Kagekaze hadn't returned yet. He had run out of the room very suddenly yesterday, and they hadn't seen hide or hair of him since. Ignoring the fact that he didn't have skin or hair. The Tower had become very tense and nervous as well, with many elements of security being told to go on high alert but not being told why. Of course, none of that explained why they were currently sitting on the otherside of a table from two Gemini borgs, one man and one woman.

The reason why? Socialization apparently. They had shown up at the door with a bulk order of chinese take-out, and said they were here to meet and greet the people Adam Smasher took in. No one there recognized them, but they were being polite about it, so they let them come in with the offering of lunch.

The man was as tall as he was, with black-blue hair and eyes. He had moderate bulk, but was built more for speed than power. His features were sharp, but his demeanor was low energy and laid back. David hadn't seen his expression budge more than a centimeter other than when the woman interacted with him, whereupon it broke out into a tolerant smile. He had glasses and the underlayer of a three-piece suit on, no jacket, but the white shirt and vest were there.

The woman was a little taller than Lucy was but shorter than the man, with bright pinkish-red hair and an expressive face. Her frame was fit and comparatively trim, toned body that looked to be the result of lots of cardio exercise. It wasn't the result of exercise, of course, but it had the same look to it. Her face cycled through expressions rapidly, and spoke in a cheerful, happy tone that seemed unshakable. She was wearing the typical garb of an office lady, black skirt and white button-up top to match the man, but with several of the topmost buttons undone.

Currently, she was in the middle of a rapid monologue about something that David was starting to lose track of. All the while slurping cupfuls of noodles and chugging sweet tea. Every now and then the man would chide her for speaking with her mouth full, and she would nod vigorously before swallowing and continuing, often forgetting what he just said with the next cup. It seemed the man had finally let her run her course long enough, because he started speaking. The moment he did she immediately stopped.

"Aka, we haven't introduced ourselves properly yet." He gently reminded.

She nodded, and slurped the noodles hanging from her mouth down without chewing. Finishing, she paused as he leaned over with a napkin to wipe at her mouth. She grinned and suddenly threw her head forwards to kiss his cheek, and he smiled back before leaning back on the couch again. She turned to them and gave a sloppy salute in mock american fashion.

He wasn't expecting what she said next.

"Arasaka strategic weapons unit, Akakyu, registered DaiOni jockey number 9! Nice to meetcha!"

It suddenly got very tense in the room. David had seen those DaiOni walk around the upper floors before. He had heard Smasher talk about them before, mostly his old frame that was stolen. They were big, they were very fast, they carried a fuckload of guns. He was not eager to pick a fight with one. He would in a heartbeat if one of these borgs came after his crew though. He would put them through the floor if he had too.

He wasn't quite sure how he would do that yet though. The man spoke up, almost lazily and seemingly unaware of the sudden tension in the room.

"Arasaka strategic weapons unit, Aoihachi, registered DaiOni jockey number 8. And don't worry we're not on here orders or anything."

David replied cautiously. "Oh yeah?"

Aoihachi replied without skipping a beat. "Yeah, it's Sunday, our one day off a week. We'll be called in if an emergency happens, but otherwise we're just relaxing right now."

Akakyu spoke up. "Hehe, yeah. I was interested in what senpai's new henchmen were like, so I wanted to see."

"Senpai?" Rebecca asked, casually curious.

"Henchmen?" Lucy asked, casually offended.

"You get days off?" Mom asked, casually surprised.

Aoihachi smiled a tad as Akakyu burst into giggles. He replied as she was trying to contain herself.

"Adam Smasher was the first DaiOni jockey, deployed in an emergency security action. Is it any wonder we call him 'Senpai'? As for the henchman thing…" He turned to raise a brow at Lucy. "You're on his payroll now, you live in his house without rent… It's either henchmen or family, ne?"

The others sputter a bit at that, but not him. He didn't really care what people called them. He was Smasher's apprentice, and his crew was under his Smasher's protection, that was enough explanation for him. Their reactions set Akakyu off on another fit of giggling though, so Aoihachi continued.

"As for the days off. It was discovered during further DaiOni testing that having such reduced jockey psychosis rates by more than ten percent, or something like that. Senpai can live in his DaiOni, but the rest of us aren't made of such stern stuff." He joked.

David realized he was rather relaxed with these people, even despite himself. They were a natural pair that bounced off each other in likable ways. That may be deliberate though, so he made sure not to lose his guard. He wasn't about to let anyone pull a fast one on him.

