Night, Watson Industrial District.
V stepped out of a building, cracking open a can of beer as she dialed Joanne Koch.
"Sent you the location. Come pick it up."
"Fuck, again? I can't even process the last batch!"
"Isn't more test material better for your research?"
"Not when you send me over five hundred Maelstrom psychos in seven days!"
"Got it."
Joanne Koch had just sighed in relief when V added:
"Starting tomorrow, I'll switch to Scavs."
"Fuck, that's not what I—"
V hung up with a chuckle.
She was in a good mood.
Partly because the abundance of test subjects would speed up the development of the nanite restorative; she wouldn't have to wait until 2077. And partly because with Maelstrom's enthusiastic cooperation, her netrunning skills had skyrocketed.
Her Intelligence had risen from 9 to 14 according to the system readout. RAM capacity increased by one, and her processing power surged. With a few more Maelstrom hideouts raided, she was confident she could push her Intelligence to 15 — the "Superhuman" tier.
Body, Intelligence, Reflexes, Cool, Technical Ability — the five attributes every self-diagnostics program used.
Each capped at 20.
3 novice, 9 expert, 15 superhuman, 20 legendary.
V had no idea who designed this system, but everyone used it.
After the Collapse of the Net, too many databases were lost behind the Blackwall, along with history itself.
A Delamain cab pulled up; V got in.
"Take me back."
"Certainly."
The vehicle glided forward, leaving the dark Watson Industrial District for the neon-soaked Corporate Plaza.
"Hey, Del."
"I'm listening."
"Raising Intelligence from 3 to 14 in one month, and going from zero netrunning skills to taking down an entire gang outpost — how would you rate that?"
Delamain paused for several seconds.
"Unprecedented… and implausible."
As expected.
V wasn't surprised.
She knew her growth rate was abnormal — especially her processing speed. Maelstrom, for all their deranged cyberware habits, weren't pushovers. They were heavily augmented and took Net defenses seriously. Yet their ICE might as well have been tissue paper to her; one second, sometimes less, was enough to crack their datamats.
Her only neural implant was the Arasaka Mk.4 Neural Interface Socket, and even that wasn't specialized for netrunning — more like a CPU providing general support. The real processing power came from her brain.
Her brain.
How the hell?
In an age where full-body chrome was normal, relying solely on biological tissue was synonymous with weakness — and for good reason.
Cracking mil-spec ICE with nothing but a meat brain was stranger than Saburo Arasaka being Black.
Was she actually gifted?
Or was it because she had "come back," and become something different?
Did removing the Relic restore her brain to some abnormal state?
What the hell was happening to her?
V sank into thought.
The cab entered Corporate Plaza — still blazing with light even at night. Megacorporate towers circled the rotary streets; inside was Memorial Park, lined with shops, bridges, and a pair of massive red-and-blue holographic koi fish lazily circling overhead — symbols of flow and the future, and memorials to the dead.
The park commemorated the victims of the nuclear blast years ago. Once a place for grief, now swallowed by consumerism.
Crowds packed the plaza every day — corp suits, NCPD officers, security contractors. Peace and prosperity were nothing but illusions built on capital; Night City had never known order.
V stared outside — and froze.
Too quiet.
No cars.
No pedestrians.
No corp suits.
No NCPD.
No security.
"Something's wrong, Del. Get us out—"
A high-caliber sniper round carrying an electrical charge slammed into the window next to her, shaking the entire cab hard enough to nearly flip it.
But the glass didn't break.
Delamain really was built different.
"Del!" V shouted, gripping the handle as the cab lurched.
"Combat mode engaged. Please remain seated, Miss V."
The cab accelerated violently, pinning V to the seat. Another shot hit the ground where they'd just been — gouging a tire-sized crater.
"Fuck — that's a Tsunami Nekomata!"
That tungsten penetrator round, boosted by electromagnetic acceleration, could punch through armor, walls — even titanium bones. A Nekomata's signature.
But the Nekomata was demanding: meticulous maintenance, constant practice to time EM charge cycles, and its destructive output meant it was tightly regulated. Mercs couldn't get one unless hired by a megacorp or government.
Abernathy?
Definitely her.
But was this personal, or did Michiko Arasaka order it?
V's eyes flashed blue as she breached the camera grid. She grouped all 342 Corporate Plaza security cams, then uploaded the daemon Target Acquisition.
