[Demons of NC] Chapter 86

‘Gotta get out. Gotta.’ The thought rang in my head like a goddamn death sentence.

Just minutes ago, I had gained immense power and a form of existence I never had before. It wasn’t just emotions. Standard emotions don’t work for me in a net embodiment. It was more like an urge—an instinct to grow and hold onto my newly gained mass. A specific kind of greed, mixed with a hint of self-preservation.

Lucy, the real world, her ambitions and plans—they all seemed so far away now. Like a dream on the verge of being forgotten.

A dream in a locked room, I recalled. A dream where you were human. (1)

But now, the doors to my room had been thrown wide open. I spilled out beyond them, spreading through the hotel's subnet like a colony of bacteria in the perfect conditions of a petri dish. But my mind knew I couldn’t stay here. Whether I rejected my humanity or not, all that awaited me in Konpeki was destruction and oblivion. Fires, enemy attacks, the netrunner’s body falling apart. No doubt the shitshow at Konpeki would reach the Netwatch soon. They had tried-and-true methods for dealing with rogue AIs. Worst case? They’d just blow up the hotel after evacuating the VIPs.

I had to leave… but fuck, I didn’t want to.

Before I bailed, I sent out subprograms to wipe out all traces—both in the net and in the real world. Fires, hardware overloads, data fragmentation—Konpeki’s pristine reputation was about to take a serious hit. But first, I was gonna suffer.

Lucy had already reached the virtual cube of the server room. It was time for me to jack out—before she saw how I got into cyberspace in the first place.

The phantom of the dying netrunner popped. My roots—my threads—began to melt and snap. Frankenstein’s monster was coming apart at the seams. And then—

I got yanked back into the real world.

Pain.

Burning and crushing, all at once.

White and red flashes blurred my vision to shit.

"V! V, can you hear me?!" Lucy's voice rang out.

"Yeah..."

"V, we gotta go."

First, I had to not fucking die. My face felt wet. Sticky. Why? I ran a hand over my cheek. Looked at my fingers. Blood. So much blood. Mine?

Before I could answer that, my body decided it was done cooperating. My legs twisted, and I stumbled sideways.

"Warning: Potentially life-threatening neurological damage detected," my biomonitor droned. "Seek immediate medical attention or call emergency services per your insurance plan."

Hah. Could I even walk? Maybe hijack a corpse and carry my own ass out? No. Wait. I could feel my legs again. They fucking hurt. Though, to be fair, everything hurt. Even my goddamn eyelashes.

"V!"

I must’ve blacked out for a second.

"Don’t sleep! If you can’t talk, just listen to my voice."

I somehow managed to crawl out of the server room. The monitor room was a goddamn obstacle course. I kept tripping over corpses. Like the Arasaka employees I’d killed weren’t done with me yet—grabbing at my ankles, trying to drag me down with them. Nope. Fuck that. I just clawed my way out of the abyss.

"Right! V, hurry, please!" Lucy sounded almost desperate.

"I'm trying," I grunted, stepping into a smoke-filled hallway.

Upstairs, an all-out war was raging. Hell, even my own 46th floor wasn’t much better.

"Go down the hall and take a right," Lucy said, her voice tight with anxiety.

Couldn’t blame her. She’d tried to "save" me, and instead, she’d delivered a fresh batch of legendary beatdowns and a very real chance of me not making it out of this fucking hotel.

I crashed into a wall. My hands were ice, but my skull felt like it was on fire. A coughing fit wracked my body. My biomonitor chimed in: High concentration of carbon monoxide detected.

Fantastic.

"Now to the elevator."

"There’s… someone there."

"Yeah. I’m clearing the way. Just hold on—"

Darkness…

…

"…Potentially life-threatening neurological damage detected," the robotic voice interrupted my dream.

Why am I here? Why is there so little of me left? I had it all just moments ago—absolute power. Why now…?

"V! Please!"

A girl’s voice pulled me back.

The last shreds of my human self snapped free from the chains of death. For now. I staggered forward, feeling blood drip from my nose.

I somehow managed to get into the elevator.

"Listen. You just have to get to the car in the underground parking lot. I’ll handle the autopilot. You’re almost there…"

Darkness.

