Chapter 19 — I Really Can't Do This Job Anymore
The night sky over Santo Domingo was bruised purple — thick clouds sagging under the weight of exhaust fumes and neon haze. The district was an open wound that never closed, its arteries pulsing with electric light and the sound of distant machinery. Old factories exhaled heat through cracked smokestacks; busted drones buzzed between alleys like dying flies.
The war never really ended here — it just changed uniforms.
Factories still worked around the clock, but the hands inside them weren't soldiers anymore. They were the poor, the displaced, the forgotten. Every brick in Santo Domingo was built by desperation, and every alley whispered: You're still alive? Must be your lucky day.
Adrian crouched in the shadow of a rusted steel container, his breath fogging slightly in the cold air. The faint hum of his cyberoptic display lit his face in ghost-blue light. His eyes tracked the perimeter fence twenty meters ahead — a makeshift grid of barbed wire and cracked concrete glowing faintly with security voltage.
Through the comm channel came Sasha's voice, smooth and focused.
> Sasha: "Signal intercept clean. Cameras looped for the next sixty seconds. Power's dropping in three… two…"
The electrical hum vanished. Adrian rose.
One fluid movement — leap, grip, swing. His boots hit the top rail, then he vaulted over, landing without a sound on cracked pavement.
A small smile flickered across his face. His heartbeat was steady. Controlled.
Behind him, the voice of the other netrunner — Kiwi — drifted through, cool and detached.
> Kiwi: "Keep low. Motion sensors are still ticking. You trigger one, and they'll turn this whole block into fireworks."
Her tone was clinical. Sasha might have been the hands, but Kiwi was the scalpel — precise, cold, and already calculating twelve backup plans in her head.
Adrian slipped deeper into the shadows between derelict buildings. The repair shop lay ahead — Steven's Auto. The name hung in flickering holo-font above a corrugated roof. Underneath the sign, spray-painted in gold, was a skull marked with the number 6. Sixth Street's emblem.
From a distance, the place looked harmless. Up close, it was a fortress in disguise.
Adrian crouched behind a half-scrapped sedan, studying two gang sentries lounging by a burning oil drum. The orange light made their metal implants gleam like animal eyes. Both were ex-military — posture gave it away. Their rifles rested on their knees with discipline, not laziness.
Sixth Street wasn't like the Valentinos or Tiger Claw. They weren't thugs. They were soldiers who forgot the war had ended.
> Kiwi: "You're being scanned. Hold position."
Adrian froze. A faint red laser swept the ground near his boots — a drone. Its whine cut through the night like a mosquito.
> Sasha: "I see it. Give me five seconds."
A brief pulse of static filled the comms. Then —
> Sasha: "Drone's blind. Go."
Adrian moved. His muscles coiled, releasing tension in perfect bursts. The shadows swallowed him whole.
He reached the garage wall — weathered red paint peeling like dead skin. Overhead, a camera swiveled lazily.
> Sasha: "I'm hijacking its feed. You're clear for entry in ten…"
Kiwi: "Nine…"
Sasha: "Eight…"
Adrian: "Don't count down. It makes me nervous."
Kiwi: "You should be nervous."
He almost laughed. Almost.
The moment the light on the camera flicked off, he climbed — fingers gripping the wall's edge, muscles burning slightly as he pulled himself onto the roof. Wind rattled the metal sheets beneath him. His system flickered data points across his HUD: two heat signatures near the east door, three in the central bay, two more in the office upstairs.
> Sasha: "Twenty seconds window. Dorio's jamming field is up. Cameras are cycling offline now."
Kiwi: "Don't waste it."
"Understood."
He crossed the roof to a narrow vent. Its bolts were rusted, but his augmented fingers twisted them silently. The grate came off with a dull clink.
Inside, darkness — but his optics cut through it.
The air duct was narrow, lined with grime and cobwebs, but Adrian crawled through like it was second nature. His training — his System — broke every movement into calculated efficiency: no noise above thirty decibels, pressure control under fifteen kilos, timing synced with external footsteps.
