Chapter 151

The explosion of the grenade going off sent dust and debris flying everywhere, but we were all safe.

 

“Woo! Yeah! Nova!” Malcolm called out as he bounced on his feet. He had already thrown a half dozen grenades, but still cheered every time.

 

The others had even started to get into it too. Hiromi actually had a really good throw once she got a little practice. Turned out her chrome hands had been to blame as it messed with her throw. Something she hadn’t even known until now.

 

Ichi had finally gotten comfortable, and the two boys were seeing who could throw the farthest.

 

It was nice that everything was coming together!

“Motoko! We got company!” Ichi called out, and I looked over and frowned. We were pretty far out in the middle of nowhere. Specifically because hey we were throwing grenades around. We had even driven off the main highway into the desert to do our training. And now a few cars spewing dust up behind them were driving towards us.

“Ichi! Get in your van and hide out. Malcolm! You have your weapons?”

“Yeah.”

“Load up. Hiromi get in the Quadra.” I ordered as I hurried to the Quadra’s trunk.

 

I wasn’t exactly armored up at the moment, but I grabbed my Copperhead and a spare magazine in one hand, and my own Shingen in the other, which I quickly passed over to Hiromi.

 

She nodded, holstering her own pistol and grabbing the Smart SMG as she hunkered down in the armored vehicle. I noticed with a bit of amusement she was still gripping a grenade in her off hand.

 

Then I turned to the approaching cars, which as they approached I noticed were in fact Wraith markings covering them.

 

Well this just got more interesting, and a lot more dangerous.

 

I walked a bit away from the Quadra and let myself go casual. Hiromi was hidden in the Quadra. Ichi had his HMG’s ready to go, and Malcolm? Malcolm was being smart.

 

He was hiding! I was actually really impressed for a moment, as he had hunkered down under the truck. Using brush to break up his outline. Shingen poking out and just waiting.

 

The two Wraith vehicles pulled up in a sliding skid, sending dirt and gravel flying, and then a moment later out stepped four gonks. Two from each vehicle.

 

I quickly scanned all four as the dust cleared. Each of them was armed, and swaggered out, only hesitating a tiny amount when they saw my Copperhead. One of them nudged the other and pointed me out, pointing out that I was armed.

 

“Drop the gun kid.” The apparent leader called out waving around an Ajax. Something I noticed he had experience handling.

 

Like most of the Wraiths, these guys were a small step above the normal Night City gangs. Better weapons, usually some military training.

 

So I dropped the Copperhead.

 

I didn’t need it, and it would make them let down their guard a bit. “Satisfied? Now what do you want?”

“Yeah, I am. You’re out here using up our turf, fucking around on Wraith territory. I know you Night City kids don’t think much of us Nomads, but out here? Well this isn’t Night City. This is our home, and now you owe us a nice Juicy tax.” The man said, but to my surprise he wasn’t talking about eddies. “Preem ride. Where’d you get her?”

 

My eyes narrowed and my hackles rose up. Because he was looking squarely at my Quadra.

 

“It’s a bit of a long story, and if I tell you, I’ll have to kill you.” I answered back, sounding like I was joking.

 

I wasn’t joking.

 

“Hah! Nice one kid, but those are nomad wheels, and you don’t look like any nomad I know of. You Clan?”

“No. Night City brat through and through.” I admited with a laugh.

 

“Even more interesting, but I think that’ll do, just hand over the wheels, and you lot can go home, and tell everyone about the big scary Wraiths. It’ll be a fun story to tell your chooms.”

 

He demanded, his focus on me shifting as he looked away. His three other buddies were split, looking at me, or at Ichi in the cab of the truck who had been faux hiding.

 

Making enough noise and moving around that they knew he was there. I wonder if Malcolm had asked him to do that.

 

Since everyone was in position and these gonks thought they had won. It was time to act.

 

The leader had his back turned, and none of them had visible speedware.

 

So I quick drew the Burya and punched a hole through the leader.

 

*750 XP Gained.*

 

I must have hit something serious, because I got the XP alert instantly.

 

“Fuc-” I was already moving, leaping up and over the Quadra, drawing the idiots attention to me, and away from the truck.

 

The truck that even as I started taking some fire, suddenly opened up. The idiots didn’t even hear it, too focused on me, and then the noise of their rifles was drowned out.

 

The roar of the HMG’s firing in unison echoed out, despite the fact they weren’t super accurate, rate of fire had a charm of it’s own. The three gonks despite moving a bit into cover to surround the Quadra were soon mulched without me even needing to do more than take cover. Malcolm was firing as well, so even as they tried to slip into new cover the Smart rounds pelted down onto them.

 

Then everything went quiet.

 

“Kill check!” I called out as I stepped out from around the Quadra to quickly look over the four bodies. I popped bullets into the three extras just to be sure, but they were dead.

