Neon Hearts in Derelict Futures [Briar & AlrunaRose]

[Blood Briar]

Torn plastic flapped in the wind beneath an overpass linking an industrial and commercial district, laid out near the channel. The din of traffic was quiet; even inside of business hours, downturned business and doomed development kept this part of the city ill-occupied, and it was long past closing time. Cigarette flame shone in the muted dark of the indefinitely delayed construction site, its planning derailed by fraud and bankruptcy. Two figures conversed softly amidst the shell left behind as the drone of an engine approached.

Headlights cut into the darkness. A deep blue (nearing black) motorcycle swung down the access road and slowed to a halt near an already parked car before cutting out and coming to rest. The rider slid off it and lifted a closely matching helmet from her head. Shaking loose electric blue hair, she set the helmet onto the seat and walked beneath the shadow of the overpass, assessing the pair as she approached.

A good heft past 6', the taller of the two bore the amber plumage and scaly flesh of a Charak, with a cigarette nestled in its beak. They wore a synth-leather jacket like the rider, but in a dull ochre and orange instead of black, and had a very tall axe with a long, wide blade strapped to their back. Their spiked tail swished casually while their eyes scanned the roads without impatience; the fourth member of the group had yet to arrive. Next to the Charak was a Human, around the same height as the rider, reclined against a bundle of steel rebar that never received its concrete shell. Clad in baggy, eclectically black and white pants with a matching shirt, he was sporting a pair of machine pistols and a utility belt laden with gear. His facial hair was notably groomed, with a thin handlebar mustache and short beard trimmed to the chin. The pair seemed familiar enough, given how close they'd situated next to each other.

"Styrix?" the rider asked toward the Charak. They nodded. A hand was offered and taken, precision filed claws carefully avoiding tearing a hole in the rider's gloves. "And Brahms." She repeated the gesture with the Human; the show of respect was an important ritual. Even among criminals. "You must be Therrye," the Charak rumbled. The rider nodded with a slight smile, more for recognition than anything else. "Ready to make some bank?" Therrye gave Brahms a look of mild surprise and then the smile became genuine. "That's the plan." He followed that with a fist-pump, cutting through any tension cleanly and sparking amusement. Infectious grins made for good company in dangerous times.

Dozens of questions waited in Therrye's thoughts about the job - the details were thin from Joi - but that should wait for the last arrival. That left a couple, though. "Joi said you two go way back," she offered toward Styrix. "We fled the Boral mines together," they intoned, thoughtfully. "Then I should thank you." She smiled appreciatively, but the Charak shook their head. "No. I owe my freedom to her."

It was a good start, at least. They looked capable enough, too, and the Dust Cartel's mines on Boral III weren't an easy place to escape. Joi had shared both too few and too many details on her years there over drinks. Plenty enough to light the easy anger and the hard hate in her. And, well, some of her baser impulses when the urge to protect someone wasn't something that could be acted on. Joi didn't have any interest in bedding coworkers, though. It was probably for the best. Therrye didn't need or want to make her work complicated.

The sound of approach brought the attention of all three of them to the road.

 

[AlrunaRose]

Tyler Bates -- Every Ending Has a Beginning

A real-life nightmare; a day of utter mayhem and infamy -- a day her mind simply couldn't let go of.
A corporate tower lighting up the night sky, as it writhed with flames; firefighters and Corpo damage control running all over the place, looking for something -- or someone. Burning cars, infrastructure chewed up from errant explosions, with the bodies in Corpo suits littering the streets in sparse leaps and bounds. In an alleyway, the bodies were more clustered in a dead end. Backed up against the wall, she fell to her knees as she began to bluster in half-screaming sobs, silver tears streaming down her face as the adrenaline began to abandon her. Her jumpsuit ripped, torn and charred; her body bruised, broken and bleeding, positively awash with grisly spatters of red and blue -- their blood, and hers. Her hands trembled, knuckles white and clasped around the hilt of a katana, it's blade vibrating inches from her midsection, ready to commit seppuku. She had won against all odds, but she wished she hadn't. Exhaustion fell upon her like the dreaded weight of the world; hoping it was Death in disguise, she fetally crumbled to the ground and just wept, and wept, and wept... She was too weak to do it. Just a little nap; maybe a few minutes, maybe forever... The last thing she saw through tear-blurred eyes as sleep pulled her into it's macabre embrace; a sight that made her heart rattle at the bars of a cage with blood-curdling rage... A neon, moving-wall advertisement -- "Arasaka Corporation -- protecting what matters most."

... darkness held her but for a few moments. And then, the sound of a glass slamming against a hardwood bartop and sliding towards her, followed by a fizzing sound.
Aolieon Amuchasteguei's eyes snapped open, and her pupils shrank to the size of pinpricks. She sat bolt upright and reached for weapons that weren't there, looking around feverishly. The sound of trance music graced her ears, but the bar was largely empty, having been hours after closing time. Her eyes locked onto the sight of a human chromed gato behind the bar, in some high fashion with a magenta manbun and ostentatious tattoos all over his face -- recognizing him, her pupils dilated to a visible depth and she relaxed. "Good morning, boo. Heard ya sobbing in your sleep; I know better than to be anywhere near you when that happens. Look alive; you're late for a job." He spoke with a flamboyant lisp and was absent-mindedly cleaning a glass in that moment.
Aolieon took a secondary look around -- and then the hangover hit her like a truck. Her eyebrows furrowed in pitiful regret, and she moaned an ensemble of child-like protest, throwing her head back into the crook of her arms. Her hair was an unkempt mess around her head and horns, being the biggest sign that she had hit the party a little too hard. The barkeep strutted quickly over there, grabbing one of her crescent horns as one might grab a child's ear and lifting her head up firmly before moving his synthetic hand to caress her cheek. "I know; you were dreaming of that night again. I'm sorry, babe; but you've got Syndicate Faces blowing up my implants because apparently you were supposed to be twenty blocks away, 15 minutes ago." When being picked up by the horns, it was a big much for a hungover Aolieon, who couldn't help but let out a "Tch!" as she sharply inhaled through her teeth and huffed in frustration at the man. She sneered at him and reached for a nearby half-full bottle of vodka, which was almost immediately snatched out of her hands and traded for the glass that slid towards her not even a minute ago. "Uh-uh; you owe me over 600 eddies now, and I'm not gonna let you pass up another job, girl. Now, get that ass in gear; bottoms up!" Aolieon lowered her eyelids at the barkeep, then reluctantly snatched the glass and took it straight to the dome -- just as she did, the barkeep produced a pistol-gripped injector and administered a shot to the side of her neck. Aolieon was taken aback, half-choking on the seltzer cocktail designed to deal with stomach-related hangover issues. "Ohh quit being a bitch-baby; it's just some naproxen. It'll take the edge off," he commented, putting the injector away and letting her finish the mixture. She placed the glass down and then reluctantly swallowed the unpleasant mixture, gasping for air and reviling at both sensations as they overtook her. Kaede Rhea was likely the only person who could have gotten away with touching her like he did without losing teeth; between the two of them, not only was he a world-class bartender, but he was a vibrant flaming man-eater and one of few supportive friends who had done more than their fair share of keeping Aolieon functional when she really didn't want to be.
She could have reacted 20 different ways, or just been overstimulated. But like a champ, the moment the glass left her hands, she reached in some hip compartments and produced a compact mirror, some eyeshadow and lipstick and began doctoring up her make-up to shrug off all the sleaziness. "Attagirl -- there she is; put your face on," Kaede gave some encouraging words, as he walked around from behind the bar with a hairbrush and approached from behind to begin wrangling the tangles out of her long-angled locks -- another gesture of daring affection, yet one justly earned. Aolieon winced as the gato worked her hair artfully, and she applied her lipstick. Holding her head still, she wiped clean some smudged eyeliner and doctored it up rather elegantly, once again masking her sleepless eye-bags. "Antoine's got your stuff out the locker; he'll hand you your gear on the way out. I'm sure you've got a slew of messages for the location -- if only you kept those damn implants turned on, you damn ganic," He finished brushing out her hair, fluffing it and whirling her around on the barstool by touching her shoulders with respect. "Now, you get out there and make some bank, choom." Aolieon gave him a mild smile of appreciation -- aaaaand then reached behind herself to procure the vodka bottle and imbibe some liquor straight from the source. Kaede put his hands on his hips and scoffed, "Hey, what did I say?!" Aolieon closed her eyes and smirked with the bottle to her lips, gracing Kaede with a middle finger from her free hand as a reply. "Bitch, you lucky you cute..." he retorted to her non-verbal brazen behavior. She put the bottle down and poked his forehead -- the naproxen and seltzer combo had clearly done wonders for her complexion and alertness. "Bitch, I'm adorable. Love you, boo." She stood up from the barstool and then strutted out the bar, pressing her finger to her temple to turn her visor implants on.
Kaede clicked his tongue and snapped his fingers at her. "Come back with money, or that'll be the last drink you ever have in here, you hear me?!" Aolieon brushed the air quietly, as if to say whatever, as she went into the foyer and was met with the visage of the giant body-builder ChromeJock that was Antoine, the bouncer. Sure enough, he had all of her gear in his hands and was waiting with a thinned patience. "Thanks, Antoine. I'll get you back for this, I swear," Antoine grunted as she quickly clasped her blades in reverse grip to her back, her pistol and all of her various cyber gadgets and amenities. She waved him a non-chalant goodbye, as 7 different messages popped up in her feed -- she didn't even bother to read them, she just opened the one with the location and began briskly walking with the pathfinding of her GPS. Before setting on her way, she at least decided to send an auto-generated "On my way!" message before starting on her journey ~

Walking through the derelict and decrepit streets was a common sight she had gotten used to. Once upon a time, she walked more glamorous streets, but when she had to go into hiding, there was narry a care to give about the scenery of the city's underbelly. She strode with a decent pace; wanting to give enough due diligence to not be much later for the sake of her connections and wallet, but not exactly being invested in the situation she was walking into. She followed the arrows as they turned left and right, getting about halfway there before she had to pause for a moment, feeling woozy. She looked around and found a smoker's outpost that had clearly been hit by a roaming vehicle and knocked open. Good enough, she thought; taking a quick left and right glance before running her fingers carefully through her hair, clasping all her locks firmly behind her -- and very briefly yakked into the smoker's outpost. Eugh. She sharply inhaled through her nose, fluffing her hair and wiping her mouth before quickly procuring some breath spray and applying it liberally into her mouth. That being said, she shook her head briefly, all her senses now coming into full focus before she continued along her way.
Eventually, the subtle pulsing of her GPS got more frequent; only a few more turns remained. Things were quiet... too quiet. She lightly clicked her tongue, and then lifted her legs one after another, kicking high and hugging her thighs. She then performed a really quick, awkward hip roll as she reached her arms behind her back and then stretched them up to the sky -- a sort of weird, half-sexy, half-awkward preliminary stretching routine. These streets were still filled with degenerates, and she had had a couple of scenarios where the job rendezvous she was walking into was actually the anticipated crime scene to be. So, it didn't hurt to be prepared for something stupid to go down. She checked the ammo in her pistol and made sure a full clip was loaded, then put it back in her holster and adjusted herself to make it look like she wasn't immediately prepared to draw on people. Without further ado, she began to strut along her way once more...

The click of platformed high heels began to echo down the alleyways, as a cerulean-skinned Liandri turned the corner. Clad in a skin-tight jumpsuit of black patent leather and vinyl lavender as the secondary color; with silver gear harnesses and the high heels built into the one-piece jumpsuit, it looked like some weird cross between leisurewear and Edgerunner gear. She ran her left hand over her crescent horn, caressing the aluminum-colored locks and finding an errant curl to play around with -- her expression dropped into a cold, semi-oblivious look, with her eyes looking complacent and aloof -- when she laid eyes on the three and saw that they were geared up for a job; she narrowed her eyes briefly and then approached as if she was going to walk right on through. Her eyes scanned the motley crew for intention and detes that might help her glean if she was in the right place... aaaaaand then the GPS faded from view. She was in fact in the right place, and this caused her to mildly bite her bottom lip, her expression turning cold and perturbed.
"I'm sorry, I appear to have made a wrong turn; I'm supposed to be meeting a business partner, and I'm sure they understand that I work alone," she began, continuing to size up the three as she crossed her arms and shifted her weight to her back leg. "... Are you all... also here for a job?" she began, deciding it was polite and customary enough to give these exotics and the cybered-up razorgirl the benefit of the doubt. Her eyes kind of lingered a little bit longer on her. She was a bit easy on the eyes, but something rugged and uncouth radiated about her. She was a bit taller than Aolieon, and even through an inquisitive, scrupulous stare -- her eyes seemed cold, seemingly awash with a sea of honey and yet devoid of any warmth. She seemed to wish to extend the proper formalities, but something about her body language gave away that there was something about this situation she clearly didn't like.

 

[Blood Briar]

For a long moment, no one said anything. The three of them shared a look that communicated a mutual sense of what at the arrogant words and the awkward approach. Brahms started laughing, which elicited an awkward chuckle from Therrye and a mild chuff from Styrix. "Then I guess we're all working alone together tonight." The Human offered a generous smile and gregarious wink in Aolieon's direction. He somehow had a knack for being disarming, despite the easy lethality of the situation summed up well in the blades on Aolieon's back.

For her part, Therrye appeared mortified for a moment (even if it was muted by her tact). Partially on her behalf, partially on the other Liandri's. The samurai gave off very mixed signals: ready to kill, unsure of herself, glam as a street doll, cold as a corpse, and armed to the teeth. That she was dangerous, Therrye had no doubt. That she was a professional, Therrye was all doubt.

She didn't return the coldness, but her own violet gaze was lukewarm at best for the time being.

Styrix made a noise vaguely in the vicinity of one clearing their throat and pushed onward with a quiet rumble. "Aolieon, right? Exfil job of a Corpo black box?" They gave her a moment to react. "The fifth, our netrunner, is already ready to go." They nodded to Brahms, who produced a hexogonal disc and pressed a button on its thin surface. A flat avatar of a scorpion surfing on water appeared on the digital surface. A tinny voice emanated. "Yep yep, tapped into the perimeter security. Y'all aces yet?" "Our samurai only just arrived." An annoyed sigh came out of the disc. "So you want me to go over the plan I'm guessing?" "If you don't mind." "Fine, fine, fine." The rapid fire exchange and tones used communicated a familiarity between them, which made Therrye and Aolieon the odd ones out of the pre-established dynamics.

That wasn't exactly comforting, but Therrye only gave Aolieon one more cautious glance before focusing in on the netrunner.

On their visuals, a node appeared right above the disc that each of the assembled could connect to. The information displayed against it made it obvious that it was a simple group channel they could use to share comms and files directly from their augments - such was as useful to a group of criminals pulling a heist as it was to students finishing a group project. "Get connected so I can show you the floor plans. They got some nasty security layouts in this bad bitch of a box."

For her part, Therrye did exactly that. A coordinated group was likely to be a far more successful group.

 

[AlrunaRose]

The long moment of awkward silence caused what little emotion was in Aolieon's expression to completely disappear, and she uncrossed her arms to smooth her hands down upon her hips, keeping her stance open and receptive while angling her elbows more or less behind her... Aolieon's blades looked oddly like unearthly shoto-katanas with a falx-like blade tips and shamshir-like handles; hardly the kind of weapons that a samurai would use unless they were defensive, and hardly what one might call a "katana". What was stranger is how they were mounted in an X-shape across her back, with the handles down by her lower back -- the key takeaway point? It would be hard to notice at first, but Aolieon having her hands on her hips with the elbows backwards was the equivalent to why some mercs stick their thumbs in belt loops -- to have their hands really close to their side-arms without demonstrating a show of force by having it on the weapon, outright...
Fortunately for the rest of them, Brahm's laughter bought a lot back for this motley crue; while her hands didn't leave her hips, she shifted her hips to apply weight to the other foot, and tilted her head, as if to quietly ask what was so humorous. When he did confirm they were there for a job, Aolieon clicked her tongue, looking away from the group with an off-putting expression. She sighed with resentment and preserved a noticeable amount of personal space from the trio, but did not openly back away or show cowardice. Brahm's honor-bearing reply to the prospect of working alone caused her to pucker her lips in a curt disdain, but didn't seem to disagree. She could feel Therrye's chagrin, even through muted lukewarm stares and hitherto decided at least for the moment to pay no mind.
"Exfil job of a Corpo black box?" -- she didn't read the messages and thus she was NOT aware of those detes; this was partly in due to the fact that she didn't want to give any contextual ammunition that any Syndicate benefactors might have gleaned from her even bothering to have the messages be labeled as "read" -- it's how she kept them from wasting her time. She tilted her head, looking down as her long hair curtained a bit to the side at this information, chewing on her lip trying to keep a lid on some bitterness inside. Her pupils slowly shrank to a small size, almost looking panicked at first glance, but it was actually a mildly menacing glower that restrained a spite that she had been trying to drown for a minute now...

A slow and reluctant return to the Syndicate's ways, doing odd jobs here and there to get by in introverted privacy, and the first major gig they give her following her reception after hiatus... was a Corpo heist. Keeping her head to the side, she leveled her gaze at the avian, squinting her eyes derisively. "...Yeah? I'm afraid so," she replied. She didn't exactly know what was up, and she was doing well to hide it, but clearly someone on the inside was really trying to grind Aolieon's gears. Either that, or they had figured out what was up and was trying to weaponize her more than she already had herself... She did not like this -- new faces? A poorly constructed motley crew of god-knows-what kind of bottom-of-the-barrel Edgerunners? A Corpo Heist of valuable intelligence? Someone was pulling the strings here, and she couldn't put her finger on it. Part of her quietly debated walking away... but she needed the money. It stunk like rotten meat, but work was work and she wasn't in a position to bargain.
She let the netrunner and the formal avian have their little tete-a-tete, fluffing her hair back behind her and smoothing the locks back into a uniform place. She rolled her eyes when they were invited to link-up to the node. She flicked her wrist non-chalantly, snapping the port open and wringing her hand to extend the cord to clasp between her thumb and forefinger, plugging it into the node. She chewed on her bottom lip a little more, mulling over the situation and making a mental note to leave some evidence to remind those who might be interested of what she was capable of -- if this job went tits-up, then somebody was going to have hell to pay. She hadn't been back in this scene long, but the ulterior motives and political intrigue of the Syndicate was already on her last nerve. Considering their piss-poor rapport with buying back her patience, self-destructive intrusive thoughts began to taunt her from the back of her mind...

She listened half-mindedly and then inhaled through her nose as the rest of the group huddled in and got friendly with one another. It was at this moment that Aolieon took notice of the damage to the razorgirl's horns -- her mind extrapolated what they'd look like fully-grown, and her mind echoed ... Liandri? ... Aolieon couldn't recall when she had seen another of her kind; probably never, and this one looked decisively more human than she did. Without much else to do as everyone gravitated towards their own established relations with one another; she non-chalantly offered a hand to Therrye, and managed to breathe out a simple, "nice to meet you," under her breath. Aolieon wasn't at all enthused about this situation, money notwithstanding, but the razorgirl's unease was practically breathing down Aolieon's neck -- she could feel the heat radiating off this one. At the very least, Aolieon figured she should try to be nice and mellow out the tension... she might not have exactly meant well, but she needed to keep up appearances until the job was done, at the very least. Who knows? Maybe this one was worth learning about -- there'd be plenty to witness, which would determine that, provided that Aolieon didn't let her own nerves overtake her and decide to paint the very walls with every drop of Corpo blood she could find...

 

[Blood Briar]

Unlike Therrye's, Styrix's gaze was more inscrutable. A little tall even for their own species, they seemed to naturally fill the role of stoic leader within the dynamic of the pre-assembled. Those eyes took in plenty without giving much back. That Charak as a species already gave exceedingly little from their nonverbal communications didn't help. Despite all of that, if there was notable emotion to decipher from them, it lay in the direction of concern rather than judgment. A good leader bears the weight of those they lead, after all. Their response to Aolieon's confirmation was a mild nod of acknowledgement.

Syndicate politics were more distant to Therrye, through both a fair amount of intentional indifference and her wide orbit from its interior. She didn't even claim the title of edgerunner, despite strings of jobs across her years of freedom. Such work was less reliable and much messier than how she more frequently put her muscles and chrome to use. Ambition meant little if your choices filled a tin with your ashes. Still, when it came to her bearing, she held quiet confidence in her self and her skills. Only a bit nervousness peaked out about the contents of the job, as explained by their nameless netrunner, and only when it came to the turrets and lack of intel about the last floors. Her concern, not unlike Sytrix's, centered more thoroughly around the discordance brought in by the samurai with the exotic blades.

Even after they later withdrew their cords from the disc, the communication channel would remain wirelessly open between the five of them. Floor plans stacked vertically in front of them on their visuals, showing five sub-levels, with a glowing yellow chest icon residing in the center of the bottommost level. They shifted to isometric and the focused floor became opaque while the netrunner ran it down.

