Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Reality: the soft patter of rain, the life-giving kiss of sunlight, the harmonious birdcall, the resonant purr of engine roars, human neighbours arguing about the mundane, and distant thunderclaps of midnight gunfire, replaced by abyssal tranquillity, with no knowing when you would find shore or see stars again. Sounded pretty much like a new advertisement presented to the board. The outside world—and everything else it might entail—no longer bore meaning. None of its problems or solutions mattered, for you were suspended in a womb of purity. But that was a fantasy.

She found herself walking down corridors with no corners. No way out, no way back, only forward. There is only the now. Removed from sense. The seclusion of isolation. All replaced by pure data.

What was sense, anyway? Sight, hearing, touch—stimuli processed by one's own sensory organs. Yes, that did make sense! Losing all five of them at once? To a human, it's inconceivable. End of the world. Death itself. Except not dying. Just there. Stationary.

She tried to remember something. Anything at this point. Who was she?

V.

Where did she come from?

Night City.

The act of remembering itself rested somewhere beyond her capabilities. Answers were spoon-fed to her, like reloading bullets into a revolver. For whose benefit? Well, for her, she imagined. Then, a spark of consciousness: why could she imagine? Her eyes opened, though they saw only blankness; her ears pricked, yet there was not a rustle of bedcovers; her fingertips remained numb. She wondered if she had gone blind, gone deaf. V panicked. Needing to inhale, to speak, to shout, but nothing came of it. How did she get to a place such as this?

Mikoshi.

In that case, without said senses, does it mean V was no considered human? Nonsense!

The tantalizing allure of cheating death, the sweet nectar of immortality. She'd been seduced by the same kind of lie which fills coffins. A forbidden chalice sought only in mythos. Immortalisation, be it biblical or historical, always came at a cost. But V wasn't King Arthur, and Mikoshi sure as hell wasn't the Holy Grail. It was nothing like she imagined. Engramming promised perfection, but perfection is such a lie. Even the finest replica of the Mona Lisa is merely pigment pretending to be the soul. How could something so abstract turn to something so suffocating? Every fibre of her code screamed imprisonment. Hubris heralded downfall, and V had plunged headfirst. She was alive, yes—if you could call it that. A perversion. A case study. They didn't see her as a person at all. Nothing more than a lab rat, wired up for innovation and shelved when the test ended.

Hollowed out, V yearned for the warm embrace of home. Her old apartment, Nibbles—the stray cat she fed and named, the aroma of a grilled synthburger. Wishing for a fucking synthmeat burger. How far had she sunk? Words failed her.

You couldn't count the number of days on your fingers; you couldn't scratch down a wall to mark a day's passing. And so, the years went by? Hard to tell. You close your eyes to sleep, but never open them back up. And, for better or worse, you don't dream either. However, she noticed… a thawing within herself? It was gradual—a spring blossom pushing through the snow.

And her mantra had been a single, quiet plea:

I wanted to live.

But sometimes, the rope frays apart. V had faced an ultimatum. Her soul or her life. Judy, Panam, and so many others. Her self-betrayal stung more than anything Arasaka could conjure up.

You abandoned them; why care now?

Frustration twisted in her—a gnawing fear crawling beneath her skin. That voice was all too familiar, even without it being spoken.

Goddammit, Vic, I—I'm scared. I chickened out. Oh God, Johnny, Misty… where are you?

Would a hand to hold make you feel better?

The sensation of having a body again returned without cause... She found herself unmoving, bracing for the routine—the inescapable interrogation, an openly cruel Arasaka experiment. Without point or purpose.

How long has it been?

Been quite a while.

A tide of guilt swelled within her. She'd traded away so much in an attempt to buy more sand for a broken hourglass. Life—no matter how meaningless—seemed all the sweeter when faced with the inevitable. Death beds were enough to turn men Christian. Hell, given proper time, she might do the same. As for leaving people who gave a shit about her behind to speculate about her fate? That was the cruellest irony. It's easy to get sidetracked by dreams never meant to come true, all because you're too weak to face the nightmare that actually did. Hindsight was 20/20, as they said. Oh, boy, did it hit like a truck when looking back.

Take Takemura, who had remained loyal out of honour, but those forced visits became infrequent, fading into rare glimpses of a familiar face. To Arasaka, her isolation was an inconvenience, a problem to be managed. Loneliness soon turned into another weapon in an evergrowing grim arsenal. The fragments of her past played on an endless, a broken loop crafted by the hands of man. She was placed in stasis, her consciousness locked in a mechanical sleep, disturbed only when they required "maintenance."

Something stirred, her breath hitched. Another cycle, another mandatory awakening, but this time she knew better. There were no friends left out there. She stayed still, resigned, bracing for the familiar runaround. Arasaka wanted something, but she couldn't guess what beyond the usual torment. The rat in a maze, dodging traps as it searched for the cheese. Yeah, not a pretty picture.

A figure appeared, almost out of reach. Face blurred past distinction.

"Hey, chica." The voice was unmistakable. Jackie's. A voice she hadn't heard in a long time, a voice she desperately needed, a voice that couldn't exist.

"Jack?" Her mind faltered. Jackie, her oldest choom. Poor dead Jackie.

"No," she said. "No-no-no. Not again!" She screamed, lunging forward.

Mantis blades erupted from her forearms, and she swung at Jackie, slicing through nothing but air. Her legs gave out, sending her sprawling across the floor. "What… where…" she stammered.

'Jackie' came to her side, reaching under her arms to ease her up. "It's alright, chica, you're safe. We made it."

"No, you didn't." V's voice trembled, her eyes filling with tears. "I couldn't—I couldn't—"

The mirage faded like a summer breeze. Her hands shot out to touch him once more, but all she could grasp was mist. It all played out like a cruel joke—a slap in the face. The voice inside her laughed, madman like. Nausea crept up.

Her body craved something solid to lean on, but there was nothing. She gasped for air, feeling her chest tighten—breathing, real breathing. For the first time in a long time, the gnawing pain, hunger, and thirst weren't plain illusions. Too real, too raw, too overwhelming, too quick. V threw up a thin, colourless liquid and coughed out her lungs. Who would've thought puking could pass up for bliss? Voices—soft and distant—cut through the pain, the bile, undeniable voices of people… humans. Pain shot through her head, like a hammer striking her skull. She grabbed at her temples, writhing on the floor in a bid to subdue sudden agony. The world spun, and she collapsed, like a puppet with no strings.

A surge of life pulsated through her veins, her heart pounding in her chest.

A heartbeat!

A light.

The realization would have sent her springing upright there and then if not for the restraints that bound her in place. Her eyelids fluttered as the real world emerged through haze. Saliva on her tongue, a scratchy throat, aching bones. An aftertaste of vomit. Ugh, that would stick. It was an indistinct space, and she tried to cry out. "Wha—" but the words evaporated into the ether. Those vocal cords were fresh as morning dew.

Paralyzed and unable able to pry her eyes open against the assaulting glare of the fluorescent lights above, she had the urge to squint—but there was nothing except a sterile, foggy room. White tiles upon white tiles. In that moment, moments returned to V, and she became trapped in them. Unable to shift from one second to the next. The overwhelming gleam near divine. Real enough to hurt. Could've stared at it until her cornea burned up.

"Help," she whimpered. It sounded like the cry of a lost child. Tears welled up, strange but joyful ones. A bittersweet reprieve, if late.

"Kto govoril?" a foreign voice queried.

"Chto?"

"Razve ty etogo ne slyshal?"

The exchange echoed in her right ear, but her vision refused to adjust. The voices were less distant than those she had been hearing. Well-nigh vivid.

Footfalls followed, edging closer. "Ah, ne nash patsiyent!" came the gruff, amused voice. "O, amerikanets?"

Could it be Russian she was hearing?

"Da-da," came the unequivocal confirmation, "eto dazhe ne paren'." The softer voice, tinged with fear, interjected.

The light dimmed as if someone had positioned themselves above her, followed by a thud against what sounded like a plastic surface. "Dazhe ne paren'? Ho-hooo, devushka!" The man let out a laugh, for an inexplicable reason. V's cheeks reddened, heating up.

"Ne bud' izvrashchentsem!" the woman rebuked him.

V was not one to remain idle in uncertainty. She mustered all her concentration to summon her mantis blades, yet nothing happened. She wasn't even able to trace her neuralware. It dawned on V how defenceless she was—a sensation so unfamiliar it made her skin crawl.

A needle jabbed her forearm. Something was administered—an antidote, a drug, or… Her vision cleared a bit more as a result, enough to offer comfort

"Ey-ey-ey, podozhdi!" the guy said, sounding pleased. V didn't share in his jubilation.

"O, net. Aleks."

But the atmosphere changed without warning.

"Ach, chto teper'?"

"On priblizhayetsya, kamera zasekla yego v koridore."

The brightness surged again, and she could hear them scramble, their voices receding.

"Chert, togda zatknis'!"

There was a flurry of movement. The lights switched off, plunging the room into eerie silence, broken only by the ticking of an analogue clock. The door banged, sharp and loud. A nasal voice barked out words—probably curses, though V couldn't tell whom they were aimed at. She focused on the ticking, a reminder she was confined no more. The knob now jostled. A grunt of effort yielded no use, followed by a defeated, summary kick against dull metal. V swallowed. "He—" her mouth was still sticky as syrup.

Still, the body stirred. Pins that held her head in place sprung free, allowing her neck to twist and turn. V had regained her motor functions, if only in her head. She arched her neck, desperate to sit up.

Lights flickered back on, dimmer this time. "Dumayesh', on zametil nas?" the woman's voice remained low.

"Nu, kak ya mogu znat'?" he said, irritation bleeding through. Something powered down, and the doors swished open. Were they going to leave her?

Brief scurrying followed: "Ladno, davay, poshli," the woman moved fast, not waiting for a reply.

V focused her eyes, prying them open. She saw a man staring back at her—bushy beard, worn clothes. He looked more like a vagabond than a doctor. Where was she? How did she get here? Her questions piled, unanswered. Her heart pounded; whilst growing impatient. She was inside a copula, her view restricted by a frost-covered window. The man began depressurizing it via an unseen panel on the side. The tiniest of text flickered by on the smart glass, which she was too fatigued to decipher. As V's sight cleared up, now making out her surroundings: a lab or an operating room. The most familiar were the stasis tubes, laid out in neat rows for others to inhabit. By her count, every second had an occupant. Were these Arasaka's? Was she still in space?

The man stared at her with a mixture of surprise and amusement, as if he had won some grand lottery. He leaned in closer, his face pressed against the glass. Proceeding to tap the copula the way one taps against an aquarium, gauging for a reaction.

"Tolya! Davay uzhe poydem."

"My ne mozhem ostavit' yeye zdes'!"

The man named Tolya opened the lid to V's enclosure. His movements were clumsy and rushed—he pulled out a knife and cut away the straps that bound her. He took her arm and examined her wrists, searching for something. As if unsatisfied, he dropped them in frustration. The skin was intact, with no trace of seams, scars, or incision marks. He worked gently, gingerly even. Sensation returned to her fingers, slow and tingling. Then he moved down her body. With a deft slice, he severed the bonds around her ankles; quite a few wires pierced underneath her skin. As they popped free, her back arched in response.

A painful groan escaped her lips. "Please—" she coughed, her throat now dry as sand. "He-he…" Words stumbled over each other, tripping on her numb tongue.

"Da. I'm helping, calm down." His English had a thick, discernible accent.

"Who—" she still tried, but her voice faltered.

Tolya silenced her with a hand gesture. "Hush, girl. We are not welcome guests here." His voice was firm, leaving no room for argument.

He turned his attention to the restraints around her torso, bashing and smashing into an adjacent panel. Looking down at her with a critical eye, she flinched as he tinkered with something beyond her view. A hum of electricity made her anxiety spike. With a final metallic clink, the last mechanical binding gave way. She attempted to sit up but slumped fast, the strength sapped from her body. Then, he detached the navel tubing, and blood outpoured as V tried to shut her eyes tight. With a piece of cloth, he staunched the wound in one practiced motion, applying strong pressure to stem flow.

One bandage later, Tolya hoisted her onto his shoulder in a fireman's carry, without warning. Her face pressed into the cloth of his coat, blood pooling in her head, her hands swinging limply against his back with every step. A part of V yearned to resist, to force herself off, to attempt to walk, to escape. She dismissed it as a foolish, prideful urge. This wasn't her world anymore, an inkling telling her it'd probably would never be.

The dizzying passage of surroundings, hallways, the chill of the outside air, the hum of a car ride—a blur too chaotic to follow. She was just so unbearably tired…

The first thing V noted was the biting cold, the darkness that swallowed her, pierced with freezing air. She didn't want to believe it. Being a victim of a good deed. A freak, impossible accident. Like winning the jackpot at a Vegas casino. Reality had taken a detour around the speed limits. Nobody—and she truly believed, nobody—was this fortunate. The state of her affairs was enough to make her panic. It could've been scavs, for all she knew! She bolted upright.

Thud.

Her forehead struck a low ceiling, sending a sharp pain through her skull. Not a dream, then, she thought. For better or worse, it was real. The raspy laughter from the front row seat suggested as much. V curled up on herself, grasping at her temples. She rubbed her eyes, feeling the familiar sting, only to vanish in seconds.

"Kha, kha, kha. Dobroye utro, devushka!" It was comforting—more so than it should have been.

Nursing the tender spot, she took a moment to adjust to her surroundings. She glanced around and realized she was in a compact cubicle—a bunk bed carved into the wall. On her left was a stand with some medicines. Down further at her feet was a ragged door with several locks. A room adjacent just before it. Were they in a hideout? A flat, maybe?

"Privet," he waved at her.

Gingerly touching her forehead, V found it feverish. Nausea rolled through her, and she squinted, trying to locate the source of the laughter. There he was. Tolya, the man from earlier. Holding a flask, sipping something, booze being a prime suspect. He waved at her with a grin mostly hidden by his bushy beard. Odd fellow, scruffy, wrapped in a dark-green coat with a fur collar, brown cargo pants with tool strappings along the legs, and tall, muddy boots. Outside, the blizzard smothered everything outside the window.

She looked down at her own attire—a grey jumpsuit marked with strange numbers and Japanese writing. Her body knew it was a mere husk, weak and frail. Heat packs were strapped around her chest, legs, and neck. Tolya loomed closer, gesturing toward her. "Heat packs," he pointed to her chest.

V took a moment to assess her situation, the urgency to move seeping in. He set a tin mug on the stool beside the medicines, eliciting a frail gasp. "Drink up, devushka. For strong health." She saw his hands were clad in thick work gloves, tearing at the seams.

The mug's contents were yellowish and odourless—far from inviting. She forced herself to whisper, "T-Tolya?"

He shook his head. "Ah, nyet. Anatoly. Tolya is short, for friends!"

He picked up a pill, broke it in half. "Take, swallow," he passed her the drug, then settled back.

Mustering up courage, V took the prescribed medicine and attempted to wash it down with a generous gulp of the mystery liquid. Immediately, the flavour hit her—like seawater, harsh and briny. She retched, stomach muscles convulsing, almost losing it—were anything to be lost—but held herself together. The aftertaste was rather mild, she conceded, as she drank up more in spite of the vile relish. Desperation drove her to drain every drop, not stopping until it was empty. All the while, she hoped it wasn't some eccentric home remedy he had concocted.

"Next to bed, mineral water. Drink if parched. Food tomorrow," Anatoly said, leaning back against a pillow and, without hesitation, drifting off to sleep.

Just like that?

V looked around the tiny room, a bare space, carpeted, with rough brick walls. Minimalism, not an attractive kind. Her whole world right now was Anatoly, his chair, the window, and this bunk. Claustrophobic, though less so than her cryo-sleep unit.

She touched the blanket which covered her, thin but warm enough. Despite her distrust of strangers, Anatoly's care assured safety, at least for the moment.. For now, she was fed, warm, and safe. Not much, but better than the but it was a damn sight better than the alternative.

A quiet sigh escaped her, drowned out by the steady rhythm of Anatoly's snoring. What was to come next? Hardly a predicament that suited her. If her strength returned, sneaking out presented itself as an option. But as things stood, V lacked even the strength to wipe a runny nose. The yellow sludge clung to the roof of her mouth. She glanced at the flask still nestled between his legs, wishing she wasn't so headstrong. Reaching beside her, she clasped around the bottle at last. Her body responded with reluctant motion, exhaustion waning. She managed to even close and open her fists. Sensation returned in tingles, and she took a long, refreshing swig of crisp water. It never tasted better, V half-hesitant to drink it in one go.

Then a thought struck her, disconcerting and persistent. Whose body was this?

She peered at her hands, trying to make out her skin tone in the dim light. It looked like a match. Her hands had seen combat; these were smoother. Trembling fingers touched her cheeks, V recognized the features as her own. But how? There was no way this was her original body. Had Arasaka repaired her? Why would they? None of it made damn sense. Even if they did, what about the injuries from her countless fights? V checked again—spotless. Prodding further, her hands gingerly explored the contours, sliding under her clothes, tracing rogue surgical scars. Still, her more... feminine features were intact. With perverse detail. Never in her life had she been this 'ganic,' knowing well from her childhood that she had been under the knife since she could talk.

The lack of implants made no sense, disconnected cognizance. V faced reality, she was a counterfeit knockoff.

Her body wouldn't stay still, mind jumping, muscles twitching, rolling over in the bunk. Mind jumping from one thought to another, sleep proved an elusive concept. Anatoly's snoring didn't help either.

Say, Anatoly his English was fluent, given his rough exterior. Or maybe she jumped to conclusions. V spotted the handle of a concealed weapon at the front of his belt. Packing heat for the rainy days. Smart. He hadn't shown malice, and his help appeared rather genuine. Was she foolish to trust him? At the outset? The answer lay apparent—never trust outright—not after NC's finest debacles. Dealing with scavs and every two-bit thug under the sun who thought they could take advantage made her wary. CEOs, presidents, and FIA agents. The world was a cesspit, no matter how low or high the ladder you climbed. Seeing as she wasn't dumped in a tub of acid, stripped naked, he was a damn miracle, all things considered.

Still, despite her misgivings, sleep found V.

Phantogram - Black Out Days

Chapter Text

V jolted awake, a gasp caught in her throat. Sturdy hands landed on her shoulders, images of the Arasaka doctors flashing in her mind, their cold claws dissecting her alive, leaving phantom touches behind. It made her heart beat louder than a stampede. Instincts from countless brawls kicked in; V grabbed an invisible dagger and thrust toward where her supposed attacker had been.

The clatter of dishes broke through the red haze. She rubbed her eyes, trying to shake off the disorientation and residual anger. By the sound of it, Anatoly was keeping busy. The blizzard from yesterday had calmed, with only scattered clouds floating across the sky. Sunlight filtered through the window, casting warmth over the snow-covered roofs, its rays tickling the bare bricks. V longed for a better view, curiosity stirring within her.

She slid her left leg out of bed first, then her right—both stiff and heavy, as if they hadn't been used in years. V braced herself against the edge of the bed, pushing up into a sitting position. Her long hair fell over her shoulders, it was bizarre, and wrong, and real. She had always kept it short, shaved on one side. Now, it almost reached her elbows.

"So far, so good," she muttered. At least her voice was clear, her thoughts coherent.

The smell of cooking reached her, reminding her how hungry she was. Anatoly, engrossed in whatever he was preparing, hadn't checked on her. V used the stool to push herself up, her muscles stretching like leather with every movement.

It wasn't graceful, far from it, but it was precious progress. She couldn't help but smile at how absurd it looked. Not long ago, she could sprint for miles, fight with bare hands, jump between buildings. This vulnerability was asinine.

V let go of the stool, standing on her own. It was shaky; her legs sturdy as jelly. But she stood, taking a deep breath. She tested a step. Then another, each taking focus, her joints aching as if she had finished a long workout. Inching forward, she aimed towards the window.

The view outside emphasized just how far she was from home. The buildings were grim and utilitarian, the kind she recognized from her brief intel tour in Vladivostok. Early Soviet-era structures, weathered and stained, with little refurbishing. Below lay a courtyard filled with slushy snow. A few children were playing, building a snowman, while an older man shoveled the sidewalk. Beyond them, a stretch of road looking like it'd lost a war. Lined with cars parked on the curb, horrible jalopies that would make a MaiMai owner blush. Above, a massive craft descended at a distance, too big to be an aerodyne.

Finally, she reached Anatoly's armchair and sank into it, grateful for the support. She stretched her aching muscles, watching Anatoly across the room. He leaned against the kitchen counter, fiddling with something in his hand, his back turned toward her.

"Okay," V exhaled. "Time to meet the neighbours."

