"Number Nine"
Ch. 22: Teardrop.
Warning: sensitive material ahead. This chapter contains graphic descriptions of violence, mild cannibalism, references to rape and all the usual nasty stuff.
If you're sensitive to these topics, either don't read or proceed with caution.
Also Brief Note: dunno if I've already stated that many points of view are unreliable narrators. In this chapter, there's quite a few POV that does not fit with the big picture the reader gets. What I'm basically trying to say is that what a character might feel/judge unfair/fair doesn't necessarily agree with reality or your personal opinions as a reader.
Just to say, I'm a fan of poetic justice.
"Love, love is a verb
Love is a doing word
Fearless on my breath
Gentle impulsion
Shakes me, makes me lighter
Fearless on my breath
Teardrop on the fire
Fearless on my breath."
- Massive Attack, "Teardrop"
Words traveled faster inside a military camp than one might initially suspect.
Last time, they had carried worrying news about two agents of the Great Whore having slain a whole contubernium of green Milites. (1)
The Centurion who had sent those boys to their death had been dealt with in consequence. For Lanius, Monster of the East, never ever made any allowances. No matter the rank, experience, or contacts. An incompetent subordinate was still incompetent.
Useless. Intolerable.
The other remaining ninety-nine contubernia were already making silent bets on which one would be the next.
Being an Optio Custodiarum, (2) - a title that was little more than fancy words defining a role as underpaid and unsavory as any other Prime Legionary but with way more responsibilities – Ivory hadn't given the issue further thought than necessary since he had had more important things to attend than indulging in such frivolities. Such as whipping the new recruits into shape so they could tend to their guard duty as best as possible since Lanius had very little patience to deal with camp logistics, so he tended to delegate minor tasks to veterans.
Ivory wasn't a veteran per se, but he knew a thing or two about bringing rookies back in line. Aided by a whip, if necessary.
His contubernium, led by Primus Decano (3) Thunderfoot, was constantly training fresh meat from Flagstaff that came in waves to support the Primus Legatus' campaign on the remaining rebel tribes of the East. All Milites who had proved their worth by serving three or four years under Caesar's foot troops' regime without guns. All brutish young men who didn't know what a pistol was in the first place, hadn't seen a woman in a long time… and were hornier than a bighorn bull in heat.
With Colorado, New Mexico, and Arizona already completely pacified, Utah still posed a pain in the ass for their Legio; most prominently in the Western part, where the Great Whore, her Vipers, and rabid Amazons still dared to oppose their Lord's will by spitting over what Caesar's civilization had brought upon the tribes.
Ivory still recalled his days in Denver, first as a tribal, then as a legionary under his late tutor's guidance: Vexillarius Terrence.
Terrence had been there since Ivory's assimilation, being the one who had scooped up the boy from the basket he had been hiding in once his tribe's encampment had been raided down to ashes.
He had been the one keeping the rest of the boys and superstitious instructors away from him and his unique condition.
For Ivory owed his name to none other than his albinism.
Terrence had been NCR. Many officers like him or the Serpent, the late leader of the Frumentarii, had once pertained to the Republic's citizenship. And they, unlike reformed backward tribals who thought having red eyes was the equivalent of being a hybrid spawn between a human and one of the Lizard People, had actually known what his condition entailed.
Hell, the Serpent's errand boy had been an albino too. Ivory had tried to approach him once… but the younger man had been this close to biting his fingers off when Ivory had touched his arm in salutation. So, engaging in further conversation had been out of the question.
Now, the aggressive little shit sat on the Serpent's chair, whereas Ivory was still an infantry soldier with more responsibilities than he would like. 'Never said life was fair, boy', Terrence used to say.
The man had taken care of him in all the ways a father would, unlike his actual father, a raider scum bastard not worth mentioning beyond his incapability to bring meat to the table most of the time.
His mother, on the other hand…
His thoughts had been quickly dismissed as soon as the boots of his Decanus, Thunderfoot, had planted themselves in his angle view since Ivory had been crouching from an elevated position, addressing tempos in-between shifts, barking orders to the guards, observing their positions, correcting their very stances.
How Thunderfoot was always able to sneak up without him noticing was something that rankled Ivory from time to time.
"Ave, Decanus Thunderfoot." – the albino had saluted dispassionately without taking the binoculars off his eyes since he had defective sight due to his condition. Not that his Decanus knew or had to, as far as Ivory was concerned – "True to Caesar."
Thunderfoot had worn his usual feathered helmet, the dark goggles and face wrap that compounded it effectively disguising his facial gestures.
"Ave, Ivory." – Thunderfoot had replied mechanically, bored to no end at having to repeat the usual formulas that ended up becoming bothersome as the years passed, and all either of them had known since their most tender childhood had been military instruction and endless warfare – "I come with good and bad news, I'm afraid." – giving a brisk gesture with his gloved hand, Thunderfoot signaled the other man to follow – "Shall we?"
Intrigued, Ivory had substituted the binoculars for his usual dark goggles and had joined his Decanus at a leisure pace as the man had filled him in.
The good and bad news had ended up being the same: their contubernium had been the ones honored with the task of tracking, capturing, and bringing back the two Great Whore's spies that had dared to mock the Legion, taking recruits' ears with them as a sign of rebellion, emulating the dishonorable hunts those curs of the NCR now entertained amidst their ranks as a sort of pastime.
Such an affront couldn't be allowed, and less coming from mere women. They needed to be punished as a lesson for those who would entertain the idea of emulating them and their disgusting behavior.
They ought to be punished to learn respect.
However, whether this was good or bad news had been up to Ivory's personal interpretation.
This had been almost a week ago.
Gabban was getting uncomfortable by the minute.
Standing perfectly still while those irradiated abominations conducted their funeral rites in silence, dressed as the soldiers, widows, sons, and daughters they once were, he opted to deviate his eyes as soon as they lay upon the shredded, discolored flag they were carrying along with the makeshift coffins.
A pre-War U.S.A. flag.
It was like witnessing ghosts from another entirely different dimension echoing what was remaining of their world. Like the photos of those pre-War books Vulpes owned, neatly stored inside his metallic footlocker whilst many other officers would likely store weapons, pieces of exceptionally well-crafted armors from their fallen foes, food supplies tastier than fucking maize gruel… and the occasional pack of cigarettes some Centurions dared to treat themselves with in secret.
He would know. Sneaking into other legionaries' tents and going through their stuff was part of a Frumentarius' training anyway. That… and not getting caught, since, depending on said legionary's rank, you could end up in a fistfight in the best of cases… or either lashed or crucified if it was a Legatus or a Centurion the one who caught you. If you weren't sneaky, you were better off dead being a Frumentarius.
He and Alexus were the only ones with a copy of Vulpes' footlocker's key. Alexus wasn't too fond of reading, but Gabban had acquired much knowledge from those books his older brother encouraged them to peruse.
Knowledge enough to shudder every single time he would steal a peek in the girl's direction.
Not only were her mannerisms getting even more bizarre since he had the dubious pleasure of meeting her, but the fact that she was actively participating in these rites willingly was making him sick to the stomach.
They were carrying the caskets in groups of eight ghouls, respectively, the flag by another six while the rest of the females and children – if one could call those small abominations children – followed in an orderly retinue forming three rows, one for each coffin. One female walking at the right side of the coffin, usually surrounded either by what once must have been younger men and women, teenagers or children. Said women's left hand resting over their respective late husbands' coffins.
The Courier was expecting them at the exact place where she had arranged that her ghoul persecutor would be buried as well, since she claimed for the thing had been a soldier, just like the rest of the 'men' they were to pay their respects today.
Just like her.
Once the coffins were set over several metallic bars they had put over the freshly-dug graves, the tall Reed ghoul and his wife stepped forward to stay behind the Courier, eyeing their people with glassy, milky gazes.
Since Gabban doubted that ghouls could cry, no tears were running down the emaciated, corpse-like faces of the Glowing Ones. They simply stood still in quiet contemplation as the Courier, being the only one who could use her vocal cords, pulled a piece of paper from her pocket and began reading.
"We are gathered here today, in a patch of land from a country we still remember, to say goodbye to our brothers." – then, as she enunciated the names, she gave a solemn nod to each family – "First Sergeant Nicholas James Campbell. Senior Airman Salvador Andrés Morales. Senior Airman Noah Jacob Bailey…" – she hesitated briefly as if trying very hard to keep her composure – "… and Major Charles M. Reese, also known as 'Charon' by his old unit." – inhaling a gulp of air, as if steering herself, she continued – "Maybe there's not much in a rank or a name when time keeps going on forwards, unwilling to look behind at those it takes indiscriminately… so, the duty to turn our heads to the past, to remember, to preserve it in our memory… falls on us. Always on us. For to remember is an act of love greater than saying goodbye. It is as rewarding as a burden for the soul to keep them with us, to remember who they were, why they fought, and why we loved them. To remember what made the man, not of bone and sinew; but the man you could find behind the thin, unimportant layer of irradiation… the man under the uniform."
