In some random back alley that Jin had chosen on a whim, we corpo students did battle.

  If I’d been writing an essay, I might have called it an allegory for the entire North American megacorp geopolitical situation. But here and now, all I could think was that if there had ever been a stupider way that Arasaka and Militech had fought, I hadn’t heard of it.

  Darius swung his Gorilla Arm fists at me, praying that any of his hits would hit. None of them did. I just kept sliding around his punches, ducking and weaving, getting a feel for his competence level in a street scrap. I wasn’t impressed. The guy was all power, no technique. And since I pretty much knew how he would move just from looking at him, my evasions weren’t particularly… active. Really, I felt way too sluggish. Too much gunk in my gears—must be the alcohol.

  He roared and sent an upper cut my way. I threaded through a brief opening in his guard and struck him on his chin. I felt the hardness of metal underneath my knuckles and knew that I’d have to put my back into this one in order to make it count.

  So I did. Again, and again.

  He couldn’t hit me, and I had every opportunity to hit him. Came with the territory of having a reaction speed of less than five milliseconds.

  Eventually, the dumb gonk finally fell unconscious.

  Only then did I realize—wait, did I use even a tiny bit of real footwork for this fight? My fists were barely even raised, really. And my feet had been planted flat on the floor for most of the spat.

  Man, Dorio would kill me if she found out.

  It couldn’t be helped, though. I didn’t wanna ruin a good buzz by suddenly going overkill on my movements. Less was more.

  The boyfriend, whose name I had learned was literally Leviathan for some goddamn reason, immediately charged at Jin.

  Less than a second and a half later I was soaring through the air, my foot planted in his face. He went flying as I kicked him into the wall face-first. He slid down slowly by his pretty face, leaving a thin trail of blood on the wall as he descended, dirty concrete ripping open his cheek. Eh, ‘ganic damage. He was probably good for getting it fixed anyway.

  Jin cackled in sheer joy while I dragged him out of the alleyway, “Trauma’s probably on its way. Let’s fucking go, Jin.”

  “Oh shit!” he laughed. We ran across so many streets, Jin running the fastest, and picking the direction, like he was trying to outrun Trauma itself. It was actually kind of hilarious. He finally did stop around ten blocks away, ever so slightly winded. “I think we shook ‘em off.”

  That was probably the fact that we hadn’t really injured them enough to summon Trauma to begin with, but why would I pop his bubble like that?

  In fact, I kind of… liked the kid?

  In a weird way, sort. Like he was my gateway to the fun I always thought I was missing out on as a corpo student who couldn’t fit in.

  I guess it was finally my turn.

  “Just lettin ya know,” Jin said, gathering up his height—he was only half an inch shorter than me, all told, and not much narrower even, “I could have kicked Levi’s ass fuckin’ easy.”

  “Yeah?” I grinned, wrapping my arm around his shoulders, “well, no shot. I wanted to kick both their asses from the moment I met them. So I called dibs before you did.”

  “Hah! You fucking killstealer!” he threw my hand away from his neck, “hell nah, I’m not letting you get one up on me like that again.”

  “What, you got more corpo students waiting in the wings? Did I just enter a fucking arcade beat ‘em up game?”

  “Hell yeah, you fucking did!” he replied, his tone a tad indignant almost, but I could tell he was only putting it on for fun. “That’s my life, motherfucker. I walk around putting the hurt on other corpo students.”

  I laughed. Hard.

  This guy!

  What a precious life he was leading!

  And… for this night alone, I did want a part in that.

  “Fuck. Yes. Point me to the next fucking gonk you want laid on the ground,” I said, “right now.”

  Then he randomly pointed to a guy walking on the sidewalk. Didn’t even look like a particularly strong guy. Or even a corpo. Or… anything. Just a guy, walking down the street.

  “Be for real,” I scoffed. “I’m not beating on some random guy for your sake. You wanna watch people die, go watch another XBD.”

  Jin scoffed, “Pft, you’re a bitch after all. Ehhh,” he shrugged, “No biggie. You can be a little bit of a bitch after today.” He gave me a considering look. “The next fucking gonk I want, huh? Anyone?”

  I raised an eyebrow. Was he serious? Just who did Jin have in mind? “Sure, I’m game for more. Just better be someone actually worth my time. Someone who can put up some hands.”

  “Hah! Perfect!” Jin laughed. “Let’s fucking go!”

  000

  Bar #2, the Red Lotus, was a vision straight out of a corpo-designed fever dream—a hyper-stylized, pseudo-Chinese aesthetic drowning in red neon and shimmering gold fixtures. Ornamental lanterns hung from the ceiling, casting warm pools of almost-natural candlelight over lacquered wooden tables and glossy black floors. The walls were decorated with huge, bold calligraphic brushstrokes on unravelled scrolls that hung from the walls like paintings—whether or not the symbols had any meaning at all was beyond me. But their meaning was obvious—to evoke a heritage that had been repackaged and sold to the megacorporate elite who clearly now fancied themselves as the heirs to their own nations. The air smelled of incense and expensive liquor, mingling with the low thrum of some sort of Chinese jazz playing over hidden speakers.

  This was Kang Tao turf.

  Jin and I walked in without an invite.

  The moment we stepped through the ornate double front doors, both literally gilded with twining gold Chinese dragons that parted as they opened, a few heads turned. Jin didn’t give a fuck. He strode in like he owned the place, laughing as he clapped me on the back.

  First thing I noticed was an active dance floor, in a neon-lit pit deeper down in the building. Hundreds of Kang Tao High students down there—on a Tuesday night—, with a whole different set of bars, bouncers, back entrances and back exits. The building somehow had sound dampeners deployed in a way so that none of what had to be an absolute roar of music and pressing bodies was getting into this bar proper—it looked to me like the plebs mostly stuck to the lower dance floor, while the real elites of Kang Tao High schmoozed in the far calmer, soundproofed second-floor upper bar I now found myself in.

