SPACE! I'm in space!

AN: Portions of the dialogue in this first segment were taken almost word-for-word from a famous exchange between a Russian officer (Ivan Alekseevich Savin) and a Chechen (Turpal-Ali Atgeriyev) right before the battle of Grozny during the 1st war. These two men were friends and comrades fighting alongside each other in Afghanistan years prior, and the combination of fate and certain boozing politicians put them at odds with each other. I adjusted a few things, but I've always remembered the words they said to each other years later when I heard it, although I was a child and already immigrating to the USA when this happened.

~~~~

Lieutenant Colonel James Waters watched the approaching column of mechanised infantry approach the rail yard he was charged to protect. He had his men and machines in a defensive position, mostly hiding in an urban area that had been evacuated, but the attacking forces outnumbered him. Still, he felt that his preparation would savage them, even if he or most of his men didn't survive the battle. Still, in the calculus of war, trading one battalion for an entire regiment could be considered a victory. It was just a shame that he could not expect any reinforcements any time soon. If he had another battalion, he figured he could destroy the enemy force while minimising his own casualties.

His XO walked up to him and said quietly, "Sir, drones have identified the approaching tangos. It's the 131st Regiment, as you thought."

Jim let out a series of invectives and finally sighed, glancing over to his commo section, "Get me a transmitter, one we don't care too much about. I want to transmit in the clear."

The enlisted men raised their eyebrows but nodded, tapping away at physical keyboards on computers. Finally, one said, "Sir, we have a transmitter in the switching yards, they already bombed it with a loitering munition, so they already know it is there, but it is still working. For now, Sir."

Jim nodded, "Perfect." He grabbed a handset and made sure it was paired with his cybernetics before routing it to the transmitter his commo section gave him. He clicked the push-to-talk and said, "Bill, is that you?"

One of his best friends, Colonel William Howe, was the commanding officer of the Southern California 131st Mechanised Infantry Regiment. He, like Jim himself, was a reservist called up to active duty. They had fought together in the past but were on opposite sides this time. There was no response on the radio, and Jim sighed, trying again, "Bill, come on, maybe somehow before it's too late, turn your guys back. Don't do this. Don't do it; it is not needed. In any case, understand that you will die, and I will die. Understand for yourself... who would win from this? Neither of us will win, understand? You and I won't survive, you know?" His men were staring at him, "If I see you in the battle, I won't show you any mercy. Just like you won't show me any, you understand?"

He paused, "It'd be better if you came up here as a guest. I could put some steaks on the grill. So, have your men retreat. At least have some pity for their mothers. Give the order to retreat."

Silence, and just when Jim was about to give up, the familiar voice of his friend came on the net, "I can't give that order, Jim."

Jim shook his head, grabbed the handset again and said, "Bill, from the bottom of my heart, I hope that you survive this... but you better leave."

Jim knew it was a lost cause when he heard his friend's resolve as he said, "I don't have a choice, Jim. I have my orders, and I will follow them."

Jim threw the handset down and said, "Fuck. Order the ATGM teams to be ready. Let their IFVs get into the bag, and then destroy them near the switching station. Order the mortars to commence bombardment as soon as they approach the kill box with no further orders. Echo Whiskey begin full spectrum jamming on all transmitters. Execute."

"Yes, sir!" his subordinates said in unison. Now that the air was filled with white static, it would be a much more old-fashioned battle. However, he had prepared by running old-style copper telephone wire to stay in contact with most of his subordinates. The bitrate would be terrible, but it was better than nothing. It would be more than Bill had to work with, but it wouldn't do to underestimate the man.

---xxxxxx---

The battle of Fresno was the first major engagement in what would later be called the Unification War and one of the bloodiest. It lasted over a period of two days, and the casualties were devastating on both sides. It was considered, on the whole, a victory for the Free States, but such judgements were lost on the men who fought it, as both units suffered immense casualties, with the NUSA force being almost completely annihilated.

Both Lieutenant Colonel James Waters and Colonel William Howe were killed in action less than twenty-four hours apart and less than a hundred metres away from each other.

---xxxxxx---

I sat the invitation down with my special long tweezers, frowning. Did I have a grandmother? I mean... people generally did unless they were the subject of some wild biotinker's experiments. Even before my power arrived, I didn't think babies came from storks. While I had already known that Alt-Dad's parents had both passed away, I had no memories whatsoever from NC-Taylor about Grams.

But if my mom, dad and I all had "alternates" in this new world that I lived in, then it stood to reason that my grandmother "here" was at least somewhat similar to my grandmother back in Brockton Bay. Except... I knew very little about her. Gram had been my mom's mother, an austere woman who'd never fully approved of my dad as a match for her daughter.