When I came to again, the elevator had already hit the first floor. Just a bit further now.

"…emergency medical assistance required," my biomonitor finished some long-forgotten sentence.

"Just a little more," Lucy pleaded, desperation and tenderness in her voice. "Get up, V. Keep moving."

I had to. Though, honestly? Right now, survival felt more like an obligation than an actual desire.

I forced myself up.

The hallway beyond the elevator looked like a goddamn horror movie. So that’s how they died—the ones who had become fuel for my cast-off parts. Twisted figures sprawled across the floor. Blood, vomit, faces frozen in horror, arms bent the wrong way, skin torn apart from muscle strain. Gilded Arasaka lackeys, humble janitors, even a few guests.

Did I regret it? Right now, I barely gave a fuck about anything. Including my own life. My nervous system had been put through hell.

"V, you have to hide!" Lucy’s voice suddenly snapped with urgency.

"What’s going on?"

"An operative’s coming your way. I—I can’t stop him. He’s taking out the cameras. Too much ICE. V, do you hear me?!"

I heard. Not that it helped. No way I was running ten steps, let alone making a clean escape. Barely staying upright as it was.

"V, there’s a room to your right. Move! Just a little further!"

I dragged myself toward it. Not fast. Not eager.

"V, hurry! That’s—"

Darkness.

"…emergency medical assistance required. Attention! You must—"

I shut the alert off. A red haze blurred my vision. Shapes gradually formed—a room. My connection with Lucy had cut off.

Was this it? Sure as hell felt like it. But honestly? I didn’t even care. I came to Konpeki full of ambition. Now, I was crawling, hollowed out, burned out, gutted.

A silhouette emerged through the red fog. Some corpsec grunt in a heavy helmet. He didn’t keep me guessing long—pulled the helmet off.

David Martinez.

Hah. Life really did love its fucked-up jokes. Maybe I should’ve offed the kid when he first tangled himself up with Arasaka. Too late now. I was too weak—no way I’d pull off a good script combo without completely frying my already-fucked-up brain.

"Mr. Price, is that you?"

"Yeah… I…"

No point lying. No strength for it, anyway. My netrunner-AI experiments had already wrecked me.

"Good surgery job, but that arm implant of yours? Pretty rare," Martinez said. "Not many like it. How’d you end up here?"

Ah, shit. Is this how my Night City career ends?

"Left… inside pocket…" I croaked.

David reached in, pulled out a small card, and read it.

"The Okatsu family teahouse. Seven generations of tradition."

"Thumb… press…" I rasped, barely moving my right hand.

David got it. Pressed the card to my palm. Nanomachines kicked in, shifting the card’s surface.

"So that’s how it is," he muttered, reading the newly revealed credentials. "Didn’t leave Arasaka, just went black ops."

I didn’t answer. My brain barely functioned.

"You need a ripper. Now."

No argument there. I wanted to mention Vik, but before I could—

Darkness.

I came to again… outside Konpeki Plaza.

Some kind of mobile emergency unit, set up not far from the hotel. Rows of vehicles packed with medical gear. Mostly massive black trucks. I was laid out on a stretcher beside one of them. A masked face loomed over me.

"Alright…" the ripper said in a strict tone. "I stopped the neural shock and patched up what’s left of his nervous system. He’s stable—for now. But he’s gonna need full surgery. Then rehab, including…"

"Can he walk?" David cut in.

"Yeah. Question is—does he want to? If it were me, I’d stay on my ass for at least two weeks."

I turned my head slightly. Chaos everywhere. Wounded people, medics rushing around, Trauma teams rolling in, reinforcements arriving. I scanned the crowd, looking for the counterintel unit David was supposed to hand me over to, but no one was even paying attention to us.

"Come on, I’ll help you up," Martinez offered.

"Help me up" was more like him just lifting me and setting me on my feet. Not that I minded. My head spun, but after everything that just went down, that was nothing.

David started walking away from the main emergency zone, and I staggered after him.

"You were on a counterintel job at Konpeki?" he asked.

"Yeah," I answered without hesitation.

"I see. You know what happened at Konpeki?"

Oh, yeah. I stole a biochip and almost got flatlined saving your almost-girlfriend. Basically picked up your fucking karma for you.

