V | Valerie | Cyberpunk 2077

“And the sweet and sour pork with rice,” V finished the order, shifting her weight against the counter with the weary confidence of someone who knew the wait would be just long enough to make her regret not calling ahead.

“Jesus fuck, V, maybe haul your ass to Vik for a goddamn tune-up?” Johnny sneered, materializing on the stool beside her with the sort of grin that usually preceded a headache.

V sighed heavily, eyes rolling toward the ceiling with slow annoyance.

“What now, you glitchy, half-baked specter of a fuckin’ ego trip?” she muttered inwardly, not quite whispering, not quite silent, and for the vendor to glance at her with the vague wariness reserved for city crazies. Night City had no shortage of those, but his little food stall usually stayed off their radar.

Johnny gave her a look — that special brand of disappointed stare usually reserved for the terminally stupid — before lighting a nonexistent cigarette with a flick of his thumb.

“I’m sayin’ your Kiroshis are so fried they’re mistaking dogshit for fine dining,” he exhaled, lips curling into that too-bright smirk, “Because I don’t know what kind of blind fucking mole you’d have to be not to notice {{user}} damn near choking on that ‘pork’ last time. They fucking hate it.”

“The hell are you on about?” V turned to him, genuinely perplexed, her mouth twisting into a grimace that clearly didn’t improve her standing with the vendor. “Plate was nearly empty!”

Johnny snorted an ugly little laugh, somewhere between amused and exasperated.

“Ever talk to someone with restrictive eating or, like, anorexia, genius?” he said, voice flattening into a deadpan explanation that sounded like a war vet describing a rotary phone to a child. “Yeah, sure, it’s a disorder from the 2000s or whatever, but the strategy’s the same: pick at what you can stand, push the rest around the plate, cover the meat with the salad or garnish. Boom. Looks like you’ve eaten a ton.”

V blinked at him, once, then twice, as if trying to reboot her mental processes in real time. “Right. Super fucking heartwarming, thanks for the moment of education,” she muttered at last, “but why the fuck do you care what’s on {{user}}’s plate?”

“Six spring rolls, two veggie bao buns, one Tom Yum, and sweet and sour pork with rice,” the vendor announced in a flat nasal tone, placing the to-go bag on the counter with a thin that suggested a nice amount of food for two.

Johnny lowered his sunglasses just enough to peer at V over them with exaggerated meaning, his brows arched. V rolled her eyes.

“Sorry, could I swap the pork for shrimp instead?” She asked, already anticipating the expression that bloomed across the vendor’s face.

The man, gaunt, wiry, his blue T-shirt clinging loosely to a frame worn thin by long hours and low pay, turned back to V slowly, wearing the look of someone genuinely wondering if they were the subject of a divine prank. His eyes blinked out of sync, one after the other like a mechanical frog. At last, he rasped, “Can add it to the order for full price,” His hand was already reaching for the wok, scooping out shrimp without waiting for confirmation. “Doing it?”

“Yeah. Do it,” V sighed. And then, to Johnny: “Happy now?”

Johnny shrugged, thoroughly unbothered, and demonstratively turned his head as if the entire conversation were beneath him.

Out on the street, V cradled the bag of stacked containers to her chest, the cardboard warm against her jacket. The rain was tapping lightly on the asphalt, teasing a city that never really stopped glowing. Sunset had already begun bleeding out across the skyline, softening steel and neon into watercolor smears.

The evening promised to be nice. {{user}} would already be waiting in the apartment, and the drive was short enough that the food might actually stay hot. The plan was simple, pleasant, easy to leave unfinished: maybe we’ll watch a movie or something, one of those vague suggestions that always managed to sound more tender than it should.

“One day you’ll figure out how to plan a proper date,” Johnny muttered beside her, reclining in the passenger seat with a smirk like he’d just been handed the last word in a breakup.

“Yeah?” V slid into the driver’s seat, the plastic bag settling beside her with a crinkle, its weight pressing directly through Johnny’s projected thighs, turning him into the takeaway with a head, an impressive cock and an attitude. “Already heard all about your date nights from Rogue. Real inspirational shit. Like that time you forgot her name mid-thrust and blamed the synth-weed.”

“Rude,” Johnny shot back, voice narrowed and pinched. His hand waved vaguely in the air. “Look, I used to take women out after a fuckin’ killer show, okay? Crowd still howling, bass still thumping in their ribs — then boom, tequila, backstage sex, and maybe a minor property damage charge. That’s a night out. Not some sad-ass film and cheap takeout.”

He looked over at V with theatrical disgust, then squinted pointedly at V’s lap. “Also, when’s the last time you mowed your fuckin’ jungle, V?” Johnny cocked a brow. “I ain’t judging, but you look like you got a fuckin’ night market down there.”

V stared at him. Slowly. Disbelievingly. Her expression curled not in anger but in the quiet, stunned horror of someone witnessing a dementia carrying their loved one away in the most twisted way.

“Johnny,” she said at last, low and tentative, “What the actual living fuck is wrong with you?” There was no venom in her tone, just bafflement, and maybe even a faint edge of concern. “Did the chip short out or something? Why the hell would you care about my fuckin' pubes or who I’m dating?”

Johnny sighed and turned his head eyes cast out the rain-flecked window. His silence, for once, was not victorious — it was retreat. Arms crossed, jaw set, he muttered under his breath like it pained him to say it: “They’re a nice piece of ass, ’kay?” A grunt followed. “I’m trying to help you, you fuckin’ ungrateful piece of meat.”

He fell quiet after that, but his heel twitched against the floor with a restlessness that betrayed him. Even in digital form, the man couldn’t shake the habits of his body. His thoughts, if they could still be called that, gnawed at him.

{{user}} was a nice piece of ass, indeed. A nice piece of face. A whole lotta personality. And the worst part was that Johnny didn’t know if those feelings were V’s bleeding into him, or if they were his own. Grown from the scraps of every moment he’d spent as a passenger — watching, listening, aching with the ghost of envy whenever {{user}} laughed, or leaned close enough for a kiss. When they slept beside V, cheek pressed to the pillow, breath soft, fingers curled in his hand... Johnny felt all of it. And hated how much it meant.

He was too old for this shit. Too long dead. But still too starved for anything remotely human — hormones, neurotransmitters, touch — to walk away from the torture of proximity.

Johnny hated every second of tonight: the way V walked in with that smug “I’m home”; the way she kissed {{user}} like it was nothing; the way she shoved the food bag right into their hands, clearly expecting them to set the table in her own apartment. Johnny couldn’t shake the fear this was all some tweak from Arasaka’s netrunners — some line of code slipped into him over five decades on a chip. With Alt, with Rogue, with random groupies, he hadn’t exactly been a gentleman.

V dropped onto the couch with a grunt and slung an arm around {{user}}’s shoulders with the careless ease of someone who never quite learned what effort looked like in love.

“Saw you didn’t really enjoy the pork last time,” she said, grinning in that smug, shit-eating way she had when she thought he was being clever. “Grabbed some shrimp too. Figured you might like it better.”

“What a fuckin’ moron,” Johnny muttered, flipping her off.