22/09/2077
The Afterlife, Watson District
Night City, California
Shaitan
-
"FUCK!"
The flight from the desert back into the city had been one that was notably silent. T-Bar and Mace were most definitely dead, bullets ripping through T-Bar's flesh and Smasher's foot caving through the skull of Mace. That signal, the possibility of it being Arasaka was running through his mind, but if that was true, how hadn't they found Bartmoss' body in the years prior to him waking up after the forty-seven odd years-worth of a technological hangover? Perhaps it wasn't them, perhaps they'd been tailed and it wouldn't have surprised him if that were true either.
Adam Smasher was a dog, a bloodied metal beast that lived to sniff out trouble wherever he could find it. Shaitan could kick his ass, maybe not as bad as he liked to think he could, but he definitely had the fight to go toe to toe with him. Anyone else, and they risked getting their arms ripped off and their skulls pulped into mush. He couldn't understand how V didn't see that same fate happening to him.
He was most certainly dead; Smasher loved a fight and he relished in prolonging an inevitable death. Shaitan had punished the interior of the Manticore, his silver-coated fist punching against the metal of the AV. Now, the younger solo was doomed to die in a desert. He'd have to tell Rogue, and no doubt she might be disappointed but life had to go on. V died, but he had not and so that meant he'd have to continue.
He'd slipped into the cockpit, taking a seat in the chair just above Condor before he jacked into the Manticore's system. The aerial vehicle stabilised again, noticeably as the neural stress of piloting the AV lessened as it was shared between the two. The defaced flyer had soon joined the air traffic streams, merging and taking advantage of it's markings as a 'Militech Manticore' to dip in and out of the routes between skyscrapers before they finally arrived in Watson.
Condor had finally managed to land the AV, the landing gear bottoming out as the aero collapsed on itself as it dropped onto the roof lifelessly. The two cyberized pilots pulled the wires out of their neuro-ports as the ship's engines were finally silenced. Bartmoss' body had still remained frozen in the hold of the Manticore. The doors opened, with Condor getting out to start making repairs as Shaitan picked up the cryo-frozen cadaver and took it into the main elevator.
The frost and ice that was seemingly flash-frozen to his skin were skimming against the receptors in his skin and on his fingers. The man Shaitan knew was a wizard on a keyboard, let alone when he was sifting through the net and ripping through ICE and the corpo net-security. When the elevator stopped, Emmerich had immediately let Shaitan through the door and into the main room. As opposed to how he usually saw Afterlife, the place was empty and the music was calmer. Rogue was situated behind the bar, Squama and Nyx next to her as she began dictating orders to each of them.
Her mercenaries had been planted around the club, security turrets and barricades set up in placements of high strategic value. Rifles, shotguns, machine guns, every single barrel pointed at the door which Shaitan had just walked through before they calmed down once again. Rogue turned to see Shaitan, her eyes falling when she noticed the body in his arms and her missing solo protégé in V.
"What the fuck happened?" Rogue called out as she emerged from the bar. "Where's V, the rest of your scrapyard crew?"
"Smasher happened. The bastard came out of nowhere with a section of Arasaka goons. T-Bar and Mace are dead, V stayed behind so we could fly out of there." Shaitan admitted as he placed Bartmoss' frozen body on the bar top. "And Bartmoss is an ice-pop, found him frozen to death with all of his techs. Died like a living computer."
Rogue' hands fell to her face, wiping away as she sighed into the palm of her hands. Soon, her hands clasped together before they fell to her hips. "Fuck. Fuck! I'm gonna get that chromed-out piece of shit one day. He can't kill Johnny, and V, and make Blackhand go into hiding and not pay Shai, he just can't!"
"He'll pay, Rogue. Just not today. We'll get him. Look, we just need to get that chip from the Voodoo Boys and then we go from there. We can't stop now."
"I know, I know," Rogue admitted, turning to look at Bartmoss. "Christ, look at him. Let's get him in the back, we need to go through his deck. There has to be something in his OS or his deck that gives us something against Arasaka."
