Author; "As an apology for my absence, I have a gift for you all.
As I mentioned, this is my attempt to fix Season 3, focusing more on the story and characters from the game and the series.
My idea is to try to take the best parts of Season 1—its slice-of-life elements and more everyday tone—and combine them with the action of Season 2.
Trying to upload weekly chapters ended up being more overwhelming than motivating, so this time I'll write at my own pace and upload chapters while working on another novel.
I hope you enjoy it."
---
At dawn the day after the attack on Lazarus headquarters at the Iron Beast campus, the first rays of sunlight lit up a luxurious penthouse in Heywood.
A luxury that didn't come from design or decoration, but from its privileged location—suspended above a metropolis that only pretended to sleep.
The open-plan penthouse blended exposed brick, steel, and glass, with a second level supported by a metal platform.
Its walls—except for one made entirely of massive windows stretching to the ceiling—were decorated with holographic photographs, framed album covers and records, guitars, and other instruments.
Only one wall broke the pattern: a space taken up by a small but well-stocked library that reached all the way to the ceiling.
There, books on robotics and advanced engineering stood alongside classic and contemporary novels.
Right next to it, crowning the apartment, suspended in mid-air by a web of micro-cables so thin they were invisible to the naked eye, hung a singular piece: a guitar shattered into thousands of fragments.
Every splinter had been carefully placed, as if the moment of its destruction had been frozen in time. You could still see the neck, stained with traces of synthetic blood.
It was no longer an instrument—it was a scar turned into art...
On the wide bed of the upper level, a man slept peacefully, caught between two beautiful women.
Their naked silhouettes were entwined with his, clinging to him as if trying to keep him from slipping away again. Sharing a moment of fleeting peace—one that was abruptly interrupted by the annoying ringtone of digital bells, ringing inside his mind.
Causing Sora to open his eyes, and—if he could—he would've thrown his IDn out the window.
Without bothering to check who was calling, he hung up immediately.
Gently squeezing his hands and giving in to the comforting feedback—both tender and firm—of what he was holding, Sora let himself relax again, as if sinking into a warm bath.
In turn, this elicited a soft, sleepy moan of pleasure from the two beautiful women who felt his grip tighten on their backsides.
Just as sleep began to reclaim him once more...
[Vrrt-Vrrt... Bzzt-bzzt... Drrr-drrr...] The "bells" rang again.
The worst part? His IDn was on Do Not Disturb...
Which meant whoever was calling had access to the IDn communication software.
'You can't even trust the government anymore... selling your data to strangers,' he thought sarcastically as he hung up again.
After so many interruptions, Sora was forced to change positions. He rolled over in bed, gently lifting Judy over him, making her giggle, and dropped her next to Lucy.
He managed to get comfortable again, without letting go of them. But the truce didn't last long. Just seconds later... the call came in a third time.
"Ahm..." Knowing they wouldn't stop bothering him, Sora let the ringtone echo inside his head.
'If I don't answer the call... then they can't call again,' he thought, proud of his flawless logic.
But then, something strange happened. The ringtone didn't stop when a second call came in; instead, both overlapped, generating a digital cacophony that echoed painfully inside Sora's skull.
"Shit..." he muttered through clenched teeth, watching his brilliant plan fall apart seconds after putting it into action.
With multiple tones bouncing mercilessly in his head, Sora sighed in defeat and ran a hand through his already messy hair before sitting up.
As he turned around, an inevitable smile spread across his face: Judy was clinging to Lucy like a little koala hugging its mother.
Without making a sound, Sora slipped on a pair of Night City Heat basketball shorts and descended the metal stairs. The echo of his footsteps cut through the morning silence of the penthouse.
As soon as he reached the open kitchen, the first thing he did was turn on the coffee maker. The aroma of brewing coffee began to fill the air—just as a digital storm of ringtones—six, maybe more—pounded relentlessly inside his head.
Finally, standing in front of one of the massive windows, freshly brewed coffee in hand, he watched the city wake up while taking a long sip, letting the bitter heat clear his mind.
"Ahhh..." Only then, with a sigh he couldn't quite place between relief and resignation, did Sora accept one of the eight incoming calls.
A moment of peace washed over his mind—instantly shattered by a cold, irritating voice that pierced through the distance to ask:
["Enjoying yourself?"]
Sora sighed like a tired old man as he leaned back into a worn but comfortable leather recliner in front of the window. Then he replied mentally:
["Depends. My night with my fiancées? Yeah, I had a great time. Being harassed with calls? Not so much..."]
["Despite the circumstances, I gave you six hours to 'relax,' Arc"] The voice, laced with reproach—especially at the end—left no room for argument.
["Fine, Joy"] he replied in the same tone, before continuing. ["I imagine Powler filled you in, right?"]
[Yes, I've read her report. She's currently investigating the processor materials to identify their origin. The fact that someone is building frames capable of hosting rogue AIs without any government, organization, or corporation noticing... that has to be stopped.]
"..." With nothing to argue or add, Sora responded by taking another sip of his coffee.
