Ghost in the City Cyberpunk Gamer SI
- Thread starter Seras
- Start date
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- cyberpunk gamer self-insert
What Jackie was actually thinking
'Okay Jackie, you can do this, your first real gig with Wakako, don't screw this up- why is the brat here? Does the girl just normally hang out around her office? Oh fuck, is she's, like, Wako's granddaughter or favored niece or something? That must be it. Fuck, if I let her get hurt on the gig Wakako will skin me alive and feed me dick first into a woodchipper!'
'Why is there goddamn fucking Oni in the brat's house. Why is she calling a goddamn merciless borged out killing machine one taco short of full cyberpsychosis burrito 'onii-chan'!? Stay still Jackie, calm your heart, no sudden movements. Those things hunt by tracking movement, right? Besides, if you as much as twitch a muscle, you are going to lose controls of your bowels and shit yourself in fear. And that will make him go psycho for sure. Just stand still Jackie. Stay still, pray, and it will all go away'
'WHY IN THE GODFORSAKEN FUCK ARE THERE ENOUGH HOMEMADE EXPLOSIVES TO BLOW UP THE ARASAKA TOWER TWICE OVER UNDER MY SEAT! WHO EVEN DOES THAT!?'
------
Next day, at Vik's clinic.
"I admit I don't often get requests like these, but sure I can install that" Vik said
"Thanks" Jackie replied
"But still.... 'reinforced colon'?"
"Don't even get me started."
'Okay Jackie, you can do this, your first real gig with Wakako, don't screw this up- why is the brat here? Does the girl just normally hang out around her office? Oh fuck, is she's, like, Wako's granddaughter or favored niece or something? That must be it. Fuck, if I let her get hurt on the gig Wakako will skin me alive and feed me dick first into a woodchipper!'
'Why is there goddamn fucking Oni in the brat's house. Why is she calling a goddamn merciless borged out killing machine one taco short of full cyberpsychosis burrito 'onii-chan'!? Stay still Jackie, calm your heart, no sudden movements. Those things hunt by tracking movement, right? Besides, if you as much as twitch a muscle, you are going to lose controls of your bowels and shit yourself in fear. And that will make him go psycho for sure. Just stand still Jackie. Stay still, pray, and it will all go away'
'WHY IN THE GODFORSAKEN FUCK ARE THERE ENOUGH HOMEMADE EXPLOSIVES TO BLOW UP THE ARASAKA TOWER TWICE OVER UNDER MY SEAT! WHO EVEN DOES THAT!?'
------
Next day, at Vik's clinic.
"I admit I don't often get requests like these, but sure I can install that" Vik said
"Thanks" Jackie replied
"But still.... 'reinforced colon'?"
"Don't even get me started."
Last edited:
Carrot of Truth
War is Peace
MCs nanobots made me wonder why no one has crossed Cyberpunk over with Deus Ex yet.
Blasterbot
Well-known member
there probably are a few. couldn't speak for their quality. I remember seeing at least 1 on SB a while ago.
Carrot of Truth
War is Peace
I haven't found any myself. I'm guessing it's because Deus Ex cybernetics are leagues better than stuff in Cyberpunk.
Chapter 78
Seras
Well-known member
After getting confirmation from Wakako that she had the target, we both got wired the eddies as I was driving back home.
“So what did you think?” I asked, Jackie had been quiet for a while, mostly just smiling to himself at the reward for the gig.
“You’re certainly the best overwatch I’ve ever been with. You helped every step of the way.” Jackie muttered quietly, obviously the big man was thinking.
“Yep, and I couldn’t have done it without you. Trying to haul that guy out by myself would have been a disaster. Like I said before, I need someone to work with. I’m best as either outright infiltrator, or an overwatch position. So want to keep working together?”
“Heh. Alright Hermanita. You’ve proven your point. You know how to handle yourself, even if I still think you are too young. What is that cannon you are packing by the way? When you fired that thing I thought my head was going to ring.”
“Ah! My Burya!” I mentioned as I pulled her out of the holster and passed her over.
“That’s… A big gun.” Jackie said, looking surprised at my girl.
“Hah! I don’t go anywhere without her… Anymore. Never know when you’ll come face to face with a borg that needs something with oomph.”
“Never needed anything bigger than my Nue personally.” Jackie said, slinging his pistol out and even twirling it on his finger.
Gonk.
But I was smiling even so.
“Nue are good guns. Honestly if I came across one while on a gig I would snatch it. But my Lexington is nice, it balances my Burya. I got the big loud hand cannon for big stuff, and the automatic pistol for small fry.”
“Heh smart. I’m surprised you can even shoot this thing. I mean, I’ve heard horror stories about gonks trying it without the right chrome. I know you got your arms, but is that enough?”
“Honestly? No. But when I first got it, I nearly broke every bone in my arm firing it… Don’t tell my brother I told you that, he still doesn’t know. Anyway, I figured out a trick on how to handle the recoil so I can actually use it.” I sort of rolled my right wrist showing Jackie. “It’s all in how you lock your joints and the give in your body.”
“Huh.” He mentioned looking at the Burya with a glimmer in his eye that I couldn’t help but laugh at.
“If you want to give it a try, I don’t mind, but before you go buying more iron, how about some new chrome? Those optics you got could use an upgrade, what even are they? My scan says Omicron Zeta Something or other.” I mentioned earning a chuckle from Jackie.
“Yeah my OZ Soul 3.0 They aren’t the best optics on the market, but they got the best soulful look, you’d be amazed at how many times these eyes got me out of trouble. Just a minute of my soulful stare works wonders, every time. With a bit of old boy politeness of course.” He said, chuckling.
“Gonk.” I could help but laugh. “I’m pretty sure a pair of Kiroshi would serve you a lot more.”
“Eh maybe. I’ll ask Vik about it sometime.” He said with a shrug and I let it go, we weren’t really partners yet. No point in trying to push things.
“Alright this is our stop.” I mentioned as I pulled into the parking garage of my apartment. “Sure you don’t want to celebrate our gig with a meal?”
“Next time Hermanita.” Jackie assures me as he reaches over and shakes my shoulder. “I’ve got plans already for tonight. Got a date.” He offers laughing and I smile.
“Oh? Girlfriend?”
“Of course! Camilla has been on my ass all week about going out on a big date, and I finally got the eddies. Have a good night Motoko.” He offered as he stepped out, but I was too shocked.
Right. Jackie wasn’t dating Misty.
They weren’t even friends yet.
Oh.
I really didn’t want to get involved in getting a gonk like Jackie dating his true girl.
Eh. It’ll sort itself out… Right?
—--
“Welcome back.” Jun called out as I entered the apartment.
“Hey Jun. You still around?”
“No work until tonight. You good? Your gig go well with that gorilla?”
“Pfft!” I burst into laughter. “What is it with you an gorilla’s recently? You called me that too.”
“It just fits is all.” He said as I joined him on the couch, he had been watching some TV show his feet up on the table. Letting me see the way his feet were covered in that grayish plastic that meant it was chrome, but hadn’t been covered in Real Skinn.
“Alright but out of the two of us only you look like a gorilla.” I teased him, grabbing his attention away from the TV to give me a grumpy look.
“I might look like one, but you have the personality of one.” Jun said bluntly and then turned back to the TV.
That…
Absolute asshole!
I punched him in the side which he ignored!
Stupid borg!
I punched him again, and again, tenderizing his side until finally he got annoyed and grabbed at me, which led both of us wrestling on the couch.
“You are proving my point!” He growled at me, but I ignored his words!
In the end Jun won the wrestling match and I retreated to my room to lick my wounds from once again being defeated by my stupid brother.
It wasn’t fair!
Flopping on my bed I looked around the room, at all the stuff that I had collected.
The stuff that sort of sat on top of the old Motoko’s stuff.
Old Tyger Claw junk hidden under guns or equipment I had nabbed.
I even reached under the bed and patted the Uragan case. Just making sure it was still there.
What was my next goal?
Probably jump back into programming again. I thought. I still wanted to upgrade my Reboot Optics, and Weapon Glitch hacks. If I could get both working, being able to interfere with multiple people at once, I would go from only being able to disable eight or nine gonks back to back before my poor Seacho couldn't handle it, to dozens.
Of course my programming laptop was out in the living room, so I got back up off my bed and headed out.
As soon as I appeared Jun noticed and raised both hands in knife hands as if he expected me to attack him!
“Gonk.” I told him before ignoring his presence and grabbing my laptop.
“Ah so you calmed down good. Wild gorilla- Oof.” He grunted as I didn’t punch him, just chucked a pillow into his face.
“Stop instigating. I have work to do.” I told him as if I was the adult and he was the child.
He huffed and ignored me though going back to his show.
While I dug into the program that I had found incredibly useful.
Reboot Optics.
My previous work on it made me cringe as I looked at it. I could do better, so much better.
So just like Ping I decided to just start from scratch.
Reboot Optics at its most simple was a virus. Infesting optical systems and causing them to reboot, or overload, depending on the chrome.
It worked, but it could be better.
There was something I had learned from using computers in the past. Most users had no idea what the tech they were using actually did, or how it worked.
They knew enough to use the basic functions they were familiar with and that is it. Any actual in depth knowledge was completely beyond them.
So rather than attacking the system causing it to reboot, which was a pretty common method, I wanted to hit them with a double whammy.
It wouldn’t work on every optical system, but the idea had hit me as soon as I started writing the program.
Inspired Programmer coming in clutch.
Instead of the virus just causing a reboot, it did one other small change into the system while it was rebooting.
It was going to set the visual brightness of the chrome to zero.
I hadn’t been surprised that dimming effects on optics were very popular. Being able to dim your eyes when things got bright was a common enough feature in most optics, and those that don’t have it, still had settings to adjust how the brain processed the image.
All I had to do was make it so the system when it rebooted would still show nothing but a black, or incredibly dark picture to the brain.
The normal gonk would freak out when their eyes suddenly rebooted, only to then still be blind when their system starts back up.
Sure all they would have to do is go into their settings to adjust the vision… Their hud system would still work as normal…
Unless I adjusted the color of the Hud to match the dimmed visuals…
Heh.
But I would bet money that most people didn’t even know a settings menu existed in their optics.
It wouldn’t work for long against people who knew what they were doing, but it would still take time to fix their eyes themselves.
Time in a gunfight that could prove lethal.
Sure the program was going to need to be completely remodeled to do the double load, but that just required a bit of work. It’s what good programming could do. Instead of ballooning the program too much, when I was done, my Reboot Optics would hopefully be even slimmer than the off the shelf shovelware I had been using.
And it could affect multiple people at once.
Of course unlike Ping, which had only taken a couple of days to program up.
Reboot Optics was going to take a while. There were no quick shortcuts here. Each piece of the coding would need a lot of attention to make sure it worked.
But thanks to my perks, not only was it doable, not only was it going to be amazing when it was done!
But it was actually really fun!
Watching my coding turn into a weapon. That image so long ago of me crafting a magical sword was stuck in my head.
I guess Inspired Programmer knew what I needed to stay engaged, because I was going to make the best magical eye gouging digital sword I could.
“Hey.” Jun interrupted me, waving his hand in front of my face making me look away from my line of code with a glare.
“What?”
“Been calling you for a minute. I’m heading out, got some easy work… Don’t stay up all night, and get some food and stuff. I don’t want to see you totally spaced out in the same spot again when I get home.” He ordered waving a finger in my face.
Like all teenagers everywhere I rolled my eyes, but did set an alarm in my hud.
“Alarm is set, I’ll eat and sleep. Be safe.” I demanded in return and Jun smiled confidently before patting me on the head.
“I’ll see you in the morning Motoko.” Jun offered and I threw up a thumps up in return which he chuckled at as he walked out of the apartment.
I quickly got up and stretched a bit and headed into the kitchen, a can of something sugary and carbonated was collected and opened.
Time to get back to work.
—--
I did end up going to sleep when my alarm went off, if for no other reason that Jun would bug me if I didn’t.
But before I could get back to programming, I got a call from Hiromi.
*Motoko! You busy?*
*Not overly?* I said looking at the laptop that was just begging me to come and finish more work.
*Great! Meet me at the Straight Lane Apartments?*
*What? You okay?*
*Course! But I need to talk to Richard and I would rather have my favorite bodyguard with me!* Hiromi teased, but I laughed because honestly it was pretty true.
*Alright. I’m on my way.*
—--
Like before the apartment didn’t have close parking so I ended up parking half a block away and having to walk.
When I got there Hiromi was already waiting outside, she wasn’t alone though.
The girls that had bothered me the first time I had returned to the apartment were surrounding Hiromi, and I narrowed my eyes. I remember how aggressive they had been to me, but if they were threatening Hiromi I was gonna have to give a beatdown.
I went cold and snuck closer, my boots going utterly silent on the concrete as I approached from the girls blind spot.
Hiromi of course spotted me, and I could spot how her spine straightened a bit.
As I stalked closer I could hear Hiromi speaking in a rush.
