Making It in Night City

I groaned as a bright light assaulted my eyes, stirring my consciousness from the deep slumber it was in. At first I tried to go back to sleep by covering my eyes with my palm, but the increasing heat made it hard to do so. Eventually, I gave up on getting more rest and opened my eyes.

I didn't recognize where I was at first but realized after a few seconds that I was inside a Panam's tent. The olive drab canvas hid away a tiny space filled with a simple bed, a hanger for clothes, some storage containers, and a few chairs. Flipping around showed Panam on the bed, only wearing her one-piece sweater and some undies. Seeing her snoozing away brought back memories of yesterday's festivities.

The impromptu party morphed into a big grill-out bash, which spanned from early noon to mid-evening. As more people returned, the attendees would bring their own contributions. Everything was present, and nothing was in short supply, whether it was food, drinks, music, or entertainment. People danced, sang, played games, and generally had a great time.

Everyone was in a great mood, and smiles and laughter abounded, but an almost imperceptible tension was underneath. For the last two weeks, the clan has known that they were preparing to duel it out with the Wraiths and bringing back a tank just provided further evidence of the upcoming engagement. Things could go incredibly well and usher in the new age, or they could fail spectacularly and be forced to disband or be absorbed by a different clan. But before everything went down, they would party like there was no tomorrow.

I vaguely remember being overfed, drunk, and horny from making out with Panam. Speaking of making out, I always wondered what the private life for Nomads was like. The private abodes were almost wholly comprised of tents, which lacked any sort of privacy. Living out in the open meant having your business out in the open, making things awkward for most people, but not the Aldecaldos.

Later into the evening, two distinct groups formed. I didn't really notice it until Panam dragged me from one to the other. One side had the normal partygoers, while the other side was a collection of people getting handsy with each other.

It was shocking to see how many people were comfortable with public displays of affection. The amount of 'throuples' and 'quads' was even more surprising than couples kissing each other out in the open. Nomads were just more open sexually than city slickers. I don't know if this applies to all the Nomads or just this clan, but the Aldecaldos were more sexually open-minded than city slickers.

The openness would typically weird me out, but I got caught in the mood and started a heavy petting session with Panam. We got carried away and eventually found ourselves in her tent, pawing away at each other. We got into her bed, and I started to take my pants off, only to look up after taking them off and discover that Panam had passed out. I remember being frustrated for a second but then finding the situation funny and curling beside her.

I sat up from the bed and swung my legs onto the dirt and sand floor. Standing up, I walked around the tent, grabbing my clothes and putting them on before opening the door flap and walking out. I stood in the open air and enjoyed the fresh air while stretching. I relished the sensation of my joints cracking and releasing the tension in my joints. Once I finished, I went to the restaurant to buy some breakfast.

I sat at the counter and ordered a breakfast sandwich and orange juice. While waiting for my food, I looked over my levels and attributes. After leveling up twice from completing the Basilisk heist, I had two Attributes and Perk points. I could raise my Body attribute and pick up level two Steel and Chrome to increase my katana damage by twenty percent, or I could raise my Technical level and unlock Cost Optimization to reduce crafting costs.

Eventually, I settled on increasing my Body stat since making my katana attacks more deadly would benefit me most immediately. The next meeting is three days from now, and I plan to use that time to go on a vigilante spree again. Having Steel and Chrome will increase the likelihood I secure a kill within one or two slashes with my Katana. Enhancing the Body stat also boosted my base health, stamina, and melee damage, improving my general survivability.

Once I was done messing with my skills and eating my breakfast, I ordered something similar to go and brought it back to Panam's tent. I placed the bag of food next to her face and watched as her nose cutely sniffed at the food. Her brain picked up that it was food, and her face scrunched before one of her eyes opened to see where the delicious smell was coming from.

When Panam saw it was food, she slowly got out of bed and yawned while rubbing her eyes. She reached into the bag, grabbed the sandwich, and ate it while her eyes were still slightly lidded from being tired.

"Thanks, Basil. You're the best."

"Don't worry about it. Finish your breakfast first, and we'll discuss what will happen with the Wraiths."

Once Panam finished the sandwich, I handed her the cup of OJ I was holding onto because I didn't want to put it on the bed. When the cup became empty, she tossed everything into the bag and threw it into her trashcan.

"What do you want to know about the raid?"

"When and how is it going down? How long will the tank take to get repaired? How many people are participating? Any detes you think I should know."

