Devil in Night City (Cyberpunk) (Patreon)

Chapter 4: Settling In

A Month Later

I kicked the last member of Maelstrom into the nearest wall, then blew his brains out with my handy Overture. Only then did I let my shoulders relax. I was alone now. I looked around at my surroundings.

Then, just because I had become a bit paranoid since arriving in this shitty world and this shitty city, I let Vibration Tracking do its work. I wanted to make sure I was truly alone and that shit was not about to turn sideways. I had already learned my lesson a few times about relaxing after thinking I was safe, and it had finally stuck.

Admittedly, it had taken a few tries. Three. But the important thing was that it stuck.

About a month had passed since I arrived. After that, I had worked my ass off waging a solo war against the fucks known as Maelstrom, the ones mainly known for their optic implants and heavy cybermodification, to the point of almost going cyberpsycho.

The bastards were crazy and brutal. For anyone unfortunate enough to run into them alone, the usual fate was horrific experimentation: cyberware forced into you whether you wanted it or not.

Because my luck was already shit, I had been one of those unlucky bastards. One night, after coming back to the shitty hotel I was staying at, I ran into them, got caught unaware, and was knocked unconscious.

Luckily, thanks to all the abilities I had collected so far, I came back to consciousness after only a few moments. What I woke up to was a nightmare of a scene that still made me shudder when I thought about what could have happened.

The bastards had a saw in hand and were in the process of trying to chop off one of my legs to replace it with who knows what. The pain was what woke me up. And since my skin was much tougher than normal, they had only been able to make a shallow cut in my thigh.

There was only one thing to do after a situation like that, of course.

Respond with extreme violence.

With a thought, my new Overture dropped into my hand from my Inventory. The next moment, the bastard who had been about to amputate me had his face blown off.

Caught unaware, I made quick work of the other three. I kicked one in the face hard enough to break his neck and shot the other two.

I then spent the next few minutes cursing myself for letting my guard down, then cursing and kicking the dead bodies of the fucks who had done it, before looting them and hightailing it out of there.

Obviously still angry at the bastards, and with a slew of abilities at my command, I had decided to hunt them down. They hadn’t taken me murdering their comrades well. And here we were: Maelstrom putting a hit out on me, and me being forced to kill them to save my own skin.

The fucks hadn’t even given me much in terms of abilities either, other than increasing my marksmanship, raising my pain tolerance from how much they mutilated their own bodies, and giving me skills in driving, cooking, and mediocre surgery.

The only positive thing I could say that came out of this whole mess, other than the fact that there were fewer Maelstrom bastards running around, was all the money I had been able to make off of them.

The bastards, having an obsession with cyberware, obviously had some cool and expensive shit. As the victor, I had taken it for myself and immediately sold it at the conveniently placed Dropouts throughout the city.

Oh, and guns. They had sweet guns as well, I guess.

Thanks to their generous contributions, I had managed to save up fifty thousand eddies after subtracting food and cheap hotel stays.

On a positive note — and one of the main reasons I had been able to go on a killing spree, take out at least fifty members of Maelstrom, and survive to tell the tale — I had managed to find and kill a few spiders. That gave me the ability to stick to any surface and jump extreme distances.

In other words, I had finally reached my goal of becoming a knockoff Spider-Man. Which was awesome as hell.

Let me tell you, that little saying that humans rarely look up is completely true. And it didn’t become any less true just because that human had cybernetic eyes.

It had been funny as hell the first time I sneaked into one of their bases by crawling up the walls and took them by surprise by dropping in from the ceiling.

I may have taken too much joy in that, if I’m being honest, when I heard one unfortunate fuck call me a demon or something after he looked up, saw me hanging there, then proceeded to scream like a little bitch before I killed him.

The rumor had spread, that’s what happens when everyone and their fucking cats have a cell phone installed in their brain, and I had to take a new approach. The fuckers started getting paranoid and would always have one or two guys watching the ceilings.

During my midnight rendezvous today, they had run the moment one of them spotted me after I killed their buddy. Meaning I had managed to spook them a bit and earn a reputation for myself.

I was hopeful I wouldn’t have to watch my back constantly going forward, or risk getting kidnapped in the middle of the night and experimented on.

I was still going to be paranoid, of course. But at least it brought some small comfort, which was what counted.

Still, I couldn’t keep staying at cheap hotels forever. With the small amount I had saved up, I was thinking of permanently getting a place for myself.

“Alright. Loot first.” I muttered, shaking my head and dismissing those thoughts. “Decisions about my future can come later.”

Already used to it, I proceeded to loot everything that looked valuable and wasn’t nailed to the ground, stored it in my Inventory, and made my way out with a skip in my step.

