Cal blindly hobbled around for another hour before he was finally able to stumble upon an NCART station. He had mao catch his breath, but his legs still burned from the long run and his nose was a bloody swollen mess. Colpsing into a seat on the monorail, he went over the events of the night and tried to figure out where everythi wrong. He knew from the start he wasn’t ready to take this kind of gig, but it felt like the city itself was f his hand. Stagnation is death and he had to keep taking steps to move forward regardless of his opinion oter. He didn’t have the luxury of deg when or how he would achieve some of his goals, for now he just had to roll with the punches and hope he came out ahead in the end.
He wondered what his future would look like if he just kept letting his surroundings push him forward heedlessly. Thinking oter helped him rete a bit to the so called “Edgerunners,” but he still never wao sider himself one of their ilk. He would tio take risks, sure, but that was just a given in this city. He realized that he still o work harder to secure his future without dieing in the process. He needed a better uanding of his oabilities and he needed more varied paths to improve and expand them. The easy ao that was cyberware, but he was retit to stray from his current pns on that front. He didn’t even have all the eddies he o pay for what he already had on order. He could tell that pushing himself to get more cyberware right now would just lead to more plications in the long run.
Before he realized it, Cal had made it back to his megabuilding. He dragged himself off the NCART before relutly heading to the drop point to deposit the items for Wakako. Needless to say, the night had not gone how he had pnned and he was absolutely wiped. The st thing he wao dht now was have a lengthy versation about how he had fucked up, so he decided to just shoot the fixer a message with a brief outline of his results.
He didn’t want to mince words out the versation. Cal still o get upstairs and try to reset his nose before he passed out. It had been a long day.
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Cal slowly stirred from his restless sleep as he peeled his face off a blood stained pillow. His nose was still tender, but the pain was nothing when pared to his ag legs. His memories of st night were a blur from the poiered the Shion’s trunk until he colpsed in his bed. He had already been anxious wheered the garage, but whehi sideways he had started operating of adrenaline and instinct more than scious thought. He remembered tag Wakako, but he didn’t even have the energy to undress after returning to his apartment. Looking himself over, he saw his jacket crumpled on the floor by his bed and the rest of the clothes he still wore were stained with dribbles of dried blood.
‘ing everything is going to be a pain…’
He ran his fihrough his hair in a soothing motion before slowly undressing and making his way to the bathroom. Taking in his haggard appearan the mirror, Cal gingerly persuaded his nose bato pce before stepping into the shower. He vaguely remembered resetting it before he gave in to his exhaustion st night, but he wasn’t sure if it had moved while he tried to sleep or if he had just done a shit job at straightening it. Either way, it needed correg and the momentary pain that caused was nothing pared to the state of the rest of his body.
He tried to enjoy his ckluster shower as the warm water soothed his aches and pains. His legs still felt weak from overexertion and he had to brace himself against the wall just to keep from falling over. The burning pain that spread through his lower extremities eclipsed the dull ache he still felt from the tusion on his bad the colle of smaller bruises he gained from his spars with Coach Fred. His broken nose was just a minor invenience when pared to the accumution of punishment his body had received over the past week. He had known from the start that living in Night City would be difficult, but he couldn’t help but feel slightly dejected at that momee the small strides he had made.
‘Oep forward and two steps back…’
Today would be a rest day for Cal. It wasn’t even a scious decision he o make, just the natural result of his previous brash behavior. Trying to push through his exhausted state right now would only result ihan ideal outes. Taking a little break and indulging in some of this world’s “culture” wouldn’t be a waste. He had always wao watch the Bushidō movies after all…
His day off had turned out to be fairly enjoyable, all in all. Cal spent most of his m just ying around and rec after his breakfast of SCOP Formu 42. He could have tried to find somethier to eat, but he was still exhausted even though he had just woken up. His sleep st night was restless so after eating he ended up listening to the rest of Maximum Mike’s program from his bed before flipping the radio to Royal Blue while he nodded in and out of sciousness. It retty rexing way to spend the m and before he k the clock turned over to 1pm.
After his little nap, Cal gathered up all of his dirty clothes and tossed them on his bed before bundling them in his sheets and heading to the undromat downstairs to toss everything in the bo washer/dryer. He was happy to discover that there was a detergent specifically meant to remove “blood stains and bodily fluids of all kinds” and from the sound of it, the product worked quite well.
