Post by Veronica Strader on Apr 17, 2022 15:04:33 GMT -5
Veronica and Victoria made a hard decision to step back into the PORTAL POTTY, but before they had left to return for a few weeks to the island, they knew they had to come back. Arasaka Mega Corporation was in possession of Valerie, Victoria’s Affliction, transforming her into a powerful AI. If they didn’t do what was requested of them, they were going to come through and set the Straders' dimension on fire via cyber warfare, and while the idea of fucking up Cypher had sounded nice, it wasn’t worth hurting everyone else.
The women would agree to do what was asked of them but Victoria had made a decision that would be a benefit to not only her reality but to the people of the reality they had been taken too. The only problem? It was going to be the greatest sacrifice she ever made and chances are she would never be able to come back from it…
DECISIONS ARE THE
HARDEST THING TO MAKE,
ESPECIALLY WHEN IT IS A
CHOICE BETWEEN WHERE
YOU SHOULD BE AND
WHERE YOU WANT TO BE.
- Unknown
- Unknown
Kabuki Slums
Nighty City, California
January 28th, 2077
Victoria Strader wakes up in the Kabuki Market of Night City, hailed as the worst city between the Pacific and Atlantic oceans. It rests on the shore of the Pacific Ocean. She feels different, lonely almost. A hand touches her shoulder, and she sits up just along the littered shoreline running through the Megapolis. She sees herself looking at… herself? It was a weird feeling.
“Who are you?”
“It’s Ronnie, you dope.”
Vee’s eyes went wide because she wasn’t speaking out loud.
“How is that even possible?”
“Is Valerie with you?”
“I-I-I don’t know. I’ll look.”
Victoria closes her eyes and searches deep in her psyche but is aided by a technology she’s never seen before. When she opens her eyes, she realizes she can scan people, and their info comes up in front of her eyes like a terminator; luckily not all in red and white. She scans the woman in front of her:
Veronica Strader. She was telling the truth.
She shakes her head and stands up, taking in the scenery. She squints while looking out at the city from the shoreline that cuts through this part of the city.
“Where are we, Ronnie? And why are you in your own body?”
“Honestly? I have no idea, Vee. I mean, I am not complaining, I love you and all, but it was awkward when riding Christian,” she adds with a sly wink and grin.
“Yeah, gross. Outside of that one time, I just went deep inside,” she says, realizing how it sounded when Ronnie laughs.
“So we have some kind of technology in us, as I am sure you noticed with the Kiroshi Optics that have been implanted behind our retinas; we also have a thing called a “Holo,” which is basically a cell phone where you can see the person in our sights. I had a random unknown sender text message with an address that says we’ll be comfortable.”
“Ok, so how in the heck do we find it?”
With a motion of her left hand, Ronnie sends Vee a map of the city digitally like an AirDrop. She loads the map up, and a location pings. She sees a GPS setting and inputs the address.
“The Glen? Sounds fancy.”
“Appears to be near the city centre, so it’s not a cheap place, I am guessing. I feel like that portal not only took us into the future but an alternate reality,” she says, trailing off in thought.
Vee puts her arm around Ronnie’s shoulder and leans her head against hers.
“We got each other, and we’ll get back home. Can’t let them give our TransAtlantic championship away. That peckerhead Kelson probably,” her chuckle at the end makes Ronnie laugh too.
“Plus, we can’t let mom get near my man,” she says, and she is probably right. Meghan does have severe daddy issues. It doesn’t go unnoticed to Vee that Ronnie referred to Meghan as “mom,” and she smiles.
“I wonder if they made it to “australia” safely?” she says with the addition of air quotes on the questioned continent.
“Best. Joke. Ever.”
Victoria and Veronica laugh as they begin to make their way up to street level. The fast-paced nature isn’t alien to them, but all the technology certainly was. They could feel this place was a place of debauchery as they watched a group called the Tyger-Claws shake down residents in the area and act like assholes. Vee and Ronnie look at one another and make their way across the street to what seems to be a public transit station. Before they can interact with it, there is a ringing, and in front of both of their eyes, a Facetime-like call is answered. Eventually, they would learn the ins and out of the Holo. A Japanese man, who looks to have similar cybernetics that Victoria has, speaks slow, precise and most importantly, with respect.
“Victoria Strader-San, Veronica Strader-San, My name is Goro Takemura, right hand to the Arasaka family.”
“Care to tell us where we are?”
“Or how the hell you are appearing in front of our eyes but physically here?”
“I know you have numerous questions. I am sending you coordinates right now, did you get them?”
A status appears in her vision showing the uploading of data from 0%-100%. Once it’s complete the girls know where they need to go.
“Sending you both a vehicle. Do not keep us waiting. When you arrive, you are to ask for Anders Hellman. Security will bring you through.”
Before Vee or Ronnie can respond, they are alerted to a vehicle approaching.
HONK!!!!
The dark green muscle looking car stops, and the doors automatically go up. Vee and Ronnie look at each other with surprise and concern.
“I guess this is our ride?”
Ronnie scans the vehicle the info coming up revealing that it’s a Quadra Type-66 640s and the owner is Victoria Strader. She looks to Vee.
“This Quadra Type-66 is fairly popular vehicle, and it’s registered to you.”
“Me? Alright, let’s go Ronnie. We need to figure out what the heck is going on.”