Joy frowned at the implications of her own words and said: ["Then Morgan was right... Norris was murdered."]
Sora nodded. ["That's what it looks like... His funeral is this afternoon—maybe we'll find something."]
His voice dropped an octave, heavy with disdain and melancholy.
["The mercs who infiltrated to retrieve his Sandevistan and killed the scientists..."]
He couldn't stop the traumas from one of his parts from reopening—like corrupted data files.
["They were searching for a specific piece of software inside Norris's Sandevistan. Possibly the Modus Operandi that triggered the major cyberpsychosis attack."]
["A program could do that?"] Joy asked. A question more fitting for late-night conspiracy shows—and yet, here they were, discussing it.
["Trigger cyberpsychosis? There's precedent. Remember?"]
["The out-of-control beggars from four years ago..."] Joy deduced, recalling past events he had witnessed firsthand.
["Winner, winner..."] murmured Sora with a half-smile that never reached his eyes.
Joy didn't even wait a second before rebuking him—without emphasis. ["I thought you and Morgan made sure the original code was destroyed."]
["We did. Or rather, I did. Buuuut..."] Sora replied with a playful tone that quickly died as he added, ["You know how this works. One bribe is all it takes."]
He shrugged indifferently and added mentally: ["If a corporate cell managed to secure one of the beggars' corpses, traces of the infected code could still be in its cyberware.
They might have used it as a base to reconstruct it... or to develop something new."]
After taking another sip of his coffee, he concluded: ["Or who knows... Maybe it has nothing to do with that. Maybe it's just a modified braindance, amplifying the post-traumatic stress Norris already had. Studies have proven it time and time again—soldiers with PTSD are prime candidates for cyberpsychosis."]
With every hypothesis, with every wild idea, windows appeared on the interface of his IDn—technical drafts showing how each theory could be implemented, along with various studies pulled from his memory archives, backing up his claims.
Joy took a deep breath. ["Have you managed to access the Sandevistan?"] she asked.
["Still encrypted..."] he replied, glancing down at the sought-after piece of cyberware lying carelessly on his apartment sofa. ["And judging by my attempts to crack it last night before going to bed... I'd say if we force it, all the data inside will be lost with it."]
["If that's the case... we'll have to do it old school and decrypt it step by step. I'll organize a team from the base in Night City to transfer it to—"]
["Don't bother,"] Sora interrupted before she could finish. ["I'll send Mathew. He'll take it straight to Base 000. If he uses my Black-Aquila, there won't be any trace."]
Joy fell silent. She didn't like being interrupted. But since it was him, she sighed before replying: ["Fine."]
Thinking about young David, who should already have his Sandevistan installed by now, Sora added: ["In the meantime, I've created a decoy. If we're lucky, it might make someone involved slip up... and reveal themselves."]
["That's dangerous. With your face all over the news after the attack on the Iron Beast campus last night... it'll also attract any corp looking to profit from Militech secrets... like Arasaka."]
["I know! The kid's totally fucked up, heh."]Sora said it with a sadistic grin, clearly enjoying the mess he'd thrown David int—all in the name of staying true to the lore.
Having come to understand his twisted nature after working with him for four years, Joy wisely replied: ["I don't want to know the details—just keep me updated if the bait gets a bite."]
Before he could answer, Sora turned the recliner toward the soft voice that asked:
"Who are you talking to?"
It was Lucy, coming down the stairs with Judy, both still half-asleep. There was no doubt in their minds that he was up to something shady, judging by the sadistic grin painted across their fiancé's face.
Judy was wearing one of his old Samurai t-shirts, while Lucy had thrown on the black dress shirt Sora had worn the night before—still stained with his scent. It was only half-buttoned, barely covering her chest.
The contrast between the masculine shirt and the feminine curves of their bodies created a bewitching effect—one that made it impossible for Sora to look away as they came down the stairs.
He snapped out of it only when both women, clearly pleased by his spellbound reaction, approached him with smiles and took turns giving him a morning kiss.
With the sweet taste of their lips still lingering on his, Sora replied both aloud and mentally:
["With the Boss."]
"Oh, your mom?" Judy assumed.
["No… the other one."] he clarified, tilting his head sideways as if pointing to some imaginary figure.
"Hm?" Lucy chimed in, adorably feigning confusion as she brought a finger to her chin.
"Then you mean President Myers?" she asked, wearing a mischievous smile.
That earned her a dry: ["Very funny…"] from Sora.
"Wanna have pancakes?" Judy asked, her cheerful tone barely able to hide how happy she was to have Sora back home.
On her way to the kitchen, she stretched lazily, raising her arms above her head, letting his old shirt slide up with the motion. The movement exposed the soft, firm curve of her bare ass—a perfect blend of delicacy and temptation.
There was no shame in it. On the contrary, it almost seemed deliberately provocative, fully aware of who was seated right behind her.
Unable to resist teasing her—even after such a gift to the eyes, which he had thoroughly enjoyed—Sora replied: ["Sure, but not yours."]
