"So this is… safe?" Veronica asks. It's about the fourth time the question has popped up, or at least Arcade thinks it is. He's heard it enough already from the voice in his head. He sighs from where he's kneeling on the floor setting up a large UV light fixture and gives her a look over the rims of his glasses.
"If you're so worried about safety, you really shouldn't have encouraged me to do this. Hand me the wrench – the small one, yeah. Thanks."
"No, I know," Veronica says, glancing at the small biocontainment unit sitting on the desk next to her. Inside, through a translucent barrier, she spies the small, closed Petri dish that Arcade won't let her get a very good look at. She wonders how old all this equipment is, not to mention where he even got it from. "I just really didn't expect you to do it, you know, where we sleep."
"I need the computer," he explains simply. He stands and wipes his sweaty hands on his pants. He flicks a small switch and the light turns on, shining an incredibly deep purple color into the room. With a small gasp, Veronica tries to get a good look at the bulb, but it looks a little fuzzy around the edges and she can't get a clear look no matter how hard she tries focus. The light makes the white on Arcade's lab coat glow brilliantly.
"So, uh," Veronica steps back slightly as she watches Arcade move the light around to get it into the perfect spot so that it's aimed onto the desk that he's commandeered as his workspace, "how contagious did you say this stuff was?"
Satisfied with his setup, Arcade turns the UV light off again and sits down in front of the terminal. Resting his chin on his cupped hand, he begins reading through the large blocks of green text that make up the old research data from Vault 22.
"Very, according to the Vault data and the medical journals we found. And also, you know, all of the spore carriers that used to be the afflicted citizens of the Vault who tried to kill us while we were there."
He sees, out of the corner of his eye, Veronica take another involuntary step back – towards the door, to be more specific – and glances up at her.
"Of course, Lilith and I had gone pretty deep into that Vault, into the thick of where the spores had contaminated the place, and neither of us ever showed signs of infection. And believe me, I was looking."
Curiosity piqued, Veronica pauses in her steady retreat.
"How long would it take to show?" she asks.
"Anywhere from 10 to 20 days. Again, this is all according to the reports from the Vault's medical ward."
"And it's been about that long since you went in there," she notes with a puzzled frown. It gives her hope that the contents of the little Petri dish aren't actually going to turn her into some weird spore monster. She never got to see the creatures – and she's thankful for that – but her mind manages to conjure up some pretty nasty images regardless.
Arcade nods, pleased with her observation.
"Exactly. And yet, the spores ravaged the inhabitants of Vault 22. So I'm curious as to why they haven't done the same to us," he explains. He gestures to the setup of his experiment. "This is all just to be as safe as I can be with how little I have to work with, but I have a feeling that there's something that's making the spores weaker than they used to be, if not entirely ineffective in terms of infecting and taking possession of a host." He pauses to spare a glance at the unassuming Petri dish and laughs. "At least, that's what I'm hoping. If not, well, I have some fail-safes. One, really. In the form of a small flamethrower." With his foot he taps the aforementioned object where it sits on the floor, leaning against the leg of the desk.
"Right," Veronica says with a wary nod, like the ambiguity of the situation doesn't concern her just a little bit. Her feelings regarding these spores are all over the place, but she's confident in Arcade's ability to not kill everyone in the suite.
Wait and see, she supposes.
She pokes at and examines the light and the biocontainment unit, fascinated by the process and procedure that Arcade has carefully laid out for this experiment.
"You're pretty good at all of this science stuff," she comments, picking up the breathing mask that's lying on the desk next to the terminal.
Arcade gives her a brief lopsided grin as he continues to scroll through medical records. "Does it look that way? It's not true. I assure you, I'm spectacularly average."
Veronica laughs mirthfully, cheeks dimpling. "Better than me, but I guess that's not saying much. Where did you learn these things?"
"With the Followers, mostly," he hums, clicking through file after file. "They have incredibly thorough archives. It's an amazing resource to have."
"Did you grow up with them?" she asks after a moment of silence, turning the mask around in her hands, touching the various bumps and ridges. "The Followers?"
"No," he says, with a small pause, "No, I didn't."
"How did you join?"
It's then that Arcade has to choose focus on Veronica rather than on the contents of the clinic files in order to makes sure that he doesn't accidentally let too much of his past slip out. He isn't going to lie, necessarily; he's just going to strategically dance around the truth. Just like he usually does.
"My family moved to the Mojave when I was a boy. I must have been in my mid- to late-teens by the time I joined the Followers."
She gives him a look that is filled with nothing but interest, and while he appreciates the thought, he would very much rather she leave soon. "Where's your family now?" she asks.
"They're… around," he says with nonchalance and a vague hand gesture.
"You've never mentioned them."
"You've never asked," he retorts, and he gives her a tiny triumphant smirk. Small victories.
Veronica rolls her eyes. "Fair enough," she concedes, gently placing the breathing mask back down onto the desk. She goes to stand behind his chair, and the way she leans forward on it pushes him forward slightly.
