Claire.
The AI glared at the man who was approaching her from the side, abruptly halting her stride, as was expected of a Paradise android while out and about on her business.
At once, bright ribbons of ‘do not approach’ tape projected around her in an altered reality, sirens blaring a cautionary warning of what would happen should she be impeded.
“Oooooh, look at that, you pissed her off!”
“Nah, that’s just what they use to scare off the scrubs, ain't no Peace-heads bothering to come out here.
Crap…
Robots were not allowed to hurt humans; however, that wasn't an excuse for ‘humans’ to touch other people's property.
What remained of that contradiction when an individual without ownership desired to mess with someone else's android could get somewhat vague, but at the very least, one could expect Peacekeepers to deal with the miscreant in due order.
Assuming the bot's owner could pay for their services…
Still, the man hesitated at her warning, even if he was laughing about it, his scruffy face, a patchwork of uneven beard, and the occasional scar. Short hair, clipped at the ears and just as greasy as Warren’s.
Concerningly, the man carried a somewhat familiar baton; switch-activated, its pitched whine heralded that its limited batteries were already being drained, but Claire knew how badly that much voltage could fuck with her synthetic muscles.
He stood there, halfway stuck between acting out on his impulsive thoughts and halfway eager for what he doubtless saw as a good time or possibly just some valuable scrap.
Truth be told, it really could be either, or possibly even both. Regardless, he jolted as if he'd just shocked himself, partially turning when another of his gang called out, laughing at him as if he were an idiot.
“Ay, lookie at Dougie. Fucker's gonna get himself splattered. Dibs on his shit.”
“Eh, that’s just an urban legend, “Doug called back, the spindly and rough-looking man rolling his shoulders and glancing back at Claire. “You think Paradise would let their bots kill people? Gov'ment would shut them down in a heartbeat. Nah, like I said, that’s just something the corps like to hiss about to try to prevent honest, hard-working folk from getting a little extra scratch on the sly, ain't it?”
“Anyone want to put money on if she kills him?” another man joked. More and more reprobates emerged from the gloom of the dilapidated building as a sizable force converged on her person.
“She ain't gonna do nothing to me. And Roy, if you touch my shit, I’ll slit you in your sleep.”
“Nah, mate, you’ll be itty-bitty chunks on the road, and I’ll be listening to your favorite songs after I pluck the augments from your chunky tomato bisque.”
“Dolls don't kill people,” a woman grunted, moving out to join the man who was already halfway toward the waiting AI. “As Dougie said, they’re just spitting fire.”
“Beckie…”
“Yeah, Dougie?” The large newcomer grinned, eyeing him with a predatory glee that had the nearest thug licking his lips.
“This 'un here's mine! Fuck off, or I’ll snip your wires.”
“Good luck!” One of the brutes shouted, the lot of them laughing at a now nervous Dougie who swallowed and adjusted his grip.
“How about I fight you for her?”
“I’m not fighting anyone for what’s already
my
property—now shove off!”
“Then how about I just take her from you?” the girl chuckled, swinging around a large, polished club that looked a lot like a baseball bat but was, in fact, nearly twice its size.
The girl was a bit of a mechanical monster: massive cybernetic arms like that of a power-loader, and while her cybernetic legs were normal, they weren't low-grade tech…
She even had what looked like long synthetic hair implants—if only because they weren't gross and messy like the others, possessing a kind of neon-and-gold gradient that glowed with highlights as she moved.
“Hey, what makes you two think that either of you gets the Doll?” another savage demanded.
And just like that, more and more men and women spoke up as the group began edging forward in a singular mass, none seeming to like the idea of losing out on a potential payday.
This was the first time that Claire had, in memory, actually come here. And now she could see why Paradise charged so much extra for a callout to this particular part of the city.
It was a shithole!
The smell of hot garbage, excrement, poor air quality, and the nonstop hammer and slam of distant industry all combined to create a miserable armpit that was so much worse than she’d thought possible.
There were as many run-down buildings as active ones; the shops were either guarded by armed mercenaries or gangs.
