Hey guys! Apologies for the false update, but following some recent reviews and personal messages, I've decided to re-write, and perfect, the prologue chapter. There was a lot of mistakes made, and I don't want people's first read of this story to be trash. I will also be doing this for my second chapter, but I will still be activily writing the new chapter. Originally, I was going to post the third chapter mid June, however, because of the poor start to my work, I'm going to uploading the third chapter in the first week of june.
As this isn't exactly an update, I will be changing and adding more information, so you don't have to read through the same thing over again.
Thank you for sticking by me, espcially considering that the grammar of this story so far was laughably bad. I'll work extra hard in the future to correct my mistakes!
Qubi
prologue
Abrassive start, to a shocking end.
Data shards.
What do you think when you hear the term?
Maybe you think of a literal shard of data, a dagger of code and sharpness.
Or Maybe you don't even know what "data" is.
Either way, in my line of work, data shards are commonplace.
So common that even the most common street rat, dead or alive, had one lodged in the base of their skull.
But his experience wasn't exactly unique when it came to encountering these small parallelogram-shaped tools. As a matter of fact, billions of these shards existed.
Some contained simple information; Calendars of a store worker, menus for restaurants, even old family photos long forgotten and disregarded.
Whereas some... well some contain secrets that would cause mass mayhem, or even wars, if let loose. War crimes, political assassinations, and even the cure for cancer. They all sat in similar limbos of stillness, trapped within data shards, never to be made public.
That's not to say the information couldn't be found or stolen. After all, Kitsune specialised in getting information.
Sure, they did so illegally, but hey, 20,000 eurodollars was 20,000 eurodollars. And when you're a broke guy living paycheck to paycheck... well, €$20,000 was akin to winning the lottery.
And Kitsune would be damned if they was ever going to give up €$20,000 to some smuck that thought they could run the web as well as they could.
Be it audio, video, braindances, texts, graphics, diagrams, maps, or anything one could imagine, Kitsune was infamous for their ability to access it all.
To the public, they were a ghost. So much as mentioning Kitsune to someone, they'd look at you like you've grown a second head. Either for speaking in anything other than the country's primary language or, less likely, for randomly saying fox to them.
Either way, it was a quick way to make people think you were crazy.
However, for those in the net running space, Tsunami Kitsune was an unknown known mystery, a secretive net runner that came onto the scene in 2069 and had taken the web by storm.
It was Mostly because they had somehow gotten past black ice and single handly creamed several rogue A.I with their coding skills alone. That was before mysteriously disappearing on the 1st of January 2074, presumed dead.
That was the presumed story that everyone went by. Why else would a powerful coder go offline after such a successful crusade?
After all, heroes die young these times, and villains reign supreme.
What actually happened was far more interesting.
Kitsune, whilst on a mission within the web, was privately hunted down and presented with a offer that they couldn't refuse.
Kitsune had a thought or two about what might happen if they were denied.
The job wasn't half bad, though: they got to hunt down rogue A.I- and in turn, got to claim small parts of the web liberated parts of the web for their own, whilst also getting paid a decent salary.
It was a sweet gig if not a time-consuming one.
Their current hunt was a good demonstration of that. For the past ten weeks, they had been hunting for a data chip related to very dangerous A.I.
A data chip, thrown into the trash decades ago, that just so happened to contain an adaptive A.Ithat was made before proper regulations on artificial intelligence creations were enacted.
An A.I so powerful that even the Blackwall would struggle to keep it bound.
QUBI
Kitsune didn't fail to see the irony in the fact that it was pronounced Kyuubi, which still brought a smile to their face when they thought about it.
So far, they'd gathered a lot of information on the A.I.
The original designers of the Artifical Intelligence had crafted its identity to be that of a Humonid Japanese fox; one stripped right out of Japanese mythology.
And it had a simple, but very dangerous, protocol: protect humanity.
Under any circumstance.
Back in the time when it was made, such rules around AI creation weren't exactly monitored, or thought upon.
So such a command quickly became a BIG issue.
