03/10/2077
Aldecaldos Camp, Outside of Night City
The Badlands, California
V and Panam
-
Panam had returned two days after she had left with Mitch and Scorpion. The black and red Warhorse's truck-bed was filled to the brim with military crates and wooden boxes strapped by harnesses that looked a little flimsy when he focused too much on the truck. From afar, he could make out her coarse laughter alongside Mitch and Scorpion's as they began to unload the truck with help from other camp members.
He'd given her the shard with the location of the compound the morning she had left, lazily shoving it into her palm before he fell back into the best sleep he'd managed to steal in a while. In those next three days, he'd limited himself to rolling around the camp. There wasn't much he could do other than offer to help out and be turned down, after all, there wasn't much an actual cripple could do in a Nomad camp other than being a nuisance.
There was a reason why he had forced himself to get as much cyberware as he had. Losing an arm or a leg forced him from doing what he was good at (whether he liked it or not was irrelevant) and if he could just swap out parts of himself, then why even worry about the consequences? His only reticence had been a full-body conversion, he didn't want to be a brain in a jar under any circumstances.
He wasn't like the Maelstromers, he wasn't like Shaitan and he most certainly wasn't like Adam Smasher.
"You know, this might just have been the calmest and content I've been since two-thousand and six. Shit, it's a wonder what a bit of sand, beer and campfire songs can do for the soul."
V had managed to sit away from most of the Aldecaldos. "That might be just about the biggest fucking lie ever told, in the history of Night City. Maybe forever, coming from the guy who used to mix his uppers and downers on a daily basis."
"Good point, but you know what?"
"What?"
Johnny appeared at that moment as his unmodified hand pressed towards the main campfire. "Being with the Nomads after my service in NUSA, probably the most content I've ever been before Night City dragged me in. Got some real good ideals, learnt what freedom really felt like. Never felt it again until you got jacked up by Bastard Smasher."
"Not anymore, won't be much longer before we can walk again."
It had been midway through the last day before he'd been called in by the camp's rippers. With Doc Teddy's blessing, they had decontaminated the main flatbed which carried the ripper gear for augmentation and cyberware. Then they had called him in, closed up the bed and started doing what they did best with Teddy's help. They'd put him on a cocktail of drugs, legal and illegal and tied him down as they took a look at what remained of his spinal sub-dermal armour.
The pictures they had taken mid-operation had said all it needed to. The armour itself was cracked, broken into shards that had clipped against his spinal cord. His lower spinal cord had just barely dodged being obliterated. As soon as the operation had finished, Teddy had decided for the rippers to slowly start activating V's cybernetics again, albeit slowly. When he woke up four hours later, he still couldn't walk, but he could at least not have to drag himself around like he was a hundred pounds heavier than he actually would.
"Thank God, we need to find Rogue and Shaitan as soon as possible. Find out whatever was on Bartmoss' cyberdeck, and kick some ass ASAP."
V huffed. "Let's walk before we run, Johnny."
V remained far away from the rest of the camp, rolling around the grounds in solitude as his wheels slipped through the grains of sand as he moved about the camp. In some ways, he preferred it that way. The Aldecaldos were family (in more ways than one) but he struggled with how they made him feel about it, how he felt included in something after so long. V didn't get attached, it wasn't good for anyone, it wasn't good for himself, it was the first lesson he learnt being in NUSA and working as a corpo. The person in the cubicle next door would quite literally stab somebody in the back for a promotion, the soldier to the left could easily get their head blown off in the first incursion, dead several times over.
There was no need for him to become attached anymore than he already was to the likes of Panam, Teddy and Cassidy. His presence, especially if he was being tracked like he had suspicions of, was a real danger to every innocent soul in the camp. He wasn't going to be responsible for more deaths, and if not attaching himself to the camp was the way forward, then so be it. The sooner they left, the better.
He needed to find his own way, whether it was with a comrade or on his own.
