You only live twice - Chapter 8 - Maevemorrigan (2024)

Chapter Text

"When you go to war as a boy, you have a great illusion of immortality.

Other people get killed, not you...

Then, when you are badly wounded the first time,

you lose that illusion."

Her head was hurting.

Not with one of her usual migraines; this was getting a lot worse by the minute. Sandra swallowed yet another pair of pills, which caused Takemura to lift one eyebrow slightly.

It was the second time he had seen her do that in a few hours.

In the dimly lit room and under the bluish light of the many monitors, she looked sick—a thing he simply accepted as a fact and decided to let it slide for now. There would be another time to ask personal questions.

The Rónin found a comfortable spot leaning against a counter, his right hand now in a sling across his bare chest, sporting large patches on his right shoulder to cover several abrasions caused by the not-so-elegant leap. The open fracture was hastily stitched, and he needed a proper ripper doc; the many small wounds were just minor inconveniences. He refused any painkillers. He’s had it worse on many occasions, and painkillers dimmed his mind. He needed to stay sharp, they had a long night ahead of them, combing through the data Momoko downloaded, comparing them with the deets they already had.

From his left, Becks was resting on his good shoulder, covered in a thick purple blanket like a small child, holding onto his arm in a child-like manner. She was still shivering and sniffling through the yawns. This was a scared kid - with a lot of powerful chrome. But still a kid in his eyes. She was not fit to work with them.

He allowed her close contact. Sandra and she were already in the parlour when they arrived from Glen. And she ran into him, hugging him and clinging onto his shirt—if it was an act, it actually worked, and he stayed close to her the whole time, even allowing her to hug him on several occasions when she needed that, like—badly!

The girl was now half asleep, and he couldn´t move an inch, even if he´d liked, because she was comfortable. Somewhere deep within him, Takemura was almost glad she was alright.

Over the room, Momoko sorted the pieces of information she pulled from the computer and played the poor doctor's last minutes in the loop. He sobbed, cried, begged and then ended up being shot in the head on repeat. And over him loomed a woman with a blurred face. No matter how much Momoko tried, she was not able to clear the picture.

“Is nae a glitch! Must be her f*ckin´ chrome,” she muttered angrily, turning in the chair. Her fists were clenched, and her face contorted in a displeased grin. It´s been some time since she had worked on it, but none of her programs could clean the recording. When angry, she behaved like a pouting teenager, throwing pens and datashards around, throwing mild tantrums, and swearing in Japanese while pacing around the room.

“And top shelf, obvi. f*ck, I´m sorry.”

Sandra sighed and, from her place, sitting on the other counter, waved her hand. “Don´t matter now,” she brushed it off. “Takemura didn´t see her either; we´ll have to figure her out later. What about the data from the files?”

Her head hurt.

No -

It was pounding with immense pain, and it was not getting any better. She needed an ice bath and stronger meds. f*ck…

She tapped her fingers impatiently on the metal beneath her and looked at the techie. “Anything good?” she almost snapped. “You don't execute a guy just because he gets hit by a patient.”

Her breath quickened, and she squeezed her eyes shut. She felt the waves of nausea coming, and it made her stomach turn. Full of only pills and cheap bourbon, she was ready to puke if this went wrong. She fought the urge to curl into a small ball and crawl into bed until it disappeared. It usually went away after several hours. Sandra didn't need her associates to see her in this state.

“So?” she growled impatiently. “Anything?”

She missed the look Takemura and Momoko exchanged. She was too busy fighting another wave of pain, this time accompanied by hand tremors.

f*ck, f*ck, f*ck…

The pink-haired woman frowned, rose from her chair, took a few steps toward her friend, and nodded uncertainly toward the door. "How ´bout you and Becks take a nap? You know - for her not to be alone," she suggested, gesturing to the sleeping girl on Takemura's shoulder. "Me and Mr Evil Spirit will comb through the file and let you know if we find anything. There's no need for all of us to stay awake. Divide and conquer or something..."

She laughed when Rónin rolled his eyes and shook his head in visible disgust at the address but refrained from any comment.

“It's my op,” Sandra whispered through gritted teeth. “I need - to - know…”

Takemura swiftly crossed the room, leaving behind blinking Becks, who almost lost her balance, and grabbed Sandra by her shoulder. Bowing down to her, he nearly brushed her cheek as he whispered: “You are clearly unwell; don't be ridiculous. Save face and accept what Momo offers.”

It took her almost all her willpower to look at him. She was visibly shaking when she nodded and let him help her to her feet. He had to steady her to make a first step. Next one was much easier as she wordlessly gestured to the younger girl, who joined her immediately, looking at the rest of the adults with worry in her eyes. She guided Sandra out of the room, looking back several times, face serious.

She even refrained from snarky comments, playing an obedient child well, as she walked Sandra up the stairs to the spacious loft Momoko shared with the young girl.

“Will fix you some cold water, kay?” she whispered as she helped the other woman to sit on the bed. “Just lay here, no biggie. Just - just lay here…”

Sandra looked at her back as the girl hurried across the room to the glinting kitchen corner adorned with many pink petals as the rest of the building apparently. The sickly, sweet colour made her stomach turn. She reached to her face to touch a sticky wet trickle down her lip - blood.

It was never that bad!

Sandra slowly lay down, her eyes fixed on the ceiling, which danced with the many neons from the street. With a thought command, she picked a number without ID and waited as the holo rang, the overlay flickering in her eyes just like the neon light.

Yes?

“It´s getting worse. I don´t know how long I have.”

I´m sorry.

She snickered: “So am I.”

We need to see this to the end, you and me.

“I don´t think I have enough time.”

You know what to do. I promised I´d help.

“Liar - “

Sandra smiled.

“It was never about me.”

*******
The bells of Laguna Bend still rang in her memory. She could hear them from time to time when she was lucky enough to dream good dreams.

She was floating, and in the darkness below her, the eerie glow from the flares painted the silhouettes of the sunken houses and the chapel red. The red of the Blackwall painted her surroundings, rendering every detail until she saw him next to her.

Floating.

Falling -

Are you afraid of deep water ?

She laughed at him that day at the dam. He was pacing around the bend, cig in his hand, ranting about her being stupid to go in with Judy. V laughed, mocking him.

Mighty Johnny Silverhand, a relentless fighter against the corpo-terror, is afraid of water!

The bells of Laguna Bend tolled even underwater, heralding something sinister coming.

They were floating, falling into the darkness, into the deep abyss threatening to swallow them. She reached for him, as she had many times, and there he was, palpable, warm to her touch like he had laid in the sun before.

Our unit AV was hit by a rocket over a bay. We went underwater pretty quickly. Got out, but not the rest of ´em. The comms were still on - we heard ´em drowning. Couldn't get them out without being pulled down, too…

The water tried to swallow them. V held his hand like an anchor, trying to reach the surface that wasn´t even visible in the dark. The silhouettes below them were the many spires of Night City, and the red glow was the bleeding neons on the horizon.

Yet you like the ocean.

He let go.

V opened her mouth to scream as he continued to fall, far from her reach. She could not catch him in the thick darkness, black as tar. Even though he reached for her, there was always a space between them.

Was the first thing that woke me when I holed up in Pistis Sofia. The sound of waves crashing ´gainst the shore. f*ckin´ poetic.

He smiled. There were times when Johnny did smile - a rare occasion that crept up to his face. No sarcasm, no rockerboy facade. Just a genuine smile.