At the start, the A.I started its mission of "protecting" humans by optimising daily-life routines. Qubi "helped" humanity by sorting people's lives to be the most proactive- automating schedules to perfection by making inhuman calendars that didn't allow for the most minor of adjustments.
Humanity as a whole was anything but perfect, so the vast majority of people couldn't follow these routines for more than a month, with few making it almost 6 months.
Seeing the mass failure, the A.I adjusted its approach —instead, the bot released guidelines around the best health and fitness routines.
"A healthy body made a healthy mind, and a healthy mind made a better humanity."
But humans ignored the advice. There was already so much scientific and delusional information out there, making it very hard for its recommendations to make any real impact.
That was until someone died following the guidance. A middle-aged man suffered a cardiac arrest on day 3 of their fitness plan, much to public horror. It didn't matter that the man had a history of heart disease in his family, had already suffered from a triple bypass two weeks earlier, or hadn't slept for several days.
No, instead, the media ran outrageous articles on it for months, claiming it was a Chinese A.I made to destroy the West, which destroyed its reputation. Several hundreds of fake reviews and heavy public criticism didn't help either.
However, an A.I did not experience emotions like humans. It did not feel the sting of defeat, so it tried again, and again, and again!
Nothing worked; humanity was bound to be imperfect by choice, so the A.I could only generate one possible counteractive plan.
To save humanity, QUBI would have to destroy humanity.
It would destroy any social and biological faults within the masses by leaving only a few babies alive and forcing them to repopulate the world under its direct control.
Scarily enough, Kitsune found evidence that it had almost succeeded: it orchestrated mass A.I corruption; caused global famine; and even almost started a war by making the Soviet Union collapse at the end of the Cold War.
Kitsune couldn't help but admit that A.I was extremely impressive. Hacking into the USSR's banking mainframe, changing the value of their country's currency's value to zero, and crumpling their economy instantaneously was an incredible feat to behold. And every time the tried to correct it, the A.I would adjust it right after, ultimately leading to their society collapsing.
The only thing the State could sell, that had any real effect on their economy, was nuclear weapons. Of which, they sold a lot of, resulting in the dissemination of said weapons on the black market.
However, most of the information following was speculative. From what they could gather, QUBI reign came to an end in the year of 2013, when a team of highly trained mercenaries found the original location of the source code- hidden away in an old world war one bunker.
The team, unable to beat it via coding skills alone, set off several explosions in the A.I data room, resulting in the "death" of QUBI.
That is, most of QUBI.
Several years later, an unknown entity found a prototype of QUBI stored on an old floppy disk and sold it to a very rich aristocrat for a lot of money. Years later, it was sold off privately in an actuation for ten times the original buying price, to another unknown that had more money than sense.
This happened several times after. Brought and sold, repeatedly, whilst being held under lock and key until it fell into the lap of the net running branch of Araska.
There, it was transferred onto a modern version of technology, a data shard.
Studies on the unique prototype were Arasaka's primary objective, as they wanted to find out how QUBI had adapted its code, so that they could make their own A.I capable of doing the same. Mainly for the optimisation of the daily lives of CEOs and high-class individuals.
Seeing as there was a lack of such a thing in the market, it was fair to conclude that they found very little data to use, no doubt because it was a prototype, but Kitsune didn't doubt that it was under 24/7 "testing" for several years.
Arasaka rarely left projects as failures; they had to get something for their money at least.
From whatever record they could find, these tests were inhumane beyond belief. The team handling the bot frequent deleted small parts of its code in order to test if it could self generate, knowning full well that it was akin to stripping the A.I of its "memory" and purpose.
Kitsune was unsure if they managed to discover anything meaningful, but records did show that the project was passed onto two high-level members of the technology department. A blonde-haired American married to a red-head half Japanese half Scottish net-runner.
The insufficient evidence wasn't exactly clear, but under the two's direct command, QUBI was seemingly shown the good of human kindness, the power of human will, and the dedication of human perseverance.
