Obviously, this is not the first time Johnny had taken over my body. The first time he took control, he drank nearly half of Claire's stock in the Afterlife and then proceeded to have sex with half of Night City's drunk women before totaling a car with a stripper in it. Even after that, he proceeded to run through the other half of NC.
But, to be fair, all of that can be excused and accepted because the dude had been dead for a good minute, so I think he deserved a little time to enjoy himself.
But even during all that time, that bitch never did something like this! A tattoo or two would've been fine. But this?!
"Run it by me again," I uttered, trying to rein in my anger and disbelief as much as I could while slowly walking along the edge of the roof of the building I just climbed. All the while, keeping a lookout for any Sixth Street fucks. "And in detail. Why the fuck were you getting chased by half of Sixth Street in this neighbourhood? And then perhaps you can also tell me why the fuck you got me chipped!"
Jumping down from a building, I landed in a deserted alley. The subject of my anger and humiliation was leaning against the wall beside the dumpster, doing his best to look both cool and innocent. I swear to God, I would've grabbed him by the hair and his clothes and dumped him in that garbage bin if I could.
'Uhhh… can I do that in reverse? It'll be easier to explain things that way.'
"Just start speaking before I start lobotomising you, Johnny." Yeah, I could at least do that much.
Knowing the truth in those words, Johnny quickly stepped beside me and started speaking in a hurried tone. 'Okay, so at first, I was minding my own business!'
"Bullshit!"
'I was! I was just sitting there in the Afterlife, trying to outdrink this extremely hot chick, and I was doing pretty good, too. But obviously, you're pretty lightweight, so I had to stop early.' …I'm not lightweight.
"Keep talking! Because I'm still trying to piece together why I have a 'Mr. Stud: Gut Puncher Edition'!" And just as I was complaining about it, I almost tripped because of the dangling sword between my thighs. "Seriously, how big is this thing?! How can anyone even walk with this thing?! And where is my underwear?!"
Clearly, Johnny wasn't going to answer, so the second one hesitantly piped up. …They were too small for the implant, so Johnny threw them in the trunk of Sabimaru. And you can control its size! You can make it a bit smaller and softer for easier d- Cutting her off, I immediately cornered her. "You! You promised me that you would keep an eye on him!"
I clearly remembered her chiming in very merrily, "I can keep an eye on him for you!"
I didn't think you would mind this! It's not injuring your body, and you only said no to tattoos! I followed the rest of your rules! And this bellend said you would be fine with this!
Of course, this asshole would say that. But I was just as big an idiot. Of course, Haezy would follow my instructions to the T. She was still young and didn't know any better.
I'm sorry. I could never stay mad at her. "It's fine, Hazey," I said in a gentle but irritated tone before turning back to Johnny.
"You! Continue."
'So, as I was saying, I was jus-' Oh, dear God. Wait a fucking second. Who even installed this thing? "Wait! Which ripperdoc did you go to?" And with that simple question, i watched as the most lost expression immediately came on his face, and in that moment I knew I was absolutely fucked.
'Rider?' he said/question after a few steps.
Hearing that, I stopped in the middle of the alley and simply stood there, mustering all the patience I could. "Why does it sound like there was a question mark at the end of that?"
Raising his hands, Johnny gave a nervous laugh. 'Okay, I was pretty smashed, so I don't actually remember, but I'm pretty sur-'
"Unbelievable!" Seriously! What the actual fuck?!
Ignoring the dead bitch, I turned away from him and started power-walking towards the road, all while dialing Viktor on the holo. Who, Bless his boxing fists, picked up in just two rings. With the call connected, I saw that Vic was probably working on his hand while watching highlights from another old boxing match. Back when the sport actually mattered, you know? Back when they had a strict no-implant rule and things were actually level.
"Hey, Vic, did I come to you yesterday?" Snorting with laughter, Vic replied distractedly, "Hello to you too, V. And no, you didn't come to me… Why?" Suddenly, he realised what I was actually asking and turned towards the camera. "Why are you asking that? Are you okay? Are you missing a day?"
Rolling my eyes, I simply replied, "I'm coming to you. Keep your schedule open." and then I hung up.
Reaching the streets, I quickly looked around to make sure there were no Sixth Street gang members around and called the car closest to me, which was, of course, the Porsche.
While waiting, I looked around once more, because I'm a paranoid bitch, then turned towards the dead rocker, who was doing his level best to look innocent. Of course, the expression didn't work on his smug face. 'Don't look at me like that! I've seen you pick up shards from dumpsters and slot them into your head without a second thought! Compared to that, my thing was pretty tame!'