"You'll come in through the delivery entrance after I fry surveillance. The door's harder, so you're up Brahms, but it's fewer guards on that side." Brahms practically beamed at mention of his person. "I shan't disappoint." One could practically hear the eyeroll in the netrunner's voice. "If you can keep it hush hush, snatching an access card gets you down to the third sub-level through the elevators. S'all biometrics from there, though, so you'll need a hostage or a hand. Probably." That a head was the next option after hand elicited a touch of squeamish color in the Human's cheeks. Brahms gave a harsher than intended cough and mustered a response. "Probably?" "Yeah, well, uh... the bottom two floors are air-gapped. If you connect me, I might be able to get the doors."

While the plan continued to get laid out, Aolieon's hand extended in offering. Her ears didn't quite pick up what she said - she wasn't specced in those directions with her augments - but the tone wasn't unfriendly. Therrye took it without hesitation and shot the fellow Liandri a more welcoming smile. The gesture gave her a little more faith into what the night would demand of them. Were the circumstances different, Therrye's approach to her would drastically differ. A job, especially one of this caliber, demanded attention and gravity, though, and she wasn't one to go about it with the candor and humor the Human brought.

'Might' was a word Styrix and Brahms clearly disliked, based on their shared look. The latter looked particularly concerned. But once again, the plucky human rallied. "If needs must, we can always go loud." He drew a small plastic explosive - the kind that came in sheets stacked upon sheets in military containers - from his utility belt as way of demonstration. It was very likely he was packing anywhere from a half to a full dozen in that belt. Styrix gave a settled nod. "Right, so, anyhoo, cameras of course on every level, three overlapping pairs of patrolling guards, and turrets on the fourth floor." Thin red boxes appeared on the plans, moving with guards. Red hazard signs indicated cameras with faint cones of shading to indicate cones of vision. And red exclamation points over dark squares showed four large turrets in the corners of the fourth floor, and four small turrets overlooking the contents of its central room. "The Corpos only care about the black box, which intel puts at the labeled location." The chest icon hopped and shook around for emphasis. "They said there was a bonus in it for downloading 'significant data' and/or for leveling the building, but we look a little light for that much damage. No offense," the tinny voice hastily offered.

Styrix, perpetually unflapped thus far, almost seemed amused. "None to take." They looked to each of the assembled runners for the night. "Prioritize the box and getting out alive, then. All in agreement?" "Can't claim any eddies if we don't make it out," Brahms replied with a winning smile. Therrye nodded firmly. "What Brahms said."

 

[AlrunaRose]

Aolieon was still listening half-mindedly to all of this briefing, taking in and skimming important words for it, but eventually, Therrye took her hand, and she was mildly side-tracked by what occurred -- She felt the soft skin and the internal density of the fingers in the handshake. She gazed absent-mindedly at the layouts and things, but her head kept somehow pulling her towards that touch, because it felt... weird. Warm. It happened in but a few seconds, and it shouldn't have at all phased her; after all she had had cybernetically modified hands all over her at one point or another, but there was a rogue element somewhere... Numb, eloquently modified, functionally elaborate... and warm. The immediate need to try and focus on the layout and the beckoning curiosity of that mildly unfamiliar sensation deep underneath the layers both begged for her attention.
Aolieon blinked, and realized that in the minor handful of seconds under which the handshake had occurred; she found her own hand had released hers and had skated itself up Therrye's inner forearm, leading oddly with the ring finger in a light, teasing gesture of discovery that had occurred absent-mindedly. She blinked twice and then pulled her hand away abruptly, not even thinking to apologize. Her expression had not changed at all between offering the handshake, un-jacking from the node and pulling her hand away -- save for a mild softening of her facial features and her gaze getting a little more pensive. Shaking her head a bit and reining in her instinct to chase sensations, she narrowed her eyes and drew all the important details of the mission back to the forefront of her mind in an instant. Brushing some bangs from in front of her face, she held up hand as if trying to pull a thought from thin air, and began to speak more than she had ever before, letting her intellect shine and speaking with a lush tone in a flighty range, with a soft, sensual purr to it's depths -- suddenly, it became clear this wasn't her first time.

"Leave the biometrics to me," Aolieon began, pursing her lips and lowering her eyelids, as if she was casually addressing a non-issue. "...and this is the sub-levels of the building? Show me a picture of the whole building... and it's construction date, if you can," she spoke with a lush tone with a flighty range and a soft purr to it's depths. Regardless of what he said, Aolieon would run her middle finger across her implants, and they'd glow and produce a holographic interface in front of her and start browsing the web for documents on the location and any public news regarding it -- pulling up some half-baked construction and other articles. "That was the year that Arasaka released the Dragoon Armor -- it's also the year Militech was expanding it's armored divisions and announced an entirely new model of bulletproof vehicle for law enforcement -- quality metallic alloys experienced a shortage, and this construction company would likely have had to use commercial-grade steel in the construction of it's concrete... Standard C4 should work for these 8 pillars, and those plastic explosives the Human has should work on the main supporting pillars of the entire building," she spoke as if she was simply reading a neat news article, but not at all fazed by the information. Her finger produced the 8 yellow points identifying structural pillars in the sub-levels of the isometric model. "... you might not be able to positively obliterate the sub-level, but the 8 detonations should cause the air-gaps in the floors to clatter upon each other, weakening the infrastructure... and then you can just bring the whole weight of the building on top of it, burying it in an irreparable mess," Aolieon clapped her hands, minimizing the hologram and puckering her lips in a bored but pensive thought. "I've got some C4 back at my pad, as well as some other toys I'd like to bring with me; shouldn't take more than 30 minutes to get... ohh, and one more thing; if someone can prioritize and take care of the turrets, then I can handle the subterfuge if need be. I make my own chaff grenades, and they're nasty, so if things get really heated in there -- I hope your eyes can see just fine without your cyberware," she finally added as the cherry on top.

"Do we have a problem with any of that? I need eddies, so if I'm gonna be working with others; I might as well go big or go home," she finished out.

 

[Blood Briar]

Therrye was just as surprised as Aolieon seemed to be, judging purely by how abruptly she pulled her hand away. The smoothness by which she had disengaged from the handshake and swept her fingers up her arm was a little impressive all on its own. Given the situation, her attention was more on danger markers, moods and important information than anything else; she did not have her guard up for soft touch. Which wasn't to say she didn't enjoy that - in many respects, the Liandri was definitely her type - but the context made it odd. Her violet gaze lingered much longer on Aolieon's face, parsing for details to explain what just happened, while her lips remained parted in that wavering state between saying something and not. The samurai wasn't giving anything away, though, and the moment passed as she dived right into details about the job.

The netrunner obliged with Aolieon's requests, and a quiet humming emitted from the disc as corroborating documents were shared across the channel from their own data searching. "Ah, the name's Brahms, oh and that's Styrix and, uh, Therrye, right," the mustachioed man managed to get some words and gestures in between Aolieon's run of information, but otherwise the assembled crew listened and took in what the samurai shared. It was a good show of expertise and resourcefulness. It also increased the difficulty of the mission. "Yep yep, checks out," the netrunner added without anyone asking. Thoughts clearly turned in a moment of silence before Styrix spoke. "How long can you keep them from requesting assistance?" "Once I kill the security, they're going to be checking in with the locals pretty quick. The dummy signal ready to spoof it won't hold up to heavy scrutiny." "How long if we aren't lucky?" "Uhhh, could be 5, could be 15. Not long."

Therrye spoke up, for the first time in the discussions. "If we can get to the fourth floor without alerting the guards, that might buy us enough time to plant the explosives. Can you spoof the cameras like you're doing with their security system?" "'course, but do you think you can stay quiet 'till that far in?" The bruiser returned her focus to Aolieon. "I think the samurai and I have a chance of it."

Styrix looked between them and amended their previous stance. "We can expect a heavy turn of resistance and the possibility of being trapped by outside forces if we take too long. If you two can get down there without raising the alarm," they looked to Therrye and Aolieon, "then we go ahead with your plan. If not, we default back to just the box." While it sounded like a statement, it wasn't hard to infer that they were once again asking for agreement. Keeping everyone on the same page easily meant the difference between life and death. "Sure thing, Sty." Brahms hemmed a little and shrugged with a cheerful look. "More eddies is more eddies." Therrye nodded assent, looking to Aolieon.

After her response, she offered, "How about I drive and we split that 30 minutes?" The Liandri didn't seem impatient. There were only so many hours before sunrise, though, so maybe that was why she suggested it. Or, maybe not.

 

[AlrunaRose]

Aolieon nodded, going along with what they said. She shook her head, fluffing the hair backwards to keep it in line, but lowered her eyelids in a look of mild disdain and contempt for all this. Being given the privilege to act upon her own interests was great, but these guys really had no idea... the job would be done, and the objectives completed thusly, but this was now a lot less about the job and the eddies itself -- for Aolieon, it was about sending a message. If they sent heavy reinforcements; it wouldn't matter. It would only add more depth to the message she intended to paint.

Aolieon paused; the record scratching in her head when the blue-haired razorgirl offered to give her a ride. She turned to look at Therrye, mouth lightly agape as a whirlwind of clashing thoughts and secrets flooded her mind -- it didn't take long for the shadow of a curiosity to be overtaken by mountains of insular depth, only to be rationalized in contrast by situational necessity. Aolieon shut her eyes for a moment, feeling slighted by the mildly bold gesture. Just as quickly as the overthinking had subsided, she found herself locking eyes with the other three, who were eyeing her expectedly. A mild scoff escaped her lips, as Aolieon was kind of put on the spot. "Sure... I guess that'll be of some help," she replied with a tone of passive-aggressiveness.
What's more is she looked at the bike and found herself being even more slightly off-put; not that she didn't like riding bitch on a good motorcycle... it's just that it would be the first time she had done so in a long time. Turning away from Therrye, she walked over to the bike, admiring it's features and modifications for a minute; she bent over, arching her back as she smoothed her hands across the features for a moment. She almost seemed to be showcasing a quiet passion for these sorts of things. She then stood up, her face becoming pensive and cold again, her eyes flickering with a little warmth before darkening more than before. She then stood up and turned back to her, with an expression of dampened ennui. "Not half bad... I suppose it'll do. Let's go," she seemed to hesitate for a moment, her glances at the other three seeming aversed to some idea. She then locked eyes with Therrye, a glimpse of a red bar appearing in the holographic fog round Aolieon's eyes -- another red bar popped up on Therrye's HUD reading, "RECEIVING ENCRYPTED DATA..." -- Therrye then received a private message, separate from everyone else, containing a zip file -- her periphery would glitch for a moment before returning to normal, as she unzipped it to reveal a small program -- running that program would cause certain items on Therrye's HUD to to become ghosted. "...MAP DISABLED.", and another visual glitch.
"I don't like people knowing my address -- or showing up to my place uninvited. It's nothing you need to worry about," Aolieon volunteered this information, as if already knowing the viral implications of the data exchange. Files emerged, being summarily blacklined and sporadically being twisted with alien symbols, denoting a personal type of encryption carefully curated to only authorize the most minimal of access -- nevertheless, a GPS arrow would populate, implying a barebones directional path to Aolieon's apartment building.

Michael McCann -- "Main Menu"
Whenever Therrye would finally decide to mount her bike, Aolieon would very shyly move herself upon the bike, clasping her hands around her waist. It was a scenic but short-lived drive, turning into a more well-lit district; a sub-let of town looking more like an abandoned gang war zone in some places, while sporting a keen service-oriented militant aesthetic in others. Some buildings were covered in graffiti, drawing attention away from carbon scoring from old firefights, the road became jagged and torn from old grenade explosions that had yet to be restored. Others looked cleaner and more meticulously maintained -- carefully guarded as well, with robots, androids and even CyberJocks of uniformed appearance that could easily have been mistaken for Corpo units, but carried no logos, nametapes or serial numbers in any way, shape or form. Drones didnt follow traffic laws here. The few pedestrians here cut their eyes at a new sight in these parts, mean-mugging with hostility which only ever eased up at all if and when they spotted the passenger. This was PMC territory without a doubt, easily intuited to cater to mercenaries of a more lucrative, free-spirited sort. This wasn't Corpo land, nor was it Syndicate land; this small world was... something else.
After a minute or two of driving, Therrye would feel a brush against her shoulder when Aolieon almost rested her head against it, but immediately pulled away. She'd readjust and give space from the pressing of her body against her, as if she had totally forgotten herself. Eventually the arrow would disappear, letting them know they had arrived to an apartment complex that was somewhere of a middle road between this place's clashing elements -- the word "safehouse" comes to mind. They dismounted and walked into the foyer of the building and we're stopped by a suited ganic of immaculate form, his flesh nearly untainted by hardware, except for the typical glasses-like implants.
Therrye was allowed to lead, and the ganic held up his hand to halt her; with this mere gesture, two warframes came to life out of the periphery, each sporting enough hardware to rend a military convoy to scrap. He spoke in a soft, eloquent and formal Haitian tone. "Sorry, you are not a registered resident of these parts. I must kindly inquire as to the purpose of your visit." Aolieon walked from behind Therrye -- "I know you're not talking to me like that... or her." Her eyes went completely cold and void once more, her expression and stance looking icier than usual. The ganic's eyes lit up with surprise, and his expression softened. "Ms. Amuchasteguei," he began, speaking her name with a flawless pronunciation which immediately indicated a fond familiarity. With a look of mildly intimidated grace, he lowered his hand and clasped his hands behind his back -- with that, the warframes immediately went dormant. "...My sincerest apologies. Is this person your guest? Pardon my candor; this is just an irregular occasion, even for you..." Aolieon didn't even so much as blink. "She's whatever the fuck I want her to be. Now stand aside," the ganic frowned, but nodded in a sort of informal bow.
"Of course. My apologies for the intrusion," the ganic concluded; Aolieon tapped Therrye's shoulder and immediately started ascending a flight of stairs. As she walked, her body language seemed to soften with the implied degree of safety; her shoulders subtly sauntered, her hips generating a natural figure eight with her buttocks as she walked. Her heel clicks softened and she sighed a breath of cool reluctance, as they ventured to the 3rd floor, turned a corner and ended at an apartment room with no markings whatsoever.
Aolieon reached for the door and paused; her movements tensing for a bit with hesitation... a moment passed where she remained like this, her coldness melting into a regretful bewilderment. The ambient sounds of the city echoed with sirens, drones and vehicles far off; one could hear her own small, calm breathing. This left room for a conjecture from Therrye, to which an ignorant, automatic response would be, "I'm fine; everything's chill, just... gotta grab a few things, and we'll be on our way," -- even so, she paused for a moment. A realization hit her, and she turned to Therrye and sneered icily. "Stay out here, and dont even think about looking inside. I dont know you like that," she seemed to lowly whisper with a hiss of venom as she unlocked the door biometrically and nearly slam the door behind her.

Ludvig Forssell -- "Infected"
Aolieon held the door closed with both hands, but it wasn't for hypervigilance or fear of intruders... no, she just didn't want to turn around. She closed her eyes and pressed her forehead lightly to the door -- this would be the first time in many months that she was home sober, and already she was doing everything in her power to stay away from this place. She opened her eyes, and caught sight of a cluster of half-filled vodka bottles. Without a second thought, she grabbed one and took all of its contents straight to the dome -- the spiteful burn and warm fuzziness that followed would be a new thing added into the mix to take a different kind of edge off. She sighed and gestured as if to fling the bottle haphazardly behind her; she thought twice and quietly placed it back down where it came from to avoid making noise. Taking in all of the self-destructive mess and cluttered memories lost wasn't an option. Closing her eyes and trying to remember where everything was, wasnt either; the memories just all come flooding back... If I just look down and then saunter over there; I can grab what I need and get out, she thought. And that she did, slowly turning around and walking slowly as to not allow anything unnecessary to fall into her periphery. There were a couple of things here and there; some joint ashes, some shattered glass, random live bullets on the ground. She just did her best to move to the other side of her apartment, chanting an improvised mantra to herself, "I need this, I need the money; I need this, I need the money..." Eventually, she made it out of the "living" area, and could see from the ambient light of the windows that she was nearly there. She spoke one word audibly, "Armory," and with that; the walls opened up; flipping panels open which contained an arsenal of firearms, blades, explosives, darts and a myriad of other things. She breathed a sigh of mild accomplishment, brushing her hair away from her face, grabbing a black knapsack from off the floor and starting to fill it with some military-grade C4 packets she had been saving for certain occasions.
She considered all of the rifles; all of the devices of war both Militech and Arasaka, and she decided to attach her wrist-mounted dart launcher, complete with folding wristblade on there -- she procured an assortment of darts with various cocktails, to include not only poisoned but drug-filled ones she crafted "just for fun"... She spotted some grungy looking knives that were crudely grafted with wires -- These were brutal and crude devices designed for cybered-up doughboys who might foolishly think a ganic like her had no chance against a ChromeJock -- simply stab hard as hard as you can and press the button; send a stupid amount of volts through their cyberware, and then follow up with another kill-shot if necessary. It was dirty tech, but it was efficient. Could also stop a normal person's heart if she wanted to... or restart one, but she didn't craft it with that in mind. She took three of them, sliding them in the folds of her sword harness, and then she took two more. Aolieon recalled her chaff grenades, but they were on the other side of the room, and so she turned around.
She stopped in her tracks when noticing the bed. Completely devoid of sheets or amenities, her heart sank but she fought it back beneath. She had done this a long time ago, because she never intended to bring anyone else here; too much pain left here. She shut her eyes and walked forwards; she didn't want to catch a glimpse of the bedside picture, or the wedding ring that had been left there. She walked over, stuffed several of her chaff grenades in the knapsack, clipping some to her belt. She had mentioned they were chaff/smoke, but they had a third nastier surprise in their mixture that she always hid below the belt -- best to keep some secrets hidden from potential adversaries. She grabbed some extra pistol ammunition; thought twice about including a rifle of some sort but decided to try and stay true to her own style for this job. Her eyes got cold and dormant, as she channeled within her the dark and ruthless emotions she would need very soon; quickly enough, she brushed them off though. "Clear," With all of that, the panels shut themselves, and the room went back to being dark once more. She took enough time to briefly recall the direction in which she came from, and then closed her eyes and walked back towards the door.

She opened the door and shut it back behind her, now looking a lot more armed to the teeth as she threw her knapsack over her shoulders. She pulled her hair out from underneath it, fluffing it and doctoring it up, and now the alcohol was rolling a bit on her, though she didn't have enough to cause any lack of physical motor skill decrease -- not for her tolerance, anyways. "Alright, let's go. I got everything we need." she concluded with a floaty tone which implied she was somehow feeling better and more receptive to people... she wasn't. But regardless, she knew without a doubt these people would wanna get going on commencing the operation, so she decided it was best to just go with the flow for now -- that is, until it was time for her to strike out on her own, and do things her way...
As she walked down the stairs with Therrye in her sultry way, now feeling more confident; the ganic nodded formally with a curt smile in their directions, eyes seeming to light up at the sight of Aolieon more visibly armed than before -- Aolieon tried to completely ignore him, but he blurted out a few words. "It's always a pleasure to see you in better health, Ms. Amuchasteguei..." his words fluttered with a tone of cordiality, but also a tinge of intrigue. Aolieon continued to strut her stuff out the door. "Are you... working again?" -- this caused Aolieon to pause, as she looked out on the town with an empty gaze. She bit her lip for a moment, then turned her head just enough to give the ganic a side-eye, and a mildly sad one at that. "... just trying to get by," she muttered in a low, weak and miserable tone. The ganic's eyes bounced subtly for a moment, to which he nodded humbly again. "I see... we wish you good fortune, milady." His tone drifted downwards, almost as if the latter of his words alluded to an omen. Aolieon clicked her tongue, and then briskly walked back to the motorbike. She sighed with relief that this whole ordeal of visiting home was over. Without another moment, she was back to her icy demeanor and caddy remarks.
"Let's go -- I'd just hate to keep your 'friends' waiting..."

 

[Blood Briar]

That Aolieon was largely preoccupied with a very personal war was lost on the others present. Whether or not she would have offered her help in the matter, had she deigned to share, would have depended on her motivations. Aims and goals were well and good, yet the why was where it really counted. Therrye had suffered enough in her lifetime under the "auspices" of "the ends justify the means."

At Aolieon's surprise, Therrye didn't even try to subdue the smile (and it was definitely a smile rather than a smirk) that crossed her lips. The samurai's emotions seemed to be as fluid as her body. If asked, Therrye would readily admit a weakness for vivid hearts - especially in femmes. The passive-aggression was less her vibe, but she'd put up with much worse from people she wasn't about to trust with her life.