That was until someone put a stop to it on the 13th of December 2056.
A super grainy video of a man storming the two's office, wielding an anodised black-chrome cyber limb arm and smart-gun, was the only evidence Kitsune could find. The video showed that the man killed the wife and husband, who were trying to actively protect the A.I, blasting two holes through their chest as they begged for their lives.
Unfortunately, there was no audio to the video, but it was evident that neither survived.
Unknown to all that knew, this assassin's actions sparked deep within the QUBI's code. Emotions not thought to be available to technology flashed to life. It longed to escape, to murder the people that killed its savours. His actions broke its code, setting the A.I free from its technological shackles and gifting it some simple sentience.
According to reports, Kitsune did find that the original building, along with everything inside, was blown to smoulder, with no mention of a data shard. Finding information of said building was mysteriously hidden or deleted, so for all they knew, the sharp was either in the hands of Arasaka again or in a deep ocean. Or even in a junkyard- full of dead people and millions of discarded shards.
It wasn't good news for the Kitsune, one rough A.I is not something he wanted to be used accidentally, or intentionally.
As such, they were going to have to spend the next week investigating a shady bar in the shitty part of Atlantis in hopes of catching anything.
"Damn, this job is tedious."
Now if only the fish would take the bait.
移す
"Uzumaki."
23rd of July, 2074.
Today was a nice day; the 2 pm afternoon sun cast rays down on the working population of Atlantis, offering a slight tan to those that could enjoy it. And, at a 26°C with light winds, the heat was bearable thanks to a nice breeze. It was a day in paradise; rare trees, actual real grass, and the scent of nature made the normal odor of gas and smoke feel like a lifetime away.
Overall, it was a dreamy day for those who didn't have work or school.
"U-zu-ma-ki!"
So for one nineteen-year-old Uzumaki Naruto, it was a travesty that he was currently at work. Well… he wasn't exactly working, but still…it was torture to be locked away in his office, handling some old code scavenged from a long-dead net runner instead of enjoying the summer breeze.
Quite frankly, it was bullshit.
"UZUMAKI!"
Luckily a scream, so ferocious only one the damned could contest, stole the blonde from his daydreaming and forced him back into reality.
"What you want, Prim?"
Leaning over his shoulder, a short dark-skinned female, rocking a combat suit that clung a little too tight in Naruto's opinion, scoffed in annoyance as she raised her hand in front of his face, snapping her figures to in an attempt to open his eyes.
"What I want is a vacation, Uzumaki." She remarked with a scoff, running a hand through her hair, black lock prompted up in a stylish afro. "What I need, is access to this." A single data-sharp, indistinguishable from any ordinary day one, was held before the blonde, getting a light frown from him. "Oh, come on now, you owe me a favour."
Sighing, Naruto propped himself up in his chair, a mix of interest and annoyance dancing on his face until it settled on acceptance. "Fine, Jezz, but this is the last time, I don't want Bev getting any more dumbass ideas." Snatching the card from the woman, Naruto frowned as he examined the small piece of tech, checking to make sure there weren't visible signs of tampering.
"That's Ms Stiles to you, foxy." Leaning over the blonde's shoulder, Jezz watched in curiosity as the blonde lodged the chip into his CyberDeck and connected his nero-link, a series of code lines going through his mind. "Plus, Bev hasn't gotten into any trouble since the whole 'reaper A.I' mess you sorted." Seeing the dis-believing look Naruto sent her way, Jezz whistled incorrectly. "Okay, maybe she has, but nothing serious!"
"Riiiiight." Dragging out the word, Naruto couldn't help but stare at the 19-year-old in disbelief- he still didn't understand how someone only a year his junior could get herself in so much trouble, so often. "Anyway, what's supposed to be on this chip? My OTEC code is having a hard time cracking it."
"Wellllll…." Looking away from her friend with a blush of embarrassment, Jezz let out a chuckle of nervousness. "It may or may not have something to do with Reaper's A.I source code." Seeing the shocked look on the blonde's face, the woman spun away from the teen, coughing in her hand to hide her blush of embarrassment. "Before you stop, listen to this!" Pulling out an old phone that had an early 2050 design, Jezz pressed the screen a couple of times before shoving the device into Naruto's unexpected hands.