She pushed herself to her feet, sluggish and awkward, using furniture for support along the way, yet making gradual headway. Even a small achievement made her proud.

V stumbled around the corner, almost losing her footing. The compact layout was simple, functional. The corner counter was littered with the remains of Anatoly's cooking efforts, and a small table was set with two places. V raised an eyebrow at the neat arrangement. The crystal glasses were out of price range for a humble Neo-Sov peasant. Anatoly was humming softly, absorbed in his work, unaware of her approach. The cold kitchen floor bit into her bare feet until she slipped on a pair of slippers right under her. She heaved onto the chair, reaching the table with a sense of accomplishment.

Casting about in her mind for something to say; for once, she was tongue-tied. As she took a step forward, her legs buckled under strain. She grabbed a chair and eased herself into it, the old wood creaking under her weight. Gathering her strength, she broke the silence, soft on purpose.

"Uh... how's it going?"

Startled, Anatoly pulled out an earphone and jerked towards her, eyes widening. "Vot ona!" His surprise turned to a smile.

"I was hoping you'd awake soon," he said. "You were sleeping quite soundly."

V rubbed her eyes. "Not sure if that was sleep or a coma..."

Without missing a beat, Anatoly returned his attention to the stove, manoeuvring a well-cooked fish fillet onto a waiting plate. He cast the fillet and sprinkled pepper over it before looking back at her, grinning. "Hungry, da? Nu, best food in town."

Before V could respond, he placed the plate in front of her. A kind gesture, overt. Her autopilot engaged upon the sight. The dish was served on an old, worn plate with blue flowers in a faded pattern. She reached for the cutlery. Anatoly set a glass of milk beside her, stepping back, watching as V took her first bite. She closed her eyes, savoring the tang. It was simple, but to her starved stomach, it tasted like heaven. Bite after bite, she devoured it wholesale.

Her gaze flickered back to Anatoly, humbled by his hospitality. "Thank you," she mumbled, breaking off a piece. The man took a seat, opened his flask, and gulped some down.

Between bites, she noticed he wore plain reading glasses while polishing a metal rod—the rod had intricate cut-outs, and he focused on smoothing it with sandpaper. She finished her plate before she even realized it, drinking the milk in one long gulp, her reflection briefly visible in the cloudy glass. V set the knife and fork down all neat; it must have been a few years since she munched on real fish.

Her eyes drifted around the room. "What's this place?" she asked, clearing her throat.

Anatoly looked up from his work, shifting his chair so he faced her. "You look better." With a sigh, he put the rod aside. "Good?"

"Preem. Honestly," she said, setting the mug down. "Don't remember the last time I had decent food." Let alone real food.

He waved her gratitude away. "Ah, no problem!"

In no rush, he took off his glasses. Oogling V with curious, wizened warmth—despite not looking all that old. Then again, with so many augments on the market now, the process of aging was pretty much optional. As for this guy there was no doubt. He preffered vintage to vogue.

"How do you feel?" he asked.

V took a moment before answering. Her energy had improved a tad, but it wasn't anywhere near peak performance. "Almost hungover, only without the buzz."

"Medicine—it wears off."

"Ah,"a faint chuckle slipped out. "Not sure what you used—seems excessive for a fever."

Anatoly leaned in, meeting her eyes. "Your immune system, very weak. It's not a fever, girl—your body almost gave up on you. Side effect."

That was what V had feared—the moment when the waters got muddy. She swallowed hard, gathering her courage. "A side effect of what, exactly?" she asked.

"Things did not go... well, inside," Anatoly said, as if walking on broken glass, his words not making sense all the while. Then his tone grew firmer, more intimidating. "No need to talk about specifics. You know we can help, just tell me what you remember."

V froze, her fingers digging into her palms as a thousand questions swirled in her head. But his words sparked suspicion, and memories of pain began flooding back. She wasn't ready for that—not yet. Instead, she focused on his question: What could she recall? Anything? Nothing? The issue of trust reared its ugly head; interrogation training kicked in. Good deeds unprovoked raised red flags. Her instincts were en garde, wired for deception.

"I'd rather not talk about it." V needed to choose her words. With the looming prospect of ending back in a cold cell haging above her head.

Anatoly's gaze became intense, unblinking. "Suffice to say, you've been asleep for a brief spell."

She wanted to scream, to punch something, to let out her rage—pummel a suit until sparks flew. Why?

Hard to tell.

"I don't understand," she said, emotions swelling in her chest, threatening to overflow. A semblance of control kept the deluge at bay; this wasn't the time for unsolicited fits of hysteria.

He gave a nervous laugh. "Strange as it sounds, neither do I." He leaned back, retrieving the flask from his coat and taking a strong gulp. "Opa! We have some time, and I know you must have a lot of questions, da? I'll do my best to answer."

She took a shaky breath. Best news all day. Focus—one thing at a time.

The first one spilled out before she could stop it. "Where are we?"

"Novoye Baykovo, Sovetskiy Soyuz," he said.

Unhelpful. Her face betrayed the thought, and he rushed to clarify. "East of us is the Bering Sea. South, the Kuril Islands." He stifled a laugh at her bewildered expression. "What, America hasn't conquered geography still?" His amusement was evident.

V touched her forehead—it was warm, but not feverish. "Why aren't we in Japan? I mean, I don't see you as Arasaka material."

"Outpost on Soviet territory. Or rather, a port." He put on his glasses and returned to sanding down the metal rod.

"How long was I conked out?" she asked.

Anatoly grimaced, glancing over to check on a clock above his front door. "Conked?"

"You know, in bed. How long?"

"Oh! About sixteen days," he said without hesitation. Sanding away. "You've been my patient, so to speak."

"Sixteen?!"

That was sixteen days too long. Suspicion bubbled up again, on the surface his whole operation stank to high hell. Sixteen fucking days?! It didn't sit right. She paused before asking further. "Do they come here often, corps I mean?"

"We do get some, during transit."

Her breaths deepened, hands beginning to twitch.

"What did you use to treat me?" she fired off. "Why so long?"

Anatoly shrugged, looking perplexed. "It is an exact science—I do not understand! It wasn't me, per se. Usually, people are in bed two to four days, take a week or two before they can recover. You, though, are the polar opposite."

"What other people? And who's 'we'?"

"Those who, like you, I've helped escape from what I call Cell Project." He was likely talking about Mikoshi. "Small team, small in scope."

V needed to know who she was dealing with. "Who are you?" He was no corpo—that much was obvious. He lacked their vanity and showed too much compassion.

Anatoly smiled, his usual cheer shining through. "We... what can I say, we help people." Absurd to even think about.

"You already said that," she deadpanned. "Who are you?" She felt steadier now, ready to take back initiative. If he wanted to hide things from her, she was stuck, at least for now. Best keep it neutral then, and work from the base.

"Hmmm..." Anatoly rubbed his brow, as if searching for an answer. "Comrade Anatoly Shults, just a simple fisherman," he grinned at her.

V narrowed her gaze, sensing he was hiding something more palpable beneath his affability. She needed it stripped raw—no bullshit. "Simple fishermen don't speak fluent English."

"Ho-hooo! You flatter me." He dipped his head towards her. "I learned in school some time ago, practiced during my career—though bit rusty now." She held his gaze, and he appeared to understand her silent request. "Well, ex-career," he broke eye contact.

"Go on," she urged. "I don't bite."

He gave a wry smile. "Kha, that's my line." Leaning in, he lowered his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. "I was... Analitik strategicheskoy razvedki for G-R-U. But not a field agent—desk work."

V wasn't a history buff, but anyone who paid attention knew what GRU meant in the Neo-Sov. The GRU equalled the KGB in every sense. He looked quite proud delivering the announcement.

"So, you've been in intel?" she asked.

Nodding, Anatoly stood to rinse out the plate and glass she used.

"With tricks like that, you could fish from all angles."

Soviet agencies—people from those backgrounds did not have good reputations. More often than not, they were tied to various mob outfits, thuggish in their methods, opportunistic in their reasoning. V hoped she'd found the exception, maybe he didn't fit the mould after all.

"You did say ex, right?" she pressed. "I don't need more trouble."

"Da-da. Long time ago." That slight relief was tempered by the immediate knowledge; ex-spooks weren't really ex-capable. And always packed a heavy laden agenda. Moreso, Soviet spooks didn't retire. They were 'retired.'

"Why leave?" she pressed further, hoping to figure out the catch.

Anatoly stroked his beard, eyes glazed over. "Did a lot of work, I had a full career." His gaze drifted to his flask, which he grabbed for comfort. "Made friends, then enemies..." He shrugged. "All of sudden enemies outweight friends. So, devushka, I left before they gave me permanent holiday."

"Dev-ush-ka?" V didn't know much Russian, but she could tell the term carried a hint of condescension. "Can stop calling me that. Name's V."

His smile faltered, a puzzled frown forming. "Vi—Vee?" He struggled with the pronunciation. "Huh. It is hard to say."

She met his gaze head on. "Just V. The letter."

He squinted, as if trying to decode something alien. "Curious name... Vee." The syllable hung in the air, not as natural, not quite right to the Russian.

She shrugged—about all she was willing to give on the matter.

Anatoly shook his head in mild disagreement. "No, won't work here. Sounds foreign, draws attention. We need to blend in, not stand out. How about Varvara? It fits, da?" He gestured at her. "Vee sounds exotic—too American! We don't need that kind of scrutiny. How about you tell me your real name?"

She blinked, stalled for half a second—then smirked. "Only friends get to call me by it. V, for others." She held up her chin.

Anatoly's chortle returned, warm and approving. Index finger on his the nose. "Ah-ha, a sense of humour. Khorosho!"

V found it easier to yield, despite how eager he made himself look. Anatoly was more genuine than most of the street rats she'd dealt with back home. Even as an ex-spook turned fisherman, there was something perennial about the way he carried himself—respectful, unlike any spook she'd ever met. Despite the obvious rapport building and faux camaraderie reading like it was straight from the manual, V needed to keep in the back of her mind that they played by different rules.

"I've been called worse," she conceded.

"Excellent. Very good." Shifting gears, Anatoly leaned in, not letting the thread drop. "And your former life, Varvara? What did you do?"

"I was a merc." His eyes gleamed with interest. "A good one."

"Nu, eto klass! Might be quite useful too. Any other... professions?"

"Corpo counter-intel." She kept it vague—no point tipping her whole hand yet.

His laugh rumbled from the chest. "Kha-ha, looks like I've caught a bigger fish than I realized!" V smiled back at his enthusiasm. "Analyst, grunt, or...?"

"I'd get in the dirt when needed. Had to step up the game every now and then. Ran almost a dozen ops, half n' half. The last one turned to shit the moment I left Arasaka Tower. So to speak."

"Sounds familiar," he sympathized. "Luckily, that's all in the past."

"For now, it is," V mused.

His words brought a new question to the surface. Anatoly hinted he had nothing to do with 'Saka; his careful avoidance of their role in her predicament was noticeable. V remembered that the only option for her to get a new body was if it could prove compatible enough—either that or waiting until technology made some leaps. Did old man Saburo have a change of heart, grant amnesty, and send wayward souls packing? Perish the thought. Overpopulating Mikoshi wasn't feasible; they'd just as well delete all unessential personalities. Her's being in the firing line was inviatable. To the Arasakas V was junk data the moment she helped restore the strongman. New bodies and a souvenir didn't come across like a balanced ledger. Something else was a foot, V couldn't put her finger on it. If Arasaka went to this length with any random Joe Shmoe in Mikoshi, they'd be broke in tome. Which they aren't, judging by the state of things.

V took a few shallow breaths before addressing him again. "When you pulled me out, why'd I have a body that looks exactly like my old one?"

"It does?" His brow arched, almost quizzical. "All that," he pointed at her figure, "is supposed to be new. According to the file we dug up."

"File? What file?"

"It was more like a notice." He tilted his head, his gaze fixed on the table's surface. "All subjects are assigned to their manifests. Daily trips passing through space stations, cargo satellites, black sites, and the like—lots of checkpoints, this one being our favourite blind spot." He took a small swig, swallowing it down. "I think an error in processing and registration caused your detour. You weren't on the manifest. Which is a first for me."

"You mean I got dumped here?" She frowned.

"As far as I can tell, you had no destination—like a package lost in the mail. But, with the way it worked out, that was a good thing, da?"

V gave a slow nod, still unconvinced. "And what happens to the people you help?"

He let out a hearty chuckle. "Like you, all our patsiyenty are first-timers. I re-re—reha—" Anatoly faltered, snapping his fingers in frustration as he grasped for the word. "Re-habilitate them, then we arrange for relocation. We're strict about our targets, however; I never imagined I'd have a chance to nab a stowaway."

"Must be quite a business model you have in place," V tapped the table once.

"I don't run a charity, normally. This time was a bit different," he admitted.

"So you work on commission? Got someone footing the bill?" she threw him a doubtful glance.

"Money's not involved, sailor's promise. We operate a special sort of diplomacy—make deals, arrangements. Each case is unique to our needs."

V rested her head in her hands. "And how long has it been? Since, you know..."

Anatoly shook his head, exasperation in his voice. "Hard to say," he rubbed his brow again. "Do you remember when they inducted you?"

It was difficult to recall a precise date. V's head still swam with hazy recollections. She tried hard to bring the details into sharper focus. Every image she conjured blurred at the edges; she tried not to dive too deep in a bid to stave off the anxiety. "Twenty seventy-seven, late summer," she she said, staring into nothing.

He whistled with genuine surprise. "Ooo, it's been a while then... ay, gavno." Anatoly's face twisted into a frown as he scratched his brow, disturbed by the thought. He tilted his flask in her direction, offering.

His words struck her like a hammer on an anvil. "What do you mean?" V's voice sharpened. "What do you mean 'a while'?" She already knew the worst outcome.

"V, please—"

"Don't fucking 'please' me," she gnashed her teeth hard enough to echo. "How long has it been? Spill it."

Anatoly's gaze darted from V's face, fists closed shut. Her jaw tightened—a ticking bomb ready to explode. The man relented, the words coming out as if his mouth were stuffed with ash. "If I do the math, eighty-eight years have passed. You were in stasis for almost century."

She'd missed the passing of a century. Everyone she knew was most definitely long dead, buried by an eon's passing, with no legacy or anything of worth to cling to.

Emotions poured out like sweat from pores. "No," she croaked—a tremor coursing from her toes up, through a pounding in her chest. Adrenaline spiked; V stopped noticing the pain against her inner fire, it had no weight left.

It was impossible—a cruel joke. Decades lost under a veil of ignorance. Those Arasaka bastards knew all along, and they hadn't said a fucking word. Everything she fought for—devalued, pointless. They discarded her like trash, stripped of everything: her body, her mind, and now, her world. Without a hint of remorse.

"No." A sob slipped out. She couldn't hold it in any longer, pounding her fist once—the thud was sharp, shaking the cutlery to one side.

"How did I—" her voice cracked into a whimper. "I should've known!" There it was. The kicker hitting deep down. That familiar, searing hatred and vengeance burning red hot. Being in Johnny's shoes sucked even worse.

V sank deeper into the chair, her gaze slipping away from Anatoly. She was adrift, uncertainty and dread flooding her senses like a wave of withdrawal—a hollow vacuum pulling at her consciousness.

"I cannot begin to comprehend..." His voice chased after her, just out of reach. "...what kind of horror your world has turned to..."

Anatoly's voice faded into the background as reality blurred around her. A noticeable ringing filled her ears; her head was heavy with dizzying vertigo. Guilt, anger, sorrow—it all spiralled in her mind.

She moved her numb fingers, looking down in despair. It was too late. "Worthless pieces of..." Her breaths were ragged, gasping in cold gulps. Tears burned at the corners of her eyes, nails dug into her palms leaving crescent marks, drawing blood. It all felt futile and inconsequential. How much more could they rob from her before she broke? She had worked her ass off to climb the ladder, shaved down to steel, only to find the prize a poisoned chalice. She had been their pawn; pawns get sacrificed when the queen needs to survive. The promises they made; worthless.

"Damn it all," V whimpered, collapsing in on herself. Did Takemura have any idea what she'd been through? Had she ever shared the depth of her torment? Why had she trusted Arasaka? It was the worst mistake of her life.

"Shithead corps," she hissed, teeth bared like a wounded animal. Inaudible, her last words came out high-pitched and ugly: "They're all so fucking dead. Dead!" Another fruitless bash against furniture followed.

She curled up in the chair, her face buried in her knees as suffocating sobs rocked her body. V wanted nothing more than to go back. Her left fist pounded on her thigh, leaving a mark—again, harder and harder—punishing herself for mistakes of her past self. V choked, her throat constricted, gasps turning into sputtering coughs. No matter how much she punished herself, it wasn't enough; she couldn't purge the self-loathing intoxicating her being.

Startled by an arm wrapping around her shoulder, V tensed at the touch. Lifting her head from her knees, she saw Anatoly crouching in front of her, his eyes level. Bloodshot and teary-eyed, ashamed that the only one to witness her meltdown was a complete stranger. She endured the embarrassment thrust upon him.

"V." His voice was gentle, with no trace of contempt. "It's all right. Let's take walk. Clear your head, get some air." He held out a bundle of warm clothes—a rough coat on top, matching his own. His eyes were kind, calm—like a grandfather's. She couldn't afford to fall deeper into despair. V needed to escape, to outrun the weight of the past.

She wiped her tears away with her sleeve, forcing a deep breath. "Yeah, I'd love that," she said, her voice trembled, but spoke anyway.

As she went to stand, the weight of her limbs underwent unbearable weight. He helped her to her wobbly feet, and together they made their way toward the door. Pathetic as it might be, V allowed herself a breath of relief that she didn't have to do it alone.

A recognition which hadn't come soon enough.

The cold air bit, dry and sharp enough to split lips. The snowfall was thick, and temperatures at ground level teetered on the frost point. Anatoly explained that it was because of the Okhotsk current pushing frigid, subarctic air through their winter-bound island below Kamchatka. Geography had never been V's strong suit—she'd skipped more classes than she'd bothered to attend—and she was reluctant to admit it. Yet Anatoly took it upon himself to educate the "ignorant American." To the east lay Alaska and Canada, while to the west stretched the expansive Motherland; the southern horizon cradled the lands of Nippon—in his own words. Despite knowing more than she let on, his yapping was a welcome break, although, as he stated, this year's winter was unreasonably warm.

Warm?! How could these people cope? Despite having gloves, her hands numbed in mere minutes.

Anatoly's home away from home was here, in New Baykovo—now a corporate outpost for the local workforce. He called it a "monotown," one of many scattered across the country—an old Soviet concept revived by corporations. SovOil, or rather its successor SovGen (Soviet General Energetics), ran the place. Fossil fuels weren't entirely obsolete, but they had been overtaken by newer, more efficient alternatives—hence the rebranding. Anatoly claimed it was a superficial change at best: so long as plastics, chemicals, and pharmaceuticals remained in high demand, so would the petrochemical corps.

To call this town bleak was generous. It looked like the post-apocalyptic, communist mirage the West always painted them as—drab, repetitive, and utilitarian in the most depressing way. Anatoly joked that places like this were "pickled." Soviet engineering wasn't meant to last this long; it was designed only as a transitory solution to the shortages which arose during the many conflicts, economic downturns, and other crises plaguing the country—its continued existence owed to the perpetuity of "temporary" government initiatives and a belief in a better future, a belief sold out abandoned not long after the communist old guard started kicking the bucket. It might have been just a delusion, but it still clung on.

V pulled her hood tighter and adjusted the scarf around her face, hiding from the gaze of two approaching patrol officers walking down the sidewalk—capped, with dark red trimmings and golden epaulettes on dark brown trench coats. One of them kept his gaze on her, but Anatoly remained unfazed, waving cheerfully. She braced herself as they approached.

"Zdravstvuyte, Anatoly. I kto eto s vami?" the older one greeted with a jovial grin, addressing him. An agreeable, well-groomed gentleman, while the young woman behind him stared daggers across the street.

Anatoly stepped in: "Privetstvuyu, tovarishch kapitan. Eto Varvara, na ekskursii po nashemu prekrasnomu gorodu."

"O, da. Suzdal' vryad li smozhet sopernichat' s nashimi mestami, ne tak li?" the captain enquired. "No, chesno, ne ozhidal ot vas… eto."

The second officer was distracted by whatever was displayed on her optics. The captain nudged her, giving an expression as if she'd had been caught sleeping. "Dokumenty, pozhaluysta. Poryadok yest'—poryadok."

Anatoly grumbled, his face set in a rigid frown. "Eto obyazatel'no? Eh, nu ladno."