He didn't know why, but her words brought Gabban an inexplicable sensation of shame. A sensation he didn't like one bit.
Six ghouls stepped forward, wielding service rifles. At a silent command of the tall one, Reed, they presented arms, readied them, aimed at an indeterminate point, and shot. Three times.
Gabban didn't feel alone in his discomfort, though, for the rest of the men were exchanging tense, confused glances, seeking to appease, no doubt, the sudden impulse to deny the message those words were conveying there. A message that wasn't meant for them legionaries at all… but it resounded so profoundly in the gut that it couldn't be ignored.
Caesar hadn't allowed the tribes to preserve their burial rites, for he said that carrying warrior's blood in one's veins was homage enough to pay to the dead.
That was his justification every time a wife lost her husband, a boy his father, a man his brother.
That was the same justification he used to demand breeding quotas from every single legionary from the very moment they reached adulthood: at fifteen.
Family was something entirely new inside the Legion. Something that had started to be put into practice in the last decade. So Gabban considered himself and his siblings fortunate enough to have been captured within such a period.
Because, thirty years ago, the tribes that were assimilated had been immediately placed in different Legio and contubernia, so they won't retain any sense of belonging other than the very Legion itself. The practice was still in force with particularly recalcitrant captures.
The Frumentarii were aware of this fact and accepted it. It had been a harsh, though necessary, step for Caesar to take since it helped avoid revolts within their ranks.
The child quota thing also had its due explanation: since the healthcare in the Legion was precarious at best, infant mortality was high enough for the Priestesses to be still necessary around since they were the ones who raised unclaimed children.
The children birthed by slaves.
In the Legion, once you reached adulthood, there was this sort of accepted rite of passage that 'made a boy a man' in which every single legionary was forced to participate.
Thirty-five years ago, it had been a necessary measure, but now the Centurions were more lenient when it came to such practices. The same that they were lenient towards homosexuality, seeing it as a way for soldiers to bond together and boost their fighting spirit.
However, such leniency was entirely extra-official and only practiced by the youngest officers. If you were under the rule of an ex-Blackfoot, the first tribe that Caesar took control of and forged into his Legion, you could be damn sure you were gonna get into adulthood like a true legionary.
Vulpes' Centurion had been a veteran ex-Blackfoot the same he had been bound to be the twins' a year later. Flavius Dominicus of Scottsdale had been his name. A true legionary through and through and one of the worst zealots they had had the displeasure to serve under. The very same who had turned Vulpes' back into a constellation of crisscrosses after their skirmish with the Iron Lines tribe and how inventive strategy didn't sit well with fanatical old men with power.
Then, the day he had been ascended to recruit legionary, Vulpes' countenance had turned sour despite how much Gabban had envied him while he would have to wait another whole year before getting lucky like him.
And so, Vulpes, along with many other boys, had been forced – each one of them at a turn – to get inside a tent with a slave at fertile age.
Gabban had been excited for his brother to tell him how the experience had gone at his return… to face the hardest slap Alexus had ever gifted him with, since Vulpes had asked their sibling to do so because 'if he were the one delivering the blow, he would be facing the loss of several teeth'.
Then, once both his siblings' posture on the issue had been made clear enough, Vulpes had explained to them how to fake intercourse since nobody but the slave and the legionary were present to witness the deed inside said tent. You got five minutes to gain the complicity of the slave since they were very willing to collaborate, ask them to feign crying or make any other sounds of pain while you tousled your hair, pinched your cheeks, twisted your tunic, groaned a little and get out when you were ordered while 'wearing a big manly grin', or so had been his cunning brother's explanation.
And so, Gabban's plans to get laid had been frustrated. At fourteen, he had hated his brother for forcing him to promise that he would follow his instructions when it would be his turn, making him miss what it was like to be with a woman… but, once he had rethought the deal after Alexus had punished him by giving him the cold shoulder for a whole month… he had understood.
Understood why Vulpes had figured out a way to avoid the situation, understood why Alexus had been so pissed off with him: if Alexus – for evident reasons – couldn't get laid, none of them would.
Besides, Vulpes was plain weird with those things, so it had worked to his advantage too.
So Gabban had simply waited for his time to come, and it had come two years later than it should have been on The Strip. It had been fun even if Vulpes had wanted to throttle him when he had taken him to the New Vegas Clinic.
More refined thoughts regarding sexual violence and the slaves' and/or prostitutes' unwillingness had come later, and the psychological consequences that had ensued since.
The more you knew, the more of a slave you were… because you were acutely aware of your limitations.
If you weren't aware of what an infection was in the first place and how the Profligate medicine could save a man's life, you simply contented yourself with that the healing powder, salves and poultices had helped you to recover.
If you weren't aware that children died because their healthcare was insufficient, you simply prayed to the gods that the other children were strong enough to survive infancy and eventually become strong soldiers or sturdy mothers.
If you weren't aware of what sexual violence was in the first place, you simply did it. Because you were a man, entirely disposable if you didn't prove your worth as a warrior, a defender. A test that wasn't a one-time situation you could overcome and be done with it, but something that defined the rest of your very existence.
You could die any moment in battle, so, by playing the defender role, you had earned to be serviced by those women you protected by fighting in their place so they could lie lazy and rounded until they gave birth.
Because you were disposable, and they weren't. Because any blows they could sustain throughout their lives in servitude were nothing compared to what you faced on the battlefield.
You were taught that it was an arrangement that benefited both parties, that sacrifices must be made for the greater common good, so you didn't dwell much on how those women might feel while being used as little more than latrines. You were used to their fear and passive rejection, for you were stronger than them, flimsy ingrate creatures unable to see the bigger picture.
But what you weren't taught was what you learned much later when you were sitting in a bar, playing your 'infiltrated' role and learning intel and customs to blend in, and overhear several Profligate women talking with pain, fear, and disgust about the Legion and their 'rape raids'. Something you have seen countless times on the field, something your older brother had explicitly forbid you to be part of. Along with the rest of your unit.
"Let us put it simply enough, dearest brother: if the rest of contubernia would think it amusing throwing themselves off a cliff… would you follow their example?"
Because you ought to be better than what you have been taught. Because, even in your disposability, even in your servitude, you ought to aspire to elevated thinking.
Humanity be damned.
Very Vulpes, judge and executioner of his very unique brand of control, expecting just the very same from you. That was how he defined loyalty.
And you better be up to the challenge… or else.
Gabban loved his brother… but his so-called 'teachings' had brought more ill than relief to their shared fate serving Caesar. His insistence upon knowledge yet another burden to bear.
Knowledge was a double-edged sword because it reminded you how insignificant and ignorant you were and how many threats lay everywhere in a world that's draped in black and red.
Or in camouflage, like this dangerous girl of dangerous words.
Because once you shed the tunic… what was left of the man under it? Who was he? What was he fighting for?
Was he honorable? Was he a good or a bad man?
Did his existence mean something beyond mere servitude? Did he deserve better?
Did he truly take pride in dying in the name of a god… Or was that what he had been actively repeating to himself all these years to survive?
What was glory beyond a concept? Something you cannot touch. Something you cannot apprehend. Something immaterial.
Something you hold onto desperately to make sense of what you have become. Of the things you have done. Of the blood on your hands.
And what was honor… if not the values that summarized you up?
Individualism, egocentrism… those very sins Vulpes had ordered to purge from Nipton were now haunting him, haunting them; for now, Gabban saw what his brother had seen in the girl.
Her group, a conglomerate of Profligates that couldn't be more different from one another, were together because of her. She had given them hope, a reason, a cause to defend.
And they had accepted Vulpes. They treated him not only with trust, a thing a Frumentarius was able to inspire should the need arise… but with care.
The small woman with the Power Fist had held him lovingly as if he were important to her. They were even on pet name terms with one another.
The supermutant had carried him as if he had been a baby, messing with his hair more than once before putting him down delicately in a stretcher.
The Mexican ghoul called him 'chavo' and cared about him. More than he let on.
The doctor had fought with them so he could treat Vulpes with his Profligate meds to spare him some pain.
The redhead woman often messed with him, enjoying watching him squirm at her crass humor playfully.
And the sniper… the sniper simply didn't sever his hands or put a bullet between his brows every time he touched the Courier.
Either Vulpes had managed to excel in his spy role, blending in seamlessly with them… or he had given them a reason to become a part of them.
And he seemed comfortable. He behaved way more relaxed around them than Gabban had ever seen him around people other than Alexus and him. He looked… happy.
It pained and scared Gabban to no end watching his brother becoming less and less the leader he was supposed to be for his men… and the more and more the Courier's pet project for… what, exactly?
Did she genuinely care about him the same as the others… or was she far more cunning than they suspected, and she feigned kindness to use all of them against that Burke man who terrified her?
Once the burial was finished, the six necrotics holding the banner folded it in a triangle-shaped pattern, and they immediately handed it to the girl with their silent best wishes, saluting her.
