The haptic tapped his palm and he smiled back at the young femme behind the screen as he took the tray she held out to him through the narrow slot in the barrier that served no real purpose that he could discern except to give the invariably bright-eyed, corpo-college side job staff behind it a false sense of security.

The lingering instant before letting go of the tray made him glance up and twitch his smile into the flattered-but-definitely-no-smirk he'd perfected over the years, in this case given exactly because of that span — behind him, and ahead of her. It seemed to please her well enough, the message received as intended, and he was left with his tray and a last smile and glance before her eyes turned to the next customer in line.

He wandered over to the fulfilment counter with an amused shake of his head, and placed the tray in the slot to wait for the order to complete. He swung around and leaned back against the railing that might've been actual wood, much like the rest of… whatever style it was they were going for here, all light woods and bright white fabrics, maybe to create the illusion of some island resort. It wasn't a bad job, he had to admit — the recorded bird calls had been unnerving at first as they'd walked up through the entrance, projected as they were to swoop down and to sit here and there around the little cove of an area the restaurant occupied between towering corporate executive apartment complexes that made up much of the Marina on both sides of Gold Beach. The restaurant terrace even managed to catch a little bit of direct sunlight, but much of it was driven down with an arrangement of mirrors he spent a moment tracing down through his darkening lenses. Just enough to make the subtle air conditioning necessary, and even with the light curtains of air flowing down mimicking a breeze he was starting to think about taking his coat off.

He opted to just throw the tail over the railing to let his back cool off without forgoing the additional protection entirely, but in doing so, he found his eyes settling on V, sitting in the far corner of the terrace. She always stood out in a crowd — unless she wanted to be completely invisible — and here even more so with most of the rest of the busy lunchtime clientele favoring the au goût du jour corporate expense card aesthetic that seemed to currently be a battle between bogas either plain and understated, or ostentatiously neo-kitschy.

But he was used to that. It was the smile that caught his eye.

V was staring out to the sea, chin on hand and fingers curled up under faintly smiling lips shaping themselves around words spoken only inwardly into the call she had to be on, with one of the exactly three people he knows she'd get on realvid for.

In all this, that smile felt like some kind of a miracle.

And he just watched, saw the glances down and back at the sea, the small laughter, the huddled-up shoulders her little shelter.

He saw all those times he'd seen joy, and happiness, and the life that she was, the little girl, the young woman, his sister. And all those times he hadn't, all the smiles and laughs that the world had taken from her and made her hide so deep even he could not see. Everything that could've been, all of the laughter and stars in her eyes, all the time.

It was never going to be like that, not always.

But if she could have even a little more.

It broke his heart to see how broken hers had been, for so long, when for a couple seconds he could see not panache and bravado, not the kinda happiness that was no better than chemical highs, the kind you made yourself believe in just to feel better for a second. The true things you couldn't let yourself feel, not all the way… not until a moment like this, and in this moment he hated that he had not been able to do any better for her, hadn't known how, and in this moment he did not care as long as something made her happy, even now, so long past due.

A brave little thing, real happiness.

The reason he'd left last night, too, instead of staying just to be close to her as he'd so desperately wanted to.

Alright, get a grip. You gotta come correct for this, that's the only way there's gonna be time to make up for it later.

Suddenly glad for the shades he didn't really need for the light, he noticed the haptic tapping at him and the soft chime ringing a little more insistently by the tray now laden with what had to be mostly grease and salt. The apologetic grin at the older couple patiently waiting for him turned into one of amusement as he stared down at the pure heft of the tray — most of it for V. At some point it had stopped fazing him that she put away more than half his old squad put together after a week of running and fighting, but sometimes through others' eyes it still struck him. He gave the couple a growing-boy's-gotta-eat shrug and a parting nod before heading out toward the table V had picked for them.

It was only when his steps shook the planks under the table that she noticed him again, and she fucking blushed, which only made him grin wider. He saw the 'gotta go' spelled out on her lips — it was only his jerk of chin materialized audibly that he actually heard her.

"And Van says hi," V said, a little louder for his benefit he had to assume. She glanced up at him with a smile a little less embarrassed to relay the returned greeting from the other end. "Judy says 'hi Van'. Yeah. I'll be over in the evening sometime again.

"Love you."