Do you think you would act differently today?

He curled his hand to his chest, where the dog tags used to be, clutching her bullet necklace instead.

I think I'm much wiser now. If I had someone to lose? Yeah, no hesitation…

V woke up to the blazing light of the Californian morning, drenched in cold sweat and shivering.

“Pistis Sofia,” she mumbled, blinking into the sun to chase away the tears. If the place was still standing -
She rolled onto her side and slowly lifted herself with her arms to avoid putting unnecessary strain on her healing wounds and attracting Reed with her huffing. He watched her anyway, crouched over the map with Taco, sipping coffee and ostentatiously pretending not to watch her.

“f*ck off,” she hissed, waving her hand dismissively as both of them got up to help her. She was not fond of their hovering; in fact, she had it enough. She wasn't dying; she was healing well. They shouldn't worry about her but their route to NC.

The echoes of underwater bells still rang in her ears as she slowly got up and stretched carefully, facing the bright neons of the Night City that, even during the day, painted the clear blue sky with commercials. They were coming from SoCal through Yucca, and below them was the border and, behind it, the Biotechnica flats, so the city was still hidden in a misty haze.

Slowly, the ex-merc dragged herself to her companions, wiping the sleep from her eyes and yawning. “We crossing here?” she asked, pointing to the map, where a coffee mug had left a wet semicircle over the ridge above Rattlesnake Creek.

Reed passed her a cup and nodded.

“Waitin´ for the drone to circle back to see if the tunnel is still usable,” Taco informed her, sipping loudly, which made her wince. The bells in her head still rang aloud, and her back wound was still more sore than she´d like to admit.

She accepted the information about a drone and nodded in acknowledgement. The other two cars accompanying them were gone, heading northeast based on the tyre tracks. They were supposed to be a distraction if things went sideways, but V trusted the Nomads knew what they were doing.

“Good,” she mumbled, hugging the warm cup in her palms to warm herself. “I´ll need you to head to Pacifica once we reach the city. Here,” she bent over to point her finger in the correct neighbourhood. And before any of them even tried to protest, she continued.

“There´s an old hotel, Pistis Sofia. Fifth floor, on the far right, there´s a room with a hidden compartment.

Should have some of my old sh*t stashed if things went south. Some serious iron and eddies, in case. If no one klepped it, we might be set for some time.”

Reed straightened his spine and folded his hands over his chest.

“And you´ll be - “

“Visiting a friend,” she replied almost absentmindedly.

Putting the cup aside, she turned on her heel, heading to Taco´s Galena, which had a motorbike rack welded to the rear frame. No self-respecting Nomad would travel without secondary wheels, and Taco surely had a bike under a well-tied tarp.

“What do you think you´re doing?”

Her fingers were still cold, and she had trouble untying the knots, but she was hellbent on greeting the city alone. The weird dream left a strange aftertaste in her mouth, and she was not ready to face her old home with two overprotective gonks hovering around her like she was about to break any time soon.

The fact, she prolly was, was really not important. It was something she couldn't stop but wasn't keen on sharing publicly in front of them.

Untying the rope frantically, she overlooked Reed behind her as he slowly touched her shoulder and turned her to face him. Her hands were shaking, and it was not from being cold.

Without any word, he opened his arms, patiently waiting to see if she wanted a hug—something he had learned after she woke up from the coma. V needed to do things at her own pace, and forcing her wouldn't get them anywhere. Reluctantly, she leaned on him, fingers tucking to the leather of his jacket.

“I´m a f*cking mess, Sol,” she whispered, sniffling. “I dunno if I can do it…”

She thought she was going home, but the home she had was long gone. And she knew it—the bells of a long-forgotten chapel buried in the dam told her she was chasing an echo.

That's what the dream meant, she thought. And though she might have told herself she was okay with it, the closer they got to the city, the harder it hit.

They had no deets, backup, or solid plan, just a ghost to chase.

A face of a long-dead man and a theory of maybe a plot to start a war. A gig given by a bunch of urban legends about rogue AIs possessing people to escape from beyond Blackwall. And confirmation from half-crazed netrunner V helped to put back into actual prison run by her former employees.

If this wasn´t a f*cked up, half-cooked, gonk-ass plan, then nothing was.

“There's still time for you to turn around,” she whispered, head buried into his shoulder like a child. “I don´t wanna drag you into my sh*t.”

A sarcastic laugh emerged from Reed´s chest like distant thunder. “Too late, innit?” he asked, but his voice held no traces of ill will. He was merely stating facts. “Guess I'm with you ´till the end of the line, kiddo. I told you so, didn´t I?”

She scoffed, looking straight into his chest, because she couldn't handle looking at him or Taco, who stood still, watching the scene from afar with a worried expression.

“We have no f*ckin´ plan, Reed. Admit it, this is f*cked up. You just follow me ´cause of guilt,” she whispered, and he stiffened under her touch for a second before squeezing her tight in a hug, rocking her a little.

“You have this magnetism,” he whispered into her hair softly, pulling her away from him to look at her. “You have a gravitational field that draws people to your orbit whether you like it or not. And they want to hang out, no matter how hard you try to push them away.

Just f*ckin´ deal with it. We ain´t goin ́ nowhere.``

She smiled through the thick veil of tears that welled in her eyes. f*ck, she wasn´t going to cry in front of them. Not that Reed hasn't seen her in worse shape. But she was supposed to be the strong, leading type, no? She was supposed to save Night City somehow.

f*ck that…

Be in for you.

“f*ck that!”

She wiped her eyes and face with the sleeve of her jacket and sniffled: “I don't want you to follow me blindly, you gonks. We need to have a serious chat. Especially with you,” she pointed at Taco.

“If we´re doing it, we´re doing it together. No need-to-know basis, no secrets. Night city style - straight to the stars and beyond. Jackie´s major leagues. And not a f*cking drink in Afterlife. We´ll see it through. Party like it's 2023 if needed!”

Reed shook his head, and his lips curved into a smirk: “Pep talk? Really, V?”

The ex-merc laughed and nodded, mimicking the same grin as her partner´s. “I f*cking need to hear it, you gonk. ´tis pep talk for me, not for you two gonk-for-brains. You're lost causes, both of you. sh*tbrains… don´t you have better things to do?”

She threw her hands in the air and started laughing until her stitches hurt, and she needed to bend down and catch a breath. She needed to have her chrome restarted, stat. not only the neural processors but also her self-ICE. and all the combat chipping she had done before she went to sleep, including the painkiller distribution, stat!

Looking up, she saw Taco move around her, untying the many knots on the rope holding the tarp in one place. He took his time and methodically coiled the rope with rehearsed movements like she'd seen the Nomads do many times before.

He paused for a second, turning his head to the sky and seemingly staring into nowhere. “Looks like it's clear,” he said then, smiling. Simultaneously with him turning back to the rack, a drone appeared over the ridge. It had blazing horses on the sides, but V recognised an older Kang-Tao weaponised model. She smiled and nodded approvingly.

This earned her a playful wink from the young Nomad, who, with a slight nod, sent the drone down to the ground, settling in a cloud of dust with a quiet hum of its engine.

“If you must, I have something from Mitch; he said it belonged to you,” he continued as the tarp fell to the ground, uncovering the sleek black body of custom Nazaré ARCH with red leather seat, Valentinos emblem and menacing sugar skull on the tank.

