Server 9-Chapter 47: THE HUNTING GROUND

We got back to the safehouse at three in the morning.

No one spoke on the way. We moved through the back alleys like ghosts — with jax in front, Tiny guarding the rear, and Maya moving across the rooftops above us like a shadow with a rifle.

The streets were empty. Wu’s riders were gone. But the feeling remained — that crawling sense of being watched. Like eyes behind every dark window.

The tattooed man opened the door without a word. We went in, down the stairs, and Into the basement. The single light swayed above us. Everything looked the same as when we left — the old couches, the table, and glitch’s screens glowing blue in the dark.

Glitch spun around in his chair when we came down. His face was pale. Sweat on his forehead and a half-eaten ration bar still in his hand.

"You’re alive," Glitch said. Letting out a long breath. "I lost comms for twenty minutes when you were in the vault. I thought—" 𝒻𝑟𝘦𝘦𝘸ℯ𝒷𝑛𝘰𝓋ℯ𝘭.𝘤𝘰𝘮

"We’re fine," I said. I sat down on the nearest couch. My body hit the cushion like a bag of rocks. Heavy and exhausted

[ENERGY: 19%]

[STATUS: RIGHT ARM — NERVE DAMAGE SPREADING]

[CARDIAC FAILURE: 4 DAYS, 18 HOURS]

I looked at my right hand. Thumb and index finger. That was all I had left. The other three hung like dead sticks. The black veins had crept another inch past my elbow while we were underground. Slow. Patient. Like Malachi. Always creeping. Always hungry.

"Tell me about Kang," I said.

"Can you at least sit down for five minutes first?" Sarah said. She leaned against the wall near the stairs, arms crossed. Tired. Her body showed it — dark circles under her eyes, skin too pale, and a slight tremor in her hands that she tried to hide by folding them tight.

"I’m sitting," I said. "We can talk while I sit. Tell me about Kang."

Sarah closed her eyes for a second. Then she opened them and nodded at Glitch.

Glitch turned back to his screens, his fingers moving quickly on his console as files popped up. A photo filled the center screen — a man with a shaved head, a thick neck, and a scar running from his left ear to his jaw. Hard face. Cold eyes. The kind of face that had done terrible things and slept just fine afterward.

"Kang," Glitch said. "Real name: Kang Dae-jung. Former Triad captain under Wu. He ran smuggling for the east side of Sector 3 for six years. Guns, implants, stolen tech — he moved it all."

"What changed?" Maya asked. She was sitting on the floor near the stairs, With her rifle across her lap.

"Wu got embarrassed," Glitch said. "After we escaped the Casino, word got out. The great Dragon-Head Wu — beaten by a street kid and a bunch of nobodies. His other captains started talking. Kang saw his chance."

Glitch pulled up a map. The east side of Sector 3. A maze of streets and buildings, with one big shape in the middle — a factory.

"Kang moved fast," Glitch continued. "he took over Wu’s east side operations in two weeks. Turned Wu’s own men against him. Then he set up here." He tapped the factory on the screen. "Old manufacturing plant. Built before the war. It has three floors. The ground floor is his base. The second floor stores — weapons, drugs, and stolen goods. The third floor is where he sleeps."

"How many men?" I asked.

"Thirty to forty men," Glitch said. "All armed. Not trained soldiers — more like street fighters with guns. A few have basic implants. Nothing high-end. But they do have drones."

He brought up another image. Small flying drones with mounted guns. Cheap. Mass-produced. The kind you could buy in bulk on the black market.

"Six patrol drones," Glitch said. "They circle the factory on a loop. Cameras on every corner, and motion sensors at the doors. Kang is very careful. He knows Wu wants him dead."

"What about the Corp contact?" Sarah asked.

Glitch nodded and pulled up a message on the screen — text only, no name attached. He had decoded it from a Triad channel.

"Kang has been talking to someone inside the Corporation," Glitch said. "I don’t know who. The messages are short, and coded. But from what I can piece together — Kang is offering to hand over parts of Sector 3 to the Corp in exchange for military backing. Weapons. Soldiers. And maybe even a seat at the table."

"He’s selling out the Triads," Jax said from her couch. She’d been quiet since we got back. Just sitting, chewing her gum, and listening. But her voice had an edge now. "Selling them to the same people who grind us up for fuel."

"That’s why Wu wants him gone," Sarah said. "It’s not just about territory. If Kang makes that deal, the Corporation gets a foothold in Sector 3. And Wu loses everything."

"When’s the meeting?" I asked.

"Two days," Glitch said. "Kang meets his Corp contact in two days. After that — if the deal goes through — Kang gets backup that we can’t fight. Corp soldiers. Real ones. Not street guys with cheap guns."

Two days. Wu gave us three. But the meeting was in two. Which meant we had to hit Kang before that meeting happened.

"Tomorrow night," I said.

Everyone looked at me.

"We hit the factory tomorrow night," I said. "Before the meeting. Before Kang gets his Corp backup. We go in, we shut him down, we take his territory. And then we trade the Ledger for the pod."

"That’s less than twenty hours to plan an attack on a guarded building with forty armed men inside," Sarah said. She wasn’t arguing — just making sure I understood what I was saying.

"I know," I said. "You got a better idea?"

Sarah didn’t answer. She looked at Glitch. Glitch looked at his screens. Maya looked at her rifle.

"Didn’t think so," I said.

I couldn’t sleep.

Everyone else tried to sleep.

Maya found a corner and curled up with her rifle. Jax fell asleep on the couch in under a minute — The girl could sleep anywhere, like a cat with a gun. Tiny stood guard behind her, his single eye dimmed. Glitch passed out at his workbench, With his face on the keyboard. Sarah took the far wall. Her breathing slowed, steady and calm, but I knew she wasn’t truly asleep. Just resting with her eyes closed. Thinking. Always thinking.