He'd left her to finish up the call while he unloaded the tray on the table to divvy up the food between them, and threw his leg over the bench that served as a presumably authentic sort of seat for… again, whatever this was supposed to be. Promising, at least, he had to admit with the smell of the burgers — two for him, four for her — and fries and whatever it was buried under all that breading. A definite step or two above the usual street fare they wolfed down, that was for sure, and something he could see himself getting accustomed to… with a corporate expense card, at least.

"What?"

He looked up to find V looking at him with the same question writ large on her face, and realized he was still smiling. "Nothin'. Everythin'," he said, grin lopsided. Even if she didn't seem outright uncomfortable, he could sense how out of her element she felt about the way she was when Judy was in the picture. And it was kind of adorable, he had to admit, especially knowing how deftly his sister usually navigated her way around her women. The contrast was something to behold, and he loved it enough to not even tease her about it. Right now, at least. Maybe later.

She seemed reassured enough by the silence he left the words hang in that she dropped the subject, too, and felt free enough to smile to herself when she dug into her pile of grease, salt, carbs, and textured vegetable protein that didn't make it significantly healthier.

It was fucking delicious, though. Preem junk.

"So… your other friend, the one you don't gotta call to talk to?"

V looked up at him, cheeks stuffed comically full, but he didn't sense the apprehension he'd been worried about, bringing him up now. "Jh-hy," V managed to intone.

"Right."

"'Bou'hhm?" V asked, and then looked like she gave it another thought and managed to wash her far more than a mouthful down with some NiCola from her giant cup before looking up at him again — and trying again, going to pains to make sure he knew it was okay to ask. "Ah mean whatchu wanna know?"

And he did know. But he wasn't entirely sure what to ask now, with the subject broached. It's maybe the one thing he'd most wanted to talk about last night — be there for her, for sure, but the thing with her head, that was just shit they were gonna have to fix. But this whole different personality… no, person, in there, that did freak him out a little despite the explanation, despite Judy not seeming too worried about that part, knowing all she clearly knew about the brain. It all needed a lot of digesting, but lying in bed later, at home, this was the thing that had kept him awake.

"So… this is Johnny Silverhand. For real for real Johnny Silverhand. Of Samurai. Dead fifty years."

"Mmhm."

"The guy that killed a million people. Sold a couple million records, sure, but also killed a million people. Not that killing any number is great, but a million people." Or close enough.

"Yes."

"You see how this isn't great news?"

V looked like she wanted to say something else, but was letting him get it off his chest first. "Yes," she said again, curt but not dismissive.

"So how am I supposed to react if you tell me you're gonna go set off a nuke?"

"Does that sound like something I'd do?"

"No."

"That's what I need you for, too," she said, softer, head dipping to to better catch his eyes in hers. "If there's something. I know you can tell if I'm not acting myself. I think Judy can, too," she added, " but you definitely can. Could even if I hadn't told you about Johnny, and you didn't know to look for it."

He shrugged helplessly. He would've liked to think so… but there hadn't been many times where he'd ever gotten in her way after she'd heard him out and made her decision.

"Remember the farm job? Down in Oso Viejo?" she asked, as if reading his mind, and smiled the kind of smile that knows it avoided a horrific mistake by a hair. "I know you can, Van."

He was still sure she would've come to her senses even without his intervention, back at the farm… but that was one of the times he'd not waited for that. And the reminder did make him feel a little better about the trust she was putting in him.

"And…" V continued when he said nothing, trailing off to find words herself, and seemingly catching them somewhere up in the sky where she stared before looking back at him, "…he's… I don't think he would do that, now."

He waved off her halting attempt at explaining how she knew what he thought — he got it well enough, he figured, even if he couldn't exactly imagine how it felt like to have that. Something deeper than a braindance, and something different from what the twins themselves shared. V was almost frighteningly good knowing exactly what he thought, her darker days aside, and he didn't feel far off on her. But that knowledge was like… that the sun was gonna come up in the morning. You knew it, for sure, but you weren't the sun. Or seeing a ball in the air and knowing where it was gonna fall, how it was likely to bounce.

"Not sure why… 'cause it doesn't feel like there's been the kind of personality mixing that Vik and Hellman have been worried about. Right?" V asked, and he could hear the worry in the voice that dipped quieter, desperate for his reassurance.

