Wow, it's been a while, hasn't it.
Phantom Liberty is out since a while now and I do have a fair amount of opinions on it but nonetheless, it inspired me to write some Kerry/V one shots again.
I feel like I am a bit rusty though; so before I try to tackle on the new ending(s), I aimed for something shorter, simpler, inspired by events in Dogtown and by a message Kerry sends.
Takes place after the infiltration of the Black Sapphire in the Phantom Liberty main quest. Please note that English isn't my native language so please forgive me my mistakes but feel free to show them to me!
- - - -Relic Malfunction- - - -
"Argh, shit... not now..."
Pain pierced through V's skull like a hot bolt. He stumbled, just barely managed to drop down behind a car wreck, dodging badly aimed shots coming his way. Fortunately, his little Reboot Optics daemon went through before the relic decided to fry his brain at the worst possible moment. Otherwise, that Voodoo Boy thug might have actually hit his target before it was able to seek cover.
V's body started to cramp. His hands were shaking, fingers twitching. Through the white noise in his brain, he heard the steps behind him much too late. At the last second, he managed to roll on his back and lift his leg to kick against the chest of the yelling goon, who came chasing after him brandishing a knife. But V's Chrome refused to work as intended, his kick not nearly strong enough to make the goon stumble or even fall. Not a moment later V felt the burning pain of a blade being stabbed into his lungs.
He gasped, coughing up some blood but bit through the pain. Lifting his right fist with nothing but pure will power, he rammed it into the temple of the goon. V merely noticed the sound of fully charged Gorilla Arms breaking bones and metal alike, followed by a soft, squishy noise.
The goon fell limp to the side. A dark puddle of blood quickly forming where once had been his skull.
It wasn't over yet, V still noticed two more enemies in the network. However, his Kiroshis were too busy sending him several warnings about the relic malfunction and systems failing. It was hard to see through the wall of blinking errors and find the remaining two thugs.
"Fuck... this... shit..." he groaned, grabbed his shotgun with one arm and used his other to pull himself back on his feet.
"Fout tonè! Chen sal!" V heard these words but failed to understand them. His translator implant was probably not among the essential systems and not given priority right now... but it told him at least where his target was. Without having a look, he aimed the shotgun towards the voice, pulled the trigger and sank back behind cover. V knew the cries of a dying man, who's been ripped to shreds by the full spread blast of a power shot gun. Thing wasn't called Bloody Maria for nothing.
One thug remained.
V booted his Cyberdeck, forced it to scan the area for the nearest sign of life and without further thinking who or what it might be, he forced a Contagion daemon through the ICE and allowed himself to take a deep breath the moment he heard someone vomiting the shit out of their intestines.
And a moment later... silence.
In the distance V heard the constant noise of Dog Town and the white between his ears slowly numbed down.
He took a deep breath and pulled the knife out of his chest.
"Preem... shit..." he mumbled. He already felt his lungs repairing themselves again, but the pain and the blood loss were never fun. V decided that this car was as good place as any other to catch his breath and recover from the attack.
"Worst fucking moment to fuck me over, Johnny..."
Instead of hearing a sarcastic answer from Johnny though, he heard a short peep.
"Who the f-"
V pulled out his phone. Blinking at the blue screen, he saw a message from Kerry.
'Ah V fuuuck worlds biggest hangover, shakes and willies. Need a kind soul to tell me I'll come out the other side OK :-/ my age be damned ;-| '
V heard a rattle coming from his lungs with every heavy breath he took. Shakes and willies? What in the-? V kept staring at the message like it was some sort of cryptic riddle and wished for his fucking chrome to just hurry the fuck up and fix itself. He didn't want to go and see a Ripper Doc just because of one knife.
Yet there he was. Rattling lungs, probably some blood leaking inside of him where it didn't belong, beaten up by some third-class Voodoo Boy goons, all because the biochip in his head decided to hurry up in the process of flat lining its host.
And there he was, reading a message from Kerry who was complaining about a hangover.