“-Not interested. Richard and your gang are a good contact, I’m not interested in putting out orders. Not my style.”
“Yeah? Well it’s not my style to listen to some corpo rat either, and don’t think I don’t know that, you got the stink of a corp all over you.” The smaller of the two girls muttered her shotgun in her hands in a way that made me twitchy.
Besides, Hiromi actually looked hurt from that. She was still sensitive about it, despite her origin not mattering.
Hiromi is Hiromi.
So before she had to open her mouth and defend her birth I was there. Chrome hands gripping harshly on the barrels of Shotguns and holding them down firmly.
“Wha!”
“Hey!”
“I think that’s enough… Mary right?” I asked the taller girl the only one that had given her name last time.
“Hey! Bitch, let go!” The smaller girl was fighting my grip on her shotgun, but she may as well have been a child. She was a lot smaller than me, and I had weight, and chrome on my side.
And an athleticism that put me far over the average teenage girl.
“No. You were bothering my choom, so I get to interfere. Hiromi? You cool?”
Despite the seriousness, Hiromi snorted at me. “I’m cool Motoko.” She assures me purposefully smiling at my words.
Cool was still cool!
“You can let go, we weren’t trying to threaten her.” The taller girl, Mary said, despite glaring at me for holding her gun down.
“Alright.” I agreed and let go of both barrels, although I kept my hands close to my chest.
If I needed to quickdraw my Burya I could fire before they bring the barrels up.
I was sure.
“Fuck. Spooky quiet bitch.” The short girl hissed as she backed up but seemed to look to Mary who just shook her head and despite seething, she didn’t attack.
“Why were you messing with my choom?”
“We weren’t messing with her. Just making sure she understood we aren’t her toys.”
“I never said you were.” Hiromi argued, obviously irritated as she growled a bit. “I told you, I’m just gonna be helping you guys get gigs, like a fixer. Richard is still your boss, you know the guy that agreed to work with me, and is expecting me for a conversation, that Richard?”
“Whatever. Just remember what we said.” Mary offered and turned to walk into the apartment, I glared at them as they walked to the elevator. Considering I had control of the system I had to stop myself from stopping the elevator somewhere and just getting them stuck in there for a few hours.
“Thanks Motoko. You saved me again.” Hiromi offered as she leaned in against my shoulder for a moment, seemingly taking energy from the contact.
“Yeah… Don’t come here alone again. I don’t like those two, they tried to threaten me too.”
“I think they are Richards girls… Or at least the tall one.” Hiromi offered and I nodded taking in the information.
“They don’t like that we are girls?”
“Yep.” Hiromi shrugged. “They’ll get easier to deal with as long as we don’t flirt with their guy.” She said and I snorted at the very idea.
Richard was way too much of a gonk for me to be interested… And Hiromi was way too good for him.
We ended up waiting for the elevator to come back down as of course the girls had gone up to the fifth floor where we were going.
The fifth floor, the level that the gang had completely commandeered for their own.
I hadn’t been there yet, only seen it through windows on the outside, or from the cameras that were around, and I hadn’t yet found out why they chose that floor.
But honestly it didn’t matter.
It wasn’t any of my business.
We rode up mostly in silence. Hiromi was psyching herself up and so I was just quiet support. There to make sure she was safe.
The door opened into a pretty standard apartment hallway. Trash was growing up the walls in places, but that was the norm for most apartments.
Waiting for us were the two girls, both looking irritated, and as we stepped off the shorter one spoke. “Follow us, Richard is waiting.” She grumbled, obviously annoyed at being the one to guide us.
Hiromi and I followed down the hallway. Most of the apartment doors were open, not that it mattered, holes were in the walls letting anyone see inside.
Or out.
Kids were all over the place, but so were adults. One of the apartments had an old lady in a chair watching the TV ignoring the group of kids in the apartment playing some sort of game.
Or the man that was in another hunched over a desk and working on fixing something or other.
I guess while Wakako’s original brief that the gang had kicked out everyone on the floor wasn’t entirely accurate.
We were led to a doorway that had been entirely busted down, the stupid bead curtains the only protection for it, and inside was…
Well a throne room wasn’t quite right, but a gathering place.
Richard was seated in what had once been this apartment's circular entertainment bar. But stools and tables surrounded the room, and many of them were filled.
As we approached Richard waved for us to join him in the circular couch which was empty except for him, and now us.
Well Hiromi, I stood behind her instead, just like the girls we followed had moved to stand behind Richard.
“You said you wanted to talk.” Hiromi offered instantly leaning back trying to pull off the badass fixer vibe.
Considering these were a bunch of teens, I think it worked.
“I did.” Richard confirmed, and I noticed all of a sudden that the amount of people surrounding him was a lot smaller than it had been that night on the roof. “Shit hasn’t been great since Morgan and V3L died. I’ve had a lot of people just delta on me, and some who have stolen from us. That last part is a problem. I want to get back some of the stuff that belongs to us.”
“And that is where we come in?” Hiromi asked bluntly, not sounding very interested.
“Right, yeah. The problem isn’t just that they stole from us. We can ignore some weapons going missing, I’ll consider that stuff square. But someone stole something a bit bigger. A vehicle. Morgans old car. I had taken it for myself, but it went missing, and Carter klepped it. Had someone get eyes on him driving it around.” Richard sounded pretty pissed at this.
Wait. Was this entire meeting because a street gang politics?
“You expect a gig like that to be on our radar? C’mon.” Hiromi almost mocked as went from relaxing back to glaring and sitting forward. “Why would we care?”
“Because. Your choom, Motoko, you wanted protection. Being able to leave your stuff in the basement and trust none of us mess with it? I can’t be disrespected like this and still be the leader.” He says just as blunt. “Unless I do something and soon, the gang will splinter even more, and then any deal you have with me, won’t matter much to whoever takes over the Straight Lane Apartments after.”
“Sounds like blackmail.” Hiromi said not smiling which was rare for the girl.
“Call it whatever you want, but I’m being serious. That’s what will happen if something doesn’t change.”
“Why not go after it yourself? You have weapons, people.” Hiromi pointed out sounding annoyed at the situation, probably more than I was.
“Carter went and joined another gang.” He said with a scowl. “I don’t exactly want to piss of the Claws.” Richard said scowling and I was surprised to hear that.
“No way this Carter guy managed to get into the TC in any respects in such a short time.” Hiromi argued, being a former TC wannabe Hiromi understand exactly how difficult it was to actually join the TC.
“Unless he showed up with high end weapons, an expensive car, and a group all willing to follow him.” Richard said, pointing out that Hiromi was wrong.
“How many weapons did he steal from you?” I asked interrupting for the first time.
“A crate. Some of the good stuff.” Richard said, scowling and looking away, unable to meet our face.
Must be pretty embarrassing to have your gang splinter and get a bunch of stuff stolen.
“Then what do you think we can do about it. I’m not planning on picking a fight with the TC either.” Hiromi offered, and Richard scowled.
“I don’t know! But that’s what’s going to happen, and since you went to so much effort to protect your stuff in the basement, I figured you should at least be told. Maybe you could do something about it.”
Hiromi sighed looking towards me and her eyes went gold as she called me.
*What do you think?*
*I think that we either need to find a new place to set up my Netrunning gear, or we need to get this gonk his car back.*
*From the TC? They won’t like that.*
*Well we have a few options I guess… We could just try talking to this Carter, or the TC he is with.*
*No way some street kid gives up a preem ride Motoko.*
*Then we could always just klep it.*
*That could lead to the TC getting pissed with us, if Carter did impress enough to get in, then stealing his ride would be like stealing from the TC.*
*Sounds like we need info. We should go talk to Carter and his boss. Figure out what the situation is.* I offered and Hiromi nodded.
“Richard, we will look into it, but no promises, but if we do return ‘your’ car, let’s talk about payment. And we don’t come cheap.” Hiromi said with a sinister smile.
Hiromi was going to leave this kid destitute.
“So what did you think?” I asked, Jackie had been quiet for a while, mostly just smiling to himself at the reward for the gig.
“You’re certainly the best overwatch I’ve ever been with. You helped every step of the way.” Jackie muttered quietly, obviously the big man was thinking.
“Yep, and I couldn’t have done it without you. Trying to haul that guy out by myself would have been a disaster. Like I said before, I need someone to work with. I’m best as either outright infiltrator, or an overwatch position. So want to keep working together?”
“Heh. Alright Hermanita. You’ve proven your point. You know how to handle yourself, even if I still think you are too young. What is that cannon you are packing by the way? When you fired that thing I thought my head was going to ring.”
“Ah! My Burya!” I mentioned as I pulled her out of the holster and passed her over.
“That’s… A big gun.” Jackie said, looking surprised at my girl.
“Hah! I don’t go anywhere without her… Anymore. Never know when you’ll come face to face with a borg that needs something with oomph.”
“Never needed anything bigger than my Nue personally.” Jackie said, slinging his pistol out and even twirling it on his finger.
Gonk.
But I was smiling even so.
“Nue are good guns. Honestly if I came across one while on a gig I would snatch it. But my Lexington is nice, it balances my Burya. I got the big loud hand cannon for big stuff, and the automatic pistol for small fry.”
“Heh smart. I’m surprised you can even shoot this thing. I mean, I’ve heard horror stories about gonks trying it without the right chrome. I know you got your arms, but is that enough?”
“Honestly? No. But when I first got it, I nearly broke every bone in my arm firing it… Don’t tell my brother I told you that, he still doesn’t know. Anyway, I figured out a trick on how to handle the recoil so I can actually use it.” I sort of rolled my right wrist showing Jackie. “It’s all in how you lock your joints and the give in your body.”
“Huh.” He mentioned looking at the Burya with a glimmer in his eye that I couldn’t help but laugh at.
“If you want to give it a try, I don’t mind, but before you go buying more iron, how about some new chrome? Those optics you got could use an upgrade, what even are they? My scan says Omicron Zeta Something or other.” I mentioned earning a chuckle from Jackie.
“Yeah my OZ Soul 3.0 They aren’t the best optics on the market, but they got the best soulful look, you’d be amazed at how many times these eyes got me out of trouble. Just a minute of my soulful stare works wonders, every time. With a bit of old boy politeness of course.” He said, chuckling.
“Gonk.” I could help but laugh. “I’m pretty sure a pair of Kiroshi would serve you a lot more.”
“Eh maybe. I’ll ask Vik about it sometime.” He said with a shrug and I let it go, we weren’t really partners yet. No point in trying to push things.
“Alright this is our stop.” I mentioned as I pulled into the parking garage of my apartment. “Sure you don’t want to celebrate our gig with a meal?”
“Next time Hermanita.” Jackie assures me as he reaches over and shakes my shoulder. “I’ve got plans already for tonight. Got a date.” He offers laughing and I smile.
“Oh? Girlfriend?”
“Of course! Camilla has been on my ass all week about going out on a big date, and I finally got the eddies. Have a good night Motoko.” He offered as he stepped out, but I was too shocked.
Right. Jackie wasn’t dating Misty.
They weren’t even friends yet.
Oh.
I really didn’t want to get involved in getting a gonk like Jackie dating his true girl.
Eh. It’ll sort itself out… Right?
—--
“Welcome back.” Jun called out as I entered the apartment.
“Hey Jun. You still around?”
“No work until tonight. You good? Your gig go well with that gorilla?”
“Pfft!” I burst into laughter. “What is it with you an gorilla’s recently? You called me that too.”
“It just fits is all.” He said as I joined him on the couch, he had been watching some TV show his feet up on the table. Letting me see the way his feet were covered in that grayish plastic that meant it was chrome, but hadn’t been covered in Real Skinn.
“Alright but out of the two of us only you look like a gorilla.” I teased him, grabbing his attention away from the TV to give me a grumpy look.
“I might look like one, but you have the personality of one.” Jun said bluntly and then turned back to the TV.
That…
Absolute asshole!
I punched him in the side which he ignored!
Stupid borg!
I punched him again, and again, tenderizing his side until finally he got annoyed and grabbed at me, which led both of us wrestling on the couch.
“You are proving my point!” He growled at me, but I ignored his words!
In the end Jun won the wrestling match and I retreated to my room to lick my wounds from once again being defeated by my stupid brother.
It wasn’t fair!
Flopping on my bed I looked around the room, at all the stuff that I had collected.
The stuff that sort of sat on top of the old Motoko’s stuff.
Old Tyger Claw junk hidden under guns or equipment I had nabbed.
I even reached under the bed and patted the Uragan case. Just making sure it was still there.
What was my next goal?
Probably jump back into programming again. I thought. I still wanted to upgrade my Reboot Optics, and Weapon Glitch hacks. If I could get both working, being able to interfere with multiple people at once, I would go from only being able to disable eight or nine gonks back to back before my poor Seacho couldn't handle it, to dozens.
Of course my programming laptop was out in the living room, so I got back up off my bed and headed out.
