NEW QUEST! Shadow of a Doubt (1):
Survive 7 days.
Progress: 2 / 7. Failure Conditions:
Axel’s death.
Shadow meguca’s death. Rewards:
New Passive Skill: Night Vision
New Active Skill: Slip
Speed: [+2]
New Quest: Shadow of a Doubt (2)
After the tiny little panic attack at, apparently, being targeted by a meguca, I couldn’t let Isia stall any longer and had her take me to meet their ripperdoc. We walked down the corridor and some stairs towards the Sewer Saint’s ripperdoc, my mind tumbled and screamed at the latest new quest. The shadow from the encounter with Bear wanted me dead? Why a timer? Why a week? Why did it have “(1)” in the title? Why did I have to "survive"!? Did it mean I had to remain in human form, or that my human form was being hunted down? What did the system know that I didn't? I tried to grill the system as much as I could, its only response being to rattle the pop-up, worried and frustrated in equal measure, as if trying to imply it would give me more if it could.
“Don’t worry about Angus, he’s a chill dude.” Isia spoke up as she glanced my way.
I gave her a half-hearted nod and tried to wonder how quickly I’d be able to run back to the motel and contact Moreau. The comms device she’d given me was there… “You wouldn’t happen to know of a way to contact Moreau, right?” I pipped up, face a mask of calmness.
She let out a snort. “Sewer Saints are way too low on the totem-pole to have something as fancy as a VIP’s contact number. Not even Quinn has a contact number, and they’re the reason the doc pays us in the first place.”
Great. Just… great.
“I know this sounds kinda sucky, but it’s for the best.” Isia apparently picked up on my frustration, giving me a pat on the back as we walked down the stairs. “The doc’s way too much first-district high-level for people like us down sniffing dirt and smog.” There was a slight undertone of disdain to her words, yet also… relief? “Her throwing some pocket change at a no-name gang like us is just either some charity case or just another experiment. No offense.”
Maybe it would be best not to mention that Moreau had given me a communicator.
“None taken.” I replied quickly. “It’s just… what do you do if you’re up against something way out of your league? Wouldn’t the doc have some way to help?”
Isia’s steps slowed as she gave me a look. “People that far up don’t see people like us as anything worth the risk. They might send some merc if they’re feeling generous, but if it comes down to it? They’d sooner see us dead than risk a hair on their pretty heads.”
Though the words struck true, I thought back to the lab, to the grimy facility we’d traversed just to get smuggled into New Francisco. Moreau was clearly a big-shot of a very high caliber, but… but was she really that detached? She was an ass in many ways, and definitely eccentric, but the older woman did not feel like she was that far detached.
It still presented a bit of an issue.
For whatever reason, the quest was implying the shadow wanted me dead. A meguca chasing after me was the exact sort of “out of my depth” I feared the most.
Quietly, we continued through the building until we reached a white door with a large red cross, one that also had a rat drawn on it, leaning against the symbol and “napping”. The doors squeaked open, to reveal a clean, if very rudimentary, looking clinic.
“You must be Axel, I’m Angus.” The man in the center of the room greeted, surrounded by what could only be described as tetanus hazard. “Welcome to my humble office away from the clinic.” He let out an amused chuckle, though I couldn’t help but flinch at the sight, every corner and cabinet held a light dusting of rust, some of the hinges were entirely gone, revealing empty shelves and half-empty bags. This might have been a doctor’s office at some point, but it clearly saw either little use or little care, probably both.
The amusement probably came out of me staring (even though I tried not to). The man’s right flank had been replaced by cybernetics, and not just normal human-looking cybernetics. His missing arm was now four thumb-thick tendril-like appendages with claws at the end of each one. If that wasn’t enough, the right part of his face had been replaced by a blocky piece of chrome with three camera-like eyes.
“Looks like straight out of a generated movie, doesn’t it?”
I flustered. “Sorry.” I quickly apologized. “It’s…”
“I don’t mind the gawking.” Angus chuckled. “It’s got quite the story attached to it. Got into a bit of a tussle with a monster, you see.”
“Sorry, sir.” He wasn’t just a ripperdoc, but a veteran. I needed answers, but I felt like I’d just entered a minefield. “I just don’t…”
“Nothing odd, frontier folk don’t get much exposure to cybernetics.” He waved it off as if it was the most natural thing in the world. “In my case it was a bomb, mostly. Came down to either my arm or the monster.” The directness of his words was unnerving, doubly so as he looked me over for a moment before gesturing at the chair. “Please, take a seat.”
