I couldn’t get enough of Katsuo’s face when he saw me sitting down on my class seat right next to him, apparently not as maimed as he thought I was.

  The engram teacher bade us to put on our BD wreaths and enter the meditation room, only for mine to fizzle out and die.

  It broke inside my backpack while Katsuo was beating the shit out of me. Fuck that dumb gonk.

  “David Martinez,” the teacher said. “You are not in the green room. Why?”

  “My BD wreath broke,” I said. “I’ll need to replace it.”

  “You can get it replaced at the reception for one thousand five hundred and ninety-nine eurodollars, a reasonable student price for top-of-the-line Arasaka equipment.”

  My haul from killing those scavs was already starting to dip dangerously.

  Fuck me. “Can I get an excuse for the absence?”

  “Fill out an absentee form after class and it will be evaluated.”

  I rolled my eyes and stalked out of class, heading to the reception near the front entrance of the school. The lady there had chipped in some gaudy earlobe transplants that sparkled like diamonds, but were probably fake if she was working the front desk. “Hello, how can I help you?”

  “New BD wreath,” I said as I put the old one on the table. “If you can recover any files from this one, that’d be great, too.” I had downloaded some Jimmy Kurosaki BDs in there that I no longer had physically because I decided to sell it to some classmates for extra eddies. Not the Edgerunner series, thank God. Always kept one of each for those, but the It’s Alive Not series had a couple of holes.

  “Ah,” she said as she looked at the wreath with obvious disdain. “You’re the Martinez kid, right?”

  “Yeah,” I said.

  “You know how much a new wreath costs here?”

  I immediately felt like lashing out, but instead, I just… activated the Sandy.

  And then I stood still and thought.

  Needed to be better now that mom wasn’t here to clean up my messes. Needed to take the corpo game seriously.

  I smiled gently as I returned to the normal timestream. “Sixteen hundred eddies,” I said. “Do I pay it to you or the school?”

  She scoffed. “Can you even pay it?”

  “How do you intend on finding that out,” I read her nametag, “Patricia?”

  “What?”

  I shrugged. “Well, I”m just a little confused, you see. You are selling a ware, correct?”

  “...right.”

  “How do you intend on finding out that a customer can afford the ware?”

  “What do you—”

  I barked out a laughter, stopping her flat, ruining her rhythm. I’d seen this so many times, it was child’s play to reproduce it. “It’s a simple question, Patricia, or don’t they hire people who can answer simple questions to the front desk of Night City’s most prestigious school? Now answer the question,” I reduced the tone and volume of my voice. “How do you wanna find out if I’ve got the scratch or not?” Not sure where I was going with it, but the tone and the insistent question should hold the shape of a threat, if not an actual one.

  Her imagination would be the one doing the heavy-lifting, I’m sure. Been on the receiving end of this tactic more times than I could count.

  She clenched her jaws, but her genial smile remained. “That was one BD wreath, correct?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “And back up the old one. Or should I go to someone that doesn’t ask ignorant questions? No danger in admitting inferiority.”

  “Certainly can do that for you,” she said with a wave of her head and a larger grin. “I’m sending you the payment address.”

  I paid it on the spot while I watched her insert a cable into the broken wreath and into the new one before her eyes flashed blue.

  “Backup is done,” she said. “Will that be all, Mr. Martinez?”

  “For now,” I said. “This pointless interaction made me run late for class. I won’t forget that,” I said as I took both wreaths and walked away. The truth was, I absolutely would forget that in time. Brain wasn’t built to carry grudges, unless they were Biotechnica, that one Ripperdoc from my childhood and… yeah. Pretty much it.

  I just needed her to feel a little bit worse for what she said to me.

  Even if it made me a shitty person.

  Yeah, right. Low-level corpo like her could go fuck herself, thinking she was better than me just because she was one rung higher than me on the corporate ladder just by having a job.

  But I wouldn’t rub it in harder than that. One thing I’d never let the corp do to me; turn me into a man who subsisted off of making those weaker than me suffer.

  [How do you reconcile this with your predilections towards violent extreme braindances? And your enjoyment of solo work?]

  David: Different, it’s different. Killing the weak isn’t the point. It’s killing assholes, and making money on the side. I’d never kill Patricia, she doesn’t mean anything to me. She was a dick for one second, and I gave that a proportionate response. Scavs got a proportionate response, too.

