#johnny’s bite-sized headcanons

[inkpot909]

Walking around looking like a million bucks, Giorno loves wearing makeup. His bread and butter being natural looks with hints of flare. Depending on the occasion he might decide to go all out. When he was little he used to raid his mother’s stash of makeup and waste time away by practicing. It wasn’t until later in life, becoming more secure in himself, that he starts wearing it out. At least, that’s the story he’ll tell if asked. Call it what he wants, but it’s largely a factor of his Brando genes finally kicking in.

Bruno gets the appeal of makeup, at the very least. The time it takes… the artistry…. he would never hold it against someone for putting on any amount or style of makeup. Does he wear makeup himself? If asked, he would shrug and say skincare takes up enough of his routine. To his credit his skincare is quite extensive, but that’s as close to ‘makeup’ as he ever gets. He’s very casual about it, but in truth he’s conscious over his unsteady hands. He just doesn’t trust himself with it at all.

A true goth diva, Abbacchio isn’t ever seen without completing his usual look everyday. Black or cool shades of lipstick, with mascara and eyeliner. It’s a simple routine, but it’s second nature to him at this point. Sleeps in makeup all the time. His eyelashes stick together and the black flakes lightly coat his dark circles. Weirdly enough… he kind of likes it. He won’t even wash his face in the morning before slapping more makeup over it. Even weirder is that he pulls it off. That, or he’s so naturally intimidating that no one dares point it out. Maybe that’s been the real goal all along.

It’s in the kindest, most understanding way, to say that Mista has never tried makeup and never will. He likes it and will be very supportive if a potential partner would take the time to do themselves up, but Mista himself…? His personal hygiene has areas of improvement that are definitely higher up on the priority list. Like… using deodorant? Yeah, that would be a big help, wouldn’t it?

Makeup? It’s a hard pass for Fugo. He doesn’t spend much time in front of the mirror and would prefer to keep it that way. His viewpoint is “Why would I put makeup on? I look fine.” A tad bit too defensive, but that’s the answer he sticks to nonetheless. In actuality… it’s one of the few things his mind cannot wrap itself around. He watches Giorno do up his face with exaggerated bewilderment. How in the world people can cake themselves so effortlessly is beyond him, and he’s only a little jealous. Besides, his practicality keeps him from indulging anyways. Maybe in another lifetime.

The idea of so much as trying makeup never once crossed Narancia’s mind. It wasn’t ever on his radar. Regardless of Giorno and Abbacchio’s habits, the possibility was never considered. He honestly thought for a while that it’s just what Giorno naturally looks like. That was, until he met Trish. It’s in her nature to want to practice beauty and play with makeup, so he considered her wanting to include him meant they’re becoming genuine friends. He was correct, and he also discovered for himself… makeup is not for him. He likes wearing makeup, but putting it on is a whole other story. As terrible at it as he is, he’s especially fond of eyeliner. He rarely puts it on, though, since he’d prefer if someone else does it for him.

[alaskan-wallflower]

maybe i’ll draw this later but i thought i’d share some mythical being au with yall (keep in mind this is a mythical au so i don’t really bother with realism lmfao)

I think Mrs Curtis would be a nymph-I head anon she was a nature lover who was soft but had a bit of a bite to her. Maybe a forest nymph-I have an idea in mind where she kinda has a “true form” that was really big (think greek god?) since she was kind of a forest protector in a way? It’ll make more sense when I draw it tbh

Mr Curtis was a gargoyle. In my headcanon I think Mr Curtis was this huge, scary looking guy but he was absolutely just a goofy sweetheart under all of that-he was pretty big too but not in the same way-he was bat like in a way? He had huge bat wings and claws and such but underneath all that he’s just a silly guy

Darry is kind of like a centaur but instead of a horse it’s a gryphon-I think gryphons were fairly big so I think he’d be quite big too (weren’t there stories of gryphons being destroyers of cities? He’s that kind of big but he doesn’t destroy shit lmao-he uses his size to his advantage and it also helps him clear ways for new construction. Mr Curtis taught him how to fly too, also lions and eagles remind me of Darry so-he also has sharp teeths. Also instead of smacking Pony, simply because of his size I feel like he just…recklessly picked up Pony and squeezed him a bit too hard and only realized when he saw Pony struggling to breathe and that was when Pony ran away

Sodapop is a centaur. Pong said it himself that Soda reminds him of a palomino colt so of course Soda is a palomino-sometimes when he laughs he falls onto his back and just kicks his hooves lmao-also horses know how to walk as soon as they’re born so Soda was pretty much running around from the moment he was born. He takes great pride in his tail and hair and lets people brush it-girls flock to the DX just to brush his tail-sometimes he lets little kids braid it if they want too!

Pony is a cervitaur-basically a deee centaur. He’s an axis deer-they’re known for their speed and agility (they can run up to 45 mph and jump up to 6 feet high so this obviously helps him in track)-he likes to style his hair so his little antler nubs are showing but when his antlers actually grow he’s so prideful about it it’s not even funny. He’s kinda like bambi in a way, when he was a baby he had such a hard time walking and when he goes through growth spurts he does too-it’s also just funny because his name is Ponyboy and he ended up being half deer

I really like kraken Johnny-just Johnny being some gigantic creature but being the most quiet and nervous is just funny to me. His scales are valuable too so maybe that’s why he gets jumped a lot. I know Oklahoma isn’t known for its water sources but just pretend with me that there’s a huge lake somewhere that he just chills in-when him and Pony run away he swims in the river. He’s always dreamed of going to the ocean but he’s kinda just stuck in Tulsa. He’s fairly huge though so it can be tough, but he swims through rivers to get to where he’s going. Darry being the size he is even made a sort of moat leading to a lake by the Curtis place. (I know it’s not realistic but bear with me)

Dally’s a dragon for sure. He’s a shifter in a way? Like Mrs Curtis he has a true form and a semi human form, he’s a huge dragon though when he is in his true form and he’s definitely caused…a number of things (jails) to be burnt down. It got to the point that the west side had to haul in fireproof things because Dally would just try to escape. Johnnyme the only one who can stop him from burning things down and just spits water at him to make him stop (another reason Johnny is a kraken because opposites attract I guess-) but Darry also has to wrestle him sometimes because he’s sick of having to rebuild things Dally burnt down even if he does get paid. Darry’s basically Tulsa’s version of Fix It Felix lmao

Two Bit is an imp. I don’t know how to describe my thought process but he’s just an imp. He’s silly. He’s goofy. He does reckless shit-he’s just this little, nimble imp with dragon wings and horns-Imps aren’t evil, they’re just mischevious and like to play pranks. Just like Two Bit. He can be smooth when. he wants to be though. He likes to jab people with his horns. He’s just goofy like that. I feel like when he’s mad his voice kinda gets deeper since they technically are devils in a way-his teeth also get sharper and he has claws. His eyes kinda glow too and his pupils slit. It’s scary. Think do when he snapped at Johnny’s mom when he was in the hospital.

Steve is a werewolf. He’s got that dog in him 😔 I think he’s always have sort of wolfish features, like sharp teeth, kinda slit pupils, maybe he even keeps the ears and/or tail (this is a stretch but idk lol) but whenever it’s a full moon you’ll know it evacsue he’s gorging on all kinds of meats and his shifts can be rough. Especially the first few. I feel like if he’s really really REALLY emotional he’ll shift a little bit too? Like it’s not confined to just full moons but he can’t will himself to do it either if that makes sense. I just think this is cool

I dunno; what do you guys think?

[tiptapricock]

Also for my love of trans guys, can you do trans Johnlaoshi ? If you don't know how to write ot3 just trans Kung Lao with anyone.

I can absolutely do those three and in fact it would b a pleAsure to.

Send me some Mortal Kombat characters or ships for some NSFW headcanons!

(Btw general hcs im operating off of for myself r none of them have bottom op, Kenshi n Johnny have had top, n Kung Lao is no op occasional binding depending on what he’s up for. Words used here include cock, dick, folds, entrance, and chest)

———

In the early days when they’re all at the academy, the dynamic is focused around Kung Lao and Johnny having fun

They fool around with each other, because it’s easy and good and they get the other’s brashness, and then they stumble into Kenshi being in the equation. Maybe through him walking in on them, maybe through a bet or an argument or a charged promise of revenge that leads into hurried touching and curled toes. Either way, it happens

From there it becomes a game, a push and pull of energy between the three of them

Kenshi is in it for the stress relief. It’s good sex, and an outlet to mess around with his friends who he regrettably enjoys fucking (even if they still annoy the shit out of him)

Johnny and Kung Lao are in it for the bit, to see who can goad Kenshi into things, who can get him to bite back first and show his fun side. It’s a challenge to make things more interesting

Plus, it is hot

“Look at that, Johnny.” Kung Lao bites his lip with a smirk as he watches Kenshi enter the room, his eyes running over the two of them as he takes his coat off, the evening already well under way. “We’ve got a visitor.”

They’re in Kenshi and Johnny’s quarters, kneeling upright on the bed as they rub against each, their cocks shiny and flushed as they bulge up from their folds

Kenshi watches quietly as he gets undressed and goes casually through the movements of getting ready himself, his eyes heated as he works on the harness of his strap

“We’re comparing sizes up close, Kendoll,” Johnny says breathlessly.

Kung Lao grinds his hips forward, making Johnny grunt, and smirks at Kenshi again. “Want to referee on who’s bigger?” he asks.

Kenshi makes a low sound, stalking over and tugging Kung Lao off Johnny. He presses him down, and Kung Lao kind of laughs, smirking. “Oh no, it seems I’ve been captured by a swordsman,” he says, and then, dropping his voice all mockingly sweet, “How deep will you impale me, sir?”

Kenshi sinks to his elbows and growls in Kung Lao’s ear, “Until you make a good sheath.”

Kung Lao’s breath hitches. “Shit, Kenshi…”

Kenshi starts to work him open, and Johnny can’t take his eyes off them

Kenshi sinks his fingers in, firm and deep, and Kung Lao makes such nice sounds and—

Johnny watches intently, touching himself while they get into it

Depending on the type of night, it can go several ways from there

On days they’re on good terms, Johnny will eventually migrate to press against Kenshi’s back, feeling him over as he rocks into Kung Lao. He’ll croon over the two of them, telling them how good they look, how nice they sound

On other nights, Johnny gets punishment. If he’s dragged his feet or been too much of an ass, Kenshi won’t let him in. He just has to stay worked up, curling into himself while he’s forced to watch from a distance

The three of them don’t really have defined roles, though. They’re always experimenting and exploring with each other

Sex becomes almost like another competition, something to one up each other on just like in training

Johnny and Kung Lao find (to their delight) that Kenshi is actually up for very stupid and risky things, if they lead him into it enough

Blowjobs behind the washrooms? (Are you chicken, Takahashi?)

Groping under the table at meals? (I’ll give you Sento if you don’t make a sound)

They feed off each other’s energy and antics, sweaty arms slung over shoulders after a hard training session blending into nails scraping down thighs and over leather as Kenshi keeps Johnny in place, Kung Lao buried deep in his throat

There are still genuine tender moments here and there though, especially in the time between Raiden becoming champion and the actual tournament, when Raiden is way more removed as he trains harder and they’re all feeling some of the sting from losing

I think some of Kung Lao’s insecurities seep out a bit here, being second suddenly, and the physical relationship helps a lot

He’s always been gung ho in his masculinity, in himself, but after losing to Raiden and hearing comments that disdain his garishness… some worries sneak in that morph and rot into doubts about himself

He finds days that his confidence stutters, that he worries about how he’s perceived in his manhood. Johnny and Kenshi notice how bothered he is by all of it, and help to reaffirm him a lot in different ways

Sometimes that’s by letting him feel in control and on top by domming them both, his hips snapping into Johnny as Kenshi watches from the sidelines, restrained and still dressed with a sweaty brow, and others it is something subtle in the passive moments of pleasure they swap on rest days

“God, Kenshi, you seein’ this thing?”

Kenshi glances down from where he’s reading at Kung Lao’s side, both of them reclined casually while Johnny lays between Kung Lao’s legs, and whistles

“Nice cock,” he says. “Very handsome.”

Johnny grins in response, and Kung Lao lets out a soft breath as he starts stroking him again. “Great cock,” he emphasizes

Kenshi rolls his eyes, putting his book down and turning onto his side, one hand settling idly on Kung Lao’s stomach where his shirt’s been rucked up. “He’s got ‘Great’ everything, Cage. Told us he takes after his ancestor, didn’t he?”

“Mmm.” Johnny leans down to mouth at Kung Lao’s entrance, running his tongue up and over his dick. “That he did,” he says, kissing the tip. His hands twitch slightly on Kung Lao’s thighs, and Johnny groans, distracted for a moment. “Damn… Takes after a damn tree, too. God these legs…”

Kenshi huffs as Johnny settles down to take Kung Lao in his mouth again, his own hand wandering up to push Kung Lao’s shirt out of the way and begin gently kneading at his chest, squeezing the flesh and rolling it beneath his palm. The mix of sensations makes Kung Lao’s eyes flutter closed.

“You guys suck,” he mumbles.

