Adam Smasher's new album, MGR Revengeance, is a partially visual experience, accompanied by several scenes supposedly drawn by Adam Smasher himself. With the pictures as context, the viewer understands that the surprisingly techno-soundtrack is in fact an operatic autobiography. It is unknown what "MGR" stands for, although several theories have been suggested.
The cover is of an oversized ACPA facing down a borg with a mono-katana. The scene is a dusty desert land with scant scrubs. It is evening, the sun is red.
Song 1 : Rules of Nature
The scene is of a blond boy in a shadowed alleyway. The boy is dressed in sneakers, shorts, a black "Mets" hoodie, and a baseball cap. The boy is holding a bloody baseball bat. The boy is eating a loaf of bread. The boy is sitting on a man's corpse. A bag of groceries is scattered on the ground.
Song 2 : A Stranger I Remain
The scene is of a young blond man in an army recruit's uniform. His eyes are covered by his helmet. He is grinning. He is in a row of many other recruits. A drill sergeant walks in front of them.
Song 3 : Hot Wind Blowing
The scene is of a blond man in weathered army fatigues. He is in a desert. He is shooting several men in middle-eastern clothing. The man is grinning. An army division is approaching from behind him.
Song 4 : I'm My Own Master Now
The scene is of a blond man. He is walking away from an army officer in clear disgust. He is tearing off his uniform. He keeps a tight grip on his gun, however.
Song 5 : The Stains of Time
The scene is of a blond man. He is wearing street clothes and body armor. He is firing a machine gun at a group that are wearing gang symbols. He is smiling.
Song 6 : Collective Consciousness
The scene is of a horribly injured man. He is hanging from the ceiling, and is missing three of his limbs in their entirety, and one limb down to the elbow. Several corporate officials are around him. The officials have an Arasaka brand on their backs. A cybernetic body is behind the man.
Song 7 : Red Sun
The scene is of a mostly cybernetic man. His cybernetics are pitch black and bulky. He is carrying a massive machine gun. He is shooting a crowd of people. The man's face is covered by a cybernetic jaw and a skull-mask.
Song 8 : It Has To Be This Way
The scene is of a DaiOni frame and a man with a black chrome arm. They are shooting at each other on top of a tower. The tower is collapsing. There is a helicopter in the background.
Song 9 : The Only Thing I Know For Real
The scene is of a mostly cybernetic man. His cybernetics are black but not overly bulky. He is carrying a mono-katana and a handgun. He is standing in front of a large quadrupedal ACPA with a large gun mounted on its back. The man has a face and graying hair. They are in the ruins of a city.
—
Arasaka purchases the Pacifica region of Night City in its entirety! Cost not disclosed!
In a shocking move, the Night City government made the decision to snub the Chinese corporation Kang Tao and instead sell the Pacifica region in its entirety to Arasaka after Arasaka management made an offer. The site is planned for major reconstruction as Arasaka agents begin to move into and police the area. Arasaka reveals that hot-topic public figure Adam Smasher has been assigned to help quell gang violence in the district. Arasaka plans to unveil plans for reconstruction at the end of the year, but has leaked that they have "no plans to make it a tourist attraction again", much to the apparent dismay of many civil planners.
—
Rogue had mixed feelings about the man sitting next to her.
Adam Smasher was there in his Gemini body, still utterly dwarfing anyone except the most borged out cyberpsychos, and slowly sipping at his drink (that she paid for) as he stared at the kids that he press-ganged into his service. Dressed in fashion that went out of style more than fifty years ago.
They were off near the center of the room, drinking and laughing with the boy's mother (that was brought back from the fucking dead a year later, fucking hell how?) talking to her cute little bartender. The kids were doing some sort of trick with bullets and guns (it's always gun tricks with these kids), they better not shoot a hole in her roof, she just got that repaired yesterday.
They were good kids, good as anyone can be in this fucked up city. David was a bundle of canned sunshine, and the girls were precious little hanger-ons. They made for a cute trio. It made her pissed off every time she saw an Arasaka logo on their clothes. They were branded now, dogs of a corpo, and they would never be able to escape that. Was serving under Adam Smasher any better than dying to Adam Smasher? She didn't know anymore.
Ask her a year ago and she would say death is preferrable to staying around the murderous bastard. Ask her now and she couldn't tell you.
