serve as cover, nor was its material difficult enough to make the high-frequency blade slip. Moreover, it was a modified DPD vehicle suffering from budget constraints.

Since I can’t cut through the frame, I create a cross-shaped crack in the vehicle’s roof, avoiding the frame. I grab the crack and pull with all my strength, including the metal coil-replaced tendons.

After a few unstable creaking sounds, it slowly tears off. At that moment, the renegades inside begin to return fire. I throw away the torn panel and jump onto the vehicle’s windshield.

They couldn’t shoot at their own driver. The result would be similar anyway. I raise my fist and strike the front window. The bulletproof glass cracks, and on the second strike, it shatters completely.

I pierce the driver’s chest with my high-frequency blade as he tries to draw his gun. The vehicle loses control, mounts the empty sidewalk, and crashes into a building. I lightly jump off.

Yet Ms. Eve still insists I wear a helmet. I put the high-frequency blade back and pick up a gun with DPD markings that seems to have been thrown out during the collision. Gardner would use this.

I grab the vehicle’s door handle and tear it off, throwing it away. I aim the gun directly inside and am about to pull the trigger when, somewhat expectedly, precise gunfire knocks the weapon from my hand.

Ms. Serena appears. Beside her is Lobringer, whom I saw yesterday. Smoke is seeping from the muzzle of Lobringer’s rifle. She was the one who fired.

Ms. Serena, who restrained Lobringer, walks toward me. Normally she would stamp her heel on the ground, but that seems impossible for her right now.

“Callsign Gardner. I don’t care if you hunt criminals in the company’s name, but… the renegades are mine to capture, and they should be detained according to company regulations, not killed indiscriminately like some vigilante.”

“The company authorized it, Serena Vanderbilt. I follow the company, not you. And what difference does it make to gather weeds in a sack? Weeds are…”

The renegades, knowing they would be killed if they returned fire but might have a chance if they didn’t, chose not to shoot. I drag one of them out.

I draw my high-frequency blade and look down at him. After checking his criminal record, I broadcast it to everyone present and the cameras. He had a history of terrorism against employee-citizens in attempts to get to Serena.

Instead of explaining further, I pick up the renegade and lightly throw him into the air. Needing a performance as the Heroism and Hope Corp handler suggested, I slice him with a single stroke from bottom left to top right.

Black oil and red blood splatter around. Gardner’s costume remained unsoiled by the blood, but both the black and red stood out vividly on Serena’s light pink enhanced suit.

“Even if it stains your clothes with grass, you need to cut it down with a sickle as soon as you see it. If you refuse small evils to maintain purity, you’ll eventually have to burn down the entire garden and start over.”

I deliberately spoke more narrowly. Special Ops, who first told me about “small evils,” was someone who could affirm even “not desiring small evils,” but Gardner was not like that.

And Ms. Serena precisely caught that narrow part. She showed that she was at least at the level of Special Ops, who talked about sacrificing the few for the many while being willing to be that sacrifice himself.

“A gardener’s basic virtue should be creativity, but it seems you’ve never imagined ways to tend a garden without committing small evils. You lack the abilities a gardener should have.”

To Gardner, Ms. Serena is not an enemy. I turn on the vibration and shake off my high-frequency blade, letting the bloodstains form an intricate pattern before sheathing it.

“A perfect garden—easy to pronounce, impossible to cultivate. I thought you were another gardener, but you’re just a paranoid patient.”

I decided to look forward to seeing Ms. Serena break this antagonism with ideal skill in a future episode. Chance’s Smogpiercer stops beside me.

Except for the one I cut down, the renegades were arrested. In reality, there’s little difference. They’re genuine criminals who can’t even be recycled as regulars, so they’ll be executed. And with that, the second episode ends.

On the way back, a few officers in DPD uniforms briefly saluted me as I passed by on the Smogpiercer. It seemed like gratitude for killing the renegades.

With the money Ms. Serena earned as the Guardian of the City, the DPD was able to save more people and properly arm them. The city’s security is maintained.

But what about the renegades? Why did they defect? Was it just because they didn’t want to bow to a giant corporation? I need to look into this properly. I arrive at my room in the penthouse and connect to the net.

I search using my Callsign Gardner authorization from Heroism and Hope Corp. Most articles about the renegades were about incidents. Even the very first article was just about defected DPD officers.

The catalyst wasn’t mentioned. Searching for DPD yielded the same results. Whatever happened to the DPD occurred when Detroit belonged to the Nationalists, not Heroism and Hope Corp.

“Chance, can you find some articles from before the DPD and Detroit were acquired by Heroism and Hope Corp? Look in the Nationalist publications.”

“Affirmative. Searching now. Accessing Nationalist network. Search authority: Chance, Dash, Zero-One-Three-Nine. Classifying information. Sorting by relevance.”

Did those Nationalists from Homeland Security or whatever maintain the authority that Chance’s AI possessed? I couldn’t understand why, especially since Chance’s body had belonged to Belvedere.

Soon the search results appear. What Chance considered most important was placed at the top. It was definitely a clue-worthy article. I had heard about modification laboratories.

‘Due to failure to maintain sterile conditions in cultivation chambers and rooms, 201 out of 204 DPD officers undergoing enhanced body procedures died.’

This is incomprehensible. Artificial body implantation is a very basic procedure. You cultivate a body and transfer the brain into it—that’s it. Especially if it’s not a proper modification like mine, it’s particularly easy.

Moreover, unlike me who was fitted with posthuman by Jack, most people have their original bodies when receiving artificial bodies, so they live with their original bodies for a month.

If sterility failed during cultivation, only the bodies would have died, and if sterility couldn’t be maintained during that brief transplantation period… can that even be called a meditech? No, that’s not it.

I begin to understand Lobringer’s words: “Why do only we have to bear this burden?” So the survivors might be Lobringer, Ms. Serena, and possibly the chief who’s the leader of the renegades.

I decided not to make assumptions yet. There’s still too much I don’t know. But it was clear that I needed to find the third survivor.