Once upon a time, learning to use the revolver had been half justifiable grinding, and half guilty pleasure. There were many reasons for me to practice with it. The first being that training with it contributed to my overall dexterity slowly rising, as did training with any other gun. The second was the matter of ammunition. I only had so many shotgun shells and rifle rounds to practice with, and scavenging from the gang members that I took down resulted in a great deal more pistol ammunition than any other. The third was that it was cheapest to buy.
Back when I first started, I learned quickly that I simply couldn't afford to drill for hours upon hours with assault rifles, and shotguns seemed to have a lesser effect on my dexterity rising, and with the shop closest to me offering no good sniper options, it seemed like the only way to really drill firing a gun was with the pistol. And when it came to practicing precision, what better option than the revolver?
Of course, the thing is that these were opinions that I had formed well after spending hours putting shots from my Nova into practice targets at the range, watching my numbers in both my dexterity and [Handguns] skill rise while grinning like a loon.
After two weeks of it however, the shine had worn off. My gaze was focused and my face flat as slowly and mechanically, I aimed and fired the last bullet in the chamber at the target. The bullet struck to the left of the bullseye, and I sighed as I unloaded the spent casings.
My agent buzzed in my pocket as my scheduled alarm entered my ear from seemingly nowhere, and I paused to check the time where it hovered in the corner of my vision. Noon exactly. Sometimes I wondered what the fuck the previous owner of the body had been doing, replacing one of their eyes and shoving metal in the inside of their skull, seemingly just so that they could link it to something that was already in their pocket. Sometimes I felt a hint of elation that a tiny part of me was now "futuristic". Sometimes I forgot that only one of my eyes was meat. The last part happened less and less as time went on.
I reloaded and holstered the Nova, before walking out of the shooting range. The owner of the store didn't even glance at me as I walked out the door. We'd spoken more often back when I was first starting out, about how to reload, how to fire, how to aim and so on, but our talks quickly petered out when I ran out of things to ask. He didn't seem particularly interested in sharing advice either, so we left each other alone.
Megabuilding H11 wasn't worse than the rest of Northside, but it wasn't that much better, either. It was certainly far more populated than the streets. All sorts of people made their way back and forth, from barefoot beggars to suits with something to prove. Space was at a premium, and people walked between everything from vending machines to food stalls to piles of garbage bags to fenced off crime scenes. It was like a dilapidated hybrid of a shopping mall and an apartment block, a microcosm of Watson within Watson, with less fresh air and more trash.
It made me think of the alleyways back home. There was graffiti everywhere and the stench of smoke and rot, while uncomfortably heavy and warm air was exhumed from exhaust fans, blasting god-knows what onto you from every angle, all the time. It was crazy to me that people would willingly live here, that the people running things were willing to let it get this bad, but the corps had nearly a century of experience giving people nothing and making them thank them for it, and it showed.
And yet it felt strangely comforting, despite how obviously dilapidated everything was, despite the screens and adverts visible and audible no matter where you looked or listened. Maybe it was the fact that despite all their wealth and power, nothing that the corps did made it truly safe. Maybe it was that even they didn't have the manpower necessary to repress human nature, to keep people from tagging the walls or murking their fellow man. Maybe it was because it reminded me of memories back home.
I stopped by a burrito dispenser on the way to my apartment. The machine was scratched up and covered with stickers, so many that one couldn't even see the options on the buttons. I pressed one anyways, and unwrapped my lunch as I looked out over the concrete railing at the tiny people far below as they went about their day.
The Megabuildings were arcologies, developed and built after the Fourth Corporate War to house the thousands that were displaced when a nuclear bomb obliterated the Arasaka Towers, destroyed Corpo Plaza, wrecked City Center and displaced millions. Perhaps they were designed to be safe and habitable, but I'd have to give the builders who made it only a half-point out of two. Corpo-cops were a constant sight, fencing off grisly scenes and cuffing people in front of their apartments as crime ran rampant, and though it was livable, the quality of life left much to be desired.
