The House of the Reapr welcomes Operative Fawaz Damilare to its ranks. Their contributions and dedication to our cause will be honored through the Net and through the Stars.
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"He who fights with monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster."
- Friedrich Nietzsche
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The morning light filtering through the reinforced synth-glass of the Charter Hill apartment was a pale, sickly yellow, bleeding through the perpetual smog that choked the upper atmosphere of Night City.
Alejandro stood in the entryway of the apartment, looking down at his son. Gone were the tailored fabrics Santi usually wore. He had dressed Santi in a pair of faded, slightly oversized cargo pants and a scuffed, dark grey synth-cotton hoodie. The boy's striking, spun-frost white hair, naturally curly, though usually kept meticulously neat and tamed by Julia, had been aggressively ruffled and pulled down beneath the shadow of a nondescript beanie.
Alejandro himself had shed his Militech corpo suit, wearing a battered synth-leather jacket over a dark tactical t-shirt. The cargo pockets of his faded pants were subtly weighted, packed with efficiency. In one, the encrypted data shards holding The Chrysalis Protocol and the raw telemetry, in another, an insulated pouch containing over one hundred thousand eddies in credsticks prepared as payment for services that didn't go on a ledger.
Tucked snugly into a concealed shoulder holster beneath his jacket rested his Militech M-10AF Lexington pistol, locked and loaded with armor-piercing rounds. Carrying anything like a duffel bag was a gonk's mistake since it invited searches, attracted thieves, and ruined a profile. An experienced operator carried everything close to the bone.
If anyone looked at them, they wouldn't see a Corpor and his prodigy heir. They would see a worn-out street merc and his kid, just another couple of faces blending into the grinding machinery of the lower sectors.
"Is the disguise entirely necessary, Pa?" Santi asked, his voice a quiet whisper in the dim hall. He tugged uncomfortably at the frayed cuff of the hoodie. "The strength of this fabric is highly degraded, and it offers zero thermal or ballistic protection."
"It's not meant to stop bullets, niño," Alejandro murmured, adjusting the collar of Santi's jacket to ensure the boy's violet eyes were somewhat shadowed. He patted his own pockets, feeling the satisfying, solid bulk of the necessary gear. Everything was accounted for. "It's meant to stop people from looking at us in the first place. Where we're going, looking like we have eddies is the quickest way to catch a shank in the ribs. We're going to keep our heads down, and we're not going to talk to anyone on the street. Understood?"
"Okay," Santi nodded, though his brow furrowed with analytical curiosity. "The socio-economic disparity of the lower sectors breeds opportunistic violence. I read that on the NCPD crime statistics."
"Then you know why we're dressing like this," Alejandro said, turning to punch the access code into the front door.
"Alejandro?" The voice cut through the quiet of the apartment.
Alejandro froze, his cybernetic hand hovering inches from the door panel. He closed his eyes for a second, cursing his own luck, before turning around slowly.
Julia stood at the end of the hallway, the belt of her silk robe tied tightly around her waist. Her dark hair was tousled from sleep, but her eyes were wide awake and filled with suspicion. She looked at Alejandro's battered leather jacket and the unnatural weight in his cargo pockets. She looked at the oversized, drab clothes swallowing her son.
Santi had barely ever left the sterilized, secure bubble of the Charter Hill apartment. His entire world consisted of these walls, his private tutor, and the digital expanse of his cyberdeck, all of which Julia was fiercely protective of. She wasn't just going to let them walk out the door looking like gangoons.
"Where are you going?" Julia asked, her voice dangerously calm. She crossed her arms over her chest, stepping fully into the hallway.
Alejandro forced a relaxed, casual smile, shifting his weight. "Morning, mamacita. Just... taking the boy out for a bit to get some fresh air."
"Fresh air," Julia repeated flatly, gesturing toward the smog-stained window. "There is no air out there, Ale. And you don't dress like a Watson street-rat to go for a walk in the corpo plaza. Where are you taking my son?"
"We're going to visit an old friend," Alejandro deflected, keeping his tone light. "Just an old choom of mine from my younger days. Thought it was time Santi saw a bit of the real world, you know? Can't keep him cooped up in this ivory tower forever."