Her hands trembled as she reverently touched the familiar quilted leather of the seat, her face switching from awe to pure surprise and back again.
“How did you? “ she looked at him in disbelief. Jackie´s ARCH was one thing she thought was lost when she left NC, the one thing she left behind and truly regretted not getting back.

Nodding to Reed wordlessly, both men took the bike down from the rack, giving it a short spin for V to admire. The body was still the same, but the exhaustion was tuned, and the bike now had four total tailpipes and detachable saddlebags.

“It was parked at the Ward guy’s trailer,” Taco shrugged. “Panam asked him to take it with her if you ever wanted it back. So you'd have to go to her, ya know.

Mitch gave it a little Nomad love, so it´s purring like a cat now. It has an improved horsepower of 185 mph and wider tyres suited for the Badlands.

Mitch thought you'd like it back now.”

She didn´t know if she wanted to hug him, kiss him, or both. She hastily crossed the distance between them and hugged him tight, kissing him on both cheeks.

“Thank you! Jackie loved the bike,” she breathed. “I thought it was gone. I thought I lost it… I - thank you.”

Taco gasped and then kicked the dust, his gaze dropping to his feet. “Eh! No biggie,” he mumbled. “We thought you might wanna return in style, ya know? Might cheer you up or—or something.”

V smirked. “f*ckin´ A!” she almost yelled. “Talk about lifting my spirits. Heh, Jackie loved the bike! Man, that's just nova!

I´ll take her for a spin, kay?

And meet you in Pacifica, alrite? I really, really need to do this alone.”

Reed sighed. There was no way to talk her out of it now. From day one, he knew about the bike and thought it was a bad idea. The bike was an admirable piece and also well known, as he found out. The merc V used to be, used to ride it through the streets of Night City. It was her signature ride. So much for any kind of secrecy.

“You know you´ll need to hide it, right?” he asked, trying to maintain a casual tone—a feat he might have failed to achieve seeing her practically beaming with joy. “FIA 101—do not draw attention. Blend in.”

She gave him an almost hurt look and smacked her lips disapprovingly: “No one's gonna remember me, Reed. There was no blaze of glory, no nothing. I just whooshed and fizzled like a stale drink. To most, I am either dead or decommissioned!”

Leaning against the bike, Reed shook his head again, then waved his hand dismissively.

"All right, whatever! I'll meet you at Pistis Sofia in T-4 hours. Taco and I have some stops to make, too."

V nodded. “I´ll be fine, Reed. Stop worrying,” she tried to console him, patting him on the shoulder.

He just scoffed. “And lose the jacket, kid. We don't need that kind of attention either.”
She flipped him a finger in a flamboyant manner, to which he waved his hand in defeat and turned to leave.

He could only hope she´d crumble somewhere in a hole and then remake herself back to at least a vague shape of what she was before they'd left Night City. She was a mess, and yes, they needed to sit down and talk.

Having her under surveillance in the office was one thing. He knew when she was down; he knew when she skipped the prescribed meds. He woke up from nightmares with her. Reed promised to help her and this help cost both of them someone dear. But he couldn't hold her together when she was constantly falling apart at the seams.

Her behaviour was erratic, and she needed f*cking therapy, not a field trip down memory lane and straight back to the city that cost her all she loved.

Well, incorrect, Sol. That was NUSA and you per proxy…

He heard the engine revving as she circled the makeshift camp and bolted in the cloud of dust, the red Oni on the back of her old jacked glaring menacingly at him.

Taco watched her leave before joining him with an uneasy smile. “I packed her a double-barrel to the saddle in case. Where do you think she's going?” he asked.

Reed stopped and looked to the horizon, where the Night City loomed like a warning finger, its many skyscrapers casting shadows where death thrived.

“Probably to visit the dead.”

*******

Momoko almost fell asleep. It was around seven in the morning, and she folded

herself into her chair, mindlessly running the programs she had at hand to clear the video, but to no avail. She even went dark for an hour to meet up with some of her old netrunnin´ pals to discuss her possibilities, leaving out as many details as possible.

And, of course, they were dying with curiosity to know what she´d been up to, old gossiping hags as they were. Not much poking around the NET and fun in town since Millitech came rollin´ and took their rightful place in the sun instead of Arasaka.

Though there´s been a rumour runnin´ around about a high-tech carrier drifting agonisingly slowly into the Del Coronado Bay like it was a Fourth of July parade float. She had her mind elsewhere but had one demon running to gather viable info about that. The last one who sailed straight to the NC bay was the old man Arasaka - and given their new acquaintance and his history with the God Emperor of the Japanese corporations, she thought it might be wise to be informed.

Her family has a beef of their own, which she should have carried like an oath written in blood, but she couldn't care less about her absent father, who worked himself to death, or her mother, who had no better idea than to sell her for a measly sum to get her much-needed fix. Nor did she care for the past glory of her family name, of which she was the last bearer.

Right now, all she cared about - stubbornly - was that f*cking woman in the CCTV recording, which remained a mystery.

Momoko even tried to check the CCTV cameras in the building, to which she still had access thanks to Takemura´s well-planted bug, but it was all the same. She had to do a dive to get into the correct data stream while the Rónin was away, and now she shivered in her faux-silk kimono, her head falling to her chest, heavy with fatigue from their endeavours. She didn't bother to suit up; she preferred the ice bath naked, as she'd been taught back in Japan. Strengthens the spirit and mind-
- or some sh*t like that.

She had her perfect netrunner´s nest with a top-tier chair, but she still deep-dived, submerged in a bathtub full of ice and freezing water.

Old habits never die.

As her head rolled on her chest, her body sliding into a more comfortable position and letting her drift into sleep, the door behind her opened with a damped hiss, bringing into the room a breath of fresh air - as fresh as could be in the early NC morning.

Through sleep-clouded eyes, she saw a silhouette moving silently across the room, two cups of steaming hot liquid in their hands. She deduced that one was meant for her - well, based on the blurry, silent silhouette drawing closer to her and leaving the cup on her table. She turned to one side, giving him a coy smile.

“Look at you being all softy and sh*t,” she mumbled, yawning and stretching, which left much of her cleavage exposed as the fabric of the kimono shifted and was left open.

“I brought tea,” he stated simply, pausing before he turned to her with an impassive expression. “I didn't mean to wake you; I apologise.”

The techie giggled. “ Is okay, Takemura,” she chirped—and yawned again. Squirming in her chair to find a more comfortable position, she left more and more of her inked skin exposed—much to Takemura´s not-so-great delight.

He sipped his tea, crossed the room to grab the purple blanket Becks left behind and tossed it over her. It made her laugh. Her voice loud and crystal clear; she pulled the blanket off her head, shaking it in disbelief.

“Oh, come on! Stop playin´ such a saint!” Momoko teased. “Everybody in this city likes to watch. Them peeps outside are just not scared to admit that.”

There was a lot to watch; he would be a fool not to notice. However, he had other things on his mind, and one semi-naked woman wasn´t enough of a distraction to sweep him off his feet. He was too old and disciplined for that.

The blanket was for her sake, not his idea of fake modesty she was supposed to exercise. He simply showed her how he valued her and was above the mundane ogling of a beautiful woman.

Once her laughter died, he grabbed one of many tablets and returned to his previous spot on the counter, scrolling through the quite sizeable file the late Doctor Youngblood had on the Foster guy.