As soon as I appeared Jun noticed and raised both hands in knife hands as if he expected me to attack him!
“Gonk.” I told him before ignoring his presence and grabbing my laptop.
“Ah so you calmed down good. Wild gorilla- Oof.” He grunted as I didn’t punch him, just chucked a pillow into his face.
“Stop instigating. I have work to do.” I told him as if I was the adult and he was the child.
He huffed and ignored me though going back to his show.
While I dug into the program that I had found incredibly useful.
Reboot Optics.
My previous work on it made me cringe as I looked at it. I could do better, so much better.
So just like Ping I decided to just start from scratch.
Reboot Optics at its most simple was a virus. Infesting optical systems and causing them to reboot, or overload, depending on the chrome.
It worked, but it could be better.
There was something I had learned from using computers in the past. Most users had no idea what the tech they were using actually did, or how it worked.
They knew enough to use the basic functions they were familiar with and that is it. Any actual in depth knowledge was completely beyond them.
So rather than attacking the system causing it to reboot, which was a pretty common method, I wanted to hit them with a double whammy.
It wouldn’t work on every optical system, but the idea had hit me as soon as I started writing the program.
Inspired Programmer coming in clutch.
Instead of the virus just causing a reboot, it did one other small change into the system while it was rebooting.
It was going to set the visual brightness of the chrome to zero.
I hadn’t been surprised that dimming effects on optics were very popular. Being able to dim your eyes when things got bright was a common enough feature in most optics, and those that don’t have it, still had settings to adjust how the brain processed the image.
All I had to do was make it so the system when it rebooted would still show nothing but a black, or incredibly dark picture to the brain.
The normal gonk would freak out when their eyes suddenly rebooted, only to then still be blind when their system starts back up.
Sure all they would have to do is go into their settings to adjust the vision… Their hud system would still work as normal…
Unless I adjusted the color of the Hud to match the dimmed visuals…
Heh.
But I would bet money that most people didn’t even know a settings menu existed in their optics.
It wouldn’t work for long against people who knew what they were doing, but it would still take time to fix their eyes themselves.
Time in a gunfight that could prove lethal.
Sure the program was going to need to be completely remodeled to do the double load, but that just required a bit of work. It’s what good programming could do. Instead of ballooning the program too much, when I was done, my Reboot Optics would hopefully be even slimmer than the off the shelf shovelware I had been using.
And it could affect multiple people at once.
Of course unlike Ping, which had only taken a couple of days to program up.
Reboot Optics was going to take a while. There were no quick shortcuts here. Each piece of the coding would need a lot of attention to make sure it worked.
But thanks to my perks, not only was it doable, not only was it going to be amazing when it was done!
But it was actually really fun!
Watching my coding turn into a weapon. That image so long ago of me crafting a magical sword was stuck in my head.
I guess Inspired Programmer knew what I needed to stay engaged, because I was going to make the best magical eye gouging digital sword I could.
“Hey.” Jun interrupted me, waving his hand in front of my face making me look away from my line of code with a glare.
“What?”
“Been calling you for a minute. I’m heading out, got some easy work… Don’t stay up all night, and get some food and stuff. I don’t want to see you totally spaced out in the same spot again when I get home.” He ordered waving a finger in my face.
Like all teenagers everywhere I rolled my eyes, but did set an alarm in my hud.
“Alarm is set, I’ll eat and sleep. Be safe.” I demanded in return and Jun smiled confidently before patting me on the head.
“I’ll see you in the morning Motoko.” Jun offered and I threw up a thumps up in return which he chuckled at as he walked out of the apartment.
I quickly got up and stretched a bit and headed into the kitchen, a can of something sugary and carbonated was collected and opened.
Time to get back to work.
—--
I did end up going to sleep when my alarm went off, if for no other reason that Jun would bug me if I didn’t.
But before I could get back to programming, I got a call from Hiromi.
*Motoko! You busy?*
*Not overly?* I said looking at the laptop that was just begging me to come and finish more work.
*Great! Meet me at the Straight Lane Apartments?*
*What? You okay?*
*Course! But I need to talk to Richard and I would rather have my favorite bodyguard with me!* Hiromi teased, but I laughed because honestly it was pretty true.
*Alright. I’m on my way.*
—--
Like before the apartment didn’t have close parking so I ended up parking half a block away and having to walk.
When I got there Hiromi was already waiting outside, she wasn’t alone though.
The girls that had bothered me the first time I had returned to the apartment were surrounding Hiromi, and I narrowed my eyes. I remember how aggressive they had been to me, but if they were threatening Hiromi I was gonna have to give a beatdown.
I went cold and snuck closer, my boots going utterly silent on the concrete as I approached from the girls blind spot.
Hiromi of course spotted me, and I could spot how her spine straightened a bit.
As I stalked closer I could hear Hiromi speaking in a rush.
“-Not interested. Richard and your gang are a good contact, I’m not interested in putting out orders. Not my style.”
“Yeah? Well it’s not my style to listen to some corpo rat either, and don’t think I don’t know that, you got the stink of a corp all over you.” The smaller of the two girls muttered her shotgun in her hands in a way that made me twitchy.
Besides, Hiromi actually looked hurt from that. She was still sensitive about it, despite her origin not mattering.
Hiromi is Hiromi.
So before she had to open her mouth and defend her birth I was there. Chrome hands gripping harshly on the barrels of Shotguns and holding them down firmly.
“Wha!”
“Hey!”
“I think that’s enough… Mary right?” I asked the taller girl the only one that had given her name last time.
“Hey! Bitch, let go!” The smaller girl was fighting my grip on her shotgun, but she may as well have been a child. She was a lot smaller than me, and I had weight, and chrome on my side.
And an athleticism that put me far over the average teenage girl.
“No. You were bothering my choom, so I get to interfere. Hiromi? You cool?”
Despite the seriousness, Hiromi snorted at me. “I’m cool Motoko.” She assures me purposefully smiling at my words.
Cool was still cool!
“You can let go, we weren’t trying to threaten her.” The taller girl, Mary said, despite glaring at me for holding her gun down.
“Alright.” I agreed and let go of both barrels, although I kept my hands close to my chest.
If I needed to quickdraw my Burya I could fire before they bring the barrels up.
I was sure.
“Fuck. Spooky quiet bitch.” The short girl hissed as she backed up but seemed to look to Mary who just shook her head and despite seething, she didn’t attack.
“Why were you messing with my choom?”
“We weren’t messing with her. Just making sure she understood we aren’t her toys.”
“I never said you were.” Hiromi argued, obviously irritated as she growled a bit. “I told you, I’m just gonna be helping you guys get gigs, like a fixer. Richard is still your boss, you know the guy that agreed to work with me, and is expecting me for a conversation, that Richard?”
“Whatever. Just remember what we said.” Mary offered and turned to walk into the apartment, I glared at them as they walked to the elevator. Considering I had control of the system I had to stop myself from stopping the elevator somewhere and just getting them stuck in there for a few hours.
“Thanks Motoko. You saved me again.” Hiromi offered as she leaned in against my shoulder for a moment, seemingly taking energy from the contact.
“Yeah… Don’t come here alone again. I don’t like those two, they tried to threaten me too.”
“I think they are Richards girls… Or at least the tall one.” Hiromi offered and I nodded taking in the information.
“They don’t like that we are girls?”
“Yep.” Hiromi shrugged. “They’ll get easier to deal with as long as we don’t flirt with their guy.” She said and I snorted at the very idea.
Richard was way too much of a gonk for me to be interested… And Hiromi was way too good for him.
We ended up waiting for the elevator to come back down as of course the girls had gone up to the fifth floor where we were going.
The fifth floor, the level that the gang had completely commandeered for their own.
I hadn’t been there yet, only seen it through windows on the outside, or from the cameras that were around, and I hadn’t yet found out why they chose that floor.
But honestly it didn’t matter.
It wasn’t any of my business.
We rode up mostly in silence. Hiromi was psyching herself up and so I was just quiet support. There to make sure she was safe.
The door opened into a pretty standard apartment hallway. Trash was growing up the walls in places, but that was the norm for most apartments.
Waiting for us were the two girls, both looking irritated, and as we stepped off the shorter one spoke. “Follow us, Richard is waiting.” She grumbled, obviously annoyed at being the one to guide us.
Hiromi and I followed down the hallway. Most of the apartment doors were open, not that it mattered, holes were in the walls letting anyone see inside.
Or out.
Kids were all over the place, but so were adults. One of the apartments had an old lady in a chair watching the TV ignoring the group of kids in the apartment playing some sort of game.
Or the man that was in another hunched over a desk and working on fixing something or other.
I guess while Wakako’s original brief that the gang had kicked out everyone on the floor wasn’t entirely accurate.
We were led to a doorway that had been entirely busted down, the stupid bead curtains the only protection for it, and inside was…
Well a throne room wasn’t quite right, but a gathering place.
Richard was seated in what had once been this apartment's circular entertainment bar. But stools and tables surrounded the room, and many of them were filled.
As we approached Richard waved for us to join him in the circular couch which was empty except for him, and now us.
Well Hiromi, I stood behind her instead, just like the girls we followed had moved to stand behind Richard.
“You said you wanted to talk.” Hiromi offered instantly leaning back trying to pull off the badass fixer vibe.
Considering these were a bunch of teens, I think it worked.
“I did.” Richard confirmed, and I noticed all of a sudden that the amount of people surrounding him was a lot smaller than it had been that night on the roof. “Shit hasn’t been great since Morgan and V3L died. I’ve had a lot of people just delta on me, and some who have stolen from us. That last part is a problem. I want to get back some of the stuff that belongs to us.”
“And that is where we come in?” Hiromi asked bluntly, not sounding very interested.
“Right, yeah. The problem isn’t just that they stole from us. We can ignore some weapons going missing, I’ll consider that stuff square. But someone stole something a bit bigger. A vehicle. Morgans old car. I had taken it for myself, but it went missing, and Carter klepped it. Had someone get eyes on him driving it around.” Richard sounded pretty pissed at this.
Wait. Was this entire meeting because a street gang politics?
“You expect a gig like that to be on our radar? C’mon.” Hiromi almost mocked as went from relaxing back to glaring and sitting forward. “Why would we care?”
“Because. Your choom, Motoko, you wanted protection. Being able to leave your stuff in the basement and trust none of us mess with it? I can’t be disrespected like this and still be the leader.” He says just as blunt. “Unless I do something and soon, the gang will splinter even more, and then any deal you have with me, won’t matter much to whoever takes over the Straight Lane Apartments after.”
“Sounds like blackmail.” Hiromi said not smiling which was rare for the girl.
“Call it whatever you want, but I’m being serious. That’s what will happen if something doesn’t change.”
“Why not go after it yourself? You have weapons, people.” Hiromi pointed out sounding annoyed at the situation, probably more than I was.
“Carter went and joined another gang.” He said with a scowl. “I don’t exactly want to piss of the Claws.” Richard said scowling and I was surprised to hear that.
“No way this Carter guy managed to get into the TC in any respects in such a short time.” Hiromi argued, being a former TC wannabe Hiromi understand exactly how difficult it was to actually join the TC.
“Unless he showed up with high end weapons, an expensive car, and a group all willing to follow him.” Richard said, pointing out that Hiromi was wrong.
“How many weapons did he steal from you?” I asked interrupting for the first time.
“A crate. Some of the good stuff.” Richard said, scowling and looking away, unable to meet our face.
Must be pretty embarrassing to have your gang splinter and get a bunch of stuff stolen.
“Then what do you think we can do about it. I’m not planning on picking a fight with the TC either.” Hiromi offered, and Richard scowled.
“I don’t know! But that’s what’s going to happen, and since you went to so much effort to protect your stuff in the basement, I figured you should at least be told. Maybe you could do something about it.”
Hiromi sighed looking towards me and her eyes went gold as she called me.
*What do you think?*
*I think that we either need to find a new place to set up my Netrunning gear, or we need to get this gonk his car back.*
*From the TC? They won’t like that.*
*Well we have a few options I guess… We could just try talking to this Carter, or the TC he is with.*
*No way some street kid gives up a preem ride Motoko.*
*Then we could always just klep it.*
*That could lead to the TC getting pissed with us, if Carter did impress enough to get in, then stealing his ride would be like stealing from the TC.*
*Sounds like we need info. We should go talk to Carter and his boss. Figure out what the situation is.* I offered and Hiromi nodded.
“Richard, we will look into it, but no promises, but if we do return ‘your’ car, let’s talk about payment. And we don’t come cheap.” Hiromi said with a sinister smile.
Hiromi was going to leave this kid destitute.
