Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The world came back to V with a flickering of neon-green lights.

Familiar lines of code from the custom diagnostic utility Vik had modded into her Rippler, to remotely monitor the Relic and its hostile takeover, filled her vision.

Several warnings were flashing front and center in her HUD with ominous lines.

>> [HIPPOCAMPAL SYNC ERROR]
>> Temporal data stream stability: 75%]

>> [EXOGENOUS ENGRAM SIGNATURE CONFLICT]
>> Overlay Index (Jx23) Merge Risk: ↑ +1.3%

>> [HIPPOCAMPAL-NEOCORTICAL DIALOGUE STATUS]
 >> Intermittent failures detected

And her absolute favorite.

>> [ADMIN AUTO GENERATED MESSAGE]
>> If you’re seeing this, get your gonk ass to the clinic, V.

V ignored them all. Blackouts were nothing new by this point.

The wetness and the nakedness, however, were.

“The blood too,” said the voice in her head.

Managing to minimize the program after a few – admittedly embarrassing – failed attempts at commanding the interface, she finally got a look at her surroundings.

She was curled up in one corner of her shower basin, the golden LED installed to light the windowless space making the dark wet tiles glister as if they were marbled with actual speckles of gold. Water dripped on her legs, a tiny wisp of a spray, slow but steady, like the shower knob had not been turned all the way off.

In front of her, just outside the shower, the muted light of a pale dawn filtered through the glass door of the bathroom from the apartment window wall, illuminating the scattered remains of her last gig. Her clothes, bloodied and torn from a lucky hit – that had, even more luckily for her, managed to only scrape her arm – lay discarded across the whole space, a used stim injector and a ball of soaked medical gauzes had missed the open bin only by a few inches, and her holster rested haphazardly stuck on the same hanger as her worn bathrobe.

Jackie’s golden gun was the only surviving piece of the previous night that had, clearly, deserved expending precious energies to be carefully arranged on the sink.

She didn’t move at first. Lifting her head to stare across the room at Johnny had already required more effort than should have been normal.

Her constant companion sat slouched on the toilet lid right in front of her, forearms resting on his thighs as he leaned towards her. He did not have his glasses on and, for once, the sour expression on his face made her wish he did.

She had become uncomfortably accustomed to that expression lately.

“The blood is not new,” she replied after a few more moments of silence, “and couldn’t you bring us to bed at least? It’s freaking cold here.”

She moved her hand to indicate her naked form. The movement ended up being little more than a wiggling of her fingers.

While she had not been particularly free with nakedness in general – ironic as that was for someone that had already been in her line of work - having to live with the guy inside her head for months had made becoming unfazed by it a necessity.

One of his eyebrows shot up, but the expression didn’t change much. Not a good sign.

“It is, when it comes out of your ears,” he grimaced, glancing at the right side of her head.

She raised her hand to touch that same ear by reflex, the movement frustratingly slower than she had expected from her own body. The wetness she found there, just above her jaw, had a viscousness that confirmed Johnny’s statement without much margin for error.

“Yeah. And that,” he continued nodding at the still slowly dripping water, a raw edge creeping into his voice, “was all I could manage, princess. Your meat suit was locked up tighter than Arasaka’s fucking tower. Be happy I managed to at least kill the tap before you drowned on that floor.”

V closed her eyes for just a moment, breathing, and willing the stubborn knot, that always seemed to form behind her sternum when that note of concern appeared in Johnny’s tone, to just disappear.

She was not having that conversation now.

“As I said, nothing new.”

He scoffed, arms crossing above his chest.

Feeling trapped beneath his gaze and the weight of a conversation rehearsed one too many times, V decided that it was time to try and actually move.

She braced one palm against the slick tile to her right and tried to stand. Her muscles fired out of sync, like only half of her body had got the memo. Pain shot from her bicep, courtesy of one lucky Tiger Claw and his passable aim. She sat back down hard.

Johnny leaned back against the tank, legs stretching out and crossing at the ankles.

“Cute,” he commented. “Real major league moment there, choom. Bet that chick Clair can’t wait to name a drink after someone that snuffed it on a fucking bathroom floor.”

She shot him a glare that, sadly, came out more like a squint.

She must have looked even more miserable than she felt, because the anger that had built in his eyes disappeared with his next exhale. Not quite a sigh, but close.

“Come on, V. You need a ripper, you know that.”

The softness in his voice was what, at last, made her find the strength needed to get up.

A tired anger of her own sparked as, with a challenging push, legs finally finding their coordination, and sane arm raising to brace against the tiles, she managed to stand.

“You are right, Johnny. Let’s call our brain reconstruction and engram wrangling specialist to schedule an appointment,” she spat, her breathing uncomfortably labored. “Oh wait, we do not have one.”

Johnny just stared straight at her. Pointedly.

“We haven’t had a lead in weeks, Johnny. There is not cure.”

And wasn’t it ironic? Feeling like she had to justify herself to the guy that was going to royally benefit from her inaction.

Then, tired of fighting both the aftermath of her body exhaustion and Johnny’s inability to leave the matter well enough alone, she faced the shower control panel, turning it on. Her muscles tensed as the cold drizzle grew into a full-on spray, the heating system slow as ever in bringing the water to a comfortable temperature.

“We haven’t searched, in weeks,” Johnny retorted. “This is no blaze of glory, V.”

That stung more than the warm water washing away the dried blood on her arm to reveal the still fresh wound beneath it. She was going to need at least one or two stitches. It seemed Vik would get his wish.

Still, she ignored Johnny.

Right on cue, like he just couldn’t help himself, his anger flared up again.

“But sure. Go ahead. Waste your time flexing your way through the Afterlife. I’ll be here, enjoying the fucking show.”

At that, V let out a dry, ragged laugh. “That’s the spirit,” she said while squeezing an almost empty bottle of shampoo to get some of its content on her palm. The flowery scent just strong enough to cover that of the blood draining away in the basin.

“You got one?” he snapped back, sharp. “Could’ve fooled me.”

Then, she was alone.

---------------------------------------------------------------------

The sun was high in the sky as V stepped out of her car, long hair still damp in the tight braid she had pulled it into, and legs finally stable enough to walk the few steps that now separated her from Misty’s Esoterica.

Her HUD too had gone back to normal, the lines flashing before her eyes now crisp and stable, without the flickering that had greeted her awakening that morning. Only one warning blinked now: external temp warning. 110°F and climbing.

Summer in Night City, where just being outdoors suddenly became riskier than walking straight into a gang skirmish. Riskier because of the heat or because the heat itself had a way of making the city’s unmistakable tang – ozone, dust, fried food oil, gunpowder, and something sourer leaking out of most alley vents – almost unbreathable, V couldn’t really decide.

Now, out the air conditioned Caliburn, sweat was forming on her skin, making her light tank top stick to her back. She already needed another shower. At this pace, even without considering the previous night’s mishap, her water bill was going to be astronomical.

She really needed to get indoors. Even letting Vik run diagnostics to his heart’s content had started to sound great if it meant she could stay for a while in his temperature-controlled lair.

Walking the familiar streets towards Misty’s was muscle memory. Even after moving to Heywood a few months back, she had still walked those few blocks enough times for them to be committed to her memories forever. Left on Buran from Bradbury, straight past the side alley entrance, and left again at the corner into Urmland, where Joytoys danced away to entice customers on most storefront windows. Night City didn’t really change, not where it couldn’t be bothered to.

But Garry’s corner was empty.

The old mattress was still tucked away between an anonymous decaying building and Misty’s shop, as dirty as she always remembered it being. A few smashed pamphlets – what her modest contributions to his cause had bought – fluttered around like the trash they were. For half a second, she heard his voice again. Ranting about alien overlords, sleeper agents from Alpha Centauri, and net ghosts.

“City eats its prophets,” Johnny said beside her, arms folded as he walked through a passing cop like the ghost he was. “And doesn’t even bother to chew.”

There was no question in that grim statement, so she didn’t answer. Just gave the empty spot a sad smile and moved on.

Nested between Garry’s old haunt and one of the street’s several houses of pleasure, Misty’s shop was like a tiny pocket dimension. The incense drifting from inside clashed with the street acrid smell, the faint glow of the candles lit on almost every surface of the shop paling in the harsh light of midday. And the warm smile of its owner, a sharp contrast to the grim faces shuffling around the street like zombies in a horror movie.

Said owner stood outside, lighting a sandalwood stick balanced in a small crack on the wall beside the door. She noticed V just as the stick started burning and smiled at her gently.

V had liked Misty almost more than she had liked Jackie when he had first introduced them. Fresh out of the corporate world, and with the scars to prove it, V had found Misty’s own brand of soul healing just what she needed to complete her first rebirth, perfectly balancing Jackie and Vik’s more practical contributions to the endeavor of patching her back together.

“Rough night?” Misty asked, eyes flicking to the bandage V had struggled to tie around her arm.

V glanced down. The bandage was already stained with blood.

“The usual,” she muttered.

“You are late for your weekly checkup,” Misty added, voice blessedly free of accusations.

“It was Johnny’s fault,” V said with a grin, her eyes moving to the rocker. He stood beside Misty now, arms locked behind his back and head bent slightly forward to look   at the incense stick.

He showed her the bird and walked inside the shop.

Misty followed her gaze, pausing for a moment where Johnny had been, and gave a soft hum. “Vik’s waiting. I’ll put the kettle on. You might need tea when you come back up.”

“In this heat?” was V’s incredulous reply.

“I’ll make it cold tea.”

V offered her a tired smile, her throat suddenly tight, and entered the shop. A cloud of sandalwood enfolding her as she moved across the threshold.

The automatic chime she had helped Jackie install didn’t ring. Busted again probably. She made a mental note to find the time to teach Misty how to fix it.

The descent into Vik’s basement felt longer than the whole drive from the Glen. Each stair seemingly a little taller than the previous one. Halfway through, the soft buzz of all the medical equipment became stronger than the sounds made by the junkies that haunted the alley during the day, and the odd mix of antiseptic and motor oil overpowered Misty’s incenses.

The place had not changed an inch since the day Vik had replaced her corporate cyberdeck – another victim of her dismissal from Arasaka’s Counter Intelligence Division - with a refurbished Paraline.

Vik himself was exactly as she had met him that first day. Slouched in a chair at his desk, eyes firmly set on the recorded boxing match playing on the screen, neon red lights reflecting on the sunglasses that he, like Johnny, almost seemed to have glued on.

His sigh as he saw her was loud. And a touch dramatic.

“Sit,” he said, jerking his chin toward the operating chair while he crossed the room to go put on the augmented glove he had designed to enhance his mobility during procedures. 

“What, not even hello?” She quipped as she followed his instructions. Sitting in the chair was awkward on any even day, but without the support of her right arm it was downright uncomfortable.

Just as she had managed to arrange herself, he came to sit on the moving stool in front of her. He ignored her question.

“You look like shit,” he added, swiping through the basic log data he had remotely received from her deck diagnostic. “That last blackout was a big one.”

From above Vik’s right shoulder, leaning on the metal fence that offered a second layer of protection for the clinic against wannabe burglars, Johnny sent her a self-explanatory glance.

“It was just exhaustion, Vik. It was a tough gig, nothing out of the usual.” She explained, and the lie must have been so unconvincing that both Johnny and Vik sent her the same exasperated expression.

“I told you weeks ago,” Johnny said, disappearing for a fraction of a second and reappearing by the desk, leaning against it. “You keep going at this rate and I’ll have to tell Rogue you are out of business in a matter of weeks, not months.”

Vik didn’t react to Johnny, of course, but neither did she.

Muttering about “gonk attitude” and “death wishes”, the ripper took her personal link and connected it to the station monitor to start the usual round of deeper diagnostics.

He removed the gauze around her arm and after a quick examination asked: “Stitch or glue?”

“Both.”

He sighed again but cleaned the wound and applied the glue with practiced efficiency. The cold of it was quickly replaced by the small fires left by the needle prickling her skin. She barely flinched. He didn’t even blink.

The advanced diagnostic ended with a ping just as Vik finished tying a fresh gauze onto her arm. His expression darkened only a few seconds into the reading.

“What?” she asked.

He didn’t answer right away, just dragged a hand down his face, muttering under his breath once more.

The monitor beeped again, louder and sharper than before.

“Cerebral latency’s jumped again,” he finally said. “Merge pressure’s climbing faster than I’d like. And your hippocampal links are failing intermittently.”

“I love when you talk dirty, Vik.”

He turned to look at her. He wasn’t smiling.

“Look kid,” he said, softer now, “it might be time to think about options.”

“Options?” Her voice came out flat as she slid from the chair, “I have done nothing else since this nightmare started. But I am all fresh out, Doc.”

He just kept looking at her, and her mind went back to the day Johnny had simultaneously saved her from a bullet to the brain and sentenced her to oblivion.

“You said it yourself, Vik. There is nothing you can do,” she said gently, the desperation that had choked her at earing that same sentence not so long ago was nowhere to be found now.

His reply took a while to come, eyes on her face without really seeing it.

“I just mean… tech changes fast. Something could still turn up,” he said, mind still miles away.

V knew the old ripper had not stopped at his own words. Just as she had searched for a lead on Night City’s streets, he had done the same among the medical community, discretely reaching out to ex colleagues and updating his own medical knowledge for months. Even without Misty’s snitching, the bespoke little diagnostic utility he had insisted on installing on her deck was proof enough.

But as good as Vik was, V knew that he didn’t have the time and resources to pull that kind of miracle alone.

“Not that fast,” she sighed, eyes meeting Johnny’s for a moment before looking back at Vik. Then she simply said, “am I good to go?”

For a moment his expression was the same one he sported every time V asked him to speculate on the possible winner of the latest boxing match. Whatever thoughts were fighting inside his mind to be vocalized, what seemed to win was a simple, “I’ll see you next week, alright? And if anything changes in the meantime, you call me.”

She gave him a crooked smile and ducked out of the clinic. Misty’s cold tea sounded like a very good idea at that moment.

---------------------------------------------------------------------

V knew exactly why she had said yes to dinner.

It was the cold tea waiting for her. The worn memory of Jackie’s laugh as he slurped down street food and told her about the sweet ass job he had bagged for them. The calm acceptance she always found Misty’s voice. The extra plate she knew Mamá Welles set out for her every week, even when she didn’t show. And also, maybe, it was the part of her that didn’t want to be alone tonight.

So, when Misty had said, “Dinner at El Coyote tonight?” with that inexplicable certainty that V wouldn’t say no, she hadn’t.

V had spent months under the Coyote’s roof, back when she and Jackie were still convinced they could find a way to live fast without burning out. She’d drank her weight in tequila, listening to Jackie’s laugh as Pepe recounted the latest weekly brawl that had broken out over nothing. Eaten her way through most of Mamá Welles family recipes. And fallen asleep on Jackie’s shoulder on one of the second-floor booths after a gig more time that she could count.

She had mourned here too. Upstairs with Padre, seeking reassurances, while down below Misty and Mamá Welles made tentative steps to find a way to share the same grief.

The smell of roasted pork, cumin and grilled corn welcomed V as soon as she and Misty entered the bar. The Voodoo Boys had not been the only one in NC to find ways around synth food.

Pepe was at his usual spot behind the bar, busy serving shots to a group of young Valentinos. He nodded at them and gestured towards the back, where Mamá Wells was clearly hard at work on dinner.

Inside the bar small kitchen, Mamá Welles was starting to plate up food. Three empty plates resting beside her on the counter.

“Mira nomás!” she exclaimed as she spotted them. “You are just in time: dinner’s ready.”

Misty grinned at her, accepting the plate she was being handed and leaning in to kiss Guadalupe’s cheek. “We brought nothing but our empty stomachs.”

“Good,” Mamá Welles replied, giving Misty a playful tap on the wrist before turning to V, hands raising to cup her face. “And tú, mija… you look thin. Are you eating?”

V smiled, but she knew it did not reach her eyes. “As often as I can, Mamá.”

She knew Guadalupe did not believe her for a second, but the older woman didn’t press. Just gave her a once over and a light squeeze before going back to plating food. As soon as she was done, they relocated to the second floor, setting their food and the bottle of tequila Guadalupe had snatched from the bar on one of the most secluded booths. V and Misty sitting side by side while Mamá Welles took the place in front of them.

From there, dinner was soft conversation and loud chewing. Misty handled most of the talking, telling Mamá about the trouble she had with sourcing an out of production incense for a client, the latest tarot pull she had done for a couple that came in every week but never seemed to listen, and passing on Vik’s reassurances that he would stop by the Coyote by the end of the week. Mamá Welles responded with laughter, the occasional snort and by keeping their glasses full.

V picked at her plate and glass both, more focused on listening than speaking. Johnny too had been silent, nowhere to be seen since she had left Vik’s clinic, and she missed his voice rattling in the back of her skull, quipping away at the most inopportune moments.

Halfway through dinner Misty excused herself to the ladies, leaving V alone with Mamá Welles.

“You know, mija,” Guadalupe said, tone deceptively casual as she twirled her glass, the amber liquid inside moving in a calming motion, “when Jackie was little and got sick, he’d tell me not to worry. That he’d ‘walk it off’.”

V smiled, she had been at the receiving end of that same phrase more than once. “Yeah, sounds like him.”

“Sì. And he believed it, too. But when it was serious, when it mattered, he always came to me. Let me help take care of it.” She looked straight at V now, eye steady as she rested her own hand on V’s across the table. “There is no shame in letting family take care of you. No pride in bleeding alone.”

V stared at the moving glass, jaw tight.

Out of the corner of her eye she saw Johnny finally appear, sitting on the table of the booth behind Mamá Welles back. His presence comforting and terrifying at the same time.

What everyone seemed to be expecting from her, she did not have the strength to give anymore.

“I’m not Jackie,” she finally said.

“No,” Mamá Welles said gently, squeezing her hand, “you are V. And you are not alone, mi hija.”

Chapter Text

-----

Miguel’s garage hummed with the familiar clang and hiss of things being welded. Heat rolled inside in thick, unrelenting waves from the open bay doors. The outside humidity mixing with the heavy scent of burning metal, making it hard to breathe within the shop.

Crouched beside the Arch, forearms and fingers stained with grease oil, V worked on tightening the last bolt to secure the newly installed shock absorber with careful movements.

Sparks flickered from the corner of the shop, where one of Miguel’s garage rats was patching up a cracked subframe mount, sending even more heat her way.  

She paused to wipe the inside of one elbow across her brow, smearing a streak of grime through the sweat collecting there, then resumed her task as Miguel’s voice echoed from his cluttered back office.

“- said she outdrove a Militech AV in that,” he was telling someone, tone equal parts disbelief and amusement. “Didn’t say it was because the brakes were fried.”

V smirked as she turned the bolt one last time.

Behind her, Johnny stood in front of a vintage calendar that had, by the look of it, survived more than one Corporate War, squinting at the 2000s pin-ups sprawled across the page.

“Jesus,” he drawled. “Print’s dead, but somehow this trash survives two Nukes and an attempted Corpo buyout.”

“Guess you two have that in common,” replied V without turning to look at him.

Johnny snorted and kicked a half-crushed can of synth-oil, only for his booted foot to pass right through it. “We gonna delta or what?” he said annoyed. “They put out heat warnings for the elderly and infirm, you know.”

V ignored him. Just wiped her hands on a threadbare rag and stood, giving the absorbers a test by pushing down on the saddle with her good arm. The slight bounce was a good sign, but she knew the real test could only be done on the road.

Miguel emerged from the office at the same moment.

“You treatin’ her right?” he asked, nodding at the bike.

“Better than I treat myself,” V replied with a smile. A sardonic “Doesn’t take much” coming from the peanut gallery behind her not a second later.

Miguel gave her a look. “Jackie used to say that too. Right before driving her into an all-out shooting.”

Her smile faltered, just for a moment.

Miguel, to his credit, didn’t dwell. He patted the bike’s engine housing with the same care some folk reserved for children. “Fixed a few scratches while she was here waiting for the new pieces. Changed the oil too.”

“Appreciated it,” V said, “How much do I owe you?”

Miguel shook his head. “Already handled. Consider it credit.”

V didn’t like debts. Especially not now, when the probability that she’d be around in a few months for them to be collected was nonexistent. But Miguel was an old Valentino. Her connection to Jackie making her family by proxy in his eyes. The fact that she had been available to scare off a few not-so-clever youngsters fancying themselves tax collectors for the local businesses when he had asked, had also helped reinforce the sentiment.

Before she could argue, her HUD blinked.

>> [INCOMING CALL]
>> [Mr. Hands]

Johnny appeared in her line of sight. “Just what we need. Dogtown’s suavest snake oil salesman knocking at our door.”

V accepted the call.

Miguel, catching the shift in her expression, took the hint and, with a salute, wandered towards the guy still welding away in the corner of the shop.

Mr. Hand’s voice came through, smooth and silky, the moment the call connected. “V. Always a pleasure. You in the mood for something light this fine afternoon?”

“Define light,” she said aloud, already walking towards the open garage door to get outside, where it was quieter.

“Low resistance. High pay. Very high discretion needed. Think of it as… a package retrieval.”

Johnny raised an eyebrow from where he now sat on the roof of a half-dismantled Alvarado Herman. “That code for ‘body bag’ or ‘psycho suit’?”

“Pickup or escort?” asked V, translating. Johnny did have a point.

“Extraction,” Hands replied, tone clipped. “The client is a defector. Nervous type. Biotech background, currently affiliated with Arasaka. Wants to end that affiliation,” he explained. “She’s holed up in Westbrook. Needs an escort to Pacifica. She made it clear she wants someone… adaptable.”

V frowned. “She name-drop me?”

“No. I did,” he reassured. “And she didn’t object.”

Johnny squinted but remained silent.

“She armed?” V asked again.

“Maybe. Not at you.”

V paused to think. In her experience, adaptable and guns did not really go with light. But gigs were gigs, and eddies were eddies.

Before she could give her answer, Hands spoke again. “Look, V… you take this gig, I’ll own you one.”

V blinked and Johnny swore. Identical alarms going off in the back of their intertwined minds.

“I’ll text you the dets,” he added before disconnecting.

“Fuck,” said Johnny after a bit of silence that lasted too long. “You are taking it, aren’t you?”

“Eddies are eddies,” she replied, heading back inside to get the Arch. She slung one leg over the bike, engine purring to life with a low growl. With a nod to Miguel, she rolled out into the heat.

“So’s a bullet to the brain,” Johnny deadpanned. “But I guess you’d know.”

---------------------------------------------------

Less than three hours later, the Caliburn slid to a halt in front of a familiar Westbrook high-rise, where Grant Ave met Pardey. Sunset caught on its glass exterior, reflecting golden light across the smooth façade, blinding anyone that dared look directly at it. A perfect golden cage for what must have been a very valuable Arasaka rat.

Her own corporate-sponsored apartment had not been far.

V stepped out slowly. The fashionable heels of her reinforced pumps sinking slightly on the melting asphalt as she took a moment to adjust the lapels of her pristine office blazer.

A sleek number from her own Arasaka days, it still fit like the day she had bought it at the Avante just a block away. The sharp lines hugging her figure were too clean for a habitué of the Afterlife, but just right for blending into Westbrook’s upper tiers.

She hadn’t worn the outfit since that final day at Lizzie’s. And she hated how natural it still felt.

“You can take the rat out of the corp,” was Johnny’s unhelpful contribution from his leaning position against the car’s hood. V didn’t bother finishing that sentence.

She breathed slowly, deliberately, as she walked towards the entrance.

The clean sidewalk beneath her feet made way to an even more polished marble floor. No trash in sight, only curated little flowerbeds adding splashes of green along the road. No fried-oil haze, no piss-soaked alley gunk, no angry synth beats leaking from a nearby bodega. Just the low hum of busy Corps going about their productive day and the quiet whisper of forced-clean air cycling through inconspicuous vents.

Because even the air here was fake. Filtered and re-scented. Some corpo chem designer’s idea of what calm should smell like. Orange peel. Vanilla spice. Sanitized serenity for the elite’s human resources.

V hated and missed it in equal measure.

Inside, the marbled lobby glowed under the red LEDs illuminating the space. The front desk sat beneath a suspended mesh of living greenery, just opposite a small waiting lounge. The two spaces framing the single elevator at the end of the hall. A concealed door hiding the service stairs beside it.

Four discretely placed cameras covered all angles of the space. V breached the system halfway to the desk. Light gig or not, there were no drawbacks in covering one’s back.

The receptionist looked up as V approached. His face was smooth and eerily symmetrical. “Good evening, Miss” he greeted, “Are you here to see one of our residents?”

V nodded. “Dr. Kess. 47-B”

“Are you expected?” he asked, pointing to a hand scanner on the desk.

V nodded again, sliding her hand on the scanner. It flashed green for a moment then beeped once.

The receptionist smiled. “Enjoy your visit.”

Inside, the elevator was clean, quiet, and dimly lit. Just like the lobby. Polished mirrors, backlit floor, no buttons in sight. Her destination already pre-approved and loaded into the system.

As it ascended, V allowed herself a moment to check her own reflection in one of the mirrors. The woman staring back at her belonged in an Arasaka boardroom. Hair perfectly coiffed in a tight bun, posture locked, eyes unreadable. She looked like the asset they’d trained her to be. Efficient. Lethal. Disposable.

Johnny glitched to life on her left, their eyes meeting through the mirror. He had the good sense of staying silent.

The elevator came to a stop with a soft chime, doors sliding open on the fourth floor to reveal a pristine hallway, silent as a morgue. No scuffed paint, no graffiti, not even a malfunctioning LED flickering overhead. The walls a tasteful ivory, interrupted only by equally spaced identical mahogany doors and the patches of green artfully arranged on the marble flowerbeds beside each of them.

Her optics scanned for signs of movement. Nothing.

Still, she sent a quick command through the security system to seal the floors accesses, elevator and service stairs both, before stepping out.

Apartment 47-B sat near the end of the hall. Just like all the other doors she had passed, there was no name on it.

V pressed the buzzer. Once.

Beside her, Jhonny blinked into view, jaw tight. “Guards up V,” he said, “I still don’t like this.”

She didn’t either, but before she could do anything more than nodding, the door clicked open.

Emilia Kess didn’t look like a fleeing corporate rat.

She looked composed. Polished even. Her petrol blue blazer was buttoned tight, a sharp contrast to the perfectly cut silvery-grey bob framing her thin, lined face. Under her arm she held a datapad, and behind her, a travel duffel was already zipped and ready to go. But the way her eyes flickered from V to the empty hallway with quick, paranoid glances, betrayed the agitation behind the curated exterior.

“You are the… escort,” Kess said. The world “escort” coming out uncertain, like the doctor had meant to use another.

V nodded. “Name’s V. You ready?”

“You are not…” The woman cut herself off. Swallowed. “No matter. I was told not to ask questions.”

“That makes two of us,” V muttered, stepping aside to let the doctor lock the apartment behind her.

Kess did so quickly after grabbing the bag and leveling a last lingering look inside. “What’s our route?”

“We go through the lobby. The car is parked out front, a Caliburn,” she explained. “Then straight to Pacifica.”

Kess clutched the datapad to her chest and nodded. “Then let’s go.”

Johnny glitched in, walking backward ahead of them as he peered at Kess’s face. “V, I think I know her,” he said.

Before V could ask him to elaborate, everything went to shit.

A loud boom reverberated from the service stairwell. The invisible door by the side of the elevator shaking with it. The lights overhead flickered.

Johnny straightened and turned. “We’ve got Company, V.”

She didn’t hesitate.

Still riding the backdoor she’d slipped through at the lobby, V tapped into the building’s security mesh while dropping down to release her gun from its ankle holster. The moment the door at the end of the hall burst open and the black-armored Arasaka goons stepped through, her HUD locked their tactical links in place.

>> [PING: Confirmed link]
>> [BREACH PROTOCOL - ENGAGED]
>> [ICE: Cracked]

After that, she lined up combat quickhacks fast.  

Short Circuit on the two front-line operatives. Overheat on the breacher with the most armor. And a brutal System Collapse queued for the one in the back with the smart rifle mod.

She released them in sequence.

Three of the goons went down hard. The two operatives screaming as their systems were overwhelmed by electricity. The breacher convulsing, hands flying to his face as thermal feedback surged.

Then, V’s HUD stuttered, static flaring across her vision. The taste of blood filling her mouth.

She cursed, blinking as the relic malfunctioned, lagging her interface for just a second. Enough to interfere with the final command.

The last goon made it through the stairwell door, clean.

Gunfire echoed through the hallway as soon as he spotted them.

V ducked sideways, grabbing Kess and throwing them both behind a decorative planter. A round of bullets flew over their heads missing them by less than an inch and shredding a good chunk of the overhead foliage.

The smell of gunpowder filled her nose and her adrenaline spiked in response.  

Taking control of the closest hallway camera, V sent a Reboot Optics towards the operative. As the hack hit its mark with a satisfying ping, she popped out just enough to fire two shots from her golden Nue. Pain surged in her arm with the recoil. She still hit her mark.

The agent dropped, dead, and the hall was silent again.

Curled up beside her, Kess let out a strangled sound.

“You okay?” V asked, already pulling the doctor to her feet, gun still raised and trained towards the unconscious Arasaka operatives.

Kess nodded, wide-eyed, clutching her pad and bag to her chest even harder than before.

“Good,” V said, her optics circling between cameras to check both the lobby and the outside for further movement. She lowered her weapon. “We are clear for now, but reinforcements will come. We need to move. Fast.”  

She grabbed Kess’s arm before the woman could reply, dragging her toward the elevator. Johnny glitched in and out at her heels, glasses nowhere to be seen and a sour expression marking his face.

Past the lobby, empty just as she’d expected, the building’s glass doors opened at her command. The sleek black shape waiting at the curb before them was not V’s Caliburn.

“I thought you said…” started Kess, having found her voice again.

“I did,” said V, gesturing for Kess to stay close and moving slowly towards the Villefort, gun ready at her side. Scanning as she went.

The passenger door at the front opened on its own.

She peered inside. Finger loosening on the trigger. “Junior?”

“Good evening, V,” greeted the multilayered voice from inside. Not Junior.

Delamain. Senior.

“What the fuck,” uttered Johnny at the same time Kess let out a surprised squeal. Perfectly echoing V’s thoughts.

“Del? What the hell are you doing here?”

“Apologies for the unexpected substitution,” he replied smoothly, “Circumstances required a more… guided solution.”

“You left,” V stated, eyes fixed on the cab dashboard like it might blink out of existence. “You went beyond the wall.”

A beat.

Then, “Yes,” Delamain answered. “I do continue to explore. But from time to time, there is … reason, to return.”

V waited, but nothing else came.

Johnny blinked into view on the other side of the cab. Pacing along the length of it, a few cars rushing down the street passing right through him. “You’ve gotta be kidding me. You hearing this shit, V? You trust this?”

And the thing was, she did.

Well, not exactly.

She knew something was going on for Delamain to show up out of nowhere just to be her chauffeur once more but, at the same time, the warning bells going off in her mind were not the alarming, dangerous kind.

V glanced around the street, the sun was nearly gone now, retreating behind the City’s skyline, and they had been standing exposed on the sidewalk after lighting up a bunch of Arasaka suits for far too long.

Waiting for the Caliburn to show up, from wherever Del had sent it, was not an option either.

Johnny grimaced, reluctantly agreeing with the thought. He glitched into the driver’s seat with a curse.

Delamain opened the closest rear door. “Please. Time is of the essence.”

With a steadying breath V nudged Kess inside, then followed.

Inside the cab, the climate control adjusted automatically. A soft chill rolled over V’s sweat-stuck collar, resetting her senses. She kept her back straight, gun pointed at the floor between her legs and still at the ready, as Del pulled effortlessly into the nonexistent evening traffic, setting them in the direction of Pacifica.

Dr. Kess sat rigid beside her, clutching the datapad case like a flotation device. She hadn’t uttered a word since spotting Delamain. Her eyes flitted between the sealed windows and the quiet dashboard, like she expected a kill command to flash on it at any moment.

V let her have a moment to collect herself, turning her attention to the front of the car.

Still in the driver’s seat, Johnny sat with one boot propped on the dash, scowling like he’d just chewed glass. “If this bucket tries to sing us a lullaby,” he said contrite, “I told you so.”

“Noted.” V replied through their connected mind.

Then, she cleared her throat, eyeing the rearview. The evening lights of the city passing them by the only things reflected on it. “You know where to go?”

“Your destination has been set in accordance with Mr. Bleecker operative brief,” he answered, matter of fact. Like the whole thing had been planned from the beginning.

V wondered for a moment if she had been the one to read the brief wrong.

No. She knew she hadn’t.

“Still waiting for you to tell me why you showed up, Del,” she settled on asking.

“Service was provided in accordance with your lifetime membership to our Excelsior package,” Delamain said simply.

Johnny snorted. V felt like doing the same. Almost.

“Alright,” she pressed, a little more pointedly. “But why to this gig, and why not Junior.”

“If he says he was in the neighborhood, we are jumping out the car,” Johnny declared.

She did snort at that.

Beside her, the doctor didn’t so much as glance up. Shock already forgotten, she was now immersed in her pad, muttering at the screen as her fingers sifted rapidly between tabs.

Delamain responded easily: “We calculated my presence would be the optimal choice.”

Johnny mouthed a questioning “we?” at her.

V narrowed her eyes. “Sure. But optimal why?”

“To ensure the delivery of your entitled services according to standard,” Delamain repeated, neutrally.

V blinked. Then leaned forward just enough to glare at the empty rearview mirror. “You said that already.”

A beat of silence. Then, “Consistency in messaging is a cornerstone of brand identity.”

Johnny groaned, took off his glasses – holographic as they were – and flung them at the dashboard. “Fuck me sideways.”

He vanished mid-sentence.

V leaned back in her seat, exhaling slowly through her nose. The leather groaned beneath her weight, and for a moment the only sounds around her were the low mutterings of Dr. Kess and the rhythmic hum of the road beneath the cab’s tires.

“Fine,” she said at last, more to herself than anyone. “Keep your secrets.”

Irritated, her gaze shifted to her side.

Dr. Kess’s eyes were still trained on the pad. The blue lights dancing across her face making her look even thinner.

But her fingers weren’t moving anymore, they just hovered, like she’d forgotten midmotion what she was supposed to do.

“No. Every time I think I’ve found the pattern…” Kess whispered then, resuming tapping against the datapad with nervous movements. “It just collapses. The scaffold never holds. Doesn’t matter how clean’s the imprint. Too much damage by that point.”

“Everything okay?” V asked, schooling her voice to a low, soothing tone.

Kess looked up like she’d only just remembered V was there. “Ah. Thinking out loud.”

“Anything interesting?” inquired V, curiosity at what particular project of Arasaka they had just disrupted by stealing away one of their scientists finally getting the better of her.

The doctor looked at V for a moment, concentration lines forming on her forehead. A flash of something V could not comprehend passed behind her eyes.

“No, nothing that’ll ever get published.” She said finally, going back to look at her screen.

Before V could press, Delamain spoke again.

“Priority route change has been issued. Destination updated: District 6 – subdistrict 3. Estimated arrival 5 minutes.”

V grabbed onto the back of the driver’s seat and leaned forward towards the front of the cab. “We are supposed to hit the Estate, Del.”

Dr. Kess looked up from her work.

“The deviation has been requested by Mr. Bleecker,” Delamain supplied. “There are security concerns on the previous location.”

At that, Kess returned her attention to the screen. Mr. Hands dropped name seemingly enough to assuage her.

Not as easily satisfied, V pulled up the interface to call said fixer just as his message popped up on it.

>> [Destination compromised. Reroute to attached coordinates.]

How Delamain had known before the message even reached her, she didn’t really want to know.

The finger she had been keeping loosely on the trigger twitched. Her grip on the gun tightening as she rested her back on the leather seat once more. Eyes glimpsing at the low ceiling before closing for a moment.

Behind her eyelids, her mind supplied the memories of another ride. Another quiet cab. Another silent space beside her. Her whole life falling to pieces between the Waterfront and Kabuki.

She breathed through her nose. Once. Twice. The iron taste conjured by her mind from memory fading away slowly.

Then she straightened again, preparing to cross the border.

“Ever been to Dogtown, Doctor?”

The woman ignored the question. Their new destination didn’t seem to be a problem for her.

V couldn’t blame the doctor. For all its flaws and dangers, Dogtown was the only real safe haven in the City for someone fleeing the shadow of one of the Corporations. She herself had enjoyed the thrill of that perceived safety more than once while running around the district.

Outside the window, the polished perfection of Charter Hill gave way to the familiar neglect of Pacifica’s main Boulevard.  

V adjusted in her seat as they neared the border’s turn, shifting subtly so the edge of the window’s frame shielded her profile. Close enough to see, hidden enough to avoid a bullet.

The checkpoint was, as usual, lit in full. Floodlights washing the avenue in bright yellow light and armed turret scanning the perimeter.

What was not usual was the black Zetatech Atlus with the Arasaka logo parked on the side of the road and the small swarm of operatives lined up in formation, stopping vehicles trying to reach the scan gate.

V tensed and threw a hand out to flatten the Doctor to her own seat, moving her away from the path of a potential bullet, just as they passed the convoy.

The woman muted protest dying on her lips as she saw what had prompted the merc’s action.

The cab glided forward on Pacific without raising so much as a ping on their radar.

“Del… ” V urged, eyes firmly on the rapidly disappearing roadblock in the rearview.

“Visual and thermal obfuscation parameters are within optimal range,” came the posed reply from the front of the car. “Our presence remains below perception thresholds.”

V released her hold on Dr. Kess, who made herself small on the seat, once again gripping her pad like a lifeline.

“You are scrambling their sensor.”

“Affirmative,” Delamain answered. Something that sounded dangerously like pride lacing his fractured voice as he added, “and their optics.”

Johnny chose that moment to glitch back into the driver’s seat. “Bringing out all the stops,” he pondered. “This is no ordinary corpo rat, V.”

V agreed.

Hands involvement, she could understand. The man was the unofficial fixer for Night City’s corpo elite, after all. Helping middle tier employees start a new life for a modest fee was nothing out of the ordinary for him. And further, collecting useful strays was clearly a hobby of his.

V would know.

Delamain, however, was a very different story. His presence – and V couldn’t decide which thought was more alarming, Del showing up on its own or at Hands request – made it clear that something important was hiding inside Dr. Kesse’s mind. Something important enough to lure back the evolved AI from behind the Blackwall.

And V had just stolen that important something. From Arasaka. Again.

Her head fell to the window with a quiet thud just as the car finally turned left a few blocks after the official border, cutting sharply down a sloped ramp V had passed a thousand times without a second glance. Nothing marked it but a faded parking symbol painted on the rusted edge of the overpass. Two anonymous garage shutters at its end.

Of course. Hands had a private access into Dogtown hiding in plain sight in the middle of Pacifica.

As the cab descended into the underground garage, door sealing fast behind them, V felt the temperature drop and a headache come in.

The slope bottomed out into a massive, poorly lit, sub-basement. Another parking structure probably meant to serve the developing Serenisand area before the project was abandoned altogether. Now clearly repurposed, like everything else in Dogtown, into something more private.

Two black Chevillon SUV idled near what must have been designed as a service elevator. Half a dozen armed guards stood a few feet in front of them, watching quietly with corporate-grade rifles slung across armored vests.

Mr. Hands paced in front of them, talking on his holo.

V stilled in her seat.

She’d expected a handoff, sure. Maybe even one of Hands top dogs showing up to collect Dr. Kess. But not him.

Not the man himself, in the flesh.

In general, fixers didn’t show up. Not when they could send someone else to collect the prize.

And Mr. Hands? He could always send someone else.

But here he was, cool as chrome, walking the cracked pavement like he owned every grain of dust in it.

A chill that had nothing to do with the temperature crawled the length of V’s spine.

Delamain eased to a stop right in front of the fixer, opening both rear doors. “We have reached our destination. Mr. Bleecker is waiting.”

Kess looked at her, and V nodded, gesturing to the open door by the Doctor’s side.

“Thank you,” she said to Delamain just before stepping out herself, holstering her gun at her waist. Robert would have been appalled with that particular disregard for gun safety, but the ankle holster – the only one that could fit below her corpo outfit – still felt a little too far for comfort.

“It was good to see you, V.” said Delamain in parting, before closing the now vacated doors and disappearing into the garage bowels, further than the few portable lights scattered across the space could reach.

Despite the weirdness of the situation, and Johnny’s irritation at the back of her mind, V found that she reciprocated the sentiment.

“She is here now. Yes, intact. I’ll call you later,” Hands said to the person on the other side of the holo, closing the call.

He stepped forward to meet them with his usual calm, the corner of his mouth curling in a satisfied grin.

“V,” he greeted. “On time, unscathed, and perfectly styled. Always a pleasure to see you.”

V really wanted to roll her eyes at the flattery and prod about what the hell was going on there, but the side of her that knew the steps of this dance took over faster. “Figured if I showed up late and bloodied, you’d dock my pay.”

“That depends entirely on whose blood it is,” he countered smoothly. Then, he turned his attention to Kess.

“Doctor,” he said, with a small bow. “Allow me.”

He extended an arm toward the closest SUV. The guards moving in sync to create a small passage between them at his gesture.

Kess hesitated only a moment before stepping forward. Hands helped her in gently, his hand at her elbow as he guided her up into the backseat of the vehicle.

As the doctor settled inside, her eyes flickered back toward V. She opened her mouth, as if to say something, but before a single word could pass her lips, Hands placed a hand on the door.

“No need for goodbyes,” he said, smiling as he shut it without waiting. The latch clicked shut with more finality than the gesture deserved.

V stood still, frowning. The unease that had slowly crept in since Hands first call deepening, curling tight in her gut.

VIP now secured, Mr. Hands turned back to V, adjusting his sleeves with unhurried precision.

“You handled the complication upstairs with admirable efficiency,” he praised.

“Wasn’t in the brief,” V said dryly. The complication being Arasaka or Del, she didn’t really know.

“No,” he conceded with a smile that could almost be defined as fond. “But it’ll be in the invoice.”

V’s HUD pinged.

>> [TRANSFER RECEIVED]
>> [35,000]

Her eyebrows lifted. “You’re paying me like I just delivered Hanako Arasaka herself,” she said, disbelief coloring her voice.

“Doctor Kess is arguably more valuable,” Hands replied enigmatically.

V wanted to press further – “Fuck discretion” agreed Johnny at the back of her mind – but before she could, a low mechanical purr rolled in from the shadows where Del had disappeared.

V turned. A beautiful Racer, matte gray, sleek profile, came to a stop near her feet. She looked back at Hands, questioning.

“A bonus,” he explained. “For your discretion. And for delivering the good Doctor as you found her.”

Johnny appeared beside the bike, eyeing it suspiciously.

V ran her fingers over the saddle. The soft leather warm beneath her fingers, like someone had dismounted only moments before. She swung a leg over it like it was second nature. Everything from the handlebars to the weight balance seemingly designed with her own preferences in mind.

“This is a custom job,” she said, a question more than a statement.

Hands smiled.

“Isn’t this a little too much for a babysitting job?” V pushed again as the engine came to life, HUD informing her that the deed and property had been transferred to her name already.

“Let’s just say I like to see my assets properly equipped,” Hands replied, already turning back towards the SUV, his guards following suit. “Besides, would’ve been rude to leave you stranded.”

She twisted the throttle. The engine roared beautifully beneath her.

V didn’t like being handled, not after that first gig in the major leagues. Shouldn’t trust any of this now. Not the fixer, not the all-seeing AI, not the bike.

But if this was a leash. Well, it was a very well-made one.

She just hoped it wouldn’t come back to choke her later.

Johnny’s long-suffering sigh was ignored in favor of pulling up the bike schematics on her HUD. A custom job indeed.

“And V,” Mr. Hands called back from the open window of the car, catching her attention, “do keep your schedule flexible, will you?”

Then, without waiting for an answer, he rolled up the window and the SUV melted into the darkest end of the garage like it had never been there.

V remained still for a moment longer. Engine idling soft and low beneath her, fingers loose on the grips. The scent of rubber, leather and engine grease mixing with the musty air of the underground garage.

Her head tilted the way the SUV had disappeared. She could follow. Find out just how deep this rabbit hole went.

But she didn’t.

She’d been paid to keep her eyes ahead and her mouth shut. And V had learned, the hard way, that in Night City, curiosity didn’t just kill the cat. It got it thoroughly flatlined, with a bullet to the head, and dumped into a landfill outside Rancho Coronado.

Instead, she twisted the throttle again and set toward Pacifica.

Perfectly calibrated under her palm, the controls felt familiar, instinctive even. Every twitch of her fingers answered without lag. Every lean a flawless extension of her own shifting body. Like the machine had been waiting for her all along.

Her HUD filled with performance stats. Embedded code, smart adjustments, responsive mods. Each one a feature she never would’ve sprung for herself but couldn’t deny loving.

She had half a mind to ask Hands which netrunner on his payroll had crawled through her profile to scrap her preferences. Or, if someone closer to home had passed on a wish list she never meant to share.

The exit ramp curved sharply up behind the open shutter, and V opened the throttle as the night sky above welcomed her back into Pacifica’s deserted streets. Just to be cautious, she veered on Appian at the next cross, bypassing Dogtown’s border and the Arasaka squad altogether.

She’d barely made it in front of the Mall when her holo lit up.

>> [INCOMING CALL]
>> [Muamar “El Capitán” Reyes]

“El Capitán,” she greeted, a smile already forming on her lips.

“Ah, there she is,” came the familiar voice, warm and playful. “If my eyes in the sky are not mistaken – and they rarely are, V – that’s you just south of Potomac, with the very pretty little grey number.”

There was a pause, just long enough for the second meaning to land.

V huffed a laugh, shaking her head. “The bike or the outfit?” she asked.

“Why not both?” Muamar teased. “Looking good either way.”

Somewhere in her mind Johnny managed to mime a gagging sound.

She rolled her eyes but couldn’t keep the amusement out of her voice. “You calling to flirt, Muamar, or there’s actually a job for me to do?”

“Again, why not both?” She could hear the smirk through the comms. “But fine, fine. You’re a few feet from a ride I’d very much like to acquire. Nothing difficult. The thing has been abandoned for days, so no complication foreseen. Say yes, and I’ll owe you a drink next time you are in the neighborhood.”

Her HUD pinged with coords, and V eased the bike in that direction.

First Hands, now Muamar.

What was it with everyone suddenly wanting to owe her something today, she mused as the coordinates dropped her at the rundown parking lot clinging to the edge of Pacifica’s coast. Right at the crossroad between Pontmac and Stonebeach.

From there, V could barely distinguish water from sky. Both equally dark and calm, separated only by the lights of the NCX Spaceport blinking miles away in the distance.

The area was mostly empty, save for a couple gutted shells and the car Muamar had flagged: a sand-dusted Thorton MTL1, tan paint sun-faded to beige, left sitting half-cocked at the end of the lot like it had been dropped there mid-gateway. Clearly forgotten, if the graffiti already marking one side was any indication.

Heart still ticking a little faster from the last gig, and mind conjuring up a thousand ways what had just transpired could come back to bite her in the ass, V decided that this was just the kind of distraction she could use.

“Drink’s nice,” she said after a beat, dismounting the Racer and mournfully sending it to her own garage with a quick command. “But are there eddies coming with that, or are you just offering your sparking company as payment?”

Muamar chuckled, low and amused. “V, baby, when have I ever sent you home without something to jingle in your pockets? My company, on the other hand, we can negotiate if you’d like.”

V grinned. “I’ll take the eddies,” she said. Then, with a mischievous tone, she added, “this time.”

He laughed at that, warm and full. The sound surrounding V as she worked the car’s security system with a carefully selected daemon.

“Then that will have to do for now. Always a pleasure working with you V. Now get to work and bring her to me. Flipping you the coords.”

The line clicked off before she could fire back, leaving her smiling to herself like a fool just as the driver’s door of the MTL1 sprung open with a satisfying click.

-----

Chapter Text

-----

Muamar Reyes didn’t get many quiet mornings.

Not in Santo Domingo. Not in his line of work. Not with half the district pinging him for gigs before the morning coffee had even hit his bloodstream.

But the sun hadn’t fully crested the skyline yet, just a faint smear of light edging over Santo’s half scrapped rooftops, and the city was still as quiet as it could get. The overhead buzzing of freight drones and the distant rumble of early cargo haulers the only notable sounds outside his garage doors.

For a few hours yet, there would be no calls, no employees or customers breathing down his neck. No gigs to vet, wheels to grease, or eddies to chase. Just the clink of metal, the low-tempo sway of old-school Chicano soul drifting from the radio in the corner, and the satisfaction of fixing something with his own hands.

Perfect morning, far as he was concerned.

Which made the Outlaw waiting patiently for him under the tarp in the back of the shop the perfect thing to occupy his time.

Muamar hadn’t meant to keep it. Cars like that moved easy on the market, after all. And for a lot of eddies.

