The Courier sat in the kitchen of the Lucky 38's presidential suite, a mug of coffee and a wasteland omelette in front of him. He had to admit; though having to get a deathclaw egg every time he wanted to make one was suicidal, it was damn tasty. The Courier took a swig of his coffee, and reached down to scratch the cyber-dog next to him behind the ears. Though Rex still technically belonged to the King, The Courier had sort of adopted him, to ease the stress that now permanently plagued the King, as he and his gang constantly had to battle NCR officials to keep order in Freeside.
"Hey Jack"
The Courier smiled, not just because it was the woman he loved saying his name, but because he had a name at all. When he had woken up in Goodsprings after being shot, close to two years ago, The Courier had absolutely no memory of his life before. Some holes had been filled in after his conversation with Ulysses, deep in the Divide, but there were many questions still unanswered; his name for one thing. Instead of going on some fruitless quest in the attempt to discover his old life, The Courier decided to simply choose a new name, and continue with the life he had made for himself in the Mojave. His name was Jack Striker, and he was proud of it. People had always called him Jack anyway, thanks to the tattoo on his left forearm. It was a simple tattoo, a few words in black ink, surrounded by decorative swirls. The tattoo said 'The Jack's Still Royalty'. Jack had no clue what it meant, despite trying to work it out for a long time. Jack's thought pattern was broken by Cass; still wearing only a nightdress, sliding into his lap. She smiled at him, and ran a hand through his thick black hair.
"What's gotten you all distracted?" Jack smiled back, and planted a kiss on her lips, savouring her warmth and smell. "Nothing, just daydreaming. You want some breakfast?" Cass gave Jack a cunning smile, which he knew never meant anything good. "Sure do, but I was reckonin' I was just gonna eat yours, what with you being busy and all." Jack raised his eyebrows in mock surprise. "And what am I busy doing?" Cass took the fork from his hand, swivelled around and stabbed herself a chunk of omelette, she popped it into her mouth, and spoke as she chewed. "Victor called from downstairs. 'Parently there's some NCR fella lookin' for ya, says it's urgent." Jack threw back his head and groaned, making Rex look up in confusion. "Don't these damn politicians know what a retirement is?" He complained, but slid out from under Cass all the same. He stretched out his athletic frame, and ran a hand over his course stubble. Cass, now attacking the omelette with signs of full enjoyment, looked up, and swallowed. "You gonna shave before you go?" Jack frowned. "Fuck that, if the NCR expects me to turn up looking smart; they don't know me that well." Cass laughed. "That's my man! I'll see ya later." Seemingly dismissed, Jack shook his head with amusement, and walked back to his and Cass' bedroom, Rex at his heels.
Jack took his pyjamas off, threw them onto the bed, and moved to one of the small wardrobes on the left side of the room that held all his clothes and armour, as well as a few weirder pieces he had collected during his travels. He decided to go with his standard gear; Jack had never felt comfortable in a suit, no matter how 'smokin' hot' Cass claimed it made him look. He slipped into a pair of black combat trousers, pulled on his boots and pulled a grey vest over his head. This was followed by a tattered and hole-ridden hoodie, originally white but now the colour of desert sand from years of use. Jack had bought the hoodie from the Goodspring's General Store the first day he had woken up, and never thrown it away since. He had torn the sleeves off years ago, as he liked to keep his arms free during a fight, and the hem was so frayed, it looked like he was wearing part of a sack instead of clothing. If it wasn't for the hood and barely-recognisable logo of some long-dead band in the chest, he very much could have. Over the top he shrugged into his duster, a beautifully made black number, with no sleeves and the NCR's flag painted onto the back; a gift from Ulysses, after Jack had managed to persuade him not to fire a nuclear missile at the NCR's major trade route into the Mojave.
Jack had no intentions of getting into a fight when he went to the NCR embassy, but he had learned never to go anywhere without some form of weapon, so he grabbed his pistol and its holster from his desk. It was a strange, heavily modified revolver that fired rifle rounds and had LED lights on the side. He strapped it to his leg, and as an afterthought attached a combat knife and its sheath to his belt. Comfortably dressed, Jack opened the bedroom door, and crossed the corridor to step into the elevator, Rex wagging his tail right next to him. They rattled their way down the elevator shaft to the casino floor, and exited to find Victor's happy smiling face waiting for them.
After the NCR ordered Jack to assassinate Mr. House, he had wondered what was going to happen to Victor and the other Securitrons. The answer had come when Jack had finally gotten around to snooping through Benny's private suite after having the key in his pocket for weeks. Instead of a secret stash of bottle caps, Jack found a hole in the wall, which lead to a room within which was an extremely creepy Securitron with its own personality. After questioning it for only a few minutes, Jack found out that Benny had had the artificial intelligence built by the Followers of the Apocalypse, so that he could use the Platinum Chip that he had stolen off of Jack on that fateful night to take over the Lucky 38, and the rest of the New Vegas Strip for himself. Jack mostly forgot about Yes Man until after Mr. House was already dead, when he had had an idea. He brought the robot back to the Followers, and after cashing in a few favours they owed him, he had them re-write Yes Man's code, so that he only followed orders from certain voices; namely Jack's. He then uploaded the AI to House's computer in the Lucky 38's penthouse, and told him to make the Securitrons do what they did before.
