The cult welcomes Zsolt Putnoki to its most venerable ranks, and assures the rest of the menials that they too may ascend with enough hard work (and totally not bribes and nepotism!)
-----
The Nomad
"Marcus, set up an overwatch topside." Ezekiel Jode snapped orders as he rushed out of the tunnel, quickly noting the messages of the lookouts confirming they got out of the Wraiths' way.
"Got it." The massive man nodded and started sprinting away.
"Selene, bring out the launchers." He said and "And Joel, stop pretending to be hungover you lazy fuck!"
Seeing the man startle into losing his slouch, all he could do was shake his head in annoyance.
The job that the Aldecaldo Fixer Dakota offered from what he was pretty sure was a Kang-Tao cell was damn good eddies. It was simple, come in, prepare and supply an operating base, and get out before anyone noticed.
Some of his fellow nomads grumbled about the risks, but the money the Chinese were offering was too good even with the location being the hellhole that was Night City.
But it seemed he had really underestimated just how many Raffens openly roamed the Free State.
Not one day went by that he didn't hear about a drive by at least. Though usually it was more of an open battle.
Really, it was only a matter of time before someone noticed them and the Wraiths decided they had found easy pickings. And he had drilled his family in preparation for that exact situation.
Having guests over... complicated things.
He'd done Falco a favor by letting his chooms stay over, he was owed that much and no one would have really denied him since he vouched for their behavior. But he wasn't part of the family right now, and he shouldn't be getting dragged into a fight that wasn't his.
Gonk would probably try to punch his lights out if he said it to his face.
'And then there are the others.' He thought as he finally reached the entrance.
And nearly got a heart attack as, in complete silence, the techie with far too many teeth leapt past him, followed closely by the more familiar stomp of Maine.
"Not here yet." Magos noted in seeming disinterest as he completely arrested his momentum by slightly caving the sandstone under him.
"Good." Maine grunted "Gives us time to set things up."
The two seemed to enter a silent conversation before ever so slightly nodding at each other.
Maine turned back to Zeke "We'll take point. You get yourselves behind cover."
Zeke felt the others look to him and his expression soured, but he knew arguing over pride during a crisis was stupid "Right. We'll cover your backs."
"T-minus eighty seconds." Magos droned as the rest of Maine's crew caught up.
And the short pale one ran up to the borg "Hey Mike!" She stage whispered "Can I try it now? Pleeease~?"
The previously serious cyborg twitched before sighing "Alright, fine." He reached over and picked up her oversized Carnage "I'll be taking this though."
"Fuck yeah!" Rebecca cheered and rounded on Falco "Come on, you are going to love this!"
The man gave an awkward, concerned really, chuckle, but still followed along into the monstrosity Magos had drove in earlier.
"Just wait for my signal." Said cyborg said with a shake of his head.
Zeke decided to just ignore the byplay for now and looked into the distance, noting the rising cloud of sand and dust "They are here."
"Want me to try diplomacy?" Magos asked suddenly.
Zeke frowned "Think it will work?"
"Probably not." He shrugged "Worth a try though."
Techies were quite intimidating... "Fine."
The family had already set up and spread out properly, joined by the mercs, and Zeke fell in behind a rusted trash container filled with scrap, eyes scanning the over twenty approaching cars, many of which had some manner of turret mounted on top of them.
The Wraiths wasted no time in fanning out, revving their engines loudly, many of them cheering and roaring over the wall of noise as most began circling the perimeter while a trio of cars drove forward, only slowing as the eerily still cyborg came into view.
They stopped a good distance away, one of them doing so by lightly ramming into the borg's van, which actually made him do a barely noticeable full-body twitch.
Out of the lead car stepped a tall, lanky man with a large mohawk on his head, and a mocking grin on his face, the rest of the Raffen following suit as he cockily left his only protection.
"What do we got here, boys?" He chuckled before lazily pointing his gun at the cyborg "You here to tell us to fuck off, eh you fucking tin can?"
Magos seemed to pause briefly, almost as if in confusion, before tilting his head "You seem like civilized people, are you civilized people?"
The Wraith blinked before throwing his head back and laughing "Oh suuure, real polite we are."
"So you must know then, that not fucking off." The borg added a subtle synthetic growl to his voice "When someone like me tells you to fuck off, is considered to be very, very poor form."
He let the silence settle for a moment before grinning, the action making the Wraith take a startled step back "So would you kindly fuck off?"
