Cyberpunk: B-Sides
Chapter 2
'Usagi Edge Operations'
The client couldn't get a more distinct clash of styles if they went to The Afterlife for corpo night.
It started with the interior of the CEO's office. Sandstone, brick, and wood laid the foundation of the office. Pre-2020's Scandi design tried to ape the room's rustic look with pre-fab greyed wood floors, a poor approximation to authentic aged wood, while the sharp, monotone, and bright cabinetry was a poor approximation of the slick corpo veneer that came next. The pre-fabricated injection-moulded furniture, some glaring white, others shining onyx, came from the professional school of aesthetic, simple, curved, polished, and sterile. Then came the outrun modern, the LED neons lighting displays, counters, dataterms, and interior lighting.
Somehow, through all the style dissonance the pieces worked together, an unfurled history of Night City in miniature, from it's small coastal town beginnings, to its development into a metropolis, the nuclear holocaust that levelled the city yet left this small brownstone in Pacifica survive, then through it's reconstruction during The Time of the Red, and the modern day, grasping so close to Night City's 2020's prime.
The clash in aesthetics also told a simple story of its owners.
One of which, seated across from the client, was a picture-perfect stock-image corpo. Caucasian face unmarred by cybernetics, long brown hair lifted by product and suspensors, designer-label Eji Japan black corpo business suit to give her the appearance of an elongated hourglass, and real leather gloves on weaved, contemplative fingers. The corpo mask didn't betray emotion, a serene picture.
The other, standing to her side and crossing her gold-chromed arms in a display of impatience, was the fixer who hooked the client up with the edgerunners to begin with. Mohawk hair colored like a fading sunset, tiger pattern tanktop, tight leathers, and plastic neon jacket. She had the look of the streets.
The people, like the building, were a sum of their parts, at first glance incompatible, then custom-fabricated to fit. Survivors in the world of edgerunning. Able to merge the professionalism of operators with the flash and style of edgerunners, without the self-destructive tendencies.
Where the client lay was somewhere in between. White hair with pastel fades were cutting-edge street style, but the precision-cut bob was at home in Night City's towers. Her pastel cybereyes and visible interface plugs, all high quality, hinted at corpo, the way they were openly displayed did not. What set her apart was the bodysuit, the skintight, beetle-black, arachno-fibre bulletproof weave bodysuit. Her Eji of Japan microjacket advertised, rather than camouflaged, her status.
All three rode the edge. The client, in her day, rode the edge hard. There was a time she would have disdained the company she kept for playing it too safe, but there were times when she needed discreet and professional. This was one of these times.
The client provided the address she found on the citynet, surprised to find the apartment was still being paid by automatic deduction from the former owner's account. As the next of kin, she cancelled the contract. As a person not wanting to be scoped by certain parties, she couldn't retrieve his goods in person. That was where the professionals came in and delivered.
Two sealed evidence bags and a carryall full of laundry.
All that remained of the man who rode the edge harder than anyone in recent memory, save for the legendary V.
A man whose eventual fall earned him a cocktail in The Afterlife, who in death fulfilled her dreams and propelled her to the moon.
She felt tears bead around the corner of her Kiroshi optics.
"Lucy?" The serene corpo asked, soft spoken. "Are we satisfied with the results?"
Lucy nodded, solemnly. "Yes, thank you, Lunar. This should be sufficient."
Lunar was calmly skeptical. "From what our staff doctor tells me, it may be too old or degraded for a viable sample. Are you sure you're not required to retain our services?"
Lucy answered, "It's our safest bet. If it turns out unviable then we'll talk. I got to warn you, any other samples may be more difficult to get. You might not be up to it."
Lunar countered, "We're all adults here. You're more than aware of the U.E.O.'s going rates, including any danger fees, major-corporate and governing body antagonism penalties, and the fines for breaking any of our contracts."