She lived in Back Bay, in Boston, in a very nice house, but I had almost no memories of her visiting us or us visiting her beyond once or twice. However, I knew that just as Gram didn't approve of Danny, he didn't particularly approve of her either, and I recall he called her and Grampa very controlling. They had come to Mom's funeral, but I hadn't seen them since.

Danny had let slip that Gram had been the one paying my allowance when I told him he didn't have to pay me one when our financial situation was especially bad in the months after Mom passed away. He told me that the money was meant for me, but then told me the real reason when I pressed: he didn't want to take her money directly. Danny could always be very stubborn and prideful like that. I hoped he was happier now, and hopefully, my meagre allowance savings helped NC-Taylor in her first months in Brockton Bay.

I closed my eyes and focused on my memories from before. Back Bay was a very nice part of Boston. It was part of Accord's territory, and the rumour was that he had a house there. I didn't believe it, personally. If I was a villain as fastidious as Accord was rumoured to be, then I would have had some secret base, maybe underneath a large skyscraper, like in a repurposed Endbringer shelter. That would be a real villain's base.

Still, it was always clear that Gram had money. Not every family could pay for their daughter to get a PhD in English Literature amidst the economic shakeups that parahumans and Endbringers caused. Most people would have to take a loan or suggest that their daughter study something more practical given the uncertain times they found themselves in.

Back in Brockton Bay, Mom's maiden name hadn't been Astor or Armstrong or any hyphenation of the two, though, so that was different. I did a net search with the terms "Sionainn Astor-Armstrong", "female", "rich", and "age>60". Then I let my Agent, a very simple machine-learning tool that most people had integrated into their operating systems or phones, churn on the results. If I didn't get anything, then I could ask Kiwi to find her, and if Kiwi didn't find anything, I could always ask Wakako to--

Oh. That was quick.

Wait... what?! Gram wasn't that rich back in Brockton Bay, was she? If so, I should have asked for more allowance. Both of my bodies were silent, slumping into the nearest chair in thought as I used my full attention to read articles online.

I glanced at the note and picked it up, not bothering to use tweezers anymore. At the bottom of the note was printed a net address that I could access to RSVP. Also, wasn't it a little pretentious to spell out the acronym when it was in French? I decided I didn't know, wanting to rub my face but careful not to do so just in case there was some undetectable compound on the letter. Maybe really high-class people thought "RSVP" was uncouth.

However, instead of following the link directly in a browser, I laid back into my chair, grabbed a fibre-optic cable, inserted it into my cyberdeck and triggered a Deep Dive. The world fractalised and was replaced by my local subnet rezzing around me. "Hoot," I said as I layered proxy after proxy around my ICON and then typed in the address in a translation-routing program and clicked enter with my beak.

Instantly I started moving, blurring through the net. I slowed briefly as I passed through large regional nets and routers, flying fast to the East. The Ihara-Grubb equations created this shared Universe of the net and added a sense of direction and distance to the net that made these types of virtual reality interfaces possible. Since I was flying to the East, according to the IG equations, that meant the server I was connecting to was in the East in the real world, too.

Finally, the program dumped me in what my Menu called the Dublin citinet in front of the largest series of structures I had ever seen on the net. It looked not so much like a castle but an old-style feudal walled city, with a motte and bailey. The very air had a charge here, and it made my feathers tremble. One of the tall structures appeared to be a lighthouse inside the curtain wall, right next to the keep. However, instead of rotating around at a standard revolution rate, the lighthouse's beam randomly searched and flitted from here to there like the eye of Sauron on amphetamines.

When the beam shifted to me, I let out a high-pitched "Hoot--" and immediately disconnected, continuing speaking as reality reasserted itself, "nope, nope." I patted myself down, making sure I was all there and feeling goosebumps on my arms. That was disconcerting, even considering I had used a Haywire comm to put a larger computer in between my brain and the net just now.

A couple of quick tests showed me that nothing had gone wrong, aside from instantly being traced by whatever that lighthouse was. Traced through all of the proxies I used and terminated at my nascent clinic subnet. While it hadn't attacked me, it instantly traced and isolated the connection to my subnet's backbone connection that I had arranged for instead of mooching off the fat pipe that Clouds had like I did the last time I lived here.

It had then performed a thorough network mapping of my entire exterior-facing subnet but didn't hack the bastion node to map out the private subnet, not that there was much inside of it anyway. At least it hadn't been hacked, as far as I could tell. But maybe I should write the storage to zeroes on that bastion node and then reflash yesterday's backup, just in case.

Yes. That would be prudent. However, if it could be hacked so effortlessly, then it could be done so a second time. But that wasn't productive to think about, so I stood up and walked over to the rack of computing hardware in the corner and powered the system down. Thankfully, with fast access solid-state memory, the process was relatively quick, but I kept the backup images off the network just in case I was ever hacked, so I had to physically change out some drives.

