Everyone in the Phoenix Club tonight was garbage. Every last one of them. The worst kind of freaks the gangs had to offer.
Vito held back the anger and finished working through Shoji's files.
Boop boop.
"Hey, Vito. I'm here."
"Front entrance. Dragon's Breath rounds. Don't leave the guests or the bartenders standing. I've already cleared the second and third floors. Watch the stairwell. That's my way down. Don't shoot ."
"Got it!"
Kabuki was running a little louder than usual tonight. Thin screams threaded the air here and there, coming and going, but Night City had never needed an excuse for that kind of noise.
Once the Phoenix Club was handled, the two of them drove back to Lizzie's. In the car, Jackie watched Vito settle back and let the music run, and smiled.
"Mano. We finally got that lunatic. Any longer and the two of us were going to end up with so kind of permanent damage."
Vito was listening to Shout FM. The weight sitting in his chest had eased a little.
"Sothing else you two need? You never seem to run out."
"What the hell, Bug. When did you patch in?"
"I joined through Vito's channel. I was going to flag ard positions for you, but you walked in the door and imdiately opened fire on everything."
"So you heard everything we said?"
"Most of it."
"Including the part where I said you've got a face like a bitter gourd?"
"Mm-hm."
"What the hell, Vito! That's why you weren't saying anything!"
"Ha. Jackie, that one's entirely on you."
Everyone's nerves had been pulled tight for days. The back-and-forth let so pressure out.
"Let's talk money. Stints only took a token two thousand, but I shook a decent amount loose from Shoji. I'll split it now."
Vito sent the transfers.
"Thank you, boss. Looks like I can retire to Tahiti by the end of the year."
T-Bug whistled at the number.
"What are you going to do in Tahiti? Grow mangoes?"
"Retire. Net-runners don't get clean exits. One day you're in the chair and you just don't get up, brain cooked from the inside. Or you end up like last ti, cornered offline by a bunch of street punks, afraid to pull your jack."
Vito nodded.
"True enough. Everything we earn in this line of work cos off the edge of sothing sharp. Getting out early is the smart play."
Jackie agreed.
"I'm almost at the number I need to renovate the Wild Wolf. Vito, ever since you talked to my mother that ti, she dropped the whole thing with Misty right away. You two have no idea. A few days ago she showed up at Misty's shop with an enormous pot of slow-braised at. She didn't know Misty was a vegetarian. Vik and I ended up eating all of it."
T-Bug made one of her rare jokes.
"You'd better get yourself a decent car then. Once your wife and your mother are on the sa side, you'll need sowhere to sleep. Vito's couch is your fallback."
That got a round of laughter from everyone.
Vito offered:
"Bug. How about we get a drink at Lizzie's tonight and mark the occasion?"
T-Bug hesitated. Then:
"Fine. I won't stay long. You know . I'm the kind of hacker who locks herself in a room and stays there."
Jackie was already excited.
"Yes! This is the first ti we've t in person. I need to go find a copy of that Aristotle book and get Bug to sign it for !"
"Ha. Get out of here."
...
Vito brought the missing girls' footage and the news of Shoji's death to the people at Lizzie's.
Susanna took the external drive and went to the back office. Judy, Rita Wheeler, and Lizzie's security all followed to watch the footage of the dead. Liying wanted to go with them. One of the missing girls had been close to her.
Vito caught her hand and gave a slight shake of his head.
Liying's eyes filled with tears. She gave a small nod.
Vito took Liying to a private booth. Jackie was already there with several bottles, settled in.
"Hey. I figured Vito here got knocked out last round. Not one judge turned their chair for him."
Vito laughed and shot back:
"Jackie, you watch too many antique shows."
Jackie was naturally funny, naturally upbeat. Being around him had a way of softening grief at the edges.
The three of them drank and talked. Then T-Bug ca into the booth, dressed in her usual hacker gear, looking more like she'd co to work than to celebrate.
With Jackie there the mood stayed easy. After a little over an hour T-Bug said her goodbyes and left. She was clearly making the effort to handle face-to-face situations. It showed.
Jackie drank for a while longer, then got a call from Mrs. Welles and moved fast to get ho.
The booth was down to just Vito and Liying.
"Keep going. Tell the rest. Where you left off last ti."
Vito dropped another ice cube into the gin.
"Mm. Let start from back then. I was born in a small town south of Night City. They used to grow avocados out there, apparently. That crop pulls a lot of water. Once the groundwater was gone the whole area dried up.
I grew up there. My dad opened a repair shop. My mother helped him run it. That was life, quiet and flat enough to wring water out of.
When I got a little older my dad taught to drive. I was probably twelve. One ti I drove out near Night City and you could see the city's lights shooting straight up into the sky. After that I was like sothing had gotten into . Whenever I had ti I'd drive out and watch Night City's neon.
Then the Unification War happened. Nobody cared about that stretch of wasteland. More and more people from town kept moving into the city. My friends too.
I kept thinking soday my family would move to Night City as well. One ti I ca back from watching the lights and ran into a drifter on the road. He said offhand that I was always running toward Night City. I was already like a city girl.
I don't know why that got to so badly, but from that day on I started taking long detours when I went, so nobody would see going. That's when my driving started getting faster and faster.
A few years after that I'd learned everything my dad knew. I decided I was going to Night City. My dad refused outright. So I snuck out in the car.
He must have known I was going. The car was packed with things he'd put in for ."
Her voice had gone slightly unsteady. Vito poured her another drink. Liying moved closer and rested her head against his shoulder.
"If this is too hard, we don't have to talk about it."
"It's fine. So I drove to Night City. When I got to the checkpoint they impounded the car. They told I could drive my wreck back out, or I could walk in.
I grabbed a few bottles of water from the car and walked four hours. When I got to Night City I found out nobody was going to give a Badlands girl a job fixing cars.
So I ran deliveries for people who couldn't go themselves. One ti, soone looked at my face and told delivering things was a waste of it. He said I should get a doll chip installed and go to Clouds.
I actually took that seriously. At that point I felt like I was running and sothing was right behind . Every delivery felt like if I slowed down I was finished.
So I saved up for a long ti and had a second-hand doll chip installed. Then I went to Clouds. They took one look at it, told the chip was garbage, and threw out.
You understand what I an, Vito. At that point I had put everything on that one thing."
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