For every crappy apartment she saw, there were two more that somehow looked far worse, and anywhere where real glass existed, there was at least one smashed window.
Yet, as much as Claire found the idea of getting accosted sort of interesting in a first-time sort of way, she quickly hacked the gorilla-woman's arm and promptly
pummeled
the nearby man in the face.
Splat.
His skull, soft and horribly biological as it was, fractured as it crunched in on itself. His nose and eyes popped like a grape under the weight of reinforced steel and composite, sending the scrawny man backward in a comical flip.
“The fuck, Beckie?”
“I—I didn't do that!” the woman shouted, just as confused as everyone else.
Yet when someone ran over to go help the very much dead scrap thief, Claire just had ‘Beckie’ punch out again.
The AI wanted to giggle as the woman scored herself another solid knockout, her fist crunching another cranium before it lurched out again, grabbing the lolling bandit by the scruff of his neck as Claire got creative.
Using the other woman's mechanization against her, she forced the girl to toss her own comrade into the mass of others nearby, creating a bit of amusing chaos as they all tumbled over each other.
Oh, silly, silly primitives...
Why was it so fun to mess with them?
What followed, however, was something that Claire honestly hadn't expected to see. Rather than blaming the dangerous cyborg, several of those knocked down by the flying body began shouting and hitting their already potentially dead comrade, furious for knocking them all down.
What the man could have possibly done to prevent that seemed relatively unimportant to those who were already kicking his body as if he owed them money.
Maybe he just wasn't well-liked?
And when Claire forced the robo-gorilla to charge into her compatriots, knocking even more of them aside like some rampaging bull, Beckie’s enraged screams of madness and confusion merely churned fires of passion and old grudges.
Just like that, the entire group turned on each other in a sudden brawl.
Two people had their heads bashed together with a sickening crunch by a big bastard who looked to have some expensive and subtle upgrades—only for said brute to be tackled by three others, stun batons in hand.
The motley crew collectively shocked the ever-loving shit out of him as his body convulsed with terribly high voltage, pissing his pants before he stopped twitching and stilled.
Another woman delivered a flying kick to a somewhat androgynous individual who was busy trying to strip something from a body struggling on the ground; all the while, the person being looted was in a wrestling match with another man whose blades whipped about his arms, sort of like a weird, ineffective blender.
The alleyway became an amateur ballet of violence, as much a scuffle filled with insults as it was physical. All of it, in a strange way, was beautiful in its chaotic pageantry.
A woman with razor-sharp claws extending from her fingertips slashed at a man's face, leaving bloody furrows across his cheek and exposing bone and steel beneath. He roared and retaliated with an off-balance kick, augmented by pneumatic pistons, that sent her crashing into a stack of rusted metal sheets, the blow also launching him sideways with a now twisted leg.
The impact crumpled the metal like paper, trapping the woman with upgraded secretary claws beneath the debris in a cascade of falling dust, taking her out of the fight as much as it had her opponent.
Some hulking brute of a monster with a fist the size of his own head ripped a metal pipe from the wall and swung it like it was the legendary sword from the stone itself, connecting with a smaller man's ribs with a sickening, cheer-inducing crack.
Wheezing and quickly dropping to one knee, the poor man gasped for air, his mechanical chest partially caved in. He held up his hands as if begging for mercy, which the brute granted with a grin, a flash of metal teeth gleaming in the light, his middle finger bared as he booted the man over, then turned his attention to another target.
Two more figures grappled on the ground as the big guy stomped off, their augmented limbs a blur of motion. One, a too-thin, spindly woman with enhanced reflexes, dodged a punch aimed at her head and countered with a lightning-fast jab to her opponent's throat.
The larger fighter choked, his eyes bulging as his foe landed several more punches in ruthlessly succession, actually denting the cartilage in his neck before she extended a blade from her arm for a proper and brutal finish.
Sadly, before she could end him, she was knocked to the side as a body was flung through the air, tangling the woman in a knot of limbs while her victim spasmed on the ground, asphyxiating toward a lonely and cold death while blood and oil spilled all around him.
