"All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain."

Blade Runner

"Wait," said V, standing up and glancing with apprehension at the frozen Hermes. "Still processing all this. This isn't real… and we're all being held captive?"

"Well, you three are."

"Where are you then?"

"I managed to escape. Wasn't easy, but they were quite focused on you, it seems."

"How long's it been?"

"Three days. Managed to release a daemon into their system before I got out. Left a backdoor open for me to hack back in from abroad."

"You could've just disappeared. Why come back for us?"
Vanya shifted uneasily on her feet and looked away, as if she were trying to decide on something.

"I didn't come back for you. Alt… well, she's my sister."

V stared at her blankly for several moments.

"Wait, what?"

"She's my sister, V." She began pacing. "I was a young child when she disappeared. Grew up thinking she was dead, hearing stories about how she was a legendary netrunner. It was only much later, once I began exploring the deep parts of the Net, that I heard of a mysterious A.I beyond the Blackwall named Alt. I had been alone, V, for so long. My family was all gone. The chance that she was still alive…"

She locked eyes with V.

"Yeah, I get it," said V. "You would have done anything to find her."

"I did some digging, started following the breadcrumbs. I was eventually led to Mikoshi. Took me years to piece together the story of what happened to her. Even then, I had no way to get to her. Sent out messages past the Blackwall, hoping one would find her. I tried everything. But the years passed by and life got in the way. I had given up."

"And here she is."

"Yes. I just about had a heart-attack when you told me the name of the A.I you were looking for. And so I came back – to help you help her. And there's something else. You're not going to believe this, V, but they've got her body – and I, I think she's in there."

"Shit," said V. "What the hell are they up to?" he whispered to himself.

"You don't seem very surprised," said Vanya, looking at him suspiciously.

"This isn't my first time dealing with these guys."

He paused to think.

"Any idea what they're up to with Alt?"

"Well," she said. "She's not far from you guys, but she's not hooked up to the same system. In fact, she's not hooked up to any system. I have no eyes on the room she's in. It's completely dark."

"Alright," said V. "I need to get outta here. What do I do?"

"It's going to be tricky. I could pull you out now, but I don't think that would be a good idea. You might not be you when you come out."

"What do you mean?"

"I've looked through the files on the program they're running. It isn't just this memory they're changing, V. They've scoured through your mind, isolated what they call "lynchpin" memories – moments from your past they've concluded form your current sense of identity. They call it 'Project Lethe.' From what I can tell, it's all about psychological manipulation – ways to control people."

"Fuck," sighed V incredulously. "So if you pull me out now, I may not be the same person when I wake up?"

"Yeah."

"Fantastic. These guys make Arasaka look like amateurs. Please tell me you've got a way outta this."

"I might," said Vanya with a smile. "Here, I'm uploading a program to you. It'll allow you to playback and control the memories like I've done. It'll also let you to spot the 'false data' in the memories. You'll need to somehow delete that data."

V watched the file upload in his HUD.

"You're a life-saver, Vanya."

She smiled at him proudly.

"So how do I delete the false data?"

"That I don't know," she said, her face falling. "This stuff is beyond me, V. I have no idea how your subconscious will represent the data – or if it will try to fight back. Perhaps if you mess with the implanted memories enough, they will become corrupted and revert back to the originals."

V took a deep breath. "Okay. How 'bout we try it out?"

"Good idea," replied Vanya. "When you're ready, hit play on your HUD."

"Any tips before I begin?"

"Think of it like a Braindance. You can pause, scan, and edit. But be careful, V. There are bound to be surprises."

"Right. Here goes."

He was back on the ground with Hermes standing over him. The emotions which had subsided with Vanya's appearance came flooding back. Grief and anger overwhelmed him, and for a moment he forgot it wasn't real.

"Ah," said Hermes. "There is something truly profound about inflicting pain in the human form." He smiled down at V wickedly. "So much to feel."

