It's About Saving Yourself Epilogue

You know...it's been over a year since I started writing this...A year and a half I wanna say. It's certainly been a trip. And I thank you lot for following this trip with me.

There will be a LITTLE bit more of this that will be posted tomorrow as a Patreon/Subscribestar exclusive. But it's something really small.

For all intents and purposes, this is the last chapter of It's About Saving Yourself. I sincerely hope you enjoy it.

Either way, let me know in a comment.
I'll also be doing a post later where y'all can ask any question you want, and I'll answer it in a writing update or something. That seems like it might be fun.

=][=

He drew the small, plain box out of his pocket and pressed it into Lucy’s hands.

“That’s yours.” He said, squeezing her hand. “Open it when you get where you’re going.”

He turned to the small woman holding a machine gun that was almost as tall as she was. “‘Becca, Falco has the address, watch over them.”

“Wait, Al!” Both the women said as he hopped out.

“I can’t trust anyone else with this. Rebecca. Get them there, I’ll meet up with you first chance I get. When you get there, you tell them ‘Contingency Nine’ you hear me? Contingency nine!” He said, throwing an inert spridery drone into the vehicle, then slamming the back of the van shut. He called the driver, who picked up immediately. “Falco, I’ll distract him, the moment you’re clear, do what you do best.”

[You got it, boss.] Falco answered, his voice tight with tension.

He took a deep breath, hacked the nearby loudhailer, and strode out, seemingly without a care in the world as to the presence of the enormous borg. When he screamed, the building’s loudhailers roared with his voice. “SMASHER!”

The Sandevistan in his back roared, he ran in the world of stopped time until he was in the street in front of the building. He brought up a control UI and programmed a number of instructions before closing it.

Despite his efforts, what had happened in the Arasaka building had not gone unnoticed. The time it took him to retrieve Lucy had been enough for the sun to dip below the skyscrapers and for the street to be lined with media vans and cop cars in equal strength.

He stopped in the circular beam of a searchlight and shut down the Sandevistan, the world regaining sound and motion, Adam Smasher’s eyes immediately turning to find him.

A second after that, every screen in Corpo Plaza showed him, bathed in light as he stretched out his left hand in the direction of the borg. He spoke in a much quieter voice that nonetheless thundered through the plaza. “My name is Alexander Martinez. Better known as Redeye. I, am a killer of men.” Adam Smasher turned to face him fully, turning his back on the vehicle.

And more importantly, to the entrance of Arasaka tower. “If you aim to place yourself between me and my objective, then make no mistake, I will kill you. However, my conflict with your employer has left me much reduced in materiel. I have little left but ammunition for this pistol, as such, I beg of you this one indulgence; step into my range, and I will grant you the death you so desire.”

Adam Smasher’s metal claws audibly groaned with the sheer force with which he clenched them. He walked forward slowly, menacingly. ++YOU MUST THINK YOU’RE SPECIAL, BOY. TO ASSUME YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO CHALLENGE ADAM SMASHER.++

“On the contrary, Mister Smasher.” Redeye said calmly, conversationally, as the enormous cyborg stalked closer. “I consider myself painfully subpar.”

++IS THAT SO?++ Smasher demanded, his voice trembling with unreleased violence. ++THEN GIVE ME ONE GOOD REASON WHY I SHOULDN’T SLAUGHTER YOU LIKE THE PIECE OF MEAT YOU ARE!++

“I’ll give you two, Mister Smasher.” Redeye said, his eye locked onto Smasher’s own through sheer will, only barely able to perceive the large shadow behind the enormous cyborg, he brought up the UI and input one last command. “The first being.”

Something that nobody really advertised, was that the Millitech Minotaur could be exceedingly quiet if one were to redline its anti-grav module. The machine was more than sturdy enough to support its own relatively immense weight; the module was only there at a premium to spare the floor or road it was made to walk on.

As such, the first real warning Adam Smasher had of the Minotaur barreling in his direction was when it slammed into his back at forty-five kilometers per hour. Lifting the borg off his feet.

Redeye activated the Sandevistan and emptied all four shots of his Burya into the center of Adam Smasher’s suspended chest, leaving a sizeable crack on one of the plates. He brought up his hacking interface but clicked his tongue in annoyance when he saw that Smasher had set up his system to Autistic Mode.

Abandoning the Minotaur to its fate, he sprinted for the front gate of the Arasaka tower.

He looked over his shoulder and saw with some dismay that Smasher was moving in the world of stopped time, tearing the Minotaur apart one piece at a time.

“Well.” He muttered as he ran. “That complicates things.”

He finished reloading, and put two flechette-slugs into Smasher, one of them tearing a hole through the cyborg’s ‘head’ where one of its eyes used to be. Buying the Minotaur a few more seconds as he made it through the gate and ran to his car.

Once there, he connected with the vehicle, armed the plastic explosives he’d left in the passenger seat, and slaved the detonator to the proximity sensor in the back of the vehicle. Before running further into the building, stumbling as the Sandevistan deactivated. He’d barely made it to the elevators before a monstrous roar shook the entire floor.