  [You will only kill those that are seeking to kill you? Then what about the Animals who caused the death of your mother?]

  I stopped in the middle of the hallway.

  David: Not nova just bringing that up, you know. She died just two days ago.

  [Apologies. I did not wish to cause you distress. But I can feel that the distress is not all simply grief, but anger and a form of annoyance.]

  David: Dunno about the Animals.

  I continued walking.

  David: Won’t bring mom back, no, but they did something bad. Not sure there’s even a point to the whole grudge.

  Already, I was feeling it slow down and run out. I really wasn’t built for being a corpo. People in this world remembered slights like the pain would never fade away. I had trouble just remembering, period, unless it was code or math.

  People were just confusing.

  David: Will I go around killing every Animal I see once I am actually strong enough to? Very probably not.

  [And what about those responsible?]

  Most wouldn’t have remembered much during that whole clusterfuck, but my memory was scarily crystalline in clarity. Fuck picking them out from a line-up, if I had the artistic skills, I could probably draw them.

  I’d never forget them.

  Could I kill them? Especially if they were cowering at my feet, begging for their lives?

  I felt guilty, guilty that I couldn’t bring myself to muster the passion necessary to do that. Avenging was supposed to be a big deal, right? A show of love. Here, I couldn’t even really do that.

  Mom was dead. Couldn’t bring her back no matter what I did.

  Hunting down the Animals responsible for what happened to mom would not only stain my soul by turning me into the same kind of psycho that Katsuo was, it would waste my time, divert my efforts towards a better life.

  Shouldn’t even have told off that meathead from yesterday either. Gangoon or not, not many gangsters went out of their way to help an up-and-comer to begin with, even if he was just trying to get my imaginary Juice connect.

  I came back to class and entered the green room for what I hated the most in the entire world: meditation. Just thirty minutes of absolute agony of sitting still and doing fuckall for the dubious benefits of a calm mind and clarity.

  Wasn’t there some chrome you could chip in or drug you could take to achieve that effect or something? Probably. Whatever this was we were doing, it couldn’t have been that helpful. I never found it to be, and I was a preem fucking student. Just goes to show that school isn’t made for all types.

  Not for me, at least.

  But I’d be the square peg that broke through the circular hole if it fucking killed me.

  As always, meditation left me feeling more agitated than calm, but this was a good agitation. It made me ready for shit.

  A call came from the principal.

  Principal Majima: David, report to my office promptly. I would like to have a discussion with the sysadmin present.

  Motherfucker.

  David: In a bit, be there in a bit.

  Principal Majima: Excellent

  000

  I sat next to the sysadmin, with Goldfinger opposite to us, still with that stupid fucking lamp setting showing off his sparkly chrome-bling. I entertained the thought of sicking some scavs on him if he was ever in the wrong neighborhood—they’d jizz their pants if they caught sight of those digits—but that was just an idle fantasy.

  “Now,” the principal began. “I would like to begin by offering my condolences regarding your mother.”

  I nodded. “Thank you, principal.” Before he could continue, I forestalled him. “It is painful, but I will manage. Mother always wanted me to reach my potential, and I can only do that by making the best out of my remaining time at the Academy, and afterwards serving Arasaka with all my capacity. There is no need for any understanding of my situation, principal, as I am ready to work ten times harder than any of the other students, as I always have.”

  The principal’s jaw clenched for a moment, but he let it go in favor of his weird, frog slash deer-caught-in-the-headlights expression he always wore. “That is… commendable and impressive, Mr. Martinez. Very well, I will hope for the best, that is provided that we can get to the bottom of the issue that the system administrator has raised.”

  The man was tall and lanky, with a messy shock of black hair. He was East-Asian as well, and had a black shirt with denim pants, utterly normal in all ways, except for the seams that ran around his neck, and the large metallic implant around the back of his head, a deep-dive port. Gonk wasn’t just a sysadmin, he was a bonafide netrunner!