As far as she could tell, the bastard was a good boss to the kids, which was all kinds of fucked up. He paid them an even share, he made sure they were ready before starting jobs, he paid for all their chrome and equipment to be updated, he gave them free lodging.
If you told her that Adam Smasher would do anything except toss the kids into a meat grinder, she wouldn't have believed you. Yet here she was, sitting next to the bastard as he drank some fruity thing that Kevin brought over. She told him to bring him drinks like that to see how the bastard reacted, but so far all he's done each time was grumble and growl.
He clearly didn't want to be here, surrounded by 'meatbags' and in a club with music that he hated, drinking fruity drinks. The kids wanted to be here though, and so here he was in the corner of the bar watching them like a hawk.
No, not a hawk. Like a lion watches his pride. Resting in the shade of a vantage point while the cubs played. Adam Smasher was a grumpy, growling, apex predator, one that was defending what he saw as his. She almost wanted to laugh at such a stupid image.
Adam Smasher didn't defend jack shit, he was the killer that Arasaka sent out whenever they needed everything in a hundred meter radius dead, enemy and bystander alike. He was the blunt instrument of destruction that intimidated everyone that thought they could fuck with Arasaka and get away with it. The walking natural disaster that turns people into corpses.
He was not a man who rushed a young girl in his arms to safety. He was not a man who stayed back to take out an assassin gunning for a young boy he was teaching. He was not a man who saved prostitutes and homeless from scavs in the streets. He was not a man who made fucking music. He was not a man who critiqued her fucking fashion choices.
He was a man who killed the dumb, cheating, asshole that she still wasn't over all these years later.
Rogue took a drink, and started speaking to drown out all this introspection.
"Scavs are basically gone from the city, I'm sure you know." He didn't turn to look at her, but she knew he was listening. He always was, even when no one else was.
"Funnily enough, you and 'Saka got rid of one gang, and two more sprouted up in the aftermath."
"The first one doesn't have a name, not really. With the sudden death of the primary suppliers of second-hand chrome gone, the ripperdocs were in trouble of staying in business as a whole. They've decided to unionize, forming a sort of ad-hoc pseudo-gang. They don't really have a leadership or command structure, just more of a formalized agreement to watch after each other. No one's sure if it'll last long."
Adam spoke at that, voice rumbling in its distinctive robotic undertone. Adam never tried to hide who he was, even in a more human looking body. Adam never hid his thoughts behind polite words or backhanded phrases. He was honest, maybe the most honest man in the city. Rogue wanted to laugh, the most honest man in the city is the most murderous one, sounded like a bad joke.
"A new gang will fill the gap soon enough. It won't last when that happens."
Rogue would normally agree, but she had a feeling on this one. She had learned to trust her feelings over the years. She just took a sip and continued.
"The other gang is formed from a combination of ligering scav elements and some other miscellaneous groups rallied around a guy named George Goode…"
He noticed the pause.
"They have a name?"
Rogue groaned and placed her face in her hand. The secondhand embarrassment from the new gang's chosen name was almost unbearable.
"...Pavement Apes."
A pause. Adam actually turned to look at her, silent for a moment.
"Pavement Apes?"
Rogue nodded.
"They know what that means right?"
Rogue nodded.
"George Goode is from Louisiana, and got himself some custom gorilla arms a while ago. He decided that he 'was going to be king of the concrete jungle' in a speech when the gang started forming a few weeks ago."
Adam stared for another moment, before scoffing and turning back to watch the kids.
"That's fucking embarrasing."
Rogue fully agreed. She found herself hoping the new gang would be wiped out real soon. It was a small gang still, so it was more than possible that she wouldn't have to hear of it again. Regardless, she was done giving out info, time for the bastard to give her some back.
"So what was with that trick where you made a district worth of scavs melt?"
Adam growled out at that. "Overclocked their chrome, then locked them into overclock."
…fucker, she knew that part.
"How?"
Adam scoffed again. Glaring at her from the corner of his eye like she said something incredibly stupid. Bastard, that was an honest question. "Netrunning, it's not hard to figure out."
…So either he was covering for his little Arasaka attack AI, or he was being entirely blunt again. Did he actually expect her to believe that he was able to quickhack the entirety of northern Pacifica in the thirty or so seconds it took for him to run Lucy back to TT?
…Adam was probably the most honest man in the city, he might actually have done that. The thought scared the shit out of her. She decided to ignore it for now, either he was lying or he could replicate an attack AI while running away.
