Disclaimer: I own nothing but my original characters and works; all other characters and worlds belong to their respective owners. I'm just playing with them.
Betad by Priapus, Marethyu, Beans
GOG: The Architect
Chapter 06: Maiko's Joy
— Maiko Maeda —
She had known from the first time he picked her that Seiji was not a regular client. They had corpos hiring girls all the time, looking for a chance to relax after a stressful day.
But almost every single one of those corpos had to go through the same rules as everyone else. They had to be scanned to take the girls or guys into one of the private rooms. They didn't just call the girls up to their apartment, they didn't have Woodman kissing their ass, and they weren't half as… intense as Seiji Moriyama.
She was half convinced she was going to die the first time she joined him in his penthouse. In hindsight, he had been testing her and she must have passed whatever standards he had because soon she was his go-to Doll.
But now she had proof that everything she'd been doing was worth it. That she was right to think he was such a big deal. It had already spread around Clouds that they had a new Senior VIP, a very short list of celebrities and people of immense power. It was a list filled with people so powerful that Clouds didn't steal their data when they jacked in out of fear of reprisals.
She didn't know the exact details, only that some big shot in Arasaka had contacted Clouds about Seiji's new status and that both the Claws and Clouds management were scared shitless of disappointing him.
Arriving in his penthouse, she paused as she saw him in tight-fitting black and red exercise clothes going through the motions. His penthouse was spacious, and he had an open area he used to practice his martial arts katas.
She'd actually done some research of her own after seeing him go through them the first time. She'd even bought a martial arts skillshard to see if she could work out more about him with the knowledge it granted.
Only true gonks thought that a martial arts skillshard would make you a match for a true practitioner who put in the effort to learn. It didn't give you the muscle memory, the body, the experience. Not to mention, it was hard to find one that was designed for your body type so you'd have to adapt the knowledge to match your form. It was a bitch when the skill came from someone a foot taller and fifty pounds heavier. But, it gave her enough to identify Seiji's movements as Arasaka-te.
Arasaka-te was Arasaka's own commercial martial arts, but his movements didn't actually quite fit the Arasaka-te that people like her could learn in strip malls and Arasaka-affiliated dojos. No, his style was sharper, faster and all around superior. She supposed they had their own version that they only taught their specialists.
"Get comfortable, I'll be done soon," Seiji said, not even opening his eyes as he moved through the stances. She didn't speak, doing exactly that as she lounged on his couch and watched his rippled muscles move.
As Seiji's exclusive doll, she'd effectively been promoted. Her only responsibility was to keep Seiji happy. All her other clients were summarily dismissed. Most accepted that, but some got attached to the dream that Clouds sold them. The types who treated her more like a lover than a sex toy when her chip was activated.
Those were always the problematic clients. The ones who played rough just left marks that a good Medtech could get rid of in a minute. The ones who got emotionally connected to whatever facade she was putting on for them were the true problems, because the ones who played rough just shrugged and found a new Doll to play with. The 'romantics' only wanted her, and that wasn't an option for them, was it?
She knew one of her regulars had been shot by the Claws bouncer for trying to force his way into the dressing room after being told she was no longer available for hire. Idiot.
She was all Seiji's now, he even had control of her contraceptive implant and the ability to turn it off at will.
As Seiji finished, he wiped the sweat away with a towel before barking an order to follow him. She needed no further enticement as she moved to his large shower with him, clothes discarded. He was stressed about something today, his muscles tense and jaw clenched.
It meant their first round was fast and hard, pinned against the shower wall as he took his frustration out on her. With a cock as nice as his was, she certainly had no complaints. If he really was becoming one of the top figures in Arasaka's Counter-Intel division, she could only imagine the shit he had to deal with.
It took three more rounds before he was relaxed enough for conversation, laying in his big soft bed as he traced his fingers along the lines of her golden cyberware.
"Mhm, someone was pent up," Maiko purred, her hair already a mess as a thin sheen of sweat coated her skin.
"Just an irritating assignment, that's all," Seiji responded, kissing her neck. "Your message said you had something to say, before I… got distracted."