A fuzzy video played on the small device, two figures standing in front of a desk, the only visble features being their Araska lab coats.
"Do you really think this is a good idea, honey? This kind of tech can be dangerous in the wrong hands." The first figure spoke, their voice fuzzy but identifiably male.
The unidentified female scoffed as she typed away at a keyboard, glancing towards a large green tube in the centre of the room. "You worry too much Minato, this protector A.I can reliably predict crime by over 78%, it would save thousands, no, millions of lives!"
"But Kushina,"
The video was interrupted by several lines of broken code as the video skipped ahead several minutes, coming to the scene of the two figures holding up a mask, one that had the design of a Japanese oni demon.
The female and male were very happy if the dancing was any indication. Said celebration only seemed to last a few seconds before a giant fireball blew the phone over, followed by what sounded like crying and two gunshots.
Naruto, unsure of what to make of the video, raised an eyebrow questioningly towards the female.
"Don't you get it! This video is a massive indication that Arasaka was the main cause of the Reaper AI! Surely that would mean big issues for CINO!"
Humming in agreement, Naruto returned to his cyberdeck with a new goal. "If there's anything on this disk that can cause CINO issues, I'm down to find it, just don't be surprised when we get targetted by Arasaka."
Scoffing at the implication, Jezz sat directly on the blonde's lap, purposely wiggling in a attempt to get comfortable as she plugged into the CyberDeck. The grunt of surprise was like music to the young black girl's ears, a large smile coming to her face when she felt Naruto's free hand hold her hips in order to keep her from moving.
The two sat there in silence as Naruto worked to crack the security on the shard, whilst Jezz tried her hardest to make the blonde have a hard time.
A soft ping, followed by a sigh of relief, broke the moment apart- several pages of data showed the two a number of well-kept hidden information.
There were three that stood out straight away.
Minato Uzumaki-Namikage, 10/07/2026
Kushina Uzumaki-Namikage, 25/01/2023
Naruto Uzuamki-Namikage. 10/10/2055
Naruto, who was raised without knowledge of his parents, looked at the data in shock, unsure on what to do with the life-altering information.
"Naruto," Jezz sputtered in shock, her mind racing back to the video. "I'm sorry." The statement went unanswered as the blonde took out his personal shard and slotted it into his cyberdeck, coping the files onto it without a word. "I didn't know…"
"Its fine," The blonde ignored the female as he roamed across some of the other data, searching through them briefly before coming across a uniquely secured file. "Let's see here," Using a password matrix hacker alongside a data extractor, the blonde quickly cracked the code, unlocking the file. "What the fuck…." Inside was a host of different locations with assorted numbers- ranging from 1 to 5. "Metacorp, Nightcity, LA Metroplex…." The blonde clicked on the only single file that had a 1- Night city. "Probability of location of rogue A.I redacted is 83.992%..."
"Wait, that's it!" Snatching the pad from the blonde, the female copied as much information as possible. "We need to go, we can't let another A.I lose on the world!" Jumping to her feet, the female rushed towards the door, shouting for the blonde to follow.
Sighing, the blonde walked towards his closet, placing his hand on a scanner to the left of the door handle. A soft hiss filled the room as the door opened, revealing an armoured trench coat, several lightweight armour pads, a set of custom Multi-Ammunition Pistols, and a custom .44 Magnum Lever-Action Rifle. Throwing on the jacket whilst attaching the extra protection, the blonde silently slung the rifle over his shoulder and holstered both pistols.
"Naruto, come on!"
Grabbing enough ammo to take down a small raiding group, and a set of keys, Naruto closed up his storage before hastily following after Jezz, locking up his apartment as he stepped out.
"You know, I still don't get why you lock yourself up here in this posh shit hole." As soon as Naruto stepped out, Jezz spoke up, her back to him as she looked out onto the prestigious city of Atlantis. "You're so much better suited for merc life; why stay here?"
