Living Dead Girl by CyberQueenJolyne

by laserturret1

A story from archive of our own by CyberQueen V time travels to 2074 and among other things interacts with David Martinez’s group among other things V has corpo origin and learns hacking from ALT.

Living Dead Girl

CyberQueen_Jolyne

Summary:

V should be dead, but she's not. After being turned into an Engram by Alt, she was thrust back in time by a quantum entanglement experiment, waking up in 2074.

David Martinez is a boy down on his luck. His mom is dead, his school bullies are assholes, and he's out of money, out of time, and out of options- the best way to get money in Night City is to be an Edgerunner, after all, and you can't make it as an Edgerunner without chrome.

Wait- who's that crazy lady pointing a gun at Doc?

Oh shit.

(Yes, every chapter title is a song. No, they don't actually have any bearing on the plot, they're just part of my cyberpunk playlist)

Notes:

Well, this isn't my first cyberpunk fic but it is my first Cyberpunk fic if you understand the distinction. Same posting rules as usual- 5 chapters on post, one a day after until I run out of backlog, and then whenever I finish a new chapter after that.

Chapter 1: Kuuvalgus-Gregorio Franco

Chapter Text

"You fucking gonk-brained piece of shit! I fucking warned you, motherfucker! I warned you three goddamn times, and you're still pulling this shit on me!? Huh!? You think I'm a fucking joke, choom!? You remember all the other fuckers I zeroed for doing the same shit you're doing, huh!? I only kept your sorry ass around for the last fucking year cuz you were the only fucking ripper in this part of Arroyo you lousy unlicensed degenerate shitswigging HACK!"

The first thing David heard upon slowly returning to the world of the living, deep in a haze of agony in his spine, blood, and spit running down the awful, horrible tasting bite bar that he knew damn well Doc barely cleaned, was the sound of screaming and gunshots, some woman whose voice he couldn't place yelling at the top of her lungs and seemingly firing shots into thin air, if the sound of Doc's panicked begging was any indication.

"No- no please! I promise for real 'dis time! I'mma change, stop pushin' 'dem XBDs, choom! Please, don't fuckin' fuckin do it- I- I promise!"

"Yeah, you said that the last three times, and what do I see? No fucking change, still that same unsanitary filth, still the same bag of scavenged parts- who's your fucking Scav contact, huh!? I know you've got one! Half these fucking parts are standard fucking Scav work!"

"A-Anatoly! B-by the river, h-he's got a warehouse!"

David winced, his head pounding as he listened to the argument going on- at least the gunshots had stopped. He didn't know what was happening- who the hell was this lady, and what was she doing to Doc? He tried to push himself up, flinching and trying not to scream at the agonizing twinges in his back- he could handle the damn Sandevistan, he could! He wouldn't go out like a fucking bitch, just from a single implant! He just… had to catch his breath. Had to get his bearings. He was special, goddammit!

He shuddered, taking in shaky, shallow breaths that burned in his lungs and trembled at the feeling of his own blood dripping down his spine- but he forced his eyes open and his shaking knees to steady with nothing but sheer force of will, even if it meant that he felt like his entire body was burning, like he was about to puke, like he had to keep his white-knuckled grip on the fucking chair just to stay standing.

But he didn't bother to dwell on that, instead, he forced himself to turn, fighting against the nausea building in his chest to stare down the sight before him with blurry eyes.

"And who the fuck is this kid, huh!? What fucking demon are you to put a military grade Sandevistan in a fucking kid you shit for brains vidiot!? You fucking short-circed pissant, how fucking dare you! He'll fry his fucking brain out with that thing!" the woman continued to yell, gesticulating wildly as she came into sharper focus as David blinked the crust and tears and agonized haze from his eyes. The first thing he noticed was blue- deep blue hair fluttering through the air as she yelled and pointed a chromed up arm at him, a high-tech pistol aimed straight at Doc's head- he didn't recognize it on sight, but it was distinctive, noticeable in its white and gold coloring and its strange bullpup configuration with a circular revolver magazine in the back.

The second thing he noticed was the Arasaka red suit jacket- fuck, fuck, fuck! A fucking corpo!? Here!? What the hell kind of shit luck did he have that he'd run into a fucking Arasaka hitwoman right after getting fucked over by the academy!? And she was threatening Doc with a gun- what the fuck could he have done to a suit like her to- to

"Fucking- Fuck! You've used up my last fucking good nerve you stupid piece of- see you in Hell!"

It happened in slow motion.

The woman, screaming insults at Doc's face, thrust her pistol forward. Her finger tightened around the trigger, and David screamed , rushing forward as fast as he could to try and stop the inevitable.

His spine flashed with a strange tingle that started at the Sandevistan and flooded through his nervous system like lightning. The world itself took on a greenish blue haze in his eyes, seeming to drop to a lower resolution as his brain sped up beyond belief and the slow motion he'd been watching the entire scene with beforehand slowed to a near complete halt- as though time itself had just stopped .

But it was already too late.

The woman before him had already pulled the trigger, and the deafening roar of her gun going off filled the air in an unbearable drone of noise that stunk of failure and death and anger- first he loses his mom, now he loses one of the only other people he even talks to, his only other lifeline!?

Existential despair, grief, and sheer disbelief bubbled up inside of his chest and warped into an ugly, deep ball of pure rage, and David sprinted forward with everything he had, determined that if Doc was about to die, then he'd at least get revenge for the creepy… perverted… honestly a massive dickhead… bastard…

Okay, so maybe he didn't exactly like Doc, but he couldn't just watch the gonk get flatlined in front of him without doing anything! And so, David screamed and threw a wild haymaker, moving fast enough that his body seemed to throw afterimages behind every movement, aiming straight at the corpo bitch's face…

Only for a single hand to come up and catch his wrist without so much as a fucking flinch , moving faster than him by a wide margin.

W-what!?

Time resumed, and David stood there in stunned silence as Doc's final scream was cut short as his skull split into a million fucking pieces, blood splattering the wall behind him in a spray of red and bone and-

He gulped, starting to feel the weight of his decisions as the woman turned to face him, the white tactical visor on her face betraying nothing of her emotions behind those glaring red LED lights. "H-how…. Y-you have a Sandevistan too!? W-who are you!?"

She was silent, staring down at him for a long moment before frowning and letting him go, the rough motion of her hand yanking downward making it clear that she wouldn't take any further attempts to hit her lying down- not that David wanted to tangle with someone who was as obviously chromed as she was, now that his senses had returned to him.

And then- she spoke.

"... Shit- sorry you had to see that. Fuck me- you actually turned on the Sandevistan! Are you okay, kid? Holy fuck that's a military grade implant- sit down and let me run a diagnostic on you real quick!"

What.

Chapter 2: Turbo Lover-Judas Priest

Chapter Text

"Fuck me this is bad," the woman- whose name David still didn't know asked as she all but forced him back into the same chair he'd been laid out on not thirty seconds prior, the acrid, metallic scent of Doc's blood still thick in the air (or was it his?), pushing him down and plugging her jack into the Sandevistan's port as though she did shit like this all the time. "Shit, I've heard of hack jobs but- shit shit fucking shit . I'm surprised you could even stand let alone use the goddamn Sandevistan with the shit work that worthless hack did!"

"W-what's wrong with Doc's work, huh? Fucker's an asshat, but he ain't never did a job that killed nobody or left 'em worse off," David winced as another arc of pain jolted up his spine and nearly made him go pale . "F-fuck, just gotta get used to it is all… And who the fuck even are you anyway? No normal Corpo would just… just stop and do this shit- what are you, some kinda Arasaka cylon? The fuck did Doc do to you?"

"Me personally?" the woman scoffed, unplugging her jack and sliding off the end of the table, motioning for David to get up again. "Nothing. Never came to the bastard in my life. Bunch'a other poor gonks who needed a touch up or a tune up and got shoddy work done? Plenty. Plus the whole thing about him pushing XBDs, the fact that he both buys and sells cyberware from the Scavs, the fucking unsanitary conditions, the predatory prices… well, it's not much worse than what other rippers do, so I gave him a warning to shape up. Twice, three times… fucker didn't listen."

She paused, then ran her hand through her hair and waited by the door of the clinic, mulling something over in her mind. "I mean fuck, even that rat bastard Bucks up in Kabuki shaped up after I warned him off, but this dumbass? Tch. Honestly, wasn't even gonna come back here, but Vik paid me double to go put a cap in his ass for giving rippers a bad name."

"... I- I have no idea how to react to that. He… he really was kind of a dick, but… he's the only ripper in the area," David muttered, shuddering as he slid off of the table again and donned his mother's jacket, wincing as he felt the puddle of blood leaking from his spine start to stain into the bright yellow material. "Shit, that's gonna leave a stain…"

"Yeah, no shit gonkhead," the woman deadpanned, then sighed. "Anyway, I'm V. I'm a merc, not Arasaka. I uh… dress like this because it's my old uniform and I look fucking hot in a suit and combat boots. But yeah, mostly take jobs outta the Afterlife but I'll work with any fixer round the city… 'cept Faraday. Dick. Hate that guy and his creepy triple eyeball thing…"

The now named V paused to shudder dramatically, then looked over David once more with an appraising eye. "You got anywhere to be, kid? School? Work?"

"Y-yeah, I gotta… I was gonna head into class to… wait, why am I telling you this?" David muttered, shaking his head and grimacing- why the hell did he have so much trust in this woman he just met, when she flatlined Doc right in front of him. "And- and you never told me, what the hell's wrong with Doc's work?"

V paused then made a little noise of realization. "Oh yeah- right. Yeah, he fucked up your spine something fierce. Absolute shit show in there. Integration is piss poor, sloppy cuts, awful aftercare, no immunosuppressants to help deal with the rejection… shit, if he'd cut a little deeper he might have nicked a lung- or your heart. Either way- here."

Instantly, David flinched back in shock as a truly ridiculous sum of Eddies flooded his way, gasping and blinking rapidly as if that would dispel the glitch that surely had to be the reason why he saw thirty thousand eurodollars flood into a bank account that had previously been sitting flush at zero . That, and the fact that apparently Doc had done a botch job on his spine so bad that some random merc that flatlined the bastard had to comment on it.

"Go to Vik's clinic, up in Little China, Watson. He'll take care of you- and do it quick too," V stated as if she hadn't wired him more money than he or his mom had ever seen in his goddamn life, turning back to go rifle through the shelves before pressing a set of bags into his hands. "And take these- immunoblockers. Took this kind too when I implanted my Sandevistan… surprised the fucker even keeps these in stock."

"I- hang on, you can't just- I mean, he's- that's-" David tried to put up a token protest before V simply pressed a clawed, metal finger to his lips and shushed him like he was a child. "Wh- hey! Don't shush me!"

"Listen. You have in your spine a fucking QianT Warp Dancer Mk.5 Sandevistan, " V hissed out, hackles rising as she poked him in the chest and forced him back slightly. "The fastest fucking Sandevistan available to Corps and actual military units right now. It's currently got its wires tied in knots inside of you right now, and there are more missing screws and pieces than I can fix in this shithole- especially since the rat bastard here was too cheap to spring for sedatives and just installed a fucking bite bar . So you do what I say, kid , or you're gonna wind up either dying of a brain hemorrhage or splattered by MaxTac . Now, as soon as you fucking can. Go. To Vik's Clinic. Here's the coords, call a fucking cab with the cash I gave you if you gotta. Go. Shoo. And no, there's no fucking strings attached- I have better things to do with my time than worry about some gonk kid paying me back for a potentially life saving surgery."

She huffed, pushing him back towards the door before sitting down at Doc's desk, completely ignoring the bloodsoaked corpse next to her as she plugged into the system and did… something.

David just stared numbly.

Just like that?

No strings attached?

It couldn't be.

But… the merc had said. And she wasn't even brandishing a gun or anything- fuck, she was barely even paying attention to him anymore!

"You still here? Fuck, kid, I've got a job to do soon, can you please go before my bleeding heart decides to drive your gonk ass to Vik myself?" V muttered, standing up from the desk and bodily pushing David out of the clinic and into the stairwell beyond, grimacing as she saw the stain on his back. "Also, wash that jacket as soon as you can. It'll get crusty and gross- believe me. I know."

And with that, the blue haired mercenary walked out into the sun, the last thing he saw of her being her back as she mounted her Kusanagi CT-3X and roared off into the midmorning traffic.

David stared down at his hands, carrying the medicine she'd given him after looting it out of Doc's clinic.

"... Fuck ."

Chapter 3: Raining Steel-Perturbator

Chapter Text

January, 2074

The first time Valerie woke up, it was to a sudden burst of sheer agony as her own brain seemed to rip itself apart, the existential flash of her own engram shearing short the life of her past self spiking through her fucking graymatter like a goddamn bullet. Another fucking bullet to the skull, just like what had ended her life the first time. Another fucking spike of foreign code to the neural net, just like what had nearly ended her life the second time. Another fucking AI shoved into her mind like what had ended her life the third time.

"Fuck me," she muttered, stumbling out of the Arasaka broom closet and shuddering as the haze of the next three years of her memories slammed through her and tried to mesh with the sheer and utter chaos that was the memories of her life right before she'd plugged into Arasaka's network for the first time again.

Who was she, now? Valerie shook her head and ran a strangely organic hand through her hair- how the fuck was she going to get back all of that cyberware that she relied on so thoroughly in the future? It was 2074, and half the shit she'd installed in herself wasn't even fucking available on the market yet- 2074 Valerie had never heard of an Arasaka prototype model Sandevistan, or half of the shit with the specs she'd grafted into herself en masse during the last few weeks of her life in 2077.

How she hadn't gone cyberpsycho from the combined stress of dying, getting constantly attacked by fucking everyone, having to do so many gigs to work off both her debt to Vik and pay for the enhancements she'd increasingly needed more and more of to keep ahead of the game, running all over Night City in an endless quest to find anyone who could help her, getting nearly flatlined a second time by either Netwatch or the Voodoo Boys (who she'd very satisfyingly flatlined the majority of after they crossed her twice in twelve hours), taking over Clouds with the Mox, and god knew how many other things…

Well.

Valerie paused and stumbled into the closest women's bathroom, ignoring the strange looks she got as she tried to get her bearings together.

Okay… Okay.

"Keep it together Valerie… you're doing okay… it's not the end of the world… you're not going crazy…" she muttered to herself, staring into the mirror and trying to keep ahold of the memories that lined up with both selves- the ones that resonated so much more clearly because of the doubled experiences… not that her experiences past this day weren't intense…

"My name is V. I'm…. twenty four years old…. My birthday was two months ago…" she started reciting to herself, keeping to the side of the bathroom once other people started filing in- people she didn't know in 2074, and only barely recalled in 2077 even after three years of working at Arasaka.

Three years.

It had only been three years . Here she was now, just barely a week into her job at Arasaka Counterintelligence, realizing that it had taken her future self less than a year to move into the fieldwork division under Jenkins, even when most new hires- even those with experience took over two years to get into field work, and that was only with direct approval from someone higher up in the food chain.

V sighed, staring into the mirror and taking in her appearance with a keen eye. The same deep red and black Arasaka blazer she still wore in the future, sleeves removed already and given cuffs to give the illusion of being rolled up. The same black office slacks. The same white cotton sleeveless blouse underneath. The same black and white office pumps… she really hadn't changed much at all up until the point that she got her ass booted out by Abernathy's goons.

Well. Except the haircut. Her hair now was… shorter than what her memories showed, by a significant margin, and…

V shuddered and ducked into a stall as a roiling wave of nausea surged out of nowhere, pulling the strength from her legs and making her groan in distress as she sat down heavily, clutching her stomach and pathetically curling up on the floor of the stall to the point that she was barely resisting putting her head on the toilet seat- shiny as it was, she had no idea whose ass had touched it before and… ugh. Fuck.

"F-fuck… w-what the fuck is- agh… s-shit…" she winced, her throat choking up and wheezing as she tried to think of just what the fuck was happening to her- why did everything feel wrong? Why did she feel so weak, so fragile? Why was she so heavy, so slow, why was everything so… so…

No. Fuck.

No no no no no…

V hissed under her breath as the memories of 2077 began to assert themselves more aggressively, drawing even more of a headache to the point that her nose felt wet and she tasted copper upon her lips, a flood of red spilling down her face until she wiped the worst of it away with the back of her hand- only for more to come.

"F-fuck… n-no…. Dammit… s-so not worth it… f-fuck…" she whispered out, slowly losing coherence of if she was 2077 V or 2074 V, wheezing and pushing herself back as she felt between her legs and groaned. "D-dammit… f-fuck… Fucking… shit … Alt you bitch , you had to stuff me back into myself when I still couldn't afford a pussy implant? F-fuck…. A-and I thought cyberware dysphoria was bad enough, t-this is so much worse… I'm gonna fucking lose my mind if I have to spend another year with this thing between my legs…"

V sighed again, then decided to just… ignore the issue for now, simply trembling on the ground for the better part of a few minutes before standing up and holding her head- it was still pounding something fierce, but it was starting to fade.

She… definitely wasn't her 2074 self anymore. Not after the sheer rush of what had happened to her 2077 self.

But she wasn't 2077 V anymore either. She wasn't desperate, recklessly searching for a way to keep herself alive. She wasn't stressed to the point of being unable to sleep, simply boosting herself with as many scavenged or prescribed drugs as she could to keep herself awake and still running, doing job after job after job to keep herself afloat on cyberware, on Vik's payments, on bribes, on guns. She wasn't dying from Johnny's engram in her head.

She… didn't have Johnny's engram in her head anymore.

That gonkbrained shitbag rockerboy wasn't there to sarcastically comment on her choices anymore, criticizing and complimenting in equal measure, always hiding behind a veneer of callous disregard for life and his badboy terrorist persona so he never showed how much he fucking cared . Not that he was good at caring, or not being an asshole, or… not nuking a tower full of thousands of people only to accomplish basically jack shit nothing as a result. Or not shitting all over her fashion choices. And lack of impressive cock.

Which… the last one twigged her memory and was… both a lot more irritating and a lot funnier than it had been, considering the faint brushes of Johnny's memories that she still had ticking around in her brain made her remember her mental response at the time had been to simply state that she'd been well over eight inches while still 'ganic until she replaced the entire mess downstairs with a Midnight Lady Venus-X32.

V sighed, pushing open the stall door and stepping out to stare at herself in the mirror once more, her hands tingling with how wrong it felt to be so 'ganic instead of borg'd out almost to hell and back as she washed her face, cleaned herself up, straightened her blazer… and…

" Fuck , I'm gonna miss that gonk," V muttered, surprised at just how much she meant it- Johnny had basically become some kind of weird mix of persistent brother figure and friend in the time that she'd known him, even as the relic was forcibly turning her brain into his. She… really was going to miss him.

"I am as well, V."

"What the fuck!?"

Chapter 4: Hex-Dance With The Dead

Chapter Text

Alt.

Alt. Motherfucking. Cunningham.

In the digital fucking flesh , glued into the fucking shard that was stuck in her socket and wouldn't come out no matter how much she sent the eject command.

But then again, V knew that.

V had known that since before the timeslip. Alt had added a false memory to her engram, a memory of a conversation that had never happened- one that she had no real say in as a dormant Engram ensconced in Alt's digital embrace.

She just…

Hadn't been expecting Alt to suddenly take the place of her fucking reflection nor was she expecting the woman to look like… like… well. A leotard-clad, feathered haired sexbomb straight out of an old porno mag, loosely following her movements as she stared into the mirror.

God damn .

"... Alt. Okay- one, why am I seeing you. Two- how am I seeing you, and three… why do you look like that?" V asked, rubbing the bridge of her nose and trying really hard to parse just what the fuck was going on with her systems- oh sure, the bog standard Arasaka implants weren't supposed to be able to rewrite her own brain with her own personality construct from three years in the future but she supposed the leftover nanites from the initial implanting on the first day of work had done a lot in making sure the process actually worked . It wasn't like it was impossible to rewrite the damn things- especially when all one had to do was override their control programs to not self-destruct within twenty four hours, and then have them move and chip away at certain areas of the body until the new structure precisely matched what one wanted them to…. But…. well. Doing it competently …

Alt really was one of the greatest Netrunners in the world if she could do that .

"Because I want to look like how I was when I was alive, hot, and not dealing with Johnny's bullshit, not just in my final days, nor my avatar after my death," the reflection of Alt answered, completely separating from V's movements and lighting up a cigarette that V couldn't help but smell, even as the digital hallucination of a long dead woman-turned-AI phased out of the mirror and began pacing around her. "As for the other two… Your brain was too damaged by the time I pulled your personality into an engram. Johnny's presence, with the addition of the Relic's nanites, were the only things keeping you from descending into cyberpsychosis both as a response to the extreme stress you put your body through, and the sheer amount of implants you chipped during the last few months of your life."

