The Courier's combat boots echoed through the mausoleum of steel and reinforced concrete, bouncing around the confines of the titanic silo, building, growing, until they resembled the footsteps of a god made flesh. It's shadow trailed after it, bobbing up and down through the air, a machine that followed in the messengers footsteps like a dog followed its master. This messenger was in very little hurry, it seemed, to deliver its message. It's footfalls fell ever closer, the predatory gait of an animal approaching what might be a fight, or a feast.
Ulysses could not tell whether it was bringing a message for him, or whether it was going to receive one from him. Perhaps, if the words they had exchanged up until now had been any indication, it would be both.
And so he waited, staring at the Giant of the Old World that rested before him, right on the very precipice of awakening. The harsh metallic peel sounded, metal on metal, the yawn of the giants awakening from their two-hundred-year slumber. Light blossomed from above as the silo doors scrapped open. Message, ready for delivery.
The footsteps clattered to a stop behind him, and an irreverent whistle cut above the sound of the wind, far above. "Put that monster back in yer pants Uly, 'fore you hurt yerself with it."
"So you came, Courier," Ulysses intoned, turning to face his teacher. The man who showed him, albeit unknowingly, the why of things. "To what? Watch your homeland burn one last time? Kill me, perhaps? Judging by your shadow maybe you can't let your machine go. Doesn't matter now, either way, the Divide Giants are awakening. The missiles here, on their way home. There is no way to stop them."
The Courier laughed, the sound reverberating around his Temple like thunder. He had removed his helmet for the confrontation, which was giving the signs of being one of words rather than violence. Ulysses should have known which weapons the Courier preferred.
This man was more cunning than Vulpes, more savage than Lanius, hardier than Graham.
Perhaps even wiser to the lessons of history than Ulysses himself.
With all of this, the weapon he chose to use were his words. Ulysses understood that power. The power Caesar also held. The ability to speak the world into being around you, words falling like commandments from history, reshaping all they touched. Those words were the only reason he had not already set the Giants into immediate motion, to spread their message, his message, loose upon the West. He wanted to hear more of the why, from this mysterious Shamans own lips.
"Came here to see what it was ye were wantin', lad," the Courier professed in a strong voice, his words amplified by the roof above them.
"Found out it were me. So then I stayed to find out the why of it, just like ye. For four years now, the spirits 'ave been testin' me, lyin' to me, kickin' me and abusin' me. Turnin' my luck sour. Never knew why," the Courier sighed, heavily.
"Til now. I didn't know. Nobody here crossed me, nor the spirits I serve. Nor did the spirits they served seek to fight me an' mine. None o' this was planned, is what I'm tryin' to say."
Six fixed his gaze on Ulysses, steel grey eyes locking with Ulysses' brown in an exchange without words, with no sound other than the fading echoes of his words. Until he spoke again.
"Won't find what yer lookin' for down this road Uly. Better to turn 'round, walk away. Better places to lay down that flag on yer back than this. Better hills to die on."
"No," Ulysses said, "Now there is purpose. I believe you when you say you were… careless. The Divide, the Chip, the Machine you brought here. Many messages can be taken from that, intended or not. What I do now is an act of conviction."
"No, Uly. It ain't. It's the act o' a man who got taught a lesson but didn't understand what it meant. I don't know if ye blame me still for what happened here, but my luck ain't sour no more, an' that means the Spirits 'ave forgiven me. If I walk away with just that much, walkin' this Road was worth the trouble. The reason why I'm still here: Ye gave me the answers I were lookin' for. Only currency ye have. An' for that, I'll be givin' ye yer answers. Whether ye want them or not."
Ulysses snorted through the gas mask, as a small part of himself stilled at the prospect of answers. But he couldn't let go of his cynicism, the lessons history taught him. If the Courier had any wisdom to impart, then he would have to work to do so. False wisdom was worse than true ignorance.
