No God on Sunday
Summary: The band strikes, and one's holding the microphone with tears in her eyes, while those around her partner up and laugh and whisper and sway – listening to her drown in her own words, "What the hell am I doing here? I don't belong here." The other stares heavenward, watching ghost far older than she; instead of counting stars she counts scars left over by the war; she can only recite prayer.
Aries "Courier Six."
III
"Daddy, why do you have the number thirteen on your wrist?" Aries inquires, bemusement falling on her lips like a second language; she turns her father's large hand over in her two smaller ones; tiny fingers brushing over old blue ink and white scars that had faded over time and hardship. The old raider's daughter is too pure to be handling him, and he's too evil to claim such a beautiful treasure.
"Always with the damn questions, eh kiddo?" Soda Pop sighs, scarred lips quirking in amusement; his free hand rustles her auburn hair. "No worries, your ol' man is happy to oblige. Look here, baby girl. I was about fourteen when I started runnin' with my dad on savaging. He had the same mark, told me it was an unlucky number. Also told me: to hell with tradition, it's lucky to him. My ol' man, your grandfather, was a mean sonofbitch; he'd gut you for a damn Nuka-Cola if he was thirsty enough. But he knew how to fight, how to find the best stuff in the most unlikely places. He said this number carried him far across the Wastes. So I followed his example, and look where I am now!"
Aries squints underneath the harsh sun, pulling her father's wrist close to her face for examination. She wasn't buying the number bit, and only frowned for just a second when she considered the gravity of luck and the number etched into her father's skin.
"Will I get this mark one day?" Aries pokes at another question, and her father rumbles a soft chuckle; he pulls his hand back, and pats his knee a couple times to shake the dust off his trousers.
"That all depends on you, baby girl. And if your mother doesn't string me from a lamppost beforehand."
-x-
"I looked, and there before me was a pale horse! Its rider was named Death, and Hades was following close behind him. They were given power over a fourth of the earth to kill by sword, famine and plague, and by the wild beasts of the earth."
-Revelation 6:8
Hell is hidden behind the cold depths of unwavering gray; a hollow-point grin fell neatly into place. Hell is a pretty little thing: wrapped in satin, warmed with whiskey, and burning bright like the end of a stamped cigarette. Lovely, long fingers entangle each other – content to look idly bored, but on-end and amused. Benny can see her across the table, peering through the pollution of her Lucky Strike, and he pulls his own brand of a jack-cheap grin, offering her something to drink with the click of a shot glass.
"Heard you're running an orphanage rather than a respectable casino," Benny jokes, but it riles no laughter out of the woman who sat adjacent from him; she keeps her steady, dangerous smile – blowing smoke rings from pearly-red lips. "Where's the pussycat who would choke a fella after giving him a bang? That's the broad I fell in love with."
"Who said my orphanage would be respectable? I was thinkin' about introducing a few of the street-side hookers and a round of blackjack in the mix. Have the kids runnin' the slots – wearing cute little suits. A real swingin' scene, I think. Yes Man can play daddy, while I play Queen to this pathetic, free kingdom."
"Queen of Harlots. You'll rule mortal, but someone is bound to kill you eventually," Benny mentions, sliding over Six's drink; the glass clicked with the contact of perfectly-kept, red nails. "You're sick, pussycat. I can never tell if you're just pulling my leash, or you're singing to the choir. But, damn, I love it when you talk like that." The woman on the opposite end finally laughs, mirthless and sick. Benny wouldn't pin her heartless – just out of her damn mind. He supposed – being left in the middle of nowhere with a hole in your head could do that to a person.
"Legends never die, Benny-boy. God knows I don't play hero, either. I'll just descend into a bigger and brighter kingdom: Hell," mellow vexation could be found in Six's undertones, sweetly spun and venomous; she's angry, but plays it off well with humor. "Why the fuck are you here, Benny? You're giving Swank over there the sweats. And here I was - hoping the Wastes made you its bitch. Ah, wishful thinkin'. You gave my baby girl a scare with all your damn bangin' on my doors." She downs her drink, and the burn doesn't faze her outlook. She's all smiles and balled hatred, trigger happy in every respect; her finger twitches over her shot glass like a trigger, body ready to burn and flex to the feel of ammunition leave her hand and the call of a fight at her heel. He stares at the old ink of her tattoo on her index finger, engraved with the notorious: 13.
"Didn't mean to give your kid a scare, Momma. Business is business, your little desert flower needs to get over it. 'Sides, I'm not concerned over playground blues – I want to know how you're running my city. My casino. My men."