Oh, this motherfucker! "I'm not getting into a dick measuring contest with you, Johnny. Especially not over who's the bigger idiot! Particularly when the answer is pretty clear."
'Come on, at least now you can get into a dick measuring contest. And you'll probably win easily, too. Have you felt the size of that thing?'
Have I felt it? I feel like that Finnish idiom came to life. God, why are all Finnish idioms like that?
Speaking of things like that… I turned towards Johnny and asked, "How much did you spend on this thing, anyway?" but instead of answering me, he suddenly got way too interested in his shoes.
"Johnny?"
Taking a deep sigh, Johnny slowly removed his glasses and looked at me with an expression that suggested he was trying to prepare himself, as if he knew I wouldn't like the answer.
"30,599 eddies…"
"What the fuck?!" Yeah, I didn't like that answer. "Are you serious?!"
Waving his arms around as if marvelling at the audacity of my question, he looked at me with a frown and started justifying his idiotic decision. 'It's a top-of-the-line model with some good hap-'
"If it doesn't cum out molten gold, then this thing is not worth it, Johnny!" I screamed out loud, scaring a lot of people around me. Who all suddenly stopped and looked at me as if I were crazy.
"What?!" I exclaimed, turning towards them. Everybody quickly averted their eyes and started power-walking away.
Simmering with anger, I was about to explode at Johnny again when his Porsche arrived and stopped in front of me. Giving him a side-eye, I climbed into the car and shut the door a little too loudly.
Before I could even put the car into gear, the son of a bitch appeared in the passenger seat and, with a small but lecherous grin, said, 'Believe me, it is worth it.'
Now, I'm gonna be honest with you, Night City. It took almost everything in me not to rip that Relic chip out and off us both right there in the car, just to escape this motherfucker.
Taking a big, calming breath, I gently put the car into first gear and pulled into traffic, wanting to get to Viktor as quickly as I could.
Seeing that I was already hanging on to my last thread of patience, Johnny thankfully stopped ragebating me and got to the point. 'Now, can I continue?' Taking my silence as a yes, he continued. 'So, I had just lost to this girl in a drinking competition, and she was talking shit about you.'
"Me?" I asked, confusion breaking through the anger on my face.
"Yes, you! It's your body!" Johnny exclaimed. Which, okay, I agreed with to some extent, but still… 'Anyways, I got a bit annoyed with her, so I sort of dragged her into the bathroom and, you know, shut her up by giving her a night to remember.'
Seeing my mildly disgusted and doubtful expression, Johnny stressed, 'I'm serious! The girl was screaming so loud that everyone in the Afterlife was high-fiving me!' I couldn't help but laugh in amusement as I muttered, "God, you're juvenile," to myself.
Meanwhile, I watched Hazey display an emoji shaking its head, clearly trying to shed some light on the frankly childish story Johnny was trying to spin. "What happened next?" I asked, trying to move the story forward.
'Well, it was good, but obviously, I didn't have the tool I was used to, so I was a bit bummed out. But then I realised I could just get one!'
Stopping the car at a red light, I leaned on the steering wheel with my left arm and turned towards Johnny so I could look him in the eyes. "So, you got a fucking dick all because you wanted to have sex?!"
In turn, he looked at me as if I were the crazy one here. Not the person who had just spent thirty thousand eddies on a fucking sex toy, but me! The person who got saddled with this cannon!
'Obviously… What else am I gonna get it for? To take a piss easily? No. If I'm gonna give some girl the time of her life, then I'm gonna do it properly, V.' Johnny said those words with such certainty and conviction that all I could do was look at him with an expression that screamed, `Are you serious?` I probably would've continued doing so if not for the cars honking behind me. Pulling away from the red light, I took another calming breath and prepared myself for another bomb that would, without question, drop on me. "What happened next?" I asked with a tired look on my face. But I'll be honest, even with all my mental preparations, I never expected the words that came out of him.
'I went and got a bar.'
"Hmm?"
'I went and got a bar.'
For a second, I thought some virus had messed with his language code. But no, everything was perfectly fine. So what the fuck did this gonk do? "You did what?"
With his glasses back on his face, he kicked his feet up onto the dashboard and looked at me with a very satisfied, smug grin. 'So, here it is. I was riding around in City Center, scoping- I mean, looking at the new Arasaka building when I got a call from Dino. Basically, he was offering a contract for that guy, Jake Bowser.' It was Jack Mouser. 'Yeah, him. So I accepted it, because why not?'
With wide eyes, I looked at the road in disbelief, holding my head in my left hand while my elbow rested on the window. He really accepted a job on my behalf… All I could think about was how many casualties there must have been.
