Yinko
Well-known member
Didn't her fixer specifically tell her to not get involved with the kamikaze?
Ghost in the City Cyberpunk Gamer SI
- Thread starter Seras
- Start date
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- Tags
- cyberpunk gamer self-insert
PeaceMaker 03
Well-known member
Moto needs to just recce the objective and shut/flip turrets and cameras and feed info on where targets are. A good option for Moto tech-wise is to build a jammer for the assaults to increase the response time from the Malstrom.
Chapter 40
Seras
Well-known member
I really should have stayed home tonight.
We had gone out to hit a Maelstrom attack. Apparently, someone had managed to get information that the Strom were going to hit a Tyger Claw business, specifically a little gun shop that supplied quite a few Tyger Claws with firearms.
So Kamikaze were sent to take out the attack. What that entailed was everyone piling into four cars in a nearby alley and being as quiet as possible as we waited.
Which meant putting a group of budding Cyberpsychoes into close proximity to each other with the anxiety of future conflict.
I was with Jun and Akari again and just with that, I was ready to kill someone. Akari was getting snippy. Jun was surprisingly handling his anger really well.
Honestly he was handling Akari poking him with her sharp feet, or continuously trying to turn on the radio over and over despite all of us supposed to be quiet really well.
I however was not.
Akari kept pushing her passenger seat back into me, and whenever I moved behind Jun she would start trying to poke ME with her feet blades.
I was half a minute away from bashing my Nekomata in the back of her head to get some peace, when both Jun and Akari stilled.
I glanced around the seat, both of their eyes were yellow.
I rolled my eyes at not being included and just leaned back Jun would tell me what the call was about.
“Alright, the Maelstrom trucks are a minute out. Get ready.” Jun said and I nodded.
Then I instantly opened the door to Jun’s shock.
“Motoko?” He whispered at me as I climbed out.
“I’ll be on the roof. I’ll wait for you guys to start attacking before firing.” I tell them, pointing to the old buildings we were parked between, I could get up onto the roof and have an overwatch position. If you were willing to do a couple of tricky leaps.
I stuck the Nekomata over my shoulder and rushed away before Jun could say anything else.
I was honestly needing my own space. Akari was fun in short doses.
Short doses.
I tightened my gloves as I started climbing up the building. Sliding from a dumpster to an AC unit, then along the window ledge to jump to the next floor, where I grabbed an overhand and climbed up with a bit of effort.
Parkour made it a simple process of just pulling myself up after a jump each jump and leap climbing me higher and higher in the shortest time.
Then I was on the roof, and I hurried to overlook the Tyger Claw shop. Crouching up to the edge, I pulled off my Nekomata and started checking it over. Gun Nut already told me it was fine, but knowing, and ‘Knowing’, are two different things. Loaded, with the safety off, I rose up, having already chosen the best place to keep myself completely out of view. A shade from a sign put me entirely into shadow, and the brick I was pushed up against was colorful from Graffiti, so I would be invisible without a lot of attention.
I eased my eye over the scope. I could hear them.
The Maelstrom trucks were old beaters, hyper tuned monsters, or just loud. Loud and driven angrily.
They came around the corner in a mess, two of them even scraping against each other as they took the turn too sharply but neither driver seemed to care. The cavalcade roared down the street stopping around the shop, the Maelstrom actually managing an okay semi circle around it, to isolate it.
I waited. Kiroshi already scanning the gangsters. My NCPD File Search letting my scan not just tell me what the Strom were using for weapons, and some of their Cyberware, but also their rap sheet.
The more I scanned the more I smiled.
Cleaning up scum was a duty to all lovers of Peace and Justice after all. I scanned them as I waited, nothing really surprising popping out.
Murder, kidnapping and illegal squatting.
But I waited.
The Maelstrom borgs were hollering as if they already won, as they stepped out, a few guns firing into the air, or into the front of the shop seemingly just for fun.
I waited.
And then finally as the door opened, it happened.
The first Borg to try and enter got ripped apart as an HMG began firing from within the building. Instantly the Maelstrom jumped for cover and started firing back into the store. The forceful response more than the borgs expected.
Which is when I saw them.
Kamikaze, rushing in head first from behind. I sighed as I kept both eyes open, one through the scope, and one without as I watched, waited.
The first Maelstrom to notice the enemies at his back and turn around, was my target. His shotgun was raised.
I exhaled, a stream of what felt like freezing air escaping my lips. It was so easy.
My scope was already adjusted for range.
My arms held perfectly still. I couldn’t design a better weapons platform than my own body at that moment. I pulled the trigger.
The borg lost his head, his Shotgun falling out of his hands as his body followed. Bleeding out across the pavement.
I specifically ignored the alerts coming through. Making sure they wouldn’t be caught on the BD I was scrolling.
I shifted, my firing had unfortunately caused a few of the Maelstrom gonks to turn around hearing the rifle, but Kamikaze were on them now. Jun just behind Fujimura. Katana blazing red as he leapt over the back of one of the pickups, cutting down the Maelstrom gonk that was standing up on the bed, and then putting himself into the group.
But I was overwatch and I saw everything.
The Kamikaze gonkhead that hadn’t properly checked his ass and didn’t notice the driver of one of the trucks step out and start aiming at his back. The Kamikaze was punching a borg into scrap despite the body being quite dead. Hazards of Cyberpsychos I supposed.
Then I fired.
The driver slammed face first into his truck's rear door, as my round burst through his chest, he slipped to the pavement without resistance.
I shifted again.
It was funny. I rarely tended to use rifles, but with all of my skills and perks. They did synergize well. I fired again.
The gonk that Fujimura was wrestling with, had been just as big as the angry Kamikaze leader. They had tangled on the floor each trying to rip the other apart with their cyberware and strength.
I had a clear shot and took it. The Maelstroms spider like head came apart in two splattering Fujimura in white borg blood.
I moved on, uncaring that I could see Fujimura’s angry glare looking towards me.
But instead of firing I dropped. A barrage of bullets slamming into my previous position, I rolled along completely unbothered by the stone shrapnel as I kept the Nekomata closed.
Chrome arms made rolling on the ground surprisingly painless.
The burst of automatic fire was pulled away, but that was all I needed. As soon as it stopped I sprung up. Jogging sideways along the edge of the rooftop, stealth no longer needed, lining up the shot, the gonk that had just shot at me, while still distracted as he was being shot at, noticed and started aiming towards me.
Too slow.
I fired.
The fucker ducked away just in time his own response wildly missing even when mine punched a quarter sized hole into the side of the truck he was now taking cover behind.
I didn’t wait. My hands already dancing, as I grabbed another magazine from a hip pouch, dropping the empty magazine, and slamming the new one home. I was already aiming in once I stabilized from the reload I fired. Punching through the truck, and the moron that thought a few bits of car siding would stop a tech Sniper Rifle.
I didn’t stop moving, instead focusing on my next target, but it was already over.
Kamikaze were tearing the last few Maelstrom members into pieces.
A quick look over the battlefield to make sure no one was playing dead, and I nodded.
Mission complete.
I threw the Nekomata over my shoulder taking a moment to scope out my path and leapt off the side of the building, landing on a sign, I slipped off that to another lower sign, and then onto a ledge of the building, then simply stepped off and landed on the concrete.
I exhaled.
That felt good.
I took a moment to glance at the alerts after I shut off the BD scrolling. Looking through the list of alerts, very pleased with what I saw.
*500 XP Gained.*
*100 Assault XP Gained.*
*100 Assault XP Gained.*
*500 XP Gained.*
*100 Assault XP Gained.*
*Assault skill level up!*
*1 Perk Point Gained.*
*1000 XP Gained.*
*100 Assault XP Gained.*
*500 XP Gained.*
A new perk! Yay! I would have to check on that later, for now I focused on the scene around me.
I jogged up, noticing the Kamikaze were twitchy, all of them looking for more bloodshed. I ignored their glares and wandered up to Jun.
“You okay Jun-nii? Get hit at all?” I asked already reaching for my medical pouch, but he waved me off.
“Nothing my Subdermal didn’t catch.” He mentioned, as I looked towards his plastic abs, a ragged scrape cut through the flesh, but I could see it was only skin deep. The bullet ricocheted.
Ow. That still looked painful.
“You sure? I got a MaxDoc, got some painkillers.” I mumbled pulling out some stuff I had picked up at the random pharmacy I had stopped at before all of this.
“I don’t feel it. I have a Pain Editor.” He told me with a shrug, and I had nothing on that, just nodding. Even if my fingers twitched to tie a bandage around it.
I looked around at the carnage then. The twenty or so Maelstrom borgs were torn to pieces. Blood dripped and ran down the road. A few of the Kamikaze were injured, only one seriously, a shotgun had clipped one of the female members. She was down an arm, but otherwise fine.
A visit to a ripper and she would be right as rain.
Funny how combat was in the future. Vicious bloody affairs.
A few vans roaring down the roads had me twitching but the Kamikaze around us waved them forward and they stopped.
Instantly Tyger Claw grunts jumped out of the back of the familiar moving vans.
It was like the ones Ichi had borrowed for the Scav raid.
No. I blinked, feeling the cool dryness of my Kiroshi. Not like the Vans.
The same van, because there in the driver seat, which I could only make out due to my Kiroshi was Ichi.
“Jun. I’m gonna go see how Ichi is doing, you alright?”
“Huh? Oh your choom. Go on, I’m fine. Stop hovering.” He ordered waving me off, but it was in a joking manner that made me smile as I threw him a thumbs up and ran up to the van.
Happily jumping up onto the door and sticking my crossed arms onto the rim so I could stick my head in.
“Long time no see!” I cried out instantly causing Ichi to yelp like a girl and scrambled around as he tried and failed to fumble a gun out of his holster.
“Motoko?”
“You should either practice that draw a bit more, or store a gun somewhere you can grab easily.” I informed him with a grin. As the boy sighed out all of his air and seemed to check his heart.
“Please don’t do that! These jobs are tense.”
“Why? All the Maelstrom gonks are dead.”
“Yeah maybe. They aren’t always, and reinforcements are a thing.”
“Well then you should definitely work on that draw. How you been Ichi? I haven’t heard from you since… Well.”
“Since the war heated up yeah… Motoko. Is that chrome?” He asked, blinking in shock as he took in my arms resting on the door.
“Yeah. I got klepped by the Maelstrom, they were trying to draw out Jun. Apparently he killed enough of the Strom to make a mark.”
“Klepped… Again!?” He asked, looking horrified.
“Yeah. Right outside the apartment. Shot me up, and cut off my hands.” I waved my hands a bit wiggling the fingers. “It really sucked, they took me to this pit fight thing. It’s… Well I don’t really want to talk about it. Eventually Jun got enough people together to come get me. I was alive… Mostly. I’m fixed up… Mostly.” I admitted actually feeling my voice go a little heavy at the end there.
He looked me over for a moment, nodding, “You’re strong. You’ll be okay. But if you need anything, we are still chooms.”
I smiled at that. What else could I do? I didn’t really have many chooms. “Thanks Ichi. Where is Malcolm anyways? I thought he was your co-pilot while you worked?”
“Malcolm bailed… We got shot up a few nights into everything, neither of us got hit, but one of the guys in the back got torn up. Malcolm tried to stabilize the guy but it didn’t work out. He took it hard. He’s been staying home ever since.”
I frowned a bit. I wasn’t really close to Malcolm, but he was part of our little kiddy gang. “I should call him, or visit maybe?”
Ichi looked surprised at my question. “You would do that?”
“Of course! We… I mean, I’m not really close to you or him, or Omaeda, but you guys are still my chooms… I mean, You’ve known me since before the coma right? And we were a little pack of troublemakers. I got to look out for you guys, or at least… At least offer an ear.” Honestly something I probably should have been doing before… I had been a little self focused, ignoring making friends or my old chooms.
Ichi was quiet for a moment before he smiled. “Malcolm would like that. Really.”
“How about you then? The Tyger Claw loot recovery job doing well?” I asked, putting on a teasing smile as he chuffed a bit.
“Honestly? You paid better.”
I cackled at that, both of us breaking into laughter.
“Well maybe I should hire you full time. I hit this Maelstrom place the other night, and with everything including Jun showing up tracking me down I had to leave sooo much loot. I was so sad.” I told him as I plopped my chin down on the door. “Leaving loot behind is wrong!”
“Well obviously you need to hire a professional loot recovery agent… Unfortunately I’m all booked.” He said giving the length just long enough to get my hopes up.
“Mean!”
“So you and the Kamikaze? You know those guys are..”
“Cyberpsychos? No, I totally missed that, and thought they were all perfectly reasonable people.” I said tonelessly, managing to draw a snort from him.
“Well, be careful. They are useful, and effective, but all the guys that work with them tell horror stories. Sometimes they go off on the retrieval guys.”
“I can see it. ” I nod thinking on the few times that they seemed to start losing it. “But I just gotta keep an eye on Jun. He… Well he wasn’t in a good place.”
“Well you gotta stick with your brother… I never would have thought they would let you in though. You have to be seriously chromed up for them to even consider.”
“I’m not… Joined, I mean. I’m more like a… ghost. That follows Jun around. That’s all.”
“Pfft. Yeah more like an Onryo.” He joked and it took me a moment to remember what that meant.
“Hey! I don’t crawl out of TVs! And my hair is nice!”
He just shook his head at me smiling which earned him a light tap on the shoulder, that he winced and rubbed. It was only a baby tap… With my chrome knuckles.
“Ow… I’m sorry. I didn’t hear about the kidnapping thing. I just thought you were busy doing crazy shit again. I should have reached out.” He mumbled after a while of silence between us.
“I was under a jammer for a long while… But I should have reached out and checked on you too. I visited Hiromi, but I didn’t even call… Sorry. Not much of a choom I guess.”
“Eh. You’re better than you used to be. Scarier, funnily enough, even if old you was more interested in being intimidating, but you manage it better.”
Interesting! “Really? How would you describe old me?” I asked, I hadn’t really gotten much from anyone about how I used to be. Who I used to be.
He hesitated for a bit but shrugged. “Listen I liked you, we were chooms and we got into trouble together, but you were kinda a bitch. You got us into so much trouble that we could have avoided by just not starting shit.”
“Wow. Hiromi never mentioned that!”
“She wouldn’t… Hiromi has always been i- Ah never mind. Look, your brother is trying to get your attention.” He instantly switched topics pointing.
As interested as I was in what he had been about to say I turned and saw Jun waving for me.
“Well he is my current ride, so I better delta. Keep in touch Ichi. We are still chooms!”
“Same to you Motoko.”
I nodded as I jumped off and hurried after Jun.
—--
“Girl! You are coming too.” Fujimura demanded as we all piled out of the cars. I had been heading back towards the apartment to put up my equipment, and probably clean my Nekomata, but Fujimura had suddenly called out, specifically at me.
“After action report?”
“Yeah. Guess Fujimura-Sama wants you there. You must have done well.” Jun offered with a smile as Akari suddenly poked her head in between us.
“Or terrible! Maybe he’ll cut you up for messing up so bad?”
“I don’t think I messed up?” I told her as we walked but she was quick to run in front of me and walk backwards which seemed to take some effort with her feet blades.
“Ooh but you ran off! Fujimura-Sama haaates when people do something he didn’t tell them to. Motoko is in troooouble.” She mocked as we reached the window that let us into the Dojo area.
“Shut up Akari.” Jun grumbled at her, but then we were there, in the downstairs area of the dojo. With the couches and little plastic chairs arrayed around Fujimura that stood.
“Another injury, pathetic.” He growled out as he looked over the people. “Injuries are expected, serious injuries are not. If you are incapable of not losing a limb, then get better chrome, or die so someone more skilled can use yours.” He demanded pulling no punches.
Also wow. What an asshole thing to say.
“Girl!” He said suddenly pulled me away from my thoughts. I was standing behind Jun who was sitting on one of the plastic chairs in the circle.
“Yes?”
“You nearly shot me tonight.” He said bluntly and I couldn’t help but wonder what the hell he was talking about.
“No I didn’t.”
“Your bullet passed less then a foot from my head.”
“Yeah? It didn’t come anywhere close to you. I mean, I’m not a crack shot or anything, but at that range? I could probably get the round to kiss you if I wanted.” I replied getting a little grumbly. This guy was such an asshole, and I was kind of sick of it.
He looked me over before nodding. “Kamikaze don’t have a marksman. That skillset doesn’t tend to come hand in hand with our purpose. Kusanagi! Your sister is acceptably useful. You didn’t waste our time having us save her.” He offered and then just…
Turned away and started squeezing everyone through the wringer on their fuckups. Jun and I both weren’t exempt. Apparently I fired too slow…
Well yeah. I only had Assault 5! I wasn’t going to shoot any faster. I might friendly fire!
Well… I could still level it up some more. It was fun.
By the time I settled onto the couch that night, blanket pulled up to my chin and ready for a sleep to get the muscle pain in my back to go away. I had a thought.
“Wait… Does he think I’m a member now!? But I’m not a Cyberpsycho!”
We had gone out to hit a Maelstrom attack. Apparently, someone had managed to get information that the Strom were going to hit a Tyger Claw business, specifically a little gun shop that supplied quite a few Tyger Claws with firearms.
So Kamikaze were sent to take out the attack. What that entailed was everyone piling into four cars in a nearby alley and being as quiet as possible as we waited.
Which meant putting a group of budding Cyberpsychoes into close proximity to each other with the anxiety of future conflict.
I was with Jun and Akari again and just with that, I was ready to kill someone. Akari was getting snippy. Jun was surprisingly handling his anger really well.
Honestly he was handling Akari poking him with her sharp feet, or continuously trying to turn on the radio over and over despite all of us supposed to be quiet really well.
I however was not.
Akari kept pushing her passenger seat back into me, and whenever I moved behind Jun she would start trying to poke ME with her feet blades.
I was half a minute away from bashing my Nekomata in the back of her head to get some peace, when both Jun and Akari stilled.
I glanced around the seat, both of their eyes were yellow.
I rolled my eyes at not being included and just leaned back Jun would tell me what the call was about.
“Alright, the Maelstrom trucks are a minute out. Get ready.” Jun said and I nodded.
Then I instantly opened the door to Jun’s shock.
“Motoko?” He whispered at me as I climbed out.
“I’ll be on the roof. I’ll wait for you guys to start attacking before firing.” I tell them, pointing to the old buildings we were parked between, I could get up onto the roof and have an overwatch position. If you were willing to do a couple of tricky leaps.
I stuck the Nekomata over my shoulder and rushed away before Jun could say anything else.
I was honestly needing my own space. Akari was fun in short doses.
Short doses.