“Okay, not using the elevators then.” He murmured and ran for the stairs. He brought up a camera feed on the lower right corner of his HUD. “Apex!”

A call icon appeared on the upper left corner of his HUD, it showed a glowing sphere of blue energy with a green optical receptor sticking out of it, the voice of a little girl answered. [Yes, dad?]

“Do you have the bandwidth to use the building against him? Target him with turrets, close doors ahead of him, just overall slow him down. Can you do that for me?”

[Yes, dad!] The call cut out as he reached the stairs.

On the camera view, he saw Adam Smasher tear his way out of the crater his body had made in the wall where the explosion had flung him. ++YOU DO NOTHING MORE THAN DELAY THE INEVITABLE! YOU ARE JUST MEAT FOR THE SLAUGHTER!++

With a huff, he started running up the emergency stairs, stepping over the occasional corpse of Arasaka Security personnel as they’d died on their way to respond to his assault. He leaned down and snatched a Tamayura and a Shigure as he ran, not daring to stop and properly strip the corpses.

He swapped out the partially spent cylinder in his Burya, then holstered it.

He kept a close eye on the camera view, where he saw Smasher methodically destroy the first floor’s static defenses. Security systems that had made short work of dozens of Arasaka Security personnel did little else than scratch the finish of Adam Smasher’s plating.

But they bought him time.

Time enough to get to the third floor before Smasher crashed through the door into the emergency stairs.

He considered spoofing the system in hopes that Smasher would be sent on a wild goose chase, but dripping as he was in other people’s blood, with the trail he was leaving behind just by walking, it would be a moot effort.

He trotted through the hallowed halls of the evacuated Arasaka Academy, infiltrating the floor’s defenses as he went and infecting the many turrets’ IFF to recognize Smasher as an enemy. Checking the chamber and magazine of both his pilfered weapons as he moved.

“Apex, how are—?” He began as he cut through a staff room but cut himself off as his Metal Hand snapped up and aimed the Tamayura at a boy and a girl, their bodies entwined and only half dressed, their skin flushed and sweaty.

The sight was so incongruous he actually stopped.

“Really?” He snapped as the two stared at the barrel of the pistol that menaced them. “The place gets evacuated because of an attack and you stay behind to suck each other’s face? There’s a time and a place for that!”

Not bothering to wait for a response, he resumed walking. “Apex, what’s the status on the others?”

The avatar once again appeared on the upper left quadrant of his HUD. [I convinced the NCPD that they are a private security firm extracting a VIP.] She said. [They’re driving slowly at Grandma’s insistence. Nobody is following them.]

“Okay good.” He said as the sound of a reinforced metal door being torn from the concrete wall and flung aside reverberated through the floor. “And break’s over.”

Not bothering with stealth, Redeye sprinted at the same time that he remotely called down the elevators as he activated the floor’s defenses.

++MORE CHEAP TRICKS!?++ Adam Smasher’s voice echoed above the rattle of machine gun fire and the explosive death of the static defenses.

He arrived as the elevator opened, without the obnoxious ping it normally emitted, got in, and pressed the button for the highest floor it could reach. Floor seventy-four.

Redeye closed his eyes and took a deep breath, kneeling on the elevator’s floor to rest.

“Apex, how are things on your end?” He asked.

[It’s getting difficult.] The avatar said as soon as it popped back up on his HUD. [More and more Netrunners are swarming the Arasaka Data Fortress.]

He grunted. “Recognize any of them?”

[A few.] Apex answered, sounding not unlike a child who was waiting to be scolded.

When she did not continue, he sighed tiredly. “Netwatch.”

[I’m sorry.] She mumbled.

He shook his head. “No, it would have been a miracle for them not to get involved. Just…just have some way to egress, prepare something so you can escape into the wider CitiNet. We need only distract them long enough to leave.”

He hesitated, then clutched his hands into tight fists. “And Apex?”

He worked his jaw, then closed his eyes and exhaled. “Be careful.”

[I always am, dad!] She answered cheerfully and cut out the call.

As the elevator reached floor fifty-four, it ground to a screeching halt. The red emergency lights coming on.

Not waiting or hesitating, Redeye sunk his metallic hand into the crack between the elevator doors, then muscled them and the doors to exit into the floor open. The instant he had the minimum space required, he dove through.

The very next second, the elevator fell, he heard the emergency brake slam on a moment later.

A few seconds after that, armor piercing tracers shredded the elevator as they burned up the shaft.

Redeye blinked.

Twice.

Then jumped to his feet and started running for the emergency stairs.

He didn’t bother going around the maze of cubicles, opting instead to tear through the flimsy plastic walls as he made a beeline for the stairs.

He ignored the many scared people who cowered in their cubicles as he tore through. The building clearly not having been evacuated beyond the first few floors.

