\+/ Tales From Night City \+/ Chapter 53 - City of Gang
The Ex-Tyger raises his iron and presses it to Brian's forehead causing Brian to look up at him. With the iron pressed against his head, he catches a glimpse of a crow cawing and calmy flying across the sky which grabs his attention... silencing the moment for himself and hearing the wind blow. His stunned gaze remains fixated on the crow... 'gotta be a hallucination... right..?' He thinks to himself in a detached haze as he hears the feint sound of Marilyn's playful giggle... remembering just how hard it was to get her to at times. Zaunya being pinned down by her head resists while screaming at the top of her lungs with her eyes wide open... completely muted by the moment.
As the trigger nears pulling, an explosion causes a bright white flash of light to blind everyone. The force of the impact sends Brian to the floor with his hands still tied behind him and the rest of the mercs to duck and scatter. He looks up to see the ex-claw quickly turn around and take a gunshot to the gut. As he falls to his knees, hes shot again in the shoulder dropping him to his back and sending blood flying. As Brian's vision fades in an out, he sees a new group of unidentified street mercs flood the area dropping the various remaining animals and mercs with ruthless efficiency. The leader of this new group slowly approaches Brian and Zaunya with his Liberty pistol drawn, passively pointing it at them. He exchanges a few unheard words with his crew securing the area before he nods to take them as their both yanked up onto their feet still in a daze. Brian's blurred vision catches a glimpse of Audrey's unconscious body being carried away before a bag is placed over his head.
The bright neon lights of Night City off in the distance assist in shrouding Pacifica in darkness. The lack of ambient light gives the district an aura of the dead... A place that was once home to the heart of Ambition in Night City, casted into the shadows of the forgotten left to rot. We focus in on the Hotel Pistis Sophia. Stagnant puddles of chemical infused rainwater, and scattered trash litter the area alongside flaming trashcans and burning vehicles. Foot traffic is sparse with the few loitering around being nothing more than a few homeless natives and the occasional pair of headlights passing by. The air was stoic on this Night... carrying a tense energy wafting throughout the leaves of palm trees and ocean waves.
The feint sounds of torture and interrogation are heard as we make our way slowly down a long, dark hotel hallway. Rooms cascaded outward to the left and right.. Some with the walls completely blown out allowing you to see the remnants of what looked like several decades of stories. Dried and blackened blood smeared on the walls, discarded old tech and tattered, decaying furniture lay littered about alongside various rusted chains and restraints. The dragging of a prisoner is heard as his boots streak-drag down the hallway while being carried by 2 mercs. The prisoner being escorted glances to his right through his bloody, barely conscious vision to see Brian tied to a metal chair by his wrists and ankles. The two of them exchange a brief look with each other before the prisoner passes by the doorway.
Brian checks his restraints with a light yank on them causing the heavy metal to clank. Iron tight. He looks around the dark, litter infested Pistis Sophia hotel room, nothing but several destroyed pieces of grime covered furniture and more trash than even worth mentioning. A repurposed paradise that looked like a holding facility tailor made for torture, terror and interrogation... naturally coated in wither and suffering over the years. He hears the commotion of various people being talked, tended to and relentlessly beaten through the walls alongside feint screams of begging and pain. Overwhelmed by the sudden onset of the brutal environment, he closes his eyes in attempt to drown out the chaos. He hears both Marilyn and Zaunya's voices echo in his head one after the other. Marilyn's panicked begging is quickly followed up by the sound of Zaunya's voice as the ladies' voices alternate back and forth in his mind:
"No no... please! VARGA! VARGAAAAAA!"
"...I almost feel like the more you learn about me, the less i realize i know about you."
"This City... it calls to me... I feel it at the core of my being... Can you feel it Varga?"
"You wanna talk about trust...? I don't even know who the fuck you are."
"All those empty headed, street tough gonks out there stand up straight and answer to Brian... I get Varga."
He then thinks back to the heart to heart he had with Audrey on the fire escape of the hideout and her nudging his shoulder with a smile on her face.
"Yeah.. of course." "Don't start to get soft on me now Varga... We've still got work to do."
"Who are you now Brian." He hears Rick's deep, rough voice from back at the 6th street compound. Causing him to open his eyes to the sounds of distant screams echoing throughout the halls of the Pistis Sophia. He then hears the heavy tapping of boots making their way down the hallway towards his room. Brian instinctually takes a deep breath and prepares for the worst... maintaining an expression as cold as ice... a mentality he seemed to work for years to bury silently returns with a vengeance... as if it only layed a mere few inches below the surface.
The merc that initially shot Audrey's Tyger Claw contact enters the room. He has a large, towering frame and dresses like a traditional Night City street solo. His body language carries a heavy aura of confidence and routine as he walks through the room. Brian's instinctual thought reaction is that he looks a bit like his late choom and best friend Graves... This catches him off guard briefly as the merc approaches him and promptly unlocks his wrist and leg restraints causing the heavy iron to release and clank to the floor.. This gives Brian pause as his mind floods with a bunch of various snap thoughts due to the unexpected move. The merc speaks for the first time with a deep monotone while posting up in a corner of the room with his arms crossed.