I let out a breath and sighed. Perhaps I shouldn't have done that. No, there was no perhaps about it. I definitely shouldn't have done that. That had been scary. Maybe Militech or Arasaka or other giant Megacorp's data fortresses were on the same level or even scarier, but I wasn't stupid enough to ever digitally go to any of those places, either.

Realistically, I wasn't in danger... probably. I had been standing outside on what had been theoretically the public Dublin citinet, but at the same time, I couldn't help but feel as though there was a giant ACME-brand anvil dangling precariously above my head like the Sword of Damocles the whole short time I was there. That was me, Taylor Hebert, Super Genius.

Well, it could have been worse. I could have used my Haywire pair back in LA to route my net traffic, and if I had done so, then that eye of Sauron would have traced me back to Los Angeles, directly to my clinic there! There would be no real reason Dr Hasumi would get curious about this giant datafort minutes after Taylor got an invitation with that address on it.

Dr Hasumi got a phone call, which I answered as I put all of my tools away and stepped out of my private area. I was taking a steady stream of walk-in customers in Night City, and this time I followed many of the NC regulations and business codes. I was a legitimate pharmacy, at least, although not a legitimate clinic. This meant more taxes I had to pay, but I didn't want to rely entirely on the Tyger Claws glaring at any city inspectors in the building.

"Bob, it's rare for you to call me," I said to the Militech suit, raising my eyebrows. Normally I called him, and only when I needed to buy things. Although, to be fair, I had invited him out to drinks with Kiwi and a couple of her men once. I had only done that to put a more personal touch on our business relationship as it was somewhat expected to socialise a little bit and to trade favours around.

When I got more money from my inducer sales, I bought another two gross Sandevesitan units from him, but he refused to sell me more until I sold most of my stock retail. He correctly assumed I was just buying them to stockpile, not necessarily to sell during the current conflict. Still, I was pretty confident I would sell them eventually as I did one to three installations of this model a day now; it had become something of a speciality of my clinic.

When mercenaries, or wannabe mercenaries, asked me what they could do to increase their chances of surviving in combat, I generally suggested in this order: a reliable rifle, sub-dermal armour, nanosurgeons, and a Sandevistan, if they could handle it. The nanosurgeons were more expensive than both the subdermal armour and my entry-level Sandy combined, though, so people did not often buy them from me, which I felt was a bit of a mistake.

Most professional militaries included nanosurgeon organs in all infantry, if not in all military personnel altogether, but I had noticed that it was a somewhat uncommon purchase for mercs on the entry-level who thought they'd rather have things to help prevent them from getting shot in the first place. I thought this was stupid because you often didn't notice someone shooting you until they actually shot you. Well... the people I shot often didn't notice it, anyway.

Bob grinned and said, "Are you interested in a job? Militech needs a lot of surgeons lately, and you could write your own ticket."

I blinked. Was he trying to headhunt me? That was quaint. That meant that Bob here wasn't really aware of my other business. Perhaps he was going down the list of competent surgeons and asking? I mentally nudged my Agent to do another net search and quickly got an article from one of the local screamsheets, the giant headline reading, "IT'S WAR, THEN."

One part of me read the article while the rest talked to Bob. It seemed like the NUSA forces tried to push up into Fresno, and a battle took place. I pulled up five more articles in different outlets, foreign and domestic. Everything I read was propaganda, but the best propaganda was true or at least had elements of truth. It was what was left out that clued you into the propagandist's motives.

By reading about the same event in multiple locations, I could reasonably interpolate that the actual truth lay somewhere in the middle. I was reasonably confident that there was a battle in Fresno and that the casualties had been heavy, and Northern California still controlled the city and rail nexus.

President Kress had immediately declared war on a number of states, which was a reaction from weakness, I felt. I had really been heads down if I hadn't noticed that, though, but I really did hate the news. The fact that she had reacted so strongly, along with a number of other things, tended to make me believe that NUSA got creamed in the battle.

Perhaps I should be watching the news more carefully, but honestly, I did not really care. I didn't have a dog in this fight, nor did I care about who won. Either way, most things would stay the same. Neither side was better enough that I would have rooted for them to win the conflict, much less wanted to support them. Although, I supposed I had a slight bias in favour of the Free States side since they had been attacked first, aggressed first.

"Uh, no, thank you, Bob. I doubt you could make it worth my while. Besides, I didn't start my own practice because I wanted to eight to six it," I told him flat-out.

This, surprisingly, got him to grin and look relieved. I didn't have to wonder long as he told me why he seemed relieved, "I didn't think so, but I have been told to offer. If you had agreed, then I wouldn't get to act as your clinic's liaison, which would mean less remuneration for me!"