While he was waiting for the mae, Cal sorted through all of the spam that made it through his filter and added the seo his bck list. He also saw that Wakako’s payment had e through adding €9,150 to his at. He was a little miffed at the small payout despite the risks he’d been forced to take, but he couldly argue for more after his performance.
It didn’t take long before the washing mae fi’s cycles and everything he brought down came out lookiively and free from stains. Five stars for Ultra .
After returning to his apartment, he spent quite a bit of time going through the vending mae s trying out various drinks and snacks while he watched TV. NiCo retty much trash pared to some of the other sodas that were avaible. The fvor was just all wrong when he pared it to the cos he was familiar with. It tasted like a bad bination of diet coke, crappy root beer, and Dr. Pepper almost like something unsupervised children would mix togeather at a restaurant's soda fountain. He would have enjoyed each of those drinks alone, but this co that posed as a co was almost unpatable. His favorite soda ended up being Cirrus Co Love Berries which retty good grape soda, despite the off-putting was sweet and grapey and he discovered it made for a perfect mixer. He may have also tried more than a few of the alcohols avaible…
Broseph Ale was the least offensive beer he could find, tasting pretty generic overall. The most notable thing about it was the ABV which sat at a nice 11.1% which seemed like a marketing ploy more than an accurate measurement. Most of the other beers were either too skunky or sour for his taste, but he was never much of a beer man in the first pce. There weren’t any higher end liquors avaible from the vending mae, so his drink of choice that evening had ended up being a mix of Bolshevik Vodka and Cirrus Co Love Berries. The vodka cut down the drink’s sweetness while the soda’s fvor and high carbonation almost pletely hid the alcohol. The cocktail ended up beiively easy to drink.
Unfortunately, on the snack front there didn’t seem to be any potato chips avaible. It wasn’t that surprising sidering most of the remaining arable nd was now used to grow the specific Bioteica wheat strain, triticum vulgaris megasuavis for CHOOH2 produ. Still, it left a gap that the best extruded snacks just couldn’t fill. There were still multiple kinds of “cheese” puffs and various other fvored treats extruded in many shapes and sizes, but Cal was bit crestfallen when he realized he’d probably never have BBQ potato chips again. He also tried some of the different dies and “meat” products, but the loss of his preferred junk food stung worse than his er the discovery.
The highlight of his day was by far the Bushidō movies which he ended up binging. They were just amaziertai at it’s fi. They were like if the Fast and Furious franchise was directed by the guys who made the k films; Nonstop a with just enough plot to glue it all together. The movies were little more than a series of chase ses and epic fights of all kinds peppered with explosions and explicit sex ses that made porn from his old life seem tame in parison. The lead actor was no Jason Statham, but he wasn’t afraid to hang dong.
During the climax of Bushidō IV, the main character got into a sword fight on his motorcycle while he was balls deep in his test paramour during their escape from the vilin’s secret volo ir that was about to self-destruct. Oh, and the guy he was fighting was also his evil twin brother but right before the credits rolled it was revealed that he was actually just a disposable e. Trying to parse everything that happened in the movie was almost impossible, but it was still one of the most enjoyable things he had ever seen. The urained nature of society had truly let the creatives of this world off their leash and it had lead to some pretty spectacur results.
Before he k, day gave way to night and Cal passed out on his couch drunk, full, and thhly eained.
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Cal woke up the m surprisingly clear headed. He had tried a hangover prevention drink he found in the vending mae the previous day and although he didn’t over indulge to the same level he did at RIOT, he still drank quite a bit the previous evening. He thought the thing would be only slightly effective or just an ht scam, but he was happy to be proven wrong.
Getting dressed and grabbing his gear, Cal left his apartment and resumed his daily training. He had gotteer with his Nue, but his marksmanship had pteaued. The main issue for him at the moment was recoil trol and to improve that any further he couldn’t just rely on practice; He o get stronger.
“HAHA! What happened kid? Pick a fight you couldn’t win?” Coach ribbed, spotting Cal’s sorry state immediately after he ehe training area with his swollen nose and bck eyes.
“More like I fated into a car while running away from a fight I couldn’t win.”
“Well I guess that expins why you were a no-show yesterday.”
“Yeah, o take a day and cool off. My legs are still sore from the marathon I ran to get away from those two bastards…” Cal said, still a bit dejected.
“Doesn’t mean I’m gon you skip cardio today, kid.”
