sountrack: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-k_Eg7zXuc

Night City
Pacifica
Aug 15, 2045
2356 hrs

Conrad's Bodega is an obvious front.  Fifteen feet wide, forty feet long, and sub-prime Pacifica real estate.  No one goes there for the food.  No one.  The cigarettes?  Maybe.  The owner, one Vernon Lee, doesn't bother manning the counter.  That falls to his epic fuckup of a son, Wendall.  Or "Snack Attack" as he like to style himself when he's trying to be cool.  Which is often.  Unfortunately.

No, the reason Conrad's Bodega exists at all is because if you brush past Snacks and take a left into the drink cooler in the back, you can find yourself walking down a stainless steel staircase that leads into an old meat locker.  At the entrance of the locker, a heavy oak door keeps the cold at bay from the converted to whisky bar on the other side where only the select few get to meet, drink, maybe play some cards.  Vernon likes to tend bar and pretend his son upstairs doesn't exist.  Makes him feel important.

"Look, Whisper," the solo's usual fixer PomPom had said with an apologetic shrug, "I know this job is about three standard deviations below your usual quality jobs, but view it as a personal favor.  And maybe beer money.  Ten minutes for ten percent."

Wendall, colossal fuck up that he is, went and borrowed money from PomPom direct, the small woman making what was almost surely a play on the old man, not Snacks.  Then he went and lost it in an absolutely shocking turn of events.  "Who could have foreseen this unfortunate turn of events?" PomPom deadpanned.  "So here's what I need you to do.  Ignore Wendall," she refuses to call him Snack Attack on general principles, "head down the stairs, and extract the money from Mr. Lee.  He refuses to take my calls.  3,000eb.  Cash."

The problem, as Whisper sees it, standing across the street from Conrad's, is that Whisper likes to drink here.  The whisky, sourced from some Nomad clan willing to race across the wreckage of the Midwest, actually tastes like whiskey, not a vat grown substitute.  Vernon maybe a shit, but he pours good alcohol, and Whisper has gotten more than a few jobs here.

The cell phone in Whisper's pocket chirps once and buzzes.

PomPom:  You got my money yet?

Martin scratches his stubble, checks for traffic, and steps into the street.  He's spent his transit time thinking about how to handle this job without shitting where he eats - drinks, rather - and he has at least a vague direction and a simple decision tree.

He also looked up "standard deviations" on the way here and he has to admit PomPom's description of the job is accurate.

The traditional brass bells ties to the door chime as Whisper pulls it open.  It's too late for the first-shift workers and too early for the serious club and bar crowd to be hungry, so there's only one customer in the place.  Wendell glances up from the screamsheet he's using to studiously ignore that customer, recognizes Martin, and guiltily jerks the 'sheet below counter level.

Martin lets the door swing shut, cutting off the bodega's supply of stale, humid air.  The mismatched brace of window air conditioners struggles to reassert itself.  Martin gives Wendell the usual nod of acknowledgement to a peer, leaving the weeflerunner his pride, and heads back into the cooler.

The ancient oak door is maglocked shut.  Martin suppresses a sigh.  Clearly, Vernon knows why he's here, and the old man must have been keeping one eye on his surveillance feed.  He taps the intercom pickup epoxied to the wall beside the doorframe.  "Vernon.  Need a moment of your time, por favor, patrón.  Got biz."
This message was last edited by the player at 18:47, Sun 27 Dec 2020.

"Got a...a...uh...private party tonight, Whisper."  Vernon's voice comes through the intercom and it doesn't take professional training to hear the nerves. "Gonna have to ask you to...uh...maybe tomorrow?"

When Martin doesn't respond, Vernon grows more unsettled, leaving the channel on so that the solo can hear background noise from inside the room.  It does indeed appear that there is a social gathering going on behind the door, but if it's a private party, Martin will be terribly surprised.

"Can't, uh, can't let you in...see...private-"

"Hey, if he has money he's welcome in as far as we're concerned!" the voice that cuts Vernon off doesn't sound threatening.  "Especially if he plays cards."

"I don't think-"

"Open the fucking door Vernon!"

If a door could sigh in resignation, this one does as the maglock disengages allowing access to the space.  Martin steps through, looking at the small room.  Maybe three meters by seven.  Wooden bar on the far end, two small circular tables in the center holding two groups of men playing cards.  A few barstools dot the perimeter with a few more at the.  The walls are blessedly free of anything other than genetically modified bamboo wood paneling, giving the eyes a break from the visual cacophony of Night City.

The card players have the look of Edgerunners.  A few deal makers and their solo muscle. Bottles of whiskey dot the tables.  No looks particularly on edge, but Whisper is going to have to make his way across the space to talk to Vernon unless he relishes the idea of demanding money from afar.  Vernon just looks miserable.

Martin steps into the room and confirms his tentative identification of the other speaker: the rarest of Night City's underworld denizens, a retired edgerunner.  Back in the twenties, he worked the net under the handle of Coral Snake.  He had the instincts and financial sense to get out on the eve of the Fourth Corporate War, when he was still at the top of his game with a robust investment portfolio.  These days, with a lot less to prove, he's a coder and occasional mentor to up-and-coming netrunners, lurking under the much-less-assuming handle of Danger Noodle.

"Mostly, Noodle, I lose at cards," Martin rejoins.  "How's biz?"

The older man raises and rocks the hand that isn't holding cards.  "Got no complaints.  Just finished a new rev of Wolfsbane, looking for a few suckers to beta it."  A wave of chuckles ripples around the table; there's a waiting list for Noodle's bespoke apps and he's fairly selective as to who he allows to evaluate his creations.

