So this is a sequel to "Far From Any Road", which can be read on this site or AO3. As in the previous story, dark themes, noncon, and incredible amounts of graphic violence await. I mean, it's not "Kill Bill" level, but someone uses a headless body as a human shield. So if you're not cool with that, you probably shouldn't be reading this.

Then

Six and her friends rode up on the ranger border station looking less like the conquering heroes they wished they had been and more like the bedraggled refugees they actually were. The rangers stared at them like they were some sort of alien creatures. It probably didn't help that they were covered in blood, and it definitely didn't improve the situation when Veronica assured the rangers that it wasn't their blood, mostly. Six was quickly ushered in to see the commanding officer while the others sat in the caravan under heavy guard. Some welcome.

After some discussion on their way in, they'd decided to tell a slightly edited version of the actual story. The NCR officer sat in silence, occasionally scratching on his notepad and fiddling with his tape recorder, while she described their initial escape from Vegas and how they were hunted down afterward while trying to make it to the border. She told them about being dragged in to see Caesar and her subsequent fight with Vulpes in the arena. Six glossed over the fine details of her captivity, assuming that they wanted to hear about it as much as she wanted to tell them about it, although she did show the officer the ragged scars that covered her back, rolling her eyes slightly at his gasp of shock. Really, what did they think happened to Legion slaves?

Six tried not to cry when talking about Boone and how he'd died, how she'd attacked the legionaries and been dragged away for punishment. The commander listened intently to the part about Boone and mentioned that he'd heard of the sniper's exploits in the First Recon. Then it was time for the big lie. The NCR wasn't very good at forgiveness – hell, they were still hunting down Enclave remnants years after the war – and the idea that a Legion spy would switch sides for a girl was probably not something they were going to believe. The group had concluded that Marcus's true identity had to remain their little secret, lest he end up in front of a firing squad. So now Marcus was just Cass's boyfriend from the Hub, and their rescue party had taken some legionary armor off a veteran they'd killed and talked their way past some very dense gate guards. The shootout and their escape on the caravan were the absolute truth. Six let out a breath she didn't realize she'd been holding when the commander seemed to buy it.

A few more officers came in and asked her questions, and she gave all the responses she could. She told them everything she knew about Caesar, Lucius and Vulpes, drew them a quick sketch of their operations in the city, and gave them all that Marcus had written down about Caesar's extensive intelligence network in the NCR. They made her repeat that several times, especially the names, and Six couldn't hold back a smirk. A lot of the Frumentarii would be dead or on the run tonight. Good.

"Is that it?" the commander asked her.

"That's all I can remember," she said. "I'll let you know if anything else comes to mind. As I'm sure you understand, it's been an eventful few days, and we're all exhausted. I'd like to request that a doctor see my friends, and that we have a place to stay for the night so we can rest. We'll be out of your hair in the morning."

"You can stay as long as you like, Courier. But what do you want? What's the endgame here?"

"Pardon?"

"As much as your reputation for helpfulness precedes you, I doubt that you came to this station and gave us more information on the Legion than we've gotten in years purely out of the goodness of your heart. We signed treaties with you and the independent Vegas after the second battle of Hoover Dam, so you can't be looking for forgiveness for any imagined crimes against us. Now, what can the NCR do for you?"

She smiled grimly. "I want revenge, Commander. I want to see the Legion destroyed and scattered to the wind. I want them all dead. And I don't care if we have to ally with the Devil himself to get it done."

The commander grinned at her. "Well, then, our aims are exactly the same, Courier."

