A/N: Okay, so this is actually chapter 12, not chapter 11, because last night, when I posted this, I actually skipped another chapter by accident. I'm sorry! My dumb author brain was tired and I completely messed up. But I promise that a real new chapter will be added tonight or tomorrow. I'm sorry for the confusion! But, thanks for reading and please review!

Pacer had been scared of the Lucky 38 since he came to Freeside with the King so very long ago. It was always completely locked down, devoid of human life, except for Mr. House, and who knew what the fuck that asshole looked like after all these years. The building stood so much taller than all the others, their ruler, their emperor, reigning silently over the whole city, the entire Wasteland. One could see the 38 for miles, especially at night, an emerging metal orb floating above the glowing casinos. New Vegas offered freedom, but Pacer had never looked at it that way. It was a prison. You could enter, but you'd never leave with what you started. Money, happiness, romance, it would vanish once you stepped onto the Strip. And then you were stuck.

Freeside didn't look so bad after spending a few minutes on the Strip, Pacer thought, putting his hands inside the pockets of his jacket and walking up the black and red walkway to the Lucky 38. The sniper had left maybe twenty minutes ago, Pacer hanging back to make sure that he wouldn't return too quickly. A woman, younger, with short red hair and a cowboy hat leaned against the outside wall, a cigarette between her lips. She glanced at Pacer, eyebrows raised. He remembered seeing her at Old Mormon Fort while Charlie was there, she being one of the few allowed inside Charlie's tent.

"You lost, pal? The casino across the street is open for business. We're membership only, here."

"Are you friends with Charlie?" He asked, lighting a cigarette of his own.

"I think the better question is whether you're friends with her. And if you were you'd be inside already. So get lost, King. Your gate back to Freeside is over there."

"So she's inside?"

"Good detective work, King. I'm surprised you figured it out on your own. And don't think I don't recognize you. You're the sad sack that cried outside of her tent for weeks, popping fixer the whole time. Didn't know the King allows his second-in-command to disappear for that long."

"I do what I want, and I want to talk to Charlie, whether you get out of my way or not."

"I'm not the doorman, go ahead and try. It's armed to annihilate intruders. You thought the securitrons on the Strip were bad, these are worse."

He leaned to grab the door handle, and she dropped her cigarette butt to the ground, pushing him hard in the chest with her hands. Pacer stepped backwards, his boots scraping the sidewalk.

"Fucking moron. It's locked. I don't have time for this. I'm getting a drink and you'd better be gone by the time I get back." She scowled at Pacer and knocked into his shoulder as she walked past.

It was what he needed, carefully extracting the cardkey from her back pocket. Pacer had been pick pocketing before his eighth birthday, and had only gotten better since. The woman didn't notice, which Pacer expected, as she was the one who initiated the physical contact. It was the oldest trick in the book, to distract the target with a bump and then reach into a purse or a pocket and take whatever was available. What a stupid bitch, Pacer murmured victoriously as he popped the card through the key-swiper and the door unlatched with a faint buzz from the other side. Even if Charlie wasn't excited to see him, she could at least recognize his ingenuity.

The Lucky 38 looked like most of the other casinos on the Strip, except for the fact that it was absolutely pristine. The counters were smooth, the carpet plush and the couches spotless. Pacer had never seen anything like it, as though the Great War had not touched this place whatsoever. The air pumped through the vents was cool and sterile. A large elevator filled the center of the space, slot games and card tables dotted along its sides. A bar pushed against one wall, empty of customers but filled with booze and other offerings, as though somebody still kept it stocked. The receptionist's desk was equally desolate. Two securitrons flanked either side of the elevator, and Pacer hoped that they would not leave their posts as he walked further into the room. There were voices coming from the VIP lounge, and Pacer intended to see if Charlie's was amongst them.

"No trespassers are allowed within the Lucky 38. We are authorized to use deadly force. We are warning you, intruder." A robot barked at him.

Pacer put up his hands, ready to argue, ready to show him the cardkey. The securitrons must have a retinal or facial scan they used to determine whom was allowed inside, key or not, because it continued speaking.

"You must leave within the next minute or else I am authorized by my mistress to eradicate all trespassers."

"Charlie! Charlie! Tell them that not to kill me! Charlie, call them off!" Pacer cried upwards, trying to will his voice to reach her.

