Chapter 232

“Heard you got a new gig.”

“Juuun.” I whined from the couch. I sat up and glared at him.

“What?”

“Don’t what me. I can hear that smirk on every word. I’m not giving up my Merc job.”

“Sure.” He said very much not agreeing with me, as he said it. I sat up and glared at him.

“I’m too good of a merc to quit.”

“You say that because you aren’t making Rockerboy eddies yet.”

“I don’t care about eddies.”

“You don’t care about eddies… Yet.”

“Okay you want an ass beating?” I demanded waving a fist at him and he just sent me another smug look.

“You’d lose.”

“Fuck I would. I got secret ninja powers. Nin-Nin.”

“Pfft. I’m still stronger than you.”

“Only like a gorilla.”

“Hey! You’re the gorilla here.”

I considered leaping off the couch and bringing truth to my words but I considered it. I had band stuff last night. Band stuff tonight. No gigs to distract me. No grinds that I was doing right this minute…

 

I still needed a better server for the Tachikoma. I’d have to figure that out soon, been leaving it hanging for too long.

 

“Jun. You doing anything?”

“Hmm?” He asked from around a Burrito so I felt my nose scrunch up.

“Gross.”

“Is’ good!” He argued as always and I shook off the fact he’d spoken with his mouth full. I think XXL burritos actually looked better chewed up, which was a disturbing thought.

 

“I’ve been meaning to do more hand to hand. I could use someone to spar against… So you busy?”

“To throw my little brat of a sister around a mat for a while? Never.” He decided and I hissed at him for acting like it was going to be that easy.

 

“I’m gonna punch you in your stupid abs and break them.” I warned him, and he actually flinched a bit and put a hand on his stupid plastic abs.

 

“Motoko… Don’t.”

“Oh come on, they’re fake!”

“It’s expensive cyberware!”

“It’s a plastic body sculpt! There is no cyberware there Jun!”

“Says you!”

“Idiot!”

“Idiot!”

“No you!”

“You!”

 

—–

 

“Oh it’s on Onnnnniiiiii-chan.” I drawled out as I tapped my padded gloves together and bounced around.

 

“I’m gonna enjoy reminding you that I’m the big brother.” he said smiling as his own hands were wrapped in heavy pads.

 

Gomorroah was close enough that we just walked to the gym both of us throwing jabs and trying to mess with the other the entire way.

 

“Rules?”

“I won’t punch you in the dick. I want little nieces and nephews someday, and you need all the help you can get.”

“Look who’s talking. Idiot.”

“You’re the idiot!” I growled and he hunkered down into a brutal looking boxing stance and rushed in.

 

Fast.

 

Jun was a lot faster than I’d normally expect. I knew he’d been jacked in with all sorts of cyberware when he first joined the Kamikaze, but I’d never actually asked exactly what he had.

 

But as fast and strong as he was?

 

I was very good with Street Brawling, and fast enough his initial assault. Which I noticed he was holding back a good bit, wasn’t fast enough to strike me. I juked, falling into a boxing stance myself despite not really being a boxer.

 

His fists whiffed twice before I grabbed one that was overextended and I tried to hip check him, only for his stupid too heavy body to just lift me off my feet.

 

I was held there, his arm straight out my feet off the mats as I jerked a few times only for nothing to happen.

 

“This is bullshit.”

“You’re way too small for that.”

“I could totally Judo throw you if you weren’t so fat!”

“Doubt.”

I activated my Sandy, even as his mouth continued to mouth the words, I dropped most of the way back to the mat, and bounced, using all the force of my stronk legs, to fly back up, calves wrapping around my idiot brothers too big head and then flinging sideways a bit.

 

The momentum this time was enough to throw him off his feet, and I landed in a cool three point landing a bit away before rising up and patting my hands together.

 

“Doubt that?”

 

“Cheating.” He grumbled, as he rose up checking himself over. “And it didn’t do shit. What was that, some stupid action movie move? You realize if you did that to someone they’ll just shoot you.”

“I’ll shoot them!”

 

“Then why do it in the first place? Just shoot them!?”

“To disable them in case they were about to shoot me!”

“THEY’LL JUST SHOOT YOU ANYWAYS!”

 

“I’LL SHOOT THEM FIRST!” Jun leapt at me, and I leapt in both of us brawling and hitting each other as we continued yelling, ignoring the normal gym goers who were all moving away.

“You fight like a moron!”

“YOU ARE A MORON!”

 

“AND YOU’RE A GORILLA!”

 

Eventually the two of us ended up on the mat. I had my arm around Jun’s stupid neck cause obviously he didn’t need oxygen for a brain that small, and he was crushing me with his stupid bulk while pummeling into my side to get me to let go.

“Hey!” We both looked up at the yell, as the Gym manager came out of his little office. “I don’t care what this is! Cut it out! Break it up!”

We instantly distangled, Jun taking a moment to catch a breath his head had been turning a bit purple, and I winced as I felt my side. Lucky he had been wearing gloves.

 

“Sorry about that.” I replied eventually and the owner threw up his hands and went back to the office. “You shouldn’t disturb people so much Jun-Nii.”

“Shut up.” He grumbled at me as he threw a towel at my head.

 

“I don’t think sparring is something we can really do.” I admitted and Jun looked at me and snorted.

 

“No, I don’t think so either.” We both smiled at each other and broke into chuckles as I walked over and nudged him. We ended up putting the pads away and getting breakfast, even though Jun just grabbed another ‘fresh’ Burrito XXL out of the vending machine, while I got some meat skewers from the guy surrounding the building.

 

—–

 

I took the rest of the morning to fuck around.

 

I flopped on my bed and checked in on my Tachikoma. Already I could see the motive programming was doing well. The Racing game that I’d set them up with whenever I remembered was doing a great job on filling in how to move around on wheels. I flicked the power on, and let the Tachikoma load up as I set it on my bedroom floor.

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Soon the little drone was moving around on its wheels pretty good. Only….

 

“I probably should have considered that.” I muttered as it was happily doing laps around my room in a circle. Well, it had gained the ability to drive and turn, that was already a big step, I’d just remove the whole circle thing.

 

In fact, I pulled up my system, and checked my points.

 

Intelligence 16 (20) Due to Cyberization, Maximum value has increased by 10.

-Breach Protocol 15

-Quick Hacks 13

-Programming 15

 

0 Stat point.

3 Skill point.

 

Yep, I really needed to spend some of those.

 

Programming instantly got another point. Bringing me up to a solid 16. I shivered as the knowledge flooded through me, as I processed and learned what it had to tell.

 

I was already starting to pull up the Tachikoma’s data as the knowledge flowed through me, and I went to work.

 

Clearing up the accidentally learning to always follow a track, or going in circles, I opened my Tachikoma to a whole new world.

 

Suddenly it stopped and just waited, making me realize once again that just because it could, didn’t mean the Tachikoma would without a bit of a push.

 

So I gave it a new task. Map out the entire room.

 

It stuttered to a start, stopping and going, and soon I was helping it develop a sort of digital mapping program to help it learn and design spaces.