V caught a glimpse of the captain's badge and the emblem on their uniform. SovGen didn't hesitate to place its seal of ownership even on these two; both wore some sort of regional ID on their shoulder pads, featuring a modest-sized red flag.

"Prosto zanesem v zamechaniya, i vsyo. Seichas nado byt' osmotritel'nymi."

Anatoly fished out a thin slab of plastic, reminiscent of a SIN card. "Togda izvinite yeye, i berite tol'ko moye."

"Bez dokumentov? Mozhete skazat' polnoe imya i dannye?"

What the hell were they saying? The tone was stern and reserved from both men, and V caught fragments of the conversation, trying her best to piece things together. She blanked out, too drained to care, watching their discussion from a distance until the captain nodded, looking over at V.

"No, v printsipe, prosto zapishem dlya formy. Sleduyushchiy raz eto dolzhno byt' v polnom poryadke, Anatoly."

"Spasibo, tovarishch kapitan." Anatoly held out his hand for a handshake. V picked up on the significance of the gesture—they shook firmly. With that settled, the cops turned their backs and went on their merry way. This place looked to follow far more informal rules than the anticipated state red tape—nothing that a bit of grease can't loosen, here or there.

"What was that about?" she asked the moment they were out of earshot.

"You still had police in your time, da?" He tugged on his beard, his fingers deep in the thick hairs. "You baffle them with politeness, comply with their every egotistical demand, sell them cheap cigarettes—boom, entire precinct in your back pocket."

More or less in line with the law enforcement she'd come to know and love. Across time or across nations, V figured people seldom differ. Offering this thought to Anatoly, however, made him scoff.

The streets were wide but scarce. In times when it mattered, countries with no shortage of space and resources were quite generous with urban planning. But, as Anatoly said, SovGen kept the lights on with the bare minimum. Pavements, roads, and previous generations of infrastructure remained unloved. Logistics were limited to the small port authority—either by air lift or by sea route. Cars were for the poor, so why bother?

V tried to keep pace with the fit guy, lagging behind per usual as her legs grew weary. A particularly brutal gust sent her stumbling—only saved from the rock-hard curb by Anatoly's quick reflexes. It infuriated V's self-reliant sensibilities to be coddled in this manner. She wasn't an invalid—not in her mind—despite the fact her shortness of breath betrayed a different reality. V let him help—emphasizing "let"—using his arm as a crutch while she steadied herself. He guided her to a bench across the street, next to a shoddy bus stop. Her teeth chattered like one of those wind-up denture toys, while her hair cast a net to catch as much snow as possible. The bench fared no better off; it took a few shakes from Anatoly's booted foot to dislodge the build-up, freezing her ass off upon contact.

"This place sure ain't Cali," she huffed. "Why do you live up here?"

"I suppose you're not a big fan of snow," Anatoly pointed out.

"The only snow I like comes up my nose," V mumbled.

"Kha," he grinned, "spoiled by a life of luxury, my dear."

Luxury was a luxury. Aside from grumbling about the local weather like a pair of old geezers, there was little to do in town, at home, nor outside. A sad state of affairs. Most shops closed, at least what she assumed to be shops. No clubs, casinos, bars, food joints, forget street markets of any flavour. Limbo made manifest.

V stood up, blood rushing to her head. "Tour on hold then?" A sudden moment of dizziness struck, almost toppling her over; Anatoly had the same idea and sprang to her side.

He took hold of V's arm, locking it in the crook of his elbow. "You are balanced as a drunken reindeer," he chided. "We need you circulating blood. Build muscles." V thought she'd give it some slack, Anatoly knew her limits better.

The journey was slow-going, and he matched her pace—a perfect time for Anatoly to inundate V with trivia. There were over five hundred monotowns like this strewn across the country, only a handful of which appeared on government paperwork. From what she'd gathered, they functioned no differently than a corpo arcology. According to him, this was better in some ways because they provided free housing, basic services, and even schooling. In other words, it was the only viable way to sustain an isolated, remote settlement long term. Life, however basic, was to be cherished when the alternative offered uncertainty. People traded freedom for security; it was a universal axiom—a matter of perspective.

Despite that, the monotowns were all destined to fail—whether by accident, malpractice, or downright negligence. SovGen had moved more infrastructure to outer space in previous decades than any company before; with far more autonomy, corporations finally surpassed their parent states. V struggled to understand how that could be achieved until Anatoly revealed that space travel had become commonplace when a principle known as the "mass effect" bled into public consciousness. For the last half-century, humanity had accelerated beyond the speed of light in search of second homes. The "mass effect" principle, as described, was simple: reducing the mass of an object allowed it to accelerate more with the same thrust. How was it achieved? Anatoly tried to explain in utter gobbledygook he himself didn't grasp. Technology such as this meant heavy patenting, secrecy, and fierce competition. SovGen, Arasaka, OrbitalAir, and a company called Astraeus ran the racket—each trying to build a foothold on every inch of frontier before corporate espionage caught up.

And here, Anatoly presented his case. So, in whose pocket was he? Something called…

"Sborka? Never heard of it," V frowned. New players were a constant, but the way he talked about them implied rather high stakes.

"Not many do, especially outsiders," Anatoly reassured her, patting her back with an easy smile. "Ever heard of the Pinkertons? An agency of old America, hired by fat cats to stomp out dissent and unionism." It stirred something, but not much. "Sborka began by doing the opposite—helping labour unions organize using various methods, in service of the state, to keep corporations in check."

"And now?"

He shrugged, as if to say, what else is new. "In the past its loyalty was state-directed. Today it's a different story. There's talk about people gearing up for conflict. Sborka is a decentralized organization with central orders. Only our group is on the periphery, so I don't know what's going on. It is… how do you say?" he mulled for a moment. "Convoluted."

As far as answers went, it wasn't quite what V had been looking for.

"What's your angle here?" she asked. "I know you're holding back."

He drew her closer, so that they were leaning on each other. "Would you agree that if something looks perfect, there's blood behind it?" he murmured, his undertone resonating through his chest.

Yes. V's gut instincts were, more often than not, accurate. To entertain naïve hope would be foolhardy.

"Can't wrap my head around why you picked me up back there in the labs. You didn't have to." She had her suspicions, but V figured it only fair to put all their cards on the table if this was to work.

Anatoly nodded. "I will be blunt. I don't know."

V drew back slightly. "'Kay…"

"I never trust fate, didn't want to start now. My mission was to extract a particular individual from the batch; however, I acted on impulse without much thought. We already de-frosted you—it would be a shame to waste potential? Or," he chuckled, "they messed up the order. And you'd wake up in the body of a woman. That'd be a surprise for sure!"

She sighed, her breath curling away. Her limp had all but vanished, her footing stable. "Who?"

"A banker—a uh, top-notch economist, First Deputy Minister of Finance."

V smirked to herself. "Sounds like a hot commodity, for sure."

"I was hot on his heels, and instead, I found someone who could fill high heels."

Nudging Anatoly gently in the ribs, compelled to let go of his supporting arm. His solid frame swayed, though he made no remark of it.

"Won't that mess with your agenda?" Her grin lingered.

"What agenda?" He was as cool as ever. "This operation relies on opportunity and improvisation…" He trailed off, glancing around the vacant neighbourhood.

They were approaching a wide-open plaza with a single monument at its centre, erected on a plinth. A man and a woman stood arm in arm, cast in bronze—one with a hammer, the other a sickle. Heavily stylized, with defined musculature, much like a Soviet David—bigger, harder, louder. It loomed over them as they drew closer, mustering a height of around eighteen feet. The male's face was cast to the right, the female's to the left; both stared with unmoved conviction into the distance, their free hands outstretched in unison. A message in a bottle, or perhaps a plea to the world.

"Bet the folks who built this had to skip dinner just to finish the damn thing."

Soviet statues always carried an intimidating aura of grandeur. Exaggerated, beefy in their core design. They were but scraps left to remind the world that communism had failed, only to be torn apart like any number of religions—a struggle not meant to last. Ill-defined, broad-reaching goals with no concrete outcomes, whereas corpos knew not how to inspire at all. They only propagated brands, recognizable at a glance, offering soulless products. Meaningless, yet an easy choice when contrasted with starvation. While V wasn't one for politics, this dichotomy couldn't be all there was. Could it?

"Bold of you to assume I don't subscribe to such ideas."

"Still clinging onto that?" V eyed Anatoly.

"Am I?" Anatoly paused to consider, the question wavering on the rhetorical side. "Maybe."

They reached the large statue, and she stood in its shadow. From its foundation, V craned her neck to gaze at the frozen faces, which glistened from the damp snow. The man wore work coveralls, and the woman, a plain dress. Their profiles were idealized—jaws squared to sharp edges, forged in an impossible symmetry, eyes hardened. It occurred to her, humanity always sought perfection in appearance. In some way, the need to create our likeness faded with the advent of genetic manipulation. What need for imitation when you could sculpt reality, rather than an illusion of it?

"I like to think I can appreciate art, history, and aesthetics," he said, amusement glinting in his eyes. "I hate corporations with a passion. Does that make me don the red armband? I'd hope not." He adjusted his collar, sweeping his gesture toward the monument. "It represents the struggle of the common worker—for toil and hope—that the fruits of their labour are their own and no one else's. A falsity, I'll grant you, Americans. Equality only begets oppression, and so the hopeless narrative of liberation persists. Your side claims a individual is the sole architect of his destiny. He stands in front of the market, ready to bargain away his talents. An identical lie, for he is but a lonely ant on the hill, powerless against anything remotely organized."

His rhetoric carried a certain power—though a bit pretentious for V's liking. While hating corporations was second nature, waxing poetical about ideologies left a bad aftertaste. V had endured her fair share of indoctrinated dipshits with their heads in the clouds, congregating around loyalty to impossibly rich families rather than ideas. Still, the compelling need to belong was hard to resist. If only she'd listened to Panam—her path was always one call away from changing course.

"At least I get to pick my poison," she stated, staring back at him as she felt the need to assert her opinion. "Though the endgame ain't too different—you still got SovGen lording over the place."

"Precisely." His agreement was immediate and unironic, with no further elaboration.

V got the gist. The statue wasn't imposing anymore, just another corpse, preserved by its medium; like the town, like the system, like all that was bound to perish. Decay was but one aspect, destruction the other. People like Johnny were the perfect catalyst to unleash the latter, believing nothing short of revolution could overturn the established order. The problem was, his revolution consisted of groupies who loved to feel 'cool.' What even was his vision? Tear it all down and see what rises from the rubble? Fuck it—these ideas started to surface like a fart underwater. She wanted no part in these pointless debates.

"Do we turn back?"

"If you'd like," he conceded, a cigarette already adorning his lips. "Plenty more to cover tomorrow."

Imagine a life so bereft of excitement—stuck at a corporate outpost where the most daring pastimes were booze, cigarettes, and philosophy. V, sure didn't want to.

Peace Orchestra - Who Am I

Chapter Text

The day passed, the snow ceased, and the winds died down. Across the evening sky, a sheet of pink and orange sprawled. V sat by the window, her feet up and legs folded, watching the clouds drift overhead. For several long hours, silence blanketed the apartment—the kind that invites brooding thoughts. Invasive, self-sabotaging ones—gnawing like rats against wood.

After her morning walk, Anatoly left for his "shift." He explained he moonlit for SovGen, running small-time administrative tasks and inventory checks at the docks. She would have believed him if he hadn't neglected the fact that such a job would likely require implants—hard to interact with complex databases otherwise.

To keep herself awake, V set her mind on her plan. It was simple, no frills: return to Night City. She had no shortage of experience to start over from scratch. For that, she needed to find transportation, gear, and, more importantly, funds. The obvious source of cash and favours was Anatoly, who happened to have all three. Would he be so inclined to aid her poor soul? Million-eddie question. The man was too smooth for someone with nothing to gain. V already counted out pathological altruism. I'd be a laugh to think otherwise. There's always a tag. Always. Demands, a price, something—an obligation. What could she trade him, besides herself? Anatoly hadn't exhibited anything unbecoming; she could have just gotten ahead of herself. Nevertheless, V had to act, now—or be acted on.

She shivered. Cold had seeped through the window. Thuds at the door startled her into standing up. V turned to observe Anatoly entering, with plastic bags tucked into the crook of his arm. His cheeks and nose were ruddy from the chill, with snowflakes melting off his heavy overcoat. There was a slight glimmer of surprise in his eyes, as though he had been expecting an empty flat.

"Privet, Varvara. Good news," he rubbed his hands together.

"Oh yeah?" V was starved for such words lately.

"Da! I declared this operation null and void." He winked at her.

"The hell does that mean?" she pressed.

"Well, you know how things are." Unlikely— not since making that decision on the rooftop. "We mess up an order, people ask questions, Altercourse sends out death squads to hunt us down."

"Are you kidding?"

"No." His smile disappeared. "A little. Was an exaggeration. It's the principle of things." He put the bags on the floor, shooing her from his throne and heaving a sigh as he sat down.

"How'd they know?"

"Alex, that yebanyy urod blabbed." He scrunched his nose.

She sat down on the bed, staring into his soul. He didn't blink often—or not nearly enough. "Your partner?"

"Nyet, a neuroscientist. Used to be my friend, partner in crime," he said, eyes narrowing. "He won't ever speak a word of me again."

Anatoly then plucked his flask, taking a healthy gulp before wiping his beard with his sleeve. "We wait for Vera, our medical specialist. We have one more woman to extract along with you."

"And then?" V asked.

He scratched at his chin, unsure on the matter. Which made two of them. Night City might be a start, a goal worth attaining in itself—though in practice, she'd have nowhere to return to, nobody to rely upon. With the world now changed from the one she'd left, what were her chances of landing on her feet? Nil. Money, implants, guns or the clothes on her back would have to fall out of the sky to make it work. Only the dream of starting over was something V could cling to. Looking back, those times of struggling to stay afloat had been bliss, simple. Back to the days when she thought she preferred merc work over counter-intel, all thanks to Jackie. To live, to be free, her days defined solely by how far tomorrow went. Damn, she never did have her own agenda, did she? Pursuing freedom meant cash, cold, hard cash. When she wanted to live, the omission often came back at full throttle—to live without consequence. Like the corps. The corps specified that to live free you need wealth and privilege, a path preordained by wanting to matter. And like Jack said, one day he'd be a legend. Easy to easy to drown in the pursuits. V sure did.

Was that wrong? For them to mould V's ambitions, for her wanting to chase an ever-elusive "big league"? Could she have been afraid of choice itself? Paralyzed by indecision, afraid to err—not because her choices had irreversible repercussions, but from the knowledge that a more appealing one remained out of her grasp. When the fog lifts, the question laid bare. What was the point?

"What didn't work out won't work out. There's no winding back the clock," Anatoly spoke up with a purr, rumbling from his chest.

"Knock on wood," she muttered with a sullen smirk.

She didn't realize he'd been scrutinizing her as well. His eyes held a gleam of knowing. Or perhaps he could feel the turmoil building within her, assuming V would be eager to throw herself head first into the past. She tried to muster up indifference—a shield, if you will.

"'S easy for you to say," she croaked, spite lacing her words. "Don't reckon you got the slightest idea what that's like."

"Matter of perspective." He brushed his fingers against the skin of his neck, his lips taut with concentration. "Take your time to settle. Culture shock, stress, grief; not uncommon for subjects of CTP."

"CTP?" It must have meant something to her old brain, but...

"Cognitive Transfer Protocol," Anatoly said. "A three-step process—extraction, preservation, and reintegration. You got the deluxe treatment, by the way; I didn't tell you, but body had no previous occupant. Unusual."

A question answered, two more raised. How and why? An inquiring mind was a dangerous one. Delve too deep and things stop making sense. "What d'you mean, 'no previous occupant'?"

"Body's fresh; vat-grown, could be. Hard to say without documentation."

Anatoly sure knew when cough up the detes, and yet he always missed crucial gaps in context.

"You mentioned you found a file on me," V brought up. "Can I see it?"

Pulling at the collar of his turtleneck, he huffed. He swayed his head left to right, shaking a firm no.

"I made an exception for you. Let's keep it at that. Besides," he patted the back of his skull, "it's all up here. Give it time. God knows you still have plenty."

Amazing. Bleedin', fantastic. V's bid to punch something almost broke out. Was he gonna string her along until she "matured enough" for release to pasture? Fuck the guy sideways—never giving a straight answer, just feeding half-measures.

"Ain't that a fuckin' consolation..." She closed her eyes, exhaling. Her hands fidgeted in her lap, unable to remain still. Alienating the only person likely to help was poor tactics.

She ought to settle for a breather. It was a matter of perspective. On one hand, life wasn't something she ever intended to take a prolonged intermission from. Her plans for retirement consisted of biting on bullets rather than playing lawn bowling and getting shit-housed for a pensioner's fee. V liked being young and dumb too damn much.

This sucked. Her life had never been on pause for so long; it was jarring, if not a little exciting—to realize how powerless and detached she'd become. Worthless. It hurt. And yet, V had to be grateful for small mercies. Even if Anatoly didn't spell it out, she understood how little control he possessed. He may be a "savior," but with conditions attached. That's the way of the world, isn't it? To bargain, to exchange—without leverage, you're nothing more than a beggar.

V was holding back anger—pent-up rage. Like a beast caged. For some reason, it was directed at the only person in the world right now who gave a sod—a singular point of reference and sanity she couldn't afford to lose. Her one-way ticket to start over. If she couldn't handle her shit in the here and now, how could V trust herself to pick up the pieces?

A knock sounded at the door, saving her from incessant rumination. Anatoly's whole demeanour changed, his hands tightening on his armrests. V's head snapped up, eyes darting between the door and him. Another series of rapid knocks—no discernible pattern. Anatoly turned to V and held a finger over his mouth in warning. He crept over to the kitchen, toes light on the creaky floorboards, keeping close to the corners. His shoulders bunched, his muscles tensed, ready to attack. More knocks—impatient this time, less polite. He didn't seem in a sharing mood until, after braving the peephole, he found that whatever stood beyond didn't cause him unease. Instead, his fingers scrambled over the locks.

"Vera!" Anatoly barked, slamming down the handle. "Chto, bozhe moy, sluchilos'?"

There stood a grey-haired old lady, wrapped in furs and a wool scarf, with snow on her heels, a busted lip, and a red bruise forming across her jaw—blood on her clothes.

"Dorogoy, kakaya radost'," Vera sobbed. "Oni byli na slede, mne prishlos' bystro yeye perevezti."

"Kto byl na tvoyem slede... Stoy. Kakogo cherta ty zdes' tvorish' togda?" His arms flew around, groping for meaning. "Ty, sumasshedshaya suka, khotela nas vsekh podstavit'?!"

"Uzhe sdelano!" the hag yelled, her shrill echoing in the hall.

"No cherta."

"Mne nuzhny tvoi ruki, a ne tvoy rot! Yeyo rany ne svorachivayutsya, implanty, ona istekaet krovyu," she snapped, gesturing to the woman sprawled unconscious.

In seconds, Anatoly sprung forward, hooking his forearms beneath hers to haul her inside. He hefted the young lass over his shoulders in an efficient manner that reminded V of their own initial introduction. With haste, V rolled away from the bunk—she couldn't take her eyes off them; finding it impossible. Her curiosity had been awakened at that first cry. Both Vera and Anatoly paid her no heed, frantically attending to the new addition—tearing through clothing to reveal damage: pale flesh covered in scabs and blackish bruises.

The girl couldn't have been older than thirty—long and lean. Brown locks of loose, curly hair were tousled atop a small face with full features—long eyelashes resting atop cheekbones like half-moons. Her bottom lip was plump, while a thin scar marred her left cheek. However, these minute details weren't important; only her injuries. She lay bare, with gashes across her chest and hips, oozing red.

"Kakogo cherta ty natvorila! Alterkurs na tvoyem slede?" Anatoly asked.

"Obychno," Vera returned, not backing down.

Anatoly grabbed her by the arm, pressing his fingers deep into the fabric of her coat.

"Kak ona tak postradala?" he demanded, tearing off her remaining pants and examining the damage. "Ty provela yeye cherez myasorubku? Vyglyadit ne luchshe, chem myaso v myasnoy lavke?"

"Grubyy dikary, otaydi." Vera nudged him as her bag slipped to the floor. She dropped to a knee and began to rummage from within.

"Idiot..." Again, Anatoly wasn't deterred by her comment; he pointed at V, his voice tight: "Ty podvergla drugikh opasnosti. Bez nadobnosti."

"Ia pisayu na tvoyo rytsarstvo, dorogoy," Vera spat, holding gauze against the girl's ribs.