"Nothing major, baby," Maiko promised, giggling at his teasingly light touch. "Just about the girl you requested."
"Oh?" Seiji asked, his tone gaining a slight edge. She had a Voice Stress Analyzer, which alerted her to the hints of anger in her tone. She didn't need the tech to translate that to annoyance at the idea of not getting his girl of choice so she moved to reassure him.
"Nothing bad, but she's… hmm, inexperienced. Judy is used to lurking in her lair, never seeing the clients. She's willing, of course, but she was caught off guard and just needs some guidance to make sure she lives up to the standards you deserve," Maiko reassured him, peppering him with kisses. "I was hoping I could join her. She's my ex, but we're still on good terms and I can show her the ropes… and just how you like things."
Judy was still fucking pissed at being picked, but between her, Evelyn and the pressure from Woodman and the Tyger Claws she knew she didn't have a choice. Maybe Seiji had picked her to see how far Clouds would go to ensure he got what he wanted, picking a virgin lesbian techie rather than any of the top-end Dolls.
It wasn't that Judy wasn't hot or anything, but she was a seven in a business that only employed eights and above. When compared to all the Dolls with Fashionware and Biosculpted perfection, Judy's natural look was fairly plain and she didn't think that was Seiji's type.
She was just glad he hadn't requested Clouds put Judy through any Biosculpting, because that would have pushed her over the edge.
"Ah, that's fine," Seiji waved off, moving from the bed as she watched him. She couldn't detect any biosculpting work on him, which meant those muscles and looks were all natural. Definitely from a wealthy corpo family that had the money for gene-editing then. "Shower again, and get dressed. Not the outfit you brought, black box on the living room table."
That was a first, but she didn't bat an eye as she enjoyed the hot water and expensive products while she removed the traces of their activities. Her outfit had been very much one of an expensive Doll, it was classy enough but still screamed 'Joytoy' while the dress and heels waiting for her was simply classy without looking like she was selling something. She supposed she wasn't, because the product was already bought.
"Are we going somewhere? Or do you just want to rip it off me again?" Maiko asked flirtatiously.
"That's for later, but yes. We're going somewhere," Seiji said, a small smirk on his lips. He was enjoying the mystery, since this really was a first. He preferred to keep their encounters in his apartment.
Taking her arm, he led her out of the penthouse and she paused as she spotted someone else leaving their apartment. The top floor of the H8 Megabuilding was split between several large penthouse apartments, and Seiji's neighbour happened to be the Tyger Claw boss who owned and ran Clouds.
She prepared to show respect to the boss of her boss, but Seiji kept her moving and to her surprise, Hiromi Sato moved out of the way with a respectful bow toward Seiji who barely gave him a glance.
Fuck. She'd just put some new panties on and they were already soaked from that display.
Taking the elevator down to the VIP garage, Seiji led her to his Quadra Type-66 and guided her into the passenger seat as he got in, utterly unbothered by the fact that a high ranking Claw had just rushed to get out of his way.
It was no wonder Woodman shat himself every time Seiji came into the Clouds itself. This was one customer who could have the entire Clouds ecosystem lined up against the wall and shot with a single complaint.
Evelyn had better not fuck up her part when it was time for Seiji's 'celebration'. She'd have to have words with the ambitious bitch soon. She couldn't stand Parker, personally, but she needed the best to impress Seiji and she didn't trust any of the others to handle it.
Chatting with him as he drove, she had to wonder what the hell was going on. Seiji never took her outside of his apartment, probably for some corporate espionage reason, but he wasn't budging on where they were going until they finally pulled up to a… ripperdoc clinic in the City Center.
It was certainly a cut above Fingers back alley clinic that most Dolls had to settle for as he got out and she followed behind. Everywhere Seiji went, he walked like he owned the building, street and district he was in, and shit, maybe he did from how quickly they were guided inside by the receptionist, led to a small booth where she was given a full-body scan and then left to look over the catalogue.
"What's going on, Seiji?" Maiko asked, unable to try and be subtle anymore as he laughed and squeezed her thigh, stroking it gently.