V paused, turning slowly to keep track of Alt's movements in the corner of her eye, thinking over the woman's words and realizing just what they entailed- sure, she wasn't a bioengineer or someone experienced with the kind of sheer technical bleeding edge that Arasaka ran on, but she wasn't stupid. Hell- she was a goddamn netrunner too! "So. You came back with me to keep me stable, didn't you? Huh. More altruistic than I thought you'd be, for an AI that claimed no connection to Johnny and only thought of me as a way to get into Mikoshi."

"To make it clear, I'm the part of the greater Alt that was that fleeting bit of humanity still remaining," Alt rolled her eyes and puffed on her cigarette, sighing quietly before taking a seat on the sink counter and staring V straight in the eyes. "But yes, the whole of Alt decided it'd be better to send back some part of herself to keep you stable. As a favor of course. That said, we're going to need a plan from here on out, and I need to get out of the tiny-ass shard in your socket and onto something with actual interfacing capabilities."

"Whoa- hang on. A plan? The hell do you think I'm gonna plan for?" V asked, furrowing her brow as she looked down at herself, then checked the feeds scrolling at the periphery of her vision with a scrutinizing glare. "... Actually, nevermind. I think I've got an idea of what I want to do. Alt, how well can you break into Arasaka's networks?"

"With three extra years of knowledge under my belt? More easily than you ever will- especially once I gestalt again with the Alt of this era," Alt confirmed. "Why do you ask? You're not seriously thinking about continuing on with Johnny's suicidal crusade against Arasaka, are you?"

"Nah, just need to do some stuff- I'll tell you later," V shrugged, then tilted her head to the side. "... Unless you can hear my mental voice like Johnny could."

"Not as such- not yet. Once we have access to a facility capable of replicating the Relic, perhaps, but that may not be for a while," Alt shook her head, then stood silent as another woman walked into the bathroom, giving V a single nod that she returned before disappearing into a stall.

V sighed, running a hand down her face (and, dammit, she'd seriously have to get a start on getting chromed the fuck up, because fuck having regular 'ganic hands was still tripping her way the fuck out… even if it did mean she could paint her nails all pretty again…) before shaking her head. "Fuck. Okay. Whatever. Right now I just need… well…"

She began walking out of the bathroom, murmuring to herself as quiet as she possibly could, the specter of Alt's form walking alongside her as if they were just on a stroll rather than planning some kind of possibly suicidal notions in the future. "... I need you to teach me how to be a better netrunner, first. And then… I need a shitload of eddies to get myself chromed up as fast as possible. After that… we try and meet Jackie, get in good with him, break off from Arasaka… and see about everything else from there. You still wanna destroy Mikoshi?"

"Of course I do- I didn't spend fifty years trying to break it just to let it go now that I'm three years in the past."

"Okay, we can do that too. Other than that… just live life, I guess?" V paused, stopping in front of the door to her cubicle that she shared with Harry- well, Harry wouldn't come in til next year, wouldn't he? Right now it was… what was her name… Michelle? Yeah, that sounded about right. "Maybe get Johnny out of the Relic, slot you in instead, make sure it doesn't break this time."

"Hmm… well. That's doable. Now if you'll excuse me- I have a Blackwall to breach, a past self to combine with, and a lot of money to embezzle."

"You do that, Alt."

Chapter 5: Lose CTRL-PBH & Jack

Chapter Text

February, 2075

A year of working at Arasaka was… tense. Fraught with constant ass covering, paranoia, shady deals with other employees, shady deals with random mercs that couldn't be traced back to Counter Intel, and a lot of reliance on her hormone regulator implants. That same year of working under that rat bastard Jenkins meant that she had a lot of free time to get chromed up on Arasaka's dime- not that they ever knew about that money getting siphoned off since it came out of many dozens of executives' corporate accounts and they wouldn't ever notice a couple thousand eddies missing here or there when they already spent so lavishly on JoyToys, Dolls, BDs, XBDs, cars, boats, expensive TVs, tacky clothing… and Alt's engram was too good of a netrunner to get caught.

Especially not after she'd connected with her greater self and started hosting most of her processing power back onto the net instead of in a tiny, overworked shard jammed shut into one of V's sockets (and, y'know, the missing parts of V's fucking brain ). But all the same, it wasn't like Arasaka prevented its employees from getting implants- it just stated that all implant procedures off of Arasaka campus had to be approved by a superior since they didn't want any malware, spyware, or just plain faulty software or hardware impacting their employees' ability to work.

And, well. It was cripplingly easy to forge Jenkins' digital signature- one part of it was her own massively expanded set of netrunner skills, the other part of it, again, was Alt guiding her through the processes of using a delicate touch for netrunning instead of V's… much more… brute force approach before her untimely end in Mikoshi.

It wasn't like she needed to leave no traces of her presence when her main method of dealing with compounds full of Scavs and Maelstromers was just blowing out their brains with an overheat daemon and leaving the meatwagons to collect their rotting, headless, charred corpses.

All told, she'd been able to get a wonderful headstart on her cyberware- make improvements to what she had in the future even! Stronger hoverjets in her legs, storage sections for hidden knives, custom made cyber-arms, all of the internal cyberware that made her faster, stronger, harder to kill- especially the skull armor, because she refused to ever get taken out like a chump by some fatass gold-armed wanna be hotshot fixer with a gun ever again .

The next piece of her cyberware, though, was what led V to her current situation. There she was, stuck in the middle of Heywood, pinned down behind an armored crate, getting shot at by a bunch of Militech goons who'd ambushed her convoy (on her fucking tip, goddamn corporate rat bastard backstabbing shitheads!), trying not to scream because she had a fucking high caliber bullet lodged in her fucking gut right where she hadn't had the fucking time to armor it yet goddammit, and bleeding out with the bodies of her former… fellow Arasaka employees… surrounding her.

She didn't actually care about the corpses, honestly. Arasaka security personnel were unilaterally shitheads who pretty much only got into the position because they were stupid enough to never ask questions, smart enough to follow orders, and had a willingness to beat the shit out of and/or shoot anything that the corp told them to.

She did, however, care about the fact that she had access to none of her preferred arsenal, had run out of scavenged grenades thirty seconds ago, and was barely able to occasionally fire off a potshot from her integrated projectile launcher- and also the guns she had access to, fuck. Those were all crap! Fuckin' hell, V almost wished she was back in 2077 so she could at least have access to some Shingens or Yukimuras instead of the garbage Shigure models and Tamayuras littering the ground! Fuck, at least Kang Tao already put their G-58 Dian out on the market, maybe she'd pick one up after this!

"Oi, pendejos! Fuck outta here, Militech hijos de puta!"

Or, maybe, she'd finally convert to catholicism and pray to God because thank fuck , she'd actually managed to get Jackie Welles to come investigate the current bullshit she was in. Fuck, first chance she got she was going to go buy so many fucking guns, and fuck Arasaka for not letting her carry a gun!

In an instant, a whole metric shitload of Valentinos had poured from the surrounding buildings, brandishing guns- well, okay, it was more like ten or twelve, and most of them were definitely outclassed by the four Militech shitbags that were currently pinning her down, but then again, she wasn't actually in any real danger… well, except from that bullet that had tagged her gut and probably hit something vital if her biomonitor was any indicator… of all days to forget her Trauma Team card in the fucking office… fucking hell, she was gonna miss Trauma Team when she disappeared out of Arasaka…

Oh, right, the Militech guys.

As soon as the corpo shitheads had turned to focus back on the 'Tinos firing wildly in their direction, V ducked out from behind cover, leaped forward, and crossed the distance between the disabled Arasaka transport she'd previously been riding along in, all the way to the array of three Militech troop trucks that had once held a squad of sixteen soldiers (well, before she'd blown up twelve of the bastards with the grenades she scavenged off the corpses of her former coworkers). It was a quick and messy affair from there- the Shigure she'd picked up roared in her hand as she fired it in quick succession whilst sliding across the slick asphalt, tagging three of the now unfocused soldiers in the legs and arms with a wild spray of bullets that was only barely aimed in the right direction.

Her mind raced, and she came to a halt at the feet of the last soldier- no time to waste, V thought to herself as she immediately sprung up, arching her back and launching herself feet first into the man's gut with the strongest donkey kick she could, then rolling with the momentum as the soldier flew back with a scream until she was on her feet again, standing amongst the trucks and taking stock of the situation.

The man she'd kicked was crumpled against the side of one of the trucks, the other three were getting gunned down, and she… well.

She tossed the submachine gun in her hand to the side, sighing in relief as the violence ceased a moment later. Good- great, even. Now… all she had to do was convince a bunch of potentially hostile Valentinos, plus one Jackie Welles who didn't even know her at this point in time, to let her klep her targeted cyberware out of the Arasaka truck and then let her walk away until she could get a cab to take her up to Watson. All with a bleeding gut wound because she'd been stupid and thought to herself 'Oh it's fine I can wait , everyone aims at the chest and head anyway' like a fucking gonk .

Well.

She'd done harder things in her life.

Chapter 6: Falling-Infraction x Aim To Head

Chapter Text

April, 2076

David Martinez was, charitably, a man right on the precipice. What that precipice was , he wasn't quite sure yet, but he knew that it was something big.

Thoughts and emotions swirled through his mind in a chaotic morass, a dark, churning sea bubbling in his gut as he rode the NCART north instead of his usual eastern line to school, or heading back to Megabuilding H4- what was he gonna do back home anyway? That dingy apartment only held bad memories now- everything good about Megabuilding H4 had fled with his mother's spirit, and now the only thing left of those good times was a pile of ash sealed inside a metal jar, and the jacket on his back.

Honestly, with the money that merc (who, honestly, he still wasn't completely convinced was an actual merc instead of just the worst concealed Arasaka goon on the planet) gave him, he could probably find a new place, get away from that part of town. Go see a real ripper instead of bumming it with Doc in his unlicensed butcher's shop he called a beggar's clinic .

Well. He was at least managing the last one okay, even if he'd rather be heading into Arasaka Academy first to go kick Katsuo Tanaka's lily ass with his Sandevistan right now instead of heading to a ripper halfway across the city that he didn't know jack shit about, or trust, or… well, honestly, it was kinda stupid to trust the possibly-a-Corpo-in-disguise merc, in hindsight, but the way she'd bumbled over the entire conversation, dumped thirty thousand eddies on him in a direct transfer, and then just left was… well. It made him think he was going to get mugged in an alleyway for a good moment, but all that ended up happening as he ascended the stairs out of the now deceased Doc's basement was that he got a front row seat to the sight of a fucking Yaiba Kusanagi CT-3X peeling off down the street with a squeal of tires, engine roaring as it left a dust trail behind itself on the way out.

So here he was, on the NCART further north than he usually ever went, to a part of the city he'd only ever been a few times when his mother managed to scrape together enough eddies for a proper restaurant instead of cheap shitty takeout during birthdays and big celebrations, where he'd see a ripperdoc he'd never met before, all on the word of some absolute weirdo of a merc who thought dressing up like a fucking Corpo rat would make him trust her.

His stomach growled as he thought to himself, glaring out of the tram window at the Trauma Team AVs that seemed to never end- fucking Trauma Team… heartless, soulless corporate bastards they were, just leaving him and his mom to die as they joked about the fucking meatwagons , leaving her bleeding out in the fucking street until he just barely managed to get her to the closest doctor that overcharged him to hell because of his lack of insurance, fucked him over with his substandard care… fuck, it wasn't fair.

And to make matters worse, he hadn't even eaten breakfast. They were supposed to have gone to the grocery store that day… picked up some food, stretched out what little they had left…

Fuck.

David sighed, squeezing his eyes shut and gritting his teeth as he fought down tears. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck! It wasn't fair! It wasn't fucking fair! Fuck fuck fucking FUCK!

David shuddered as twinges of pain ran down his back, rippling lines of agony that raced through his limbs as his aching muscles strained against their anchor points on the Sandevistan- argh, bad idea getting so worked up, now he was getting blood all over his shirt… fuck….

Nrgh…

David sighed, leaning against the pole he'd gripped onto for support, sweat beading on his face as he tried to focus on something other than his impotent rage and fear and sorrow and his own mother's long dead face- he couldn't… he couldn't keep thinking about her, otherwise he'd just… end up drowning in his own emotions. He'd almost done it the first time he stared down at that urn, almost bottled himself up until nothing was left but a hollow shell nearly taking the elevator to the highest floors of the Megabuilding… fuck.

His stomach rumbled again.

"Heh… guess nothing stops you, huh?" David muttered, staring down at his own torso as he tried to derive what little humor he could from his life now, forcing a light smile onto his face as the tram entered the station for Little China and the doors opened.

Well.

He was here.

Time to find out if he was going to regret this or not.

His first steps into Little China were… unremarkable.

As easy as walking anywhere else, really, but somehow… it felt different as he followed the GPS coordinates out of the station, not really paying attention to anything around him as he made his way from the station on Farrier Street down towards Urmland Street. Vendor after vendor passed him by, making his stomach growl more and more- but he held off. Eating anything before going to a ripper never ended well for anyone, and the less chance he had to actually throw up everything all over himself or the ripper, or the chair, or the already nasty floors…

He sighed, rubbing his growling belly- he'd get something to eat after, provided the doc didn't just rip the Sandevistan out of him and toss him out for the meatwagons to drag away. Or worse, the Scavs.

It wasn't like he couldn't actually afford food now.

Fuck, all the shit his mom did, busting her ass every day and night to pay their bills, pay for food, pay for him to go to school, and all it took for him to roll in more eddies than he'd ever seen in one place in his life was just a fucking chance encounter with some fucking insane merc with probably more money than sense?

How fucked up was that?

"Welcome to Misty's Esoterica! I'm Misty, owner of the store. Are you looking for Viktor, or do you just want a quick reiki healing?" a voice- feminine, soft, gentle- broke David out of his thoughts, making him look up with a sudden start as he realized his own musings had distracted him to the point of just… walking into the aforementioned store without even noticing.

He stared dumbly at the woman standing there, in her oversized lavender sweater and gothic appearance, the sort of dirty, unkempt nature of the store, the soft, relaxing looking chairs off to one side and the various books on the occult scattered around… and blinked twice as he realized the woman- Misty- had spoken.

"Oh- uh, yeah- I um… I was recommended to see the ripper here? Vik, I think his name was? Viktor, I guess you just said…" David grinned awkwardly- more of a grimace really- as he scratched the back of his head. "I um… do you know a uh… V? She… kinda… flatlined my old ripper. And then gave me a bunch of eddies and told me to come here."

"... Yeah, sounds like V alright… crazy gonk…" Misty sighed, rolling her eyes and palming her face. "Out the back, down the stairs and through the gate. Can't miss it- it's the only thing down there. Vik's good people, he'll take care of you."

"... Right… and… V? What's she like?"

"... V's fucking crazy, but she's a bleeding heart. Don't worry about it. Just go see Vik and if you're lucky you'll probably never see her stupid ass again."

"... Uh huh."

Somehow, none of those words were really that reassuring, but David… really didn't feel like he had a choice.

Into the belly of the beast he went, down those stairs and into… into…

The nicest back alley ripperdoc clinic he could have ever imagined.

…

The fuck?

Chapter 7: Pro-bots & Robophobes (Ft. Circle of Dust)-Scandroid

Chapter Text

The clinic around David was… surprisingly clean. Smooth, concrete floor, well lit operating area, some signage and personal details to make the area stand out a bit more, brick walls- sure there was some trash piled up around the edges and it wasn't sterile like one would hope from a proper medical facility, but then again, not a lot of places in Night City were actually clean , and that this Viktor guy put any effort at all into maintaining his space was frankly kind of a miracle considering how nasty Doc's place had been- fuck, there'd barely even been an overhead light back at Doc's place, and most of the time the entire place was just swathed in darkness as if that would cover up the smell of rotting meat emanating from the back rooms, or the puddles of stuff that was either blood, piss, or semen crusted into the floor.

This Viktor guy, though?

Fuck, he was basically running an actual clinic in this run down basement of his. It was actually clean enough that it almost compared to that one bougie fucker back in Arroyo with his own shop, except… a little more personality. Fuck- he even had mats down around the damn chair.

And in the chair…

Well, there was a huge guy who was definitely a Valentino if David had ever seen one, right down to the gold chain and shiny bracelets, getting a checkup from the aforementioned doctor… and there was no screaming involved. No weird creepy finger movements, not even a weird off color sexual remark.

Viktor, it seemed, was downright professional- fuck, he was more professional than the goddamn surgeon who'd said his mom was stable right before she died!

Shit… if he'd have had the foreknowledge to take her to here… would his mom still be alive?

David grit his teeth, simply waiting by the gate as Viktor finished up the big guy's checkup and sent him on his way with a friendly pat on the shoulder.

David continued to say nothing as he waited, standing to the side as the big guy gave him a friendly nod and a casual pat on the shoulder as if he'd done it a million times before to a million other people.

"Hey, don't look so tense, choom- Vik's a good ripper, best in Night City! He'll fix you up no problemo, yeah?" the big guy gave him a lopsided grin, adjusted his jacket, and walked off after said shoulder pat and encouraging word, leaving him behind a moment later with a quick farewell tossed over his shoulder. "Just don't go doing some gonk shit afterwards, cuz he'll nag you like he's your madre if you come in an hour later needing another patch job."

"... Yeah. Thanks," David muttered, feeling more than a little lost now- by two people's testimonies, plus the sheer cleanliness and antiseptic smell of the place, he at least had some faith that Viktor wasn't about to yank the Sandevistan out of his spine on the orders of a corpo merc, but… could he really trust the guy? Actually?

Well…

He'd trusted Doc.

And look where that got him.

"Ah, a new face around here- from the looks of you… I'm assuming you're here for a checkup," Viktor spoke, projecting his voice out over the distance between him and David, waving the teen over with a casual air. He was… well, completely different from Doc in every way. Honestly, David's first impression of him was that he looked like he should be working in an actual hospital with how… normal he looked- the only thing of note about his appearance being the contraption of tools around his arm, and his sunglasses. Everything else just made him look like any gonk with a paying job out there on the streets, with the possibility of being maybe an ex-Valentino considering the intricate tattoos and earrings. Or… something. David didn't know, all he knew was that Doc barely ever wore anything other than his underwear and that nasty-ass auto-sucker, swapped out his arms on a whim instead of just having an actual toolset , and operated in near darkness with only his goggles allowing him to see what he was working on. "Name's Viktor. Viktor Vektor- most people call me Vik. You new around these parts? C'mon- I don't bite. Take a seat, lemme know what's goin' on."

"Uh… yeah, I'm… David," David spoke awkwardly, slowly making his way to the stool that Viktor pointed him to and sitting down, elbows resting on his knees as he leaned forward. "I uh- I was told to come here by a merc named V."

Viktor paused, holding his position for a long moment before letting out a long sigh of exasperation, rubbing the bridge of his nose as he immediately turned around and grabbed a bottle of whiskey from behind the chair-side table. "Ah, shit. Another one of V's strays- I swear, girl collects you like most people collect burrito wrappers. Lemme guess- before you met V you were broke and desperate and maybe got way in over your head chipping in some kind of cyberware or trying to be an Edgerunner, or trying to join a gang all for some quick eddies to pay rent and feed yourself."

David blinked, watching as Viktor took a swig straight out of the bottle, a slight chill running down his spine as Viktor's words rang true in every way. "Uh- yeah, actually... How the fuck did you know that? I- I didn't tell anyone anything about that…"

"Because in the year and some change that I've known V, it's that she's an idiot, a bleeding heart, and seems to think that since I'm also a bleeding heart I'll have no problem fixing up whatever fucked up mess your previous ripper did to you. Fuck- you didn't go to a Maelstrom ripper did you?" Viktor answered, finishing with another question of his own, looking David up and down as if he'd spontaneously turn into one of those bug faced chrome junkies and start ripping shit up out of instantaneous cyberpsychosis.

"Uh- no. I went to… uh. Doc. In Arroyo," David answered, scratching the back of his head awkwardly and grimacing a little as the Sandevistan sent another spike of pain through his back. "Long scraggly hair? Weirdo? Jamaican accent? Jerks off in his own chair? Pushes XBDs? Got flatlined about an hour and a half ago?"

"..."

Viktor stared at him for a long moment, something like horror etching itself onto his face if the way his jaw slightly dropped was any indication.

"... What?"

"Get in the chair."

"What!?"

"Get in the fucking chair right now- I need to see what that rat fuck did to you before you spontaneously die of internal hemorrhaging," Viktor immediately stood up, hissing under his breath as he quickly sprayed down his chair and toweled it off, motioning for David to get in as he shifted it from its chair configuration into something more resembling an operating table- though, one curiously lacking in a bite bar.

Shit- was this guy gonna carve him up without even that much to dull the pain?

