AN-I haven't stopped working on this I was just taking a break to write some swords and magic. Every few weeks my brain switches from future sci-fi to sword and board, magic missiles combat. Will keep writing, just will not be fast.

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Thinking of what I want my store clerks and such to look like I came to think of anime. More specifically Dan Machi and eina tulle from the Adventure's Guild. A pretty half-elf with emerald eyes.

Putting together a robotic doll that looks like Eina is easy. And because I'm awesome I'm making a V.I. that will run every doll that I make to run them. Especially because I'll need a lot of Eina's. which sounds weirder than it might be. Might.  

It's just a system that will have Eina as a face. And with the V.I. taking care of everything I won't have to worry about the small stuff. Just have to protect it from cyber intruders and that's easy thanks to the points that I've spent.

But that can wait until I have the building complete and send the word out about my place. For now, I'll focus on getting the design done and then I can worry about it. It shouldn't take that long cause in the evening the construction bots sent over the fact that they were done with the repairs and were starting to work on increasing the height and cleaning up all the trash and stuff from people dumping their crap there.

And with the first 30 or so floors done the estimated time to get it up to to 70 that I wanted would only take a month. The only thing slowing them down is that they have to wait for the fast-drying concrete to dry. which takes like an hour in total, not long at all. Of course, that's with a lot of replicators and even more bots that are being made by designated replicators.

Timeskip

2 days later I put the next 2 points that I got into the replicator bringing that up to five and made them so effective that it was like magic. making the cost cut down to half of what the original cost was. meaning I could run even more replicators on one battery.

During the last 2 days, I finished the Eina doll and even wrote some of the V.I. that I wanted to do. And some of it I was buffing up the security of my building and deciding on a name for the building itself and I've come up with: The Hub.

Mainly because I hope it will become a hub of merc activity. Plus it sounds good.

I also had the bots out together in the basement of the hub for me to live in. temporarily until I can set up the top floor as a penthouse. Mostly just cleaning it up and adding all the things I need plus moving out all my stuff from the old apartment, Which I am using as a second place to use in case of emergency. Keeping a bunch of medical supplies until I can buy more permanent safe houses. 

It was in the afternoon that Mitch and Cassidy showed up to grab their stuff. 

Rolling into the only gate that I had open they stop before going into the underground garage, mostly because I have a couple drones guarding it. Getting an alert from them I tell them to move aside and open up the crash gate I had installed. Giving a drone the command to wave them inside.

Once they start moving in I also get up from my netrunning chair that I use to increase how fast I connect to everything and program, and start heading to the elevator to take me up from the basement.

Mitch's view

Driving my lady into the creepy underground garage I think back to how all this started. With the best fixer in the night city calling our boss in the middle of the day for a transport job.

At first, when Saul went to talk to her in private we thought we were getting another job to take some poor sap out of Night City. Probably cause they messed with someone they shouldn't have and were getting them out of there for a price. It wasn't until a minute later that we weren't doing that but instead running weapons through the badlands. A lot of weapons, enough to equip a small gang.

Not to mention it's supposed to be a few entirely new guns made by some kid. Just that alone made this job weird, the robots carrying around some of the weapons were supposed to transport confirmed it.

Pulling up to another batch of bots I stop and the rest of the boys follow. Getting out and walking up to the bot I waited to ask where the weapons were when the elevator dinged and a teen stepped out.

With shaggy brown hair and blue optic eyes, he's dressed like a net runner with a full-body suit that most of them wear.  Walking up to us he started talking.

" So the Aldecaldos huh, Mitch and Cassidy yeah?"

Giving him a nod he turns to the side and pulls his head to the side.

"Well over here is what you're looking for. How much was it that you're taking?"

"6 crates filled with the 3 types of Halo series guns, along with however much ammo can be fit afterward."

Nodding his head and still walking he reaches a number pad and puts in a code. It opens to reveal a small storage-sized room filled with enough firepower to make even some small corpos think twice if someone was wielding these. And considering he has that bot he can probably do so. 

"pull your cars up and take what you ordered."

" You heard him, come on and get to work."

Hearing that all the young blood start to load up the car with Cassidy watching over them, I instead look to Jake Campbell. Rogue herself said the kid is probably a genius on his level. Said he could turn scrap into works of art and now that he's kind of set up she expects him to speed up. Said he could show up that saka scientist if he got the chance.

Which is high praise from someone like Rogue. 

"So what's it like living out in the badlands?"

Huh didn't he to be the small talk type?