*after a round of negotiation that leaves Richard gnashing his teeth in frustration*
Richard: "Fine, that's the final offer"
Hiromi: "Preem. It's a deal then" *they shake hands* "Motoko, do the thing"
Motoko: *calls her TC contacts* "Moshi moshi, Sensei desu? I need a favor. *pause* Well, not that important to interrupt the Kamikaze business, but- *pause* Thanks Sensei, you are the best. It's about a gonk kid called Carter, should've joined one of the junior divisions recently, had a fancy car and a crate of weapons as an offering, I kinda need the car back for a thing so- *pause* I appreciate it, but you don't need to send a message to every TC oyabun in Night City- *pause* -well yes, I will keep practicing the blade, no need to keep reminding me. How's Jun by the way, heard he had a job today. *pause* Good to hear. Anyway- *pause* -oh, done already? My thanks to the boss of that branch. *pause* -yeah, you can dump the body, I think they guys here can clean up the interior by themselves. Sending the coordinates right now. *pause* Of course I'll drop by on Saturday, I feel like I'm close to a breakthrough anyway. Bye Sensei, see you later! *ends call*
Everyone: *stunned silence*
Motoko: "Good news, found the car. It will need some deep cleaning of the insides, but it's going to be here in half an hour or so."
Everyone: "..."
Motoko: "...I forgot to use my internal voice when calling someone again, didn't I?"
Chapter 79
Seras
Well-known member
Hiromi and I left Richard at the apartments, the two of us piled into my car and I was driving a few blocks over to a Tyger Claw front operation.
From what Richard had said it was actually a drug distribution center, but it pretended to be a tattoo parlor.
Considering how big tattoos were with TC members. I was sure it was also a fairly active tattoo parlor.
I pulled up into the parking lot and couldn’t help but shake my head.
There were times I could forget that the world I was in was a Cyberpunk world. When the sun was out and shining, and the streets weren’t covered in homeless squatters, and trash. I could think I was just in a big city from a century ago.
But then moments like this hit me.
The parking lot was full of bikes. Mostly Kusanagi, but not every TC gonk drove one, they were expensive after all. The neon of the entire strip mall was bright covering the slightly rain soaked pavement in a neon array of color, there were people sitting around outside. Some were TC, some were joy toys, or just girlfriends of the claws.
A wild array of colors, and skin. Cigarette smoke blew around them creating trails of gray across their bodies.
I found a spot and parked, but I had done it all on autopilot, because I was completely distracted at the sight.
I actually stopped and took a picture of the scene. That was how picturesque it was.
“Motoko?”
“I’m okay Hiromi, just distracted, let’s go find Carter.” I said, stepping forward and leading the way up to the open door of the tattoo parlor.
I could tell that we were getting plenty of attention, eyes from all along the street were on us. Some disinterested, some watchful and guarded.
In the end it wasn’t uncommon for teenagers to come to a tattoo parlor, but the fact we weren’t wearing TC colors, or gear set us apart.
I ignored the couple of gangsters that were hanging around on each side of the door as I stepped in and made sure Hiromi was behind me.
The insides were covered in smoke and dark lights, the faint noise of the machines that were used to install the neon tattoos the TC loved buzzing in the background.
“Yo Girlys, what can I help you two for?” A large man with a smiling face called out. The fact he was covered in glowing tigers made of fire, and Dragons swirling around on his skin, the neon tattoos actually moving on his flesh was a little distracting.
Thankfully Hiromi was the one doing the talking.
I was just the muscle.
“I need to find one of the boys that works here. Carter? Should be someone new.” Hiromi offered with her best smile.
Of course asking about a single member of a gang? Coming from two girls?
“Listen if you need to speak to your boyfriend, or Ex boyfriend, this ain't the place for it.” The older man offered, trying to keep a big scene from happening at his shop.
I could feel my own nose scrunch up and Hiromi looked about as disgusted.
“Yeah not what this is about.” Hiromi offered with a look of disgust. “He klepped something he shouldn’t have. I’ve been asked to get it back. Considering he went and joined up with the TC, I wanted to keep it above board. So can I speak with Carter, or whoever his boss is?” Hiromi asked, trying to sound professional and confident.
But I could tell she was nervous, there were plenty of TC guys all surrounding us.
“Huh.” The older man said after a moment. He reached up and rubbed his chin processing what Hiromi had said. “Can’t say I’ve ever seen something like this before.” He offered before shrugging. “But Carter is one of us now. If he klepped something, it's now ours.” He said with a shrug, and I could see some of the boys hanging around starting to loom over.
Hiromi of course noticed as well, and I could see her will wavering a bit.
Hiromi still wasn’t great with actual violence, even with me at her side.
“I just want to talk to the gonk, get the car back, and we can get out of here. I’m even willing to throw in some eddies or something else for the time. Not like we care about the weapons he also klepped.” Hiromi offered, trying to throw out a lifeline.
“No.” The man said bluntly with no wiggle room. “Now get lost. This ain’t the kind of place you two are welcome in.” He said giving us a chance to leave, and honestly I moved to grab Hiromi to bail, but Hiromi had other ideas.
“Don’t be a gonk ass! Just let us talk to Carter so we can get the car back. Then we can delta. No need to be such a schizo!” She cursed at him, her anger obviously overriding her common sense. Hiromi was quite used to yelling at gangsters after all.
“I don’t much like a couple of kids walking into my shop trying to cause trouble for my boys.” The man jerked his head and the door slammed shut behind us.
Hiromi went suddenly quiet, I realized what was off. These guys weren’t seeing Hiromi as she used to be. Covered in TC gear. They just saw some Corpo kid trying to cause trouble. She looked at me, obviously growing concerned.
I just frowned, confused as hell. Were these idiots actually going to what? Attack us for coming to have a conversation about a stolen car?
Fuck. The temptation to start firing was there.
It might even be the right choice, but I had multiple things I needed to consider.
Hiromi being right there next to me in the line of fire. Future dealings with the TC going pretty bad if I shoot up one of their drug distribution sites.
So I shook my head to her. “Just play it cool, Hiromi.” I told her, as I closed my suddenly golden eyes quickly sending a text. Once I was done the guys were already on us. “You’re joking right. What are you trying to do? Kidnap us? You have no idea who we are. We’ve been perfectly reasonable with you.” I interrupted, trying to put the focus from Hiromi onto me.
“A couple of arrogant kids walks into my shop and starts making demands? I should be asking you this bitch, who do you think we are?” The boss asked glowering as he stepped up trying to loom over me, his face bending down close.
“Some TC mid level boss. Hey. You’re gonna want to be careful here choom. We came in above board, you won’t like what happens if you do something stupid. Make sure y-” I was trying to tell the guy not to hurt Hiromi.
I mean Arasaka parents wouldn’t be happy to learn Hiromi had been hurt by some TC stooges.
But the man stepping forward and punching me in the face shut that up.
“Don’t tell me what to do in my own business. Choom.” He said, pausing and enunciating the last word mockingly.
“That was rude.” I told him, wincing as my cheek pulled. He hadn’t hit me super hard, I guess being a teenage girl did have some benefits, but he certainly wanted to shut me up.
“Put them in the back.” He ordered, but I cut him off.
“Just so you know. I have connections with the TC. You don’t want to do anything stupid.” I called out before he could walk too far away.
So he turned and slugged me again.
Okay fine. Play it that way.
Hiromi was looking a little panicked after I had been hit, but I turned and gave her a wink.
“I messaged Jun.” I told her and she looked a little dazed for a second trying to process what I meant, before it struck her.
She almost was able to smile at my words, although her nervousness won out.
Yeah.
They searched me, pulling out my weapons including my Burya.
I would be getting that back. Of course the sight of my handcannon got some looks as they disarmed me. Upping my threat from teen to what the fuck?
Then we were both pushed into a back room, which was basically just a storage room and thrown into a set of chairs. A couple of thugs hung around the room glaring at us, but we weren’t left alone for more than a moment before the leader stepped in with a younger teenager behind him.
“Ah there is Carter.” I said in greeting. Hiromi and I had been given a picture of the kid from Richard.
“The fuck are you?” He demanded glaring at the two of us. “I don’t know these bitches.”
“They said they came for your car.” The boss offered and Carter went from irritable to ballistic in an instant.
“Bitch! You won't touch my ride!” He roared, stomping up to Hiromi and I.
Instantly I got his attention to keep him from looking at Hiromi.
I really would have to start killing if they touched Hiromi.
“Technically it isn’t yours. It’s Morgans.” I said and got the kids' eyes to lock onto me.
The fact he had them glowing red to look more intimidating, along with a TC style jacket opened on his back, with a bare chest showing off a pretty complete lack of muscles made the whole situation more amusing than anything.
“Bitch! It’s mine! Fuck you!”
“How eloquent.” I commented which to my lack of surprise caused the boy to react. Fist flung back I breathed out and tensed my stomach as his fist slammed into my stomach.
It wasn’t too bad. I coughed and overacted, but it had barely done much to me.
“That’s what you get, fucking cunt.”
“Carter. You don’t know these two?”
“Nah. I thought they might be that prick Richards whores, but I don’t know these two.”
“Surprising.” I mentioned as I stood back up after fake coughing. “I guess you weren’t there that night I killed Morgan and V3LOCITY.” I told him.
Carter looked confused for a moment before it seemed to hit him. “Purple hair. That’s right. The bitch that fucked up the Shooters. That was you huh?”
“Yep.”
“Heh.” He chuckled before predictably punching me again.
“Motoko!” Hiromi called out in horror as Carter punched me across the face.
That… That hurt a bit. My cheek was already stinging from before!
“I’m fine Hiromi.” I told her firmly as I rose back up, to glare at the kid.
“That’s for fucking up the gang. I was making a ton of eddies there, you know?” He said with a glare but I looked towards the boss.
“A punk kid that jumps to a new gang the moment the eddies run out. I wonder how reliable he is?” I mocked a bit.
“Enough! I didn’t bring you here to fuck up the meat.” The boss yelled just as Carter cocked back to punch me again. “Well girls you wanted a chance to talk to my boy, are you satisfied with the conversation?” He asked with a laugh, and I just shrugged.
My lack of fear thanks to Cold Blood, was probably odd, and Fearless Chill was in effect.
I was kinda of curious what their mind was telling them when they realized how utterly unafraid I was of them.
That was when the boss got a call.
I could tell as his eyes lit up gold for a second.
Then his eyes flicked around as he obviously spoke internally.
Then he went pale. Looked to me.
I purposefully gathered some spit in my mouth and hawked the bloody spittle onto the ground.
Bastard cut the inside of my cheek.
The room was quiet for a moment as everyone was waiting for the boss to act, but things stretched on, as he seemed to be in a conversation.
Considering everything…
“If that’s Fujimura, tell him hello for me.” I called out interrupting the boss's conversation and the way the man jumped like I just stabbed him I was right. I relaxed back, crossing my arms over my chest and throwing Hiromi a big smirk.
Although the fact I was probably bruising up a bit from being punched diminished the comfort it brought. So instead I just walked over and put my arm over her shoulder.
That seemed to help, a little.
“Fujimura-Sama is sending someone to properly resolve this… Incident.” The boss says looking a little pale, and I nod.
“Probably Jun. My brother.” I tell him and that makes the boss wince even more.
“I would very much like my gun back.” I tell him with a bit of threat in my voice and he jerks his head, causing his goons that had mostly been watching with sinister smirks to slowly walk over with my equipment, and the stuff Hiromi had on her of course.
Holstering my Burya and Lexington I felt much better.
“I did warn you that I have TC connections.” I told the man and he nodded quietly before rising up to this full size and bowing his head.
“Apologies for this mistake.”
I just snorted. “Let’s just wait a bit. I’m sure Jun is going to be sooo happy seeing me all bruised up… You’re all just lucky I don’t go out of my way to murder TC gonks myself.” I grumbled although only Hiromi understood just how much danger my words actually represented.
—--
In the end, Hiromi and I were seated back in the shop in comfortable chairs, and the boss had even had some men go out and get drinks for us.
The whole atmosphere was tense, and I was just willing to wait for Jun to show up.
Seeing Jun tear these gonks a new one would be pretty entertaining. Hiromi was regaining her spark, and I made sure to keep an eye on Carter who was looking pretty nervous now that the situation had so completely altered itself on him.
Finally a vehicle roared into the parking lot, and it was moving fast enough I bet it was Jun. Looking towards the door along with most of the people inside, I felt my smile slowly disappear into an irritated frown.
“Hey Akari.” I grumbled out as the Kamikaze Borg woman sauntered into the tattoo parlor.
“Hey Motoko!” She called out with a big grin.
Dammit. I had wanted Jun!
“And you! Kato-San!”
“Yes!” The boss of the place greeted the borg woman as he rose up and bowed to her.
“You fucked up!” She said happily and then slammed a fist into his cheek.
Ah, that was Akari alright.
“Boss!” The men around us called out shocked at the sudden violence happening to them.
“You touched something that doesn’t belong to you. Motoko Kusanagi, works for Kamikaze. She has boss Okina-Sama’s favor as well… For saving his life during an assassination attempt.” Akari walked over and to my surprise kicked the man as he was trying to get up.
“The hell! You bitch, the fu-”
“Shut up!” The boss roared at one of his boys that was moving forward to try and defend him. “Don’t interfere. Moron!”