He waits for the inevitable follow-up, but she says nothing. He moves to continue reading from where he'd left off.
"So, where did you live before you came to the Mojave?" she asks suddenly, just as he's started to slip into a much more clinically focused mindset. He's barely able to restrain himself from sighing as he tears his attention away from the screen yet again.
"West of here," he answers simply; most of the time, no one ever cares enough to inquire further than that.
"California?"
"Yeah." Arcade is grateful to settle on such a broad answer. He hears Veronica huff behind him, feels the air ruffle his hair slightly.
"We're all from California. How boring," she whines. She wants to know more about other territories and what things are like outside of the NCR and the Mojave, but not even the travelers she'd meet during her supply runs for the Brotherhood can ever tell her much about what it's like outside of here. Very few portion of them come from the northern states, but too close to the Mojave for the conditions to be as different as she hopes to hear about. An even lesser few are familiar with Caesar's lands, and she always listened to those tales and descriptions with rapt attention.
"I don't think Lilith is," Arcade offers, smoothly taking the opportunity to turn the topic of conversation away from himself.
"No, but she never tells me where specifically. She always says 'east of here'." Arcade laughs openly at Veronica's poor impersonation of the Courier, and receives a light swat on the head. "She's like you."
Arcade shrugs. "I'm sure she has her reasons."
"Oh yeah? And what are yours?"
"You know," he turns around suddenly, "I really need to get through these journals and reports before I decide on how to interact with the sample."
"You're so bad at hiding the fact that you're hiding something," Veronica tells him with a frown. She gives him another small swat on the head.
Arcade only shrugs again.
"Or I've just been reading the same sentence for the past five minutes. But sure, if that's what you want to believe, then believe that. Now, maybe you could go keep Boone company. I think I just saw him go into the kitchen."
Veronica slides a plate of cooling eggs and slightly burnt hash browns across the table before returning to the old – yet amazingly pristine and functional – stove.
"Thanks," Boone says quietly. He picks up the fork and simply holds it there, hovering in the air, unsure of whether he should wait for Veronica to join come him before he begins eating. It would be the polite thing to do, wouldn't it? Especially for someone as good-natured as Veronica, who had immediately offered to make him breakfast for lunch as soon as she'd walked into the kitchen.
He settles for picking at the food, occasionally taking small bites of the surprisingly fluffy yellow egg in an effort to at least appease his growling stomach.
"I've gotta say, I've always found the food up here better than what we have in down the bunker," Veronica muses lightly, pushing the contents of the sizzling pan onto a red plate for herself. She pauses and scrunches her nose, and adds as an afterthought, "Maybe we just have bad cooks."
"You should see the rations they give to soldiers," Boone replies.
Veronica picks up her plate, along with two carefully balanced glasses of cool water, and joins him at the table.
"It's better?" she asks as she settles in and lifts her fork.
"No. Worse."
She pauses in the middle of her first bite and gives him a blank look. "Oh."
Boone waits for her to start eating before he begins steadily shoveling food into his mouth. He makes a sound of appreciation and nods to, silent in his gratitude since his mouth is full.
She watches him, delighted with his never-ending favoritism for her cooking. She isn't all that, she doesn't think, but she can admit that the various tips and tricks she'd learned simply by hanging around the trading post have come in handy time and time again.
It's amazing how tolerant and even amicable people become when provided with a good, warm meal.
"How much worse is 'worse'?" she asks with an amused smile.
"Terrible," Boone says around a mouthful. He grimaces at the memory. "They mostly fed us meat, maybe some staling bread every now and then, but it all tasted like dirt."
"Why meat?" Veronica asks, genuinely curious and pleased with a chance at any form of conversation with the usually quiet sniper. Especially regarding his service in the military, which he's never entirely forthcoming about for reasons she probably can't blame him for. "Protein?"
Boone shrugs, stirring some egg and hash brown together.
"That's what they told us, but we knew better. It's no secret that they have trouble growing vegetables out here. And when they can, most of it goes back into NCR territory. The ration program was pretty shit, or at least it was during the war over the dam. Probably still is."
Veronica blinks. "Wow. Seems like the NCR can't decide on its priorities."
Boone snorts into his glass.
"I don't think you're wrong about that."
They share small grins, something that Veronica relishes in, and then they fall into a comfortable silence, with only the clinks and scrapes of metal utensils against ceramic plates filling the void. In another room, someone turns on a radio, and the calming music of Mojave Music Radio starts drifting softly throughout the suite. It makes them feel lazy, loose, and relaxed.
Boone spares a glance up at Veronica, for no reason in particular, and finds her watching him with her meal temporarily abandoned. There's a question sitting heavily on her tongue, and in her inquisitive grey eyes he can see a debate over whether or not she should venture to ask. His good mood begins to drop almost immediately.
"I wanted to know," Veronica begins finally, and Boone can already feel his muscles tensing up in grim anticipation, "Were you at Helios One?"
