Veronica

Theresa found Niner at the roadside bar she'd met Russel, and he, that is Niner, was harassing someone in an ugly, rough brown robe.

"Hey, hey! I'm talking to you…. Hey, what are you some kind of lesbian?" asked the boy, or at least the boy in Theresa's estimation. She wasn't sure how old he was, but Niner had displayed all the emotional maturity of a 13 year old in the brief time she'd known him.

But that line, about being a lesbian, caused Theresa to groan. There had been a day, long ago, when 'LGBT Liberation' had been a real thing. Gays and Lesbians could marry, and transgendered people were becoming more accepted. But the kind of people who win race wars don't like queer people, so it didn't stick.

I wondered what would happen when Niner found out I swing like a saloon door? Thought Theresa, not asking herself what would happen if he were to discover all her other secrets…nonetheless, she scolded him, shouting "Niner! Now there are a lot of reasons a woman might ignore you—"

"Ah Six!" he said ruefully. "Wha'dya mean?"

"Niner!" Willow snapped, "That's not a way to treat a lady. You can't go around asking people if they're lesbians."

"Why, are you a lesbian?" Niner asked. He actually meant that as a question, but Willow wasn't sure of that. Theresa was mortified but had to stifle a laugh anyway.

"No! No, I am not a lesbian Mr. Niner, but that's not the point."

Theresa decided to end the coming argument. "Niner! I need to talk to you for a second."

"Now what I'd do Six?" he was whining. And obvious to all completely innocent of what he was doing was unseemly.

"Willow, see if that's Veronica," said Theresa, although the instant tracking of the robed woman's head confirmed she was.

Theresa took Niner to the side and correctly assuming his ignorance, explained to him the finer points of sexual harassment and why that was a bad thing, and how his aggressive harassment of this Veronica made him seem, in her words, 'rapey.' Theresa felt she had a good feel for him, and her gut told her he was no rapist. But his mannerism and dress were that of a street thug, and Theresa was at pains to tell him that if he continued to act like this, he was going to get shot by a woman fearing for her safety.

"Oh, it's not fair, Six!"

"Really?!" Theresa asked.

"Yeah, it's not fair!" Niner said, with a look of bewildered rejection. "Men always gotta be aggressive, or they get ignored. Then we get noticed, but we come across as 'rapey', we're nice to girls, they ignore us, we treat them like crap, and then we're the bad guys. I'm telling you Six, you females….you're impossible to please."

Theresa sighed, as this made her head hurt. Then she had an epiphany and grabbed his crotch.

"Wait Six, what are you doing?!"

She hissed in his ear as vile as she could make her voice "Aw come on, Niner, you're a man! Always asking for it. What man doesn't like a woman putting her hand on those scrumptious dangly bits? What are you, some kind of faggot? You a lady boy?! You want play dress up?!"

"Ah ah ah!" He threw himself away from her as though she were a hot iron bearing down on his felsh. He looked at her with bewilderment and betrayal.

"Now, do you see?"

Niner's painful expression changed to something more bewildered. She was trying to teach him something but in the moment, he just wasn't getting it. "I, I feel violated Six. That was seriously not cool."

"Of course it wasn't Niner. That's what all women learn to fear. Now do you see?"

"Uh, yeah. Kinda…." He trailed off but Theresa figured the 'kinda' was put there as a placeholder. He was getting it, but it was taking time to set in fully. Then he smiled and laughed a little, "You know, that's why I like you Six. You explain things to me in ways I can understand."

Theresa, bless her heart, had no idea how true he spoke, and how rare that had been for him.

That reaction though had a very discomforting effect on Theresa. He'd taken it a LOT better than she should have. "Uh, you're welcome. You're….welcome."

Theresa put her arm around his shoulder, the sleeve of her thick leather coat going over his bare shoulders "Now, keep your nose clean and we're going to have a good time in Vegas!" She punched him lightly in the arm with my other hand good naturedly. "Now, I'm going to go speak with the girl OK? And when I do, I want you to take Willow and wait in truck by Delilah, OK?"

"OK, six, can I play with the nobbies on the radio bot?"

"As long as ED-E doesn't holler, go ahead," she said, pronouncing the name as 'Eedie' instead of 'Eddy.' He went off in the direction of the truck, where Delilah and Ringo, two other companions, were taking a nap.

Willow was having a pleasant conversation with this 'Veronica.'

"I'm from a hole in the ground!" said Veronica, as though it were the most natural thing in the world.