  And elite they were. Here in the rarified upper bar, the students of Kang Tao High I could see, less than three dozen in count, were all unique in some way or another, all impeccably dressed in crimson red jackets with gold-threaded trim, all unusually distinctive or beautiful, with custom cyberware glinting under the dim lights, every drink in their hands no doubt more expensive than my entire life’s possessions only a few months ago.

  Their uniforms were all slightly customized to reflect their own personal wealth and styles, with marks of distinction on their uniforms whose meaning I couldn’t recognize, no doubt denoting what had to be the people at the top of Kang Tao’s own social order in Night City—at least as far as high schoolers went.

  In short, these were the elites of Kang Tao High—

  And their stares weren’t friendly.

  I ignored them all. I still couldn’t get over how over-the-top pretentious this place was. Even Militech’s place had been nothing by comparison. At least they weren’t literally gilding their place with real-deal gold, if the spectrometer app on my Kiroshis weren’t glitching out and lying to me. “Interior design is real fucking subtle, huh?” I muttered to Jin.

  He grinned. “Oh yeah. The Kang Tao in Night City are mostly all Taiwanese expat fucks who think they can lay claim to the mainland’s ‘heritage’ here by throwing around enough eurodollars. Behold.” He spread his arms, as if to encompass everything we were seeing. “China, but better. All courtesy of Kang Tao International’s marketing division.”

  I scanned the room, taking note of who was really in charge here. Not the bartender. Not the bouncers. Not the various elites lounging around in the building’s upper bar where I now found myself. Certainly not the plebs down on the dance floor. No, the real power sat in on a mezzanine floor balcony, where the elite of the elite could look down on both the bar and dance floor—a literal built-in hierarchy.

  A group of Kang Tao High students unlike all the rest were gathered around up there, lounging on cushioned seats with the same sort of lazy confidence I’d grown too used to at Arasaka High; I could tell at a glance they were all corpo trust-fund elites beyond even the rest, brats who didn’t even know the meaning of consequences. But my eyes settled on one person in particular. At the center of them, with a commanding view of the entire building, sat the one Jin had brought me here to see.

  The queen of this little kingdom.

  She sat in the best seat in the house, legs crossed, looking down on everyone and everything. She held a delicate crystal glass in hand, swirling something like liquid gold and no doubt equally expensive. Her hair was sleek, ink-black with subtle gold threading, catching the neon lights in shimmering flickers as she turned slightly, her eyes shifting down the moment we arrived and then locking onto Jin in particular.

  “Oh, great,” the young woman sighed, setting down her glass with the kind of slow precision that screamed bored royalty. “Jin Ryuzaki has deigned to bless us with his presence.”

  “David,” Jin grinned, looking straight upwards. “Meet Ling Ruomei. Daughter of Ling Xiaohan, a board member of Kang Tao.”

  Daughter of a fucking board member? That meant she was one of the most powerful people in our generation in the entire city. Maybe on the entire west coast. This was almost the equivalent of meeting an actual descendent of Saburo Arasaka himself.

  She’d barely spared a glance at me. From the way her eyes narrowed, the way her lips curled in a particular smirk, I could tell that she and Jin had history.

  Jin grinned, calling up to her in her perch of a balcony like we were in his own backyard. “Miss me, Ruo?”

  “Not in the slightest.” She leaned forward, chin resting on the back of her hand, her smirk widening just enough to betray underlying amusement as she looked down on us. “Though I must say, you never cease to entertain me. Get up here, Ryuzaki.”

  When we got up to the top of the stairs, she gave one of her hanger-ons a dismissive glance. “Ràng kāi, xiǎo gōng.”

  The young woman in question—they were mostly all women, as far as I could tell—scrambled out of the way. Jin slid in to take her spot. “You always know how to roll out the red carpet, Ruomei.”

  Ling Ruomei’s smirk didn’t waver. She studied him, fingers tapping lightly against the rim of her glass. “I tolerate your presence in my bar because it amuses me.”

  This place was hers? I boggled for a moment, while Jin chuckled. “And because you like the game, same as me.”

  Her eyes flicked to me, for just a moment. Assessing. Measuring. Then she turned her gaze back to Jin. She crossed her fingers together in a steeple, giving Jin Ryuzaki a level look. “So, what do you want, Jin? This better not be a waste of my time.”

  I stood behind Jin—I hadn’t been offered a seat, which was whatever, I was clearly being underestimated—and watched as their little game played out, illuminated by the upper bar’s tastefully dim lights.

  Ling Ruomei was beautiful—too beautiful, inhumanly beautiful. She looked like a vampire princess out of a fantasy BD, in a corporate-perfected way of such quality that I couldn’t even tell how much of it was ‘ganic or not. Long black hair that looked like a waterfall of liquid shadows, high cheekbones, flawless, seamless skin, a slight edge of cold detachment in her dark red eyes. I couldn’t see a single spec of visible chrome on her.

  But there was something more to her than just another corpo princess—she carried herself with, not just confidence, but something else. Something that reminded me too much of Jin himself.

  She wasn’t like the other trust-fund kids in this place. I could tell, instantly. Something in the way she carried herself, something in my street instincts, something in how my inner gutter rat recognized the predators of the world.

  She was the real deal.

  Jin took a shot glass that wasn’t even his, downing it in a single gulp. Then he grinned. He set the empty shot glass down with a deliberate clink, settling back into the padded cushions. Jin exhaled theatrically. “Business first, huh? Alright then.” He leaned forward, elbows on the table. “I wanna know where Kang Tao stands on QianT.”

