Author's Note: It's always bugged me, just a tad, that the relationship between Joshua Graham and Daniel wasn't explored more during the DLC. It's referenced periodically that the two of them are friends, and they clearly know one another well enough to argue details about one another for their cause, but aside from those things and other small details on the Wikipedia, everything else is just left blank. Hence, this. Because heck — this site needs more of these two sadomasochistic retards from time to time.

So, without further ado, I present this to thee:

₪1

When he feels the immediate cool of a shadow moving along his face, he opens his eyes.

This is no hallucination brought on by prolonged dehydration or the misery of endless waves of pain. There is a presence above him. He knows, for while severely damaged and emaciated he may be, Joshua Graham is legendary himself for his apparent durability. After all, many a rumour and tale have been made of such — and never before has he found his instincts to be off, aside from in slumber, perhaps.

Even now, in his current condition best described as dire, he looks up from the cracked asphalt below him to find his intuition intact, and, perhaps more importantly, that he is no longer alone.

He sees them first. A pair of brown, dusted low-heeled shoes characterised by multiple-piece, sturdy leather uppers with decorative perforations and serration along the visible edges. Out of all possible occurrences, these are things Joshua Graham does not expect to see, and he blinks in his surprise. Yes, shoes. And then, a pair of pale hands clasped together in between the bended knees of someone trying to get a better look at a lower level. In his wearied state, incapable of movement and speech, Joshua focuses upon them. The owner of these hands is no man of rough trades; hardly any sort of legionary, with the lack of calluses and scars, with no red welts from hard work. But then, once they bring one hand up towards him, he sees the callus that appears to have formed on the side of their trigger finger. A signature that Joshua also shares. He feels his heart beating harder in his chest.

A tense murmur of apparent distress, and whomever this is brings their hand away from where it hovered uncertainty above, having apparently decided that physical contact upon singed flesh blistered raw is the improper course of action. Joshua is thankful, and slowly again, he closes his eyes. The pain is agonising enough without pressure being applied. Why is this man here? He wonders, absently. Surely he is far too gone for most wanders of the Wasteland to bother. But then he remembered the Samaritan who stopped for the injured man — and the priest and the Levite who didn't.

But of course, he shall go forth, suffering pains and afflictions and temptations of every kind; and this that the word might be fulfilled which saith he will take upon him the pains and the sicknesses of his people. And he will take upon him death, that he may lose the bands of death which bind his people; and he will take upon him their infirmities, that his bowels may be filled with mercy, according to the flesh, that he may know according to the flesh how to succor his people.

This, Joshua Graham knows.

Slowly, very slowly, something cool presses against his upper cheekbone, and Joshua's eyes flicker open to be locked upon the gaze of another man. Eyes the colour of unpolished blue kyanite with flecks of navy. New Canaanite blue. Joshua understands then, that yes, it must be true; the haircut, kept tight and neat at the back and sides; the painfully familiar handgun settled securely under the arm and then, the rectangular shape, two pieces of sturdy lathered hardback containing the word of God.

A New Canaanite.

Joshua has been found by one of his own.

He's only a young one, but then, Joshua assumes that this also makes sense; often Missionaries leave as boys to come back men, from the age of nineteen for two years or much longer. This one here was old enough, definitely, to retain the form of an adult but not the confidence. Joshua idly wonders where his tribe is, or, if he even has one, for there is little reason for him being so close to Ogden territory if he ought to be working on spreading the word of God.

"Can you hear me?" He asks, and then, figures it out alarmingly quickly for someone so clearly out of their depth. "No— Uh, blink if you can hear me."

Joshua blinks, but before the boy can speak, he wrenches his head upwards and away from Joshua to look further down the road. There appears to be a consideration of their options, and Joshua waits for the decision to be made. He has the gut wrenching feeling of not being able to do much else.

The boy looks back at him, mouth set into a grim line. "I'm going to have to get you up. I can't help you here."

Here? Oh, yes. Joshua had collapsed in the middle of the road.

"I'm sorry." The boy grunts as he begins to raise Joshua into a standing position, kneeling by the Joshua's head and hooking his elbows under Joshua's shoulders. Slowly, he finds himself off of the floor at long last, and he feels the boy shifting his body-weight to his right leg, sticking it in between Joshua's own, and the firm grasp of the boy's arm grabbing his right hand. Joshua hisses at the contact, but the boy doesn't stop; he just splutters some form of sincere apology again as he squats down, keeping his back as straight as possible as he shifts Joshua up over his shoulder, so his torso is relatively perpendicular to the ground. "Sorry." He grunts again, grabbing a rucksack Joshua hadn't seen before with his free hand. "But I can't help you here. Too dangerous."

Perhaps it's the hope of being found by one of his own that does it, but Joshua manages, eventually, to speak. It is not an easy affair; his mouth is hopelessly dry and working his jaw is painful beyond belief. His eyes open again. "Thank you for finding what's left of me."

The boy startles a little, but when he speaks, Joshua detects some sombre amusement in his tone. "Wry. But, honestly, don't mention it." He lets out a noise of strain as he picks up the pace. "It's the least I can do for a fellow brother."

How he knows, Joshua doesn't — but it must mean something.

Home, perhaps.