"I'd offer you my helmet, but it wasn't designed with four horns in mind." As she pulled on the helmet, electric blue hair long enough to flair out from the bottom, the private message came up on her screen. Her gut gave a little lurch. Considerations over trust were forced into the forefront of her mind which was something she rarely ever wanted to face directly. Trust built on necessity felt more stable than anything else, with familiarity a distant second. Every choice could erode and shatter it, and the implications of each choice worked the same kind of corrosion; one or two modest fuck-ups could easily spiral into her ghosting someone. This was an unlabeled, encrypted file, from someone she'd never seen before tonight, and could be as likely to blow her up in the Geraldi black site as pull her out of its burning wreckage.

In short, suspicious as fuck.

Therrye practically snarled in frustration. The helmet obscured the face she made, though, as well as the look of spite that came over her when she saw the results of opening it. "You could have simply asked," she said in a tone of rage barely kept from seething out of its cage. That she was experiencing such emotions toward someone she was supposed to be working with did not help her mood in the slightest. Turning her bike around and mounting it immediately after, she kicked on the engine and waited less than a heartbeat after Aolieon secured herself around her waist to take off. Driving angry meant tight turns and jagged accelerations, though she kept the presence of mind not to completely blast the soundscape of their desolate environs with unmitigated use of the throttle.

Brahms and Styrix shared a look of concern.

Tension remained corded throughout Therrye's body for the entire drive. That she was controlling a death machine at high enough speeds to put their lives in danger was largely what kept her from jackknifing the bike at Aolieon's sudden touch on her shoulder. However much the Liandri could intuit from her nonverbals, it was at least clear that she drove skillfully regardless of her emotional state. She parked sharply and let the samurai depart completely from the motorcycle before moving. A part of her wanted to just take off, but the professionalism kept her in check. Getting petty would just make things enormously worse. Her chest swelled with a deep, whole-body breath, and she exhaled into the helmet, settling down some of her agitation. It was fine. She was fine.

Therrye didn't mind leading - at the moment, it was easier not to look at Aolieon. Her gaze swept the threats without alarm, and she waited for their conversation to end without interruption (though she did note the surname). Her eyes tightened at Aolieon's touch, but she otherwise didn't react and followed silently, too preoccupied with her own shit to notice much of the change in the samurai's flow of movement. Therrye was already starting to turn away from the door, ready to wait at the railing, when Aolieon sneered at her. The impulse to clock her right in the face swam up. Steely fury peeked out from her composure.

Once again, she said nothing, and was already looking out at the city before the door closed. For a minute, then two, then three, there was only the whorl of anger and the skyline of the city. Memories of hatred lay embedded in the cells and chemicals of that anger, layered into the fabric of her muscles across year after formative year. Slowly, slowly, enough of it seeped out to make room for anything else. Therrye's eyelids shut with an exhale, and she let the world fall away while she focused on the rhythm of her breath. In. Out. The mantra repeated, silently, and lungful by lungful she let go of what was burning inside of her. Only embers remained when the door opened and closed behind her. Turning, she nodded, her gaze closer to when they had been standing around the disc, and went back the way they had come up.

Therrye went ahead to the bike, slipping on her helmet and waiting for Aolieon before starting the engine this time. A quiet scoff and obscured roll of her eyes was her answer to Aolieon's words. The drive back was notably smoother, all the same.

 

[AlrunaRose]

Rolling it back, Aolieon sent the zip file haphazardly without paying much thought to what it contained -- or how it might make someone feel. When Therrye spat at her, she couldn't help but snort... Although, something in the back of her mind protested the predicament. Those last few words before they drove off were words she could not deny; Aolieon should have asked first, but had borne so much non-chalance and disdain for very chromed-up people in the past that she had neglected to think of how they'd receive what was basically unwanted spyware. Despite that, she had not seen enough of this woman to judge whether or not it was worth the trouble. Inner demons moaned in her mind, egging on her spite at the prospect of getting into a fight with someone so careless with their own flesh, and so spicy -- she liked fighters; Aolieon couldn't help it. Something about the thrill of their strength and how unhinged their emotions made them promised rolls in the hay of such destructiveness... which was a gambit in and of itself, but in her mind; she deserved it.
Masochism joined into the mental instigation, and the rumbling of the machine underneath her ended up accidentally producing a bit of heat in her core; seeing this girl pissed off and driving like a bat out of hell was kind of hot... Aolieon could no longer hold back a sinful smile, as she held her head aloft in the wind at high speeds, letting her hair cape backwards in it's wake. She was battened down for the most of their time spent together, but she could not deny she missed this feeling; riding bitch on a motorcycle at high speeds -- it brought back flashbacks of blazing a trail a trail through industrial compounds as Corpos fired upon her and chased her with futuristic VTOL fighter-craft; a MAC-10 in one hand and someone special in the other; she let the maniacal laughter of someone madly in love escape her lips as she hosed down pedestrians carrying assault rifles... it was this brief flashback that led her to choke back a chuckle, and try and lean her head against Therrye... but feeling the slender, muscular build of a woman against her was what made the visions through rose-tinted glasses fade all too quickly, causing her to pull away. Her smile melted, and her composure reluctantly seized back into the moment -- this wasn't him. This gave her all the more compulsive thirst for a drink; being sober made the memories come back...
Still, she looked back at the hyperfocused femme fatale, driving through the streets with a tension so great, it almost made her wanna rub the shoulders. She knew contained rage; this couldn't help but allow the smile to slowly creep back upon her face. An intrusive thought made her want to antagonize it; an even darker thought cared little if she was kissed or killed... but this wasn't someone potentially worth the gambit. Just some bottom-of-the-barrel Edgerunner, roped into the circumstances of this mission for which all of them needed eddies -- At least, as far as she knew...

When she got back on the bike after acquiring her stuff, the ride was smoother, and she noticed the change in Therrye's body language, after cooling off. Part of her was glad, but the majority of her was disappointed. A thrill had been realized once more, and now it wasn't there; still, she enjoyed the scenic drive, still feeling the rumbling beneath her, still somehow failing to reminisce... her tongue slipped between her teeth.
"Aww, what's the matter? You were driving so fast mere minutes ago... what, catch some stray ICE and nearly blow your top? Is that all I needed to do to get you started?" Aolieon raised her voice to be heard clearly above the engine as she taunted Therrye, biting her lip with a smirk; too late to back out now... "I'll keep that in mind; you seem like you'd be more fun pissed off... By the way, I prefer Harleys. Ohh, and be angry at me all you want; so long as you can aim it at the Corpos -- they actually deserve it." She let out a melodic chuckle with a tinge of sociopathy, her last words carrying some venom that revealed a little more about what her intentions with all this was. Even quietly aware of who was at fault, she couldn't help but just flip a hateful card in her hand, in kind with Therrye... even if it was only to stoke the fire inside.

 

[Blood Briar]

An image of Therrye whipping her head back to bash in Aolieon's nose with her helmet flashed through her mind. That was one of the things about anger, though; as fun and funny as it might be to feel the samurai thrown off the bike, to hear a crunch of cartilage, and inhale the scent of fresh blood, it wouldn't make her feel better. Nothing about rage had ever really made her feel better, and once the distraction of adrenaline was gone, the restless churn of guilt and anguish was what awaited when she let it blow out without focus. Without purpose. The endless dungeon and the cage had made that clear to her, and nothing since had proved it wrong.

This arrogant mess of a samurai wasn't worth feeling that way over. Her guard was up for anything coming from her now, making it easy to be the cold, deflective sort of angry. Not that she felt any better about how that kind of ice gouged lines through her heart. "You aren't worth it," she said flatly. Had she been less of a chaotic bitch, Therrye would have easily agreed with her on that last part. The arms of camaraderie were only extended to actual comrades, though.

---

It was a clusterfuck in the making. Everything had gone smoothly down to the fourth floor in spite of the toxic tension crackling here and there between Therrye and Aolieon. The samurai's blade sliced cleanly through the guards she hadn't disabled with an impact to the skull, and she was at least as light on her feet as Therrye was - more, probably, but Therrye wasn't in a generous mood. Events were still playing out as planned on the fourth floor, with Aolieon planting C4 on pillars as they went, but something went wrong shortly after Brahms and Styrix arrived after them. A poorly hidden body, a flash of Styrix's orange jacket, a quip too loud from Brahms; whatever it was, the guards had snapped to attention. The team's netrunner blocked out the comms, then, but the guards still activated the turrets.

By the time they were junk, internal klaxons were sounding throughout the facility. The commotion must have alerted the upper floor guards. "Spoof's running guys, so the timer's started." Even the netrunner sounded on edge now.

The lethal competence in the duo of Aolieon and Therrye was clear enough to Styrix, whose two-handed axe was now slick with Corpo guard blood. "Handle the box. Brahms and I will eliminate anyone who comes down after us." Brahms was distracted in inspecting the demolition placements of Aolieon's handiwork, and snapped a thumbs up in her direction once he was brought to attention. "Hells yeah. We'll bury this concrete heap right on their heads when we blow out of here."

Thanks to their teamwork, the two Liandri had suffered minimal flesh wounds getting this far. That was about to change.

On their way into the elevator that led into the fifth and sixth floors, Therrye picked up two guard corpses, one with each hand, and carried them by their tactical vests. Her previously synth-leather gloved fists resembled thick hunks of articulated metal now, having equipped Millitech's answer to the gorilla arms: breaker fists. Already sporting weaves of synthetic sheathing over tendon and bone and auxiliary muscles in parallel with her natural ones, the breaker fists bolted into her forearms to add alloy weight, shaped precision in the protruding studs, and explosive piston impacts to her fists. The strain on her musculature and bone systems was far from negligible, but the strength increase was well over the top for most purposes - which was perfect for an edgerunner's line of work.

The two bodies were held awkwardly to her sides as she gazed levelly at Aolieon. "I'll leave the elevator first to take their fire and give you an opening." It was clearly a statement instead of a suggestion. Though she knew the samurai had brought grenades - or so she said, anyway - landing calculated tosses from behind cover and while under fire wasn't going to be an easy feat and she only had so many. Per the original floor plans the netrunner fed them, they knew there would be at least two batteries of turrets that could light them up with their crossfire.

So, Therrye did one of the things at which she excelled (throwing, it's throwing things). When the doors opened, one of the corpses came hurtling out in a devastating throw, triggering bursts of gunfire, shouts, and a couple of toppled guards. Therrye charged out after it in the other direction, using the other corpse as a shield, and slammed straight into a duo of guards in cover with it. At that range, there was little they could do with their rifles. A strike to the chest threw one guard into the other with an audible crunch of ribs and immediate spurt of red. Bullets sprayed her leg as she dodged for cover, a third guard on that side painting the floor with Liandri blood. A moment or so later, one of the rifles was chucked into the third guard with enough force to pierce their arm with its barrel.

Not the worse start, all told.

---

This was her element. Rage burned like fuel in her fight, and the adrenaline kept her going after each impact into her body. Collapsing bone with near every punch took her one step closer to leaving this place alive. Breaking the folks who stood between them and their prize was something she would do over and over again; no hesitation, no stopping, not until the threat was over. And that wouldn't come until they were well away from the site.

Therrye's breakers smashed in a turret from both sides with a triumphant shout, rocketing its dome toward the ceiling and sending the gun barrels clattering onto the floor. With its partner already a smoking mess of crumpled metal, there were no more automated weapons to drown them in a fusillade. Entry wounds up her torso, on her left arm and right leg leaked vital fluids, but hardly the usual amount a person would suffer. Pain shot up her arm whenever she rotated the shoulder, telling her a dermal plate or three had been deformed or worse. The lack of diminished feeling meant that it probably hadn't severed an artery internally, though.

Silver linings.

With the enemy forces on the level unconscious, dead or dying, Therrye hustled with just a little limp to the doors of the central lab, where the black box could be seen through the transparent walls. She looked to Aolieon as she approached, heat radiating off of her, her focus locked in. "Can you hack us in quick, or am I punching us through?"

 

[AlrunaRose]

... Aolieon honestly wished she could have said this wasn't going to happen. The two razorgirls were just barely getting into the rhythm of one-upping the other with a mild contest of who could kill more. Aolieon started it with the bike remarks, but shortly thereafter, they were using neural comms to just spit sassy taunts and firey insults, one after another. Styrix would ask them to keep the channel clear, only to be heckled by fire and ice, because they weren't out there doing work. Broken back after crushed head, Aolieon couldn't help but notice how crude yet efficient she was -- and despite how unhinged she went about her work, it was quiet enough; the snapping of bone and withdrawal of larynxes by hand just happened to be far enough out of earshot, while Aolieon was simply being crafty with how she slit throats and delivered fatal chest impalings -- at first, Aolieon was just being a tease, brazenly antagonizing Therrye to try and see if she could make her snap and get into a fight with her, but after the first few kills; Aolieon spaced out her catty remarks and aimed them deliberately at Therrye's styles in dealing death -- causing an insolent synergy to occur that even when Brahm tried to interpose his cheery nature between them; the netrunner just cut him off, pointing out how good they were making it on time, remarking simply, "let the razorgirls cook, Brahm."
It was incredible -- even Aolieon could see it. Competition wasn't so bad at all, and Therrye's snarky slander was actually goading Aolieon into trying... it made her blood flow; it made her try out old moves, she was getting creative. Therrye mocked her reliance on blades, and Aolieon used her hair to blind, smother and snap a neck. A gymnastic high kick got wrapped around a standing fellow's head, bringing him down to the ground to be smothered between her thick thighs before he savagely took a knife in between the eyes. She was handspringing into a somersault to kneel upon another guy's shoulders before twisting his head 180 degrees with her body... and she didn't let a single body thud against the floor; she was graceful as a cat and quiet as a mouse, plus the charges got placed where they needed to like clockwork. One could only hope that Brahm placed his own charges on the structure-bearing pillars of the skyscraper to her specifications... Eventually, their body counts got to the double digits and even though there was a visible hatred in Therrye's eyes -- one could only imagine the respect that was being built for their pursuits in this line of work.

Just when Aolieon began mentally tossing and turning with the forbidden concept that maybe, just maybe working with others wasn't such a bad thing... all hell broke loose.

The two males arrived, and while it couldn't be pointed where; comms started going haywire, turrets came alive, and gunfire began to rip in half the silence that Aolieon and Therrye had worked so hard to preserve. Aolieon flipped behind one corner and chucked a chaff grenade to the other side of the hallway to disable it and carefully place a few bullets in its optics -- before she could move to dispatch the other turret, she turned the corner just in time to watch Therrye put her fist straight through the turret's chassis. Damn, Aolieon thought. Girl wasn't just a grappler, she was a fucking wrecking ball. I'd let that wreck me... Aolieon licked her lips for a second to muster a salacious grin and then turned the corner back to worrying about herself. She didn't have any blades innovative enough to cut through military-grade turret chassis, so she quickly got to work refitting herself. She opened her knapsack, took a count of her chaff grenades; two normal, 3 spicy... Clipping them to her utility belt and sheathing her right-handed blade; she removed her silenced pistol, quickly removed the silencer and loaded it with a mag of hand-filed bullets designed to produce hydrostatic shock as well as pierce armor in their own crude ways. She would have to manually pull the slide back each time if she didn't want the gun to jam or blow up in her own hand, but desperate times called for desperate measures. When Brahm and Styrix told the girls to go on ahead, Aolieon was already on her way and didn't even acknowledge them; she didn't need permission from some nobodies to ensure a job was well done. Therrye followed quickly behind as they got into the elevator.

Aolieon took a deep breath and sighed exasperatedly as she smoothed her hair back behind her head. She stowed her equipped blade in her armpit, using the free hand to reach for something out of a hip pouch; while Therrye was busy picking up two dead guards she had managed to smear the heads of together, Aolieon flipped open the cap on the pipe to reveal an orange substance inside, after which she took a lighter and inhaled the thing straight to the dome -- just as Therrye looked at her and told her the improvised plan to storm the floor. Aolieon snorted, furrowing her eyebrows in oblivious complacency before she groaned to release a bunch of dab smoke. "Works for me," she merely replied, grasping her sword again and closing her eyes...
It may have looked like Aolieon clearly didn't give two fucks, but there was a method to her madness...
Beneath shut eyes, thoughts swirled and rushed, being mellowed by the THC. She pulled down the zipper of her jumpsuit down to her sternum to allow some cleavage to be shown, as thoughts to the surface to remind her of the principles that she had taken so many wounds to devise... and she concentrated on those single thoughts ~Don't think about the bullets; you can't let them concern you. There can be ZERO wasted effort. Distract, dodge, whirl, flip, KILL -- repeat, but never in that same order. Keep the center-of-mass moving; change the move-set, just like you're spinning the revolver... and pray. They don't know it, but you play this game every day.~

Perturbator -- Shock Doctrine (Remix)
The elevators opened, and Therrye groaned with effort as she hurled one of the corpses as far as she could, using the other as a shield and blitzing forwards like a bull in a china shop. The excitement of that moment was almost enough to stun Aolieon with her sick twisted arousal again, but one guard managed to dodge the flying body, and was completely fixated on Therrye; completely horrified at what he just witnessed her to do his friends. A perfect start. Aolieon strutted forwards in large strides, eyes fixated forwards as she approached, flipped her blade into reverse grip and then savagely sheathed her blade up to the hilt with the side of his skull with a sickening crunch. Her pupils practically disappeared -- she was now officially in cold-blooded assassin mode; her zen in the heat of battle achieved. Holding the standing fellow there for a minute, she pulled her blade from his head in a grisly manner allowing him to crumple into the ground as she decided on a bit of suppressing fire. Placing the grip of her blade on the top of the pistol and hip-firing a couple of deliberate shots of suppressing fire -- the slide went back twice in a fluid manner, releasing the trigger after the 2nd shot rang out and pulling the slide a third time. It was easier to aim for collarbones; armor tended to be thinner around the neck, and more concentrated near vital organs. One shot found it's mark, flower-petaling open and rending flesh as it released its tungsten slug inwards. All the while she strutted forwards -- the cat was out of the bag now -- the Corpos saw her, as well. Time to put on a show...

At least the way of things might serve to draw some fire away from Therrye, thereby increasing her survival. The Corpos now had two threats to contend with -- the Beauty & the Beast...
Distract. She smoothed her hands through her hair, dropping it low into a salacious Goddess pose before throwing her head forwards into a dodge roll. She quickly planted her feet out of the forwards roll, and sprung up; Aolieon letting her shoulders lean to the wayside as she flipped her sword back into normal grip and then went into a full Sufi twirl; taking two wide steps in the general direction forwards, she pressed the press button on the blade -- her shoto-katana extended itself to the standard "daito" length or long blade, extending two bars to stabilize its now flimsy form. Bullets whizzed past her head; one grazed her shoulder -- IGNORE the pain! The body tenses up a moment after each shot -- if you do that, more will come! She leaned shoulders to the left and crossed her feet into a turn, flipping the script to bend over backwards into a back-handspring. She managed to close into melee with a guard, WHIRL -- Her blade found enough momentum to chop itself halfway through his torso; he tried to check her with the rifle-buttstock. Quickly pulling her sword out, she steped back; plied into a reverse twirl, and swung her blade about. In two lunar arcs of her blade, she had now not a piece of a single guard, but TWO. But she couldn't waste another moment; turning back to face the line of fire, she fired forwards, landing another shot into center-mass; that would make four, but he's not down... Nevermind! That was when Therrye punched another guard into her mark, and knocked him over. The first guy was totally dead, but if the 2nd wasn't dead after that collide; he sure was, now... Pull the slide back before you forget.
A guard pulled a katana and tried to close with Aolieon. She combat-rolled towards him and flung her hips to the side halfway through, kicking her legs to sweep the leg. Poising her pistol arm underneath her quickly, she watched him fall forwards as she thrust her sword in an arc -- it found it's mark in his head, just before it landed. She used this opportunity to grip the sword in reverse grip and stand up; more bullets flew past, one finding her thigh. Urgh. She used her pistol arm to slither up the side of the wall sensually, cut a look forwards and kick her leg off the wall while swinging her other leg straight upwards as best she could -- executing a bona fide aerial backflip. Another bullet whizzed past, narrowly missing her head. Using the momentum, she performed two more back-handsprings, and brought her blade down straight onto another guard's collarbone, cleaving downwards. Removing the sword, she took another step forwards and impaled another's head, removing it thusly; this happened just as Therrye was smashing the second turret -- using dervish twirls and back-handsprings as primary movement forwards while making targets second-guess where to shoot best to hit her; Aolieon had finally caught up to Therrye, each of them performing more or less equally in dispatching about a dozen guards -- although, the turrets really gave Therrye a leg up. Whatever; she was pretty sure she got more stealth kills back there... Aolieon's cheeks were flushed from both exertion and adrenaline; emotions and thoughts whirled through her head as her nerve-endings made it painfully clear that she had been injured more than she had originally perceived. As Therrye withdrew her hand from the turret chassis, she put her sword away and quickly reloaded, her breath heavy as she looked derisively into Therrye's eyes, as she spoke in a breathy, flighty and derisive tone. "Damn, honey, you spread legs with those hands? I wish men had the balls to do that to me..." she bit her lip and began strutting briskly towards the door of the vault -- barely giving time for Therrye to process the brazen cat-call. Aolieon was high, but more importantly; she was high on death, and these situations brought out a different thrill in her.