But when it had come in a few weeks back, he’d told the crew to keep their hands off.

Not because it was rare, or armored, or because it had custom mods worth more than some gonks he knew.

He had kept it because she had been the one to bring it in.

V.

Sharpest edge in the city, the merc was… efficient. And in a city that bled out almost as much mercs as it made, it was a credit to her name that she’d managed to bring herself up to run alongside the big players without selling or burning out.

Professional, adaptable, quiet except when loud was needed, V made even the messier jobs look clean. She was the kind of merc you could rely on to find a solution to the most fucked up gigs.

And Muamar liked reliable.

The Outlaw, for instance, she’d delivered cleaner than it had any right to be after the chase its former Sixth Street owners had given her. Not even a scratch from a fast turn marking its chrome, and anti-theft soft utterly obliterated by one of her clever daemons.

Miles away, en route to meet a client, he’d watched through the shop’s camera as she had slipped out of it like satin sliding off polished chrome. Eyes bright and cheeks flush from the chase, her hand had lingered on the hood as she’d told his man to ‘Tell the cap’n to sell this one high, cause she’s a real beauty’.  

As she had walked away, his man’s gaze had set on her retrieving figure. Assessing her, like she could be his next prey.

What a goddamn fool.

The scene had struck in his head, grating on his nerves for no good reason.

So, instead of logging the car into the system, he’d found every excuse to keep working on it. Tuning the ride to match the merc it had been seemingly made for.

He’d just managed to free it from the cover when his holo flared to life.

>> [INCOMING CALL]
>> [W. Bleecker]

He let it ring for a beat, then another. Thought about ignoring it and going back to his quiet morning. But Hands wasn’t one for social calls, and curiosity got the best of him.

“This better be good, Bleecker.” Muamar finally answered the call after a few more beats.

“Always is,” was Hands’ prompt reply. Then, tone shifting, he added, “I am calling a meeting, Muamar.”

Halfway to opening the Outlaws’ hood, Muamar’s hands faltered. “A meeting? What, you feeling nostalgic?”

Hands laughed, that same calculated laugh Muamar had heard in one too many meetings. Back when both of them used to be rats.

“Promise you won’t have to put on a suit,” the other fixer teased, “it’ll be just a few of us.”

“Define few.”

There was a pause on the other end. Muamar leaned against the open hood.

“Rogue. Wakako. Padre. Regina. Dino. Dakota.”

Muamar huffed. “That’s not a few. That’s the whole damn board.”

“So you understand the gravity.”

“Yeah,” Muamar said, closing the hood of the car with a touch too much force.

So much for a quiet morning.

“I also understand,” he continued, “that putting us all in one room sounds like a really good way to get us all flatlined. You finally trying to corner the fixer market or what?”

Hands had the audacity to sound affronted. “You know that’s not my style.”

“Bullshit, that is exactly your style, Wade.”

Again, Hands laughed. He also didn’t deny it.

In truth, Muamar wasn’t really worried about that possibility. But anything that required all of NC top tier fixers to sit in one room was still alarming. He just hoped this meeting would not be about that fifth war Arasaka and Militech had been courting since the end of the fourth.

“Spit it out, Bleecker,” Muamar snapped finally, “I’ve got better thing to do than chit chat with you all morning.”

“One of ours is in trouble,” Hands said at last.

Dread took old of Muamar without notice. “One of ours?”

“V.”

Muamar’s jaw locked. That fifth war did not sound so bad after all.

Hands didn’t elaborate further. Didn’t need to.

They had both known the merc long enough not to underestimate her. They’d seen the way she moved through gigs, the way she handled people. Bold enough to make herself known but careful not to ever ruffle the wrong feathers too much.

If she was in enough troubles to inconvenience Hands, something had gone truly sideways.

“The others, do you think they’ll agree?” Muamar asked.

“They have already,” Hands confirmed. “You are my last call. I knew you’d say yes.”

That certainty in his voice smarted. Him being right smarted even more.

Exhaling through his nose, Muamar covered the Outlaw back again with the tarp. “Send me the detes.”

A damn fool indeed.

--------------------------------

The location Hands had chosen for the meeting turned up to be on his own home turf. Muamar would have been shocked had it been anywhere else.

What was surprising, was that the fixer had also decided the situation warranted sharing with the rest of them his own private way into Dogtown.

As far as he knew, not many in Night City could boast among their assets a secure route into Kurt Hansen’s playground. Fewer still would be arrogant enough to use it as a meeting venue with the competition. But Wade had always liked theatrics and power plays.

As his man drove the old Colby down the ramp and towards the area where two unremarkable cars and a Shion where already parked, Muamar thought that the security measures in place certainly reflected it.

The two sensor curtains they had passed, thin red lines that flashed green on the car hood for the briefest moment before blinking out, and the turrets lining the passage and following their descent like sunflowers the sun, were probably just the tip of the iceberg.

He knew he was early but still dismounted the car before Diego could even kill the engine.

Minimal lighting, industrial feel and clearly incomplete, the subterranean parking structure was still cleaner than he would have expected. Hands’ touch to be sure.

In the middle of the area that could actually be seen under the sparse lighting, a massive oval table was surrounded by nine chairs, four on each side and one at the end, evenly spaced. The dark wood and leather a brutal contrast against the grey concrete, even to his eyes.

All that was missing to make it undistinguishable from most corporate offices was a slide deck, a terrified intern delivering coffee, and a shady agreement that would probably results in a lot of collateral damage.

Then again, there was a good chance they could get on with the last one by the end of the night.

He almost regretted not wearing that suit.

Three of the seats were already occupied.

Dino sprawled wide in his, like the table belonged to him. One of his vultures, a tall man with a tan fedora and a chrome arm, was hovering behind him.

Going by the look on her face, the Downtown fixer had already managed to annoy Dakota, who, sitting stiffly in front of him, was puffing from her oxygen tank like a few breaths of the moldy garage air would kill her.

At the closest side of the table, unmistakable both in posture and presence, Wakako sat whispering to her own bodyguard, a woman with enough chrome to make any Scav wet himself, including a barely concealed set of mantis blades, standing by her side.

As he approached the table, coming to stand behind the seat at Wakako’s left, hands resting on the back of the chair, they all looked at him.

“Ladies, Dinovic,” he greeted with a nod.

Dino grinned, teeth white against his tanned face. “Will wonders never cease. First Dakota inside NC, and now El Capitán outside Santo Domingo?”

“Some of us don’t have the luxury of living in Corpo Plaza’s shade, Dinovic,” Muamar countered, meeting Dakota’s eyes and finding there the same expression he was probably sporting too. “Out here, we’re too busy cleaning up the shit corps leave behind to spend our days joyriding and haunting bars like you do in Downtown.”

Dino’s exaggerated laugh echoed around them, mixing with the nearing sound of a car coming from the exit ramp into Pacifica. “Oh, I see, someone’s in a mood.”

“Of course he is, seen as why we are here,” said Wakako, waving her bodyguard away. The woman retreated with a nod, going to stand by the cars with his own man, and Wakako continued before anyone could prod at her statement. “Muamar, my dear, I’ve a bone to pick with you.”

“Do you?”

“Yes. Your 6th Streets have been picking fights with the Claws right in the middle of Japantown,” she explained.

“They are not my 6th Streets, Wakako. You know I don’t deal with them,” Muamar stated, just as two new cars entered the parking space.

The lady of Westbrook looked at him like a knowing mother watching her toddler make excuses. “It is not good for business.”

Muamar breathed deeply, weighting his next words. This day was really shaping up to be as far from perfect as possible.

“Fine,” he said. “I’ll see what I can do.”

Silence followed, filled only by the sound of the Delegate’s engine turning off and the squeal of tires as the Galena parked beside it.

The first to step out was Regina, alone, her ponytail bouncing behind her as she strode straight to the table. She nodded at them and took the seat in front of him without much fanfare.

Muamar respected that about her. She didn’t posture, didn’t play dominance games. Just came in, got shit done, and left people better than she found them. Most of the time, at least.

Also, for once, Muamar noted, there was no camera strapped to the tactical vest she always seemed to wear on the few occasions they had met.

Padre took his time getting out of the Delegate, stopping not a few paces from it to take the space in. He signed the cross, murmuring a prayer to go with it.

Muamar didn’t miss the way Dino snorted.

Padre didn’t either. “Even down here, God sees,” he said, loud enough for them to hear him clearly.

“Still no Hands?” Regina asked after a few moments of silence.

“Running fashionably late,” Dino replied, even though they were at least ten minutes ahead of schedule. There was a wide grin on his face, like he had just told the most entertaining joke. “Probably rehearsing his talking points.”

Muamar felt like rolling his eyes but decided to ignore him in favor of meeting Padre’s proffered hand.

“Reyes, it’s good to see you, child,” the priest said.

“Padre,” Muamar returned with a nod, keeping hold of his hand. He leaned in slightly, not bothering to lower his voice. If there was a chance that one of them knew more than the others about these troubles V was in, that one must have been Padre. “This about that Arasaka mess in Wellsprings?”

Padre took a while to give him an answer. He covered their clasped hands with his other before releasing Muamar altogether. If the gesture had mean to be comforting, his next words could not even try to be.

“It is an Arasaka mess, yes. But this started long before she brought me that confession.”

He paused for a moment, as he took the empty seat on Muamar’s left. “It is more personal than their crusade against Militech.”

Dino gave a loud whistle. “If it’s more personal for Arasaka than manufacturing a casus belli to start the fifth war, then someone’s really stepped in it.”

He leaned back in his chair, its front legs leaving the ground as he balanced on the back ones.

Muamar hoped to see him fall.

“Not that I’m surprised,” Dinovic continued. “That girl’s a firecracker, she’s been courting trouble since the day she was booted out of the Tower. Bound to blow up in someone’s face eventually.”

Muamar, having just moved to sit in his own place at the table, had to stop himself from going round it and push Dino.

Before Dino could say more and force Muamar to rethink is restrained approach, Dakota took a long drag from her oxygen mask, the hiss loud in the silence that followed.

“Not everything explodes for the fun of it, Dinovic,” she intervened, without looking at said fixer. She adjusted the dial on her tank, then fixed her eyes on Muamar. “Some people light fuses because no one else will.”

Her words hung between them just long enough for the brash sound of Rogue’s bike to take over.

The Afterlife’s resident queen swung off it with a fluid motion that made a mockery of her birth certificate and strode toward the table without a world. She took the seat at the head of the table, barely missing the tablet placed in front of it – identical to those similarly waiting in front of each seat – as she put down her helmet with a forceful motion.

“Look at this,” she said lighting a cig. Smoke rising in a hazy frame around her face as she took a few puffs. “Pulled us all out of our corners for one merc. City must be running dry.”

Her presence was the one that puzzled Muamar the most. It was no secret that the Afterlife’s fixer did not work with the merc. The why, he still didn’t understand.

At first, V had been a risky bet. After the Deshawn fiasco – the particulars of which were pretty vague – her reputation had been hanging by a thread. Ex corpo and with a trail of bodies following in her wake, she had been no one’s first pick.

For his part, he was a little ashamed to admit, he had bet on her only because he had never liked Deshawn and had loved the idea of proving himself right. But still, it had been a bet, so it was not surprising that Rogue, or anyone else, could have chosen to abstain.

Now however, months later, V was a known quantity, and betting against her a fool’s errand.

Rogue’s continued disdain for the merc felt a lot more personal.

Regina was the one to speak up, “You know this is serious, Rogue.”

“And yet, I’ve seen top-tier mercs flatline with less fanfare,” sneered Rogue.

Muamar tensed, but it was Dino who bit first. “So what, you too know what everyone’s favourite merc got herself into?” he said while gesturing for his man to go wait by the cars.

Rogue took a long drag from her cig, eyes circling the table. Stopping a moment longer on Regina, Padre, and finally Muamar.

“Your favourite,” she drawled, “has a ticking bomb in her skull. It’s a matter of time before you’ll need to find a replacement.”

Muamar didn’t let anything in his posture change. But something tightened behind his sternum all the same.

A ticking bomb.

He’d known V was in real trouble. Hands had not been subtle in his summon. But this was not the heat from a gig gone sideways or some Corp nursing a grudge.

In Rogue’s words and eyes this was something built-in. Inevitable.

“That is exactly what we are here to avoid.” Regina snapped, the venom in her voice not even registering for Rogue.

Coming from the woman working to reverse cyberpychosis, the words felt like cold horchata after a particularly exhausting summer day. Still, they left a bitter taste in his mouth.

How long had they known?

He wanted to speak, to ask how long they’d been keeping this between themselves. How much time had been wasted.

But he knew a reply to those questions would not change the situation or make finding an actual solution easier, so he breathed and kept quiet.

The service elevator pinged then, catching everyone’s attention. Dino nearly topped his chair in an attempt to twist around and see.

Hands came out of the elevator in no hurry, dressed in a tailored suit that was perfectly at home with the little conference room setup he had prepared for them.

He took the room in like a man appraising assets. A slow pass across each face and a hint of calculation behind every blink.

His gaze caught on Rouge, perched at the head of the table like it had been set out just for her. If he minded, he didn’t let it register. Just shifted course without pause, claiming the seat to her right with elegant movements.

The man that came out of the elevator after him, Muamar had never met. He still recognized him as Viktor Vektor, ripper, boxer, and name at the top of several Corporation’s HR head hunting list.

The ripper hovered behind Hands for a moment, eyes darting across the group. Muamar caught the faint twitch in his jaw and clocked the moment Regina reached up, brushing his arm and nodding toward the final empty chair beside her. The man took it with a stiff breath.

Hands let the silence sit long enough to ensure everyone’s attention returned to him.

“Evening,” he said finally, chrome hands clasped in front of him and elbows firmly planted on the table. “I’m glad everyone could make it. Let’s not waste anyone’s time. We have a lot to discuss.”

--------------------------------

One hour later, Muamar was ready to hurt someone.

Pacing the edge of the table, jaw aching from a tension that he could not seem to be able to release, he didn’t really know who.

Because even without considering those that had already got what was coming for them, the number of people on his shit list had grown considerably in the last hour.

DeShawn, Evelyn Parker, Maman Brigitte – even Saburo fucking Arasaka – unfortunately belonged to the former. But Hands, Rogue, Padre, Regina and Vektor were all sitting at the table.

Across form him, Dino was now leaning halfway over that same table, finger tapping against his tablet with a recurring rhythm. “Wait, V got DeShawn zeroed?” he asked.

The genuine disbelief in his voice made Muamar pause. Among all they had just learned about the heist, he had thought that particular detail to be one of the few to actually have made the rounds already. Or even the least relevant. Apparently not.

Maybe that was why Dino had never seemed to have a problem with giving V gigs.

Rogue scoffed, the latest cig she had lit raining ash on the table. “DeShawn got himself zeroed. And for good reason. He sent the lousiest netrunner and the greenest mercs I’ve ever seen grace the Afterlife to do a job I would’ve had doubts sending Bartmoss and Blackhand to,” she spat.

From his expression, Dino seemed to find Rogue’s assessment reasonable.

Dakota shook her head, “Successful gig or not, that girl was never meant to walk away from it.”

“There were too many actors, too many risks,” Padre agreed. “DeShawn, Arasaka, the Voodoo Boys. That gig should have never happened.”

Muamar dragged a hand down his face, still pacing.

He couldn’t hear it again. The gig, the Relic, the betrayal. The way everything had funneled V straight in front of the barrel of a gun and left her there. Alone.

Rogue blew a smoke ring toward the ceiling. “Yet, it did. And the girl should’ve flatlined ten times over by now chasing leads. Don’t know how she has managed not to end up a smear on Arasaka Tower’s lobby yet, but it’s a miracle.”

“Miracle’s the wrong word,” muttered the ripper. It was the first thing he’d said in twenty minutes, after explaining why the relic could not be safely extracted from V’s brain. How DeShawn bullet had, for all practical purposes, killed her and jumpstarted the Relic takeover.

“She ain’t alone in there,” Dino said suddenly. “That’s the story, right? Silverhand’s ghost riding shotgun. Sounds like something – someone – you’d like kept quiet.”

Everyone looked at Rogue. He hadn’t said your ghost, but they all heard it all the same.

Wakako was the one to voice their common thought. “You shared a bed with him, dear. That still colours your choices?”

Rogue didn’t flinch, but she did answer. “I knew Johnny, yes. And knowing he’s in there, rattling around in her head and colouring her choices… then I have reason to worry too.”

If that reason was the possibility of V being convinced to blow another nuke inside Arasaka, Muamar didn’t really like it either.

“You also have reason to want her gone,” Padre said. The words weren’t loud, but they felt so.

A long breath of silence passed between them all.

“Wouldn’t be the first time someone let a grudge do the steering,” Wakako added, her tone so pleasant it looped back around to menacing.

Rogue flicked more ash on the table and said nothing. Not raising to the bait.

Muamar stopped his pacing behind Dakota’s chair, arms folded across his chest. He could feel the tension rising like heat from the table, friction building between egos carrying old grudges.

He didn’t care why each of them wanted to save V. Because there was no mistaking the fact that each of them did. Their continued presence at the table proof enough even if their motivations weren’t as clear.

No, what he cared about was time, and how little of it was left.

He looked at Hands. The man had been silent, just like the ripper, for a while now. Watching them squabble like children.

But Muamar knew him better than that.

“What’s the plan, Wade?” he asked, voice steady and hard enough to cut. “This meeting would have been an email if you thought V didn’t have any options left.”

The Dogtown fixer leaned back in his chair, a self-satisfied smile on his face. “You are right, Reyes. If there was nothing to be done, I would’ve sent flowers, not a summon.”

That earned him a snort from Dino, but he ignored it.

“The good doctor here believes a solution is possible,” he continued, with a nod to Vektor. “And I have already started moving pieces. What we need now is your contribution to accelerate the timeline.”

“Possible,” Rogue repeated, the scepticism in her voice almost veering into disdain.

“Yes, possible,” intervened the ripper. “With the right knowledge and surgical conditions, fixing the damage and separating the engram is possible.”  

“And we already have leads on all the pieces. Starting with a very specialized mind.” Hands finished for him.

“Specialized how?” Muamar asked.

“Meet Dr. Emilia Kess,” Hands said, moving his tablet across the table. The holoscan of an older woman in an Arasaka lab coat shimmered up from the screen. “The woman has been one third of the scientific team that developed the Relic since day one.”

Rogue expression tinted with confusion. “Hellman developed the Relic,” she said. “And he didn’t have a solution. I know V tried that route already. You said it yourself before.”

“Well, yes, he did develop the Relic. And yes, he did not have a solution. But he was not alone,” was Hands reply. His satisfaction at having more intel than her almost comically sculpted into his expression. “Hellman had not one, but two lab partners: Dr. Kess and Dr. Ando.”

He showed them a second image of a much younger man wearing a similar version of the lab coat Dr. Kess had been wearing.

“Unfortunately for us, Dr. Ando has moved on to a better life quite a few years ago now,” he explained, sending Padre a look that earned him a nod and a sign of the cross from the priest. “Dr. Kess, however, is very much alive and still working for our friends at Arasaka.”

“So, the plan is to kidnap her?” Asked Dakota.

“Nothing so complicated. The Doctor actually reached out to me a few weeks ago. She plans to… end her collaboration with Arasaka and needed someone to provide safe passage. We’ve since reached an agreement.” He revealed with a wide grin.

“This sound all very convenient,” commented Dino, stealing the words from Muamar’s mind.

“Convenient, yes, but not that casual,” replied Hands. “Dr. Kess is a farsighted and practical woman and has been working on developing herself some insurance from Arasaka since 2023. Lucky for us, that insurance has taken the shape of a reversal process for the Relic takeover.”

On the other side of the table, the guilt that had been framing Vektor’s expression since before he even sat at the table seemed to lessen with those words.

It was clear that V was not aware of this summit taking place on her behalf, and even clearer was that the ripper had been the one to betray V’s condition to Hands and Regina at some point.

How Padre had known was just as easily deducted. V’s connection to Jackie Welles and his surviving family and friends was no secret. The merc had even recently moved to the Glen, less than a block away from Guadalupe Welles’ bar.

Muamar could not deny that having her a good deal closer to Santo Domingo that she had been before had been a pleasant surprise. For business reasons, of course.

“That still doesn’t explain the non-causality of it,” said Dino, interrupting both Hands explanation and Muamar line of thoughts.

“Being the farsighted woman that she is, Dr. Kess contacted me after the Relic was stolen and Hellman kidnapped,” Hands continued with a pointed look at Dinovic. “Her request was for extraction and help making contact with someone that would be extremely interested in what the Arasakas are developing, and even more in a possible cure. We decided that testing the process at least once before selling it would benefit everyone.”

“Would that someone have a name that starts in N or M?” drawled Rogue.

Both Regina and Dakota scoffed at that, with the latest saying, “Is there any difference?”

“Not really, but either way, that is not important now.” Muamar intervened before the conversation could be derailed on the level of overlapping between NUSA and Militech.

“No, it is not,” agreed Hands. “The most important thing now is to secure ourselves a scientist. V will extract her in two days and bring her here. After that, we’ll have to collect the rest of the pieces fast, and without fuss.”

“Wait, we are planning to tell V? You have changed your mind?” asked Regina, an underlining hope clear in her confused tone.

Hands hesitated, just long enough to confirm Muamar’s suspicions.

“She has a right to know,” Regina pressed, and the words felt like the echo of an argument that had been rehearsed before.

“She won’t do it,” Vektor cut in. “If she knows she’s been sent chasing after a cure, she won’t do it. But these last few weeks? There seems to be no stopping her from taking on all the random shit you lot have been sending her way. I know I’ve tried.”

For the first time that night, the doctor’s voice was not underlined by guilt but anger. At them, at V, or at himself, Muamar couldn’t guess. Probably all of them.

And Muamar could not blame him.

At the same time, he found himself understanding Regina’s point. The idea of lying to V sitting wrong with him. But Padre was nodding too. And if the two people at the table closest to the merc agreed on that assessment, Muamar would find a way to live with the lie and its consequences.

“So, this is why it’s so important to split the gigs,” Hands confirmed. “I don’t trust anyone else with retrieving the assets we’ll need. But, if we want to succeed, V cannot see the pattern. She cannot put together what’s happening until it’s too late to back out.”

“Doesn’t hurt if we can also manage to avoid alerting our Corpo friends this way,” Dino added. Dakota nodding along to that statement.

“Nor would hastening their reckoning. And Arasaka’s is long overdue,” agreed Padre.

Before the mood could veer fully into righteous crusade, Wakako tapped a finger against the rim of her tablet. “Now that we’re all in agreement on what must be done – and I trust you’ll be sending over briefs with the particulars, Wade dear,” she said, voice sweet like caramel, “let’s talk eddies.”

Of course. Muamar knew that at some point the conversation would have ended up there. They were fixers, after all, solving problems for money was what they did.

That it was Wakako to finally raise the point was also no surprise at all.

Hands didn’t miss a beat. He leaned forward, chrome hands once more clasped together. “Rest assured, there will be no shortage of interested buyers once the process is proven effective. As Rogue kindly suggested, N&M will be right at the top of that list.”

His eyes moved around the table, assessing. “Whatever tech, data, or method comes out of this, everyone at this table will see his own share. That was the deal the moment you sat down.”

Wakako nodded, satisfied with the prospected cut she was to earn.

Regina, not surprising, was not. “And what if some of those could be used to treat neural trauma? Degeneration? Cyberpsychosis?”

Her voice had none of Wakako’s sugar, but all the same demanded attention.

“Because if this works,” she continued, “and we sit on something that could help this city’s people, then we use it. Not lock it behind some corpo paywall.”

Muamar was not one to refuse eddies, would have been a volunteer at a hospital, not a fixer, if that was the case. But he had seen what cyberpsychosis did to kids in Rancho when chrome and bad choices were all that was left in the wake of megacorporations like Arasaka. So, he knew what he would choose given the option.

Hands raised his palms in a slow gesture of concession. “Then we’ll find a way to do both.”

But his smile didn’t quite reach his eyes, and they all knew, if push came to shove, what his choice would be. Still, Regina nodded. There was no reason to stall the whole initiative for something that could never come to pass.

Hands gave one final glance around the table, chrome fingers drumming against the wood. “Very well,” he said, pausing for just enough time to give them the opportunity to speak. When it was clear that no one had anything more to say, he dismissed them, “Then we have our course. Let’s get to work.”

Not a moment later, the sound of chairs scraping against he concrete filled the space, signaling that the meeting had ended.

Wakako was the first to go, her bodyguard appearing at her shoulder as if summoned by thought to escort her back to the car. Before going, she offered Hands a nod and Muamar a ‘Let me know how that conversation with 6th Street goes, dear’.

Dakota and Dino left right after her, the former without a word and the latter with a salute and a smirk.

Padre did not leave, but rounded the table moving towards Regina and Vektor, who were now sitting facing each other, speaking in hushed tones. The priest rested one hand on Vektor’s shoulder as he joined the discussion.

Before going, Rogue killed her last cig by pressing it on the concrete floor with her booted foot. “I hope you know what you are doing,” was the last thing she said, looking at Hands.

Hands smile didn’t falter, and he just watched Rogue go before raising from his own chair. Eyes finding Muamar’s.

“We really have time?” Muamar asked, joining Hands as he moved towards the elevator.

Vektor’s explanation earlier had been clinical and not remotely comforting. Neural degradation, synaptic collapse, engram bleed. Each new symptom worse than those before. But the way he had said reversal was possible, given enough time, had stayed with Muamar.

“Not much, as I understand,” Hands admitted. “But enough, if we don’t waste it.”

Muamar had no intention to do so. “Then tell me what I can do.”

Wade looked at him with the same glint in his eyes he used to get when, during one of the dozens of negotiations they had attended on opposite sides of the table in their corpo days, he believed to have just found out what the perfect piece of leverage would be to get his way.

The chuckle was new.

“You really like this one,” he teased.

“I like results.”

“Of course you do, my friend.”

Wade’s grin was wide as they reached the elevator. But, strangely enough, it was also devoid of malice.

 “You’ll get to play your part in due time, like everyone else,” Hands said, just as Vektor - now alone - reached them to join him into the elevator. “But, if you feel so inclined, I could use some assistance with her next gig.”

--------------------------------

Muamar had seen the Caliburn only once, in picture, when V had messaged him a few months back to see if he knew anything about it. Apparently the merc had found it abandoned and had received a nameless deed transfer as soon as she had gotten behind the wheel.

At the time, he had called her just to say she was the luckiest gonk he had ever met, pride swelling as her laughter had erupted on the other end of the holo.

Knowing what he knew now, that memory felt hollow.

He still recognized the car as soon as it entered the frame of one of the four feeds he had been monitoring for a few hours.

Two days after he had left Hands’ underground lair with more questions than answers, the man himself had called to confirm that V would retrieve the Arasaka scientist that same evening. So, as agreed, he had fired up his small fleet of drones and dispatched them to monitor the job.

Now, hours after that call, he watched through them as the sleek car stopped right in front of Dr. Kesse’s building.

V stepped out of it slowly, pausing right outside to look up at the building glowing in the late afternoon light and to adjust her already perfectly styled blazer.

In her fashionable office wear, she looked just like a high ranking Corpo coming back home after a long day of juggling corporate espionage and office politics.

Muamar knew that, less than a year ago, she had been just that. And for a moment, but not for the first time, he wondered what would have happened had their paths met when they had both walked that corporate one.

As he glanced at the corner of the feed’s interface, where a constant stream of status updates moved across the screen, V started to walk towards the building at a measured pace.

He leaned back in his chair just as she disappeared inside, settling in for the wait.

Inside, she was alone. His drones unable to give him visual behind the shielded glass panes of the building.

The thought unsettled him more than it should have.

More than it would have just a few days before.

This was her job, after all, and he had only ever seen her do it solo. What he knew now shouldn’t have changed the fact that he himself had sent her on gigs ten times more dangerous than this, and she had completed them all.

Still, his shoulders tensed and his stomach dropped as soon as the black Arasaka Atlus entered one of the drones feed, depositing four operatives right in front of the building’s doors before moving away.

Armed to the teeth, the operatives didn’t waste a second before storming the building lobby. Muamar didn’t either, opening the secure line before the last one had even touched the ground.

“We got company?” Asked Hands as soon as the line connected.

“Arasaka. Four, inside already. I’m sending a few drones after their driver and then to secure the route to Pacifica.”

“Good. She is alone inside, but I’ll see what I can do for backup outside.”

The line disconnected before Muamar could ask what kind of backup.

On the screen, the building doors opened, only to reveal a scared young man fleeing the scene. The man had just rounded the corner on Pardey Street when V’s Caliburn started to move in the same direction, disappearing from sight a moment later.

Alarmed, Muamar had almost opened the secure channel back up again when a Delamain cab rolled up in front of the building, parking in the exact spot vacated by the Caliburn.

He blinked at the screen. Twice. Then, his mind supplied a memory of V, a mischievous grin on her attractive face, explaining exactly why Delamain had ceased its activities in NC after Muamar had complained to her about it.

V, he knew, was now the only remaining client of Delamain’s taxi services, and the proud owner of one of the AI’s spawns. Junior, she had called it with a fond smile.

Hands had quite literally sent in the cavalry, it seemed.

What must have felt like an eternity later, but were in fact no more than fifteen minutes, the doors opened again, and V emerged, eyes sharp and gun drawn, followed by the woman he knew to be Kess.

The next breath he released, Muamar had not even realized he had been holding.

The closest drone focused on her automatically, its readouts on the screen reassuring him that she was indeed as unscathed as she seemed to be from the feed’s image.

He watched her hesitate in front of the cab, talking for a moment to the empty cabin through the open door before looking over the vehicle, straight at the almost empty street on the other side of it. He wondered, frustrated, why she was wasting time.

She must have realized the same, because not a minute later she was urging Kess inside, following suit.

As the cab started moving, Muamar forced himself to focus on the other feeds, mapping the route and searching for threats.

He found two: a second and third Atlus already dispatched by Arasaka after the first team’s failure. The first, posted at Dogtown’s border, with a small swarm of operatives already dismounting from it and setting up a cordon on the street leading up to the gate. The second, patrolling the building and the end of the Estate where the drop-off was supposed to happen.

Supposed, because neither site had ever been part of the actual plan. Only false trails they had laid to be safe. To keep the actual destination as confidential as possible until the very last moment.

The diversion must have worked, because the cab moved through the planned route without trouble.

He called Hands just as the black Villefort disappeared behind familiar shutters halfway through Pacific Boulevard. The tension in his shoulders releasing as soon has the garage doors sealed.

“How did you managed to send her own cab without her knowing?” he asked as the line connected.

“Ah,” said Hands, “I didn’t. That, is dear old Delamain itself.”

“What?”

“He contacted me shortly after Vektor did. To help,” he explained. “Apparently our little merc has made herself a lot of interesting friends in the last few months.”

“That girl,” Muamar could only say, disbelief colouring his voice.

“Indeed,” agreed Hands just as the sound of an engine filled the connection.

“Is she there?”

“Yes. She is here now. Yes, intact. I’ll call you later,” was Hands cheeky reply.

The line cut and Muamar went back to the feeds, waiting for V to surface once more from the underground garage.

As he lazily eyed the monitors, inspiration struck. On the top screen, one of his drones had just passed over an unassuming Thorton. The graffiti on its side anticipating what his scan confirmed. The car, belonging to one Anderson Holland, had been abandoned there since its late owner had left it in his, unfortunately futile, attempt to escape a pack of enraged Animals.

Would be a real shame to leave it there to gather dust, he thought as he settle into the wait, and I have just the merc for the job.

He was scanning for threats once more when, a few minutes later, a notification on his personal holo informed him that the little bonus he had set up for Hands’ gig had been delivered to its new owner. He smiled and focused on the feed of the drone surveying the garage entrance.

V emerged on the Racer not five minutes later, perfect on the sleek bike like he knew she’d be.

He fired up the holo as soon as she turned the Arch on Appian, astutely avoiding Dogtown’s border and the squad still waiting there.

“El Capitán,” she greeted, the smile in her voice destroying the last of the day’s tension.

“Ah, there she is,” Muamar said, watching her sleek figure as she guided the bike past the Imperial Mall. “If my eyes in the sky are not mistaken – and they rarely are, V – that’s you just south of Potomac, with the very pretty little grey number.”

There was a pause, just long enough for the second meaning to land.

V huffed a laugh, the sound pleasant as it always was to his ears.

“The bike or the outfit?” she asked.

“Why not both?” he could not refrain from teasing. “Looking good either way.”

There was amusement in her voice as she prodded, “you calling to flirt, Muamar, or there’s actually a job for me to do?”

“Again, why not both?” and he could have kept her on the line for hours just trading lines, “but fine, fine. You’re a few feet from a ride I’d very much like to acquire. Nothing difficult. The thing has been abandoned for days, so no complication foreseen. Say yes, and I’ll owe you a drink next time you are in the neighborhood.”

He sent her the Thorton coordinates and watched as she eased the bike in that direction, waiting patiently for her to reach it.

Through his drone, now free to get closer to her, Muamar could see her shoulders relax as she reached the parking lot.

“Drink’s nice,” she said after a beat, dismounting his little gift and taking her new objective in, “but are there eddies coming with that, or are you just offering your sparking company as payment?”

Muamar chuckled, low and amused. “V, baby, when have I ever sent you home without something to jingle in your pockets? My company, on the other hand, we can negotiate if you’d like.”

“I’ll take the eddies,” V said, and the disappointment he felt came out of nowhere. It subsided, replaced just as fast by something sharper but much more pleasant when, with a mischievous tone, she added, “this time.”

He laughed, at himself mostly, watching as she approached the Thorton with purposeful strides, “then that will have to do for now. Always a pleasure working with you V. Now get to work and bring her to me. Flipping you the coords.”

He cut off the call before she could say more. Before he could say more.

Then, he got up from his desk, moving towards the small office fridge in search of that drink. Anticipation driving each step.

-----

Chapter Text

“So,” said Johnny just as his own recorded voice, coming from the car radio, started to scream about escaping and chasing becoming one and the same, “we gonna talk about what just happened?”

V tapped the steering wheel with one hand, following the moderate tempo of the song and ignoring the question.

The coords Muamar had shared were not far from where she had picked up the car, so she had hoped the ride would be quiet. Feeling the day’s tiredness creeping in at last, all she wanted was to get home and sleep it all away. And if she stepped a little on it, she could deliver the car and be at home in less than an hour.

Discussing the gig with Johnny was not part of her curated plan.

Johnny, however, sitting shotgun and half glitching in and out of existence at irregular intervals, clearly had other ideas.

Now, had their situation been different, had he been just another merc accompanying her on the gig and not the ghost in her rapidly decaying mind, she knew she would have been the one to raise those same concerns he had.

The gig had been unusual. Hands insistence she take the job, his presence at the drop off, the insane payout and bonus. Delamain deciding to hop this side of the Wall just to give her a ride. Even the way Kess kept looking at her made her pause. So yes, the whole thing stank more than Rancho Coronado in July.

But.

Even if there was something going on, V didn’t have the time to look into it. Literally.

She was going to be gone in a matter of months – if not weeks at the pace she was going – and there was little chance Johnny would continue in her chosen profession.

Not that he could go back to singing, her voice was not made for it, at all, but a merc Johnny was certainly not. He would have to figure out what to do on his own, and the little fortune she was trying to accumulate with the time she still had would help him do just so.

Therefore, she saw no reason to dig deeper on a perfectly closed and paid job. No reason to risk getting Johnny in the middle of another shitstorm orbiting Arasaka.

She glanced at him briefly.  

Streetlights flashed over him in stripes, catching on the silver outline of his chrome arm. Just as they would have if he had been real on the seat beside her, not just a projection of her mind. Because he wasn’t really there. And still, in moments like this he felt like the only constant left.

She felt that familiar knot form behind her ribcage.

“You wanna talk about the fact that we stole an abandoned car?” she said after letting the silence stretch a moment longer, deciding to go for clueless. There was no way in hell Johnny was going to drop the conversation, but there was also no harm in trying to make him. And, riling him up a bit had the positive side effect of always improving her mood.

“V.”

From the corner of her vision, she could see that he was now looking at her. Even if his tone hadn’t given it away, the frowning lines between his eyebrows speaking volumes about his frustration.

“Look, I know the gig was weird. Did we just participate in something a lot bigger than we can see? Yeah, probably,” she conceded as they emerged from the gallery that crossed over from Pacifica into Arroyo, “I mean, fuck. Del was there.”

Taking her words as an opening, Johnny turned in his seat, one foot planted on the faded synth-leather and elbow resting on his bended knee, “That’s what I’m saying V. If Arasaka is involved –”

“Arasaka is always involved, Johnny,” V interrupted him, fondness and exhaustion all mixing with a touch of exasperation in her voice, “but that doesn’t mean we have to.”

He stared at her for a moment, his gaze heavy even from behind his glasses.

“Maybe we should,” he said, like it was a question. For himself or for her, V could not decide. “The doctor’s face… I think I’ve seen it before, V.”

He had said the same earlier, she remembered, just before the Arasaka ambush.

Her grip on the steering wheel tightened. And she knew where this was going. She’d followed this road one too many times. The high only hope could give, the adrenaline of chasing it. The burn, when all that chasing lead to nothing.

She would not do it again.

“You think?” she questioned.

He nodded but didn’t have anything more to add.

V exhaled loudly. She would not.

“Look, I’ll keep an eye out, ok?” she conceded, to pacify him. As Johnny opened his mouth to speak, she added, “But. We cannot just go digging around Hands’ business because the ghost in my mind thinks he recognises a face.”

Johnny stared at her for a moment, the lines between his brows growing even deeper. “Fuck V, what if this is our chance? What if that corpo bitch has what we need?”

The omitted ‘to save you’, rang loud and clear between them even without him saying so.

“What if she doesn’t? What if this is another merry chase that leads to nothing?” she countered, the words coming out of her angrier than she wished them to be while at the same time sounding so much like a plea. A plea she hoped he would not ignore.

He didn’t, and the fact alone told her much on how far along the merging process must have been. The Johnny that had tried to kill them both on that first night would have never backed down from an argument for her own sake. But this Johnny did.

“Fine,” he snapped. “I still don’t like this.”

V exhaled, the stiffness in her shoulders and the tightness of her grip on the wheel loosening all at once.

“Somehow, I think I got that,” she teased, earning herself a scoff from him.

The rest of the drive was short and quiet. His recorded voice on the radio the only one interrupting the silence between them.

V took a moment to recall the Racer, redirecting it from her garage to the coordinates Muamar had given, before loosing herself in the drive.

As she eased the car through the familiar gate, the Johnny living in her head finally spoke again. “Oh, fuck no.”

“What?” She urged, tension returning to her shoulders as she followed his line of sight.

What she found there was surprising but not at all alarming.  

El Capitán himself was waiting at the far end of the parking lot, leaning on the silver Shion parked there. Two Calavera bottles sat on the car roof beside him.

“I’m gonna bail before your weird mating dance starts again,” Johnny said as she parked the car just outside the closed garage door, right beside the Shion. The disgust in his voice was a little insulting.

“What? It’s just banter,” she protested, shutting the engine off and turning to look at him.

Johnny gave her a look that spoke volumes before disappearing altogether, “Sure. You keep telling yourself that, V.”

Barely restraining herself from stomping her feet on the car floor, she sent a last indignant thought his way before stepping out of the car, “even if it were true, I’ve literally had to relive your memory of fucking Alt backstage at a club. I think you could survive a little flirting.”

As expected, she got no reply.

Outside, the temperature had cooled after the sun had set. Not to a point that could actually be defined as cold, but breathing was at least a little easier now that there was no heat rising from the burning asphalt.

V longed for one of her tattered tank tops to get out of the damn blazer.

She took a moment to at least stretch, feeling each vertebra pop back into place one after the other, before turning her attention to the fixer waiting for her.

Still leaning on the hood of his car, she found the man was already looking at her.

Muamar El Capitán Reyes usually came with movement. With words, and charm and that loud, fast Santo Domingo rhythm that made it impossible not to look his way. Bright shirts and brighter stories, he always had a half joke and a half gibe on his lips.

But now, leaning lazily against the car and bathed in the faded light coming from inside the garage, he was something quieter. The shiny purple shirt she had seen him wear already hung open, a black tank with a yellow skull printed on it clinging to the line of his fit chest beneath it. Casual, in a way V had seen him just a few times before, when, like tonight, he had shown in person to collect one of the cars.

It wasn’t a common occurrence, Diego was still the one sent to collect most of the times, but it had happened on a few occasions now. And V had found herself staying a little bit longer to chat each time it did.

The gold of his chain caught the light, and her gaze moved to his face. His eyes didn’t spark the way they usually did when he was winding someone up or talking up his auto business to a potential client. They were steady and focused. On her. Searching for something she couldn’t quite name. He seemed to find it as their eyes met, because a smile bloomed on his face.

“There’s my favourite merc,” Muamar greeted. His face was as tired as she felt, but the smile there felt genuine and brought out her own.

“Am I? Really?” V questioned, the scepticism in her voice tinted with amusement.

“Of course you are. No one else delivers quite like you, V,” he confirmed with a grin and a wink, the boisterous fixer most of NC knew coming through a little, before turning to the car to grab the two bottles waiting on the roof. He opened one with the other and passed it to her.

The glass was slippery with beads of condensation, but the coldness of it felt pleasant on V ’s heated skin and she pressed it to her cheek for a moment, relishing the sensation.

Muamar raised an eyebrow at her, and she responded with a shrug and a smile.

“Wasn’t all that difficult with that one,” she said raising the hand that held the bottle, gesturing at the car behind her.

“Told you it’d be a smooth ride,” he agreed, moving to lower the Thorton tailgate. He sat on it, leaving enough space at his side for her.

She hopped on with a little less grace than the Capitán – the few inches she was missing on him clearly not helping – and took another sip from her bottle.

“Still,” he continued raising his own bottle, “you look like you could use more than one of these.”

On V, alcohol had the unfortunate side effect of making her slow and sleepy, which, in her line of work, were definitely not preem states to be in. So, she didn’t usually drink much. But he was not wrong, tonight she could use something to wash away the day’s eeriness.

“Hmm, I closed another gig just before you called,” she explained with half a mind. The other half busy trying to suppress the embarrassing series of yawns she could feel rising in the back of her throat.

“In Pacifica? V, you betraying me like this? With Hands?”

The disappointment in his voice was so theatrical that it stole a laugh from her. It sounded loud against the quiet of midnight in Arroyo. But it also chased away a little of the exhaustion.

“A gig is a gig Capt’n. And you know I don’t play favourites.”

At this, he turned towards her, shifting on the tailgate so one bended knee rested on the space between them. There was a glint in his eyes not unlike the one Nibbles usually got when he managed to catch one of the shoelaces V sometime dragged across the apartment to entertain him.

“Liar,” he called her, one finger pointed in her face and a smirk on his. “You’ve done more gigs for me in the last month that for all the others combined.”  

V startled a little. Technically, he was right.  

There hadn’t really been an intention to do so on her part, though. It had more to do with the fact that Regina already had enough cyberpsychos to fill an hospital wing and there hadn’t been a new sighting in a while for V to chase, and that Padre was being unusually skittish with giving her work – and V just knew Mama Welles handywork when she saw it.

Still, she could not deny that, with them being kind of off her grid, she had gravitated towards Santo Domingo and the opportunities that laid there quite often and without much of a thought. The fact that she actually liked and not just tolerated the fixer she worked with there was just a bonus, not a reason.

“And how would you know that?” she asked anyway.

“V, El Capitán knows everything.”

This time, she was the one to raise an eyebrow at him, “Mm-mmm. I think it’s cause you lot gossip like old ladies. Is that it?”

Muamar laughed, and this close, she almost felt that laugh vibrate across her skin.

“Do not let Wakako hear you say that, V,” he warned, nudging her leg with his own. The warmth of his skin painfully obvious even through two layers of fabric.

“I’m not a fool,” she replied, colouring her voice and expression with mock horror at the mere idea.

He laughed again, and V was reminded of Jackie for a moment. Of how she had missed being around someone still capable of laughing so freely even in a city like NC.

“No, you are not. And thank fucking God for that,” Muamar said, raising his bottle in a toast before taking a long sip. “Not gonna lie V, I was this close to say fuck it with the cars when you took over the deliveries. I swear, finding quality mercs like you has become impossible.”

V hid the smile that statement got out of her behind her own beer.

All considered, she knew she was kind of good at her job. Her background in counterintell and her netrunning skills alone giving her an unfair advantage on most gigs even when her size didn’t do her any favours. And, with the exception of Rogue, who still refused to give her work, she knew the major fixers she worked with were usually in agreement.

And yet.

She was also mature enough to admit – and Johnny could stuff it – that Muamar’s praises hit a little bit different than, let’s say, Dakota’s.

In another life, V knew, with a certainty that was scarier than facing down a cyberpsycho rising out of a fridge like an eldritch horror, that given enough time and opportunity the Capt’n was exactly the kind of man she could go for.

“Anyway, you running around for Hands at least explains the threads,” he mused, taking his time to look over her outfit.

The slow pass of his eyes on her body told her he probably would not be so opposed to give her a go either. Under his scrutiny, she felt herself getting warmer, her thoughts veering towards something she knew Johnny would give her shit about later.

She set her half full beer on the truck bed. The missing half clearly starting to affect her senses.

This was not another life, and as much as she would enjoy it, she didn’t have enough time to get herself tangled up in something like that. Like him.

She shifted in her seat, angling herself towards him too and shaking her head a little, “you know Hands, it’s always Corpo shit with him. Had to play the part.”

“Is it a part if it fits so well?”

His tone was as flirty as his gaze had been, but underneath there was something more. An understanding born of having walked that same path ahead of her.

“I think it always was,” she admitted. To him and to herself both.

He nodded, something like approval passing behind his blue eyes. “And yet, you miss it. Don’t you?”

It was a question, and yet V had the distinct impression Muamar knew the answer already.

She did. Miss it.

Even though it had always been a part she played, an identity superimposed on her before she could even understand who she was by parents that had only known that kind of life. Because what she missed was not being a corpo, it was the structure of it. The rules, the playbook, the charted path.

So, even now, having finally found her own balance among the ever-shifting sand that was the mercenary world, and with so little time left to waste on remorse, she sometimes found herself longing for the kind of order her old life entailed.

She wondered if the reason he seemed to know the answer already was because, for all his talk about fucking corps before they fucked you, he felt that longing too.

Still, she schooled her voice into something sly as she replied, “I miss the espresso machine in my office.”

He laughed, and she breathed a little easier. No reason to unload on him something that wouldn’t even be relevant by the next season change.

The smile he sent her way was however more fond than amused. Softer where it reached his eyes. “That why you pulling long shifts lately? Need the eddies for a new coffee maker, or are you trying to outrun something?”

V blinked, caught off guard.

This wasn’t the first time she had lingered after a delivery to exchange a few lines with him, and it wasn’t even the first time they had talked about something a little deeper than the latest CrystalCoat configuration released by Raifield.

But it was the first time the conversation had felt so personal. And while she could own up to her past, this last question she wasn’t so sure she was ready to face.

“Aren’t we all?” she answered. And it unfortunately came out a lot more guarded than she intended, more telling.

She looked away, readjusting on the tailgate to angle herself straight ahead once more. Hiding her face a little from his continued stare.

Muamar didn’t press, just mirrored her move on the seat and went back to nursing his beer.

Despite the abruptness of its origin, the silence that descended between them was still comfortable and V let it stretch. Quietly enjoying the solid presence beside her.

She was so relaxed, focused on trying to spot a few stars in the too bright night sky, that she startled when her HUD beeped, notifying her that the ride she had called here was now just a few yards away. Her eyes moved to the gate just as her newly acquired Racer, in all its matte glory, glided through it, slowing down until it stopped right in front of her.

Muamar let out a loud whistle, hopping off the tailgate and leaving his almost finished beer on it before moving to get a closer look on her ride.

“Up close, this is a beauty indeed, V. But you betrayed me once already tonight. You’ll break my heart if you tell me you are also buying from the competition now,” he lamented, managing to steal another laugh from her.

She moved too, standing on the opposite side of the bike from him, leaning against the frame just as he crouched low to check out the exposed components on its side.

He checked them out one by one, his eyes flashing a more electric blue than his natural one as his optics scanned each one in details.

“I would never,” she reassured as he continued his investigation. Leaving out the occasional foundling, unplanned AI adoption and unexpected bonuses, it was even true. V had no intention to buy her rides from someone that wasn’t as familiar with her specs as the Capitán was. “This came with a gig. Part of the payment.”

“Good,” Muamar said as, apparently happy with the results of his examination, he abandoned is crouched position, straightening and ending up right in front of V. One hand gripping the closest throttle and the other resting on the saddle.

Still leaning across the bike, V felt his next exhale right on her face. This close, she could smell the bitterness of the ale on his breath, blending with the faded sharpness of the aftershave he must have put on that morning. Pleasant. Just like his company.