  The air shifted. I stiffened.

  The chatter in the surrounding booths, the clinking of glasses, the low murmur of music—it all seemed to dim in that moment. Ruomei’s expression didn’t even flicker, didn’t show anything beyond mild intrigue, but something about the way she held herself suddenly seemed sharper.

  “Do you, now?” she mused.

  Jin spread his hands. “Come on, Ruo. We both know the shooting’s got every megacorp in the city on edge. Soon as their recent financial troubles started, QianT became the choicest piece of meat on the city’s entire buyout block. Things were set in stone to go Arasaka’s way. But now, after my retarded cousin’s actions? The market’s twitchy. I don’t like twitchy. Makes the shareholders start bitching. Word is, Kang Tao’s already lining up contingency plans. So I figured I’d go straight to the source.”

  Ruomei tilted her head, eyes gleaming like a predator considering its prey. “And why, exactly, would I share any of that with you?”

  Jin smirked. “Because I’m fun.”

  She laughed, softly—a sound that was at once genuine and dangerous. “You are,” she admitted. Then her fingers drummed once against the table, and the amusement in her gaze cooled into something more calculating. “But I don’t offer corporate secrets as party favors, Jin. If you want insight into Kang Tao’s next moves, I suggest you take up stock analysis. Or do something to… impress me.”

  Jin clicked his tongue. “Yep, I expected that. That’s why I brought him.” He quirked his thumb backwards. To me.

  Ruomei’s lips quirked. “Who is he?”

  “Meet my new choom, David Martinez.”

  Ling Ruomei’s gaze finally settled on me with something approaching real interest. “David Martinez,” she said levelly, as if committing my name to memory. “I see.” She leaned back, studying me in a way that felt almost clinical—like she was assessing a product, testing its quality. Her crimson eyes flickered back to Jin. “What is his worth to us?”

  Jin stretched lazily. “Well, one, he’s a real-deal genius. Two, he’s probably the best fighter our age I’ve ever seen. So, I was thinking, and I had a fun idea.”

  Ruomei’s eyes narrowed slightly, but it wasn’t in annoyance—it was in curiosity. “I assume you have something in mind?”

  Jin’s grin was pure devilry.

  “I wanna know who’s better,” he said, his voice dripping with anticipation. “My boy Martinez, or Kang Tao High’s best fighter. Your best fighter.”

  Silence passed over the table.

  The statement hung in the air for a moment, lingering. I gawked for a moment, as did most of the women sitting across from us at the gilded table.

  Then—

  Ling Ruomei smiled.

  And it wasn’t just any smile. It was razor-sharp, amused, and deeply, deeply intrigued.

  “Oh,” she murmured, “Oh, now that is an interesting proposition.”

  She lifted her glass to her lips, taking a slow sip as if contemplating the very idea of it. Then she set it down and snapped her fingers.

  One of her hangers-on—a silver-haired, silver-eyed girl with sleek silver dermal plating along the side of her cheeks—leaned in at once.

  “Hou Ken,” Ruomei said. “Tell him to come here.”

  The girl nodded immediately, her eyes starting to glow gold before vanishing down the stairs.

  “Hou Ken?” I asked.

  Jin just shot me a grin. “You’re gonna love this.”

  I just rolled my shoulders. “Can’t wait.”

  I wondered what Jin’s endgame for tonight was, really. Was he working me until failure? Was this just a game to him, and not really biz? The true blue corpo way would be to only bet when you knew what the outcome would be. Gambling was a sport for the poor—a proper suit could predict the future with frightening accuracy.

  That said, just how much did Jin know about my abilities? Maybe I should sweat him a little bit, make him uncertain? I gave him a grin, “I’m not gonna lie to you, Jin—I think I’ve had, like, ten drinks today alone. What happens if I lose?”

  Ruomei gave a quiet snort of derision while Jin gave me a patient, neutral expression, one that made it seem like he hadn’t had a drop yet. What a complete bullshitter. “Then, you lose. And Ruomei’s guy is probably gonna make that its own punishment.” He chuckled, shaking his head, “So really—don’t lose. But hey—if you still got the balls to step up, ain’t like I’m just gonna forget that.”

  “Man, I’m scared,” I sighed, “Kung Fu is supposed to be this really big deal, right? Don’t think I can handle all that hwooaahing and hyaaahing.” A few of the girls around giggled derisively, a few others started chattering in Mandarin. My optics gave me the subtitles—it was mostly just trash talk directed at me.

  Ruomei seemed to wake up slightly from her seat, leaning closer to the table and giving me a predatory grin, “Your man is quite the talker, Jin.”

  “He’s an acquired taste,” Jin waved her off, “Uppity as fuck, but honestly? He has what it takes to back all that talk up.”

  “What chipware is he running?” Ruomei asked.

  “Company secret,” Jin lied. I snorted. He gave me a curious look at that. I shrugged back. I could tell him the truth after this. Or not. Didn’t hurt to keep this one close to my chest—that I had none at all. Actually, that would probably be for the best. Didn’t want Jin to turn me into his personal ninja.

  I was not built to be a fucking ninja. An invisible vassal expected to die for their master. What a joke.

  Right then, the girl finally ascended the stairs, with someone behind her. Moments later, I saw silver hair rise up. The guy was tall—taller than me, at least—with broad shoulders and a stiff, straight-backed way of moving, like he had a damn stick up his ass. As more of him came into view, I caught the gleam of metal on his face—some kind of dermal plating along his cheeks, sleek and expensive-looking, the kind rich kids got installed to look intimidating. His eyes were sharp, glowing gold like high beams in the dark. Yeah, real subtle.

