Chapter 59

I ended up practicing some songs for another hour or so to see what my new voice could do, before Jun threw a pillow to shut me up.

 

But while I couldn’t Mimic all voices, I had a pretty large range and so some songs I could even sing in character.

 

It was fun!

 

But since Jun was going to sleep I settled in to do more programming through the night.

 

Like all programmers I ended up going out and getting some coffee and then piling the coffee table full of old cups as I worked on the keyboard.

 

“Motoko. Did you even sleep?” Jun asked as he shuffles out of his room that morning.

“Not yet. I’ll take a nap in a bit.” I told him, which wasn’t untrue. A good eight hours would soon be on the horizon meaning I would be at 100% for the gig.

 

“Well… Make sure you sleep. You said you were going out on that gig… I can come wi-”

“Denied. This is a Motoko crew only thing. It’s gonna be a milk run Jun. Just some scavs that need to be exterminated.” I told him throwing a thumbs up towards him without looking away from the screen. “Plus if anything goes wrong, Ichi, Hiromi, and Malcolm will be there as backup.”

 

“Didn’t Hiromi crash her bi-”

 

“Juun! You can’t repeat that! I told you that in confidence!” I hissed at him pointing. “Besides, Hiromi is like the fixer for this job. She’s going to be contacting buyers for the loot. So she doesn’t have to fight.”

 

“I wish you wouldn’t pull this shit… But you do have the skill… Take some extra firepower at least. For your chooms or something.”

“Oh that’s a good idea. I’ll grab some stuff and bring it along!” Too bad my HMG was still in rough shape. I really needed to fix that thing.

 

“Alright…” he sighed “I can’t stick around. Call or text me when the gig starts, and then when it’s over. If it takes too long. I’ll be coming!”

 

“Okay okay. I’ll let you know. Now get out of here. You got work?”

“Just some stuff with Sensei today. We are removing all the stuff the TC put in to the dojo.”

 

I blinked before remembering the underground room full of tech, and the Ripper room. I guess it made sense. The place was basically the C&C for the Kamikaze. Pulling it out now that it wasn’t in use, and clearing up Sensei’s Dojo made sense.

 

“Alright drive safe!” I called out, only getting a grumble in return.

 

—–

 

I was back to working on Ping trying to get my little addition working when it happened.

 

*Intelligence Leveled up!*

 

I blinked.

 

Level 7!

 

“Yes!” I cheered as the level up came in, I guess all my programming had finally given me an upgrade!

 

I settled back down and I did actually notice a difference as I worked. I hadn’t been able to really notice a difference between intelligence levels before, but this time? This time since I was programming before and after I could pick out the differences.

 

It wasn’t that I was just smarter. But I did process information faster! I could look at a cluster of code and process through it that bit faster than I had before. The numbers were able to be calculated just that little bit faster.

 

It was nice.

 

But I pushed that aside. It didn’t really change anything. Just made it a little bit easier. So I spent the next hour or so debugging the code.

 

It would work.

 

It was messy. It wasn’t clean. But it would make Ping a little bit harder to track if I used it on a network. Stretching out I uploaded the completed program into my Cyberdeck and shut the laptop down.

 

Time for a nap!

 

—–

 

“You all look great!” I told the crew as we met up. We were all meeting up at Hiromi’s apartment complex. Funnily enough the security there meant that it was actually pretty safe to gather together in our armored clothes before the gig. Sure there were cameras, but if you knew anything about Night City, you knew that anyone in a Corp isn’t going to want records of their coming and going.

 

So the garage was pretty safe.

 

We all met up around Ichi’s truck, I was the last to show up much to my embarrassment. Thankfully Hiromi distracted me from being late.

 

“What’s with your mask Motoko?” Hiromi asked and I eye smiled as the bottom of my face was covered in a cloth ninja mask.

 

I was pulling a Kakashi!

 

“I’m a ninja Hiromi. Nin-nin.” I told her happily.

 

“Nin-nin? What the fuck is that?” Malcolm asked just confused, and so was everyone else.

 

“And three fourths of you call yourself japanese. Disappointed.” I tell them all frankly. “Now enough about my amazing ninja outfit. Let’s go over the plan again.” I said grabbing everyones attention.

 

I had planned this last night.

 

I had wanted to mess with my friends to work off some of the anxiety. So I coughed lightly into my fist. Altering my voice to my Sexy Motoko.

 

“Attention Section 9. Mission brief begins now.”

 

And then I stood there enjoying the lovely chaos.

 

Hiromi’s jaw dropped.

 

Malcolm looked utterly confused. Looking around as if wondering what the hell was going on.

