The desert sun scorched the earth as always, steaming twisted heat waves from the abandoned town's wreckage.
Inside the workshop, Cairo had just finished fine-tuning a combat servitor's transmission joints. The servo-skull hovered silently beside him, ghostly blue light flowing in eye sockets reflecting continuously refreshing data streams.
Just then, the outer perimeter monitoring network transmitted familiar signal characteristics.
"Old friend, Maine's crew is here." Cairo's synthesized voice was steady and flat, optical lenses sweeping across convoy information marked on the visual interface. "Three vehicles. Heat signature identification—full crew present."
He paused slightly, sensors capturing a new detail. "Hmm? One additional weak biosignature with abnormally active neural activity... a netrunner."
He wasn't surprised.
As transaction depth and risk escalated, Maine's crew would inevitably deploy all core members, including technical experts who hadn't appeared before.
Soon, that familiar, repeatedly patched and reinforced Goodwood led two other equally weathered modified vehicles into the town's outskirts, stopping in the safety zone cleared by servitors.
Doors opened. Maine's tall figure first exited, Dorio following closely behind, sharp eyes scanning the surrounding environment—she keenly noticed the town seemed "cleaner" than last visit, some obstructive wreckage orderly stacked, like some silent warning.
Falco, Rebecca, and Pilar also successively disembarked.
Pilar moved his perfectly repaired shoulder, appearing somewhat excited.
Rebecca, as always, first bounced toward the workshop entrance, but this time followed by an unfamiliar figure.
A girl with petite frame, even slightly more slender than Rebecca.
She wore dark-toned, movement-facilitating fitted clothing, covered by a slightly oversized ballistic jacket. Hood pulled low covering most of her face, only revealing delicately lined jaw and slightly pale lips.
Her movements were light and quiet like a wary cat, forming stark contrast with Rebecca's liveliness.
Most eye-catching was the high-quality data cable connected behind her head, the cable's other end bundled in her jacket inner pocket—one hallmark of top netrunners.
"Boss! We're here! Brought a new friend!" Rebecca's voice remained full of energy. She pulled the girl's wrist, quickly walking to the workshop entrance.
Maine's crew followed.
Maine's gaze met Cairo's crimson optical lenses, nodding slightly in acknowledgment.
Cairo's sight passed Rebecca, falling on that new face.
His sensors rapidly completed scanning: low muscle density, bone structure not significantly enhanced, minimal surface cyberware implants, but neural network activity abnormally active—especially cerebral cortex region—energy metabolism rate far exceeding normal people, plus detecting highly encrypted data streams silently exchanging between her built-in interface and some external device.
Typical neural netrunner characteristics.
"This is Sasha," Maine introduced, voice deep. "Our crew's netrunner. Some previous jobs needed her providing rear support, didn't come together. Rebecca said you might need... more 'technical' goods. She thought Sasha should get acquainted."
His tone was steady but carried barely detectable scrutiny, seemingly observing Cairo's reaction to this important team member's appearance.
Sasha slightly raised her head. Under hood shadows, a pair of bright eyes with some amber tones quickly and cautiously swept across Cairo's massive mechanical frame, those writhing mechanical tentacles, and hovering servo-skull.
Her gaze held no obvious fear, more like extremely focused technical assessment, trying to parse this being's technological level and potential threat.
She just nodded lightly, voice soft yet clearly stable: "Hello."
"Netrunner. Valuable professional domain." Cairo's response was equally direct without pleasantries. "Your neural network activity level is high, data encryption method also interesting. Hope your capabilities match your hardware configuration."
His tone was indistinguishable between praise and mere statement, as if evaluating a tool.
Sasha's mouth corner seemed to move slightly. She didn't answer, just nodded again lightly, pulling hood even lower, seemingly unaccustomed to this direct "scanning-style" attention.
"Brought the items?" Cairo redirected attention to Maine.
Maine gestured to Dorio.
Dorio and Falco lifted out a heavy, cold-emitting metal sealed case from one vehicle's trunk.
The case body bore no markings, but edges stained with some not-yet-completely-wiped dark red sticky traces.
The case was placed on the workbench Cairo designated. Lock latches opened, cold air spilling out.
Inside, three cyberware pieces were neatly secured.
Their design language filled with Militech's cold efficiency—hard lines, extremely high interface standards, surface treatment matte dark gray to reduce reflection.
Complex energy conduits and neural interface cables embedded like exquisite patterns.
One piece was military-grade subdermal armor covering entire spine and ribcage area, internally integrating miniature impact dispersion system and emergency hemostatic injection pump—but now the metal surface showed obvious dent and tear damage, edges still stained with dried tissue fluid and blood scabs.
Another was "Achilles" tactical tendon and lower leg enhancement system, providing explosive sprint force and stable lower body support—but connection ports showed scorch marks, seemingly forcibly stripped by some energy weapon.
The last was a pair of "optical camo" system generators, usually installed at scapula positions—but one generator shell already fractured, exposing burnt precision crystal inside.
These cyberware pieces had obviously experienced brutal combat, extremely "roughly" dismantled from their former owners, full of bloodshed and violence traces.
Maine's crew members all stood silent, looking at these cyberware pieces with complex expressions.
Obtaining these things clearly wasn't pleasant.
However, Cairo was completely unconcerned.
His mechanical tentacles had already flexibly extended, carefully picking up that subdermal armor, fingertip sensors emitting subtle scanning beams.
"Militech 'Fortress' series third-generation subdermal armor, energy distribution efficiency twenty-two percent higher than market circulation versions, neural interface adopts bidirectional feedback design—good."
His synthesized voice actually revealed a trace of clear satisfaction. "Biological contamination doesn't affect material analysis and structural reverse engineering. Bloodstains and tissue remnants instead provide original data samples of its neural interaction with former host—very valuable."
He examined the other two pieces: "Achilles system, linear accelerator damaged, but basic structure intact."
"Optical camo... core burnt out, but scattering lenses and diffraction gratings still have research value."
"Very good, this batch's quality far exceeds previous 'scraps.'"
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We're falling down the rankings, powerstones?, also dw I'm uploading more chapters.
Advanced chapters for $7 @patreon:michaelv1.
Every 200 powerstones = Bonus chapter!