Kenshi noses against his jaw, moving some of his loose hair out of the way to kiss the skin. His fingers tug pointedly at Kung Lao’s nipple. “That’s Johnny’s job,” he mutters.

That tender piece of their dynamic, that feels different from the friendship and the sex, only grows during their time in Outworld

By the time they’re post Kenshi blinding, there’s a lot more slowness and touch to everything they do, they’re not as rushed and are all more familiar. Whatever relationship this is is… solid.

Johnny gets even more touchy than he already was. Nearly losing Kenshi and learning… concerning things about different fates in previous timelines from slips and interactions in the chaos between realms has made him… clingy. He doesn’t want to lose this, either of them, and feeling both of them under him, around him, inside him, is one of the best ways to feel full and secure that they’re… ok

They feel up each others bodies, the old scars and the new, grounding each other as they grind on each other

Johnny tells Kenshi how he’s got him, how he’s always got his back as he fingers him open while Kenshi’s in his lap, his movements slow, and Kenshi lets himself relax for once, feeling safe even without Sento assisting as Kung Lao kisses all over his chest and stomach

Calloused fingers scarred with small cuts from hat practice run over Kenshi’s top scars and the tattoos that cover and decorate them, and the areas on his ribs that unsafe binding used to bite into the skin

Kung Lao leans up to suck into his neck, carding fingers through his hair only to reach past and tug Johnny a bit closer by his nape, both of them sandwiching Kenshi between them

He can hear their dual smirks as they mutter to each other, about how lovely he looks, about how good he feels. There’s a soft sound as they kiss, a little hum, before Johnny’s chin hooks over Kenshi’s shoulder, his cologne strong

“We’ve been talking, babe, and uh…” He laughs slightly, almost sounding worried, and kisses Kenshi’s neck, crooking his fingers suddenly. Kenshi makes a sharp sound, hands scrabbling up to grip Kung Lao’s arms. “I know you’re up for bein’ in my movies, but uh… would you ever wanna make a private flick?”

Kenshi groans, rocking down into Johnny’s touch hard

“Told you he’d hate it,” Kung Lao prods.

Johnny sputters. “I don’t know if that was hating it, maybe a little disapproving but—”

Kenshi makes a grunt in protest, grip immediately tightening. God they’re both idiots. His idiots, though… maybe he’s not that far behind them with what he’s imagining right now

He tilts his face up with a gasp as Johnny’s palm grinds against his cock, his mouth finding the edge of Kung Lao’s jaw. “I really—” He swallows thickly. “I really don’t hate it,” he breathes.

Kung Lao makes a sound of surprise, but it���s muffled as Kenshi kisses him, swallowing the next grunt of appreciation as Kung Lao melts forward

Johnny laughs from behind him, pushing them both down until Kenshi is laying on Kung Lao’s chest, Johnny still knuckle deep inside him

“That’s great to hear, Kendoll, ‘cause honestly?” His hand runs past Kenshi’s thigh to skirt over Kung Lao’s. “I’ve been wanting to capture this view for a while.”

[machveil]

Collective Writings - Simon “Ghost” Riley

Collective Writings navigation page - tab one, current tab

page two for all things Lieutenant Simon “Ghost” Riley! 🌸✨for fics 18+ please read content warnings (CW) - you come first! check the fic before you read it

Simon “Ghost” Riley:

Husband!Simon Riley - lurks/leans/tasks/spritzes - headcanon

Loser!Simon Riley - first significant other/holds/advice/touch - headcanon

Roommate!Simon Riley - locks up/your safety first/plan/dog tags - headcanon

Butcher!Simon Riley x Blacksmith!Reader - reblog + headcanon

Cod Headcanon: Found Family/Familial Love - headcanon

Reader casually wearing a thong - blurb

Ghoap - Johnny gets the aux - headcanon

(18+, mdni) Loser!Ghost being nervous around you - headcanon, fluff, nsfw under the cut

(18+, mdni) Simon Riley is a patient man - headcanon, nsfw under the cut

Simon Riley has someone at home - fic

Off-Putting!Simon Riley x Reader that can match his freak - headcanon

Roommate!Simon Riley - “just friends”/bite/at base/141 - headcanon

Roommate!Simon Riley - misses your marks/realizes/tattoo - headcanon

Roommate!Simon Riley - correcting/knows you/comfortable/morning - headcanon

Roommate!Simon Riley - cute aggression/gym/gets it - headcanon

ChildhoodBestFriend!Simon Riley - Simon Says - headcanon

ChildhoodBestFriend!Simon Riley - nervous/your date - headcanon

(18+, mdni) Loser!König and Loser!Ghost with bound wrists - headcanon

Roommate!Simon Riley - fidget toy/hand/nipping/gnawing - headcanon

Simon Riley and König x Cosplayer!Reader - headcanon

Roommate!Simon Riley - kisses you/tv/massage/home -headcanon

Roommate!Simon Riley - if you brought a cat home - blurb

Roommate!Simon Riley - passive aggressive/subtle/your date/flaunts - headcanon

(18+, mdni) Loser!Simon Riley x Short!Reader - headcanon, fluff, nsfw under the cut

Roommate!Simon Riley messes with your friends - headcanon

Roommate!Simon Riley sees your sweatpants - headcanon

(18+, mdni) Loser!Simon Riley x Short!Reader - headcanon

Simon Riley misses his doll - headcanon

Husband!Simon Riley gets a surprise - headcanon

Domestic!Simon Riley - blurb + YT link

BestFriend!Simon Riley and his big, beautiful brown eyes - headcanon

HouseHusband!Simon Riley - blurb

(18+, mdni) Simon x Reader x OralFixated!Johnny - headcanon, fluff, nsfw below the cut

Dad!Simon Riley - blurb

Simon Riley - baby fever/shopping/redoes the guest room/shocked - headcanon

GuardDog!Simon Riley x Puppy!Reader - headcanon

Roommate!Simon Riley - gifts/rings/engraved/pretends - headcanon

playing with Simon Riley’s hair - blurb + YT link

(18+, mdni) Roommate!Simon Riley’s boxers - headcanon, fluff, nsfw under the cut

(18+, mdni) GuardDog!Simon Riley punishing Puppy!Reader - headcanon, fluff, nsfw under the cut

(18+, mdni) GuardDog!Simon Riley play wrestling with Puppy!Reader - headcanon, fluff, nsfw under the cut

(18+, mdni) GuardDog!Simon Riley, Mutt!Johnny + Hound!Price - headcanon, fluff, nsfw under the cut

CoD Headcanon: Fashion - headcanon

GuardDog!Simon Riley x Puppy!Reader - playing rough/being gentle - headcanon

Cerberus!Ghost x Reader - headcanon

Simon “Creature of Habit” Riley - headcanon

(18+, mdni) Loser!Ghost x Short!Reader size training - headcanon, nsfw under the cut

FriendsWithBenefits!Ghost - trust/care/friends - headcanon

Simon Riley’s fat ass - blurb

OlderBF!Simon Riley with a savior complex - blurb

(18+, mdni) Husband!Simon Riley shadow boxing - blurb

Loser!Simon Riley - distant/watches/heart monitor - headcannon

Simon Riley has soft hands - blurb

Simon Riley not understanding cuteness aggression - headcannon

Simon Riley holding your hair back - blurb

AverageMan!Simon Riley struggling with his mattress cover - blurb

Hades!Simon Riley - blurb

Ghost - friends/activities/bonding - headcanon

Vampire!Simon Riley plays by the rules - blurb

18+ Fics:

(18+, mdni) Loser!Ghost being nervous around you - headcanon, fluff, nsfw under the cut

(18+, mdni) Simon Riley is a patient man - headcanon, nsfw under the cut

(18+, mdni) Loser!König and Loser!Ghost with bound wrists - headcanon

(18+, mdni) Loser!Simon Riley x Short!Reader - headcanon, fluff, nsfw under the cut

(18+, mdni) Loser!Simon Riley x Short!Reader - headcanon

(18+, mdni) Simon x Reader x OralFixated!Johnny - headcanon, fluff, nsfw below the cut

(18+, mdni) Roommate!Simon Riley’s boxers - headcanon, fluff, nsfw under the cut

(18+, mdni) GuardDog!Simon Riley punishing Puppy!Reader - headcanon, fluff, nsfw under the cut

(18+, mdni) GuardDog!Simon Riley play wrestling with Puppy!Reader - headcanon, fluff, nsfw under the cut

(18+, mdni) GuardDog!Simon Riley, Mutt!Johnny + Hound!Price - headcanon, fluff, nsfw under the cut

(18+, mdni) Loser!Ghost x Short!Reader size training - headcanon, nsfw under the cut

Retired!DadBod!Simon Riley - blurb

(18+, mdni) Husband!Simon Riley shadow boxing - blurb

Fic Recommendations:

(18+, mdni) Simon “Ghost” Riley fics - fluff, nsfw below the cut

(18+, mdni) Simon “Ghost” Riley fics pt 2 - fluff, nsfw below the cut

thanks again to followers and friends for keeping up with my writing! CoD requests are always welcomed, please review this post before requesting🎀✨ giving you guys a big, fat kiss for being wonderful and I hope to see you around - either in my inbox or notifications<3

[stuckysdaughter]

Butterfly's Masterlist

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Sherlock (TV)

Mycroft Holmes:

What Do You Know About the British Men of Letters?

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Kingsman (Movies)

Harry Hart:

What Once Was Lost

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Heathers (1988)

JD:

JD/Short!Reader

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Harry Potter

Young!Sirius Black:

Clever Little Snake - Series (COMPLETE)

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

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Ghostbusters

Egon Spengler:

Uncomfortable

- - -

Shadow and Bone

The Darkling:

How to Make Meetings More Fun

Green Isn’t Your Color, Darling

Nikolai Lantsov:

Nikolai/Grisha!Reader Headcanons

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Stranger Things

Steve Harrington:

Billy Hargrove:

Goodbye, My Love

Eddie Munson:

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The Karate Kid

Johnny Lawrence:

Touch-Starved Johnny HC's

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Top Gun

Jake "Hangman" Seresin:

You're a Pilot!

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Kinktober 2021

Day 1 - Face-sitting with Billy Russo

Day 2 - Against a Wall with Aleksander

Day 3 - Hair Pulling with Dorian Gray

Day 4 - Spanking with Aleksander

Day 5 - Lap Dances with Billy Russo

Day 6 - Deepthroating with King Caspian

Day 7 - Stripping/Striptease with Aleksander

Day 8 - Size Difference Kink with Billy Russo

Day 9 - Lingerie with Billy Russo

Day 10 - Hickey/Biting Marks with Aleksander

Day 11 - Sleepy Sex with Caspian

Day 12 - Begging with Billy Russo

Day 13 - Licking with Sirius Black

Day 14 - Bath/Shower Sex with Aleksander

Day 15 - Masturbation with Aleksander

Day 16 - Nipple Play with Billy Russo

Day 17 - Breast Worship with Aleksander

Day 18 - Hand Jobs with King Caspian

Day 19 - Glove Kink with Billy Russo

Day 20 - Phone Sex with Billy Russo

Day 21 - Dirty Talk with Aleksander

Day 22 - Praise Kink with Billy Russo

Day 23 - Cockwarming with Billy Russo

Day 24 - Vanilla/Soft & Slow with Aleksander

Day 25 - Breeding Kink with Logan Delos

Day 26 - Pregnancy Kink with Aleksander

Day 27 - Aftercare with King Caspian

Day 28 - Almost Getting Caught with Billy Russo

Day 29 - Food Play with Dorian Gray

Day 30 - Against A Wall with Nikolai Lantsov

Day 31 - Bath/Shower Sex with Billy Russo (Wild Card)

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REQUESTS OPEN!

[heartofsnark]

Can You Feel The Sun? (Chapter Nine): Lazarus Rises

Notes: I’m on a roll with writing this. I’m honestly, a little nervous with sharing this chapter since i go more into Johnny’s backstory and like...my headcanon of it since CDPR gave us nothing. But hopefully it works. I also haven't written Johnny's voice in a while, so ahhhh. 

Word Count: 12098

Chapter Warnings:  Death, brief mentions of child abuse, drug use, alcohol, war, ableism, pov switches but not in the usual way.

If you haven’t yet, you can read the previous chapter here!~

 Oblivion wraps around her like a blanket. 

There is no existence. 

No pain. 

No world. 

No V. 

No Aidan. 

Every anxious little thought, every guilt soaked burden; swept away with the reaper’s scythe. Years of running and death has finally caught her. 

Then all at once it seems to let her go. 

It's a flicker at first, neurons firing up again, rewriting and rebuilding themselves. No true sensation or senses; just existence. World still dark and lost to her, but not she is not lost to it, or some version of her isn’t. 

Pain hits her before anything else, a crack in her skull, or where her skull should be. She has no sense of her body, only the vague notion she exists and is in pain. And when every sense returns, the world coming back…. 

It’s not her own. 

There’s a fog around her, a fuzzy filter muting it all. Like trying to recall a memory from too long ago. And she sees and she hears, in a body that isn’t hers. She’s smaller, the world seeming to tower around her. A blazing sun burning overhead in the bright blue of the sky. Playing outside on a sweltering day with bruised knees and grass stains on cheap children’s jeans. A mothers voice calling for Robbie to come home for lunch. She catches a reflection in a puddle, there’s a blur to it, but the dirt smeared face of a dark haired boy looks back at her...at himself… for a moment. 

