#torturing johnny

Johnny can’t stand it a second longer. The pressure inside his chest swells to the point of bursting. No one here can do a damn thing to help him make this right. Alt’s gone, and no one that’s left can bring V back.

Then, without uttering another word, he runs.

The city is in ruins.

He can’t be bothered to care.

He gets on his motorcycle and rides—the broken scenery of the place he’s called home blurs in his peripheral vision. Bitterly, he thinks that maybe the busted-up pavement and burnt-out buildings give the place some fucking character. Smoke burns his lungs, hot wind blows his hair back as he goes faster and faster. Maybe if he closes his eyes, he’ll feel her there behind him, her face against his back, and her arms wrapped tight around him. Then they can ride together into the murk of the Old Net, fly off the edge of a cliff, and meet their fate together, burn up in each other’s arms.

Without V, all he’s able to do is rot. He languished in Mikoshi before he woke up in her head—damn near lost his soul to putrid indolence after he landed in Ghost City. Only thing that kept him goin’ was knowing V was ok, that his sacrifice was for her, so she could keep on living.

There’s something particularly cruel in how she came to him one day, lifted him up out of despair, and brought him back to life. She stuck around long enough to give him just a taste of what happiness feels like.

And then she left him.