V wished he could complain about a hangover.
Had nothing else to complain about but a hangover.
He stared at his phone for the longest while. The gonk inside of him wanted to smile brightly, simply because Kerry had thought about him, had wrote him of all people a message, probably right after waking up with a head as heavy as stone. Kerry, all wrapped in blankets and pillows, empty booze bottles and pillboxes all around him, a guitar somewhere in the bed, blinking himself back into consciousness, groaning from the heaviness of the hangover and just reaching for his phone, reaching out to V...
… but V wasn't all gonk.
He was also a dying man grasping at straws, sitting with his back to a dirty car wreck, coughing up blood. There was the still twitching and warm corpse of a Voodoo Boy goon right next to him - and that all in the possible worst place to be in all of Night City.
V typed a reply.
'Need better candy to pop at raves, physio venting helps, mutes nerves, you'll stride strong, won't bother us workin peeps!'
Sending the message away, V wasn't even sure if it really was meant for Kerry – or rather for himself. And Kerry seemed to have similar thoughts.
'Srsly V – soundin like you need time off, ad hoc vacay. U know, throw the monkey off your back, dunno, air your skull sponge.'
V let his head drop against the whipped car and allowed himself to close his eyes for a second, fading out the noise and stench of Dog Town, just for a moment.
Vacation. Wouldn't it be nice. On some white beach, somewhere in this world where the drinks were cold and the sun was warm. Lying under a palm tree with not a thing to worry about.
The peace held only for the breath of a moment as the booming deep sounds of an air drop cut through the air and into V's thoughts, pulling him away from the beach and drinking cocktails with Kerry. If only he could...
V looked at his phone again. Send a message.
'That an invite...? ;'
He saw Kerry typing immediately after he'd sent away those words and it made V smile. The thought of Kerry, still heavy with a hangover, was staring at his phone, eagerly awaiting a response from V – it was a nice thought. A warm thought.
'Dunno, maybe...?'
'My door's wiiiiiiiide open, always ;'
That's it, V thought. There was no point in crawling through this mud, coughing out the bloody bits of his cyber lung, while he could also be on the couch with Kerry and listen to his antics of NC's night life. It wasn't a white beach with palm trees but it was with Kerry and that's what mattered. Reed had said that he needed a couple of days anyway before he would come back at V. And sure, he could idle away the time by doing contracts, gigs and shoot up hide outs of Scavs and Voodoo Boys alike – or he could spend at least a few hours in somewhat happiness.
No counting rounds, right?
V typed one more message.
'Right, I know. One of these days – surprise! You'll see, be at your front door.'
V pulled himself back on his legs and took in a deep breath. Seemed like the rattling in his lungs had stopped. He felt better. Not good – but better. And the prospect of seeing Kerry – not in one of these days but actually quite soon – gave him a moment of ease and peace.
I'm running out of time
'Cause I can see the sun light up the sky
So I hit the road in overdrive
V parked his bike in the purple lighted drive way. He noticed a couple of very expensive cars and a quick scan told him that those weren't Kerry's, except for the Reyfield Aerondight. Suspiciously there was no noise coming from the mansion. No blasting music, not even a lot of lights. There were party guests - but no party? The security bots were at ease and it gave V a strange sense of comfort to be able to walk so freely among them and to just let the scanner at the front door recognize his hand imprint and open up for him.
V was welcomed by the usual sight of pure chaos. He could swear that there were more empty bottles, broken glass and random clothes on the floor than before.
Carefully he navigated through the mess.
And then, in Kerry's large living room, he was greeted with a living and breathing Renaissance painting. Bodies all over the table, the floor, the furniture. Some naked, some barely clad. Golden and silver chrome shining in the light of the dim lamps and Night City's own neon spark. And all above it the soft snoring and groaning of a collective hangover.
"Oh, hey V!" Kerry's voice sounded tired and content at the same time but also deep and rough, as if too much Whiskey, too many cigarettes and quite the amount of other drugs had left their marks on it.