Six left the building with a bounce in her step. She'd requested an unconditional pardon for her and her friends for any and all crimes against the NCR in their past, despite the commander's insistence that they weren't in trouble; then again, he didn't know about Marcus's true history. He'd seemed receptive to her idea about getting Veronica to talk to the Brotherhood of Steel, and Arcade to speak the Followers. They needed all the help they could get. Another fight at the Dam was imminent, he told her, and the NCR was unlikely to win this one; the Legion's numbers were too great and since they were surrounded, the NCR had been unable to get in any additional troops or supplies. They were essentially under siege, and while they would go down fighting, it was inevitable that they were going down. Fucking Vulpes and his fucking brilliant idea about using Stimpaks and healing chems. If the Legion's death rate hadn't dropped so dramatically, they wouldn't stand a chance. After that, there was nothing stopping the Legion from heading west, said the commander, and he'd be damned if he'd end his career dying on a cross in his own country.

In the meantime, he suggested that they meet up with the group of Vegas refugees that had settled in the Hub, since she still had a lot of pull with them, and try to determine who was willing to fight. He would radio ahead to Shady Sands and discuss her ideas with the military leadership, who would bring it up to President Kimball. They could stay in the station's guest rooms until they healed up enough to continue on, and of course he would get a doctor to tend to their wounds. By the way, while you're here, Courier, we have something of a Fiend problem to the northwest, would you mind helping out once you're rested? Six smiled at that. She had almost missed having people ask for her help on dangerous missions with no appreciable benefit for herself. It was nice to be needed.

She walked to the caravan, where the remainder of her party waited for news. The commander had requested to speak to Arcade, probably about whatever medical issues he'd treated Caesar for in the first place, which he'd refused to tell her about. But when Arcade got off the cart, it became apparent that something was very wrong. He was pale and sweaty, and stumbled to his hands and knees on the ground when he tried to walk. When Veronica put her arm around him to try to help him up, he yelped in pain and wrenched away from her. Six felt a sinking sensation in the pit of her stomach.

"Arcade," Veronica said gently. "What's wrong?"

He murmured something about Med-X and looked away. Her feeling of dread growing, she pulled at his shirt while he tried to bat away her hands. His skin was hot to the touch, and when she finally got him to remove his top, she was unsurprised to find a mass of red welts across his back in horizontal stripes. Whip marks. Infected, too.

"How long have you been hiding this?" Cass demanded.

"About a week. Turns out people did see how things ended with Boone, and they … weren't happy," he said quietly. "I tried to keep it as clean as possible, but I left all of my supplies behind in Vegas. I didn't want to worry you guys. There's too much to deal with as it is."

Veronica and Cass ran to the station to get help in bringing Arcade in while Six and Marcus eased him to the ground. "Who was it? How many?" Six whispered.

"Twenty from Lucius and twenty from Vulpes," he said. She and Marcus both cringed. She'd felt half dead after twenty-one lashes, and she'd had Arcade to clean and bandage her right after. Six mentally added another bullet point to her Reasons for Revenge list.

"You told us you'd gotten off easy," Marcus said.

"Compared to her, I did."

"There's something you're not saying," Six said, looking in his feverish eyes. "What else is hurt?"

He muttered something softly. When she asked him to repeat himself, she could just make out the words, laced with shame. "Made me … watch. Said it was tradition."

It took Six a moment to comprehend what he was saying, and then she reeled backwards, horrified. The deadbolted room, the drugs, the fucking blindfold. Arcade had been there, probably tied and gagged, unable to do anything. She remembered Vulpes's words from when they'd first met in Nipton, when he was just some asshole in a skirt on a power trip and not her personal nightmare. "I told them that when legionaries are disloyal, some are punished, the others made to watch."

When Boone had died, she'd felt rage, but also guilt, shame, and grief. But now every inch of her vibrated with fury. She'd never hated anyone more than she hated them in this moment.

Arcade looked at her weakly. "Don't tell Cass and Vero."

"I won't, I promise." She glanced at Marcus, who may not have known the full details, but definitely got the gist of the situation. Marcus quickly promised too.

