“Section 1.2: Regulation of Personal Armament
As of May 3rd, 2198, personal gunpowder-based firearm ownership is unrestricted for residents of Nova York, including individuals over sixteen and robots owned by certified robotics experts. Energy-based weaponry and resonance-based blades are unrestricted for individuals over eighteen and robots owned by certified robotics experts. Distribution to eligible individuals will not be restricted and will not result in detainment. Non-compliance will result in immediate detainment and revocation of all cybernetic augments for the minimum duration of three years, with a possible fine of up to 10,000 chips.”
— The Nova York Governance Code, Unrevised Edition 2198. Revised in 2199 following the near assassination of Nova York’s Mayor Alan Itch, resulting in the strictest armament regulation among megacities, which was later revised again by the GUF in the following year.
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The Contractors’ HQ wasn’t far from the bustling heart of the megacity, but I would still need to use something other than my legs to get there if I wanted to be done with this today. I’ve never taken a subway though and the SSU forums said that could actually be somehow challenging so they advised taking a cab if you had funds for it.
Looking back at my reluctant companion, I thought about spending some amount of time with her in an enclosed space of a cab and then decided on taking a subway. Better not risk more injury.
Terra, lead me towards the nearest subway station, while trying to evade camera range.
Will do, Miss Steele.
“So, how’re you gonna get there?” Rin asked while loudly and obnoxiously chewing on a piece of gum. I think it was gum. I didn’t see what exactly it was she put into her mouth.
“I’ve been thinking about taking the subway.” At that, Rin looked at me in disbelief and then started to howl with laughter. I was concerned about her choking on whatever she was chewing. I didn’t want to check with an x-ray scan, though.
“Wait.” She stopped laughing and looked at me with, now, a serious expression. “Are you serious? Well, alright then. Just don’t beg for my help if something goes wrong.” With that ominous comment, I started to walk more briskly towards where Terra led me.
The walk would take a couple of minutes so meanwhile, I decided to look at the passerby people and see how a Nova York civilian acted. Before, while I was running through a very similar looking street, I didn’t think to look at how a person dressed or walked. This time I wanted to take my time.
Back at the base, the biggest percentage of personnel there was mili-corp and therefore much different in behavior to some of the people I managed to pass by already.
These Nova York people didn’t walk in a set rhythm, or had to have their heads set straight and forward. There was almost none of the tenseness and combat ready postures in those people. They almost looked relaxed. Well, the majority of them at least.
There were also some people dressed in black and white corporate-style attire. Blouses and skirts with straight and uncompromising edges that just screamed of corpo lifestyle. These people in particular, had some of that military tenseness, but with a more precise assessment, I was able to say that it was not due to combat readiness, but probably something more in the line of massive amounts of stress.
The other group, which was dressed in much more colorful and asymmetric clothing, did look aware of their surroundings, but also strangely relaxed. They either had a very aggressive piece of music blasting out of their SDIs or spoke hurriedly to someone on the other side of the digital conversation. Some people either traveled in groups of two or more and talked to each other in an animated manner.
In conclusion, there was a clear divide between someone so engrossed in corpo lifestyle that I was able to sense the elevated cortisol and adrenaline levels with a quick bioscan, and someone that lived on the very edge of that work pace.
Besides the people, it was the buildings, and the architecture, as well as massive amounts of holo screens floating up high showing colorful advertisements, that made me also pay attention.
I was able to notice the clear divide between a fully corporate building and ones that were not made for a corpo use. It was the difference in the building materials that gave it away. While the corpo high scrapers were made of metal and glass, the other buildings had the foam concrete look to them. Not surprisingly since one was much pricier and difficult to come by than the other.
Looking at the buildings that had not much to do with corporations, or were simply being sucked dry by one, there was much more diversity in them compared to the corpo skyscrapers. I saw stores selling items that I would never think existed. There was no mention of them in my original programming.
What was an edible strawberry gun grease? I thought there was only one type of gun grease. And what was a ‘Duck-Ass Shooter 9000’? It did not look like a gun, but it certainly was in a firearms store’s display window.
“Yo! Stop for a sec! I need to check somethin’ out.” With that quick and hurried demand, Rin started to skip towards the firearms store which had that strange - let’s just call it what it probably was - gun.
I reluctantly trailed behind her. It might be prudent to check what weapon I might like to have after I get my license, which I intended to get right alongside acquiring my ID.
As I stepped into the store, I was greeted by a very animated and colorful notification in my ocular implant. Humans probably got that in their SDIs. Should I opt out of public notifications? But what if there’s an important one? I suppose that I could suffer through this idiotic picture of a very well-endowed woman hugging a sniper rifle between her breasts, while the name of the store floated around her head like a halo.
‘Rick’s Gunshafts’ is not a very compelling store name in my opinion. It’s clear that there is more than gun shafts on sale here.
“Damn! It’s sold out.” Rin said with her face plastered to an acrylic glass showcase, in which only a small piece of holo screen was left that said, “XIAN & JUAN’S SACRIFICO AUGMENT NO. 34 - SOLD OUT”, typed with big red letters.