The world shifts and with it comes a pain she can’t truly feel, a belt whipping through the air and welting a back that isn’t her own. Vision blocked by skinny arms marked with cigarette burns, hiding a face from the next lash. A boot gnashing into his side, the thick fog protecting V from the pain he feels. When he clambers to his feet, spitting blood she can’t taste, despite seeing vignettes through his eyes. He walks through a musty home, where the floorboards creak and threaten to break under his feet. A mirror showing a dark eyed boy with a split lip. 

Then she’s watching the hands of this boy she doesn’t know, playing guitar. He plucks and strums at strings until they bite into his fingers, until he leaves them speckled with blood. And then he plays more. Gifted an acoustic, stole his first electric but forgot to klep the amp alongside it. 

Playing in a musty crowded garage with a young boy with olive skin. Each playing away on instruments, the sounds and words all muffled to V. The pair play badly until they play great, she doesn’t hear, but she knows… 

Tequila and cigarettes before he’s old enough to buy them. V can faintly feel the burn of the booze and the warmth of the smoke. 

Stealing anything that can be tucked away in his pockets. Spray painting every wall he sees. Cherry bombs in mailboxes, picking a fight with anyone who sets him off and most people do. The faint burning of anger in his chest, she can feel it as if it’s her own. In and out of detention centers, a system that can put him away for petty theft, but never lift a hand to stop his father... 

Military reps scouting out young, poor troubled boys, seeing nothing but canon fodder when they look at him. 

Knocking on the door and that same olive-skinned, dark haired friend answering. She can hear the words but knows what’s being said without them. Both fog and clarity. ‘Robbie’ is enlisting, off to say his final goodbye to Kerry, a name she doesn’t know how she knows. He comes running down the street after him, before ‘Robbie’ can get too far away. Neither old enough, children. One made of lank and the other with baby fat still clinging to his cheeks. But the military knows boys can take bullets just as well as men. They need bodies, age irrelevant. Forged documents with Robert John Linder scratched across it. That name...

Blurs of training, a mop of dark hair shaved from his head. Separated from Kerry, stationed in different platoons, finding another friend who sticks by his side; both hardened by the military. Lank becoming muscle. Give optics, interface plugs, tech he doesn’t want, but they pry open his skin and put it in anyway. Anything to make him a better soldier. 

Then they’re in combat, muffled gunfire. People brutalized; shot, blown apart and chrome shoved into whatever remains; treated cruelly both by the enemy and the corps that shipped them out there. The heat of Mexico and the smell of gunpowder. Enemy ambush, the faint ting of a grenade hitting the ground. Then Robert is on the ground, shoved there and the body of a friend draped over his own. A heavy boom, shrapnel tearing through his left arm and size, burns across the skin. But nothing compared to his friend…  A grenade meant for him is taken by another, the pair rushed away to medical attention when the air clears. 

He wakes up without a left arm and scars across his torso, pulling tight at his skin. His friend gone, remains thrown out and tags offered to Johnny, the man who died for him nothing but a number, canon fodder in the corp’s war. Not even a day passes before they’re shoving chrome onto what’s left of Robert’s shoulder, eager to give him another chance to die for them. 

So, he runs, deserting and heading to a Night City that V has never seen. He climbs into a dirty motel bed and refuses to crawl back out, watching a ceiling fan turn until Kerry pulls him out. Older, more weathered, still young but neither of them quite the children they were before they saw the war. 

And music becomes his life. Kerry and him scream their words into any microphone they can find. Blaring concerts, they sound as if they’re coming from three rooms over to the merc, but she can feel the energy through the memory. Long nights writing lyrics and melodies. A band forming around them, three more members coming into the fold. Grimy smoke filled clubs and a cramped pathetic excuse of a tour bus. Shows that turn into riots. 

Cigarettes and tequila aren’t enough anymore. He pops pills like candy, snorts anything that will go up his nose, drinks everything but vodka, and fucks any pretty thing that looks his way. 

A woman with freckles and blue mohawk kicks his ass when she catches him balls deep inside a groupie. 

A blonde thrown into the back of a van. 

An anger and rage burning like wildfire in his chest. 

It all blurs and rushes; V never fully feeling what’s going on. All senses are fogged, seeing the snapshots of someone’s life through his own eyes. But she doesn’t feel linked, still distanced from it all. Barely able to think or decipher what she sees through the haze of it all. Just watching blips of a life not her own flickering by, with knowledge she shouldn’t have. 

Its the feeling of graffiti covered steel pressing against hands that first pushes through the fog. Hands that feel like they’re hers, but aren’t. One inked flesh and the other chrome. V can feel the body move as if it’s her own, but she has no command of it, muscles flexing to open double doors. Surrounded by the halls of a grimy little club. She can smell smoke and sweat, she’d gag but she can’t seem too. 

There’s music somewhere, muffled by distance but nothing else now. 

Fog lifted, she's both connected enough to it to feel everything, but separate enough to question what the hell is going on? There’s a tangled mess of emotions in her...his…. Their head. Her own fear, anxiety, mingled with a burning rage pitting in his core. 

There’s a girl leaning against the dirty wall of the club, watching V...or whoever she’s stuck inside of as they walk down the hell. A little smile playing on her lips. Thoughts flitter around V, in a voice that’s not her own. Chick’s cute enough, might of been worth a quick fuck, if he wasn’t rushin’ for time. 

“Hey…” 

V wants to ask her what’s going on, if the girl has any idea, what the girl sees when she looks at her. But her hands don’t move to sign and when she feels her mouth move, a different voice, different words, come out. The same rough voice that thought of fucking the girl in a dressing room. 

“Hey.” 

“You all right?” 

No, none of this is alright. V screams inside a head not her own, but she can feel the pride rolling in his chest, a smirk on his face. There’s an anger mixed with it, he’s going to settle a score, leave a mark. Those thoughts and feelings rattling around. 

“Never been better.” 

“Sure don't look it…’

There’s a scoff in his throat, she’s got no idea what he’s got planned. He continues around the corner, a man at the end of the hall standing before a set of double doors. The letters above say its backstage. Green hued fluorescent lights only draw attention to the grime as his boots click over the floor. That smell of cigarettes and sweat still hangs heavy around her, she thinks it may be coming from him, the man she’s playing passenger in. Oh god, that smell is him, isn’t it… 

What the hell is even happening? Dex killed her, didn’t he? 

“I can't let you on!” The man yells out at him. 

The fuck he can’t. His anger flares, a sliver left arm brought up, slammed into the guy's throat as he’s shoved into a wall,  a gun held in chrome fingers. There’s a mirror against it and V can see the man she’s living life through now. And those foggy vignettes press at her, he’s much older now. Face angry and with a scruffy beard, dark hair grown to his shoulders. 

His name was Robbie..? Robert.. ? Something, like that.

“Hey hey, we're chill,” the man begs ‘Robert’. He certainly looks too old to be a Robbie.

‘Robert’ lets the guy go with sneer, furious the guy would ever try to get in his way as he marches towards the doors. Abandoned music equipment and the music shoots in volume, a man blocking ‘Robert’ from getting up to a stage. Where four people play what sounds like older dad punk rock.

‘That smack, drag drunken roll

Chips are bashin' in my top

Ridin' high, my slots are shot

Metal burnin' beneath my skin

I'm chippin' in, chippin' in’

V would wince if she had control of her face, his face, does she even have a face anymore? The music is good, but painfully loud, something she could enjoy if only she could lower the volume. Phantom limbs she no longer has urge to turn the volume down on hearing aids that don’t exist. 

“Heh… 'course you're high.”  The bouncer in front of the stairs rolls his eyes at ‘Robert’ then steps aside.

‘Robert’ climbs up the short staircase, music painfully loud to V but exactly where he feels at him, bright lights down on him. A familiar face, Kerry from ‘Robert’s’ memories, is the one who sings. 

Until he’s pushed out of the way, gun still in ‘Robert’s’ hand as he grabs the microphone. Looking out into a crowd of people who stare up at him, an entire club room of people cheering and yelling for him. Shirts with tha bright red demon symbol, Samurai across it. Adoring fans, hearing his words, people who know his message, heard it loud and clear. Common men and women beaten down by the corps that rule their lives, that tear them all down for the chance to make an eddie.  And tonight he’ll show them all there’s a bite to his bark; he’ll make his mark, topple Arasaka and do what he should have done years ago.  

“Tonight I'm…” he pauses, leaving that mark may be the death of him, he’s damn near sure it will be, “I'm here to say goodbye to all of you.

And he begins to play to the cheering crowd, a final show before he changes the world.  V would cry out if she had the mouth to do it. Music shakes the venue, ‘Robert’ playing guitar and screaming lyrics into a mic, completely taking the show from Kerry. He channels his anger, his fury, into his music. Screams his rage into the mic. And it's a cacophony for the merc tucked in the back of his skull. She can feel her own stress and pain, but she also feels his energy, his love of this. Even through the anger, he knows that this is the place he belongs. 

This is hell, she thinks as he sings. The idea that every hell is tailored to an individual, everyone has their own personal idea of torment. This is her’s. She died and now she’s doomed to live in the head of some foul smelling rocker who plays nothing but music her sort of ex liked. Surrounded by loud sounds, foul smells, and no control. This is hell, her own special little hell. And she’ll be stuck here forever, for being an atheist or bi or a whore or a murderer… one of those did it. 

After an agonizing hour, the show closes down. More sweat is now clinging to her current vessel’s body and V mentally screams at him to take a shower, but no panicked thoughts seem to reach him. He’s completely unaware of her...presence… in his head. Sweat slick, ‘Robert’ puts away his axe and lights up a cigarette; smoke settles in his lungs, the cloying taste of tar sticking to his mouth. But there’s a relief in him, a tension leaving him, nicotine soothing him if only for a moment. 

Two women are settled down on the steps of the stage, in clinging tacky clothes. Groupies there to claw their way into the pants of anyone who’ll have them, entire fucking lives dedicated to riding the dick of someone more important than them.  Because playing fleshlight to a rockerboy is the closest they’ll ever get to making a difference in this world. 

“You're wastin' your lives, followin' us around like dogs.”

If she had hands she’d hit him. The women scowl at him, obviously taken back at the rockerboy talking down to them, like he hadn’t been thinking of fucking a girl just before the show. Like his eyes didn’t look over the curve of their asses and cleavage. If one of them asked he’d be inside of them in a moment, just has to make them feel like shit first. 

“What crawled up your ass?’

‘Robert’ sneers and rolls his eyes, walking past the stage. His fingers wrapping around the door handle, he was thinking about something he was going to do, toppling Arasaka. There’s a determination in his walk, a goal he’s marching off too, still hints of a soldier in his steadfast gait. The hell is he planning? How could some rockerboy take down a mega corp? There’s a faint but steady sound past the door, a whirring sound. 

“Johnny, wait up!”

He turns, answering to the name she hasn’t heard until now and it’s Kerry running towards him; chasing after him like he did all those years ago, when he followed ‘Robbie’ right to war. She’s not sure if it’s her or ‘Johnny’ remembering it. 

Kerry is older now than he was in the memories, though he looks younger than Johnny. A tall fluffy mullet of dark hair, a scraggly mustache, and a half finished sleeve of ink on his left arm. His hand wraps around Johnny’s wrist, pulling him the rocker closer. 

“Don't do this,” Kerry warns, “You can still change your mind.”

“Get over here man,” Johnny pulls Kerry in closer, a hand cupped to his friend’s face,“Fuck this band. Not your crowd, not your noise, do your own thing.’

They’re close enough to see the scar above Kerry’s lip and the freckles that dot his neck. Johnny taps his finger against Kerry’s chest as he brings his hand from the shorter man’s face. Kerry’s always cared more for the music than the message, more about fame than impact, Samurai more Johnny’s baby then his. But fears kept Kerry from chasing that solo dream as much as he wants, dipping his toes but never taking the chance to fully dive in. Kerry always needed a good kick in the ass to get where he needs to be, might be the last one Johnny can ever give him. 

“Bastard. Tsh… Gonna miss you something awful.”

There’s a softness in Kerry’s voice and smile, a fondness that only comes from lifelong friends. A soft warmth nestles in Johnny’s chest as well, for the first time she feels his lips pull into something she can almost call a smile. 

“See ya in the next life, friend.”

With that Johnny puffs on his cigarette and turns, leaving out the door, the whirring growing louder. The source of it shown; a helicopter landed outside the club, blades spinning and whipping up dust. A woman stands nearby, a wild teal mohawk, someone Johnny knows, fuzzy memories of a tumultuous past. 

“You're late,” she yells out over the sound of the chopper. Hands on her hips, eyes glaring at him. Always tries to play like she’s pissed, but never could resist him. 

“Love it when you're mad. Gets my southern blood pumpin',” he teases with a grin and V can feel the reality of his words, a throb in his dick behind his leather pants. And she doesn’t like that, her discomfort at feeling what it’s like to have a dick oddly mingling with his lust. 

