Rogue sat quietly in her private booth. She was waiting for that smug brat Macguffin to swing by and either explain himself (after which he would die) or look over the spybot that another party put in her fucking wall. She glanced over at the fist-sized hole (a normal person's fist, not one of Adam's giant hands. One of those could completely cover both of hers) in her reinforced concrete wall.
He had reached over, barging in without any regards for where she was, and tore out a problem she wasn't even aware of, damaging her stuff in the process. Rogue groaned a bit and sipped the low-proof alcohol. It was an apt metaphor for all of her interactions with the man recently. She lowered her guard, he pushed in and pressed against her, and then hurt her by helping her. Then immediately after he withdrew and wasn't even aware of his effect on her, having never left 'business' territory for him.
It was hard to be mad at someone who didn't know what the fuck you were talking about. Bastard had just been going about his day, noticed Johnny's old shit in his trophy room, and decided she would probably want it. No, you fucker, she didn't want any reminders of Johnny. She had the car and gun moved to a storage container and kept there, she didn't want to think about either of them. She was, in the end, too much of a little sentimental girl to get rid of them entirely.
Who fucking does that? He just happened to be thinking of her when he was moving? He didn't even give them personally, he had a flunkie do it for him!
Rogue growled into her drink.
The worst part was that he had been thinking of her. Bastard was too much of a dense fucking brick to lie about something like that. She couldn't get mad at him, because he literally didn't fucking get it. It was, as she said, like getting mad at a dog for tearing up a couch.
She glanced over again.
Or a dog tearing up your wall, as it were. She snorted, and decided that dog was an apt metaphor for Adam.
…A dog abandoned by his parents, constantly outliving his packs, and getting collared by suits until he got blown up and then turned into a literal killing machine. No wonder the bastard was such a fucking psycho, he never got a chance to be anything else.
No, that wasn't quite right, was it?
"Even tried romance out for a bit. Not making that fucking mistake again. I'm meant for murder and not much else, that incident made it fucking clear to me."
The one time he reached out, he got burned.
She had known much of his story beforehand, but not the parts he talked about. She knew he was in the army, and his division. She knew that he ran two gangs, and where it was both times. She knew that he had a fling with Michiko Arasaka for a bit, and he looked like Elvis back then.
She knew that his body count was five digits, and she knew the names and locations of many of his victims.
But his perspective shed some light on things. Namely, the reasons and his feelings about them. He didn't even understand how fucked up it was that he was abandoned like that. At least her parents wanted her. It made her feel queasy that she had an objectively better life than Adam, probably at any point in time too.
He didn't understand that he should be mad about how much he got fucked over. He didn't understand that he should be sad that he outlived his gangs so many times. He didn't understand that he should be mad that he was forced between a rock and a hard place and forced to sign a contract that kept him in chains.
He didn't understand any of that, because it was normal to him. No wonder he enjoyed killing so much, it's probably one of the few things he ever had control over. No wonder he didn't mind being a killing machine, he didn't have any happy memories of being human. Even after being borged, he still had bad experience after bad experience.
Suffering was the expected result for him. It wasn't avoidable.
He glossed over decades of constantly fighting and destroying on Arasaka's behalf, because nothing had happened in that time that he considered important. He had just been… going to work. No struggle, no particular passion beyond loving his job, no real desires beyond it outside of occasionally writing a song up in his rooms. He embraced being a robot, because being a human had only hurt him.
It was hard to hate a guy you pity. Then again, it was tremendously hard to pity Adam Smasher, his presence made that impossible. There wasn't a single instance in which he didn't feel dangerous. Like sitting next to an unstable bomb, or a hungry predator.
Rogue groaned. It would be easier to deal with the guy if he wasn't hot. His gemini was handsome, the techies putting him together did real good work there. He was tall and broad and strong. His face was mature without being old and withered. His hands were big, big and strong.
A hot chest pressed up against her own, a strong jawline right over her eyes, hand braced on the seat next to her hip.
His behavior too! Now that he was looking after others instead of killing all the time, the way he came off was entirely different. His dedication to getting the job done translated into a hyperfocus on ensuring their safety. His power became less threatening and more appealing when it was focused on defending rather than attacking. His gruff and grumbling demeanor became downright charming when she knew what the limits were.