"Hey!" That drew an instant pout and a charmingly indignant frown from Judy.
Lucy gave her a sympathetic look, raising one eyebrow as she softly said, "Honey…"
"I know, okay?! Just let me complain... At least I know how to order pizza!" Judy surrendered with a huff, arms crossed beneath her generous chest.
["Now that you know!"] exclaimed Sora, proudly backing up his fiancée's small victory.
Even if it didn't seem like it, he hadn't forgotten about the other person on the call—he was simply waiting for the moment she'd... explode.
However... his plan was thwarted when Joy, a forced witness to the cheerful trio, dropped a question more worthy of a nosy mother than the head of Lazarus—just as Sora was taking a sip of his coffee:
["I see everything's fine at home… so, when's the long-awaited wedding?"]
The question caught him so off-guard that all he could manage was a choked: "Hmhk!" as he started to cough.
Like a veteran trained to strike when the enemy was wounded, Joy twisted the metaphorical knife:
["You'll have to give me the date in advance. I'm sure more than one Seat and several high-ranking agents would want to take a break just to attend."]
Sora turned pale. He knew each of the Seats far too well: unique, unpredictable, and all tuned to the same eccentric frequency as Powler.
Just picturing that kind of circus turning into his wedding… was enough to turn the idea into a nightmare.
And, as if that wasn't enough, Joy landed one final sadistic twist, her voice thick with barely concealed satisfaction:
["I'm sure the AOE agents would be delighted to perform at your wedding."]
'So this is karma', thought Sora, struck by a moment of clarity.
How much had he enjoyed the embarrassment of those beautiful, but stiff agents, forced to parade and perform for the masses?
And now, they were being used against their proud creator.
["Didn't know… you could joke."]
Joy tilted her head slightly, wearing a half-smile as cold as it was falsely confused. ["Huh? Who says I'm joking?"]
Regaining his composure, Sora replied firmly, ["It won't be anytime soon."]
Even if he hadn't shared it with either of his fiancées, he… was waiting for someone.
["If you'll excuse me, one of my fiancées is waiting with pancakes… the one who can coo—"] He didn't get to finish the sentence.
["Tch, it was a joke! Why are your fingers so stiff? Stop digging them into my ri—"]
Joy shook her head, barely holding back, determined to end the call without giving him the satisfaction of having gotten under her skin.
["Let me know when Mathew's on the move. And if you find anything, I want to know immediately... In the meantime, enjoy being home. Congratulations, you earned it after these four years."]
Sora minimized his IDn interface with a blink, just as Judy dropped onto the couch.
"Now that you're finally home… what are you gonna do?" she asked, letting out an "Ow!" as she landed on Norris's Sandervista.
Which she immediately grabbed and tossed toward an empty armchair without looking, as if it were just another piece of junk Sora used to bring home.
Lying there, one leg dangling off the edge and her hair falling over her face like some street-corner muse, she added with a half-smile:
"Your grandparents—and mine—are dying to see you. Ever since they saw you on the news the second you got back to the city... they're rushing to meet up before you get kicked out again."
Sora glanced sideways at her and murmured, pretending to be offended, "Mean…"
"I'm just hitting back," Judy replied, one eyebrow raised and a half-smile that hid more affection than resentment.
Sora stretched, ran a hand through his messy hair, and replied lazily:
"In the afternoon I'll see Musashi at Norris's funeral, that counts as a visit. After that, I'll swing by Arasaka Academy."
Judy shot upright, kneeling on the couch.
"You really want to get exiled from the city again!" she exclaimed, genuinely alarmed given her fiancé's history:
Arasaka property steps in = explodes.
"I'm not gonna break anything. Scout's honor," said Sora, raising three black fingers — more mockery than oath.
Still, his cheeky promise got under Judy's skin in more ways than one:
"You got kicked out of the first meeting!" she exclaimed.
"What did you expect, huh!? Aoi made me go—probably mother's idea—judging by how she wouldn't stop taking pictures of me in that stupid uniform," Sora complained, as if everything that happened afterward hadn't been entirely his fault.
Lucy, who had been quietly listening with a discreet smile while flipping pancakes, couldn't help but imagine it: a five- or six-year-old Sora, miniature, stuffed into an ill-fitting scout uniform, with a face that screamed I'm gonna burn this place down.
She brought a hand to her chest, chuckling softly, and asked:
"Aww, adorable. So… what did you do?"
Sora didn't answer. Judy answered for him.
"He headbutted the Scoutmaster in the balls and ran off through the city."
Lucy burst out laughing. "That's not even that bad... I mean, for Sora's standards, I'd say it was basically inevitable." She turned toward the man in question.
Who, instead of confirming or denying anything, pulled a cigarette pack and lighter from a compartment in his black forearm, lit one, and looked away, avoiding eye contact.
Which made Lucy start to worry, turning quickly to Judy…
"Wait… what else did he do?" That apparently she wasn't finish.
"Before he escaped..." she said calmly, "El Demonio... stuffed his underwear in the Scoutmaster's trunk."