He peeked through a grate below. Two gang members were chatting beside a broken vending machine. Their rifles leaned casually against a workbench.
> "Can't believe Marton ditched us for that party," one said. "Heard he brought twelve girls."
"Yeah? He'll need twelve doctors after."
They laughed — easy, human.
Adrian didn't.
He slid the vent cover aside, dropped down silently, and struck.
A swift hand around one throat, a blade under another's jaw. Two bodies slumped without a sound. He dragged them into the shadows.
> Sasha: "Seventeen seconds. You're clear for the next room."
He pushed through a cracked door and found himself inside the main workshop. The place smelled of oil, sweat, and ozone. Racks of weapons lined the walls — not gang-mod rifles, but corporate-issue firearms. Too clean, too advanced.
> Adrian (quietly): "Sasha, these guns… they're not Sixth Street. This is corpo hardware."
Kiwi: "Describe it."
Adrian: "Arata rifles. Markings stripped, but you can tell by the frame design. And… is that a mounted turret?"
He stepped closer. A sentry gun, hidden under a tarp, hummed faintly — its optics dormant but charged. His system pinged:
> [UNAUTHORIZED MILITARY HARDWARE DETECTED.]
> Sasha: "Arata? You sure?"
Adrian: "Dead sure."
Kiwi: "That's… interesting."
Her voice didn't change pitch, but Adrian caught something — a thin thread of concern. For someone like Kiwi, concern was a red siren.
He crept down a hallway lined with flickering lights until he reached the office door. The glow of monitors spilled out through the glass pane. Inside, two people sat in network chairs — full immersion rigs — helmets wired into the wall. Their bodies twitched faintly, nerves sparking from the datastream.
> Sasha: "Two netrunners. You see them?"
Adrian: "Yeah."
Kiwi: "They're using corpo firmware. Not street-ware junk. Kill the connection before they notice us."
Adrian nodded. He moved like a whisper. His dagger flashed once, twice. Two sparks. The smell of scorched flesh filled the air as their neural implants overloaded. The hum of data streams died instantly.
> Sasha: "Confirmed. Network quiet."
Adrian's gaze fell to their terminals. The logos on the displays made his stomach drop — ARATA SECURITY SYSTEMS.
Not Sixth Street.
Corporation.
He jacked in through his wrist port. The data poured across his HUD — encrypted layers, military-grade. His system protested:
> [ACCESS DENIED – SECURITY TIER B.]
> Adrian: "Encryption's too heavy."
Sasha: "Send it to me."
He synced. Sparks of data transfer danced along his neural cable like lightning veins.
> Sasha: "Got it… reading… oh, hell."
Her tone changed — disbelief. Then fear.
> Sasha: "Arata internal message logs. Captain's orders. Something about a transfer… 'the package must stay undiscovered. The head's data still useful.'"
Kiwi: "Define package."
Sasha: "...You don't want to know."
Adrian opened a locker nearby.
He froze.
Inside were body parts — cleanly severed, stored in separate compartments. A head, torso, and thigh, each connected to cybernetic attachments. The man's skin was pale yellow, his prosthetics top-tier. His eyes, still open, stared blankly at Adrian's reflection in the metal.
The name tag on the severed jacket read: Dr. S. Nakamura — Arata Biotech Division.
Adrian exhaled, cold sweat beading on his neck. "Sasha… I found the package."
> Maine (over comms): "What package?"
Adrian: "A dead corpo. Arata scientist. Chopped up like spare parts."
Dorio: "Wait, Arata Biotech? That's corporate-level. Maine, this isn't a gang gig!"
Maine: "Goddamn it!"
Adrian leaned against the locker, the weight of realization hitting him. He wasn't here for a simple snatch-and-grab. They were cleanup crew for a corpo cover-up.
And they were expendable.
He looked again — behind the corpse, rows of sealed crates filled the shelf. He cracked one open: compact rifles, Arata-make. Another held encrypted drives and black boxes.