Lucy understood and nodded. The trip to the moon was a trip for two. Selling the extra ticket bought a lot of services. She wasn't hurting for eddies. "You'll be compensated, and I'll do what I can to minimize major corpo involvement. But I need time to prepare. I'll let you know."
"Nova." Ulla extended her hand. "You sure you don't want to join us? We could use a decent netrunner."
Lucy accepted the handshake, but shook her head. "Sorry Ulla. They won't be looking for you, while they haven't forgotten about me. I'll do what I can to minimize your risk."
"Fair enough." Lunar also shook hands with Lucy. "Keep in touch, and thank you for hiring Usagi Edge Operations. We look forward to your next request."
Lucy looked the fixer and the corpo in the eye. Cryptically, she said, "I have some prep to do. Don't earn your cocktails until then."
"You know how to reach us."
She waited for Lucy to leave before Ulla lounged on her seat. "You sure about this, Lunar?"
Calmly, Lunar said, "I know you have reservations..."
"Damn rights I do!" Ulla snapped. "You know we got a policy. Don't fuck with corpos. Remember?"
"I remember." Lunar said, unruffled.
Ulla boomed. "Word on the grapevine say their crew lubed up and fucked Militech like a joytoy, then for bonus points did the same to Arasaka."
"So I heard."
"Then you probably heard 'Saka brought out The Smasher once things got too heavy."
The name brought a chill silence to the room. Adam Smasher. Solo, Arasaka 'borg, enforcer, one-man cleanup crew. One of the devils of Night City. A name treated with the same respect Jehovah's Witnesses treated the name Yahweh. Not to be invoked lightly, and never as a joke. When Adam Smasher arrives, people die.
If one survived the onslaught of The Smasher there were rumors of an unlucky few edgerunners being taken to Arasaka's basement where their R&D department believed in reduce, reuse, and recycle. Adam Smasher was a demon. The higher ups were the devil himself. And the Arasaka basement was hell itself.
The execs of Benson Aeronautical all knew this, which was why they stayed out of Arasaka's way and stuck to hover vehicles.
And Lunar knew this because she was a former Benson Aeronautical exec.
Being an exec she knew the legacy. Ulla, on the other hand, was a fixer, a person of the streets. She knew what the streets knew, and the streets, once one's personal hyperbole filters were in place, tracked more accurate than the screamsheets.
If Lucy was part of the crew that rampaged through the city to Arasaka Tower like the spirit of Johnny Silverhand possessing them, it made Lucy radioactive goods.
Yet Lunar, in her serene manner, wanted to look past that.
She explained, "We've avoided 'Corps because we were too small and our interests didn't conflict. We knew it couldn't stay this way forever."
Ulla said, "Yeah, but we've got a good thing going. Eddies, equipment, our own headquarters. We keep doing what we do and we'll have steady income, guaranteed."
"Our growth stagnates while our competition gets all the good contracts." Lunar replied.
"We'll get good contracts. Our reputation is solid. We get the job done."
"And we also have a reputation for playing it too safe, so what should be our clients are going to the competition instead." Lunar expressed her impatience not through her unwavering gentle voice but through her shuffling around her desk. "Eventually, more clients like Lucy will come to us, and what happens when we say no to them all? Our business dries up. No more contracts. If we want to stay in business we must take greater risk."
Ulla sighed. "Damn if you're not right. Last thing we need is a word on the street that we're candyasses. But this is the big leagues. Any one of those major corpos could wipe us out without so much as a dip in their petty cash."
"Then we better get good. Both at not getting caught, and at plausible deniability when we do."
Ulla took a moment to consider the ramifications of Lunar's words. It left her face puckered. "I'm not wasting our best people on this."
"I didn't say we had to." Lunar soothed. The pacing continued. Her nervousness decreased. What propelled her was planning, furious planning. "We're getting more small-time contracts from the community. We need the additional help."
"Hiring spree?" Ulla asked.
