Ravensdagger_Kittypunk_Cyberpunk_Kitrpg

Chapter Thirty-Two — The Solonet

Chapter Thirty-Two — The Solonet Jenny led Alyssa into a doctor's office of a sort at the back of the building. It reminded me a little of the surgery room I'd just been in within the mega building the cult occupied, but this one had more posters of scantily clad women on the walls and LED lighting. It was also, notably, cleaner.The doctor who came out was shrugging on a pristine white coat as Jenny entered and helped Alyssa onto the surgery bed in the room's centre.Sharp and I stood back as he asked Jenny some pointed questions and then started to inspect Alyssa.Jenny stepped away soon after. She gave Sharp a quick tilt of her head, indicating that she should follow her out into the corridor. "Hey, uh, thanks for everything. I've got to talk to some people. I'll arrange a ride back over to the bar for you, if you want. On me.""Thank you," Sharp said. "I'd appreciate it."Jenny nodded sharply. "Yeah, no problem. And I was legit about the Solonet thing. Hook me up with your deets.""Okay," Sharp said.We stood awkwardly off to the side while Jenny moved on past. Sharp waited for her to be out of sight before she glanced down at me. The curiosity in her eyes was obvious.I sighed. "The Solonet is a sub-faction of the wider internet," I said. The modern internet was... divided. For safety, and because it was more profitable for some people this way. The city had its own net, as did most major metropolitan cities. There was a country-wide net as well, then dozens of corporate maga-servers. The Solonet was not one of those. Instead it piggie-backed off of the wider internet, a collection of well-hidden yet accessible sites."Okay. I think I know what that means," Sharp said. "We had something like that for education stuff."Right, that made sense. "Well, in this case, the Solonet was designed by some mercenaries. It's both a forum, and information gathering device, and an organisation of sorts. When you create an account to log into the Solonet, you tie it to your mercenary ID. Official or otherwise. That account is used across the Solonet, for access and also as a sort of social-media account.""I never really got into social media stuff. The orphanage warned us that it was unproductive," she said."Fair enough. It mostly is. The only useful thing is that accredited members of the Solonet can tag others for having completed a job. Fixers and info-brokers have more power when it comes to giving someone credit for work accomplished."It took a moment for the light in Sharp's eyes to brighten. "Is that how edgerunners are made?""It's... one of the ways," I said. "Mostly those credits are added up to a score that determines how good a member of the Solonet is at accomplishing certain types of work. Netrunning, hacking, assassination, grunt work, transportation, information gathering. There are categories. An edgerunner is often someone who rises very rapidly through the ranks with little regard for pacing themselves.""I need an account, then," Sharp said.Great. Now I had to temper her expectations.The Solonet had plenty of work available on it. Some of that work was gatekept behind certain levels of capability. It prevented nobody idiots from taking on jobs far beyond their capabilities. But some work? Anything went for those. The pay was trash, and the work dangerous, but it paid and it gave the worker points.People often became obsessed with seeing numbers go up. It was a stupid part of being a thinking, human being.The riskier the job, the better the reward in terms of accreditation and expertise rankings. A fresh solo might start off with simple, low-risk gigs, but they often quickly discovered that the best gigs were locked behind higher levels of expert ranking.To get those levels faster, they could take on riskier work. If they lived, they'd get access to jobs that paid significantly more, as well as more respect on the Solonet and outside of it.It was a vicious cycle that mulched up unwary and unprepared idiots all the time.That was how Edgerunners were born. People wanted to be at the top of the rankings now. Not in ten or twenty