An: It is indeed ya boi Rastislav, again.
Welcome and welcome back one and all to another bout of my unhinged scribblings!
A few bits of housekeeping/disclaimers before we begin.
Those of you coming over from my other story will find that the direction I am taking this one in while similar will still be quite different from Sorcerer's Tale, since this character will not be starting out as developed or experienced he will have to go through a few things someone like my other protagonist might take for granted.
So kindly do not bombard me with questions of why he is not instantly the greatest genius mastermind god person to have ever graced the pitiful earth in existence at all ever.
He will definitely have his advantages but we aren't doing an SI in this one.
In short, let me cook.
As to those who might feel the starting chapters are bordering on suffering porn, do not worry, I do not plan on making that an absolute mainstay of the story and it all ends relatively quickly.
Schedule shall be 5 chapters (one every workday) on the first week, and two chapters a week (Monday and Thursday) on every week hence.
Big thanks to AliyaGenesis for being an advanced unpaid intern and beta reading this stuff, truly exposure is the best reward.
Without further ado, welcome ladies and gentlewomen to Shiny And Chrome!
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BD sequence "Flashback" loading...
His first memories were of warmth, and a constant rhythmic thumping.
He remembers thoughts racing through his mind then, of what kind he was unsure but what happened immediately after remained permanently seared within his brain.
The thumping picked up, slowly falling out of tune before a blinding pain assaulted him and he knew no more.
He would later learn an entire four years passed before his was conscious again.
He remembers blinking awake, a loud beeping noise immediately following and a blonde woman with far too many lines on her young face entering his blurry vision, bombarding him with even more noise, soon followed by a wave of sensation that was almost painful as he became aware of his body.
He would curse that moment for many years to come.
Consciousness came and went in those days, sometimes for weeks on end before suddenly returning and making him go through the assault of sensation all over again.
It was only after two years that his condition stabilized and he learned who and what he was.
He was Michael Sobronov, son of Gregor and Svetlana, and he was cursed.
An incident occurred while he was still in the womb, that left his body wrong. His head was oversized, his limbs atrophied and useless, and his organs barely functioning.
The moment he learned that eating through a straw and not being able to stand up was not the norm was not a pleasant one.
His awareness spread then, and he also learned that being able to remember every moment of your awareness was also not the norm. This he found to be only mostly unpleasant.
He could hear life going on outside his room, within an apartment of what he would later learn was floor 46 of Megabuilding H11, located in Night City. Each moment remained carved within his mind, feeding his growing jealousy, even if he did not understand that quite yet.
It was only when he reached nine years old that he met his father for the first time.
A tall, sharp man with short black hair much like the few strands atop his own head entered his sterile room, dressed in a sharp business suit and staring at him with a mix of disgust and regret.
"Svetlana" He greeted his mother coldly, the tired woman barely bothering to face him while her hands continued sewing a length of fabric "Why do you insist on keeping this..." He sneered "Waste alive."
In an instant, the fabric was discarded as blue eyes glared into grey "That is our son you are talking about!"
"He is" Gregor nodded calmly, a slight twitch of his face revealing the facade "And keeping him alive for the sake of your weak sensibilities is needlessly cruel."
Michael thought his cold tone was the far greater cruelty.
"Hah" The woman scoffed, brows creasing "If you don't like spending your money on a 'waste' just say it. No need to dress it up."
The man flinched minutely but still kept to his calm exterior "My position at Night Corp. is not certain, we cannot keep going on like this. If we miss the medicine payments for even one month he dies anyways."
"I refuse!" His mother leapt to her feet and roared "I will find a better job, hell, I will pick up a gun and join one of the gangs if need be but I am not leaving my son!"
Gregor's jaw tensed, the middle aged man just standing there and staring for a long moment before jerkily nodding once "I see you will not be convinced." And leaving without another word.
Svetlana's furious breaths slowly evened out and she looked at Michael with all the gentleness of an angel, she went to hug him but stopped herself.
She wiped the tears from her eyes "Don't worry my son, mother will never leave you."
The boy felt his heart twist then, and he forced his atrophied neck to twitch downwards ever so slightly.
The hopeful look on his mother's face only made the feeling worse.
