Neon Requiem (2023)

The Cost of Love

The neon-soaked night was young when my boss's call cut through the synthpop haze of the bar. His voice, cold as a corpo's heart, sliced through my artificial buzz.

"V, where are you?"

I couldn't help but smirk. "At the bar, drowning in sorrow," I drawled, knocking back another shot of liquid courage. "What's the honor, oh taskmaster mine?"

"I'm sending you information on your next target. I need him taken care of before dawn." The unspoken threat in his words was as subtle as a mantis blade to the gut.

My cyberware kicked in, downloading and processing the data faster than any meat brain could manage. "Another deviant?" I asked, unable to keep the cynicism from my voice. These retirement parties were becoming all too frequent.

A heavy sigh crackled through the line. "Yeah, I don't know what the fuck has been going on with your kind recently, but they just keep failing their baseline tests. This one bolted as soon as he flatlined the test. Last known location is that building I marked. Transmitter went dark shortly after, but intel says he's still there. Find him and retire him."

"Understood. Anything else I should know?" I asked, a creeping sense of unease coiling in my gut despite my feigned nonchalance. Alan had been one of the few who understood the burden we carried.

"He snatched mantis blades, so watch your ass."

"Hmm, what a copycat," I forced a dry laugh, the humor ringing as hollow as my soul. "I'll take care of it tonight. Full report by the time you wake up from your beauty sleep. And I'll swing by for my baseline test tomorrow morning, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed."

The call ended with the abruptness of a flatlined mark. I downed one last shot, the synth-alcohol burning a path to my artificial stomach, before heading out into the neon-drenched night.

The chill air wrapped around me like a shroud as I made my way to my parked helicarrier, its sleek black form humming with barely contained power. As I locked in the coordinates, my mind wandered to dangerous territory.

The sudden surge in deviancy among our ranks was becoming impossible to ignore. Was it the controversial update we all received, or the experimental upgrades that now coursed through our veins? It made no sense why so many of us were unraveling, our minds rebelling against their programming.

My line of Blade Runners, Arasaka's elite enforcers, had become so unstable that they halted our production entirely. Some whispered it was our ability to exercise free will, a malfunctioning trait that led some to seek full brain transplants to purge the glitch. But that very quirk was what made us the best of the best—naturally conceived humans with altered genes, superior to ordinary people and even those with basic chrome.

As I soared above the neon-lit canyons of Night City, I couldn't help but appreciate the irony. We were Arasaka's ghost operatives, doing the dirty work that couldn't see the light of day. Legally, we didn't exist—just urban legends spoken of in hushed tones. But we were the grease that kept the corporate gears turning, the shadowy guardians that prevented Arasaka's empire from crumbling under the weight of its own corruption.

And when one of us goes rogue? Well, that's when they call in someone like me to clean up the mess.

My target, Alan, was a runner I'd spoken to in passing but never knew well. One of the older models in my line, it pained me to see him succumb to the siren's call of deviancy. Taking him out wouldn't be easy, but it was a grim necessity in this twisted world we navigated.

The dilapidated building that served as Alan's hideout reeked of illegal chrome and desperation. It was a notorious den for black market mods and souls too broke or too stupid to care about quality.