Chapter 4: History
Never, no maybe once before once, has Luther been as hungover as he is right this second. Sitting in the tub, the bottom of which is coated with his vomit, he can barely focus on anything as his head pounds, the world spins, and even his own breathing sounds way to loud. Not to mention the nagging ringing in his ears, and Jesus, or whoever runs the wasteland, why does Tyler have to clean his gun now?
The ghoul in question has dismantled the sawed off shotgun he has been favoring as of late and is currently scrapping any excess gunpowder our of the barrels. The sound of metal rubbing against metal is setting Luther on edge, more so than he already was, and his teeth are gritted in pain as he claws at his ears. "For the love of all things decent or right in this world! Can you please not do that right now?" Luther rarely begs, but he is begging right now.
Tyler glances in his direction and considers the plea for a moment, before continuing to clean the weapon. Luther groans and somehow manages to get to his feet and stagger out of the bathtub. He has no memory of their getting here, or even why they left the Wrangler, but he assumes they are no longer welcome there and should avoid it for a few weeks, months even. He hopes that whatever happened wasn't his fault. Stepping out of the room he heads towards a set of stairs leading to the main floor. On his way down he passes an angry Kc. She grabs the front of his coat and shakes him, "You awake old man?"
Luther cringes and grabs his ears. A hiss of pain escapes from between his clenched teeth. He angrily shoves Kc off of him and proceeds down the stairs. He groans again as he hears the girl follow him down. In the main floor is a lounge like area where a few squatters are cowering and eating some rations the likes of witch he doesn't want to know how they obtained. All of them look at him in fear, as if he is going to steal their food and rape them. He bares his teeth and snarls in their direction. They scatter, crawling through openings in the walls and diving through windows in a panic. With a heavy sigh he drops into a now empty recliner and lets out a yelp of pain as a loose spring digs into his back. "Son of a whore."
Kc leans against a door frame and watches him with humor in her eyes. "You are a soft bellied bitch. One night of heavy drinking and you fall apart?"
Luther covers his eyes, the light coming in from a nearby hole in the wall seems blinding. "I have been maintaining a level of drunkenness for months. You could bottle my blood and sell it as a strong wine. Last night is the first time I have run out, this is the accumulated hangover of all those months. A single night would be nothing. If you were experiencing this, you would die. Now go away. I saw Tyler poking around in your bags, probably looking for your last..." Before he even finishes Kc lets out a string of curses and disappears back up the stairs, swearing that if Tyler has touched any of her stash she is going to gut him.
With a sigh of relief Luther relaxes into the chair. For five blissful seconds, there is silence. Then the silence becomes deafening. At least his head is slowly ceasing to throb, at least he things. How does one describe the descent from torture to slightly less torture?
Its your own damn fault!
No.
Yes! Trying to shut me up with drinking! You are a pathetic excuse for a soldier!
Damn it! Three months! Three whole months and he had heard nothing from the voice in his head. Now it his back? Shit! The drinking has helped. Keeping the mind in a state of hazy half awareness keeps all the dark thought and memories away. Damn it all, why did Tyler have to take them out of the Wrangler? At least there the booze flows freely.
Pathetic! You are a waste of human flesh! You would be better suited to serve as a cannibals last meal! Everyone you ever really cared about has either died or abandoned you! Your wife and child, murdered! The man who killed them, dead by your hand! Clayton, lost to the world! Nick, vanished! There is no one left for you to live for Luther. You should just end it all!
Luther grits his teeth and stands up. There is no way in hell he is going to ever just die. He isn't going to commit suicide, and he sure as hell isn't going to just let someone put a bullet in him. Yet, if he is truthful, perhaps he has been trying to kill himself. All the alcohol, the careless fights, throwing himself at any and all enemies that come withing eyesight. Maybe, maybe the voice is right. What does he have to live for? For the longest time, revenge was what drove him to stay alive. With Colonel Autumn dead, and his family avenged, what point is there any more?
You see? You have wanted this. You want it all to end. Let me help you, I can end this all. No more nightmares, no more fighting, just emptiness.
Admittedly, that does sound good. There is a knife in at his belt, and a gun, not to mention plenty of other ways to kill. His hand seems to move of its own accord, reaching for his knife and pulling it out of the sheath. He stares into his own refection in the mirror of the blade. A thumb flicks over the edge and a small drop of blood appears. No, he thinks, this isn't right. The knife begins to move towards his throat, and he cannot stop himself! No, this isn't me! I am not doing this!
Let me help you.
NO! through sheer willpower Luther forces himself to re-sheath the knife. This will not do! He leaps up out of the chair and dashes up the stairs to their room. Tyler and Kc are shouting at each other, but he forces them apart and all but dives for his pack of supplies. "What has gotten into you, asshole?" Tyler's shout is ignored as Luther desperately digs through is pack for something to drink, anything! All he finds is an empty bottle of vodka. With a furious curse he throws the bottle against the wall where it shatters. "Shit, what the hell Luther?" Tyler grabs his shoulder and Luther reacts in a panic, driving his elbow back into Tyler's abdomen.
Thats it, try and drive me away again! You can't get rid of me Luther!
Luther jerks away from Tyler and draws his knife again. "Your chems!"
"What the hell is wrong with you?"
