A Motive with a Universal Adapter 01

Part 1 of 2

"Your time has expired. Please deposit additional funds or vacate the unit."

The polite voice repeated in Spanish, Japanese, and Canto. The buzzer that followed immediately after was a stark contrast—a dissonant series of tones developed to be especially irritating.

The Kiroshi's chrono down in the left corner of my field of vision read 14:27. Time to get up.

Despite the buzzer, I rolled over and took the time to check the charge on Uncle Sam's leg and unplug it from the wall jack. The micro turbine in my aorta provides enough current to power the Kiroshi and my implants, but the leg needs a daily recharge. Once I was sure the coffin hadn't stiffed me, I rolled back the other way, unlatched the door, and pulled myself out of the horizontal locker that I'd paid €2.50 an hour for.

I've slept better in worse places.

The coffins in this hotel are stacked five high. In this hall, there are nineteen stacks on each side. All 190 units were occupied. A thin crowd was queued up, waiting for the next unit to vacate.

A young guy in stained coveralls with a crimson mohawk like some kind of tropical bird rushed up as soon as I opened my hatch.

Instinctively my pulse quickened and my muscles coiled. I had to make a conscious effort to calm my reflexes and not reach for the pistol slung under my arm. The guy wasn't a threat, he was just in a hurry to get to bed. Probably hoping to catch a few hours of sleep before the clubs opened.

"I'm going, I'm going," I snapped, reaching back into the coffin for my bag and jacket.

He tried to be subtle as he looked me over, but I could see him doing the math in his head—was it worth it to ask me to join him? He wasn't unattractive; I might have taken him up on it. But I guess he wanted sleep more than pussy, because he just gave me a polite grunt and climbed into the bed I'd just left.

I caught my reflection in the polished chrome of his left arm and decided the math hadn't been all that hard. I was a trog. It was the motivation I needed to spill a few more euros for a shower.

Out on the street, the grey California sunlight filtering between the high-rises and crisscrossed skyways couldn't compete with the neon and video boards and marquees. Ads for the latest Zetatech implants and Gibson Fashion blared from speaker screens. Street hustlers waved flyers for the latest club to open where the last one had closed. Scop cooks hawked food from stalls and take-out windows, shilling their corporate sponsors' flavor of the month. Traffic. Construction. Sirens.

Down on street level, there's no peace and no privacy.

I muscled my way through the teeming throng on the sidewalk and waited at the intersection for the light. A luxury AV passed overhead, its turbo fans drowning out the other racket and blasting us peasants with its downdraft.

Stepping off the curb, I avoided a scuffed up cyber-arm with last year's day-glo finish. It still had three fingers left on the hand, but someone had decided it wasn't worth salvaging. Now it was garbage like all the other shards of silicon and crumpled screamsheets and scop wrappers in the gutter.

The choob behind me wasn't so nimble. He stumbled on the arm and lurched forward, dumping his cup of soup down the back of my pants.

"Sorry," the bakebrain muttered, shouldering past me when I stopped short in the middle of the street with the heat and the damp against my meat leg soaking down into my boot. He crushed the empty cup in his fist and tossed it in the gutter before disappearing into the flow of humanity.

It was gonna be another beautiful fucking day in Night City.

The aroma of soup clung to me, overpowering even the smell of exhaust that filled the streets. I hadn't eaten yesterday, so it piqued my hunger and despite the dwindling euros in my pocket, I stopped at a scop shop window for some breakfast before I'd gone two more blocks.

"You wanna add spinach, scallion, asparagus?" the shopkeeper asked cheerfully. "Veggies are good for ya!"

He knew as well as I did that the vegetables were extruded from the same algae-derived Single-Cell Organic Protein as the scop noodles in scop broth I had ordered. The only difference was in the flavoring and texturizing chemicals. I'll admit, the garnish made the noodles look more appetizing in the glossy photos on the menu screen, but I didn't have the cash to spill on presentation.

"Not today, thanks," I answered. "Gotta watch my figure."

"Pretty gal like you? Nah, spoil yourself sweetheart!" he cajoled, trying to squeeze me for a few more cents.

"Maybe next time."

Reaching out to take the cup, I felt my arm tremble.

Tremors are the first sign of Lucidrine withdrawal. I was coming down and I'd need another fix that I couldn't afford—not on the night-watchman wages I was making. If the shakes got too bad, I wouldn't even be able to work. Fortunately, my shift didn't start for almost five hours so I had time to go see Joe.

