Games We Play: Gossip
Notes: Everything belongs to Bethesda and Obsidian, I'm just playing with their toys.
gossip
noun
casual or unconstrained conversation or reports about other people, typically involving details that are not confirmed as being true
Deacon's not sure how many days he loses in Covenant. The weather turns bad again and he uses this as an excuse to stay inside with Charmer, languidly surveying the contours of her legs, the curve of her breasts, the hollow of her collarbone in which his nose fits perfectly. He charts the white stretch marks on her thighs, a vestige from the childbirth that, to her, was less than a year ago. He unearths a line of freckles that zigzag down her back and kisses each one. It could be three days; it could be a week. The air inside the guesthouse is heavy with the scent of sex and the intimacy of shared secrets.
Telling the truth is its own kind of drug, he discovers. After so many years of casual dishonesty, the thrill of lying is gone, though the habit still remains. More than once he answers a question or begins telling an untruth and has to backtrack, to start over, to think hard about what's real and what isn't and begin again. Charmer's patient with him - he never knew she could be so accommodating - and eventually he finds himself unloading things he never thought he'd tell to another person.
Tangled in soft white sheets, he tells her about his time in the Institute, the first twenty-three years of his life, and in telling finds he can forget it; things that weighed on him, that made him feel old and tired are lighter now, with two minds to carry them. His childhood below, the things he saw, the things he participated in - they don't seem to faze her, and Charmer accepts them all with understanding and gentle kisses.
Someone once said the truth will set you free. For the first time, he realizes now the wisdom of that.
Except for Barbara - she's the one thing he doesn't touch, the one truth he doesn't even approach. Her ghost lingers, her beloved and confounding memory a specter he can't share. So far as Charmer knows, his wife was killed by the Deathclaws and her body burned in a fire. He find he hopes to keep it that way.
Deacon doesn't regret it, but he also can't admit what he's done. Not to her, not out loud. That would make it real, more than a dim and violent memory.
His arm wrapped around Charmer's narrow shoulders, he tells her instead of how he was recruited for the SRB at a young age, when Father discovered his knack for picking up on behavior, clothing styles, speech tics. He has helped program the coursers, teaching them how to appear more human for a pilot program that seems to have ended, probably when he left. As she kisses his chest, her lips moving between old scars and graying tufts of hair, he explains about how he escaped, bribing Liam Binet to send him through using the relay. The kid had always had a kind nature. He stops speaking - stops thinking entirely - when her mouth moves lower.
He's been with other women, of course. Just because his wife is gone doesn't mean he's been a monk for the last twenty years. There's always some girl interested, usually a new agent who only sees the romance of the Railroad, the thrill of risking their neck to help another person and not the day-to-day drudgery of sloshing through sewers and the terror of being caught. Once they realize the harshness of this life and as their passion for fighting the good fight wanes, so does his attraction.
But it's never been like this. He's not sure it was even like this with her, so many years ago. It felt like it, the days slipping by, lost in a voluptuous labyrinth of sex. But this is different, maybe because he's older or maybe because he understands how precarious the whole thing is.
The day that he wakes and finds her preparing to leave is sunny and cold. The warm spell has broken - winter is making a brief comeback before spring claims the year - and when she opens the window to let some fresh air in, the breeze wakes Deacon with a shiver.
Charmer is fully dressed, for the first time in a week, or is it a lifetime? Deacon stretches in the bed, patting the mattress next to him, and she walks over, her hips swaying, to sit next to him.
Her face is sad; it makes him sad to see it.
"Do you have to go?" Under the sheet he's completely naked and it feels wrong for her to be dressed when he's not. For the first time since he took his sunglasses off days ago, he feels vulnerable.
A nod from her. She sets her jaw, and then she tells him something he doesn't like.
"I have to go meet a courser. I - I need to go to Libertalia, out on Nahant, and help bring a rogue synth back to the Institute. Apparently after he was...rescued - well, now he's in charge of some raider gang."
Is he imagining it, or will she not look him in the eye?
The sarcastic bastard in his head, the one that doubts everything and everyone, pipes up before he can stop himself. "Is that why you had so many questions about the SRB? So you could take all that information and use it now?"