The increased growl sent a shiver even down Zeke's spine.
"You think I am fucking afraid of you?!" Came the intelligent answer from the Wraith as the man began waving his gun around "Just because those nomad fucks-"
Michael 'Magos' Sobronov
'And that is enough of that.' I decided as the idiot began prattling along, lowering Rebecca's eye-wateringly pink Carnage and pulling the trigger, instantly turning the Wraith and the car behind him into fine mush.
I did not wait to watch the car explosion, power-stomping out of the way as the more distant gangoons' turrets turned my previous position into a bullet hell.
Through my Cyberdeck, I observed Maine detonate the rest of the 'negotiators' with his PLS, my van's engine revving up a half-moment later before the glorious bark of its autocannon began cutting down whichever Wraith was stupid enough to rush to the rescue of their boss.
I could almost hear Rebecca's crazed laughter from inside, despite the interior being sound-isolated.
The surprisingly well-armed Jodes wasted no time in joining the fight, their overlapping lines of heavy weapons fire turning the area around their camp into a killing field that would annihilate anyone stupid enough to stay still for even a second.
But the Wraiths would never make it that easy for them.
The remaining cars sped up, switching to evasive maneuvers with a practiced kind of fluidity, and began hosing our position with a storm of shells and bullets, almost completely suppressing the nomad positions in mere seconds but not before losing a few of their cars to sniper and grenade launcher fire.
My eyes narrowed as I fried a man just before he fired his rocket launcher, my quickhack hitting the rocket a moment later and sending his ride up in flames alongside his buddies.
Another Wraith crew didn't seem to appreciate that terribly, and I found myself sliding behind a large concrete roadblock just in time for the high-caliber bullets to start denting holes into it.
This gave me a brief moment to properly consider the battlefield.
'We could win just by holding our ground and hoping to God no one dies...' I thought, but having already detected a number of the nomads taking hits, and one falling into critical, I wisely decided 'Fuck that.'
We needed to go on the offensive, and I had just the idea.
[Maine.] I called as I established a connection.
[What?!] He snapped as he gunned down a number of Raffens.
[I have a plan.]
-
The steaming Wraith car trying to ram my flank disappeared behind a black blur as Falco drove my own ride into it, Maine joining me exactly a second later as we took cover behind the van.
"Fucking hell." The massive man swore as we took cover "If this gets me killed I'm fucking murdering you."
Flinching away from a spray of fire, I crouched and peeked out lower than the gunman expected me to, blowing the top off his vehicle with him included with one satisfying click.
"But Maine." I snark-growled over the cacophony "Think of your Legend."
"Stupid doesn't mean legendary, you gonk." He spat as he sent another spray of bullets down at the Wraiths "And dying to Raffen is fucking stupid."
"It's only stupid if it fails." I grinned and flicked on my Agent [Falco, floor it!]
The adrenaline-chasing racer needed no further motivation as I heard my van's engine roar awake, the vehicle jolting into movement and leaving us momentarily open before the two of us rushed after it, our cyberlegs allowing us to keep up despite its high acceleration.
This alone would have been enough to confuse the shit out of the Wraiths.
Naturally, there was no kill quite like overkill.
[COME GET IT COCKSUCKEEERS!] Rebecca cheered as she very generously began hosing everything in front of her with thousands of eddies worth of armor-piercing tracer ammunition.
And just after I upgraded it with an auto-loader too...
Whichever dumbfuck was stupid enough to be anywhere in a ninety degree cone in front of my Mahir soon became much less dumb as they were swiftly delivered from this Earth and out of their drug-ridden bodies.
Anyone intelligent enough to get out of the way and try flanking the APC that was my ride was handily taken care of by Maine and Myself, our heavy munitions making short work of the lightly armored cars the Wraiths preferred, and leaving the injured survivors for the nomads to take care of.
Needless to say, when faced with such overwhelming aggression, those Raffens who did not immediately run like their lives depended on it soon found themselves and their vehicles turned into a smoking wreck.
"Like fucking whack a mole." Maine chuckled darkly as he shot a crawling Wraith in the back of the head, the sounds of gunfire slowly dying down around us as the scant few surviving enemy cars left our firing range.
Naturally I immediately embedded my signature into their hardware and uploaded it directly to the Jodes' lookout parties.
Something told me the survivors wouldn't stay survivors for long.
"Took out the actually dangerous ones while I was talking with the leader." I said as we began walking back to the unfinished tunnel, waving at the passing van which was now in need of a serious paintjob "The rest was just casualty control for the Jodes."
