I've been getting back into the swing of things once again with Persona 5 ideas again. This time, for something that is definitely completely different than what I've done before with this property: a crossover with Cyberpunk 2077. Now, you may be wondering how in God's name I'm going to make this work. The truth is, I usually make this stuff up as I go along. But, let's get into the idea itself so we're both on the same page.
As you know, I've done a few Cyberpunk fic ideas before. And in doing so I've reused the same "true ending" scene a few times. This time will be no exception. So, if you've read my previous fics that have reused this before, you can skip to the first transition to continue as that's where the story will pick up. If you are familiar with Persona but not Cyberpunk, I'd implore you to at least look this over. On to the idea itself.
After V gets inside of Mikoshi and separates Johnny from himself, instead of going back, he's transported by gods to another timeline where humanity hasn't gone to shit yet into the body of a kid named Ren who's been tasked with preventing the world from going into ruin but still isn't sure how or why he's even here.
As for the Persona side of the coin, Ren is "John Doe," our player character, our self-insert. In reality, if the game were to mimic what I think it was going for, none of our characters are canon, only the events in which they participate in. You could replace him and nothing would technically change so long as they're the Wild Card. After all, even if you get into a special relationship with one of the girls, everyone's choice is different. Some like Ann, some Makoto, Haru, Futaba, etc. I know that for some this will be an unpopular opinion, but variety is the spice of life. If you want a faithful literary adaptation of Persona 5 (Royal), play the game; it's on Gamepass for Xbox, Steam, and PS4/5 (hell, you can emulate the base game if your rig is good enough). But with all that said, let's get this show on the road.
And before we get too far, I will wholly admit that this chapter contains copied and pasted content from previous fics that I've written as it helps expedite the process of getting to the point I want to be at.
Title: [undecided].
Rating: M for V's dreams and language (maybe some citrus later?).
Pairing: V/Ren x undecided girl.
Summary: V did it, he made it to Mikoshi and got Johnny out of his head. So, why was he in the body of an infant in a world that wasn't going to absolute shit? Why does he have to literally grow up again in a world that's less technologically advanced? Well, at least the food isn't literal kibble. What's this about stopping the world from falling into ruin?
Disclaimer: I own nothing other than my copy of MS Word and my desktop. Cyberpunk 2077 belongs to CD Projekt Red and Mike Pondsmith, Persona to ATLUS. I only own this concept as an idea. See the forward for the full disclaimer.
XxXxXxX
V crawled towards the red, glowing tower in the center of the room. It was appropriately colored considering that red was considered a 'danger' color, something to stay away from. If it wasn't for the Relic killing him, he'd agree with that gut instinct. But this 'danger' would also be his salvation. Fucking with Corpos, befriending fellow Nomads, losing a good friend; this was all done in two weeks that could have only happened in Night City. He leaned up against the tower terminal and pulled out the cable and plugged it right into his wetware; slowly he made his way into the pool of liquid and red errors and diagnostics starting popping up.
"See you on the other side," Johnny said.
His vision darkened and he found himself in an elevator. There's no way he was in an elevator, right? It was taking him to the roof of some building. The doors opened to show the dingy hallway of one of many of Night City's apartment blocks. You could tell from the grime and smell. The odd thing was there were a lot of cats, an extreme oddity. As he stepped out onto the roof, he found that it was raining and the neon lights of the city made it feel… picturesque if you wanted to call it that. Near one of the ledges sat something that he picked up out of the corner of his eye. It was right next to a pair of lawn chairs, the tacky plastic-type that somehow was always comfortable. He walked over and found the necklace that was made for him by Misty, the bullet that was put in his head by Dexter DeShaun that booted this whole suicide mission off, to begin with. As he picked it up and analyzed it, the world fell away and was replaced by another.
V recognized it was the digital world, the deep cyberspace netrunning that he had experienced when he had gone under with the Voodoo Boys, right before they were all fried to a crisp. He was standing on a walkway floating over a black abyss with a pyramid glowing green in the distance, a gold pillar beyond it.
"Let us go, you and I," Alt recited in her digitized voice. He started to walk towards the pyramid, considering there was nowhere else to go but forward. "When the evening is spread out against the sky. Like a patient etherized upon a table. Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets. The muttering retreats. Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels, and sawdust restaurants and oyster shells. Streets that follow like a tedious argument of insidious intent. To lead you to an overwhelming question. Oh, do not ask 'what is it?' Let us go and make our visit."
