He suddenly looked down and saw that the PDA displayed the words: [Unable to read, chip damaged].
Then he felt a sudden chill, goosebumps rising on the back of his neck.
The voice he just heard was not only in his right ear with the Bluetooth earpiece but also in his left ear.
[Damaged chip detected, do you want to initiate repair?]
This voice seemed to have sounded inside his head.
He shook his head vigorously, rubbing his temples, and started pacing uneasily.
"Lucky? What's wrong?" V noticed Rogue's odd behavior and asked.
"No, no, no... wait."
Rogue raised a hand and gently shook it from side to side, signaling for a moment of silence.
The slightly chilly air of the basement entered his nostrils, and everything around him was very clear and logical.
This was not a dream or a hallucination.
He remembered the time when he first met V in the Badlands more than half a year ago.
During the haze of his newly awakened consciousness, he seemed to have heard this voice.
Is... is it me?
Inside my body?
Rogue looked down at his body.
All-natural, without any cybernetic modifications or mental illness; he was in a stable psychological state.
What could it be??
[Damaged chip detected, do you want to initiate repair?]
He raised the PDA, which still displayed the unchanged message: [Unable to read].
This was the year 2077, not 2777. A person without any cybernetic implants could not have their brain memories altered without any operation.
Long-term and gradual hypnosis does exist and can have astounding effects.
But inserting a chip and then directly projecting a voice into a purely biological brain—this was simply impossible!
"Did any of you hear a voice?"
Rogue swallowed, holding up the PDA and asking.
In the basement, only the sound of the ventilation system and the boxing match Old Vic forgot to turn off echoed.
Everyone indicated in their own way that they hadn't heard anything.
[Damaged chip detected, do you want to initiate repair?]
"It's back, it's back! Did you guys hear that?"
Rogue hurriedly pointed at his surroundings and the PDA in his hand.
Still nothing.
"Are you okay? Do you want Old Vic to check your hearing? That explosion just now…"
V came over and took a look near Rogue's ear.
"No, no, no, it's not that. I'm fine, I'm okay." Rogue pressed his hand down and spoke to the air, "Start... start the repair?"
[Executing repair process, please wait…]
Damn it!
This is unbelievable!
Rogue's eyes widened like headlights.
He held up the PDA, revealing DuangDuangDuang's classic puzzled gesture.
[Repair completed, retrieving information from a third-party device…]
[Buzzing…]
[Buzzing…]
Strange electrical noises emerged, like some meaningless electronic noise.
Then, Rogue heard a slightly hoarse, wild voice in both his head and the earpiece on his right ear.
[Damn… where the hell am I?]
[Is... Johnny Silverhand!?] Rogue thought in shock.
He never dared to imagine that one day, a voice not belonging to himself would appear in his head.
This feeling was novel, but mostly terrifying.
[Damn… I'm Johnny Silverhand, not Ironhand, f*** your Ironhand.]
Johnny's unique voice sounded, filled with dissatisfaction and irritation.
[Who the hell are you!? Who the f*** sent you!?]
Rogue: ...
You seem quite agitated, sir.
Now, not only was Rogue confused, but also Johnny Silverhand, who had just awakened from an unknown situation and found himself trapped in a black world devoid of all senses.
Just then, a strange voice suddenly intruded, so he subconsciously thought that he must have been taken by Arasaka's goons to perform some "unimaginable horror experiment."
Just like what they did to his girlfriend.
[Get the f*** out! You dogs who only know how to hide behind the company and bark!]
Rogue: ...
Sir, you might be misunderstanding something.
[It's not like that. I'm not with the company…]
[Stop pretending! Just do whatever you're going to do, I want to see what new tricks you've got!]
Rogue: ...
[Please, I'm not with the company. In fact, I'm more of an enemy of Arasaka.]
Rogue gave a wry smile, shaking his head helplessly.
[...]
The voice in his head suddenly quieted down, followed by a long silence.
V, Jackie, and Old Vic looked at Rogue with concern, their faces full of worry.
Takemura watched him as if he were a cyberpsycho, sighing helplessly, seemingly lamenting that these reluctant allies were truly unreliable.
[Damn... so who are you? Hurry up and let me out.]
Johnny's deflated demeanor was something Rogue had never seen before. In his very brief understanding of this agitated man (referring to the end of the prologue), he seemed to be an explosive character (referring to the nuking of Arasaka Tower).
[I am... I am...]
Rogue suddenly didn't know how to introduce himself to Johnny Silverhand.
A guy who traveled to the CP2077 world and messed up the script and timeline?
Trying to explain such a situation to Johnny Silverhand, a "senior" from the early 21st century, was indeed not an easy task.
Might as well say he was a passing masked rider.
[The situation is like this: it's now 2077.]
[Are you f***ing kidding me?]
Rogue could already imagine Johnny's expression.
Probably the kind that raised an eyebrow, then gave a "do I look like an idiot to you?" look.
[I'm not joking.] Rogue spoke with a serious tone, [You died in 2023, defeated by Adam Smasher, then your soul was uploaded by Soulkiller, and now it seems you've been transferred to a relic.]
[Relic? What the f*** is a relic?]
[A biochip.] Rogue wasn't quite used to Johnny's frequent use of profanity, [It's called "Protecting Your Soul."]
He introduced the still clueless Johnny to this "conceptual product" recently released by Arasaka, which was still in the testing phase.
The Relic utilizes the concept of personality transfer, converting human neural system data into digital imprints, and then storing them as consciousness in the biochip, with the goal of allowing users to communicate with their deceased loved ones.
It sounded ridiculous and unscientific. Before Johnny's voice began to rage, he thought so too, until that thing really entered his brain - even if there was a PDA as a relay.
[You're saying I'm on some f***ing chip?] Johnny obviously didn't accept this situation, [Damn those Arasaka bastards!]
[Don't be angry, getting angry won't defeat Arasaka.] Rogue tried to calm his agitated emotions, [How do you feel right now? Can you talk to me about it?]
Perhaps it was Rogue's gentle voice, or maybe it was the sincerity he sensed from him, but Johnny eventually chose to calm down and explained his current situation in detail.
[How does it feel?]
[It's like being trapped in a pitch-black world where I can't see, hear, or sense anything. There's not even a single hair in this place except for your voice. I thought it was some new Arasaka torture technology to satisfy the needs of that 100-year-old pervert.]
Johnny laughed coldly.
[Now that I think about it, it's not much different.]
Hearing this description, Rogue touched his hair, clicking his tongue and shaking his head.
If the original timeline had continued, the Relic would have eventually been inserted into V's chip slot, saving his life from Dexter's gunshot.
And the activated Relic chip would continuously overwrite Johnny Silverhand's personality onto V's brain, eventually completely replacing V.
V's brain cells, or his entire body, would become the vessel for this "terrorist from half a century ago."
In this irreversible and unstoppable process, V and Johnny Silverhand would share a body and mutually understand all of each other's memories.