He had thought that he had gotten rid of her for good, but he was quickly proven wrong when he saw her lounging about at the Association building the very next day.
He pretended not to notice the delusional girl, hoping to be able to slink away unnoticed but it was not meant to be. She noticed his presence immediately.
"I really need your help."
"What would I need to do to get you to leave me alone?" He asked, already on the verge of seriously contemplating if it would be worth it to remove her from his life through his usual method (a.k.a. violence). The only reason why he hadn't done so was because he doesn't have a habit of mistreating women unless they are hostile.
The girl is an annoyance, but not hostile.
"You are a merc, right? What if I pay you?"
His eyes instantly brightened up at the mention of money.
"I'm listening."
And that's how he allowed himself to be led to the nearest bar. She ordered them drinks and he casted her several doubtful looks. This is a lawless city so it's kind of pointless to say this, but is she even of legal age to drink?
"Don't give me that look. I'm eighteen," she scowled upon noticing his unsaid question, downing that shot of alcohol in her hand in one gulp.
"I didn't see anything, especially not to someone who treated me to a free drink," he made a lazy toasting gesture in her direction and took a sip of his drink. "So what kind of job do you have for me?"
And so she started her story, a story of a galaxy wider and larger than anyone's wildest imaginations, a story of space travels, a story of Aeons and Stellarons, a story of the Cancer of All Worlds destroying civilisations across the galaxy, a story of a small group of hunters on a quest to collect Stellarons.
Truth to be told, if it wasn't for the fact that he had spotty memories of knowledge from his previous life he might have just dismissed her due to the ridiculousness of it all.
"I could see why your intel told you to find me. If you told this to any other person they would have labelled you as crazy. Wait, you already are."
"I don't care if you think I'm crazy. Are you helping me or not?"
"Why me?" He asked, putting down his cup on the table after taking another sip. "There are many other individuals you could enlist the help of."
"You are the only person with the right skill sets and not affiliated with any of the city's forces. And well, intel suggests that you work for the highest bidder, I thought I could work with that since what we are going to do isn't exactly legal."
And also because she's not adept at field work where combat is involved, so it would be wise to work with someone who could fill this role and also be her guide on this foreign planet at the same time.
"So this… Stellaron," he made a vague gesture with his hand, still trying to get used to all the foreign terms that he had just learnt from the girl, "the cause of all the monsters out there if what you said is true, where is it? How do we get rid of it?"
"Well, that's the problem. It's at this place which you locals call-" she brought up a holographic screen with a swipe of her hand, "- Area 99, I believe?"
"Area 99?" His interest was definitely piqued at her words. "That's the most heavily guarded place on this planet, right in the middle of all the remaining cities where every city places their best and brightest minds in a joint effort to figure out a way to combat the monster waves."
It also goes without saying that the best soldiers from every city are also placed there to protect the people who could very well be humanity's last hope. It's not going to be easy to infiltrate that place.
"Which means only an inhabitant of this planet would know the best route to reach there without alerting the monsters or the guards at Area 99. You in?"
"You're goddamn crazy," he muttered under his breath, still reeling from the information overload because he now has a very scary realisation after hearing what she has to say, assuming that it's correct. If the Stellaron is in the hands of humanity and if every city leader has knowledge of it and is involved with keeping it out of sight and out of mind of the general public… what would that imply? That their cities' leaders had been responsible for the monster waves for three centuries? That they were the ones responsible for the emergence of the monster waves in the first place?
Holy shit.
If his suspicions really are true, then he might as well kiss this planet goodbye and head for greener pastures. If this shut-in gamer girl came from space then she would be his ticket out of this crazy planet destined for doom.
However, he needs to investigate and see the truth for himself before he comes to a decision.
"Fine, you got a deal. I'm in," he decided after a period of silence, "but we are not going to start work immediately. Give me some time to do the preparation work before we head for Area 99."
"Fine by me. I have another favour to ask though."
"I will charge you extra."
"Is it always about money with you?" She facepalmed. "Fine, whatever. I need a place to stay, you have a spare room or something?"
"Where did you sleep last night?"
"On the streets right outside your home," she deadpanned. "Thanks to somebody."
"You couldn't have rented yourself a room from an inn?"
"Their wifi was non-existent. Yours was pretty good though."
"Wait, you hacked into my wifi?"
"Don't sweat the details," she waved him off dismissively, pulled up a screen with a chunk of numbers on it, and turned the screen around for him to look at it.
"This enough remuneration for you?"
"I'm saying this in advance, the room is not going to be five stars, it hasn't been used in ages."
"Gotcha." She held out her hand to him. "So it's kind of weird how we haven't introduced ourselves to one another after talking for so long, but call me Silver Wolf."
He stared at her outstretched hand for a few seconds before returning the handshake.
"As you would have already known from your intel, Zind."