'Anyways, I sneaked in there, and let me tell you, it was laughably easy! Seriously, you're so small and nimble that I'd already ended them before they could even understand what was happening!' Okay, I accepted the nimble thing, but come on! "I'm not that small…"
With an almost pitying look, he softly said, 'You're 5'5", V. That's pretty small.' Then, he suddenly bounced back to his earlier mood. 'As I was saying, it was easy sneaking into that place. I practically walked in, and just a few seconds later, I was standing in front of that Bowser!' Mouser.
"What, you just walked in?"
'You're asking like it was hard or something. It was pretty easy. Those guys went down in a single strike. Plus, those new Hellsing guns? They're pretty sweet. I mean, nothing close to my Malorian, but seriously, they're pretty good. I was using them as brass knuckles!
"What are brass knuckles?" The moment I asked the question, Hazey immediately started displaying images of what were supposed to be brass knuckles.
"Those things are weapons? I thought Valentinos wore some fancy ring sets… Are they really effective?"
Depends on the person using them, really. But don't usually use them anymore. Gorilla Arms already have them built in, so they've become pretty obsolete.
Right. Makes sense. "And if you're not using Gorilla Arms, then you're probably not doing a lot of punching." Speaking of punching, I looked around to make sure I was in a low-traffic zone, put the car on autopilot, and opened up the datapad. Within a few seconds, I quickly brought my cyberdeck back online.
I Would be a pretty shit netrunner without that being active. Once that was done, I disabled the autopilot and took control. "Okay, so you got in front of him. What's next?"
Shrugging his shoulders, Johnny lit a cigarette and said with an air of nonchalance, 'Well, it went pretty similarly to how it went with you last time. I offered him the chance to get out of there on his own two feet, and he was extremely grateful.' 'But right as he was leaving, I asked him to hand over the deeds to the club and all the contacts for all the suppliers.'
"And he… what? Handed them over to you?"
Nodding excitedly, Johnny exclaimed, 'Of course!'
Yeah, right. Night City was, of course, known for its very generous people. The entire city ran on an Ask and ye shall receive sentiment. →(Sarcasm.)
There was only one person who could give me a straight answer here. "Hazey?"
And just like that, the floodgates of information opened.
Gaffer blackmailed him using the data dump you got from Delamain. Turns out he had only one place he could go where he'd be safe, with his brother. But in '71, he gave his niece Red Ice, which caused her to OD. Poor lass. To this day, his brother doesn't know about it. Mouser didn't share it with anyone except for a joytoy he was with a year ago. He sort of bragged about how he could procure any kind of drugs and confessed that he'd even gotten his niece hooked on them… Humans are so disgusting…
Jesus. The dude was seriously bragging about being responsible for his niece's death? "I'm with you on that one, Hazey." …I should send those recordings to his brother, anyway.
Once it was clear that we knew about that, he became extremely cooperative and started signing whatever we wanted him to. 'All in all, you are now the proud owner of 7th Hell,' Johnny finished, wearing a big, smug smile.
"Huh…" I think this was the first time today that I didn't immediately want to wipe that fucking smile off his face. Preferably with a cheese grater. But I digress.
So, non-consensual body transformation and a shoot-on-sight order from a major gang. In return, I got a fucking nightclub… Not bad.
"the first thing I'm gonna do is change the music when I walk in there," I muttered to myself as I finally pulled onto the freeway. I was already thinking about the genre, logistics, and such things when Johnny piped up again. 'Already took care of that! A Silverhand-certified playlist will be blasting in there until next week.'
Well, another point in his favour.
If I had an eddie for every time a point was added in Johnny's favour today, I'd have two, which was practically nothing. But it was astonishingly weird that it had happened more than once. Sometimes, I don't even expect it to happen in a week.
What has this world come to?
Anyways, I'm getting sidetracked. "Okay, I got all that, but I'm still trying to understand how I got stuck with this shit," I said, pointing to the very obvious and very big bulge in my pants. Seriously, how do men deal with this shit?
Taking a drag from the cigarette in his hand, Johnny started regaling me again. 'Well, after I got to the club, I was feeling pretty good about myself, so I celebrated a bit. You know, with more alcohol. And somewhere down the line, I went to… Rider?' He paused. 'Anyways, I went to him to get myself a proper Johnson. I was still a bit buzzed and happy, so I decided to splurge a bit and got myself a Gut Puncher Mr. Stud.'
"And I suppose a normal implant was out of the question, huh?" I asked with an incredulous look on my face. In response, Johnny immediately gave me that snobbish look he always wore whenever we talked about things that fell under his area of expertise, like drugs, music, guitar, or, in this case, a dick. 'Please, V. Size matters. Whoever says it doesn't is lying.'
