[Good morning, Night City! Last night was quite the shock, wasn't it folks? A giant space ship resembling a rifle, coming down from the sky! Not to mention some of the giant planes that came out of them. Now why would these space people come to Earth for? We've seen them building something in the Badlands, and come up in the morning- boom, it's a pristine, clean, and preem building in the middle of the wasteland. It certainly looks out of place from the mountain of garbages behind it, but hey- maybe they have plans for that as well. I know for sure that building is going to smell of rotting stench, but I bet you smell the same thing I do at the same time: new opportunities. Whatever they came here for, I bet you half my eddies they brought something that's going to change the game in Night City. All I know is that the rest of the Corps are going to have a try at our newcomers, one way or another. As far as I know, I'd like to watch this far away from that ship- the end of that spacecraft no doubt looking like a barrel of a gun.]
"I guess that's our queue." Agent Locust loaded a pistol as he announced to the team.
Rifles, handguns, shotguns.
Fireteam Baba Yaga had no problem taking care of the Mavericks formerly setting up base in the abandoned factory. Had no problem taking their guns as well in the process.
They weren't in top condition - gravel and dust in the gaps between parts, as well as dents and scratches everywhere on the gun- but it was good enough.
The Spartans could work with this.
"Alright, team. Remember: For the next couple of months, we're not UNSC. We're freelancers, highest bidders win. Of course, don't forget to clip some data and materials from our soon to be rivals if you're sure you won't be caught. Ram, do you get what you needed?"
"Yeah. It's a bit disappointing, but I guess this is my new standard now."
Spartan Ram looked at the recently modified cyberdeck. The Fireteam's Dumb AI BUTLR had informed the Spartans that it was Earth's equivalent of a neural interface Operating System.
My god, Ram thought. Was this thing clunky.
Ram did not hesitate in taking mechanical parts out of the Mavericks to modify his newly acquired cyberdeck - downgrading it a little to make it function manually rather than through a neural link. Like hell he was going to connect this to himself, much less his armour.
The Spartan specialising in Cyberwarfare sure to take the Maverick's laptop as well, searching through the net for more information.
"Find anything?"
"A lot, actually. For starters, the original internet is now quarantine as a danger zone, an event in 2022 called the DataKrash caused by some hacker going by the name of Rache Bartmoss. Whatever Artificial Intelligence Earth had went rogue through his virus. No one could destroy them, so they decided to close it off using an Intrusion Countermeasure Electronics called the Black wall."
"So Earth has been dealing with Rampant AIs too? Jesus christ, guess we are all the same."
"The thing is, compared to our Smart AIs the ones here are quite… primitive."
"So it's more like a dumb AI?"
"More like a prototype to the dumb AI. It's almost juvenile."
"Juvenile to you and your brother, maybe. To us, it's all the same."
"I guess this was the main reason why the Created could only hold Earth hostage. A lot of these are just spaghetti codes. The so called Black wall that they brag about is barely even a wall. It's more like a flimsy piece of paper taped over a broken glass window."
"Then try not to touch it here- give that intel to your brother once we meet him again. I bet you guys can take care of that once our operation is finished."
"Alright. Other than that, I'm finished. Once I get some tools I can have a look at our newly found weapons too."
"We can do that on our way. We're moving, folks. Time to find what this City calls a fixer and start our jobs as Freelancers."
Ram stored the laptop in his back and cyberdeck in his right shoulder guard.
"Noble 6, Killshot."
Agent Locust called over the two on watch.
"It's time to go."
Rome wasn't built in a day.
But the mainframe for the new Megacorp's first building did.
The Municipal Landfill was barely managed by the Warbler Lake Hazardous Waste Facility.
And even then, the Scrapyard couldn't stop the growing amount of trash that was filling the Rocky Ridge.
Enter UNSC Revenant, Sending 4 pelicans down to start eating them up and spit them out as recycled materials, piping hot and ready to be made into new products.
Among the many UNSC soldiers standing guard, Ian and Anthony were Spartans wearing Red Gen 1 and Gen 3 Security helmets.
The Spartans stood on top of a wall built by the Assembler Vat's nanomachine blocks. A downgraded imitation of the Forerunner's Smart Matter, the nanomachine-assembled alloy was still leagues above in durability and versatility to whatever materials the Megacorps in Night City could offer. Khyl would call this thing 'Cell-Matter', to the chagrin of Spartan Cell.
Beyond the wall laid corpses and shattered vehicles of Raffen shivs scattered across the wasteland ground.
"Hey, Ian?"
"Yeah?"
"You ever wonder why we're here?"
"It's one of life's greatest mysteries, isn't it? Why are we here? Are we a product of some… cosmic coincidence? Or… is there really a god? Watching everything? You know, with a plan for us… and stuff. I don't know, man. But it keeps me up at night."