"You mean like a Vault? Or more like a Molerat warren? I've seen people live in both." And Willow was not kidding in that.

Veronica shrugged, "Ah it's a bunker, if you want to get technical. But I think it sounds more interesting my way."

Theresa had no doubts this girl was Brotherhood of Steel. But there could be two Veronicas in the same chapter. Theresa put up a hand to flag the girl down and spoke above both of them, "I'm sorry ma'am?"

Veronica turned to me.

"Are you Veronica Santangelo by any chance?"

"Ah…yes? Do I…Why do you ask?"

Jackpot. Theresa thought she'd be carrying her packages from the Sierra Madre until the day she quit, and not even three months later, she had found the girl.

"I'm a courier for Mojave Express, I have two messages for you. Lucky for you, I wasn't carrying my normal parcel bag when I got robbed….I was robbed a few days ago."

She was intrigued. "Mail? For me? Is it good news…or…"

Theresa didn't know how to answer that question. Explaining what happened at the Sierra Madre was a two hour conversation, and she didn't want to start a new relationship with it.

Veronica lifted the robe off her head, revealing short cropped brown hair and blue eyes. The hair would have given her away, the robes said beggar or wasteland scav, but the hair was as clean as it was short.

"Um…no offense, but you look like you're walked down some bad roads. Where'd you come from?"

Theresa smirked, "The grave."

In that moment, Veronica believed her. Her eyes widened with appraisal, then came back to resting. "Wow, I take that back. You look pretty good all things considered."

Theresa's smirk grew into a soft smile, "Yes ma'am, I got shot twice in the head and buried in a shallow grave in Goodsprings." Theresa found it morbidly funny.

"Good God!" Veronica gasped, her back arching back and her hand coming up to her mouth as though to shield it. Very feminine, noted Theresa.

Theresa sat down, and began the rather laborious process of actually getting to her pouch. First, she had to unclamp her recharger rifle from it's maglocks on her back, and place the gun on the table. Long practice had compelled her to do this slow and careful, because those who could not reach for their guns at a moment's notice in the Mojave were just asking to be robbed. Then, one hand on her gun so no thief would come and snatch it away as she fiddled with the pack. One handed, she slid the cylindrical leather pouch off her left shoulder then stiffly threw it up and caught it all in the left hand before placing it on the table.

"Now," She put down my pack on another picnic table, sat down and sort through the mail, and unclamped the recharger rifle from her back. Only then could she could get at the pack straps underneath. In the Mojave, if you can't reach for your gun like lighting, you're just asking to be robbed.. Most of the time the 'town bulks' are all bound together for easy delivery, but Theresa had six pieces for delivery whenever she found the person.

"You should thank your lucky stars I wasn't carrying this when I was robbed. Had a 'special delivery' to make, not allowed to make rounds. Now, sign here" and she handed the girl the release forms.

Veronica used the pen clipped to the signing form, at which time Theresa handed her the package, a little square thing, just big enough for the holotapes inside.

"What's in it?" She shook the little box

"Two holotapes. You may want to sit down for this."

Her brows furrowed, but she dutifully sat across from Theresa, who moved her pack out of the way so as ensure there was nothing physically between them.

"One is from Christine Royce, and the other is from…Father Elijah."

Veronica turned white. Those were names….names she never expected to hear again. She flipped her hood back, exposing closely cropped brown hair. "You found…Father Elijah? Oh God Where? I mean…I thought…I don't even know what I thought might have happened to him."

Veronica studied Theresa's face, a pale, lean, narrow face with plucked auburn eyebrows and bright green eyes. "But…you don't have a 'this is good' expression look on your face." Veronica turned her eyes down and expected to hear the worst.

Theresa smiled a bit, but if Veronica had really seen it, it would have struck her as less and jubilant. "Well it's not all bad. The good news is, both he and Christine are alive and well."

Veronica looked straight at her, eyes wide with surprise that bordered on joy.

"Where are they?"

"Alcatraz."

This was not good news to Veronica, but it was better than them being dead. She wondered if Alcatraz was the best future she had in store. She sighed at bad news. "So, they've been…captured by the NCR?"

"Yeah, but they're both alive. As to Father Elijah….well, have you ever heard of the Sierra Madre?"

"The one on the Strip they converted to apartments, or the other one? The luring treasure hunters to their doom in a blood red cloud? All that treasure hunting mobo jumbo?"

Theresa laughed without any trace of humor. "The second one. Well he kidnapped me and a bunch of other people including Christine and strapped bomb collars on us and made us rob the casino."