"What does 'Saka have you doing down in Pacifica now?"
Adam audibly snarled at that, clearly deeply annoyed at the situation.
"Bossman told me I was in charge of its development, and assigned a fucking stipend to get it done. I don't know fucking why, but I'm going to have to move there once the preliminary structure is finished."
…what? All she knew was that he was being assigned to the area, not that he was in charge of its development! What the fuck? Why was the Emperor assigning his butcher to administrative duties like that?
"Do you even know anything about civil development?" She asked, bastard was a killer through and through, she doubted he knew jack shit about something if it didn't involve murder.
Adam paused a bit, he grumbled and took a drink.
"A bit, and now I have to read up about it."
"You know about civil development, really?" She somewhat sarcastically asked.
"Lots of free time between jobs. I don't sleep." He explained, and it did actually explain things somewhat, she knew he didn't have a social life. Him being cooped up in the tower all the time, he had to have some sort of hobby.
Besides music and fashion, apparently. Rogue turned to her drink, and considered her state of dress again.
She knew for a long time that she wasn't looking good. It had only gotten worse over the years. A woman slowly rotting away, clearly visible to everyone around. A silent cry for anyone to care, anything except apathy to her state of being. But no one cared to say anything as she decayed.
No one except a murderous asshole.
He pissed her the fuck off, she had to prove him wrong. She got the rejuv treatments, she actually tried with her clothes again…
And when she looked in the mirror, she felt better than she had in decades. He came back, and eyed her up like a lecherous bastard. She felt as sexy as she had when she was twenty, still able to draw gazes from every fucker on the street.
Rogue snorted, and took another drink.
She was still weak in the knees for violent, asshole musicians it seems. What a fucking embarrassment. He'd take responsibility, she'll make sure of that.
—
The Voodoo Boys were in the middle of a schism. It was a bit inconvenient for her.
They had seen the clip of Adam Smasher running with the girl in his arms. Everyone in the fucking world probably has at this point. They didn't care about that part. They cared about the recording of the same scene in cyberspace.
A brilliant golden bonfire, washing over an entire fucking district and selectively melting scavs but leaving everyone else alone. If it wasn't the work of an AI, then it was the work of a Netrunner on par with an AI. The fire being sucked right back into Adam Smasher as soon as he went into emergency shutdown meant that the signal had to have come from him.
Either Adam Smasher was the direct host of an AI, or he was on par with an AI while running a girl to TT. Either was ridiculous.
Overnight the Voodoo Boys fucking imploded. Half of them declaring him to be a false idol, half of them declaring him to be an avatar of Those Beyond the Wall. With both sides willing to back up their opinion with violence.
Violence that only got worse with the news of Arasaka buying the whole of Pacifica, and assigning Adam Smasher to bring it in line. They declared it a sign of either the material world's trickery or the spiritual world's guidance.
Either way, Brigitte was eager. Violence would prove who was right here, she just had to pick a side and survive.
—
Vincent walked forwards through the dusty winds.
In front of him was a car-circle, guns pointed in his direction. He walked forwards unafraid regardless, it wasn't like he would let any of those bullets touch him.
Three steps now before the first shell fell on their west flank.
Two steps. The guns shifted their aims to focus more on him instead of the warband behind him.
One step. The fingers on the triggers prepared to squeeze.
The shell fell, turning their westmost cars into scrap. All of the guns pointed at him suddenly jolted, some of them turning to look at the new threat to their side and some of them firing at him. He took one step to the right. All bullets of their first volley missed him.
He drew out a six-shooter, you couldn't beat the classics when selling a pitch, afterall.
Two steps before the second shell landed on their eastern flank.
One step before they fired at him again. He raised a hand up and flicked the ash off his cigarette.
The shell fell, distracting them again. More of them fired at him this time, he stepped left and raised an arm. The second volley mostly missed, four bullets tore into his coat, but not his body.
Four steps until his men on the west flank could fire at their interior, the dust starting to clear.
Three steps until they realize they were surrounded by snipers in the hills around them.
Two steps until they recovered from the double shelling to fire at him again.
One step until his cancer-stick stopped being helpful for the image he was selling here. He pulled it out of his mouth between two fingers and tossed it on the ground to his side. The casual disinterest would sell his utter dominance better than a serious demeanor.