“Now that I think about it, I should have just enough to get myself a car as well.” I muttered to myself as I crouched down a bit, then suddenly jumped to the nearest roof and repeated the process as I made my way back to the hotel I was staying at.

Of course I wasn’t stupid enough to leave my identity exposed when I was fighting people with access to an instant camera. I had gotten my hands on a plain black balaclava that covered my entire face, leaving only my eyes and mouth exposed.

Not liking the look too much, I had upgraded a week later to a ballistic mask. It served the same purpose, just looked better, and offered a bit of protection for my face and eyes.

“The only question now is, where do I want to live?” I muttered to myself, which was becoming another habit of mine since I had no friends or anyone I talked to.

Not that I was in any hurry to change that anytime soon. Trust was rarer than a fucking unicorn in this city, and I had no want or need to get a partner only to get stabbed in the back.

“Haah. I guess it’s apartment hunting tomorrow. I think there was also a page where I can find myself a car, so I should look at that as well.” I said with a small sigh.

By the time I made it back to my shoddy hotel, I quickly took a shower and was off to dreamland as soon as my head hit the lumpy mattress.

=====

Following Day

Leaving the latest shitty hotel, hopefully for the last time, I made my way to the metro and took the route to Watson — or more specifically, Little China and Megabuilding H10.

After thinking it over following a nice rest, or as nice as it got in this city, I ultimately decided I wanted to live in the same place the main character in the game, V, had lived. I figured it was as nice a place as any, and it was close to a lot of places I wanted to visit, like Lizzie’s Bar and the Afterlife.

I was aware of some anime or something that had come out later back home, but I was already used to most shows released by Netflix being utter trash, so I had skipped it.

It definitely would have come in handy. I was more than half a year away from the events of when the game started, and having more knowledge about this world would have helped.

On the way there I brought up my Agent and quickly looked up empty apartments available in the building, since almost everything was done online nowadays.

I found various openings before stopping and blinking when I saw that apartment number 0716 was available. That just further confirmed that the events of the game were still a ways off, since that was V’s apartment.

With a shrug, I paid the deposit of ten thousand eddies and the first month’s rent of one thousand, then smiled as a notification of acceptance and a generic welcoming email came through a moment later, making me the new owner.

“Sweet. I’m no longer a homeless bum.” I whispered to myself and leaned back in my seat, shooting a somewhat attractive brunette across from me a smile and a wink. She had been eying me since I got on.

I received a sultry smile in return as the woman started tidying up her hair and crossed her legs, giving me a peek at the lace panties underneath.

Unfortunately for her, even if I really missed having casual sex with strangers, I couldn’t go back to my manwhore ways here.

One, because they might not be clean. And two, because I had no fucking idea if the woman I did the deed with was someone of importance, part of a gang, or the wife, lover, or paramour of a mafia boss or a corpo.

I had just gotten Maelstrom to back off — at least, I hoped so — and I didn’t want to immediately jump into another mess so soon.

At the very least I wanted to wait a week.

What can I say? I really missed sex.

Seeing my exit coming up, I stood up and waited by the door, ignoring any further looks the woman gave me, much to her disappointment.

Quickly making my way out of the station, I reached the surface and smiled when I saw the huge building up ahead. The metro had dropped me off literally in front of it.

“Well. Time for a new chapter of my life.” I muttered to myself as I walked toward it, spotting the familiar food stands on the bottom floor and quickly finding the elevator.

In no time at all I made it to the seventh floor and navigated my way through the various stores — one of them being a gun store called 2nd Amendment with its own gun range — a fighting ring, and the various homeless bums or junkies loitering off to the sides, before reaching my destination.

Fiddling with my Agent, I quickly followed the instructions, had my retina scanned and registered, and watched the door slide open to reveal an empty apartment.

Walking inside, I came to a stop in the middle, looked around at the quite snazzy place, and nodded in satisfaction.

“Now this is what I’m talking about.” I said with my hands on my hips, then started rubbing them together with a grin.

“And this is where my hoarding and looting addiction will finally pay off. I was sure I would eventually need some random junk to decorate my apartment, and one of the various computers I confiscated.” I muttered with glee before getting to work.

It was time to spruce the place up a bit. I was sure I would need more things later, but for the time being, the stuff I had would serve instead of just leaving me with an empty apartment.

=====

That Same Evening

Exhausted — mentally, at least — from cleaning and decorating my new home, I was in the mood for a small celebration. I was no longer a homeless bum, and I wanted to go out for a drink.

I had wanted to visit Lizzie’s Bar for a while now but hadn’t had the opportunity, so that became my choice for the evening. I followed the instructions on my Agent and made my way there.

Arriving after a few minutes, I saw the parking lot mostly full and cast an appreciative gaze toward a Quadra Sport R-7, silently promising myself I would get one in the future.

