Ghost in the City: Early chapter 216

When I exited the club I was struck with by the image of Sasha hissing and cussing as she actively was trying to breach into the club, despite… No, she was playing more than anything, like throwing rocks at a wall. It would send a message to Yoko every time no doubt, but it wasn’t enough that the defenses started up.

“Sasha?”

“Huh? Oh Kitten.” She stood up from her slightly hunched over position and wiped herself down like she hadn’t been doing anything weird before looking at me with a smile. “You free for a minute?”

I blinked at the sudden request and realized she said with actual maturity. She wasn’t kidding.

“Sure Sasha.”

“It’s still Neko-Nyan<3!” She reminded me, once more enunciating the heart, and I still flinched at her response. Her cackling didn’t make me feel any better. But then her kitten face smile shifted back to a mature look. “I’m happy you’re okay. I just… If you ever need any help you can call me, okay Kohai? I know I didn’t exactly give a good impression, and I’m upset at myself for that.”

“It’s fine Sasha. Like I said, that was more of a me thing than anything. I could have just left.”

“But you didn’t and I threw you into it. Sorry.”

“Okay. I accept your apology.” Again. But… “How's the arm?”

“Huh? Oh, yeah that.” She replied and I noticed she didn’t flinch to grab her arm or something like she had before. “Got a proper replacement. Flash cloned. Lost my scratchers, but honestly, I just like flesh and blood more.” She offered a smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes.

“I’m glad. I was worried about that.” I offered back and there was a moment where Sasha looked like she was going to deny what I had meant, but instead she sent me a bashful smile. 

“Yeah. I’m doing better. Maine complained about it, but most of the time I just do the opposite of what he recommends when it comes to chrome.”

“Yeah that’s probably a good idea.” I accepted, and looked around, we weren’t really surrounded by anyone but we were on a public server. No doubt someone was listening in. 

“I have something I want to ask you about, but not here. Follow?” She asked, and I took a moment before nodding. 

Then we were off, jumping off the Kabuki Roundabout server and then across the city jumping from net space to net space, until she sent me a private access code, and I slipped into…

“I’m leaving.” I said flatly and turned to do just that, but Sasha was there unable to grab me she still jumped in front of me and made a yowl like a cat.

“Nyoooo!”

I groaned and looked around again.

It was very pink…

And full of anime cat stuff. I like cats, I like anime cats, I don’t cover literally everything in them.

“Welcome to my lobby Nyah!” She offered, when I didn’t run away and even did a cat motion with her hands like they were paws.

I moved to slip past her and leave and she once more yowled.

“Nyoooo! Sorry! Sorry!” She begged and I sighed and looked at her. 

“Alright, we’re as private as we’re likely to get, what’s up Sasha?”

“Okay! Serious time. See? Serious face.” She pointed at her cheeks which were still fighting to shift into a smile.

I just waited. 

“Right, so… I’ve got a gig, Maine jumped into it, and it’s going nova for something easy to slide back into, but the client is a total Corp type, and wanted his pet netrunner to take part. You know how it is.” She grumbled, and I very much did not know how it was, but I just nodded along and made accepting noises. 

“Right right.”

“Right? So this total ugh type, she’s so uptight, anyway… She has a cadet Netrunner and totally showed off their teamwork! This kid is like Nova. I’ll admit, she’s definitely got some real hardware under the hood you know? But it’s not faaaaair!” She whined at me. Looking at me with big watery eyes. 

I just sent her a flat look “Sasha. The point?”

“Right, serious! I can do that.” She said and her serious face lasted half a second before she smiled. “Anyway, the gig is going fine, but I got a little heated, and made some remarks to the other runner. And I maaaay have a bit of a challenge on my hands?”

I blinked slowly, very slowly, letting Sasha know exactly how little I cared about this.

“Nyooo! Don’t look at me like that! I said, I’m sooooorry!”

“I’m not sure if you’re more annoying now or before.” I commented and I watched her jaw drop for a second before she went full pout mode, her cheeks puffing up and she glared at me with eyes that were about to start crying.

Which was literally something she had to choose to do, the avatar didn’t replicate tears.

“Kiiiiittten!”

“Sasha, did you come find me just to ask me to help you again?” I asked and she instantly shook her head back and forth.

“Nooo! Sashanyan wouldn’t do that!” She stopped and seemed to regain herself. “It was just coincidence Motoko, I was there to grab some data for Maine, and saw you and had to take my chance to apologize, you haven’t been answering my calls. You can ask Yoko if you don’t believe me!”

