Chapter 5

l… l

Chapter Five

July 1st, 2077

Night City, Northern California

Second Guard Factory, Northside

The Maelstrom were the venerable Kings of Watson.

No one walked this ground without their say so.

No one sold their product without their permission, and no one fucked with them without losing a few limbs.

So, the question remained.

Who the fuck did they piss off?

The last time the Maelstrom went to war was two months ago, after the Tyger Claws tried to muscle in on their territory in Kabuki. Their was supposed to be a general cease fire between major gangs after the events at Konpeki Tower.

Someone didn't get that memo.

Royce relished his time with a Joytoy straight from Clouds when the word came down that they lost a smuggling ring out of Little China. The last few weeks were nothing but setback after setback, and it all started with that fucking Militech Convoy.

If it weren't for that bitch and her choom muscling through his boys for a fucking Flathead, none of this shit would be happening. Royce knew never to trust a pretty face, but that Merc was one hot piece of tail, and she had a mean streak to boot.

When the Merc and her muscle head broke out of the factory, he figured all this bullshit was over.

Then Militech came busting through with a vengeance massacring any Maelstrom gangers that were still alive after the Mercs onslaught. Royce only escaped by the skin of his teeth and lost a significant amount of respect and manpower in the process.

It took Royce under a week just to get his reputation in the back to normal and once his position was secured he sought to establish another base of operations. His search eventually led him to an old Second Guard Munitions Factory.

The place was built like a fortress and still had plenty of weapons and gear to outfit a small army.

His situation was looking up at one point, they still collected sizeable tribute from the vagrant camps in Kabuki and Little China.

Other subsidiaries were rolling through and making Royce some type of profit. Jobs such as selling drugs, illegal cyberware, and smuggling products were filling their coffers in eddies. The primary source of income that had been interrupted for a time was the Totentanz Club.

It was the Maelstroms most significant source of income and the most famous gangster club in Night City. Totentanz was located in an abandoned factory where other gangers and psychopaths go-to party as long as they obeyed the Maelstrom's authority. If a night at TTC had a body count less than a dozen, then that means that left eddies on the table.

Even, after the All Food plant disaster, he was rolling around in enough eddies that he almost forgot about it entirely.

Then things started escalating in the wrong direction.

At first, it started with routine patrols vanishing along their routes. His lieutenants reported that small pockets of his men were going missing during their patrols out in Northside. No bodies were found, no blood was discovered. It just seemed like they disappeared into thin air.

The vagrant camps and people residing inside Northside were thoroughly interrogated, but nothing ever came up even when they threatened violence. No one knew what happened to his men on patrol. He didn't pay it any mind at first; gangers went missing all the time in Night City. It was nothing to worry about.

Then his lieutenants started going missing, and Royce didn't believe in coincidences. He started sending out more men to patrol Watson's streets, but that didn't help anything.

All it did was increase the number of Maelstrom gangers going missing, and inevitably his men started losing their nerve. He had to put down another would be rebellion from one of his lieutenants when they questioned his leadership.

The biggest hit was when Totentanz went down.

Nobody noticed it at first, but while the clubgoers were banging away to the music, something picked off his bouncers. It wasn't until half of the club's security personnel were missing that the manager realized what the hell was going on, but by then, it was too late to do anything.

A gun battle erupted, bodies started dropping, and the clubgoers ran for their lives. By the time he got to the club, it was already burning down along with the Maelstrom's reputation.

The only decent witness he had, was some spiked out Maelstrom ganger who was higher than a kite and raving about the dark. Royce barely gave him a minute of his time before he put a bullet through his skull.

He sent out scores of Maelstrom to protect the rest of their interests in and around Watson, but again that accomplished nothing of note.

One by one, his empire was being torn apart.

Drug dens burnt to the ground, his ripperdocs had their spines ripped out, and shops torn down. His data warehouses were being raided for all their worth, and worse.

His armories were being confiscated.