“Get in. 'Fore I change my mind.”

Johnny makes his way to the helicopter, climbing inside, blades achingly loud. Two people already sit in the chopper. A man with chromed skin and fatigues, a woman fiddling with a computer. Her face is obscured by a helmet and visor, only black painted lips showing. 

“Silverhand,” the man greets him. 

Johnny...Silverhand… 

“Hey, Shaitan,” he greets as gears start to turn in V’s head, a head she no longer has. 

Johnny’s ex, Rogue, comes walking towards the helicopter as he turns back to the open doorway. Her name only known through Johnny’s thoughts skittering around her, but it sounds strangely familiar to V as well. Johnny extends a hand to help Rogue into the chopper, but she ignores him. Prideful bitch, he rolls his eyes. 

“Get us in the air,” Rogue yells to the unseen pilot, shoving a headset into Johnny’s hands, “here, put this on, and it stays on, got it?”

Johnny pulls it on and the helicopter starts to take off, the world falling further and further below them. The sign at the top of the club comes into view; The Hammer, Johnny taking another drag on his cigarette as Kerry steps out the back door. Silverhand flicks the out onto the cement as his friend watches the chopper fly off. 

As the helicopter flies through skyscrapers and towers, V struggles to take in where they are. Night City, but not. Towering buildings and screens blasting ads, par for the course in the city of broken dreams. But the ads are for products she hasn’t heard of or ones discontinued and no longer sold. The buildings look rougher, not quite the same slick clean look of the city she’s come to know. 

A city consumed by corps, a vile cesspit with ads as far as the eye can see, each desperate to wring out one last eddie from the masses. The entire system designed to crush people too apathetic to do a damn thing about it. Exploited, violated, used for a profit, and thrown out the second the corps get what they wanted. And the people just take it. No longer questioning why there’s no more farms, only land stripped for profits and nomads forced to abandon their homes. No longer questioning why real food is a rarity, why the priciest drink on the market is filth free water. No longer questioning why someone like saburo is pushing a hundred and the average Night City citizen won’t see forty. Corruption and apathy, best friends united to create the city of broken dreams. He’d burn it all down if he could, but truthfully can’t imagine himself anywhere else…

So… he’ll burn it all down, die for it if he must, and something better can be built in it’s ashes. 

A building in City Center holds a large holo-display showing the time and date; August 20, 2023… Fifty years in the past, the day Arasaka Tower was destroyed. And given his thoughts, she knows where Johnny is headed. That name, Johnny Silverhead, rattles through her. She’s heard it before, a few times. Half listened to conversations with Ava about music, where V would just nod and hope it earned her pity kiss. A name brought up by Jackie when discussing the tower being blown up, shots thrown back in… Rogue’s bar. The older woman with gray hair and the young adult with a wild teal mullet are one in the same. 

V is in the foul smelling, cigarette smoking body of a rockerboy turned wannabe terrorist on his way to set off a nuke that will kill over a quarter million people. 

“Piers're on fire. Pacifica's cut off, shut down. APCs on the streets of Watson,” Shaitan explains, stationed at the machine gun turret beside Johnny. 

“Sons of bitches.” 

“Skull-crackin' out there… that us?” A voice, the pilot maybe, asks over the headset. 

“Johnny's idea. Weyland's drawing Arasaka's attention away from the tower.”

“Collateral damage part of the plan, too?”

“This isn't the cub scouts, Thompson, Chew it up, spit it out,” Rogue tells him, no hint of fear or remorse in her voice as the chopper starts to come around a tower. 

A pillar of black metal with the Arasaka logo emblazoned at the top of it in silver. Levels of the tower get smaller towards the roof, from the distance there’s the bright red flash of holo warning signs forbidding entry. As they ascend higher and higher, the barrage of Arasaka soldiers and turrets atop the tower come into view. 

“Target range acquired.” 

“Make it rain,” Rogue commands and Shaitan begins shooting off the machine gun turret. 

Gunfire rings through the air, Arasaka soldiers yelling out as they fire back, automated turrets beginning to fire at Shaitan. The chopper stays rotating, hovering but never still, to avoid being shot out of the air as the chromed sniper works to clear the roof. Blood painting across the metal as Shaitan blasts through them. 

“Fuck!” 

Enemy fire, Arasaka fire, blasts through, Pinging against chrome and metal, practically sparking. A lucky shot, or three, ripping through Shaitan’s shoulder and he screams in pain, falling onto his back. Rogue yelling out as she kneels down to check on him, Shaitan convulsing in pain. 

“Taking over!”

Johnny takes over the machine gun, optics connecting with the turret sights. Arasaka soldiers flood the roof, nearly impossible to keep track of them; not even a moment passes before Johnny is firing off the gun. It's rapid and brutal, an onslaught as the reverberation of it shakes his body. But there is a hint of strategy beneath, taking out the automatic turrets first, blasting each one until they explode into shrapnel. Only when the final one is in sparks does he turn to the soldiers, Their sidearms can’t compare to the heavy fire. Blasted full of hole at rapid fire, blood and brains spraying. 

A body of corpses and shrapnel left across the roof. He pulls away from the gun, unzipping a duffle bag. A white constructed mechanism, wire, switches, and a giant nuclear energy warning across it. He’s about to plant a nuke in Arasaka. Fucking stop it, you idiot, all you do is cause more harm than good. She tries to scream inside his head, but nothing comes of it. The helicopter lowers down closer to the tower roof. 

“Murphy?” Rogue calls out. 

“Found our access point. Get moving.” 

“Johnny, remember the plan?” Rogue asks as Johnny zips the duffle bag and slings it over his shoulder. 

“Get the payload on the elevator,” he jumps from the helicopter, “arm it, let gravity do its thing. Explosion rocks the foundation, tower crumbles - chaos, screaming, roll credits.”

He pulls out a gun, a heavy duty pistol, Malorian Arms 3516, Last True Friend etched in it.He spins it between his silver fingers, flourishing and completely unneeded. It’s smartlink tech, synching with his cybernetic arm. And she can feel a sort of dampening of his feelings and emotions, that rage burning in his chest starting to simmer down, a colder more calculated anger taking over. 

Rogue and Murphy run ahead of him, across the roof, through the piles of bodies. Johnny follows behind them down a flight of stairs on the side of the building. 

“Exit window's gonna be tight,” Rogue tells him, brandishing her own side arm as she comes to wait by a door. 

“Jacking in,” Murphy connects a small computer into an interface, “Is grass green, do birds fly, do cats eat bats, do rats shit gnats?”

“Mainframe's not your playground, Murphy, c'mon. Evac announcement - broadcast it across all frequencies and let's get movin’.”

“Sheesh, who wrote this manifesto?”

“Really need me to answer that question?”

“Jesus, Johnny, you've gone of the deep end. And that's comin' from chairjock,” Murphy tells him, interface with a spider avatar drifting across the door, before it slides open. 

Johnny rushes through and down a flight of stairs as Arasaka guards running to meet him. He shoots the first in the head, point blank, brains splattering. The gun is powerful, devastating, sending a reverberation through Johnny’s silver arm. Enough that bone would have broken in the recoil. The guard no longer recognizable. 

The second guard stays further back, at the bottom of the second step. Johnny slams a trigger on the back of his gun, shooting flames out towards the guard. The man screams and staggers back, flesh burning as Johnny follows up with a shot through his chest. 

A third one follow, stumbling over burning remains, when three shots go through his skull, Rogue taking him down. The two continue down the spiraling stairs, stepping through blood and ash. The meet another guard at the end, who fires off his hand gun rapid fire. 

“Shred the whole fuckin' lot!”

The pair take cover behind the corner banister, Johnny reloading his gun with another twirl, before jumping back up. He shoots twice through the guards chest, watching the man fall in a bloody heap as they reach the end of the staircase. 

They go through a doorway and two more guards greet them, gun’s trained on the two edgerunners. 

“End him already! That’s an or-” 

The guard's yell is cut off by a bullet ripping through his shoulder, a second through his chest. His underling going down a mere moment later, with a headshot from Rogue; room cleared. Blood soaking into silver and marble floors. Johnny’s eyes focusing on the elevator across the room. 

“Murph?” Rogue calls out the netrunner’s name, her avatar showing on Johnny’s optics as she starts to hack the elevator. 

“She sought it with thimbles, she sought it with care, pursued it with forks and hope…” Poem finished, the elevator doors open.

“Johnny payload.” Rogue yells out, but Johnny’s already across the room, making his way to the elevator. He brings the bag down off his shoulder, placing it down, crouching,  and unzipping it. 

“Bushido II - bomb's name was what?” He asks, in a slow sly voice, entertaining at least himself if no one else. 

“Wrap it up, we gotta delta!”

“The ‘Demolitron’,” he sets the charges with a light hand, “we're good to blow.” 

He stands up and leaves the elevator, no hurry, only determination in him as he walks back towards Rogue. Like this is just a regular Thursday night. 

“'Saka elites incoming! Run for it!”

“Get the fuck out of there, Johnny,” Rogue yells as he steps away, “shoot the cables!” 

He does just that, blasting through the elevator cables, the carriage with the bomb dropping down through the lower levels. 

“Get the rotors spinning! We're on our way!” Rogue yells out to their pilot, but there’s something rattling around in Johnny’s chest. He’s got to save her.  It’s his only chance. 

“Not done yet still need to feed this to their subnet,” he waves a small handheld computer in the air. Rogue’s face twists and grimaces, infuriated. 

“I fucking knew it!” she swings her hand through the air, fingers clenched like she could strangle him, “This was never about "corporate colonialism" - this was about your groupie output wasn't it?!”

“Nah, you wouldn’t understand, Rogue.” 

“Givin' you four fuckin' minutes. Chopper's not gonna wait one sec longer.”

“Door lock breached. Arasaka sons-a-bitches incoming,” 

“Love you, Spider,” he jokes as he pushes through double doors, the woodwork of a lobby greeting him a moment before an armed guard can. 

“Whole world loves me.’

“Fuuuck!” He yells out, something between a frustration and excitement as he blasts a hole through a guard's chest. 

Johnny reloads before stepping out further, quickly having to pull back into the doorway for cover through the marble passageway. Two guards coming from a corridor on the left, a third from the right. The tower is made of rectangular balconies wrapping around, corners and curves to hide around. He fires around the corner at the guard on the left, taking a leg before a second shot takes their hide. 

A bullet whips past his head and he pulls back, guard coming to him, in front of the passageway. He slams his hand on the trigger, a plume of flames engulfing his enemy, before finishing them off with another shot. He rounds the corner and slams forwards into the third guard, knocking them off balance for a moment. Johnny swings his fist out, rings colliding against their jaw, they hit the ground. He fires a shot point blank into their head, continuing on his way. 

A staircase in the left of the room, across from the stone garden in the midst of the balonied section. He rushes up two sets of stairs, reloading along the way. It brings him to the upper level of the stacked balconies, a guard directly across the gap on the other side. The first shot Johnny fires splits the banister in front of the guard, the second shot rips through them. 

Three guards rush out from another room and Johnny pulls back, stepping down some steps, reloading. The movement forces the guards to come through the doorway, one at a time, letting him line up a shot that blasts through two at once, the third gagging as his friends' brains splatter and cling to his face. But he barely gets a moment to process before he’s dead too. 

Johnny runs up the stairs, stomping over corpses, as he goes around the corner. There’s a doorway that leads down to what looks to be a board room. One more guard down with a quick clean headshot, brains now sprayed across a vase of flowers on the table. He walks over them around the corner and towards a paneled wall. 

“Closing in on the access point,” he tells Murphy and the panel opens up, revealing a main frame. 

“Slot in.”

Johnny pulls out a little computer, stickers across the top of it. He flips it open and plugs it into the terminal. A little interface coming across his optics, Uploading Virus: Liberator.

“Sweet ICE-breaker,” the runner speaks up again, “Foreign, right? Just, wonder if we know anyone who can switch the subnet protocol…”

“Hilarious. You gonna help or not?”

“Do spiders spin webs? It's time we caught some flies.”

“Thanks, Murph.”

“Now, just for good measure…”Murphy trails off for just a moment, “Holy cybercow, we’re on TV! Take a look.”

A large TV mounted on the wall pings on, tuned to a news cast. Johnny shifts to the side to watch it. Brief clips of chaos flashing by in snapshots as the anchor talks over them. 

“And we turn now to Arasaka Tower, its evacuation ongoing after an unidentified terrorist organization released a manifesto threatening violence. The terrorists stating their desire to, quote-unquote, "topple a monument to corporate colonialism." Night City's mayor, Mbole Ebunike, has issued a statement declaring that he will bring the full force of the law to bear in response to any act of terrorism. Going now to our reporter on the scene at Arasaka Tower. Hopefully, he can shed some light on this situation as events unfold.”

People might finally wake up. There’s a swell of pride in Johnny’s chest, that this will finally send his message, finally change the world for the better. And V thinks of the rebuilt tower, now with remembrance monuments, but rebuilt and still standing proud fifty years later. The virus finishes uploading, Johnny unplugging his computer and tucking it back in his pocket. 

Took too long, but better than never. Stay safe, Alt. 

