Chapter 26: Arasaka

"Rebecca!"

Mane commanded from the driver's seat. Rebecca, sitting next to Lin Yue, leaned halfway out of the window, perched on the door frame.

"Whoosh!" Pilar's window also slid open, and he tossed out a "Scorched Earth" incendiary grenade from his belt. As a tech expert, Pilar always had some kind of ordnance on him.

BOOM!

The intense blast wave sent the car fishtailing. A deafening explosion instantly turned the pursuing van into a fireball, sending it tumbling backward!

Spent casings from Rebecca's gun clattered into the car. Amidst her shouts, she unleashed a shotgun blast into the rear windshield of the following vehicle. The glass shattered, mixed with blood and gore; the driver had been turned into mush, and the vehicle veered wildly, crashing into a burning pile of trash on the side of the road in Pacifica.

A true Night City cyberpunk squad indeed! Lin Yue felt he hadn't chosen wrong.

"Get to work, Mr. Lin!" Dorio raised her pistol, leaning out the window to join Rebecca in the assault.

The Scavengers were suppressed by the heavy fire. Lin Yue caught on instantly, opened the sunroof, and stood up on the back seat. He mounted his Nekomata rifle on the roof, locking onto a Scavenger who had just poked his head out of a window.

The sound of the sniper rifle, like an electromagnetic heavy cannon, echoed through the dilapidated streets of Pacifica.

"Nice shot, you asshole!" Rebecca laughed, praising Lin Yue. Her voice was carried by the howling wind into the ears of the Scavengers behind them.

"Damn it! Kill that bitch! These guys are tough, stay sharp!"

The burly Scavenger wore a strobe-lit, graffiti-covered mask—a method they used to hide their grotesque faces. He was muscular and wore a butcher's apron sticky with gore and flesh. Before he could finish his sentence, nothing was left but his neck, swaying in the wind outside the window.

Which one was that? Lin Yue counted; it seemed to be the third.

"The meat grinder is here!"

The rifle in Rebecca's hands spat sparks, riddling the Scavengers' pickup truck with holes. Bullets whistled past her ears, but instead of being afraid, she squeezed the trigger even harder.

The Scavengers changed tactics, flanking from a narrower side road. Rebecca, caught up in the frenzy, didn't even notice.

*Zip!*

A bullet struck the window frame next to Rebecca, causing her to instinctively shrink her neck. Lin Yue's pistol had already taken out the driver of that vehicle. Lin Yue and Rebecca exchanged a glance, then both continued firing.

Several of the Scavengers' bullets hit Lin Yue's arm. His subcutaneous armor only allowed the bullets to penetrate a short distance; the deformed slugs remained embedded a centimeter under his skin. There was no severe cavitation effect, just a light trickle of blood.

No longer the frail body that would render him immobile.

Love you, Doc Viktor!

Lin Yue truly felt that Viktor's hardware was top-tier. His "Copper Heart, Iron Guts" perk granted him even greater resilience, and the bleeding from some of his wounds was already stopping. Although the pain was real, at least it wasn't a case of being pierced through by a single shot.

Following a series of collisions and explosions, Lin Yue and the Mane squad fought their way to the Pacifica coastline. After the battle ended, Lin Yue sat in the back seat, using his hand to dig a bullet slug out of his palm.

Rebecca patted Lin Yue on the shoulder in approval, then crossed her arms and leaned back against the cushion, closing her eyes with a look of satisfaction.

"Screw you, Scavengers!" Pilar's grotesquely long cybernetic arm reached out the window, giving them the longest middle finger in Night City!

...

Following the corporate pickup instructions, the car slowly drove to the entrance of an abandoned hotel by the seaside.

The rusted iron fence groaned in the sea breeze blowing around Night City. In the courtyard stood a man in a gray suit wearing sunglasses, flanked by two mechanical guards and several security personnel. A guy wearing an Arasaka netrunner helmet sat on a chair in the back, typing on a computer.

Mane slapped the face of the man they had rescued. His vitals looked stable, though he was likely in shock. Mane hoisted him over his shoulder. Chewing on a cigarette, he cursed, "This kid's got no pants on; he's chafing me!"

The corpo dog gestured. As the group walked into the courtyard, the man waved his hand, and the mechanical guards lifted the man from Mane's shoulder and placed him into the trunk of a car.

"Nice work. It seems this new dog you've picked up is quite efficient." The man clapped his hands, a remark that made Lin Yue frown slightly.

"Your boss made things clear to everyone, right?" The man scanned the group.