"You have forty-five seconds to leave, sir. I will count down if it will give you an accurate representation of the time that you have left to live."

"Charlie!" Pacer screamed again, louder, more frightened.

There was a flurry of activity from the VIP lounge, three people peering down at Pacer, two men and Charlie. She looked at him, then to the securitrons, as if deciding whether it'd be easier to let him die in the entrance to her casino.

"Thirty-three, thirty-two, thirty-one, you now have thirty seconds to leave. Twenty-nine. Twenty-eight-"

"Charlotte, please! Christ, Charlie, please!" The voice that he forced from his chest sounded nothing like him, his lungs tightening.

She frowned and shouted into the air, "Yes-Man, please allow this man entrance to the Lucky 38. He is not a trespasser. Stop the attack, please."

Charlie descended the stairway to the left of the VIP lounge, Arcade Gannon at her side, helping her hobble towards Pacer. For a moment, he smiled, for she still felt like his own. An urge to envelope her in his arms overwhelmed him, but Pacer knew that she might rescind her offer of peace if he attempted that. Charlie crossed her arms over her chest, head tilted, watching him closely. She did not approve of his presence, but he was glad that she stood only a few feet away.

"Miss, this man used a key to enter our establishment, one that he purloined from Miss Cassidy. Should I add him to my facial recognition database as to avoid another accident?" The voice came over the loudspeaker, strange but genial. Pacer wasn't sure whom it belonged to.

"I suppose that's alright." She sighed, "Do not issue him his own key, however, Yes-Man. We'll wrap up our business and he will not return, right?"

"Right," Pacer and the man she called Yes-Man replied at the same time.

Like the last time that Pacer saw her, Charlie wore a dress, a pretty deep green that cinched across her waist and flowed away from her body. Its sleeves reached the middle of her forearms, covering most of her wounds. Perhaps that was intentional, Pacer couldn't be sure. She was probably self-conscious about eventually being covered in scars. He didn't care about that. Charlie already had a few before the attack, and she was the still the most beautiful girl Pacer ever saw. Those wonderful coppery curly tresses were tied in a loose braid that hung over her right shoulder. He wished to pull free the black ribbon that held her hair, allowing it to scatter over her shoulders. Then she would truly be the same girl he'd met in the King's School of Impersonation all that time ago.

A passerby wouldn't have known that Charlie nearly died a month ago. She still looked like an angel that some higher power had sent to the Mojave. Pacer's angel.

"I'm sorry. I needed to talk to you, Char. I didn't know how else to find you." Pacer offered, shrugging. "The sniper ran me off at the Old Mormon Fort, or else I would've waited for you."

"Give me the card key back, Pacer." She stuck her pale hand out, the silver ring on her left middle finger glittering in the fluorescent light.

Charlie turned back to her friends, the ghoul and Gannon, who cast a disgusted look Pacer's way. He didn't care. Arcade was an asshole, one that Charlie shouldn't associate with.

"Arc, can you wait in my room? I'll be up in a little while. Raul, would you mind heading over to Gomorrah to give this back to Cass? She's always at the Brimstone this time of day. Tell her not to worry about losing it, I'm taking care of it. We'll resume the caravan game later."

"Sure, sweetheart." Raul, the ghoul, murmured comfortingly. Arcade nodded and retreated towards the elevator, still glaring at Pacer.

She waited until they were gone before speaking to Pacer again.

"I cannot believe you, Pacer. Are you really so stupid?"

"I guess so."

Charlie pointed towards the lounge, sighing. "Come on, it's more private up there. I'm going to need your arm to climb the stairs though. I'm still a little stiff."

"Sure thing, Char."

Her hand gently clasped his wrist, their skin touching for the first time in many months. Pacer remembered the smooth calluses on her fingers, which were part of traveling the Mojave Wasteland. Trying not to think about how easy it would be to pull her face forward and press his lips against hers, he looked down. Underneath the emerald fabric of the dress, her left shin bore an unruly cut that wrapped around the back of her knee. That must be the source of the limp, Pacer figured, though Charlie was in remarkably good condition, barely needing Pacer's help.

"How are you feeling?" He asked, sitting her down in own of the high-backed leather chairs.

"Not as bad as I would've thought. Arcade says that I should be using three syringes of med-x a day, but I'm trying to heal cold turkey. It's been going well."

"Good to hear."