Squama had soon picked up the frozen carcass of the netrunner and hauled him into the back, with Shaitan, Rogue and Nyx following right behind as more guards stepped behind and guarded the door into the private net-room. Squama had gently laid the body into the net-running chair, and soon Nyx had gone to work. He'd pulled out more and more extension cables and platforms, attaching and connecting them together before he finally took the main input wire, sliding it gently into the ice-cold neural port of the legendary runner.
Going back to the computers, wires and extensions cords, Nyx had soon finished his work as each one connected to a dummy-net or a proxy sub-station. He approached the computer once again, connecting the wires from Bartmoss' deck into the computer before he took his own jack-wire out, the line extending from his neural port before Squama grabbed his hand.
"Listen, fre, whatever is in this guy's brain, isn't good. Can't you find another way to crack him open?"
Rogue was next. "Squama is right, Nyx. Whatever Bartmoss' has, he won't have just left his defences in the desert. Money's on the fact he's jury-rigged his deck to shotgun whoever jacks into his brain. He was paranoid for a reason, Arasaka wouldn't have been looking for him for fun, there's a reason."
Nyx shrugged, his wire snapping back into his flesh. "Look, perhaps this is the best chance we have at saving Silverhand, whether he's a person or in a Relic bio-chip. This has to work, and I don't think anyone else here is willing to take a dive into some dodgy net. This must be done."
Shaitan shook his head. "This isn't time for you to get sacrificial. Look, if something goes wrong, I'm pulling the wire out."
"No," Nyx immediately shot. "If something happens, keep me in. Otherwise, he just turns into a corpse. Please, just let me do this."
The silver-skinned borg, as well as the Haitian and elder female solo, were concerned. Nyx, the small little African-American had been a tech wizard, perhaps one of the best net-runners that Rogue had known for the past ten years. He made a name for himself because he was one of the few who could ever leave the Voodoo Boys for something better. He didn't have the accent like Squama, but he knew how they operated and it was no different from every other gang. They would kidnap, murder, rape, the only real difference was the fact they operated on a level above others because of their net-running.
"Fine." Rogue allowed it, as Nyx finally took his wire back out. He aimed it at the port in the main computer, before he took a few deep breaths as he finally plugged himself in. "Okay, this is good."
"What's in there?" Shaitan asked.
Nyx moved away, his line extending as he swiped his arms through the air. "Lot's of bad shit. Copies from parts of dead networks, a wandering malformed AI and a shit-hot virus that's mutating everything inside here."
Rogue sighed. "Is there anything in there? There has to be something. Be careful."
"Trying," Nyx stated. "Shit, well, that's my death warrant signed."
"Fuck this, I'm getting you out."
"No! Do that, and Bartmoss is useless. I found a way in, but it just meant that if I had to make myself the key breaker to destroy all the locks." Nyx admitted, sighing as his hands dropped to his sides, he turned to the trio. "That's it. The deck is jailbroken. As soon as I take this wire out, that's it."
Rogue stepped forward, moving towards the netrunner. Her hand gently pressed against his cheek as his eyes shone an eerie orange glow. His eyes were darting around, rapidly switching direction from left to right, up to down, back and all around as they started glowing again. Shaitan pulled her away gently as his body started spasming. His legs twitched, shuffling before he regained control of his shaking hands as he grabbed a hold of his jack-wire. With twitching hands, jerking legs and his body contracting multiple times a second, he could barely mutter a goodbye before he ripped the wire from his head.
He dropped lifelessly to the floor, his eyes stopped glowing as the orange faded away and turned into a bloodshot brown pallor. The computer chimed, the cyberdeck belonging to Bartmoss was open. Squama moved slowly towards the body of Nyx, as his hand pressed against his neck before he shook his head. Nyx had died, refusing to burn himself out or become a nest for an AI, opening the cyberdeck as a final act before he went out, on his own terms.
-
Johnny Silverhand
The Desert, who fucking knows where, somewhere in California…
-
He couldn't fucking believe it.
Adam fucking Smasher gets away with bullshit. How the tip of his blade hadn't ripped through his brain baffled the rockerboy. Ripping through the skin and the eye of his patchwork force on the steel frame still felt better than any orgasm he'd had. He'd always been told that whoever sought revenge should always dig two graves.
Well, he was in the grave and it still felt really good when he finally managed to hurt the bastard that killed him.
