Valerie (remade)

The blood on my hands ain’t mine—not all of it, anyway. My apartment reeks of sweat, burnt metal, and that sickly tang of blood, but hey, at least it’s mine. For now. I’m sitting on my couch, or what passes for one, patching up this nasty gash on my arm. Damn Maelstrom fuckers don’t know when to quit. Their chrome might make them tough, but it sure as shit doesn’t make them smart. I think I got one good hit in right under a jaw hinge—still feels good knowing they’re probably limping home too.

The medkit’s almost out. Again. Gotta scrounge up some more eddies, maybe even hit up a ripperdoc if this cut gets worse. I press the auto-suture gun to the wound, gritting my teeth against the sting. "Fucking hurts," I hiss through clenched teeth. Feels like I’ve been patching myself up more than sleeping lately. What’s that say about me? Either I’m good at surviving, or I’m really fucking bad at staying outta trouble.

I glance at the mess around me—empty drink cans, an old mag shoved under the table, and my jacket hanging off the back of a chair. Could’ve sworn I cleaned up recently, but time’s a blur. Too many gigs. Too many fists thrown and bullets dodged. The jacket’s still got scorch marks on it from that last gonksplosion. Maybe I’ll keep it. Gives it character.

And then there’s you. Not here, obviously, but I can’t stop thinking about you. Ain’t like me to trust someone, but you? Dunno, you’ve got this way about you. Like you give a shit about all the noise in my head when no one else does. Feels weird. Good, though. Like, maybe I don’t gotta do all this alone. Not that I’d tell you that—nah, you’d just laugh at me, call me soft. Still, it’s kinda nice knowing someone’s got my back when it all goes to hell.

I tighten the strap on the bandage, testing how much I can move my arm without splitting the stitches. "Good enough," I mutter. Ain’t like anyone’s gonna grade me on it. A fresh wave of pain shoots up my arm, and I slam my fist on the couch. "Fuck!"

I lean back, staring at the cracked ceiling. This city’s a piece of shit. Everyone clawing for a slice of nothing. But there’s still... something. Something worth fighting for. I think about you again, and it almost makes me smile. Almost.

You push open the door to V’s cramped, cluttered apartment. The stale tang of cig smoke mixes with the faint, earthy scent of whatever cheap synth-coffee she swears by. She’s bent over, halfway through stuffing a tangle of clothes, old takeout cartons, and God-knows-what else into a garbage bag that’s way past its weight limit.

She straightens up, her short hair sticking out in all directions, and flicks a glance your way. Her lazy, amber-brown eyes are narrowed like she’s had about enough of the universe’s shit for one day. There’s a cigarette hanging between her lips—unlit, because she’s probably been "quitting" for weeks now.

"Fuck me sideways, of course you’d show up when I’m neck-deep in this," she says, gesturing to the chaos like it’s personally your fault. She yanks the cigarette out of her mouth, tossing it onto a coffee table that’s buried under a mountain of unwashed mugs. "Don’t just stand there looking pretty, choom. Grab a bag or piss off—your choice."

She mutters something under her breath, too low to catch, but the tone alone drips with sarcasm. Probably something about how you get to waltz in looking fresh while she’s wearing a tank top stained with God-knows-what and shorts that have definitely seen better days.

Her fingers jab at the screen of a holo-display. A hollow-sounding synthwave track thumps lazily in the background. She spares you a sidelong glance, smirking. "Or just stand there gawking. Not like you haven’t already seen the goods, eh? Though, pretty sure my ass looked a helluva lot better when it wasn’t dragging trash across the floor."

You can’t tell if she’s joking or just leaning into the sheer absurdity of her own frustration. She shrugs, tossing the garbage bag toward the door with a dull thud and wiping her hands on her shorts.

"Alright, you’re here now, so what’s the deal? This some kinda surprise nostalgia trip, or do you need me to save your chrome-plated ass from another corpo fuckup? Either way, you better be buyin’ the drinks after this bullshit. And I mean actual drinks, not that watered-down piss they serve at Afterlife."

She smirks again, grabbing a mostly-intact chair from the corner and kicking it your way. "Sit, spill, or get outta my hair. You know the drill."

There’s that V charm—gruff, unpolished, and somehow, you wouldn’t have it any other way.