[Bryce: The Brainiacs? Didn't think they'd crawl back out again.]
[Bryce: But to be honest, we did tag you as possibly ex-Brainiac before. Guess we can take that off now.]
The Brainiac Gang was a crew of full-body cyber psychos—similar to the Maelstrom—but while Maelstrom preferred brutal, weaponized implants, the Brainiacs had a fetish for skill chips.
They didn't just love Chrome; they worshipped knowledge.
Old Night City archives list them among the prime cases of cyberpsychosis outbreaks—but theirs had a unique strain, nicknamed "White Matter Madness."
In short, they just knew too much. Their minds spun too fast to keep up.
Some of the higher-ups were practically walking computers.
Rather than fight with weapons, they preferred setting up traps with raw mental power.
Like the Slaughterhouse crew, they once ruled Northside—
Slaughterhouse favored blades, while Brainiacs favored skill chips and neural augments.
In the end, both gangs vanished. The one that survived was Maelstrom—
because they never said no.
Didn't matter if it was junk pulled from the gutter—knowledge, weird implants, whatever—they devoured it all.
And the ones who wiped out those two gangs?
They were sitting right here in this very room.
Brick wiped down the cyber-eye he'd just pulled out, blew on it, and popped it back into his flaming golden sockets.
"The Brainiacs? Bunch of sneaky old bastards.
All they got left is the sneaky part—ten of them couldn't take one of us in a fight.
Slaughterhouse was even worse—total shitshow.
I still don't get if they jerked off with razor blades or slept on 'em.
If it didn't slice, they didn't like it.
We blocked them with some decent armor, sprayed a few rounds, boom—gone.
And those brain-dead idiots always shouted: 'Within seven steps, blades are faster!' Pfft."
Joestar nodded along.
"That's right, boss! That's the Maelstrom way!"
Brick grinned, then his tone shifted.
"But… we ain't doin' too hot these days either.
Wouldn't surprise me if they crawled back out."
"Focus. What's this about Dante?"
Leo cut in, pulling Brick back from his nostalgia.
He was right—this "Dante" had shown up in Northside too, even ran with Maelstrom for a bit.
After Maelstrom's turf went up in flames, the NetWatch sweep through Watson North found an illegal terminal with a curious user ID:
D@nt3_InF3rn0.
It looked abstract at first, but now that they knew Chu Qiaoxi's handle matched that—
the "Dante" reference hit a little too close to home.
Brick scratched his head.
"Eh… I don't really know.
Kid jumped ship from Tyger Claw not long ago, brought a big bag of powder—real party stuff.
Think his name was… Sparkle?"
"That's our product," Maekawa said bluntly.
"Our people do get gigs tied to the Deputy Mayor's office. But embezzlement?
Those suits ain't idiots. My guess—he wanted some extra cash on the side."
So this Dante originally ran with Tyger Claw.
From what they could piece together, he probably learned something while working a job for the gang—
something big enough to make him try squeezing the Deputy Mayor.
Then Tyger Claw got wrecked,
so Dante bolted to Watson to lay low—and keep his little side hustle going.
But then Maelstrom got hammered too,
and he ran again.
Brick frowned, trying to remember. Leo helped him out:
"Didn't Dante stay in touch with Royce?"
The data NetWatch found was scraped from Royce's own system.
Brick froze—then barked:
"Right! Now that you say it, makes sense!
No wonder I don't remember giving him any turf!
Goddamn Royce—shoulda taken his head!"
"Uh, boss," Joestar tugged at him, "we already did. He's paste."
Brick went quiet.
"Right. Forgot."
And so Dante kept bouncing around unstable jobs—
until half a month ago, when the Deputy Mayor's database was confirmed to be in Heywood,
and someone got sent to check it out.
Then came the Heywood incident.
[Bryce: Got it. I'll handle Dante. You keep digging into Kabuki's black market.]
[Leo: You free now?]
[Bryce: Not exactly. Dante might've slipped into the Pacifica side by now.]
So their next lead was the Brainiacs in Kabuki.
But Leo was starting to feel that this passive chase was wasting time.
He needed to move first.
That conversation could wait, though.
"Alright."
Leo stood by the window for a while. From the top of H8 Tower, the view was stunning—
streets below lit with muzzle flashes, alleys bursting with flickers of light.
Westbrook wasn't what it used to be.
"That's it for today.
Now—your turn. What's your problem?"
Maekawa hesitated, then spoke carefully.
"Tyger Claw's done.
No backing, business dead, no new blood, no gear."
"If Jotaro hadn't done what he did, it wouldn't have come to this."
Leo turned around.
"And no—I don't mean me."
If Jotaro hadn't been exposed, Tyger Claw would still be the local tyrant of Westbrook—
gaudy, feared, but at least maintaining some kind of order.
They hadn't always been rich.
Before they grew into a powerhouse, they were just a bunch of poor immigrants from Japan.
People crave strength, crave wealth, crave stability.
Eventually, someone ruthless enough always rallies others with promises beyond profit—
crushes rivals chasing the same dream—
and from that violence, order is born.
Maekawa stayed silent.
Truthfully, until today, he'd always thought Tyger Claw's downfall
was entirely their own fault—
the fault of those lunatics with their ridiculous names.
But after hearing what Leo and Judy said earlier,
he found himself agreeing more than he wanted to admit.
He rubbed his forehead, half covering his eyes.
"What you said to that crazy woman earlier—did you mean it?"
"Of course. Why else would I ask Maiko to help me recruit workers?"
Maiko, the head of Clouds,
had deep control over the entire sex trade.
Leo wanted to use her network to convince some of those women
to move out to Santo Domingo's outskirts for real work instead.
But Maiko twisted his meaning for her own gain—
warped by fear and envy toward Leo's power,
and by her own ambition to climb higher.
Maekawa lowered his gaze.
"Most of the Japanese who fled here did so because they couldn't stand Arasaka's ways.
Many were victims of the Chiba plague.
They all thought Night City was a city of freedom—and it is, to a point.
Every desire can be fulfilled, every idea respected—
as long as you've got the eddies.
But most of us are born broke.
To get rich, you gotta learn to wear your own head like a belt ornament.
No guts, no eddies.
Without courage, money's just something you hold until someone stronger takes it.
Money can buy a lot of things,
but the best deal you'll ever make is buying safety—
even though you're not really buying it.
It's just someone powerful granting you a bit of safety,
because if they wanted, they could take it by force.
Maiko's a lunatic.
She tricked a bunch of idiots with her lies.
She doesn't understand a damn thing."
"And you do?" Leo shot back. "Don't kid yourself—you don't understand either."
Maekawa's face twisted.
He clawed at his own cheeks, losing control, and roared:
"I was going to take care of that freak myself! I just—!"
"Don't make me laugh," Leo said coolly.
"That's not even what I was talking about."