That was before he got hauled from his feet and thrown into the valley. V was fucked, no matter how he looked at it. The only saving grace was that the sub-dermal armour under V's skin was the cushioning that saved their lives. Grey carbon-polyweave under the fake skin being the nice hard pillow for a fall that in all honesty, should have killed the both of them. His legs were fucked, and he could barely feel his spine.
The last time he'd felt this weak was when he died himself, and that was because he got bodyslammed by a heavy shotgun by Smasher himself.
"I'm what is keeping you going, we need this chip if we ever want to live separate from each other. I'm letting you live another day, and when you wake up, me and you are gonna be everyone's biggest fucking problem. Come on, wake the fuck up, Samurai! If I have to take over your body, I'll fucking take it!"
Now, he was lying in scorching sand, aching like never before with a mouth that was probably about as dry as Rogue's cunt, but thoughts like those weren't gonna save them from heatstroke or dehydration. No, he needed to actually do something. V's body took a heavy breath, sucking in air and exhaling rapidly before he managed to roll over, his chin grating against the hot sands.
"One step at a time, Johnny." V's mouth croaked hollowly, his lower body refusing to move as the silver prosthesis weakly slapped into the sand, grains of sand slipping away. "One step at a time. Come on, V, your tough piece of corpo-shit, fucking work like I need you too…"
Everything that V had valued, everything Johnny valued, they flashed before him. Each handful of sand triggered a memory to come falling onto him. Shared experiences, losing a loved one, joining the military, experiencing true freedom as they travelled with the nomads.
Losing Alt.
Losing Jackie.
The truth being revealed, like a message from a dead God. Arasaka was the root of all evil, and it needed to be ripped out, root and stem. Everything they did, as individuals and as one body, was done to destroy Arasaka. Tearing through to save Alt before she was killed, nuking the Arasaka Tower, robbing Konpeki, killing Oda and stopping them from getting Bartmoss. All so Arasaka never gained an upper hand.
Johnny roared, V's mouth opening to spit blood and mucus as the body of the nomad echoed Johnny's voice, bellowing loudly with each drag of his body. The sun beat down on his back, burning against his flesh as the sand scorched every inch of skin that it brushed against. What felt like hours turned out to be minutes as Johnny refused to die, refused to let V die in the middle of a desert on his own.
"COME ON! I'M NOT LETTING YOU DIE LIKE THIS! I'M NOT LETTING YOU FUCKING GO OUT LIKE A BITCH! MOVE, V! MOVE!"
He could feel his heartbeat go faster; his head began to thrum as every thought turned into that same sweary oath. He wasn't going to die, he refused to die to Adam Smasher again, he'd kill that borged-out bastard if it was the last thing he ever did.
The wastes seemed to go on, the shifting sands never-ending as the desecrated body of V crawled and dragged and hauled and heaved itself across the desert. Johnny felt his mouth go dry, he swore he could have seen both of his arms turn silver before he shook himself out of his stupor and continued crawling.
He was not going to die.
He stopped crawling, reserving the energy to utilise the HUD, activating his holo-cell. Johnny managed to find Panam's number, clicking the presented text as a small dial-up tone started. As it rang, he started inching forward again, growling and groaning as the pain began flooding to every inch of his back and legs. He could feel them dragging loosely behind him, as the tone ended and his HUD lit up with Panam's face, half in a pillow.
She looked dazed, more so confused as she started to wake up. "V? What, what's wrong? Are you okay?"
"Need…" Johnny felt faint, almost as if the light and spark and soul was going out. "…help. Sending my co-ords. Quick…"
The HUD fell away soon after, as Johnny just managed to send off his location to the female Nomad. He made a few desperate grasps in the sand before he lost control once again.
He'd done all he could. His heartbeat slowed, his breathing calm as he lay there in the burning sun. Even if V lived, and they managed to split apart again, he'd never fade away.
-
29/09/2077
Aldecaldos Camp, Outside Night City
The Badlands, California
VAt first, with all the bright lights and the dull plucking of strings with humid heat, V thought he'd died. There was a cacophony of sounds echoing around him, clanking metal arms and legs, beeping from what sounded like medical machinery. He could barely feel his legs under the light covering that hid him away from the waist down. The dull strings soon found a small rhythm, going from unorganised notes to somewhat ordered chords that repeated and changed.
