As the two friends left the private room of the Afterlife where he had just finished programming the last details of the plan, a leaden silence seized Victoria, she who was so suspicious and who thought about how she had left with Christina the day before this historic day for her and sidekick and best friend, Jackie, who meanwhile was more than excited to become a living legend of Night-City as a result of breaking and enjoying his life with all the money he was going to make.
It was only a matter of minutes, during the journey to the final destination, a silence reigned in the car, until the call of T-Bug, to check if the link was stable and secure. Arriving at the entrance of this huge tower, Jackie could not help but laugh at the look so serious of Victoria, who was concentrated to the maximum and very observant of where she was, she was there, finally she was finally going to return the favor to those who had taken these parents from her so many years ago. She was ready to take action, nothing could stop her anymore.
While the heist was going like clockwork, they were forced to wait for long hours for everything to coordinate with the final assault. Victoria wanted to contact her best friend, but the stakes were far too risky for the communication to be intercepted by Arasaka. So she decided to rest until T-Bug could break through security, and facilitated access to the sequel.
～
The fateful moment had finally arrived, as he managed to infiltrate the penthouse undetected, they eventually pinpointed what they had come to and taken so much risk. It was a briefcase, quite heavy, it contained a program to save a digital psyche of a person once dead. But before they could leave the room, a Navi approached and a person went up via the elevator, they were stuck. After a moment of reflection, T-Bug manages to open a window to allow the two friends to escape, m but the moment the window opened, she warned them that there was a problem and that she was not the only one on the network, it was then that the last radio communication was T-Bug's cries of pain before this same communication suddenly cut. Victoria understood that the situation had just escaped them. They began to flee the scene trying to pass through a windowsill, it is there that they both fell through a window and found themselves in a room where they were quickly surrounded by a dozen soldier trainers from Arasaka.
～
The fighting began with bare hands so that Victoria and Jackie managed to retrieve a pistol to defend themselves against Arasaka's forces who continued to pour towards them in whole squads. That's when things got out of hand, a bullet hit the briefcase, which damaged it and forced both of them to open the briefcase to check the status of this chip, which prompted Jackie to insert it into her port in her neural port, but a few minutes later, as he made his way up the tower to the parking lot, where the car was waiting for them, Jackie was shot in the stomach. Victoria tried her best to repel the assaults of Arasaka's forces while helping her friend to stay on his feet and keep fighting.
～
They finally arrived at the parking lot and managed to get rid of the last soldiers who were blocking their way. As he left with the car, he was slowed down by the living legend of Night-City, Adam Smasher, a man who had received so much improvement that there was not an ounce of humanity left in him, he had become a cyborg made to destroy his target no matter what. But the two young friends still managed to avoid him and flee. The journey was long to the hideout where they were supposed to deliver the briefcase, while Victoria tried as best she could to keep her friend conscious, Jackie's wounds being too great, in a last breath he inserted the chip into Victoria's neural port and told her not to trust the one who had hired him but to go away while she still could. Jackie's lifeless body sent to her family, and that's when she began to keep a low profile trying to figure out what had happened during this heist, while protecting herself from the fixer who had hired her, Dexter Deshawn.
Until she received a message from an unknown number saying these few words :
<< Sh3 1s 3v3ryth1ng f0r m3, 1 m4nag3d to r3l3as3 h3r, s1gn3d 8. >>
She didn't understand who the person who had just sent her this message was, and wondered what had been released, and if it was not something but someone?
Victoria fell asleep, unanswered to her questions and was already thinking about the next day....
～
Meanwhile, Christina was scanning her phone counting the hours that passed, without hearing from Victoria, it had now been 10 days since they had had an answer to all her calls and texts. She watches every report in the newspaper hoping for more information, she did not dare to contact the NCPD to report her missing, she wanted to find the answers to these questions on her own. When she was on a trail she thought was the right one, she would always fall back on a place "Kompeki Plaza", but she did not understand, because Victoria never mentioned this place, knowing that a night in this hotel is clearly beyond their means, but after a few days of searching, she found an article that was 2 weeks old, on an intrusion within this same hotel as well as on a murder that occurred the day after the last contact with his best friend. She then believed that Victoria had gone from the wrong side, she who had always fought for the right people. But Christina then came across the name of the deceased person and the person who occupied the penthouse, her blood then only made a turn when she read the name of Arasaka. She didn't know what to think, and just hoped Victoria wasn't involved.
