Once again, Dexter collapsed to the floor.
"You... why are you—"
Bang!
Before he could finish, a bullet punched through the center of his forehead. His eyes bulged wide open, and life drained from his obese body in an instant.
Leo, spinning his tech revolver like an old-school cowboy, mock-blew away the imaginary smoke from the barrel.
"Dexter, you can't bla for this. I actually was planning to let you walk. But you broke our deal—you were supposed to crawl out of here."
Beep!
The room's automatic door was suddenly hacked open.
V and Jackie, guns drawn, burst inside.
"Leo! Are you alright?!"
They hadn't listened to Leo's instructions to stay put in the car. After Leo entered the No-Tell Motel, worry got the better of them, and they decided to follow.
Before Leo could even answer, they both froze at the sight before them.
Despite hearing the sounds of fighting earlier, and guessing sothing bad had happened, actually seeing Dexter's and the bodyguard's corpses sprawled on the floor still shocked them.
"What the hell happened?" Jackie blurted.
"Nothing much," Leo said casually. "Dexter panicked after the job blew up and tried to kill to save his own skin. Sa way he bailed back during that ss two years ago in the Pacific."
Jackie spat viciously at Dexter's corpse. "Fuck! This fat pig!"
V gave Dexter's corpse a savage kick.
Seeing she was about to kick again, Leo reached out and stopped her. "Don't bother. You'll just dirty your shoes."
He glanced at her leg. "Your leg—still hurting?"
V blushed slightly, looking away. "No... it's fine now. Thanks for asking."
"Ahem," Jackie coughed awkwardly, scratching his bun of hair. "Uh, maybe now's a good ti to leave?"
Originally, they had thought Dexter would handle everything—after all, that was what fixers were for.
They never expected Dexter would not only abandon his responsibilities, but also try to kill them to save himself.
Now, with the realization hitting him fully, Jackie couldn't help but panic a little.
After all, this ti they had pissed off Arasaka—not so two-bit gang, but one of the most powerful corporations in the world.
Sure, they had fought their way out of Konpeki Plaza.
But if anyone thought that was the full extent of Arasaka's strength, they were kidding themselves.
Arasaka didn't even need to personally co after them. They could simply slap a massive bounty on their heads, and rcs would swarm them like flies to shit.
No matter how strong you were, you couldn't fight an entire city.
No one could stay on alert 24/7—you had to sleep, you had to eat, and you had to take a shit at so point.
In a wuxia novel, maybe a Nascent Soul cultivator could crush countless martial artists without breaking a sweat.
But in 2077, in a cyberpunk world, raw strength alone wasn't enough—you needed power, resources, backing.
Even Adam Smasher, top of the rcenary food chain, would be dead at without Arasaka's protection.
Realizing all this, Jackie's heart filled with regret.
He should have listened to Leo and V. He should have stayed out of this ss. But now it was far too late.
Seeing Jackie's face twist in regret, Leo didn't rub it in. He just clapped Jackie on the shoulder.
"Relax, Jackie. Don't worry. I already expected sothing like this might happen."
He was just about to explain his backup plan when sothing flickered in the squad comms— T-Bug was back online.
"Hey, Leo, thanks for earlier."
"For what?"
"I had just jacked out of the Konpeki subnet when Arasaka's netrunners almost nabbed in cyberspace. Without your warning, my brain would've been toast."
"No problem. Are you still at your original location?"
T-Bug hesitated, clearly debating whether to tell Leo the truth.
After a mont, she spoke honestly. "No, I bailed. Arasaka was closing in on my place. It was only a matter of ti. Staying there would've been suicide."
"And you guys? You made it out of Konpeki, right? Did you et Dexter at the No-Tell Motel?"
"What's Dexter's plan? He sorting out a way for us to leave the city?"
T-Bug's questions were rapid-fire—but Leo's strange expression made her pause.
"Why aren't you saying anything? Sothing happen?"
"Dexter's dead."
"What?! What happened? Arasaka?"
"No. I killed him."
Leo quickly and succinctly explained what had gone down in Room 204.
"You're telling Dexter was going to sell us out?"
T-Bug sounded incredulous.
Well, maybe not completely incredulous.
When the Pacifica disaster two years ago went viral, even if T-Bug hadn't been there personally, she'd heard the rumors.
Abandoning his crew and fleeing at the first sign of trouble?
Yeah, that sounded exactly like Dexter.
After a mont, T-Bug sighed. "Okay... fine. No big shock, really."
"But without Dexter, how are we getting out of the city? Arasaka already found my place. They'll definitely be staking out your hos too. The whole city's crawling with Arasaka scouts. We're—"
"Okay, okay, calm down. Listen, T-Bug. I have a place. It's safe. Sending you the location now. et us there."
.........
..
.
Half an hour later.
A battered coupe rolled up to a rundown part of the North Industrial Zone, pulling in front of a rusted fence.
The three got out.
In front of them were rusted fences, piles of abandoned cars, trash bins, and broken vending machines.
To the left, a wall bore a graffiti of a skeletal spiderbot. To the right, a garage door was covered in colorful spray paint—a chaotic masterpiece of street art.
Jackie stared at it all, puzzled. "This is it? This is your safehouse?"
"Yeah. Follow ," Leo said, waving them forward.
V and Jackie followed— only for Jackie to suddenly notice sothing.
"Wait, wait—that's—"
Hidden defense turrets embedded in the walls suddenly rose, red targeting lasers locking onto the group.
"Shit! Get down!"
Jackie, acting on pure instinct, threw himself over Leo and V, shielding them with his own body.
The red dots landed on Jackie's back—but the expected storm of bullets didn't co.
Instead, the turrets recognized him as friendly, retracted their guns, and sank back into the walls.
Jackie, confused, scrambled to his feet. "What... the hell was that?"
Leo stood, helping V up as well.
He smiled warmly at Jackie's instinctive sacrifice.
Opening his arms wide, he grinned. "Welco to my turf."
During a previous job in the North Industrial Zone with Lucy, Leo had stumbled across this place by accident. Those turrets had caught his attention, so he'd scanned the area using his tactical visor.
He found the building empty, with only a single corpse inside.
After Lucy hacked in and disabled the turrets, Leo went in to investigate. Turned out, the place's forr owner had been a netrunner—a lot like T-Bug.
But he'd been killed while trying to breach soone else's subnet—the counter-intrusion defenses frying his brain.
With no living owner and no claims, Leo had simply... helped himself to the property.
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