#panzerboys

[pinkyjulien]

━━━ 2069 | Unification War

[wanderingaldecaldo]

[pinkydude]

📙 What Mattered Most

▶ 2069 / Mitch and Scorpion / 7 pages 🔴 TW for Homophobia

[streetkid-named-desire]

SilverV Week Day 1: Dreams

Johnny and V share a consciousness and subconsciousness. This means they occasionally share dreams, too.

Read it on AO3 here or below the cut.

See the prompts and read more about the event over at @silverv-week!

"Where the fuck are the panzerboys?" I could barely hear my own voice over the gunfire and explosions and cries.

Cries. Cries. Fuck I wanted to cry. I should be blowing off school to smoke weed in an alley with my chooms. Not fighting a war I couldn't care less about.

"Get up! Let's move!" Falco screamed in my ear. His breath was hot and rancid. He grabbed me by the shoulder strap of my MOLLE and yanked me up. We crouched low in the trench, not low enough to dodge bullets. These weren't world war trenches. We'd thrown ourselves into an irrigation ditch and tried to dig deeper down into the earth. The only time the enemy couldn't see us was when we were flat on our stomachs. We hustled further down the trench, closer to the forest not yet torn away by capitalist greed.

"Shit!" I tripped over a body and stood up too far to regain my footing. A bullet whizzed past my nose. I looked down, careful where I stepped.

Bodies. So many bodies. Fuck.

Fuck.

Fuck!

"Here." Falco stopped and I nearly bumped into him. He jumped out of the ditch and pointed to a deeper groove in front of me. "Provide cover fire for the med AV. We got bodies to load up."

I looked to my left. My fellow soldiers were too far and too busy to call for help. I looked to my right. The untamed tropical forest was dark and menacing. But also enticing. Could I be reprimanded for desertion if they never even found me? Better to be eaten by a jaguar and her cubs than bleed to death from a missing limb.

No. I was alone. I looked up at Falco, "What, just me?"

His eyes burned with disgust. How dare I, a grunt, question my role? I was a United States soldier. My sole purpose was to be fed to a wood chipper, feet first so I could salute the one at the controls until my dying breath.

"Did I fuckin' stutter? Point and shoot, asshole!"

I kneeled in the mud cooled by the shade from the forest. I loaded a fresh magazine into my rifle and looked up. The AV whine grew louder as it extended its landing gear and thumped into the dirt behind us. Medtechs armed to the teeth filed out and walked towards the pile of bodies unceremoniously stacked next to it. A bloody cardboard box lay next to it, filled with one dog tag that matched one worn on each corpse.

I got down on my belly and looked through the scope. Four soldiers were rushing at us. There was a fifth further back, he was holding something big but I couldn't tell what.

I breathed deeply. Exhaled.

Two I got in the head. One zig-zagged and dodged my shot. I got the fourth one twice in the chest and once in the throat.

Not my best work.

Deep breath. In through my nose. Will the stench of gunpowder and burnt bodies ever leave me?

Exhale and pull. Just as the fourth man goes down I see the fifth drop to his knees and hoist something up on his shoulder.

All the air was knocked out of me in an instant. My eyes stung from the smoke and dust. My ears rang but I could hear the faint screams behind me and what sounded like a smaller explosion. The smell of AV fuel burned my esophagus.

My body felt so heavy. Except…my left arm felt weightless. The ringing got louder and blocked out the screaming.

The wailing.

My wailing.

I scrambled for my rifle. A special model for lefties. Something wasn't right. Pain shot up my shoulder and into my brain, digging deep. My arm hurt but all I could think about was getting my gun. I had to defend myself. That fifth guy could be rushing up any second. I lifted my arm and slammed it into the dirt in frustration. White searing pain knocked me cold. Sweet relief.

"Linder! Linder, can you hear me?" I'm being dragged through dirt and every uneven bump sends a new shockwave of pain through my body.

"Yeah," I croaked. My throat stung, my lungs burned. I opened my eyes and saw Falco. His face was smeared with ash and blood. His eyes were wild. He kept looking at my arm and then back at me and back at my arm.