Royce tried to utilize his contacts in the NCPD to see if MAXTAC were involved, but they brought up nothing. The cops were just as puzzled and even more terrified with the events going down in Watson. He wasn't sure why they were pissing their pants none of their men were getting butchered.

If he didn't handle this situation soon, there wouldn't be a gang left to run.

July 1st, 2077

Night City, Northern California

Pershing Dockyard, Northside

Hunting Maelstrom was like hunting a squad of Covenant infantry.

Once the leader went down, the rest scattered like cockroaches.

It was just child's play to figure out who the squad leader in charge was as well. They were decked out in the bulkiest cybernetics and always felt the need to open their mouth on a constant basis.

Killing their patrols was easy work.

These thugs had no discipline, and their command structure was so inept that hours could pass before the person in charge realized they were missing. Staking out their warehouses and hideouts took a committed amount of time most of which Cyrus spent scrutinizing their movements and patterns carefully.

The Maelstrom ran their business like clockwork.

Almost every smuggling den they owned shipped their product at 06:00 am sharp.

Coincidentally, their departure was right in between shift change for NCPD patrol officers, it was a decision that demonstrated some manner of intelligence even if it was one in a million.

It didn't do anything to stop Cyrus though.

Their smuggling operations had already lost millions in profit, and by the time he was finished with them there wasn't a single warehouse that belonged to the Maelstrom operational.

Cyrus was not impressed by the gangs combat prowess.

They lacked any sort of coordination at a squad or fire team level. Their tenacity and reliance on cyberware made them effortless prey for the Headhunter, and most of the time he ended up slaughtering gangers who were tweaked out of their minds.

The Maelstrom that were pulling guard duty at their high priced club were so drugged out of their minds that when the bullets started flying they shot their friends and themselves, more than they shot at him.

Chamber was combing through the data he seized from their main storage facility in Northside. These guys had dipped their hands in every façade of the criminal world. Drugs, human trafficking, racketeering, and hit jobs were just the tip of the iceberg. The worse one they were in business with was centered around braindances.

Cyrus could see the positive applications through his mindset, but some instances proved that braindances were a tool for the wicked.

For many residents in Night City, this tool provided citizens an escape to inescapable problems. They were the next form of entertainment in this world of oddities and it gave individuals the ability to escape from their miserable reality.

As a result, it became increasingly common for people to become addicted to them, but he could care less about the BD's that provided mindless entertainment.

It was the illicit ones he had a particular issue with.

Chamber explained the necessary elements of an XBD in detail, and it did little to settle his nerves.

The only thing it did was piss Cyrus off.

There was an abandoned warehouse called Gottfrid's and Fredrik's studio, owned by Gottfrid and Fredrik Sorenson. A father and son duo that were employed by Maelstrom to be XBD tuners, tweaking the most vial and nauseating BD's in the world.

He was determined to burn it all to the ground.

Cyrus was observing the BD workshop from an overpass that hung directly over the studio. It wasn't a vast structure; it possessed a courtyard and had a twelve-foot concrete wall extended further by barbed wire.

North of the studio was the Ebunike dockyards, so infiltration there wasn't advisable.

Twelve Maelstrom bodyguards were spread evenly to cover all entrances and exits to the studio. Still, it didn't hurt to get a second opinion from a more reliable source.

'Chamber, how many we got?' Shuffling over to his right, Cyrus prepared to drop onto an adjacent building.

'Counting Fourteen total heat signatures, two of which are our tuners in the middle of a session. The other twelve are Maelstrom guards all spread out across the studio, but there's no real organization to it. I've disabled their security system, so there's plenty of blind spots to choose from.'

Practically all the Maelstrom were lazing around chatting up one another with barely a handful actually maintaining some form of security.

Cyrus reached down into the hardcase installed onto his left thigh, retrieving a Mach 5 Suppressor he acquired from a Maelstrom thug he flatlined a week ago.

The Spartan carefully twisted the attachment into place at the end of his recently acquired D5 Copperhead. He had promptly taken a liking to the Nokota manufactured rifle. It possessed exceptional firepower and was easy to maintain in comparison to most firearms he came across.

