Cort pushed back from the desk, her field of vision starting to go dark. To her it felt like she was looking up from the bottom of a pond she was drowning in, someone dribbling ink into the water as she drifted farther into it, the black closing in from above and below. And whose fault is it if everyone knows about us, you fucking..just...kill her then the robot, she can scream, can't let it get out. We didn't pass many people in the corridor, it's late, and these fucks are pathetic I can take half the fucking ship out, take them all, all of them all dea- She jolted back from the horror she was sliding into as Charon reached over to wrap an arm firmly around her waist, the ghoul tilting his head and sneering down at Vera, his insecurities taking a firm backseat for the moment.

"Oh up yours, you slapjawed old bat, I bet no one's gone after your goods for a fucking decade. It's probably hard to fuck something that won't shut the hell up. Come on Cort, we can bunk down in the Lab. Li wouldn't mind, and we won't have to pay for this overpriced, roach-infested shithole again." Tugging, he bodily steered her out of the room. He had noticed the way her shoulders were pulling back and her rocking up on the balls of her feet, and as a consequence swiftly directed her away from the irritating woman before she could degenerate into another pointless fistfight that would most likely result in him having to maim half of security to prevent them from taking her from him. Fuck, the way her face looks she might've jumped straight to breaking her damn neck.

Allowing herself to be led away as Vera shrieked in outrage, Cort resisted the urge to crumble to the deck and grip her head, her voice coming out strained. "We'll have to make sure to leave everything tidy. She wouldn't like it if we made a mess of things."

"We can do that." Steering her down the corridors and towards the Science Lab, curious heads that had poked out of doorways to see what the noise was about instantly darting back in at the sight of them, he scooped her up against his hip when she faltered on one of the raised bulkhead partitions and continued carrying her until they had reached Li's private quarters.

"My legs work."

"Mine work better." Placing her on the narrow bed, he rapidly peeled her pack and armour away before moving back to secure the doors to both the Lab and the room. He had been more than a little surprised to find both doors open in the first place, finding it an unusually sloppy move for the strict scientist. By the time he got back, Cort had removed Dogmeat's suit and curled up on her side, eyes shut and one arm snugged tightly over the animal. Stripping his own armour and load off, he dropped next to the bed and buried a hand in her hair. "You're pushing yourself too hard."

Opening her eyes, she smiled at him weakly. "No, I'm just...my stomach's upset. That's all."

Charon moved his fingers behind her intact ear, rubbing gently. Her face was pale, the tone of it an almost greenish hue, and he beat down the urge to go back and tear into the Weatherly woman again. Fucking fantastic, now she's making herself sick over this shit. As if today wasn't perfect enough. "Do you want anything?"

"No, just keep doing that. Keep doing what you're doing. I'll be fine in a little while, as long as you keep that up." Cort sighed. "Once I feel...better, we'll head down to the bar and ask around, I don't think Vera will want to answer any questions. I sure as fuck don't want to ask them. I do want to get this out of the way first instead of burning up the morning, just in case we need to go outside again."

"You should go to sleep."

Cort thought about closing her eyes and slipping under. Shuddering at the thought of what she would find there, what she always found there now, she shook her head. If she went to sleep like this and woke up like that, she really would start a massacre, and more importantly, she didn't know if she would be able to let Charon stop her. Oh God, what the hell's happening to me. I really am damaged goods, right royally screwed up in the head. Curling up even tighter, she buried her face against Dogmeat's as she bunched her hands into pained fists, her voice coming out choked and muffled. "Fucking deranged damaged goods."

Cort not elaborating enough to keep him from misunderstanding, Charon tried to think of how to respond to that, wondering what the hell he could say back to her. Some small, completely reprehensible part of him agreed, and he wished he could cut the offending bit out of himself, like removing a bullet from a festering wound. Another part, and this hurt worse than anything, thought it would be a good idea if he steered her towards the insufferable caravan merchant on purpose when she found him again. The normal, obviously attracted to her smoothskin, who was not going to outlive her like badly but adequately preserved rotting meat, and certainly wasn't going to turn her into a weeping pariah. Mentally beating that thought into total oblivion, he went with one of her own arguments, wanting to do something before she whipped herself up into another fit. "Are not. You're perfect."

