Artifice

Status
Not open for further replies.
Caesar looked up to see Gracia eating rather formally. He looked down at his own plate. She was using an actual steak knife, while he used his combat knife. Definitely different upbringings, here. Did he even have an upbringing? He could hardly remember anymore, all he remembered was his parents dropping him off at an orphanage in upper, several years of blurry agony, and then the Artificer that gave him his arms. Who he killed, of course. He would pay no debts for an unasked service. Artificers did that often, taking the dying and modding back to life and into eternal debt. Which made him realize: she had her own mods. That arm looked pretty fancy, definitely not the work of a Neutra Artificer and likely cost a pretty penny. "So, what's the story?" he asked, pointing to her prosthetic arm with his knife.

"Forty five minutes, Lord Caesar." "Noted, helm."
 
He looked at the woman who had just come in on the group, checking her body from bottom to top and admiring her features. Jaxer met the girls gaze with a grin as she asked who she was and he shrugged at her before stretching his wings for a moment. He began to tap his foot on the ground, thinking of some witty answer to meet the statement with but he couldn't think of anything. The 'batman' was about to render some words to the girl who asked him a question but his train of thought was derailed when the girl with the large power fists asked who she was. Even the ugly mutant from his other side asked who he was as well and his look gave Jaxer the hint that he wasn't very happy, but the 'bat' didn't care either way. Jaxer was just excited at the fact that everyone suddenly wanted to know who he was; he never thought that he would become so popular in such a short amount of time! He blinked his eyes a couple of times before bringing up the internet and brought his arms up, beginning to type away at his holographic keyboard. After bringing himself to the Forma Regalian police site, he saw that his masterpiece was still there. Jaxer grinned before pressing his right temple, bringing up a large display of the police website, still having the image of a large phallus encircling a world.

"You guys may call me the hacking heckler! Or heckling hacker? Hacking hackler? Oh well! You guys may just go ahead and call me Jaxer since that is who I am. I am hacker extraordinaire! Vandal of numerous websites, and the most reliable mercenary who gets no work ever! Don't you like my slogan? Doesn't it just make you want to invest ALL of your credits into such an individual like me? You know, since we are all here, how about I give you my number if you need me to do anything for you guys!"

His hands rapidly brought up a new tab showing a number. The display showed the numbers 903-5762. The beast man did not care that much about giving his number out openly to a few people. He needed to get some work in anyways or he would be kicked out of his apartment!​
 
Resic took another step back, moving closer to the mutant without notice, as the one called Jaxer stretched out his wings. He actually had wings! So he must be some sort of mutant as well! Just like the one she was standing very close to. With a quick glance at the mutant male, she shifted away from him feeling embarrassed about having moved so close to him. But it seemed that he had not minded; not once had he tried to move away from her or push her away. Either way, it was best that she not get to close to any of them without making sure that none of them meant her any harm. Cyborg or not, avoiding harm to a body she could not pay to have repaired was one the top priorities on her list.

Her eyes moved back to Jaxer as he began to ramble on about him being a hacker. Though if anyone had not been paying attention from the beginning, they would have been quite lost as to what was going on. She listened and could not help the smile that was forming on her face as he kept on going. Watching him move about as he spoke. All of it was quite amusing and despite the events that had brought the all together, Resic could not help but giggle once he had finished. Figuring it would not be a bad idea to keep the number handy, Resic looked at the digits he had brought up and memorized them with ease. "You are strange." Turning so that she was facing all three of them, Resic kept her smile in place and looked at them all. "My name is Resic. Unlike you Jaxer, I am not worthy of a slogan." Her smile flatered for a moment, but with an inward poke to herself, it was lifted right back to how it had been. Her black orbs landed on the female boxer... "Thank you for saving me from that drunk. It was very kind of you to do." Her words were pleasant and filled with much gratitude. She really was grateful to the woman for saving her. If he had gotten his dirty hands on her, there was no telling what he would have done. Her gaze moved from one to the other, lingering on the mutant male a second longer than the boxer or the 'batman'.
 
Jordan watched a scuffle turned murder occur involving a woman in a robotic exoskeleton and some lowdown, who got engaged in a conversation with some mutant in oddly nice clothing. When suddenly a bad jumped between them. Jordan then heard something. He heard a voice, but from close not from below. After a quick check of the area, gunshots were heard. 863 turned around and found that it came from a camera turret underneath 863 folding into the wall. "Time to get someone's attention" Jordan said to himself. 863 popped a round into the camera.
 
