Ghost in the City: Early Chapter 220

We were making good progress and frankly there was a lot of stuff. Ichi was actually considering heading out with his van and coming back with the Behemoth and Hiromi was angling for that, but I kind of wanted to just get the good stuff and get out.

I took a break from grabbing loot to head to my Quadra, my old Shard literally didn’t work anymore, and that alone pissed me off all over again. I’d ended up breaking into my own car just to figure out what the hell had happened. 

That device the gonk that stole my car had, really was a shard writer, it reset the vehicle to a new shard, basically re-keying the car. 

The fact was my old shard really was useless. I had to flash a new shard as I wasn’t sure which of the gonks had actually kept my car's new shard and I didn’t want to find out. 

Re-keying my car took a while and when I finally opened the car I rolled my eyes at the mess inside.

The fucker had obviously been going through some shit, mostly my grenade box was opened, and from the way it looked… I’d put money on him realizing it was a bunch of grenades and doing everything possible to ignore that fact.

People were so squeamish about explosives in the same car as them.

But there was something missing.

“Tachikoma?” I’d set it on guard mode, but… Where was it? I reached out with the control shard and it did instantly connect which had me relaxing, but when I looked through the Tachikoma’s eyes I could only see darkness…

I bent down and stuck my head entirely under the seat.

“How did you get back there?” I couldn’t help but wonder as it was not just under the seat stuck as it struggled weakly trying to move, but was even upside down.

I reached in and with a bit of untangling got it free and flipped back right side up.

It wiggled a little.

Hmm. It must have reacted to the intrusion on the car but… Got itself stuck under the seat?

“We really need to work on your thought process.” I told it, as I settled it on the passenger seat, and double checked my car's computer. The re-keying device was very brute force, and the last thing I needed was my poor car to fry its own computer. 

Thankfully whoever had made the thing was talented. It hadn’t fried anything, simply disrupted the normal system long enough to switch keys.

“All good choom?” Rebecca called out as she stuck her head in the cab.

“Yeah, I re-keyed my car, and thankfully nothing is fried or broken.”

“Damn. You said this was from a piece of tech.” She asked, and I pulled the carjacker out from my jacket pocket and handed it to her. 

“Wait really? This thing stole your car?”

“Yeah it took a bit, it needs to break the security and then slowly convince the car that a new shard is the key, but that’s what it does.”

“Huh.” Rebecca whispered, folding it over in her hands as she looked at it in interest.

“You want it?” I offered, because that was a greedy look on her face alright.

“Wait really? You sure?”

“I don’t need it Becca, if I want to break into a car and steal it I just break into it and steal it. That thing would take like ten twenty minutes minimum on most vehicles, and I doubt it’ll work on the real top of the line stuff. Malcolm’s Caliburn is safe.”

“Heh. I bet he’d shit his pants if I pulled up one day driving his baby.” Becca whispered evilly, and I couldn’t help but giggle at the thought. 

“No stealing Malcolms baby, I really don’t want to get a call from him freaking out. Again.”

“Alright alright. Thanks Choom. I mean I got my own car now, but…” She grinned a bit evilly. “There’s this one car I’ve had my eyes on, but never really had the eddies for you know?”

“Just don’t get caught, or better yet have some backup or something.”

“Nah I know the owner. A real asshole. Used to make fun of me for always walking when Pilar took the car.”

“Ah. Revenge. Got it.”

The moment was ruined as I heard a heavy engine rumbling getting close suddenly. Rebecca instantly reacted, rushing to grab her HMG while I stood up to see what was happening.

BARGHEST was here. 

The former Militech soldiers had very specific colors and mods to their rides, and one of their rides just turned the corner onto the ramp down into the construction site. The thing looked like someone took a truck, put a Van on top of the frame, and then stuffed it with armor and weapons.

Dangerous.

Very dangerous.

Ichi, Malcolm, we have company of the unfriendly variety. I called out to the both of them on our call channel, and then casually took a position at the back of the Quadra leaning against it as I watched the vehicle slow down, and a few Barghest guards clambered out.

