As I followed Mirage through the halls, I couldn’t help but notice how tired everyone was. Mirage wasn’t the only one who looked worn out. Pretty much every staffer that I passed looked like they hadn’t slept in days.

  “I hate to tell you this, but I don’t think repg your staff with zombies is a good way to increase productivity,” I remarked as I watched one girl walk into a closed door.

  “Har dee har,” Mirage sneered. “Do you holy think we’d be running this anization into the ground if it wasn’t an emergency?”

  “I just figured that’s how all corps worked. Run the employees into the ground and repce them when they’re no longer useful,” I expined. I noticed one of the staffers turn and look at Mirage in horror, but the man just shook his head and waved him away.

  “I still don’t uand your vehement hatred for corporations and the o badmouth them every ce you get. Not all corps are bad,” Mirage sighed as he pushed open a door and held it open for me.

  “Yeah, well, my experience says differently. Sweatshops desigo drive their employees into debt, mines using IS workers to mine illegal materials, and industrial hellholes barely paying their employees a living wage. You’re right, corporations are great,” I said sarcastically as I slipped into one of the fortable boardroom chairs and slumped down. Unfortunately, I was so short that when I slouched, I could barely see over the table. I decided just to wait until the meeting started before I sat up.

  Bob pushed his way into the room after me, then took up a position behianding menagly. Helen followed afterwards and quickly found a p the other side of the table. After she was seated, Mirage finally made his to the head of the table.

  “Normally I’d wait, and try t everyone up to speed at the same time, but sidering the situation,” Mirage said, gng in my dire. “I’ll just record this and pass it out to the others.” He flicked on a projector and called up a dispy. It just looked like a bunch of random lio me. “As you see, over the st few months, ever sihe i in Jasper, the big four corps have seen sistent, major losses in their profit margins. At first we thought it was due to market fluctuations, due to Global Rare-Earth’s… unfortunate closing, but now we know otherwise.”

  I stared at the squiggly lines for a long moment before yawning. “I get it someone’s fug with the corps. Why is this a samurai issue?” I asked.

  “Because the corps pay for the PMCs, aween Global Rare-Earth going under and profit losses, the city’s standing military is down more than thirty-five pert,” Mirage expined.

  I blinked, “Is that a lot?”

  “Over seven hundred people? It’s enough to promise our perimeters during the incursion,” Mirage said. He flicked to a new dispy, which dispyed a plete list of military units from four months ago pared to today. It was quite a difference.

  “’t you just, I don't know, tax other corps to make up for the lost profit?” I asked, sitting up for the first time.

  Mirage sighed. “Helmar Eleics, Tel Aerospace, Alliance Bio Tech Systems, and Great Northern Info Systems not only employ about fifteen pert of the city, but they either trol or have is in most of the other major institutions iy. They’ve already tapped whatever resources they could to keep things stable. If we don’t figure out who is trying t them down and why, the city’s defenses could be at risk.”

  “That sounds…” I started.

  “Catastrophic?” Mirage interjected.

  “Like it’s not a fug samurai issue,” I pleted. “Sure, it sucks if they go under, but how is that different than repg a mayor elsewhere? Did you ever sider asking for help from the Family elsewhere, bringing io cover the lost PMCs?”

  Mirage froze for a moment. “Calgary ’t survive without the corporations,” he said quietly.

  “Is that an empirical fact, or your opinion?” I spat.

  “Okay you two, enough!” Helen yelled, causing both of us to turn towards her. “As much as I like to watch you tear each other apart every ce you get, it’s getting old.” She rubbed her eyes for a minute before looking up again. “Teddy believes that the guy tured was from out of town. you think of a reason why some outside force would want to mess with the city?” she asked Mirage.

  “I only think of two. her are good,” Mirage admitted. “Either another corp is making a py for more market share, driving the supply of products of a petitor down, but if that were the case, I think the attacks would have been more focused.”

  “And the other option?” Helen prompted.

  “plete corporate takeover,” Mirage admitted, log his fingers and putting his hands up to his nose.

  “Again… I don’t see how this is a samurai issue,” I muttered.

  “Teddy, for all is and purposes, the corps trol the city and its defenses. If they go pletely out of business, the city will fall to the antithesis before their oppos have a ce to take trol of their assets. So, the best way to take trol is to perform a hostile takeover when their oppos are weak,” Mirage expined.

  I just stared at the man.

  “He’s saying that co to war, Teddy,” Helen finally said, “Someone might roll up to the city with a n of tanks to take over.”

  I gnced betweewo for a minute, looking for any sign that they were lying. “Bullshit! No one would be stupid enough to throw their defensive forces against another city, decimating both, on the ce they could perform a coup.”

  “It’s happened before,” Mirage signed. “People get greedy.”

  “Why the fuck would someone want to take over this shithole anyways?! What’s so good about it?!” I yelled.

  “Calgary has some of the best mining, processing, and produ capabilities on the west coast. We have tracts from Cascadia to New Montreal and everywhere iween. There are a lot of corporations that would love to have their hands on that produ power,” Mirage said softly.

  “Well… maybe you should interrogate that cyberninja we just delivered to you before jumping to clusions. Maybe the man was just a nutcase, or maybe he was hired by a local corp and just never heard of me before. There could be a ton of reasons he was running around besides destabilizing the city for a takeover,” I said.

  “Don’t worry, I’ve assigned my best people to ‘talk’ to him. We’ll get answers out of him soon enough,” Mirage replied darkly.

  “Alright… don’t say it like that,” I muttered back. “It’s creepy.”

  “Is there anything we do to prove who’s behind this?” Helen asked. “Besides waiting for the torture to end.” Mirage gnced her way, but she just locked eyes with him. “Don’t try and sugarcoat it. We all know what it is.”

  “The best thing we do is try and prevent more disruptions to the supply s and produ. If the corps get ba track, they’ll be able to hire more PMCs, and that’ll dissuade anyone fr to mess with us.”

  “I guess I could use my tacts to look out for more issues in the industrial sectors. I’ll make sure to emphasize not to get involved, so no one ends up like Alex,” Helen mumbled. “With your permission, of course.”

  “Absolutely,” Mirage replied.

  “Yeah, well, good luck with that. I’m out,” I said, hopping out of my chair.

  “Wait, you’re not going to help?” Mirage asked, fbbergasted. “Didn’t you just hear what we said here?”

  “There may be a war because a bunch of greedy fug assholes hate each other,” I replied. “But it’s still a corpo issue, and I have no idea why I should be involved as a samurai. I’ll help with the C forces until things stabilize, but don’t expect me to run around and do chores for you.”

  Mirage stared at me for a minute. “You have over six hundred bears sitting around?” Mirage asked. It was obvious that he didn’t believe me, based upon his deadpan void half-lidded eyes.

  “Of course not,” I replied. “I have around a thousand, so there are spares.” I turned and started walking out of the room “Have someone figure out the best pce to station them, a me know,” I said, waving over my shoulder. Of course Bob was right behind me, so they couldn’t see it.

  When I finally stepped out of the room and into the hallway, I stopped and looked around. “Fuck…” I muttered. “I fot to keep track of the path again.”