Liberty and Death, Chapter 53
Fortunately, Hawk’s mood shifts worked both ways. By the time they were walking down the thoroughfare to the Bazaar in front of their heavily laden cart, she seemed right as rain. She was walking too close to Cora once more, but Cora wasn’t exactly complaining; at least Hawk was talking to her.
Kyra, on the other hand, had been a ghost all morning. Cora would hear her talking to someone a room over, rush in to try and clear things up, only to find Kyra’s conversational partner talking to air, then looking around confusedly as though Kyra had simply disappeared. Which was a real fuckin’ possibility with the girl, to be honest.
Oh, Cora could see her in the party HUD well enough, but that sure as shit didn’t mean she could catch her.
In the end, she’d relented, and asked Lux to tell Kyra to hold down the fort while she took the away team to check on Berg, and hopefully supply her a bit. It’d be best if Kyra stayed behind anyway, if only to have a home-team badass; Cora wanted to get Trish a Receiver Array, and was considering seeing if Fern would be amenable to implantation of the Party Array they’d pulled out of a Chain-head last night. One badass team did not a revolutionary force make, after all.
She’d also have left Iain, but the man had been oddly insistent he come to the Bazaar, ‘Bein the only man what knows the ways around n such’. Cora didn’t buy that for a second, but as someone who pined for her own giantess, she wasn’t going to deny Iain the chance to gaze upon his power-armored paramour.
They weren’t exactly relaxed, but they’d been kicking ass all over the Chains the past few days, and this time they didn’t have any non-combatants with them to worry about. It might not be true, but it was tough not to look at any potential ambush as just a way to add to their stock, which was already impressive.
21 adrenobytes, a couple weird glands, and that Party Array made up the bulk of their cyberware. There was another odd silvery net none of them had been able to identify, that Cora had a feeling might be useful. It was shut tight in Hawk’s premium microsome. They also had 37 Alphound skins, tooooons of teeth, and a couple Gerblin clubs, alongside the chains that the Chained had left behind. She’d also brought some of the Matriartch’s bone plates and teeth, but had kept about half, having an inkling that they’d be extremely useful for crafting.
Cora…. didn’t really know what all this was going to translate to monetarily, but she thought it would be a lot; this stuff might not be intended to be super-rare, but for the time being at least, her group was the only one who was gathering it. Market price should be sky-high.
They pulled up to the gate without incident, and the giantess in power-armor made a rumble of disapproval that felt like an earthquake.
“This ain’t a cart entrance,” she chided. It was tough to tell where she was looking, but Cora liked to think she was raising an amused eyebrow at Iain.
“Oh, I know, I know Ingrid, but ye see, things didnae go so well fer us on the trade route last time, thought mayhap we keep em guessing, ye ken?” Iain explained, the first time Cora had heard of this thought process. Ingrid regarded him archly for a moment, then shook her head, speakers amplifying her laugh to tectonic activity.
“Aye, heard about ya’s wee dustup with the Chains, both on the route ‘n outside o’ ol’ Jonah’s. I’d tell ye te keep that shit outta teh Bazaar, but I ain’t dumb enough to be thinkin’ ya’s is the ones what started that. That where all this… Gods, that’s a lot o’ skin in there, ye’s’ve been huntin’ monsters?” She asked, obviously surprised.
“Oh aye!” Iain responded with a twinkle in his eyes, “Interested? Dab hand I am, could be persuaded to show a young lass the ropes, ye ken?”
Ingrid’s laugh was more genuine this time, softer.
Iain you dog, it's working!
“Might take ye up on that sometime, iff’n I’ve got some free time off shift,” Ingrid chuckled, and Cora watched Iain’s eyes go wide like a pup who’d caught the truck. “Times like that are few and far between though. Guess ye’ll just have to keep comin’ back and checkin’ in!”
“Aye, that I will, that I will…” Iain said, visibly stunned by his own minor success.
“Fer now, ye’s all know the drill,” Ingrid said, extending one of her suit’s massive hands. “No firearms in the Bazaar, that means ye too, Trish, since it don’t look like yer here for hire no more.”
The merc grumbled, but handed over her weapon alongside the rest. Ingrid said something muffled by her helmet, and when the gates opened, a man walked out, taking the reins of the cart out of Iain’s hands.
Iain hopped down, and explained; “They’ll be takin’ that ter the depot fer us. We just gotta tell em where we want it ter go once we get there. Let’s stop by Jonah’s first, see if teh ol’ Clanker might know where Berg set up and get Trish and Fern wired for bear.”
The group almost walked right past Jonah’s office. Not because it no longer said Jonah Finkwaite, Techgraft, but because its canopy was no longer empty. The sign on the canopy now had a few extra words. Jonah Finkwaite, Techgraft, and his Emporium of Wonders both Modern and Antique!. It was rare you saw an exclamation point on official signage.
Where had once been a fenced off area intended simply to make space, now stood shelving, display racks, and a clerks table. A very bored looking Berg sat at that clerks table, obviously not busy, as she had nothing to sell. She looked up in shock as Cora pushed past the small wooden gate into her area.
“You actually came back!” She exclaimed, looking at Cora like she’d seen a ghost.