I tightened my gloves as I started climbing up the building. Sliding from a dumpster to an AC unit, then along the window ledge to jump to the next floor, where I grabbed an overhand and climbed up with a bit of effort.
Parkour made it a simple process of just pulling myself up after a jump each jump and leap climbing me higher and higher in the shortest time.
Then I was on the roof, and I hurried to overlook the Tyger Claw shop. Crouching up to the edge, I pulled off my Nekomata and started checking it over. Gun Nut already told me it was fine, but knowing, and ‘Knowing’, are two different things. Loaded, with the safety off, I rose up, having already chosen the best place to keep myself completely out of view. A shade from a sign put me entirely into shadow, and the brick I was pushed up against was colorful from Graffiti, so I would be invisible without a lot of attention.
I eased my eye over the scope. I could hear them.
The Maelstrom trucks were old beaters, hyper tuned monsters, or just loud. Loud and driven angrily.
They came around the corner in a mess, two of them even scraping against each other as they took the turn too sharply but neither driver seemed to care. The cavalcade roared down the street stopping around the shop, the Maelstrom actually managing an okay semi circle around it, to isolate it.
I waited. Kiroshi already scanning the gangsters. My NCPD File Search letting my scan not just tell me what the Strom were using for weapons, and some of their Cyberware, but also their rap sheet.
The more I scanned the more I smiled.
Cleaning up scum was a duty to all lovers of Peace and Justice after all. I scanned them as I waited, nothing really surprising popping out.
Murder, kidnapping and illegal squatting.
But I waited.
The Maelstrom borgs were hollering as if they already won, as they stepped out, a few guns firing into the air, or into the front of the shop seemingly just for fun.
I waited.
And then finally as the door opened, it happened.
The first Borg to try and enter got ripped apart as an HMG began firing from within the building. Instantly the Maelstrom jumped for cover and started firing back into the store. The forceful response more than the borgs expected.
Which is when I saw them.
Kamikaze, rushing in head first from behind. I sighed as I kept both eyes open, one through the scope, and one without as I watched, waited.
The first Maelstrom to notice the enemies at his back and turn around, was my target. His shotgun was raised.
I exhaled, a stream of what felt like freezing air escaping my lips. It was so easy.
My scope was already adjusted for range.
My arms held perfectly still. I couldn’t design a better weapons platform than my own body at that moment. I pulled the trigger.
The borg lost his head, his Shotgun falling out of his hands as his body followed. Bleeding out across the pavement.
I specifically ignored the alerts coming through. Making sure they wouldn’t be caught on the BD I was scrolling.
I shifted, my firing had unfortunately caused a few of the Maelstrom gonks to turn around hearing the rifle, but Kamikaze were on them now. Jun just behind Fujimura. Katana blazing red as he leapt over the back of one of the pickups, cutting down the Maelstrom gonk that was standing up on the bed, and then putting himself into the group.
But I was overwatch and I saw everything.
The Kamikaze gonkhead that hadn’t properly checked his ass and didn’t notice the driver of one of the trucks step out and start aiming at his back. The Kamikaze was punching a borg into scrap despite the body being quite dead. Hazards of Cyberpsychos I supposed.
Then I fired.
The driver slammed face first into his truck's rear door, as my round burst through his chest, he slipped to the pavement without resistance.
I shifted again.
It was funny. I rarely tended to use rifles, but with all of my skills and perks. They did synergize well. I fired again.
The gonk that Fujimura was wrestling with, had been just as big as the angry Kamikaze leader. They had tangled on the floor each trying to rip the other apart with their cyberware and strength.
I had a clear shot and took it. The Maelstroms spider like head came apart in two splattering Fujimura in white borg blood.
I moved on, uncaring that I could see Fujimura’s angry glare looking towards me.
But instead of firing I dropped. A barrage of bullets slamming into my previous position, I rolled along completely unbothered by the stone shrapnel as I kept the Nekomata closed.
Chrome arms made rolling on the ground surprisingly painless.
The burst of automatic fire was pulled away, but that was all I needed. As soon as it stopped I sprung up. Jogging sideways along the edge of the rooftop, stealth no longer needed, lining up the shot, the gonk that had just shot at me, while still distracted as he was being shot at, noticed and started aiming towards me.
Too slow.
I fired.
The fucker ducked away just in time his own response wildly missing even when mine punched a quarter sized hole into the side of the truck he was now taking cover behind.
I didn’t wait. My hands already dancing, as I grabbed another magazine from a hip pouch, dropping the empty magazine, and slamming the new one home. I was already aiming in once I stabilized from the reload I fired. Punching through the truck, and the moron that thought a few bits of car siding would stop a tech Sniper Rifle.
I didn’t stop moving, instead focusing on my next target, but it was already over.
Kamikaze were tearing the last few Maelstrom members into pieces.
A quick look over the battlefield to make sure no one was playing dead, and I nodded.
Mission complete.
I threw the Nekomata over my shoulder taking a moment to scope out my path and leapt off the side of the building, landing on a sign, I slipped off that to another lower sign, and then onto a ledge of the building, then simply stepped off and landed on the concrete.
I exhaled.
That felt good.
I took a moment to glance at the alerts after I shut off the BD scrolling. Looking through the list of alerts, very pleased with what I saw.
*500 XP Gained.*
*100 Assault XP Gained.*
*100 Assault XP Gained.*
*500 XP Gained.*
*100 Assault XP Gained.*
*Assault skill level up!*
*1 Perk Point Gained.*
*1000 XP Gained.*
*100 Assault XP Gained.*
*500 XP Gained.*
A new perk! Yay! I would have to check on that later, for now I focused on the scene around me.
I jogged up, noticing the Kamikaze were twitchy, all of them looking for more bloodshed. I ignored their glares and wandered up to Jun.
“You okay Jun-nii? Get hit at all?” I asked already reaching for my medical pouch, but he waved me off.
“Nothing my Subdermal didn’t catch.” He mentioned, as I looked towards his plastic abs, a ragged scrape cut through the flesh, but I could see it was only skin deep. The bullet ricocheted.
Ow. That still looked painful.
“You sure? I got a MaxDoc, got some painkillers.” I mumbled pulling out some stuff I had picked up at the random pharmacy I had stopped at before all of this.
“I don’t feel it. I have a Pain Editor.” He told me with a shrug, and I had nothing on that, just nodding. Even if my fingers twitched to tie a bandage around it.
I looked around at the carnage then. The twenty or so Maelstrom borgs were torn to pieces. Blood dripped and ran down the road. A few of the Kamikaze were injured, only one seriously, a shotgun had clipped one of the female members. She was down an arm, but otherwise fine.
A visit to a ripper and she would be right as rain.
Funny how combat was in the future. Vicious bloody affairs.
A few vans roaring down the roads had me twitching but the Kamikaze around us waved them forward and they stopped.
Instantly Tyger Claw grunts jumped out of the back of the familiar moving vans.
It was like the ones Ichi had borrowed for the Scav raid.
No. I blinked, feeling the cool dryness of my Kiroshi. Not like the Vans.
The same van, because there in the driver seat, which I could only make out due to my Kiroshi was Ichi.
“Jun. I’m gonna go see how Ichi is doing, you alright?”
“Huh? Oh your choom. Go on, I’m fine. Stop hovering.” He ordered waving me off, but it was in a joking manner that made me smile as I threw him a thumbs up and ran up to the van.
Happily jumping up onto the door and sticking my crossed arms onto the rim so I could stick my head in.
“Long time no see!” I cried out instantly causing Ichi to yelp like a girl and scrambled around as he tried and failed to fumble a gun out of his holster.
“Motoko?”
“You should either practice that draw a bit more, or store a gun somewhere you can grab easily.” I informed him with a grin. As the boy sighed out all of his air and seemed to check his heart.
“Please don’t do that! These jobs are tense.”
“Why? All the Maelstrom gonks are dead.”
“Yeah maybe. They aren’t always, and reinforcements are a thing.”
“Well then you should definitely work on that draw. How you been Ichi? I haven’t heard from you since… Well.”
“Since the war heated up yeah… Motoko. Is that chrome?” He asked, blinking in shock as he took in my arms resting on the door.
“Yeah. I got klepped by the Maelstrom, they were trying to draw out Jun. Apparently he killed enough of the Strom to make a mark.”
“Klepped… Again!?” He asked, looking horrified.
“Yeah. Right outside the apartment. Shot me up, and cut off my hands.” I waved my hands a bit wiggling the fingers. “It really sucked, they took me to this pit fight thing. It’s… Well I don’t really want to talk about it. Eventually Jun got enough people together to come get me. I was alive… Mostly. I’m fixed up… Mostly.” I admitted actually feeling my voice go a little heavy at the end there.
He looked me over for a moment, nodding, “You’re strong. You’ll be okay. But if you need anything, we are still chooms.”
I smiled at that. What else could I do? I didn’t really have many chooms. “Thanks Ichi. Where is Malcolm anyways? I thought he was your co-pilot while you worked?”
“Malcolm bailed… We got shot up a few nights into everything, neither of us got hit, but one of the guys in the back got torn up. Malcolm tried to stabilize the guy but it didn’t work out. He took it hard. He’s been staying home ever since.”
I frowned a bit. I wasn’t really close to Malcolm, but he was part of our little kiddy gang. “I should call him, or visit maybe?”
Ichi looked surprised at my question. “You would do that?”
“Of course! We… I mean, I’m not really close to you or him, or Omaeda, but you guys are still my chooms… I mean, You’ve known me since before the coma right? And we were a little pack of troublemakers. I got to look out for you guys, or at least… At least offer an ear.” Honestly something I probably should have been doing before… I had been a little self focused, ignoring making friends or my old chooms.
Ichi was quiet for a moment before he smiled. “Malcolm would like that. Really.”
“How about you then? The Tyger Claw loot recovery job doing well?” I asked, putting on a teasing smile as he chuffed a bit.
“Honestly? You paid better.”
I cackled at that, both of us breaking into laughter.
“Well maybe I should hire you full time. I hit this Maelstrom place the other night, and with everything including Jun showing up tracking me down I had to leave sooo much loot. I was so sad.” I told him as I plopped my chin down on the door. “Leaving loot behind is wrong!”
“Well obviously you need to hire a professional loot recovery agent… Unfortunately I’m all booked.” He said giving the length just long enough to get my hopes up.
“Mean!”
“So you and the Kamikaze? You know those guys are..”
“Cyberpsychos? No, I totally missed that, and thought they were all perfectly reasonable people.” I said tonelessly, managing to draw a snort from him.
“Well, be careful. They are useful, and effective, but all the guys that work with them tell horror stories. Sometimes they go off on the retrieval guys.”
“I can see it. ” I nod thinking on the few times that they seemed to start losing it. “But I just gotta keep an eye on Jun. He… Well he wasn’t in a good place.”
“Well you gotta stick with your brother… I never would have thought they would let you in though. You have to be seriously chromed up for them to even consider.”
“I’m not… Joined, I mean. I’m more like a… ghost. That follows Jun around. That’s all.”
“Pfft. Yeah more like an Onryo.” He joked and it took me a moment to remember what that meant.
“Hey! I don’t crawl out of TVs! And my hair is nice!”
He just shook his head at me smiling which earned him a light tap on the shoulder, that he winced and rubbed. It was only a baby tap… With my chrome knuckles.
“Ow… I’m sorry. I didn’t hear about the kidnapping thing. I just thought you were busy doing crazy shit again. I should have reached out.” He mumbled after a while of silence between us.
“I was under a jammer for a long while… But I should have reached out and checked on you too. I visited Hiromi, but I didn’t even call… Sorry. Not much of a choom I guess.”
“Eh. You’re better than you used to be. Scarier, funnily enough, even if old you was more interested in being intimidating, but you manage it better.”
Interesting! “Really? How would you describe old me?” I asked, I hadn’t really gotten much from anyone about how I used to be. Who I used to be.
He hesitated for a bit but shrugged. “Listen I liked you, we were chooms and we got into trouble together, but you were kinda a bitch. You got us into so much trouble that we could have avoided by just not starting shit.”
“Wow. Hiromi never mentioned that!”
“She wouldn’t… Hiromi has always been i- Ah never mind. Look, your brother is trying to get your attention.” He instantly switched topics pointing.
As interested as I was in what he had been about to say I turned and saw Jun waving for me.
“Well he is my current ride, so I better delta. Keep in touch Ichi. We are still chooms!”
“Same to you Motoko.”
I nodded as I jumped off and hurried after Jun.
—--
“Girl! You are coming too.” Fujimura demanded as we all piled out of the cars. I had been heading back towards the apartment to put up my equipment, and probably clean my Nekomata, but Fujimura had suddenly called out, specifically at me.
“After action report?”
“Yeah. Guess Fujimura-Sama wants you there. You must have done well.” Jun offered with a smile as Akari suddenly poked her head in between us.
“Or terrible! Maybe he’ll cut you up for messing up so bad?”
“I don’t think I messed up?” I told her as we walked but she was quick to run in front of me and walk backwards which seemed to take some effort with her feet blades.
“Ooh but you ran off! Fujimura-Sama haaates when people do something he didn’t tell them to. Motoko is in troooouble.” She mocked as we reached the window that let us into the Dojo area.
“Shut up Akari.” Jun grumbled at her, but then we were there, in the downstairs area of the dojo. With the couches and little plastic chairs arrayed around Fujimura that stood.
“Another injury, pathetic.” He growled out as he looked over the people. “Injuries are expected, serious injuries are not. If you are incapable of not losing a limb, then get better chrome, or die so someone more skilled can use yours.” He demanded pulling no punches.
Also wow. What an asshole thing to say.
“Girl!” He said suddenly pulled me away from my thoughts. I was standing behind Jun who was sitting on one of the plastic chairs in the circle.
“Yes?”
“You nearly shot me tonight.” He said bluntly and I couldn’t help but wonder what the hell he was talking about.
“No I didn’t.”
“Your bullet passed less then a foot from my head.”
“Yeah? It didn’t come anywhere close to you. I mean, I’m not a crack shot or anything, but at that range? I could probably get the round to kiss you if I wanted.” I replied getting a little grumbly. This guy was such an asshole, and I was kind of sick of it.
He looked me over before nodding. “Kamikaze don’t have a marksman. That skillset doesn’t tend to come hand in hand with our purpose. Kusanagi! Your sister is acceptably useful. You didn’t waste our time having us save her.” He offered and then just…
Turned away and started squeezing everyone through the wringer on their fuckups. Jun and I both weren’t exempt. Apparently I fired too slow…
Well yeah. I only had Assault 5! I wasn’t going to shoot any faster. I might friendly fire!
Well… I could still level it up some more. It was fun.
By the time I settled onto the couch that night, blanket pulled up to my chin and ready for a sleep to get the muscle pain in my back to go away. I had a thought.
“Wait… Does he think I’m a member now!? But I’m not a Cyberpsycho!”
Last edited:
PeaceMaker 03
Well-known member
Be warned, when everyone around you dies without a noise being made it is the Onryo, she-ghost striking from shadows. Just run because if you do find her it will only get worse when the Oni does a “Hey Kool-aid” and blast through the wall to cut your head off. You had better have a HMG or your dead. Well you will still be dead but it might slow him done.
Blasterbot
Well-known member
poor motoko. keeps getting more gigs. earning those eddies like a productive person. she even does BDs so she can run gigs while running gigs.
xachariahxx
Well-known member
I wonder how the Kamikaze will feel about Motoko selling a BD of them blowing up maelstrom.
On the one hand, opsec. On the other hand, it's maelstrom getting shit on from on high.
Ah who am I kidding? They'll all be watching that shit 24/7 when not on duty. They might start even doing stupid shit during Kamikaze runs with her so they get screentime on the highlight reel.
On the one hand, opsec. On the other hand, it's maelstrom getting shit on from on high.
Ah who am I kidding? They'll all be watching that shit 24/7 when not on duty. They might start even doing stupid shit during Kamikaze runs with her so they get screentime on the highlight reel.
Chapter 41
Seras
Well-known member
The next morning I decided I needed some friend time. So I went over to see Hiromi.
While I made it up to their floor, it took almost ten minutes after I hit the button for the doorbell before someone came to the door.
“Oh hello Hiromi’s mom.” I greeted her with a smile as she opened the door. A scowl set on her face.
“Hiromi is in class right now.” She said as if that explained everything.
“Wait. I thought they closed the academy while everything was going on?”
“They have. Hiromi is taking her class right now.” Hiromi’s mom explained getting annoyed and I realized what she was actually saying, Hiromi would be in the middle of her Group BD class… Thing.
“Oh gotcha… Umm do you know how long that is gonna take? Should I wait in my car, or go grab some lunch before coming back or something?”
The woman sighed before stepping aside to my surprise. “You can wait in her room, just don’t disturb her while she is in class. Hiromi will be happy to see you.” The woman offered, sounding kind of stilted as I slowly walked in. Hiromi’s mother took a few steps before slowing. “Hiromi hasn’t handled the security measures we implemented well… Your last visit was… Well taken.” The woman offered a little awkwardly before she seemed to breathe in and out, and then that solid stone face was back. “Remember, don't disrupt her class.”
“I won’t.” I agreed, a little surprised. I guess Hiromi’s parents did care… They were just corpo. Which had its own issues.
I walked into Hiromi’s room, and there she was resting on a big comfy looking chair, a BD wreath on her head actively in the middle of her session.
Cool.
I decided not to bother her, instead settling on another chair in front of her computer.
I waited for a while before I realized this was going to be boring. So I looked at the computer she was hooked up to.
Obviously her class wasn’t a normal BD, in the show it allowed multiple people to all take part in a class environment. So it would need a lot of processing power. The fact they could even do this remotely was… Impressive. But considering how many Arasaka executives went to the school, of course they would choose the option to keep their kids from being murdered or kidnapped.
Still.. It was right there… I popped the cord out of my neck and pushed it into the computer's access port.
Oh! That was some strong security! I guess Arasaka execs wouldn’t buy their daughter cheap stuff… I could do this without sending any alerts up, since it wasn’t like I was actually looking to break through. So I started poking the security, touching the ICE.
It was tough shit!
How fun! Without any need to worry about time or anything it was like opening a puzzle game while I waited.
*100 Intelligence XP Gained*
I smiled happily as the alerts for upgrades came in.
*100 Breach Protocol XP Gained.*
Both skills were being tested with this security. But long before I would have broken through especially with how slow I was taking it, Hiromi moved.
I looked over as she sat up groaning a bit as she stretched her arms as she was taking off her wreath. I held up my hand.
“Hey Hiromi!”
“EEEeee!” She squealed, arms jerking and sending her wreath up into the air. I pushed on the floor letting the chair I was on roll a bit as I held out a hand and snatched the wreath out of the air.
“Safe!”
“MOTOKO!?”