Alt was then silent as he reached the stairs and started to climb the pyramid. At the top, just beyond was the golden pillar of light. The top of the pyramid was a plateau of which only had one way off of it, that happened to lead toward the pillar of light. Just barely noticeable against the golden glow was the red projection of Johnny Silverhand. V approached him and called out as he was right behind him, "You're here!" He placed his hand on the projection's shoulder and asked, "Who was right, you cranky bastard?"
"Ha! You were right, V. You were," the long-deceased rockerboy admitted.
"And who just ate their words?"
"Oh, fuck off." He then started to walk towards a projected booth which he sat down in. V followed suit.
"So, when do we start?" V asked the question of the hour.
"Haven't caught on yet, have ya?"
"What, whaddya mean?"
Johnny placed his feet up on the holographic table. "Alt's already split us. Once you jacked into Mikoshi, she lit you up with Soulkiller."
"Your output don't fuck around."
"I am not his girlfriend," the aforementioned Alt appeared and rebutted.
"Hey, Alt. So, seeing as we seem to have the whole soul-splittin' out of the way, what's next?" V asked the incredibly advanced AI.
"I am currently verifying the checksum and eliminating engram copy errors in the process."
It then hit V like a ton of bricks, what Mikoshi and Soulkiller really did, despite being told what it did. "Wait, you mean… I… Am I a construct?"
"She means you followed in my footsteps," Johnny translated. "Next step's to copy you into the gonk's brain."
"So that's really it. We're done. You kept your word," V felt relieved.
That relief was immediately shattered by the next words uttered. "There is one aspect I failed to take into account," Alt interrupted.
"Alt, what?" Johnny asked for both of them.
"The body is a key factor in this transaction." That was stating the obvious. "The DNA reconfiguration by the Relic has progressed too far. Added to aggressive, invasive medications, the body's immune system attacking its own neurons…"
"Christ, will you skip to the end?!" V interrupted. This was bad, really bad if what she was saying was true.
"After I transfer your construct into your body, you will die. It is inevitable. It is imminent," Alt said with finality.
V was immediately enraged, and rightfully so. He had been played. "You had this planned all along, didn't ya?" V waved accusatorily towards Johnny and Alt in the same motion. "Never had any intention of keepin' me alive."
"Is that a fuckin' joke?" Johnny asked as if what was just said was the punchline to a dad joke.
"You backstabbin' motherfucker! You just fuckin' kicked back, dumbass grin on your face, and waited for me to realize you had me fucked from the start."
"Gonna pretend I didn't hear that."
V turned to Alt. "Alt, question. Will the body reject Johnny's construct?"
Johnny could only shake his head. "No, they are compatible. The body is his."
"That's enough, Alt. V and I need a minute," Johnny interrupted this time.
V started to stand up. "I ca- I can't believe it. Everything." He found himself leaning against a backward-facing chair. "All that we did – it was pointless." He sighed in both annoyance and exhaustion. "I've had enough of this. Of everything. You, most of all," he directed towards Johnny in particular as he too sat in a backward-facing chair of his own.
"Perfect, 'cause we're stickin' to the plan. I'm goin' with Alt, fuck knows where, and you're keepin' your body."
"Where's she even gonna take you?"
"Beyond the Blackwall, to become part of her. Whatever the hell that means."
"Is there really no other way?" V asked with desperation. There just had to be another way.
Alt decided at that time to interrupt them. "As I said, Johnny can retain the body, remain there, while you come with me," Alt could only seem to say with a shrug.
"Guess I meant, I dunno… a happier ending… for everyone involved."
"Here, for folks like us? Wrong city, wrong people," Johnny replied. What he said was the truth. Night City was the stopping point for many, and it was never a happy one no matter how little of an impact in the grand scheme of things he had on it.
"Yet the right to make a choice you have earned, through will and endeavor," Alt added. "This bridge leads deeper into cyberspace. Cross it and permanently sever the connection with your body." Alt seemed to multiply which went on for eternity in whichever direction he looked. "The path to your body passes through that mortal well."
V thought for a short time to consider his options. Is it better to give up on life for some kind of 'immortality' or to live life to its fullest? He came to his decision, as much as he may regret it later. "I told you… I said I wanted you to have my body. But… but I can't do it… I'm sorry," V said to Johnny.
"Don't apologize. We knew all along this is how it would play out," Johnny replied. V stood up and turned to see what looked like a netrunner cradle. Alt floating over it and Johnny warping over to the side of it.
"Don't… don't fuck with me right now."
"Only if you cut your pathetic 'I'm sorry' bullshit." V looked and to the right, in the corner of his eye he could see the bridge to cyberspace. If he really wanted to, he could just… run to it, Johnny wouldn't be able to stop him. No, he had made his decision. He continued to walk towards the well.
