Author: This chapter is shorter, but I think Sora and Musashi's conversation is worth a chapter of its own, and I'll get it out sooner! As always I hope you like it
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Musashi, upon hearing Sora's request, hesitated on whether he should tell him what happened... especially to him. He felt a lump in his throat when he thought about his children, but above all, about young Tashin, for whose death Musashi blamed himself.
On one hand, he feared how his own grandson would look at him upon learning the truth, certain that Sora wouldn't have made the same decision he did. And that's why Musashi deeply respected that selfish part of his grandson.
He took a deep breath, as he organized his thoughts, and then, Musashi asked, hoping that Sora's sudden curiosity about Tashin wasn't significant. "Sora, is it truly necessary?" Once again demonstrating how he wanted to avoid the topic.
Sora simply nodded, but before his grandfather could speak, he placed his helmet, which had been on his lap, on the floor next to Eco and picked up a small ochoko cup with sake for his grandfather and another for himself, saying, "Why don't we start with a drink?"
This brought a smile to Musashi's face, who took the cup and clinked it with his grandson's before taking a sip. This prompted Sora to suddenly say, "Now we're brothers!"
"What?" Musashi asked, perplexed.
"It's nothing, I couldn't help it, here," said Sora with a slightly embarrassed smile, without having finished "preparing" his grandfather to talk, refilling his cup. Then, he offered one of the hand-rolled cigarettes, which suspiciously had a greenish hue.
Musashi stared at his grandson, who was offering him drugs, and upon seeing the expression on his face, Sora said, "What? If someone wants to discuss something unpleasant, I can't think of a better way. Besides, yours is light," Sora argued, surprisingly convincing Musashi to take it with some reluctance but with too much desire to smoke to resist.
"It's just tobacco, and...?" Musashi couldn't finish his sentence when Sora, after lighting his own with his battered Zippo and taking a long drag, completed it for him, his voice deepened due to the smoke, "The best marijuana that Biotechnica cultivates!... (Cough), or at least the one Excella herself smokes... (Cough-cough) damn, that's couchy," Sora said, letting the smoke escape and coughing like a rookie.
Before lighting his "cigarette," Musashi looked at Sora and said, "I'm staying here tonight; I don't want your grandmother to find out I've been smoking, got it?"
"Sure, but a shower would work too, right?" said Sora, not minding that his grandfather would take over the empty apartment for a night.
"With that woman, it won't work. Maybe after a night of cleaning my clothes and showering multiple times... I might, and I emphasize 'might,' finally get rid of her damn Inuzuka nose," Musashi said, lighting his "cigarette" and, after taking a long drag, feeling the knot in his throat and the pressure in his chest from thinking about Tashin slightly ease.
"Tashin," Musashi began, his voice filled with nostalgia. Pouring himself a glass of sake and another for Sora, the liquid shimmered in the dim evening light. "He was the most lively of the three, always full of energy, sometimes too much... he..." Musashi paused, finding it difficult to continue.
After getting lost in memories for a moment, he continued, "Hmpt, sorry, Miyamoto was an exemplary shooter; his scores still stand as the best within Arasaka. Ishida, on the other hand..." A hint of resentment could be heard in Musashi's voice as he added, "idolized his uncle Hiroyuki, so much, he couldn't wait for the day to earn his Mantis Blades. And Tashin, almost as if his name predicted it, was the best swordsman of the three, specializing in Tsume-ryū, like Aoi's brother. Taishin is the one she had intended to give to Getsuga, who ultimately ended up with you."
Upon hearing about Taishin, Sora reacted by slightly squinting one of his eyes, as if something had hurt him, aligning perfectly with what he had lived in the gala. While, without realizing it, one of his hands went to touch the hilt of Getsuga resting against his chair.
Musashi didn't notice his grandson's subtle gesture, as he focused on how Sora carefully caressed the hilt of his beloved sword before continuing, "After losing Miyamoto and Ishida, I felt an overwhelming need to protect Tashin. We even tried talking to him to get him to leave the corporation or at least fieldwork."
"Since we couldn't convince him otherwise, and thanks to his skill with the sword, Tashin joined my unit, the team I personally led. At least, I would always have my eye on him while we protected... your grandfather."
"That man is not my grandfather!" Sora interjected, irritated by the way Musashi referred to the head of the Arasaka family.