He shook his head, and gave her half a smile. "I don't think so, no. Even though this festival plan is batshit insane. It's not like you to even consider something this crazy… or it's not your kinda recklessness," he said, finding himself having to rush through what he had wanted to be just a little levity because it wasn't coming out quite as light-hearted as he'd intended it to sound, "but not like we've ever been in this kinda situation either. I know you gotta be thinking about things you never normally would. Just… maybe now, with me in the loop, we move a little slower on some of this static? We're back in the game, and we're gonna do it right, yeah?"

She took the hand he offered to her, the back of his down on the light, silky smooth wood, fingers curled up for her fingers to hook into, and squeezed the joint fist with a grateful nod.

It was a little funny, really. V had always been the careful one, the one to spend the extra while to think about contingencies he'd stopped short of considering — like, for example, getting involved in a gang possibly resulting in getting sent to a Militech academy — except for a few things, strangely, that somehow she'd just… decided didn't count. The rides, for one. And having seen the kinda shit she pulled on the regular on the bike without thinking twice, or probably once for that matter, he had to sort of agree that there seemed to be some cosmic rule that excepted her from consequences in her chosen areas.

"He says it's a fair point to make, in case you were worried about offending him," V said when he'd been silent for a moment, and followed it up with a small smirk when she clearly heard something more. "But apparently that doesn't mean you're not being a dick."

He had to laugh at that, even though she picked up on the unease that must've flashed on his face.

"I… I promised Judy I'd always talk out loud with Johnny when she was around," V said, a little sheepishly, and glanced toward the next table with his gaze following hers. "Think you'd like that better too?"

"Yeah," he said, vacantly, staring at the empty table. "Uh, yeah. I think that might be better. Is he… there, right now? Where, exactly?"

Relieved as V obviously was that he didn't make a bigger deal of it, she raised a brow at his question before looking back at the table, and pointing. "Your side, straddling the bench, about a foot off the end of the bench," she said… and picked up on what he was going for. "He's about my height, maybe a bit shorter, sits slouched up."

"Am I looking at you now, Johnny? He can hear me, right?"

"He can hear you. And no. Up and left. Left. …Yeah. Close enough."

"Jesus," Van said, his eyes fixed on the spot the incorporeal dude apparently stared back at him from.

"Close your eyes, V," he continued, and checked she'd done so before looking toward the other table — but not exactly at the dot in the wood pillar he'd fixed on earlier. "Am I looking at you, Johnny?"

"No, to the right. Now, yeah," V said… after he moved his eyes back at where Johnny had been. And evidently still was. "Can see which finger he's holding up?"

"…How the fuck does he see me if you don't?"

"Same way I do," V said with a small smile when he looked back at her. Stared back at her. She twirled her finger around in the air. "There's enough coverage here to create a pretty good three-dee meatspace map even without directly accessing the visual feeds."

"Oh, good. This is just your regular creepy witch magic shit, not some dead rockerboy voodoo."

This time V laughed at his awe-struck teasing, soft… and bubbling over until she was almost doubled up over the table.

It felt good.

"Asshole," she said, wiping at her eyes.

"Always."

She grinned, and reached out to muss his hair — his move, dammit."Love you, lil' bro."

He grinned back, and patted at his hair while she went back to what little remained of her burgers. He glanced around, trying to see what she might be using to project a mapping out for herself. "I gotta say, I was surprised you'd picked this spot to meet her, but I guess that explains why. Less suspicious than some shady alley, more public in case shit goes sideways."

V looked up at him, brow rising mid-bite of a burger held in both hands. "N-uh," she said, swallowing through her smile, "I'm touched by your faith in my abilities, but this is way too much. This is a fucking square mile to cover… a surface scan gave me almost a hundred cams and other sensors with at least partial coverage around here. I'd never try to take all this on."

He waited for it.

She saw him waiting for it, and grinned. "Unless I had no other choice."

"At some point you're just gonna have to accept the title, bruja."

V laughed into the back of her hand, eyes glittering at him, and tucked back in. "She wanted to meet somewhere other than a current or former sewer, in her words," she explained between bites before jerking her chin out over the railing, and got him to follow a finger pointing toward the Gold Beach breaker extending around the small yacht marina. "I dunno if the beach really counts as not-sewer, but we're meeting down there, under the pier. Here… I was just hungry. And this is preem junk, isn't it?"

Grin. His. Hers.

CW: dissociation, dissociative personality (pseudo)

I added a separate story in which I'm experimenting with extracting some V and Van adventures from my in-character Twitter threads. You can find it through my AO3 profile, or under the Souldance series, or directly here: /works/30898703.