“Fine, but we aren’t sparing until my nose heals. I’m not shelling out the eddies at a biosculpt ic to fix it after you fuck it up even worse that it already is.”
“Aww, don’t be such a baby. Just because I ’t hit you in the face doesn’t mean we ’t still spar.” Coach said with a grin that made him look like the devil inate.
“No fug way. I don’t believe for a sed you won’t “actally” slip a few straight jabs through my guard. Not happening.”
*Tch* “Fine. I’ll just have to push you harder on the weights then.”
“See? Isn’t better when we both e to an agreement?” Cal said, even though he was silently dreading his uping workouts.
While the routines Coach Fred ran him through were longer and more extehan usual, they didn’t feel as exhausting as they did on his first day of training. He wasn’t sure if he had already started to show that much improvement or if Coach just wasn’t pushing him as hard. Knowing the man a bit better now, he probably threw Cal through the wringer on his first day to determine his baseline and maybe a bit to scare him off if Cal proved to be weak of will.
He was sweaty and sore when he finally got back to his apartment, but Cal was just gd that today wasn’t leg day. The dread he felt just thinking about that uping workout caused a chill to run down his spie the warm water that cascaded down his back during his shower. After a brief scrub down, he spent some time pnning his uping days.
He still o make around €42k over the wo weeks to pay Yoko for his cyberware and cover his upi. It was a tall order sidering he couldn’t really run packages for the week. He wasn’t about to step foot in Heywood for a while and that also made him a little wary of wandering around the south side of City ter. Dex didn’t seem like the kind of guy who was going to aodate those stiputions. He’d probably just tell Cal to kick rocks.
That left El Capitán as his primary source of ine for the time being. He could try to get more jobs from Wakako, but that would be tempting fate. They hadn’t met in person, but he didn’t have the best impression of the woman. Most gigs offered by fixers carries at least some degree of danger, but the one she offered him was clearly above his level. On top of that, the information she provided him to plete it was minimal at best and she clearly didn’t give two shits about his well being. Their brief iion gave him the impression that she would just use him as a disposable pawn until he could prove himself to be more capable.
It’s not like the woman was trying to train up mercs. She was in the game for profit and power. Unless Cal could offer her one or the other he would just be areet rat in her books. Another resource to be used up and thrown away. He couldn’t just keep jumping on whatever jobs she offered to him right now. That seemed like a quick way to get dead.
Despite that he could still see himself w with the her iure, but he wasn’t sure he’d ever go back t for Dex. This seemed like a good point for him to cut ties and focus on other avenues. For now, he would focus to steal cars with a more methodical a low risk approach.
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It took Cal two and a half weeks to earn the money he needed. He hadn’t heard a peep from Dex or Wakako in that time, not that he was surprised. Dex probably thought he was dead or otherwise indisposed during this time and the ck of uniade a break easier for Cal. Dex didn’t have much to offer him anymore and maintaining a retionship with the man would potentially draw him into whatever shitstorm the fixer was cooking up. He didn’t kly when or how the guy would fuck up and be forced out of the city, but he wasn’t about to wait around and find out.
Cal had been spending more of his time training during the day while he would go out and lurk around at night looking for cars to steal. He had kept his activities mostly fio Westbrook and Santo Domingo, doing more re when he found a potential target to mitigate any ces that he would be stealing from the wrong kind of people. It wasn’t all that difficult, really. He didn’t veo expensive areas to avoid any irritable corpos, and most gangsters paiheir colors on their cars either as a warning or a challenge.
Most of the work retty easy, but he still had a few close calls. Nothing like his his previous misstep with the Shion, but things had still gottey dicey and he had to abandon a few cars along the way. He tried to stay hidden or blend into crowds most of the time, but on one occasion the car’s owner had suddenly showed up as Cal was getting into the drivers seat of his car and the guy pulled iron. Cal had to duck down while he drove out of the lot as the guy started unloading into the car, shattering a few windoopping a tire in the process. The loss of trol and limited visibility caused Cal to crash into a near by street mp, f him to ditch the car and turn tail. He probably would have caught another bullet in the back if the guy hadn’t dumped the whole mag into the car and fumbled his reload. The dey gave Cal just enough time to slip away and disappear into the maze of streets and alleys of Night City.
Yoko had messaged him the prior week letting him know that his cyberware was all in and ready for pickup. Now Cal finally had all the eddies he needed for his first upgrade.