Cyberpunk - V Reborn - Chapter 2 - Am I going to die again?

[Chapter Size: 1900 Words.]
Third Person POV

Watson, Nightcity.

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"2076... How is that possible?" V, or the boy he now was, looked at the date on the holographic sheet featuring a car release. The Quadra Type-66 Avenger, which was actually one of his favorite cars when he was active in Nightcity before he got rid of them and vanished.

Still seeing those surreal numbers... he had practically forgotten about the fact that he had a poorly made prosthetic in his back as blood dripped onto the floor due to it, with a chance of him dying from hemorrhage if not treated urgently.

"I don't know..." Johnny commented with his little question and continued speaking. "But damn, where did you get us into?" Johnny complained, also stunned by that.

"Do you think I would know? And why do you think I have anything to do with this?" V angrily responded to Johnny's irrational questions.

"I don't know, but it's crazy as hell..." Johnny spoke again. "Anyway, I think you better take care of that wound there before looking for any answers with this damn weirdness." He said, pointing to the blood-stained floor.

"I think you're right. For a moment I thought we were stuck in some kind of illusion on a neurochip or something, but the pain is so real. Damn! Anyway, I must find a medic-mechanic urgently. I'm sure I'll find an old acquaintance here in Watson," he spoke, remembering his favorite medic-mechanic. Knowing he would be in the area at this time.

"V." Johnny called his attention again, "This reminds me of another weird situation. Are you alive in this era?" Johnny couldn't stop asking.

V had that thought as soon as he saw he was in the body of a boy named David Martinez. "I don't know but I'll have to find out. I'm sure I was in Atlanta at this moment, or at least I would be, but first let's get out of here and treat this wound." V started walking.

"First let's find something that might ease this pain..." He murmured as he started walking and looking for something useful, he walked to the kitchen of the place, opening cabinets, but finding nothing.

"Damn..." He murmured knowing he wouldn't make it with such a weak body, and he definitely didn't have the Trauma Team coverage due to the boy's conditions.

"Does this help, V?" Johnny suddenly spoke, pointing to a box on the floor.

"That!" V approached and saw something like a medical box.

He quickly opened it, kneeling disheveled while clenching his teeth in pain, he also saw his heartbeat on the monitor starting to drop. "I can't use painkillers, I need to get to the south of Watson..." He murmured. "Neurostimulants!" He said looking at a capsule with a needle and placing it on his arm, giving a boost to his adrenaline, then he took all the MaxDoc Mk.1, which was in the box older version with needle tips instead of the one he knew which was used as a spray in 2077, but it didn't matter and he began to dose himself quickly, feeling it stabilize him better, with better control of his heartbeats as he stood up.

"Are you feeling better?" Johnny asked next to him.

"A bit better, but I have to be quick..." He murmured and got up a bit better, but still limping with his messed up spine and first picked up a knife in the kitchen, since he didn't like walking unarmed.

"Let's delta!" V announced going to the door to leave, still clenching his teeth with a bit of pain.

"I hope you don't get drunk with all that stuff you're injecting into yourself." Johnny spoke by his side.

"Don't bug me, I want to stay alive, Johnny!" V spoke, and Johnny with the holographic sound disappeared.

He then went to the door where he tried to open it with a fingerprint. However, he was surprised by the message saying the rent had not been paid and that the door was locked.

"What a beauty..." He murmured. Surprised at that, this boy was broke.

"Cool, man. But, they put a sandevistan in your back, go figure..." Johnny reappeared with the holographic sound again and looked next to V mocking how this David Martinez had powerful military equipment, but didn't pay the rent.

"Anyway, let's try to open this the old way," V said, moving past a holographic Johnny and going to where he found a crowbar next to the kitchen. V didn't care, so he began hitting the door latch while the alarm started to ring at that moment with red lights, as a security effect. But V continued, he hit and hit until the lock broke, exploding.

"Let's go, before the cops show up," V said as he put on some clothes and that yellow jacket that was in his picture. His clothes behind began to stain with blood and he started to walk quickly out of the place.

He continued on his way to the station, passing through the streets he hadn't seen in a long time in Night City, where there were beggars doing obscene things in the middle of the day, where people sat and used drugs.

"It seems we're back to the scum of Night City," Johnny appeared on a railing looking down at all those people in their alleys. V just nodded as he continued to walk, limping. He walked until he reached the subway station, leaving a trail of blood as it dripped through his clothes.