She then spent the next twenty minutes going over what she had planned. The meetings occur in the afternoon, so I had to be at the meeting point before then. There will be two teams with thirty people in total. The first team has twenty personnel, the assault team, which will move on the ground with the tank. The tank will ram through the gates, allowing the Nomads to enter through that gap.

While the assault team draws attention, the infiltration team will take advantage of the chaos going through the secret tunnel entrance. Once inside, the ten-man squad will surprise the defenders from within. The infiltration team will also aim to find and eliminate the leaders immediately.

The Vets will all participate, most of them in the infiltration team. The only two with the ground team will be Mitch and Scorpion since they have experience operating the Basilisk during the unification war. Saul, Panam, and I will also be a part of the infiltration team, with the remaining spots being filled by volunteers.

Panam doesn't know how long it will take to get the tank back up and running, but she said that Teddy, Bob, Scorpion, and Mitch were confident that they could get it up and running by the time the raid goes down. I was skeptical that a tank could be assembled and operational quickly, but if anybody could do it, it would be the Aldecaldo Vets that served in Basilisks. And I hope they do for their sake since it would significantly boost our likelihood of victory.

"Sounds like you have everything under control."

I was sitting on one of the chairs in the room while Panam was getting dressed and ready to start her day.

"As much control as I can, I guess. But there's still a lot to do."

When she was getting ready to leave, I got up from my spot and walked over to Panam, giving her a quick kiss and exiting the tent with her.

"Well, I have my preparations to do, so I'll have to go back to the city. If you need anything, feel free to ask."

"Will do. See you soon."

We bid farewell and went our separate ways. As I was about to get into my van, I remembered I had forgotten something. I wanted to see if my crafting ability was limited to weapons and gear or if I could make anything as long as I had the technical documents. Instead of heading home, I returned to the camp and found my way to the area with the tents housing the stolen vehicles.

I poked my head into the tent where the Basilisk was and was greeted by the sound of power tools working away. A small team of Aldecaldos was working hard, drilling, cutting, and welding the Basilisk back together. Bob was alone at a table, soldering iron in hand and working on some small electronic piece.

I walked over to Bob and called him when the soldering iron was off the workpiece.

"Hey, Bob. Think you'll be able to get the ol' girl up and running in time?"

Bob put rested his soldering iron down before looking at me.

"We'll cut it close, but things have been going well. Can I help you with something?"

"Yeah. Did there happen to be any schematics or diagrams for this thing?"

"There is," Bob motioned for me to follow him, and I obliged, "The buyer wanted to be able to service the Basilisk by themselves as much as possible."

We walked past wires and people working, eventually stopping at a different desk with a desktop on it. Bob tapped the keys a few times, logged into the system, and then pulled up a file.

"They also wanted to be able to order spare parts from Militech, so Militech included a pretty comprehensive technical data package. It's got measurements and specifications for everything."

Bob stepped to the side and let me look at what they had. At first, the file he pulled up just looked like a diagram, but when I clicked on a part of the Basilisk, it expanded and gave the exploded view. This was nicer than having many separate files or physical blueprints to look over.

You could go to the component level and pull the details for every part. And when Bob said everything, he meant everything. I could go as far as seeing the detailed dimensions for individual screws and rivets. This should work for testing what I want.

I then had bob make a copy on a spare chip and slotted the information into my neural interface. Once the datalink was established, I copied all the info onto my internal drive and ensured none of the data was corrupted. I then went into my system and, to my shock, found that I could craft the Basilisk.

Well, not exactly. I could craft portions of the Basilisk that still have to be assembled. Five new crafting specs were available in my menu related to the tank, the hull, the engine, thrusters, lifters, and the cannon. They were all exorbitantly expensive, costing between one to two and a half thousand rare and epic components. It'll probably take me months to get enough materials to make all the parts, and afterward, I'll still have to get someone to put them together.

But the cost wasn't what was important. What's important is that my powers had far fewer limitations than I thought. I was surprised to be able to craft the tank since the game never let you make vehicles and only weapons, pieces of gear, or ammunition. Maybe I could create the Basilisk because it technically was a weapon. It was in the weapons category, after all.

Regardless, this raised my ability into the realms of being broken. I could make it as long as I can get my hands on the TDP. Of course, there's the limitation that I don't know how to assemble or service the more complex objects, but I just so happened to have a good relationship with a faction known for its technical prowess.

I giggled slightly, imagining the Corpo elites and government officials scrambling to react to a mysterious tank force that popped up in the desert. I probably wouldn't do something as drastic as that... Probably. It's time to invest more heavily in my technical and crafting abilities.