"I mean, Jesus, I'm about to shred a comrade and a chunk of my own soul in one fuckin' go. You got no idea what that shit feels like," V said as he sat down on the well's edge. Without waiting for some kind of witty remark from the deceased rockerboy, he swung his legs over the ledge and laid down inside of it.
Johnny placed a hand on his shoulder and pushed him down. "Goodbye, V. And never stop fightin'," Johnny's final words to the merc were short and to the point. He started to fall backward, blocks of data streaming past him as he felt like he was in freefall. This seemed to go on forever until he blacked out. However, that didn't last for long as his vision was turned completely white.
XxXxXxX
The first thing that V remembered was waking up in the body of an infant and then proceeding to lose his mind, to his parents he was an 'unhappy baby' and 'probably cranky.' But no, he had lost it. Gone cyberpsycho. Got stuck in Mikoshi when Alt attempted to boot him back to reality and 'Saka was just tormenting his soul with inane things just to see what he would do to react. Literally anything else other than what he had experienced.
Finally, he came to terms with it, and many called him a prodigy or extremely intelligent in many fields such as electronics and programming. He had to completely relearn how to talk, doubly so in actual Japanese rather than having a piece of code translate for him. Then was reading and writing. The reading part was easy since there was such a mass Japanese presence in Night City, he could read most Japanese, but couldn't write it for shit though. Gave him a leg up in primary school when he was forced to take it. Then came junior high and finally high school.
Not a whole lot happened. Tried going out with a chick in junior high, didn't work out and they ended up going to different schools anyway when they went up a grade level. A lot of his 'stats' leveled out at this point with a high proficiency in the sciences, primarily electronics, coding, and engineering. Though, he did on the side do some tinkering with smithing and 3d printing despite it being in its infancy. He even made some friends in the west and helped a few resistance groups in legitimately oppressed countries with designs that could be made with hardware store parts and a 3d printer. As someone who had been fucked by the powers that be, it was a catharsis to see those who had power tremble at the little guy.
For once in his life, Ren or V was living the good life despite not being loaded. No record of high levels of violence. No need to carry an iron everywhere you went. It was a future that he wished Jackie could see. He did wonder if his old friend may have gotten the same treatment. He left a few cryptic clues on well-known sites or on sites that V knew that Jackie may frequent on information that only the two of them would know. If he were in this world, Jackie would find him. Maybe he'd have his best choom back.
But all of this positivity in his life changed when he walked home late one night after helping out his student council with a project for the upcoming culture festival.
There had been some bald – though in hindsight, maybe his head was shaved – cueball harassing a woman. Even months after this, the only features that he could remember were as such: bald head, had some kind of facial hair, had glasses or sunglasses, and had a deeper voice. The only other thing that he knew was that the man had the local authorities in his pocket. The reason he knew? Well, he was arrested for separating the two physically and the man fell on his own drunken stupor. He was subsequentially arrested, tried as a minor, and sued for an indeterminate amount of money.
Now, getting arrested wasn't new to V. In fact, if push came to shove, he could beat any inmate six ways to Sunday with combat skills he remembered from his former life without killing them. In Night City, if you got arrested for anything besides the most depraved shit, you weren't looked down upon. It was a constant of life that if you were an Edgerunner, you were bound to have run-ins with the NCPD at some point in your career. However, in a collectivist society like Japan?
Not good.
The immediate thing that happened was that any friends that he had immediately distanced themselves from him, despite knowing who he was and some even knowing him since he was a toddler. So much for 'childhood friends,' huh? The most understandable one was his parents. They had to keep their jobs in order to keep food on the table. They had some savings, but those savings had been wiped out by that bald bastard; they weren't a rich family by any means, but they certainly weren't poverty-level. However, that lawsuit drove them to borderline bankruptcy. His parents loved him, but they had to send him away to make the public think that they were punishing him despite him clearly being in the moral right. In order for him to survive when his probation was up, his parents needed money to pay off their debt on top of being able to live. It was shitty, but yet understandable.
And so, he spent two months in a Juvenile Hall while his parents got the next year's living situation worked out. He met some… interesting people, to say the least. There was one boy who claimed his senpai was high-ranking in some mafia and for protecting him from a group of other boys he owed him one. They shared phone numbers, but Ren had a feeling that this was more out of obligation than gratitude; not wanting to owe anyone anything, that is.
Getting released on parole two months later, Ren went to the dead center of Tokyo to visit the police station to meet with his new parole officer. It was a meeting that went as expected.
Stay out of trouble. Get passing grades. Break any laws and your ass will be sent right back to Juvie.
