Jackie Welles: V's Partner and the Heart of Cyberpunk 2077

Jackie Welles is a mercenary from Heywood in Night City who becomes V's partner and best friend in Cyberpunk 2077, and who dies after the two of them steal the Relic. He's loud, loyal and funny, a former gang member who wants to make it big as a merc and give his mother a better life. His death at the end of Act 1 is the moment the game turns from a heist story into something darker, and it's the one loss no player choice can prevent. (Cyberpunk 2077)

Who Jackie was#

Jackie grew up in Heywood with a mother everyone knows as Mama Welles, who runs the El Coyote Cojo bar. As a young man he joined the Valentinos, the neighbourhood's biggest gang, and he still has friends there in 2077. A near-fatal gunshot wound at 19, in a firefight with Maelstrom, pushed him out of that life and into merc work. (Cyberpunk 2077)

By 2077 he was dating Misty Olszewski, who runs an esoterica shop next to the clinic of Viktor Vektor. His mother didn't approve of Misty, and Jackie didn't care. He's the kind of man who quotes his mother, loves his bike and treats every job as a step towards a bigger one. (Cyberpunk 2077)

How Jackie meets V#

Every lifepath puts Jackie at V's side by the end of the prologue. A Nomad V smuggles cargo across the border with him. A Street Kid V meets him in the middle of stealing the same car, and both are caught by the police. A Corpo V meets him at Lizzie's Bar, where Jackie, an old friend, saves V from the Arasaka team sent to deal with V after a power play goes wrong. (Cyberpunk 2077)

Six months of jobs follow, shown in a montage. Jackie introduces V to Viktor, to Misty, and to the Afterlife, the merc bar where Night City's legends drink. One job, pulling a woman out of a Scavenger den before her implants are cut out, is played in full. (Cyberpunk 2077, "The Rescue")

The heist that killed him#

Dexter DeShawn hired V and Jackie for the job of their lives: steal a biochip from Yorinobu Arasaka's suite in Konpeki Plaza, a plan set up with Evelyn Parker and the netrunner T-Bug. Jackie was thrilled. To him it was the ticket to the Afterlife's wall of legends. (Cyberpunk 2077, "The Heist")

They found the Relic, but Saburo Arasaka walked in and his son killed him, and the hotel went into lockdown. In the firefight getting out, Jackie was badly hit. The chip's case was damaged too, so V slotted the Relic to keep it intact. Jackie died in the back of a Delamain cab before they reached Dex. (Cyberpunk 2077, "The Heist")

The choice about Jackie's body#

Jackie can't be saved, but V does decide what happens to him after. The Delamain cab asks where to take his body, and there are three options. (Cyberpunk 2077, "The Heist")

• His family. Mama Welles holds a traditional ofrenda for him at El Coyote Cojo. Viktor, Padre and Valentinos come, and Misty if V insists against Mama Welles's wishes. V can speak or stay quiet. Jackie is later interred at the North Oak Columbarium. (Cyberpunk 2077, "Heroes")
• The cab waits. Telling Delamain to hold on to him leads to the same ofrenda. (Cyberpunk 2077, "Heroes")
• Viktor. V sends him to the ripperdoc's clinic, and there's no ofrenda. Mama Welles leaves V a package of his things instead. (Cyberpunk 2077)

Whichever route V takes, Mama Welles ends up giving V the keys to Jackie's Arch motorcycle, at the ofrenda or in a package. (Cyberpunk 2077, "Heroes")

On the ofrenda route, V also gets into Jackie's garage, where his bike, his gear and his pair of gold-plated pistols, La Chingona Dorada, are waiting. The ofrenda itself is one of the quietest scenes in the game: his family and friends talk about who he was, and V can share a memory of him or say nothing at all. (Cyberpunk 2077, "Heroes")

Jackie after his death#

Jackie never really leaves the story. His death shapes V's anger at Dex, and in the Devil ending he appears to V in a nightmare on the Arasaka orbital station, trying to hand V the chip. In Mikoshi, on every route but The Devil, an engram of him shows up in a simulation of Misty's rooftop before V's last conversation with Johnny Silverhand and Alt Cunningham. (Cyberpunk 2077)

His story also shows the price of the Afterlife dream. Jackie wanted his name on that wall, and in the Sun ending V gets there without him. (Cyberpunk 2077, "Path of Glory")