As always, he found himself lingering on the edge of the cliff overlooking Night City again. It was a view he adored, how from afar it was quite literally a jewel of the Californian deserts that just beckoned and urged for more people to come inside. A tourist-trap in some aspects, a literal death-trap in others. He started twiddling his thumbs, mostly on purpose to keep himself from going crazy. He'd white-knuckled the handles of his chair to the point where they were shaking whenever he let his arms rest on them. He was more surprised by the fact that the wheelchair hadn't collapsed under the weight of him, despite the groaning and crinkling of the rugged leather.
His HUD and his holo-cell still weren't active. He'd begged Teddy to activate them as soon as possible, but the old doctor had spat some harsh words in response. Unless he wanted his brain to melt after such a heavy procedure and the damage he'd taken from the fall, he'd have to make do with being dead to the world for at least another few days. It was torture, forced withdrawal from a sardonic doctor who cared too much about the Ricciardo scion.
It wasn't long before he could sense a presence behind him, someone tall and bulky lingered before they stood next to him. Saul, haggard and tired before he sat on the edge of the cliff. He sighed, ready for some kind of verbal battering that never came.
"V."
"Saul."
"Just jack each other off and get this over with. Please…" Johnny groaned, appearing from nowhere as he laid back on the edge before he rolled off to his digital demise once more.
The two men languished on the cliff edge in silence for longer than necessary before V looked at the older leader. "I'm guessing you have something to say, Saul."
"I was a fool and I've been a fool for so long and I never realised," Saul admitted. "I spent so much time thinking I was doing the right thing for everyone, that I never stopped to look that we were barely surviving. Not letting us go out, never finding others who would join us after Granite Pass, not letting us go into the city. Everything I've done, I've been torturing the people of the camp."
V grunted. Saul was broken, but he could be fixed. "You didn't torture them; you just couldn't see what was happening because you thought you were doing everything for the right reasons. It happens to every leader, at some point."
"But I hurt them in the process."
V turned his wheelchair to look at Saul. "You say that, but you kept them alive despite everything. You never gave them up to the Raffen Shiv. You aren't a terrible leader, not in comparison to me."
Saul shifted, squinting suspiciously at V. "What do you mean?"
V readjusted in the wheelchair, locking the wheels in place as he shuffled around to find a comfortable spot amidst the crinkling and creased leather. "When I first came back, when Panam saved me from the burning fuel station after we had killed Nash. I had a flashback or something like that."
Saul pushed himself away from the cliff edge. "Flashback to what? When I exiled, sorry, when I forced you out?"
"No," V muttered. "Time served in the NUSA military, during the Unification War. I got promoted to Staff Sergeant, basically forced into becoming a commissioned officer which I didn't want. I wasn't ready, I was too young. We ended up fighting in New Mexico, and I was leading my section into a kill-zone, based on info that was faulty. Trapped on a desert plain, me and twenty other guys just getting picked off in transit to the nearest firebase."
The camp leader had placed a hand on V's. "I'm sorry, V. I can't say I know what you went through, but I know that whatever hit Mitch and Scorpion…"
"It's not the same, Saul." V gently pushed his hand, spurning the affection. "They managed to conquer their issues, but it never leaves you. The experience, the fighting, the gunfire."
The heat from the sun beat down on the two, even if it was slowly setting on the city and the camp just away from the border gate. It was hot but not as sweltering or arid as the heat in New Mexico. There was no city in sight, just a flat plain that had the faintest traces of radiation that were all but unavoidable for the entire company as they journeyed on to Santa Fe. The freeways had been torn apart, any sort of straightforward path from one base to the next bombarded to the point that nature seemed to be slowly regaining control of the southern states.
The first thing that went was the tanks, the light panzers that had no chance of escaping the bombardment even if they weren't as large as the heavy divisions. The trucks sped off, attempting to force themselves forward without armour. They were cut off by more artillery fire, more ordinance shelled out that ripped flesh and metal to bloody, burning bits. Staff Sergeant McCall had pushed them off the dead road, running into the sand in a panic to escape the killzone.
It was no different. Snipers set up in the hills above, zeroing them left, right and centre in every second that passed. His section was down to thirteen men, no transport and no heavy armour. Of course, the free-staters had trapped the road, turned it into a highway of death for any poor soul that was wearing NUSA patches or tags.