“Does it ride as well as it looks?” he asked, voice low, the playful tone she had gotten from him for most of the night gone, replaced by something a lot more heated.

She had to swallow before she could reply, the words caught by the tightness that had suddenly taken over her throat. Her own voice came out lower than she had wanted it to. “I… haven’t had much time to test it, yet.”

“Then let me know when you do. I need to know if I have to step up my game.”

“Your game?” the question came out so low and heated that V knew she was in trouble. Yet the only thing she felt was a pull so strong she feared she would end up toppling over the bike if one of them didn’t take a step back soon.

“Mm, maybe if I improve my gig’s bonuses, you’ll finally play favourites.”

The tone of his explanation resonated straight to V’s spine, while the way his gaze lowered on her lips as he spoke went somewhere else entirely.

And holy shit, she really needed to get on that bike and delta before her tired and slightly tipsy brain made her cross the biggest line ever drawn.

As she fought with herself to back away, Muamar was the one who took a step back first. His own expression going from hazed to puzzled in the span of a second, like he too had not been entirely himself and just regained control over his own mind.

Her own body still thrummed with the echo of the tension that had flared up between them as she exhaled, reaching up to tuck behind one ear the strands that had escaped her now messy bun. Her other hand found the throttle of the Racer, the cool and solid rubber beneath her palm enough to anchor her to reality once more.

“I should go,” she finally said, gesturing to the bike without quite looking at him. Then, after a beat, she added, “Thanks for the drink.”

“I owed you one, didn’t I?” he replied, his voice easing back into something lighter.

She swung a leg over the bike, settling onto the seat before reversing it in the small space between them. “Still didn’t expect you to pay up tonight. Was a nice surprise.”

“I was already up,” he said, is tone amused like there was some kind of joke there that V could not understand.

One hand adjusting the grip on the throttle and the other resting on her thigh, V started the engine but, for a moment, just sat there. Letting the low vibration ground her. Preparing to face everything that waited for her outside this little corner of NC he had carved out for himself.

When she did look back at him, whatever flicker had passed between them was gone. Packed neatly away behind a familiar grin. She matched it. “See you around, Capt’n.”

He nodded and took another step back. Giving her space. “Do me a favour, V. Keep yourself alive.”

The added distance made it easier to finally gun the throttle and lose herself back into Night City.

His parting words did not.

------------------------

The elevator doors of the Glen condo closed behind her with a tired wheeze. V, feeling just as exhausted and used as they were, leaned against the wall, letting her head fall back until it knocked softly against the Valentinos’ graffiti painted on the chrome panel there.

Her stomach churned with the few sips of Calavera she did have and the too many feelings she had not planned to walk into that night.

“Real smooth back there, V.”

She closed her eyes, inhaling deeply and exhaling, loudly, from her mouth, “I did not ask for notes, Johnny.”

Opening her eyes, she found him leaning on the other side of the elevator. Arm crossed and glasses dangling from one hand, his expression made her wish he had his own body just so she could punch him.

“Doesn’t mean you don’t need them. That was painful to watch, choom.”

“And no one made you,” she shot back, closing her eyes again.

Silence stretched just long enough for her to convince herself he’d let it drop.

“You like him.” No such luck.

“He is my fixer,” she said, and that should have been enough even without considering the whole dying thing. Didn’t matter if she liked him, and they both knew she did, so no getting around that, mixing biz and pleasure always ended in disaster.

Johnny, and Rogue could probably testify on it, had apparently not learned that particular lesson, “so? Doesn’t mean you gotta act like a braindead gonk every time he looks at you like he wants to take a bite.”

“I do not –”

“V,” he interrupted, his voice getting serious, “maybe it’s not the worst idea. Giving a damn about something.”

She opened her eyes and looked at him fully now, arm crossed and disbelief making her question if maybe she should give a call to Viktor to check up on the relic. “You serious? This from the guy that threatened me with bodily harm every time River so much as blinked at me?”

Johnny rolled his eyes and, looking at her like she had just tried to plug a data shard into a toaster, said, “That gonk was a badge. And you didn’t even like him.”

Her brow rose. Yeah, she was definitely hallucinating the whole conversation. More than usual, that is. “And Muamar was a Corpo. That really better for you?”

He snorted, “Yeah, and he had at least ‘nough brain to get the fuck out on his own. The badge had to be booted out.” He paused, his gaze flicking to the roof of the elevator, then back to her. “Look, I’m just saying… a little fire in your chest wouldn’t hurt. Might even make you start giving a shit again.”

V’s breath caught. Her mind conjuring up memories that were not her own. Of a fire that burned so bright it changed the City’s skyline forever. Of another woman, another netrunner, he could not save, dying in his arms as he pleaded.

“I do give a shit,” she murmured, but even to her own ears it sounded defensive.

He looked at her, and V wondered how often he saw echoes of Alt when he did so. How often regret darkened his thoughts.

The elevator slowed and he shook his head.

“About yourself, V.”

The doors opened with a low chime. But Johnny was already gone.

Chapter Text

>> [ V ]

The summer storm hit just as V pulled into the parking lot outside the Afterlife.

The sky over Charter Hill had been an almost electric blue, bright and clear, as she had left the district. Now however, not even an hour later, it was dumping half the bay’s humidity straight onto Little China.

Steam rose from the pavement as big drops crashed on it with accelerated velocity, and her boots splashed into a shallow pool as she slammed the V-Tech’s door and bolted across the few yards to the club’s stairwell.

She stopped as soon as she reached the twin doors above ground, as if an invisible wall had arrested her momentum.

It had a name and a laugh so loud it could silence the whole bar, that wall. And it was its absence, not its presence, that always made the first step down so damn hard.

For a heartbeat, she let herself remember the way Jack had leaned against that same door once, waiting for her so they could cross it together. The way he had said ‘Major Leagues, chica. This is it’, giving her a slap on the shoulder so strong she had almost tumbled down the stairs. The way he had grabbed her not a moment later to keep her from falling.

There was no one to steady her now, and she let herself feel the pain of that empty space for a moment longer.

Then, she swallowed the knot in her throat, squared her shoulders, and down the steps she went, skipping the last three to land with a heavy thud at the bottom of the stairs.

By the time she reached the neon-green sign reminding patrons exactly what piece of NC’s history they were entering, her tank top clung to her back in damp patches. The cold temperature inside, that no one seemed to have bothered adjust since the place previous stint as a morgue, biting straight through the soaked fabric.

Her body gave a small, involuntary shiver.

At the end of the corridor, Emmerick saluted her with a slow nod, moving aside to let her in without a word. That first time, he had all but laughed in their faces as they had cockily demanded to be let in. Proclaiming themselves the next big thing.

Now, even though Rogue still wouldn’t toss her a job to save her own ass, V’s cred spoke for itself. People knew who she was. What she’d lived through. And those doors were open for her without needing to drop anyone’s name if not her own.

There was nothing sweet to balance the bitterness of it all, she thought as, returning the nod, she stepped through them.

Inside, the Afterlife was almost empty. Most of the translucent vats - where several dancers usually floated like caged mermaids - left vacant, the beat of the music lower, and the lights brighter. 

Midnight through dawn was when business flourished and most deals were made. So, at half past noon, V was not surprised to find only a few seats at the bar taken and most booths free of mercs and low-tier fixers negotiating their next gig and payout.

Behind the bar, Claire was drying glasses, listening with what looked like very little interest to a heavily inebriated merc half sprawled across her counter. As she passed them, V sent her a nod and a raised eyebrow, receiving a playful eye roll and a smile in return.

Amused, V pressed on, ignoring the few heads turning around and only responding in kind to a few of the nods sent her way as she moved towards the back.

Rogue emerged from the door in the back just as V approached it.  Her cold gaze skimmed over the merc like they barely knew each other, acknowledging her presence only at the very last moment and with a movement so small that could hardly be even called a nod.

V didn’t react – one way or the other – just kept going her own way.

So much for making amends, she thought at Johnny as she stepped inside Nix’s room.

What he sent back was a snort and an overly confident ‘she’ll come around’, that V had troubles believing.

The broom closet Nix called office was dark and even colder than the rest of the Afterlife, kept at a freezing temperature to compensate the heat coming from the servers humming away in a corner and ease his dives into the net.

Nix himself was half propped on his desk, the smoke from his cigarette mixing with the frozen vapor coming from the vents above him.

“So,” he said without any preamble, “ya got the book?”

V raised the hand that carried the old Zetatech XPR and grinned, “ya got my eddies?”

“As I said, V. I am a serious man. Amount as agreed. All yours.”

Her HUD pinged with the transfer at the same time Nix extended his hand to get the pad. The amount was as agreed, but now that she knew what the spellbook actually was she also knew it was well below what she could have asked for.

Still, she handed it over without pushing for more. “Thanks a bunch.”

Goodwill was, in her line of work, at time more valuable than eddies. And after Rogue’s glacial welcome in the hall, she decided she could use some here.

“Don’t mention it. It’s money well deserved,” he responded, grabbing the pad and plugging it into his rig. As the screen booted up and streams of code flashed on the side monitor, he asked, “Exchange was clean?”

V would have been offended had he not asked the question with a tone that sounded more like small talk than actual concern.

“It was. The seller was nothing more than a low ranking corpo, making a few side eddies by lifting antiquities from a forgotten storage cupboard. No one is even gonna notice the spellbook is missing.”

Nix hummed his approval just as a message popped up on the corner of his screen.

From her position, V could not see its content or sender, but she caught the shift in Nix expression. His face going from eager to confused in the time it took him to read it. Before she could ask, a particularly nasty piece of ICE also rebutted his ongoing first attempt at breaking in.

By the look of it, extracting any actual spell from the book was going to take a while.

Nix must have reached the same conclusion, because he turned back to look at her with an apologetic expression, “ah, sorry to disappoint V. Our magical friend here’s trying to connect to the net. Which one, I’ve got no clue, seen as it was coded before the crash. Gonna have to sandbox it all the same.”

V caught the dismissal in his voice and nodded, “See ya, then. Let me know if you manage to extract anything useful.”

“Of course. Later, V,” he said, his focus captured once more by the XPR before V had even crossed the door.

V did not linger, and when she reached the bar, Claire moved to meet her as soon she slid onto a stool. The drunken merc was nowhere to be seen.

“Get you anything, V?”

“Thanks. But no bite,” V nodded.

Claire smiled and moved up the bar again, picking up bottles and ingredients as she went.

The drink she deposited in front of V a few moments later had the colour of amber, smelled like honey, and was garnished with an orange twist and a chili pepper.

V let the first sip coat her mouth before raising an eyebrow at Claire, “Is this a virgin Johnny Silverhand?”  

“Spot on,” Claire replied just as Johnny, glitching in the seat beside V, said, “that is an abomination.”

V grinned, suppressing the urge to toast him. Instead, she took another sip, enjoying the drink’s sweetness and his offended expression. He glitched away after sending her drink a last disgusted glance.

“So, how is it going, Claire?” V asked, her attention going back to the part-time bartender, part-time mechanic.

“Can’t complain. Haven’t even had a fight here in two days, so that’s a plus. And a record,” she answered, making V smile. “And you? Looks like you’ve been through it,” Claire continued after watching V take a few more sips, voice light but with that hint of warmth she reserved for V since the merc had helped her put to rest her own demons.

V first instinct was to respond as she usually did to this, now quite common, line of questioning. With an attempted diversion. It almost never worked, but a girl could dream. “Night City’s weather. Crazy downpour outside,” she offered, her short nails tapping a repeating rhythm onto the glass.

Claire’s expression was anything but impressed. “Weather doesn’t put that kind of weight under the eyes.”

V didn’t really want to explain, couldn’t even know how, so she took another sip and remained silent.

Claire tried again, “that’s why you haven’t been around much?”

“Not much reason for me to come. You know Rogue is not my biggest fan,” she mumbled in response, starting to regret the lack of spirits in her drink a little.

“Eh, she’ll come around,” Claire responded, echoing Johnny’s earlier prediction. “Your name has been bouncing around here quite a lot, you know.”

That caught V’s attention, “that right?”

Popularity for a merc was a double sword edge. Having enough cred to be on the top fixers radar was obviously a necessity to get access to the best jobs, and V was now clearly in possess of enough of it to have her pick of both fixers and jobs. But while becoming an Afterlife legend was always the dream, having too much notoriety also came with obvious downsides if earning a spot on the menu was more of a long-term goal than a pressing one.

For V, whose plan to get added to the menu was kind of short term but also required keeping her body from actually flatlining, the downsides far outweighed the upsides.

“More than,” Claire confirmed, hands on the bar and leaning in a little. “Mercs talk, and from what I hear you are at the top of the call sheet for solo gigs nowadays.”

“Meaning… I have to watch my back more than usual?”

“No,” Claire shook her head, “I’ve even heard a few regulars taking bets on how long till Rogue caves. So, no more than usual, I think. But it does mean you have been taking jobs one after the other.”

V exhaled, relieved this latest development would not immediately add to the growing pile of things she already had to worry about. “Yeah,” she said, her fingers resuming their tapping against the glass, “guess I’ve been kinda busy.”

Claire gave her a sad smile, “busy is one thing. Overwhelmed is another.”

V let her eyes fall to the last few drops of amber liquid inside the glass, wondering how transparent she must be for everyone around her to pick up so easily on the fatigue that was, like Johnny, her constant companion these days.

“I’m fine, Claire,” she said when the silence between them became a little too long. The smile that accompanied her reassurance further proof of her inability to lie to save her life.

The way Claire looked at her reminded V of Mama Welles. “Sure,” she said, in the same tone someone might use for if you say so. But she didn’t push further, just reached for a towel and started wiping the counter.

As V searched for something to say, a tall guy in a cheap brown suite and thin, circular glasses approached them, coming to perch on the seat right beside V.

“Hey,” he said without any preamble, “interested in some work?”

V straightened in her seat, sending Claire a look that was meant to say something along the line of is this guy for real?

Claire hid the laugh she was clearly trying to suppress behind her hand, shrugging before regaining her composure. “I’ll give you two a minute,” she finally said, moving away down the counter.

With a sigh, V turned her gaze back to the guy, the NCPD file search Viktor had injected into her optics naming him as one Dennis Cranmer, no affiliation found. Not a fixer then.

“Doing what?” she asked, curiosity getting the better of her.

“A business opportunity – cargo transport. Get from A to B, quick and quiet,” he explained, “interested?”

V could be, but she also needed like more information.

“You oughta run this by a fixer first,” she said.

There were usually only a handful of reasons to bypass a fixer. Saving on their fee, when the gig was nothing incredibly complicated and could be done solo, was one and not even so uncommon. Being persona non grata, was another, and also a very different story.

“Fuck the middlemen. They are cash drains.”

So, it was money. V could work with that.

“Attitude like that won’t get ya far in this line of work,” she said anyway.

While her own first major experience working with a fixer had notoriously not been the ideal example of the support one of them could provide to a merc, her latest ones had done a lot of work towards the complicated task of changing her mind.

Some even more than others.

“I don’t need a consultant – I need a transporter. Will you do it or not?” Cranmer urged, the lit cig between his fingers releasing small clouds of smoke between them and making V’s nose itch.

Now, V could say no and just find something else to fill her day. But Padre and Regina were still desaparecidos, she had no interest in driving out to either Pacifica or the Badlands after the previous day, and Dino and Wakako’s jobs always tended to require a sort of finesse V was not sure she could deliver that day.

El Capitán… was not really an option she felt like exploring so soon after her awkward performance the previous night.

Going over Rouge’s head in her own house, however. Well, V had always been a little bit petty like that.

“I’m listenin’.”

Cranmer nodded, satisfied, and launched into explaining the gig, “it’s simple. You go to the Kabuki waterfront, collect the package, give me a call, then I tell you how to deliver it. Very straightforward.”

It seemed so. But so had been Hands own package retrieval on the brief.

Still. “Yeah… everything except my pay.”

“Don’t worry,” he said, confidence oozing from every syllable. “There’s a bonus in it for you – imported and duty-free.”

“Duty-free and detail-free,” V countered.

“Yes, but altogether fair. It’s a simple job, generously compensated. Do you accept?”

V sighed, the guy had really said ‘simple’ one too many times for it to be anything but. And yet, the merc side of her won over the analyst one. “Yeah, sure. I’m in.”  

“Good, I knew we’d find acceptable terms,” Cranmer said. “Head to the Kabuki waterfront, then search for a fridge with the words ‘No Future’. Once you locate it, collect what you find inside, then call me for further instructions.”

As he finished his explanation V’s HUD pinged with the new contact.

“Hmph,” she said raising from her seat, already planning the best route to the waterfront in her mind. “Till then I guess.”

-----

>> [ V ]

Kabuki at that hour was a mess of voices, smells, and heat. Early afternoon meant the streets were very much alive with vendors shouting over sizzling grills, bargain hunters haggling over junk tech, kids darting between market stalls and barracks, and Claws prowling their domain.

As she descended the stairs on Malley’s towards the waterfront, the chatter and chaos thinned into a quieter, distant murmur.

V stopped on the landing in front of one of the hundreds abandoned Buck-a-Slice scattered across the City, casually leaning against the rail that opened on the barracks haphazardly assembled on the sand.

The job was simple, get in, find the package, and get out. But this was Tiger’s turf and while V had managed to avoid an all-out feud with them, not in small part thanks to Wakako’s connections, she still was not their favourite person. Doing this without raising their attention would be in everyone’s interest.

Her optics flickered green as she surveyed the area in search of the perfect entry point. She found it in the guise of two young Claws leaning together against one of the barracks down below, their side activities clearly taking precedence over the security details they had probably been assigned to and any form of vigilance whatsoever.

“Ah, young love,” mocked Johnny, propping himself beside her on the railing.

She suppressed an amused smile, focusing on the lines of code cascading across her vision.

>> [BREACH PROTOCOL INITIATED]

One quick script and a backdoor thrown wide open later, and the ICE of the closest man shuttered like glass against a bullet, leaving her free to roam their local network. Its nodes lighting up like a Christmas tree on her HUD.

She threaded her way into their system, cycling through the few individual camera feeds she found there until she located what she had been looking for. Almost at the northernmost end of the beach, inside one of the shacks that had been fashioned as arcades for the locals, waited seemingly undisturbed the fridge Cranmer had described. The tag proclaiming “No Future” – and wasn’t that just ironic – clearly visible through the camera feed.

With her target pinpointed, V looped through the cameras once more, scooping out an infiltration route that would minimize her chances to be intercepted. Aside from the two busy exchanging fluids, there were only a handful of Claws in the area, and, luckily enough, none of them seemed interested or aware of the package she had been tasked to retrieve. Not one of them was even positioned close to it.

Sneakers barely making a sound on the concrete, she resumed her descend.

Her daemons and optics would do the heavy lifting in keeping her hidden from prying eyes as she descended towards the shack. Still, just to be safe, she untied the tight high braid she usually collected her hair in with quick and efficient movements, letting the dark strands free to frame her face. Hiding her most recognizable features at a quick, passing glance.

With the exception of a few civilians loitering outside the shack bordering the one housing the package, who ignored her completely, she managed to reach her destination undetected.

Inside, the humidity from the waterfront and the heat released by the arcades lining up one wall mixed with the smell of rusting metal coming from the recycled walls.

After a quick scan that didn’t flag any threat, V didn’t waste time, grabbing the fridge door and yanking it open.

With a yelp she backed away, narrowly avoiding the middle-aged man that tumbled out of it. “Oh shit…”

Johnny chose that moment to appear once more, arms crossed and leaning slightly forward to get a better look at the man sprawled on the floor at his feet, “Would you look at that. Another babysitting job.”

V closed her eyes, breathing slowly, counting each exhale.

At ten, she felt calm enough to check on the package. Her optics flared up with diagnostics. The guy was dehydrated, could use a dose or two of painkillers, and would undoubtedly benefit from a good night of sleep, but all considered, he was doing fine.

“He’s in rough shape… but alive,” she said out loud, more to keep herself from screaming than for Johnny’s benefit. The rocker seemed to be endlessly amused by the situation, the grin on his face bright as she hadn’t seen it in a while.

She fired up her holo with an irritated, “let’s see what Dennis has to say…”

The line connected on the second ring, Cranmer’s voice coming through a lot less confident that it had been at the Afterlife. “Hey, got a status? Find the package?”

“You coulda told me the ‘package’ was a man.”

“If it was a box of bananas I’d’ve used the post office. Get over it,” Cranmer said.

His response was so ridiculous, V was at a loss for words for a moment.

Johnny was not. “I kinda like the guy,” he said, crouching to get a better look at the man still on the floor.

V, as often did, ignored him. “Well, who is he?” She asked into the holo instead.

“The ambassador to Mexico,” snapped Cranmer. “Jesus, it doesn’t matter who he is.”

“Oh, I really like him,” doubled down Johnny.

“I prepared a car for you,” continued Cranmer before V could say anything, to either him or Johnny. “Put the man in the trunk and head to Northside. The address is in the GPS.”

“Ok,” V said, her mind evaluating options on how to drag the man to the car.

There was no way she could physically drag, or even worse carry, the guy by herself. Luckily enough he was awake, if not completely lucid, and she did have a Bounce Back with her.

“One more thing,” said Cranmer, “watch for Tygers. They’ve got their sights trained on your new companion.”

“Wait, wait, what? He-… asshole hung up.”

Johnny had the audacity to laugh at that. The point he made when he next spoke was, however, kind of good. “As entertaining as this is, I think we should delta before his friends wise up.”

And this, is why fixers exists, she reminded herself bitterly as she helped the still nameless man take a hit of the Bounce Back.

The guy coughed, shaking as V held his head up. A moment later his eyes focused and his breathing took on a steadier rhythm.

“Gonna need you to help me out a little, man. Cause sure as shit I’m not going to carry you to the car,” she said to him as his eyes found hers.

He seemed to understand, if not the situation at least the urgency of it, because he propped himself up, using her proffered hand to stand.

V positioned herself on his right side, stabilizing him with an arm around his waist while she gripped her Nue in her right hand.

As they started to walk, she circled through the cameras in the area, finding with relief that most of the Claws she had pinged before were still loitering around the barracks at the southern end of the beach. Only three of them had moved closer, chatting right at the top of the stairs she had mapped as part of her escape route.

Taking them head on was not an option. The probability her new friend could catch a stray bullet, in case something went wrong with her daemons and they ended up opening fire, too high to risk it.

Distraction, while not V’s favourite route, would have to do.

The small explosion, courtesy of a can of gas left unattended beside an old and easily overloadable vending machine, rocked one of the empty shacks closest to the sea just as V and her package turned the last corner before the stairs.

All three Claws startled at the explosion, rushing in its direction as soon as raised voices came from the area.

V did not waste time and, as they disappeared around the corner, manoeuvred the man and herself up the stairs and towards the coordinate where the car waited for them. They stumbled a few times, pain blossoming once again in V’s arm where Viktor’s stitches strained against her skin. She also had to stop once to give the guy another puff of Bounce Back when the weight of his arm on her shoulder started to slip.

But her distraction worked, and they managed to reach the small Thorton without being noticed by the Tygers.

As instructed, she helped him into the trunk, leaving the half empty Bounce Back with him in case of need, before taking the wheel and rushing to the meeting point pre-loaded on the car’s GPS.

Her destination ended up not being far, a parking lot in the shadow of Megabuilding H10, on Kennedy Ave, and she got them there without further complications.

Cranmer was already waiting for them in the otherwise empty lot.

V killed the engine, popped the trunk, and helped the man she had been hired to deliver out. He looked a little less like death warmed over now, but still wobbled a little on his feet as he managed to walk on his own the few paces to join Cranmer.

“Job’s done,” she said, shutting the trunk with a dull thunk and joining them herself.

Cranmer’s eyes flickered between her and the man, “I can see that. Well done, excellent work.” His tone softened as his gaze finally stopped on the man, “holdin’ in there all right, Haruyoshi?”

Haruyoshi straightened, breathing slow but steady. “Dennis give me hope,” he said, voice gravelly from the dehydration, like that could explain the bizarre turn of events that had been his rescuing.

V crossed her arms, focusing once more on her client, “early warning about the Tygers would’ve been nice.”

“I had a hunch you’d manage this just fine,” Cranmer replied with a faint smirk.

Johnny materialized beside her, cocking his head in her direction.  “A hunch?” he echoed.

The answer didn’t sit right with V either. She had assumed – and that had been her mistake alright – that the guy had approached the first merc he had found at the Afterlife, driven by urgency. But a hunch, was not something you could use to justify withholding that kind of information unless you had a pretty good idea of the mercs capabilities.  

The guy had, at the very least, known who she was before proposing the gig.

“Given that you’re here now, I see I was right,” Cranmer continued when she didn’t offer a reply.

Still, the gig was closed and there was little reason for her to know how the guy had gotten her name. Claire herself had said V had been object of gossip among the Afterlife mercs lately, so there was a good chance Cranmer had been pointed in her direction by someone there.

The identity of the man she had just smuggled from under the nose of the Claws, she was definitely more curious to know. “So, who is this guy?”

“He’ll tell you his story. Haruyoshi?”

Haruyoshi adjusted his plaid blazer, drawing himself up like he was about to address a lecture hall, “in Japan, brain surgeon, top of all. Good instinct. One day, Tyger Claw boss need surgery. But... boss die on table! Tyger Claws were very angry. I hide in boat, swim to America. Here Dennis save me. But there is secret –” he leaned forward slightly, eyes glinting in the afternoon light, “I kill Tyger Claw boss on purpose. World best surgeon make no mistake!”

Still loitering beside her, Johnny let out a sharp laugh, “this guy? I like him better.”

V shook her head, wondering just how much of that could actually be true. Maybe it was the Bounce Back mixed with the dehydration, but she couldn’t really peg the guy as a brain surgeon, famous or not.

Still, one thing was accepting a lowly gig under Rogue’s nose, another was stepping on a Tyger’s claw. She hoped Wakako would not get word about this.

“This’s all very heartwarming, but you haven’t paid me yet,” she said, now eager to cut the conversation short and to close the gig.

“I know,” Cranmer replied, pointing to the shiny katana propped up one of the barrels beside him just as her HUD pinged with a transfer. “Here… may this blade serve you well.”

As far as bonuses went, the sword had nothing on the Racer she had received just the night before. She was not going to make use of it, that was a given, but she could still sell it or even mount it as a decoration for her apartment.

She nodded her thanks, and before she could say anything more, Cranmer stepped aside, helping Haruyoshi back to the Thorton before the strange duo disappeared into the late afternoon traffic.

Leaving a puzzled V alone with her new prize and Johnny’s lingering amusement.

-----

>> [ V ]

“You know,” Judy said a few hours later, her hand hovering over the two pizza boxes she had set up on the small table by the couch at least half an hour before. “Sometimes I forget you used to be a Corpo. And then you go and order artichoke and avocado pizza.”

From her sprawled position on the opposite side of Judy’s sofa, back propped up on all the decorative cushions she had managed to get her hands on, and with her socked feet resting diagonally on the back of the couch, V raised an eyebrow at her.

“What’s wrong with artichokes and avocado?” V asked, taking a bite from her second helping of the aforementioned pizza with a satisfied hum.

The more solid texture of the artichokes balanced out the buttery consistence of the avocado and the creaminess of the cheese below perfectly. It was all synthetic, of course, down to the basil’s fabricated aroma, and miles away from the perfection of the natural ingredients she had routinely enjoyed in her previous life. But, with the exception of those sold by Buck-a-Slice, pizza was always a great deal better than most of NC’s other fast-food offerings.

Judy scrunched her nose as she settled on a slice of tofu tuna and pineapple, going back to her position on the couch, back flushed to the backrest and legs folded on the seat like a praying monk.

“Nothing wrong with them, but together on pizza they are a hell of a personality statement,” she said before taking a quick bite off her own slice.

“Pretentious with a sweet aftertaste. She got you there,” interjected Johnny, glitching on the couch between them. With how wide his legs were splayed he would have occupied half the couch by himself had he been corporeal on it.

Without much though, V stuck her tongue out at him, not sure if she should be more offended about the pretentious or the sweet descriptor he had given her.

Judy’s gaze settled right on Johnny, where V had directed her childish rebut. Her expression turned apprehensive. “Is he here?”

As Johnny waved is hand in mock salute towards a blissfully ignorant Judy, V wondered for the hundredth time if explaining what was truly going on with her to the few friends she had managed to assemble in the last few months had been a good idea.

The list of those in the known had grown well over her comfort zone, with Judy, River, and Panam – who was of course a package deal with Saul and Mitch, joining the already informed Viktor, Misty, Mama Welles – who V was sure had told Padre, Rogue, and Kerry in quick sequence.

On one side, not having to come up with an excuse every time the Relic decided to malfunction – something that was now starting to happen with an almost daily frequency – was a welcome change. Seeing the hurt on her friends faces each time she had regaled them with a painfully obvious lie was not something she would miss or could even stand anymore. So that, was a clear bonus.

The other side of that choice, however, were the worried faces and endless redundant conversations.

Are you alright?

Do you have any new lead?

What can we do?

There must be something we can do!

V hadn’t been the subject of so much concern since before she was even conceived, when her now long gone parents had needed to resort to their platinum insurance to bring her into this rotten word. She had not been there to witness that bout of preoccupation, obviously, so now, twenty-seven years later, she really had no clue on how to bear this level of fussing.

“Technically, he is not.”

Humour and diversion had become her go to responses. The lack of any kind of positive result not enough to discourage her from persisting in her use of them.

Right on clue, Judy let out a weary “V” just as Johnny did the same. Both of them pointedly looking at her with scarily similar expressions.

“Alright, alright,” she conceded, moving to mirror Judy’s position on the couch, palms raised in a surrender gesture. “But it’s not unusual. Also, I haven’t even had a malfunction today and the last one yesterday was so small, just a hiccup, really.”

The fact that hiccup had almost ended up with her catching a bullet, Judy didn’t really need to know.

Johnny snorted his disagreement. She ignored him.

The frown that had formed on Judy’s brow did not ease, “V, you are running yourself ragged.”

“Says the woman who hasn’t left her rig in two days?”

“That’s work, V. This is…” Judy gestured at her. At the faint tremor of her fingers where they held the remains of her slice of pizza, at the bandage on her arm, where blood had once again marred the white gauze after her afternoon stint as a crouch for a two-hundred-pound man. “This is you acting like the clock’s already run out.”

V exhaled, letting her head drop on the back of the couch. “Might be it has,” she murmured.

“Don’t,” Judy’s tone sharpened in an instant. “Don’t talk like that.”

Johnny’s own ‘V’ was equally sharp.

“Why not?” she demanded, turning her head only slightly to look at them, without lifting it from the support provided by the couch. “You want me to pretend everything’s peachy?”

“I want you to stop acting like you’re already gone,” Judy stated, holding her gaze. “You are still here, V. Start acting like it.”

“Good luck with that. Been telling her for weeks and she’s still being a gonk,” said Johnny, as if Judy could hear him.

V didn’t have an answer for that. Because the true was that she didn’t know how. Didn’t know how to find the strength to go back to chasing miracles that never were.

She swallowed. The familiar knot in her throat making its unsurprising appearance.

Before she could think of something to say to derail the conversation – maybe she could ask Judy about things at Cloud, that would work – her HUD pinged with a new message.

>> [NEW MESSAGE]
>> [Muamar “El Capitán” Reyes]
>> [Sold the Thorton already, if you can believe it. Gonna need you to work your magic again soon. I’ll bring the drinks.]

Heat crept up the back of her neck, travelling right to her cheeks, before she could do anything to stop it.

“Gotta give it to the guy, he doesn’t waste time,” said Johnny, whose unrestricted access to her every thought and feed always proved to be an unlimited source of vexation for V.

She rolled her eyes at him. And it was clearly the worst move possible, as Judy locked onto the movement like a nasty daemon on a poorly ICED net.

“What was that?” she asked, eyes narrowing.

“Nothing,” said V, too fast for someone that actually had nothing to hide. “Just a text. Work,” she amended quicky.

Judy’s suspicious expression split into the widest grin, filling V with dread. “So it’s ’just work’ making you blush like a Joytoy out on their first gig?”

“What?”

“Was it from River?” Judy prodded.

“What?!” The heat in her cheeks gave way to a horrified expression. River was a great friend, and just that, thank you very much. He had also recently expressed to V an interest in a certain Aldecaldo friend of theirs after meeting her while said friend helped V out with a gig, so.

Judy, well aware of the whole thing, laughed. “C’mon V, out with it!”

“It is work, you know,” she said, looking at her slice of pizza with great interest. “One of the fixers.”

The brief moment of silence seemed to last an eternity and was as loud as what the Maelstroms called music down at Totentanz.

“Holy shit, V. A fixer?”

V groaned, dragging a hand over her face, “yeah, yeah, I know.”

Beside her, Johnny was grinning like a maniac, and once again V felt that urge to find a way to procure a body for him that was not her own just so she could punch him.

Judy too was clearly enjoying herself. “You don’t really have the best track record with fixers, do you? But then again, doesn’t take much to find one better than DeShawn.”

“There is nothing going on,” V protested.

“But he makes you blush, and smile like that,” Judy continued, undeterred. “Maybe there should be.”

The words hit hard, echoing Johnny’s own from the night before. The knot in her throat came with a vengeance. And a lot tighter than before.

Judy studied her for a bit, taking a bite of her pizza and chewing for a moment. When she spoke again, there was less teasing in her voice, more softness, “Fighting can be easier than giving up, you know? If you can find something worth it…”

Johnny chose that moment to scoot closer to her, his movements overexaggerated, like his intention had only been to better adjust himself on the couch. His projected shoulder now touching her own.

V closed her eyes and wished she could feel its weight.

-----

>> [ Viktor ]

The lab Mr. Hands had put together inside Dogtown’s bowels was not so different from the one Viktor had made for himself out of Misty’s basement.

The light coming from the overhead strips of LED were brighter and the space definitely bigger, but the smell of ozone and antiseptic was the same. Just like the thick cables coiled over the floor like lazy snakes, carrying power to a few consoles and several racks of humming hardware arranged around the space with little reason.

Seated at one of those consoles, Viktor watched the latest batch of logs from V’s diagnostic tool crawl across the display. Each marker appearing on the screen accompanied by a comparison to its previously collected datapoint. So far, they had all come with a flashing warning. He leaned in, as if proximity alone could somehow change the data.

The degradation pattern was accelerating.

He took off his glasses, pinching the bridge of his nose while muttering a curse. They needed to move faster.

From the corner of the lab, where a couch and a pair of perfectly matched chairs made up an improvised break area, Mr. Hands voice come unhurried.

“Thank you, Wakako,” he said, pausing a moment to listen to what the fixer at the other side of his holo said. “Good, I’ll let our doctors know. Be in touch.”

Viktor turned his chair on its wheels, leaving behind the worrisome data and focusing on Hands.

The furniture – apparently scavenged from Hands latest office renovation – really looked like it belonged in an exec’s waiting lounge, not in an abandoned parking garage. Mr. Hands fit on the couch there perfectly, legs crossed, posture relaxed.

Despite what Viktor had heard about the guy, and the hours spent agonizing over the choice to reach out to the fixer for help, the man had not yet done anything to make him regret going behind V’s back. Quite the opposite, actually.

 “Our brain surgeon is on the way,” he announced, tone level as if discussing the weather, not matters of life and death.

Sitting at the station beside Viktor’s own, Emilia Kess swivelled in her chair to face the fixer too. “Even with him, we’re missing too many pieces. If we want a chance to bring the project to competition in a matter of weeks, we need to move faster,” she said, giving voice to what was painfully clear to all of them. “If the subject even has that much time,” she added as an afterthought.

“She’s held on this long.” The words come out of Viktor’s mouth before he could ever think about filtering them, harsher than he wanted them to be.

Kess did not flinch. Viktor could not really fault her for the level of detachment she constantly showed. It was natural, born both by years working for Arasaka and by the hollow luxury of not having an attachment to the subject. The last one was something that would have made Viktor’s own work a lot easier but also something he would never wish for.

The smile on Hands’ face didn’t falter at the exchange, but he raised from his seat, adjusting invisible creases on his tailored pants as he did. “The timeline is tight but defined,” he said, and there was a hint of steel in his voice that Viktor had rarely heard, more used to the salesman tone the fixer usually favoured, “and our girl will keep.”

Viktor wondered, not for the first time, how much of Hands motivation was driven by eddies and how much by something else he had yet to find a name for and much closer to Viktor’s own.

“Now, I’ll leave you to it and go welcome the latest member of our team.”

He disappeared towards the garage’s entrance area, behind the prefabricated walls that had been arranged to delimit the lab inside the underground space.

Kess went back to her numbers without so much of a word.

Their next update was scheduled later that night, so Viktor too returned to his own data. On his screen, a 3D scan of V’s neural pathways spun slowly. A ball of multicoloured yarn marred with too many red threads. Paths V’s consciousness had already been banned from ever travelling again.

The surgeon Wakako had arranged safe travel for would have to unravel that mess, managing to find a way to restore access were Viktor had failed.

His jaw tensed. That realization, that he could had never solved that issue on his own with the time V had left, had been the one to drive him to seek help at last.

There had been nothing to do for Jackie when death had come to his door. Viktor not even aware that something had gone wrong until Guadalupe’s frantic call had reached him. Her grief put aside in her search for the still missing V. They had thought her gone too, after a few days. The grief adding up to an unbearable weight.

Then the Arasaka guy had brought V to him, barely hanging on, but alive. Viktor had managed to bring her back to life then, fighting tooth and nail against a literal bullet to her brain, only for grief to add once more to the pile as it became clear that would be a temporary measure at best.

But with every new paper read, contact reached, and line of inquiry explored, the edges of that death sentence had started to become a lot less defined, giving way to the bare outline of something that resembled hope.

Viktor looked back at the screen, where the pale green neural patterns that were still V’s to command shined through among all the red. He wouldn’t stop searching for a cure until the very last one had turned red, and even then, he would find a way to just reframe the parameters of his search and continue.  

He would not fail the kid. Not like he had Jackie.

-----

>> [ V ]

The outside air hit her as soon as V pushed through the door from Judy’s floor into the outdoor landing. The metal stairwell creaked as usual as she started down on it. A thick humidity still clung to the air after the morning storm, making each breath damp and heavy.

Halfway down, her HUD fractured. A sudden scatter of ghosted UI elements flashing in and out of place as a jagged burst of static lanced up from the base of her skull. White-hot pain sharp enough to blur her vision.

She caught the rail with one hand, leaning onto it until the spike receded. Each breath sounding loud and ragged to her own ears.

When she managed to look up again, Johnny was there, propped against the rail at her side.

“That the ‘hiccup’ you told the Mox chick about?” he asked, his voice dry. “Hate to break it to you, V, but that wasn’t small.”

“It’s fine,” she rasped out, pushing off the rail and starting down again on legs that were now a touch less solid than before. She set one hand on the railing once more, just in case. “Just a blip.”

“Blip my ass,” he shot back, glitching at the bottom of the stairs.

She ignored him, searching with her eyes for the Racer in the almost empty parking space as she descended the last set of steps. She found the bike near the far corner, closer to the main road exit.

Johnny lingered on the last step as she reached it. Had he been corporeal, he would have blocked her way. She stopped, pointedly looking at him.

His tone did not have the same bite as before when he spoke again. “She’s right you know. Not all, fighting not easier than giving up, that’s just bullshit. But it’s worth doing. You gotta find a reason, V.”

Her grip tightened on the rail. “What if I can’t?”

And why did her voice sound so small?

He shrugged. “Then make one. Or borrow one. Destroying Arasaka’s always a good choice,” he said, managing to steal a smile out of her. He grinned at that. “Doesn’t matter which. As long as it keeps you breathing.”

He glitched out of the stairs then and didn’t reappear.

Alone, V looked up, at the clear sky and at the few stars that dared to shine bright enough to be visible despite the City’s heavy light pollution, and did just what he asked. She breathed.

Chapter Text

V’s dreams had stopped being her own a long time ago.

Since she had woken up in Viktor’s chair with a bullet hole in her brain and a surprise passenger in her head, her nights had been filled with Johnny’s memories.

V had not been alive for any of the four Corporate Wars, yet she now knew the stink of diesel over the scorched earth of Mexico, the copper taste of dust kicked up by troop carriers, and the way the sky turned to blood when enough bombs were dropped all at once on the field. She could tell, with painful precision, the difference between Johnny’s screams. The way his voice never broke as he sang his rebellion on a stage, and the way it did, raw and jagged, as he bled out on a battlefield.

Tonight, however, when she opened her eyes into Morpheus’ realm, there was no battlefield or stage to welcome her. Tonight, it was Evelyn Parker.

The woman was lounging on one of the fine couches of the Konpeki Plaza’s suite, the smoke from her cigarette rising in lazy clouds around her face as Yorinobu Arasaka strangled his father, the emperor, just a few paces away.

Caged inside the familiar pillar, V screamed for her to flee, to find a way out. But her voice, just like her fists pounding on the monolith glass, made no sounds.

Evelyn’s eyes found V’s own anyway, just as Yorinobu’s hands left Saburo’s breathless throat and he turned on her. “Remember V,” she said, voice calm and sweet like honey, “there are two kinds of fixers.”

Then Yorinobu’s figure obscured her from sight and V moved fast, pivoting to exit the pillar and run to her. But there was no door, no sliding panel behind V.

Just a broken mirror, reflecting V’s bloodied face back to her. Her hands were trembling, covered in blood that was not her own.

V knew this. Knew with painful accuracy what waited behind the door that had materialised to her left.

She didn’t bother washing away the blood – it’ll always be there anyway. But she picked up her gun, finger tight on the trigger, and stepped through. Her body betrayed her, locking up even though she knew she needed to sidestep the punch. On the floor, she raised her arm to shoot, but there was no gun in her hand anymore.

And then DeShawn was there, and she braced for what was to come.

“Quiet life or blaze of glory, Miss V? Make your choice.”

The words looped, once, twice. They fractured, syllables doubling and echoing all around her. Then the shot came. Her ears popped and she felt the bullet chart a path through her brain, bouncing around her mind as if searching for something.

Her eyes closed of their own volition. When she opened them again, the Blackwall stretched as high and as far as she could see.

On the other side of it, Maman Brigitte stood immobile, staring at V with vacant eyes.

“Will you be on the right side, when it all comes down?” she wondered more than asked, her thick accent reverberating through the emptiness around them.

V did not know. Didn’t even know which side she was standing on now. But she raised her palm and touched the wall, hand glitching in and out of existence like she had seen Johnny’s own do countless times, as the blackness rippled and shimmered. She passed through it.

The other side was the back of a cab she could never forget. Her heart beating fast and out of sync as Jackie took his last few breaths beside her.

“Jack,” she pleaded. And finally, finally, her voice had a sound. And it didn’t matter. Because he was already gone.

Tears pooled around her eyes before falling, feeding a puddle at her feet that reflected a light with no source among the darkness that surrounded her. She fell too, hands and knees scrapping against an obsidian floor and the salt she had spilled on it.

“Are you dead yet?”

Jackie’s voice startled her. She turned, lifting her damp hands from the floor, following the sound she had so longed to hear once more. He was waiting for her a few yards away, sitting at the food stand there, eating noodles from a steaming cup.

She tried to stand, to reach him. But her legs wouldn’t work. A force she could not match keeping them tethered to the pool of tears growing on the floor.

Jack raised an eyebrow at her, “So?”

“I’m not,” she responded, still struggling to get up. The water was raising fast now, sloshing around her hips in cold, lazy waves.

He shook his head, smiling like he always did when he thought she was being a little too slow. His voice was soft, fond, as he asked, “then why you actin’ like you are, Chica?”

Once more, V didn’t know. Didn’t know why. Or even how.

She just kept struggling, fighting against that invisible force and the water rising at her throat, wetting her lips with the taste of salt.

As it submerged her, lungs screaming for her to take that final breath and mind refusing to do so, she felt him call her name. Over and over, until, finally, she found herself free to swim to the surface. To him.

The hand that reached out to her from above the water was firm, urgent. But too small and too strong at the same time. Not Jackie’s.

Yet, V thought as she was dragged to the surface with a pull that felt so desperate and as fire filled her lungs, its silver chrome was warmer that she had thought it’d be.

---

She came to with a painful gasp. The weight of phantom water clinging to her chest as her fingers grasped tightly at sweat-soaked sheets.

Around her, the room swam into focus in broken pieces. First, she saw only the panelled ceiling above, then, as she sat up, the almost empty dresser in the corner came into view, followed by rows of books and trinkets nested into the wall in the far distance behind it. Johnny’s figure, leaning on the loft rails in front of her bed and illuminated only by the neon lights of the signs shining outside the ceiling-high windows, was where her gaze stopped.

“You alright?” he said, voice grave. There was a roughness in his tone that V had only heard from him in his own memories.

She swallowed to try and clear her dry throat. Jackie’s ghost and his questions lingering in her mind. “Yeah, just a –”

He HUD fractured and her throat closed up before she could finish answering. The elements of her interface glitching even behind her closed eyelids as the seemingly unending series of coughing fits made her double over.

An eternity later, when the malfunction ended, there was blood on the hand she had brough to her mouth in a too familiar reflex.

Looking up from the crimson reminder of her condition, her eyes met its reason.

Johnny didn’t say anything, waiting for her to find her voice again. But his expression had gotten even sourer, and his patience was a thousand times more concerning than his usual agitation.

V found herself wishing she could go back to dream about stages she had never set foot on or songs she could not even attempt to sing.

Sleep and weariness making every movement a battle, she took advantage of the rare grace he was giving her, reaching blindly for the small bottle of Vatnajökull on her nightstand and downing half of it. After being left on her bedside table for at least two days, the liquid wasn’t even cold, yet every sip felt like a panacea in that moment.

When she felt her throat had finally regained its capacity to produce coherent sounds and her nerves had steeled enough, she looked back at Johnny. “I’ll go see Viktor. That enough to skip the lecture?”

He shook his head with a sigh, untangling his crossed arms so his hands could move to grip the railing behind him. “Had to fight to pull you up this time, V. Old ripper not gonna cut it anymore. Need to find something fast.”

“Like what?” she exhaled, struggling to even get the words out.

“You have Hellman’s blueprints, find someone that can do something with them,” he said, in what was the least useful idea she had heard since her last brainstorming session at Arasaka on how to contain a data breach after a Militech mole had gotten into a secure server months before.

At the time, the guy, a junior analyst that had clearly decided a senior position was not interesting enough for him before opening his mouth, had proposed to reach out to the mole with a ‘competitive counteroffer’. He had been escorted to the building’s door by the end of the working day. Unfortunately for V, her inability to do the same with Johnny was still at the heart of all their problems.

“Vik studied the whole thing and went through his list of contacts. And their lists of contacts. Still couldn’t find shit. How am I supposed to find someone? Put an ad on N54?”

One of his hands drummed a restless rhythm on the railing. “Fucks’ sakes, V. Where do you go in this hole of a city when you need a problem solved?”

V blinked. “Rogue’s already tried.”

“Rogue’s not the only fixer in town, is she?”

Of course she was not. Fixers in NC’s were a dozen an Eddie, but V had evaluated, and discarded, that possibility as soon as the Hellman lead had frizzled out into nothing and Alt’s only brilliant idea to ‘save’ V had been to make her into a construct too.

Of all the available fixers, only eight of them could potentially have the kind of connections needed to even discuss something like the Relic. Rogue, guided by her lasting fondness for Johnny, had tried her contacts already, and nothing had turned out. Of the remaining ones, V was not so sure she could trust half and was adamant not to put in that kind of danger the other half, whose help she counted on to smuggle Johnny out of NC after.

Unlike what he seemed to believe, his suggestion was not such an obvious answer to their lead problem. “Not really keen on having Wakako sells us to Arasaka by proxy of the Tiger Claws,” V said, knowing he would have followed the rest of her line of thoughts well enough in her mind.

Johnny pushed off the rail, pacing the small space in front of her bed like a caged animal. He stopped, turning to her with his mouth slightly open, then thought better of it and went back to his pacing, one hand making a mess of his hair as he did. The whole sequence repeated three times before he finally found something to say.

“Mikoshi then.”

V had not expected him to actually find a solution. They had rehearsed this same conversation with varying degrees of screaming – the intensity of which followed a pitiful downward trend on the time-slash-worsening-of-her-condition axis – so every scenario had been SWOT analysed ad nauseam.

But Mikoshi. Mikoshi was always the point of no return suggestion in these conversations.

Forcefully making their way into Arasaka’s rotten core was the one road Johnny had pushed almost from the start, and the one he always returned to. But after they had found Alt, and understood what her solution entailed, she knew he didn’t believe this to be a real option anymore. Suggesting it was just muscle reflex for him nowadays.

She let herself fall back on her pillow, closing her eyes to block out even the artificial lights filtering into the apartment from the outside. Her body felt heavy, muscles slackening in increments she couldn’t fight. Just like her mind.  