Veronica's face went blank.

"Oh it gets better. Then he tried to get us to kill each other when we no longer served his purpose."

Veronica didn't give a normal reaction, but to be fair there wasn't a normal reaction to this story. For several moments, Veronica was blank; Theresa compared it to an OS crash on a robot. Finally, she said "Um…did it work?"

Theresa sucked on her lips, finally pursing them with a pop. "Nope. But it wasn't fun. Luckily we managed to knock him out and we smashed his hands up with hammers to make sure he couldn't detonate our collars."

Veronica grimaced. "Yeesh. That's…that's awful."

Theresa nodded in sympathy. "Yeah….Elijah's pretty insane. I know you were his star pupil, so I can't imagine what you're going through. Elijah, he kept threatening to kill everyone until it was 'just him, him alone in a quiet world'. He said this more than once. Yeah….anyway, right as we're leaving, the NCR shows up, late to the party as always and takes away all the gold we looted." Theresa was very sore about that point, and it showed.

Then she changed the subject to lighten her mood. " So that was how I spent my summer vacation. By the way," I leaned in close "The moment you said you lived in a bunker, I pegged you for Brotherhood. Discretion isn't your strong suit. That or you're an exile."

Veronica looked at her as if she'd grown a second head. Her thin lips puckered and she clicked her teeth, "Well, that's… You know everything about me, and I know nothing about you. This awkward. So if you know everything about me-"

"I don't know anything about you Ms. Santangelo. Except….you were close to Father Elijah, and of course everything Christine old me about you."

"He was my mentor, made sure I got raised properly after my parents died."

"I'm sorry to hear about that,"

Veronica looked at her weary eyes. "It's happened a lot since the war with NCR. They died in the same battle trying to hold off the NCR from... something. I don't remember what it was. Guess it seemed important at the time."

Theresa felt it in the gut. She also made sure to show that she felt it. There were times to put on the poker face, but when you're trying to manipulate someone, a sense of empathy goes a long way.

"Thank you…I know the Brotherhood isn't always the most sympathetic bunch."

Trying not to show her eagerness, Theresa continued, "So what are you doing here?"

This time it was Veronica who smiled, a little whistful smile that was gone as soon as it appeared. "Oh I dunno, dreaming of distant horizons. But…I'm at the 188 because we're a big family, and someone's got to get the groceries. And actually these days I think they'd rather have me out here anyway. But that's a whole other story."

"Really? Tell me more." Theresa was sniffing a jackpot.

"W-what do you think of the Brotherhood?"

Theresa gave a long look at her gun, a clearly modified Malcrocon MBX recharger rifle and then back to Veronica.

"Ah, what?" Veronica tried to stoneface, but she was very bad at it. It wouldn't have saved her in any case as Theresa was well aware of events in the Wasteland.

"You want to take my gun?"

"Um…no. Not at all." Veronica meant it, although Theresa wasn't low to trust her just yet. For Theresa, the Brotherhood was so in the wrong, Veronica's contrition to the point of embarrassment wasn't quite servile enough. But, not wanting to alienate a potential ally, Theresa accepted it.

"Good!" Theresa smiled at her, tried to put her at ease. "We'll get along just fine then."

Veronica sighed. This was the first real conversation about the Brotherhood she'd been able to have with an outsider, and it was clear the outsiders were not in a mood to forgive. "We've made a lot of enemies, haven't we?"

"Yes, yes you have," Theresa didn't want to condemn the daughter for the sins of the tribe, but as she was on her 'Empathy mode', hiding such disdain was difficult. "You guys did not need to pick that fight with the NCR."

That bit Veronica, it bit hard. It made her yearn for the parents she would never see again. So she changed the subject to avoid feeling the full whammy of anguish. "I'll be honest. You're the first person I've run across out here that looks like she can really handle herself, and you've got friends. Friends are good, right? There are places I've never been to that'd be too dangerous for just me. What do you think? Maybe we could travel together, help each other out? If I turn out to be a burden, we can part ways at any time. No hard feelings."

Despite being shielded the full blast of her long buried anguish, she felt the cold blast ripple through her soul. In that moment, she expected this courier to tell her no. God knows, she was a Brotherhood Scribe, she deserved it.

"Sure!" said Theresa. "I love company. The more the merrier….you don't have a problem with crowds, do you?"

"Oh…I'd prefer not to be a third wheel or anything…"

"Makes us harder to ambush, and frankly, after ambushed and shot in the head, I don't want to be alone for a long, long time."

