#original character v

[thenervousmedic]

Here's another quick Cyberpunk oneshot

Back on my bullshit.

Only just under 1k words, just a lil snippet.

'Just existing'

(In which my V (Hoodie/Hound) and Johnny chill out on the couch during a rainstorm.)

fluffy and comfortable with just the barest hint of angst.

==========================

The lack of words is probably the best part. No conversation, no act to keep up, just... existing.

Johnny was sat lazily slouched back on the couch, one foot up on the coffee table, guitar in hand, and no thoughts in his head. Just the subtle roaring of the rainstorm outside beating on the window and the mindless notes coming out of the instrument; a slightly slower tempo of Black Dog. He knows that’s their favourite, he knows a lot of Hoodie’s favourite things thanks to what ended up being nearly an entire year stuck in the kid's brain. Well, he says Kid… but he’s not even sure how old the guy is. Imagine that. Knowing your roommate's innermost thoughts but not how old they even are.

It was easy to forget Hoodie was even there despite their continued neural link, he hadn't heard a peep out of them for the past hour. No moving, no nothing . They lay draped over the other end of the couch with their chin on their folded arm while the other dangled off the cushion. It was... nice. So nice . Maybe the best both of them had felt in years. The vibes were perfect like the world didn't even exist outside his apartment. Only the scruffy couch fabric, the slight smell of Johnny’s cigarette smoke and Hoodie’s scattered mounds of old clothes, what little of the light from distant neon signs manages to reach through the rain leaving the room in a dim orange and blue glow.

The rockerboy had only got his body back a month ago, and already it sang every tune he played with it. No more delays between Hoodie’s senses and the relic processing it. He didn’t miss that in the slightest, though in a strange kind of way, there was something oddly empty about not hearing Hoodie’s rather satirical inner commentary for him to match wits with. He hadn’t realised that his hands had stopped moving until a small almost inaudible honk of acknowledgement hums out of his former host’s nose as they pick up on the sudden pause in sound. Cracking an eye lazily open to spy on him and see if he's good before closing it again. "Y'allright?" His voice had that 'I'm barely awake and not putting effort into staying that way' raspiness to it, as if saying one word was a lot of effort that Hoodie didn't care to expend.

For a little while there was no response, only Johnny’s long relaxed inhale that ended in a grunt-like sigh as he let his head flop onto the backboard of the sofa, the guitar sliding down to lay flat on his lap as chrome fingers idly tapped at the wood. "...Yeah.”

That nervous energy that seemed to plague his body, no, his mind, wanted to crawl its way back up his spine. Digging claws into skin and hooking an uncomfortable sensation through his gut like a jealous lover trying to keep his Attention. But it couldn't. And for some dumbfuck reason that felt… wrong in its own way. He'd been that way for so long, that being without it felt almost dissociative. Derealising. As if he'd wake up any minute back in Hoodie's head again as an engram and have the weight of knowing he's draining their life away on his shoulders.

There wasn't another word. The 'yeah' had been true, he was alright. That's… what made him uncomfortable. He was fine. Hoodie was fine. This room was fine, fuck there wasn't even any traffic.

A warmth on his lap dragged his attention forcefully back to the present, grounding him like a tether line, rolling his head a little on the cushion to glance down. He hadn't heard them moving, probably because he'd spaced out so hard, but Hoodie had turned around and was now partially obscured from view by the guitar. His head and one arm slack on the rocker's legs like some kind of mutt.

All that time, all those shared words and memories, and yet even now Johnny couldn't figure out how this gonk of a man knew when someone needed something like that. Something as simple as that, a nearly meaningless gesture, some kind of confirmation that he was really here… god it would break him if he didn't have a million snide comments he could make at this very moment.

"I'm not petting you." He grumbles, his cybernetic hand making its way back to the neck of the guitar as he picks back up where he'd drifted off. Only barely overshadowing the soft and effortless chuckle that made Hoodie's chest jostle a little on the couch cushion. The gentle drumming of rainfall on their window, pitter-patter, consistent white noise.

"Mhm, you're welcome."

[g00bergoo]

Pickles

Blank version

[tapeworrmart]

Venomous 🦂

[t0bey]

finally got around to designing an idv self insert for myself

[mareeoth]

Gotta spread my Mikuláš Medek propaganda B)

[swollenbabyfat]

Dream Girl

[milton-chamberlain]

Last commissions!

[upsidedog]

i was gonna do this meme with the original format then a much better came to mind

[zeusmachina]

My V Rising baby girl

[sunsettemplar]

I wanted something poetic, but I'm not a poet, so a little romantic and silly

[dreamskug]

Happy Halloween 🎃

For Lens & Light - Issue 04 - coming soon!🦇 Check it out: @lenspluslight Don’t re-upload without credit.