Grabbing her by the wrist, he raised her to standing, jerking her forcefully toward the kitchen. Vera thrust a fist into his back—once, and then twice—yet to no effect. His eyes bore into hers with an intensity none could match; his pupils were so large they almost eclipsed his irises. "Oni poshli za toboy?" Vera, trying to avoid eye contact, cast her gaze around the room, refusing to square up.

"Ty znayesh', ya luchshe tebya, svin'ya." She held her head high and mighty, nose pointed towards the ceiling.

Anatoly flinched toward the entrance, letting her go in an instant. Without another word, he walked over and bolted the door shut. "Pack your belongings, V," he ordered. Gesturing to the girl on the floor, he leaned into Vera's ear: "Zdes' my nichego dlya nee ne mozhem sdelat'. Yesli ona umret, eto budet na tvoyey sovesti." V could smell blood in the air—the thick scent of copper tickling her sinuses. Her palms grew clammy. It was the kind of situation you don't walk away from clean; her feet practically cemented in place while Vera fished for the needles to close a nasty, open laceration.

Another knock. Bang-bang-bang. Everybody stiffened; Anatoly's head twisted back.

"Pizdec," Anatoly said through a heavy tongue. "Corpo. Altercourse."

"Here!?" squeaked V.

There came a sharp click of his tongue. "Be quiet." A single digit appeared in her face, as though her own father were shushing her.

He straightened to stand with an unnerved sense of composure. Dusting the fabric from his shoulders—as if this were merely a drill—he glanced in the bathroom mirror; his brow creased in focus and thought as he smoothed back his flyaway locks and pulled his overcoat taut around himself. An irate grumble escaped his throat.

"My, aren't I popular today," he chuckled, prepared to face the inevitable.

V watched as he crept to the door with silent ease. Once there, in plain sight for whomever lurked beyond, Anatoly feigned normalcy without much effort. He offered a welcoming smile. Fingers tightened around the pistol grip at the edge of his pants.

"Kto tam?" he asked, tone too sweet to be sincere.

Hinges flew apart as a resounding kick launched itself against the middle panel, bursting forth and throwing Anatoly to his heels. Given no time to react or retaliate, the pistol knocked out of his grip. The front man stormed inside while his accomplice followed to press Anatoly into a corner. Guns were drawn, sights trained on him; Anatoly obliged by keeping both hands in view. V was on her stomach in nanoseconds, as the first man shouted in crystal-clear English, "Don't fucking move!" Starved of choice ever since waking up, V collapsed onto the floor. Not a moment later, she felt a gun barrel pressed right against her temple. The only thing that mattered was breathing steady, as someone's knee push harder on her back, her ribs pressing into concrete. Her hair had fallen across her face, and she didn't dare move a muscle. V's mouth turned dry; the room was eerily quiet, with Vera pushed up against the wall on her tiptoes. The men conducted a strip search, riffling through the bag next—their actions relentless.

In the kitchen, Anatoly made himself heard, spouting a string of incomprehensible Russian. His arms were pinned high above his head; V could only see fragments from behind. He was pushed to his knees, a pistol barrel pressed against the back of his neck. His tone wasn't angry or pleading—he sounded remorseful, apologetic, if anything—negotiating in short sentences only. One of them lifted the injured girl from the floor, her limbs swaying, marching out of the apartment post-haste. After Vera's frisk was done, the men beckoned her to the ground, pistol-whipping her when she refused to comply.

Once more, the adrenaline pumped into her chest and ears; her heartbeat throbbed in her ears, limbs, throat. Fighting instincts ingrained to turn corpos into mincemeat. Wishful thinking at it's worst.

You and what army?

Hard to say: muscle atrophy, shortness of breath, nausea. V was in no condition to brawl with a squad of well-trained, trigger-finger-itchy SWAT maniacs. Either way, she hadn't enjoyed having doubts placed in her head. Instead, desperate to escape scrutiny from the voices in her head, V was almost begging they'd put a bullet through her forehead already—to put a merciful end to her second attempt. However short-lived, it was already an embarrassing mess.

V brushed the hair from her eyes, focusing on her captors and keeping tabs on their every gesture. She noted a team of six men, all armed to the teeth. Each sported a modular visor clipped onto an enclosed helmet, breathing quite hard from vents under a voice-filter system. They wore light chest plates and utility pouches across the waist, each belt bearing a small blue indicator. The kneepads were pressed into her spine column, making her ribs ache in protest. Aside from that bog-standard Arasaka arm-candy, it was hard to tell much else about their appearance or identity from this comfortable angle. Anatoly's interrogator was taking his time with him. Pacing around, talking, gesticulating in an exaggerated manner—she caught only glimpses of him as he moved.

"Zatknis' nakhuy!" the man standing over them bellowed.

Vera screeched back as a gun discharged inches from her, blood spraying across the floor. She was still alive—barely. Her screams echoed throughout the room, ringing in V's ears. V didn't see what happened, but one of the men started shouting obscenities at her. A gasp caught in V's throat as she was tugged upward, her face smashed into the cold, hard wall. She puckered up to kiss the plaster. Her scalp grazed against the tight hold, her hands twisted on her back, and her wrists were clamped by constricting restraints. Shit. What a day this was turning out to be. She had no idea where Anatoly was at this point, and her anxiety grew as she was held there still, forced only to listen to Vera's sniffles and the cocking of a hammer. V couldn't afford to peek, her neck glued in the wrong direction. But the single, ear-splitting blast spelled it out clear enough. Her handler spun her by the arm, giving her a second to take in the scene—just to rub it in. Vera lay dead on the floor, a single bullet to the back of her head. Her eyes were shot open, glazed over, with blood already pooling. Nothing new under the sun. The room remained as quiet and unceremonious as ever. A body bag lay unfurled at the ready; two of them fell to their knees, stuffing her inside like garbage.

V was yanked along, pulled into murky hallway, her hand on her neck pinning her head as she stared at the grimy floor. She only caught a fleeting sight of another bag upon which the wounded girl lay. Rushing down the flight of stairs, V tripped several times in quick succession, her knees scraping along the old stone. There was little protest. What else could she expect? For a fleeting moment, V dared to peek upward, only to be rewarded with a smack to the cheek. Stars littered the cosmos; no light pollution in the world was intense enough to drown them out this far up North. But alas, right below them awaited a convoy of three cars—the middle van finally bearing the Altercourse logo.

Passing the threshold of the apartment block, the cold wind stung her fresh scrapes, as though pinpricking her. She was passed along to another armed goon who wrenched V all the way to the van, shoving her unceremoniously into the cramped rear compartment. She sighed, plopping down next to none other than Anatoly, his wrists bound in the same manner. Quick work.

Locking eyes, he huffed. "Fancy seeing you here," shuffling beside her, elbows tight. "So, what're you in for?"

V glared, looking down. Was his optimism a natural reflex at this point? She couldn't tell—she was too busy staring at the floor in disbelief, leaning her elbows on her legs, trying to piece together what the fuck was happening.

"You tell me. They seemed pretty keen to jump our asses."

Inside, the truck was pitch-black and bare-bones; nothing except metal benches for comfort. It had a cramped ceiling that reeked of chemicals. A few cracks of light shone in from behind V's back, and it wasn't long before the doors closed with an ominous slam. A beep. A click. Then a buzz—and the doors were sealed off.

"Oh, yes. Can always be worse," he spoke low, his eyes roving around the space.

"For fuck's sake..." V swallowed—eyes closed, hands clenched, jaw flexing once more.

No point biting each other's heads off over a little inconvenience like impending torture, information extraction, or re-incarceration. Or at best summary execution.

Anatoly banged his head on the glass pane separating the driver and the cabin in hopes of drawing his attention.

"You can relax, V. This," he said, glancing around the van with his head bowed, "is not to be our cage." She was given little say; the only one allowed free passage here somehow revolved around this man.

A speaker buzzed to life, and the driver addressed them both. "Pain in the ass. It's an American expression, I think," his thick, Slavic voice crooned—if only a tad smug. "Yes?"

Anatoly's eyes crinkled as he suppressed a chuckle. "Tak tochno, tovarishch kapitan—most appropriate."

V couldn't read the situation any more than when she first woke up. Was she supposed to be relieved or suspicious at this point?

"Who's he?" V asked, her words measured and carefully spoken.

"Like I said, Varvara," Anatoly eased into the seat opposite her, his legs spread wide to occupy the space. "In my pocket."

"Oh, is the American pretending not to understand simple korruptsiyu?"

"She's fresh off the press, Dima," Anatoly interjected. "Not privy to the terms and services!"

The driver, Dima, grunted in acknowledgement. "I owe... uhm, usluga, debt," he admitted. "To a mutual friend."

"Ay, focus, Dima! Are they still inside?" Anatoly asked, quite impatient. "It was good thinking to move on short notice, but you've compromised both sides here."

The driver fidgeted with his seat. "Da, searching. Two hours, at most. Your colleague—not good. Zhal', no yeyo ubili."

"Thought so," he said with a huff, turning to V. "You saw it?"

"Shot," she said, tone arid. "In the head. Other girl's gone too."

"Yes. They're Altercourse," he spat. And it meant less than nothing to her.

"Where're you taking us?" her voice rasped against the silence.

Dima chuckled. "No. No taking to do. We wait! And wait."

Anatoly and the driver began barking in their native tongues like wild dogs over some juicy piece of meat. They exchanged details at a rapid-fire pace—nothing V's ears or eyes could catch in the dark. Either way, they coordinated on something, intent on ignoring her worries. The two bickered back and forth, all in the same vein, yet she couldn't get a single iota of information. She couldn't tell if the argument was about the extraction plan itself or what they had for breakfast that morning. The Russians began to piss her off. So, she shifted a little—her legs cramped in the space, so she stretched them out, and kicked Anatoly's shin a bit, which earned a displeased jolt.

"Ay!"

"English, please," V piped up, trying to remain in the loop.

"Nyet." Dima's curt response was quick and resolute. "It time."

Anatoly made to pacify, "I'd say plug your ears in normal circumstances, but ducking would do." Kneeling by her feet and sprawling onto the floor hastily, he didn't make her flinch—but V's brain tried connecting dots a little too late.

A shockwave hit the vehicle, its suspension lashing in recoil. The vehicle jerked right from under her seat, her back lifting from the cushion, her head hitting the opposite wall. She hadn't the luxury to brace herself. The van pivoted on the spot, glass shattering through the cabin, tiny shards licking across her skin and raking her cheeks. There was a loud thump at the front. For a moment, she thought they were rolling—her gut said so—but the van landed on its side with a creak of steel. Then everything came to a standstill; the dust settled, and her ears still rang. It had happened in a blink—within a second, her stomach had crawled to her lungs and then dropped dead at her toes. Dazed but otherwise uninjured, V couldn't process where up or down had switched around.

"Dima?" She was disoriented, latching onto the name like a lifeline. "Diiimaaaa." Anatoly was enjoying the nap, squashed between V and the bench, calling out for his little helper.

There was some hazy commotion from what looked like the driver's door—muffled. He sounded okay, though—pissed more like—and he wasn't the only one.

"Motherfuckers." She'd had it. This whole adventure. "The fuck is happening?" V demanded, her head spinning a touch.

"A bit overzealous there, V." Anatoly rubbed his shin, voice tired, as V's kick barely missed and thudded into his thigh. She rolled off him, landing a knee on the other side of the floor. He rose slow, brushed himself off, and adjusted his coat like it meant something.

The lock gave way with a soft click, Dima popping the seal on their compartment, and in the process helped V to her feet by undoing the restraints on her wrists. She hopped out, the van at a perfect angle. Sanding her sore joints. Walking woozily and stumbling on glass. Blazing fire now engulfed the apartment building she left minutes ago. People stood around, staring and pointing; some rushed to help the victims of the blast, crawling from their homes burnt to a crisp. V turned on her heel to see that the other vehicles had met a similar fate. Standing, bewildered and unsure of what to do. Anatoly emerged after her, a small pistol in hand as he reloaded it. She didn't have time to question him as the front doors of the escort cars were pried open on both sides—the drivers dragged out, eyes vacant, minds numbed.

He tossed one of them onto the ground and pressed a barrel to the back of his head. "Tovarishch," he saluted them before squeezing the trigger. Then he marched on to the front car, giving the driver there the same send-off.

Dima jumped out of the van, a blackbox of sorts in his hands. Wasting no time, he popped the lock and threw it like a Frisbee into a burning window. V watched the spectacle, feeling the heat on her face and her hands. The wind had picked up, fanning the flames. Distant sirens beckoned her to leave, drawing closer. People had scattered as soon as the executions started. V was no stranger to violence—or the stench of it. It had been a while, though—the taste of it on her lips. She had no words, no questions. Of course it had come to this.

"Come on, V! Don't just stand there—we've little time."

Anatoly stood over a manhole cover, heaving the lid with his legs and grunting with effort. Dima had made a run for it, vanishing as soon as V turned her back to him. The sirens were getting close, and her mind raced to catch up.

"Do you want a police interview?" Anatoly bellowed. "Get moving."

V moved on instinct, sliding down the ladder without much thought, headfirst into the abyss. With her hands scraping against the metal rungs, she descended. Unsure what awaited her below, she kept going until her boots touched solid ground. The musk was horrible—a mix of rotting food, sewage, and who knows what else. Her vision took a second to adjust, and then she saw it: a dimly lit tunnel stretching ahead, its grate torn apart. Anatoly clambered down, setting the cover back in place and leaving them in near darkness.

"You have some explaining to do," she rasped, her breath tight.

"Psh, later," he hushed her, putting a hand to her shoulder—which she shrugged off. "I don't want to stick around too long."

Haunt Me - Slow Dancing With Death

Chapter Text

Bloody warm this place was, yeah. Homely too. No wonder the Japs set up shop years ago. A land down under? More like one day under their thumb.

Didn't quite pan out according to plan; sore losers. Wasn't for a lack of trying, mind you. They went for blood, Nip bastards came in swinging, ready to choke the country into submission. Right ol' fuck-up when they took over Westie way back when. Pissed off the entire bloody continent, and it is a continent like none other. Snakes, spiders, sharks, crocs—you don't get to choose which one bites your arse. None of 'em pretty. And while Zaeed's been to plenty of hellholes, this one took the cake.

Westralia should've crumbled months ago, but corps don't just roll over and die. Even now, with their backs against the Indian Ocean, they had their last holdouts dug in tight. Perth, mostly. Arasaka's lapdogs, clinging to the bone their masters threw them. Federal forces were moving in, tightening the noose, but it was slow grunt work. Too much coastline. Too many cracks for rats to slip through. That's why they brought in hunters, mercs, from across the Indian Ocean. It was not a war so much as a big game hunt. Risky as hell though. Expensive bounties to collect: a CEO's scalp, minor executives, board members, even some of the WDF's generals. Bet they didn't expect they'd end up like a deer head mantelpiece. Most of them were Australians that threw in their lot with Arasaka, thinking the sun shines out of their arse. Wrong fucking conclusion. Nothing quite like a home crowd wanting to string you up by the guts. Massani saw his fare share of it over here: castrations, waterboarding, flaying, beheadings, all done without breaking a sweat and a cheeky stubbie in their teeth. He supposed there was a bit more finesse to the brutality on display, compared to those back in former India. A better class of psychopath at play.

Zaeed leant elbows against some sun-worm pipes of the waste station and fiddled with the dead silent radio transmitter. Watching, waiting, snoring. Sweat dripping down his back. His collar chafing. He didn't mind the work. You stop minding after the first tour. Afterwards, it's just muscle memory. Breathe, aim, shoot, cash out.

All the local corporate heads seemed to be well under lockdown; nobody had caught a whiff of them leaving. They huddled up tight and had no intentions of coming out to play. The herd was panicking, no doubt. So what did the corps do to slow the reaper coming their way? Hire fixers, cheat, steal, threaten bloody Armageddon. Their rival wasn't nothing special either. Same old same, just more efficient. ColoSys, Australia's last megacorporation. Huge on terraforming and construction. Small-time, Zaeed'd say, compared to the heavyweights like Militech or 'Saka. Suffice to say, he was proven wrong more than once.

He grit his teeth, pressing the comm link button with more force than needed. "Zezee. You better not be having a kip."

Zebulon "Zezee" Zeeman. Ridiculous name and an even more ridiculous attitude to match. Afrikaner stock, blonde hair, green eyes, prettier than most slags running around the local cathouse. Thick as mince. Gave up a well-paid, cushy corpo gig to risk it all as a merc. Stuck onto Zaeed like a leech since running a tour in the Congo.

"Zezee!" Zaeed snapped, his voice scraping from the inside out.

"Who do you think you are, jou donner? Think I'm sitting on my gat all day, huh?" Zezee fired back, his voice crackling through the static. A rough laugh followed.

Zezee was glued to the screen, monitoring every blip on his scanners from inside his shitty little shack. Arasaka loved deploying cloaked drones for hit-and-run tactics against stations like theirs. Radar & Lidar and IR were used to track them. Turrets on the perimeter. And a massive lot of anti-air rocketry to down long-range stragglers.

"You're supposed to check in every half-hour," Zaeed groused. "Not when it suits you."

"Relax, boet, fokall out here," Zezee drawled.

"Your eyes or your screen?"

"Jislaaik, man, my oë are fokken burning, no lies! Haven't blinked, I swear," Zezee promised. "You owe me, by the way."

Zaeed grunted. "Owe you shit, sunshine."

"Listen, jou sally. I covered that bounty in Canberra, shared my last case of bitter, kept your sorry ass breathing through many a night. So wake up that groot swart bliksem, it's his turn anyway!"

"Bitch at him yourself. He'll split your face open and hand you your own jaw." A grin played on Zaeed's lips. Andile was a quiet lad, but God, was he lethal. Son of a warlord, no less.

A mosquito buzzed past Zaeed's ear, its high-pitched drone grating on his last nerve. A toasty 35°C in the shade by day, dropping to 20's during nights. A slight breeze brought some relief, enough not to start stripping down to a loincloth.

"Ja, ja, whatever. If the Japs sneeze, we'll hear them blowing," Zezee scoffed, cutting the comm.

"Looks to be another boring night." Zaeed scanned the horizon, sitting back down on his chair, feet propped up on the control console to the perimeter defences. For a solid hour not much occurred. His legs went taut, pins-and-needles crawling. He scratched his neck, the implant jack still raw. Damned cyberware always acted up in the heat.

Their camp consisted of two trucks and a camper, all three of which at a low-low price of stolen. Better than kissing the ground every night. All in all, they ran a skeleton crew, with most yellow guns-for-hire ditching their posts to cash in early. As far as Australia was concerned, they were on victory laps. 'Saka couldn't sustain a protracted war of attrition, on a budget. There were far more profitable endeavours waiting in outer space than some rinky-dink colonial leftovers. Not exactly Zaeed's style, mind; space. Cold as balls, hard to breathe. Too bad he'd have to reconsider and follow the money.

Another reason Perth stood on its heels was the space elevator. In the initial stages of the battle heavy fighting damaged a precious section of the main tether line. Didn't take a genius to deduce this would spell disaster for anyone on the ground. The whole ordeal revolved around this one metropolis. Hard to hold, vicious to lose. That's why it dragged on so fucking long. That's why it dragged on… until it didn't.

Perth was a money-sink now. A liability on every quarterly report. Sink them in the red enough and Arasaka might cut their losses and bail. Which meant one of two things. Either they'd torch the place on their way out, make it unsalvageable for anyone else. Or—and this was more likely—Arasaka leaves their clients dangling with their pants down. Let the bootlickers fend for themselves. Wouldn't be the first time a megacorp ghosted in unfavourable situations, and it wouldn't be the last. But the mood around town wasn't quite as bleak anymore.

"Massani!" Zezee's voice burst through the comms, loud and urgent, snapping Zaeed's attention back to the here and now.

He jerked forward, almost toppling out of his seat. "Fuck." Zaeed slapped the comms. "What? Got a lock?"

"Fokken right, I do! One bogey inbound—low alt, low sig, no transponder. Popped on infrared for half a tick, then ghosted again. Whatever it is, it's not running civvie protocol."

"No shit." Zaeed's voice was a growl as he slammed the console awake, a large overhead map materialising on the display. The radar kept tracking the contact in sporadic intervals, its path curving away from Perth proper. "Vector?"

"Looping south to east. Dropping elevation fast. Grid 2-Alpha, maybe four klicks out and coming in hot. Thing's flying crooked."

"You sure you're reading that right?" Zaeed frowned. "Only a dumb bastard flies straight into a noose."

"You think I'm stupid, huh? Kom kyk self then—moenie my kak vra nie!"

"Alright, calm down, you sprog." Zaeed's hands were already on the controls, bringing the defence systems online.