Then, she simply cried, holding the old banner to her chest, and then, the reaction was instantaneous: all of her companions, Vulpes included, formed a circle around her and cocooned her.
Different ages, races, backgrounds, and very different ideologies… all put aside because of one individual.
An individual that secretly fed them what each one craved the most.
Gabban wasn't as observant as Vulpes was and couldn't speak for the rest… but he understood his brother's needs better than anyone.
Intellectual needs that very few people in the Wasteland – and even less inside the Legion – could really meet. For knowledge, to Vulpes, was more a game than a means, more of a pastime than a tool… and the Courier was game enough to pose a fair challenge.
She had ensnared him within a trap so perfect he had even walked into it without question. Willingly.
But maybe, hopefully, the one inside a trap would actually end up being her if her needy eyes - despite her arms embracing the sniper's form - searching for Vulpes until they found him were confirmation enough that, manipulation or not, attraction or not, should any of them dared to pull the rope way too much, the other would end up throttled at the opposite end.
Because, between two spies… who was using who?
Zion, they called this place. A paradise untouched by radiation's kiss, where greenery emerged lush and beautiful, permeating the air with fragrances, exotic in their freshness, that had remained unknown for Scylla and Charybdis up to this day.
Their Lady had told them once that this was a land where other gods dwelled, preserving echoes of creators and destroyers alike, for this was a place where a God of many powers had chosen His children to extend His teachings.
She had warned them not to mock local beliefs regarding a figure called the Father in the Cave, since what they wanted was to form an alliance, not to assimilate the Sorrows.
They could imitate some of the Legion's customs regarding slavery with the legionaries they captured, but they weren't Legion.
The twins let their tired feet wander the riverbank they were following up North, beyond the Caterpillar's Mound. Crossing Pine Creek had been incredibly challenging, given the Yao Guai nest settled in the vicinity of the pre-War tunnel they had used to get into the valley.
But Scylla and Charybdis were innate survivors, the very reason they were Hecate's best agents, only surpassed in cunning by Artemis herself, their Lady's Commander, the Moonchild Huntress.
They had moved in the night until they had abandoned Legion territory, leaving stabbed corpses in their arrogance, marking fallen Legion scouts as their claimed prey, gouging the bodies' eyeballs the same the Butcher did with his women.
Emboldened and breathing freedom as their feet traveled with the water, little they had known about the hounds sniffing their trail day and night, with a full contubernium giving chase under the orders of a veteran, a tracker, a hunter.
However, it hadn't been the tracker's talented eyes the ones who had scoped the sisters from atop the canyon, but the eyes any Twin Mother would fear to attract: devil's eyes.
For crouched behind a rock, resisting the sun's unyielding bite as he dragged his perfectly coordinated limbs across clay soil, Ivory of Denver spied their very distinctive obsidian forms undulating with the river, admiring their survival skills after bearing witness to their finesse at enduring Pine Creek's long tunnel and its many mysteries.
And so, when he felt the moment was right, he signaled for his Decanus to launch their attack.
It had started innocently enough, she had kept telling to herself all of this time, a silly game of sorts she would have played with another kid a handful (biological) years ago, scoring points by repeating a specific action as often as possible, pursuing being the one accumulating the most. Never a definitive winner, taking into account the other kid's scores as well, so you didn't fall too short in comparison.
A tacit agreement of competition where the two parts were having fun pursuing one another with an established pattern.
But she hadn't counted on either the other player not being a kid anymore, nor did she feel like a kid the more touches they scored.
Because that had been the competition's premise: stealing touches.
For the record, she hadn't started it, but him.
After receiving Irina and Reed's blessings, leaving their group under the care of Captain Parker at the Aerotech Office Park until they could, somehow, adjust to life on the outside and become part of a community that wouldn't shun them out; their group along with Zorro's Frumentarii had gotten back to the Lucky 38. Which hadn't been an easy task, to begin with, given their ban out of House's territory. A ban in which she was a direct accomplice.
She has had to hack the North Gate's checking securitron with the hole in their programming she had found after testing the code the first time her group had accessed The Strip. She had felt kinda silly, kinda relieved once the credit check hadn't been necessary and she could spend her caps freely, not having to worry about a next check in the future. But all of that time they had spent outside looking for jobs to be able to pay the steep check for seven people had felt like a waste.
Nonetheless, she hadn't divulged the code, so none of them could enter again once they got out. After all, a deal was a deal, and she was sure she could install a microphone inside one of the Frumentarii's suits' lapels to monitor their movements inside The Strip. Gabban would have to do since he apparently was the second calling the shots, and he would be likely the one checking on their contact at the Gomorrah after all this time in silence.
That was why, before getting inside the Lucky, she had asked the tribals to wait so she could give them more 'adequate' outfits to move around House's territory. Because she wasn't letting them in. One Legion spy was enough, and she wasn't looking forward to learning just how thin her employer's patience could get with this foolhardy gambling of hers.
So, she had sewn full speed a microphone inside one of the pockets of the suit she intended to give to Gabban with the excuse that one button had gotten loose, and she had bestowed her gifts along with a generous amount of caps to the legionaries so they could buy themselves a decent dinner and a night at the Vault 21's Hotel and Gift Shop before wishing them goodnight, shutting the door behind her.
She could tell her decision to leave them out had sat immensely well amongst the rest of the group, most prominently Arcade, who had released a relieved sigh once their group's dynamics had returned to normal.
Veronica had proposed yet another pajama party with a movie marathon, and the agreement had been unanimous.
Everyone looked in good spirits, even Zorro, whom she had initially predicted wouldn't like one bit leaving Gabban behind to, instead, watch how his neck and shoulders became definitely less tense after losing his brother from sight.
She hadn't asked him anything since his family life wasn't her business unless he deemed the contrary and concentrated what had remained of her energies to prepare everything before submerging into yet another cinema session. She had planned to play the 'Alien' saga to them, just to see how Boone and the rest reacted to the Survival Horror genre.
The game had started when she had gotten out of the shower since they had to take turns to bathe, given the three only available bathtubs.
The girls had gotten first pickings after Veronica had beaten Arcade at rock paper or scissors, so Cass, Six, and her had been the ones taking the first turn.
Six had taken her sweet time washing off the grime from their adventure throughout the sewers since what they had managed to go on at the Aerotech had been sponge baths until today.
She brushed her teeth, drowned herself in liters and more liters of shampoo, deodorant, and several pounds of hydrating cream with a faint coconut scent (two hundred years later, it was a miracle it still smelled of something) before emerging from the bathroom along with the girls shining like the Queen of Sheba. Wearing a giant towel around the likes of a toga and beaming a Cheshire smile at the guys, who had been waiting patiently outside well-armed with towels and razors since Boone and Arcade needed a good shave.
And then, she had exchanged a timid glance with Zorro, who had given her his usual poker face… until he had passed by her side towards the bathroom, and his fingertips had drawn a very slow, very deliberate pass along her naked arm. From wrist to shoulder.
It had given her goose pimples, and, once she had reacted by turning around, the door had been shut right in her face.
The trick?: not a soul but herself had noticed his bold move as Cass had asked her if she was eyeing the door 'because she wanted to steal a peek', adding cheekily that 'should she was curious, the carpet definitely matched the drapes'.
Blushing pink from head to toe, she had played deaf at the redhead's teasing and had looked for a clean pajama to put on with trembling hands.
Later, while preparing meals in the kitchen for everyone (or rather, she cutting potatoes, carrots, and peppers whilst Lily operated her magic at the stoves), she had noticed from time to time an odd slight sensation at the nape of her neck as if a spider were tickling her to, every time she searched her hair with her free hand, she didn't find anything.
At the fourth or fifth time, her suspicious eyes began scanning around on their own accord and discovered that the odd sensation happened every time Zorro moved around her to gather glasses, cutlery, or dishes to bring to the guest dorm area.
The next time, she had attempted to catch his hand, and she had only ended up grasping air.
Then, she had turned her head to him in a straightforward manner, catching him schooling his features back to default with the subtle difference in how his eyes gleamed with mischief.
Okay, two could play this game.
Once the feast was ready, next came the due preparations with the white screen and the projector.
Since he and she were the ones adjusting the screen on the wall, the covert war of ghosting touches, brushing fingers, pinching, tickling, and the like began.
It was exhilarating, moving around a limited space, feigning normalcy, and putting on a hieratic expression whilst preparing your next move against the other.
You could even exchange simple instructions regarding the cinema preparations and the room's distribution, pinching the other traitorously when they were talking.
She had to give him some credit since she never managed to make him jump or modify his default facial expression.
On the other hand, he didn't waste any time after finding several ticklish spots on her that he exploited mercilessly as they moved around the room amidst the others.
And nobody suspected a thing.
She could very well issue instructions to Arcade to turn on the projector and ask Boone to bring in more beverages from the kitchen while helping Raul carry more cushions… as she covertly kept poking Zorro's ribs around in the vain hope of finding a weak spot in him.
