Cyberpunk: The Relentless

"Name?"

"Lucy."

"Real name?"

"Real name."

Oliver stared at Lucy, who was obediently seated on a metro bench. There was something oddly familiar about this interrogation.

Back when he first met Karl, he had been questioned in the exact same way.

"Age?"

"Twenty-one."

"What do you do?"

"Netrunner. Occasionally make some extra cash on the metro."

"Karl."

Oliver turned to Karl.

"She telling the truth?"

"Based on her registered identity in Night City? Pretty much. But she seems to be an outsider—there's no record of her before she got here. Then again, that's pretty normal in this city."

Karl yawned as he spoke. After giving Lucy a few more glances, he added,

"Saw her a few days ago at a restaurant downtown. Pretty sure she dined and dashed."

"So she's a thief and a dine-and-dasher? A street rat?"

"Most likely."

Karl wasn't particularly interested in dealing with pickpockets. Killing her wasn't necessary, but roughing her up and tossing her into a dumpster? He had zero issues with that.

Karl didn't discriminate—man or woman, he'd hit both. If it came down to pulling the trigger, he wouldn't hesitate either.

"Damn, I just wanna eat some braised meat already… the metro's too damn slow."

Unlike Karl, Oliver was actually thinking about what to do with this thief.

She tried robbing the wrong people—and on top of that, right after they had their car stolen. Her timing was unbelievable.

Should he beat her up and toss her out, or…

Oliver turned to David.

"David, what kind of chip was she trying to steal? How much was it worth?"

David glanced at Lucy, who had already made quite the impression on him.

"Just a storage chip for cafeteria credits. Had about three hundred eddies left in it."

"Three hundred?"

Oliver nodded and, in front of Lucy—who was clearly tense—gestured to Jack to ease up on the trigger a bit.

"Then let's make it three-for-one. Pay up a thousand eddies as compensation."

Oliver understood how things worked on Night City's streets. But steal from him, and there had to be consequences.

She got caught, and she wasn't skilled enough to get away with it. So instead of calling NCPD—who wouldn't do much besides lock her up—she could just pay a fine.

"Three times? Wouldn't that be nine hundred?"

Lucy, feeling slightly less pressure from the gun, still had the audacity to argue about the numbers.

Even at a time like this, she was trying to bargain.

"Round it up. Be glad I'm not charging you ten times the amount. Transfer all of it to David—it's his money. You picked the wrong target. If you're gonna steal, at least go for someone with cash. Instead, you went for a broke kid."

"An Arasaka Academy student is broke?"

Lucy might have been handing over the money, but she wasn't going down without a fight—at least verbally.

Still, she transferred the full one thousand eddies to David without hesitation.

"Not every Arasaka Academy student is a corpo brat."

Oliver turned to David.

"Got it?"

"Yeah, one thousand eddies."

"Alright, then. Consider this your lucky day—I won't kick your ass. Next time, be more careful who you pickpocket."

Just as Oliver was about to say something else, he noticed Lucy's eyes flash for a second.

"Trying to hack us?"

That was his first instinct.

Before he could act, Karl's lazy voice came from the side.

"It's a call. I'm reading the data now."

"I already paid up—can I at least answer my damn phone?"

Lucy was clearly eager to pick up the call, but with Jack's gun still pressed to her head, she didn't dare make any sudden moves.

"Be more careful next time, chica."

Jack finally lowered his gun.

"Not everyone is as nice as us."

"Not everyone would rob me for a thousand eddies either."

Her extra earnings for the day? Completely gone.

Lucy was just about to answer her call when she noticed something strange—

The laziest of the group, the black-haired hacker, had suddenly sat up straight and was looking right at her.

"Maine… you know Maine?"

Lucy blinked in confusion.

Only now did she realize that the person calling her was Maine.

Wait—did this guy hack into my system and check my call logs?!

If she hadn't just been staring down the barrel of a gun, she would've counter-hacked him on the spot.

But that wasn't what mattered right now.

What mattered was that this guy had recognized Maine's name.

Because Maine was her squad leader.

"You know Maine?"

Lucy fired the question back at him as she answered the call.

"Lucy, got a job. Get here fast."

"Maine."

Karl's voice cut into the call, joining the conversation.

"Karl?!"

On the other end, Maine was stunned.

"Why the hell is my call to Lucy routing to you?"

"It's an open connection. Lucy—what's your connection to Maine?"

"Wait, you ran into Lucy? She's a new member of my crew. Since Sasha is still recovering, we needed an extra netrunner for jobs. Kiwi found one of her contacts, and Lucy joined us. Something happen?"

Maine instantly realized that Karl had tapped into Lucy's comms channel.

Which meant something must've gone down.

"If she screwed up, cut her some slack for me, will you?"

Maine knew how Karl operated.

If Lucy was still alive and talking, that meant Karl wasn't too pissed.

But if things had really gone south… Karl would've already put a hole in her head.

Maine was hoping to smooth things over before it escalated.

"Nah, nothing serious. She was just making extra cash on the metro… and picked the wrong people to rob. We already settled it—her skills weren't sharp enough, she paid up, and it's done. But if she's one of yours, we could've let it slide."

Karl explained the situation to Oliver, Jack, and David.

Meanwhile, Lucy's face was burning with embarrassment.

Not only did she get caught… but by someone Maine knew?!

This was beyond awkward.

"Yeah, that's nothing. If it's all settled, then let me apologize on Lucy's behalf. Let's grab a drink sometime—I'll cover it."

"Not necessary… but if you've got some good food spots, I'm down. I'm cutting the call—talk to your team. If anything comes up, hit me on private comms."

With that, Karl ended the call.

Since Lucy was a friend of a friend, there was no need to keep things tense.

"I'm Karl. That's Oliver, and that's Jack."

Karl gestured toward David.

"And this is David. Guess you could say we didn't exactly start off on the right foot. Let's start fresh."

"Lucy. Netrunner for Maine's crew."

She introduced herself properly this time.

And right on cue—

The metro arrived at their stop.

Bringing an end to this extremely awkward encounter.

The moment the doors opened, Lucy practically bolted, barely throwing out a goodbye as she escaped into the station.

She knew Maine's crew was going to roast her about this for weeks.

"Braised meat time!"

Coincidentally, Lucy's stop was the same as Karl and the others.

As Karl cheered about finally getting to cook his long-awaited meal, David took a moment to glance at Lucy's retreating figure.

So she was a mercenary too…

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