Bzz-
The indicator light on the enormous Hellhound mech flickered faintly, and the mech gave an almost imperceptible shudder.
The signal anomaly lasted less than a millisecond. The machine kept running as though nothing had happened.
Some kind of completely invisible quadrupedal robot quietly crawled down from the mech's interface, the sound of its metal feet striking the armor drowned out by the mech's operation.
The combat network had been hacked. The Biometric Data of all twelve soldiers stationed in this aboveground parking lot had been retrieved and applied to the Sensors of the two unmanned mechs and four drones.
And once their Cyber-Eyes on the network could no longer see Lier's group, the three of them stood up from behind cover and brazenly walked through the parking lot as though no one else were there.
The quadrupedal robot was the Flathead Combat Robot that had just been delivered. A specialized robot suited to espionage, it possessed Militech laboratory-grade optical camouflage and electromagnetic shielding. Fooling mass-produced combat mechs also manufactured by Militech was right in its wheelhouse.
Once it connected to a physical interface, hacking became simple and efficient.
"High tech sure is nice."
V voiced her admiration, then walked over to the half-open warehouse door and worked with Jackie to lift the rolling shutter a little higher.
The noise left the guards slightly puzzled, but by the time they looked over, the three had already entered EBM Stadium.
This was a maintenance passage, surrounded by metal frameworks. Red warning lights were still glowing. Clearly, Hellhound really had no interest in sorting out Dogtown's infrastructure lines.
The three could only walk single file, with Lier in the middle, V in front, and Jackie bringing up the rear-
Because Jackie was the biggest, the passage was somewhat narrow for him.
"If