It was incredibly funny.
The thing is… that one thing is to move around playing strategic moves against your adversary… and another entirely different thing is to sit side to side in the dark on a bed, noticing the other's movements under the sheets while trying very hard to watch some horror Sci-Fi.
For the covert war kept going on nonetheless.
First had been who fished more fries from whose's plate. Then, he began using the scary moments in the film to pinch her, make her jump, AND squeal… or even imitate arachnid moves with his hands along her back and shoulders every time a Facehugger was on screen.
And every time she would elbow him in reprisal, he would faintly snort in amusement.
She hadn't known he would be into these sorts of games, but damn if she wasn't having the most hilarious night ever.
Around the second movie, they were already running fingers over each other's hands whilst Boone at the foot of the bed kept sputtering comments about 'how incredibly retarded were those space soldiers'. In contrast, Arcade made a brief observation about how unlikely were some evolutionary features of the xenomorphs, adducing that 'such a destructive species would waste a whole planet in a matter of months, thus not serving any manner of purpose in the food chain'.
The four parts of Lieutenant Ripley's journey against the monster followed one another, and a general drowsiness had settled over the group, where the only one who still got startled by the alien's moves was Veronica, who muttered, 'No, don't go there!' or 'Run, you idiot, run!' from time to time.
Drowsiness had also affected their covert war since they had shifted their sitting positions to a more relaxed lying down, hands caressing one another under the fluffy duvet, fingers intertwining.
Once the cinema session was over, almost everyone was either asleep or too drowsy to bother with something beyond leaving the dirty dishes over the floors' carpets so they could accommodate over the beds and drift to sleep.
Darkness and Lily's soundly asleep form by their left acting as a barrier had provided Zorro and her with a strange privacy that not even Rex, who was helping himself with the dinner's leftovers on the floor, had bothered to interrupt by climbing over between them.
The natural thing for her had been to accommodate her form against his', pushing her luck by giving in to her desire to cuddle.
And he had provided.
Thing is… that idle hands are the Devil's tools. And theirs continued roaming around, first just the wrists, forearms, and elbows… later, they grew restless and dared to take a hike upwards to the shoulders.
Six was very aware that her arms were nothing special… but she hadn't been prepared for his' to be so… muscled.
It was true she had already seen him without his shirt… but that time, they had been surrounded by Fiends, and with very little time in their hands, so her eyes had opted not to file away for a later further examination of the fact that his body structure was a legionary's body structure.
His gaunt face and long, tendinous hands were incredibly misleading if one didn't peruse further under his clothes – something she, now, was doing with a complete lack of shame that left her mentally stunned.
Physically, he felt compact and sinewy. The only thing truly soft in his entire anatomy was his hair, for not even his skin felt tender or silky under her fingertips, but kind of dry and… scarred.
Severely scarred.
Somehow, their hands had mutually slipped beneath the pajama's chemise, and hers were patting up and down the vast expanse of his back over the military undershirt, catching glimpses of skin at the prominent trapezius, deltoid, and major rhomboid muscles, all of them rough and scarred the same as his lower neck.
But his hands, perhaps more seasoned in the art of caressing, had gotten brave when his fingers slipped beneath her sports bra.
She had been so flustered that she had plunged her burning face in the crook of his neck, and the embrace had gotten closer, even more exploratory.
It hadn't been groping exactly, but more on the tender side when his fingers had dug expertly between her shoulder blades, undoing tiny muscle knots and finding subtle spaces between bones and muscles, making her very aware of how underweight she was and how unattractive her lack of curves and prominent ribs must be.
The moment she had backed away, he had stopped altogether to put her back between his arms as she had crawled her way towards Lily's big structure, feeling too exposed and seeking the protection she associated with the Nightkin's strength.
They shouldn't be doing this.
They really shouldn't be doing this.
The same it shouldn't feel good when you think your heart is creeping its traitorous way up to your throat, and you're trembling like jelly when you find you're breathing the heat that's coming in waves off his parted lips hovering yours… But you give in the same.
Consequences be damned.
It sorts of happened. Sorts of because the contact had been so incredibly brief before Lily's sudden snoring had made both of them jump to hurriedly disentangle from one another, fearing having been caught red-handed by the big grandma, that Six wasn't sure if that really counted as a kiss.
Technically, it did, she supposed. But the unbelievable dissatisfaction that came over immediately as soon as she turned around far away from him and made herself a ball under the sheets, cursing her own stupidity, impeded her from falling asleep until it was nearly dawn. Lips burning non-stop and hands gripping Charon's dog tags around her neck, the only thing she had to remember him.
The only thing she now had to remember that she was still in grief, that she didn't have her emotions under control, and… that she was a fucking two-hundred-and-seventeen-year-old pre-War phenomenon getting the hots for a post-Apocalyptical twenty-year-old.
It was weird and disgusting. She was weird and disgusting.
Little did she know that her also frustrated counterpart was nursing an already worsening case of hurt pride for his persistent inability to obtain what he wanted… besides cursing his own biological functions, that had come to haunt him in a rather painful fashion that didn't calm down for the nightly hours to come.
Meanwhile, the recording Yes Man had been instructed to copy to the holotape that she had put in her Pip-Boy's slot for that evening was ready.
Ivory stirred the bonfire's embers with the flat side of his machete.
It had been over an hour, and he had been doing his best to utterly ignore the woman's screams. Even his Decanus was beginning to tire not only of her high-pitched screeches but also of her rebellious behavior.
The harsh sound of a slap echoed throughout the canyon valley, and Ivory simply turned the small gecko they had managed to hunt, roasting slowly over the fire.
"What!" – another slap – "I've!" – yet another one – "Told!" – slap – "You!" – a punch this time – "Whore!" - by Mars, weren't they gonna get a peace's moment, for fuck's sake?! Capturing them alive for Lanius to play his devious games with them wasn't worth this shitty evening… not that those other evenings camping in Utah's wilderness were much better, anyway – "Bit me again, and I will personally remove your tongue!"
Ivory heard the spitting sound she produced. Here we go again.
More slapping, a kick or two, some groaning, and, when they thought they had her at their mercy, she would go for a thigh, a bicep, a finger… one of them had gotten killed after he had attempted to shove his manhood down her throat.
Rookie mistake, since the only ones who accepted to service a legionary in such a fashion, were the slaves. Not even a decent Legion woman would accept such treatment.
But the new kids were like… what? Eighteen, nineteen years old? Too hormonal to string two coherent thoughts together. Too inexperienced to tell the difference between a tame slave and a capture.
Too horny to refrain from behaving like goddamned animals.
Yet another scream was followed by more kicking on both parts.
"Would you two stop at once?!" – he bellowed, earning frightened countenances out of the couple of idiotic morons attempting to make the wildcat comply with their wishes – "The Primus Legatus wants them as untouched as possible! You already have your fair share with the other one, so cut it!"
They obeyed him quicker than a whip's crack. Thunderfoot gave him a silent warning glare.
Ivory sighed. It wasn't his fault that the rookies feared his red eyes more than they feared their Decanus' wrath.
Anyway, the woman was tied to an old pre-War advertisement pole with ropes sturdy enough. She wasn't going anywhere.
Even less since her twin had been knocked unconscious. And women's primary weakness was how much they treasured their loved ones, incapable of making the hard decision should the need arise.
Were those two whores men AND legionaries, the conscious one would have attempted to break free to either get lost in the night or kill their sibling and themselves.
But they were women. Not easy to capture, but a child's play to break if done properly.
He would know since his time under Vexillarius Terrence's tutelage had provided Ivory with enough experience to know how to deal with recalcitrant slaves.
Once the lizard's meat was edible, he distributed portions amongst the legionaries. The silence that ensued immediately after, a blessing in its entirety.
At least, at first.
Thunderfoot tasked Ivory with the first watch accompanied by two rookies given that the other Veteranus Legionario (4) and he would do the same with the rest every three hours.
Ivory hated sharing watch duty with recruits because he knew they would either start chatting his ear off with their stupid nonsense or attempt to bargain a turn with the woman in exchange for food.
Which was precisely what they did.
One got bitten, and the other simply kicked the wildcat in the face. Typical recruits.
The hissing bitch was already black and blue when he got his well-deserved rest when the other veteran rose from his sleeping bag.
… Until he himself rose two hours later to take a piss.
At first, he hadn't paid any mind to the movements he had thought he had mistakenly perceived around their bonfire since he was relieving himself half-asleep and his eyes, even in the dark, weren't too good with long-medium distances.
Then, he had heard the screams.
Running, hunting rifle raised, Ivory couldn't fire a single time when his red eyes took in the bloodbath that had unleashed around the bonfire with a shadow moving impossibly fast between recruits, impaling them with a spear, gashing throats open with iron claws merged in leather gauntlets.
Thunderfoot had stepped ahead to defend his men… facing one of the most gruesome deaths Ivory had had the displeasure to watch when the shadow had launched over him, tearing his throat open with serrated teeth.