He wiped away the blur and the sleep from his eyes as he tried to pull himself up, failing tremendously as the lower half of his body refused to comply. A small handle dangled in front of him, his arms barely reaching the wooden grip as he managed to haul himself up from his bed. The chords stopped, as somebody rushed to him, a soft arm behind his back that kept him falling back.
"V, you're okay!" the deep voice shouted. V made out Mitch's face as he put the guitar against the bed. "Teddy said if you didn't wake up, you were basically gonna be a… well, let's say it wouldn't have been good for any of us."
The cyberized nomad groaned. "I would have been dead…"
"Yeah, well, you're not. I guess you got somebody looking over you. You were on the edge of flatlining when we managed to find you in the valley." Mitch replied, handing V his waterskin. The bedridden nomad sucked the water out almost immediately, wetting his lips doggedly. "Teddy said, with every intention, that you should be dead."
"…well maybe I should be," V grunted as he handed Mitch the waterskin. "Guess somebody here isn't exactly happy about that."
Mitch laughed a dry and gravelly version that seemed to exhale instead of inhaling. "Happy about you being dead, or being alive, because I can count one for each side at this point."
V sighed again, trying to move only to find that he still couldn't. His legs felt stiff, unmovable objects that existed just to stop V from ever moving again. He kept one hand on the small wooden hold that kept him upright in his bed. His clothes felt loose, a pair of loose shorts and a heavy number of bandages wrapped around his chest and gut. The skin that he could still see was purple, blue or yellow. He took a deep breath, before letting out the little breath he managed to catch as he realised how much damage he'd really taken.
"Let me guess. Panam wants me dead, and Saul wants me alive." V managed to crack a smile, forcing another throaty laugh from Mitch. "What, am I wrong?"
The former panzerboy nodded as he handed V the skin again, the nomad drinking the water slower than the last time. "Just about. Panam and Scorpion were the ones that saved your ass from the heat sink of a valley. Saul didn't want you here at all."
"Mhm, why? Because he knows that if I could stand, I'd fuck him up for what he's planning?"
"Something along those lines, because he thinks selling out to PetroChem is the only way to secure ourselves against the Raffen Shiv," Mitch muttered. "I've got my concerns, but as of now, it looks like it's set-in-stone. We're selling out, or like he says, cashing in."
V growled, outstretching a hand as Mitch pulled out a wheelchair. "Yeah, cashing in on a bad hand. Also, fuck you. I can walk."
"V. Move your legs."
"I can't!"
Mitch smirked. "Exactly, now come here."
"You're not carrying me into the wheelchair, Mitch. I refuse, you are not my knight in shining armour." V grunted before Mitch's arms dug under his own. "Mitch, I swear to god, put me down!"
He couldn't do anything other than fuss and whine as he felt himself get dragged from the bed, Mitch grinning as his two-tone legs were freed from the covers of his bed. They dangled limply before he felt himself being placed roughly into the old wheelchair. The leather was rough, hewn together as Mitch soon managed to place his feet in the footwells. V's sense of humour was admittedly dark, something he'd inherited from military life, but the thought of him being disabled after a rough tumble off a cliff was just pathetic.
Mitch tried to push him, but V had soon forced the panzerboy away from the handles of his wheelchair as he found the grips to push himself around the camp. The sun was falling, and if he had to place it, it was probably around six in the afternoon. The movement from the chair was rough, the wheels weren't exactly made for riding around in the desert on sand, and rock and rubble. He noticed that the cantina truck was louder than everywhere else in the camp, everyone settling under the awnings and coverings as they settled down for the dinner at the end of the sunny day.
"You want anything from the truck?" Mitch asked.
"Coffee, black as night," V replied, looking into the campfire. "When can I walk again?"
"When Teddy decides to turn on your cybers again. He's put a block on so you don't stress or tax your brain into burning out your synapses." Mitch admitted, heading off to the cantina. "Wait there."
No chance of that, Mitch. Where's Saul?