“All set. Now get outta there. They're movin' up! Hit the roof, quick!”

Johnny rushes through the board room and around the bends of the squared balcony, heading straight to the double doors on the other side. Just as he reaches it there’s a heavy blast, wood and metal shredding as Johnny is forced backwards. 

Pain shoots through his back as it collides with the floor, looking up where the door was blown through. A man stands in the destroyed remains of it. A tall man in heavily armored Arasaka garb, wielding a heavy duty shotgun. Cybernetic arms, a black cyberware jawed, and adornments of metal across his forehead. 

“Shit! That's Adam Smasher!”

Adam Smasher, the same borged out man protecting Yorinobu? He jumps down from the ledge, hitting the floor in front of Johnny with a heavy thud. He’s different than in 2077, more human, a healthy more flesh colored face behind the cyberware. Fuck, Johnny curses mentally and starts firing shots at Adam.  The devastation of his Malorian doing nothing as they fire into Adam’s cybernetic arms, the top of the line chrome holding up under each fire. 

“Johnny, run!”

He wants to fight, wants to teach Smasher a lesson the borged fucker won’t ever forget. Every fiber of his being screaming at him to stand and fight. But there’s a nuke on a timer, falling down to the depths of  the tower. There’s a helicopter getting ready to fly off. And while he doesn’t mind dying today, expects he just might, Rogue and Spider are waiting on him. He doesn’t need the last thing he hears to be their nagging… or for Rogue to make the chopper wait on him.  So, he swallows his pride, as foul as it tastes, and makes a run for it. 

Johnny pistol whips and shoots an Arasaka soldier on his way out the door, reaching the stairs back out to the roof. The door shuts behind him before any more soldiers can come after him. 

“Murphy!?” 

“Door's sealed, but it won't hold for long. Run, Johnny. Like the wind.”

He can see Rogue ahead of him running up the stairs. She should have been back in the chopper by now, she waited on Johnny. Rogue will bitch him out and nag until she’s blue in the face, but she’d never leave him behind.  Wrapped around his finger, no matter what he’s done. Johnny runs quickly up the stairs, to the roof, three steps behind Rogue as she jumps into the chopper, as it starts to lift off without him. 

“Johnny! Move!”

He jumps, grabbing Rogue’s outstretched arm, fingers wrapping tight around her forearm. Rogue tries to pull him inside to safety, when his fingers begin to slip. Something fires in the background a whistling noise, as his hand catches in Rouge’s, fingers twisting tightly together as she pulls. A boom rings out, hitting against the chopper with a spark and a shake, he slips right from Rogue’s grip, world going out from under him as she plummets back down to the tower roof. His back hits the metal with a crash, head bouncing against the cement, pain shooting through his body. Pain blurs his vision as the helicopter spins overhead, watching as the pilot regains control and they’re forced to fly off without the ill-fated rockerboy. 

Boots thunder against the floor around him, Smasher coming into view. Johnny’s silver arm shakes as he tries to reach for his gun, nerves on fire after the fall. Smasher throws down his heavy shot gun, kicking the gun away from Johnny’s fingers. 

“Smasher.” 

“Told ya, Johnny boy. Told you I'd end you someday,” Smasher all but snarls, a compartment in his cybernetic arm opening, Johnny’s staring down the barrel of the hidden weapon. 

Johnny holds his arm out, only for it to be shot, chrome sparking as it’s blasted. Vision going out as he passes out. It only feels like a moment, a blink and the world returns. 

The rattling of wheels against cement, strapped to a gurney. Bright and silver, a moon hangs high above the skyscrapers. Dirt and dust fly through the air, dancing around him like confetti. Faintly he hears sirens, hears screaming, hears cries. And when he shifts his head, to look further back, he can see the plumes of fire and smoke. 

“Yes, he’s still alive,” the Arasaka doctor wheeling him says, spoken in Japanese, but understood by Johnny...and by extension the merc tucked in the corner of his mind. Everything hurts, no other memory so sharp, so clear. Able to feel every bruise and cut, like she’s truly him. 

“Understood. We're en route,” the worker says above his head. 

And Johnny falls back into darkness again, unable to keep conscious, the sound of explosions and chaos erupting around him as he passes out. It’s impossible to know how long, black void blanketing it all, time losing its meaning and grip on them. 

It's a sharp slap across his face that wakes him back up, blood clinging to his lips. Blinking as he tries to take in his surroundings. He’s tied down to a chair, two guards standing before him. In a slick little room, a stretch of windows across the back wall, a bright mushroom cloud of destruction going off in the distance. Charge should have finished going off by now…

“Your associates - who are they? How did you acquire fissile material?” The guard questions him. 

“Gonna give good cop over there a chance to say something?  C'mooon…” Johnny sasses his interrogator, looking at the second quiet guard. 

Then the guard sucker punches him, knuckles slamming into Johnny’s gut with a sharp crushing pain. 

“Which terrorist organization do you belong to? How did you acquire fissile material?”

Another slap, backhanded and harsh against his face. His head forced to the side where he sees a man walking into the room; an older Japanese man, Saburo Arasaka. The corporate leader walks with his hands behind his back, a younger woman in all black following closely behind. 

“Old man don’t look too impressed with your efforts,” Johnny taunts. 

Saburo and the guards bow to each other, the old man speaking in Japanese, “leave us. I wish to look him in the eye.” 

“Hot damn,” Johnny rolls his eyes,  “done and gone.”

Saburo keeps his back turned to Johnny as the guards leave. The woman sets up a tech station by his chair. Her flingers click against a keyboard, looking at a screen before she finally speaks in a soft voice. 

“My husband died in that tower.” 

And Johnny’s stomach drops, pits with something akin to guilt. He can still see the burning clouds, the explosions in the distance through the window. Something went wrong, charges weren’t meant to be that strong. An evac announcement, charges just meant for the tower, a message. Not this. Casualties sure, everyone knew that was inevitable, but… 

“But there are fates worse than death,” the woman tells him, fixing a metal wreath over his head. Wires connecting it back to her computer system. 

“I… didn’t want him to die.” 

“Why did you do this?” Saburo asks in his native tongue. 

“To bring an end to the madness you wreak.”

“I have found that people lie, most often deceiving themselves. Not So the dead…”  

Saburo finally turns to face Silverhand walking closer, stalking closer. And Johnny spits at him, blood and saliva now sticking to Saburo’s face, red staining the wrinkled skin. There’s barely a twitch to the old man’s face as he wipes the spittle and blood from his face. Disgusted but not stopped. 

“Fuck you!” Johnny yells out for good measure, voice rough in his throat. 

“The dead are so very, very loud,” Saburo scowls, “And yet, lying is not in their nature. It is so… humbling - to listen to the dead speak… Begin.” 

The techie turns a switch and Johnny’s optics start to glitch, distort. Cyan fuzz piercing through the world as a UI screen appears. Soulkiller Primed: Commencing Engram Transfer. An crackle of electricity starts to course through him, a scream leaving him as his body convulses, Neurons cracking and frying as the world around his shakes, trembles, then finally cracks apart.

And V dies, not for the first time. 

Darkness overtakes him, near oblivion. Only the vaguest notion of existence, suspended in time and reality. In a cold black choking void. Enough awareness, just enough, to know fear. Overwhelming fear, terror, trapped under the thumb of Arasaka. Never knowing when, if, there’s an escape. Never knowing what can, will, or has happened. 

Time loses all meaning in digital purgatory. 

And then sunlight starts to breach through. A haze over his vision, like watching sunlight through fogged glass. He can see the sunlight but he can’t feel it, maybe it’s an Arasaka trick. Trying to convince him he’s free, that he’ll ever see the sun again, just to rip it away before he can ever feel it’s warmth on his skin. 

Then the view shifts, like someone turning their head, seeing the world through someone’s eyes. The sun beating down on a campsite, nomads, but their cuts and colors unlike any he’s seen. Not the Aldecaldos for sure, that much he knows. Might be some sort of experiment? Corps have never been above testing shit on people, nomads seen as less than human by most folks in the city, means they get away with it. 

Someone calls the name Aidan, a mother calling for her child, the girl...he’s seeing the world through That feeling that knowledge seeping into him. A tent with an older woman and a young girl, a mirror in the tent catches a reflection, showing him Aidan. A young sunburnt nomad child with dark hair and gray eyes Nearly identical to the other child he’d just seen. 

And in a blink, like a slide changing, the world changes again. Training sessions for the nomad kids. Taught to be strong. The kids made to fight each other, to spar, and losing meant going without food for the rest of the day if they were lucky. A beating if they were considered particularly pathetic. Some nights she won. Other nights watching other kids eat. The worst nights spent in a tent, mother rubbing salve on her injuries. 

She’s taught how to load a gun, repair an engine, and kill without shaking before she’s seen her seventh birthday. 

Members of the ‘family’ culled before everyone. Because they were sick. Because they were weak. Because they were a burden. They could drag the rest of the family down, The Herd must be culled so that they can stay strong. For the best of the family.

Gareth, an older man of the nomad family, gets sick. cancer running rampant in his body, treatment available but timely… expensive.  He’d sneak toasted marshmallows to Aidan on nights she’d be made to go without anything…. 

He begs to die on his feet rather than his knees like most cullings. 

His wish is denied. 

Aidan’s father forces a dying man to his knees, pressing a captive bolt pistol to the back of his skull and killing him in front of the family. For their own good. 

And one day, Aidan gets sick too. Johnny can’t feel it through her, through the snapshots, too disconnected. But he gets a rumbling of it through her. Body aching, head in agony, world constantly spinning enough to make her puke. 

She tells no one. Refuses to be the next one culled, no doubt her father’s rules apply to her. Her sister, the same age and near a picture perfect copy, frets over her as they go to pick through a landfill. Instructed to spend evenings in search of anything useful to the family, to earn their keep. A ringing in her ears, world spinning as the noise builds and builds until silence strikes and she drops to the ground. 

The world has gone silent. She wakes up in a med tent, but can hear nothing. A world of noises and chaos now silent. 

And a stone faced father comes barging in, he’s saying something, but she doesn’t know what.  Flinching in threadbare sheets, knowing the signs of his cold anger, but not what’s driving it, not how to fix it. Nails dig into her shoulder, dragged from the medical tent and out into the midst of the camp sigh. Vision blurred by tears. She yells out what’s happening, but can’t hear the words. 

But she knows the press of the barrel against her head, the touch of the captive bolt pistol, how they cull the herd. She was weak, defective, broken. Nomad family gathered around, watching her cry and scream, unable to hear herself.  Weak and pathetic before them all. 

Then a pair of hands grab her, save her, pull her away and into a hug. Her mother holds her tight, crying, screaming, then kissing the top of her daughter’s head. Whispering words she knows won’t reach her. Aidan is saved, she doesn’t know what’s said. What spared her life. But she’s allowed to live on. 

Her mother and sister learn ASL with her; the only two who never shun her, protecting her too much if anything. The implication clear whether in kindness or anger, she’s weak now. Defected. But her father expects her to work harder, to prove his mercy wasn’t a mistake. That this child earned her right to live. 

She earns hearing aids years later[ and cries when she first puts them in; the world is too loud, too painful. Aidan keeps them low and continues using ASL. 

A homeless teenage girl in a town they ransack; long dark hair and heavy makeup. Calls herself Avarice, they call her Ava. She tries to sign to Aidan and the young nomad girl is in love that easy, desperate for someone who cares enough to meet her even halfway. Despite it all, she begs Ava to join The Herd. Because maybe hell is more bearable when you’re in love. 

She’s dragged to the med tent one night, told she needs a checkup, no rhyme or reason. Knowing better than to fight her father when he’s barking orders. They sedate her, clan doctor holding her down and forcing her into unconsciousness. She awakes with a scar across her lower stomach. Sterilized. So, she’ll never pass along defective genes. 

The next snapshot doesn’t feel much longer after, older but not by much, a year maybe. When The Herd is swarmed by an rival nomad clan, one they’ve fucked over one time too many. Aidan trying to drive one of the cars to get her sister and mother away from the ambush. When a rival vehicle slams into them, a screech of tires, the gnash of metal. Eira and Aidan safe, but their mother is pinned between a caved-in door and the center console, bleeding where shrapnel pierces deep into her legs. 

Trapped until Aidan’s father and a group from the family find them, The three women pulled from a crushed vehicle, the mother the only one gravely injured. Aidan follows as she’s dragged to an emergency medical set up. 

Legs too damaged, it'd require a double amputation, prosthetics or cyberware. Easily doable. Nowhere near beyond saving if they’d act in time, take the time. But they never do, never truly will. Aidan begs for her mother’s life, like her mother did for her. For her father to have mercy just one more time. 

And the bolt pistol is put in her hands. She’s told to do it. To cull her mother, to be strong, to put the family above the individual. A test of her strength. 

She refuses, screams, and points the gun at him. And he mocks her tears, mocks the way her hands shake. He rips the pistol from her hands, she fights and pulls with him. But he’s over a foot taller, stronger, leaves her black and blue; crying on the ground with his boot on her back as he takes the gun and kills her mother. 

And once her mother’s body is burned to ash, she runs.

Years of traveling, towns across NUSA, some faces are kinder than others. Eira and Ava sent to track her down, to kill the traitor. 