"You didn't let finish…..Ms. Miller…..Theresa, can I call you Theresa?"

Theresa shrugged, "Sure."

"…but a fourth wheel or a fifth wheel. I can dig it…daddy-o."

Theresa nestled her head on her hand, which was being propped up by the elbow on the table, "But don't you have a family to feed?" she asked sardonically.

Veronica did not fluster. "They can handle themselves. And I'm not the only one getting supplies for them. It's a big family."

"So they're not going to miss you? Send out a scouting party if you don't check back in, one that might, you know, want to take my gun?" She gestured back with her right hand to butt of her recharger rifle.

"Um no. It's big family."

Theresa was digging at this point, but was honestly surprised cracking Veronica was coming so easy. "They don't seem to like you very much."

Veronica smiled lopsidedly, and rolled her eyes and shrugged. "Oh, it's not a matter of liking me, they like me fine. It's that they respect my procurement abilities…if you take trying to keep me as far away from Hidden Valley as possible because I ask too many difficult questions as a sign of respect, oh yeah. That's not to say I don't get along with them. I just think they don't know what to do with me sometimes."

"I didn't mention that the Brotherhood was in Hidden Valley."

Her eyes widened and she crossed her hands in front of her mouth. "Oh Crap!" Her pallor became ashen. This was the kind of loose lips that got people killed, and there were so few people left.

"Calm down, everyone who's important knows that's where the Brotherhood is though."

Veronica looked at her with horror and stupefaction. Finally she said, "That doesn't make me feel any better."

Bait her a little, a little at a time, thought Theresa. "I got to be honest with you kid, I don't see great things in the Brotherhood's future. Ah, anyway, where do you want to go?"

Veronica thought about it, seriously thought about it for the first time. "Oh, nowhere in particular, really. Just hoping to see more of the world. Looking for a fresh perspective."

Theresa nodded graciously. "I can do that."

Veronica continued "I want to see how different groups have adapted to survive in the Mojave. See if there's something I can learn from."

Theresa approved of this open mindedness in a Scribe and said, "Kid, there's so much you can learn. Now…I hate to drive a hard bargain, but there's something I want from you."

"Oh? What?"

She sounds concerned. And she should be. And I'm going to get it anyway, thought Theresa. "First, tell me about Elijah. I can't imagine him caring about, anything really. What was he like, before?"

Veronica seemed to really think on this, before saying, "I don't know. Last time anyone saw him was in the battle at HELIOS One. I wasn't there. He gave orders to hold the plant until it could be reactivated. But he ran out of time. The NCR overran it. Everyone thought he was dead. "

"But I got a note from him at a comm station. That's... how he liked to talk, even to me. He wasn't good at face-to-face. It was... strange. Even for Father Elijah. He's always been unstable, but this was... something else. I don't want to say delusional, but I don't know what else to call it. The only thing familiar about it was the signature. He said the Brotherhood was doomed, but that he'd return, save us. But the, ah, way he said it... I don't know... Said he'd return with one of the greatest treasures of the Old World, make the Mojave like it was meant to be... wipe the slate clean. What did he mean by that?"

It figured, thought Theresa. "You know that story about the Sierra Madre being drowned in blood red cloud?"

"Yeah."

"That's what he meant. It's incredibly toxic and he was going to use it as a weapon to kill anyone who opposed him." There was significantly more to his plan, but it just got worse from there.

Must be because of the hood, but Veronica Santeanglo was pretty pale for living in the desert. And she turned whiter than that. She looked sick. "I…don't want to talk about this anymore."

Theresa demurred, for the moment. "I won't ask you anything more about Elijah. However, you were in contact with him after the battle of Helios One?"

"Yes, but what does that have to do with anything?"

Theresa thought about how to best articulate what she wanted to say without moaning 'Teeeeeccchhhhhh' like nerdy zombie. "Father Elijah is brilliant. I saw him develop new technology, and re-purpose old. He had a nose for technology. He had to if he took over a solar power plant instead of marching straight on to Hoover Dam. A lot of technology that an Elder wouldn't normally be interested in."

"I don't know where you're going with this," This was a lie, she knew exactly where Theresa was going with this, and Theresa knew it.

"I want your help. See, courier work is what I do for a living. But my real passion, is technology. All kinds. There's real money to be made in salvaging tech. Not old bottles of turpentine, or melting down tin cans to make prairie glass for shacks and dugout houses. Real technology that can help real people."

