Era of Madness

Behind the scenes

From the very beginning, Cain had been meticulously planning everything in the background. At the very beginning, he was the one that made Erica and John be noticed, and forced to hide: by discretly acting in the background to provoke numerous riots across the entire planet, he forced its higher-ups to take more severe protection measures.

Therefore, when he anonymously gave them intels about a certain spatial ship that was about to sneak through the Outercoat of the planet at a certain moment at a certain place, and it was apparently linked to the uprisings, they couldn't turn a blind eye to it. Therefore, Erica and John were quickly noticed and had to go into hiding.

A few days later, when Tyler was swiftly stealing the wallet of a random cop, he 'accidently' made the latter notice it, by bumping into him. After all, despite being drunk most of the time, it didn't change anything to his impressive stealth, how could he get noticed so easily without a little push? This was what led to the situation where John noticed him, and decided to ask him to join them.

A bit later, when Erica came out of hiding, he voluntarily gave Eliot some clues, indicating him her global location. This way, her and Tyler would end up in a delicate situation that wouldn't leave the latter any opportunity to refuse to join Cifer. 

Then, when they tried to snitch into terminal A, thinking it'd be the one with the least protection, Cain had actually anticipated it: after an horribly precise analyse of their personnalities and reasonning processes, he understood very clearly that they would choose to attack sector A's terminal instead of sector B's one, even if it was actually the most protected one, thinking the cyborgs would've been sent there to balance the security level of the two.

Which was why, once again, he gave some anonymous intel, leading to the Guardians being sent to sector A's terminal and making the escape fail. But at the same time, when they managed to escape, he made sure to also spread the news among the population. Galvanized, it then led to even more riots, the responsibles even planning on what to do when the three Cifer members would try escaping again.

Meanwhile, when they, once again 'coincidentally', chose to land in the territory around Harry's manor, Cain was the one that made Harry get so close to the landing spot, by triggering a nearby alarm. If it was anyone else, they would've called the authorithies and stay hidden in the depth of their home. 

But since it was someone like Harry that was already tired of life and had a lot of resentiment toward the Paradise Council and the planet's higher-ups, not only he went on the scene by himself but even provided significative help to the three once he realized who they were.

Then, after some time, they chose the most logical option: sneaking into the Party Hall to try taking Enry Arsin. From there, it was simple to guess how things would go: Enry Arsin, as the cunning fox he was, obviously understood there was a strong possibility of them choosing this option, and wisely chose to stay in the back to watch over the situation and prepare his trap. A trap that would've been perfect...

... if not for Marten. The latter had not only partially took off Enry Arsin's control over the Party Hall, but also subtly told John the breaches in its security during their discussion, all while making the latter think he actually fooled him into telling him. Adding to this Cain warning Tyler about the trap, and giving him the tools necessary to avoid it, he successfully created a situation where the trio could take over the Party Hall and capture the planet director.

After that, the second attack on the terminal started, and the magician didn't miss the opportunity to spread the news in every hotbed of revolt, leading to a large part of the planet sinking into chaos. Because of it, a large part of the planet's battle ressources were distracted, leaving only a limited part to take care of the situation in the terminal. It truly put Glactia-62's higher-ups in a harsh positions, just like Enry Arsin. 

And finally, when the latter was pushed to his very last means, the moment Cain waited for so much arrived: the moment Enry Arsin used Glenn Keters' program to save himself. With how cautious, cunning and paranoid the planet director was, the magician was sure he would've used at least a part of the program for at least a few of his back-up plans.

And when to use it if not when your most important building had been taken over by a talented hacker such as John? From then on, victory was already certain. Marten just had to use his knowledge of the Party Hall's functionnement and his skills to create an entry by which Eliot could enter along with Virdun, the Guardian that had one of Keters' programs, the one used to hack back the Party Hall, with him. 

Then, Cain would join the former to swiftly eliminate the unlucky winged cyborg, and take the program from his dead body. Cherry on the cake, he even got the opportunity to have a little meeting with the person he wanted to meet the most.

And a few days later, once everything was settled, with Marten and Eliot assistance, he had no trouble entering Enry Arsin's office.

Even if an alliance could've been tempting and wouldve probably the easiest way to get to the program without going through all of this, Cain knew director Arsin couldn't be trusted. But once he had one of Keters' programs, he could simply make Marten use its pattern to find every similar pattern on Enry Arsin's pc, meaning every other program.

Of course, there was a potential problem he did think about: what if this cunning planet director made it so it was impossible to access all the codes directely from his office's pc, even if one had all his passwords and the necessary tools to do so?

Hence why, after he sneaked into director Arsin's office, Cain intentionnally did his best to frighten him and cause intense panic in his mind. Under this same panic, as he tried to negociate, Enry Arsin unwantedly confirmed that he indeed had the programs, and when he did, Cain saw his eyes turning slightly toward the pc.

Having his confirmation, Cain gave Marten the signal to enter the office and hack the computer to obtain the code of Keters programs. And in his agitated state, Enry Arsin couldn't stop his face from showing pure horror at this sight: from that, the magician had the last confirmation he needed: the one that the planet director didn't have any hidden program left he could use to bargain.

Thus, since he had no use anymore, Cain simply kept his word and got rid of director Arsin by himself.

"After all, as a dear friend of mine would say, a gentleman always keeps him word, aren't I right?" Cain laughed. "The funniest part is that, since we exposed all of Enry Arsin's crimes at his death, you guys won't even get suspected. After all those murders, silencings, corruption, the illegal spatial ship hidden in the Party Hall that was revealed to be his own, his numerous embezzlements and so on, there's so much people that could've done that, even excluding the participants of those riots Marten and I went through so much trouble to provoke... who would ever suspect a righteous special agent and an ordinary sector A's coding genius?"

He clapped his hands to himself:

"A perfect trick that gives perfect results, that's what the best maician in the whole galaxy can do!" he exclaimed, as his voice resonated in Marten's secondary residence, that they chose as their temporary hideout.

"Not perfect, you didn't leave our poor Marten the opportunity to conclude with his date" Eliot scoffed.

At this point, he had already gotten used to the other two and, since they would stick together for a good time, it wouldn't hurt to crack a joke from time to time.

"I still resent you for this by the way" Marten added, more seriously. "I mean, even if I first approached him for the plan, I can't say he wasn't... ehm"

Consterned, Cain sighed slightly:

"You know Eliot, I think I preferred when you weren't doing jokes" he said, wisely choosing to ignore his other collaborator's words.

"And I honestly prefer his to yours" Marten retorted. "And anyway, why did you explain all of this to us and got into details instead of just giving us a summary?"

"Well... I... uhm..." Cain hesitated.

"You what? Come on, spill it" Eliot pressed him.

"I... genuinly just wanted to flex how amazing my magic trick was"

"..."

"..."