[Demons of NC] Chapter 91

Night was already creeping in, and every damn movement still made my brain go, “Why the fuck was that so fast?”

While waiting for Becca, I skimmed the theory behind the procedure they'd done to me. Neocortex—the “new” cortex. Just 2–4 millimeters thick, but responsible for the big stuff: sensory input, motor control, conscious thought, and speech. Basically, what makes a human a human. But below that lies the old brain—the unconscious, the autopilot, the lizard shit keeping your guts in check. Thing is, evolution never really streamlined the link between those two layers. That’s where the delay comes in—between thinking and doing. The operation tweaked that pathway, cut out some middlemen.

“Sounds mega-dry,” Becca summed up while we sat in a rented Thorton. “But lemme guess: you’re faster now and a little buggy?”

“Yup.”

“Hold up…”

She tossed an open pack of gum onto the dash—neon pink and green with bubble graphics and little skulls.

“Who grabs it first, wins. Go?”

Reflex test? Sure, why not.

On the first go, I beat Becca easily… but missed the damn thing and knocked it onto the floor.

“Again!” she barked, diving to grab the pack.

Second time, same story, except this round I managed to catch it between two fingers before it fell.

We did it eight more times. Every time, same result: body’s faster, but accuracy’s shot to hell. Swiped the gum, smacked the dash, dropped it—whatever.

“All right. Let’s hit the first spot,” I said, glancing over my shoulder.

Under a green tarp in the backseat was a pile of weapons.

“Let me guess—you brought the grenade launcher?”

I meant the M-32 auto 40mm we looted off the Brazilians.

“Well, duh. You said to pack heavy. Why’re you laughing?!”

“It’s like I just dropped into a movie.”

“What movie?!”

“Take your pick,” I chuckled. “You didn’t happen to bring a flamethrower too, did you?”

“…Maybe. So what?”

“Okay. Let’s roll.”

We had six private datacenters to check across the city. Small-time ops under gang or crooked cop protection.

First, we stopped by a clothing market so I could ditch my flashy corp-style threads. Picked up some godawful synthetics Becca picked out—a green tee with red splatter patterns, a blue puffy jacket that reeked like a chemical spill, matching sneakers, and neon green shades. I looked like a low-level netrunner chasing delusions of grandeur. My twitchy post-op movements? Easy to mistake for someone tweaking off a fresh batch of street sludge. And Becca beside me? Perfect partner in crime. We looked like two chaos junkies out for kicks.

Disguise? Check.

Security at the first center—a pair of Valentinos—let us through for 400 eddies. Honestly? Cheap as hell.

Inside was a tight room humming with ancient servers. Half that shit probably ran just to heat the dust in the air. I jacked into one system, scanning for suspicious activity during the Konpeki hit. Took about fifteen minutes. Nada.

Threw in some fake, harmless programs just for show, then moved on.

Second datacenter? No trouble. Except for Becca wanting to eat some abandoned pizza.

“We’ve got eddies. We can order a whole damn pizza truck.”

“Yeah, but look at it… it’s right here! Looking at me…”

“As long as it doesn’t start talking to you,” I smirked. “Just give it to some hobos. We’ll get fresh. With crunchy grasshoppers on top.”

But the third place? Yeah, that one smelled like trouble.

Old industrial building in Northside. Real shithole. Well past midnight by the time we got there. Two Maelstrom newbies stood at the door—guy with just a couple red optic mods, and a girl with a knockoff Cyclops-style face visor.

“Private party tonight,” the guy slurred, stepping in our way. “Fuck off, plebs.”

Wrong move.

“Who the fuck you calling a pleb, dickhead?!” Becca flared up instantly, gun drawn before they even processed what was happening. “I’ll punch you a new pair of eyes right in that chrome skull!”

The Maelstrom kids froze. Newbies, no doubt—probably hadn’t fried their brains on enough synth yet. Caught between fight-or-flight and realizing they were already staring down a gun barrel. Aggression? Maybe not the best move here. Peace, love, and bubblegum?

I wasn’t too worried about the front-door duo. What had me more on edge was who might be inside. I spotted a silhouette moving toward the entrance—saw it through the wall with optics. No weapons. Not a gango. Just a greasy-looking blonde with a pretty-boy face I instantly didn’t trust.

“Easy, now,” he told the red-eyed fucks. “We’re leaving. No reason to pick fights. Go on—scram.”

They looked at him. Then at Becca. Then wordlessly slinked off toward a nearby van. Weird. He paid them off? Even so, Maelstrom ain’t exactly known for good behavior. And yet, not a peep of protest.

Another chromehead followed the blondie out—this one better modded. Walked right past us toward the van.

“Sorry about that,” said the blonde with a smile I wanted to punch. “You all right, choom?”

“I’m good.”

His glassy blue eyes scanned me like a fucking virus. I had to resist reaching for my piece.

“Movements are desynced. What’d you get installed? Ah, shit, sorry. Bit forward for strangers. Here—”

He handed me a slick little card, which I accepted with my cyberarm.

“If you’re ever in the mood for something… special, give me a ring. Ciao.”