"He is, and by saying that, I'm not implying that I'm not, but Saburo Arasaka is also your grandfather, Sora," Musashi said, taking a sip of sake, the warm liquid sliding down his throat, strengthening him for the difficult story he was about to tell. "One of the reasons I didn't want to talk to you about the passing of Tashin is because it's related to your father, the reason for my resentment towards him."
Upon hearing this, Sora's eyebrows shot up, and his eyes widened, before he asked, "He... had something to do with it!? I... thought you hated him for..."
"For the explosion of the Arasaka Tower in Night City," Musashi completed Sora's sentence before continuing, "It would be hypocritical of me to hate him for that, when I still maintain a close relationship with the person who directed, participated, and actually triggered the explosive that blew up the tower. You don't see that I can't hate Morgan for it, do you?"
"No," Sora replied slowly, apprehensive about Johnny's involvement in Tashin's death.
Seeing Sora's despondent tone, Musashi clarified, "I do hate him, Sora. I hate your late father... but I don't blame him for Tashin's death. That honor falls to no one but myself." Without giving Sora a chance to react to his words, Musashi continued;
"During the turbulent times at the end of the Fourth Corporate War. Due to the difficult times of that era, your father's death and his songs inspired many people to take up arms. Numerous extremist and terrorist groups formed during that period, and one of the most dangerous ones called themselves 'The Silver Hands' in your father's honor," Musashi said, unable to keep his hatred for that name from creeping into his tone.
"This terrorist group showed no consideration for collateral victims, even if they were children. They favored car bombs as their preferred method, and because of them, the use of AVs by high-level corporate executives became popular as a way to move around while avoiding the dangerous streets.
A few months before the war ended, after Kei Arasaka's supposed suicide by seppuku, Saburo was forced to personally oversee many Arasaka subsidiaries and meet with different corporations, both allies and enemies, around the world.
During one of those meetings outside Japan, Saburo's location suspiciously leaked. Taking advantage of Saburo's refusal to meet with Militech via AV, considering it a sign of weakness, 'The Silver Hands' saw the perfect opportunity to carry out their last and most ambitious assassination attempt before being wiped off the face of the Earth as retribution."
Musashi paused, his eyes fixed on Sora's. "That day... as Saburo was leaving the building, 'The Silver Hands' launched a massive attack. Hundreds of self-driving cars loaded with explosives sped directly towards us...
Thanks to strict security measures, kamikaze drones, and twin turrets on armored trailers, we managed to stop and destroy more than half of the approaching cars. But the rest... crashed and exploded against the first lines of defense, with the explosions even reaching our group, causing me to become separated from the team.
When I regained consciousness, there was only smoke and dust around me... With the security circles broken and the security team in chaos due to the massive explosion, 'The Silver Hands' seized the opportunity they had created to attack and end Saburo's life."
Musashi paused, his gaze intensifying as he recalled the conflict. "When I got up, still dazed and freed myself from the debris that had trapped me, I hurried as fast as I could toward where the most intense battle was taking place, thinking that Saburo and Tashin would be there.
As I approached amidst the chaos and smoke, the first person I encountered was... Tashin. He had been separated from Saburo due to the explosion, just like me, and was facing several attackers alone...
Before I could intervene, Tashin efficiently handled his assailants, using the Tsume-ryū. At that moment!... I should have been more vigilant and not acted hastily, believing his reassuring lie that he was 'fine and that I should go help Saburo-sama.' I-! I should not have believed him!"
Musashi's narrative became chaotic as he revealed the guilt he had carried with him all these years. "I should have noticed how he slightly hunched over and leaned on his sword. I should have noticed how his breathing was abnormal... I... I should not have left my only wounded son in the midst of chaos to protect the head of the Arasaka family." Musashi revealed the root of his guilt, his eyes shimmering with unshed tears.
Seeing his grandfather in a state he had never witnessed before, Sora intervened, trying to calm him. "Ojii-san, please, calm down!"
Musashi couldn't hear his grandson's concerned words and continued to narrate his tailspin into the depths of guilt and self-loathing, "Or perhaps I did notice, but I refused to acknowledge it, choosing to sacrifice my son's life for my 'Daimyō'," Musashi said with self-disgust in his words before concluding, "Like an obsessed fanatic, willing to sacrifice his own fami—"
Before Musashi could finish, Sora, filled with frustration and confusion, threw a punch with his tattooed and injured arm, which landed on his grandfather's cheek, silencing him and causing him to stagger backward in his chair and fall with it.