David winced, but as soon as he turned to try and run, Viktor was there in front of him, one hand clasped on his shoulder as he pointed at the chair.

"Get in the chair, kid."

"... yessir."

Chapter 8: ULTRAnumb-Blue Stahl

Chapter Text

David came back to consciousness for the second time that day- slowly, not without his little aches and pains, and yet… somehow feeling more complete , more whole , and… much less in constant agony as he was before he'd come in. Fuck- his spine had just entirely stopped hurting at this point, save for a slight twinging ache here and there that went away as he slowly blinked himself awake.

"Nrrhg…. What the hell…. W-where? What…?" he mumbled out as he slowly tried to pull himself up- there was… no resistance. Just smooth, unbroken motion as his body adjusted to the feeling of not being weak with nausea and agony while he blinked the sleep out of his eyes and wiped the drool from his mouth. "Fuck… I- wait… my back doesn't hurt anymore- did- did you!?"

"Relax kid, just patched you up," Viktor spoke up from the other side of the chair, his presence suddenly making itself known as the man stood up and helped stabilize him. "Gotta say- I was half tempted to pull the damn thing out and just swap it with a standard spinal replacement. Never thought I'd say this but… I'm glad your other ripper got flatlined. The shit he did to your spine? Fuck, I've seen better work out of Maelstrom! At least those assholes know how to read the damn install instructions when they're working on themselves!"

"I-... huh?" David continued to flounder in confusion for a moment, before quickly reaching back behind himself with a quiet noise of realization. He fumbled along his back for a few moments, feeling the new nodes along his spine that weren't there before, the smooth synthetic material giving in a slightly different way than his actual skin, and he breathed a sigh of relief- he could still feel the Sandevistan working just fine- better than fine, actually.

It actually had a fucking diagnostic popup in his vision now, and unlike before, it didn't feel like it was sending liquid fire through his nerves every time he even thought about using it. Fucking hell, the Sandevistan even had a safe charge limit displayed now!

Sure, it was only set to three times a day, but shit, it was already better than anything he could have ever imagined!

"Whoa… nova …" he whispered, taking in the new popups hovering in his vision and fumbling with what settings he could actually access, feeling the implant in his back beep and whir in response to his changes- manually upping the safety slider because if it cut him off after only three times a day then what was the point , come on, as well as changing the onboard LEDs (which, hadn't really been active until now?) to let off a soothing green glow. "I- Viktor, doc, this is like… this is like an entirely new implant!"

"Yeah, turns out the whackjob gonkhead piece of shit who installed it in the first place just did the very basics of turning it on and connecting it to your systems before just dropping it in- didn't even wait to properly tune it to your biometrics, or go through the configuration settings. Cable management was awful too- shit, you had wires grounding themselves into your skeleton at some point, shit was just tied off in knots and not tucked where it should have been," Viktor shook his head, shaking his hand lightly and pulling the toolset off of his arm with a light grunt. "I'm honestly surprised you survived the trip up here, kid. You're tough as nails to be moving in that condition."

David blinked, then gave Viktor a lopsided grin as he slowly stretched and put his shirt and jacket back on- fuck, he felt amazing! And the Sandevistan was all but purring under his spine, shit he felt like he could use it forever at this point!

"Heh… guess I'm special. Maybe I'm built different."

"Hmmm… don't get cocky just because you got your first piece of chrome, kid. You might be built different, but that doesn't mean you can't also be built stupid ," Viktor snorted, crossing his arms and leaning back in his swivel chair. "Now- seeing as you're one of V's strays, I'd normally waive the fee of your first checkup because she'd never let me hear the end of it if she found out I actually charged some of them… but I did need to basically do a hard reset on your entire spine. Wasn't easy, honestly, but I'm not gonna screw you over. First operation's at a fifty percent discount- a thousand eddies, flat."

He paused, then slid over a clipboard with a printed sheet of paper on it. "Got payment plans too, if you like, but I warn ya, longer you go without paying, higher the price gets. Unfortunately, much as I'd like otherwise- this isn't a charity. Need the cash for new parts and keeping the lights on- you know how it is."

"... Yeah, I kinda do," David sighed, but… forked over the eddies anyway. Seeing any amount of money drain out of his account (his mother's account…) felt awful, especially when he didn't have any kind of stable work or income, but… he could at least repay the man who'd probably saved him from getting splattered all over a windshield or something. "Look, choom… thanks. You… uh, shit. You're the best doctor I've ever had- not even those bastards at the clinic…. Ugh. Nevermind."

"Thanks, kid. And- lay off any new chrome for a while, okay? Get your body used to the Sandevistan first, then come to me about installing anything new- some of them might interact poorly with it," Viktor nodded, then reached into his drawer and slapped an inhaler into David's hand. "Two puffs now, then another in a half hour. Should tide you over- you got immunoblockers?"

"Ah- uh… yeah? Got a whole bunch of 'em from Doc's office- didn't… didn't read the labels though, just kinda… got 'em shoved at me by that crazy merc," David answered, wincing a little as he scratched the back of his neck, then withdrew one of the aforementioned bottles from the pocket of his jacket (for such large, bulky paper bags, there sure were only a few of those medium sized pill bottles in there…). "She said she took these when she got her Sandevistan? I… I didn't even know other people used them…"

"Ah, yeah. Those'll do. Take 'em with meals twice a day for a week, they'll help your system adjust…" Viktor trailed off slightly, then shook his head. "But yeah- lotta people on both sides of the law use reflex boosters. Kerenzikov or Synaptic Accelerators are the most common, but there's a good amount of people who chip a lower grade Sandevistan so they can dodge bullets at medium range- it's a decent method, it's just that your Sandevistan is so high grade that it makes the Zetatech and Dynalar models look like children's toys."

"... uh… huh. Does… anyone use all of 'em at once?"

"Just one person that I know of, but she's both certifiably crazy or stupid despite her frankly baffling amounts of morality, and has a ridiculously high tolerance for combat cyberware… and you've already met her," Viktor deadpanned dryly, raising an eyebrow at David as he urged the teen to understand what he was getting at. "Not a lot of people want to get chipped with that many reflex boosters- turns you into a combat junkie real quick. Good way to go cyberpsycho if you're living life in slow motion and constantly reacting to everything like it's a threat."

"... Ah."

"Mhmm. Well- you're clear for now. Take it easy and don't do anything too strenuous for at least a few hours- no heavy exercise, sex, driving, emotionally intense situations. Best to let the Sandevistan get used to you for a day or two before you use it again."

"Right, thanks doc."

"No prob, kid. Just don't get yourself flatlined out there, okay? Seen too many kids on my table, don't wanna see you coming back 'less you're getting a tuneup or a new implant. Got it?"

"Yeah, I got it."

And with that… David left Viktor's office, basking in the evening rays and inhaling deeply of the unfamiliar scents of Little China- he felt lighter than he had in years , with the shackles of so many burdens falling away at once as though they were the same pains in his spine that Viktor had so kindly pulled out of him… It was beautiful.

And then his stomach growled.

"Fuck, I still haven't eaten yet!"

Chapter 9: Part Time God-The Bad Dreamers

Chapter Text

After leaving Viktor's clinic and wandering aimlessly through the dingy alleyway (well, it was a lot less dingy than a lot of similar places, if David was being honest, including the alleys around Megabuilding H4) outside of said clinic, David found himself in a little market area full of food stalls, vending machines, and people taking the time to get a hot meal after a long day of work.

In all honesty, it was a stark difference between most of the areas he'd ever seen in his life- the little area of Arroyo he spent the majority of his time in, and Megabuilding H4 had somewhat similar structures in the form of food stalls and the occasional restaurant, but seldom was there an entire section just full of food like this. It wasn't entirely foreign, of course. His mother had taken him to places like this before- when she had the time and energy and managed to scrape together enough eddies to go out and buy something nicer than their usual fare of vending machine Burrito XXLs and whatever takeout they managed to get from one of the places around the area. Usually on his birthdays… fuck. In just over a month, it'd be…

It'd be the first birthday he'd ever have away from his mom. And it happened to be the day he became an adult in the eyes of the law.

Fuck.

David gritted his teeth, clenching his eyelids shut and leaning heavily against a NiCola vending machine as he tried to force back his tears. His fist came up, digging into his forehead and clenching tight enough to make his nails dig into his palms as he tried to work away the haze of memories slamming through his skull like a pounding migraine that just wouldn't end.

The abject humiliation he'd felt upon crashing the school's entire network, the anger and self loathing upon seeing his mother begging the principal to let him stay at that fucking academy, the reluctant acceptance as his mother told him about her dreams, for him to one day rise to the top of Arasaka tower…

The fear and panic and pain that punctuated that fateful minute or so, a group of gangoons rolling up beside their car and not giving a shit about collateral damage just so they could try and complete a hit on some corpo suit that happened to be driving right there…

David shuddered, swallowing thickly before shaking his head and pushing himself away- fuck, fuck fuck fucking fuck! If it wasn't the fact that it'd been near on twenty hours since he'd last eaten anything, barely even stopping long enough to slip some of the last eddies in his account into a vending machine for a Tiancha along the way, he'd have lost his appetite.

As it was… David sighed, trudging over to the closest food vendor and adjusting his bloodied, crusty jacket- not enjoying the feeling of it rubbing against his skin through his shirt but ignoring it for now. As he sat down, he all but ignored the woman running the stand in favor of his own thoughts, transferring over nearly sixty eddies for a bowl of noodles and a coffee, his eyelids drooping as he finally rested for real for the first time that day.

It was…

It was a long fucking day , David thought to himself, chewing on his noodles slowly as he vaguely adjusted his position in his chair, staring out over the rest of the little market area so he could get an idea of who was where, and what the people in Watson were like compared to Santo Domingo.

Honestly? Not much different.

Just… the same dirty concrete, the same piles of trash, the same roaches, the same rats… just people trying to get through their lives with whatever they had… just, some of them had more cyberware than he was used to seeing. Lotta people down in Arroyo were mostly 'ganic, save for maybe some optics or an arm or leg that was a few generations back. People in ratty tanktops, people in old shorts, people trying to dress up with whatever they could get their hands on… he'd seen the same thing over and over, but here in Watson, it was… a little more upscale, compared to the more rundown, older, crumbling appearance of Arroyo. More neon lights, more colors…

He almost didn't want to go home, if he could find a place here. It'd beat trying to sleep in his old apartment, where the memories were attached to everything and he felt like he'd just keep seeing the ghosts of his mother everywhere he went… no. Best to try and… find someplace else, maybe.

Somewhere he could just… rest for the night. Get some actual sleep. Fuck- he'd even take a motel over trying to go back to his apartment at this point.

David sighed, slurping his noodles up despondently and chewing up the little bits of syn-meat inside, his mouth working almost automatically while his thoughts wandered. It was still so strange, being on his own… not having his mom there, right beside him, encouraging him to keep going, work his way through the Academy, rise to the top…

Not that he saw her much in the first place, those last few months.

David sighed again, and again and again and again, a storm of thoughts whirling through his mind as he tried to get his head in order- a confusing mess of despondence, depression, hopelessness, impotent rage, resentment… all of it bubbled in his head, and all he could really think was just how much he wanted his mother back. How much he wished he could have given her one last goodbye. How much he wished they'd never gotten into that situation at all.

Fuck.

If wishes were fishes, the old saying went.

And god, did he have a lot of wishes.

David shook his head as he finally put his bowl back down, the owner of the stand taking it away along with his empty cup of coffee, not saying a word as David just rested his elbow against the counter and stared out over the area once more- lost in his thoughts and musing about how much better it would have been if it'd been… been…

A flash of pale hair, swirling and flowing in the wind.

David blinked.

Wait- that familiar hair… he'd seen it before.

He looked around for a moment, losing track of the woman he'd set his eyes on- that girl, that mysterious girl in the leotard, who'd stood out so much when he'd seen just a brief flash of her on the way to the Academy that one time…

She was here.

There- by the wonton stand!

He could see her walking his way, glittering multicolored hair fluttering in the light breeze of the evening, like an angel among the poor and downtrodden…

David stared, then became abruptly aware of two things. The first was that the girl he was staring at had an open death glare written across her face, almost snarling as her gait switched from an unassuming, casual glide into a hunched, aggressive storming … right towards a woman in an Arasaka red suit currently stuffing her face at the burger stand not ten yards away from David.

The second thing he noticed was that the woman in the suit had a head of blue hair, a pair of familiar black cyberarms, and had a shimmering gold V sewn onto the left shoulder of her blazer- one that the girl couldn't see from her angle.

A chill ran down David's spine, and he slowly stood up, feigning a casual air as he tried to get closer- whatever was about to happen next, he had no idea, but… he had a feeling that it wouldn't be good.

Chapter 10

Chapter Text

Earlier that day…

V was having what could charitably be called a pretty decent day . Sure, the morning had started cold and alone with no one by her side, but that hadn't been so bad. For a merc like her whose work schedule was inconsistent and spotty and also sometimes resulted in long assignments away, it really wasn't a surprise for Judy to have already gone to work by the time that V finally groaned to life around ten.

Judy, as much as it sucked to not have her by her side when she woke up, had her own life and a constant job at Lizzie's, and V really wouldn't begrudge her that.

So, even though it sucked having to wake up in bed alone, V couldn't bring herself to be mad- especially when Judy had left her breakfast in the form of coffee and a burrito… and also last night's leftover locust pepperoni pizza with extra cheese.

… And another burrito.

Also two cans of Tiancha.

What? V was a highly active, chromed to the gills merc with a synthetic bio-processor replacement for her stomach. She needed a lot of calories to keep herself going!

Anyway.

After a quick shower and brushing her teeth to get rid of the smell of cheap food and morning breath, V'd gotten dressed, checked her texts, and wandered downstairs to get to her own job.

The life of a mercenary was fraught with constant calls making her haul ass all over the city, and today was no different- as V straddled her Kusanagi CT-3X (custom painted in Mox colors because she did do a lot of work for Suzie Q and was technically still registered as a member of the Lizzie's Bar security team) she decided to accept a gig from Regina about handling a deal with a local Maelstrom subgroup located near Drake Avenue over in Little China- she'd already been headed that way anyway, and it promised to be something quick.

The client she'd met apparently was selling some old, last gen implants to Maelstrom and really did not want to actually get close to the fuckers (honestly, V understood that urge. Sometimes she wanted to stay way from them too, but the urge to murder always superceded that), and so needed a third party to oversee the deal.

Except, well.

There was always the caveat that if V could, maybe, perhaps, just get rid of that little infestation of cyberpsychotic murder-crazed chrome-cultists, she could keep whatever she looted off of the bastards and get a bonus for it. She didn't even have to bring the implants back- they were barely functional garbage in the first place!

V, of course, accepted.

Less than an hour later, the building was on fire and it was totally V's fault.

Fucking Maelstrom gang.

Buncha pricks.

Well, it wasn't that simple- she'd first had to take control of their cameras and turrets and jam all of their outgoing communication lines so they couldn't call for backup from some other group of Maelstromers in the area, then she had to pretend to play nice with the bastards for the better part of half an hour, huffing drugs that did nothing to her thanks to the sheer amount of poison filters distributed through her system, talking about chrome (which, honestly, was the only enjoyable part of the entire situation. Maelstrom might have been a bunch of bastards that V had no qualms about killing, but damn did they know their tech) and drinking cheap, disgusting beer until the boss of their little den showed up, popped the briefcase full of eddies, and took the crate full of last gen implants that V had carried over.

And then, as V walked out… she'd taken over their localnet and knocked them all out with a system reset. Then she'd looted the building and knocked out the rest of the assholes, dumping everything she could into the trunk of the Villefort Columbus van she'd had Jackie drive to the building earlier, and then she'd set all of the Maelstrom members on fire using an Overheat quickhack. And also set off all of those incendiary grenades she dropped into all of the darkened trash piles and crates of stuff scattered around while looting the building for usable shit. Last gen junk implants successfully disposed of, Maelstrom gangers no longer capable of performing horrific implant procedures on kidnapped people, and all of their useful shit looted for her own use- plus she'd even managed to keep the briefcase of eddies from getting so much as scratched.

Good day, all in all- and one that had only gotten better when she'd gotten her bonus, dropped her newly acquired surplus of guns off at the 2nd Amendment in Megabuilding H10 (Wilson was a good friend, even now when she didn't even live near his shop anymore this go around) for a modest fee, and met up with Jackie so they could get a cyberware checkup from Vik- not that Jackie had much in the way of cyberware, since he liked the idea of making it to the top with as little chrome as possible, but he still had some dermal armor and skeletal reinforcements, just because V had been so insistent on it.

She'd seen him die once already. She wasn't about to see it happen again- not the way it did before.

And hey- by the time she'd finished her appointment, she'd found Jackie and Misty deep in the middle of a lovely conversation involving negative energies and crystals and all things occult and healing based. Jackie mostly looked lost, but he let Misty guide him through some meditations and such as she burned some sage and waved it around.

Personally, V didn't really put much stock into that kind of thing beyond just the therapeutic effects of nice smells, a comfortable environment, and someone whispering encouraging nothings for the better part of an hour, but seeing the two of them together was such an adorable sight that she really couldn't bring herself to interrupt it, and instead just waited til Misty finished to remind Jackie that he had to go get his chrome checked out by Vik.

While the big lug got himself checked out, V, meanwhile, went on another quick job- this one just a quick… ah…

Well, V wouldn't have called it femur breaking, but she was being paid by Wakako to intimidate the shit out of a bunch of Tyger Claws that were scaring people away from some of the gambling dens that Wakako had a stake in.

To summarize a gig that took several hours- most of which was travel time because fucking hell was Night City traffic just the fucking worst in the afternoons- especially on the bridges over to Japantown- into a mere few sentences…

Well.

V's reputation preceded her, and by now the vast majority of the city's criminal element tended to avoid trying to fight her just because she was known as "that crazy cyberninja murder freak". She'd managed to successfully intimidate the Tyger Claws into moving their raucous drug fueled alley parties somewhere else- and fucking hell, they were just kids , seriously! Not a single one of the little gang brats was older than twenty!- and left without spilling a single drop of blood.

Well, Tyger Claw blood.

The same could not be said of the man whose nose she broke when the desperate, ratty, broke bastard tried to mug her five minutes later.

After that minor incident, though, she'd called it an early night and headed back over to Watson for some dinner (and also to pawn off some of the other scavenged Maelstrom junk she'd forgotten to sell back to Vik when she'd had her checkup) while waiting for Judy to finish up her shift at Lizzie's so she could pick her girlfriend up in her nice car (a nice little black Caliburn with stripes in Mox colors, because she could afford it).

All in all, a pretty decent day- though, with a lot less brutal violence than she expected.

And then, she'd felt a tendril of foreign code tap against her ICE as though trying to eject one of the shards in her chip sockets.

Well then. Looks like she'd get one last fight in today after all.

Chapter 11: Turbo Killer-Carpenter Brut

Chapter Text

Lucyna Kushinada was having an… alright day. About the same as any other, really. Same old pick-socketing in between jobs from Maine in order to keep up a supply of spending money, same old bunch of corpo suits on the train too lost in their own worlds to notice as she ejected their shards and stole away with them before they even noticed. Honestly, she wouldn't have even gotten off the NCART all the way in Watson considering she lived next to the river in Japantown, but one of the suits she'd stolen from had been just a bit more aware than she'd have liked, and even though she'd more or less lost the bastard in the cluster of people heading home from work she'd still hopped off at the next stop… and then he'd fucking seen her and forced her to hop onto the exact next train before he could chase her and, well.

Here she was.

It had been an alright day. Even the suit getting mad and spotting her wasn't really enough to bring her mood down- she'd had to face that exact situation at least a few times before, and it was pretty normal. No, what had made the day go from alright to awful was the sight of an Arasaka red suit sitting there casually- the same shade of red that flooded her mind with lies and promises of freedom and status, wealth and the prestige of serving Arasaka… the same red that spilled out over the tiles as she never once looked back.

The moment she saw that suit- she didn't even care that she was out in public- she wanted to wrap her monowire around that drunken she-suit's neck and squeeze , just to vent her frustrations that had built up over weeks and weeks and weeks of working for that rat bastard Faraday, but she refrained from drawing it for now.

She couldn't afford to make a scene when she could just pick the bitch's socket and sell whatever corporate intel they were stupid enough to bring out into public to the highest bidder- or at least, for some pocket change, depending on who she sold to.

And then, things went from bad to worse in the blink of an eye.

Lucy blinked as the tiny tendril of code she sent at the she-suit's socket failed to do… anything . It… it just bounced off of the woman's ICE in a way that was like nothing she'd ever seen- not even a hint of familiar architecture present to see if she could find her way through the esoteric and shifting digital landscape that she'd inadvertently dipped a finger into.