Lunar's shuffling stopped. "Exactly. We'll see who's good with a few odd jobs. By the time Lucy returns we'll have a B side to our little organization."
"One who can tweak the noses of the 'Corps and cut ties if it gets too hot." Ulla pursed her lips. "That's cold."
"That's business." Lunar countered.
Ulla rolled up her eyes. "Alright, I'll put the word out. But we're doing this right. No 'dorphers. No 'gangers. And no cyberpsychos."
"I'll leave candidate selection in your capable hands."
"And there's something else too." Ulla added. "Amarok wanted me to bring it up. Has to do with one of our staff. Got some concerns."
"For the last time, Patch can be a pacifist all he wants as long as he's an effective medic."
"It's not him. It's Mei Li."
Blindsided, Lunar asked, "What did she do?"
"Remember the last mission?"
"Yes. Took out some Maelstrom 'borgs. Saved a civilian. What's the problem?"
Ulla explained, "She risked her life, and the job, for a stupid gonk who just happened to stumble into our operation."
"Saving lives is good PR. What's your point?"
"The point she acted off-script. Put the whole op in danger. Charged into four Maelstrom 'Borgs and nearly got killed. If that same gonk didn't grab a pistol and start blastin'..."
"We'd be down one edgerunner." Lunar shook her head. "And a waste of talent at that."
"What you call talent, I call a liability. She's been taking on too many risks. One day she took a Tyger Claw to Dick Kick City. Next day it's a cyberpsycho. Now she's taking on four of 'em without pulling a piece? She's gonna get someone killed, and if we're lucky it's gonna be her."
Lunar felt conflicted. Mei was exactly as Ulla described. Impulsive, reckless, quick to use her fist and feet, and too quick to ditch a plan when it proved inconvenient. Mei worked well enough with a team, but under stress she had a tendency to react without sanction. But she had her uses. Their specialists needed protection. Mei fit the role perfectly, going where Amarok's guns and armor would look conspicuous, and fighting what their techs and medics could not. She was also bioware only, rendering her, unlike her cyberware enhanced compatriots, unhackable. Then there were the intangibles. Her nomad honor. She had courage. She had heart. She gave all to her allies, and by proxy, the company. More than once she saved the lives of individual crew. Lunar owed her own life to Mei after she fought off posergangers while both were wounded.
And, thanks to investing a huge amount of her reward money back into the company, a sizable share of its stocks. Firing her could threaten her share. The company couldn't afford to buy out her share without taking a significant hit, ensuring her job security, and U.E.O.'s continued headache.
Lunar hoped the problem solved itself by letting Mei Li move on while she earned dividends.
Instead, Mei kept asking for tougher assignments and took greater risks.
Yet she saw an opportunity.
Mei's risky behavior needed a channel, something to challenge her and burn out whatever glitch itched her sphincter. Lunar needed a crew so she didn't have to risk her best people, but still needed at least one of her top people to lead it.
Success, and the U.E.O. proved they could roll with the hardest of the hardcore.
Failure, and they could tell the public a team of cowboys went rogue. Happens all the time in edgerunning. So hard to keep good talent.
Yes, she thought, this was perfect.
She also knew the best person to deliver the news. Someone who could soften the blow.
Lunar said, "Bring Amarok to my office."
Devon's list of demands didn't go as well as he thought.
Upon returning to Rent-a-Samaritan Inc. (a subsidiary of the Night City War Orphan's Fund), Devon's plan to bring down the organization through personal outrage petered out. The adrenaline rush was over, there was only the crash, too weak to tell his supervisor to shove it when he asked where his donation money was, and what the hell was in the bag. He was in no mood to argue with a middle manager more emotionally invested in his own position than he was in the well being of his own employees. So he told his boss what happened. The Maelstrom 'borg attack, getting robbed, nearly getting his brain fried, and the kung-fu action vid girl who saved his life.
He ended his tale with an ultimatum. It sounded like, "So please, either get us some safer routes and some armorjacks or I quit, 'cause... This. Is. Fucked."