"Last time I checked: this isn't your city, your casino, or your men. Not anymore. It's mine. And however I run it is none of your damn, daisy-suit, business. In fact: I don't see why you called me here. We have nothin' to talk about 'sides a bullet in your head – and I see none of that happening. Well, not yet."
"You're a little girl playing an old man's game, pussycat. Won't take long 'til the business swallows you alive. Greed? I know all about greed. You may think that you have a hold on all the other families on The Strip, but they're just waiting to catch you with your pants down. Can't trust any of these finks," Benny leans in close from across the table, keeping an even face, a careful façade. Swank on the other end of the bar can see this, and he frowns; he's seen that look before on his boss. "You can trust me. We have history. Give me a cut. You've done me proud so far, but I can teach you on how to make this gig really swing."
"'We have history," he says," Six mocks, abandoning her empty glass to cross her arms over her breast, "No good history comes out of being shot twice in the head and left for dead out on the Wastes."
"Well, you're not dead. Six, baby - that was over a year ago. Get over it. If you really hated me – you would have choked me out on one of my bar counters."
Six snorts, slowly shaking her head, keeping that infamous smile. "Get the hell out of my sight, Benny-boy. You've stated your case, and now I'm stickin' with mine. Leave, and let the Wastes devour you. If I wanted a second-in-command, I wouldn't want a nodding sycophant who would only stab me in the back."
"What makes you think I'd stab you? I own a gun."
"You've tried shooting me. Look where that got us."
Silence settles among the two again, giving leeway for Benny to ask, "We're meetin' again tonight, honey baby? Same song and dance?"
Six laughs at that, loud and hard; oddly, she feels like crying when he asks that. She nods anyways, validating that they'll meet again in his room. Even if he'll leave her again.
They all leave.
III
Mel is the oldest woman in their raider family; she teaches Aries to read and write; her mother can barely spell out her own name, and her father can only piece together a few syllables and complete sentences before he's completely lost in whatever text his daughter shows him.
Mel can be a vengeful woman; lingered in the thick smell of smog and toiled earth. Her beautiful, dark ebony skin toned down by the smothered ash she never washes off; hair dreaded back in lovely, crimson beads that Aries loved to pick at and play with. A dark warm eye catching the light of the sun. Mel is missing her other eye, sealed shut with an ugly, pink gash; she said her own mother gave her that prize. Said her mother wasn't the sweetest drunk in the world. Mel said all this with a bitter smile, laughing away like it was some joke she could pass around the bonfire at night. However, Aries never found the joke funny.
Aries' mother told her that it was Mel who helped bring her into this world; she was the only woman nice enough in the group to take her on, while the others found Aries' mother too green – too childlike and spoiled to be hanging around them. It was Mel, and Mel's wife, Tali, who really pushed Aries' mother in making a name for herself within the group.
Mel's the warmest woman Aries has ever touched; her larger hands wrapping around her own, smiling down at the child as if she only belonged to her. Mel always told her, in her raspy firebrand voice, "You're my sweet little desert flower, right baby girl? Let Aunt Mel braid your hair."
Aries' mother, Jamie Leigh, would laugh, "You're too soft on my girl. She isn't goin' to learn much with all this kindness."
"My desert flower," Mel replied with pride, "Well, she doesn't have to take this world with kindness. I'm teachin' her to show kindness now, because once you've done pissed someone off – they don't believe the kindness anymore. So be nice. Be nice 'til there is no reason to be nice anymore. Then destroy them."
-x-
"The band really knows how to strike, eh baby girl?" The instruments are too loud for Melody, but she bites her tongue from saying so when she looks up at Six with a huge grin on her face – peering through the haze of her own smoke. The older woman waves the pollution away; the little girl merely nods her head, and smiles back. Her fingers twiddle in her lap, watching the water in her glass vibrate with the excessive sound.
Six really took her time pulling Melody's hair together, finding joy in brushing and pinning her hair back. Dresses in her size seemed almost foreign, children in lavish dresses just didn't fit the New Vegas' vibe, but Six had the time and the money, and she was willing to shove her caps down anyone's throat just to have her way. Melody never felt like she deserved the luxury; she feels completely uncomfortable to the sensation of someone being nice to her.
She's dressed in velvet treasures, a hint of blush marring her dark complexion. Excessive for a child, yes. But Six loved to spoil as much as she loved to destroy and dominate; she let Melody have first picks to her jewelry box. The girl chose nothing too flashy, a sting of age-tinged pearls wrapped around her small neck.