  By the time he reached the top of the stairs, I could see the whole package—long legs, lean lower build, broad shoulders, V-shaped upper body, and an air about him like he thought he was too good to be breathing the same air as the rest of us. Golden eyes, silver hair, face of almost hawkish aspect. Intense eyes—he looked like he could win a staring contest with a fucking lamppost. Was he the other girl’s older brother? His red and gold uniform was crisp, buttons done up all neat, like he had just walked out of a modelling catalog.

  The silver-haired girl stepped aside, and the guy—Hou Ken, I guessed—finally turned his attention to me. His lips curled, not quite a smirk, not quite a sneer, but something in between.

  “So,” he said, looking me over like I was some cheap meal he didn’t order. “This is what I’m dealing with?”

  I crossed my arms, grinning. “Damn, you talk like you already won.”

  Hou Ken tilted his head, like I was some kind of puzzle he hadn’t figured out yet. “I don’t talk about obvious things. I just acknowledge them.”

  The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

  “Oh, that’s cute,” I shot back. “You rehearse that in the mirror?”

  Jin wasn’t just smiling, but grinning in anticipation. Ruomei sipped her drink, amused. Hou Ken’s eyes flickered slightly, like maybe he wasn’t used to people talking back.

  “You’ve got a mouth on you,” he mused.

  “And you’ve got some fancy upgrades,” I said, nodding toward his chrome. “Bet they cost a fortune. You sure you wanna scratch ‘em up?” I gave him a good scan just for good measure. My Ping got caught in his fucking ICE. Goddamn rich kid.

  I debated on sending a Breach Protocol his way before realizing—fuck that. Playing it smart? Strategizing? The fuck was that for? This wasn’t work! This was a party.

  And I was here to have fun.

  His lips twitched. “You sure you should be worried about anyone else right now?”

  I grinned. “Nah, that was just me pretending to care.”

  The air around us got heavy. Tension, excitement, maybe a little bloodlust. Jin leaned back, watching it all unfold like a man who just ordered the best meal of his life.

  Hou Ken took a step closer. “I’ll make sure this doesn’t last long, mistress,” he said, voice smooth as ice, giving Ling Ruomei a curt bow.

  I cracked my knuckles. “Good. Saves me the trouble of dragging it out.” I started unbuttoning the jacket before carefully folding it over the balcony railing—the club was surprisingly clean given that this was Night City.

  “The fuck are you doing?” Hou Ken asked.

  “Ballistic threads—just trying to make this fairer on you,” I began to unbutton the shirt as well, revealing my plain white tank top underneath. The girls sitting with Ruomei tittered in delight, and I took some personal satisfaction at that. “I’d take off my pants, too, but—not for free, of course,” I winked at the girls. A few of them gasped in outrage while some others grinned incredulously. Then I looked up at Hou Ken, “so aim above the belt for maximal effect. I’m mostly ‘ganic, so it shouldn’t be too hard to get some good hits in. Best of luck.”

  “Enough banter,” Ruomei announced, “let’s begin.”

  “Wait—” I absently dodged a strike from Hou Ken, raising an eyebrow at Ruomei, “Right here?” I dodged again.

  Jin cupped his mouth and howled “Make it fun!”

  He wanted fun? I suppressed a giggle.

  I could do fun.

  Right, so this fight needed a story of course. Hou Ken was throwing crazy strikes at me now. Flat-handed, fists, everything. It was weird. He was moving stiffly, but undoubtedly with explosive power. In fact, he reminded me of every wuxia flick I had ever seen on freemium TV. At least his form looked combat applicable.

  Rather than evade, I began to block. Had to make things look more even after all.

  Ow.

  Ow.

  Ow.

  His arms were quite tough, and mine weren’t exactly that, being that they were still made of ‘ganic, and his most certainly weren’t.

  Suddenly, an idea dawned on me.

  The balcony drop was right behind us after all.

  I clinched at Hou Ken, just like Dorio had taught me, hugging around his neck.

  Then I absolutely gave up on doing anything useful, simply trying to drag him to the drop. His resistance was almost non-existent, forcing me to have to slow down and subtly give him a way to grapple me and—

  Right there!

  He picked me up bodily and tossed me—right into the crowd of dancing bodies, almost two stories down.

  I contorted in order to avoid seriously hurting anyone, though I did manage to make a few fall down—very minor damage, didn’t matter.

  The bass-heavy beat of electronic Chinese jazz swing cut out mid-drop, the pulsing neon overhead flickering as the music the lights had been synced to suddenly stopped. While those few guys and gals got up and evacuated the dance floor—

  I realized all the dancing had stopped.

  A second ago, it had been a writhing pit of bodies down here, Kang Tao High’s students—elites all, even these relative plebs—losing themselves in music and liquor, and the press of bodies grinding against one another.

  Now?

  Now, it was quickly turning into a goddamn colosseum.

  The music hadn’t even finished fading before the revelers started reacting to my sudden entrance. Like they knew what it meant, on some level. Damnit, I should have seen this coming.

  “Yo! A fight’s starting!”

  Word spread quickly. It started in small pockets as half-drunk voices rose in excited disbelief—some laughing, some confused, some just in it for the spectacle. But then it must have settled in that this was actually happening, and the floor hundreds of students shifted, stepping back, forming a rough human ring of tightly-pressed bodies around me. And then the chanting started.

  “Fight! Fight! Fight!”

  A spectacle, huh? I snorted. Fine, worked for me. I pushed myself up on all fours, groaning way louder than I needed to in feigned agony, putting in some choice sound effects for my viewers.

  A few of the closer spectators jeered, while others snapped holovids mid-stream, their Kiroshis flashing as they captured everything, every second, every angle of each and every drop of blood, ounce of sweat, and flicker of neon lights across my skin. I saw a wall of faces all around me, all alight with the expectation of violence.