He remembered the feeling, arms wrapping around his chest as he was tackled into the burning sand by another soldier before his head was blown to bits. Crushed under the weight, V could barely move before he shuffled his arm at the wrong time. Some smart prick had set their sights on him, intent on flatlining him when he blew his left arm from his socket. Not one man survived but him.
The panic manifested in a shake in his left hand, where he managed to contain it temporarily when he white-knuckled grip of his wheelchair before it inevitably bent and folded under his cybernetic grip. "Shit."
Saul had knelt in front of him. "You went off there, you okay?"
V shook his head. "About as okay as one can be after fighting in that fucking war. Pieces of shit never cared, not when they started, not when they signed legislation that made them states but not states. Left every soldier to rot. No job, no purpose, nothing to help the ones with rejection, nothing to help the panzer-drivers that they plied with drugs and 'dorph to stay effective. Fucked us."
"What do you need?" Saul asked. "Teddy can help, you know he will."
The younger nomad sighed. "Just leave this fucking city, leave this state, leave the country if you can. Further away from the West Coast, the better."
Saul shook his head that time. "What if something like Granite Pass happens again? If we lose any more people, it'll be the end of the clan."
"I won't let that happen, Saul. This is my clan as much as it is yours." V unlocked his wheels before he turned towards the camp, where he could see Panam sitting on the campfire couch. "Panam's just saved you for the time, weapons, some augs and cyberware, but I know someone who can get you out and give you the shit you need to thrive. Car parts, food, real security. You and Panam can get the clan out, go to Alaska or Montana, go to a nomad market and stay in Middle America."
The clan leader stood up at that, looking at the campfire as she chugged a beer alongside Mitch, Scorpion and the other camp members as the guitar slowly started playing, muted due to V's and Saul's distance away from the camp centre. V had followed suit, looking at Panam before turning to the city. The elder Aldecaldo offered his hand to V, who was distant before he observed Saul's gesture.
"We can work together on this." Saul stated. "I was wrong about you, you aren't Raffen Shiv. I don't think there's been a time when you ever were."
V was uncertain, but he took Saul's hand nonetheless. "I'll ping you when I get something from my contact. Now, go on. Camp needs you. Can't be hanging around the cyber-cripple forever."
The clan leader had soon gone off deeper into the camp, speaking to each member he came across in a way that a leader would do when he was concerned for his people. V tried to imagine himself in his position, would he have done the same in his position, would he have broken at all? Perhaps, he might have collapsed in his own way, got himself or other people killed as he had done in New Mexico. Militech was different, he wasn't responsible for others in Cypher-9, despite it being a squad but they were all sufficient in their own right.
As he knew, corpo-work was just another self-centred occupation that worked for people without the burden of leadership on their shoulders. That's what the pencil-pushers were for, give out the orders and let the people who could do the heavy lifting do the hard work. Working for the clan was everything that represented the opposite of working for a mega-corporation like Arasaka or Militech.
He couldn't see himself fitting in, not then anyway. It took him years to really settle in a job, to succeed for himself.
He soon rolled past the centre of the camp, swiftly wheeling himself past the campfire and to the area of the settlement where the cars were all parked. Jackie's Arch and his own Outlaw were settled tight and snug in the middle of the other vehicles. Pushing himself to his nomad-ified Outlaw, he'd pushed open the boot and dug through his bags and supplies until he found what he'd been looking for at the bottom of the furthermost duffel bag.
A burner phone, and old piece of crap from the thirties that he'd received as a favour from an ally many years back, just after he'd been fully wired into the Militech employment structure. He'd placed the old phone in his pocket, taking note of his mobile armoury. Jackie's pistols sat snug on V's hips, before he unclipped the belt they were strung up in before he slipped them into the trunk. Closing up, V had rolled between the cars until he came to the edge of the camp, far away from everyone else.
He took the phone from his pocket, sliding through the various protective protocols before the device finally unlocked itself. He checked his contacts, which ended up being pointless considering the only contact on his phone was the one who had gifted him the phone.