"Blame you? No. Learned from you. Both the weapon to kill a nation, and the strength to do it. You showed me a road, a way to carry my message. You've already answered for what you've done. Now the flag you follow will answer for it."
His head cocked to the side in confusion, grey hair slipping off his shoulder. "What're ye on about? My flag, Uly? An' what flag would that be? Are ye gonna bomb the Mojave, is that it now? An' so what if ye do? Won't prove nothin'. This fight is between ye an' me."
"No," the denial came once again, "The paths we've walked, the Roads and the flags above them carry equal the blame. You walked the West, didn't stay. You know the reason. The Bear grows without structure, follows a symbol without knowing it's history. After this, only one flag will remain over the Mojave. Let that one fly or destroy itself."
"Sure, not enough giants here to kill the Bear, Uly. It may have lost it's spirit, but the flesh is still strong. Stronger than bombs, stronger than bullets."
"Hmm…no need to destroy the bear; just cut it's throat. You taught me that at the Divide. Only need to cut off the supply line, the Road, to watch something greater die. I'll turn the Long 15 into miles of fire, cut off the Mojave. NCR will fall back, loose Hoover Dam, and leave their throat exposed to the Legion."
The Courier nodded slowly, mulling over the plan with all the careful deliberation that was available to a man as old and as well travelled as he. The plan would work. NCR had banked heavily on the fortifications around Hoover Dam and Vegas. Their supply lines were over-extended, the populace demoralised by a war that seemed never to end. And the Bull had what the Bear lacked: A Spirit of Rage.
Mars was a spirit of war, of anger and retribution for the crime of living a truth not it's own. NCR was fat, slothful. It's people cared more for safety and comfort than war or supremacy. Made them peaceful, and prosperous. It also made them no match for the Legion when the advantage of numbers and technology was taken away. He had seen NCR go up against Legionnaires. The difference between soldiers that lived for killing, and those that lived for living, was written on the walls in blood. When tricks like the ambush at Boulder City went out the door, it was obvious to see.
"So fuck 'em all, then? Burn down the Bear? Wait 'til the Bull reaches the end o' it's Road, and with no more lands left to conquer, turn on itself? Those flags still have their parts to play, Uly. You might not be thinkin' so, but I do."
Ulysses paused, weighing this in surprise against what he knew of the Courier. A part, they had to play. False wisdom it was then. His voice was harsh as he replied, dripping with venom and disdain.
"Yet you follow nothing at all. You have walked the Mojave, let the shadow of the flags fall upon you, yet walk carelessly, no allegiance. Your words empty as your actions."
Ulysses realised too late, that he had taken a step too far. Like a switch had been pulled, letting loose a demon within, the Courier's face clouded with a rage that rivalled the storms of the Divide. His skin turned a mottled purple and red with the strength of contained emotion, a vain standing out on his forehead where it pulsed like an angry leech.
"YE FUCKIN' DARE TELL ME THAT I SPEAK EMPTY WORDS, ULYSSES?!"
Cracks of concrete dust fell from the ceiling, knocked loose by the reverberations of the Couriers voice, raised like a weapon to strike down all that opposed it. The sudden anger shocked Ulysses, who gazed at it like it was a wild animal bearing its teeth.
"YE, WHO WENT THROUGH LIFE AT THE WHIMS O' OTHERS, FLYING FLAGS NOT YER OWN?! A FECKIN' MESSENGER BOY FOR CAESER?!"
Six advanced on Ulysses, who stood his ground even as the words impaled him like a thousand of the Legions spears.
"YE RAN WITH THE TWISTED HAIRS, A TRIBE YE WERE BORN INTO THROUGH NO PART O' YER OWN! THEN CAESER CAME, AN' YE FELL IN WITH HIM, FOLLOWIN' HIS EVERY WORD, THE MAN WHO KILLED YER TRIBE, LIKE A BLOODY MONGREL! TWAS YE WHO LED THE LEGION TO HOOVER, TWAS YE THAT SET THEM LOOSE UPON THE NEVADA, TEARIN' DOWN VILLAGES, TOWNS, TRIBES NOT YER OWN! JUST AS I BROUGH THAT MACHINE TO THE DIVIDE!"
