Dawn was breaking as The Courier and her companions were approaching Boulder City and with the brightening of the sky, The Courier's own disposition brightened too. She wouldn't say she was afraid of the dark, because darkness alone could never do anything to harm her. It was however a natural ally to those who wished to unleash a darkness of their own into the world and that was a concern she knew she was justified in having. She had, after all, used it's shrouding qualities herself in the past, concealing activities that she was sure if she ever recalled aloud would cause the moon to recoil from the night sky in horror and never grace her with a glimmer of it's light again.
Most times The Courier felt that that was no less than what she deserved but there was a part of her that knew she deserved a second chance. A chance to become who she could have been; who she would have been had fate not decided to screw her over. Everyday she fought to recapture the person she was before...before things changed. All the anger and regret and bitterness that lived inside her battled each other daily for the chance to be the overriding emotion that propelled her forward through life but she fought them all so that maybe one day a sliver of contentment may find a crack to seep through and settle in her soul. Some days she even felt she was winning the war and that's what gave her the will to keep going.
Even when fate decided to put a bullet in her brain.
"Can't kill a bad thing," she muttered to herself.
"What?" came the unexpected response from her companion beside her. Boone was so quiet and The Courier so lost in her thoughts, she had momentarily forgotten he was traveling beside her. "Oh, nothing, just talking to myself."
"Right," said Boone before continuing, "We're coming into Boulder City now, that building ahead should be a saloon, maybe you'll find who you are looking for in there."
"Yeah, or at least get some information," replied The Courier before a low menacing growl from Rex caused her to draw her pistol holstered at her hip and crouch down in response. What is it boy?" she asked while frantically looking around before noticing an NCR soldier standing ahead of them by a big upright slab of stone.
The Courier exhaled a breath she didn't realise she was holding. Rex's barks so often forewarned of danger, her body tensing for action was an almost automatic response by now.
"It's NCR," said Boone, who hadn't reacted at all to The Courier's movements.
"I can see that," she replied as she moved to stand up dusting imaginary dirt off herself in the process. "We were just checking to see that our reaction times are still good...you know, if it were danger. It's just a game we like to play sometimes."
"Yeah," Boone grunted as he walked off toward the soldier.
"Think we got away with it, boy?" The Courier whispered to Rex, to which he whined in response. "No, me neither. Come on lets go see what the soldier boys are talking about."
"This is Private Kowalski" Boone told The Courier as she approached the two men. "He lost his brother at the battle for Hoover Dam."
"You come to pay your respects?" the Private asked her pointing to the memorial beside him.
"To a slab of stone?" she replied arching an eyebrow.
"This stone is a memorial that commemorates all the good men and women of the NCR who gave their lives here so we may be free of Caesar."
"Well I'm glad it doesn't commemorate the bad ones."
"You tryin' to be funny?"
"No, I'm not the funny kind"
"Easy to tell you didn't lose any family or friends in the NCR anyway."
"No, just non NCR family and friends."
"Well I assure you the NCR would have done everything in their power to protect them."
"Well I assure you they didn't. They did fucking nothing! In fact they were worse than useless."
The Courier could feel the anger build up inside her as she fought to remain calm and civil to Kowalski. It appeared the Private was fighting a similar battle only less successfully as he lunged towards her grabbing her by the throat.
"How dare you shit all over the good name of the NCR," he shouted at her. "My brother didn't die for assholes like you!"
The Courier caught by surprise and struggling for breath just threw her fists about hoping to land a punch somewhere that would hurt. She failed however, to do anything but anger him further and he turned them both around and slammed her back into the monument. A sharp pain shot down her spine followed by one radiating through her skull as her head crashed against the stone. Stunned, she was powerless to do anything as Kowalski drew back his arm ready to strike her. But just before his fist made contact with The Courier's face, Kowalski's body dropped lifeless to the ground and in his place stood Boone with the butt of his rifle where the Private's head previously was. Rex was now snarling ferociously standing over Kowalski's prone body.
The Courier slowly slid her back down the monument until her ass hit the ground. Sitting there, she wrapped her arms around her knees and tucked her head in between them to give herself a moment to go over what had just happened.
That had gotten way out of hand.
For a moment there she had been transported to a different time and the anger and resentment she had felt towards the NCR came back with her to the present. She lost control for the first time in a long time and she wasn't sure why. Her feelings toward the NCR had mellowed a lot since then.
"Can you get your dog away from him?" Boone's voice drew The Courier out of her thoughts, something she wasn't entirely ungrateful for. She called Rex and he left Kowalski and sat by her side.
"Is he dead?" she asked Boone.
"No just unconscious. There shouldn't be any lasting damage from where I hit him. You have a stimpak?"
"Uh yeah I think so. You gonna bring him to?"
"No. We need to be gone when he wakes up. Your dog bit his leg. It needs a stimpak."
The Courier handed Boone a stimpak from her bag and he fixed up Kowalski's leg. Once done, Boone discarded the empty syringe and without looking at The Courier told her to "Come on," as he walked away.
"That's alright I don't need a hand up or anything," The Courier shouted after him, rushing to get up while ignoring the ache in her head and back.
"I've done enough for you," he replied as she caught up to him.
"Great he's pissed," The Courier thought to herself, before seeing that they were walking away from the saloon.
"Aren't we supposed to be going into that saloon?" she asked Boone.
"Too dangerous. The barman's likely to be aligned with the NCR, he'll attack us if he saw what happened."
"Well, where are we going, then?"
