Pack | Targeting

“Firefly, repurpose. Do not deploy flash-bang. Detach one of your demo-limbs. Set it to minimum yield. We’re talking a firecracker, not a bomb. Cicada, you have the tethers. Hornet, prepare to scream on all EM frequencies the second I give the word.”

Kael felt a cold surge of panic. The pack was built to kill, not to capture. Scarab’s cannon would atomize him. Firefly’s charges were for doors, not limbs. Peaseblossom’s railgun could pin a fly to a wall at 500 meters, but it had only one setting: lethal. targeting pack

“Targeting pack, new directive. Do not eliminate. Capture. The Archivist has a dead man’s switch. The schematics are rigged to self-destruct if his heart stops. We need him alive. Repeat, alive . Disable and extract.” “Firefly, repurpose

“Hornet, confirm no other active electronics. Cicada, get a demo charge on the primary support pillar at the junction. Firefly, prepare a flash/stun for the entrance. Scarab… stand by.” The pack moved with a silent, lethal grace. They were one organism, and the Archivist was the tumor. Set it to minimum yield

Then he saw it. The floor. It was old ferrocrete, cracked and waterlogged. The Archivist’s console was bolted down, but the panel at his feet was a maintenance hatch, held by four rusted screws.

But as the pack’s remote feeds went dark, Kael replayed the moment: the old man’s eyes, wide with terror behind the respirator mask, the way his hand had clawed for the gun. He hadn’t been a monster. He had been a tired, frightened archivist.