He'd selected their name, pressing the phone to his ear. It was a full minute before they answered. An accented voice began, exotic, a small Japanese twang to it. "Well, well, what a pleasant surprise. I'd never thought you'd call, Mr V."
"I do like to keep people hanging when I need to," V smirked. "How have you been, Miss Sanderson?"
He could hear a chuckle from the other side of the line. "Well enough, considering the news of my uncle's death. Uncle Yorinobu was a brave man, least he was in his youth from what I know."
V's smirk fell, he knew well enough what it was like to lose someone who yearned for freedom. "I am sorry for your loss."
"Forget the condolences, Mr V." The executive quickly pushed past the topic. "You called, and from what I remember I owe you. One of my detectives also apparently came across a counter-intelligence agent when looking for a kidnapping victim. Somebody named V, but I ran the name through the Militech database here at Danger Girl, and nothing came up."
The nomad remembered River, the hulking PI who was looking for Dex too. "Sometimes we end up sharing a common goal. Besides, I left Militech a few months back. Don't blame Ward, I wouldn't question a counter-intel agent like me either, Michiko."
"What do you want, V?"
He coughed a little, patting his chest. "I need any and all intelligence you have on Adam Smasher, where he's been hiding out, where he's operating out of, any officers he's using to defer orders to. Supply stashes, anything you have."
He could hear Michiko clicking her tongue. "That's a very bold request. Smasher's dangerous, we all know that. Why do you need his file?"
"Liquidation."
"I would advise you that trying to liquidate Smasher is about as bad of an idea as trying to urinate on the doorstep of Arasaka Tower." Michiko quickly replied. "Convince me why I should send it."
V sighed, his hand patting on the un-bent handle of the wheelchair. "I can tell you who and why they killed your uncle Yorinobu. I don't have the evidence but when I get it, you'd be the first to get it."
"Respectfully, V, that sounds like a lot of nothing you're offering."
"Michiko, you owe me for what I did for you in New York. Your exact words were 'Take this phone, and call me when you need something, big or small'." V grunted in response, locking his wheels as it started to slip in the sand. "Look, whatever happens, is gonna happen. Whether I die or not, he's not going to come for you because of your name. I want this for personal reasons, and it might just do you a favour too."
Michiko muttered something in Japanese. "I knew Smasher long before he became what he is today. He wasn't always bordering on the edge of cyberpsychosis."
"That's you, and for me, it's all I've known him for. He killed my best friend, killed a close associate, took my arm and almost killed me twice. He has to go. It's time for him to go before he does some real damage to somebody he shouldn't. He needs to be scrapped."
There was a long silence between the two. He had no doubt that perhaps before he was born, Adam Smasher wasn't the guy he was in the present day. People could be born a psychopath, but not everyone totally indulged in it, not every single psychopath enjoyed causing pain and violence. However, some did, and Smasher was a unique take on that because all he was known to do was inflict pain. From what he knew, all he knew was that he killed, caused collateral damage for pleasure.
All he ever did, was kill and maim and rape and torture. Killing off the old borg was going to be doing a favour for every single person in Night City who could be killed by him whenever he decided to take a job that allowed for the occasional floods of blood he'd spill. V could end that thing, and whilst he indulged himself in doing that duty, he'd hoped that he would be known for killing the steel-skulled bastard.
The Danger Girl exec sighed. "I'm pinging them over now. Do whatever you're planning, but I want that proof for who killed my uncle. As soon as you have it."
"I can guarantee that you'll be the first thing that gets it," V replied. "Thank you, Michiko."
"Don't thank me yet. You actually have to follow through first. Oh, V?"
"Yes, Michiko?"
"When you go after Smasher, make sure that before you walk away, he stays dead. For both of our sakes. Sayōnara."
The line went dead as soon as the Japanese executive finished speaking, the line cutting off before V could even reply. He'd slid the old phone back in his pocket as he let out a loud growl to the sand. Michiko Arasaka-Sanderson was perhaps the most influential contact that he could get a hold of, she was the head of Danger Girl, she was an Arasaka, the granddaughter of Kei, niece to Hanako and Yorinobu. He wouldn't have called her if he didn't need her help, and whatever she could send would have been of some use whether he needed it for an operation or not.