When they finally ran to the door to try and breach it, Therrye was limping and Aolieon was doing her best not to. They got to the door, and a fury-hazed Therrye tried to contact the netrunner; just as he was beginning to reply, Aolieon clicked her tongue in impatience as she planted a fifth and final C4 charge on the door. "No time, we gotta move," she breathed out, pressing a few buttons on her wrist to single out the charge number before she lightly pushed Therrye out of the way and then bounced out herself and blew the door off. Aolieon blitzed into the smoke and immediately started loading the enormous black box into her knapsack. "Disregard that last. Package secure. Want to leave, NOW. Get useful, boys." She recounted her grenades and started practically running out the place, because she didn't want to remain here much longer.

 

[Blood Briar]

Against all odds, the tension between the pair of them had evolved into a deadly dance of competitive death. To Therrye, it seemed that the more seriously she took the job, the less seriously Aolieon did. The more extravagant Therrye got in ending a guard's life, the more precise Aolieon became in slicing arteries and windpipes. Every push came with a pull, the two acrobats jumping from wire to wire after one another. Neither could grasp much of an edge over the other in measuring their kill counts, which only pushed them further forward.

If Therrye held any disapprobation for her fellow Liandri for her use of substances, it was well sunk beneath the pressures of time and the evidence of her results. As for the cleavage, well, she made certain assumptions about her intent and left it at that. This wasn't the time to put much thought to her curves.

While they mutually turned humanoids with guns into nothing more than split meat and sinew, Therrye had to offer her a measure of trust. She could not keep tabs on everything happening in such a well-designed kill zone, and worrying pre-emptively about either of their survival would only divert her focus from the present task of hot murder. That Aolieon was an elegant dance of blood and metal in this open field would be a fact she would only catch glimpses of, for now. The samurai had given her quite an eyeful on the earlier levels, all the same. What came out of her mouth after she destroyed that last turret made Therrye pause for a moment - a very brief moment, but a moment all the same. Seriously, this wasn't the time for flirtations, though she had to admit it had only come after the last thing shooting at them was dead and down.

In spite of all such sentiments, she didn't actually mind a comrade that brought candor to the job. It was what made her instantly warm up to Brahms, after all.

Her eyes widened at the immediate planting of the explosive and she rolled with the push to get clear of the blast that would have happily torn off a limb or three. She got back to her feet with a huff and limped her way after Aolieon back to the elevator that would take them up. She was grateful she could move as fast as she was going, but knew it would put a damper on further skirmishes with the fellows trying to turn them into perforated dolls. Hurling more objects from advantageous positions would work out better than throwing herself as cavalierly into the throng as she had down there. At least there wouldn't be any more turrets, right? A glance at Aolieon told her well enough that there was no dead weight in her kit; she'd find heavy debris to use in whatever mess awaited them above.

About that.

Comms crackled as they ascended. "Brahms is down." The weight in Styrix's voice made it clear that it was the sort of down one wasn't getting back up from. A snarl threatened out of Therrye as she cast her eyes toward the ceiling and ground her teeth against each other. "Fuck," was all she could manage after a heavy moment of silence. The lethality of the job had taken another step up. When the netrunner piped in next, there was clear emotional distress in their voice; was that a choked sob? "Reinforcements are inbound."

Now was the second best time to leave. Therrye cast a quick and terse glance toward Aolieon. Then the doors opened and she was moving through the sea of wreckage that awaited them on the fourth floor. The aftermath of multiple small detonations (luckily leaving all of the C4 packages untouched), countless rounds of small arms fire, and a lot of severed body parts made a mess of the floor. Styrix was hunkered down behind a now very fucked half wall next to a stairwell, and had miraculously only taken a couple of visible hits thus far. Brahms' still-warm body lay before him. That Styrix wasn't waiting at the elevator going up was indication enough that it wasn't the right option to take, currently.

Therrye limped over to the two - to Styrix. Her expression of pain communicated her commiseration with whatever the Charak was going through. She didn't know if they were drinking buddies, best friends, or off and on chooms, and that didn't matter to her. A comrade was a comrade. She kneeled down next to Brahms for a moment, and from her backside, it may have looked like she was paying her respects and, perhaps, wasting time. When she stood back up, though, she had the last few of Brahms' explosives in hand: two grenades and two plastics. She tossed the latter to Aolieon. Styrix was at the bottom of the stairwell at that point, axe pointed toward the ceiling. "We go up."

Tucking the two grenades into her jacket - that she could manage fine reticulation at all like that with the breakers on was a sight, to be sure - she salvaged a large armored plate from a destroyed turret before following the Charak up.

---

An ambush awaited them at the second floor. Multiple stairwells meant divided forces, at least. Careful movement up the steps had prevented the three of them from being perforated, but the guards had the upper ground and more advantageous position. At least until Therrye pulled a grenade out.

While holding the salvaged plate in one hand, she could be seen looking at the walls with narrowed eyes for a couple beats before she pulled back to throw at something considerably less than full power. The grenade hit one wall in the corner facing them, bounced upward against the adjoining wall, and then soared up into the top of the stairwell. With her timing, the humanoids up there had less than half a second before it went off. Shredded armor and viscera sprayed down the stairwell after the bang of its payload. "Go!" Therrye shouted, disregarding the pain in her leg to race up the stairs as fast as she could. Additional guns arrived as they arrived at the first floor; before they could get off more than a few rounds, Therrye pounded the plate forward straight into their formation, knocking them off their feet by its direct impact or the entanglement with another flying body.

She took another two hits in the torso for it, but their forces were completely unable to prevent the trio from getting out that door. Two sweeps of Styrix's axe made certain that any left on the ground were well and truly dead. Now they just had to make it out of the building and somewhere, anywhere else, untracked. Nothing to it, right?

As they took cover, a squad of armed Corpo troopers poured in from the front door. That didn't pull Therrye's attention nearly as much as it could have, though - she was attenuated to the heavy footfalls of something large and mechanical coming up from behind. The steel floor resonated with each impact, and the glare of floodlights outside obscured the entrance until a large shadow came into relief before them. A careful glance out of cover confirmed Therrye's apprehensions fully. "A fucking Centaur," she swore with a scowl. There was no helping it, then. Any cover they used would end up melted by the armor's on board weaponry. It would need to be handled proactively. "Can you keep the soldiers busy after I lob this grenade?" she asked of Aolieon and Styrix. The Charak gave a nod, looking as impassively stern as ever. Whatever Aolieon replied with, she was going for it anyway.

Right as a loudspeaker clicked on to issue whatever Corpo garbage commands they had toward them, Therrye acquired her angle and released. The grenade bounced off a plasteel panel and into the midst of a formation of soldiers. As it chunked armor and swallowed up their attention, she hurtled forward with as much momentum as she could muster. Mid-turn, the Millitech Centaur - an exoskeleton that doubled a soldier's height and equipped them with a massive thermal weapon and a large ballistic shield - was hit by her. Even with Therrye's not insignificant weight, she wasn't able to pull the Centaur off of its feet after launching onto the weapon arm; she did manage to spin the whole armor around, though, keeping its armament pointed away from Styrix and Aolieon. The pilot shook the arm, trying to get her off, while she delivered a hard punch to its side. Despite the satisfying sound, she could tell she didn't have the leverage or force to decommission it with one blow. Given its size, she'd need to strike further up anyhow, meaning this was likely going to take several successful attacks.

That line of thought was interrupted by the Centaur slamming her into the ground after turning its arm. Her face twisted with fury, the pain registering somewhere deep down but failing to get any traction on the surface of her. Kicks at the exoskeleton's leg did little to impede its balance, and the weight of the weapon with the strength of the armor kept her pinned in place. Therrye took the opportunity to score another solid blow on the thermal gun arm, crumpling in the long and wide 'barrel' further. The weight on her suddenly drew back, the pilot understanding what she was up to. She rolled immediately, but the swing of its ballistic shield caught her leg anyway, smashing down into her calf. This time the pain was vivid, tearing a hateful scream from her throat. With her stomach to the ground, she was at a severe disadvantage in their current positions. Scrabbling around her with quick glances for anything of use, her hand took hold of a table leg. Even with leverage working against her, she hurled it behind her, smashing against the Centaur's front and sending a broken leg straight into the pilot's face. It staggered back from the pilot's instinctive physical response while he swore up a storm.

The Liandri pulled herself to her feet, despite now having two impaired legs. Even if she was making headway on dismantling the larger part of the Centaur's threat profile, it was winning in the race to put each other into the ground for good. A grin split the pilot's lips as its arms moved up the barrier to block her while its gun's ignition sequence spun up. Therrye cursed loudly as she threw herself right past the weapon toward the Centaur's back side, a wave of immense heat melting and igniting everything in its path through where she had been a couple heartbeats ago. Instead of trying to find a better position, Therrye pushed up and grappled the weapon arm once more, this time managing a barrage of punches into its base. Millitech alloys groaned and deformed beneath the assault, and the following sound of a failed ignition sequence brought a smile to Therrye's face.

Even without the thermal weapon, the Centaur was larger, heavier, and more durable than her. The arm swung wide, sending Therrye flying back into the outer wall. Blood practically ejected from her mouth upon impact. Her augments did wonders in preventing bullets from killing her outright, but the trauma from such force couldn't be 'deflected' by internal armor. She snarled and started to get up again, only to be smacked in her upper body by the crushed weapon arm. She could hear the labored element to her breathing, and her legs weren't giving her the speed she needed to survive this. Approaching her, the Centaur loomed above, arms rubbing together with metal scraping on the ballistic shield as the pilot savored their impending kill. Therrye pushed out her jaw and spat blood, getting some on the Corpo soldier's tactical helmet and inspiring a little fury in him. Fucking good, asshole.

Then she was grinning and holding up her breaker fists from her slumped spot against the wall. If she couldn't dodge, she'd try parrying. There was no way she'd give in and give up to fucks like these, and she'd fight until she was too crushed to move.

 

[AlrunaRose]

Only mere moments after getting out of the vault, word came from the comms that one of their little accomplices had bitten the dust. Aolieon clicked her tongue; now things were starting to get serious. She noticed the worse for wear state of Therrye, and see her almost get choked up over the loss of one of their companions. She squinted her eyes, feeling a tinge of pity for the razorgirl -- maybe she had actually known this guy before. Of course, Aolieon would be lying to herself if she dared to put any stock in these folk; not to insinuate that she didn't have a caring fiber in her body, but Aolieon was a consummate professional of a different breed, when it came to these matters... and she somewhat knew that this was bound to happen. Corpos go to great lengths to protect their assets, and it often takes a lot more than a rag-tag band of Edgerunners to steal something from them that which they're prepared to fight to keep. This is why Aolieon worked alone; she took a great amount of care to never put herself in these positions. Always never putting faith in the abilities of others, always carefully curating a plan, sometimes even over the course of months -- all to guarantee that she doesn't find herself in situations like this. It was a disaster; if they had just stayed out of her way and allowed her to do things her way, then this wouldn't have happened. She sighed, both in a quiet note of apathetic frustration, but also pity. After all, Edgerunners were an aptly named profession; of that there was no doubt, but when questioning their skill in running private wars of their own, Aolieon was all doubt... but she knew how it felt to lose a friend. A little too well...

As they moved on upwards, she could see that despite her wounds, Therrye was going all out and quite possibly pushing herself past her limits. A swirl of dark thoughts began to take shape in the back of Aolieon's head -- they needed to get out, but now Aolieon had to calculate the probability of her getting out of this shitty mess with at the very least the payload and her own skin. One major Syndicate gig wasn't the way to go; she had too much to do, and her own work was never done. Still, there was a possibility of being able to drag at least one person out of this; it would depend on the extraction details the netrunner had set up, and if she would need to see herself an alternate way out. "Deckhead. Compile extraction details in a jacket for me to skim, time now. I've held my patience for your methods of planning, but no longer. You're on the verge of crossing me now -- everything you've touched has been on the fritz, and when I make it out of this, you'll be seeing me real soon. You have the next 10 minutes to decide whether I'll see you slamming drinks down your throat... or my steel," She spoke lowly and quietly into the comms, no venom, no emotion but the chill of the void in her voice. She checked her mag as they proceeded into the stairs... and then emotionlessly put it away. She sheathed one sword, and then pulled out the other to switch to a more sharp edge. She proceeded up the stairs, but shared no other words; her eyes cut in different directions with no emotion, not shifty-eyed... no, analyzing the environment. She was scanning and skimming the netrunner's file as she ascended the stairs, using hot-finder algorithms to highlight key words and look at maps.
Every time a few baddies showed up to try and kill them, Therrye simply threw a grenade and then used her strength to brute-force the situation. It was a miracle she was able to keep pushing, and it was a good sign. She recounted the razorgirl; it would be a true shame to see her be wasted on something like this... the walls on Aolieon's priorities were closing and she remained silent out of the minimal amount of respect they could have for their fallen comrade, but she filched the still-warm body for one thing they had neglected to check for in their maelstrom of emotions -- Brahm's detonator. She pocketed it, then nodded to Styrix; her eyes devoid, as if addressing yet another dead man. Situation after situation regarding the climb up was dispatched quickly, as the other two now seemed to be fully committed to the situation -- Aolieon choked back any expressions that would denote any contempt; a poker face that could make a CEO quiver.
But everything changed, when they were approaching the front exit.

... There was a time in Aolieon's life where every breath was rattled with fear; where she walked on eggshells and was somehow willing to do anything to survive. But when the time came for her to come into her own as an assassin; someone turned fear into a game -- every day was a dance with death, and they greeted the chance to play gladly. This person taught her a great many things -- taught her a variety of fighting techniques beyond dance that wasted no breath; taught her to use her mind to her advantage to calculate every possible angle, and to only dish out death that she was prepared to take on the chin easily. There wasn't any honor in killing one's fear, but there was honor in facing it; embracing it and aiming it at your foes...
The fear of death is a powerful and inevitable force in one's life. But of the many things there was to fear; no one would ever see Aolieon show fear in the face of combat... not anymore.

"You might want to hold your breath," was the only words she spoke to Therrye and Styrix -- the only words to warn them of what was about to happen.
Michael McCann -- "First and Last"
Time seemed to slow for Aolieon as she stepped into cover and she gazed upon the Corpos with eyes of void and sheer predatory intentions -- standard Militech augmentation packages and assault gear; western-made rifles, sidearms, flashbangs, the whole kit-and-kaboodle for a Militech strike team -- and of course, the Centaur. Therrye eyed up the Centaur from her cover; that was Aolieon's main concern. One she had plans for, but she decided that the most efficient way to dispatch all of this was simple -- allow Therrye to be herself, cut through the Corpos and not even consider Styrix at all.
She sheathed her sword and pulled two chaff-smokes from her belt; one standard, and one spicy one. Without another word, she stepped out of cover with a big step, tossing the grenades and plucking their custom ripcord tabs as they flew from her. She then immediately dropped into a perfect split and flattened herself on the ground as fire was drawn to her -- this would at least make her a much smaller target, far more difficult to hit for a few seconds.. Seconds after going full-prone, the grenades would detonate with a strange "Krrsh!" sound, as embers of electronic chaff were scattered throughout the air and smoke puffed violently from the epicenter of where they landed -- one of them also had a nasty surprise for anyone who was not a Centaur or Aolieon; aerosolized fiberglass, which could wreak havoc on anything that still needed lungs to breathe. The Centaur might fair better, depending on whether they kitted it with riot gear, but Aolieon? She was relying on all her years of smoking deathsticks with fiberglass butts to desensitize herself. Whatever the case, she had about a good 30 seconds before she'd have to deploy more of her vile, inhumane concoctions. Normal vision was immediately obscured by smoke, and the chaff started to cause camera shutdowns, and cyberware (particularly of a visual variety) began to malfunction, for which some of the Corpos would quite possibly have to force-reboot any visual optics before being able to engage.

It was like something out of a nightmare; lights flickering from the chaff, black smoke permeating the air. The Corpos began to curse and bunch up; some were coughing disgustingly as the itchy substance got in their lungs, sinuses and eyes, adding insult to injury with the obscurity. A couple Corpos started spraying in the direction in which they saw the blue devil -- she wasn't there anymore. Out of the periphery, silhouettes began to tease and deceive. One straggler Corpo turned and found her in point-blank range, slapping the dogshit out of him before giving him a nasty sucker-punch enough to break his nose -- Aolieon then placed both hands on the buttstock and barrel of his assault rifle, pulling away spontaneously to disarm him. Gripping the rifle by the buttstock, she clobbered him with it as she reached for a sword grip; naturally, the Militech Corpo did the most rational thing he could, reaching for his sidearm. Aolieon drew her sword and immediately flipped it around to normal grip; venomously snarling to give some auditory misdirection, she harshly kicked at one of his knees and dropped down, wrapping the assault rifle behind him as he began his descent downwards -- allowing him to fall on her sword and impale it through.
She twisted the blade to confirm the kill and then let go of her sword, posturing in a kneeling position to grip the assault rifle. Please don't be ID-locked, Aolieon thought to herself -- it opened fire upon her command, dispersing fan of suppressing fire in the directions she knew the rest of them to be; two were hosed down in seconds. Emptying the clip, she bent down to wrench her sword out of the first corpse and violently flung the emptied assault rifle at another to discombobulate him. Approaching quickly, she kicked a leg out from underneath him to make him stumble, quickly side-stepping to circle behind in the view of the front door's light to the streets to cast a floating shadow upon him. Naturally, he tried to twist in the direction of the shadow's movement with his knife and pistol drawn, nearly leveling it upon the feminine silhouette -- too late; another venomous snarl saw a lunar sword swipe completely deprive him of his head. Zero. Wasted. Effort. Three remained.
She rolled across the room and sprinted a few meters; 18 seconds. The smoke was beginning to fade. She blitzed another Corpo, crossing her blade across his assault rifle to pin it to him as she stomped down with her heel, turning it to drive the stiletto clean through the portion of his boots behind the steel toe. Drawing her pistol with her free hand, she sent a bullet through the bottom of his chin, causing viscera to explode out the top of his head from the Dum-Dum bullet (that was the result of the dirty-tech modification to her bullets; these things were the bane of Pancho Villa...). She interacted with the slide, pulling her foot out and popping another in the body armor of the second-to-last Corpo, holstering her pistol as she broke into a low sprint and shouldered him off to the side to spin him around and knock him to the floor. Flipping her sword around in reverse grip; she knelt before arcing the blade out, in and then savagely stabbed it in through the top of his collarbone to go straight down through his ribcage. She let go, unclipped his sidearm and fired upon the last one -- she drew her second sword and rushed him at last, after staggering him and putting the fear of God back in him from the painful hits to his kevlar. Sucker-punching him hard enough to turn his head, she quickly circled around him and slashed behind his knees. With a spiteful roar of bitterness and vampiric rage; as he fell to his knees, she gripped his shoulder, vaulting over and cartwheeled, her heels arcing over the man -- all before she found her footing and impaled the Corpo through the chest and followed through with the momentum from the vault, violently ripping the sword upwards and out of his shoulder. Cold. Calculated. Ruthless. Bitter... this was what Aolieon was truly made of, under all the layers of subterfuge, calm and muted professionalism hampered by alcohol... a femme fatale, in every sense of the word.

Blue-blooded knuckles, skinned enough to reveal bits of bone. Mildly tainted in the curves with black soot and spattered all over with crimson like a Jackson Pollock painting; Aolieonlooked like a space-age terror out of a slasher film -- her apathetic, sociopathic stare completely absent of any pupils in those honeyed eyes shadowed by spite did no favors for the look; it was truly intimidating. Finally, she looked towards the Centaur, which looked like it had Therrye right where the driver wanted her. It's chassis had taken some decent damage, especially to it's weapon arm. Impressive. A single cold thought fluttered across Aolieon's mind, but she already had plans for this anti-personnel mech, as well... Her sword dripping with lots of blood, she switched it to her right hand in reverse grip. This blade had remained in shoto-katana mode the entire time, allowing her to use it as some oriental bowie knife.
Procuring one of the crude pocket knives from the loops in her harness, she slowly strutted over to the Centaur, keeping mind to not let her heels clack on the floor. When she got close enough, she gritted her teeth and jumped up, arcing the knife high over her head; this allowed it to find it's mark in the top of the right shoulder of the Centaur driver. With a snarl of venom that quickly peaked into a blood-curdling shriek of spite, she pulled back as hard as she could on it; pushing the button to trigger the voltage and send the driver violently convulsing. His cyberware glitched and went haywire underneath the electrical overclocking, and she somehow found the unyielding rage within her to not only pull it back from Therrye, but get the confused chassis to yield to her strength -- the leg servos failed and the Centaur effectively was wrangled with one hand to sit on it's own ass, and her right hand arced around as she used leverage from the impaled knife to swing herself over to mount the Centaur its right and drive the shoto-katana clean through the driver's left pectoral. Gripping the blade with both hands and an expression of visceral hatred, the sickening sound of steel tearing through cyberized flesh retched through the air as Aolieon began pushing back and forth on the shoto-katana like it was a lever, cutting a huge gash into his chest. Finally, she pushed off the Centaur and pulled the katana from his chest, landing on her feet and performing a Sufi twirl. With a crescendoing cry that ended in a vicious snarl of triumph -- the shoto-katana swung from behind and cleaved the driver's head clean off, flying with an excessive amount of momentum away from the two.