"Give me a fucking fix or I will gut you like the fucking degenerate ghoul you are!" Tyler bristles at his words. Luther feels slight regret, but ignros it, he needs to do something before the voice takes control. Leaping past Tyler and a wide eyed Kc, Luther sprints out of the building, a single through making him move. A fix, a drink, a kick to the head. Anything will do!
The Courier looks up from the magazine she was reading to see a man wearing a long and tattered coat sprint by in a near panic. From where she is sitting she can hear him speaking in an almost desperate tone. He keeps repeating the same thing over and over. 'gotta get a fix, gotta forget, gotta escape!' She rolls her eyes and flips her magazine back up. She got used to crazy junkies running amok in Feeside years ago. Her plan was go just ignore the sorry excuse for a scaver, right up until he grabbed her and shook her violently, demanding to know where to get a fix.
Her instincts kick in and she does what they say, kick like a bitch. Her armored boot connects with him between his legs and he drops her. She expected that to give him the message, instead it barely seems to have registered with him. In a flash both of them have drawn their guns and both are aiming at the other's head. Neither of them move, save for the psycho breathing heavy and sweating bullets. "Chems, or booze, where can I get it?" His voice is scratchy and ragged, as if he has been shouting way too much.
Courier tilts her head to she side and tries to get a read on the guy from his eyes, but all she sees is a barely contained panic. She reaches three conclusions about him. One, he is not from around her or he would know exactly where to get both chems and drink. Two, he is well trained enough to be able to react quickly to a dangerous situation even while under mental duress. Three, He is on the run, either from people or himself. Despite the fact that he has a gun to her head, and she has one to his, some sort of understanding seems to pass between them and they both lower their weapons slowly. "I can give you some med-x, but in exchange I want to know who you are. Deal?" Her natural curiosity taking over again, damn it all, at least he is sort of attractive, for a guy who is probably in his mid to late forties.
The man struggles with the offer for a few seconds before nodding his head vigorously. "Fine, whatever you want." Courier nods her head and dips a hand into the satchel at her side. The man tenses for a second, but then relaxes again as she pulls the syringe of med-x out and offers it to him. He snatches it out of her hands and she watches him closely. Despite being in a near panic, the man admisters the drug properly. She has seen plenty of junkies just jab themselves wherever the nearest patch of exposed skin is. This guy rolls up his sleeve and taps the crook of his arm first to find the vein. Then he slowly presses the needle into the raised vessel and pumps the chem in slowly. A sigh of content escapes him as the last of the pain killer is forced from the syringe. He removes the empty needle and offers it to her, she shakes her head, "I don't want something that has been inside someone who I don't know."
The man shakes his head. "Just sterilize it with some alcohol or with heated water. If you are desperate you can clean it by passing it through a flame." The Courier is impressed, and her theory that is isn't just some junkie is confirmed. No crazy addict would know enough about medicine to tell her that. This guy knows about humans, how to fix them without causing more damage. Also, she can't shake the feeling that he is reading her much the same way she is reading him. "So," she crosses her arms, "what are you running from that you need a fix so suddenly?"
The man cringes, probably realizing that he did make a deal to tell her all she wants. "I, am not from around here." She has already guessed that. "I came west looking for caps. Back east, where I am from, the work for mercenaries as all but dried up due to military occupation. I won't bore you with all the details, but I have voices in my head from post traumatic stress. At least I think that is the cause. Or, I hope that is the cause. I really don't like the idea that I am simply insane."
Courier sits back down at the bench where she was before and pats the spot next to her. The man sits down without question. "You are from out east? How far east?"
The shrugs his shoulders, "About as far as you can go without hitting the ocean. Capital Wasteland, the capital of the nation that existed before the Great War. Good old US of A. I was part of a military group that claimed to be working to better the future of the Wasteland, but their principals were too extreme for me, not to mention they labeled me a traitor after they killed my family right in front of me. Hell, why am I tell you all this? A complete stranger? There are people who have known me for years who don't know the things I am telling you."
Courier smiles. "I have found that confiding in a stranger is often easier than confiding in your friends. With a stranger, you don't have to worry about the way they judge you, as you don't know anything about them and will likely never see them again. It is easier to pour you heart out to someone you don't have to live with every day and night of your life. My name is Courier by the way, what is yours?"
The man looks at out of the corner of his eye, "Courier? What the hell sort of name is that?"
She smirks, "Mine. I was shot in the head a while ago. Somehow I survived and was patched up by a doctor and a cowboy robot, but I have amnesia. No memory of before waking up in a shallow grave to a securitron digging me up. I can remember how to talk, how to eat, how to tie my shoes, and how to fight and kill, but nothing of who I am, why I was singled out as a courier, or where I came from." She trails off as she realizes the man is staring at her intently. "What? Is there something on my face?"
The man shakes his head. "Courier." He mutters the word under his breath, as if testing out how it sounds. "Couriers take packages from place to place, right?" Courier nods her head, wondering where this is going. "Would they ever travel as far as the Capital Wasteland on the east coast?"
Courier thinks for a moment. "I haven't actually spent much time as a Courier since I was dug up, but I imagine that is possible. A Courier could be hired by a private contractor to take something almost anywhere. Why to you ask."
The man squints at her. "Courier, I think I have some information about who you are."