Friday Night Firefight: A Cyberpunk Isekai

Farida Nazeri was one of the many ripperdocs in Dogtown. She had ended up there during the Unification War when the NUSA was trying to reclaim its long-seceded territories. She had been attached to a Militech paramilitary unit deployed to Night City to set up a staging ground for the impending invasion. When the war ended without Colonel Kurt Hansen – the leader of the Militech unit – being able to sack the city, he left Militech and established himself as a warlord in Dogtown. Farida chose to remain in the area and open her own ripper clinic.

I knew that Hansen had provided her with some funds and support when she was setting up her clinic so he’d have a ripper on call for his Barghest soldiers. I also knew she still had contacts within the FIA – the NUSA’s version of the CIA. It was those connections, along with the advanced cyberware she possessed because of them, that made her clinic and ideal target for a heist.

My initial plan for robbing Farida’s Dogtown clinic had me hanging around the place for a couple days, pretending to be homeless. The past few months in Night City taught me that nobody looked twice at homeless people. It was the perfect cover, giving me the chance to scout out the clinic’s security and see if my burgeoning netrunner skills could get me inside without triggering any alarms. However, after running through the plan in my head, I realized I was being an idiot and that there was a simpler method to gain access to Farida’s clinic.

I rang the doorbell at the front of the clinic and waited for Farida to let me in. As the door buzzed open, I stepped through and strode into what felt like a mudroom. Another glass sliding door stopped me from making my way further into the clinic. Farida stood on the other side of the glass, shooting me an inquisitive look as I came in. I greeted her with a nod and a wide smile.

“Hey doc. I heard you’re the best ripper in Dogtown and wanted to see if I could score some upgrades.”

She tilted her head and stared at me. “Why me?”

“What do you mean? I just told you. Heard you’re the best.”

She looked me up and down, taking note of my somewhat bedraggled appearance. “Other rippers would be cheaper.”

That kind of hurt. But I noticed she had spotted I wasn’t wearing a gun. Good. I’m not armed. Not dangerous at all.

“You’re right,” I acceded with a shrug. “There are other rippers. At least five around here. One works up at the stadium and deals in super high-tech military cyberware. I don’t need a rocket launcher stuck in my arm though. Another is out in the stacks and seems kinda shady. Don’t know his whole deal. One works almost exclusively with Scavs. So, nah. I’m good there. The other…well, he also works with Scavs. Plus, I heard rumors that people sometimes don’t find their way off his operating table. If I’m shopping for an upgrade, I’d rather pay a little more for the assurance that I’ll still be around afterwards.”

As I rattled off my monologue, Farida kept a close eye on me through the sliding glass doors. When I finished, she took a moment before finally pressing a button on the wall. The doors swooshed open, and I walked further into the clinic.

“I’ve heard those same rumors about Anthony,” Farida said, referring to the ripper who worked with Scavs and had a clinic a block or two away. In the DLC, there was a mission where a bunch of Scavs took over his clinic because he’d been taking cyberware out of Scavs and installing it in the poorer residents of Dogtown. “I haven’t spoken with him much, but he seems competent. He knows his business.”

She pointed to an operating chair at the rear of the clinic and commanded me to sit. “So, what were you thinking?”

“You got an upgrade for my optics?” I asked. “I’ll also take a smartlink if you’ve got one. Don’t got a gun right now, but when I buy one I want it to be able to help me out when I’m in the middle of a gunfight.”

Farida nodded and disappeared into the back room of her clinic while I settled into the operating chair. “You know, I gotta say, this is one of the cleanest clinics I’ve seen.”

Her only response was a ‘hmm’ that she grunted from the back room. She returned to the operating chair with a small cylinder labeled Kiroshi.

“Kiroshi optics,” she said, flashing the cylinder at me. “They’ve got an external lens disruptor and better optical zoom capability than anything else on the market. These’ll do as an upgrade.”

She wheeled a weird box-like machine next to the chair and opened the Kiroshi container, pulling out the cybereyes with the long metal ripper claws she wore on her right hand. She clipped the Kiroshi lenses into the machine and then handed me a personal link cord.