  And above it all—above the chants, the flashing optics, the sheer animalistic frenzy of the moment—I watched Hou Ken’s slow and assured steps as he simply… came down the stairs.

  Honestly, I could see the appeal in leisurely walking downwards rather than flex his abilities and dive right after me. It was very hidden master of him. He put on a damn good act of it too. He took the stairs down slowly, each step a deliberate, measured act of contempt, hands held behind his back, and chin pointed up.

  The crowd fucking ate it up.

  “HOU-KEN! HOU-KEN! HOU-KEN!”

  For a moment there, I felt a slight crisis of faith bubble up—not because of this arrogant jerkoff or his trust fund brat peanut gallery, but because I cringed inside when realized I’d just mouthed off about goddamn kung fu tropes in front of probably the wealthiest Chinese girl in the city. Was that racist? …Culturalist? Was that even a word? Point was, was my assumption that her vassal fighter would be using Kung Fu racist? Katsuo had boasted extensively about his chipware, sure, so it wasn’t like I had pulled that from out of nowhere, but did Ruomei think that about me now?

  I winced, cringing at myself. I was such a gonk.

  Not that there was any way for me to apologize or try to clear the air now—it wasn’t like I was dealing with real human beings here. All these people were just… bodies. Or characters, really, in my own personal corpo beat-em-up BD.

  They existed for my amusement.

  “That’s it?” Hou Ken asked quietly, standing at the very edge of the dance floor. “That’s all you could do?”

  I shakily pushed myself up on all fours.

  Then I slowly got up, groaning all the while, before straightening. “No…! This isn’t it for me!” I cried out dramatically. “This isn’t my end! I can still go on!”

  The crowd roared, Kiroshis flashing all around us as hundreds of people recorded every second of this. Somewhere, a girl screamed in excitement. I caught a glimpse of a guy near the bar hopping onto a stool for a better view. I could see people trading bets with one another, treating this as a goddamn impromptu prizefighting match. Damn, I wished I could get in on that game.

  Hou Ken scoffed, “you’re a frog in a well, Arasaka. You might be strong in your school, but in Kang Tao, we all know how to fight for our survival, make our name known and thrive anywhere. And unlike you, we are welcome everywhere we go.”

  He was not going to make me spout off some cliché ‘defending Arasaka’s honor’ line. Especially not in front of a crowd. I absolutely refused.

  I just… raised my fists.

  And, uh, what else did Dorio say? Stand like this. Feet apart, left foot forward, at this ratio to my arms. Uhhhh. Yeah. Seemed about right.

  I threw a few experimental jabs in the air just for good measure, until I really started feeling the whoosh sound effect. It was weirdly pronounced now. Was that just the alcohol? Probably just the alcohol.

  “Nanny, what’s the sitch on my body anyway?” I muttered, inching closer to Hou Ken, who had taken his own stance, and was reading me. “You think you’ve made me as good as chrome yet?”

  [Undoubtedly. Your bones have been reinforced with a nanocarbide lattice, increasing their tensile strength by approximately 850% while maintaining 60% of their natural flexibility to absorb impact. This will make it exceedingly unlikely for your opponent to be able to break your bones. Muscle fiber density has been enhanced by 450%, allowing for a peak output of up to 7,200 newtons of force per limb. Ligaments and tendons have been reinforced with synthetic collagen microfilaments, reducing strain-related injuries by 85% and increasing physical reaction speed by roughly 40%. You’re not as durable as full-body chrome, but pound for pound, you hit just as hard—and you’re faster.]

  Was that a fact? I’d read that Gorilla Arms of average quality could exert up to ten thousand newtons of force.

  Sucked that I was lagging behind, but I was closer than I expected, to be honest. And physical power really wasn’t everything. You could do more with a gun and good aim than with giant metal arms and legs. Nothing in this world was truly bulletproof, in a practical sense at least.

  The most important tidbit of that summary, by far, was that pound for pound, I was as good as chrome—and faster.

  Meaning better. “Better than chrome,” I said. Hou Ken narrowed his eyes. Damn, I was talking out loud.

  D: Not to say that I’m not super fucking jazzed to hear this news right before handing this corpo cocksucker his ass, but—Nanny. We have to talk about your time management, because why am I hearing this—

  [No. No. No. No. Actually, no. We do not have to talk about my abysmal comprehension of time, and your insistent need to learn about every bit of improvement I’ve managed to do to your meat. David, to me, all of that is just—it’s the same as walking to you. Walking. What if I was strangely obsessed with how many steps a day you take, and you continuously forgot to keep me updated?]

  D: Nanny. I hear you. But you live in this meat. So maybe, uh, have more skin in the game?

  [I have all the skin in this game. And you don’t rely on basic physical statistics regularly. You already knew you could beat this flesh bag. This report was for your vanity.]

  D: I fucking—goddammit I hate that you’re so fucking right all the time. I really do. Fuck off. Time out now.

  [Gladly.]

  I clicked my tongue. looked at Hou Ken, who just shook his head, stepping into his stance.

  I did the same. Fists up. Feet light.

  “FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT!”

  And then we gave them one.

  000

  “He’s already a gibbering mess,” Ruomei wrinkled her forehead in a combination of disgust and concern, “Jin, if this is going to turn into a gore fest, I must ask that you refrain from showing me this. I won’t be impressed.”

  “No!” Jin laughed, “No, not at all!”

  But seriously though, what the actual fuck was David doing?

  He was barely keeping up with Huo Ken, ringed by hundreds of dumbass mouthbreathers, gibbering nonsense to himself, barely able to stand on his feet. No, was he swaying on his feet like a—

  Oh, no. No, no, no, nonono! That gonk was way too drunk.