“Hiromi!” I greeted with a smile that had her blinking a bit as she looked around like she wasn’t sure what was going on.
“What are you doing here?”
“I wanted to come visit! Your Mom let me in as long as I didn’t bother you while you were in your class. Have fun?”
“A-ah. No. It’s boring… But I’m glad you’re here.” She said instead with a smile that I returned.
“Anyway! Let me unplug out of this.” I told her my neck cord was stretched to its limits in order to save Hiromi's Wreath from the floor.
“Wait. Why are you plugged into my system?”
“Mostly because I was bored! But you have really good security! I was practicing breaking through the ICE, it’s really good shit by the way.” I told her as I rolled back to the system and unplugged.
“Wait. You were trying to break through my ICE!? Motoko! That! I have private stuff on that system!” She said face going a little red.
“Oh I wasn’t gonna look at anything Hiromi I promise. I’ve just been working on my Netrunning stuff recently, and I was curious what the ICE would be like. It was really advanced Arasaka stuff. It was cool… I didn’t mean to make a pun there.” I admitted, Hiromi rolling her eyes at me, but at least she wasn’t mad anymore.
“Nobody says Cool anymore Motoko. Were you watching old shows or something?”
“H-Hey Cool is cool! You can’t just replace Cool!”
“Preem so much better.” She said, but she was purposefully teasing me I could tell.
“Anyway! Want to play some games? Or watch some TV? I’m taking a cool down day after last night.”
“What happened last night?”
“Well Jun invited me to another Kamikaze raid-”
“Whaaa! How was it? Was it amazing?” Hiromi asked looking so much like a kid wanting a fun story.
I laughed, I couldn’t help it. “So I recently klepped this absolutely Preeeeem. Nekomata. Its previous owner came down with a case of ripped out throat, so I took her, and she is a dream. He might have been Maelstrom, but he did take care of his girl.”
“A Sniper Rifle? Do you even know how to shoot one?”
“Course I do! My arms make it super stable too! Anyway, So I-”
—--
“Jeez you’re out there doing so much stuff… I’m not even able to leave the house.” She sighed during the story Hiromi had cuddled up and was now looking up at me from my lap. “I… I’m sorry. You always tried to drag me into stuff, but I’m just a coward.”
“You’re not a coward Hiromi. If I had any sense I wouldn’t be running around with all the crazy shit going on.”
“But you are… You aren’t afraid.”
“I’m afraid sometimes! Just not like in the moment.” I told her being honest. “Besides fear is good. Fear is that little voice in your head telling you that you are being stupid. It just means you are smarter than me. Cause I don’t listen.” I told her, making fun of myself a bit to earn a chuckle from her.
“It still sounds so preem. So cool. You gonk.” She added poking me making me laugh as she used my slang.
I couldn’t help it! Even if everyone looked at me weird when I shouted cool.
“Well… Do you want to see?”
“Hmm?”
“I forgot to tell you, I made friends with some Mox a while back, saved him from getting jumped, but he offered me a job idea, and I thought it was a good idea. So I went to Viks and got a BD Recorder implant.”
“Motoko!” Hiromi jerked out of my lap. “You can’t! The Mox BD’s are-!”
I couldn’t help but laugh at Hiromi’s reaction, it was just like Jun’s!
“No no Sorry sorry. Nox wants me to make BD recordings of my gigs!” I told her as I put my finger to her lips to keep her from exploding. “So I recorded the last couple of times I’ve been out. Including last night's raid… So do you want to see? I was planning on dropping a visit to the Mox’s BD editor today to drop off the recordings.. I don’t know how long it will take to edit them b-”
“Of course! I want them!” She assured me, Hiromi was sitting up now staring me in the face. “But Motoko. You should be more careful. The Mox aren't as nice as they like to make everyone think. How much are they even paying you for the Recordings?”
“Not much at first.”
“Ugh. Motoko! BD recordings are hot items! If you have an awesome recording you could sell it for a ton!”
“Hey! I’m not a complete gonk. Nox the guy that came up with the idea is our age, so I’m giving him a break to get started, but if it works out, you're right a lot of eddies will start flowing… Besides if he ever does fuck me over. I can always just hunt him down and kill him. I kinda do that for a living.” I remind her with a shit eating grin.
Hiromi looked at me for a minute before chuckling shaking her head. “You are such a gonk.”
—--
Hiromi and I hung out for a while after that until her next class was starting. I promised to see her again soon and headed out. This time I went to Lizzies.
The streets were more populated than usual, I noticed as I drove down the street. Every time I stopped at a red light, people were crossing the street. It felt more normal. Like the city was returning to what it had been before. Yet the NCPD were still missing. The effects of that meant I could visibly see crime as I drove down the streets.
Theft was everywhere.
Damaged buildings that had been looted, or in some cases tried to be looted only to end with dead thieves.
Night City took self defense seriously after all.
Pulling into Lizzies I wasn’t surprised to see the parking lot was packed. People were obviously still coming here, to a relatively safe place to get some distance from reality.
But I found a spot and walked through the few little groups of people hanging out, outside the bar.
Rita as usual was out front, her baseball bat at her side as she watched me walk up.
“Kid.”
“Hey Rita. Is Judy in?” I asked as I walked up to her. Honestly if I could not have to walk through the bar that would be best.
Rita’s eyes narrowed a bit at my question. Holding out her hand. “Why do you want to see Judy?”
“I’m dropping off some BD recordings to her. Part of Nox and I’s thing.” I told her honestly, this reaction was weird, and now I was a little curious about Rita’s weird reaction.
“Stay here.” She demanded nodding at another Mox who took her spot in front of the door to act as bouncer as she walked in.
Weird.
“Any idea what’s going on?” I ask the Mox who just kept staring at me without a word. “Good talk.” I snarked but decided to just back up a bit and wait. Finally Rita came back out and nodded for me to follow her.
Stepping away from the car I had been leaning against I followed with a quick jog to catch up.
“What’s going on? I’ve met Judy before, never had this much concern.”
Rita was silent as she walked me through the floor of Lizzies, and then into the back halls, leading me towards Judy’s underground lair.
“We had some Tyger Claws sniffing around for her. They always try to recruit good editors. They were a little aggressive about it the other night, so I’ve been ready to bust some kneecaps.” Rita finally said as we started down the stairs.
“Ah gotcha. That explains a lot.”
“Especially since you’re TC.” She said with a firm look.
“I’m really not… My brother is though.” I admitted as we wandered down but Rita didn’t respond any further just keeping an eye on me as she led me to Judy who was already free of her Wreath and waiting.
“Motoko.”
“Hey Judy. I got some recordings.” I greeted with a smile. “Rita said you had some trouble the other night? You okay?” I asked and she just kind waved her hand back and forth.
“I’m fine. Nothing Rita can’t handle, just some pushy bastards wanting access to my skills. Come sit here, I’ll pull the recordings.” She said as she pointed me at a chair and wandered over to her computer. Pulling a cord out with a connection port she rolled over to me as I settled into the chair.
“Alright go ahead and connect to this, and start the upload.” She says and I nod, pulling the cord out of my neck and slotting it into the port. Instantly the connection locked and I started transferring the files.
I had been recording at the start of all the gigs Wakako had given me, and the raid last night. So hopefully four missions would be enough, even if the Wakako gigs were pretty slow. I mean, I hadn’t even killed anyone!
“And four files? Four?” Judy asked, as she typed away at her system.
“Yeah! Three of them were acquisition gigs I got from Wakako. But don’t worry I asked her about recording them before I did. As long as a week passes before we release them we are all good. And the last one was… Well I was working with my brother Jun and the Tyger Claws. Maelstrom trap.” I offered, not wanting to side swipe her with the information I worked with the Tyger Claws.
“You’re TC?” Judy asked sort of tonelessly not looking at me.
“No. No, no I’m not!” I told her firmly. “My Brother is a member though. Well technically I’m a legacy. Both of my parents were in the Claws. But I didn’t join, I’m just a merc. I just back up my brother on Maelstrom raids.” I waved my hands a bit. “Mostly for payback for what they did to me.” I said kind of showing off my arms a bit. The chrome glinting in the dark studios light.
Judy didn’t respond but Rita kinda stepped closer and sat on the edge of the big chair Judy had sat me on.
“I’ve been forcibly chipped before… If you ever want to talk about it.” She offered suddenly and I blinked because Rita had never shown much interest in me before then. “Just don’t give me any reason to bust your skull in.” She offered and her words actually pulled Judy away from the computer to look in shock that I felt a bit as well.
Because Rita had just tried to be nice.
“I don’t plan too. I don’t have anything against the Mox.” I told her and she nodded a bit before rising up.
“Well Judy, you going to check the BD’s?”
“Yeah, I have some time, and Nox has bribed me to at least get the first few done first.”
“Bribe? Did that kid seriously sneak you some of that disgusting pure caffeine shit we banned?”
“Maybe!” Judy offered smiling, before she sort of glanced towards me. I was making her uncomfortable. She had a certain look on her face.
“Was it bad… The Tyger Claws that tried to recruit you?” I asked, I knew that look. It was fear. Judy had been freaked out.
I had never heard of Tyger Claws bothering Judy in the game, but… I guess it sorta makes sense. Tyger Claws were constantly trying to reclaim Mox business. In the game they owned Clouds, and if Judys crazy plan actually worked and you put Clouds under Mox control…
Well Tyger Claws didn’t react with grace. They sent a kill team.
“It’s nothing. Just they broke into my place. I’m sleeping here for a bit until a better security system is hooked up.” She explained and I frowned.
“Hey Judy. I know you don’t know me or anything, but we are… chooms? I guess? If the Claws ever snatched you. I promise. I’ll come find you, and kill any of them that get in my way. Okay Choom?”
My serious, honest, drama filled moment was broken by Rita snorting through her pretty plastic chrome nose.
“Sure kid. The Mox will have already hunted any fuckers down that dared, but I’m sure you’ll show up.” Rita offered joking, but it seemed to be the right thing to say because Rita was more relaxed than she had been before, and Judy wasn’t so tense either.
“So how long will it take to edit the BD? I uh… Have a choom that was interested in seeing them too.”
“Come back… around tomorrow? Yeah Tomorrow. These aren’t super long. But go on, both of you, I’ll need to focus on this.” Judy demanded waving us away which Rita was already standing to leave.
“Cool oh wait one more thing. When someone is in the BD, can they like… Not see my face? Or at least have trouble figuring out who I am? I just don’t want anyone to be sure who it is that is stealing from them, or killing them, or killing their friends, or-”
“Whoa whoa. Chill Choom. Your face would already be blocked by those Kiroshi of yours, but I’ll be adding a body filter in. Whoever is in the BD will feel like it’s them doing everything. It works way better on action BDs. Let everyone feel the motion and action through their own body, creates a deeper connection.”
Preem! You are amazing Judy. Thank you! I guess I’ll see you tomorrow then!” I chirped happily following the borg out of the room and up the stairs, but then she stopped me.
“Hey. I was serious before. I know what it’s like… If you ever want to talk to someone that went through it.” Rita said and it took me a moment to realize what she meant.
I couldn’t help but break out into a gentle smile. “Thanks Rita. I’m okay, well okay-ish. I’ll be okay.” I ramble at her earning a smile on the chromed up woman's face.
“Well the offer is open. It’s why we started the Mox in the first place. To help people.”
“Preem.” But I wasn’t really in need of someone to talk to. I was actually feeling loads better after the adaptation upgrade had opened up the floodgates.
Wait! I still had a perk!
I forgot!
I was smiling brightly as I followed Rita out and towards my car, I was gonna go home and pick a preem perk! Upgrades! Yay!
While I made it up to their floor, it took almost ten minutes after I hit the button for the doorbell before someone came to the door.
“Oh hello Hiromi’s mom.” I greeted her with a smile as she opened the door. A scowl set on her face.
“Hiromi is in class right now.” She said as if that explained everything.
“Wait. I thought they closed the academy while everything was going on?”
“They have. Hiromi is taking her class right now.” Hiromi’s mom explained getting annoyed and I realized what she was actually saying, Hiromi would be in the middle of her Group BD class… Thing.
“Oh gotcha… Umm do you know how long that is gonna take? Should I wait in my car, or go grab some lunch before coming back or something?”
The woman sighed before stepping aside to my surprise. “You can wait in her room, just don’t disturb her while she is in class. Hiromi will be happy to see you.” The woman offered, sounding kind of stilted as I slowly walked in. Hiromi’s mother took a few steps before slowing. “Hiromi hasn’t handled the security measures we implemented well… Your last visit was… Well taken.” The woman offered a little awkwardly before she seemed to breathe in and out, and then that solid stone face was back. “Remember, don't disrupt her class.”
“I won’t.” I agreed, a little surprised. I guess Hiromi’s parents did care… They were just corpo. Which had its own issues.
I walked into Hiromi’s room, and there she was resting on a big comfy looking chair, a BD wreath on her head actively in the middle of her session.
Cool.
I decided not to bother her, instead settling on another chair in front of her computer.
I waited for a while before I realized this was going to be boring. So I looked at the computer she was hooked up to.
Obviously her class wasn’t a normal BD, in the show it allowed multiple people to all take part in a class environment. So it would need a lot of processing power. The fact they could even do this remotely was… Impressive. But considering how many Arasaka executives went to the school, of course they would choose the option to keep their kids from being murdered or kidnapped.
Still.. It was right there… I popped the cord out of my neck and pushed it into the computer's access port.
Oh! That was some strong security! I guess Arasaka execs wouldn’t buy their daughter cheap stuff… I could do this without sending any alerts up, since it wasn’t like I was actually looking to break through. So I started poking the security, touching the ICE.
It was tough shit!
How fun! Without any need to worry about time or anything it was like opening a puzzle game while I waited.
*100 Intelligence XP Gained*
I smiled happily as the alerts for upgrades came in.
*100 Breach Protocol XP Gained.*
Both skills were being tested with this security. But long before I would have broken through especially with how slow I was taking it, Hiromi moved.
I looked over as she sat up groaning a bit as she stretched her arms as she was taking off her wreath. I held up my hand.
“Hey Hiromi!”
“EEEeee!” She squealed, arms jerking and sending her wreath up into the air. I pushed on the floor letting the chair I was on roll a bit as I held out a hand and snatched the wreath out of the air.
“Safe!”
“MOTOKO!?”
“Hiromi!” I greeted with a smile that had her blinking a bit as she looked around like she wasn’t sure what was going on.
“What are you doing here?”
“I wanted to come visit! Your Mom let me in as long as I didn’t bother you while you were in your class. Have fun?”
“A-ah. No. It’s boring… But I’m glad you’re here.” She said instead with a smile that I returned.
“Anyway! Let me unplug out of this.” I told her my neck cord was stretched to its limits in order to save Hiromi's Wreath from the floor.
“Wait. Why are you plugged into my system?”
“Mostly because I was bored! But you have really good security! I was practicing breaking through the ICE, it’s really good shit by the way.” I told her as I rolled back to the system and unplugged.
“Wait. You were trying to break through my ICE!? Motoko! That! I have private stuff on that system!” She said face going a little red.
“Oh I wasn’t gonna look at anything Hiromi I promise. I’ve just been working on my Netrunning stuff recently, and I was curious what the ICE would be like. It was really advanced Arasaka stuff. It was cool… I didn’t mean to make a pun there.” I admitted, Hiromi rolling her eyes at me, but at least she wasn’t mad anymore.
“Nobody says Cool anymore Motoko. Were you watching old shows or something?”
“H-Hey Cool is cool! You can’t just replace Cool!”
“Preem so much better.” She said, but she was purposefully teasing me I could tell.
“Anyway! Want to play some games? Or watch some TV? I’m taking a cool down day after last night.”
“What happened last night?”
“Well Jun invited me to another Kamikaze raid-”
“Whaaa! How was it? Was it amazing?” Hiromi asked looking so much like a kid wanting a fun story.
I laughed, I couldn’t help it. “So I recently klepped this absolutely Preeeeem. Nekomata. Its previous owner came down with a case of ripped out throat, so I took her, and she is a dream. He might have been Maelstrom, but he did take care of his girl.”
“A Sniper Rifle? Do you even know how to shoot one?”
“Course I do! My arms make it super stable too! Anyway, So I-”
—--
“Jeez you’re out there doing so much stuff… I’m not even able to leave the house.” She sighed during the story Hiromi had cuddled up and was now looking up at me from my lap. “I… I’m sorry. You always tried to drag me into stuff, but I’m just a coward.”
“You’re not a coward Hiromi. If I had any sense I wouldn’t be running around with all the crazy shit going on.”
“But you are… You aren’t afraid.”
“I’m afraid sometimes! Just not like in the moment.” I told her being honest. “Besides fear is good. Fear is that little voice in your head telling you that you are being stupid. It just means you are smarter than me. Cause I don’t listen.” I told her, making fun of myself a bit to earn a chuckle from her.
“It still sounds so preem. So cool. You gonk.” She added poking me making me laugh as she used my slang.
I couldn’t help it! Even if everyone looked at me weird when I shouted cool.
“Well… Do you want to see?”
“Hmm?”
“I forgot to tell you, I made friends with some Mox a while back, saved him from getting jumped, but he offered me a job idea, and I thought it was a good idea. So I went to Viks and got a BD Recorder implant.”
“Motoko!” Hiromi jerked out of my lap. “You can’t! The Mox BD’s are-!”
I couldn’t help but laugh at Hiromi’s reaction, it was just like Jun’s!
“No no Sorry sorry. Nox wants me to make BD recordings of my gigs!” I told her as I put my finger to her lips to keep her from exploding. “So I recorded the last couple of times I’ve been out. Including last night's raid… So do you want to see? I was planning on dropping a visit to the Mox’s BD editor today to drop off the recordings.. I don’t know how long it will take to edit them b-”
“Of course! I want them!” She assured me, Hiromi was sitting up now staring me in the face. “But Motoko. You should be more careful. The Mox aren't as nice as they like to make everyone think. How much are they even paying you for the Recordings?”
“Not much at first.”
“Ugh. Motoko! BD recordings are hot items! If you have an awesome recording you could sell it for a ton!”
“Hey! I’m not a complete gonk. Nox the guy that came up with the idea is our age, so I’m giving him a break to get started, but if it works out, you're right a lot of eddies will start flowing… Besides if he ever does fuck me over. I can always just hunt him down and kill him. I kinda do that for a living.” I remind her with a shit eating grin.
Hiromi looked at me for a minute before chuckling shaking her head. “You are such a gonk.”
—--
Hiromi and I hung out for a while after that until her next class was starting. I promised to see her again soon and headed out. This time I went to Lizzies.