[thenervousmedic]

Here's another quick Cyberpunk oneshot

Back on my bullshit.

Only just under 1k words, just a lil snippet.

'Caught in the mirror'

(Vee and her brain hitchhiker have a brief encounter with a mirror... she doesn't look quite as he expected.)

A bit angsty, TW mentions of scarring and in depth descriptions of said scars.

==========================

There were agreements in place, even unspoken ones which seemed to evolve naturally as time went on, but despite all that some things were inevitable. Vee’s clothes slipped off carefully one by one, all the while she avoided looking down as if it were just another part of the routine. That is… until she catches a brief glimpse of herself in the mirror. The flinching wasn’t the worst part, it was that subtle buzzing sound that signalled Johnny’s arrival in the front of her brain. “Johnny, not in the bathroom, I want to shower-” She complained, only to be swiftly cut off from continuing.

“Look in the mirror.” The demand made her cringe, gritting her teeth at the firm ‘I’m not joking’ tone he’d taken almost instantly on arrival. “I really-” “Vee. Look. In the goddamn mirror.” Johnny repeated, firmer this time though notably not unkind. More… Stressed? Tense? Something that confused the both of them in their shared headspace, taking in everything as her eyes flicked from the sink to the display and back down repeatedly. There were a lot of things he could say, but right now his mouth felt as though it had run dry and he wasn't entirely sure if those nerves were Vee’s or his own.

The image of her pale skin leant over the rim of the sink wouldn’t be soon leaving his thoughts. It wasn’t the subtle freckles, the sickly pale colour, or even the more private zones of her anatomy on display that kept his attention. It was the scars. Not like the little nicks and lines across her hands and arms that he’d caught on passing glance. Not like the few blemishes around the rim of her cyberware. There were too many to really count, some more visible than others, but the most noticeable were extensive to the point where Johnny had to wonder how she’d even survived such trauma. They sat as angry red marks along her skin, like windows into the damaged tissue beneath. A thick V-shape stretched between her collarbones like a grim necklace, dipping below her sternum at the bottom point, the edges pinched and stretched as though it had been caused by some kind of high-speed impact to the chest. A subtle indented line through the centre of it marked where whatever wound used to be there had been just barely stitched shut. Then there were the scratches. At least that’s what he would describe them as. Three long ragged lines cut into the flesh in a way that implied whatever had torn its way through her body wasn’t as sharp as maybe it should be. They started, or ended rather, down by her gut. Dragging winding lines up around the left side of her torso to curl around to her back. He couldn’t see the rest, not from this angle, but judging by the incessant itching that sometimes plagued Vee’s left side he had to guess it reached all the way up to her scapula. What he could see, however, was the way every rib the ‘healed’ gashes passed over had a harsh valley where the skin was forced to bridge the gap between the broken segments of the ribcage that had been splintered and never got to reconnect. “Fuckin’ hell, V…”

The thin glowing rim of her optics spun slightly as she watched the face in the mirror glare at her. As if catching her own reflection had been an act of violence and she was now staring down a potential threat. “I don’t want your pity,” she hissed, uncharacteristically hostile toward the digital parasite riding shotgun in her brain, the sudden flush of anger quickly fizzling back out like a distant firework “I just… want to take a shower.”

He could tell she didn’t want to talk about this, about any of it, even if at some point they both knew there’d be a high chance he’d relive whatever fragmented memory she had of getting these scars. Still, the questions rose and sat at the tip of his tongue like bullets in a chamber. “Just wanna know one thing.” A lie and they both knew it, but if she wasn’t open to talking he’d at least narrow it down to just the one. “What do you see?”

That caught her a little off guard, expression softening if only a little back to the round and deceptively innocent appearance it leaned into when she relaxed. “See?” she echoed back confusedly, blinking while turning to look at where his hologram was leaning against the wall with his arms crossed. Nodding back at the mirror as an instruction to keep her eyes on that and not him. “... A problem. A risk. A weapon. A mistake.” “A survivor.” He corrects firmly, glitching across the room to place a hand briefly on her shoulder before disappearing entirely. The strange warmth that word left behind made her lip quiver. Nodding once or twice as she took a sharp steadying breath and stood straight from leaning on the cold counter. “... A survivor.”

[g00bergoo]

Probably the only time you’ll see them happy today…

[tapeworrmart]

Man's best friend (parasites) 🩸🪱

[t0bey]

some bitty jeds

[charliesgayhead]

Been playing GTA Online lately and wanted to draw my character