I narrowed my eyes, "Liaison? You are my sales rep."

"Well, yeah, about that. I am. But your practice is being drafted by the NUSA federal government in accordance with the Defence Production Act. You should be getting a national security letter explaining things shortly," he said, sounding polite and sending me some signals that he was slightly apologetic about it.

I narrowed my eyes and said reasonably, "Bob... Bob... I'm sure you don't want to look underneath your car for the rest of your life before you start it. So, talk fast." Sure enough, I got a message from a cryptographically signed address from the Department of Homeland Security right on time.

This caused him to grin and spread his hands placatingly. It might sound weird that he seemed relieved that I threatened to put a bomb underneath his car, but a blatant threat like that was a way for me to say that I didn't really hold it against him. If a Corpo really wanted to kill someone, they didn't warn them—unless they were extra sneaky, I supposed. He said, "Be subzero, Doc, be gato. You know this isn't me doing this. They just stuck me with the detail since I know you. And you're not singled out, either. All the hospitals and clinics that aren't a back alley chop shop in LA are getting one of these."

I read the letter and forwarded it to my attorney for him to review as well. From what I could tell, though, the Defence Production Act was an overly broad law that gave the President or her designee the ability to force a private business to accept and or prioritise contracts for materials or services deemed necessary for national defence, theoretically, even if in so doing the company suffered a loss.

I didn't expect to be forced to take a loss, as I would just shut the clinic down temporarily, and they would have killed the goose. The threat to do so was so obvious I didn't even need to mention it, either. This situation was kind of like temporary partial nationalisation, though, so I sighed and shook my head, "What baka decided this? It's stupid."

He shrugged, "LA will be the main hub for casualties. We're taking over most of the hospitals, too, like I said. What this means for you is you'll get a couple of patients a day, already stabilised, with the goal to assess and, if possible, bring them back up to a hundred per cent using cybernetics or biological replacement, depending on the economic factors involved, of course."

I wanted to groan inwardly. This was the type of medicine I hated to practice the most, the enny-pinching kind. I rapidly sent a message to the three surgeons who worked PRN for me, asking if any of them wanted to come on full-time or at least increase the days they worked and offered bribes. I didn't mind if I had to pay a little bit more; I'd prefer these mandatory patients go to someone else.

Hopefully, one would bite, so I wouldn't have to do this very much. Also, how quickly could I get contractors to come and install one or two more operating theatres on the second floor? I had already moved all production out, so I had the space now. I would definitely need more than just one operating theatre.

"Alright, tell me in detail how badly you're fucking me, Bob," I said in a monotone.

---xxxxxx---

It turned out it wasn't that bad. But I wasn't going to be making very much money on any of the work I did for Militech. Or, excuse me, for the NUSA government. Same thing, really. Militech was still technically nationalised and had been for years and years.

Gloria and Kiwi arrived home about the same time, and David had been home from his Aikido class for an hour. His mom had agreed to him starting martial arts early, and I found an Aikido dojo nearby. I had been a little hard on the discipline, considering, wrongly, it was not very useful for actual fighting.

I'm not sure if that was some of what I knew about from Brockton Bay filtering through and altering my opinions, but here Aikido was a little more useful and taught a little more practically. When some of your enemies might be superhumanly strong borgs, it would be stupid to go punch-for-punch with them. Due to this, many disciplines considered "soft" or that relied primarily on an attacker's force and momentum were much more effective. The most famous Solo in the world, Morgan Blackhand, was supposedly a fifth dan Aikido master, although nobody was sure if he was alive or dead.

It seemed useful enough that I had started taking classes, too, twice a week. Tai Chi, though, was still mainly just for meditation and discipline, which matched NC-Taylor's memories of studying it when she was little.

I said as they all got into my living room, "I'm not making dinner tonight, but how does Chinese take-out sound?" That was agreeable to all parties, especially David, who pumped his fist.

Gloria looked tired and said before I even asked her, "It's been crazy at the hospital! I'm glad I'm only doing one rotation this last semester. We've been taking in a lot of soldiers being evacuated from the north, although some suits kept saying we'd get arrested if we talked about it. I think they're trying to keep a lid on how many casualties they're taking."

That made sense to me. From what I could tell, they hadn't even been informing the KIA's next of kin yet. Gloria looked tired, but it wasn't the tiredness from lack of sleep as she had experienced in the past, but the tiredness of someone who wanted to get something over with. She would be graduating soon. Her focus was critical care and emergency medicine nursing, although she had a minor focus on psychotherapy due to her scholarship.

"They're sending stabilised patients to my clinic that I have to accept, or else, too," I told them, which got both Kiwi and Gloria to raise their eyebrows, as it was definitely not usual.