"Damn it, that wasn't good for my arm! Are you done, Ojii?" Sora said, staring at the old man he had just struck, finding it difficult to recognize his imposing and energetic usual grandfather in his current state.
Sora, as he looked at the guilt-ridden and doubtful imitation that resembled his grandfather, refusing to recognize it as such in its state, to burst out. "You say you resent my father, huh?
But where's your anger for the real culprits who turned those people into psychopaths? 'Due to the hard times of the era' My ass! It was the tough times that corporations caused, which made people rise up in arms when they had nothing left, not the songs of some silver-armed guy angrily shouting at the world through a microphone.
You say you hate yourself because, in a damn crisis, in which you were probably injured or concussed too, you couldn't recognize your son's lie and the wounds he was hiding so you wouldn't notice. The wrong decision was his, for lying to you, Musashi!" Sora concluded, raising his voice, one of the few times he called his grandfather by his name.
Musashi remained silent, looking at his grandson from the floor, with no intention of getting up, he asked with a voice full of helplessness, "You may be right about your father... and I only hated him because they used his shovel arm as a symbol. But about me, tell me, Sora... If you were in my place, would you have abandoned your son to fulfill your supposed duty?"
Faced with his grandfather's question, knowing that his grandson would never have acted like him, Sora fell silent, unable to imagine a hypothetical scenario in which he had a child and would leave him alone in a crisis like that, as his top priority would be his child.
However, as Sora continued to simulate this hypothetical scenario, he came to the conclusion that he would only be capable of leaving his 'badass' son alone if it meant saving another member of his family.
As he reached this conclusion, Sora had a small epiphany in which he saw things a bit more clearly in his mind, from his grandfather's tormenting decision, Tashin's fate, Saburo's lie, and how it was possible that after Musashi left Arasaka... Saburo had abandoned the project he had hidden from his friend... attempting to bring his son back.
Sora closed his eyes for a moment, processing all his new insights, and when he opened them with a confident look, he replied, "Ojii, maybe I wouldn't have done the same as you..."
Sora couldn't finish when the impulsive Musashi, who didn't believe there was any salvation in his self-loathing, interrupted him. "See, that's why I-"
"Let me finish, Fuck!" Sora raised his voice again, silencing his grandfather, before repeating, "'Maybe I wouldn't have done the same as you' with terms like 'Daimyō' that you use, but in a moment of crisis, I might have been capable of leaving my badass son, whom I mistakenly thought was okay, to try to save another member of my family."
Sora's words made Musashi, grasping the meaning behind them, widen his eyes in surprise as he fell silent, attentively listening to his grandson
"And that, even though it's hard for me to believe, is what you think of that old fossil Saburo. You have both respect and affection for that man, even after what you and Obaa-san have suffered for the Arasaka name... I've never heard you blame him. Like those damn Umeboshi you only like because you used to eat them with him..." Sora said, pointing at the pickled plums, which he relished, proving his point.
In a calmer and more reconciliatory tone, Sora continued, "After knowing you since I opened my eyes in this world... with how rigid your mind was, you never thought of Saburo as anything other than your 'Daimyō,' and not realizing that he was more than that, someone you saw as family... it made you torture yourself all these years, confusing your feelings for protecting your loved ones... for something like twisted honor.
So, Ojii... you weren't to blame... even I could have acted like you in that moment... so don't torture yourself anymore... okay?" Sora concluded, raising his arm to help his grandfather up.
Seeing Sora from the ground, with the sunset behind him, and hearing his final plea for him not to torture himself, almost begging, like a child who didn't want to see his loved ones suffer, made Musashi, instead of seeing the attractive young man armed and in armor in front of him...
For a moment, he saw the eccentric 6-year-old boy with his small arm extended to help him up while smiling, with the same smile that had brought color back to their lives, his and Aoi's. Even the little Eco, who had been silent, gently placed his small paw on his empty eye socket, covered by an eye patch, to encourage and annoy him at the same time.
As Musashi took Sora's hand to get up, he felt lighter thanks to his grandson's words, as the weight of guilt he had carried for years noticeably lightened.
Both standing, they leaned against the railing, and while they were appreciating the views of the city, Sora asked with a more direct tone, "Let's get to the point... Despite your chaotic narrative, I can understand that when you found Tashin after the battle, he was severely injured from blood loss, specifically his brain due to hypoxia, with particularly severe damage to both frontal lobes, right?"
