Glass rained down like falling ice.
The front display window was gone.
High-intensity tactical lights blinded the room, cutting through the dust in sharp, blue beams.
”Target spotted!” a harsh voice shouted from the street outside.
“Cover the back door!”
I grabbed Sua by her waist and threw us both behind the thick oak workbench.
A split second later, a heavy spray of automatic gunfire tore through the shop.
RAT-AT-AT-AT-AT!
Ancient wooden clock cases exploded into splinters.
Brass gears, glass panels, and steel springs flew everywhere, chiming randomly as they hit the floor.
Beside us, Assemblyman Kang dropped to his hands and knees, covering his ears and screaming in panic.
”Stay down, Kang!” I yelled over the deafening noise.
I pulled my pistol, peaking around the edge of the heavy workbench.
Two black-clad Aegis tactical enforcers were climbing through the shattered window frame, their submachine guns raised.
Behind them, hovering in the middle of the dark street, was a heavy class-3 surveillance drone, its twin spotlight beams searching the dark room.
”They aren’t firing to kill,” Sua gasped beside me, clutching the black data drive to her chest.
“They’re trying to suppress us!
Baek wants the drive intact!”
”Then he shouldn’t have sent enforcers into a clockmaker’s shop,” I said.
I leaned out and fired three quick shots.
BANG!
BANG!
BANG!
He stumbled backward out the window, crashing into the street pavement.
The second enforcer dove behind a display shelf for cover.
”Sua!
Where is the physical interface node?” I asked, my voice cold and calm despite the chaos.
“The main cable junction!”
”Under the workbench!” she shouted, pointing with her good hand at a heavy steel box bolted to the wall beneath the desk frame.
“It’s the original fiber-optic line I installed in 1998!
It connects straight into the Mapo district power grid!”
”Can you plug the drive in with one hand?”
She looked at her blood-stained shoulder, her jaw setting in a hard, uncompromising line.
“Watch me.”
She crawled toward the heavy box, keeping low to avoid the flying wood splinters and glass.
The second enforcer leaned out from behind his shelf, raising his weapon to take aim at her back.
”Over here, dead man,” I growled.
I popped up from behind the workbench and fired two rounds into his shoulder joint, forcing him back into cover.
But outside, the class-3 drone flared its blue lights and began angling its heavy front turret directly into the shop.
The turret started to spin with a high-pitched electronic whine.
”Ji-hoo!” Kang screamed from under a pile of broken wood.
“It’s going to fire!”
I couldn’t shoot down a heavy military drone with a 9mm handgun.
”Sua!
How much time?!” I yelled, firing two more rounds at the drone’s armored lens to distract its targeting computer.
”Three seconds!” Sua shouted.
Beneath the workbench, she ripped open the heavy steel box.
She shoved the matte-black military data drive into the main fiber-optic port.
A sharp, red LED light on the drive flashed twice.
Then it turned a bright, steady, electric blue.
CLICK.
For a fraction of a second, the entire world went completely still.
Then, every light in Mapo died.
The glowing blue spotlights on the drone instantly cut out.
The spinning heavy turret slowed to a silent stop, and the drone crashed heavily onto the street asphalt like a dropped rock.
Outside, the bright blue billboards, streetlamps, and security cameras across six square blocks blinked out at the exact same time, plunging the district into pitch-black shadow.
Silence fell over the shop.
The only sound left was the slow, steady ticking of a single brass pocket watch resting on the floor.
Sua sat back against the wall, panting heavily in the dark, a small, triumphant smile on her face.
”Sector 4 is offline,” she whispered.
I stepped out from behind the workbench, grabbing my tactical pack and slinging it over my shoulder.
I walked over to Sua, reaching down to pull her up to her feet.
”Let’s move,” I said, looking out at the pitch-black street.
“The dark won’t stay ours for long.”