A low hum — the entire surrounding view unfolded in her optic feed.
"Got you. Four o'clock, top of the tower! Del, left turn — shake him!"
A red silhouette locked onto her HUD.
"He's not getting away."
She smirked — but the silhouette vanished.
"What?!"
A second later, a massive man appeared directly in the cab's path.
"That speed… Sandevistan?!"
Before she could warn Delamain, it was too late.
The man lifted his left arm; with mechanical clicks, it split open and fired a small missile glowing red.
The glow died.
The missile launched.
BOOM.
The cab took the hit head-on, momentum halting instantly before inertia flipped the entire vehicle. It tumbled like a toy box, crashing and rolling more than a hundred meters before stopping.
V was smeared in blood — tossed like a ragdoll inside the cabin. The pain was blinding.
"I swear I'm wearing a seat belt next time!"
She tried to push herself up, but the door was ripped open. A massive hand clamped around her neck and lifted her like a chick.
The same brute.
"Fuck!" V struggled, but without access to her cyberware she was too weak.
A missile launcher arm on the left, and a Gorilla Arm on the right?!
What kind of cyberpsycho builds was this?
Maybe this wasn't Abernathy's man — maybe he was Maelstrom. Only Maelstrom mixed incompatible cyberware like this, practically begging to go cyberpsycho.
His cyberoptic glowed red.
"Target confirmed. Commencing termination."
Okay, maybe not Maelstrom — they didn't care about collateral damage.
His Gorilla Arm tightened. V's vision whitened. If not for her Reinforced Skeleton — titanium replacing her original bones — her neck would've snapped instantly.
But that wouldn't save her for long. Without functioning cyberware, her skeletal shock-absorption systems wouldn't engage. She could only rely on the metal's raw durability until fatigue set in.
So — what now?
Her eyes flicked to a parked Chevillon Thrax 388.
Middle-manager favorite: elegant, respected, armored to hell, heavy as a tank — perfect.
Eyes flashed blue: Vehicle Breach → Remote Control → Unlock Safety → Overload Engine.
The 388 roared like a beast and slammed into the brute from the side, body-checking him into the air.
"Kh—! Cough!"
Freed, V collapsed to her knees, gasping for air. She checked her signal emitter.
As expected — the entire area was jammed. No Traumateam, no comms.
A hell of an operation.
So — flee?
Her eyes drifted to the overturned Delamain cab.
No escape.
She couldn't outrun a Sandevistan on foot, and couldn't call another Delamain.
"…Heh."
V wiped the blood from her lips and stood.
"If that's the case… then come on. Show me what Abernathy's people can do."
She set a 3-minute timer in her optics.
Cars hurled toward the brute again as she breached them remotely — smashing him against a wall. He shielded his head as vehicle after vehicle slammed him, coughing blood with each hit. Finally, roaring, he grabbed the last car and flipped the entire pile aside.
He reached for one of the three weapons on his back — an Arasaka HJSH-18 Masamune assault rifle — when his vision went black.
Daemon: Reboot Optics.
At the same time, V scanned him — finding military-grade ICE and a name:
Lieutenant James Norris.
"A soldier of the NUSA? Things are getting interesting."
V had expected a blinded target to lose accuracy — but she underestimated a trained soldier.
Relying solely on memory, Norris still fired with shocking precision; bullets grazed V, one even punching into her shoulder.
But she didn't move.
She was waiting.
Waiting for her Tsumetogi Gen-V Smart SMG to finish smart-link lock.
2.5 seconds.
Enough time for Norris to fire dozens of shots.
But luck favored her — only one hit.
"Beep."
Lock complete.
She pulled the trigger. The recoil sent the barrel skyward, bullets firing upward — only to arc sharply midair and strike Norris's temple from the side.
CLANG-CLANG-CLANG.
Sparks flew. His head jerked — but no penetration.
"Subdermal Armor?" V glanced at her gun. "Damn it, Arasaka guns look pretty but hit like wet noodles."
If it were Kang Tao's QianTao QWR-16 Yu Long, the plasma rounds would've cooked him.
No point complaining. If firepower was lacking, then close the distance.
Put the barrel in his mouth — that should work.
She rushed forward, firing. Norris advanced too, trading shots.
He still couldn't hit her due to Reboot Optics, and she couldn't pierce his armor.