"Fuck, Linder," he muttered. He dropped me on the ground. It was cool, quiet except for birds. Gunfire in the distance. We were in the forest. He kneeled beside me and pulled the first aid kits from a pouch on his MOLLE and mine.

He looked at my arm. He put the back of his hand over his mouth and looked away.

So I looked instead.

"V!" Bea shook V's arm. He'd been thrashing all night with his left arm moving the most. A sign his dreams were being mixed with Johnny's.

Red, shining wet meat extended from the middle of my bicep down. Parts of it were caked in dirt. Ants were crawling up and down the tendrils of gore looking for crumbs. I was numb. Would the jaguar smell the blood?

Falco wrapped the tourniquet above the stump and gripped the windlass. He looked at me. Gone was the disgust replaced by fear and pity. I frowned. And then screamed as Falco twisted the windlass over and over and over and over.

V grunted and contorted his face in phantom pain. "C'mon, V. Wake up." He was lying on his back and Bea kneeled over him. She caressed his face and tried to jostle him awake again.

"What the fuck happened?" I was breathless from the pain.

"Rocket launcher," Falco gulped back puke. Where did he get off judging me when he can barely stand to look at his injured comrade? "Hit the AV. 'Nother one exploded too close. Took your fuckin' arm, man," Falco said and finished wrapping the stump in all the gauze and bandages we had.

Falco opened his canteen and dribbled water over my lips. I grabbed it with my right hand and drank like it was the sweetest ambrosia. I handed it back and worked to prop myself up on my right elbow. Something shifted and cracked inside me. More pain. My head lolled back and I scrunched my face, trying to power through. Falco helped me sit up further, propping me against a tree, and the pain inside my body was indescribable. I felt ribs crunch and rub against each other. Something in my core didn't feel quite right, some burst organ or something.

V's mouth opened in a silent scream. His eyes scrunched tight and his left arm shot up. Bea just barely dodged getting hit in the face. "V!" Bea yelled this time and slapped his arm, hard.

"Fuck!" Johnny and V yelled at the same time. Johnny sat up through V and twisted to sit on the edge of the bed. V looked over at him, wishing he could comfort him. Touch him. Hug him. He knew he lived out these dreams the same time V did.

Bea placed a soft hand on his cheek and turned his head towards her. "Nicaragua?"

V and Johnny nodded. V sat up and shifted to sit exactly where Johnny was. They sat like that for a few moments, gathering their thoughts and letting their bodies relax. V looked at his left hand covered by the ghostly overlay of Johnny's eponymous cybermod. The pair flexed their fist and Johnny's chrome clinked inside V's head.

V got up, his knees a little shaky, and padded along the metal floor and downstairs for a drink of water.

<When you take over my body, you ever sleep?> V asked. He grabbed a glass from the cupboard and placed it beneath the refrigerator's built-in water filter.

<Once or twice. Why?> Johnny looked out the window behind the sink. The neon skyline of corpo plaza made his stomach turn. Arasaka Tower, rebuilt just as tall and just as strong as the last.

<You ever have my dreams?> V pressed a button for water and filled the glass halfway. He took a small sip, breathed, then gulped the rest down. The cold water was soothing, calming his nerves.

Johnny did share V's dreams. Weird distorted rooms covered in the blood of his parents. A whole maze of them. Feeling trapped and scared and angry. His dad coming around the corner holding a knife in one hand and his mother's decapitated head in his other.

But he didn't want V to think he was a burden. This was a one-way deal. Johnny was the problem, Johnny was the one stuck in his head. Johnny is the only one that gets to feel guilty for their situation.

Johnny shook his head. <Nah, don't dream when I take over.>

[mhbcaps]

updated blorbo catalog :)

info, tags, and more under the cut!

relationship map:

David “V” Lozano: my canon V, a born-and-bred Heywood brawler who never really cared about being famous but god Jackie made it sound so good. He doesn’t think he can make a difference and he doesn’t really try to. It’s all about survival, and corps can wipe you out in the blink of an eye. He would’ve minded his damn business after the heist if it hadn’t been for Johnny.