V stepped over a sleeping woman to join Kerry on the couch.
There he was, on his back, barely able to lift his head and with a guitar resting on his stomach. One hand lazily plucked some strings but the guitar wasn't connected and didn't really make a sound.
Kerry lifted his legs just long enough so V could sit down and then let them drop on V's thighs. V rested his hands on Kerry's legs. He let out an amused snort.
"Surprised to see me?"
"Nah, not really. That 'one of these days' sounded rather urgent to me," Kerry mumbled. "You're predictable and in this case, I like that!"
"Yeah. Right. And what's... that? A new form of art?"
Kerry let his sunglasses slide down so he could throw a glance over their rim. He took his time to look around the room, one eyebrow raised, as if he was just as surprised as V by this view.
"Yeah. Might call it that," he said. Then his eyes were shining blue for a few moments – and not a second later everyone in the room was in for a rude awaking. Kerry let his fingers graze over the guitar strings, aimless and merciless. A loud and screeching sound filled the house for a moment, being blasted out of several speakers that all were heavily over tuned. Bodies started to move and groan. V could almost feel their headache.
"Wake up, ya gonks! Wanna introduce you to someone!" Kerry exclaimed.
A few tired eyes started to find V.
"That's V, my uhm... muse! And the little bird who helps me when I need to delta – or when you chooms need to delta."
"Pleasure to meet you all," V said with an amused smirk.
Confused faces were turned towards him. V could barely contain a chuckle.
"That's Spector over there. Ya remember Spector, right?" Kerry said and waved into a darker corner of the room where a man was smoking a cigarette. Spector Cheng gave V a nod. V nodded back.
"And that over there is Jeff..."
"Jehans..." corrected 'Jeff'.
"Yeah whatever... my new manager. Maybe new manager. If he manages to get me that world tour in 2078, 2079 latest. And I want the Crystal Palace, hear me Jespar?"
"Yes, Mister Eurodyne... I will... manage that... and it's Jehans..."
"Yeah, you will. That's why you're the manager, 'cause ya manage stuff."
Jehans groaned. Judging by the colour of his face, V guessed that he was busy finding his innards at the moment. Jehans stood up and went to look for some pants and because of that, a quite busty woman underneath him was freed and lifted her head.
"Oh, welcome back to the living, Betty," Kerry grinned and nudged V. "That's Betty. Great bust. Great baker, too."
"Baker?" questioned V. "That a thing?"
"High luxury goods, V. Really expensive pastry and scones 'n stuff. Gotta be rich to afford her."
V recalled something like that from his days at Arasaka Counter Intel. Didn't Arthur Jenkins himself order some fine pastry once in a while, made by some company called BBB? He suddenly wondered what those three B could stand for.
"And the other people...?" asked V and watched how zombie after zombie slowly raised.
"Figure skaters, mostly." Kerry shrugged. "Yeah folks, party's over, don't make me tell V to throw y'all out... Spector, catch up with ya later..."
V was surprised by how fast the party ensemble was able to leave Kerry's property. Almost like they were used to it.
V's hands started to knead Kerry's calves.
"So, what was the occasion?"
"Music, V," Kerry hummed all content and pleased under V's massaging hands. "Songs. I got ideas. Visions. A new album. And man! It's going to be a banger."
"And I am your muse...?" V smirked and Kerry lifted his head, just enough to take a lazy look at V before he melted over the arm rest again.
"Yeah you are..." he said softly and lifted one arm, like he wanted to paint an invisible rainbow into the air. "There's one song... wrote that one 'bout you, V... just you."
A strange sensation settled in V's stomach. Not unpleasant but unexpected.
"That's the hottest thing someone ever said to me," he said.
"I bet," Kerry said with low voice and let he guitar slide from his chest. Slowly he worked himself into a somewhat sitting position, his legs still stretched over V's lap.
V leaned in, one hand reaching out to take the sun glasses off from Kerry but the moment he did, Kerry just hissed and squinted his eyes hard.
