TOTALLY NOT DRUG TRAFFICKING

Thanks to Psyckosama and Skitzyfrenic for helping with this chapter.

Chapter 12

The baking California sun sat high in the eternal summer sky of Night City. Its reflection glinted off the waters of Morro Bay and the glass towers of the city with blinding brightness. This ancient ball of fire also washed out much of the Neons Lights of Night City; a reminder that despite all of the actions man had wrought on the world for good or ill, there were some things beyond their reach still.

With few stupid enough to actively stare at the sun, none noticed the small quadcopter flying in from the southeast. Nothing more than a typical delivery drone, one of the tens of thousands that could be seen flitting about the better parts of town, it was of course, completely out of place in Pacifica as it buzzed its way towards the small field of plants growing in the formerly asphalt-covered parking lot of the Grand Imperial Mall, using the sun as cover.

Tartan-clad guards surrounded the walled plot but using a combination of size, speed, and altitude, the intelligence directing it was skilled enough to avoid their notice. Small cameras and other sensors scanned the plot of land, taking in the rows of broad-leafed plants surprisingly healthy looking for the famously polluted and even irradiated soil of Night City. Nothing seemed unusual for them besides the odd nodules that appeared along the edge of the leaves of the plants.

On the other end of the line, the operator thinly smiled as he observed his quarry. Those very plants were the reason he’d been sent today, to deliver a very, very special package.

Taking direct control of the cheap little device, he placed his drone several hundred yards directly above the field and released his payload.

The packet was small, and at least to humans, completely harmless. Just a bag of powder and a small explosive charge designed to detonate about twenty, thirty meters above the ground. Not enough to even explode really, just enough to dust the potato field with a special gift they kept around for mom and pop operations like this that weren’t smart enough to keep their heads down.

Smiling as he finished his duties, and dreaming of what he’d do with the small but comfortable bonus he’d receive for this little operation, the operator’s world turned to pain as his implants began to scramble themselves in his skull.

This is your brain. This is your brain on Catgirl.

Any questions?

-------------------

I couldn’t help but stare at the young woman perching in the chair across the desk from me. Sasha had all but danced into my office a few minutes ago to announce that she’d dealt with what seems to have been some sort of attack on the potato field.

The girl looked like, if nothing else, an overpleased house cat who’d just been let in after scratching the door with a dead rat in its jaws.

“Sasha.”

She cocked her head and smiled.

“Was cooking the guy really necessary?”

“Biotechnica.” She chirped, as if that answered my question.

“You cooked a man’s brains…”

“Bio... tech...nica...” She repeated.

Something told me that was all I was getting out of her.

Sighing I shrugged my shoulders and said, “Alright, good job Ms. Sasha.”

“Bonus?” she asked hopefully.

Another sigh, and I pulled open a drawer and tossed her a hundred eddie bill.

The girl’s smile grew, and I swore I could hear a purr.

Considering how bizarrely catlike she was, I would not be at all surprised to find out she’d had some exotic work done to gain the ability.

“Good job Sasha.”

With a smile an a swipe of her hand over her hair, she stood up and padded her way to the door. Waiting on the other side was Valerie with a tablet in hand. The two women exchanged a wordless glance before the younger woman left after shooting us both a wide smile and a happy wave.

“That girl’s going to get herself killed one of these days.” Valerie commented as she entered my office.

“A hero and a legend, avenging her mother exposing Biotechnca’s malfeasance,” I replied with a sigh.

“Good way to go out,” V replied, approvingly. “So she’s that one who broke that painkiller scandal two years before everything I went through happened?”

I nodded. “She was, but personally, I think there are better fates than getting a drink at the Afterlife.”

“Like what?

“Old age at ninety-five and surrounded by twenty grandkids.” I commented. “Though considering modern medical tech, we might be able to drop the old age part.”

Despite us working like a well oiled machine, V was still an Edgerunner and a Corpo before that. Fighting like a wild animal for every scrap, living fast, and dying young was practically a law of nature for her. It was a cultural gap that lay between us still.