 

Ichi had a flush crawling up his neck to his ears as she stared at me.

 

“Oh? Cat got your tongues?” I mocked a little, putting a hand on my hip and cocking it a bit. “I suppose I’ll hav-Hiromi!”

 

“Mooootokooo! Did you get a voice changer!? Your new voice is so sexy! Amazing!” Hiromi called out after tackling me, nearly knocking me on my ass as I had to spin her a bit to bleed off her momentum.

 

“It’s certainly… Mature.” Ichi offered.

 

“Is Motoko fucking with us?” Malcolm added.

 

“I’m not, not fucking with you.” I offered to Malcolm, and I got to enjoy the way his face got a little flushed too as I threw him a wink.

 

“I’ve never heard that voice before. It’s pretty good. What’s it called?” Ichi asked a little too calmly.

 

“Well fortunately for me. It’s not a voice changer.” I pulled down my ninja mask showing my unchromed neck. “I just learned how to change my voice a little. It’s mostly in the chest, breathing differently, to make me a bit deeper and huskier.” I offered with a casual shrug. Once you knew the trick it really was pretty easy.

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My answer did not in fact calm things.

 

I ignored the many questions from my chooms as I coughed into my fist. “Let’s all settle down now. We have a gig to do don’t we? Malcolm. Ichi everything settled with the truck?” I prompted cutting through the many questions, and my voice did grab attention.

 

“A-ah yeah I messed with the license plate. As long as we don’t run past any NCPD we’ll be fine, and any recordings will have the wrong plate.”

 

“Excellent. Malcolm, you got the equipment loaded?”

 

“Yeeep.” He said staring a bit but shaking it off. “The trolleys and loading tools are all in there ready for us.”

“Hiromi, ready for boredom?”

 

“Yeeees.. I mean no?” She asked, looking a little frazzled as she was still hugging me.

 

I smiled at her, and patted her on the head. “Good job.” I told her and turned towards my car. “I have some extra weapons if anyone wants something with a bit more kick. I doubt we will need them, but I would rather you have them just in case.” I called out as I pulled away from a suddenly limp Hiromi.

 

“Uh yeah I’ll take something. I only have my normal iron. Wasn’t any reason to pick up something bigger during the war. If I got into a fight I was fucked already.” Ichi called out and Malcolm echoed him as I pulled open the side door on the Quadra showing my collection of shotguns and rifles. The Nekomata was there too, but I was gonna slap anyone upside the head if they went for that.

 

You have to be trained to use a sniper.

 

Hiromi didn’t collect anything but the two boys each grabbed a shotgun.

 

“H-hey Motoko… Are you gonna use that voice from now on?” Hiromi asked quietly but I laughed, which sounded pretty cool in sexy Motoko voice.

 

“No. This was just a little trick I was playing on all of you to calm you all down for the gig. Unfortunately, Sexy Motoko voice is going away.” I said relaxing my throat and stretching it a bit with a hand. “See? Back to normal.”

 

“Aww.” Hiromi whined and even Ichi and Malcolm looked disappointed.

 

Of course! The Major’s best voice is definitely an amazing voice! I’m almost sorry to go back to my normal voice too!

 

“Alright everyone! Section 9! Move out!”

 

“Section 9?” Malcolm asked and I could see Ichi just shrug out of the corner of my eye. I ignored them of course and climbed into the back of the truck with Malcolm.

 

Hiromi and Ichi were driving, and Malcolm was the one with experience in the back of these trucks.

 

And so we set off.

 

—–

 

“Seriously though Motoko, that voice is pretty preem, especially since you can just switch like that.”

“Malcolm, it’s been ten minutes. Let it go already.” I told him. I guess my plan to distract my team went a little… Too well.

 

“Here it is… But seriously, the voice!” He whispered to me as we bounced lightly down the road.

 

“Just keep focused.” I told him as I kneeled down. My recording of the gig started, and as the truck passed across the spot I rolled out of it landing on my feet and with a quick jog slowed myself down as I ran up a set of stairs into the alley. I reached the back entrance of the Scavs den in moments.

 

The sun was down. The lights were dim in this area, and no one noticed a lone truck just driving down the street.

 

Ichi would drive around the building parking near the front entrance until he got the call. Until then I was on my own.

 

Looking around and being pleased there was no one around. Not even cameras or anything. A little dead spot…

 

Probably set up like that on purpose I realized.

 

My eyes flashed as I started scanning. As I slipped inside the door not even taking a second to get through.

 

It looked like an old chopshop. A busted up car that was half taken apart stood in the little garage area.

 

Figures scavs would hide in such a place.

 

No sign of them being scavs… Yet.