"And…maybe convince the Brotherhood they're on the wrong path?" Veronica sounded very hopeful in this.

For a moment, Theresa was reminded of the very bad old days, where superhumanly powerful Elders ruled over the young undead and dominated their minds to make the fledglings do their bidding. At 199, Theresa was beginning to suspect it wasn't any supernatural power that made the Elders so compelling, just decades of observation. She, that worthless little Caitiff, had just struck gold. Another tech cache was about to fall into her hands. Another fortune was going to be made, and most importantly, Theresa could prove once again she was a boon to humanity and not a bane.

None of this appeared anywhere near the calm surface of Theresa's young looking features. "I'll help you if you'll help me. And then there's always the money."

"Um, yeah," Veronica had never really thought about money before. It occurred to her that she could in theory live better on the outside than in the conforting confines of the earth, but suddenly that seed began to germinate, the shell cracking and a tiny shaft of green began pushing out. "Money's always good."

"How about you and I take a detour, go to that comm station?"

"It's...well, not too far from here I'd use to access messages from him. If we go there I can pull up his research on it. He'd send Scribes out into the desert chasing whatever leads he found. There were a few he only trusted me with."

"Sounds great." Theresa stood up and stuck out her hand to shake.

Veronica rose and took it gingerly. Which is surprising because she had a powerfist over her hand. Not that Theresa was ungrateful, even the finger servos could have crushed her hand into a broken piñata of flesh and protruding bone.

Theresa took it with a firm graciousness of someone used to making deals. "Welcome aboard Ms. Santangelo."

Veronica looked and felt slightly queasy. Sharing technology with outsiders was forbidden. On the other hand, she needed someone, anyone to really talk to. An ally who could show her the outside. And she was so grateful this opportunity had come. "Veronica, you can just call me Veronica. And if I turn out to be a burden we can part at any time, no hard feelings."

"Not a chance. Now, I'm assuming you're a scribe? Fathers are scribes, Elders are Paladins that is if I recall my Brotherhood terminology right."

"Uh, yeah. I'm a scribe." She added emphatically, "I've been taking things apart and putting them back together since before I said my first word. You want to build something, talk to me, and we can do it right there on the spot. Workbenches are for novices. Who knows, I might even be able to show you a Brotherhood trick or two."

Theresa's latent greed surged forward with such suddenness it was hard to separate it from lust. Much as a horny school boy asks for petting privileges, Theresa tentatively approached Veronica with a hard look in her eyes. "Can you…disable robots?"

"Yeah, actually yes I can."

Theresa felt her smile mirrored the cheshire cat. "Perfect…under fire?"

This made Veronica nervous. "Um, why are you asking me that?"

Theresa smiled ear to ear and put her arm chummily around Veronica's shoulders. She nearly whispered into her ear. "Because there's a lot of money to be made in salvaging robots. Sure you can just EMP them to death Pulse grenades but then you only get the scrap, the plating. But disabling and reprograming them to be nice and docile? So much money to be made."

"I can't do that."

"I can." Theresa put up her left arm showing an old, battered Pip-Boy 3000 around her wrist. "Don't be fooled by the PipBoy, that's just the interface I borrowed in Goodsprings, my processor is implanted in my arm, with the factory reset codes for any standard Robco, West Tek, or General Atomics robot line. I can even reprogram Securitrons if I have to."

"Really?" Veronica deadpanned. She was impressed, but she half expected there to be more.

"I've made a lot of money hauling out bots from old locations." Humblebragging if there had ever been.

"And yet you're a courier?" It wasn't an idle question. Being a Courier was dangerous work.

Theresa shrugged and said "Vegas." This was a lie, but it would be crazy to admit she delivered mail for fun in her retirement. Especially since every third recipient tried to kill her.

But Veronica had heard many stories in the 188 of people ruined at the tables of the Vegas Strip. "OK, fair enough. Is there any place worth salvaging in the Mojave?"

Theresa thought about this. At any other time, she'd had several locations in mind, but she shook off the greed and steadied herself. "There won't be too much longer, but yeah, there are places to go. I have just a place in mind, but I want to see how you move before I risk your life. Besides, I have business in the Strip."

"Oh!" Veronica was excited, "Going to strike it rich?" She giggled evilly at Theresa.

"Probably not," I said.

"Oh, it sounds like things are going to get super exciting with you around." Veronica was not nearly displeased at the prospect.

"I try to keep the violence to a minimum, but it is the Mojave. Now, shall we get going?"

She smiled at me and nodded a bit. "Let's go make trouble."