There were dates, descriptions of episodes, nightmares, and hallucinations, both visual and auditory. Kai Foster was supposed to recover from a severe brain trauma caused by a horrible car accident; however, the file indicated an extreme case of DID, which Doctor Youngblood attributed to the traumatic experience and stress of a near-death experience.

Foster was heavily medicated from day one, using an unhealthy variety of antidepressants, anti-anxietics and antipsychotics mixed with cognitive behavioural therapy and artificially regulated hormone levels through a corporate bioimplant.

There was heavy substance abuse during the episodes, and another persona emerged from time to time that claimed he was in an incorrect body and was not Kai Foster.

Apart from that, another identity seemed to live within Kai Foster - as he usually hallucinated her after his episodes.

He called her Red, for lack of better terms. She spoke directly to him, convincing him something was wrong with him. Yet she never took over his body as the other identity did from time to time.

From the brief description of the woman given to Doctor Youngblood, a picture emerged in Takemura´s mind. That of a girl he saw crawling from underneath debris, clawing her way through the mud the same way as she did carve her path through the city later.

“Can you pull out the Valerie Blackford file,” he asked without looking up, frowning. “Bring up the photos, please. And run this portion of the text through sketching AI.”

He highlighted a column, sending it to her computer with a swipe of a finger, repeatedly stretching the cyber fingers of his other hand nervously like they were sore or stiff. He heard a barely audible irregularity in one of the servos, probably caused by how he used his cyberarm to break the fall.

Momoko narrowed her eyes and turned around in her chair to face him. “We´ve been looking into it for hours now,” she sighed. “We got some behavioural patterns, possible spots to get him if needed, heck; we even have his favourite ´ganic coffee shop. Where he goes if he wants to relax -

What more do you think we´ll find?”

The Rónin looked up to her and frowned some more.

“What do you know about this op anyway?” he asked, dodging her question, as he slouched, elbows nested on his knees in a relatively relaxed position. It was very out of character for him.

Momoko reached for her now lukewarm tea and sipped a little, letting the strong taste of organic green tea leaves unfurl on her tongue. It was all artificially made. There were no tea plantations anywhere in the world that produced regular organic tea anymore. It was all grown in a greenhouse with BIO and Organic labels, stamped with the quality mark of a company that was just a name, bought by a corporation to make the most of it. But it was still good tea.

Tolerable, as Takemura said.

But Takemura was bitching about the quality of a lot of things in Night City, and deep down in her soul, Momoko understood that. Made her almost view him as a human being, not the ghastly assassin they said he was.

A decent person, even though he tried to hide it.

And patient, as he was waiting, gaze fixed on her, almost not blinking.

“You creepy,” she murmured, hidden behind her mug. The only reaction was a raised eyebrow and a shrug. Momoko caved in pretty quickly. She wasn't going to dodge his questions forever or lie even. He was a good judge of character and she wasn't a very good liar.

She pulled up the file he asked for, data popping on a screen behind her, accompanied by a mugshot of a very young and pretty beaten woman with a split lip and a black eye. She was sporting a grey jacket, a tattered crop top and an asymmetrical cut in colour resembling her hair.

“So, this is your miss Valerie Blackford,” she sighed dramatically, returning the same intent gaze. “Twenty-five of age, a pretty big name around the mercs, solos and the other fun bunch. The rumour goes she dead as dust, some hope for it, some dream of it, nobody knows if it's true. She was on her way to becoming a legend, but she just vanished into thin air one day, leaving behind a pretty big commotion and,” she gestured to Takemura, “some sour faces that were desperately looking for her.”

As the photo changed to another static shot from a CCTV, Takemura shifted to a more comfortable position. Now, he relaxed his back against the wall with one foot on the counter, leaning on his knee, watching the techie as her eyes moved ever so slightly as she was fed the data directly from the computer.

“Father was a cop, KIA, mother unknown. Kid grew up on the street in Heywood. No living relatives, as far as I know.”

Takemura raised an eyebrow. “Is this going anywhere, or are you stalling?”

With the grace of a dancer, she raised a hand and stopped him with a gesture. “Of course, I'm getting´ there,” she smiled. “I´m just giving you the deets we have. Am pretty sure you can fill in the blanks, amirite?”

He cleared his throat and growled, which she took as his instruction to continue. “She was mostly taken care of by the community, namely one Padre Sebastian Ibarra. She was in and out of public school with petty crimes to her name. Apparently, she lived for some time from her father's pension before the money ran dry.

Left NC in 2074 for Atlanta to get a better life and returned in 2077 with a bang. Rumour has it she was the one who pulled off a heist in Konpeki Plaza with her partner Jackie Welles, who died shortly after.

And was shot by her fixer, one Dexter deShawn. Which is where you come to the picture, right? I´ve connected the dots because the rumour mill in Afterlife spews unbelievable stories of how she was shot dead and reviewed by Arasaka tech. And how she worked with some top-tier ´saka ninja, trying to investigate the murder of Saburo Arasaka.
´twas you, right? The ´saka ninja? Whatever she klepped from ´saka made her a number one target and also the most requested merc in NC. She did over a hundred jobs in less than a year, which skyrocketed her into the big leagues and made her the most sought-after name.

And here I´m thinking that something went south, right? Because in 2077, she disappeared, and that´s leaving you in NC empty-handed and with a hefty bounty on your head for not one murdered Arasaka family member, but two.”

Takemura nodded approvingly and ran a hand through his hair. “And where do you come into the picture? Because Sandra,” he gestured into the ceiling, “ is at the beginning of this story, as one of V´s first gigs in Night City, and also the one big breakthrough that made deShawn contact her because of the Konpeki Plaza.”

Momoko lit up with a bright smile. “Oh, you are good,” she stated with admiration. “Did your homework, I see. Great!

So I don´t need to explain how Sandra fits into this whole shebang, right?”

He shrugged. “I assume she has a personal connection to V. A life debt to pay,” he mused. “That's what makes her good for the middle-man role.”

In her chair, Momoko flinched, and the former bodyguard smiled. “Thank you,” he said and bowed, earning him a pen to the back of the head and another juicy Japanese curse she so much loved.

“How did you know?”

Takemura straightened and intertwined his fingers before him. “I wasn't sure,” the Rónin admitted. “Till now. But this isn't something Mis Dorsett would pull off by herself. So - do you know who we are working for?”

She jumped from her seat, leaving the purple blanket behind her, and hastily crossed the room to the AC wall holding her server's cooling units. She fished a small silvery box from within the many wires and simply set it in the middle of them. The low vibration inside the box made him tilt his head to one side. He touched his ear and looked at her quizzically.

“Should be fine, I´m just paranoid,” she replied. “And no, I dunno who the boss is.” She shrugged and settled back down, this time tugging on her kimono to cover herself at least a little. “Sandra came to me, asking for help. A fine sum of eddies to entice me, and I was in. Helps she's a long-time choom of mine. We go way back.”

He nodded, and it seemed like he was happy with her answers. She was no liar, and her replies were honest, as far as he could tell. It was a fresh experience from all the secrecy and need-to-know basis during his service to Wakako-sama. Or Arasaka.

“About your tattoos…” He paused awkwardly, and Momoko started to laugh.

“Heh, I knew you´d ask,” she practically jumped in her seat, grinning. “Okay. Waddya wanna know, Spirit-guy?”

“Any affiliation?”

“Recent?” She peeked under her kimono like the dragons could give her any answers and shook her head. “Hell nah! I used to hang out with the wrong crowd back home. Got me places. Got me into trouble.