The streets were more populated than usual, I noticed as I drove down the street. Every time I stopped at a red light, people were crossing the street. It felt more normal. Like the city was returning to what it had been before. Yet the NCPD were still missing. The effects of that meant I could visibly see crime as I drove down the streets.
Theft was everywhere.
Damaged buildings that had been looted, or in some cases tried to be looted only to end with dead thieves.
Night City took self defense seriously after all.
Pulling into Lizzies I wasn’t surprised to see the parking lot was packed. People were obviously still coming here, to a relatively safe place to get some distance from reality.
But I found a spot and walked through the few little groups of people hanging out, outside the bar.
Rita as usual was out front, her baseball bat at her side as she watched me walk up.
“Kid.”
“Hey Rita. Is Judy in?” I asked as I walked up to her. Honestly if I could not have to walk through the bar that would be best.
Rita’s eyes narrowed a bit at my question. Holding out her hand. “Why do you want to see Judy?”
“I’m dropping off some BD recordings to her. Part of Nox and I’s thing.” I told her honestly, this reaction was weird, and now I was a little curious about Rita’s weird reaction.
“Stay here.” She demanded nodding at another Mox who took her spot in front of the door to act as bouncer as she walked in.
Weird.
“Any idea what’s going on?” I ask the Mox who just kept staring at me without a word. “Good talk.” I snarked but decided to just back up a bit and wait. Finally Rita came back out and nodded for me to follow her.
Stepping away from the car I had been leaning against I followed with a quick jog to catch up.
“What’s going on? I’ve met Judy before, never had this much concern.”
Rita was silent as she walked me through the floor of Lizzies, and then into the back halls, leading me towards Judy’s underground lair.
“We had some Tyger Claws sniffing around for her. They always try to recruit good editors. They were a little aggressive about it the other night, so I’ve been ready to bust some kneecaps.” Rita finally said as we started down the stairs.
“Ah gotcha. That explains a lot.”
“Especially since you’re TC.” She said with a firm look.
“I’m really not… My brother is though.” I admitted as we wandered down but Rita didn’t respond any further just keeping an eye on me as she led me to Judy who was already free of her Wreath and waiting.
“Motoko.”
“Hey Judy. I got some recordings.” I greeted with a smile. “Rita said you had some trouble the other night? You okay?” I asked and she just kind waved her hand back and forth.
“I’m fine. Nothing Rita can’t handle, just some pushy bastards wanting access to my skills. Come sit here, I’ll pull the recordings.” She said as she pointed me at a chair and wandered over to her computer. Pulling a cord out with a connection port she rolled over to me as I settled into the chair.
“Alright go ahead and connect to this, and start the upload.” She says and I nod, pulling the cord out of my neck and slotting it into the port. Instantly the connection locked and I started transferring the files.
I had been recording at the start of all the gigs Wakako had given me, and the raid last night. So hopefully four missions would be enough, even if the Wakako gigs were pretty slow. I mean, I hadn’t even killed anyone!
“And four files? Four?” Judy asked, as she typed away at her system.
“Yeah! Three of them were acquisition gigs I got from Wakako. But don’t worry I asked her about recording them before I did. As long as a week passes before we release them we are all good. And the last one was… Well I was working with my brother Jun and the Tyger Claws. Maelstrom trap.” I offered, not wanting to side swipe her with the information I worked with the Tyger Claws.
“You’re TC?” Judy asked sort of tonelessly not looking at me.
“No. No, no I’m not!” I told her firmly. “My Brother is a member though. Well technically I’m a legacy. Both of my parents were in the Claws. But I didn’t join, I’m just a merc. I just back up my brother on Maelstrom raids.” I waved my hands a bit. “Mostly for payback for what they did to me.” I said kind of showing off my arms a bit. The chrome glinting in the dark studios light.
Judy didn’t respond but Rita kinda stepped closer and sat on the edge of the big chair Judy had sat me on.
“I’ve been forcibly chipped before… If you ever want to talk about it.” She offered suddenly and I blinked because Rita had never shown much interest in me before then. “Just don’t give me any reason to bust your skull in.” She offered and her words actually pulled Judy away from the computer to look in shock that I felt a bit as well.
Because Rita had just tried to be nice.
“I don’t plan too. I don’t have anything against the Mox.” I told her and she nodded a bit before rising up.
“Well Judy, you going to check the BD’s?”
“Yeah, I have some time, and Nox has bribed me to at least get the first few done first.”
“Bribe? Did that kid seriously sneak you some of that disgusting pure caffeine shit we banned?”
“Maybe!” Judy offered smiling, before she sort of glanced towards me. I was making her uncomfortable. She had a certain look on her face.
“Was it bad… The Tyger Claws that tried to recruit you?” I asked, I knew that look. It was fear. Judy had been freaked out.
I had never heard of Tyger Claws bothering Judy in the game, but… I guess it sorta makes sense. Tyger Claws were constantly trying to reclaim Mox business. In the game they owned Clouds, and if Judys crazy plan actually worked and you put Clouds under Mox control…
Well Tyger Claws didn’t react with grace. They sent a kill team.
“It’s nothing. Just they broke into my place. I’m sleeping here for a bit until a better security system is hooked up.” She explained and I frowned.
“Hey Judy. I know you don’t know me or anything, but we are… chooms? I guess? If the Claws ever snatched you. I promise. I’ll come find you, and kill any of them that get in my way. Okay Choom?”
My serious, honest, drama filled moment was broken by Rita snorting through her pretty plastic chrome nose.
“Sure kid. The Mox will have already hunted any fuckers down that dared, but I’m sure you’ll show up.” Rita offered joking, but it seemed to be the right thing to say because Rita was more relaxed than she had been before, and Judy wasn’t so tense either.
“So how long will it take to edit the BD? I uh… Have a choom that was interested in seeing them too.”
“Come back… around tomorrow? Yeah Tomorrow. These aren’t super long. But go on, both of you, I’ll need to focus on this.” Judy demanded waving us away which Rita was already standing to leave.
“Cool oh wait one more thing. When someone is in the BD, can they like… Not see my face? Or at least have trouble figuring out who I am? I just don’t want anyone to be sure who it is that is stealing from them, or killing them, or killing their friends, or-”
“Whoa whoa. Chill Choom. Your face would already be blocked by those Kiroshi of yours, but I’ll be adding a body filter in. Whoever is in the BD will feel like it’s them doing everything. It works way better on action BDs. Let everyone feel the motion and action through their own body, creates a deeper connection.”
Preem! You are amazing Judy. Thank you! I guess I’ll see you tomorrow then!” I chirped happily following the borg out of the room and up the stairs, but then she stopped me.
“Hey. I was serious before. I know what it’s like… If you ever want to talk to someone that went through it.” Rita said and it took me a moment to realize what she meant.
I couldn’t help but break out into a gentle smile. “Thanks Rita. I’m okay, well okay-ish. I’ll be okay.” I ramble at her earning a smile on the chromed up woman's face.
“Well the offer is open. It’s why we started the Mox in the first place. To help people.”
“Preem.” But I wasn’t really in need of someone to talk to. I was actually feeling loads better after the adaptation upgrade had opened up the floodgates.
Wait! I still had a perk!
I forgot!
I was smiling brightly as I followed Rita out and towards my car, I was gonna go home and pick a preem perk! Upgrades! Yay!
Yinko
Well-known member
Really need a scene where someone is watching her BD's. Or like: one of the people she hit finds out about them and orders an edge-runner hit crew to find out who she is and take her out in revenge, but all they know is that she posts her activities as BD's. So the crew buys all of them they can, watch through a few and then nope right out of the job.
Chapter 42
Seras
Well-known member
Judy Alvarez
Judy was glad that was over. Such an awkward conversation, and even worse she had been totally treating the kid like some TC hit squad.
Stupid Jude. Real stupid.
She was a good kid, even helped out Nox. Nox who was very annoying, but still had that bratty charm that made everyone like him…
Mostly. If they didn’t want to punch him.
But he was annoying, and that meant most people outside the Mox did fall more on the punching side of the spectrum. He tended to get beat up a little too often.
Still it was over, and she had four virtues to edit through and turn them into nice shiny Mox approved XBD’s. It was a bit… Well Judy didn’t think it was likely to work. What kind of gigs could a kid get up to that anyone would want to watch?
Judy was well aware of what normal XBD viewers were like. What they wanted.
Sick fucks.
But maybe this softcore XBD would be a hit among kids. Give them a look into the experience of working as a Merc, from a kids perspective.
She picked up the most recent one first. Motoko had said this was from last night. Tyger Claws assaulting Maelstrom.
“I’m not afraid of the Tyger Claws.” She said, strengthening herself as she slipped on her wreath, hands on the edit controls.
Time to work.
First she started the BD, and instantly she was there. She could hear and feel and taste. Nothing too strong yet thankfully. Some BD’s liked to start already mid… Act. Judy hated feeling it. Sex wasn’t exactly something she wanted to feel from certain perspectives.
Which was why she always started a BD with the senses layer turned down. Get a feel for the BD first before she edits it all down to make it smooth to experience.
“Alright, the Maelstrom trucks are a minute out. Get ready.”
Judy shivered as the irritation she was feeling instantly vanished in a rush of excitement. The BDs emotion layer hyping up her own.
The conversation continued but Judy only kept half an ear on it. Then Motoko started moving. Judy focused the feel of the girl moving an important element to the BD. Especially with all the edits she would make to replace the visual layer with the watcher.
Most users of the BD would focus on visual, humans were like that, but one of the big things that would throw someone out of a BD was odd feelings. So balancing it right was super important. Usually you had to throttle it way down. If you were scrolling someone fat, and you weren’t?
That sense of disconnect would be pretty intense.
Although some people scrolled BD’s like that on purpose. Everything was someone's fetish.
But this? Just through the motion, Judy could feel live muscle, shifting balance. Motoko wasn’t just some kid with a gun, she definitely worked out. It was pretty intense. Judy wasn’t exactly the type to hit the gym.
She left it playing without delving heavily into editing, just to see, when suddenly Motoko went from a walk to motion in an instant, a blitz up the side of a building that by the time Judy realized what was happening she had to pause the recording, take off the wreath and actually step away.
Judy didn’t really like heights, and the feeling of free climbing up a building made her stomach flip.
But it was so sure. No hesitation, no slipping, or stumbling just up the building like climbing a ladder.
No faster than a ladder.
Grabbing her secret stash of Mega Joult. Thank you Nox for slipping that in. She recaffeinated and felt ready to continue.
Slipping back into the BD she let it play. She was on the top of the building. The cold air was crisp, but Motoko’s breath was completely even, like she hadn’t just climbed a building. Hell her heart rate had barely gone up.
Judy made a note, she would need to adjust that feeling, actually maybe increase it, let people feel their heart beating without any disruption, let them feel how calm Motoko was?
Judy would have to test it both ways, but for now she let it continue.
A rifle pulled off her shoulder Judy felt her hands roam over it quickly. A single practiced action, and it was practiced, Judy knew the difference. It felt good. That would be nice. Motoko certainly had some gun experience.
Then… Then Motoko stalked. Judy suddenly realized the audio file was practically dead. Not a sound as Motoko stalked up to the edge.
She played through it a few times there. Just to see what she could catch, and she realized despite walking in boots, there was barely a sound coming from her steps.
Damn. She must have a really good Lynx Paw. Judy went ahead and brought some focus in the BD towards the lack of sound with each step. Letting people feel that surety of stepping without a sound.
Motoko kneeled, settled into the shadows and then brought up her… Nekomata? Yeah Judy was pretty sure that was the right name. Eyes slipped over the scope, and Judy nodded to herself, everything was so clear. Kiroshi made this so much easier. The visual file was actually higher density than a normal BD. Kiroshi were expensive after all.
Then Judy could hear it. A rumble of a truck that Motoko instantly picked up, her attention focused on the sound making it come in so clear. Judy wouldn’t need to play with it much.
Motoko took it all in without shifting an inch, she remained perfectly still. The cavalcade of Maelstrom. She was already picking out faces thanks to her scope and Kiroshi. And Judy made sure to focus on some of them, bring them into focus on the BD.
XBDs were all about murder after all. Even if Judy found it disgusting it was what people wanted.
She watched as the Maelstrom parked around, and noticed the information Motoko gathered about their NCPD record! Nice. Judy made sure to bring each one into sight, it would let the user get a look at the people that were about to die.
Then Judy felt it.
Motoko was smiling. BD’s recorded emotions. And since Judy hadn’t finished cleaning up the BD, she could feel exactly what Motoko was feeling. Exhilaration. A macabre happiness about the targets she was going to kill.
Motoko had been happy that she was going to kill these Maelstrom especially.
She continued letting that excitement flow through her. She would maybe have to heighten the excitement emotional layer a bit, it was pretty low. Building the tension a bit more could be good.
The Maelstrom stepped out, firing around, opening the shop only to be blown apart with a riot of noise.
Judy flinched, but Motoko didn’t. Perfectly calm at the sight and sudden assault. Not a twitch, not a bump in her heart rate.
Just control, and a focused excitement.
It was enough to make the differences all the more apparent. In a normal BD she would have smoothed it, maybe lowered the users surprise, or increase Motoko’s. Just to make sure it felt like a smooth transition.
But there was something about the complete calm that was… Noticeable. And Judy decided she was going to have to play with that. Maybe leave it as is.
Motoko’s attention shifted. Tyger Claws. Racing out towards the Maelstrom from behind.
Yet even as she registered that her scope was focused on the Maelstrom ready to shift.
Then it happened, a Maelstrom started to turn around, they had noticed the Tyger Claws.
Judy felt herself freeze. Outside the BD. Her throat opened in a silent gasp as everything changed.
The emotion file practically spazzed out.
Judy’s heart was racing outside of the BD.
Because in an instant she felt it. The supreme control over herself.
No, the control Motoko had over herself. Emotions distractions, all of it disappeared. There was only…
Purpose.
The rest of the BD went by in a blur of controlled focus. Every part of her body moved in tandem, every breath, every thought, all working towards the purpose of killing whoever Motoko needed dead.
By the time the BD ended Judy had stopped paying any attention to editing. Had stopped even remembering who she was.
Because for a while she wasn’t Judy experiencing a BD, she was Motoko. Every instinct, every movement felt so sure. So right. Perfect.
Judy pulled off the wreath and nearly chucked it away before controlling herself.
She couldn’t control herself like Motoko. Already the feeling of her own heartbeat speeding was so… Strange. Especially after feeling so in control. But Judy couldn’t. Her heart raced, her body twitched. It was wrong. All of these things could be controlled. She just… Had to learn how.
Judy had no idea.
“I need a break.” She said instantly standing up on wonky legs her stride was wrong. She could feel it, even if she wasn’t sure what she was doing wrong, but there was an awareness there, that she was moving wrong. Too slow, too heavy, too loud.
“Fuck me.” She whispered as she hit the bathroom and washed her face. That had been… Intense.
Judy felt her eyes go gold as she decided to make a call. “Rita. I need you down here if you got a minute… I want you to see this.”
—--
Finally!
No more distractions!
I settled down into the apartment with an armful of components I had needed, and set to work.
I had CAD. I had some knowledge, a full toolkit, and some peace and quiet.
Time to get to work!
The idea I had come up with while I was killing Maelstrom had been percolating in my head.
I needed a way to listen into conversations. If I was sneaking around, then being able to gather intel was a must. Luckily this was the future. Parabolic Microphones were outdated tech.
Long range microphones were easy enough to tech together.
Even I could do it!
I had the basic know-how in my head thanks to Engineering. The skill had flooded me with solutions and knowledge on not just how to tinker with something, but to have a needed idea and then what it would take to create it.
It was dense stuff. Technical Ability was knowledge about what exists… Sorta. Crafting, was being able to physically put something together. Engineering was knowing how to design something from the ground up. And a bit of fixing problems while crafting… But then again Crafting had solutions to engineering as well.
Or maybe I was wrong about all three! It was all so dense, and mixed together, it was difficult for my own head to split them into their own categories.
It all fit together. All three parts were sort of needed to create a whole. But the knowledge dumps were insane. Comprehensive education was rare in Night City, Especially outside of Corpo kids. Rarer still was an education that someone could take and then immediately be able to use.
Even with my low stat and skill points. I was probably more flexible than most Techies, a wider base, if not as deep. Yet.
So I started designing. I needed it to be small but functional. High range, good fidelity. With the ability to narrow down sounds.
Can’t have loud music stopping me from being able to listen in. Although that would be a later problem. Programming the damn thing came later. First was the engineering half. Design and create.
The microphone was fiddly, but other than a bit of sloppiness thanks to my manual dexterity still not being 100% perfect at times with the chrome. My transferred skills helped me get it working.
Then I set up a small transceiver, and went to work on the ear piece. Which I actually scratch built. Since anything I made would be cheaper than one from a store.
With that done I set the two pieces of tech to the same channel, and activated it.
Nothing.
“Fuck.”
—--
It took me four hours to figure out what went wrong.
The answer? Nothing. I was just a moron.
I was under a jammer! Of course my wireless connection didn’t work!
Realizing that wireless access like that was just asking to become useless under a jamming system, I tore it apart, and decided to go a little analog. With my 3D printer I created some wires that would connect the two parts, even created a small wire storage that would wind up the wire when I was done.
All done the entire piece of tech was small enough to hold in my hand, and be stored in one of my pouches. But with that, I was able to pull it out, stick the ear piece in my ear, and stretch out the wire along my arm. The mic easily attached to my fingers, and was small enough it wouldn’t get in the way if I needed to fight with it on.
I turned on the TV to a very low level and walked across the room, to the point I could barely hear it then I pointed the mic.
The voice of the news reporter came in clearly in my ear, only a static pop from time to time showing it wasn’t a direct audio, but a long range mic picking up a TV audio.
Done.
“I did it.” I couldn’t help but breathe out as I looked at my long distance microphone. I could listen into conversations now! But the alerts that I had ignored were my first stop.
*Engineering skill level up!*
Engineering 3, it had leveled up while I was working in CAD designing my new toy. Apparently my system liked it when I designed the ear piece from scratch as well. But there was more. So much more!
*Technical Attribute Leveled up!*
Technical Attribute was now level 4! And it had even leveled up mid build because I had a bunch of alerts for Crafting, ending with a level up!
*Crafting skill level up!*
Crafting 4.
My entire Tech tree had leveled up in one afternoon! Which just goes to show how little I had actually built… I would really need to fix that. Tech was too useful a thing, plus it was fun…
But Leveling up Engineering had reminded me!I still had an Engineering perk! Hell I had two perks! The Assault perk was still sitting there too!
I stretched and fell back onto the couch, instantly wincing and sitting up to move a piece of the wireless system that I had apparently dropped on the couch back to a table and then laid back down.