“I do, it’s fine. Okay so what is this challenge, and why do you need me?”

“Well… That old bitch! She said that since her having an apprentice was part of her talent that her apprentice could help! She tried to say I didn’t have an apprentice because I’m a scop runner… I just yelled that she was dumb, but… Pleeease! If you back me up we can totally derezz this bitch! She’ll have to apologize and everything!”

I looked at Sasha. I honestly wanted to just tell her, no thanks. That I wasn’t interested, because I wasn’t. I had my own things to deal with but…

“This netrunner that the client pulled in. Do I know her?”

“Oh, some uptight bitch called Kiwi… She’s alright, honestly, but she’s got this ego! Ugh!” I breathed in and out, a sympathetic response, as I wasn’t actually breathing as my Avatar…

“Okay fine, I’ll help.”

“What, really? Yes! Kitten!” She jumped around like a happy cat that was getting a treat and I just rolled my eyes.

I did want to see Lucy again, but more importantly?

I really really wanted to do something to Kiwi. She… I really liked her in the show. Cool trench coat. Mysterious mask, spider web chem skin, like she was cool.

Then she turned traitor. 

It was a complicated feeling, but if I could ruin her day by letting Sasha one up her? Well that was worth a bit of time.

I glanced at my stat sheet. 

Intelligence 14 (14) Due to Cyberization, Maximum value has increased by 4. 

-Breach Protocol 14

-Quick Hacks 9

-Programming 13 

That was… Solid, but nothing amazing. Not if I was going to face a top netrunner in some challenge, so I’d need to put in a lot of extra work. Maybe make a slight change and put a few extra stat points in just to really build my netrunning up. But that reminded me that I needed to know something.

“Sasha. What’s this challenge all about?”

“Oh, breaking into some corpo security. We each try from different angles. Pretty standard Netrunner challenge.”

“Oh… I can probably sneak into the location if we need.”

“Hiss! Bad Kitten! You can’t cheat at a netrunner challenge!” She cat scratched at me, and I continued to just look at her blankly until she stopped. “But uh… Yeah it’s not a good idea, the location is tight, but we can get in from the net for sure. It’s just a matter of who can do it faster and with less trouble.”

“Alright. Well I guess I’ll be helping you out then Sasha.”

My words didn’t get the response I wanted as she shifted to looking at me with once again teary eyes as she begged for something… I had no idea what she wanted.

“What?”

“My Kouhai! You should! You should call me Senpai! How can I show off to that nasty old hag without my cute Kohai calling out to m-”

“Not a chance.”

“Nyoooo!”

Motoko, Motoko why do you put yourself into these positions? I sighed, and just shook my head as this stray cat that apparently adopted me continued to badger me. This was such a stupid waste of my time. I should be leveling up like I had planned for today-

“Sasha.”

“Yeah Nyan?”

“I need a server full of Daemons to test some things on. You know of a good one?” I asked, and she instantly nodded and opened her mouth to tell me, but then her brain caught up and she shifted back to that look.

I sighed. 

“Please help me Senpai, you’re my only hope.” I said, maybe a little flat, but it worked and Sasha cheered as she once more bounced around. 

“Yes! Nyahahaha! Don’t worry! Sasha Senpai will hook you up!”

“I regret asking. I’m gonna go.”

“Nyoooo!”

—--

Sooo.

“Sorry Malcolm. You good still?”

Yeah Choom, just checking in, that was quite… An experience?

“Tell me about it.” I grumbled as I appeared at the IP address that Sasha had sent me.

“Welcome my Little Apprentice Kohai-Kitten-Chan!”

“Don’t call me that.”

“You wanted a server that has a lot of defenses? Welcome to the old No/Brainer corporate access server!” She waved her hand, shaking it around as if unveiling something at a circus.

“Okay? Never heard of them.”

“Course not. No/Brainer’s been scop for like twenty years kid.” She teased with a stuck out tongue. “They used to make agent progs. Stupid shit, but they had a prog called HusTool.”

“Hustle?”

“Basically. You’d sign up and it would connect the gonk doing it to someone that needed something ran. Packages, food pickups. All sorts of things.”

“That sounds…” Like UBER, or DoorDash. I didn’t say, but I got the idea.

“Exactly! Stupidly dangerous! What kind of gonk would run packages across the city for like 10 eds? You’re likely to end up walking through territory you shouldn’t be in, or some ganger sees you walking with a package. Easy mark.” She explained making a throat slicing motion.