Ivory had wanted to vomit the instant his ears had perceived mastication and swallowing noises coming from the hunched figure, covered from head to toe in a Yao Guai pelt like some wild animal.
The albino took a step back. A treacherous twig under his boot snapped with a deafening crack.
Two blind rifle shots later, and he was on his back, facing the inhumane countenance of a skull.
A radstag skull.
However, bloodshot, very human eyes looked at him under the mask's visage; and also, a human mouth filled with red spurted a single word with a hissing voice.
"Chʼį́įdii."
The Optio Custodiarum barely acknowledged the bloodied spittle that landed upon his brow, iron claws releasing him but taking his weapon with them as the hunched figure crept backward, blood still dripping between the radstag skull's maws neatly stylized into pointy ends.
Ivory remained in shock even after the shadow had disappeared from sight; taking with it the women, the blood of his comrades, and the whispers of a legend that had spared him the kiss of death that had been hunting down the men in red since their campaign on the East had started under the orders of their new Primus Legatus almost three years ago.
Wendigo, the Maneater.
The march back to Camp McCarran after a well-deserved night's rest (for some, anyway) got the entire group plus the Frumentarii addendum dragging their feet all the way.
Cass had forcibly wakened herself up with a shot of whiskey after the next until the only remaining bottle in the entire Presidential Suite had gotten empty, and she had gotten pissed off because she wanted more, but she didn't feel in the mood to search for some more around the Cocktail Lounge. Even less with Veronica hot on her heels, pestering her not to drink more.
Arcade looked like he could use another twelve hours of uninterrupted sleep as he was hiding behind a polite hand his constant yawning, no matter how much coffee he had drunk before getting out of the Lucky.
Zorro's eye bags were so noticeable that nobody had dared to bother him since he was evidently feeling cranky.
Gabban looked no better since he also sported eye bags and a tousled hair he hadn't bothered to comb this morning, whereas the rest of the Frumentarii eyed both their leader and his Second-In-Command like they were about to explode any time soon.
The only one who looked unusually fresh and in good spirits was Boone, who led the way with a brisk, though enthusiastic pace.
Today was business day with Colonel Hsu, and the sudden silence that filled McCarran's Northern Gate with the absence of regular Fiend raids felt oddly eerie, almost surreal in its tranquility.
Six had decided not to engage the Monorail's services from The Strip, since it would give the wrong impression to the Republicans. Today was talking day, not cock-sucking day. She didn't want to provide them with an excuse, as insignificant as it may be, to owe them any sort of gratitude.
She had to play her cards carefully if she wanted Hsu to collaborate without dealing with Ambassador Crocker's moves in the shadows. Crocker was a firm Kimball supporter; he had been instrumental in the man's presidency campaign nine years ago. They didn't need him sticking his nose where it didn't belong.
They were well-received upon identifying at the entrance to the point of earning an escort to guide them to the Colonel's office. The one holding such an honor had been Bitter-Root, the ex-Khan First Recon that had also aided them with the Fiends' wiping not two days ago.
Bitter-Root wasn't the talking type, so he surprised Six with a brisk acknowledgment of her work and how popular her group was becoming amongst troopers.
"Lot of folks at McCarran really appreciate what you've done." – he grunted, face carefully neutral – "Many would like it if you enlisted… but I'm guessing you aren't here to play the patriotic part, huh?"
He didn't really expect an answer, and he didn't get one since that 'play the patriotic part' bit could be highly debatable, and she was in no mood to get into specifics with yet another First Recon. Explaining to Boone her take on the situation had been hard enough already.
Getting into Hsu's office had been tricky at best since everybody wanted a bite from the cake; but in no way was an NCR officer allowing fourteen people - a supermutant amongst them - to bear witness of his meeting with the infamous Courier Six, so she had to choose her 'bodyguards' carefully.
Her first and foremost choice had been Boone, not only because she felt safer with him, but on diplomatic principle. If Hsu saw him with her, he would feel more inclined to take her words into account.
Since Zorro was putting on that pissy face – brow carefully schooled into slightly disdainful nonchalance, slightly flared nostrils… and slightly puckered lips she shouldn't find so impossibly distracting - that warned her NOT to ignore him in front of his men, he got a seat almost immediately. Again, more diplomatic stuff in front of a Legion representative.
A Legion representative that she had sort-of-kissed the night before.
Finally, the choice between Veronica and Arcade had been a hard one, but, since Vero's Power Fist packed a more threatening feel than Arcade's Followers lab coat, he had ended up being the most sensible option.
Nevertheless, she bet the rest will be sticking their ears to the wall just to get a general feel of the conversation.
"They say three is a crowd, Courier, so I don't know how to qualify… this." – was Hsu's polite observation on the matter, eyeing the three men behind her with questioning eyes.
"An ex-First Recon, a representative of the Followers of the Apocalypse, and a tribal." – she explained, misleadingly calm – "I'd say it sums up the currently interested parts in the Mojave conflict quite nicely, Colonel. At least the ones we know we want to keep around."
James Hsu wasn't an unhandsome man, and his warm voice, though firm, would have melted even the most hardened disposition… if his lineage wouldn't have been something that had prompted Six to take two tea bags of valerian this morning before even thinking of facing him.
Hsu had an evident, though half-blooded, Chinese ancestry that was putting the girl's nerves on edge every time her eyes met his'. And right now, she was trying really hard not to picture the man dressed in the olive field uniform with the red stars that ALL of the Vault 5's VR simulations gave to the simulated Chinese troops she had to fight against.
Because it creeped her the hell out.
As if sensing her discomfort, Arcade had taken her hand into his own, and she had given him a reassuring squeeze in response.
"And you, Courier?" – Hsu replied to her previous statement – "You came in the representation of Robert House as well?" – he asked astutely.
"Partly, yes." – she admitted with as much integrity as she could muster, willing her eyes to meet his'. No sense in lying to a man she wanted on her side in the first place – "However, I can assure you that what I want to discuss today, Colonel, has more of a personal take than my political associations."
Hsu crossed his arms lightly, reclining on his chair's backrest, not entirely hermetic but still cautious enough to convey a polite skeptical attitude in his body language.
"I'm told you've been an angel on our shoulder, Courier." - he began – "Anders, the Ranger you rescued from Vault 3, can attest the immense favor you have bestowed upon McCarran… but make no mistakes: I'm a patient man but not a naïve one. I already know that Robert House's favors always come with a price. A steep one, if you want an educated opinion." – he pointed out defiantly – "I also don't take you for a naïve child as everybody else around here wants to believe, for age is not an impediment to making some moves over the board, such as you have abundantly demonstrated." - he added, making a lazy gesture with his right hand – "If we are here having this conversation, it is only because House has allowed so. Speak your part, and I shall consider what you are bringing to the table."
Inhaling deeply to steel herself for what was about to come, she forced her eyes not to waver from the direct look Hsu was giving her.
"I need support manpower to launch an attack on the NCRCF." – she managed to say without stuttering.
Hsu's brows shot up.
"I beg your pardon?" – he asked as if he hadn't heard it correctly.
He could be speaking English… but all she could hear was the AI's simulations issuing threats. Threats they were taught to identify, for learning the enemy's language was fundamental given the chance that they would capture one of them alive and needed to exact information from them.
Qù sǐ ba, zīběnjiā!
Go to hell, capitalist!
Arcade's hands around hers and Boone's over her shoulders got her back to reality, giving her some impulse to continue.
"The Powder Gangers." – she clarified – "They're a problem that has been going on for too long since the prison break. Nobody needs murderers, rapists, and thieves all over the Northern part of the Long 15, and it seems not even the Deathclaws at the Quarry Junction have dissuaded them from keeping the territory as their own."
Hsu blinked.
"Are you saying…" – he began, slowly this time – "… that you are volunteering to reclaim the Correctional Facility back from the criminals' hands? May I ask what you are gaining out of this deal?"
"Besides making the roads safer?" – she replied – "Mr. House wants to clear up the tense relations that have recently developed between him and the Republic due to a… misunderstanding regarding the recent attack on the Freeside resulting in several casualties primarily amongst what locals call 'Squatters': NCR citizens."
Hsu's eyes squinted.
"So much for being 'personal' instead of political, Courier." – he replied dryly.
Her hands twitched between Arcade's.
Keep your cool. – she reminded herself – Think as Burke would. He would never let them know that they'd gotten under his skin… if they ever did.
Fighting her hardest to keep her emotions under control, she fished inside one of her cargo pants' pockets to place what she had been looking for over Hsu's table: a letter.
"Read it." – she said, pointing to the folded paper with her eyes, giving her a respite from looking at the Colonel's – "It was in the attacker's pockets."
The man eyed her, then the aforesaid paper dubiously, but did as requested.
The way his expression shifted from concerned to downrightly irate as his eyes took in the letter's contents was the proof Six had been hoping for since it indicated the good Colonel's lack of involvement in her assassination attempt.