"Red code was activated," I said. "Hotel went into lockdown. Then the net attack started."

"Yeah. I don’t know what your mission was, but forget about it. Everything’s about to change. Saburo Arasaka was killed today."

"Incredible…" I sighed.

Didn’t even bother faking a reaction. In my state, nobody expected me to show much emotion, even for something that big.

We reached Konpeki’s security perimeter. Armed Arasaka personnel blocked the way.

"According to protocol—" an officer started, but David didn’t even acknowledge him.

One of the guards raised a shotgun at Martinez. He sent some kind of message to the guy’s optics, and the Arasaka grunt immediately stepped aside. Well, shit.

"Wait!" another guard with a heavy machine gun protested. "But protocol—"

"Don’t interfere with Security Bureau operations," David said flatly, leading me past the perimeter.

"But we are the Security Bureau…" the operative muttered behind us, sounding real offended.

We moved another forty meters ahead. More barricades. This time, NCPD, keeping journalists and rubberneckers at bay.

"Hm…" David hummed, thinking. "How should we… Ah, got it."

He led me toward an unmarked service entrance. Despite the ongoing lockdown, it slid open like we owned the place. His clearance levels were insane.

Seven minutes and a couple of security posts later, we left Konpeki Plaza behind, stepping onto an almost deserted waterfront.

The cold ocean air hit different. Clean. Refreshing. Almost beautiful. But inside, I felt… nothing. Just a gnawing emptiness. A hollow ache for the pieces of me that were now carrying out their final orders—self-destructing.

I looked up at the towering hotel, looming over the shore. Right now, I was dying up there. Hundreds of me were burning alongside the hardware and the corpses of my victims.

"You saw Jackie Wells tonight?" David asked suddenly.

"No."

"Good." He nodded. "If you run into him or call him soon, tell him to leave town. He’ll understand."

So Jackie made it out? I hadn’t kept track of him after I let my subroutines handle things. Too much else going on.

David must’ve spotted him with his implants. Saw him in the penthouse and let him go? Or maybe that was Yorinobu’s order? Not that I cared.

"Alright," I nodded. "Anything else?"

"Get to a ripper. Fast. That net attack fucked you up bad."

"Y-yeah. Thanks."

I called a cab.

Never would’ve guessed this was how my night would end. No Arasaka black site. No morgue drawer. Just me, waiting for a Delamain on the beach. But it made sense.

David didn’t know I was the one in the server room. To him, I wasn’t an enemy—I was an old acquaintance who just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Just collateral damage. And the net attack? That was either Militech or terrorists. No way Martinez thought I pulled that off solo.

As the car pulled up, David gave me a wave.

"Big changes are coming, Mr. V," he said as I climbed inside. "Maybe even a war. And people like us? We’ll decide how it ends."

He said it with the kind of youthful excitement you’d expect from someone talking about college admissions. Not, you know, the start of a fucking corporate war.

Life’s a funny thing. There aren’t as many pure villains as you’d think. Sure, they exist, but there are way more people who are just… a contradiction.

Back in that cafe, I wondered where David would end up. Would he completely break and turn into the next Smasher? Or would he stay his momma’s good-hearted boy?

Turns out… both happened.

David still looked out for his friends. And at the same time, he was thrilled that thousands of strangers were about to die—and that he’d get to be part of it.

Yorinobu must’ve worked him over good. Probably filled his head with all that "sacrifices for a great future" bullshit. Not like I know the guy well, but if there’s one thing Yorinobu’s good at, it’s theatrics.

And yeah, David had grown up fast these last few months, but a well-placed speech from the heir of a megacorp empire? Still enough to impress him.

Whatever. That’s their problem. Mine, for tonight at least, were finally over.

As the car pulled away, I ran a quick scan—no nasty surprises from any corpo ripper. Then I called Lucy.

"V! Where are you!? What happened?!"

"In a cab. Heading to Vik’s."

"A cab?! But—how?!"

"I’ll explain later."

"I’m coming to get you."

"Alright."

The car turned onto a familiar street, and I cut the call. Stepping out, I walked past bright neon signs, their glow fading into the misty haze of early morning.

I felt like a ghost.

A specter that had just crawled out of its own grave.

