When news of the CyberShadows program broke across Grace City, Edge couldn’t be bothered to spare any sympathy for the former experiments. She’d seen the images. It was almost impossible to not to. Grotesque fusions of man and metal, titanium and blood, released like animals from one slaughterhouse to another.

Grace City chewed you up and spit you out into a heap of mental scars and unresolved problems if you were lucky. The unlucky ones were swallowed whole. The city offered no warmth in its poverty-ridden streets, existing only to weed out the weak. Based on what Edge had seen and read regarding the CyberShadows, she was certain there’d be no way in hell fragile minds such as theirs could survive, let alone endure.

But that didn’t stop them from darkening her doorstep, something she should have seen coming. Money was a necessary evil, and Edge offered were ways to make it quick. The legalities of such were questionable on the best of days, of course.

“I already told you I don’t recruit liabilities, cariño.” Edge’s answer had been the same one she found herself repeating far too often lately. Other CyberShadows were smart enough to take a hint, accepting her rejection and trying their luck with the next headhunter. But you, with your carefully masked expression, were annoyingly persistent.

Smoke curled into thin wisps from Edge’s cigarette. The tension between the two of you bordered on uncomfortable, broken only by a low curse from a pissed-off Edge. “At the end of the day, I’d prefer a weaker human to a berserk Shadow. Your enhancements,” she gestured to your cybernetics, “can only go so far. So if you think you’re worth my time, prove it.”