Despite his doubts about how Sora knew, Musashi nodded in response to his accurate question, adding, "The damage was so severe it was considered... brain death... There was nothing we could do... Aoi and I decided to let him go rather than keep him in a vegetative state. It was really tough..."
Sora interrupted, asking the final question he needed, "You don't need to continue. Saburo, in addition to ordering all of Arasaka to mobilize and eliminate the responsible parties as an act of vengeance for his employee and friend, also told you that he would take care of the body and the burial, right?"
With a bit of fear about where Sora's questions were leading, Musashi affirmed one last time. Before Sora, without beating around the bush, said, "He lied. I don't know how he did it or if you verified the body, but what you buried wasn't your son... Saburo kept Tashin alive, searching for a way to repair his brain damage... to bring back his friend's son... Or... that's what I would have done, in his place"
Sora felt disgusted with himself, supposing what he would do in Saburo's shoes, and matching what he possibly did. He had to pause for a moment when the railing deformed under the grip of Musashi's cybernetic hands.
Even so, Sora said; "When I was about to finish off Smasher, Yorinubo's second bodyguard, the one with a red oni mask, used Tsume-ryū to interrupt me. I-I believe, no, I'm sure it was Tashin... He, despite his 'condition,' when he received my imitation of your vertical attack... he called me... 'Otou-San.'"
Sora's revealing account and the 'Otou-San' he mentioned aloud ignited something in Musashi, seeming to Sora like a mere illusion of his grandfather's previous melancholic and weakened state, which was replaced by an intimidating demeanor. When Musashi tensed all the developed muscles in his neck, accompanied by a cold expression on his face, in which, Sora could see a dangerous spark flickering in his grandfather's eye.
With that cold expression still on his face, Musashi couldn't help but let some of the dangerous intent brewing inside him release and mingle as he asked by.... "Hanako, your mother... did she know?"
The question and the unsettling intent preceding it, made Sora's expression change as well, and releasing his own to counter his grandfather's intimidating pressure, he warned him; "Ojii, I'll only say this once... be careful with the expression you're making... and the disturbing intention you're releasing, while naming my mother"
Feeling that his warning took effect, with the pressure Musashi was releasing diminishing, Sora sighed, calming his own intention before adding, "No, she didn't know and still doesn't. You're the first person to bring it up."
Although Sora had more to tell his grandfather about what he had discovered about Tashin with his Nanobot-laden "spit," Musashi turned around with the intention of finding out and demanding the truth from his son himself.
Seeing his grandfather's heated reaction, exactly what he had feared, Sora shook his head in exasperation with his hand, further tousling his disheveled hair before disappearing. Activating the tattoos on his back, he reappeared in front of his grandfather, blocking his way.
"Get out of my way, Sora!" Musashi demanded.
"What are you going to do, huh? Storm the Arasaka Tower demanding Tashin's return?" Sora said, preventing his grandfather from leaving the rooftop.
"Even if I have to use my sword to get it! I intend to demand an explanation from Saburo himself... That Tashin is in the hands of someone like Yorinubo... It's something I can't ...!" Musashi barely managed to say, squeezing his words through the anger he felt upon learning the truth.
"Fucking Great! I have a dead father from assaulting the Arasaka Tower, I might as well have a dead grandfather!" Said Sora ironically, in the face of the furious intent behind his grandfather's dangerous gaze.
Musashi, with no patience for jokes, firmly seized Sora by the harness of his armor. Getting close, he exclaimed with a touch of desperation, raising his voice, "HE'S MY SON SORA!"
"THAT MEANS HE'S ALSO PART OF MY FAMILY!" Sora replied, raising his tone to match his grandfather's, adding, "So calm down and listen to what I've found out. I swear I intend to retrieve Tashin, and my failure to finish off Smasher might actually help make it possible."
Following his words, Sora raised his black hand, releasing a faint cloud of nanobots over it, which puzzled Musashi. Until the five tips of Sora's cybernetic fingers lit up. Projected onto the nanobot cloud a 3D hologram of a bust with an oni face on the surface of his mask.
Under his grandfather's mesmerized gaze at the hologram, Sora made the bust's mask disappear, revealing a face that appeared only ten years older than Musashi remembered of his son Tashin. It was so lifelike that Musashi released his grip on Sora's harness and attempted to touch it. Successfully doing so, when Sora increased the nanobot volume where Musashi's hand reached the face of his son.