"You can pardon the precaution. Some of my boys saw the work you and your girl did out there... The two of you sure saved us some time and bodies dealin' with that bunch. Real fuckin' blood bath... on the beach of all places. Eh, they felt the need to be better safe than sorry." The merc says
"But not you huh." Brian quickly responds.
The merc recognizes the sentiment behind the statement and gives Brian a tired grin and chuckle.. confident in his own ability and experience.
"We got no reason to go at each other choom."
"Well, i'll tell you one thing... if you or your crew did anything to those women you brought me here with... then we've got nothin' to talk about."
"They're as fine as you are... For now."
"Yeah, and why is that exactly..? Could've flatlined us right there n' left us in the sand."
"Cuz first off all, generally, that's not how we roll... keepin' fresh marks and activity in and around Pacifica is always good for business in this shithole. And second of all, i couldn't give two shits about you or your women. After a bunch of back and forth with these circ fiends givin' us the run around we finally got what we came for."
"Then why am i here."
"How bout you start by tellin' me what you were doin' out there tonight huh? What kinda biz could you have with a piece of shit like Saichen."
"I should be asking you the same question. Pacifica isn't necessarily known for being a bastion of organized crime and structure in street activity... let alone territory. I think Ya'll going out of your way to pick over a random street spat while saving my life at the same time in itself is proof of that shitstorm of confusion."
"If you wanna consider your life 'saved' I suggest you start talkin' rather than askin." The merc says sternly. Brian pauses for a brief moment hearing the thuds of someone being punched in a nearby room causing him to briefly glance in the direction of the sound before continuing.
"We had a quick trade with em. That's it... Kiroshi Oracles."
"Heh. Those were yours huh. Explains the amount of eddies we found on em. Who put you up to the gig?"
"Who?"
"Fixer. Who hired you?"
"Santa Claus... I'm not a merc choom."
"Not a merc..?" He laughs "Shit; Playin' a dangerous game in these circles then. Got a habit of steppin' on toes? Or maybe you just don't value your life much. Shit'll catch up with you eventually-"
"This interview done or are you lookin' to play some fuckin' pea knuckle too? Think i left the oven on."
"Don't bullshit me choomba... Do you or either of your girls know anything about a Maelstrom convoy drop or any of that piece of shit Saichen's dealings in DogTown."
"DogTown...? Night City's sewer deposit? Thought there was nothin' but broken vagrants and scop bein' flushed into that shithole-."
The merc steps to and punches Brian in the face hard as a loud thud echoes in the room. It staggers him only slightly causing blood to spray out of his mouth... He feels little to no pain at all from the blow. Brian looks up at the Merc unfazed with a more serious demeanor. Being free of his chains he resists the opportunity to make a move and instead shows expert level restraint while staying focused. Not knowing their current whereabouts, the number of hostiles, or most importantly, where Audrey and Zaunya are.
"Just an honest deal... quick trade. DogTown pretty much sits at the top of my list of fuck that places... Only biz i've ever had there once upon a time involved 2 Barghest gate security girls and a bottle of Joe Tiel... One of em had a voice fit for cartoons. Where is our shit by the way?"
The merc pauses and ignores the question.. instead thinking over a a brief period of silence. "Cmon, lets go." He says getting up and gesturing toward the door. The pair begin to make their way down the dark, low visibility hallway at a slow pace. Brian sees various unknowns looking more like shadows than actual people doing various things through the deep darkened hallways of the Pistis Sophia. He sees a man soundly asleep in a cot, he sees a woman mopping up blood in an empty room as he hears the sound of mop water and blood sloshing around, he sees a man bound by chains and hanging from the ceiling of another room unconscious. As these scenes pass by, he keeps his eye out for the ladies... any weapons, and how many bodies he can spot... how many potentially hostile and not hostile... Threat and not a threat... The merc leading him stops abruptly which snaps Brian out of his intel gathering. "Shit. Hang on a sec." He says as he promptly turns back and re-enters the room he was holding him in. Brian knows making a move now eliminates any element of surprise he may have left. The merc's nonchalant nature shows a level of confidence thats telling of their current situation and environment... this was his domain... and the lack of alertness could easily be a setup just baiting Brian to try something. He holds fast.. testing the limits of his patience and instincts to see where this is going.
In the brief moment alone, Brian just happens to glance over into the open room next door and sees the man who was being dragged past him earlier. After hearing the voice of the merc escorting Brian, it causes the man to glance up and see Brian stood in the doorway who was already looking at him. It gives Brian a good look at him. He was fairly tall, had a slender, lean frame with short white hair and a deep widow's peak. He was badly beaten, covered in blood and resting in his restraints completely defeated. Based on his state Brian could tell he had been there for quite some time. He wore his dejected and drained demeanor on himself like a tattered blanket. The hopeless and lifeless gaze in his eyes seemed to pierce directly through Brian who stood there looking at him. Brian naturally shifts his weight while standing there and accidently steps on a thick piece of broken glass making a subtle cracking noise... causing him and the tied up prisoner to both glance down at it at the same time. "Cmon, lets go." The merc says returning to Brian. Brian keeps his foot firmly planted on the glass, covering it up as the merc to passes by him. As the merc steps past him, Brian shoves the glass with his foot toward the prisoner without looking and continues down the hallway. The prisoner watches the thick, sharp chunk of glass scrape across the floor towards him... causing it to hit the metal leg of his chair with a light 'tink'. Cutting to black.