Gloria seemed upset, glancing at her number on priority, David, before saying, "This war sounds serious, then. I hope nothing happens here."

"I doubt it. It's not like the Free States want LA," I said wryly, and then turned to Kiwi, "I've decided I can help that merc you told me about if she is still in town."

Yesterday Kiwi mentioned that a woman she knew as an acquaintance was in a bind. She had done something kind of stupid and needed a new identity, kind of like the person Wakako had sent me. I didn't want to advertise that I was capable of such things, so I brushed her off at first, but everything going on today had me accelerating some of my plans, and she could be perfect for one of them.

From what I could tell, this lady needed a new identity or to get out of the country and was pretty sure she would be murdered if she stayed anywhere inside the continent. That said, she really didn't want to leave North America and had been saving that as a last resort. She had, allegedly stolen from a semi-powerful central American crime family. They could project power enough to assassinate her in the NUSA, but probably not in Europe, which had been her plan if she couldn't find someone to adjust her genome.

Kiwi mentioned her as she often mentioned people around the area that had problems that I solved in a way that got the elf-girl to think I was a Fixer.

Kiwi nodded, "Okay... I'll bring her by tomorrow. She is lying low right now while trying to find a way to get out of the country. This whole unpleasantness isn't helping."

"If you're the CEO of your company, how much do you pay yourself? I would set my salary at a million eddies!" David asked me and declared after the Chinese food arrived, and we sat down to eat.

I snorted, "My salary is one eurodollar a year."

"What?! Why?!" he asked, shocked and dismayed.

I chuckled, "Because I have to pay forty-five per cent income tax on my salary. But I'm the only one who owns the company, so if I just issue a million dollar dividend to the shareholders, myself, then I only have to pay ten per cent tax on that because it is considered a capital gain." I couldn't claim to have come up with that idea, but the accountant I hired did and made it seem like I was stupid for not realising it. There were dozens of different tax loopholes like this, and it wasn't surprising that they were structured so, mainly, the rich were the main beneficiaries. It had been the same in my last world, too. The more things changed, the more they stayed the same, after all.

I personally didn't think the NUSA government was in any way working for the benefit of its citizens, though, so I didn't feel bad about avoiding taxes.

This caused David to laugh, "Nova!"

I glanced down at him and smiled. In a few years, David would be old enough to start life extension and genetic therapies. I'd do the life extension myself, but he would need the cover of some common genetic tweaks on the commercial market, so it seemed like that was where he got the LET too. The current consensus, which I mostly agreed with, was the ideal time to do initial life extension and genetic therapies was just before puberty, after all.

---xxxxxx---

I got to my clinic fairly early in the morning the next day, as I had two Militech-delivered patients waiting for me. I blitzed through them but had a few issues finding the correct people to send the treatment plans to, which had to be authorised and returned to me before I could perform the procedures, but I ended up finding the correct net address to submit in the end, after talking to three people on vidcall.

The two soldiers were both missing some limbs and had organ damage in a few places. Not a big deal at all.

"Tsk..." I said as I finally got the treatment plan back, as Militech was nixing the scar removal biosculpt. Penny-pinching bastards. This was like dealing with an HMO, or worse. I vastly preferred my normal "cash on the barrelhead" business. I would do it anyway, even if Militech didn't pay. My vats didn't use very many nanites these days with the multi-level filtering systems I had installed, after all. I'd just call this a freebie and doing my part for the GIs, I supposed. I stood with a Rosie the Riveter pose for a moment before I realised I wasn't alone, glanced at my receptionist and then fled to my office. The truth was it upset my sense of medical elegance not to include it.

I spent most of last night doing more research on my alleged grandmother. I dug through all of Alt-Danny's old things and did find Alt-Danny and Alt-Mom's marriage certificate, and sure enough, her maiden name had been Annette Rose Astor-Armstrong, so that made this note more credible. Although, with the wealth that Grams had, she could have afforded a ninja to sneak in and alter this physical document, and I might never have known.

Wait a minute... Wait a fucking minute! I smacked my palm on my desk. A ninja? I had put down my kidnapping and interrogation under brain scan as to a friend of Alt-Danny's. It was pretty clear to me that my behaviour since coming to this world raised some flags with people who knew NC-Taylor. In retrospect, it had been obvious that the main thrust of the interrogation was ensuring I wasn't a doppelgänger, and only after that had they branched out into general questions and subjects of interest. Only I definitely was a doppelgänger, just one close enough to NC-Taylor not to be detected.

I was still a little sore about that, but most of it was because of how easily that man with the British accent took me apart. I had to admit it had been something I had been trying to forget, too, which was kind of stupid. I had thought I was dangerous at the time, and seeing someone who really was dangerous had been a stark wake-up call to me. I didn't like feeling helpless. I hated it, in fact, so I avoided thinking about when it had happened to me.