Arasaka Tower
Night City, Northern California
“Alright, here we go.”
Victoria Strader stares up at the black reflective glass tower of the Mega Corporation that runs the world, and she feels a chill run down her spine; it could’ve been her Kiroshi Optics sending signals to her nervous system, but she could tell the difference. Veronica walks up behind her, placing a hand on her shoulder.
“You really think this is going to work?”
Victoria sneered at their near-identical reflection, except Ronnie’s hair was dirty blonde with a hint of red. She wore dark blue synth-denim jeans, a white tank-top, a leather jacket and her right hand is made of steel as she could hear her fingers clicking against each other. Her hair with a red tinge to it falls over the black leather jacket she has on. Victoria’s brown leather pants hug her hips as she makes her way to the automated door that swishes open, making her way into security.
“Welcome to Arasaka, Strader-San. Anders Hellman-San is expecting you. Please place all weapons to your left and step into the scanner for a few seconds,” the pleasant Japanese security guard instructs her. Vee places her Malorian Arms 3516 custom silver-plated revolver on the tray, which security pulls through as she steps into the scanner. Thousands of thin green lasers scan her head to toe four times. Rinse and repeat for Ronnie, but she can’t carry much with her outfit.
Ding. All Clear.
Security has removed the ammunition from her gun before handing it back to her. She places it inside her brown Samurai jacket and heads toward the elevator. Veronica pitches in again, this time beside her.
“You really think this will work?”
“I hope so. I want to know how you got out of my head, Ronnie. Out of my body.”
“Our body. I am not some rogue daemon like Valerie probably is. You still haven’t seen her?”
“No, I haven’t. You?” she asks softly, only her eyes moving to see what Ronnie is doing: making a face, squinting, anything to give her a clue of what she was thinking.
“The better question might be, why am I in a new body and in constant telekinesis with you?”
Maybe.
“Yeah, you might be right. This is no coincidence; we have been to Arasaka HQ.”
“Yeah, I bet these bastards split us when we got here. But where is Valerie?”
They would soon get their answer.
Vee and Ronnie’s Apartment
The Glen, Night City
January 29th, 2077
The Strader ‘Twins’ have had a night to go over the meeting they had with Anders Hellman, who explained that when Arasaka found them, it was just Victoria and she was beaten all to hell (from her match against The Lost Stranger). It was when they started to heal her injuries when they discovered three distinct personalities in her head: her, Veronica and Valerie (the Affliction). They also learned something that they were going to use to their advantage, which is that Victoria is a descendant of a legendary Night Runner, Alt Cunningham. Veronica wasn’t sure what to believe.
“I don’t know if I buy this, Vee,” she says, leaning back into the black synth leather couch and putting her boots up on the table in front of her. Victoria stands by the window overlooking the city from their big bay window. “How are we a descendant of someone from an alternate dimension? Oh, and infamous one at that?”
“Well, that’s just it Ronnie. It’s an alternate dimension. It’s an alternate reality, and our bloodline happens to exist in this one. Hell, you have her body. Plus you heard them, they will come to our dimension and light the world on fire by hijacking the world's online systems.”
“The irony is no one will ever know what we did for them.”
During their meeting, Hellman had revealed that they had kept the body of Alt in a cryogenic chamber after she had escaped into the NET. They then uploaded the engram of Veronica into her because while in theory, it’s possible for an engram to take over any person, it works much better with someone that shares similar genetics aka family/bloodline.
“Do you think they are on the up and up about why they have done what they have done?”
“I’m not sure, Ronnie. I don’t think they realize what they have with Valerie. Being used as an AI to prevent the possible army of rogue AIs from breaching the Black Wall with the aid of Millitech, whatever that is. We have a lot of studying to do Ronnie.”
“I don’t trust Val, Vee. I don’t. She’s playing along because of the power she’s been giving,” if her worry was a fire they would be evacuating the building. “I don’t care what kind of safeguards they have in place to keep in her line, she will get out. She will get out and cause havoc on the people of this city, of this world.”
“Do you believe them when they say they need her and eventually us in the NET to stop Millitech?”
“Well, the US government’s President is the head of Millitech and from what I was reading, they have been trying to rebuild the US and assimilate Arasaka and other corporations in it, while Night City just wants its own independence and if Millitech were to win this “cyber-war” it would lose that.”
Vee looks back out onto the streets and sees a situation unfolding on the streets. The NCPD has surrounded a man in large tech armour shooting up the streets. Ronnie tilts her head curiously to what Vee is looking at. She gets up, makes her way over, puts her left arm around Vee’s shoulder and watches the massacre unfold down below. Vee sighs.
“That must be Cyberpsychosis they say Millitech is behind….”
“And you believe them when they say it’s Millitech causing these issues?”
“Well it makes sense, use crime fuelled by that poor soul down there who was probably just walking down the street when someone scrambled their circuitry and now they slaughtered a dozen people,” not even a second after those words left her lips, she looks to Ronnie on her right. She looks back at her with a quick squint followed by a nod.
“Let’s do this, then.”
Vee pulls out her Malorian, cocking it, as Ronnie one hand pumps her Carnage Shotgun, and they head on down to the Cyberpsycho. What would be one of the first tasks they did arrive from a different reality, they would prepare and train for the Megacorporation’s task they had been given.