“Gotta turn off your eyes and link you in. It’s necessary to calibrate the Kiroshi’s.”

My vision flickered and went black as she plugged the cord into my neurolink. I was ready for it and tossed the tiny worm Yoko gave me through the connection. Yoko had assured me that the worm was nearly untraceable when I bought it from her. No one except trained netrunners would notice it as it went to work.

The worm started infesting the clinic’s security system, and my heart was pounding, worried Farida might have installed a quality NETArch to protect her clinic. I trusted Yoko’s work but couldn’t help but feel nervous. The worm was small and should go unnoticed. Its only job was to rewire the clinic’s alarms so that if one went off, the alert would be sent to my optics instead of Farida or an off-site location.

My vision clicked back on, and I was immediately hit with a wave of nausea. I was seeing myself through the Kiroshi optics still attached to the machine next to Farida.

“Hmm, Dynalar Opti-Zooms. They can cause dizziness and migraines,” she remarked as she placed my previous optics in the case that had held the Kiroshi’s. “With your new eyes, the worst you’ll get are a few occasional blips. Those will go away as your body adapts.”

Thirty minutes later, my new Kiroshi optics were installed, and a smartlink was running through my right hand. It wasn’t as involved a procedure as when Vik had installed all the basic cyberware, so Farida simply handed me a maxdoc and instructed me to take a few puffs throughout the day before letting me know everything was done. I flicked her some eddies for the work and headed out the door.

It only took ten minutes to get from Farida’s clinic in the middle of Dogtown to the Longshore Stacks and the bar called The Moth. I climbed the flight of stairs to the bar and wandered in where I took up a seat at the far end of the bar, closest to the jukebox.

“Hey sweetkins. What’ll it be?” The bartender wandered over to my end of the bar and leaned on the counter, flashing her white teeth in a flirty smile.

“Surprise me,” I replied with a smile of my own.

I watched her walk away and pull a brosef ale for a regular, stopping to chat with him, before grabbing a metal cup from under the bar and tossing a couple ice cubes in it.

Alex was my favorite character to be introduced in the Phantom Liberty DLC. In a game filled with professional liars, I always felt that she was the only person who was even remotely above board with V. Myers puts on a mask that’s aimed at securing V’s help in getting her out of Dogtown. Songbird tells a story about how V could save the both of them from all the damage done to their bodies, despite knowing that there’s only one cure and she plans on backstabbing V to get it. And Reed sells a vision of loyalty that only he, with his misguided allegiance to a nation that sold him out, believes. But he’s lying to himself and is willing to throw away his honor in the name of ‘patriotism.’

Alex always felt a little more like V; someone caught up in the game of powerful people. I’d played the Phantom Liberty DLC a bunch when it first came out, making sure to unlock all the endings. I’d seen her retire to a life of leisure in Monaco. I’d seen her gasp her last breath after Kurt Hansen slashed her throat in the Dogtown stadium. Her death, more than that of Songbird or Reed, always got to me.

“Here you go honeybuns. House special for ya,” she said as she placed the drink down in front of me. “So, what brings you ‘round these parts? Never seen your face here before.”

I flashed her my most charming smile – which was probably a lot less suave than I hoped – and took a sip of the Moscow mule she had poured. “A friend is over by the stadium hashing out a deal. I’m just exploring Dogtown for a bit. Never been in this part of the city before.”

We chatted for a bit, and I flirted with the idea of playing a song on the jukebox in the corner; the same song that she dances to in the DLC. I shook the idle thought away and quietly sipped on my drink. I was here for a job and needed to be forgettable. As much as I might want to chat with Alex, I had a job to do and having her remember me would make that job harder.

I slowly scanned the bar to make sure no one was paying attention to me before I breached the security on the jukebox in the corner. It was connected to the NETArch of the bar itself, and it was easy to trace the connection from the jukebox to a laptop in the backroom of the bar. Bypassing the laptop’s security and installing a worm that gave me backdoor access was child’s play. I sipped on my drink and watched Alex move around the bar, chatting with locals and regulars. A few seconds later the worm I installed did its job and gave me access to the laptop. The security around the bar was subpar, which was understandable.