years, after carefully picking their way up.A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.I explained all of this to Sharp, though with a hefty dose of warnings and some careful arguments about the dangers of the Solonet and its tendency to make young people turn into young corpses."I really want to be at the top of the rankings," she said."You haven't even seen the rankings," I said.Sharp blinked sleepily. "Yeah, and?"This girl was going to be the death of me. Fortunately, Jenny returned. She checked on Alyssa before saying anything, but she did return with good news. "I got a friend of a friend to agree to give you a ride back to Fenway. He can drop you off on the same block as the Bloody Bat.""Thanks," Sharp said. "I think the moment I'm home I'll be taking a shower, then it's off to bed. Today was a lot.""Yeah," Jenny said. She smacked Sharp on the shoulder. "Thanks again. I'll uh, talk with Aly about a decent pay.""Cool," Sharp said. She took the name of our driver, then headed out with me riding on her shoulder the entire time. We got to the garage, where Jenny's van had been reparked in a more sensible location and where some of the locals gang members were now loitering. One was waiting by a car.He just nodded and let Sharp in, and then we were off. His ride was one of those little Asian imports, low to the ground, covered in neon paint, and with a sound system worth more than the rest of the car.The car blasted neonstep until we were in Fenway. I was very much tempted to bite the driver, but that might cause us to crash, and I didn't need that at the moment.Once we were back in our home turf Sharp and I made it back to the Bloody Bat, slipping in through the rear. Sharp never did get that shower of hers. She crashed onto the bed face first and was instantly out.I sat on her back, then laid down. She was warm and made for a good bed, even if she did stink a little of sweat and gunpowder. We would have to wash the sheets out.Then again, we might not be staying here for long.We had enough money now that continued work for the Bloody Bat felt... somewhat foolhardy. Money was nice, but the amount Sharp earned here was too small to matter.It would be far more sensible to start moving back to my place.There were trains from the town I lived in to Boston Two. It was a good three-quarters of an hour ride, and it wasn't cheap, but we could afford it now, and we had the means to cross the city.Sharp was almost earning enough from her gig work as a courier to afford rent. Almost. With the savings we had, she could ostensibly afford a place for several months in the same building I lived in as long as she was accepted. And if I had access to my place, then she would be.I nodded to myself as I started to fight off sleep myself. It was a good plan.Not tomorrow, though. There were a few things we needed to get done first.The money left sitting under the bed was a bad move. I hadn't thought about it, but with a Solonet account, we would be able to funnel it into a... somewhat secured account. Mercenaries needed discreet ways of moving money around.I trusted the Solonet as much as I trusted any bank. Less, actually. But for someone like Sharp? Well, it would do for now.I made a mental list of things to go over:— Continued training— Securing our current money— Obtain some basic gear for Sharp— Continue courier work— Get a bead on some better gig workThat all seemed... challenging but doable. As long as we didn't exaggerate anything, we had some good opportunities lined up.Ah, right, there was the entire kerfuffle with Jenny and Alyssa as well.Best to find a way to avoid either of them for the foreseeable future. They owed us one, as far as I was concerned. Hopefully, anyone who'd seen me would assume that I was an agent of the Cat Eidolon, or one of their warlocks, and not tied so closely to Sharp.I... was going to need a disguise as well, at some point, even looking like a cat.How irritating.I yawned, then pressed my paws into Sharp's back before spinning around to find a more comfortable way to rest. This girl needed to eat more, she was all skin and bones, and that didn't make for a comfortable bed.