Lucy's smile vanished in an instant. "Oh, shit," she muttered, already picturing what came next.
Judy nodded heavily. "Yeah. He was arrested on the spot. It made the news... charged with pedophilia and kidnapping."
"What happened to him?" asked Lucy, one hand over her face, like she had to physically hold up her suddenly heavier head.
"He's lucky Musashi didn't kill him. He's still in prison," Judy replied flatly.
As soon as she heard that, Lucy turned quickly and reproachfully towards; "Sora!" — el Demonio.
Seeing her furious expression, the way she was bending the spatula in her hand, while the pancake — surely meant for him — burned on the stove, Sora quickly threw up his hands.
"Ca-calm down! The guy really was a pedophile!"
Lucy blinked, bewildered. "What...?"
"You didn't know!" Judy snapped, glaring daggers at him. She wasn't about to let him off the hook.
"So what?" Sora replied, completely unfazed. "That makes me a hero!"
"What you are is shameless!" Judy shot back, raising her voice. "You could've ruined his life!"
"Ahmm..." While the others kept "arguing," Lucy let out a relieved sigh and shook her head, turning her attention back to the pancakes. She couldn't help but smile again — another loud morning, just like the ones she'd missed.
"Who the fuck cares about a pedophile's life?" Sora replied without a single molecule of shame.
"YOU—DID—NOT—KNOW—THAT!" Judy barked, punctuating every word like a sentence.
Sora took one last drag from his cigarette, shrugged, and said: "Whatever... it all worked out. They should've given me a damn medal and begged me to join."
Letting the topic drop, he added casually: "I'm just going to the academy to pick up David."
"David? The kid from last night at the Turbo Bar?" Lucy asked, raising an eyebrow.
"Oh, you remember him well," he replied, half-amused.
"Hm? Jealous? That's not like you," she teased, her smile as mischievous as it was seductive.
"Not at all." Sora exhaled smoke one last time, then added without a shred of modesty: "I don't think there's a more charming man alive than me. Besides, for you to be interested in someone so..." —he searched for the right word, then finished with a crooked smile— "inexperienced... you must be going through something."
The comment made her laugh — but it also made her think. Unintentionally, her mind drifted back to her old apartment: empty, silent... and she couldn't deny it.
As he stood up from the couch to help with breakfast, Sora spoke without looking back:
"I'll be spending the morning in the bunker's lab."
Hearing that — and fully aware of the reason that lab had been built — Judy, still kneeling on the couch, lowered her gaze. Her hand slid almost unconsciously over her belly.
Sora noticed instantly. He turned without hesitation, walked over, and wrapped his arms gently around her head. Then, he placed a soft kiss along her hairline.
"Trust me... it won't be much longer."
Judy smiled, calm and assured. "I know. I can't wait to hear the good news."
"You will." Sora returned the quiet confidence in her words with a look just as resolute.
Their tender moment was cut short by a jealous snort from the other end of the room.
"Hmpt. Breakfast is ready for His and Her Highness," Lucy muttered sourly, balancing three plates in her hands. "Do let me know if you need anything eeeelse."
Judy stood up abruptly, still holding Sora's hand, and said: "The help is getting more rebellious by the day..."
"Tell me about it..." he replied, barely suppressing a smile. "You give them a hand, open your bed, and suddenly they're taking your whole damn arm."
"I'm actually starting to get pissed... for real" Lucy snapped, dropping the plates on the table with a little too much force.
The dull thud of ceramic was all it took — Sora and Judy instantly stopped teasing and moved like well-trained machines, jumping in to finish preparing the rest of breakfast...
-
One hour later.
Sora stepped out of the apartment with an adorable Eco, puppy-sized, perched on his shoulder.
His head was bare, with no helmet or mask on. Ash-black hair tied back, loose strands falling over his face, and tattoos rising up his neck, nearly reaching his sharply defined jaw.
He wore a worn leather jacket, with military patches on the left sleeve and, on the right, the silver spear of Lazarus. On the back, a flickering hologram displayed the emblem of the R.A.B.I.D.S. unit.
Over his black shirt, he wore a form-fitting harness with a high collar and an integrated hood*. The design—refined and functional—covered his chin and could extend up to his nose. Ideal for moving through crowded areas without being recognized… or mistaken for a mugger.
As always, the Malorian twins rested discreetly beneath his arms. And Getsuda hung horizontally from the back of his hip.
His dark beige pants were loose, reinforced at the knees and along the sides, with a geometric, pyramid-patterned texture. His footwear—light work boots left unlaced—didn't clash with the look; on the contrary, it completed it.
A micro-representation of himself… somewhere between functional and careless. Human and "artificial."
They both descended to the garage and got into the Porsche. Sora started the engine, Eco stuck his head out the window, and with a roar, the vehicle screeched through the parking levels, dodging columns and cars by mere inches, before launching up the exit ramp.