Case in point, the food. The "meat" was like dough, and the vegetables were anything but. The spicy sauce covered up the taste, but that was all it did. I swallowed the bite as quickly as I could, doing my best not to think about what counted as "meat" in the future. I could go on about the myriad ways this was an insult to food as a concept…
[Effect Blocked: Minor Food Poisoning]
…But I had better things to do. I chewed through the rest on my way to my apartment as I mentally reviewed my progress thus far.
I'd cleaned out that Maelstrom Den two days ago, and since then I had only enjoyed a few increases in my skills, and not a single raised stat. The short bout of combat I had gone through had contributed greatly to my [Annihilation] skill, allowing me to push it over the edge in subsequent firing drills, while a jog last night had finally raised my [Athletics] skill. And the rest? Zilch. Nada.
It'd been so easy at first. Three or four stat increases a day during my first week, and new skills appearing constantly. Nowadays it took me a day of concerted effort to get a skill halfway to leveling, and even making use of the gyms only pushed me about a tenth of the way a day.
I'd decided near the start that I was only going to raise my stats once exercising them simply failed to make a meaningful difference. I hadn't expected to hit that point so quickly. I was holding out for hitting the 50s in my stats before boosting them with my points, but that point would be a while coming.
But living in the future wasn't all doom and gloom. A slight sense of relief washed over me as I walked into my apartment and shut the door. My own little slice of the world, away from the trash and the corps and the gangs. It was pretty spacious and just as threadbare, my only personal effects being the empty bottle and the cracked Tactician from my first real go at Maelstrom. I found myself staring at it, running through the night in my head again. I turned away and switched on the TV, flicking through a few channels before settling on some sort of talk show to help fill the silence of my apartment.
Then, I got on the ground and began doing push ups.
I hadn't expected to run into Maine's crew so quickly. Hell, I hadn't even planned to meet them at all. There simply wasn't any real reason to seek them out, aside from the credits capturing them could offer, but I had plenty of those, and neither selling them off nor being responsible for them for the rest of my days seemed appealing to me.
In my mind, joining them was out of the question. Even if I had the skills to make myself a valuable team member, which I was pretty sure I didn't, Maine's crew was a sinking ship. The thing about being an edgerunner was that you were pushed into being constantly pushed to the brink. The latest chrome. The biggest iron. The best skills. All for bigger and bigger jobs. It taxed the body and the mind, and however successful Maine was, his psyche wouldn't be able to handle it for much longer, if what I knew was accurate. And after he kicked the bucket, David would go off the edge in a matter of months, culminating in a suicide run at the Arasaka Towers. Time was on my side, time I wouldn't have if I joined up.
Not only that, but my need for secrecy just didn't mesh with the rest of the crew either. Kiwi was ultimately in it for herself. I was sure that she'd sell me out if she could find the right buyer. Lucy was motivated by her fears for both herself and David, and if Arasaka came knocking, I could barely imagine what she'd do to protect the people she actually cared about. David and Rebecca would probably have my back if I could earn their trust, though I wasn't completely sure how I'd even accomplish that, and for the rest I just didn't know enough to tell.
And ultimately… I didn't want to take orders. At least, not from Maine or David. I wanted to be self-employed. My own man. Couldn't do that in a team I didn't run, and running a team of Edgerunners meant juggling extreme personalities who would be constantly pushing forwards. No thanks.
Speaking of orders…
Welcome to Night City
Details: Night City is a mega-metropolis, overrun by corporations, corruption, organized crime and gang violence. In this city, people either make a name for themselves and become legends or die in obscurity. Lucky for you, you only need to get a small taste of what it is like to live in such a place.
Conditions:
* Complete 3 minor jobs [ ]
* Complete 1 major job or Heist. [ ]
* Enhance yourself with half of the eight types of Cyberware. [ ]
* Fashionware, Neuralware, Cyberoptics, Cyberaudio, Internal Body Cyberware, External Body Cyberware, Cyberlimbs and Borgware all count as categories.
* Capture at least 1 Cyberpsycho. [ ]
* Visit all 8 Districts of Night City. [ ]
Reward: Transhuman Heritage - First Augmentation (Cybermorph)
Additional Conditions:
* Complete 10 minor jobs. [ ]
* Complete 10 major jobs. [ ]
* Complete 3 heists. [ ]
* Enhance yourself with all eight types of Cyberware. [ ]
* Capture at least 3 Cyberpsychos. [ ]
Reward: Transhuman Heritage - Corporeal Transcendence Engineering.