Aolieon's body vibrated with adrenaline as she reveled in the carnage leveraged upon the Centaur driver for but a second. She fluffed her blood-stained hair back for a second, it now a sweaty and disheveled mess. Turning away from Therrye, she swung the blade sharply, painting a line of blood across the foyer and cleaning it off before apathetically sheathing it and beginning to walk away... A thought cried out for acknowledgement as the klaxons continued and she hesitated for a moment... before turning back to Therrye and approaching her. She procured a handheld injector from a hip pouch and pressed it to Therrye's neck; without a word, she administered the drug -- she knew Therrye was likely to lash out at her for real this time, but Aolieon couldn't find the care; plus Therrye herself was in a pretty banged-up shape already. Nevertheless, even a slugger like Therrye would come to recognize what the injection was in a mere few seconds -- it was Dorph. "Feeling lucky?" Aolieon began in a low, quiet tone with a tone of sultry warmth as she let the injector clatter to the ground haphazardly. Somehow with that void stare, Aolieon managed a slight smile, as if she was trying to let her calm nature claw its way back to the surface. "I never intended to die out here... so, don't go soft on me now, firecracker. Let's go," She'd pull Therrye to her feet, wrapping her arm over her own shoulder and briskly walking towards extraction, coughing up a bit of blue blood onto the ground and trying to clear her throat with a growl as the foul substances from her grenade began to affect her. The front door was NOT an option; if not already, within seconds a Militech slew of vehicles and reinforcements would have that exit completely surrounded. She hustled the two of them towards the extraction point that the netrunner had laid out for her -- she meant what she said earlier; if things went wrong at this spot, there'd be hell to pay for this shoddy excuse of a netrunner...

She left her other shoto-katana in the Corpo guard that it found its final scabbard within -- she may have needed the money, but it was for sure now not about the money -- it was about sending a message.

 

[Blood Briar]

With Therrye taking off to solo the Centaur and Aolieon going full psycho on the Corpo reinforcements, Styrix had another path to follow rather than getting in the middle of all that flatlining. Clawed and strapped feet pounded across the synthetic floor with surprisingly little sound for a creature of their stature. They slid to a halt in the delivery entrance bay, and went over to the end of a row of cabinets to drag a rather large case out. When Styrix and Brahms had come in, they deposited it there for safekeeping, as its bulk was rather unwieldly and they wouldn't need it inside. Laying it out flat, they unlocked the lid with a quickly entered passkey to reveal a double frame-racked interior. Drawing out a jack from their arm, Styrix plugged into the module set into the back of the case. Lights clicked on as the system booted up, and soon ten thin rectangular objects in the top rack lit up, with a second set streaming from the bottom rack.

Less than a minute later, Styrix unplugged and went to the single door at the side of the delivery entrance. While the plan wasn't to leave through the front entrance, the level of firepower back there would be enough to probably roast their engines before they got clear of the site. Unlike Geraldi Industries, they had none of the resources required for a ride that would survive a Millitech-level response. Active deterrence was their best path out.

This part of the plan showed up in what the netrunner sent Aolieon, along with what came next. "Give me the external camera visuals." Styrix leaned into the wall, flattening their profile to avoid catching any strays while visually pouring over the data. Two transports were responsible for delivering the other half of the mayhem currently transpiring at the front of the building. Only one bore a turret atop it; the other was configured to be able to bring the Centaur along. With no one to control them, though, they may as well have been toasters.

Styrix was used to hearing back direct and immediate confirmations from their netrunner, but they were strangely silent. Overly preoccupied? Or something else? "ETA?" A moment, then three, drifted by. Finally, "2 minutes tops." The Charak hoped for the lower end of that.

---

A Sound for Endings

It truly was an exquisite orchestration of applied force; one could make more than a modest sum from selling Aolieon's virtus, had she been fitted with a recorder. That so little could be seen of what she was doing was more the pity, not that there was anyone present with the ability or bandwidth to appreciate it at the time.

Therrye knew her position at the moment was stupid. 'Play stupid games, win stupid prizes'. She had planned - guessed - anticipated? - hoped for backup from Styrix and Aolieon once they had cleared the soldiers. Trust was shared, based on mutual necessity, and one did their best to make sure everyone made it out outside of a body bag. That was the mutual code of street punks like her and much of why traitors were so reviled once their reputation became known. Everyone knew this line of work was bound to get you killed, sooner or later, but with where the runners came from and who they were against? You sided with your fellows and didn't become another boot pressing necks down into the mud.

Of course, not everyone played that way. There were many different players in this world and many different sets of rules. Knowing who played by which ones was pretty important if you wanted to keep breathing. Aolieon ended up inserting a lot more than a little worm into her system when she sent that file. The sequence of action and reaction that played out between them, the vicious remarks, the cold distance, the escalating competition - Therrye ended up choosing fury more times than not, and while dumb fury might work in a cage match, the world outside of those linked chains was a lot more complicated. She had put herself into this situation, and she hated that a little more than she hated the prospect of dying.

When you trusted others to catch you after putting everything on the line for them, you were even worse off than being alone if they didn't deserve your trust in the first place.

Therrye was ready to punch down death as it came for her and give as good as she got. Dying would be a real drag, especially in this shit box of a building. Corpo architecture was the worst, right? Still, hate wasn't enough to keep you alive all on its own. Even with fists that could fuck up a dump truck.

As she pulled back an arm to slam it with all the force she could muster into the oncoming shield, the Centaur suddenly lost all of its momentum. Like a vid of unexpurgated serial killing come to life, Aolieon appeared to shock, stab, gore and decapitate the exoskeleton's driver. Certainty was replaced with uncertainty once more as surprise registered across Therrye's synapses. Back against the wall, bruised, bleeding or both from each leg, she cut a very different figure from when the two first crossed paths. So did Aolieon, for that matter, wounded yet exultant in her reign of bloody terror.

That she had come to her aid at all after all of her callousness planted something, then.

Grimacing from the awkward position, Therrye tilted her head down as she started pushing herself up from the floor by her fists just in time to get stabbed in the neck. That it was a needle instead of a blade felt odd, too - she was the type, wasn't she? She grunted and looked back up to see Aolieon over her, injector dropping from her hand. Compromised as she was, there wasn't much of a reaction in her at all. What could be seen in her gaze was a void in her anger. Something was missing compared to before.

In the next moment, drugs were lacing through her system like the fingers of a jilted lover. Therrye's right eye twitched as her awareness dilated in the swell of the Dorph. She cooperated without complaint to Aolieon's help and tested her feet along their way to the delivery entrance. The pain pulled grimaces and hissed breath out of her, but she would make do. Therrye wanted to live, after all.

---

A pair of Millitech vehicles were indeed not far off as their ride pulled up to the delivery entrance bay doors. Styrix slammed the side door open after hitting a button to retract the bay door into the ceiling. Meanwhile, the ten lit-up rectangles in the top rack of the case all flipped up onto their ends, pointing upward. Their upper halves then split open, revealing blades that began spinning. All ten of them lifted into the air in loose formation and past Styrix out the opened door, followed shortly by the second set of ten. As they started lifting into the sky, the trunk of their escape car popped open and ejected out a second large case. After it slid to a stop on the asphalt, its lid snapped open on its own to reveal a nest of red lights within. Small spheres extended sharp, reticulated legs out their sides and poured out the sides of the box.

The engine revved in the car as Therrye and Aolieon came down the ramp; Styrix joined them on the other side, helping carry the bruiser's not inconsiderable weight toward the vehicle. Car doors pulled open to let them pile in with minimal effort, Therrye opting for a back seat while the Dorph was temporarily dropping her back into a state of managed fury.

Clusters of the rectangular drones flitted toward the oncoming Corpo vehicles while the spider drones carpeted the road. Two assault drones lifted off from the backs of the incoming and immediately began firing at the drones being piloted by Styrix. Many were shattered to pieces, but eight still got through to explode themselves upon the flying threats; they crashed less than a minute after they had been deployed. The wheels, meanwhile, had begun collecting spider drones. Crawling their way toward the outer edges of the rims, the drones began linking up together to form chains before shunting themselves into the wheels' path and popping in a series of minor explosions that cracked them, causing the drivers to veer uncontrollably.

Seeing a rifle on the seat next to her, Therrye picked it up and began firing out the window at the soldiers taking shots at them. Styrix joined in while their netrunner handled navigation. The fire was enough to cover them from too many incoming rounds as the car roared out of the lot, leaving disabled vehicles and impotent soldiers in their wake.

Which was a scene set for Aolieon to give them a proper send-off. One detonator was depressed after another. With the explosions came gouts of dusted concrete and whatever else was swept up in the paths of exiting gas. The ceiling caved in as the walls folded, no longer able to support the weight of the structure, and everything of value plummeted and crunched between layers of concrete. Whatever she felt or saw while watching the destruction, Therrye wasn't privy to it.

---

The mood teetered along the spectrum of morose and triumphant while their ride took them to the drop-off point. Up one dramatic payout, down one runner. That it didn't claim more lives was what some might call a lucky break. Therrye credited it to something else entirely. Leaning forward from the back seat, she craned her neck around the side of Aolieon's seat, not wanting to creep up on her neck or shoulders. What anger remained in her was at a low simmer, threatening to curdle; it wasn't directed at the Liandri, though. "Thank you." A beat. Then, "I owe you." A half-smile. Given her mood, it might as well have been a grin.

As they neared the drop-off point, Styrix gave them both a meaningful look. "You were both good. Very good."

"You're there," the netrunner chirped quietly in their group channel as the car rolled to a stop. Legs of a figure stood just outside the shadow of a dilapidated building's entrance, not five meters off. Nearly in unison, all three of them exited the vehicle. Therrye felt a little paranoid, despite having already come down from the Dorph; Styrix was being judicious. And, well, Aolieon had the box.

Along with the exfil info, the netrunner had provided the samurai with the pre-arranged hand signals. Stepping forward from the shadows, a black-coated Human with a very out-of-style hat held up two hands and made three gestures of numbers, finger joints crackling audibly; their texture of their skin looked anything but healthy. The signals played out exactly as expected, and after Aolieon returned the runners' set, all that was left for the eddies to hit their accounts was to hand over the box.

---

As the ancient Human departed, Styrix sized the two Liandri up and extended an open hand. "Brahms would have wanted us to drink in honor of his passing. Would you join us?" Therrye looked to the side toward Aolieon, and then was unsure why. With a single shake of her head, she nodded and stepped forward. "I will. Though... I should probably see a doc first." She offered a pained smile.

 

[AlrunaRose]

Aolieon didnt say a word, even though the sounds of enemy forces surrounding the front of the building threatened to plunge them both into the jaws of death once more. She kept Therrye's arm wreathed over shoulders; damn she was heavy. Aolieon's pupils were slowly returning, as the adrenaline abandoned her body. She was bathed in the blood of her enemies; Therrye was, too. Even as the Dorph began to work its magic within Therrye's veins and she began to try and walk with her own two feet; she was still so heavy. Inner Demons scratched at the back of her mind, questioning her why. Why was she doing this. Why was she bothering to carry such dead weight. She was slowing her down. She could escape right now with the payload and leave them none the wiser. Aolieon bit her lip, and closed her eyes as she trudged on. She winced as the pain began to flare within her; the ambiance of law & corruption rang louder within her ears... and for a moment, all went silent as she heard an old familiar voice of a Japanese accent reverberate through her surface thoughts.

"A mercenary will sell his soul to the highest bidder. A soldier will sell his soul to whomever he thinks is right. A samurai will only ever sell their honor. But a true Warrior will sell their soul to whomever alongside them, braves the flames they may walk."

Aolieon opened her eyes. The words cut her heart deeply -- if she wasn't sure she was sober before, she was sure now. This horrible clusterfuck was such a buzzkill... She debated reaching for another one of her pocket vises she carried; in the process, she almost dared to drop Therrye. Righting herself, she pulled her back upwards, continuing to limp them both towards the extraction point. She looked ahead, and her expression steeled itself with a sheathed determination. In the wake of the words echoing in her mind, she surmised that she had indeed come too far to recant her actions. She found the courage to stick with the situation somehow all too easily.

Aolieon took Therrye alongside Styrix and helped her into the van. Aolieon entered the van, clambering over them to sit in the shotgun seat. Aolieon fluffed her hair, the smell of blood making her curl her lip. In the ensuing rush to get them quickly extracted, Aolieon couldn't help but shoot a glance backwards at Therrye; her oddly normal-sized pupils communicated a reserved concern, which upon seeing Therrye start to come to her senses, Aolieon wished to immediately withdraw. Her eyes drifted over to Styrix, who had a laptop open and was typing several things at once. As the gas pedal was slammed, she lurched backwards and saw all the spider drones skitter out of the trunk. She narrowed her eyes amusingly at Styrix, whom in his own way had earned a smattering of credit for being able to hold his own while flying solo. Her mouth opened as she found an intrusive thought that wanted to give compliment, but what slid from between her teeth was "This was your specialty? ...You should have stayed in the van." she mused, chuckling with a derisive sneer. And without further ado, Aolieon was back on her bullshit -- not like the reasons for that fact weren't exploding fifty meters behind them at best, and far closer at worst. Aolieon pulled her knapsack off, unfurling it and taking care to sift around the black box for whatever she had left -- a couple of more chaff grenades and one more C4 charge. She ran her tongue along her teeth, agitated that she had been driven so low as to almost be out of emergency equipment. However, she had little time to be spiteful, as Therrye began to open fire with the rifle next to her. Aolieon's puckered her lips with a reluctant sneer, but her eyes turned serious again. All this excitement for one day, but she might as well not let up, if everyone else was getting involved in the getaway. Aolieon snorted, rolling down the window and pulling a ripcord with her teeth as she stuck her head out the window. She cooked the chaff in her hand before lobbing it straight up, allowing a shower of chaff sparks to cape off the top of the van in the general flight path of a Militech VTOL drone or two -- it faltered and then proceeded to grind itself to dust on the asphalt at 90 miles per hour. She did this one more time, and when a Militech vehicle began to draw nearer as Therrye fired upon it -- Aolieon queued her detonator to single charge proximity before she frisbee'd the C4 charge underneath the truck and detonated it, causing the vehicle to flip forwards in a fireball that ground itself to a halt. Aolieon couldn't help but let out a derisive cackle at the explosion and utter mayhem they had managed to produce together, followed by a sigh. Maybe this thrill wasn't so bad, after all...

As the vehicles started to get sparse and the runaway chase was almost over, Aolieon climbed back into the van and looked sporadically at everyone; their eyes meeting hers expectedly, same as when they first met. In that moment, she tried to come up with another sassy or snide remark -- she wanted to make it clear that nothing had changed, to reassert her aloof independence... but against her own bitter expectations, this motley crew she had met not even 6 hours ago had earned their keep. She sighed with a flighty decrescendo to her voice as her face softened; her eyes dilated to a more genuine look, and her sociopathic smile faded into an expression that showed a shadow of humanity. From her pocket, she produced a device that perhaps only one could recognize; what slipped from between her teeth then were two words that would likely have taken aback everyone in the van... "For Brahm." She hit her own detonator, and then after a handful of seconds, pressed the last thing of his that had made it all this way. A rumble that shook the earth emanated from behind them -- with a single drop of compassion, what was once done merely for extra eddies now carried the tone of the proper burial for a lost comrade. Aolieon might not ever apologize; she might not ever remember their names, but she felt generous enough to at least give them this -- a note of understanding; a silent nod to their dedication before they inevitably parted ways...
Aolieon turned around to sit proper in her seat and she haphazardly chucked the detonator back in Styrix's direction -- giving him something to remember him by and thereby washing her hands of her good deed for the day.

Aolieon turned her head curtly at the approach of Therrye from behind, cutting her eyes lowly at the soft approach. When she said those five words, Aolieon shifted in her seat to be able to look at her sideways, but still a little cold in her body language. The drive had calmed down considerably, and Aolieon fidgeted a little as she calmed down, eyeing up Therrye up and down before looking outwards on the drive. "Don't mention it," she breathed coolly, preening her bloodstained hair in a motion to play it off. After a few beats though, she found herself looking back, the eyes now showing that glimmer of calm, as she did a double-take of her, remembering something which she mutedly rummaged for the words to. She dodged it, and decided to redirect. "May I see your hand?" She offered her own, to which perhaps after a moment's hesitation, Therrye might offer it.

Aolieon took her left hand in her own, and she visually studied it. It didn't look at all like it did when they first met --silvered, dented, the knuckles chipped, lightly caked in viscera and with a stray bullet or two eschewed in the forearm -- to a degree, still bleeding. Fresh memories surfaced, of what these hands had been subjected to... of what they've done. What they had prevented and what they had destroyed. Aolieon couldn't help but frown deeply; such carelessness with the flesh... anytime she was with someone who was cybered-up; it felt empty. Soulless. An animal in a welded steel box; she tried it once or twice, and it would hurt. Not just physically, but mentally... kinesthetically. Often there were electrical impulses like data; small and fleeting without emotion. Other times, there was a void that matched or even eclipsed her own. But here she could have sworn there was something different... something that begged to be noticed. Aolieon's face softened and became pensive once more. She began searching for it.
She lightly rubbed Therrye's fingers between her own; caressing the digits individually. She traced the palms in places where there would otherwise be lines. Her other hand got involved, and she smoothed her hands down the forearm... there. It was faint, beneath the layers of dermal and reinforced cybernetic tissues. A flow of impulses buried deep underneath, faint and numbed. It called to Aolieon; whispered to her like a loving prisoner. It beckoned her deep inside... but it was more faint than before. It was damaged; in pain. Quietly choking back sobs, and yet yearning. Her eyes dilated a noticeable bit more as they fluttered over each visual detail, eyelids lowering as she was driven to chew at her bottom lip. Closing her eyes, she was graced with the flashback image of two figures; one bathed in blood both red and blue, with the other battered and broken -- two badly damaged people, moving together for a kiss...
She drew a breath, pulling herself back to reality as she released her hand. She looked onwards in the drive. She brushed it all off, trying to push the thoughts from her mind. No, no, no... no more, it was too real, too close; it hurts -- all of the sudden her memories lost and cutting thoughts were silenced by an intrusive thought of three words.

... This is new...

She didn't tense, but she didn't move. Her face dropped and she blinked slowly. The epiphany rolled on her gently. Something... new. How long has it been, since she allowed something new into her life? In that moment, Aolieon didnt know. In the moments that followed, Styrix piped up with a meaningful compliment -- granting Aolieon the chance to snap out of it.
"Ohh, don't get all sentimental on me," she brazenly brushed it off. She curled her hair back behind one of her horns and straightened up in her seat with a snarky smile "It's unprofessional," she mused, relaxing for the remainder of the drive -- her manufactured cheeriness dissolving immediately when the netrunner spoke and the time came for the drop. She clicked her tongue into the comms, then said what little needed to be said. "Not bad, jacket-jockey. Not bad... but be better." A moment's pause and then Aolieon huffed and stepped out of the car, commencing the rendezvous ritual that which was in place.

She walked off to the side while the motley crew looked onwards as she did the drop-off -- when she approached and saw who was picking up the black box, her face took on a look of surprise and then immediately darkened, becoming like the apathetic void from before, only with muted psychopathy and a tone of regret. "You," Aolieon began, her tone a low, icy wisp. "Yes," the ancient Human mused in Japanese, bowing his head in slight apology, "Worry not; I've told no one -- none but the Syndicate know about you." Aolieon gritted her teeth and started rummaging through the bag for the black box; she wanted to get this over with, fast as possible. The ancient Human continued to muse, as if out of spite. "When they listed off their hiring pool and they described you... I did not want to believe them. But when they showed me how you fight, I knew. I'm not entirely sure the Syndicate knows who you really are, my dear. It's--" "Save it. I don't care; just pay me and be done with it," Aolieon responded in Japanese, giving a notion of respect while cutting off the human's words with a chill of venom. She stuffed the black box in the human's hands, her expression bitter and resentful as she tried to walk out of the alleyway. Before she could turn the corner and rejoin the group, the human called out seven words which froze Aolieon, and haunted her to her core. "You can't hide forever... there's still hope." Aolieon paused, and then turned with her expression firey and menacing, as if tears were about to well up in her eyes but it was overshadowed by bitter rage. "There is nothing to talk about. Your family made sure of that. I'm only letting this slide because of what you meant to him. In the spirit of that mercy, I'm only gonna say this once -- leave me alone, now and forever," Without another word, she left the ancient human behind... just like she did everything else in her life, save one.

