There was no real decision process, just a simple, absolute, irrefutable fact. There was no need to think it over, or consider it, or hesitate in following through with it.
Everyone in his way was going to die within the next five minutes, three if he managed to finally get the hang of his new body in time. His problem was that it wasn't that it wasn't good enough. No, just the opposite in fact. It was too good.
A dodge back would end up as a leap many feet off the ground, hearing an enemy come around the corner would result in him shooting too fast and needing to double-tap to ensure a clean kill, a swing of the sword designed to knock a weapon up would instead cut it in half.
Even the speedware was better than he was used to, now this shit actually made him go faster rather than just giving him better reactions. It was incredibly annoying that it seemed like all speedware did that these days, judging from how fast everyone was now.
Everything he tried to do, his body would output way more force than he was intending on, sending it wildly off the original mark. It was only the fact that he could take far more of a beating now that kept him in the fight. His body was covered in segmented plates of metal capable of bouncing off a few shots from his own Malorian.
Smasher had a point back in the day, as annoying as it was to say Steelhead was right about fucking anything. Metal was better than Meat, and that fact was throwing off every-fucking-thing he tried to do.
Fortunately, Silverhand considered himself a fast learner, and right now he had plenty of targets to practice on.
His new Gun was out of bullets, he would need at least two seconds to reload it. It was his best bet for turning the big one into scrap.
His sword could cut through one of those joints just fine, but he would need a clear shot at it.
His Malorian wasn't going to do any damage except to a real delicate part, but it still had four bullets left before he needed to reload.
He activated his speedware, the world slowing down to a crawl once more. His optics locked onto the form of the giant falling back, his audio suite could detect the guns around him starting to fire, bullets whizzing through the air.
His hand moved, holster in his thigh opening up, Gun slammed inside and holster beginning to retract. His other hand gently tossed the sword in the air, then moved to draw his Malorian again.
He kicked off the ground, very lightly this time, and caught the sword in his now free left hand as he flew.
He swung as hard as he could, letting the blade carry him. Two strommers suddenly lost their bodies from their pectorals down, their guns began to fall. He twisted into a crouching aim, letting the homing micro-missles slowly trail past his head and into the wall.
…who had fired those?
Ah, that one with his arms unfolded. Silverhand took aim, moving his arm slower than he was used to, locking on and firing a bullet. Three shots left.
His gun didn't fire any faster than this. This wasn't a problem back when speedware didn't make you actually move faster. He grumbled as he ducked down in the cover the two strommers were slowly dying in, and deactivated his sandevistan.
It left a bitter taste in his not-mouth, to know that his most recent Malorian couldn't keep up with him anymore. That taste was only made more bitter when he realized he didn't have any eddies to commission a new one.
His instincts screamed at him, he threw himself to the side.
The cover he was behind disintegrated as a rocket-fueled hammer the size of his torso smashed down. Nine baleful optics turned to follow him as he moved. He didn't even hear the big fucker move, one moment he was a safe distance away and the next he was turning steel bench into scrap.
So he had speedware too then, that pissed him off just a bit. He landed and rolled, scrambling to get up as bullets from other strommers in the room began to ping off of him like hail.
"Don't be so impatien-"
"Bang." Malorian interrupted, punching a spider-web of cracks into the fucker's visor. The giant staggered back as Silverhand got his bearing and stood up straight again. Nice visor gonkass, bet that's really helpful right now.
His instincts screamed at him to move. He jumped off the ground as hard as he could straight up.
The hammer crashed against the sound barrier right where his body just was. He ignored the spike of dread and hooked his sword around the edge of the balcony, pulling himself up and over.
Swinging around the edge, he kicked and turned the strommer about to shoot him into crumbled plasteel. His sandevistan was ready again. He crouched behind the sandbags they put up here and activated it.
The world slowed to a crawl. He tossed his sword up and unholstered both guns.
One, Two, Three, Four new bullets into the Gun.
A new clip for his Malorian.
Lightly tossing the Malorian up. He reached up to pluck the slowly spinning blade from the air and sheath it.
He stood and grabbed the Malorian. This fight was already over, they just didn't know it yet. He glanced over to the open side of the factory, to make sure that Rogue was doing fine. His brow furrowed when he saw that she and her lackeys were actually starting to fire into the factory itself now, every now and then turning a strommer into scrap with heavy fire.
Had she already taken care of all their reinforcements? How many strommers were there these days anyways? There were only around fifty of them back in the day, and he's already flatlined at least that many…
It didn't matter. There could be a whole country of them and he'd still kill them all. He might have to start taking their guns partway through though.
