A/N: Just a little story I've been working through in my head for months. I couldn't help but post it.

The setting is post NCR ending. My courier and Boone joined First Recon, and the NCR moved east to take over the capitol. i know the timeline doesn't fit for my courier to be the same person as the Lone Wanderer, but dang it it's a video game and I'll screw the timeline up if I wanna! :P Anyway, this first chapter is kinda just a back story to the courier's mischief in the Mojave. Enjoy! I revised a few things, such as stupid spelling mistakes. Ahh... it was kind of embarrassing seeing so many misspelled words. I am lost without spell check. xD

History&Faithfulness

My throat tightened as the final pieces of my memory fit elegantly back into place. My breath caught in my throat. My nostrils flared.

Damn you, Butch. Damn you straight to hell.

He knew it was me even with the changes Doc Mitchell made to my face, and the cosmetic surgery the auto-doc in the big MT had given me. Even though I was wearing a red beret that the brotherhood would shoot me on sight for wearing. Even though my guard was completely down.

"Leah," Butch was saying as I continued to stare past him at the broken down rubble that was Megaton, attempting to block his words. I couldn't reopen these wounds. I wouldn't let this prick do that to me. "Amata doesn't mean anything. You got to understand baby, I thought you were dead. When you left-"

I drew my Q35-module plasma rifle. "Don't try to feed me that shit, Butch! I left because you were sleeping with her!"

His face paled. "Baby I don't know what-"

Amata, the arrogant bitch, looked up. "Give it up Butch. She's been out here too long to listen to reason. She's as good as dead now!"

"Fuck you, Amata! At least I haven't been wasting away in a vault. You the one who's as good as dead. You're already six feet under!" I turned back to Butch as she shied away. "I trusted you." I took a step forward. "How many more of my friends have you slept with, Butch? Did you have sex with Sarah Lyons, too? What about Sydney?" I tightened my grip on my rifle, struggling not to pull the trigger and end his stupid worthless life. "What about-"

I felt a hand on my shoulder, a single light in darkness.

Boone.

"He's not worth our time, Leah. Come on. Veronica's getting impatient."

I closed my eyes and placed my hand over his, which was still lingering on my shoulder. A stab a peacefulness crept though me briefly. Then it was gone, and the anguish I had been suppressing for so long rose to the surface. My eyes watered, and I dropped my gun, falling to the dirty ground. Boone crouched besides me, slowly rubbing circles into my back.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Butch soften. For a moment, he was the ridiculously cute and innocent little boy I fell in love with back in Vault 101.

Then I saw the way he was clutching Amata's waist, and I remembered. I remembered everything.

And it hurt. Bad. A double-edged blade, slowly slicing my flesh.

Low moans of ecstasy, a light-hearted giggle as he touched her in just the right spot. I squinted, barely making out two forms on MY bed. One male, one female.

"Butch, babe, what if she-" A squeal.

"She's out scavenging, A. We'll hear that stupid mutt before we see her. It's okay. I'll have you back to the vault in no time."

"Uhhh…." 'A' leaned her head back in contentment as the man left a trail of kisses down her neck. "The vault. I don't… wanna go back."

There was a pause. "You have to babe. Your dad will have my head on a platter if I don't get you home soon..."

"Okay," Amata sounded resigned. "But I get to come back soon, right?" There was a grunt of agreement. "And you'll tell Leah about us soon, right...?"

There was a pause, and all movement seemed to halt. "I don't know, Amata. I don't know if I can. She's... I don't know."

"Dammit, Butch!" Amata roughly pulled away. "You said you loved me! What's the deal with trying to stay with her?"

Butch sighed. "I love her, too, you know."

My heart was beating fast in my chest. I could feel my pulse in my ears, and my vision was distorted by my tears. He was talking about me, cheating on me, and he had the nerve to say that he loved me. What a load.

I heard a feminine sigh. "But you love me more. I know. You told me."

"Yeah, but I can't just turn my back on her. She's done so much for me..."

"And I haven't?" Amata turned away, and hung her head. "The overseer, my dad, wanted to throw you and every one of the tunnel snakes out of the vault. He thought that you were all a load of garbage. But I told him not to! Because I love you more than that blonde bimbo ever could."

Butch seemed torn. "But she's helped me out here! Where it's life or death. You don't get it Amata. You've only been out here on little field trips. You always had a home to return to. She was kicked out of her home! BY YOU! After she even spared your dad's life twice. And the first time, he wanted to kill you. It wasn't fair."

"I told you why I did that! It was for us! If she had been allowed to stay there, then you would have dumped me just like you did in the vault when you thought she was going to sleep with you. Face it, Butch. You're a toy to her."

That's not true, you skank! I wanted to shout. But I couldn't. I couldn't move my feet to stop listening to this conversation that was breaking my heart, I couldn't even turn my head to stop looking at them. Butch's resolve was shattering. He was going to believe her.

And there was nothing I could do about it except avoid watching it.

So I ran out of my house, out of Megaton and out of the capitol wasteland. Leaving all my memories, and the corpses of my family, and every person I'd ever killed behind me.

