He was in a very shitty spot right now.
Here he was, sitting in another person's apartment, unarmed and surrounded by Edgerunners, while currently having a Sandevistan that he had apparently klepped of this exact crew taking up the space where his spine used to be.
And to top it all off, the massive, chrome'd up guy in front of him had a projectile launch system pointed right at David's centre mass.
Yea… 'in a shitty spot' was probably underselling it.
"Fuck, why don't we flatline him? The 5-finger Scav discount will work fine on his dead body"
David really did not want to be on the receiving end of the so-called '5-finger Scav discount', and gulped at the mention of it, leaning back into the couch he had been thrown against. Luckily, the lanky guy with the custom arms shook his head at that.
"Nah, we'd still need a ripper to deal with it after that, and that'd cost us a pretty Eddie."
Even with the pain from getting punched by the human-sized equivalent of a truck being dampened, David assumed it was from adrenaline, he could feel himself shaking slightly as he most definitely panicked.
A sigh came from Lucy, and David glanced her way, a faint stab of betrayal sinking into him as she pulled the cigarette out of her mouth for a moment. "Whatever you do, just don't get blood all over my apartment, please?"
The big guy with the glasses head snapped over to her. "Mind your own business!"
Lucy just scoffed. "Excuse me? I was the one who found the kid."
David winced. He had guessed that she had tricked him, but to hear her admit it so casually hurt. "You fuckin lied to me?"
Smack!
David coughed as the big guy's gorilla arm slapped him, sending his vision white for a moment. It was then that he noticed a number in the top left of his sight drop from [63] to [49].
'What the fuck is that shit?'
He didn't have time to think about it too much tho, because after slapping him, the big guy grabbed him by the ankle and dangled him in the air. "Now, punk. You're gonna tell me the where and the why about how you got my Chrome in ya."
David felt a little woozy from the sudden shift… for a moment, before his head suddenly cleared, just like it did after he had gotten hit. What the hell was going on with him? "What do you mean, yours?"
The big guy snarled at him. "That's fucking right, shithead. Bought and paid for. Except my supplier fucking ghosted me once the eddies went through."
The muscle-bound woman sitting across from David on the couch spoke up, shaking her head. "That's what you get for paying in advance."
The long-armed guy chuckled at that. "Yea, real gonk move, bossman."
The big guy just glared at them for a second. "Shut it, she was good people, one of our own. Mind telling me how the fuck was I supposed to know she'd ditch outta nowhere? Always been good to klep shit for us before."
David's head was technically clear but he felt more confused than ever. "Wait, a supplier? Do you mean-"
The big guy shook him a little, his glare shifting to David. "Gloria Martinez, that ring a bell, punk?"
David felt himself wilt a little under the big guy's gaze, but he kept talking anyway. "Well yea of course it does, she was my mum."
That made the big guy pause, glancing back at his crew, who all had surprised looks on their faces too. "Fuck, you're Gloria's brat? What the fuck was she thinking, handing tech like a Sandevistan over to you? Didn't take her for a fucking gonk."
At that, David felt a little of his panic get overtaken by pure anger at hearing this fucking cyberpunk talk about his mum like that, and he could almost feel his Sandevistan getting ready to try and redo his attack on Katsuo, but he held himself back from activating it. Super speed wouldn't really help when he was hanging upside down, being held by proper fucking gorilla arms.
"She didn't just hand it over, she died. Just yesterday."
As that came out of his mouth, he could literally feel every set of eyes in the room take a look at him more closely. The big guy even actually paused in swaying him back and forth for a second, a shocked look on his face, before he schooled it back into anger.
"The fuck you mean she died?! I fucking talked to her like, two days ago. What the fuck happened to her?! The badges catch onto her?"
It was still a little wild to know that the cops would want anything to do with his mum, let alone be looking to arrest her, but David focused, shaking his head. "Nah, car accident. Some fucking gang goon drive by, nothing to do with the Sandevistan."
The big guy paused for a second before sighing, and suddenly David found himself getting spun back into the chair, landing on the hard cushions with a thud, again. The big guy sat down in between his crew, placing his elbows on his knees and holding up his head with his hands.
The woman to his right hummed. "Tracks why she never called us back then. Kinda hard to do when you've been slabbed."
The big guy didn't react to that, just shaking his head slightly. "Condolences kid. Shit sucks… but still. Don't think that means you're getting off scot fucking free."