Being around corpos for a week was fucking exhausting. No wonder Smasher just started murdering them after decades. He was starting to consider it himself already, even knowing the consequences. There had been no less than twelve fuckers trying to pull fast ones on one of them so far. These were the only ones that didn't seem to want anything from them other than the introduction. Didn't mean he was going to trust them, that sounded fucking stupid to do.

He could trust his chooms, he could trust his mom, he could trust Smasher. No one else needed to be on that list.

"The DaiOni is that rough, huh?" Rebecca said, with a sad glance towards him. Hey, what was that about?

Aoihachi and Akakyu both got quiet. Aoihachi got a distant look in his eyes as Akakyu laid a hand on his arm. It took a moment, but eventually he started a reply.

"...The DaiOni is overwhelming. Your mind gets placed into an angry god made of chrome. You become strong enough to toss trucks like hunks of firewood. You become fast enough to grab a man while his sandevistan is active. You become durable enough to shrug off anything but the main gun of a tank. You become heavy enough to shatter steel-reinforced concrete with a stomp. The sensors are like a flood, a layer of virtual reality over the entire world alerting you to a thousand notifications of potential threats and hazards, and how to best eliminate them."

As he spoke, David started getting reminders. He swallowed, and stared at the table.

"...The DaiOni roars at you, constantly. It wants nothing more than for you to wade into a fight and destroy everything around you. It makes sure you know the best way to kill everything you see, constantly, and then tells you every other way too just to make sure you know. Shironi, one of our other senpais, coined a term for it. She called it 'wrestling the demon', and we've since adopted that as official terminology. The DaiOni practically fights on its own, our job is to hold it back long enough to not kill anything except the enemy."

His vision flashed. Massive limbs made of blackened chrome, strong enough to crush a man into paste. An array of hands on his fingertips, each with their own set of functional fingers. The ability to reach out and will weapons into his hands without gesture. Body too heavy to move until he commands the world to stop holding him down.

The feeling of being able to fly without wings. The feeling of being able to smash armies into piles of meat and scrap…

A hand on his leg was squeezing. His vision focused again. The hand on his leg was familiar. He loved that hand. His vision trailed up the arm it was attached to. It was attached to Lucy.

The feeling of Lucy's touch.

He smiled and leaned back, putting his hand on hers on his leg. He focused again on the two guests, who were patiently waiting for him to pull himself together.

…He nodded at them, and they nodded back. Aoihachi stood up sedately, followed by Akakyu practically bouncing up. Aoihachi spoke, waving with one lazy hand.

"Ah, sorry for bringing up memories like that. We know how hard it is sometimes. We'll not overstay our welcome, so we'll be off. Feel free to keep the rest of the food, Aka and I don't actually need to eat after all."

They walked to the door, left with Akakyu giving an exaggerated wave and 'Cya henchies!' as she left.

He wasn't sure what he had been expecting from the DaiOni jockeys. It probably wasn't that though.

He grabbed a cup of noodles, and tried slurping it.

…Hey, this was pretty fun in retrospect.

—

Arasaka Saburo sat on a comfortable cushion.

In front of him, Arasaka Yorinobu. He was attempting to disguise his anger at him the best he could, but it was for nought. A father's eyes know his son better than any other. It was not a hot, fresh anger. It was an old anger, an anger from one who felt betrayed by family. An anger that a ronin felt for a tyrannical daimyo.

His son… He was young and brash, full of righteous fury over the evils of the world. It was Saburo's misfortune that his son blamed him for all those evils. He would grow out of it in time. He hoped as much.

Jorogumo model-three poured both of them a cup of tea from his personal stock. She had dramatically improved, only a single ripple in the pour and two degrees off in posture. A vastly more successful model than one and two at its intended purpose thus far. One was useful still, but he had ordered a kunai, not a katana. Two was almost entirely useless still, even with improvements from three's instructions.

He took up his cup, knowing that his son was watching his every move. His son was not an expert in social matters, of hiding one's true intentions and reading those of others. It was partly why Yorinobu had installed that grade-two kerenzikov and 'boostmaster' so long ago. Decades of seeing the world slow enough to count the wing beats of a bumblebee, and he still wasn't able to hide his thoughts from his father.

Kei was able too, the skilled administrator that he was. Yorinobu was not Kei. Kei was born to lead the affairs and bureaucracy of a nation. Yorinobu was born to lead armies. It was bad luck that he was determined to lead that army against his own people.

He sipped at his tea, and held it passively again, waiting. Yorinobu eventually relented, and took up his own cup of tea. He sipped, and closed his eyes. His posture was off by two degrees. His right eyebrow twitched.