Viggo “Gogo” Day: a Static of the Kessler clan along with their three brothers and a sister. They’re David’s best friend, a bright and cheerful foil to his taciturn toughness. The city hasn’t beaten the optimism out of them yet, and they have a lot of friends in surprising places who’d like to keep it that way.

Sanctuary Zelenko: Medtech washout, ex-Scav, currently a ripperdoc in Northside. They’re eccentric, they’re enigmatic, they’re downright creepy sometimes. Their friends tell people they’re harmless, but no one knows for sure. Best not to find out.

Brother Calloway: a statuesque netrunner that’s earned herself a spot in the Afterlife’s back booths. She’s highly focused and more than a little intimidating when she’s working, but in her personal life she tends to be quite demure in contrast.

Omen: a hard-boiled techie from Pacifica. He generally prefers machines to people, but his patience can be bought with salty snacks, and rumor has it that he's got a soft spot for ex-gang members and new techies.

Harvey Vignaud: London-born and never figured he’d do anything else but work for Arasaka like his parents. And he did, for a while, netrunning his way up the corpo ladder and earning himself a reputation as someone you never want to meet out there in the net. Then he quit and became a BD editor instead. There’s not much more to it - he’s fickle, and he’s got the skills to do whatever he wants and not be bothered about it. He’s got the air of someone standing comfortably on that thin line between enigmatic and completely detached from reality.

Heiress Sharp: Seasoned merc and 6th Street royalty - her grandfather was Santo Domingo’s premier fixer in the 2020s and her mother was a founding member of the Street. She used to be a high school teacher, but she got sick of corpos headhunting her students. Now she takes young and dumb mercs under her wing and teaches them a thing or two about survival before the city can eat them alive.

Joey Armas: Scav who grew up homeless in Pacifica. His brother was killed by some trust fund kid testing out their new combat-grade implants--that’s probably what set him down the path that led to the cyberware and organ black market.

Hunter Ward: the eldest daughter of Gogo and River. She’s a rainbow baby and her parents are protective of her, and she’s fine with that. Probably why she tends to be shy and doesn’t go out much without her family. Put her on a motorcycle, though, and she lights up like Christmas.

the St. Martin family: four siblings from the Kessler nomad clan who settled on the outskirts of Night City so that Augie could attend his mandatory therapy after the Unification War drove him to cyberpsychosis. They own and operate a rest stop just outside the city.

Auguste (Augie) & Noel are identical twins and the eldest of the four. They served in the Unification War: Noel in communications, Augie as a panzerboy. Augie is registered as a cyberpsycho in Night City, and doing well in therapy, but remains shy and reclusive. Noel is highly protective of him, and almost as distrustful of any cyberware.

Léonide (Leo) is the middle child, occasionally referred to as Gogo's twin because they were born only a few months apart and Leo's mother nursed Gogo after their mother died in childbirth. Leo suffers from the classic middle child syndrome and was a little too eager to break away from the family when they settled in Night City. Like Gogo, he loves the lights and excitement of Night City, but unlike Gogo, he gravitates to the darker side - and his abrasive personality doesn't earn him many favors. His dream is to be a rocker, but in the meantime he takes grunt jobs as a merc and makes a lot of people mad.

Marceline (Molly) is the youngest St. Martin. She feels torn between Night City and her family - she wants to live it up as a rocker in the glitz and glamour of the city, but she also feels a responsibility to stay with Noel and Augie on the outskirts because she knows Noel is resentful of Leo and Gogo for choosing to live in the city.

[ekrixart]

Cyberpunk 2020 rpg oc-

Delivery boy turned panzerboy that accidentally got involved with delivering anything between city destroying weapons, dangerous tech, to fast food pick ups for an elite gang of Crystaljocks

[esorydoolb]

WIP... Whenever

thank you kindly for the tag, @therealgchu!

Finished another brief section of the wip chapter, it's a slooow process but I need it to be worth the wait. Here it is.

--

“V!” Panam’s voice resounded like honey in his ears, which it only did when she was in an exceptionally good mood. She had dimples in her cheeks from smiling so hard and strutted towards him as if she had engineered the monstrous machine behind her from scratch with her own hands. Granted, fixing the AV had been an essential step of her master plan she had devised to deal with the Raffen Shiv.