David rubbed his butt for a moment, before once again the shock of landing on the couch, something he noticed didn't make the weird number go down, dampened to almost nothing. "Look, I didn't fucking know I was kleppin' it from ya."
The guy with the long arms laughed. "Yea right and I remember chipping all the experimental military shit my mum left around the house too. Jesus, this kid clearly got a circ' loose or some shit"
The big woman on the right frowned. "Oi lay off, the kid obviously didn't know what he was doing. You can tell he was all 'ganic before the Sandevistan."
David looked around quickly while the 3 on the couch were talking. These guys were clearly pros. Lucy worked with them too, at least a little bit, or this whole thing wouldn't be happening. And so had his mum, apparently. So maybe…
"You guys… you're proper cyberpunks, aren't ya?"
The big guy dragged his sunglasses down his nose at David, a smirk on his face. "What's it to ya?"
'Alright Martinez, Mum always said you were quick on your toes. Time to prove her right.'
Sitting up properly, David made sure to keep proper eye contact, like the fucking Corpo guides explained how to when doing a… could this be counted as a job interview? 'Fuck it, close enough for me.'
"Let me keep the Sandy. Flat broke at the moment, but I'll pay you back, work it off if I have to, gig by gig, as long as it takes."
His breathing was a little shallower than he would have liked, but that was to be expected when you were trying to bargain your way into a Cyberpunk gang that you had just stolen from.
At least, David thought so.
The big guy frowned, leaning back into the couch, one of his gorilla arms going around the shoulders of the also massive woman. "That's not good enough. That shit was military, no, experimental-grade tech. Do you think another one's gonna fall into my lap? Ain't no fucking way."
David's attention was drawn to Lucy as she let out a massive puff of smoke. "Remember, I said no murder in my apartment."
His eyes shifted from Lucy to the three on the couch, and he was quick enough to take the hint that his 'negotiation' wasn't going super well. David gulped. "C'mon, man! You gotta at least give me a chance!"
The big guy sniffed, looking him up and down. "Now that's funny. Does it look like I'm running a fucking preschool here kid?"
David took a deep breath. He probably only had one shot at convincing these guys to take him on, otherwise, he might just end up getting zero'd. "I'll… I'll fire up the Sandevistan, prove I can handle it, use it to help you."
The big guy and the woman glanced at each other, and the guy with the long limbs cackled at that. "Fuckin really now? Toddler your size, you'll fry trying to boot it up let alone use it."
He heard a soft snort from Lucy. "Think you'll be surprised this toddler."
Blinking at the unexpected backup from Lucy, David smirked. "Yea, I was helping Lucy out on the NCART earlier. Fired off the Sandy seven, or maybe eight times. Here, let me show you."
Maybe it was Lucy's support or the fact that the Sandevistan was something that felt like it came naturally to him, but he was confident enough to stand up off the couch. Said confidence was rattled slightly when all three of the cyberpunks in front of him levelled their guns at him.
"Woah, punk, take a fucking seat."
David could feel his heart pounding in his ears, and saw small black boxes with glowing red skulls appear over the heads of the cyberpunks. He shook that off for now though. He could figure out what the fuck was going on after he stopped himself from getting shot.
"Chill, choom. Just gonna klep that guy's cig, no biggie."
The Sandevistan made almost no sound to him as he fired it up, and immediately the world around him turned that greenish hue that it did when he went into Sandevistan-time. He didn't need to use it for long, just long enough to take the cigarette out of the long-arm guy's hand.
He saw the shock on their faces as time resumed to normal speed, but he didn't stay like that for very long, using the Sandevistan again to put the cigarette back into the techie's hand, and sitting back down across from them.
"So, what do you think about-"
[System Calibration Complete]
David and the shocked cyberpunks all froze at the voice that came out of the Sandevistan. And all of a sudden all the little things he'd been noticing made sense as he remembered his ripperdoc telling him about some 'program' the Sandevistan would be running.
"Kid, what the fuck was that?"
He looked at the cyberpunks in front of him, and then over to the side to see Lucy giving him a worried look. "I honestly have no fucking clue."
[User "David Martinez" ready for integration]
[Rebooting user to finalise integration]
"What the fuck does 'Rebooting user' mean?"
Those were the last words David got out before it felt like every muscle in his body seemed to relax, and he slumped over into the couch, passing out before his head had even touched the cushions.