Well, seems like I've been
tasked to write either cyberpunk or NetHack versions of Gensokyo, and seeing how I'm more familiar with cyberpunk, I decided to roll with that. Be aware that I generally equate cyberpunk with "dark", so... Yeah, this has the potential to be somewhat bleaker than the other stuff I've written. Anyways, here goes!
The girl sat in the corner, head between her knees, arms hugging her legs. She sat there, twitching, at times only occasionally, at others violently, thrashing around, ranting and screaming at some invisible phantom.
get out get out get out get outShe rolled over the floor, tears rolling down her cheeks as she grasped tightly to her skull, repeating the same thing over and over again like some kind mantra of madness.
get out get out get out get out get out GET OUT GET OUT GET OUT!Her fingers clawed at the side of her head, pulling on the red cables sticking out from either side. Unable to remove them, she instead grasped the scarlet orb they were both attached to and began banging it against the floor like a woman possessed.
GET OUT OF MY HEAD! GET OUT! OUT! LEAVE ME ALONE!Soon, very soon, she gave up on assaulting the orb, and stared at the data terminal in the middle of the room, the screen still flickering with light.
Please... Go away... Get out...Slowly, she got to her feet, and shambled towards the nearest door. She shuffled zombielike across the balcony, rain lashing down around her as she grasped desperately to the rail.
Why... Why won't you go away? Get out... Of my head... Leave me alone...The rain and the madness combined to make the entire world seem like a blur. The bright lights of the city hurt her head, but not as much as what was inside her. Not as much as what she'd seen, what she'd unwittingly put inside herself. It was supposed to have been a routine assignment, nothing more! Just routine! It wasn't supposed to end like this!
But... She'd stumbled across something she hadn't expected. A dark secret that even now ate away at her mind, abusing the very implants she'd had put in place to help her stop this kind of thing happening to someone else to rape her thoughts and rip apart her very sanity.
I... I'm sorry. Koishi... I hope you can forgive me... But I can't take this anymore... It hurts... Too much...She gulped in fear, one hand still cradling her aching head whilst the other gripped tightly to the rail. There was no other option in her mind. This was the only way, there was nothing else she could do. She just wanted rid of the pain, rid of.. The voice, that terrible, terrible voice.
And so, she jumped.
It took a while to reach the ground. Thirty stories was a long way to fall, and with the pain in her head, it felt like an eternity. But eventually it all came to an end. The grimy pavement hurtled closer and closer towards her, closer, closer, ever closer, until...
The sound of flesh hitting tarmac with such velocity was sickening. Blood oozed out from underneath a shape that was once a remarkably pretty young woman, but now, with every bone shattered so suddenly, was little more than a crumpled pile of meat.
Satori Komeiji passed away at 23:04. Cause of death: Suicide. Jumped off the thirtieth floor of Chireiden Apartments, East Gensokyo, for unknown reasons.***
Gensokyo. The land of fantasy. A festering wound in the rotting cadaver that was New Japan. And what a joke that was. "New Japan"... As though appending the name like that would distract her residents from the fact that ever since the war ended, everything was slowly spiralling down on a one way trip towards Hell.
The city lights gleamed as bright as they could, but they could never fully pierce through the thick smog clouds that clung to the towering skyscrapers like a cancer to the lungs of a chronic smoker. Every day, hundreds died pointless and meaningless deaths in this sickening piece of suburbia, but until now, none of them had ever mattered to me.
Name's Komeiji, by the way. Koishi Komeiji.
Detective Koishi Komeiji, actually, of the cybercrimes division of the Gensokyo Police Force, which is yet another joke. And three nights ago, my sister died. Hurled herself down thirty stories. I would be lying if I said that didn't sting a bit.
But now wasn't the time for mourning. Y'see, before she... Well, you know... My sister was working on a case. She was a cop too, see. Pretty much the reason I got into the force. I idolized my big sister. I wanted to be just like her, which is why I let them drill a couple of holes in my skull and wire my brain to a portable computer. But yeah, this case... It was nothing special, really. Just an investigation into corporate corruption, nothing big. Apparently some folks over at Ichigo Corp were embezzling funds into some personal project. Whatever it was, it seemed like she was really onto something before she... Ahem.