Fighting a strong feeling of revulsion, V smiled up at him. Emotions played a strong role in these memories. He suspected that if he could subvert them, he would have a better chance at success.

"Out of all the bodies you could've had," said V, "you chose this one?"

V's vision swam. His head pounded with an immense pressure and he could barely get out the next few words.

"You look like a malnourished Maelstrom gangbanger."

Hermes' face turned from one of sadistic glee to confusion.

V paused the memory, gasping for breath.

"V?" came Vanya's voice from beside him.

He was once again standing next to Vanya, looking at the scene of his memory.

"Changing the memory," winced V, "is painful."

"Hmm. Thought there might be complication."

He scanned the room. Hermes and Panam's body lit up red, indicating they were false data. No surprises there. Question was, how to get rid of it.

"Emotions," said V. "I think that's the key."

"What do you mean?" replied Vanya.

"What I said to Hermes was so out of place for the moment, I think it disrupted something big."

"Good. Keep doing that."

"Easier said than done. Because this memory is all about Panam," continued V, "her death…" The words caught in his throat. "That's what I need to focus on."

Vanya put her hand on his shoulder.

"You've got this."

"Alright. I'm gonna rewind."

V was back behind the door in the hallway with Panam. Soldiers were firing at Rogue and Johnny from the other side. He fired at the soldiers alongside Panam. The scene continued, the blast from behind them came. For the first time, V noticed that Rogue and Johnny lay dead in the elevator. He fought back strong feelings of remorse and regret. He watched as Panam ran toward him and, with gut-wrenching verisimilitude, her body get torn to pieces in front of him. He stared down at her body, revulsion and immense grief pulling at every fiber of his body. He wrenched his eyes away and summoned up all the courage and willpower he had as Hermes walked toward him.

"Clearly not your best work, Hermes," said V, mustering up a smile. "I mean, I would've expected full disintegration from you, not this D-league bullshit."

Hermes stopped in his tracks as a wave of agony swept over V. He watched through blurry vision as Hermes' form blinked in and out of existence. Hermes looked down at his hands and back at V. His form flashed one more time and then disappeared. V lay blinking over at where Hermes had been, relief washing over him. Then, as quickly as he had gone, a pixelated, red outline of Hermes' reappeared. Panam's body was gone. So were many of the details of the room. It was just Hermes and him. He frantically tried to pause the memory. Nothing happened.

"Vanya!" he shouted. She too seemed to have disappeared.

Hermes stalked toward him raising his wrist. V dove for his pistol lying several feet away and just managed to avoid a blast from Hermes' wrist-launcher. He scrambled to his feet and began firing. Several blocks of pixelated data flew from Hermes' form as the bullets connected. Hermes let out a synthesized roar and fired back. V managed to dodge the main impact of the rocket, but some of the shrapnel blasted into his arm. He looked down. Instead of the dark-red of blood he expected to see, he saw a bright, pixelated red, matching that of Hermes. Before his eyes it seemed to spread over his shoulder, and a dark flood of depression and grief seemed to flow from the wound throughout his body.

"No!" he screamed, as despair threatened to overwhelm him.

With desperation he threw himself over toward Hermes, and sprinted toward him, tackling him to the ground. They wrestled erratically, Hermes trying to raise his wrist toward V's torso. The bright-red pixels had reached his neck. With one last effort he pushed his right arm holding the pistol past Hermes' grapple and slowly, inched the barrel of his gun toward Hermes' temple. He felt his strength fading as hopelessness strangled him. Panam's face appeared in his mind, clear as day. Her loving smile, those warm, tender eyes, and the freckles beneath. She pushed away the despair, and as it disappeared, his pistol sank in line with Hermes' temple. He pulled the trigger.

He stood beside Vanya, surrounding by swirling light.

"What the hell happened? You disappeared."
"I- I think I did it."