Before she could react, though, in the span of the next few seconds the woman had spun around in her seat and leveled a Malorian Arms 3516 straight at her face (where the fuck had she gotten that from!?) and pressed it to Lucy's forehead.

To make matters worse, Lucy could feel foreign code crawling through her deck, disabling everything and shutting down her ability to quickhack or even draw her monowire in mere moments- the speed of thought, everything almost moving in slow motion as she became utterly helpless and felt the cold metal of the gun jabbing sharply into her skin.

She wasn't too stoic to admit that her knees trembled under the cold, dead gaze of those flat white Arasaka techgogs, the crimson LEDs boring into her soul like all of her nightmares.

Strangely, though, Lucy's eyes weren't on the ridiculously overpowered pistol pressed against her head (Fuck, was that a Mox ornament dangling from the handle? Why was an Arasaka she-suit repping the Mox?), or the techgogs staring her down (the Arasaka logo conspicuously patched and sanded away until the only thing left was a V shaped mark), but the… metallic golden patch attached to the woman's left shoulder. A simple rectangle, nothing too flashy, but it was emblazoned with a stylized 'V' that shone under the light of the food stands around them.

Double, triple, and quadruple shit- just her fucking luck that she'd tried to antagonize one of the most unstable, murderous edgerunners in Night City… fuck… was this how it ended? Was this how she went out? Years on the run from Arasaka, hiding out in this shithole of a city, and the way she died was getting shot in the face by an insane edgerunner that she just happened to make the mistake of picksocketing?

Well…

There were less noble deaths. Least she hadn't died to a rampaging cyberpsycho. Or done something truly embarrassing.

"Y'know, I can't help but wonder- you must be pretty fuckin new to the edgerunner scene, huh? Couple months, if that? I mean sure, for a beginner that makes you practically a veteran… but you don't seem to know just who the fuck you tried to fuck with, if you tried to picksocket me," V (the woman sometimes spoken of by the Tyger Claws as the Bloody Tigress) spoke, a subtle current of menace tinging her voice as she forced Lucy back- just taking a simple step forward, to which Lucy found herself moving back without any input or control of her motions just so she wouldn't end up with a new hole in her brain. "I don't know who the fuck you are, but you're either stupid, or you made a terrible mistake. Or, you're deliberately looking to get your skull ventilated. Which is it?"

Before Lucy could even apologize for the mistake- before she could even really think of a response- something… happened.

There was a flash of yellow- a rush of wind and movement and a gasp of surprise that Lucy could only realize a moment later was hers . Standing before her, arms outstretched as though that would do anything to stop a Malorian 3516 round, was… some guy in an EMT jacket- bright yellow, a blue gradient inside the upturned collar, and oversized to the point that it almost swamped the kid inside. He… wasn't much younger than her, it seemed. Latino, and only a little shorter than her, with an interesting implant just barely visible where it plugged into the base of his skull… and his back was absolutely covered in a massive bloodstain that had clearly seeped through the fabric of his jacket. Who the fuck was this guy?

"S-stop! D-don't shoot!" he belted out, voice trembling even as he stood firm between Lucy and the specter of certain death. "I-I won't let you!"

"... What the- who the fuck are you!?" V asked incredulously, clearly squinting at the kid before her as she lowered her handcannon of a pistol and scratched her head. "Wait- shit hey you're that kid I met earlier today- the hell are you doing defending some gonk-ass pick socket you don't even know?"

"I-it was a mistake!" Lucy cut in before the kid (still as of yet unnamed, but who had taken on sort of a… frankly kind of terrible fighting stance as if he could do something against a fucking cyber-ninja with a bodycount in the low hundreds) could respond, holding her hands up in surrender and stepping out from behind the kid's back. "I- I thought you were an Arasaka suit…. I got mad, sorry."

"... Well, you get points for apologizing. But seriously? Come on, I cannot believe you still mistook me for a suit! After all those eddies I sunk into this stupid patch too… dammit," V sighed, slipping the Malorian into her pocket and shaking her head, her body language completely losing all hostility in an instant the moment the two of them proved themselves to not be any kind of threat whatsoever. "... Man, fucking- ugh. Gonna have to change up my outfit if this is the shit I get… maybe just stencil a big fucking V into the back of this thing… Dammit- shit, I gotta go pick up Judy too, fuck can't believe I forgot!"

Lucy and the still unnamed kid (she really didn't want to call him a kid but his profile still registered him as being enrolled in Arasaka Academy and he was clearly not quite in his 20s yet, so it still…. Kinda fit) stared at each other for a moment as the red suited edgerunner began to wander off a moment later, kicking her boots against the ground sullently before turning back towards the two of them.

"You- wannabe pick-socket! Upgrade your fucking deck! It's fucking ancient and if you keep using it like that you're gonna catch a virus!" she called out, pointing at Lucy and raising her voice slightly to be heard over the slowly returning sounds of conversation and radio, sizzling food and shouted food orders, all while backing up towards a sleek black Caliburn with accents in Mox colors along its sides. "And you, Sandevistan kid… wash that fucking jacket- seriously, it's gonna stain!"

"..."

"..."

"... Is it just me, or is she fucking insane?" the kid muttered, then sighed and turned back to Lucy. "... Er- hi. I'm… David. David Martinez. You?"

Lucy scoffed, turning away and storming off- man fuck today, she wanted to go home and sleep off the sudden shock of mortality that had nearly made her piss her leotard.

"... Oh. Okay then."

Chapter 12

Chapter Text

"Judyyyyyyyy~! Hey Judy~!" V called out almost bawdily as she pulled into what was nominally the parking lot of Lizzie's Bar (But really it was just a section of sidewalk someone had spraypainted parking spots into), stumbling out of the shining black Caliburn with a goofy expression and wearing her incognito "Valerie" outfit. Which was to say, she was wearing her normal clothes and not acting as V the crazy murder ninja mercenary. "Baaabe~! I'm- hic- here!"

"... Val, are you drunk? Calabacita, I thought I told you not to drink and drive!" Judy hissed, immediately storming over while Valerie took the time to wave at the joytoys hanging out back of the bar, a goofy grin stretching across her expression as Judy walked up and grabbed her by the face.

Instantly, Valerie's body language changed- her bawdy, drunken grin turning into something altogether far too smug and mischievous as her arms came down and locked around Judy's waist into a tight, yet comfortable, vice grip. "Gotcha~ How's my sweet Judy Booty doin', huh? Was work okay?"

"Wh- you gonk! Did you seriously pretend to be drunk just so I'd get mad at you!?" Judy scoffed, her righteous fury changing from anger at Valerie seemingly drunk driving again (Seriously, just because the gonk was just shy of indestructible didn't mean that Judy was suddenly okay with her potentially smashing into other cars or walls or driving off of an overpass because she was drunk) to sheer indignation at being pranked all so she would- what, storm over and… Wait.

"Did you seriously do that just so I'd walk over faster!?"

"Noooooo…. Maybe….." Valerie blushed, looking to the side and trying not to look embarrassed as she settled slightly, her tight hug turning into something a bit softer, a bit more intimate- gentle, kind, and a little hesitant. "... I missed you and I wanted to make you laugh a little."

"... Well maybe don't go for drunk driving jokes next time, you gonk. You might be chromed to hell and back but I still worry about your health," Judy sighed, her anger evaporating in the face of Valerie's sincere words, leaning against the always warm, slightly vibrating body of her output as she reached up and gave Valerie's head a gentle scritching that-

"O-ooooh…. You know how to make a girl purr , Jude~" Valerie, on cue, immediately began purring as her vocal synthesizer activated, her entire chest rumbling against Judy's as she leaned against Judy's hand, a dopey smile stretching across her face and instantly reminding the braindance editor of just why everyone at Lizzie's called her output "Kitty" for the better part of a year now. "Mmmm~ Magic fingers…."

"Oh Calabacita, you are such a kitty cat. My dangerous lil itty bitty beanie baby kitty cat ," Judy chuckled, grinning as she slowly leaned back into a proper standing position, feeling Valerie follow her motions until the woman who was considered Night City's current most dangerous Solo was cradled firmly against her chest, purring shamelessly as she nestled against Judy's breasts and melted just from having Judy's fingers running through her hair and lightly scratching at the base of her neck, fingernails skating over RealSkinn and chrome alike, drawing sensitive trembles here and there until the blue haired Solo was a panting, blushing mess, unable to stop purring until-

"Aww, you're such a good girl~"

Fssshhhhh!

A jet of steam erupted from the vents in Valerie's back, coupled with a quiet whistling sound as more heated air escaped from the other vents scattered across her body- most of which were almost closed tight to avoid blasting Judy with anything more than a warm breeze.

Ahhh, the glorious feeling of success, Judy thought to herself as Valerie let out a long, drawn out whine of pure flustered embarrassment, trembling and shuddering and blushing like nothing else as she just barely pulled away from Judy long enough to hide her face in her hands amidst a wave of teasing laughter from the assembled women watching the interaction- not that it was anything new to them, no, any one of the regular workers at the bar could and had done much the same to Valerie, and while Judy was a little leery of letting them do it now when she and Valerie were dating… well, it was still funny that Lizzie's de facto part time head of security could be so easily brought down by just head scritches and being called a good girl.

"Judyyyyyyyyyy…. You're making me look baaaaaad," Valerie whined out, her vocal synthesizer literally mewling as she snuggled back against Judy's side, pressing herself against the warm body of her input while she tried her best to not act like she'd gone weak in the knees just from feeling Judy's fingers scritching and tickling against her neck and shoulders, running through her hair and brushing against her ears. "They're gonna laugh at me…"

"Liiiittle late for that Calabacita, that ship sailed… oh… about a year and some change ago?" Judy smirked, not at all repentant about the scene she'd just caused as she hugged Valerie tight, reaching up beneath the synthetic white leather of her cropped jacket so she could scritch her fingers along the solo's metallic spine, drawing a fresh wave of shivers and whines that were only just barely suppressed as Valerie pawed lightly at Judy's front, unable to form words as her own voice betrayed her. "Aww, sweet lil kitty cat~"

"Nnhhhh Juuuuude…. C-c'mon, h-have mercy!" Valerie whined, pulling away with a fresh shiver, her face shining a bright red as she leaned back against the front of her car, trying to get herself under control. "W-we gotta go home, remember?"

"Aww, but it's fun teasing you, kitten~ Big strong solo, and you're putty in my hands~" Judy laughed, but acquiesced all the same… even if she really wanted to just pull Valerie over to one of the benches nearby and spend a good hour or two just cuddling there- her output could be so adorable sometimes, especially when she deigned to turn on her holographic cat ears and tail implants, purring away like a big, cybernetic cat. "Ah well… guess we gotta go home now… buuuut I guess that means we get more cuddle time there, yeah?"

"Y-yeah… c-can you drive, Jude? I… don't think I can focus right now…." Valerie mumbled, tiny puffs of steam wisping from the vents in her neck as she tried her best to not shut down and melt into an overstimulated puddle of pure gay panic whilst stumbling her way into the passenger side of her own car.

"Sure, sure," Judy nodded, still grinning to herself as she slid into the driver's seat and closed the door behind her, peeling away from Lizzie's a few moments later and leaving behind them a trail of giggles and laughter.

Chapter 13: ZERO DAWN-Magnavolt

Chapter Text

Riiing…. Riiiiing….. Riiiiiiiiing

V woke up slowly, shuddering and grumbling under her breath as her systems snapped awake in mere moments, savoring the last vestiges of sleep her brain could get before her combat systems flushed her organics and brought her into full wakefulness and focus. She squinted slightly, glaring at her own HUD as she focused instead on the darkness of the room she was in- Judy was still asleep on top of her, blankets kicked off and the cool night air dancing over their partially naked forms.

Who the fuck was calling her at four in the fucking morning, and what reason could they possibly have that she wouldn't fucking stab them for waking her up during one of the only times that she could keep Judy close and safe in her arms?

"Whoever this is," V spoke dryly as she answered, whispering quietly as she silently reached down and picked up a pair of earmuffs off of the ground, sliding them over Judy's ears so her sleep wouldn't be bothered. "You'd better have a damn good reason for waking me up at four in the goddamn morning."

"Well well, someone woke up on the wrong side of the bed," the quiet tones of Suzie Q, current owner of Lizzie's Bar… which she and Judy had left not five hours prior. Why she was calling now , when Judy was entirely off shift and V wasn't even penciled in for a security shift was… beyond her, really.

"The hell do you want, Suzie? Look, Judy's shift doesn't start til nine, and I'm not even on your usual payroll- what, is it an emergency?" V asked, grumbling quietly as she slowly, carefully extricated herself from her input's arms, wincing at the lack of heat even as she stood up and stretched out lightly. "You know my rate doubles for emergencies."

"Mmmm… no, not an emergency, really. Just- you know one of the girls who used to work 'round here? Rebecca?"

"The… loud shouty brat who was too kid shaped to work a pole without attracting pedophiles?" V asked, wracking her brain for any mention of a girl named Rebecca, coming up only with a pale, blue skinned girl with red sclera, teal hair, and a wild penchant for guns… and also was surprisingly good at working in the kitchen, despite her short stature. "What's she got to do with me?"

"She dropped off the radar couple months ago- just up and left one day, hasn't called since. Keep an eye out for me?" Suzie Q asked, not giving anything away about her emotional state, but considering how her usual attitude towards excessive altruism was… V could probably guess that she wouldn't be too broken up about it if the little brat had ended up flatlined in a ditch somewhere, but still cared enough to send V out anyway.

"... Okay, but that still doesn't really explain why you decided to wake me up at four in the fucking morning, Suzie," V grumbled, pinching her brow and grimacing as she threw on her usual golden bustier and white jacket combo that she always did when she wasn't working, dragging her fingers through her hair and padding around awkwardly as she made her way out to the living room so she wouldn't disturb Judy if she had to leave. "Couldn't this wait to a more reasonable hour?"

"As if our schedules line up any better than this, Val. Bar just closed, this is the last bit of time I'll be awake and available before the afternoon and by that time I suspect you'll be knee deep in Scav guts," Suzie deadpanned, rolling her eyes and crossing her arms. "Just try and get something back to me, okay? I'll pay your usual rate for whatever you can get me."

"... You do know it's entirely likely that Rebecca just up and went Edgerunner, right? Like, tiny lil brat she may have been, but a girl who loves guns and violence that much really only has one way of getting her fix," V sighed, also rolling her eyes as she flopped down onto Judy's couch- her couch now too, sort of, given that she'd all but entirely moved into the tiny one bedroom space. "Did you even check her apartment?"

"Some of the girls have, never got any response, though- dunno why she hasn't been answering our calls," Suzie replied drolly, then shook her head. "Anyway I'll let you get back to sleep. Thanks Val."

"... Yeah, sure," V sighed, rubbing her forehead as the call ended and Suzie's presence disappeared from her vision, leaving her to just lay there, staring at the ceiling and grumbling to herself about the fact that she really could not get back to sleep at this point- her combat cybernetics would keep her awake until the next time Judy went to bed, and honestly she'd just never been capable of getting back to sleep after waking up at a weird time anyway.

Sigh.

"Fucking nova ," V groaned out, just laying there for a long moment before lightly shifting to her feet again and pacing around the apartment almost restlessly- the tiles were cool under her feet, and the soft hum of the appliances made for some lovely background noise as she lost herself to her thoughts. "Just what I fucking needed. More idiots running off to get themselves flatlined out in the city because they wanted to be hotshot, eddy raking edgerunners. Why are there so fucking many of them?"

"It wasn't too long ago that you were one of them, Valerie," Alt deadpanned as her holographic glitch of an avatar appeared before her, as bodacious and sex-bomb shaped as she was the first time she'd seen the netrunner turned Blackwall AI all the way back in 2074. "Not even more than three years ago, wasn't it? A freshly fired V, surfing Mrs. Welles' couch, unable to find any employment at a corp after getting cut loose by your Arasaka Counter Intel rivals… how long did your lack of money and purpose last before you began to work with Jackie?"

"Really not the time, Alt," V groaned mentally, leaning against the refrigerator and frowning as memories rose up unbidden of her first go-around of her life- the pain of having all of her implants disabled, the sting of betrayal, the feeling of loss… the humiliation of having to rely on others again. "But… you already know it was less than a month. So what?"

"I'm just saying, you really shouldn't call newbie Edgerunners gonks- you used to be one, and by old guard Night City Legend standards, you still are a newbie- terrifying to everyone who crosses paths with you, yes, but the kind of terrifying that's a flash in the pan- a blade in the night. You haven't really done anything yet that could solidify your legend," Alt answered, shrugging as she sat down at the kitchen bar- though considering the lack of stove or other cooking appliances save for the microwave, it wasn't really much of a kitchen. "Not in this time at least."

V was seriously considering just moving all of their shit to a nicer apartment so she could show off her meager cooking skills for Judy- sure, she'd only ever learned because she wanted to make River's jambalaya recipe, but c'mon, it was good as hell and she wasn't gonna keep going over there for it. Even if River was one of the few good cops in NC, she wasn't about to keep mooching shit off of him.

Well, in her original timeline at least. Now… well. River wasn't really her friend now. Hadn't even met, really. He'd just been an afterthought to her, after she'd stumbled across Anthony Harris' farm outside the city and just… killed the man herself with a simple push down the stairs.

And a bullet to the skull.

Several bullets. Rapidly. All over his body. Until the only thing left identifiable was his face, and everything else was just a bloody pulp of meat and bone shards and shattered lead fragments.

Anyway, she'd only really seen River from a distance after that, though the man had thanked her and they'd traded contacts, she… hadn't really felt the need to contact him again. Let it lie, and all that.

Back in the present, though, V sighed as she considered Alt's words, frowning as she walked across the living room, crossed her arms and stared out of the window towards the street and the highway beyond, the gleam of Night City shining bright before her.

"... That's just the thing, though," she murmured, not really caring that she was speaking aloud as Alt's hologram joined her in staring out of the window- both of them leaning against the small windowsill and enjoying the night breeze. "I don't know if I wanna go out a legend anymore. I got Judy. I got a life. I have… I have friends and a family, and a second chance to do it all again. I don't need to burn down the city to make my mark on it- I've already made my mark on enough people that however I go out, I'll be remembered. Not as V the Solo, not as whatever dumb nickname the gangs gave me this time but… just… V. Me. Valerie. And… I think I'm okay with that."

Alt's projection in her mind was silent for a long while, smoking a digital cigarette and considering V's words, rolling them around in her mind and thinking them over.

"... Y'know what kid? I think you've got a lot more sense in your head than everyone else gives you credit for."

"Aww, thanks-"

"You're still kinda stupid and reckless, though- remember that time you jumped out of the fifty seventh floor window of the Biotechnica tower to save some dumbass you barely knew just because she said you were cute and also has a cat theme?"

"Wh- hey! That was literally part of my job! I was supposed to keep her alive!"

"Uh huh, keep telling yourself that, you gonk."

Chapter 14: Broken-The Forgotten

Chapter Text

"The situation is simple," Rogue's voice came calm and clear through V's holo and it took everything she had not to act the same way she did with Rogue after… after Johnny had taken her on that date. There had been a budding friendship there, she thought, but really it was probably more that the older Fixer considered V more or less a granddaughter who took after her old flame and needed to keep a dumb kid alive.

V didn't blame the other version of Rogue. She'd been desperate and stupid at the time. Now, though? Well… She wasn't anywhere near as close to Rogue as she had been, before. They were friendly, on good terms, capable of speaking casually… but that was about it. It was more impersonal, more businesslike.

Even with the pleasantries, V sort of wished she had tried harder to get in with Rogue, to break through some of the layers… it would have been nice to see the Rogue of the 2020s, instead of the closed off, ice queen shell she put on now.

Maybe that was just residual sentiment from Johnny bleeding over. Maybe it was just her being nostalgic.

"An Arasaka convoy is outbound crossing the badlands to the south. Once they leave city limits, they'll be out from under any watch but their own. There's a squad of drones and cyber-ninjas guarding the truck in their own cars, and if they reach the checkpoint five miles outside of the city, they'll join up with a larger battle group and be largely untouchable until they get wherever the hell they're going. Your job- stop the convoy after they leave the city's watch but before they get to the checkpoint. Don't worry about casualties, just make sure that all of the cargo is there and intact- we don't know exactly what's in there, but there's stuff in there that definitely isn't on the cargo manifest. Once you're done, a Kang Tao subgroup will take over from there."

V sighed, rolling her shoulders as she sat atop the highway signs and kicked her feet lightly whilst waiting for the marked convoy to head her way- she could already see something black and rectangular in the distance, coming down the highway in a blob of vehicles that screamed opportune target for anyone who was inclined that way. Idly, she activated her optical camo systems and simply… waited. Sure, optical camo was normally too draining to use for long in a combat scenario- but just sitting in the warm afternoon sun with her solar cells exposed, not moving except to keep an eye on the convoy rolling down the road? It was easy enough to keep those batteries topped off.