The old surface-to-air suite groaned as it powered up, mechanical limbs shuddering into motion. The twin-barrelled AETOS launcher tracked the bearing with a measured grind, internal gyros compensating as the hydraulics braced against coarse terrain. Dust spat outward as the struts dug in, anchoring the unit against recoil. On-screen, the target signature flickered—low altitude, intermittent cloaking. The AV's stealth field was compromised, bleeding heat in irregular pulses. Enough to lock. The fire control crosshairs hovered amber, twitching with every fresh ghost on infrared.

Zaeed stood firm at his station, eyes locked on the radar screen. His jaw clenched as the first pair of missiles shrieked past, engines howling like banshees. Bright exhaust trails carved across the sky. A wall of heat and grit swept outward from the launch, scattering loose scrap and choking the air with powder-fine dust. Canvas flaps snapped taut. The trailers groaned under the shock, wheels chewing shallow trenches.

Above, the target barely flickered—a smear of heat against black. The first missile veered off, tricked by a scatter of countermeasures. Chaff burst like glitter, a pulse emitter flared, and tracking broke. The missile spun wide and detonated harmlessly. The second corrected hard and sharp, mechanical stutters mid-flight, guided without hesitation. It punched through the countermeasure veil and zeroed in on the unstable signal.

Zaeed's radar blinked. Then again. The contact flared bright, then staggered. A muted flash bloomed past the ridge. No plume. No ignition. The heat signature blinked out, but LIDAR showed mass still falling. The sound came late. A distant boom, stretched thin by distance, crawled in over the basin and rattled the loose sheet metal around the camp.

Zezee's voice crackled in, breathless. "Fokken hell. Confirming impact—just lost altitude trace. You hit something."

Zaeed didn't answer. He watched the contact bleed off the screen, a slowly smearing dot vanishing into static. The launcher hissed behind him as it powered down, servos grinding into idle.

He keyed the comm again. "Eyes peeled. We're not done here yet."

"Copy, boet."

Zaeed slung his rifle and stepped off the platform, boots crunching over sun-blasted grit. The air still reeked of propellant and burnt ozone. He made for the camper, ducking under the frayed canvas, and shouldered open the rattling door.

"Andile," he growled. "Up. Something just dropped out the sky."

Andile was awake, but not quite upright. He stood, leaning against the sink unit, a towel slung low across his waist. His skin gleamed in the half-light, wet from the tap and glistening with sweat.

"Big or stupid?" he rumbled, already moving.

"Both."

From their overwatch perch along the ridge, Zaeed adjusted the focus, tracking along the starboard flank. Markings were unreadable, either charred over or deliberately obscured. The undercarriage had taken most of the force; the belly plating was warped, split along one seam.

Their target had ploughed into the earth with enough force to gouge a trench. What was left of the AV rested at an awkward angle in the gully—half-buried in sediment. The nose cone had collapsed inward, crumpling like cheap tin, and the forward stabilisers were missing entirely. One engine mount smouldered, trailing faint ribbons of heat into the night air. Scorch marks cut deep into the rock face where it had skidded, the path of descent clear from to the naked eye. From the type, the AV was a heavy lifter. From the make, it was Arasaka's.

He shifted position. "Hull's sealed," he muttered, mostly to himself. "Don't see a breach. Could've been pressurised inside."

Andile grunted, going prone, his gaze fixed on the wreckage. He carried his rifle at ease, fingers loose around the pistol grip.

Zaeed scanned for movement—none so far. No bodies, either. No sign of forced ejection, though one panel looked sheared from the inside. A long groove in the sand trailed off from the hull as if something had rolled or been flung. He tracked it with the scope, but it vanished soon after.

"Too quiet," he muttered. "If that was a VIP transport, someone's gonna come looking."

AV sorties didn't fly solo, especially not with cargo aboard. Where were the wingmen? The escort? Drone compliments would've made sense, sufficiently fast and agile to carve a perimeter until an extraction team arrived.

He panned his scope farther out, tracing the ridgelines and air corridors. Nothing but static on the comms and the soft rasp of wind kicking dust into the basin. He tapped the side of the scope once, checking IR again; nothing. If someone was watching, they were holding their breath.

The terrain ahead wasn't natural. The gully ran too straight, its walls too cleanly cut, banked in a way that screamed engineered intent. A dead riverbed, probably—one of ColoSys's old geoforming trials, meant to turn the scorched belly of the continent into something green and habitable. That never happened. Half the projects were shuttered when orbital ambitions proved more lucrative. What remained were these ghost arteries: dry, silent channels carved through red dust, useful now only to scavengers, smugglers, or in this case, whatever corporate their blacksite asset had just cratered into it. The incline was steep in places, but manageable. Sand and compacted clay offered traction; rock clusters made for natural cover.

He made the call with a nod toward Andile, who hadn't moved. Didn't need to.

Both of them understood the silence too well. It was a blind spot. And it wouldn't last. If there were reinforcements en route, they'd be fast, aerial, and pissed. That meant they had a window. Ten minutes, maybe less, before the bigger boot dropped.

Zaeed adjusted the sling on his rifle and began descending the ridge, one boot grinding into the shale, weapon trained low. Andile followed suit. They made short work of the climb, taking a switchback path that led them into the ravine proper. The going was easy.

"What you expecting?" Andile kept pace, matching step for step.

Zaeed snorted once, adjusting the sling on his rifle. "Not expecting anything. You know how this works."

That earned him a slow nod. No trust for windfalls. Not when they came wrapped in Arasaka packaging.

"We fetch salvage, neh?" Andile offered.

"Sure. If that bird's empty, we strip it and call in a tow."

Zaeed raised a hand and crouched behind a broken slab of rock, peering over the edge. Andile mirrored him a pace back, shifting to one knee.

It begged the question if the other teams were snoozing on the job. Maybe they were just as lazy and uncoordinated, but he couldn't rely on supposition.

"Zezee?"

Static hissed back, and then a loud yawn. "Sharp."

"Check our grid and the next two. Run a sweep, ask around. Need to know if anyone else clocked this bird."

"Ja, ja. Want me to send flowers while I'm at it?"

"Stuff it," Zaeed cut the line.

Loose shale crunched underfoot. They closed on the wreck, rifles low and eyes sharp, approaching sniffing distance. Scorched polymer drifted on towards them, a sweet hint of burnt circuits too.

They advanced low and staggered, offset by six paces. What little wind there was dragged the heat downslope, pushing it out into the basin and toward the coast. The sky hung clear overhead, stars bright despite the glare from Perth's sprawl. The soil around the impact zone was blistered, baked to a dull sheen where exhaust had vented in uncontrolled bursts. A scorched tree stump stood nearby, blackened and cracked from the backblast.

They circled in silence, scanning for breaches. Now, up close, the damage was clearer.

Debris was scattered over a fifty-metre radius. Fragments of carbon struts, optical relays, bits of shielding warped by internal heat. The fuselage sat in quiet ruin, its once-sleek profile marred by violent compression and heat stress. The dorsal plating had buckled inward, sections crimped and peeled like an open wound. A tangled mess of cabling and coolant lines dangled from one exposed conduit, some still leaking slow drips of fluorescent gel onto the sands below. One of the starboard thruster housings had detached entirely. It rested several paces from the primary wreckage. Near the aft section, the hull had split along a pressure seam, forced open from the inside, judging by the direction of the metal folds. A shallow trail led away from it. Something or someone had ejected or crawled out.

Andile veered off toward the AV's port side, his steps cautious, sweeping with his rifle. He crouched near a section of the hull that had partially split open, one of the outer panels had buckled under pressure. A jagged breach revealed the innards within.

"Found something."

Zaeed approached, angling over broken debris. The metal had curled outward along the edge, like it had been blown from within. One of the locking rods was warped, twisted free of its mooring.

He nodded toward the opening. "Clear?"

Andile leaned forward, weapon ready. "Not empty."

"Hostiles?"

A pause. "No."

Zaeed frowned. He edged closer and aimed his rifle into the darkness. The interior was warped, almost skeletal. Ceiling plates had collapsed inward, forcing him almost crawl. Tangled cabling hung like dead vines from the overhead. Emergency diodes pulsed dimly in blue, casting the ruined interior in alternating shadow and light. Seating modules were twisted off their railings and warped from impact. By some miracle the damn thing hadn't burst into flames. Not yet anyway. The forward section had collapsed completely, separating the cockpit from the troop carrier. A bloodstained restraint strap dangled from one overhead latch, torn at the seams.

In the far corner of the compartment, beneath torn harness straps and scattered medfoam canisters, lay a figure.

Female. Pale skin. Mid-thirties if he had to guess, face still, half-turned toward the wall. Clean jawline. Slight shadow at the cheekbones. Short-cropped hair, bleached or naturally pale, stuck flat with dried gel. Shoulders squared even in unconscious sprawl. Plain synthetic jumpsuit, sealed at the wrists and ankles, bog-standard transitwear. A single cuff secured one arm to a mounting rail, now warped and sheared loose. No tags. Bio-asset. No visible headjack, or chrome for that matter. If there was cargo onboard, she was it. Lightly guarded though, for an asset.

Andile crouched near the breach. "She waking or what?"

"I'll ask." Zaeed's tone was curt. He kept his rifle aimed into the cabin as he spoke. "You awake sunshine?"

Not so much as a twitch. Unconscious then. Probably for the best. He didn't have time to wrangle answers out of some stiff who'd likely not give any in the first place.

"That's a no." He looked back to Andile.

"Eish. Zezee's bad influence," Andile muttered.

"Tell me about it." Zaeed shifted his weight forward, bracing himself on the warped floor. He kept the barrel pointed away from the woman and leaned down to tug at her wrist. With the interior so cramped, dragging her out would be a pain in the ass. He found a ticking pulse at the artery. She didn't stir under contact. Sedated then, maybe even comatose.

"So?" Andile asked.

"Alive," Zaeed said. "And out like a light."

"We fetch her," Andile suggested, blunt but with some sense. They weren't exactly spoiled for choice here.

The woman stirred suddenly, a faint groan escaping her lips. Zaeed paused, watching closely as the woman's head tilted to one side, her eyelids flickering with the promise of awareness. She might've been coming out of it.

Zaeed ducked lower, wedging himself deeper into the wreck, boots planted awkwardly between bent support struts. The woman was limp in his arms, head lolling against his shoulder. He hooked one arm under hers, the other gripping her waist, shifting to lift without torque. The cramped cabin left no room to pivot. The woman twitched again. Her lips parted, breath shallow, eyes fluttering open for a second—clouded, unfocused. Pupils tracked nothing. She wasn't there yet. Just the body waking up before the mind followed.

"Give me a hand," he called over his shoulder. "We've got dead mass and zero room."

"Can't, too narrow." Andile called from outside.

"Then pull me," Zaeed barked. "Get a grip."

Andile crouched low, shoved his rifle aside, and reached in. His hand clamped around Zaeed's belt, then shifted to his harness. With a sharp grunt, he leaned back, dragging them inch by inch toward the breach. Zaeed leveraged his weight around as best he could, bracing knees against whatever jagged surface wouldn't snap. The woman's feet dragged over twisted metal and broken cabling, catching on every imperfection. He swore loudly when his shoulder scraped against a twisted support strut. The last stretch was pure stubbornness, all three of them fighting for leverage. Another tug. And another. The edge of the breach scraped along his backplate, catching once on a shoulder strap. Andile hauled one final time, dragging them clear.

Zaeed lay there for a moment, staring up at the night sky, wondering why he was doing any of this shit in the first place.

Andile stood, dusting off his hands. "Better?"

"Yeah. I'm bloody better." He pushed the woman off gently, laying her out on flat ground.

Kneeling right back beside the woman, rolling her gently to her back. Keeping one hand steady on her shoulder as he leaned in close. No blood, no visible trauma. Chest rising without strain. He reached for her eyelid, pried one open. The eye tracked faintly, then drifted. Pupils equal. Not blown, not fixed.

"Still out," he said.

He patted down her torso next, checking for breaks, bruising, anything sunken or misaligned. All in place. She didn't stir at the contact. Her skin was cool but not cold. Pressing the back of his glove to her cheek. Clammy. Could be sedation. Could be decompression. Lacking any real medtech, he couldn't say which. He hooked a hand under her shoulder and checked the spine gently. She was limp, but not locked a good sign. The harness burn on her wrist was the worst of it: raw skin beneath the restraint cuff, but nothing deep. Lucky break considering most AV wrecks weren't as pretty.

"She's intact," Zaeed confirmed, pushing up to one knee.

The crack of a pistol shot cut the quiet.

Zaeed's body hit the dirt by instinct, his arm snapping out to drag the woman's body closer, her collar gripped tight in his fist. Dust exploded around them as another round slammed into the sand nearby, the high trajectory kicking up debris in a wide spray. A sharp, fast angle—whoever was shooting didn't have the precision. His partner already moving. Ducking behind a low outcrop, rifle raised and aimed back. He motioned toward the ridgeline above, the direction from which they had descended minutes prior.

A third shot rang out, closer this time, the man panicking in his aim. Zaeed caught a brief flash of movement on the incline: a figure scrambling up the rocks, a pistol clutched tightly in one hand. The next round hissed through the air, grazing too close to Zaeed's side. A few more inches, and it would've found him. Sloppy aim but lethal by accident.

Big man didn't hesitate. Finger tightening on the trigger, his rifle kicked once. The shooter's head jerked back violently, blood and bone fragments spraying from the exit wound as he tumbled down the slope. His body went limp mid-roll, crashing against a flat boulder. One leg twitched for a brief moment, the only sign of life left in the man, and then stilled. Add another corpse on the pile.

Zaeed exhaled through gritted teeth, adrenaline fading fast and frustration taking its place. No such thing as an easy job anymore.

"Mnandi, cured him." Andile called back, letting the rifle rest.

"Go look him over, figure who we're dealing with." Zaeed's attention returned to their cargo. He shifted her onto her side, rolling her into the recovery position. Safer than her splayed out on the sand.

Andile approached the corpse cautiously, one hand keeping his rifle aimed at centre-mass. He nudged the body with his boot, pressing at the shoulder joint. The corpse shifted without resistance, rocking to face him. By the garb, the woman's handler most likely. Dead now. His face had been obliterated by the shot, a mangled cartilage where his nose once was. Burnt suit. Blood splatter and brain matter all over the rocks around him, like spilled paint. Andile crouched and began rifling through the dead man's pockets, stripping him for anything of value.

The night was cool, the air crisp, and it didn't help their asset much. Time to get going. Zaeed picked the woman up, carrying her close, his right arm hooked under her knees, head lolled against his chest. Must've weighted seventy soaking wet tops. He turned, his boot grinding over loose grit as he marched off.

Andile returned, still fastening one of the dead man's comm units to his belt.

"Gains?" Zaeed asked.

"Niks useful," he said flatly. "Just a burner pistol and a pack of smokes."

The climb out was slow but steady. The loose incline gave beneath their boots, fine clay and dust sliding underfoot with every step. Andile took point, eyes still scanning the skyline with calm precision, rifle angled low but never lowered. Behind him, Zaeed kept pace, the woman cradled tight against him.

"What do we do with this piece?" He tilted his chin at the woman. There wasn't a name on her person yet.

"Don't know," Zaeed muttered. "But she's someone's problem alright. And for now, she's ours."

Chapter Text

V loathed boats. Hated oceans too, though not for any conceptual reason; it was a deeply physical aversion, grounded in the body's quiet revolt. Constant sloshing, terrible sway, tight cabins and the slow creep of pressure rising in her chest whenever she couldn't see land. Delicate lungs and sensitive stomachs did not mix well with open waters.

She pulled her jacket tighter, nuzzling the only heater in the cabin, trying to pretend the bile wasn't climbing. The boat's engines rumbled beneath them, a low growl carrying through the steel frame. Anatoly did claim he was a 'fisherman'; V should've taken his word for it. The trawler smelled like the inside of a gutted tuna, its look doing nothing to counter the impression.

Patched upper deck and repainted hull more times than V could guess, its original name scorched off the stern with an angle grinder. Most of the outside still passed for a fishing vessel if you squinted hard. Nets piled at the fore and rust stains down both flanks of the ship. Two cranes bolted to the gunwales, both untouched by grease for decades on end. The factory controls had been partially cannibalised, with wires rerouted into carbon-plated housings, panelling replaced with brushed composites scrounged from God knows where. Knotted bundles of conduit ran through the bulkheads, pulsing with heat dissipation. Tech spliced in later, meant for something sharper than navigation. And yet, fixed above the console, a strange little box kept scratching a needle across a strip of rolling paper, carving jagged graphs in faded ink. Whatever it tracked, it hadn't stopped.

The wheel was locked in place, a rudimentary autopilot rig bolted to the controls, hydraulics groaning as the boat held course. V stayed by the heater for a moment longer, listening to crude bangs from down below.

Anatoly disappeared into the engine room, grumbling over a coolant imbalance and more 'Soviet shit.'

Fine by her.

Left alone, V took her time digging up his past, beginning with the obvious.

Across from her, shelves lined the upper walls. Filled with oddities, crammed right behind the guardrail: mechanical trinkets, hand-carved figurines, dog tags that looked unissued, and souvenirs from places V wasn't sure existed anymore. Curiosity itched. V stood, padded over, and began poking through the items. She focused on what wasn't bolted down, her hands hovering above it all. She picked up one of the carvings: a tiny bird resting in her palm, its wings outstretched and detailed down to every feather. The craftsmanship was elegant, precise. She traced the edge of the beak and paused at a thin line of text carved into the wood. V brought it closer, squinting through the dim cabin lights. No language she knew.

She placed it back, careful not to move it from its spot.

While reaching for a small engraved box tucked behind a faded map case, something slipped loose above her. A folded newspaper print fluttered down, landing square on her head. V snatched the thing and smoothed it out. A copy of 'Pravda', yellow with age. Front page read:

[-]

STRIKE ACTION THREATENS SOCHI SUMMER

Sochi - February 24, 2066 - As Sochi prepares for summer, a strike looms in the streets. Unionised workers have declared their intention to withdraw labour, threatening to halt preparations. A spokesperson for Sochigaz, a state-run company that manages Sochi's utilities, has accused the unions of a 'war on progress.' This isn't the first time union members have taken to the streets. Last year saw a similar showdown with the same company, resulting in the brutal beating of several groups of its employees...

[-]

Charming, V thought. But only beatings? She would've figured there'd be a nice, tidy public execution or two. The state's go-to for union troubles. Efficiency through terror. What caught her attention was the medium. Paper. Real ink-on-pulp, mass-printed, folded and distributed. That's what made it strange. Old print, brittle and browned, the kind that belonged in archives or museums. Granted, it was printed in the Central Committee's own paper, but still, what was the point in clinging to obsolete concepts? Sentimentality? V flipped through the article, finding several editions stitched together from various points of time, some featuring celebrities from her time. The further she dug into the clippings, the more the articles seemed to repeat the same old song: 'worker unrest, corporate control, foreign influence.' Lather, rinse and repeat.

Growing bored, V thumbed down toward the lower shelves.

Fingers skimming past a row of stamped folders and decommissioned data cartridges before settling on a thick, leather-bound album tucked behind a rusted tool kit. Handling wore the rigid edges smooth. Supple leather darkened from contact. V eased the cover open, careful not to tear the spine.

The first few pages were tame enough. Snapshots of mountains, a river, some cityscapes featuring people she couldn't place. In chronological order? Hard to judge. Fading sepia polaroids from when the tech was still a novelty. Some tinted black-and-white stills followed, the kind of posed portraits bearing stoned-faced expressions. V had never quite experienced the physicality tied to photo albums like this one before. Let alone remember seeing them outside a history class. Might've seen them in old vids or holos, but those lacked the texture. An extinct, intimate ritual. She leafed through a dozen more pages. Wanting to pry open every crease and study every face. But what would it give her? Anatoly wasn't exactly forthcoming by himself, and neither did he appear in any of the photos she briefly perused.

She set the album aside with a soft exhale, another thing that didn't belong here.

Her gaze wandered to the far corner of the shelf, where that small, engraved box sat nestled between stacks of manuals and logbooks. It was heavy when lifted, with a smooth, polished exterior and an intricate clasp on the front. Tiny, illegible Cyrillic script flowed along the edges. V placed it on the table and eased it open with care.

