(SPOILERS FROM THIS POINT ON)
The story begins with our main character, David Martinez. He is introduced as a violent kid from the slums, with a mom who wants to give him a rich life. His mother, Gloria Martinez worked as an EMT for Nightcity Healthcare, and enrolled her only son in Arasaka Academy.
During an incident where David and Gloria were attacked while driving, the car flipped and Gloria was ejected out of the car and into the street. After the Trauma Team arrived, they did not provide care to David and Gloria because they weren’t platinum members, and instead helped another less injured individual. By the time David and Gloria received care, it was too late for Gloria to recover, and after a successful surgery from a low-budget surgeon, her condition worsened and she perished.
David had few decisions regarding what to do with her body because they were quite poor, so he had his mother cremated into a cheap plastic urn, which he held dear to him all the way home. He took and wore his mother’s EMT coat and set out back home where he finds a strange plastic-wrapped piece of cyber ware, found out to be a Sandevistan. David took this implant and went straight to a man named Doc, a porn-addicted cyber surgeon, who implants the Sandevistan into David’s back.
The surgery is a huge success and David realizes early on that he can move at a speed like no other, but this comes at a cost that wouldn’t affect him majorly till way later on.
From this point on David goes onto trains, stealing minor cyber ware like microchips with his newfound Sandevistan. This is where he meets a woman by the name of Lucy, an incredibly mischievous character from the get-go, who decided to partner up with David and steal a bunch more microchips. David uses the Sandevistan way too much that it exerts himself and Lucy gets him into the back of an EMT vehicle where they are attacked yet again, and with nothing but a little bed, they fly out the back, coasting down the street and inevitably making a perfect stop.
David and Lucy make their way back to Davids, where Lucy shows David her dream of going to the moon. They have a wonderful time there but meanwhile back in the real world, David is in a lot more trouble than he knows.
David gets a visit from Maine and his crew of Edgerunners while in the middle of his time with Lucy, and learns that Lucy was just a distraction. Maine explains that David stole his Sandevistan, to which David claims he just found it sitting there, and that his mom died without being able to deliver it to him it seems. David explains that he can be of use to the edge runners with his Sandevistan and that he handles the cyber ware almost perfectly.
So there it starts, David’s quest to be an edge runner. As David gets better every day doing odd jobs for the edge runners, and being a total rookie. He makes a few important friends by the names of Rebecca, Dorio, Falco, Julio, Kiwi, Lucy, Maine, and Pilar. Skip forward a few, David gets into a sticky situation with Maine and his girlfriend Dorio, they are in a building that is soon to be invaded by the NCPD and Trauma team. With Maine and his cyber psychotic state, he is left with not being able to do anything but fight, and relive constant memories caused by his cyber psychosis. And that leaves Maine, deceased by the NCPD and Trauma team.
David takes it upon himself to inherit Maine’s cyber ware and step up as the next leader of the edge runners. David and his crew continue to do odd jobs. David and Lucy begin to fancy one another and eventually live together in a nice place in the night city, but Lucy has all but given up her hope of visiting the moon with David. David makes a promise that he won’t be able to keep, and wants to eventually go to the moon with Lucy.
Faraday, an Arasaka higher-up who David and his edge runners worked with quite often, has Lucy kidnapped and used as bait for David. David, Rebecca, and Falco set out to what seems to be a deserted location, where an Arasaka convoy is set to be destroyed and cleared out. The truck that they are supposed to take stuff from gets thrown over a cliff and we see our edge runners in a panic over the coming fleet of Arasaka. To escape the situation, David takes the cyber ware in the vehicle for himself, knowing it will cause his cyber psychosis to worsen immensely, and maybe even cost him all of his sanity, but in attempts to save the whole crew, he combines with the cyber ware called a prototype Arasaka cyber skeleton.
David with his newly found cyber ware easily dispatches the fleet, just managing to cling to his sanity. David learns the real location of where Lucy is and quickly hurries over there, where Falco and Rebecca are forced to follow their leader. They make it to Arasaka tower where David quickly makes his way right to where Lucy and Faraday, where Lucy is held at gunpoint. David doesn’t see this as a threat and dispatches everyone with weapons before they are able to harm Lucy, and kill Faraday. What David didn’t know is that someone with a stronger Sandevistan and a stronger cyber skeleton named Adam Smasher had found him. David gets Lucy to safety before having his most powerful fight, and what was to be his last battle.
When Lucy gets to safety, David and Rebecca go at Adam Smasher together and in attempts to stop him, Rebecca gets obliterated. David gets even further enraged and in his cyber psychotic state, rushes Adam Smasher, who quickly takes care of David and his desire to defeat him.
After David is gone and the smoke clears, Lucy uses the rest of what money they had to achieve her dream of living on the moon, she stares out the window and sees our beloved David Martinez one last time, who gives his main character smile just one last time before finishing out the final episode, and rolling to the credits.
An amazing new-gen anime that single-handedly resurrected an entire video game. Based off of events before Cyberpunk 2077, this anime ranks among the top of Netflix’s charts. And this concludes our summary of David Martinez short life from 2058-2076.
If you’re interested in watching this anime, you can find Cyberpunk: Edgerunners on Netflix.