The riot act, essentially.
The meeting went on to show his officer's expectations of him. What he expected a boy on the route to reform to act like. In other words, 'yes, sir' and keep his nose out of trouble. After that, he was dismissed, but due to the meeting being delayed until almost sundown, and them not wanting a minor out on the streets, they put him in a hotel for the night. The next morning, a Saturday – April 9th – he was on a train on the line to arrive at Yongen-Jaya with his final destination being Café Leblanc.
Due to the number of stops, it'd take a while to get there. So, Ren decided that he'd read a book. Though, it didn't take long before he nodded off. He jolted awake as the intercom went off with a woman's voice.
"Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for riding with us today. We will be arriving in Shibuya shortly. This is the last stop for this line, please transfer here for all subway lines," the woman's voice on the intercom announced. "The doors to your left will open."
"What? Are you for real? A mental shutdown?" a girl across from me asked.
"It's the truth!" her friend countered.
"To a person though? That's got to be a joke. You really love all that occult stuff, don't you?" the girl teased before the two giggled.
Ren had a small yawn as he woke up and checked his phone, only fifteen minutes had passed. Mental shutdowns? What the hell was that? Considering the station was coming up, he pulled out his phone's notes app and added 'search mental shutdown later' as a reminder. He proceeded to walk out of the station and entered Shibuya itself and saw the famous crossing. Ren had plugged the address for Leblanc into his map app which said to cross to the station across the road there, and so he followed. As he observed the controlled chaos of people from six different directions flowing around each other from the curb, my phone chirped. On it was a new icon that he had never seen before: a red and black eye. Before he could do anything with it, it consumed half the screen and started to static itself out. He tapped on the screen both around and near the new icon, but the phone did nothing. Suddenly everyone stopped in place. One man's conversation was stuck in mid-sentence. What really solidified it was a bird frozen mid-flap but it wasn't falling.
On the other end of the street was a growing blue flame which then took the shape of a demonic figure before the almost jack-o-lantern face turned into him, but it wasn't him – he didn't think so, at least – as this person had yellow eyes that seemed to glow with otherworldly power. As quick as this came, it left, and everyone started walking again. Ren rubbed his temple with his free hand contemplating whether he was having a mental shutdown. The icon turned into an app icon. Ren proceeded to delete it. Just dragged and dropped it into his phone's trash. With that, his journey continued to the next transfer line.
The train would take almost fifteen minutes with stops, so he proceeded to use the limited wifi to search what 'mental shutdowns' were. Apparently, some people would have psychotic breaks when no such episodes had happened prior and commit acts that they wouldn't remember (or live about to tell the tale). There were a couple of notable examples from the site of a conspiratorial forum. A taxi driver had committed a hit-and-run about two weeks ago and killed a high-school girl, a first-year starting this semester, in front of her sister and the man didn't recall a thing. There was a mega thread list created by some internet sleuths on a website that seemed to be quite popular that had some unproven incidents from almost a decade ago, one of the first involving a Doctor Isshiki who just stepped in front of a car in an apparent suicide. Strange. The only connecting thread that these people had established was that they all happened in Japan only. No such incidents occurred overseas, and this is something that these people found out early on as it appeared to have a multinational interest.
Ren's next station came up and the automated system repeated "Yongen-Jaya" several times as he exited. The specific back streets that Leblanc was in were a few blocks from the station itself. Arriving inside the residential block, he looked that the text message my mother had sent me with the address he was to go to as well as a name, 'Sojiro Sakura.' He looked at his map app and it said he had arrived but he seemingly hadn't. Spotting an officer, he walked over to him and asked; he was clearly annoyed but answered. He pointed him two side streets down. He thanked him for his time and made his way over.
The first thing Ren noticed was that it was a residence. Maybe he had been given the wrong directions? However, spotting the nameplate of 'Sakura' on the gate around the property told him that he was in the right place. He saw a buzzer and rang it, but after a few minutes, no one responded as well as the windows were dark.
"Looks like no one's home," someone said behind him. "Oh, yeah… Sakura-san's usually at his café around this time. Well, Leblanc's in the back alley, so I should make my other deliveries first…"
Ren pulled up his phone and put in the location. There was a presence on the map app which had the operating hours. It was an hour or two before closing. Looking up, he saw the sky was overcast. Granted the weather forecast didn't say there was going to be any rain, but he didn't want to take any chances. It was just around the corner. And one quick walk around the corner and he found himself in front of a very western-looking café. Inside he could see a man minding his kitchen wearing an apron before he sat down on one of his stools to read a newspaper. The delivery guy had called it 'his' café and given there was no name tag, he had to have the right place.
