Chapter 1: My Demons

The moon is awesome!

The low gravity made jumping feel like you're a superhero, the sun felt so hot while the space felt so cold that Lucy felt like she was in a blizzard in the middle of the summer, and the view!

"It's beautiful. I could stay here forever." She says out loud.

"Tell me about it." David says as he walks up to her, clad in his own spacesuit, "We did it Lusy." David says with a smirk on his face, even though Lucy couldn't see it through his visor. "So, what now?" He asks her.

Lucy thinks about it for a moment, "Well, I guess we have to focus on your dream now. What was it again?" Lucy asks David.

"Well, for one, I want to own a kasino." David casually says, much to Lucy's surprise.

"Hm? You never talked about that before, what gives?" Lucy asks him, and then David's smirk turns into a massive grin.

"Why else? For those nice bunny girls and all that legally stolen money! I even have a suit for you if you're interested!" David says as he winks to her.

"You ass!" Lucy chuckles as she pushes David, "You're lucky I'm your girlfriend!" She says as David lands.

"About that," David says as he gets down on one knee, his voice completely serious, "Lucy, will you marry me?"

Lucy stood there stunned, before tears started to well up in her eyes, "Yes David, I will!" She says as she goes to hug him.

As they hug each other, they can see into each other's helmets and see their faces. David was laughing, completely content with his life, "I wanna stay here forever!" He yells.

"I do too David," Lucy repeats, "I do too."

*BEEP* *BEEP* *BEEP* *BEEP*

Lucy woke up completely miserable.

'Please don't tell me this is going to happen all the time.' She thinks as she gets out of bed. As she starts to shower, Lucy thinks about Mikoshi. 'I know I've heard of it before. If it's from Arasaka, that must mean it was during my time spent with them.' She thinks as she moves her hand over the back of her head, a constant reminder of where she came from, and what happened to her. 'The main thing is that V guy is also looking for it. I wonder if it has anything to do with the relic?' She thought to herself as she finished her shower.

As she gets dressed and goes downstairs, Lucy turns on the TV as she begins to cook some food.

A female news reporter starts speaking, "-protests turned violent recently as the recent Night City blackout continues its city-wide repercussions. As previously stated, the blackout was caused by a pack of Nomads known as the Aldecaldos as a way to bring down a convoy owned by Kang-Tao. The whole plot was seemingly both created and done by the infamous mercenary V, the same man who killed Saburo Arasaka. V promised the Nomad gang the entire transport, just so long as he gets the passenger in the convoy all to himself. The passenger was ex-Arasaka scientist Anders Hellman. Although it's unclear what his intentions were, V captured Hellman and escaped into the desert. His current whereabouts are unknown." The news reporter concludes as Lucy is in the middle of eating her ramen, "We will now go live for Mayor Holt's statement on both the violent protest and the mercenary V."

'Holt?' Lucy thought as the fat politician came on with two cops on each of his sides and a Militech mech behind him, 'What happened to Rhyne?'

"I can understand why these protests went violent. I can, really. The fact is that this blackout has affected all of us, it really has. I couldn't even eat anything for breakfast because my fridge is still getting repaired-" Holt was cut off mid sentence by a man in the crowd.

"Most of us don't even have fridges!" The man angrily yelled.

"I-I understand that, but my point is that I'm suffering just as much as you all are. With that being said, we have the brave people at the NCPD to thank for keeping the streets clean in these trying times. C'mon guys, let's give them all a hand!" He says as he turns around and claps at the cops. On the other hand, no one in the crowd is clapping with him.

"You don't speak for us!" The same man from before said before another person said the same thing, and then another, and another and everything snowballed into yet another protest.

Holt looked down on the crowd, a sneer slowly appearing on his face before he got a hold of himself, "Alright, I just have one last message for the mercenary who started this whole mess called V. Now listen here, I don't know why you're doing this, but when I find you and when I'm done with you, you are going to wish you never stepped into Konpeki Plaza." He says as he leaves the stage, the protest turning more and more violent.

"Kick his ass V!" one protestor yelled before Lucy turned off the TV.

'Talk about out of the frying pan.' She chuckled to herself, 'Still,' she thought to herself, her tone now completely serious, 'what now? I should definitely stay as an edgerunner, that's a given, but where do I go?' She thought as she looked around her penthouse, 'This place isn't cheap. I did manage to get all of David's savings, but do I really just move on?' She thinks as she goes back upstairs and looks into her ice tub, feeling the back of her head, 'CAN I move on?'

Then Lucy looked at a photo of their gang, then at another one of just her and David, before all of the implants. 'That's right,' She thought as she remembered a certain someone.

Lucy then goes out, a new look in her eyes. Not one of happiness, one of rage. 'He's going to PAY!'

/./

The Afterlife still remained to be the heart of Night City. Great drinks, good people, nice atmosphere, the whole shabang. It was the only true safe part of Night City too. Sure, there were some places that had a no violence rule, but it was only a matter of time before some idiot broke that rule. The thing that sets the Afterlife apart from all those other safe places is that nobody is dumb enough to break it's rules, and for good reason.

The bar gets people from all over the city, especially legends, washed up or otherwise. Speaking of which,

Falco was bored. Then again, if you just took one look at him, that part would be obvious.

To be fair, he did have one hell of a life, but that was a year ago. The past is the past, nobody can change that. 'Just hope Lucy gets that.' He thought to himself as he took another swig of beer, 'David's death hit us all, but she can't keep obsessing over him. It can't be healthy. She needs closure.' Falco thinks back to when Lucy came back from her trip to the moon. 'That should've been enough. She accomplished her dream, she made David's life worth something. So what gives?'

Falco begins to take another swig of his beer, until he realizes he's out. "Hey Claire! Could ya give me a refill?" He asks the bartender.