"But you didn't come to ask about my injuries. You wouldn't have broken in for just that."

"You don't know that, Char. I was worried."

His skin was itching terribly, but Pacer tucked his fingertips around a cap that somebody had left on the table. The only way to stop the side effects was to distract himself. Arcade was always saying that, and now, in Charlie's presence, Pacer was willing to listen. The reason why he always itched so bad on jet was because the drug crystallized under the skin, or at least, that's what Arcade also told him.

"Are you high right now?"

"No, I'm not." He raked his nails across his scalp for some quick relief. There were already scratches underneath his hair from doing just that a few days ago.

"Pacer." Her tone was stern. "Forget it. I don't know why I asked."

"I took a decent amount of fixer. I didn't want to see you off my mind but I couldn't come in the throws of withdrawal, either."

"Okay."

Her hand sat on the table, the left one, with the ring, and he took it in his, expecting Charlie to snatch it back as soon as their fingers linked. She didn't, as if she knew that it was important for her to stay. Pacer's heart leapt, but not in the painful manner he'd become accustomed to.

"Pacer, why are you here?" It was tender, and he smiled as she asked.

"Charlie, would you believe me if I told you that I dream about you every time I sleep?"

"So every three days then? When you come down?" Charlie didn't say it as nastily as she could have, her face still settling into disapproval.

"If you want to be technical, yes. I have the same dream. You're always the star."

"I dream about you sometimes. When it happens, I sit awake until morning." Charlie admitted. "Not that a whole night of sleep occurs very often."

"I remember that."

"You came here to talk about our sleeping habits?"

"No, but it's part of it. In the dream, there's a party at the School and you're onstage, singing. You dedicate the song to me when you're finished, and walk off, towards the back of the room, where I am. I can't move, but I want to meet up in the middle. The band has started to play again, and when you reach me, you're crying. Charlie, you kiss my cheek and wish me peace. I'm dead, in my coffin. It's my funeral that everyone's celebrating, but you're mourning. Everyone else has champagne and they're happy, but you are the only one that is sad."

"You've alienated a lot of people." She frowned, and then shook her head, "But I would be upset if you… well, you know. I wouldn't be the only one though."

"I know." Pacer tightened his grip, squeezing her hand. "I went to the Old Mormon Fort a while ago, to get my regular dose of fixer. Arcade is my doctor. The Followers have a rule, in order for an addict to get a prescription of fixer; they have to be examined first. We both hate the rule, Arcade and me, but he did it, like always, weighing me and measuring me and checking out my lungs and stuff."

"Your lungs are bad. I remember waking up to a cacophony of coughs in the morning." Charlie commented, taking a sip of water from a glass on the table.

"Yeah. Arcade constantly warns me about it. But anyway, something was different that day, and he made me go to New Vegas Medical. They have an x-ray machine there. They showed me pictures of my heart, and he and the doctor there, some lady, they both said that I have holes in my heart from using jet. There's nothing they can do. No surgery, no medicine, nothing."

Charlie withdrew her hand from his and put it to her mouth, closing her eyes. Pacer saw that before, when she first confronted him about his habit. "There must be something. Christ Pacer, what are you saying?"

"I'm dying. That's what I've been trying to tell you."

She pushed her seat back, standing suddenly. The glass of water skidded across the table, falling over, but neither of them reached to fix it. Charlie pointed her right index finger at him, shaking her head. "No, you did not come here to tell me that. You are not dying, Pacer. Tell me you are not dying."

"Charlie, stop."

"No, Pacer, no. I refuse to believe it. What did they say? Tell me exactly what Arcade told you."

"He can't fix it."

"But you can sure as hell stop it from getting worse, right? Fuck you, Pacer, fuck you." She shouted, her eyes filled with tears. "You came here to make me feel guilty for leaving."

"I didn't. I swear it."

"Well, I do, so good for you, Pace. I have always felt terrible for leaving and now I always will. I loved you. I loved you and you didn't care. I was never important enough for you, not until I left. The jet is your first love, and I was just pretending otherwise."

She picked up the glass from the table and threw it, shattering it across the carpet. "Charlie, stop." Pacer pleaded, grabbing her wrists and pulling her into his torso. "Stop it."

There was a loud click behind them, and they both turned to look. The sniper stood on the top stair, rifle pointed directly at Pacer's head.