V had scanned the camp once again, his eyes drifting over the white and beige fabric that was nailed into the ground before he set his sights on the largest tent, a large black stripe in the middle of the fabric, that was just away from the fire. Twisting and setting his sights on the entrance, V pushed himself forward. As he approached, the sounds of polite chattering and disjointed laughter died out, being slowly replaced by the sounds of angered shouting coming from the clan leader's tent. The gruff voice that was most definitely Saul's, one that was cut off in favour of a youthful woman. The fact that she was as loud as she was, gave it away.
Of course, who else would it be other than Panam? Every tinge of her voice was there, highly-strung, emotional, ready to fight whenever she could sense a fight was to be had. He just about managed to wheel himself over. He struggled at first, the wheels trundling and rumbling as he rode over rocks on the way. He stretched out a hand to pull the fabric away, using his free hand to wheel himself inside the tent as the shouting finally reached the apex.
"You are selling us out when you said you wouldn't! What happened to the Aldecaldo spirit, Saul? Why can't you just admit that we're not thriving, shit, we're not even surviving!"
"This is the only way that we stay safe, that we don't have to worry about being murdered by the Raffen Shiv!" Saul shot back. "How can you not see this; we can't leave the city like this! We're weak!"
Panam pushed him. "Because of you! You don't let us raid, don't let us go out into the city, you don't let us hunt the Raffen as we know how!"
V coughed aloud, causing the two notable nomads to turn at the source of the sound. It seemed silly, especially considering V's threatening stature whenever he stood tall, that he wheeled himself around the camp as an invalid. He pushed himself forward, aiming directly for the camp leader before he stopped right in front of Saul, staring directly into the eyes of clan leader Saul Bright.
"Here he is, our clan's own stalker. Welcome back, V."
"Fuck you, Saul. I saved your ass." V grunted, refusing to back down. "I should have left you to rot. First, you exile me, and then you decide to have the fucking cheek, to sell out my clan, my dad's clan! If I could stand up right now, I'd beat your ass in front of this camp."
Saul sneered. "But you won't, because you can't."
V leaned forward. "Try me, asshole. I could kick your ass with my hands tied behind my back, blindfolded."
Panam dropped to a crouch, her hand immediately fell over V's own. "V, there's no point. He's too stubborn to see what he's doing is going to be the end of this Aldecaldo chapter. He's selling out to the corpos."
Saul grimaced at both of them. "It's not selling out! We have to make this choice, we have to cash in on the goodwill we barely have, for our own sakes! The closest nomad market is in Boise, and we don't have security or tech to make it out of Granite Pass, or the water to cross the Valley. This is it, this is the end of the line!"
Panam scoffed, and V shook his head before he turned back to look up at Saul. "Because you won't let them, you dumbass! Panam said it best, if you don't let nomads do what they're good at, what are they gonna do? They can't leave, because you won't let them!"
V noticed Saul's fists clenching before he leant over, face to face with V. "You haven't travelled with this clan in ten years, and you think because you stayed here for five days where I couldn't lead is enough for you to understand what it's like to lead a clan this small, with little chance of moving out? You are Raffen Shiv, and that's all you'll ever be."
The ex-nomad spat in Saul's face. "If that's all I'll ever be, it would still be better than being a leader who sells out his people. You didn't deal with corpos for seven years, you never worked behind a desk, never had to do the dirty work on people you knew. All you've done is sign your own death warrant. You know what corpos do, to people like you?"
Panam's hand pushed back on V's shoulder. "That's enough, V. We've said our piece, we can't make him listen…"
Saul wiped away the spittle, his eyes burning a hole in V's head before a palm slapped him dead across his cheek. "Tell me then, V. Tell me what corpos do to people like me, people who care."
V let out some guttural sound, animalistic, bitter and angry. "Let him know, V. Really let it out, tell him what you know, seven years of shit. Let him have it."
"They get rid of you." V started. "Because you're the first one to get cold feet. Maybe they'll concrete your feet and throw you in the ocean. But not only do you care, they already know you're a turncoat. You already sold out your own people, because you're a pretty cold-hearted bastard. Automatically, they'd be a gonk to ever trust some piece of shit who'd sell out his own family. That means, they'd have no regrets about zeroing your ass as soon as it became rewarding for them to do it. Because that's what being a corpo is like, it's being ice-cold, not having a heart."