A scarred predator, abused its entire life, trying its best to protect its new pack. A predator that had been hurt by love so badly it declared it was only meant for violence, purposefully ignoring the affection it was creating in its wards. A predator that would growl at those that came close, but never bite if they didn't attack first. A predator that was doing its best to create a paradise in a hellhole for others to be safe in.
Creating that paradise for no other reason than that it belonged to him now, and he took care of what belonged to him as best as he could. The kids first, then the land, it formed a pattern. Literally millions of eddies and hundreds of hours poured into something most would leave to rot because of how ruined it was, all of that simply because it was his and he wanted it to be better.
And she was the dumbass little girl that had been led in by stories of big bad wolves with hurt souls.
She pushed her empty glass aside and buried her face in her arms. She wanted to scream, but that would be a step too far. She was already ruining the dignified image of the queen of Afterlife.
She was going to get eaten, wasn't she?
—
It was rare for Hanako to spend time with her brother. She delighted in every chance she got. They had already lost their mother, brother, and sister-in-law. There were precious few of them left. There was father, brother, and their darling niece left.
To her eternal sorrow, her family was divided, and there was nothing she could do to fix it. She did her best to curb father's darker actions, and he loved her enough to allow it. There was only so much she could do, but she had been making progress, however slowly, through the decades. He had even occasionally spent time with her outside of working himself to near-death. Never to death, he was too precise to die from his own labors.
It was not enough for her brother, who still longed for nothing more than father's death. His vindictive crusade against anything he saw that caused suffering. He refused to see that Arasaka falling would mean only more violence as the rivals would sweep in and perform atrocities innumerable against their people. Or perhaps he did see, and simply didn't care. Damning every consequence for the sake of justice on behalf of those who would happily butcher them.
Let alone darling niece, who seemed content to stay overseas and simply go along with what other people told her. Leading a faction that she didn't particularly have investment in, chasing after the latest trends in whatever they called fashion that year, running her little band of kunoichi seemingly out of momentum alone at this point. It had been years since she had spoken to her, and for now that seemed set in stone.
Hanako longed for the days of their youth, when Kei was still alive, when the family was still together. It was happier then. Not for the last time she damned those in America, for starting the war that brother had to kill himself to regain his honor for. Privately alone of course, it was not right to blame the citizens for the actions of their leaders, and it would not be ladylike to curse another like that.
It would have been easier if she could, she thinks.
Yorinobu grabbed the teapot and slowly raised it to pour a cup for each of them. He was sitting on the other side of the small table as they sat in his Kyoto home. He refused to go to Tokyo while father was there, and his section of the compound was dreadfully disused and abandoned by all but the servants of the household.
He was focused on the tea, she smiled behind a sleeve. Yori was always bad at things requiring fine control like this, he had to focus lest he spill it. He was still insistent on pouring each time she spent time with him, such was the pride of a man. He glowered at her playfully as he began to pour to the best of his abilities.
He didn't spill any this time, she felt mischievous.
"Ah, witness my grace dear sister, am I not refined?" He spoke like he was a kabuki actor. One of the few things he enjoyed of his youth, whenever father brought him to a theater on special occasions. Silly brother, you hate father but still carry all those happy memories, can you not forgive one another?
"I am most impressed, you have become quite good after all these decades." She returned fire with a backhanded compliment. His eyes widened comically as he pretended to be struck. He sat the pot down and gave an exaggerated gesture to himself and then the wider room.
"Ooooooohhhhhh. A grievous blow, and the samurai is slain by treachery." He called out to an invisible audience. She played her part with an imperious look down her nose at him.
They smiled, and raised their respective cups.
The tea wasn't as good as fathers, something Yori was always shamed by. It would be best not to mention it to him, her prideful brother was always prickly about these sorts of things.
"I heard you traveled to France recently, besides the attack and the guards, did you enjoy it?" He spoke, eager to hear of her little adventure. She frowned at him.
"None of that rudeness brother. They work hard to ensure my safety, I have no experience running around with guns as you do." He grunted. It was always a concern for father that Yori refused to take guards where he went, trusting instead in his cyberware and pistols. Foolish brother, too prideful to accept help from anyone, she as a lady had to be much more practical.
He grumbled and leaned back, chastised suitably. She continued when she was satisfied by his look.