Eventually she finds herself in Night City, but not the one Johnny knows. Newer, slicker, brighter. But the corruption and apathy remain, chrome even more common place than it was before. Folks more metal than flesh, every ripper doc with back alley tech. 

She meets a friend, Jackie, Johnny knows his name despite never hearing it. A big ‘tino fucker covered in gaudy gold chains who helps her settle in. Taken into his home. Merc work, scummy nothing jobs, merc janitors at best. Jackie pulls her into a tight hug, the nomad unsure of what to do as his arms wrap around her, face pressed into his chest. 

Then there’s a sharp pain, nerves and neurons firing off as everything is suddenly real. No haze or glass between him and her memories. Face tucked in against fabric, a chest, but there’s no warmth. No heartbeat. Arms wrapped tight around a body that’s cold and limp, one hurting like it’s been ripped open. They feel like his own, it feels like it’s his body. 

He can feel the movement of muscles, the beat of the body’s heart. How the face is twisted up with tears running wet and hot down the cheeks. It feels like him, but it's not. Smaller, thinner. 

No more ‘chicas’, ‘jainas’, or the odd ‘mija’. No more smiles that outshine the sun. No more nagging her to look on the bright side. No more bear hugs or hands the size of her head ruffling through her hair. No more Jackie….

Thoughts not his own swim around his head, the voice feminine. What the hell is Arasaka playing at? Playing someone else’s memories, trying to make him sit in the backseat of someone else's life? An experiment, they going to try to twist him, fuck with his head?

“Mr. Welles has passed. Where shall I take his remains?” An AI voice asks, in some tech cab with a bleached digital butler staring at her. 

He’s got to find a way out, there’s got to be a way? But how do you leave someone’s head? 

The body, her body, moves without his permission. Able to feel it like it’s his own and he can see just who’s corpse she was clinging to. Jackie… The same guy who took her in, now dead in the back of a cab. There’s a pit in her stomach, a tightness in her chest; he can feel her pain… 

He’s both separate and intrinsically connected, his thoughts and feelings distinct enough, but her own still overwhelming. 

”W-what?” She says...what was her name Aidan, Brayden, Hayden, some shit... Frat boy name on a nomad brat. 

She stumbles over her words, sounds like she barely knows how to talk, might be the blubbering. Fuck if he knows or cares. Her grief, while he can feel it around him, surrounding him from where he sits in her head, is her own. He’s got bigger worries, bigger fish to fry. Former nomad, now a merc, but that doesn’t meant she can’t be with Arasaka. Corps hire mercs, use nomads as scapegoats, all sorts of shit. She could be in on whatever the fuck this is. 

He’s just got to figure out what exactly the fuck this is, what Arasaka’s plan is. A way to get intel from him? Prodding at memories by seeing if someone else’s sparks something?

“The Excelsior package provides for the disposal of passenger remains free of charge. I merely require a destination.”

“I…he-he’d want to be with his family.”

“Mr. Welles' closest blood relative is Guadalupe Alejandra Welles, proprietress of the El Coyote Cojo bar. I will make sure to deliver him safely. Mr. DeShawn awaits you in room number two-oh-four. ” 

Her hands are stained with blood, her forearm has a gash down it. He can see the traces of Mantis Blades, one ripped out. Something happened, flashes of dangling off an Arasaka branded hotel, holding her friend up. Red everywhere, fighting Arasaka guards. Doesn’t mean she didn’t work with them, how else would they somehow plant him in her head, in her memories. 

She squeezes her friend’s shoulders and presses her forehead to his, feeling the cold of his corpse. 

“See ya in the major leagues, Jack…”

She gets out of the back of the cab, she’s dressed like a corpo, he realizes when her eyesight catches her body. White blouse, stained red with blood, black slacks. Rain is pouring down on her, as she walks through a dirty alley. She doesn’t seem to notice Johnny’s existence, his presence in her head. Everything he thinks, tries to scream without a mouth, doesn’t earn him a response. 

Then again, if she is with Arasaka, might be told to ignore him. He���d be pulling his hair out if he had a body, if he existed beyond some former tarmac rat’s mind. She walks through a door into a filthy excuse for a motel, the No-Tell. There's chatter around them and he catches the rambling of a tv, something about Saburo Arasaka. But she doesn’t stay to linger, doesn’t let him fully hear it. Something about the old fucker’s life. 

But she’s at the door of a hotel room before he can hear much, bloodied knuckles knocking against the door. 

“It's V,” She says, knocking again when there’s no answer. V? Since when is she V? Where the fuck did she get V from? 

The door opens and a guy comes out, giant fucker around a foot or so taller than her, so was her newly departed friend. Which begs the question, how tall is she?

God, he’s stuck in the skull of some munchkin merc, isn’t he? 

Everyone, everything is… bigger. A hand on her shoulder, nearly the size of her head stops her from stepping forward. And he hates it, someone putting hands on him, controlling him so easily, he tries to force her hands to punch the ugly fucker. But it doesn’t happen, hands clenched at her side. How the hell does she fight anyone like this anyway, she’s half the height of everyone she meets. 

“He waiting.” 

V, Aidan; whatever dumb fuck name she has is allowed into the motel room. A man inside, puffing away on a cigar, watching the news. He can feel her worry swelling inside of her as she clears her throat, the man doesn’t look Arasaka. But the little runt of a merc has to be attached to them somehow. He’s not one to give Arasaka too much credit, be none if he had his way, but they’re not dumb enough to put his engram in any klepto punk’s head. 

Arasaka uploaded his engram, scorching him with Soukiller, he remembers that. Mikoshi is where they store them, digital souls tucked away, where they got the tech to play with the human mind. If she made it there, they had to have trusted her. 

“WNS… N54… Even the pirate networks… You blowin' up everywhere! And the Jackster? He out in the car?” 

“He’s...dead.” Having to say it, having to hear it from her own lips. Stuck in the whiny mind of an Arasaka asslicker, wonderful. 

“Condolences friend and the relic?”

The relic? Arasaka’s ultimate project, what they needed Soulkiller before. There’s always been a constant murmur about it, Arasaka looking to commodify the human soul. Must have finally rolled it out after they fried him. 

“Here,” she explains by tapping her chipslot, is that how he’s here? 

“Hmm, I was afraid of that…” 

“What?!”

But the relic, they advertised it like imaginary friends, or some shit. If he was on that, she’d be able to see and hear him right? Unless Arasaka fucked up… 

“Saburo Arasaka,” the man, Dex, paces, “Dead…?! You got any notion of the shit you pulled me into?! You offed the fuckin' emperor! His majesty! Anyone with so much as a pinky toe dipped in this mess is as good as dead!”

Saburo’s dead, old sack of shit finally kicked it… and Johnny’s in the killer’s head. Memories, her’s, creep up. Ones he didn’t get in the brief glitches of memories before. Saburo’s body, dead limp and collapsed on a hotel floor. Ripping the dogtags from his bruised neck. Means Johnny won’t get the satisfaction of offing the bastard himself.  

“I didn’t kill Saburo! I- I-”

She stumbles and trips over every word; can she act like she didn’t fuck up any of this? Like she has no role in Jackie and Bug’s deaths… He’d gag on her feelings if he could, a blubbering child, those memories may be a mystery to him right now. But he buys it, if he couldn’t manage to kill Saburo, he doubts some miserable little half pint could, chick can barely get a sentence out. Which means he very well may still be tripping around in the neurons of some shitty nomad turned bootlicker. 

"No shit?l Tell that to the ‘Saka ninjas they send after you!”

“We...we got to leave Night City.”

“You don’t say.” 

“Call Parker, we close the deal, collect our eddies, and go off the radar.” 

“A’ight, settle down, Gotta be tactical about this. Parker, eddies, then we leave the city limits behind. But first… Your face… got blood all over it. Bathroom's there. Go get yourself cleaned up.”

She nods and makes her, their, way to the bathroom. Dex is going to trick her, pull some shit, Johnny can see it a mile away. Chick’s outnumbered, outstrength, if they think she’s a risk and Dex made it clear he does, he’ll drop her. But she doesn’t see it, walking into the bathroom and settling at the sink. The mirror lights up, showing her face, giving him the first good look at her since those foggy memories of childhood. 

He sees traces of that kid; gray eyes and her face is soft. Young, delicate, but with a heavy layer of blood coating iit. 

Her blood and Jackie’s.

He can taste the bile in her throat, as if his own, can feel the burn of it and the churn of her gut as she pukes into the sink. It's not the first time he’s ended up with the taste of someone elses puke in his mouth, though it’s her mouth, he supposes. She pushes her bleached blonde hair off her face as she retches, streaking blood through it. 

If she would have refused the job. 

If she had gotten them up the ladder. 

If she had been stronger. 

If she had been stealthier.

If she had gotten them through the lobby quicker. 

If she could have convinced Delamain to get him to a doc.

If she knew better first aid. 

He tries to shut it out, the knots in her guts, the ache in her chest. Her thoughts spinning around her head and what feels like his. Surrounded by the feelings of another, he can’t fucking live like this, there’s got to be a way out. 

She washes the blood from her hands and face; Jackie wanted this for her, one of the only people who ever wanted anything good for her. If only for him, she owes it to him to finish this job.

Can she fucking hear him? He tries to mentally scream at her, he’s going to find a way out of this, if he has to claw his way out of her damn head! Slamming him in the head of some grieving merc, that Saburo’s idea of a sick final joke? Making him feel someone else’s pain meant to make him talk? Meant to give everything away? If hell exists, Saburo better be burning or Johnny will set the son of a bitch on fire himself. 

Nothing works, nothing seems to draw her attention. Johnny thinking to a void as she leaves the bathroom. 

She’s punched clean in the head as soon as she steps out the door, to the surprise of no one but her, the rattling of her skull and shock of pain hitting Johnny like it’s his own head. The merc is knocked to the floor and a boot kicks into her gut for good measure. Her head stomped on, beaten to the ground like all five feet of her is a truly dangerous threat. 

“Can’t risk it, V,” Dex levels a pistol with her temple as she writhes on the ground, “‘Member our first convo?”

“I’ll fucking kill you!”

“Seems I've chosen the quiet life, after all. No blaze o' glory for me.”

And Dex pulls the trigger, a bang in the dirty motel room as he fires a shot into the merc’s head. Agony and terror, gagging on blood, darkness, cold, and fear… then nothing. 

And Johnny dies, not for the first time. 

Death relived, but through the eyes of another. The bullet hits. Soulkiller scorches. And the world around the two rewrites at the moment of their second deaths. Reconstructs and digitizes. A liminal space within the net. Structures like the squared mazes of balconies and stairs within Arasaka Tower of 2023. 

But everything made up of digital matter, pixels of color collected loosely to form the shapes against a black backdrop. Nearly everything a shade of blue, but hints of red bleeding through. 

Nothing moves or feels like reality, floatier, less certain. And it all moves, pixels twitching, it all shifts, all seems… alive. 

That where V finds herself, dying again but through Johnny, an echo of the pain from his torture still seeming to stick to her. But when she looks down, it’s her, but not. Like the world around her she knows seems to be constructed of these pixels, data, a bright red hue to her But it all forms to be her. Her arms, her painted nails, her freckles, her scars. They move with her permission, no one else’s. 

But what is happening? 

The biochip, maybe? But it’s meant to show someone like an imaginary friend, not put you in their lives, then send you to the net. At least she thinks this is the net, remembering descriptions Bug had given her. And by all intents and purposes, she should be dead. 

Data around her shakes, reverberates, brightens and stretches across the hall around her. There’s a thrum to it all, that she can hear, no physical limitation in the net… Then it stops only to reveal something new. A flash of bright red, standing out in a sea of blue data. It forms the shape of a person, composed of red data and negative space, their back to her as they lean forward on the banister. 

V signs from instinct, but finds no translator, forcing her to speak, “Hey!” 

She rushes towards the figure, they don’t answer her call, maybe they know what’s happening? But as she gets close, they push off the banister and turn. Their figure blurs as they move away from her, but she sees a closer glimpse. 

It’s a man, not as tall as Jackie, but still over a foot taller than her. Shoulder length dark hair and what looks to be the outline of sunglasses on his digital form. Even in the strange form, she recognizes him. The man’s who’s death she just lived, moment after her own. Johnny Silverhand. He blips away as he turns. 

The flash of red, his form, now further away, on the stairs of the lobby. 

“Hey, sir!” she calls out again, trying to sound vaguely polite as she rushes towards the stairs, he has to know what’s going on. He stands from the stairs and blips away just as she reaches them. 

She runs up that first set of steps seeing his form sitting on the second, “Johnny!” 

And he’s gone as soon as she reaches him, like they’re playing some sort of game, does he not hear her? She knows damn well he’s not deaf, if she can hear in this place, he should be able to. She reaches the top of the stairs, reaching another balcony railing, him around the corner on the adjacent side of the square floor. His back is to the banister, hands on it. Paying her no mind. 

“Robert!” She yells his full first name, remembering seeing it scrawled in chicken scratch across an enlistment form. But she turns the corner and he’s gone. 