It had been a good thing that Charon always had kept important papers on his person. Otherwise, her chances of convincing Hsu to act would have been significantly smaller.
Without further adding, the Colonel got up from his desk, walked briskly to his office's door, and called for one of his men to fetch him Lieutenant Boyd after giving the rest of the nosy Courier's followers a stern look, for their ears had been on the door all of this time if their ashamed, evasive faces were proof enough.
Meanwhile, Six had schooled her features in a neutral façade she was having some trouble maintaining without breaking into a mess of a nervous fit. Zorro's hand fishing one of hers from her lap didn't help at all since she still felt guilty from the night before.
She hadn't meant to take advantage. She still didn't, given the ultimatum House had threatened her with. She should control herself, she should… oh, golly gosh, let him NOT caress her hand that way…
He was getting bolder in his demonstrations, she thought. So bold it made her suspicious of his intentions.
Because, despite not liking one bit being touched, since he got in the group he had been behaving oddly ambiguously when it came to this flirting game he had kept throwing at her face, daring her to take the first step.
At that time, she had thought it to be just that, a game. But now…
Once the solicited officer, a young short-haired woman dressed in the typical NCR military fatigues, presented herself before Hsu, the man didn't waste any time issuing his orders.
"This is the chance you have been waiting for all these months, Boyd: I want you to go to the Supply Shack and arrest Sergeant Contreras under the charges of NCR's funds' malversation, illegal weapon-selling, complicity in an assassination attempt, and indirect responsibility in the deaths of several citizens of the Republic." – he instructed, to the woman's growing awe – "Take him to the interrogation chambers along with that other Legion scumbag. Today is either confession day… or broken jaw day. Wait until I get my way upstairs along with the Courier before starting."
"Sir, yes, sir!" - the Lieutenant exclaimed a tad too enthusiastically before signaling a pair of men from the camp's police near the garage doors from the terminal building's entrance to follow her.
Turning around to face Six with a severe frown, Hsu held his breath before he spoke again.
"If Contreras' story confirms yours, this will unleash a tide of shit so huge not even the very Council will be able to dodge. I trust you know what you are getting yourself into, Courier." – were his grave words – "Regarding your petition to liberate the NCRCF… it will have to wait until we manage to sort all of this mess out." - licking his lips, he added – "Until then, you and your… companions will remain inside McCarran's facilities."
"Are we arrested, Colonel?" - Six asked defiantly, willing her voice to sound less shaken than she truly felt. And then, Zorro's hand squeezed hers in a way she felt so reassured that she momentarily forgot her inner conundrum regarding him and answered his silent support with yet another hand squeeze.
Hsu's fists clenched and unclenched several times before answering.
"No." - he declared – "At least for now."
Wanderlust was something Follows-Chalk could relate to very easily.
Restricted as he was to what once New Canaanites called Zion, however, did very little to aid in scratching that itch. At the age of eighteen, he had already grown tired of reading the chalk marks the advanced scouts left for them hunters.
Even if he could not legitimately call himself a hunter yet.
He would never understand some of his tribe's rites regarding how an eight-year-old could get a name but not a tattoo, a thirteen-year-old could get his first tattoo but not a club… and a sixteen-year-old could get his own club... but not a title.
He, the man who returned from that war on the distant civilized lands that didn't go so well years ago, always said that there's a moment for each thing. Out of respect, Follows-Chalk would always defer to his judgment since, after all, that man was their war chief.
But youth was a fickle thing that made Follows-Chalk's legs swarm with impatience, restlessness growing stronger the more moons crossed throughout the nightly sky, remote and vibrant, witnesses of the many wonders surely the world beyond Zion's lush valley could offer.
That had been why he had sought to learn the English language of the civilized lands down to almost perfection, not content with the botched job many of his tribesmen displayed in front of friendly caravans. Follows-Chalk had also learned that the more nailed you got the pronunciation and the phrase construction, the more seriously civilized people took you.
Otherwise, they thought you were duuv… retarded, stupid.
Also, he had started wearing more elaborated outfits since civilized people apparently liked to cover their bodies way more than tribals. The footwear thing was still something that he was getting used to. He still didn't understand what the purpose of hiding one's feet inside heavy pieces of fabric that left traces any good tracker could detect a mile away was… It might have something to do with the odd covering attitude, disguising flesh under clothing so they could feel safer from prying eyes.
Or that had been the strange explanation he had gotten from their war chief when Follows-Chalk had asked him what 'modesty' was.
One of the hunters accompanying him suddenly put a hand over his shoulder and pointed something down the canyon, several feet below, near the waters.
Then, Follows-Chalk's eyes followed the index finger until they caught sight of the two huddled female silhouettes embracing one another like asleep children.
It took less than ten minutes getting to them, the hunters' clubs rose, just in case, but Follows-Chalk approached the pair fascinated, a shiver crossing his back once he saw their state.
Their skins were beautifully colored the likes Follows-Chalk had never seen. Not even the man from the Happy Trails Caravans had a skin tone that profoundly dark… but they had been subjected to so much abuse that not even such a trait could disguise the blood and hematomas that bloomed all over their slender bodies.
How could someone abuse such beautiful creatures? It was beyond his comprehension.
Their pale warpaints signaled them as warriors of a sort, though Follows-Chalk didn't recognize the pattern. They were outsiders, pretty much as those White Legs that had installed an encampment at the Three Marys several months ago.
After driving the Dead Horses from Dead Horse Point with their Storm Drums.
They could consider themselves fortunate, for neither the Tar Walkers nor the Crazy Horns had survived the wrath from this false god their war chief had served in the past, this Kai-Zar.
A false god whose singular target had managed to elude death once. And so, the New Canaanites had paid dearly for this. Along with any tribe remotely affiliated with them.
Nasty people, those White Legs. Since their arrival, all tensions and skirmishes around the Southwest part of Zion. And the Sorrows, though initially friendly, weren't too happy to have the two tribes dwelling in their territory, no matter how Daniel would tell them otherwise.
As a result, Dead Horses' relations with the Sorrows were tense. And it truly was a shame, for their women would make formidable wives for young, single men like Follows-Chalk. After all, finding a strong life companion was everything a Dead Horse could aspire to. Besides surviving the false god and his rabid hounds bearing reminders of salt upon their faces.
The White Legs were preparing for something, and Follows-Chalk didn't need their tribe shaman to get a general idea of what. New Canaan was an example enough.
War will be soon calling at their precarious encampment at Zion Canyon, and Follows-Chalk didn't feel even remotely prepared for that. He was a hunter-in-training, not a warrior.
Nonetheless, their war chief would like to know about these women. And they simply couldn't just leave them here to rot.
They agreed to carry them in turns to their encampment and allow the wise women to tend their wounds. If they survived, they could tell them who they were and what they were doing in Zion.
But most importantly: who had attacked them.
Contreras had fled much earlier than when Boyd and her men had reached McCarran's Supply Sack. With half the ammunitions' stock – being the least heavy goods a man could carry – missing.
To Hsu, this news had been confirmation enough to admit the letter as proof to add to the current ongoing investigation he had just opened the instant Boyd returned empty-handed.
Nonetheless, the Colonel had insisted on lodging the Courier and her group inside McCarran until he received answers from both the Rangers at the Mojave Outpost and Chief Hanlon at Camp Golf, whereas he himself mobilized the military police to search for Contreras around Vegas. If he but dared to sell some of the very specific ammunition only the Republic's Army had a license to use, they'll know.
Hsu had entrusted this new investigation to one of his key officers. A man whose name Six had forgotten not five minutes after introductions that had given the girl a most charming smile saying that she could ask him whatever she wished about how said investigation advanced as the Colonel was too busy basically trying that McCarran didn't collapse under the weight of its own inner problems.
This had been her cue to start, yet again, sorting up NCR's poor planning, picking whatever available shit she was expected to help with.
Tasks with the Republicans never ended.
On these premises, she had found herself and the others assigned to the First Recon zone outside the main building.
Whereas Gabban and the rest had seemed tenser than a guitar's string – the more when the blonde Frumentarius had ended tangled in yet another aggressive mocking contest with Betsy, who had seemed more amused at being able to annoy the young man than truly angry at having to share a tent with him -, Boone had installed his backpack at the foot of his bunk without uttering a word but doing so comfortably, making himself at home almost immediately, joining later a card game with Betsy, Ten of Spades and Bitter-Root as if nothing had ever happened and he had never gotten out of the Army.
Six had even overheard him later talking with Bitter-Root, the Hispanic young man mentioning missing having a partner to team with in a very deliberating manner that told the girl just how good it would be for Boone's mental health to re-enlist again, as much as it pained her to admit it. Not that she wanted to lose him… but, right now, she was more concerned with what was better for Boone than what her heart desired.
He looked happy amongst soldiers, a sense of true belonging quickly developing between him and the members of the Alpha Team, whereas the rest were just that: guests.
