Caveat: All of my writing is drafty
Cold Open
Aya poked at her stomach. A still-angry scar followed her lower ribs, tracing a five-angled shape around a port implant. The only flaw visible in otherwise pristine skin. A bit of a novelty. She hissed in pain, and touched the opal-like round gem in her jugular notch.
"Don't", a voice admonished her, - hers, almost, - and a silvery hallucination of a woman - her twin, almost, but a bit taller and more muscular - appeared in her vision, standing next to a rotten couch in the dilapidated room.
"It's potentially an optical sensor. Better depth perception, wider visual range. You know this."
Aya pinched her lips. "Andi... yeah. Hm. You do look like how I think Andromeda does."
The figure preened. "Good. that's the goal. Sure you don't want a bit more of a frame?"
Aya shrugged at that. "If needs must."
She brushed her hair, same pale opal as her gem, almost like fiber-optic but not quite like the ones she saw in the ads, or on the streets. "Photonic crystals?"
Andromeda nodded. "Proof of concept, plus, we like the aesthetic."
Aya smiled at that. "Yeah... Haah."
She pulled her shirt back down. "I don't think it's infected. Just a bit inflamed, still."
Andromeda agreed, "Umu. I'm numbing some of the pain, but... the prototype was never meant to be implanted into a person, not for long. Connecting it to major arteries makes the propagation of the retrovirus faster, but..." She shrugged.
Aya knew all of this. Mostly. Just in less detail. She sighed and gave a resentful look at a metallic briefcase, with the 'Biotechnica' logo messily covered by stickers. "And now we gotta deal with that. At least we're bootstrapped, but..."
"...No guarantee we managed to wipe all of the director's private server and polymer-encoded data storage, AND we have no idea if the control computer has malware AND we can't break the WIFI without risking breaking the whole thing AND we need to vanish into Night City and that place is... well..."
"...Social media made out of concrete and neon lights." Aya sighed.
"That. But at least you've stopped sweating goo," Andromeda suggested, chipper.
"...I guess there's that." was Aya's acknowledgement. "Maybe I can finally start wearing something besides cotton." She pulled at her shirt and pants. She was not entirely sure she wasn't just wearing pajamas.
She sighed.
"I want to get this piece of junk out. But we need it to build a proper, high-quality replacement, and... I can't exactly do surgery on myself. So we need to find a, whachamacallem, ripperdoc? Ugh. Getting used to the slang is.... I'm not going to even try."
"That. Don't worry, I am keeping a todo list.", Andromeda confirmed.
"..."
"...You don't want to know how long it is." Aya really didn't.
Andi continued,
"But if we want to get our body to 'Astra' spec... You don't mind eating bits of silicon and titanium, right?"
Aya sighed. "Call me a lightning rat and feed me kibble."
"Pica pica," Andi cheerfully voice-acted.
"..." After a moment, Aya humphed, "Gotta catch 'em all, huh?" The pursing of the left edge of her mouth could be interpreted as a smile.
"So," Aya stated.
"So..." Andromeda confirmed, also appearing to look at the briefcase.
"...Do we leave that here or lug it around? Neither option seems ideal."
It didn't matter which one of them said it.
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