Mane looked at Lin Yue with a puzzled expression. Lin Yue shook his head. "Clear about what?"

"Keeping secrets, everyone." The man pointed to the Biotechnica logo on the car behind him. "This guy was carrying secrets, got cornered by us in Dogtown, and then tried to hire Scavengers to silence him. Who would have thought those bastards would try to sell him to us instead. We had no choice but to swallow that loss."

"Did this guy tell you anything?"

Mane was annoyed. "Can you just spit it out? Enough with the runaround."

"It's just a small insurance policy. 755, come over here and wipe their memories."

As he spoke, the cybernetics of the Mane squad members beside Lin Yue suddenly began to spark with electric arcs! Amidst the crackling, Mane's dark, burly body kicked up dust as he struggled to stand. Their cyberware had all been disabled; they were left with nothing but the ability to speak.

"Lin Yue! What the hell is going on?" Rebecca's expression was ferocious. "Screw you, corpo dog!"

Pilar yelled, "I knew nothing good would come from following this kid!"

Lin Yue remained calm. "What's the meaning of this?"

The Biotechnica man waved his hand. "Hands mentioned you to me, said you had some prominent figure backing you. I'd like to ask who that is. As for them... 755 was worried your friends might do something irrational, so she stopped their cyberware from working for a while. No objections, right?"

"Mr. Lin!" Dorio's gaze went cold. The entire squad was looking at Lin Yue.

"If I were you, I'd consider how to get my partners back on their feet, and you'd better brush the dust off them, too."

The man didn't speak, but the netrunner, 755, did. It was a distorted, fuzzy female voice: "And how do you plan on making me pay?"

Lin Yue ignored the netrunner entirely. "My boss said he’s taking the Dogtown job, no matter what. Let me guess—you want to stick up for Hands, right? And as for you, Miss Digit, your mouth is too big. It’s a real testament to your boss’s blindness that he’d hire an idiot like you."

"It seems you still don't quite understand Biotechnica." The man shook his head. "Do you know what you mercenaries... and your so-called boss... are in our eyes? Dogs. Efficient dogs that can get the job done."

Lin Yue asked, "Do you know a saying in Dogtown?"

Seeing the man remain silent, Lin Yue continued, expressionless:

"Even dogs... can bite."

As he spoke, the faint sound of car engines drifted from the old highway behind them. Two corporate vehicles emblazoned with the Arasaka logo—dark Lexus ZR-5000 security cruisers—slowly pulled up.

"Damn it, why is Arasaka here?" The Biotechnica security team fell into slight disarray.

The lead Arasaka vehicle stopped behind Lin Yue. Two Arasaka agents stepped out and opened the door, and V hopped out from the back seat.

"Dr. Isaacson, Biotechnica R&D. Since when did you start doing the work of a field agent?"

"Is the mess from 'Safe-Spirit' still not cleaned up yet?" V stared at the Biotechnica man.

The man glared at her. "Who the hell are you? Arasaka... does your boss really want to mess with us?"

"Watch your mouth. When Arasaka does something, do we need to ask our boss for permission? We still need this guy—"

A burst of electricity erupted from 775's netrunner helmet. The woman screamed as she rolled off the back seat.

"Let that be a lesson to your people... So, is this over?" V's expression didn't look at all like she had just taught a netrunner a lesson. She had a keen sense of measure; just enough force to keep someone bedridden for a few days—the perfect amount.

Dr. Isaacson's expression shifted. This Arasaka corporate woman was likely the person behind the boss of the mercenary standing before him.

*Screw you, Hands.* So this mercenary was working for Arasaka.

*Damn!* The doctor cursed the Dogtown fixer a thousand times over in his mind.

Isaacson seemed to be weighing his odds and fell silent. Time ticked by, and everyone's hearts grew heavier. Lin Yue felt beads of sweat on his brow; he wasn't sure if Biotechnica would let this go or if they would make things difficult for Arasaka.

Only V stood there, watching the Biotechnica people calmly. Behind her, the Arasaka agents had their hands on their holsters.

"Let's go!"

The doctor's face flushed red, and he finally compromised.

V raised her hand, her fingers twitching. "Don't let the door hit you on the way out."

The group watched as the gritting-their-teeth Biotechnica personnel departed. As the engine sounds faded into the distance, everyone let out a sigh of relief.

Everyone except Lin Yue.

He didn't feel relieved at all. There is no such thing as a corporation backing a mercenary for free, and V was not the type to make a losing deal. Arasaka never did anything for nothing.