Chapter Text
So call me when he breaks your heart next summer
Baby, I'll be waiting here
Call me when you're all fucked up, my lover
And I'll be there to lick your tears
You had to throw away our love
To find out nothing's as good as us
So call me when he breaks your heart next summer..
2079, Summer…
Judy's eyes widened as she watched her holo ring. The caller I.D. was labeled with "Valerie <3", because even though she was married and had been for over a year now, she could never bring herself to change the contact name.
Not even after V had abandoned her in Night City.
Or, so she thought.
She took a deep breath before grabbing her holo with shaking hands and pressing accept.
She was met with a sorry sight.
The mercenary she remembered was gone. In her place was a skinny, pale shell of the woman she had fallen head over heals for.
Valerie was nothing but skin and bones. Her once full face now showed her cheekbones. The two lines that had run from just above her eyebrows, down her face, and then back up to her temple were gone too. Her face was completely different.
Her head had also been shaved down to a very short buzzcut, showing a healed scar on her head. Judy couldn't make out much more than that.
V was staring with watery eyes into the camera, giving Judy a lopsided smile that made her heart flutter even now.
"No fuckin' way." Judy remarked.
"Hey, Judes." V said. Her voice was hoarse and soft, like she hadn't said a word in years.
"V…Jesus," Judy huffed out a laugh in an attempt to fight off the tears that were forming in her eyes. "Where you been, choom?"
V sighed softly, "NUS Clinic. Had surgery. Long, long story." She chuckled, "Like, months long. I oughta write a book." She joked. Her gaze had been wandering around whatever place she was in, but now returned to look at Judy.
"A book." Judy repeated, "Would mainly just be about your long operation, no? Bet it'd be gruesome, bloody." She let humor slip into her tone at the end of her sentence.
"Yeah, probably." V agreed, "Spent most of that time in a coma, unplanned. Obviously." The former merc had raised her hand to rub awkwardly at the nape of her neck.
"Wow V, thought I'd never see you again…"
"Should be dead, I know. Good news, however, is I finally found a way to excise the biochip."
"Whoa, what, how?" Judy questioned. She hated to think it about back then, but she was fairly certain she'd end up back at the Columbarium, putting V's niche fairly close to Evie's and being forced to leave the both of them behind in Night City. "You really tellin' me Silverhand's out? You're gonna remain, uh, yourself?"
V grinned proudly into the holo, "Forever and ever. A hundred percent V."
"V, that is so damn nova! 'S nice to know some stories from Night City actually get a happy ending."
V nodded before sighing, her expression dropping, "Dealin' with some drawbacks, course…I can't handle cyberware anymore. Doc said I'd never fully recover. I'm alive, sure, but got no idea what comes next."
"Shit…" Here it is. Judy had to tell V that she wasn't gonna be apart of what came next. Wasn't hers anymore. "Really sorry, V. Hope you figure it out, get yourself set up again."
V furrowed her brow, but was either too groggy to realize what Judy was trying to imply, or was simply ignoring it.
"Thought I could drop by, see you. We'd grab a pizza, talk…?" She asked hopefully.
Judy swallowed hard, averting her gaze.
"Y'know…a lot's changed…"
"Preem. Fresh NC gossip, huh? Can't wait to hear it." The battered woman was still clinging to a little bit of hope that her girlfriend wasn't being serious.
Judy exhaled slowly before responding. "V, I'm in Pittsburgh, actually. And," she looked up at her- the former mercenary, "I'm married. If you ever, I dunno, hop to the other coast, c'mon over for a beer, but now? Really can't help you, Val."
Judy kicked herself immediately for using the nickname, watching V's eyes fill with tears as she scoffed in disbelief.
"Wow…wasn't expecting that at all." She gave a watery laugh, sniffling as she quickly wiped at a tear that had fell.
"Two years, V." Judy started, her voice low and cracking at the edges. "I was lonely, lost in my own head. First Evelyn, then you… No way I woulda made it alone."
"What's her name?
"Bianca," Judy answered, "but, looks? Character? Nothin' like you at all."
V shook her head. Her eyes had dropped to the floor when she started crying, and as far as Judy could tell, she had no intention of looking up again.
"We could've made it, y'know…"
"Sure, maybe. But you were dyin', and then you up and disappeared on me with a single text. What was I supposed to do?" Judy let her frustration out on the merc, her tone bitter and harsh.
The techie took a deep breath to steady herself before adding, "But I'm good now, V. Please don't take that away."
"Don't have much of a choice, do I?" V's voice broke on choice, and for a second Judy was ready to say fuck it and rush to wherever the hell V was.
Instead, though, she wished V goodbye, apologizing before she hung up.
Fuck.
Judy needed a drink. Lots, actually.