The instant the shot went off, all color drained from the world.
The laughter that had been carrying through the street, the easy banter between friends, the warm looseness of a night after a good fight — all of it crushed flat by one single sound.
Pilar's warm, living smile froze in its last second.
A burst of blood mist splattered across the container's iron surface. Warm fragnts of flesh sprayed across cold neon tubing. The brilliant light colors mixed with crimson blood painted Night City's most absurd and brutal image.
Pilar's body fell hard, landing in the cyberpsycho's urine at the base of the container, making a dull, heavy sound.
One instant of dead silence.
The whole street went completely quiet.
The wind stopped. The noise stopped. Even the flowing light of the holographic ads on the street seed to suddenly freeze.
David's feet were rooted to the ground. His pupils shook violently. His mind went blank. The blood in his body ran cold all at once.
He opened his mouth. His throat was blocked like sothing had lodged in it. He couldn't make a sound.
Pilar, who had been laughing with him just a mont ago, warm and easy — was a headless body.
Lucy's body pulled tight. Her hand instinctively grabbed the frozen David beside her. For the first ti, a deep and bone-cold dread flooded into her clear eyes. Her fingertips trembled slightly and she couldn't stop them.
Dorio froze where she stood. The joy of her victory monts ago vanished completely. Nothing left but cold and shock.
Kiwi's cigarette had already fallen from her fingers and gone out on the ground. She narrowed her eyes. Even in those eyes that had spent years in Night City's shadows and seen more death than she could count, sothing barely naable passed through them.
Maine's whole body was struck as if by lightning.
He stared at Pilar lying in the blood nearby. At the body that would never again smile and talk cyberware with everyone, complint a modification, or share sothing worth sharing. A block of ice seed to have been forced into his chest, making it hurt to breathe.
This was his crew mber. His family. The one he'd been protecting and walking alongside this whole ti.
No warning. No conflict. No reason of any kind.
Just one well-aning mont of curiosity. One completely unguarded question. One living person, casually crushed by this city.
On top of the container, the late-stage cyberpsycho was still in his daze.
He seed completely unaware that he had just killed an innocent person. He maintained his crooked stance. The exposed chanical tubing sparked with erratic electrical flickering. His red cybereyes were unfocused. His mouth ran through the sa broken, obscure, incomprehensible words in a loop.
He raised his arm, let it fall, swayed. chanical and deranged. Killing, for him, was nothing but unconscious instinct — the cheapest possible release left after chro had eaten his mind.
"Bastard!"
Thin, hoarse, trembling at its absolute limit.
Rebecca.
The petite girl stood at the back of the group. Her usually bright eyes were completely soaked in red.
She looked at the blood covering the ground. At Pilar, who would never open his eyes again. At the killer who showed no remorse and was still raving.
The accumulated emotion split apart.
Everyone else was still in the daze of sudden, unexpected grief. Rebecca had already raised her hand.
She drew the new pistol she'd bought from the Gunfire Children's Clinic and emptied the magazine into the cyberpsycho.
Vito hadn't exaggerated. His pistols, with the right rounds, could penetrate military-grade cyberware.
But this cyberpsycho had no pain. No fear. He didn't care about the rounds entering his body. As long as the chro still moved, he would keep following the instinct to kill.
Rebecca threw down the empty pistol. She needed more. She lunged for her weapon case. Inside was the Ajax rifle.
She'd tested this rifle at the Gunfire Children's Clinic range. With tungsten rounds, the armor-piercing capability was exceptional. This rifle was how she was going to kill the cyberpsycho. This rifle was how she was going to avenge her brother.
Ratatatatatat!
The relentless, dense volley erupted.
Rebecca held the trigger down. The modified Ajax poured out savage bursts of fire. Round after round after round, without holding anything back.
Her body trembled from the intense recoil. Her muzzle stayed locked. Not a single deviation.
Rounds hamred into the cyberpsycho's body. Tearing apart his disrupted cyberware. Blasting open exposed tubing. Smashing chanical components to pieces.
tal fragnts. Exploded parts. Oil and blood mist flying in every direction.
She didn't ease up. Didn't stop. Didn't show the faintest rcy.
At this mont she had no room left for reason, for rules, for consequences.
All she knew was that her stupid brother — the one who always said she was too emotional and had too much empathy, the one who grew up alongside her from the beginning, the one she had shared everything with — had just died for absolutely no reason, right in front of her, in this piece-of-garbage city.
Night City didn't play by rules. So she'd make her own rules with bullets.
The container was torn apart under the dense fire. Iron sheeting warped and collapsed. Debris scattered everywhere.
The cyberpsycho couldn't even scream. His body convulsed and shattered under the brutal fire, reduced entirely to a wreck of broken machinery and flesh.
Rebecca's shooting didn't stop.
Her eyes were red. Tears and rage stread down her face. Her fingers were locked on the trigger, pouring out grief and fury again and again.
Maine watched Rebecca firing out of control. Watched Pilar, silent and still in the blood. His throat worked hard. Everything that might have been said compressed down into sothing heavy and wordless in his chest.
Click.
The empty chamber. Rebecca was still holding the trigger down. Her fingertips had gone white from the pressure.
Maine stepped forward and pried her hand open. Her face was streaming.
"Rebecca..."
Then movent. Maine's instincts fired and he shoved Rebecca sideways. A heavy round hit the Ajax's fra and the rifle was destroyed on the spot.
"Cover!"
Maine grabbed Rebecca and rolled behind a container. He looked up and saw another cyberpsycho — eyes glowing red.
This one had Maelstrom's signature multiple cybereyes across his face. His entire body had been modified. What his hands had beco could no longer be called hands. They were wrapped around a heavy machine gun that had clearly been ripped straight off a turret, now spraying indiscriminately in all directions.
David reacted fast. He got behind a wall, out of the heavy machine gun's line of fire. He looked out and spotted Lucy behind a trash bin. The cyberpsycho's muzzle was slowly tracking toward her.
David didn't hesitate. He drew the compact, an pistol Vito had given him and activated the Sandevistan.
He moved and fired, heading for Lucy at the sa ti. The military-grade Sandevistan's near-ti-stop effect let him reach her and pull her to a safer position before the cyberpsycho's muzzle could track there.
Several heavy rounds struck the road surface and kicked up debris. Shrapnel hit David. Without subdermal armor, the wounds bled.
Maine's crew was in serious trouble. They were fighting back, but this wasn't a job — nobody had brought heavy weapons tonight except Rebecca. And the Ajax was gone.
Maine fired his last explosive round. It was shot out of the air before it reached the target.
He made the decision: get out from behind cover and make his stand, buy his crew the ti to get clear.
30 ADVANCE CHAPTERS at patreon/Eatinpieces
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