“Yea, yea. I get it. Though all the power in the world doesn’t help if I can’t use it because of the traffic,” Leo sighed as he pulled into the stream of hover traffic winding through the city.
Leo almost missed a turn when Aegys said that. “Seriously? Wouldn’t the automated defenses take me out if I flew over it?”
Leo continued following traffic for a couple minutes before taking a look at his navigation app, two hours until he reached the Family building. “Alright, if I get shot out of the sky I will find a way to haunt your motherboard or something.”
He pulled up on the handlebars of the bike and punched the accelerator, sending him screaming up into the sky. He rapidly approached the edge of a megabuilding and flew past it into open air. As soon as he was above the megabuilding the city sprawled out in front of him. A few buildings still rose higher than he was but for the most part he could see everything.
A grid of blocky buildings in one section of the city was the result of a short lived campaign to organize the city a couple decades ago. In another section was an area that seemed like a tangle of cargo containers and slapdash buildings denoting the slums. In the center of the city rose multiple massive skyscrapers made of artful curves and dynamic lines, the home of the bigger corps.
The navigation app flashed in his vision pulling his attention to one of the smaller towers in the center. Leo pointed his bike towards it and gunned the engine, enjoying the wind whipping past his face.
His rush was interrupted by a sudden flashing from his augs. The icon for his bike flashed before opening suddenly.
ALERT! ALERT! WEAPONS LOCK DETECTED! RECOMMEND EVASIVE MANEUVERS!
“Uhm, Aegys, I thought you said I wouldn’t get shot?” Leo screamed as he looked around wildly for the weapons emplacement.
“Is it that hard to keep track of them all? You sound distracted.”
Leo stared straight ahead as he continued towards the Family building. “Can I get a new AI? Please?”
Leo followed his navigation to an opening in the side of the Family tower and saw an individual in an expensive looking suit waving him down. He swooped in and stopped the bike just in front of the man.
The man reached his hand out as he spoke, “Samurai Phoenix? My name is Alexander Pierce, please, call me Alex. Your AI told us you were coming to learn more about what we do?”
The man, Alex, had a too-perfect smile that was so common amongst corpos and people who inhabited the upper crust of society. Leo climbed off the bike and reached out to shake his hand, “Pleasure. Yea, I was looking for some way to help out and heard you guys might have an idea where I could do that.”
“Of course! If you want to park your bike anywhere then I can give you a short tour. You are, of course, afforded open access to the majority of the building but it can get a bit confusing for newcomers.”
Leo just nodded as he sent a short command to his bike to find a parking spot before turning back to Alex as the bike sped away into the depths of the parking space. “Makes sense. Well, lead the way, I can’t wait to see what you have for me.”
Alex nodded and led the way through the sliding door into a well designed office area. “As you may know, the Family exists to assist Samurai in many of their projects, however we are decidedly neutral in regards to political matters.”
Leo nodded, that much was common knowledge.
Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
Alex continued as they briskly made their way through various walkways, “Except for those matters, we excel at acting as an intermediary between the various Samurai and any local government or corporate entities that they may either not want to deal with, or not have time for.”
Unspoken was that they also dealt with Samurai who don’t have the patience to deal with the standard corpo bullshit and may resort to more lethal means to get what they want.
Leo glanced at the man. “I hadn’t realized the Family was so involved with the Samurai, I thought you all were more of a country club if I’m honest.”
Alex laughed, a sound that seemed more manicured and perfected rather than natural, “It can certainly seem like that. We try to keep our involvement as unobtrusive as possible. In addition to helping with Samurai projects, we also provide a mentorship program of sorts, linking new Samurai such as yourself with more experienced ones who are willing and able to take on a sort of mentor role to new Samurai.”
Leo made an impressed sound as they continued walking. They continued for a few minutes in silence as Leo took in the various artworks and windows decorating the space. Eventually they came up to a door that Alex opened and gestured for Leo to enter.
Walking inside he saw a tastefully decorated office with a single desk in the center of the room. There were shelves along one wall holding a few small plants and some picture frames as well as a few varied objects.
Alex entered the room and made his way to the other side of the desk. Taking a seat in the well padded chair he opened up a laptop that was sitting on the desk and gestured for Leo to take a seat as well.
Leo studied the laptop sitting on the desk, in an age full of cyberware and augs it was rare to see any sort of manual computer.
Alex noticed him looking and smiled. “You like it? I had it custom made, I find it easier to formulate my thoughts and focus my work if I have a physical medium. Of course, I can still control everything with my augs.
“Now, what can we do for you today?” Alex asked, looking at Leo expectantly.
Leo thought for a few moments before responding, “I recently came back from the incursion in Vegas and was looking for somewhere to put my efforts closer to home. I need to gain more points as much as possible so I was wondering if you all might know of any possible Antithesis presence or if not, somewhere I might be able to help out.”
While Leo detailed what he wanted, Alex was typing away at his computer Leo was surprised at the speed with which he typed at. Alex nodded and turned back. “We can certainly help with that, if you would give me a few minutes I can get a report compiled and we can go over it together?”
At Leo's nod he continued, “Wonderful! It will take about half an hour to get the report done, in the meantime there is a break area just down the hall if you would like.”
Leo stood and moved to the door, “Thanks for the help. I think I’ll go check it out, just let me know when you’re done.”
He headed down the hall and found a small sitting area with a couple vending machines in the corner and a water fountain next to them. There was a large floor to ceiling window with a small table sat in front of it. He grabbed a small coffee from one of the vending machines and settled himself at the table, content to gaze out the window until Alex was done.
Almost exactly half an hour later Leo got a ping on his augs. Opening it he saw it was a message from Alex telling him the report was ready and he could come by whenever he had a chance. Leo downed the last dregs of his coffee and tossed the cup before heading back to Alex’ office.
The door was open when he got there so Leo just walked in.
“Welcome back Phoenix, I got that report ready for you,” Alex said, sending Leo a file on his augs as he sat, “There are a couple different reports that might fit your abilities, though without knowing some more details about what your focus is the results are rather broad.”
“Makes sense. A lot of my abilities focus on heat and fire, though I have some barrier abilities as well,” no need to give too many details.
Alex nodded and looked back at his laptop. After tapping away at it for a minute he sent an updated list that was much shorter. “Here is what we have that is more tailored. A couple Antithesis sightings as well as some cleanup jobs that need Samurai attention. Please feel free to review the list and let me know what you think.”
Leo leaned back in his seat and began slowly scrolling through the list.
‘Aegys, anyway you can make this faster?’
Leo leaned back to think about what his AI had told him. Going after the Antithesis sightings might get him some points, but if Aegys thought the intel was shaky then it would probably just be a waste of time. As for cleanup, he wasn’t really well suited to that type of work and with the other Samurai in the area there wasn’t really a point. The report of sections of the undercity with no heating did jump out at him though.
‘Aegys, do we have anything that might be helpful with providing heat to a large area?’
Leo nodded before looking back to Alex, “I’ll take a look into the heating issue in the undercity. Seems right up my alley.”
Alex smiled and flipped his screen back around, “Wonderful! I’ll put a note in here and if any other Samurai show interest we’ll let you know.”
The two stood and shook hands before Leo began to make his way back to the parking area. He sent off a quick message to Kat just letting her know what he was doing and asking if she wanted to join. He was getting on his new bike when she messaged back saying she would tag along, but she didn’t really have anything that would help.
Leo couldn’t help but smile as he took off into the air and back to his house to begin planning.