  And now that he was only wearing a tank-top, the truth was out—aside from that disgustingly oversized neural link taking up his entire fucking spine, he really was fully ‘ganic. He didn’t even have any fucking EMP threading that would even imply any chrome either.

  At least, as far as he could tell. And his scans couldn’t really pull up anything on him, either.

  Katsuo had allowed Jin to peek into David’s school med records after he’d first met the gonk at a party a few weeks ago—and despite the clear chrome spine showing at all times on the nape of his neck, neither the school records, or the city records, reflected that David had anything beyond a standard-sized neural link and corneal implants—what every fucker in Night City had.

  That wasn’t crazy, though. It just proved that he had the scratch to make sure all his mods stayed off any books. Everyone did that—everyone with the money, of course. Meaning David did have money.

  Either that, or he let some back alley Ripper implant that spine on him. They didn’t keep records either. But that was crazy. Too fucking crazy to even take seriously.

  Finally, after a million years of them inching closer to each other, Hou Ken finally moved. David blocked. Hou Ken punched. David blocked.

  Ah, for fuck’s fucking sakes! “David, goddammit, do something!”

  David’s eyes met his for a moment and then—

  He jabbed Hou Ken’s jaw and avoided a strike.

  Then they went back and forth like usual. Hou Ken punched. David blocked.

  “Again, motherfucker!” Jin hollered.

  David attacked, staggering Hou Ken. Then he capitalized on that, giving him a punch to his body—a liver shot. Unfortunately, the fucker was chromed at that vital area. It didn’t stun him.

  David had to dodge a furious blow from Hou Ken, and then continue blocking the onslaught.

  Jin was beginning to see what was happening. David was… he was putting on a show. On purpose.

  But he was doing it like a fucking gonk. First of all, he hadn’t even cleared it with Jin yet. Goddammit! They could have done a whole fighting choreo talk in the bathrooms before getting started, come up with a decent monologue, even a few epic one-liners—it would have been a show for the ages. This fucker!

  Still, Jin would have to give the guy points for taking a dive off a fucking balcony to a sixteen feet drop just for the vibes.

  Ruomei tittered. Jin turned to her with a confident grin, “What?” he asked.

  She didn’t stop tittering at his question. Finally, his feigned confusion made her mirth fall into a flat expression, as though she was questioning his intelligence, “you don’t really expect me to be entertained at a long and drawn out fight—engineered specifically to your desire, do I? I value authenticity. And if you want to hold my attention, then your man needs to give me a real show—not this meaningless spectacle.”

  Fucking spoilsport! Jin personally loved this, even if it was total bullshit—for David at least.

  “Besides,” Ruomei frowned, “Clearly, Hou Ken is trying to play along in order to put on this show. That makes two inept showmen in one show. Fix this, Jin, or our talk is over.”

  Wow. Fucking spoilsport biaaaatch! And she was wrong! This was David playing around entirely by himself!

  But playtime was over.

  Jin took a deep breath and then, “DAVID, YOU FUCKING BASTARD! KILL HIM ALREADY!”

  David’s eyes widened for a moment.

  Then he firmed up his entire body and took on a real boxing stance, skipping on his feet, never staying in one place for too long before—like a snake darting for its prey, David’s fist found itself on the face of Hou Ken. David sent a followup that sent Hou Ken staggering back in surprise.

  And Hou Ken suddenly became fucking fast. His arms became a whirl of motion—a blur to Jin’s own eyes.

  “It’s here!” Ruomei whispered.

  Was that—?

  No, no way. Hou Ken. That fucking arrogant silver-haired prick had a Sandevistan?

  He did. Hou Ken was suddenly a whirl of movements, his fists flying too fast for Jin’s eyes to follow while David—

  David was slow enough for Jin to follow, and yet he continuously evaded or deflected Hou Ken’s strikes, and threw counters of his own, over and over.

  “What?” Ruomei hissed, “how could a Kerenzikov compare to a QianT Sandevistan?”

  How the fuck was Jin supposed to know? But he grinned a wild, wild grin, and put on his absolute best bullshit face. “Company secret, Ruomei. Proprietary. Fucking. Company. Secret.”

  She gave him a flat, unimpressed look, but he just ignored her. All he saw was David… well, winning. He got in more clean hits than Hou Ken got in strikes that were inevitably blocked. In fact, Jin could not recall a single moment where Hou Ken had struck through David’s guard to his core. Just block, after block, after block. Sure, that would most certainly bruise, but—fuck. David was moving like he had fucking precognition. Jin had never seen anything like it before.

  “Alright now,” David said audibly, taunting, “where’s the ‘ganic? Show me? Is it here?” he hit Hou Ken on the liver, “is it here?” he did it again. Hou Ken did not react predictably. Just lashed out furiously, as if he hadn’t just taken a hit that would have instantly put down a normal man. “Shit, what about here?” Solar plexus. “Here?” Throat. “Fucking here?” Temple. “Fuck, does it even matter? You’re—” he struck Hou Ken’s jaw, “clearly feeling it! Why don’t you fire that Sandy up again, motherfucker? You almost made this shit fun for me!”

  Each hit, Hou Ken became slower, more bruised, more bloodied. And David kept moving, somehow endlessly dodging and sliding around Hou Ken’s desperate counterassault like a fucking ghost, doing his best to suss out the silver-haired fucker’s weakness until—

  David punched the open air where Hou Ken’s head used to be—because the man had fallen on his back, utterly insensate. He let out a cough, sending a tiny spray of blood next to his head on the floor

  FUCKING.

  YEAH.