“We talked about it. Making me into an engram is not an option. And even if it was, that’s still a coin toss,” she said, “best case scenario we both die. Worst, you and I both end up constructs trapped into Arasaka’s horror drawer. This way…” she hesitated, for just a moment, “at least you get to keep the body.”

Johnny’s sigh was loud in the late-night quiet. “Not what I want, V.”

She didn’t know how, but a laugh tore out of her. Maybe it was the way he’d said it, like it was something in her power to give him. Or maybe it was the fact that there had been a time, not so long ago, when he had been more than eager to take control of her body by any means necessary to achieve his own goals. But laugh she did, even though it sounded far, and almost like an exhale. “Tough luck, Johnny boy. Better warm to the idea fast and start browsing Mr. Stud catalogues. ‘Cause you’re getting it.”

Her eyelids were heavy now, impossible to open even if she had wanted to try, so she didn’t see Johnny glitch out of the room, only knew he had. His voice, drowned beneath the weight of sleep pressing down on her chest, followed her as she was dragged under once more.

“We’ll see about that, V.”

---

The food stand was just as it had been in her dream.

Blue neon lights flickered inside it, a sharp contrast to the traditional red lanterns swaying from the same yellow tin roof. Oil sizzled as strips of synth pork hit the flat pan on the stove there, the smell mingling with the sharp bite of ginger and the sweet char of caramelized onions. Underneath all, V could almost taste the rich flavour of broth that had been simmering since dawn.

Everything was the same except the stool that was now empty.

Her throat tightened, and for a moment she almost expected to hear his laugh rise above the street noise anyway.

“V!”

The voice that yanked her back was not Jackie’s but was still familiar. She breathed, giving the empty stool a last glance before turning toward the stairs leading up to the Megablock entrance. Barry was leaning on the railing, waiving a hand down at her to be noticed. His plaid looked like it had lost its battle with an overenthusiastic dryer, and there was a large coffee stain on the t-shirt beneath. But the shadows under his eyes had eased, and he looked better than he had a few months before, when V had knocked on his door on Petrova’s urgent request.

V mustered a smile and a half wave of her own as she got up to meet him on the landing.

“Hey Barry. How you doing, choom?”

“Eh,” he shrugged, but there was a smile under his short beard. “Can’t complain. Been enjoying the luxury of having a window since I moved into your old haunt. Thanks again for the heads up.”

In the megabuilding, finding an apartment with windows and as far away as it could be from the polluted-in-every-way-possible ground was just as likely as finding a straight cop. Jackie’s improbable net of connections had helped in securing such a rarity for V after she had lost the corporate part of her corporate-sponsored apartment in Charter Hill, and that small luxury had done miracles for her rickety state of mind at the time.

Understanding Barry’s situation better than most and having seen his apartment, he was therefore the first and only person V had given a heads up about the upcoming vacancy of her apartment as soon as she had signed the lease in the Glen.

“Don’t think about it,” she shrugged. “And how’s Harry?”

Harry, being the pet iguana V had stolen, when it was just an egg, from Yorinobu Arasaka alongside the Relic. Once the thing had hatched, she had found herself at a loss for what to do with it. Her brilliant solution had therefore been to leave it in Barry’s care, who had, at the very least, a degree or two more knowledge on the subject of reptiles’ care than her.

She had chosen its name before delivering it, ignoring Johnny’s comment that her sense of humour desperately needed work – she was hilarious, thank you, Johnny – and while Barry had seemingly agreed with Johnny on the name, he had grabbed Harry before she could even finish her sentence and had not, in fact, changed it in the end.

“Good, good. His care’s not much different from what Andrew’s was. I’m heading out to a NCPD vets’ meeting now, but you’re welcome anytime if you wanna stop by for a cold one and to say hi.”

Barry was a good guy, and V enjoyed their chats on engines and life, but making commitments and promises these days felt impossible, and more than a little dishonest. So, she just nodded.

“You going up to Wilson?” Barry asked when the silence stretched, nodding at the two guns she carried in her tight and shoulder holsters.

“Yeah, this one’s acting up a little,” V confirmed, patting the golden Nue by the side of her chest.

“Better not keep you then. Never know when you’ll need it, you know, with what you do,” he said with a grin. There had been a time when references of her work had taken a sour note in his tone, but it was gone now, replaced, like often happened when familiarity increased, by understanding.

“Yeah,” she said, shifting her weight from one foot to the other. Awkward, as she always was when conversations didn’t really have an objective outside from just talking. “Was nice to see you, Barry. Say ‘hi’ to Petrova and Mendez for me if you see them.”

Barry smile was open and reached his eyes. “Will do. See you, V.”

He didn’t linger, taking the stairs two steps at a time and disappearing rapidly into the sea of people hurrying along the sidewalk by the Megatower.

V waited just a moment longer, her gaze finding the food stand one last time, before she moved deeper into the building towards the elevator.

The 2nd Amendment sign greeted her as she stepped out on the 8^th floor. The same red lanterns swaying from the food stand also lining Wilson’s shop windows. Together with the neon sign and the cartoonish posters advertising the ongoing sale at the store, the three elements created quite the interesting aesthetic.

“Ghastly,” corrected Johnny in her mind, and she snorted.

Robert emerged from the range area – the sound of gunshot coming louder through the door before it closed behind him – just as she crossed the threshold. “V,” he greeted as he saw her, “haven’t seen you in a while. You here to shoot or to get yourself something new?”

“Neither,” she answered pulling Jackie’s pistol out of her shoulder holster and showing it to Robert before setting it on the counter, “slide’s been acting up. It sticks sometimes.”

Robert nodded, gesturing for her to wait as he stepped into the back of the shop, reappearing behind the counter a moment later. He took the gun, looking at it from several angles before nodding again. “I’ll tune her up like new. Couple of days.”

“Thanks, Rob,” she said, her eyes following the golden piece as he put it away, safe in one of his locked cabinets. V trusted Roberts above everyone else with her guns, but she felt anxiety spike anyway as the gun disappeared from her sight. Without it, she felt naked, unprotected despite firepower not even being her first line of defence in case of troubles.

She moved the Lexington from her tight to her shoulder, just to try and clench that feeling.

“That your backup?” Robert asked, his judging eyes taking in the scuffed edges and worn grip.

“Yeah,” she shrugged.

Robert brow furrowed. “You want me to take a quick look? That thing has seen better days.”

V shook her head. “Wish I could, but I gotta run. I’m late as it is.”

He squinted at the gun, clearly unhappy with it.

V took a step back, hands raised in surrender. “I’ll leave it with you when I come for the Nue, alright? How’s that sound?”

“Like the beginning of a cautionary tale,” he deadpanned, “but fine, have it your way. I’ll call you when your main is ready.”

V, one foot already out of the door, smiled and saluted. “Thanks, Rob. You are the best!”

“Yeah, yeah. Don’t get yourself killed in the meantime.” He threw after her as she turned towards the elevator.

There, leaning just beside the metal door, she found Johnny.

“See,” he drawled, “should have taken the Malorian.”

V rolled her eyes at him, pressing the elevator call pad beside his leaning form with enough force to make her finger hurt.

“The Malorian has the recoil of a train, Johnny. And I’d very much like to get this blasted scratch on my arm closed at some point,” she told him, the annoyance at having to repeat the same argument they had had in her armoury that very morning coming through in full force. “While this, as old as it is, is actually designed to reduce it.”

Johnny didn’t seem fazed by her vehemence, and he grinned, the way he did when something incredibly rude and infuriating was about to come out of his mouth.

V braced for the inevitable, and probably questionable, comment coming her way.

“Pussy.”

Yep, it was going to be a long day.

-----

At almost noon, the Coyote was a study in contrast with the City outside. The artificial lights casting neon shadows inside against the scorching brightness of the sun outside. The quiet murmur of the few patrons scattered around the bar, nursing their poisons of choice, and the loud buzz of countless faceless people going about their day in parallel lines on the walkways the Glen. The stillness within versus the chaos outside.

Just like Misty, Mamá Welles had managed to create a pocket universe. Cutting out a piece of Night City and making it her own. A sanctuary, for the people she loved.

No wonder, V thought, that after nudging them a little in the right direction, Mamá Welles and Misty had hit it off like a house on fire.

Behind the bar, Pepe was restocking Abydos on the top shelf by one of the fridges, back turned on the entrance.

“As requested, here I am,” she called out to him as she slid into one of the stools. The perspiration on her skin was staring to cool down in the bar conditioned environment, so she grabbed one napkin of the bar to dab her face.

Pepe startled at her voice.  The bottle he had been in the process of putting on the shelf wobbling a little as it was set on it.

“One hour late, that’s what you are,” he teased as he moved to pour a can of NiCola into a tall glass with a slice of lime without missing a beat. He set it in front of her with a wink.

“Thanks,” she beamed at him, drinking half of it in one go. “And sorry. Had to go all the way to Little China. To drop off Jackie’s gun for a tune up.”

“Ah. Thought you took your sweet time shaking off a night out.”

He gestured at her face. To the purple shadows she knew underlined her eyes there.

“Nothing so fun,” she sighed. “But I’m here now, so what was the big emergency?”

He ducked below the counter, reaching somewhere she couldn’t see, and came up with a glass bottle in his hand. The label was old, fraying at the edges, with a stylized rosette of blue agave on it. The bottle itself was nothing remarkable either, clear, simple glass filled with liquid a dark shade of amber.

“Here,” he said putting the bottle down beside her NiCola glass. “From Cynthia, for your help.”

V eyes moved from him to the bottle. The name on it was one she had never heard, but knowing Pepe, she was definitely in for a treat.  

She looked back at him. “This is… great, thank you. But I thought it was an emergency. On the holo, you said it had to be today.”

Pepe scratched is head, the sheepish expression he sported comical on his massive form. “Well, you try telling a pregnant woman throwing up daily you have yet to do something she asked you to. And see if that’s not an emergency.”

V winced. Her sympathy equally split between Pepe and Cynthia.  

She downed the rest of her cola, getting up from the stool and, twice in the same day raised her hands to admit defeat.

“Alright, alright, it classifies then,” she acquiesced. “Keep it safe here for me? I wanted to say hi to Mamá before going.”

Pepe nodded, moving the bottle back below the counter. “Lupe is upstairs,” he offered, “with Padre.”

V tapped twice with two fingers on the bar, then moved towards the stairs.

The trembling lights from Jackie’s ofrenda caught her eyes. She stopped, bowing her head in its direction for just a moment before resuming her hike to the second floor. The question he had asked in her dream resurfacing in her mind as she went.

Am I? Acting like I’m already dead?

Maybe she was, but what else could she do?

Mercifully, the unsolicited advice she expected to receive from Johnny at that thought, did not come.

Stepping on the walkway in the middle of the second floor, V found that the upstairs was even less populated than the downstairs, with Mamá Welles and Padre the only souls occupying the space. Overseen by La Muerte pictured on the wall by their booth, the two of them sat one in front of the other, speaking in low voices.

As V got close, Mamá Welles was the one to saw her first. Their conversation abruptly stopped as Lupe nodded in V’s direction before standing to meet her halfway on the walkway.

“Mija,” she greeted, the word wrapping around V’s heart like a warm blanket on a winter night. “Come see me when you are done here,” she continued, sending a glance back to Padre, whose eyes were now trained on V, “I’ll have lunch ready for you. I’ve made your favourite tamales, with the beans.”

“I… was just coming to say hi. Before going.”

Lupe shook her head. “Nonsense, Mija. Padre wants a word, and you need to eat. Dios mio, you are even skinnier than Misty.”

Before V could protest, Mamá Welles gave her a gentle squeeze and marched toward the kitchen, leaving her alone with Padre.

With a defeated sigh, V moved to take the seat Lupe had just vacated.

She didn’t have a problem with Padre, per se. Quite the opposite, actually. The fixer had been the first to give V, a disgraced ex-corpo rat with more experience with numbers and deamons than guns, a chance to prove herself as a merc. He had taken her under his wing just like he had taken in Jackie years before.

And V was grateful.

But. Lately their conversations had started to veer more towards confessions than business meetings, with the fixer more interested in talking about her soul than in giving her gigs. And, while she couldn’t prove it, V was almost a hundred percent sure Padre had been informed of her condition, and asked to act accordingly, by Mamá Welles.

Feeling the strain the last few days on her, V was not particularly trilled by this unexpected meeting.

“Padre,” she greeted cautiously, sliding into the booth.

“Valerie.” His voice was warm, patient, like it always was when they spoke. V had never heard him use any other tone, but he didn’t really need to. The use of her full name warning enough that the conversation was going to be serious.

“You’re keeping busy,” he added, and it wasn’t a question but a statement.

V gave him a thin smile, ignoring the fact that half the city seemed to be interested in keeping tabs on her these days. “That’s the job.”

Johnny appeared in the empty space beside Padre, boot up on the bench and smirk already in place. “Translation: you’re running yourself ragged and the priest’s about to give you a sermon on it.”

She ignored his remark, pretending she could not see him. He flipped her the bird.

Padre studied her face, then the bandage on her arm, and finally inclined his head slightly. “Work has its cost. It marks you, more so when it’s without purpose.”

V’s lips pressed together. “Keeping the lights on is purpose.”

He shook his head slowly, letting the faintest sigh escape. “It’s what you keep them on for that counts, child.”

Blast proof, there was no way Mamá Welles had not told Padre about the Relic and the ticking clock it had activated on her head.

“Preach, Padre. Not that the gonk is listening,” said Johnny, leaning back to stretch over the booth’s backrest.

V’s jaw tightened, but she kept her voice steady as she replied, “I have my reasons.”

Padre’s eyes held hers, making her feel as small as she had when Jackie had introduced them. “Be sure they are the right one, Valerie. Drifting is hardly different than standing still.”

She dropped her gaze to the table, tracing the scuff lines on the worn surface with one finger, feeling each erratic beat of her heart in her ears.

The people around her always expected V to fight. To be strong. To find a solution. To save the day and herself.

They knew V had done it countless times. When her parent had died in service of Arasaka, leaving her alone among sharks. In the Corpo world, where the person you could trust – most of the time, at least – was yourself. Out of the Corpo word, reinventing herself. As a merc, going solo after Jackie had gone on to become the Legend he always dreamed he’d be.

So why couldn’t she do it again?

She let out a deep breath.

“Are you?” she said to Padre, mostly to try and change the subject, to bring it back to biz. To what felt safe. “Offering a direction, today?”

She was also curious to see what excuse he would use to avoid signing her up for a gig. The last time she had asked for work he had not even tried to come up with something plausible, simply stating that biz was slow and he didn’t have anything lined up.

She had called bullshit on it but, like Johnny, she had only done so in her mind, firing up El Capitan’s contact on her holo to find something to fill her schedule instead.

She planned to do the same later that afternoon – after Mamá Welles unexpected tamales, of course – to see if he finally had a lead on that next delivery they had exchanged messages about.

Except, Padre slid a shard across the table.

V stared at it for a long moment, then picked it up, turning it between her fingers like it could reveal its content just like that.

“A job,” she stated, disbelief colouring her words. The uncomfortable idea that this whole visit had not been, in fact, solely driven by the whims of a pregnant woman taking root in her mind.

Padre nodded, the smile on his face fond and a little amused. Exactly like a parent a dozen steps ahead of his child in a game with very complicated rules. “Yes, Valerie. A delicate one.”

“Lucky indeed that after weeks of silence he has a job for you now. On a random day, just like that,” Johnny agreed, the insinuation clear in his tone.

Her brow furrowed. “Alright,” she said to Padre, “go on.”

“Years ago, there used to be a place of faith, in the Badlands, up north,” he explained, clasping his hands as if in prayer. “It used to be a sanctuary. For men of God and sinners trying to atone. Now, it is a vault.”

“A vault? For what?”

“Confessions. Decades of archived sins, whispered by the powerful of this city when they thought only God was listening. Abandoned, when the last faithful left.”

 “And you need these confessions retrieved?”

Padre nodded.

V eyes focused again on the shard in her hand. She turned it over once more, feeling it warm under her touch. “Why now? If the place has been abandoned for a while, why wait so long to retrieve them?”

Padre eyes sharpened, “Maelstrom have recently moved in. Disturbing the sanctity of the place. And its safety.”

“Ah, so resistance would be expected.”

“To a point.” He raised the golden cross hanging from his neck to his lips, kissing it before continuing his explanation. “By the grace of God, the gang doesn’t seem to be aware of what gold is hidden below their feet.”

“Still, I’m not on the best of terms with them. Can’t just walk in. It’ll have to be on the quiet.”

And the last time she had prodded a Maelstrom nest it had been as far from quiet as an op could go. But then again, she had been with Jackie that time and loud had always been more his style.

“This is why I trust you with it,” Padre replied without missing a beat. “Others would underestimate. Make a mess. You know how to be careful. And discreet.”

She exhaled through her nose. “And the payout?”

“A generous cut, the precise amount you’ll find on the shard,” Padre said, gesturing at the object. “I’ll also consider this a personal favour, my child. With all the goodwill that entails.”

Johnny swore, the scene so similar to the way he had during her call with Mr. Hands a few days before, that she didn’t know if she should laugh or swear herself.

V decided to do neither. She pressed her thumb along the shard’s edge, then pocketed it. “When?”

“Jesus Christ, V. Leads, not gigs. What’s all these favours worth if you’re not even around to cash them in?” Johnny spat, hands thrown in the air as he glitched away. 

“Tonight,” responded Padre. “The longer this sit, the less likely Maelstrom will remain ignorant to what they have within their grasp.”

She grimaced. She had really hoped for something a tad lower stake to tie her week.

“Alright,” she said anyway, the word coming out as heavy as her body felt.

Padre regarded her for a moment, then he leaned forward. “Valerie, listen to me. The work you do, the life you have… it takes more than skills. It takes strength of spirit, conviction. Do not forget that.”

V did not bother for once to mask her weariness as she responded, “I understand that, Padre. Some days it’s just harder to do than others.”

Padre leaned back on the booth, expression softening into something that fit perfectly with the name life had given him. “Go to Guadalupe, child. Eat. Rest. You’ll need your strength tonight.”

The dismissal was gentle, but as clear as it could be, and V rose from the booth. “I’ll take care of it.”

He gave her a small nod, whispering a blessing under his breath as she turned away. Then his eyes unfocused as he turned to his holo.

As she got to the top of the stairs, the faint smell of Mamá Welles' tamales drifted in from the kitchen below, warm and grounding.

V let it guide her weary steps.

-----

Chapter Text

The Hoon was, without question, V’s least favourite car.

It was supposed to be made for speed, agile steering, and traction. A racing car through and through, with tires wider than V’s waist. And she had checked. They really were.

Yet the blasted thing was almost impossible to control. Tail going out each time V had the audacity to try and make a turn, it just begged to be abandoned on the side of the road.

“Maybe that’s why we found it abandoned,” reflected Johnny from the passenger seat. He had been silent for most of the ride, nursing a cigarette whose phantom smoke, mercifully, made no smell.

V was inclined to agree with him. Still, the Quadra was the only armoured car in her growing collection of wheels, and a handy backup in situations where her exit could end up being not so clean. After spending the afternoon going through the shard Padre had provided, taking it had seemed the logical choice for the gig.

Right on cue, she felt the back tires slide as she eased off the Ringroad into Industrial St. towards the Oilfields.

“This fucking car, I swear,” she swore, counter steering and slowing down slightly to help the tires find their bite on the road.

Johnny’s own swearing was definitely more coloured. “Then again, maybe, you are just a bad driver,” he said, righting himself on the seat.

V snorted. “Shut up, Johnny. You don’t even need to be in the car.”

“And miss a drive out of the City? Not a chance,” he said. “I haven’t been out this way since my last gig in Frisco. And that was way before 2023.”

V could understand the feeling.

Up until the whole Jenkins-Abernathy debacle, her life had been filled with trips outside NC. Most had been business trips, to Arasaka’s branches all around the world, lobby meetings, industry summits, and even on occasion on the field. She had met Jackie, on the most memorable of those work trips, down in Mexico. But sometimes, getting out of the City was just for pleasure, to escape the bustle of it all, and San Francisco, as close and as rich as it was, had been a favourite destination for her up until the air had become so toxic that lung implants had become mandatory just to be outdoors.

Driving that same road now, albeit not all the way to San Fran, felt freeing in a way she hadn’t felt since those days.

As they passed the crossroads with Eisenhower St., V rolled down both front windows, enjoying the night breeze coming in from the bay. Their destination was, give or take, forty minutes out from there, up on the mountains lining the coast to the east.

“Padre said out in the Badlands, didn’t he?”

“Yeah, he did,” confirmed Johnny, distracted. His elbow had moved to rest on the open window, and his eyes were trained on the Oilfields passing by. Searching. Somewhere inside the darkness that made the fields even gloomier at night, where she had scratched his name on a cold piece of junk metal, to mark a grave that was probably not even there.

“Is this far out still Badlands?” she pondered, pushing a little harder on the accelerator.

Johnny’s gaze and focus did not waver, only turning towards her when they passed the sign marking their exit out of Night City and approached the end of the Oilfields. “Don’t know. But it is up north alright, and he did say that too.”

“Mm,” she nodded, “he did. Still, this is the first time someone other than Dakota has sent me on business so far out of NC.”  The Hoon twitched as a stronger crosswind hit, and V steadied it with a small correction on the wheel. “And the Badlands are her patch,” she added. “Fixers usually mind fences.”

“Unless they’ve traded favours,” Johnny said, letting imaginary ash fall outside the window from his cigarette. “Or something’s important enough to bend the map.”

That was not unusual. After months of working as a merc, V had learned that while each one of the big fixers controlled a piece of NC, the different territories were far from islands. Instead, relations between them closely resembled those between corporations. Each one of the fixers had its own best interest at heart at all times, of course, but they still traded with each other, favour and gigs both. And anything that could benefit or threaten the whole system was dealt with, swiftly and as a unified front.

El Capitan’s Autofixer was a clear example of a mutually beneficial agreement between them. The Captain was allowed to source his products all around the City and its limits, and in exchange the other fixers could rely on a steady supply of wheels at a generous discount. V had learned of this arrangement when Muamar had first proposed the recurring gig, wondering if she was to expect grief from Mr. Hands for running gigs in Dogtown for another fixer. Muamar had laughed then, teasing her on how fresh she still was in the game, but had taken the time to explain.

She had started to debate in her own mind the pros and cons of texting said fixer to line up a new gig after her current one when Johnny interrupted her thoughts.

“Let’s get this straight. The old preacher sends you forty clicks out to play cat burglar in a half-burned monastery crawling with crazy chromed up psychos just to retrieve confessions that are, what, ten years out of date?”

“Twenty,” V corrected. From what she had gathered studying the info shard, the monastery had burned in 2057, halfway through NC reconstruction period.

“Twenty,” he deadpanned, one eyebrow raised well above the rim of his glasses. V knew he saw the same way she did – they had tested it – so the added layer of darkness was not really a problem for him, but he still looked ridiculous with glasses on well past midnight.

“Yeah, but there could very well be stuff in there that’s still relevant. Think about Soulkiller. Arasaka’s been working on that for decades. This City is full of long running cons and schemes, we’re just not aware of them most of the time,” she said, her mind going back to the Peralez and the man with the blue eyes lurking in the distance and pulling the strings. “If so, one shard like that could be worth more than a fleet of AV full of eddies.”

Johnny hummed in agreement. “Who knows, maybe we’ll find something there on the Relic.”

V snorted a half laugh, “Arasaka’s personnel with that kind of clearance are not usually the types you find at kneeling at Sunday Mass,” she mused. “And even if that was the case, I really don’t have enough good Karma to stumble on a coincidence that big.”

“Not enough Karma? You’re a fucking girl scout V,” Johnny debated, shaking his head in disbelief.

Her being a ‘soft-hearted gonk’ had been object of discussion on several occasions between them. Johnny had gotten used to that side of her by now and, even if he would never admit it, had actually grown fond of it. But, regardless of whatever he thought of her, she was pretty sure the balance of her deeds still leaned heavily on the wrong side of it all.

“But yeah, chances are pretty slim,” he ruled, throwing the butt of his dying cigarette out of the window. He seemed to think for a moment, then, he added, “kinda strange no one has made a play for this treasure chest in all this time.”

The brief Padre had shared had given an explanation on why that was. The confessions had clearly not been public knowledge, and out of the monks that had survived the fire only one had even been privy to it. The man had kept an eye on the place since the fire, deeming it safe to let all that data rest undisturbed below the ashes, in the forgotten old crypt underneath the burned church. The relative distance from the City and the few ghost stories that seemed to have spread surrounding the place, efficient enough in keeping random visitors and scavengers at bay.

Age was however catching up with the old monk and in addition the Maelstroms had recently decided, with no rhyme or reason as to why, to move into the place. So, the monk had resorted to make his own confession, asking for absolution and help from the only man that could provide the kind of grace he was searching for: Padre.

Why the fixer had chosen V for the gig was, in her professional opinion, a little less clear. She was not the only merc with soft feet in his call sheet, and a crew of three or four would have probably been a safer bet for such an undertaking. But V was not one to check serials on a free shipment of chrome, and after the recent drought of gigs from him she was even less incline to let an offer pass her by.

“Doesn’t matter anyway. Only thing I need to worry about is getting in and out as fast and as quiet as possible,” V explained. “Main entrance is a no-go, obviously. Too exposed and too many Maelstroms to take them on fast and quiet. But the side cloister’s still half-standing and apparently not manned by more than one or two goons at a time. If I can get through there, I’ll hit the stairs down to the crypt before they know I’m inside.”

“Gotta be a ghost, V.”

“That’s the idea.”

Johnny’s fingers tapped a nervous rhythm on the window’s edge. “And if you can’t?”

V exhaled though her nose, eyes trained on the front lights opening the way before the car. “Then we improvise. Like always.”

Johnny grinned at that. Where she was quiet and calm, he was fast and loud. And while he had come to respect her as a merc, his jabs on her hiding behind a screen becoming with time more fond than sharp, she knew he relished those occasions where netrunning her way out of a tight spot became impossible and guns had to be drawn. His phantom adrenaline mixing with and almost overshadowing hers when action became inevitable. “Improvisation I can get behind,” he said.

She hoped it wouldn’t come to it but got ready for the worst all the same.

Silence stretched between them for a few moments, then Johnny broke it with a lazy flick of his wrist towards the console. “Put on some music, V. If we’re heading into a den of meathead borg freaks, might as well enjoy the ride.”

She smirked despite herself, turning on the car radio as he had asked. Already halfway through the first chorus, the notes of Suffer Me spilled into the small space between them. Johnny’s fingers changed their drumming rhythm on the window’s edge to match the song as he hummed the words.

V smiled and settled into the drive.

-----

She killed the Hoon’s engine two miles short of her destination, after having backed it up a small service area almost completely overgrown with thickets. This high up, there was no breeze coming in from the bay and no lights to illuminate the way or make the car visible from the main road. With a bit of luck, she would be gone long before dawn came.

Switching her optics to night vision, she got out, moving to pop the trunk open. Almost on autopilot, she sorted through all the gear she had loaded onto it just a few hours before.

The bullet-proof vest she took out first. The black thing, a very well-made piece that had probably fallen off a corpo transport before finding its way to V, had been a gift from Regina after a too close encounter with one of her cyberpsychos. V fastened it over her netrunning suit, and while that was not her usual setup, the added layers of protection had felt like a minimum requirement when planning the gig. Maelstrom did not play nice when crossed, and she had caught enough lead to know she would much prefer to bear the discomfort of wearing a vest than risk getting more.

The well-worn Lexington, that Robert had so disparaged but that had yet to betray her, followed suit. Its suppressor was screwed on with two neat clicks before she tucked the gun into the thigh holster on her right leg. A small tanto blade was sheathed on the left one right after.

She hoped neither would be used that night.

To complete her gear line up, two MaxDoc, one Bounce Back, one Ram Jolt, and two spare mags were tucked into the pockets of her vest before she closed the trunk.

“Look at you. Almost look like a professional,” Johnny teased, glitching beside her.

“Fuck you, Johnny,” she told him, but smiled as she activated the map she had found on Padre’s shard.

On her HUD the map’s wireframe overlay drew a glowing geometry over the darkness. A distant point two miles north marked her destination, while a blinking one much closer to her right, just on the other side of the road, pointed to the start of the old hunting trail that would take her there through the oak woodland.

After a last gear check and a nod to Johnny, she set off on her hike, crossing the road quickly and disappearing through the bushes there.  

She let her HUD do the orienteering work for her, boots stepping on dusty ground and crunching leaves highlighted by the phantom lights blinking before her eyes. The overlay Padre had provided wasn’t just a line on a map. Little blue chevrons pulsed where the trail grade steepened or bent, neon green circles suggested ‘best grip’ placements for both feet and hands, blinking exclamation marks warned of loose screes and crumbly patches of clay ahead, and semi-transparent comment bubbles appeared when alternative routes could be taken in case of unforeseen changes to the terrain.

Someone had scouted this thoroughly, stitching together an absurdly exact guide through the trail. A whole hive of drones and at least a few people on foot must have combed the area to provide this kind of intel. Padre had clearly not spared any expense to retrieve those confessions, and V was impressed, not having seen such thorough intelligence work since her Arasaka days.

As she followed the glowing path, she wondered at how dark and quiet the world this far out of the City could truly be. There were no NCPD sirens howling from a crime scene to the next, no junkies screaming, and no billboards blasting their ads in a never-ending loop on all corners of a City so loud that, at times, V had difficulty hearing even herself think. No neon lights illuminating the sky at every hour, hiding the stars scattered there even when they would have shone the brightest.

Here, barely thirty miles out of NC, the only light powering her night vision was starlight, and V could hear every leaf crunched under her boots, every creaking branch moved aside as she made her way, every new uptick of wind rustling the canopy overhead. Even the rare rustling of small paws from animals running around the underbrush at a distance was clearly audible.  

Ahead of her, Johnny glitched in and out of existence for the whole twenty or so minutes it took to reach the monastery, and she was glad for it. Even without talking, his presence filled the gap between the foreign whispers of the forest and the familiar and loud sounds of the City at night, easing the anxiety threatening to take control of her reason in the dark.

As they neared their destination, the silence was the one to go first, replaced by the unnatural thumping beat of techno music, growing louder and more out of place with each passing step. As she crested the last rise, the monastery’s bones came into full view, a halo of trembling industrial lights making it look like the fire from years before had never ended.

V had approached from the west side, right where the map placed her planned point of entrance, so she found herself separated from the cloister with the burned down wall only by an old and overgrown orchard. Crouching to hide behind the equally crumbling half wall made of dry stones fencing the outdoor garden, she switched her optics to thermal and swept the area.

She found ten live signatures.

Two guarding the outside entrance to the church, five clustered together inside, on the further side of the nave from V’s position, two hovering close to what must have been one of the sources of the loud music, and a final one loitering close to the altar area marked on the map.  Only three cameras covered the inside of the church, while the cloister area didn’t have any and was deserted of life, only the heat from a few wall lights appearing on her HUD there.

No signature at all reached her from the crypt below, where Padre’s treasured shards waited. Probably shielded.

“Ten, only one close to my route,” she said, more for her own benefit than Johnny’s.

The man in question appeared beside her, peering theatrically through the brush. “This noise sucks,” he said, “then again, better than what those chicks Kerry’s working with make.”

V rolled her eyes and continued outlining her next moves, ignoring his comments on the Maelstroms’ musical tastes. “Hole in the cloister wall by the side is the way in. Right, then left. I hit the back walk and from there the door to the sacristy. The stairs to the crypt are in the next room, between the sacristy and the presbytery. If all goes right, I won’t even have to enter the church proper and – ”

“Did you really say, ‘if all goes right’?” Interrupted Johnny. His glasses were gone, and his eyebrows were pinched together as he looked at her.

“I’m not superstitious,” V replied, frowning as she kept scanning the area.

“With your track record, maybe you should be.”

Just as she turned to tell him, once again, to fuck off, a red streak of movement above them, close to the cloister entrance, caught her attention.

“Fuck,” she swore.

“What?”

“There’s a drone, there,” she explained, pointing to the darkness where her optics clearly showed the thermal signature of a drone flying in lazy circles right above her entry point.

“Can you hack it?”

“Already trying,” she said, doing so. The firmware had no recognizable signature, but she knew Maelstrom were good at wiping out serials from stolen tech, so that wasn’t a surprise. Her most used breach daemon would still work well enough, and she set it on it fast. Just as the breach was almost complete, the drone system reacted, pulling up a wall that seemed to be perfectly tailored to stop her incursion.

V’s breath hitched as she scrambled to hide her tracks, preparing to stop any alarm from spreading through the net and alerting the Maelstroms inside. But no alarm came, and the drone camera only focused on her general direction for a few seconds before zooming away, disappearing into the darkness south of the monastery.

“Is it coming back?” Asked Johnny after a moment, voice as tense as V felt.

“I don’t know,” she replied, scanning the area where the drone had seemingly vanished for good. Its thermal signature becoming smaller and smaller with each second before fading completely. “But it’s gone now, and no alarm was raised, so I need to move.”

“Could be a trap.”

“Yes.”

She jumped the half wall with a fluid movement and crossed the open ground at a crouch. The grass here had gone wild, waist-high all around the overgrown nectarine and apricot trees, it rasped on her suit, and she found herself glad for the long sleeves despite the summer heat, inescapable even at this altitude. Smoke had licked up along the mortar lines of the cloister during the fire that had seen it abandoned, and V’s finger came away grey as she touched it. She found the gap where fire and time had pulled down a section of masonry and hauled herself up, belly sliding flat on the stones there. Manoeuvring herself into the cloister, she dropped on the other side of the thick wall, rolling quickly to crouch low beneath the central arcade shadows.

Inside, the quadrangle had only partially suffered from the fire. Half of the walkway a tangled mess of charcoal and ruined furniture, while the other half mostly clear, looking like a monk could still walk its length at any minute. The internal garden too was as overgrown as the orchard, sage and rosemary bushes having taken over the space while ivy had almost completely covered the stone well at its centre.

As she moved, V kept to the shadows, steps light and carefully thought out to avoid the crumbling remains of the fire that littered the side of the cloister she had entered. Deep bass beats thudded through from the adjoining church, and she let their rhythm map the gaps between her movements, timing the most complicated steps trough the debris for when a rim shot overtook any other possible sound.

Just as she turned left on the side of the walkway untouched by the fire and housing the door to the sacristy, her optics registered a thermal signature incoming from it. A few seconds later, just enough time for V to flatten herself to the wall hiding in the shadows, a Maelstrom emerged into the cloister. There was a subdermal LED string pulsing beneath the skin of his left cheek, and his optics had more in common with infrared binoculars than human eyes.

V tracked him as, with a lazy swagger, he walked straight on, coming to lean on the column right in front of the sacristy door he had come from. One of his knees bent to rest casually on the low parapet there. The guy didn’t seem to be intent on patrolling, only interested in muttering and nursing a cig instead.

“Check the garden, Strobe. We need to do the rounds, Strobe. Fuck rounds, there’s nothin’ here. Nothin’ for miles,” the guy grumbled. “Could be at ‘Tanz now. ‘Stead I’m stuck guardin’ rocks and fucking ghosts. Fuck NetWatch. And fuck Brick.”

By the time he finished his rant, V had breached his system, and a System Collapse was on its way to the guy’s synapses.

She counted down the seconds from four, coming off the wall and moving into him from behind as soon as she reached two and the daemon activated. One hand clamped over his mouth while the other came to rest at his back, supporting him as he started to collapse. His whole body stiffened as the hack collapsed his neural system, and V turned that rigidity into leverage, tipping him over the low wall and guiding him down on the bushes below.

She glanced at him over the edge. Breathing, but out cold.

With a quick look around, she confirmed that the other nine signatures had not moved closer to her position, then looked back to the collapsed Maelstrom. His half-burned cigarette had fallen on the floor by her feet, and she put it out with the heel of her boot. The bushes only covered him partially and that was certainly not the best hiding spot, but it’ll had to do.

“They’ll clock him on the next comm check,” Johnny said, appearing beside her.

“Then I’ll have to be faster,” she replied, the sound of her grinding teeth the only one overlapping the loud music still coming from the church as she moved towards the sacristy door.

“What was it about NetWatch?”

“Explanation,” she said, taking stock of the door in front of her. “Must have contracted Maelstrom to secure the place before making a grab for the shard themselves.”

The inner door had once been the shortcut connecting the church with the refectory and dormitory housed on the cloister second floor. Untouched by the fire, the door was still the original one, made of old wood and metal hinges. A military grade keypad hung where a latch had once been, the display greasy with fingerprints and a strip of duct tape keeping one of its edges on. NetWatch had clearly provided the equipment but not its installation. V breached and opened it in a matter of seconds, slipping through and letting it close behind her.

The sacristy behind it was a small and cramped room with furniture and objects that had once been considered sacred, all of them now covered in dust and sooth. V did not linger, moving to the corridor that separated the sacristy from the presbytery and housed the stairs that led to the crypt.           

She found the stairs where her map told her they would be, in an alcove to the right of the door connecting the corridor to the church. A short flight of stone steps led to a rust-scabbed wrought iron door with intricate decorations. The same kind of keypad from before had been installed on it.

Padre’s intel must have been either not as accurate as he thought or already out of date, as there was no way Maelstroms would go to the trouble of securing the door if they had no idea of what rested behind it.

V let that thought go, filing it under the growing list of things that could potentially complicate the gig and become problems later, not wasting any more precious time on it at that moment.

The door started to open as she reached the last step, her daemon doing its job once more. The gate sagged inward on corroded hinges, squealing like a dying rat, and V froze. The bass coming from the nave swallowed the sound whole, and nothing changed. No alarm sounded and no thermal signature moved inside or outside the church. 

“Blessed be Maelstrom’s terrible taste in music,” praised Johnny.

As the door closed behind them with another high-pitched scream and nothing moved above, V released the breath she had been holding and found herself agreeing with him.

Inside, V’s optics circled through vision settings, thermal to night and back again, calibrating to better adjust to the poorly lit space. There was another flight of stairs right in front of her, and her HUD registered a few heat signatures below, all of them inorganic.

Cold, stale air caressed her face as she took careful steps. The sweat that had accumulated under her suit, during the hike and the unexpected take down both, was starting to cool uncomfortably on her skin. If she managed to get out of this intact, she was going to shamelessly ask Kerry for an hour with his Jacuzzi.

Johnny, following her down, snorted at the thought just as they reached the last step, finding themselves into an empty room built out of only stone.

At the opposite side of the space an equally stone-made arch led to a dark and seemingly endless corridor. A security camera well past twenty years out of date moved slowly from side to side over it, monitoring the corridor antechamber. The blinking red LED by its lens relaying a clear warning that had probably a lot to do with the laser grid flickering inside the arch.

V set on breaching it. Not even halfway through the upload, her HUD stuttered and the hack failed. White noise took over her optics for less than a second, snow flickering in front of her and covering the whole room in black and white dots. Blindly, she reached for the railing to her right, steadying herself as her vision gradually came back.

“Fuck,” exhaled Johnny. He was bracing on the rail too, just a few steps behind her, one hand holding his head and a deep frown marring his face. “What the hell was that?”

“You felt it too?” asked V, confused. She had thought the glitch yet another Relic malfunction, but those did not affect Johnny the same way they did her.

“Yeah, felt like something slammed right into my brain. The hell was that, V?”

“No idea,” she said, readying herself to queue the hack again.

She frowned. There was nothing there. The camera’s augmented reality anchor was gone. No MAC, no broadcast, no open ports. At all. Her deck couldn’t even fingerprint the firmware. In front of her, the camera continued to move as nothing had happened, but on her HUD it had all but vanished. “I can’t hack it,” she said, dumbstruck.

“What?”

“It’s gone, from the net. It was there and now it’s not. I can’t take down the security system without it,” she explained, eyes scanning the room back and forth in search of a physical access point. She swore as her search produced no results.

“I don’t think that’ll be necessary,” said Johnny while she moved around, her hands tracing the walls hoping to find a port of any kind.

“If I can’t access the system we are going in blind, can’t know what security measure are active. And they will be active as soon as I cross that grid,” she protested, feeling the adrenaline rise as her brain run through one improbable scenario and contingency plan after the other.

“I know,” Johnny huffed, “But look!”

The forcefulness of his command made her pause, and she followed his raised hand with her eyes to what he was pointing. Above the arch, the camera LED had turned green, just like the laser grid inside it.

“I think we are cleared to go in.”

V blinked. That seemed the case, and she did not like it one bit.

“I don’t like it,” Johnny said, echoing her thoughts. “We should turn back and go. If NetWatch is involved this is dangerous, V. A lot more than taking on a bunch of Maelstrom’s psychos.”

V agreed, NetWatch was in a totally different league than Maelstrom, and a lot of intel on the gig had already been proven out of date or incomplete, making good part of her plan and its contingencies pretty much useless. But. Street rep was not built by abandoning gigs halfway through because a few parameters had changed from the brief. And V had worked hard to build her own, with no intention to ruin it like this.

Also, the gig came from Padre, a man she owed a lot to.

With a steadying breath and a determined look sent Johnny’s way, she eased forward. The ghost camera followed her every step as she passed through the grid. Green strips of LED turning on gradually on the floor at each side of the corridor, highlighting a path forward almost in the same way as Padre’s map had done earlier, in the forest outside. Perfectly spaced cameras, as invisible to the net as the one in the antechamber, lined the upper walls. Their LED turning green too as they tracked her progress through the space.

“Someone is watching, V.”

She nodded. Could not be sure if it was NetWatch or someone else entirely, but Johnny was right. Someone was keeping tabs on her descent through the crypt alright.

V steps quickened. Both because every additional minute increased the risk of this whole gig becoming an absolute shitshow, and because she did not feel like spending more time than necessary in the corridor itself. Honeycomb niches full of old, chalky white bones lined each of its walls, adding to the unease growing under her skin.

At the end of the corridor V found herself crossing another stone arch into a circular, empty room. Four arched metal gates, adorned with wrought iron leaves and stylized scrolls, marked the compass points, each labelled in old, fading letters engraved above the keystones. A dove that had once been white, was depicted surrounded by light on the mosaic adorning the floor at the centre of the room. The white stones that made up the small bird greyed and eroded by time and wear.

Like the corridor, the room was lined with cameras that seemed to be maintaining a friendly stance towards her.

The overlay map from Padre blinked on V’s HUD, pointing to objectives behind three of the four doors. V moved clockwise, starting with the closest on her left, the one marking the North.

Behind the broken iron gate, V found a columbarium. A long, rectangular room stacked with urns and even more bones. Among shattered pieces of both the former and the latter, laid three bodies that had definitely known the spark of life more recently than the rest of the remains in the room.

Their trademark implants, both in terms of quantity and invasiveness, easily identified them as Maelstrom. The closest one, just a few steps to her right, had his optics blown clean through. A jagged hole left in their place. The second, further down the room on the same side of the first, laid back against a niche in the wall with one arm severed at the elbow. Hydraulic fluids and blood mixing on the floor around him. The third one was sprawled across the floor, face down and half covered by the remains of a few shattered urns.

V's mind drew angles and cones, following the trajectory of the bullets that had made quick work of the Maelstroms to the source. She turned back, eyes hiking up above the arch keystone, where an old compact turret hid in what could pass for a candle niche. The LED on it blinked red and the barrel followed her movement as her eyes found it, its rusted servos moving with a grating sound.

V took a step back, scrambling to hack the device before it had a chance to greet her the same way it had the Maelstrom. She saw Johnny glitch to her left, and before she could do or say anything, something pinged her own ICE. Nothing more than a tentative knock on the surface, really, not even an invitation to a proper handshake.  But the LED turned green, the barrel of the turret moved into an idle position, and at the end of the room a small compartment opened in the wall.

“I felt that, V,” said Johnny, hovering beside her. “This is no NetWatch lapdog watching us.”

“No, I don’t think so either,” she confirmed, moving to collect the shard hidden inside the compartment. The tag on it read ASP.02/3, matching it with one of three shards Padre’s brief instructed to recover.

One down, two to go.

“But it seems to like us, and I want to be out of here before that changes,” she added, sidestepping one of the bodies and making her way back towards the circular room.

The world detonated into light as soon as she stepped through the arch.

Her night vision overcompensated and she hissed, palms up, blinking hard until the lights in the room fizzled back into nothing and darkness encompassed the space once more. Between blinks, something glitched at the other side of the room, just beside the gate to the south.

The shape of a man, his dark hair a sharp contrast with the stark white lab coat he was wearing. His outline jittered, frames dropping then catching up in a stuttering sight that made V’s head hurt. For a heartbeat his eyes seemed to track her. Then they moved, fixing on the air just behind her shoulder.

Where she knew Johnny had trailed her.

The figure glitched out. A relay thunked, embed somewhere in the stone wall, and the south gate swung inward, rotating on rusted hinges.

“V,” warned Johnny, appearing to her side.

“I saw it,” she confirmed, fighting the shiver that made its way up her spine. The Maelstrom in the cloister had said something about ghosts. But it couldn’t be possible, could it?

No, it must have only been a glitch, and echo from the old security system meant to keep unwanted visitors away.

“Then let’s get out of here,” Johnny urged.

V swallowed, shaking her head. “We’ve come this far. And whatever that is, it’s helping. I’m not leaving without those shards.”

Determined, she crossed the room and slipped through the newly opened gate, her boots leaving a trail of prints over the dust-covered dove.

The scriptorium, as the plaque over the keystone declared it to be, smelled of mould and old paper. Two long tables flanked by benches just as long, sat in the middle of the room, surrounded by ceiling high bookcases of worn dark wood that were crammed with damp papers and folders.

The only light source in the room was a flickering lamp at the furthest edge of one of the tables, and V approached it, irrationally hoping it’d be a mark set by their unseen helper to mark the next shard.

Unfathomably, she was right. On the table, fastened to a ream of printouts with a crumbling rubber band, she found exactly what she was looking for. Another shard, with the acronym ASP.01/3 scrawled across its side in permanent marker.

V’s gaze roamed the headings under the shard briefly.

Ashen Soul Protocol. Limbic reconciliation. Reintegration heuristics. Dr. K. Ando. / First draft.

None of it made an ounce of sense to her. But, if this was a hardcopy of what was on the shard, Padre would for sure appreciate her removing it from the scene. So, she took it all, putting the shard in the same pocket of her vest where she had put the first one and sliding the papers in the tight space between her vest and suit, just above her stomach.

“C’mon, V. Let’s move,” called out Johnny from the gate.

She joined him there with quick, long strides, not quite running but close. When no more blinding lights flashed as they stepped back into the circular room and no other ghost made himself known, she made for the eastern door, finding it slightly opened already.

The gate was cold under her fingers as she pushed it enough to slip through, and inside, she felt the temperature drop by several degrees all at once.

As the sound of the music above grew more distant this far out, the hum of conditioned air and the need for it became clear.  Hundreds of green LED lit the room and the rows of servers they were installed on, surrounding the old altar in the middle of the room like glowing flames.

Somewhere down the line, the stone slab had been converted from a sacred object to a crowded desk. Now, instead of crosses, chalices and communion cups, only an obsolete terminal, hardwired to the servers through thick cables, sat in the middle of it.

The terminal’s screen was lit, rows of code running through it in an endless stream.

Behind it, the glitching ghost watched.

V froze, eyes captured by the impossible presence and heart beating erratically.

Outline sharper and steadier than it had been before, the man raised one hand, slowly, palm up. As if wanting her to take it.

V swallowed and with her next blink the ghost was not behind the terminal anymore, but right in front of her.

“Your souls,” he said, voice fracture and synth-like as his gaze moved to her left, “I see them both.”

The green lights flickered in unison, and Johnny, standing right there by her shoulder, swore.

-----

Chapter Text

“Holy shit,” said Johnny, cutting through the haze that had taken over V’s mind. Startling her even if he had barely whispered the words.

Shaken, V’s gaze focused, her mind going from confused and barely registering what was in front of her to assessing in the span of a breath. As her heartbeat slowly found its way back to a sustainable rhythm, she examined the glitching figure.

The man it was fashioned after seemed young, no more than forty if she had to guess, but could have been a hundred and a frequent visitor at a cosmetic ripperdoc clinic for all she knew. His dark eyes were, however, unmistakenly full of sorrow. The emotion distinguishable in them as clear as the Arasaka logo on his lab coat.

He was, also, not real.

At the very least not in a physical sense. Because while his outline was sharper and steadier than when they had first seen him inside the rotunda, it still glitched in and out of view every few seconds. And he was not, she deduced with horror as a quick glance around found no visible emitter, actually in the room but only projected inside her optics.

“V, the creepy man can see me,” said Johnny, urging her to do something about it with the inflection of his tone alone.

“I know,” she replied, just as her scan found what she had dreaded, leaving her feeling like the greenest of all rookies. “It breached my system.”