-----
Six torturous years passed in silence, save for the television that had long since become white noise, his sole escape being the few 'old world' movies and shows his father kept within his collection.
Something within him resonated with those remnants of a world long gone.
The small eternity ponderously ticked away before finally, he was deemed stable enough to get his first implant.
The Neuroport, or Neural Link was the foundational implant most people carried in some form or another, allowing them to interface with their local net and access basic services with only a single thought and also connect to any other cyberware they may end up installing.
The words smartphone-in-the-brain came to mind, even if he could not quite make sense of them or source their origin.
The doctor his mother invited to perform the installation of a basic Militech civilian model seemed just as cold as his father had been, speaking in a clipped and professional manner and remaining utterly to the point, completely ignoring his mother's nudges to perform a more thorough examination all the while.
He did offer to do it for a price after she badgered him for long enough which shut her right up.
"This might sting a little." The doctor said on autopilot and injected his arm with something.
Michael blinked and the doctor was gone, replaced with the sight of his mother wiping what seemed to be blood off the side of the chair that was his lifelong prison.
She saw his eyes opening and smiled at him.
But before she could speak, his attention was drawn elsewhere as he felt a new sensation at the edge of his senses, the distant buzz of what he quickly realized were the appliances around them.
His eyes flickered from left to right until finally landing on a small screen now attached to his chair, a long cord of cable extending from its side and reaching to the back of his head.
The screen reacted to his attention immediately, a spread of information appearing the moment he thought about it. Naturally, he did the first thing that came to mind.
Svetlana flinched slightly as she heard the ringtone in her head and with wide eyes answered the incoming call on her own personal link [Son?] Her voice echoed in his head.
[Mom] He responded, his voice completely flat.
Not that that stopped the tears streaming down his mother's eyes.
------
With the installation of the Neural Link, an entire new world opened up for Michael, and his days of boredom and empty existence turned slightly more tolerable as he began devouring information from the local net.
He learned of the world around him, and of the state of his family. They were what one might call upper middle class, something only reinforced by the fact they lived in the middle floors of the town sized megabuilding, which offered far more space and privacy than the lower floors.
The odd look his mother gave him when he completed his basic education, which he now had access to, in mere months made him quite proud. He was quite happy the large stack of eurodollars she spent on datashards was not wasted.
When he wasn't learning, he consumed anything and everything to satisfy his curiosity, from repetitive television to music the voice in the back of his head called dull and tasteless techno trash, to news on the newest advances in weaponry and the most recent scandal local celebrities got mixed up in.
Though he had to say, the amount of sex and porn displayed so blatantly and so constantly felt just a bit... off to both sets of his sensibilities.
He learned about the corporations controlling the world, and ignored the feeling of wrongness coming from the withdrawn recesses of his mind as he researched the most recent conflict between the New United States of America (NUSA) and the separatist states surrounding it.
Said New United States widely considered to be just another front for the Militech megacorp, just like every other nation out there that was still worth mentioning. It was an open secret the 'nationalized' company was the true power behind the state, and the true decision maker.
The revelation Night City was nearly invaded by the NUSA army and only stopped by a Japanese Arasaka corp super-carrier and forced into an uneasy truce rattled him something fierce.
Whenever he wasn't gushing at how damn preem having a supercarrier was of course.
It also explained the air of tension that surrounded his mother for years.
Not that he appreciated the Megacorporation's involvement at all, both his fellow net enjoyers and the voice in the back of his head understood that the corporations concerned themselves with only one thing, profit.
Fourteen hour work days if you were lucky, eighteen or even twenty if not, company owned augmetics that were "revoked" in case of the worker quitting or being let go (the context did not matter to them at all), cutthroat politics at every level, and a complete lack of morality to top it all off.
Michael wondered how they were not slaughtered by an angry mob yet, and then remembered all the porn and other brain-rotting drivel people were bombarded with on a daily basis and understood quite well the state of things.
It was bread and circuses taken to its logical extreme, perfectly curated to control the masses and exploit them to the utmost while letting them wallow in filth.
Or maybe that was just the old Night City charm, could be either really.
The voice in his head agreed, although hesitantly.