"You'll never find a better show other than at The Tops!" The man who sat adjacently from Melody proclaimed rather loudly, nudging Six's elbow and winking at Melody; Melody didn't mind Swank, but she could had done without him.
However, he's never given her a solid reason to hate him. He was nice enough, always kneeling to her level to talk, or passing her a few caps for a Nuka-Cola bottle at the bar when he wanted to speak to Six alone.
Trust took time. But how can you trust a man who competes casinos with other families? Passing blood-stained caps across knife-picked tables, scarlet grins passed around freely, lit up by the dusty glow of a swinging lightbulb in a dark and gutted hotel room. It's a man's game – or, that's what the men who run Gamorrah say. Six liked to say otherwise – pointing her gun and laughing manically at any fucker who questioned her leadership skills.
Six did the same, however. Six was just as evil. But Melody loved Six, so she always reconsidered Swank's attitude. His festering kindness that almost seemed excessive – and fake. And almost too New Vegas for her.
"Hey! What's a man got to do to get served around here? The kid needs another round of water!" Melody is unsure on how Swank could be louder than the music and the chatter of people who talked across flattops, and gargled alcohol; she barely remembers drinking all of her water, nervously, constantly taking sips from her glass so she wouldn't have to make small talk with Six's table guest.
"You okay, baby girl?" Six leans into Melody's space, leaving the child to shiver with the close proximity. Swank's too preoccupied hounding the waiter for a round of whiskey and a glass of water.
Melody will never be completely "OK," but she nods her head, smiles, and pretends to enjoy whatever lifestyle she's forced into.
"I'm just enjoying the music, Six. I'm doing just fine."
III
"Queen of the Bottle Caps, right here!" Tali yells, grinning madly with a rusted rifle in-hand. "That bottle didn't even see you comin'. But there you go! Shootin' the heads off 'em. Rally up boys, the boss's daughter is going to make us all rich one day!"
The men in the group snorted, clicking Nuka-Cola bottles with their leader.
"You salty puta, pretty wife, pretty kid. While you're an ass-ugly, sonofabitch father." Second-in-Command, Deer, nudges Soda Pop's arm, inclining his head in the direction of his leader's daughter who stood next to Tali; shaking, slim fingers hold onto a pistol – eroded and old – it was her grandfather's. It'll be completely hers one day.
"Ah. Get out of my face with that shit," Soda Pop jerks away from Deer with a hoarse laugh, shaking his head, he gives a sigh of content; they've been traveling the Wastes for two weeks now, trying to find better grounds, trying to find somewhere safer for the women in their group to raise their own children – somewhere where he could watch his own. "Your fuckin' scars are givin' me nightmares. You take one damn flamethrower to the face, and now you're getting all cocky with it."
"Soda Pop," Jamie warned. "Would it kill you to be a little nicer?"
"Yes. Ah baby, don't give me that look. Can't tell what's worse: Deer's fucked up face, or your damn nagging." The Raider Leader lazily leans in close to his wife, wrapping his arm around her shoulders to pull her in close to the warmth of bare chest. "It almost physically pains me to hold back my sarcastic comments while you're around. And you're going to protect him? Deer? Baby, did you not just hear the man call me ugly? I tell ya, I get no damn respect. None. Not from my scavenging mate, and definably not from my wife. I got feelings, ya know? Deep down."
Deer grins hard with that, hollow-point and stretched. "Listen to your ol' lady. I'm almost tempted to off you, and put her in charge."
"Fuck off," Soda Pop freely laughs, keeping his arm wrapped around his wife, his index finger hooked in the rim of his bottle, holding the glass loosely.
Silence plagues the group for a moment; they watch Tail line up Aries' next shot. A new generation of scavengers among them.
"Do you think we'll ever find some place nicer? You know – for Aries," Jamie inquires, quiet enough to be shared amongst Deer and Soda Pop.
"Can't be healthy on a kid to be traveling all the damn time," Deer adds, "But we all did it, girl; it can't be as safe like it was on your papi's farm. You married into it, now you're with us." He's sympathetic, but also a realists. If Jamie didn't want this lifestyle, she should had stayed with her old man.
"We'll find somewhere, I swear. Just long enough 'til we know our little girl has enough spirit in herself to protect herself. We're raiders. We're never meant to stay in one place for so long," Soda Pop pats his wife's arm, leading them both away from Deer who stood with a crooked, smug look.