Last edited:
Gracia sighed and sat her utensils down, relaxing her elbows on the surface. "So, the deal with my arm, right? Well, you know I'm from House Sinclaire in Forma, bla bla bla, arranged marriage. Well, when I was about 17, we'd recently purchased a particularly feral mutant for the gladiatorial games. When I mean he was particularly feral, I meant people had to wear full body armor to be safe around him, and even then, there was a risk of him ripping you in half instead of cleaving you in half. He had these razor sharp bone blades from his forearms, kinda like scythes. Believe it or not, he was pretty calm around me. I was the only one who could approach him without armor. He treated me like a dog treats their master. Well, except, one day, he had gone through some really rough training - involving obedience torture. You know, the trainer says jump and if you don't jump, you get a fingernail plucked off, or some mutation agitated or something. He just got shocked, cut, and salted. He'd been broken, and... Well, not in a good way. I went to see him, and..." Gracia looked down and her right arm started supporting her forehead, her hand combing out her bangs.

She sighed and straightened her posture again. "Bastard chopped off my arm. Almost mauled off my leg, too, although I made a good recovery there. No long term nerve damage, no tendons severed, nothing, just a few scars. I had to go through some major surgeries, some to prepare for the prosthesis. After I recovered, any mutant which had a less than human brain would lash out at me. The human-brained ones even hated me in the first place. The Sinclaires don't buy mutants anymore. I... Prefer not to go near them. Bad experiences and all of that." She pulled up the leg of her right pants leg to show the scars on her thigh, just above the knee. "Full fuckin' recovery. Prosthetics made up for the rest. Cybernetics is one Hell of a science. It's partially why I got into Robotics, although I'd always enjoyed robots in the first place. After that, I started commissioning mods for myself. Recoil shell in the right shoulder, neuroprocessor in the temporal lobe on the right. The right side of the brain controls the left side of the body, so, it made sense to get it on the right. That's when I went bad girl and started hacking. Met a couple boys on jobs, started hanging out in Neutra more often, folks got angry, had a couple of my boyfriends killed because they had some asshole lined up for me to marry. I retaliated by killing said asshole. Now they just want me gone. I've still lost a couple boyfriends to assassins because of them, though." With that, she pulled her pants leg down and got back to eating her synthetic steak.
Was this guy mentally ill? He was giving his number out in public after he...

Disgusted, Aeon held back much of his strength and slammed his hand into Jaxer's neck, pinning him to the ground. A weaker man would likely suffer a concussion. "Listen up, you little shit. You're obviously out to lunch or something because even I know that you don't give out your contact information AND name after proving that you defaced a public domain - especially not the Forma Police Department. They have access to Upper and Neutra resources as well as their own. If they find out it was you, you'll be hunted down and strung up. I know for a fact that they would just LOVE to work out the kinks in their website, starting with you, so do yourself a favor and make yourself scarce for awhile."

But it was obvious the small girl had a soft spot for this winged prick, so he let him go, rolling his shoulders to work out the combat numbness - the absence of sensation he got in a fight after his gladiator training. He'd been eviscerated and fought on because of it.
 
"Goddammit, motherfuckers!" Roslyn cursed as 5 was shot as it was folding itself away, luckily the mic was still in tact, it was only the screen that was damaged beyond repair. She clamped her finger onto the mic, firstly she turned the dials down on her voice amplifier, causing her tone to sound automated once more;

"To the one who shot the camera; you owe [undisclosed name] five-hundred credits. If this is not delivered to the bank by noon tomorrow, they will have to either: A) Take the money by force, or B) Take blood money. Have a nice day, Sir or Madam."

"You want me to get the bots?" Morikei sighed,

"Please do, well, if that one doesn't comply, then yes. Get the mites prepared." Roslyn replied as she swiveled around, now facing him in her chair.
 
Caesar listened intently to her story. It was actually quite interesting- he himself was rather indifferent towards mutants. Anyone who owned one knew not to let it get near him aggressively, or he'd put it down. And if they complained he'd put the owners down beside them. It was unlikely to run into mutants in Neutra, though. They were either too stupid to come up from lower, too chained to come down from Forma, or too smart to show themselves in broad daylight. He Finished his synthsteak as his helm alerted of the 20 minute mark. At thought occurred to him just then. "Helm." "Yes, Lord Caesar?" "Reassign name." "Name change prepared." "Helm code 'Brutus'." "Accepted. I shall now respond to the alias of 'Brutus'." "Excellent."