It would be a lie to say that Kafka wasn't worried about their newest recruit embarking on her very first solo assignment as a hunter, but it's a trial of passage that every Stellaron Hunter would have to go through. Silver Wolf is very talented in her field of expertise, there's no doubt about that, but she's not exactly a combatant even if she is capable of defending herself.
She understands that Elio chose Silver Wolf to be a part of them despite her shortcomings, but from what she had seen from the girl thus far she was a little worried if their newest recruit could even survive the rookie assignment. Her loner personality and shut-in tendencies isn't doing wonders in helping her to progress with this "game", a quest that cannot be completed if she were to work alone like she usually does. She would definitely need assistance from one of the planet's inhabitants.
Perhaps she was feeling generous, but Kafka ended up giving her some intel about the planet and some of their notable inhabitants that Silver Wolf's mission would be situated at. She ended up choosing to team up with another lone wolf (why is she not surprised) but even Kafka has to admit that her choice of partner was a wise one, be it in terms of ability, allegiances, personality, and character. He's literally the best man for her job out of all the possible candidates in their intel.
She brought Zind's intel up on screen with a swipe of her finger. Hmm, totally her type if she was younger. Oh, Elio had marked him as a possible recruit too? When did he do that? It had to be recent.
A small smirk graced her face.
Interesting.
"This is your room," he showed her the spare room that he never ever used since he never had any guests over in the first place. "There's a bathroom connected to it but-" he led her into the bathroom with a working flushing toilet bowl, sink, hot shower and all before pointing to a second door of the bathroom that leads elsewhere, "this bathroom is also connected to my room. Meaning to say, this is a shared bathroom for both rooms, so make sure you lock the door on the side of my room when using it unless you want me to walk in and watch you taking a piss."
"What a weird design."
"Take it up to the architect that built this place," he snorted. "I'm going to do some preparation work for our trip to Area 99, do whatever pleases you in the meantime. Just don't mess my place up."
He left her in her room once he had said his piece. He wasn't lying when he said that he needed time to complete preparations before they could even dream of infiltrating Area 99. That area is the most dangerous and also the most heavily guarded place on this planet as far as he is aware. He would need to procure the latest intel, obtain the most suitable equipment, plan the most optimal route before taking his current client there for a road trip.
"You never needed a personal vehicle. What changed?" The gruff mechanic who specialises in collecting vehicle spare parts and used them to modify second hand vehicles inquired in curiosity. Zind once saved his life so cannot help but be a little concerned about this oddity.
"New job," Zind's reply was succinct as he checked the new cyberpunk-ish jeep that he will rely on to ferry him and the crazy gamer girl to Area 99. He was satisfied at what he saw and transferred the required credits with a flick of his finger.
"That's too much," the mechanic wanted to refuse the extra tip that his benefactor gave him. If it wasn't for the fact that he still has a family to feed he would have given this vehicle to Zind for free.
"Keep it," Zind hopped into the driver's seat and started up the engine. Hearing the comfortable purr of the jeep made him grin and he drove off. He drove one round around the city to get a feel of the jeep before eventually parking it outside his home. The sound of the revving engine attracted the attention of the newest occupant of his home.
"Nice equipment. Want me to give it an upgrade?"
He looked up, spotting the gamer addict looking down at him from the second floor of her room's window where she poked her head out from. She wore a loose fitting shirt which he heavily suspected her to have stolen from his wardrobe.
"Do what you want with it, but if you break it I'm putting this on your tab. We will need this to go where you want to go."
The girl gave him a lazy salute and disappeared back into her room. She walked out of the front door just minutes later, blowing a bubblegum with her hands nonchalantly kept in her pockets.
"That's my shirt."
"Really? What a coincidence, we both have the same shirt," Silver Wolf shamelessly denied while walking around the jeep to give it a visual inspection. Zind simply facepalmed and sighed. She could have at least put in a little more effort to spin a more convincing lie.
"There's no GPS?" She asked in mild shock when she realised that there really wasn't any GPS navigator installed on this vehicle. Just how backwards is this place?
"The only place where you can find vehicles installed with GPS is the military."
"Oh you poor thing," the petite girl drew out an exaggerated sigh. She pulled up a holographic screen using the terminal she always wore on her arm and began to type away at the virtual keyboard. A brief flash of light later, the new modifications which she intended to add to the jeep materialised into reality.
"What the hell is that?"
"Aether editing," Silver Wolf continued to blow her bubblegum without a care in the world as if she hadn't just altered reality. "Get used to it, country bumpkin npc."
She turned on her heels and walked back to the house, leaving the awed man standing there, inspecting and fiddling around with the new GPS modification in confusion. Feeling mischievous today, she pulled up the holographic screen again and quickly added a few new modifications. She saw the brief bright flash of light from the corner of her eyes and heard the "what the flying fuck?!" from the npc outside. Heh, that got the reaction she wanted.
That will teach him not to belittle the almighty Silver Wolf.