“Ah see you do have a brain in there after all!” Akari said, smiling with her plastic face. “Motoko? You alright kid?”
“I’ll live. They got a few licks in, but I’m mostly irritated that they tried to kidnap us or something. Plus they did this to Hiromi. Can’t just let that one go.” I said and Akari just nodded happily.
As usual the woman did things in her own way.
“You should all be really happy! The Oni was so angry when he got a text from his sweet little killer-I mean Imouto that he almost raced right over! I got sent instead saving all of you from having your heads ripped off!” Akari called out laughing a bit like it was a joke.
It was not a joke.
Jun had ripped that borgs head off after all. I had even been there!
Of course the room was chilled at Akari’s words, but the boss was still coughing as he slowly rose back up.
“Kotoniki apologizes to Ane-san.” He offers going back into a bow.
It took me a moment to remember that Yakuza used sister and brother to talk about each other sometimes.
“Pfft. It’s not me you have to apologize to. Motoko here is Kamikaze, you caused some serious trouble. Last I heard, Katsuragi-Sama is getting a ‘Call’ from Fujimura-Sama about this. Fujimura-Sama doesn’t like people touching things that belong to him after all.” Akari said and while I scowled at being called Kamikaze I would let it go this time.
“Katsuragi-Sama?!”
“What you think touching a Kamikaze wouldn’t get your boss involved?” Akari asked, sounding amused. “But that’s not important to me. Motoko you ready to go?”
“Not quite.” I said standing up and tugging Hiromi up too. Walking her over to Akari. “Hiromi, Akari. She’s a bit crazy but cool. Akari, Hiromi. She is my best choom, and her parents are Arasaka. If anyone so much as scratches her, I kill everyone in this room.” I say rather bluntly pointedly looking at Akari and her tendency to poke people. “Keep an eye on her for a second.”
Then I turned and since things were cooled off slammed a fist with all my might right into Kotoniki’s face.
The boss hadn’t expected my own retaliation.
Nor had he expected a five foot five girl to hit like a truck.
Thank you body 7, Street Brawling 6, and chrome knuckles.
He went down in a heap, and unlike when Akari hit him he didn’t get back up.
Then I took another three steps before anyone could react and slammed a fist into Carters stomach. The kid had been standing nearby obviously too nervous to do anything until now.
I wasn’t feeling very gentle at the moment. I grabbed Carter by his ears and slammed his face into my knee. A crunch echoing out as that dropped the kid to the floor.
I wasn’t breathing heavy. I wasn’t gritting my teeth. As far as anyone could tell looking at me, I was completely calm.
And in a way I was.
That didn’t mean I didn’t bend down and punch Carter in the face again.
“That’s for calling me a cunt.” I grabbed his stupid jacket, and wiped my knuckles free of his blood and stood back up. “One more thing.” I called out to the room. “Where is the car this fucking gonk stole? It’s mine now.” I demanded and the room went quiet as everyone sort of wondered what to do, most of them looking to Akari.
“I don’t know why you gonks are looking at me. Motoko asked you a question.” Akari said with a deadly smile on her plastic face.
“Out back… I can show you?”
“Good. C’mon Hiromi. Let’s delta.” I grumbled, following the man out behind the shop where there was a back alley that had a line of cars lined up.
I recognized the car that Richard wanted and nodded.
The Thorton Colby Butte wasn’t exactly what I would consider an expensive vehicle. But I guess it made sense. The back end of the normal Colby was removed and turned into a truck bed.
Probably how the SLS had originally stolen all the shipments that they were so proud of. I popped the door, not surprised the alarm was broken, and after a few seconds found that Carter or the other kids had already hotwired the damn thing.
With a roll of my eyes I got it running I didn’t even need to actually rely on my limited tech knowledge. The hotwiring job was obvious and shit.
But not my problem.
Hiromi slipped into the passenger seat quietly, but before I could take off Akari was leaning down into the window.
“Lot of trouble for a piece of shit.”
“Tell me about it… Thanks. I didn’t really want to murder a bunch of gonks.”
“Yes you did.” Akari said with a knowing smile. “Jun-kun will fuss over you, and Fujimura-Sama will want a meeting.”
“Great.” I grumbled and Akari chuckled.
“Go on kid, I’ll deal with the nonsense here. We’ll meet up again soon. Probably sooner than you’d like.” She said stepping back and I frowned but nodded as I drove back to the apartments. Sending a message for my Quadra to head there as well.
From what Richard had said it was actually a drug distribution center, but it pretended to be a tattoo parlor.
Considering how big tattoos were with TC members. I was sure it was also a fairly active tattoo parlor.
I pulled up into the parking lot and couldn’t help but shake my head.
There were times I could forget that the world I was in was a Cyberpunk world. When the sun was out and shining, and the streets weren’t covered in homeless squatters, and trash. I could think I was just in a big city from a century ago.
But then moments like this hit me.
The parking lot was full of bikes. Mostly Kusanagi, but not every TC gonk drove one, they were expensive after all. The neon of the entire strip mall was bright covering the slightly rain soaked pavement in a neon array of color, there were people sitting around outside. Some were TC, some were joy toys, or just girlfriends of the claws.
A wild array of colors, and skin. Cigarette smoke blew around them creating trails of gray across their bodies.
I found a spot and parked, but I had done it all on autopilot, because I was completely distracted at the sight.
I actually stopped and took a picture of the scene. That was how picturesque it was.
“Motoko?”
“I’m okay Hiromi, just distracted, let’s go find Carter.” I said, stepping forward and leading the way up to the open door of the tattoo parlor.
I could tell that we were getting plenty of attention, eyes from all along the street were on us. Some disinterested, some watchful and guarded.
In the end it wasn’t uncommon for teenagers to come to a tattoo parlor, but the fact we weren’t wearing TC colors, or gear set us apart.
I ignored the couple of gangsters that were hanging around on each side of the door as I stepped in and made sure Hiromi was behind me.
The insides were covered in smoke and dark lights, the faint noise of the machines that were used to install the neon tattoos the TC loved buzzing in the background.
“Yo Girlys, what can I help you two for?” A large man with a smiling face called out. The fact he was covered in glowing tigers made of fire, and Dragons swirling around on his skin, the neon tattoos actually moving on his flesh was a little distracting.
Thankfully Hiromi was the one doing the talking.
I was just the muscle.
“I need to find one of the boys that works here. Carter? Should be someone new.” Hiromi offered with her best smile.
Of course asking about a single member of a gang? Coming from two girls?
“Listen if you need to speak to your boyfriend, or Ex boyfriend, this ain't the place for it.” The older man offered, trying to keep a big scene from happening at his shop.
I could feel my own nose scrunch up and Hiromi looked about as disgusted.
“Yeah not what this is about.” Hiromi offered with a look of disgust. “He klepped something he shouldn’t have. I’ve been asked to get it back. Considering he went and joined up with the TC, I wanted to keep it above board. So can I speak with Carter, or whoever his boss is?” Hiromi asked, trying to sound professional and confident.
But I could tell she was nervous, there were plenty of TC guys all surrounding us.
“Huh.” The older man said after a moment. He reached up and rubbed his chin processing what Hiromi had said. “Can’t say I’ve ever seen something like this before.” He offered before shrugging. “But Carter is one of us now. If he klepped something, it's now ours.” He said with a shrug, and I could see some of the boys hanging around starting to loom over.
Hiromi of course noticed as well, and I could see her will wavering a bit.
Hiromi still wasn’t great with actual violence, even with me at her side.
“I just want to talk to the gonk, get the car back, and we can get out of here. I’m even willing to throw in some eddies or something else for the time. Not like we care about the weapons he also klepped.” Hiromi offered, trying to throw out a lifeline.
“No.” The man said bluntly with no wiggle room. “Now get lost. This ain’t the kind of place you two are welcome in.” He said giving us a chance to leave, and honestly I moved to grab Hiromi to bail, but Hiromi had other ideas.
“Don’t be a gonk ass! Just let us talk to Carter so we can get the car back. Then we can delta. No need to be such a schizo!” She cursed at him, her anger obviously overriding her common sense. Hiromi was quite used to yelling at gangsters after all.
“I don’t much like a couple of kids walking into my shop trying to cause trouble for my boys.” The man jerked his head and the door slammed shut behind us.
Hiromi went suddenly quiet, I realized what was off. These guys weren’t seeing Hiromi as she used to be. Covered in TC gear. They just saw some Corpo kid trying to cause trouble. She looked at me, obviously growing concerned.
I just frowned, confused as hell. Were these idiots actually going to what? Attack us for coming to have a conversation about a stolen car?
Fuck. The temptation to start firing was there.
It might even be the right choice, but I had multiple things I needed to consider.
Hiromi being right there next to me in the line of fire. Future dealings with the TC going pretty bad if I shoot up one of their drug distribution sites.
So I shook my head to her. “Just play it cool, Hiromi.” I told her, as I closed my suddenly golden eyes quickly sending a text. Once I was done the guys were already on us. “You’re joking right. What are you trying to do? Kidnap us? You have no idea who we are. We’ve been perfectly reasonable with you.” I interrupted, trying to put the focus from Hiromi onto me.
“A couple of arrogant kids walks into my shop and starts making demands? I should be asking you this bitch, who do you think we are?” The boss asked glowering as he stepped up trying to loom over me, his face bending down close.
“Some TC mid level boss. Hey. You’re gonna want to be careful here choom. We came in above board, you won’t like what happens if you do something stupid. Make sure y-” I was trying to tell the guy not to hurt Hiromi.
I mean Arasaka parents wouldn’t be happy to learn Hiromi had been hurt by some TC stooges.
But the man stepping forward and punching me in the face shut that up.
“Don’t tell me what to do in my own business. Choom.” He said, pausing and enunciating the last word mockingly.
“That was rude.” I told him, wincing as my cheek pulled. He hadn’t hit me super hard, I guess being a teenage girl did have some benefits, but he certainly wanted to shut me up.
“Put them in the back.” He ordered, but I cut him off.
“Just so you know. I have connections with the TC. You don’t want to do anything stupid.” I called out before he could walk too far away.
So he turned and slugged me again.
Okay fine. Play it that way.
Hiromi was looking a little panicked after I had been hit, but I turned and gave her a wink.
“I messaged Jun.” I told her and she looked a little dazed for a second trying to process what I meant, before it struck her.
She almost was able to smile at my words, although her nervousness won out.
Yeah.
They searched me, pulling out my weapons including my Burya.
I would be getting that back. Of course the sight of my handcannon got some looks as they disarmed me. Upping my threat from teen to what the fuck?
Then we were both pushed into a back room, which was basically just a storage room and thrown into a set of chairs. A couple of thugs hung around the room glaring at us, but we weren’t left alone for more than a moment before the leader stepped in with a younger teenager behind him.
“Ah there is Carter.” I said in greeting. Hiromi and I had been given a picture of the kid from Richard.
“The fuck are you?” He demanded glaring at the two of us. “I don’t know these bitches.”
“They said they came for your car.” The boss offered and Carter went from irritable to ballistic in an instant.
“Bitch! You won't touch my ride!” He roared, stomping up to Hiromi and I.
Instantly I got his attention to keep him from looking at Hiromi.
I really would have to start killing if they touched Hiromi.
“Technically it isn’t yours. It’s Morgans.” I said and got the kids' eyes to lock onto me.
The fact he had them glowing red to look more intimidating, along with a TC style jacket opened on his back, with a bare chest showing off a pretty complete lack of muscles made the whole situation more amusing than anything.
“Bitch! It’s mine! Fuck you!”
“How eloquent.” I commented which to my lack of surprise caused the boy to react. Fist flung back I breathed out and tensed my stomach as his fist slammed into my stomach.
It wasn’t too bad. I coughed and overacted, but it had barely done much to me.
“That’s what you get, fucking cunt.”
“Carter. You don’t know these two?”
“Nah. I thought they might be that prick Richards whores, but I don’t know these two.”
“Surprising.” I mentioned as I stood back up after fake coughing. “I guess you weren’t there that night I killed Morgan and V3LOCITY.” I told him.
Carter looked confused for a moment before it seemed to hit him. “Purple hair. That’s right. The bitch that fucked up the Shooters. That was you huh?”
“Yep.”
“Heh.” He chuckled before predictably punching me again.
“Motoko!” Hiromi called out in horror as Carter punched me across the face.
That… That hurt a bit. My cheek was already stinging from before!
“I’m fine Hiromi.” I told her firmly as I rose back up, to glare at the kid.
“That’s for fucking up the gang. I was making a ton of eddies there, you know?” He said with a glare but I looked towards the boss.
“A punk kid that jumps to a new gang the moment the eddies run out. I wonder how reliable he is?” I mocked a bit.
“Enough! I didn’t bring you here to fuck up the meat.” The boss yelled just as Carter cocked back to punch me again. “Well girls you wanted a chance to talk to my boy, are you satisfied with the conversation?” He asked with a laugh, and I just shrugged.