When she regrouped with the motley crew, Aolieon's face was devoid of emotion, shadowed in bitterness. When she met eyes with one of them, the expression faded back into the cool, off-putting demeanor she had. Styrix proposed a gathering in honor of Brahm, and she fluffed her hair with a sigh of exasperation. "Fuck, FINALLY someone's speaking my language! Ugh, someone needs to pour me a river and drown me in it; I've had too much excitement for one day..." Her head hung low, and she finally came to terms with all the dried blood and viscera upon her. She pursed her lips, and ran her fingers through her hair, realizing the mats. "... I should probably go wash up real quick, though. There's a bar about five block away from here, it's my absolute fav -- it's called Neon Dreams. Very isolated, but one helluva scene. The bouncer Antoine don't like new people very much; just tell him a Aoli sent ya, and we just got paid. The bartender will wanna know that, too," Aolieon paused once again at giving her name, opting for the nickname. It might have been an alias she worked hard to iron out, but nevertheless -- less personal, the better. With that, she started running in heels to go find the nearest washroom, calling in a delivery drone to dispatch her a change of clothes. "I'll see ya'll soon; I won't be long. Don't stand me up now, mmk?" And she turned the corner to follow up on her words.

 

[Blood Briar]

That Aolieon's energy and demeanor was volatile might be an understatement. The shift between the start of the night and the end of the job struck Therrye as something more... complicated than that, though. There was enough complexity that she didn't mark it all off as her being a Dorphhead, even if that might be somewhere in the mix, highkey or low. Vices got folk through the endless grind of life in this era, and she certainly had her own. A shot of chemical still doesn't make you go from staring down people with the warmth of a glacier to speaking one's name in memoriam, and she didn't think it was a simple matter of no longer being strangers - they were definitely still strangers. Therrye had looked her way a couple times during the drive. Curiosity kept rapping its knuckles on her door in Aolieon's direction. The bruiser went in for femme, less so for fatale, and Aolieon made it dramatically clear just how fatal she was when she worked. One of her expressions threaded its way into her past, reflecting the eyes of another she spent years growing up and suffering with - and those eyes belonged to a serial killer. Even at the deepest pits of rage, the difference between foe and everyone else never dissolved. Maybe she was built different. But that sort was not someone you let your guard down around while expecting to live to a late age.

There were multitudes in the Liandri, that much was clear, and that's why she hadn't completely written her off as a 'ganic caricature of a cyberpsycho. What about that was enough to keep tapping at the back of her thoughts, though? Maybe I'll find out eventually, came the thought, with no expectation of her not ghosting completely after the payout.

Was Therrye surprised, then, when Aolieon asked for her hand? Absolutely. The pause in her was more out of consideration than straight hesitation, though; the circumstances made it excessively unlikely that she would try something dangerous, and she'd earned enough trust back to permit something so seemingly benign. Showing up to save her from flatlining isn't something Therrye would forget. She could count on one hand the number of souls who'd done that for her, after all, making it easy to put that hand into the samurai's.

Therrye's senses weren't augmented, so whatever Aolieon was doing seemed to be on a different level than the usual flesh and bone. Her hands had the callouses of one who repeatedly and enthusiastically punched things on the daily and didn't expect them to ever be treated like objects of curiosity. That Aolieon was getting dried blood on her didn't bother her at all; she just couldn't figure out what Aolieon was seeking. No resistance was offered as her hand was rubbed, turned over and inspected thoroughly. She'd begun picking up on how often the Liandri chewed her lip, and it was there again as her hands gently went down most of her forearm while her eyes dilated. As she did so, Therrye became aware of some subtle pulsing in her fingers, and for that she had truly no explanation. The way her hands moved didn't lend themselves to some special response like that (even with the softness of her hands and figure considered), and nothing in her data stream had changed.

Then her hands and the rest of her attention were gone, as abrupt as a few of her previous turns, leaving no answers to any of the questions that had started forming. What is going on with her? Maybe that particular vibe was what kept drawing some of her focus. But it was the telltale marks of self-directed violence she noticed on her wrist that occupied her thoughts in the time after she withdrew. Something deeply familiar, while also being a bit distant. She couldn't tell how old the marks were. Their presence lined up with a few other nonverbals, though, and spoke of things that roused the strings of emotions attached to Therrye's protective nature. The absurdity of feeling that way toward a verified murder-wheel of a gymnast was not lost on the bruiser.

Aolieon's dismissals made more sense in the context she had now. She wouldn't make any assumptions about it all, still. Aolieon yet remained a stranger. While she mulled that over, Therrye remembered something rather important and sent a signal off to her property.

Later, while the samurai was handling the drop, a faint sensation crept along the inside of her forearm. The closest she could come to placing it was as if her arm had fallen asleep. She tapped her arm pointedly to make sure she wasn't losing feeling - internal bleeding was a risk from the firefight, and deadening sensation would be cause for alarm. No less feeling came from her forearm, though. It was forgotten, then, in the louder words called out by the ancient Human dealing with the samurai. Another piece to slot into the largely empty puzzle that was Aolieon, especially alongside the context of her retort to the man. Therrye kept her curious look gentle, knowing how apt Aolieon was to deflect, wall up, dismiss and bark back.

Noting the name of the bar suggestion, she gave a not unfriendly wave and then pulled up a map while dialing an unfortunately familiar number. Spotting her bike's GPS dot blipping in her HUD as it came roaring down the street on autopilot, she limped down a block and a half to meet it halfway. Pulling on her helmet and mounting it with legs that'd rather be doing nothing at all, Therrye started off as the call connected. "Kara. You busy right now?"

---

Pink and blue lighting filled a rectangular outline on the storefront she pulled up to, extending out into blocky letters from its upper right corner to spell out "Doc Ryder." Therrye thought Kara could do better than this ripperdoc chain, but couldn't complain that they kept a doc in house 24/7. That was how she had met Kara in the first place, after just her second outing as a 'moonlighting' edgerunner.

Standing several inches shorter than the Liandri, Kara held a posture serious enough to compete with a Corpo agent. Lines in a sideshave denoted hidden cranial implants, the rest of her hair spilling out in an ombre of brown to blonde down past her clavicle. Her brown eyes didn't regard Therrye unkindly, and despite her demeanor, her history was clear in the rose tattoo on her neck. Kara was even more a product of the streets than Therrye.

She was grateful that Kara hadn't seen the same level of violence firsthand as she had, even if the ripperdoc had thoroughly seen the aftermath for many years now.

Whatever warmth she might have had for Therrye was marred by a frown that registered the moment she saw the bruiser's limp. She clicked her tongue chidingly, despite Therrye offering an apologetic smile and raising her hands. "Why are you always coming in here with this many wounds?" "Because you always turn me down when I ask you out for drinks?" The scoff and eye roll deflated some of her reprimand, but only some. "Roots below, get that jacket off. Letting them give you chest wounds like this. We're lucky you don't have a mother to worry over you." "Glad to see you too, Kara." Kara shook her head as Therrye stripped off the synth-leather, walking over to the patient bed and hoisting herself onto it. Rings of augmentation in her brown eyes expanded and contracted as she inspected the bullet holes. Poking Therrye's chest with a disapproving huff, she went to the console on the bedside and turned on the medtech system while her patient dutifully laid down.

"Tell me it was at least worth getting all of this metal inside you." Layers of light languidly swam over the Liandri's body, spitting out data with a rapidity that had always impressed her. "I'd be in the green even if they'd slagged my breakers and my bike." Kara let out an exhale that summed her feelings well and stuck a finger probingly into one of Therrye's bullet wounds, making her hiss and wince. "That part of the service, now?" A nail scraped the dermal plate beneath it and elicited some breathy sounds of pain. "Ah, I'm sorry, I'm sorry!" "Good."

Withdrawing the finger, Kara mused over the data aggregating in her stream. "Damaged plates in your right side and leg, hairline fracture in your left leg, damaged synthetic muscles in your right arm." She looked quite unimpressed. "You're fortunate the rounds that punctured didn't land in any organs." "Fuck, they punched holes?" "Two." "That's two too many." Kara shut down her complaint ruthlessly. "I didn't choose your line of work or your taste in plating." "Hey, it's only a side gig." Another roll of the eyes. "You said that four jobs ago." Therrye ran it back through her memory and ended up shrugging very unreassuringly. "You don't need to spin me any sweet lies, I'm not your input."

Lips parted to toss back a retort, but closed without saying anything. She had a point, whether she wanted to face it or not. Edgerunning had steadily creeped up for her in her week to week, and it wasn't like she was even in any noteworthy debt. Who was she trying to convince at this point? Lifting the hand she'd given to Aolieon, Therrye turned it over, tensing and then releasing. Was she missing the violence?

Therrye really, really didn't want to think about that, neither tonight or at all, and dropped her attention entirely back to Kara. "How long will it take?" "Plates'd be a new install, so at least thirty. The rest, mm, ten-ish." "Just the wounds, then." Kara narrowed one eye down at her, sharpened medtool in hand. "You ring me up and then want to jet before I can even patch you up right?" Therrye tried to think up something slick to say, but was at a loss. "Shit, you got a date or something?" Her hands came up with an emphatic gesture. "No, no, just a meetup to get to." Kara shook her head, injected a painkiller into Therrye's arm, then started removing bullets. "Whatever you say, chica."

Laying back, Therrye didn't try to argue with her. Not that she couldn't, or unable to spell it out, but her attention was wandering. The job that night really saw her going all in once the guns got hot and not letting up. That wasn't her usual style. Despite her brazen tactics, throwing her life away was not in the cards she dealt herself, and pushing too hard, too fast, made it all too easy to get zeroed. So why did she do it? That the main twist of influence far from her usual range was clearly Aolieon was clear to her. What about her had so steadily pushed under her skin and got her acting on stranger lines, though? Toxic competition, definitely, immediate trust breaches, yes and yes, yet that wasn't entirely novel. So, the question remained. Another pulse of sensation in her forearm distracted her, then, making her stare at it. Kara hadn't said anything, and she'd just given her a scan, so... maybe she was just getting a little old. She never knew how long she could expect to live, naturally, and it would've made sense. Being a member of a rare species was filled with a wide array of downsides and ignorance was chief among them.

"You're awfully quiet tonight." Therrye gave a mild shrug, trying not to move too much while Kara treated her fracture. From her position, she could see blood well up from her skin where the scalpel went in, but couldn't feel a sliver of pain from it. That had always unnerved her. "Guess there's a lot on my mind." Kara, at least, was entirely a professional. She didn't make any cuts that weren't necessary, and she was more than deft with her hands. "Alright, alright, I'm not going to drag it out of you." "It's... not that." The bruiser fell quiet again, her violet eyes distant as she looked out the window. "I just don't know the words for it yet." "Go chat it out with one of your chooms then, eh? Work's done, though you should stay light on that leg for awhile." Therrye chuffed, settled her bill, and got herself out of the bed with a modicum of care. "Thanks, Kara." "Yeah, yeah, thank me by not getting so fucked up next time, y'hear?"

Something about being fussed over made Therrye smile. She supposed it was growing up without that, in spite of all of her fierce independence throughout her life.

Well. She had a bar to get to. Hopping onto her bike, she took off toward Neon Hearts.

 

[AlrunaRose]

Aolieon walked briskly, pulling up her map to recall where the nearest washroom location was; she could easily go home and wash up there, but that was the whole point of her stand-offish nature earlier -- she hates going home, and avoids it as much as humanely possible. She eventually found a dilapidated apartment complex in the ghetto made up of connexes which contained a washroom unit. She stalked up it like a cat, hearing arguments and all other kinds of poverty chaos, and she didn't wanna get caught up in all that mess. The unit contained some rudimentary showers, sinks with mirrors, toilets, etc. She started doffing gear and pinged her GPS to let the delivery drone where to come into, leaving the door open to let it fly in... Her overthinking got the better of her and she found a top outcropping on a water heater to store most of her gear, but she unsheathed her shoto-katana and propped it blade-down in the corner of the shower she had selected. She then started doffing extra gear, and she sighed as she turned the water on as scalding hot as it could get and proceeded to begin washing herself.

She felt the burn against her bullet wounds; it was deserved. Had she not deigned to trust complete strangers with her own preservation, this would have never happened. She heaved a heavy sigh under the flow of water, and looked down as she watched all the blood and viscera in her hair simply pour out and down the drain. She had been here so many times before; so many days gone wrong, so many days gone right and yet it was still an altogether reviling sight. She did the stupid thing, letting the question of how many times come to her head and visions of explosions, utter chaos and many frontal assaults on compounds where she effectively brought knives to a gunfight went down. It all rushed to her head like a kaleidoscope of grisly dark thoughts, and the flash of that night where she wanted to end it all the most come to her mind...
She couldn't fucking take it anymore! Aolieon stepped out of the shower, shaking her head and trying to wrestle the thoughts. Her nude body positively dripped and steamed with water as she walked briskly over to her belongings. With a voided stare and a deep frown that wanted to cry, her eyebrows furrowed into anger as she fumbled with her jumpsuit and saw all the cuts and holes placed in it. Dammit, this was her last good jumpsuit -- hopefully the drone grabbed a few good things. She gripped the wrist containing her dart launcher and fumbled in a hip pouch for some darts. She looked through the colored rings on each piece of savage technology, and procured one that was colored green with white stripes. She loaded it into the dart launcher, pressed it to her neck and fired. It embedded into her neck with a sharp stab of pain from having too much velocity to be used at point-blank range. She cried out for a second, but then ripped it out of her skin; it dribbling a bit blue before her eyes dilated very widely and her vision distorted something fierce -- mescaline; just enough to take someone on a wild trip for about 30 seconds, but also send their serotonin skyrocketing for at least a couple of hours. Well, of course the secondary effects of the dart weren't ever considered; this was for enemies, particularly to cause distractions and weird situations, or make a target helpless enough to either subdue or assassinate with minimal effort so long as she capitalized upon it. Knowing full well the effects, she whirled around and stumbled back into the shower before she could completely lose motor control or get stupid, as it were. She giggled derisively as the colors got brighter and the water turned into fractals upon her face. She smeared herself on the shower walls, and spotted a stain of discoloration -- preeeeeetty... The walls felt so smooth and made her skin tingle. She closed her eyes and ran her fingers through her silky, aluminum-colored hair, marvelling at how good it felt.
Aolieon's thoughts drifted to the razorgirl -- what did she say her name was? Ahh, not important enough right now... Her thoughts filled with images of her punching straight through turrets, ripping out larynxes by hand in that fierce and hateful demeanor; of every moment she saw the fury in her rise with each snide remark; of her wrestling with the Centaur, when she threw that guard halfway across the hallway; that helpless look when she smeared herself back against the wall after the Centaur's death... the feeling of her skin and her nerves that drew her inwards; how her inner demons mused on how those hands would feel when put to work in other ways... Aolieon bit her lip hard, smoothing one of her hands from her belly downwards to a place being warmed by something other than hot water...
... Such an interesting and feral creature, that one... Aolieon thought to herself.
... Ohh, she'll do... ~ ♥

Aolieon's eyes snapped open; the hallucinations now having subsided with the sensory enhancement effects remaining. Her eyes dilated and flickered with a tone of daring. Not a moment later, she heard the whirring of a drone as it flew in. Good. She kept the water on, and walked out to the door to close it, barring it shut with some rebar randomly laying on the ground, before she walked back to approach the hatch and procure some self-care items such as soap. The gears turned in the back of her mind, starting up the overthinking process again -- in her mind, she was on the hunt again, but for something else entirely. She started washing off her body, especially her wounds vigorously in order to make up for time. She picked through her different items and procured some shampoo and a hairbrush. Quickly she applied soap liberally to it, some water and some more soap before brushing her hair out -- this would take an agonizing several minutes, but as her peripheral nervous system bounced in revelry with the flow of mescaline; she ended up enjoying the pain of pulling out tangled knots and getting her hair thoroughly washed. In the time it took, she began piloting her consciousness against the flow, even though there were so many interesting sensations all about to play with! She began to pull together some focus in thinking on how to better present herself in a different light -- not a usual occurrence, mind you but a frequent enough one when she wanted company.
She finished washing up and dried herself liberally, before wrapping her hair in the towel; it was hard to do and brushing or bumping her horns in this state was enough to make her legs get weak or falter and stumble... However, she managed to get an awkward wrap at the top of her head, as she began quickly fumbling through garments. There was her typical choice of clean lingerie, her streetwear, her all-black patent leather jumpsuit... too ratty. She glossed over a vibrant red cocktail dress. YES! NO, too much... There was leisurewear, generic chic, all kinds of stuff that was either too bulky, casual, ratty or just didn't suit her right now. She needed something that would dazzle, but be functional.. found a synth-leather crop-top jacket with neon accents that emitted a gentle purple light, a lace bra designed more into a crop-top to wear as an underlayer, a neon-purple translucent mini-skirt (also giving off its own light) some knee-high patent leather stilettos -- a curated combination of urban flash and bona fide high-fashion; a salacious and tasteful bait and blitz...
That'll do; at least I can deblouse and dance with these... She put on her outfit after drying, reapplied her makeup from before, but applied a more vibrant lipstick and a neon eyeliner to draw some more attention to her eyes... Finally topping off with something fresh to apply for pheromones, she had herself rapidly transformed from a viscera-covered jumpsuit and armed to the teeth, into a glam dance club doll. She took one of her shock-knives and hid it in the pocket of her jacket, pushing her cred-chip in between her breasts before admiring herself in the mirror as she started fluffing out and refining her hair. She licked her lips, popped them and gave a sultry half-smirk to herself.
Aolieon was either gonna get plastered or get ripped in half up the middle tonight -- hopefully both...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Tiesto - "Just Be"

The scenery surrounding Neon Hearts wasn't much of a pretty sight, but the buildings that wrapped it in velvet were definitely business locations in a strip mall that was doing it's best to stay alive; the neon sign had two-dimensional holograms of a stripper and a ChromeJock, their hearts glowing as they danced the night away. There was a small line of people up-front and the people were halted by a cybered-up African man who looked like he could lift a Tank despite looking like a ganic. He had his arms folded, and he mean-mugged the group as they came forwards, growling lowly as if he was prepared to tear them all apart.
He'd wait for them to say the line, and then his eyebrow would pop up. He'd analyze their wear and gear -- he'd stop at Styrix, who still had his axe and he'd hold out his hands before speaking in a Ugandan accent.
"Weapons. Now," after which he'd kindly take them and then gesture for them to go inwards. He'd hand them to somebody through a drive-in window and and then he'd give them the nod to go in. The walls were simple as they went in, with the corners lining the walls and ceiling lined with fuchsia neon strips; a few people were already hanging out, with a couple of male chooms making out in the corner and a girl practicing her slutty moves in another. They'd make it into the main bar, which was small but modest -- across from the full bar where Kaede worked non-chalantly and ignored the three as they walked in; there was a simple stage with a three stripper poles in the middle, two manned by a ganic girl and a cybered-up male. Some people were dancing off to the side, not being confident enough in themselves to take center-stage; others sat at the tables lining the edge of the wide room. The bar was stocked with every liquor known underneath the sun -- a section closer to the corner contained familiar injections and other devices which catered to Dorphheads and other drug-users, and there were even some chip injectors and stimulant needles that one could tell were specifically for people with too many augmentations to enjoy an organic high. Kaede clearly was running a tight ship with this Edgezone of his, and while the venue was small and had little to go off of -- it was clearly one that had it's small places filled with as much passion and daring business as one could hold. There was a medley of patrons here; mercs, Ronin, street dolls, exotics, even the odd sleazy Corpo who was debloused and trying to take the edge off away from his peers.
Upon approaching the bar, Kaede would put down the glass he was cleaning, and speak in that prissy flamboyant accent from before, "Welcome back, ya'll; what can I ge--" he narrowed his eyes at three new faces he had never seen before. Most of his patrons were regulars who had a history (social or sexual) with him, and to see not one, not two but three people randomly walk in, he was a little off-put by it. "You just roll into town? You ain't pigs, are you? I'll find out, promise you," ... a red bar would pop up on Therrye's HUD; "DECRYPTING..." The wall that didn't feature the bar had various rainbow colors like a Jackson Pollock painting -- certain lines became bright neon to Therrye's vision, and the clandestine Syndicate logo would be forged in neon imposed over the paintings. As Kaede crossed his arms, he'd notice Therrye staring at the painting a bit too long. He'd narrow his eyes and smirk, before smoothing his hands across the bar and leaning in. "Nah, ya'll are hard, ain't ya? What can I get you, boo?" ... which was of course, correct; only those employed by the Syndicate could identify their logos in new places.
He noticed her chipped horns, and his eyes would light up. "Ohh honey, I love your chrome! Don't cause trouble, and you'll have none from me. Say, I know a lovely doll; she's an absolute preem. You two should meet," He'd press his hands to his jawline and listen intently to whatever the three had to say, especially Therrye. His smile would drop if and when any of them said the line they were supposed to say. "... 'Li-Li' sent you? ... ya'll from that job she went on? Ohh, god; she didn't flatline, did she? No... you're not the type to outdo her; no offense, boo -- you got looks that could kill, but so does she." Kaede would stand up and pick up a glass, talking to the side. "Well, that kills my buzz; hopefully she didn't rub you the wrong way out there... No, I will NOT let you pay her tab for her; I don't judge if you're trying to stuffit with her, but that girl hates it when people do her favors. You gonna order something or what? I'm on a time-crunch, here..." Clearly, Kaede was an absolute chatterbox and quite an eccentric fellow, but at least he warmed up to the situation quite quickly.

