Chapter Text
He explains to her what she missed from the month he has been back, though he only tells her small pieces and not the whole story. He lets others explain the months where he wasn’t around, explain what happened and how he returned.
He knows that it’s information overload for her and can tell by how she fidgets on the couch as she listens. The way she holds tightly onto his hand as Misty explains just how rough she had been.
She cries when she hears how she handled – or didn’t handle – coming back, and it hits him hard that had he not been there when she woke up the second time, it would have played out the same way.
But they are both here, real beneath their fingertips, alive.
It’s when they’re alone, that he fills her in on the more intimate parts of what happened. She gets upset that she can’t remember their first kiss, that she doesn’t remember other moments between them. “It feels like I was robbed of something,” she says quietly, but he tells her that she’s wrong.
“You’re only missing a few months, Val,” he tells her. “We still have everything else.”
She balks at that notion at first but relents. Acknowledges that had she lost more; she’d be devastated not knowing how they got to this place.
There’s an overwhelming feeling of love that he feels towards her, finally no longer afraid to put the name to the emotion. He couldn’t let things go unsaid anymore, he couldn’t let things end up in a place where he’d have more regrets than he ever held before.
At night, when everyone has left, when they’re the only ones left, he takes her to bed. But it’s not for what she expects at first.
He guides her to sit on the bed and brings out a box from under the bed. Set in front of her, she sees her BD wreath. “Johnny?” She asks, looking at it curiously.
His hands go into the box and take out a shard, as he puts it into the wreath and moves to the bed to sit next to her. “Judy helped me with somethin’,” he says softly. “Figured you were gonna hate not knowing what happened when I came back.” The wreath feels heavy in his hands, as he hands it over to her.
“What is it?” She asks, as she sits closer to him, her arm brushing against his.
“My memories,” He said, with a half-smile, “Been nothin’ but data this whole time, yeah? So…just been recordin’, as it were. Judy helped pull out the important moments for you. Good and bad.” But his mouth feels dry, and there’s a nervousness that he can’t explain. He’s shared his memories of his life with her before.
But none pertaining to her, and what he felt for her.
She looks surprised, and there’s a look in her eye, as he sees them water for the briefest of moments. She puts the wreath on and moves her back against the headboard. “But you’ll stay here, right?” She asks, as she holds out her hand.
“Not going anywhere,” he says, as he puts his hand in hers, and she turns on the BD.
Her hand squeezes onto his tightly as she relives the memories through his eyes. His panic when he first wakes up in her bed, and the relief that he’s in his own body. Then the surge of emotions that shoot through him as he figures out where he is.
She experiences his nervousness and relief when he finally lays eyes on her, how they wrap their arms around each other and don’t want to let go. Seeing how she was, the shape she was in, by his eyes, causes her to bite her lip. Next to her, outside of the BD, she feels Johnny shift closer to her.
He can’t see what she’s watching, but she doesn’t think he needs to.
They’re in the shower, and she’s tenderly taking care of him, and she can feel that he’s so touch-starved that it makes her cry. Just how overwhelmed he is to be back, to be with her, that he doesn’t deserve her. But he does deserve her, she knows that. She doesn’t need to remember everything that happened to know that.
Each memory that unfolds in front of her, told through his eyes, brings different reactions. She swallows hard at how rough she is, but how caring he is towards her. That she feels like home to him, that she is home to him, that she occupies his every thought without him realizing it most of the time.
Afterlife, and his conversation with Rogue. How he watches V take control of the crowd at Afterlife, and he just beams with pride. So happy and content to just be hers.
That when she brought him to his grave marker that she had set up, he hadn’t felt he ever deserved something. That he had noted she picked a place for him next to Alt, that she knew what that had meant to him. Could hear his thoughts, that he knew then just how fucked he was, just how in love with her he was, but still couldn’t bring himself to say it.
When the memories shift to the first time they end up having sex, she swallows hard and shifts up from the headboard, moving forward without realizing it.
Next to her, the bed shifts, and she feels Johnny moving her to rest against him, his legs on either side of her, and he wraps his arms around her stomach as she continues to watch the gift he had given her.
The malfunctions she has, the fights they have, the song he’s writing for her that 100% has a title that he doesn’t want to tell her and lyrics he’s too scared to voice.
The little moments where he watches her when he thinks she’s not looking. How he wants to make sure he’s around her all the time. That he’s, for the first time in his life, thinking of the future.
She cries as she watches it, because everything overwhelms her to the point that she can’t stop it.
