They talked for a long ti. When they finally left, they exchanged contacts and made plans to et again.
It was a rare stretch of quiet. Vito doesn't believe in God, but talking to Liying had felt like confession.
A few days passed. Vito won the boxing championship without much drama. Dorio had withdrawn from the competition entirely. After losing Pilar, she had no heart for it.
Jackie sent a ssage. The commission from Susanna had turned out to be more complicated than they'd thought.
"Vito. Got so leads. Found out where a few of the girls are. The Tyger Claws grabbed them."
Tyger Claws again.
Vito's contempt for the Tyger Claws had reached the point where it no longer had a ceiling.
"Did they put a ransom demand out?"
Jackie sent an attachnt.
"No ransom. They're being quiet about it. The Tyger Claws grabbed these girls for black BDs, best guess. T-Bug traced the biotric signals. They went dark in Tyger Claws territory in Kabuki."
Vito went through the attachnt carefully, then opened a shared channel and brought T-Bug in.
"Black BDs again. Those Tyger Claws freaks never get tired of this. But if they're filming it they're going to sell it. Here's the split: Bug, find an expert who can unpack black BDs. I'll grab so Tyger Claws and squeeze them for leads. Jackie, find out who's moving black BDs right now. Anyone have anything to add?"
T-Bug had pulled up the attachnt. She said:
"The people who unpack BDs and the people who edit them co from the sa pool. That circle in Night City isn't large. We could get burned."
Jackie didn't follow.
"Why not use the legitimate BD people?"
T-Bug was direct.
"They either don't know how black BD encryption works, or they can't get us the information we need. And anyone with the skills to do both is a prize hire for the major BD houses. Nobody wants to wade into this."
Vito thought of Apollonia. He thought of the person dissolving in the acid container.
"Forget about whether the Tyger Claws figure out we're looking. Anyone grabbed for a black BD shoot probably isn't coming back. Find the evidence. Then we send every one of those dogs to hell, one at a ti."
T-Bug frowned. Her cautious wiring made her naturally resistant to mission plans built on emotion rather than calculation.
"If the Tyger Claws get on guard we'll have a serious problem. Kabuki's network isn't so amateur backwater fence."
Jackie stepped in.
"Find the people first. We don't need to think past that yet. If the plan breaks down, we make a new one."
T-Bug agreed. She'd reach out to a few contacts from her old net-running days and have them put their ears to the ground.
"I'll ask Susanna too. Have her point toward soone trustworthy who can actually get things done. Lizzie's Bar is in the BD business. There has to be soone in that orbit who knows the editing side."
Vito hung up and drove to Kabuki.
He spotted his first target quickly. A few Tyger Claws thugs at the mouth of an alley, working over soone Vito recognized.
Vito pulled out two throwing knives and moved in.
"What's up, bitches!"
The thugs turned at the shout, confused for exactly the second Vito needed. Both hands moved. Two knives crossed the distance and found both targets through the eyes. They went down.
The remaining thugs scrambled for weapons.
Vito didn't draw his gun. He answered them with fists and feet.
One minute later, every thug still breathing was flat on the ground and staying there.
"Sergeant Stints. Long ti. Get that promotion? You look a little rough for soone who only ran into a few street-level thugs."
The familiar face being worked over was Stints, the NCPD sergeant who had co to Vito months ago to deal with his corrupt colleague.
Stints glanced at the bodies on the ground and made a sound sowhere between a laugh and a dismissal.
"Those were just Dutt's people, sent to make my life uncomfortable. You did good work last ti. Sha it didn't change much. In a few days, though, you'll be calling Superintendent Stints."
Vito had no interest in NCPD internal politics. NCPD's records were a different matter.
"Still haven't dealt with your dirty colleague? Doesn't he have the Tyger Claws behind him? Help out and I'll take out whoever's pulling those strings too. How's that sound?"
Stints had recently gotten in with Arasaka. A little faithfulness, a little useful information, and the Superintendent's chair was waiting for him. Selling his soul — Stints had made his peace with that. Plenty of people wanted to be soone's dog and couldn't find the door.
"I've never had much ti for rcs. I don't think I can help you on this one."
Vito looked at the one-eighty Stints had pulled since their last conversation and read it clearly.
"Found a new patron and dropped the old ones? Which corporation are you rolling over for?"
Stints's face shifted. He said through his teeth:
"You ca here to give grief about that? I'm still NCPD. I can have you arrested and dropped in a cell."
Vito didn't waste words. He dropped low, swept Stints's legs out from under him, and took him to the ground. Both arms twisted behind his back, Vito's knee pressed into the back of his neck.
"NCPD is just another corporation now. Drop the cop routine."
Stints struggled, face going red, he shouted:
"I can't breathe! Damn it, Vito, get off ! I was kidding! Hell!"
Vito released him and stood back to where he'd been.
" too. Don't reach for the gun. You know I'm faster."
Stints, furious, catching his breath:
"So you want my help and if I don't give it you'll kill ?"
Vito smiled and waved him off.
"Of course not. At most I'd have the new Superintendent in a hospital bed for a few months. Paid leave. Has its appeal."
The anger went out of Stints considerably. He knew Vito would do it.
"Fine. Tell what you need. I'll help. But you help back."
"Good. I need NCPD database citizen records. Specifically the one tied to frontline officer Kiroshi scans."
Stints agreed imdiately.
"Done. I'll have it for you tomorrow. Outside the classified material, you'll be able to scan anyone in this city from it. Now what about what you're doing for ?"
"Give the na. Two weeks, I'll put a bullet in his brain."
Stints thought about it.
"I don't need you to kill anyone. I need you to find out who Dutt's real handler is. Not the one everyone already knows about."
"Real handler? Who's the known one?"
"Soone called Woodman. He runs Clouds. But there's a rumor that Woodman is just a cutout for dirty work. Soone else is running the operation above him."
Vito turned that over. He knew exactly where this pointed.
"As it happens, I know this one. Tomorrow you give the data, I'll give you the na above Woodman."
"Deal."
They wrapped up. Vito zip-tied the Tyger Claws thugs still breathing and loaded them into the trunk. Then he drove east, out of Night City, into the flat dead wasteland of the Badlands.
Thud.
He dropped them out of the car one by one and woke each of them up.
"All right. Let's play a little ga. I ask. You answer."
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