  “Yeah,” he began. “I’m sorry, principal, but there’s no way I’m buying that this kid just released a heavy duty virus into my system and defused it in forty-five seconds flat without having practiced. I could do it myself, but that’s because I’m, well, me. Like I said before, he obviously practiced this stunt before the fact in order to try and score points. I don’t care what you do with him, just make sure he never has another class that gives him such unbridled access to the system again, I don’t care how talented he is.”

  Holy fuck!

  This motherfucker wanted to sink me!

  I activated the Sandy before I did something passionate, which in the corpo world, meant something stupid.

  Think. Be calm. There was a way out.

  My speech just now? Probably won me a few points. I put my damn name out there as a preem student, and he couldn’t just reject that on principle, not if I could play the corpo game well.

  Stolen novel; please report.

  That was all the Academy ever wanted from me, to shed my normal personality and become another corpo brat who cared about social status and deferring to one’s betters. I had bought a ton of leeway by sheer virtue of my genius, but that wasn’t going to get me places alone. Lots of geniuses were street netrunners and solos who could never get a corpo job.

  Had to speak the language.

  I re-entered the normal timestream. Sandy’s usage in this way felt incredibly overkill, but none of the big side-effects were even happening when I did it. I didn’t feel an ounce of exhaustion or anything like that. Maybe my brain felt a tiny bit foggier, but even that could just have been in my head.

  “Permission to plead my case, honored principal?” I asked.

  The principal nodded in my direction.

  “The honored system administrator’s concerns are valid and deserving of the utmost attention. This, I totally agree with. And I am committed to cooperating and making sure that all parties walk away satisfied from this interaction. Towards that extent, I would like to make a proposal, if it pleases either of you.”

  The principal quirked his lip, but schooled his expression. “You may go ahead, Mr. Martinez.” There was some enthusiasm in his tone. Was this a trap? I entered Sandy-mode just to think about it, but I couldn’t come up with any ways in which my proposal would leave me especially vulnerable.

  “Thank you, honored principal,” I said. “The system administrator believes that I orchestrated the unfortunate events of two days ago. I believe the answer to whether or not I would be capable of doing what I did only requires that I am tested with similar parameters. Let the system administrator watch me defuse as many viruses as he would like. Only then can his doubts about me be put to rest.”

  The sysadmin chortled. “You sure you wanna go ahead with that, kid? Bravado only gets you so far.”

  I considered turning to him to grin and say “It ain’t bravado, choom,” but then I wouldn’t be speaking the language.

  The language was context-dependent, and varied when interacting with a superior or inferior.

  “I only wish to assure you, honored system administrator. I am honest in my intentions and I hate that the only recourse I can see is to flaunt my meagre ability.”

  The sysadmin smiled, but in a ‘this fucking kid’, kind of way, which was par for the course.

  “And if I may be more bold,” I said. “I hope that my display may be able to overturn the decision on my grade,” I said. “An F was… not deserved, especially considering my track record.”

  The principal clenched his jaw again, for a little longer, but didn’t let any of his agitation creep into his voice. “Mr. Martinez, I don’t think you should be asking for such favors when it was your mistake that led to the—”

  A message flashed in my vision. The sysadmin.

  Nakajima: I’ll overwrite your grade to an A if you’ve got the stuff, but if you fuck up, not only will you lose access to all coding courses that the school offers, I’ll tank every fucking grade you’ve had here since you started. You’ll never graduate, choom.

  Jesus Christ, choom.

  I nodded contritely at the principal’s words. Once he finished, I donned a forlorn expression. “My sincerest apologies for the impertinence. I recognize that I am in no position to ask for such a favor when the incident was caused by my imprudence. I thank you for your understanding and I hope that you do not hold my lapse in judgment against me.”

  I had activated the Sandy several times during that conversation. I was tempted to add an adjective before ‘lapse in judgment’, thinking it should either be minor or grievous, but the middle way just called to me.

  This time, the principal did let a smile grace his frog features. “I’m glad you understand, David,” his voice had that joy I’d heard from earlier as well. “Mr. Nakajima, what do you say?”

  Nakajima let out a long sigh. “I suppose I’ll let the kid show his stuff,” he said. “With your permission, of course. And the child’s.”

  I nodded. “I would be honored to assure you that I am no threat to your system.”

  “Very well,” the principal said. “You may reach out to Mr. Martinez once he’s free. He will have a class after this.”