"You're my Doll, Maiko. Exclusively. I have standards, and your current cyberware doesn't match them," Seiji said with an upturned nose as he looked over the report on her cyberware. "I could tolerate it before, but if you're exclusively mine, I don't intend to settle. Pick out some new cyberware."
"What's my budget?" Maiko asked, excitement in her tone. This was far better than the Ripper she usually went to, and the Cyberware on offer was ridiculously good compared to hers.
Hers wasn't bad, especially for a Doll when half of Clouds had second-hand scaved gear from Fingers, but this was top-end corpo shit.
"Budget?" Seiji asked, raising an eyebrow as she shuddered. Just what was his new role that he could flex like this?
As they went through the catalogue, Seiji picked out several pieces himself for her. A Cyberaudio suite with Amplified Hearing, an Audio Recorder and some other audio analyser equipment that put her shitty Voice Stress Analyser to shame. It was also stuff that a Doll shouldn't need, but he didn't explain as he did the same with her new optics.
Sure, she had ColourShift that would let her change them to whatever colour he wanted, good for accessorising, but he also made sure she had MicroVideo for recording anything she saw, enhancement upgrades and stuff that was more fitting for spy work than a joytoy.
She made sure to pick out the cyberware that was best suited for her role of being his obedient arm candy, including a vibrating tongue from the Midnight Lady line. She knew he preferred natural pussy to the Midnight Lady cyberware, so she kept herself all natural down there. Her new tongue quickly got an upgrade that let it detect poison on Seiji's demand, but she wasn't going to argue. She knew the risks of being by the side of someone who was so high ranking.
A Sensory suite would let her alter her senses, both ways. It was technically a pain editor, but the main use for her would be to do the opposite and enhance her sensations so she'd feel every little thing Seiji did to her. A Voice Modulator would let her tune her voice, accent and pitch to fit any situation, mixed with a singing skillchip. She was no Lizzy Wizzy but the two together would make her sound better than 99% of 'musicians'. The wardrobe, etiquette and dance skillchips would stop her from embarrassing herself (and more importantly, Seiji) at whatever high class place he felt like taking her.
Every doll in Clouds would kill for a single piece of her ever growing cart. She was going to be the source of so much jealousy when they saw her upgrades. This was the kind of shit that took a girl from being a regular doll to the type who made tens of thousands of eddies in a weekend.
As they went through, the cost at the side grew more and more without Seiji batting an eye. Watching him pay the absurd eddie cost for her new cyberware without so much as blinking, she had to hide her triumphant smirk. Nobody spent this much on a girl they didn't plan to keep around, even if you had all the money in the world to piss away.
— Seiji Moriyama —
Watching Maiko go under to get her new gear chipped in, I barely give the Ripperdoc a glance. Why would I bother? They're just a synth, after all.
Abernathy has forced my hand. I can't take things slow when she is taking such pleasure in poking holes in my life every single day. I don't care about the price of the upgrades today because of two simple reasons.
They'll be useful going forward… and I am not paying a single eddie. Oh, the transaction will go into their system but I know intel work enough to know that anyone actually looking into this won't notice that the money wasn't paid when the transaction claims it was.
Anyone who sees me spending this much on my joytoy will naturally assume that she's important to me. Manufacturing weaknesses is just as important as covering your actual vulnerabilities, because people won't stop looking for your weak points until they find something. I'm turning Maiko into one of mine, my personal Doll that I'm too attached to. A lot of the upgrades I picked are to keep her safe, a Biomonitor, poison detection, things that are useful for a trophy wife who might be targeted to get at her lover.
All those fancy cyberaudio and optics suites? I have direct access to them at all times. It's all being broadcast back to my Vault, through several layers of obfuscation, and recorded. Her analysis cyberware will always tell her exactly what I want it to tell her, especially when it is used on me. The geo-tagging suite gives me a live location at all times.
Creating a VI Agent to sort through it all was easy enough. I could have done that with the tech of Night City, let alone my new powers. Her life will be recorded, sorted and filed away for my perusal. Every meeting she has will be recorded in perfect quality for me to watch at my leisure.