Ren entered with the bell jingling and the TV was turned up for the remaining patrons. Where Sakura appeared to be in his mid to late forties, the two patrons appeared elderly. The volume must have been for their benefit given they were the only two in the shop. "A public transport bus was driven down an opposing lane with its customers still on it!" a news anchor announced. "The citizens can't live in peace if this keeps up!"
"Oh, how frightening," the elderly man commented.
"What could be going on?" the elderly woman asked. "Didn't something similar happen just the other day?"
"And down is… the name of a shellfish used in pearl farming…" Sakura muttered before he looked up to see him. "Oh… right. They said that was today," he said as he placed his newspaper messily on the counter.
"We'll be going now, the payment's on the table," the elderly man said as he stood up with his wife.
"Thanks for coming."
"This place is in the back alley, so there's no worries of a car crashing in here."
'I've seen crazier gonks try,' Ren thought at one particular instance back in Night City.
"A what now?"
"There's been a string of those rampage accidents, you know. I just hope that none happen around here."
"It's none of my concern."
"Haha," he chuckled, "we'll see you next time." The couple proceeded to leave.
"Four hours for a single cup of joe," he lamented after the door closed. Ren didn't know how to really respond to that and remained silent. "So, you're Ren?"
"Yessir," Ren noded. "Please take care of me."
"…Uhhuh. I'm Sojiro Sakura. You'll be in my custody over the next year. I was wondering what kind of unruly kid would show up, but you're the one, huh?"
"My feats have been grossly exaggerated," he says flatly but with no disrespect.
"Apparently," he muttered. "Have you been told? A customer of mine and your parents know each other and- never mind," he shook his head. "Follow me," he ordered. He brought him into the attic of the café which was being used as a glorified storage space. It looked like once upon a time it was someone living quarters. "This is your room," he announced. "I'll at least give you sheets for your bed."
Ren hoped that they were sized right for the mattress. "Thank you."
He took a moment to take in the space. It was quite large, and despite being filled with both bean stock to sell on top of literal garbage it was still a lot to work with.
Sojiro noticed his silence, "Hm? You look like you want to say something."
"It's a large space…" Ren states as he continues thinking of useful space management that could be utilized.
"But it's cluttered, I know. It's on you to clean up the rest."
He walked over to the apparent garbage. "How much of this is store use?"
He looked over. "The ladder. The rest is either garbage or needs to get disposed of. Like those phone books." It looked like he'd need to purge a bit. He'd also need to browse through the books to see what was garbage and what was just old books left in an attic. "I'll be leaving after I lock up each day. You'll be alone at night, but don't do anything stupid. I'll throw you out if you cause any trouble."
"What's the floor rated for weight-wise?"
"I know what you're thinking. It's residential, not a garage." Ren nodded. He'd need to think up another location for any… acquired vehicles. He knew that his one motorcycle that he had purchased for borderline scrap that he spent the majority of the last two years rebuilding was sold to pay the bills. That pissed him off more than anything since it was going to be licensed under him once he became of age.
"What about using the kitchen?"
"That's off-limits," he replied quickly. That meant convenience stores and microwave meals for him, then. "I got the gist of your situation. You protected some woman from a man forcing himself on her, he got injured, then sued you. Right? That's what you get for sticking your nose in a matter between two adults. You did injure him, yeah?"
Ren had plenty of time to think about it the more time passed. There was still quite a bit missing, but he knew what was true. "Yes, and no." Sakura paused for a moment to allow him to explain. "Yes, I pushed him but he landed on his rear stabilized by his hands. When getting up he slipped on a still-drying puddle and fell onto a nearby car causing him to get a gash on his brow." Ren continued the thought, 'I could have easily killed him if I truly wanted. Chrome or none. Gonk got off easy.'
It was once again his word against someone who apparently had enough power to have the police in their pocket as well as have the woman he was with silenced. "Even so, you now have a criminal record, you were expelled from your high school. The courts ordered you to transfer and move out from your home town which your parents approved. In other words, they got rid of you for being a pain in the ass." Ren knew he was trying to get a rise out of him. If he act up now, Sojiro wouldn't have to do anything. "It's best not to talk about anything unnecessary. I am in the restaurant business, you know. Behave yourself for the year. If nothing happens, your probation will be lifted."
"A whole year…" Ren thought aloud. This was going to get really boring because he had to stay low.
"We'll be going to Shujin tomorrow."
"Shujin?" Ren asked. He had done some research before embarking that morning, but he knew very little about it. "That's the school that had an Olympian hired as a PE teacher recently?"