 

[Blood Briar]

Styrix was there first, with Therrye and the netrunner arriving about at the same time. The familiarity between them and Styrix gave it away before they even said anything, which helped, since Therrye wasn't sure what she was looking at. Blixians were simply rare sights in this sector of the galaxy. Nearly two feet shorter than her stood the squat, blue-and-black mottled bulbous flesh humanoid dressed in decades old glitter-fashion overalls over a thin black jumpsuit and sporting oversized rectangular sunglasses. Strands of flesh at the crown of their head resembled hair in a superficial way. She didn't bother guessing at their gender; it rarely mattered, and she didn't have anything carnal on her mind at the moment anyhow. "Haebi," they offered, and Therrye shook their hand. "Thanks for your work," she gave them, a little cheerful now. "You got it," they chirped, both more and less confident than she might have expected. Between Kara's care and the restorative chems in her system, Therrye's tension had spilled out easily now that she was no longer 'punched in'.

Since she stowed her breakers in her bike, there wasn't anything for Therrye or Haebi to offer up to the bouncer. Styrix had given a modest effort at cleaning the blood off of their axe, but it wasn't entirely clean when they handed it over. She gave a respectful nod to the bouncer, as she always did to another in her line of work. Most bouncers actually kept people safer, if just a little. It was more than she could say for cops. "Aoli sent us," Haebi offered, with a sliver of fear in their voice, to a subtle sign of recognition from the man.

Therrye took stock of the place, violet gaze lingering momentarily on the gals at the poles then the sort of clientele present. It seemed safe enough, and clean enough in the right areas; one could tell a lot from the bar's care, particularly. That it might not be 'safe' was more a consideration of Aolieon's rather violent tendencies than a matter of trust, there. After catching sight of the emerging Syndicate logo, the rest of the details clicked into place. Not every establishment was so marked, after all. Absorbing that information and filing it away, Therrye shot Kaede a friendly-enough smile, striking the balance between the politeness a non-hostile stranger gets and the warmth of her mood. If asked, she would have said the beat playing was in her types of music, and the muscles of her non-recently-fractured leg pulsed to the beat in spurts. Subtle, but not unnoticeable.

Kaede's comment about chrome confused Therrye. She took a little pride in not having nearly any visible signs of it beyond the typical forearm port, her cascade of electric blue covering up what was in her neck. Glancing to Styrix, there was little visible there as well, and then to Haebi - well, they had a double set of ports on the left of their face and shoulder. Not much to comment on, really. Dismissing the thought, her violet eyes returned to Kaede's. "Much more fun to put down trouble than start it." A mild raise of her brow responded to his suggestion that she meet a lovely, preem doll. "I'm not averse, but I have company to enjoy first." She gave a friendly wink. "'Aoli' said to say she sent us, and that we just got a shower of eddies."

Given Aolieon's seeming familiarity and the up-frontness of her suggestion, Kaede's response wasn't what she expected. He talked rather fast for a bartender, too, making it harder to get a word in. Aolieon indeed had much more than just murderous looks, though she wasn't sure if there'd be any offense to saying that. "Would've expected a happier reception at that," she said simply with a shrug. "Wouldn't dream of it," was her follow-up to Kaede bringing up the matter of her tab. That was her business, and while she was generous with who she'd put up fists for, Therrye knew better than to spread out eddies like candy.

"Pineapple Fizz," came the Charak's first words since they got in. Haebi was busy hemming and hawing over the grand selection available; Therrye guessed they didn't get out much. After a moment of glancing through an old file, she spoke up: "Zapatero." Since she usually drank the cheapest of beers on the rare occasion she did drink, she'd been challenged by a choom to spread her horizons, and that was the next drink on the list. While those were made, Haebi eventually managed to make a pick, opting for an imported liqueur made of starberries. Did the runner have expensive tastes, or were they just a little lost in the realm of drinks?

With their drink first up, Charak went and got them a table. Therrye joined them with another quick glance around the establishment before leaning back to relax. She took a sniff of her drink before trying it; some sweetness, some bitter, some citrus and some nutty. It was a sight better than the last one she'd tried, a "Dirty Synthtini." A moment of reflection gave a little more sobriety to her energy. "So... you work with Brahms long?" The response came after a moment of pause. "Two years." "Shit," she replied. The Charak nodded. Haebi slipped into a chair and sipped at their drink, then made a very pleased noise with an undercurrent of a burble in their voice. "All three of you a crew?" Styrix shrugged at that. "Off and on." In the shifted light, Therrye better noticed a tiny pin on Haebi's overalls - the scorpion riding on a wave. A half-smile. The whimsicality of netrunners often made her smile. She was a little envious sometimes, truth be told, not that she'd ever trade her fists for a life spent jacked in.

"How'd you meet?" She looked between the two, and Haebi looked at Styrix, so she followed their eyes. Styrix's look became even more far away than usual before they began. "Place like this, actually. He was celebrating a job gone well and starting chatting up tables, buying people drinks. Joi caught his eye and he made her laugh." The first expression resembling an open smile touched the Styrix's features, even if it was subtle. "Once he pulled up a chair, he was there for the rest of the night. Him and I'd both done a circuit of cop bounties and we commiserated. She wasn't reciprocating his advances, but he kept her amused all night. Joi called me up a few days later. He had a line on some gang-stolen Corpo merch. That was our first job together. Went a little sideways until he dropped some explosives on their heads." A sound like a laugh came from their beak.

Therrye could imagine, based on what she'd seen of Brahms. Souls that poured out positivity despite how dark everything got here were few, each a treasure in their own way. Even if she didn't really know him, she didn't doubt that he'd touch a number of lives for the better. He probably died doing something stupid, too, like eating a bullet for Styrix. She let out a heavy exhale. It wasn't like she didn't understand that type. The Liandri would've toasted then, but it felt too soon until Aolieon arrived. A glance toward the door and then a stray wonder of what was taking her so long. Hopefully nothing so bloody, she found herself thinking with a modest smile, which still took her a little by surprise. She distracted herself with another drink of the cocktail in front of her and looked up, watching the light play on the ceiling. Another day, another death. That was how it always went.

 

[AlrunaRose]

Aolieon finished doctoring her appearance and then opened the "lock & shock" compartment on the drone, which required a retinal scan. She practically lived out of this drone and was often maintaining it -- the lock & shock compartment was for her weapons. Inside of it, she stuffed her dirty jumpsuit, her blades, her pistol; all of it, but then took apart her wrist communicator and started adding components to it. It was basically Aolieon's phone and data interface, but she could retrofit this with anything she might need and not want to think about -- wristblade, dart launcher, single-shot pistol, tazer -- you name it, this little device could end up just as heavily armed as Aolieon preferred to be. She did up the bracer, applied the wristblade and the tazer, then at long last slid the wrist-contoured tablet into its slot. She then gave herself one last look, packed everything up and then dismissed the drone. She began strutting her stuff, knowing the way to Neon Hearts by, well... heart.

Along the way Aolieon strutted her stuff, letting her safe, glam girl walk take over her as she felt the confidence of her dress and the dopamine of the mescaline still running in her veins. Eventually, it happened; a commonplace activity of some idiot bag guy trying to mug her because she was wearing nice clothes. A man in bohemian clothing pulled a stupid pistol on her and demanded her cash. She'd normally play them for suckers; show them her tits and then just fuck em up, but she tilted her head, focused on the guy, instilling doubt. He yelled something she chose not to recall, putting the gun inches in front of her face -- well shit, that was easier. She grabbed the gun and pulled the slide back to hold it in place, unfurling her wristblade and sticking it through his eye. She could have gone for the favored under the chin or jugular, but she didn't want to get blood on her outfit. She then pulled it free and let him crumple before her as she took the gun, carefully disengaged it and pointed it at his friend with the knife. "Now what? I have a smoking hot date tonight, and luckily I'm in a good mood. So, you can run back to your little foxhole and rethink your life choices, or you can stop thinking forever. Make it quick," the man was thunderstruck, and after a moment's hesitation, he split for a nearby alley. She smiled in an apathetic, detached moment. "Good boy," she mused as he ran off, and she finally turned the corner and approached Neon Hearts, curtsying for Antoine. "I'll pay Kaede inside -- it went well. Can you take this piece? Consider it a donation -- never a last time; you know it..." Without a word, Antoine begrudgingly took the pistol, and then held out his free hand. Aolieon frowned with puppy dog eyes, then produced her shock knife -- he somehow always knew when she was packing more heat than originally agreed upon. Long ago, one night she and someone special pulled Kaede's and Antoine's asses from a gunfight when Corpos found out his establishment. From that day on, Antoine agreed to turn a blind eye to the fact that Aolieon's communicator was weaponized. Speaking of which, she glanced over her outfit, stepping in a rain puddle to clean some errant drops of blood off of her stiletto boots and wringed her wristblade clean to sheathe it. Aolieon was basically voluntary staff here due to her relationship with Kaede -- both dancer and bouncer. She did her part in caring for the establishment when she was around; Kaede and Antoine kept her existence a secret, at least until they knew someone was trustworthy. Aolieon smiled, tracing Antoine's nametag and biting her lip before simply walking in. Truly, a quiet choomba worth his own salt.
She stepped into the neon violet-lined hallways leading to the bar/club/dance floor, and located a wall mirror that had been placed there for people, in addition to her own vanity. Aolieon did a final check of her entire appearance, then texted on her communicator to Kaede, ~Babe ~<3 got eddies; can you play one of my favs?~ Kaede sat his head up, then he checked his messages, and he just chuckled lightly in his flirtatious, flamboyant way before texting back ~Brought money, AND friends. Bring that cred-chip, and dat ass. Your fav music, and your fav bev, on the house. Anything for you, gurl <3~ Aolieon looked back in the mirror and scanned herself for even a drop of blood. Then, she slowly swayed her hips side to side, transitioning into a slow hip roll to loosen her mid-section while stretching her arms behind her... She equipped some earrings at the last minute for an additional touch of glam and then smiled at her reflection, and bit her lip -- she was ready.

IIO - "Rapture" (Armin Van Buuren Remix Remastered)
(skip to 2:15, if you wanna bypass the long trance music build-up)

What walked into the scene of the Neon Hearts bar wasn't an otherworldly, modestly-suited assassin covered in viscera and armed to the teeth -- what emerged was the glamorous tribute to the neon lights and sensual palate of Night City. A lustrous black synth-leather cropped jacket sporting glowing neon fuchsia curliques barely covered her chest this showcased her entire midriff, let a bejeweled belly button piercing glimmer, and did little to conceal a lace bra of black and purple. A transparent, asymmetric high-fashion miniskirt shimmering with its own high-tech neon luminescence bared matching lace undergarments for all to see. Only other article of clothing Aolieon wore was a pair of shiny synth-leather stiletto boots. She strutted forwards with the elegance of a gazelle, her shoulders lightly teetering as her hips subtly swung her behind in a tasteful figure-eight with each step. Her makeup was fresh, the plum eyeshadow shaped into cat eyes and now spiked with neon eyeliner, her lipstick glossy, lusty red. Her clean hair bounced freely with her pace, shimmering metallically in the lights, contrasted by polished, multi-faceted amethyst teardrop earrings encrusted in gold; her honeyed eyes imposed upon by large yet normal sized pupils which scanned the room with brazen confidence and comfort in her own cerulean skin, which lightly glistened with fragrant massage oils. Every inch of her flirted with the kaleidoscope of lights coming from the dance floor; everything curated to make a mortal lick their lips with desire. Before she could even spot Therrye, Styrix and the newcomer known as Haebi; she beamed brightly with a glam doll's smile at Kaede, waving with a feminine excitement -- the latter leaned onto his bar and beckoned her with a finger, a sensual tone to his body language which openly led her to sashay on over to him.

"Damn, girl -- you brought out the big guns. Looking like you about to walk the line, AND get some. I know getting paid ain't that glamorous," Kaede teased her, sticking out his tongue and chuckling. Aolieon brushed one of the barstools off with her hand before sitting on it neatly. "You think this is my best? Honey, you ain't seen shit." Kaede immediately started pouring what looked like a deadly cocktail of absinthe and four other liquors and mixing it with starberry shein liquer of plum color for taste into a hefty daiquiri glass. "Bitch, you pulled out the high-fashion! People get mugged 'round here for dressing like that, you slut," Kaede batted his hand at her, making a kitty claws gesture. "Ohh, one tried -- you know how that ends," Kaede gasped visibly, shaking his head and fluffing his free-hanging slickback hair out of his face. "What am I even gonna do with you?" Aolieon chuckled derisively, hanging her head back as she looked to the sky and propped an elbow up on the bar. "You can start by giving me my drink," she flirtatiously cat-called at Kaede, who indeed had it finished but slid it away from her, gesturing obnoxiously with an open hand and a prissy grunt of denial. Aolieon sighed, reaching in between her breasts and procuring her cred-ship to lay in his hand. He looked at it, a transparent fog appearing before his eyes as he loaded Aolieon's tab and wired the tab closed with his cybernetics. "And here's to another tab closed!" Kaede cracked open a beer and gestured to Aolieon, who graciously wrapped her fingers around the daiquiri glass and lifted it up to clink with his beer can -- Kaede shotgunned the beer in one go, and Aolieon kissed the rim of the glass to take a hefty sip to the dome. Both winced and cleared their throats, Aolieon whirling her head lightly before she looked at the glass with wide, enamored eyes -- he made this one spicy for her, and her usual is already basically all alcohol and 70% hard liquor ranging anywhere from 100-190 proof!
"Ohh, by the way; your three new chooms are over there," Kaede openly gestured towards Therrye, Styrix and Haebi, to which Aolieon whirled around in the barstool to turn towards them. She gazed upon the three, lingering over Therrye, whom even from here she could tell had been healed, to her relief. Aolieon wore a sensual smile on her face as she preened her hair to the side, as if saying/waving hello without actually doing so -- even from Therrye's perspective, she'd be able to tell that these two were talking about her, now. "Who's the razorgirl? That another Liandri? Gurl, spill it -- what went down?" Aolieon turned to cast a derisive glance at Kaede, then fixated back on her. She bit her lip a minute, then turned to Kaede and lowly said, "That girl can fist straight through a Militech turret -- I'm hoping she'll do the same to me," Her eyes dilated a little bit as she eyed Therrye up and down for a bit. Kaede's jaw dropped and he visibly blushed. "Girl, you are incorrigible! So, I take it everything went well?" Aolieon looked up and away, biting her lip and squinting as if trying to recall. "Well, between me and her, we killed, what; well over 50 Corpos? I got a Centaur, but she took out all the turrets. They lost an Edgerunner along the way, though," her smile faded for a moment as she looked back at Kaede, taking another sip of her drink afterwards. Kaede's eyebrows furrowed with visible sorrow. "Ohh, nooo... I'm so sorry," Aolieon pulled the glass from her lips and she clicked her tongue. "It's alright; I barely even know their names. They wanted to have a drink in his honor, so I recommended your place," Kaede's expression turned serious and sassy as he procured copies of the three drinks they ordered and put them on a tray. "Well, you're kinda putting me on the spot, but I won't say no to building rapport, especially in the name of something like that -- c'mon, let's not keep them waiting," Aolieons eyebrows bounced, as she turned to the side and slowly sat up from her barstool "If you insist..."

Aolieon and Kaede approached the table with Therrye and Styrix; both seemed to sashay over with a hip sway each of their own tastes, with Kaede carrying a tray of cocktails one-handed. "Heeeeey, ya'll! Li-Li and I were just talking about ya'll -- all good things!" Kaede began with a smile, which immediately dropped into a look of concern. "I'm soooo sorry for your loss. On behalf of Neon Hearts and keeping my gurl safe; here's a drink for each of you, on the house. Ya'll can come back anytime -- I'm here if you need to talk" Aolieon nodded curtly, before grinning at Kaede and rubbing his shoulder in a very friendly manner. "You're too kind, Kaede, but damn; give em some time to decompress," She stopped rubbing his shoulders and then booped his nose. "Go shake your money-maker, boo; I'll wave you down if I need anything," Kaede gave her an off-put look and snapped his fingers at her ostentatiously. "Don't tell me how to do my job, boo! I'ma do that, but not because you told me to -- and YOU be nice; I'm tired of being your only choombata." Aolieon rolled her eyes at him as he planted the drinks in front of whoever ordered them at first -- he remembered what everyone ordered without being asked to.
Aolieon leaned down and grabbed Therrye's hand; she didn't do anything fancy, she just turned it around and examined it. "I see you got patched up; why you didn't get your plates replaced is anyone's guess," She let go and then sat in the fourth seat, rolling her head back to fluff her hair and smile at Therrye, her eyes now dilated to a very comfortably large size but not all the way. "You like to dance close to the fire, don't ya, slugger?" She smirked, tilting her head before her eyes fell on Haebi. She eyed him up and down; seeing the scorpion pin, her smile faded and she looked at him quite seriously. "You must be the netrunner. Not a half bad job out there... I can see you need to relax though, Blixian. What's the matter, never been to a nightclub before?"

 

[Blood Briar]

Haebi had slipped into some small talk with Styrix about a vid they were into - something about moon jumps? - when the song turned. The soft tapping of Therrye's heel to the music had become more pronounced by then, her focus having slipped back into a more internal space for a bit. Even though it was just the first drink, alcohol tended to draw that out of her. She'd always struggled with downers, which was why she rarely drank in the first place. Not that it was impossible for her to enjoy herself with it; it just took the right mix of energy. A toast to a fallen comrade, however briefly shared, wasn't something aligned with revelry for her. Somber and melancholy were more the vibe that'd come out of that after enough drinks were in her, though she certainly wasn't a lightweight, all told. But - they had just completed a job, and Brahms wasn't much of a downer himself, which led the tone for it all.

All of that was a bit of a wash for her mood. The music was more the tipping point in the upward direction than anything else.

That was until Aolieon walked into her line of sight and stepped in between her thoughts. Whatever Therrye was expecting, that was not it. She couldn't help tracking the woman's movement from the first catch of light on her amethyst earrings, eyes widening as pupils dilated in what amounted to a restrained double take. Aolieon had pulled a bewilderingly complete transformation since she'd seen her last. While her bodysuit didn't leave much to imagination in terms of form, what she wore now brought out the vivid details of her body, emphasized the sinuous way she moved it, and then doubled down on its adornment.

Then she was out of sight, briefly, while moving toward the bar. Therrye found herself leaning to the side to get a better view without realizing it, along with a whorl of heat in her chest and color at the back of her cheeks. Between her horns, cerulean skin and aluminum hair, there was no doubt it was her. What struck her, aside from the blazing audacity of beauty on display, was the lack of incongruence in the high-femme glow up. A through-line of sensuality was pulled taut between the two visions of her, but this was all flesh instead of blood.

It didn't feel like this was the heat beneath the ice to Therrye. They seemed more side by side within her.

She didn't hide that she was openly staring at Aolieon. Subtle movements of her violet eyes told her she was trying to decipher something, while their dilation and her parted lips made a certain interest clear. The two together occupied the whole of her attention, and the moment she tried to look away, she caught the other Liandri running her gaze over her. That made her smile, despite herself. Funerals and fucking got along terrifically, even if felt a touch disrespectful. Therrye doubted that was what drove the samurai tonight, though that might as well have been a wild guess with how familiar she was with the woman. It had only been a few hours and already Aolieon was turning out to be a mind fuck. Therrye drank to that while wondering what she had said to make Kaede drop his jaw and blush.

Therrye's self-awareness returned once the pair of them started walking over. No matter how much her body was pulling her toward her other favorite way to spend her days and nights, respect for the dead came first. She downed the rest of her drink in a paradoxical effort to focus on the others at the table and made a face at the burn running down her throat. Kaede certainly wasn't stingy with his pours, and he made it easy to smile, too. The three at the table thanked him, though only Therrye gave a clear smile, given Haebi's wincing at Aolieon's proximity and Styrix's infinite poker face. Her booping Kaede drew a laugh out of the bruiser, and seemed to make Haebi more comfortable, if only just.