I overheard before that Gabriel offered to buy Rin an augment for her ‘Sacrifico’ which I deduced meant a gun. Apparently, one which is very modular if there were already 34 augments available.
“Is that the one Gabriel is supposed to buy for you?” I asked because maybe Rin’s forgotten Gabriel’s promise.
“What? No, this one’s different. Supposed to lower the recoil by twelve percent.” With a sigh, Rin came up to the counter and asked a man, with excessively many tattoos to be working in a corpo, a question.
“Yo, I need that Sacrifico 34th augment. When do you have it in stock?” The older man raised his head up and away from the screen of his datapad and said,
“Oh, that thing? It’s not gonna be in stores for at least a couple of weeks.” He said tiredly as his head went back to his pad.
Rin was clearly not pleased by his response, but surprisingly left the man alone and stormed out of the store.
As I stepped outside after her, I got a notification from Terra.
Camera presence detected, Miss Steele. I advise adjusting the course of the travel if detection is unwelcome.
Either the store had some cameras on their customers or there was a monitoring drone moving around somewhere for me to get that message.
With that unfortunate information, I followed Rin and decided that if I were to stick to populated areas, I shouldn’t be ambushed. Although, it is also possible to be incapacitated in a crowded space. I uncapped my senses’ limitations and put my body’s mechanics into a combat-ready state. I’ll be prepared if something were to happen.
Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original.
As I followed Rin, I noticed that she was going to the subway station. Apparently, even after bad news, she was determined to accompany me. Well, now it was I that was following her. I trotted forward to match her mad walking pace.
“Is that augment something you need right now?” I asked because Rin’s emotional response seemed highly elevated if the answer to my question was no.
“Of course! This baby needs her augs!” She exclaimed as she petted the holstered gun at her hip. By ‘augs’ I think she meant ‘augments’.
“I see. So unless you augment your gun with them, it doesn’t work?” I asked as I thought about the atrocious engineering of such a weapon.
“What? Of course not. It works fine without them, but it could work better with them, right? It’s simple math. You should know, calculator.” She looked at me pointedly, and I had to issue an administrative command to my social protocols to NOT put Rin under as an ‘anomalous individual’. I think there are more flavors of human behavior than my original programming was ready for, is all.
“Alright.” I said, and then I pointed to a set of stairs that were leading underground. Next to them was a big and visible sign that simply said ‘subway’. Well, ‘visible’ might be a bit of a stretch if one didn’t have an x-ray vision to see that word under a pile of stickers and vulgar drawings. “That’s the station, I imagine.”
“Yep. Are you ready? I know Gabby doesn’t like it there. You gonna be fine or what?” Rin asked as she spit out the gray substance she was chewing onto the sidewalk. I didn’t want to know the composition of that thing.
Rin asked me that because the underground was not a great place for people who were heavily augmented with cybernetics or, in my case, who were synthoids. It had to do with the connection to the outside world, on which some cybernetics relied heavily, but mostly it was due to the metro itself. The trains that transported the passengers were built with durable materials and neutronium-based cores. Normally, a synthoid would have no problem being near a neutronium core. After all, I was able to exist without difficulty near Gabriel or Starfall. However, neutronium cores in the trains were bigger and some had slight defects that didn’t impact their performance, but what those defects did affect was the resonance. That was supposedly very annoying to people with neutronium-based cybernetics or synthoids.
I looked at Rin and said, “I’ll be fine. Let’s go.” I started to walk towards the entrance.
My engineering was superb and top of the line. It’d be a surprise if this was going to be a struggle for me.
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This was a struggle for me. I could feel my core battle the assaulting resonance of the train. It was grating and made me feel the human equivalent of nauseous. I thanked my inventors for not giving me a stomach.
“Why am I not surprised?” Rin sighed next to me.
We were sitting down on one of the benches that lined the walls of this disastrous tube.
No amount of adjusting my resonance helped with this incessant and almost harmful interference.
“By the way, I wanted to apologize.” Rin said out of nowhere. “You know, for being a jerk. Calling you a ‘calculator’ was uncalled-for.” She explained.
“It’s fine.” I needed to learn how to deal with difficult people, and it wasn’t as if Rin hit me or was actively antagonistic towards me. From what I heard from Moose and Gabriel, she could be just mean on the regular. Didn’t make me feel special.
“Alright.” She said in response. I looked at her subtly and saw another form of this perpetual grimace she always had her face twisted in.
“I heard you’ve been helping Gabby train. That’s nice of you.” She looked at me and met my eyes. I could tell my face was twisted in what humans would call discomfort. Her expression screamed pity, said my facial expression recognition software.
“He asked me in exchange for staying with him.” I elaborated.
“I know. Gabby told me. He tells me anything.” Her pity changed into something else. “That’s why I need to know that whatever problems you have, won’t affect him. Gabby has already too much on his plate to be bothering with your corpo troubles.”
I considered Rin’s words and cataloged them as genuine and caring. She was not as bad as she appeared to be. I suppose Gabriel told me the truth about that.
“They won’t. I started training him, so I know what he can handle.” I couldn’t help squirming in my seat as the train started going forward again. Only one more station to go. “That’s why he’s not with me right now. I refused his company.”