Mildly surprisingly to Jack, that was exactly what Yes Man did, it was like nothing had happened in the strip, and aside from a Follower coming round every week to perform maintenance, and make sure Yes Man hadn't done anything computer related that Jack honestly didn't understand a word of, everything was pretty normal. To Jack's relief, Victor had not been affected by Yes Man's upload; he liked the robot, and was a useful 'assistant' whenever Jack needed and errand run on The Strip or Freeside.
Victor waved his metallic claw at Jack as he and Rex stepped out of the elevator. "Howdy partner!" The robot called cheerfully. Jack smiled, and began to walk towards the casino's main doors, Victor squeaking along next to him. "You know what this NCR guy wants, Victor?" The TV screen that all securitrons had in the middle of their bodies changed to static momentarily, and replaced the normally smiling cowboy face to a frowning angry one. "No sir, he did not tell me! That darn varmint just strode up to me like he were the sheriff of this here town, and demanded that he come see you. I had to get a few o' the boys over so he didn't just barge past me. That fella had no mud on his boots, if ya catch my meanin', he were a pen-pushin' office boy and no mistake" His screen returned to normal.
Jack sighed and mentally prepared himself for the will-sapping bullshit and bureaucracy that he was about to face. Jack didn't like the NCR that much, but they had good intentions, and they were sure as hell better than leaving the Mojave to Caesar or House. "Alright, is he outside?" Victor tilted forward slightly on his one large wheel, as if attempting to simulate a nod of conformation. "Yep, good luck partner" Jack waved as he opened the door, Rex weaving through his legs to sprint out into the sun and fresh air. "See ya later Victor" Jack called over his shoulder. "Happy Trails!" Came Victor's reply as Jack shut the door behind him.
Rex had bounded off to accost a random man that had been walking down the street, eating a squirrel-on-a-stick. Jack's attention was taken up by the angry looking man in front of him, his arms crossed over a khaki shirt and brown tie. "You The Courier?" He demanded. Jack pointed over his shoulder as he replied. "No, I'm the other guy that lives in the Lucky 38. Watta ya want?" The man looked him up and down, and scowled. "You don't look like much." Jack's fought to keep his expression neutral. "A lot of people say that. I ask again, what do you want?" The man's scowl increased, he huffed. "I was ordered to escort you to the NCR Embassy, where Brigadier General Hsu awaits to brief you on your new assignment" Jack raised an eyebrow. "Last time I checked, the NCR gave me a golden branch award thing, not conscription papers. I ain't a soldier, hell I ain't even an NCR citizen technically. You can't tell me what to do" As the NCR staff officer was about to give a furious response, Jack interrupted him. "On the other hand, I kind of like Hsu, he's definitely better than Oliver, who was kind of an asshole to me, so I accept his invitation to come and see him. C'mon." He strode off without another word, leaving the officer to stare after him with his mouth open for a few moments, until finally regaining his senses and hurrying after him.
Jack strode through the Strip, the gates opening automatically by securitrons as he approached. Rex joined them as he walked past the Ultra Luxe, wagging his tail and panting happily. The NCR officer tried to keep up as best he could without jogging, but the small man struggled to comfortably keep up with Jack's long strides. There weren't many people out on the street; the Strip was never truly alive until night time, but those that were there nodded to him in recognition. Everyone knew the Courier that killed Legate Lanius.
The NCR Embassy's gate was guarded by a pair of Military Policeman, cattle prods at their wastes. When they saw Jack flanked by the NCR officer, they opened the gate and stood to attention. The NCR officer rushed ahead of Jack and opened the door to the embassy building first, seemingly seeing this as some form of victory. Jack knelt down and rubbed Rex under the chin. "Wait here boy, I'll be right back." Jack entered the building and wound his way through the bland corridors to Ambassador Crocker's office. As he entered the room, he couldn't help but notice that instead of the Ambassador behind the desk, Brigadier General Hsu stood in front of it, hands clasped behind his back.
After General Lee Oliver was declared a hero after the Second Battle for Hoover Dam, he returned to the NCR's capital to peruse a political career, leaving Colonel Hsu as the commanding officer of the NCR military presence in the Mojave. With Oliver finally out of the way, nothing stood in the way of the promotions that Hsu rightly deserved, he was awarded the rank of Brigadier General only weeks after Oliver left, with a highly likely chance of becoming a general in a few years. Hsu's level headed calmness and common sense, which to Jack seemed to be a very rare quality in NCR officers meant that the trouble between soldiers and locals, whilst still bad, wasn't as disastrous as could be.