If I had to describe mine, they were… bland. Taken alone, they might not have seemed like orders, but the context made it clearer. Back when I had started, I didn't have a choice on where I was going. My destination was locked into the dark future, and all I could do was decide what I brought with me.
As much as I relished the little niche I had carved out for me thus far in the streets, it was obvious that I was here because something wanted me here. And it wanted me to engage. To take on a specific role in the streets of Night City. And I didn't want to know what would happen to me if I turned out to be disappointing.
That didn't mean that I could easily get invested though. The quest was something to work towards, sure. Something to aim at. And I wasn't going to turn down the opportunity to obtain the rewards listed, but there was something vaguely uninteresting about the whole affair that made me bounce off of it like rubber.
I was working towards finishing it, but I felt no real impetus, just all the emotional journey of ticking off boxes. Very, very slowly ticking off boxes.
What an otherworldly adventure, eh?
I noticed my arms beginning to shake somewhat as they ached more and more, and I gave it another ten before I let myself hit the ground, staring at the TV.
"Nicola!" The speakers blared, as a simplistic, black and white cartoon of a vaguely asian woman blew kisses and jiggled her rear at the screen. "Taste the love!" I heard and saw emblazoned on the screen in pink, before both disappeared in a flurry of hearts. As the display swapped to something else, I realized that I had completely lost my train of thought staring at advertisement ass.
"…I need to touch some fucking grass." I muttered to myself.
----------------------------------------
Of course, one does not simply touch grass in Night City. I could jog as I sometimes did, but I just didn't want to spend too long in the slowly decaying streets of Northside. A trip to City Center seemed appealing, but I simply didn't have the funds for a fun day out. So, as per usual, I decided to find my own fun in the ruins of Northside, throwing on my coat and slinging a cargo bag with a Copperhead assault rifle inside over my shoulder before beginning to walk.
Not having a car didn't particularly bother me. While the public transport system wasn't the best, the trains generally got you close enough to most places in Night City. And besides, everything I wanted to accomplish was in the nooks and crannies, or in the buildings themselves, and I imagined getting a car would make it tougher to take notice of the different sorts of business gangs conducted out in the streets.
Looking for trouble was surprisingly effective as both practice and stress relief. The reasons were myriad. First and most important was the valuable EXP that only taking out live targets seemed to give. The second was that actually fighting others seemed to increase my skills like nothing else did, giving me hours of progress in moments. The third was my title.
[Bottom Feeder - Improved combat effectiveness against low-ranked members of street-gangs, corps and people with little combat experience.]
I'd obtained it after taking out thirty or so different gang members. I had been in the middle of combat at the time, and had equipped it without any thought. I hadn't expected it to do much then, but the moment I did my bullets seemed to punch right through the leather jackets that had been previously giving me trouble, and sometimes it felt like I had a preternatural sense of how much each one would take before going down. Even the damage I took and the pain I felt seemed to be noticeably reduced. Since then, going looking for trouble in Northside had become less and less a matter of careful preparation in my mind and more and more like a treat after long hours of keeping my nose to the grindstone.
What I didn't expect was for trouble to find me first.
I bumped into a small patrol of Maelstrom around a corner about thirty minutes into my little walk. The three all had the signature faceplates and red optics, though their configurations differed. Two of them were men, who were holding their weapons at the ready as they turned their heads to look at me while their leader, a woman without even a shred of her face left, threw her arms out in a welcoming way.
"Oh would you look at that? Our lucky customer." Her voice was harsh and grating, her artificial voice likely intentionally of a poor quality. "Not too shabby, not too shabby." Her optics twitched up and down, scanning me like a machine would.
"Thank you?" I said hesitantly, glancing behind them. There were a few bystanders, not particularly close, but not far enough away that I felt in any way comfortable with using anything supernatural. I doubted I'd be able to unzip my cargo bag before the men could attack. The one on the left had a single cyclopean eye, and was equipped with an Igla double-barreled shotgun, a weapon that was poorly suited to urban combat, but would still devastate any normal man in close range, while the other was shirtless and armed with a simple lead pipe, and his pair of simple red dots seemed to jump erratically.