The instant he saw a flash of steel out of the corner of his eye, he put a .45 caliber hollow point into whoever that was with the Tamayura. The man who was going to try and kill him gained a messy hole in his guts for the trouble, his hand spasming, squeezing the trigger of the .42 magnum revolver in his hand, the bullet whined past Redeye’s head, tearing through the plastic wall of his cubicle as if it weren’t even there, resulting in a spray of blood and grey matter from the poor unfortunate on the other side. And a ragged scream from the one after that.

The terrified screaming started instantly, a stampede of terrified humanity the moment after that.

He activated the Sandevistan and wove between the frozen forms as he ran, finally reaching the door he needed. And deactivated the implant as he began bounding up the stairs three at a time.

Armor piercing tracers peppered the shaft on their way up the building, a few of them chipping the concrete in his general vicinity.

A faint. ++YOU WON’T GET AWAY YOU WORTHLESS MEAT!++ Floated up from far, faaaaar down the shaft.

He ducked and kept running. Further fire was curtailed as the workers of floor fifty-four flooded into the emergency stairs and began the long process of running down.

“Hah! Good fucking luck for once!” Redeye gasped as he continued to run up.

He ran up a dozen more floors, more and more people entering the emergency stairs behind him as he ascended. He was elated due to the delay this would force on Smasher.

At least, he was, until the pitch of the sounds coming from below him changed. He chanced a look down the sheer sixty-something story drop, to see Smasher literally trampling the fleeing Arasaka employees in his pursuit.

Bones broke, organs ruptured, some were thrown down into the void, others jumped in their desperation to find relative safety.

The only saving grace, if it could be called that, was that Smasher wasn’t going out of his way to kill any of them in particular.

“Sick fuck.” Redeye muttered, then shook his head and ran up four steps at a time.

By the time he reached the top of that set of emergency stairs at floor seventy-four, his legs were screaming, his steps uneven, and he could barely breathe.

He grit his teeth and stepped out into floor seventy-four. To be met with bewildered gazes of people in very fancy suits who had very expensive cyber-ware.

Redye oriented himself, made use of the fact that the building’s ICE essentially belonged to him, and slapped everyone around him with Weapon Jam deamons as well as shutting down any offensive cyber-ware before any of them got any ideas.

He stumbled forward, ignoring the heavy stares as everyone present, most of whom probably made a salary in the seven or eight digits, looked about like chickens with their heads cut off, waiting to be told what to do.

He stumbled until he found an infirmary, present was a bored looking, beautiful woman in a lab coat and a goth-punk dress, her black hair was cut into a stylishly messy pixie-bob haircut.

Ignoring her, he looked through the medicine cabinets, all of them helpfully labeled, he stuffed his pockets full of speed-heals, bounce-backs, then hesitated for a second before grabbing the more serious stims.

“Seriously, who the fuck keeps a combat stim in an office building? Are you people really that wired?” He muttered as he put the combat stim into an airhypo.

“Some of the workers here have developed too strong a resistance to anything lesser.” The woman answered helpfully, her voice was a smoky drawl that, were he less tired and not happily in a relationship, would do things to him.

“Huh, that seems really counter intuitive.” He said, as he held the airhypo to his neck and depressed the stud. The airhypo hissed, he felt a cold pinch on his neck, and an instant after that he felt a hot rush as his fatigue was vaporized, the pain in his legs vanished, and strength returned to his limbs. He shook his head like a dog shaking water. “WHOOO! Okay! I can see why people get addicted to this shit. Apologies for the inconvenience, have a good rest of your day.”

He nodded to the woman and resumed jogging. Ignoring her. “You too.” As he searched for the next set of emergency stairs.

One of the workers, a woman with a haircut that screamed ‘My boobs may look fifteen but I’m in my forties and I’m going to make that your problem’ planted herself in his way, her fists on her hips. “You don’t have clearance to be here! Sit down, you’re being detained for trespassing!”

Redeye didn’t pause or change speed, though he did double check that her combat cyber-ware was disabled and that the security system was still slaved to his will.

Seeing he wasn’t deterred; the woman smirked and sent a mental command to the two anti-personnel turrets in the ceiling in front of her. She spoke with mock regret. “You leave me with no choice.”

She had just enough time to register that the turrets weren’t working before he was within arms reach of her. His HUD informed him she tried to activate an arm launcher, her eyes widening in panic when her own chrome didn’t follow her commands.

“Wai—!” She began but was cut off when the back of Redeye’s metal fist crashed into her lower jaw, the crunching snap of metal breaking bone drowning out the sound of several teeth hitting the floor.

He stepped over her crumpled form as he considered using the elevator before slipping into the emergency stairs and starting his ascent once again.

He’d only made it up two floors when he heard the door to the 74th floor be torn off its hinges. ++THE MORE YOU RUN, THE WORSE IT’LL BE FOR YOU! I WILL ENJOY SCOURING THE MEAT FROM YOUR BONES!++

Without thinking, he activated the Sandevistan and threw himself through the door to the 76th floor, running as fast as he could through…a jungle.

The area was muggy and hot, the mossy, sandy ground gave away beneath the tread of his boots. He could see beetles suspended in their crawl up the bark of the trees, moths and butterflies hanging still in the air.