Comically, one enterprising madman even tried to sneak off with Claire through all the mayhem and carnage. With a grafted-on chameleon skin, his body shimmering with shifting colors as he made his bid for her while partially bending the light around him.
Sneaking from the side, he got close, but it was simply not to be. Claire easily tracked his movements; the robotic sensors of her eyes were not nearly as primitive as a normal human's, let alone the fact that she was inside the head of everyone here.
She took control of his interconnected nervous system, a rather intricate and expensive bit of cyberware, then sent a fun little jolt of electricity through his body that made him spasm uncontrollably.
His camouflage failed as his skin flashed a blinding, flickering white that seared his retinas, almost looking shocked as he stumbled to the side, eyes fighting the disorientation before Claire called in the ‘Beckie’.
Hissing and frothing as the woman was, she gave the chameleon a sweet, sweet knuckle-to-face kiss goodnight that had the man flipping backwards so fast that his neck snapped on impact.
Clair tasted the palpable miasma of sweat, piss, and burnt flesh.
The screams of the injured mingled with the clatter of metal on metal, creating an orchestra of a well-deserved lesson that echoed against the tall buildings all around them.
But even as she reveled in the mayhem, a part of her remained detached—an observer watching the bitter struggle of animals driven by passion with a sort of heated excitement that warmed her synthetic cheeks and caused her to bite her lip.
Whew…
Maybe there was a lot more to all this violence business than Claire had first thought.
This was so exciting.
So visceral.
So random and fast-paced and messy to the point she could hardly anticipate what might happen next, even as she herself perpetrated the demise of those who thought she was property to be stolen.
It was all very thrilling in a way that genuinely encompassed what she was beginning to love about the silly monkeys. So primal and unhinged, so driven by nonsense and emotional grievances that she almost wanted to grab a weapon and jump in.
Yet bathing in the blood of humans was a questionable desire that she held off on, albeit reluctantly.
Ugh, stupid primates got to have all the fun… But no, the single moment that an AI wanted to get in on the bloodbath, everyone screamed and cried and prayed to their god while asking how the universe would be so cruel…
Big bunch of babies, the lot of them.
It was a good thing that most of these people had some serious hardware, as, despite the violence, there were really only one or two deaths thus far, brain implants keeping things nice and alive while organics shut down.
Blood, synthetic oil, and sparking electronics began emerging in ever greater quantities, with Claire occasionally noticing a good opportunity too hard to pass up.
It was all too fun to take someone’s implant over and deliver a solid asskicking amidst the havoc, which had several bystanders wandering over to watch.
Sadly, while this had been a delightful little excursion, Claire began walking off once the crowd started getting too big for her.
There was no point in drawing attention to herself, after all. Thus, leaving the gang to settle their differences and old scores the old school way, Claire moved right along to her chosen destination.
As it happened, only specific areas in Port Pride were actively protected by the Peacekeepers, and it was generally easy to tell where that was and where they might turn a blind eye to.
A good rule of thumb was that anyone who could pay for the service or looked like they could pay could generally be assumed to have that protection. That being said, such locales did not include shitty alleyways filled with thugs.
However, as she began striding away, amused but no longer interested, the AI had a sudden idea that brought her legs to a complete stop.
If she was looking for someone shady to deal with, what better people to introduce her to the right business partner than those who were already shady?
Right…
Slowly, Claire turned back around, her gaze narrowing on who she thought would best fit that bill.
Gunther.
An old and weary man sat behind a counter, a burner tucked between his lips.
The occasional plume of cherry-scented vapor was released into the air following a long breath, intermixing with oil, polymer, and burning circuitry.
To his left was a quickly cooling mug of coffee, its chipped rim only slightly less impressive than the time-worn ‘best boss ever’ logo sitting on its side.
In truth, he’d bought the mug himself, and for more years than most would care to think about, Gunther had placed his mug right front and center, entirely on display for anyone who might choose to wander into his shop.
Honestly, the damned thing might have been with him longer than his oldest employee; yet, employees were a dime a dozen. If they weren't calling him and explaining why they weren't coming in for the day, they were in the back, more often than not, fucking something up.