He knows as soon as he's spoken that he made a mistake; before the words are even quiet in the air, he wants to apologize, but it's too late. The look on her face couldn't be more stricken if he'd slapped her. Her eyes go wide, her mouth disappearing into a tiny O near her chin. She's stunned.
She's hurt.
"I'm just...Desdemona said -" She stops, stands. A pink blush spreads over her cheeks and this time he hates it, hates himself for his part in it. The look she gives him is like ice. "If you think this was just about...pumping you for information -" She gestures at him, still naked under the sheet. She crosses the room, grabbing her pack from the floor, and opens the door.
"She told me I might have to prove myself to them, to earn their trust. This is how I can do that, much as you might not like it." She heaves a sigh and he wants nothing more than to cross to her, to hold her and apologize, but she's already out the door.
"You had nothing to do with it. This...this was special."
The door swings shut behind her with a loud crack. The air is noticeably cooler, although Deacon isn't sure if it's from the air outside or the intense loathing he now feels for himself. He scrounges around the floor for his sunglasses and puts them back on as he searches for his clothes and kicks himself.
He tracks her east towards the coast. Just because he fucked everything up before it could really begin is no reason Charmer shouldn't have an extra set of eyes watching her back.
She spends the night in County Crossing; Deacon backtracks to the National Guard Training Yard kills a couple of ferals that have infested an old bus. He sleeps on the bus, shivering without a fire and kicking himself for always expecting the worst from people.
For expecting the worst from her, despite everything he knows to the contrary.
The nightmares pay him a visit again, only this time it's not Barbara he kills with the bat; it's Charmer's body he pulverizes and lights on fire.
Wonder what old-world psychiatrists would make of that, he teases himself cruelly the next day. He tracks her to Revere Beach and then north, around the bay, into Nahant. She encounters some trouble, but he stays back and watches her take care of herself; she's better at shooting things until they stay down than he is, anyway.
The courser she meets is a black man in dark glasses. If the sunglasses make her think of him, she doesn't show it. She's Charmer again - both irreverent and business-like, and she and the courser load their weapons and head into the floating raider den. Deacon debates going in after them but in the end gives up. With a courser at her back she'll probably be fine, and he should probably report in to HQ again. Desdemona tends to worry.
The crypt beneath the church is the same as always: dank and candle-lit with an aroma of decay and unwashed socks. When you put so many agents in a cramped space with no place to shower, they're bound to get a little ripe. By this time, he's mellow, relaxed by the bottle of gin he purchased in a quick detour to Goodneighbor. The smell doesn't bother him, or the closeness of too many people in too small a space.
As always, Desdemona paces the tomb like a lion - or, at least, like the holotapes of the big cats he saw on that trip to the library. Her concerned expression lightens when she sees him approach. He takes a tentative sniff of his breath behind his hand and deems that it doesn't smell too strongly of booze and approaches her, lighting a cigarette as he goes. The smell of tobacco makes a perfect mask for the smell of gin, and when he offers her one he sees the hint of a smile cross her lips.
"Deacon," she greets him as she always does, without an actual greeting, just his name. She certainly has a flair for the dramatic, he thinks as she lights the proffered cigarette, exhaling the smoke towards the cavernous ceiling.
"Yeah, boss?" He hopes he sounds like himself; he hopes he doesn't sound too drunk, or heartbroken. His mind drifts to the clear bottle in his pack, and it takes some work to refocus his attention on her.
"Chasing ghosts again?" The half-smile lingers. She has no idea how right she is.
He forces a laugh that he hopes sounds casual, genuine. A week in Covenant and it's like he's forgotten how to lie.
"You could say that," he says. "Took a while for Charmer to make it back to the surface. Turns out she's got some sort of loyalty test for the Institute. There's - well, there was a synth out in Nahant that went full raider."
"Jesus," Desdemona exhales a plume of smoke as she curses. "One of ours?"
Deacon nods. "Sounds like it."
"What happened?"
He knew she was going to ask this. He always has the answers and this once - well, he doesn't.