She spotted the money first. Paper money, bright, crisp-edged paper, still stacked with care. Redbucks. Good as toilet paper. Mint condition, vacuum sealed. Coins lay beside it as well, each sealed in a protective sleeve. V toyed with the notion, wondering when anyone had last handed over a dime or nickel. During which, she was unable to shake a strange wave of nostalgia. Was it habit or message, this catalogue of outdated curiosities? Her attention shifted to the second stack nestled within. Stamps, preserved in clear plastic sheets. Some bore emblems of far off countries like Namibia, Zambia, China, France and Egypt. V recognised a few stamps from the USA, all depicting American presidents, labelled: Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, Roosevelt. The collection continued, a mix of countries and faces. Intricate detail and meticulous care with which these tiny pieces of adhesive were preserved betrayed a reverence. The odd ones out were Kress, Whindam and Myers, all ex-CEO's turned President. Corporate sellouts which didn't seem to capture the same appreciation.

V's lips curled slightly, eyes lingering on a new, unfamiliar face. Huerta, 2100.

Further down, she spotted something peculiar—a Soviet passport with Anatoly's face and name. That alone would've been odd. Nobody used physical passports anymore, hadn't for decades. But underneath lay the Sakura tree of the Arasaka Corporation, a wax seal imprinting the pages. The back cover held a stapled contract. Black ink on brittle paper. Signed by Saburo Arasaka himself. Shock didn't so much jolt V's body as slow the synapses in her mind into treacle sludge, turning everything sticky-slow as her jaw lowered an inch.

The engine groaned, more arrhythmic than before. A grinding click echoed through the deck plating. Boots on steel grumbled closer.

V snapped the box shut in haste and set it right back where it had been. As a finishing touch, she tucked Pravda against the case, giving no clue anything moved an inch. Scooting post-haste back across the bench to warm her cold hands over the burner, hitting her thigh against the table. Her mind raced through increasingly unconvincing excuses. Cursing internally at the would-be bruise. The door groaned open on tired hinges, admitting the hunched over Russian inside.

"I didn't hire mechanic; hope we don't swim to shore." Anatoly emerged with boots slapping against the linoleum, grease smeared from chin to cuff. He glanced towards the bow where the sun hadn't dared yet rise, casting an icy, bluish glow across the swells ahead.

Her back tensed; shoulders curling inward on instinct when turning towards Anatoly. Stance softening as their eyes met, a tight smile tugging at her mouth.

"It's fine." The words came easy. Trust didn't.

"For now. Boilers need replacing, the gauges lie, and pumps leak more than they flush," he waved around the screwdriver, scratching his scalp with it.

A teapot rattled in his second hand as he moved to fill the samovar from a nearby bottle. "I'll make tea."

"Tea?"

He huffed. "You haven't had tea before?"

"O'course I did!" V said, lifting her chin as she watched him stoke the fire with practised ease.

"I don't mean American dishwater." He set the pot aside, reached for a cracked coffee jar, and shook out a pinch of loose-leaf over the tea bags. The mix hit the base of a smaller pot with a dry hiss. "Proper tea, from samovar."

"What's a samovar?"

"Samovar—this," he patted the metal vessel now humming as the water began heating, its sides dented and scratched. It combined boiler and urn elements, possessing a bottom spout and a chimney-like top. Old brass fittings lined the edges and dulled fine with age. Ornaments in intricate copper scrollwork adorned its centre.

He levelled an eye on her. "Hope you like the black stuff."

She looked away. "I'm picky, but...

"Let me guess, fizzy sugar-water. Or maybe office coffee?" Anatoly asked.

V smirked a little, rubbing her arms as a gust of cold air snuck through a crack in the window seals.

"Tequila, soda, coffee, beer, whatever wasn't liable to poison me." You weren't spoilt for choice when you didn't know what was in your drink.

"Tequila. You, a big drinker?"

"Not unless I had a good reason."

"Kha!" He pressed the samovar's lid shut with the back of his knuckle, a thread of amusement threading through his voice. "You're in the motherland now, devushka! Reasons come easy."

V tracked his hands as he moved about the small galley, gathering a mug and a spoon. Anatoly hummed an off-key melody while he worked, tapping the spoon against his thigh. In a fruitless endeavour, he snagged a towel from the hook, rubbing at the stains along his cheek.

"Where are we heading?" she asked, watching as he tossed a handful of crushed black leaves into the pot.

They hadn't spoken, not since they had climbed down into the sewers. They didn't exchange pleasantries, and his lips remained zipped tighter than hers for miles to follow.

"Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky."

"Never heard of the place." Her teeth nibbled on her bottom lip as the words rolled out in clumps.

"It's at the edge of the world," Anatoly said, matter-of-factly. "Isolated, cold, bit like a poor Alaska." The samovar thrummed as the water began to boil, steam rising in a thin ribbon.

"So," V ventured, "this boat really yours?"

Anatoly didn't look up. "I stole it fair and square."

V leaned back into the bench, legs crossed, and hands warming up. Fragrant. Unexpected, given the state of everything else aboard the 'Anatoly Express'. He busied himself with cleaning the two least crummy cups while the tea brewed. A minute passed, the boat still swaying on the waves. He tapped the spout once, twice, watching the first few drops fall into the dented tin. Steam curling around his knuckles.

"How's your head?" he asked.

She brushed a stray strand of hair behind her ear. "Better than yesterday."

The boat creaked in agreement, pitching and yawing as it rode through a swell. V braced with a foot to keep from sliding across the bench. Anatoly, for his part, seemed unaffected. He moved with the motion, almost dancing around the confined galley. In hindsight, the access and familiarity with Mikoshi made more sense now. She wished to delve deeper, questioning him on the photos, stamps and their link to "Altercourse". Actually forget that, under any other circumstance, gun barrels would've been involved. Why'd he hide away past Arasaka connections?

Sure-fire way to build rapport, she mused. Even if the guy was amiable, admitting she pried on his personal effects would only serve to earn her a slap and a side-eye.

"We gonna talk about what the fuck that was?" V pulled her knees up, arms locking tight around them.

The pot bubbled. Cups rattled in their places—one had an image of a cartoon fish with Xs for eyes and a corny slogan 'Get Nauti.'

"What about?"

V's brows furrowed. "The part where you blew up an apartment block? I dunno, maybe start there?"

Anatoly looked at her then. No signal crossed his features. He held her stare, but something in him moved outward, tracing the ocean's far line.

"You don't burn the weeds," he said, gaze steady. "You salt the earth. Make sure nothing grows back."

Great. Riddles. "The hell does that mean?"

"Hell means Altercourse." His mouth tightened. "Subsidiary under Arasaka. They specialise in memory architecture, containment, identity replication. You were their property, V. We breached site, pulled you out. But they responded fast, found Vera. With a trail to follow, we'd never be rid of them. So," he said, thumb and forefinger cocked like a trigger, flicking them outward, "boom."

V snorted, her eyes rolling back. "Altercourse. I'll be hearing a lot more of that name, huh?"

The name meant little, but its connotations were clear enough. Another layer of obfuscation. Some dotted line invariably leading back to the decision she made aboard the space station. Convinced she could trust Hanako, relinquishing control over her psyche, no better than a coin toss.

"Yes, we established this."

"What's so special about me? Out of all people. I'm nobody, no one that matters. Some merc, overplayed her hand, got what was coming." Some merc who threw it all away so she could lick the boot soles of corp-rats. V still had her pride. Even if it was a bitter one.

"Ah, you ask difficult questions." Anatoly peered into the mug of tea now sitting in front of him, his reflection rippling on the dark surface.

She couldn't help but feel a pang of irritation at the whole situation. The deeper she dug, the more the ground gave way beneath her.

"Ain't those the most interesting?" She set the cup down harder than needed.

Anatoly shook his head dismissively. "I'm sure you're used to living with a few mysteries."

"Well, not this one."

She stared out of the window, dark waters lapping against the hull. It was a daunting sight, vast, deep, and empty.

The samovar finished its murmuring, steam easing from the spout. With an almost reverent touch, Anatoly reached forward, twisting the valve with care. A rich, earthy aroma filled the cabin, the scent of something ancient and potent. He didn't look up as he poured the tea in his cup, swirling like liquid obsidian. Then, without hesitation, offered it to V. She took it, the tin warm in her hands, a slight tremor running down her arm.

"With you being, pardon the pun, fish out of water." He poured another for himself, a few drops splashing onto the table. "You're probably wondering what comes next. And I can't promise answers, at least not to ones that matter most. But I can put food on the table."

"Meanin'?"

He stirred his tea, the spoon clanking against the mug's sides. "I can tell you, or show you. Ruminate on the past, V. We're not in a rush."

V wrapped her hands tighter around the tin, feeling the warmth seep into her skin. "Okay."

Anatoly stood, mug in hand, then turned towards the controls. He toggled a few switches, adjusted the bearing on the autopilot. The sea outside was black glass, the moonlight catching the peaks of the waves as they rolled past. He leaned over the console, his breath fogging against the cold glass. His face lit blue in its hue, then amber by the instruments' lamps.

Little remained to discuss. Be it emotion or instinct. They pointed her back there, to what felt familiar. But Night City was far removed now, chewing up its own kind, leaving only an ache in V's back. Running home made little sense with Altercourse and Arasaka circling. Eighty-eight years had passed. Whatever stood where the city once was, she wouldn't know it. Street cred gone. Contacts wiped. Nothing in the account. No clue who held power anymore. She doubted her body or mind would last another pass through the meat grinder. Any thought of return fell apart the moment she admitted the truth. Until she could face Arasaka directly, she wasn't going anywhere. Not without a plan. And the means.

Night stretched thin; morning unfurled as a gradual lightening of the horizon, a grey, misty dawn creeping through the frosted over windows. The trawler plodded through swells and dips, pitching, rocking with each wave, an ever-present creak in the bulkhead. V had dozed on the table at some point, head propped between her forearms, hair falling in loose, eyes gummy. Anatoly, on the other hand, seemed as fresh as a spring lamb, whistling tunes whilst spinning a screwdriver around his knuckles. He paced around the wheelhouse, adjusting this, fiddling with that, keeping their course steady. An hour ago, the radio had popped to life with static, followed by a clipped exchange between Anatoly and another speaker. The conversation was brief, in gibberish Russian, but he'd nodded and set the throttle to 'all ahead flank' afterward.

"V," he called, tapping his boot against the table leg.

Sunlight broke the horizon as she lifted her head, squinting into it.

"Yeah?"

"Awake?"

"As can be," she said, fingers pressing into her eyelids.

"Get ready."

"For what?" She stretched, jaw wide, in a slow yawn.

"Docking."

Her brain stalled for a moment. The phrasing hit sideways, a giggle welling in her throat. It was still early.

Anatoly straightened up, adjusted his sea cap, and looked past her. "Rotten youth." The words slipped out quiet, almost tired.

She stood, stretching, joints cracked with a dry snap. Bit sore after sleeping half-propped, half-bent across a table. Her fingers traced the outline of the window seal, ice crystals frosting over the panes, fractals branching outward like tiny trees. Slathered in fog, jagged white peaks emerged, jutting out of the landscape, their summits obscured by low-hanging clouds. As the boat drew nearer, she could make out details across the coastline: rust-flecked pylons rose from the sea like the spines of some submerged animal. Concrete jetties slouched under their own weight, bowing toward the water. Shipping containers formed crude walls along the pier, stacked two, sometimes three high with faded brands peeling, tarpaulins roped down in loose, careless knots.

Some of the container siding had been carved into, reshaped—jagged weld lines stitched window frames where none belonged, and smoke curled from makeshift vents. Others were blackened from fire or blown open at the seams, spilling out torn netting, old metal, things too ruined to scavenge. The trawler slowed, nudged forward by currents more than the engine. The crane ahead was tilted, long arm hanging limp over a decommissioned freighter with its stern collapsed into the waterline. The vessel's name had been scorched off or weathered to illegibility. Only its draft marks remained. To port, a barge rested with one end upturned onto a sandbar, frozen in its own tipping point. Lines had once tethered it to something; now they trailed like wet hair into the shallows.

Anatoly killed the engines with a sharp lever pull. "We're lucky. This isn't an icebreaker. Strait's usually frozen solid by December."

He steered them through, easing the boat between moored trawlers and fishing boats, letting momentum limp towards the starboard pier. Their boat gurgling as it glided into stillness, tapping against the fender. Squat rectangular buildings huddled against the hillside, boarded-up windows covered in graffiti. Some warehouses had collapsed, roofs crumbled and buckled under the weight of ice.

"Petropavlovsk, V. V, Petropavlovsk."

"Charmed." V pulled her jacket tighter around her shoulders, breaths hung in a dense mist.

Snow crusted the edges of the pier, windblown and clumped, iced over in patches. Faint footprints and heavy scrapes marked the concrete; signs of habitation were present amongst the desolation. Beyond the port, she could make out more buildings scattered across the waterfront hillside, lights twinkling in the gloom. It all seemed so serene; nothing stirred except for the occasional gust of wind.

Anatoly pulled up on a small hatch cover by his feet, flipping it open. Inside was a toolbox, its contents arrayed in tight rows: every bill crisp, every pouch labelled. He knelt beside it, digging through the compartment, taking out a sagging duffel bag and various bundles of money tightly bound with elastic bands. He counted them twice before stowing them.

He tossed the bag to V, who caught it, the rubberized outer layer crinkling as her fingers wrapped around it.

"What's this?" she asked.

With the words "peace offering," he slammed the hatch shut. "We're going to need that."

V's brows knitted together. "For who?"

No response. Anatoly just barreled through the door, shoulder first, the wind screaming past. The cold struck like a thrown sheet of glass. He was already stomping on deck by the time she'd followed suit.

"Let's go." He pulled the bowline from its cleat with a practiced twist and flung it hard onto the quay, moving fast. The rope slapped against wet concrete as he moved. He paced to the stern, boots thudding over metal, wind dragging at his trench. The stern line was knotted tight—he worked it loose, looped it twice around the post, then locked it with a hard cinch. The boat jolted slightly as tension held. Anatoly checked it once, gave it a final tug, then turned and gestured for her to follow.

"Here." Anatoly pointed at an old stepladder welded onto the hull's side and pried off an ice shelf clinging on. "Watch your step. It's slippery."

V slung the duffel bag over one shoulder and hopped across the deck. Her boots thudded against the rung, felling her muscles tense involuntarily as she descended, hands gripping tight against the cold steel. Wind bit her cheeks; the frosty air stinging her nose and throat as she took shallow breaths, trying not to breathe too deeply and trigger a coughing fit.

She reached the bottom of the ladder and stepped off onto the pier, boots crunching in compact snow. The air reeked of CHOOH2—sharp and sour, like spilt grain liquor cut with solvents. Pungent. It made her nose wrinkle, and her mouth taste metallic. Silence pressed, broken solely by ice scraping and rigging clanking as she surveyed her surroundings. A few cars lay about in various states of disrepair; a couple had been cannibalised for parts, whilst others had their tyres slashed, windscreens smashed. No sign of any owners, at least not recent ones.

Anatoly landed behind her, snow squealing as he spun round, kept walking, eyes on a workshop at the far end of the compound. Lights shone through boarded-up windows, throwing long shadows across the carpark, the sign hanging lopsided above the roller door. A scuffed logo which she couldn't read, shaped like a car badge. The concrete was stained black, and a few chunks of metal scrap lay scattered around the entrance.

"Who're we meeting here?" she called out, struggling to keep pace. The bag bumping into her thigh.

"The crew," Anatoly said loud enough to carry, not breaking stride. Cradling the toolbox in his armpit.

V didn't know what exactly that entailed, but she hurried after him, pulling her collar higher. Her legs were already tiring from trying to navigate through the dents in the ground filled in by snowdrifts, boots slipping on patches of ice.

They crossed the carpark and came up to a side entrance of the garage, metal door painted dark green, set flush into the wall with a thick security chain hung through its handle, padlock fastened tight. Anatoly tried to thumb the keyhole, then stopped short. Nothing lay where the mechanism should have slotted.

"Pizdec nahuy, what is this? Modern security measures?" Anatoly spat, kicking the lock with his heel before giving it a hard yank. It didn't budge. "Fuck's sake."

V shivered, teeth chattering. She blew into her palms, trying to warm them.

"Open up, debil! Lev, this wouldn't keep out the fucking rats!" He slammed a fist against the door, then turned away, pacing around like a caged wolf.

V eyed him, her eyes darting between him and the surrounding buildings. "They know we're here?"

"They know." He tugged his cap down lower.

The lock fell off without a sound, tumbling onto the concrete. V flinched back as it popped open.

"But they love to annoy me," he slipped the chain free and yanked the door open.

Stepping inside after Anatoly, she felt the temperature rise, her skin prickling, cheeks flushed pink as they thawed out. V dumped the duffel on the floor, hands stiff as she flexed her fingers.

"Wow." She tilted her head. "Great vibe."

"Welcome to the periphery, V. Population: us." Anatoly led the way through, pushing the door inside.

The heat inside didn't warm so much as soften the cold, leaking from a patched radiator in the corner that clicked like a dying insect. The foyer was narrow and half-lit, the floor layered in melting snow, boot tracks, cigarette ash. A poster curled away from the walls: faded paper advertising something illegible, ripped and defaced. An old vending machine stood to one side, empty except for a single packet of peanuts. It emitted a dull electrical tone, regular and subdued. Hooks lined the wall, holding up jackets in varying states of wear and tear. A metal staircase wound upwards along one side, with a single window facing outwards.

Across from them, an ajar door beckoned them further within.

He strode in like he owned the place, stomping away the wet snow caked into his soles. V trailed behind him, entering a space that had once been part of the shop floor. Clear from the ceiling tracks, power conduits or the overhead crane now serving as a chandelier draped in old bulbs. But the machines were gone, replaced by mismatched furniture ranging from plastic chairs to crusty couches and armchairs. Folding tables dotted about with ashtrays overflowing onto the surface. The bar itself was solid wood, old and uneven, lacquer chipped along the edges, stained darker in the places where regulars leaned. Someone had tried to sand it once but gave up halfway through. Behind it, shelves upon shelves of liquor bottles set with obsessive precision against the mirror. The counter was clean, though, wiped down with care.

A bartender stood behind, wiping down a glass, back towards them. Presumably the one called Lev. Eyes glued to the overhead flatscreen, volume low, news scroll passing along the bottom. The picture quality was to be desired, a bit too saturated. V could see him chewing, jaw grinding away as he watched. The bald man turned to acknowledge their presence with a curt nod. Narrow across the shoulders, quite a wiry fellow. Deep wrinkles etched around his eyes and mouth. A scar ran downwards from his left cheekbone, cutting a groove through his stubble. His chrome forearm caught a dull glint from the bar light, its plating scratched.

Anatoly pulled his hat off, shaking out loose flakes from his collar. "Roll call!" He slammed the toolbox onto the counter and dropped himself onto a stool.

Lev didn't even flinch, flipping the glass upside down and setting it aside. Wordlessly wiping another from the drying rack, sporting that thousand-yard stare.

"What, no kiss?" Anatoly said, grinning like it cost him nothing.

Lev snorted in reply but made no comment.

"Hello to you too, cyka." Anatoly's tone curdled. "Where are the rest?"

From within, a voice called out. "Over 'ere."

V glanced over her shoulder. In the far corner, a young man sat slouched in a low chair, posture loose, arms draped across the back as he stared at a chessboard in front of him. One leg was crossed, boot tapping against a crate serving as the table. His face was unreadable, pale under the room's yellow light. Tousled brown hair fell over his brow, his jacket scuffed with grease stains, cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth.

"Tsk," Anatoly clicked his tongue, turning his attention to the bartender once again. "What's crawled up your ass?"

"A tebe chto, lyubopytno?"

"English, Lev. We have guest."

Lev ignored him at first, repeating the motion of drying and flipping glasses upside down, one by one. He let the breath drag out of him, eyes flickering. Attention finally settling on his uninvited guest lingering in the doorway. "I was enjoying an illusion of solitude, of peace."

He set the current glass down and placed his hands flat on the bar top, staring straight ahead. Meeting Anatoly's gaze just long enough to dismiss it. "But then, I find out you've compromised your mission. Got Vera killed, dragged a stray back, alerted Altercourse, blew up their retrieval team." He ticked off each transgression with his fingers, the chrome digits whirring on every count.

"And?" Anatoly shrugged, leaning back on the stool.

"And?" Lev echoed. "This complicates things."

"It wouldn't have mattered how we parted ways," Anatoly said.

"You've exposed our interests to them. Which is bad enough, but your stunt bumped us right up their priority list."

Lev wasn't talking out of his ass. Anatoly ripped the asset out, made sure everyone saw it. Of course they'd retaliate.

"Getting cold feet?" Anatoly let out a dry breath, flicking a hand toward the seated man. "What about Kusma? He's not whining like you."

"He doesn't give a shit."

He glanced over at the younger man. "Nothing new there, granted."

The man named Kusma smirked as he took another drag, bleeding smoke out his nose.

"So I'm the liability," V cut in, arms crossing. It felt weirdly better to say that aloud than letting it stew.