“One day…” I muttered, then made my way toward the entrance. It was guarded by two chicks with baseball bats, of all things.

To nobody’s surprise, Lizzie’s Bar was actually the headquarters for the Mox, a gang made up mostly of sex workers, anarchists, punks, and sexual minorities.

They immediately zeroed in on me. One of them gave me an appreciative look from head to toe, while the other cocked an eyebrow at me.

I glanced down at what I was wearing for a moment. Nothing too outrageous. Just some normal black jeans and a black dress shirt that was untucked.

“Good evening, ladies.” I greeted, upping my natural charm as I smiled at them.

“Well, well. A new face. Can’t say I’ve seen you here before. I would have definitely remembered such a pretty face.” The one on the left said with a small smirk.

She had pink hair up in buns and appeared to be of Asian descent, but what drew my eyes most was the fact that her shirt had a huge boob window, leaving almost everything exposed, with a tattoo of Moxes across her chest.

“New to Night City?” The one on the right guessed calmly. She had short blue hair, dark skin, a yellow shirt, and an open green jacket.

“Hahaha. That obvious, huh?” I said in a relaxed manner before shrugging. “Yeah. Just arrived about a month ago and just got properly settled in. Thought I’d come celebrate with a good drink. Heard good things about this place.” I revealed, not worried about oversharing since it was trivial stuff.

“Well, at least you’re not dead yet. That’s not something everyone who comes to Night City can claim.” The one on the right said in amusement before stepping out of my way. “Welcome in, handsome. As long as you’re on your best behavior, you won’t have any problems.”

“Haha. Ain’t that the truth.” I muttered, joking back at her, then nodded seriously. “And thanks. I will.”

“Be seeing you around, choom.” The one on the left said, winking sexily at me.

Giving them one last smile, I stepped inside, and immediately the sound of blaring music reached my ears, typical of any bar or club I had been to before.

I strode forward confidently, opened the next set of doors leading into the bar proper, and was almost blinded by all the flashing neon lights.

Blinking it away, I made my way to the left, where the bar was located, passing people dancing and just generally having a good time.

Sitting down at the nearest empty stool, I looked at the bartender. “Give me something good. Doesn’t matter what.” I instructed as I relaxed.

The man nodded and got to work, already used to such demands, then quickly served me a colorful drink and placed it in front of me.

Nodding in thanks, I brought the glass to my mouth, took a decent drink, and let out a sigh at the burning feeling in my chest.

“That’s the stuff.” I muttered in satisfaction, taking another drink before pulling up my Agent and paying the man. I got a curious eyebrow in return.

“An Agent? That’s rare.” He commented idly.

I shrugged and finished the drink before setting it down. “I’m sure it’s only a matter of time before I get some chrome. Get me another.” I lied with a straight face.

Nodding, the man quickly did as asked.

As I was about to down that one too, someone took the seat next to me. I turned curiously with a friendly face in case it was a hot girl, only to freeze at the familiar-looking turquoise hair styled in twin tails and the white skin with a blue tint.

‘…Wait. Isn’t she?’ I thought blankly as the memory of a cute girl literally running me over on my first day replayed in my mind.

For some reason, said girl turned to me as well, giving me a disinterested stare for a moment, only to blink, then widen her eyes and pointed at me dramatically.

“Holy shit. You’re actually alive, choom!?”

Host: Lucius Grimlaw

Age: 20 years old

Main Powers:

·           Plunder

·           Inventory

·           Personal Demiplane (Locked until main mission is completed)

Abilities:

·           Super Strength – 15 times that of a normal human.

·           Pressure Resistance – Withstand pressure five thousand times heavier than yourself.

·           Vibration Tracking – Pick up sounds coming from the ground and vibrations through your feet.

·           Strong Lungs – Can hold breath for up to 30 min.

·           Super Speed – Can run up to 200 mph once you pick up momentum.

·           Radiation Resistance – Can withstand small amounts of radioactive fallout that would normally kill humans.

·           Strong Immunity – Strongly resistant to all forms of disease and some poisons.

·           Marksmanship – Can use most guns with expert efficiency.

·           CQC – Adept at hand-to-hand combat with knowledge of most known unarmed martial arts.

·           Pain Tolerance – Bullet wounds feel like mosquito bites.

·           Blunt Weapon Mastery – Adept knowledge with blunt weapons.

·           High Intelligence – Doubles current intelligence.

·           High Stamina – Doubles current stamina.

·           Driving – Can drive most cars with expert efficiency.

·           Medicine – Have basic knowledge to make crude surgeries.

·           Cooking – Has knowledge of most basic foods.

Current Mission:

Main Mission: Make your name known enough to be forever cemented in legend in Night City. How you do it is your choice — just make sure that, at the very least, you get a drink named after you.