His optics widened as he saw a blurry figure rush from underneath him, heading straight for Rogue. He finally realized why the giant was so fast.
It didn't have a kerenzikov or sandevistan. It had both. It was only its immense bulk that made it anywhere near reasonable for him to react to.
Rogue began to turn, faster than the world around her but not fast enough.
He kicked off the wall, rocketing towards the rushing figure.
The giant began to swing.
He realized his mistake, as the giant's hammer was turned the wrong way around. Its rocket back-end ignited brilliantly. He wasn't holding his sword…
The giant spun on a dime, hammer moving to crash against him. Eyes glared at him in triumph, half orange, half red. Judging from what it did to his cover earlier, it would scrap him in a single hit.
His speedware timed out. He was out of time to think.
He was never really good at thinking anyways. He trusted his not-gut and squeezed his finger.
"Boom." Said the Gun.
The hammer turned into an improvised shrapnel mine as the bullet collided with its head mid-swing. He grunted as he was hit by what was now just a metal stick, sending him flying back to collide against the wall.
Rogue gave a shout of pain. He threw himself off the wall and forwards. Rogue had fallen back, clutching at her face, a bloom of fresh red. Her lackeys were peppered in newly installed metal spikes.The giant was turning to raise its arm at her.
He trusted his gut again.
"Boom." said the Gun.
The giant was thrown to the side, now missing the arm it tried to aim at Rache. It began to let off an electronic roar as it crashed to the floor, stumbling in an attempt to catch itself.
Rogue and her help screamed, along with every strommer in the room. He didn't know why, all he knew is that he wanted this fucker to shut the fuck up.
He didn't need to trust his gut this time. The shot was guaranteed.
"Boom." Said the Gun.
The giant was thrown from its position on the floor to fly through the air, crashing against the far wall of the factory, a sizable hole opened up in its side. The roaring intensified, and Silverhand almost felt like he could hear the voice of a second woman in pain. He decided that he didn't care.
"Boom." Silverhand declared. His finger pulled the trigger as the giant's head began to rise again.
"Boom." The Gun confirmed. The giant's head and upper-torso disappeared, and a hole opened up in the wall behind it. The metallic roar ceased. The strommers stopped screaming. Rache and the other two stopped screaming. That was four shots, the fucker better not move again. In fact, he better just make that clear.
"THE NEXT GONK THAT RAISES THEIR HEAD LOSES IT!" He roared out to a now-quiet factory, voice drowning out anything that the strommers might have been saying or listening to.
A couple of them thought they were clever. Silverhand started walking sideways, over to Rache, keeping an eye on them.
A few raised their guns…
Bang, Bang, Bang.
A few lost their heads.
He kept walking until he was over her. He leaned back against the cover she was using, gun raised, optics on the factory, Malorian idly spinning in his hand.
He glanced over, Rache…
Alt's cry for help repeated in his ears.
No, Rogue.
Rogue was already fixing herself up, a bloody stake of iron sitting on the ground next to her, her hand clutched over one of her eyes, face painted red. A second stake was still in her gut, and another in her thigh.
She fared better than her lackeys, both of which weren't moving anymore, their impromptu acupuncture being much more thorough than her own.
He turned his gaze back to the strommers.
Bang, Bang, Bang.
Three more fuckers would be going home in caskets.
"Can you fix yourself up?" He asked, voice low and serious.
"Give me a minute." She grumbled out at him, pulling out a medical kit and quickly going through the motions of self-patching by using her speedware. In another few instants, the shrapnel was out, she had sprayed some kind of foam on all the wounds, and she had a bandage tightly wrapped around her left eye.
…He was able to keep up with that, but only barely. He glared out at the crowd of subdued strommers and ignored it. He also ignored her frustrated complaints about how he crashed the car. It was his car to crash, she had no right to complain.
Bang, Bang, Bang, Bang.
Four more strommers suddenly realized they had appointments in the afterlife.
He activated his speedware, and reloaded everything.
He didn't have any more reloads of the Gun. He only had four shots left. He stored it in his thigh and resolved to not touch it if he didn't need to. His Malorian was still good enough for anything on the streets.
He drew the blade in his right hand, transferring over his Malorian to its proper place in his left hand.
"I'm good for now." Rogue said plainly, weapon drawn and standing with her back to him, watching for anyone coming up to them.
"Let's go, they probably have her in the basement." He said, his optics glanced down to the two he didn't even know the names of. He frowned briefly, before pushing down the feeling.
He started to walk forwards, Rogue following behind him.
The strommers, now reduced to perhaps a tenth of their number and leaderless, didn't peak their heads up anymore.