"So, you did research your future school. Correct, Shujin Academy – the school you'll be attending. We'll introduce ourselves properly to the staff there."
"I was under the impression that they were an extremely selective school with one of the tougher entrance exams in the prefecture?"
"There's rarely a place that'll accept someone with your record, you know. Perhaps you're a charity case they've taken on to get good press should you be a success story. What a waste of my Sunday…" he lamented.
'My heart weeps for you,' Ren thought.
"Your 'luggage' arrived a little while ago. I brought it up here for you." And with that, he left to go back to the shop.
Ren's luggage was little more than a cardboard box. He proceeded to look through the box. Inside was a week and a day's worth of casual clothing, a week's worth of uniforms for the school he'd be attending, an envelope, and an extra pair of shoes. No laptop but there were a few hard drive enclosures which meant all he needed was a PC to restore his data on. Wouldn't shock him if the PC he once had was confiscated and eventually sold – again to pay for the bills. He put the clothes away in repurposed plastic bins on one of the shelves and opened the singular envelope on top. Inside was one hundred thousand yen. Doing the math, it'd be enough for a year's worth of subway traveling from school and home as well as general food usage. If he budgeted wisely, there may be an end-of-year celebratory meal he could squeeze out of it should he somehow stay out of trouble.
He was an Edgerunner though at heart. Trouble always seemed to find him no matter how hard he tried.
If he wanted more personal expenses, he'd need to get a part-time job. Too bad there weren't any bounty-hunting gigs, those usually paid well. It was one of the few things that Ren unironically missed about the dark future. Plenty of work and plenty of Eddies flowing to make them happen. Sojiro took that moment to walk back up the stairs.
"What the heck?" Sojiro asked sounding annoyed. He then noticed the attic looking different. "I heard you making all sorts of noise up here but I didn't think you were cleaning." He looked around and gave his non-verbal approval. "Actually, the place doesn't look too bad. Though, it's only natural you'd want to keep your room tidy. Why don't you go to bed tonight? You don't have anything better to be doing, right? I'm going to close up shop and get out of here myself. I won't be the one looking after you if you get sick from staying up too late, you got that?" He didn't say anything further and left. Ren could hear the door close, the little bell that would have alerted Sojiro that there was a new customer ringing to confirm that he had left.
Ren sat down on his newly acquired bed which was little more than a futon mattress on top of milk crates after changing into his PJs – a pair of sweatpants and a t-shirt. He was light enough where they should be able to handle his weight, but he opened up his phone and looked at Amazoom, a retail website, and found that the cheapest, aluminum bed frame from some Chinese sweatshop was going to cost at least 10k Yen. He grimaced at the cost. He was essentially an 'emancipated' child and had to take care of himself. He had his side-hustles that the police didn't find out about, but he didn't have the hardware to run any of it; he just had his drives that contained the programs that were able to. That meant, if he wanted any form of disposable income for anything outside of school or justified school purchases – which may take some time for his parents to even respond or send money – he'd need to get a part-time job. Hopefully, none of them were too willing to look into his record.
The only upside is that if he managed to get through this year without any issues, his record would be sealed meaning gainful employment after high school was still possible. Well, at least from how he understood the legal system of Japan. He could be completely wrong.
His phone beeped and when he unlocked it he found the same eyeball app from before. He looked through all his phone's settings on the kernel level. There was no way an application could install itself without his express button-pushing consent. Media drops were disabled by him. This piqued his curiosity.
"Now, how did you get on here twice?" he asked aloud with only himself to reply.
Before he could get into it, the phone downstairs rang. He had remembered a yellow payphone and sure enough, when he reached the ground floor it was ringing.
He picked it up, "Hello?"
"Oh good, you haven't turned in for the night yet. It's Sojiro," the unknown caller identified himself.
"Why are you calling the payphone?" Ren asks.
"I forgot to lock up and turn the sign to 'Closed.' From now on, that'll be your responsibility nightly."
Ren internally groaned but didn't say a word about it. "Alright."
"Good. And keep out of the kitchen, I'll know if anything's missing." And with that, he hung up.
Ren proceeded to open the door and switched the 'Open' sign to 'Closed' before locking up. He sat in one of the booths and opened up his phone again. The app was still there, and he was still curious about it. He opened up one of his tools and started scanning it. It wasn't being flagged as malicious. He dropped the APK file into a FOSS online program analysis tool. It came back as not malicious. Going into the details, the program didn't seem to be broadcasting anything at all. No calls to a server for instructions, no requests to access media files or personal data, hell, it didn't even ask for more storage space than what it was using. The only indication of finding out what it was, was that it had the name 'Meta Navi' below the icon.