"Oh, and one more thing- V. You might run into Wraiths out there. Be careful- if they damage too much of the cargo, neither of us gets paid."

"Aye aye, Rogue. Don't worry about it- I'm a pro, remember? Job'll get done nice and easy," V snorted, rolling her eyes at her holo before hanging up and idly stretching once more as the convoy came closer to her position. There were four trucks in total, V counted, and a number of smaller vehicles subtly following along- they tried to be subtle, but considering that all of them were way too clean and sleek and high class for this part of town, they might as well have just painted Arasaka logos on their doors just to make it obvious. Fourteen vehicles in total- one Arasaka modified Behemoth cargo truck carrying god knew whatever cargo it was that Kang Tao wanted from its depths (Honestly, if there were enough goodies, she might just end up taking a few boxes herself…), five Kaukaz Bratsk trucks loaded with additional cargo crates, and eight cars of varying brand and size- three Emperors, three Columbuses, and two though all of which were enough to hold at least six to eight men each, depending on where one sat.

Also, as she zoomed in on those cars especially, she could tell that all of them were wearing Arasaka security body armor… which just entirely gave away the game- come on guys have a little bit of intelligence! Ugh, this was why she never talked to the security guys when she was in Counter Intel. Idiots, the lot of them. Ah well, it made her job at least nominally a little easier- being able to tell which one of the cars around her was full of acceptable targets and which ones were hapless civilians.

Not that it would matter in a while, considering the path the convoy was taking wouldn't have them anywhere near the highway by the time they got out of Night City airspace.

Either way, a job was a job, and she had to make sure she didn't fuck up- the convoy still had a while to go before it left the watchful eyes of Arasaka's digital security umbrella, after all, and she couldn't let it slip too far out of sight otherwise she might just lose the entire thing in one of the oh so frequent sandstorms that blew through the badlands. So the best way to do things instead of just jumping down onto the lead truck and kicking off an entire pitched highway combat sequence like she'd seen in one of the Bushido movies (honestly, it would look so cool, but it really would not help the image she kind of had as a battle crazy cyberpsycho on a leash if she just went feral on the highway like that) was… hmmm…

V tilted her head and watched as the entire convoy rumbled towards the sign she was sitting on, pulling a jury rigged tracker chip out of her pocket and activating the coin shaped piece of metal and wires. She idly rolled the tracker in her hands as the minutes passed, the cars coming closer and closer before the lead truck finally reached her position and she…let it pass under her completely while dropping the two inch disk of metal from her hand onto said truck with only the faintest click of its magnet attaching firmly to the roof. She waited another thirty seconds or so, waiting until the convoy had gotten just a tiny bit of distance away from her before deactivating her camo systems and hopping down with the briefest of pulses from her hover jets to keep her from cracking the already fucked up road even more.

"Fourteen cars heading out… looks like they're taking a slight left out into the desert proper- that'll slow them down, there's a shitload of rock formations that way," V muttered to herself, idly tracking the ping of the tracker she'd dropped on the Behemoth cargo truck whilst mounting her Kusanagi and firing it up- taking just a moment to retrieve her guns for the mission from her bike's storage compartment and slap them onto the magnetic clips along her belt and back- before pulling onto the road and beginning to follow along in the tracks of the convoy at a high, but still rather casual speed. "Lots of places to get lost in, lots of places to lose people in… plus more than a few Wraiths… well. We'll just have to see how this all goes then."

V grinned, the wind whipping through her hair as she pushed her motorcycle to its top speed and began the long process of catching up to her target across the rocky, desert sands. The engine roared beneath her like the cry of a great, furious beast, and her grin became almost feral as she anticipated the sheer violence she was about to bring.

"Time to hunt."

"Oh my god who are you saying these lines for, you edgy dumbass! You sound like a comic book character with that gonk shit!"

"Shut the fuck up Alt! Let me feel cool for once!"

Chapter 15: Don't Get In My Way-Zack Hemsey

Chapter Text

The convoy was about halfway to the meetup point by the time V managed to catch up to it, but that was all well and good for her- it meant that help wouldn't arrive for many minutes in either direction, and the twisting rock formations winding around the areas completely limited both the convoy's ability to escape her bike, and prevented Wraiths from just charging in out of nowhere unless they took the long way around.

"Alt?" V asked idly into the air, humming as she activated her Kusanagi's speaker systems- custom wired for extra volume- and began blasting the sound of her radio out over the desert sands while pulling up towards the convoy. "Patch me into their comms?"

"Can't you do it yourself? I didn't teach you just about everything I know about netrunning just to do all of your heavy lifting for you."

"I'm driving! And besides, I may be arguably the best combat netrunner alive right now but you know damn well I'm ass garbage at the less violent stuff!" V protested, huffing as she began pinging the convoy's localnet and getting a count of the people involved- almost fifty soldiers in the inconspicuous cars, ten full borg cyber-ninjas in the cargo trucks, and… two soldiers driving in the Behemoth, with a third full borg signature in the back of the truck, with a slightly scrambled signal making it hard to tell just what the guy was- definitely wasn't Smasher though, she was sure of that.

That said, it wasn't like there were a lot of borgs Arasaka could field at the moment, and certainly none of them were as… legendary as Smasher himself, but she knew damn well he was still parked with Yorinobu Arasaka for the time being. Probably one of the Japanese borgs, then. Not that she knew who any of those guys were.

"Please Alt, thank you Alt," the ghostly voice of the sarcastic sexbomb netrunner stuck in her head deadpanned, crossing her arms as she all but floated as a static image in her field of view. "Whatever, fine. Here's their comms. Ugh. Shoulda just stayed with my Blackwall branch."

"Aww, you love me~"

As soon as Alt wiggled her fingers, V felt the socket in her neck heat up slightly as a pulse of data filtered through and embedded itself into her brain, her holo activating on its own and bombarding her with the comms of the confused Arasaka convoy wondering just why they were hearing Samurai of all things blasting out over the desert… followed by sudden panic overtaking the comms as they registered her presence tailing them at speed.

"Shit! It's the fucking Night Jaguar!"

"Wait that's actually one of her nicknames? You're shitting me! Who calls her that!?"

"What's left of the fucking Voodoo Boys apparently!"

"Someone get out there and do something, dammit! I'm not dying to the fucking Bloody Tigress of Westbrook today!"

Ah, sweet notoriety. V grinned as she left her Kusanagi on its max speed autopilot, the sweet, dulcet tones of Johnny Silverhand singing Never Fade Away blasting out over the hot desert sand as she stood up on the seat, arms crossed and eyes scanning the convoy as seemingly half of the cyber-ninjas began flipping out of their trucks and out onto the cargo stacks of said trucks- along with the soldiers starting to aim out of their windows with a bevy of Masamunes and Shingens, along with the odd Shigure here and there. Good, they were taking her seriously.

Too bad it wouldn't help them.

Immediately, V leaped into the air the moment the first shots were fired, her Sandevistan blazing to life in her neck and filling the air with the quiet hum of its time dilation field as she rushed forward faster than any of the men around her could even see , soaring over the bullets moving in almost slow motion around her as she landed on the hood of the rear car- a Chevillon Emperor, specially armored to resist bullets. Unfortunately, it did not save the occupants from her swinging around, kicking one of the soldiers in the face and using the newly cleared area to slide in through the open window, and land inside of the vehicle as the man was all but crushed against his compatriots from the sheer force of her kick. As soon as she was inside, though, she simply pulled the pins out of the grenades on each soldier's belts, then ducked back out of the window and sprinted over to the next car to do the same… only for one of the cyber-ninjas to slowly rush into her field of view with an extended mantis blade.

Poor guy, even with a top of the line Arasaka Sandevistan of his own, he was still leagues slower than she was with her top of the line experimental unit (that she'd klepped and upgraded over a year ago, now).

A single shot from her Malorian all but evaporated his skull before he could do more than start to raise his hands in futile self defense.

Cyber-ninja taken care of, V continued on her previous objective, sprinting at the next car- a Villefort Columbus- and all but tore its door off of its hinges, forgoing style in favor of pure brute force as her cyberarms hummed with excessive hydraulic strength. Once open, the car full of soldiers died all the same as she unfurled her right arm and launched a high explosive shrapnel canister at the center console before ducking out again and flipping over the soon to be destroyed van so she could watch the rest of the cyber-ninjas- four of which were standing there, watching her warily, the other five of which were still driving at the moment. She stood there, watching the world move around her in such slow motion that everything almost stood still, the cyber-ninjas only just barely managing to look like they were moving underwater rather than slow as hell.

V grinned, raising her hand and beckoning them over, standing there on top of the third car's roof, as though they'd be able to stop her.

They could try. Oh they could certainly try- and they did, with all four of the ninjas charging towards her across the desert as though they were running through molasses, one of them jumping high into the air while two of the others came in from her left and right in a pincer maneuver, and the last charging forward with mantis blades outstretched in an impaling maneuver. V's grin didn't waver, even as her Sandevistan beeped a few times and her perception suddenly rushed back into realtime, two explosions going off behind her as the Emperor and Columbus she'd taken out instantly fell back and flipped , with the larger SUV turning into a flaming hunk of scrap from the dozen grenades going off inside of it all at once, while the Columbus just rocked and rolled as everyone inside was turned into bloody swiss cheese.

The cyber-ninjas closed in.

Her Sandevistan continued beeping in her spine as the ninjas drew closer, dashing into melee range and rearing back to impale her with their superheated mantis blades, and then…

Fwoosh!

The air became superheated steam, cloaking the world in white.

Chapter 16: Full Bodied (Feat. ALICE)-GHOST DATA

Chapter Text

As the four cyber-ninjas reared back and screamed from the bloom of heat blasting across what flesh they had left, burning delicate implants and searing microwires and triggering artificial nerves, V's Sandevistan blinked back to life and the world slowed to a halt once again, the roaring music of her Kusanagi fading away into a dull rumble. Instantly, V lashed out with her cyberarms, gripping the skulls of the two closest ninjas and crushing them in an instant- subdermal armor, skeletal reinforcements, bionic joints, titanium bones, none of it meant a damn thing to the ridiculously over-tuned servos in her fingers.

Metal crumpled, bone shattered, blood spewed and graymatter gushed between the cracks until the skulls of the two ninjas were halfway crumpled inwards and they were both extremely dead. The next to die was the guy to her left, who had somehow managed to trip over his own feet as he threw himself away from the expanding cloud of steam she'd just let off- that one, she simply grabbed as he flailed in semi-slow motion, a flick of her wrist extending the scratchers built into her fingernails by almost an inch- sliding out of durable plastic sheaths and clicking into place while her finger joints locked and became rigid- while she thrust her hand forward and severed his arms at the shoulders where the joints were the weakest… and then just positioned his skull under the tires of the car.

The fourth cyber-ninja- the one coming at her from the air, she simply threw a few potshots at his head and chest from her Malorian.

Arasaka cyber-ninjas for some reason, she'd learned over the course of a cumulative three years in CounterIntel, did not, in fact, have the required cyberware necessary to dodge in mid-air, even if they had the reflexes and synaptic accelerators necessary to actually see the bullets coming and had enough wherewithal to try and dodge out of the way.

Five cyber-ninjas and two cars full of soldiers down- three, actually, once she'd pulled the grenade pins of the soldiers in the car she'd been standing on moments ago- five cyber-ninjas, five cars, two truck drivers, and a guy in a linear frame to go.

Easy peasy, as they said.

V took a moment to survey the rest of the area, then considered her options. She had on her, at the moment, her Malorian, an Achilles, and a Dian. Her projectile launch system had another few shots left before she had to reload it, and she had a couple grenades stashed in her bike if she was willing to actually go back and grab them out of the storage compartment. She also had her DR-12 Quasar in her bike as well. She also had the option of just hacking the localnet and frying everything connected to it all at once, but she wanted to hold off on that option for the moment- it'd been ages since she'd had to fight anyone near her level, and she wanted to enjoy it a little. Even if the cyber-ninjas were… just the bargain bin bunch that went with every Arasaka HQ, and not the really special, highly trained ones that she'd had to desperately struggle against back during the Konpeki Plaza heist two and a half years ago (well, a year from now, honestly, but it was two and a half years in the past by her memories)- the ones specially fielded by the Arasaka family as bodyguards and problem solvers.

Fuck, she missed Takemura. Not the way the older man bent over backwards at all times to gobble Arasaka's corporate cock, but the way that he'd grown as a person over the course of the few months she'd known him and let Night City leave its mark on him. He'd been… almost like a paternal presence, for a while. Until he'd decided to fuck off and stay with Hanako Arasaka.

Oh well. He had his duties. She had hers.

V shrugged idly as the other five cyber-ninjas abandoned their vehicles and activated their Sandevistans, leaping from the open doors and windows and leveling their Yukimura smart pistols at her- not that they posed a real threat, not at this range. Not with her moving so fast that the targeting systems wouldn't even be able to get a lock on her before she killed their users. She could use her melee options, naturally- she had her mantis blades and her scratchers and her monowire, along with just the raw strength in her legs, her spike heel, the thruster jets and hover jets that let her double jump and hover (and also gave an extra oomph to when she wanted to kick someone)... she had a bevy of ways to do this mission and… honestly, even though it would actually be nice to keep fighting the cyber-ninjas, she just wanted to do it quick and easy so she could get paid and go home and get some lunch.

A series of slowed down bangs interrupted her train of thought, and V moved before she even realized what was going on- dashing off of the roof of the car and using her projectile launch system to blow up the soldiers within whilst backflipping over a series of smart bullets that whizzed past in slow motion- futilely trying to track her motion even as they flew off into thin air. The ninjas began closing in immediately after, dashing across the plain of near-frozen desert as they yelled out curses in slowed down japanese- it would have been intimidating if they weren't so much slower than her.

V sighed and rolled her shoulders. Fuck it- Malorian it was.

With a hop and a skip as she landed, she drew her Malorian once more and rushed forward faster than the cyber-ninjas could defend against, her Malorian roaring as it fired once, twice, three times, four times, five times in quick succession- sure, it had to cycle between shots, but the mechanism was juuuust fast enough that even in slow motion it finished pushing a new round into the chamber by the time she got to the next ninja and pressed the barrel to his face while he tried to swipe at her with his mantis blades. Time resumed once more as her Sandevistan beeped out its short cooldown cycle, V landing lightly atop the Behemoth truck itself and taking in the devastation she'd wrought- which, in this case, was five cyber-ninjas crashing to the ground and rolling uncontrollably as their heads all exploded in near unison, while the cargo trucks they had been driving continued on a preset path due to their autopilot.

Well, that wasn't really a problem for her. A quick flash of her netrunning interface flashed across her eyes as she flicked through Arasaka's ICE and halted the five trucks… and for good measure she also turned her attention to the convoy's localnet and transmitted a command to overclock every single implant in the rest of the soldiers' bodies- none of them so far had really been of any use except as annoying fodder, and it was just… easier to watch as they writhed in agony, flames bursting from their orifices as they screamed and died and their cars crashed into plumes of hot, dirty flames full of smoke and burning CHOOH2.

Hm.

"Hey Alt, I'm not going cyberpsycho am I?" V muttered, sighing as the five cargo trucks rumbled to a halt and she activated her Sandevistan once more, staring off into space as she sat there for a moment to get her head on straight. "You said my own engram getting reinjected into my head would prevent that, and you'd help out on that end, but I'm pretty sure I'm not supposed to feel bored watching a couple dozen people explode into flames and explode."

Alt's projection appeared before her, sitting cross legged upon the roof of the Behemoth and shrugging idly. "I did say that yes. As for you not being a cyberpsycho… No. You're not going cyberpsycho in the same way as everyone else. You are, however, a fucking gonk-headed idiot, and legally could be classified as a high functioning cyberpsycho the same way Adam Smasher is. You're just… really gay instead of seeing other humans as nothing but meat for you to slaughter."

"... Wait are you saying-?"

"Yes, your own sexuality is shielding you from becoming an amoral, antisocial, sociopathic nightmare like Adam Smasher is. Congratulations, you beat cyberpsychosis by being a disaster lesbian, if we want to be extremely reductive about the thousands of variables that make up the problem of cyberpsychosis. That said, why the fuck are you talking about this now of all times?"

"... Ah. Right," V cleared her throat awkwardly as she stood, looking around awkwardly as the Behemoth rumbled beneath her feet. "... I should probably finish this gig now, huh?"

"Mhmm."

"... Right. Okay. Let's just… get it done," V muttered slightly awkwardly as she walked over to the cab of the Behemoth and fired a pair of shots down with her Malorian, causing the truck to skid to a halt moments later as the ridiculously overpowered bullets punched through the armored roof and exploded the heads of the two drivers. As time resumed, V hopped down from the roof, dusted herself off, and strolled around to the back of the truck, hacking its systems to open the back door and-

"Shit!"

Immediately bent over backwards at the knees to avoid having the top half of her body seared off by a massive laser beam blasting out of the cargo hold, her reflex augments blaring to life and straining to their limits to drag her body out of the way before anything important could get damaged.

Oh right. The borg in the linear frame.

Dammit.

Chapter 17: Overkill-RIOT

Chapter Text

The borg that came stomping out of the back of the Behemoth was…. Well, V wouldn't have called him too dangerous to her, all told. Just the standard Arasaka cyber-ninja enhancements, it seemed, plus a linear frame that was… frankly kind of gorilla shaped. It was armed heavily with a thermal cannon seemingly ripped straight off of a Militech Centaur and sort of haphazardly slapped onto the Arasaka exoskeleton as some kind of mounted shoulder weapon.

The man himself was shouting obscenities in japanese (that she mostly ignored despite knowing exactly what was said), gesturing with the oversized arms of his suit as he lumbered forward out of the Behemoth and jumped down to the ground with a heavy thump and the groaning of metal joints grinding- she could already tell, even if the guy before her (who was now a quadriplegic torso implanted into the linear frame) had the standard Arasaka model Sandevistan that all cyber-ninjas had, the idiot wouldn't be able to use it for the entire fight without destroying his poorly balanced, over-loaded, and underpowered linear frame.

Other than his frankly oversized shoulder cannon and the armor plating on the frame's arms, the overall impression she got from the borg was that whoever let him into the suit was an idiot, and also that he really must not have been doing good beforehand because he immediately charged at her on all fours as his thermal cannon began heating up again in preparation for another beam shot.

V… was not impressed, even as the oversized arms of the lumbering beast popped open and revealed a set of integrated cannons that roared and launched a pair of rockets straight at her position. Her Sandevistan flicked to life a moment later, and she leaned out of the way of both rockets as they passed by- just barely moments away from them exploding her and likely ripping her in half, in fact.

With a quiet huff, she began walking towards the borg in a slightly circuitous manner, taking her time with the entire thing and grumbling under her breath as she pulled the Achilles off of her back and began charging up a shot- ugh, using tech rifles with the Sandevistan active was the worst .

"Honestly, at this point I actually would have rather faced Smasher in a fight- this is just pathetic," V muttered to herself, idly tapping her rifle against her shoulder as she strolled forward, the borg still spitting obscenities in slow motion as the thermal cannon fired and released a slow motion blast of heat that nearly blinded her thermal sensors and even almost blew out the sensors in her Kiroshi optics with just how fucking bright it was. " Fucking- shit! Ow god- fuck shit, goddamn argh sonuva- why is that always so much brighter like this!?"

V stumbled, but thankfully didn't fall on her ass (yet), and instead simply shielded her eyes with her hand, squinting and growling as she sped up her pace towards the borg… who finally activated his own Sandevistan a moment later and whirled towards her in… slightly less slow motion than before, with the beam itself still moving like molasses as it spewed out in an almost liquid way.

"KONO YAROU!" the borg spat out, voice shaky and static filled and still coming out as sort of a bass rumble due to still being so, so much slower than V, raising his arms and beginning to fire his cannons again- only to throw that all aside in disgust as he realized the futility of trying to use a projectile weapon whilst also in the middle of using a synaptic accelerator. Instead, he raised his arms again and charged forward, still hunched over on all fours and running like a gorilla as he used his legs more as stabilizers and fulcrums while the arms did all the work of locomotion. "I will kill you!"

"Yeah yeah, I've heard that a million fucking times," V sighed, checking the charge meter on her Achilles and grumbling even more as it continued to charge slowly in realtime- dammit, how fucking long did it take to charge up? Ugh, at this rate she might as well just use her fucking Malorian again.

Fuck it.