“Right, and this server is theirs?”

“Yep! See the gonks needed a server that could process the calls and requests. All good, but they expanded a bit too much. They tried to move into Pacifica, and well the VD boys at the time didn’t like it. No/Brainer though they’d just harden up their server. Didn’t work, not really. They lasted a while until their whole corp crashed down, and then the server got bought up by a new corp but the server was fucked with by the VD.” 

Sasha waved for me to enter and I took that with a lot of hesitation as I moved into the server lobby…

“Wow.”

“Right? The server is still up, let’s just say one of the big netrunners tricked the current owners into not realizing they’re powering the thing, but it’s an absolute jungle. Not quite as bad as going over the Blackwall, but for just a random run? It’s pretty intense.”

I looked over the lobby. Multiple IMP’s wandered around, along with Static ‘turret’ Daemons, just waiting for an alert. I could see that the pathways out of the lobby were also pretty well secured just from a glance. That would take time to break through.

“Well? You wanted a mess of defenses.”

“It’s…” I didn’t want to say perfect, that would give Sasha too much credit. “Is there anything good on the server? Data or something?”

“Nope! There’s a reason no one comes here. Everything’s been pulled, this entire server is dead code. But hey, it’s what you wanted… Now can you tell your big Senpai Mysterious Neko-Nyan! Why you want to fight Daemons? Pleeeeease.” I ignored her and moved in, HEAT Bullet already loading. 

Time to get to wor-”Waaaaait!” I was halted as Sasha jumped in front of me with her arms out.

“What?” I stopped in surprise, not sure what she was doing but she smiled.

“This is the perfect chance for us to get a bit more used to each other! If we want to beat that bitch Kiwi, then we need to know how to netrun together… So let Senpai help!”

I blinked, and realized she… Yeah okay. This wasn’t just for me to grind some XP, but also to get used to working with another netrunner, something I hadn’t really done before. 

The Arena with Sasha had just been the two of us splitting up and that was it.

“Okay. You’re right. We should do this together. It’s a good time to figure out how to work together.

“Yay!” Sasha bounced up and down and then threw me a wink while trying to act cute. “Then as your Senpai-Sensei-Sama I’ll guide you in the first steps of working together as netrunners!”

“I regret everything already.”

“Nyoooo!”

—--

Sasha Yakovlleva

“ICE is down.” She called out and looked up, as Kitten finished off another Daemon giving Sasha time to break through. She stepped into the data path and Motoko joined her in moments.

Seriously even after burning herself out, she still tended to Breach Jump around like a rabbit.

Maybe Usagi-Chan should be her new nickname? No Kitten-Nyan was much cuter!

The path behind them closed blocking the resurging Daemons from following.

“That worked well.” Motoko said as always her Avatar had a tendency to look around, her eyes checking every corner as if just waiting for something to pop out.

“Yes! You’re little sight Daemon was cute. Wouldn’t mind trading for some data.”

“No. That ones private.” Her very uncute Kohai responded back instantly.

Mooooe! Always so mean to her Senpai. Not that Sasha didn’t deserve it, she looked away. She’d never tried to take another netrunner under her wing like that, but cute little Motoko with her obvious crush had just been too much to ignore!

Only for her to fuck it up.

She squeezed her arm and relaxed. All good. Everything was good. She was flesh and blood. It was her, and not a monster under her skin.

She wiped that thought from her brain, and focused on the here and now. 

“Next room will have a data moat. You ever came across one?”

“I know what it is.” She said but didn’t really answer the question.

“Nova-Preem! Okay I’ll get the bridge rezzed, and you just keep the Daemons off me, good?”

“Yeah, leave them to me.”

“Yay! Usually baby netrunners hate being on Daemon duty! I’m adopting you forever!”

“Denied.” Motoko offered back with her arms crossed, Sasha just cackled at the fact that Motoko was such a fluffed up kitten absolutely denying attention.

She should invite her to hang out in real skin. That would be nice. The door opened, and they both entered the next security room.

The data moat was just as she remembered a massive chunk missing from the bottom of the room, it wasn’t just a visual thing, even Motoko’s little Breach Jumps wouldn't be able to cross it, not until the servers bridge was reconnected. It was a literal hardware disconnect.

Turrets dropped from the ceiling. The IMP’s controlling the servers attack programs already opening up. While a Succubus also manifested.