All my synths are doing the same, of course. My VI has quite the mountain of data to sort through, incoming from a dozen eyes.
Well, a dozen so far. Soon to be more.
Abernathy is forcing me to pick a side earlier than I wanted. It is smart of her, because she knows I'd never pick Jenkins. So, I'm doing my part to 'show her' that I'm playing along.
Jenkins will soon get a report that instead of doing the job he told me to do, I'm fucking around with a Doll and taking a day off. Abernathy will see that I've 'accepted' her generous offer, and without us ever speaking, she'll know that I'm antagonising Jenkins as a show of loyalty to her. Fucking corpo politics.
Jenkins will take this as proof that I've turned, and that will make him pressure V all the more. If I was loyal to him, I'd be entirely focused on the job he gave me. The fact that I'm delaying the raid when everything is in position is just a sign that I don't care about pleasing him.
And of course, that's because I don't expect him to remain in charge, or alive, much longer. All these signs are blaring in neon red for Jenkins to read clear as day.
I am spending money like water, so I'm expecting to have access to far more money. I'm delaying doing the assignment Jenkins has assigned to me, so I don't fear his reprisal. I couldn't have laid this out more clearly for Jenkins if I tried.
I might as well have sent him a message asking him to redecorate his office so it fits my personal style better when I move in.
But more importantly, I know how this would look to someone like V. Literally everything I am doing is spitting in the face of our training, and I know V enough to know that the conflict will be driving her insane with paranoia. Especially with her body-double theory.
V will be looking at me and asking 'is that even Seiji'? And she knows that if she shoots the wrong person, she's a dead woman. If I don't get her, Abernathy will. I could walk up to V, put her gun to my head and dare her to shoot and the indecision would paralyse her.
I truly do pity her, because she's incredibly talented but Jenkins is choking the talent out of her. Her cortisol levels are bafflingly high even for a member of Counter Intelligence.
I should know, I killed and replaced her Quantified Satori Life Coach. Seeing her Biomonitor report has been a source of amusement for me. This assignment has her more stressed than any on their record.
This is why I would never use the life coach that we have access to. This information is… dangerous in the wrong hands, and the idea of someone else having access to it would have me hunting down my own life coach and shooting them at the first sign of anyone knowing so much as a hint of my biomonitor details.
I wonder if V even knows how much information… and access she is giving Quantified Satori. See, V, like every single member of Counter-Intel, has hormonal regulators to control their hormones, cortisol and reactions. The idea is to prevent chemical reactions from fucking with us during a mission, but… it goes both ways. What can be reduced can just as easily increased.
I think V's issue is that Jenkins works her so hard that she doesn't have time for any stress relief. I have racing and Maiko to destress between missions. V goes from mission to mission with no breaks because Jenkins is using her as a tool for his own ambitions. So, her stress just builds and builds without a chance to detox.
And now, with all that stress and worry, with Jenkins breathing down her neck and demanding she assassinate an agent that she knows is as dangerous as her, she is getting constantly misleading and conflicting information from me.
V is too talented to take chances with. I need her to bite the bait the moment she thinks she has eyes on the 'real' me. And, given that V knows of my perfectionist nature, the only time she can confirm that I am the real Seiji would be on the job. Effectively, V will have no choice but to attack me while I invade Biotechnica's lab.
'Luckily' for her, she has access to the data I've already inputted on this gig. She has the plans for the lab, she knows where I'll be, what the current plan is, and how I intend to weaponise the mercs. She knows I'll be in the lab with only Kiwi and Dorio for reinforcements.
All she needs now is the when.
How convenient for her then, that her Valentino solo and Netrunner are still stalking me, reporting my every public word to her.
— Maiko Maeda —
Awakening a new woman, she couldn't deny that she spent the first few minutes just playing around with her new gadgets.
Seiji was surprisingly patient with her, amused by her glee. The upgrade on her cyberoptics let her see him in a definition that made her feel like she'd spent her entire life half-blind. Her analysis soft told her that his body language was currently affectionate, lustful, proud and amused.
The pride of a man who got to show off his incredible resources. The amusement of seeing someone playing with tech way beyond their means.
