'Can he really not see me?'
Holding my breath and standing stock still, I watched the purported scav saunter towards the cage without so much as a glance in my direction, his rubber apron and booted feet particularly loud in the moderate sized room.
Harboring substantial doubt regarding my current existence and the events playing out, I ignored the discomfort of my bare feet on the rough ground and took a slow step back.
When the scav still showed no inkling of having noticed my presence, I took another, then another, until my naked back pressed against the cold metal bars of the cage.
True to my mysterious benefactor's prediction, my caution would prove to be unnecessary.
The completely oblivious man unlocked the security keypad and swung the cage door open, a screechy whine cutting through and rising above the noise of his own movements. Unbothered, he strolled in and went straight for the unconscious pile of sparsely clothed people.
Without missing a beat, he stooped down, grabbed the nearest person and tossed the unlucky man over his shoulder.
'Yep. Definitely a scav. That means...'
Watching him turn around to leave, I closed my eyes, inhaled, and cleared my mind of all unhelpful thoughts. With a deep and loud exhale, I reopened my eyes, clenched both fists and charged him, screaming inside for an extra dose of courage.
Right before he exited the cage, I rammed into him shoulder-first, the little momentum I'd gathered sending him down in a rough tumble.
He slammed into the metal bars face first, the full weight of his body and the load on his back making the hit painful and loud. Suppressing a wince, I ignored what seemed to be curses in an unknown language and reached down into the messy entanglement of his and the unconscious man's limbs.
After a brief search, I grabbed the gun holstered on his hip and pulled it free, flinging myself back not a moment later. My foresight proved excellent as he spun with a roar, his gloved arm swiping through the space I occupied a split-second ago.
His gaze a picture of fury, he stood up and scanned the enclosure, his contemplative gaze pausing on the man at his feet and the pile of unconscious people for a worrying amount of time. To my relief, he looked away after a short while. That relief disappeared as fast as it came when he pulled out a knife.
The apparent lack of a culprit seemed to have stoked his rage. He slashed the air around him frantically and released another round of expletives, all while trying to retreat. I needed to act before he left or called his friends, but the knife gave me pause.
I was invisible, not invulnerable. Nonetheless, I still needed to subdue him before he left and called for reinforcements.
As a complete and utter novice at handling firearms—or taking lives for that matter—I didn't bother trying to shoot him. I instead adjusted my hold on the gun and gripped the barrel tight.
Moving to his right flank and keeping the itinerant knife in my sight, I made sure to stay out of its reach and timed his movements, watching for the perfect opportunity. Said opportunity presented itself the exact instant he swung to the left and exposed his right side.
Like a predator stalking his prey, I took advantage of this momentary lapse and pounced, my gun-holding arm stretched far behind me. As though I were swinging a hammer, I brought the gun down on his temple, using every ounce of strength my new, healthy body could muster.
The loud and brutal nature of the collision made me wince, but again, I suppressed it.
As though I hit him with an actual hammer, the scav's head jerked to the side and his body followed suit. He staggered like and fell like a drunkard, catching himself on his knee and arm. Him assuming this position unknowingly dictated the next round of attacks he was about to receive.
Using every bit of musterable effort, I brought my foot down on his right hand and got a howl of pain in response. The same hand also happened to be gripping the knife, however its hold loosened but did not break despite the ruthless stomp.
Putting my shock at that failure on the backburner, I shifted most of my weight onto the planted foot and raised my other leg. I shot it forward and acquainted the sole of my foot to the side of his head, jerking it to the side sharply.
This brought him to his knees completely. However, in a show of surprising resilience, he tried to retaliate with his left arm. The makeshift hammer reappeared on the scene and knocked away the offending appendage, right after which I gave his gray matter another good shake.
I felt him go slack before I saw it. The tension in the hand beneath my foot loosened when I kicked him the second time.
Worried that he may be faking to catch me off guard, I kept the foot trapping his hand in place and wrapped both hands around the gun barrel. I twisted my waist, swung both arms to the right before swinging them back in a manner one would a baseball bat or golf club.