My lack of fear thanks to Cold Blood, was probably odd, and Fearless Chill was in effect.
I was kinda of curious what their mind was telling them when they realized how utterly unafraid I was of them.
That was when the boss got a call.
I could tell as his eyes lit up gold for a second.
Then his eyes flicked around as he obviously spoke internally.
Then he went pale. Looked to me.
I purposefully gathered some spit in my mouth and hawked the bloody spittle onto the ground.
Bastard cut the inside of my cheek.
The room was quiet for a moment as everyone was waiting for the boss to act, but things stretched on, as he seemed to be in a conversation.
Considering everything…
“If that’s Fujimura, tell him hello for me.” I called out interrupting the boss's conversation and the way the man jumped like I just stabbed him I was right. I relaxed back, crossing my arms over my chest and throwing Hiromi a big smirk.
Although the fact I was probably bruising up a bit from being punched diminished the comfort it brought. So instead I just walked over and put my arm over her shoulder.
That seemed to help, a little.
“Fujimura-Sama is sending someone to properly resolve this… Incident.” The boss says looking a little pale, and I nod.
“Probably Jun. My brother.” I tell him and that makes the boss wince even more.
“I would very much like my gun back.” I tell him with a bit of threat in my voice and he jerks his head, causing his goons that had mostly been watching with sinister smirks to slowly walk over with my equipment, and the stuff Hiromi had on her of course.
Holstering my Burya and Lexington I felt much better.
“I did warn you that I have TC connections.” I told the man and he nodded quietly before rising up to this full size and bowing his head.
“Apologies for this mistake.”
I just snorted. “Let’s just wait a bit. I’m sure Jun is going to be sooo happy seeing me all bruised up… You’re all just lucky I don’t go out of my way to murder TC gonks myself.” I grumbled although only Hiromi understood just how much danger my words actually represented.
—--
In the end, Hiromi and I were seated back in the shop in comfortable chairs, and the boss had even had some men go out and get drinks for us.
The whole atmosphere was tense, and I was just willing to wait for Jun to show up.
Seeing Jun tear these gonks a new one would be pretty entertaining. Hiromi was regaining her spark, and I made sure to keep an eye on Carter who was looking pretty nervous now that the situation had so completely altered itself on him.
Finally a vehicle roared into the parking lot, and it was moving fast enough I bet it was Jun. Looking towards the door along with most of the people inside, I felt my smile slowly disappear into an irritated frown.
“Hey Akari.” I grumbled out as the Kamikaze Borg woman sauntered into the tattoo parlor.
“Hey Motoko!” She called out with a big grin.
Dammit. I had wanted Jun!
“And you! Kato-San!”
“Yes!” The boss of the place greeted the borg woman as he rose up and bowed to her.
“You fucked up!” She said happily and then slammed a fist into his cheek.
Ah, that was Akari alright.
“Boss!” The men around us called out shocked at the sudden violence happening to them.
“You touched something that doesn’t belong to you. Motoko Kusanagi, works for Kamikaze. She has boss Okina-Sama’s favor as well… For saving his life during an assassination attempt.” Akari walked over and to my surprise kicked the man as he was trying to get up.
“The hell! You bitch, the fu-”
“Shut up!” The boss roared at one of his boys that was moving forward to try and defend him. “Don’t interfere. Moron!”
“Ah see you do have a brain in there after all!” Akari said, smiling with her plastic face. “Motoko? You alright kid?”
“I’ll live. They got a few licks in, but I’m mostly irritated that they tried to kidnap us or something. Plus they did this to Hiromi. Can’t just let that one go.” I said and Akari just nodded happily.
As usual the woman did things in her own way.
“You should all be really happy! The Oni was so angry when he got a text from his sweet little killer-I mean Imouto that he almost raced right over! I got sent instead saving all of you from having your heads ripped off!” Akari called out laughing a bit like it was a joke.
It was not a joke.
Jun had ripped that borgs head off after all. I had even been there!
Of course the room was chilled at Akari’s words, but the boss was still coughing as he slowly rose back up.
“Kotoniki apologizes to Ane-san.” He offers going back into a bow.
It took me a moment to remember that Yakuza used sister and brother to talk about each other sometimes.
“Pfft. It’s not me you have to apologize to. Motoko here is Kamikaze, you caused some serious trouble. Last I heard, Katsuragi-Sama is getting a ‘Call’ from Fujimura-Sama about this. Fujimura-Sama doesn’t like people touching things that belong to him after all.” Akari said and while I scowled at being called Kamikaze I would let it go this time.
“Katsuragi-Sama?!”
“What you think touching a Kamikaze wouldn’t get your boss involved?” Akari asked, sounding amused. “But that’s not important to me. Motoko you ready to go?”
“Not quite.” I said standing up and tugging Hiromi up too. Walking her over to Akari. “Hiromi, Akari. She’s a bit crazy but cool. Akari, Hiromi. She is my best choom, and her parents are Arasaka. If anyone so much as scratches her, I kill everyone in this room.” I say rather bluntly pointedly looking at Akari and her tendency to poke people. “Keep an eye on her for a second.”
Then I turned and since things were cooled off slammed a fist with all my might right into Kotoniki’s face.
The boss hadn’t expected my own retaliation.
Nor had he expected a five foot five girl to hit like a truck.
Thank you body 7, Street Brawling 6, and chrome knuckles.
He went down in a heap, and unlike when Akari hit him he didn’t get back up.
Then I took another three steps before anyone could react and slammed a fist into Carters stomach. The kid had been standing nearby obviously too nervous to do anything until now.
I wasn’t feeling very gentle at the moment. I grabbed Carter by his ears and slammed his face into my knee. A crunch echoing out as that dropped the kid to the floor.
I wasn’t breathing heavy. I wasn’t gritting my teeth. As far as anyone could tell looking at me, I was completely calm.
And in a way I was.
That didn’t mean I didn’t bend down and punch Carter in the face again.
“That’s for calling me a cunt.” I grabbed his stupid jacket, and wiped my knuckles free of his blood and stood back up. “One more thing.” I called out to the room. “Where is the car this fucking gonk stole? It’s mine now.” I demanded and the room went quiet as everyone sort of wondered what to do, most of them looking to Akari.
“I don’t know why you gonks are looking at me. Motoko asked you a question.” Akari said with a deadly smile on her plastic face.
“Out back… I can show you?”
“Good. C’mon Hiromi. Let’s delta.” I grumbled, following the man out behind the shop where there was a back alley that had a line of cars lined up.
I recognized the car that Richard wanted and nodded.
The Thorton Colby Butte wasn’t exactly what I would consider an expensive vehicle. But I guess it made sense. The back end of the normal Colby was removed and turned into a truck bed.
Probably how the SLS had originally stolen all the shipments that they were so proud of. I popped the door, not surprised the alarm was broken, and after a few seconds found that Carter or the other kids had already hotwired the damn thing.
With a roll of my eyes I got it running I didn’t even need to actually rely on my limited tech knowledge. The hotwiring job was obvious and shit.
But not my problem.
Hiromi slipped into the passenger seat quietly, but before I could take off Akari was leaning down into the window.
“Lot of trouble for a piece of shit.”
“Tell me about it… Thanks. I didn’t really want to murder a bunch of gonks.”
“Yes you did.” Akari said with a knowing smile. “Jun-kun will fuss over you, and Fujimura-Sama will want a meeting.”
“Great.” I grumbled and Akari chuckled.
“Go on kid, I’ll deal with the nonsense here. We’ll meet up again soon. Probably sooner than you’d like.” She said stepping back and I frowned but nodded as I drove back to the apartments. Sending a message for my Quadra to head there as well.
Use those connections Motoko, and they'll tie those strings tighter to you.
"I can quit TC's any time I want!" - Motoko Kusanagi, 46, chief of TC Special Operations Division
Karmic Acumen
Well-known member
Press-ganged into a gang is a go, yes?
Blasterbot
Well-known member
Motoko is trying really hard to avoid murdering gonks. it was successful. it may not have been worth it.
Random thought...
Big problem for Motoko and her cyberware...she's still growing physically. I wonder how much that will mess woth her cyber arms and maybe even her neural ware since her brain ain't close to fully developed.
Will her super-special-GAMER nanites keep that from being an issue?
Big problem for Motoko and her cyberware...she's still growing physically. I wonder how much that will mess woth her cyber arms and maybe even her neural ware since her brain ain't close to fully developed.
Will her super-special-GAMER nanites keep that from being an issue?
IIRC she needs to visit a trusted doc semi-regularly to make minute adjustments every now and again so no issues will pop up.
Chapter 80
Seras
Well-known member
Hiromi took care of giving Richard the car back, I hadn't wanted to talk to the gonk after everything, and in the end I drove her home. Both of us were pretty quiet on the way, but to my surprise Hiromi didn't just get out when I reached her home.
"Come up with me. There's something I still need to do." She demanded, and I looked surprised at her sudden aggressiveness.
"Hiromi, I'm-"
"I know. You have to go talk to Jun and deal with Fujimura-whatever. But come up first." She demanded and I sighed and ended up following her up to her high end apartment.
To my surprise, unlike before it seemed empty now. I guess her parents would be back at work with the gang war over. But she dragged me into her room, and pushed me into a chair before heading into the bathroom.
Coming out with a medkit.
I almost snorted, but Hiromi was looking so serious, I kept my amusement hidden as she sat beside me and started fussing over me.
"You don't have to do that." I told her, but she just shook her head, her hair flying around at the harshness of the motion.
"I do. So just… Sit there and let me make up for my screwup." She ordered and who was I to argue with Hiromi being this serious?
I didn't need much really, I was mostly bruised on my cheek, and probably on my stomach, but Hiromi sprayed some sort of gunk on my cheek anyways.
It did numb my skin so that was nice, but not really needed. I didn't even notice the pain.
"I messed up, got hot headed, thought it was like it always had been, that I could just mouth off to the stupid Claw gonks and get on with it… I didn't even think that you wouldn't want to start killing them. So I mouthed off."
"They were being idiots. Trying to intimidate two girls that were there for business. It was dumb." I added my own frustration with the whole scenario coming out.
"They were just acting like people act. I wouldn't be happy if someone came up to me and started demanding you give back the netrunning gear or something." She said, playing devils advocate.
"Hey! I looted that clear."
"I know you gonk." Hiromi said, shaking her head as she worked on putting a bandage on my cheek.
Silly Hiromi, I didn't need a bandage for a bruise, but she was fussing so I allowed it.
"But I mean, I walked in not thinking, and then got frustrated… I guess I expected them to treat me like they always did. Just another TC hanger on, but I'm not dressed like that anymore. I came in looking like an enemy."
"They shouldn't have done that anyways. You don't conduct business by messing with people like that." I argued, shaking my head. "We'll just make sure we have more muscle or something next time."
"Yeah." Hiromi offered nodding and then she reached out and double checked my bruise. "Sorry."
"It doesn't even hurt. Besides, it gave me a good excuse to punch them back. Very satisfying." My joke managed to earn a giggle from Hiromi and it seemed to help her finally calm down.
"Want to come over? We could do a sleepover." I offered, considering her parents weren't around, Hiromi might not want to be alone at the moment.
She hesitated before nodding. "I have some school stuff I have to do first, so give me a few hours and I'll come over?"
"Sounds preem!"
—--
Of course hanging out with Hiromi had to end eventually. I headed home, expecting to see Jun already there.
I had texted him that Akari took care of everything and we were good during the earlier drive, but when I got home it was empty.
So I shrugged, sent Jun a text telling him I was home, grabbed something to eat and decided to do some programming while I waited.
Reboot Optics was definitely more complicated than Ping, and the time it was taking for me to 'fix' it was definitely proving that. The lines of code were filling in pretty quickly in the grand scheme of things. I mean, most modern hacks are probably designed by committee in some corp rather than being free range like what I was doing, but while they could get things done faster.
I could do it better.
Maybe… Probably.
I was still only at level 10, and I was still going under the assumption that level 20 was the max.
So I was only half way there.
But I was still an amazing programmer. Level 10. The human peak.
My fingers blazed across the keyboard. The lines I wrote were clean, and the few errors I made were easily caught and fixed with Debug.
I was never stumped. I never hit a point where I had to wonder what the next line of code should look like, it all came to me before I was even ready.
And so spent a few hours creeping closer to a finished program.
The door opening made me glance up, my voice already about to greet Jun, but it wasn't Jun.
"Hey Hiromi." I called out instead realizing that it was getting late, and Jun hadn't come by.
Weird.
"Motoko!" Hiromi greeted with a smile, seemingly much recovered from the scare. "Whatcha doin?"
"Programming. I'm working on streamlining a quick hack." I explained showing her the laptop screen which was just displaying line after line of code.
"That's preem… I have no idea what I'm looking at though."
"It's fine, I should take a break anyways, I've been pretty good about hyper focusing on my coding. Want to put on some terrible TV?"
