Bringing myself back to the present, I quickly called the others over and explained what I had found and everything else Radia had told me about.
Once they were fully caught up I asked them the most important question of all, “so who’s gonna use this?”
Inspecting the small, black injector, John answered, “Well the only ones who would benefit are you, Chris, and Chloe.”
“I wouldn’t really benefit from this thing, honestly,” Chloe interjected. “My avatar only really gives me better senses, while Chris is incorporeal and has telekinesis, and we don’t even really know what Ella can do.”
At that Chris got a contemplative look on his face. “Would I really get access to my telekinesis? That seems like it would be a bit too far from what Night City would normally allow.”
“I mean, incorporeality seems just as farfetched to me,” I add.
“True. And how would that even interact with my cybernetics? I mean, an injectable really shouldn’t be able to affect implants. And even if it did work properly, this would basically mean that every implant I have would become worthless.”
Hearing that, Oliver interjects, saying “but you have to acknowledge, a grenade throwing poltergeist would be super cool.”
“Well, hold up. What about Ella?” Chris asks. “She’s obviously some kind of sea serpent, so she’ll probably get the ability to breathe underwater as well as super-strength or something.”
“I mean,” I say uncertainly. “What if I’m just a fish beastman or something? There’s not much evidence that I’m some sea serpent or something.”
Hearing my reasoning, John barks out a laugh before asking, “how many fish do you know of, have horns like that?”
“Narwhals,” I respond meekly.
“Actually, what is commonly thought of as the horn of a narwhal is just a really long tooth,” Chris interjects. “And plus, I’m probably not going to return to Night City anytime soon, so I won’t get much use out of this, but you will. Right?”
“I… I guess. But I still feel like telekinesis is way cooler than getting to breathe underwater.”
“Don’t forget, sis,” Ethan adds, “We don’t actually know what you’ll get out of this. For all we know you’ll get hydrokinesis and you’ll be able to turn people inside out with just a thought.”
“But…” Finally running out of reasons to avoid taking what felt like the antithesis of the very nature of Night City, my last protests died on my lips and I reluctantly took the injector from John’s outstretched hand.
Carefully, I inspect the small device for a few seconds in the hopes of allowing my uncertainties to run their course, but when that doesn’t work I look back up at the encouraging smiles of the rest of my new team and resign myself to utilizing the biomod.
So far we’ve run into only one group that posed a threat to us, but as we progress deeper it’s a near certainty that we’ll encounter more, and if this thing will grant us an advantage in any of those fights then that’s worth more than my silly prospects of the core fantasy of Night City.
Placing the device into the nanoinjector port in the neck of my armour, I slowly press the plunger until the contents are fully expended.
Over the course of the next few seconds, my nerves steadily ratchet up as nothing happens. Worries start to flood my mind about potential side effects of using an untested biomod — all of which really should have been brought up sooner — and my breathing starts becoming heavier, which starts worrying the others in kind.
Only moments later, however, I hear a quiet whistle emanating from my nose that causes my horns to vibrate — ever so slightly — in a way that causes my brain to explode with new sensations.
The only way I can think of to describe what I was feeling in that moment was an external proprioception.
One of the oft forgotten senses of humanity is a constant awareness of the relative positions of our limbs. People don’t need to look at their arm to know whether it’s raised above them, or at their side, they just know.
And in that same vein I didn’t need to look behind me to tell whether the door to this room was open or not, I just knew that it was.
I just knew the number of boxes that were in this room.
I just knew the general layout of this entire floor.
I even knew the contents of the one lab we had left open.
And most importantly of all, I knew that 2 dozen guards in power armour were halfway between us and the elevator.
Before I could report this information, however, my nose was assaulted by more scents than I could even properly process. The stench of sweat, oil and a variety of more organic scents reached me, but overpowering all of that was the distinct smell of blood.
Not only could I smell the remains of those we had killed on this floor, I could also smell the blood left on the walls of Floor -2.
And despite the fact that my heightened olfactory abilities were nowhere near as strong as my newfound echolocation, the sensations derived from it were so much harder to handle.
In fact, while the addition of echolocation to my sensory repertoire had been disorienting, in a total reversal of what I would have expected, the enhancement to a sense I already had felt far more like a punch to the face.