I sat on the floor with my back against the wall and stared at my right hand.

Thumb. Index finger. The only two that still moved when I told them to. Two out of five. The other three hung useless — stiff, cold, dead weight. The blackness had spread past my elbow now, dark veins climbing my arm like roots pushing through soil.

I tried to make a fist. My thumb curled in. My index finger bent halfway. That was it. Not a fist. A claw. A broken, half-dead claw.

Four days and eighteen hours. That’s how long I had before the nerve damage reached my heart. Before my own body killed me.

I thought about Jasmine. Lying in her pod in Server 12. Her lungs filled with dust. Machines breathing for her. Twenty days left in her clock. She didn’t know I was coming. She didn’t know about the Ledger, the pod, the deal with Wu. She was just lying there. Waiting. Trusting her brother to figure it out.

I’m coming, Jazz. Just hold on a little longer.

My wrist-comp buzzed. Low. Quiet. A message.

I looked at the cracked screen. Unknown sender. No return address. Just three lines of text.

[INCOMING MESSAGE — UNKNOWN SOURCE]

[THE ANT BUILDS A HILL IN THE DRAGON’S GARDEN.]

[THE DRAGON SEES EVERYTHING.]

[BUT THE DRAGON IS NOT THE ONLY ONE WATCHING.]

I felt a sudden wave of fear.

Someone was watching us. Someone who wasn’t Wu. Someone who wasn’t Malachi. Someone else.

I looked around the dark basement. Everyone was asleep. The single light swayed overhead, and casting long shadows on the walls.

I deleted the message, and closed my wrist-comp.

But the dread didn’t go away.

Morning came, cold and grey.

Glitch woke up first. He lifted his face off the keyboard and groaned. Then he noticed me still sitting against the wall, eyes open, and his expression changed.

"Did you sleep?" Glitch asked.

"No."

"That’s bad."

"I know."

He reached into his bag and pulled out two ration bars. Tossed one to me. I caught it with my left hand.

"Eat," Glitch said. "You can’t fight Kang on an empty stomach."

I bit into it. It tasted awful. But my body needed it. The Devourer needed energy from machines. But the human needed energy from food. Both were running low.

The others woke up one by one. Maya checked her rifle. First thing. Before she even opened her eyes all the way, her hands were on it. Taking it apart. Putting it back together. Her morning prayer.

Jax stretched on the couch like a cat. Popped her gum. Scratched Tiny’s head. Tiny rumbled.

Sarah came over and sat across from me. She looked at my right arm. I didn’t hide it. There was no point doing that anymore.

"It’s moving faster," Sarah said quietly. Not a question.

"Yeah."

"After Kang — the first thing we do is get that pod."

"I know."

She started to reach for my arm, hesitated, and then drew her hand back.

"We’re going to make it," Sarah said.

I didn’t know if she was telling me or telling herself.

"Okay," I said. "Everyone up. Let’s plan for tonight."

Glitch pulled up the factory map on his center screen. Everyone gathered around. The blue glow lit our faces. Five tired people and a junk robot, planning to tear down a Triad captain in less than twelve hours.

"Here’s what I’m thinking," Glitch said. He pointed at the factory layout. "Kang’s ground floor is the main area. That’s where his men hang out, eat, sleep, and guard the doors. The second floor is storage. Third floor is Kang’s room. We need to get to the third floor."

"what about the front door?" Jax asked.

"that’s Suicide," Glitch said. "Forty guns will be pointed at anyone who walks in uninvited."

"what about the back door?" Maya asked.

"Same thing. Cameras and sensors."

"the roof?" I asked.

Glitch paused. Looked at the map again. Tapped the top of the building.

"The roof," Glitch said slowly. "The roof has a vent system. Old air ducts from when the factory was running. Big enough to crawl through. And Kang’s security doesn’t cover it."

"Why not?" Sarah asked.

"Because nobody’s crazy enough to climb three stories up the outside of a guarded building in Triad territory," Glitch said.

"Well we are," Jax said. She blew a bubble.

I studied the map. The roof. The vents. A path down to the third floor — straight to where Kang slept.

"Small team," I said. "Me and Jax go in through the roof. Quiet and fast. We reach Kang before his men know we’re there."

"And the forty guys downstairs?" Maya asked.

"That’s where you come in," I said. "You and Tiny hit the front. Loud. Draw their attention. Make them think the attack is coming from the street."

Maya’s eyes lit up. Just a little. "A distraction."

"A big one," I said.

"I can do big," Maya said. She picked up her rifle. Didn’t put it down this time. Held it like she meant it.

"Glitch handles the drones," I said. "Kill their cameras. Blind their eyes. And keep our comms running no matter what."

"Done," Glitch said.

"Sarah," I said. I looked at her. "You stay with Glitch. Run the operation from here. If things go wrong — really wrong — you get everyone out."

Sarah stared at me. I could see the argument building behind her eyes. The Queen didn’t like being told to sit back. But she looked at her shaking hands. At her pale skin. At the body that was running out of time almost as fast as mine.

"Fine," Sarah said.

"We go tonight," I said. "Ten o’clock. That gives us three hours before Kang’s patrols change shifts."

I looked around the table. Tired faces. Scared eyes. But nobody was leaving. And nobody was backing down.

"Get some rest," I said. "Eat something and check your gear."

I flexed my right hand. Thumb moved. Index finger moved. But barely.

Hold on. Just one more day. Give me one more day.

The clock was ticking. It was always ticking.

But tonight, we were going to make some noise.