Neon bled through the cracks of Delta-9, the cyber-slum of what used to be Chicago. Trash bots sputtered down alleyways, glitching mid sweep. Every wall buzzed with holo-ads offering chrome limbs, memory wipes, or instant dopamine loops.

Jax adjusted the synthetic patch over his left eye, now a lens tuned to track heat signatures. He wasn’t law, just someone who remembered what the law used to feel like.

Tonight’s job? Track a kid who stole some corporate passkey barely ten years old and already worth more dead than alive.

He found her tucked behind a fried circuit stall, holding a pulse pistol too big for her hands.

“I ain’t goin’ back,” she spat.

“You don’t have to,” he muttered, tossing her a burner chip. “New ID. New place. Get lost.”

She stared. Hope flickered.

“Why help me?”

Jax lit a smoke, eyes scanning the towers overhead.

“Because you remind me what I used to be, before this place rewired me.”

She vanished into the steam.

The rain fell harder. Jax turned toward the chaos again, one foot already back in hell.

He took a drag.

“Be careful out there.”