He had just sat back down at his computer to continue watching a boxing match, but he pushed off the floor with his foot and turned his chair around again.
"None of your implants have much protection. If you go out, buy a bulletproof vest at a weapon shop. It will not stop real firepower, but sometimes it is enough to keep you alive."
"A vest, got it. Thanks, I will remember."
Carl recalled that back on Earth, selling bulletproof vests had been restricted. Cyberpunk really was different, and he nodded as he thanked Viktor Vektor for the reminder.
"No need to thank me. I just think that polite young people like you are rare in Night City, and having one more does not hurt."
Viktor Vektor turned back to his screen, and the sound of the boxing match filled the room again.
Carl and Oliver left the Ripperdoc Clinic, and before going, Carl pulled the clinic's folding metal door shut. Viktor Vektor really was a good person, someone who did not put money first and even offered a discount, which was rare enough, let alone for a ripperdoc.
If they ever needed new implants or repairs, this was a place worth coming back to.
In Night City, no shop was easier to find than a gun store. In a city where almost everyone carried a weapon, gun stores were even more common than convenience stores, and the two of them found one on the street after only a short walk.
The bag full of guns did not sell for much, only twenty-five hundred euro in total. The price was clearly pressed down, but since the guns were picked up along the way and the owner threw in a few boxes of ammo and holsters, Carl sold them without complaint.
Feeling the data transfer and seeing twenty-five hundred euro appear in his private account, Carl could only say that the experience felt strangely unreal.
"Beep."
While waiting for the transaction to finish, Oliver suddenly noticed that twelve hundred and fifty euro had been transferred into his account. He understood immediately and looked at Carl.
"We split it fifty-fifty for the help."
Sliding his Militech Lexington into the holster given by the shop owner, Carl spoke before Oliver could refuse and transfer it back. He said that if they were going to work together, then an even split made sense, and if they wanted to count every detail, they could do that when a big job came along.
The meaning was simple. They were both green mercs, and there was no need to overthink it yet.
"No, I just wanted to say that this might be the first money I have ever earned myself," Oliver said. He sounded a little emotional, explaining that he had always lived off his dad and sister, and after joining the gang for less than a week and nearly getting kicked out, this was the first time he had actually made his own cash.
"Then you must have had a pretty good life before."
For someone like Oliver, who grew up on the streets, to have never needed to steal for money meant his father and sister had protected him well.
After tossing some of the ammo to Oliver, Carl looked at the gloomy sky outside the door. He asked what they should do now to find work.
"Find a fixer?"
A fixer was a middleman who connected edgerunners with clients. They took a cut, but handled most of the paperwork and risks, and in this era, anyone who wanted to do serious jobs could not do without one.
The idea made sense to Carl. Taking jobs blindly without connections was just asking to get cheated, but there was one small problem he had to point out.
"Do you know any fixer?"
"I never planned to be a merc, and I have no reputation. Of course I do not know any."
"I see."
Carl and Oliver looked at each other. To get jobs, they needed a fixer, but they did not know any fixers. To get noticed by a fixer, they needed jobs, and just like that, they were stuck.
On the very first day of their mercenary team, they found themselves troubled by the simple fact that they could not get a single job.
"All right, just as I expected, I got kicked out."
On the second day after crossing over, Carl woke up in a hotel in Watson District and received a call from Oliver, who had rushed back to Santo Domingo the night before. He listened quietly while sitting up, the room still dim and cramped. The air smelled stale, and the thin curtains barely blocked the street noise outside.
"What do you mean by that?"
He washed his face and looked at the young face in the mirror before replying. The unfamiliar reflection still made him pause for a moment. He spoke in a steady tone, as if it were nothing important.
"What else could it be, I can't go back to Santo Domingo anymore. You could say I got chased out, but I'm almost in Watson District now, meet at the restaurant by your hotel in a bit. You order first, I want a steak, ten Eurodollar."
"You really know how to eat."
Without a toothbrush or toothpaste, Carl used his finger and some water to scrub his teeth, then rinsed his mouth again. He decided that he absolutely had to rent a proper apartment in the future, because this hotel was barely livable. After grabbing his things, he headed out, since the room fee had already been paid the night before.
He crossed the road to the restaurant opposite the hotel, almost getting hit by a swerving car on the way. Thanks to his calm nerves, he did not pull a gun and send the driver a few shots to wake them up. This was not Gotham, and there was no need to be that extreme.
He ordered the steak for Oliver and a plate of Chinese Cold Noodles for himself. Before the food arrived, he bought a drink, thinking that getting used to bug meat might take longer than getting used to merc work. Yesterday's Mini Cola had left his teeth feeling rough, so today he chose a different cola.
The bottle was called Sirius Classic Cola, and just from the packaging it screamed America. Red and white stripes with white stars on a blue background made it look aggressively patriotic. After one sip, his eyes lit up, and he had to admit that Sirius Cola really did taste better than Mini Cola.
"Oh, you're drinking Sirius Cola. I like that one too."
While Carl was tasting the cola, Oliver had already arrived and naturally sat down beside him. He bought himself a bottle of Sirius Cola from the vending machine by the table and took a drink as he spoke. "There's a weird saying in 6th Street that Sirius Cola is the patriotic cola. If you drink other colas, you're asking for trouble, and even if you don't drink it, you're supposed to salute it with whatever drink you have."
"What kind of America-supremacy drink is that."
Carl complained casually, thinking that this kind of marketing had clearly worked. He remembered that Night City was supposed to be an independent city, yet people were still this patriotic. Then he recalled that 6th Street had been founded by veterans from America, and it all made sense.
"So what about today, did you manage to contact a fixer?"
"No."
Oliver shrugged easily, then offered an idea anyway. "But my dad said if you're going to do something, do it properly and don't quit halfway. He suggested I check out Wild Wolf Bar in Heywood. People there often recruit hands for jobs, so maybe we can pick up some work."
Information about Heywood flashed through Carl's mind. It was a district with a sharp divide between wealth and poverty, parks and towers in the north and violent slums in the south, but with a clear and strange charm. The NCPD rated it as partially dangerous, and current gang intel followed right after.