  The system administrator nodded and stood up to leave. I stood up, too, but the principal did the unthinkable; he moved his hands from the light of the lamp, to raise it to forestall me from standing up. “A word, Mr. Martinez.”

  My stomach sank. Once Nakajima left, the principal let out a somewhat relaxed grin. “You are a gifted student, Mr. Martinez. There is absolutely no hiding that fact. You have consistently topped classes, in math and sciences at least.” A but would come, of course. “Your greatest weakness, however, was your inability to ever take an interest in the social moores of the school and the society that your mother wished for you to take part in. I am glad to admit that I was wrong about you, Mr. Martinez. Keep this up, and you will go far.”

  I ducked my head forwards. “Wait, no shit? You’re not gonna chew me out or—” Ah, fuck.

  The principal’s joyful expression turned into one of exasperation.

  “You have work ahead of you, child,” he said. “And my current encouragements are due to the fact that I can see you have a future in this world. You have taken the first step, the most important one, no doubt, but it is only a first step. You still have a long way to go.”

  “I understand, honored principal,” I said. “And I thank you for the grace that you have showed me by believing in me. Truthfully, it means a lot.”

  The principal’s grin returned. “I am glad you think so. You have only one year, now, to make connections that could truly last you a lifetime. If your ambitions take you to NCU, then your immediate classmates will still be the people you know from Arasaka Academy, especially if you plan to pursue a career with our corp. I cannot stress how important it is for you to have a robust network in high school if you wish to prosper in university, which sets the foundation for your future employment.”

  Holy shit. He was giving me real advice!

  “I can sense that you are shocked, David. Don’t be. I was serious when speaking to your mother about you not being a good fit for your classmates. The experience you’ve had with us thus far has been nothing but prolonged torment, and you would have had nothing to show for it upon graduation beyond a job so far beneath what the average Academy graduate can expect that it’s laughable. You truly weren’t a good fit, and you still aren’t. You need to work hard now.”

  “Speak the language,” I blurted out.

  He actually chuckled now. “That is correct. Speak the language, Martinez. Watch those around you, absorb everything you can. Act the corpo. It is the only way for you.”

  I nodded. “I understand. Thank you, principal Majima. That was very helpful.”

  “I hope it was,” he said. He then schooled his expression, subtly signalling that this interaction would soon end. “If there was anything else you wished to bring to my attention, Mr. Martinez, then you are dismissed. I have some work that I must catch up on.”

  What work? He had nothing on his desk aside from the lamp, and his hands. Did he just clear out his desk every time someone was about to come in? What in the OCD was that?

  “Thank you, principal,” I said as I stood up and bowed to him before leaving.

  “And boy,” He said and I stopped to turn around. “Fix your hair. Conform.”

  I gave him a nod and continued out.

  That was… well, fucking bizarre.

  000

  I was in the sysadmin’s office during my lunch hour. Fucking gonk wouldn’t even let me eat in peace.

  It was a pretty messy environment, filled with all sorts of hardware: harddrives, servers, chips and computer terminal parts of all kinds. He relished around the chaos in an island of clean floor and a swivel chair.

  “David, right?” He asked, as if he didn’t know my name already.

  “No, Daniel,” I said.

  “You a smartass, David?”

  I clenched my jaws. Wasn’t I just told to ‘speak the language’ as it were?

  “No, sir,” I said.

  “Sad. Hoped you were. The corpos got you whipped already.”

  “You’re not a corpo?”

  “I’m in the sweetspot, kid,” he said. “High enough up that nobody’s gonna wanna throw me out for not glazing dick the right way.”

  “Of course, sir,” I said. “About the virus testing.”

  “What? You wanna back off?”

  “No, sir. I just wish to get started as soon as possible.”

  “Whatever tricks you got up your sleeve, it won’t work. Just bow out already, I really can’t handle getting a faceful of cringe right now. I’ll die.”

  I clenched my jaws and took a deep breath, then exhaled slowly. “No tricks, choom. Let’s just get to it. I need this A.”

  He let out a disbelieving snort. “Okay.” he stood up from his chair and gestured towards it. I sat down. “I’ve got a virus for you, different, tricky, maybe even a little harder than the one you unleashed.” He pointed to his terminal. “Get cyberseccing, you bitch.”