At the top, two sleek katanas hung on magnetic locks — pitch-black steel with faint crimson veins running down the blade.
He reached for one. The sheath was cold, humming faintly. When he unsheathed it, the edge glowed a molten red — a thermal vibro-blade.
He felt a flicker of awe.
> System Log: [Weapon Identified: Nanothermal Katana — Model: Arata Mk. IX.]
It wasn't meant for gangs. This was an assassin's weapon.
> Kiwi: "We need those crates."
Maine: "Fuck the crates. We need to live."
Sasha: "Hold on—someone's pinging the network again!"
A shrill beep filled Adrian's ear. His HUD flashed red.
> [ALERT: INCOMING NETWORK CONNECTION – ARATA SIGNAL.]
> Kiwi: "They're rebooting the defense grid! Adrian, out. Now!"
Maine: "We're driving up!"
Adrian grabbed the katana, slung a rifle over his shoulder, and kicked open the back door.
The sirens blared instantly — sharp, metallic, echoing across the compound.
The two guards outside spun, rifles snapping to position. Adrian moved first. The katana sliced once, clean and burning, through one man's torso. The second fired — too slow. The bullet shattered on the sword's heated edge, ricocheting harmlessly. Adrian ducked, swept low, and drove the blade up through his gut.
Flames hissed as the wound sealed with molten flesh.
> Sasha: "Motion sensors tripped. Reinforcements inbound."
Adrian sprinted through the alley, boots pounding on concrete. The roar of engines grew louder. At the intersection, headlights flared — Maine's car skidded into view, purple frame smoking from bullet holes.
Rebecca leaned halfway out the window, cackling, submachine gun spitting fire into the darkness.
> "Get your ass in, rookie!"
He dove into the back seat just as Dorio threw a grenade behind him. The blast shattered the road, throwing debris across the yard.
The car fishtailed, tires screaming. Maine roared, "You got the package?"
Adrian held up the black lockbox, still clutched in one hand. "Got it."
"Then we're done here!"
They tore down the cracked highway as tracer rounds cut the night behind them. The reflection of the repair shop burned in the side mirror, a miniature apocalypse swallowing the skyline.
Adrian leaned back in his seat, the katana glowing faintly beside him. His breathing was shallow.
"Corporate ops in gang territory," he murmured. "They were using us to clean house."
Rebecca laughed breathlessly. "And we just robbed 'em blind while doing it. Kinda poetic, don't you think?"
Dorio shot her a glare. "Poetic doesn't cover the heat we just picked up."
Maine said nothing for a long moment. His massive cyberarms flexed on the steering wheel. Then, quietly, he said, "We find that fixer. Koff. He set this up. He knew."
> Kiwi: "You can't prove that yet."
Maine: "Don't care. He's dead either way."
Silence filled the car except for the hum of engines. Adrian stared out the window. The neon bled across the glass, smearing color into rain streaks.
His mind replayed the images — the severed body, the smell of burnt circuits, the silent terror of seeing Arata's logo again. He'd run from that world once. He'd built a new one under Maine's crew.
But Night City had a cruel sense of humor. You never really escaped the corps. You just served them in different colors.
His shard blinked softly.
> [Mission Complete: Data Extracted.]
[New Mission: Report to Maine.]
[System Note: "Sometimes, simple jobs hide complex graves."]
Adrian smirked bitterly. "No kidding."
Maine exhaled smoke through his nose, eyes fixed on the road. "Listen up. We'll stash the loot at Afterlife, regroup, and get intel on Koff. This isn't over. The next time someone tries to play us—"
He grinned, teeth flashing gold under the neon.
"—we'll make 'em pay with interest."
The car disappeared into the lights of Night City, leaving the burning repair shop behind.
And somewhere in the distance, Arata's servers lit up, logging a simple message:
[Unauthorized Breach Detected – Operative Roll: ACTIVE.]
Adrian closed his eyes, letting the rumble of the engine drown his thoughts.
"I really can't do this job anymore," he muttered.
But the city didn't care.
The city never cared.