"I enjoyed seeing the historical sites, and the buildings came in many strange and unique varieties, and the people were beautiful as a rule. The subject of the meeting was concerning, and the attack was frightening, but I knew I was safe as I could have been."
He hummed. She knew he wanted to know what the meeting was about, but it was strictly confidential. As far as she knew, only the top netrunners and their direct assistants of each major power, as well as the leaders of those major powers, knew of what was happening directly. There was sure to be information leaks, but on an official basis that was all.
She was not going to break the contract of that meeting by revealing the subject matter, she had more honor than that.
"...I saw the footage of the battle." he spoke slowly, in that way he did when he was considering a matter heavily. Her mind went back to it. An invincible steel giant slaughtering an army, two warriors confronting it on behest of their wards, holding it off for their escape. A dark-clad warrior maimed on her behalf.
A raging turtle-dragon about to devour him, a spirit of golden fire revealing the warrior's true feelings, chains of fire barely saving them from the monster's attacks again and again. A warrior-youth, delivering a fatal blow to the wounded giant to save the elder. An exchange of names after a hard battle won.
She shook herself, Adam Smasher was only performing his duty, she held absolutely no illusions it was for her specifically. He grumbled as much as they rode back after picking him up again, her girls fussing over him. She knew his specifications, he had no pain editors like the foolish brute he was. You are in pain! Why are you refusing a balm for it?
Perhaps the fool simply liked being hurt, she bitterly thought. Her brother and Adam Smasher were entirely too similar, much to their detriments. They shared the same self-detrimental pride of all men.
"Yes, what of it?" She eventually asked.
"What do you think of it?" He asked back.
"Which part?"
"All of it, I suppose." That helps her none, brother. She glared at him for his impudence. He took a sip of tea and brushed off her anger. She took a sip of her own and thought about how to answer it.
The concern for the physical was great yes, but she had long grown used to living in a world of physical terror. What her own mind kept returning to was… the Daemon.
Adam Smasher's soul of fire was reviewed and evaluated again and again by her over weeks of labor. She had poured tirelessly over the existing footage that was recorded of it. She knew his specifications, she knew that he had never been subject to the pseudo-soulkiller, and thus no engram of him should exist. Father was all too happy to allow her to check every existing company file on the matter, his eyes glinting with amusement as she did.
The ICON-AI (if indeed that's what it was) should not exist, yet its existence was not… too terrifying to consider. Its efficacy was limited against targets that had more than just basic ICEs and its range was quite small, a mere district at best. The effect was strong, but limited, and the range was pitiful for what seemed to be a spontaneously bound AI.
It was… within her comprehension and ability to plan around, and it seemed to be unique. So long as it was, there was nothing to worry about. She had no idea how it worked or how the brute got it, but she knew more or less what it could do. Gravity was not frightening before it was theorized, things simply fell and men planned around that.
Then the France attack happened, a fully cybernetic warrior appeared, and carried what seemed to be a bound AI of its own. It seemed far more efficacious, although still limited in range. Indeed it seemed even more limited in range, but its efficacy was tremendously higher.
Adam Smasher was equipped with an ICE of the highest grade possible, one that also broadcasted a scripted counter-hack whenever it detected an unverified signal. The Dragon-Turtle did not circumvent this ICE when it attacked, as the spirit of fire preferred. It simply inflicted a supercomputer's worth of DDoS upon his frame, overloading the ICE, and almost completely ignoring the continuous counter-hack.
It was only this continuous counter-hack and the full processing power of Adam's own ICON-AI that slowed it down long enough for the Kang-Tao warrior to destroy what was presumed to be its broadcasting host. Anything else and Adam Smasher's code would have been completely deleted, after which his biopod would die from the life support no longer functioning.
The Dragon-Turtle did not use administrative access to gain access to the brute's command prompt either. It simply… brute forced its way through layers and layers of firewall. A data-fortress consists of many layers and 'rooms' in order to gain access to the deepest store information. The Dragon-Turtle performed the digital equivalent of tearing down an outer wall and walking in.
That should be impossible. Not that the existence itself was impossible (which it could be, for all she knew), but that action too was impossible because code does not work like that. It was interpreted for a human mind to be as rooms and layers and such, but it wasn't any of that! That was all for human convenience!
