Alt Cunningham

Altiera Cunningham, better known as Alt, was the best netrunner in Night City during the 2000s-2010s. She was described as a beautiful and talented woman; having worked for the ITS Corporation, and being the developer of the infamous Soulkiller program. Cunningham was also the girlfriend of the famous rockerboy Johnny Silverhand.

Her whole life changed however, when she was kidnapped by the Arasaka Corporation, who used her to create a version of the program for them, and later made her the program's first victim. Now her consciousness exists only as a digital ghost in the Net.

Early Life
Cunningham was one of those rare few geniuses who could not only run the Net, but also create new concepts and new code. She wasn't just your typical netrunner, but one of the best programmers in the world.

Like many others during her age, Cunningham spent money to upgrade her body, enhancing her beauty with the best European bodysculpting money could buy. She also bought the neural processors and interface plugs needed to navigate the Net, and a golden cyberarm with a hidden compartment, specially designed to hold a Federated Arms X-22 pistol.

Shortly after the Pacifica region of the Net was formed, Cunningham would run the region with Rache Bartmoss, later calling these times her best netrunning memories.

Cunningham was famed for her skills at seeing software development on a different level. Due to her abilities, she was poached by the mysterious ITS corporation. During her employment, she began development on a revolutionary human/AI transfer program. Alt kept investing heavily in neural processing cyberware to augment her netrunning skills.

During this time she met Johnny Silverhand and the two entered into a relationship.

2013
Fascinated by the development of artificial intelligence, Cunningham made a breakthrough in the transfer and containment of intelligence, both AI and the human mind. The unnamed program was able to transfer the user's mind into the Net and explore independent of their existing body. Her employer, ITS, capitalized on the breakthrough and developed it further into a weapon known as the Soulkiller. Instead of transferring personalities, it imprisoned them.

On April 15th 2013, whilst leaving a concert with her boyfriend, she was kidnapped by gangers and Silverhand was left for dead. The kidnappers were hired by Toshiro Harada, who wanted Cunningham to recreate the program for the Arasaka Corporation. While captive, she rebuilt the software from memory and watched closely with the fear of Arasaka testing it on her. To prevent this, she built a fail-safe to ensure that she could make her escape.

Having survived his injuries, a team led by Johnny Silverhand started a riot at Arasaka Tower, with his legion of fans. Fearing the worst, Harada used the software on Cunningham, but before he was successful she managed to fend off the attack, killing the Arasaka netrunner team and incapacitating Harada's bodyguard, Akira, from within the Arasaka mainframe. Silverhand detonated an explosive charge which gave Harada the chance to disconnect Cunningham from her body. Silverhand killed Harada and disconnected Cunningham from the Arasaka mainframe, killing her in the process. Silverhand left with her lifeless body, unknowingly leaving her digital form behind.

Not long after, Cunningham's digital personality contacted Silverhand telling him she was in Arasaka Tower, she also told him not to come after her.

2020s
In 2021, during the Fourth Corporate War, Alt Cunningham's digital ghost was contacted by Militech, who asked her help in destroying the Soukiller 2.0. She agreed with the hopes of taking revenge on the Arasaka and convinced Rache Bartmoss to help in the effort. She was later captured by Arasaka, who forced her to develop the Soulkiller 3.0.

In 2023, Militech deployed an attack on the Arasaka Towers, with Johny Silverhand leading one of the teams with the hopes of rescuing Cunningham. After infiltrating the building, she was contacted by Spider Murphy, who informed her of Bartmoss' death before downloading her into the memory core. During the conversation, Cunningham gave Spider a piece of the Soulkiller to use if needed. Later, however, after the team got ambushed by Adam Smasher and two squads of Arasaka Troopers, Cunningham was scattered into the Net by Spider, with hopes of retrieving her someday.

2045
In the years following the Fourth Corporate War, Cunningham set up a digital haven for the other victims of Soulkiller. It was rumored to be hidden on a server somewhere in Night City or in the great white north of Canada, but after the bioplague wiped out the population, the "Ghost Town" was established in the ruins of Hong Kong.

2077
In 2077, Cunningham was still a very powerful entity on the Net. A memorial niche to Alt Cunningham can be found at the Columbarium in Night City. V encountered her after being forced to cross the Blackwall by Voodoo Boys; while doing so, they relived Silverhand's memories of Cunningham before her physical death in 2013. The hope of the Voodoo Boys was that Cunningham would reveal herself to a familiar entity from her previous life.

Cunningham recognized the engram of Silverhand's and brought him and V to a safe place behind Blackwall. She revealed that she is nothing but an image of Alt Cunningham and is not actually her. The rogue AI explained that the engram was transferred to the Net during the 2013 raid. However, due to Silverhand disconnecting the physical embodiment of Alt Cunningham while she was still in the Net, her consciousness was split from the engram leaving her mind stuck in the Net while her body and consciousness laid dying in Silverhand's hands.

The engram kept the image of Alt Cunningham to keep itself from going insane as any other AI would in the Net over a prolonged time, as Mikoshi didn't exist back then to protect engrams from interference.

After Silverhand revealed the nature of V's goals, Cunningham did not see the situation as her problem. The two offered to take her to Mikoshi, which was the tech she would need. The AI explained that if they destroyed Mikoshi, she could try to create an engram of V if they were subjected to a Soulkiller program and then would transfer it back to their body. Doing so would kill V but allow the engram to be transferred back to their body allowing their brain to overwrite Silverhand's engram.


 * Upon getting control over Arasaka Tower, Cunningham killed all employees within the area of Mikoshi and warned an elite soldier was on his way to intercept V. Cunningham destroyed the Mikoshi subspace and forced all the occupants to merge with her (members of the Secure Your Soul program as well as victims of Soulkiller). Once at the Mikoshi access point, she instructed V to pull in and submerge themselves so they would not fry. The AI tried to use the Soulkiller on V to ensure they were put back in their body. However she mentioned she could not repair the damage done to V's body, and that they would have six months to live. As for Silverhand, the body would accommodate his psyche without issue. She asked for whoever would remain should go back with her beyond the Blackwall.