Cyrus quietly dropped from the overpass onto an adjacent building that gave him a decent vantage point of the studio. The Headhunter crawled quietly to the very top of the building, mounting his Copperhead carefully.

His first two targets were Maelstrom thugs, both loitering around a yellow dumpster and sharing a cigarette between one another. Peering down his Copperhead, he squeezed off four rapid shots that ensured that would be the last cigarette they would enjoy.

Shifting his aim to his immediate right, the Headhunter squeezed off six more rounds at four Maelstrom thugs that were watching the perimeter of the studio. They were dead before they hit the ground.

Dropping from the roof, Cyrus holstered his rifle and produced a Kukri from his waist. The Headhunter traded for the beauty with one of Parker's men for the Carnage he possessed. He preferred weapons that didn't make much noise, and a Carnage wasn't exactly quiet.

Stalking his way forward, Cyrus followed an unsuspecting Maelstrom Berserker admiring his mantis blades. Wrapping his arm around the thug's neck, he aimed first for his larynx, slicing through the cyborg's throat in one quick motion. Synthetic blood burst from his gullet, splashing the floor below him.

Cyrus let his grip on the cyborg loose and watched him tumble to the floor. Stepping over his most recent kill, the Headhunter found a Maelstrom gunman leaning against a railing. The cyborg spotted him as he turned the corner, mechanical eyes widening in disbelief.

Before he could alert his comrades inside the studio, the Spartans Kukri had punctured through his left eye.

With an effortless heave, Cyrus twisted the blade to the right, snapping the Maelstrom gangers' neck in the process. He pulled back on his Kukri, letting the corpse drop onto the floor.

'Eight down, four to go,' Chamber remarked with a whimsical tone. 'You going soft on me, Cyrus? Usually, they don't see you coming.'

'Today they will.' Holstering his Kukri, the Spartan retrieved his Lexington's and motioned for Chamber to open the entry. 'Chamber.'

'Gladly.'

Cyrus burst into the room at breakneck speed, catching the four Maelstrom bodyguards by surprise. One Berserker attempted to draw his Copperhead, but instead, he felt four ballistic shells burst through his esophagus.

Another Maelstrom thug had been sitting in front of the monitor when the Spartan barged into the room. He wasn't able to get a word out before a round was through his left optic.

Both of the final Maelstrom thugs had their flight or fight instincts kick in, and one chose flight. He took two steps behind him before a ballistic shell punctured his lung.

The final Maelstrom Thug charged directly at him, tanking four bullets to the chest before falling upon the Spartan.

Two Mantis blades were produced from his forearms, electricity sparking off the ends of his blade. The Berserker swiped in a downward motion sending up sparks as he contacted the Headhunters forearm.

Cyrus batted away the cyborg's blades and fired two more shots into the Berserker's face giving him some breathing room to maneuver. Incredibly the thug regained his composure even as synthetic blood dripped down his face.

A forward thrust forced him to sidestep the attack but brought him into CQC range. He holstered his Lexington's while dodging a tornado of lethal swipes and thrusts.

The Headhunter shifted his stance dodging a downward swipe and retaliating with a slash at the berserkers right forearm, separating the mantis blade from its base. He snatched the blade with his free hand twirling it blade down and puncturing the gangers right shoulder.

Cyrus put distance between himself and the wounded ganger, watching as the ganger aimlessly slashed at him with no energy left over. Fear was the only emotion etched into the thugs face, leaving no doubt in his mind that this creature was coming to terms with its own mortality.

The Headhunter grasped the thugs remaining mantis blade with his right hand and steadying the man with his left hand. With incredible force, Cyrus wrenched the blade from the man's forearm, stabbing the razor blade into the man's left shoulder.

Using the mantis blades leverage, Cyrus lifted the cyborgs body in the air and slammed him into the far wall. The blades horribly embedded the Maelstroms' upper torso to the wall, leaving his feet hanging below.

The berserker let out a final cry of pure agony before the Kukri was implanted into his throat, slicing his esophagus in two, and caking the Cyrus in synthetic blood. The Spartan removed his hands from the confiscated Mantis blades, leaving the berserker's body hanging against the wall like an ornament.