It was an action that was impossible. Like gravity suddenly no longer working.
…Smasher was the second-oldest cyborg that she was aware of. The oldest was Kagekaze, but she hadn't seen any evidence of him having one of these… spirits of the net. She called them spirits because they were blatantly supernatural, what they did should have been impossible. Then again, it was rather hard to see evidence of Kagekaze-san doing anything, such was his duty.
Did all cyborgs that live long enough develop one of these? A personality matrix-AI-ICON-spirit?
In the end, she simply had too little information to work with. Even including the third example in the form of the attack on Arasaka tower in NC, with tendrils of code reaching down from the sky.
…She did not want to consider them for any longer than she had too. She quickly hurried to say something satisfying, so she could ignore the topic a small while longer.
"I think it is quite concerning that such cybernetic warriors lurk just out of sight in the world. I think it is quite unfortunate that so many lives were lost to stop one alone. I think I am quite fortunate that Smasher-san was there to confront it, lest I be dead right now."
Yori considered that for a moment. He sipped his tea and looked out to the city below. The city that had been hand-designed by father to look both historically authentic, culturally rich, and immensely functional.
"...Smasher has changed recently, your thoughts on him?" She glared at him for his informality, but he didn't see it. Mayhaps you could tell her what you were thinking right now, so she knew where your sudden interest in the brute came from.
She sipped her tea and looked out to the city as well, wintry fog slowly dissipating under the rising sun. She thought of the brute for a small time. Regardless of his behavior, his loyalty was unquestionable.
He had served the Arasaka family for fifty-six years now, wait, no. He had been first turned and recruited during two-thousand and ten she thinks, which means he had been serving them for sixty-six years. That was far longer than most warriors stay alive, let alone stay in active service.
He had been recruited into her family's service when they were still whole, when Kei was alive and they were not divided as they are today. He even had a brief relationship with her darling niece, even if it ended so dreadfully for the both of them.
Her mind went back some time, to when she had been waiting with father to meet him for the journey to France. When her father tells a man they may drop formalities, there is normally an unspoken level of formality that is always maintained, lest the man lose their lives. Adam Smasher didn't maintain that base level, he ignored it entirely and truly dropped all formalities with father. He did not lose his life for it, but father instead allowed it, even playing a joke on him in short order.
…The last time she saw father joke like that was with Kei. He was never cruel to them, but he never seemed so lively. She wasn't sure what that meant. What was it that Father saw in the brute to make him so open? What was it that allowed him so much freedom from father's wrath?
He had been serving loyally for sixty-six years. She did not think that alone was enough. She dismissed the thought from her mind, dwelling on something like that would do her no good, she had done so many nights and hours before already. She didn't have enough information to draw an accurate conclusion at this stage. She would need more evidence before she could draft semi-accurate hypotheses.
Thought dismissed, she gave her honest assessment of the man father was willing to joke with.
"I think he is brutish and violent. I think he is crass and boorish. I think he is reckless, quick to leap into danger and reluctant to leave it. I think he is loyal beyond doubt and his tolerance for suffering is immeasurable."
She paused.
"I think he is a villainous man, and I think he has been trying to change that."
—
Michiko Arasaka sat alone in her office, staring at a screen of compiled information about Adam Smasher.
Danger Gal needed accurate information about all potential threats they could manage, they were primarily an investigative and security organization. Even if they had withdrawn from the public eye more in recent years, they still received contracts. Information was power, and power was required to stay alive in this tumultuous world.
Information such as psyche profiles about high danger subjects and areas. They had a psyche profile on most everyone that could threaten her girls, but every now and then they had to be updated to prevent one of her girls making a poor decision from poor information. She didn't want to lose anyone else if she could avoid it.
One of her girls was assigned to do nothing but follow the single biggest threat in all of Night City. Following from afar with telescopics and lip-reading, or closer up with enhanced audio and recordings. His whereabouts were constantly monitored, and his behavior carefully examined. Thanks to this diligence, she never had to lose one of her girls to him on a job. They were always able to pull out of the situation before he arrived.
They weren't able to follow him into high-security areas, like his private rooms in Arasaka Tower itself. They would be noticed by the cameras in time. But more public places were far easier to manage.
An accurate psyche profile was important, especially so on someone like him.