Luckily, the scale of the facility meant that I had more than enough time to adjust to the heightened capabilities of my nose before the guards reached us. As such, only a minute or so later I was able to say “guards are on their way. They’ll come from the left door in like a minute or two.”
In response, Ethan worriedly asked, “how can you tell? What abilities did you get?”
“Echolocation and a shark’s nose or something. My sense of smell is much stronger, but my ability to smell blood is — specifically — almost supernatural.”
Before Ethan’s concern for my well being could distract us further, however, John clapped his hands to draw our attention and said “We can explore all of Ella’s changes later, but for now let’s focus on these enemies on their way to us.
“Ella, do you think you could count down when exactly they’ll be turning the corner?” He asked, and upon seeing my nod in response, started getting everyone into position so that we would be able to annihilate all of the guards before they could even manage to see us.
As we waited, however, I decided that now was a good opportunity to properly test the special rounds we had found with my revolver.
Moments after I had loaded 3 of the special rounds, I aimed the gun at exactly where I knew my target’s neck would be upon turning the corner and started counting down into the team’s coms.
“3.
“2.
“1.
“Fire.”
Instantly, the sound of Oliver’s and Chloe’s automatic weapons filled the room as they unloaded into the just appearing guards and a half dozen flashes of light were etched into my vision as Ethan precisely eliminated the most heavily armored targets.
But mere moments after the first guards appeared, all of that became irrelevant as the man I had shot burst into flames.
Which was what I had expected. What I didn’t expect, however, was for the flames to spread like a plague. Sparks were flung off of the first victim, and when they contacted anyone else, they burned through any armour and burrowed their way into their new host’s body.
This new victim would then be set alight as well, starting the process anew and further propagating the infectious combustion.
Meaning that in only a couple of seconds, the entire hallway was filled with the crackling and popping corpses of our former enemies.
This, of course, meant that my recently enhanced nose was rapidly filled with the putrid scent of burning flesh, which instantly broke my tenuous hold on the sense, made worse by the bile I vomited in the next few seconds.
“Ho. Ly. Shit.” someone said as I felt everyone turn to stare at me.
“Well,” Ethan said. “That thing is fucking terrifying.”
In response John nods his head, saying “oh definitely. Although it should make the rest of this heist a cake walk.”
Shaking my head as I slowly recover, I answer “no. I only have four more bullets and I can’t imagine we’ll only have four more groups to fight.”
“Hmm. Unfortunate, but it should serve us well in emergencies.”
Chloe then adds “you should load one round as the final shot in your mag. That way you won’t have to load one in whenever you want to use it.”
Following her advice, I empty my magazine before filling it back up with 5 normal rounds and 1 pyro round. When I finish, we quickly move to get away from the still smoldering corpses and make our way back to the stairs.
Shortly after turning the last corner before our current destination, I feel the elevator doors opening on the other side of the floor and turn my head — along with my focus — to that area.
Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
“Twelve people just stepped out of the elevator.”
The rest of the group turns to look at me, surprised, for a few moments before John incredulously asks “how far can your echolocation reach?”
“I can’t really tell,” I answer while shrugging. “Currently I can sense everything that’s not behind a physical barrier.”
“So, if we left the doors on the stairs open would you be able to sense both this floor and the next?”
“Maybe.”
“Well, we might as well try.”
When we reached the next floor his idea proved successful, as — despite the absurd lengths and numerous turns in between me and the elevator of Floor -5 — I could still sense everything happening with perfect clarity.
And while this was useful in determining what the group I had already noticed was doing, it didn’t provide any truly useful information, considering that all of the guard units were using the singular elevator to move between floors.
Despite this, my ability still proved useful in its ability to locate enemies on the same floor as us. Since the moment the door to Floor -6 opened, I was able to detect two groups approaching our location.
Luckily, they were both a fair distance away, which meant that we had the chance to inspect the closest lab for details on what this floor would contain.
What we found was, honestly, about what was expected.
Strewn across the same workbenches as we had seen in every floor but the first were numerous different pieces of armour — both powered and not — in various different states of repair. The only thing that set this room apart from all the other, were the mannequins that accompanied each station, but unlike the specialization of Floor -1 these weren’t accounted for in the design of the space, and as such were simply placed in the walking spaces.
Fortunately, we had no real reason to enter the room, and as such, we were quickly on our way to the central storage room that we had raided on the floor above.