But, yes, it fit. I always thought that the British ninja seemed vaguely butler-like, and this family was based in the UK and Ireland, from what I could tell. I tried to work up some righteous indignation about a grandmother who had her granddaughter kidnapped and interrogated under brainscan, but I had to admit if I had a daughter or granddaughter and I thought they had been replaced by someone who murdered them and took their identity, I would... likely do the same—but probably not as a first resort, at least!

Couldn't they have... just knocked on my door and asked, though? I mean... that would have worked. Of course, meeting someone whose first step was kidnapping and interrogating you would have to be taken very carefully. But it meant I couldn't ignore the invitation. I didn't want to wake up to a polite man standing over my bed or comfortable chair some dark night.

I waited about twenty more minutes before Kiwi brought in the woman she had mentioned. I already knew what she looked like, but I was surprised at her height. At least a-hundred-and-eighty-five cems, and she looked jacked. Her dossier said she was a former US Navy petty officer that may or may not have been in the special warfare department. After she separated, she worked as a mercenary for numerous legal, quasi-legal and outright criminal enterprises.

After introducing herself to me, she sat down in front of me and asked when we were alone, "Tron said that you have connections that could get me a new ID. I need more than a physical change, though. Otherwise, I'm dead eventually, anyway. What will it cost me?" Kiwi was going by "Tron"?! Who came up with that name, anyway? Avocado was better.

Still, I grinned at her, steepling my fingers like a proper villainess, "It will cost your everything."

---xxxxxx---

She expected to pay in eddies, of which she had quite a few, possibly from her thievery but ended up more excited by what I charged her. Namely, her entire identity. She was perplexed at first why anyone would want to assume an identity that was marked for death, but from her perspective, someone else continuing on her life was great for her, as nobody would ever suspect her of being, well, her. I tried to give the impression that I had another client, and I leaned into my mistaken identity as a Fixer here, that needed a "real" identity and wasn't planning to remain in the Americas anyway, so it was a perfect trade.

She had spent over eight hours recounting for my recording devices a detailed account of her life's story, especially her military service and jobs afterwards. She wouldn't divulge some things, mostly to do with her criminal career after she left the service and a few governmental secrets, but that was fine because I didn't really need to know everything about her. I just needed to know everything she would disclose about herself. If there was no way she would tell any other person about it, then I, too, didn't really need to know.

She was unconscious now and going to remain so for some time inside my personal biosculpt vat in my laboratory. The body she had helped design with me was downright petite, and it definitely didn't resemble her. I had to take all of her implants out, as well, and I would be replacing them with comparable models or biosculpt treatments that could mimic their functionality.

"I always wanted to be small and cute," the Amazon said bashfully before the surgery. Well, she'd get her wish, I supposed.

---xxxxxx---

"It's nice to see you again. How, how can I help you today, Miss Hebert?" Wakako asked me after a little polite small talk in her pachinko parlour office. My discussions with Wakako reinforced my belief that Wakako had come up from the streets, so to speak. She certainly didn't have a Corpo background, but I would have been a little bit surprised if she had.

She was polite, like a Corpo, but she barely sent out signals using body language, intonation or cultural referents that tended to change what a Corpo meant when he or she said something. For example, I would never casually threaten to put a bomb in Wakako's limo as a way of telling her "no hard feelings." I was afraid she would believe me.

I smiled, "I need some security. As ridiculous as this sounds, I have another meeting at Konpeki Plaza, and I thought it might be good to have a security team waiting for me outside."

She pursed her lips and looked at me weirdly, "I do hope it goes better than your last meeting there. Although, it did end up being quite profitable for the both of us, eh?" Then she slowly shook her head, looking more amused now, "But yes. I think I can assist. I will need to know who you are meeting and a little bit about what it is about so I can accurately underwrite the risk, price it and offer the gig to mercenaries which might be most appropriate."

I nodded. I did that as well when I acted as a liaison for people in Chinatown in LA. I mainly picked the gigs that I thought would be profitable and fit Kiwi's risk profile; the rest I handed off to mercenaries that I had become acquainted with that operated in the area.

I generally charged a small fee for the service. I mostly acted as an escrow. In almost all cases, people had to pay upfront for mercenary service; otherwise, trying to get clients to pay afterwards was almost impossible. I was trustworthy enough to both keep the money, correctly judge the success or failure of a gig and pay the mercenary if the gig was successful or return it to the buyer if it failed.

I frowned, having a sudden epiphany. Maybe I was a Fixer. A little one, though.

Tabling that thought for the moment, I said while smiling, "Well, my grandmother has invited me for--"

Wakako immediately interrupted me, "I'm afraid I won't be able to assist you."