His recent actions didn't line up with his psyche profile, the same profile that's held for decades now. Her girl working on it had nearly had a panic attack at the sudden change, so Michiko had to do it herself.
No matter how miserable it made her.
Especially as her girl assigned to 'listening duty' sent her the data-recording of what she had heard, collected from the last two months of tailing him. He had gotten a student, and although he never opened himself up to the boy, he seemed to throw himself fully into his growth.
Michiko was probably the most qualified person in the world when it came to figuring out Adam Smasher. Everything she had heard of his recent actions… hurt, then again, everything involving him had hurt for a long while now. She had simply gotten used to the pain. Marc was always able to soothe her…
But Marc was gone. Danger Gal had but one leader again. Michiko Sanderson was Michiko Arasaka again. She was alone again.
It's been hurting for a while now. She bore through it, her girls needed her. She went through the various recordings again.
"I've been thinking about getting an apprentice."
Undercurrent of anger, is mad that he has to go out of his way for something. Pushing past that because he thinks it is essential.
"I've been thinking about getting a successor recently, 'case some meatbag gets lucky and scraps me."
Undercurrent of anger, this time from having to lie, something he was never good at.
"These aren't men, they're meat. Men hold themselves to a higher standard."
Unfiltered pride, he considers himself better than the vast majority.
"You don't have enough chrome to handle me rough, girl."
An honest statement, undercurrent of lust regardless. He always was a horndog.
"Ordering your sword."
Undercurrent of excitement, he still enjoys playing around with weapons.
"No, I just fuck her when I feel like it."
Boredom, undercurrent of lust and pride. He enjoys sleeping with her enough to brag.
"Your sense of fashion is still garbage."
Disinterested observation, his basic reaction to most people he couldn't fight. He didn't feel like he could fight the queen of the afterlife? Not for himself, but for others? He was using another topic to deflect her anger.
"I'll make sure to bring the kids."
Boredom, undercurrent of amusement. He had heard something he thought was slightly amusing.
"Replace the sweater with a vest, no shirt underneath."
Genuine advice, undercurrent of anger and boredom. He thinks this should be obvious, but doesn't mind handing out the advice. She thought about what he would say to her now. She quickly dismissed that thought.
"Your name?"
Anger from the situation, undercurrent of genuine interest. He was upholding a promise with himself to ask.
Hundreds of recorded voicelines and conversations later, she got to the most recent one.
"I was moving, took the chance to clean out my closet. Was going to sell them, figured you'd get pissed at that."
Anger, undercurrent of confusion.
"Took them a week to get them to stop fucking around again after. Whole affair was annoying as shit. Kid scrapped a fucker that hits around my level, he's growing fast."
Anger at the situation, pride in another.
"There is a fucker responsible for taking my shit. I'm going to kill them. So I'm snooping to find out who it is."
A familiar rage. What belongs to him has been taken by someone he can't kill yet. He's furious about it.
"Even tried romance out for a bit. Not making that fucking mistake again. I'm meant for murder and not much else, that incident made it fucking clear to me."
…she stopped the recording. She leaned back and looked to the ceiling. It had been hurting for a while now, and she didn't have a way of soothing it. Seeing the results of her fuck-up had only amplified that, like rubbing salt into an open wound.
Privately, she had been hoping that he had moved on from her, that his natural state was just murderous rage and that she never had a chance.
His recent behavior proved her private hope was dust and ash. Adam was dragging himself out of the pit of darkness he had been born in. The pit that she shoved him back into.
He had never moved on from her. The songs alone proved that.
"Heh, you're really bad at this music thing, ain'tcha Adam?"
"Ah, shaddup, this is pointless anyways!"
"No! Keep practicing, I want a beautiful love song on my birthday, okay?"
"Geh, alright alright."
His last forty years of silent butchery was her fault, wasn't it? All because she was the coward who gave up on him. She got up from her desk and looked at herself in the mirror.
She acutely realized that she didn't care for any of it. How long had she just been going along with whatever style was most popular? How long had it been since she's done something that wasn't the easiest thing to do? How long had she been… going with the flow?
…Since Marc died, she thinks.
…
She was going to change, she decided. Danger Gal had gone underground because she couldn't keep up with the demands of a more public organization alone. They were long overdue a grand return to the spotlight.
And she couldn't look like this when she made a comeback, could she?