  The first virus was… tricky. Really fucking tricky. From what I could immediately tell, it would worm its way into the system's core processes, creating a cascading chain reaction of fucked up subroutines that would destabilize the entire data matrix.

  I started tapping away at the keyboard, executing a precision-level data analysis—or at least the best I could—, attempting to isolate the virus's volatile threads and disrupt its quantum encryption protocols. Each line of code I deciphered felt like trying to walk through a digital minefield, with the slightest misstep potentially launching everything to hell.

  I felt sweat bead in my forehead as I continued typing, continued reading. It was like my entire brain was getting sucked into this increasingly complex puzzle, demanding more from me with every second that passed.

  As I dove deeper into the system's architecture, I met a neural net defense mechanism, a sort of AI ICE, woven into the virus, adapting and learning from my intrusion attempts. It was like battling a constantly-evolving sentient entity hell-bent on protecting its digital sanctuary. I pushed my toolkit to its limits, unleashing every advanced countermeasure I had learned in school and on the Net to subdue the virus's fractal polymorphic structures.

  With a surge of adrenaline-fueled concentration, I initiated a quantum backdoor access, exploiting a minuscule vulnerability in the virus's self-repair subroutines. As I navigated through the confusing and maze-like corridors of corrupted code, I uncovered the virus's control node, a pulsating hub of malevolent algorithms. My cursor hovered over the 'delete' command, and with a decisive keystroke, I severed the connection, disrupting the virus's propagation and finally killing the last of its malicious code fragments.

  The terminal's digital landscape finally settled, its once-flickering interface now stabilized. Beads of sweat glistened on my forehead as I wiped my brow.

  I had only narrowly avoided getting my shit absolutely fucking rocked by the asshole sysadmin who had sicced a virus on me that was way fucking harder than the one I had accidentally unleashed.

  “Motherfucker!” I yelled, looking up at him. “That wasn’t the same tier of virus at all and you know it!”

  Nakajima was just… wide-eyed. Fuck, I forgot the language. But then again, did he really give a shit?

  “Kid, what… you got neuralware?” he asked. “Brain implants? How the fuck did you do that?”

  “I feel honored for the compliments but—”

  “Cut the crap, kid,” he said. “You’re the real deal.”

  I sighed in relief. “Do you finally believe me, now?”

  “I’ve seen corpo programmers twice your age that couldn’t do the shit you just pulled,” he said. “What the hell are you, kid?”

  I’d had just about enough of this guy. “The fuck do you want me to say, choom? You’re the one who asked to see my skills and I showed you. I’m just here for my A.”

  He laughed. “Your A, right. Fuck, man. Can’t deal with gonk prodigies. You guys have zero perspective. An A? Is that really all you want?”

  “Yeah,” I said.

  “Fine, you’ll get it,” he said. “Only one question. You good at ICE?”

  I immediately sensed an opportunity, and jumped on it. “You wanna try breaking through mine, give me some tips?”

  Nakajima grinned like a loon. “Do I?!”

  000

  My entire lunch hour went by with Nakajima poking holes at the ICE I’d made on my way to school. Good thing was, he showed me plenty of places where it could be improved, and also showed me a pathway to extending the code by at least three times, receiving a proportional amount of cybersecurity for my troubles, too.

  I had scored gold, with him.

  Once classes ended, I made a bee-line for the NCART, grabbing a couple of Burrito XXLs and scarfing them down far before my ride even arrived.

  I was ready to tune out and just, sort of, fast travel to my stop when I saw something in my peripheral vision.

  The bombshell from a few days ago, white-haired, with a body to absolutely die for, with pink, blue, yellow, and green hair. How did she make that work so well?

  And… she was picksocketing.

  Ah, I mean, was that any of my business? These corpo fucks could do with a little shortening of personal funds.

  She passed by behind me, and I activated the sandy, just so I could get a closer look at her. Maybe that was a creepy use of the cyberware, but I couldn’t help it. She was just… that hot.

  Just as I did, my chip was about to eject from my socket. I caught the chip pretty easily, and when I had turned fully, I saw how her hand was upraised, seemingly to adjust her hair, but more accurately, to take the chip.

  No luck with me, unfortunately.

  I grabbed a hold of her forearm gently, careful not to hurt her once time resumed as normal.