He waited for Gracia to finish her synthetic steak before taking her plate and silverware and dumping them into the dishwasher. "Alright, Gracia. Grab your guns or whatever else you might need. It's showtime." he said, placing the nanofiber armor back onto his body. From the shelf he grabbed his assault rifle and pistol, placing them into preset spots on his person. Placing Brutus back onto his head, he waited at the door for his new companion.
 
Gracia found his polite gathering of her dishes laudable. Even for a native to Neutra, he had better manners than some of the scum her family had tried to pair her with. Best potential boyfriend ever. She let off a smile as she was directed to retrieve her guns, which she did so happily. There was a mutual trust between them, so she'd never have to feel so unsafe in his hideout again, or so she hoped. The first thing she did was check the cylinder of her shotgun for cartridges. She ejected the empty shells and put in new ones. She changed her clip on her PDW and her pistol, taking a few minutes to refill said clips before placing the clips and the pistol back in her back. Holstering her guns, she popped her knuckles and rolled her shoulders, nodding an affirmative for readiness. "It's about damn time."
 
"Good. Get in the car. Brutus, set the Imperial's coordinates to the home, workplace, and favorite hotspot of the Target." "Yes, Lord Caesar." HE entered the garage of sorts, the entire complex underground. he climbed in as the door popped open, and held them just long enough for Gracia to get in. "First, we check her PC. You hack, I'll guard. I know nothing about her except she's been known to kill intruders, so be prepared for fire." he warned her, the car taking off. "1695 Kirrst Avenue in Upper is our fist stop. Next, a tech testing site. After that, we head back to Neutra to check out some of her hangouts." he said coolly but rapidly, briefing Gracia of the situation.
 
Gracia sat in the car and crossed her legs, dragging her smartphone out of her satchel to input and store the information she was being fed. "No kill unless the evidence is conclusive, right? I'll be through any security measures she has up within the moment we get there. I can perform a sync with her browser cookies and short-term storage, as well as stealing her IM info and checking up on her that way, or I can do an active investigation. We can get up and go if I do a sync, but I'll probably get more information if I investigate. What do you recommend, Caesar? By the by, you got any non-lethal weapons in case she finds us? I don't think the guy wants her dead unless she's definitely a cheater, so we'll have to incapacitate her."
 
"Imperial, generate non-lethal ammo clips for all personal weapons on board." A compartment opened and out came several clips of varying types, each containing non-lethal stun bolts. They were designed to deliver electrical shocks to stun the target long enough for them to be apprehended, but do no serious harm. "Sync first. If it looks like there might be something, go active. I want to be thorough about this." he said, unloading his personal guns of their conventional ammo and replacing them with the stun bolts. OF course he would keep conventional on him as well, and maybe some incendiary. Never knew what could happen, these days.
 
Gracia didn't expect that, not even in Forma. Some sort of tech she hadn't heard about - she really needs to read up more on that stuff. Too busy with her nose in computer codes and AI programming. There was one instance where she had a superb AI program she made installed on a mindjacked hostile. He survived - Gracia wonders what happened to him. "Nice. Shock nets for my shotgun, too." She unloaded her guns, shotgun first, then PDW, then pistol, and reloaded them with the non-lethal cartridges. After replacing the weapons in their place, she looked over to Caesar. "Never used stun bolts before. They got recoil like ballistics, or do they just float away without any kick? I'm used to recoil, but it would be nice to pull a trigger and my Recoil Shell not activate."
 
Caesar nodded, typing something into the dash. "Nope. Electric bursts propel the things out with the force of static energy. Less distance than standard projectiles, but they won't kill anything but lizards and small rodents. perfect for taking down a close range psycho-bitch." he leaned back in his chair. "Brutus, set to play Moonlight
Sonata on repeat, but hyperset visuals to alert of anything worthy of noticing." "Yes, Lord Caesar." "So, Gracia, just how many people have you killed?" he asked, as though it were a casual question. Which, to residents of Neutra, it really was.
 
