Several evenings later, the blood-red setting sun dyed the boundless desert into a murky yellow oil painting. The workshop's automatic defense network transmitted an early warning—a familiar heat signature was approaching at alarming speed, driving that oft-repaired Goodwood, carving a flying trail of dust through the desert.
Rebecca. But only her alone.
Cairo's brow furrowed imperceptibly. According to past behavioral pattern analysis, these siblings were always inseparable. Appearing solo, and at speeds far exceeding safe thresholds, reeked of unusual urgency... high probability something had gone wrong.
The Goodwood emitted a piercing roar, a brutal drift, almost crashing via inertia hard against the garage door, raising clouds of dust. The door was violently kicked open, Rebecca's petite figure leaping out impatiently, stumbling toward the workshop entrance before the dust even settled.
She looked terrible. Her usually pretty pale green hair was matted with sweat and dust, messily plastered to forehead and cheeks; those always lively eyes now red and swollen, beautiful features twisted with extreme anxiety and fear, lips trembling uncontrollably. Her signature jacket was covered in dark oil stains and... already darkened, blackened bloodstains, emitting a pungent mix of rust and gunpowder.
"Boss! Boss! Open up! Please! Quick, open the door!" She'd completely forgotten their previously agreed covert signal, instead pounding those scarred fists frantically against the heavy metal-reinforced door, hoarse voice saturated with thick sobbing and desperate helplessness.
Cairo signaled the hovering servo-skull to lower alert level, personally operating internal mechanisms. The heavy barrier slid open with dull grinding sounds.
The moment the door opened a crack, Rebecca squeezed through like a bullet, nearly falling from excessive momentum. She jerked her head up, seeing Cairo's tall, dark red-painted figure standing before her like the only lighthouse on a pitch-black sea. Those emerald optic implants just carefully upgraded were now filled with unprecedented panic and helplessness, tears uncontrollably surging out again, tracing wet tracks.
"Boss... save Pilar... please..." She spoke incoherently, voice shaking uncontrollably, "He... he's not gonna make it... those damn ripperdocs in the city... either charge outrageous prices, or... or shake their heads saying he's beyond saving, tell us to prepare for the worst..."
Cairo's optical lenses swiftly and calmly scanned her entire body. No severe open wounds on body surface, vital signs monitoring showed high tension, extreme fatigue, adrenaline levels spiking. Those dark red spots confirmed by spectral analysis as human blood, hemoglobin profile not matching her genetic records.
"Calm down, Rebecca." His synthesized voice remained steady, but actively adjusted audio frequency, deliberately reducing some of the cold metallic quality, injecting a trace of extremely subtle, attempting-to-soothe meaning—this was a scattered communication technique remaining from his distant human days, though application still seemed somewhat stiff. "State slowly. What happened to Pilar? Specific injury condition."
His extraordinary calm was like a stabilizing anchor, slightly restraining Rebecca's near-collapse emotions. She gasped violently several times, struggling to suppress body trembling, roughly and forcefully wiping eyes with the back of her hand, beginning to recount brokenly, voice still fragmented:
"It was... that damn shipment from last time... Maine took a hard job, ended up running straight into the target... those bastards came prepared, firepower too heavy... Pilar, that idiot, to cover Dorio's retreat, got... got locked by their smart weapons... armor-piercing rounds... went straight through his abdomen, hit his spinal nerve cluster and several major organs... and... triggered his body's ancient old cyberware, causing cascade overload..."
Her voice was cut off by sobbing again, each word seemingly wrapped in blood and tears: "That son-of-a-bitch fixer Faraday's ripperdoc... opened with fifty thousand eddies! Where the hell do we get that much cash on short notice! Went to those underground black clinics... they... they took one look at the wound and waved it off, said neural burn area too extensive, organs starting massive failure, unless immediately swap in full military-grade internals and neural scaffolding, otherwise... otherwise..."
She couldn't continue, just staring desperately at Cairo with those tear-completely-blurred, expensive optic implants, gaze burning with a last trace of almost devout hope: "Boss... you... you fixed my eyes and Pilar's busted shoulder so well... you must have a way, right? Please... save him... he's my only family left... I only have him..."
Cairo listened silently. Abdominal penetration wound, severe spinal nerve damage, progressive multi-organ failure, cyberware overload cascade reaction... this indeed far exceeded street ripperdocs' processing capability limits. Even in that war-torn world in his memory, such injuries required Tech-Priests or Genetors intervention.
He rapidly retrieved the detailed physiological data and cyberware interface information scanned when repairing Pilar's shoulder earlier, constructing preliminary injury simulation models and generating several treatment plans in his processing core. Complex, extremely time-consuming, and requiring considerable reserves of precious bioactive materials and specific nanometer repair agents, but... from a technical standpoint, not impossible.
His brief silence made Rebecca's heart instantly sink into an ice cellar, massive fear nearly completely severing her fragile nerves. "B...Boss?..."
Cairo raised his head, crimson optical lenses steadily focusing on her: "His injuries are very severe. Treatment process will consume my reserves of specific biomass materials and energy. These resources were already allocated for other important projects."
Rebecca's face instantly turned paper-white, breathing suddenly stopping.
"However," Cairo's tone sharply turned, "not irreversible."
Hope's light exploded like an overloaded bulb in Rebecca's tear-filled optic implants.
"I can treat Pilar." Cairo continued, tone maintaining its consistent matter-of-fact steadiness. "But as equivalent exchange, I need to collect 'medical fees.'"
"How much? I'll get whatever amount! I'll rob for it if I have to!" Rebecca shouted desperately, body leaning forward from excitement, nearly lunging at him.
"I don't need money." Cairo shook his head, optical lenses slightly flickering. "What I need is research material. More diverse, well-preserved neural processors with new models or special markings, biochips, and any cyberware components containing unknown alloy compositions or abnormal energy signal characteristics. Quality must be far higher than those 'scraps' you brought last time."
His requirements were "more" and "higher quality" research specimens, clearly defined parameters, not exceeding boundaries within Rebecca's and her crew's adventuring capabilities. These things were admittedly hard to obtain, requiring taking risks through specific channels (such as corporate abandoned laboratory equipment, specific gang boss high-grade implants, or black market circulating unregistered prototype components), but not unattainable. This was more like a fair transaction based on risk assessment, rather than kicking someone while they're down.
Rebecca froze momentarily, then immediately reacted, head nodding vigorously: "No problem! Absolutely no problem! As long as you can save Pilar, whatever you want we'll get it! Maine and Dorio will definitely help with everything! I swear! By everything!"
"Agreement established." Cairo nodded slightly. "Where is the patient now? Time factor is critical, must immediately begin preprocessing."
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