But when she turns her head she sees his back again, down a narrow passageway made of more negative space than blue data. She walks across the negative space, hands skimming the data that forms it’s walls, each step taking her closer to him. She heard three different names, unsure of which may earn her an answer. 

“Robbie! Robert!”

Neither name spurs a reaction, he doesn’t turn, doesn’t speak. Only stands at the end of hall, shifting in pace,  as she continues her way to him. And she stops when she’s within arm’s reach, he hasn’t blipped away, hasn’t ran off.  Able to see fully now, the red data particles that form a bullet proof vest, the cyberware left arm. V reaches out and taps a finger against his shoulder. 

“Johnny?” 

He turns to face her and she doesn’t know if she should feel relieved, or terrified. 

“And you? Who are you?” 

Her answer catches in her throat, mouth half open when it hits. White hot blinding pain ripping through every nerve, head and world shattering as she screams. Like she’s been torn open, every part of her stripped raw and set on fire. Everything vanishes from her sight as she cries out. 

V’s contact UI blips, blurry as data fills it, system reboot. Her senses return to her, slowly and steadily as systems reload. The arm her blade was ripped from burns, open nerves exposed to the air. Her head feels shattered, aching as if it’s been broken apart. There’s a stench of trash and filth around her. There’s a weight on top of her, heavy, firm, crushing down onto her lungs. The warmth and stick mess of blood clings to everything. Caked across her skull, down her neck, her arm. 

The diagnostics flicker away, but her vision still struggles. A cyan fuzz clings around and distorts it all. Her depth of field is cut off, half her vision seemingly gone. Not aided by the fact that it’s dark, looking around she can see trash thrown atop her. a cold sheet of metal lays on top of her. Metal and plastic of discarded goods lay beneath and around her, jabbing uncomfortably into her flesh. 

A landfill, if she were to wager a guess, Dex tossed her out like trash. How is she not dead? How hasn’t she bled out?

She doesn’t know the answer, but she knows if she doesn’t do something, she’ll die anyway. Favoring her left arm, the right still damaged, she pushes up on the sheet of metal. Muscles scream in protest, pain shooting through them as she forces herself to put her weight into it. And she rolls it off of her and she can breathe a little easier, move a little better. A bit more light allowed on her. But she still can’t see very well, like her right eye is closed. 

Tempting fate, she presses her hand to it, sees nothing, when she closes her left. The world goes black. She touches the lid, feeling the blood that mats her eyelashes, she pries her eyelid open with her fingers. Nothing. Down a blade and an eye, she needs to move. Vik can fix those, he can fix this. 

She shoves a TV off of her legs, twists up s to see the sky. Silver and orange light color the world, moonlight and fire, plumes of dark smoke coming from somewhere she’s in some sort of pit or ravine within the landfill, a wall of dirt and trash around her. An upward climb to save herself. 

V forces her body to move even as it aches and screams in pain, forces her shredded arm to grip even as she can see the tendons twitching through the mangled remains of it. She forces blood soaked fingernails to dig into dirt and grip abandoned pizza boxes for traction, slips her aching feet in between wires and appliances for foot holds.

“Fuck!” she screams out loud, but can’t hear it, as she loses her traction and starts to slip. She extends her left blade, sinking it into the wall of muck and trash. Her right arm stings, throbs, begs to release a tool it no longer has. 

She uses her blade to help pulls herself, dragging herself up and up with every sink of it into the muck. V’s thankful she’s lost her hearing aids in the process, hell maybe Dex stole them back to recoup some losses, but it means she can’t hear her own curses, her own groans of pain, her own rattling breaths with bruised lungs

And she reaches the surface. Rusted remains of god knows what surrounds her and a trashcan fire burns not far away, but she’s out of the pit. She pulls her feet under her and she tries to stand, body shaking, swaying, trembling with blood loss and pain. 

But for a moment, she rises.

She stands, looking out across the landfill of trash, cyan fuzz still glitching around her,  and for a moment...maybe she’s okay. Maybe she can walk out of this, find Vik, maybe she can be okay. 

V collapses with the next step, body all at once going out from under her, mocking her hope. Mocking her moment of stupid fucking hope as her back meets the mud. It mingles with blood, collides with her gore, and sticks to her open wounds. She lays there in muck, just breathing, her lungs ache with the strength needed just to do that. Each one feels fainter than the last. Her eyes start to close, feel too heavy, her right one might very well already be shut… she wouldn’t know. A mangled mess of who she once was, now laying in filth, surrounded by trash. 

Maybe she’ll not move again… maybe this is a fitting end. A childhood of scavenging landfills, thrown in a dumpster her first night in the city, and dying in a landfill; maybe the world has been trying to tell her something all along. She’d never have to face Mama Welles, Misty, or Vik; never have to tell them she failed Jackie. Maybe she’ll just let all go, never even have time to grieve, maybe it’s best to just let it all go… 

“Wake the fuck up, Samurai. We got a city to burn.” 

A rasp of a voice rings out and she gasps, opening her eyes. A man kneeled over her, one she knows well, but he’s no longer digitized and she’s not looking through his eyes. Silver fingers pull his aviators off of his face, dark brown eyes scrutinizing her. His form isn’t solid, glitches like old vhs footage. 

But...

She heard him. 

[fromthewifecage]

Ugh your writing is amazing ok, just remember that :D! Is it alright that I request something? Could I have some nsfw headcanons for Raiden? Sfw is fine if you don’t want to do nsfw

OMG thank youuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu anon! You are so utterly kind to post this, thank you so much :D

I adore Raiden, he was my favourite since MK1 (yup, am old enough to have had that on the Master system, bloody loved it) until Johnny in MKX joined him in the ‘best kombatant’ status. (Hope this is ok!)

RAIDEN HEADKANONS

I’ve read plenty of Raiden h/c that have him as (very) inexperienced, and I can’t see that myself. We see him always focused on the fight or the danger, and he is a not someone to ever take his eye from where he feels he’s needed most. That doesn’t mean he doesn’t relax or spend time with a significant other, just be aware that he feels his duty is to protect Earthrealm and prevent war between the realms. So if his amulet starts going wonky again you’ll have to be prepared to spend a great deal of time apart from him, and prepare yourself for the worst.

This will weigh very heavily on Raiden’s mind, and he will wrestle with his conscience about being with you. Expect much hand wringing and him popping out to ‘konsult with the Elder Gods’ every 5 fucking minutes. In the end Shinnok bans Raiden from talking with him more than once a week unless the realms are in grave danger. (This might also be because Shinnok is trying to watch through Breaking Bad again on Netflix and Raiden keeps popping up at the most inopportune times.)

He’ll also worry that you’ll be in danger from those who he considers enemies. He’ll probably put you under Fujin’s guard if needs be, and be prepared to be trained to defend yourself (if you can’t already).

That out the way, now it’s onto the more fun part of being with Raiden :D

You’re utterly fascinating to him and he wants to enjoy all of you, no matter size, shape, gender, anything. If he loves you then he LOVES you, for you. He’s the best boost to your self-esteem. He loves to kiss you all over, especially where you are ticklish because he loves to hear you laugh and wriggle in his arms.                                   NSFW under the cut!

Raiden is a big man, both in stature and cock. The man is packing. He’s very aware that as a big beefy gorgeous hunk of a God that you’re much more delicate than he is. He’s going to treat you as the most precious thing in the universe and he’s not going to want to hurt even a hair on your head. He’ll take his time getting you ready for him, expect extended foreplay and body worship. He’ll also demand you have plenty of lube at the ready (whether male, female or non-binary, he wants you to be comfortable).

With him being so blessed in the cock department, he’ll go to town with his mouth, tongue and fingers. He can and will kiss you until you’re a writhing sweaty mess and you’re tugging at his hands for him to touch you. He loves to tease and take his time removing your clothes, preferring to have you naked before he moves away from your mouth.

He’s got the patience of a God (of course) and will take his time kissing and nipping at your chest, he likes light touches rather than mauling you, and if you’ve been very very good he may use the gentlest of lightening to tickle you.

Raiden loves oral sex almost as much as he loves to kiss you. Just as he’s undressed you, he’ll always make sure that he at least has removed his hat and cowl because he loves it when you run your fingers through his hair as he works you into a squealing mess with his mouth, tongue and fingers. If you tug/pull on his hair it’ll only encourage him to keep up his pace. He’ll be very nervous about using his lightening during oral, if he does then he’ll be constantly worried about hurting you so it’ll rather spoil the mood. Best keep that for less delicate places of your body.

Having a massive dick can be a hindrance, and when you first tug him towards the bedroom (he’s ever the gentleman and waited for you to be completely ready and take the lead the first time you have sex) he does worry if you’ll be compatible, though he has to admit your gasp and giggles when he fully disrobes does make him feel a little proud. He’s more than happy to follow your lead and let you set the positions and will ask if you’re comfortable and it takes you jokingly suggesting he goes for a quick ‘konsult’ before he relaxes.

He has stamina for days and can keep pace with you if you’re setting it. If you want (and can take it) to fuck until tomorrow, he’ll happily oblige, or if you’re in the mood for a quickie on the kitchen counter-top he’ll have you screaming in moments.

He loves to finish inside you if you’re happy for him to, it makes him feel more connected to you. If you want him to finish on your face/chest/back/wherever then he’ll oblige, but he does feel a little sad at not being able to hold you close when he climaxes.

He takes his aftercare seriously, loving holding you to him once you’re satisfied. You are his most precious thing and hurting you would break his heart. He also loves to be loved after sex so offer to share a bath and wash his hair for him, he’ll be as happy as a cat getting head scratches if you do.Dark Raiden

Raiden will unleash his inner darkness in the bedroom only when and if he’s completely sure you’re able to handle him. He’ll still ensure your consent, but after that he’ll be much more likely to fuck you so hard that you have problems walking afterwards.

Dark Raiden loves to receive oral, even if it’s a struggle for you with his size. He loves to finish on your face and will demand you lick his cock clean when he’s finished. This time it’s him tugging at your hair or holding the back of your head. Safe words are an absolute must, or if you have your mouth full (with his cock, or his balls if you can’t quite manage his dick) then you have hand gestures/a touch that acts as a safe word. He may be Dark but he’s not evil.

He’s much more likely to use his lightening on you, and will be more eager to take up a dominant role, demanding you call him ‘Lord Raiden’ and beg for him to fuck you. He’s more eager to be inside you but he’ll still ensure you’re wet/lubricated enough for you to enjoy yourself. Expect rough fingering and for him to bite you, he loves to hear you whimpering his name and beg for him to be even rougher. You won’t be having marathon sessions but when you’ve climaxed that many times in one night you won’t want them either. You need to recover!

[kweebtrash]

Kinky Headcanons/Turn-on's for Messy

Some of these aren't really "super kinky" but everyone's gotta start somewhere

Eri:

Being tied up with rope (shibari)

Fucking machines

Non stop vibrator torture

Anal (giving/receiving)

Strap-ons

Hot girls telling them what to do

Hot boys telling them what to do

Double penetration

Oral (mostly receiving)

Leather paddles/wooden paddles/ silicone crops(basically whatever hits hardest)

Leather cuffs/metal handcuffs/blindfolds

Being a bratty sub

Choking/breath play (especially if being done by large hands)

Ballgags

Hair grabbing (but not pulling)

Deep voices/moans/breathy gasps and soft curses

Slow deep fucking

Rough hard fucking

Public sex (public spaces but hidden from view mostly)

Slight daddy kink (but theyre too embarrassed to say so...for now)

Femdom (when their dom side strikes they can be particularly brutal)

Degradation (giving only)

"Baby boy", "puppy", "sweet prince", "princess", "sweetheart".

Collars/leashes

Finger sucking (giving/receiving)

Big hands, big bodies, big dicks

The usual scratching/biting (giving/receiving)

Cock warming

Squirting

Fuckboys who dont deserve anything from them

Johnny:

Hair pulling (receiving/giving)

Soft moans/sighs/sex noises

Having all control in sexual situations

Oral (receiving only)

Nipple sucking/biting (giving/receiving)

Thick thighs

Biting (giving mostly but he doesn’t mind a few bites on his neck just not as harsh)

Pinning hands down (he wouldnt mind just a small bit of restraint play)

Mutual masturbation

Some public sex (open spaces but hidden from view)

Girls riding him

Slight daddy kink (he's still awkward about it but he's willing to try it)

Begging (hearing other people beg for him)

Doggy style (goes with the having all control and pinning down kink)

Kissing (he loves kissing so much like oh my god he could make out for hours with the right person)

He likes cupping a girl's face in his giant hands before running it over their bodies and pulling them close to grind into them and deepen kisses

He's really into sensual touches?? Like rubbing thighs/hips/backs. He likes spreading his fingers over warm skin

He also likes doing teasing scratches just to see people shudder/shiver (he likes scratches on him too)

He also likes grinding. Grinding on thighs/hips/between the legs. He likes the friction against him

He doesnt mind slow fucking but he also doesnt like the intimacy of it. He rarely does it

He prefers hard and fast fucking -something that will leave a lasting impression

Short girls (especially when they have to stand on their tiptoes/look up at him. He dont mind taller girls either just short ones are his preference)

Girls with trust issues and big attitudes

Lucas:

Oral (giving/receiving, he actually enjoys eating people out and can do it for awhile)

Cuddles/pets/snuggling

Anal (giving)

Sex with multiple partners (threesomes mostly, hasnt tried an orgy yet)

Fucking one person then moving onto the next one quickly/going back and forth/sharing the same condom(or doing it raw, also kinda goes with the cumplay a bit)

Watching girls make out/have sex (eyeroll into next dimension)

Fucking without a condom

Cumplay

Being a tease/annoying to get what he wants (he can be bratty/pouty and a little subby like but he isnt really into bdsm dynamics)

Loud sex noises (he's loud himself)

Hes into any sexual position tbh

Hes generic when it comes to sex but he's still pretty good at it.