All of it was quite disgusting to the chair-bound boy, to the point he swore off consuming the "brainrot" and focused on more productive things, like his ever-growing fascination with cybernetics.
It came with no great surprise that someone as bound and burdened by the weakness of his own flesh would grow a fascination with transhumanism, something he spent most of his time daydreaming about.
Those daydreams were utterly shattered when he spoke to his mother one day and asked why not replace his wrong parts with better cybernetic ones.
"Your body is in a delicate balance, dear." Svetlana said as she very gently caressed the side of his face "The nerves in your limbs are completely atrophied, and replacing your organs with better ones is just as likely to overload the others as it is to help you"
She winced and looked away "At least the ones we can afford."
And therein lie the problem.
Cyberware did not come cheap, and the more advanced and useful it was the more expensive it got. Civilian models were plentiful, but they were mere replacements, and not actual improvements to the human form.
And those superior versions available to the public usually came with great drawbacks, or so the dwellers of the net said.
The revelation was not a pleasant one to the now fifteen year old boy.
He did not speak for three days after that, save only to reassure his mother as she went back to work.
He always pretended not to see her holstering the gun under her jacket, not that anyone sane entered Night City unarmed of course, but the fluidity of her movements was quite telling of her work.
He was finally drawn out of his spiraling thoughts as he heard the radio his mother forgot to turn off.
"Goooood mooorning, Night City!" The host cheered with a an audible grin "Today's body count lottery comes up to a nice round twenty after a cyberpsycho attack in Northside Watson! Another Maelstrom gangoon with too much chrome for his blood tried his hand with a band of Tiger Claws only to be put down by the pros at Trauma Team after he nearly beheaded one of their clients with one of their severed arms!
I am your man Stan and welcome to-"
Michael did his best to roll his eyes as he connected to the radio and switched the channel to something else.
'Only in Night City' He thought with morbid amusement.
He flicked through a few other channels, mostly ignoring the usual sensationalist garbage until he ended up listening to the melodious voice of a corpo announcer.
"We at Zetatech are proud to announce that with our latest advancements in medical technology we have managed to reduce the necessary biological components of a Full Body Conversion to solely the brain and adrenal glands. You heard that correctly, dear listeners, you may now become your better self with only-"
He tuned out the rest of it as the three words kept echoing in his mind "Full Body Conversion" repeating at nauseam and despite the sense of wrongness from that little voice in the back of his head, searing themselves into his mind.
And thus the fascination evolved into an obsession, and a plan began to form within the fractured mind of the chair-bound boy.
With an almost frantic energy, he began browsing the net for guides on netrunning, all the while he started formulating a way to convince his parents to help him learn all he would need.
-----
It took many days of convincing his mother but finally he managed to make her give him a chance, and then even longer for her to convince his father but eventually the old man was moved and faced his son once again.
"So" The artificially grey-eyed man looked at him without a hint of emotion, the twitchiness he remembered from all those years ago utterly gone and replaced by perfect coldness "You want to pursue an education, do you?"
His mother was obviously furious at the cold address but he preempted her by answering.
[Yes.]
Gregor continued looking at him for a long while before simply asking "Why?"
[Because I have nothing better to do?] Michael snapped in monotone but just as he felt his father was about to tell him off he corrected himself [I want to do something other than waste space and resources. My body may be dead but my mind is still here. The least I can do is fight for my right to live.]
"Hm" Gregor grunted before lightly nodding and stepping forward. He inserted a data-shard into Michael's datapad and ordered "Solve it"
Within was a series of tests that encompassed the entirety of his early education, all of them designed to test what he quickly translated from corpo-speak as a "gifted" child, and fittingly difficult. All of it unraveled before his eyes in mere minutes, and was resolved just as quickly, the datapad pinging loudly as the datashard was ejected.
Gregor's eyes widened slightly but his gaze remained hesitant.
Without a word he picked up the shard and inserted it into the dataport on the back of his neck.
He closed his eyes and exhaled "Acceptable. My new position at Arasaka should give me access to plenty of their material. So long as I grease enough palms" he muttered to himself "What field are you looking to study?"
[Medicine, engineering, cyberware.] Michael listed off instantly.