"An old friend," Julia's eyes narrowed, her maternal radar screaming at her. She walked closer, her gaze flickering between her husband and her son. She could smell the stale ozone and old sweat ingrained in Alejandro's leather jacket. "What old friend? Give me a name, Alejandro."
Alejandro sighed, rubbing the back of his neck, knowing he was trapped. "Vik... We're going to see Viktor."
Julia stopped. The color drained slightly from her face, replaced instantly by a flush of absolute fury. "Viktor Vektor? The ripperdoc?"
"He's a solid choom, Jules-" Alejandro tried explaining himself, only to be cut off.
"He operates a clinic in Little China!" Julia exploded, her voice echoing off the vaulted ceilings of the apartment. "In the guts of Watson! Where the Valentinos, the Tyger Claws, and the Maelstrom all bleed! You are not taking an eight-year-old boy into a ripperdoc's basement in a combat zone!"
"It's safe, Julia," Alejandro argued, his own voice rising, stepping forward to bridge the gap between them. "Vik's clinic is neutral ground. Nobody starts any shootouts near his shop. I wouldn't take him if I couldn't protect him."
"Protect him from what?" Julia demanded, her hands balling into fists at her sides. "Why does he need to see a ripper at all? He's a child! He doesn't need cyberware! He doesn't need to be around the blood and the chrome-"
"We're going to get my neural link today, Ma," Santi said.
The silence that followed was suffocating.
Santi looked up at his mother from beneath the shadow of his beanie, his violet eyes blinking innocently. He had no idea where they were actually going, no concept of Little China or the dangers of a ripperdoc's basement. To Santi's logical mind, they were simply discussing an inevitable hardware upgrade.
"The latency gap in the meatspace is causing a zero-point-four second delay in my decryption algorithms," Santi continued, speaking precisely, unaware of the horror blooming on his mother's face. "Pa said we don't have to wait until I'm ten to build my Neural Link, so we are going to the clinic so I can interface natively."
Julia stared at her son, her breath catching in her throat, her mind struggling to process the clinical, terrifying words tumbling from his mouth. Neural link. Interface natively. She slowly turned her gaze to Alejandro. The look in her eyes wasn't just anger; it was pure, unadulterated betrayal.
"Alejandro Alfonso López Reyes," she whispered, her voice trembling with a rage so profound it shook her entire frame. "Tell me he is lying. Tell me he misunderstood what you told him."
Alejandro didn't look away. He squared his shoulders, his instincts locking his jaw. "Mi amor... the boy is telling the truth."
"Have you gone completely cyberpsycho?!" Julia screamed, lunging forward and slamming her hands against his chest. The impact did nothing to his cybernetic frame, but the emotional hit staggered him. "He is eight years old! The corporate standard is ten! You told me that yourself! If you put a neural link in him now, you will fry his brain!"
"I'm not using a standard neural link!" Alejandro shouted back, grabbing her wrists to stop her from hitting him again, though his grip was gentle. "I found something else! A lost protocol! It's safe-"
"Don't you dare fucking lie to me!" she shrieked, tears of sheer panic spilling over her eyelashes, struggling against his hold. "There is no safe chrome for a child! You are turning our kid into a borg, you gonk! You're stripping away his humanity just so he can type faster!"
"He needs this, Julia!" Alejandro roared, his voice booming with the desperate, raw terror he had been hiding for years. The sound shocked Julia into silence, and Alejandro released her wrists, stepping back, his chest heaving. He looked at Santi, who was watching the emotional spike between his parents with wide, analytical eyes, and then looked back at his wife.
"You see what he does," Alejandro said, his voice dropping to an intense, pleading rasp. "You see the math he does in his head. You've seen him rewrite the city grids and optimize physics models for fun. His brain is a supercomputer, Julia, and it is trapped inside a flesh-and-blood cage that cannot keep up with it. It's frustrating him. It's hurting him."
"So let him be frustrated!" Julia cried out, sobbing openly now. "Let him be a human boy who can't do everything perfectly! Let him have a childhood before you plug him into the Net!"