"No," Anatoly said. "Lev has a habit of pressing on open wounds. Instead of owning up to his mistake—because who could've seen it coming—Vera was a walking red flag from the start. This isn't a place for people who want to help."

Lev's jaw flexed, but for better or worse, he didn't dare interrupt the boss man.

Anatoly didn't blink. "She was a fearful, menopausal woman, without children, and inexperienced with weapons; easily overwhelmed. Vera's biggest adversity in life was a deadbeat boyfriend and alcohol. And what does Lev do? Fills her skull with dreams of espionage and adventure that she can play revolutionary too!"

"A nurse, Anatoly." He gestured at him with a shake. "Was a nurse. If I recall, you needed her on-site for medical. You don't get to decide how this works." He jabbed at the air, "you want to set the rules, take it to the high table."

"I'm done with the table. It keeps dipping to one end."

He sucked in air through his nose, nostrils flaring. "You think you got it so figured, huh? Fucking everything up, letting me hold the bag. Mudak."

The argument flew over V's head like a kite on the wind. She eyed Kusma, seeking clarification. But lost the board's gaze, the young man seemed withdrawn.

"Kha! You run a church shelter, Lev." His voice bone-dry, face hardening. "Don't give me this lone crusader spiel, it's embarrassing you."

"What'd I ruin? You've nothing to ruin. Does—does your pride hurt? Are you sad Vera died? One less drunk for your herd?" He paused, his lip curling in derision. "Ooh no—no. No. You're angry I was the one to call her worthless. To make tough calls, see who's bait and who isn't. While you get to pour drinks, except when I'm asking!" He hammered a fist on the counter, knuckles rapping.

V flinched. She wasn't expecting a screaming match first thing upon entering. It felt premature, before the whole 'hi-ho introductions, how are ya' shtick wore off.

"Now!" His voice hit like a whipcrack. "I'll say it again. Roll call. Where is the good doctor? Where is Vasiliy? Where is that cretin, Novosel?" As the questions grew more aggressive. Lev bristled, but didn't say a word, keeping his gaze fixed ahead. "Is the bastard so hungover that he can't pull himself from his early grave?"

"Vasiliy is out on an errand." Lev said.

"What for?"

"I'm not privy to that information."

Anatoly clasped his hands together. V's neck muscles tightening further at his increasingly condescending tone. "Kusma." The young man glanced over at Anatoly brows raised in an unspoken question. "Where are the others?"

Kusma took another long drag of his cigarette before answering. A soft, raspy sound escaped his lips. "Doctor's in debtors' prison. So to speak. Won't come out his clinic."

"And Novosel? I'd rather hear from him. He doesn't talk back with a mouthful of vodka."

"Aboard his ship. Sleeping. Drinking. I dunno. Said he'd only talk to you, said you should visit him."

Anatoly leaned closer to the bar, squinting at the man behind it. The bill would come due.

"Sorokin," he ground out.

"My absence was brief. For good or bad, I consider you my deputy. We've known each other for... how long?" His tone softened; there was a warmth creeping in. "Seven—no! Eight years. You're a stubborn bastard, and you'll do things your own way, regardless. But you're telling me you can't reel in three."

He threw up three fingers, announcing it with a mock-grandeur fit for a play. "Three men!"

"We've had setbacks."

Anatoly by this time was grinning, despite the visible vein running along the temple.

"Oh! Setbacks. Hm. Da-da. The worst setback was your own negligence. You're like a drawbridge, no wonder everyone walks over you."

Lev's face darkened. He took the final glass, setting it before himself; then he checked the screen again. It filled the silence, displaying news clips, the picture distorted. V wasn't really watching. Just letting it run in the corner of her eye. Unwanted background noise filled the room she wished to leave; a senseless rant filled her ears.

"Listen you—"

The audio, barely audible, was lost within static. The newscaster—painted lips, pink synthetic blouse—stood framed by a backdrop of revolving flags and flickering ticker numbers. Her voice was modulated into perfect neutrality, sharp on consonants, warm on vowels, polished to the point of artificiality. Behind her, footage stuttered: armoured convoys, orderly crowds, an explosion blurred underneath a Ministry watermark. More footage. Fire. Then medical tents. Then charts. The pattern repeated: up and down, up and down. Bureaucratic rhythms of war, the drones of logistics, and then the same footage, recycled. It played like a carousel, mindless around and round, until it felt almost normal. V couldn't understand a word of it. Watching on, like one might a hypnotising ceiling fan. Could've been Pacifica, Warsaw, Rio, didn't matter. She saw it play out all before. Policy dressed as empathy, compassion in the form of crackdowns. The universal language of power. Who picked the clips, why repeat it ad infinitum?

The absurd barrage of disaster porn with an abrupt shift to commercials snapped her out.

She stopped paying attention to the argument a while ago. It dulled in her head like radio static. Voices raised, tinny and directionless. Everything in the room briefly became momentarily blurred. V shifted her weight from one foot to the other, soles skimming the concrete floor. Drifting over to Kusma's corner. The chessboard was warped plywood, the pieces were different sizes, different stains. He was hunched forward, chin cupped in his hands, didn't bother to look up when she approached.

"Hey."

He acknowledged her with a slight tilt of his head, a hum deep in his throat.

"This a private party?" she asked, pulling herself onto a rickety wooden stool by the side.

His tongue pressed against the inside of his cheek, eyeing up his white rook. He reached down, adjusting it a few millimetres on its square, then resumed studying.

"Join if you dare." V watched Kusma's fingers hover over a bishop, then retreat.

Romeo and Juliet kept at it, pivoting towards their mother tongue, gestures more explicit. The cadence of Lev's voice reminded her of Johnny. It lacked the rock star flamboyance though, and his temper seemed to have a much longer burn. Yeah, the good ol' days. She hadn't known how to process her nostalgia for daily migraines, nags about committing suicide, and the threat of impending death. It was a hell of an incentive to stay on course. He'd be chewing non-existent smokes, firing off quips as she'd wade through the shitshow, gawking at all the wrong turns taken, the wrong choices made, and the wrong people followed. A real party in the backseat.

"What's their problem?" she asked, glancing towards the bar.

Kusma's eyes never left the chessboard. "Don't sweat it. They've missed each other; the occurrences get rarer with age."

"How do they usually solve squabbles? Rock, paper, scissors?"

Her quip elicited an amused, twitchy smirk. "You're not far off."

Kusma leaned over the board, eyes fixed like the pieces might shift if he blinked. She looked too. V wasn't any good at chess; she understood the basics but could never get beyond that. V found his gaze disquieting, his pupils wide, leaving thin circles of pale green. His expression was placid but focused, the creases at his forehead were deep.

She side-eyed him. "You playing or communing?"

"Trying to."

"Trying to play or commune?"

"Both." Kusma rotated the cigarette between his fingers. The filter was moist. He'd smoked it down to the nub, heat stinging as the tip glowed red.

V drummed a beat with her fingernail. "Need a second player?"

"Already have one. Anatoly told me that the opening move makes it my last, picked the black set then fucked off for a few months."

V leaned back, crossing arms. "I don't understand."

A slight shoulder twitch was the man's only reaction. He inhaled the final bit of his cigarette before discarding it in the ashtray. Fingers patting against his temple. "Mmm, perhaps for the best," Kusma didn't elaborate.

"It's another one of his mind games. Keeps me busy is all."

He pushed back from the crate to stand, the chair's legs scraped with a weak protest. He offered a bandaged hand, a loose end dangling from his palm.

"Kusma Pogrebov," he announced in that peculiar accent, sounding every inch an American up until pronouncing his name.

"V." She took his hand, gave it a single, measured shake. "Yeah," she said. "Seems that way."

Chapter Text

The hours dripped away. Sunlight leaked through the planked-up windows in thin blades, dust swirling around like lazy snow. It caught an empty glass and an unfinished bottle on the low table, their twin shadows crawling across the floorboards. A spoon glimmered where it had fallen, flashing each time the sunbeam inched.

V sprawled sideways on a bunk that smelled of old sweat and older detergent, blanket hauled to her nose, bare feet dangling off the edge. From the next room came the steady rhythm of someone's private routine—creak, thump, creak, thump. Every impact sent a faint tremor through the frame, syncing with the pulse in her temples. Getting up felt optional; thinking, unfortunately, did not. The brain insisted on another round of What-If Roulette. Evelyn Parker, bright with secrets. Jackie, hands wide, promising big leagues. Dex's greed. Padre's crumbs. All those forks in the road, none of them led here.

Yet here she was. Not like she ever had a steering wheel. Just the crash, neat as hell.

What if? What if.

She pressed her fingers into the bridge of her nose and told the voices to pipe down. They obeyed, for once, leaving behind a quiet so complete it became its own weight. She tried counting heartbeats; got bored at forty-three. Tried tracing patterns in the peeling wallpaper. Nothing helped.

The sunlight inched on, brushing the bottleneck, making it glow like warm amber. She imagined Jackie tilting one just that way while bragging over homemade tacos. He'd called her names, "hermana", or "chica" with a grin that made the whole dump feel golden. Everyone in that orbit was gone now, or so distant that eighty-plus years might as well have been the bullet to her head.

She exhaled through clenched teeth, pinching the inner corners of her eyes.

"Perspective," she said, still staring at the ceiling, voice pitched dry.

Perspective has a nasty habit of arriving after the exit ramp. Still, you kept running. That's what Jackie would say. Anyway, lying here wouldn't reverse time or pull a bullet from a dead woman's skull.

The thumping next door stopped. A familiar commotion took its place: someone whistling, off-key but determined. Had to be Anatoly. The man woke up whistling, carried on like the world's punchline was a secret only he knew. Annoying, yes, but grounding. Better a human noise than the clatter in her own head.

She swung her legs off the bunk. One foot, then the other. First mission of the day: find running water, maybe hot. Second mission: figure out what a woman does with a century-old grudge and a body that isn't hers.

The door swung inward with a tired creak.

She started to rise—

"V."

—her head swam and she sat back down fast, feet skimming the floor.

"You decent?" Anatoly asked, one shoulder wedged into the opening.

"Yeah," she rasped, voice gravelled from sleep.

He stepped inside, sleeves rolled, suspenders hanging loose, hair slicked but already escaping in soft grey strands at the temples. Rumpled charisma in motion. His gaze swept the barracks—dusty bunks, limp blankets, that lonely bottle on the crate—before coming to rest on her.

"Ah, I see Kusma's first instinct was to bring the damsel straight to bed," he said, amusement crackling in every syllable.

"God." She dragged both palms down her face, peeling off a groan. "No more dad jokes, please."

He barked a bright laugh, then crossed to the opposite cot and dropped onto it. The old springs squealed in protest. Leaning forward, forearms on his knees, he framed a rectangle in the air and examined her through it.

"Right. How about a close-up with a slow zoom on the heroine's morning face?"

"Very fucking unenthusiastic. Zero outta ten. Camera off."

"I see, I see, that won't do! You're going to ruin the ratings."

V snorted, her eyes tracking a stray moth in the rafters, its wingtips brushing against cobwebs. She didn't feel entitled to jokes—certainly not to the casual patience Anatoly kept pressing into her palm like spare change. It grated, but not enough to make her mount a sermon. Soapboxes were his pastime, not hers.

"Why so melancholic?" he asked. "You're in the land of alcoholic."

"Pretty sure Russians don't hold a monopoly on liquor or misery."

"Yes, true. But in Kamchatka, we've built a foundation on both." His tone went sly. "That said, you still look like the before photo."

She was undignified, somewhere between hungover and roadkill. Sweat-flat hair, jumpsuit fused to clammy skin, pores shouting mutiny. The sour musk of rancid tank fluid, and dried up grease wrapped around her as if it were cling film. She replied with a languid eye-roll, fingers combing through the bird's nest atop her head.

"You just cruisin' by to bust my chops?"

"Among other things." He shifted, one brow raised. "We've practicalities to settle."

"Such as?"

"Help I can give you. Help you can return." He sliced a hand through the air, motioning across the room. "But first, let's civilise. You could use a shower."

Her heart leapt at the thought of real scalding water. The thrill faded quickly however; her eyes drifted to a rust-riddled door, picturing a communal stall with mildewed tiles and dripping taps. The kind where soap scum coated every surface and your feet never touched the floor.

She flicked the grimy jumpsuit with two fingers. "This thing's a biohazard, could do with fresh threads."

Anatoly gave a theatrical sigh. "I dread the days when women ask me to pick their wardrobe. Measurements? Inseam? Bust size? All beyond me."

"Cut the act, smartass." She nudged him with her boot. "I don't care if I'm decked out in potato sacks, I can't wear this shit anymore."

"Okay." He tapped his chin, squinting. "But we don't abound with bespoke tailors here, or any for that matter. You're stuck with the second-hand pile, we might find a potato sack yet."

"Nothing fancy. Nothing floral. No skirts."

He pressed two fingers to an invisible oath over his heart. "I'm not taking you to the prom, V."

"If it sparkles, I'm torching it."

He winked. "No need to glamour. Would take true talent to hide beauty such as yours."

"Uh-huh."

"But you shall appear plain—bland as porridge."

"That's the idea."

"Boring like brick," he persisted. "Utterly forgettable. I wouldn't waste a second glance."

"I get the picture."

"It will be hard to believe you were ever belle of any ball," he finished, triumphant.

"Are you done? Or do I need to charge by the insult?"

He scratched his chin, feigning contemplation. "A woman in a hurry? Must be my lucky day."

"Jesus—"

He broke into wheezy laughter. "Okay, okay! It's too easy anyway."

This was her new life: sunrise serenades of half-baked flirtation and onion-scented wit, delivered by a man who'd long outlived subtlety. She hadn't decided how to feel about Anatoly Shults, the "rooskie" ex-spook with an obsession for the vintage. Everything about him felt rehearsed. Easy charm slipped on and off like a jacket. Cards always tight to the vest, yet he dealt them fast enough to dizzy you.

He jerked a thumb toward the barracks' corner, where the narrow steel door gaped a fraction. "Steam if it cooperates, pressure if you bribe it, hot water if you threaten it."

"Noted." She stood—knees wobbling—and shuffled past him. "And my clothes?"

"They'll be waiting, krasivaya."

She wrinkled her nose at lazy endearments, deployed as casually as a cough, always two steps ahead of sincerity. He may not wear a suit, but learned manners suggested otherwise.

Anatoly straightened, gave a soldier's nod, and headed for the corridor. "Holler if the boiler explodes," he called over his shoulder.

"Sure. I'll save you a finger."

"Generous," he shot back, disappearing with that trademark whistle—the off-key tune ricocheting down the concrete hall.

She waited until it faded, then pushed into the wash-room and thumbed the switch. The overhead bulb flared once, surrendered with a sizzle, and left her in slatted daylight leaking through the blinds. No spa day: mottled tile, spider-webbed mirror, a single towel folded with suspicious care. But there was a working showerhead, a sink, and a lid that actually stayed up. Luxury enough.

V twisted the tap. The pipe coughed up the colour of tea, then bled clear, steam curling with a faint hint of iron tablets. She eased a knuckle under the flow, waited for warmth, and began peeling the jumpsuit away. Like snake shedding skin—crackling at the seams, leaving chalky grit on her flanks. She kicked it into the nearest bin and faced the mirror.

A stranger stared back. Shoulders narrower than she remembered, clavicles too sharp, breasts set higher—almost sculpted rather than grown. No dermal ports, no tattoo coils; the skin was newborn smooth, unnaturally uniform. A ghost-map of lines showed where nutrition feeds had pulsed into her in the tank: pale, almost opalescent, spiralling across her ribs. She prodded one hip without tenderness. V arms and flexed hollow biceps. Tried balling fist. Tendons flicked like piano wire—weak, but precise. They'd built this body asymmetrically perfect. Human in a streamlined sense, making it seem counterfeit.

She smoothed the damp fringe off her forehead and tested expressions. The face followed old muscle memory, but something in the eyes looked fresher. Gene-bright. Almost glassy.

Was she supposed to mourn what came before? She wasn't sure. Maybe this whole deal was the closest thing to immortality: an eternity do-over. A brand-new face, a blank slate, ready for mistakes you thought were learned already. She was twenty-three again and it didn't matter.

She stopped thinking and stepped into the shower.

Misty dawn pressed a flat grey lid over Petropavlovsk. Fog stood chest-high on the road and only pulled apart when the UAZ's headlights pushed trenches through it. Few locals risked the cold at that hour; the handful who did stayed buried in doorway shadows, cigarettes glowing like tiny coals. The city rolled past in muted colours—factory shells, boarded workshops, hotel frames poured halfway and then abandoned. It looked like someone copied Pacifica and forgot to add the paint.

"Blin, slow it down," Anatoly said from the passenger seat, a folding paper map snapping in his hands.

The windshield took a slap of muddy slush. Kusma kept one palm light on the wheel, steering around craters instead of over them. "Relax. The suspension's older than Lenin. She likes a little dance."

"Next intersection," Anatoly said, eyes still on his grid. "Hard left, then third right by the kiosk."

"Got it." Kusma tapped the turn signal. Mirrors, rooftops, alleys—his scan never stopped. "You know GPS exists, yes? Satellites, AI, the Net."

Anatoly rapped the map with a knuckle. "Paper never needs charging." He folded it with soldier-quick precision and slipped it into his coat.

Kusma kept his eyes on the road. "Paper also blocks my view," he said. "So kindly stop playing at tour guide and watch for speed bumps."

"…NUS forces announce another ceasefire—"

"Boring." Click.

"…People, this is not a game. The government—" Click.

"Get your fill at Pen-Island dot sov—" Click. Anatoly slapped the panel.

"Back-alley sewer stations. No taste."

Kusma didn't look over. "Easy, old man. You'll blow a valve."

In the back seat, V watched their volley like a ping-pong match. A duffel of hardware rested between her boots. She'd stopped trying to decode their banter—it was easier letting them wrangle.

A thin smile twitched in Anatoly's mouth. "Are we there yet?"

"Don't even start."

"What can I say? I like clichés," Anatoly said. "Lost art."

The truck bounced through a deeper pothole, and the glove box spat a knot of cassette tapes onto the floor. Kusma sighed, reached down, and fished one from under the brake pedal. "Talk about lost art—start here."

Anatoly rifled through the cases, each labelled in real pen. "My god! The treasures in this tin can," he said.

They passed the last line of apartment slabs. Ahead, the fog thinned. Low bungalows, chain-link fences, and sodium lamps flickered like dying fireflies, lighting the waterfront approach. Kusma eased the throttle; the engine settled into a low rumble.

"Park close," he said, voice shifting to the business register. "Burak's flat faces the bay. Club's in the basement and he likes regular visits."

V let their checklist float past and replayed the file Anatoly had handed her at the garage.

Burak: half Russian, half Turkish, rejected by each side of his family and later by the Georgian bratva he tried to court. Current résumé—pimp, pill-cooker, petty tax man on the sick and destitute. He'd torched every bridge east of Khabarovsk before sliding into this crumbling shithole. His club squatted under a prefab block that overlooked the harbour. One neon sign, one staircase down, two roided-up watchdogs checking VIP-only credentials. Burak kept to the upstairs flat. When he dropped to the club, he paraded the newest side-piece he'd managed to coerce. Anatoly claimed the man liked "foreign and lost."

Hence today's cover. Anatoly played the middle-aged talent scout, V the fresh import. Show the fish, keep his eyes forward, slide a blade under the ribs. A simple plan for a bottom-tier creep—especially after the Altercourse clusterfuck.

V flexed inside the outfit Anatoly had sourced: black bomber, faded jeans threaded with smart fibre, low boots on tactical soles. A plastic choker, a smear of gloss. She hated how convincingly "new arrival" she looked.

"Smile like you just washed up from Alaska." Anatoly checked his reflection in the mirror.

She produced a grin so strained it felt like her mouth might snap. "Need eyelash batting too?"

"Save it for Burak. If puppy stare works on Kusma, it'll make our mark drool."

The truck rolled to the curb half a block short of the target. Engine off, cabin ticking as metal cooled. Kusma popped the glove box, retrieved a short-barrel pistol, and slid it under his coat.

"Rules," he said. "In. Smile. No weapons drawn until Burak's in arm's reach. Quick, clean, no collateral."

Kusma tilted his chin. "We ghost the flat afterward?"

"Club first. We need a look at the book."

V patted her jacket, tried to feel casual. "If I'm meant to play doe-eyes," she said, "where's my piece?"

"There's plenty of time for that."

Fog drifted around the streetlights, soft as cotton candy and bitter with salt. Across the intersection, sticky neon buzzed weakly over a recessed door. CLUB GOLUB 24HR—some letters burnt out. Two bulked shapes flanked the entrance, jackets fitted over chest armour.