Kids. They were basically kids. Not that much older than I was. Three boys touting Copperheads and body armor to try and look mature. But I doubt any of them could even shave, and one older guy. Definitely an actual soldier. He had the look in his eyes.

“Evening.” I called out loud enough for them to hear as I continued to lean against the back of the Quadra.

“You’re not Daniil, or a member of his group.” The big guy called out, he was carrying a nice Crusher, the Militech Shotgun. Definitely modded out too.

“Nope.” I responded just as calmly. “If you’re talking about the scav group that used to live here, they came down with an unfortunate case of dying horribly.” My words had the intended effect. The old soldier didn’t bat an eye, but the three kids were pointing out the dead bodies still lying out where they had fallen.

Joking around and whispering to each other about the bodies.

“Focus up!” The old man snapped, and the kids went rigid, their joking ending, and their guns all settling into grips ready to fire if needed.

Good training, but not that good. 

I’d been hacking them from the moment they stepped out of their beast of a rig after all.

The big guy stepped closer, close enough we were no longer shouting at each other, and he looked me up and down.

There was a flicker in his face. No doubt he was trying to square the situation. Teenage girl with a lot of chrome sitting in the middle of a former Scav base that was now a graveyard.

His brain was no doubt fighting against the reality of what was in front of him.

To my surprise, he nodded simply. 

“Not gonna ask why you felt the need, not my bizz, not Barghests bizz, but they were affiliates. Taking ‘em out? That’s gonna cost you.” He rumbled out in a gravely voice.

Was this guy trying to get eddies out of me or something?

“Not sure what you want, these gonks stole from me, I came back to collect. Far as I’m concerned, the business is done. If Barghest wants something, then Barghest is going to need to be frank about what, and why. Cause I’m just not seeing where they would get a cut.”

“Heh. You just came to clear out all these slime fucks, without a Fixer? That’s not very smart.”

“They stole from me.” I repeated and the man actually had a smirk on his face at my words. 

“Hmm I can respect that. Even appreciate it. Not like these scop suckers are worth much. But still. Barghest had a deal with them. We like to keep things peaceful. People that break the peace? Disrupt the way things are? It causes us trouble. We have to explain why something happened when things are supposed to be quiet, peaceful.”

“And what does Barghest want? Cause I don’t talk eddies or deals. The only thing I deal in is death.” I repeated, because I hated this sort of stuff. Just tell me what you were trying to rip me off for and we could go from there. 

Oh wait that actually sounded pretty cool. Good job Motoko! You said something preem!

The Barghest kids were chuckling at what I said, but weren’t taking me seriously, but the older man? He just nodded. 

“The cost for something like this is standardized. I’ll pass the deets.” He offered somewhat kindly, in the gruff manner the man had, and I got a text which had…

Actually costs for attacks and things on Dogtown grounds.

This was… You had to be fucking kidding me

“This is the weirdest shit I’ve ever seen. NCPD has never tried to demand bribes so blatantly.”

“NCPD are a bunch of morons. Colonel knows what’s up.”

“Alright give me a minute. I’ll send this to my numbers gal. This is fucking hilarious.” I sent the message to Hiromi, along with an explanation, and just continued to lean back against the Quadra.

It took a minute but I got a response back, and Hiromi telling me to give her a minute to look everything over.

So I just relaxed, waiting.

The soldier chilled out. Even though I noticed that his eyes flickered to Becca who was staying mostly hidden every once in a while.

“Don’t worry. If a fight breaks out you’ll be too busy dealing with me, to worry about her.” I offered to the man, and there was that flicker in his eyes of surprise, before his face broke into a grin. 

“Yeah, I think you’re right on that.” He gruffed out a laugh, and actually seemed to truly relax. “Never liked these assholes. Always caused problems, liked to grab people they shouldn’t and pretend they hadn’t done shit. Bizz is bizz, but I appreciate them being gone. Hell of a lot of gonks to flatline in an afternoon.”

