Cort needn't have worried, at least for the time being. James remained dead to the world until she shook him awake slightly after dawn. "Dad. Dad, wake up. I need some help getting past a security terminal. And yeah, breakfast and stuff. Dad. Dad. Dad. Da-James. JAMES." She jerked back as he sat up abruptly, wildly looking around. "Jeeze, jumpy. Come on, I need your help with something."
He stood up slowly, scratching at the side of his beard as he followed after Cort, sparing a glance towards the ghoul who appeared to be dressing the dog in a small set of armour and pouches. "I feel terrible."
She gave him a Gallic shrug then continued down the stairwell. "You're the one who wanted to start out early. Could've slept in the Lounger, it was squishier."
"No thank you, Cort. That isn't funny. Now what is it you're dragging me down to help you with?" James frowned. "Have you even eaten yet? You know you always forget."
She rolled her eyes to herself as they came into the big room and headed towards the far wall where a terminal was set next to a sealed door. "Yes, mother hen wouldn't let me do anything until I did."
He raised an eyebrow at her as she pulled the keyboard down. "Who?"
Absently starting to tap at the keys, she jerked her head back. "Charon. He always does that." She leaned up as he looked thoughtfully back up towards the catwalk, and pointed at the monitor. "That's where I got stuck, can you finish it? There's a lot of good stuff in there and I can't break the window."
Leaving his speculations aside for the moment, James leaned over and started poking around the keyboard. A moment later the door gave a click. "There, sweetie. You should have selected that option there and then this one, not the other way around." Cort clapped and darted into the room.
"Thank you, Daddy!" Hauling lockers open and quickly walking the room, she found a small but lovely cache of armour and weapons in pristine condition. "Look there's combat armour! And a laser rifle, assault rifle, ammo, grenades, medical supplies, fantastic." Riffling her fingers through the first aid box, she pulled out a handful of Stimpaks, Rad-X and Med-X, then flung an ampoule of Psycho over her shoulder, discarding it. "Go change into that armour, and then we can go after you eat."
"Yes honey." Smiling bemusedly at his daughter's authoritative tone, he grabbed it and headed up to the second room to change as Cort stuffed ammo and grenades into a pack from another locker, then snatched up the rifles and followed him upstairs. She was fiddling with a holotape in one hand as she came back in to see Charon.
"Presents!" Cort smiled and fished out several frag and pulse grenades, handing them to the ghoul as he stood up, then started loading both the rifles. "Found better weapons for Dad too, and some more supplies." Finishing, she clicked the holoptape into her Pip-Boy, then frowned. "I'll be right back, there's one more room I want to check."
Charon watched her leave then started re-arranging all three packs, depositing as much weight into the new one as he thought James would be capable of carrying without strain, swearing internally when the man himself came back into the room before Cort had returned. Charon wordlessly handed him the pack, watching him stuff his Vault suit into it. He started swearing to himself again as James started speaking to him.
"So. You've been taking care of my daughter?"
Charon straightened up and blandly looked back at James, who was staring intently at him. "Cort is my employer, and for good or ill, I serve her."
"And what precisely does that entail? Cort wasn't exactly forthcoming about the details when I asked her."
Charon scowled. There was no way he was going to discuss a personal matter like his contract with anyone else but his employer, especially after James had made it clear that she had clammed up about it. Getting a feeling of satisfaction from that, he schooled his face back into neutrality. "Talk to Cort."
"Well Charon, I want to talk to you."
Oh that's fucking it. He snarled at James, having had entirely enough of the man before even meeting him through dealing with Cort's unhappiness. "Well I don't fucking want to talk to you, so unless she tells me otherwise, which she won't, you're shit out of luck."
He patiently responded to the ghoul, not breaking eye contact. "You have to understand my concerns. You're not exactly the first choice a father would make for his daughter to associate with."
"You didn't make the choice, she did. If I fucking recall correctly, your concern extended as far as leaving her blind in that shitting hole. She hired me to get to you after ending up fucking crippled in Underworld for half a month, and it's amazing she made it that far. You're fucking lucky she found that mutt so quick, or fuck knows what else would have happened to her. Most Vault dwellers end up slaved out or offing themselves in the first few days, for fuck's sakes! Do you know how fucking close she came to that?"