Anthony took his eyes off the scope of his DMR, and slowly turned his head to Ian.
"… What? I mean, why are we out here? In this makeshift junkyard?"
"… Oh, right. Yeah."
"What's all that stuff about god?"
"Hmm? Nothing."
"… You want to talk about it?"
"No."
"You sure?"
"Yeah."
Anthony went back to scanning through the wasteland for any possible raiders coming to have a crack at the newest Megacorp factory.
They made sure to leave the bodies out here as warning.
But apparently most of them are way too illiterate to read the signs.
"But seriously, why are we out here? As far as I know, it's just mountains of trash in the middle of nowhere. I thought we were suppose to build our… you know, shop, closer to Night City."
"Oh, that was the original plan. Until our Chief Engineer saw this trash heap and decided to build it here."
"… What?"
"Yeah. Called it 'a treasure pile'."
"… It's trash."
"That's what Simmons said to Cell! Then Cell said, 'exactly. That's why it's treasure.' I guess it's because whatever Cell and Khyl managed to cook up in the Workshop allowed them to completely recycle trash into these materials."
Ian took a knee and knocked on the wall. Audible sound of metal clanging against metal resonated in the air.
"Huh."
"I'm pretty sure we're making more buildings and walls for protection, and then announce ourselves properly to the rest of the City."
"Did they decide on a product yet?"
"Cell said we're starting with vehicles. But you know Cell, he could stick to the plan last night, then the plans to focusing on buildings today."
Soldiers (including 2 Spartans wearing Rakshasa Mjolnir) went out from the gates to start retrieving new materials - guns, broken down vehicles. Anything that Spartan Cell wanted to check to see if he can create new blueprints for a product.
Ian and Anthony was to keep watch with the rest of the soldiers standing guard.
Of course, the snipers were keeping an eye on the hill next to the trash mountain. The guard's experience told them that the flashes they were seeing from there was from a lens.
[Hedgehog Team, watch your 7. We've witnessed another of these hooligans using what seems to be a rifle. It could be just a scope, or a binocular. Luckily they haven't shot us yet.]
"What are they doing?"
One of the Aldecaldos pestered their nomad friend using binoculars.
Night City was already buzzing with the news of the spaceship. But the Nomads were the first to witness it with their own eyes. What seemed to be a Megacorp Factory built up in a single night. Clean, smooth, robust and sleek at the same time.
It looked more like a sculpture
Wraiths, Raffen Shivs, Aldecaldos…
Who wouldn't want to at least try and have a look?
Dakota Smith did. As a fixer, she needed info about this newest diva of a Megacorp.
Or… about this possible alien invasion.
"They're… They're taking the guns and the cars."
"What about the corpses?"
"They're just… leaving them there. To rot in the desert."
Raffen shivs never stood a chance. Each bullet precisely shot, as if they were surgically placed into these raiding Nomad's skull.
The Raffen Shivs expected the place to be poorly defended, that with enough of them strike at once they could overwhelm them.
Their calculation was based on average Megacorpo's construction speed, the results were severely off.
And their miscalculations costed them dearly.
Entire families of Raffen Shivs laid dead, their camps miles away were now empty.
The Aldecaldos saw this as a happy arrangement - the cars and engines and other supplies they had raided from Corpos and other Nomads and stored in their camps will not be left alone.
They just needed to know if their new visitors from outer space was happy to settle on killing Raffen Shivs, or if they were planning on extending their list to the rest of the Nomads of Bad lands.
"Are they doing anything else?"
"No, just taking guns and cars. Holy shit-one of those guys just flipped a truck over!"
"That's not that hard to-"
"They used only their right arm. One. Fucking. Arm. They're dragging it back to their base using only one arm too!"
"… Oh."
"Yeah, they've just gone back in… Oh shit, I think one of them saw us, they're aiming at-"
Gunshot exploded through the air. Hearing how loud it was, this far away, told the two nomads just how powerful the rifle was.
But the bullet itself travelled faster than the sound, they saw the trail left behind by the bullet getting shot out of the gas-operated S7 Sniper.
But it didn't hit either of them.
At first the two looked at themselves, then each other, to see if the bullet had passed them, and it was just so fast the punctured body hadn't reacted yet.
No blood. Not on either of them.
But they soon noticed the puddle of blood pooling from behind them.
And they saw a Raffen Shiv lying flat on their back, head was missing a huge chunk and blood was flooding out from the exposed, shattered cranium.
An assault rifle fell next to the Raffen Shiv.
Poor bastard probably didn't even realise he got shot. Died to quick to even notice the pain.
The nomads quietly looked back at the building. Then back at the Raffen Shiv.
They dared not to raise their body off the ground. And simply moved out crouching or crawling.
They got everything Dakota needed anyway. They could move a good safe distance away, call Dakota, and go back to their camp.
They couldn't afford to push their luck any further.