Ulysses flinched, as the words brought his history back to the forefront of his mind as if history were today, and the blades of the Legion were still yet falling on profligate necks.
"AN' YA 'AVE THE GALL TO STAND THERE, AN' JUDGE ME FOR CARELESSNESS?! YOU, THE MAN WHO TRAWLED THROUGH THE WRECKAGE O' HISTORY, TO LEARN TRUTHS YE NEVER EARNED! YOU, WHO NEVER ONCE FOLLOWED A FLAG THAT WAS YER OWN! YA FUCKIN' MAGGOT! YE DARE CALL ME EMPTY?!"
The Courier spread his arms wide, now at the foot of the steps up to where Ulysses stood, like he was displaying himself before a judge, and daring him to pronounce a verdict.
"I built the Divide," he continued in a quieter voice, that was still the distant rumble of a force that had made itself known to the world, with the intention to make all that came before it tremble, "An' I destroyed it. No fairer than that. I had a right, even if I did 'na know what it was I did. Ye come here, to the Nation I built, an' stand there lecturing me as if ye had some sorta claim on it?! The Divide were just another flag not yer own, ye adopted! I raised it to the sky! 'Twas mine to tear down!"
Ulysses stared at the Courier, rage mixing with denial and self-loathing in his heart. If his mouth had not been concealed by his rebreather mask, his feelings would have been plain to see in his gritted teeth.
"An' that brings us here," the Courier continued in a level tone, his face back to its normal coloration, the spirit of rage that dwelt within him fading back into the depths of his soul. Proving, that despite all other things he might be, empty was not one of them. He had spirits in him.
"What are ye, Uly? What is yer history? Not the Bull, not the Bear. Yer history, an' mine. Ye haven't learnt the right lesson from this fuckin' mess," the Courier kicked a chunk of concrete across the concrete floor, under the metal walkways and down into the missile silo, hearing it as it clattered down through the earth, "An' I'm not leavin' til ye do."
"Our history? The Divide: that history has been written, its lessons learned. There is nothing more to be dug from these cracks in the earth. No more fury to be torn from its skies."
"Come on, Uly," the Courier pressed, "If all ye want is to launch them fuckin' matchsticks to spite me, 'cause fuck me, an' that's why, then go right ahead an' do it. Ye could launch one right up my feckin' hole if ye wanted, wouldn't matter."
Ulysses saw a look akin to madness in the Courier's eyes. Madness, or something deeper. Familiar, yet alien. Something he knew, yet never received a name for.
"The message I carry can't be destroyed by bombs, nor bullets, or lasers. T'would rise in a thousand others, just as it rose in me, just as it always has, as it always will. Spirits never die. Ye know this Uly, ye saw the spirit of America. It lives still, to rise again under a new name. At some point. At some time. Nations rise an' fall like the sun, the spirits that live in all o' us remain the same. But if ye meant what ye said, and ye don't blame me for carelessness, then take the Road offered to ya. It's there for the walkin'. Ye simply have to put boot to Road, til ye get where it takes ya."
The two Courier remained in silence, contemplating the words they had exchanged, the weight of them. The meaning behind them. The winds of the Divide howled like maddened beasts far above them, as if protesting the Couriers words. How could so much death be just procedure, the natural order of things? How dare he say this here, at the site of so much death, perpetrated at his hands! But Ulysses blocked the screams of the dead from his mind and asked his questions.
Six seemed to know the why of things. Perhaps more than he had guessed. "Walked many Roads, Courier. Seen sights and sounds, from dead men or living. Where would this road go, that would justify the walking? The searching?"
"Home," the Courier stated, simply and succinctly.
"My home in the East, Dry Wells, is no more. It is part of the Legion. The only other home, the chance of a home was what you built at the Divide. And you destroyed it."