"Ah, f-fuck, light, horrible invention... fuck, I'm gonna throw up."
V had to laugh.
"So the hangover really is that bad, hu?"
"Fuck, don't laugh, you gonk. I almost called Trauma Team on this when I woke up. Lemme just..." Kerry stretched, grabbing the first bottle in reach and took a swig. V would bet his cyberdeck that this wasn't water.
"... better. And now come here, kid."
Kerry grabbed V's head and pulled him into a deep kiss. The taste of strong alcohol was on his lips and tongue and V wanted to drink it all in.
Kerry pulled back after a few seconds, biting his lower lip. For a moment V was back on the yacht. And what followed was that amazing feeling of having no worries. At least for one short, blissful moment. Kerry's seducing smirk. The spark in his eyes. That breath of freedom.
"Tell me, V. What have you been up to?" Kerry searched for a cigarette, found one and got comfortable on the couch and V's lap again.
"Actually... I've just been to a big thing in the Black Sapphire. Kinda expected to see your face there too, to be honest. Lots of big celebs there. Lizzy Wizzy performed on stage."
"Psh... Black Sapphire," Kerry scoffed. "Think I would go do such a place, filled to the brim with corpo rats, specially when I am not the one on stage...? Nah, got better shit to do. Like writing these new songs... but shit, V, if I had known, we could've party together, thrash the bar, ya know, flip some eddies."
"Yeah..." V said slowly, "I wasn't exactly there to... party."
"Shiiit! A gig then?" Kerry said excited. "Could've been your sidekick, choom! What were you doing there? Not working for that lead head Hansen, I hope?"
"I uhm... long story. It was an infiltration job. For the FIA. A little follow up after I rescued and met the president of NUSA."
Kerry froze in motion. The tiny flame of the lighter burned but the cigarette just fell out of Kerry's mouth.
"You're kidding."
"Nope." V picked up the cigarette and put it back into Kerry's mouth. "And if things go as planned then... they gonna help me with the relic."
"Johnny." A weird shadow crossed Kerry's face, one of old pain and sudden clarity through the pills, the alcohol and the hangover. He averted his gaze for a moment, as if he didn't want V to see any of that.
"They can save my life..." V said slowly.
He truly hoped they could. And if he would have to beat up Hansen with his own fists for that, if he would have to burn down all of Dogtown just for this chance – he would do it.
For a few moments there was silence between them. It wasn't the unpleasant kind but V wondered what went through Kerry's head. He would've probably asked, if it wasn't for Kerry to face him again, showing a determined smile.
"You better make the fucking FIA keep that promise then. If I go and have that world tour, I'm gonna need a personal body guard. And I only take the very best merc of Night City for that."
There it was again. That warm feeling in V's stomach.
"I hope you pay well, Ker. This merc works for the president herself right now – I might wanna up my pay rates."
"I can offer you something much better than the president of NUSA every could," Kerry said with seductive tone but then he grimaced slightly in sudden pain and blinked irritated. "But not right now. Feels like a small animal is living in my stomach and wants out." He closed his eyes with a groan but then started to move and shift around on the couch until he could lay with his head on V's lap.
"You gonna stay?" he murmured, eyes still closed.
"A few hours, sure," V said softly and let his fingers gently brush through Kerry's hair.
"Preem, preem..." Kerry muttered, slowly dozing off.
V just watched him. Listened to the soft but steady snoring that was now the only noise in the big, dark mansion. His hand still combed through Kerry's hair and he turned his gaze towards the large windows. The mud of Pacifica seemed to be so far away from here. His problems, if just for a few hours, seemed to shrink too.
And even Night City was just a large silhouette made out of gorgeous neon lights and dark shadows from here.
The text messages are taken 1:1 from the game. I have no clue HOW heavy Kerry's hangover was for him to write like that.
"I'm running out of time
'Cause I can see the sun light up the sky
So I hit the road in overdrive"
is taken from "The Weeknd - Blinding Light".