My lame-ass father worked himself to death; my mother first took a loan in my name to maintain her comfortable life, then sold me to the Dragons to work it off.

Was ridin´ Net for them for some time, met Sandra that way.”

Her face was bright with her smile like she was telling an extremely funny anecdote, but her eyes turned cold. Takemura suddenly saw a different woman sitting in her place; one well-acquainted with the manners of the Japanese mob and its customs. And she wanted none of that in her life.

Even here, she still embraced her heritage but shaped it to her liking, leaving behind the customs that bound her.

“Got into bad sh*t with ´em. But she helped me back on my feet, and helped me get smuggled to NC. You see, when I met her online, she was a stuck-up corpo bitch, then she went missin´ for some time and emerged one cold, fearless chick. Guess it has somethin´ to do with that Miss V here.”

She narrowed her eyes and sized him up like he was a young boy and shook her head: “Funny thing this -

I did some extra research, too, and she had her fingers in so many things here, not only the gigs, y´know? One would think she'd have an army of allies waitin´. I guess it never changes - once you outlive your use, you're an expendable piece o´ meat.”

“What do you mean?”

Momoko shrugged and crossed her legs at the knees like a schoolgirl, pursing her lips while she mimicked tough thinking.

“I dunno,” she said finally. But I guess that's what we´re doing here: building her a new crew and doing a recon on a guy who, for some reason, might be important enough for her to return to NC. He's what, her old input? Guy, she'd like to kick in the nuts?”

Takemura mulled over his reply for a while. He had as much information as her, maybe less than her. And he couldn´t be sure that what he saw back in the apartment - might have been a figment of his imagination. He might have been only concluding, but over a few months of working with V, he noticed her behavioural changes when Johnny manifested himself. He did his research once he found out she'd been living with his engram in her head and found a picture of the rather unpleasant, selfish character Silverhand used to be back in the 2020s.

Of course, he knew that Silverhand was some sort of boogeyman for Araska employees, making him the sole conductor of the bombing in 2023. What he learned from different sources was scarce at best, untrustworthy, and borderline fabled.

For V, he was a living passenger in her brain, and somehow, the only one who not only shared her fate and thus understood her but also the only one she fully trusted. He witnessed her having entire conversations with him, sometimes making her shout into a blank space like a madwoman. Yet, in the end, when she was coughing blood and gasping for air, she always had his name on her lips.

When she was sick…

“Pull the medical record, please,” he blurted at once, startling her. He was on his feet in a blink of an eye, another one, and he was gripping her chair, leaning over her to reach the computer interface. She slapped his arm and threatened him with her finger as the screen in front of them unrolled Kai Foster's individual medical records on her command.

“What are we looking for,” she asked, looking up at him.

“V was dying. She had a malfunctioning Relic slotted with an active engram of Johnny Silverhand,” he explained, scrolling through the pages, eyes darting from line to line.

She gasped: “That immortality at your hands, Relic sh*t? And how was an active engram of a f*ckin´ terrorist co-existing in her brain with her? Her neurosynapses must have been fried!”

He only nodded, scrolling furiously. “It´s a long story,” he replied. “But after she disappeared, we thought the Relic killed her. She contacted me a year ago,” he explained, “wanting to apologise - I caught a whiff of her when she returned to NC and left her a message. I wasn't keen on hearing her story or giving her any absolution.”

His eyes darted from one page to another as the data switched on the monitor, showing medication prescriptions and details of the dosage. Takemura stopped and stared at the list briefly before pointing at one name amongst many.

“Can you tell me what this is?” he glanced at her.

Her fingers ran over the backlit transparent keyboard while the monitor to her left lit up with several windows popping up ads for medications, Real water™, and adult cyber toys. Takemura nervously paced up and down beside her, stretching his cyber fingers repeatedly. It took less than a minute before the results popped up with a victorious chime.

Momoko glanced over at him and shrugged: “Some pretty heavy omega-blockers. Why is he taking that?”

He laughed and closed his eyes for a second.

“Because he is a personality construct,” Takemura declared triumphantly.

Momoko turned to face him, looking quizzically at best. “He's a what?” she asked.

“He is a personality construct,” he repeated. “Not a Johnny Silverhand lookalike, but his engram uploaded to - my best guess would be a flash clone. Listen - “

He stopped pacing and pointed to the monitor, bringing up the mugshot of V and one of the surveillance cam stills of Kai Foster. “He talks about a woman he calls Red in the med file. The doctor thought she might be another of his personalities.

She is not. She is a memory of V that's somehow still trying to manifest.

And they are feeding him omega-blockers to stop his memories, his real personality from emerging back from - “

“ - whatever state he is,” Momoko interrupted him, wide-eyed. “It's not DID, but overlapping personalities or a coding of some sort. That´s why he thinks he's in a different body?”

Takemura nodded.

Looking at the pictures, Momoko tilted her head, biting the knuckle on her right hand, thinking. There were rumours - no - scary stories - about the Soulkiller technology on the Net. The big bad sh*t Arasaka klepped from one of the most talented Netrunners of the 2010s. Those who did dive beyond Blackwall talked about souls caught on the chips, tortured forever in the state of never really dying nor living.

The immortality Arasaka promised with the Secure Your Soul project could have quickly turned into an eternity of imprisonment.

She looked up, scanning Takemura´s face, as he smiled almost from ear to ear, and his contentment was practically infectious. If she were a bit more of a bitch, she would take a screen of him and then harass him endlessly with his oh-so-happy face! But she decided not to - for the sake of civility between them.

“How did you know?”

He ran his hands over his face and then through his hair, stifling a mighty yawn.

“V told me Johnny was gone,” he shrugged. “Not that I cared then; I was angry with her. She said they somehow extracted him from her, and it took a toll on her body. But she was finally free of the pills.

She said it as a joke, and it - erm - stuck with me.”

Momoko gave him another puzzled look.

“She used to take the omega-blockers to hold the Silverhand construct at bay. Once she didn´t, he took over.

And that man, over there,” he pointed at the well-groomed corporate employer in his Millitech uniform and hair in a bun not so different from his, “he saw me yesterday when my camo switched off. He saw me, recognised me, and called me a ´saka dog.'

He laughed bitterly, and it almost sounded like a bark.

“And I remembered him speaking with V´s voice. With the malice and hatred of someone long dead. I´m sure of it.

This IS Johnny Silverhand.

And whatever is happening, he is the reason V is coming back.”

Momoko sighed and covered her face with her palms briefly. Then she sighed again and rolled her eyes.

"Just what we needed," she grinned wryly. “A f*ckin´ star-crossed lovers reunion in f*ckin´ cyberspace.´ amid some spy sh*t drama. Kuso !”

She rose from her chair, passed him, and headed to the small cabinet she had hidden in the back of the room. It was usually full of sweets she had hidden from Becks, but lately, she had filled it with booze.

“I need a drink. You need a drink?” she yelled, swinging one bottle of gin above her head.

He shook his head in reply, taking her place in the chair and running a data mining program on the city CCTVs - or at least he tried. Momoko swallowed a snide remark about his ass in her chair and took a swig from the bottle.

It all sounded like a plot from an old spy thriller BD or worse. It sounded like utter nonsense, when said out loud. She took another big sip, letting the warmth seep into her pores and spreading into her limbs. It tasted horrible. She had moonshine tasting better than this sh*t.

She looked at the label and scoffed; that was no ROMVLVS; that was fake AF.

