Chapter 3: Identity Theft

Listen. I'm gonna tell you about the night Vance stole another man's identity, walked into the Triumvirate's Weapons R&D facility, and decided he wanted the title for real.

This is Chapter 3. Identity Theft. Chapter 2 was the plan and the Echo-Mask. This chapter is the job.

The Weapons R&D tower sat in the rain like it owned the block - because it did. No neon ads. No welcome. Just a big secure building and a perimeter that said stay out. Vance stopped outside long enough to feel the Echo-Mask warm against his skin. The device hummed and rewrote his biometric signature into Lord Ezekiel, a high-ranking Triumvirate manager who existed in their systems - and, for the next hour, as Vance's cover.

He wore a clean corporate suit. He walked straight to the doors. He did not hesitate. Hesitation gets you checked twice.

The Echo-Mask lit up - a hexagonal grid across his skin - and finished the job. To every camera and scanner ahead, he was Lord Ezekiel.

Mr. Nightshade (in his ear): "Don't act. Be him. Ezekiel doesn't wink at cameras. Ezekiel doesn't look nervous."

Vance: "I've got it. He walks like he belongs here. So do I."

Inside, he put his palm on the biometric scanner. Blue light ran over his hand while the system checked the stolen identity.

The screen flashed green.

BIOMETRIC CONFIRMED: LORD EZEKIEL

That was the moment the job changed for him.

The doors opened. The system called him Lord - and meant it. No argument. No suspicion. Just access. It hit harder than high-grade blood. Vance stood there and made himself a promise: when he took power in Neo-London, he was keeping that title. Permanently. Not as a disguise. As his name.

He walked into the white lobby like he'd worked there for years. Staff stepped aside. Nobody questioned him. The Echo-Mask was doing its job.

He stopped at a glass wall and looked. The people around him saw Lord Ezekiel - pale skin, beard, glasses, the face of a Triumvirate manager. In the reflection, Vance saw himself: grey skin, red eye, cybernetic implants, the street merchant underneath the lie. He smirked, then kept walking. The split didn't scare him. It excited him.

Mr. Nightshade spoke through the secure channel in his ear, calm and precise.

Mr. Nightshade: "You're drifting left of the route, Ezekiel. Take the next junction left. Security is changing patrols. Get past before the logs notice your timing."

Vance: "Got it."

He stopped at a balcony overlooking the lower floor. He wanted a look at the people who ran this city.

Below, Triumvirate security marched in red coats - carbon-weave armor, silver epaulets, heavy visors. They moved in perfect lockstep. Boots hit the stone together. They looked powerful. They also looked stuck in the past.

A junior technician with a stack of data-slates pressed himself against the wall and bowed his head as they passed. The lead officer barely nodded and kept going.

Then the same thing happened to Vance. People called him Lord. Systems addressed him as Lord. Nobody knew he was a Bloodware merchant from the Night Market wearing a stolen face.

Vance (quietly into the mic): "Look at them, Nightshade. All that power, and they still march like machines. They don't even know what century they're living in."

Mr. Nightshade: "They don't need to. Tradition is their cage. That's why they're weak. Stop watching the guards. Watch the vault manifests I sent you. We're here to steal weapons, not give speeches."

Vance: "Fair. I'd rather take the weapons."

He fixed his cuffs, left the balcony, and headed down the secondary corridor toward the R&D vault - where the Triumvirate locked away prototypes they refused to improve.

He took a glass elevator up through the tower. Neo-London's neon slid past outside. Vance watched the city drop below him and liked the feeling.

The R&D corridor was empty and white. Ceiling drones watched with blue sensors. Vance kept his pace steady. Lord Ezekiel would not rush. So neither did he.

At the end of the hall: a heavy circular vault door, chrome rings locked together. This was the target. Vance plugged in Nightshade's decryption tool and started the unlock.

It worked.

The rings hissed and pulled back. Inside were racks of prototype weapons, armor specs, and pulsing Sanguine Cores - advanced hardware the Triumvirate stored and never put to real use.

Vance grinned. This was exactly what Ad-Vance Bloodware needed.

He moved fast and carefully. Components into the rucksack. Weapons packed tight. Specs against his side. No celebrating. Just the job.

Then his wrist display flashed red.

Biometric drift. The Echo-Mask was slipping. Security had noticed something wrong with the signature.

Alarms screamed. The white corridor flooded with red emergency lights. Defense turrets dropped from the ceiling.

The Echo-Mask shut off. Vance's real face came back - grey skin, red eyes, fangs. The building had let Lord Ezekiel in. Now it was hunting Vance.

He hit a security checkpoint hard. A guard swung a stun-baton. Vance blocked it and smashed the lead guard's helmet. He wasn't playing Lord anymore. He was fighting his way out.

Another red-coated guard crashed into him. The visor cracked - same grey skin, same fangs underneath. Triumvirate muscle were vampires too. Vance jammed a stolen prototype under the guard's chin and fired.

He backed down the hall, firing controlled bursts. Guards dove behind overturned consoles. Empty casings hit the floor under the strobing red lights.

He reached the blast-proof exit, slammed a stolen keycard on the panel until it went green, and shoved the doors open as explosions tore the corridor behind him.

He stumbled into the rain-slicked plaza, scanned for snipers, then ran. The rucksack was heavy with everything they'd come for.

A matte-black Jag-404 interceptor skidded to a stop. The rear door flew open. Mr. Nightshade sat inside - tech-visor on, calm, almost smiling.

Vance dove in. Rounds sparked off the armored chassis. Nightshade hit the accelerator.

They tore away into the neon. Sirens woke up behind them. Vance wiped grey dust from his face and still heard the word Lord in his head from that green screen.

Hover-bikes and cruisers came after them. Nightshade knew the streets. He used that.

He cut a hard J-turn. A pursuing cruiser slammed into a holographic newsstand and spun out. Vance laughed once - short and real. The Triumvirate could bleed.

Mr. Nightshade: "Did you get the weapons?"

Vance: "All of it. Prototypes, armor specs, the cores. It's in the bag."

Mr. Nightshade: "Good. The Echo-Mask almost slipped. If security had locked down one second sooner, we'd be dead."

Vance: "Almost doesn't count. And when I take this city, I'm keeping the title. Permanently. I want to be called Lord for real - not just while a mask is lying for me. Merchant was the warm-up."

Mr. Nightshade: "Then stay alive long enough that you don't need the mask. Make the scanners recognize you as Lord on your own face."

They crossed a bridge as sunrise broke through the pollution. Two men in a black car. A bag full of stolen Triumvirate tech between them. Neo-London screaming behind the rain.

That's Chapter 3. Vance walked into Weapons R&D as Lord Ezekiel, stole their best prototypes, fought his way out when the mask failed, and left wanting the title for keeps.

And inside that facility, the Triumvirate is still counting empty racks.

They thought tradition would protect them. Tonight proved it doesn't.