Heh, frustrated that the tea was too good to complain about. His son was predictable in that way.

Eventually the tea of the cups was drained, and a refill was provided by Jorogumo model-three. It was then that he began to speak on matters of business and exchange. His son was in no mood to speak on personal matters, not for fifty years or more.

"The transferrel of Smasher Adam's Long-Term Contract is contingent on three things."

His son was paying attention, eyes sharpened to a hawk-like focus.

"The first is a trial period of six months, in which your management of his contract will be reviewed to ensure no mishandling of his power." This was to be expected, his son knew this walking into the family compound again.

"The second is the maintenance of the following list of existing Long-Term Orders I have given him already. You are not to impede these without extenuating circumstances. You are to use your best judgment for what circumstances count as such." He continued, a scroll being held up by model-three and offered to his son, who took it silently. He would likely review such later in exacting detail, studying over the scroll over and over again. He had never gotten into the habit of memorizing the contents of a document in one pass and then reviewing them later.

Lastly, to both deal with a now troublesome asset and test his son…

"The third condition is the deployment to Night City. You are to replace Jugemu Jun as acting president of Arasaka NC."

His son's eyes glinted at him, and his right eyebrow twitched. Saburo knew that he would agree. Because that much power could be used to kill his father, much easier than what he had right now.

Saburo was waiting for the day his son finally slew him.

Waiting and dreading what his Engram would have to do afterwards.

He desperately hoped that Yojimbo would be a good influence.

He did not want to kill his son.

He did not want to lose another son.

—

David sat on the concrete stairs leading into a side-garage of Arasaka, looking out into the busy streets in front of him. It looked like it was going to rain soon.

He heard footsteps, and readied his sandevistan.

Katsuo offered him a can of soda, and he took it. He let his sandevistan relax.

"Tanaka."

"Martinez."

They cracked their carbonated aluminum cans open, and took simultaneous sips. Root Beer this time, Katsuo's favorite. He liked it well enough, and besides that, the drink was free.

"You doing well?" He asked.

"About as well as I can, I suppose." Katsuo responded casually, taking a sip. The dude was better at handling loss than David was. It was admirable in a cold sort of way. Mom died and he went off the rails straight into the edgerunner life. Katsuo's mother died, and he kept trucking along just the same, even if a bit more quiet nowadays.

'Being sad sounds like a waste of time, to tell the truth. She's dead, and not coming back. No point in being sad about it.' Katuso had told him once, after a long night drinking cans of soda and watching the streets. His voice was dull and flat, but the expression gave it away. A furrowed brow, narrowed eyes, the tiniest hint of a frown.

Katsuo was good at moving along, but he was going to carry that weight. David respected that, all he carried back then was a jar of fake ashes and a deathwish.

"Work still the same?" David asked after another few sips in comfortable silence. It had started to rain by this point, but they were sheltered by the building. The rain was carried by the wind fast enough to angle and hit the neighboring building instead of them as it came down.

Katsuo groaned a tad at that, and let loose a frustrated huff. "They've been cutting my hours down more and more. I think I pissed someone in management off by accident."

"They've been cutting your hours? What are you down to now?"

"Barely within the range of full-time worker. I'm going to need to find another source of income if I want to keep the bills paid."

David gave a joking suggestion. "Heh, you could chip in that karate and join me on the job, I'm sure you'll be fine."

"That sounds a lot like getting killed with extra steps."

"What, you don't think you'll win against gangers?"

"I don't have any training Martinez, no, I don't think I will win against murderous gangers."

"Then let's get you some training, you said your hours were being cut, you have free time. C'mon I'll teach you how to throw a punch."

"Heh, I think you already did that."

"Now imagine doing that to some ugly gonk on the street."

Katsuo chuckled and stood up, his second drink finished. "I'll think about it. I gotta get back to work now."

David chuckled back and went back to street watching. "See you later Tanaka."

"See ya, Martinez."

Katsuo walked away, door into the building closing behind him. David lounged in the liminal space between noisy street and silent alleyway. These kinds of places… It was hard to explain. They were nice.

So he sat, and finished the root beer flavored sodas, just letting time pass him by. In the distance, thunder started to crack and roll in.

He reached over, and realized he had finished the last one. He stood, cracking his bones, and reaching down to grab the trash to throw away. He straightened up again, breathed in, and breathed out.

He opened his eyes.

A massive boom echoed in the distance.

No, multiple booms.

Then the entire city, once illuminated with countless neon lights, went pitch black.

And the streets began to roar with the countless yells and screams of confused civilians.