Corpo Age

Chapter 11: Raiders

Once I finished what should be the last enemy, I immediately went to examine the rooms near the big, dangerous cyborg I had taken out first.

Unfortunately, with one arm injured, I didn’t have any leeway to leave anyone alive to question, but judging from the reaction of the last group I dealt with, it seemed like he was someone important. I found the dropped key the man had tried to use earlier and unlocked the crate.

Inside the shipping container were neat stacks of crates with Nova Tech logos on them. Upon opening one, I found several hands, prosthetic ones. The other crates were all filled with similar cybernetics, various limbs, tendons, and muscle replacements.

This was… a fortune. It was worth way more than the 30,000 credits from this job. It was a flat-out jackpot.

The models in the crates were all current-gen ones, worth a pretty penny. This was a huge payday! I couldn’t wait to be able to afford better food, buy like bots to do cleaning and cooking, and maybe even move to a better place…though that would require stabler income.

I could also bring forth my plan to start a business with this startup fund. I just needed to level up more and upgrade a suitable tech to base my business around.

While taking in the mountain of expensive tech packed in front of me, I spotted in the corner an out-of-place box that didn’t have any markings on it. Within it lay various limbs and other smaller cybernetics in a disorganized fashion. Rummaging through the box, I sorted out the smaller cybernetics, and examined what make and model they were.

It didn’t take long until I found the SAID I was supposed to be looking for. I guess the box contained all the chrome looted from the bodies of the caravan’s personnel.

With my newfound fortune came the problem of how to move it.

With the mission objective secured, I walked out to the parking lot to secure a means of transport. It was about time I got my own ride. I wonder how the ownership and insurance stuff would work…I was not looking forward to that one bit.

I inspected the vehicles and found they all looked pretty worn and some of them had bullet holes all over. Only two didn’t, a sedan and an SUV. After spending some time searching the bodies, I found the corresponding keys and started packing away all my loot into the cars.

It took over half an hour to load all the crates from the shipping container into cars, and with some room left, I went to search all the other locked areas I ignored previously when I was busy taking out the surrounding hostiles.

The shipping containers I searched in the first warehouse I snuck into were simply bedrooms with nothing special in them. When I went to search for the final remaining ones in the second warehouse where the boss was, my search came up empty until I opened up the one furthest from the exit.

The moment I opened the last container, a pungent stench instantly rushed out, and within, I could make out the two slim figures in the corner, huddled together. What was most notable from the silhouettes were the chains tied around their arms and feet, attached to the railing welded to the wall.

As I wasn’t able to make out much detail even with night vision, I took out a flashlight and shined it towards them. With color restored to the world, I spotted a girl with long brown hair around my age holding onto a boy around eight, who looked similar to the girl.

“Who are you two?” I asked as I made my way closer.

“You’re not with them, are you? Why don’t you introduce yourself first?” The girl snapped while she placed herself between me and the boy.

“I’m Rollo. I had some business with your captors, but they aren’t around anymore. Now I can leave you alone and be on my way if you want, or I could do some charity work and bust you out of there, up to you.”

While helping them wasn’t profitable in a financial sense, I hope they could bring me some useful business connections; it wasn’t that steep of an investment for me, anyway.

“...Yes, remove these chains… please.”

“Sure thing, stay still,” I pulled out my‌ handy vibro dagger to cut the chains loose.

The two of them followed me as I headed out. I had everything packed and looted the place clean, so I was ready to leave. They didn’t speak until the moment they had stepped outside.

“Where are we?” The girl said as she looked around.

“We are…in the outskirts of District 12.” I read off the map from my optics.

“...Is that in the north part of NLA?”

“NLA?”

“New Los Angeles,” The girl stared at me as if I was dumb.

Okay, maybe they aren’t the local connection I was looking to make.

“I’m just going to go ahead and let you know we are in Elevate City, over 3,500 kilometers off the coast of New North America.”

“...How many miles is that?”

“Um. over 2,000.”

She froze for a second as the young boy held her closer.

“...You guys want to stay at my place for now?”

---

“Excellent work, Mr. Halls. Send me a message once you have dropped off the package at the designated spot.”

“About that loot I mentioned. Are you sure Nova Tech won’t be looking for it back?” I asked while I kept my eyes on the lights, waiting for it to turn green.

“The chances are very low, as they likely have written it off and claimed their insurance policy already. Unless you retrieved a sizable part of the shipment and flaunted it around, there should be no one looking for it.” Fitel replied at his usual measured pace.

That was useful to know. I had only told him I found a few cybernetics instead of the dozens of crates that I actually had.

“I see…thank you. Then I’ll text you once I drop off the package.”

“Understood, and one more thing, Mr. Halls, I would recommend keeping minimal contact with people affiliated with raiders, regardless of age.”

“...Thank you, I have it under control.”

“Very well, until we speak again,” Fitel said before he hung up.

I turned to look at the other two people in the car sitting behind me and gave them a smile.