The woman tapped the Cut-o-Matic chainblade on her waist as she stared at me, her eyes a blazing red. "Why don't we find somewhere else to talk about the fabulous prize you've won, hm?" She suggested, sounding almost like she was trying to be salacious, but being able to see where the shreds of skin ended and the metal implants began utterly destroyed any sense of appeal she might have had.
My mind ran a mile a minute. Two melee, and only one ranged. I'd have to disable the one with the shotgun first. And I couldn't wait too long, or they'd get tired of whatever game they were playing and decide to take me where they wanted down a few pieces. I couldn't edge towards my gun without making it obvious. I needed time. "Just checking, does this fabulous prize have anything to do with the neat optics?" I raised an eyebrow and rubbed my chin.
The woman's head tilted to the side slightly in lieu of a response, while the man with the crowbar bent over cackling. He recovered quickly, grinning with metallic teeth. "You serious? Is your brain as soft as the rest of you, or are you just that much of a fucking sheep?" He sneered, his voice not modified even in the slightest. Meanwhile, the one with the shotgun kept his eyes squarely on me.
I kept up the charade. "Red's a neat color. What can I say." I tilted my head back at the woman. "So does this mean I get to pick the config of those optics? Because honestly, I like his set the most." I said, jerking my head in the shotgun wielder's direction.
"Oh?" All of a sudden, the little warmth in the woman's voice bled out. "Is there something wrong with mine?" She demanded, her hand going to the Cut-o-Matic. "Something you don't like?"
I paused. On one hand, not what I wanted. On the other, maybe I could use her as cover against the man with the shotgun. "Well… It's just a little bit thin?" I hesitantly suggested, honestly not even sure what I was saying.
[Charisma: 11 > 12]
Huh?
"Thin?!" She stepped up, pressing the trigger and causing the chainblade to rev up as she held me at bladepoint. "What do you mean, 'too thin'?! You calling my eyes fat?!"
I quietly realized that her sides had signs of augmentation. "Uh…" My eyes darted to the shotgun wielder, who looked faintly concerned, and then the shirtless man, who had thrown his arms up.
"Oh hell yeah!" He shouted. "Rip 'im to shreds!"
The one with the shotgun finally spoke up, casting a worried look at his leader as she trembled in rage. "Remember, the boss said to bring in-" I jabbed at the side of the woman's faceplate with a [Power Strike], stunning her and doing little else as I ripped the Nova from its holster and fired. At further ranges, I would have had trouble, but up close, I had no problem blasting out his single lens. "AUGH!"
Stepping to the side, I aimed for the shirtless man's torso, but he threw himself to the side faster than I could track, and the shot bounced off the pavement. He shouted. "Get his gonk ass!"
But before the woman could bring the Cut-o-Matic to bear, I grabbed ahold of her arm and the handle and began to wrestle the woman for it. Thankfully, only some of her fingers were made out of metal and not her entire arms, so she couldn't easily overpower me. She tried to force it into my leg, but I shoulder-checked her with another [Power Strike]. The strike became more of a shove as I yanked her off balance, but that was all I could manage as the shirtless man came in swinging.
The blow struck me across the head, rattling my brain inside my skull. But I'd trained myself for this sort of thing, and I recovered more quickly than he expected, stepping backwards and shooting him right in the chest as I scrambled out of the reach of another wild swing-
[Skill Unlocked after certain actions: Dodge!]
Really? Now?! I bit back a snarl and ignored the notice as I aimed at the man with the shotgun, who was pointing it seemingly at random, but far too close to me for comfort. The shotgun roared as I juked out of the way, the motion already seeming smoother than my earlier panicked rush, though still only just in time. The first bullet slammed into his leather trench coat, while the second found his skull while he staggered, sending him crumpling to the ground.
The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.