The Porsche hit the street, unleashing a cacophony of blaring horns, screeching tires, and creative insults from drivers who had to slam their brakes and swerve—not just to avoid a collision, but the inevitable spike in their insurance.
Sora replied to the insults by sticking his black hand out the window and flipping his metallic middle finger. Eco mimicked him as best he could, just before the Porsche sped off again—this time through the streets of Night City.
As he drove, Sora opened the messaging app on his IDn and, with a simple thought, mentally typed:
[How was yesterday with David?]
The reply came a few seconds later, the irritation of its sender palpable even through text.
[My shift doesn't start for another two hours. Did you really have to wake me up this early!?]
[I get you, sister... Same thing happened to me. Sucks, huh?]
Not taking the bait, Rebecca's reply came only after a few deep breaths helped her resist the urge.
[Everything went fine, though it got a little weird when Mysti went full Witchy Mode.]
With both sides of him deeply despising all pseudo-sciences—especially the ones that didn't even qualify as that—Sora replied with a heavy sigh:
[Tarot reading?]
The confirmation came instantly from Rebecca: [Tarot reading.]
[Someone really needs to tell Mysti that if she keeps scaring everyone off by throwing Tarot cards at them, she'll never get a boyfriend...]
'Especially now that Jackie's taken', Sora thought to himself.
[Aren't you curious what she told David?] wrote Rebecca, lying in bed in her underwear, eyes fixed on the ceiling, legs crossed and swaying rhythmically without thinking as she typed.
There was nothing left of the childish body she once had. After going through a "second puberty," her figure had become enviable—smaller in scale and with a slightly bluish skin tone, but enviable.
[Nope.] Sora replied, drifting the Porsche around a tight curve, weaving through traffic.
[You came up again... as the creepy figure pulling the strings.] she wrote, having gone through a reading similar to David's.
[You really need magic cards to tell you how awesome I am?] he replied, triggering her instant reaction the moment he finished thinking it:
[What about your Grandma, huh? Didn't she ever teach you humility?]
[I had that once... and it did nothing for me.] Sora replied, with a strange kind of conviction—just as palpable through text as her earlier irritation.
It made Rebecca stop shaking her leg... until she resumed with his next message:
[About Aoi, she's fine, I think. Still need to see her.]
[Tch. Jackass... Tell her I said hi. Every time she comes to visit Lucy and Judy on campus, she brings us food.]
[Will do. Back to David—did you tell him what I asked?]
[Yes. When I dropped him off at his place, I told him to keep going to the academy like nothing had happened. Although… he was pretty out of it after the operation—looks like Viktor hit him with more anesthesia than usual, since it was his first time getting chromed.]
Sora nodded to himself and typed back[Thanks.]
The Porsche 911 Turbo sliced through the city streets, heading toward a seemingly abandoned warehouse in the Arroyo sub-district.
Even though the building was covered in graffiti and its façade was worn down, unlike the surrounding buildings, its windows were still intact—hidden behind old cardboard and reinforced with solid bars.
The armored doors, rusted only on the outer layer, opened automatically upon detecting the vehicle. As soon as they shut behind it, the floor began to descend smoothly, revealing itself as the hidden elevator to the city's underbelly.
Over the past four years, Sora had built entirely private new entrances to Night City's sublevels, making sure no one—not even Night Corp—caught on.
At the bottom, the elevator stopped with a metallic click, and the Porsche shot forward with another roar from its original 1977 flat-six Boxer engine—customized to the bone not just to meet modern standards, but to surpass them.
Sora had even replaced the combustion system with a NeoHydro one. He wasn't thrilled about such a drastic change, but he was certain his creation was the future.
Clean. Simple.
What wasn't simple was understanding why he clung to that archaic engine instead of swapping it out for a new one—or building one from scratch.
But in a world where everything was modular, disposable, and obsolete by design within five years, keeping a nearly century-old engine alive was a statement in itself.
And the car had more history than it let on.
Thanks to his new car junkies friends, Sora managed to trace the origin of his 911.
It had once belonged to an actor who crashed it just days after it rolled off the factory floor. Declared a total loss, the car ended up rusting in a landfill near what would, over time, become Night City.
Settling one of the city's old mysteries: did the landfill come first, or the city?
The vehicle remained forgotten, until someone found it and poured hundreds of hours into restoring it—likely the same person who would later drive it through the city...
That car, shared by both of them across time, had been there before the city itself. In a way, it was Night City's oldest citizen.
After several kilometers through the undercity, Sora finally reached the entrance to his cherished bunker.
The area was surrounded by a swarm of hydraulic gates that dumped thousands of liters of ocean water, producing a constant roar of artificial waterfalls. Most of it, once no longer needed, was pumped back into the ocean—just part of an efficient loop.
The massive doors, disguised as just another set of concrete blocks, opened to reveal a natural cave, partially flooded—giving the illusion that the bunker, or rather its lone structure, was hanging in midair, floating like a solitary island.
As he entered, a mechanical tremor echoed beneath the water.
Black columns emerged, one after another, aligning with precision until they formed a bridge. Water slid across its smooth surface as the Porsche advanced, and each segment retracted behind it.