They had opened up a little, and we managed to hold a conversion with them while the car’s auto-drive did its work. It seemed like they were children of a tribe living out in the wastelands of New North America, what most people called wastelanders or raiders. Apparently, they were being held hostage and their tribe was made to do work for the group.

I guessed that wasn’t a half-bad plan for a motley put-together crew, as corporations rarely cared as much about raider attacks. They were considered cockroaches that kept coming back no matter how many times they were put down, and it was an unprofitable business trying to wipe them out considering the harsh terrains they lived in.

They were able to use the information they gathered in the city and use raiders to do the actual work and would have gotten away with it too, if only they didn’t happen to get a hold of some sensitive item the corp wanted back.

I took some time messaging my building’s management office through my SAID and attained two guest parking passes. It seemed like I would have to go in person if I wanted to rent one.

Once that was done, I spent some time surfing the web, looking for ways to send these two to NLA, the closest city to their tribe. Plane tickets were way more expensive than I had thought, easily in the five digits, and these two didn’t have any IDs in the first place either.

“And we’re here. How about we grab some food first for you guys before going up to my place?” I turned around to ask the two as we pulled up to the colossal megabuilding.

“Woah, you live in this giant tower?” The little boy asked excitedly.

“Just renting a small place here. They’re almost two hundred floors, housing hundreds of thousands of people.”

“That’s like… a lot,” The boy replied, counting his fingers.

I grabbed a crate with my one good arm, dreading the fact that I had to move them all to the apartment now.

“Here, let me give you a hand,” The girl quickly took a crate, wincing at my poor one-armed display.

“No, it’s fine. I’m sure you’re both tired. Let’s go get something for you guys to eat first.”

“I insist. It would shame my clan to eat without having worked for it,” She glared at me with determined eyes.

“I’ll help too!” The boy said brightly and carefully picked up a crate with both arms.

“...By the way, my name is Sarah of the Wells clan, and my brother is Caleb.” The girl muttered as she carefully watched her brother lift the crate.

“Well, nice to meet you, Sarah, and Caleb. Now follow me. I don’t know about you, but I’m starving.”

We safely arrived at my apartment without incident and picked up some food along the way. It seemed like the siblings did not enjoy the cheap food here, but still ravenously ate all the food.

Can’t believe even raider clans probably eat better than the garbage sold around here. How far have we fallen…

Once we finished eating, I rented a cart from the building used for moving in or out and transported all the crates into my unit. I had the two accompany me to both keep an eye on them and to make it seem like they were moving in to help keep curious eyes off my cargo.

With all the moving around and excitement dying down, Caleb fell asleep soon after, so I let the two of them rest while I headed out after organizing the crates.

Ensuring the cameras placed in my apartment were in order, I first headed to drop off SAID at a lockbox and messaged Fitel. Then I headed to the cybernetic clinic I had previously used. Fortunately, I only had to wait twenty minutes even without an appointment.

“Dr. Keyes, we meet again. How are you doing?”

“I am fine, but you have seen better days.” He paused and stared at my bandaged-up arm before continuing. “You know, you should go to a normal clinic to get your wounds looked at. We mainly perform installation or removal of cybernetics here.”

While I could have gone to the hospital instead, for my arm, it would take some time to heal. Not to talk about the rehabilitation period. I was planning on installing cybernetics anyway, and this just accelerated that decision.

“Yes, I am aware. I’m looking to have my arm replaced with this.” I placed a package on the desk between us.

I had gone over the cybernetics from my loot and picked the best one that suited me, a Nova Tech Mudra. It retailed for 20,000 credits and was considered one of the better middle-tier cyberarms.

Dr. Keyes took a moment to take out the arm from its factory-new packaging and inspected it for a few minutes.

“I can do that. There doesn’t seem to be any problem with it. The fee for installing a cyberarm for the first time will be 5,000 credits. Is that acceptable?”

“Yes, do you guys accept cybernetics as payment, or would you like to buy some? I happen to be in possession of a few pieces you may be interested in.” I immediately took the chance to hawk my new wares. The loot wasn’t useful to me until I converted them to credits, after all.

“No, Mr. Halls, it is against our company policies and procurement contracts.”

Damn it, the payment for the job hadn’t come through yet so I’ll be using almost all I had left, but I had plenty of stuff to sell if I needed so I wasn’t too worried. It was better to get the cyberarm now than to wait weeks for my wounds to recover naturally, plus all the new functions that came along with it.

“Understood. Please go ahead with the installation.”

“Perfect, as a licensed cybernetic surgeon. I do need you to sign here to confirm that you would like to remove your current arm. I will not be able to reattach it after the operation if you change your mind.”

“Ha, I can always get a new one grown if I come to regret my choice,” I said as I read over the waiver before signing it.

“Well, if you had a couple of hundred thousand credits to spare, you could do that. Anyway, the procedure won’t be too different from last time. Please lay down on the table and inhale from this.”

I guess that means it is time for lights out. Hopefully, Fitel will come through with the payment by the time this is done.