"The Net is coming for him whether we plug him in or not!" Alejandro snapped, the weight of the encrypted shard pressing against his inner vest pocket. He couldn't tell her about the Blackwall. He couldn't tell her about the things he had gone through almost nine years ago. But he had to make her understand the necessity of the neural link.
Alejandro took a deep, shuddering breath, dragging a heavy hand down his face. He looked at his wife, seeing the absolute terror in her eyes. He couldn't just drag the boy out the door. If he did, he would shatter his marriage permanently.
"Mi amor," Alejandro said, his tone shifting from a shout to a low, serious command. "Santi, wait here. Do not touch the door panel."
"Yes, Pa," Santi said quietly, stepping back against the wall, shrinking slightly into the oversized hoodie. He was entirely oblivious to the true nature of the risk they were arguing about.
Alejandro reached out and gently took Julia by the arm. She flinched, but she didn't pull away. "Come with me," he said softly. "I need to show you something. I need to show you why I'm doing this."
He led her away from the entryway, down the hall, and stopped in front of the locked door of his home office. He pressed his thumb to the biometric scanner, let the retinal laser sweep his eye, and pushed the heavy acoustic door open.
The room was cool, dominated by the hum of the super-cooled server racks Alejandro had smuggled in. The air tasted faintly of ozone and hot silicon. Julia stood in the center of the room, wrapping her arms around her chest, looking at the blinking lights of the massive processing units. It looked less like an office and more like a corpo black-site.
Alejandro walked over to the air-gapped terminal. He unzipped his jacket, reaching into an inner pocket to retrieve the primary data shard, and slotted it in. He booted up the system, the screens flaring to life, casting a harsh, emerald-green glow across his sharp features. His fingers flew across the keyboard, bypassing his own ICE, and pulling up the decrypted files from Kjellberg Neurogenetics.
"What is this?" Julia asked, stepping closer to look at the scrolling medical data.
"This is what I've been doing," Alejandro said quietly. "This is what I found in the Old Net data. It's called The Chrysalis Protocol. It's a clinical study from 2021, back before the DataKrash burned all the real scientific progress to the ground."
He highlighted a specific block of text, bringing up the biometric scans of a human brain interwoven with a faint, luminous blue webbing.
"You were right about the copper. The corporate standard waits until a child is ten because they use cheap, mass-produced copper wiring for their neural processors," Alejandro explained, adopting the calm, clinical tone he used during Militech briefings. "Copper runs hot. It causes micro-strokes if the myelin sheath isn't fully developed. But this... this is different. It uses a microscopic mesh of carbon-nanotubes that would run completely cold."
Julia stared at the rotating holographic model of the brain on the screen. "You want to put experimental, fifty-year-old technology into our son's head?"
"I want to give him a neural mesh that won't burn him," Alejandro corrected. He scrolled down to the results section. "Look at the data, Jules. They tested this on an eight-year-old girl under the label of Subject 4."
Julia leaned in, her eyes scanning the green text. She wasn't a netrunner, but she was a corporate wife, and she knew enough about the metrics of the world to understand what she was reading. She read through the data, saw the number, the latency collapse, the near-zero response threshold, the petabit-scale bandwidth, and the millions of concurrent cognitive streams.
"My god," Julia whispered, her hand rising to cover her mouth. "Ale... this isn't just a standard implant. This is... this is an entirely new lobe. Was she processing millions of data streams at once? How is that even physically possible?"
"Because at eight years old, the brain is hyperplastic," Alejandro said, stepping up behind her, resting his hands gently on her shoulders. "It's still growing. If you introduce the carbon mesh now, the brain doesn't fight it. The astrocyte cells physically bind to the synthetic webbing, becoming a permanent, organic part of his grey matter. He won't just be using a cyberdeck. He will be the deck. He will have an intuition for the Net that would eclipse the most elite NetWatch agents on the planet."
Julia stared at the numbers on the screen. The overwhelming power of it was terrifying. In Night City, power was the only currency that mattered, and it was the only thing that kept you alive. If Santi had this... if his mind was truly capable of processing the world at this speed natively... no corpo hit-squad, no rogue AI, no street gang would ever be able to touch him in the Net. He would be a god among machines.
