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Neon Hearts in Derelict Futures [Briar & AlrunaRose]

Aolieon groaned for a second, and then it turned into a sultry laugh as she took Therrye's hand in assistance towards sitting upright. "Ohh, you don't know the half of it, baby," she commented at all of Therrye's known praise for her stunts. She pulled the chopsticks out of her hair, lettinf the hasty braid fall loose as she brushed a few loose bangs out of the way of her gaze, looking up at her with a leer. "Something tells me you'd do well to remember that, in more ways than one..." she lowly muttered, turning a slow blink on the bruiser as she wiped some sweat from her brow, just finishing up on catching her breath. She plucked the Chromanticore off the ground and placed it to her lips hungrily, chugging it as if she had been parched for days and letting a gasping sigh as she finished the tasty drink. Wiping her lips, she bit her lip for a second, working valiantly to regain her composure as the euphoria subsided; eventually she stood up and dusted herself off -- frowning at the crumpled and crispy burnt bits of eurodollars on the ground. She went into the room prior and re-equipped all of her gear, doing her best to straighten everything out and get it all back into place.
She then approached the door to the next room, turning to give Therrye an ambitious leer. "One more room to go, yes? After all weve been through thus far; i swear the pay better be good. Well, bruiser... let's finish this." She gestured to the door, allowing Therrye to work her magic at what she had managed to turn into a destructive art. She then crouched preemptively, expecting a practical firestorm to come at them, after all they had been through...

🎶 Norihiko Hibino -- "Dead Crew" 🎶

Whenever Therrye finished rending the door to this room however, what Aolieon furrowed her eyebrows at, was that this room appeared to be more illuminated than the rest, with the edges of the walls and ceiling lit up with a calm blue light, with even the floor tiles illuminated in this same color. The wall and ceiling panels were blackened out, with blue scrolling digi-code in various wall panels, scrolling past; beyond this, there appeared to be no other details, not even another door -- what's more is that oddly whenever they stepped in, the door would not even attempt to seal behind them despite not receiving a proper door code... In the middle of the room was a black pedestal, upon it appearing to be none other than their prize -- the datacube in question, with various cables spindled from the back wall and plugged into it.
"Hmm... guess their budget must have been exhausted," Aolieon commented, stepping into the room and looking about the room, trying to discern if there was any other traps or defenses for this -- she narrowed her eyes; this all seemed too easy, compared to the rest of what they had been through... "Ugh," Aolieon groaned, squinting her eyes shut and placing a hand over her forehead and eyes -- her headache had seemed to return with a vengeance. Withdrawal? Overexhaustion, Stress? She couldnt tell for a moment, but then she steeled herself still looking about the room. She found herself squinting, feeling as if something was mildly burning her eyes -- although she hadn't exactly been looking at many bright lights today, save the laser grid. Eye strain, came the thought... almost feels like when I catch a BD. She rubbed her forehead and eyebrows, fingers parting enough to briefly let light upon her eyelids -- it was all so surreal; the lighting of this room seemed ambient, albeit blue, but it seemed as if the light was in front of her face... Aolieon paused, the sound of her breath seizing very audible -- there was no sound of data transfer, no cooling fans... no sound at all. "Wait," Aolieon called out with a low and icy tone; opening her eyes and glaring seriously at the datacube, she narrowed her eyes but locked her gaze onto the ominous box, no matter how much it seemed to hurt, just to look at. Just as her bruiser companion entered and got close, she saw it; a tiny portion of one of the datacube's faces ever so silently bristled into net-code static for but a few milliseconds... Before anything could be done, let alone allow Therrye to lay a finger on the "datacube" -- Aolieon quick-drew her pistol and fired a shot directly at the ominous box without a second thought. The paranoia had peaked instantaneously and so fast within Aolieon, that she reached forwards with her free hand, grabbing Therrye by the hair and pulling her a couple of steps back.

🎶 Norihiko Hibino -- "Countdown to Disaster" 🎶

And just like that -- the holographic illusion faded. A small wall of bullets flew from the side walls, blinking into the walls around them in various directions -- all aimed at an attempt to kill whoever had just instantly touched the datacube. The blue lights in the room all turned a glowering red; visible lasers crossed the room, coming from Militech Mines that had not been witnessed before... and the door appeared in the back, full black and reinforced, with a single data panel on it now showing a red bar that was slowly filling up...

"Ohh, NOW they decide to get serious??!" Aolieon immediately started curling and maneuvering herself through the direct center of the room, meandering around the various lasers so she could get a closer look at the data panel. "Stupid fucking Ghost Protocol; Corpo anti-espionage bait-and-switch fuckery... Therrye, do something about these mines!" Aolieon eventually crouched underneath the last laser line, and read the data panel. "Shit... 'Logic Failsafe Primed; Copying for Upload' -- they're backing up the Cube's files!" Aolieon turned around, her eyes sharpened to vibrant amber seas, almost without pupils -- her AR glasses spun with netcode, and lasers started coming offline, one by one. "Scratch my last, bruiser; rip this door open -- Get it open NOW!"
 
"I'd say I've learned my lesson, but then I'm here, aren't I?" she smirked slightly then looked toward the door while Aolieon refreshed herself and recovered from the Slo-Mo. While she waited for her companion to gear back up and return, she eyed the door, thinking over the traps they'd already encountered. There should only be one left at this point, she mused, but the intel hadn't been clear on what might be in it. Having run through the ones she was familiar with, she quietly sighed and stretched her neck, back, arms and shoulders, reading herself for what came next. "That's the hope," she replied with a larger smirk before getting back into the headspace of work. This time she went back to her first technique, wanting to take more care in preparing for whatever lay in wait for them. When the door didn't come down immediately, she set to destroying the mechanisms above and below her to make it impossible for it to do so, taking the time to thoroughly demolish and disable the door from ever closing again.

"There should still be one more room after this one," the bruiser murmured, considering how... plain this room seemed. She tapped on the walls, perused things, narrowed her eyes, perused them again, then shrugged after a beat and carefully approached the data crypt. "Intel might have been wrong?" she voiced out loud, unsure of it herself. Her eyes widened at the grip on her hair and she started to cry out when the bullets blasted the space around and near to where she'd just been. Digging into more of a crouch with the illusion dispelled, she grit her teeth, the anger of defiance welling up. Fingers rolling in consideration, she moved to one side of the room, twisted her arm, and then did a swift jab into a mine's center, ruining it utterly before it could detonate on her. "Hn." It seemed too easy, and yet... she'd destroyed another two mines by the time Aolieon called for her. "Ah, fuck. Of course it wouldn't be that easy." Dashing forward, she smashed her shield into a couple mines on her way to the door, then used it as a turtle shield in a dive to the front of the door, weathering a hail of laser fire and explosive discharge. The shield wasn't entirely fragged yet, but it'd definitely seen better days, and was losing its defensive coherence. Clear from more boom-booms on one side, she planted the shield toward the other and then got to work on the final door.

Rapidly pummeling into the bottom half, she got an indent to grip from and tear the lower half forward, twisting as she went until it rent free from the floor entirely with a heave of exertion. Tossing it aside, she started doing the same to the top, while getting a look through it toward what lay ahead. "Data crypt's in the next room unless it's another fucking mirage!"
 
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