Oh no! That was the old school fully nude ones! Good luck Motoko! Don’t fall for her Digital whiles!

Senpai Sasha was busy!

Sasha focused on her task, a Succubus was a bit much for most newbies, but Motoko was a bit more than that. 

Okay access node, entered, ICE bypassed, there’s the Bridge connection, but it’s behind a whole lot of protections. Whoever designed this room wanted to keep a netrunner stuck here for a while.

Sasha looked over and relaxed. Motoko had already ripped the Succubus apart, despite the Daemons four programs, it didn’t matter to Motoko’s speed. That girl really was quick. Not quite as fast as some of the best with a Keren, or Sandy setup for a real connection. Or those that went all out and got Deep Net Dive equipment. 

Sasha didn’t have that sort of eddies, or a hospital she trusted to actually do that to her.

Such was life.

Another ICE wall was cleared, and Motoko had wiped out the turrets, but the second wave had already activated. A small army of Soldier Daemons. They were battering down Motoko’s own ICE that she’d surrounded both Sasha and herself with.

Sasha had been ready to raise her own, it was rare to be able to truly trust your back on the net to another runner.

Sasha was going to have to give her Kohai lots and lots of affection for being such a good girl!

ICE cleared.

“Bridge is loading!” She called out as she rose up, and set her own hacks to wiping Daemons to clear the path.

Motoko’s rapid light hacks were very clean. Low Ram, high output, but Sasha liked things a bit beefier. She started loading, relying on Motoko to keep her safe, three seconds, five seconds.

Ten seconds.

Upload complete.

The wave of fire that exploded out of her hands wiped the entire group of Daemons, even causing some discoloration on the server walls.

“Hah! Take that!”

“Sasha… Don’t kill steal.” Motoko replied back, cutting the wind out of her sails.

“Wha! I was helping!”

“I almost had them all.” Her Kohai grumbled like a grumpy little kitten and headed for the bridge.

Oh no! “I’m Sooooorry!” She called out rushing after. She’d ruined her little Kohai’s big moment! She’d need to work extra hard to build up her confidence! Don’t worry Kitten! Sasha is here!

—---

250 XP Gained.

250 XP Gained.

250 XP Gained.

250 XP Gained.

The numbers flowed, and I was a happy Gamer.

“And here is the end! Like I said, just an old data processing server, but it has crazy defenses huh-huh! I was right, right?”

“Yes Sasha, this was actually surprisingly tough. It was good training… We work well together.”

“Hehe! Well next time we should switch jobs. I want to see how well Kitten does breaking down ICE instead of slaying Daemons.”

All I could do was nod, it would be a good idea, but…

“How about we call it here for today though? I’ve been on the net all day, and my choom has been watching for me.”

“Oh that’s so smart! What a good girl! Having a choom watching out for you! Aaaa! You’re such a good Kohai!” She squeed at me, and I once more got the feeling Sasha was sort of overcompensating a bit.

“It’s just a good idea.”

“Mhmm! It is, it is! I wish Sasha could trust Maine or one of the others to watch over her, but they’re no good.” She admitted, and I actually felt kinda bad.

Sure, it was a big ask to have Malcolm basically sit around all day, and I was kinda-sorta his boss as well, but he could say no, but hadn’t so far…

I would have to thank him when I logged. 

“Well thanks, Sasha, I appreciate this.”

“Yes! Want to meet up with best Senpai tomorrow? Oh! Or is that too soon?”

“Let’s say the day after at least. I have other things to do.”

“Yes! I’ll see you then okay?” She asked and I couldn’t help but send her an actual smile. 

“Yeah see you then.”

“Hehe!” We both disappeared from the server not long after and I arrived back at my Lobby, and logged out.

“Malcolm?”

“Here ‘Toko.” Malcolm called out as I rose up blinking my eyes and stretching. Malcolm was laying across a few chairs with the laptop in his lap as he played some game on his agent while he watched.

“Hey, uh… Thanks Malcolm, really. I appreciate you covering me.”

“Hey, it's cool choom. Seeing netrunner stuff is neat, and I don’t like the idea of you laying there without someone covering you anyways.” He offered as he sat up placing the laptop on the chair he had his legs up on as he rose up and stretched himself. “Oh man. I’m ready to move though.”

“Yeah me too. Want to grab some food?”

“Ah, I can't, I ate like everything. I’m stuffed.” I looked towards the bags of snacks we’d brought with and yeah he’d demolished it all.

“Alright, let’s get out of here anyways.”

“Definitely.