Chapter Text
V flips the photo over and over in her hand. It’s worn, frayed at the edges, with the sharpie-scrawled writing at the bottom smudged a little from how much she’s fiddled with it. She stares at it with a blank face, seeming almost indifferent to the memory the photo contains – but on the inside she is all twisting guts that she habitually shoves away.
Giving the photo one more look, V carefully puts it in an inner pocket in her black armor-quilted jacket. She stands up from her bed, cleaned and made up with the sheets tightly tucked in, and surveys her apartment for the last time. It’s barren and gray, as if no one had ever lived there at all.
Good.
Her boots wait by the front door and she makes her way over, grabbing her backpack that carries every item of importance to her – it’s not heavy. As she moves down the entry hallway she passes by a shoulder-height mirror and stops. V’s never been one to care much for her appearance, always sticking with a clean cut, simple and quick. But that is not how she looks right now.
Her dark brown, almost black hair is outgrown, curling over the tops of her ears, her bangs almost brushing against her eyelashes. The ends on her neck tickle in a way she’s not used to, having always kept it in a low fade.
Normally bright blue eyes are dull and the whites are bloodshot. V’s been out of sorts, to say the least.
The corner of her mouth curls in disgust before moving back to neutral, moving away from the mirror and crouching down to slip her boots on, wrapping the laces around her upper ankles and double-knotting.
A cold hand grabs the equally cold handle of the front door, but she doesn’t turn it. A brief pause is had where she stares blankly at the floor as if she’s trying to disappear into the silence of the empty, lifeless apartment. If she focuses enough she can almost hear a distant echo of voices, loud and interrupting, nameless music, glasses clinking, laughter. But now they’re all gone, her to join.
V opens the door and steps through, the door closing and locking shut automatically behind her.
She slips off her bandana and eye-goggles as she steps into the clerk’s office, not bothering to shake off the mountain of red sand that’s already collected on her shoulders and hair. She bypasses the long line of tired and dirty workers turning in their hours and goes directly to the empty desk.
“Full name and occupation,” the clerk drones out through the voice buzzer in the glass.
“V. No last name. Blade Runner,” V hands over her identification documents through the slot at the bottom of the shield glass. The clerk, hunched over in her seat and eyebags drooping harshly in the low orange lighting in the room, looks over her papers.
“A Blade Runner, huh? Not many of you stationed here.”
“Yes, I’ve met my quota and am ready to transfer out.”
The clerk glances up from her papers and looks at V with the expression of someone who's looked into the same gray horizon for years. “To where.”
“Yvaga.”
The clerk looks at her a moment longer as if trying to detect some kind of lie or deception V might be giving her but V expertly keeps her face blank, staring back with the same empty eyes. It deters the lady and she scans the documents into her computer. Her profile pulls up as the computer makes clicking noises.
“Unfortunately, you cannot be released from your contract yet.”
V’s jaw ticks. “I have earned the required hours for transfer.”
Another click of the computer. “The quota has changed to 24,000 hours, so you will be released from your contract in…” The clerk pauses to read the information on screen. “Five to six years. The company thanks you for your hard work.”
V stands outside across the street from the clerk building, leaning against a road barrier. Her hands are in her jacket pockets and she stares at the dark red dirt below her boots. The sand does not pelt at her face as it normally does, being in a domed section of the labor town. The thick, bullet-proof glass encompassed the long stretch of road that housed most of the planet’s workforce and facilities, also shielding them from the planet’s extreme sandstorms.
The limited space, however, also meant crowding issues, and V was no stranger to bumping into people and getting bumped into. Luckily, she had found a spot that gave her a few inches of space from the groups of people also hanging by the road barriers to not rub shoulders.
This gave her just enough breathing room to not spiral into a meltdown.
V tried to remember her training and focused on taking deep breaths, and although she was mostly successful, she could not fully shake away to black dread filling her chest.
Another five years was not manageable. Virtually impossible, mentally. She would not sit here on this rock for another day, even. Even if that meant…
Her agent chimes on her left wrist just as she goes to reach for the photo in her jacket. Her hand changes course, presenting the screen of the agent to her eyes.
A video recording… from Mitch.
V hesitates, an action that is becoming more and more common these days. Her boss would be disappointed. That thought makes the corner of her lip quirk up – DeShawn already was.
Her other hand comes up to hold the square screen steady, thumb pressing a button on the bottom-side to play the recording. Mitch’s face pops up.
“ V, hey! Uh, I’ll keep this short. I… know we haven’t talked in a while, what with how… Well, y’know. But, uh, look. Somethin’s come up. Somethin’ you need to hear about. So… Come on down. You remember the spot, yeah ?”
It’s a rhetorical question, seeing as how V can’t respond in real time to a recording, but she’s always liked Mitch and it’s nice to hear from him. She notes his nervousness – or maybe he’s feeling a bit awkward? – and how he checks his surroundings before talking.
“ And listen ,” Mitch continues, his voice lowered into an almost hush. “ Panam will be here, of course. Just… talk to her. I know she’d appreciate it even if she doesn’t show it. See you soon .”
