Maniac’s Mayhem: A guide to being a corporate slave

Dollhouses, and other such institutions that take away a human's ability to think for themselves, almost completely disappeared in Europe after 2051. If you look online, no official reason will be found, but everyone who tries to make such an establishment will quickly find themselves hanging by the neck of the tallest skyscraper in Paris. It does not matter where or who you are.

As to who is responsible for the killing, footage has never been found.

-- How dollhouses disappeared, a short note made by the Purple Truth.

Well, this is bad. Yui is most definitely freaking out, and so is the other person, whose name I still don’t know. I turn to her.

“Miss, sorry to bother you.” I say as I turn to her, her eyes going wide in surprise. “But I don’t think that I know your name.”

“Ooh, it's Elena, miss, Elena Blaser,“ She says

I turn back to Yui, “Do I have a miss sort of face? People keep calling me that.”

Yui just sighed, “That is probably because you are; excluding anyone with a weapon, you tend to be the scariest person in the room.”

“Scary? Who, me? Why is that?” I ask, a bit confused.

“Well, I don’t know for others, but I have a sneaking suspicion that if you wanted someone's data, you could easily obtain it; add on top of that that you are dating the daughter of a CEO of one of the top 10 most powerful corporations in Europe, and yeah, you are scary.” She says.

I nod; I guess that makes sense, still, kind of sad; the first thing people get out of me is fear. Anyway, this conversation is not helping us get out of here. I take a look at the surveillance, and yeah, this is problematic. I mean, I want to get Elena out, but I would prefer that rest of the dolls get out as well.

There are a total of ten of them in the room, but with the amount of people just walking in and not buying anything, I think the real number is a lot higher. As for security, well, it is not great. It is still going to be a problem, but it is about average for an establishment in this area; I guess not attracting attention is more important than keeping this place secure.

I turn back to Yui. “Any good ideas?” I ask her.

Her eyes go as wide as saucers “No, fuck; I thought you had some ideas.” she says, panic clear in her voice.

“Well, I do have ideas, just that none of them is particularly good.” I say, while counting up the guards.

“Care to enlighten us.” Yui says.

“Well, first of all, we have the basic idea of just running out guns blazing. The patrol is thin enough for us to get out of here with limited resistance if we choose the right moment to strike.”

Yui pulls a face. “I'd rather not go into a gunfight.”

“That is fair; the second option is that she and I switch clothes. She pulls her hood up and pretends to be me, so you two can walk out, and then I can sneak out a bit later.”

“I don’t like that plan much either. Would feel like we are abandoning you.”

“Well, maybe a bit, but we only have one gun, and it is easier for one person to sneak out than three.” I say.

“Okay, and what is the third option?” Yui asks.

“You are in their security system too, right?” I ask, and when she nods, I continue, “Well, there is this black spot with no surveillance, so that might hold some options, but I can’t really be sure.”

Yui sits down on the bed and sighs “So, only bad options then? Anything we should consider?”

“Yes.” I turn back to Elena, “ Do you remember how your wounds got healed?”

“Yes, they made us inhale some weird gas that would heal us after any of us had a violent customer, but it felt like my entire body was set on fire.” She says with a shiver

‘Lyssa, any guesses?’ I subvocalise.

It sounds like nano-regenerative equipment, something humans should not have access to. And by the sound of it, Lyssa believes that the version they are using is incomplete.

“So good news and bad news,” I say. “So that stuff is definitely samurai tech, but an imitation or derivative of it.”

“And what is the good news?” Yui asks.

“No, that was the good news.” I say.

“How is that good news?” Yui asks.

“It means that we can rule out the possibility of a samurai being involved; it is more likely they found some old samurai equipment and tried to copy it.”

“I fail to see how that is good news.” Yui says.

“Copying samurai tech takes a long time, so chances are, the control chip and the healing is the only thing they have, and we don’t have to deal with an alien-empowered murder machine.” I say, while looking at Elena.

She nods, “Yes, I did not see them use anything else that was suspicious.”

“Good, so we are only dealing with people with control chips and healing spray.” Yui says in a sarcastic tone.

“If you say it like that, it sounds a lot less great.” I complain.

Yui looks at me, unamused, “That is because the options are not great. Don’t you have anything else?”

“Unless you can come up with a reason for a lot of people leaving all of a sudden, then no, I don’t have anything else,” I say.

“What about a fire?” Elena asks.

I look at her: “That could work.”

I look around the room. It does not really scream fire hazard to me, but it is not impossible. I check the ceiling, and there is a fire alarm, but that can work to my advantage. I jump on the bed and try to slowly twist it off. As it comes off, it reveals not only the wiring but a big plastic tube connected to it as well.

“Yui, do you know of any fire alarms with tubes connected?” I ask, looking at the thing.