He didn’t get much time to look for the other Arasaka-code-mandated emergency stairs before the familiar crash of a destroyed door reverberated languidly through the trees, the hulking form of Adam Smasher tearing through the concrete wall and screaming as he fired a salvo of miniature rockets. ++NOW YOU DIE!++

Redeye fell skidding to a knee, carefully aimed the Tamayura, and with seven shots, shot the six rockets as they crawled through the air.

He frantically searched through the floor’s defenses, and found a number of enforcer bots, he activated all of them and set Adam Smasher as the target.

++FANCY SHOOTING FOR A MEAT BAG!++ Smasher complimented as he hefted a heavy machine gun in one hand.

Redeye threw himself to the side, the bullets racing through the air significantly faster than the rockets. He emptied the last round in the Tamayura in Smasher’s direction, the borg not bothering to dodge or react at all to the .45 caliber round.

Once the pistol was empty, he pulled out the Shigure and emptied that in Smasher’s direction in a single pull of the trigger, the nine-millimeter projectiles, like the .45 before them, doing little else than scratching Smasher’s plating.

++IS THAT IT!? IS THAT ALL YOU HAVE!?++ He demanded, taking a few casual steps forward. ++WHERE IS THE DEATH I WAS PROMISED!?++

Redeye slid behind the thickest tree he could see, the Sandevistan deactivated an instant later, and the near bass rumble of the machine gun became a continuous explosive rattle, the foliage around him shredding into plant paste and splinters as the armor piercing bullets tore chunks out of the tree he hid behind.

He took a deep breath and plunged himself into the word of stopped time.

He drew the Burya and rolled out from behind the tree, settled the sights on Smasher’s fist, and squeezed the trigger.

In his haste, with the bullets whizzing past him, he ended up aiming high.

The flechette slug still tore through the heavy machine gun’s upper housing before cracking one of Smasher’s right inguinal plates, the weapon falling silent as its mechanism was shattered.

He put the other three rounds into the center of Smasher’s chest, forcing the ‘borg back a step and causing the armored plate to break into three pieces.

++SO YOU DO HAVE SOME BITE IN YOU!++ Smasher laughed. ++I WAS GETTING BORED!++

Redeye jumped to his feet, turned around, and ran further into the trees, swapping out the Burya’s cylinder as he went.

He ran a hand over his remaining shotgun rounds as he kept moving.

“Apex!” He gasped, stumbling as the Sandevistan deactivated, he fell, rolled, and was back on his feet, running. “Apex! Can you find anything to shut down Smasher!?”

Tellingly, it was several seconds before Apex answered. [I can’t dad, I can’t look.]

“Fuck.” He muttered. “They’re pressing you that badly?”

[It’s bad, dad…it hurts.] Apex murmured.

“Okay, okay just…” He felt a titanic punch on his back, sending him to the floor. The tree to his side exploded as something hit it. On the edge of his vision, he saw a black blur and forced the Sandvistan to scream to life.

The blur resolved into Smasher, his foot coming down.

Redeye rolled, throwing himself to his feet as the metallic foot sank into the earth where he’d fallen. His right arm shot out slamming a punch that could bend hardened steel into the center of Smasher’s chest, exploding what little remained of the already damaged plate, shattering more armor beneath it.

He ducked under Smasher’s backhand, jumped over his kick, and was slapped to the ground as the ‘borg took advantage of his being momentarily airborne. He rolled out from under another stomp that ripped a strip off his jacket, drawing the Burya as he went and emptied the cylinder into the center of Smasher’s chest. Using the second that bought him to jump back to his feet, he concentrated on his defense as Smasher continued to attack. Slipping in the occasional steel-rending punch into Smasher’s epigastric plate.

The gigantic borg’s arrhythmic attacks proved very difficult to predict, Redeye found himself unable to consistently read the borg’s movements. His body did not always move and was not balanced like a human body, allowing him to occasionally attack without the telltale signs Redeye had been trained to react to.

Or, as the case went, to pretend at those very same tells.

++NOW YOU DIE.++ Smasher said as Redeye dodged what he thought would be a kick, Smasher’s hand shooting out and taking hold of his metal fist. He reared back, his hand spinning on its own axis.

Before his feet left the ground, Redeye threw himself into a roll in the same direction as Smasher’ fist turned, he still felt like the cyber-arm was nearly wrenched out of its socket until Smasher threw him at the ground so hard he bounced. The borg leaned back and froze as his Sandevistan timed out.

Redeye clawed to his feet, drew a bounceback and another combat stim out of his pocket and stabbed them into the side of his neck. His hearts racing as the nearly paralyzing pain was deadened. He drew his shotgun and emptied the four barrels into the center of Smasher’s chest, the slugs flattening and dumping their kinetic energy into the cracked armor, exposing yet another layer beneath.

He reloaded as he gained some distance and stumbled as his Sandevistan deactivated.