Then she sees herself fall lifeless in his arms. She hears him screaming out, begging for her to be okay, and the helplessness that he feels not being able to help her. The panic as he wraps her in his arms, rocking back and forth waiting for Vik and Judy to arrive.
Pacing outside, throwing things into her pool he knows she hates. Reacting in ways he only knows how, screaming at the top of his lungs when he finds out she won’t remember.
Waiting at her bedside. Waiting for her to wake up.
The BD ends, and she waits for the lights to stop flashing as it pulls her out. The lights on the wreath go out, and slowly she removes it.
Johnny is solid and still behind her, his chin resting on her shoulder. She feels him bury his head into her hair, and she lets him stay there for a moment before she turns around to face him.
She’s crying. She knows that she is, her face feels wet and warm, and she’s overwhelmed.
He reaches for her, his organic thumb running across her cheek to wipe the tears away. She reaches out and her fingers move over his beard, before her thumb runs over his lips.
She wonders if he realizes that she’s the one that doesn’t deserve him. For what he’s done for her in the last few days, what she knows it took for him to share this with her – to put himself in front of her again completely raw and trusting her.
Her arms go around his neck then, her lips crash against his, and she hears his breath hitch as she kisses him. It’s slow and passionate, it’s tender in the ways that they deserve now. She knows now this isn’t what they’re used to, but they’ve shared enough tenderness between the two of them that he doesn’t shy away.
Heart pounding against her chest, as she melts against his every touch, every kiss, every move.
They undress each other slowly, and with each piece of clothing discarded, it’s a chance to rediscover each other all over again. He kisses her skin in every place he’s allowed to; she gasps beneath his touch as if she might shatter into a million pieces.
He’d pick up those pieces, to put her back together, knowing that she would do the same. That she had done the same when he had returned. That he had done that for her when she returned.
She’s soft to touch, her lips are rough on his, they fall to the bed entwined in each other’s arms. She whispers promises against his neck, she tells him that she’s never letting go, she tells him that he’s her home.
He had never been someone to partake in the act of lovemaking, but this was what that was in its pure form.
Nothing could pull him away from her now, nothing would tear him away.
Love.
This was love.
Against the sheets, they land on their sides, and he pulls her close to him, his calloused fingers rough to her smooth skin, capturing everything they touched. She arches her back against his chest, her hand moving to his thigh. He grinds against her, as he captures her breasts in his hands. She lets out a breathy moan, leaning her head back, access granted to him; his lips to her neck in rough kisses to mark.
She shifts against him, spreading her legs, inviting. The cue is taken, his organic hand sliding from her breast, slowly down her stomach before his fingers move against her clit. She writhes against him, her hand sliding over his to push him further, to slide his fingers deep inside her.
He does, fingers hooking as he feels just how ready she is for him, and it causes a groan to be caught in his throat. She grinds her ass against him more, and he moves at a faster pace. He wants to slowly untangle everything about her, he wants to coax out every desire and need from her, he wants to have her beg him for release.
She comes louder at his motions, curses falling from her lips like a song, and it’s the only tune he wants to hear. She tightens around his fingers, but he stops then, sliding his fingers out and running them up against her stomach before he shifts.
There is little protest from her, only a whine when he removes his fingers, but it stops as he kisses her, hovering above her as she lies on her back.
She wraps her legs around his waist, she pulls him down on top of her, and her hand slides between them to his cock. He buckles forward at the touch, and she grins, slowly pumping him.
He tells her that he needs to be inside her, she tells him she wants to feel him fill her, and it’s all that remains before he lines up and slowly enters her. Pushing into her until she’s taken all of him, a kiss rough and demanding as he pulls back and thrusts into her again.
It starts slow and tender, but she begs him to fuck her harder, to fuck her faster, and he obeys her commands.
Her fingernails dig into his back, the pain pushing him into her harder, and the pleasurable scream that she gives out almost ruins him completely. He moves his hand to her clit, as he tells her to let go, to come for him.
She tightens around him and she climaxes with his name on her lips, a sound so sinful that it unravels him as his climax follows. He kisses her, muttering her name over and over as it is the only word he knows, the only word he cares to know.
“I love you,” he tells her after once they’ve cleaned up and back in each other’s arms. “Should have said it sooner, should have told you a year ago, should have--” but she silences him with a kiss.
“I love you too,” She tells him, “And besides,” she lifts herself up, looking down at him with a look of adoration that he finally feels that he deserves, “I think I already knew.”