This was the life.
I had two perks to choose, Engineering and an Assault Perk. I opened up the Perk list to take a look.
Engineering first, since I had forgotten about it for so long. Since I didn’t really intend on going mad bomber, I ignored most of the grenade focused perks. I was looking for tech stuff.
And I found it. Like Crafting there were tons of perks here, but I ended up choosing the one I wanted the most.
Design Wizard: Your designs will always be beyond the average, you work faster, and more efficiently while designing.
I nodded as I selected it. Feeling the rush of the perk coming into play.
And instantly wished I had picked this before spending all afternoon working on my Directional Microphone. That would have made things a lot easier…
I shook it off. No point pouting at what I could do better. I would constantly be improving just take it as it is. I shook it all away and focused back on the menu.
It had been a while since I saw the assault perks. I ran through them again, my eye catching on Bullet Counting, but I didn’t really need that. My Kiroshi, and a Smart link would take care of that… When I got a Smart Link anyways.
But it was pointless. I didn't need it. Not for a Perk point.
Instead I looked for other Synergy Perks. Perks that would upgrade not just assault weapons, but potentially all of them. I had already taken Gun Nut, which was incredibly useful in order to keep myself from looking like an idiot by trying to shoot a gun that was still on safe.
Most of the perks were Assault skill focused. Accuracy with Rifles, SMG’s or Sniper Rifles.
Things that were useful, but that would come with just increased stats anyways…
But I was tempted to do the Sniper Rifle one.
‘Crack Shot: While wielding a Sniper Rifle, If you are in range you can work out a path for your bullet to reach its target.’
That sounded mildly terrifying.
But it wasn’t exactly what I was going for…
Yet.
No, instead I continued digging, Until I found it. The exact perk I wanted. Because it didn’t just deal with a specific series of guns. The name of it had made me pass over it at first.
‘Rifle Ace. Long rifles of all types are deadly in your experienced hands. Ready your long gun to fire in a blink.’
It was literally Quickdraw for long guns! I was kicking my feet into the air and laughing as I selected it. Instantly I felt the information flow. That surety of motion and knowledge that I KNEW the best way to do something.
It was amazing. I loved new perks and skill upgrades, that confusion, or amateur attempts at something simply washing away under absolute surety.
The natural anxiety that everyone feels. That ‘am I doing it right?’ feeling was gone.
I sighed in happiness, deciding to take a break from any grinding for the night. I put on some wacky future cartoons, and curled up on the couch.
Judy was glad that was over. Such an awkward conversation, and even worse she had been totally treating the kid like some TC hit squad.
Stupid Jude. Real stupid.
She was a good kid, even helped out Nox. Nox who was very annoying, but still had that bratty charm that made everyone like him…
Mostly. If they didn’t want to punch him.
But he was annoying, and that meant most people outside the Mox did fall more on the punching side of the spectrum. He tended to get beat up a little too often.
Still it was over, and she had four virtues to edit through and turn them into nice shiny Mox approved XBD’s. It was a bit… Well Judy didn’t think it was likely to work. What kind of gigs could a kid get up to that anyone would want to watch?
Judy was well aware of what normal XBD viewers were like. What they wanted.
Sick fucks.
But maybe this softcore XBD would be a hit among kids. Give them a look into the experience of working as a Merc, from a kids perspective.
She picked up the most recent one first. Motoko had said this was from last night. Tyger Claws assaulting Maelstrom.
“I’m not afraid of the Tyger Claws.” She said, strengthening herself as she slipped on her wreath, hands on the edit controls.
Time to work.
First she started the BD, and instantly she was there. She could hear and feel and taste. Nothing too strong yet thankfully. Some BD’s liked to start already mid… Act. Judy hated feeling it. Sex wasn’t exactly something she wanted to feel from certain perspectives.
Which was why she always started a BD with the senses layer turned down. Get a feel for the BD first before she edits it all down to make it smooth to experience.
“Alright, the Maelstrom trucks are a minute out. Get ready.”
Judy shivered as the irritation she was feeling instantly vanished in a rush of excitement. The BDs emotion layer hyping up her own.
The conversation continued but Judy only kept half an ear on it. Then Motoko started moving. Judy focused the feel of the girl moving an important element to the BD. Especially with all the edits she would make to replace the visual layer with the watcher.
Most users of the BD would focus on visual, humans were like that, but one of the big things that would throw someone out of a BD was odd feelings. So balancing it right was super important. Usually you had to throttle it way down. If you were scrolling someone fat, and you weren’t?
That sense of disconnect would be pretty intense.
Although some people scrolled BD’s like that on purpose. Everything was someone's fetish.
But this? Just through the motion, Judy could feel live muscle, shifting balance. Motoko wasn’t just some kid with a gun, she definitely worked out. It was pretty intense. Judy wasn’t exactly the type to hit the gym.
She left it playing without delving heavily into editing, just to see, when suddenly Motoko went from a walk to motion in an instant, a blitz up the side of a building that by the time Judy realized what was happening she had to pause the recording, take off the wreath and actually step away.
Judy didn’t really like heights, and the feeling of free climbing up a building made her stomach flip.
But it was so sure. No hesitation, no slipping, or stumbling just up the building like climbing a ladder.
No faster than a ladder.
Grabbing her secret stash of Mega Joult. Thank you Nox for slipping that in. She recaffeinated and felt ready to continue.
Slipping back into the BD she let it play. She was on the top of the building. The cold air was crisp, but Motoko’s breath was completely even, like she hadn’t just climbed a building. Hell her heart rate had barely gone up.
Judy made a note, she would need to adjust that feeling, actually maybe increase it, let people feel their heart beating without any disruption, let them feel how calm Motoko was?
Judy would have to test it both ways, but for now she let it continue.
A rifle pulled off her shoulder Judy felt her hands roam over it quickly. A single practiced action, and it was practiced, Judy knew the difference. It felt good. That would be nice. Motoko certainly had some gun experience.
Then… Then Motoko stalked. Judy suddenly realized the audio file was practically dead. Not a sound as Motoko stalked up to the edge.
She played through it a few times there. Just to see what she could catch, and she realized despite walking in boots, there was barely a sound coming from her steps.
Damn. She must have a really good Lynx Paw. Judy went ahead and brought some focus in the BD towards the lack of sound with each step. Letting people feel that surety of stepping without a sound.
Motoko kneeled, settled into the shadows and then brought up her… Nekomata? Yeah Judy was pretty sure that was the right name. Eyes slipped over the scope, and Judy nodded to herself, everything was so clear. Kiroshi made this so much easier. The visual file was actually higher density than a normal BD. Kiroshi were expensive after all.
Then Judy could hear it. A rumble of a truck that Motoko instantly picked up, her attention focused on the sound making it come in so clear. Judy wouldn’t need to play with it much.
Motoko took it all in without shifting an inch, she remained perfectly still. The cavalcade of Maelstrom. She was already picking out faces thanks to her scope and Kiroshi. And Judy made sure to focus on some of them, bring them into focus on the BD.
XBDs were all about murder after all. Even if Judy found it disgusting it was what people wanted.
She watched as the Maelstrom parked around, and noticed the information Motoko gathered about their NCPD record! Nice. Judy made sure to bring each one into sight, it would let the user get a look at the people that were about to die.
Then Judy felt it.
Motoko was smiling. BD’s recorded emotions. And since Judy hadn’t finished cleaning up the BD, she could feel exactly what Motoko was feeling. Exhilaration. A macabre happiness about the targets she was going to kill.
Motoko had been happy that she was going to kill these Maelstrom especially.
She continued letting that excitement flow through her. She would maybe have to heighten the excitement emotional layer a bit, it was pretty low. Building the tension a bit more could be good.
The Maelstrom stepped out, firing around, opening the shop only to be blown apart with a riot of noise.
Judy flinched, but Motoko didn’t. Perfectly calm at the sight and sudden assault. Not a twitch, not a bump in her heart rate.
Just control, and a focused excitement.
It was enough to make the differences all the more apparent. In a normal BD she would have smoothed it, maybe lowered the users surprise, or increase Motoko’s. Just to make sure it felt like a smooth transition.
But there was something about the complete calm that was… Noticeable. And Judy decided she was going to have to play with that. Maybe leave it as is.
Motoko’s attention shifted. Tyger Claws. Racing out towards the Maelstrom from behind.
Yet even as she registered that her scope was focused on the Maelstrom ready to shift.
Then it happened, a Maelstrom started to turn around, they had noticed the Tyger Claws.
Judy felt herself freeze. Outside the BD. Her throat opened in a silent gasp as everything changed.
The emotion file practically spazzed out.
Judy’s heart was racing outside of the BD.
Because in an instant she felt it. The supreme control over herself.
No, the control Motoko had over herself. Emotions distractions, all of it disappeared. There was only…
Purpose.
The rest of the BD went by in a blur of controlled focus. Every part of her body moved in tandem, every breath, every thought, all working towards the purpose of killing whoever Motoko needed dead.
By the time the BD ended Judy had stopped paying any attention to editing. Had stopped even remembering who she was.
Because for a while she wasn’t Judy experiencing a BD, she was Motoko. Every instinct, every movement felt so sure. So right. Perfect.
Judy pulled off the wreath and nearly chucked it away before controlling herself.
She couldn’t control herself like Motoko. Already the feeling of her own heartbeat speeding was so… Strange. Especially after feeling so in control. But Judy couldn’t. Her heart raced, her body twitched. It was wrong. All of these things could be controlled. She just… Had to learn how.
Judy had no idea.
“I need a break.” She said instantly standing up on wonky legs her stride was wrong. She could feel it, even if she wasn’t sure what she was doing wrong, but there was an awareness there, that she was moving wrong. Too slow, too heavy, too loud.
“Fuck me.” She whispered as she hit the bathroom and washed her face. That had been… Intense.
Judy felt her eyes go gold as she decided to make a call. “Rita. I need you down here if you got a minute… I want you to see this.”
—--
Finally!
No more distractions!
I settled down into the apartment with an armful of components I had needed, and set to work.
I had CAD. I had some knowledge, a full toolkit, and some peace and quiet.
Time to get to work!
The idea I had come up with while I was killing Maelstrom had been percolating in my head.
I needed a way to listen into conversations. If I was sneaking around, then being able to gather intel was a must. Luckily this was the future. Parabolic Microphones were outdated tech.
Long range microphones were easy enough to tech together.
Even I could do it!
I had the basic know-how in my head thanks to Engineering. The skill had flooded me with solutions and knowledge on not just how to tinker with something, but to have a needed idea and then what it would take to create it.
It was dense stuff. Technical Ability was knowledge about what exists… Sorta. Crafting, was being able to physically put something together. Engineering was knowing how to design something from the ground up. And a bit of fixing problems while crafting… But then again Crafting had solutions to engineering as well.
Or maybe I was wrong about all three! It was all so dense, and mixed together, it was difficult for my own head to split them into their own categories.
It all fit together. All three parts were sort of needed to create a whole. But the knowledge dumps were insane. Comprehensive education was rare in Night City, Especially outside of Corpo kids. Rarer still was an education that someone could take and then immediately be able to use.
Even with my low stat and skill points. I was probably more flexible than most Techies, a wider base, if not as deep. Yet.
So I started designing. I needed it to be small but functional. High range, good fidelity. With the ability to narrow down sounds.
Can’t have loud music stopping me from being able to listen in. Although that would be a later problem. Programming the damn thing came later. First was the engineering half. Design and create.
The microphone was fiddly, but other than a bit of sloppiness thanks to my manual dexterity still not being 100% perfect at times with the chrome. My transferred skills helped me get it working.
Then I set up a small transceiver, and went to work on the ear piece. Which I actually scratch built. Since anything I made would be cheaper than one from a store.
With that done I set the two pieces of tech to the same channel, and activated it.
Nothing.
“Fuck.”
—--
It took me four hours to figure out what went wrong.
The answer? Nothing. I was just a moron.
I was under a jammer! Of course my wireless connection didn’t work!
Realizing that wireless access like that was just asking to become useless under a jamming system, I tore it apart, and decided to go a little analog. With my 3D printer I created some wires that would connect the two parts, even created a small wire storage that would wind up the wire when I was done.
All done the entire piece of tech was small enough to hold in my hand, and be stored in one of my pouches. But with that, I was able to pull it out, stick the ear piece in my ear, and stretch out the wire along my arm. The mic easily attached to my fingers, and was small enough it wouldn’t get in the way if I needed to fight with it on.
I turned on the TV to a very low level and walked across the room, to the point I could barely hear it then I pointed the mic.
The voice of the news reporter came in clearly in my ear, only a static pop from time to time showing it wasn’t a direct audio, but a long range mic picking up a TV audio.
Done.
“I did it.” I couldn’t help but breathe out as I looked at my long distance microphone. I could listen into conversations now! But the alerts that I had ignored were my first stop.
*Engineering skill level up!*
Engineering 3, it had leveled up while I was working in CAD designing my new toy. Apparently my system liked it when I designed the ear piece from scratch as well. But there was more. So much more!
*Technical Attribute Leveled up!*
Technical Attribute was now level 4! And it had even leveled up mid build because I had a bunch of alerts for Crafting, ending with a level up!
*Crafting skill level up!*
Crafting 4.
My entire Tech tree had leveled up in one afternoon! Which just goes to show how little I had actually built… I would really need to fix that. Tech was too useful a thing, plus it was fun…
But Leveling up Engineering had reminded me!I still had an Engineering perk! Hell I had two perks! The Assault perk was still sitting there too!
I stretched and fell back onto the couch, instantly wincing and sitting up to move a piece of the wireless system that I had apparently dropped on the couch back to a table and then laid back down.
This was the life.
I had two perks to choose, Engineering and an Assault Perk. I opened up the Perk list to take a look.
Engineering first, since I had forgotten about it for so long. Since I didn’t really intend on going mad bomber, I ignored most of the grenade focused perks. I was looking for tech stuff.
And I found it. Like Crafting there were tons of perks here, but I ended up choosing the one I wanted the most.
Design Wizard: Your designs will always be beyond the average, you work faster, and more efficiently while designing.
I nodded as I selected it. Feeling the rush of the perk coming into play.
And instantly wished I had picked this before spending all afternoon working on my Directional Microphone. That would have made things a lot easier…
I shook it off. No point pouting at what I could do better. I would constantly be improving just take it as it is. I shook it all away and focused back on the menu.
It had been a while since I saw the assault perks. I ran through them again, my eye catching on Bullet Counting, but I didn’t really need that. My Kiroshi, and a Smart link would take care of that… When I got a Smart Link anyways.
But it was pointless. I didn't need it. Not for a Perk point.
Instead I looked for other Synergy Perks. Perks that would upgrade not just assault weapons, but potentially all of them. I had already taken Gun Nut, which was incredibly useful in order to keep myself from looking like an idiot by trying to shoot a gun that was still on safe.
Most of the perks were Assault skill focused. Accuracy with Rifles, SMG’s or Sniper Rifles.
Things that were useful, but that would come with just increased stats anyways…
But I was tempted to do the Sniper Rifle one.
‘Crack Shot: While wielding a Sniper Rifle, If you are in range you can work out a path for your bullet to reach its target.’
That sounded mildly terrifying.
But it wasn’t exactly what I was going for…
Yet.
No, instead I continued digging, Until I found it. The exact perk I wanted. Because it didn’t just deal with a specific series of guns. The name of it had made me pass over it at first.
‘Rifle Ace. Long rifles of all types are deadly in your experienced hands. Ready your long gun to fire in a blink.’
It was literally Quickdraw for long guns! I was kicking my feet into the air and laughing as I selected it. Instantly I felt the information flow. That surety of motion and knowledge that I KNEW the best way to do something.
It was amazing. I loved new perks and skill upgrades, that confusion, or amateur attempts at something simply washing away under absolute surety.
The natural anxiety that everyone feels. That ‘am I doing it right?’ feeling was gone.
I sighed in happiness, deciding to take a break from any grinding for the night. I put on some wacky future cartoons, and curled up on the couch.
Last edited:
Yinko
Well-known member
There was no stat or skill rank up in that fight, so Judy didn't get to feel that rush?
stalked observed from afar and fan-girled over solemnly imitated.
Which was the start of how the Mox became a monastic order dedicated to perfect self-control... and sex work... and murder. Based off of the Bene Geserit, with Motoko as honorary Reverend Mother, to be
posh-goofiness
Well-known member
Man, Judy got a lot more than she bargained for there, huh.
PeaceMaker 03
Well-known member
What a rush, and I was just reading the story, no BD and it has been over a decade for me bit you summed up running over rooftops, weapon in hand to violently explain the wrongness of the bad life choices of some unfortunate (but deserving of violence) soul.
This chapter was more of an impression than the actual chapter of Moto shooting Malstrom-gonks. Great job
This chapter was more of an impression than the actual chapter of Moto shooting Malstrom-gonks. Great job
Blasterbot
Well-known member
good to find out that he was a natural and that the nox did not train him to bait Ara Aras. I like how she didn't think they would be that popular and was just indulging Nox as well. then she gets the product and says this is Preem.
Chapter 43
Seras
Well-known member
The next morning I headed out to go see Judy. I did at least wait until afternoon, as I was pretty sure Judy wasn’t a morning person. She just gave me that vibe.
Pulling up into Lizzies I was greeted at the door by a different bouncer than usual. Rita wasn’t there. But I was waved through and I headed into the back and down the stairs.
I slipped into Judy's studio, only to find Judy mid BD.
I shrugged and grabbed a chair and settled in waiting for her to finish her editing. Or whatever she was doing. Unfortunately this was boring, and it wasn’t like I could go and hack into her system. Judy wasn’t Hiromi.
So I just waited. Minutes passed as I watched Judy sort of mumble to herself as she rested on the chair.
Finally she shifted, slipping the wreath up away from her eyes and letting her stretch a bit.
“Hey Judy.”
“EEEEEee!” She shrieked as I accidentally startled her.
I should probably stop doing that.
“Sorry Judy, you okay?” I asked after a moment as Judy was gasping for air and holding her heart.
“Don’t do that!” She hissed at me, hand clutched to her heart.
“Sorry! I just didn’t want to disturb you while you were working.”
She muttered a few expletives in spanish under her breath as she slowly rose up and took a few steps around as if gathering herself again.
“You are way too quiet. Those Lynx Paws of yours must be high end.” She finally said and I tilted my head.
“I don’t have a pair of Lynx Paws. I thought about getting them, they would definitely help me be sneaky, but I haven’t picked them up yet.”
“What? That’s not right, you’re already super quiet. What do you have that lets you do that?”
“Practice mostly.” I answered semi-truthfully, I even pulled up my boots and undid one to show my normal fleshy foot. “See.”