Not wanting to make a fuss over it, she simply presented me with the tablet and stepped back at attention, acting less the wife attending her husband and more the agent reporting to her superior.

On one hand, the coldness made me uncomfortable, considering the depths of our relationship. On the other, I did appreciate her professionalism when on the job.

With a nod I picked up the tablet and glanced at her. “Short version?”

“Looks like they dumped an especially virulent subspecies of Phytophthora Infestans, the Irish Potato Blight.” she frowned. “We might need to burn the entire crop and decominate the area.”

I smiled and shook my head. “Not going to be a problem. I’ve read the datasheet the company sent when I bought them.”

She raised an eyebrow.

“I can read, Valarie.”

Rather voraciously when I had the time as a matter of fact…

And while the documentation was kind of dry, those potatoes were actually pretty interesting.

“Disease resistant?” she asked.

“They’re less crops and more terraforming equipment. You could probably drop the damned things on Mars and come back a year later to scoop up dinner.”

“No concern about them custom engineering a bioweapon?’

“They’re proofed against anything short of a Life Eater Virus and even then it’s more the resulting fireball that kills them.”

She blinked. “Wait, what?”

“Different universe, different setting,” I replied with a shrug. “‘Exterminatus’ class Bio-weapon designed to break down all biological material on a planet to a highly combustible chemical slurry then autoignite, scorching the surface of the planet down to the bedrock.”

“Babe… the fuck!?!”

“When you have a million worlds to defend, just one is merely an unfortunate statistic…”

“What the fuck are they defending them against?”

I grinned. “What cha got?”

She threw up her hands. “You know what? I don’t even...” she paused and trailed off. “Wait. You don’t have access to that shit, do you?”

“Yes and no.”

“The fuck does that mean?”

“At least two varieties actually. Both virus bomb and biogenic weapons are on the list. Functionally the same, but just incase I want to go more 24th century and less 41st millennium with my ecosystemic apocalypse.”

“The actual fuck, Rob?” she exclaimed. “And what’s next, you’re going to tell me you can buy the fucking Death Star?”

“Of course not,” I snorted.

Her shouldered slumped in relief and she let loose a sigh while muttering something that sort of sounded like “Thank god.”

“Do you have any idea how expensive that thing is? Do I look like I’m made of points, woman?”

I couldn’t help it, it didn’t come out often, but I could have a nasty trolling streak in me I had to fight down the grin that threatened to spread across my face as I watched a part of her seem to die. Her eyes dimming ever so slightly.

I still wanted to smile even when she beaned me with that tablet. My superhuman durability shaking it off without even blinking.

With a pout she collapsed into the same chair Sasha had just vacated and glared at me. “Fucking gonk.” she muttered before taking a breath and schooling her features. “What next?”

“What next?” I asked.

“Even if it was a pointless attack it still was and attack on us. You can’t let that go unanswered.”

I smiled. “I just happen to know that Biotechnica released a flawed analgesic that killed people. Would be a shame if the local catgirl gathered the evidence and released it publicly.”

“You just said that’s what killed her the first time,” V pointed out. “You sure you want to risk it?”

“She went in unsupported and still managed to expose them before going down. She’s going to have her full team on support and a couple squads of our boys sitting in vans around the block.”

And it’d be the best of the lot, I’d seen how the lads watched her walking around the mall, or breathing, or eating. And the less said about her bending over the better... Pretty sure her fanclub would gleefully murder each other if they thought it’d give them a chance to pet her kitty.

Nodding to herself she looked up to me, professional mode back on. “Alright then. I’ll start gathering the resources and teams. Just tell me when to pull the trigger.”

“I’d like to wait until we have Kiwi and Lucy before going in for the kill. I don’t know how much of her success was skill and how much was luck, but I’m not sending her in without backup, physically or digitally.”

“Putting it to the top of the list.” She replied, “I’ll admit I was already looking for them. But with this operation pending I’ll make onboarding them a priority.”

