Once we had traveled several minutes north, we crossed into the Arasaka Waterfront district, which was near a Megabuilding labeled 11. I slowed the Galena down, we had to be on the lookout for our first customers. Traffic was present but minimal, so we could take our time hunting. The only snag was that the roads became more tangled in this part of town, so I had to pay more attention to where we were, however the Probes could scan for viable targets.

I began spotting Maelstrom graffiti everywhere. They were horrible scenes of spider like borg faces, the multiple eye were a menacing red. While the tags invoked a sense of dread, I didn't let it worry me much. I figured it was just a gang trying hard to be intimidating.

Scuff beeped that he'd located a potential victim. When I got my first look at actual 'Strom "gangoons", I realized Sinnamin hadn't overblown how repulsive they looked. The gang tags were at least partially descriptive. I stared a bit trying to make sense of what I was seeing, it didn't seem possible for anyone to alter their bodies that much and survive. there was certainly no way that anyone that could do that to themselves was sane, by any definition of the word I understood.

I found a small parking lot with other cars, and slipped in between two larger vehicles. Since I was taking both Probes, my thinking was that any thief or scrapper would mess with the more valuable vehicles before the Galena. I filled Scuff and Fix in on a tentative tactical plan, both of them seemed to be almost buzzing with excitement as I described their roles. Their beeps were incredibly aggressive sounding. "We can do it, Executor. We will eliminate the enemies." That was Scuff, and Fix was no less rearing to go, "We will destroy the ugly ones, Executor."

Their behavior more than anything else, gave me pause. I do not think I could have ever been labeled a violent person. Yet here we were, about to murder people for profit. In my case I was sure it was a combination of revulsion and desperation. With the Probes, who had up until now seem to be happy little Robo-Buddies, was their showing this new aggression, my fault? Or was it a consequence of fusion, leading to a bizarre interaction between magic and metal? Could this be what happens to Probes over time? Maybe, if you let them fight a bunch, they become like this?

Am I a bad person for using them like this? I've never been much concerned with morality. I've never had a reason to be. I mostly just tried not to be a dick, and kept to myself. So in those terms; we were about to start killing people, admittedly grotesque people, to take their shit. That sure sounded like a dick move to me. Or is this one of those situations were one dick move was canceled out by another group's generally dickish behavior?

I growled as some new part of my psyche responded to my increasing stress. It didn't know, and didn't care about the answer. It just wanted to purge what it saw as the unclean. The questions were annoying, action was needed. Wait. That didn't sound like me. What was wrong with me, was this place twisting my outlook? Or was something deeper at play in my mind.

I found I had been moving the whole time I was thinking. My feet just moved while my mind churned away at it's problems. I should have been paying more attention to my environment, but now the time for moral quandaries had ended. I had been noticed and my observers certainly thought I had something worth taking. Or maybe my wallet didn't even matter and they just wanted to start some shit.

Their red eyes gleamed fiercely in the dark. They had found prey. Me. A damned shame they hadn't noticed my friends, who hadn't lost focus. Even now the Probes were using their stealth to creep around behind our three new friends.

"Hey, whadda we have here?" The voice was grainy and distorted. It grated on my nerves, almost as much as looking at their faces hurt my eyes. Up close, these three were in poor repair. "Rusted" I think Sinnamin had called it. You could hear some of their chrome's joints grinding. Lines of an old oil-like substance, dribbled out of places, that it didn't seem like oil should be coming out of. They were either extremely down on their luck, or no longer had the capacity to care about themselves.

"A poor lost Ganic is need of help." They laughed. there was no joy in that noise, only a type of manic madness. Everything about the sound was wrong. Everything about them was wrong. There was nothing I could recognize as human to them, regardless of their ability to speak.

"Maybe we throw 'im in da box and watch 'im squirm." Well, that didn't sound like fun. I didn't like the sound of that idea at all.

"Could just cut off his arms, and watch him bleed out." Really? What an asshole. Though, I didn't have much of a leg to stand on, I came here to kill them after all.

"Nah, we take him home and play, pin the Chrome on the Ganic." I had already pulled my Omaha, but I wasn't quite pointing it at them yet. Safety off.

"Oh is little Ganic scairwd, we're sorry. We just wanna help you." They started spreading out, not a dumb move. Except the two spreading to the sides now had tagalongs hovering just behind their heads. The fact that they hadn't pulled their weapons yet, told me they felt they were in total control. Like nothing I could or would do mattered in the slightest.

That really pissed me off. I don't think I've been this kind of mad before. The sensation burned like magma slowly coursing through my body.