Martin grins, greets a couple of other acquaintances, and makes his way to Vernon, whose hangdog look has been intensifying by the second.  He leans on the bar, back to the tables, and lowers his voice.  Half the talent in the room has wired audio, lip-reading chips, or other surveillance tech, but the trappings of discretion are what matters here.  "Hey, Vernon.  You having agent issues?  I talked to PomPom earlier.  Said I was headed here, she mentioned she'd been trying to raise you."  Leaving the proprietor a graceful amount of flexibility for negotiations.

Vernon wipes his bar with a cotton rag, refusing to meet Whisper's eyes.  The bio-engineered oak already shines like a Mox's eyes, no signs of water stains anywhere on the polished surface.

"She knew what she was doing," Vernon says quietly.  "Who would loan Wendell money?"  The bartender/host folds the towel before placing it down underneath the bar.  Each movement slow, deliberate, as not to set off any programmed reflexes any of his patrons may or may not be running.  "Three thousand eddies, Whisper.  That's a lot of money. Christ."

Vernon turns slowly, brings down a bottle of whiskey from the shelf under the mirror and pours two shots.  Whisper recognizes the label.  Singing Porcine, a knock-off of some way back when whiskey that still packs a pleasant punch.  And the one Whisper usually orders.  Eyes finally turning up, Vernon motions towards the shot and wraps his fingers around the other one.  "You know what he spent that on?  It wasn't sports betting.  No, that's just what I had to tell people.  Social Media Presence for Edgerunners and a two day course on 'Corporate Extraction Management.'"  Embarrassment leaks from his voice. "We used to say that if you had to take a comedy class, you weren't funny.  You know what I mean?"

The phone in Whisper's pocket pings again.

PomPom: Be aggressive.  B-E-aggressive.

Martin studiously ignores his phone.  In a world where conversational multithreading is the norm, focusing on one interaction at a time is an incremental edge.  It also makes the other person feel like they're the most important thing in Martin's world, which is usually another increment.

Once, Martin made the mistake of disclosing this to PomPom after she commented on his behavior, which is why she now makes it a point to carpet-bomb his phone every time he's on a job for her.  Primate dominance rituals or some such bullshit.

"Wendell reaching for an edgerunner makeover is not going to end well," Martin admits, obliquely acknowledging Vernon's point.  "I'm a problem-solver," he deliberately avoids "troubleshooter" and the implied literal resolution, "but that's a problem I can't solve for you.  That's tomorrow's problem, though.  Today..."

"She's making a run on me," Vernon murmurs, wavering between ongoing despair and simmering rage.

Martin savors the whiskey and hopes this won't be his last in this bar.  "I like the place the way it is.  I'd hate to see what might change with different management."  Not admitting or denying PomPom's hypothetical agenda.  "I'm probably not the only regular who feels that way.  Lotta 'runners with good business sense come in here."  He ignores the phone, ignores the sputtering conversations behind him as everyone intensely pays no attention to him and Vernon.  Metaphorically reaches out and places an implied solution on the gleaming wood with a soft tick.  Hoping Vernon is savvy enough to pick it up and work it.

"I...uh..." Vernon's eyes dart back and forth as he looks at Whisper and then past the solo to the other clientele.  "Debt is...but..."  The barman wrestles with the implications of the solution Martin has brought him, obviously doing the mental math on having a new silent partner.  Or several.  Finally he sighs and puts both his hands on the bar.

"Gentlemen," he offers up, moving slightly to the side of Martin. "I seem to be in need of assistance.  Perhaps...well that is...I need a loan?"

Martin watches in the mirror above the bar as multiple sets of eyes, at least half of which sport cybernetic enhancement, focus on Vernon, relieved of their false disinterest. "My good friend Martin has brought news of a competitor that wishes Conrad's ill will."  A set of overly theatrical moans and sighs meets this announcement from the assembled fixers and muscle.

"How much, Vernon?" One of the fixers, this one a short Hispanic man running by the moniker Six Digits taps his whiskey tumbler thoughtfully.

Noodle exhibits his usual lack of social subtlety.  "PomPom!" he announces with more than a little derision.  "Seriously Vernon? PomPom?  Why don't you just hop in bed with a shark?" The speed with which the Netrunner's agent was able to act is more than a little intimidating.

"Not that simple..." Vernon answers quietly.

"Bidding war?" Six Digits, leaning forward with obvious excitement.

"No," one of the other fixers declares, this one hanging back, more focused on his cards than anything else.  "Vernon, we'll take up an even collection here in exchange for preferred access and a standing 15% discount on your booze."

Martin watches the man stand and weave his way through the assembled patrons.  "If group membership isn't your thing, I'll bankroll you myself, but you probably have a better chance of not pissing off PomPom if..." he lets the thought trail away with casual sweep of the arm encompassing the room behind him and all the dangerous men in it.

Vernon makes sure Martin's drink is refilled as business negotiations commence.  Ten minutes and a handshake later, the deal is done; Conrad's future secure and Martin in possession of 3,000 eb.  A few moments later, Martin's agent vibrates his phone in a new pattern, one informing the solo that his reputation is being scanned, history evaluated.  A flick of the eyes towards Noodle and the Netrunner tilts his head towards the fixer completing his business with Vernon.

"You handled that well," the fixer says to Whisper, offering a hand.  "Could have gone bad, but you made sure Vernon saved face.  I appreciate that kind of discretion and forethought.  I'm Jasper and I'm always looking for suitable talent.  If you're looking for more than PomPom can bring, let me know.  Hell, you want to stay with her and moonlight with me, that's fine too."