“Look at that gorgeous beauty,” V grinned appreciatingly, having to squint his eyes against the sun reflecting off the smooth metal surface of the Basilisk. 

Panam coquettishly batted her long eyelashes at him and pretended to be bathing in his praise. She was not one to reject an easy compliment, even thrown sideways at her like that. V had to admit that she owned every right to it, anyway.

At that moment, Mitch took the opportunity to step forward from the shadow of the beast, having still worked on some last-minute fine-tuning, apparently. There was a smear of motor-oil on his left cheek, and he looked a little sweaty under the warm sun. The corners of his mouth were turned upwards though, revealing humble pride in the expression of the former panzerboy. He spread the palms of his mismatched hands outwards, celebrating what was presumably a large part of his handiwork as well. “She’s ready and waiting for you. In fact, I wanted to give her a quick spin before you arrived, but Panam here insisted that she wanted to share the honors with you first.”

Panam whipped her head around and fixed her eyes at Mitch. “Because I knew that I would never get you out of that damned thing again if I let you play with it first.”

“Ha!” Mitch retorted, unimpressed. “Trust me, I’ve had more than enough time to get acquainted with these. The honor is all yours.”

--

as always, if you have something to share feel free to tag me in it I'll be happy to read!

[77shaya77]

Guys, you have no idea how much I love these two. Really, you don't have it!

I LOVE THEM SO, SO, SO MUCH! ❤️❤️❤️

Ps: Of course I’m talking about the two Aldecaldos in the back of this picture. Lol.

[rainyssafespace]

[so--br-ok-en]

Ich weiß, dass das mit uns schon einige Monate her ist, aber trotzdem mache ich mir sorgen um dich.. Besonders jetzt wo deine Diagnose kam..

[a-pirate]

Favorite Teddy headcanons:

He's from Night City.

He was once friends with Dum Dum.

He will sleep literally anywhere.

Not much of an explanation for this one, just a vibe. His accent reminds me of folks I grew up with in SoCal, but a bit subtler. I like to think that even if he wasn't born in Night City, he spent a significant amount of time there. (My tenuous canonical support for this idea, besides the Maelstrom tattoos, is the conversation on the Basilisk during We Gotta Live Together, which seems to suggest he's newer to the life of nomads.)

Just popped in my head one day when thinking about Teddy's potential Maelstrom background, what if Dum Dum and Teddy knew each other? And I was never able to let go of the idea. So I have a headcanon that they were a couple of punks running the streets until Dum Dum really started getting into the world of Maelstrom, and more or less dragged Teddy with him.

To put it lightly, Teddy's seen and experienced some shit. He's a war vet and was a panzerboy, and he probably had a hell of a time trying to sleep peacefully after the war ended. There's no way in hell Mitch and Scorpion were the only one with nightmares. So I think he just didn't sleep. And he seems like a person who doesn't do things until he does (Cass teasingly calling him "dead weight"), so he didn't sleep until he did. This developed into the clan finding him passed out... well, anywhere. And I like to imagine he's almost impossible to wake up when he finally is sleeping.

[pinkyjulien]

Further up on the road,

further up on the road

Where the way is dark and the night is cold

One sunny mornin' we'll rise I know

And I'll meet you further up on the road

[wanderingaldecaldo]

All my love to @humberg for letting me test out their wonderful pose pack. I cannot believe how easy it is now to put these two together.

[pinkydude]

━━━ PANZERBOY

[twistedpixie77]

WIP Wednesday

Thanks for the tag @wanderingaldecaldo ! I don’t usually share on tumblr but why not? This is part of my unnamed enemies to lovers AU that’s set during the Unification War. It’s been driving me up the wall even as I should be writing my reverse bang fic 😵‍💫

“Since all of us deltajocks can pilot circles around you barely functioning morons,” Vella sneered, glaring up into a pair of angry blue eyes as she moved to stand toe-to-toe with him, despite being several inches shorter. “If it weren’t for us, none of you assholes would ever come back from an op alive.”