“Yep, I came back,” Cora responded, pretty impressed by how well Berg had set things up. “Howed you manage all this?”
“Luck, I suppose,” Berg sighed, jerking her head towards the door to Jonah’s office. “I came back here, seein’ as a Techgraft’s office is the safest place in the city, hopin’ I might be able to bribe Jonah to sleep in the lobby or somethin’, seein’ as it seems like half the city were after you.”
“Very resourceful,” Cora praised.
“Oh aye, always been that I have,” Berg said, then continued; “Well, you know how Jonah likes to talk, and I told ‘im what you’d set me to do. It turns out, he could really take or leave the whole bartering part of his business. Doesn’t like it. His prices are his prices, he says. Says maybe he could use someone to help him out with that, while he just takes care of the actual operations. Says mayhap I could buy ‘n sell for him, and run your business alongside, offer stuff as he can’t, used wares, monster bits, what have you.”
Her eyes gleamed as she continued, and Cora was feeling very good about her appointment of Berg as Luxholme’s commercial representative.
“Plus, since I’m workin’ for him too, he’s given me a salary and cleared a room above the shop! Ain’t much, but its better’n you were offering, generous as ye were, and the shop falls under his defenses!”
“Holy shit, Berg….” Cora breathed, as the magnitude of the woman’s coup became clear to her. “That’s fucking amazing! Like, it literally couldn’t be better! This won’t mean anything to you, but I’m so goddamn proud of you!”
“Well, like I said, always been resourceful,” Berg preened. “Would be far better, if I actually had anything to sell for you. People come in, look confused at the empty shelves, then I just tell ‘em what Jonah can do for ‘em.”
“Right!” Cora snapped, “We brought a ton of stuff. Not…. probably not enough to fill these shelves, yet, but we’ve got Alphound bits, Gerblin clubs, Chains cyberware….”
“Oh! Lemme see the ‘ware,” Berg fussed, and Cora had to shrug helplessly.
“Can’t, it’s on the cart. We’ll get it delivered here soon enough,” Coa explained, and Berg scowled at her.
“Right, suppose that makes sense.” She said, but nonetheless reached under her counter, and pulled out some high-tech looking display cases. “Jonah gave me these display microsomes, been itching to put something in ‘em. They are just as neat as all-get-out.”
Cora thought about her Party Array. 5 combat slots, 3 support slots. If they could get Berg integrated….
“Berg, what are your thoughts on Cyberware for yourself?” Cora asked.
Berg followed them into Jonah’s shop, looking more than a little apprehensive. For all the kindness Jonah seemed to emanate on the surface, he was still remarkably off putting. He pushed open the door from his surgery the moment Cora stepped inside the door.
“Ah! Miss Casanova!” He exclaimed, “Party Array treating you alright? I must say, your old pink jelly took to it like few things I’ve ever seen, I do hope that its served you well!”
“That’s a new and exciting way to say ‘brain’, Jonah,” Cora laughed, accepting his proffered hand. Too hard. Too many ‘bones’. “And yeah, it's doing just fine. Well enough I’m back to be a repeat customer, in fact.”
“Oh good! Good… pray tell, however, if that’s the case, why not arrange things with my new assistant, here?” He said, nodding to Berg. The woman shuffled nervously, not meeting his eyes.
“Cause she’s gonna be the recipient of some of it. Looking to get her, plus Fern and Trish here set up with Receiver arrays. Have a big shipment of ‘ware and parts heading your way, but I’m low on cash. Can I trade you…. Oh, 7 Adrenobytes for parts and labor?”
Jonah stared at her non-plussed for a moment, then looked to the sky, eyes flashing blue with racing lines of text.
“Oh! This isn’t a scam, the depot confirms your delivery!” he said, once more all smiles. “It will be 12 of those for this to be a fair deal I’m afraid, but seeing how many you have, I trust that won’t be an issue?”
“Deal,” Cora grinned. “One more thing before you start?”
“Of course!”
Cora produced the premium microsome, handing it to Jonah. He took it, and a holographic image of the tech inside shone from his eyes. Cora hadn’t been able to parse its shape before, but in the 3D view, it was clear as day. Spidery, silvered lines formed the shape of the upper part of a torso and arms.
“Ah, a Nano-Fibril Interstice! Very rare…. I don’t even have access to these. I’ll give you 100000P for it, no questions asked!”
Holy shit, bye bye money problems. But…..
“How much would it cost to buy one, and what does it do?” Cora asked, fighting the urge to just accept the payout. That was roughly as much as she estimated Berg would make from selling everything else they’d brought combined.
“It reinforces and enhances the musculature of your upper body, giving a +20 [Str] and [Dex], with absolutely no downsides, and no outward appearance changes, although it can be laid close to the skin to appear as a sort of metallic tattoo. Like I said, I don’t have any in stock, but list price for this would be 350k,” Jonah exclaimed.
Cora let out a low whistle. It had been fun to be as strong as Lacey, yesterday, but it really hadn’t been that useful. [Dex] was much more important to her fighting style. That said, something like this would triple her effective [Str], making her quick hits hard as well as fast, without having to risk going crazier than she already was by falling into Lacey.
“How much to get that implanted?”