Johnny turned towards her. The incredulous expression on his face making her feel even more like an idiot. “What the fuck, V. How?”

“I don’t know,” she answered truthfully, baffled herself at how that could have happened. The when, she thought she knew. The first camera, the one she had tried to scan after descending the stairs into the crypt, must have been it. The lights had turned green, and the security system had deactivated for them right then and there. But she had felt nothing. Nothing that could even register as a breach or, worse, as a threat to her countless layers of ICE.

Even though she had done the same times and times again to others, V just couldn’t fathom how whoever or whatever that man was had managed to break through her defences without her even noticing.

The thought was humbling and, in a way, at least reassuring. If the man had been inside her system for so long, then he could have easily killed her already.

“But, if that’s so, then he is helping us. Or I’d probably be dead already,” she explained to Johnny, before turning her attention back to the mystery man.

“You are not hostile, are you?” she asked him, taking a tentative step closer.

Johnny’s hand moved as soon as she did, passing through her bicep as he tried to alt her advance. The phantom feeling of it was not enough to stop her.

The ghost in her optics lowered the hand that was still raised towards them and shook his head.

“Okay,” V said, mostly to keep her nerves steeled and herself from bolting. “Who are you then?”

He studied her for a moment before answering. “Ken… do,” he said, voice fracturing as his glitching seemed to become more frequent.

“Kendo,” repeated V, sounding out the word.

He tilted his head slightly to one side, looking at her for a moment, then nodded.

The name did not mean anything to V. She could not recall anything connected to it, either from her stint at Arasaka or later as a merc. Nor she had seen it anywhere on Padre’s brief.

She glanced at Johnny. Shoulders set in a tense line and brow furrowed, he responded with a curt shake of his head.

Maybe the guy really was a ghost.

She swallowed. “Are you… an AI?”

“Close. A… ” he said, interrupting himself as he glitched again, “…broken…hato.”

“What the fuck does that mean?” uttered Johnny, finally shaken from his own shock.

Early in her Arasaka days, V had learned to never, ever, interpolate something based on a number of observations so small she could count them on her fingers. But her life as a merc had taught her the opposite. That sometimes you had to go with your guts, as bullets had the annoying habit of not waiting for relevant data to be collected and analysed.

Based on what little information she did have, her current theory was really no more than guesswork. But, it could fit. And it was way better than believing that Kendo was, indeed, a ghost. After all, she had been sent to retrieve data, and the brief never specified what kind.

“Most divisions inside Arasaka use AI assistants. We had one in intelligence. They are limited, of course, not true ones like Del. But, he could be one of them,” V speculated, pointing to the familiar logo on Kendo’s lab coat. “Maybe, someone at Arasaka did kneel at Sunday Mass and brought it here. Sold it for favours or protection. I don’t know.”

“But why would it help us,” questioned Johnny, looking at the logo on Kendo’s coat with narrowed eyes, “when it killed the three fuckers in the other room?”

That, V had yet to work out. At the moment, she really had no solid theory except that maybe, after breaching her system, he had seen her mission brief and actually wanted to be recovered. It was a stretch, but nothing else seemed to explain his goodwill towards them.

Before she could voice that weak explanation, Kendo spoke again, catching their attention.

“Defected…” he said. Then he glitched, reappearing once again behind the altar. “My sin. You…  fix,” he added, and, as he did so, a shard was ejected from the terminal. He pointed at it. “Reconcile.”

Once more, he made little sense.

Had circumstances been different, V would have dived into that puzzle head on. Limited and broken as it seem to be, if Kendo was still somewhat of an AI, V had been netrunning long enough to understand the value behind such a thing. More so, if indeed it came from Arasaka.

But time was a currency she had little of, in general and especially at present. So, she focused on what she knew and what needed to be done.

She stepped forward.

“V,” warned Johnny, his hand raising again towards her. This time he did not make contact, and through their connection she could heard him sighing even under the humming of the servers and the muffled music coming from the nave upstairs.

She kept going. Whatever its motivations, Kendo had helped them. No reason to believe that would change now.

Her eyes lingered on Kendo as she closed the distance between herself and her objective. The maybe-AI remained as immobile as his glitching granted, observing her and even nodding an encouragement when V’s hand hesitated over the shard.

Just like the previous two, the shard’s side was marked. ASP.03/3.

V breathed heavily, the air in her lungs rushing out from her mouth in a shaky exhale as she tucked it away with the others.

Three marked shards. That was what Padre had tasked her to collect and she had now done it. 

“V, you got your confessions, let’s go,” urged Johnny.

Still.

“Yeah, just a second,” she said, without turning, only raising one hand behind her in a placating gesture. “Are you on the shard?” she asked Kendo.

“No. Research… confessions,” he replied, pointing at her vest.

“Is there a way to download you? Fast?” she asked again, pointing at the terminal. The urgency in her voice increasing with every wasted second. “A blank shard or… I can try to set up a connection with the net outside.”

Without waiting for a response V moved to the terminal’s keyboard, mind evaluating possibilities. But just as her fingers found their position on the dusty keys, the whole room bled to red. Lights turning from neon green to warning red in the span of a blink.

“V!”

In seconds, well before she had time to truly understand what was happening, she turned towards the door, hands already gripping the Lexington and raising up toward the keystone there. The turret was exactly where she had expected it to be, red light blinking warningly. But it didn’t fire. Didn’t even move at all.

“What – ”

“Oni… coming,” Kendo said.

Her HUD glitched, static taking over for a moment before clearing away on the image of the familiar corridor she had crossed to get deeper into the crypt. The camera she was looking though seemed to be halfway down the passage, looking away from the crypt entrance. Six Maelstoms crowded the narrow space, advancing in pairs towards the rotunda, armed to their teeth with power shotguns. V did not waste time, trying to breach their system as soon as she understood what she was seeing.

“Fuck,” she said out loud when the breach failed before even starting.

“What, what?” asked Johnny, somewhere behind her. “What the fuck is happening, V?”

“Maelstrom incoming, I have access to the cameras, but I can’t hack them,” she explained, trying once more. When her second try failed again, she let the camera view go, optics readjusting to the room in front of her and gaze finding Kendo’s. “Why?”

“Old system… not… compatible,” he explained.

For the second time that night, V felt like the earth had shifted below her feet as her netrunning skills failed her. Netrunning had always been like breathing to her, easy in a way that no amount of study or practice could grant. Hell, she would have probably ended up in NetWatch herself had Arasaka not snatched her first. So, failing now, and on something so basic like retro-compatibility, was unthinkable. Earthshattering.

Kendo glitched beside her, breaking the spell of self-commiseration she had fallen victim too. “Hide,” he commanded, hand pointing to the space behind the stone altar.

As he said so, the creaking hinges of four different doors started to move. “Distraction,” he explained, nodding at her.

The shape of a plan flickered at the edge of her HUD, and V understood.

Instincts taking over as muffled steps and voices started to ring out from the rotunda, she moved, sliding low behind the altar. Dust pricked her nose as her right knee touched the floor. She focused on the feel of the cold stone where her shoulder braced on the altar, tongue pressing on the roof of her mouth to keep herself from sneezing. Her grip on the Lexington tightened.

Johnny appeared beside her, mirroring her pose, like he had to take cover too. Every muscle in his face seemed to be contracted, tense like a pulled cord close to snapping.

“Clear those rooms,” barked one Maelstrom from the Rotunda. “Nowhere to hide here. Go.”

A few seconds later, V watched Maelstrom number one cross the eastern gate into the server room from the camera above the door. He stepped inside, shotgun raised and optics scanning the room for movement. Behind him, a second goon enter in the same way, the barrel of his own gun moving from side to side as he took in the room.

V held her breath, watching from different angles as each one of the six Maelstrom entered one of the rooms. As the last stepped through the scriptorium, the hinges of all four gates moved once more, sealing them all in.

The two Maelstrom stuck in the room with her turned at the sound, but before they could do anything about it, the niche above the door clicked. The old barrel came to life in a flurry of dust and gunpowder, three curt bursts of heavy ammo that lodging themselves right into the chest of Maelstrom number one. He fell on his back, twitching for a moment before going still. His shotgun falled with him, skirting to a stop halfway between him and the altar where V was hiding.

The second Maelstrom had clearly faster reflexes, because he managed to take the turret down before it could focus on him. The barrel exploded, the detonation not enough to injure the goon but enough to cause a distraction.

V used it to move out of cover, levelling the Lexington with the Maelstrom head with precise movements. She pulled the trigger and the gun jammed. Trigger going dead below her finger and slide stuck halfway through its movement.

Dread filled her as the guy turned, and V scrambled to breach his system. The Reboot Optics was already queued, but the Maelstrom’s reflex were faster. He fired just as the upload started and before V could crouch back to cover.

She did not have time to brace for impact, but the Maelstrom must have been quicker than precise with his aim, as the pellets only managed to scrape her left hip. Pain blossomed there and she felt herself take a step back, straining to keep her balance.

“V!”

Her leg burned, and her vision split as she felt the too familiar warmth starting to seep under her suit. But she ignored it all – the pain, the blood, Johnny’s cry – because her daemon had landed, and the Maelstrom was lurching forward, blind and confused, head jerking from side to side like he could shake the effect off just with that movement.

V sprint to the side, out of cover of the altar and forward, launching herself to the floor between them to grab the discarded shotgun from the dead Maelstrom. Gritting her teeth as her hip collided with the stone pavement, her hands closed around the loaded shotgun. Turning on the floor just enough to prop herself up and take aim, she fired. At such a short distance, her aim was true even through the haziness barely kept at bay by the surge of adrenaline that took over her body.

The Maelstrom crashed into the sealed door behind him. A leaking mess of mangled skin and white fluids leaving a macabre trail on the iron door where his head should have been as the body crumbled to the floor.

V, frozen on the same floor, breathed, chest rising and falling at a wild pace, and for a moment, the only sound she could hear was the hissing of the blood rushing down her veins. Then her breathing started to slow, the hissing fading back as noises from inside and outside the room rushed in.

The rhythmic sound of fists pounding on metal came from the rotunda and beyond it, accompanied by the screaming voices of at least three different Maelstrom. Inside the room, the hum of servers was accompanied by the crackle of the broken electrical contacts from the one that had taken the blunt of the shot meant for her. Over it all, the electric beats of music still resonated from the church above.

Johnny glitched in front of her, crouching with one knee to the floor, eyes wild and chest raising and falling not much slower that hers had been just a moment before. “Fuck, V. Still breathing?”

His voice was enough to shake her from her stupor, and her mind cleared enough to spur her into action.

“Yeah, working on it,” she said, reaching for the Bounce Back in her vest wih shaky hands after disarding the shotgun to he side. She injected herself close to the wound first, like Vik at taught her to, then moved to examine it. Hooking two fingers under the torn seam of her suit she peeled it back enough to check the damage.

The pellets had peppered several shallow tracks of red and angry scrapes along her outer hip. Blood seeped slowly through the frayed skin but there seemed to be no entrance holes without exit or going deeper than a few layers of skin. No torn muscles, bones or major veins meant her chances to get out alive had not tanked as she had feared.

“Just a scratch,” she told Johnny with a reassuring nod. He searched her eyes for a moment, the tension in his face easing slightly as he nodded.

V’s own gaze moved across the room in search of something that could pass for gauze. Standing a few paces behind Johnny, Kendo pointed her to the altar. There, at its further end, an old lab coat sat neatly folded. Even from her position on the floor she could see the fabric had yellowed with time and was covered in dust. She winched. But beggars and choosers, and V would just have to brave Vik’s scolding when he’d inevitably have to stab her full of antibiotics.

She managed to get herself up with less fuss that she had foreseen, avoiding pressure on the arm where the shotgun recoil had made a number on Vik’s stitches. The Bounce Back, designed to temporarily overcome wounds way more severe than her own, overcompensating easily the contained damage and blood loss on both hip and arm.

Reaching the altar with just a few, slightly limping, steps, she made quick work of cutting out one of the coat sleeves with her tanto and fashion it into a makeshift wad. Her hip stung and she grimaced as she pushed the rough cotton through the hole in the fabric over the wound, wedging it into the space between her skin and the suit and hoping the tightness of the black Aramid weave would be enough to keep it in place. She did not bother with the arm.

“Now what?” Johnny asked. He had glitched over to the door, examining both the sealed gate and the Maelstrom body slumped over it.

“As I said, now we improvise,” she answered as she moved to retrieve the Lexington. The adrenaline and drugs in her system making her sound uncommonly giddy.

Anger still flared inside of her at the sight of the gun, adding to the mounting frustration over how the gig was turning out. She snatched it up from the floor with a touch too much force, hissing as her wounds protested the movement.

With curt gestures she made quick work of clearing the jam, releasing the mag and racking the slide several times back and forth to clear the rounds stuck there. Two popped out, explaining why the gun had jammed.

She inhaled and exhaled, letting her anger settle. Just like in the case of the compatibility issue for the cameras, V knew she alone was to blame. Her preparations for the gig had been sloppy. Sure, she had read the brief front to end, and twice at that. But she hadn’t gone deeper, trusting the provided intel instead of putting her intelligence skill to use like she usually did to consolidate her own. In her mind, she had blamed a lack of time, but exhaustion had been the real motive behind it.

Maybe I do need a break, she thought as the worries of one too many people in her life resonated through her mind.

Still, not now.

Shaking herself from those thoughts, she secured the useless Lexington it in its holster before reaching for the discarded shotgun.

“Wanna be a little more specific?” pressed Johnny, bringing her back to the conversation and rolling his eyes at her cheeky call back.

V turned to look at Kendo, a silent conversation passing between them as he fed camera feeds and information streams to her HUD.

“There are still four Maelstrom in the crypt,” she explained while she reloaded the shotgun. “Kendo has killed two in the columbarium, and sealed another two, one in the scriptorium and one in the western room. Another two followed the others down as the screams started and are loose, so that leaves only one upstairs. Also, in those last rooms the turrets are KO, so no way to kill them from here.”

“What, doesn’t he have something nasty to upload into their system?” interrupted Johnny, sending a side glare to the glitching form of Kendo.

V shook her head. “No, no combat hacks, that why the three we found in the columbarium made it that far. He needed to use the turret.”

Johnny scoffed. “Can he open this door at least? You can take the two outside.”

“I’d rather not take my chances here. They won’t rush in after all this commotion and going out in an open space like that is just asking to be flatlined,” V disagreed, shaking her head once more. Her vision swam for a second at the movement and she regretted it immediately.

“Then what? You plan to wait here until they decide to go away?” he pressed, sarcasm colouring every word.

V managed to keep herself from rolling her eyes only because she really wanted to avoid the ensuing dizziness. Winching with every step, she walked to the end of the room, behind the altar, stopping in front of a sever a few paces further from the broken one.

“Kendo and Padre’s confessions are not the only secrets the old monks kept,” she said. Then, she turned to Kendo, “could you?”

He nodded, and a second later the server rack in front of her moved, rotating on invisible hinges and revealing a small passage in the wall. A whiff of stale air engulfed her, making her nose twitch.

V grinned at Johnny’s incredulous expression. “Ta-da,” she said, pointing to the opening with the shotgun in her hands.

“Are you fucking kidding me?”

“Nope, I don’t know why this wasn’t in the brief, but there is a whole maze of passages down here, connecting the rooms in the rotunda. Even some hidden ones, actually,” she explained. The unexpected revelation adding to the weirdly euphoric effect of the drugs in her system without her having any say in it.

Johnny only stared, so she continued. “The easiest way up would be from the columbarium,” she said, pointing to a server at the other end of the room, “but the door that goes from there to the main corridor is stuck – Kendo already tried it – so we’ll have to take the long way around, passing the south and west rooms.”

Johnny kept staring, brows furrowing a little bit more with every piece of explanation she supplied.

“There are Maelstrom there, but taking them one at a time and by surprise is going to be way better than taking the two in the rotunda head on,” she finished, her own eyebrow raising in a silent question to Johnny.

Her favourite ghost shook his head. “You are telling me we are gonna Indiana Jones this shit?”

V, already turning to enter the passage, frowned. “I don’t know what that means,” she said, using the barrel of her shotgun to dislodge an enormous web before stepping through.

She felt, more than heard, Johnny’s sigh through their connection. “Of course you gonk don’t know what that is.”

V felt her own lips turn into a smile. “Tell me when we get out,” she told him moving forward on the narrow space.

The tunnel that led to the scriptorium was darker than the server room and V’s optics adjusted as she ventured deeper. After a few paces, the passage opened into a another, perpendicular to it. V turned right without slowing, following the map Kendo had shared and continuing on towards the scriptorium at speed despite the pain flaring at her hip with each step.

There was a high enough probability that Maelstrom had called reinforcements from the City already and, if so, she had maybe half an hour at most to incapacitate the Maelstrom in her way and get out.

When she reached the end of the passage, both Kendo and Johnny glitched into view, the first hovering beside the empty stone wall there and Johnny leaning on one side a few paces from it.

V readjusted her grip on the shotgun as feed from inside the room appeared on her HUD. Maelstrom number three was trying to open the door to the rotunda, talking with one of his chooms on the other side of it. He had abandoned his shotgun on the floor by his feet and was facing away from the bookcase that hid the passage.

V advanced, as close as possible to the wall where her opening would be, then started to count. Kendo opened the passage on three, and she bolted into the room before the door had even open completely and the guy inside could turn at the sound of its creaking hinges.

Maelstrom number three crashed against the door behind him almost exactly like number two had in the server room. A nearly perfect headshot taking him out of the board swiftly.

For a moment, only the thumping bass from above broke the scriptorium’s quiet, then the Maelstrom outside started to scream and pound on the door as the sound of heavy footsteps accompanied the arrival of another.

V did not linger, crossing the room while reloading the shotgun. From what she could see on the schematics Kendo had shared, the doors were heavily reinforced, but time must have taken its toll on them, and she had no intention of finding out how long they could resist the Maelstrom’s assault.

“Dear God, could this be more cliché?” drawled Johnny. He was inspecting the bookcase that acted as cover for the secret passage as it closed back up and realigned itself to the wall the way it had been when V had first seen the scriptorium.

“I’ll take all the clichés in the book, if they can get me out of here alive,” V replied, stepping through the identical passage that Kendo had already opened for her across the room.

Johnny snorted at that, but he grinned when, reaching the end of the second passage towards the west room, another of those clichés materialized in front of them.

“Is that a double-sided mirror?”

“Yep,” said V, eyes already following the Maelstrom pacing inside the room. “First grade too, if it can still fool his optics, as old as it is” she added as the guy turned to look at the mirror for just a moment before moving on without a clue.

“The hell were those monks even doing here?” Johnny wondered, side eying Kendo.

As if feeling called into question, Kendo spoke. “Atonement,” he said, gaze set on V.

“Yeah, right,” said Johnny, his own gaze moving from Kendo to V. “Thing’s busted for sure, V.”

V was not as certain as Johnny about that. Their unexpected companion was, after all, the only reason she was still alive and with a reasonable chance of getting out of that mess as such. She had seen broken or corrupted AI, and the more he helped them the less she believed her own theory.

But, figuring him out was not the priority objective now. So, she ignored them both and set to breach the Maelstrom’s system through the mirror.

The guy collapsed in the middle of the room less than a minute later, his fall softened by the dusty carpet that covered the stone floor there, and V felt the tension in her shoulders ease at the successful hack.

“Nice,” praised Johnny, appearing inside the room, just by the unconscious Maelstrom.

V joined him as soon as the mirror slid to the side opening the way into the room. “Six down, three to go,” she counted, taking the space in. A small kitchenette, a long table with wood chairs, and an old living room set in a corner, identified it as a small refectory.  

“Gonna get out now?” Johnny asked, nodding towards the door to the rotunda. Behind it, somewhere closer to the scriptorium entrance, the two Maelstrom left in the crypt were still talking, alternating between brainstorming ways to open the door and wondering if they should just run upstairs to get help.

“No, they are too close, the door opening will alert them. And I need to take them by surprise.”

“Right. Where are you gonna crawl to, then?”

V’s eyes swept the room, the overlay on her HUD pointing her to a section of the wall where a bucolic painting was framed. “There,” she said, prompting Kendo to open the way.

A rectangular section of the stones moved. V felt vibrations ripple through the floor at her feet as the heavy door opened into the hidden corridor behind it.

“This is the weirdest day,” mumbled Johnny as she stepped inside.

Her way out into the crypt’s main corridor was just a few steps ahead, and V closed the distance as quickly as she could despite the burning at her hip and the slickness slowly making its way down her leg.

Her legs were starting to fell slightly less solid, the muscles straining against the heaviness creeping in, so she took out a MaxDoc and inhaled it whole. The relief almost instant as the drug filled her lungs and spread through her system.

She steeled herself with three deep breaths. Then, after circling through the cameras outside to ensure that her targets where still exactly where she wanted them to be, gave Kendo the ‘go’ through their connection.

This time, the passage that opened was low, a small square that more closely resembled a cupboard door than an actual one. The same vibrations as before shook the floor as the stone moved, opening up one of the small niches lining the corridor.

V crawled out without delay, the combined painkillers inside both BounceBack and MaxDoc allowing her to crouch down with almost the same agility she would have had before the gunshot. She still held her breath, monitoring the cameras for signs of movement.

But the Maelstrom did not move from the rotunda, engrossed as they were in their discussion on what to do next.

“Not the brightest in the bunch,” commented Johnny, and she had to agree. These guys were sitting ducks, and they had been now for far too long without even knowing what or who they were supposed to hunt.

But V could actually see Brick choosing the least competent of his goons for something like this. Just a few months past the latest coup to his reign, the Maelstrom leader would not send his best and brightest to do contract work so far from the City that most gangs wouldn’t even consider the job. Royce would have probably made a very different call, and V mentally patted herself on the shoulder for how she had dealt with that particular situation.

As quiet as she could be, she approached the rotunda. Kendo had cut the LED lights in the corridor when his first assault on the Maelstrom had started, and the darkness gave her an additional layer of stealth she was grateful for.  

“We gotta get backup, Phage,” said one of the two Maelstrom, urgency bleeding from his every word as V peeked beyond the archway into the rotunda.

Their backs were both perfectly clear in her line of sight and textbook targets for her breach, so she got to work.

“No way,” replied the other Maelstrom, bent towards the scriptorium door. He was trying to open it by wedging a blade in the almost non-existent gap between door and wall and using it as a lever. “Brick will skin us alive if we don’t fix this mess.”

“Yeah, but – ”

V never heard what the first goon counterargument was, as twin System Collapses took them down in quick sequence and they slumped on the floor in a pile, one on top of the other.

With a heavy exhale, V let her head lean to the side on the cold stone of the archway, closing her eyes for a moment.

Johnny’s hand came to rest on her shoulder, and for a moment she almost believed him to be real beside her. She looked up at him, and he grinned.

“Last stretch, V. C’mon,” he said, as he squeezed her shoulder. Her skin and nerves registering the sensation even when nothing had actually touched her.

“Guess there’s no ‘5 more minutes’ on the job,” she joked bitterly, planting her hand on the wall for leverage and pulling herself upright.

“Nope, but I bet Kerry will let you use the Jacuzzi for more than one hour if you show up looking this pathetic,” he said.

V winced, the picture not so inviting anymore as her brain conjured the stinging feeling of warm water on raw skin. “Goddammit.”

Johnny’s laughter accompanied her all the way to the stairs that lead out of the crypt.

There, just shy of the first step up, Kendo waited for them.

“Is he coming with us then?” asked Johnny behind her.

V found Kendo’s gaze, searching their connection for the answer to that question. What she found there was not what she had expected.

“There really is no other way?” she asked him.

“No,” replied Kendo. “Fix… sin.”

“What, V?” demanded Johnny.

Letting out a tired sigh, V explained. “This is as far as Kendo’s hold on the system can go. And there’s no way to download his core in the time we have. So, as soon as we get out of here, he’s going to blow the servers.”

“Ah.”

“Yeah,” she said.

Silence stretched between them for a moment, as V’s mind circled one more though options, trying to find a solution to a problem she could have never anticipated. Then, resignation settled in as Kendo shot down each one of her ideas, finding issues in every one of them.

Shoulder slumping in defeat, V focused on Kendo once more, her head and bust bowing deeply like she had learned to do in her etiquette course at Arasaka. “Thank you,” she told him, keeping the position for several moments before straightening again, “for your help.”

Kendo nodded at her, and the sorrow in his eyes seemed to lessen with the movement. He bowed the same way she had, then disappeared.

This time, she clearly registered the connection ending.

“V,” said Johnny after a time she couldn’t quantify, “we need to go.”

V swallowed, squared her shoulders, and looked at the door at the top of the stairs. Taking cover as best she could to the side of the stair, she readjusted her grip on the shotgun and willed it open with a quick hack.

The hinges screamed as they had on her way down but, just as before, the sound did not seem to draw movement. After the impressive show of incompetence below, she still found herself surprised when she realized, a few seconds later, that the upstairs corridor was, in fact, not manned. Then again, not one goon had thought turning off the deafening music to be a smart idea during a perimeter breach, and they had all but one rushed into unknown danger. So maybe she was the slow one.

Shotgun drawn, she moved up the stairs, disbelief mounting with every step.

Once she stepped into the landing and through the door, her optics’ thermal view activated, placing the last standing Maelstrom at the nave entrance and, to her left, the first Maelstrom she had taken out still slumped exactly where she had left him.

Weighting her options and deciding a trek through the woods would not be her best bet with a fresh shotgun wound, V pinged the Hoon, sending coordinates for the auto-drive. Then, she moved right, hacking the door to the presbyterium open and slipping through at a crouch.

The Church was a mess of old furniture and cutting-edge technology, most of it stamped with NetWatch logos. It seemed that, for once, the runners had not been interested in keeping their involvement a secret.

V wondered how much the three little pieces of plastic and circuitry stashed in her pocket were exactly worth. V’s fee for the job had been pretty telling on his own, but adding NetWatch and Kendo to the mix made the already outrageous sum pale when compared to anything V could even estimate.

Padre had several pointed questions waiting for him. Just, as soon as V managed to get out of that godforsaken place.

Speaking of, her last obstacle was all the way across the nave, pacing the entrance, unaware of her presence as he spoke on the holo. Between the distance and the thumping music, V could not hear a word, but she wondered, seeing how animated he seemed to be by the conversation he was having – arms flailing up and around him, even the one holding loosely on an SMG – if at least one of the Maelstrom had finally taken initiative and was now actually calling for backup.

Either way, it didn’t matter much at this point.

V sent a ping through his breached system, highlighting the few turrets and cameras covering the space. She turned them all off as he kept talking and pacing, unaware of either her physical or digital presence.

A small alert flashed on the corner of her HUD, informing her that the Hoon was now less than a minute away, and V released her daemon.

Almost as if the two had been timed, the echo of a loud explosion rocked the stone floor at the same moment, throwing her off balance slightly. Somewhere below, Kendo had blown the servers containing his core, ensuring no one could get to him.

On the other side of the nave, the last Maelstrom’s pacing had stopped mid stride, but he did not manage to turn towards the chapel as V’s daemon finished uploading. He collapsed to the floor just outside the Church heavy doors, his SMG clattering down the few steps that led to the road.

“Well,” said Johnny not a second later, glitching into view halfway through the nave. “Thank fuck this shitshow’s over.”

Gripping the overturned wooden bench that had been her cover, V waited a little longer before moving, sweeping the area one more time to ensure the threat was actually over. When she felt confident that nothing would jump out to ambush her, she emerged from cover, pushing down on the dark wood to ease the weight of her injured leg.

“Yeah,” she finally agreed with Johnny, standing still and looking down on the empty nave before moving to cross it. “Thank fuck, indeed.”

Now free of immediate danger, her mind longed to replay the gig from start to finish, analysing every rushed step and overlooked clue to understand what had happened. To fit each piece of the puzzle together and examine the picture they’d make. But, V kept the urge at bay, prioritizing – as she knew she should – putting as much distance between her and the monastery as fast as possible.

Outside, the Hoon skid to a stop in front of the open Church doors as V herself neared the exit. The driver’s door opened at her command and V almost flung herself inside, not even regretting the stab of pain that followed that burst of motion. Once inside, she wasted no time, turning the car around and launching it down the road as fast as she could.

Johnny appeared on the passenger’s seat as a sharp bend finally made the monastery disappear from the rearview.

“That was fun,” he said, eyes scanning her.

Despite the weariness and exhaustion that threatened to swallow her whole, and the chaos of barely connected thoughts and theories running wild through her mind, that managed to steal a quiet laugh from her. “My definition of fun is a little different, Johnny.”

“Yeah, no kidding. Let’s not do this again,” he agreed, leaning back on his seat as much as he could and raising his feet to rest on the car dashboard.

On instinct, V tried to swat them down, her hand passing right through them instead. “Fuck, I’m tired,” she said, realizing what she had just done.

Johnny’s eye narrowed. “You going to manage the drive?”

V was almost positive she could, but let a simple diagnostic tool run for a moment before answering. “Yeah, I still have enough blood not to pass out from that. And I can take the last MaxDoc if I need a little boost later,” she confirmed.

He nodded. “You should still call the ripper.”

“Nope. I can deal with it for tonight. Not gonna wake him for something this small. I’ll go in the morning”

“You got shot,” Johnny deadpanned.

“Barely,” she countered, looking at him for a moment. Every mile of road she put between them and the monastery raising her spirits exponentially. The familiar exhilaration that always came with having pulled off a gig more potent than any drug she knew. “Also, I still have to drop the shards,” she added.

Johnny snorted but didn’t respond, and silence stretched between them as she hurried the car down the hillside towards the coast. 

She had started replaying the exchanges between her and Kendo, trying to find deeper meaning in the few and broken lines he had spoken, when Johnny interrupted her thoughts.

“You know, I was right,” he grinned, and the smugness in his voice did not bode well for her. At all.

“About what?” she asked anyway, humouring him.

He grinned, eyes shining with glee. “You should have taken the Malorian.”

In retrospect, V knew he was right, the sting in her arm caused by the shotgun's recoil way less painful than the abrasions at her hip. But in that moment, she could not give him the satisfaction of being right.

“Oh, fuck off, Johnny.”

He laughed and, as she shook her head exasperated, V found herself smiling.

Chapter Text

>> [MUAMAR – EL CAPITÁN – REYES]

Muamar Reyes was no stranger to violence and fear.

Being born in SanDomo halfway through the City’s reconstruction – when most of it was still rubble, and the dirty waste of the Hot Zone had yet to be cleared – had made constant companions out of both during his formative years.

On those streets, where a glass of water could be scarier and more lethal than a bullet, and tomorrow never a promise, he had mastered them both, in himself and in others. Learning when to wield the first, and how to tame the second.

Later, his years of brokering deals, as a corpo first and an independent fixer after, had done a thorough job of honing and testing those skills. 

Nowadays, he still could not claim to have reached the same level of ruthlessness and detachment someone like Wakako had – his empathy still way too active to do so – but it had been a long time since the threat of either violence or fear had steered his steps and affected his future. Even more so, when those threats were made against others.

But time had passed, and fear had become such an unfamiliar feeling, leading Muamar to commit one of the cardinal sins in a city like NC. Becoming complacent. Believing himself safe from its effects.

So that was why, when fear finally slipped through his control – for the second time in as many days, and from an almost identical situation – he froze.

By that point, he had lost eyes on his merc and the feed coming in from the main drone had been the same for way too long: just a lone Maelstrom pacing the length of the open double doors leading inside the church. His thermal signature the only thing moving on the screen since the second Maelstrom, that had been posted there with him, had run inside at least ten minutes earlier.

So, when the guy had started to speak on his holo, Muamar attention had shifted eagerly. Itching for action, he had focused on monitoring the drones dispatched along the road from Night City and then sending instruction to Delamain. Ensuring backup would not reach the monastery before V had time to get out and be well on her way to safety.

In his haste to provide more than just a silent watch, he had missed the Maelstrom collapsing on the main feed, his attention returning to it only when the Hoon entered the frame and a blinking notification was dispatched to all the screens to alert him.

V had emerged from the church a moment later, and he had felt himself tense; cold sweat forming at the back of his neck despite the summer heat that kept the City hostage even so late at night.

She had been on the screen for less than ten seconds. A red blur launching herself across the thermal feed and inside the open car, before speeding away on it. Barely enough time for him to reassure himself that she was alive, but plenty for his drone to pick up all the wrong readings.

>> [SUBJECT: V]
>> [BIO-MON: HR 128 | RR 28 | BP (EST) 152/92 | TEMP 37.8 °C]
>> [WOUND: L-HIP | DERMAL ABRASION | CAPILLARY BLEED < 10mL/min]
>> [WOUND: R-SHD | DERMAL ABRASION | CAPILLARY BLEED < 5mL/min]
>> [STATUS: COMBAT CAPABLE | PRECISION INDEX 0.72]

And that was where he was now. Hostage to a few lines of diagnostics that didn’t even come close to paint a dire scenario.

Hell, he had seen a worse outcome for a gig just that morning. One of three mercs he had sent to parley with a misbehaving group of 6^th Streets had managed to get his foot blown out just then, and Muamar had not even flinched as blood splattered even on the drone’s camera.

Yet, his eyes were stuck on those readings while the Hoon ate the road towards the City in the background. His blood pressure and heart rate competing with V’s own as fear crashed over him, mind conjuring increasingly worrying scenarios. Filling the gaps between the moment she had pinged his drone outside and now, reappearing at the church’s front door with a fresh bullet wound on her hip and a reopened one on her arm.

He understood – somewhere deep into his mind that seemed impossible to reach at that moment – that V had just given the slip to at least ten Maelstrom armed to the teeth, so she could clearly manage to drive herself to safety from there. Even without his drones clearing the way ahead.

Yet the fear remained. And the why, he knew, was what scared him most.

Because that fear that kept him frozen was not tied to the injury or the situation at hand. No, it was tied to the what if scenario running through his mind where she did not come out of that church – his eyes endlessly monitoring screens that would never pick up her signature again. To that scenario and the fact that his mind could not envision an after.

“… out?”

His teeth gritted together and the pain running through his tense jaw was what finally shook him, just in time to catch the end of a question. He ignored it as the blurred lines on the screen slowly refocused into a topside view of V’s car finally reaching the coast and turning onto the 101 towards NC.

From there, she was safe.

Even if Maelstrom reinforcements managed to leave the City in the next half an hour and cross paths with her – and with all the roadblocks he had laid out for them that was highly unlikely – they wouldn’t have reason to flag the Hoon and engage.

“Muamar.”

Wade’s voice broke through his focus while he worked on repositioning the drone following V, angling it just enough to get a new set of readings on her from the open window without being noticed.

“What?” Muamar blurted out, the hint of amusement in Wade’s tone grating on his nerves.

Turning on the wheeled office chair, he found himself subject to the attention of three different sets of eyes. 

“Is she out?” asked Vektor from his desk. The sunglasses he wore even this far underground were doing little to hide the exhaustion clearly written in the slouching of his shoulders and in the way his head hung heavily between them.

Dr. Kess had left her station beside him hours before, retiring somewhere in the garage’s bowels to rest after what had been, Muamar had understood, several hours of uninterrupted research and work. The old ripper had been about to follow her when V had entered Muamar’s feed, exiting her apartment building in the Glen and getting inside the Hoon before driving off to her gig. Vektor had watched the feed for a few minutes before moving back to his seat, booting up his computer once again and resuming his work.

His typing had slowed down gradually – the hours clearly piling up on him and adding to his fatigue – but each time Hands had tried to convince him to go get some rest, the ripper had stayed.

Vektor was still firmly on Muamar’s shit list, but he had lowered his own position on it by quite a few paces with that choice tonight.

“Yeah, she is,” Muamar answered, his voice losing the edge he had sent Wade’s way. It came back with a vengeance when his eyes focused on Padre, sitting on the out of place couch at the far side of the room with Wade. “Got shot too.”

Padre had definitely climbed way higher on that same list.

“Let me see,” urged Vektor, sprinting out of his chair with surprisingly little wobbling for a man that was going on thirty hours without sleep.

Muamar moved to the side, making space for the ripper to examine the screen where his drone had reported V’s latest readings.

“Can she manage?” asked Padre, ignoring Muamar’s sharp tone. On the couch beside him Wade was doing nothing to conceal his growing amusement.

Muamar closed his eyes and counted to five to keep himself from saying something incredibly rude in front of a man of the cloth. Also, to a man of the cloth.

Vektor let out a sigh and spared him from answering at all. “Yes, she can,” he said, “it’s nothing major.”

“Good,” said Padre.

Muamar counted again, then focused his attention on Vektor. “I can have transport here in five minutes,” he said.

“Transport?”

“To your clinic. You should be there when she –”

“Oh, no. Kid’s not gonna show,” Vektor said, interrupting him before he could finish his explanation.

“Not gonna show,” repeated Muamar dumbly.

Vektor shook his head, and the look he sent Muamar’s way was the same he had seen on countless of parents in SanDomo. Resignation masking the fear they could not ever shake at thoughts of all the things their children got up to on those dangerous streets. “Kid’s stubborn. Not gonna wake me for something like this. No matter how many times I tell her she should,” he explained. “Tonight, she’s just gonna put a band aid on, sleep on it, and stumble in tomorrow. In pain, and in a mood.”

This time, when Muamar closed his eyes, he counted to ten. Twice.

Wade’s laugh interrupted his thoughts as he was trying to come up with a way to get the merc to Vektor well before morning without getting them all discovered. At that moment, the only option he had thought of was to randomly show up at her place with beers and just feign ignorance.

And wasn’t that pretty indicative of how much of a fool he was.

“C’mon Muamar, no reason for the long face,” Wade said. “Our girl is out, and I bet she even has Ando’s research with her. All in all, I’ll call this a success.”

“You would,” he replied. And the thing was, in any other situation Muamar would call it a success too. But that fear was there. Its tendrils taking root as he came to terms with V’s mortality and why that mortality disturbed him so.

Still, Muamar was a pragmatic man, and letting himself spiral on what-ifs and maybes would not benefit anyone, less of all V. So, he shook himself and went back to his screens, eyes lingering a moment on the Hoon driving swiftly along the coast, before focusing on the screen where Delamain was reversing one of his armoured taxis on a closed street a few blocks from Totentanz. Dodging the wrecks of Maelstrom’s first round of backup.

“Also,” Muamar threw over his shoulder, where Wade and Padre were now discussing the latest news from the streets like the old gossips V believed them to be, “I’m not taking that bet. Of course she has the shards.”

The laugh that came from Wade in response, he expected. The heavy hand that fell on his shoulder – and he really had to remember that Vektor used to be a professional boxer the next time the impulse to throw hands found him – squeezing it for a moment before the ripper moved back to his desk, he did not.

Muamar didn’t turn, but the gesture startled him, leaving him feeling like he had just joined the ranks of those stupid kids getting into troubles around SanDomo.

After that, the room went back to the same quietness that had characterized it during V’s descent into the old monastery. Vektor typing slowly on his computer, Wade and Padre whispering in their corner, and Muamar, monitoring V’s journey while his mind turned over the events of the last few days, trying to make sense of it all.

They were all still there half an hour later when the conversation between Padre and Wade stopped. The former standing stiffly from his place on the couch and addressing them.

“She’s calling,” he explained, before connecting the holo and walking out of the room. His greeting to the merc on the other side of the line becoming less clear as he moved further away. “V, it’s good to hear from you, child –”

On the screen, Muamar watched that same merc approach a new car, an old Hella EC-D parked by the curb, after making the drop at the agreed coordinates. His eyes still firmly on her, he typed a few commands to redirect one of the drones to monitor the drop point, keeping the area secure until one of Regina’s associates was cleared to move in and retrieve the shards by Padre’s signal.

The limp in V’s steps was clear through the feed as she walked the short distance before getting in, and Muamar’s hands kept moving on the keyboard in front of him without a second thought, rushing to dispatch instructions to his waiting men.

“Doctor,” he said, soliciting the ripper’s attention. “A car will be here shortly. You should be at the clinic tonight. Just in case.”

As the beginning of a protest started to appear on the ripper’s face, he then added, “You can work on a computer just as well from there, doc. Or you could even take the opportunity to sleep. And, you know, be at the top of your game for when she’ll come in tomorrow.”

Whatever objection Vektor had readied died with those last few words. “Fine,” he sighed, removing his glasses with one hand before rubbing his eyes with the other. When he moved to turn off his station and gather a tablet to take with him, he added, “I’ll need transport back later.”

“You have my number, Doc.” Muamar said, fingers going back to the keyboard as he also arranged for discreet security at the clinic and outside V’s building. “Call when you are ready.”

Focused on his screens and the merc moving through the City on them, Muamar did not pay the ripper any more attention when the man stopped by Wade’s couch, exchanging a few muffled words with the fixer before leaving the room.

Wade’s voice broke the silence left in Vektor’s wake several minutes later. “You should take your own advice, Muamar,” he said.

“Gig’s not over yet.”

“Technically, it’s not your gig,” retorted Wade, that same amusement from before colouring his tone.

Muamar kept his eyes on the screens a moment longer, just enough to watch V’s car speed through Downtown. Then, he wheeled his chair around once again. “Then, technically, Padre made a piss poor job of gathering intel.”

“You know he did not,” pointed out Wade.

“She got shot,” argued Muamar. The vehemence in his voice surprising even to himself.

Wade, however, was not fazed by it. On the contrary, his amusement only seemed to grow. A knowing grin appearing on his face. “Yet, she still got out and delivered. And this is exactly why V is the one doing the gigs, Muamar. The girl’s a professional and can handle a few omissions and unforeseen circumstances. You know that.”

His tone, as he reminded Muamar of those simple facts, was full of implications. And he was right. Of course he was, just like he had been before.

The brief had been a collaborative project – like most of their work these days. Carefully put together to balance her immediate need to know with their long term need to keep the bigger plan a secret.

Hands and Padre had been the ones to trace down Ken Ando’s research following intel shared by his own colleague, Dr. Kess. Uncovering how the Church – particularly sensitive to the whole ‘soul’ issue – had been the one to provide sanctuary and resources for the scientist after his split with Arasaka. Allowing him to continue his work of atoning for his involvement and sins in the Soulkiller project.

They had done so in what was record time by any fixer standard, and in less that a full day Muamar’s drones had been deployed to scout the area. The Maelstrom moving in out of nowhere just then had been one of those unforeseen circumstances, transforming what was supposed to be a simple retrieval into an infiltration nightmare.

From there, they had all done everything they could to map the area and gauge Maelstrom’s motives. Muamar had, by now, forgotten when he had last seen his own bed, and the same was also true for the other two fixers. But even so, the timeline had been blown to bits by additional players entering the game, and V had needed to be called in way sooner and with way less intel than he would have been comfortable doing in any other situation.

So, really, Padre was as much at fault there as any other one of them was.

And more, not even a week before Muamar had declared himself ready to live with the consequences of lying to the merc. But here he was now, already chafing at the seams at the first sign of those consequences.

He felt like a fool, again.

“When’s the next one?” he asked Wade, rubbing his face with one hand and slouching back on the chair. Eager to escape those damning thoughts.

Wade’s grin morphed into a lenient smile, and he let Muamar change the subject without fuss. “Wakako’s almost done organizing hers. Two days at most. Soon enough to keep to the timeline, but also enough to give V a break.”

Muamar nodded, “I can send her on a delivery, but that won’t keep her out of trouble for two whole days.”

“We’ll figure something out,” reassured him Wade. “Reluctant as she is, Rogue has actually sent a few contacts our way that could very well do here.”

Again, Muamar nodded.

Wade grin came back in full force then. “Now,” he said, getting up from the couch. “Let me see if I can find a bottle of something strong around here.”

Muamar blinked at him, brows furrowing at the abrupt change in subject.

“I believe we’ll need it, my friend. For Padre’s debrief,” he explained. And he was still grinning when he left the room a moment later.

Alone, Muamar shook his head briefly at the absurdity of it all, turning back to his screens just in time to catch V limping across the sidewalk before disappearing inside her building in the Glen.

Even though her latest readings – now blinking in a corner side by side with the earlier ones – had only worsened as the night had gone on and he would have much preferred to see her drive straight to Vektor’s clinic from the drop point, Muamar felt his whole body relax the moment the sliding doors closed safely behind her.

-----

>> [V]

The drawer on the drop point machine closed over the three shards with a brash clang of metal on metal. Its hinges screamed like those in the crypt, and V winced, eyes sweeping around in search of threats.

But she had been cautious during the drive from the monastery, and there was no one around that could mean trouble. The whole street almost completely empty save for the few drunk gonks stumbling her way from Lizzie’s down the road.

V flattened herself to the machine all the same, making herself small in its shadow when a group of patrons walked past. Their laughs quieted as they walked further down the street, and V breathed deeply, waiting for them to disappear completely. When they finally did, she fired up her holo and moved.

The call connected halfway across the road. The burning in her side made the few yards that separated her from the car she had called to switch out the Hoon – a precaution as much as an indulgence – feel like a whole mile, but she gritted her teeth and kept going.

“V, it is good to hear from you, child. Is it done?” Padre said, without much preamble.

“Yeah, it is. Shards are at the drop,” she answered.

“That is good,” Padre aknowledge. “And are you alright, Valerie?” he asked right after, voice softening.

Now manoeuvring herself inside the old Hella, careful of her injuries as her reduced strength and reflexes allowed her to be, V took a moment before answering. It was a weird question, something she usually heard only when their paths crossed at El Coyote. Certainly not part of their usual post-gig exchanges, and V wondered about it. “Yeah, I am. Just a few scratches,” she said at last. “Turns out ‘quiet’ was not an option tonight. I had to engage.”

Johnny, already sitting in the passenger seat, gave her a pointed look. She shrugged at him, mouthing a ‘what?’ that only earned her an eye roll and a ‘gonk’ in response.

“I can arrange for a ripper if you need –”

“No, no. I… ah… thanks, Padre. No need. I’ll see Vik tomorrow,” V stopped him while she eased the car on Sutter St. right at the crossway where Lizzie’s bar and Regina’s place shared a border.

The sight of Regina’s building added to the growing list of weird coincidences for the night. Making V wonder why Padre had chosen this particular drop point. Right in the middle of another fixer’s turf and so far from Heywood.

Padre and Regina were not at odds with each other – like other fixers definitely were. That much, V knew, having herself heard the priest praise Regina’s efforts on Cyberpsychosis more than once. But even so, Padre would never move such valuable assets so close to her centre of operations without her knowledge and a compelling motive to do so.

Any thought on Regina’s possible involvement was however pushed down the list, fading from her mind just like the lights of Lizzie’s bar in the distance, when Padre spoke again.

“Very well, then,” he said, but his tone was a familiar one, scepticism and fondness blending together and alerting V that a call from Mama Welles would, without a doubt, hold her to her words by noon at most.

“Your compensation is on its way,” continued Padre. “You have done well tonight, child. Contract –”

“Padre,” she interrupted him, voice firm like it seldomly was with this particular fixer. “We need to debrief properly on this one.”

There was a pause on Padre’s side of the line, and it lasted several seconds.

“You have concerns,” he said finally, the words somewhat coming out both a question and a statement at the same time.

“Yes. Most of the intel was good. But some of it was… ah… hazy.”

“Hazy?”

“Yeah, Maelstrom knew that there was something of value in the crypt, and they were trying to retrieve it. Also…” she explained, hesitating on where to start to explain her theories and even more so on how to ask all her questions.

Questions whose answers could, despite her reticence to admit it, point to one of those elusive leads Johnny had been stressing her over for weeks.

“I’m listening,” Padre prompted her.

“They had NetWatch equipment,” she went with, eliciting a snort from Johnny. His approach, she knew, would have been more direct. And loud.

“NetWatch?” wondered Padre.

“Yes, I believe NetWatch was the actual player here, not Maelstrom. Serials and firmwares were mostly intact. That tech was provided, not stolen,” V said.

“Ah,” he said, more to himself than V, “this complicates things.”

“Complicates things?” V repeated.

Padre was, once again, silent for a few moments. When he spoke, he ignored her question altogether. “Thank you for this information, V. Was there anything else I should know about?”

V’s felt the muscles in her jaws tense, and her fingers started drumming a chaotic tempo on the steering wheel at his reply.

Rationally, she knew Padre did not own her any explanation. A brief and intel on how to do the gig was all a merc was entitled to in terms of explanations. Anything more than that – motives, client’s identities, consequences, spider webs and big pictures – was usually not part of a gig’s contract and definitively not something fixers were usually keen to part with.

But V had been generally lucky on that front, finding herself unusually well informed on most gigs. Her fixers often lingering to discuss with her the finer details of particularly interesting ones and even offering a plethora of details without prompt. So, Padre avoiding her questions on something like this was quite a surprise.

Still, V was a professional, so she let her hurt settle and relayed the other relevant bit of info. All the while, ignoring both Johnny’s mounting frustration and his waving hand as he tried to catch her attention from the passenger seat. “There was something down in the crypt, aside from the shards, I mean,” she said.

“Go on.”