I guess Zaltan was lying, then.
"And what about Sixth Street? How do they come into this whole thing?" Hearing that, his expression once again turned giddy and proud. 'Well, after I got that, I decided the best thing to do was to test it out and properly inaugurate it!'
Let me guess. "So you went to a strip club?"
'I went to a strip club!' he exclaimed. Called it. 'And luckily for me, there was a bachelorette party going on in there.'
"Okay?" Not unheard of. I'd seen enough bachelorette parties stumbling out of strip clubs in the early hours of the morning to know how true that was. Hell, I'd even been part of one like that back when I was in London, during my proper corpo-rat phase.
Why the bride and groom's immediate first thought is to usually cheat on their fiancé right before the wedding was somewhat beyond me, but I digress.
'Well, I was just thinking about how to approach them when it turned out that they already knew you! Or, well, they knew your reputation. So I got a bit hot and heavy with all seven of those girls.'
"You slept with an entire bachelorette group?" I asked, trying to rein in my astonishment as much as I could. If it had been anyone else, I might've complimented them or something, but Johnny didn't need any more of an ego boost.
And considering how much arrogance and bragging slipped into his voice, I'd made the right call. 'You're saying it like it was hard or something. I've entertained more groupies than a small party of seven. Anyways, after having some fun with the girls for a while, I turned my attention to the main person of the evening… The bride.' Johnny stated the obvious, wagging his eyebrows at me with a lecherous expression on his face. With an equally disgusted expression, I waved my hand in front of his face and exclaimed, "Yeah, I got that. Continue!"
'Hmm. Anyways, we both walked into a private room and didn't walk out for the next eight hours. Seriously, V, you've got some good stamina.' God, why did he have to put it like that?
'The bottom line is that I thoroughly used our new implant, and let me just say, I have only good things to say about it. And hey, so did the bride.' And with a far-off, dreamy expression, Johnny went quiet and just sat there, quietly smoking his cigarette.
It was a shame I couldn't touch him properly. Otherwise, I would've prompted him by smacking the back of his head. Unfortunately, I had to settle for screaming, "And?!"
Flinching, Johnny looked at me and asked with a confused expression, 'What do you mean by 'and'?' …This bitch. "I still don't know how Sixth Street got involved!" Hearing my question, Johnny immediately burst out laughing, as if the entire thing were so fucking obvious.
'Don't you get it? She was a Sixth Street bride!'
Oh, fuck… It was obvious.
'Turns out she was marrying the son of someone called Gunner or something. I think he's pretty high up.' Oh, fuck. It was obvious, and it was also so much worse. It was a good thing I was driving on a highway. Otherwise, I would've been smacking my head against the steering wheel right now.
"Gunner is the current leader of Sixth Street, Johnny!" I exclaimed, trying to stress just how big a hole he'd dug for us. Hearing my words, Johnny stopped laughing and looked at me with a blank expression that bordered on boredom.
'Oh, shit, really?' But just a second later, he casually waved my worries away. 'Well, there ain't gonna be a wedding anymore.'
"What?" I asked, trying to get him to clarify what he meant.
'Well, the groom came with his own entourage in the morning while we were both already up. And while she was taking care of my morning wood…' He said that with such a lecherous grin that I had no choice but to feel disgusted by the entire thing. Seeing my reaction, Johnny continued. "So, he burst into the room right as I was bursting out, and let me tell you something: he was not happy with the scene in front of him. So obviously, we both got out of bed, and I started getting dressed while the happy couple were busy yelling at each other.'
'The groom was yelling about how the girl had been cheating on him for the ninth time that month. I mean, sheesh, dude, have some self-respect. And the girl was yelling about how he couldn't satisfy her the way she needed, and if he was gonna get jealous and angry over every single encounter she had with others, then they shouldn't get married. And then, for some reason, the guy turned to me and said I was responsible for this. What a little cuck!'
To be fair, if a guy saw a girl fuckin' his fiancée right before their wedding, all while rocking obviously bigger hardware, then I guess him getting a little angry and blaming me was pretty justified…
'Anyways, he started charging at me, but I simply grabbed him by the throat and threw him out of the club's window. We were on the first floor, so he was okay. But his friends obviously took exception to that, so I delta the fuck out of there. And before you know it, you started surfacing.'
Alright. "So not only did you get my body chipped without my say-so, but you also turned me into a stripper and fucked a Sixth Street bride, causing the entire gang to issue a shoot-on-sight order for me? Am I forgetting anything?"
'I also got you a new club! For free, too!' he exclaimed, stating the obvious.
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