Saul grinned. "That it?"
"Oh, that's just the start. As soon as you're gone, they'd have nobody to look to, not that it would matter. Some of them might try living in the city, they'd die sooner rather than later. This is Night City, after all, you dragged them here and that's your fault. Whoever stays, well, they're basically slaves. You signed their freedoms away for 'safety' when all safety means is having some bigger guns and letting them do whatever they want with you. You know what I found out when I was in Militech, Saul, it's how dirty everyone is, especially the ones who like to say their clean and innocent. You want to sell out, to Biotechnica and PetroChem? Go ahead, as long as you know that everyone here is gonna be used as guinea pigs and test subjects for experimental cyberware and new medicines!"
Saul growled again. "I'm doing this for us, I'd never let that happen!"
"You already are!" Panam argued. "It's either the Raffen or the Corpos with you, and you're hamstringing us by not letting us take risks to get stronger. I had a lead on a fixer who worked solely with Nomads, and you didn't even let me go and meet her. We could be neck-deep in tech and supplies to leave, but you are so concerned with us surviving, you won't even let us thrive!"
V finally turned to look at Panam, and then to Saul. "Any true nomad would rather die, before even considering selling out to a corporation if they knew what it was like. You're nothing to them."
Saul's fists remained clenched. "You'd rather die free? You were a corpo yourself."
"I was born free, and I lived in chains ever since I left until I broke free again," V announced. "I'd rather die before ever shackling myself to a corporation again. If you lived in Night City, seen who really run this place, you'd feel the same. I'd rather die a free man, than live in chains, and I'd make that choice every single day."
Saul was silent, and Panam had soon given up even looking at the older camp leader. V couldn't help but think that he looked haggard, and despite how much V vehemently disagreed with his choices, V could see when a man was truly broken. Losing people was tough, losing the support of your own people was tough, but he had to come back stronger if he was ever going to prove his mettle as a leader. He was dejected, as he pushed his bushy mop of hair back and wiped the sweat from his brow.
He'd started to tense, and then the pacing began. Panam moved behind V's wheelchair, but V did not falter as he watched Saul. It was odd, the thought of the two younger nomads watching as their leader stomped from side to side as he tried to think of a way out. Desperate, looking down every avenue for answers except the one that made the most sense to him. Nomads weren't risk-averse. Living life on the road was dangerous, it was just a fact of life.
Saul used to be a role model, someone the kids at the camp back in the day could look up to as a figure to aspire to be. Panam would get angry when a younger Saul refused to let her on a raid or a trip out for supplies, V would occasionally be honoured when Saul asked him to fix his bike or truck as if it was deity selecting him to be the chosen prophet of a holy message. Now, Saul was older.
"Life breaks people. He's broken, V. He needs to build himself back up, and that takes time." Johnny whispered in the back of his mind. "So, do you."
V understood. "We need to do this for him. He can't lead like this."
"And you can't operate when you're hiding away from what's happened. Until we know we can fight back, we need to stay out here. Shaitan will know what to do next, so will Rogue."
Saul waved them out, waved them away. The wheelchair-ridden nomad backed up, only for his head to bounce lightly off Panam's stomach. Her hands had gripped the handles of his chair, turning him around and wheeling him out as Saul thought to himself. Scorpion and Mitch were sat at the cantina truck, Mitch sipping gently at the black coffee that V had asked for before he wheeled himself into an argument. As they came out, V barely had the will to stop Panam from pushing him around the camp. They'd walked (and wheeled) through the masses of tents before they finally arrived at the tent nearest to the cliff that looked out over the city in the distance.
V had to admit, that after every thought of Night City, he always hated the place. It was condensed, pressed together, everything was too small and too tightly packed. Yet, from afar, it was a jewel in a broken crown. He'd tired of manufactured air, fake people, he hated the constant blaring of advertisements that impeded his every thought. The thoughts, that he barely kept to himself.