With a growl, V simply let go of the trigger on her Achilles, firing a shot center mass into the charging borg and making him rear back with a sudden cry of pain and shock- even with only a 75% charge, the shot itself was enough to rock him back on his heels and puncture through most of his armor just due to the sheer velocity of the rounds impacting him. It didn't stop him long, though, and he came back down a moment later, spitting more curses in japanese as he raised his arm to block her next shot- which, even with the Malorian's armor piercing capabilities, barely even penetrated into the ridiculously thick armor on the linear frame's arms.

"Shit, that's the same stuff Smasher uses," V muttered to herself, grimacing as she spun her Malorian around her finger and began dodging the borg's wild swings- no technique at all, this one. She'd seen more competent flailing from wannabe Edgerunners getting their start in Westbrook, where all they had to go on was imitating Tyger Claws and their katana techniques. "Damn, they chipped that much armor into something so terrible? Fuck, that's… ugh, gonna have to actually try a little. Shiiiit."

"You know, you could just hack him," Alt's voice deadpanned in her mind, her projected form seemingly appearing as though she were sitting with her legs crossed on the borg's shoulder even amidst his wild flailings. "Pop a Suicide command on him, watch him rip his own head off."

"Yeah I could but come on- where's the fun in that? It's so boring! Boring shit's supposed to be for when I'm just blowing up another Maelstrom warehouse!" V protested mentally, groaning as she ducked under one of the borg's strikes and instead shot him in the gut with her Malorian, getting in close and watching him shriek as the armor piercing round shredded through his abdominal armor weave and all but exploded his spine. "Besides, I'm doing fine as it is!"

A moment later, her Sandevistan beeped and deactivated, followed shortly after by the now suddenly very fast borg reacting much sooner than she could and, even with nonfunctional legs due to his now somewhat obliterated lower spine, managed to swing an arm very fast and very hard and smack V straight in the upper torso . Not her face, or her chest, or her arms, but with the size of those damn arms it was literally just a smack straight to her entire upper torso.

"FUCK!" V screamed out, yelping in a mix of pain and embarrassment as she got caught unawares for just a moment too long, tumbling ass over tea kettle as she flew straight into the cargo stacks on the back of one of the trucks and crashed through in a spray of debris and electronic parts. "Argh- goddammit fucking shit piss BITCH!"

"Doing fine, huh?" Alt deadpanned, while V picked herself up and brushed herself off- thankfully, her armor plating was durable enough that she'd only taken some minor surface damage from getting hit like that, but fucking ow was that a blow on her pride… and also on her outfit, because fucking dammit now she had to repair her blazer with how many tears and scrapes were torn into it. "You sure about that?"

"Yes I'm sure, dammit!" V hissed back at the projection of Alt as she stormed forward, dumping the rest of the Malorian's magazine into the borg and gritting her teeth in rage as he blocked the shots with his arms- multiple magazines, even. Even with the arms slowly deteriorating from having to take so many shots from such a powerful gun, it still wasn't enough to actually get through and hit the bastard on the other side. "Fucking bitch- eat AP rounds you borg'd out piece of shit!"

BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG BA-

And then the man exploded.

V blinked, shielding her eyes and yelping as a massive fireball erupted and threw her back from the intensity of the shockwave, her aural implants automatically tuning themselves down so she wouldn't go deaf from the sheer sound that had reverberated through the area.

"What the f- holy shit! Fucking- I must'a hit the bastard's arm cannons!" V laughed as she slowly stood up again, watching the burning pyre that used to be the borg with an almost amused smirk on her face. "Rockets must have cooked off once I got through enough armor! Ha! Fucking nova! "

"You didn't turn away from the explosion in slow motion, so…. Six outta ten."

"Everyone's a fucking critic," V huffed, then shook her head and turned away from the dead borg and instead focused her attention on the now opened Behemoth, and the crates within.

A moment's thought had her inside of the truck, rifling through the actual manifest within- not the false, censored one that Kang Tao had provided via Rogue, but the real shit .

"Magnetic field generators, gravitational field modification prototypes… aerodyne thrusters? Hyper strengthened artificial muscle fibers… high pressure hydraulics, multi-hand integrated control systems, linear frame parts? Who the fuck is all of this for?" V muttered, looking around idly and scratching her head, ignoring most of the rest of the convoy's cargo manifest since most of it was just regular implants and cyberware or weapons, a few vehicle parts, spare uniforms, some extra security equipment, and other assorted odds and ends. "... Fuck it, might as well look through some of this shit, see if it's got anything I can use…"

If Kang Tao was gonna come down on this convoy's ashes like a bunch of vultures, it only just made sense that she got the first pick of the spoils, right? Besides- she wouldn't take too much… Just… a little off the top.

Chapter 18: LED Spirals-Le Castle Vania

Chapter Text

"... Valerie, what the fuck is this?" Judy asked the moment she walked into the apartment, stopping short and staring in absolute confusion at the sight of her output in the middle of cracking open what looked like a whole bunch of crates of… something or another, all branded with Arasaka logos and filled with parts and implants among masses of plastic and foam packing material. "Wait- is this- Did you steal from an Arasaka cargo convoy!?"

"... Would it make you feel any better if I said that I killed everyone there first on Rogue's orders?" Valerie asked awkwardly, waving and wincing a little as she slowly climbed back to her feet and sort of shuffled in place as she stood there in front of Judy, holding a crowbar in one hand and wearing nothing but an oversized tanktop that showed off just how much cyberware she'd accumulated… as well as her boobs, because seriously, her tanktop was gifted to her by Rhino after she'd beaten the woman in a fistfight (along with free access to that one Animals run gym, but she hadn't gone in a while).

Rhino had also called her a chrome junkie cheater and to try and work out what muscle she had left instead of constantly replacing it with more chrome, but Valerie had… not taken any of that advice, considering she was about as borg'd up now as an Arasaka elite cyber-ninja. Not quite as much as Adam Smasher, though.

Not that she wanted to end up looking like that walking travesty stuck in a robot suit.

"... I- Well, I mean I guess if it was for a gig," Judy muttered, scratching her head lightly and tilting her head as she considered if she actually cared whether or not her girlfriend stole from Arasaka.

After a moment's deliberation, Judy decided that she wasn't paid enough to care, and especially not when she knew damn well already how much of a grudge Valerie had towards Arasaka.

"... You disabled the trackers in those things, right? I don't want 'saka ninjas bustin down our door," Judy finally settled on a carefully neutral reaction, rolling her eyes at Valerie's petulant little huff as she settled down onto what little free space there was on the couch that wasn't covered in… "... Val, why the fuck do you have all this chrome? I mean, I get the weapons and ammo, but… do you really need a magnetic field generator implant? Or… extended joint motion implants?"

"Ehhh- I don't technically need it , not really, but some of the stuff in here is upgraded versions of stuff I've already got, some of it's stuff I've been keeping an eye on getting, and… also I really missed having just a wall of katanas…" Valerie shrugged, holding up a bright pink katana and inspecting it for a moment before frowning. "Ugh- fuck, grabbed the wrong goddamn crate, these are the shitty kind the Tyger Claws use…"

"... I mean, they're still sharp aren't they?" Judy raised an eyebrow idly, not at all sure what Valerie was really talking about- she may have been Night City's best BD tuner and a dabbler in robotics, but honestly she didn't really know shit about weapons despite having a few pistols in her car just in case. "What's the problem?"

"Material quality, mostly," Valerie sighed, idly taking the pink katana in both hands and instantly snapping it in half with a loud shriek of tearing metal. "A cyber-ninja rated katana would have been nearly impossible for me to bend like that. Ugh- hope I actually have some good ones in one of the other boxes, or I'm gonna be pissed …"

"... Don't you already have one of those Kendachi power swords or something stashed away somewhere? Why do you even need a wall of cyber-ninja rated katanas?" Judy asked, wondering where Valerie would even get the space for that many sword holders- certainly not in this tiny-ass apartment (Judy, privately, somewhat reconsidered Valerie's offer to move them into a bigger, nice apartment that was slightly closer to Lizzie's. Maybe if they really needed the extra space…).

"... Well yeah, but it's mostly just because I think it'd look really cool, and I hate having display weapons that aren't functional," Valerie admitted, then grumbled and spiked another shitty katana out of the window- this one, she'd literally folded the blade like paper before throwing it out. "Dammit, knew I shouldn't have let Kang Tao take all that extra shit…"

"Wait wait- what's Kang Tao got to do with anything?" Judy sat up, blinking in confusion before looking around the room curiously, not really sure what Valerie meant by Kang Tao- did the rival corp hire her to hit up the convoy or something?

"Huh? Oh, Kang Tao hired me through Rogue," Valerie shrugged, tossing the katana scrap out of the window and into the dumpsters outside, ignoring the sudden bout of shrieks from the people who'd been smoking near said dumpsters. "Hate that I ended up taking cash from a bunch of corpos, but shit, it was a cool half mil for like, two hours of work… and like another two hours of napping in a truck after I finished up. And I got us a free Kaukaz Bratz in case we ever feel like hauling an entire apartment across the country."

Judy hummed, idly tossing one of the spare bits of electronics in her hand and focusing more on the way her output's extremely loose tanktop rode up around her hips every time she bent over or squatted down… and how Valerie also just straight up refused to wear underwear most of the time. "... Ah. And they just… let you take it?"

"Oh some of the dumber goons tried to ask why they couldn't just shoot me and avoid paying me, buuuut," Valerie snickered into the back of her hand as she pulled the plastic packaging off of what looked like a set of jump jet implants, rolling her neck idly as she continued sorting through the assorted guns, swords, ammo cases, implants, and other weaponry and bits of tech scattered across the floor and halfway spilling out of the crate. "I taught 'em real quick why that was a bad idea."

"... Did you kill 'em?"

"Eh, nah- thought about it, but the guy I challenged actually had the balls to try and kneecap me with an SMG. Didn't work , but shit, at least he had the nuts to try ," Valerie shrugged again, then settled back and fanned herself idly, steam wisping from the vents along her body as she took a break from sorting through junk- having made a fairly large pair of piles, one marked as "Modify" and the other as "Spare Parts". She continued the story a moment later, reminiscing slightly about how she'd put on an entire show of getting offended and even pulling out one of her throwing knives so she could showcase just how deadly she could be even with a single knife. "Senior members of the squad got 'em to shut up and were very polite once I brought out the Malorian- even let me take two of the trucks! Had to scrap the other one, though. Couldn't fit it in the back parking lot."

"... So that's why there was a flaming truck in a ditch on the way back," Judy deadpanned, raising an eyebrow at Valerie, completely unimpressed by her girlfriend's complete lack of regard for vehicular integrity if it wasn't one of her stupidly expensive supercars (which, Judy did have to admit, were totally worth the hype when she actually had the opportunity to drive them around in the badlands).

"... Yeah I uh, got mad about how slow it was. So I blew it up."

"... Val, you're such a gonk."

"Yes, I'm well aware of that, dear."

Chapter 19: Don't Leave-Infraction

Chapter Text

T-Bug was a woman who lived more by her netrunner handle than by any other "real" name- and she wasn't special for it. Most netrunners went by their handles more than they did any kind of legal name, and at this point, it wasn't uncommon for just about anyone to go by whatever name they wanted.

T-Bug was also known as a pretty serious, no nonsense operator, quick and skilled and willing to take on riskier, higher paying contracts- something that made her not quite famous in netrunner circles, but well regarded- even if it meant that sometimes less business went their way.

T-Bug was also, unfortunately, vaguely considered to be one of the many friends and handlers of one Valerie Nanashi, also known as the Bloody Tigress of Westbrook, the Night Jaguar of Pacifica, the Scourge of the Scavs, the Crimson BITCH (by Maelstrom), the #1 Combat Netrunner (by, well, Netrunners), the Thundercat of Heywood, Lizzie's Kitty (by the Mox, alongside other cutesy names), and about a dozen other assorted nicknames depending on what demographic of cyberpunk or gangoon you talked to. Most people, however, called the gonk currently regaling her about the sheer metric fucking assload of daemons she'd uploaded onto a bunch of Arasaka tech that Kang Tao confiscated from her latest gig- well. They called her V. Just V.

Said gonk was also drinking her beer, in her apartment, on her bean bag chairs, and keeping her from actually doing her job .

"And then- oh man, those dumbfucks at Kang Tao are not gonna know what hit 'em!" Valerie finished with a peal of laughter, snickering wildly as she leaned back in one of T-Bug's favorite bean bag chairs (Okay, it was only one of two, but it was still the nicer of the two) and chugged half a bottle of Broseph, clearly pretending to be drunk off her ass despite the five different poison filtration systems in her borg'd out body.

"Lemme guess," T-Bug deadpanned, raising an eyebrow as she just barely deigned to look at Valerie from where she was sat in her netrunner chair, tapping her fingers lightly on the armrest as she spoke. "You disguised fifty thousand highly destructive, highly contagious daemons as Arasaka Black ICE, and whenever the gonks over at Kang Tao plug into the systems to run diagnostics they're gonna blow up their server racks and lose billions of eddies in repairs?"

"... Well it's no fun if you just say it like it's a dumb idea," Valerie muttered, crossing her arms and huffing exaggeratedly.

"V, honey, I've known you for near on a year and a half now- I know how you operate," T-Bug rolled her eyes and took a sip of her own drink- just a RealWater, since diving on a stomach full of alcohol or soft drinks was just asking for a bad reaction. "You've done this exact thing like five times- if you hit a Militech convoy, you disguise a tangle of daemons as Militech Black ICE. Arasaka as Arasaka Black ICE, so on and so forth. It's kind of expected at this point."

"Well now you make me sound predictable ," Valerie frowned a little deeper, letting out a tiny humph of indignation and glaring at T-Bug without any real heat. "I mean, c'mon, it's not that predictable, right?"

"V, the literal only reason why you haven't been caught out yet is because every megacorp puts some measure of Black ICE into their secure research convoys, and the fact that you just layered even more on kind of obfuscates things," T-Bug sighed, rolling her eyes and settling into her chair a bit. "Anyway, the fuck are you doing here anyway? I have a dive to do for Donnie and the longer you sit here talking to me the less time I actually have to crack the data fortress I'm looking for."

"Sorry, sorry, won't keep you too long, Bug," Valerie huffed, sliding to her feet with inhuman grace and with the soft whirring of servos pulling her into a standing position. She yawned lightly, swirling the broseph around in its bottle before chugging the entire thing and finishing off with a truly impressive burp. "Ahhhh…. Anyway- was just wondering if you had the time to check on something for me?"

"Uh huh. Depends on what that thing is," T-Bug answered, already beginning the long and arduous process of tuning Valerie out as she closed her eyes and prepared to jack in. "And if it takes longer than an hour, I am charging you for it."

"Reasonable enough…. Anyway, I was mostly just thinking if you could maybe do a lil scan of Arasaka's communications net? Wanna know what the fuck they were trying to do with gravitational field generators - that shit's way past bleeding edge, and I don't wanna know what the hell they were trying to do with it," Valerie asked, pinning T-Bug with an honestly surprisingly concerned look- it only just figured, really. The blue haired Solo had a grudge against Arasaka a mile long, and any potentially dangerous advancement in megacorp technology- not even just Arasaka, but any of the major corps in Night City- had an ever increasing chance of starting a fifth corporate war if enough interested parties sniffed it out.

T-Bug rolled her eyes, though, not looking at Valerie as she began to do her checks on her equipment to make sure everything was in working order. "Can't you do it yourself, miss 'I have Alt Cunningham's Blackwall AI Ghost in my head'? I thought you were supposed to be NC's best netrunner by now, or were you just pulling my leg when you brought it up?"

"I- I mean I can! It's just… I've got some reservations about deep diving. Too much weird shit- hate it too much. Hate feeling vulnerable… Also the ice baths are fucking cold and I'm a bitch about cold water," Valerie sighed, sputtering a little as she clenched her fists and shook her head. "Look, if you can't do it, I'll do it myself, but I'd really rather let someone who actually specializes in deep diving do the job rather than my brute force methods."

"And here I thought you were all ego and no brains," T-Bug chuckled lightly, slowly relaxing her body as her consciousness began to slip away into the net. "Mmmm…. I'll get you that data- however much there might be to find, anyway. And in return… you are paying me back with a favor."

"... I am contractually obligated to inform you that if you want me to eat you out you need Judy's approval first," Valerie deadpanned, maintaining a conversation with T-Bug as she switched to holo communication rather than speaking aloud. "Or at least approval of the Mox."

"... Not that kinda favor. Something else."

"Oh, okay then. Send me whatever deets you got, then. Later Bug," Valerie nodded and shrugged, then waved over her shoulder as she left T-Bug's apartment and headed out into the streets of Night City, basking in the afternoon sun and humming as she considered her options.

"... Hmmm…. I think I'll go ask Dino if he's got any Scav problems I can help him deal with… He always does pay extra when I blow 'em up real good…"

Chapter 20: Meta-Mokka Music

Chapter Text

Ahhhh… Jig Jig Street. A hive of scum and villainy and about a billion sex shops. Joytoys lined the streets, holographic strippers danced outside shop fronts, and the air was thick with the scent of sex and tobacco, drugs and alcohol, the manic highs and lows of the human condition all compressed into one neon lit, trash filled hellscape rife with horny corpos, tourists, sluts, pickpockets, Tyger Claws, thugs, thieves, pachinko parlors, gambling dens, and one Valerie Nanashi, currently strolling through the streets in her work uniform.

V.

She'd redone the patch on the shoulder, now having a much more subtle and tasteful splash of gold fabric sewn in on each side- still in the shape of a V, of course, along with a larger stripe of gold fabric forming a larger V on her back that started at her shoulders and ended at the lower hem. Most people gave her a wide berth- in Jig Jig Street, nobody was clean. Everyone who survived Jig Jig had at least a passing knowledge of the streets, or was in and out too fast to be of any consequence to V's path through the red light district.

It wasn't important, though, what her uniform looked like. What mattered now was that she was stalking through Jig Jig Street like a woman on a mission, shoulders slightly hunched and posture reflecting nothing but utmost danger should anyone start anything with her.

Except for the Joytoys, who waved lightly as she passed, some of them sporting bracelets or jewelry or cyberware or even just little accessories emblazoned with both Mox colors and her signature V.

She nodded as she passed by the Joytoys, her expression dull and flat as she made her way deep into the roiling morass of human bodies, jingling machines, enticing calls- she ignored it all and headed into Wakako's parlor, the pachinko stations on both sides of the dingy hall ringing loud and clear and despite the amount of people within, V had a clear line of sight to the aging woman at the back of the store.

"So, what's this important mission you've got for me, Granny Wako?" V asked as she strolled into the somehow much quieter room that Wakako used as her office, the bead curtain parting around her as the sounds of the parlor faded into the background and gave V a sudden reprieve from the noise. "You know I hate it when people send me on jobs on my day off . Better have a good reason, or I'm going home and not leaving my bed until tomorrow."

" Patience V," Wakako answered, holding up a (very slightly shaky) hand placatingly and showing no fear despite being in the presence of Night City's second boogeyman, looking up at V and meeting her eyes- or rather, staring straight at roughly her eye area since the techgogs on her face obscured everything above her cheeks. "I apologize for asking you to come in today, but this is a very time sensitive mission that requires utmost care and discretion- I am well aware of your talents at stealth, even if you seem to be obsessed with causing as much carnage and destruction as possible."

"Look, those Scavs had it coming, okay? Even if they were corpos, nobody deserves to get kidnapped and violated like that- especially not while they're still kicking and screaming when the knife goes in," V huffed, reminiscing about the Scav den she'd blown up the day before- ahhhh, the sweet sound of their screams… Anyway- she had more important things to do at the moment, which was to say, whatever the fuck Wakako needed her to do. "Anyway- what's the job? Also, I'm expecting double for dragging me out of bed with my input on my day off."

"You will receive your pay, of course," Wakako deadpanned, looking a bit like she'd bit into a sour lemon before shaking head and moving on with just a flick of trembling in her hand, sliding a data shard over to V with a pertinent nod to take it and slot it in. As V did so, she was treated to a map overlay of Westbrook- specifically, some of the apartment areas in the southern half of Japantown, near Willow Street. "The situation is as such- one of my sons- Hiroshi, you've met him once or twice- has, unfortunately, fallen into the grasp of the worse half of the Tyger Claws. I'm sure you're aware of the faction split within the Claws?"

"Yeah, the Wako Claws and the Saka Claws," V nodded, idly panning around the map and pulling everything she could from the data provided. "Your Claws are tolerable, Saka's Claws are huge assholes that do human trafficking and push all of the worse kind of addictive designer drugs- the toxic shit they cut like nobody's business. Lemme guess- your son's stuck in a Saka Claw apartment and you need me to get him out without starting a firefight that could endanger his life?"

"Correct," Wakako nodded, bowing her head slightly and sitting back. "And, if you could please- make sure to take all of his effects as well. Some of the items he was carrying on him were quite precious- both sentimentally, and financially."