As they crossed, Sora's gaze swept across the cave's walls and ceiling, alive with activity—Spidebots scurried along every surface, darting in and out of conduits designed specifically for them, like ants in a robotic hive.
The Porsche came to a stop in the open workshop surrounding the central structure that housed the rest of the rooms: armory, bar, kitchen, gym, even a pool and other facilities.
The walls were lined with tools, and the area was surrounded by workbenches, cranes, and mechanical arms. When the engine shut off, the pedestal beneath the car lit up and rose, lifting the vehicle until it aligned with the rest of the mechanical gems on display in the room.
Like his beloved Yaiba* motorcycle—the same one destroyed in his fight against Smasher.
Rebuilt and modified beyond recognition. Its wheels, now wide and barely a few millimeters thick, left a large empty gap in the axle. Combined with a more refined and advanced chassis design, it had become a truly unique piece of engineering.
Sora stepped out of the car and looked around. The bunker greeted him with its usual blend of order and chaos: clean surfaces, but cluttered.
Much like the contrast between concrete, steel, and wood that softened the coldness of the space.
Modern, yet lived-in. Functional, but welcoming. A serene, clean space—even if things weren't always in their place.
Satisfied, he nodded and headed to the elevator with Eco.
Though the bunker originally had only two levels, Sora had expanded it... just a bit.
The elevator descended, leaving behind the complex's two vanilla levels and plunging underwater, headed for the bottom of the cave.
The external pressure created a low, steady hum that accompanied the descent—until finally, the elevator stopped at a third level.
One almost no one knew existed.
The doors opened with a metallic whisper, revealing a dimly lit chamber that seemed to come alive in his presence. Soft lights emerged, slowly illuminating a setting that could've come straight out of a villain's lab.
Lined with precision along the room were capsules filled with a greenish fluid, inside which floated deformed bodies. These abominations—inhuman in appearance—resembled bioweapons: mutated flesh amalgamations designed for combat.
The laboratory, cold and calculated in its layout, was built around the pedestal at the room's center. Everything else around it felt secondary, constructed solely for its benefit.
Unlike the other capsules, the pedestal held a bluish liquid laced with silver particles that shimmered with their own light—though nothing could be seen floating inside, at least not at first glance.
A massive screen beside the pedestal, positioned before an imposing black chair, flickered to life. An elegant voice followed, breaking the silence through the speakers:
["Welcome back… Sir."]
Simultaneously, the hologram of Night City's legendary founder materialized before Sora, who walked forward calmly, inspecting the subjects. Still sedated, but alive—oxygen masks strapped to what could barely be called faces, grotesquely malformed.
There was neither pride nor shame in his gaze. Only...
Pragmatism. Nothing more, nothing less, he thought, reevaluating the morally questionable acts he had committed in that very lab.
Eco, always at his side, emitted a low hum in greeting as it scanned the room, verifying the condition of the specimens. Stopping before the pedestal, Sora studied the bluish fluid, bubbling with controlled cadence.
His fingers gently brushed the surface of the small capsule before asking:
"Status?"
["Stable,"] Jarvis replied briskly. ["As it has been every time you've asked. Cellular degradation has completely halted."]
Seeing Sora nod, Jarvis continued:
["After integrating Dr. Fabius's personal data into our own research, we've significantly approached the viability threshold with each iteration. Would you like to initiate the analysis?"]
With a mix of hope and determination, Sora nodded once more.
"Proceed."
Jarvis let out what almost sounded like a sigh.
["While I celebrate that importing samples from Okinawa is no longer necessary, I still condemn the method you've chosen. It borders on irrational."]
Sora dropped into the central chair and ordered, "Do it."
["My disagreement does not affect performance. Your directive is now in progress."]
As the extraction tools were sterilized, Jarvis continued:
["Current iteration: variant T-235. Derived from subjects 211, 77, and 198.
Preliminary results show a 36.25% increase in cellular repair rate compared to the Krysp-11A modification developed by UNSA and used in your case.
T-235's regenerative capabilities have reached levels comparable to Byle's bioweapons.
At the same time, we've observed a 22.13% increase in cellular cohesion, resulting in significant improvement in the formation of muscular, nervous, and vascular tissue."]
As he listened from the chair, Sora turned his gaze away from the data on screen—confirming Jarvis's report—and back toward the deformed creatures floating in their capsules.
All of them his, created from his own genetic material… and Judy's.
Each one, an ambiguous experiment. A tragic existence.
All for the sake of a single life yet to be born.
"Does unsupervised growth still lead to malformations?" Sora asked flatly, analytically, with no emotion in his voice.
["That appears inevitable… Sir.
As documented by Dr. Fabius Byle—and confirmed by our own research—once a certain threshold of genetic editing is crossed, cellular division becomes chaotic and uncontrollable.
Without a system to prune and regulate in real time, it will inevitably lead to cancer or deformities. Fortunately, we have one."]
