Note: Sort of boring chapter, but I'll always remember walking into that casino, completely unprepared to face that bastard.
After getting into Freeside and onto the Strip, McCrae was waylaid by the creepy robot, Victor.
"Hey, pardner!" He rolled over to her. "I wasn't sure when you were gonna get here!"
"Can it, Victor. What do you want?" She put her hand on her hip.
"I've been asked to tell you to stop by the Lucky 38, pardner. It's very important. Mr. House has a personal message for you. You'll have to leave your friend outside."
She muttered something under her breath best not spoken loudly. "Fine. Boone, wait here."
Stepping into the Lucky 38 was like opening a sealed room with little air. It was stale and almost untouched. She glanced around at the tables and cashier's booths, then rode the elevator up to the penthouse as she was told.
There, she was greeted by a highly patronizing computerized face of a man, calling himself Mr. House. He explained to her that she was meant to deliver the chip to him, and he was very disappointed that she did not still have it.
"Well, mister, I did get shot by some asshole in a checkered suit," she grumbled.
"Ah, Benny. You'll find him at the Tops. Deliver me the chip once you retrieve it from him. The delivery won't be rendered complete until I have the chip in my possession."
She sighed in frustration. "Fine."
"And, should you be inclined, work will be forthcoming upon the completion of your delivery. Good day," he said, and the display powered down.
Great. Now she was certain that she was going to get herself killed. No more deliveries after this job, she promised herself. It was a bad time to be in the Mojave anyway. She would just leave, and not come back.
Victor informed her that she'd been allowed to use the presidential suite at the Lucky 38, and her friend was allowed, as well. She went down and retrieved Boone before riding the elevator to the rooms.
She was floored. "You could house an entire family in here," she said. "Maybe two." Upon her trip to the bathroom, she shrieked out, "Why would you need two tubs?!"
Boone parked himself at the kitchen table and didn't make a noise.
She took a bath, cleaned out from under her fingernails, washed as much of the blood as she could off, and cried without stopping. She didn't want to be like that. She reminded herself that she'd gotten out alive, and she needed to calm down and remember that. Unlike most of her other memories, she just couldn't lose this one.
And this dog thing. I need to remember why that one is, too.
She got out after maybe an hour or two. She didn't count the time. She went into the master bedroom and half-fell onto the bed.
The lights on the Strip were just coming on when McCrae and Boone left the Lucky 38. She was approached by an NCR soldier, bearing a message from someone called Ambassador Crocker, but she didn't bother to read it. She let herself goggle a bit at the amazing lights on the Strip before they walked down to the Tops Casino.
"You okay?" she asked Boone. He seemed off.
"Not sleeping well," he answered.
"Yeah, me either," she said. "Well, here goes nothing."
At the casino door, weapons were confiscated, as she expected. McCrae hid the tiny little pistol and her brass knuckles. Boone didn't have any option but to go unarmed. She didn't offer him anything; no way was she going mano y mano with Benny without a weapon of some kind.
Before she went looking, she thought to talk with the counterman. "Hello, baby! Welcome to the Tops! What can I do for you?" he greeted her.
She was not amused. "Looking for Benny," she said.
"Oh, what you need him for? Swank can give you whatever you need, baby," he smarmed.
She smiled at him, trying to turn on her charm. "Thanks, hon, but I need to speak with Benny. It's business." She leaned onto the counter, looking him in the eyes. "Maybe you can tell me where to find him."
Swank cracked a grin. "Sure, baby. Benny's usually here on the casino floor. If he ain't here, he's up in his room on the 13th floor."
She leaned back and flashed another big smile. "Thanks."
"Hey, baby, when you get done with him, you come back." He winked at her.
She walked away before starting an under-the-breath mutter about men and Vegas and her luck. It would be a long time before she felt the urge to take that kind of offer up, maybe even longer if he was an estimation of the quality of New Vegas company.
If I hadn't been shot, assaulted and practically eaten, she thought to herself, I might have been more agreeable. She shuddered at the memory.
She almost forgot that Boone was there as she looked around for a checkered suit. Once she spotted Benny, her stomach dropped and she stopped mid-stride. Boone came up behind her, making it impossible for her to escape. She remembered that face, now. She also remembered that pearly piece-of-shit gun he carried.
She approached him slowly. He turned to face her just as she was being warned to stay away by the guards around him. Big man in the casino, to have so many guards.
"What in the goddamn...!" He held his hands up. "Hey, listen," he said.
McCrae simply stared at him. She didn't trust her breakfast to stay down. A gentle bump from behind her reminded her that she was not in a private area.
"Let's talk," she said. "Alone."
"Yeah, baby, whatever you want," he nervously played with a key on his key ring. "I'll comp you the Presidential Suite. Give me a minute to clear my head and I'll come meet with you." He handed her a key.
She took the key and went into the room just across the casino floor. Settling in for a wait, she leaned against the wall by the door and stared at the back of a chair. After a few minutes, the intercom crackled to life.
"I hate to do this to ya, doll, but I just can't come in there," Benny said.
"What!" she yelled. "You rotten son of a bitch!"
"That temper of yours? Kinda why this conversation's taking place over an intercom. Look, I come in there, all you're gonna do is shoot me in the head. As I told you, that's not happening, baby."
McCrae stomped to the door and tried to open it. "Let me out, you prick!"
"It'll open soon enough. Now I gotta skip town and get outta your hair." The intercom crackled again, and went dead.
"Don't that beat all," she muttered.
"He's a piece of work." Boone's voice carried well in the secluded suite.
She sighed. "He's crafty enough," she said. "I'll give him that. Doesn't make me feel any better for having been scammed and shot, though."
