Boone ordered his food. Lucky didn't eat; she tossed the caps on the counter with a faint smile. He looked at her, worried maybe, but unaware that her thoughts were elsewhere.
"I just wasn't hungry. We still had daylight to burn and I was that much closer to my target," Lucky remarked. Boone could picture the scowl on her face. "But I knew we were being watched. I didn't know if it was Legion, NCR, or some other person looking for trouble. I tend to attract those elements. Thankfully, it was just Veronica."
As they sat at the bar, a woman came up beside him. She sat there watching the two of them. Lucky stayed watching forward, ignoring the woman, but the girl unsettled Boone. She cleared her throat several times and in a huff of frustration and maybe a little annoyance, his companion finally looked at the interloper.
"You look like hell," the woman said with a snarky tone.
"I feel like it," Lucky answered back. She waved over the barkeep and ordered a shot of whiskey. She slammed the alcohol back without a thought and grimaced in pain. She sniffed sharply and wiped her hand across her nose. She examined it closely and shrugged. "What do you want?"
"Nothing. Just making an observation," she replied back. Her eyes fell on him and the small grin she had vanished. "I'm Veronica, by the way."
"Lucky."
Boone stayed silent. He ate his dinner; his memories of Vegas begging to be relived every time his eyes fell on the bastion of light in the distance. He was torn about the city in the desert. It was an Old World memorial reborn. It was almost like returning home for him. It was where he was raised, where he loved, and where he changed. It was Carla and NCR. And now it was just the burial grounds of those memories.
He got up amidst the women's conversation and walked to the overpass. His mind was flooded, his heart heavy, but that moment and feeling were for him alone. There was no point in weighing down the levity of Veronica's personality or stressing Lucky anymore than she already was. He still argued whether going with the courier/mercenary was a good idea.
He turned to the young woman he'd traveled with and frowned. Both women were getting up from the bar. Lucky's brows were furrowed, an obvious look of pain on her face. Veronica looked chipper as they came to a stop beside him on the overpass.
"She's coming with," Lucky stated with a slight groan. She rubbed her eyes and shook her head. Adjusting her glasses again, she looked at Boone. "Is that a problem?"
He scoffed but never uttered a word.
"Fine then, let's go" Veronica replied. She started walking down the off-ramp and came to a dead stop. "Where are we going?"
Lucky lit a cigarette and looked at her Pip-Boy. She inhaled sharply and glanced at ED-E. "I know." She kept turning the dial and pressing the screen until she was satisfied. "Vegas."
"Oh! I've never been there! Elder McNamara wouldn't get me a passport to go," Veronica chirped cheerfully.
"Right," sighed Lucky. The word hung on her lips as if unamused by Veronica's comments.
"I was going to keep going as long as the headache would allow. Painkillers didn't help anymore. I knew that before getting double-tapped. I had grown immune to them when I was teen. Probably from over use after my surgeries. I don't know. My father never forgave himself for what had happened, even though it wasn't his fault.
He'd lost most of his family for three years. And when he found me, he knew I was the only one coming back and even then, the girl he'd raised as his own died somewhere across the border in enemy territory," Lucky chuckled weakly. She let out a shudder and sniffled. "Look at that: of all the things I told you, Veronica, Arcade, all of you, I couldn't follow my own advice. It's probably why I'm not there telling you this to your face. Fear, hypocrisy,regret, outrage. Those things aren't something you forget and they are impossible to let go of because they become a part of you."
The continued for an hour maybe two before Lucky's pain had turned to full blown vomiting. Several times they had to stop as she purged bile and blood on the side of the road. She looked ashen in the pale moonlight. Her swaying walk continued until they came to a small roadside dinner. She let out a loud groan and gagged as if to puke up her innards this time.
"We can stop here for the night," Veronica insisted with a worried voice.
"You want to stop here? This place smells like brahmin shit," Boone barked.
"Would you rather her pass out on the side of the road some place?" Veronica shot back folding her arms.
"Enough!" Lucky yelped. The two stopped arguing and looked at the ill woman. She glared at the two of them. Her head tilted as if her equilibrium was starting to fail her again. "I can't take this shit! I didn't bring either one of you with me to put up with this! Yes, my head is fucked up right now and you guys bickering like children doesn't make it any easier to deal with it."
Boone went to protest the disgruntled woman and then thought better of it. He turned and looked at the bright lights of Vegas. He was so close now. The monorail leaving McCarran loomed in the distance. They could have kept going, but the ailing woman staring at him made him hesitate to move on without them.
"Just give me an hour to sit. Hopefully we can get there and find lodging for the night, just let me get this under control," Lucky pleaded.
Boone nodded. He could accept that. He knew an hour probably wasn't going to do much for her in the way of relief, but guessed she knew his insistence was for the better.
They moved to a distant spot and Lucky pulled her backpack off and dropped it on a mat. It made a loud metallic noise as it hit the ground. Boone quirked an eyebrow with curiosity and sat on the mat next to her. She quickly followed suit. She let out a relieved sigh and dug through her pack for a moment. She pulled out a book, the binding still intact even if the cover's title was barely readable. She set it beside her and reached into her pocket. She tossed a small object at Boone and pointed to the firepit.