[+500 EXP]
A sudden pain ripped through me as the Cut-o-Matic bit into my leg before beginning to whirl, tearing into me. I jumped back, landing on my ass as I failed to find my balance. The shirtless man tried to come in for an overhead swing with the crowbar, but I shot him the final time with my revolver, and he fell down clutching at the new hole in his chest while his weapon dropped with a clatter. How many had it been now? Six? Five?
[+350 EXP]
I saw the woman getting up, and I frantically began to reload. The chainblade whirred loudly, but her metallic voice was louder. "I'm going to FLAY YOU INTO JERKY!" She screamed, raising the chainblade.
Quick thinking and the shirtless man's crowbar kept it from burying itself into my gut. She tried to force it down, but I kicked her in the waist, sending her back long enough to get back on my legs, which stood firm despite the damage.
[Skill Unlocked after certain actions: Block!]
A strange mix of annoyance and gratitude ran through me as the woman and I circled each other, "I don't suppose you'd mind turning around and going away?" I asked, gripping my new crowbar with both hands.
"Flabby fuck, calling me fat. You're fat! You hear me?! You're the fat one here!" She snarled.
I gave her an incredulous look, "Okay, sure. You're big boned." I said. Then I stopped. Then I sighed. Me and my big mouth.
There was a wordless shriek of rage as she started to run at me, murder alight in her artificial eyes. Her swing had incredible force behind it, and it was only because I had braced that I didn't find myself bowled over. I held the whirring teeth of the chainblade at bay for a brief moment, before shoving her back. Before she could recover, I hurled the crowbar directly into her head, knocking her down and sending the Cut-o-Matic whizzing across the ground.
[Throwing: 6 > 7]
So worth the practice.
The Maelstrom woman seemed to realize her position, her eyes darting towards her missing melee weapon as she watched me open up the cylinder of my Nova, spent casings falling out onto the ground with a clatter. Huh, six after all.
"You've got no idea what you've just done." She seethed, scooching back as I kept an eye on her on the side and fished a speed loader out of my pocket. "When Brick finds out what you did, he's going to make you wish you were dead!"
"Sorry, I guess?" I shoved the cylinder back in.
That answer seemed to enrage her even further. "You STUPID-" I shut her up with six shots, every single one finding their mark on her chest. She started to gasp wordlessly, her mouth silently opening and closing like a fish out of water.
That also ceased when I reloaded again and blew six more holes in her for good measure. "Damn," I muttered as I ejected the shell casings, tilting my head at the dead woman. "Why would Night City do this?"
[+550 EXP]
[Cred: 1 > 2]
[Strength: 38 > 39]
[Handguns: 14 > 15]
I sighed and looked away from the corpse, doing my best to forget about my irreparably damaged sense of humor as I picked up the Cut-o-Matic from the ground and dropped it into my cargo bag, along with the crowbar. I glanced around, looking for bystanders or more maelstrom, but it seemed like during our fight, everyone else had long since booked it.
I was about to go and grab the shotgunner's ammo when the inside of my ear began to ring and an alert appeared in my vision. I blinked in confusion as I pulled out my agent. The caller was an unknown number, but after a moment of standing there, I decided to take the call.
A face flickered into existence in the corner of my vision. A face I vaguely recognised, though I wasn't entirely sure from where. She had a flat expression and an eyepatch, while a golden cross on a chain hung around her neck. She wore a tactical vest over her shirt, and though her mouth moved when she spoke, the way the image hovered in the void made it clear that this was an agent-generated headshot. Realistic, but not her real face. "I presume I had the pleasure of speaking to Ron Robinson." The woman on the other end began without preamble. Her tone was no-nonsense and expectant.
"...Yeah? Who's this?"
"Regina Jones." Her answer was swift, and it sparked a surge of recognition, though I still couldn't place her. When I didn't reply, she continued. "I've heard that you've been making trouble in Northside recently. Kicking the hornet's nest."
"Wait, if this is about merc stuff, then I'm going by Razzle, just to be clear." I specified. "And yeah, that's me. Been meaning to lay off and let the heat die down, but Maelstrom's everywhere."
"Then good thing I'm not calling about that." Her tone was clipped. "I've got work if you're interested. Scavengers set up shop in one of the abandoned clinics in Northside. Client wants them flushed out, and they're willing to pay a fee to see it done."