  Jin fucking jumped down the balcony, coming to a smooth roll before walking up to David and slapping his hands on his shoulders, sticky with sweat—what the fuck, they really felt like meat! What a crazy guy! “Are you fucking kidding me, motherfucker? Am I dreaming? You—you fucking! Gah!” he let go and walked away, pacing around furiously, “I gotta stop glazing you—fuck, forget I ever said that. Goddammit. Bastard! But you shoulda told me you were playing before doing all that, what the fuck!”

  000

  “That obvious?” I grinned and winced slightly at the same time.

  He looked at me as if I was stupid, “Nobody gives a shit about people trading punches for five minutes straight, this isn’t a goddamn anime. Anyway, let’s go up again and hear what Ruomei has to say to our glorious victor. But…” a flicker passed over his expression as he looked me up and down, “You hurt?”

  Unsurprisingly, I was. Lots of contusions and the sort of shallow internal bleeding that would form a solid portrait of bruises up and down my arms, but otherwise I was fine.

  Though the pain did annoy me.

  D: Nanny.

  I activated the Sandevistan. Nanny healed everything.

  Everything.

  Oh god—hangover.

  D: Why did you undrunk me?! I didn’t ask for that!

  [You are welcome.]

  Fucking hell.

  I immediately rushed to the nearest bar. I needed a new drink in me ASAP.

  No way I was going even a second sober tonight. Something about my ego just couldn’t handle the inevitable self-reflection that would follow. Especially here on Kang Tao turf, which would just endlessly make me think of Fei Fe—fuck.

  “Dude?”

  “I’m ordering a shot,” I muttered, “or ten. You go on up, I’ll follow.”

  Eventually.

  000

  Jin watched as David staggered toward the bar, shaking his head in equal parts admiration and exasperation. The guy had just humiliated Hou Ken, fucking Hou Ken of all people, in front of half of Kang Tao High—and his first move was to refuel on liquor like it was some cheap MMO buff.

  Fucking legend.

  Jin turned back to the second-floor balcony, where his host of the hour, Ling Ruomei still sat, unruffled and apparently unimpressed, fingers tapping idly against the rim of her glass. She had enjoyed the fight—Jin could tell from the way her eyes were still gleaming in the Red Lotus’s neon lights—but that didn’t mean she’d let him see through that mask of hers. She was too good at the game for that.

  With one last glance at David, who was already chugging from an entire fucking bottle of real-deal ten thousand eddie Russian vodka at the bar as excited Kang Tao students mobbed around him, Jin grinned and made his way back upstairs.

  Ruomei’s entourage parted without a word. They knew their place. Good.

  He slid into the seat across from her, stretching his arms along the back of the plush cushions. Fuck did Kang Tao know how to make a man feel welcome. But then again, that was half their biz. Corp espionage, spying, thievery, assassination. Honeypots, all of them. No matter how tempting it was, he couldn’t let himself be personally entangled with them, or with her. Especially with her.

  Not until he had real power.

  “Well?” he said. “Show worth the price of admission?”

  Ruomei took a measured sip from her drink, her smirk returning. “It was… amusing.”

  Jin scoffed. “That all?”

  She set her glass down. “I’ve seen better fighters.”

  Jin snorted, baring his teeth in a too-wide grin. “Oh yeah? But have you seen one our age? Let alone one that could move like that without hardly a single ounce of strength-enhancing chrome in his body?”

  “…No.” Finally, a crack in Ruomei’s expression. An actual scowl. “David Martinez. Who is he? What’s his deal?”

  There it was. The bait. David had pulled through magnificently.

  And Jin? He wasn’t going to let her have a bite.

  Instead, he leaned forward, dropping his voice just enough that only she could hear. “He’s my choom. That’s all you need to know, Ruomei. Now then, you gonna give me the inside word, or are we just flirting all night?”

  Ruomei exhaled softly, almost like a laugh. She leaned back, crossing one leg over the other, and finally, she spoke.

  “There’s been division in Kang Tao’s board on the matter of QianT for months,” Ruomei began, her voice smooth as silk but as cold as tempered steel, now that they were talking actual business. “But this shooting last night, it magnified those divisions.”

  “Divisions, huh?”

  Ruomei nodded. “As far as you need to know, there are two factions on Kang Tao’s board in Night City. The conservative faction, led by Zhou Jianwei, as ever, sees no reason to intervene on the QianT matter.”

  Jin nodded, already taking mental notes. He knew the name—Zhou Jianwei wasn’t just old Kang Tao money, but ancient Kang Tao money. Taiwanese, efficient, unimaginative. The kind of fossilized old fuck who didn’t believe in risks unless they came with a 100% guaranteed return. The Chinese faction of Kang Tao—led by Ruomei’s mother—was far more interesting.

  “Kang Tao’s conservatives see QianT as a bespoke artisan shop, fundamentally unprofitable. A boutique tech firm that specializes in impractical masterworks. Nothing scalable, nothing worth real investment. Even if they had an interest in acquiring the company for its underlying technology, QianT’s suspected connections to offworld research labs on Mars make them too inscrutable. And since QianT has made it very clear that those connections—if they even exist—aren’t for sale, there’s no real value in a buyout as the board’s conservatives see it.”

  Jin nodded along, but his mind was already working.

  Mars, huh?

  Such rumors had been floating around about QianT for years. If they really had offworld Martian connections, then that meant their tech wasn’t just advanced—it was years ahead of anything on Earth. Martian megacorps like GN Trading and Ultor had absolutely refused to ever allow any competitors from Earth to gain even the slightest of footholds on the red planet. That alone made QianT valuable. So—if they had connections to those forces—why was Kang Tao willing to let them rot?

  Ruomei continued. “Our board’s liberal faction on the other hand, sees potential. They think QianT’s technology merits investigation—but not for the price QianT is demanding. With their main point of contact, Mei Jing Qiang critically wounded, possibly dead, the only point of negotiation left with real power is his grandfather.”