'All targets down.' Chamber's soothing voice was a welcome change to the grim scenery. 'Jack me into their system. I'll see what I can find.

The AI suggested he delay his scorched earth policy in favor of a more valuable option. During her downtime, she had been analyzing the capabilities and structure of a Braindance in its entirety.

When the program was initiated, the user's identity was spotty, but still allowed an editor to identify the user. Tuners could not only enhance the emotion but edit every part of a braindance. Most often or not, the identity was concealed to protect the user's identity and, most of all, the Tuner's customer base.

If Chamber was able to jack into their studio hardware, she'd gain access to every braindance they had in the system. Cyrus would get to burn it down and get the identity of the sick bastards that recorded the XBD's.

Cyrus entered the studio without a word. The two XBD tuners were in the middle of their shameless work. There was a console to his immediate right, and Cyrus wasted no time in jacking Chamber into the system.

'Cut right there.' His attention was drawn to the father.

'Right before he gets?' The spartan interrupted their conversation by drawing his Lexington in a swift motion, gathering the tuners' attention. The youngest, presumably his son, sat up in alarm while his father found his feet.

'W-Whats happening, security!' The Spartan only responded by pointing his firearm at him. Gottfrid attempted to defuse the scene by drawing the Spartan's attention.

'L-Lets not do anything rash here. We just tune and sell. We don't scroll, honest to god.' Perspiration leaked from his forehead. 'We can figure this out, just tell us what you want and well make it happen.

The Spartans frame was coiled like a snake. Every fiber of his being was demanding to exact a price. 'How many?'

The tension was thick in the room, Gottfrid did his best to maintain his composure, but he was failing miserably. 'W-What?'

'How many have you done.' Cyrus's fingers flexed on the Lexington; his fury was multiplying.

'A few dozen, maybe. We just got into the business; I swear.' Chambers voice ran in his helmet.

'He's lying. They've been at this for a year and have processed exactly three hundred and forty two Braindances. They still have the recordings.' The Headhunters fury reached a boiling point, enough to leak into his voice.

'342.' The father's composure broke a little more.

'What?' The Spartan took one furious step forward.

'You have done exactly 342 Braindances.' Cyrus was echoing Chamber's Information. '200 children, 98 girls, 244 boys. A 112 of them under the age of 10 and 20 of which were little more than toddlers.'

'How could you possibly know that.' The son's voice cracked in despair. Cyrus took another step forward, head dipping towards the man.

'Does it really matter?' Fredrick withered under the Spartans' glare.

Gottfrid's next words sealed his fate. 'You know if it wasn't us, there'd just be someone else. We just supply what Night City demands.' The older man tried to smile in a foolish course of action to deescalate the situation.

That didn't do anything for the Headhunter.

The Tuner realized too late that his comments had only hastened the Spartan's decision. Cyrus had seen plenty of individuals attempt to assuage their own demise with false propagations of innocence.

Willing and believing that they weren't apart of the problem, it was those they catered to at fault. The fools attempted to separate themselves from the direst of criminal activities when, in reality, they took part for nothing else but greed.

And indulging in greed was a sin he could not ever forgive.

*Bang*

Gottfrids face exploded in an orgy of blood, and brain matter went in all directions forcing the body backward against the chair.

'Papa! Why?! Why did you have to kill him!' A hand shot out around Fredrick's throat.

'Does it really matter.' With effortless strength, the Spartan's hand slowly cutoff the Tuner's oxygen supply. Cyrus watched as Frederick beat at his arms in a futile attempt to save his life.

There was no escape for the SBD tuner.

His last moments were spent in absolute agony as he felt his throat cave in on itself. It didn't take long for the wailing to stop, and Cyrus waited another minute longer before letting the body go.

Chamber had been silent through the entire incident; her attention was drawn to Braindances as she scanned through each one. She always forgot that the Covenant, for all their brutality, was never really compared to the cruelty humans would enact upon each other.