His supervisor couldn't agree more. The situation was fucked. The burbclaves weren't letting them in any more, or ever again, the blame planted on canvassers who couldn't flash their fake passes fast enough for the scanners and guards not to notice the imperfections. Therefore the inner city was all they had left. Donations were also down. Not because of demographic shifts to the new territory. Management reasoned the inner city were just as generous with their eddies as anyone else, more so since they were the ones most impacted by their programs, so it had to be a problem with the canvassers, feeling too scared in the new areas, rushing through their scripts, buying into the hype of the city's violent reputation. It's all scop, didn't you know?
Therefore the problem had to be Devon. He was never part of 'the family', not one to give it his all or throw his passion into the work. And who couldn't be passionate about helping children in need? Isn't that enough to keep you motivated.
So his manager and supervisor both accepted his resignation, right there and then.
After changing into his civvies, tossing his dork drip in his manager's face, and walking away with a carryall his supervisor still asked about and he ignored, Devon left the office, permanently, grabbed a scop-based taquito from the convenience store, and rode transit back to his apartment.
Where he caught his landlord, a big, hairy, bowling ball of a man from one of many former Soviet States, pinning an immediate eviction notice on his door.
"What the fuck? It ain't midnight yet!"
There was nothing to fuck about, according to his idiom-impaired landlord. He was owed three months rent on a conapt the size of a prison cell, so hand over eddies before his two swarthier, taller, and more athletically able sons placed a Caucausus-style beatdown. So Devon paid the backrent, offered next month's rent in full, and asked if he could please go back inside, he had a rough night.
The landlord thanked him, and informed him there was already a new renter lined up tomorrow, so could he please get his black ass the fuck out and take his worthless shit with him?
So adding another carryall full of clothes, his outfit (the essentials every itinerant Night City citizen never went without), a box full of old vinyl records, two turntables, and a microphone to his burdens, Devon bid adieu to his racist landlord, hailed a cab and searched for help on his agent.
Hotels would work for a short while, but the money wouldn't hold out longer than a job search. There was always the streets or the combat zones, if one didn't mind being robbed, beaten, pressganged, or killed. And the vacancies? There were none, waiting lists for conapts were weeks long.
Most his friends were just like him. The best of them were broke, chronically underemployed, and living in one-room coffins. Considering he owed something to every one of them, his credit wasn't good enough to crash on any of their couches.
Except the one friend who had a semblance of stability, in that his studio conapt had room to spare and he made a steady income at home. Only Devon's credit was no good there either.
He knew his friend had a soft spot for tough tales and hated confrontation. Calling him by agent would get an automatic no. So, to secure a safe place to crash for the night required complete surprise. In person.
Blitzkrieging a surprise houseguest without calling ahead was the height of rudeness, something Devon didn't like to do, but his little kung-fu savior was right when she said nobody got nothing by asking nicely.
Devon couldn't do it, but Demand could.
He directed the taxi to his friend's conapt, rang the bell, and waited. Before the pale, suspicious looking little guy could automatically say no, Demand told his story, pure shock and awe, without pause or giving his friend time to say no.
"... and that's why I gotta stay the night." He said after pitching his tale of woe.
His friend's eyes narrowed, the tint on his Zeiss cyberoptics turned an aggrevated red, his face suspicious and not pleased, but the brain behind it grinding its gears and making its calculations.
Demand had to wait for his friend to consider, but he figured his bed for the night was on lock.
Because his friend was a media guy, a local culture and advocacy freelancer with a weakness for human interest stories. His real name was Calvin, but he functioned under the pseudonym 'I.C. Yu', as a play on his name and, if enough corpo noses were tweaked by his news stories, his final destination. It didn't matter than he hadn't hit a story big enough for the big corpos to care, but he built up the tools of a professional journalist in the meantime. His optics read Demand's subtle reactions while his cyberaudio suite's voice stress analyzer passed final judgement.