Ancient music not unlike what she'd often hear playing in the halls of the Sinclaire mansion. Acoustics and manual wind. She learned how to play the electric violin, but she was more of a cello girl herself, so when she crossed over, her arms got a lot leaner. She wasn't exactly a virtuoso, though. She prefered raves to concertos, but she was quite good anyhow. "People I've killed? Shit, I've probably killed more people than live in Forma. Security, police, the occasional target for an assassination. Being able to jump across entire streets tends to get you assassination contracts. If you don't count mindjacking and robots, I've probably killed around the neighborhood of 400. If you factor mindjacking and bots in, I'd say more like seven. You gotta take a couple people down in my line of work, especially when people see your face or happen by while you're hacking. I've only been at this for 6 years, but I'm pretty sought out as far as hackers go. What about you? How long you been at the business, how many people you had to kill? How many avoidables and unnecessaries?"
 
It took Caesar to recount. He had the full count as they arrived. "Roughly 2,265 total, majorly elimination of entire gangs. About 140 or so could have been avoided, but witnesses and Uniform Pigs get in the way." he said, getting out of the hovercar and making sure all his guns were locked and loaded. "Been in since the Artificer, so..." "Ten years, three months, and twenty-four days." "Thank you, Brutus. Oh, if you're not too fond of the music I can set Sonata for just me and have the externals blast something more to your tastes, if you'd like." he offered, waiting for her to get out.
 
Gracia stepped out as well, stepping onto the ground beneath and unholstering her shotgun. Indoors, close quarters, keep it quiet, keep it secret. "The music's fine, it's just not my favorite. I'm from Forma, I acquired a taste for the stuff." The fact that she PREFERRED raves didn't mean she despised classical. Gracia nodded to herself. "You're very good at picking up subtle hints. All the shit you've been mentioning had recently crossed my mind. I'm impressed." At that, Gracia looked about to gather her surroundings. "How're we gonna do this? Up from the ground or down from the roof?"
 
Caesar laughed quietly. "When you get paid to read certain people and then kill them, one tends to note the little thoughts that cross the eyes in their brief flight across the mind." he laughed a little harder, realizing the vocabulary he just used. "Now, don't take me for an intellectual because of the way I speak. I used to read dictionaries and shit I got so bored when I didn't have work. In a regular conversation, I could impress a Forma with regards to my status. Any in-depth stuff and I'm fucked, however." he considered the two options. "We'll go top down. There's a ladder series on the side of the building we can climb. Then we just search until we have her. Look for... Brutus?" "Angelique Asarrat. French-Arabic." "Thank you, Brutus. Angelique Ass-rat." he joked, headed towards the ladder series.
 
"If we weren't going quietly, I'd have an alternative method of getting in from the roof. I'm right behind you, pointman."

Mission start. Strictly business - no matter how bad she wanted to get into this guy's pants, they were still professionals. Gracia got her shotgun on ready, holding the over-under shorty like a really heavy pistol, pointed slightly down so she could easily acquire a target if shit got real. She was still ready to throw out a quip or a seductive line, but she was much more prone to talking tactics - move up, head down, on your six. Business is business is business.
 
IT took but a minute for them to get to the roof and pick the lock of the roof exit. He guessed security here didn't expect Neutra Mercenary level skills to be invading the building, so fuck it. All the easier. They made their way down, searching each hallway, Brutus bringing up room records of the apartments. "406. Floor below." He rushed down the stairs, and began looking for the room. "Found it. Numpad lock. You hack, I'll cover." he announced, taking position.

Once inside, they found the room all but empty. There was a wall plug, some furniture, and brain-internet connector. "Huh. Webjunkie. Get cracking, I'll cover the door and hall. When you have what we need- or don't- let me know." he called, pulling out his rifle and taking a knee behind whatever he could use as cover. "MAke it quick."
 
Of course she expected him to hack the lock. Except she didn't need to. An electric discharge left her left arm as it made contact with the door handle, opening the lock and allowing her to work the door. "Electric locks will open with a discharge of the right voltage. Numpads are always the same." She made it look easier than - well, actually, it was pretty easy. On the neural link, she could employ mindjacking techniques to steal the information. She crouched down on her right knee as she held her phone in her left hands, which split apart and worked tirelessly towards their goal. "Beginning sync. Code for interrupt, designation 'Romeo has killed Tybalt'. Code for success, designation 'Hamlet has killed Claudius'. Code for lead, designation 'Malcolm has killed Macbeth'. Remember that, C." Her literary allusion also showed a bit of Forma blood in her.

It's odd, really. New technology can make other technology obsolete and cause older tech in the latter area to be the new norm. Since an electric discharge can open an electric lock, keys were the only way to go.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top Bottom
Back