It was then that she received a call during the night, it was the charcudoc Viktor Vektor, who informed her that Victoria had passed by his clinic following numerous injuries sustained during a fierce fight with Arasaka's henchmen. He informed her that she was currently busy resting at her clinic and that she could come by, but he told her that she was not aware of his phone call, for Victoria did not want her to worry, even if it was already too late for that.
～
As Christina arrived at the clinic, she saw her best friend, lying on the table, with bandages and a multitude of wounds on her arms and face, she then remained at her bedside for several hours before receiving a phone call, the call came from a person she had not answered for several days, the one with whom she had a fairly close relationship, she had met him in a nightclub, at Lizzie's more precisely, on his twentieth birthday, since that day she had remained in contact and saw each other regularly, but as Victoria had occupied her mind for several days, she had forgotten to answer him, she picked up, apologized in any way she could, and invited the young lady to join her at her house for a drink and a chat, something the person on the other end of the line was quick to accept.
In the evening, she was stressed about seeing her again, because the last time they had seen her, it had not gone well, because Christina had fallen asleep in front of the movie they were watching that day, and the person had taken it badly thinking that she was bored when they were both together. But since then, things have changed, and she has forgiven herself, but you are probably wondering who is this person with whom Christina has a date, well this person is Maria Jimenez, a young corpo whose only professional goal is to become the new Fixer of Night City, but above all, to destroy Arasaka.
They talked for long hours, Maria was worried about her, because she had noticed that she was worried about something, she then asked her :
- What is going on? There's something on your mind, I know you well enough to know when something is wrong...
- I'm sorry, I won't have to bother you with my stories, especially since I love spending time with you....
- It's Victoria, right?
- She set out to pursue Arasaka and bring them down for the death of her parents for so many years, but now she is in a dirty state, I'm afraid she will do something that I can't go back....
Maria hugged Christina with a soft kiss on her cheek, not far from her lips, and promised to do her best to find as much information as possible about what was going on in that tower, to protect her best friend as best she could, but before all that, she had to settle some matters and get support from her contacts. Before walking away, she gave Christina a small smile and wink, then returned to her car and left as the early morning was just beginning to rise.
～
It had been 1 week since Victoria was at the Viktor Clinic, while she felt better, she straightened up with all her time screaming with all her strength after her friend << T-BUG...... >> , she screamed her name so loudly that she dropped the ripperdoc from his chair, she took her phone and reread the message she had received a few weeks rather saying it is a few words :
<< Sh3 1s 3v3ryth1ng t0 m3, 1 m4nag3d to r3l3as3 h3r, s1gn3d 8. >>
But who could it be, and if she was still alive, Victoria trying to contact the number in question, thanked Viktor and promised to be careful, even though he knew that it was just empty words, he knew her, and knew that this was not the last time she would find herself on his table in such a state.
～
She tried to follow her pain medication, but she was not the type to listen to what was being told to her, even though she should have taken her medication with her, because shortly after leaving her apartment, she began to have visions of her friends, whether of Jackie or T-Bug, she couldn't help but run around trying to escape, she couldn't shake the idea that it was her fault that those friends were dead.
It was then that she went to Lizzie's for a drink and forget those flashes she had for 2 days, despite Viktor's ban on drinking for a few days, she met a girl with green hair melted to pink, her heart began to beat faster before seeing the girl leave the room towards what seemed to be the offices or the storeroom. She finished her drink and took the road to her apartment, where she opened a bottle of tequila while renouncing to this girl seen earlier in the bar, but something else took over these current thoughts...
Who could the message come from?
Was T-Bug still alive?
If so, why hadn't she called her yet?
So many unanswered questions, what happened, Victoria finished her drink, then went to bed without knowing what to think......
Comments