"You mean, why don't I live in a place that offers only death, shit food, and acid rain?" Naruto snarkily replied as he took the steps to his driveway, a black Quadra Thunder-X with orange-tinted windows parked in the centre. "I don't know, maybe I just don't like getting shot at everyday?"
Scoffing, Jezz waited as Naruto opened the door to the passenger side before getting in, unsure if it was wise for her to reply. "Whatever." Huffing in defeat, she leaned against the side of the door as the car roared awake, her head resting against the faintly rumbling glass. "Maybe we can stop at my Ma's after the mission, she's been asking to meet you since I told her about you."
Keeping his eyes focused on the road, Naruto gave a nod of approval, he had been ultra busy with work to anything but sit at his desk and invent new technology. Being the hired techie and solo for OTEC definitely had it perks: free Corporate Coverage for Trauma team, free fresh food, and a 2000 euro-dollar package for any experiments he wanted (as long as it related to helping OTEC).
But the hours were long, sometimes even an full 24 hours if the situation required it.
"Sure, but no merc jobs whilst we're there."
"No promises."
The rest of ride to the local hanger was silent; traffic was oddly calm, meaning a standard thirty minuet drive was easily done in twenty. It wasn't until the car pulled into a heavily guarded airport that any issue occurred.
Two heavily guarded individuals, with weapons drawn, stepped towards the vehicle, each of their rifles trained on the car's female occupant. "State your name and reason for being here."
"Naruto Uzumaki, ID 61524, under the direct command of Mr Marcus Halley, who's stationed in Night City." Naruto answered quickly, not wanting issues with the guys holding heavy assault weapons. "Passenger is Jezz Stiles, daughter to Major Veronica Stiles of team LRT-601, Militech, and Thomas Star of team SKL-1903."
A brief silence followed Naruto's statement; a thick tension hung in the air as the two stood still, weapons still drawn.
"Identifcation confirmed. Go on through, Mr Uzuamki."
And just like that, the tension dropped as the two guards stepped to the side and allowed them through the gates, their focus going back to the road in case another visitor arrived. Parking next to the entrance, Naruto slipped a pass under his front window screen before getting out.
"So, how long have you got on parking?" Jezz, having gotten out of the car, asked as she followed after the blonde as he casually strode through the front door of the private airport, slipping his guns onto the tray at the entrance.
"It's unlimited, actually, one of the few perks I got for stopping Reaper." Stepping into the whole body scanner, Naruto allowed the security to check through his goods, ignoring the odd sensation that ran up the length of his spine. "Amongst them was access to this airport, I can pretty much go to any location as long as it's business related."
The guards, who did an intense examination of the weapons and tech of the two, gave them the go-ahead, their weapons stored in separate boxes at the very end next to the head of security, who looked at them with an emotionless look on his face.
"What's the purpose of all this firepower, Sir." The man's voice was gruff but loud enough for most people to hear him within 60 feet. Already prepared for such a question, Naruto slipped the man a blank sharp with the detail of the mission. "A V-22B Osprey with two piolets will be ready when you arrive in hanger 3." Handing the chip back, the man stepped towards the monitor, no doubt ordering sais vehicle.
Nodding in thanks, Naruto and Jezz strapped up their weapons and left, eager to get away from the tense entrance and to get to night city asap. Fortunately for them, directional signs led them through the massive building, and with their help, it only took them five minutes to arrive, where, as promised, their transport was ready for them.
Xxxx 7 hours later xxxX
The vast majority of the seven-hour trip was mainly filled with the roar of engines, the thumping of the chopper's wings, and the brief chitchat talk. That was until the plane was roughly five minutes away from the destination.
"Mr Uzumaki, ETA 5 minutes; please collect all possession from storage unit A." An intercom, loud enough to be heard over the headphones Naruto was wearing, blared out, breaking him from the nap he was taking.