  Jin grinned. “Mei Jing Huotang. That old bastard. He fucking hates Kang Tao.”

  Ruomei sighed, gave him a small nod. “Deeply. His hatred for Kang Tao’s ‘liberals,’ starting with my own mother, is… legendary.”

  Huotang, chairman of QianT’s board, was as old-school as they came. A Taiwanese loyalist over a century old. One of the Kang Tao expats from the early days who split off when the company decided to play ball with then-communist China. He fucking hated Kang Tao’s mainland Chinese and Taiwanese sides and anything having to do with either them—apparently, he at best saw them all as betrayers of the nation. At worst? Well.

  Jin let out a low whistle. “So, neither side thinks they can move on QianT.”

  “Correct.”

  “And that means…” Jin trailed off, giving Ruomei a knowing look.

  She met his gaze, her smile faint. “That means Kang Tao will do nothing. QianT will be left to succeed or fail on its own merits.”

  Jin exhaled through his nose. “And most likely fail.”

  Ruomei tilted her head in acknowledgment. “QianT is already being hounded by its creditors. They’ll bleed the company dry before the Mei family gets another chance at a buyout. Your cousin fucked things up more than he could possibly imagine.”

  Jin tsked, tapped his fingers against the table. This still wasn’t… quite… enough to explain everything. “And I’m guessing there’s another reason Kang Tao’s sitting this one out?”

  Ruomei’s crimson eyes gleamed. “A rumor. One that both factions of the board agree on, through their own independent sourcings of intel south of the Rio Grande.”

  Jin raised an eyebrow. “I’m listening.”

  She leaned in slightly, voice dropping to a whisper.

  “QianT has been illegally selling advanced tech to the Mexican cartels.”

  Jin blinked.

  Then he whistled.

  “Oh, that’s fucking rich. The NUSA is gonna lose its goddamn mind if that gets out.”

  Ruomei nodded. “And neither Kang Tao’s conservatives nor the liberals want to deal with that kind of geopolitical fallout.”

  Jin chuckled, shaking his head. “So, you folks are playing the long game. Waiting for QianT to wither on the vine. To become more… receptive… to your buyout terms.”

  Ruomei finally leaned back again, sipping from her drink. “Exactly.”

  He smirked. “Maybe even get enough leverage over them to give the NUSA some sacrificial lambs.”

  Ruomei’s crimson eyes narrowed. She tapped her long finger on the table three times. Her lips thinned as she looked at him, suddenly warier than at any point before.

  “…Yes, should such action prove necessary. Yes. That is my mother’s backup plan, Ryuzaki. Though she would prefer to avoid such… distasteful, appeasement strategies. She sees the NUSA as fundamentally unappeasable, that they’ll only respond to countervailing force over the long term, not negotiation.”

  Jin nodded silently, then let the weight of it all settle.

  It made perfect fucking sense.

  Kang Tao had nothing to gain by moving on QianT now. If they waited, they could let debt, pressure, and politics do the work for them. Maybe even speed things up by leaking info to the Americans on who exactly QianT had been selling to—wait, no, terrible idea, given the political heat that revelation might bring on Night City as a whole. Last thing any of them needed was even a possibility of a second coming of Operation Big Stick—especially before the new gravitational linear frame model was in mass production and ready for deployment to the front lines. And it might be years until then—it was still only in the early prototype stage.

  Seriously. Those fucking idiots.

  “So,” Jin said, tilting his head. “Why are you telling me this?”

  Ruomei smiled. “Because it’s in Kang Tao’s interests to make sure Arasaka doesn’t move either.”

  Jin’s grin faded slightly. “You think ‘Saka’s still gonna pull the trigger?”

  Ruomei’s expression darkened. “Even considering this shooting, we know there are people in Arasaka who still see QianT as a potential asset. If they move too soon, they’ll ruin the chance to force a real buyout. It’s not enough to own QianT—we see it as an inefficient shell corporation, terrible logistics, no economies of scale at all. Their access to Martian technology, though? That’s a potential game changer.”

  “Yep, I get it. “Jin clicked his tongue. “You want me to tell my old man to make Arasaka to back off.”

  Ruomei sipped her drink. “My own mother is advising the same to our faction on the board. She wants to ensure that Kang Tao and Arasaka remain on the same page.”

  Jin didn’t need to ask why.

  Militech.

  It was the unspoken threat hanging over both megacorps.

  If Kang Tao and Arasaka started fighting over one mid-sized company, it would only serve Militech’s and the NUSA’s interests in the long run.

  And neither Asian corp could afford to be divided when the real war came with the Americans. The ashes of the Fourth Corporate War had long since settled, and now the sharks were beginning to circle, converge. It was only a matter of time before the Fifth Corporate War began, and the Americans made their final drive to remove all foreign megacorps from their continent—the ones that wouldn’t play ball at least.

  Jin exhaled slowly. “You play a mean game, Ruo.”

  She gave him a knowing look. “I expect you to play it well.”

  Jin smirked. “Oh, I will.”

  He subtly deactivated his cyberware.

  The entire conversation had been recorded.

  Not just for David—Jin had plans for that gonk, plans of the sort that meant he had to be kept informed on these matters. But also, far more importantly, he recorded for his father. Arasaka’s board in Night City had to know what he had just heard. All of it.

  Jin leaned back, stretching. “I’ll make sure the right people hear the message.”

  Ruomei’s gaze flickered, but she simply nodded. “Good.”

  Jin tapped the side of his glass. “Now that business is done…”

  He grinned, putting in an order of the priciest bottle of Maotai in the bar through the Localnet.

  “Let’s get back to having fun.”