When the door finally unlocked, she went straight to Swank and slammed her hand on the counter. "He's gone," she yelled.
"Not in the casino?" Swank shrugged. "Can't be home all the time."
"No, he left New Vegas entirely," she said, clenching her fist.
"Now why would he do that, baby?"
She gathered her wits and explained that Benny had been trying to pull a fast one on House. It took her a while to convince him, but once she had, he was somber enough about it.
"Guess that means I'm in charge. Ring-a-ding." He looked up at her. "Well, baby, I don't know if I should kiss or kill ya."
"Neither," she said, frustrated.
"That's fair. Listen, you need anything, you come on back to Swank. I always take good care of the VIPs 'round New Vegas."
McCrae screwed up her face. "What VIP?"
"Word is, you went into the Lucky 38. Ain't no one done that since New Vegas got started."
She threw up her hands and stormed out of the Tops. I can't believe this shit, she told herself. All over one measly fucking delivery.
As soon as she stepped out of the Tops, a man in a suit stopped her and pressed something into her hand. "The eyes of the mighty Caesar are upon you. He appreciates your service, and bestows upon you the exceptional gift of his Mark," he said.
She looked down at the Mark and then up at the man. She jerked back when she realized it was Vulpes Inculta. He smiled softly, a less vicious and more agreeable look on his face. "Why the hell would I want to talk to Caesar?" she muttered.
"It should interest you to know that your target, Benny, will inevitably fall into the hands of the Legion. All who attempt to go east are already in the net of the great Caesar. It is only a matter of time."
Confused, she held the coin in her hand, then watched as he touched his hand to his hat and began to walk away.
Remember Nipton.
She drew and fired. Boone's hand was on his rifle when Vulpes Inculta hit the ground. She removed his hat and spat on him. "Not so fucking tough without your goddamn dogs," she hissed. She tried the hat on and looked back at Boone. "I don't know how these people find out who I am."
"Doesn't take long for word to get around." Boone eyeballed a Securitron, who approached slowly.
"It wouldn't," she said, bitterly. "Let's get out of here."
She tossed her piss-stained hood into a trashcan on way back to the Lucky 38. After a moment of assessing her inventory, she realized it was going to cost her a small fortune just to get re-situated with her armor and guns. She bypassed the casino and went to Gun Runners, spending money she didn't want to. She had to cobble together a few sets of leather just to get hers back to working condition.
"You need anything?" she asked Boone.
"No."
They worked back to the Lucky 38 and she went to the bar area. Gathering up the booze and cigarettes, she shoved the bottles into her haversack and stuffed as many packs into her pockets as she could manage. "Hey! You got pockets, right?" she called down at Boone.
He slowly walked up the stairs to the bar area and she could tell there was something on his mind. She gestured to the barstools and went behind the counter, pretending for a moment that she was working it. "What can I get ya?"
"Are you going to speak with Caesar?" he asked, carefully.
"Not at this very moment." She swept a few bits of plaster from the bar and put her hands down, leaning on it.
He sat for a moment, unmoving. "...You never asked how I knew my wife was dead."
She picked up a bottle of vodka and halfheartedly made an attempt to wipe it clean. "It's none of my business. You made that pretty clear."
"She... I tracked her down. Southeast, near the river. They were selling her. Saw it through my scope." He paused. "Whole place swarming with Legion. Hundreds of them. Bidding for things no man has a right to."
McCrae opened the bottle and waited.
"I just had my rifle with me. Just me, against all of them, so... I took the shot."
Yeah, that's it. She downed a gulp of booze and let out the breath she'd been holding. She swallowed more and then slammed down the bottle. "Is it always this way with you? Just so much hurt and anger, rolled into one big, silent package?"
He was, of course, silent. "I'm sorry," she said. "It's just..." She sighed and rubbed her eye. "Look, if it's a problem for you to go there, I'll go by myself."
"If you choose to side with the Legion―"
"I am not an idiot, Boone," she interrupted, angrily. "Legion means slavery, fear, and forced babymaking. That is not a choice."
"Why even bother talking to Caesar?" He clenched his fists. "There's no guarantee you'll even come back from it alive."
She noted, that for the first time in their time together, his voice had become overtly angry. Not that his voice had raised in pitch or volume, but his words came quicker and his face was more animated.
"Maybe I just want to go in there and take care of him personally," she said. She took another gulp of vodka. "Or maybe I'm setting up a sneaky plan the likes of which you've never seen." She smiled at him, emboldened by the liquid courage.
He just looked sick to his stomach.
"If it makes you feel better, I am contractually obligated to retrieve that chip from Benny. I'm bound to die if I don't, and Mr. House doesn't seem the forgiving type." She gathered the remaining bottles into her haversack and looked around. There wasn't much more in the bar area to steal.
She went into the casino's safe room and was appalled. Looks like someone was planning to ride out the bombs, she said to herself. All this slap-dash planning, only to leave behind everything. Piles of money, cigarettes and other goods lay scattered through the room. She filled her haversack up with as much as she could.
When she finally made it back up the to suite, she called out for Boone. He didn't answer, so she went looking. In the guest room, she found him sleeping as peacefully as one can while wearing a full set of clothes. She reached over and, on an impulse, removed his beret. A hand whipped out and grabbed her wrist, tightening. "Dammit!" she yelped, dropping the beret. He let go and she shook her hand. "I was just trying to be nice," she muttered, shaking her wrist.
She went to the master bedroom, feeling strangely. Reality felt distorted. She couldn't put a finger on what was wrong, like she had forgotten something, or forgotten to do something. It was uncomfortable, and she didn't know how to handle it.
If I do catch up with Benny, she thought, I'll stab him in the eyes just for making my brain so broken.