I wolfed down my breakfast and lit a cigarette from the half pack I had in my bag. Nicotine helps with the tremors, but not much.

The dataterm on the corner was in use by a pair of chromers arguing over which clinic on the directory screen boasted the shortest recovery times so I found an open unit down the block. After ignoring an ad for a body sculpt artist I couldn't afford, I paid fifty cents for an audio call and dialed from memory. It was picked up after three rings.

"Talsorian's, Don'na goyōdeshou ka?" the bartender answered.

"Hoshi, it's Ritz. Is Savage Joe around?" I asked. There was some muffled noise on the other end of the line.

"Ritzie!" Joe answered after a short pause. "I was just thinking about you, querida. I might have a job lined up for you."

"Seriously!? That is... Oh frack, Choombata, that's news I needed to hear right now. Listen, I got the shakes, and I'm kinda runnin' on fumes here."

If I was really lucky, he'd found me a new income stream, but I'd settle for a side job with one good pay day. Hell, as fragged as my resumé was, I'd thank him for a second part-time rent-a-cop gig.

With euro in my future, I could probably count on Joe to get me a Lucidrine hit on credit. If he was between inputs, I might have to sleep with him, but it wouldn't be the first time, and I could think of worse fates. Savage Joe Carmichael was a solid output.

"Aw, we can't have that. Come see me. We'll work something out."

"You're the best, Joe," I told him, and I meant every word.

"Nah, you're better. See you soon."

Joe and I go back almost a decade. After the war—after the U.S. government collapsed and pulled us grunts out of CentAm—the dollar was in freefall. That was before the corporations stepped in to fill the vacuum. Those were strange days.

Having a roof over your head at least meant some kind of security. Even if your paycheck was worthless, having a job would get you a credit rating. I had none of that. I was on the street with nothing but the cyberware Uncle Sam left me with and a skill set that was only good for ruining other people's day.

When I finally got hungry enough, I had tried to mug the first suit unlucky enough to cross my path.

As he lay on the asphalt in that alley clutching the knee I'd dislocated, Joe saw something in me I hadn't even seen in myself. Instead of begging for his life, he kept his cool and offered me a job as his bodyguard. He was on the run and while he didn't have money, he had contacts and charisma.

Between his talent for solving other people's problems and mine for causing them, we made a good team. We were even romantic for a while, but it's not like we ever jacked each other or anything.

Eventually the world settled into a new kind of normal. We parted on good terms when I got a better offer. These days, Joe works out of a Northside dive bar called Talsorian's that he owns a stake in.

Passing a subway entrance, I considered my finances. If I took the metro up to Northside, I couldn't afford a coffin tonight. But if I ended up sleeping with Joe, I wouldn't need one. But if he has an input, I won't be sleeping with him... unless she's into it. But it's a long walk and the exercise would hasten the withdrawal symptoms.

I decided to risk my last few euros on the metro, which was a huge mistake because some rust-out threw himself on the tracks and shut down the line. Without a seat, I stood in that crowded train car with nothing to do but watch the minutes tick by on the Kiroshi's chrono, floating there ever-present in my view. We finally started moving again after ninety-seven of them.

As soon as I came back up to street level, I spotted the flashing police lights three blocks away.

With a thought, the Kiroshi zoomed in and I could see the cruisers and meat wagons blocking the lane in front of Talsorian's. A crowd clustered behind police tape. I had to will myself not to break into a run; to slow my breathing and stay calm. The only thing panic would do was hasten the Lucidrine withdrawal.

Approaching through the crowd, I could see the front window of Talsorian's riddled with bullet holes—nine-millimeter, maybe ten. Submachine gun fire. As I watched from across the street, the body bankers wheeled out four gurneys, their passengers zipped into bags.

I switched my vision to a thermograph rainbow hoping to pick out tell-tale cyberware from the cooling body heat, but too much time had passed. If one of them was Savage Joe, I couldn't tell.

Nobody in the crowd seemed to know what had happened beyond the obvious. Once the meat wagons pulled away and it was evident there would be no more carnage to ogle, the crowd started to disperse. I hung around watching the cops, trying to pick a useful shred of conversation out of the background noise.