Cort laughed bitterly. "To you, maybe." She moved her hand far enough to shove it into a pocket, crumpling up the paper in it. Charon decided the noise sounded like someone shoving broken glass in his ears.

"Who the fuck else matters? None of these inconsequential fucks. Nobody else matters, in here or out there." He tugged on her hair a final time, then pushed up off the floor, forcing himself to sound far more confident than he currently felt. "Screw em. Now come on, we'll go get this crap over with, fix the fucking tin can and go the hell home."

"Okay." Snucking back on her nose, Cort sat up and strapped her pistol back onto her left hip when he held it in front of her. "Thank you, but I don't think I'll need that to order a drink with."

Looking at her critically as she stuffed her pockets with caps and then slumped towards the door, one hand working the lever while the other stroked the dog's head, the ghoul thinned his lips and then slung his shotgun over his back before following. One never knew, especially with her.

Belle Bonny turned out to be just as friendly as Cort remembered her to be, which was not at all. Fifty-five and sharp as a broken bottle, the only thing tighter than the bandanna on her head were her lips, unless she was slicing someone apart with them. She used them on her as the trio made their way down the staircase and into the pit of the deserted bar, Dogmeat looking like he was trying to avoid touching his paws to the sticky floor at all costs.

"Oh look, it's Chatty Cathy. Order a drink or get the hell out." Belle narrowed her eyes, looking alternately at Dogmeat and Charon. "And remember to-"

"Yes, I know. Keep the mutt from pissing on the bar." Cort rolled her eyes as the woman's mouth opened again. "Yes, both of them. Christ." Sliding onto a stool, she decided that there was no point in wasting time on pleasantries. They hadn't worked the last time she had come down, asking around for Moira's book project. All she had gotten was overcharged for her drink and then herded back up the stairs by the ape of a bouncer. Dogmeat was currently sitting next to the dark-skinned man, the area around Brock the only clean space on the deck, and the pair were giving each other the exact same 'start shit and your ass is mine' stare. Cort turned back to face Belle as Charon dropped down in the mismatched seat to the right and proceeded to do the same thing with the bartender. Jesus the atmosphere in here is so soothing. How the fuck am I supposed to start this conversation off. It's like trying to get blood out of a Goddamned stone. One that pelts you for trying. "Scotch. Scotch?" She turned to the ghoul, who rolled his eyes and shrugged. "Two scotch."

"Hallelujah. Caps on the bar."

Counting out the money, Cort picked up the glass of liquor and sniffed, then delicately stuck her tongue in it, Belle not seeming to find anything amiss with the behaviour. Nodding to Charon when she found no evidence of bodily functions in it(at least any obvious ones), she went back to her problem. Crankiness aside, having the puzzle to work over was making her feel more like herself, and she considered how to get what she wanted as she sipped at her rotgut. Well, maybe a trade. I've done one stupid errand, I've done them all. She looked up at the bartender as she ran a finger around the edge of the glass, wondering if the smears on it were countless scratches or leftover spittle from a previous patron. Living it up out here. Yup. "Belle, you ever need anything done?"

"I need you to shut up and keep buyin' until you're dyin'. Which you can do outside, unless there's enough cash on your corpse to pay for someone to shift you overboard."

Cort was sensing a theme. Shut up and drink, or get out. Maybe it's as simple as caps on the bar. She drained the glass, gulping down the remaining liquor in one go. "Nother one." Belle grunted and slopped another measure in before she had finished counting out the caps, which she took as a sign of progress. "I'm looking for someone."

"Bully for you."

Encouraged by something that wasn't a direct insult or a directive to go fuck herself, she repeated her previous actions, knocking back another finger of scotch. "Yeah. Someone suggested you were a person who was in the know of where to go." Cort stopped herself from smiling just in time. Heeh. I rhymed. Wow, this shit is potent.

