8 ~Do You Want To Build A Cyborg?~

"Eh, why exactly are we skipping work today?" Ralph asked as I rolled up the door to the workspace the Boss set aside for me.

"We're not skipping work." I answered, "We're still working. It's just that all of you aren't getting paid."

"That's like… slavery, homes." Ralph complained as I went inside and started inspecting the equipment Campo got for me.

"You've got it all wrong, Ralphie." I shook my head at the young man, "You're not my slaves, you're my chooms. Now get to work lifting this with Pedro. It goes over there." I pointed to one of the workbenches in the space.

"That's just slavery by a different name, homes." Ralph said as he stood there while Pedro came over, "And I don't remember anyone ever saying you were the leader of our group."

I looked at the guy with a flat expression on my face, "Fucking Ralph." I sighed, "Listen, dude. If you were in charge of this group we'd just spend our free time loitering in different places catcalling chicas and talking about all the cool shit we'll do someday. I'm not in charge just because I'm the coolest, smartest, strongest, fastest, and best looking guy in the group. I'm in charge because I always have shit for us to do that's dope as fuck."

"We should vote on this." Ralph dug his feet in, "I vote for me."

"I vote for me!" Small Juan called out as he carried a box of tools into the workshop.

"I also vote for me." I responded and we all looked at Pedro, who was wearing a Vote for Pedro shirt.

"Big Juan." he voted without spending any time thinking about it.

"What? You're wearing a shirt that says Vote for Pedro." Small Juan shouted.

"And a vote for Pedro is a vote for doing shit that's dope as fuck. Which is a vote for Big Juan." Pedro explained, "Now get over here and help me lift this."

After the world's lamest attempted coup, the chooms and I got the workshop laid out and the equipment inspected. Most of it was second hand, but it was also free, and with my Repair skill it was the work of an afternoon to get everything working like it was brand new.

Campo gave me the money that I intended to use to get all this stuff, leaving me enough to not only make all the cyberware I intended to, but also the SPECIAL implants from Fallout. They didn't work the same way as in the game, but instead gave me a +1 to each category, but I could tell that I could take it farther in the future now that I had the knowledge of how they worked. It was something to contemplate another time.

Once I got everything set up I let the chooms go back to their normal lives, no need to cost them eddies during the two weeks I estimated on the fabrication of all my equipment. What I was doing wasn't something simple. Not at all.

I'd been working on cross technology in regards to cyberlimbs and between the Sandevistan and Berserk Systems. The latter of which was far more simple than the former despite the far more delicate technology involved. Sandys and Berserks cover a lot of the same territory, both enhancing strength via the nervous system, but one focuses on hyper reaction speed and the other on staying power.

I built the OS around custom heatsinks to bring the system cooldown to a minimum and the Beast Mode mod, a truly beautiful piece of tech that ramps up a Berserk user's Armor, Resistances, and Health 15% further than standard and doubles striking power. I repeat, that tech is truly beautiful.

I didn't try to mix in a Cyberdeck with those two. Not because I couldn't, but because I prefer Portable Decks to one built into a cyber limb. When a Portable Deck ignites you chuck it and you're out some eddies. When cyberware Cyberdeck overheats and ignites you overheat and ignite. The odds of such happening are greatly exacerbated by the OS of my hybrid Sandevi-zerk.

The only reason people don't use Sandevistan and Berserk in tandem is the fact that they'll fry your brains and nerves. A bit of a wet towel to the face of people's enthusiasm about the topic. I get around this in two ways. The first is that I am peak human endurance and supernaturally tough. The second is in the engineering of my equipment. I'm better. I am better. I'm the mother fucking Homelander of building shit.

That's a good self image to have. Go be the Homelander of whatever it is you do.

I'd done my homework on the Gorilla Arms - strength enhancing with a kinetic charge and release system for extra thump - and went about redesigning it around the Old Soviet style Hydraulic Rams. Ram tech is three times stronger than standard myomar muscle strands, and fifty percent stronger than thickened strand tech. The weight, bulk, and shape of the systems meant that they were impossible to hide on an agent. But that was then and this is now and remember that Homelander shit?

I managed to triple the efficiency of those systems, cut the size down to a third, and hid them within a thickened myomar strand system as a nasty surprise. With the size of my frame I had no problems fitting in internal microwave and EMP shielding systems, but also the augment known as Spike Hands, pile driven nails that come out of the lower palms and wrists Assassin's creed style just in case I run into anything that needs a quick impaling rather than a bully beatdown.

The Animals gang already figured out the best type of knuckle augmentation for the system, their homebrewed tech capable of causing massive internal bleeding with every punch, something I had no problem improving considering its origin despite the genius stroke of the design. The entire system got protected from harm in three layers, with a strong subdermal armor under the NEMEAN Implant from Fallout with a final layer of my proprietary Heavy Realskin - biotech that performs slightly worse than kevlar armoring but maintaining that Realskin look and enjoying enhanced sensory feedback.

The legs received similar treatment, built around the Fortified Ankles, Reinforced Tendons, and Lynx Paws systems. It was a lot of tech for a man's legs for sure, but in the name of mad hops, double jumps, and doing it all in creepy levels of silence I was willing to make the sacrifice.

I built a pair of eyes myself and slotted in Threat Detector and Analysis, and Trajectory Analysis into them, but more importantly increased low light sensitivity and shielded from extreme light capable of blinding me. The ears got similar treatment except for sounds.

Internally I only had enough left in the bank for a Hybrid Kerenzikov and Maneuvering System to give me the natural grace of a circus acrobat, and what I call the ICE Age - a tripled up Self ICE system that purges any attempts at Quickhacking me. The cooldowns are very short on each of these at thirty seconds. When mixed with my own security measures preventing such things from happening in the first place I can easily deal with multiple netrunners at once even in an ambush.

Even with the synergistic effect of it all being custom designed for me and to work together it was all a ton of neural weight. Your average Joe on the street would last maybe a week, week and a half before going complete cyberpsycho. No Ripperdoc of good morals would install this much chrome on someone, and definitely not all at once. Fortunately the guy who would go on to do the work on David Martinez was operating, meaning I had a guy who obviously hadn't fucked anyone over hard enough to get offed by 2076 with no compunction about borging a guy fully.

I'd bring the chooms to watch my back just in case. Trusting people you know about through a TV show is a great way to die.

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What a fucking info dump. I pulled sources from both the table top and video game to create all that. I don't want Juan to just build some bullshit and force feed it to you all. I want everything to have a source from Cyberpunk lore.

I considered doing Mantis Blades inside Gorilla Arms, but then was like nah choom. Go deeper. When I was considering giving him a Cybersnake tongue I was like too deep choom, go back. Go back to monke. So we ended up with some hella beefed gorilla arms and all the leg mods except the hover jets. And since all his gear is sixty percent faster and stronger and more durable than it should be, Big Juan is now the unholy baby of a wrecking ball and a mountain lion.

You can support me and my family at

ko - fi . com / jmanm