I knew that The Moth had been built over an old NUSA safehouse that was active back during the Unification War seven years ago. Alex had built the bar there so she’d have a safe place to run if she ever needed help. There wouldn’t be a bunch of security attached to the bar for fear that it would draw too much attention. A random bar in Dogtown that had a NETArch that would give professional netrunners a headache? That would make people curious and want to poke around.

Instead, she had weakened security around the bar and then added a much stronger NETArch that surrounded her saferoom. That saferoom security would probably go unnoticed unless there was someone like me around who already knew that there was something important hiding under the bar. Thankfully, I didn’t need to poke the saferoom NETArch. Everything I needed for my heist was in the laptop in the backroom.

I got access to Alex’s email account and started writing a message from ‘Alex’ to Farida.

Alex: Dr. Nazeri. A guy came into the bar, offering to sell a few pieces of Night City history. I heard you collect Unification War trinkets, and wanted to know if you’d like to stop by to talk with him.

I used the pass phrase that Idris Elba’s character gives V when he tells him to meet up with Farida. Hopefully, it would pique her interest and get her to The Moth. Then, I set a timer on the email, telling it to be sent in twenty minutes.

I finished my drink, left a healthy tip, and strode out of the bar and made my way back to Farida’s clinic.

It only took me a few minutes to get into the abandoned parking deck hallway between the clinic and The Moth where I had stashed my duffel bag with the built-in faraday cage. I hadn’t wanted either Alex or Farida to ask why I was carrying around a bag.

With my duffel in hand, I walked back towards Farida’s clinic and took refuge among a few cars about a half block away, trying to blend in with the rest of the lost souls of Dogtown. I checked the time in the right-hand corner of my vision and set a new timer for ten minutes. A few minutes later I saw Farida climb the steps from the underway that led out of her clinic and head in the direction of the Moth. I started the timer and walked towards the clinic. I’d only have a few minutes to get what I needed and get out before Farida returned.

At the front door of the clinic I breached the security around the door, resetting the entrance code to 0000. I punched it in, catching the alarm that flashed in my optics telling me there was an intrusion in the clinic’s security, and shut the door behind me. The worm had done its job. There was no blaring noise coming from the clinic, Farida didn’t get the alert that her security had been compromised, and I had successfully made my way into a ripper’s clinic with hundreds of thousands of eddies worth of equipment around.

I crossed the room and signed into the clinic’s computer to shut off the security alert and then slipped a shard into the computer’s access port. I activated the shard which started wiping everything on the clinic’s computer. There’d be no access logs, no security tapes, no evidence of the worm that I used to infiltrate the clinic’s NETArch. It was a hammer instead of the scalpel approach that I preferred, but I didn’t have the time to get cute with the security. I glanced up at the timer in my vision.

Eight minutes left.

I dropped my bag to the clinic workstation table and unzipped it, pulling out all the sheets I had stuffed in there to make it look more packed than it actually was. I also grabbed the paint thinner I had bought from the Roundabout and walked to the rear of the clinic. I bunched the sheets together into a ball and stuffed them in the corner of the clinic and then drenched everything in the paint thinner.

Seven and a half minutes.

I rifled through the various shelves and containers around the clinic, grabbing everything I could and stuffing it all in the faraday bag. I snagged a Kereznikov, a few Sandevistans, some RealSkinn and a couple smartlinks. With my bag pleasantly full I turned to the large machine near the front of the clinic. Time to grab what I came here for.

In the game, the FIA had access to a Militech prototype faceplate. It was called the ‘Behavioral Imprint-synced Faceplate,’ and was basically the ‘domino mask’ that Indrajit had creamed himself over. It let V become a completely different person once it was installed. It was the reason why I spent so long prepping for this heist. It was the answer to all my pressing anonymity concerns.