“I’m not sure what. Could have been an AI or something else completely. I had no time to clear that up. But it had control of the security system down there. Killed several Maelstrom and even breached my system,” she explained.

“This presence, did you destroy it?” Padre asked.

V blinked, her eyes losing focus on the road for a moment when she registered the words. At this point, the headache pounding at her temples was, she was sure, as much the result of her blood loss as of her frustration with how the conversation was going.

Destroyed? How was that his first question?

“I did not. It helped me escape,” she responded after taking a deep breath. “But it blew the servers on its own when I left. It didn’t want to get out of the crypt and there was no time anyways. But… it said I could fix his sin and that was enough.”

Again, silence stretched for several moments at Padre’s end.

“Did it confess which sin?”

What?

“C’mon V, you are not that dense. Priest clearly knows more than he’s willing to tell,” spat out Johnny, lighting a cig.

Halting her drumming on the wheel, V’s grip on it tightened. “No,” she replied through gritted teeth. “But it gave me a name. Kendo. And it projected an image on my optics. A young man, forty something if I had to guess. Wearing an Arasaka lab coat.”

As Downtown gave way to Heywood, and Padre kept is silent act up, V pressed on. “Padre, do you know anything about this?”

The sigh that came from the holo was a tired one, heavy on the exhale and so unfamiliar to V’s ears. When Padre next spoke, there was a weariness in his tone that she would have never associated with him and his usually serene composure.  “Only whispers. But nothing that cannot wait for you to rest first. We’ll talk – ”

“Wait, Padre. Wait,” V interrupted before he could disconnect the call, or she could think better of it. “If this all has to do with research done at Arasaka, I need to know. There could be something on those shards that – ”

“Valerie. If by the will of God there is something there that can help your condition, you’ll know,” he declared, voice firm once again. “I promise you.”

As that one sentence confirmed that Padre did know about her plight and was not, after all, so unfazed by it like she had thought a moment earlier, V felt her throat go dry and her eyes begin to sting. She swallowed and blinked a few times, fighting to maintain a composure that was already hanging by a thread, worn down and frayed by the night’s events.

But it was too late, and the real damage was done. Because she had gone and fallen for it again. She had gotten her hopes up.

She glanced at Johnny, and the way his expression had shifted from sour to almost placid in the span of a breath told her that he too was aware of that treacherous spark igniting inside of her.

“I… ok, yeah. I’ll call tomorrow, then,” she managed to get out, turning the Hella onto the stretch of Pacific Blv that crossed the Glen. She parked the car right in front of her building’s entrance but made no movement to get out yet.

“Of course,” said Padre, softer, like he had been when he had asked about her status. “When the time is right, we’ll talk. Now go rest, child. Goodnight.”

The call disconnected with a small click that felt final, just like Padre’s words, and V sagged along the old seat. Head resting all the way back and eyes closing almost on their own volition.

“He’s not gonna pick up that call tomorrow, you know that, right?” said Johnny, matter of fact.

Opening her eyes and focusing her gaze on the empty street beyond the windshield, V nodded. “Yeah, I know. But he was not lying. If he finds something he’ll tell me.”

“V, c’mon, the guy already knows something.”

Well, yeah. Of course he knew.

V had been raised in Counter-Intel, reading people and zeroing in on their tells was what she had done for most of her life. What she still did. And Padre? The man avoided lying by omitting and bending the truth. Exactly as he had done just now on the holo.

“Of course he does. He wasn’t the least surprised about Kendo, and he did not speculate because he probably doesn’t need to,” she said, mustering enough energy to get out of the car.

The pain in her side kept worsening, flaring up with every step as the drugs she had taken at the monastery gradually burned out of her system. Weary of taking too many MaxDoc when not desperately needed, she had not taken the last one during the drive back, saving it for later – to help ease her sleep once she had finally reached home. Now, she was starting to regret that caution.

Johnny glitched beside her, walking the short distance to the building’s sliding doors and then to the elevator by her side. “Then why are you so sure he’s gonna give you something?” he said.

She sighed as, after entering the small elevator, she found herself struggling to even raise a hand to its terminal to make it move.

“Because Padre is a man of his words,” she said once she succeeded and they finally started to move.

Johnny scoffed, and her eyes found the skull spray-painted on the wall beside him, focusing on the few words written on it. Por la familia vivo. “He did not lie when he said he would tell me, Johnny. Just omitted a clear timeline.”

“Well, tough luck, cause time is kind of the essence here,” Johnny said, glitching on the couch when the elevator’s doors opened onto her apartment. Curled into a tight ball on the same couch, Nibbles did not move but started to purr loudly as Johnny continued talking. “Are we doing something with this or are you just going to ‘have faith’ and wait for the priest to call?”

Turning right towards the armoury after clearing the elevator doors, V could not contain her eyeroll at his last barb. Once again, she regretted it immediately. Both because the movement went wasted on him – focused as he now was on watching the sleeping cat – and because once again it made her vision swim, forcing her to prop herself on the door frame and breathe for a few seconds to let it clear.

When her vision came back and she felt stable enough to cross the door into the small room, she found Johnny was already there, sitting on the small coffee table in the corner.

“So?” he asked, one eyebrow raised.

Leaning on the counter with her good hip for support, V ignored him and set on removing her gear, discarding the Lexington and what remained of her boosters on it.

“The only thing I’m doing tonight is sleep,” she replied a few moments later, struggling to unlock the bindings on her vest.

This time, the eyeroll came from Johnny. “V,” he said, holding out the single letter a touch too long.

“Look,” V snapped just as her vest’s buckles did, the abrupt motion releasing both the garment from her body and the stack of papers she had stashed below it.

Wincing as a fit of sharper pain shot through both her hip and arm at the sudden movement, V tried to catch the thick ream before it fell. But her limbs were heavy, slowed down by blood loss and exhaustion, and she missed the blasted thing by a long shot.

Somehow, the papers managed to bounce off the crate stashed below the counter, sliding behind it at an awkward angle. V stared blankly at the bloodied corner peeking out from behind the crate for almost a full minute before shaking herself. Finally deciding that retrieving them would require way more energy than she currently possessed.

“Fuck it,” she muttered, tossing the vest on the counter with little grace.

“Should take a look at those,” said Johnny unhelpfully, eyeing the papers.

V exhaled, heavily.

“Tomorrow,” she declared, grabbing the last MaxDoc and turning to the cabinet by the door in search of what was needed to dress her wounds for the night. “Right now, I’m probably ten minutes away from passing out. And I’d really like to do it on my bed. With fresh pyjamas on. Not bleeding in the shower like last time.”

Glancing at Johnny before moving for the bathroom upstairs, she found him examining her, brows furrowed and eyes squinting almost to a sliver. She saw the moment he relented, his shoulders going slack as a sigh tore out of him.

“Fine,” he said. “But this is a lead, V. And we are following it.”

V found herself smiling at him. Then, taking a page from Padre’s book, she left the room without giving an answer.

The journey upstairs took considerably more effort than expected, and she stumbled on the stairs twice, catching herself on the railing at the last moment both times.

Still, she managed it, and once there she went through the motions of removing her netrunning suit, showering and dressing her wounds, as quick as she could in her current state. Her jaw hurt too by the time she was done, the muscles there sore from being clenched tight each time pain from her injuries flared up throughout the whole ordeal.

When she finally fell onto the bed, her hair was damp and her shirt was inside out. But her reserves of energy had run out somewhere between tying up the clean gauze around her arm and putting on fresh clothes, and V had still managed to reach the bed without accidents, so she counted it like a victory nonetheless.

The trail of discarded clothes, blood, and wet towels she had left behind would just have to be a problem for future V to take care of.

Because now, almost twenty-four hours later, V was finally back where her day had first started. Gradually succumbing to sleep as her unresponsive body suffered through the aftereffects of her latest adrenaline high.

Her eyes had just closed when Nibbles jumped on the bed and curled up by her side. His loud purring mixing with the soft notes Johnny had started to string somewhere downstairs. Both sounds helping along her descent into sleep.

Her consciousness had almost slipped completely, succumbing to that desperately needed rest, when the alarm that signalled a new incoming message pinged, and V found herself disoriented as awareness returned to her all at once.

For a moment, while her HUD reappeared before her optics and her mind anticipated news from Padre, her heartbeat spiked.

It almost stopped, her heart treacherously skipping a beat before resuming its thumping rhythm back up even faster, when she realized the message was from her fixer.

Just, not the one she had expected.

>> [Muamar “El Capitán” Reyes]
>> [Found the next sweet ride in need of a change of hands. You up for it?]

Fighting to keep her eyes open long enough to even read the message, V knew she had to say no. But the sudden queasiness in her stomach had nothing to do with the events of the day and, really, she had done gigs in way worse conditions anyways. Also, she had plenty of Bounce Back and MaxDoc in the armory.

The music from downstairs stopped. The silence that followed broken right after by Johnny’s disbelief. “Fuck’s sake, V. Seriously?”

V ignored him, and when she typed back, neither Johnny nor her brain had much say in the matter.

[V] <<
[Sure. Send me the dets?] <<

The small dots on her messaging interface bounced in looping sequence for almost a full minute as the fixer seemed to mull over her response. V spent that whole time trying to get up. But even just sitting up on the bed proved to be a greater challenge than she had estimated.

Fortunately, her worries about how to get to those boosters downstairs vanished as his reply came in.

>> [Muamar “El Capitán” Reyes]
>> [Eager, are we? I like it. But not tonight, princesa. Call me tomorrow]

A few seconds later, a second message followed, like an afterthought.

>> [Afternoon if you please. I’ve had a long night]

Lips curving into a smile, V ceased her efforts to get up, letting tiredness weigh her body down fully on the firm mattress.

[V] <<
[Aye aye, Captain] <<

This time, his answer was almost instantaneous.

>> [Muamar “El Capitán” Reyes]
>> [Preem. Goodnight, V.]

[V] <<
[Goodnight, Muamar] <<

Downstairs the music resumed. The familiar opening notes of a slow rendition of ‘Night City’ culling her back to sleep as she wondered what had kept Muamar up tonight. A gig, just like her, or maybe something more pleasurable.

When sleep finally pulled her down, it spared her from examining exactly why jealousy had spiked at the thought that, either way, she had not been the one there with him.

Chapter Text

>> [V] 

By the age of twenty-seven, V had been stabbed more times that she cared to remember. And, by a plethora of different blades too.

Machetes, katanas, knives, mantis blades, shuriken. V’s skin had, unfortunately, tasted them all. Once – during a quarterly review meeting that had seriously gone off the rails – even an Arasaka commemorative pen.

Yet, there was no sharp edge in the City capable of making her skin crawl as much as the sight of Vik’s needles when the ripper was in a mood.

And boy, was Vik in a mood.

V had limped down into the clinic halfway through the morning. Scoring a solid six on her personal pain scale, with far too few hours of sleep under her belt, and expecting the lecture of a lifetime. What she had gotten instead, had been a weary sigh and a handful of words – most of which monosyllables – directing her to the chair.

Stonewalling each one of her attempts to start a conversation until she had finally stopped altogether, Vik had examined her newest wound in silence, not even asking how it had come to be on her hip before moving to prepare the supplies needed to treat it.

Feeling chastised like she had somehow received that lecture all the same, V had moved on to observing him. Hoping to find something that could explain his sour mood and – even better – something that could help her snap him out of it and restore his bedside manners before he got to the needles part.

Now, Vik did not seem much different from the last time she had seen him. But the dark shadows peeking out under his sunglasses were the same shade of purple as the ones she had seen reflected in her own mirror that morning, and while his hands were steady as they filled the syringe with drugs from different bottles, she could see the strain to keep them so written in both his frowning brows and thinned lips.

Clearly, V was not the only one getting too little sleep these days, but nothing else registered as out of the ordinary to her examination of him.

Even a quick sweep of the room came up mostly clean. Aside from the turned off screen on his desk – where for once no match was streaming – everything was as she expected it to be. The clinic looking just like she had last seen it.

Her ears barely registered the sound of clinking glass as she finally found something that could be, by Vik standards, described as out of the ordinary: a small duffel bag.

Stashed under his desk, there was a shirt peeking through the open zip. The worn fabric half tangled with what seemed to be a tablet. The shirt, V had seen several times before as the ripper wore it at the clinic often. The tablet, corporate grade and protected with ICE that could rival her own – as a superficial scan showed her – she had not.

She pondered in just how much trouble would she be if Vik caught her breaking the ICE and snooping. Not keen on finding out, she cleared her throat and settled on a more cautious approach.

“Sooo,” she said, stretching the word out, “are you going somewhere or – ouch! Vik, what the hell!”

“What?” said Vik, hands and eyes focused on injecting the syringe’s contents right above her wound – where the night before she herself had shot up the Bounce Back.

Her unfortunate sensitivity to the wide spectrum antibiotics Vik used made itself known right away, and V’s own hand moved on reflex at the familiar burning, searching the skin above it.

Before she could even get close, Vik swatted her away. Then, without pause, he removed the needle and covered the wound up. First with a generous dose of antibiotic gel – “you at least cleaned it up as I taught you, but better be safe” – then by pressing down on the skin a cotton gauze that chafed and made the burning worse.

V winced.

Vik raised an eyebrow several inches above the dark lens of his glasses.

“C’mon Vik, warn a girl?” she pleaded.

“Why? It’s just a needle and some gauze. Can’t hurt more than this,” he said, nodding at the wound and pressing an oversized adhesive plaster to cover it all. “And I’m sure the guy who shot you didn’t.”

“Yeah, actually…”

Having already moved on to examine her arm and how she had managed to unravel his work there in so little time, Vik stopped. Eyes moving up to stare at her. “Seriously, kid?”

V’s shoulders relaxed and she smiled. The pet name making it through despite his mood was always a good sign.

“Well, I was going to shoot him first. But the gun jammed,” she explained, “it was just bad luck, Vik.”

“Bad luck, she says.” He shook his head. “Kid, your bad luck run out months ago, this is being stupid.”

“Did I tell you?” said Johnny, appearing behind Vik. He was leaning on the old punching bag hanging there, his non-existent weight not impacting it one bit. “Of all the gonks you surround yourself with, this one, I like.”

V rolled her eyes without thinking, jumping on the chair when Vik pinched her shoulder. Just above the wound.

“Ouch,” she complained, again, wiggling a little on the chair.

“That’s what you get for being stupid, and cheeky,” Vik said, “now stay still, or you’ll get glue everywhere.”

“That wasn’t even for you,” she grumbled, sending a grimace Johnny’s way in response to his satisfied smirk. Her constant companion raised a finger in her direction and V rolled her eyes again before going still on the chair like the ripper had asked. The purple gel had ruined enough of her clothes already, and she did like the synth-cotton tank she was wearing.

“Silverhand?” Vik asked, the already tense line of his mouth morphing into something strained.

V nodded.  “Yeah. He thinks you’re right – that I’m being stupid, that is,” she said, feeling just a little lightheaded. The burning under her skin and his worried expression pushing her to say more than she would usually do. “Thinks I should spend my time searching for leads, not doing random gigs.”

The lines between Vik’s eyebrows deepened. “Does he?”

“V,” warned Johnny, frowning.

“Yup,” she confirmed, dragging the ‘p’ a little. Head slightly tilted, she kept her eyes firm on the old ripper, expecting him to lean on Johnny’s assessment and double down on the sentiment.

He did not, but the tense line of his mouth softened, and – despite the subpar bedside manners he had demonstrated so far – Vik handled the redressing with kinder movements. He applied the cold glue first, squeezing it generously on the three gaps that had formed where she had removed broken stitches the night before. The new sutures burned just a bit more than her tender skin already did as he wove them in, and V’s nose scrunched up at the sensation.

She must have tensed, because Vik interrupted his work to press a hand on her forearm. “Hold still,” he said, resuming his work when she did just that.

“Sorry,” she mumbled, eyes transfixed on the needle. Following its motion as it was threaded in and out of her skin.

Vik sighed. “Not what you should be sorry about, Kid.”

“This the part where you agree with Johnny? Or where you tell me to take it easy?” V asked, almost playfully. The conversation moving to that familiar script making her feel more grounded.

She was a netrunner and an analyst, after all. Patterns were something she could handle. And even if this – now customary – discussions were not anywhere near comfortable, they were safe. Easily deflected with the counterarguments she had crafted to her friends’ objections over the span of several weeks – since her search for a mystical cure had stopped.

“It’s not,” Vik said, covering the wound with gel and a plaster like he had done on her hip.

Brain sifting through rebuttals to find the right one, and mouth already halfway open to deliver it, V took a moment to register the words. When she did, her mouth clicked shut.

Behind Vik, Johnny stopped his perusal of Vik’s old trophies and turned to look at her. Their eyes met for a second, mirroring the same confusion.

“It’s… not?” V asked.

Removing the latex gloves he used only when keeping patients from flatlining was not a bigger – and more pressing – concern than infections, Vik sighed again. “Look, Kid,” he said mildly. Pausing until V’s eye found him again.

The tired smile she found on his face was desolate. Resigned, like the ones he had given her in those few gloomy days between removing the bullet from her head and deciding to throw himself on researching medical miracles to find a cure.

Its reappearance now felt like her stomach had been emptied suddenly. Bottom half torn right off, leaving a gaping space – that somehow felt heavier than lead – where it used to be.

“I’ve been doing this a long time, kid,” he continued. “Seen enough mercs walk through that door – and right back out as soon as their gut was tucked back inside their abdomen – to know you lot have no sense.”

V grimaced, more from the growing hole twisting her guts than from his assessment.

“Yes, V, you included,” he chastised, misinterpreting her expression. “So, no. I’m not going to waste any more time on a fool’s errand. You wanna get back in the ring, I’m not stopping you.”

The hole, V thought, was clearly a black one. Growing outwards and swallowing every shiver of light left inside her. Snuffing even that small spark that had taken residence there in the dim lights of an old, dusty crypt.

She swallowed, trying to at least ease the matching knot crushing her throat. “Then what are you doing?” she asked, voice coming out small and rough.

For a moment, it looked like the question had left him without words, and he looked as lost as she felt. But he shook himself out of it fast, actually shaking his head before standing up from the metal stool. “Giving you instructions,” he said, “so infections don’t kill you before the Relic has time to”.

Then he moved, walking the length of the clinic in different directions. Gathering supplies from drawers and trays as he went.

With movements way more unstable than she would have liked them to be, V took the time to put her pants back on. Vik was still rummaging through drawers when she was done, so she sat back at the edge of the chair.

“What crawled up his ass?” asked Johnny, appearing on the stool Vik had vacated.

V let go of her next exhale heavily. “I think he finally believes his own words,” she said, giving voice to her own realization. It burned, just as much as her wounds.

Brows drawing together and mouth twisting in a scowl, Johnny shook his head. “So what, this is palliative care? I don’t buy it,” he said, eyeing the bag in Vik’s hand. It was growing fuller by the minute as the ripper scoured his clinic for supplies.

The same bag, filled to the brim and now worth quite a few eddies, was dropped on her lap before she could ask Johnny to elaborate. She scrambled to keep it from falling and Johnny glitched out of her vision.

“One,” said Vik, “you keep those wounds clean, and you take your meds like prescribed. I’ll send you a text with instructions.” Dragging his stool along, Vik moved back to the desk, sitting down there. He turned her way and raised a finger, counting his points and waiting for an answer.

V only nodded.

“Good.” He raised another finger, “two: you know the drill, no poison when you are on antibiotics. Not even a sip.”

Mind going guiltily back to her drink with El Capitán, V nodded again.

A third finger came up. “And three,” Vik said, pausing a moment. Inhaling and exhaling like he was steeling himself for what came after. “Two days. You take it easy for two whole days. After that, you can go back to do whatever it is you are doing to your heart’s content.”

“Got it,” she said. ‘Easy’ was something she could do for a couple of days.

“I’m not kidding, V.” He removed his glasses, setting them on the desk before rubbing his eyes. “We know the clock’s ticking, but there’s no reason to hasten it.”

 His voice trembled a little at the end of the phrase, and V felt her heart do the same.

“Okay,” she managed to say around the knot in her throat. “Promise, I’ll follow the instructions.”

“Good, that’s good.” He turned to the desk, doing something V could not see from her position.

As silence stretched and her lungs started feeling like there was not enough air in the room anymore, V slid off the chair, inching towards the exit with her back to it.

“Add this one to my tab?” she said, shuffling from one foot to the other. Going for levity even though she felt none.

“Yeah, yeah,” he said, even though they both new he had not added a single charge to it in months.

When he turned, stretching an arm towards her, there was a small piece of paper in his hand. V blinked at it, and Vik shook his arm slightly, gesturing for her to take it. She did, and there was a holo number on it.

“I’m gonna cut back on opening hours for a while,” he explained. “Relic check-ins are confirmed, but that’s it. So, you call me when you need me. Don’t just show up here bleeding. Misty is traumatized enough as it is.”

V stared blankly at the piece of paper in her hands. A new, even more horrifying realization making way in her mind.

“And if I don’t answer my holo, you call that number,” Vik continued when she did not say anything, “understood?”

“Vik, are you ok?” she blurted out.

“What?”

“You look tired, Vik,” she said, the words sounding like an accusation. “And now you are closing the – ”

His laugh interrupted her rambling, startling her.

“Tired. Kid, this is what happen when you get as old as I am,” he said.

“But the clinic – ”

“Just taking time for myself. Don’t need the eddies anyway,” he explained.

V held his gaze for several moments.

“You are sure?” she asked finally. Worry now contributing to the expansion of that blasted black hole.

Vik shook his head again, finally sending a smile her way. “I am, you gonk,” he chuckled, “now get out of here, Kid. And memorize that number.”

Then he gave a final nod and headed towards the garage in the back. “See you next week.”

Watching him go, V weighted pros and cons of stopping at Misty’s Esoterica to try and elicit more intel from its owner.

“Maybe he got himself an output,” said Johnny, lounging on the chair she had vacated. Ignoring him, V turned and limped out of the clinic. Glad – and not for the first time – no one else could hear him.

-----

The Hawt Dawg had gone cold by the time V perched herself on the lone flowerbed at the end of the pier. She took a bite anyway. The bun was stale, the dog itself was a little soggy, and way too much ketchup had been stacked on top of what passed for sauerkraut on a mere technicality. But after a few bites, her hunger somehow elevated the bootleg meal to be on par with the gourmet ones she had enjoyed on Arasaka’s dime.

Bill Mitchell’s food stand was not – as a rule – her first choice for a meal, but she had been in urgent need to break a fast that had been going for way too many hours, and the place was just around the corner from Padre’s centre of operation.

On the drive back to Heywood from the clinic, V had called the fixer thirteen consecutive times. Padre had, unsurprisingly, left them all unanswered. Even less surprisingly, he was also not at his usual spot, and – according to César – had not been for several days now.

Resigned, but with her mood partially lifted by holding the youngest member of the Ruiz family for half an hour while she spoke with his parents, Breakout Hotdogs had seemed a good enough idea. Eating its offerings by the sea had been an even better one.

Now, pumped up on painkillers and munching on her hot dog while waiting for the day to slide into the afternoon, V let herself enjoy the Wellspring waterfront on a sunny day.

The sea breeze that caressed her face and ruffled her loose hair tasted like salt, and – while still not remotely close to cold – made the summer day bearable even at midday. Because of that small breeze and the respite it brought from the heatwaves that had been keeping the City hostage for days, the pier was bustling with people. The distant whine of traffic on Skyline and Hanford St. almost completely covered, by dozens of different conversations and by the fast, lively notes of a radio tuned to Principales. Circling the area in search of their own lunch, only the screaming gulls flying above managed to overtake the sounds of a busy day on the pier.

Taking a sip from the Té Sencha she had gotten to go along with her food, V’s eyes moved from the far point where sea and sky met down to the terrace below. The bodies and equipment of the unlucky crew of the ‘Saigon Sisters’ had been removed long before – probably by Regina’s crew when she had collected the unconscious Dao Hyunh – but the blood was still there. Staining the planks like spilled paint.

V wondered how far along Regina’s research had come. If there was, maybe, a chance that she could see the fruits of her own contributions come to life before she lost hers.

“That’s gloom.”

Looking out from a scenic viewer directed towards Pacifica and its – surprisingly, after their hazardous ride – still-standing rollercoaster, Johnny looked like the weirdest tourist.

“Yeah,” she said, taking another bite out of the Hawt Dawg. A large blob of ketchup fell from it as she did. After surviving the staining attempts of Vik’s gel, the light blue top did not manage the same luck twice. The ketchup landed perfectly on the fabric stretched over her right boob, looking like a fresh blood stain. 

“Oh, c’mon,” she lamented.

Having abandoned his sightseeing, Johnny turned, regaling her with the expression he used when he thought she was being a gonk. “Entertaining as watching you eat worse than that Valentino’s baby is, we have more important shit to do. Are we going or not?” he said, tone matching his expression perfectly.

V let his question go unanswered for a moment as she dabbed the only clean napkin she still had on the dirty fabric. Her efforts only making the whole thing worse.  “Fuck.”

“V,” urged Johnny.

“El Cap said afternoon. It’s not it yet,” she answered, feeling only slightly guilty. Vik had said to take it easy after all. By her standards, a delivery for Muamar – usually – fit the description well enough.

“What? Why the hell would you waste time playing car thief again?”

Eyes still focused on her shirt, V felt Johnny’s agitation grow as much though his words than through their connection.

She abandoned the lost cause of salvaging her threads and looked at him pace by the viewer. “Cause it’s my job?” she said, knowing the answer would not satisfy him in the least.

“Sure,” he bit out, “nothing to do with El Clowno himself.”

V bristled, straightening her back and squaring her shoulders. “First, no. It’s a job. And second, even if, weren’t you all for it just two days ago?”

“Sure, when we had no leads and you were acting like a suicidal gonk. But we have a lead now,” he said, voice raising with his agitation, “and you are still acting like a fucking gonk.”

Her hand closed tight around the used napkin. With a steadying breath she loosened the hold before speaking. “What we have,” she said, working to keep her voice calm, “is a random name with a threadbare connection to Arasaka. That is not a lead, Johnny.”

“Threadbare? That Kendo thing literally had the blasted logo stamped on his chest!”

“News flash Johnny, half the City does,” she countered, gathering the remains of her lunch and downing the last of her Té. “That does not make everything we find a lead.”

“Well, maybe it should,” he spat.

She raised an eyebrow at him, pointedly. He did not back down.

“Where is this even coming from?” Johnny asked. “You agreed, last night.”

Fight going out of her fast, V’s shoulders sagged, dragged down by invisible weights. “You have seen Vik today,” she said, “he doesn’t believe in a cure anymore either.”

“Bullshit, guy looks at you like half your DNA came out of his dick,” Johnny said, like that explained everything.

“Eww, that’s gross, Johnny. Even for you,” she grimaced.

He rolled his eyes. “Doesn’t make it untrue. There’s no way the old man has stopped searching just like that. And no way in hell he’d stop with the lectures without a reason.”

She shook her head. “What other explanation is there, if not this?”

“I don’t know. But we have a lead. If we just follow – ”

The laugh that tore out of her had no trace of amusement. “What? We find out this is all a big conspiracy? C’mon, Johnny.”

“You don’t think it’s strange?” he insisted. “Just as we finally get something the fixer lies and disappears, and the fucking ripper decides to act weird? C’mon V, he is closing the fucking clinic. I’ve seen your memories, that’s unheard of.”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake!” V said, breath and words coming out of her forcefully. “Coincidences do exist, Johnny. I’m sorry to disappoint, but you and I?” she gestured wildly between them with the hand that still gripped the empty cup. “Not the centre of everyone’s universe.”

A trio of kids walking their way froze as V’s voice raised a few octaves on the last phase. They looked at each other briefly and turned on their heels, going back towards the pier’s plaza.

V inhaled and exhaled a few times, eyes closed, while Johnny resumed his pacing. She could feel his anger rising under her own skin, simmering like a pot just a few degrees shy of its boiling point.

Before he could cross that threshold, pouring out on her all his frustrations and opinions, her holo pinged. Signalling an incoming call.

Johnny froze, and his eyes found hers in a silent question. She shook her head, and he started walking once more. Not Padre.

“Mamá,” she greeted.

“Hi, mi amor,” came the familiar voice from the other side of the connection. “Dime, did you see Viktor?” she said, not even trying to feign ignorance on her latest gig.

“Yeah, I did. I’m fine Mamá, promise,” she said. Without permission, her mind went back to that first day at the Afterlife. To Jackie, and how the lies he told Mamá Welles weighted on him like stones. V, whose parents had been gone too long by then to remember the feeling, was finally starting to understand him now.

The silence that followed her answer told her she was not the only one aware of how that answer was – while technically true – still a lie.

“Okay, mija,” said Lupe after a moment. “You rest today, and do what Viktor says. Entiendes?”

“Yes, I do.”

“Mm,” muttered Mamá Welles. “You eat yet?”

V glanced at her lap and the sad remains of what had been lunch resting there. “Yeah.”

“Bueno. Tomorrow, come for dinner. I’ll make tamales again. Misty will bring dessert.”

“Mamá – ”

Lupe cut both V’s protest and the whole conversation short. “No excusas, V,” she said, tone making it clear that compliance was not optional. “Ahí te veo, mi cielo.”

The line clicked shut right after, leaving V to stare out at the bay for a breath that stretched easily into several more.

“So?” said Johnny after a while.

He had stopped pacing, and V found him staring at her. One eyebrow raised in silent question.

She breathed. Steeled herself. “I’m calling El Capitán,” she said.

Swearing, Johnny threw his hands in the air. “Fine. It’s just your fucking life on the line,” he spat. Then he disappeared from both view and the front of her mind. Crawling somewhere deeper she could not reach him to let his anger simmer down.

V watched the empty space he’d left for a beat. Somewhere behind her the radio in one of the food stands moved on to a new track, accompanied by the screeching of a few gulls fighting on the pier for a half-eaten slice of pizza.

With a sigh and a last lingering gaze out to the sea, she hopped off the concrete planter and made her way back, stopping only to throw away her empty cup and crumpled napkins. Halfway down the pier she pulled up Muamar’s thread and, smiling at his messages from the previous night, typed up a new one.

His call lit up her holo in what seemed less than a full second, and her smile widened.

-----

>> [MUAMAR]

Muamar started the call before the contents of the message could even appear on his HUD. V’s name flashing before his eyes reason enough to spur him into motion without a second glance. He still read the casual text – just a simple ‘afternoon yet?’ – while he waited for the call to connect, smiling without wanting to at its sender’s cheekiness.

“It is indeed, Princesa,” he said when the call connected. Earning himself a chuckle that made his shoulders straightened and his chest push out.

“Then I’m all yours, Cap’n,” she said, the same cheek that had accompanied her text also colouring her voice. “Where do you need me?”

Tired as it was with only a few hours of sleep under his belt in the last forty something hours, his body still managed to read something very different than amusement in her words. And por Dios, that girl – woman, really, and there lay the problem – was going to be his ruin.

Grabbing the laptop he had been working on for the past hour – since Regina had left the garage after delivering the shards into his hands herself – he moved from the desk to the worn couch in front of it. The short walk not helping much in redirecting to the right places the blood that V’s voice had sent rushing.

“Downtown,” he said, clearing his throat before continuing, “got a Quadra Sport R-7 waiting for you to work your magic in a garage there.”

V whistled. “R-7? Neat,” she approved. “Should I expect resistance?”

Setting the laptop on the low coffee table in front of him, Muamar looked briefly at the screen to confirm the intel before passing it on. “Nah, couple of security guards – civilians. Bored out of their mind and definitely not ready for you.”

His holo picked up both V’s chuckle and the purring sound of her car coming to life. “I’ll be gentle, then,” she said. “Would now be a good time?”

Muamar stretched on the couch, crossed feet coming to rest on the table by the laptop. “Perfetto,” he said, “even better if you can bring her home in the next couple of hours.”

“Client’s in a rush?”

“Something like that,” he answered.

Truth was, the whole gig was really just a setup. To keep her away from trouble mainly, and long enough for her to rest and for them to set up the next real one. But also – Muamar was self-aware enough to admit – to get her to be in the same room as him fast after the events of the previous night.

Sleep deprived and with way too many glasses of whiskey slushing away in his stomach, Muamar had not trusted himself to find something legit that would not put her in danger. So, he had improvised.

Still, V didn’t need to know that the garage she would be walking into was owned by Dinovich – just like the security company that provided the guards for it – and safer for her than a kids’ playground in Rancho. Nor that the car she was to retrieve had come from Muamar’s own private collection, delivered to the garage by hers truly just a few hours before she had called.

“Mm, you sending your drones out for this one?” V asked, cautious.

Muamar laughed. A few weeks back, one of his smaller ones had fallen at her hands during a gig. Unaware of its origin, V had believed the poor thing part of the security system set up by the Scavs she was hunting. Unable to hack and deactivate it – Muamar’s security had been V-proofed shortly after their collaboration had started – the merc had found a creative way to take the threat out of the game.

By having three propane tanks explode just as it flew a few inches over them.

Her chagrined face when he had explained the misunderstanding had been worth every eddie he had spent to replace the expensive piece of tech.

“Already on the scene. But don’t you worry, I’ve learned my lesson, and I’ll keep them out of your way,” he said.

Another chuckle. “Good. I’ll be going then. Send me the coords? Garage and drop both?”

“As you wish, Princesa. And V,” he said, doing what she had asked.

“Yeah?”

“Drive safe,” he told her, even though the most dangerous thing she could cross path with on the phony gig was a pile-up on Republic.

“Aye aye, promise I won’t scratch her,” V replied, distracted. Her attention was turning away already from the call, probably to focus on the fabricated intel he had sent. Like the professional she was.

“I’m not worried about the car, querida.” 

He closed the call before she could reply, head falling heavy on the back of the couch and eyes looking at the thick cables running across the ceiling without really seeing them.

His ruin, indeed.

A few years past forty and having by now experienced just about anything NC had to offer, Muamar had believed himself immune – and safe – from certain kinds of entanglements. Of course, he had both relationships and people he cared about. Most of them family – too many cousins to even count, really – and friends, sometimes associates, and, on rare occasions, even brief liaisons. So, he was no stranger to affection.

But those deepest kinds of relations, the ones were the word ‘partner’ had nothing to do with biz, well, those he had managed to dodge quite easily. No one person crossing his path in all those years spurring him to ask for more. To want, for more.

Until now. Until V.

He groaned, closing his eyes. “Fuck.”

The coughing that came from the tool area of the garage almost had him jump off the couch, hands reaching for a sidearm that was not even there. He managed to stay himself only because it sounded ridiculously staged.

Still, he straightened on the couch, gaze moving to where the cough had originated.

Leaning on the workbench there, Diego was watching him. One eyebrow raised in an insulting way, and amusement written all over his face. “You alright there, boss?” he asked.

“Oh, fuck off,” Muamar told him, busying himself back with the laptop and the drones feed on it.

The snort that followed told Muamar clearly how the fucked one was not, in fact, Diego. The man was stoic. And the number of times Muamar had seen him laugh or crack jokes in all their years working together – and those were many – did not reach double digits. If this had managed to crack him up, well. Muamar was truly fucked.

 “Your merc is on the way?” Diego asked, amusement at his boss’ plight clearly persisting.

“Yeah, yeah. She is,” he grumbled. “So, scramble. You know what to do.”

“Sure you don’t want me to stay close?” Diego did not move from his position, assessing the closed garage doors. “This is Claw’s turf.”

Muamar shook his head. “No deal. Our scientists need the shards ASAP, and I’m not trusting anyone else with them,” he said. “Also, the Lady of Westbrook is in on it too, you know that. She’ll keep them away.”

Diego was not impressed by his last proclamation, and Muamar had to give him credit.

Wakako was usually unpredictable. But this whole operation was set to make them all a shitload of eddies, and Muamar was sure that was reason enough for her to see it through successfully. Granted, his own motivations where quite different, but to each their own.

Also, he had recently scored some goodwill after taking the time out of his crowded schedule to have words with 6^th Street about boundaries on her behalf.

“C’mon, clock’s a ticking,” Muamar said, breaking the staring contest they had entered.

Diego grimaced, but he finally moved, putting away the tools he had been using to fine tune the wheels of the Thorton parked inside. As the garage door opened, he stopped by the couch, setting down on the table a loaded Unity.

Muamar smiled to himself, bringing the gun closer as Diego, got in the car without a word and backed it up out onto the road. “Let me know when the drop is done,” he called out to him.

From the open window, Diego nodded. Then he drove away, and the garage door closed behind him. Leaving Muamar to wait for his merc.

-----

Later – half an hour before the alleged two he had given V to complete the gig – Muamar was already on his feet when the shutter rolled up again.

The familiar sports car eased inside a moment later under V’s expert control, coming to a stop right in the middle of the space. Behind it, the shutter started closing, cutting the afternoon light filtering in off and restoring the room back to its original dimmed light.

Despite the darkness, and the tinted glass of the windshield, Muamar’s gaze found V immediately, like the coords for her face had been hard coded into his core programming and his eyes could not set on anything else when she was this close.

Even from there, he could read the signs that too little sleep had drawn onto her. But she was there, and she was safe. And he breathed a touch more easily.

When V finally met his gaze, she grinned at him. Then she cut the engine, shutting the CrystalCoat feature off with it. The car’s body shimmered for a moment, colour rippling on the surface as the exterior paint reverted to its original black from the neon blue V had chosen to disguise the car on the way there.

The moment V got out of the car his eyes zeroed on a dark stain front and centre on her shirt. “Is that blood?” he asked, eyes following her as she moved closer. Every muscle in his body tensing at once.

V looked in quick sequence from arm to hip – confirming the location of the injuries Vektor had reported – settling on the spot high on her shirt when she found nothing there. “Nah, just ketchup,” she said, meeting his eyes and grinning.

Tension leaving him, he shook his head at her. “Favourite merc or not, there better be no stains on that baby, V,” he told her, matching the grin.

“Relax, I had lunch before I called, not after,” she said, leaning lightly on the car’s hood. “Also, no scratches, as promised.”

“I had no doubts. You drive like a fucking psycho and still somehow manage it every time,” he praised, watching the grin on her face morph into a bright smile that brought out his own. “Payment is on the way.”

She nodded.

Gesturing to the assortment of cold sodas he had arranged on the coffee table while she had been busy stealing his car, he kept talking. “As a bonus, you get your pick here. Only, no beer this time, sorry. Diego cleared me out,” he lied.

The minifridge by the desk was actually decently stocked. But spirits and drugs did not mix well, and going by Vektor’s brief, V was currently pumped up on enough drugs to affect even the biggest Animal out there. The objective being to speed up her recovery, not slow it down, there was no way in hell he was going to make the same mistake as the last time he’d offered her a drink.

“Oh,” V said, sounding more surprised than disappointed, “these are more than fine.”

Leaving her place beside the car, she grabbed one of the Vita-Mine cans on the table – smart girl – and opened it. She waited for him to do the same before taking a generous sip. “Thanks.”

“Don’t mention it. Gotta keep my best merc healthy, don’t I?” he dismissed.

She chuckled again, the sound coming out a little darker and heavier than the ones he had heard before. “If only it was that easy.”

Muamar felt his chest contract, the big muscle inside spasming before settling on an uncomfortable rhythm. “Speaking of,” he said, clearing his throat to make it as soft as he could manage. “Don’t get me wrong, mi vida. You are always beautiful, but you also look like shit right about now. Rough night?”

She snorted, leaving her Vita-Mine on the table before moving back to examine the side of the car. “You could say that,” she threw at him over her shoulder.

Doing the same with his own can, he followed.

“Gig?” he asked, prying for answers he didn’t need. Having acquired them the night before, as he drank his way through a bottle of very expensive whiskey with Wade and Padre.

“Yep, Maelstrom.” She said, no intention in her tone to elaborate further.

“Ah, that would do it,” he said, accepting the one-word explanation, like he would have had his knowledge of the whole affair been as deep as she believed it to be.

With a heavy exhale that once again disrupted the rhythm of the vital muscle in his chest, V nodded. Changing the subject altogether before he could ask more. “Got one of these myself, you know?” she said, nodding at the car.

Muamar knew. His drones had picked her up driving it around Rancho more than a few times.

“Do you, now?” he said anyway, “I don’t remember providing it.”

“'Cause you did not,” she agreed, levity returning to her tone.

Raising a hand up over the space where his heart had yet to resume a normal pace, he feigned being affronted. “We talked about this kind of betrayals, my vida. You know my heart breaks easily.”

She laughed again – finally – shoving his shoulder lightly before going back to her perusal of the car. A speck, so small it could have been a dead mosquito, caught her eyes, and she rubbed her thumb on it gently until it disappeared. “Don’t be dramatic, I won that one. Body-Count lottery in fact.”

“Body-Count – of course you did,” he shook his head. “Didn’t peg you as that morbid.”

“Well, I’m not,” V pointed out, shoulders raising and falling in small shrug. “It was actually a glitch in their system. Don’t even know how they got my number, cause I sure as hell didn’t play.”

She crouched down, attention once again caught by something on the car’s body, and Muamar stepped closer, standing by her side.

“Could take me out of business, selling all the cars that get thrown in your lap,” he told her.

“And the bikes,” she teased, “don’t forget the bikes.”

“How could I.”

V crouched lower, palm gliding under the rocker panel. Eyes narrowing at a detail he could not see.  

Bathed in the low, neon lights of the garage, working on making one of his favourite cars just perfect, she was beautiful. And he stepped in without thinking, close enough to hear her breath, the soft rasp of her threads as she shifted, and the quiet click of her tongue when an obstinate smear refused to bend down to her will.

“Hold on a second,” she instructed, studying the car’s underside. “Thought I saw – ah, nope. Just a shadow.”

Planting her hand on the floor she pushed up. The motion pulled wrong on her injured hip, and he saw it just as it happened. Saw the tight wince and heard the half-caught breath as she listed just a few degrees off centre, stumbling on unsteady legs.

He caught her, moving before he knew he was going to. One hand found her elbow, the other slid to her waist, resting firmly on the warm span of exposed skin there as her weight tipped onto him.

Breath caught short, she looked up at him. “Sorry.”

“I’m not,” he said, edging them both towards a completely different kind of fall.

This close, he could see the moment her pupils dilated, black pushing away the green that surrounded it until it almost disappeared. He could also see the tiny scar on her jaw, healed and faded a long time before, and the countless freckles on her nose, brought out by the midsummer sun and her time spent outside in it. And she smelled like soap, and sweat, and disinfectant.

And she was warm, perfect, and safe in his arms.

He could kiss her. Two inches, maybe less. He was almost sure she would meet him halfway, redrawing the room, the day, and the careful scaffolding they had built between them and called professionalism.  

Because he was not just a fixer, and she was not just a merc.

“You’re running hot,” he said instead, voice low. Because his mouth needed something to do.

A corner of her rosy lips tugged a little to the side, and she took a steadying breath. “Yeah, rough night, remember?” she said. “Give me a second.”

But she made no move to straighten up, and he held on, moving the hand on her arm to her side, just where the waist dipped, creating curves that had already haunted his dreams more than once. Pulling her just a little bit closer.

Her hands – small and lethal – were still awkwardly set between them, and she moved them slowly, searching for a place to fit. His shoulder and the space right above his heart was what she chose.

Muamar swallowed, goosebumps taking over what seemed every inch of his skin. “Got all the time in the world, love.” He said, even though it wasn’t true.

V blinked, eyes scouring his face. And the pull he felt was the same from the night she had brought him the Thorton.

This time, he wasn’t sure he could resist. Or even wanted to.

“V – ” he started, not knowing where to go from there.

Her eyes flickered down, to his mouth. Her lips parted, and right there, there was no decision to make anymore. The choice all but ripped from him.

Where he dipped down, she tipped her chin up. And he was right. She was going to meet him halfway. Lashes fluttering over her sun-kissed skin as her blown pupils disappeared behind dark lined eyelids.

On V’s breath, he tasted the sweet smell of the ketchup that had made a fool of him before. And nothing more.

Because in the next breath she pulled away abruptly. Hands pushing back on him, creating a distance he already resented before their lips could even touch.

Disoriented, he found V’s eyes. Reading there the same confusion he felt.

She inhaled shakily, and even though she was not as close as she had been a moment earlier, he still felt it reverberate on his skin, where her hands had yet to let him go.

“Holo,” she explained, biting on her bottom lip. Unsure.

Muamar was – despite the clownish façade he liked to cultivate – a rigorous man, capable of reigning himself in when the situation commanded it and more disciplined than most would give him credit for.

Yet, he had no idea how, in that moment, he managed to nod and step back. No idea how his hands could just fall limp at his side after a single, lingering, last press on her skin.

But he did, and she gave him a sad smile before turning away, walking a few steps back towards the garage door.

“Panam? Everything alright?” she said, listening for an answer from the other side right after.

Panam. Right. Rogue’s contact.

Wade had arranged for her to keep V out of the city and out of trouble for good part of the two days the ripper – and their operation – had prescribed.

At four in the morning, Muamar had found the idea to be a good one. Dakota’s playground offering way less troubles for V to stumble into. Now, he really wanted to punch someone. That someone being Wade, Rogue, or even himself, was still up for debate.

Walking back towards him, and stopping farther away that he would have liked, V was closing her conversation. “Send me the position. Gotta stop home to check on Nibbles and then I’ll head out.” A pause. “Yeah, yeah. See you soon.”

“Everything alright?” he asked, busying himself with one of the open cans of soda they had abandoned on the table. He took a sip.

V’s fingers drummed a restless beat on the side of her thigh as she kept on biting her lips, “Ehm, yeah. My friend, she needs help, out in the Badlands. It’s gonna take a while to get there, so…”

“You’ve got to go,” he said, giving her the out she seemed reticent to find on her own.

“Yeah,” she exhaled, “I’m sorry.”

“Me too, love,” he told her, managing a smile that made the drumming of her fingers slow down almost completely. He nodded to the car. “You need a ride?”

“No, no. Thanks. Mine should be out front by now,” she said, glancing to the exit.

Muamar nodded and moved there, slowing down his strides as he passed V, waiting for her to follow.

As they watched the shutter roll up, V spoke again. “Thank you,” she said, “for the gig, the drink, and... the company.”

Words failing him, he only nodded and she moved, stepping back into the City’s danger.

His hand shot out, grabbing her wrist before she could disappear.

“V,” he told her, losing himself in her confused gaze. “You need anything, you come to me.”

She blinked. A smile and that cheek he loved so returning on her face when she next spoke. “’Cause I’m your favourite merc?”

He smiled, brushing gently on the inside of her wrist with his thumb. Feeling her shiver under that simple touch, he squeezed her wrist one last time and let her go.

“Sure,” he told her. “Let’s go with that.”

She stepped out, but the laugh she left him with reverberated into the small garage long after she had gone.

Chapter Text

>>[V]

The Colby – another one of V’s lucky finds and her go-to car for Badlands runs – started struggling somewhere between Rancho and Red Peaks, losing speed as the AC gulped down power in a desperate attempt to combat the scorching heat.

When turning off the radio didn’t do much to improve the situation, V resigned herself to shut it off, opening both front windows to let the air in. She regretted the move almost instantly. Because outside the car, the wind was hot, dusty, and apparently working in tandem with the late afternoon sun to try and turn the Badlands into hell on earth. This side of the City, far away from the bay and separated from it by its own imposing skyline, had clearly not been graced by the same breeze that had made Wellsprings at midday almost refreshing.

V considered calling Panam, saying something had come up, and then go back. To the breeze and to the other thing. The one she had been trying to ignore since bolting out of Japantown like Wakako had set all the Claws on her at once.

Muamar Reyes. And the moment her world had narrowed down to him, a couple inches of space, and a decision.

Fingers drumming on the wheel, she groaned.

There were a thousand reasons why what had almost happened there was not supposed to.

Interest, on either part, was clearly not one of them.

But V had listed all the others in her mind countless times. Revising the ones at the top every time El Capitán managed to find new ways to make her skin flush and her heart beat a little faster.

For once, he was her fixer. Mixing biz and relationships was always a risk. A big one. And El Capitán? He was a damn good fixer. And sure, V had alternative options, but the idea of not working for him anymore – not hearing those proud ‘Beautiful work, V’ on post gig calls – sat badly in her stomach.

And if she ever went down that road, that was surely going to happen. Because that was just her luck, and because merc life had a tendency to burn out sweet things fast anyway.

That was why, like most in her line of work, V had adapted to take warmth where she could, no promises and no strings attached. Hardening to a life where connections of the romantic kind did not exist. Replaced by imitations that could never be more than fast and easy. With no backstories to pull her in or names to get attached to.

Muamar was not a stranger. She could not even remember a time when he had been one.

They call me El Capitán. And they call you V.

No introduction’s necessary.

Those had been the first few lines they had ever exchanged. And it had really been so. Because they had just clicked. Then and every time after. Their conversations akin to banter between old friends, reminiscing about a shared past and experiences that were not there but felt like it. Understanding guided by twin views of the world and having walked the same path, only at different times, they moved together a little closer to a precipice with no way out every time they crossed paths.

