Broken roads and crumbled buildings filled Westside; this inner city ruin was once part of Las Vegas but was now nothing more than a faded memory. Although many bombs from the Great War missed the Mojave they had been abandoned for more than two hundred years, as a result the building weren't too badly damaged and on some even the original neon lighting from the time still functioned perfectly.
Loogie looked around at the sights while Darrel led the way; one seemed to be fixated on what once was while the other tried to find their destination. Darrel examined the structures and their positions while correlating them with the directions given by Lexi, although she had given him limited descriptions he managed to make out the correct way. He remembered her saying once you get into the second half of Freeside take a right, go down the road between two lampposts and head straight to the end where you'll find the Silver Rush.
Loogie admired the sign above the King's school of impersonation; he then went on to tap Darrel on the shoulder to ask, "Do you ever wonder?"
"Wonder about what?" Darrel wondered.
"What the world was like before the war,"
Darrel stopped walking, he turned back to Loogie with a grim look in his eyes, "To be honest I couldn't care what it was like. No matter what we like to think about the Old World is gone, it went up in a ball of flame and radiation. Besides, we have more important to think about than what the world was like so let's just focus on what we need to do"
Loogie felt phased, "Alright then"
Darrel went back to walking; he took a right turn when he came to the crossroads and headed toward his destination. At the very end of the road sat the building both of the rangers were looking for, with grey and white neon lighting above a double doorway sat a sign reading 'Silver Rush' in big white letters that turned on and off every grey seconds. Either side of the doorway stood two men dressed in black battle armour armed with laser rifles and both men were obviously door guards to ensure thieves did not break into the building. Loogie then stopped admiring his surrounding and looked in the direction that Darrel was focused on, he saw the Silver Rush at the end of the street and felt his curiosity of the old world slip away.
Loogie made sure his rifle was still on his shoulder, "I sure do get a funny feeling in my gut when I see that place"
"We don't have to deal with them," Darrel stated, "All we're here for is to get the details of a job, do the job then after we get paid we never have to see them again"
"Until they want us to do another,"
"Well in that case we'll ask Lexi to give the job to someone else,"
Darrel headed toward the Silver Rush with Loogie beside him, the young rangers wondered what their next job would be or how it would go. The two never really came this far into Vegas, not that they never wanted to but because of what they would hear. Stories from gamblers would describe how if you were caught cheating or screwing over the wrong person could result in broken limbs or violent deaths or sometimes even both. These stories filtering back through the outer reaches of the city caused worry and concern for those who wanted to take their chances and get rich. Neither of the two ever thought about gambling in the casinos, they were handy with a gun and they made a pretty cap earning it via a fight so they didn't want to give that up. Not a day went by that the lights of The Strip couldn't be seen from miles away and while the two young men thought about going there they knew not what they would find or if they could stay out of trouble. Yet with everything that was happening, it felt that the rangers may not be around for long, Darrel had something on his mind he wanted to share.
"How much do you think?" Darrel asked.
"What?" Loogie replied.
"How much do you think we could get if we went to The Strip?"
Loogie let out a tut of disappointment, "Thought you said we shouldn't go to the Strip encase we get killed by some gambler"
"Given the fact this could be our last job don't you ever think we might need to do something else," Darrel stated, "I mean we could work part time as bodyguards for some rich folks while gambling our winnings. Occasionally"
Loogie then grabbed Darrel by the shoulder, turned him forward so he could look him in the eye and stopped. Loogie then poked his finger into Darrel's shoulder so hard as if he were trying to puncher his flesh, "That life, it ain't for us and you know it. Come on, look at us; we're guns for hire and nothing more to it. Guessing we could always try and gamble and we could win big too if we were really lucky. But that won't change how the suits look at us. We're hired hands; we got dirt on our hands and now no matter how much we got, no amount of caps can get rid of it in their eyes. If I were you, I'd push that idea out of your head and forget about it"
Darrel took in the words of his friend and deep down he knew he was right. All the while there were two groups of people in the world, those with stuff and those who needed it. He also knew that he and his friend fell into the category of those who need things, sadly for people who need to work there was not much they could get out of life unless they did something incredible or they took things from others. Darrel could never be that kind of person, killing or hurting others just so he could survive.
"Yer," Darrel added, "I guess you're right man"
The two then continued on walking down the road and toward the building. As the two approached the entrance of the building, one of the men in body armour called out to them, "You two from the Rangers?"
Darrel replied, "Yer, the Van Garaffs called for our services"
The two men in armour sniggered in amusement before the other one commented, "That they do my friend, that they did"