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Chapter Thirty-Three — SharpRunner1902

Chapter Thirty-Three — SharpRunner1902 We woke up early enough the next morning for Sharp to confirm with Mark that he didn't need Sharp to come in that morning. He seemed used to his couriers being the sorts of people that dropped in and out of the job. We did get news that Derek was back on the job properly, though he was taking things slow and keeping to safer, less burdensome deliveries and was also helping Mark in the office with paperwork.He was recovering from that gunshot well, but still had some postoperative convalescence to get through before he would be ready for proper work.In any case, once we got through that call, Sharp and I took a long shower. I still didn't have cleaning products for cat fur, but we made due with some water and softer shampoo for now. I needed it.And then... we returned to bed.The night had been long and rather rough on both of us, and we clearly needed some more rest. I was pushing it as it was. My body was still very much juvenile, I needed sleep. Or so I told myself as I laid down next to Sharp's warm body and fell right back asleep.By the time I woke up some hours later, I wasn't feeling nearly as damp. "Good morning," Sharp said.She reached down and ran her hand down the length of my back. I almost told her off for it, but it did feel nice. "We should find a grooming kit," I said.Sharp giggled. "We can add it to the list."I nodded. "Today's going to be a big day," I said."It is?" she asked."It is. First, we're buying a computer of some sort. We don't need an advanced deck, just something better than a phone to connect to the internet with. Then we're going to get you access to my apartment. I've been thinking about it, and... I can enter your biometrics into my personal apartment. We don't need you to rent a separate space.""Oh," Sharp said. "Thank you? Is that something we can just... do?""Certainly. Then we need to make it to my apartment. We're going to want to create a Solonet account first, however, and use it to stash the money we have in a secured banking account."Sharp yawned, then moved me aside so that she could sit up on the edge of the bed. "Okay," she said. "So a big day of shopping and such, and then... a new home?""If we make it there by tonight," I said. It was a good ways from the city. Obviously we were going to take a train to the town, then take an autocab from the station to my place. That'd take a solid hour, however.I generally liked the separation between my home and Boston Two. It was safer that way. It was surprising how often gangs and the like would simply refuse to move out of their neighbourhoods."First, we need to meet with Paris and let her know that we won't be working for her anymore."Sharp tensed up. "I can't do that! She needs me for a shift today!""And how do you think we're going to get everything we need to do done if you're going to be here working a shift? Do you think I can lug that bag full of cash all the way to the nearest bank on my own?"Sharp groaned and flopped back onto the bed. "Maybe... tomorrow?"I narrowed my eyes at the galling laziness, but... well, it wasn't smart to rush. "Fine."Sharp grinned. "We still have hours before work starts! Let's get that computer and do the banking thing?"That was a sensible idea. Sharp got dressed in her Sunday best, which were still too close to rags for my liking, then scooped me up into her arms and we were off. Our first stop was a place to grab some semi-decent electronics.We could have gone to any old retail place, but those tended to piss me off. The computers they sold were half bloatware by mass. I didn't need to have Sharp spend the next week deleting pre-installed spyware and mucking around with operating systems to remove the constant pop-ups that came with that kind of system.No, instead I decided to take on a slight bit of risk and I led Sharp across the city towards Cambridge. The area had several large universities and colleges, many of them technical in nature. That did mean that there were more stores selling basic electronics, laptops and tablets and the like, but there were also a few stores hidden away in that area that sold things directly to netrunners and hackers.Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.Those kinds of places were usually paranoid, and for good reason. They sold to people who were often on the wrong side of the law and jailbreaking systems was... questionably legal.The issue in closing them down was that a good portion of the netrunning community relied on these shops to function, and in turn the city needed its netrunners, as did every corporation out there. So, a blind eye was turned towards the shops as long as they kept their heads down.It took us a solid hour to find a decent one that very specifically wouldn't ask any questions. Not even a peep about our Solonet account or any ID. With Sharp wearing her courier jacket, they probably assumed she was being sent out to grab something on someone else's behalf.It was a sensible enough thing to assume.The shop we snuck into was long and narrow, filled with racks that pushed into what little walking space there was. We found a selection of refurbished laptops at the rear, then picked something that was right in the intersection of not too expensive and not unusably old.A wad of cash was handed to the shady older man at the counter later, and we had a working machine.Now we just needed an internet connection.Fortunately, Cambridge had more cafes than a poor neighbourhood had dollar stores, and it wasn't hard to find one that was pet friendly and which had wifi. The hot chocolate that Sharp ordered was exorbitantly expensive, but it came with whipped cream, marshmallows, and a dusting of cocoa powder."Alright," I said. "Now we just need to make you a Solonet account.""Is that hard?" Sharp asked as she fiddled with the laptop. It had a few things pre-installed, but they were innocent enough. A browser and some basic programs, all we'd need to set it up to our liking later."It shouldn't be. Go onto the main page from your browser, yes, that's right. Ah, we need a secure browser, so we need to download that first... good, now while that's downloading, order me something too. Maybe some milk? There has to be some sort of pastry that's cat friendly here, right? They have seventeen types of milk."I got a snack and ate it while resting on a table made of recycled pallets. Sharp got us the browser we needed, along with a few extra bits and bobs, and finally got onto the Solonet. From there, we opened a fresh account.There was some arguing over names. I veto'd KittyLover and CatPetter, but I wasn't able to prevent her from avoiding any sort of pun.The SharpRunner1902 account was born.It took another half hour past that to use the Solonet account to open an account on a digital bank. It wasn't as secure as I'd want, but it was a start."Okay," I said perhaps an hour later once we were all set. "Now we just need to deposit the cash in our digital account and we're done. Fortunately, we happen to know a courier service that we can trust. Mark can take care of the transfer for us.""I'm gonna text Jenny my username!" Sharp said. "Ohhh, there's a leaderboard."I walked up and sat on the keyboard. "No," I said sensibly. "We don't need you hooked on the idea of seeing numbers go up when all it means is that you're going to risk your life even more. Contact Jenny if you must, you do deserve that reputation and more, but don't get fixated on these leaderboards."Sharp pouted, but it had no effect on me.She did finish her hot chocolate and packed up. A few minutes later, we were riding our way back to the Bloody Bat.One more night at the bar, and we'd be out of there.I was looking forward to it. So many luxuries had been left behind when I turned into a cat. I suspected that Sharp wasn't quite ready for it all, but it would be fun to see her trying to get used to a soft mattress and a limitless shower whose water was actually warm.

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