V had felt that kind of affinity once already. And paid the price for believing – against the City and all its stacked odds – that she could get to keep a connection so deep.

She had also lent her shoulder to Misty enough times now – and felt her loss as she grieved on it – to know how the pain could go even deeper when friendship was not all there was keeping two souls together.

The kind of strength that kept Misty from shattering every time something reminded her of Jackie, V could not fathom.

So, no. Muamar was her fixer, and he had backstories, and quirks, and jokes, and words he reserved for her. Too many and already too dear to just be someone fast and easy in her life.

And that, right there, was why she had drawn a line and kept herself firmly on the safe side of it. Enjoying the little moments but never pushing for more. Stepping back when he stepped forward. Moving the line as needed to keep them both from crossing it. Keeping their relationship as close to her definition of professional as possible.

It had not been easy but, for once, the Relic, and the clock it had put on everything in V’s life, had helped. After all, there were no odds to defy when one had no future to begin with.

Muamar did not know that. And he was a menace.

Got all the time in the world, love.

Damn him.

Cool hands pressing on her heated skin and keeping her steady, V had felt hunger steer low in her belly at those words. For more days, for that connection, for a reason to say yes to gigs that had nothing to do with killing time. For a lifetime of defining the odds.

Turning at the sign that marked her first stop, V blew out her next exhale through her teeth.

Now, she did not know if she should buy Panam a drink or lecture her on timing. Her mind still set on option one – albeit less resolutely – while several other parts of her body pushed for the second.

She eased off the accelerator and parked the car right outside of Dakota’s garage, glancing at her side as she cut the engine.

The empty passenger seat – its usual occupant was still sulking somewhere she could not reach – should have been, for once, a relief. Instead, the empty space and the silence there meant she had no other questions to answer – to deflect – except her own.

Was she really ready to stop pushing? To call two inches of space and an almost kiss “enough”? Let the rest of that bet and the time it deserved to be seen through stolen from her by Arasaka?

She’d told herself she wasn’t giving up. Every lead had pointed to the same conclusion. No cure and no miracles. So, what she was doing, was choosing how and where to spend what was left.

But now… now.

Now there was hunger. And steady hands, and words that sounded like promises.

And ugh.

V let her head fall heavily on the steering wheel. Her hands, still gripping it, only softened the impact slightly, preventing the klaxon from going off.

“No need to think about it now,” she told herself out loud, used to sharing her thoughts with Johnny. “Got to see a girl about a part.”

When the responding silence reminded her once again of their fight and his absence, she scrubbed a palm down her face and finally stepped out into the heat.

Late in the afternoon but still too early for the night’s temperature drop to have worked its magic and cooled it down, Dakota’s place felt more like an oven than a garage. Inside the open bay doors, the industrial conditioning struggled just like the Colby’s AC. Its stuttering fans only managing to spin hot air, dust, and the pungent smell of synth-oil about the place.

Working on covering up the familiar paint job of another Colby up on the closest lift, a couple of Aldecaldos she recognized from camp nodded at her as she passed by. V almost stopped, curious to know how the Clan had managed to swipe a ride from Barghest and smuggle it out of Dogtown.

She nodded back and kept walking. The sweat beading at her temple making the idea of lingering in that furnace even a second longer than her task required not at all appealing.

At the far end of the garage, Dakota’s office seemed to be an entirely different climate zone. Stepping inside, V had to blink a few times, her optics adjusting to the stark contrast between the brightness she had just left behind and the barely lit space, while a wave of artificially cold air made her shiver.

When she could finally see clearly again, V found Dakota sitting with one of her guys inside. Their conversation stopped as the fixer’s gaze moved from the tablet in her hands to the open door.

“Hey,” V greeted.

“There you are, sister,” Dakota said. “Aldecaldos sent you?”

“Yeah, Panam says you got the piece for her ride. You know… the big one.”

The big one being none other than the Basilisk that V had helped the Aldecaldos swipe a few months back, from a Militech convoy nonetheless, not far from where she was standing now.

Dakota nodded. “I do. Your ride out front?”

“Yes, red Thorton by the door.”

She nodded again, turning to the guy on the couch. “You heard the woman. Have the guys load it,” she told him.

“I can –” V started saying, but the guy was on his feet and out of the door before she could finish, “do it myself.”

“Guys out front can do it well enough,” Dakota dismissed her protest, “damn thing weighs probably half as much as you do anyway.” She looked V over and shook her head. “Also, at the moment? You don’t even look so hot, sister.”

V grimaced, sitting down on the couch by the door when Dakota motioned for her to do so. The synth-leather stuck to her sweaty skin, and she readjusted immediately, perching herself at the very edge of the seat to minimize contact. The burning pain flaring at her hip because of the movement still preferable than getting herself glued to the couch.

“Coming out of a few back-to-back gigs. Nothing new,” she explained breathing a little heavier.

“Mm,” was Dakota’s only comment as she kept on examining her.

Squirming a little under the probing gaze, V pressed forward. “Speaking of which,” she said, “got any lined up?”

The fixer raised one thin eyebrow. “Shouldn’t you walk off those back-to-backs first?”

“I am,” V shot back, fingers drumming on her thigh. “You know, taking a couple of days rest. But my schedule is clean after.”

The eyebrow did not lose altitude. “And driving for the clan is rest?”

“Well, yeah. I’m not getting paid, am I?” V joked. “So, anything for me to blow up or rescue?”

Dakota shook her head, setting down on the desk the tablet that was still in her hands.

V frowned. “C’mon, nothing? Not even a delivery?”

“Not one,” Dakota confirmed, eyes zeroing on V drumming fingers.

Her drumming stopped but Dakota had already read too much in it.

“You’re twitchy, why?” she asked as V’s let out a heavy sigh.

And wasn’t that the million eddies question? Why couldn’t she stay still even for just a moment? V knew the answer. Of course she did. But even thinking it was scarier than facing down a few squads of angry Max Tac officers without her deck at the ready.

“Cause one can’t stay idle long in this line of work. You know how biz is,” she answered instead, tone just a touch shy of whining.

“I do know,” the fixer said, “fast, and waiting for no one.”

“Yes, so –”

“No one,” continued Dakota, “except the one it does wait for. And you V… you got enough rep by now that if you need a vacation, you get yourself one. Biz will wait for you. Trust me, I’ve been doing this long enough to know what a pro like you can and cannot afford to do.”

V felt herself deflate.

Thing was, putting modesty aside, V’s rep was that good. But rep alone was apparently not enough to buy the kind of time or miracle she really needed. A vacation was not going to fix that.

“Now you are just buttering me up,” she told the fixer.

The door to the garage opened then, and Dakota’s man peeked in, catching her attention. “Cargo loaded and ready,” he said, disappearing again after a brief nod from his boss.

“You are set, then,” Dakota told V, standing up abruptly. “I’ll call you if something comes up.”

Recognizing a dismissal when she was presented with one, and not in the mood to force the issue, V did the same. “Alright, thanks Dakota. I’ll see you.”

She was right on the door’s threshold when the fixer spoke again. “V,” she said, “the future is not etched in stone, sister.”

The familiar words – V was sure she’d heard them from the fixer before – landed strangely and caught her attention. She stared at Dakota for a moment, trying to find a deeper meaning behind them in the lines of her face.

“Sure,” she said when she couldn’t.

Dakota only nodded, and V stepped out.

The clan was waiting.

-----

The Basilisk had broken down just a few clicks from where V had found the Colby. Rusted metal blending seamlessly into the scorched earth all around, it sat lifelessly between the twin radio towers overseeing the abandoned movie set, belly open, and being fussed over by several Aldecaldos.

Glancing over while she parked the car, V recognised all the veterans, a few faces she had only seen in passing at camp, and Panam’s legs. Sticking out from below the tank.

Chuckling at the sight, she cut the engine and jumped out. The painkillers she had swallowed dry on the drive over from Dakota’s – when the burning had started to bother her again without even needing to move – had not taken full effect yet, and she stumbled when her feet met the hard ground.  

The hand that shot out to stabilize her, mercifully reaching for her uninjured shoulder, belonged to Mitch.

“Hey, V,” he greeted. “You alright there?”

She straightened, finding her balance again. “Yeah, just lost my footing.”

Mitch’s hand kept hold of her arm a moment longer. “You made record time,” he said, letting go but staying close.

“Not much traffic out here,” she joked.

Mitch grinned, the expression accentuating the creases around his eyes. “Another damn good reason to give that City of yours a wide berth.”

He nodded towards the Basilisk and the rest of the group a few paces further, and V followed as he walked there.

“Can’t argue with that,” she told him. “But according to Dakota, there’s not much in terms of gigs here either. And a girl has got to eat.”

“Does she?” intervened Carol, glancing up from the tablet that had held her attention up until then. “You look like a Chinook could carry you away without even trying.”

“A Chinook could carry you away too, Carol,” came Panam’s voice from below the Basilisk, countering the veteran’s observation before V could say anything.

“Try me,” bit back Carol without much heat, going back to focus on her tablet as Panam wiggled out of the tank.

When Panam was upright and the cloud of dust twirling around her had settled, her gaze found V’s. “Hey, V.”

“Hey,” she smiled back. “Got your package in the bed.” Hand going up to swipe at her brows in a futile effort to dry the sweat already forming there, V found herself envying the way the clan seemed to have adapted to be almost immune to the heat.

Panam gestured to Cassidy and Teddy, and they moved to unload the spare part. “You are the best,” she said to V.

V shrugged, shifting her weight between feet with slow and cautious movements. “It was on my way.”

“Nothing is ‘on your way’ out here,” said Mitch, handing her a small canteen. “And you got us out of a real pickle.”

The water inside was lukewarm, but it helped clean the taste of sand from her mouth, and V was more than grateful for it.

The bitter taste Mitch’s words evoked was not, however, so easily erased. The vivid memories of the time she had been the one to land them in something way worse than a pickle making it impossible.

There was red on V’s hands – a lot of it – and very little she could do to wash it off. Even less in the time she had left to try. That much she knew. But helping the Aldecaldos when they needed her, for as long as her body was still her own, she could do. And she would do.

She cleared her throat. “What are you doing here, anyway?” she asked, steering the conversation to less painful grounds.

“Carol has worked on a few upgrades for old Bessie,” Panam grinned, patting the tank’s body like V had seen her do with Nibbles’ head the couple of times the Aldecaldo had come visit her in the City. “We needed to test them somewhere.”

V frowned. “And Saul okayed this?”

Helping the returning Cassidy and Teddy set the spare part down gently, and as close as possible to the Basilisk, Mitch nodded. “His idea, actually. Remembered you talking about this place. If you can believe it.”

“I can’t,” she said, eliciting laughter from them all.

Sure, after she had wiped out a full Wraith camp to free him, Saul had changed his tune about her just enough that she did not feel like watching her back every time she visited at camp anymore. But the idea that he had actually listened to something she had said – in passing at that – and used it to make decisions still sounded surreal.

“He does like you,” Panam said. After a pause, she added, “sure as hell trusts your judgment more than mine.” Her tone was a comical mix between sour, angry, and indignant.

V could not contain herself. “That’s just him being smart, doesn’t mean he likes me,” she said, grinning at Panam.

“Hey!”

Panam stuck out her tongue in her direction, and this time, when the others laughed, V did too.

“Alright, alright,” said Mitch when the amusement died down. “Let’s go you two, if we stay here chatting much longer there’s no way the Basilisk will be back at camp before sunset.”

Agreeing with Mitch’s assessment of the situation, V stepped forward, eyeing the Basilisk’s open underbelly. “Where do you need me?” she asked, hoping the answer would be somewhere close to assisting Carol with debugging at the soft end of her upgrades. Given the double round of painkillers she had taken since morning, she was sure she could manage to help with installing the spare part itself, but she really didn’t look forward to the aftermath of crawling on her bad hip and arm at all.

“Behind your wheels,” said Mitch, earning himself a confused look from V. “Playing chauffeur for Panam,” he added.

“Uh?”

“We,” explained Panam pointing in sequence to the three of them, “are going back to camp. Carol and the boys don’t need us distracting them to have it up and running again.”

“And,” added Mitch, “Panam wasn’t lying. Saul does trust you. So much so he wants your input on something.”

“Got orders to bring you back at camp. Even against your will, if needed,” threatened Panam happily, sauntering towards V’s car without waiting for them.

Amused, V passed the canteen back to Mitch. “So, this is a kidnapping?” she said, making him laugh.

“Hope you didn’t have plans,” he told V before turning briefly where Carol, Teddy, Cassidy and two other guys V could not remember the name of, were starting to work on the repair already. He threw up a two-finger salute at them. “See you at camp.”

Their responding ‘see you at camp’ were eerily synchronized and V marvelled at how much like family they all looked and sounded without sharing even a drop of blood. Only child and orphaned young, V found the Aldecaldos, and the space they had carved for themselves in that grim world of theirs, truly fascinating.

Mitch’s hand found her good shoulder once again, pushing her gently towards the cars. “C’mon, before Panam starts tinkering with your ride specs.”

The thought was enough to add as much sprint as she could manage to her steps, and she hastened to the Colby while Mitch walked to his own ride.

“You look like shit,” said Panam the moment V’ door closed beside her, already messing with the Colby’s console.

“Thanks,” V said, lips pressing together tight. She turned the car around and followed Mitch back to the main road. “You are the third today to tell me so. Fourth, if you want to count Vik’s disappointed glare.”

“Well, maybe you should do something about it.” Panam scoffed, then turned in her seat to face her.

Eyes fixed out front, V could still clearly see her friend’s pointed gaze in the corner of her optics. She exhaled heavily. “Really, Panam?”

“Really. You are being stupid.”

“Again, thanks,” V said. “Also, not the first to say that either.”

Panam’s hand moved to rest just above V’s knee, and the unexpected contact made her body tense. She relaxed again a breath later, when her brain finally ruled it as non-threatening and the fight or flight instincts subsided.

“I’m not… questioning your choice,” she said. The unsaid ‘again’ at the end sounding clear all the same. V did not trust her friend’s statement one bit. Shoulder straightening, she braced for the argument to come.

“But you still got time,” Panam continued “Doing gigs looking like death warmed over won’t do you any good. And you don’t even need the eddies.”

And there it was.

If the idea wasn’t ludicrous, V could almost see her friends keeping a shared list of talking points for this specific argument. The list would probably be titled something like “how to change a merc’s mind in 10 steps” or “arguments for when V is being a gonk”. Because she swore, V had heard the same case from each one of them at least once.

Johnny included.

Still, V had her own counter list by now. “I know that, but Johnny will.”

Panam’s hand spasmed, tightening her hold on V’s knee. “Not what I mean, V,” she said, her voice coming out frustrated. “You are loaded. And even if worst came to shove…” she stopped a moment, clearing her throat and looking back out the windshield. “Well, you’ll leave him enough for a few lifetimes. You don’t need to risk your neck for eddies.”

Following Mitch through Rocky Ridge and its deserted streets, V kept her eyes firmly on the road.

No, V didn’t need the eddies. Panam was right. But how could she tell her friend – the one pleading at her to just stay safe and alive – that getting herself in the firing line of a bullet was now the only thing making her feel alive?

Well, almost the only thing. But that specific mullet-wearing can of worms, she had decided not to think about for now.

“Buying a new identity and safe passage out of the country won’t be cheap,” V argued instead. Because she couldn’t.

Easing the car out of the abandoned town, V hazarded a glance to Panam. She saw the moment her mouth opened to argue – ‘we can help, you know smuggling things is what we do’ – and the moment it closed, V’s own counter probably resonating in her mind – ‘I’m not putting you guys in that kind of danger. Even with Johnny driving it, my body will still be on a lot of people’s hit list. Maybe more if he is driving, actually.

The heavy and stretched out exhale Panam let out told V she must have won the argument in her friend’s mind. Satisfied, if not a little confused by the easiness of her win, V focused her gaze back on the road.

“Look,” Panam said after a while, squeezing on V’s knee again before releasing her hold and crossing her arms. “I’m just saying you could take a breather sometimes.”

Relaxing the tight grip she had on the wheel, V smiled. A tired sad thing that barely curved the edges of her mouth, but still a smile.

“And come out here to hang?” she asked Panam.

“Yeah.”

“Mm. I got orders from Vik, two days rest. Would that suffice?” V continued, offering up a little share of her borrowed time.

Panam’s mouth curled up in a clear effort to hide a smile. “It’s a start,” she said, unfurling her crossed arms and making her overdue move on the car’s radio.

Never Fade Away’s chorus filled the space between them, and V’s smile retreated again when the only voice singing was the one coming from the speakers. Johnny’s real one still silent in her head.

“You know,” continued Panam, unaware of her brooding, “I heard from Judy yesterday.”

Her tone had shifted, and there was a cheerful note in her voice that reactivated V’s fight or flight instincts in full force.

She swallowed, aware of every inch of her skin. The same way she always was when knowingly walking into a trap. She knew, all those months ago, that someday she would regret introducing the two women.

“And?”

Panam barely concealed smile turned into a full-on grin. “And, two days should be enough for you to tell me all about that fixer of yours,” she said.

Head thumping against her seat, V groaned. And Panam laughed.

All the way back to camp.

----

“And that’s it? This code of yours will bypass the ‘Dream Catcher’?” asked Saul, astonishment clear in his tone.

The problem Saul had needed consulting with was an easy one. Well, relatively. Because the issue was, in fact, a fucking nightmare. But, luckily for them, V already had a foolproof solution to it.

Dakota’s tight grip on signals traversing the Badlands – the system jokingly named by Carol after a trinket the fixer kept in her office – had been a thorn in V’s own side when she had first ventured out there. Back then, V had worked herself stupid for a couple of days to find a stable solution to the annoying interference messing with frequency ranges.

Now, with a general solution already found, adapting it to the Aldecaldos’ systems and rigs was not going to take more than a few hours.  “Yeah,” she answered, “should clear up the interference right away.”

Straightening from where he had been leaning against the desk, Saul nodded. He looked at Carol, sitting on the closed fridge that was standard issue in every netrunning den. “How long will it take to integrate it?” he asked her.

The Aldecaldos’ resident techie had come back to camp an hour before. Way after sunset, but with the freshly patched Basilisk up and running and just in time to join their discussion.

“Couple hours tomorrow,” she said, confirming V assessment. “If V is up for it.”

V nodded. “Sure.”

Danger-free netrunning work was as close as rest as Vik could hope to get from her. He should have been proud.

“Then that’s our plan,” Saul said. “And it’s enough work for tonight.”

He pushed away from the desk and gestured for them to do the same. V did, stabilizing herself with a hand on the desk, she raised from the chair on stiff legs and moved to Saul’s side. Even subdued by another round of painkillers - taken after dinner on Panam’s insistence – the burning was there. Manageable, but demanding from her an unnatural carefulness of movements.

Jumping down from the creaky fridge, Carol did not follow, taking instead the chair V had vacated. “You go ahead,” she told them, “I need to start on some prep work for tomorrow.”

Outside the artificial brightness of the tent, the day had faded into darkness, and all around them, the camp was lit in spots. Harsher white lights coloured the spaces hugging tents and trailers, while the warm glow coming from the two fire pits washed the camp’s heart in soft yellows and oranges.

The closest of the pits was surrounded by children. The oldest were sprawled on the dry ground in various positions – each one making V and her bad hip wince at the mere sight – while the youngest had been granted reign over the faded couch. Flanked by two girls with identical pigtails – that could not be more than six – and balancing an even younger boy on his knees, Taco was squished on the couch among them, spinning a tale.

Going by the snippets she had managed to catch during her discussion with Saul and Carol, he was recounting the – heavily redacted – story of a gig that had been completed long before most of those kids were even born. Remembering the gory details she had not been spared from, V was really – really – glad for the artistic spin Taco was giving it as a bedtime story.

“They are safer because of you,” said Saul, catching her attention when she stalled not three steps out of the tent. Her eyes and mind lingering on the strange picture of children being allowed to be just that.

Looking back at him, she shrugged. “It’s a clever piece of code, yeah. But given enough time Carol would have fixed it too.”

Saul’s hand found her good shoulder. A warm and firm pressure, keeping her from resuming her walk. “I’m not just talking about that, V,” he said. “You have done a lot for this clan. And for me.”

His voice was low and steady, and his eyes did not leave hers as he spoke.

V’s cheeks warmed. Heartfelt recognition still felt foreign to her ears, so different from the hollow praises she had learned to gracefully receive in her Corpo days. Impossible to accept.

“I… most of what I did, I did with Panam,” she downplayed, fighting the urge to shuffle her weight between her feet under Saul’s hold.

He shook his head. “Panam was born Aldecaldo. You weren’t,” he said. “But you have shown up for us. Again, and again. And out here,” he added, “road goes both ways. You act like family, you are family.”

Throat suddenly dry, and eyes threatening to go the opposite way, V swallowed.

Family was – despite Sauls proclamation – something V knew she could not hope to ever really claim for herself. She had friends, sure. Close ones, even. The Aldecaldos being proof of that just like Vik, Misty, or Mama Welles were.  But family… family meant a permanence, a kind of commitment, that could not be achieved with the life someone like V lived. And the shortness of it.

The most V could give them was to offer her skills as a merc and as a runner. And surely that could not be nearly enough to make someone family.

Saul took half a step closer. Enough for her to refocus on him, tilting her head up a little to maintain eye contact. When she did, he squeezed her shoulder where his hand still gripped it. “You ever need help, V, we are here for you.”

“I…”

Someone whistled loudly, and V was saved from saying whatever her brain had yet to come up with.

Judging by Teddy’s elbow stuck in his side, the whistler had to be Bob, and V found Panam’s gaze in silent question.

The second fire was surrounded by warmth and adults, listening to the freshly recovered Jake strumming on his guitar, and chatting away the evening. Her friend was perched on the old couch there, twisted in her seat so her arms and chin rested on its back as she looked V’s way.

“Nope,” she declared, shaking her head and pointing her finger towards the clan’s leader. “Line,” she told Saul, eliciting a sound that was halfway growl and sigh from him, and several badly disguised laughs from the other Aldecaldos.

V blinked. “Did I miss something?”

“No,” said Saul. His voice was curt now, but his irritation did not seem to be addressed to V, and his tone softened again when he looked back at her. “I meant what I said, V. Remember that.”

Even though there was no chance in hell V would ever drag the clan into her mess, she nodded. Then the hand on her shoulder was gone and Saul drifted away, joining a bunch of older Aldecaldos and disappearing into their conversation.

Her mind still reeling with thoughts of family and time, V moved too. Claiming the empty space Panam had saved for V at her side. Around them, Jake resumed playing, and several conversations picked up again.

When no one was paying attention to them anymore, V turned to Panam. “What was that?” V asked, voice low.

Panam took a long swig from her beer. “Nothing I want to ever think about,” she said, leaning down over the couch arm. She came back up with a can of Vita-Mine and tossed it V’s way.

Without thinking, V caught it with her bad arm and winced at the resulting pang of pain. “Ouch.”

“Sorry, sorry!” said Panam, fussing over the still white gauze in V’s arm.

V swatted her hands away and settled deeper on the couch, raising her feet on the empty beer chest in front of it. “It’s alright, no foul,” she reassured. “And thanks,” she added, raising the can.

Panam nodded, and for a while they stayed like that, sitting side by side without speaking. Enjoying their drinks, the fire, the music, and the clan, alive and safe around them. Mitch joined them sometime during that quiet, taking the spot on the couch that opened up at V’s other side.

Lulled by warmth – of more than one kind – V’s mind wandered into danger.

You could have had this. Friends, family, and so much more.

The thought hurt. But not as much as the one that followed.

You could still have it.

It always hurt, that little spark of hope. But her mind usually whispered it in Johnny’s voice. Because he was the only one still believing in that fantasy. So, it was easy to dismiss it.

But tonight, the voice in her head was her own. Only and truly. And so much more difficult to ignore. To silence.

Small sneakers scuffed to a stop in front of her then, relieving V from her own spiralling thoughts. Their young owner bouncing on his heels with too much energy for the hour to be as close to midnight as it was.

“V,” said the small boy V. He had a buzz cut, a glow-stick looped around his wrist, and two pigtailed shadows at his back. “Story?” he asked.

Once again, V blinked. “Story?”

“’Bout cars,” the left pigtail said, eyes as big as the full moon that night. “And sneaking, and AI.”

“But no blood,” instructed the right pigtail.

The boy nodded, solemnly.

V’s mouth tugged to one side, and she fought to keep a straight face as Panam hid her own laugh behind her third beer of the evening.

Behind the coordinated trio, V found the tired gaze of the father currently in charge of reining them in. His lips mimed V’s next word.

“Tomorrow,” she said to the kids, watching as the man’s shoulders relaxed.

Synchronized groans threatened to obliterate the control she was already struggling to keep on her face.

“Tomorrow,” she repeated. “Cross my heart.”  

The trio exchanged a tribunal’s worth of glances, nodding only when V finally drew an X over her chest in solemn promise.

The father did not waste time. “You heard the woman, bed now,” he said, before something else could catch their attention. He mouthed a grateful ‘thank you’ at V and herded the little menaces away.

“You’re going to have to own up to that one,” said Mitch, his chuckle helped along by the tequila he had been drinking.

Smile finally taking over her face, V shrugged. “I’ve done worse.”

“And you still need to own up to me first, anyway” interjected Panam. She straightened on the couch. Then, legs crossed on the seat and facing V, she scooted closer until her knees touched V’s thigh and wiggled her eyebrows suggestively.

V groaned and tried to scoot away, but she found Mitch just as close on her other side. The amusement in his expression having nothing to do with the kids’ antics anymore. “Do we really need to?” she asked them.

“Yes,” said Panam. “Now spill.”

The logs and flame on the firepit blurred into a shapeless orange blot as V stared into it for a moment too long. “There’s not much to tell.”

Panam’s head shook from side to side, the movement so forceful that beer spilled out from her half empty bottle as her whole body swayed with it. “Not much to tell? V, you got the hots for a fixer.”  

A few heads turned at her raised voice, and both V and Mitch shushed her.

“I don’t have the hots for a fixer,” protested V, mortified.

Panam’s eyes widened. Mitch took a long sip from his glass.

And V regretted her choice of words.

“Oh, V. You like him,” Panam blurted out, lowering her volume to a whisper loud enough for just V and Mitch to hear. “Like… actually like him.”

Sliding down the couch until her head could rest on the back of it, V closed her eyes. So much for not thinking about it.

“Yeah, I think I do.” The out loud admission sounded damning. Terrifying, like no gun barrel had ever been.

Mitch shoulder touched hers gently, pushing just enough to be felt without causing pain. “There are definitely worst things than liking someone,” he said, quoting her earlier statement.

Were there? What could be worse than looking at possibilities knowing they were already out of your reach?

She gave him a sad smile and he returned it, understanding.

Occupied with draining her beer and finding another, Panam did not seem to catch the exchange. “If you are even admitting it, then I really need dets here,” she said when her task succeeded and her attention focused on V once more.

“There are no dets, Panam,” V said. “I don’t have the kind of time to get to dets.”

“Bullshit,” called out Panam. “You like him, so there are dets already. Now stop stalling, and spill.”

Against Panam’s wishes, V’s stalling went on for a few seconds more. When her friend gaze became too much, V finally exhaled. “I have a… recurring kind of gig, with him,” she said. Not really knowing where to start. Not really wanting to. But starting all the same.

“Is that a euphemism?” asked Panam.

Mitch rolled his eyes and shushed her again, gesturing for V to continue.

“I have been delivering cars for him,” she clarified, pointedly looking at Panam. “And he used to send one of his men to collect them, at first. But lately, he has been showing up to drop offs himself. Well, not always, but more often than not.”

The first time had been so unexpected V had almost swerved the Shion she had been driving right onto a concrete bollard upon seeing him. He had laughed, and V had blushed like never before, making up the lamest possible excuse.

To her alarm, that original surprise had rapidly morphed into curiosity, then grown to interest and finally settled into expectation somewhere around the fifth time he had shown up. And by now, V had clearly lost both count and control over these ‘professional’ rendez-vous.  

“So he does like you too!” exulted Panam, sending Mitch a strange sort of smug gaze.

When Mitch ignored it, V did too. Not interested enough in what that look meant to encourage – and suffer through – a squabble between them.  

Eyes going back to the fire without really seeing it, V thought about that last drop off, just a few hours previous. To the way Muamar had held her a little closer while they had almost done something incredibly stupid and obliterated the line between them.

She blinked a few times, enough for the fire to regain its shape, then took a sip of her third Vita-Mine of the day and nodded. “I think so.”

“Then he gets points for good taste,” said Mitch before Panam could say anything. Her friend eyes had narrowed, her gaze sharp. And V knew Panam had clocked something in her faraway expression. Something V didn’t really want her to prod.

“What else does he gets points for?” asked Mitch. “Fixers are kind of a complicated bunch,” he added, a small hint of worry in his voice.

“Tell me about it,” agreed Panam.

V was biased, obviously, but there were a lot of reasons in her book to give Muamar points. Both as a fixer – especially when compared with the rest of the category – and as a man.

“He is funny.” Was what she went with. Because funny was safe. Easy.

Clearly too easy for Panam. “Yeah, yeah. Bob’s funny too, but I don’t see you making eyes at him. What else, V?”

Feeling petulant, even though she had expected the rebuttal, V stuck her tongue out at her. “You don’t see me making eyes at anyone, actually.”

The cheek earned her a shove, not even close as light as those Mitch had given her, but still harmless enough on her good shoulder. “C’mon, V.”

With another sip, V steeled herself. “I trust him,” she said, relenting to the inevitability of that conversation. “Like I haven’t trusted since… since.”

“Oh,” said Panam, a serious expression taking over her tipsy face with surprising speed. She set her beer on the floor and one of her hands found V’s knee again. On her other side, Mitch was silent but present.

V’s throat constricted. “I trust you guys, you know that, right?” she said, needing to clear every possible misunderstanding.

They nodded in unison, and she continued.

“I trust you. I really do. But…” she hesitated, searching for the right words to explain something the logic of which she didn’t fully comprehend herself. “But, in the back of my mind, there is this voice. Expecting something and counting exits. You know, knowing the other shoe will drop at some point. Telling me to stay sharp, and ready.”

As she spoke – fast and all within the span of a breath before losing her nerve – Panam’s eyes had gone a little shiny, and V whished she had not said anything. But there was no taking the words back, and so she pressed on. “With him, that voice is quiet. Always. And I feel safe. Truly safe.”

Like the voice knew he would never do anything to break her trust. And that feeling, that certainty, was addictive. A drug she had been resisting against with all her waning strength for weeks.

“That,” said Mitch while Panam squeezed her knee a little too tight, “is a whole lot of points.”

Her responding smile was small, and sad, but there.

“That is good,” agreed Panam, giving V an encouraging smile of her own. “And I’m sure that the fact that your Capitán is easy on the eye doesn’t hurt either,” she added with a grin.

The phrase had been clearly meant to break the heaviness of the moment, but V’s brain came to a halt as soon as the words were out of Panam’s lips. Her whole body froze, and that voice at the back of her head was not whispering anymore but screaming.

“My… what?”

Panam blinked. “Your Capitán,” she repeated.

But she winced, halfway through. And the tell was so clear even one of the children would have zeroed on it.

“How do you know it’s him?” V asked, voice steady. Her firing nerves keeping at bay the screaming voice more than her reason.

Panam’s mouth opened, then closed. Her eyes searched Mitch beside V. “Judy told me,” she said.

Pressure bent the aluminium can beneath V’s clenched fingers, changing its shape. “I didn’t tell Judy.”

She laid that fact between them the same way she queued hacks on a target, quietly but effectively. And in the same way, she recognized the moment it landed.

Panam eyes widened, and her hand on V’s knee trembled.

Unable to stand the contact, V stood, letting that hand fall on the couch. “Panam,” she said. Her voice rough with gravel. “How do you know?”

Around them, the clan noise quieted again, and V felt eyes turning to stare. But there was no more time to be mortified, because the voice was screaming and Panam was not answering the question.

“Panam,” she repeated, breath shortening without her permission just as the thumping of her heart grew louder in her ears.

Her friend didn’t seem to have answers, only apologies.

“V, I’m sorry,” she said, looking up from the couch with the same guilty expression V had first seen the day they had met. Just before being convinced to go on a revenge quest that had ended with several dead Wraiths.

“V,” Mitch cut in. Voice urgent as he stood beside her. “Breathe.”

She tried. But each breath came out shorter than the previous one, and her chest started to burn with the lack of oxygen. All around her, edges lost their sharpness, melting together in an orange tinted blur.

“V,” said the familiar voice she hadn’t heard since the pier. It was worried now. The annoyed edge that had last coloured it gone. “You need to calm down. Your vitals…”

Her fingers twitched, and the can between them slipped and thudded against her sneakers. Cold ran from the base of her skull down her spine like a poured line of iced water. Something warm and dense trickled down her nose, and the air around smelled burnt.

The worried voices of Panam and several Aldecaldos disappeared around her, and Mitch’s arms were already waiting when she swayed into them.

Johnny’s glitching face was still the last one she saw, and when all the lights faded to black her mouth tasted like iron.

Chapter Text

>> [MUAMAR]

Wade Bleecker – Mr. Hands for those he did not owe favours to – was a formidable man.

Sitting in the conference room the man had built for their joint operation, Muamar was reminded of that particular truth once again.

The room itself was a testament to that fact.

Deep underground and straddling the border between the City and its Combat Zone, the whole facility would be defined as prime real estate by any player in NC. Even as crumbling and desolate as it had been when their first meeting had taken place. But Wade was not anyone, and in just a week from then the whole place had been overhauled into a state-of-the-art operations centre. All under the unsuspecting eyes of those same players.

Even more impressive than the space itself, however, was the operation he had built inside those newly remodelled walls.

Because before most of them had even been aware of V’s predicament, Wade had already solved it. Putting together – at least on paper – all the pieces needed to fix what the Relic had broken and save V’s life. And, given enough time to gather those pieces by himself, Muamar was sure Wade wouldn’t have needed to get him or the other fixers on board at all.

Despite the tension that took hold of his whole body when thinking he could have gone on never knowing of V’s plight had it not been for those time constraints, Muamar almost wished that had been the case now.

“Miss Alvarez confirmed it,” Wakako said, blowing out a puff of smoke that blurred her projected image on the conference room screen. “The unit you flagged should work for our purposes. Also, our surgeon agrees. Without its stabilization effects the surgery will most likely result in something more… akin to a sack of synth meat than either a merc or a terrorist.”

Jaw tensing and temper rising, Muamar’s eyes found Wades’ from across the table. The darkened shade of blue could have registered as a trick of the light, but Muamar had been friend with the man in front of him long enough to know he had found Wakako’s phrasing just as aggravating as he had.

Muamar tilted his head at him, and Wade turned to the screen with a smile as synthetic as his hands. “Lovely image, Wakako,” he said, voice level, as if the three of them had been discussing the weather.

“You want lovely, we need to keep to the timeline, dear,” Wakako retorted, smiling. The sweetness in her voice made Muamar’s teeth hurt. “I’ll make the call tomorrow. And arrange the gig for the day after.”

“She needs more time,” Muamar said. The words coming out of his mouth unbridled as images from just a few hours previous argued in his mind against logic.

V, stumbling over nothing in his garage, right into his arms. Smaller and feebler between them that he had imagined. So far, in that moment, from the honed weapon he knew her to be. The way she had steadied herself against him. The way they had moved at the same time towards each other only to be so rudely interrupted.

Maybe, Muamar thought ruefully, he was the one that needed more time.

“The timeline is tight as it is, Muamar,” Wade said, the thin line of his mouth showing how unhappy he was with the situation. “Unfortunately, there is no room here to delay it further.”

“And the doctor has given his blessing,” added Wakako.

Vektor had indeed. Ignoring Muamar’s loud protestations that two days were not enough to recover after being shot and, once again, gaining positions on his shit list.

Fighting the itch to get up and pace the room, Muamar planted his elbows on the table and tried a different angle. “What about NetWatch? We still don’t have clear intel on that,” he said, looking at Wade.

After three separate informants had come to them with news of poorly disguised agents asking peculiar questions, NetWatch’s presence at the monastery – albeit only in the form of supplies for the clearly hired Maelstroms there – had been the final confirmation that someone was indeed trying to keep a close eye on their operation. Deciphering the particulars of that interest and putting a stop to it, before those eyes got to be too close, was unfortunately still a work in progress.

Muamar did not like that one bit.

Wade cleared his throat, but Wakako was faster, answering first. “NetWatch is no reason to delay. On the contrary, if they are indeed sniffing around, that’s all the more reason to move fast. Before they actually catch the scent.”

“She is still recovering, we can’t send her in blind again,” he argued, his first few words overlapping with Wakako’s lasts.

On the giant screen Wade had had installed in the conference room, Wakako scowled.

“Then you find someone else for this job, Reyes,” she said. “Someone you’d trust with keeping this little project of ours a secret and that could actually do it.”

She paused, taking a drag from her cigarette before smiling sweetly, and Muamar tensed.

“You choose, dear. It’s her life on the line either way.”

In the silence that followed, Wade found his eyes from across the table, and Muamar knew he had lost the battle. If there had ever been one to fight at all.

He would trust a half dead V to do the job – this one and everyone else too – over every merc in the City. And most importantly, he would never trust her life on any of them either.

He sank back into the chair. Arms folding against his chest, as if the pressure could keep at bay the erratic rhythm of the – clearly – organic pump thundering away below them.

“She is a runner, Muamar, and a very good one at that. No one would be better equipped to go against NetWatch, anyway,” said Wade. “And really, there is no indication yet that they’ll interfere here. Still,” he added when Muamar moved to protest, “we’ll find a way to give her a heads up without saying too much.”

There was a part of Muamar, the logical one, the one that had been doing that fixer job for way too long already, that really agreed with them both. Intel was never a hundred percent accurate – almost by definition it could not be – so this, having the whole of NC fixer’s elite fixing their gig and them being intent on also keeping the asset alive as part of the job, was really as good as it could get for a merc. Not that merc were generally expendable – not in their league, at least – but reducing risks and keeping mercs alive was costly business, and few really managed to worm their way into being worth as much as V did. So yes, a part of Muamar recognized that sending V to do the gig was, under the conditions and constraints they had, still a best-case scenario.

But there was another part of him. A part that had held that asset in his arms, heard her laugh and come frustratingly close to kissing her.

That part wanted to tear Wade’s expensive table in half.

“Fine,” he said, because the first part was the one that was going to buy V all the time in the world. “But this needs to be airtight. And truly quiet this time.”

Wade nodded, his expression recovering part of that knowing amusement that lately he seemed to reserve especially for Muamar.

“Good,” he said. “Walk us through it again, Wakako. Let’s see how to make our merc’s life easier.”

Wakako nodded, stubbing out her cigarette somewhere out of frame. Its dying smoke filling out the half of the screen that was still displaying the woman. The other half was now displaying planimetries for a half-finished residential tower.

A long list of critical points already clear in his head, Muamar was ready to dissect Wakako’s plan when the door whooshed, sliding to the side as Vektor came in like a thrown wrench. He had a tablet in his hand and a troubled expression on his face.

Muamar shot to his feet before he could talk. “What is it?”

“She is having an episode,” the ripper said, voice as grave as his face. “Is she still with the Aldecaldos?”

“She is,” Muamar answered, sending a glance to Wade.

The man did not even blink at the news, turning to the screen. “We’ll call you back, Wakako,” he said to her, waiting just enough for her to nod back a “Of course, dear,” before cutting the call and starting up a new one.

Muamar turned back to Vektor while the call got through. “Define episode, doctor.”

“Her vital spiked suddenly, and something triggered a hippocampal sync error. It’s happened before but it could impact recovery,” he said, half distracted as he parsed through lines of readings on the tablet in his hands.

“In layman’s terms, Doctor,” Muamar bristled. Fear, masquerading as anger, threatening to take hold of him.

“She – ”

“Hands,” came the Aldecaldos woman’s voice from the screen, interrupting Vektor’s explanation. “This is not a good moment,” she said, breath irregular and voice frantic.

“Miss Palmer, I am here with Viktor Vektor and El Capitán,” Wade cut her out, calm and collected in a way that managed to both irk and pacify Muamar’s anger at the same time. “From what I understand from the good Doctor, our V is experiencing some form of distress and in need of medical attention.”

There was silence from the other side of the line, and it stretched long enough for Muamar’s anger to flare up again. “Panam, how is she?” he urged.

“Breathing. She is breathing,” she said finally, voice getting steadier with every word. “She couldn’t for a moment, before. Got worked out and couldn’t do it properly, then she just dropped. Mitch got her before she could hit the ground, but she seized. A few seconds before going still.”

“She didn’t hit her head?” asked the doctor.

Muamar’s hand found the edge of the table, and he leaned on it, gripping the wood like a lifeline.

“No, no,” confirmed Panam, “and she’s calm now. Just sleeping, I think. Hutch is looking her over, got her on fluids already.”

“I need access to his diagnostics,” Vektor said. “Sending a request now.”

“Sure, let me just… Hutch, I’ve got V’s ripper on the holo. Yes, Vektor, yes, it’s from him, let him through? Thanks,” she said, talking to someone on her side before addressing them again. “You should be in now.”

“I am,” Vektor confirmed. Focusing on the tablet. His face circled trough several expressions, ranging in severity from something that made Muamar’s stomach twist on itself to something that almost managed to calm it down completely.

“Doctor,” he urged when the man’s analysis of the readings stretched on.

Vektor did not look up from the sea of red numbers on his tablet when he finally spoke. “It was a bad one. Almost as bad as the one she had a week ago.”

Muamar’s hand tightened on the edge of the table until it hurt. “I’m driving you out there,” he said to Vektor.

The doctor looked up then, alarmed, searching for Wade’s eyes across the table. The man in question shook his head at him.

“No,” he said calmly, turning to Muamar.

“Try and stop me,” Muamar bit back, feeling the fragile hold he had on himself close to snapping.

Wade rounded the table placidly, coming to stand closer, like he could truly stop him physically if needed. Had he not been so worked up, Muamar would have laughed. Wade’s chrome hands were not only for show, granted, but there was no universe where the man could overpower him in a physical fight.

A verbal one however, was a different story entirely.

“Let at least the man talk before you waste the fuel and the whole operation, Muamar,” he said, nodding to the screen where the Aldecaldos woman was still listening and resorting to the tone he used when he thought Muamar was being unreasonable.

Muamar exhaled, letting go of the table. When he did not immediately protest – more because he was busy forming a plan in his head to get to the Aldecaldos camp fast than because he agreed – Wade nodded at Viktor. “Doctor?” he prompted.

Vektor glanced to the table again, scrolling down on the screen to read a few newly received lines of diagnostics before speaking. “As I said, it was a nasty one. But it was not the first and it won’t be the last. I see no signs of damage besides what can be expected from the Relic’s organic progression, and her vitals are already correcting on their own,” he said.

“So, we just wait for her to wake up?”

Three sets of eyes moved back to the screen in sync. On it, the call had switched from audio only to a slightly shaky video. V’s friend, Panam, was on the feed, flanked by the two men Muamar had met when he and Wade had called to arrange V’s outing into the Badlands that very morning, way before the sun had even gone up.

“Yes,” said Vektor. “And I’ll send instructions to your ripper, but from what I see here I’ll say he already has the situation in hand.”

“She is going to be fine,” said Panam, the words sounding as much as self-reassurance as question.

“Yes,” Vektor confirmed again, looking at Muamar briefly before facing the Aldecaldos again. “But key point here is to keep her calm when she does wake up,” he went on. “She might not remember much of what happened.”

Muamar’s stomach constricted again. “Is that normal?”

Vektor exhaled, his shoulder seemingly sagging under the weight of his question. “Unfortunately, yes. The Relic is already working to take over her brain, blocking out the creation of new memories during episodes like this is part of its programming. It’s usually just a few minutes. Close to an hour is the most we have registered to date. But there’s no way to really say. Could be several hours, a full day, even,” he explained.

Ice flooded Muamar’s veins.

A day. V could lose a day.

That day.

He swallowed, finding the edge of the table once more and leaning there. Stubbornly ignoring Wade’s prodding gaze as Vektor went back to address the Aldecaldos.

“So, no prodding,” Vektor said to the trio on the screen, “we don’t want to risk another episode.”

The Mitch guy put a hand on Panam’s shoulder when her expression – lifted when the doctor had pronounced his reassurances – dropped at that last instruction. “Copy that,” he said, squeezing the woman’s shoulder and glancing at his leader. “We’ll keep you posted.”

“Please do,” Wade said, managing to make the two words sound like the order they were. The Aldecaldos leader – Saul Bright – nodded.

Distracted by too many thoughts, Muamar almost missed it. But, just before the call cut, his eyes found the screen, and he could swear the sad expression Panam sent their way had been directed right at him. The holo cut before he could say or do anything about it, and Muamar let the strange sensation the look had left him with go, focusing on more urgent matters.

“We can’t go ahead with the next step,” he said.

Sighing, Wade sat on the chair closest to him. His usual theatricality nowhere to be found, replaced by a weariness Muamar knew all too well. “Doctor?” he asked, soliciting Vektor’s assessment.

“I’ll keep monitoring, but if the situation doesn’t change before morning, there’ll be no reason to delay further,” Vektor said, resignation colouring his voice as he did.

“That is bull– ”

“It’s not,” Vektor said, cutting Muamar’s protest off.

Lately, protesting plans that put V into even more danger seemed to be all that he did, and anger simmered beneath Muamar’s skin as once again those protests were rebuffed. But he held, giving the doctor a chance to convince him.

“This is nothing we did not already expect. Episodes like this will keep coming. And the more we wait the worse they’ll be,” Vektor said. Trying, and failing, to give Muamar confidence on his assessment. “This one is kind of lucky, actually,” he added.

Muamar hissed, taking a step towards Vektor without even knowing he had. “Lucky?”

To his credit, the ripper – and ex-boxer, Muamar’s brain vaguely acknowledged – did not back down. “Yes. The malfunction did no real additional damage and there is a good chance she’ll get to sleep it off well past the morning. And that, that is more hours of rest she has had in a week,” he explained. “So yes, lucky.”

Still not convinced, Muamar pressed on. “What if she has another episode during the gig?”

Again, Vektor did not seemed fazed by the question. “Oddly enough, I don’t think anything as severe as this could happen during a gig,” he said. “From our analysis of the diagnostic data, it appears that adrenaline tends to have a stabilizing effect on the Relic. It’s cortisol that seems to be triggering the worst malfunctions.”

Before Muamar could get on with finally breaking something – the table, the ripper, or his own head against the concrete walls – Wade spoke. “What does that mean, doctor?”

“Real danger, the one she can put down and control, is actually good for her system,” he said ruefully, “it’s emotional distress that we really need to avoid. That one, has an accelerating effect on her neural degradation.”

“Fuck,” swore Muamar, fight going out of him as he fell back on his chair like a broken doll.

Guns, and gangs, and corporations, were things he could control. And while keeping V safe from those kinds of dangers was not easy per se – the woman was a menace – it was doable. And Muamar could do it.

Emotions, however, were a very different story.

The scrapping of Wade’s chair on the marbled floor as he angled it to face them – and for fuck’s sake, Bleecker, Muamar thought, really? How was marble on the floor a priority – caught both his and the doctor’s attention.

“Let’s table the greenlight discussion for the morning,” Wade said, ever the consummate diplomat. “You keep monitoring our girl, doctor, and in the meantime, we’ll find a way to design this gig so she’ll truly be a ghost if you give us the go ahead.”

Vektor nodded, satisfied by the compromise. “I’ll be in the lab. And I’ll have doctor Nishikata take a look at these scans, get his opinion too.”

When the door closed behind the doctor, leaving the two fixers alone, Muamar was, despite his own instinct, already reviewing the gig in his mind.

“I understand that for you this is more… personal, than it is for most of the team,” said Wade casually, when enough time had passed for the doctor to be truly gone. “But you need to keep it together, Muamar. It’ll do her no good if you stop thinking like the fixer you are just when she needs it the most.”

Muamar bit down a varied list of curses and let his eyes linger on the now black screen. As much as he wished for it not to be the case, the man was right.

“She was right in front of me not ten hours ago,” he said anyway. “Safe, and sound. And now she is out in the Badlands and unconscious.”

He looked right at the man that, by the City’s standards, had been his friend for a long time. The same man that had clawed his way to the top of the fixers’ food chain after having ended at the bottom of the corporate one. Sitting calm and collected in his impeccable suit like nothing could ever really disturb him. All while the family – a wife and daughter, for fuck’s sake – he had somehow managed to keep from harm in all that time was miles away, out of his sight.

“How do you stand this?” Muamar asked, pleading for a solution, a remedy, even a magic trick, to clear away the disquiet that kept hold of him every time he thought about how far and unprotected V was.