Obliging, I swallowed the lump on my throat. On one hand, I definitely would want to hear the whole story, but on the other… Probably best to move things along. “Could we have a minute in private?” I offered, thinking up an easy excuse. “I want a quick check-up to confirm I’m good to go, so I can do the streaming thing I’d promised.”
It wasn’t a lie, either. Chugging on as much AP as I could would also be very helpful if things came down to a fight. Conveniently, it was also a great excuse to leave and go to the motel to contact Moreau. I was hastily cobbling together whatever pieces I could to make a plan, something to hopefully use as guidance out of whatever was going on.
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Angus gave me a long look before glancing at Isia. “Mind stepping out for a bit?” Angus glanced at her with a meaningful nod.
She snorted. “Fineeee, keep the abs all to yourself.” Despite her words, she didn’t make a fuss, giving a small wave and closing the door behind her.
I held my breath. This was it, then.
Angus gave me a long look, and let out a longer sigh. “Doctor Moreau gave me the rundown.”
The claim immediately made me hesitate. She had? That… didn’t seem right. She’d insisted on no one knowing, no one telling. “What exactly did she tell you?” I asked hesitantly.
Angus’ face remained impartial, calm, only cracking a grin before speaking up. “Her exact words were that anything you need for your health, anything at all, I was to go fetch it.” He chuckled, making a point to show his sneakers. Despite the levity in his tone, there was a slight nervousness about his scent. “She’s paying well enough for me to keep my good running shoes on at all times.”
“And… that’s it?” My question came out carefully, nostrils flaring, catching on the doctor's tension and adrenaline. “What did you do while I was unconscious?”
He looked into my eyes as I stared back, a silence stretched out. The slight waving of his tentacle arms slowed, his brow twitched, and for a fraction of a second, his eyes flickered down at my hands. Was he gauging me up? Measuring whether I’d start a fight?
Angus' voice came out calm and even. “I just checked whether anything was broken or bleeding, and gave you some anti-inflammatory medicine.” Yet as he spoke, there was a slight barely perceptible waver.
I trained my face into a blank expression. “And nothing else?” I pushed. A stray thought left me wondering what Angus’ cybernetics were capable of.
Angus froze, for a moment so brief anyone else might have missed it. The reek of adrenaline swelled within the room, of someone ready to fight for their lives. The image presented itself clearly in my mind. If he attacked me, what would be my best bet? The arms didn't look strong, just fast. But fast was all you needed if you had access to cutting tools or a gun. Would I be able to tank that? No, wrong question, if things went down, my advantage would be in acting before he moved. He'd likely seen the videos of my fights, though what could he do? The sequence played out in my mind, the fastest option: I’d reach out to his head and yank, crushing his skull against my knee. There was a risk his cybernetics would react to the damage even if he couldn't, lashing out at me with medical-grade utensils, and whatever weapon he might have. But it would be too late, by the time my attack finished, the skull would be nothing but paste, the neuralink's connection to the rest of the body lost, he'd be dead, and… and someone somewhere would ask themselves why their father or uncle or friend wasn’t coming home.
My stomach twisted into a knot and my jaw clenched, revulsion welling inside like a ball of thorns. My mind swam with a thousand and one more thought-out reasons to kill Angus here and now. He'd seen something he shouldn't, he could rat me out, he could sell me to a corporation... but even as it tried to pile on one reason after the next, I knew deep in my gut it was wrong. I couldn't kill him. It was wrong.
The logic of the decision came after the emotion, a wave of justifications. I didn't have enough proof to take a life. Isia was on the other side of the door, making it impossible to hide the murder. The Sewer Saints would rightfully see this as a betrayal. Would I need to kill them, too? Slaughter my way out of the place they called home? I grimaced, lowering my gaze, focusing on my white-knuckled grip on my knees.
Taking in a deep slow breath, ignoring the nervous twitch of the ripperdoc, I looked back up at him. I held his gaze there for several seconds, not speaking up until I was sure my voice wouldn’t shake. “Any samples should be destroyed here and now. If you don’t, I won’t be able to guarantee Moreau won’t come after you.”