James face hardened as he began to lose his temper, slashing his hands in front of himself and raising his voice. "Yes, I know. She told me as she did you that if it wasn't for the dog she would have shot herself instead of her ear that first week. I am very, painfully well aware of the consequences of my failure to take her with me and do not need a reminder."
Charon's vision went completely and instantly white at James' unknowing verbal slip. All Cort had told him about finding Dogmeat and her ear was that she had had a collision with the raiders who had killed the dog's previous owner. Since she had hired him, there had been ample opportunity to observe how efficiently the animal slaughtered her opponents. When she had told him the mutt was the reason she was still alive at all, he had assumed she was referring to that. A red haze started to filter in over what he was seeing. The idea that Cort -beautiful, valuable Cort- had tried and nearly succeeded in eating her own gun over this abandoning bastard incensed him, and he clenched his hands.
Cort had wandered into the rest of the accessible area of the small Vault after discovering the holotape contained a password for the Overseeer's office. Padding through the halls and smoothly weaving through the Robobrains(she still wasn't sure where they had taken the resident's bodies, and honestly didn't want to know, still depressed by the entire affair), she came up to the door she wanted and punched in the sequence. After it had opened, she walked into the dim room and discovered Braun in his own Tranquility Lounger, upright against the wall. Walking over, she stood on her tiptoes and leaned against it, smiling as she looked in at the ancient comatose man and rested her head against the glass.
"If you can hear me in there, just remember you're stuck forever. I'm going to leave your password holotape in here and re-lock the door, so even if anyone gets past the main Vault one, and trust me, they won't after what I'm going to do to it, they'll never get to you. The only one who ever can is me. Little old me, in charge of you. And I'll be out there, with real people, living, eventually dying, while you'll be here for eternity dancing with your Communist friends." Cort grinned wider and impulsively licked the glass, then spun around to leave, throwing the holotape violently against one wall. Resealing the door, she trotted happily back to her companions, ready to depart.
Coming back in from her errand, she warily flicked her eyes from one man to the other, feeling the tension between them crackle up the back of her neck. Both James and Charon looked ready to throttle each other. Oh, this is going to be a real fun time. I wonder which one of us will spontaneously combust first on the way back to the city. She sighed and considered what to do as both of them jumped at the sound and turned to look at her, James instantly appearing to calm down. Asking what had happened would probably result in both of them winding up even farther, and Cort already had a fairly good idea that whatever it was involved her father trying to ask Charon things he didn't particularly want to talk about. Like anything at all. Walking over to her armour, she began strapping it on, starting with the plating on her legs first. "Charon, get your armour on too. Charon." He looked down at her, face unreadable before he complied.
"Cort, honey-" She cut him off, then deferred out of habit and a desire to balance everyone out.
"Sooo what way are we going to get back to Rivet City, Dad? Lead on and all that."
James gave her a knowing look and then settled his pack into place, taking up the laser rifle after settling the assault one on his back. "I came up from the south to avoid the raider encampment, and from what you told me about their recent movements, it would probably be wise to go back the same way."
"What's down there?"
"More of the same blasted landscape, basically. Nothing I can't handle with you along." Smiling to himself, he nodded towards the door, then they all headed back out into the Wasteland, Charon starting to get a bad feeling about where he thought their route would take them.
Not near there. Please not near fucking there.
Charon grudgingly admitted that Cort's father was at least competent in combat. Not nearly as quiet as any of them, either due to lack of motion or practice, he was sufficiently brutal enough to make up for it. The look in his face when he was fighting was a near mirror image of Cort's, a clinical intensity bordering on manic. If the ghoul had had any doubts over them being related, they would have departed after observing this. James setting a fast pace and having yet another fighter added to their party, they made it as far as Tenpenny Tower once evening had set in. Worried, Cort pulled her father back shortly before the sun went completely down as Charon nervously paced back and forth behind them.
"We're stopping. It's getting dark, and you look really washed out again." She glanced over at the ghoul, who hadn't taken his eyes off of the old hotel since it had appeared over the horizon. "Charon, what is it? What is that place?"
"That is Tenpenny Tower, and we don't want to get anywhere fucking near it. Definitely not on that side. We're too close already." Charon pointed to the eastern face of the building, almost completely black in the failing light. Cort stared at it, indignation coming over her features.
"Tenpenny. Wait, that's the sonofabitch Burke works for. He's the reason those Goddamned Talon Company assholes are after me!" She was distracted a moment later by James' tired voice, missing the startled jerk Charon gave at her words.