"Somebody needs to keep their mouth shut if they want to keep their tongue."

Damnit. "Nother one." Settling herself in for a long slog, she tried calculating exactly how much she had jammed into her pockets and how far it might get her. Left out of her calculations was the amount of weight she still had to regain, something that was seriously cutting down just exactly how much alcohol she could take. The bar's stock being next door to moonshine didn't help in the slightest. By the time she had her eighth strikeout with Belle, Cort was nearing third and ready to puke on home plate. Wobbling slightly, she nearly fell off her stool when a quiet voice rasped out from beside her.

"Cort."

She blinked, having almost forgotten the ghoul was next to her. He had done nothing for the entire hour but sit and nurse the hell out of his drink, alternately brooding at the wall or at his increasingly inebriated employer. "Hmm?"

"Maybe you should stop with the swill for now." Charon rubbed a hand over his face, Cort having turned around halfway through what he was saying to watch a blonde woman in pigtails trotting down the stairs, quietly talking to herself.

"Hey, it's Trinnie. She's like Nova, 'cept she's stuck in a bottle instead of an inhaler." She turned back, giving him the sodden upset look that only a drunk could have, belatedly realizing that they had done something socially improper. "That wasn't very mannerly of me. Remind me to apologize when the room stops spinning." Letting her eyes wander, she appeared to be following it as it went.

"Cort."

She focused back in on him fully, feeling rather punchy and too happy to move. "What? Look, I'll do what I want, alright? Leave me alone and don't rain on my parade." Sliding a hand into her pocket, she crumpled the paper wedged in it. Mother hen. I'll make it up to him later, but right now there's business to take care of.

Tired, feeling rejected and more than a little petty hearing her manhandle the map again, Charon snorted and retreated into himself. Fine, she can have it her way. I'll fucking pick her up when she keels over and drag her out. Watch me not be sympathetic when she's retching her guts out before morning. Turning as feet started noisily stamping down the stairs, he focused on the three people entering the bar instead, taking comfort out of doing his job and seeing Dogmeat do the same. On face value, they weren't much, standard Wastelander garb, grubby packs and hunting rifles all around. Stupid, slack-jawed and scruffy, if he had wanted to label them with a description. The one in the lead yelled out.

"Hey Belle! Slap them bottles up on the bar, we've got stuff to trade."

Bonny responded instead by crossing her arms and glaring like she was trying to freeze bits of them off. "Be still my cold dead heart, it's the Goddamn Sparkle boys. If it's more roach meat you can shove it up your well-worn asses, Duncan."

"Is that any way to treat the men who just brought in prime 'lurk flesh?"

Charon tuned out as the pair started bartering, Belle snappish and the Wastelander smarmy. One of the other two was approaching Cort. He sat up. One of the other two was touching Cort. And she was smiling. Like she did for him. Like she had for the merchant. Charon shut his eyes, not wanting to see what came next. Fuck.

Ironically, if Cort had made hauling off and decking the grabby bastard her first order of business, the encounter would have been over almost instantly. Charon would have immediately acted instead of wallowing in hurt confusion, Brock would have thrown one or all of them out for security to deal with, and Belle would have dismissed it as a regular, run of the mill evening. As it was, it turned into the biggest bar brawl she had seen in fifteen years(twenty if she discounted the incident with the Brahmin calf. After two decades she still couldn't figure out how the hell that group of herders had gotten it past security, down the stairs, and stone drunk without her noticing. It had gotten back out as a week's worth of patron's meals, since them starting to butcher it was the thing that had finally tipped her off, and she took the carcass in payment for the mess). Right now nothing was getting past her, and there was a lot to keep track of.