He lit it and handed the lighter to Lucky who didn't take it back. She just picked up the book and began to read. There was nothing for him to do but watch in boredom as Veronica examined ED-E and mentioned that the Brotherhood Scribes would be completely elated to get their hands on the eyebot. ED-E didn't take to kindly to that and squawked. He zoomed away from her and hovered just behind Lucky. Veronica finally joined them and sat on an adjacent mat.
"So, you two married?" Veronica questioned. He could tell she was trying to make conversation, but he wasn't in the mood to talk.
"Yeah," Boone said softly. He looked away from Lucky when he felt her examining him.
"It's complicated," Lucky replied, returning her attention to her book.
"Complicated? Did I break up some newlywed trip?" Veronica asked with a frown.
"No, we're not married to each other," Lucky stammered in shock. "My person... isn't here yet."
"Person?" Boone queried.
"I wouldn't exactly call him my spouse," she replied. Her hand began feverishly rubbing her ring finger. "He's – I – not here yet."
"You don't sound happy about that," Veronica remarked.
"What? About him not being here?" Lucky asked back. Veronica nodded enthusiastically. "I'm thrilled he's not here. Yet," She looked over her shoulder toward the east and shook her head. She let out a soft chuckle and looked at Boone. Her blue eyes shimmered in the dancing firelight. There was something in them that he couldn't place. Maybe it was fear or doubt, but something was definitely there. "It's only a matter of time before he's back in my life and then he'll come back for what is his."
The group grew silent as they thought about what Lucky had said. Veronica snapped a twig and threw it in the pit. Boone's throat had a lump in it. He would never have thought about Carla that way. Lucky just took the hand given and resigned herself to it. She was "glad" that her significant other was there? Even if he was an abusive asshole, it meant she still had someone thinking about her and even if there were bad days, there had to be good days in there as well.
Veronica let out a heavy sigh and leaned toward Lucky; who was eying Boone with a contemplative look. When she realized he was watching her watch him, her eyes darted back to the book.
"Hey, who's that?" Veronica asked, her hand shooting into Lucky's reading space. She grabbed a dingy scrap of paper from out of the book and looked intensely at it. "Is that your husband?"
Lucky was frozen. A strange pained expression hit her like she'd been socked in the gut.
"It's no one," she finally snapped.
Veronica flipped over the paper and squinted. She mouthed something and then handed it back to Lucky without saying anything else. The wounded woman snatched it violently from her and stuck it in the book. She slammed it shut, threw it in the pack, and stood.
"Let's get this over with," Lucky scowled angrily.
She had every right to be pissed; he would have been too if it had been him in her position. What was Veronica thinking? Lucky couldn't look at either of them, she made her pace fast to put distance between them, only ED-E stayed with her. Before either one knew it, they were standing at the gates of New Vegas and Lucky, well, she wasn't as enraptured as Veronica but not as beaten down by the idea as he was. She was just Lucky.
"It's the second thing in the box," Lucky said with hesitation.
Boone stuck his hand in and felt around. As he hit the top stack of items, the lights flickered on, blinding him in an instant. The drone of machinery and electricity filled the air. He rubbed his eyes and stood over the box. On the top of the stack was another photo attached to a holotape.
He examined the picture intensely. It was of a soldier and another young girl. This one, however was covered head to toe in bandages. The soldier – who appeared to be a cadet - was handing her a teddy bear. The location looked like Fort McCarran before the place was truly established.
Boone looked closely at the bear in the photo and then to the one he'd put on the bed. There was definitely a resemblance between the two. The tattered bow was near pristine in the photo.
"Is that you?" he questioned under his breath. He flipped over the photo and read: Quiescit in pace Abigail Bell. He knew she could speak latin – he'd heard her do it before when speaking with captured Legionaries or Arcade when they were messing around, but this was written by a child. He shook off the dreadful thoughts coming to mind and noticed something else. In smaller text by the corner was more writing but it was scrawled in an unintelligible language. The only thing he could make out were two names: Donovan and Isaac Bell. 2275 and 2270.
"It means rest in peace. That girl was dead. She died... along time ago without a friend in the world at the hand of someone you've met before," Lucky explained.
"Someone I've met?" Boone asked to the ether. He didn't know anyone capable of that personally. If he had, he'd have killed them when he found out.
"The second is just tribal. It says the same thing as the other. Those two people: my father and uncle. Both taken by Legion, because of me," her voice cracked and then went silent.
Boone turned the tattered picture back and looked it over again. The whole thing seemed so vaguely familiar to him, but he couldn't place it. He opened the center desk drawer and pulled out a magnifying glass. He held it before him and glossed over the soldier in the photo.
"No," he stammered.
"Don't touch the holotape. That's for me and me alone," Lucky coldly hissed. "There are things in there that you should never know about then, what happened. There is no 'why' because I don't have an answer for it. It just was. Is. Fuck." She started stumbling over her words. And in a flustered tone she said, "Just... let's deal with this now. What it has done. You'll be looking for rationality where there is none on that holotape. I don't want to be thought of anymore differently than I am now."
"But.." Boone argued.
"Don't argue. I know you're going to goddamn argue with a recording, but please-," Lucky begged. "Abigail Bell is dead!"
"I'm sorry," he said softly. His finger ran down the little girl in the photo. He closed his eyes and let out a pained sigh.
"Just hold out a little longer. We're almost done and we can go our separate ways. Like I thought we were going to do after you found out about Benny."