A crack closely followed by the ringing of metal echoed throughout the room as my strike caught his limp, falling form in the face and shot him back into the bars of the cage.
His unconscious form slumped on the metal bars and ground in an undignified manner, his arms by his sides and mouth slightly ajar.
My chest rose and fell as I lowered my arms and took in the gruesome sight.
The trembling in my body and the sick feeling in my stomach urged me to drop the gun and look away. But I forced myself not to, eager to get accustomed to such acts of violence and what they begot as quickly as humanly possible.
Cyberpunk 2077, and by extension, Night City, was not for the faint of heart. The notions from my old world would not fly here. Rather, the faster I got used to dishing out and experiencing violence, the better my prospects would be.
My recent actions and this train of thought summoned to mind the deal I'd agreed to, making my grip on the gun tighten unconsciously.
The two options presented to me were basically this: either strike out on your own and maintain your clean conscience or sacrifice your morals for power.
Had this been my old world, this would have been an easy choice. I'd take a normal, boring, heck, even painful life over becoming a murderer any day.
However, here on this deplorable earth where existence for the common person was as depressing and terrible as humanly possible, I did not trust my average human abilities to help me survive nor thrive for that matter.
Any pride I had in myself and my capabilities had long been beaten out of me.
Being born with a chronic illness and experiencing a lifetime of pain because of it tended to have such an effect. I had absolutely no misconceptions about the absolute mundaneness of my existence.
I was nobody.
Without power, Night City would swallow me whole, chew me up, and spit nothing out… like it did to countless others with dreams of grandeur. That's why I chose to put my moral hangups aside. Or else I could kiss any notions of a meaningful life or a happy ending goodbye.
With this line of thought coming to a close, I reaffirmed my resolve and exhaled through my nose, relishing in this simple act that used to be an everyday battle.
I focused on the gun I'd identified as some sort of revolver. I turned it over repeatedly, scanning and probing it with a gaze that grew more knowing as it danced in my palms.
With both hands, I adjusted my grip on it, using the wealth of media I'd consumed about firearms. Pulling from that same font of knowledge, I pointed the golden weapon's muzzle at a downward angle and took aim at the unconscious scav's head.
Aware of how the smallest of tremors could wildly disrupt one's aim, I stepped closer and pressed the muzzle directly against his temple. Finger stuck to the trigger but unwilling to move any further, I looked down at my first would-be victim and psyched myself to proceed.
'It's not about right or wrong. It's about doing what's necessary.'
Even with all this mental encouragement, I still was unable to fire the shot. Just when I thought I'd never be able to do it, the scav flinched suddenly, igniting and sending my panic into overdrive.
I shut my eyes and squeezed the trigger, abruptly acquainting myself with the thunderous and powerful nature of firearms.
It was as though a bomb went off right in my face.
The smoking revolver bucked against my arms as a massive jolt wrecked my entire being. I flinched like I'd been struck by lightning, leaving the gun to slip from my grip and join its deceased owner on the pockmarked concrete.
I winced at the incessant ringing in my ears and scrunched my nose at the burnt chemical odor assaulting it. The obscenely high decibels and sulphuric scent of gunpowder were all novel experiences, but they couldn't beat the harrowing sight of an opened cranium and the fresh pink of its leaking contents.
For some unknown reason, the gruesome sight drove away any hint of trembling from my body. Even the tiny tremors I'd been feeling in my eyelids had vanished.
A chill originating from my deep within had spread to all my extremities, freezing me in place so I could properly "appreciate" my handiwork.
I stood there for hours. At least… that's what it felt like.
Eventually, I couldn't take it anymore and turned my gaze away, the urge to vomit driving my actions. The chill in my body receded like a dream, and my stomach erupted like a volcano, shooting its contents up my gullet into my mouth.
Instead of partially digested food, all I got was a distinctly bitter burn in my mouth, throat and chest.
With an expression that matched the disgusting sensation, I forced the scant bile down and straightened myself. I began to think about obtaining some water to relief my mouth of the awfulness when a robotic voice suddenly said out of nowhere.
"Custom Made System activated."