The memory reformed in front of their eyes. He watched Panam and himself enter the room, firing at the soldiers. He watched as Hermes appeared behind them. But instead of blasting them all with a rocket, a flashbang erupted around them. Rogue, Johnny, Panam, and himself hunched over shielding their eyes. Then, one by one, they dropped to the floor, darts sticking out of their necks. The memory began to go dark as Hermes walking over them, shouting out orders to have them bound.

"V, that's fantastic!"

V described to Vanya what he had done to fix the memory.

"Excellent. But this is as dangerous as I'd feared. V, there will be more memories. Can you continue alone? I need to help free the others."

"Of course. Thank you, Vanya."

"See you on the other side," she said with a wink.

The light swirled more rapidly around him and became blinding.

He was 14 and sitting at the kitchen table with his mother. Her head was in her hands and she was sobbing.

"This is your fault, Vincent. You stupid, unruly child. If you hadn't run away, your father wouldn't have gotten lost in the dust storm. He wouldn't have…"

"No, no…" muttered V. "This isn't right. That's not how it happened…"

His mother slammed her hands on the table and stood up, knocking over the chair.
"Get the hell out of here, now! Leave like you always do! Just don't come back this time!"

He shrunk from her fury, shame and anguish filling him. He frantically paused the memory.

He tried to remember the truth, what really happened, but the more he searched his memory, the more the truth faded away. The more this became the truth. He scanned the room. His mother lit up bright-red, the fury on her face amplified to a demonic pitch. It hurt to see her like this. She died not long after his 15th birthday – cancer caused by the vast amounts of radiation she was exposed to during the last war. He caught a red flash out of the corner of his eye. A photo on the fridge, glowing red.

He walked over to it and examined it. It was his father standing in front of a delivery truck, wearing a green company uniform. Something was off. His father didn't work for a company. He did deliveries, yes, but he was a freelancer – mostly worked with The Bakkers. Then it came to him all at once. His father didn't die chasing after him – he died doing his job. He was caught in a dust storm on a delivery.

He pressed play. He was staring up at his mother.

"Mom," he said, "wait, I have something to show you!"

He stood up and ran over to the fridge and grabbed the picture. His head was, once again, being crushed under enormous pressure.

"I told you to get out!" she screamed.

"Look! The picture!" He held out the picture in front of her. Dad never worked for a company – and I didn't run away this time – I never ran away once you got sick. I would never…"

Her face went blank and she began to slowly flicker. Then, as Hermes had done, she became an outline of bright-red pixels. Fury once again radiated from her. She raised her arms.

"Mom!" he pleaded. Not know what to do, he gave in to his instincts. He threw his arms around her and hugged her tightly. "I miss you so much."

Fear and shame seeped from the pixels and wound their way around him. He squeezed tighter and thought of the memories he had of her. The Sunday morning breakfasts, the times when he was sick in bed and she took care of him, the long chats about the girls he liked in school. The bad feelings began to fade.

"I wish I would've been around more," he whispered into her ear. "I wish you could see me now."

The room began to fade. She dissolved into his arms and he stood alone in the swirling light.

He watched the memory reconstruct. Watched as he and his mom sat at the kitchen table crying together, hugging each other over the loss of his father. And then it was gone.

There were two more memories. In the next one, V found himself with Jackie outside of Yorinobu's penthouse. They had altered the memory so that V had been directly responsible for Jackie's death. That had been a tough one to overcome.

In the last one he stood off the highway next to Panam, looking out over Night City. She had accused him of taking everything from her – of being responsible for the deaths of Scorpion, Saul, Bobby, Ted, and others. She had implied that she was staying with him because she had nothing else left. That had dug deep. But he knew Panam. He knew she didn't feel that way, and never did. There were certain things these guys could never touch – Mr. B and the rest. Certain things they could never understand.

He was once again surrounded by swirling light, waiting for Vanya. She appeared before, looking worried.

"V, I've got the others sorted out, but Panam…"

"What is it?!"

"She's stuck on a memory. I can't help her."

"Get me in there," said V with urgency.

"Okay," said Vanya. "I can get you in, but…"

"Just do it!"