"Not sure," he admits, earning a raised eyebrow and a chuckle from her. It would hurt more, but he knows when he's done he can go find a bed to crash in and drink until it all melts away. "She had to meet up with a courser and I thought it best if I made myself scarce. Probably they were successful, though."
Desdemona nods thoughtfully; her hair gleams in the flickering lights. Although she's got to be as old as he is, she doesn't have a gray hair on her head. Curious.
"I did tell her to do whatever was necessary to get in good with them. It's the only way she'll be able to reach Patriot." With her voice so low, it's clear Des isn't speaking to him but is thinking out loud. It's one of her quirks, albeit less obnoxious than when she sings showtunes late at night.
"Well," this is louder and more likely directed to him. "While we wait for her to get back, I need you to run a mission for me. I was hoping to send Charmer with you, but it looks like Glory will have to go in her place, since we don't know how long it'll be and this needs to be done now."
"What's the deal?" Anything, he thinks. Anything that'll get him out of here and away, so he's not just waiting for a woman who hates him.
"Randolph Safehouse reached out."
"Randolph? I thought they were gone, wiped off the map."
Again the ghost of a smile flits across his boss's face. "Exactly."
"When should we leave?"
"How's about tomorrow?" She crushes her cigarette out in the ashtray before her. Deacon follows suit, intensely grateful for the chance to leave the church, to get out in the fresh air and try to forget.
"Sounds good. I'll let Glory know to get ready."
Traveling with Glory is familiar, and safe. Due to his unique position within the Railroad, Deacon is one of the few people to know most of the agents, but Glory is probably the only real friend he has in the organization. It's a relief to be out with her and not someone new, someone who might want to chat or ask too many questions.
Glory knows by now not to ask him anything unless she feels like hearing a tall tale, and she seems to respect his commitment to his craft. At least, that's what Deacon tells himself as they trek north, to East Boston Prep - the former Randolph Safehouse.
"So what's going on with you and Charmer?"
"What d'ya mean?" He steps over a piece of rusted metal in the road. Pretends to be surprised and confused by the question.
"Well, I heard some of the runners talking. Drummer Boy heard from Hermes that you two shared a moment back at New Year's." She's looking off in the distance but Deacon can hear the smile in her voice. She sounds a bit like the cat the ate the canary, whatever that is.
It kills Deacon to laugh, but he does, infusing it with as much derision as he can muster. "I wouldn't buy it if I were you. Hermes had a little too much to drink that night. I heard him talking about bare-knuckle boxing a deathclaw, too."
Glory snickers at this and for a minute, Deacon thinks he's in the clear. "Cut the crap, man. You and I both know there's something going on there."
Oh. So she wasn't laughing at what he said, she was laughing at him.
He debates lying, spinning a web of bullshit that'll put her thoughts back where they belong - on watching for dangers on the road - and instead gives it up. He's broken the habit of lying just to do it, just to practice.
"Alright, there might be." Well, maybe it's not entirely broken.
Glory's laugh is real this time, no half-measures; it's bold and congratulatory. "Nice, man. Did you hit it?"
He gapes at her. He's heard rumors, of course, of the people Glory's bedded - few women say no to her, apparently - but they've never spoken so baldly about a specific person before. And not about someone he...cares for.
But he must be taking too long to formulate a good answer, because Glory laughs again.
"Silence means yes."
"Maybe," he croaks, wondering when everything became so complicated.
"Maybe means yes," she crows.
"So that's why you took so long to come back to HQ. We were all taking bets on it."
This surprises him. "Really? Who won?"
"Depends on what you mean by 'winning.' Drummer Boy's the one who said you might hook up with Charmer, but he bet you got your ass kicked by a mirelurk. Carrington got closest, I guess. He bet you were shacked up with some girl."
Carrington. That clever, snide bastard. At this, even Deacon laughs.
They walk for a while. It's quiet around them, except for a sea bird flying overhead, cawing. They must be nearing the beach.
"You're not going to tell anyone, are you?"
Glory snorts. "'Course not. Not till you're ready."
Relief washes over him in a wave. "Thank you."
"But once you come out with it, oh man, are we gonna torture you."