Cass and Veronica returned with a handful of rangers, who helped pick Arcade up and bring him to the clinic. Veronica accompanied them inside, holding his hand tightly, and Cass told Marcus and Six that she might as well use the opportunity to get her leg injuries from their escape looked at. This left Marcus and Six, uncomfortably avoiding each other's gaze. Six suddenly felt a new surge of anger. Lucius and Vulpes may not have been there for her to attack, but Marcus had been one of them.

"What, you don't like being reminded of what your buddies like to do for fun?" she snapped. "How many times did you participate in their shenanigans?"

"They're no friends of mine. I never raped. I never tortured. I never crucified anyone," he said gently. "I collected information, and when I had to kill someone, I did it quickly and cleanly. I didn't enjoy it."

"But you never tried to stop them, did you?"

"Do you want to know what happened when my tribe was pacified?" he asked, anger in his tone. "My parents were shot in front of us. My older brothers were crucified when they tried to resist. My sister was dragged off to be a slave. She was twelve. So don't try to make it out like I didn't know what the Legion was capable of."

"You joined them! After all that!"

"I was a child," Marcus said. "I'd just watched my family die, and I didn't want to die myself. And I wanted justice. You of all people can understand that. I couldn't get it unless I was alive to mete it out. And then things just kind of … happened. It turned into a job, one I was good at. Until I met Cass."

She thought for a moment. "Who was responsible for your tribe? The Malpais Legate?" God, she hoped not. A revenge crusade to Utah would take months, and she didn't fancy fighting her way through the tribes she had once allied with just to kill a reformed and confused Joshua.

"Aurelius of Phoenix."

"Oh," she said. "We killed him, you know. With radioactive waste. It was very satisfying."

"I'm aware," he said, rolling his eyes. "Spy, remember? Why do you think I came all the way to Vegas on a suicide mission to save you?" She raised her eyebrows. "I love Cass, but there's not a woman in the world who's worth the price that's probably on my head now. I owed you for killing him."

"And now that that debt has been repaid in spades, what are you going to do? Can we trust you?"

"I'm going to help you, as long as you want my help," he said. "If I was planning to betray you, wouldn't I have done it before killing a bunch of legionaries in Vegas? I could have just left Cass and Veronica there, if that was my aim. I would have been rewarded handsomely. But I helped you escape, and I'm sure that Vulpes wants me skinned for it. You know what sort of person he is. Would I risk angering him for some sort of … pointless escapade, if I didn't truly love Cass? If I hadn't changed? Is that enough proof of my loyalty?"

She looked in his eyes, and saw nothing there but honesty. "I'm sorry. It's been a hell of a time. I find it difficult to trust people. Especially former legionaries."

"It's understandable," he said, a slight smile on his face. "Most of us are pretty awful. If it helps, I promise I'll let you get the first shot at Caesar if we get the chance."

"The NCR can execute him, for all I care, and they'll probably want to. Those other two, though … can we set them on fire and toss them into the Grand Canyon?"

"Turns out that's not nearly as fatal as you'd expect."

"What? You guys know about Joshua being alive?"

"Of course. We sent several assassins to Utah to try to take care of him, but none of them ever came back. Only you did. I wonder if he'd fight on our side? He's got enough reason to hate the Legion."

"I doubt it," she said. "He's learned the value of forgiveness. He's almost a pacifist now."

"Really? That's a shame. Waste of a good killing machine."

That night, after Arcade and Cass were cleaned up and treated for their injuries, Six enjoyed the first time to herself she'd had in months. She took a long, hot bath, and even managed to score a bit of buble bath from a sympathetic female ranger. The bed was small and there were only thin blankets, but it was worth it to know that she would be finally, blessedly, be able to sleep alone.

Less than an hour later, she slipped into Arcade's room next door, trembling and sobbing. The nightmares had started as soon as she hit the mattress, and she found she couldn't bear to be by herself. From the dark circles under Arcade's eyes, he had been having similar thoughts. He held out his arms to her, and they curled up in bed, holding onto each other like rafts in a storm, murmuring their apologies and promises of revenge. Cold comfort, but comfort enough.