I awoke snarling! That FUCKING BITCH!

I even had a good idea what she had done.

Corporations had gotten more and more out of hand, especially as the Solar System colonization had started advancing in the late 2040's.

Humanity was still coming off the Great A.I. Struggles, that had started in the late 2020s, and ended with the A.I. bans of 2044. Nukes were used. Yup, death by radiation was considered the better choice, than allowing the A.I.s to keep fucking everything up.

As in a bullet to the head of anyone proven to mess with, try to create, or aid the already existent A.I.s.

Whole sections of earth became uninhabitable, due to the A.I.s' great ideas.

Like Species diversity was a problem, and trees cause too much pollution, kind of ideas. By eliminating these, you would have less problems to solve for thus ushering in a utopia.

One even argued that Humans should be forced to generate power by operating crank generators. The power was so it could expand and help humanity better.

Or Humans should become more like machines themselves, that would fix so many of their issues. You guessed it that was the origin of what would become Metal.

Yup. Still some of those running around. Like the one that ran what's left of South America. Don't go down there!

Still needing something to crunch all the numbers. V.I.s (Virtual Intelligences) became the mainstay.

Adaptive learning programs, hardcoded(chained) into their machines. I don't fully understand how precisely they are different, other than the assurance they couldn't gain any real sapience. Something, something, can't alter their own core coding. And more importantly were easily disposed of if they did. Wait, hold up!

So as humanity spread through the Solar System with their new latent murder machines, Corporations kept seizing more and more control from the broken governments, and already owned all the colonization efforts.

This continued mostly unchecked.

2050s The old net collapsed, and the Corps created the ISL to replace it. Now they owned all the information.

Even the Petroleum Phage incident of the 2060s only temporarily slowed them down. Mitigated by the now established colonies and mining operations out in the black.

Somewhere in there the first ARCs were founded. A defense against, all manner of problems. Hostile environments cause by the A.I.s bullshit, Nuclear fallout, food and water shortages, and crazy people.

Some smaller Corps, lead by slightly less asshole-ish people, began to reintroduce modified plants and animals back into the wild. Results Varied. Sometimes hilarity ensued.

The Consumer Rebellion started in the late 2070s over something so ridiculous, it was redacted by the new Governments that were established by the Conflict. The Corps too.

This is also the origin of Arbiters. Created to combat the Corp Heavies, and the increasingly out of control civvies.

Part of it, the only part still known, was that Corps had taken subliminal advertisement to insane levels. Pheromone induction, Sonic Frequency Manipulation, Light Tone programing, even brute force Smithing (programing/hacking) of peoples Metal. In some cases effects were permanent. Bad PR was no longer their concern. Destroyed lives, eh who cares, there are billions of them.

Thus to today's issue. Metal Wards protected against most of it, MetEyes and MetEars filtered out a lot of it. Not everyone can afford the best Wards, or Eyes or Ears at all, and unscrupulous merchants and Corps take advantage.

While there are laws preventing it being used beyond a slight inclination towards whatever's being pushed. Unsurprisingly Enforcement had been an issue, bribes easily making it go away.

Molly had used that crap on me, subtle at first, probably within the law.

It likely affected me more than it should have. Due to my better sense, but a lack of filters.

She cranked it up after she saw the armor's materials. Pure fucking greed.

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It scrudged my judgement, and now I had no armor. Or boots?! I walked back barefoot. Fuck.

At least she didn't get the under armor. Spider Silk would be worth a lot. Worth it to sell it. I might go through Saul, just intelligently this time, without the brain slag.

I was going to find her, and I was going to kill her.

I pulled out my ICBD.

I called Joshua and gave him her details, asked him to find her, if not soon then once she settled into whatever life she was going to build with my money.

"No problem meatbrain, I'll save you from your Derp." Sigh, I couldn't respond to the truth.

"Thanks Comp." I closed the connection. Plotting, images of tearing her apart.

I needed protection and something to guard against such bullshit in the future. Filters in a helmet, maybe.

Purchase Options, please have what I need.

Sigh, the only weapons or armor, on the list, were the Mimirian and Goblin Stuff. I couldn't afford the Mimirian Power Armor, 10,000 creds. I could afford the plasma carbine 5000 creds or a plasma axe for 3000 creds, but no. Too much attention.

I'd do it another way. That's what contacts were for.

I ranged up Saul.

"Saul, I got Cyced. I need a reputable Fire Dealer on the Zap(fast/double)."

"Who would fuck with you?" Saul seemed genuinely shocked.

I gave him the whole story. Tried not to curse every other word. Failed, badly.

"Whoa that's one canned Porta. You need help finding her?" Saul could be good people. At least as long as you were good to him.

"No, Joshua's on it."