Smasher finished taking a step back, the report of the shotgun bouncing through the trees. ++IMPRESSIVE.++ Smasher said as he absently ran a metallic hand over the damaged area of his chest. ++YOU’RE THE FIRST TO HAVE WITHSTOOD MY PANZERKUNST.++

Redeye paused as he drew one of his last cylinders for the Burya. “Did…Did you seriously create a martial art that only full borgs with very specific setups can conceivably be proficient in, purely as a reference to Alita: Battle Angel?”

Smasher’s head tilted to the side, his one remaining eye flickering for a fleeting instant. ++AH, A FELLOW CONNOISEUR. IT’S ALMOST A SHAME TO KILL YOU.++

“I’d be willing to skip the killing part, myself.” He said past his pants as he finished reloading the Burya, minimizing the warnings on his HUD about the micro-fractures in his ribs, the ruptured blood vessels all across his back, and the bruised bones where the modular shoulder joint had been nearly torn out of him. “Or the fighting. If you’ll accept my apology for egging you on, I’ll be more than happy to politely fuck off. I’ll give you my email, we can chat about back when Anime was actually good.”

Smasher made a harsh grating sound. Laughter. Smasher laughed. ++TEMPTING, BUT NO. YOU’LL DIE TONIGHT, MERCENARY.++

A nav point appeared in Redeye’s HUD as ferro-magnetic slugs slammed into Smasher’s chest and sides, the shriek of their passage catching up to them an instant later.

Dozens of robots came out of the trees, all of them firing their weapons at Smasher, all of them screaming in unison. +Leave my dad alone!+

Redeye turned around and ran as Smasher roared and began destroying them. One of the robots dropped a Nekomata and a bag with five magazines in his way, which he gladly picked up as he ran to the plain, unadorned wall the Nav point directed him to, a wall that began to slide away soundlessly, showing an elevator whose lights were off.

He took a deep breath and grit his teeth, his back screaming in agony as he plunged into the world of stopped time. Sprinting into the elevator, squeezing his body through as he hadn’t given the door time to fully open.

He fell into the regular world, barely managing to hold himself upright as the door reversed and closed, only then did the lights come on.

He tore the gasmask off his face and vomited. His entire body feeling like a singular cramp.

[Dad.] Apex said, she sounded…off. [Daddy, I can’t, they have AI. They are very mean. It’s…difficult.]

Redeye closed his eyes. “I know honey, I know. Where am I going, what’s the plan?”

He took a deep breath, used a little of what water remained in his canteen to rinse his mouth, then drank the rest. He responded as he put his mask back on. “You’re doing great, Apex. We’re almost through. Just a little bit longer. The moment I’m in the air, I want you to give them the slip, get back to your drone, and message me that you’re there. I have a little surprise there that’ll help. But only once you’re in your drone. Okay?”

[Yes…Dad.] Apex said, the little girl’s voice coming through with static and scrapdata screeching.

“Just a little longer, Apex.” He said like a mantra. “Just a little longer.”

The elevator door opened into a floor that looked like a traditional Japanese mansion. With polished wooden floors in the hallways, rice-paper doors and genuine tatami floors in the rooms.

Redeye stepped out of the elevator and fell to his knees. “Okay, fuck…maybe I should have gotten that pain editor…fuck.” He pushed himself slowly to his feet, then resolutely put one foot in front of the other, his knees threatening to give out with every step, his back a single plane of hot, throbbing agony. “Just a bit longer, just a bit longer and we’re done, Apex. That’s what matters.”

He made his way unsteadily to the Nav point, leaving muddy, sandy, bloody footprints with every shuffling step. “Puppies, and kitties, and ice cream. Genuine ice cream, made from actual milk, not the milked cockroach juice that Daring-Dary sells. Actual, fucking, vanilla ice cream. With real vanilla. Can you imagine that? No you can’t, because the vanilla plant went extinct in 2050. Though the first thing I do? I’ll find a cow. I’m gonna find a cow, kill a cow, and I’ll cook, the whole thing, all at once. And then I’ll eat it. All by myself. Maybe I’ll make butter first, so it can be extra unhealthy.”

His rant about what food he’d eat seemed to invigorate him, his steps becoming surer, his back straightening, as he made his way closer to NAV point.

Until he heard an obnoxious ‘ding!’

The Nekomata was in his hands and charging before his conscious mind had finished processing that sound, the doors began to slide open, he glimpsed a huge shadow through the slight opening of the doors. The rail’s overcharge protection triggered, discharging the tungsten spike. He plunged into the world of stopped time and fired off the next three rounds in the rifle without overcharging the weapon, the four rounds cracking and in places shattering the armored plate of Smasher’s chest, granting him a glimpse yet another layer of armor.

He dug out another combat stim, and repressing a feeling of guilt, stabbed it into his neck. Strength returned once again as his hearts raced. He turned around and sprinted for the nav point.

++STOP HIDING BEHIND THE SKIRT OF YOUR PET AI!++ Smasher roared behind him, the heavy thuds of his footfalls accompanied by the shattering of wood. ++FACE YOUR DEATH LIKE A MAN!++

He ignored Smasher, broke through the rice-paper walls rather than go around or wasting the time to open them, until he reached a modern door which he muscled open just enough to squeeze through, abandoning the Nekomata when it got stuck on the crack he’d made in the door.