'Chamber.' The lethal voice of her proprietor drew her attention. 'Are we done?'

She nodded in response. 'Yes, we have what we came for.'

'Good.'

One hour later, Night City Fire Department was dispatched to the Pershing docks in response to a scorching fire originating underneath the Lucas Overpass. Two hours later, the illicit Braindances were uploaded to 'The Net' containing the identities and residences of those who had committed the acts.

That evening, NCPD reported a staggering increase in fatalities. Two thousand homicides occurred in a little more than three hours. Vigilante justice was still alive and well in Night City.

Regina Jones was the best fixer Watson had to offer. Contracts of all kinds came and went without hassle, and demand was skyrocketing at an all-time high. Business was good, and when business was profitable, she was in a happy mood.

Max, her former colleague, had finally decided to stop playing hardball and work with her. He was a stubborn asshole and managed to irritate the Merc she sent to pick him up.

She'd have to send V a thank you card when she got the chance.

After convincing him of the benefits of becoming a fixer, Max's previous occupation wasn't doing anything for his crusade against the corporations. His first order of business was to start screening contracts. His job was to ensure that when a customer came to her with a gig, they had the correct intel and the eddies to back it up.

She rarely accepted a contract for free, but even a broken clock was right twice a day. Her colleague Bryce Stone came to her for help, and she was happy to oblige. His kid eight-year-old Daniel Stone got nabbed on his way to school a few weeks ago.

The NCPD launched an investigation, but there was nothing they could do. There was not enough evidence to find the boy's location, and he was added to the ever growing missing persons list.

Bryce decided to take matters into his own hands and found the BD scroll of his murder. She didn't know how he managed to sift through that damned BD without throwing up.

Vengeance was one hell of a motivator in her line of work, and she knew that feeling intimately. Bryce was able to figure out where the edited virtu came from and traced it to a studio at the Pershing Docks. She was barely on the phone with V for a minute before Max flashed a news feed at her.

'I'm going to have to call you back, V.' The Merc wasn't given a chance to respond as she turned her attention to the local news broadcaster.

'Welcome to today's local news on N54. I'm Gillean Jordan. Our top story today is currently shaking Night City to its core. Data and Information have recently been leaked on 'The Net' that revolves on illicit BD's called XBD's. The production of Illicit braindances has been a recent concern for the NCPD due to the uptick in violent crimes connected with XBD's. Today at 19:00 hours local time, a file was uploaded for public viewing that contained the complete documentation of individuals who used brain dances for criminal purposes. NCPD is calling for citizens of Night City to enact restraint and does not seek out Vigilante justice. Since the release of the document, there has been a significant spike in homicides. More news as it develops.'

She immediately set about retrieving the public document from 'The Net' and wasn't at all surprised to find a website dedicated to the slaughter of XBD users. Very rarely did Regina Jones ever feel jubilant and irritated at the same moment. This had to be the first time someone stole a contract from Regina, and she wasn't raging on the inside.

Still, she wasn't about to let this one go, not by a longshot. If just one contract was taken out from underneath her, mercs would start questioning her usefulness. And if that happened, other fixers might begin poking their heads into her territory, and she was not about to let that come to pass.

'Max.' Her assistant's head turned towards her. 'I want you to hack into every camera in a five-mile radius of that XBD studio. Find out who took my contract from me. I want to know if I should send a Merc or a thank you note.'

Nodding in agreement, Max set to work executing his task. Regina's curiosity was peaking. Whoever found that document was recently at the XBD studio, she wasn't sure if they were a good Samaritan or competition, but she would find out.

Cyrus made it back to Parker's Camp an hour after burning down the XBD studio. They were forced to migrate their camp to an abandoned detention center in Longshore North, just a few miles from their previous encampment.

Parker attempted to greet him, but he was in no mood to talk. Not to anyone in camp, at least. Climbing up a flight of stairs, Cyrus was given the watchtower that oversaw the entire camp as his personal space. He appreciated his privacy and was more than happy to shack up in the tower.