 

“Everyone alright?” I called out, and Malcolm and Ichi both confirmed they were okay. Malcolm took a moment longer to slide out from under the truck.

 

But as I walked over to the Quadra, Hiromi still hadn’t spoken up. I hurried to the car and popped it open only to relax, Hiromi was shaking a bit, and looking…

 

She wiped at her eyes, but she was okay.

 

I leaned in and pulled her into a hug.

 

“It’s okay. I’m just glad you’re okay. Everything’s fine.”

“It’s stupid. They weren’t even shooting at me.” She whispered back and I just hugged her tighter. For a while until she eventually calmed down and nodded quietly, pushing me away and stepping out.

 

“You okay?” Ichi asked Hiromi gently and she nodded.

 

“I’ll be fine. Ugh. Look at this mess.” She said instead, staring at the corpses.

 

“Well… I mean…” I trailed off looking at the Wraith vehicles. Considering how many of them we had already sold off these probably wouldn’t net us much…. “Who wants to throw grenades at the cars until they explode?”

 

“Oh! Me me me!” Malcolm called out jumping up and down like a little kid, and even Ichi snuffed out a laugh before raising his own hand.

 

“Oh fine.” Hiromi added herself. Stomping over to grab some grenades.

 

“Okay, first let’s check them for loot, then let’s turn this into good practice. Try to aim into the cabin!” I called out as my chooms all grabbed high explosives.

 

This was such a good day.

 

—–

 

Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

I flopped onto the couch beside Jun when I got home that evening. We had used up all the grenades I had crafted, turning the Wraith vehicles into hunks of scrap.

 

Fuck the Wraiths.

 

“Welcome home. You’ve been out in the badlands?” Jun asked, I looked up and he was looking me over. Huh. Did he scan me?

“Gonk. You don’t have to scan me, you can just ask where I’ve been.”

“I didn’t! I just noticed all the dust on you.” He answered back trying to sound cool, but I was barely dusty anymore. So I just kept staring at him until he got awkward.

 

“Okay I did a small scan.”

 

“Goooonk. But yeah, Section 9 didn’t know how to use grenades so I made a whole bunch of them, and we went out into the desert and blew shit up. It was kinda nova.”

“You could have invited me.”

 

“Jun I love you, but inviting my brother along with my chooms is weird.” Then because I really didn’t care about being weird… Well mostly… Sometimes… I shook my head. “You can come next time.”

 

Jun smiled at my offer and reached over, dropping a hand into my hair.

 

“Next time then. What are your plans for the rest of the night?” He asked and in return I smiled and adjusted myself so I was laying sideways on the couch.

 

“Well first, I’m going to veg out on the couch with my gonk brother and watch his crappy TV shows. Then I’ll probably do some more work on my drone.”

 

“Heh. Well this gonk brother knows there is going to be a new show starting tonight!”

 

“Yeah?”

“Yeah it’s about a drug dealer in-”

“Blegh.” I answered instantly. “That sounds like total scop. I don’t want to watch that.” I grumbled, but Jun was by now well used to ignoring my complaints about any and all TV shows in the future.

 

He just continued to ramble on about what he had heard about this new show.

 

I ended up watching the first episode.

 

I wanted to kill the director.

 

——

 

The Tachikoma Chassis was done.

 

I had finished every piece, and put it all together, even uploaded the very basic program into its little brain the moment it was finished I got a burst of alerts. Programming. Engineering. Technical Ability. The system liked when I finished a big project.

 

Then I set the tiny drone onto its four limbs and flipped it on.

 

It ran through its check process. It’s eye rolling around as it checked the rotation. Limbs one at a time stretching and moving gathering range of motion data.

 

Then it was off. Taking a wavering slow step forward, then another leg moved, and another and soon despite how unsteady it was, the program I had created was learning, and it walked, and walked. And…

 

Touched the wall. Then it just kept trying to walk forward…

 

I waited a minute, hopeful the program would figure out something was in the way.

 

But no.

 

“Oookay. That needs to be fixed.” I reached down and picked it up, and despite being lifted it still just tried to walk forward.

 

I grabbed my personal link and plugged it in….

 

Yep it had gotten stuck on the basic walking program I had made. It hadn’t actually switched over to the learning process….

 

Oh. It wasn’t a programming fault.

It was hardware.

 

“Fucker sold me an off brand CPU.” I grumbled. It literally wasn’t strong enough to run both sides of the program, which meant I needed to buy a new one, and or get creative.

 

I sighed as I grabbed a personal link cord and my laptop.

 

“Time to offload some of that thinking little Tachikoma.”

 

—–

 

While I watched the Tachikoma slowly walk in circles hampered by a length of cord, I at least was happy enough.

 

It was definitely learning now.