That… is not the question he was expecting. He stares at her blankly, bewildered, and taken off-guard.
"Uh," he takes a moment to collect his thoughts, and takes a sip of water to buy time. "No…no, I wasn't."
Veronica's shoulders sag just the slightest bit, and she frowns in barely concealed disappointment. She's always interested in hearing NCR accounts of what happened at Helios One, no matter how bitter most of them tend to be towards the Brotherhood. She finds it interesting to hear the story of something she'd lived through from the opposing side, although she'll never admit that to them.
Living with an ex-NCR soldier (and 1st Recon, at that!) only serves to intensify her curiosity.
"Oh. Okay," she says reluctantly, picking up her fork again. She glances up at him as she stabs at her eggs. "So where were you? At the time, I mean."
"Helios One was in '76, right?" Veronica nods. "My unit wasn't part of that, but we had gotten our orders to head out here. We were getting ready for the war, at that time. The dam was more important than Helios One, so that's where they wanted our focus." He gives her an awkward look, followed by and even more awkward, "Sorry."
"No, you're fine," she waves him off with a small, bitter laugh. "Helios One was a waste of everyone's time, really."
Boone nods, a minute movement that's more out of discomfort than anything, and returns to staring at his plate. His appetite has steadily dwindled in light of the conversation, and he does nothing more than absently push the remaining bits of food around.
"So you fought during the Battle of Hoover Dam, then?" Veronica asks after a few moments of silence, which is not as comfortable as it had been.
Boone doesn't look up at her this time. "Yeah. 1st Recon was an important part of the retreat maneuver at Boulder City."
"I remember that. McNamara wouldn't even let any paladin scouting units out until it was over. Honestly, I think he was hoping the NCR would fail. He's got some serious grudges."
"I can imagine," the sniper replies lamely. Veronica watches him push his food around for a little while longer before she stands and offers to take his dishes.
"I'll wash, you dry?" she suggests to him cheerfully, balancing the plates and glasses in her arms. He simply grabs a small dishtowel and follows her to the sink.
As they clean, he waits for her to speak up again, like she is always prone to do. She looks thoughtful as she scrubs at the first plate, and Boone is certain that she isn't quite finished with their previous conversation. It makes him regret ever opening his mouth in the first place.
"Wasn't 1st Recon also at Bitter Springs, later on?" she asks finally.
And, there it is, there's the dreaded question.
He freezes, face falling and becoming stone-like. His mouth draws tight, until it's nothing but a straight, hard line.
"Yes," he answers quietly.
"And you were there?" If she notices the way his grip on the drying rag and the plate tightens ever so slightly or that he has effectively begun to shut down, she doesn't bother to stop the line of questioning.
"Yes."
She hums sadly. "That must have been awful."
His grip around the plate he's drying tightens more, until his knuckles are nearly white.
"It was," he says, and the small utterance is hard to spit out.
"I've heard so many accounts of what happened," Veronica continues obliviously, setting down the other plate for him to dry. "Bad things about the Khans, bad things about you guys. A lot of pointing fingers. It's hard to know which story is the right one."
"I think we're done here," he quietly, yet resolutely, growls. She finally looks up at him, examines his tense posture and the tight grip with wide eyes.
"Oh, wow, I'm sorry!" she hurries to say, immediately setting down the glass she's washing away at. She reaches out to touch his arm, to give him some sort of comfort or apology, but instantly thinks better of it. "I didn't realize – is that why you left the military?"
Boone sets the plate down on the counter harder than he means to, and Veronica jumps. He lightly grabs her by the arm – willing himself to calm down because she is more or less his friend and despite her prodding, he knows deep down that she means no real harm – and silently leads her out of the kitchen.
She doesn't make a sound of protest – she's too busy worrying over whether or not she's ruined her friendship with the sniper.
Boone stops in the doorway of the rec room, and Veronica turns to him, another apology ready to spill out. He holds up a hand before she can say anything.
"Thank you for lunch," is all he says – a tight grumble, obviously attempting to maintain some sort of composure – before releasing her arm and heading to the elevator. She watches him as he leaves to go wherever he's going, and then turns to the room to face Cass.
The older woman is sitting at the table, had been lightly humming along with the radio and picking at her nails before Veronica had been dragged in. She now simply stares at the younger woman, an equal mix of amusement and confusion playing across her freckled features.
"Hi," Veronica says, giving Cass a small wave. Cass takes pity on the poor, sulking woman; whatever she did to piss off Private Grump, she clearly feels bad about it.
"Hey."
"Are you going to be annoyed with me if I start asking you about your past?"
The caravanner scoffs and rolls her eyes. "Not really. Unlike everyone else that lives here, I've got nothing to hide."
Veronica grins. "Cool. You wanna play checkers?"
Cass smiles, genuinely, in return. She kicks out the other chair from where it had been tucked under the table. It's as open of an invitation as any.
"Sure."