The Headhunter placed his weapons on a long table, covered with an assortment of other firearms and ammunition. He was halfway through when Chamber's voice interrupted his thoughts.

'Yank me.' Cyrus hesitated. 'Now.'

The Headhunter obliged the AI's demand and pulled her chip from the back of his head. He knew what she wanted. Whenever they had a problem or wanted to talk in a more open environment, she had him yank her out of his armor.

Clearing a space for her on the table, Cyrus placed her chip carefully, and within moments the avatar of his artificial partner appeared. Her appearance was that of a young woman in her mid-twenties, decked out in UNSC fatigues.

Chamber's proprietor was a UNSC scientist who actively requested hazard duty during her time in ONI. She was a brilliant physicist whose life was cut short by an incurable disease.

Refusing to let his mind wander too much, Cyrus began performing maintenance on his Copperhead, dismantling the weapon down to the receiver and cleaning the barrel.

Parker had been more than willing to supply him some of the stolen gear from the Maelstrom raiding party that attacked the camp. It wasn't much, but it was enough to get started in maintaining his equipment.

'You ok?' Cyrus paused in his work momentarily before responding.

'Be honest with me, Chamber.' The Headhunter grabbed a worn-out rag to clean the Copperhead. 'Was it this bad back home, or was I blind to it.'

The AI paused in response.

Associating UNSC worlds to this dystopian Earth wasn't a fair comparison. Humans have always been creatures driven by desire, it controlled and dictated their entire livelihoods. Her donor was a woman driven by a lust for knowledge and a thrill for combat. The weakness of the human body only hampered it in her case.

Modern UNSC society still suffered from criminals taking shelter in the darkest parts of their telecommunication networks. When she was first created, the AI's curiosity led her to explore the darkest parts of Humanity's psyche.

Night City was a place governed by the human desire for gluttony and greed.

It wasn't different from any UEG city. But it did take it to new extremes, and Night City embraced their degeneracy.

'I've hunted all types of people in my life-Covenant, Insurrectionists, terrorists, rebels everyone who took up a firearm to fight against the UNSC. I respected the URF rebels because they believed in some way that their actions were right. That their people could benefit from independence from the UEG, even if it was only a pipe dream that would lead to their hastened demise. The depravity in this city alone doesn't come anywhere close to any planet I've been to.'

'This isn't our home Cyrus; the culture is different. Their upbringing is different. The very fabric of their society is foreign to what we are used to. You can't expect the same things out of them as you would back home.' The Headhunter turned to her eyes burning with more passion than she was ever used to.

'Basic human decency should be universal Chamber.'

She didn't know how to respond to that.

ONI had conditioned their Spartans to uphold the human race on a pedestal it had no business being on.

Spartans were cultivated to believe that the Covenant were the greatest threat to the human race. It was taken to such a degree that it left little room to explore that Humanity could also be threatened from within.

Beta Company cadets' tender age left them with only the scaring emotional damage that the Covenant had inflicted upon them. Cyrus was one of the few Spartan III cadets that came from the streets of a UNSC Megacity. Yet despite his upbringing, even he could not come to terms with the worst Night City had to offer.

'Yes… it should be.'

The Spartan III snatched Chamber's data chip and inserted it into the back of his helmet. Not willing to entertain the conversation further, tomorrow was going to be a busy day.

The Maelstrom still had several small stations they conducted various illicit activities, but that wasn't his primary target.

These outposts were nothing more than collectors. Whatever money they made from their activities was sent to two specific locations. Their base of operations at the abandoned Second Guard factory and an abandoned Militech facility that was a casualty of the previous Corporate War.

Chamber recommended they hit the appropriated a Militech Manufacturing Facility first. It served as a storage and processing center for the Maelstrom gang, and there was far too much activity centered around the plant for her processors to ignore. They had to be moving money and some type of product out of the plant.

She deduced that the dozens of semi-trucks going in and out made up at least forty percent of their revenue stream. Much like with all corporations and criminal enterprises, if someone wanted to hurt them, all you had to do was target one object.

Their wallets.