NOVEL NEXT Chapter 31: Flashback 15: Chippin/'_In.bd
It's nighttime, an old metallic gray Porsche speeds through the muddy terrain outside Night City. The car stops in front of an old abandoned oil well. The driver's door opens, revealing V wearing Johnny's leather jacket.
Johnny: Can't believe they bothered to truck it all of the way out here.
V begins to wander among the ruins of the metal structures that made up the oil wells, sinking his boots into the mud.
V: Better than the junkyard where I landed.
V cautiously walks on a metal walkway near some shacks, and then arrives near two metal piles. He turns around looking at a huge metal silo as Johnny's ghost appears behind him.
Johnny: So that's how it is… Nothing here at all…
Johnny sits on a pile of metal, while V does the same, staring at him.
V: What'd you expect? Headstone, flags and flowers?
Johnny stares at the ground, saddened.
Johnny: Nah, I… I dunno. A marker? Something. Anything.
V picks up a stone from the ground.
V: We'll figure something out.
V begins to scribble Johnny's initials followed by the date "2023" on top of the metal stack on which he is sitting.
V: Better now?
Johnny: A bit. Let's say It was my real grave… What would you write?
Johnny raises his metal arm toward V, as if describing something.
Johnny: Here lies Johnny Silverhand…
V: The guy who saved my life.
Johnny takes off his sunglasses, staring at V.
Johnny: V… You don't know how much I wanted that to be true.
Johnny stands up, walking in front of V and overlapping with the city lights.
Johnny: Listen, I realized I fucked up a lot of things… Either let down or used every last person who gave me their trust. Blind, selfish bastard that I was. But I've managed one thing for now. Not to fuck this up, what we have.
V: Been a long, bumpy road. But we made it.
Johnny teleports next to V, then lights a cigarette.
Johnny: Most people I thought were my friends, they couldn't even stand to be in the same room with me. You're the fucking closest to me by a long shot. There twenty-four seven… And yet… You don't seem to hate my living guts.
V: Too bad we didn't talk like this earlier. Woulda made things easier.
Johnny: Never found the right moment…
V: Listen, when you said you let your friends down… Ya mean Rogue?
Johnny stands up again.
Johnny: Rogue, Alt, Kerry… Santiago. Not all lost yet, 'least with Rogue.
Johnny turns toward the city skyline.
Johnny: Can't pretend nothing changed over fifty years, can't just insert myself into her life.
V smiles at Johnny.
V: Already have.
Johnny: True. Y'know, did promise her I'd take to movies. Long, long ago.
V: Good Idea.
Johnny: Call her for me, ask if she's free some night? Thing is, you'd have to surrender control… again.
V stares at Johnny for a while, then smiles at him.
V: I'll call her.
Johnny: Thanks, V. Of all the heads I could've popped up in, hella glad it was your's. Now let's delta, nothin' to see here.
V gets up from the metal pile, walking toward the car.