Hey, chum! You’re tuned into the inaugural kick-off of VIP3R’s graphic novel. This originally appeared on Twitter back in December 2022, where each thread featured storytelling, art, and a choose-your-own-adventure poll to help guide the story. This chapter is now mintable via Mirror. Aside from being a super cool graphic novel, VIP3R is also a story-based learning platform that empowers the future marketer with web3 and AI. Join us on Circle here.
-- Reggie
▸▸ ᴅᴀᴛᴀꜰᴇᴇᴅ ɪɴᴄᴏᴍɪɴɢ.
Runners.
The inconspicuous jet fuel powering this dying metropolis.
Mega City finds beauty from death. An unhinged allure to those flatlined on the job.
And tonight is just another night to dance.
NOIZE is a frequent for Mega City's dregs. A unity of stimmers & pushers, mudslingers & anarchists.
The bar is hidden in a sub-level of Grimslocke, one of many barrens that litter the Lower Sanctuary.
A unit of masked runners arrive. Just one street employer tonight: Rusco.
Fraggin' Rusco. Smells like artificially grown algae & stale noodles. Brash, but never late to fork over the cred.
Need runners.
Break into the Warui Arcology.
Steal a pile of code.
Return for payment.
Pay is 10,000 ⌾. Enough to lick a wound or two.
An assault on a self-contained private city is like a fresh shot of stim. Next hit could be your last.
Mega City is home to many fortresses, and Warui Arcology is equally nefarious.
One runner, a hacker named Rabbit, pulls out their cyberdeck and jacks into Warui's access point.
Active floor plans aren't hard to steal. Usually protected by low effort ICE.
Volley, a tactical runner, produces two entry points: waste management & the carport.
An entry through waste management is fraggin' disgusting. A sludge haven for rats and ferrels. But: less chance of alarms, longer path to the server room.
The carport is blendably busy, and less sludgy. If any of the runners slip up, we'll need to burn our way out.
Street samurai don't waste time thinking. Right answers always come from the gut.
Waste management it is.
Waste management -- safest way inside.
Slipping past security and into the tunnels, the only adversaries were boot slime and occasional ferrals. Goblins with zero brain matter.
Server room ahead.
Rabbit needs another 15 seconds to finish the download.
A rogue ICE tripped an alarm, setting a tidal wave of alerts across the arcology. Laser reticules beam erratically as the sounds get louder. They're closing in.
Rabbit rips her goggles off. Download complete. Time to run.
Improvising an escape lures a rapid release of adrenaline. The ultimate drug for junkheads.
A quick flash startles incoming security, enough for the runners to blast a wall & bolt down a service path.
Outnumbered is an understatement. Almost out of options. Can't run forever.
Warui security teams begin closing the gap. Far more aggressive than last time they made an unwelcome visit.
Two options left.
-
Take cover in an abandoned warehouse and be silent, or
-
Make it messy in the busy Hitotsu market.
The abandoned warehouse had a colossal odor of mold & humiliation.
It had better days as a storage facility, but had been repurposed into a bootleg human experiment lab.
Dried blood smears carry a weight of emotion.
Once safe inside a warm vessel, spilt blood becomes exposed, naked. It grows colder by the millisecond.
Over time it hardens, darkens, stains. Like dark memories, hard to remove.
Dried blood surround the makeshift human testbeds.
A faint tri-colored light shines from the end of the warehouse. The subtle blink seemed like it had been calling for a millennia.
The runners approach, moving aside debris and trash, exposing a glowing "V".
The floor below appear to have edges, in what may be a trap door.
Pressing the "V" on the wall illuminates an array of light.
The wall's edge surrounding the runners shine in formation. Segments of the floor deconstruct, releasing shots of dust hit the air.
What was once hidden, has been released.
Light shines up from the gaping ground, revealing a dark staircase.
The railless steps drop them further into a simulated nightmare. A habitat for inhumanity.
No signs of life.
At the foot of the stairs rests a rusty service ladder.
Beneath the ladder would have been anyone's guess: a desolate station, closed off for ages.
A deserted bar, pool table, and videophone for datajacking, a sitting area silhouetted by a panelled window, an assault rifle on the table.
Around the corner, screens blink to life.
A faint sound could be heard from one of the terminals.
red glowing ring shimmers in front of dozens of monitors.
It appears to be a signal.
But from whom?
▸▸ ᴇɴᴅ ᴏꜰ ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ ᴏɴᴇ.