“David, I have a favor to ask.”
“I’m listening, Regina.”
“I need you to help with some justice.
There’s an underground fight club in Kabuki.
It’s run by a guy named Guddini.
Nobody’s seen much of him, but he’s involved in human trafficking and drug sales.”
I frowned.
It wasn’t the infiltration that bothered me.
It was the nature of the job.
An elimination contract.
One thing is taking out gang members during a mission; that’s self-defense or collateral.
But a straight assassination?
Hypocritical?
Yeah, probably.
But it’s my hypocrisy, and I’m fine with it.
What I’m not fine with is my girls getting their hands dirty with blood they don’t need on them.
We’d been running jobs for over a month now.
More than forty missions completed.
And the flow of contracts from Regina wasn’t slowing down.
She was the main fixer for the district.
The only reason smaller fixers got any work was because she couldn’t handle the volume herself.
And she was picky.
She’d never take a job like “break up a street food stall for five hundred eddies.” Neither would I.
But the jobs she sent me?
Good pay, solid intel, clean operations.
She’d even started tossing work to V, though the corpo girl didn’t take much.
Her and Jackie maybe ran three jobs a week at most.
Big ambitions, though.
They wanted to be legends.
I knew because I saw Vik every week.
He checked my Sandevistan, the core of everything I do.
Without it, I’d have failed a long time ago.
And I’d chat with Misty, Jackie’s girl.
My girls liked her too.
They’d come with me sometimes, just to hang out.
It was good for them to see the contrast.
Me, the serious workaholic who runs multiple jobs a day and takes his rest seriously.
And Jackie, the dreamer who saved for a year just to buy a bike.
Misty had to plan every date, pay for everything.
Love’s blind, I guess.
So I just sympathized with Misty and let my own image shine by comparison.
It worked, too.
Even Judy had started looking at me differently.
She was more thoughtful lately.
Something was going on with her, but I figured she’d tell me when she was ready.
My thoughts drifted as I kept talking to Regina.
“Regina, I’ll take it.
But only because it’s you.”
“Thanks.
Wait…
what?”
“You know I don’t like straight assassination work.”
“No, no, no.
You misunderstood.”
Her image shook its head and smirked.
“If I needed someone killed, I’d send V.
She doesn’t have your hang-ups.
But this time, you don’t need to kill him.
Just knock him out and drag him to a car.
That’s it.”
I blinked.
“You want me to kidnap someone?”
“Yeah.
Problem?”
“No.”
I shook my head, looking at the ceiling of my apartment.
It was supposed to be a day off.
Regina usually respected that.
But she was calling now, which meant it was urgent.
“Taking the job.
I assume it’s time-sensitive?”
I know it’s your day off, but this is the only time in three months I’ve known his location.
I don’t know when the next chance will be.”
“Send the details.”
The call ended, and the job specs arrived instantly.
I sighed, got off the couch, and stretched.
I’d been sleeping there lately, Judy had crashed with us and I’d given her the bed.
Panam had threatened to bite her if she got handsy, but I figured what actually stopped Judy was that Panam was busy with me.
Maybe I could use that dynamic to my advantage.
But not now.
I shook off the thought.
Judy had gotten closer to us since she joined the crew, but it’d still take time to bridge that gap.
Glancing back, I saw both girls still asleep, tangled up together.
It looked cute.
I shook my head again and went to make breakfast.
Twenty minutes later, everything was ready.
Judy and Panam had woken up, showered, and were waiting at the table.
“Girls, I have news.”
“You’re giving me Panam?”
Judy grinned.
“Hey!
I come as a package deal with my man!”
Panam shot back, knowing it’d hit Judy’s sore spot.
But the expected reaction didn’t come.
“Honestly?
I’ve been thinking about it lately.
Maybe it’s not as bad as I thought.
Having a guy around, I mean.
I keep asking myself why I never saw it before.”
“Never saw what?”
Panam raised an eyebrow.
“I wouldn’t say I’m in love with David.
But the thought of sleeping with him doesn’t make me cringe anymore.
So that’s something.”
“Tch.”
Panam shook her head and looked at me.
“So what’s the news?”
“The day off is canceled.”
“No.”
They stared at me, shocked.
“Well, it’s moved to Monday.
Regina has an urgent job.
We need to grab a guy named Guddini and hand him off to a client.”
“Got it.”
The girls sighed but started eating.
The food perked them up a little, at least.
Just then, someone knocked on the door.
“Of course.”
I opened it.
“And I’m not even surprised.”
Rebecca looked away.
“Brother blew all our money on chrome again?”
“Yeah.”
“Rebecca?”
Judy looked up from the table, surprised.
“Judy?
You got Judy into bed?!”
The question was aimed at me, disbelief dripping from her voice.
“Come in.
I’ll feed you.”
“Thanks.”
She stepped inside, still awkward, and sat down.
I gave her a generous portion.
I’d cooked extra anyway.
“Judy, Panam, look over the job details.”
I sent them copies.
I had my own ideas, but I wanted their input.
“Um…
isn’t today your day off?”
“Usually.
I shrugged.
Rebecca nodded like she understood.
Mercs don’t usually talk about jobs anyway, not unless they’re finished.
Even then, most stories are lies.
“I actually heard about you.”
Rebecca said it through a mouthful of food.
“Chew first, or you’re cleaning my apartment.”
She froze, chewed frantically, and swallowed.
“…Yeah.
You’ve never failed a job.
You turned down five offers from Faraday.
Why?”
“You don’t know?”
“What?”
“His rep’s garbage.
At least among people who work for other fixers.
He works for Arasaka and Militech at the same time, and he loves to shortchange his mercs.”
“Hey, that’s not true!”
“Really?
When’s the last time he paid you a bonus?
Or explained how to get one?”
“Well…”
She looked away.
“See?
Good fixers explain what they want.
You deliver, everyone wins.
With him…”
“Alright.”
“Stealth’s not gonna work.”
Panam had already figured it out.
“Yeah, I know.
Let’s see what Judy thinks.”
“Hm?
They gave you the wrong kind of job?”
Rebecca smirked.
“You were just complaining about Faraday.
And now…”
“Now I have a job with full intel and no stealth requirements.
Just the target.”
“So no stealth?”
“Right.”
I nodded.
“You gonna take me as backup?”
I looked at her skeptically.
“Hey!”
She saw it.
“I’m strong!”
“I don’t doubt it.
I’m just thinking about logistics.
And I doubt your boss would let you freelance.”
“Maine’s not my boss.
He’s a good leader, but he doesn’t stop us from taking outside work.”
“Got it.”
“I have an idea.”
We all looked at Judy.
“We’ll need two more solos.
One of them a netrunner.”
“I know a good runner!”
I raised my hand to stop Rebecca.
“Can we afford that?”
“Yeah.
Profit margins will take a hit, but we’ll still make money.”
I glanced at Rebecca.
“Fine.”
Judy sent me a rough plan.
I skimmed it quickly.
“Nice.
I’ll call Regina and warn her this won’t be quiet.”