Brian and Zaunya carrying a brisk pace weave through heavy foot traffic and a shouting match over a fender bender. The hustle and bustle of Heywood amongst the chaos echoes the get down you'll find in Santo Domingo... however, to the natives? To Brian?... This is where the lucky chooms are born... at least their daily life or death struggle comes with a chance to rub shoulders with the ruling elite... grass is always greener n' all that. Closer you are to the city center... the more fertile the ground.
The pair enter a stacked apartment complex with endless floors. They make their way through the unkempt front lobby past various residents and blue collar building mechanics going about their day... giving them subtle glances as these two towering solos pass by packing gear like they mean business. No matter how well you might try to blend-in in this town, if you're not from there... people know it. A light breeze flows through the long hallways as Brian and Zaunya exit an elevator onto the top floor. They walk down the long tattered hallway with stray trash and stained carpet.. noticing multiple cameras throughout it. Some were completely busted... however the cameras that were functional followed them directly as they walked past each one. Brian notices this and abruptly stops walking causing Zaunya to stop and look over at him.
The cameras follow suit and stop as well... locked in on the pair of them. Zaunya now picks up on it and glances directly at Brian who returns the look. The pair continue walking as the cameras follow them.
They arrive at the apartment door matching Mama Welles' deets. As Brian takes a knee and begins to run his fingers along the edges of the doorframe, it abruptly slides open causing Zaunya to snap draw her Nue and point it inside. He stands up and slowly pulls his Nue... they exchange a look with each other and enter with iron drawn.
The apartment catches them by surprise as they look to see the massive size of the living area. The next 3 apartments over have had the walls removed allowing for a huge open and cascading living space. The opulence on display was waning but still clear. An all white and red theme was visible throughout... white leather couches, red furniture with white and red cushions... chandeliers hung from the ceilings as they walked on white marbled floors. It was as if the rat had cracked open his piggybank and sunk whatever he had left into this place... doing his best to look like the biggest fish in the smallest pond of Heywood.
"What the fuck..?" Zaunya whispers confused as the pair make their way through the place clearing rooms and checking out the opulence on display. Zaunya uses her Kiroshis to scan the area, temporarily turning her eyes a golden yellow and offering her enhanced sight and detection.
"Definitely not a temporary stay for this one. A stealth place like this..? Choom had the mind to plant roots here no doubt." He says
"Where do you want to set up-" She asks glancing over at him.
She suddenly sees Brian's entire body begin to tense and seize up as several static sparks fly out of some of his neuro ports. He screams in pain briefly stumbling to one knee.
"Brian!?" She shouts as she rushes over to him.
"I'm... i'm alright... the fuck was that?" He says taking deep breaths trying to gather himself and slowly staggering to his feet. The pair of them raise their iron as they continue to scan around the apartment on alert. Zaunya then hears the sound of Brian's Nue drop to the white marble floor with a loud thud and cracking a piece of the floor on impact.
She looks over and sees him with his hands on his head as he shrieks in pain and collapses to floor. Brian's vision begins to black out as he sees yellow static and particles flickering.. making it nearly impossible for him to see.
"BRIAN!!" she yells as she runs back over to him; He blinks and rubs his eyes trying to clear his vision while withstand the pain. It feels as if someone is twisting the very nerves in his brain... like a migraine combined with a taser shock. Zaunya looks up to see someone stood at the far end of the apartment nearly 50 yards away looking over at them.
They stood still with their arms rested at their sides... they sported a sleeveless Cyberpunk yellow hoodie with black jeans and boots... their hood was up... leaving her only able to see a black digital mask covering their entire face. The mask has yellow LED lights... illuminating what looked like digitally pixelated eyes staring directly at the two of them ominously. The pixel nature of the face made it look emotionless... creepy... as if it were designed to evoke a particular neural response.
She quickly points her Nue up at the person causing them to take off... sprinting through a door they were stood next to at the far end of the connected apartments. Zaunya triggers her Sandevistan... Brian laying nearly blinded watches her flash after them out the door on the far end.
Brian groaning, rolls over on his side and begins to immediately feel relief... his vision and body abruptly return to normal as the neurological tension in his body releases. He takes deep labored breaths as his eyes open wide in shock as he slowly stumbles back up to his feet. He hears the sound of Zaunya scream in pain louder than he even thought possible causing him to jolt as he races out of the door they came in from.
He looks down the long hallways and sees Zaunya collapsed onto the floor twitching and contorting her body as she rolls around in pain... the yellow hoodie standing over her with their back toward Brian.
Zaunya screams again even louder as her eyes open wide from the unbearable amount of pain surging through her back and limbs as she helplessly rolls on the ground.
Brian suddenly yanks the person down by their hoodie from behind causing their mask to fly off down the hallway and yanking the hood off of their head. Zaunya immediately feels instant relief as she lays on the ground rolling back and forth crying in deep, fleeting pain as her entire body begins to throb. Brian points the Nue directly at the person's forehead as the the safety clicks off.