I.C. Yu looked surprised. "No scop?"
"No shit of the bovine variety, choom." Demand said. "You gonna let me in or leave me hanging?"
"Let me do a story on your crappy job and you got a deal." I.C. Yu extended his hand.
A handshake with a choom was as solid an agreement as one could get. Demand tried to shake on it.
I.C. Yu pulled back. "But you still owe me 200 eddies. Pay up."
"Yeah yeah, I'll break you off a piece." Demand pulled out his wad of eurobucks and added it to his extended palm.
I.C. Yu pulled his hand back again. "And you're buying Buck-A-Slice tonight. Extra large."
"Yeah, alright." Demand was hungry anyways. He added another twenty eddies in his hand and let himself in.
I.C. Yu's palm shoved him back. "Hawaiian."
Now Demand was aggrevated. "Awwww man, you're bustin' my balls, Caaaalvin! Ain't no way pineapple's touching my slice!"
By the way I.C. Yu smiled, something must have pinged on the voice stress analyzer. "Hawaiian. Or the street. Choose wisely."
Demand rolled his eyes. He hated pineapple on pizza, but it wasn't worth being tossed out on the street over what he saw as I.C. Yu's bizarre culinary preference. "Hawaiian on half, the rest Canadian. Final offer."
"Ugh, gotta be gonk to like mushrooms on pizza. Fine, whatever." I.C. Yu shook hand with Demand, an agreement forged under a eddie handshake. "One night, and one night only. Now get your ass in here before I change my mind."
Demand chuckled. "Anything you say, choom."
He figured he could stretch it for a week. And why not? Fussy and paranoid as I.C. Yu was, he was also Demand's media guy for his other (and currently stalled) ventures. In exchange, Demand helped I.C. Yu chase down leads and do a little videography. It was symbiotic relationships like that which made friendships in Night City possible, providing one kept the balance.
Over pizza and an audio recorder, I.C. Yu went over Demand's tale, transcribed it, attached a donation link to the article, and had it proliferate through the city net faster than the Night City War Orphan's Fund could kill it with automatic bad press seeking bots (a small time charity couldn't afford real PR damage control).
Demand found something satisfying in advocacy. If his statement stopped unlucky gonks from getting shot in the street for fundraising he considered it a good deed done. I.C. Yu was of the same mindset. He didn't do independent local news reporting on the citynet for a shot at Network 54 or one of the corpo media departments. This one channelled the spirit of Walter Cronkite, no different than when Demand stepped up to the mic.
It's how Demand and I.C. Yu found common ground.
When it came time to talk about his kung-fu lady savior, Demand showed I.C. Yu her business card. I. had the card scanned and the company searched and indexed in seconds. "Usagi Edge Operations." He read. "Small-time private security firm. Wanna-be Danger Girl clone. Got good reviews with the normies, but real edgerunners call them candyasses."
"That's not what I saw." Demand sniffed, skeptical of the assessment. "One little Kato cosplay girl, four 'borgs. Fucked 'em up."
"Didn't you rescue her?"
"It was confusing, what does it matter?" Demand stated. "She's lucky I can shoot, I'm lucky she can fight. 'Sides, she had backup. Biggest fuckin' Solo you ever seen. Cut up the last 'borg apart with rifle fire like it was surgery."
"Oooohhhh, isn't that like your deal, like with that whole Midwest redneck thing you always talk about?" I.C. Yu mocked.
Demand laughed. "Shit, I ain't seen any of them old rednecks shoot like that, but what can I say? Game knows game. I think these U.E.O. gonks ain't nothin' to fuck with."
"If you say so." I.C. Yu shrugged. "Maybe there's a story in it for us.."
"Yeah." Demand sighed. "And who knows, maybe they're hiring."
I.C. Yu did a spit take. "You're joking, right?"
"No, why?"
"Oh come on, you shoot a couple Maelstrom 'borgs and you think you got what it takes to be an edgerunner?"