"Ready to head to our next destination?" Seiji asked, making her blink.
"We aren't heading back to your place?" Maiko asked, surprised as they headed out of the Ripperdoc (but not before she was informed that she'd been added to their client list, and that Seiji expected her to use this place exclusively).
"Not yet, no. I didn't buy you that dress and have you get all dolled up for the Ripperdoc's sake," Seiji laughed softly. It was a very expensive dress, and while this was the city center, she wouldn't need to get so dressed up for a ripper. "I will be leaving the city in two days on an… important assignment, and I likely won't be back for a week or two, so I want to make the most of tonight. We have a dinner reservation, a Jinguji appointment, then we're going clubbing."
— T-Bug —
Tracking Seiji Moriyama almost immediately had her ready to curse Jackie for pulling her into this mess. Being a tool in a counter-intel agent showdown was not good for one's life expectancy, but V was a convincing woman.
The pay was good, and V had assured T that while Seiji was a decent combat netrunner, he was not a specialist. He wouldn't be able to track her before she could pull out if she got his attention. That didn't mean he wasn't dangerous, but he was dangerous for people he was physically close to and she was a deep-dive Netrunner specialist. She wouldn't want to try and hack his ICE, but remote observation was safe enough.
Night City was a city of surveillance, with three cameras on every corner and microphones hidden in every wall. A good Netrunner could follow someone from the northern tip of Watson to the south of Pacifica without ever losing them for more than a moment.
Not that she'd try tracking someone through Pacifica because the Voodoo Boys treated every device in Pacifica like it was their property and didn't enjoy outsiders using them.
If someone wanted to disappear, they'd need to be a Netrunner themselves or know how to hide. Usually by having Cyberware that detected the kind of tech that people like her used to track people. There was a reason you could find so many cameras that had just been shot.
Seiji, almost certainly, had that kind of cyberware and also had the skills to prevent idle tracking. Every so often he tossed out quickhacks disabling cameras or hidden microphones and she was careful not to touch any of them and give him reason to suspect anyone was watching him.
Better to have a brief blind spot than to alert her target and have him scouring the net for her. She had no desire to find out just how dangerous Seiji Moriyama really was.
Hacking the restaurant was not easy. It was a high-end place Downtown, used by corporate execs and celebs. Lifestyle of the rich and famous, huh? Luckily, whoever did their cybersecurity had slacked off and forgot an essential security exploit, leaving her an opening. It would probably be patched when they inevitably saw the traces of her presence but she could lurk in the subnet tonight. Ugh… Was that real beef?
God, she was hungry.
His joytoy tried to hide how starstruck she was, but Seiji acted like this was just another Friday night. Fuck, that salad looked good. She was never tracking anyone through a high-end restaurant again, her dinner was going to suck in comparison.
The joytoy was drinking wine (expensive wine), but Seiji barely drank anything. More importantly, he almost certainly had cyberware to prevent intoxication so he was clearly entirely sober as they moved on to the next appointment.
Jinguji's cybersecurity made her immediately back down without a second thought. Whoever their netrunner was, they didn't fuck around and there was a serious daemon lurking in their subnet.
Made sense, in hindsight. They served some of the top celebrities, politicians and executives. Even Hanako Arasaka had been seen wearing Jinguji clothes. She was almost certain that they had cameras in the changing room and the last thing they needed was some netrunner getting in and getting videos of Night City's elite changing.
Instead, she stuck with a traffic camera nearby and watched his car for their return. It didn't take that long before they returned, both changed from the classier clothes to something more fitting for clubbing. Maiko's dress was far shorter, cutting off mid-thigh, and Seiji's executive look was replaced with a black silk-like shirt.
Very fitting for their final destination, Bella Mia. One of the most exclusive clubs in Night City, and one you could only get into if the bouncers (who had wardrobe and style skill chips) believed you were fashionable enough.
Seiji, clearly, knew a thing or two about style as he got through the door with his arm candy. Meanwhile, she got to wrestle with another high-end ICE. If this was a decade or two ago, she wouldn't be fucking with this place.