He wheeled himself away from the cars, pushing himself back into the camp when he saw the group at the campfire growing larger by the minute. Mitch had taken the guitar from somebody, fiddling and tightening the strings before he plucked, experimenting slowly before he found his familiar sound and started playing without issue. V could just about see a bottle of something in Panam's hand before she caught sight of V on the border of the central camp.
She raised her hand, beckoning at him gently before she turned to the rest of the group. V had struggled for a moment, tried to resist the urge to join, but also resist rolling away to the solace he found more comfort in. He sat there for a moment, looking at Panam once more before he pushed himself towards the campfire. Wheeling himself forward, he locked his wheels as he sat next to Panam. His ruined armrest was pulled off by the disabled ex-corpo, his SynthSkin-coated hand slowly edging to Panam's knee, soon comforted by warm caramel skin.
-
Arasaka Tower, Corpo Plaza
Goro TakemuraIt was rare that he ever had a moment to himself.
He found himself in the small room that he had been gifted by Saburo-Kun from whenever they were forced to go to Night City. Japan was where they lived, it was where they found the most comfort, they could reside in privacy on Okinawa where they wouldn't have to worry about aggressive observation from whoever wished harm upon Master Saburo or the Arasaka bloodline.
He'd been present when the thief from Konpeki had sent the video-link to him, with Smasher watching too. How the fool had claimed that they had taken everything from him, and he would do the same to the corporation. The threat had been followed through, Oda's head falling to the floor, separate from his body. He had failed, not just as a friend to the young warrior but as a master to him.
His body was left there when they recovered the corpse, to be taken away and cremated on Goro's orders. In Goro's room was a small wooden table, carved and put together by the older samurai out of boredom when Arasaka reigned with impunity. Two fresh candles burnt bright, between them sat the golden urn which housed his apprentice's ashes. A photo of the young warrior when he had just started out under Goro's tutelage was flat down next to the urn.
Night City held no form of religious centralisation, and for a country like America that focused so much on Christianity, it was even harder trying to find a Shinto priest to begin the process of kichu-fuda, but there was no point. Oda was an orphan, he had nobody who cared about him except Goro. The old warrior had coated himself in black robes, placed his nodachi and tanto in front of the table as the master tried in vain to remember any kind of old saying that express what he felt, but none came to mind, no words could ever do Oda the respect that he deserved.
The fact that he never tried to perform the tsuya as soon as they had cremated the body was a shame, a shame on Goro's part that he couldn't show the amount of respect that his young pupil deserved in death. The smell of incense flooded the room, notes of spice and old pine resin that reminded him of his student's physical presence that could no longer be real. The thief had stolen his sword, stolen his life, stolen everything that he had no right to take.
"I'll bring your honour back if it is the last thing I do, I won't allow you to die without any kind of merit or renown, with no glory or respect," Goro stated, swearing it to himself again in Japanese once again.
Before he could say anything else, there was a ringing in his head. The holo-cell in his hand reminding him with every reverberation that Adam Smasher of all people was trying to call him. He ignored it, refusing to deny the robot the pleasure of getting declined. The call died away, if only for a small moment before the cyborg had decided to call him again and again and again. It was of no surprise that the robotic soldier didn't care about whatever ritual Takemura needed to perform.
Goro threw the salt over his shoulder quickly, stopping any kind of evil spirit from threatening Oda's spirit before he finally answered the call. "What do you want, robotto, I'm busy."
"Mikoshi central, test patient." Smasher's voice groaned, oscillating slowly as his voice lingered longer than necessary.
"No."
"I don't want to see some poor meatsack on a hologram, but orders are orders."
"I'm performing a ritual for Oda, you wouldn't understand."
"Don't care. Come up ASAP."