Wait, what?! Then it became clear. This bitch knew who my Grams was and hadn't even told me?! The odd first meeting with the tea service came to mind, telling me she probably knew the whole time! I narrowed my eyes but then realised it was kind of ridiculous to expect someone not to know who their own grandmother was. Also, I wouldn't have gotten involved in the family drama of that level, either.

This did add strong corroborating evidence that Gram did not send that ninja butler to alter Alt-Mom's marriage certificate while I was asleep, although I had already felt that was a very out-there prospect, to begin with.

We just stared at each other silently for a moment before I finally sighed, "Alright, fine."

Wakako smiled and asked, "Besides that, is there anything I can help you out with?"

I opened my mouth, paused and then closed it. I was about to decline, but something caused me to stop. I did need to buy something from Arasaka, and they were no longer willing to insure my shipments into LA, and even if I could get what I wanted there, it would be another adventure getting it to Night City through the NUSA blockade. Night City was trying to remain neutral in the conflict, which just meant that it pissed both sides off, kind of like Texas.

Finally, I nodded, "I need at least one more of the same model Arasaka brand thermoptic implant you sold me last time, but if you can get three, I'd buy all three."

I should have bought more when I had the chance from my Arasaka rep back when I ordered the robots. Both Dr Hasumi and Taylor had one unit installed, but I would need at least one more. The rest, I would stock, and it wasn't like I couldn't find buyers for them in this market.

Stealth systems were technically an illegal, or at least restricted, implant in most jurisdictions, including Night City and the NUSA, but it was one of those laws that were selectively enforced. A hallmark of tyranny was that the legal system was so Byzantine that any random person was basically an unindicted felon, with only prosecutorial discretion keeping anyone out of gaol. As Beria said, "Show me the man (or woman in my case), and I will show you the crime." It kind of grated my sense of justice that I was getting the benefit of this selective enforcement, but not enough not to take advantage of it.

She raised her eyebrows and hummed, "I can get one for sure. Maybe two, but I'll require payment upfront if you don't mind." I didn't at all. Taylor Hebert's accounts were flush, as were Dr Hasumi's. I had more contacts that were able to "tumble" electronic currency transfers, or rather obfuscate transfers between two parties, and they charged less than Wakako did. In fact, such a thing was one of the services I provided mercs in LA, too. It helped to have a big bankroll, as that made it a lot easier to move money around until even an AI couldn't determine who got what.

I paid her and departed, a little disappointed. Military backup had only been a plan B for me in the first place. And even then, it was just something to make me feel better from a psychological perspective; I didn't think it would actually provide any protection beyond that.

As I stepped out of the pachinko parlour, I briefly caught a glimpse of a camouflaged drone flying silently overhead a couple of hundred metres in the air. The stealth system of the drone flickered briefly as it occluded a darker cloud before refactoring and vanishing again in less than two hundred milliseconds, my eyes quickly and automatically shifting through all vision modes to try to recapture the vanishing shape in an automated "notice stealth, defeat stealth" program I had made.

I barely got a glimpse of the flyer, but it still had me almost ducking for cover just in case it had a precision munition attached. It was clearly a military model. My observation drones had simple camouflage made of SmartPaint on their undersides but mainly relied on being small. This was both large and also featured an active stealth system.

However, nothing happened, and I wasn't blown up. I ran a continuous scroll of my life onto a BD, but only a rolling twenty-four-hour period. It was useful in times like this, though. I rewound and paused the frame when the drone was visible and used several image post-processing techniques to create an outline of its shape, then punted that to my Agent to identify.

The result came back quickly. Over ninety per cent confidence that it was a British BAE Demon Eye observation platform. I grinned widely. So they had won the contract, eh? I hadn't heard, but I didn't really care. It was probably publicised as a press release, though. Good job, Mr Stewart!

I hummed the melody to Land of Hope and Glory as I walked to my car.

---xxxxxx---

As Taylor left, Wakako let out a breath in what was half an exhale and half a hiss. What had that girl been thinking, asking her that? It did seem that this was the real girl, though. At first, she was confused when she noticed that Dr Hasumi was still active back in Los Angeles, but it was clearly within Hebert's ability to make anyone indistinguishable from her, after all she did it for herself.

She must have hired a relatively skilled surgeon, perhaps one that got in a lot of trouble to continue to be Dr Hasumi while Taylor came back to Night City. Probably for a share of her profits? But how was Taylor controlling this double? Well, Kiwi was still in LA, so it wasn't hard to guess that if Dr Hasumi tried to take things over that she would disappear, with everyone being told she was "on vacation." Then, another more pliable Dr Hasumi would return.

With as much money as she thought Dr Hasumi was making, Wakako was frankly astonished that Taylor Hebert wanted her old identity back. But this... it was a good scam and a great way to have her cake and eat it too.