“Oh.” A three-second pause. “That’s good. Then we won’t have a problem.” Rin said as she reclined on the bench. I worried about the stickiness of the seats when I sat down, but she seemed unbothered.
“No, we won’t.” I said and then my memory came back to what Gabriel had said about me needing to shadow someone on a contract before I can take them on my own. Now seemed like a good time to ask Rin about that. “I have a question. Could I shadow you on a contract? I heard you take combat ones and that’s the category I wish to pursue when I’m eligible to take them on my own.”
She closed her eyes and relaxed. Her body swayed with the miniscule turbulence of this horrendous moving tube. “No problem. You seem capable enough. I actually have a job lined up later this week. It’s a retrieval job, but I expect there to be some shitheads ready to be beat up. You’d be perfect for it.”
“Thank you.” Another annoying spice of interference hit my body. What an annoyance.
Ever since I got here, I’ve been having difficulties. First the injury, then that strange experience during the V-F test and finally that unrestricted memory that took a chunk out of my current processing power. It’s been getting better on that front, but I still couldn’t figure out what those mysterious files were that my core downloaded after the test. It has been stabilized, thankfully, but now there’s this.
I will never take the subway again.
“That’s the stop. Come on!” Rin pulled me up by my arm as my body sluggishly moved forward.
We had to push our way forward, but with a couple of quick steps, I was able to enjoy the air clean of disruptive neutronium waves.
I looked around near the exit of the subway, and I could immediately notice the building to which I had to go. It was tall and had a big sign near the entrance that read ‘Global Unified Forces’ with an accompanying flag in blue and green colors.
Rin and I walked briskly through the crowded street and finally reached the destination.
“Alright, I’m coming with you.” Rin said as I stepped through the doors made of real glass.
Inside the grand entrance hall, people were coming from left and right. Talking to their SDIs or looking at something on their datapads. Some people were dressed in elaborate corpo outfits with small pins of green and blue flags on their jackets. It was busy here, but I managed to see there was a massive reception desk opposite on the other side of this hall.
Before I came closer though, I checked the message I received from them again, and it said to tell the receptionist desk an identifying number attached to this message, and they should sort this out quickly.
I also checked SSU forums for any additional information I might need. There wasn’t much since apparently the process was easy and quick. I would receive a physical ID, but also a digital one. For the latter though, I would need to allow the GUF to connect to my universal port.
Some SSUs apparently refused the latter, which was an option, but not one that was advertised by the GUF.
It’d be smart if I also refused.
“Hello.” I said as I came closer to the reception. “I’ve been told to come here to receive my SSU identification.” The male-presenting receptionist by the name Jake, as his name tag suggested, looked at me once and then handed me a datapad.
“Welcome to the Global Unified Force's headquarters. Please input your issue number in the left top corner of the screen, and I’ll sort you out, ma’am.” He said as I got the device from his hands.
“‘Ma’am’! Ha! What a pony.” Rin murmured under her breath. I was able to hear it, but thankfully Jake did not.
I did as instructed and then waited, as there was a big ‘PLEASE WAIT’ shown on the small screen of this datapad.
“I see. I see.” Jake nodded to himself as he looked at his screen. “Well then, the only thing I need from you, ma’am, is to connect to the visible port on the datapad you’re holding. Then I’ll be able to issue you both digital and physical identification. If you’d please.” He gestured towards the connector on the datapad in my hand.
“Thank you, but I would like to receive physical identification only.” I handed him the datapad and the man looked confused.
“But, ma’am, it is mandatory for a SSU identification to be both physical and digital. I cannot issue one without another.” His eyes momentarily shined with an electrical impulse of a message or notification. “Oh.” He exclaimed. “I see there was… a policy change recently.” I’m very sorry about the confusion, ma’am, apparently there is no longer a need for digital identification.” He took the datapad from my hand.” If you could please wait a couple of minutes. I’ll go and fetch the physical ID.” Jake got up and walked towards the room behind the reception desk.
“Well, that wasn’t weird at all.” Rin said as she leaned on the desk’s surface. I was able to conclude that it was sarcasm.
“It was strange, yes.” I agreed with her.
“Yep, but at least this is it, right? Now you’re going to be a full and legal citizen of this great megacity.” Another wave of sarcasm, but I had a feeling I didn’t want to touch more on this subject.
That’s why when Jake came out holding a sleek looking, transparent and thin rectangle made from holo-capable acryl, I took it and immediately said.
“I would like to get a firearm license. Is this a place to do this?” Jake nodded and a few minutes later I was able to legally buy a firearm.
“Rin, I have a suggestion.” I stared as we stepped from the entrance of the GUF building onto a bustling street.
“I’m listening.” This time I was able to read what was said on the package of the supposed gum. It said ‘Gumzoo’, which I’ve taken to mean that it was indeed a gum Rin was chewing before.
“Could you help me with buying a gun?” I asked and Rin’s face turned from mildly bored to an excited smirk. I didn’t stop my face from making a similar expression. Who didn’t like buying themselves a firearm?
“Fuck yeah! I know just the place.” She started to walk and I followed along.