OUR LADY OF MERCY.

>...     HIS  OLD   STOMPING   GROUNDS ,    amidst the blaring bass and the wide eyed onlookers,  he’s relaxed,  slouched over the bartop where you’d find beer bottles, and empty tequila old fashions around him.   

Where was this, again?    Atlantis?   

     Nah,    he’d feel Rogue’s charming gaze from a mile away if he were at Atlantis;    bleary eyed,    he knuckles at his eyes,    blinking up at the bartender,    then finally surveying the shit hole they both were in.   ‘Silverhand!’    A smile curls onto his face,    a nearby fanboy gets all giddy with delusion, and he figures not knowing where he was was probably for the best;    let the new guy manage that out tomorrow when it hits the scream sheets.    He could picture it now,    a COO and a rockerboy walk into a bar dot dot dot  -  a lazy glance to the woman who was never in his company,    always in her own,    not that he was complaining when she looked like that tonight.

      It was fucking annoying though,    the way the fans leered at him from nearby,    hovering,    watching his every move as though he’d whip out an encore right here,    right now.    Johnny raises his glass to his lips,    knocks back a shot,    and sets it down with a bang.    As if on cue,    the one behind the bar is quick to replace his drink.   He shoots them a grateful look.   Didn’t matter in the end where he was, as It was all the same to him and Night City;    you couldn’t find one place that sold booze on the streets that hadn’t already played host to Johnny Silverhand.     He was good for business.

>...    OR MAYBE THE DRINKS WERE JUST THAT GOOD,    given that he was accosted of his own,  red lipstick staining the rim.    Leave it to her to set the mood.    A brow raises,    and he’s aware of her proximity,    the gold gleam of her mods shining just so under the dance lights.    Johnny takes back what’s his,    a knowing smirk,    as he downs the whole thing where her lips had just been.    Lady,    I don’t even know where we are.   

   “    You know I wouldn’t be caught dead with the likes of you   ----    “

     A half smile,    a running joke,    as he knows she shares the same sentiment with him and his band.    Tickets,    and extended invitations to their shows were offered whenever he felt like maybe,    just maybe,    he’d see her in his crowd.    And yet,   “    guess I musta kicked the bucket,    ‘cuz here we are.   “

    Johnny settles the glass back down onto the nearest surface,    reaching out so he has all her attention on him,    his chrome arm rests on her shoulder,    mindful of the sharp metal extending from his elbows, he leans in,     

“    only time I get an angel all t’myself before the devil knows I’m dead.     “

     He presses a kiss to her forehead,    and smiles.

MYSTERY WOMAN SPOTTED WITH JOHNNY SILVERHAND! 

         ROCKERGIRL? SILVERHAND’S NEW ARM CANDY UNMASKED! 

   SELL YOUR SOUL: SILVERHAND SPOTTED WITH CORPO BABE?    WHAT THIS MEANS FOR SAMURAI. 

The alcohol burns her in the same way that her sermons do; fire and brimstone ( hope, too ); down her throat and into her belly where it twists and turns — her lips leave a red stain upon the glass, smudged by his lips when Rockerboy steals what is rightfully his. He looks good in red. Remnants of her upon his mouth ( does she taste better than the drink? ); and those LED, energy efficient eyes watch him with a strange sort of hunger. Wandering for forty days and forty nights in the desert and Johnny is not the oasis that awaits her after all, but something far stranger. Stronger. “ You look good tonight, Johnny. ” And he does. He looks real. Painted red and blue and fogged by smoke; and her left hand moves, ring finger gleaming gold; tracing around the curve of his lips as the warmth of his skin seeps into modded flesh. It is a genuine compliment, paid in the wake of his teasing, his taunting — eyes half lidded as she takes him in, more heady and potent than any drink this bar might serve. He looks better than nights she’s seen him through, sweat-stained and so drunk he cannot stand — hers are hands that should have been a nurse’s. Husband, Booker, Johnny; all poisoned by the same stuff; all searching for something she cannot give. “ I bet you sounded better. ” She wouldn’t know. Our Lady does not walk amongst the people as Johnny does; does not part crowds like the red sea, does not stand like a penitent waiting for the Word to be spoken or sung. She keeps Johnny at arm’s length, as she does with everyone — close enough for their fingers to touch, if she were to reach; but no more. It was better that way, surely. He would not like what he saw, after all, if he peeled back chrome and flesh and bone to find what was beneath. Maybe he didn’t like what he saw now, maybe she was a project; maybe he was hers — then his arm is around her; cold chrome against her own skin; an uncomfortable sensation that she leans into, wants more of. Her own hands are wanting things, strangling things — pressing into the small of his back, the ridge of his spine; fingers clutching on to the synth-cotton of his shirt. It is not a benediction when his lips press to her brow, but it feels like one all the same. 

Angel, he calls her. What does that make him?