"I'm Doctor Charles. What do you want replaced? A new arm? The finest synthetic lungs? I've got them all." Charles said eagerly. Seeing Berry was female, he added: "I don't have sex‑doll chips here, but I've got channels. I can get you one for eighty percent of the original price."
Ignoring his nonsense, Berry frowned and quickly sized him up.
The man called Charles wore a transparent plastic surgical gown, with a jellyfish‑like hood of the same material over his head. He looked like a doctor—and like a butcher dissecting carcasses.
In Night City, butcher and doctor were sometimes synonyms.
While Berry observed him, Charles was also observing her.
She was dressed like a street punk, not someone rich. The exposed wiring of her "cyberware" convinced him she was strapped for cash. That meant he couldn't squeeze much money out of her.
But sometimes you had to think long‑term. After all, people themselves were valuable "resources." And when Charles saw Berry's rare "innocent" face in Night City, he became even more certain.
A pretty face had value. That was Night City's twisted sense of "humanity."
Charles chuckled inwardly, scheming.
No money, but a pretty face. He quickly categorized Berry, ready to prescribe the right "treatment" to extract the most profit.
Charles liked poor people. No money meant empty heads—easy to fool. Especially girls like this one. Maybe she couldn't stand the city's filthy air and needed a new filter system, or maybe an organ had failed and needed replacing. He didn't care.
All he had to do was sell her something slightly expensive, then scare her with a price several times higher. Then he could strip her clothes off, enjoy the "first course," and sell her to the snakeheads in Jig‑Jig Street for a fat profit.
Would she retaliate? What could a pauper do? Charles was confident in his methods. Even if there were bumps, he had backing behind him.
In less than half a minute, Charles had already planned Berry's entire future.
Good people shine in different ways. Bad people rot in the same way. When Berry saw his sewer‑like gaze, she knew.
This guy was the kind of black ripperdoc more despicable than frog piss. Ten out of ten deserved execution, and still some would slip through.
She decided to probe him first, see if she could get intel about that stolen shipment before dealing with him.
"Doctor, help me! My right cyber‑arm hurts like hell, it's driving me crazy." With her plan set, Berry clutched her kinetic arm, face twisted in pain. Sparks flickered between the exposed wires, and she screamed in perfect timing.
"Come, come, sit down, let me see what I can do!" Charles acted the part of a devoted healer, quickly beckoning her to sit.
"No, Doctor." Berry glanced at the chair with difficulty, face showing the shame of poverty. "I only have enough money for a cheap second‑hand implant."
She didn't want him touching her arm and realizing it was actually external armor.
"My cousin said Little Chinatown has some good, cheap cyberware lately. Do you have any?"
Berry lowered her eyes, but kept her focus on Charles's face, watching for a slip.
"Little Chinatown?" The name seemed to alarm him. He frowned, studied her carefully, then relaxed.
"Oh, you mean that trash those Little Chinatown guys make." Charles sat down, complaining. "Listen, I ordered a batch from them last time. But halfway through, it got hijacked. I asked them to replace it—they refused. Refund? No. I'm stuck, it's killing me."
He looked genuinely frustrated. Maybe she was wrong?
His slumped, complaining posture made him look like a victim who lost both goods and money. Berry wasn't sure if he was really uninvolved in the robbery.
Fortunately, Berry carried a lie detector.
"Hey, Doctor, look at mine."
"What?" Just as Charles thought he'd fooled her, he looked up—and froze. A black pistol was aimed at his waist.
His face went pale. He raised his hands, trembling.
"Be honest. Come here. Pants down to your ankles. Face down on the floor." Berry smiled sweetly, gesturing with the gun. She wasn't about to give him a chance to bolt.
This wasn't the first time Berry had done this. She was very practiced.
"Move it! Don't dawdle!" Seeing him hesitate, Berry cursed, shaking the gun. He flinched.
"Okay, okay, I'll do it!" He didn't know why the patient he'd been scheming against had suddenly turned into a robber, but he wasn't about to risk his life. He obeyed, stripped his pants, and lay face‑down.
Berry worked smoothly: threaten with the gun, control the victim, prevent escape. Like an assembly line. Even veteran robbers would give her a thumbs‑up.
There were rules to this kind of business.
For example, don't press the gun to someone's forehead like a rookie from TV dramas. Berry held it at her waist—maximum firing range, harder for the victim to grab. Professional choice.
And making the victim drop his pants and lie face‑down limited him without contact. Try it—you'll see it's hard to get up, and easy to trip. In that time, the gunman could kill you ten times over.
Charles realized all this too late. He wanted to cry. He thought he'd found easy prey, but it was a predator.
"Name!?"
"Huh?"
"I asked your name!"
"Ch‑Charles."
"Gender!"
"Male. Please, don't shoot, I'll pay…"
"Did I ask you that?" Berry kicked him in the stomach. He curled like a shrimp, eyes rolling.
"Answer only what I ask. Got it?"
Charles nodded painfully, unable to speak.
"Who got the Little Chinatown shipment?!"
"I don't know, I really don't, I'm just a customer…"
"ID. Read it!"
"7… 78341…"
"Your mother's birthday?"
"February… February 15."
"ID again!"
"78341…"
"How much profit did they cut you in? Speak!"
"I really don't know. Those scavvers would never… uh…" At the word "scavvers," Charles froze. His eyes went wild with fear. Even with a gun to his head, he hadn't looked that scared.
"Heh." Berry smiled. "Funny. I don't recall telling you the robbery was done by scavvers."
She had thought maybe she'd misjudged him. But her "lie detector" worked perfectly—he'd slipped.
"N‑no…" Charles's face pressed to the cold floor, drenched in sweat. He stammered, unable to explain.
The clinic door slammed open. Arnold strode in, grabbed Charles like a chicken, and smashed his head against the wall.
Without pause, Arnold kneed him, clamped a gloved hand over his mouth, and snapped his thumb like a pea pod.
The thumb bent outward, bone jutting. Sweat poured down Charles's face, eyes rolling. His muffled screams buzzed like a fly.
"This is the price of disobedience. Understand?"
Berry leaned on the table, smiling with her gun.
"One more chance. Tell me about that shipment. Think carefully. This time it's your finger. Next time, your head."
Her cute face was now filled with cruelty.
For scum who worked with scavvers, she never held back.