Before that, though, we stopped at the first corner and waited in ambush. Following the strategy that had worked so well on our first encounter with the better equipped security, the combination of my ability to get in close with my blade, and our ability to take our enemies by surprise, allowed us to wipe this group out without trouble.
The second group, however, posed a slightly larger threat.
The two groups had actually gone in different directions from the elevator when they first arrived. Which meant that while we had free access to the testing room, they would be passing through that room in order to attack us.
So, in order to give ourselves better positioning, John made the executive decision to run to the testing room and lie in wait.
You see, while the testing room on the floor above had functionally been a massive gym, the one on this floor was — ironically — a glorified paintball arena.
Because, where cybernetic and organic implants needed to be tested in their capacity to exceed the human condition, power armour — and the more mundane variants — primarily needed their capabilities in live combat situations examined.
Which meant that — while there were likely rooms used for other tasks — the main testing room was actually incredibly suitable for actual combat.
This meant that we were able to take up proper positions. Placing Oliver on ground level half-way through the space, with everyone — except for me — spread out on raised platform behind him, while I was positioned in front of him, so that I could get the jump on our opponents.
This structure meant that, when our opponents first arrived, the first person they spotted was Oliver — who didn’t stay out of cover for even a second longer than he had to — and when they rushed his position to take him out, they were in prime position for the other to annihilate them. Then, when they tried to retreat, I was able to jump into their backline and start slicing and dicing.
Unfortunately, by the time we had finished with this group, another had arrived on our floor which meant that if we wanted to get into viable combat positions — or even just leave before they could reach us — we had to be quick in looting the storage room.
This meant that each of us grabbed one item — I got the vest I had heard Radia talk about, Chloe got the form fitting exo-skeleton, Oliver grabbed what was basically a small mech, Ethan got what looked to be a space suit, Chris got something with obscene explosion resistance, and I’m pretty sure John just grabbed the first thing he saw.
Luckily, by the time we were leaving, the third group on this floor had just entered the paintball arena. Which meant that the various structures obscured our exit, forcing them to waste time searching for us, and allowing us to make it to the stairwell unobstructed.
And then it was on to the seventh — and final — floor.
Unfortunately, however, this is where things started to go wrong.
Emboldened by our flawless performance so far, we failed to act with due caution upon first reaching Floor -7, and ran headfirst into an ambush.
Waiting for us just outside the doorway, were three full groups of security guards, who opened fire on Oliver the second he opened the door.
His new armour did, fortunately, protect him from the worst of the damage, but the numerous bolts of plasma managed to disable the powerful machinery that allowed for the considerable bulk of the equipment to be moved with any amount of speed.
Seeing Oliver go down — and unaware of whether he was alive or dead — I made the snap decision to click my revolver’s cylinder over to the last round in the magazine and fire.
Mere moments after we had first opened the door, John slammed it shut and held it there — an explosion from one of Chris’s grenades ringing out from behind him — while calling out “Quickly! Get Oliver to cover and prepare for round two! I don’t know how long we can hold this door closed.”
Following his orders despite thinking that the situation was likely not as pressing as the others believed, I made my way over to Oliver’s prone form and helped in pulling him behind the stairs.
Upon reaching a position out of view of the door, Chloe pulled a nanoinjector out of her backpack before coming up short when she realised that the experimental armour Oliver was wearing didn’t have an injection port.
Seeing her look at me, I quickly realise what she wants and carefully use my sword to cut the neck piece from Oliver’s armour.
As we were doing that, Chris notices the relative quiet of the door and asks “they’re not trying to break their way in?”
“They’re probably waiting for us to open the door again. No reason to give up the advantage their positioning offers them, just to finish us off a little faster.” Ethan explains. “Plus I’m sure they have reinforcements coming in from above that’ll be able to finish us off. Right Ella?”
Turning to him as Chloe administers the medical nanites I hesitate briefly before saying, “uhh, yes to the reinforcements thing, but I don’t think they’re waiting for us out there. I used one of those Pyro-rounds so they’re probably just occupied with that.”
From my side I hear Chloe snort, muttering “pyrounds, heh,” as everyone else takes a moment to react to what I just said.
“Well,” John says, “good job. That was some quick thinking there.” Before he turns to face the door — no longer holding it shut — and says “in that case I think I’ll crack this open a hair. Give you the chance to scout out what’s left out there.”