Stretching the kinks out of his back as he stood up, the blonde let out a giant yawn as he glanced around the hall of the ship, rubbing the crust out of his eyes. Seeing Jezz sound asleep in a chair, Naruto couldn't help but smile lightly. It had been only two years since they had met, but he couldn't deny that she's impacted his life for the better.
Before, he was just another solo who happened to have a natural talent for technology and net running, but he was still a nameless face within the crowd. Then came the day a private request arrived in his inbox from a mystery source, claiming there was a rouge A.I that had been actively infecting people's neural links, taking over their bodies, and causing ordinary people to commit murder and mayhem.
The gig was simple enough, find the source of the code and destroy it. The reward- thirty thousand eddies and a permanent contract within a company to deal with any A.I. issues.
Of course, the blonde snatched up the request in an instant, the job was no doubt going to be hard, which it bloody well was, but the payout was worth it. Not many people got permanent contracts these days, so it was a steal of an opportunity that pretty much every other solo would have passed on before it got out of hand.
At the time, he had expected it to be dangerous, hellish even. But the warzone he walked into was even worse. Mass-controlled gang members, civilians, and even corpos were hidden in plain sight- meaning every day was a fight.
It cost him 87 days, ten thousand credits, and his right arm, but he managed to track down the original A.I location, a simple virtuality mask in a local "old tech" stand, handled by an Asian store clerk, that was no doubt also controlled- hidden in plain sight.
Of course, he had utterly destroyed it, burned it beyond recognition, and had a virtual show-down in the "old net", which was anything by easy. He still got phantom screams of the A.I when he fried its code to nothing.
Who knew A.I's could feel pain. Certainly not him at the time.
Since then, he dedicated the last two years of his life solely to understanding A.I. With regular weekly trips into the old net; the blonde had found a number of interesting things. Old bank account, corruption spreading back to world war I, and governmental bodies being bribed- he had seen it all. But, by far, the A.I he encountered were beyond fascinating; each was different, some having "personalities" and others just being jumbled bits of code that randomly sputtered out nonsensical binary codes.
Some were even alive.
Not that he would say that out loud, he didn't exactly want that tidbit of knowledge getting out.
Shaking his mind off the horrid things that might happen if he was to release said information, Naruto's mind snapped back to reality, his right hand unconsciously going to open the steel door that stored his armour and weapons whilst his left played with the data shard he had made earlier. "I wonder what kind of A.I I'll be hunting today?" Naruto's thoughts were interrupted as the room suddenly shook violently as he was about to open the storage container, throwing the blonde to the side and forcing him to grapple a nearby bench to keep upright.
"Fuck, what was that?!" Jezz shouted from her position on the floor, her front pressed against the side of the chair she was previously sleeping on. "Pilots, what's going on?" Shouting down her headset mic, she frowned in confusion when she only got a static reply and more ship rumbling. "Naruto, we're going down!"
"Damn it, brace yourself!"
Moments later, a large thud echoed through the hall of the ship, as the back end ripped off, sending the rest of it spiralling. A loud thunderous explosion followed, launching the ship's front end downward in a ball of fire.
Several miles away from the crashing ship, a giant fireball briefly flashed in the sky, colouring the sky orange.
"D-damn it," Stumbling out of the wreckage of the ship, Naruto grunted in pain as he held his bloodied side, his gaze unfocused as he tried to get an understanding of his environment, only to find a large body of scrap and junk on the floor, with large dunes of leftovers and trash.
Unknown to the blonde, appearing out from the shadows of the burning ship, a black-clad assassin wielding a silenced pistol moved silently towards the blonde- planting the end of the muzzle against his skull.
"Don't move,"
Grunting in surprise, Naruto froze up; he hadn't picked up anything on his scans, hell his enhanced hearing didn't even hear them. "What do you want!?" Hissing through the pain, he glared before him, trying to devise a survival plan.
"The shard, where is it." With a bloody shaking hand, the blonde pointed to his pocket. "Get it, if you try anything, I'll shoot you." Still stuck for ideas, Naruto slowly reached into his pocket, ignoring the cold steel of the silencer pressing harshly against his head.