“ Kuso! ” she mumbled and less than graciously stumbled to where her companion sat. It was horrendous, but it had a kick.

She leaned on his shoulder, offering the bottle again. He refused again, and she took another big gulp with a shudder, making a sour grimace. It really tasted awful!

“Whaddya do,” she asked sheepishly, casually leaning against his shoulder like furniture. He hissed in pain, and Momoko raised her arms in horror; her total weight rested on his chafed skin.

“ Hontou ni gomen nasai,” she mumbled awkwardly and gently patted him on the shoulder. Setting the bottle aside, she leaned beside him and asked again: “Whaddya doin´? Tasuke ga hitsuyō? ”

Takemura smiled. “Can you program a demon to search for V´s face if she appears in the feed? So we know when she arrives?”

She blushed under his gaze and nodded fervently.

“Can - You´re sittin´ in my chair-”

The Rónin stood up, offering her the seat with a deep bow and a hidden smile. This was a stepping stone in this precarious business he couldn't and wouldn't escape.

There was an open road in front of him that led from his old cage to freedom of his own choosing.
He would be stupid not to take it.

*******

Did ya miss me? Judging by the way the boards lit up, I'd say you couldn't live without me. You make me feel so desirable, NC. So many callers, so little time. If you don't get through to me, don't let it break your heart; I'm here each and every a.m. So keep dialling those magic numbers; maybe you'll be lucky!

Or just keep screaming to the void, NC, and maybe someone will notice you!

This has been your Foxxy Voxxy, and we´re playing only the best tunes only on 92.9 NIGHT FM!

Some things will never change, no matter what. The radio station that pops up first when you get to the signal range around Night City will forever be 92.2 NIGHT FM. It will always play the song you just needed, thanks to that finely attuned algorithm that reacts to your shared biomon data.

Some things will never change - even in the early morning, the highway leading to the city will be filled with cars, as the less fortunate living in Badlands drive to the city to earn some scratch in the fuming factories huddling in the outskirts like poisonous fungi growing on filth and corpses they produce. Yet people will still come to earn the eddies and hope for filtered water, some semblance of insurance, a little less than a bit of dignity, and maybe - maybe protection of the corporate behemoth they work for. They find themselves as expendable as any other poor soul on the job, but hey - at least they tried, right?

A neverending line of cars in and out in the morning traffic jam like a string of colourful beads adorns the many highways of the utopian city of equality, more like a strangulation groove on the neck of those who never left.

Never tried.

Or returned -

Some things will never change -

Night City will always beckon, and people will return, welcomed by the many unfinished Megabuildings towering over Dogtown on the horizon when the city panorama drowns in a haze. The aerial ads of the light towers are more like a mirage, and the howling of the AV motors in the distance is much more reminiscent of the surf than the actual deafening sound of the machinery.

It was like coming home after the war - your memory knew all the lanes, streets, nooks and shady corners, but they weren´t really there.

From up close many of the buildings were covered in scaffolding, high cranes towering over them like the proverbial sword of Damocles hanging above the heads of the citizens and casting a shadow on the free city. Many of the construction sites bore the logo of Militech or the companies associated with the corporate. Dogtown was still holding on, though many of the derelict buildings seemed to be in some state of renovation, with the stadium being now devoid of the gaping hole on the side, the Black Sapphire being one of the buildings that seemed more finished than three years ago.

With the city on the left, V zigzagged between the cars streaming into town from the Badlands, weaving quickly through the morning rush hour. She went through Jackson plains, speeding. Almost like she couldn´t get fast enough to the shadow the city was casting. A hard right turn brought her onto the highway circling the city and overlooking the landfill -

-and there she stopped. Looking down at the sea of useless garbage, she pondered if this place was what held such power over her.

V had much time to think, sitting in the back of Taco´s Galena as they travelled across the states. A lot of things to dig through and maybe get off her chest. A lot of sh*t to work through and get sorted off quickly before her own inability to let the past go causes someone to lose their life.

The NC landfill was where she crawled out of her grave and started her new life.

She felt worthless after Konpeki Plaza. For some time, she made herself believe she was supposed to end there, buried in debris like a dumpster fire of a being she was then. It took her two months of heavy drinking, no sleeping and a lot of tempting fate by being in the crosshairs of many gangs of the Night City before she even mustered her courage and revisited that place.

The whole way down between the debris, she had Johnny behind her ear, nagging and bitching, but at the end - when she stood over the decomposing body of Dexter deShawn, it was him who applauded her courage. Him, who said job well done, kid.

Now f*ckin´carry on!

After seeing what was left of that motherf*cker who doublecrossed them, who shot her and buried her under rubble, she felt a sense of relief and calm. His plan B sounded as stupid as the first one, the one that had him bail on some gonks in Pacifica after he started a turf war. Mister Cool wasn´t so bright as he liked to say. All mouth, big talk, no spine.

He ended the same way she did - dead in the dumping grounds, where bodies popped up like fungus. And forgotten by all.

A cautionary tale for those who wanna play dirty, have it all and don´t think about consequences.

That night, when she returned from the junkyard, messy, drunk, and crying, she sent a message to Takemura with a plain and simple Thank you! They never spoke about it again. He was one of her lifelines then. Vic, Misty, Takemura, and Johnny.

She thought her friends and lover were one, too, grounding her, making her slow down before she faded away like a comet in one blaze of glory. She thought they were what stopped her from swallowing lead.

But she was selfish to think they were only for her. All of them have had their own sh*t they were running from and used her as a help they weren´t able to get from the world around them.

Judy grieved Evelyn too much to see she had another friend who valued her for who she was and bailed at the end. She left the city long before V ended up in a coma, leaving messages and pictures of her being happy and content with her life. Something V never would and probably never could have done if not for Reed and the sh*tty deal with NUSA. The leaving part, at least. Happiness was still too expensive for her.

Panam was too harsh in her judgement - it was ride or die with her. Nothing else. She was too impulsive and harsh and thought it was plain honesty. It was not! In her wake, she left burnt land if anyone dared to hurt her feelings and was so bold to go to deal with their own sh*t. She was too stubborn for her own good and always made up her mind before being proven wrong.

River was a walking red flag, to be honest. They were just an idea, never good together. She dreamt he was the one who saw her, knew her. But too late, she realised he, too, dreamt her. He has moulded her image as the one who saw him as a good, righteous man. He used her to make him feel better, to be able to look at himself in the mirror. And the deal was very one-way.

V laughed. She always had to have someone next to her.

The sad truth was she didn´t know how to be alone. How to stand on her own two feet. She would rather solve other people´s sh*t than her own. That´s why they needed her. Panam and her family quarrel, Judy and her freedom fighters, River and his broken home and strange ways to mend his family, and Kerry and his selfish way to adulthood and self-esteem.

Even Takemura and his road to redemption. However, she felt they did bond over their shared misfortune and Saburo Arasaka's hasty demise. For some time, V even thought they were more than just acquaintances, that they shared an unlikely friendship after all they´ve been through.

The sea of trash under her moved and crashed like waves as the garbage AVs poured more junk into the already overfilled site. It was a poor allegory for the lives lived under the shadow of the city that never remembered anyone living, cared very little for the dreams of its inhabitants, and crushed all hopes you could cultivate under the guise of the pretence of not caring at all.

Dreams were dangerous in this city—dreams of wealth, happiness, rising above one's rank, glory, and fame. The living legends had thick skin and sleepless nights and had to live with their sins of the past and their deals with the devil.