Staring into her dirty glass and admiring the colour of the remaining booze in it, Cort's initial reaction to the arm that slid around her was to be pleased and slightly aroused by the way the hand on it was rubbing her side, before she noticed that instead of large, slightly cool and muscular, it was puny, sweaty and gaunt. It was also coming from the wrong direction. Wait, that's not Charon. What... Turning her head and staring up at a mousy-haired, scruffy Wastelander smelling like Mirelurk and at least thirty days from a good bath, she blinked and kept smiling, since he was also. He was also now squeezing uncomfortably close to the base of her right breast. More than a little buzzed and not actually being genuinely molested as of yet, all she did was blink a few times before defaulting into polite diplomacy, the scotch making her sound far more cheerful than she meant to. "Now what do you think you're doing?"

"Just getting acquainted, darlin'. M' Jonah, and these here are my brothers Duncan and Ollie. I haven't seen you here before, you come here often?" He smiled, displaying surprisingly white teeth in a dirty face.

She snorted. "And I suppose you're going to want to discover me like Columbus next. You have any lines that aren't a few hundred years out of date?" Cort rolled her eyes as he leered, for whatever reason encouraged by her response. Christ, this prize is probably encouraged by a girl breathing. "Why don't you sidle on over?" She flicked her hand away from her, making the glaring oversight of not verbally stating that she wanted him away instead of towards, and Charon twisted to lean onto the bar, pressing his glass to the side of his forehead, eyes still clamped firmly shut.

Looking at the way the kid's eyes were hardening up, Belle snapped out again as Brock started moving away from the wall, Ollie moving to crouch down next to Dogmeat, looking like he was trying to make friends and keep himself the hell out of the equation. "Fellas, why don't you see if Trinnie's feeling friendly tonight, huh?"

"You're a nice ol' fella aren't you? I had a pup like you once."

Duncan piped up as Cort started squirming, belatedly realizing that she was effectively trapped against the bar. "Aw Belle, we've all had Trinnie." He looked over to the table where the other woman was sat. " No offense gal, but I want something fresh."

Cort tried friendly one more time. "Come on, please."

Trinnie sneered and made a rude gesture. "I could have said the same thing about you." The blonde reached up to wrap a hand around the neck of a beer bottle as he started moving towards her.

"Let go of me. Now." Charon's eyes popped back open as Dogmeat peered around the man politely scratching his ears.

Belle's eyes narrowed to slits, watching a bad situation get worse. The Vault girl had moved about as far as she could towards the ghoul, who was suddenly looking like he was about to invest himself in the situation, and she would bet her last cap he was going to buy in with lead if the rumours about the pair were true. In her experience, any man that big and that ugly, nevermind that it was a ghoul(maybe in this case especially because it was a ghoul), was possessive as hell once they noticed someone sniffing around their property, and trespassers usually ended up shot. Repeatedly. She briefly wondered why it had taken him that long to pick up on it before dismissing the thought. No, the question she had to figure out the answer to, the only real question, the only one in the fucking world right now was who was going to pop first in tonight's set of rejects. "Jonah, you know I don't stand for shit like that in my bar." She raised her voice further, not turning as she talked to the one making for the tables. "And don't think I can't hear that clunker you call a brain thinking about pulling shit, Duncan."

Ollie(and in Belle's opinion he was the only one with any sense, unfortunately the youngest and having the least amount of clout) stood up. "Shit on a stick, don't you two go and get us thrown out again, Grandma'll have a dang fit when she finds out about it." He threw his hands out, and the dog silently crept past under one of them, making for the bar. "You two are always fuckin' everything up!"

"Shut the fuck up, Ollie." Turning back to Belle, Jonah whined at her and moved his hand north as Cort slapped her own down on the bar, Brock putting one of his on Duncan, and Charon drawing his own into fists as he drew himself up. "Belle, don't be such a hardass. You let shit like the zombie over there in."

"He's not acting like a fucking doped up raider. I mean it, Jonah, Brock will have you out of here in five seconds fla-"

Cort had him out in two, laid out flat on the floor, the side of her Pip-Boy smeared with blood as she snarled down like her dog was from the floor behind her. The remaining three left plenty of time for all hell to break loose.