“Eh. It wasn’t too bad actually. I had to rush things a bit at first, cause they had my car. Some gonk stole it from the Stadium parking lot, and I had to rush all the way here to make sure they didn’t sell it off, or start taking it apart. After that, it was just systematic.” I shrugged and my low key response gave me a respectful nod. 

“Hell of a job with just a few. You got what three, four upstairs? And that one with the HMG?”

“Oh they arrived after. I cleared the place before they got here. They’re just here to get a return on my time investment.” I offered, smiling at the semi-corpo speak. 

Hiromi would have been so proud if she heard me just then.

“Just you?”

“Just me.” I assured him, and the kids were scoffing none too quietly. 

“Don’t believe me?” I asked them and one of them spoke to me, only after glancing at the old man.

“Fuck no. You’re a kid, no hardware or shit. Those shitty arms of yours aren’t impressing.” The kid offered showing off his own left arm which was a pretty high end Militech prosthetic.

“I’ve never had any issues with my Condors. Good Militech hardware. Solid.” I responded back, and to my surprise the old man nodded. 

“Good replacements. Nothing flashy, but easy to install and handle.” 

“Exactly, and just for your information. I recorded a brain dance of the whole thing. Give it a few days or so, and it should hit the market. You can see for yourself what this ‘kid’ can do.” I smirked, although I guess I shouldn’t be too judgey. I’d been thinking of him as a kid the whole time as well.

“No shit?” He asked, and his buddies looked interested as well. But my eyes flashed as I got a call.

“Mind if I take this?” I asked, and got a shaken head.

Motoko! I got it handled, jeeze. How dare these idiots think they can try to push-

Hiromi. Focus please.

Oh Right. Sorry. Everything is paid, and not these extortionist rates. I contacted Barghest’s guest services and got it taken care of. Tell them it’s sorted.

“My number girl says everything is sorted with your guest services.”

“Tsk. Dammit Sarge!” One of the kids cursed. “Fuck that, I wanted to get paid!”

“Not how it works. I’ll check in and if that’s the case we’re done here.” The old man offered and I nodded, and then not a few minutes later he nodded to me, his eyes turning back to normal as he turned and headed to the vehicle they had come in on.

“Man! You’re so lucky! We’d have taken you out!” One of the kids offered pointing a finger at me, and making a shooting noise.

So I shrugged, popped open my truck and hefted out my Uragan. 

“Not if I took you and your giant target out first.” I explained and that caused all three kids to jump, and the ‘Sarge’ to shift looking ready to fight before I simply put my Rocket Launcher back in the trunk.

They hurried out of there, but not before the Sarge gave me a look with all sorts of meaning.

Ichi, Malcolm. Hurry up. I don’t know how much longer we’ll have for things to be quiet.

—--

After the Barghest thing we decided to pack up what we had and get out of there. Ichi Malcolm and Rebecca split off to leave Dog Town while I went to pick up Hiromi from the Heavy Hearts.

As I pulled up she was already waiting outside, which wasn’t great, I’d prefer if she had stayed hidden inside, but she walked over as I popped the door and stepped half out. 

“Hey. Sorry for the wait.”

Hiromi gave me a once over and nodded and slipped into the Quadra without a word.

Strange.

I got back in, and started off, Hiromi wasn’t on a call or anything. I made it to the checkpoint and then through before finally poking her. 

“Everything okay?”

“No.” She replied back, and that didn’t sound good. 

“Hiromi? What’s wrong?”

“This is my fault. You’ve been warning me about Dog Town from the start, and I blew it off. It’s supposed to be pretty safe, but Barghest didn’t do anything! They just watched your car get stolen and then!”

Hiromi fell into a quiet rant as I drove through the city. 

“It’s not that-”

“Motoko! It’s… You’re the one that takes care of things when things go bad, but I just ignored you, and so your car got klepped while I was left standing there with nothing I could do.”

“Hiromi, someone could have stolen my Quadra anywhere. This… This isn’t a Dog Town thing, and that pains me to say it because I have been warning you that Dog Town is dangerous… But it’s not that dangerous. Not really. I’m overblowing it. I know that.” I grumbled.

“Sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry. You didn’t do anything wrong. You still have my new chrome right?”

“Yeah?”

“Then it was all very worth it. Besides, we made some more eddies, and I had fun.”

“You had fun?”

“I had fun.” I confirmed smiling at her, and that thankfully earned a small smile in turn. “Now, are we heading home, or do you want to come with me while I bug Vik for a late chip in?”

“I’ll come with.” She said firmly, and I nodded. It was always good to have backup when going under the ripper's knife, even if I trusted Vik completely.

It was a quiet drive into Watson, finding a parking spot was actually the hardest part. The entire area was busy since the sun was going down and all the bars and clubs were filling up. 

This time, making sure my Tachikoma knew to actually alert me in case of any trouble, I set it up and left walking down the street arm in arm with Hiromi as both of us carried the bags of cyberware.

We got plenty of eyes, because not just everyone walks down the street with an arm full of stuff, but none tried anything. I still had a sword on my hip, and luckily the weapon seemed enough to keep everyone off.

Instead of going through Misty’s we entered through the alley entrance, as that was just closer to where we had parked the quadra, and entered down the old steps into Vik’s clinic.

“Vik!” I called out as I entered, breaking away from Hiromi gently to run up to the older man.

“Hey Kid. I was getting worried, I expected you here hours ago.” He rumbled out with that easy smile. “I’ve even finished watching the evening's matches.”

“Sorry! My car got klepped just after we bought the Cyberware, and I had to chase it down, and then well… No point leaving good eddies on the floor.” I explained with a happy smile that Vik looked a little discomforted by. 

“You alright? Any injuries?”

“Nah, the Scavs my car ended up with never even saw me. Literally! I used a new quick hack. It was fun.” I gently started putting some of the cyberware bags on the table besides Vik letting him eye up the chrome.

“Ooh. Now that’s a pretty piece.” He mumbled, looking at the Camillo. “Gen Four?”

“Yeah.” I confirmed as Hiromi walked over and placed the two pieces of chrome she’d carried in next to the others. 

“Oh? You really went all out Kid. Ex-Disk, RAM, ICE? Nice choice.” He mumbled, shifting a bit in his chair to look up at me. “That one does my heart some good. A good defense is better than more offense a lot of the time.”

“Hehe!” I couldn’t help but flush a little at the pride in Vik’s voice. I got praised!

“She only bought it because it gives her more RAM.” Hiromi whispered quietly half behind her upraised hand.

“Rude!”

“Hahaha!” Vik busted into a big chuckle at Hiromi’s snitching! “I figured it was something like that. It’s good anyways. Alright, kid let me do a full clean and check on these parts. Especially since you bought them from Dog Town.”

“Yes please! The guy we bought them from was… A bit sketchy.”

“He held an official trade spot in the stadium! He wasn’t sketchy!” Hiromi argued instantly, almost offended at how I considered her little trader.

“He sold out of the back of a van. Super sketchy.” I whispered, holding up a hand to cover my mouth just like Hiromi had done before. 

“Motoko!” She half shrieked and went to slap at me, but I avoided her attack and danced away laughing as she gave chase a little.

“Alright, this’ll take a few minutes. Why don’t you kids have fun.” Vik called out and I took the chance and ducked for the stairs Hiromi followed after me in a sprint. 

“You brat!” She shriek-giggling at me, and I laughed just as happily as I easily raced up the stairs even doing a flip at the top of the stairs to turn me around so I could see Hiromi only half way up chasing after me.

“B-Bullshit!” She groaned at me, pointing and I just laughed at her irritation.

“No way slow Hiromi can ever catch me!” I teased, and her face scrunched up in irritation.

“Slow Hiromi? Fuck that Motoko! Get your ass over here!” She snapped and charged and I just broke in laughter as I let her chase after me, never quite managing a catch.

Hiromi’s failure made her face get more and more red, and her hands curl into claws as she was definitely going to make me pay for messing with her. I stuck my tongue out at her, because if I was already in trouble I should definitely make it worth it!