Meanwhile, Cass had joined a group of soldiers later in the night when she had learned where they had stocked their alcoholic beverages, leaving Veronica sulking cross-legged on her bunk with Rex licking her hands and nuzzling her lap as if trying to comfort her. Arcade had locked himself inside their tent when a pair of passing NCR soldier women had started whistling at him, making catcalls and offers he hadn't been in the mood to reject with his usual acerbic wit.
Lily had fallen asleep like the dead as soon as she had taken her antipsychotic medicine. Raul had simply started to clean his weapons as he always did until they had called for dinner ranch, and he had been the only one who hadn't grimaced at the menu: corn and beans. Beans taken specifically from Pork N' Beans pre-War cans. Yuck.
After all, having most of your senses dwindled due to a burned, irradiated nervous system had to have its perks.
And Zorro hadn't taken his eyes off Six, no matter how hard she tried to ignore his silent invitation to join him. Out in the night, far from the soldiers' tent barracks.
Or that was what she imagined he would be whispering in her ear with that sinful voice of his if his brother hadn't been present to watch their movements.
As uncomfortable as Gabban's presence and the rest of the Frumentarii were, Six forced herself to accept it as a guarantee that things wouldn't get out of hand with her intense legionary.
Because she was a very, very weak pre-War girl with a very, very huge post-Apocalyptic crush.
What? She wasn't going to deny that he was cute… perhaps too cute for someone like her.
Excuses inside her head were becoming more and more bizarre as she tried to make her hormones understand why playing his game wasn't a sane or smart move on her part.
From typical reasoning dealing with his Caesar's agent role, that might be the only reason as to why a dude as hot as him would be interested in ol' geek her in the first place… to more fantastical – clearly influenced by her love for Science Fiction – ramblings about her being old as fuck and him a distant descendant of Vault dwellers that might or not might have been blood-related to her at some point in the remote past.
Yeah, as if Utah and Boston couldn't have been more different and far from one another before the bombs. Try selling those theories to a talking Deathclaw, Sherlock.
So, she kept playing dumb all evening, going to sleep with his bunk next to her, same eye level since he had chosen the upper bed as well, making eyes at each other in the dark as if both were fucking fourteen.
No nightly Pip-Boy chat, though. That had oh-so-very-slightly stung.
Anyway, Betsy's screams awoke her around two in the morning.
Six awaited patiently for everyone who had gotten awake as well got back to their bunks before braving descending hers to seek the sniper woman.
She found her having a smoke outside the tents, her beret and shades blessedly absent, allowing the Courier to see the real woman beneath the tough façade for the first time.
"Hey." – she acknowledged Six after blowing off a couple of puffs of smoke. She was sickly pale, sported bloodshot eyes, and her lips were starting to peel.
Six offered her some Nuka-Cola lip balm she had found at Vault 3 silently.
"Mmm." – she nodded appreciatively after tasting it – "Pre-War geeky stuff. Dunno why you gals like it so much, but I can see some interesting kissing avenues coming out of this one." – she added, winking at her tiredly.
"Get yourself a bottle of cream." - Six suggested quite brazenly, as if she really knew what she was talking about – "Avenues can get aplenty as long as you have a good imagination and a willing partner."
Betsy almost choked on her own laughter.
"Goddamnit, girl." – she whizzed, amused – "And here I was thinking your kink was black and green computer screens."
"Hey, pre-War raunchy novels have some pretty nice ideas." – Six didn't know why she was having this conversation with this woman instead of seeking Cass or even Vero for girls' stuff, but she liked Betsy. While bold as hell, her humor wasn't as explicit as Cass', and Six felt comfortable around her, maybe because she and Boone shared quite a few traits in common… And because Betsy, once you got her very personal gist of humor right, could be a very kindhearted person who would entertain idle chatter with a Nightkin without being condescending, endure a cyberdog's enthusiastic lapping without lashing out… or lend her best pillow to an arthritic Mexican ghoul – "A girl has to dream from time to time."
"Damn straight." – the sniper woman agreed – "Dunno if I should read more or not, but I'm borrowing that one. Might find myself a cute little number who could use some extra sweetness. I definitely could." – she took another drag at her smoke – "Maybe your redhead friend likes cream." - she added as an afterthought.
"Cass? As long as it's whiskey cream…"
"Pity. I like it more a girl that is sober enough to tell the difference between horizontal and vertical smiles and how to deal with them. Got pissed off enough times with drunken hotties during sex to draw the line. If your partner isn't there with you on a hundred percent, it ain't worth it."
Six hummed, applying some tasty lip balm whilst Betsy finished her cigarette before speaking up again.
"Have those nightmares often, Corporal?" - she asked timidly, huddling in Boone's bomber jacket defensively as if expecting the other woman would lash out at her.
She didn't.
"We should get the heck out of here now that Nephi son of a bitch is dead." – Betsy sighed, frustration already seeping through her voice – "But guess what? The Lieutenant actually sat me down and asked if I wanted to talk to a doctor before we headed to Camp Forlorn Hope as we were ordered right when this shit with the Fiends started." - she laughed humorlessly – "Wouldn't believe me when I told him to forget it. I mean, if that slab of meat had gotten me pregnant, then maybe I'd want to talk to a doctor." – shrugging, she added – "If I was smart, I'd fake a big old breakdown. That'd make everybody happy, and I'd get some leave time. But then I'd be doing what everybody wants, and being the asshole I am, it just wouldn't feel right. Got to have some integrity."
"You already have integrity, Corporal. And I dare anyone telling me otherwise, being you the one who carried Sterling all the way back here." – the girl replied, eyeing the airport's distant rusty gates absently – "However, a wounded soldier can be more of a hindrance to her unit than a true aid when hard choices have to be made."
She didn't know who she was talking about anymore, unsure if this was truly about Betsy's trauma or her own, that got worse every single fucking time she tried to repress those memories that spoke of a very different world from the one she now knew.
A world before Vault 5, Burke, and the Platinum Chip, when everything had been so seemingly easy.
A world before the bombs.
"I've already gotten patched up and medicated since the bunch of souvenirs that fat pile of shit left me weren't on the short side." – Betsy's voice interrupted her looping thoughts – "I'm not wounded."
Six nodded, turning around to get back to the tent.
"I'm not telling you what to do, Corporal…" – she sighed, rubbing her arms – "But if there's something way more dangerous than an open wound, that is a wound of the soul." – and, with that, she disappeared in the night, leaving a very dumbfounded Betsy to mull over their conversation.
Feeling every single kick and punch burning through her body, Charybdis opened the only eye whose lids she could still move.
A persistent coppery tang filled her mouth, whereas she couldn't use her nostrils, so she had to breathe through her mouth.
An odd, refreshing feeling washed over her swollen throat, and there was when her eye focused on an unknown female face.
Her first instinct was to ask if she was a slave of the Legion… but the woman's shaved head and tribal tattoos gave her some pause.
They weren't green or blue but dark brown, so these weren't the Sorrows.
"Shoah!" – the woman exclaimed upon seeing her awake, her hard, tanned countenance smiling – "Yah ah tahg, Owslandr." (A)
Her words sounded warm and seemed directed at her, but Charybdis couldn't place the dialect.
Not that she could return the likely greeting since she barely could open her mouth.
She blinked twice with her only operative eye to show that she had heard her. A friendly woman was always an ally to the Daughters of Hecate.
The woman took her hurting, swollen hand wrapped in a mixture of plant leaves and refreshing poultice delicately, guiding her movements with her eyes so Charybdis could follow where she took it.
The Amazon's eye filled with tears when the woman joined her hand with her sister's, who was also lying by her side.
"Schwes'taern." (B) – the woman said, pointing Scylla with her eyes.
Charybdis' fingers closed around her sister's weakly.
The ambush… she had reacted way too late, distracted as she had been with the immense beauty of Zion Valley… she had heard her screams as those animals had…
Scylla had always been the smart one out of the two of them, the one who always knew how to weave words, the one who always knew exactly what to say.
Charybdis had been the strongest. Always. But she hadn't been strong enough to prevent…
Suddenly, a shadow was cast upon the two sisters, and Charybdis dreaded the moment the other woman retired to leave a pair of worn rattlesnake skin boots in her place.
How fitting for a serpent to wear another serpent's skin.
"Wo, wo, unto Jerusalem, for I have seen thine abominations." – a voice, profoundly deep and profoundly dark, enunciated dispassionately as bloodshot steely eyes peered from behind an amalgam of white bandages and patches of scarred skin, reddened, uneven and angry the same that voice from the Abysm reached her ears like a cacophony; for her fear, her pain, and her hatred were so great that she couldn't listen to his voice without recalling the hundreds of screams that always accompanied his twisted words, preaching salvation through pain and loss - "Yea, and many things did my father read concerning Jerusalem—that it should be destroyed, and the inhabitants thereof; many should perish by the sword, and many should be carried away captive into Babylon."
Gathering all the strength she could, with all the bile such a voice inspired in her, Charybdis spat at the rattlesnake-covered feet.