***
They fall back into a routine together; different than before. They take care of each other, but there’s no hiding of their affection anymore. There are plans they make now of the future; no longer going from the day to day just trying to survive. Because now, there is time.
One by one, the favors start coming back in. Panam wants V’s help with taking down Militech. Rogue has jobs she wants V to go on, and even drag Johnny to. Even River tries to get back into V’s good graces with a case here and there, though she never answers him. Judy never asks for favors, she just sends photos of her trip across the country, sometimes with dorky selfies (and threats to Johnny she never follows through on).
Johnny and Valerie take their time considering the next steps.
The first step is to sell her apartment that she hates. When Kerry hears that they’re moving, he offers his guest house on his property; it’s not as large as her old apartment, not close to the size of Kerry’s own house, but he offers it for free.
Johnny knows that Kerry is doing it because some part of him still wants them close by, and maybe it’s his age showing but Johnny doesn’t hate the idea.
Valerie agrees to it, only if Kerry lets her throw money at him to clean his damn house because “it’s been over a fucking year, it smells like ass and looks like a drug den.” He refuses the money but does reluctantly hire someone to clean it.
Once they’ve settled into the guest house, and make it their own, things get comfortable. Valerie transitions from being a mercenary; focusing on Afterlife and becoming a fixer with help from Rogue. Johnny writes music again, and it’s not long before Kerry is begging him to go on tour with him like they used to.
They have ‘family’ dinners in Kerry’s house each week, with various people joining depending on what is going on at the time, but it’s always the three of them to start. Eventually Vik and Misty become permanent fixtures at dinners, and once Kerry starts to date someone seriously enough, his new boyfriend joins them.
It’s a life she never expected, but when Johnny joins her up on their roof at night to stare at the stars, she knows it’s the life she finally deserves.
She just worries they’re getting too content. Too quiet.
Quiet doesn’t suit either of them. They both know this.
“Val,” Johnny says, her name on his lips always stirring something within her. He joins her one night on the roof, as they share a bottle of wine, “Got a pretty interesting opportunity drop into my lap if you’re interested.”
He says it with such a mischievous look on his face, a shine in his eyes that she can’t resist. And when he tells her all the dirty details, she laughs.
“It’s perfect,” she says, “When do we start?”
***
They’re dressed similarly for the occasion; she’s dyed her hair from the bright colors it had been, to black with shades of blue -- only slightly darker than his own hair. She wears a snug fit black suit, sleeves of the jacket rolled up to her elbows; the etchings of her cyberware shown purposefully.
He wears a similar black suit, also with the sleeves up. The small knives on the elbow of his metal arm are sharp and polished, his organic arm spotting a new tattoo that matches her own.
Playing the part, they look every bit as intimidating as requested they be. There is no hiding his gun on his hip, the sneer on his lips. Both of them hide their eyes behind dark aviators, as they make their way into the lower levels.
Above them, the music is loud and vibrating down through the floors. Once again, Kerry had promised an explosive show, and once again, he was going to deliver. “They’ll never fall for the bodyguard act again,” Kerry had protested when V suggested the idea, the confusion on her face as she was reminded this was something she had planned before.
This time though, things were different. Because the Crystal Palace had seen the likes of V before, but it had never seen what she could do with her partner-in-crime at her side.
And corporations were ultimately easy prey when you understood what they feared the most was their secrets getting out.
“Remember the plan?” Valerie said, as they neared the hallway to the security level of the casino.
“Covering you while you get the data. Think it will be enough?” Johnny asks, pulling his gun out of the holster, reloading.
“It’s a start,” She replies with a raised eyebrow, “but just think of all the fun we’re going to have getting to it.”
They come up to the double doors at the end of the hallway, and Johnny shoots out the security camera that starts to turn towards them. “Fuck, Val, you just keep getting better and better,” he grins.
On the other side of the door, there’s yelling and the casino security getting into position. They know Johnny and Valerie are coming – given the trail of bodies behind them, they hadn’t made the attempt to hide it.
She pulls Johnny towards her in a burning kiss, and he returns it before the kiss is roughly broken. “Cuffing you to the fuckin’ bed after this,” he smirks, eyebrow raised.
“Oh, babe, I’m counting on that,” Valerie laughs, taking a step to the side as she activates her mantis blades.
They look at each other once more, grinning before together they kick the doors open and go running in; two Night City legends working flawlessly together.
Just as it was always meant to be.