Redeye sprinted and dove into the open, sleek looking Aerodyne, drew his shotgun, aimed it at the door, and waited.

The door bowed outward as a titanic force slammed into it, before it was torn open from the other side like an exploding tin can. He fired all four barrels, the four brass slugs slamming into Smasher’s chest, shattering what remained of the damaged outer layer and cracking the pristine plate beneath it.

They also imparted just enough kinetic energy to force the metal behemoth back a step.

Just enough for both of their Sandevistans to time out, forcing them into the regular world. Granting the Aerodyne the time it needed to close its door and take off.

Redeye fell back and curled up, trying to get his breathing under control, his chest felt as if a giant were stepping on it. He barely managed to mutter a faint. “Fuck!”

Checking the many diagnoses his HUD threw at him, he saw that the mil-spec heart had suffered cardiac arrest. The second heart more than enough to keep him going, but at reduced efficiency. “Apex,” he gasped out as he forced himself into a kneeling position, then crawling to the panel that controlled the Aerodyne. “Apex, I’m out, do what you’re going to do…get to your drone, now.”

He did not receive an answer, icy fear gripped him by the throat, when suddenly the CitiNet spasmed, his feed was drowned with warnings, spam, obvious malware. Through the Aerodyne’s wall-screen, he could see the advertisements on the side of buildings going crazy before settling into an episode of Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood.

Every screen in the city showed an elderly man in a blue jacket, he spoke while looking into the camera, his voice firm, but kind. “This program is not for young children to watch alone. When children see and hear about frightening things, it’s best for them to have an adult close by, somebody who loves them, and can put their arm around them. So, please get a grown-up that you love to watch this program with you, because we’re going to talk about some sad and scary things. There are people in the world who are so sick or angry that they sometimes hurt other people, and they’re usually the ones who end up on the news.”

Redeye wheezed with laughter. “Apex, Apex you’re a genius!” He said hoarsely. “…Apex?”

The icon appeared on his HUD again. When it spoke, the little girl’s voice sounded much more natural, at ease. [I’m here, dad! I’m in my body! What next?]

Redeye sighed in relief as he brought up a different interface, one that detailed the internals of a custom drone with spidery apertures. He navigated various parts of the drone’s blueprints until he settled on something that would mechanically shut down the drone’s ability to move and would isolate it from Net access. “First, how long do we have? Who is all over there? Did everyone make it alright?”

[Okay! You, me, mom and the others should be the only ones who can communicate for a few minutes. Mom and Grandma and Miss Rebecca and Miss Kiwi are all here! As are the magic lady and the elf!] Apex rambled, the feed changing to show each of the people in turn. [Mister Falco left, apparently, Mister Vik refused to come.]

Redeye chuckled. “I see. Okay Apex, here’s the plan.”

Redye triggered the mechanism, and the call cut out immediately. He closed his eyes, sighed, and spoke into the air. “No matter what, you’ll be safe now, Apex.”

He brought up navigation, and set his destination, the Aerodyne changing course and heading for Japantown.

Redeye took a few moments to punch himself in the chest hard enough to bruise, but the percussive maintenance was enough to get his milspec heart restarted, if with a little stutter and out of syncopation with its twin. “Yeah, definitely gonna have to get that changed out first thing.” He muttered.

The Aerodyne’s target lock alarm rang shrilly in his head. He quickly cycled through the views of the vehicle’s various cameras, and saw that, hot on his six, was another Aerodyne, this one boxy and militaristic, it also had a nine-foot-tall metal monster standing on top of it.

“Why won’t you just take the fucking L!” Redeye shouted as he redlined the Aerodyne’s engines, the sudden acceleration feeling like a punch to his whole body.

In response, Adam Smasher raised a long tube.

The Rayfield Excalibur had a max speed of roughly eight hundred kilometers per hour. It could be pushed to roughly a thousand kilometers per hour on a dive.

The Arasaka Amaterasu Shoulder-fired Missile Launcher’s payload had a maximum speed of seven thousand five hundred kilometers per hour, it could reach this speed in just under five seconds of acceleration.

As such, the missile that slammed into the rear of the Rayfield Excalibur had not managed to reach even half of its speed by the time it impacted.

That said, by that moment, it had been traveling at nearly three times the speed of sound, making it essentially silent to its target. As such, the only warning Redeye received was a flash of light, and just over a second to curse. Then he was too busy trying to keep the Aerodyne in the air to spare Smasher any thought.

He woke up to shattered metal, fire, and smoke, his gasmask’s redundant air supply being the only reason he could breathe at all. With a groan, he pushed, punched, and shifted metal debris off his body, dragging himself out of the wreck of the VTOL. Once he was a few meters away from the fire, he took stock of himself. And was quite dismayed to realize that his right leg stopped a little below the knee.