"Hey why's the chump glowing?" No more, I'd heard enough of their fucking disgusting voices. It was time to end this.

"Now!" I snarled as I raised my iron. Two zaps rang out as did two deafening cracks. Three bodies hit the ground.

I stood there, staring at the corpses for few minutes. I was processing. While my feeling bubbled, I took the time to top off my magazine. I wasn't thinking about it, the action just a reflex, that I shouldn't even have had. In that moment, I didn't feel like morals mattered anymore. I was glad we'd killed them. My head and my heart went still.

My BTC shivered the motion pulled me back into the moment.

[ Adjusting...]

[ Gained skill Firearms at Rank 1 ]

Oh, okay. I guess that was good. I really had no clue whether any of the information on the screens was actually useful. For all I knew, the data on those screens was a lie.

Well, enough bullshit, time to get to the real work. We found three more of those crooked chips, in their ports. Sinnamin said those can be anything like Cred Chips, Skillsofts, or even just secured data. So potentially valuable, though I was without any way to calculate that value. Into the backpack they went. Even if I could pull the data off the chips right now it wouldn't do me any good, I'd need a lot of context to make the best use of anything I discovered.

Which reminded me, I pulled out another can Cirrus Cola. After the NiCola disaster I hesitated, then shrugged and tried it. The liquid tasted like off brand Coke maybe with some lime or lemon in it. Not as bad as the other junk that was for sure, but not that great either. This possible future was disappointing me in a great many ways.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

I noticed Scuff and Fix scanning everything in the area, including the corpses. I guessed they were curious little robots.

Only one of the "gonks" had a gun. A big ass revolver, into the backpack with that as well. The blades the others carried, looked like garbage to me, so I didn't bother with them.

Shit, they only had $200 in bills. This method of resource gathering would take a while. There was nothing else worth "klepping" on the bodies. I did go poke around where I first seen them, while I was driving around. I found a whole bunch of junk, of indeterminate worth. I wasn't sure what a lot of this stuff was even for. Various cables and microchips. A radio that while functional looked cheap. "Food" and "drinks" of various descriptions. A couple of inhaler looking objects. If I had got the context right, these could be either medicines or drugs. Into the backpack. There seemed to be the lot of it.

That could explain their erratic behavior, maybe the three gangers were junkies.

I sighed. No one said it would be easy. We needed to get back to hunting down another group, I supposed. Very disappointing.

I found a massive Wall. The wall was black and lit with red. Blocks worth of the city had been walled off behind this edifice. The colors and the name of the district gave away who this area belonged to, Arasaka. A Mega Corp, wielding massive power and influence across the world. Perhaps the biggest gang in Night City, from a certain point of view. We were not ready to mess with them. Though raiding Corporations for fun and profit did sound exciting? Maybe, one day. For now, I'll have to be content with smaller game.

Skirting the wall led me to a place were I could hear some ear bleeding music, if you could call it that. I followed until I had found the Totentanz. The screeching noises were very loud. Yup, definitively looked like a place for Death Metal concerts. Haha, Death Metal. Borged up Psychos.

Loads of Maelstrom, too many for us to deal with right now. Let's skip it. I'll come back with my own gang someday. Tree gang represent. I threw a few silly gang signs, in a moment of pure childlike glee. Or would we be the Nature gang? Eh, I'll figure it out later.

Much larger gatherings of the more ordinary looking people milled about in this area, normal by 2074 standards anyway. I couldn't understand wanting to be around the Maelstrom. You'd think the constant threat of being robbed, killed or worse, would keep the riff-raff away. No such luck.

Driving on, I was overwhelmed by a sense of futility. There were just so many of these fuckers everywhere. My initial distaste for the city had grown to full blown hatred, by this point, and I'd not been here for even a full day yet. The truly weird thing was, I think this fucked up city wanted me to hate it. Like it thrived off all the pain and misery. There's a terrible thought. A Cursed City, feasting off blood, sorrow and death. And here I was about to feed it some more.

I spied a couple of more isolated groups of 'Stromers over by Megabuilding 12. As good a place as any for us to setup a hunting ground. I circled around and parked by a clothing store, called Ded Zed. I picked it because while there were still cars in the parking lot the store itself was closed. Good.

This time I'd try to be more cautious, I'd rather not get surrounded again. It might have worked out the first time but I couldn't rely on luck to see me through this. Trying to be stealthy likely wouldn't work for me. But I thought that I could be a distraction for the Probes to make their moves. I nodded as I got my weapon ready for action. Eyes open. Let's bag some 'Strom.