“Shit!” she blinked before shaking herself a bit. “What crazy corpo black ops training did you crawl out of? Half the stuff on the BD, I have no idea how you even do it. Really Motoko… It was eye opening. Where did you learn to move like that?”
I decided a lie was perfect here. Let people draw their own conclusions. “Well my Mom used to be a Netrunner, and my dad was a Solo. They worked together.” I decided to offer with a shrug, as if that explained everything.
Nailed it.
“Right… Crazy. Anyway. You here for the BDs?”
“Yeah! Did you finish them?”
“I did… I spent all night editing them. The side jobs were smooth, I actually thought they were pretty interesting. The Maelstrom one? It was preem work. Terrifying but preem. Took forever to edit the virtu, but it was good… You, uh… Do that a lot? Killing people?” She asked nonchalantly as she was busying herself with her system, leaning back and pushing some keys on a keyboard.
I hummed a bit. “Sometimes. Depends on the gig and the people. I’ve killed a lot of Maelstrom recently, but that’s more for personal reasons.” I replied, wiggling my hand a little to show what I meant.
“Right. Right. Preem.” She muttered, obviously uncomfortable with the thought.
“Not really your thing huh?” I couldn’t help but ask.
“I don’t like XBDs. There’s a reason I do BD work for the Mox, and not anyone else.” She mentions pushing a final key and looking over to me, her expression was still uncomfortable, but I could see her try to get over it.
I winced a bit. “Sorry. Should Nox and I find a different editor?”
“No, no nothing like that. It just makes me uncomfortable, but it ain’t the first time I scrolled some fucked up shit. This was less fucked up than most to be fair. Really it was the surprise at how it felt more than anything. You’re more deadly than you let on. You know?” She said quietly, looking me over as if… Well I guess she was comparing the me that was sitting in a chair in front of her, to the one she had seen in the BD.
I could only shrug and smile at that. “I try.”
“Yeah.” Judy said awkwardly before pulling herself together, she reached over and hit a button on a machine connected to her system, a short buzzing noise echoed out, and I blinked when I recognized it. A BD file producer.
As I watched a few BDs started clunking out, each of them wrapped in that stupid condom wrapper.
Four in total.
“Well here you go. The first of your BDs.” She said, swiping them up and offering them to me. I quickly grabbed each of them, gently looking them over. I couldn’t help but snort as the wrapper had Mox colors, and well… The packaging wasn’t really matching. But I knew how to be polite, and it was a Nox problem.
“Thanks Judy.”
“Hey don’t mention it. Nox is the one who bribed me to do this, so it’s not like you owe me anything.”
“Still thanks. I can’t wait to show these to my Choom Hiromi. I hope it cheers her up a bit.”
“XBDs would cheer her up?” Judy asked, sounding a little skeptical.
“Not that! Not exactly, but like. Seeing what I do because she’s been a little trapped and… it’s a long story.”
“Right, not my bizz. I-”
“JUDY! I’m here!” Nox suddenly called out as he ran down the steps, his hair a bit in disarray.
“Did you just get out of bed?” I couldn’t help but ask as I noticed the way his hair was everywhere and he looked half asleep.
“Yes! Hey Motoko, I was up all night waiting… but I’m here! Judy, you finished the BDs?”
“Yep, a while ago, they weren’t super long, not like a long session… Anyways. You need to make them though. You aren’t burning through my printer.”
“Aww. C’mon Jude, You know Suzie charges me!”
“It costs money to make BD’s Nox, you know that.”
“How much? I have some cash I can put in.” I offered, interrupting as Nox was going full puppy dog.
“Hey I can’t do that Motoko… You already put in enough eddies!”
“It’s not a big deal Nox.” I offered my eyes going blue as I threw a couple grand towards Nox. “There you go. That should be enough to get started right?”
“A-a-eh!” He choked a bit but Judy just snorted at his reaction.
“Just make sure you make more than you spend Nox.” She tells him as she pulls a shard out of her computer. “Here. These are the four files. Go on, I got some work to finish up… After my break.” She muttered rubbing her eyes a bit. I guess I had been proven wrong, Judy was a morning person, she just stayed up all night to be one.
“R-right. C’mon Motoko! Let’s go! I’ll show you how to make some BDs.”
I shrugged, willing to take a look.
The puppy-I mean, Nox led me upstairs chattering away at how he had already put some buyers together, and if sales went well, he knew some street kids that would sell them on his behalf.
Nox definitely had some ideas about spreading them around.
It was cute how excited he was about it.
He led me up and into one of the BD booths upstairs, where I did my best to ignore the music and the partying going on around me.
He put the shard into a machine along the wall, and with a few options selected, BDs began flowing out.
“I’ll start with like ten of each, spread it around, let some interest build up. I hope it’ll explode right out, but sometimes it takes a bit before buyers will start biting, word of mouth and stuff… That okay?” He asked over the blaring music and I threw him a thumbs up.
“Yeah nothing happens instantly. Just let me know. I don’t know when my next gig will be, but I’ll let you know once I have some more cool recordings.
“Great! Okay! All done.” He said the same backpack he had when I first rescued him was now full of BD wrappers.
“Do you… Want to come along? See the process?” He asked, sounding a little nervous. Was he worried about getting jumped again?
“Sorry I have some other stops to make, but if anyone causes you any trouble call me. I’ll come help.” I told him. While he smiled at my reply, it was a bit of a weak one.
“Right. I guess I’ll see you later?”
“Of course. Keep in touch Nox, let me know how the sales go! I’m super excited to hear about it.”
“I’ll… I’ll send texts every day, to uhh. Update you?”
“Preem!”
—--
Funnily enough, it was Hiromi that gave me the idea for my next grinding session.
Her Arasaka ICE had been a good whetstone to grind against for my overall Netrunning skills.
So I headed over to Yoko’s for my next adventure. The Netrunning Cafe was as busy as always, only one of the chairs was actually in use.
But as always Yoko was standing there already watching me behind her glasses as I entered.
“Oh? Back already?”
“I need some ICE. Preferably something pretty high end.” I told her and flashed her a smile.
“You already know what I deal in. Any information to trade?” Yoko’s question made me wince. I really didn’t have anything.
“I don’t suppose what I just asked for is something I can buy with Eddies?”
“Not unless you want some over the counter WET.” She said with a blank look behind her sunglasses.
“Wet?” I couldn’t help but ask. The way she said it was weird.
“ICE that’s melted. Already been solved. Useless.” She informed me and I nodded. That was good to know. It also gave me an idea.
“Actually… WET would be just fine. Do you have something that was solid before it was solved?”
Yoko seemed to take in my words with a sort of confused stare, before she shrugged.
“Sure Motoko, I have some old copies of everything, it’s sort of my thing. What do you want?”
“How much will…. Two grand get me?” I asked checking my account. Wakako had given me some good eddies for the gigs I had done plus bonuses. I could spend a little here. Splurge really.
“I’ll go get you a stack.” She replies laughing a little as she disappears into the back.
Cool!
—---
So I now had a ton of shards that had ICE programs.
But I needed something to run them on, and I had a good option…
But it involved going home.
I still had another repaired laptop in the apartment. But I hadn’t been back alone since…
So I took a deep breath and drove over. Sliding into my parking spot in the parking garage, and checking my guns. Making sure my Burya was loaded… I also grabbed my Carnage.
Just to make sure.
Then I walked up to the apartment fully loaded for war. It earned me a few looks, but I was just happy there were people around again. In fact!
I happily took a slight skip in my goal as the food cart guy that sold the tasty mystery meat balls on a stick was in his usual spot out the front door.
“Morning!” I greeted, as I passed over some eddies and got my usual order in return.
“Glad to see you’re alive, kid.” He offered with a nod, but that was all the words he offered and I wasn’t waiting around.
I headed inside. Passed the piled up trash, that was actually worse than normal. A few of the old asian guys that were playing chess just inside were back in their normal spots.
It was almost like before. Just without the protection of the NCPD ever arriving if something went wrong.
I took the stairs easily racing up the flights until I arrived home.
The door opened easily.
Home.
I took a deep breath and let it out.
I finished off my meat stick, placed my Carnage on the table and flopped onto the couch.
It was good to be home. The last time where we just grabbed stuff wasn’t the same thing.
Still I wasn’t here to relax.
I was here to grind.
I grabbed my Laptop, I had planned on selling this one, but using it as training was good too.
I installed one of the WET ICE from the pile of shards, and locked down the laptop.
Just because the ICE was solved, and wouldn’t stop any Netrunner that knew what they were doing, doesn’t mean it wasn’t still good security if they didn’t have the solution. It was like a lock that everyone had a key for. But if you chose not to use a key and instead tried to picklock it… Well it was still a lock.
Really it just meant I could pull out my cord and jack in, and start hammering the security.
It didn’t matter if the ICE noticed.
It didn’t matter if I failed, or succeeded.
If I failed, I just tried again. If I succeeded then I could just uninstal the ICE, chuck the shard in the trash, and grab a fresh one.
I wasn’t going to stay at home the whole day. So after just a couple hours of intense grinding, I locked everything down and decided to head back to the dojo. I couldn't let Jun start freaking out when I didn’t come back.
But I left with plenty of alerts.
*Intelligence Leveled up!*
Intelligence 6.
*Breach Protocol skill level up!*
*1 Perk Point Gained.*
*Breach Protocol skill level up!*
Breach Protocol leveled twice in just that amount of time. Since I was breaking ICE without worrying about alerting someone, or having some Black ICE catch me unaware, I was able to go all out. Uncaring about mistakes, or caution.
I learned a lot, even without the levels, but with them?
Breach Protocol 6. I was filled to the brim with knowledge about breaching system security. In a way I was at the point where I finally realized how little I knew about it.
I shook off the knowledge of the mountain I was staring up at when it came to the knowledge of the net, and instead focused on getting back to Jun.
I decided to keep the perk saved for now. Mostly because I wasn’t sure what I wanted out of it yet. A little time to think about it would do me some good.
—--
After a winding route back home, carefully making sure I wasn’t followed I made it back to the dojo apartments. Finding Jun already napping in his bedroom, I crashed on the couch and decided I would join him.
My brain was tired from all the Netrunning. I didn’t like puzzles, and Breaching systems was like the worlds most complicated puzzle game.
I just had to deal with it for now until I got good enough that the puzzles were all easy mode.
I set myself a sleep schedule for eight hours and activated it, passing out instantly.
I did not sleep for eight hours.
I startled awake.
Something was wrong.
I looked around, having grabbed my Burya off the living room table as I rose up. The TV was off, there weren't any noises. No intruders no movement…
But something had struck that chord in me to wake up. I blinked the tiredness out of my eyes, since I didn’t get my full eight hours I was groggy.
But then I heard it.
Sirens.
I ran to the window, but couldn’t see anything.
But I could hear them.
I turned on the TV, switched to the news and got my confirmation.
“-Are once more on the streets. A full deployment of all NCPD forces have been released onto the city to once more secure a peaceful Night City. The Curfew is in full effect. NCPD has asked us to remind all citizens, that the safest action they can take is to head home and lock their doors until NCPD once more secures any and all troublemakers in our fair city-”
I turned away from it then, opening Jun’s room to see him still passed out as I flipped on the lights.
“Wha!” He surged up and looked around confused.
“Jun! The NCPD are back. Listen!” I demanded and he blinked confused at me for a moment until he heard the sirens as well.
“Shit!” He cursed as he jumped out of bed and grabbed the first clothes he could find. Before rushing out of his room and towards the dojo.
Since I was wondering what the Tyger Claw response was. I decided to follow. Benefits of Jun being higher up in the gang I guess.
We both slipped into the dojo, only to discover it was surprisingly calm.
Jun looked around before finding Sensei.
“Sensei!”
“Kusanagi… Kusanagi.” He greeted us both but focused on Jun. “So you heard?”
“Motoko woke me. Are there any orders?”
“No.” The voice that responded wasn’t Sensei. Instead Fujimura, walked out from around the corner, if memory serves, there was an office over there. “We knew exactly when the NCPD would return. The word went out, and all contacts are going to ground tonight. The NCPD will not find the Tyger Claws in their sights. So stay off the streets.” He rumbled out a metal finger pointing, but not quite making contact with Jun’s chest.
“Understood Fujimura-Sama.”
I shrugged, fair enough. I wasn’t about to run out on the streets with the NCPD probably arresting anyone and everyone.
With that Jun started a conversation with Fujimura, that I didn’t care about, and I wandered off.
The dojo was quiet and Sensei just gave me a little nod showing he saw me, but he was speaking with Jun and Fujimura as well.
So I went back to the apartment. Settling back onto the couch and turning on the news.
Of course the news was filled with ‘positive’ situations happening throughout the city. It was all bullshit propaganda, but it did give me an idea of how fast NCPD was spreading across the city.
I couldn’t help but wonder how the return of law enforcement would affect Night City.
Pulling up into Lizzies I was greeted at the door by a different bouncer than usual. Rita wasn’t there. But I was waved through and I headed into the back and down the stairs.
I slipped into Judy's studio, only to find Judy mid BD.
I shrugged and grabbed a chair and settled in waiting for her to finish her editing. Or whatever she was doing. Unfortunately this was boring, and it wasn’t like I could go and hack into her system. Judy wasn’t Hiromi.
So I just waited. Minutes passed as I watched Judy sort of mumble to herself as she rested on the chair.
Finally she shifted, slipping the wreath up away from her eyes and letting her stretch a bit.
“Hey Judy.”
“EEEEEee!” She shrieked as I accidentally startled her.
I should probably stop doing that.
“Sorry Judy, you okay?” I asked after a moment as Judy was gasping for air and holding her heart.
“Don’t do that!” She hissed at me, hand clutched to her heart.
“Sorry! I just didn’t want to disturb you while you were working.”
She muttered a few expletives in spanish under her breath as she slowly rose up and took a few steps around as if gathering herself again.
“You are way too quiet. Those Lynx Paws of yours must be high end.” She finally said and I tilted my head.
“I don’t have a pair of Lynx Paws. I thought about getting them, they would definitely help me be sneaky, but I haven’t picked them up yet.”
“What? That’s not right, you’re already super quiet. What do you have that lets you do that?”
“Practice mostly.” I answered semi-truthfully, I even pulled up my boots and undid one to show my normal fleshy foot. “See.”
“Shit!” she blinked before shaking herself a bit. “What crazy corpo black ops training did you crawl out of? Half the stuff on the BD, I have no idea how you even do it. Really Motoko… It was eye opening. Where did you learn to move like that?”
I decided a lie was perfect here. Let people draw their own conclusions. “Well my Mom used to be a Netrunner, and my dad was a Solo. They worked together.” I decided to offer with a shrug, as if that explained everything.
Nailed it.
“Right… Crazy. Anyway. You here for the BDs?”
“Yeah! Did you finish them?”
“I did… I spent all night editing them. The side jobs were smooth, I actually thought they were pretty interesting. The Maelstrom one? It was preem work. Terrifying but preem. Took forever to edit the virtu, but it was good… You, uh… Do that a lot? Killing people?” She asked nonchalantly as she was busying herself with her system, leaning back and pushing some keys on a keyboard.
I hummed a bit. “Sometimes. Depends on the gig and the people. I’ve killed a lot of Maelstrom recently, but that’s more for personal reasons.” I replied, wiggling my hand a little to show what I meant.
“Right. Right. Preem.” She muttered, obviously uncomfortable with the thought.
“Not really your thing huh?” I couldn’t help but ask.
“I don’t like XBDs. There’s a reason I do BD work for the Mox, and not anyone else.” She mentions pushing a final key and looking over to me, her expression was still uncomfortable, but I could see her try to get over it.
I winced a bit. “Sorry. Should Nox and I find a different editor?”
“No, no nothing like that. It just makes me uncomfortable, but it ain’t the first time I scrolled some fucked up shit. This was less fucked up than most to be fair. Really it was the surprise at how it felt more than anything. You’re more deadly than you let on. You know?” She said quietly, looking me over as if… Well I guess she was comparing the me that was sitting in a chair in front of her, to the one she had seen in the BD.
I could only shrug and smile at that. “I try.”
“Yeah.” Judy said awkwardly before pulling herself together, she reached over and hit a button on a machine connected to her system, a short buzzing noise echoed out, and I blinked when I recognized it. A BD file producer.
As I watched a few BDs started clunking out, each of them wrapped in that stupid condom wrapper.
Four in total.
“Well here you go. The first of your BDs.” She said, swiping them up and offering them to me. I quickly grabbed each of them, gently looking them over. I couldn’t help but snort as the wrapper had Mox colors, and well… The packaging wasn’t really matching. But I knew how to be polite, and it was a Nox problem.
“Thanks Judy.”
“Hey don’t mention it. Nox is the one who bribed me to do this, so it’s not like you owe me anything.”
“Still thanks. I can’t wait to show these to my Choom Hiromi. I hope it cheers her up a bit.”
“XBDs would cheer her up?” Judy asked, sounding a little skeptical.
“Not that! Not exactly, but like. Seeing what I do because she’s been a little trapped and… it’s a long story.”
“Right, not my bizz. I-”
“JUDY! I’m here!” Nox suddenly called out as he ran down the steps, his hair a bit in disarray.
“Did you just get out of bed?” I couldn’t help but ask as I noticed the way his hair was everywhere and he looked half asleep.
“Yes! Hey Motoko, I was up all night waiting… but I’m here! Judy, you finished the BDs?”
“Yep, a while ago, they weren’t super long, not like a long session… Anyways. You need to make them though. You aren’t burning through my printer.”
“Aww. C’mon Jude, You know Suzie charges me!”
“It costs money to make BD’s Nox, you know that.”
“How much? I have some cash I can put in.” I offered, interrupting as Nox was going full puppy dog.
“Hey I can’t do that Motoko… You already put in enough eddies!”
“It’s not a big deal Nox.” I offered my eyes going blue as I threw a couple grand towards Nox. “There you go. That should be enough to get started right?”
“A-a-eh!” He choked a bit but Judy just snorted at his reaction.
“Just make sure you make more than you spend Nox.” She tells him as she pulls a shard out of her computer. “Here. These are the four files. Go on, I got some work to finish up… After my break.” She muttered rubbing her eyes a bit. I guess I had been proven wrong, Judy was a morning person, she just stayed up all night to be one.
“R-right. C’mon Motoko! Let’s go! I’ll show you how to make some BDs.”
I shrugged, willing to take a look.
The puppy-I mean, Nox led me upstairs chattering away at how he had already put some buyers together, and if sales went well, he knew some street kids that would sell them on his behalf.
Nox definitely had some ideas about spreading them around.
It was cute how excited he was about it.
He led me up and into one of the BD booths upstairs, where I did my best to ignore the music and the partying going on around me.