I paused. This conversation was moving faster than I expected. I was off balance, and my next words came out instinctually. "How much?"
"A thousand and eighty." Her tone was casual.
"Done." I didn't even know why I bothered asking. The sum didn't matter, but actually pulling off a job? From a Fixer? That did.
Fixers were organizers and dealers. If you wanted something, you went to a fixer, whether it was a car, a gun, a drug or a hit job. They also acted as skill brokers, putting people in touch with the right sort of mercenaries for the things they wanted done. They weren't that much more trustworthy than any other element of Night City, but silencing the people they fucked over tended to draw eyes, and generally, being a trustworthy Fixer was a hell of a lot more profitable than not. As a rule, they tended to be well-connected, like spiders sitting in the center of a web of favors, contracts and blackmail.
As another rule, they tended to be well-informed, and Regina seemed very well-informed. I don't remember anyone ever calling me, so I had no idea where she'd gotten my number. Not to mention the fact that I hadn't told anybody my name throughout my time in Night City thus far, only my nickname. How the hell Regina had tracked me down, I could barely even guess at, but the course was clear.
"Sent you the details. Take pictures and send them over when you're done." Regina stated, before hanging up. I eyed my agent's screen, reading the message as it popped up, memorizing the address and the ballparked number of enemies before grinning.
A job. My first real job. The stone in my stomach transformed into a whirl of glee and excitement. My first real step on the road to becoming a legend.
My [Inventory] snapped open in the confines of my cargo bag as I unzipped it, and I pulled out a Tactician, twirling it once before I let it rest on my shoulder.
"Well then." I quipped. "Let's get this show on the road."
Quest Created
Carrion Culling
Details: Well will you look at that? Your go-getting is getting you going! Try not to stumble on the first step, new meat.
Reward: 3000 EXP, 1080 Eurodollars.
----------------------------------------
Regina's current office wasn't the worst she had ever used, though that wasn't saying much.
Her cubicle when she had worked for the World News Service had been cramped, but she had rarely bothered with it then. She'd been too busy building a network, and her "office" usually ended up being whatever motel she was staying in for the night. Eventually, she'd grown bitter about the bias towards Arasaka she'd been forced to include in her work and quit.
Her place at FTF radio had been better, but still small. She ended up using it more often when she started securing favors from higher ups from all walks of life, though her co-workers quickly began to rankle her, with a few exceptions. Then FTF Radio had been brought out by N54 News, and she'd decided to get out before her experiences with WNS kicked off again, just with a Militech slant instead.
The first few years after adjusting her career path had been rough. She'd bounced from building to building before she'd eventually landed on the top floor of Yaiba Tower. She hadn't expected to stay at first, but it was a surprisingly pleasant place. The view was good, and the way the wiring was arranged made it easy to have an array of screens in her main office, showing everything from talk shows to news channels to financial reports. A drip feed of dross to sort through. And best of all, plenty of space to think. The only other person on the top floor with her was Blake. Blake was good at his job. Quiet, and he only spoke up when he needed to. He watched the screens as he held his tablet-sized agent in front of him, occasionally noting something down.
The trash and the ruined equipment got to her at first, but she'd gotten used to it a long time ago. It served as useful cover for when the NCPD tried to snoop, whether due to a badge looking for a promotion or somebody on the street trying to overstep. The last time, she'd spent a week in a safe house before walking right back in and picking up where she left off. The time after that, she hadn't even had to leave. The people in charge had told the snitch to "Piss off and come back with evidence", word for word. Then, when a private snoop tried to get that evidence, her Militech turrets pasted them across the interior of the elevator.
She expected it'd be a while before she had to do it again.
A call sprang up on her agent. One that she hadn't scheduled. The caller was a Media based on the outskirts of NC, near the badlands, one she hadn't spoken to before. She picked it up, the name of the man on the other end coming easily to her. "Trace."
"Hey. Heard you wanted to hear if there were any signs of a cyberpsycho on the loose. Been hearing some gossip about explosions in Northside. Spread out across the past day. Might be some Maelstrom messing around with a Projectile Launch System, maybe not." The man stated clearly and quickly. Good. Time was valuable, and so were words. "Nobody's come forward with how our mystery man looks."