"Oh, she's so nulled. Just so happens there's a guy I know in your ARC. Floor 11 Shop 1896. He'll have things that fell off the AT. He'll treat you right. His handle's Wrap. I'll tell him your coming." He sighed as I closed the connection.

I checked the time 10:00 AM plenty of time to deal with Wrap and get to my appointment with Rita.

I grabbed the Avenger and headed out.

Wrap as it turned out had everything I needed. Also needed to dump it quick and cheap. The armor, a nice set with helmet, boots and gloves included, just needed to be resize, his printers could have it ready and sent to my Apartment later today. Payment on delivery.

For right now, I picked up a tac-harness, two strap on ammo pockets for my thighs, another backpack altered to be used as a hip pack. A tac-belt with two sheaths for gladius style blades with extended handles, made decent knives for me. He had a wicked looking fighting ax, designed for a fulm. Mine now. Magnetic attachment point on the harness. Time to Chop!

But the real prize.

[Kraken HMG short version

Tier 0

Type: Rifle - Full Auto or Burst Selectable

Ammo: .50 BMG

Capacity: 30 round Box Mag

Damage: Devastating to Obliterating

Iron Sights / Zerhe Muzzle Break / Back mounted mechanical stabilizer

Effect: Depends on Ammo ]

I typically prefer going tactical, but..

Oh ho! I going to have fun with this.

The fully adjustable harness for the stabilizer slipped right under my tac harness. The strong mechanical arm could lock in any position, so I could carry it hands free in any manner I chose, even over my head. I preferred the behind the shoulder locked methods.

Sadly, I couldn't fit the box mags in my thigh pockets, but two would fit in my new hip pack. 60 extra rounds of pure unadulterated "FUCK YOU!"

Avenger on my tac harness, some extra extended mags for it in my thigh pockets. Ammo scaled for Fulm, in everything.

Best part 8000 NBs for everything I got now, another 5000 NBs for the armor when it's delivered.

I used 5600 Exp to Buy and raise, Firearms - VI, HMG - III, CompSci - III, Hacking - III, ISL Smithing - III (Costs Double), Covert - V, then raised both my Racial and Class Levels to 4.

Ain't that a kick. A strong rush of power flowed through me, and my brain burned as new info got downloaded.

Time to see Rita.

Rita, was 4'8" maybe 4'9", dark hair and eyes. Maybe in her 40s, though it be hard to tell when someone is as Tinkered up as her.

She met me in her waiting room, and brushed her secretary away.

"Vick, let's see what we can do!"

She loved the idea of Tinkering Metal into someone with absolutely none, like some people like deflowering virgins. Weird, but whatever. Takes all kinds to make a good Taco casserole. Or something like that.

"Okay start with just some MetSkin on my left hand, then we observe the result." Bet it won't take.

She lead back to her operating theatre. Which was mostly a giant (to most people) chair. With dozens of thin auto-surgeon arms hanging about it, like insects getting ready to pounce. Holo-monitors here and there spewing stream of data. The walls were covered in Storage, both shelving and refrigeration for more biological components. Hmm, that might be another way. Go full on Wet Gear. Bio-manipulation can grow far superior organs, skin, muscle, even bones all based on your own genome. Sure not as durable as Metal, but it was you, for the most part.

Course, I was already quite the specimen. So not going to hold my breath.

I hopped into the not so giant to me chair, and settled in.

"Okay just relax, should be completely painless. Process for just the hand is about three minutes." Rita was grinning like she had won the lottery.

The Auto-surgeon arms worked at blazing fast speeds. Creepy and cool all at the same time.

First they disconnected the nerves to my hand. Then they degloved it. What a sight that was!

Three minutes later I had a hand covered with MetSkin.

The Auto-surgeon arms reconnected the nerves. Huh. So far so good.

Ten minutes later the pain began, from the wrist to the fingers it flared, rolling in waves. My own skin regrew and pushed apart the MetSkin. It looked like mushrooms sprouted at first, here and there.

Five minutes from when the pain began I had my old skin back, just as it was.

"Holy Fucking Metal!" Rita screamed. "That's so gleam!"

"Yeah, figures." I wasn't surprised. Confirmation, no Metal for me.

"Let me take samples! Please Vick!" She was practically jumping.

"Sure, but don't share the info with anyone else. Tell me if Wet Gear could work, or if I'm better off not bothering." I Shrugged. Didn't care. Eventually nothing any of their tech could do would matter to me. I just needed to start making the rules work for me.

The arms got to work, a pinch here, a nick there, and pokes everywhere. I was indifferent to it all.

"Share, Hell no, this slice is gonna be all mine." Strange Lady. Probably dreamin' about all crazy things, she'd do to all the samples.

I already knew what I was going to do.

I was going to kill and level and then repeat, until that bitch's skull was crushed by my hand.