Upon the opening of the door I’m instantly — or at the speed of sound I suppose — able to sense the entirety of Floor -7 and 3 things immediately jump out at me about it.
First, all of the guards that ambushed us are dead. In fact, the entirety of the hallway this door leads out to is devoid of life.
Second, there are a lot more guards on this floor. Currently I can see 7 squads patrolling the hallways, and more are constantly emerging from the central room.
Finally, the room that, on every other floor, was a testing facility for whatever was being designed on that floor, is instead the barracks for the guards. Additionally, I manage to spot a squad entering a stairwell, at the center of the barracks, that leads even deeper into the facility.
When I relay this information to the rest of the group they quickly start to look concerned. John looks at the reactions of everyone else and asks “so? We doing this?”
Unexpectedly, the one to respond is Oliver, as he pulls himself out of his ruined armour. “We came down here expecting to die right? No reason not to keep that up.”
Smiling, Chloe voices her agreement. “Hell yeah! Blaze of glory baby!”
I silently nod to John as Ethan and Chris look at each other in exasperation, before Ethan says “well, it’s not like we’re getting out of here if we split up.”
Seeing our consensus, John nods before explaining the plan. “Alright. In that case we’re throwing caution to the wind. If we’re doing a blaze of glory we’re not gonna take this slow and steady. We get in there, grab anything we can, get out, and shoot anyone we see on the way.
“Sound good?”
Simultaneously, we all voice our agreement, and without any further discussion all of us burst out of the door and rush straight towards our inevitable deaths.
The moment we enter our death rush a second alarm starts sounding.
Waiting around the first corner are two groups of guards. Unlike those we had killed on the floors above, however, these people have backed up enough that I’m unable to get close enough to use my sword, which means all I’m left with are the inaccurate shots of my revolver.
The others, in contrast, move like a well oiled machine.
At the front, Chloe and Oliver mow through the enemy lines with their automatic weaponry. Just behind them Chris cuts swathes of death through their ranks with a variety of explosives, and Ethan precisely annihilates the enemy backlines with his laser-rifle. And, although he is in the very back just like me, John is taking out anyone who seems to pose a threat to our team.
Despite this absurd display of technical prowess, however, the enemy was ready for us.
Without cover or the disruption of a melee fighter, numerous plasma bolts find their marks. Because of John’s quick judgement and skilled shooting, none of these bolts are lethal, however Chloe takes a shot to the shoulder, gut, and left leg, Oliver gets hit multiple times in the midriff and once in the arm, and Ethan gets a chunk of his sternum carved away.
But even with those injuries, our team finishes off the first two groups and marches on.
Halfway to the barracks, we encounter a single unit of security and this time we handle them easily.
Stopping just inside Ethan’s range, our group waits for my brother to pick off as many enemies as he can before the security decides to rush us.
At this point we duck into one of the rooms on the side of the hallway — although they were labs on the floors above, here, they’re residences — and use the room as cover.
The next group is a collection of 3 squads, and despite using the same strategy it is then that we suffer our first casualty.
Unlike the single squad, this group of 3 immediately charges us when we start to approach Ethan’s range. This means that we don’t have anywhere near enough time to pick our enemy off before their upon us. At this point all of us are firing through a small doorway and using beds as cover.
Just as I’m contemplating using my next Pyro-Round, Oliver takes a major hit to the chest. But instead of slowly bleeding out on the ground he rises to his feet, leaves his cover behind, and marches towards the enemy, finger on the trigger.
This action quickly clears the doorway of enemy fire — many backed off to let the dying man peter out, and those who didn’t, joined him in the afterlife — which I quickly took advantage of by moving right up to the doorway, blade drawn.
Seeing my actions, Oliver smiles at me, mouths “three, two, one,” and lets go of the trigger.
Seizing the opportunity he granted me, I dash out of the doorway before anyone can react and start making mayhem.
Without the supporting fire of my team in those first few moments, I take a couple of hits to my torso, but — because of how fast I’m moving and how frequently I’m changing directions — those shots do barely more than graze me.
Shortly afterwards, however, everyone else follows me and we quickly clean out the rest of the enemies without further trouble.
Not taking even a moment to mourn the loss of Oliver, we all quickly rush to the barracks entrance, where Chloe kicks the door down.
