"Maybe you won't mind if a couple of us happen to take a stroll around Patty's clear-out at the same time as you, then. Then, we got no trouble, we got someone helping out a bit instead, and it's all good. Yeah?"

"Sure, you can come along, I just wanna grab some junk I was told nobody wants."

"Yeah, we're coming along. We don't have any beef with you either. It's just the baseline for trouble is pretty fucking high in Night City, you know?"

"I have absolutely noticed that! I'm a little puzzled why more people aren't walking around in armor considering!" She walks in.

"Well... Obvious combat gear makes you look like trouble. And looking like trouble ain't good for your long term health, comprende? Too bad some of we gonks love trouble, eh? And armor's expensive and heavy, we silly humans are way too willing to take risks for convenience I think sometimes. If you get subdermal weave though, you can't accidentally leave it at home. And armor's cumulative, yeah?"

There's a bank of elevators right there. Kinda low-income but it looks safe and maintained. (The 'Tinos going with her are still kind of tense but slowly calming down...)

"Sounds uncomfortable, subdermal weave."

"Eh, if you get a good brand and get it skinned in by a good doc, a lot less so."

Up the elevator goes.

"But if you turn out to hate it you have such a production getting it out again."

"Better itchy than flatlined. Or you can try to stay a civvie and pay protection to assholes like us, eh? Valentinos will actually protect you too, unlike Sixth Street, you know."

"I didn't know, I'm not from around here."

"Glad I can tell you, then."

...Awkward silence now?

It's not a long elevator ride, up four floors.

And then there is junk?

There's junk.

It's light on valuable junk, and is indeed mostly trash. Broken childrens' toys, old clothes, big stacks of paperwork and fading books, old takeout and drink containers, table dishes and lighters and random kitcsh, dead batteries and dull knives and expired food and bundles of wrapping paper and and and--

A few random dead electronics- A minifridge that looks like it was in a car wreck, a similarly broken small TV, mangled chargers and cords. Practically everything has microchips in it though. A pair of discarded gloves has LEDs and a microcontroller for them.

Jackpot.

Her power knows what it wants. She cannot quite stick her hand in a bin full of doodads sold by the pound and pick out the stuff with chips in it blind, but it's close. She's not using her actual knowledge of what components things have in them. She is using her power. Her power, opened full throttle, knows the gloves have something important. And she can build with material that isn't necessarily computerized, too. The limit of her power is that she has to trust her devices to make choices, but she can build a quadcopter as long as she doesn't build a remote control. She can build armor if it redistributes force without consulting her and flies based on reading her body language instead of asking. She can build all kinds of stuff as long as the stuff is in charge.

(But Rete is letting her move her own arms, right now - it usually does, unless it has reason to think she's compromised. It doesn't have her power, to know what's worth the carrying capacity. She does.)

Sort sort scoop scoop is there anything baglike in here?

Cardboard boxes? Mismatched tupperware?

Cardboard box is acceptable! Cardboard box fills with the highest value junk.

Her 'escorts' are chatting in Spanish with nearby apartment-havers. The mood is rising as she seems to really just be intent on junk. One older lady is handing out taquitos to everyone. Including Lorica, if she wants one?

"That's very kind of you, thanks!" She can in fact eat without unmasking - the helmet can pop partway - and does this by default.

It's not bad! Not the best thing she's ever tasted, a bit spicy, a bit off but not in an inedible way.

"Oh, cooking is something to do. And now that you've eaten you're a guest and my grandson should stop menacing you so much, yes?"

"Abuela... We're just trying to make sure everything is safe."

"I don't mind the escort, it seems like I scared some people without meaning to."

"Flying armor is like, action movie shit, head. Usually you'd have drones or a full on AV. It's weird, and weird can be preem but also scary."

"The armor is comfier than it looks."

"How it looks is more important than how it feels sometimes."

"Yeah, I get it looks like I'm looking to need it."

"You got a name you want the Valnetinos to remember you by?"