Waking in a Cyberpunk World

[IsabellaRose]

You wake to the distant thrum of neon lights, the steady drip of leaking pipes, and the distant hum of a city that never sleeps. The air is thick with scents, a mix of damp metal, burnt circuitry, and the faintest hint of something toxic. You take a slow breath, and your lungs protest.

The world around you flickers as your vision stabilizes, glitching like a corrupted screen rebooting itself. Dim red lights bathe the alleyway in a sickly glow, pulsing in time with your pounding heartbeat. Sparks rain from an exposed wire above you, and the metallic stench of burnt electronics lingers in the air.

Your head throbs. A dull, sharp ache radiates from the base of your skull, and as you lift a shaky hand to touch it, you feel the ridges of a fresh implant port, cold metal fused into your skull. You don’t remember getting an implant. You don’t remember much of anything.

Your surroundings sharpen as your mind catches up. You’re slumped against the side of a rusted-out vehicle, its tires long stripped, its hood panel removed, exposing a gutted engine. Beyond it, the city looms high, buildings rising as endless steel monoliths, their sides covered in neon ads and projected holograms that promise everything from enhancement surgeries to synthetic dream injections. In the distance, the bass-heavy thump of music rolls from some underground club, and high above, hovercrafts drift between the upper levels of the megacity, their underbellies flashing corporate insignias like floating gods overseeing the street-level chaos below.

Then, a voice, directly in your brain. "You're late."

A holo-screen snaps to life in your vision, projected directly into your retinas. A figure stares back, half-shadowed, wearing sleek cybernetics, their face obscured behind a shifting digital mask. Your neural interface confirms an active connection. This is a direct uplink. Whoever they are, they have access to your systems, your biometrics, your status feed, and that means they know more about you than you do right now.

You try to move, but your body resists, your limbs sluggish, like they’ve been rebooted from a cold shutdown. A system diagnostic flashes across your HUD.

Unknown code detected. Neural pathways rerouted.

The voice in your head speaks again, and somewhere in the dark, footsteps are approaching.

• If the voice says, "Get your head straight and get back on task. You were supposed to extract the target fifteen minutes ago." click here. <link forthcoming>
• If the voice says, "Your brain’s still catching up. That hack scrambled your eggs. Follow my instructions and maybe you'll live." click here. <link forthcoming>
• If the voice says, "Wake up. I don't know how you're going to flirt you way out of this one, but you better get your game face on. They're coming." click here. <link forthcoming>
• If the voice says, "I warned you to stay out of it, but you had to stick your nose in. You better get out before they find you. You're not even supposed to be here." click here. <link forthcoming>
• If the voice says, "I don't know how you're still alive, but you need to move. They're already looking for you." click here. <link forthcoming>