Thoughts of Adam Smasher. What he did, what he admitted to doing. How V was stupid, so careless and benign to ever think of just calling to see what Meredith wanted. Could he have saved her, could he have ever made a difference if Smasher outclassed him in such a way that he was nothing but an ant, and Smasher was a child with a magnifying glass. Taking out his eye was the most satisfying thing, and it barely made a difference to the borg. He still choked the life out of him, he still was the one that got thrown off a cliff and died in a godforsaken valley in the middle of a dead California.
Every memory of her seemed distant, fading, reminiscent of a time where V had a mask stitched to his face. He wasn't a nomad; he wasn't a happy-go-lucky triggerman who got off on performing hair-brained schemes that were successful based on the link he had with Panam. No, with Meredith he was some slick corpo-rat who wore a suit, drank expensive alcohol and ate expensive meals at any time of the day.
Her real skin against his own synthetic epidermis, receptors that made it feel as if their touch was organic like it was meant to be authentic and heartfelt. Maybe it was, from one side of it. They were weak, for each other. There was a fervent, unfeigned love, and V had always told himself that it was just the sex that they were both after but it wasn't. There was love, and it was dead.
That had been killed. Murdered, by some pale imitation of a man who valued blood and guts and death over everything that mattered more than the death and fighting and the inevitable battle. Smasher destroyed something real, something rare that couldn't be reproduced in the capitalistic hellfire that was Night City, a man-made scourge that existed as a never-ending, oncoming storm.
He hadn't realised how far out he'd been before Panam had waved her hand in front of his face. "V, you there? You spaced out for a minute there."
V shook himself out of his depressive stupor. "Yeah, just thinking. Saul needs help."
"That doesn't sound like you. I thought you'd be the last person to help him." Panam replied.
"In any other case, I would be. Said so when we saved him last time, but he's so desperate he turned to corpos. You guys are lucky he hasn't signed over the papers yet." V grunted. "I think I can help, but it means we'd have to operate outside of his purview."
"Sounds like corpo-speak to me," Panam muttered as he was soon wheeled underneath the grey material of Panam's tent. She'd soon managed to barely haul V up and into a small little couch, that she'd taken for herself. "I take it you mean we have to go on a raid without his permission."
V nodded. "Been waiting for the day for me to have to ask you to do something that goes against the camp. Never thought I'd live to see it."
Panam was quiet, if only for a small moment before she soon took V's place in his wheelchair. The black and red jacket that was draped over her was soon discarded, thrown on a litany of bags of other things that V assumed were Panam's things. She looked at him, smirking before she wiped the look off her face as she tried to contain herself. She soon stood up, pushing his wheelchair next to her bed before she had crouched in front of him, her eyes looking into him as her hands laid themselves on his.
She let out a stressed sigh. "I thought you wouldn't wake up again when we found you."
"Neither did I, Panam. I'm pretty sure I should be dead."
Panam nodded as if she were consoling herself. "Teddy said the same thing. He put Mitch on the watch when he had to get some more medical supplies from the city without Saul knowing. He said you were basically on the way."
V nodded, because what else could he do? Say he felt grand and jolly and ready to get back at them? No, he wasn't. He could barely walk, his sub-dermal armour around his lower spine needed taking out, he could feel the plate digging, grinding against his bones. He felt pain, for once after such a long time of feeling immune to it, he could say he felt physical pain after being almost killed.
"V, I…" Panam began. "…I'm sorry."
"Sorry for what?"
"For kissing you, in the cabin after we saved Saul. I left because I needed to think to myself. I didn't know what I was doing, I was drunk, we were both drunk and I was stupid. I was really fuckin' stupid, and I needed to think about what I wanted from this place, from you, just from life, I guess. When I came back, you were gone and then the next time I see you, you were half-dead."
V's head shuffled, drooping down and left to right. "Panam, it's okay. I understand. As soon as the camp is ready to leave, you have to go with them, I understand. I can't be with you."
Panam looked down, and V had realised to some extent that he had a talent at breaking people. Her head bobbed up and down, heavy breathing before she looked up at him as she tried her best to contain her laughter. "V, all I could think of was that I missed you. Everything I remember, with you, memories of us. I want you to come with us, I want to…"
"Want to what?"
"Please don't make me say it. You know what I want." Panam and V finally locked eyes. "I want to be with you."