“Maybe it will release water.” Yui says in an unsure tone.

“That could be the case. Can you give me my knife? I want to check it.” I say, while reaching out my hand.

She gives me the knife, and I make a small incision in the piping. Almost immediately an alarm in my augs starts to beep loudly, and a warning sign appears in my vision. With several chemical names.

‘Lyssa, the fuck is this?’

It's a warning from your internal gas filter.

“Everyone back off. These pipes are filled with poison gas.” I say, and both Yui and Elena stand up and run to the far side of the room.

Technically, the gas is supposed to put you to sleep, not to kill you.

“Sorry, it is knock-out gas, not poison.” I say. Then I have an idea. “Wait, I have an idea! Elena take off your clothes."

She looks at me, confused. “Why?”

“We are going with the second plan; once the two of you are out, I activate the sleeping gas and walk out.” I explain, as I start taking of my shirt and sweater.

“And how will you prevent yourself from being put to sleep?” Yui asks.

“I have a gas mask filter thing in my throat, too, so I am immune to the gas.” I say with a smile.

Yui looks at me with a frown. “That actually does not sound that bad. Are you okay with being on your own?”

“Yeah, I mean it will only be for a bit. I will trigger the gas a few minutes after you leave.”

Yui sighs “Fine, here. We are hiding out over here. If you are not there within half an hour, I am calling in backup.”

Swapping clothes and making Elena look like me from a casual glance is easy enough. We are pretty much the same size and everything, the only downside being that her Maniac costume does not come with pants, so let's just say it is a bit more drafty down there than normal. Luckily, the hoody is slightly oversized.

Then we have to wait for the full two hours to run out before they can leave. I follow their progress on the security cameras. They are allowed to leave the building without any issues. I wait a few minutes and stand up. Sadly, whatever is controlling the gas release is not remotely accessible from here, so I pull on my hood and adjust the mask to cover my face.

I take a step out of the door and walk left, towards the blank zone in the security network. If the controls to the gas are going to be anywhere, they are going to be there. I approached the area at a confident pace, acting like I am supposed to be there.

I come up to the door without being accosted. Okay, that is not true. I had multiple guards grab or smack my butt, but if I have to deal with that to get here, then it is a worthy sacrifice. I mean, I will just cut off the offending limbs on my way out.

When I get to the door, I hesitate for a second, because it is guarded by two active guards. But they don’t seem to react to my presence, so I decide to go on with confidence. I walk up and open the door, and head inside. I note that the door has a digital lock, so I take control of it and lock it behind me.

Then, I take a quick scan of the room. There is a big desk there with a woman with bright red hair sitting behind it ,working on some kind of computer. In addition to that, there are two more guards in the room. The woman looks up from whatever she is doing to look at me.

“What reason do you have for coming here? My entertainment should be here in a few hours.” she says in an annoyed tone.

I do not answer. I am way too busy cracking the security of her computer and activating the sleeping gas. Then I pause.

‘Lyssa, the chip allows the dolls to move in their sleep, right?”

That is correct.

‘Good, take control of them, make them put on some clothes, and make them head to a safe location’

Certainly.

With that settled, I turn back to the woman. Sadly, there is no gas vent here, so everyone here is still very much awake. I turn my mask to the side, revealing my face and giving her a bright smile.

“Hello, I think we should talk.” I say in my business voice.

I walk further into the room and take a seat on the sofa. The two guards pull out their guns and aim them at me. Not that that really matters. I still have my shields, so as long as I am fast enough, I am not in any danger.

“Oh, and who might you be?” the woman says, pressing more keys on the keyboard.

‘Lyssa, can you track all the outbound connections, please?’

Certainly, you want Lyssa to tuck you into bed next?

I ignore the sassy AI in favour of answering the woman. “Just a concerned citizen.”

“And why would a concerned citizen be in my shop? I doubt you are here to complain about sex workers.” she said with a confident smile.

“Nah, though I do have my hangups about them, that is not why I am here. I am here because of the insane number of people who are not customers going in here. And running their faces through some facial recognition software tells me that most of them are people in important positions.”

“So what, you are concerned that this is a secret meeting spot for the rich and powerful?” the woman says.

“Not really. I am more concerned that you are trying to control the elites of this city through the use of control chips.”

“Huh, well, that is unfortunate. You have a pretty face, so I am sure I could have had a fun time training you. Guards, kill her.”

I summon my shields, and the guards empty their ammo into it. I grab one of the pens off the side table and activate my launcher, throwing the thing straight through the guard's chest, and into the wall behind him. Then I stand up, pocketing the second pen. I make the blade appear out of my left arm and use it to cut down the second guard. I walk back to my chair and sit down.

“Now, where were we?” I say with a smile on my face.