"Another armed robbery." ... "Witness saw two guys come out the back." ... "Any survivors?" "None that stuck around." ... "Waste of good alcohol, man." ... "Did we get a description?" "Yeah, same as always—too generic to be useful." ... "The cash register was smashed open." "Any idea how much they got away with?" ... "The owner's on his way." ... "Probably just a couple dorphers trying to get a fix." ... "I don't suppose they had a security cam, did they?" "Yeah, but it's offline. We might get something off the one guy's optic if he was quick enough to rec--"

"'Scuse me... Hey! Excuse me!"

I turned with a start. I'd been so engrossed in the chatter across the street that I hadn't realized the comment was directed at me until the girl tapped my shoulder.

"Abby Rhoades, Network 54 News," she introduced herself and nodded to the camera on her shoulder. "Mind if I ask you a few questions?"

"Not right now," I told her, turning back to the crime scene.

"It's just, you've been standing here for over an hour," she pressed. "So it kind of seems like maybe you have a personal connection to this story."

When I didn't respond she continued. "And this story could really use a personal connection, you know? Something to give it some human interest. I mean, it's just a street-level robbery/homicide. There are probably like a dozen of them today. The only way this makes broadcast is if it's a slow news day anyway. I'd sure like to give it a fighting chance though."

I mostly tuned out her babbling and focused on the cops across the street again as they packed up to head off to another call, but then the reporter said something that caught my attention.

"...guess I'll follow up with the list of victims and see if I can get--"

"You have the victims' names?" I asked, all of my attention now on her.

"Yeah, I bribed a cop for it." She grinned like she'd just scored a point on me.

"Joe Carmichael. Is he one of the victims?"

"Will you answer my questions if I ans--"

Before her expression could change from smug to startled, her back slammed against the brick wall behind her. I held her pinned with one arm braced across her shoulders and the muzzle of my Militech Avenger pressed under her chin. My back was to the cops across the street, hiding the pistol from view.

"Yes!" she squeaked. "José Carmichael. My source says his ID was a fake, but he was one of the fatalities."

She gasped for breath when I released the pressure on her chest. I trembled from the Lucidrine withdrawal and nearly dropped my weapon as I tried to holster it. Whatshername misinterpreted my symptoms.

"I'm sorry for your loss," she consoled. "Would you like to talk about it?"

"No."

"Listen," she pushed, "I know you're going through some shit right now. You're grieving. I get that. But the police are gonna write this off as a random act of violence."

She was right. Junkies knocking over a street-level bar for the till wasn't worth wasting stockholder euro to investigate. Not to the corporations that run the N.C.P.D. anyway.

"If we can get this story on the air though—if we can make people care—it'll put pressure on the police. There might be justice for your friend... Justice for Joe."

The manipulative little bitch.

"Network 54 has the resources to--"

"You're not Network 54!" I cut her off. "If you were, you'd have a cameraman, a producer, and a bodyguard."

That finally shut her up. She stood there glowering at me for a beat before she recovered.

"Fine!" she spat. "I'm a freelancer. I sell footage to anyone who's buying. But two weeks ago, Network 54 put one of my stories on the air. This story could make it too, but only if I can give people a reason to care about the victims. I have a preliminary police report, but viewers don't tune in for ballistic data or coroner's notes or witness statements. If peop--"

"Witness statements?"

"...Yes," she acknowledged, warily stepping back away from me.

I did the interview. I answered her questions, but she seemed frustrated.

"I get the whole strong-silent-type thing you're going for," she said rummaging in her bag. "But it's not good TV. Here, this will help you open up and express yourse—Ow! Ow! Ow! You're hurting me!"

She had reached for my neck and without thinking I'd caught her arm in a joint lock. With another few grams of pressure I could’ve snapped her wrist.

"It's just a skill chip!" she protested, holding up the wafer of silicon so I could read the label. 'Roget's Elocution & Oratory, level 1'. "Let me plug this into your neural processor and it will help what's in your head come out your mouth."

With a sigh, I let go of her wrist. Cooperating was the fastest, cheapest way to get a description of the dorpher garbage that had creased Joe.

I pulled my hair aside to expose the socket on the base of my skull. She inserted the chip, but nothing happened. Normally when you chip in a new skill you can feel the tingle as your nerves rewire themselves to establish muscle-memory. This time, nothing.

