Gift from God

Aramaki touches down at an airport, where a representative acting for Prime Minister Tate hands him a letter of authorization clearing him to reach Section 9, along with a private aircraft to carry him there. Meanwhile, Ishikawa slips a surveillance drone toward Patrick Huge's estate, and the first thing it turns up is the corpse of Huge's wife, dead for roughly two months.

When Stan questions whether their mark is even still present, the Major insists Huge remains inside, reasoning the NSA would not have arranged all this for nothing. Sensor-equipped drones blanket the property, so Ishikawa's bug can advance no further without exposure. The Major decides the crew will hold until dawn before moving.

Cloaked in stealth camouflage, the team steals into the mansion while dodging patrolling robot dogs, then splits, with the Major and Batou below and Ishikawa and Stan above. Ishikawa uncovers that Huge has been liquidating his company holdings and staying put because the property has yet to sell, with a program set to route the resulting fortune after his staged death from an earlier missile strike.

Contact turns violent. Stan is cyber-locked, robotic maids attack, and the Major grapples with Huge, breaking his hand and pinning him before the robot dogs disrupt everything. A naked Huge flips away into a closet and emerges in an armored suit, taking the fight outdoors. Saito's sniper round only briefly halts the reactive-armor mech, and a Tachikoma driven by Togusa saves the Major from being crushed. She has the crew drop their Autistic Modes, sends Batou at the armor with a flood of malware, and once it is restrained, Saito severs its knee. The Major then dives into Huge's mind and, as an outside force nearly hijacks her, orders Saito to blow his head off.

Delta Force cyber operatives immediately close in, and John moves to execute the crew until his superior, Ada Byron, calls off the operation over his objections just as Aramaki lands in his private plane. The installment is the fifth of SAC_2045, carries the subtitle PATRICK HUGE, and sits between Emissary from the Divide and Quantized Gospel.