He's always willing to try something new

Overall he wants to have fun

Yuta:

Shibari

Having partners dress up in cute outfits before tying them up (he does enjoy a good school girl outfit)

Vibrator torture

Double penetration with vibrators/dildos (giving)

Overstimulation

Orgasm denial

Cumshots/squirting/messy orgasms (he prefers to cum on people more than anything)

Blowjobs (his preferred way to get off. He likes it rough and dirty)

Yuta's the kind of person that enjoys watching the torture then getting off later (Eri usually has to beg him to actually fuck them instead of having to give him a bj)

When he does penetrate he prefers missionary to watch the pleasure on his partners face or watch them squirm and cry

He can literally like drink tea/eat/do homework etc while someone is in his bed tied up and being plowed by a fucking machine.

He'll even sometimes yawn and pretends he isnt bothered by the fact that he's denying orgasms (he's a little shit)

Ballgags/gags of any type

Collecting panties

Taking videos/pics of who he's fucking to admire his handiwork

He can do normal sex but he gets bored easily.

Ten:

What doesnt ten like lmao (piss/pee/vomit/extreme little/caregiver dynamics)

Will try almost anything once

Shibari and any other restraints, not limited to cuffs and things. His goal is to get someone in a St. Andrews cross

Hes a power bottom with guys around his size(and certain girls), (mostly)dom with girls, mostly sub with bigger guys

Vibrator torture (giving, sometimes receiving)

Double penetration (giving)

Sex with multiple partners (he's been in a few orgies)

Crossdressing

Fire play/knife play/ needle play (hes the most experienced)

He hasn't tried hook suspension but he'd like to learn

He goes to bdsm parties/events and sometimes performs in them, therefore he doesnt mind public sex and voyeurism

Orgasm denial/overstimulation (giving)

Edging (receiving)

Puppy play (light)

Collars/leashes are his fave

Vinyl/leather/silk/pvc

Sensory play/deprivation (ice play, headphones, wartenburg wheels, etc)

Anal/rimjobs (giving/receiving)

Sloppy blowjobs but cleaner eating out

He likes getting cummed on (by guys mostly)

Choking/autoerotic asphyxiation (to the point of passing out)

Multiple orgasms/going multiple rounds (ten's probs a nympho tbh)

Rough/hard/fast/bruising sex only

Marking- branding, bites, bruises, rope burns

Making his bottoms cry bc he thinks it's cute

Trying to fuck straight guys that will never give him the time of day

I could go forever with ten tbh

Taeil:

Library sex/public sex

Dirty talk (nothing overly gross though)

Eating out (he's the BEST at giving head)

he’s great at manipulation and getting girls to do what he wants/convince them to sleep with him.

roleplay

rough fucking

praise (receiving)

making his partner have as many orgasms as possible

keeping his partner quiet/covering their mouth with his hand (maybe stuffing their panties into their mouths, who knows)

[inkpot909]

Giorno is the type to base his YouTube content around music, focusing on the history behind certain artists while also aiming to introduce people to more obscure musicians. He has an entire ten-part series on Jeff Beck alone. It comes across a tad bit elitist, but he’s quick to grow a following due to his reliable information and passionate delivery.

While not one to upload consistently, Abbacchio talks about true crime on his channel. He used to do conspiracy theories at times too, but eventually pulled back on doing so. His videos are never under an hour long at the very least. After finally releasing a video (usually occurs around once a month), the comment section is full of people expressing excitement to see him on their feed. Definitely makes content that people enjoy falling asleep to.

Fugo himself occasionally dips his toe into true crime content. However, his focus is mainly informing people on subjects including history, media literacy, and even philosophy at times. He has a series dedicated to giving as much information on a specific topic in the smallest amount of time possible. Outside of those select videos, they’re all usually hours long. College students especially consider him a lifesaver.

Mista and Narancia both host a podcast where they upload episodes on YouTube, as well as other platforms. It’s comedy oriented and subject matter varies a lot. They could be discussing a book Mista read one week, and how Narancia’s a terrible cook the next. The appeal largely stems from their chemistry together, their audience finding them absolutely hilarious and often saying that they could listen to them ramble for hours on end.

Without a doubt, Trish’s makeup tutorials are both fun and informative- inspiring, even. Outside of that, she also reviews clothing brands and their latest releases. Trish is seemingly always on top of those reviews specifically, coming out with a video on the matter rather fast. At times, she makes videos giving tips on how to better take advantage of deals or coupons when shopping. Every now and then, she appears as a guest host on Mista and Narancia’s podcast.

Although a tad bit technologically inept and generally disinterested in content creation to even think of making anything himself, Bucciarrati is always sure to support the others however he can. Across the board, he’s everyone’s number one fan. Similarly to Trish, Narancia and Mista have attempted to get him on their podcast. He always refuses.

[inkpot909]

Josuke loves makeup- he often wastes time at a makeup store in town. And that’s without much personal experience with caking up his face. Sure, he messes around with eyeliner and lipstick here and there… but he doesn’t wear it out regularly. Specifically because his mother, like with a lot of nonessential things, tells him that if he wants it- he ought to save up his money and buy it himself. Regardless, he feels at home in a makeup store. He’s a regular, but not the type that always comes in to buy something. His skincare routine is extensive and well-thought-out, though. Keeping up to date on brands, and their new releases. Skin is fleeting and precious… he figures he ought to take good care of his own.

Makeup might as well be rocket science to a guy like Okuyasu. Too confusing… too many steps for a full face. Couple that with the fact you can play around and adjust any powder or shade to be anything that works for oneself… slow down, he’s already lost. He’s glad to leave that all to the knowledgeable. As far as skincare is concerned… he doesn’t even wash his face with warm water. At least, not until becoming close with Josuke. Once the cat was out of the bag, letting it be known he’s got absolutely no routine, he thought Josuke was going to pass out. Being Okuyasu’s introduction to the concept, Josuke knows to keep it simple. Getting him started with washing his damn face and at least using a lotion (Okuyasu’s skin is naturally dry). He doesn’t remember the short routine all the time… but he does try.

Like Okuyasu, Koichi doesn’t know much about skincare for a long while. He does wash his face with water… which is apparently a bar that was set. Unlike Okuyasu, he doesn’t need Josuke to get him into better skincare habits. Honestly… it progresses naturally on his own. Noticing the products his sister uses one day, he became curious from there. It’s still a simple routine… but he’s good at sticking to it most days. Makeup, though? That’s a no go, there. Being with Yukako has… had him wearing it more than he would on his own. She uses him as a sort of test-dummy for whatever she wants to do. She’s not super big on makeup herself, and he’s the supportive type, so he doesn’t have any hangups over helping. Not that it’s his favorite pastime or anything. Outside of that… no way in hell.

There are few in Morioh who have a skincare routine quite like Rohan… just the way he likes it. It’s extensive… with luxury products to boot. As far as he’s concerned, taking care of his body is extremely important. Keeping himself fit in everyway possible is imperative to his work, even if not many out there understand the mindset. And makeup? He’s sure to put some on, if he has an event of some kind to go to. He doesn’t get lazy or conservative with it either. If he’s doing up his face, he’s going all out. Primer, foundation, concealer, blush, faux eyelashes, lipstick… he has pretty much anything one could think of. He particularly likes getting creative with his eyeshadow, and he almost never shows up with the same look twice.

[inkpot909]

Joseph is as dramatic as they come when falling ill. He has a cold? Surely not! Surely, this is a life-threatening affliction that’ll render him deprived of his senses for the rest of his days. Or worse, it’ll send him to his grave! In all actuality… he’s just being dramatic less he grow bored. He can’t do much when kept in bed, and will grow stir-crazy within a single day. Leave him alone long enough and he’ll have a needlessly complicated display in the room. Made up of anything he finds within a confined space. Dolls made of trash, blanket forts propped up by tables or nightstands, and the like. He feels useless in such a state, so he might as well try to have some fun with it.

Denial is one hell of a drug and Caesar is a damn addict. He’s not sick! He can’t be. Won’t elaborate any further on the matter, either. He just can’t be. And questioning his very sound, totally understandable, reasoning behind it isn’t encouraged either. Getting bedridden is done dragging him practically kicking and screaming, as well as saying "Over my dead body!" at least five times. When the facade is broken and there’s no use denying his own sickness, he grows grumpy. He’s thankful for any help that’s offered to him, of course, but he’s much more sour than usual. Doesn’t help that Joseph takes the opportunity to wound Caesar’s pride.

[inkpot909]

Jotaro probably couldn’t be paid to watch a musical. Whether it’s live on stage or a movie, he simply won’t budge. His only quiet exception to that, are actually animated movies. Suspension of disbelief is much easier for him in that medium specifically. That said, he doesn’t really watch animated movies all that often anyways. Oh, well. His favorite: Swears he doesn’t have one (it’s Disney’s Oliver and Company).

Much like his grouch of a grandson, Mr. Joestar generally doesn’t like musicals. He’s a lot easier to nudge into seeing one, though. That is, at least, when it comes to his wife. Suzi Q loves going to live shows, and drags him to a good amount. In her eyes, they live in New York City- they must go to live shows! So, despite claiming he doesn’t care for them, Mr. Joestar still manages to have a weirdly educated opinion on them. Plus, being a casual enjoyer of musicals at best, he does have a movie musical or two close to his heart. His favorite: Funny Girl.

Now, if someone with a secret affinity for musicals is what you’re searching for, Avdol is exactly where you should turn your attention. He quite likes live stage performances, whether it’s a musical or a play. Easily prefers them over movie musicals and will jump at the opportunity to see a stage version instead. Avdol especially favors funny and lighthearted musicals that aim to make audiences laugh. He’s even seen a show in New York with Mr. and Mrs. Joestar. He vows that never again will he see a musical with Mr. Joestar after that experience; next time him and Suzi Q will have to leave him at home. His favorite: Something Rotten!

Throughout his childhood, Kakyoin was the type to scoff and turn his nose up away from musicals. His mother used to let classics like Hello, Dolly! and Singing in the Rain play on their family TV more times then the redhead can count- much to his annoyance. But then, upon reaching his late teens, he ended up watching Little Shops of Horrors by chance one night. Since then, macabre and (admittedly) weird musicals float his boat. Give him the oddest or most unconventional musical choice imaginable, and he’s bound to enjoy himself a little. His favorite: Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street.

A true softie at heart, Polnareff adores classic musicals focused on soft romance. Although not one to go see stage performances, he’ll happily watch an old movie musical from time to time. That said, his modern musical exception is probably something massively successful like Hamilton or The Book of Mormon. Once, him and Mr. Joestar sang the song Rose’s Turn in the car together on the Crusaders’ way out of India. The side-eye Kakyoin and Jotaro threw to one another during it was a clear enough indication that it was meant to be a one-time thing. His favorite: West Side Story.

Iggy loves stage musicals. No, seriously, any chance for people to go away and leave him be for hours on end- he’ll take.

[inkpot909]

Josuke is a very meticulous vinyl record owner. He cleans them often and never stacks them horizontally (Josuke’s certainly whined to his mother about her mindlessly doing so). Considering he’s always proud of the money he saves, he’s by extension also quite happy with the vinyl he does own. Whenever he does finally retreat into his bedroom at the end of a night, he’s listening to music almost constantly. Therefore, he uses his record player quite often, and is in part the reason as to why he’s so aware of their playable condition.

Being best friends with a person like Josuke doesn’t leave much room to not become wary of one’s vinyl record habits. Okuyasu lives that reality. When he started buying records, he simply figured you put them in a box to keep them all together and... that was pretty much it. He’s gradually grown more careful over how he handles them, though. Sometimes Okuyasu will poke fun at Josuke for his music taste “not being delinquet enough.”

It wasn’t until after Josuke and Rohan gifted Koichi a handful of vinyl records that he went out to purchase a record player in the first place. Generally, he prefers to listen to a radio station more than anything else. It’s not that he isn’t picky about music, (he’s really not but wishes to better refine his own taste) it’s just much more convenient. He’s a music chameleon, listening to whatever people around him prefer. Because of this, Koichi’s preferfences skip across vastly different genres and come across as rather unfocused- and by extension, his record collection does as well.

With the amount of free space available in his house, Rohan has a specific room solely dedicated to his vast vinyl record collection. He’s very precise about the placement of everything he owns, having all his records organized meticulously. Not only that, but he wouldn’t be caught dead owning a cheap record player. Is certainly high and mighty about his music taste; not ever considering that his opinion is flawed or simply objective in any way.