He watched the arterial spurts in fascination for a few seconds, before his training took over and fashioned a tourniquet on it. With that taken care of and nothing else being immediately fatal (none of the other fractures were immediately life-threatening according to his diagnostic programs.) He stabbed himself with a speedheal, a bounceback, and the very last of his combat stim, giving him a rush and clearing his head enough to take further stock.

The Aerodyne was totaled; he’d managed to crash just short of the edge of the pier in corpo plaza behind Arasaka Tower. The pier hidden underneath the city’s megastructures. Which meant there was only a kilometer or so of water between him and extraction, though he could conceivably drive to the highway that connected the two landmasses of Night City.

Looking at the small piece of sky that he could see between the buildings and saw the boxy Aerodyne moving carefully closer. Judging by the damage to the buildings along his likely path, he realized that he must have bounced between the buildings on his way down. “You know.” He gurgled a laugh. “That probably looked really fake.”

He brought up his contacts and called the one labeled ‘Lucy.’

She picked up immediately. [Al!?]

“Hey honey.” He said with a sigh. “Just calling to say hi.”

[Alexander Martinez!] She said in that tone that made every guy’s butt pucker in panic. How was she so good at that already?

“Okay okay. Just…” He coughed, it felt wet, like something came up with the cough. He suddenly felt rather grossed out. “Just calling is all.”

[Al? Are you hurt?] Lucy asked, her tone changing on a dime to concerned.

“Y-Yeah. Took a few hits. But you know, I’m on my way.” He said, at the same time that he once again brought up his contacts and navigated to the one called. ‘Kiwi.’ “Stole an Aerodyne so, I can avoid the traffic, which is awful by the way.”

Lucy giggled. [Oh, that’s great. The white-haired girl will be happy to hear that, she’s been pacing nonstop since we got here.]

‘Hey Kiwi, is everyone in the Behemoth?’ He texted.

“So hey. Just to pass the time…” He coughed more. “Was thinking about our last conversation, you know, about what to name our kid.”

‘Yeah, how much longer till you get here?’ Kiwi returned.

[Alex, we are not naming our child after a hundred-year-old cartoon!] Lucy said sternly and mock-angrily.

‘Tell the white-haired girl ‘Contingency ten’. And I’m sorry to say, I’m going to have to owe you that favor.’ He sent to Kiwi.

“But ‘Optimus Prime Martinez’ is such a badass name!” He whined, then groaned as he turned over to look at the sky. “Any kid would be lucky to have a name half as badass as that!”

‘Don’t worry about it.’ Kiwi returned. ‘We’re squared.’

[Alex, naming your kid after some old cartoon is weird.] Lucy said.

“But not only is the name badass.” He insisted. “He’ll have a destiny and shit! With a name like that, one with history! He’ll obviously turn out a badass and a good man!”

[Oh? What if the baby’s a she?] Lucy demanded.

“Then you name her Megatron, because girls are evil and you lot have cooties.” He answered.

Lucy laughed, then cut off when an eerie sound came over the call. [Al? Al something’s happening. Wha—?]

The call cut off.

He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and let it out slowly, as he heard the Aerodyne whine closer, he looked around, and spotted his quad-barrel shotgun.

It lay broken in three pieces.

He blinked at it, then laughed. “Oh man, it finally broke! I can upgrade now!”

When Adam Smasher landed with a crash, holding an L-69 Zhuo, he continued to laugh, long and merrily. Then moving as fast as he could, he drew and aimed his Burya. Only for it to be shot out of his hand.

“Well shit.” He said past his chuckles. “That didn’t work.”

Adam Smasher walked until he loomed over Redeye, then reached down and used his left hand to pick him up by the collar. ++MY PREY DOESN’T USUALLY LAUGH AT THIS JUNCTION.++

“Well, you see Mister Smasher. I won.” He said, hanging limply in Adam Smasher’s grip. “I may die here, but those I cared for are gone, beyond the reach of Arasaka, and anyone else who might try to harm them. So…I won.”

++ARASAKA CAN REACH ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD.++ Adam Smasher said.

“Exactly!” Redeye responded with a laugh.

Smasher studied him for a long time before speaking. ++TAKING YOU DOWN WAS AN EXERCISE IN FRUSTRATION. BUT I’LL ADMIT, I WAS CHALLENGED. YOU’RE THE FIRST TO SURVIVE THIS LONG AGAINST ME…IT WOULD BE A SHAME TO LOSE SUCH DISCIPLINE.++

“Is this where you offer me cookies if I join the Dark Side?” Redeye asked.

++IN A WAY. YOU’D MAKE FOR AN INTERESTING CONSTRUCT. WHAT DO YOU SAY?++ Adam Smasher offered.

“Sorry, but no.” Redeye answered. “I did that to enough Maelstromers and Scavs while doing research, to know that I’d hate every second of it. So, no thank you.”

++SHAME.++ Smasher said, a projectile system popping out of his forearm. ++ANY LAST REQUESTS?++

“Yeah.” He said, his head lolling on his neck. “Can you drop my corpse off at Lizzie’s? I think the Mox at least will give me a proper burial.”