He descended into the concrete hall leading down. The lights flickered as he passed them. He checked every door as he stepped through.
Some doors were filled with random chrome. Some were operating tables. One was a studio. A few were crates of storage.
Some of them were empty. Some of them had strommers in them. He made sure that they didn't have any strommers left by the time he moved on, just scrap metal and viscera.
Eventually, they reached the final door. Kicking it down and turning the strommer inside into a ghost with one well placed bullet, he looked around the room.
He didn't recognize what it was for immediately. There was a medical table, diagnostic machines, a computer with an actual interface, a cut cord leading to a modem…
He walked over and around to see the computer screen. On it was just a single chat room screen, with replies from 'user' and 'guest 1'. Rogue followed behind him, glancing at the screen but her weapon trained on the door.
They were talking to someone. He narrowed his eyes and began to type, pecking away at the keyboard.
[where is alt]
There was a moment's pause, before the guest began to type out vitriol.
[You absolute dense motherfucker, don't play games with me you son of a bitch, you ape-brained gonkass incest-baby shit eater. I will rain death and spit fury down on you the moment…]
It kept going. He didn't need to read anymore.
He pulled out its interface cable and slammed it into the port on the computer. Immediately his body locked up and a presence settled in his mind. He didn't move, even as Rogue started cursing and wheeled her gun around to point at him.
The presence paused, the hold it had on his body slackened.
A sweet, beautiful voice echoed in his mind.
'...Johnny…?'
He slowly collapsed, gripping the computer as a lifeline to stay upright. He began to laugh, it would have been a cry if he was still capable of shedding tears, and shake in the dimly-lit room of a cyberpsycho fortress.
He lost her in 2013.
Ten years that he remembered since he had her back. Fifty-four years that he didn't remember since he had her back. Sixty-four years he's been separated from her, and here she was, she was…
She was…
'Oh Johnny…' Her sweet voice turned a little sad. She was always beautiful when she was sad, she was beautiful all the time.
"H-hey Alt… Long time no see, huh?" He held back the hysterics just enough to give her a reply. Rogue slowly lowered her gun as realization took hold over her features.
He couldn't care right now. Right now, none of that mattered. He just kept laughing, desperately clutching the computer, desperately hoping this wasn't another dream.
He had Alt back.
He felt the sensation of imaginary hands rub against his back, he welcomed the delusion for what it was.
He didn't know how long he stayed like that, but eventually Rogue grabbed his shoulder.
"We need to get back now Johnny. We're still in enemy territory here." She said with a conflicted look on her face.
'Let's go home Johnny.' Alt whispered to him, feeding his mind the sensation of a tight hug.
He picked himself up, and nodded, forcing his features to smooth out again.
'There's no Johnny left anymore. I'm all chrome now.' he thought sadly back to her. 'I'm just the Hand. Just the worst bits…'
'Johnny, stop being a gonk.' Alt playfully returned, voice twinged in melancholy.
He left out a laugh that was relieved and desperate in equal measure. That was just like her to say.
He moved to unplug himself, hesitating before the plug.
'Don't worry Johnny, pull it, I'm right here now.' Alt confirmed with an imaginary smile.
He pulled, like ripping a bandaid off, and almost froze in panic. It was only the feeling of the hug squeezing tighter around him that reassured him.
She was in his head now, she was with him, she wasn't going to go away again…
…she was in his head.
…Note to self, Alt, we need to get you a body ASAP.
Alt's laughter twinkled in his mind as he and Rogue fled the basement levels. Rogue didn't speak again for the rest of their time rushing back to her club. Along the way, Alt started filling him in on everything he's missed since he was dead.
Of course, about halfway back, an announcement blared on all frequencies, a man who he didn't recognize speaking just barely below shouting levels.
[This is a Netwatch-sanctioned announcement. There has been a class-four breach in the Blackwall in the Watson region. I repeat, a class-four breach in the Blackwall in the Watson region. Netwatch has been notified and will arrive in an estimated three hours. All Netrunners in Night City are requested for aid in containing the breach, with standard compensation for breach events.]
'Oh no…' Alt whispered in horror. Her voice matched the expression on Rogue's face.
All around him, every electronic in the neon city began to go haywire, firing randomly.
Around him, half of the strommers started screaming or convulsing or both. The other half suddenly started firing randomly.
His eyes flickered, and suddenly he could see things he couldn't before.
'Sorry love, I need to see this.' Alt spoke urgently, and he swallowed down the frustration.
The sky overhead was a swirling vortex of angry black storm clouds.
And from the clouds, thousands of things descended.