"Yep! I brought snacks!" She chirped, showing a bag full of all sorts of random stuff.
And so thanks to horrible TV and snackfood, everything was good.
—--
Hiromi was passed out snoring on my shoulder on the couch. I had muted the TV but left it running for the extra light. The ability to skip sleeping was still one of those super useful side features of the Gamer system.
I had pulled up my programming laptop to work with after Hiromi fell asleep.
I hadn't been in the mood to sleep myself, so I worked instead.
It was to this scene that Jun suddenly walked into. I blinked. It was nearly three in the morning. I expected Jun to have slept wherever he was, like he tended to do when he didn't come home.
We both looked at eachother, Jun looked like he wanted to say something but after noticing HIromi he just nodded and didn't speak.
Instead he walked over quiet as a mouse thanks to his Lynx Paws, and knelt down gently patting my head as he looked me over.
I could see the anxiety on his face, that look of anger and frustration. But I wasn't going to let Jun just walk away.
So I called him. Literally. My eyes went gold as I could hear the ringing in my head.
*I'm okay Jun. So is Hiromi. Thanks for helping us out. I didn't really want to murder a bunch of TC guys. It would have caused trouble.*
*You should have killed them. All of them. They shouldn't have touched you.* He responded back without hesitation, his face angry.
I shook my head, reaching out and patting him on the head in return just like he had just done for me.
*There were better reasons not to jump to murder. What's his face? Was a jerk, but it's fine. I hope Fujimura didn't cause you too many problems?*
*I was sent to Sensei to cool off… Fujimura wasn't happy that I wanted to go and rescue you.* He said and I snorted quietly.
What Fujimura wasn't happy with was Jun definitely planning to murder all the TC guys that ran that base.
*I punched him pretty hard after. So we're square.* I inform him with a quiet thumbs up. And Jun finally rolled his eyes, a bit of amusement shining through his expression.
Good.
*Next time someone threatens you, just flatline them. If they are TC I'll take care of smoothing everything out.* He tells me and I smirk a bit.
*I'll be careful. Next time I have to speak to a gang, I'll either go in better armed so I'm more of a threat, or I'll bring more muscle for the same reason.*
Jun just shakes his head.
*I'd prefer if you didn't go into a gang base at all. But Motoko will Motoko. You always do.*
*You love me.* I told him smirking as he scoffed and ruffled my hair but stood up. Heading to his room. *But I love you more.*
It wasn't until he was fully in his room that the call finally ended but of course he still sent it.
*Love you too.*
—--
Hiromi was kind of clingy in her sleep.
At some point she had grabbed onto me instead of just drooling on my shoulder, and I had to fight off the grasping hands of my best choom.
Thankfully programming was quiet, and I didn't wake her while I worked slowly adding more and more to my Reboot Optics hack.
Oh man. If Yoko thought my Ping was cool. This was going to blow her processor!
Hacker humor!
Since I was a hacker I needed to practice it!
But eventually the sun rose up and it started getting bright enough that Hiromi was grumbling and shifting in her sleep.
Slowly she started waking up, lazily shifting and contorting as her body tried to wake up but she fought it.
Until eventually I felt her hand squeeze my stomach twice as if her brain realized she was wrapped around something and she glanced up, eyes blearily open to see my own eyes looking down at her.
Then she let out a squeak and leapt away.
Which of course sent her over the end of the couch and onto the floor.
I had tried to grab her, but she flailed quite hilariously. As she went right over the edge of the couch. Disappearing from sight.
"Hiromi? You alright?"
"Never better." She called out after a few moments as I peeked over the edge of the couch, she was looking up at me from the floor, one foot still up on the couch cushion she had just tripped over and the rest of her in a mess on the floor seemingly desperate for no one to notice her current state.
"Okay…" I said drawing it out but instead of helping I just edged back over the couch and took my spot.
It took a few moments for her foot to disappear over the edge of the couch completely and a few moments after that for her to rise up and brush herself off.
"Morning." She greeted casually as if everything that had just happened, never did.
"Good Morning. Hungry?"
"Still full of snacks I think." She said casually retaking her seat and slowly running her fingers through her hair trying to reorganize the mess of bed head.
She was failing, so I reached over and helped untangle a bit of her hair letting it go flat.
She was so embarrassed about her messy hair she went red! How cute!
—--
In the end Hiromi had cleaned up and gotten dressed not long after and as much as she wanted to stay she had to head home.
So I went back to programming until Jun woke up. My brother was just as bleary as Hiromi had been, and while his hair wasn't as long as Hiromi's mohawk style it was still standing up in the back.
"Sleep well Jun-Nii?"
"Where's Hiromi?" He asked in turn, looking around.
"Went home already." I told him and he nodded rubbing the back of his head as he yawned.
"Slept okay. You?"
"Eh. Hiromi's a bit of a grabby sleeper." I told him instead of telling the truth that I hadn't slept at all.
"Heh." He chuckled as if that was a joke and not just the damned truth. Pretty sure I still had a red handprint on my thigh from where Hiromi had wrapped herself around my leg.
It's a good thing she didn't have chrome hands, that could have hurt.
"Fujimura-Sama wants to see you today… To talk about what happened." Jun offered and I scowled as I pretended to ignore him focusing on the laptop.
I'm not a damn dog. That jerk can't just summon me when he wanted.
"I think you should see him Motoko… He wants to apologize."
"What?" I asked jerking up at that. Why would he want to apologize?
"Motoko. You've helped out the TC a bunch, saved one of our bosses. Remember? If one of our members assaults you? That's a big deal. A huge black mark. Fucks up our Giri bad."
I frowned I guess that made sense, I mean I hadn't expected the sudden sorta kidnapping from them either.
"Fine I guess…"
"Great. Why don't you get ready? I'll need a shower first." He grumbled heading into the bathroom.
Alright. Code more later. Deal with Pseudo Yakuza boss first.
—--
Jun refused to let me drive so I was stuck on the back of his bike as he drove us to our destination.
Where?
No idea. In fact I suppose this would be the first time I've been to Jun's work since the whole Casino thing. And I knew he didn't work there anymore.
I doubted he would ever want to return to that place.
So we drove across the bridge into Watson, but unlike how I would usually turn down into Kabuki, we kept going to head into Little China.
We got off the freeway, and were basically instantly turning into a small strip mall type place.
It honestly reminded me of the Tattoo parlor. Similar setup.
Take over a business, surround it with TC members, and the place gets locked down and income comes streaming in.
This time it was more like an alleyway market place. Stalls set up along the walls of the very slim walking path, hawking everything from food, to weapons if what I saw was right. Jun parked in the parking lot outside it and waved me to follow which I did. It was pretty easy to follow along through the crowd, Jun's bulk easily made a path.
Well that and the respect people had for him.
I saw plenty of TC gangers nodding their head to Jun, or calling out greetings, usually calling him "Oni."
I guess Jun-Nii was pretty popular.
We walked through nearly the entire alley before Jun walked up to a door that looked the same as any other and opened it revealing a set of stairs downwards.
"C'mon Motoko."
"Yeah, yeah." I confirmed following along, it wasn't like a little darkness was going to worry me.
The stairs curved at the bottom opening up to a bar of all place.
It reminded me of all those little dark japanese bars you would see in anime. A man behind the counter, bottles of alcohol behind him. All wood and dark leather. I crinkled my nose at the smoke.
Apparently there wasn't a non-smokers section. Hell this place was so old fashioned there was even a little piano in the corner.
Of course I also noticed everyone inside was TC.
Tattoos, weapons, attitudes, all screamed Tyger Claw. Men and women. Sitting around the bar, the tables, a few in booths set along the darkened corners. It was surprisingly full, but then again, I doubted this was actually a bar at all.
If Fujimura worked out of here, then this wasn't a bar but probably the nerve center of the TC in the area.
I followed Jun down into the carpeted floors.
I was getting plenty of looks, but none were hostile. To my surprise though I didn't recognize anyone. I thought I would, but I guess most of the Kamikaze hadn't continued working solely with Fujimura after the war.
"Junichirou."
"Howard." Jun was greeted by the barkeep who was doing the most stereotypical bartender things and rubbing a glass with a rag.
"Fujimura-Sama will be back soon, take the private booth." Howard the Bartender offered as he settled a glass down onto the drying rack and walked over to seemingly prepare some drinks.
"C'mon Motoko." Jun called as he led me past the bar towards a back area, it was gloomy at first, but more of those bead curtains just blocked the light from a set of private booths that as Jun waved me into one was well lit by a few ornate faux candles around the booth.
"This doesn't strike me as very TC. No neon? I'm almost disappointed."
"It was originally a bar owned by a smaller gang that controlled this area. When it was taken over the decor ended up being something a few of the guys liked and so it's stayed the same." Jun offered as he settled into his booth seating. "You want anything?"
"Not really." I shook my head and it was true. The stink of cigar, and cigarette smoke filled the air killing my thirst and hunger.
"Sorry." Jun grumbled, noticing the way my nose was crinkled.
"It is what it is, so Fujimura?"
"Should be here soon." Jun offered just as the beads were parted and the bartender dropped off a tray of drinks. More drinks than just for Jun and I.
Jun nodded and even took a tumbler of something amber himself.
"You aren't going to drive home if you drink." I inform him and Jun actually hesitates before scowling at me and taking a drink.
"You can call your car then. I'm not riding bitch on my own bike."
"Heh." I chuckled, giving him a lopsided smile as I imagined Jun, the big tough guy that he is forced to ride behind his little sister cause he was too drunk to drive. "I'll drive you home in my Quadra. You can call for your bike."
"No way." He grumbled and I just rolled my eyes at Jun.
I would force him to drive home with me if he drank too much… Even if his chrome probably would protect him from most driving accidents.
In the end we both were just sort of waiting.
"I'm bored." I told Jun after about twenty minutes of sitting around.
"Just be patient. Fujimura-Sama is a busy man." I rolled my eyes, not because I didn't believe him. I am sure a TC boss like Fujimura probably was busy. But what did that have to do with me being bored?
"You got about a minute before I start doing something to relieve my boredom." I informed Jun and then started mentally counting down to Jun's concerned face.
"Minutes up." I said as I stood up, avoiding Jun's grasping hand as he tried to keep me in the booth as I stepped out back onto the bar floor.
Mentally I went through my options. The street market upstairs could have something interesting, but I pretty much already had everything I wanted…
I stopped.
Piano.
I've never played a piano before.
"Come up with me. There's something I still need to do." She demanded, and I looked surprised at her sudden aggressiveness.
"Hiromi, I'm-"
"I know. You have to go talk to Jun and deal with Fujimura-whatever. But come up first." She demanded and I sighed and ended up following her up to her high end apartment.
To my surprise, unlike before it seemed empty now. I guess her parents would be back at work with the gang war over. But she dragged me into her room, and pushed me into a chair before heading into the bathroom.
Coming out with a medkit.
I almost snorted, but Hiromi was looking so serious, I kept my amusement hidden as she sat beside me and started fussing over me.
"You don't have to do that." I told her, but she just shook her head, her hair flying around at the harshness of the motion.
"I do. So just… Sit there and let me make up for my screwup." She ordered and who was I to argue with Hiromi being this serious?
I didn't need much really, I was mostly bruised on my cheek, and probably on my stomach, but Hiromi sprayed some sort of gunk on my cheek anyways.
It did numb my skin so that was nice, but not really needed. I didn't even notice the pain.
"I messed up, got hot headed, thought it was like it always had been, that I could just mouth off to the stupid Claw gonks and get on with it… I didn't even think that you wouldn't want to start killing them. So I mouthed off."
"They were being idiots. Trying to intimidate two girls that were there for business. It was dumb." I added my own frustration with the whole scenario coming out.
"They were just acting like people act. I wouldn't be happy if someone came up to me and started demanding you give back the netrunning gear or something." She said, playing devils advocate.
"Hey! I looted that clear."
"I know you gonk." Hiromi said, shaking her head as she worked on putting a bandage on my cheek.
Silly Hiromi, I didn't need a bandage for a bruise, but she was fussing so I allowed it.
"But I mean, I walked in not thinking, and then got frustrated… I guess I expected them to treat me like they always did. Just another TC hanger on, but I'm not dressed like that anymore. I came in looking like an enemy."
"They shouldn't have done that anyways. You don't conduct business by messing with people like that." I argued, shaking my head. "We'll just make sure we have more muscle or something next time."
"Yeah." Hiromi offered nodding and then she reached out and double checked my bruise. "Sorry."
"It doesn't even hurt. Besides, it gave me a good excuse to punch them back. Very satisfying." My joke managed to earn a giggle from Hiromi and it seemed to help her finally calm down.
"Want to come over? We could do a sleepover." I offered, considering her parents weren't around, Hiromi might not want to be alone at the moment.
She hesitated before nodding. "I have some school stuff I have to do first, so give me a few hours and I'll come over?"
"Sounds preem!"
—--
Of course hanging out with Hiromi had to end eventually. I headed home, expecting to see Jun already there.