And with another too-wide grin, he turned and strolled off to the van. I scanned him—nothing popped. Still, something felt off. Had we met?

I glanced down at the card. Surrounded by snakes, butterflies, and bloody claws, it read:

“Peter Riviera’s Sensory Illusion. Braindances for the bold. The most extreme experiences.”

Ah. One of those black braindance sickos. That’s who he reminded me of—Jimmy Kurosaki, may he rot. Makes sense Maelstrom gave him so much leash. They love that twisted shit. He’s probably under protection from one of their top psychos.

Alright. No shootout—I'll take that as a win. At first, I was gonna toss the card, but then thought, fuck it, might as well scan it. If that “Sensory Illusion” joint is under the Red-Eyes, it might come up in some future job. Kidnappings for black braindance recordings or whatever. “Sensual Illusion,” my ass. Who comes up with this shit?

We spent about twenty minutes combing through the third datacenter. Nothing. Not even a trace of what Riviera was doing there. Cleaned up well, even if he didn’t look like a seasoned netrunner.

The fourth spot was in the basement of a Chinese food joint. Place was so smoky the walls were practically stained yellow. Despite the late hour, seven or so people were still working. Every now and then, a fat woman came down from upstairs to peddle her dumplings.

“You need energy for your brain to work!” she declared, waving a chopstick around. “You need strength! Take the good gyoza. Fatty! Little broken, but I give you discount!”

The netrunners bought them quick—probably just to shut her up so they could focus. Toward the end of the scan, four Tyger Claws walked in. I reached for my piece, but they didn’t give a single shit about us. Grabbed some scrawny dude with twitchy eyes. Becca looked like she was about to jump in, but I put a hand on her shoulder.

“Not our problem.”

“No shootouts tonight?” she asked, visibly disappointed.

“Night’s not over. Or morning, I guess,” I muttered, as yelling in Japanese came from outside.

Sounded like the runner they nabbed tried to hack a Tyger-owned node. Real dumbass move. Yak security’s better than most give them credit for.

Our patience paid off—maybe it was the discounted dumplings. I found a hidden, masked software module embedded in a router’s service firmware. And it had been active the night Konpeki went to shit. T-Bug’s work? Possibly. Whoever coded it had serious chops—most corp runners wouldn’t even notice it. But what really bugged me was that I found it in deleted files. If Bug got fried during the raid, who came back to wipe the logs? The center’s owner? Could be.

When we left the dumpling dungeon, I called Lucy.

“Hey. When you were working inside Konpeki’s net, did you notice any other runners poking around?”

“I did. Yeah. But by the time I noticed, I had bigger shit to deal with.”

Right. Like playing suicide-by-corp-sweep for my so-called rescue.

“They got in clean. We’d already disabled the gatekeeper runner. They didn’t try to jump me.”

“Luce… when you say ‘they,’ you mean it literally? Or are you just using plural?”

She paused. Five seconds of silence while I stared out at city lights through the windshield. Becca was quietly humming some random tune.

“I think I noticed something, but I wouldn’t bet eddies on it. Everything was going to hell, V. We opened a door into guarded corp territory. I’m not shocked someone else slipped in. They didn’t bother us, and back then, I didn’t give a damn about the rest.”

“No blame,” I said. “Just trying to figure out what really went down that night. The little shit that might matter.”

Could DeShawn have hired another runner after bot thing flaked out? Maybe they had another bot, like ours. Pretty sure we didn’t grab all the toys outta that Militech convoy. Would be nice to hear it firsthand from those who were there. But Jackie and his partner still hadn’t resurfaced. I’d hoped they’d reach out to me or Vik. So far, nothing. And that silence? It was starting to piss me off.

“All right, let’s move,” I said to Becca.

The fifth place was out on the edge of the city, Sixth Street turf. Looked like an ordinary house but rigged up like a server bunker, with a homemade relay tower slapped onto the neighboring building. The place was buzzing—bunch of young Sixth Streeters busy pushing propaganda for Peralez. They were hijacking broadcasts, splicing their candidate’s mug into random vids, and cheering like mad every time something landed. No fear of Tyger Claws here—no corp channel was gonna bother retaliating, and crossing Sixth Street on their own turf? Yeah, that’s asking for a closed-casket.

While waiting our turn, I noticed we had company. Four guys in a piss-yellow Archer Hellhound loitered nearby, stealing glances at us and our ride just a little too obviously.

“You see that car?” I whispered to Becca. “Don’t stare too hard.”

“That busted junker? Yeah. What about it, choom?”

“Looks like we might finally get that shootout.”

“Fuck yeah.”

When it was my turn, I dug through deleted files again—there was something fishy, but not enough to say for sure. Either someone scrubbed the logs better here, or the campaign traffic just drowned it out. Those kids were dumping gigabytes of homemade Peralez vids every minute.

“All right, we’re bouncing,” I muttered, then pinged Lucy. “We’ve got a probable tail. Can you cover us?”

“Where to?”

“Back to our tub or your chair. Just need some net overwatch.”