But a dark, cold knot formed in her stomach.
"If this technology was so perfect, Alejandro... if it created someone this powerful..." She turned to look at him, her eyes searching his face. "Why have I never heard of her? Why isn't this 'Subject 4' running the world right now? Where is she?"
Alejandro looked down at his wife. He thought about the final log. 'Terminated due to critical asset destabilization.' He thought about the fourteen-year-old girl who had lost her humanity, who had stopped sleeping, who spoke only in static before corporate security put her out of her misery with a bullet in her brain. He thought about the 42% fatality rate on the operating table.
He swallowed hard and made up a lie.
"They flatlined her," Alejandro said, his voice flat, maintaining absolute eye contact. "The corporation realized what they had created. They realized she was too powerful, that her processing bandwidth meant they could never lock her out of their own systems. They realized that they couldn't control her, Jules. So they killed her to protect their bottom line, and they buried the research."
Julia gasped softly, a hand flying to her chest. The lie worked perfectly because it was exactly the kind of ruthless, sociopathic action a megacorp would take.
"But we aren't a corporation," Alejandro pressed on, his hands tightening slightly on her shoulders. "We are his parents. We won't be trying to control him, instead, we'll be guiding him. We will be his anchor."
Julia looked back at the screen, at the glowing, synthetic brain. She was torn apart by a violent mixture of fear and hope. In her eyes, this neural integration could make her son entirely untouchable. It could build a fortress around his brilliant, fragile mind that no one could ever breach. But she also knew Night City. Power drew predators.
"But it will put a target on his back," she whispered, a tear slipping down her cheek. "If anyone ever finds out what he is capable of..."
"No one will find out," Alejandro promised fiercely. "I will scrub all of his local data. I will teach him to hide it. I've already taught him how to build camouflage in the Net. He will look like any other gifted kid with a standard port, but underneath it all, he will be safe, Julia. I swear to you, I am doing this to keep him safe."
Julia closed her eyes, letting out a long, shuddering breath. The silence in the office stretched out, heavy with the weight of the irrevocable decision. She thought about Santi in the hallway, looking so incredibly frustrated with his own small, organic hands. She thought about the brutal, unforgiving city waiting beyond their synth-glass windows.
She opened her eyes. The maternal softness was gone, replaced by a cold gaze. If her son was going to become a weapon, she was going to be there to watch the forge fire.
"I'm coming with you," Julia stated, turning to face him.
Alejandro blinked, surprised. "Jules, the clinic is in a red zone-"
"I don't care if it's in the middle of a fucking combat zone in Pacifica," she interrupted, her voice leaving absolutely no room for argument. "If you are going to cut into my son's head and permanently alter his brain, you are not doing it without his mother in the room. I am coming, and it's not up for debate."
Alejandro studied her face, seeing the unyielding resolve there. He nodded slowly. "Okay. Go get dressed. Don't wear anything flashy, neutral colors only."
Fifteen minutes later, the Reyes family stood in the private elevator of their Charter Hill complex, descending rapidly toward the ground floor. Julia had swapped her silk robe for a dark, heavy synth-fleece jacket, her hair pulled back into a messy bun. She looked pale, her jaw set, holding Santi's small hand in a grip that was almost painfully tight. However, Santi remained quiet, his violet eyes darting between his parents, analyzing the heavy, unspoken tension vibrating in the elevator car.
Alejandro tapped a command into his internal optics, connecting to the Delamain network. He ordered an anonymous, mid-tier Executive package. He checked his pockets one last time through his jacket, confirming the subtle bulges of the data shards and the heavy payment credsticks.
When they stepped out into the biting, acidic wind of the underground parking structure, a sleek, black Delamain cab was already waiting, its doors sliding open with a soft, electronic hum.
"Please enter, Mr. Reyes," the smooth, synthetic voice of the Delamain AI chimed from the internal speakers. "Destination required."
Alejandro ushered Julia and Santi into the leather-scented interior before sliding in beside them.
"Take us to Watson," Alejandro commanded, his voice tight. "To the Little China district. Coordinates uploaded. Take the arterial highways and avoid the center grid."