"I'll look into it." She answered, ending the call. She hadn't heard about any Arasaka convoys being hit recently, but there had been plenty of cases where somebody in Arasaka 'misplaced' a shipment of military-spec cyberware for a quick buck, resulting in them being slowly ripped apart and stitched back together for their short-sighted greed. And of course, there were plenty of places in Night City one could find used cyberware. "Blake. See if the ripperdocs in Watson say anything about somebody chipping in a Projectile Launch System. Then check with our people at the Cargo Bay about our mystery bomber."
Media were informed, but they were also one of the people most likely to screw her. It was unlikely that they were lying about the explosions. A few pointed questions would be all that was needed to expose the truth. The real question was what their angle was. If they were looking for someone to sell gossip to, more the better. If they wanted to see what her reach in Northside was like, then it was something she had no issue with exposing some of it. If they wanted an interview, they weren't getting it. The surge in requests she'd received after Rogue had given hers was genuinely infuriating.
Blake quietly compiled without a word. Another call came in, one of the people she had stationed near the Scav den in Northside. A bum with a gambling addiction that had learned to go where she told him and look at one she wanted. One of her many remote eyes and ears. She raised an eyebrow. So soon? She took the call. "What's the sitch?"
"Some gonk just walked into the den, boss lady." The voice on the other end muttered. "Blonde and tall. Looked built. Like you said."
So it was him. Even if he hauled it in a car, she doubted that he'd make it there so quickly. So he was already in the area. That didn't mean much, but it was something she now knew. "Let me know if he walks back out." Then, she hung up.
Testing new mercs was a constant, ongoing process. Learning their capabilities, their limits, the lines they refused to cross. Putting together the parameters on every name she knew. Ron had popped up on her radar at first a week prior, appearing every other day to hunt Maelstrom and Scav patrols. She'd tracked him down to Megablock H11, and had kept an eye on his stunts for a short while, waiting to see if he got himself flatlined or did something worth eddies.
The Maelstrom bust was worth plenty. She kept an eye out for bust contracts in Northside, and when a factory manager grew tired of their workers being pulled apart on the streets, she had picked up the job, though only after negotiating the price.
As things currently stood, she was only going to make a pittance off this contract. The cut she took only barely made up for the money she'd offered the bum to keep an eye on the building today and the day before, but Ron had demonstrated enough capacity as a Solo to make him worth her while. Though the quality of his work was sometimes lackluster and his attitude was going to get him chewed up and spit out if couldn't make up for it, he was thorough in both his work and his looting, and that was something she could use.
She already had plenty of hired guns, though. She'd have to see if he had talents anywhere else, on other small contracts. If he lived. Which he probably would, but one could never be sure of these sorts of things.
Her agent rang again, and Regina took the call. "He's out." The man on the other end muttered. "He's got a fucking LMG on him. I could hear it all the way across the road." There was a pause. "He's tracking blood all over the sidewalk."
Unsubtle. When the opportunity came up, she'd ask him to try being discreet. Maybe offer a bonus for it, depending on the job. But for the moment, the work she handed him would have to be of a certain type. Unfortunate for him in terms of the range of the work she'd give and for her in terms of the jobs she could take. But it was Night City, and plenty of notices needed to be written in blood. "Well done. Wiring you your payment."
There was only the slightest pang of satisfaction. This was minor business, but business nonetheless, and Regina Jones liked business going smoothly.
A message hit on her burner agent, and Regina gave it a once over. The pictures were gorey, but no particular emphasis was placed on the bodies. Just straightforward snaps of every room in the former scav den. Nothing that she hadn't seen over the course of her career.
The contents of the message caught her interest, though. "There was something else. Aside from all the bodies and bits. There were some klepped agents with some stuff on them. One of them was particularly interesting." Regina raised an eyebrow. She hadn't known that his looting was that thorough. It suggested either true desperate levels of need, or a disorder of some kind, or something else. Whatever the case, it could be a problem further down the line. She'd have to see if he could keep it on the low. For now, she'd have to take that into account and bar him from work of a more sensitive kind. "Messages between some guy and you. Little freaky."
