Zeke sat cross-legged on the roof of a ramen bar, chewing on something that claimed to be beef but tasted suspiciously like optimism and printer ink.
Below, the city throbbed. Sirens. Neon. Drones scanning faces. Corporate choppers sliced the sky like angry metal bees.
"Are you sure this is a good idea?" Tess asked, ducking behind a rusted vent. "You're literally the most wanted man in Neon Sprawl."
Zeke nodded, slurping. "Exactly. And the last place they'd expect me is in public eating overpriced street noodles."
Tess blinked. "That's… not completely stupid."
"It's mostly stupid," Nyx corrected. "But stupid enough to be unpredictable. Which, statistically, makes you temporarily invincible."
Zeke beamed. "Told you! Chaos is a strategy."
Tess muttered something about karma and throat punches.
...
Meanwhile, across town…
In a chrome-plated hovervan packed with weapons, synth-lasers, and questionable playlists, the SynthBlades were assembling.
Elite assassins. Half-human. Half-machine. All fashion.
Their leader, a towering figure with glowing red eyes and a katana made of compressed nanofibers, slid on his shades indoors like a boss.
"Target is codename Neon Ghost," he growled. "Infamous. Elusive. Rumored to have hijacked a military AI with his mind alone."
A younger assassin raised a hand. "Is it true he speaks fluent Binary and once seduced a drone?"
"…Does it matter?" their leader snapped.
"No, sir. Just… cool lore."
...
Back on the roof, Zeke wiped his mouth with a napkin that read Eat Fast or Be Eaten and stretched.
"So what's the plan?" he asked.
Tess tossed him a datachip. "This is the location of an old Net-Jack node buried under the city. You connect to that, and you might be able to override your wanted status."
Zeke frowned. "Like… delete myself from the system?"
"Exactly."
Zeke squinted. "Sounds risky. Like, fry-my-brain risky."
"It is," Nyx agreed cheerfully. "There's a 34% chance your consciousness might get duplicated and turned into a dancing adbot for protein powder."
He blinked. "That's oddly specific."
"Because I ran the simulation. You looked shredded."
...
As they descended the fire escape, Zeke spotted a poster fluttering against a wall. His face. Glowing red letters.
WANTED: NEON GHOST – DEAD, ALIVE, OR VERY CONFUSED
REWARD: 1,000,000 CREDITS & A YEAR OF PREMIUM NETFLUX
He stared at it.
"Hey… do I look that cool in real life?"
Tess snorted. "No. But now we have to keep you alive. You're a meme now."
"Long live the chaos messiah," Nyx added.
From the shadows across the street, three Synth Blades watched silently, their eyes flashing.
"Target acquired."