"Why not? My mom and my pops were 6th Street. I learned to shoot before I could walk. I could do it."
"Yeah, and then there's the other thing."
"And what's that?"
"Like why, if you're such a badass, have you been working shit jobs instead of edgerunning to begin with?"
"Because it's what my mom and pops want!" Demand answered vehemently. "I mean, you know what was in our family tree before America died? Professors. Poet Laureates. Social Justice Advocates. It's what they wanted too, could have, if Biotechnica didn't chase us off our home. They rolled with 6th Street 'cause they had no choice, but they didn't want that choice for me. So I go legit, so I can get up on that mic and spit."
"Okay, you don't have to rap with me..."
"I'm not rapping. That's slam poetry."
"Whatever you call it. It clearly doesn't pay the bills or you wouldn't be here."
"Yeah?" Demand crashed on the couch, staring up at the dead white ceiling, his heart feeling heavy, "Well, neither going legit. It's not like I'm against doing what my momma told me. I wanna drop truth bombs on the stage, but I like food and shelter too, know what I'm sayin'?"
"Ain't that the truth." I.C. Yu lounged back on his desk chair, joining in Demand's commiserating. "But are you sure edgerunning's the way to do it?"
Demand drew the business card out of his pocket. It covered his depressing view, a ebon and alabaster sheen to its slick, corpo-style printing.
"Worst they can say is fuck off, and you know I'm good at hearing that." The business card scanned well on his agent, triggering an auto-dial to the U.E.O.'s phone line.
"Oh come on!" Shouted a voice from under the partially disassembled undercarriage of a courier van. "You think I'm stupid? You think I don't know when I'm being shuffled off to do busy work? This is bullshit!"
Amarok pressed a big, cybered-up hand on his forehead. "I swear, every time with her..."
Orders from management, the tag team of former corpo Lunar and the street fixer Ulla, to the tactical team leader, whom Amarok had the misfortune of being. He was their weapons and tactics man, their op planner, and, because they lacked the proper department, the human resources guy for the field team. So every interpersonal conflict, performance review, and individual screw up was his responsibility.
As much as he liked her, Amarok confessed a certain agreeance with upper management.
For all her skill, daring, and loyalty, there were certain volatility issues that made Mei Li a pain in the ass to deal with. Delivering the news to her only proved him right.
He tried his best to soothe the nomad's ego, but felt his temper fraying. "Look, it's not like that, it's just there's some concerns about your conduct as of late..."
"...you mean where I saved some civilian's life and fucked up a bunch of 'borgs?" She rolled out under the chassis and shot baleful eyes at Amarok while brandishing her wrench like a club. "Yeah, major fuckup, doing all that while NOT blowing the op. I'm soooo sorry."
Frustrated, Amarok said, "It's not like that either."
"Then what is it like?"
"Shut up for five fucking seconds and I'll tell you!"
Mei Li's eyes bugged like a system shock. Amarok's patience was a finite resource, carefully managed and one could get away with minor infractions. Push too far, and one found they could deplete it quickly. Mei took a deep breath, set her wrench down with a peeved clatter, and replied, "Fine, here's my undivided attention."
Relieved, Amarok continued. "You did the right thing saving that civilian. Nobody doubts it. But the civilian still had time. You could have waited for me. You should have waited for me. Instead, you almost got killed and needed that same civilian to bail you out."
She waited for Amarok to finish. "Hindsight's 20/20. I didn't think he had the time. I acted. I don't regret it."
Amarok sighed. "You're not that chromed up so it isn't cyberpsychosis, but you flight like one. What's going on with you?"
"What's going on with me?" Mei sat up and snarled. "What's going on with me? There's nothing going on with me. I'm great! I'm excellent! I put my life on the line kicking ass, bringing in eddies, and investing my time and money to make this company grow. What do I get for thanks? Nothing but criticism!"
