Author's notes: this is a retelling of a unique playthrough of NV through the eyes of Dr. Angela Edwards, her struggle to piece back her memories, find her love, and return to a life that is slowly slipping away from her. It focuses on character and retells a lot of the narrative of the main story reframed within the context of Angela's journey to find her wife and not lose herself to the unforgiving Mojave. It will feature companions and her interactions with them, but the story is still mostly hers'.
She awakes in Goodsprings with little memory of how things were. Her mind is a fog. Many things are lost to her: her home, her job, the way her wedding ring fit just a little too tightly on her aging finger, and the frail thorns of the rose bushes she managed to grow in the garden by her trailer. She's lost her favorite radio songs, what color her dad's eyes were. the taste of nuka-cola in summer. She feels incomplete. Like she's a fragment of a fragment, a clump of dry Nevadan rock chipped off by shrapnel and dog teeth.
She does remember some things. Science. The way to machinate atoms smashing into themselves around a nucleus to induce criticality. Her wife's smile. Her wife's name. Irene/That summer-blonde hair that smelled like lilacs and lightning-pulses that struck through their nervous systems as they touched each other for the first time. She remembers the cold steel of a gun, fitting snug in the indentions of her palm, and the warm radiation of the laser that the trigger wrought. She remembers making a delivery. She remembers being shot.
There is a dull pain against her temple. A man says something. She can't make out the words. He sounds kind and old, like her father whispering "you're a tough girl, aren't ya?" as he poured whiskey over the fresh gecko bite on her hand. She still has that scar. She runs her finger along it sometimes when she feels scared. It is raised and tough. It is ugly. It is permanent. It is childhood curiosity and it was the Mojave's mark on her. It is the last thing her mind focuses on as a needle is jabbed into her thigh and she lets out a gasp. She is so tired. Her eyes shut and in her sleep she dreams of Irene and chemistry sets.
"A-Angela," she stutters, looking at the old man with a tense expression, trying to size him up. Old, skinny, frail. If he tried something she was sure she could overpower him. She found herself mindlessly rubbing the gecko scar. Her eyes glance across the room – there's scissors, paper, he's an artist – no, stimpaks are lying on the table, there's a stethoscope on the desk. Oh. He's a doctor. She had just given a fake name to a doctor.
"Well Angela, nice to meet you. I'm Doc Mitchell, I got you all fixed up an-"
"Where are my things?" Angela spat. She didn't mean to sound mean or distrusting, but she had no idea where she was. She had no idea who she was. Doc Mitchell seemed nice enough – but she was a smart girl. Smart enough to know to not just trust a stranger at his word in a situation like this. She was smart, or maybe she was scared. So incredibly scared that she could feel every heartbeat reverberate her entire core like the earth itself was trying to rip her apart from behind her chest. Everything felt wrong. This was not her life. She was not supposed to be here. She was supposed to be with Irene in Freeside working together on – on *something*. Why was she here?
"Your things are just over by the door there," The doctor said calmly, "Guess you were a courier?"
He wasn't lying. In a pile by the door were some wasteland clothes, a few bottlecaps, stimpaks, a laser pistol with 30 energy cells – not enough – and a piece of paper on top of the stack. A job description from Mojave Express. Deliver a platinum chip to New Vegas. New Vegas. No, Freeside. Where Irene was. Where Angela's life was. It's coming back to her like blurry edges in a painting, undefined and rough but with just enough to understand the focus. She was heading home to Freeside when an old friend had asked her to take a package along with her as a favor. She was no courier, no, she was a scientist – and perhaps, also, a victim of opportunity.
"What about the package?" she asked, calmer this time, without any of the edge she had in her previous interactions. If Doc had mal-intent he probably wouldn't have given her things back, least of all a laser pistol with 30 rounds.
"Wasn't there, figured the guys who shot you in the head took it," he stated bluntly.
"Shot in the head?" Angela instinctively reached up to her temple where the soreness was the night prior. It was bandaged up well, but she could still feel the soft, wet, squishiness of tissue underneath. Doc must have given her enough stims to numb her up good, all she felt was pressure and this dizzy nauseousness. "Did you, did you save my life Doc?"
"I did," he replied "no need trying to compensate me or anything, just get good rest and don't make my effort a waste by doing something stupid.'
Unfortunately for Doc Mitchell, something stupid is exactly what Angela had in mind.
Doc continued. "For now just head on down to the saloon. Rest up a while. Make sure you can still handle a gun and get some warm food in ya."
Angela nodded. She was hungry and food did sound nice. The trip to Vegas, no, to Freeside – to Irene – was going to be a long one. She needed energy and she needed luck. Angela thought to herself that things would be best if she could avoid her would-be murderer. At least for now. At least until she could collect herself. At least until she could look into Irene's eyes and see her smile and listen to her talk for hours and hours about how the NCR radio station has been going downhill and doesn't do real reporting like she always admired. She just needed to know she was safe.
She said "for now" in her mind, but she knew better. She wasn't a swashbuckling, action-movie star. She was a scientist. Vengeance against mystery men with pistols and platinum packages were out of her skill set. Sometimes bad things go unpunished. Sometimes you're just not strong enough to get justice. Sometimes innocent people get roped into the schemes of the rich and die. And hey, she thought to herself, at least she didn't die.
"Thank you, Doctor, for everything," Angela said, donning the dusty, time-worn white shirt and jeans of an old surgeon's outfit and making sure her glasses still fit on her narrow face. "I"ll, um, see you around."
"Hope ya don't! Life's a lot better without needin' a doctor aharhar" he replied
Angela kind of smiled but, awkwardly, didn't really know how to reply. She never knew how to reply – talking to people was Irene's job. She'd even order for her when they bought food at Ralph and Mick's.
"I, um, am leaving now," she said. Then she just scurried out the door. She didn't mean to seem unthankful, she just didn't know how to express that gratitude. When she finds Irene they'll come back – the two of them will give him a nice dinner or something to make up for all the trouble. But for right now, her mind drifted to the expanse of the Mojave in front of her, to geckos and half-built shacks. Despite her stomach she was going to ignore Goodsprings, ignore the man who shot her – she was going straight to Freeside. If she could get back to Irene that would be good enough for her. This could all become a memory and the blood cells slowly forming into a scab on her temple could be just like the gecko bite. Time would turn all this into a fog, like the rest of those bad memories, coalescing together into an intangible ether and swept away by the dust of the Mojave.