Just as the words left his mouth, the sterilization cycle completed. A black, pressurized, refrigerated drawer slid out from the machinery connected to the computer.
Inside: two black syringes. One large and imposing—empty. The other, more conventional in size, contained a metallic black liquid.
As Sora prepared to begin the procedure, Jarvis issued a reminder:
["Recall iteration T-233. It was used to replace the vastus intermedius of your left thigh."]
Though already aware, Sora nodded as he removed his jacket.
Stretching his body and taking a deep breath, he steeled himself mentally for what was to come. Then, he lowered his pants, exposing his black boxers and his thighs.
Without hesitation, he grabbed the large syringe and drove the thick needle into the vastus intermedius of his left leg.
With the syringe still embedded, Sora sat back down and delivered his own assessment of T-235—after testing it... on himself:
"Given the partial compatibility of the genetic sample, performance was solid.
There were malformations in 3% of cellular divisions under pressure. But the nanobots executed their programming as intended. They didn't let it spread. The mutated cells were isolated and removed immediately.
The malformation rate didn't increase during the four-week trial. It held. Stable. Contained.
And most importantly..." He paused. His jaw clenched, recalling every spasm, every gasping breath, and the haunting numbness that crept inch by inch through his body—leaving him bedridden for more than half of his short, miserable life.
"There was no pain. Not during formation. Not during pruning." He said it with a gaze as dangerous as it was resolute—his son would never suffer the same.
"In short: there was no suffering. Performance remained within expected parameters. The margin of malformation was acceptable and not increasing. Which is why..."
Another pause. Shorter—but heavy with meaning, given the weight of his conclusion.
"Iteration T-235 is the most viable to date. And it deserves to proceed to final simulation."
As if his conclusion had served as a trigger, his thigh suddenly began to vibrate irregularly—forcing Sora to grit his teeth as a low "Hmm!"—half groan, half growl—escaped through clenched jaw.
He held back the scream lodged in his throat as he felt the muscle—formed from the viable material—being extracted from within.
Cannibalized by his own nanobios, which shredded every muscle fiber composed of cells modified by Iteration T-235.
Sora could have cut the nerve signals and shut off what could easily be defined as torture… but he didn't. He accepted the pain.
As ethical payment—or moral punishment—for his actions in that lab.
What had once been a powerful muscle quickly turned into crimson fluid, slowly filling the syringe.
Jarvis watched in silence until the process completed.
["Sir, viable material extracted."]
With his thigh still pulsing under inflamed skin and cold sweat running down his face and back, Sora yanked the syringe out in one sharp motion, then carefully inserted it into the input port designed for it on the console before him.
As the fluid began to drain, Jarvis reported:
["From this point forward, Sir: I will require one hour to modify the sample across all 200 human cell types, and another two to synthesize tissue samples for every organ. Then, one more to analyze the data for the simulation."]
["If you assist me, Sir, with real-time genetic chain variable mapping, we could complete the simulation in approximately 7 hours, 12 minutes, and 39 seconds. Without your processing power, I estimate the procedure will take me a full three days."]
Grabbing the syringe filled with the black, metallic liquid—shimmering like negative mercury—Sora injected it into the hollow of his thigh. It gave him just enough strength to pull up his pants without seeing stars.
"I will. Let me know when it's ready," he muttered, collapsing back into the chair.
Having just saved himself days of solo processing, Jarvis couldn't help but comment before deactivating his hologram: ["Good to have you back... Sir."]
With a few hours of free time ahead, Sora closed his eyes as if trying to relax—though that wasn't what awaited him.
Instead of darkness, his consciousness was pulled into his Cyberspace.
It shifted before his eyes, revealing the inner workings of his body in real time—specifically, his left thigh, where an entire muscle was missing.
Surrounded by tendons, nerves, and pulsing veins, Sora raised his arms. As his hands moved, the swarm of newly injected nanobots began to shift, like an orchestra responding to its conductor.
The microcosmic units dispersed through the living tissue, drawing muscular material from surrounding areas, planting and weaving fibers together, rebuilding his vastus lateralis from the inside out—strand by strand.
-
4 Hours Later… 12:04 AM, January 26
Without needing anyone—or anything—to alert him, Sora opened his eyes just as Jarvis's hologram began to re-materialize beside him.
["Before we begin the simulation, as you know, a digital recreation capable of replicating every cell of every organ and vital system of a human being for a hundred years requires an absurd amount of processing power and a ridiculous amount of energy..."]
As Jarvis spoke, Sora began testing his new upper limb, gradually shifting weight onto his left leg. Though incomplete, the missing sections had been reconstructed using his nanobots.
["That's why I need your authorization to access the rest of the underground systems—both power and computational."]
"Do it," Sora replied, without a hint of doubt or delay.
["As you wish."]
Then, hundreds of underground locks disengaged, spinning up their turbines and generating electricity—off-grid and outside the supervision of any organization, corporation, or government.
At the same time, thousands of liters of water crashed down like waterfalls, flowing through concrete-carved channels and vanishing within, cooling Richard Night's secret servers—recently upgraded with next-gen hardware.