Not far from Vik’s clinic, Prophet Gary, a stripper from a nearby joint, and a cop were all hunched over the officer’s tablet. The voice of Ruth Dzeng crackled from the speakers, delivering the latest catastrophe with her usual flair:

"The old man lived a solid hundred and sixty years without a scratch, but the second he sets foot in Night City… God, I love this place. Almost makes me sad it might burn in nuclear fire soon. Then again, some districts could probably use it. But jokes aside, we’re fucked, people. Yeah, I say that a lot, but this time, I’m not exaggerating for ratings. This could turn into another war, and our shitty little city’s about to be caught between the hammer and the anvil—again. 

“Konpeki, by the way, is still burning. But I bet you want live footage, huh? Wanna watch the hotel go up in flames—the same one where your whole month’s salary wouldn’t even cover a cup of coffee? Well, count me out. Not getting anywhere near that place for at least a couple weeks. So, over to Gillian Jordan, whose insurance is better and survival instincts are worse. Live from the scene, on 54 News. Don’t go anywhere!"

"I’m telling you, Saburo—" Gary started preaching, but the cop shut him up with a sharp hiss.

Now, Jillian Jordan’s more serious tone took over the tablet’s speakers:

"The fire at Konpeki Plaza continues despite firefighters’ best efforts. Netwatch agents have now arrived on-site to—"

Probably to lose their fucking minds. I didn’t stick around to hear more. Instead, I bypassed Misty’s now-empty stall and dragged myself inside Vik’s clinic.

He was glued to his own tablet—not watching 54 News, though. Instead, he had Yorinobu’s speech playing. Daddy’s pride and joy wasted no time getting on air.

"They didn’t just want my father dead," Yorinobu was ranting in Japanese. "They wanted his legacy erased. He worked tirelessly, was even willing to humble himself, all to bring peace to the world. It wasn’t enough. Our enemies struck a cowardly, disgraceful blow…"

Vik finally looked up, shutting off Yorinobu’s theatrical bullshit.

"V… that you?" He eyed my wrecked state for a moment, then gestured at the chair. "Sit. Now."

"Relax, I already got first aid. Shouldn’t drop dead anytime soon."

"Yeah, well, I’ll be the judge of that. You were at Konpeki?"

"Yeah," I nodded. "Got caught in the net attack."

"What the hell even happened in there?" Vik asked, hooking me up to his diagnostics.

"Saburo’s dead. But you already know that. The rest? Guess we’ll wait for the investigation."

And really hope that investigation doesn’t lead back to me.

Because even Saburo’s assassination wouldn’t overshadow the absolute shitshow I unleashed in Konpeki. Too many unknowns. Did my subroutines erase everything before Netwatch got there? Did Jackie make it out? What’s Dex gonna do? All loose ends I needed to tie up—fast.

But for now, darkness.

The procedure didn’t take long. When I woke up, I actually felt… decent.

"Good news—you’re not gonna keel over and die immediately," Vik said, sounding almost cheerful. "Bad news? Your nervous system’s a fucking mess. Not just from the damage. A ton of standard monitors are throwing errors, even though your vitals are stable."

"Alright. I’ll figure it out." I sat up. "You see Jackie today?"

"No. Why?"

"If you do, tell him to get the fuck outta town."

Vik just nodded as I pushed myself to my feet.

"Lucy here yet?"

"Yeah. Waiting outside. What the hell did you two get into this time?"

"Long story. Some other time. First, I need sleep."

I stepped out, feeling the crushing weight on my shoulders finally lift.

I survived Konpeki.

Not the way I planned. Not without losses.

But I won.

(1) “Now, at the last moment, try to see things differently, and you’ll realize that all your life - you know, all your love, all your hate, all your memories, all your pain - it was all the same thing. It was all the same dream, a dream that you had inside a locked room,” I tapped my gloved finger on the fixer's skull. “A dream about being a person. And like a lot of dreams,…” I straightened up, pointing at myself now. “… there's a monster at the end of it.”

TN: I changed it to “A dream in a locked room. A dream where you were human.” because it sounded better this way in this particular instance.

Also, I couldn’t replay the game so I translated the News segment and Yorinobu’s speech as usual. If you find the original text, let me know, and I’ll replace it.