Ren went back to the home screen and against his better judgment, opened it. Before him lay a screen laid in with black and red. In his opinion, it was super edgy. Occult symbology everywhere. On it was five selectable things, the first three were text boxes.
"Person, place, keyword?" Ren said aloud. Lastly were two buttons, 'Navigate' and 'History.' "Alright, then." Against his better judgment once more, he entered a name. "Jackie Welles. Night City."
"No candidate found," it replied immediately in a woman's voice.
"What am I doing?" he scoffed with a small chuckle as he set his phone back down on the table. "Me, Ren Amamiya, computer engineering prodigy, playing around with an unknown app in Sojiro's restaurant when I should be sleeping." He leaned back and looked at the ceiling and sighed. "It's times like this I really do miss Night City. It was simpler despite how fucked up it was," he said as he closed his eyes for a moment.
"Input successful," the voice from the phone said.
Ren's eyes immediately snapped open and stared at the phone. "I'm sorry, what?"
"Beginning navigation," it continued unfazed.
"Navigating? Navigating where!?" he yelled at the device which didn't answer. The world swirled around him in blacks and reds before he was dropped unceremoniously in a booth. He immediately looked around and saw that it was the same diner where he had met Takemura in when plotting to take down Yorinobu. "What the fuck?" he asked.
"You really shouldn't be here," another him sat down in front of him before shifting into the visage of his former life's body. "But since you are, we have a few things we need to talk about." Instead of the piercing blue eyes he had, even with his Kiroshi optics, they were a menacing golden-yellow color.
XxXxXxX
Meanwhile…
Futaba Sakura was a girl of means and skill. Currently, she was watching over the newest resident of her adoptive father's shop through a hidden camera system she had installed before she… hid herself from the world. He didn't tell her much about the boy, other than he was a troublemaker and to stay away from him. She dug very shallowly and found that he had been convicted of an assault, but what stood out to her is that the plaintiff was not mentioned, only the law office they used. Not to mention the witness had their name removed from the record as well. This stood out to her as very abnormal in terms of judicial proceedings. Though, granted, her area of expertise was on computer science, programming, and minor dabbling in cognitive psience but not criminal law. Though, if she made time for it, sure was sure she could understand it. Granted it'd be very dry reading.
Not any dryer than Cognitive Psience.
He had just locked up her father's shop and sat down at a booth looking at his phone. The angle wasn't the greatest, so the glare from the shop lights kept her from seeing exactly what he was looking at. Though, it appeared he was doing something to his phone which left him perplexed.
"Person, place, keyword?" Ren said aloud. There was silence before he continued, "Alright, then. Jackie Welles. Night City."
"No candidate found," his phone replied immediately in a woman's voice.
That was strange to her, mainly because of how he said the name. It was clearly not Japanese, but he knew the exact pronunciation he needed in English. Also, the city name was strange; Night City? No such city existed unless it was one of those cities that were translated that literally meant that. Why would he say that?
"What am I doing?" he scoffed with a small chuckle as he set his phone back down on the table. It seemed like he realized how stupid it was. "Me, Ren Amamiya, computer engineering prodigy, playing around with an unknown app in Sojiro's restaurant when I should be sleeping." He leaned back and looked at the ceiling and sighed. "It's times like this I really do miss Night City. It was simpler despite how fucked up it was," he said as he closed his eyes for a moment.
Once again, this 'Night City' was mentioned. Was the reason this boy was on probation because he was hallucinating things? If he was mentally unstable, why would the police allow him in the general population if he was a threat?
Though she wasn't one to speak ill of people on topics of that. She had her own demons.
"Input successful," the voice from the phone said.
Ren's eyes immediately snapped open and stared at the phone. "I'm sorry, what?" This got Futaba's attention as well. So, he was using some kind of map app. But why did it work with himself and a false town name?
"Beginning navigation," it continued unfazed.
"Navigating? Navigating where!?" With a ripple in the air that was borderline invisible, Ren disappeared from the camera.
If Futaba was holding a drink she would have simultaneously done a spit take while dropping her drink. "How did he just disappear?!" she exclaimed before she realized the volume she was speaking at and quieted down. "That doesn't make any sense, those cameras are foolproof. Plus, I didn't see any special effects equipment." Not to mention he seemed genuinely shocked.
But, clear as day, he was gone from the restaurant.
Whatshouldshedowhatshouldshedowhatshouldshedo?
Futaba slowly looked at her closed door. Should she tell Sojiro? How would she even explain it? 'Oh, hey Sojiro, that boy you took in? Yeah, he no-clipped through reality and is in the Backrooms now.' That would go well!