I fought back a sigh. Corpo speak. Gotta love it…

-------------------

Faraday glowered at the environs he found himself in. Despite being located in City Center, the Braindance Club Empathy felt more like it belonged in some ratty corner of Kabuki. Normally he’d never be caught dead in a place this devoid of even the most vague pretense of class, but his contact had insisted on meeting here face to face. He was loath to say it, but he needed this woman and thus he had to allow her a few demands from time to time.

So he had agreed to the meeting place and just glared at the crude debauchery happening around him, nursing a glass of an tolerable grade of whiskey. Not one he kept in his own cabinet, but acceptably upper shelf as not to be offensive.

The music was changing to some thudding beat when one of his huscle jerked his head towards the entrance. Glancing in the direction the man indicated, he spotted an exceptionally tall ash-blonde woman with the lower half of her face covered walking towards him. Next to her was a young girl with silver colored hair worn in an asymmetric bob with a large but fashionable bag under one arm. Kiwi and her young protege Lucy, surprising to bring her for a meeting like this.

He was about to send one of his men to bring the pair to him when both women turned their gaze to him at the same. Their eyes both glowing at the same time. An atavistic trill of fear ran up his spine. A feeling he quickly tamped down using the indignant outrage he was feeling for having to be brought here.

Without a word Kiwi and Lucy made their way to his seat at the bar. To his shock both women walked right past him, Kiwi slowing down just long enough to say, “Booth,” before continuing to one of the Braindance booths that ran along the walls of of the club.

Rage boiled in his chest, the nerve of that bitch, giving him orders like that! Glancing to the man on his right he gave a quick order to the hustle. The large hispanic man left his seat and began moving in the same direction as the two, quickly walking past them and then in front of them so as to lead the way. Faraday and the big blond who was his other guard followed behind. The guard keeping a hand on his weapon, Faraday’s brows furrowed as he entertained the many, many ways he could hurt Kiwi for insulting him like this. Perhaps Jimmy Kurosaki could use a pair of new starlets for his next big production.

“It’s important. We need the privacy,” Kiwi stated in a cold, level, matter of fact tone. Faraday accepted the explanation, but it had better be important to drag him down to this dump and speak to him like that. All is forgiven… for now…

Once the five were ensconced in a soundproof booth, the hustle still standing and clearly keeping their hands in their coats and on their concealed pistols. Kiwi was leaning back against the back of her bench while young Lucy just sat upright, the large bag under one arm. Faraday idly wondered why she’d brought the thing, a quick scan showed it to be empty. But Kiwi broke his train of thought when she pushed a small shard forward, “There’s a hit out on you. 100k.”

Everything seemed to grind to a halt, the music faded to nothing, and the bright colors of the club turned sepia, the blood running through his veins turned to ice. Faraday struggled to comprehend the Netrunner’s words. A hit on him? For a 100k? “What?” He choked out. “Why?”

A sudden thought came to him and he glanced to his two bodyguards. Their faces showed nothing but stunned surprise, but Faraday knew better than many in this city the sorts of things people would do for 100,000 eddies. What he would do for 100,000 eddies.

Triple your rates… He quickly messaged both men before turning back to Kiwi. “You better have evidence for this Kiwi.”

Kiwi kept calm at the fixer’s obvious distress as she gestured to the shard. “Deets are all there on the shard.”

Hands shaking, Faraday grabbed the shard, mind too distracted to even let one of his men check the thing as was procedure for him.

The instant the shard clicked into his slot realized he’d fucked up as walls of red text rolled across his vision and his body froze into place.

“YOU BITCH!” is what he wanted to roar as he pulled out his pistol and put a dozen bullets into that blonde slut’s half-chromed face. Instead he could only sit there, only silently watch his two guards seize in place then collapse like boneless fish, smoke erupting from their heads as their chrome cooked the meat in their skulls.

