Chapter Text
They're in the pool again.
It doesn't happen every day, but Johnny figures that's only because they're not always at V's place. Kerry's place is still the villa out in North Oak and okay, so Johnny doesn't exactly pay rent, but if he had to give a home address, if there was no way he could think of to get out of it, Kerry's address is the one he'd give.
The truth is, though, he kinda floats between the two places, the corpo sellout mansion and the high-priced merc penthouse, and more often than not whoever doesn't technically live there were be there already, to turn up a little later. That or Johnny will call them up and ask them why: sometimes V has a job to do, or has a job to give to someone else. Sometimes Kerry's in one of those moods Johnny hates, or he's writing a song so it's best to leave him be until he's done. Sometimes Johnny's working, though calling it work seems kinda extreme when all he really does is write tunes and bitch at Judy on the holo. But it's weird if more than a couple of days go by without all three of them getting together at some point, whether that in Watson or North Oak.
But it's V's place they're at now and so Kerry and V are in the pool again, like they can't keep out of the water. Even if Johnny's pretty sure it's got a whole lot more to do with finding reasons to get half-naked and in close proximity than it has to do with exercise.
Usually, Johnny doesn't swim. Even now he has the new arm, one that doesn't feel like he's dragging around an anchor where a limb should be, he's just not into it - he can swim, he knows how, could probably save himself from drowning if he had to, but that's not to say he wants to swim. He's better off where he is: lounging on a chair by the side of the pool, sunglasses on, beer in hand. Fuck, he's even wearing some of V's least offensive beachwear, knee-length cargo shorts in a sensible shade of army green, though he's a long time out of the army now. He'd still rather look like a retired GI on some kind of a last chance vacation than wear V's short-shorts, though, or something in a shade of neon that he can't even stand to look at. He thinks he might be allergic to half of V's wardrobe, but it's not like he owns any shorts himself and it's not like he's gonna sit there sunning himself with his dick out. Kerry and V would probably be into it if he did, but there's places a guy really shouldn't get sunburn.
Kerry and V swim, though. He's kinda unsure how it is that V can even float with the amount of cyberware he's got packed into him, and Johnny's intimately acquainted with just how much that is. He had sole custody of V's body for more than a full year in the end, by the time he got him back, so he really had time to understand it. He knows how it feels to be able to jump like V can, and run like V can, and see like V can, though he guesses he has his own pair of Kiroshis these days. Less gaudy, more natural, and he's wearing a less street-kid-with-no-fashion-sense body these days, too. One that looks a lot more like his own, though maybe that's because it is.
Who'd've thought the scum at Arasaka would've lied about what they'd done with his body? Who'd've thought he'd end up back inside it one day? Who'd've thought any of this bullshit was gonna happen, honestly? Not Johnny, that's for damn sure, though he guesses he's the one that made it happen. Kinda. He had a little help from V's friends.
It wasn't easy. It made dying look simple. So there's no way he's gonna give it up now.