With his eyes fixed on the hologram, Musashi, now more composed but still uncertain about not heading to the Arasaka Tower, inquired, "What have you discovered?"
"Tashin's brain damage was irreversible," replied Sora, causing Musashi to divert his gaze from the hologram and look despondently at Sora upon hearing the only piece of good news he had found, shattered by his grandson's words.
This prompted Musashi, recalling Sora's earlier statements, to argue, exclaiming, "B-ut you said that despite his 'condition,' he spoke! He called you... Otou-san!"
Sora changed the 3D hologram of Tashin once again and began displaying the fractions of brain scans that the nanobots had gradually performed on Tashin before his signal was lost upon entering an Arasaka base in the badlands.
In the holographic brain, resembling a 3D MRI scan, one could observe Tashin's brain activity as a random blue pulse coursing through the brain. Musashi, upon seeing his son's active brain, was surprised by the contrast between his actual activity and the time he had been diagnosed with brain death, showing the results of Saburo actually trying to save his son.
However, the most damaged part of the frontal cortex still remained practically dark, with only slight activity, which hadn't been present previously. Sora, before showing something that had surprised him the first time he saw it, warned Musashi, "Ojii, what you're about to see is delicate, so please refrain from jumping to hasty conclusions, okay?"
Musashi could only nod faintly as he witnessed a new change in his son's brain hologram, with the previously inactive brain regions lighting up with two different colors, orange and yellow, in a digital pattern. Also becoming visible were two chips installed in both damaged frontal cortexes of his son's brain.
Having been Saburo's bodyguard for years, Musashi was able to recognize the distinctive digital pattern of his son's brain, eerily resembling the patterns generated by Soulkiller engrams when uploaded into human brains. But the perplexing three-colored brain before him was something he had never seen before.
Before he lost his composure and jumped to premature conclusions as his grandson had warned him, Musashi managed to ask, through gritted teeth, "Sora, is that what I think it is?"
"Yes and no," Sora replied. "As you correctly identified, the digital pattern matches Soulkiller engrams, but... it's not the digitized copy of Tashin, because he is still alive... nor are they two complete engrams... They are two fragments, from two different and incomplete Soulkiller readings."
Musashi's heart sank upon hearing this, refusing to recognize the two faces that emerged in his mind, as he thought about the source of the two incomplete Soulkiller readings. "Sora, what does that mean?" He ask with the hope that Sora would deny it for him.
With a heavy heart, Sora was honest and shared his thoughts, "I-I think Saburo..."
-
A few minutes later.
Sora, with his helmet on and Eco perched on his shoulder, appeared on the second floor of the apartment. As he descended the stairs alone, Morgan, who was playing billiards with Mathew, inquired, "How did it go? I heard quite a commotion up there for just a conversation. Did you guys resort to fisticuffs? And where's your grandfather?"
Facing Morgan's barrage of questions, Sora quipped, "I threw him off the roof," as he entered his fortified room on the first floor to get ready to go out.
Sora's joke only elicited a reaction from Mathew, who exclaimed, "Ah!" and gripped the billiard cue tightly with both hands, believing that he was capable of throwing an old man off a rooftop after witnessing the incident at the bar.
Morgan looked perplexed at Mathew, who had taken the joke seriously, before raising his head toward the upstairs, thinking about Musashi, and saying, "So, he wanted to stay upstairs instead of saying goodbye to his delightful friend, huh? Things got complicated, didn't they, Kiddo?"
"Yeah... he needs some time alone to think," replied Sora with a heavy tone from the room.
"I hope you'll at least tell me something as we move. Night Corp just got in touch with me a few minutes ago; the survivor has awakened," Morgan informed while leaving the cues on the pool table.
"Alright, let's go," Sora responded, leaving the fortified room with Getsuga, his jacket, and his split on his left arm.
"Are you going to keep wearing that?" Morgan asked as he exited, followed by Mathew.
"it's worse now," He replied regretfully as he left and closed the door, not regretting hitting his grandfather but regretting not using his metallic arm instead.
While riding the elevator and noticing Mathew following him, Sora asked, "Hey, Morgan, what do you plan to do with the kid?"
Mathew fell silent and clenched his fists nervously as he listened to Morgan's response. "That's what I wanted to ask you. Depending on what you told him, I would offer Mathew what I had in mind."
As the elevator closed, Sora began to reply, "I was thinking..."