Get comfortable, turn the page, and let’s see what this story has been hiding 🔥 ✦ Leaving Dogtown went unexpectedly smoothly.
Because of their size, Maine and Dorio took the driver and passenger seats.
Cade, Rebecca, and Pilar squeezed into the back, with the poor man dragged out of the Scav nest lying under their feet.
The car drove toward Coastview.
The handoff point was at one of Pacifica’s abandoned seaside resorts.
[Message] Mr.
Hands: The Dogtown client does not trust you, but I gave my assurance and made the introduction.
I hope that does not offend.
Mr.
Hands: I did the good deed to the end and even contacted the next party for your people.
Your subordinates should be helping the client with the matter now.
Mr.
Hands: For anything else, you need to contact this regular directly.
I should not interfere further.
Best of luck.
Cade looked at the message Hands had just sent to Rook, his gaze dark.
So far, everything seemed smooth.
Hands had even negotiated the price on behalf of the new fixer and thoughtfully pointed the edgerunners toward the next step.
Strictly speaking, the job was not Dogtown business.
Someone outside Night City had paid to ransom a person, and though the route ran from Dogtown into Pacifica, Hands was not the type to hand over work like that.
Yesterday’s terms had been clear: after two months, Dogtown jobs became fair competition.
Until then, business outside Dogtown could be contested.
Something felt wrong.
Cade could not yet tell exactly where.
Then Hands forwarded the client contact.
Unknown number.
Cade stared at the contact marked [?], then watched the road outside with new caution.
His optics lit up.
The unknown caller tried three times in a row, and he ignored all three.
He sent a text instead.
[Message] ?: Who are you?
Rook: Hands transferred the business to me.
More accurately, Dogtown now has two people who solve problems for clients.
You should know Hands temporarily passed this job to me.
?: I know.
Have your people do the job.
The money needed corporate accounting, so it was paid through the Scav.
How much the Scav pays you is between you and Hands.
Rook: My people only deliver him to the location?
I assume Hands knows the rest, but he did not tell me.
You understand.
I need to confirm the process.
?: For example?
Rook: For example, why the price is not the normal market rate for ransoming someone from Scavs.
What emergencies we should expect.
Fair and transparent cooperation.
?: Then send merc dogs who do not hold grudges.
This man carries corporate secrets.
The people you assigned need our company netrunner to run a [Memory Wipe] on them.
Of course, that has nothing to do with you, new fixer.
Rook: Why was this not said upfront?
How many mercs in Night City do you think would let a netrunner mess inside their brains?
Rook: If you had used Hands, would you wipe his people too?
?: Hands’s people, no.
Your people are new.
I do not trust them.
?: And listen, you are just the middleman taking the job.
Understand?
Why ask so much?
You are trying to compete outside with this level of reliability?
Help me out here.
Cade’s eyes stayed calm, but his mind was already sprinting.
‘Playing roles has risks.’ From a fixer’s perspective, this deal was not bad.
It was not his own brain getting attacked by a quickhack.
But for Cade and Maine’s crew, a memory wipe was absolutely unacceptable.
The crew would likely mutiny on the spot.
They would only think the boss had sold them, especially since a corporate netrunner would be doing the work.
As for Cade’s new fixer identity, a corpo dog naturally looked down on some new player who had appeared halfway through the game.
Why Biotechnica would not treat Mr.
Hands the same way was probably a matter of weight.
A gold-tier fixer with a name in Night City always had something behind him.
Clearly, Hands had also hidden Rook’s true Arasaka backing from this idiot.
Right now, the new fixer Rook was being treated like an impatient amateur desperate for a meal.
Cade had understood Night City’s survival rules even before transmigration.
Why did some fixers end up dead in miserable ways while the city’s evergreens stayed alive and respected?
If you had no network and no corp behind you, talk was worthless.
Take fixers like Hands and Wakako.
Hands had South American contacts, corporate background, and enough shared interest with Hansen to sit comfortably in Dogtown.
Wakako was even clearer.
Several of her husbands had been high-ranking Tyger Claws, and she had been one herself.
Now that she was old, she simply preferred easier work.
Huge webs of interest interlaced through the city.
If you tried to be a fixer without relying on anything but a silver tongue, your ending would be ugly.
The pillar at the center of the scale was always the most stable.
Clients and mercs stayed balanced in a fixer’s hand, but that required absolute confidence.
Hands, Hands.
Cade shook his head.
Mr.
Hands’s personality was becoming clearer.
He was using the client to test Rook, the sudden new competitor, while keeping himself clean.
He wanted to see how much power Rook really had.
In other words, Hands wanted to see whether Rook could make a show of force.
Knowing his style, this was probably not the only thing he had hidden.
“Maine!” While Cade was thinking, Rebecca glanced down at the man on the car floor and shouted.
The man had been pulled from ice water almost naked, so they had covered him with a jacket for warmth.
While everyone sat with their own thoughts, he suddenly began convulsing.
Maine twisted around.
“Under the right seat.
Painkillers, MaxDoc, whatever.
Hit that gonk with something.
Do not let him die in my car.” Cade took the MaxDoc from Rebecca and pressed it over the man’s mouth and nose.
Hiss.
The man’s chest swelled.
His eyes snapped open.
“Shit!
He’s close!” The car accelerated violently.
Maine looked ready to stomp the gas pedal through the floor.
Pilar crouched awkwardly in the back seat, stretching his neck to see whether the man was about to flatline.
The man was saying something.
Cade pushed Pilar’s head out of the way and leaned close to the man’s face.
“Securicine…” The man suddenly grabbed Cade’s collar.
“Don’t…
take me…” Cade quietly watched the man’s hand slide off his collar.
‘So that is it.’ Cade placed a call.
“Maine!
Scavs behind us!” Dorio checked the mirror and saw several graffiti-covered vehicles speeding up.
One van was already almost level with their car.
Cade snapped out of the call and looked back.
Five Scav vehicles were chasing them.
Of course.
Scavs were rarely good for anything.
That bastard Agata Leszcz was probably counting money in some corner right now.
Selling one piece of cargo twice was normal business for Scavs.
“Light them up!” Pilar shrieked, and weapons chambered inside the car.
…
✦ ✦ ✦ Ready for more?
CREATORS’ THOUGHTS EmberHollow Thank you for reading.
I hope this chapter pulled you deeper into the story.
Stick around, because there’s still a lot waiting just ahead.