Cyberpunk: STRAY

Arasaka Black Ops Division – Corpo Plaza, Night City

The room was dim, the only light coming from the holo-screens hovering above the conference table. Faces bathed in cold blue, the executives sat in tense silence. But these weren't just Arasaka higher-ups—they were security operators, spies, black ops contractors embedded within the corporate machine, working beneath the radar to feed intel back to the main branch.

And right now, they had a problem, a huge one at that.

A lost shard.

A shard containing a mirror pipeline of Militech's Cynosure project.

"We FUCKING HAD IT" Ito Sakamoto, the leader of the unit, muttered under his breath, his fingers drumming against the table. 

Across from him, Ono Takayama, a logistics exec with deep ties to Arasaka's internal espionage network, swiped through a series of encrypted logs.

"The shard vanished in a dead zone. No pings. No uplink, one of our guy dead. It's either destroyed or hidden."

 "Hidden". Sakamoto corrected. His voice was sharp, his patience thinner than monomolecular wire. "Nothing worth an eddie disappears like this, not in this city."

The data on the Cynosure project could tip the scales of corporate war. Militech had been playing big trying to compete with the Arasaka's Soul killer and this shard was a golden ticket to whatever the fuck they were planning. Now, it was floating somewhere in Night City, and they had no idea who had it.

Takayama flicked his fingers, bringing up the last known location. A low-tier data broker had intercepted the file somewhere in Dogtown but the trail went cold fast.

"Whoever has it knows how to stay quiet."

Sakamoto exhaled through his nose.

"Then we'll make some noise."

Jig-Jig Street – Vincent's Apartment

Vincent sat at a rickety wooden desk, his tiny one-room apartment smelling like cigarettes and damp clothes. His neighbor was fucking again—thin walls made sure of that. The neon lights outside his window painted everything in shades of pink and red, the glow of Jig-Jig Street's nightlife slipping through the cracks of his curtains.

He ignored it.

He had numbers to deal with.

A cracked holo-display hovered in front of him, his budget spreadsheet pulled up. He adjusted his earpiece, tapping through the data on his vision.

Rent: 2,800 eddies. Due in 4 days.

Food: enough left for him to last a few weeks. Stretch it.

Utilities: Overdue.

Broke. Again.

Vincent wasn't stupid—he played the money game better than most. But Jig-Jig Street wasn't a place where smart people got rich. It was a place where smart people survived.

A job pinged in his smart lenses, a soft beep cutting through the ambient sound of distant sirens.

New gig available.

Category: Courier.

Details: Package delivery. No questions.

Payout: 800 eddies.

Easy.

He closed his display, grabbed his worn-out jacket, and slid his switchblade into his pocket.

Just another night in a city that didn't give a fuck.

 He sat up, walked out of his den, neon signs flickered overhead, casting shadows in reds and purples across the wet pavement. Vincent moved like a ghost, slipping past joytoys, street vendors, and desperate corpos looking for a cheap thrill. Jig-Jig Street never changed—it stank of sweat, liquor, and bad decisions.

His stomach growled. He ignored it.

800 eddies wasn't much, but it meant food for the month and keeping his lights on. Rent was another issue, but that was a problem for future Vincent.

He made his way past the usual street rats, eyes sharp as he approached the rendezvous point. A bar. Some hole-in-the-wall joint wedged between a BD parlor and a cyberware shop that ran its upgrades off the books.

"Yo, you the runner?"

The voice came from the alley.

Vincent turned his head just enough to see the guy—a mid-tier fixer, face hidden under the brim of a baseball cap with a pair of cheap Kiroshi optics flickering in his right eye. One glance, and Vincent could tell the guy was on the edge.

"Yeah," Vincent muttered, hands in his pockets.

"Good. No questions, no problems. Just get it done."

The fixer tossed him a small black case.

Vincent caught it without effort. Light. No rattling. Not a bomb, then.

"Address?"

The fixer sent the location to Vincent's deck. A few blocks away. Easy.

"Don't open it. Don't be late."

Standard rules. Vincent just nodded and walked off.

Watson, Sub-Level 03 – Arasaka Black Ops Safehouse

Takayama's fingers twitched as he watched the monitors. Every camera feed, every drone, every surveillance point focused on one thing.

The lost shard.

They didn't know who had it yet. But they had their suspicions.

"We sweep the district. Block by block."

Sakamoto's voice was cold.

Takayama glanced at him. "That's gonna get messy."

"Then let it get messy." Sakamoto leaned forward. "Find the shard. I don't care who we have to kill."

Takayama exhaled. Arasaka wasn't just looking for the data. They were looking for someone to pin it on.

And in Jig-Jig Street, bodies were easy to get rid of....

Back Alleys, Jig-Jig Street, Japantown 

Neon haze flickered off rain-slicked pavement as Vincent weaved through the tight backstreets of Japantown, keeping his head low. The city hummed—distant gunfire, sirens, the occasional scream, all blending into the white noise of Night City. His cheap earpiece crackled with static before a garbled voice cut through.

"Oi, errand boy. You alive?"

Vincent adjusted the mic. "Breathing. And on schedule."

"Good. No detours, no funny business. Client's high-profile—just drop it and ghost. Don't fuck up kid."

Vincent sighed. He hated high-profile jobs. They had a habit of getting people killed. But money was money.

Tucked under his arm was a slim, reinforced case—contents unknown. Probably something expensive, probably something someone would kill for. He didn't ask questions. Just another delivery. Get in, get out.

His route took him past the district, toward a rundown strip of buildings near Jig-Jig Street. The air smelled like damp concrete, fried meat, and perfume strong enough to strip paint, and sounds of people having sex echoed from nearby sex shops. Vincent turned the corner—

And walked straight into chaos.

Gunfire erupted ahead, shredding a parked car into Swiss cheese. A cyberpsycho? No—too coordinated. Mercs. Pros. And caught in the middle, moving with lethal precision, was her.

V.

The V.

Vincent barely had time to register the carnage before a body hit the ground in front of him, blood pooling at his feet. His stomach tightened. His brain screamed run, but his legs were frozen as adrenaline rushes in his blood.

A figure, clad in corporate black, slammed against the wall near him—Arasaka. The suit was reaching for something. Vincent knew that look. Panic, desperation. The kind that got bystanders killed.

Vincent took a step back, trying to melt into the shadows.

Then V's eyes snapped toward him.

And the barrel of a gun followed, A bullet grazed by his ear, blood on his face, brain matters everywhere, the man in front of him went down....

Now there were two corpses, him and a crazy looking chromed up woman with a gun....