-x-
"I received a letter. Funny little thing. Heartfelt, really," Six motions around a sturdy chair, chipped with age and creaked with weight. Her heels click across rug, digging into the surface of stale blood; the room smells of death and chemicals, bleach intoxicates those in the room, but it only serves to spur Six on. To truly piss her off. The smell of decay reminds her why she's hold up in a dimly-lit room, illuminated with the faint glow of a swinging lightbulb and the electric buzz of her pip-boy. "Clanden, you silly man. Want to know what this letter is about?"
Swank carefully watches the malicious grin stretch itself across her features, gray eyes lit up with utter excitement and morbid disgust. He stands to the side, holding a single dainty yellow heel; broken and worn, the heel is practically peeling back by the glue and faulty stitching.
"Here baby," That's all Swank says when he hands over the heel; Six holds up the footwear to the man strapped to the chair, fidgeting under the strength of his bindings. Clanden sweats out his frustration, nervously biting at the bottom of his lip till he breaks skin and can taste the copper at the edge of his tongue. Still, he pulls back the dry skin with his teeth, trying to concentrate on anything besides his embedding execution.
"Remember this? Certainly not my color, but it makes it no less important," Six keeps her haunting grin steady, close and demanding; she stalks her prey by coming in close, eyes locked onto shame and fright. The man under her gaze fears for his life, but he had no problem taking from women who felt the same emotion before they were cut short. "I think you do. I think you remember it well. Not too long ago I received this very special letter -,"
Six pauses, fixing her poster, she places the heel upon the counter with care. Pulling back, she jerks her head in Swanks direction; seamlessly, the Floor Man walks to the adjacent end of this well-hidden little torture room, pulling away a sheet to reveal a familiar sight: a camera.
Dark and gray, Swank starts up the old camera with a flip of a switch. The sound of film being feed into the wheel alarms the group that they are being filmed; the sound is a lot more ominous than what Clanden is used to. Of course, he was always on the other end rather sitting on this end.
"The letter is signed by a boy, addressed to me. He told me he knew about me through trade routes that would pass by his grandmother's farm; he heard I could fix his problem, said his momma worked in New Vegas, asked if I could help find her," Six tightens Clandens restraints, still keeping that damning smile that would follow his abstract gaze; he was listening to Six's sweet voice in all its falsehoods, and damned her to hell in his mind. "Well, I wrote the boy back. I asked him about his grandmother's farm. I asked him how old he was and what's his name. And then I asked him, 'is there anything that he could remember that your mom loved wearing.'"
Once Six finds the bindings intolerable and straining upon the man's flesh, she turns away from him with an amused little chuckle; she rolls out her equipment from a leather slip, silver equipment glittering under the dusty light from overhead. "I visited his farm. He told me his name is Tony. He's eleven-years-old. And living on his grandmother's farm is bearable enough, but his mother went to work in New Vegas to help pay their way through a not-so-honest-living. He doesn't know what his mother did for a living, he doesn't know that she gave him everything by making a living on her back. I never knew the woman, but I told him his mother was a respectable woman, a lucky woman for having such a smart and strong boy, too. He told me her favorite color is yellow, and that she loved wearing her yellow heels while she ran off for work. Every. Day. He told me he loves his mother very much, and would appreciate it if I could bring her home to him."
Six pulls a blade from its slip. The stained and jagged edge of a blade shines under the light; it's dull and rusted over. She tests the weight in her hands, eyeing down her weapon of choice before nodding her head almost enthusiastically. Clanden can barely handle Six's smile now; he's sick and tormented, eyes held wide and hollow. His shoes skid across the floor in the attempt to break from his bindings, but that only proved to be fruitless and only made Six laugh out with his vain struggle.
"You see, it's going to be very sad for me to tell a little boy that his mother will not be returning home to him. Clanden, the world is a very evil place – of course you would know that, correct? You were the one involved in that little, tiny, crime. And what did you do? Well, you took your time like any artist who loves their work. You took your damn time in front of a rolling camera and tortured this young mother for hours, did you not?" Clanden is silent under Six's evil glare until she paces back over to him, snapping his head heavenward by the hairs of his head, curling her nails into his scalp. He's blinded by the dreary light, still listening to the maddening sound of a rolling film hum in the background. "You will answer me when I talk to you."
"I did," Clanden murmurs, vocal cords strained and burning; he can feel the pressure of cold steel pressed to his throat, tracing the hollow of his throat, and he waits patiently for Six to take the plunge. He knows better. He knows that Six won't kill him just yet – that's just how she is. She wants to make a statement – even if she has to carve it into his skin and bone, and lay out his wrongdoings before him, spelled out in blood. His blood.
