The elevator was broken. Because of course it was.

I trudged up the concrete staircase. Desperately ignoring the trash and debris.

How could you not at least remove the filth? Was their anguish so complete that they truly didn't care?

Fix met me at the 12 floor entryway. Two still smoking corpses filled the doorway.

I piled their corpses to the side after stripping them. I had to vomit, thanks to the the smell, and as realization of what we were doing hit me, my gorge rose again.

While they were according to my information just as despicable as the 'Strom, they didn't look as inhuman. Hell most of them barely had any cyberware.

I guess it was easier to sympathize. (AN: Let him cook, as they say.)

The Scavs had taken over the entire floor.

On the side of the building by the stairs the rooms were more or less intact.

They had been sleeping in them, and less pleasant things. The smell of human waste always hits me hard, it was why despite finishing the plumbing course in trade school I didn't even try to become a plumber. I simply saw it as a skill worth knowing.

It seem I wouldn't get to keep anything in my stomach today.

I found no less than three makeshift "operating" rooms. The amount of blood and viscera resembled an abattoir.

New blood and gore added from where the Scavs had joined their victims. Good job guys, I mentally cheered Fix and Scuff.

The instruments were all crude, and looked like like they had never been cleaned.

My impression from Sinnamin was that they cut people apart for their organs. To sell on the black market. A terrible act, no doubt.

Worthy of a bullet or three.

I didn't know I would find the situation much more traumatizing than that.

Certainly, I found many organs in refrigeration units haphazardly place around the walls.

My throat burned from the upwelling acid from the sight of bodies discarded in heaps, in side rooms. The rooms were dark so I could make out too many details, that's for the best I'm sure.

I choked it down and tried to figured out what the Scavs were after. All of this just for money?

You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

I had to clean the results of the Probes' assault off the glass in quite a few places. Peering into cases to try to understand.

Mostly kidneys, hearts, eyes and lungs. Preserved in jars, submerged in unknown fluids, kept just shy of freezing.

I feel a rage brewing, knowing that folks were reduced to this. The ones that were obviously from children were the hardest to deal with.

The organs were an afterthought, that was the only conclusion I could draw from the sloppy extraction methods and poor packing techniques.

Most of these probably wouldn't be worth a damn. It was all wasted effort and a waste of life.

The reality of what they were after was stacked neatly in crates filled with foam and shipping material. The precision of storage and the care taken to clean and maintain the integrity of the goods painted a stark contrast to the treatment of the organs.

The only filth, being the remains of the Scavs who tried to defend their cache to the bitter end.

Cyberware. It was all cyberware. "Chrome."

People slaughtered like livestock for bits of chrome. Metal valued over flesh.

Abomination. It was the only word I could think of to describe what this act felt like to me. The spark of life wasted on the false animation of equipment.

My world view had begun to shift, I sensed it. I let it crash into me.

My earlier sympathy felt wasted. Anyone who could do this didn't deserve to suck the same air as me.

How was I better? A stray thought whispered.

Target selection? Intent?

Recrimination was nothing new to me. All the time I questioned whether I made the right call not going to college.

Never had I faced anything with this level of grim weight. Part of me crumbled away, leaving the strongest parts to rebuild with.

I knew I could fall into the trap of endlessly questioning myself, but that's what it really was, a trap. Think too much fail to act. Act without thought and commit atrocities.

An endless circle.

Oh, I'm just as bad because I do this thing that's sort of like what the objectively bad people do. I growled, "Bullshit."

Fuck that. I'm not going to waste the time justifying my actions. I'll never get anything done.

I sneered at myself. "Some people need killing. Some people need saving. In the end it's all just people needing."

If anyone had a problem with that, they could suck it.

Chuckling at the ridiculousness of my own two-bit philosophy. My resolve settled, I started looting.

15 dead Scavs, not counting the two by the door. So twenty Scavs were here? Unless someone had gotten away.

Almost $12,000 in paper, dozens of weapons and other small things to sell.

My assumption was most of it was from the victims.

That soured my thoughts a bit, but they couldn't use it anymore. I'd attempt to be worthy.

I couldn't do anything with the organs and I simply didn't have room in the Galena for the cyberware.

Luckily one of the Scavs had a Fob for a car, maybe it would be bigger.

I checked it out.

It was indeed.

[ Mahir Supron FS3

Model: Basic

Fuel Type: CHOOH2 formula Delta

Top speed: 135

Weight: 2,690

Horsepower: 108 ]

It was junk, poorly made, poorly maintained, but with the back seats down I could fit maybe four crates of cyberware in there.

I didn't want to leave the Galena behind, but as I understood it once I was chipped I could call it to me with the fob.

I nodded, my plan formed.

I loaded everything into the minivan. I was officially and thoroughly over going up and down stairs, carrying heavy things.

Scuff and Fix found their attachment points on top of the van.

They had been subdued. I guess they didn't like what they scanned in there, or maybe they didn't like how it affected me.

"It's okay guys, I'll be fine."

They gave me doubtful, half-hearted beeps.

I tried to convince myself it was true, as I headed towards Misty's.