"So that's why." He muttered, giving me a considering look "Even you need some time to set up then."
"Did your research, hm?" I hummed non committally "Should I be flattered?"
"Bah." He scoffed "Sasha's the one who won't stop talking about you. I'm just forced to listen to her every day."
"Right." I felt a wry kind of amusement "Her."
Maine just grunted at that.
I had made my opinion of her intelligence quite clear last time, and with some hindsight I realize how I maaay have come off as a bit abrasive.
'Too bad, the truth is rarely appreciated.' I thought dryly.
"Look." Maine spoke up as we started nearing the tunnel.
I turned to him but said nothing.
"I'll admit." He spoke slowly, as if weighing every word "That I was suspicious of you, coming out of nowhere like you did..."
"Too convenient for your liking?" I prompted.
He grunted in agreement before continuing "But you didn't have to stand up for these people like you did, and that's worth something." He exhaled, looking out into the distance for a moment "What I mean to say, is I was wrong about you."
"Thank... you?" I half asked, not exactly sure how to feel here.
"Hm." He made a vaguely understanding noise before offering his hand "We good?"
Well, Mike. That's about as close to an apology as you are going to get.
'Fuck it. I'll take it.' I decided before shaking his hand "Yeah." I said "We're good."
Maine nodded, and that was that.
Our return to the nomads was met with many cheers, and Zeke quickly jogged over to us after he was done instructing his people.
"Well I'll be damned." He said as he approached "I was already going to spread the word about you standing with us, but this... We owe you, a lot."
"You let us stay with you, Zeke." Maine waved him down, briefly giving him a firm look of denial "That is enough."
"I've learned enough to know pressing you is pointless." Zeke clicked his tongue, much to Maine's amusement.
The man who evidently really disliked owing someone, moved on to me "And you, Magos?" He asked "Hope you aren't as stubborn as this one."
'Did they even have something to offer me?' I mused as I shook my head "No need, I helped because I wanted to, not because I was looking for a quick eddie." And before he could protest I added "I could use a favor from your clan though, never know when it might come in handy."
And it felt more palatable because of my vague involvement in drawing attention to their current camp.
"That's fair." Ezekiel nodded, sounding almost relieved "But I'm paying for your ammo and repairs at least, would have taken a lot more losses if you didn't butcher them like you did."
This made me pause, before I ever so cautiously asked "Are you reallyyy sure about that?"
He frowned "Of course I am. It's the least I can do."
"Right." I nodded a bit awkwardly "So um... that'll be 21k eddies."
Maine barked out a laugh.
And Zeke, the poor fucker looked like he had just sucked a lemon.
He did agree though.
Autocannon shells were capital E Expensive.
"Now what's this about casualties?" I said as the business end of things was finished "Last I scanned your compound I found no fatalities."
For whatever reason, the man briefly looked at me like I had just grown a second head, but he did answer "Our doc got hit." He looked away "He is critical, as well as two more. We're doing our best to help them but we aren't sure they'll make it."
Maine's lips thinned at what I guessed was a distinct sense of deja vu.
While my own lips twisted into a grin "You are in luck then, for I happen to be something of a doctor myself."
And while the rest of the nomads became hopeful at that declaration, their leader seemed to wilt even more.
-----
Hours later, I methodically hosed down my arms and Mechadendrites, thin dissolving blood dripping off them like so much water as I felt the distinct satisfaction of a job well done.
A sudden, loud snore made me look up only to find my 'assistant', one of the more medically savvy nomads (a somewhat functional drug addict, really) with his head lolled back, asleep in his chair from the moment I declared our work finished.
Huffing in amusement, I made sure not to make too much noise as I left the medical trailer, a complete and utter silence waiting for me outside as the gathered nomads and mercs looked up at me as one.
Whether I succeeded or failed, Zeke insisted we stay the night so his family could at least throw us a party in thanks, but despite his words no true jubilation had spread as I worked.
'Well, so much for letting you sleep, Joel.' I thought dryly, before giving them all the good news "Operations were a success. They are all making it."
Half a second of silence passed before the whole fucking cave shook at the cheer that followed, and despite the pain that awaited I increased my Audioreceptors' sensitivity just in time to hear Joel startle awake before falling over himself.
That will teach you to huff glitter while I'm stitching up your brother you fucking gonk.
-------
Huffing stone is superior. It is known.
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