He put the shard into a machine along the wall, and with a few options selected, BDs began flowing out.
“I’ll start with like ten of each, spread it around, let some interest build up. I hope it’ll explode right out, but sometimes it takes a bit before buyers will start biting, word of mouth and stuff… That okay?” He asked over the blaring music and I threw him a thumbs up.
“Yeah nothing happens instantly. Just let me know. I don’t know when my next gig will be, but I’ll let you know once I have some more cool recordings.
“Great! Okay! All done.” He said the same backpack he had when I first rescued him was now full of BD wrappers.
“Do you… Want to come along? See the process?” He asked, sounding a little nervous. Was he worried about getting jumped again?
“Sorry I have some other stops to make, but if anyone causes you any trouble call me. I’ll come help.” I told him. While he smiled at my reply, it was a bit of a weak one.
“Right. I guess I’ll see you later?”
“Of course. Keep in touch Nox, let me know how the sales go! I’m super excited to hear about it.”
“I’ll… I’ll send texts every day, to uhh. Update you?”
“Preem!”
—--
Funnily enough, it was Hiromi that gave me the idea for my next grinding session.
Her Arasaka ICE had been a good whetstone to grind against for my overall Netrunning skills.
So I headed over to Yoko’s for my next adventure. The Netrunning Cafe was as busy as always, only one of the chairs was actually in use.
But as always Yoko was standing there already watching me behind her glasses as I entered.
“Oh? Back already?”
“I need some ICE. Preferably something pretty high end.” I told her and flashed her a smile.
“You already know what I deal in. Any information to trade?” Yoko’s question made me wince. I really didn’t have anything.
“I don’t suppose what I just asked for is something I can buy with Eddies?”
“Not unless you want some over the counter WET.” She said with a blank look behind her sunglasses.
“Wet?” I couldn’t help but ask. The way she said it was weird.
“ICE that’s melted. Already been solved. Useless.” She informed me and I nodded. That was good to know. It also gave me an idea.
“Actually… WET would be just fine. Do you have something that was solid before it was solved?”
Yoko seemed to take in my words with a sort of confused stare, before she shrugged.
“Sure Motoko, I have some old copies of everything, it’s sort of my thing. What do you want?”
“How much will…. Two grand get me?” I asked checking my account. Wakako had given me some good eddies for the gigs I had done plus bonuses. I could spend a little here. Splurge really.
“I’ll go get you a stack.” She replies laughing a little as she disappears into the back.
Cool!
—---
So I now had a ton of shards that had ICE programs.
But I needed something to run them on, and I had a good option…
But it involved going home.
I still had another repaired laptop in the apartment. But I hadn’t been back alone since…
So I took a deep breath and drove over. Sliding into my parking spot in the parking garage, and checking my guns. Making sure my Burya was loaded… I also grabbed my Carnage.
Just to make sure.
Then I walked up to the apartment fully loaded for war. It earned me a few looks, but I was just happy there were people around again. In fact!
I happily took a slight skip in my goal as the food cart guy that sold the tasty mystery meat balls on a stick was in his usual spot out the front door.
“Morning!” I greeted, as I passed over some eddies and got my usual order in return.
“Glad to see you’re alive, kid.” He offered with a nod, but that was all the words he offered and I wasn’t waiting around.
I headed inside. Passed the piled up trash, that was actually worse than normal. A few of the old asian guys that were playing chess just inside were back in their normal spots.
It was almost like before. Just without the protection of the NCPD ever arriving if something went wrong.
I took the stairs easily racing up the flights until I arrived home.
The door opened easily.
Home.
I took a deep breath and let it out.
I finished off my meat stick, placed my Carnage on the table and flopped onto the couch.
It was good to be home. The last time where we just grabbed stuff wasn’t the same thing.
Still I wasn’t here to relax.
I was here to grind.
I grabbed my Laptop, I had planned on selling this one, but using it as training was good too.
I installed one of the WET ICE from the pile of shards, and locked down the laptop.
Just because the ICE was solved, and wouldn’t stop any Netrunner that knew what they were doing, doesn’t mean it wasn’t still good security if they didn’t have the solution. It was like a lock that everyone had a key for. But if you chose not to use a key and instead tried to picklock it… Well it was still a lock.
Really it just meant I could pull out my cord and jack in, and start hammering the security.
It didn’t matter if the ICE noticed.
It didn’t matter if I failed, or succeeded.
If I failed, I just tried again. If I succeeded then I could just uninstal the ICE, chuck the shard in the trash, and grab a fresh one.
I wasn’t going to stay at home the whole day. So after just a couple hours of intense grinding, I locked everything down and decided to head back to the dojo. I couldn't let Jun start freaking out when I didn’t come back.
But I left with plenty of alerts.
*Intelligence Leveled up!*
Intelligence 6.
*Breach Protocol skill level up!*
*1 Perk Point Gained.*
*Breach Protocol skill level up!*
Breach Protocol leveled twice in just that amount of time. Since I was breaking ICE without worrying about alerting someone, or having some Black ICE catch me unaware, I was able to go all out. Uncaring about mistakes, or caution.
I learned a lot, even without the levels, but with them?
Breach Protocol 6. I was filled to the brim with knowledge about breaching system security. In a way I was at the point where I finally realized how little I knew about it.
I shook off the knowledge of the mountain I was staring up at when it came to the knowledge of the net, and instead focused on getting back to Jun.
I decided to keep the perk saved for now. Mostly because I wasn’t sure what I wanted out of it yet. A little time to think about it would do me some good.
—--
After a winding route back home, carefully making sure I wasn’t followed I made it back to the dojo apartments. Finding Jun already napping in his bedroom, I crashed on the couch and decided I would join him.
My brain was tired from all the Netrunning. I didn’t like puzzles, and Breaching systems was like the worlds most complicated puzzle game.
I just had to deal with it for now until I got good enough that the puzzles were all easy mode.
I set myself a sleep schedule for eight hours and activated it, passing out instantly.
I did not sleep for eight hours.
I startled awake.
Something was wrong.
I looked around, having grabbed my Burya off the living room table as I rose up. The TV was off, there weren't any noises. No intruders no movement…
But something had struck that chord in me to wake up. I blinked the tiredness out of my eyes, since I didn’t get my full eight hours I was groggy.
But then I heard it.
Sirens.
I ran to the window, but couldn’t see anything.
But I could hear them.
I turned on the TV, switched to the news and got my confirmation.
“-Are once more on the streets. A full deployment of all NCPD forces have been released onto the city to once more secure a peaceful Night City. The Curfew is in full effect. NCPD has asked us to remind all citizens, that the safest action they can take is to head home and lock their doors until NCPD once more secures any and all troublemakers in our fair city-”
I turned away from it then, opening Jun’s room to see him still passed out as I flipped on the lights.
“Wha!” He surged up and looked around confused.
“Jun! The NCPD are back. Listen!” I demanded and he blinked confused at me for a moment until he heard the sirens as well.
“Shit!” He cursed as he jumped out of bed and grabbed the first clothes he could find. Before rushing out of his room and towards the dojo.
Since I was wondering what the Tyger Claw response was. I decided to follow. Benefits of Jun being higher up in the gang I guess.
We both slipped into the dojo, only to discover it was surprisingly calm.
Jun looked around before finding Sensei.
“Sensei!”
“Kusanagi… Kusanagi.” He greeted us both but focused on Jun. “So you heard?”
“Motoko woke me. Are there any orders?”
“No.” The voice that responded wasn’t Sensei. Instead Fujimura, walked out from around the corner, if memory serves, there was an office over there. “We knew exactly when the NCPD would return. The word went out, and all contacts are going to ground tonight. The NCPD will not find the Tyger Claws in their sights. So stay off the streets.” He rumbled out a metal finger pointing, but not quite making contact with Jun’s chest.
“Understood Fujimura-Sama.”
I shrugged, fair enough. I wasn’t about to run out on the streets with the NCPD probably arresting anyone and everyone.
With that Jun started a conversation with Fujimura, that I didn’t care about, and I wandered off.
The dojo was quiet and Sensei just gave me a little nod showing he saw me, but he was speaking with Jun and Fujimura as well.
So I went back to the apartment. Settling back onto the couch and turning on the news.
Of course the news was filled with ‘positive’ situations happening throughout the city. It was all bullshit propaganda, but it did give me an idea of how fast NCPD was spreading across the city.
I couldn’t help but wonder how the return of law enforcement would affect Night City.
Yinko
Well-known member
The NCPD might be a good mid-level group to grind against. Not in combat, but in infiltration and netrunning. Not full corpo levels, and pretty incompetent overall, but better than the gangers. Say that someone gets arrested and she either gets hired to break them out, or decides to because they are her friend.
Chapter 44
Seras
Well-known member
I did the smart thing after waking up the next day and stayed inside.
I was really lucky, without my ability to fall asleep at will, I definitely wouldn’t have managed to get much sleep. The constant NCPD sirens throughout the night meant when I finally did wake up, it was to a groggy Jun drinking some caffeinated drink he had grabbed out of a vending machine while watching the news.
Me though? After eight hours I was perky.
“Couldn’t sleep?” I chirped at him as I rose up and stretched.
“No.” He grunted as he took another sip as I sat up and stretched. Then I hopped out and cleaned up a bit before grabbing my new testing laptop.
I settled onto the couch cross legged right next to Jun as I slotted my cord in, and went to work on another set of ICE.
“What are you doing?” He eventually asked, distracting me a bit, but I kept myself from getting booted out of the Breach.
“Netrunning training! I’m getting used to breaching through ICE.” I told him with a smile, one eye on him, the other taken over by a screen displaying the ICE countermeasures.
“Huh.” He offered, turning back to the news and taking another sip of his drink.
Silly Jun. I would have to get him a pair of earmuffs or something, if he kept having trouble sleeping.
I was practically buzzing though. I really wanting to go out and do something, but knew it was a bad idea. So instead I fell back on what was my favorite activity when I was stuck inside.
Grinding!
Although…
“Hey Jun?”
“Yeah?”
“Do you mind if I mess with you a bit?” I asked only to have Jun slowly turn towards me, mouth still buried in the can.
“Whatever you are thinking… No.” He responded after a moment deadpan.
“Aww.” I whined at him. “You don’t even know what I was thinking.”
“And I know I wouldn’t enjoy it so no.”
“I just wanted to send my quick hacks at you for practice. You probably have better ICE than most people I would see on the street…. Right? You do have ICE right?”
“I have the ICE provided for me, and my ECM.”
Oh right. The tattoos were actually not just tattoos but a ECM system the Tyger Claws preferred.
“Preem.” I told him. “So can I quick hack you? It’s just Ping.”
“No.”
“You are boring when you are sleepy.” I grumbled at him, but went back to my Breaching…
Of course. He might not even notice… I looked towards him out of the corner of my eye and just before I managed to send the Quickhack his hand reached out and grabbed my face covering my eyes.
“Ow ow ow ow!” I hissed as he squeezed a bit.
“I said no.”
“I give! Surrender!” I whined not really wanting to start a fight with my laptop in my lap.
Plus Jun was obviously grumpy right now. And I wasn’t sure I wanted to mess with Grumpy Jun.
He let go and I sighed as he gave me a single look before turning back to the news.
“Fine. See if I ever act as a Netrunner for you. You’ll be like ‘Motoko! My beautiful and genius little sister, please save me by hacking into this evil mainframe!’ And I’ll just be like ‘No way you jerky faced older brother! You didn’t believe in your glorious and slightly eccentric little sister!’”
“I would never say that. More like Annoying brat.” Jun replied and that I couldn’t allow that. So I kicked him which unfortunately was a mistake.
Grumpy Jun had no chill.
“Okay if I offer a cease fire can I at least reach my laptop?” I mumbled into the couch from beneath Jun.
The jerk had literally sat on me, and knocked my laptop out of my lap in the scuffle. So I wasn’t even able to grind!
Trapped beneath my stupid heavy brother who was definitely eating too many burritos.
The fatty.
I managed to swivel my head a bit and catch his eye. Then I realized to my horror what I was seeing. Those weren’t my Nii-chans eyes. They were the eyes of a Cyberpsycho.
Jun was too far gone.
“No.” He told me smiling the look of a monster as he reached down and continued to poke my face.
I couldn’t even retaliate! He had managed to pin both my arms while I was still playing around!
“My Vengeance… Will be legendary.” I told him but he didn’t seem to mind.
A few minutes of my pleading getting nowhere, we were both interrupted by the door to the apartment opening.
My inability to grab a gun and do anything was the only reason I wasn’t pointing my Lexington at whoever walked in without knocking.
“Akari. The door was closed.” Jun said grumpily as he glared towards the door which is when Alari appeared in my view.
First she looked at Jun, then down to me, then back up at Jun.
Then she sat.
The bitch sat on my struggling legs.
“Vengeance.” I mumbled into the couch because I couldn’t even kick or wiggle with two heavy borg asses on me.
“Now now Jun boy, you should really knock on the door before entering my apartment. Got any more of those?” She asked, pointing towards the can of soda Jun was drinking.
“Akari.” Jun growled out.
“Oh fine. You are as always boring. Far too serious. But getting better since your cute little sister came around. How is she by the way? Not too flat?” She asked, but the fact I could see her wave her hands over her own plastic tits told me she was making a double joke.
“At least mine are real!” I hissed. “OW!” I yelped as she took a sharp nail and poked the bottom of my foot that was trapped under her plastic ass.
“Oh I’m sorry I thought I heard a-”
“Akari. Don’t stab my sister.” Jun said, sounding totally done with this as he stood up.
Freeing me.
“C’mon Jun b-” That was as far as Akari got, now freed I rose up, arching backwards, my knees digging into the couch as I slammed a bit into Akari’s side grabbing her shoulder wrapping my arm around hers and then flexing to literally toss her over my shoulder and off the couch.
Her absolutely shocked yelped was glorious as she went flying and landed off the couch in a massive thud.
“That’s for calling me flat.” I huffed a bit as I rolled a bit to get onto my feet. The Borg woman laying on her back staring up at me with a dropped jaw.
“Yeah Motoko does that.” Jun called out as he grabbed a soda and we both heard the hiss as it popped open.
Then he just started drinking.
“Don’t mind me. Carry on.” He offered waving his hand.
Asshole.
Akari though, instead of getting up and going on the assault, just started laughing.
“You really are a fearless little thing aren’t you? Last time I nearly went off on someone they started running away every time I met them from then on. Look at you, willing to literally throw me around? Jun, your cute little Imouto is gonna either get herself killed, or become a monster.”
“I’ll be a monster!”
“More like get me killed.” Jun and I said at the same time.
I just snorted at Jun being a jerk as Akari rose up chuckling still. “It’s kinda nice to be treated like a normal person again. Just be careful little Imouto.” Akari said and she was suddenly beside me her arm over my shoulders. “You might set me off some day.” She whispered into my ear.
“Akari!”
“Fine, fine. I’ll leave her alone. You big overprotective brother you. Fujimura-Sama is calling everyone in.” She said and Jun quickly put his can down.
“When’s the meeting?”
“Now?” She asked, sounding innocent, but Jun sighed as he instantly rushed for his room. Hurriedly getting dressed and ready.
“You should come too little Imouto. This isn’t a war meeting, so they are likely shutting down our little headquarters. The excuse of the gangwar keeping the dojo closed isn’t going to fly much longer.” She offered poking my nose with her thin claw like chrome.
Seriously Akari had this thing, where she had to be constantly poking or prodding, or stabbing someone.
“Sure.” I said shrugging as I slipped out from her claws and started getting dressed, if not as quickly as Jun.
A few minutes later I was following after Jun as he stalked to the dojo, trying to pretend he was put together, and not grumpy, running on barely any sleep.
Akari as usual, being annoying, but not to me this time.
Inside the dojo the main room was full.
The entire Kamikaze group were here, most were sitting seiza around as Fujimura stalked around. A few couldn’t sit that way thanks to wounds, or simply how their legs worked. But otherwise that was the room. The only one that wasn’t was Sensei.
He stood against the far wall. I decided to do like him, resting up against the wall, and not joining the group.
I didn’t want to let them think I was one of theirs anymore than they already did.
“NCPD have already done much of our job for us. Maelstrom has been pushed back. They were caught unaware by the return of the cops.” Fujimura called out suddenly as Jun slipped into a spot, Akari settling in nearby. There were nodding heads and sharp grins from the group at that.
“There has already been communication from the Maelstrom leader Brick.” He called out but this time only a few of the Kamikaze looked pleased. Jun most of all was now frowning.
“Yes. That means there will likely be an end to this war with Maelstrom.” Fujimura called out and I could see Jun’s tension ratcheting up.
“That does not mean we will stop killing them of course.” Fujimura added his eyes happened to be passing over Jun. “But the full out assault to push back the Maelstrom is over. We won. There will still be plenty of blood for those of you with grudges. But it does mean that the Kamikaze will no longer act as a fast response unit. You will all return home. Duties will come slower, and in smaller groups. You bled for your people. Kamikaze!” He said something at the end.
Something in japanese, that I just couldn’t figure out.
Stupid America brain. I only knew two languages, English and bad English.
But all of the Kamikaze offered a bow, as Fujimura did the same. Huh.
The rest of the little Cyberpsycho party was pretty boring. Fujimura went around to the group, some of them were told they would be returning to previous jobs as there was no reason to keep the entire Kamikaze group together during a peace time.
Jun wasn’t one of them.
Instead he was told the Dojo apartment could be his if he liked, but otherwise, he was free to return home.
The Jammer wasn’t needed anymore, and everything was going to sort of…
Go back to normal? If anything could go back to normal. If I thought I was feeling a little confused about all the changes that were happening. Jun looked like someone had tugged the rug out from under him down a massive flight of stairs.
He was just kinda… Staring into the distance.
I walked over since the borgs were milling around or wandering out of the room, and plopped next to Jun. I didn’t say anything. I didn't need to. He was feeling lost. His goal pulled out from under him. It’s okay Jun. We can figure out what to do next.
Together.
—---
I followed Jun around for the next while as he finally stood up and headed back to the apartment. Once he was inside he made to move back to his room but I finally spoke up.
“Jun!” I called out loudly enough to startle him.
“Motoko?”
“Take your time. Get some sleep, and don’t worry. We will figure everything out. I’ll be here when you are ready to talk.” I told him before walking over and flopping on the couch. He watched me for a minute before snorting, and then turning and walking back inside his room.
“Idiot.” He said as he entered his room, but I let that pass.
I was totally going to wake him up in a day or two by jumping on him. Let him get settled and not think about the revenge that was coming.
Until then I had some grinding to do. I really wanted another point in intelligence. It was time for the system to properly acknowledge my brain!