“Yes, the world’s best and brightest—yet you can’t seem to get your people back alive consistently,” he retorted, returning Vella’s glare with fire in his eyes and a smug curve to his mouth. “Wisp, Merc, Mav—do I need to go through the whole list? Are you sure your call sign should be Vixen? Reaper seems more appropriate.”

Auri groaned from behind Vella, scrubbing a hand down his face and watching his sister vibrate with barely restrained fury. Here we go, he thought.

Vella drew back her fist to punch Mitch, but he caught her fist in mid-swing, squeezing it to the point of pain as others in the bar gathered around them, divided unevenly between panzerboys and deltajocks. Mitch leaned his face down closer to Vella’s, and Auri closed his eyes. He knew his sister too well, and what was coming next would not be pretty.

“Did you think that would actually work on me?” Mitch growled, almost crushing her flesh fist inside his cybernetic one as he bared his teeth in a feral grin. “You’re so predictable it hurts.”

Vella titled her head slightly, a wicked smile curving her mouth. “I’ll show you predictable, bitch,” she snarled, snapping her head back and driving her forehead into Mitch’s nose. He let out a string of curses as he released his grip on her hand and took several steps back. He wiped the back of his hand across his gushing nose, shifting his glare between the crimson smear and the woman who had caused it. Something snapped in his mind, and he charged Vella, hitting her center mass with one shoulder. He heard the air whoosh from her lungs as he drove them onto a wooden table, and they tumbled to the floor among splintered wood and broken chairs.

A half-second later, the bar erupted in chaos. Tables and chairs went flying, the cacophony of splintering wood and breaking glass drowning out the music blaring from the ceiling speakers. Vella didn’t have time to notice or care about anything else as she fought to keep sucking air. Mitch swung at her face, and she barely had time to move before his fist collided with the floor where her head had been. She took that opportunity to jab the side of her hand up under his arm in a quick strike that left it temporarily numb. He howled in surprise and pain, and she wriggled out from beneath him and clumsily got to her feet, unsteady from lack of oxygen and too much whiskey.

She held out a hand, beckoning him with a curve of her fingers. “C’mon, don’t hold back now. Fight me like you mean it, Ghost,” she taunted him with a feral grin. “Or are you afraid of me?”

“Nah,” he growled, “I just want to savor teaching you a lesson in manners.” He regarded her with a frigid scowl as they circled each other like predators. Broken glass and splintered wood crunched beneath their boots as they stared each other down, and Mitch was almost certain Vella was enjoying this.

“Ooh, kinky,” Vella said, her eyes glinting with amusement as she tilted her head, “but sorry teach, so far, I’m not impressed. My grandma has better moves, and she’s fuckin’ dead.”

Mitch charged her again, driving them backward and pinning her against the wall, their faces so close he could feel her breath on his lips, and it sent a shiver of something he didn’t care to think about through his body. Okay, so maybe Vella wasn’t the only one enjoying this. “Says the bitch who couldn’t find her ass with both hands, a map, and a fuckin’ tour guide.”

Vella drove her knee into Mitch’s ribs, baring her teeth in a snarl. “Ohh, good one,” she growled, shoving him back as the pain in his side forced him to release her. “Did you come up with that one all by yourself? Didn’t think you had enough brain cells for that—wait, how are you still breathing?” She threw a left hook, sending a shockwave up the length of her arm when it connected and sent him sprawling across one of the few upright tables left. As Mitch righted himself, Vella threw a right jab that he easily caught, twisting her fist until she winced in pain as he pinned her with an icy glare, his mouth contorted in a sneering grin.

[untitledtheunknown]

RE: ROGUE; TEAM UPDATE

Pulled some strings, called in a few favors, but think I have our next merc group set up. Least the makings of it, few odd bodies we may pick up along the way. Running out of chances to end this thing going on with Umbra. NC is about to get a lot messier if the rat problem isn't dealt with and think this is our best shot.