"Even sinners such as your ilk deserve pity in these dark times, for the Lord works in mysterious ways, and I choose to believe that your presence here cannot be merely coincidental." – the eyes grew dark the same the voice became icier, its tones the Hell's Bells chiming in an ominous lament. Pain, loss… and fire. The same fire in which he threw those he deemed his Lord's enemies, indistinctly of age, gender, or race. The same fire that had consumed his flesh in retaliation for those he once fed to it – "However, I do wonder… what are two Amazons of Babylon doing this far from the House of the Crossroads?"
She had feigned returning to the tent, but she hadn't climbed up to her bunk again.
It was fortunate that the space within the tent had been near pitch-black since, otherwise, she would have noticed his absence as well.
Remaining less than ten minutes inside, she had sneaked out of the soldier barracks to direct her steps to the terminal building, surprising him with how skilled she was when she infiltrated the main doors without alerting any of the guards outside.
Like the shadow of a ghost.
He initially had followed her out of pure curiosity, but now he wanted to see what she was up to.
She rounded the building's lower level inside to sneak again to the training courtyard.
Zigzagging amidst derelict planes and NCR trailers parked in disarray around, he followed in her steps until she reached the far corner where the two-story junk hut that constituted the whole armory that the Republicans had available for their troops sat.
Vulpes almost smiled when he caught her trying to pick the hut's door lock.
"Well, well, well! What's our favorite Courier doing so far from her tent?" – he whispered in her ear, relishing in her bodily reactions when she first jumped slightly and then blushed to the very points of her little, nimble fingers – "Trekker of McCarran, it is fortunate that it's me the one who has found you in such an… incriminatory position, given how fragile your deals with Hsu currently are."
He had been resting his chin on her shoulder, so their noses almost bumped when she turned her head to face him. Such a peppered little nose she had.
"Shit! Don't sneak on me like that!" – she admonished him in a nervous whisper to almost immediately turn her face back to her task, blushing even more deeply – "You almost gave me a heart attack!"
He observed her working on the lock with mild interest since his imagination was painting him very suggestive scenarios in which he could simply drop the pretense, pin her to the shack's wall and show her how persuasive he could be without the use of words.
Such as he had abundantly demonstrated the night prior.
"Ah ah ah." – he sang when he saw her attempting to force the lock – "What have I told you about using brutish means?" – he gently chided her, grabbing her wrists lightly though firmly – "This isn't a lever." – he added, raising the little hand wielding the screwdriver – "And this…" – he continued, raising the other hand with the bobby pin – "… is a very delicate implement than can snap inside the lock should you apply the incorrect amount of pressure on it." – accommodating his larger form behind hers, he couldn't help but notice the way her shoulders shivered slightly at the contact, so he decided to push his luck by encasing her position between his legs while enclosing his arms around hers, his chest firmly planted upon her back – "Do it again… this time more calmly." – his lips caressed lightly short hair above her left ear, allowing himself to inhale a brief gust of her natural scent, and she smelled so impossibly sweet… - "Patience is the mother of science."
He aided her on the basics and allowed her to proceed until she could find the correct position to unlock the mechanism.
However, her hands were trembling the more he kept literally breathing on her neck.
"What's the matter?" – he inquired with faux innocence at her struggles – "Weren't you paying attention the other day at Vault 3?" – he knew he was winning their silent contest when his arms closed around her waist, slowly trapping her – "Shall I go through teaching you everything again?"
He was playing dirty, but so she was, feigning that she didn't notice at all the crystal-clear signals he had been giving her throughout the evening.
While he enjoyed a small challenge, her continuous resistance didn't make any sense to him. There was definitely chemistry between them, an established attraction with perhaps even a little scoop of infatuation on both parts.
And it was sweet. Sweeter than he might have possibly ever suspected coming out of this unfinished, frustrating to no end liaison they had.
And he wanted more. He wanted it all.
Why wouldn't she? Did she have any other particular reason than simply playing difficult on purpose?
Was it because of the presence of the others? True that he himself was starting to resent his brother's surveillance as if he were committing betrayal by simply having found his target to be more appetizing than he had initially calculated, however…
He felt her hand patting his forearm softly.
"DIS-TRAC-TING." – she syllabified, emphasizing with every little pat – "Cannot concentrate with you playing stuff there, you dummy."
Forgetting his train of thought momentarily, he grinned at her admission.
"Distracting, am I?" – he purred, nuzzling her hair briefly before she giggled, shoving him gently aside.
"Naaaaaughty." – she chided him, finally managing to conquer the lock's mechanism – "Okay, here we go."
He allowed her to scurry off his arms and followed her inside the shack, still not knowing what they were doing there until they found the terminal supply database on the second floor.
However, after hacking it, she didn't find any usable information on the computer aside from a manifest regarding a complicated and very profitable operation Contreras had been leading in complicity with a man of the Gun Runners, Isaac, and a merchant from the Crimson Caravans, Blake.
"Manipulating the books like the worm he is." – she hissed, frustrated – "But nothing on the blackmail deal he had with Burke, with him shuffling in Littlehorn & Associates' agents through the rail as long as his little operation wasn't uncovered. Clever."
Nevertheless, she downloaded the data into her Pip-Boy.
"What are you planning to do with that information?" – he asked, arms crossed, leaning against one of the junk walls.
She shrugged.
"Given how unlikely thorough Boyd and her men might be, I might attempt to bargain with Hsu giving him this information in exchange for taking back this 'invitation' of his having us detained in here while there's still much to be done instead of playing the standard NCR apathetic part… hey, what's so funny?"
He covered his mouth with a hand, his shoulders slouching a bit as he chuckled.
"You." – he replied, amused – "Not twenty-four hours inside McCarran yet, and you are already devising strategies as to how to get out of its walls." – shaking his head lightly, he unglued his back from the junk wall and walked toward her – "Oh, Sullivan, Sullivan…" – he said with that silky tone he knew it always got her all flustered – "There are better, much more beneficial ways to gain the good Colonel's trust than bartering with information obtained through illegal, highly compromising means." – he added, grabbing her softly by the chin.
This was a golden opportunity if his brother wanted irrefutable proof that she was Legion material. He had had the solution to his problem right before his very nose all this time.
Though she very predictably blushed yet again, her eyes held a hint of curiosity.
"What do you have in mind, Fox-Man?" – she asked, eyeing him suspiciously.
How well did she know him, trusting his criterion while wary of his intentions.
She was learning fast. That was a trait he loved from her.
"Do you remember the Captain you spoke with this afternoon regarding any updates on the Contreras case?" – when she nodded, his smile amplified – "Let us say that I… happen to know him well, dearest Sullivan. Would you like to hear more?"
She didn't disappoint him.
LATIN:
(1) - recruits
(2) - Same rank as Primi Legionarii (Prime Legionaries) but in charge of guard posts.
(3) - Prime Decanus
(4) - Veteran Legionary
DEAD HORSES' CREOLE LANGUAGE:
(A) - "Look! Greetings, Outsider"
(B) - Sisters
A/N: hi again! Long time no see, huh? Took me ages to complete this chapter, to be perfectly honest. I had to "study" Dead Horses' Creole language to write even the tiniest sentence; the Mormon Bible since it's slightly different from the standard one (not a believer, so save me the chiding regarding my ignorance); the very Joshua Graham and his lines of dialogue (I simply find him frightening, doesn't happen to you too?) in order to make him believable... and then, Legion Lore.
I had to go through the nasty details of their society and had to make some adaptations. Nothing too drastic and still believable... I think.
To Another S.T.A.L.K.E.R and Eruch: I enjoyed a lot your long reviews. They show that you care and even make yourselves questions about this story and how the Fallout New Vegas world works. I know I sometimes tend to be a bit chaotic regarding dialogues and who's who, but that's Lily's chaotic mind for you.
Regarding the linking stories and world construction: I always appreciate that people realize just how difficult is to reconcile both Fallout and "Bethesda Fallout" since the former has the good lore and story, and the latter has the dynamism and "landscapism" the other lacks. Fallout 3 doesn't make much sense given how it deals with the Rogue Chapter of the BoS or where half the NPCs come from. Vaults? Enclave? Zetans' abductions? Pre-War cryogenized people? And what about people coming from overseas such as Tenpenny or Cait from F4? Does it make sense? So many plot gaps.
Motivations besides James' dream of purifying water for a better Wasteland?: zero. Burke needed motivation, Charon needed a story, so here we are XD
Thank you a lot for your support and your patience. Let's see if I can have the next chapter in three weeks or so since I've already started it but I'm not sure whether I want to disclose some things or not. Cheers! ❤
PD: Vexillarius Terrence, Thunderfoot, and Ivory are characters that were going to appear in Van Buren. Ivory was kind of "resurrected" in the MOD "Simply Uncut - New Vegas" and is an albino, so...
[EDITED 06/20/2021: corrected hugest mistake ever regarding the Lore surrounding the conflict between the Dead Horses and Sorrows with the White Legs. Now everything makes sense].