"There's smoke up ahead, so there's a fire. So probably people."
"Right. Yeah, obviously. Shit that bang on my head has really messed up my senses."
"Looks to be more NCR ahead. Is that going to be okay with you?"
"Yeah, of course. Look Boone what happened back there-"
"Not now. We need to keep moving."
The Courier and Boone came to what looked to The Courier like a makeshift wall put in place to either keep something in or something out. There was a single NCR soldier standing guarding the way in, a ham radio on a table beside him. The Courier was going to start asking questions when the soldier spoke first.
"I'm Lieutenant Monroe. We have a situation with some Great Khans right now. The ruins are on lock down until it's been resolved."
"Great Khans?" The Courier asked, "What happened?"
"One of my patrols was on it's way back from Novac when it came under fire from some Great Khans. They chased the Khans into the ruins and now they have two of my soldiers hostage."
"They may be the Khans I'm looking for," The Courier said to Boone before turning to Monroe, "I think they have something of mine- a Platinum Chip. Was there a guy wearing a checkered suit with them?"
"I have no knowledge of anyone else being with the Khans but once they have been killed or captured you're welcome to retrieve any property they have taken from you."
"Right, except I need answers from them and dead people tend not to be so talkative. Maybe I can make a deal with them- they let your guys go, you let them go, I get my answers- everyone's happy."
"Normally, I'd turn you down since I have no idea who you are but considering the hostages are as good as dead when we attack and you have a 1st Recon guy with you, you can have your chance. Their leader is a man named Jessup, he's holed up in a building down the end on your left."
"Jessup, got it!"
"If we hear shooting we'll be coming in but it'll probably be too late for you."
"That's all right I can take care of myself."
The Courier gave Monroe her thanks as he stood aside to allow her access to the door. Opening it, she noticed Boone hadn't moved to accompany her.
"You not coming?" she asked.
"They see me coming towards them, they'll attack when they see my beret."
"So take the damn hat off."
Boone seemed to consider the idea but made no move to remove his beret. This guy had more issues than The Courier gave him credit for if removing an item of headgear was this big an issue for him. Exasperated at her companion's non decision, The Courier threw her hands in the air in defeat, "Never mind, I can sort this myself." And with that, she made her way across the rubble to the Great Khan's hideout.
"All right, let's do this?" The Courier said to herself as she put her hand on the door handle to the Khan hideout.
"Yeah" came a response from behind her. The Courier looked around to see Boone sans beret standing behind her.
"Go ahead," he said "I got your back"
The Courier smiled at him and opened the door.
Inside two Khan's were waiting behind a counter, guns pointed towards the intruders.
"Who the fuck are-" the guy with the bandana stopped mid sentence and lowered his gun, staring at The Courier.
"You look like you've seen a ghost, Jessup. It is Jessup, right?"
"You're that courier Benny wasted back in Goodsprings. You're supposed to be dead."
"I got better."
"And here I thought us Great Khans were tough to kill. So what happens now?"
"Well, I've a few questions. You know the usual kind- Why did you try kill me, where's my would be killer now and where's the platinum chip?"
"Don't have it, Benny stole it right before he stabbed us in the back. He's probably back at the Strip by now laughing at me."
"Yeah, you and me both."
"Why he wanted to kill you for it, I don't know. Just a fancy chip as far as I can tell."
"All right, well that's my questions answered but you and I have another problem now. We need to sort something out between you and the NCR. I suggest you let the hostages go."
"Why would we do that?"
"Because if you don't the NCR will attack and there's more of them than you. And if I have to choose a side, it ain't going to be yours."
"So what, we die or surrender?"
"No you let the hostages go and the NCR let you go. Simple"
"I can't believe I'm agreeing to this but I guess I don't have much of a choice."
"No, you don't. Once the hostages are out, the NCR will leave the area and you can go."
"Fine."
"Okay, no need to thank me for your freedom, or for not taking your life."
With that parting sentence The Courier and her companions left to speak again with Lieutenant Monroe, who was just finishing up a conversation on the ham radio as they neared him.
"What's the situation with the hostages?" he asked.
"They should be released shortly, if the Khan's stick to their word," the Courier replied and just on queue the soldiers came through the door.
"I'm glad you got the hostages free but I've just gotten orders to take out the Khans, hostages or not.
"Are you fucking kidding me? You made a deal."
"My hands are tied. I can't go against orders...can I? "
"If you care about what's right and wrong you can. You have a mind of your own, use it!" The Courier said, her voice pleading with the lieutenant to see sense.
"You're right. The Great Khans are free to go." said Monroe before shouting at his men to move out.
The Courier breathed a sigh of relief. Commonsense had prevailed, an unusual happening for the Wasteland.
"We ready to go too?" she asked Boone.
"Yeah. Like I said, I don't want to be here when that Private wakes up."
"Oh yeah, about that...that won't happen again. I know the whole thing was mostly my fault."
Boone nodded slowly before asking, "They let down your family?"
"No, not my family, it was a different time...different everything" The Courier halfheartedly explained. It was something she didn't want to go into with Boone. In fact she was sure if she did go into it with him, the most likely outcome would be another bullet to her brain courtesy of her companion.
"I don't work for the NCR anymore but I am still NCR. You understand?" said Boone.
"I understand," The Courier replied.
And she did understand. No more fights with the NCR and definitely no more letting emotions from her past leak through to the present. She knew that she had to leave her emotions and everything else from the past, in the past. At least until it was time to act upon them. And that time hadn't yet arrived.