"Sure thing. Hey, have you heard?" She asks the man as he takes a swig from the new bottle.

"Bout what? Some gonk off himself or something?" Falco jokingly asks as he takes another swig.

"No, someone's been going around town asking about David Martinez."

That made Falco almost choke, "What do they want?" He asks in a much more serious tone.

"Dunno. What I do know for sure is that they got people like El Capitan to look for him and his gang." Claire says as she goes to another person at the bar.

Immediately, Falco pays his tab and finds a secluded area. There, he makes a call.

"Well, well, well, just the man I was looking for. How's it been?" El Capitan asks Falco.

"Been good all things considered, but let's cut the shit. Who asked you to find us?" Falco asks the Fixer.

"The one and only, V."

"WHAT?!" Falco yells out loud, El Capitan wincing as he feels his ears hurt from the yell, "What does he want? Why us? How'd he even find out about us? Is he planning to kill us?"

"Chill, choom. It's not as bad as it sounds." El Capitan says in an attempt to calm him down, "If you really wanna know, he wants to know how David Martinez died, and what some cautionary tale has to do with it."

That just made Falco confused, "Cautionary tale? The fuck're you talkin' about?"

"Here's the BD." The fixer says as he texts Falco a Brain Dance.

After a bit, Falco finished watching it, "Don't know jack about it." Is all he says.

"C'mon choom, V isn't a bad guy. Well, not a bad guy by Night City standards."

"Oh, so he doesn't kill his own partners?" Falco asks sarcastically.

"Believe it or not, that rumor's a lie. That was all Arasaka." El Capitan said before adding, "Look, Falc, do this for old time's sake. Please?"

Falco thought for a minute, "I'll… give it a thought." Then he turned off the call.

"Fuck me." He whispered, "Maybe I should give him a chance? I mean, Muamar wouldn't do that."

As Falco left the bar and headed home, he realized what he was forgetting, 'Lucy!' he thought to himself as he dials her number. 'C'mon Luce, don't be under yet!'

/./

It was getting late in Santo Domingo, and everyone was either out partying or going home to sleep. Not many were putting in hours at 11 at night.

The ripper "Doc" was one of those people. As he went to snort more Glitter after yet another Brain Dance, he heard the door to his clinic open. "Yeah, just sit down and tell me what ya wanna chip in. I'll be out in a minute!" He says as he takes out another bag of the new drug.

"Alright, what d'ya want?" Doc asks as he comes out. As he looks around his room, he doesn't see anybody. "The hell?" he whispers. Suddenly, his fingers start to ache. Doc takes out some lube and rubs them all over his fingers, but the aches only intensify. Soon enough, Doc loses all the feelings in his fingers. Then, both of his arms start to ache. "Shit!" He says out loud as he looks around for the hacker. 'I know they're somewhere in this room. There aren't any windows, and the only way in and out is through the front door. So why can't I find them?' Doc frantically thinks as his arms ache more and more. Doc thinks fast and jams an air hypo into his left arm, and that seems to slow down the aching. As he looks relieved and finds another hypo, his left arm becomes completely numb. A few seconds later, his right arm suffers the same fate. "AAHH! W-who the hell are you? What did I do to you? I-if this is about the Claws, I thought I had until next week! Just give me till then, y-you can even have the Eddies in the back!" He frantically said.

"This isn't about money." A female voice echoes through the room.

"T-then what is it? W-whatever it is, I'll do it!" Doc frantically says.

"ANYthing?" The voice asks.

"ANYTHING!" He frantically yells.

"Don't move." The voice says. Doc did exactly that, his whole body going stiffer than a pencil. But, just as he thought he was in the clear, his whole body started aching.

"B-but you promised!" Just then, a body slipped down from the ceiling. Doc immediately recognized her, "Y-you!"

"This is for David." She says before unleashing the quick-hack Synapse Burn. Like clockwork, Doc stopped moving, and his eyes, ears and nose gushed out blood.

After that's done, a small smile begins to appear on Lucy's face. Then, she realizes she needs to get out of there before anyone else comes.

As she is driving through the highway, she gets a message from Falco. "Luce, I need you to dig up some info on V."

"Why? Is something up?" She texts back.

"He's looking for us."

Aaaaand done! What a cliffhanger, eh? Let me tell you right now, that scene is just the start of Lucy's arc. Also, let's talk about that Holt speech. Arasaka is trying to make V public enemy #1 while he is really a hero to Night City. Unfortunately, Arasaka still has their hands DEEP in NC, hence Falco being confused about V. I tried to base Holt off of Trump, speech patterns and all. I'm even debating on bringing him back with a blond wig! Still debating though.

Let's also talk about that Falco and El Capitan scene. I wanted to make it ambiguous, but let's just say they had a past together. They both moved on though, something Falco is trying to help Lucy through too. We'll see how that works for Falco though (Still deciding what exactly to do with him, but it definitely won't be pretty).

Would you believe me if I already have chapter 2 done? No seriously, this is the first time I've been on top of my schedule since, like, April! Feels awesome, I should do this more often.

Alright, now onto a misconception with the last chapter. I consider Sandevision the mode when the Sandevistan is turned on, hence putting in vision. Needless to say, I am sorry if I caused any of you confusion during the fic, and I hope you accept my apology.

One more thing before I go; In case you couldn't tell, all the chapter names are going to be named after songs, with each song having to do with the chapter and especially a person or scene in it. Last one was Retrograde by James Blake. You might also know it as the opening song for Tales From The Borderlands chapter 5. Honestly, I figured that just fit for the whole chapter. This one is My Demons by Starset. I'm pretty sure we all know what this has to do with the chapter, so I'll stop here.

Have a good one!