First things though, sent that message like a month ago that The Veils are looking to move West, they're moving into Cali for whatever reason Azera has seen. Lord just follows her orders, but the rest of the clan follows them to death. Well, they're finally making the move which has both been a good and bad thing for us and our Nomad friends out in the Badlands. They're making quick work of some Wraith encampments, but Lord has no interest in allies, he'll start, if he hasn't already, wiping out every clan that's in their way. This is where we need to start making deals, Aldecaldos ain't gonna just give up their territory, Wraiths aren't getting a choice, and we can't have just a sit down with Lord and Azera.

Where our first new agent comes in; they have a daughter, Silver. She runs a lot of their military ops, likes her guns big and the explosions bigger. She's agreed to work with me, and by extension you, as she is compassionate, she wants to find that middle ground that doesn't involve the mindless slaughter of other "noble" clans. She's going to be our muscle, she has access to a armory of weapons of war, explosives, tanks, gun galore - you name it, she has access to it. She works with us, we work with her, she can convince at least her mother to have the other clans spared. Have to pull our weight that they're worth saving, satisfy Lord's bloodlust, because biggest fear is it wont stop at the city line. She has her own motives for wanting to get close, long story about situations going on back at base. Tell you some other time, probably sooner than later, but yeah. Silver is good, she's young, but she grew up with Vets and Panzerboys, she knows her shit and knows how to take orders just as well as dish them out. Her team comes first, just don't treat her as a rookie.

Emile Martinez, may of heard of her under the name Red Ring. I know you said to get a Netrunner, but trust me on her, she's better than any Runner you can find. Techie Crystaljock, she does everything old school. She knows viruses and net shutouts better than anyone. Hell, how many times she's been under investigation by NetWatch for potential RABBIDS outbreak? They really think she's the second coming of the Net wipe out, and I don't blame them. She can clear a 5 story building in 10sec flat; stealth is always an option, stealth killing the whole gang is another one. Contagion and viruses are her specialties, all her bugs are made by her and controlled strictly by her. She works on old school tech and uses old programs that are so out of date new systems can't block them out. But if we need, she is an expert hacker, she can crack most systems and override almost every security program she can get into. She just ain't about committing her life to cyberspace. She rather pull them into the real world. She's a bit wild, and has a temper, may push back. But she's damn good at what she does and her expertise in older tech may just be the foot up we need on these rats.

Now, I really need you to trust me on this next one. Håkan Rikusson, ex-Panzerboy out of Sweden, he had an incident several years back. Cyberpsychosis, but you know that's just a scape goat they use when they don't want to figure out what's going on with someone mentally. He had an incident, freaked out, like 3 people were injured and no deaths. Thing is when the cops, or Max or who the fuck ever went in to neutralize him; he did their job for them. Had burned out his eyes with some type of acid, sewn his mouth shut and was bound to the kitchen table. Took him to medical and besides the self inflicted injuries, he was completely fine, sound of mind even. This is where I need you to trust me, I'm putting my own name on the line for him, I know this guy, I've worked with him and he gets shit done. He thinks he's a reincarnation of Loki... don't know if it's how he copes with whatever happened or what. But he's got more tech in him now then he did then, and he pulls contracts for the likes of Arasaka, Militech, OASIS, you name it. He's a stealth guy, he gets in, cops data, takes what's needed and gets out. Not to mention he's a damn good fighter in hand to hand, and melee style. Guns he can do, but ain't his style.

Kelvy is also back in NC, may have stopped by the bar by now, dunno. She's going to be helping with recon, already fed her what I've got on the cult situation and where it started. She's not going flat out and asking. As much as I hate to say it - we can't go for a straight attack on this, Umbra needs to make the first move. We need to take them down slow but steady, wait for the slip and make our moves. What ounce of sanity he had is slipping away, he's going to get messy, just hope we'll have enough time on that.

Crew will be in NC in a couple days, Silver is already here, can get you two introduced. Meanwhile have my people working the Corpos in Inferno Luxuria, seeing what loose lips can spill on insider knowledge. I'm going to keep Ker in Vegas for another week, see if anything else comes up on this stalker issue. Damion has muscle from the Kings watching him... that's another story. Lot of those lately, need to catch up.

- Valor