And it wasn't until months later that I looked back.

I was in what the old world called Tennessee before I stopped to rest. This part of the wastes wasn't really inhabited except by a few brotherhood outcasts that were looking for an adventure. But, then, if there were no people, there was very little for me to do except walk.

I really hated that I'd left all my guns. All I had was a generic laser pistol on my hip and a couple of combat knives strapped cleverly to my ankles. I already missed my many special plasma rifles. But it didn't matter. I had had to get away from those people. I knew I would have ended up attacking Amata, then Butch would have gone psycho. So I had done what any normal scared and freaked out little girl had done.

I ran.

It was the smartest decision I had made since leaving the vault two years ago. Even if it meant leaving irreplacable treasures behind.

I sat down in the dirt. The wastes were pretty much the same here as they were in the capitol. Highways that had cracked and fallen, old weathered roads that hadn't been traveled in years. But strangely, my pip boy still had a map of the area. Huh. Old world technology had its uses.

I was tired, and had no idea where I was going. I probably would have turned around and forgotten the conversation I had heard if not for the vertibird that I saw floating in the sky at that particular moment.

It landed right next to me.

"Dammit," I muttered and brought out my laser pistol. "Enclave remnants."

They were clad in power armor, but it wasn't the standard Enclave armor. It was brotherhood. Still suspicious, I only lowered my gun an inch.

The tallest one, and the one that was obviously the leader took off his helmet and spoke. "Woah, there. Sorry. Didn't mean to startle you." He put his helmet underneath his arm. "We were just flying by and saw you sit down." He smiled sheepishly. "It's not every day you see a pretty girl walking alone in the desert."

I shrugged. "I needed to get out of the house for a while." I holstered my gun, but was still thinking about the best ways to reach it or my knives if this conversation ended badly. "You brotherhood, or outcast?"

He chuckled. "Brotherhood. We're part of Lyon's pride. We're new recruits. We were sent out this way to go check on a different chapter of the brotherhood."

"How new?" I thought I knew everyone in Lyon's pride, being an honorary member, and all.

"We were dispatched yesterday, and were sent on this mission today." He looked me in the eye. "I understand your mistrust, but believe me, none of these chuckleheads will give you any trouble. The way you held that gun makes me think that arming ourselves wouldn't do any good."

I smiled. Kid has potential. "Smart move. So where you headed?" I asked casually, trying not to make myself sound like someone desperate to escape their own mind for a while.

"The Mojave. There's a chapter up there that we got a distress call from a while back. Apparently they started a war with the organized government over there."

I looked at the vertibird, then looked back at the kid that was probably no older than 20. Not that I was too much older, I was only 22. But still, him with his longish light brown hair and warm green eyes and childish features, I could tell you that he didn't deserve this. No one deserves the life of a wastelander. The world we live in today is cruel, and there wasn't a person anywhere you should ever trust. Before I had decided to forget about this poor kid and move on, I smiled at him and asked, "Mind if I tag along? I'm an honorary member of Lyon's pride." Thankfully, I had remembered my Brotherhood dogtag and still had my standard brotherhood tattoo on my chest.

The kid widened his eyes. "Wait... You're THE Lone Wanderer! I was wondering why you were out here all alone." He extended his hand to me. "This is a huge honor. Leah isn't it? My name's Atch. Atch Gorde. We would be honored to let you on our vertibird." He released my hand, and I smiled.

"I was hoping you'd say that. I'm about to die of boredom here."

We shared a smile. He was still slightly in awe, and I caught him looking at my chest, trying to see some skin through my merc charmer outfit that I had forgotten to change out of before I left, but other than that he was a good kid.

Atch didn't even know what hit him when we crashed.

After we were gunned down by something, I checked to see if any of the remaining members of the little fleet Sarah had dispensed here was still breathing. Atch was dead, as was almost all of his team. The only one left was the small guy with permanent fear in his eyes.

I snatched a laser rifle off of one of the dead bodies, and motioned for the short guy to follow me out of the vertibird. We had been almost there when the missiles had first hit us. Atch had said it would only be a few hours longer.

Then the glass shattered, and his face was cut to shreds.

I glanced around, trying to identify if we could get out of this alive. There weren't any actual human soldiers as I expected, they were all just old malfunctioning Mr. Handy robots and Protectrons. I looked at my companion. "Hey. When I tell you to run, run. Okay?"

He wimpered. That didn't seem very promising, but I was out of time here. So I pulled out my only pulse grenade and tossed it. The robots were stunned, but I knew they weren't dead. We had to move fast. "Run!"

He didn't run very well. He screamed and ran back inside the vertibird. I briefly comptemplated going back for him, but then I saw him shoot himself through the shattered window.

"Over kill much?" i shouted to his corpse. I shook my head, and took off before the robots regained their bearings.

You gotta have willpower to live in the wasteland.

Alrighty then. This chapter one. I didn't really wanna post this cause its kinda badly written, but i was bored. So lets see what kind of response this gets. Bye friends!