Mission Complete

Watching the face covered in cybernetic eye implants explode right in front of her, Carl shook her head and staggered sideways.

"Hey, KK, you okay?!"

Oliver, who was a little faster than Jack, hurriedly supported Carl. Looking at the Maelstrom ganger whose face had blossomed open, he clicked his tongue. "Looks like a bloody flower really did bloom."

"I almost died."

Carl felt like her face was killing her, and one of her arms seemed dislocated. The Crusher's power and recoil were both absurd. She had only fired one shot, yet both her hands had gone numb.

"Get up first, Carl."

Jack came over to help Carl to her feet. Seeing her crooked nose and the cheek that had split open to reveal a bloody cross-section of flesh, he reached out and pressed a hand against her nose.

"Bear with it."

Then, without giving Carl a chance to react, Jack wrenched hard. Carl felt a crack echo through her skull as her nose was snapped back into place.

"Ahh!"

The sharp pain made Carl cry out, "Damn it, Jack, couldn't you give me a second to prepare?!"

"If I gave you time to prepare, it'd hurt worse."

Jack spoke with the confidence of experience. Looking at Carl's miserable face, he showed a smile that seemed especially guileless with his current expression. "How do you feel now?"

"Much better. At least it's just hurting now instead of throbbing."

Grimacing, Carl glanced at the Maelstrom ganger on the ground. "Judging by the quality of this guy's Subdermal Armor, he might be the leader of the Maelstrom here. Ordinary punks probably can't afford armor that can withstand Copperhead rounds. We might be able to catch our breath for a bit."

"No wonder this job was worth a hundred thousand eddies. Fuck, I thought that Corpo Dog was being generous. Turns out there was such a tough bastard here. Even Copperheads couldn't punch through it. That thing must cost at least thirty thousand eddies." Jack changed what he called the employer, reverting to Corpo Dog.

"It's fine. Most of the job's done now. We just need to find that box and destroy it, then the remaining seventy thousand eddies are ours. Once we split it, you'll have enough money to get yourself some decent Subdermal Armor too."

Carl patted Jack on the shoulder. "But once we find the thing, we need to get Old Vic to patch us up as soon as possible."

"Let's do it your way."

Oliver picked up the Crusher Carl had dropped after firing it. "We could also jack into the corpses from earlier and see if we can take the money from their private accounts. Hopefully their heads aren't too badly damaged. If they look like this one, we won't be able to read anything."

"That probably won't work. I put a bullet in everyone's head."

Carl shrugged. "Come to think of it, why was that woman chasing after you? Some romantic debt you left behind?"

"Who knows? She's dead, so there's no way to ask. If she were alive, we could try finding a netrunner to pull the data."

While chatting, the three moved quickly. Jack, whose leg was injured, went back along the way they had come to pick up guns for resale. Oliver and Carl, who could still move despite her aching face, went to search the factory for a computer and jack into it to find records related to the box.

It took Carl half an hour to find a computer on the factory's first floor. She didn't find anything related to the mission, but she did see something quite interesting.

It was a record of Maelstrom's recent attacks on various corporations and clashes with different gangs.

"Maelstrom caused another stir in Kabuki District yesterday." That was the first thing Carl had heard upon arriving in this world, spoken by a news announcer. Adding the Sixth Street Gang's gun shipment connected to Oliver being hijacked, the Corpo Dog's box being stolen in this job, and now this whole series of records on the computer—

Maelstrom was preparing for something, and it might be something huge.

But that had nothing to do with her.

She was just a nobody on her second day in Night City. She wasn't in any position to get involved in the affairs of a major gang with more than thirteen hundred members. Though she had killed nearly twenty Maelstrom members by now, that was still far too few compared to their total numbers.

I found the box.

A message came through from Oliver, along with its location. After receiving it, Carl disconnected from the computer in front of her and casually fired a shot into it with the Lexington, destroying its data.

It wasn't for secrecy. Their situation had already been exposed on the surveillance cameras. She just wanted to test the gun's power on a computer.

The Lexington couldn't penetrate Subdermal Armor, but it could destroy a computer. Still, judging from how the bullet lodged inside after hitting it—

It'll do, I guess.

Its penetration was still lacking. Maybe she really did need a new gun.

In her heart, Carl was already preparing to abandon this "old love" she had only gotten two days ago.

By the time she reached Oliver's location, Jack had arrived ahead of her. The box, identical to the one in the employer's files, sat right before them.

Carl nodded to the two of them, then called the employer. A few seconds later, the call connected.

"How is the mission going?"

This number seemed to have been set up by the employer specifically for this job. The moment the call went through, the other side knew it was Carl calling.

"We've got the box. Do you need to verify it?"

"What does the box look like?"

Carl examined the box and reported the relevant details, including the red flower pattern on it.

"That's the box. Destroy it."

"Understood."

Carl nodded at Oliver. Oliver walked over to the room's access point and used his own port to connect to the room's surveillance system and begin recording.

Then Carl backed away a few steps. Jack tied several grenades beside the box, moved it into a corner away from them, then pulled all the pins at once and turned to run.

Five seconds later, the grenades exploded, blasting the box into fragments. In the final instant before it burst apart, Carl seemed to glimpse several bar-shaped Data Chips inside, but everything turned into ash or debris with the fireball.

Oliver waited a moment, unplugged the connection cable, and transmitted the video file to Carl. Carl forwarded it to the employer.

More than ten seconds later, the call between Carl and the employer disconnected.

"You did very well on this mission. You weren't overly curious. I'm very satisfied."

Along with that message, Carl received a notification that seventy thousand eddies had been deposited into her account.

This employer had paid without hesitation. Finish the job, get paid. Honestly, they were a pretty good employer.

"How is it?"

Oliver glanced at the wreckage. Though he was a little curious about what had been inside the box, he cared more about the payment.

"It's in. I'll transfer your shares right away."

The next second, Oliver received a notification that he had gotten twenty-three thousand three hundred eddies. Jack received the same.

"There's an extra hundred eddies that's awkward to split. Let's use it for dinner. Tonight, we'll find a decent place to eat."

"I know a few good restaurants."

Jack strongly approved of Carl's suggestion, though he added, "But if we go to places like that, a hundred eddies might not be enough. I'll transfer some back."

"Forget it. I'll cover the extra."

With Carl's unconcerned wave, their little team's first mission came to an end.

Mission payment.

One hundred thousand eddies.

P.S. I'll adjust cyberware according to my own judgment, as well as the prices of other things. After all, the rewards for missions in the game and the anime differ too much. Please understand.