The dreamers were dead as dust!

But even the dust, if piled up, can become a mountain.

She must have read it somewhere. Or it was one of Takemura´s cookie wisdom sh*t.

Small effort does make a difference - what a bullsh*t!

They tried and tried, hustled for every scratch they could find and the major leagues came with a horrible price. It took two lives - her best friend´s and hers. From all the f*ckups of her past, losing Jackie was still the one sore spot that never seemed to heal.

All her other “meaningful” connections were void compared to their camaraderie. They were the end game; they were the chooms 4 life!

f*ck!

Mama Welles once told her that Jackie had it all planned—them living next door, being best mates, and having a family. He wanted her to be his best man once he settled down.

That f*cking, stupid idiot!

Did he ever ask her what she wanted?

And was it ever the same dream they shared? Or was she living his dream ´cause she was feeling guilty for letting him die?

Did she really knew what she wanted?

The wind that swept through the city last night turned and brought the cold from the sea. Under the steel grey sky, Night City suddenly changed its face, like an old lady turning in the crowd to be recognised as a long-lost loved one - only to find the memory faded and almost unrecognisable. And in the first drops of the heavy rain that came out of nowhere, V finally fully saw the change that happened while she was gone.

The city lacked the colourful neons that screamed advertisem*nts on every corner. The suburbs were much larger now: Rancho Coronado crept to the sides and up to the Red Peaks, and so did Charter Hill. North Oaks was bristling with luxury villas, suddenly making the quiet upper-ten neighbourhood of Night City a bit of a housing project.

Many of the scaffoldings hid the once glistening and colourful buildings that gave the city its flavour, only to be dimmed by the grey prefabricated pieces that made all the buildings look the same. Even from up close, the awful commercials in the light towers were somehow tame and muted.

The city wasn't getting a facelift or a renovation. This was a slow but steady change to a prefabricate that fitted the box, which someone can check as done.

The rain danced on the roofs of passing cars, slowly creating puddles on the road, as the weather picked up speed and force to bring the cold front and cloud the city. It was never only half-cooked here - even the weather knew that with Night City it was full throttle or go home.

V started the engine and gave the heaping debris field one good look before she vanished into the rain, the bike's tail light dancing on the drops of water with glee.

*******

The Columbarium didn´t change. It was somehow still grey and sad and an impersonal place like it used to be. V loved cemeteries, but not North Oak Columbarium - it was as cold and detached as possible. Rarely has she seen flowers or candles in the nooks, only holographic pictures, if the bereaved had any scratch to spare. Most people in Night City could barely afford to have their dead cremated, let alone spend the money to rent a mourning niche or even the more expensive service that comes with a memorial holo.

Only once a year did the grounds bloom with a splash of colours, paper flowers, and candlelit family picnics—the Dia de los Muertos, which was still held mostly and fervently by the Valentinos, who worshipped Santa Muerte and upheld the tradition tied to the Day of the Dead.

The rest of the city celebrated Halloween - mostly with even more excessive drinking, violence and over-the-top lavish parties, the higher you were in the food chain. It was also one of the days when most of the gangs honoured the ceasefire.

V did a quick calculation - the Day of the Dead was approaching fast, only in two weeks. She visited here every year with Padre when she was a kid. Tradition, he used to say. We must honour our dead and mourn the ones who were left behind.

She didn´t understand this sentiment until recently. One had to see a fair share of close ones leaving for good to understand that the living ones were the ones left behind. As she walked up the stairs to the main plateau, she passed isolated mourners who came early in the morning to greet their dead, standing under the LED umbrellas or simply in the rain, whispering unintelligible words to their loved ones. Most of the visitors, however, were huddling under the plastic roof of the bus station; some were waiting for the rain to stop in the farther corners of the place, which people rarely visited because the nooks bore old names and almost ancient dates of death.

April 2023…

She pulled her head down between her shoulders and hurriedly climbed under one of the roofs to escape the raindrops. The rain intensified as if reflecting her mood.

She wasn't surprised to discover another one next to Jackie's nook, where a plain V fluttered in the pale blue of a digital image.

Someone thought hard to come up with the memorial quote, “Loved by many and never forgotten”, and V burst out barking laughter. Oh, the irony. It was so impersonal it hurt. Not even after all she did, all whom she helped and saved, she wasn´t really seen.

The only two people who truly knew her had their names written on the walls here.

With a sardonic smirk, she slid to the floor, knees bent and head co*cked up at Jackie's name.

“Hey, Jackster,” she whispered. “Guess what - I am back.”

She reached into one pocket and fished a half-empty bottle of tequila she had klepped from Taco just for this occasion. She poured a bit on the ground next to her and then drank a hefty gulp, letting the liquid warm down her throat.

“How have you been? Hope the place up there doesn´t suck; they have good drinks and open roads! Have heard it´s a preem spot there, better than North Oaks, better than Corpo Plaza -” She sighed and shook her head; she took a big swig from the bottle and looked around with a frown. People were hurrying into town to escape the increasing rain and bad weather. The number of visitors rapidly dwindled as the rain grew heavier and steel clouds gathered over the hills.

“Listen - there´s so much I want to tell you, mi hermano. So f*ckin´ much. Should´ve visited sooner, but I was - was busy, ya know? Gigs, boxing matches, races, stuff,” she laughed. Sadly, she didn´t have the balls to come here to say her final goodbyes. Even after his death, V avoided this place like it was a toxic waste dump. It meant that it was true. The end of one life she lived.

She came to the ofrenda just because of Mama Welles and Misty. They needed each other, and V wanted them to realise it. Speaking at the altar made her almost vomit. The guilt building up in her threatened to swallow her whole, so she almost drank Pepe´s bar dry and bailed.

This was the first time she actually visited Jackie´s grave.

V marvelled at the silence that spread over the columbarium like a heavy blanket as the tequila slid down her throat. She had never noticed it before, not even when she and Padre came here to visit her father, who had a plaque with his name and badge number somewhere down on the right, while his mourning niche overlooked the green hills of North Oaks.

“Guess you´d like this spot, Jackster. People have to come through here, so it´s busy. Lotta traffic, some noise and such. You´d be bored down the hill with my pops.”

She didn´t remember him for a long time. A man not so different from Jackie - a broad-shouldered guy with a horrible sense of humour and the heart on his sleeve once he let you close. V wondered if her old man would approve of this kinship with a Heywood boy from Valentinos. But again - her pops was not so different from Jackie, and Santa Muerte once adorned his arm and Padre called him his ángel de la muerte.

“ Oh, Jackster - I´ve missed the chance, ya´ know?.” Another gulp, another thing to say. Once she started, all the words she wanted to tell him started to pour out like water from the dam. “Was headin´ up, and I f*cked it up. For a f*ckin´ president of f*ckin´ NUSA. Can you imagine? Me with a f*cking madame Prez herself!

But hey! They did f*ck me up just a little. I´m alive, rite? I´m f*ckin´ alive like they promised.”

Another sip. The rain outside intensified, and with it came a cold wind from the sea, which began to drive water under the columbarium's roofs. A crowd of people gathered around the entrance, waiting for the bus to arrive so they could quickly run through the storm and take shelter in the carriage.

A girl with a backlit transparent umbrella appeared at the entrance, looking like a shimmering surreal goldfish in the grey morning. The crowd swallowed her up and took her with them as if she were a mere mirage.