"Wonderful! Then you'll understand what I'm about to do," Six pulls away the blade, "We're going to make a little video. Just like you did with the girls under my rule. My city. You see, I'm planning a little fund. All proceedings I make from your snuff video will go into that little boy's farm. While you did rob him of a mother, you will be paying his way through a proper education and putting food on his table. See? Now your life wasn't a complete waste, after all."
Six places the edge of her blade back at the hollow of his throat, tilting his head towards the camera. He swore he was looking at the Devil herself. She leans forward, turning till the side of her face pressed against his cheek and they both looked at the camera. She was smiling, and he was sweating.
"Clanden, baby, smile for the camera. You're going to be a star!"
III
Aries loves Deer like she loves Mel and Tali; he plays the roll of angry and sarcastic uncle rather well. Deer can speak another language like he can speak Aries' language; loud and boisterous, soothing the next. He's from Mexico City, a foreign little place that Aries never knew existed. Never even heard of.
She's only known life from the lands that surrounded her crumbled – yet sturdy – bridge. A home that's supported by concrete, smeared in old blood that's older beyond her parents, polluted waters that trickle a tiny stream in front of her hobble and pocketed with tiny bullet holes; sometimes, if Aries dug deep enough in the ground, she would pull casings from the dirt like tiny seeds – adding them to a growing collection she keeps in a tin can that her mother found her.
Aries is allowed to sit on Deer's knee while he cleans the groups' guns, performing ritualistic maintenance by dismantling and reassembling weaponry; he makes sure to tell her to watch closely, she'll be taking on his trade one day – reminding her that she'll hold a huge part in their raider group once she's older.
Aries doesn't understand what he means, but she automatically takes pride in that knowledge when Deer leans down to smile at her, ruffling her fire-lit hair. Deer was never nice to anyone. He always yelled and cussed and blew his cigarette smoke in the faces of his subordinates. Aries found no flaw in that man, besides the distant look in his troubled eyes and his woeful smile that tugged against his fire-warped lips. He treated her like sunshine.
Deer told Aries that she reminded him of his own son, and when she felt left out on that bit of information, she frowned. "There's other kids my age?"
Deer holds that smile, fingers stiffening under the feel of cold, rusted steel; he places a gun down that he's been trying to modify for the past hour on his age-ridden workbench, and leans back in his chair. "Si, mi corazon. My son, my – hijo. His name is Carlos. But he doesn't live with me. Haven't seen him in – oh, fifteen years."
"He's older than me then," Aries frowns, and Deer can't help the amused laugh that escapes him, riddles him with a different type of emotion that seems so far off from her Uncle Deer. "Well, where's he at?"
"Back in Mexico City with mi amor."
"Well, are you going to see him again? Will I ever meet him?" With innocence laced, Deer wraps a single arm around Aries, holding her strong and keeping her supported. Automatically, Aries turns in his lap, and tires to wrap her arms around her uncle, nudging her nose against his warm chest, familiar to the smell of burned ammunition and desert sand.
"Mi Corazon, I'm looking for him. And when I find him, I'm sure he'll love you just as much as I love you. You have that special somethin' about yourself that keeps others close."
It'll be years later while Aries is running off for that courier interview when she asks Mel for any bit of information she had on Uncle Deer's son. Maybe with her newfound connections she would finally be able to locate Carlos. Trace a name. Something. Uncle Deer would had appreciated that a lot.
Mel would give her that weary sigh, folding over an old magazine, and sit forward in her ragged recliner and explain Deer's problem.
"Deer met your daddy and grandfather when he was twenty-five, came struggling out of the border with a bunch of other settlers. Deer said he and his girlfriend had Carlos around the age of fifteen. Mexico is hell, baby girl. In my youth, I've only been around the border, but I sure didn't stick around long enough to suffer the hand of Satan reachin' out towards me. When Deer still had his wit, he told us his son and girlfriend were sold from underneath him by a group of Cartel – whatever he called 'em. Robbed him during the middle of the night, set him aflame - leaving him to die in his shack while the group hauled off his young son and girlfriend like cattle. That's why he looked fucked. I'm thinkin' the Wasteland finally got to him, gave him that small bit of hope, a terrible delusion, that maybe he'll be able to find his son. Who knows? We sure didn't want to ruin his outlook, so we never swayed him to think differently. The whole group knew that his son and his pretty little girlfriend all belonged to some shallow grave. That's humankind for ya. It just wasn't – our place to remind him how terrible the world is. We like to believe he already knew."