"It's freeing, living with your life in your own hands. working together with people towards the common goal of enjoying today and making tomorrow better for the clan. Why, do you want to join?"

"Pfft, hell no. I spend a day out there and I'm pretty sure I'd melt all my chrome. Just wanted to know what people who drive through Satan's anus everyday live. Seriously I don't know how you all live without all of life's comforts, You know they spent centuries perfecting inside for a reason."

Laughing loudly at that, I can also see Cassidy smiling at him.

"Yeah I can see why you want to know if that's how you think about the badlands, but it's not like we don't have any of those things it's just we have to use them sparingly. besides the less time, we have to look out for scavs and gangers the more time we get to relax. Plus the corpos won't go anywhere near the badlands, which is a plus in anyone's book."

"Yeah I can understand the Corpo thing, the basterds are everywhere looking for a way to get ahead of the other corpos."

Nodding at that we both go quiet, both of us probably thinking about some crap the corpos did. Thinking about the war always brought me a bad feeling in my gut. Shaking my head I think about the kid and what Rogue told us, about how the kid can make anything.

"Rogue said you make anything, what did she mean by that?"

"Hmmm, kinda. I have a 3-D printer, so long as I have the schematic for something I can make it. I just need some scrap and then it changes it into whatever the schematics are. Why do you want something printed out?"

" Maybe, the Aldecaldos are always looking for better parts for our rides. Being able to just come here and just print a part instead of letting a good ride just sit in the desert and die if we can't get what it needs before we move."

" Well I can, but you would have to order a lot at once. It makes it easier to do a lot of orders one after another than one small order at a time. plus the cost would change depending on how big something is. I can't just make something like a car's frame right now. But I can weld 2 parts of a frame together."

 Nodding I see that they're done loading the cargo and I turn to Jake.

"We might have to take you up on making some of those parts. But for now, pleasure doing business." I hold my hand out for a handshake and he reaches out and takes my wrist in his hand nodding as well.

"Yeah, good luck on your run and pleasure doing biz. Hers my number if you ever want to make those orders or make another bulk purchase of guns."

Heading to my ride I lead the others out of the garage after giving a wave back and head into the streets.

A minute later Cassidy calls me on the radio.

"What did you talk to the kid about?"

"As if you weren't listening  you old gossip"

"Of course I was but it wasn't to gossip and you know it"

"Yeah, yeah you're just a regular old town sheriff and knight in shining armor protecting the innocent"

""Knight my foot.......So the kid"

" He's either going places or ending up as another target of Night City. The thing is that I don't know if that kid is gonna go quietly. You saw those bots, brought me back to the time we were in the war. They moved like trained human soldiers, vets at that. And because they're bots as long as he can make more he can have a small army at his beck and call. The only way to take them down is through the net and it looked like the kid was mid-dive with that suit."

"Did you look up?"

"up?"

"Yeah, there's construction going on, Looked like more bots, but more like the building ones. And if he's adding on to that place and filling it with nothing but combat bots and other stuff to protect himself. Well, I'd say he'll be the best-protected person in Night City bar if god himself came down."

"Yeah well, let's call Saul and tell them about the cargo. We can tell him about the kid later or something."

As I stop at a light and call Saul I can't help but hope the kid stays alive, a whole bunch of new parts for my baby would be nice.

Jakes view

Heading back down to the subbasement, the floor under the garage floors, I think about the meeting with the Aldecaldos. Honestly, I think It went pretty well. No one shot each other and even did a little banter back and forth. Although I think the security bots were freaking them out. Cassidy was looking at them most of the time watching the other's backs like the bots were jumping at them.

Not that I blame him. The bots are pretty Scarry. Let them get a hold of you and suddenly you don't have whatever it grabs ahold of. Resistant to most damage that would kill a kind-chromed human. 

It can't be blinded through most means other than EMP or hacking into their network and optics. 

Along with all that they are pretty much 360 no scopes masters. Mixed with a auto aim hacker and a navy seal for his tactics. And that's just on the bot itself. 

It can also be hooked up to a network and boosts effectiveness all around by several hundred percent. I would know cause when I gave them and my construction bots a server each. The threat analysis changed from holding off a small gang force to holding off Maxtac with potential building damage. 

Maxtac, the cyberpsycho hunting squad who have a lot of cyberpsychos on the team. And my bots can say with confidence after watching videos and reading stats on them, that they can hold them off. 

Holding off meaning long enough for me to escape or be reinforced by more units. And they say it can be done with damage to the building.

Of course, that's with an entire server running the numbers and stuff.

Sitting in my netrunning chair I get back to work on the V.I. I'm making.