Faraday could still move his eyes so he turned from his dying hustle and instead watched the younger woman’s eyes flash red while at the same time a long string of monowire spooled out from her wrists. He’d heard she was a deft hand at quick hacks. Now he’d gotten to see it in person. He’d laugh if he could.

The last thing he ever saw was Kiwi placing the bag over his head while he felt the red hot monowire loop around his neck.

“I’d say nothing personal.” Kiwi said, “But you always were a prick.”

Then his world turned to pain as it flipped upside down.

And then there was nothing.

-------------

I was sitting at my desk, looking over the digital forms needed to sign two individuals up for Trauma Team service on behalf of one Gloria Martinez. While normally I’d delegate this, I wanted to make damned sure that every I was crossed, every T was dotted, and that there was no way in hell that anyone would mistake this for anything except my direct personal intervention.

I was going to try and hire her, of course, but it was always nice to have contingencies. Lets just say, that this time, they wouldn’t be leaving them in the car...

My phone chimed.

I looked at the table.

Not my agent.

My phone.

Sighing I reached into an empty pocket, and pulled out that same single button device. The screen was lit up as a message said,

Characters saved, points added!

David Martinez: Five Points!

Rebecca: Five Points!

Kiwi: Five Points!

Maine: Five Points!

Dorio: Five Points!

5 rescues, 5 points each for a total of 25 points. Guardian Angel Challenge has been maxed out. No more points will be awarded.

You now have the option to accept additional challenges!

Thank You and have a nice day.

I chuckled. The downside of being a wanna be mastermind bitch with chronic backstabbing disorder. When everything is your fault, either directly or indirectly, the fastest way to fix everything is to remove the one common factor.

I glanced back at the tablet for the Trauma Team contract. Everything was ready. I just needed to sign. With five people already ‘rescued’ this was technically superfluous. And just a waste of Eddies…

I pushed accept.

Sometimes it wasn’t the money or the points.

Now for the purchase.

“V, please come into my office.”

A minute later V walked into my office, her hair in disarray as she had been napping on a couch we had scrounged from somewhere and place outside of my quarters. With a yawn and stretch she blearly asked, “Yeah Rob? What is it?”

“I need your help with a job interview.” I answered cryptically.

She stared at me a bit harder as the sleep faded from her brain and she took in my words. “Alright… but what do you need me for?”

“Because you speak her language.”

“And what language is that.”

“Corpo.”

Her eyes actually sparkled when she realized what I was talking about. “So we have the points now?”

“We have the points. Seems Faraday was a bad, bad boy.” I replied with a grin.

She blinked in surprise, “Faraday? As in Pacifica’s number one fixer Faraday?”

“That’s the one.”

She did not seem as happy anymore, staring at me she asked, “What the fuck did you do?”

“I might have called out a hit on the four-eyed freak.” I replied, not so confident about my cunning plan anymore.

“You called a hit out on a fixer? A high ranking fixer?” Her voice was getting louder with every word.

“Twenty-five points. You cost twenty.”

She pouted. “Okay, I see your point but, you know, way to make a girl feel special. You’re not upgrading are you?”

“What’s there to upgrade? We agreed we needed a proper administrator, I know just the girl, and this was a quick and easy way to get her. Now let me summon her and you can fill her in on what we need her to do in a language she understands.”

V nodded. “Alright. And once I’ve briefed her in, maybe we can try and clean up the mess you just made.”

With that I swiped the screen and brought up the appropriate menu, scrolling down to the picture of the girl in question and tapping it.

A confirmation screen.

I tapped it again.

A second confirmation screen to confirm that I’d confirm and remind me there we no refunds.

“You know, if only microtransactions were this secure...”

“Get on with it.”

“I’m trying, I’m trying...,” I grumbled as I kept hammering the display.

Finally confirming my purchase, fifteen points vanished from my account. A moment later, light, sound, and sparkles filled the room, not unlike a transporter from Star Trek as a small, feminine form appeared from nowhere..

V’s eyes narrowed as she rounded on me. “Rob, what the fuck is this?”