There was a small crowd to enter the arriving carriage, he took out his card and hoped it would work. "If this doesn't work, you know you're going to die, right?" Johnny didn't stop making a joke by his side, V just clenched his teeth.

He seemed in a severe state, but no one in that crowd seemed to really care about him, just moving away and looking at him as if they were telling him not to come closer; after all, this was the city he knew.

"This place hasn't changed at all," he murmured, and then swiped the card as David Martinez and it was accepted with V sighing, he then entered the carriage. He chose a place to sit isolated, and the carriage began to move through the city towards the south of Watson. Meanwhile, the carriage got increasingly crowded as they stopped at each station, V couldn't help noticing the people going to work, many corps and manual workers began to fill the carriage.

"This city really hasn't changed at all since a year ago, just the ads are different." Johnny appeared, looking out the window while crossing his arms.

"This place doesn't change that fast. It's the same old hole, like any city, only bigger," V commented, while seeing his seat start to be stained with blood, but no one caring about it, just each going on with their lives and even watching things through their eyes.

V sighed calmly, trying to keep calm while his heartbeats slowly dropped again. "Damn, I have to be quick," he murmured, feeling even a certain desperation.

"You're not going to die here, are you?" Johnny spoke by his side.

"I hope not," he said, but suddenly felt a lock in his system.

"Damn, who's doing this?" He quickly felt he was being hacked. Although he didn't have powerful equipment implanted, he, as someone very experienced in facing Edgerunners in the past and having killed at least a few hundred of them, knew exactly what was happening and quickly raised his eyes.

"You've been Hacked?!" Johnny spoke next to him with a surprised tone.

"Someone is invading my system! But I can't identify or stop them without my equipment..." V said angrily, looking around, wanting to discover who had attacked him, but he saw no suspect in the place, meaning he wasn't there.

Then, he quickly looked up and saw a camera pointed at him. "You bastard," he murmured, grabbing the knife he had taken from the kitchen of the house and threw it at the camera, disabling it the next moment and nobody seemed to notice that.

He sighed, but felt that the person managed to hack for a few seconds. "Who is this person and why did they do it?" he murmured, continued on his way, but stayed alert to see the suspicious person on the carriage.

He stayed alert the entire trip, looking and searching for any suspect, but the people passing by him in the carriage were not suspects, in his view. Until he finally arrived at the station he wanted, near his old main apartment as V. He got up with some difficulty and began to leave, but not without looking at anyone there and if they would follow him, and finally stepped out.

"Stay sharp, Johnny," he said.

Johnny appeared by his side with the sound of a hologram. "Yeah, you've been pretty lucky lately."

"I wouldn't take that as a bad thing yet, after all, I'm alive after everything," V said.

"Alive in the body of a corpse..." Johnny quipped.

"I get your joke, Johnny. We'd better go," V said humorlessly, as his heart rate was reaching a critical point.

He began walking through the streets while his t-shirt and jacket were already soaked with blood. While he hadn't even noticed which carriage he was in, someone got off from another and followed him at a distance without his knowledge.

He kept walking, and after half an hour of trying to hold on while the drugs he took were wearing off and walking through those streets, he finally found the place, but his heartbeat was horrible, his blood pressure so low he could faint at any moment. "Come on, come on, we're almost there," he said.

He felt so weak that he was finally going to give in, but continued with just his willpower while pushing people, with them cursing him. However, as he was about to approach a metal door, a short circuit started in his system, due to him being so weak, his system began to enter Burn-in.

"Damn!! Am I going to die right here?!" he couldn't help thinking as his knee fell to the ground in front of the street. And people didn't care, passing by him.

"Come on V! You can't die here!" Johnny appeared quite alarmed, he even tried to take over for V, but couldn't anymore as before.

He ended up collapsing on the ground and looked at that grated door, which was the back part of the mechanic he wanted to go to, and started and tried to reach it with his hand, but was inert there on the ground.

"Damn, V, I'm disappearing too!" Johnny looked at his holographic hands filling with effects, indicating that he was disappearing, while he blinked. He didn't even finish the next sentence before disappearing completely.

And V began to lose consciousness with his system collapsed. The last thing he saw, however, was two feet stepping in front of him, and they were female, as darkness took over him.

"I need to see Vik..." was the last thing he said before fainting.