His father looked at him like he had just said something incredibly stupid despite his previous success "Want me to throw a few more in there?" He scoffed, cold exterior slipping momentarily "People spend their lives chasing an education in one of those and you want all three?"
But the boy was undeterred [I can do it]
"He can do it he says" Gregor mocked though there was a tinge of careful apprehension in his voice "And how do I know you aren't just going to give up the moment it turns difficult? How do I know my effort will not be wasted?"
"Gregor, that is your son-"
"Be silent Svetlana" The man rose his hand "You have coddled him too much already."
"Coddled?!" She snarled.
[I can do it] Michael's blank "voice" echoed across the room [As I've said, I have nothing better to do with my time.]
Gregor once more turned silent for a long while "Is that so?" He asked coldly and leaned in "You aren't just trying to get your hands on a braindance wreath to find an escape?"
[The lessons themselves will be an escape.] He fired back instantly.
Though the idea of experiencing a braindance or two of someone simply walking around was also quite tempting, he admitted in the depths of his mind.
"And serve as all the motivation you need." His father finished for him before shaking his head regretfully "You are a clever boy."
The "What a waste" was silent but went heard by both Svetlana and Michael.
[So?] The chairbound boy pressed.
"Fine" Gregor Sobronov clenched his jaw "I will get you the introductory lesson shards for all three for now. Do not disappoint me."
[I will not.]
His father let out a long exhale before slowly nodding and looking to his mother "I am going to sleep now, I have another double shift tomorrow."
For the first time in his life, Michael saw his mother look at the man with any level of warmth "I will be there in a few minutes."
Gregor grunted and left, the doors behind him closing with a hiss.
"He does care about you." His mother whispered "He just doesn't-"
[Doesn't want to get attached.] Michael finished for her, both he and the voice feeling quite bitter [Mom] He called a moment later.
She blinked the exhaustion from her eyes and turned to him with a smile "Yes?"
He hesitated for a moment before firming his resolve. It was necessary for the plan [I need a Cyberdeck.]
Her eyes immediately narrowed "What are you talking about?"
[I am not blind, mom.] He said [Night city is dangerous, and I will need some way to defend myself while I build myself a body.]
"Build yourself a body-" She visibly twitched "Are you hearing yourself?"
[Why do you think I asked for those specific courses?] His eyes were filled with utter certainty.
She sighed "Michael, I understand you might feel confident but-"
[I will not trade one prison for another!] The words came from the depths of his soul [Even if I impressed Arasaka by finishing my education quickly and had them fix me, I would only be selling myself to them body and soul.] He repeated, eyes alight with determination [No, I will make myself a body that is not tainted by the megacorps or their control, and I will never be imprisoned again!]
Svetlana gaped, looking at him like this was the very first time she had truly seen him "What-" She paused and firmly shook her head "No, I can't let you risk yourself like that."
The voice in the back of his head pressed and he followed its guidance [And what about you?]
She directed him with a warning look.
[Every time you leave the apartment you do so with a gun strapped to your chest. How is that not a risk?]
"I am an adult and your mother" She answered sternly "You don't need to risk yourself-"
[And if you die so do I] Michael really hated the voice then, making his mother flinch like that.
[Let me help us!] He closed his eyes [I don't want to feel useless anymore.]
"You aren't useless-"
[Don't lie to me!] He interrupted her angrily [I am less than useless like this. What is the point of being alive if all I can do is sit and stare at the net all day?]
"I-" She went to speak again but seeing her child's stare she merely deflated, looking down listlessly.
Michael only vaguely noticed it before but now that he looked at her she seemed far more tired than usual. The lines on her face and the bags under her eyes were far more pronounced and a few imperfectly healed scars could be seen on her hands.
She was already running on fumes, and he was demanding even more.
He assured himself he would pay her back and shook the thought away, even as his gut twisted at the act.
"I will think about it." His mother said after a long while a light teasing smirk spreading on her face despite her fatigue "If you do well with your studies."
[As if there was ever another option]
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Get those stones going boys and femboys, we need to get those numbers up!
As always the dread Patreon exists if you want to read ahead, currently we are 15 chaps ahead but the end goal is to make it a nice fat 10 in advance (as well as advanced Sorcerer's Tale chapters.) patreon .com/Rastislav156
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