++VERY WELL.++ Smasher said. ++ANY LAST WORDS?++

Redeye gurgled a laugh. “You will die, to a corpse, piloted by a ghost. And it will beat you to death…with a dildo.”

Smasher tilted his head to the side and made a humming noise.

Redeye then used his metal hand to squeeze down on the barrel of the projectile launcher, crumpling the barrel an instant before it was triggered. The weapon exploded, causing him to be peppered with shrapnel and Smasher to drop him with a curse.

He landed in a heap, his HUD screaming at him about his external jugular vein having been severed. With a curse he jabbed his organic thumb into his neck and pressed it closed. With that done, Redeye had the time to realize that his right arm now ended in a cruelly shaped, sharpened, blackened spike, just short of where his metallic wrist had been.

++YOU REALLY DON’T KNOW WHEN TO GIVE UP, DO YOU?++ Adam Smasher said, his voice ringing with both anger, and begrudging respect.

Redeye glared up at the huge cyborg. He felt warmth suffuse his veins, and his diagnostics programs informed him that any further speedheal may begin to be toxic to his system. He blinked in confusion at the notice, before his HUD showed him his blood pump. A few moments later, he got a message that his external jugular vein had been healed.

++MANY OTHERS IN YOUR POSITION WOULD HAVE BEGGED FOR MERCY LONG BEFORE THIS MOMENT. I DO REGRET HAVING USED THAT MISSILE LAUNCHER. THIS…THIS IS JUST UNSATISFYING.++ He dropped something on the ground next to Redeye. ++I’LL DO YOU ONE LAST FAVOR, BOY. LET YOU END YOUR LIFE WITH SOME DIGNITY.++

Redeye looked at what Smasher had dropped. A Malorian Overture, .42 caliber magnum load. The weapon was matte black and menacing.

Redeye took a deep breath, then grit his teeth through the agony of forcing the Sandevistan to roar to life. His milspec heart failed again, but he nonetheless used his left hand to snatch the revolver and aimed it at the very center of Adam Smasher’s chest, then pulled the trigger.

The weapon bucked in his hand, the armor piercing round sinking into the plate compromised by the brass penetrators. He fired again, and again, each round further cracking the brittle armor. He fired a fourth time, the plate disintegrated, granting Redeye a glimpse of Adam Smasher’s biopod, nuzzled deep in the most heavily armored section of the borg’s body.

With a triumphant scream, he pulled the trigger.

‘Click.’

He pulled the trigger again.

‘Click.’

With rising dread, he pulled the cylinder release and swung the cylinder open.

Two of the cylinders were empty.

++BE PROUD BOY.++The titanic borg said, staring down at Redeye with its single remaining, malevolently glowing eye. ++YOU’RE THE CLOSEST ANYONE’S EVER COME, TO KILLING ADAM SMASHER.++

Redeye roared and threw himself upward, swinging the sharpened spike that was his arm.

The L-69 Zhuo flashed.

Urawa Saori sat up with a strangled gasp. Her face tingling with the phantom sensation of micro-missiles tearing through it.

She tore the BD Wreath off her head, the music of Lizzie’s Bar returning her to the present. She sat back and breathed a sigh of relief.

No matter how many times she watched it, Redeye’s Last Stand always hit different than any other XBD. There had been attempts to replicate it, or surpass it, but it was known as Jimmy Kurosaki’s and Judy Álvarez’s magnum opus for a reason.

Redeye’s Last Stand was…special.

She groaned and stretched as she got off the BD wreaths. Lizzie’s was one of the few places where the XBD could be enjoyed, and there was something…special, about experiencing it in Lizzie’s Bar.

Ignoring the other patrons shouting for beer, the girls of Lizzie’s insulting them as they served, and the occasional catcall for her to give a drunk man a lap dance, Saori went to the display set near the BD wreaths, the one with Redeye’s gear, still covered in blood, some of it his, mostly of his enemies, and stood in front of it.

She was just tall enough that her face was reflected on the helmet, the mask seemingly superimposing itself over the lower half of her face, leaving only her ice-blue eyes visible over a green lower jaw. The rest of the outfit dwarfed her. She was slight of frame, svelte, showing off her flat stomach with a crop top, and wearing the tight jeans that really showed off her legs. She looked like exactly what she was, a girl out for a fun night in the town.

But her reflection on that mask made her imagine being…more.

More than her father’s ‘perfect yamato nadeshiko’. More than ‘that girl that Redeye saved once’ as she was to her classmates.

With a shake of her head, she stepped way from the display, and stopped to read the plaque, a plaque she’d read so often she essentially knew it by heart.

Saori sighed and walked out of Lizzie’s Bar. Her hand falling to the Tsunami Nue she kept holstered at her hip.

She thought back to the BD, to the way Redeye, her savior, never once gave up. And with a resolute nod, she went to a nearby store, bought herself a gasmask, and called Regina Jones.

She had an iron, she had the will. And just like her Hero, she would make this damn city remember her name. She would force Night City to recognize that she wasn’t just some corpo rat wannabe.

Urawa Saori, just like Alexander Martinez, would become a Legend!