A thunderstorm broke over the city, grey clouds hanging low over the skyscrapers as the relentless rain drummed staccato on the roofs of cars and the backs of unfortunate pedestrians who hadn't had time to take shelter. V didn't mind the wind, the cold or the rain. All she had to do was turn her head a little, and she could feel the raindrops on her face covering the tears that ran freely down her cheeks like molten lead.

“I miss you, Jackie.” She left the words hanging in the air, heavy and raw like her voice that faded painfully in the sound of the raindrops.

Another sip.

“I f*ckin´ miss you, and I don´t know what to do. You just left me. I let you die, and you just left me to carry on the dream for both of us. And I f*cked up major time. I tried so hard to matter, I tried so hard to be remembered, and now look at us.”

A bitter laugh escaped her lips as she looked up to her name next to his. f*cking line like from a brochure.

Dunno what to write? Pick one from the catalogue.

That´s what she was for people around her: a punch line. And this piece of crap wasn´t even funny - it was just bland.

V raised the bottle above her head and barked: “To us, Jackie. To the dead.” With another gulp, she poured him a little again, eyeing a woman who frowned at her from across the corridor. She mouthed a WHAT? at her and then proceeded with the drink.

“To the dead,” she toasted once more before she let her hand fall heavily to her lap. “And to you, mi hermano . To you… You left me a dream, and I ruined it. I should have stopped you. Should have told you that Dex was bad news. You were so excited, and I couldn´t say no.

And look at us now!

You a pile of dust, and I´m a sad excuse for a meatbag. Beloved by many ,” she mimicked a news anchor's chirpy voice, grimacing and sniffling.

“I would have burnt this city down if it meant saving you. You were my brother! You f*cking promised we´ll take care of each other.”

Her voice broke as she began to laugh.

“You could have lived, you know? If you just left the chip slotted in the thick skull of yours. You could have lived.

It´s called survivor´s guilt, s´pose you have no idea what I´m talkin´ ´bout. Had to be told by a freakin´ psych, ya know. That I´m a piece of work - guilt and all. Should have swallowed some lead a long time ago, but was too scared to do it. There was always someone to tell me how my miserable life was too precious to waste away like that. While I was havin´ seizures, spitting and coughing blood while being hunted by literally every corpo sh*te in the city because of the f*ckin´ Relic.

So f*ckin´ precious I had to argue with myself that I don´t wanna die again. Like - finally die.”

The bottle next to her rattled as she dropped her arms along her body and slammed her head into the wall behind her. A holographic sign appeared next to her head, warning her not to destroy Night City property, and she just laughed bitterly again.

“Even if I tried, Johnny wouldn´t let me, ya know? Oh, Jackie! You would have liked him. You would have f*ckin´ loved him with that stupid sense of humour of yours and the f*ckin´ ray of sunshine attitude.”

She closed her eyes and wiped her face with the back of her hand. The rain didn't let up, and her damp hair stuck to her face like wet snakes. And it was almost futile to try to dry her cheeks or even attempt to.

The rain was a blessing that allowed her to cry freely, to weep like the La Llorona in the old song that cried a river in which she drowned. And so she cried - because she needed that. Because Jackie was the only one who could understand. She didn´t cry for the dead; they were in a better place. No. V wept for the living, for herself. Because she barely had time to figure out who she was, and she was again thrown into a game she knew nothing about.

She was no echo of a rockerboy, yet somehow, she didn´t know where he ended, and she began. She was no merc with bravado and panache; that was all Jackie. She was not an FIA agent—Reed was. She soaked up everything around her like a sponge and adapted to everyone and everything.

A free spirit of the open road, freedom fighter, lover and a family girl, Rónin´s path to redemption, a pawn in the hands of the rich and powerful, a kingmaker, judge and executioner…

She was always what people needed her to be.

And along the way, she lost her voice.

She was a fool.

On her path to - where?

She wiped her nose on the sleeve of her jacket and sniffled. Pity was not going to get her places; it would probably get her shot. Self-loathing could also wait for another time.

“And he would have loathed you,” she told him, her head shaking. “Because you were a f*ckin´ ray of sunshine, and everybody´s life was better when you were in it.

I never had a chance to tell you how I freakin´ hated it. This “can do, will do” way of life. I thought I could jump to the sky and above clouds with you. You made me feel invincible.

You were supposed to be bulletproof!”

V sighed and reached for the bottle again.

They were supposed to grow old and watch a bunch of his obnoxiously cheerful kids grow in a better place to be better people. He deserved it all. He should have it all.

Soft footsteps broke her from her reverie, and she looked up at another shimmering goldfish bathed in light from a neon umbrella.

“Is this seat taken?”

V smiled, wiping her cheeks again in a vain attempt to hide her tears. She patted the wet concrete next to her and nodded; the lump in her throat from the emotions built up in her almost prevented her from speaking.

In the eerie glow of the LED light, Misty slid next to her, her long braid wet from the rain, her lashes and cheeks adorned by droplets of water. She looked oddly serene in Jackie´s oversized jacket, old sweater, and long skirt, which reminded V mostly of fairytales and forest cottages.

Curiously, she looked at V and then at the bottle in her hands, then grabbed it and took a sip. Her face contorted as she pulled the bottle away from her mouth and swallowed. She stuck out her tongue a few times and shook it disgustedly as if that would help the aftertaste of the poor-quality alcohol in her mouth.

“It´s gross,” she paused, and V started to laugh.

“What are you doing here?” she whispered in quiet disbelief. She still didn´t touch her—too often, the people she talked to were invisible to others, and V wasn´t sure if she didn´t dream her friend.

Misty pulled her knees under her chin and hugged them with her free hand. A gesture that was painfully familiar to V because that was precisely how she'd found her sitting outside Jackie's garage.

With a shrug, the other woman replied: “Jackie told me you´d be here. And that you´ll need me. So I came.”

V silently repeated her words, eyebrows arched in disbelief.

“So I came,” Misty repeated, gesturing to her and the almost empty bottle sitting in V´s lap. “And apparently, you really need me if you drink cheap tequila with my Jackie on a wet concrete in the morning. Come on - you need to get up. He wouldn´t want you to get drunk. I think a pretty big storm heralds your arrival, don´t you think? Things are about to get interesting again. I did a reading when I woke up. There are a lot of players on the chess board. You have to be prepared.

But you always knew, how to shake up things a little.

Come on.

The city is waiting, V. “

*******

Listen, I have somethin´ ye might wanna pay a hefty sum for.

Sumthin´ nova!

Trust me!

“I´m listening.”

´ ve just seen a ghost ridin´ in the rain. Like it was 2077.

“I don´t pay for fairy tales, just hard deets.”

I know, I know. Hard deets it is. ´ve seen ya girl V ridin´ back to the NC. Like no time passed.

And ´ve been thinkin´ somebody might wanna pay for ´er a looot of scratch, amirite?

“And what sum are we talking about?”

Like 10k or whatnot? I went straight to yo, cuz yo mah man. But iz not negotiable. There´s heaps of peeps in NC willing to pay -

“- that won´t be a problem. No transfer, though. Be at the Pacifica Pier in three hours; I´ll get you your money.”

Wohooo, that what I´m talkin´ ´bout, my man! Preem! Love workin´ with ya!

“I´m buying your silence, understood?”

Ya can buy me whole for that scratch, and I will toss in my old momma!

“Silence will be enough.”