The Courier gesticulated wildly about him, sweeping his arms left and right as if the world at large contained the point he was trying to make, and Ulysses was missing the forest through the trees.
"For fuck's sake Uly, did we not just have an 'tire argument over how I raised the flag o' a new nation and tore it down again, both by fuckin' accident. I never gave a tinker's damn 'bout the Bull, nor the Bear, nor even House when he was alive. I never needed their flags. I have my own to raise. An' you have a fair idea too. You said so yerself! If ye don't like any of the sides, make yer own."
"There is truth in that. History has proven it. But Mojave's proof that no homeland is sacred until the larger symbols are destroyed. Whatever is built, the Bear, Bull, even Vegas, will tear it apart, convert it either with purpose or by accident."
"Ya know what home feels like to you," the Courier declared. "Ye spoke with it's spirit. Surely, if ye believe it worth buildin' a home for, lettin' that spirit fill it, believe it better than the Bull or the Bear, then it can stand against the spirits of both. I built the Divide right between the both o' them, an' all I had to do was carry fuckin' packages. Yer makin' excuses."
"Nothing can prevent what comes," Ulysses said, crossing his arms and looking down upon the Courier from the walkway, the flag of America behind him. Now, infinitely more meaningful, with even this small amount of why. History could tell a man what had happened. He had struggled all his life to know the why of it. What was the point in knowing what things were if you didn't know why? "The missiles will launch. These questions, your words or mine, what do they matter to you?"
The Courier smiled a devilish smile, displaying his bright white teeth in the light from the silo door far above. The winds of the Divide screamed their fury at his impertinence, the messenger of their Will having been subverted away from them, by the very one it had been meant to destroy.
"Sure, I'm just the messenger Uly. The point is to deliver the message. What better use for a Courier, than to put wisdom in the hands of those with the strength to use it?"
An understanding had been reached. Ulysses nodded, satisfied with the answers. If nothing else, he knew why. And a man with a little 'why', can bear almost any 'how'.
"It is… enough. It may be that as much destruction as been written in the earth here, you may built something else, as you built the Divide. You have spoken truly, there is a shadow of a Nation behind you. The hope of a people; yet it may not matter. The Divide still stands against us."
A clattering and a reverberation of noise echoed from the entrance to the Temple. Courier Six and his machine, ED-E, whirled around to take in the sounds of Marked Men gathering to assault this tabernacle at the heart of the Divide, agents of its hatred for the world that birthed it, and the two Couriers that had betrayed it.
Ulysses reached to the side, and hefted up his Anti-Material Rifle, readying it for battle. "The Divide can suck a fat one, lad. Horrible things happen to good people every day in the Wastelands," the Courier scoffed derisively, flicking the safety off on the Survivalists Rifle and reaching a hand over his shoulder to run his fingers over the walnut stock of his own massive Anti-Material Bolt Action Rifle, "That day was just its turn."
"Our enemies gather outside," Ulysses said as he advanced down the walkway steps to stand next to the Courier, rifle cradled in his arms, "Shadows of the Bear and the Bull. They will have found their way in, just as you did. It was always my intention in case I could not kill you. The Marked Men would flood this place, cut off your escape. If we cannot prevent what comes, then let us make our stand here. Two Couriers together at the Divide."
ED-E powered up his weapons system, shaking from side to side as if he really were a dog shaking itself off, readying itself for the fight. The familiar combat jingle played through its speakers.
"Ya hear that!" The Courier shouted towards the entrance, walking over to a nearby control bank to crouch down in a makeshift firing position, as he shrugged his massive, scoped weapon off his back and propped Clarke's rifle up against the bank in preparation for a quick switch. He worked the bolt expertly on the AMR, chambering one of his custom tooled HE rounds before resting the barrel over the top of his cover.
"Come on down ya cunts, so's I can fuckin' eat ya!"
Guns roared at the centre of the Divide, as winds howled for a vengeance denied it. Horrible things happen every day in the Wastelands. What was one more on the pile?