Once we stepped out and got in the car, the Hellhound followed after a short pause. Subtlety clearly wasn’t their strong suit. Sloppy work.

“Where to, choom?” Becca asked. “We could dip into North. I know a badass little alley out there.”

“Sounds good,” I said, adjusting my vest so it wouldn’t show.

“Luce, we only got one car tailing us?” I asked. “What’s their ICE look like?”

“One car. Their ICE is trash. If they’re working for anyone, it’s recon, not hitters.”

“Perfect. We’ll lure ‘em into a quiet corner and ask real nicely what they want.”

Becca gunned it, pulling ahead just a bit before diving between a row of rusted-out shipping containers and onto the lot of some abandoned factory. A couple windows still had light, though. Not a surprise—probably squatters or lowlifes. Even Night City’s dead zones cling to life thanks to scavengers and parasites.

She killed the engine, grabbed her assault rifle, and hopped out. I followed, locking the ride behind us.

“This way,” she said, tugging my sleeve.

We ducked behind a concrete road barrier, long-abandoned and covered in graffiti. Glass shards crunched underfoot. I pulled out my Yukimura smart pistol—needed that extra auto-aim right now. My left hand raised a micro-cam just over the top.

Yup. There they were.

Their car stopped about ten meters from ours. All four stepped out—a Black guy, a Latino, and two white dudes. Cheap synth threads, hands too close to their guns. No heavy cyberware flagged on the scan. Whoever sent them clearly had no idea who they were fucking with.

One of the four pulled out some kind of tool—looked like he was about to jimmy the car open.

"We jumping 'em?" Becca whispered right into my ear, close enough to tickle.

"Yeah. Just make sure we take one alive. And try not to hit the flamethrower on the back seat."

"Go time!"

Becca shot up like someone had installed a spring in her spine along with her bone reinforcement. She moved in short, precise bursts. The poor bastards didn’t stand a chance—they did pretty much everything wrong.

First, they froze for half a second, which was long enough for one of them to catch three rounds to the dome. Not ideal. Then the other three bolted in the same direction—straight back to their ride—without even trying to use ours for cover.

They fired back too, technically. Sprayed rounds in whatever direction like bugs scattering when the kitchen light flips on. No plan, no aim. Pure panic.

I aimed for the leg of the one furthest left and squeezed the trigger.

The smart rounds danced through the air, weaving a path before tearing through the blue-and-white track pants just above the knee. The guy staggered but didn’t drop. Needed a little extra.

Three more rounds did the trick. He finally hit the ground. Becca had already handled the rest.

I tossed a quick amnesia his way, then rushed him before it wore off to disarm the punk. No problem pulling that off. Didn't look like he’d bleed out either. Good—we could have a chat.

"Who you working for?" I asked, leveling two pistols at him—mine and his ex-Lexington.

"Shit, fuck! That hurts!" he whined, writhing on the pavement—but he was quick to realize a hole in his leg wasn’t his biggest issue right now. "Workin'? Me? Hell no, choom! You got the wrong guy. Shit… I need a ripper, man."

"Then why were you tailing us?"

"Tailing? Nah, man! We just… saw your girl and thought we’d, like, invite her to a party…"

"Aww, how sweet," Becca giggled. "Well, that party was lit. I had a blast. Next time, bring more friends."

"Right. Sure," I nodded. "And cracking open our car? That was to leave a party flyer and a love letter. Guns out just for self-defense in the big bad city. Checks out."

"Yeah, yeah!" the guy agreed, nodding frantically.

"They weren’t sent by anyone," Lucy chimmed in over comms.

So just a plain ol’ attempted mugging. Guess I did a decent job looking like a street rat after all—even pulled in some actual vultures.

"Get the fuck outta here," Becca said generously, nodding down the street. "Shooting unarmed dudes is boring."

"Wait," I said with a crooked grin. "One more question."

"Fine, fine—just hurry up. My leg’s fucked."

"What kind of music do you listen to?"

"Huh? Music?" he blinked.

"Let me be more specific. Ever heard of a band called Samurai?"

"Uh… yeah. Old chrome. Still plays on the radio sometimes."

"And? You like 'em?"

He squinted at me, probably pegging me for some psycho fan and decided to play along.

"Yeah! Totally! Love 'em. Big fan!"

"Then lucky you," I said, jabbing a tranq into his neck. "You're about to help bring the legend back."

Good hit. Despite my still-wonky motor control, the Dynalar-Kandachi arm did the job. He went down fast.

Just then, a worn but still somewhat decent-looking chick leaned out of one of the lit windows and asked in a thick accent:

"You takin’ the bodies?"

Scavs.

"Just one," I said. "We’ll load him up and bounce."

"Cool. We’ll crawl out later so your girl doesn’t twitchy-trigger us. She shoots real good."

"Thanks, and that’s not even—" Becca started, but the chick was already gone.

Weird night. First we part ways peacefully with the Red-Eyes, now this. Is it possible we already shot the dumbest and most aggressive of the city’s scum over the last few months?

Nah. No way. Just lucky tonight.

Alright. Time to bag Johnny's future meat suit and get the hell out. Plenty more to do.