Angus’ face lost all color, and the cybernetic arms twitched. I restrained myself from jumping into action. Neither of us moved, staring at each other until he very slowly nodded. "Understood," he said with a shaky voice, very carefully standing up as I followed him with my gaze. The doctor telegraphed every slow movement, his human hand trembling slightly as he pulled out a black metal box from one of the drawers. Pressing his thumb against the box, the side hissed and opened, revealing four metal vials within. "This is everything." He handed them over, allowing me to inspect the lock-box before I gave it back, empty. "No copies."
I restrained from showing the relief that washed over me, giving him a deathly nod. “This can’t happen again.” I said firmly.
Though he nodded back, there was a moment of hesitation. “If… can I ask how? If it’s possible to create an artificial meguca, then the amount of lives that-”
“I don’t know.” I cut him off before I could doubt myself. “And if you try to look into this, I am sure Moreau will not be happy about it."
The older man looked more terrified of the prospect of Moreau's wrath than being in the same room as someone who'd been a breath away from turning him into paste. I felt slightly guilty over tricking him this way, but at the same time, I suspected everything I'd said was true. Moreau had made abundantly clear anyone who knew anything about the true nature of my abilities should die, and as much as I wished I could claim she was joking, a part of me knew she hadn't been.
Angus gave me another nod, one of his robotic tentacle arms reaching out to fiddle with his other arm’s wrist. It looked like a nervous tick of some sort. “Just… how am I supposed to be your doctor? If I fuck-up and you die while I’m around, Moreau would leave me buried in the desert.” There was a slight nervous lilt in his laughter. I suspected he wasn’t entirely joking about that, either.
“I… don’t know.” I answered honestly. “If… how did you deal with the meguca that was part of the Saints? Beatrice?”
“If she said she needed something, we got it for her, but otherwise we just kept some of the preem first-district medicine Moreau got us on hand.”
“Then do that.” I nodded. “And if an emergency happens, then… no records, no samples.”
“Got it.” He nodded readily, then let out a deep sigh. “Fuck, no wonder half the city-”
“And if anyone asks, it’s biomods, make something up.” I cut him off again. I didn't want to stretch this conversation anything more than I had to. Every time I looked at the walls I imagined them plastered with the doctor's blood, and I needed space to breathe and clear my head. “No questions, no details. I’m sorry. This is how it has to be."
“I get it. Total secrecy.” Angus’ scent shifted, he scoffed. “Anything for the VIP.”
I took him in for a moment, clenching my jaw and trying not to add unnecessary commentary. With the samples and data-shard in my pocket and the situation under control, I stood up. There were other urgent issues I needed to address. “Am I good to go?”
The doctor let out a snort. “You're healthier than anyone in the district,” he said, rubbing his shoulder, bitterness in his tone.
“Thank you.”
As I turned to leave, my eyes caught a glimpse of a gun on the counter behind him, one that hadn't been there when I'd stepped inside. I mentally reassessed what would’ve gone down, followed by a wave of uncertainty whether or not I'd be able to survive. What if his cybernetics had some sort of 'revenge' protocol installed? Maybe we would've both died in there. I shuddered at the thought, stepping outside, combing my fingers through my hair, trying to get the image of-
“You ok-?”
“AH!” I jumped, hit my head against the ceiling, then immediately dropped down to the floor. Glancing up, I cursed myself for my strength, I’d cleared two whole meters off the ground in that one reaction.
Isia looked at me, barely restraining herself from bursting out in laughter. “Sweet revenge.” She whispered as I rubbed the top of my head, wincing from the pain. Though her voice turned a bit more reassuring after she let out a cackle. “You ok? You looked like they’d told you your mom died.”
“I wish,” I immediately winced with a pang of guilt at my words, pushing away the uncomfortable thought. “No, just… a lot to think about. Does Angus…” I shook my head. We were right next to the ‘clinic’, if he had cybernetic hearing, the conversation would not be private. “I’d like to go to the motel and pick my stuff up. From there, do you think we could gather everyone up and prep for an official stream?” I needed to vent, and I needed AP. Killing monsters would give me both.
Eyeing me once over, she beamed. “If the doc says you’re cleared, then sure!” Letting out another cackle, she grabbed my hand and yanked me down the corridor. “Let’s go kill some monsters!” Letting out a squeal, she pulled harder. “You’re going to rock the costume! I just know it!”
Wait.
Costume?