I had texted him that Akari took care of everything and we were good during the earlier drive, but when I got home it was empty.
So I shrugged, sent Jun a text telling him I was home, grabbed something to eat and decided to do some programming while I waited.
Reboot Optics was definitely more complicated than Ping, and the time it was taking for me to 'fix' it was definitely proving that. The lines of code were filling in pretty quickly in the grand scheme of things. I mean, most modern hacks are probably designed by committee in some corp rather than being free range like what I was doing, but while they could get things done faster.
I could do it better.
Maybe… Probably.
I was still only at level 10, and I was still going under the assumption that level 20 was the max.
So I was only half way there.
But I was still an amazing programmer. Level 10. The human peak.
My fingers blazed across the keyboard. The lines I wrote were clean, and the few errors I made were easily caught and fixed with Debug.
I was never stumped. I never hit a point where I had to wonder what the next line of code should look like, it all came to me before I was even ready.
And so spent a few hours creeping closer to a finished program.
The door opening made me glance up, my voice already about to greet Jun, but it wasn't Jun.
"Hey Hiromi." I called out instead realizing that it was getting late, and Jun hadn't come by.
Weird.
"Motoko!" Hiromi greeted with a smile, seemingly much recovered from the scare. "Whatcha doin?"
"Programming. I'm working on streamlining a quick hack." I explained showing her the laptop screen which was just displaying line after line of code.
"That's preem… I have no idea what I'm looking at though."
"It's fine, I should take a break anyways, I've been pretty good about hyper focusing on my coding. Want to put on some terrible TV?"
"Yep! I brought snacks!" She chirped, showing a bag full of all sorts of random stuff.
And so thanks to horrible TV and snackfood, everything was good.
—--
Hiromi was passed out snoring on my shoulder on the couch. I had muted the TV but left it running for the extra light. The ability to skip sleeping was still one of those super useful side features of the Gamer system.
I had pulled up my programming laptop to work with after Hiromi fell asleep.
I hadn't been in the mood to sleep myself, so I worked instead.
It was to this scene that Jun suddenly walked into. I blinked. It was nearly three in the morning. I expected Jun to have slept wherever he was, like he tended to do when he didn't come home.
We both looked at eachother, Jun looked like he wanted to say something but after noticing HIromi he just nodded and didn't speak.
Instead he walked over quiet as a mouse thanks to his Lynx Paws, and knelt down gently patting my head as he looked me over.
I could see the anxiety on his face, that look of anger and frustration. But I wasn't going to let Jun just walk away.
So I called him. Literally. My eyes went gold as I could hear the ringing in my head.
*I'm okay Jun. So is Hiromi. Thanks for helping us out. I didn't really want to murder a bunch of TC guys. It would have caused trouble.*
*You should have killed them. All of them. They shouldn't have touched you.* He responded back without hesitation, his face angry.
I shook my head, reaching out and patting him on the head in return just like he had just done for me.
*There were better reasons not to jump to murder. What's his face? Was a jerk, but it's fine. I hope Fujimura didn't cause you too many problems?*
*I was sent to Sensei to cool off… Fujimura wasn't happy that I wanted to go and rescue you.* He said and I snorted quietly.
What Fujimura wasn't happy with was Jun definitely planning to murder all the TC guys that ran that base.
*I punched him pretty hard after. So we're square.* I inform him with a quiet thumbs up. And Jun finally rolled his eyes, a bit of amusement shining through his expression.
Good.
*Next time someone threatens you, just flatline them. If they are TC I'll take care of smoothing everything out.* He tells me and I smirk a bit.
*I'll be careful. Next time I have to speak to a gang, I'll either go in better armed so I'm more of a threat, or I'll bring more muscle for the same reason.*
Jun just shakes his head.
*I'd prefer if you didn't go into a gang base at all. But Motoko will Motoko. You always do.*
*You love me.* I told him smirking as he scoffed and ruffled my hair but stood up. Heading to his room. *But I love you more.*
It wasn't until he was fully in his room that the call finally ended but of course he still sent it.
*Love you too.*
—--
Hiromi was kind of clingy in her sleep.
At some point she had grabbed onto me instead of just drooling on my shoulder, and I had to fight off the grasping hands of my best choom.
Thankfully programming was quiet, and I didn't wake her while I worked slowly adding more and more to my Reboot Optics hack.
Oh man. If Yoko thought my Ping was cool. This was going to blow her processor!
Hacker humor!
Since I was a hacker I needed to practice it!
But eventually the sun rose up and it started getting bright enough that Hiromi was grumbling and shifting in her sleep.
Slowly she started waking up, lazily shifting and contorting as her body tried to wake up but she fought it.
Until eventually I felt her hand squeeze my stomach twice as if her brain realized she was wrapped around something and she glanced up, eyes blearily open to see my own eyes looking down at her.
Then she let out a squeak and leapt away.
Which of course sent her over the end of the couch and onto the floor.
I had tried to grab her, but she flailed quite hilariously. As she went right over the edge of the couch. Disappearing from sight.
"Hiromi? You alright?"
"Never better." She called out after a few moments as I peeked over the edge of the couch, she was looking up at me from the floor, one foot still up on the couch cushion she had just tripped over and the rest of her in a mess on the floor seemingly desperate for no one to notice her current state.
"Okay…" I said drawing it out but instead of helping I just edged back over the couch and took my spot.
It took a few moments for her foot to disappear over the edge of the couch completely and a few moments after that for her to rise up and brush herself off.
"Morning." She greeted casually as if everything that had just happened, never did.
"Good Morning. Hungry?"
"Still full of snacks I think." She said casually retaking her seat and slowly running her fingers through her hair trying to reorganize the mess of bed head.
She was failing, so I reached over and helped untangle a bit of her hair letting it go flat.
She was so embarrassed about her messy hair she went red! How cute!
—--
In the end Hiromi had cleaned up and gotten dressed not long after and as much as she wanted to stay she had to head home.
So I went back to programming until Jun woke up. My brother was just as bleary as Hiromi had been, and while his hair wasn't as long as Hiromi's mohawk style it was still standing up in the back.
"Sleep well Jun-Nii?"
"Where's Hiromi?" He asked in turn, looking around.
"Went home already." I told him and he nodded rubbing the back of his head as he yawned.
"Slept okay. You?"
"Eh. Hiromi's a bit of a grabby sleeper." I told him instead of telling the truth that I hadn't slept at all.
"Heh." He chuckled as if that was a joke and not just the damned truth. Pretty sure I still had a red handprint on my thigh from where Hiromi had wrapped herself around my leg.
It's a good thing she didn't have chrome hands, that could have hurt.
"Fujimura-Sama wants to see you today… To talk about what happened." Jun offered and I scowled as I pretended to ignore him focusing on the laptop.
I'm not a damn dog. That jerk can't just summon me when he wanted.
"I think you should see him Motoko… He wants to apologize."
"What?" I asked jerking up at that. Why would he want to apologize?
"Motoko. You've helped out the TC a bunch, saved one of our bosses. Remember? If one of our members assaults you? That's a big deal. A huge black mark. Fucks up our Giri bad."
I frowned I guess that made sense, I mean I hadn't expected the sudden sorta kidnapping from them either.
"Fine I guess…"
"Great. Why don't you get ready? I'll need a shower first." He grumbled heading into the bathroom.
Alright. Code more later. Deal with Pseudo Yakuza boss first.
—--
Jun refused to let me drive so I was stuck on the back of his bike as he drove us to our destination.
Where?
No idea. In fact I suppose this would be the first time I've been to Jun's work since the whole Casino thing. And I knew he didn't work there anymore.
I doubted he would ever want to return to that place.
So we drove across the bridge into Watson, but unlike how I would usually turn down into Kabuki, we kept going to head into Little China.
We got off the freeway, and were basically instantly turning into a small strip mall type place.
It honestly reminded me of the Tattoo parlor. Similar setup.
Take over a business, surround it with TC members, and the place gets locked down and income comes streaming in.
This time it was more like an alleyway market place. Stalls set up along the walls of the very slim walking path, hawking everything from food, to weapons if what I saw was right. Jun parked in the parking lot outside it and waved me to follow which I did. It was pretty easy to follow along through the crowd, Jun's bulk easily made a path.
Well that and the respect people had for him.
I saw plenty of TC gangers nodding their head to Jun, or calling out greetings, usually calling him "Oni."
I guess Jun-Nii was pretty popular.
We walked through nearly the entire alley before Jun walked up to a door that looked the same as any other and opened it revealing a set of stairs downwards.
"C'mon Motoko."
"Yeah, yeah." I confirmed following along, it wasn't like a little darkness was going to worry me.
The stairs curved at the bottom opening up to a bar of all place.
It reminded me of all those little dark japanese bars you would see in anime. A man behind the counter, bottles of alcohol behind him. All wood and dark leather. I crinkled my nose at the smoke.
Apparently there wasn't a non-smokers section. Hell this place was so old fashioned there was even a little piano in the corner.
Of course I also noticed everyone inside was TC.
Tattoos, weapons, attitudes, all screamed Tyger Claw. Men and women. Sitting around the bar, the tables, a few in booths set along the darkened corners. It was surprisingly full, but then again, I doubted this was actually a bar at all.
If Fujimura worked out of here, then this wasn't a bar but probably the nerve center of the TC in the area.
I followed Jun down into the carpeted floors.
I was getting plenty of looks, but none were hostile. To my surprise though I didn't recognize anyone. I thought I would, but I guess most of the Kamikaze hadn't continued working solely with Fujimura after the war.
"Junichirou."
"Howard." Jun was greeted by the barkeep who was doing the most stereotypical bartender things and rubbing a glass with a rag.
"Fujimura-Sama will be back soon, take the private booth." Howard the Bartender offered as he settled a glass down onto the drying rack and walked over to seemingly prepare some drinks.
"C'mon Motoko." Jun called as he led me past the bar towards a back area, it was gloomy at first, but more of those bead curtains just blocked the light from a set of private booths that as Jun waved me into one was well lit by a few ornate faux candles around the booth.
"This doesn't strike me as very TC. No neon? I'm almost disappointed."
"It was originally a bar owned by a smaller gang that controlled this area. When it was taken over the decor ended up being something a few of the guys liked and so it's stayed the same." Jun offered as he settled into his booth seating. "You want anything?"
"Not really." I shook my head and it was true. The stink of cigar, and cigarette smoke filled the air killing my thirst and hunger.
"Sorry." Jun grumbled, noticing the way my nose was crinkled.
"It is what it is, so Fujimura?"
"Should be here soon." Jun offered just as the beads were parted and the bartender dropped off a tray of drinks. More drinks than just for Jun and I.
Jun nodded and even took a tumbler of something amber himself.
"You aren't going to drive home if you drink." I inform him and Jun actually hesitates before scowling at me and taking a drink.
"You can call your car then. I'm not riding bitch on my own bike."
"Heh." I chuckled, giving him a lopsided smile as I imagined Jun, the big tough guy that he is forced to ride behind his little sister cause he was too drunk to drive. "I'll drive you home in my Quadra. You can call for your bike."
"No way." He grumbled and I just rolled my eyes at Jun.
I would force him to drive home with me if he drank too much… Even if his chrome probably would protect him from most driving accidents.
In the end we both were just sort of waiting.
"I'm bored." I told Jun after about twenty minutes of sitting around.
"Just be patient. Fujimura-Sama is a busy man." I rolled my eyes, not because I didn't believe him. I am sure a TC boss like Fujimura probably was busy. But what did that have to do with me being bored?
"You got about a minute before I start doing something to relieve my boredom." I informed Jun and then started mentally counting down to Jun's concerned face.
"Minutes up." I said as I stood up, avoiding Jun's grasping hand as he tried to keep me in the booth as I stepped out back onto the bar floor.
Mentally I went through my options. The street market upstairs could have something interesting, but I pretty much already had everything I wanted…
I stopped.
Piano.
I've never played a piano before.
Karmic Acumen
Well-known member
Go ahead and embarrass yourself in public, Motoko, it's alright, it's only the bigshot gang of your part of town.
Vetrom
war
Too late, she's already got points in Rockerboy.
Was thinking of songs that could be performed on a piano in a hurry, and apart from the classics, I do remember that Bohemian Rhapsody uses the piano heavily.
Her level of Rockerboy ain't high enough to properly do Freddie Mercury justice, sure, but hey, it's actually rock you can rock on on a piano.
Also, unlike Johnny, Freddie is an anime character.
Seras
Well-known member
I'm sure at some point Motoko will put together the Rhapsody.
While we're at it, this should merit some kind of character growth from Hiromi. Hopefully she'll learn to act in a more professional manner, making her corpo parents proud.
It would merit a little change in her look, and would you look at that, by sheer happenstance I'm in possession of some green-haired cyberpunk girls :V
It would merit a little change in her look, and would you look at that, by sheer happenstance I'm in possession of some green-haired cyberpunk girls :V