The third volley fired. He twisted to the side as the bullets shot to either side of him instead of hitting him dead on. His snipers fired, and key members of their command structure collapsed.
One step until his victory was assured.
They realized the state they were in, and Vincent was unhindered as he continued to approach the Delmingas Nomad Clan. Their patriarch had stepped out from beyond their car-circle to finally meet with him. His profile said he was distrustful but not stupid, he knew the situation he was in right now.
The man approached him, and spoke.
"Alright, you got us surrounded and crippled already. What do you want?"
Vincent spoke plainly, that would work best on a man like this.
"Your loyalty."
The man tilted his head a bit at that, before slowly replying.
"...What exactly do you have in mind?"
Vincent replied honestly.
"Uniting the Nomads."
It took a moment, but the man slowly nodded. He was backed into a corner, he was out of options here unless he wanted his clan to die. He agreed just as Vincent knew he would.
Alright, a fourth clan now under his banner. Not bad for a month of work. It's a good start.
Vincent waved the medics over to take care of the wounded in the Delmingas clan, all of them having been shot with tranq rounds that needed a special antidote. No sense in killing anyone if he could avoid it.
He'd need all the help he could get when he goes to Night City.
Immediately, he started back for his command truck. He had profiles to review.
He made sure his walk was just as nonchalant and confident as before. No need to waste the potential moment of social influence.
—
Adam Smasher looked at the busty one. She was in front of his elevator door, flanked by four Arasaka Internal Security agents. Her hands were bound.
Adam looked at one of the guards.
"Why is she here?"
The busty one spoke at that, despite him not asking her anything.
"I have agreed to defect to Arasaka on two conditions."
Adam grunted.
"Which are?"
"The first is that you must fight me. The second is conditional on if you defeat me."
'If'? Arrogant woman, Adam Smasher didn't lose to fucking anyone. She lost to the kid and the gremlin.
Speaking of which, the kids came in and tensed at the sight of the woman, before untensing confusedly at the sight of her bound. The woman saw them, and nodded her head, before loudly declaring.
"I did not take you two seriously, and in doing so forced you to take a cheap victory. I apologize for that." Ah, she was one of those 'honorable' types.
The kid blinked at that, before scratching the back of his head.
"...I forgive you, I guess?"
The gremlin nodded in agreement, looking just as confused. The busty one rose up again and smiled at them. She then looked at him and gestured to her shackles. Adam grunted before gesturing for the AIS team to unlock her. It's not like she could hurt anything in here while he was around.
"Shall we?" She spoke. Adam grunted again before walking to the sparring room, gesturing for her to follow. The kids followed too, clearly wanting to see the upcoming curbstomp.
Adam got to one side of the ring, and waited for the busty one to do the same.
"Boy, say when."
The kid startled at that, before raising one hand and chopping it down with a 'start!'.
They activated their sandevistans simultaneously. She moved to punch him, Adam decided to oblige her by punching her in return. Their fists collided with a devastating boom. She moved to punch him with the other arm, he matched her. Both of their fists ground together as their sandevistans wore out.
She punched a little harder than him, but his armor was more than enough to completely ignore it still. Her arms were not armored enough to ignore his blows, however. Her knuckles on both hands were damaged. Eh, better than most meatbags, but not nearly good enough. She might be able to beat all three of his kids, assuming she was actually taking them seriously. She wouldn't be able to beat him though, not even if he stood completely still and let her punch him.
Adam jerked his arms down, breaking their lock. Before she could move he slipped them under her arms and grabbed her by both wrists. Pushing back, he slammed her onto the floor, arms breaking a bit more under the force of 600 pounds of chrome pinning her by the wrists.
She had lost, fairly decisively at this point. He was too heavy to be lifted off from this angle. She knew it too. She slackened in his grip, smiling up at him.
"The second condition is that you are the only one who can order me."
He'd have to get her better chrome than what she had, but that was fine he supposed, another body to throw at the meatfucker was a good thing.
"Now for a personal request, please impregnate me."
…huh, she was a forward one, wasn't she? Still, she wasn't asking for romance, just sex. Uriel lost it, filling his head with laughter.
Meh, he'd have to get the techies to put live swimmers in.
"Later."
Uriel couldn't stop laughing. The kids looked baffled for some reason. The woman looked like she was halfway between rage and confusion.
What were they on about? Actually, Adam decided he didn't care.