And is promptly shot in the head.
Chris grabs a handful of grenades and tosses them into the room as I prime and fire my loaded Pyround before the four of us that remain take cover.
Through my echolocation I’m able to make out the spreading of the infectious flames, but I’m also able to see how the enemies that were farther back move away from those who have been infected, allowing over half of the enemies to survive.
That doesn’t last long, however, as when Ethan notices me loading a new Pyround, he draws his sniper rifle and fires it — blindly — into the mass of flames I had just created.
Instantly, the remaining security forces are hit with multiple waves of superheated air as the rounds that erupt from my brother’s rifle turn the atmosphere around them into plasma.
And when he runs out of ammo, he pulls a roll of tape from his pack, tapes the trigger down, and flings the rifle into the room. Then he draws his laser rifle, and the moment the rifle finds its way above the bulk of the enemies, he pulls the trigger and the entire room explodes.
A wave of force knocks all of us flat on our asses and stalls us for a brief moment, but without even really considering what just happened, we rush into the room and straight towards the stairs.
Unfortunately, when we reach our destination we are caught by surprise by another squad of guards, and they manage to hit John with a dozen shots directly to the torso.
Instantly Chris throws a grenade and we all take cover. Only moving forward once the blast goes off, and even then very cautiously.
Upon reaching the bottom of the stairwell, Ethan peaks the door to the next floor open just a crack so that I can see what’s on the other side, and the sight demoralizes me.
“Five squads. Also seven squads are gathered above us.”
Going against what I expected, however, upon hearing my report, Chris smiles widely and says “blaze of glory,” before bursting through the door, rushing to the center of the enemy formation — now full of holes — and ignites all of the explosives he had on him in one massive detonation.
The explosion slams the door shut and knocks me off my feet, but Ethan quickly picks me back up and pulls me towards our final destination.
Luckily, the various demolished doors allow me to guide us to the weapon storage, but I’m briefly distracted by a large hole Chris’s sacrifice created.
While typically I would have believed it to simply be a large crater, my new sense is informing me that instead, the hole leads to a cavernous opening.
Unfortunately, I don’t have much time to wonder about the possibility of whatever that could contain, as I can already feel the security forces on the floor above us moving down the stairs.
Stopping just outside the storage room, I choose to load my 2 remaining Pyrounds into my revolver instead of searching for weapons with Ethan, and my choice is proven correct when — before Ethan is ready — the first of the final wave of guards reaches this floor.
My shot takes him in the chest, and his sparking body creates a hazard that those behind him desperately try to avoid.
Unfortunately for me, these guards weren’t in a rush, and they managed to stop before losing more than a couple lives. When the flames die down, however, Ethan is still not ready, and I’m forced to expend my final shot on further delaying them.
Luckily, by the time these flames finish their short life Ethan has emerged, equipped with a flamethrower and a god damn lightsaber.
Immediately, he and I start opening fire on our enemies — him with his Deagle and me with my revolver — and by the time I run out of ammo in my mag, he’s within the optimal range of his new flamethrower.
Upon him pulling the trigger, a purple, semi-transparent plasma is ejected from the nozzle, incinerating anything in its path instead of igniting it.
Steadily, Ethan marches forward, inching closer and closer to the stairwell, until — when the fuel finally runs out — he’s close enough to ignite his lightsaber and rush into the fray.
Except, it's not enough.
As I rush to join him in melee combat, I’m hardly halfway across the room when my brother's head is mulched by a lucky plasma bolt.
Following which, the remaining few enemies take advantage of my shock, and nail me in my chest, right over my heart.
The knockback of the blow flings me into the hole Chris opened up, and a few seconds later, I feel myself hit water and sink deeper and deeper.
As I hit the bottom, I look to where I was hit and the sight shocks me.
While my brand new vest was burned clean through and I suffered severe burns, there’s nowhere near enough damage to cause a fatal wound.
This means that I have the chance to escape. I don’t know why there’s an underground lake down here, but I should be able to breathe underwater, which means I can wait a couple hours and sneak my way out, or at the very least I’ll have an advantage in marine combat.
As I’m considering my options, however, I feel a sensation like something is being wrenched off my skull and my vision goes black for barely a moment.
When I can see again, what greets me is my mother’s very angry visage.