"Route calculated," the Delamain AI said. "Enjoy the ride, sir."
The Delamain accelerated smoothly, merging out of the gilded, heavily guarded perimeter of Charter Hill and into the sprawling, neon-soaked labyrinth of Night City.
Inside the cab, the silence was deafening. Julia stared out the window, watching the towering glass spires of the corpo center slowly give way to the dense, crushing concrete brutalism of the lower sectors. The rain began to fall, streaking the windows with toxic, iridescent runoff. The holograms outside grew larger, more aggressive, flashing advertisements for cheap chrome and synthetic meat.
Santi sat between his parents, his legs kicking slightly, unable to reach the floor. He looked at the massive, neon koi fish swimming through the air outside the window, projecting a soft orange glow into the cab.
"Ma," Santi whispered, looking up at Julia's rigid face. "Are you mad at Pa?"
Julia closed her eyes for a moment, letting out a soft sigh. She turned her head, offering her son a tight smile, and squeezed his hand. "No, papi. I'm not mad at your father. I'm just... worried. This is a very big step for you."
"It's a necessary optimization," Santi stated logically. "My processing speed will increase exponentially."
"I know," Julia murmured, leaning over to kiss his beanie-covered head. "I just want you to promise me something, Santi. No matter how fast you get... no matter what or how much you can see in the Net... promise me you won't forget the real world. That you don't forget us."
Santi tilted his head, genuinely confused by the request. "Why would I forget you? You are my primary foundational variables-" He stopped, catching the lingering, desperate fear in his mother's eyes. The cold, mechanical terminology faded from his expression, instantly replaced by the soft, pure sincerity of an eight-year-old boy. He squeezed her fingers tightly with his small hands. "You're my Ma and Pa. I could never forget you."
Alejandro let out a quiet, trembling breath, looking out his own window, the neon lights reflecting in his hazel eyes. The boy wasn't a machine yet. The humanity was still there, fighting to stay on the surface.
The Delamain pulled to a smooth stop forty minutes later, the doors sliding open to the heavy smell of Watson, a mix of stale synth-pork, ozone, and wet garbage.
"We have arrived at your destination," the Delamain chimed cheerfully. "Stay safe out there."
Alejandro stepped out first, his hand instinctively dropping toward the concealed holster beneath his jacket, his other hand casually brushing the pocket holding the payment while his eyes swept the street. It was a narrow, neon-lit alleyway in Little China, crowded with food vendors and hunched figures hurrying through the acid rain. He nodded to Julia, who stepped out, pulling Santi close to her leg.
Alejandro led them toward a rundown storefront. The neon sign above the door flickered erratically, spelling out CHAKRA HARMONY in half-dead pink letters. The front window was cluttered with cheap, plastic esoterica, tarot cards, synth-crystal healing pyramids, and dusty incense burners.
Alejandro pushed the door open, a small bell chiming weakly. The shop was empty, smelling heavily of patchouli and dust. He didn't stop to browse. He walked straight past the display cases, leading Julia and Santi to a heavy, reinforced steel door at the back of the room. A subtle retinal scanner hummed to life as Alejandro approached. A green light flashed, and the heavy door unlocked with a loud, metallic clank.
They stepped into a narrow, dimly lit stairwell leading down. As they descended, the smell of incense was replaced by the sharp, sterile scent of medical-grade alcohol and hot metal.
And then, a sound.
Thud.
Thud.
Crack.
It was the heavy, rhythmic sound of leather striking dense sand.
Alejandro pushed the basement door open, revealing the clinic. It was a surprisingly clean, organized space hidden beneath the grime of Watson. Sleek surgical chairs, advanced biometric monitors, and trays of gleaming, sterilized tools were arranged with precision.
In the corner of the room, hanging from a reinforced steel beam, was a heavy boxing bag. A man was working it with punishing, methodical intensity.
Viktor Vektor had given up professional boxing years ago as the sport became more and more chrome-dependent, trading the ring for the scalpel, but he had never given up the training. In 2061, Vik was still a mountain of a man, his shoulders broad and corded with muscle. He wore a simple white tank top, damp with sweat, and a pair of worn boxing gloves. He moved with a heavy, grounded grace, throwing a devastating left hook that made the heavy bag groan on its chains.