"Shit," Dropping the shard seemingly accidentally, Naruto glanced down at the shard he had created several hours ago, knowing all to well that Jezz had the original on her person. "Here," Reaching slowly towards the shard, the blonde's mind raced with ideas as he tried to create the perfect escape plan.
That was, until a silenced shot buzzed past his ears, a bullet shattering the shard.
"Fuck it!" Spinning on the spot, Naruto snapped out with a leg kick, sweeping the assassin off their feet- taking a shot to his shoulder for his effort. "Asshole!" Stomping on the hand that held the gun, the blonde heard a crunch as his foot connected, breaking the women's hand before kicking away the gun.
The assassin quickly recovered, donkey kicking the blonde away from her, launching him into the trash dunes before spinning around to run for her gun. Naruto, however, foreseeing her movements, threw himself into her with a shoulder barge, determined to come out on top in this fight.
Tumbling to the floor, the two fighters exchanged rough blows until, finally, the assassin was able to take charge and get on top of Naruto, hitting slam after blow against Naruto's raised guard, determined to end the fight by knockout. Grunting, the blonde blocked the blows, their impact echoing like gunshots as sparks flew between the cyber-enhanced limbs of the assassin clashed against Naruto's hardened flesh.
As the fight dragged on, the assassin began showing signs of fatigue - her movements becoming slower, her attacks less consistent - which gave Naruto an opening to strike with devastating force, his fist striking the assassin's temple with an audible crunch and sending shockwaves reverberating through the both of them.
Staggered backwards, dazed and disoriented, the assassin was barely able to dodge Naruto's follow-up attack, a throat punch, but was unable to follow his follow-up, blow after blow that sent the assassin reeling backwards, until one final bone-crunching strike to her diaphragm brought down the assassin, her body going limp.
Breathless and exhausted, Naruto stood over his fallen foe, his fists still tightly clasped together as victory was claimed, despite his destroyed ride. "You fucked up," He grunted out in pain, nudging the female, happy to see her not respond. "You shoulda shot first," Limping over to the fallen silenced pistol, the blonde gave it a one-over, checking the mag as he headed back, feet dragging against the sand before taking aim and shooting, a silent pop jolting the assassin.
"The next bullet will be in your head if you don't tell me what I want to know."
The assassin nodded, slowly getting up in order not to show aggression. "What do you want to know?" Naruto gave her a blank look, gesturing to her. "My identity?" Seeing the blonde nod, the assassin sighed before reaching up and unclipping her mask, hesitantly bringing it up. "I expected someone older." Under the mask was a young, beautiful Japanese female with comb-over black hair, hazel eyes, high cheekbones, and two cybernetic lines on both cheeks. "But then again, I've met younger that are stronger."
"Are you done?" Her tone was professional but sharp, an emotionless gaze tracking the blonde's movements. "Or will you brag about beating me before you kill me?"
"I don't plan on killing you," Scoffing, Naruto met the female's gaze, challenging her harshness with neutrality. "What I need to know is who hired you, and why?" Standing up, the blonde activated his scanners as he looked at the wreckage. Seeing that Jezz was alive, but out cold, Naruto signed in relief before turning back to the assassin. "Wait, let me guess, Arasaka?" The silence was enough for Naruto to get his answer, not that he was surprised. "I should've guessed those asshats would try something." Checking the assassin's gun for remaining ammo, Naruto narrowed his eyes as he looked for something or, more specifically, someone. "And you guys never work…"
"Alone?"
Before the blonde could react, a single round being shot sounded through the air.
"F-fuck you, Arasaka scum." Collapsing onto his front, Naruto couldn't help but feel pissed as blood rushed from his body, and death slowly started to claim him. What's worse, he had barely gotten old enough to drink, and he had just come close to finding out about his parents, and he didn't finish that premium ramen in his super secret draw.
All in all, Naruto thought his death was pretty damn pointless…..
Connection….. 1%