As silly as the name 'the Princesses of Justice' sounded, they were not a gang she would be willing to fuck around with and the owner, Velvet Lux, was one of their most famous members. Luckily, or not, the posergang had fallen out of fashion, along with most others, as the 'main' gangs of Night City grew stronger.
Sure, there were still Princesses around, but not enough for her to be scared of delving into one of their subnets. Besides, at the most she'd get a beating. They'd fashioned themselves as a gang that protected abused women by beating the ever loving shit out of their partners, and a Netrunner poking her nose in wasn't going to get fatal response unless she really fucked up.
Like a Mox before the Mox became a thing, in truth. Only, they helped enough rich wives and powerful women to get far more support than joytoys could provide.
Watching Maiko drink her third Velvet Lush, the signature drink of Bella Mia, she snorted. Bitch had spent more on food and drink than she was even getting for this job. Maybe she should have tried banging her counter-intel contact if this was the treatment it got you. Unfortunately V wasn't her type and she liked her contacts far away from her when it came to the meatspace.
It was the safest way for a Netrunner, after all. There was nothing she could do in person that she couldn't do better from her chair. One of the reasons she was so willing to work with Jackie was because he didn't mind her keeping some vast distance when it came to meatspace. Her presence was entirely digital.
Seiji was a good dancer, and so was Maiko, though the drinks were getting to her. Using a soft to read their lips, she made a transcript of everything the duo had said tonight. V paid well enough for her not to half-ass this job, at the very least.
As the night continued, and the pair slipped out of sight of the cameras in Bella Mia, she did a scan for nodes she could use and was utterly unsurprised to find a hidden camera in the toilet stall. It wasn't on their subnet, probably set up by someone else and left abandoned for quite a while but it meant she got to continue third-wheeling this date as Seiji railed Maiko in the toilet stall, her dress pulled up as she rested her hands on the stall to brace herself.
She just wasn't sure why they'd bothered going into the backrooms, there were enough people fucking on the main floor. Night City wasn't exactly shy about sex, especially in clubs where so much booze was being consumed. Nice cock, but that wasn't exactly something she was going to be putting on her report.
She had assumed he'd be… distracted thanks to the joytoy he was currently railing from behind, but to her shock he did his own scan and connected to the same camera. He wasn't in the netspace so he didn't see her avatar, but he definitely noticed her presence as he instantly took control of the node, tossing some nasty hacks her way.
She could have fought him, but she was running out of Bella Mia's subnet the moment he noticed her. Her Self-ICE fought off the Short Circuit and Overheat sent her way, and she was out before he could send more.
Great, now she was hungry, horny and mildly terrified. This job sucked. Should she jack out now? Ugh, no. The job wasn't done yet. She'd need to be far more careful, but she wanted to make sure she followed him home through the traffic cameras. She didn't need V and Seiji pissed at her because she'd called it too early only for Seiji to disappear into the night.
Besides, there were so many runners fucking around with the public cameras that her presence wouldn't raise any eyebrows. Even now she could feel two other Netrunners doing the same shit as her in this neighbourhood's security node.
They were mediocre, probably some kids fucking around because hacking public cameras was baby's first netrun, but they served as obfuscation enough. Their amateurish work was causing a stir and muddying the waters so she could hide in the mess.
She wasn't going to risk going into Bella Mia's security again, but his car was still there. People didn't leave a custom Quadra Type-66 Avenger sitting in a parking lot.
True to her suspicions, the duo left the club almost an hour later. Maiko was beaming like the prettiest princess at the ball, hanging off his arm and stumbling slightly as the far more sober Seiji led her to the car.
With him out of the system, she quickly broke back into Bella Mia and got a copy of their tab. Wasn't going to be much help, but V wanted everything she could get her hands on.
Tracking the car back to his Megabuilding, she followed them to the elevator and then watched as the Megabuilding subsystem tracked the elevator going back to the top floor. Ain't no way she was trying to hack into the penthouse subsystem, because that was going to be his home turf. Sure, there were cameras up there, but even from here she could sense the daemons lurking.