The call ended as soon as it began, and Goro had soon taken off his heavier robes before he bowed respectfully to his makeshift tribute to his late student. Leaving the room, he approached the nearest elevator as he attempted to avoid every single Arasaka employee that gave him more than a sideways glance. His robes showed off more skin than he liked, all the silver fibres and synthetic muscles that replaced most of his body. His lower half was robotics, he was barely human, but he tried to find anything to keep a grip of his humanity.
Entering the elevator, he had input the code for the Mikoshi laboratory and the elevator soon shot up. If anyone else were there in the elevator then they would have been shocked by the speed of the elevator before it managed to punch through the cloud layer and into the sky. As soon as the rocket elevator stopped, Goro had planted himself steady as it stopped, rocking slightly before he entered the lab.
It was dark, to the point that all the light in the room was coming from the central chamber. The towering shadow of Smasher lingered just in front of the chamber, the bright blue light from the holographic displays growing brighter and brighter, illuminating the front of his massive metal frame. His frame had been disarmed, rocket pods, chainguns and rail-cannons mechanically removed to turn him into a charging tank if the need arose.
Goro stood next to the soldiering cyborg, overshadowed by the mechanical frame wrapped over Smasher's power armour. "Which poor soul do I need to see begging for life now?"
His frame creaked, his head turning when the damaged skin plate wrinkled upwards. Perhaps that was a sadistic smile. "Militech official. Senior ops manager from what I got out of her. Stout."
The inner chamber crackled to life, blue light shimmering and beating up and down, electrical charges flowing before the holographic displays finally came to life. Pixels flooding in and fluctuating to form a half-baked, crackling image of a woman. Legs first, wearing black heels that made her look taller than she actually was, flesh covered by a grey skirt, a white shirt tucked tightly in with a designer belt around the waist.
Her hair looked ragged, blonde hair ripped from her well-kept mane into a horrifying blonde mess. The woman's skin was pale, but what could be seen that wasn't covered by weave and fabric was bruised, battered and bloodied beyond any recognition. Her face was a mess, cheeks torn and bruised with split lips. He knew Smasher had been sent on an offensive mission against Militech, but his actions, however vile they were, sickened him.
"You are capable of causing such pain, the violence I cannot attribute to anyone else but an army," Goro muttered. "You sicken me."
"I. Don't. Care."
"That is no surprise."
Smasher growled. "Militech bitch, had it coming."
The holograph of the woman seemed to turn and swivel around, looking at her environment before she dropped to her knees as she saw Smasher. Her eyes were dead. Goro turned to the terminals to the left, looking at the biometric profile. Meredith Stout, Militech employee, blonde hair, stern from what her assumed profile stated. The hologram of the woman was a far cry from what her profile described. Ops managers were stern, they had their eyes on the ball that kept a corporation or a task force moving, whatever Smasher had done had broken the soul of the woman.
Goro turned to the robotic psycho, although he wasn't given a returning look. "Did you kill her off quick?"
There was a light thrumming coming from the central chamber, something that seemed to be coming from the mechanic structure of the Mikoshi Consensus that caused a beating to start again. The hologram did not flicker away and die, but instead, it seemed to strengthen more and more, the beating going from a thrum to what seemed to sound like a robotic heartbeat. It throbbed loudly, a dulled screech coming from the chamber as the hologram of Stout seemed to rise from her knees.
The beating grew louder, faster, throbbing and aching and reverbing through the floor and walls until it started a thundering charge that never seemed to stop. The beating stopped but the sound didn't, and soon enough the robotic structure began to falter and spark before the hologram of Stout stood before she fell again. As she fell, Goro barely realised what had happened before the glass shattered into little pieces, throwing Smasher and Goro away. The Japanese advisor swore his ears were bleeding, and the force that erupted from the chamber was strong enough to throw Smasher to the floor.
He barely registered the scream from the hologram before it died out. The Mikoshi Consensus looked broken, but it could be repaired nonetheless. The padding and metal and forced themselves out of place, metal bending and shearing from the effect of the holographic manifestation. Wires were torn from the roof, sparking as they dangled lifelessly. The main stand which held the hologram in place flickered to life, dying out again for the last time before Goro stood up, Smasher right behind him.
"Not quick enough."