“Motoko!” Hiromi screamed and started chasing, but we were both interrupted by a familiar voice.

“What’s going on out here?” Misty asked, sticking her head out of the back of her shop, and I realized we were probably making a lot of noise, if Misty had a customer that wouldn’t be very zen.

I smiled and made my move, Hiromi charging for me, actually hit me which surprised her, and so I grabbed her thighs as she hit my back, and spun around until she grabbed on and then once I had a Hiromi back pack I stopped and smiled at Misty.

“Hey Misty, sorry for the noise. Just hanging out with my Choom.” I offered and made my way over. Hiromi adjusted herself against my back even if her arm around my neck was a bit tight as she grumbled in my ear. 

“Motoko, and Hiromi, nice to see you both again… Want to come in?” She offered, and I nodded following her into the shop. It would be a good thing to waste some time with until Vik checked everything over.

—--

“Well it’s all clean now. Nothing too bad before. This Ex-Disk would have given you a nasty infection if you’d just stuck it in your head, and the RAM had a bug, but it was old. So probably wasn’t your sketchy trader.”

“He wasn’t sketchy.” Hiromi grumbled, and Misty and I shared a look and giggled. I might have been riling up Hiromi explaining the day to Misty and she was all grumpy about it.

“Thanks Vik. I don’t know what’d I’d do without you.”

“Well, let’s not find out. You ready for all of this? It’s a lot of chrome, and you were trying to take things slow.”

“I am. I’ve been taking it slow, but I do need to upgrade my rig a bit. I’ve got a netrunner challenge coming up, and I’ll need the upgrade.” My words didn’t really earn me any points, and Vik looked me over for a long moment, before nodding slowly. 

“Alright Kid. I’ll trust you, but you know if it causes issues, you show up here, and I can pull it without much trouble. Always better to handle Chrome slow. I’ll do my best to handle any conflicts, but this is four different pieces that all need to talk to each other.”

“I know. I think I’ll be okay, but I’ll take it slow.”

He nodded and patted the chair and I slid in, as he adjusted me up, to get access to my neural link, and then like usual his calm bedside manner took over, and he spoke soothingly, as he explained that he was pumping me with drugs, that would loosen me up to make sure I didn’t move while he was installing. 

Then after a quick pinprick as the drugs were injected I felt my whole body go loose, and he adjusted my head and started working. 

It was… Sort of soothing actually? I could feel it, almost from a distance, like dental work after you're completely numbed up. I could feel the vibrations and the effects of him moving my neck around, popping the access panels on my neck, but there was no pain, or real feeling of it. 

“Almost got the old Ex-Disk out. I’ll put it aside and you can decide what to do with that after.” He spoke into my ear, and if I could I’d have smiled. He could have it. It wasn’t much good to me, and I didn’t mind. 

I could feel my agent and system alert me to the cyberware removal, and my head felt a little empty for a few moments, before I could feel something else being inserted, and slotted in. 

“You okay Motoko?” Hiromi asked from the side, and I really wanted to smile at her or roll my eyes, but everything was pretty loosey, so instead I just sent her a quick text.

Motoko: :P

“I think that’s a yes.” She whispered, and Vik chuckled lightly, but I noticed it didn’t even cause his hands to shake.

“She’s fine. The kid’s a champ under the knife. A real chrome head if I’ve ever met one. It’s a good thing she knows restraint. I’ve seen a lot of kids like her lose themselves.”

“Motoko will never do that.” Hiromi argued instantly but she went quiet when Vik sent her a quick look I could just barely see out of the corner of my eye. 

“That’s what they all think. Don’t worry Motoko’s a good one, and I’ll do what I can to make sure she’s on the straight and narrow. You do the same? And she’ll be right as rain. Now let me get this RAM Upgrade in, you’ll feel a little pinch.” 

The RAM slotted and I felt the increase in functionality like someone just made my arm longer, or my hand stronger.

I loved it.

Yeah Vik was right. I was a chrome head.