Wakako didn't ask when this invitation was for. She didn't dare. However, just the fact that such a personage was coming to Night City, even if it was only briefly, was precious information. She wouldn't be so uncouth as to sell it directly, but she could definitely profit from it.

Taylor's "grandmother" wasn't on the same level as, say, Saburo Arasaka or Rosalind Myers. Wakako thought it was mainly because her family had already accepted the fact that they would not, in fact, rule the whole Solar system, so instead, they just carved out sections of it. It was a very European philosophy, Wakako thought.

The portfolios of such families were, of course, confidential, but it wouldn't surprise Wakako if they owned significant amounts of shares in both Arasaka and Militech, just in case.

---xxxxxx---

It was time to "wake up" the new clone, which was floating in my personal vat in the laboratory in LA. It looked virtually identical to the woman who had floated there herself a week ago.

That lady had been delighted with her new, "cute" body, and I had used a shipment of new implants to sneak her out of the building. She was starting a new life... somewhere. Perhaps staying here in LA, to me it didn't matter.

All of my implants had been identical between Hasumi and Taylor Hebert, and that was very wise with the first pair, but I was diverging from this rule this time. Slightly, anyway. I would absolutely have to have the same cyberbrain and operating system for now and definitely the same or at least equivalent Kerenzikovs, but I thought the rest I could change. It might take a little bit to get used to, but it would be fine. Kiroshis would stay the same, including my modifications to them, because they were just too useful.

I did include the stealth system on this new body as well because it was so universally useful, and it was very tolerated, even if it was restricted. But I could not take integrated weapons systems where I was going, not at all, so the monowire had to go.

What replaced it was a very high-end military set of full-arm prostheses by MoorE Technologies. They were in the "Strong Arm" or "Gorilla Arm" class of cybernetics, and while they were in some ways as dangerous as a monowire, they were tolerated everywhere because they were also used by labourers.

This body wouldn't have a cyberdeck at all, but I would be able to act as though it had one through my connection to my other bodies and other computers, and it had a full-body set of high-end subdermal armour system.

I frowned at the almost Amazon body. Although Hasumi was curvier and a little shorter, she had a similar body type to my original, so it wasn't too difficult to get used to. Hopefully, this new body wouldn't cause any dysmorphia, especially with its more radical cyber limbs and armour instead of the more subdued muscle lace and ballistic skin weave. However, I was trying to fit in, and she had dermal armour, not ballistic skin weave. Well, it also had muscle and bone lace for the organic legs, too.

Plus, this was exactly what a body that used to be a US Navy SEAL would look like, I thought. I couldn't exactly try to change it too much when I was trying to look like someone who had been a real person. Questions would be asked already, and I didn't want to diverge from what was expected too much.

Well, there was no use continuing to wait around. I triggered the integration, and both my bodies sat down and began meditating while a countdown timer flashed in my HUD.

Suddenly, again, I was more. It was hard to describe the feeling, but I really liked it. It wasn't like taking a drug because that just muddled your mind, whether it was a depressant or stimulant. It was the opposite of that, although I thought it might be just as addictive, so I tabled any plans for expanding to four any time soon. Besides, I had some special plans for number four that would take quite a while to implement.

I helped myself out of the tank and got dressed. I had to hustle now. I only had a couple of hours to get to the Los Angeles International Airport for the OrbitalAir spaceplane flight to the Crystal Palace. A brief layover, followed by a much, much longer ride on a freighter to the Galileo Cylinder, one of the O'Neill Colonies. It would take close to two days to boost out to the Lagrange point where the space stations were situated at.

If you had enough money and technical skills, and most importantly, no further entanglements or loyalties to the planet Earth, then you could immigrate, although I was sure I would be scrutinised severely due to "my" past military experience. I wouldn't be going there as a Doctor, no way. Too suspicious. The Amazon had no medical experience at all. But they needed a lot of electricians and other zero-gravity workers.

The Amazon didn't have any experience in microgravity, but that could be taught. She had been a specialist in Interior Communications in the Navy before becoming a special warfare operator, but it meant she had both skills, and those would be the ones I would be leveraging. Submarines were half-spaceship, anyway, so my CV and immigration request had been tentatively approved by the Republic of O'Neill cylinders.

I had already been devouring training manuals for both low and high-voltage electrician work, including training materials for precisely her former job in Interior Communications. It was basically the Navy's version of a networking tech, which I already had a little experience with creating the networks for several buildings.

I frowned as I got into the cab with my duffle. I hope this didn't count as stolen valour. It was merely identity theft, and I had permission, even!

At the same time, Taylor Hebert logged into the site to RSVP that she would, indeed, be available for tea on the fifth.