She looked away from her door, deciding that today would not be the day she'd leave. "No, Sojiro can take care of it," she muttered as her eyes remained glued to her monitor.
About a half-hour later, the boy dropped out of the same ripple but instead of appearing where he disappeared, he appeared just a foot off of the booth and fell to the ground on his ass. He looked around in disbelief, shocked that he had actually gotten back to where he was before. On the bright side, she didn't have to tell Sojiro anymore, not that he'd believe her anyway due to how crazy it sounded. Though something immediately caught her eye.
He started patting down his body and pulled out from his pocket a monster of a chromed hand cannon. "The hell?" they asked at the same time in disbelief not knowing they were speaking together.
"Shit," he said before he ran upstairs in what appeared to be an attempt to hide it.
Futaba was confused to all hell. He definitely didn't have that on him when he disappeared, it would have been obvious. But he disappeared into a portal and then reappeared with it. It didn't look like any gun she had ever seen recreated in a video game or in real life for airsoft. The only glimpse she caught of it was on the barrel, and on it was written the word 'Malorian.'
To be continued…?
XxXxXxX
And with that, this chapter is complete. As mentioned at the beginning of the chapter, this entry does contain a fair chunk of copy and pasted content from two other pilots that I've done before for Cyberpunk 2077 as well as Persona 5; so, it's all my own words I've recopied. But that ending, right? One of the immediate twists I'm going to work through is Ren/V discovering the Metaverse early, and, yes, he has a Palace. But remember, like with Futaba and Sae, not everyone who has a palace is evil, they just have twisted desires. In the case of V, it's regret over Jackie's death plus a little cyberpsychosis. I am thinking of an arc that happens post-Shido at the end of the Third Semester where Ren's friends have to help him come to terms with his sorrow and regret which collapses the Palace. Think of Marie's optional dungeon in Persona 4 Golden (granted it's not optional if you're aiming for the true ending). And speaking of Futaba, she's paying close attention to Ren now considering he appears to have a psyker power from her point of view. The implications this could have is that Futaba may approach Ren and co. sooner than in game. There's a lot of promise this story has, especially when you have a more combat capable Ren who may teach his team how to fight better through training.
Some of the other things I'm planning on having be different are V's muscle memory of cars and motorcycles which will have a slightly different chase scene with Makoto when it concerns Kaneshiro. Ren and Futaba will bond easier over tech due to the basis of the build for V that I ran during my run of Cyberpunk (that being a gun toting netrunner). I also intend to also make this reveal of Joker's hidden palace a treasure trove of future tech that he can bring back into the real world as it's all cognitive memories of when he was V (minus the daemons and runaway AIs). But that does bring the question of whether Ren will get Chromed. No, at least not in the real world. The cognitive world is a different story. As that may imply Joker's appearance in the metaverse is going to have some changes as well as his casual wear in the real world which will include "modern" clothing to fit his former style. There are other things as well that I have in mind as well, but those are still in the planning phases.
At the end, how likely am I to turn this into a full series? I do not know. It really depends if I can put my own spin on Persona 5 Royal without directly copying from the script unless it's a "scripted event" that has to happen which requires specific wording of the dialogue. I'll probably do what I've done with two other stories that I said I was going to expand on and draw up a storyboard of events that have to happen and then the things in between them. But again, this is a ways off. On to other things.
I don't have any new ideas that have come up since the last installment of this series. I'm still working on different ideas that I came up with before. I have added a few new ideas to a spreadsheet for tracking but that's all future stuff (not even created yet). I did recently get a commission proposal, actually the first I've ever gotten. While I may release that chapter to the public in time, it will remain theirs to enjoy for a while. I am open to proposals via DM, however, whether or not I'll do them is wholly up to me. After all, I don't do this as a way to make money, but as something I do for fun. On to real life stuff.
So, the last two weeks were fun. Got a crown installed on one of my molars. Not fun. I may have said this before but avoid crowns, take care of your teeth, they're not fun. As for some real life stuff, got the newest installment of Nagatoro currently available in print (Vol 13); I really do need to sit down and read it. Work's been driving me up the wall, but I blame certain coworkers for that. You'd think that me telling them how to do certain things would stick, but I'd be wrong, I suppose. I guess I'll just tell my bosses and let them address it. Finally Norma got .32 back in stock (hallje-fecking-leouia) so I can finally use the Skorpion again next time at the range.
I don't know if I'll be posting anything again before the holidays. So, if you don't see anything from me before Christmas, I wish you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. May all your travels be safe. I'll see you all in whatever I decide to put out next.