The gap closed.
A bullet finally drew blood from his head — but V was hit again.
Both refused to stop.
Click.
Both mags ran empty at nearly the same instant. Instinctively, both drew sidearms.
V: Arasaka HJKE-11 Yukimura smart pistol.
Norris: Militech M-10AF Lexington.
They fired.
Both emptied mags.
Both hit.
Blood splattered.
"Fuck…" V clutched her waist, half-kneeling. "Not bad, man."
Norris ripped away his ruined optic. "You too."
Then he pulled a third weapon: M2038 Tactician shotgun.
V had no third gun.
But she had daemons.
Her eyes lit blue.
Daemon: Weapon Glitch.
The Tactician exploded, shredding Norris's hands.
He grinned.
"You're too close."
Click.
His leg popped open — deploying a Mantis Blade.
V's face hardened.
Daemon: Cyberware Malfunction.
Sparks burst from the Mantis Blade.
Norris frowned — surprised she still had tricks left.
But the fight was ending.
He focused.
Sandevistan — activate.
A hum.
The world bathed in blue shift.
Time didn't slow — he accelerated.
One step.
He only needed one more step to snap her neck.
But he couldn't move.
He had lost control of his legs.
Daemon: Cripple Movement.
"The perfect counter to Sandevistan," V said. "I was waiting."
Silence.
"…How much RAM do you have left?" he asked.
"Not much." She tossed aside her blood-soaked blazer. "You? How long till your Sandevistan cools down?"
"Two minutes, six seconds."
V chuckled. "So it's useless for now."
Norris ejected his empty mag. "Then we end this with traditional firearms."
"At least it's romantic in its own way."
V picked up her Yukimura, reloading slowly.
Norris reloaded the Lexington, equally slow.
Both stared intensely.
Both dragged out the process.
Both waited for optimal condition.
V held the advantage — RAM auto-regenerated faster than Sandevistan cooldown.
A war of attrition.
Norris felt strangely at peace.
Dying in the street wasn't so bad — better than dying in a lab.
As long as his daughter received medical care, that was enough.
He calmed himself.
He needed to time his attack perfectly — drag it out, but not too long.
A delicate balance.
He was wrong.
V fired first.
Why?
She should've stalled — her advantage grew over time.
Had her RAM fully recovered?
Impossible. Humans had limits.
Unless she wasn't human…
But the warm blood staining the ground said otherwise.
So why?
Because her countdown was almost up.
Norris didn't know that — but he still fired back.
They shot simultaneously.
Bullets crossed midair.
Round after round buried into flesh.
A final bang.
One body collapsed.
"Hah… hah…" Norris panted violently.
He had won.
He had won.
He looked at V's corpse — headshot, unquestionably dead.
Good… good…
He prepared to confirm the kill — but froze.
The short-haired woman on the ground was gone.
In her place lay… his daughter.
A small girl in a dress, a black bullet hole in her forehead.
Blood bubbling out, pooling beneath her.
"Gh— gh—"
Norris made an inhuman noise.
His rational mind screamed it was fake — yet the girl spoke.
"Daddy, it hurts…"
"Daddy, why did you shoot me…?"
"Daddy." Her eyes rolled toward him, smiling eerily. "You always wanted to kill me, didn't you?"
Snap.
His sanity broke.
"Hahahahaha…"
"Yes — if I kill you, I won't have to suffer anymore. Do you know how much your meds cost? You're just like your bitch mother — a burden! A burden!"
"Kill you! Kill you both!"
"No— Jenny— don't leave me, I'll quit Glitter, don't leave me!"
"Baby, don't be scared, Daddy will make so much money! I'll fix everything!"
He laughed and cried, shifting between loving father and violent addict.
Finally, he went still.
"So I already killed Jenny and our girl myself…"
"Good… I'm free… I'm finally free…"
"Jenny, sweetheart, I'm coming."
He wandered toward Corporate Plaza like a saint — or a beast.
V watched him silently.
Then whispered, "Sorry."
She had uploaded Cyberpsychosis — but its effect differed from the usual description.
She wasn't a saint.
She could kill without blinking, but she didn't toy with emotions.
This was unlike her.
But it was too late; blaming Abernathy was enough.
For herself — and for James Norris.
V donned her Reaper Mask and disappeared into the shadows.