Wasn't impenetrable, and she might be willing to risk trying if she hadn't already gotten a warning shot from Seiji tonight. If he was anything like V, he was on guard and he'd be checking the penthouse security on the regular. Just wasn't worth the risk.
Sending her findings to V, she smiled at the eurodollar transfer that followed. Still wasn't as much as they'd spent in that restaurant, but maybe she would splurge and get a good takeaway tonight.
Jacking out and returning to the meatspace, she sat up with a stretch. Hours of diving was always a bitch to come out of, her body all stiff no matter how comfy she tried to make her Netrunning chair.
Leaving her room, she went down to the kitchen to grab a NiCola from the fridge. Not exactly a Velvet Lush but it'd do to quench the thirst she'd built up while working.
Returning to Meatspace was never fun, because her body was eager to remind her of the needs she'd been ignoring while on the Net.
She got exactly one step out of her Netrunning room before she froze, blood running cold at the sight of an all too familiar figure leaning against her kitchen counter.
She couldn't exactly mistake the guy she just spent the last few hours stalking as Seiji stared her down challengingly. Without even thinking, purely on instinct, she tried to throw a system collapse his way because there was nothing more worrying for her than being confronted in the flesh.
But V's words rang through her head. Seiji was a combat netrunner. Quickhack duels were his speciality as his ICE laughed in her face. Normally in a Netrunner vs Netrunner duel, it came down to who had the better ICE and Seiji had already won that duel.
But as he pierced hers with a Sonic Shock and Reboot Optics, disabling her Kiroshis and deafening her, he simply closed the distance, and she realised the second issue.
He was a close-quarter covert specialist, who was now in arms reach of her. Before her vision and the ringing of her ears cleared, he had her in a chokehold that she had no chance of escaping with her fleshy body.
This was why she preferred the Net. In the Net, your strength was directly connected to your intelligence, but here? She had no chance in hell of thinking her way out of the grapple and soon she knew she was moments away from unconsciousness.
She really shouldn't have taken this job, and she wasn't sure if she should be grateful or terrified over the fact that she was being taken alive.
— Bonus Scene — Evelyn Parker
As Maiko strutted into Clouds, Evelyn felt her jealousy rise like the great green beast it was. Maiko had no actual reason to come into the club, because she couldn't take other clients. Her position was wherever and whatever Moriyama wanted.
Maybe she could say that Maiko was here to make sure Judy would play her part, but no, Evelyn knew exactly why Maiko felt it necessary to come in today.
Evelyn's eyes wandered over Maiko's body, but it wasn't arousal that had her blood heating up as her optics analysed the only competition she had for the position of top Doll in Clouds. She had bought a soft so she could analyse clients, being able to spot the real and fake brands, that had a database on cyberware for her to scan. It let her work out how much they were really worth at a glance, because someone wearing knock-off clothes just trying to look rich wasn't worth her time.
So, she was very aware that the Jinguji dress that Maiko was wearing was real, and with a price tag that would make some of her richer clients wince.
But a single dress was nothing. Not compared to the sheer amount of cyberware that Maiko was flaunting. High-end optics, luxury techhair and RealSkin, and was that the newest Midnight Lady oral module? That was just what she could see at a glance, and she was sure that the upgrades didn't stop at skin deep.
Even her old cyberware had clearly been replaced with far higher end stuff, the kind of stuff most Rippers didn't have access to.
The other dolls rushed to admire the preening peacock as Evelyn leaned against the dressing room table, forcing down a scowl. Her analysis soft gave her a price estimate of what she could see and it was already more than all of Evelyn's cyberware combined.
All of it was laughably outside Maiko's price range, and that meant that their new VIP had to be the cause. Judy kept trying to convince her to not get involved with Moriyama, but Maiko was just proving that she was right to.
She was meant for more than this, and Moriyama was going to be her ticket to the big leagues as she listened to Maiko's tale of her night of luxury.
All she had to do was make him want her as his exclusive doll more than Maiko.
Author's Note: Seiji has learnt the truest fact of corporate life. Everything is affordable if you just don't pay for it at all.
Meanwhile Evelyn has not realised that Seiji wanting you is not good for your life expectancy.
Written: 07/06/2026