Wade smiled, and Muamar had seen that same smile – the inexorability behind it – once already, the last time they had crossed paths in a corporate office, just days before the man had gone to ground.

“You’re allowed to swear,” Wade said after a while, chrome fingers tapping on the expensive wood. “It usually helps.”

Muamar huffed something that was supposed to be a laugh. “You first,” he said.

“Oh, I already did, today,” retorted Wade, deadpan. “In my head. And I assure you, my friend, it was very colourful.”

This time, Muamar’s laugh was not just a huff, but full on. And painful.

As it died as abruptly as it had come on, the screen on the wall flickered back to life under Wade’s command, displaying the half-finished tower.

“Planning helps too,” Wade added.

Exhaling the last of the disquiet away – at least for a while – with his next breath, Muamar nodded. “Let me call back Wakako, then.”

-----

>> [V]

The first thing back was the heat.

A warmth kind, like an old blanket that smelled of rough canvas, smoke, and sun-backed dust. The second was the low humming of a fan oscillating somewhere by her side, its bearings ticking every time it changed direction. Moving the air enough to lift stray strands of hair from her face, tickling her cheek, but not enough to stop the sweat from beading at her temples or ease the throbbing she felt beneath them.

V’s eyes opened on one of those gusts of air, and she blinked a few times, until the roof of the world focused into view. A familiar green – dull, stained and patched in several places – told her what she could not quite recall. She was at camp. In the tent Panam and Mitch had – with Saul’s surprising support – all but insisted to set up for her despite the sparseness of her visits.

Beside her, on the rickety metal table that acted as a nightstand for the even more tired cot, someone that she was quite certain had not been her, had left a bottle of Vatnajökull water, a can of Vita-Mine, and a plastic cup with two painkillers.

Or at least, V hoped they were painkillers, as she reached for them. Wincing when a pang of pain, sharp and deep, branched out from her temples.

“Easy,” said Johnny, cutting through the haze as once again V had to blink to clear her vision.

When she managed it, she found him sitting on a camp stool by the end of the bed, elbows braced on his knees as he scanned her like she had seen NCPD’s ordnance handlers scan an armed bomb. A ray of sunlight coming in from where the tent’s flap didn’t quite close all the way, reflected on his chrome arm, making the tense expression on his face clear even in the otherwise dim light of the tent.

Straining to get herself to a seated position, V diverted her gaze back to the painkillers on the table, pointedly ignoring the bloodied gauzes and discarded IV on the ground beside it. “Again?” she asked when her still booted feet were braced on the ground and the pills were finally in her hand.

“Yeah,” he confirmed. “Big one, too. Like that last one in your shower.”

“Preem.” She swallowed the pills dry, only reaching for the water after. Too eager for their effects to begin to waste a single second. “How long have I been out?”

“Fuck if I know,” Johnny said, “but it was dark when you decided to face plant in the middle of camp, and it’s definitely not anymore.”

Looking back at him she tried to recall what had happened before the malfunction. Her search came up empty, and she frowned.  “Did I hit my head?”

“No, I don’t think you did,” he answered, leaning back on the chair. “What’s the last thing you remember?”

She searched her own mind again. The faint smell of smoke that permeated the tent unfolded into a thread, and she followed it down, past the tang of blood and antiseptic that clung to blank spaces in her mind. “Saul,” she said, “and Carol. We talked.” She gestured vaguely, as if the motion could sketch the scene back into being. “Shop talk. I promised to help with the Dream Catcher. Then the kids by the fire.” She frowned again. That felt close, but not right. “No. No, that was before. I left Saul by the fire. He said…” But she didn’t know what he had said, so she tried again. “I sat on the couch, with Mitch and Panam, promised a story to the kids, and then – ”

“Nothing,” finished Johnny for her.

V nodded, echoing the word. “Nothing.”

Johnny tapped two fingers to his temple. “I know your vitals went psycho there for a moment, and I know I said something to you. But nothing else, V. I can’t remember shit either.”

Mouth dry, V reached for the bottle on the crate and took a long gulp from it. “It happened before, and Vik says it’s normal. As much as this whole clusterfuck is,” she said, raising her shoulders at him in a resigned shrug.

“I don’t like not remembering, V,” he told her, crossing his arms and shaking his head. “Not one fucking bit.”

“Join the club,” she retorted, earning herself a snort from him.

Fingers drumming on the cot beside her, V made herself breathe slow. In through the nose, out through the mouth. Steeling herself as she put into words what kept circling through her mind. “Maybe that’s better,” she said, soft. “Maybe if it can snip out minutes like that, someday it’ll cut out all the parts that…” She trailed off, the words stuttering under Johnny’s piercing gaze. She swallowed, cleared her throat. “Maybe you won’t have to remember...”

“No.” Johnny stood abruptly, cutting off her weighted words with vehemence. He paced the tent, mumbling and cursing under his breath.

Something that was more determination than anger emanated from him in waves, and V, feeling his restlessness like it was her own, let him pace, tapping her fingers a little faster and following him with her eyes as he moved.

Almost a full minute later, he stopped right in front of her.  “This ends now,” he spat. “I’m done with this pity party you’ve decided to throw yourself into. The ripper gave you two days, well, it’s your lucky day, V. You get two more to get your shit together,” he added, pointing and shaking a silver finger at her like an angry schoolteacher to a misbehaving child. “’Cause I’m magnanimous like that. But after. So help me, V. You don’t get your ass in the game, I’m gonna wrench the fucking wheel from you and do it myself, I swear.”

“Johnny,” she started. Uncertain and confused – by what she did remember of the previous day – for the first time in weeks on how to respond.

“Nope. Don’t wanna hear it,” he interrupted, stopping words she didn’t even have. “You got two days to decide which one is going to be. Now, why don’t –”

Light flooded the tent as the flap was opened from the outside, interrupting Johnny.

Panam’s face appeared there, peeking through the opening. There were dark circles around her eyes that had not been in V’s last – available – memory of her, but her clothes were the same. Only now they were rumpled and creased like the little sleep she might have had had been done in them.

“V?” she called out, voice almost trembling. The same way it had all those months before, as they took stock of the bodies scattered around Hellman’s downed AV.

V’s insides twisted. Guilt rising, not for the first time, for all the ways she had brought danger, chaos, and pain in her friend’s life. Her heart thundered just as much as the headache the painkillers had yet to subdue, and she forced herself to count every breath to slow it down.

“Hey,” she greeted just as Johnny glitched out of view with a last pointed glare.

Her friend hesitated for a moment, looking her up and down cautiously, making V feel once again like an armed bomb. But then she moved, the tent flap falling behind her and cutting off the bright light as she strode in and let herself fall on the bed. Sitting down so close that V swayed with the movement.

“You scared the shit out of me, V,” she exhaled, grabbing the Vita-Mine can from the table. She opened it, and passed it to V, trading it for the water bottle still in her hands.

V took a sip from the can. The sweetness of the drink doing wonders to wash out the metallic taste lingering on her tongue. “Yes, sorry about that,” she said. “What happened?”

Panam turned to look at V then. Her eyes were wide and her mouth slightly opened, and V thought she must have really given her friend a scare to get such a reaction to something that had happened before in her very presence too.

“You don’t remember?” Panam asked.

V shook her head, lips curling into a grimace. “Nothing after I sat down with you and Mitch last night. Was it last night?” Panam nodded. “Alright. Well, no,” she added, feeling Panam tense beside her, “I also know that I promised the kids a story. But after that, not a thing.”

Beside her, Panam nodded repeatedly. “Okay. Good,” she said.

V raised an eyebrow at her.

“No, I mean. Not good, just…” She winced, rubbed her eyes with the heel of her hand. “You did not lose much after that.”

Panam being Panam once again, awkward and capable of always saying the wrong thing at the wrong time, was good. Normal. And it made V laugh despite the headache and the pain the act sparked. “Yeah, at least there’s that,” she agreed with a smile. “What did I miss?”

Silence followed her request, as Panam moved her gaze towards the floor between her feet and kept it there.

“Panam?”

“Yeah. We were talking, joking around with Mitch and… you got up, yes, to…” She hesitated, like she had forgotten the whole thing too and was trying to remember the details. “To mimic something, yes. And you just, you know, went down.”

Reviewing the words inside her head, trying to conjure the actual memory from them, V frowned. Still nothing. Then a thought crossed her mind, and she winced. Vik was going to be pissed.

“Was I drunk?” One thing she had been tasked to do, and somehow, she had managed to screw it up. Cause there was no way she would have stood up in the middle of camp doing impressions sober.

But Panam frowned. “No, you weren’t,” she said, confused. “And Mitch caught you, so no scrapes either,” Panam added quickly. “And Doc said to give you fluids and keep monitoring but that you would be okay. You know, all considered. So, we let you rest.”

“Hutch saw me?” V asked, latching on that piece of information. Viktor was the ripperdoc V trusted above every other and she did not usually go to others if that could be avoided. But having a backup so far from the City – a backup that also knew about her problem – had not been a bad idea, and V trusted the Aldecaldos. Also, Vik had done a background – and skills – check on Hutch when V had asked and he had given his blessing.

“Ahem, yes. Yes, he did,” blurted out Panam, the words coming out faster than they really needed to be. One of her legs was bouncing, agitated like her owner.

“Panam,” V said, mirroring her friend gesture from the day before and resting a hand on her knee, stopping its anxious movement. “I’m okay.”

Panam searched her face, as if looking for the lie there. But her knee stilled and the tension in her shoulders eased. “Yeah?”

“Yeah,” V confirmed.

Panam kept on searching, but a small smile started to appear. “Headache?”

“Afraid so, but I took the painkillers. Should clear in a bit.”

Her friend nodded. “Mm, alright. Dizziness?”

“Less now, I think I’m good to stand,” V said, trying to do just that.

Panam stopped her. “Let’s wait a little longer,” she said, pulling her down by the elbow. “Anything else… weird?”

Her hand swirled in the air in front of V, as if that might summon a diagnostic overlay from thin air. She looked ridiculous and endearing at the same time.

“Yeah,” V grinned at her. “Your mother-hen routine.”

Panam snorted. “Oh, bite me.”

“Yeah, no, sorry. Not my type.” V laughed, earning herself a slight shove.

“Yes, I know – ” Panam’s laugh died halfway through her retort, and she stopped speaking for a moment, eyes going wide. She cleared her throat before trying again. “I mean. Yes, I know. Judy’s still bitter about that,” she finished, a little lamely.

V frowned, the tone shift startling. But she chalked it up to awkwardness for the topic and moved on. “No, she isn’t,” she still countered. “Judy can do much better than an ex corpo rat on a deadline.”

Panam’s mouth was already halfway open around a retort when the tent flap rasped, cutting her off as Mitch entered, followed suit by Saul.

“Hey there, V,” Mitch greeted. “How we doing?”

“Upright,” she said, grinning at him. “Thanks for the catch.”

He grinned back. “Don’t mention it, I’m just glad to see you awake.”

She smiled at him and then nodded at Saul. “Hey, Saul.”

In between the glances he was sending Panam’s way, Saul greeted her back “Hey, V. Are you –”

“V doesn’t remember what happened,” said Panam, cutting him off and earning herself a glare from him.

“No?” asked Mitch. Both he and Saul looked straight at her, as if searching for the answer right on her face, and V felt herself squirm under their combined scrutiny.

“Nope. But I do remember I made some promises last night,” she said, hoping it’ll be enough to shift the subject from her own health to something less complicated. She looked at Saul before any of them could say anything. “Is Carol still available to look at that code?”

Surprise coloured his features. “You gave us quite the scare, V. You should rest,” he said.

“I think I already have,” she argued, calling up the time on her HUD. It was already past noon. Yep, definitely rested enough. “I need to be back in Haywood by eight or Mama Welles is going to give me an earful, and I don’t want to leave you guys hanging when the fix is so easy,” she argued. Then shrugged. “I also owe a story to the kids.”

Mitch shook his head and Saul sighed, but it was Panam that took her bait.

“Fine,” Panam said, standing and hovering by her side. “You can’t do much more damage to yourself anyway, doing those things.”

“Hey,” V protested, getting up with Panam’s – unnecessary – help.

Mitch chuckled, and Panam ignored her protest. “But first, you need to eat” she continued. “Cassidy set something aside for you from lunch. And breakfast, actually. So, you get your pick.”

Head shaking – probably as he convinced himself there was no benefit in entering into an argument with Panam just then – Saul headed for the tent entrance, opening the flap all the way and fastening it to keep it so.

“That sounds like a good plan,” said Mitch, walking out in the sun. “After that, you can hack your way through Carol’s approval and traumatize the kids to your heart’s content.”

V laughed, following them, and Panam, out on surprisingly steady legs. “I don’t just have grim stories, you know? I wasn’t always a merc,” she argued, amused.

Panam snorted. “V, you were a corpo before. That doesn’t really inspire confidence either.”

V grimaced, and Mitch patted her good shoulder as she passed him. A strong sense of déjà vu making her next step almost falter. But she caught herself, shaking away the sensation as Johnny glitched into view for just a moment, standing by the now extinguished fire in the middle of camp. He raised an eyebrow at her and threw up two fingers, in a V sign that now had more in common with threats than peace. Then he glitched away again, grinning. Leaving V to scoff at the empty space where he had been as Panam pushed her towards the mess area.

“Cheer up, V,” said Mitch, misinterpreting her expression. “You can always lie to them.”

Yeah, she thought, if only.

-----

Elbows planted on the worn counter and chin balanced on the heel of one hand, V felt on the brink of sleep. The low music, the clink of glass, and Misty’s familiar voice as she recounted a story about a haunted tarot deck for Pepe’s sake, all contributing to the heaviness of her eyelids despite the twelve hours of sleep she had managed to score after the Relic’s malfunction.

Nodding in agreement wherever Pepe’s laugh highlighted a particularly funny moment in the story, V let her focus drift. Her two days of rest, the reason Vik had ordered them in the first place, the malfunction, Panam’s worry and the Aldecaldos warmth. Everything piled in her mind, in a line so clogged she didn’t even know where to start processing it.

Just like Johnny’s ultimatum. And the stolen moment that was the reason she had yet to tell him to just fuck off.

She sighed.

“You alright there, V?” Pepe said, leaning in a little over the counter.

V gave him a tired smile. “Yeah, just knackered.”

Misty squeezed her arm then. The smile she sent V’s way was knowing. “I’ll drive you home after dinner,” she said. And before V could protest she added, “it’s on my way.” Satisfied when V nodded her reluctant agreement, Misty turned back to Pepe and her story.

V let her own gaze blur into the glass of the bottles stacked on the shelves behind Pepe. Her mind going back to the daunting task of sorting her messed thoughts.

Her HUD signalled an incoming call before she could really set on it.

She gestured to Misty, mouthing the word ‘holo’, and then stepped away, toward the gated area by the side of the bar. Leaning on one of the tables there, facing the almost empty room, she connected the call.

“Wakako,” she greeted, suddenly awake. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“V, my dear,” the Lady of Westbrook answered from the other side. “There is an asset I’d like to acquire. Its former owner is an old acquaintance of yours, I believe. One Jotaro Shobo.”

V blinked.

“Really?”

“Indeed. Not all his operations have been abandoned by the Claws after your paths crossed,” Wakako explained. “And fortunately for us, this particular one could benefit us both, V. But there is a certain urgency to this acquisition,” she added, “and a need for discretion.”

“How urgent?” V asked, not worried about the discretion part but wondering how was it possible for fixers to always have the worst timing ever.

“Quite a bit,” Wakako answered, “I’ve arranged for a particular set of circumstances to happen and make the retrieval of this asset less… complicated. But it is a small window. One that would be very difficult to recreate. Tomorrow afternoon.”

Afternoon. Well past Vik’s mandated rest and still before Johnny’s deadline. V could work with that.

“Alright,” she said, eyes roaming the room without really seeing it. “Send me the dets, Wakako.”

“Already on the way, dear. I’ll be in my office tomorrow morning if you need to clarify something,” the fixer said, cutting the call just as V’s HUD alerted her of the incoming data package.

V flickered it open, just enough to see a set of floor plans flash on her HUD, before she shut it off again, clearing her vision. Work could wait at least after dinner. Her nerves, apparently, couldn’t.

The shiver that raised the air at the back of her neck told her without error that she was being watched. The almost imperceptible glitch in her HUD that someone was also trying to ping her.

She let her weight sink into the table and her gaze drift lazily across the room, like she was just killing time. On the ground floor, a pair of Valentinos was playing a game of pool, watched by a third one nursing a glass. Behind them, the only other patrons seemed to be a young couple exchanging sweet words – and spit – on the couch by Jackie’s ofrenda. None of them stood out, to her naked eye and optics both, and for a moment she convinced herself she must have imagined it.

But the sensation came again, a disquiet that, like a beacon, brought her eyes up, towards the walkway on the second floor. There was a man there, a beer in his hand and pointedly not looking down.

V’s optics blinked into a scan, lining up a quiet piece of code that had served her well before on occasions like this to remain unnoticed. It did its job, and the man did not move, still looking towards the upstairs windows and seemingly focused on his thoughts and beer.

Her triumph was short lived.

>> [SCAN // QUERY … ]
>> [RESULTS:  –  ]
>> [AFFILIATION:  –  ]
>> [NCPD DATABASE:  –  ]

Empty.

She tried again. Same results.

Squaring her shoulders, she felt the urge to sigh. A civilian, a low life thug, a corpo, or even a clearly faked identity she could have expected. But the whole thing had come out blank. And that could only mean trouble. Either because the guy watching her had a bone to pick and enough confidence in his own skills to let her know, or – worse even – because he intended to engage V’s services for something that, considering her luck, would almost certainly end badly. Probably for her.

“V!” Misty’s voice called out before V could decide if making a scene in Mama Welles’ bar was something she had the gall to do, capturing her attention.

At the bar Mama Welles had finally joined Misty, having clearly ended the holo call she had been engaged with when the two of them had arrived. “Ándale, mi hija,” she told V when their eyes met. “There’s warm tamales already waiting in the kitchen.”

V smiled at her and nodded, pushing off the table to walk her way. When she crossed the railing delimiting the small side area, her eyes went up again. She had expected it, and still, disquiet took hold of her when she found he was not there anymore. Nor anywhere else she – or the Coyote’s security system that V had breached the first time she had set foot in the bar trailing behind Jackie like a lost puppy – could see.

“You alright, mi cielo?” Mama Welles asked as V stepped by her side. There was worry in her eyes, and V did not want to see it there.

Letting go of the strange man for the moment – if there was to be trouble, it would find her soon enough anyway, preferably far away from the Coyote and the people in it – V smiled at her. “Yes, Mama. Thought I recognized someone for a moment,” she reassured. Then, both to change the subject and because Johnny’s ultimatum lingered at the front of that chaotic queue in her mind, V added, “Speaking of, you heard from Padre lately?”

Chapter Text

The beaded curtain rasped over V’s shoulders as she stepped out of Wakako’s den and into the small arcade that was supposed to act as its front. The endless clicking of the pachinko machines assaulted her in full force and V hastened her stride in an effort to escape it as quickly as possible.

When she finally emerged into the outside street, she found Wakako’s only bodyguard – a woman whose barely concealed mantis blades were clearly deterrent enough for those few thugs that had yet to learn about Wakako’s reputation – leaning against the wall outside. The woman had stepped out of Wakako’s den as soon as V had made her entrance almost an hour before, disappearing somewhere on her boss’ orders. Now back, she was taking survey of the street and the bustling but sparse crowd moving up and down it.

When V nodded at her in passing, the bodyguard nodded back, killing the cig she had been smoking before going back to her post inside.

V watched her until she disappeared inside, before walking away.

“Should get yourself a pair,” said Johnny, flickering into being a few steps ahead of her, just at the other side of the small walkway. As she walked towards him, he moved backwards through the crowd. Glitching in and out of view every time he phased through someone walking on the same slice of pavement as he.

Since their talk at the Aldecaldos camp he had been uncharacteristically quiet. Letting her mull over his ultimatum and everything that came with it without interference. V had found the lack of needling unsettling.

“Sure,” V said, putting as much sarcasm as she could into the single word. “’Cause I definitely have the build for that kind of up-close-and-personal action.”

Johnny snorted, pivoting on his feet as he took the street in, eyes focusing on the joytoy soliciting business by the shop there. His head tilted towards the guy. “Could get yourself one of those, then. I’m sure even you can manage that kind of up-close-and-personal action,” he said, parroting her own remark and grinning like the ten-year-old he not so secretly was.

Pettiness drove her as she stepped right through him, knowing full well the unpleasantness of the ensuing feedback loop would annoy him just as much as it did her. He grimaced, glitching out of view for a moment before reappearing on one of the concrete jerseys below the neon sign marking the beginning of Jig-Jig Street.

“Right, my mistake” he said, unrelenting. “Gotta save yourself for the man with the worst fashion sense in all NC.”

Walking by him, she stumbled, managing to keep herself upright only by grabbing onto the jersey at the last possible moment. “For fuck’s sake, Johnny. Really?”

“What? It’s true. That mullet alone must be some kind of joke. Or the result of a bet.”

Cheeks warming up, V started walking again, crossing the street towards the stairs that lead down to the Cherry Blossom Market.

In truth, she had asked herself that question too. More than once, to be completely honest. Muamar Reyes was a good-looking man, enough so that even the awful haircut somehow managed to work for him. And her. But V would be lying if she said she had never found herself fantasizing about what he would look like with a more flattering cut.

Still, that was not the point here.

She told Johnny – now walking beside her – as much. “That is not the point, Johnny. I don’t need that kind of action now. Got enough on my plate as it is,” she said, wincing at how much that statement rang as the lie it was.

Johnny clearly heard it too, and he snorted again. “‘Cause you keep adding to it,” he accused. “Really needed this stealing-from-kittens’ nonsense too now?”

V sighed. And there it was. “You saw the brief. That’s a lot of eddies,” she told him.

Johnny’s eyes went to the layers of concrete covering the clear sky above them as he passed right through a guy so big that could have been easily mistaken for an Animal. “That you don’t need,” he commented.

“I might,” V said, hoping to steer clear from the old argument. “Buying answers and following leads is costly business.”

The words had the effect she had expected, and Johnny stopped walking abruptly, glitching a few steps down the stairs from her a second later. His eyes narrowed. “And that’s what we are doing?”

She grinned at him, stepping down the stairs, putting much more spring in her steps than the still raw abrasion on her hip warranted. Johnny glitched away a second before V could pass through him again, reappearing even further down, on the landing where so long ago they had stopped to watch a cowboy play his guitar with just the right amount of hurt.

“Real mature,” Johnny said, grimacing. “So?”

V shrugged. “I said ‘might’. Still got a day and a half to decide, no?”

The annoyance on Johnny’s face was priceless, and she smiled as he raised a finger at her while she passed him by.

He glitched into view on a stool by one of the food stands. “You know what?” he said, “Maybe that lack of action is why you are such a –”

The familiar thrill of her holo interrupted his nasty remark and killed V’s nastier response before she could even get to it.

She glanced at the corner of her holo, where the caller’s name was blinking relentlessly.  Her stomach fluttered and a warmth that had nothing to do with the sizzling heat coming from the food stalls spread throughout her body from the inside out.

The grin reappearing on Johnny’s face made her own eyes roll to the sky. “Speak of the devil,” he said, unfazed, eyebrows moving up and down suggestively.

V gave him the bird, turning her back on him as she moved to a less busy area of the market. It still took her another few seconds to connect the call.

The fixer had occupied the majority of her thoughts recently. Either because of what V had started to call “The Almost Event” in her mind – capital letters more than warranted – or because of the spark of want it had managed to reignite. And while a good part of those thoughts had been employed to conjure hypothetical scenarios on how their next conversation could go from there and, most importantly, how soon that could happen, V found herself at a loss on how to proceed now.

Exhaling deeply to steel herself, she connected the call.

“Hey Cap’n,” she said.

Muamar spoke at the same time. “V.”

They both paused, silence stretching between them for barely a second. A second that felt a thousand times longer and packed tight with unspoken words.

They spoke again in almost perfect sync. “You first.”

Somewhere behind her, Johnny snorted. “Smooth, V. Real smooth.”

V ignored him, her next exhale coming out in a small laugh. “You called, Cap’n,” she told Muamar. “Pretty sure that means you get to go first.”

“I did, didn’t I?” There was a little bit of echo on his side of the call, reduced to almost nothing by the noise suppression filters of the holo system, but enough to make V wonder where in NC he could be. All the garages she knew he owned way too crowded to create that kind of distortion.

The softness in his voice – the same she had heard while in his arms – was still perfectly clear when he spoke again. “Then, buenos días, princesa.”

The smile that stretched over her face was involuntary. An embarrassing reflex he had somehow managed to condition out of her with those ever-present pet names. “That what you are calling for? To say good morning?”

The faint echoing of dress shoes on a hard floor came from his side of the holo before his answer did. “And what’s so surprising about that, querida?” he asked, and there was amusement in his voice. “Can’t a fixer wish his best merc a good and productive morning?”

V snorted, the sound coming out of her closer to another laugh than anything else.

Maybe, she thought, she wasn’t the only one without a clue on how to manage that conversation.

“It’s noon, Cap’n,” she told him. “Also, lately I’d say you only remember my number when you need a car delivered.”

The sigh that came from the other end of the line was as pregnant as the silence the call had started out with. “I remember more than that,” Muamar said, voice going low. “Especially lately.”

A new wave of heat crawled up the back of her neck.

“I meant, remember me for bigger gigs. But… yeah,” she said, because for days now she had been on the brink of a precipice and jumping felt like the only logical choice now. “Last time we saw each other was… eventful.”

“Mm. That is one word for it.” There was a sly humour to his voice, but it was threaded with something warmer that only added to the heat V was already fighting. “I would perhaps use unfinished.”

Throat going dry all of a sudden, V swallowed. Then, feeling like she had just taken a puff of Black Lace, she called to that same foolishness that allowed her to routinely step in the path of flying bullets for a living. “And is that something you would like to finish?”

The echoing sound of his walking stopped abruptly. “Jesucristo, V.”

“That a no?” She asked. The breathiness that accompanied her name as it passed his lips making her foolishness feel more like bravery.

On the other side of the holo Muamar exhaled heavily, and his walking resumed. V imagined him pacing with as much pent-up energy as she felt. 

“There is a car,” he said, finally. “Still working out the details, so it could be a couple of days.”

V’s shoulders sagged as the source of the flush in her cheeks changed from anticipation to embarrassment. “Oh.”

Could she really have misunderstood that badly?

“Yes, V. Preem wheels too, so I’d like my best merc on the job,” he explained, the amusement in his voice now rendered bitter to her ears by his rejection. “And, of course, I’ll have to see to the drop off myself.”

Oh.

“Oh.”

She was a fool.

He laughed, the sound once again sweet. “Indeed. Think you could keep yourself available, princesa?”

Fighting to keep at bay the smile once again taking over her face, V cleared her throat. “That could be arranged,” she said, because denying that she did want that was not going to fool anyone anymore. And then, because she was a little shit at heart – even if that same heart was feeling raw and unprotected at that same moment – she added, “but I do work with other fixers, you know? I may need a little more notice than this.”

“Oh, I do know,” he said, the added dramatics in his tone making V lose the fight against that smile. “That’s what you’re doing now?”

“A gig?” she asked. He hummed a confirmation and she continued. “Do you think I would answer your holo if I was?”

“You did, that first time you brought me a car,” he said.

She had, hadn’t she? Still. “That was different, wasn’t really a gig by that point,” she argued.

He chuckled. “Well, I do like to think you would. For your favourite fixer.”

“Of course I would,” she said, the seriousness in her tone as fake as the implants Fingers installed in his back-alley clinic not far from there. “I always answer Hands’ calls.”

The laughter that obvious lie earned was unrestrained, and V felt want stir again inside her.

I want more of this, she thought. More of these moments and more of his laughter.

I want more time.

Busying himself with perusing the market stalls, Johnny froze, and his head shot up. Their eyes meeting for just a moment. V swallowed. “Two days” she mouthed at him, and he nodded, raising his hands in mock surrender before going back to his perusing.

But there was a grin on his face, and they both knew what had put it there.

“You hurt me, querida. Deeply,” Muamar said when all that remained of his laughter was the amusement in his tone. “And yet, I am but your humble servant, and you’ll get all the notice you need. I’ll call as soon as I have more details. How does that sound?”

“Preem,” she exhaled, “it sounds preem.”

“Good,” he said.

Neither of them spoke for a moment after that. But neither closed the call. V knew, for her part, that the reason for it was a frightening abundance of things to say more than a lack of it.

Before letting one of those things go, she wondered if that was what kept him silent too. “Muamar,” she said, honestly, “I look forward to it.”

His answer came after a few more heartbeats of silence. “I do too,” he said. “Cuítate, V.”

The line clicked shut then, and the market rushed back in. The sound of sizzling oil reached her from the shop that had sprouted on the remains of the defunct Rainbow Cadenza at her back, while vendors shouted over one another in at least three different languages, trying to entice the constant stream of customers and window shoppers alike.  

None of it was loud enough to drown the I do too looping front and centre in her mind.

Johnny’s loud whistle unfortunately was. “So,” he said. The same grin from before now looking even bigger.

“Nope,” V cut him off. “Shut it.”

Miming a zipper over his mouth with one hand and showing her the bird with the other, Johnny disappeared. Grin still plastered over his face.

Pushing off the rail she had been leaning on, V almost laughed. The bite had gone out of her, and all that was left was amusement. And a kind of resigned determination she hadn’t felt in weeks. In a show of great restraint that surprised her too, she still managed not to give him the satisfaction.

-----

Wakako had not lied about the expected results of her particular set of arranged circumstances. If anything, she had undersold them.

First, the walkway V had used to enter the building – a green monstrosity that started on Holly St, crossed over the East Ringroad, and ended up right on the eleventh floor of the building whose top three floors the Claws had efficiently repurposed into an R&D facility – had been laughably devoid of security.

According to the gig’s brief, there was no automated security system overseeing the passage. The Tiger Claws felt confident enough inside their territory to only have human patrols there, Wakako had explained.

V thought that was one of the stupidest things she had ever seen that particular gang do – especially after she herself had demonstrated how inefficient their human security could be even against just one merc. But, at the same time, she was also not one to check stolen chrome for serials, so she had adjusted accordingly, planning for close quarters hacking. So, she had switched into full alert mode after crossing the highway, expecting to find – once again according to the brief – at least a few strategically positioned goons patrolling the last stretch of walkway by the building. But there had been none.

At least, none patrolling.

Two middle aged guys had been hanging out by the door that was to be her entry point into the building, smoking and talking way too fast for V’s translator to pick up what, by the snorts of laughter that were clear in any language, had seemed to be a hilarious conversation. It had taken V forty-six seconds to drop them both with almost simultaneously uploaded hacks.

So, yeah. The walkway had been her first clue that Wakako may have gone a little overboard with the prep work for the gig. Leaving little for V to actually do.

Now, shuffling through the security cameras the Claws did have inside the building, V wondered if her presence – and fee – was even warranted at all.

Not considering the two guys taking a nap outside, the whole security of the clandestine lab consisted of seven goons scattered around floors eleven through thirteen of the tower, and two turrets positioned just outside the elevator on floor twelve.

The whole gig could have really been done by a remote runner and a courier sent in just to bag the asset.

“Thought you were not one to question stolen chrome,” Johnny said. His feet appeared beside her, dangling from the desk she was hiding behind.

V looked up at him, sending a glare his way before going back to circling cameras. “I am not,” she said. “But this is a little underwhelming.”

“That’s what you get for wasting time on side gigs,” scoffed Johnny. He glitched away, reappearing a few desks down, lurking around the open space that must have been, at some point, meant to be an office but had never quite managed to make it that far.

Movement on the bathroom camera just down the hall from V’s hiding spot recalled her attention. The – way to young – Tiger Claw girl that had been touching up her makeup inside the bathroom for at least as long as V had been in control of the cameras, was on the move. If the girl had any sense, she’d have to do a sweep of the floor after being distracted for so long.

That meant V had less than a minute to take her down gently before having to resort to quicker but deadlier solutions.

The System Reset – way slower on the upload than her preferred System Collapse but gentler on the synapses – finished uploading with just a few seconds to spare, and the girl collapsed silently not two steps from the corner that would have brought her on V’s position.

Following the momentum of that first take down, V’s sight moved to the thirteenth floor. Like the ones she had taken down on the walkway, the two Claws there were out almost too easily, collapsing simultaneously by the elevator lobby as her hacks uploaded.

Waiting as her RAM emptied from residual processes, recouping enough resources to move on to clearing the twelfth floor – where her target was kept – V turned to look at Johnny. “What did I say about the eddies?”

Stopping his perusal of the space in front of a netrunning chair that looked particularly out of place beside one of the repurposed desks, Johnny turned to look at her. “Bullshit,” he said. “We already have a lead, V. How much could it cost to have some gonk fixer ask around a few questions?”

Standing up from behind her cover after ensuring the remaining Claws were all still on the floor above her, V moved towards the corridor. “Tell that to your ex-input,” she argued, remembering just how steep the price for finding Hellman had been.

Johnny followed, stopping to crouch beside the unconscious girl as V approached the door leading to the stairs up. “Well, she didn’t know about us then, did she?”

There were five Claws on the twelfth floor, all but one lounging on couches in the makeshift break area right outside the elevator there. V estimated that a well-timed Overclock could be enough to take them all out at once.  But the timer blinking in a corner of her HUD – to mark down Wakako’s window of opportunity – was still on the comfortable side of one hour, and V did not like the sluggishness that always followed overclocking her own system.

Divide and conquer would work just as well.

The Claw talking on his holo in one of the closed offices at the far end from the break area was the first to go down. Sliding to the floor as his synapses rebooted ten seconds after his call finally ended. The twin turrets framing the elevator followed right after, her hold on the system making the process of shutting them down almost as simple as thinking it.

“I’m not so sure knowing about you will result in a discount,” V threw at Johnny while she scouted for a distraction to split up the remaining goons. Two out of four were actually scrolling BDs, so with a bit of luck, she only really needed to have one move away from the group.

“Ah, ah,” mock laughed Johnny. “Well, if that doesn’t work, we can always go to your output. I’m sure he’ll give you a discount if you offer to suck his cock.”

There was a fully stocked vending machine by the bathroom door – around the corner from the open space just like on the eleventh floor – that could probably do. A quick command had it come to life, with sounds and lighting going crazy while the delivery system unloaded almost half its merchandise in a heap on the floor.

“Classy, Johnny. And very mature,” V told him half-heartedly as she kept a close eye on her Claw friends.

Startled by the noise – but apparently very much invested in whatever was streaming on the screen they had been watching – it took the Claws several seconds of back and forth to decide which one of them was supposed to go and check the disturbance out.

“Wasn’t kidding,” Johnny said. “Actually. By the way he looks at you, I’m pretty sure the guy would do it for free. No need to even trade fucking favours.” He paused for a moment, chuckling to himself. “Pun very much intended,” he added, extremely proud of himself.

The younger looking of the two Claws had gotten the shorter straw, and V waited until he got in front of the vending machine – and all the way out of view from the other guy – before dropping him with another System Reset.

“No fucking way,” she responded while the guy hit the ground. “I’m not involving him. Or any other fixer. Rogue already knows about our situation, she is still our best bet.”

While she waited for Johnny’s inevitable reply and her RAM to be once again entirely free, she queued the same hack on the three remaining Claws.

“Pretty sure the priest knows too,” Johnny supplied.

V was sure Padre did, too. She was also still bitter about his disappearing act. “Yes, and he is still not responding to my calls. So, Rogue it is.”

Johnny grinned. “Then it’s decided?”

The RAM emptied and V released the hacks. “If,” she clarified, scoffing. “I still have time to decide.”

“Sure, V. Sure you do,” Johnny said, appeasing. “Now, can we get a move on? Those gonks are already out like broken dolls, and this is getting boring.”

A last shuffle through the cameras confirmed Johnny’s assessment down to the boring part. With both the organic and synthetic parts of the security systems now disengaged, V moved into the stairwell, taking the steps up to the next floor two by two.

“This is truly sad,” Johnny commented, surveying the three sleeping Claws on the couch as V reached the landing that opened into the break room. “Granted, we are here to steal a fucking BD reader, but I’ve seen better security at some of my gigs.”

“That’s because you are a fucking menace, Johnny. The security there was probably just to keep you at bay,” she told him, only partially joking. “This way,” she added, turning left towards the conference room down the hallway. From what she had seen shuffling through cameras, the room – currently devoid of researching scientists thanks to Wakako’s planned distraction – had been converted into some kind of lab and was the most promising place for the wreath to be stored.

The keypad that controlled the lock on the lab door was an old model, not even military grade. With plenty of time to go – the countdown on her HUD had just gone under one hour – V didn’t bother with anything fancy, setting up a brute-force hack and waiting for it to do its job.

Johnny glitched into view beside the door, leaning on the wall there with a smug grin that told V he had taken her remark as the flattering comment it sure wasn’t meant to be. “What I mean is, this kind of soul-sucking shit brings in eddies, you’d think they’d had better security than this.”

The screen flashed at the same time as the locking mechanism disengaged with a clear click. “Probably as Wakako said. The Claws feel confident no one would challenge them like this on their own territory,” she shrugged, pushing inside the lab. Mind going back to several different gigs in which V herself had proven that theory wrong – one of which had ended with the termination of the very guy that used to oversee that very R&D lab – she added, “goes to show nobody ever learns a fucking thing in this city.”

“Can’t argue with that,” Johnny said, checking one side of the room while she searched the other.

Like everything else regarding the gig, finding the wreath turned out to be almost too easy. A quick scan of her side of the room found the match to the intel’s description inside a case not so different from the one that had housed the Relic.

V’s hand hovered on the case for a moment, as her system absorbed the sudden spike in adrenaline the memory had brought on.

At the other side of the room, Johnny paused his own search to look at her.

“It’s here,” she told him, finally moving to open the case.

He reappeared beside her as the lock on the lid clicked open. “That’s what we are looking for?” he asked.

The wreath was not so different from the one Judy had given her all those months before to scroll BDs on the go. The wiring on the rough steel frame was more complex, however, with a few additional connections and ports that V could not really attribute to any particular function with just a superficial scan. “It is,” she told Johnny, pointing to the handwritten label on the case.

“NM Diagnostic and Stabilization Unit,” Johnny read. “Fancy name for a BD scroller. What does ‘NM’ even stand for?”

Closing the case and grabbing it off the table, V checked the countdown. Forty-six minutes to go. At this rate, she was going to be back on Holly St. with at least twenty to spare.

“Neural Mesh,” she answered Johnny’s question while moving back into the hallway. A quick camera check confirmed that everything was still quiet – even the two goons napping outside, one floor down and clearly visible through the glass door the camera she had used as an entry point into the system pointed at. “If I had to guess, prototype probably has something to do with adding to the sensory experience,” she explained when Johnny raised an eyebrow in confusion.

He shook his head as they reached the lobby below, where the girl was still sprawled – and out like a light – on the corridor floor there. “Preem, fucking preem,” Johnny said, making a show of sidestepping the girl just like V had. “‘Cause those things are not addictive enough as they are. Between the gangs and the Corporations this fucking city really doesn’t stand a fucking chance.”

Making for the door to the walkway, V almost laughed at that. “Bit ironic coming from a guy who can recognize most drugs by smell alone,” she tossed back at him.

Johnny scoffed. “You know that’s different, V.”

With a hand already on the glass door, V stopped and turned to look at him. Old discussions about control, Corporations, and changing people into something they were not, surfaced in her mind. And once again, V longed for more time.

She exhaled, and the smile she sent his way was soft and sad. “I know, Johnny. Let’s just get out now,” she told him. “Nothing much we can do about that here.”

Understanding cleared the dark clouds that had formed on Johnny’s face for a moment, and a familiar grin reappeared there.

Satisfied, he nodded, and V pushed out into the walkway.

-----

With the sun setting low on it, colouring in warm yellows and oranges both Pacifica’s broken skyline and the open sea stretching further than even V’s premium optics could see, the bay looked as peaceful as the City behind her was chaotic.

Legs dangling from the same concrete flowerbed that had been witness to her sad lunch just a couple of days before, V found that stillness unsettling. The emptiness of it bringing forth memories she had been trying to outrun for months.

Quiet life or blaze of glory, Miss V?

Dexter DeShawn’s question had haunted her – both in her waking hours and dreams – since the cursed day she had met him.

Back then, fresh out of the somewhat sheltered life a Corporate affiliation afforded in a city like NC, she had thought the answer to that question obvious.

You’re either somebody or you fizzle out into nothing. Night City doesn’t let you choose.

That had been her answer then. A truth she had so adamantly professed and believed.

She had been a fool. In all the ways it was possible to be. Believing those two choices to be the only possible ones. Believing a path to glory could be worth walking without the promise of peace at its end.

The sound of an incoming call broke through the stillness, interrupting her maudlin thoughts.

She sighed, then connected the call just as a second notification alerted her of a new, and substantial, transfer into her account. “Wakako,” she said. “I gather the package has reached its destination alright?”

“It has indeed, V,” the fixer answered in one of her most placid tones. “And you did your job flawlessly, my dear. My… client, is very satisfied by both outcome and execution,” she added, curiously stumbling on the word ‘client’.

Considering the level of prep work the woman had orchestrated for the gig – a level more than bordering the overkill territory – V put it down to the client being Wakako herself or someone very high up on the NC’s food chain.

Either way, what mattered was that the client was happy and V’s virtual wallet a little bit heavier. “Good to hear,” she told Wakako. “Gotta keep that rep high, after all.”

The small laugh that came from the other side of the holo startled V, who could recall no instance of ever hearing the Westbrook fixer laugh.

“Indeed,” Wakako said, like her show of glee had not fundamentally changed the picture V had of her. “And I assure you, V, this will go a long way in ensuring you get to keep that high rep for a long time to come.”

“Preem,” V said, at a loss for something more to say. Torn between the lingering surprise and a small pang of curiosity. A ‘long time’ was not yet something that was safely secured in V’s cards, but maybe she should have taken a deeper look at that wreath before delivering it anyway. If Wakako was so confident this one single gig could do so much for her – already major-league – rep in the long term, that thing must have been really worth something. And, at the very least, Judy would have gotten a kick out of tinkering with new specs.

As her mind spiralled down a rabbit hole of technical thoughts, Wakako spoke again. “I’ve to cut this short, dear. Your fee should be waiting for you already, and I will call you if anything new comes up. In the meantime, enjoy your evening.”

The call cut, and V found herself looking out at the ocean once again. There was a lot more purple colouring the world around her now. Even the loud sounds of the evening rush hour seemed to have somewhat quieted down behind her, leaving her alone to go back to her thoughts.

Scooting back on the concrete, V pulled her legs up, resting her chin on bended knees as she looked out towards Pacifica. Across the rippling dark water, the district was a patchwork of broken promises. All of them abandoned when the P&L of the Corporations making them had to be balanced against the cost of the Unification War.

Half-built and half-abandoned, too expensive to fix and too expensive to tear down, Pacifica was stuck in limbo. A monument to giving up halfway.

V stared at its shadow as something hot and ugly twisted in her chest. Just where resignation had been sitting for weeks.

Wasn’t that the same thing she had been doing?

She pressed the heel of her hand into her sternum, like erasing that thought and its effect could be as easy as rubbing it away. It wasn’t.

The whole point of what she had been doing for weeks had been to find closure. Decide to stop chasing miracles and accept the inevitable, make her peace, tie off loose ends, set the stage for Johnny.

Say goodbye.

Fingers drumming where they held her legs from shaking, she swallowed.

And yet.

And yet, she had kept going on countless gigs – even tedious ones – working to raise her rep higher than the City’s borders. Cultivating it, like Wakako had said, for the long run. Even though that long run was not supposed to be there.

And yet, while Misty still knew nothing about how to fix the bell over her own shop’s door, V had yet to pass over even one of her friend’s offers for a reading. The gentle sound of Misty’s voice, divining a future V should have given up on already, more alluring than finding time to teach her friend how to live that future without V.

And yet, while V had been the first to remind Viktor of his own words, she had yet to find a way to swallow the hurt that had lodged inside her throat when his acceptance of her inevitable demise had finally come.

And yet, Mama Welles was still inviting her for dinner at least twice a week. Because while V knew the time to distance herself had come and gone – to lessen the blow, to spare her from reliving that kind of loss again – she had capitulated every time she had tried. Lured in by the promise of warm food and a warmer home.

And yet, she had capitulated in the same way every time Judy had invited her for a night of pizza and nerding out on the latest tech gadget. Failing there too to sow a distance V had proclaimed herself ready for.

And yet, she had her own tent at camp. Filled with mismatched furniture and trinkets Panam, Mitch, the Vets, and Saul had gathered for her – even though resources were scarce and precious for Nomads, and it didn’t make sense to waste them on someone who had no future. And that tent was filled with things she had left there herself. Drawn in time and time again by the promise of family the Aldecaldos kept dangling before her eyes.

And yet.

And yet, she had let herself cross a line, walking at speed towards a precipice that had a name, and backstories, and quirks, and jokes, and words reserved only for her. And now she wanted to fall on that precipice.

Rougher now that the wind had picked up, the bay lapped at the shore below. The change in its lulling sound waking V from her endless list of failings.

Exhaling heavily, she rubbed one cheek, finding it wet.

None of what she had done in those last few weeks felt like accepting fate.

No. Just like that moment with Muamar, it all felt unfinished.

“I don’t want to leave it like this,” she said out loud to the emptiness around her. “I don’t want to die yet.”

And there it was, coming out on a dry sob. The loud and undeniable truth she had tried to conceal even – and especially – from herself.

The shoulder that materialized beside her own, close enough to touch, felt warm despite not even being really there. “Then don’t,” said Johnny, looking out to the sea.

V shrugged, waiting until she was sure her voice would not tremble before answering. “If only it was that easy.”

“There’s nothing easy in this fucking city, V,” Johnny said, toying with an imaginary cigarette. “Why would this be? But that doesn’t mean it can’t be done.”

The statement, so close to something that could have been stolen from a Night Corp promotional poster and so out of place on his lips, got a snort out of her. “What, ‘cause this is ‘the City of Dreams’?”

“No, you gonk,” he said, rolling his eyes and pressing his phantom shoulder to hers. “‘Cause while you are a gonk, you are a crazy good one. And I’ve seen you do things that not even Blackhand and Bartmoss would have the balls to do.”

“That is both flattering and definitely untrue, Johnny,” she said.

Johnny scoffed. “Doesn’t change my point. You want to live, and we have a lead. Following it down is nothing different from most of the gigs you waste your time with. What do you have to lose?”

V’s response died on her lips as Johnny pressed on.

“And enough with the eddies excuse. I bet by now you could even buy that hole Rogue’s running if you wanted,” he said.

Gaze wandering towards the rollercoaster’s loops marking the skyline in the distance, V shook her head. “That’s not what I was going to say.”

“Then what?” he asked.

She inhaled, holding the air for a moment before releasing the breath on another heavy exhale. “You know what, Johnny,” she said, shoulders raising and falling in a resigned shrug.

Silence stretched for a moment as they both looked out to the place that had been host to such rare and happy memory.

Then Johnny followed her example, taking in a deep breath before speaking. “I’ve been dead a long time, V.”

Again, she shook her head. The movement a touch more forceful this time. “Doesn’t matter, you are here now. You get to have a second chance.”

“And I have,” he said, sounding as small as he had before his own unmarked grave. “Let me do with it what I choose.”

V swallowed, finally turning to look him in the eyes. There was nothing there that felt like a lie, only a determination she had once thought reserved for plans regarding the annihilation of Arasaka.

“Then we find a solution that saves us both,” she argued.

Johnny smiled. “That seems like asking a little too much. Even from the City of Dreams,” he said.

“You said it yourself. I’ve done worse,” she countered, her attempt at humour not quite covering the gravity of it all.

“Fine, then it’s agreed. Tomorrow, we speak with Rogue, follow our creepy ghost lead, and find a solution that against all the fucking odds buys us both a few more years to be gonks. Deal?”

As the last ‘and yet’ – and yet, she could not imagine a future without Johnny’s caustic brand of humour in it – joined all the others in her mind, V straightened, letting her feet dangle as she nodded. “Deal.”

“Deal,” he repeated. Then, one of his hands hovered above her knee, like he had intended to pat it. “But V,” he said, hand retreating by his side and voice all at once serious. “If push comes to shove, you let me make my own choice.”

With a final look at the darkness across the bay, V jumped down from her perch, barely wincing when her scratched hip protested the movement. “Okay,” she said. Because he would have accepted nothing else. “Let’s go home now,” she added, the words sounding as much a question as a request.

“Yeah, let’s go,” he said, glitching out of view for a moment before reappearing beside her.

From there, home was not far, and they walked the whole way back together. Leaving Pacifica’s unfinished shadow in the dark behind them.