"I just don't get it..." sighed Chief Kotohime, scanning through Satori's notes on her dataport as she walked beside me, her long red ponytail bobbing up and down with each step. "She didn't
seem to be troubled when she left the station last night... What makes a girl like her through it all away like that? Oh, um..." She stopped and looked at me apologetically. "I'm sorry if this is troubling you, Komeiji."
"No, it's fine, chief. Talking about it is sometimes the best way to cope with loss. But thanks for the concern." I tried to smile back to reassure her, but I must have given the wrong impression, as she just ended up looking even more worried. Guess I have that kind of smile, huh. "Um... Well, Satori was... Always pretty good at hiding what she really felt. Good trait for a cop, not so good at... Other times." I laughed, but it was a hollow laugh, devoid of any actual emotion. We both stood awkwardly in silence for a few moments after that.
The silence was broken by a green haired girl wearing an old fashioned maid uniform, and a steaming mug. "Mistress, your coffee is ready." she chirped in a melodic, but ultimately mechanical fashion. Her outfit coupled with the generally artificialness of her appearance and her stiff movements easily marked her out as a Ruukoto, one of the many identical robot servants manufactured by Ichigo Corp.
"Oh, um, thank you," the chief replied, taking the mug from the Ruukoto and blowing on the steam rising from it.
The Ruukoto stiffly bowed at an exact forty five degree angle, and chirped again. "If you are in need of anything else, please let me know."
"Um... No, that'll be all for now. You're dismissed." And with that, the Ruukoto performed the perfect bow once again and marched away, her mechanical joints whirring with every step.
"Those things give me the creeps," muttered the chief, when she was sure the robot was out of earshot, before sipping from her mug. "Ugh... And they can't make coffee to save themselves..."
Not wanting to be deprived of her precious caffiene, however, she continued to drink the revolting coffee as we walked to her office, gagging on every mouthful. She sat behind her desk, and beckoned me to sit opposite her.
"Now, Komeiji, I know it's a bit too soon, but I've been asked by the higher ups to ask you a few things about your sister," she said, clasping her hands in front of her and trying to sound as sympathetic as possible. "Are you okay with that?"
I nodded. In all honesty, it was probably better to get this over with as soon as possible. I tried to smile as I answered all of her questions, which turned out to just be stuff about her childhood, and whether she'd ever been depressed before, and the like.
"Well, that's that taken care of, I guess," the chief sighed, and slumped back in her chair. "Komeiji... I'm really, honestly sorry about what happened. Your sister was a damn fine cop, and it's a shame to lose someone like that."
I responded by merely nodding. As much as I missed Satori, the amount of condolences being thrown at me already was starting to annoy me. "Is there anything else, chief?"
"Well..." the chief leaned forward, clasping her hands again. "There was one other thing." She handed me the dataport she had been scanning through earlier. "I know it's highly unorthodox, but I want you to pick up where your sister left off. Normally we wouldn't do such a thing, but seeing how you're the only other cop we have with that implant..." She stared at the blue ball sitting on my lap, her eyes running up the cables protruding from it that stuck into either side of my head.
I could understand why no-one else currently in the force had one of these other than me and my late sister. Not many people are exactly enamoured with the thought of having a computer terminal wired directly into their brain, after all. Implants in general were a rather iffy subject in Gensokyo, but this was a completely different beast than some of the other stuff you see nowadays. No, this was an Ichigo Corp Third Eye, an invaluable tool in my line of work. See, with this little ball drilled into my cortex, I had instant wireless access to any network I could get within range of. Not only that, but I could... Well, it's difficult to explain how it works, but it makes cracking into encrypted files a whole lot easier, at the expense of making them a thousand times trippier than normal.
"I see. So you want me to take up the case, then." I idly flicked through some of the files on the dataport. "Won't Commisioner Yama-whatever throw a hissy fit over this being against regulations, though?"
"I'm... Sure I'll get her to understand once she realizes you're the only other cop we have with the... Necessary abilities to pick this up, Komeiji." She then suddenly leaned closer to me, and spoke in a hushed whisper. "There's one more thing I need to tell you, though. It may prove important to the case."
"And what's that?" I murmured, half-paying attention to her as I browsed the dataport.
"Your sister... Hasn't been the only strange suicide recently. Several Ichigo Corp employees have also killed themselves over the past few weeks. I can't be sure, but there's a chance there might be a connection."