"Your chip appears to be suffering a malfunction," I told her. "I'm afraid your scheme to augment my vocabulary and enhance... Oh. I get it."

She smiled and winked at me.

With Talsorian's bullet-riddled facade as a backdrop, I told her about Joe who always knew who to call, no matter what your problem was. I told her about Hoshi Satō who tended bar all day and shredded face-melting speedmetal with his band all night.

I told her about Talsorian's and how it wasn't trendy or edgy, but it was the heart of a neighborhood. I told her I'd fought the cartels in the Second Central American War with the 13th Urban Division. I told her that after the government cut me loose, this bar was the closest thing I had to a home.

I gave her what she wanted. I would have shed a tear if I hadn't sacrificed my tear ducts for the Kiroshi.

"Thanks," the reporter said after she'd stopped recording. "I know that was hard for you, but that's good TV... What name do you want me to use on the chyron?"

"Just call me 'Ritz'," I told her.

"Like the hotel?"

"Sure."

"Alright..." She made a note and then gave me a sidelong glance. "You seem familiar. Have you been on TV before?"

"No," I lied. "Now pay up. Let's see what you've got."

She cued up her interview with the cop, turned the camera around, and handed it to me to watch.

"I still have to obscure his identity," she told me. "I'm trusting you not to expose my source."

If I could have, I would've rolled my eyes as I took the camera.

In the viewfinder I recognized one of the cops that had been working the crime scene. He stuffed a wad of cash in his pocket and kept looking back and forth, wary of being caught, but he obviously didn't expect the footage to ever make it to air. They were in the alley behind Talsorian's.

"Yeah alright, I'll tell you everything we know so far. But this ain't an official statement so don't quote me, ok? The register was jimmied open and empty, so it's most likely just a couple gangbangers looking for easy cash."

The cop pulled out a notebook and read off the first page. "Ballistics found both forty-five and ten-millimeter slugs. Neither weapon was recovered. One of the victims managed to get off a shot from a nine-millimeter before he was killed. The other victims were all armed but didn't draw their weapons."

"Were you able to identify the victims?" the reporter asked from off screen.

"Well we got names, but that ain't always the same thing," the cop answered.

He read Joe and Hoshi's names off his notebook along with their age, race, and gender. The other two names I didn't recognize.

"Satō was found behind the bar," the cop continued. "Poor guy had been nearly cut in half by automatic weapon fire at point-blank range. A real mess—just blood and guts and broken bottles everywhere. Carmichael was in front of the bar at the corner."

I recognized that as Joe's usual stool.

"He had two forty-five caliber slugs in his chest and another in his skull. Smith and Lee were at a booth by the window about fifteen meters from the bar. Lee took one forty-five to the gut and another to the shoulder; Smith took one in the neck. Both were hit by multiple ten-millimeter rounds."

"You said one victim fought back?" the reporter prompted.

"Yeah, Lee managed to get off a shot. There was one round fired from his gun, but we don't know what he hit yet. Hard to find a nine-millimeter slug in all those tens, or to tell one guy's blood from another without a lot of testing. And what with our backlog, well..." he shrugged and let it go unsaid that he didn't expect to ever know.

"Were there any survivors or witnesses?"

"If there were survivors they didn't stick around." The cop flipped a page back in his notebook and continued. "Looks like the call came in at three fifty-one from a Mister, uh... 'L. Nero'. They're still talking to the guy. If you hurry, you might catch him yourself."

The recording buzzed with a moment of static and cut to the street out front. The video zoomed in on a plain clothes detective talking to a twenty-something guy in a black suit with jet black hair, but the audio couldn't pick up their conversation. The detective handed the guy a card, they shook hands and parted ways.

The camera went shaky as the reporter tried to follow the witness through the crowd, but as soon as he turned his back, I'd seen enough. I handed the camera back.

"What? What did you see?" she asked. "You look like you saw a ghost."

"I did," I told her, turning and heading up the street in the same direction as the guy in the black suit. I tried to slow my breathing to keep my legs from wobbling.

"You know something," the girl accused, following. "Tell me what you saw. Do you know who did it?"

"Yes and no."

"Ritz, stop! He got into a cab."

Well, fuck. Of course he did. Did I think I was just going to walk down the street and bump into him?

"Did you get the cab's plate?" I wheeled around on her.

She stopped short and held the camera back away out of my reach. "It's gonna cost more than just an interview," she grinned.