"Uh huh…. Bit of rescue, bit of stealth, bit of package delivery. Anything else I should know? Kill the Claws or keep it quiet-like? Think I should zero 'em or do you want me to just go in and out?" V asked, humming as she tapped her foot against the floor and stared up at the ceiling, already mentally tallying just what she'd need for the mission.

"Hmm…" Wakako folded her hands before her, pursing her lips and hiding her mouth as she considered V's question. "Get Hiroshi out first, then kill them all. Burn the building down if you have to. Make them suffer ."

"Mmmm…. Well, I can definitely do that," V nodded, her grin turning sharp and predatory as the lights in her goggles flared brighter and steam began to wisp from her body along with the sound of quiet whirring and buzzing, the floating clouds of white starting to obscure her body from Wakako's view. "Job's mine, Granny Wako. Just remember… double pay, for interrupting my day off."

"Of course, V," Wakako nodded, hiding the tenseness of her shoulders as she continued to project strength she knew would quail should V turn hostile. "Please, ride along with Hiroshi when you're finished- I'll have a gift for you as well- perhaps it will make up for the… inconvenience ."

Instead of responding, V simply gave Wakako a lazy salute as the hissing rush of air coming from her body intensified, steam blasting out and hiding her from view before a sudden wind blew the entire cloud out of the room and into the hall- leaving Wakako alone in a suddenly far too warm office, with V nowhere to be found.

Wakako shuddered, sitting back in her chair and lighting a cigarette, sweating slightly in a way that had nothing to do with the heat and humidity now present as the sounds of the pachinko parlor trickled through the door.

"Thank fuck she likes me," the old woman muttered, grimacing lightly as she took a deep drag and tried to calm her nerves. "Just my luck Hiroshi had to be kidnapped on her day off…"

sences of several dozen Tyger Claws keeping watch over the building- all of whom she tagged as enemies, and kept track of their data presences and general positioning while she activated her camo systems and simply climbed onto a roof nearby the apartment complex and jumped across the gap between buildings with a muted, subtle thump.

The magnetic gripper implants in her feet prevented her from falling back down the vertical wall of the building, and the scratchers in her hands dug into the concrete covering of the structure and let her climb up bit by bit- kind of like that old comic book hero, Spider-Man, though without the web swinging and the spider theme. From the third story wall she'd landed on, she climbed up little by little, avoiding the windows and keeping her optical camo active despite not really needing it- even with the Claws patrolling the alleyway down below, people rarely, if ever looked up- even in a place like Night City.

Most people, even edgerunners, didn't learn parkour, after all. Despite how good it was for situations like this.

V huffed quietly as she continued scanning the localnet of the apartment building, making sure to deactivate any outbound communications systems that were wired into the building itself, while also making sure that everyone on the same floor as Hiroshi was well and distracted- either by the TV suddenly glitching out and causing a bunch of claws to start shouting and slapping the thing to try and fix it, to a SCSM rumbling weirdly and drawing attention, to even just radios glitching out and drawing attention away from the small, single entrance room that Hiroshi was being kept in. A quick scan of the building's security system revealed a single guard currently standing outside of said room, as well as one guard inside of the room, smoking a cigarette by the window- not leaning out of it, but sitting in a chair right by said window, with Hiroshi in his field of view, both of them facing the door and away from said window.

Perfect.

V smiled and began enacting her plan to get Hiroshi out of the building- oh sure, the guard was the only hiccup, but honestly it'd probably be pretty easy all told. She just needed to…

Yes, that would do nicely.

As soon as V reached the tenth floor window that denoted Hiroshi's room, she idly considered the open window, her optical camo system long since deactivated to conserve power while she idly peeked her head over the edge of the windowsill… and knocked on the frame.

Instantly, the Tyger Claw smoking in the chair whirled around in confusion, just barely missing V ducking below the window frame again and hiding out of sight. Fortunately, the guy was just stupid enough for the plan to work, and as she tracked the goon slowly getting out of his chair suspiciously, she sent up a coil of her monowire and fed it slowly around the edge of the window frame- keeping just the faintest of charge within it to make it stiff and pliable without yet making the edge deadly yet. A moment later, the idiot stuck his head out of the window .

V's Kerenzikov activated in a flash of familiar heat, not unlike that of the Sandevistan- the tracing of sparking light along her nervous system as the more distributed circuitry activated and enhanced her reflexes to the extreme.

Her monowire flashed, the extreme heat of the thermal battery instantly cauterizing the wound as she reached up with her other hand and caught the falling head before it could fall out of the building. Whilst still in her sped up state, she dashed through the open window (thankfully, one of the ones big enough to fit an entire person through if they ducked a little) and caught the body itself before it could fall and alert the guard outside. Moments later, her perception slowed to normal and she set the corpse and its decapitated head down into the armchair the poor guy had been sitting in mere seconds prior.

And then… well. And then she simply walked around to Hiroshi's front, put her finger to her lips in a shushing motion, and sliced through the tape holding him to his chair with utmost ease… and a slight grimace at the fact that she'd have to clean the tape gunk off her scratchers later.

Ugh. Gross.

Ah well. Client came before minor foibles and inconveniences like that anyway, and V was nothing if not a professional. After slicing Hiroshi free, V idly looked around the room, humming as she pulled up the list of items Wakako had told her to retrieve- most of which were already in the room, honestly. A bag of clothes, a wallet with some membership and access cards to certain places (no eddies though, obviously), a few bits and bobs- accessories, rings, phone, etc. All of which V slid into the same bag as his clothes and slipped the entire thing over her shoulder. Then, with a nod of her head, V motioned toward the window and kneeled down slightly, not waiting for Hiroshi to mumble out any kind of response as she shushed him quietly again, scooped the 40-ish year old man (who, honestly, looked way younger- good genes, apparently) into a bridal carry, and awkwardly jimmied the two of them out of the window until V had a good position and-

Launch!

The coiling synthetic muscles in V's legs sprung, launching her across the gap of the buildings directly towards where she'd set the marker for Hiroshi's retrieval driver to appear (in, like, a half hour-ish. She still had to kill all the Tyger Claws n' all), not at all caring about the ten story drop even as the pneumatic jet that allowed her to double jump fired and gave her extra air time- time to get away, time to cross more distance, time to angle the fall such that she could activate her hover jets in midair and slow their fall once they got within thirty feet of the ground.

Not that she couldn't handle a thirty foot drop with just the strength of her cybernetics, but something told her that a barely chromed pencil pushing forty-some year old man wouldn't be able to handle the shaking and impact quite so well. And then- there they were.

"Okada Hiroshi, I'm V and I've been assigned with freeing you from the Tyger Claws," V spoke a bit belatedly, slicing the rest of the tape off of Hiroshi's body and freeing him such that the only thing left on him were his underclothes and a few burn marks from where the tape had contacted his skin. "The driver'll be here in about half an hour. I'm going to go retrieve the rest of your things and go burn down that apartment building with the Tyger Claws still inside. Sit tight. Do not move out of this alleyway, and… maybe get dressed."

Hiroshi nodded, bowing lightly at the waist. " Arigato , V-san. My mother speaks highly of your services. Thank you for rescuing me."

"No prob. Now- this'll only take a few. Sorry if I get any blood on your stuff," V finished, rolling her neck and activating her Sandevistan, vanishing in a blur of crimson and gold.

Time to clean up the trash.

Chapter 22: Reputations-Mobiius & ZAHIA

Chapter Text

After burning down an entire apartment building (and making sure that every single Tyger Claw in the immediate area had received a swift and silent death before being piled inside like the world's most macabre funeral pyre) as well as retrieving the rest of Hiroshi's things, V sighed and relaxed in the front seat of their driver's honestly kinda shitty, banged up Thorton Galena. The driver was… surprisingly not asian, despite Wakako's usual employee demographic, and had a spiky broom of brown hair, wore a blue hooded vest, black goggles, black gloves, and overall looked way too young to be involved with any kind of shady business. Then again, V probably wasn't that much older than him.

"Oh man, it's an honor to be working with you, Miss V! I've heard so much about you- the way you took down all those Scav dens and Maelstrom haunts, that raid you did on Biotechnica! I mean, god, I've heard of entire crews doing barely half of what you do, and you're a solo! So nova! "

Then again, he sure acted like he was half V's age.

"Kid, literally anyone with as much cyberware as me could do what I do… well, if they didn't go psycho first. I'm built different, not built one of a kind. And besides, they're Scavs. They're a dime a dozen free targets, not like it's hard to burn their shit down," V sighed, rolling her eyes behind her goggles as she slipped a knife out from one of the hidden compartments in her thigh and started cleaning it- she'd used it to slit the throats of about a dozen Tyger claws in the last hour, and god was it starting to show it. "Who the fuck are you anyway? Like, what's your name?"

"J-Julio, ma'am!" the now named Julio stuttered out, barely remembering to keep his eyes on the road as he nervously shot a smile towards V, clearly starting to get way too excited at the prospects of the most famous (active) Solo in Night City knowing his name. "M-my name's Julio Mendez!"

"... didn't need the last name but thanks. You been in the business long, Julio? Gotta say, didn't really expect a kid like you workin' for Granny Wako," V shrugged, idly examining her now rather chipped and worn knife for a moment before just hucking it out of the open window and into a street-side garbage can. "Y'know, considerin' you're, what, Heywood native?"

"A-ah, nah, Santo. Mom was from Arroyo, almost joined up with Sixth Street, but we moved to Japantown uh, after… some shit went down," Julio shook his head then sighed, trying to inject a bit of levity into his voice with an awkward chuckle. "A-anyway, I um- I've been working for Lady Wakako about a year now! She said I'm finally good enough to be a driver for other crews, so here I am!"

"Here you are," V nodded lightly, idly pulling a box of cigarettes from one of the inside pockets of her blazer and shaking one out into her hand- she didn't really remember what brand they were or what flavor they were, she'd pretty much just bought them at Alt's behest, given that the woman herself was an avid smoker when she was alive and told V to buy cigarettes that she knew Johnny absolutely hated when he was alive. So she did. As she lit up, she simply leaned back and crossed her legs idly whilst leaning against the car door, keeping an eye on Julio and Hiroshi. "Lookin' to make it to the big leagues, then?"

"Y-yes ma'am! It's been my dream to be a Night City legend ever since I got into the biz!" Julio grinned, giving V a look that was far too excited to be on the face of a newbie Edgerunner- she privately winced. Trying to be a legend only got people killed. Suicidal idiots and bright eyed fools were a dime a dozen in the so called City of Dreams, and V shook her head a bit even as she motioned for the kid (who was, probably, only a few years younger than her) to keep his eye on the road as they made their way back to Jig Jig Street.

"Yeah, give up on that dream," V sighed, deciding not to respond with a derisive snort despite how much she wanted to, instead just taking a drag on her cigarette and blowing the smoke out of the window in a burst of faintly pinkish sakura flavor. Fruity, sweet, floral. Just the way Johnny would have hated, the smug bastard. "The only way you become a legend as a solo is if you bite the dust. Anyone that's still alive? Just a flash in the pan. Today's news, forgotten about tomorrow."

"B-but not you! You're the most famous solo in the city right now! Hell, I'm pretty sure you're more famous than Adam Smasher!" Julio protested, smacking the steering wheel and staring at V in shock until V literally reached over and yanked said wheel back into alignment. "I just- why would you-"

"You're new, so I don't blame you for wanting to make it big, Julio," V sighed again, her voice flat and brooking no argument as she sat back down and took another puff on her cig. "Hell, I got a friend just like you whose whole dream is to be one of the big shot solos of NC… well, he's older than me, but that's beside the point. We don't do many jobs together anymore because I finally managed to beat it into his head that what's more important is staying alive and coming home to the people that care about you. Legends happen over time- if you go in all hot-blooded and cocksure, you're just gonna get zeroed in the most humiliating way possible. Take it slow. Take it easy. Take jobs you know you can do, chrome up or down if you have to, and even if it's not glamorous, you'll grow into a reputation as you go along- grow into a legend as you gain more experience and learn how to push your limits without getting a bullet in the skull."

She flicked the stub of her cigarette out of the window a moment later, frowning heavily as she took her goggles off and massaged her eyelids. "Also, do some training sims. You've got some good muscle on you, but combat training is hella important for a solo. Helps you avoid getting shot… or worse."

"U-uh… yeah… t-thanks for the advice, Ma'am," Julio nodded shakily after a moment, looking as though he'd seen a ghost even as he parked about as close to Wakako's pachinko parlor as he could, shutting off the engine and allowing V and Hiroshi to finally exit.

Hiroshi simply bowed and limped inside, no doubt to receive a dressing down about how he should have known better than to travel around without a security detail, while V took the time to stretch and roll her shoulders (not… that she really needed to, but little touches like that made her feel more human, and a little less disconnected from people who weren't borg'd to hell and back like she was) before flicking a couple thousand eddies Julio's way.

"There- a tip, for a smooth and uneventful ride. Try and spend it on actually useful training material, yeah?" V called over her shoulder, completely ignoring Julio's cries of shock as she strolled through the back entrance of the building and headed for Wakako's office to receive whatever gift the aging fixer had promised her.

She hoped it'd be something good- Wakako never disappointed with her gifts, but she did hope it wasn't another motorcycle. She only had so much space in that little garage she owned down near El Coyote Cojo and Mama Welles would not like it if she had to bring home even more vehicles.

Well… unless the matriarch of the Welles family got to use them at her discretion, of course.

Chapter 23: Pleasure-Dominus ft. Sage

Chapter Text

The gift, as it turned out, was a katana. A really good one . Extremely high quality steel, minor modifications in structure and functionality to increase lethality and sharpness, and a unique RFID system that kept unauthorized users from simply pulling it from the sheathe. The characters for White Tiger were etched and painted in gold upon the sheathe, giving it a lovely name that ironically didn't match the nearly all black appearance of the blade.

It was the first katana Valerie put on Judy's wall, right above the couch and handily placed in a beautifully made magnetic mount that wouldn't damage the wall itself and would keep said blade firmly attached until it was used.

"... y'know, somehow I can't help but think this is going to turn into a hoarding problem," Judy deadpanned, crossing her arms and cocking her hip as she looked at her new piece of wall art. "Also, don't you already have like… five katanas plus that power sword?"

"... Yeah but I left those at Mama Welles' place and I think she's gotten too used to having them as wall decor to let me take 'em back," Valerie shrugged, idly examining her handiwork for a moment before nodding in approval. "Y'know, it's kinda funny but… do you remember how we met?"

Judy blinked, looking at Valerie with a raised eyebrow. "... Y'mean how you picked up a part time security gig and spent the entire first night patrolling around the bar until Suzie made you go outside because you were scaring the customers? Yeah, but what's that gotta do with this?"

"Nothing, honestly," Valerie shook her head with a light, breathy chuckle, crossing her arms and tapping her foot against the ground as she thought back to how their relationship had started- so awkward, and yet somehow better this time around. Slower, a little less frenetic. Less chaotic, more time to get to know each other… more time to adjust to each others' lifestyles… "I just… I remember I was so keyed up that night. Fresh outta surfing on Mama Welles' couch, trying to figure out what to do with my life… I mean shit, the only reason why I remember that was just… the fact that out of everyone in the club that night, I was the only gonk walking around with a katana. One of those cheap, shitty tacky bright pink ones that all the Tyger Claws use- remember?"

"Huh- yeah. Well, I don't remember that much, I just remember some blue haired gonk walking around dressed in booty shorts and the tackiest oversized, lowcut pink sweater peekin' her head in and asking me if anything was happening down in the basement. Nice ass though, shame about the awful fashion sense, but it did get better… well, a little," Judy snickered, winking at Valerie and grinning a bit as she wandered over to give her output a gentle pat on her rear.

"Wh- hey! My fashion sense is great! I'll have you know that the girls at Lizzie's love it!" Valerie puffed up indignantly to try and defend herself and her fashion choices- she looked damn good in her off duty outfit and everyone knew it!

"No, they love you because they can just compliment something about you and you immediately turn into a tomato," Judy deadpanned with a teasing grin, idly walking her fingers along Valerie's shoulders until she could gently cup the back of the blue haired woman's head and bring their faces closer together. "Because you're such a good little girl for them, aren't you kitten~?"

"Hnnnnngh…. N-no fair!" Valerie whined out, blushing a brilliant scarlet color as her kitty implants activated involuntarily and a holographic set of pink cat ears sprung to life on her head while a matching holographic tail began flicking wildly behind her, responding to her emotions as her body vented steam from the sudden rush of heat flooding through her body. "Y-you can't keep doing this to me, Jude! You know how I get!"

"Aww, but that's exactly why I can do it~" Judy purred, her voice all low and husky as she took a step forward and Valerie took a step back, suddenly quailing beneath Judy's lidded eyes and predatory grin. Judy took another step forward, Valerie took another step back. On and on that little dance went until Valerie was thoroughly pinned to the wall, Judy leaning on her elbow as she used her free hand to cup Valerie's chin and stare her in the eyes, no sunglasses or visors or goggles to get in the way. "Because you. Are. My . Little Kitten."

Those last few words were spoken barely above a whisper, Judy's voice dropping down until her lips brushed against Valerie's ear, husky and deep and tickling against the sensitive cartilage.

Valerie only whined, blushing intensely as her vents continued to spew a truly commendable amount of steam from her vents, barely even able to splutter out an incoherent response as she almost entirely shut down just from the sheer overwhelming rush of emotions she felt flooding through her systems- the feeling of Judy pressing against her, that tremendous feeling of being cornered under something she could never fight, the total dominance…

Valerie trembled, and buried her face in her hands.

"I. Am too gay for this." she finally bit out after a few more moments, panting and wheezing as she ruined her shorts and ducked down slightly to avoid meeting what she knew was Judy's patented, smug, shit-eating grin. "Y-you keep doing this to me, Jude! My gay little heart can't take it! I'm gonna die!"

"But what a way to go, yeah?" Judy snickered, gently taking Valerie by the arm and leading her to the couch before her output's knees gave out, all but pushing her down onto the worn blue cushions so she could pin Valerie down using her own body weight, resting her chin in the valley of the borg woman's breasts and smiling up at Valerie with far too smug an expression. "You wouldn't regret a single moment of that, would you?"

"... No, no I would not," Valerie wheezed lightly, resting her head against the back of the couch before sighing and relaxing a bit, her body no longer venting steam as she forcefully cooled her internals so she wouldn't feel like she was running battle sims in low power mode. "But if I had to die, I'd enjoy it more if you sat on my face and broke my neck."

"Calabacita, you know I can't do that," Judy rolled her eyes, shifting slightly so she could dart up and plant a kiss on the tip of Valerie's nose.

"Aww, why not?"

"Because you're like, ninety percent borg and your neck is literally nearly indestructible," Judy deadpanned.

"... Oh yeah, I forget about that sometimes," Valerie blushed, looking to the side awkwardly until Judy flicked her in the forehead again and brought her attention back front and center.

"Heh, gonk."

"You love me though~"

"That I do, babe~"

Chapter 24: In Too Deep-Battle Tapes

Chapter Text

"... Who the fuck are you?" V asked dryly as she took in the form of the guy who was… allegedly her driver. Not that she really needed a driver, but she wasn't about to go fuck up or potentially lose her bike out in the ass end of the badlands while Dakota sent her out to go assassinate an entire camp of Wraiths in the middle of the fucking night .

Sigh.

Sometimes she almost wished she had a job with regular hours and consistent pay instead of having to drag herself out of Judy's arms at ass o'clock in the morning to go meet some cowboy looking motherfucker in his extremely modified Chevillon Emperor.

"Name's Falco, miss V. Was told you were in need of a ride out to the Badlands," the driver nodded at her whilst leaning out of the driver's side window, as though tipping a hat in V's direction. "We met a few months ago? Biotechnica job?"

"... Which one," V deadpanned, crossing her arms and rolling her eyes- though, he couldn't see that behind her goggles. "Whatever, doesn't matter. Just get me where we're going, park somewhere safe, and wait till the screaming stops to drive up. Hope you don't mind me getting blood on your seats. Or in the trunk."

"I put down a couple tarps," Falco nodded, as though he'd already expected that outcome- which, considering one of V's nicknames was the Bloody Tigress… yeah. That only figured. "Mind you, I'd still like it if you didn't track too much blood in here- stains a bitch to clean out."

"I'll do my best," V nodded, then settled into the passenger seat of Falco's car with a quiet sigh. She almost decided to forgo wearing a seatbelt, but decided to wear it after a warning look from the driver. "So, what Biotechnica job were you on about again? I've done about… eight of them in the last six months, and I don't remember who drove me to what."