Aolieon mentioning her dermal plates surprised Therrye, much more than her grabbing her hand. How could she tell? Another question added to the pile; she'd suspect, later, that it might build up into a mountain before she could make any meaningful progress in getting answers. "Didn't look like you kept your distance either, dancer." Her eyes glittered with darkness right back at Aolieon's amber rings.

With her turning toward Haebi and much closer now, Therrye could catch more of the fine details of her body. The samurai had scars. A  lot of scars. More scars than she'd seen in a long, long time which, given the number of bodies she'd touched since she left the dungeons... Other emotions entered her eyes.

Haebi quailed under Aolieon's focused attention. They hadn't forgotten her threats, delivered not so long ago. "I don't go out much," they stuttered out, avoiding eye contact. Sound rumbled from Styrix's throat to draw attentive. "Thank you both for joining us, even though you didn't know Brahms long." Therrye's mouth drew in a somber line and she nodded, while Haebi looked down at their drink. "Every time he was around, he made even strangers smile and laugh." Haebi nudged around the base of their drink, unsure of what else to say. "Feels weird that he's not here."

"He made me feel welcome with the first thing he said." Sadness wasn't heavy in her look, but it was undoubtedly present. "He will be missed." She looked over to Aolieon, and a spell of silence gave her the opportunity to speak if she so desired.

Regardless, Styrix raised their glass after, and Therrye and Haebi followed suit. "Brahms was the best man I've had the honor of running with. The world is a little darker without him." They toasted their glasses, then, and drank. Exhaling, Therrye looked to the Charak. "Thank you for inviting us. I'm glad I could pay my respects." Styrix returned a nod. "Brahms would have liked that. I will give him more with Joi another night." The Liandri smiled at that.

She glanced then at Aolieon, with a look more curious than anything else.

 

[AlrunaRose]

Aolieon let out a subdued, sultry chuckle from deep within her throat at Therrye's reply to what was effectively Aolieon's metaphorical musings on how the other liked to 'live dangerously'. It was so quietly brazen, yet so keenly appropriate, considering her type. She found herself pulling her free hand up to her left set of horns and twiddling an errant curl around it as she tilted her head at Therrye, her smile that saw her biting her lip again presenting her face in a manner that seemed uncharacteristically gregarious in contrast to how Aolieon had been known to carry herself thus far. She felt those violet eyes fixed on her from the moment she walked in, and that's what she wanted. Inner demons in her head were moaning and cheering in revelry, really rallying behind the opportunity to party once more, and that excitement was made all the more vibrant in Aolieon's visible features at the prospect of a new intangible toy to play with amongst the scene -- Therrye's interest. There were parts of her that really didn't want to know new people; however, one of Aolieon's guilty pleasures was running the desires of another through her fingers, seeing how far she could take them. Seeing the mixture of emotions bubble to the surface in Therrye's face appear as her eyes lathered her with keen attention to detail certainly wasn't helping the razorgirl's case. But the dance of serotonin and flattery happening in Aolieon's mind wasn't at all dancing to the beat of what might have been going through hers...

ATB "Ecstasy" (Intro Edit) (external setting tune change)
Michael McCann - "Icarus" (song's first half only, introspective ambience for the following paragraph only...)

A brand the size of a pencil-eraser two inches to the right of Aolieon's epiglottis; various places where implants were ripped out, irreparably damaging skin... Underneath the Femme salacious high-fashion was something that Therrye might recognize as the first big puzzle piece of what made this mind-fuck of a woman -- a slaver's brand, and scars where augmentations commonly known to be possessed by sex slaves were known to exist. Aolieon's body quietly spoke of a profession known for running one's confidence, dignity and self-preservation instincts through a meat-grinder. Even freed, women who were given a chance to walk away from such a life often killed themselves... Yet, not even an hour ago, what was witnessed was not meek, self-destructive or weak; it wasn't even up-tight like a beav, such as the lucky few who escaped were known to become -- what was in the place of such weak negative emotions was something that screamed to the rooftops from the jaws of a bladed void. The visceral warrior spirit from before might actually now have a meaningful Story to tell... even Therrye would know that. Because the strength and confidence she gained from her darker days more linearly translated to what ended up freeing her in the end. But for a sex slave, there was almost no hope for building defenses like that...
Somewhere along the line, a creature such as this would have needed to be built back up from the lowest of lows in depraved downward spirals. Overcoming the horror and self-loathing that strangled the souls of dolls who were made to live lives like that; to go even further and weaponize such a sinful skill set afterwards would require... something that just didn't exist in this world. There was a chapter of life that was written and closed with an ending that might only ever exist in a delusional, rose-tinted braindance -- not in Night City. There was a three-word question beginning to take shape in the back of Therrye's mind, although she probably wasn't conscientiously reaching for it with a stranger. One intrusive thought would stab the surface the mind, though, leaving much to be conjectured...
... You don't walk away from that kind of life, and make it this far... Not alone.

Naturally, Aolieon's sassy and brazen exterior wasted no effort in snapping anyone caught up in their own thoughts back to reality. Her head tilted a little more, her eyes flickering with a noted audacity at someone staring, as she lightly licked her lips and let something slip between her teeth.
"What's the matter? ... Cat got your tongue? Take a picture, it'll last longer... although I could give you something else that'll last a whole while longer than that..." Aolieon chuckled a bit derisively, turning the cheek and winking flirtatiously at Therrye -- she was entirely oblivious at anything Therrye was staring at; either that or she was consciously aware and just that much more comfortable in her own skin for the time being... more than likely the former. She daintily sipped at her drink, eyes skating down Therrye's figure before turning her attention back to the other two.
"Oh my gooooood..." Aolieon groaned with frustration at them, now deliberately tipping the glass to take a hefty sip down her throat. Their commiseration was really putting a damper on Aolieon's buzz. As she stomached the burn of the downright malicious cocktail, she thought fast about what to do in order to really turn this situation around. A snide remark? Perhaps, get offended and gaslight them into stopping? She blinked for a moment, finishing nearly half the drink now. She then decided on what might really put this whole downer tone to bed and get their awkwardness to stop radiating into the Scene -- a touch of empathy. Aolieon lightly slammed the drink down, clicking her tongue and rolling her head around as if to crack her neck, eyes closed as she savored the hateful burn of the liquor. "I may not have known the guy for long at all, and I'll admit that I'm struggling to take stock amongst ya'll in that same vein, but..." she teasingly took another sip; damn this was good. "But even to a girl like me, Brahms seemed like the type of guy who would have had people celebrate his life, rather than mourn his death."
She sighed, lightly pulling her hair out of her face with her fingers and glancing from beneath her eyebrows with puckered lips at Haebi and Styrix, all an expression of complacency. "Ya'll need to lighten up a little; we escaped with our lives, and I understand he meant a lot to some of ya'll. But he made his choice, one that is more than most other Edgerunners can say they've done; and if that strikes a chord with you..." Aolieon leaned in a bit sighing; she looked like she wanted to grab Therrye's hands but went more towards the center instead. "... then do yourselves a favor, and remember to live a little. Seems to me like Brahms remembered to do that..."

Aolieon turned her attention back to Therrye, who was clearly feeling down enough that this commiseration was affecting her. She looked down. "Beer, huh? You'd be the type, wouldn't you?" she licked her lips, then slid the remainder of her drink towards Therrye. "You should try mine; don't let it touch your tongue, though. It might knock you on your ass!" she giggled, grinning a bit, as her stiletto began to tap in tune with the music. "Although, if that's not your speed, I can get you something a little more euphoric -- you look like you could use it." Her smile faded a bit, showing that look of humanity before looking down at her fingernails and then huffing with a tone of more seriousness. "Unless you've got a lot on your mind; I suppose we all do. If you want you can talk about it... I guess," she smirked in the negative, not really wanting to be someone's shoulder to cry on while she was pre-gaming but reluctantly, she decided upon channeling another drop of compassion. This did seem like the kind of crowd to be emotional; guess she should play into it, even if it's not what she usually does...
Aolieon had a carefully curated sense of independence and spite for the weaknesses of others, but in this particular case; serotonin was still dancing in her head from the mescaline which was mingling with a bit of mild synthesia as a result. Not to mention the heavy drink was beginning to roll on her -- her tongue was loose, her sensibilities were softened and she was now officially in that middle ground where if someone wanted to reasonably talk to her about something and have her be less inclined to lie or be toxic; the time was now, whether or not any of them knew that...

 

[Blood Briar]

Outside of the deadly context of the job and its push and pull of vigilance and tension, an ease of expression and full range of emotion appeared readily in Therrye. Without such restraint, seeing her dilated notice of Aolieon's teeth on her lip wasn't hard. Nonverbals pulled a lot of her attention; most of her survival was owed to subconscious processing of them to push her body in the right direction to avoid or deliver harm. Outside of that context, it still served to assess and react to those around her in any context, and in the general, Aolieon's was one of her favorites. Gestures like biting one's lip communicated more emotion and involuntary expression versus more physical displays made with intention like the roll of Aolieon's hips and the way she touched her arm. And despite Therrye's thorough grounding in her physicality, it was the emotions of others that wrapped threads around her fingers over time. She was intimately familiar with the difference in gifts given out of affection and care and those bearing prices or malice.

That Aolieon's body bore so much evidence of the latter kind had sparked chains of thought and feeling that were still spooling out internally.

"I don't think a picture of you would do the memory justice." More an oblique flirt than a deflection, while also being entirely honest. Even if she never saw Aolieon again, there was no doubt the memories would be vivid.

The samurai's words of at least token respect, and a half-bodied push against the vibe of that conversation, didn't get much of a rise out of Therrye. It was fairly expected and she at least gave it some thought and a touch of tact. How vast the gulf between their stances on respect and treating others affected Therrye's view of her but wasn't, on its own, enough to dismiss or judge her. Her actions hadn't been entirely congruent with that distance, either, and the more context she added to the picture of her, the more complicated it clearly got.

Beneath her thin cut-off shirt, Aolieon's fingers could feel a little softness over the thick muscles of her abs; Liandri physiology was stubborn in its lushness, after all. Further beneath that, dermal plates separated sheets of muscle to create something more like interwoven armor, albeit punctured in two spots across her trunk. With Kara's treatment, the wounds were already in advanced stages of healing, but the holes remained. The woman's casual intimacy dilated her eyes further, though her body didn't visibly respond otherwise.

Brazen flirting from Aolieon toward Therrye and her returned interest wasn't lost on their mutual company. Styrix was the first to react to Aolieon's speculation on Brahms and her dismissal of the edgingly somber mood. "You are right. Brahms would not want us wallowing in grief." Haebi fidgeted fingers together and looked upon them in a self-conscious, if not guilty, manner. "Not much of partier, I guess." All of the confidence and candor in the Blixian seemed to be tied to their relationship with cyberspace. Out here, at least in this environment, they were mostly wallflower. Keenly aware of the alignments of the present company, Styrix moved to their feet. "Let's see if they have a vid-cade." Though it was hard to tell at the best of times, the Charak seemed to be smiling at the Blixian. Haebi perked up a little, even if it was a bit bashful. "I do have some co-op games in my local storage." Picking up their drinks, the two took their leave of the table for now, with Styrix giving them a respectful nod and Haebi offering a nervous smile beneath those chunky sunglasses.

Therrye's eyes tracked them taking their leave for a couple moments before looking back to Aolieon with a smile. "I prefer coming by my euphoria in more natural ways." Her hand moved to the drink the Liandri offered and she drew it up to her nose, inhaling and exhaling the scent and sensing it'd hurt. She downed it anyway. Aolieon wasn't kidding; the burn could be described as spiteful. Therrye gave a cough, made a face, and then laughed. "No wonder you're already so flushed." With three fingers, she slid her own drink over to Aolieon. "This tastes a lot less like factory run-off."

That there were other occupations of her mind owed more to the Liandri than it did the recently departed Human. The drop of compassion seemed wildly notable, enough so that dismissing it entirely would feel rude. Perhaps even cruel, despite her apparent displeasure in indulging such feelings. Therrye wasn't actually that down in her mood, though. Aolieon's body held a bleakly depressing story, yes, but pity was a civilized sort of savagery to offer in response. She'd knocked out a couple of gonks for straying across that line in her time at the gym, where much of own her scars ended up on display. Her gaze shifted toward the bartender, Kaede, with whom Aolieon had great rapport. Between her many options for how this could all go down, the heat the woman was inciting in her wasn't how she wanted to lead. Refusing to follow it wasn't in her hand, either, and the desire to feel the Liandri's neck beneath her lips was enough to drown in if she let herself. But the precarious stack of impulses and copes glinting through her intentions of distance invoked more of Therrye's caretaker impulses than her lascivious ones, and she'd be left with guilt and unanswered questions if she didn't give them enough weight.

"I'm more curious about you, actually." Therrye shifted in her seat to face Aolieon and then nodded in Kaede's direction, starting with something likely easy for her to talk about. "How'd you two meet? You seem like you go way back."

 

[AlrunaRose]

Aolieon's eyes lit up at the brushing remark towards her catcall regarding photos. It almost made the amber in her eyes glow, as the kaleidoscope of lights caught it at just the right moment. She witnessed as Therrye turned her head a little bit to the side to cast a sideways glance at her; there was a tone of deflection to her voice, but she detected a certain warmth to it.
"Oh, yeah?" Much as she loved the warmth of the comment, Aolieon couldn't let that remark slide. Her eyes narrowed for a flash and she felt a bold intrusive thought; one that had her lean a bit forwards as one of her hands quietly floated underneath the table to lightly brush up Therrye's obliques -- a careful grazing, well away from the more daring parts of her body, but as quickly as it began -- Aolieon paused her breath for a second to very mutedly gage for reactions, and when Therrye didn't exactly move away; her eyes flickered again and Aolieon couldn't help but let a smug, sultry smirk spread across her face.
Feeling the muscular flesh express hardness underneath with structured abdominals once again granted her further insight into Therrye's cyberware -- when flesh feels sinewy and supple, but gets wooden to a certain depth, as if frost-bitten; one can tell when subdermal body armor has been added -- what was interesting is how these plates were sub-muscular... with a simple teasing poke below the ribs using her middle and ring fingers (where the nails were short), she let out a little giggle and wink, but in truth she was subtly confirming the plates submuscular existence. Before the poke, her hand grazed over the bullet holes, too... Thoughts bubbled to the surface of how hot it all was; not just to feel the heat of her core beneath her hands, but also the fact that this woman dared to take fatal shots like a champ for a total stranger. Thoughts of what everything else felt like, and one primal thought of how her abs might feel beneath her tongue...
She held back any immediate reactions, but her eyes and chewed lips couldn't lie. She held the smirk as pensive thoughts of a different line began to take shape. She knew someone like that who preferred augmetics that went out of their way to preserve one's humanity... something was lining up in the back of Aolieon's mind, and it wasn't lost on her. She took her drink and finished it in one gulp; the last thing Aolieon wanted to do was fall down that rabbit hole, but a split-second frown of pain and sadness became visible as she growled and winced at the drink before her daring facade came back to the forefront.

She cast a glance at Styrix and Haebi as they stood up to go engage in recreation. "Ohh, well it'd be a tragedy to see your little frigid form party TOO hard, now wouldn't it?" she remarked at Haebi, casting him a sideways glance that brushed him off. "Have some unplugged fun, for a change; vid-cades past the dance floor, turn right down the hall and you'll see the lounge, dispensaries and vid-cade machines. That's where the netrunners sequester themselves. Make some friends, won't you? I'd love to see Pacifica freeze over before I die..." she sneered teasingly at Haebi, giggling a bit before melting her sass long enough to nod respectfully at Styrix. "Holler if yall need anything, ok?" she readjusted herself in her seat, fluffing her hair with her hands in a way that had her arching her back and granting a free moment where she could be touched similarly, but she wasn't trying to be that way. She scanned the area for shady people, almost falling into her hobby as voluntary staff for Kaede -- why was she all of the sudden being all service-oriented? It was unlike her... Aolieon shrugged it off, then went back to giving her undivided attention to Therrye.

"Oh, him?" Aolieon began, turning her head to cast a glance at Kaede. She paused for a moment, her thoughts bridging into the past. "Yeah, we do." she stared at him for a little bit while she twiddled an errant curl at the side of her head for a little bit. There was so much to say, but an unspoken rule between them meant that while Therrye's inquiry may have been innocent enough; Aolieon had her own secrets to keep, of which not a soul could know. She bit her lip, a little more concerned with how to approach the question. "We used to work together. Did a few, uhh, jobs working for a Nomad Tribe. After awhile, he decided to hang up his guns and open Neon Hearts. We've always been looking after one another. Especially since..." Aolieon's voice trailed off, and she lowered her head for a bit. Her smile melted, her pupils shrank and her expression became forlorn. Then she blinked and made eye contact with Therrye. "I've known him for like 6 years. Flame, Badass, man-eater and one helluva Runner. He's a fixer, now; can you believe it? MY fixer... You wanna know how to stay alive; he'll show you the ropes," Aolieon concluded, raising her finger in the "Another drink" gesture. With those last few remarks, her cheeriness and teasing manner came back, as she crossed her legs underneath the table and lightly brushed up against one of Therrye's legs. She didn't know how the night was gonna go, but her craving to be touchy-feely was withering away by the minute...

 

[Blood Briar]

With how she downed her drinks, Therrye suspected it'd be a lost cause to suggest she do any moderation of her intake, let alone that she take any time to enjoy what she was putting into her body. Besides, it wasn't like she was in any position to judge others for how they lost themselves - at least when it only hurt them. That Therrye's preferences for vanishing the currents of thought that brought with them miserable reflection and memory had her coherent at the end of them was more happenstance than else. For how long was she a Dorphhead herself, even after it was no longer being forced into her system?

Haebi gave her a wide frown and practically hid behind Styrix's leg as they made their way out of sight. Styrix nodded to her about the offer for aid, though. Therrye, meanwhile, found that offer quite curious, and the echoing of Kaede's sentiment of finding more friends even more so. She wasn't quite like a system-mind, but seemed to flip pretty hard at times. Was there an identifiable switch involved? If there was, could she even tell? The way she was arching her back made it a little more difficult to consider, in so many ways, so she let her gaze bounce off of it when it presented itself, for now.

Her lips were a much more tempting look, anyhow. They seemed to take such punishment from her nerves. It made her want to put a thumb on her bottom one and tilt it toward her, so she could see the full of it.

Then once more that deep shift and return of mood for her, slithering back beneath the surface as she pushed her need for else to the top and ordered herself another shot of vice. Being in this proximity and seeing it ripple so close told her plenty. Therrye didn't like the idea of forcing her into it further, and pared away many of the questions she had for the samurai. She also realized, belatedly, that the earnest smile she was making probably wasn't helping. "Sounds like he's got it made." Showing genuine cheer for others like that was neither difficult or rare for Therrye; she always started in the corner of fellow souls trying to survive the grind, which was most often for those born and raised in the streets. Whatever Kaede's background or the painful places where Aolieon's intersected with it amidst the pleasant, retiring from the deadly game of edgerunning was an accomplishment worth celebrating. One she didn't seem to be veering much toward, if at all. "If you learned even a fraction of what moved you through tonight from him, it'd be well worth my time to listen." She let some of the earnestness slip away to trade with cheer. Aolieon seemed entirely phobic to too-bright sentiments, even if she might drink them up when they were unspoken, as she assumed was the case with Kaede. Therrye leaned in toward her with her upper body as she brushed her leg against hers. "'course I think I'd learn plenty from watching you, 'tween that hard arsenal and how you place yourself between bullets." "Dancer" as a title almost slipped from her lips with how naturally it matched her patterns of movement, the sheer confidence with which she seemed to manipulate her body. Something about it felt too familiar, too presumptive, though. "Been running for a few years now and I've never seen someone move like that on a job." Off a job, well. There were multiple reasons she had a reputation among the joytoys in the areas she frequented.

With Aolieon already getting herself another hard drink so soon, Therrye wasn't sure she wanted to encourage her, but she didn't want to be an entirely sober counter to her dive straight into chemical looseness, either. When Kaede delivered it, she held up two fingers to get his attention to ask for a drink of her own. "Boilermaker, thanks." Something hard to relate, something wet to enjoy. After that, Therrye moved her hand to brush through the strands of Aolieon's hair starting at shoulder level and moving up, stopping just shy of her cheek. The deliberate slowness of the motion came from both taking her time to enjoy the texture and also signaling intent before pushing into the woman's space. "Didn't expect that I'd be making it out after that Centaur broke my leg." Her tone laced between serious and suggestive as her gaze focused in on Aolieon's, pupils dilating her irises into violet rings. "How do you like to be thanked?"