Looking at the faceplate floating in the massive machine at the front of the clinic, I started comparing it to the Mission Impossible technology that let Ethan Hunt fake the appearance of random goons in the movies.

I released the faceplate from the floating tank and carried it to the faceplate container I had bought from Vik. When it was securely placed inside the container, along with a handful of subdermal…thingies that worked in tandem with the faceplate, I stuffed everything in my faraday duffel bag and took one last look around the clinic.

Four minutes.

I used up the remainder of the paint thinner to douse everything else in the clinic, making sure to soak the electronic equipment in the back, and pulled out a lighter. I lit a small trail of paint thinner and then booked it out of the clinic.

With my duffel bag slung over my shoulders I started walking towards the Dogtown stadium, keeping my head down and trying desperately to not draw attention. Behind me I could hear a faint “phrumpf” sound as the bundled sheets covered in paint thinner caught on fire and Farida’s clinic began to burn.

Sure, I felt bad that I was burning her livelihood. But she worked with Barghest and I was pretty sure that Kurt Hansen would buy her another clinic. She’d be up and running in no time. In the meantime, the fire should wipe out most of the evidence of the break-in and give me some time to get away with all my ill-gotten goods. I sped up my walk to try and put as much distance between myself and the clinic as possible.

A couple minutes later I strolled up the steps of the stadium, keeping my face blank and my attention forward. I ducked into a bathroom off the main concourse of the stadium and changed out of my clothes and zipped up the jumpsuit I had brought along with me. It had the logo of a maintenance corporation that did work on the stadium, and I hoped that I would get lost among the numerous workers wandering the stadium.

I bunched my clothes together and tossed them in the trash as I left the bathroom. I slotted the final shard I had brought from Yoko and made my way through the stadium. Unlike the worm and the virus that had bricked Farida’s clinic computer, this shard was only filled with information.

It had the architectural design plans for the Dogtown stadium, including all the maintenance shafts that meandered throughout the whole place. I picked one shaft and followed the twisty and windy corridor until it let out into the sewers. The only reason I knew about the sewers that let out to the rear of the stadium was because I had played the DLC so often. I was taking the same route as Songbird when she leaves the stadium with V after betraying Reed.

I climbed out of the sewers where I emerged at the rear of the stadium, sliding down the muddy hill that led out to the badlands. My jumpsuit was covered in mud and my duffel bag was still slung over my shoulders. That was sure to draw attention but the camp of homeless who had taken up spots at the rear of the stadium ignored me as I headed out into the desert.

It was about a mile and a half through the badlands to the shrubs where I had hidden a bike that I had stolen earlier that week. I rode the bike out to Rocky Ridge and switched it for the Tashigi I had stolen from a worksite earlier in the week. I drove that to the Orbital Air Lunar Airport and parked in the long-term parking lot where I found James Speil’s MaiMai exactly where I had left it. I flashed my ticket for the MaiMai at the parking lot attendant, paid the exorbitant fee they charged me for parking the car there for a few days, and drove back to Watson.

I left the MaiMai in a random alley, assured that someone would eventually find it and either take it for a joyride or try and offload it to one of the many chop shops in the neighborhood, and made my way towards my apartment.

Once in my room I peeled open my bag and transferred all the cyberware I stole into new packages that didn’t have RFID tags. It took some juggling, but I was able to get the whole thing done without letting any of the RFID tagged cases out of the duffel bag.

I stuffed the maintenance corporation jumpsuit into the duffel bag, changed into a new set of clothes, and once more left the apartment with the bag slung over my shoulders.

I made my way to an NCART station and bought a ticket, not bothering to check where the train was headed. A few stops later, I pushed my duffel bag deep under the seat with my foot and stood as the doors opened. Nobody noticed my bag under the seat and, with any luck, nobody would find it as it made a circuit of the city. Hopefully the train would end up in Heywood or Arroyo or somewhere and a rando would grab the bag and take it wherever he wanted.

I, meanwhile, left the NCART station and started walking towards my apartment. I took a deep breath and relaxed on my walk, enjoying the fact that I had completed yet another heist.