Her message was swift. "I gave him the same job I gave you. He couldn't handle it. You did. Any problem with that?"
"Nah. Just feel a little small in the grand scheme of things."
Regina felt the ghost of a smile briefly before it vanished. "Don't we all. Good work, Razzle. Gig closed."
Realistic. She could work with that.
----------------------------------------
[Quest Success!]
[Gained 3000 EXP]
[Gained 1080 ED]
I stared at the cleared out clinic as I sat on the rusting wreck of a car. The scavengers weren't like Maelstrom. They didn't have the emphasis on transhumanism, and their members didn't shove themselves full of cybertech.
Their modus operandi was simple. If you had implants. They wanted them. It didn't matter who you were, from your average joe on the street to the corpo higher-up to a gang member from somewhere else. If what you had in you was worth anything, they'd cut you to pieces to get it out of you. It wasn't just cyberware that they harvested, of course. Organs were still worth a pretty penny in the far future, and if you had a wallet to pick through or an agent to wipe and sell, they'd take that too. Not like you'd need it as a bundle of limbs and an empty torso.
They were through, I'd give them that. Some far-away piece of me noted with humor that where Maelstrom shoved more in, Scavengers ripped stuff out. Addition and subtraction. Yin and Yang.
There was something distinctly sickening about them that even Maelstrom didn't make me feel. They were the most unscrupulous and base gang that I knew of. Every other gang had something about them that distinguished them from the rest of the city. The Maelstrom and their transhuman philosophy. The Tyger Claws and their Chinese and Japanese influences. Even the corps had their own brands and slogans.
All that made one a Scavenger was desperation, and the willingness to gut someone for a dollar.
…Well, there was one thing that I could admire about it all. The holographic masks they wore. They were base, crude and though they were low-tech and cheap for Night City, they had a unique appeal to me. Like a sign that for all the future had ushered in, people still drew smiley faces on their masks, and crossed out where their eyes were.
Still, my gut was through the floor, and I stared at the emptied clinic as the sun slowly crawled over the sky, trying to place my thoughts. What was the sensation that I had felt, when I had realized that I was a replacement for the first one to take the job? What was that pit in my stomach now? Was it dissatisfaction? Exhaustion? Hunger?
…
I pulled out my agent, opening up the few apps that had come preinstalled. "Hey, Alex?" I asked. "What are you supposed to do when you feel empty inside?"
"I'm sorry to hear that you're feeling empty inside." The app chimed. "It's important to remember that as a SAAI developed by Ziggurat, advice given by Ask Alex Anything does not represent the views of Ziggurat in any way, and the following should not be taken as medical advice, and should be read for informational purposes only."
"Feeling empty can sometimes manifest as a sense of loneliness, confusion about your life and goals, or lack of motivation to pursue anything in life. Everyone might feel this void in their heart from time to time. The experience could have many causes, including installing out-of-date cyberware, losing your job, or a required change in personal circumstances, such as when moving to a new city for work. When you experience a sense of emptiness, it can be helpful to explore various avenues for self-discovery and personal growth-" I shut the thing off, and stared at the sky.
I had a goal, however nebulous and devoid of meaning it was. I had more than enough motivation to keep grinding, knowing that the world was slowly but surely sliding towards the shitter and getting the hell out was my best course of action. Was loneliness really it?
In hindsight, it shouldn't have been surprising. Sure, I had always been an introvert, but there was a world of difference between not being interested in talking to friends and family and not being able to. And now…
I sighed, waiting for my agent to reboot, when it did, I opened up the first contact that I had written in, and sent a message. "Hey Becca, want to chatter about guns for a bit?"
I got up and was ready to leave, but the reply was nearly instant. "Sure thing! Got a meet-up with David at the Kabuki Roundabout tomorrow! There's a Straight Shooters there we can check out. You in?"
I had expected a text chat, not a meet-up. But I definitely wasn't turning this down. "I'm in."
"Preem! Remember to bring your Iron!"
I stuffed the agent back into my pocket, and as I began my walk home, I realized I was smiling. "Dope." I muttered to myself.