"Cortenay, what do we not do?" She winced and then rolled her eyes.
"We don't take the Lord's name in vain because Mom wouldn't like it. See, you are worn out if you're choosing now to pick on my manners. And using my whole damned name." Looking grimly at him, Cort suppressed the fury rising up in her against Tenpenny and Burke for the moment. Nodding towards the east, she started walking towards a run-down old garage after spotting the tell-tale fake rocket dominating the front of it. "Look, we can stay there." She stopped when Charon spoke up a second later.
"No. You can see the door of that from the hotel. Go just past it, there's an old office building with a good second storey area that's easy to defend." Looking at him questioningly, Cort redirected herself towards the destination Charon had indicated, James trudging behind her. After eating, she signalled Dogmeat to stay with her sleeping father again, and after crossing the blasted concrete floor they had climbed up to sat next to the big ghoul. He was crouched in a cover position by one of the shattered windows, his helmet loosely clasped in one hand while he stared towards Tenpenny Tower. Upon entering he had stationed himself there, even eating in place when handed his supper. "So how do we get in there?"
Charon whipped his head around to look at her. "We don't. I told you, don't go anywhere fucking near it. Especially when it's fucking light out."
She frowned. "Why? Look, the bastard's trying to have me killed, it would be nice to go get him to stop that. So all we have to do is-"
"No. I'm not going the fuck in there ever again."
Blinking, she tried to read his chalky eyes in the dark. Whatever the place was to him, it apparently came with a very unpleasant set of memories. She considered pushing the issue, then decided that it didn't really matter. If it was bothering him this much there was no way she was going to make it worse, so she would just have to take care of it herself since it was bothering her just enough to want to go murder someone. Sonofabitch sends fucking mercenaries after me for not doing his work. I'm going to send my silencer after his fucking prostate, is what I'm going to do. Then find it with a slug. "Okay. More for me then." Cort got up and started to go back for her pack. "Keep watch on the others, and I'll be back by morning, probably."
"No!"
A second later she was sprawled on the floor in a complete state of shock. Charon had grabbed her by the wrist and yanked her to the ground. Her arm burned in the socket, and she brought up her other hand to rub at the joint. The ghoul still had a painful grip on her, and she pulled against his fingers, swearing. "That fucking hurt! What the hell is wrong with you? You're going to tell me what the fuck is up with that building and why I can't go kill that bastard right now or-"
"He was my last employer when I was still...when I wasn't this." Charon hung his head for a moment before looking up again, loosening his hand but not letting go of Cort. "It's why I know not to go the fuck around that building. Tenpenny likes to snipe anything he sees from his balcony, fucking animals, mutants, people. Anything for fucking shits and giggles, and he likes to let them crawl until they die. Unless things have changed, and I fucking doubt it, it's also fortified to fuck with a lot of security. Probably a lot more of both by now."
Cort pulled her legs up, hissing at the bruises she could feel setting up shop on her hip as she scooted towards him. "So what happened."
"I don't want to talk about it."
"Charon, you just slammed me onto the floor. Half my ass and one hip are probably turning black and blue as we speak, so thinking on that, give me a good reason why you're not going to spill the damn jellybeans already." The ghoul instantly let go of her and dropped his head back down again, mumbling quietly.
"I didn't mean to hurt you."
"Yeah well, you're big and hard and I'm small and soft." Cort closed her eyes briefly as the statement she had just made went somewhere interesting and entirely, desirably wrong. 'Never mind, I know you didn't mean to. It's okay. But please tell me why you did it anyway." When he failed to speak she shoved against him hard, unbalancing him enough for him to collapse into a sitting position, then crawled into his lap before he could recover. Twisting herself around to get comfortable on her battered hip, Charon brought his arms up around her waist once she had settled, their armour grating together. He removed her helmet a moment later and started tugging at her hair, running his rough fingers up under it. "Better?"
Rubbing a hand over her stomach, the ghoul felt the tension of the last few hours bleed out of him. "Yes." He spent a few minutes cuddling her for reassurance before continuing. "You've never asked, but I've been a fucking ghoul for fifty-seven years."
Cort shut her eyes, rested her head back against his chest and listened to him rasp out his history.
Thanks for the new reviews folks! And don't worry, I don't plan on stopping this anytime soon, and I always post if I'm running off to do something else. ;)