Mitch ends the recording and V stares at the black screen before dropping her arms back down. She leans back against the barrier and angles her head up to the dome above, almost completely covered in red sand and casting life down below in deep wine color.
Pulling her bandana back up over the lower half of her face, V quietly curses.
“Who was that?”
Mitch jolts and looks at her with wide eyes, having just clicked off the recording. Panam is immediately suspicious and squints at the pilot, leaning against the open doorway of the cockpit and tapping her foot against the steel flooring of the ship.
Mitch shrugs after a moment, giving her a shaky grin. “Hey, Panam! Uh, that was no one, just left a message to… an old friend.”
Well that certainly wasn’t weird, Panam thinks. “An ‘old friend’? What old friend do you have that I don’t know?”
He swivels in his seat, looking far too casual. “I got friends outside the family, girly. I’ve been around the block long before you were even a swimmer in your daddy’s-”
Panam throws a hand up. “Please shut the fuck up,” they chuckle together briefly. “But seriously, who were you contacting? We’re almost ready to head out.”
Again, Mitch stiffens. Now Panam is really suspicious.
A long and awkward pause. “I… left a message to someone who I believe can help us.”
Panam raises an eyebrow, frowning. “You called in some help without consulting anyone? And for some nobody?”
The pilot's seat creaks under Mitch’s weight as he shifts around.. “Ah, well I did actually consult… with the crew.”
Anger flares up in Panam, hot and heavy and familiar. She twists around to her friends, family, really, where they sit in the common area, scattered around the couch and coffee table. It’s dark and moody, with only a few lowlights shining a pale yellow lighting the space.
“You consulted with everyone but me ?” She barks out to Mitch but keeps her eyes on the other ship occupants, feeling rightly offended.
Most everyone looks some level of apologetic, except for Scorpion who raises his chin and flips his hood off. “I tried tellin’ him it was a shit idea, Pan. Like you said, we don’t need no help, ‘specially from a fuckin’-”
“Scorp!”
Judy hisses and smacks Scorpion’s arm from where she sits next to him. The interaction only puts Panam more on edge.
“No, tell me. What the fuck is going on?” Everyone goes silent again and casts their eyes away to anywhere but Panam. She growls, annoyed, and slams the side of her fist against a wall, echoing throughout the titanium walls. “Goddammit, stop pussy-footing around and tell me who the fuck is supposedly helping us!”
“We just thought we could use an extra hand,” Mitch jumps in and steps out of the cockpit to stand by the half-circle couch opposite Scorpion and Judy. “Jude is good but she isn’t practiced enough to hack the station’s systems. We tested it.”
“And I told you we won’t need to do any hacking. We have the tools to tear the doors down manually,” Panam says sharply.
“Not without potentially damaging the hull. It’s too big a risk, Panam.”
The navigator/engineer scoffs and throws her hands out. “Staying here is a risk! Our people are on Yvaga and if we don’t take this chance now, we will never get off this planet!”
She looks to everyone, trying to emphasize the direness of their situation. No one could meet her eyes, either looking down to their feet or in any other place besides Panam.
“What’s even riskier is bringing someone into our very secret, very illegal operation without consulting me,” she continues, voice turning low and dangerous. “Did you guys even vet this person? How do we know they’re good enough to hack an Arasaka station? How do we know they’ll keep their mouths shut?”
They all look at each other as if waiting for someone to drop the ball first. Neither Judy nor Mitch looked like they wanted to do so and Scorpion seemed fed up with the whole situation before it even started, glowering at the other two like a disappointed sibling.
“I promise this person can get the job done and she won’t rat on us.” Judy chimes, finally meeting Panam’s hard gaze.
“And how do you know that?”
“‘Cause-”
Just then there’s a knock against the airlock door and everyone looks towards it, unmoving. Panam scans everyone’s expressions while they’re distracted to gauge whether this mystery person was a good idea or not.
Scorpion looked pissed, face turned sour and leaning back into the couch with crossed arms. In a lot of ways they were similar, in personality and body language.
Mitch seemed a little nervous but mostly relieved.
Judy’s was interesting; she leaned up off the couch, almost vibrating in… excitement? Also relief? It didn’t do anything to settle Panam’s own nerves.
Everyone remained unmoving and Panam quickly grew impatient and she huffed.
“Christ, fine, if no one’s going to grab it, I will.”
“Wait, Panam, I’ll do-”
Mitch tries to stop her but Panam is already storming over to the airlock, hand already on the button that will unlock it.
“No, you guys want to be so secretive and not include me in a crucial part of the plan, you can fuck off.”
The button clicks and the latch on the airlock opens, creating a loud hiss of new airflow. The large metal door shifts out of its socket and moves outward before tilting downwards and creating a walk-up ramp. It moves slowly against its heavy weight and Panam prepares herself to tell the person to also fuck off, not wanting any unknown element to potentially ruin their plans and their only real shot of getting off this planet.
The curse sits on the tip of her tongue as the door lowers further… until she sees a familiar head of dark hair that’s longer than she’s used to seeing it. The person’s appearance reveals itself further, showing worn goggles sitting on a forehead, dark blue eyes under sharp eyebrows,
beautiful lips
, a familiar black jacket and…
“Shit.”