In parallel, Sora settled in and rested his black hand on the keyboard. It opened like a black iron flower, releasing hundreds of mechadendrites that spread like living roots into the keys.
Inside cyberspace, directly connected to the system, Sora summoned two dozen augmented-reality keyboards—one for each replica of his fragmented consciousness.
He pushed his performance to the limit, doing everything he could… without waking up his "big self."
On the lab's main screen, a storm of epileptic flickers erupted. Hundreds of windows opened and closed relentlessly, filled with genetic code, mathematical formulas, and molecular structures.
For several minutes, the room became a sea of pulsing light. They were processing the data Jarvis had collected: the 200 human cell types and tissue samples from every organ.
Until suddenly, everything stopped.
The central screen fell into visual silence, displaying a single, massive strand of genetic code: A, T, C, G, T, A, G…
Which culminated in an animation of a DNA double helix, slowly spinning in pale blue, floating against a dark background.
But this wasn't just any DNA helix—it was modified with the T-235 Interaction.
Suspended between the two main strands was a third, partial strand: a glowing semi-helix, rising like a spectral column.
From it, mini-chromosomes sprouted—half the standard size—directly connected to the main helices.
The original chromosomes remained uninterrupted, passing through the central strand as if there were no physical barrier at all.
Thanks to that intermediate strand, a single cell could store multiple times more information than with a conventional chain.
In the calm animation on the screen, the new structure added complexity—but not conflict. As if the DNA had accepted the changes without resistance.
"If only it were that easy," Sora muttered to himself, eyes closed in the chair.
Jarvis spoke plainly:
["Genetic model T-235 complete. Beginning simulation."]
At the center of the screen, the triple DNA helix began to recede. It wasn't just a zoom out—it was a shift in scale.
Revealing the full interior of a cell. Organelles, membranes, ribosomes, mitochondria… each component appeared progressively, simulated in real time.
Once the cell was fully rendered, the next phase began:
Division.
Over and over.
With each zoom out, the cells multiplied: 4, 8, 16, 32, 64...
Until, in the tens of thousands, they became indistinguishable from one another.
And still… they didn't stop.
Splitting into groups, they grew exponentially, gradually taking shape and forming distinct structures.
With each passing second, as the shapes emerged, every part of the system tightened just a little more.
In the secret underground chambers and the bunker's cavern, the fully submerged servers began to bubble violently, as if the water were boiling.
The lab was bathed in red as a tremor ran through the floor, radiating from the core of the main computer buried beneath their feet.
Even Sora was struggling to breathe, his face drenched in sweat.
Before initiating the process, Jarvis had summoned one of the spider bots from below. The unit had dropped through one of the ceiling conduits connecting all the rooms like an ant colony's tunnels.
It crossed the room on its eight carbon legs and, upon reaching the chair, extended the metal tray it carried with its pincers.
Sora nodded silently in thanks and took one of the coolant packs without opening his eyes.
As he pressed it to the back of his neck, a curtain of vapor rose where it touched his burning skin, evaporating the frost that covered the frozen surface. Without pause, he slipped the rest under his shirt and pants, letting his nanobots auto-regulate by migrating toward the "cold" zones of his body.
On screen, the cells kept dividing—forming organs, nerves, tissues, and muscle. The human body was assembling layer by layer, as if the system were simulating it atom by atom.
Near the end, there was a sudden power drop. Half a second of total pause. Then the system responded with one final zoom out…
The processor noise dropped. The main fans shut off. And Sora exhaled the hot air trapped in his lungs all at once...
The body was complete.
On screen: the figure of a newborn, rendered from interlinked blue particles. No human details, no features. It slept peacefully—though it was only data.
A digital structure without consciousness. A placeholder, built from billions of calculations.
And yet… that didn't make it any less awe-inspiring. On the contrary. The moment hit hard, punctuated by Jarvis breaking the silence:
["Congratulations, sir. Your simulated 'child' has been safely delivered."]
Sora opened his eyes, and when he saw the infant trapped inside the screen… he couldn't help but smile.
His heart pounded, but his mind stayed sharp. Yes, there were reasons to celebrate. But not yet, he thought, unsatisfied. A safe birth wasn't enough.
"Let's move on to the main objective: cellular aging over a simulated one hundred years," Sora said. "As a control system for possible malformations, we'll apply the nanobot mean-performance equation used during the birth process."
It wasn't that he wanted his child to live only a hundred years. But it gave him more than enough time to correct any errors… and to take advantage of whatever breakthroughs the future would eventually bring.
["Parameters loaded. Extended aging mode active. Execution at your command,"] confirmed Jarvis, sharing in the resolve of his creator, ready to begin.
Sora stretched his neck, his vertebrae cracking with a dry, unsettling sound. Then he closed his eyes and gave the order in a low voice:
"Run it."
-
Inspirations/references
-Harness with a high collar and an integrated hood*
-New Yaiba motorcycle
-Wheels
-Body