I spent the rest of the day grinding out alerts, but it was coming in a lot slower, plus Jun kept interrupting me with watching the TV which kept drawing my attention away from my grind.
—--
Another afternoon passed with me grinding away trying to get enough Intelligence alerts.
When suddenly my head started beeping.
I was getting messages. I looked at the small list of messages, some from Hiromi, mostly just talking about how boring her classes were.
But I got a few from Nox, and one from Judy as well!
*Nox: Got some clients lined up. No sales yet, like you said, but I’m putting out feelers!*
*Nox: Managed to snag a few more kids interested in your gigs, haven’t gotten any responses back yet!*
*Nox: Hey! Haven’t heard from you, that Jammer again? Gave someone a sneak peak, interest was super high! Even managed to get him on the line all four BDs.*
*Nox: Big day today! Word is getting around! The NCPD coming back is making things hard though. Might be slow sales at first. Since it’ll be dangerous to get around. Shame. If we could have the BDs on the market now all the people stuck at home would have something to check out. Haven’t heard from you…*
I nodded along at Nox’s messages. I would have to send him a text letting him know the jammer was down… Well for once I might want to hold off on that just yet, he was a Mox. So I continued on reading the other messages.
*Judy: Motoko, I feel like I was a bit bitchy last time we talked. Just wanted to make sure you know, you are welcome with the Mox. Regardless of your TC connections. I was just freaking out a bit.*
Oh. That was kinda sweet of Judy. I didn’t really feel that I couldn’t. I mean she had just been threatened by the TC with kidnapping. I’d be a little uncomfortable too.
As I was browsing through the sudden deluge of messages, Jun came out of his room. “Jammer is down.” He said suddenly as he walked past the couch towards the fridge pulling out a drink and hammering it down.
“Yeah, I just got a ton of texts. I’ll have to call Hiromi!”
“Do it after, pack up first. We're… going home.” He said and I actually whooped as I jumped off the couch. It would be sorta nice to return to normality, that and the jammer was such a massive pain in the ass!
I hurriedly gathered up everything, arms overflowing with my treasures, as I raced it down to the car.
It took a few trips.
With that Jun slipped onto his Kusanagi, my Quadra ended up being stuffed with junk that Jun had gathered since he left since he couldn’t carry it on his motorcycle.
Then we raced home.
Well Jun did. I followed the traffic laws, and at the first red light that Jun blew through I lost him.
Seriously Jun. I don’t care if your butt is made of metal, you are on a motorcycle, drive safely!
Finally I reached home.
I parked out on the curb, where Jun was waiting. I stayed with the car to make sure nothing got klepped as Jun ran up and down the stairs toting everything inside.
Then I parked in the garage and headed inside.
Home.
The streets were crazy busy, I couldn’t help but notice as I crossed the street, even more than usual. It’s like with the NCPD returning everything that hadn’t wanted to leave their homes were now on the sidewalks. That and I supposed with the curfew no one wanted to be caught outside after dark when the NCPD were feeling more trigger happy than normal.
I walked through the throng of people, some heading towards the Cherry Blossom Market, some to other shops down the street, and some just hanging out.
It was nice. The tense atmosphere of the city was gone, returned to this constant mishmash of people.
I ran up the stairs and entered the apartment to hear Jun shuffling around in his room. I peeked in and saw him going through a backpack of stuff. Slowly taking it out looking it over, running his fingers over the items and then putting them somewhere around the room.
It felt like a personal moment so I went ninja and slipped into my room without him noticing.
Ninja skills were useful for something other than on gigs!
Inside I shut the door and looked around. My bags and stuff were in a pile at the entrance.
I walked inside. It felt… Odd to be here. This had been my room since I woke up here in Night City. It wasn’t quite nostalgic, but it felt good to be here. I decided not to unpack anything yet, instead I walked over and flopped onto the bed.
I lay there for a bit just sort of taking in the familiar ceiling.
I was really lucky, without my ability to fall asleep at will, I definitely wouldn’t have managed to get much sleep. The constant NCPD sirens throughout the night meant when I finally did wake up, it was to a groggy Jun drinking some caffeinated drink he had grabbed out of a vending machine while watching the news.
Me though? After eight hours I was perky.
“Couldn’t sleep?” I chirped at him as I rose up and stretched.
“No.” He grunted as he took another sip as I sat up and stretched. Then I hopped out and cleaned up a bit before grabbing my new testing laptop.
I settled onto the couch cross legged right next to Jun as I slotted my cord in, and went to work on another set of ICE.
“What are you doing?” He eventually asked, distracting me a bit, but I kept myself from getting booted out of the Breach.
“Netrunning training! I’m getting used to breaching through ICE.” I told him with a smile, one eye on him, the other taken over by a screen displaying the ICE countermeasures.
“Huh.” He offered, turning back to the news and taking another sip of his drink.
Silly Jun. I would have to get him a pair of earmuffs or something, if he kept having trouble sleeping.
I was practically buzzing though. I really wanting to go out and do something, but knew it was a bad idea. So instead I fell back on what was my favorite activity when I was stuck inside.
Grinding!
Although…
“Hey Jun?”
“Yeah?”
“Do you mind if I mess with you a bit?” I asked only to have Jun slowly turn towards me, mouth still buried in the can.
“Whatever you are thinking… No.” He responded after a moment deadpan.
“Aww.” I whined at him. “You don’t even know what I was thinking.”
“And I know I wouldn’t enjoy it so no.”
“I just wanted to send my quick hacks at you for practice. You probably have better ICE than most people I would see on the street…. Right? You do have ICE right?”
“I have the ICE provided for me, and my ECM.”
Oh right. The tattoos were actually not just tattoos but a ECM system the Tyger Claws preferred.
“Preem.” I told him. “So can I quick hack you? It’s just Ping.”
“No.”
“You are boring when you are sleepy.” I grumbled at him, but went back to my Breaching…
Of course. He might not even notice… I looked towards him out of the corner of my eye and just before I managed to send the Quickhack his hand reached out and grabbed my face covering my eyes.
“Ow ow ow ow!” I hissed as he squeezed a bit.
“I said no.”
“I give! Surrender!” I whined not really wanting to start a fight with my laptop in my lap.
Plus Jun was obviously grumpy right now. And I wasn’t sure I wanted to mess with Grumpy Jun.
He let go and I sighed as he gave me a single look before turning back to the news.
“Fine. See if I ever act as a Netrunner for you. You’ll be like ‘Motoko! My beautiful and genius little sister, please save me by hacking into this evil mainframe!’ And I’ll just be like ‘No way you jerky faced older brother! You didn’t believe in your glorious and slightly eccentric little sister!’”
“I would never say that. More like Annoying brat.” Jun replied and that I couldn’t allow that. So I kicked him which unfortunately was a mistake.
Grumpy Jun had no chill.
“Okay if I offer a cease fire can I at least reach my laptop?” I mumbled into the couch from beneath Jun.
The jerk had literally sat on me, and knocked my laptop out of my lap in the scuffle. So I wasn’t even able to grind!
Trapped beneath my stupid heavy brother who was definitely eating too many burritos.
The fatty.
I managed to swivel my head a bit and catch his eye. Then I realized to my horror what I was seeing. Those weren’t my Nii-chans eyes. They were the eyes of a Cyberpsycho.
Jun was too far gone.
“No.” He told me smiling the look of a monster as he reached down and continued to poke my face.
I couldn’t even retaliate! He had managed to pin both my arms while I was still playing around!
“My Vengeance… Will be legendary.” I told him but he didn’t seem to mind.
A few minutes of my pleading getting nowhere, we were both interrupted by the door to the apartment opening.
My inability to grab a gun and do anything was the only reason I wasn’t pointing my Lexington at whoever walked in without knocking.
“Akari. The door was closed.” Jun said grumpily as he glared towards the door which is when Alari appeared in my view.
First she looked at Jun, then down to me, then back up at Jun.
Then she sat.
The bitch sat on my struggling legs.
“Vengeance.” I mumbled into the couch because I couldn’t even kick or wiggle with two heavy borg asses on me.
“Now now Jun boy, you should really knock on the door before entering my apartment. Got any more of those?” She asked, pointing towards the can of soda Jun was drinking.
“Akari.” Jun growled out.
“Oh fine. You are as always boring. Far too serious. But getting better since your cute little sister came around. How is she by the way? Not too flat?” She asked, but the fact I could see her wave her hands over her own plastic tits told me she was making a double joke.
“At least mine are real!” I hissed. “OW!” I yelped as she took a sharp nail and poked the bottom of my foot that was trapped under her plastic ass.
“Oh I’m sorry I thought I heard a-”
“Akari. Don’t stab my sister.” Jun said, sounding totally done with this as he stood up.
Freeing me.
“C’mon Jun b-” That was as far as Akari got, now freed I rose up, arching backwards, my knees digging into the couch as I slammed a bit into Akari’s side grabbing her shoulder wrapping my arm around hers and then flexing to literally toss her over my shoulder and off the couch.
Her absolutely shocked yelped was glorious as she went flying and landed off the couch in a massive thud.
“That’s for calling me flat.” I huffed a bit as I rolled a bit to get onto my feet. The Borg woman laying on her back staring up at me with a dropped jaw.
“Yeah Motoko does that.” Jun called out as he grabbed a soda and we both heard the hiss as it popped open.
Then he just started drinking.
“Don’t mind me. Carry on.” He offered waving his hand.
Asshole.
Akari though, instead of getting up and going on the assault, just started laughing.
“You really are a fearless little thing aren’t you? Last time I nearly went off on someone they started running away every time I met them from then on. Look at you, willing to literally throw me around? Jun, your cute little Imouto is gonna either get herself killed, or become a monster.”
“I’ll be a monster!”
“More like get me killed.” Jun and I said at the same time.
I just snorted at Jun being a jerk as Akari rose up chuckling still. “It’s kinda nice to be treated like a normal person again. Just be careful little Imouto.” Akari said and she was suddenly beside me her arm over my shoulders. “You might set me off some day.” She whispered into my ear.
“Akari!”
“Fine, fine. I’ll leave her alone. You big overprotective brother you. Fujimura-Sama is calling everyone in.” She said and Jun quickly put his can down.
“When’s the meeting?”
“Now?” She asked, sounding innocent, but Jun sighed as he instantly rushed for his room. Hurriedly getting dressed and ready.
“You should come too little Imouto. This isn’t a war meeting, so they are likely shutting down our little headquarters. The excuse of the gangwar keeping the dojo closed isn’t going to fly much longer.” She offered poking my nose with her thin claw like chrome.
Seriously Akari had this thing, where she had to be constantly poking or prodding, or stabbing someone.
“Sure.” I said shrugging as I slipped out from her claws and started getting dressed, if not as quickly as Jun.
A few minutes later I was following after Jun as he stalked to the dojo, trying to pretend he was put together, and not grumpy, running on barely any sleep.
Akari as usual, being annoying, but not to me this time.
Inside the dojo the main room was full.
The entire Kamikaze group were here, most were sitting seiza around as Fujimura stalked around. A few couldn’t sit that way thanks to wounds, or simply how their legs worked. But otherwise that was the room. The only one that wasn’t was Sensei.
He stood against the far wall. I decided to do like him, resting up against the wall, and not joining the group.
I didn’t want to let them think I was one of theirs anymore than they already did.
“NCPD have already done much of our job for us. Maelstrom has been pushed back. They were caught unaware by the return of the cops.” Fujimura called out suddenly as Jun slipped into a spot, Akari settling in nearby. There were nodding heads and sharp grins from the group at that.
“There has already been communication from the Maelstrom leader Brick.” He called out but this time only a few of the Kamikaze looked pleased. Jun most of all was now frowning.
“Yes. That means there will likely be an end to this war with Maelstrom.” Fujimura called out and I could see Jun’s tension ratcheting up.
“That does not mean we will stop killing them of course.” Fujimura added his eyes happened to be passing over Jun. “But the full out assault to push back the Maelstrom is over. We won. There will still be plenty of blood for those of you with grudges. But it does mean that the Kamikaze will no longer act as a fast response unit. You will all return home. Duties will come slower, and in smaller groups. You bled for your people. Kamikaze!” He said something at the end.
Something in japanese, that I just couldn’t figure out.
Stupid America brain. I only knew two languages, English and bad English.
But all of the Kamikaze offered a bow, as Fujimura did the same. Huh.
The rest of the little Cyberpsycho party was pretty boring. Fujimura went around to the group, some of them were told they would be returning to previous jobs as there was no reason to keep the entire Kamikaze group together during a peace time.
Jun wasn’t one of them.
Instead he was told the Dojo apartment could be his if he liked, but otherwise, he was free to return home.
The Jammer wasn’t needed anymore, and everything was going to sort of…
Go back to normal? If anything could go back to normal. If I thought I was feeling a little confused about all the changes that were happening. Jun looked like someone had tugged the rug out from under him down a massive flight of stairs.
He was just kinda… Staring into the distance.
I walked over since the borgs were milling around or wandering out of the room, and plopped next to Jun. I didn’t say anything. I didn't need to. He was feeling lost. His goal pulled out from under him. It’s okay Jun. We can figure out what to do next.
Together.
—---
I followed Jun around for the next while as he finally stood up and headed back to the apartment. Once he was inside he made to move back to his room but I finally spoke up.
“Jun!” I called out loudly enough to startle him.
“Motoko?”
“Take your time. Get some sleep, and don’t worry. We will figure everything out. I’ll be here when you are ready to talk.” I told him before walking over and flopping on the couch. He watched me for a minute before snorting, and then turning and walking back inside his room.
“Idiot.” He said as he entered his room, but I let that pass.
I was totally going to wake him up in a day or two by jumping on him. Let him get settled and not think about the revenge that was coming.
Until then I had some grinding to do. I really wanted another point in intelligence. It was time for the system to properly acknowledge my brain!
I spent the rest of the day grinding out alerts, but it was coming in a lot slower, plus Jun kept interrupting me with watching the TV which kept drawing my attention away from my grind.
—--
Another afternoon passed with me grinding away trying to get enough Intelligence alerts.
When suddenly my head started beeping.
I was getting messages. I looked at the small list of messages, some from Hiromi, mostly just talking about how boring her classes were.
But I got a few from Nox, and one from Judy as well!
*Nox: Got some clients lined up. No sales yet, like you said, but I’m putting out feelers!*
*Nox: Managed to snag a few more kids interested in your gigs, haven’t gotten any responses back yet!*
*Nox: Hey! Haven’t heard from you, that Jammer again? Gave someone a sneak peak, interest was super high! Even managed to get him on the line all four BDs.*
*Nox: Big day today! Word is getting around! The NCPD coming back is making things hard though. Might be slow sales at first. Since it’ll be dangerous to get around. Shame. If we could have the BDs on the market now all the people stuck at home would have something to check out. Haven’t heard from you…*
I nodded along at Nox’s messages. I would have to send him a text letting him know the jammer was down… Well for once I might want to hold off on that just yet, he was a Mox. So I continued on reading the other messages.
*Judy: Motoko, I feel like I was a bit bitchy last time we talked. Just wanted to make sure you know, you are welcome with the Mox. Regardless of your TC connections. I was just freaking out a bit.*
Oh. That was kinda sweet of Judy. I didn’t really feel that I couldn’t. I mean she had just been threatened by the TC with kidnapping. I’d be a little uncomfortable too.
As I was browsing through the sudden deluge of messages, Jun came out of his room. “Jammer is down.” He said suddenly as he walked past the couch towards the fridge pulling out a drink and hammering it down.
“Yeah, I just got a ton of texts. I’ll have to call Hiromi!”
“Do it after, pack up first. We're… going home.” He said and I actually whooped as I jumped off the couch. It would be sorta nice to return to normality, that and the jammer was such a massive pain in the ass!
I hurriedly gathered up everything, arms overflowing with my treasures, as I raced it down to the car.
It took a few trips.
With that Jun slipped onto his Kusanagi, my Quadra ended up being stuffed with junk that Jun had gathered since he left since he couldn’t carry it on his motorcycle.
Then we raced home.
Well Jun did. I followed the traffic laws, and at the first red light that Jun blew through I lost him.
Seriously Jun. I don’t care if your butt is made of metal, you are on a motorcycle, drive safely!
Finally I reached home.
I parked out on the curb, where Jun was waiting. I stayed with the car to make sure nothing got klepped as Jun ran up and down the stairs toting everything inside.
Then I parked in the garage and headed inside.
Home.
The streets were crazy busy, I couldn’t help but notice as I crossed the street, even more than usual. It’s like with the NCPD returning everything that hadn’t wanted to leave their homes were now on the sidewalks. That and I supposed with the curfew no one wanted to be caught outside after dark when the NCPD were feeling more trigger happy than normal.
I walked through the throng of people, some heading towards the Cherry Blossom Market, some to other shops down the street, and some just hanging out.
It was nice. The tense atmosphere of the city was gone, returned to this constant mishmash of people.
I ran up the stairs and entered the apartment to hear Jun shuffling around in his room. I peeked in and saw him going through a backpack of stuff. Slowly taking it out looking it over, running his fingers over the items and then putting them somewhere around the room.
It felt like a personal moment so I went ninja and slipped into my room without him noticing.
Ninja skills were useful for something other than on gigs!
Inside I shut the door and looked around. My bags and stuff were in a pile at the entrance.
I walked inside. It felt… Odd to be here. This had been my room since I woke up here in Night City. It wasn’t quite nostalgic, but it felt good to be here. I decided not to unpack anything yet, instead I walked over and flopped onto the bed.
I lay there for a bit just sort of taking in the familiar ceiling.
Argent
Well-known member
Had no idea this was here. I have been following it SB and is one of the best SI I have seen. You also have made the gamer stlye work. Way to many gamer fics waste over half the chapter as stat updats and ofrget the story.
I do like the reactions we have seen from the BDs starting to get around. It seem like the Mox and Judy mainly thought that Motoko was doing small time gigs.
I am also glad that Jun and the others are still around. Having the lager cast allows the story to feel more realistic. It also makes the world you are building much more fleashed out.
Also I am glad to have seen that your recent job troubles have not stopped you from writing and doing things you enjoy.
I do like the reactions we have seen from the BDs starting to get around. It seem like the Mox and Judy mainly thought that Motoko was doing small time gigs.
I am also glad that Jun and the others are still around. Having the lager cast allows the story to feel more realistic. It also makes the world you are building much more fleashed out.
Also I am glad to have seen that your recent job troubles have not stopped you from writing and doing things you enjoy.
Blasterbot
Well-known member
Poor Jun. His murdeer boner is getting blue-balled.
Argent
Well-known member
Its Cyberpunk plenty of place to get your murder on.
Worst comes to worst he can take a drive out of the city for afternoon.