Brian's eyes open wide as he abruptly stops in his tracks... his finger curled around the trigger and a twitch away from firing. In total shock and disbelief he whispers to himself under his breath... gritting his teeth:
"Its a kid.... Its only a FUCKIN kid..."
The expression on the kid's face is one of complete fear and surrender. With his eyes open wide he puts his hand up in front of Brian's blood red, crimson Nue.
"P-Please.. i- i didn't-" The kid says as Brian slaps his hand away and presses the barrel directly to his forehead.
"What the FUCK did you to her!" Brian yells with eyes open wide.
"She- Shes ok! i- i let go! i didn't-" The kid pleads as Brian shoves him down further onto the floor before quickly getting up and rushing to Zaunya's aid.
He gently rolls her over and tends to her... hearing her deep labored breathing as he cradles her in his arms... she wraps her arms around him as he slowly helps her to her feet. She falls back onto the wall of the hallway with a thud... looking down, completely out of it as Brian gently grabs her face checking on her. The power of this kid's quickhack having taken a serious toll on her. While doing this, they hear the sound of the elevator ding as it casually slides open... causing all 3 of them to look over.
As the elevator casually slides open they see their target with 3 huscle of various sizes. The corpo sees the 3 of them as his eyebrows lower and his eyes open wide. "HEY!!!!!!!!" He screams at the top of his lungs to the 3 of them. The kid quickly rolls over onto his stomach and faces the elevator to see who it is.
"WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING ON MY!-" The corpo's screaming is interrupted by one of his huscle quickly yanking him back deeper into the elevator. "GO!!" He yells to the biggest one of their group as he confidently steps out of the elevator into the hallway. He's huge... sporting traditional black corpo security wear... based on his size and implants looks to be a former member of The Animals boostergang. He steps forward while the other 2 huscle quickly step in front of the executive to sheild him as the elevator casually closes.
Without hesitation, The Animal charges down the hallway at break-neck speed... the sounds of his weighted boots thump hard... shaking the walls and weak wooden floor boards underneath them giving way.
"Oh SHIT!" The kid shouts as he quickly rolls out of the way of the charging huscle barely avoiding getting trampled.
The Animal crashes into Brian at full speed.. the impact knocks Zaunya off of her feet as she falls to the ground still stunned and out of it. Brian catches The Animal's charge energy.. sprawling before attempting to twist his body and throw him using his own momentum against him to no avail. He grabs Brian by his waist and uses all of his strength to lift and fling him at the wall of the hallway letting out a labored roar of a grunt. Brian hits the wall hard causing a loud crack as a massive chunk of it caves in kicking up drywall dust and debris into the air. The force of the impact doesn't faze Brian at all... as he lands on his feet, he grabs the corpo by the back of the head and throws an elbow directly at his face. The impact of his new titanium vanadium bones powered by his new bionic joints combine with his refined technique... delivering a crushing blow with booming impact as chrome meets chrome... staggering the ganger back stunned. Brian throws another elbow... chrome cracks chrome meeting flesh this time... effortlessly sending blood and teeth flying... leaving a caved in dent in his face. Brian then steps forward putting his leg behind the ganger stumbling backward to trip him. As The Animal falls, he grabs Brian's jacket and the back of his neck causing them both to tumble to the ground.
The Animal uses his momentum to roll on top of Brian grabbing one of his wrists and using his other forearm to pin him down by his neck choking him. As Brian reaches up to claw at his face, it becomes clear to him their physical strength is near equal even if their skeletal structures aren't. The air compression and sounds of working mechanics engage in the Animals gorilla arms as he begins to apply immense pressure to Brian's neck and wrist. As the strength of the cyberware begins to slowly overwhelm Brian, sparks begin to shoot out of the arms as the pressure quickly begins to let up around his neck. The pressure of the gorilla arms suddenly release as the Animal sits up and looks at his arms with wide eyed confusion. As sparks continue to fly out of them, the Animal quickly grabs his own throat with both hands strangling himself. The force of the strangulation causes the Animal to fall to his back and off of Brian.
Brian looks over to see the kid stood about 10 yards away... seeing the red glow in his eyes and a serious look of focus on his face as he quickhacks the boosterganger.
Brian takes the opportunity to jump on top of the Animal... he begins punching him in the face repeatedly with rapid force. The pace and strength of Brian's punches and breathing gradually increase as blood begins to fly up to the ceiling. As his punches increase in power... the Animal's face begins to cave in... blood sprays violently onto Brian's face as he doesn't let up... causing the kid to back off in fear at the level of brutality. Feeling and hearing that level of weight and chrome clashing at that speed and impact up close... was unlike anything he had ever experienced. The raw speed and power on display was whiplashingly deafening.
"BRIAN!" Zaunya yells as she stumbles over to him. "STOP!! BRIAN!! Stop!-" She says gritting her teeth.. struggling to grab him from behind and pull him off. The force of her pulling causes Brian to fall backward on top of her and the kid to take another step back.