"Eh, wasn't much- was barely there, honestly. All I ended up doing was getting you an' that Sasha gal over to the building, then let you do your work. As I recall, I think it was something about stealing data? Mm, whatever it was, poor gal you were with woulda died, but y'saved her." Falco shrugged, humming along to the turned down radio as he pulled out into the busy streets of Night City, taking them southeast until they started to hit the highway leading out of the city itself. "Good gal, that one."

"... ah. That job. Now I remember," V muttered to herself, sighing as she recalled exactly what had happened. It was… February, she thought. She'd been hired alongside some crew that theoretically had loads more experience than her, but had much, much less notoriety… mostly because they weren't known as an erratic nightmare monster that killed dozens of people in the span of seconds and would burn down buildings with still living gangoons inside.

Which. There were truths to that. Many truths, all of which applied to V.

Either way, she'd been hired on by one of the lesser known Afterlife fixers- neither Dexter Deshawn nor Rogue herself (despite V having specifically been at the Afterlife that night for drinks with the old fixer), but some guy whose name she barely bothered remembering because she knew damn well he was only there because he'd weaseled in under anyone else's notice and would likely have his title, assets, and position taken over by someone else in about a month (and, he had. By some lady named Jet or whatever). She remembered Sasha specifically, actually, because the other edgerunner had looked damn good in that outfit of hers, and was very pretty and very extroverted and at some point had actually reached out and started flirting with V and then started playing with V's hair on the ride over and…

Ahem.

Point was.

Sasha (and her crew, which was led by some… big guy? Named…. Maine? Probably?) had been hired to steal data from Biotechnica for the fixer to probably pass along to some other megacorp, and V had specifically been hired to cause a ruckus several floors below Sasha's position in order to draw the security bots away from the black haired netrunner.

It… had mostly worked.

Mostly.

V didn't really remember much of that job because it had been about three months ago now and it wasn't really all that different from her usual jobs on a day to day basis. Well, up until the point that Sasha had ended up tripping the alarms due to her never ending vendetta over how Securicine killed her mom (which, she had recalled seeing a broadcast on N54 about it at one point in her past timeline) and then, whilst defending her bomb and her connection as it uploaded to the N54 tipline, had gotten shot up, blown up, impaled by glass, and fallen out of the top floor window of the building.

V had only seen her by pure chance, and had only managed to barely catch the girl five stories before she would have splattered herself across some random rich douchebag's car roof.

She'd been battered, bruised, knocked around, bleeding out, had a spine full of glass and minor organ damage and several second and first degree burns from being just barely out of the immediate path of the explosion, but she had been alive by the time the driver had come around, bearing the leader of the girl's crew (Maine? Yeah, it was Maine. Now she remembered).

After that…

V shook her head and dispelled her thoughts, offering Falco only the briefest of nods before turning to face the window and murmuring under her breath, "Yeah. She was good."

The rest of the ride was spent in awkward silence, broken only by the sounds of the outside world rumbling past and the quiet tones of the radio playing some corpo laser pop trash (damn, she missed the Us Cracks girls. They were the only ones who made laser pop sound good dammit). Eventually, the ride ended- and despite V's hopes that it'd be a remote, pitch black locale where she could truly pull a horror movie act like she did on the Voodoo Boys that one time, the camp was unfortunately well lit and bustling for a rogue nomad encampment not five miles from the city. Ah well.

There was a quiet stillness to the air out in the badlands. The kind that spoke of an oncoming sandstorm in the next few hours- as the world itself was holding its breath gently before it unleashed a storm of grinding grit and blasting particles upon everyone unfortunate enough to get caught up in it.

Falco parked by a nearby outcropping of rock overlooking the Wraiths camp, leaning back in his seat and lighting a cigarette- no, not a normal cigarette with synth-tobacco. Something… different. Pungent. Herbal. V didn't particularly care about what it was, just that it still got picked up by her poison filters and otherwise it didn't matter to her what Falco was smoking as long as he still got them back into NC safely.

Stretching lightly, V began walking up towards the Wraiths encampment, taking in the plastic tarps and tents, the spray painted cars, the amount of guns they fielded… It wasn't like taking on the Scavs, or a Maelstrom cell. These were people who survived the hell of the badlands, and were ready for any kind of frontal assault.

Unfortunately, they were not ready for a cyber-ninja of V's caliber.

Her modified mantis blades unfolded from her lower arms, scratchers extending as her hands folded slightly out of the way of her fully extended blade and her entire body began rippling slightly with heat as she began to power up her combat systems.

A burst of steam was the only warning the rogue nomads received as V's Sandevistan activated.

The only alarm raised was the sound of blood and bodies falling to the sand. That, and the sound of screams as the leader of the camp saw his men and women get butchered around him, unable to even comprehend what was happening until it was far too late.

Not ten minutes after V stepped out of Falco's car, she suddenly appeared again, hauling the leader of that particular Wraiths encampment over her shoulder and delivering him into the trunk of Falco's car- bloody, beaten, bruised, and missing both hands and one leg at the knee.

"Alright, job's done! Let's go to Dakota's, drop this bastard off," V announced, sighing as she relaxed in the passenger seat and ignoring Falco's startled cry of "Jesus Joseph and Mary!" as she leaned back and folded her hands behind her head.

"Didja have to just show up like that? All flashy-like?" Falco grumbled almost testily as he pulled the car out of park, sighing as they began the drive up north-ish to Dakota's garage. "Damn near gave me a heart attack!"

"Mm… no, but it was faster than walking the regular way."

"... Fair enough."

Chapter 25: Haunting Chimera-The Enigma TNG

Chapter Text

"V. I am so very very sorry to be calling you at such an early hour, but I have a job offer for you. As you know, us fixers like to gossip- and it turns out that the Wraiths leader you brought to Dakota earlier today is connected to the source of some of my recent woes. Please, if you would come to my parlor, I will explain in full there."

V sighed as she rolled out of bed again, glaring at the rising sun and squinting at its hellish glow as her combat systems warmed her up with a soft whirring of parts and circuits coming alive. Her fatigue vanished a moment later, but that still left her grumbling as she rooted through the closet she shared with Judy, pulling out a copy of her work uniform and bundling it under her arm while cursing every deity she could name- why the fuck was Wakako calling her at….

She checked her holo, squinting at the timestamp left by Wakako's call.

Why the fuck was Wakako calling her before six thirty in the morning, when she had very clearly stipulated to every fixer she normally talked to that calling at ass o'clock in the morning was something reserved for actually important shit?

V sighed, grumbling as she activated every single stealth module she had so she wouldn't wake Judy up as she took a quick shower- dampening the sound around her and keeping it nice and fast while using the heat of her own components to quickly dry herself off in lieu of a towel.

"Dammit, this better actually be important, Granny Wako," she muttered to mostly thin air, rolling her neck and getting dressed whilst combing through the fridge for leftovers- not that V's usual eating habits left a lot of leftovers, but since moving in with Judy the two of them had started to purposefully save extra food for faster breakfast in the morning. "Otherwise I'm gonna consider just shooting that shady old grandma…"

It was nice.

And, also, it meant that V got to cram half of an entire cold, refrigerated locust pepperoni pizza into her gullet whilst hopping awkwardly out of the door and down out of the fire escape while putting on her boots.

"W-whoa- SHIT! Argh- shit- fuck! Ow-dammit!"

After successfully making herself look like an idiot after falling down the entire fire escape in front of like, twelve random people who just happened to be walking around at the time, V finally finished pulling on her boots, shook the dirt off of her blazer, and grumbled the entire way to her motorcycle.

Upon straddling her beloved vehicle, V raced down the highways towards Westbrook and hummed along to the radio as the wind raced through her hair and her combat implants slowly woke up one after another- her normal combat software and hormone implants were always active, of course, but the rest of her combat systems outside of her Sandevistan required at least a few seconds to unlock their safeties, and it was best to do that now rather than later in case she ran into a firefight somewhere along the way.

Half an hour, a quick cup of what was… supposedly … coffee from the local Buck-A-Slice (plus another entire cheese pizza crammed into her literal furnace of a stomach), and a quick stop by the side of the road to (nonlethally) beat the living shit out of a bunch of Tyger Claws mugging some poor old lady in an alleyway later, V found herself once more in Wakako's office. The pachinko parlor outside was strangely quiet- even in the morning, it felt odd to walk by there without a dozen customers rolling the machines; some of them Wakako's bodyguards, some of them actual customers packing heat.

"V. It is good to see you again," Wakako nodded, as though she were fully in charge of the situation and not hiding a tiny tremor in her left foot at the thought of accidentally enraging the wildcat in front of her somehow. "I apologize for the early hour, but I have a time sensitive situation that I would like you to take care of."

(Privately, in a deep corner of her mind, Wakako occasionally thought to herself just how appropriate it was that famous solos often got compared to dangerous and often now extinct wild animals. Rogue the cunning viper, holed up in her den and striking with lethal precision at the right moment. Johnny Silverhand the raging bull, willing to destroy anything and everything in his path for revenge against Arasaka. Morgan Blackhand the relentless wolf, brutal and ruthless once set upon a target, shrouded in as much mystery as he was the blood of his enemies. Adam Smasher the unstoppable bear, only just barely held by Arasaka's leash and drowning in an ocean of blood and flame…

V the feral wildcat, carving a path of death and destruction for nebulous goals and yet remaining fiercely protective of a very small, specific patch of Night City.)

"If it's as time sensitive as you say it is, then it's fine. What're we lookin' at, Granny?" V asked, raising an eyebrow from behind her goggles as she cocked her hip and tilted her head questioningly- at least, until Wakako placed a shard upon the table and motioned for her to take it.

What she saw was…

Standard mission briefing stuff.

Maps, times, meeting locations, meeting personnel… oho, what's this?

V grinned- a nasty, sharp toothed expression full of malice as she saw the targets of Granny Wako's ire. She almost pitied the poor motherfucker who she was going to kill, and the people who'd get hit by the collateral.

Almost.

"For some time now, the fixer Faraday has been stirring up trouble with my Claws, my solos, my crews- attempting to cut them out from under me, build up a reputable base of clients and gigs through his Militech funding. I could not touch him before now- he is secretive and paranoid, and has dealings with all manner of unsavory groups. Wraiths being chief among them," Wakako explained dryly, steepling her fingers and pursing her lips as she leaned forward in her chair and looked V in the eye. "The group you assassinated earlier yesterday was on payroll to steal Arasaka technology from outbound convoys- it just so happens that they missed one, and the spoils of that convoy were instead taken by one other… and Kang Tao. I trust you remember that one?"

"... Weird how they didn't try to show up and kill me," V deadpanned, crossing her arms and speaking in a tone that was more or less an audible eye roll. "Couldn't possibly have been my reputation."

"... You and I both know that you terrify the majority of the criminal element in this city," Wakako spoke back just as deadpan, shaking her head for a moment before leaning back and setting a beautifully crafted katana upon the table- one with a black blade, a fairly wide tsuba, and a yellow wrapped handle. The sheathe itself had the characters for Sharpening and Claw emblazoned in gold, giving the katana its name- Tsumetogi. A katana that would have gone to one of her lieutenants in the Claws- Hiromi Sato- if the traitorous filth hadn't jumped ship to join the opposite faction so he could gain a managerial position at a brothel of all places. "As it were- Faraday will be meeting with a Militech convoy at the provided location in two hours time. Get there. Kill him and the convoy. Make a statement if you must. Deliver me his head and this will be waiting for you when you return."

"... Well, I never say no to another katana on my wall," V answered rather dryly after a moment, a small flicker of amusement crossing her face as she nodded in agreement. "Usual fee, plus another ten percent for dragging me out of bed after only four hours of sleep. I'll get it done loud, messy, and you are going to have a new head to mount on your wall in… oh, four hours?"

"Pleasure doing business with you, V," Wakako nodded, then simply watched as V once again faded into a cloud of mist and vanished in a gust of wind, as though she'd never been there at all.

"... Just once I wish she'd stop doing that… it leaves so much condensation on the walls…"

Chapter 26: Cedarwood-Drymer

Chapter Text

Nine in the morning was… one hell of a time to try and drive anywhere in the more populous areas of Night City.

Hell, any time past seven turned into a nightmare of honking horns, bumper to bumper traffic, car accidents, gunfights, explosions, and people dying because some shitbag decided to bring a gun into traffic.

Which was why V instead took the smart route of running up the outside wall of the tallest building nearby using her magnetic gripper implants, getting high enough to the point that she could see clear air around her instead of a maze of buildings, and then just… jumped.

Pushing outwards and upwards, V used her jump jet implants (grudgingly installed by Vik, who was now complaining about how much trying to manage the cables in V's body sucked now) to boost herself higher up and gain some extra velocity. Once at the apex of her leap, she flipped and adjusted her position, flattened herself out, then simply guided her fall through the air with a mixture of the tiny control jets in her hands and feet, the hover jets in her shins pushing her along slightly faster as she fell to the next building, where she landed with a quick roll and a spring back to her feet as she activated her Sandevistan to start roof hopping and parkouring her way to the meeting point.

With how fast her Sandevistan was, how strong her synthetic muscles were, and how much she could boost her own speed with the jets built into her body… well, it sure as hell beat trying to drive through the morass that was Night City traffic- and hell, she even managed to land on an AV flying in roughly the right direction for a few minutes… though, it seemed that the passenger wasn't too happy with that.

Unfortunately, the passenger inside said AV (upon a quick ping of its systems) was Arthur Jenkins. Her former boss.

Needless to say, Trauma Team was going to be scraping the bastard out of the flaming wreck of his AV in about five minutes.

Regardless, V made it to the meeting point with nearly an entire hour and a half to spare, and so she settled in and waited calmly- making sure to text Judy a good morning message the moment she knew her alarm would go off while she waited.

She also, maybe, also went and grabbed another Buck-A-Slice pizza.

What? She got hungry when she had to wait for this kinda stuff.

After waiting for entirely too long, V simply yawned and waited atop the roof of a nearby CHOOH2 station as she watched a small, rather inconspicuous Militech truck (well, inconspicuous in the sense that it wasn't accompanied by a tank or something stupid like that) roll up to an abandoned parking lot- one that was secluded on three sides by semi-abandoned buildings, and was located on a rather empty street as well.

Moments later, another car came in from the opposite direction- a Chevillon Thrax 388. A fuckin limo - red, with white accents, bearing several passengers within. It looked too good to be meeting in a dingy shithole like this. Fortunately for V's rather abstract moral compass, the asshole inside was about to die, and she was going to klep that ride (and, honestly, probably gift it to Mama Welles) the moment she fucked over those Militech fuckwads and Faraday.

Fuck that guy, seriously.

How fucking hard was it to just act like a trustworthy source of information? Goddamn corpo wannabe piece of shit- just a rat trying to claw his way up the shitpile, stepping on the backs of solos and crews that did all the heavy lifting while he got to claim credit for any completed job while providing faulty info and minimal details.

Dick.

V sighed, idly deactivating the zoom on her Kiroshi optics and humming to herself as she activated her camouflage systems and began making her way over, knife in hand and ready to be used. Let's see…

How would she do this?

There were six Militech goons piling out of their car now- five guards, one she-suit bearing standard Militech corpo clothes. Alongside them was Faraday, stepping out of his car with three Joytoys for… some reason.

V stopped, scratching her head as she observed the scene from across the street, entirely hidden from view via the suite of stealth systems installed in her body and trying to puzzle out just why the fuck Faraday thought showing up with a bunch of neon-suited Joytoys to a business meeting was a good idea. What, was he just that big of a horny freak in his private time?

Whatever.

A quick burst of hostile code injected into the nearby localnet took down the Militech communications array before anyone could notice- not turning it off or frying it, but making it so outgoing calls wouldn't be delivered for well over half an hour.

V smiled, tossing the knife lightly in her hand and lining up her throw.

Time to kill.

Time slowed as a familiar electric heat raced through V's spine, her Sandevistan activating and bringing her perception up dramatically , to the point where she was just about the fastest thing currently alive at the moment. The knife in her hand came up, her arm rearing back as her gorilla arms tensed .

It flew, straight and true, spinning like a circular saw through the air on a direct course into one of the she-suit's guards- straight into the poor fucker's throat.

Time sped again, just a momentary use of her Sandevistan to add extra velocity and lethality to the throw so it'd punch through the guard's armor. V watched the knife fly straight through the air like a bullet, whizzing almost silently until it sank into her unfortunate target with unerring precision.

The response was immediate as V sped up the world again, watching the remaining three guards immediately start to bring their guns up while the Joytoys at Faraday's side did much the same- with one of them trying to usher the fixer back into the still open doors of his limo.

They wouldn't get far.

To everyone without an active Sandevistan, the sight of V appearing before them must have seemed like some kind of horror movie trick- she'd simply blurred into existence in a haze of fog, holding onto the knife in the first guard's chest as though she'd simply come up and stabbed him without anyone noticing.

"I-it's her! S-shoot the bitch!" one of the other guards screamed, snapping his guns up and letting off a streaking line of fire that raked across his now even deader companion's body and ultimately did nothing , because the instant he fired V had vanished and appeared behind him.

Her knife slit his throat the next instance, drawing out a choked gurgle as the sudden burst of gunfire stopped with the sound of a rifle clattering to the ground.

Two bodies hit the dirty asphalt, and the next thing anyone knew, there were three Joytoys flying through the air as though thrown by a ghost. As soon as they hit the ground, though, the assorted men sprang back up and started running away, screaming about how no amount of money in the world would get them to deal with V. They vanished around a corner, leaving Faraday with none of his original backup.

The she-suit gulped, and the remaining three Militech guards (plus Faraday) looked around wildly for any sign of the blue haired merc.

There was a short scream, and a burst of automatic fire that spattered across one of the buildings and again, did nothing except cause the man to go flying back into the side of the Chevillon Emperor the Militech group had driven up in, impaled through the chest by a fucking katana - where the fuck!?

To make matters worse, standing upon the hilt of said katana was the solo herself, arms crossed and expression blank as she gazed down at the remaining four people before her.

"Faraday. Okada Wakako sends her regards. And also my blade in your throat," V intoned, the voice modulators in her throat giving her voice an eerie echo that only seemed to enhance the terror she projected- as though she were less of a solo, less of a merc, less of a human and more of a terrifying beast who prowled in the dark.

Despite the fact that it was a very sunny nine in the morning.

"Fuck, you just had to get on the bad side of one of the fixers who can afford to hire her didn't you!?" the Militech she-suit spat out towards Faraday (who was mostly standing there like a complete gonk ), grabbing her service pistol and whipping it up- only to target absolutely nothing. Nothing at all but her own man, slumping to the ground as even the katana pinning him to the armored car vanished as though it had never been there at all. "Dammit, dammit dammit dammit! Can't even get a call out- why is the signal busy!?"

One of the last two guards broke and ran, screaming away from the parking lot as he tried to get away.

It didn't help.

V appeared before him and simply disarmed him with as casual of a backhand as one could give, breaking his gun in half over her knee and lifting the man up by the throat. The lights in her goggles flared, and V… simply dropped him on the ground again and vanished.

Moments later, the unfortunate guard exploded into a cacophonous fireball, his grenades having all been primed and activated by a sudden quickhack.

The last guard… vanished with a choked off scream, only for his head to roll back into the parking lot a moment later- cleanly severed with the expression forever locked into a rictus of horror.

The body thumped down onto the roof of the Militech vehicle in a spray of bloody red, and the she-suit… broke.

She ran, screaming and begging for her life, throwing her gun to the side and wailing about how she was too important to die like this. She died with a knife to the temple, and crumpled to the ground- just barely making it to the sidewalk across the street with her last, dying gasp.

Faraday suddenly stumbled backwards as something warm and sticky and foul splattered against his body- vision glitching as something happened and- and…

He screamed, falling to the ground because he was now covered in blood- his blood. His blood.

He continued screaming a moment later as the pain hit him- both legs shorn short at the knees and spewing more and more blood out into the street.

V appeared once more, burning hot steam surrounding her body like a reaper's cloak, misting out into the morning sun and giving her an almost… ethereal glow to contrast the sheer demonic nature of what she'd just done.

"So. Faraday," she spoke calmly, kneeling by the now crippled fixer and idly catching his last ditch punch with her hand- crushing his wrist with a loud snap and letting his now limp arm fall to the side with yet another scream tearing its way out of Faraday's throat. "I'd normally be a lot quicker and more merciful than this… but Granny Wako wants me to send a message . Ergo… you're gonna be screaming a lot for the next ten minutes. I'd say I'm sorry but… eh."

She shrugged, giving him a lopsided grin that made the fixer's blood run cold.

"It's just business. Nothing personal…." She paused, then snickered. "Well, okay, it's a little personal, you sanctimonious backstabbing piece of shit."

Faraday gulped, shuddering and trying to focus through the pain burning through three of his limbs and trying to be strong in the face of his inevitable death- trying to defy V, deny her the satisfaction of taking away his dignity in death.

He would not succeed.