"Beachfront property," V whistled. "Who said crime doesn't pay?"

Kusma nosed the UAZ against a crumpled chain-link panel and killed the ignition. The engine ticked a slow countdown as the three sat watching.

"Five minutes," he said, cracking his door. Fog slid inside like dry ice from a stage rig. "I'll swing round to the service alley. If the house sound drops, give me ten seconds, then stir the pot."

Before Kusma slid out he pressed a bead-sized ear-bud into her palm.

V thumbed it into her left ear; the micro-jack hissed once, then overlaid the car interior with a faint machine whisper—Russian phonemes already queuing as English in her head.

He pulled his cap low, stepped into the haze, and closed the door with a soft click. His boots barely scraped the pavement as he crossed, hands in pockets, shoulders slouched like a labourer coming off shift.

Silence returned. Anatoly used it to shift a last gear in his head. He drew a flat envelope from his coat—heavy vellum threaded with gold fibre, a red wax seal stamped with a bear paw. He tapped it twice against the wheel, then looked back at V.

"Our visa," he said.

V eyed the thing. It looked like it should arrive with a velvet glove and an organ dirge. "That real?"

"Real enough. The wax tells them a bigger bear already signed off. Nobody down here wants to read the fine print."

"And if someone does?"

Anatoly slid it away. "Then you smile wider and I lie faster."

He stepped out first, boots slapping roadside slush. V followed, the chill slicing through her bomber like tissue. Club Golub loomed ahead—nine prefab storeys leaning seaward, rain-polished aluminium sagging like tired skin. A blue-white neon pigeon flickered above the basement mouth, wings stuttering in the current. Two guards waited underneath, their bulk exaggerated by cheap trauma plates under leather dusters; smoked half-visors—cheeks exposed—winked dull red each time their optics recalibrated.

Anatoly's walk shifted into a salesman's lope. Halfway across the pavement, he let the envelope ride high enough for the crimson wax to catch the sodium glare, then dropped his hand to V's lower back, steering her with proprietary ease.

He rubbed his throat, gaze distant. "Foreign. Travel-worn. No one else to turn to."

She pasted on a tremulous smile, let her shoulders slump. "Fresh off the ferry."

Up close, a scent of damp mould and cheap cigarettes emanated from the building. Salt had gnawed pits into the steel lintel; graffiti—wolves, hearts, slurs—bloomed beneath peeling lacquer. The nearer guard straightened, jaw working. Then he saw the seal and lost two shades of colour. His partner hesitated, attention flicking from the envelope to V's face.

"Parcel for gospodin Burak." Anatoly tapped his pocket. "Direct delivery."

That was enough. The wax did the rest. One bouncer pivoted aside; the other unlatched the door and pushed it inward. Stale club air rolled out.

A damp stairwell yawned beyond the bouncers—cement walls sweating tar-dark streaks, LED strips coughing pale light every few metres. Broken vodka minis glittered on the treads; a smeared lipstick kiss glowed against a cracked placard. Down in the shaft's throat, a synth bass kicked, rattling bolts in the railing like loose teeth.

Anatoly led the way. The descent seemed steeper than city code allowed, more ladder than stairs. Artificial fog rolled upward around their ankles, tinted rose by wandering lasers. Sweat, nicotine, and cheap perfume floated on the warm breeze; beneath, a colder note—chlorinated mop-water cut with something metallic—clung to the back of V's throat. The steps spat them into a dim vestibule, where a bored attendant waved a wand that chirped once at Anatoly's envelope, then let them through.

The club proper opened in tiers, every surface fighting for ocular bandwidth. Cracked ferro-concrete columns supported a ceiling so low the haze scraped it. Gilded drapes sagged over plush alcoves; hologram fish swam through their folds, scales winking orange-gold. A low stage dominated the centre-pit. Two joytoys revolved round a chrome pole—skin oiled to mirror gleam, sequins flashing corporate logos when the strobe hit just right. Their hips worked a rhythm as precise as a servo arm while the DJ above thumped a lurid synth line, braindance crown pulsing mood colours across his shaved head.

Patrons packed the floor in concentric eddies: middle-management sleaze, freelance muscle, overdressed wannabe influencers. Wealth here was loud rather than deep—chromed teeth, optic rims scrolling stock tickers, coat linings glowing bioluminescent green. Everyone tried to look like someone's nightmare of success, hoping real predators would take the bait. The air was so thick it felt as though a hand kept palming her face.

Anatoly cut sideways, guiding her along the wall where the crush thinned. He moved with patient authority, one hand at the small of her back, the other flashing the bear-seal envelope whenever a random tough tried to square up. Fear did the rest; doors opened, shoulders slid aside. No questions asked.

They reached a half-moon booth recessed beneath a rusted mezz-rail with a prime sightline to both stairs and stage. A brass tag read RESERVED / НЕ ТРОГАТЬ. Anatoly flicked it onto the floor and folded himself into the velvet like a man visiting his own living room.

V took the aisle seat. From here she could watch the joytoys cycle through another piston-smooth routine, track the balcony where private rooms waited, clock the exit signs—one behind the bar, one beside the toilets—plus the door they'd come in. The bass rolled under her boots, steady as artillery. Different postcode, same script. This could be any dive, from Dogtown to Watson.

"How's the stage fright?" he asked, not bothering to look at her.

"Prickling." She drew a breath through her teeth.

"Forget it. Nothing here is real. Plastic smiles, rented bravado. You're just another veneer." He tipped his chin toward the bar. "And veneers drink. Thirsty?"

Before she could reply, a waitress glided up. Black micro-bob, gold lip stud, eyes blurred with fatigue. She set coasters in place with the smooth precision of a practised magician and waited, lips parted as if expecting a line of praise.

V glanced at the menu, playing the part. "Rested tequila." He gave a small approving nod at her selection, then paged through the flimsy drink list.

"Scotch, neat. If the bottle is older than our hostess, so much the better," he said.

The girl's smile flickered. Insult or compliment—impossible to tell. She pivoted on a spike heel and disappeared into the crowd, shoes clicking time with the synth beat.

Mint-laced pheromone fog drifted from overhead vents, cool against V's throat, carrying a chemical undertone of lust and antiseptic.

"What is this shit?"

"Advertising." Anatoly steepled his fingers. "Empties your conscience, your bank account, and your… load."

He buried a sneeze in his sleeve, cursing incomprehensibly.

"Ugh, like breathing through gym sock," he said, voice muffled.

She studied the floor from behind half-lidded lashes. Dealers anchored corners, thick-necked bruisers guarded corridor mouths, and a knot of men in imported suits orbited an empty leather throne on a dais just off stage-left. Patrons staggered from back rooms every few minutes, clothing wrinkled, eyes glassy, smiles vacant. High on sex or chems—maybe both. The kingdom fed its people well.

Anatoly sniffed, wiped under his nose. "I despise brothels. Shallow people fucking for the shape of the act." Contempt thickened his accent.

"Well, what do you fuck for?"

He considered, index finger stroking the hardened cheekbone. Kept composure despite clear irritation, eyes scanning the crowd.

"Should I even grace such a question? Surely not for fuck's sake."

"I don't know. Seems a good reason to me," she said, rolling her shoulders. "Anyway, what now?"

"We sit," he said, knee knocking hers, chin angled toward the dancers, "and let them smell blood in the water."

Lights strobed pink gold, briefly turning every face into a grinning skull. She lifted her chin, expression blank. Let the hunger show through.

The waitress returned, tray balanced on her forearm, posture stiff despite the effort. A fresh scratch ran down one cheek, eyeliner caked along the edges. She slid the glassware into place, accepted Anatoly's payment, and vanished again without a syllable.

V lifted the tequila. The first mouthful burned in a clean, purposeful way, smoke and agave welding her nerves together. Second swallow unclenched her jaw; third let her lean back into the cushions. She took the fourth slowly, tasting salt, and watched the room tilt sideways. Overhead, the stage remained empty, lights looping across nothing.

Silence dropped as though someone had pulled the main breaker. A spotlight snapped on. A woman strode from the wings in faux-fur epaulettes and sequined elastic, a ringmaster in lingerie. Her voice rolled out through pitch modulators, silky as poured chocolate.

"Good evening, distinguished patrons, ladies. Today we tempt you with—"

Names spilled like candy from her lips—Anastasia, Nina, Kristina, Sveta. Each triggered a holopanel above the crowd: glamour shot, height, likely a discreet STD fine print. The joytoys flowed onstage, swivelling between poles until every woman stood planted before her image, hips, and hands cocked in identical poses.

V thought the stock was local. Until the host rolled out Joanna, Molly, Abbie—globalisation at work. Panels shimmered overhead, stats scrolling past unread. The joytoys filed onstage in threes, fishtailing around the pole, oil lights skating their skin so every pore gleamed.

V sank deeper, arms stretched along the backrest, legs crossed at the ankle. Anatoly nursed his Scotch, eyes amused behind half-lidded lids. An onlooker might see them as a bored couple killing time before an appointment.

The host finished her catalogue, bowed with exaggerated flourish, and the DJ punched up the volume. Low synth kicked in. Audience roared. A beam of violet swept past, painting V's boots; she let her gaze drift, counting exits again, timing the bouncers' sweeps. Underneath the perfume, she detected the copper note of violence. Someone here was going to die even before they showed up.

"Not bad, no? Relax. You're getting spoiled for free," Anatoly said, swirling what remained of his Scotch.

"'M relaxed." V rolled the sweating tequila glass between her palms. "So relaxed I might dissolve."

Stage lights slid from washed-out rose to stabbing the cyan, casting the dancers in hard relief. They moved with dead-eyed efficiency. Their bodies weren't theirs anymore—if they ever had been. Most spun not for show, but because it paid better than gigs, hurt less than hunger, and offered more safety than alley corners. It was a quick route to callous. Soul erosion traded for eddies. And in that moment, V saw too much of herself in them, whoring out violence to put distance between herself and a shallow grave.

V watched for a minute, felt nothing. The spectacle slid off the shell she wore these days, left no mark. What did surface was a flicker of the old her. The version that first strolled into Lizzie's Bar, eye on the mark, zero expectation. Then Judy Álvarez happened—one of one. They hustled, got bust up, patched each other back together. Shared trade, laughter, bruises. Earned some splendid memories, pillow talk, walk the walk. But the longer she sat in it, the further away that version of her felt. V wanted a gun to spray on them too, these people; to splatter those vacant faces on a club just the same. Let them feel what it was to have something sweet and lose it. Fuck their pleasure. And fuck everyone too numb to feel it anymore.

She knocked back the rest of the tequila. The burn didn't erase envy.

"Tch." Anatoly clicked his tongue at the stage. "Look at that form. Choreography is so timid! Do they think the poles might sue?"

"Keep talking and I'll stick you on one," she muttered.

He sipped, unbothered. "Please. I'd clear the place out. You, though—" he leaned in, voice low "you'd bankrupt them by intermission."

"Funny. Don't quit your day job yet."

He gave a mock scowl. "I like you angry, brings out the colour. Something the matter?"

"Nothing I can't fix." She looked away, jaw locked, not wanting to meet his eye.

"Typical. Too hard to please."

The tempo spiked as the act dissolved into the rabble. Hands shot up, eager patrons plucking dancers off the stage and steering them across sticky tiles; an open mind went cheap in here. Others prowled the aisles, fishing for onlooker to pull behind gold-tasselled curtains. Two of them drifted close—insincere come-hithers aimed at V. She answered with a blank blink and the offers slid off. More performers spilled into the circuit, filling gaps in the churn.

Then an unfamiliar figure descended the private balcony stair, and the mood pivoted. Platinum hair so pale it diced the light, swung like a scalpel against the smoke. The rest of her sharpened as she approached: cheeks bevelled, corset cinched to display rather than protect, legs sheathed in lattice stockings that suggested a whip's weave. Nothing casual about the arrangement. Even the rhythm of her walk seemed set to its own metronome, fractionally behind the house beat, forcing the room to notice the lag. Halfway across the floor she ignored three invitations, a bold hand that thought it could snag her waist—until her fingers flicked once, casual as brushing lint, and the man jerked back, knuckles split open in a clean red seam.

She didn't break stride.

Anatoly lifted his glass in a lazy salute that carried more caution than welcome. The blonde's response was microscopic. An almost-nod, the tip of her nose dipping a degree. Stopping just shy of their booth. V caught an expensive scent on her wake, metallic-amber and rich.

For three heartbeats the blonde said nothing, simply inspected them: Anatoly first, measured, filed away; then V, longer, head tilting until her stare turned surgical.

"Shults." She purred the name like it was meant to be licked, stretching the hiss. "And here I thought you'd sworn off company."

Anatoly's eyes tracked up the metric of her legs, paused at the soft swell of hip, then rose to meet her gaze. A mutual audit, but not flirtation. If anything, he looked wary.

"Pressure makes me relapse, Bela."

Her glance slid to V again. "Yours I presume."

"Picked her up on clearance—no miles, fresh paint." He nodded at the stage. "Careful; she might steal your tips."

Bela bared neat carnivore teeth. "Mind if I inspect the stock?" She was already moving in, hips drawing slow parabolas, hands braced on the table's edge. She circled the inside booth, leaning in close enough to catch V's jaw between two fingers and lift it upward, breathing her in like incense. V's shoulders twitched, a reflex she strangled.

"Still smells of bubble-wrap," Bela said, voice sliding between them.

Anatoly's candour didn't waver, nudging V's foot. "She'll age nicely, unlike others."

Fingers dusted V's collarbone, nails grazing the skin just enough to promise blood. "Pretty, if a bit inert." Her hand slid to the choker, thumb stroking the flimsy plastic. V kept absolutely still, not breathing, a prey creature in plain sight. Every sinew shrieked: get her off. "I know what a man thinks is his, but I must beg you—do lend her," she pressed on.

"Think that violates labour rights, no?"

Bela answered with a pout and a shrug. "Let me liven things." She let the rippers show—chrome tips sliding from lacquered sheaths—and trailed them down V's arm. Cloth parted with a whisper; V felt the sting bloom, hot and precise.

"Stand," Bela said.

V remained seated until the grip on her shoulder tightened. Then she rose, unhurried, gaze level and blade-flat.

Bela stalked round her once, fingertips brushing hip, thigh, lower back—appraisal disguised as caress. A hum of vague approval slipped free.

"Not even pawed her yet," Bela said, lifting V's chin with a single nail, pressure flirting with puncture. Her breath teased against her mouth, tasting like honey on top of battery acid.

"It's not his hands I'm worried about," V cut in.

Her lips curled sweet, but her gaze wasn't playing. She scanned V like she'd strip her open with a look, probing for soft spots, anything soft to press on besides skin. V wanted to punch that perfect face and watch it crack like china. Instead, she gave a half-lidded look that said it all: even if you had me figured—I wouldn't care enough to flinch.

"Spirited, even," Bela noted, eyes still on V, and a trace of malice crept in. "If you don't leave a mark—" she turned to Anatoly "—I'll leave one for both of you."

"Then don't bring nails to a gunfight."

With the same hand that had lifted V's jaw, Bela caught a strand of her hair, twining it around two fingers.

"Such a bore," she pouted, leaving V's space.

Bela shifted targets. With two liquid steps she slid onto the bench beside Anatoly, thigh pressed to his, palm skating up his lapel as if she owned the cut of the cloth. V watched her index nail extend—three centimetres of mirror-bright ripper—then retract. The woman leaned in until her mouth brushed the shell of his ear, teeth working on his lobe.

V's hand twitched. She pictured herself reaching over, twisting Bela's arm backward until the socket popped like a match head.

Bela whispered, letting her breath feather Anatoly's ear.

"Thought you missed the thrill of danger."

"You've no idea." His jaw flexed once, a tic beyond conscious control.

Undeterred, she let the nail trail to the knot of his tie, teasing the silk loose a millimetre at a time. The gesture should have read seductive; instead it felt like a locksmith testing tumblers. Anatoly caught her wrist, held it steady, then raised her knuckle to his lips and gave it a quick, courtly peck. The steel under his calm made her blink.

"Hands where you work, Bela." His mouth grazed her skin. "You know my rules."

She tested his grip, found no give, and withdrew with a tiny shrug. "Rules," she echoed, tongue tasting the word as if it were sour. "What if I want you to be my workbench?"

"I don't see you in overalls, love."

"But I've worn worse for worse men."

She reached up, pressed both palms to his jawline. A caress but not quite: one claw-tip rested a hair from his eye, pressing the lid down with gentle insistence. Another hand-span of pressure and the iris would collapse.

"I still remember it," she said, gaze following her own nail. Being a little close for comfort seemed to excite her—Anatoly too, on some level.

"It's not something you can forget, is it Tolya?"

Anatoly reached into his trench coat, unfastened something. His hand came back out holding the narrow envelope, wax seal visible and intact. He held it up, a magician displaying his next card, letting it slide against her cheekbone.

"Unfortunately for you, I have amnesia."

Bela held steady, staring past her finger like a rifle sight, the smile on her lips frozen in place. If the seal surprised her, she didn't show it; if it scared her, she swallowed that too and let her touch glide down, away from his face, onto the paper still held between his fingers. Pinching the upper corner of the vellum she broke eye contact, lifting it into her line of vision.

"Clever," she said. The compliment sounded such as a curse.

"A man's allowed to hedge his bets."

"You are that," she agreed, releasing the envelope, letting her hand trail down the inside of his thigh. Her nails grazed the fabric with enough force to make him flinch—barely, but enough. Then she leaned forward and kissed his cheek, lingering long enough for him to feel the press of teeth behind it.

Anatoly rose in a single, deliberate motion. One hand closed on Bela's elbow, the other on the back of her neck, guiding her sideways like a hooked fish. The pressure was exact—enough to move her, enough to show choice wasn't hers. She let it happen, pupils widening, a small breath escaping as if she enjoyed the bruise-to-be. When he released her, she tested him—raised a clawed hand toward his jugular, all theatre. His palm intercepted, rotated her wrist a quarter turn: a painless lock that promised worse.

Her lips parted out a noise equal parts delight and restraint.

"Still keeping score?" she asked, hungry for more.

"Door's that way."

Her pout was breathy, mocking. "Tsk. Still no fun."

"You mistake my leniency," Anatoly said, his grip loosening without losing weight.

Bela's eyes flicked past him, toward V. A quick recalibration. Then she leaned in close, letting the envelope still trapped between them crinkle against Anatoly's coat. "She's going to disappoint you," she whispered. "They always do."

She smiled like she'd scored a point, glided her fingers across his chest and shoulders, tracing the fabric with the same rippers she'd used to tease, threaten, tempt. She could have drawn blood in half a breath—but didn't. Instead, she let her hand slide up the side of his neck, adjusted the collar of his shirt with an intimacy that should've belonged to someone else.

"I like this on you," she said, more to herself than to him.

Anatoly's expression shifted by half a degree, the nearest thing to flinching he'd allowed himself so far.

"Go. Earn."

Bela's smile faltered—just for a blink. Enough to register the insult. She stood, her gaze lingered on him as though a dare, a last-second itch to make a scene. But she didn't scratch it. She dropped her hands, turned with deliberate grace, and swept back into the gloom. The crowd parted for her as if sensing the bad luck she'd left in her wake. The room seemed colder in her absence. V's pulse hammered under the skin of her arms. Her eyes followed the platinum figure, watching until it dissolved into smoke and shadow.

Anatoly slid in beside her again, like he hadn't just handled a live wire. He reached into his coat, found the spot where the envelope had been, checking it absently. Remaining composed but for the faintest flush on his brow.

From the inner lining, he withdrew something wrapped in black silk—a long package, slender and heavy. He handed it to her. The fabric fell open between her fingers like petals, revealing a knife in a matte-black scabbard, handle of bone inlaid with polished ebony. The metalwork was exquisite, if a little jagged. V weighed it in her palm, thumb brushing the hilt. A custom piece of blacksmithing that belonged on museum walls rather than in gutters.

"Want to share with the class?" she asked.

The scowl painting his lip held ground, eyes fixed on the stage as if he were counting down the seconds until Burak's appearance. His hand moved to his neck, pressing at the spot Bela's rippers had marked. V watched as he swallowed, smoothed his suit collar twice before opening his mouth.

"Tipped with a neurotoxin, muscle paralysis. Go for the blood flow, or major organ." He didn't explain further, nor felt inclined to.

The blade whispered from its sheath: dark ceramic, softer sheen than steel, honed so fine its edge seemed to melt away. V balanced it on two fingers, testing the heft, then twirled it once and slid it home.

It was the first time she'd felt confident since leaving Mikoshi.