"We're not questioning your effort, only your execution. If you just had a little more patience..."
"Yeah, well it's easy to say considering how much cyber you shoved up in there."
Amarok glowered. "What is that supposed to mean?"
Mei slapped her forehead. "Do I have to print it on a screamsheet for you? You're chromed up to the tits! You're a walking tank! Me? I don't have that luxury. I don't have your cyber. I don't have your guns. I can't make the connections like Ulla and Lunar. I don't draw the crowds like Kusu Guru, and the last time I stitched a wound Patch begged me not to do it again! And I certainly can't hack the planet! All I got are my fists, my feet, and my tricks. That means twice as much effort unless I get bounced by the next edgerunner that comes walking through the door!"
Amarok never saw Mei slip her insecurities before. He was too stunned to exploit it. His first instinct was to assuage it. "You're a good driver."
She spoke frankly. "Being the wheelman is boring. I need to get in the action, you know that."
It was the old clash of ideals that kept the two at a distance. Most of it was Amarok's insistance. He was former Night City Max-Tac, a professional who preferred order and predictability in all his meticulous plans. Mei Li was a wild nomad. Their idea of a plan took out the 'l', put a 'ts', and added a seat. Preferably on a souped-up crotch rocket for added style points.
That, and she put out serious 'I want your output' vibes.
Amarok was a one man woman and left it at that.
Their clash of sensibilities made more sense now that Mei let the firewall drop, if just a little. She ran the edge closer than the others because playing it safe was stifling her. She was acting out as an outlet for her professional frustrations.
Amarok and the company needed a professional who could safely skirt the edge. Mei needed an outlet and a way to appreciate their approach.
"Look." Amarok used his reasonable voice. "If we thought you were hopeless would you still be here? Prove you won't be a liability later down the line. Build up our new team. Get some jobs under your belt as a team leader."
"I'm not cut out as a team leader." Mei said. "You know that. Last time I planned an op..."
"Shit happens, choom. You've learned since then. Back on the saddle."
"But I like being on your team, Amarok. I don't want to be anywhere else."
Amarok patted Mei on the shoulder. It was a tender touch, surprisingly gentle for a hand that could crush a steel pipe. "But it's not where you need to be. What you need is something to challenge you. I'm here giving it to you now. You don't like it 'cause you're afraid. Well, personal growth don't come without taking some of that fear head on, and I know you're good at facing fear. So don't be gonk-headed. See it for the opportunity it is and take it." His hand left her shoulder as he stood back up. His stride shuffled him away, heavy feet on cushioned hydraulic lifts. "We'll go over candidates tomorrow. If you know anyone looking for work bring them in."
Mei Li paused to consider Amarok's words. Some of it made sense. She was increasingly frustrated during ops. Maybe a change of assignment and fresh new start would give her what she needed?
Her own crew would be nice, but her current crew throwing her under the caravan and giving her a babysitting gig with a bunch of noobs? Rationality tempered how pissed off she was at Amarok and upper management, but it wouldn't hold out forever.
At times like this she found work to be a good distraction, so back under the courier van she went.
Until her agent rang, dragging her out from underneath her one ton Yokohama-made patient. She answered, "Usagi Edge Operations, Mei speaking."
"Hey, so I guess they got you answering the phones too, huh?"
She recognized the voice. "Personal company extension. Devon, right?"
"Yeah, thanks for pronouncing it all proper. I go by Demand now."
"Oh yeah? Preem. So, what can I do for you, Demand?"
"Yeah, I know this is all like sudden and shit, but I've fallen on some hard times and well... I was wondering if you're hiring?"
That was quick, Mei Li thought, silent on the phone as she thought back to her skirmish hours ago. She didn't think much of the gonk in his corpo polos and khakis, but she remembered him being a mean shot.
Amarok wanted her to take initiative, be a responsible leader? She'd start by making an executive decision right now.
"Yeah, we're hiring. Come in tomorrow. I might have something for you."