Jack liked Hsu, they had worked together quite a few times, discovering a spy in Camp McCarran, and then proceeding to find and deactivate an explosion hidden in the monorail. He smiled politely as he entered the room, and leant against the wall opposite the Brigadier General. Hsu nodded to him, and moved over to shut the door, making their conversation was private. He turned back around. "Thanks for coming, Courier. The NCR needs your help again" Jack snorted.
"Firstly, calling me 'The Courier' got old two years ago, and secondly; I am sad to say I'm not surprised" Hsu smiled, but there was no humour behind it. He was obviously uncomfortable with asking Jack to bail the NCR out again. "Very well Mr Striker, I'm sorry to hear you have such little faith in us. In all honesty though, we're in over our heads on this, and we need someone who knows these lands better than we do. The NCR have had a presence in the Mojave for close to fifteen years, but we're still just as much strangers as the first day we arrived." Jack shook his head, a little confused.
"Yeah, yeah. People still hate the NCR, your soldiers are running wild in the towns cuz their bored and taking it out on the locals. What has this got to do with me being here?" Hsu walked behind the desk, and opened a draw. He pulled a fairly thick sheaf of papers out of it, and slapped it down on the desk. "I won't bore you with the details, but these are some reports of soldiers over the last few months. People are going missing. Our people. Soldiers, civilians. Sometimes they turn up, but never in a pretty state. We are being hunted, Jack. Someone is telling the NCR that they have outstayed our welcome. We need you to look into this." Jack frowned. "Why don't you just get a platoon of your best guys, and search the area that people are disappearing in." Hsu replied by once again going to the drawer, this time taking out a map of map of the Mojave, covered in red crosses. "Because it's not in one place. It's all over. Military patrols, caravans. Hell, even once a guy leaving a bar to take a piss. It seems like if you consider yourself a part of the NCR, you're a target." Jack leaned over the map, trying to take in the magnitude of what Hsu was telling him. "So, what? The entire Mojave is rebelling against you?" Hsu half nodded. "It could be that. But if I'm going to sleep tonight, I would like to think it's the other option." Jack looked up from the map. "Which is?" "A single group of extremely well trained and organised guerrilla fighters. The men have started calling them the Desert Pirates." Jack shook his head in disbelief. "What sort of people could do something like that? Even the Brotherhood of Steel would seriously struggle to do something like that. You'd need to be-" Hsu interrupted him. "A veteran NCR Ranger?"
Jack paused, and looked up at the Brigadier General. His face was as always blank and impassive. "Are you telling me there's a veteran NCR Ranger out there somewhere managing the systematic murdering of NCR personnel?" Hsu nodded, and flicked through the papers on the desk, handing Jack a sheet of block text.
"Jonathan Grahams, codename Fox. He was a Desert Ranger long before the Ranger Unification Treaty. He never agreed with it. He had a record of disobeying orders, starting fights in the mess hall, things like that. We would have had him out on his ass if we wasn't such a damn good ranger. His brother, Wolf helped keep him in line, but he died two years ago when Ranger Station Charlie was hit. Fox got worse, a lot worse. It culminated when he murdered Major Dhatri in his sleep when he was at McCarran for a debriefing. They had never met each other before; Fox just snapped, opened the Major's throat and disappeared."
Jack's mouth tightened as he thought of the old soldier. "He was a good man. Dhatri helped me deal with the Fiends. Though cutting off their heads was a pain in the ass." He grimaced, and looked at Hsu. "What would you have me do?"
Brigadier General Hsu was all business, but Jack could see a hint of relief as he spoke. "I need you to find these bastards. The locals don't hate you, which is a serious advantage that we do not have. Good luck Jack, I have a feeling you're going to need it.
Jack left the NCR Embassy a little light-headed. He thought that with the Legion gone, the Mojave would be peaceful. Yeah the NCR cause a lot of trouble, but they also helped a lot, gave the whole desert power from Helios One and Hoover Dam. They even started funding the Followers of the Apocalypse in the Mormon fort again, after Jack pushed them a little. He just couldn't understand how someone could hate them enough to just start randomly murdering them. Jack had looked at the reports before he had left. Whole families were found butchered on the roadside, children and all. Jack's fist tightened as he remembered the description of the twins that had been hung in their own home, their mother raped and their father mutilated and tortured. He was going to find them, and stop them. But he was going to need help.
By the time the elevator reached the Lucky 38's presidential suite, Jack had calmed himself down a little. He stepped out with Rex, to find Cass already standing there, dressed with shotgun in hand. Jack raised an eyebrow. "Going somewhere?" Cass gave him a lopsided grin. "Yep, I was figurin' that the only reason the NCR wanted you was to do their dirty work again, so I'm ready when you are. Where we headin'?" Jack smiled, stepped aside to let Cass into the elevator, going back in behind her. "Goodsprings first, we're gonna need some help with this one. I'll explain on the way."