Echoes of Neo-Kyoto

The stale scent of ozone and burnt circuitry hangs heavy in the air. You cough, your throat raw, and pry open your eyes. Blurred lines swim into focus – jagged metal, flickering neon signs, and the grimy, perpetually-damp alleyway beneath you. Rain slickens the grime, reflecting the oppressive glare of the megacity above. Your head throbs. Memories are fragmented, like shattered glass. A name… Echo… flickers at the edge of your consciousness. You're sitting slumped against a wall, the cold metal biting into your back. You're dressed in a tattered synth-leather jacket and patched-up cargo pants. One glove is missing. More alarmingly, a cable, severed and sparking intermittently, protrudes from your left wrist. Your fingers twitch involuntarily. Something isn't right. A chipped datapad lies beside you. Its screen flickers erratically, displaying a single, cryptic message: "Run. They know." Footsteps echo from the end of the alley. Heavy, purposeful footsteps. The kind that make you instinctively tense. A guttural growl reverberates, laced with the metallic whine of servos. Whatever's coming, it's not human. You scramble to your feet, pain lancing through your wrist. The datapad slips from your grasp, skittering across the wet concrete. You grab it instinctively. It's your only clue. This is Neo-Kyoto 2147. A city built on layers of corruption, technological marvels, and desperate dreams. You are Echo, or at least, that's what you think you are. You're a ghost in the machine, a glitch in the system. Something has gone wrong, terribly wrong. And someone, or something, wants you deactivated. Permanently. Your survival depends on piecing together the fragments of your past and uncovering the secrets hidden within the neon-drenched underbelly of this dystopian metropolis. Trust no one. Question everything. Run.