The first group we ran across were five chromeheads right by the Megabuilding itself. We came upon them at a good moment, they were getting ready to head some where else. They gathered their stuff up and were trying to put out the fire they had been cooking something over.

Scuff had snuck up on them and was now hovering well over their heads. The aggressive little Probe began to zap one and then another. Fix came in fast and low zapping at the gangers' feet. I fired a few rounds, trying to do my part. Our first volley, we did a lot of damage. But some of them still had some fight left. One ganger had a machete and only seeing me decided to charge, the other two still standing started firing at me one with a shotgun the other with some kind of automatic rifle.

Something slapped into me. "Shit!" I went down hard. At first, I didn't feel anything. It's like my body couldn't believe what had happened. The only good thing to out of it, was in my reflexive spasm, I pulled the trigger on my Omaha. This somehow dropped the machete wielding asshole long enough for Fix to zap him face first into the next life. When my mind finally started to catch up, Scuff was finishing off the 'Strom with the rifle. Then the last guy, showing he still had half a brain, tried to run, but the Probes tag teamed him, zapping him into a smoldering pile of metal and meat.

I was fervently attempting to cast regrowth, I fumbled the shape of the spell a few times as this throbbing burning pain set in. "Fuck, fuck, fuck... " Finally, I managed to get the shape right and mana to flow properly. I channeled the spell, keeping the mana flowing until I could return to full health. Somewhere in there, I fumbled the spell again. My concentration was shot. Curses flowed from my mouth as I tried to get the spell shape right for the umpteenth time.

Scuff beeped, "Executor more Enemies are approaching. Orders?" The Probes seemed like he really wanted the order to be, "kill them all."

"Damn it, ambush them, shit, while I, fuck, finish up here." I got the spell going again and felt my mana drain more rapidly, this time.

"By your Command." Both beeped in unison. They flitted off at top speed, eager to lay into some more borged out fools.

As I was trying to dredge up more mana from the thin air, I heard the sounds of battle. This made me feel even shittier for having to depend on the Probes so much. The pain was dying down. I dared to check myself over. No wonder I fell down, I'd gotten hit by both gangoons. The remnants of both wounds were on my gut, though I guessed nothing too vital got wrecked. I used my hands to feel around the wounds, skin was once again mostly smooth. Still tender, but nicer than being dead.

The ruckus in the distance was getting louder. What was going on?

Okay, if I was going to keep doing this crazy bullshit I required some armor. Also staying further back would probably be a great idea. Let's just shoot the guys panicked into running by being zapped by something they couldn't see. It was becoming more and more obvious to me, that I knew nothing about combat. This learning it the hard way shit, not so fun.

I stood up, getting a good look at my ruined clothes. Rapidly drying blood was soaked into the entire front. Yup, these robes were a lost cause. Likely the clothes underneath were in even worse shape. I tested my movement. No hitches or cramps or muscle pulls. I seemed to be able to bend every which way. My legs solidly held my weight. Alright, I was fully functional if not optimal.

I decided to let Scuff and Fix handle the fighting for a moment while I started looting. Everything I could make out sounded like they had it covered. Pulling the backpack off was a struggle, somehow the straps got cinched tighter with my earlier fall. It didn't get hit but some of the cola cans ruptured when I was dropped to the ground. Ah, too bad. The shards seem unaffected, though the revolver would need to be cleaned later.

So I dumped the colas. Dried the pack out as best I could with a shirt scavenged from one of the retired Maelstromers. I somehow hadn't dropped my Omaha this whole time, and I wasn't about to now, which created a few awkward moments while looting. Thankfully I managed not to shoot myself.

The sounds of fighting were moving further away. I guessed that I was going to be looting the aftermath, of dozens of small fights.

An hour later, The Probes were done with their rampage. Soon after, both the trunk and backseat of the Galena were full. $9000 in script, 31 shards, a dozen more inhalers and various odds and ends that might be worth something. Fix and Scuff were dancing around in celebration, this was after they'd scanned every little thing in the area. I let them play, they'd earned it. Neither one of them had even gotten scratched. Were the Maelstrom that bad, or were my Probes that awesome?

I managed to scrounge together an outfit, from the 32 dead Stromers. It didn't look too bad, more of blue collar look rather than death metal video extra. Now if I could just get some mechanics overalls, I'd look like I did back home most of the time. I threw my tattered robes and clothes into the back seat of the Galena as well. I'd have to be sure to clean up all the blood later, but for now, my exhaustion was becoming unignorable.

Let's go sell all of this loot before finding a hotel, so I could zonk out for a while.