  She swung her head towards me in disbelief.

  “Uhm, hey,” I said with a smile. “That was mine, hahah.”

  She growled a quick “Come here,” as she dragged me over to the end of our train car.

  “What’s your angle? Spill it?”

  “My angle?” I asked.

  “Your mussing up my work. What do you want?”

  “To not get stolen from,” I said. “Doesn’t take a Rache Bartmoss to piece that one out, does it?”

  She scoffed. “Then why get grabby? You gonna put cuffs on me?”

  I took a step back. “No, no, I just… I just thought you were pretty is all. Think I may have seen you around before.”

  “Do I know you?” she asked as she cupped my cheeks and dragged her hands down my chest—oh my GOD.

  Then she grabbed me by my arms, turned me around and slammed my face to the wall. Before I could move, I felt the unmistakable bite of something hard and sharp around my throat.

  “Easy there, tiger,” she said. “If you so much as twitch, that monowire opens up your throat like it’s Thanksgiving synth-turkey.”

  Shit. Shit, shit, shit.

  Why was this happening to me?

  And why did it feel so good?

  “Corpo ICE, huh?” she said. “Didn’t take you for the type, despite the ‘Saka Academy fit.”

  “Try self-made,” I said. “No ‘Saka help, either.” It was true. I hadn’t had time to implement Nakajima’s code review yet. Everything I made was from knowing the fundamentals of coding. And sure, I learned that from the Academy, but I could also have learned that from somewhere else. Wasn’t exactly something that couldn’t be easily encoded into a shard and then spread around.

  “I doubt that,” she said. “It’s taking even me a while to crack. Who do you think you are, some kind of super genius?” Before I could reply in the affirmative, she continued. “And… there. Oh, wow, a Sandevistan, huh?”

  I clenched my jaws. “What’s the matter, you scared?”

  David: What if I tried to activate the Sandy to get some slack in the monowire, but cut myself anyhow? Would you be able to heal it?

  [Not certain. Please don’t try.]

  Yeah, like I gave a shit.

  I activated the Sandy and backed up, pushing against her hold on me quite easily, gaining some slack in the monowire. Using my fingers, I loosened the wire around my throat, although not fast enough for the bitch behind me to pull, scoring a cut on my fingers.

  [Already on it.]

  I transmitted a thanks as I continued, getting around Lucy, and then pushing her into the wall.

  Then I continued the normal timestream. “You should be,” I grinned.

  She reflected that grin. “What if we worked together?” she asked, her voice as sweet and slick as honey.

  “Stealing?” I asked.

  “Is it stealing if it’s against Arasaka suits?”

  “Come on,” I groaned. “Do I look corpo to you?”

  “Other than the fact that you’re wearing a ‘Saka Academy uniform and that my scan picked up an Academy ID? No, not really. How does that work?”

  “I’m from Santo Domingo,” I said as I let go of her and backed up. “Not exactly the cream of the crop capital-wise. Always get reminded of that, too.”

  She chuckled. “Maybe you should drop out.”

  I laughed. “That’s what they all say, but I don’t care. I don’t go down easy. And to your proposal… sure. Could use the eddies.”

  “Attaboy,” she smiled. “Alright then, let’s discuss the split. Ninety-ten.” She led me to another car.

  “That’s bullshit,” I said.

  “Really? You’re the corpo brat.”

  “Am not!” I replied hotly. “I’m barely getting by as it is! You think a kid from where I come from can just pass up on eddies like that? Seriously. Fifty-fifty.”

  “I’ll be pushing the klepped shards,” she said.

  “I’ll bet you a hundred eddies I could streamline your shard quickhack,” I said. “Your labor ain’t special, choom. I could do it too if I had a cyberdeck.”

  “But you don’t, and audacious claim aside, I’m the one with the shard quickhack, not you. Seventy-thirty.”

  “Sixty-forty,” I said. “Since you’re determined to be an asshole.”

  “Yes, I am.”

  “Deal?” I asked.

  She whirled towards me and gave me her hand. I narrowed my eyes at it, but then I saw her face, and that knowing smile on it. I wanted her to know me, too. All so I could continue to see it. “Deal,” she said. We shook on it. “I’m Lucy,” she said.

  “David,” I replied.