Crack.
Viktor stopped, his chest heaving slightly, hearing the hydraulic hiss of the clinic door. He turned around, wiping the sweat from his forehead with the back of his glove. He squinted through the harsh fluorescent light, taking in the battered leather jacket, the dark hair, and the familiar, dangerous stance of the man standing in his doorway.
A wide, genuine grin broke across Viktor's face.
"Well, look what the stray cat dragged in," Viktor laughed, his voice a deep, gravelly rumble that filled the basement. "If it isn't Alejandro motherfucking Reyes. Thought the corpos had entirely sucked the soul out of you by now, brother."
Alejandro smiled, the tension bleeding out of his shoulders for the first time all day. He stepped forward. "They try, Vik. But you know me, too stubborn to flatline. Good to see you, man."
Viktor stripped his boxing gloves off with his teeth, tossing them onto a nearby metal table. He walked forward, raising his right hand. It was entirely flesh and blood, a rarity for a ripper, but a testament to his own steady hands. Alejandro raised his right arm, the synthetic, matte-black chrome plates shifting with a quiet whir.
They dapped up, flesh meeting metal in a firm, solid grip, pulling each other into a half-embrace, slapping each other on the back.
Viktor stepped back, his sharp eyes catching movement by the door. He looked past Alejandro and saw Julia standing there, holding the hand of a small boy hidden in a hoodie too big for his size.
Viktor's eyes softened instantly. He grabbed a clean towel from a rack, wiping his face and chest rapidly.
"Julia. Damn, it's been too long." He walked over, offering a warm, respectful smile. "I'd give you a proper hug, but I'm currently sweating enough to drown a rat. You look beautiful, as always. Ale is still punching way above his weight class, I see."
Julia's rigid posture relaxed slightly. She had always liked Viktor. He was one of the few pieces of Alejandro's past that didn't feel toxic. She offered a genuine, if tired, smile. "It's good to see you, Viktor. Thank you for seeing us on such short notice."
"For Ale? Always," Viktor said. His gaze dropped downward. He crouched down, resting his forearms on his knees, bringing himself eye-level with the boy hiding behind Julia's leg.
"And who is this?" Viktor asked, his voice dropping to a gentle, rumbling register.
Alejandro stepped up beside his wife. "Vik, this is Santi. Santi, this is Viktor. He's an old childhood choom of mine. One of the best men in Night City."
Santi peered around his mother's leg. He looked at the massive, sweaty man. He noted the lack of cybernetic optics, the steady flesh hands, and the warm, open expression. Santi stepped out from behind Julia, reaching up to pull the drab beanie off his head. It freed a messy mop of naturally curly, spun-frost white hair, exposing his piercing violet eyes to the harsh clinical light.
Viktor's breath hitched slightly, taken aback by the sheer, striking anomaly of the kid's appearance, but he recovered instantly.
"Hello, Viktor," Santi said politely, offering a small, formal nod. "Are you the operative installing my neural link? Pa said we were going to a secure location to see someone he trusts. I am very pleased to meet you."
Viktor blinked, then let out a booming, delighted laugh, looking up at Alejandro. "Jesus, Ale. You didn't tell me he swallowed a corpo dictionary." He looked back at Santi, offering a large, calloused hand. "Pleased to meet you too, kid. Call me Vik."
Santi took the massive hand in his small one, shaking it firmly. "Okay, Vik."
Viktor's smile lingered for a fraction of a second before the words actually registered. He let go of the boy's hand and looked at the sheer size of him, the small shoulders, the thin wrists. He looked back up at Alejandro, the warmth of the reunion vanishing entirely, replaced by a sudden, chilling confusion.
"Wait," Viktor said, his voice dropping. He looked back at Santi. "Kid... how old are you?"
"I am eight years and ten months old," Santi answered precisely.
Viktor froze. He slowly stood up to his full, imposing height. The professional demeanor of the ripperdoc was shattered as he reached out and grabbed a fistful of Alejandro's battered leather jacket and physically dragged the man three hard steps away from Julia and the boy.
