"Silent Skies"
A NeoStrata Story Featuring the S-DN.07 “Black Vulture”
Lt. Valen Korr – Urban Enforcement Bureau (UEB)
It hovered just outside his field of vision.
Korr knew it was there. The faint static in his comms, the shimmer at the edge of the rooftop—all signs the Black Vulture was online, watching, thinking. Some of the rookies called it “Ghostwing.” But to Korr, it was a necessity. A partner that didn’t flinch.
"Sector 9—Riot cell movement confirmed. Targets marked green. Orders?"
The drone's AI spoke with sterile calm. Korr scanned the data stream on his HUD. Heat signatures clustered inside an abandoned mag-train terminal. Too organized for looters. Too quiet for drunks. Probably Anarchist scouts.
He hesitated, thumb hovering over the assault override code. One confirmation and the Vulture would switch modes—dart in, go surgical, make it quick.
But that was the problem.
Everything was too quick now. The Black Vulture didn’t blink. Didn’t doubt. Didn’t hesitate like flesh did. The machine didn’t ask why. Just how fast.
“Hold.” Korr’s voice was low.
NEON – Anarchist Courier, Signal Diver Class
She crouched in the tunnels under the rail yard, fingers pressed to her earpiece. Static. Again.
“Zine, you copy? Embercrow’s not reporting in. Might be fried.”
Her brother’s voice crackled in—barely. “Vulture?”
“Yeah. Probably. Shit.”
She looked up. There were no stars above NeoStrata’s sky anymore—only gray haze and ghosts. She remembered the stories: how the Vultures moved without sound, without trails, without mercy. One dive and your comms were fried. If you were lucky, that’s all it took.
But she’d seen it once.
During the Thren Hold Raid, she'd watched a Vulture take out three sentries, disable a jammer, and hover above the corpse of her friend—like it was waiting for someone to mourn him.
That’s when she knew: it wasn’t just surveillance. It was theater.
Korr – Rooftop, Night
The override key blinked.
"Authorization code required: RED IVORY SEVEN."
Korr exhaled. He could almost hear the debate happening in his head: the UEB doctrine versus the truth he saw every day. The drone was precision incarnate—but its operators? Subject to fear. Politics. Election cycles.
And lately, the brass wanted results. Not peace.
“Authorization denied,” he said.
The Vulture paused. Korr watched its shimmer retreat toward the haze, silent as a shadow falling out of sight.
Sometimes restraint was the only rebellion you had left in uniform.
NEON – Debriefing Hollow
NEON recorded the last known pulse of her Embercrow. She stared at the waveform—corrupted, jagged, beautiful.
“We lost another,” Zine muttered.
“No,” she said. “It blinked.”
Zine frowned.
“I think the Vulture had the kill… and it blinked.” She looked up, eyes fierce. “That means someone up there is still thinking.”
And thinking, she believed, was the last resistance left on either side.
[Epilogue: Report Excerpt | Level 4 Clearance Only]
“Despite target cluster eligibility, S-DN.07 did not initiate assault mode. Operator override denied engagement. No escalation reported. Possible subversion or psychological hesitance. File under: Pattern Red Drift.”
Artifact File: S-DN.07 “Black Vulture”
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