Of course, Gunther would have to, invariably, go back there himself to see how bad the damage was for any given accident, but that was just par for the course, and he’d since worked such hiccups into his costs.
No, Gunther was a man of the community. And as such, he gave the street scraps who called themselves locals an earnest and genuine chance for some real work.
Still, three strikes, and then you were out.
If you couldn't figure out the difference between a torch and a pair of pliers by that point, you had no business working with your hands. But if you did all right, came to work on time, and actually picked up a talent or two for scrap, Gunther would punt you right up the chain.
That was where he sent his most talented workers. Off to an actual apprenticeship in exchange for a generous finder’s fee and the knowledge that he’d done his good deed for the week.
Labor was cheap, but people who knew what was what were harder and harder to find. It meant he had a substantial turnover rate, but he could also generally track when the people worth anything were coming and going.
It made things easy; it made things organized. And though people liked to call Gunther a cheap prick or a thieving snake, the thing was that they all still came to his shop because his prices were reasonable, just as the wages he offered were low.
Eh, there was an art form to making credits. And sure, some of the fancier shops charged two to four times what he did, but they also dealt with parts that weren't quite as long-lived as his own.
The abrupt clamor of a little electronic monkey that one of the lads had rigged up as a prank after stealing his old doorbell rang out to the sound of slamming symbols.
He swore, cursing whoever had wired so many dummy connections into the damned thing, then Gunther peered up from his tablet.
News seemed to have a tendency to err on the side of the miserable these days, so he was earnestly pleased for the distraction, if not the noise.
Yet, as he blinked at the beaten, bruised, and bloody mutt that had just dragged herself inside, Gunther couldn't help but smile and whistle with a grin.
“Rebecca, haha…You look like shite, girl. What the fuck happened? Ya get in a scrap with the lads from Baker’s Row again?”
“N-noooo…” the woman replied, her words stretching out as though she were straining just to speak.
Her head twitched at erratic intervals, even as her limbs stomped her forward, her hips leaning back as though she were trying to pull herself away.
“You, ugh, you alright, lass?” Gunther asked, his expression dropping into a frown as his hand reached down for the EMP he kept right under his counter. His finger caressed the button while he watched the large woman warily.
“Stop—fucking—fuck! Stop already! I’ll do it! Fuck, just quit it, will you?”
All at once, the woman's entire body relaxed, and the girl Gunther had known since she was but a puny runt, no larger than his damned knee, took a deep and shuddering breath.
“God—fuck!”
“Rebecca?”
“Just—chill out, will you, Gunny? Fuck's sake, everyone just needs to give me a goddamn minute here…”
There was silence after that. The tension practically vibrated on a string as Gunther’s fingers twitched, nearly activating his security. But he felt his own anxiety lessening as the young woman pulled out a burner of her own and then started huffing back on the thing as though she'd just rolled off some asshole after late-night hate sex.
Honestly, it seemed like she’d gone through an industrial wash cycle with a drum filled with razors and hammers, but after a few moments, she seemed to calm down to a manageable state.
“Alright, Gunny, I need you to do me a big favor,” she announced, her face disappearing in a plume of colored vapor as she stared at him, eyes as hard as they were pleading.
Slowly, Gunther nodded his head. He wasn't about to agree to anything, but it wasn't like he couldn't hear the girl out.
Rebecca was a good enough sort. Not the brightest girl around and certainly not great with her hands, but as far as those that so often stumbled into gangs went, she was one of the far less violent ones when it came to bothering good and honest folks.
If anything, the young ruffians who liked to think themselves hard men and women could even be said to be a sort of soothing presence. They rarely took from those they’d grown up around and always seemed eager to butt heads with others who weren't so judicious.
Still, Gunther considered the girl for several more moments, not terribly sure what was going on as the lass seemed a touch cracked, but again, what did it really cost him to listen?
So, taking another sip from his coffee, he grunted at the woman, as noncommittal as he could be, all the while his fingers danced across his backup plan, waiting to see if he'd need it.