"Are you fucking gonked, Ale?" Viktor hissed, his voice a low, furious rumble vibrating in his chest. "I thought the Kjellberg specs you sent over the encrypted line were for a teenager. A young adult with severe nervous system degradation. You want me to run this 'Chrysalis Protocol' on an eight-year-old?!"
"I know the math, Vik," Alejandro said, his hazel eyes cold and resolute, making no move to break Viktor's grip. "Santi is choking in his meatspace. His brain is a supercomputer, and it's trapped. The installation of a standard copper neural link at age ten won't be enough for what he needs to do. The carbon-nanotube mesh requires hyper-plasticity. If we wait, then the window will close."
Viktor's eyes darted away from Alejandro, landing on Julia. He looked at her with a mixture of absolute horror and disbelief. "Are you both completely cracked?"
Julia flinched, wrapping her arms tightly around herself, but she held the ripper's gaze. "I was against it at first, Viktor. I fought him and screamed at him. But... I saw the data he's talking about and realized that it's for the better good of Santi. It will make him untouchable when he grows up, and it will keep him safe."
"For the better good?" Viktor repeated, his voice cracking with sheer incredulity. "Fuck the better good, Julia! He's a kid, for fuck's sake! Let him be a kid for another year! Let him grow!"
"We don't have the luxury of waiting another year, Vik," Alejandro insisted, his voice hard. "Biology won't allow it. The astrocytes won't bind to the mesh if his myelin sheath sets. It has to be now."
"No," Viktor said, shoving Alejandro backward and releasing his jacket. He took a step back, shaking his head. "I refuse. I will not install a neural link on a kid that's younger than ten. I don't care what century the tech is from. I don't care what the processing output is. I'm a doc, Alejandro. I am not doing it."
Alejandro adjusted his jacket, his expression completely blank, fully shifting into the cold, calculating corpo-rat he was. He played his final card, knowing exactly how much of a low blow it was.
"Fine," Alejandro said smoothly. "Then we'll just go to another ripper. After all, I have the creds. I'm sure to find some chop-shop butcher in Kabuki or Pacifica who doesn't ask questions and doesn't give a shit if their hands shake during the procedure."
Viktor stared at him. The sheer, ruthless manipulation of the threat hung heavily in the sterile air of the clinic. If Alejandro took the boy to a back-alley butcher to perform a fifty-year-old, experimental surgery, Santi was a dead kid walking.
Viktor turned away, letting out a roar of absolute frustration. He walked over to the heavy boxing bag, raised his bare, ungloved fists, and struck it.
Crack. Crack. Crack.
He punched the bag hard, again and again, the heavy leather groaning under the brutal impacts. He punched it in anger, furious at Night City, furious at the corpo meat-grinder, and furious at his friend for backing him into a moral corner and forcing him to compromise his own values as a man and as a doc.
He stopped, his knuckles raw and flushed red. He leaned his forehead against the heavy bag, his broad chest heaving as he breathed heavily, staring blankly at the concrete wall behind it.
The silence in the clinic was suffocating, and Santi watched the massive man with wide, analytical eyes, entirely unsure of why his age had triggered such a violent shift in the man.
"I can believe this coming from you, Alejandro," Viktor said to the wall, his voice laced with a bitter, profound disappointment. "You've always had a screw loose. Always been a bit of a gonk with the way you looked at the world like a math problem."
He turned his head slightly, looking over his shoulder at the mother of the boy. "But you, Julia? I never thought I'd see the day."
Julia closed her eyes, a single tear escaping to track down her pale cheek, but she didn't apologize. She couldn't.
Viktor let out a long, heavy sigh, pushing himself off the bag. He grabbed the towel, wiping the fresh sweat from his face, before turning back to face the Reyes family. His eyes were tired, carrying the weight of a man who knew he was about to do something he would never forgive himself for.
"I'll go take a shower," Viktor finally relented, his voice a hollow, clinical rasp. "You can put him in the chair, but God help you both if this goes south. Because I won't."
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Cut my life into pieces, give me the last of your stones!
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