Revelations 12:1

"And there appeared a great wonder in heaven; a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars:"

2288

It was always the same nightmare.

There she was. Standing in that empty room...except, it wasn't like a normal room, even by Vault standards. The walls were all wrong...the ceiling was, too. They were mutilated, like the jagged chasm that cut into the side of his face. It was dark, it smelt of smoke; she looked all sorts of out of place.

Her hands were clasped shyly behind her back, just bumping gently across the top of the curves of her lower backside; that hair was undone, wild, roaring, in a glittering color of golds and browns. There were lions sleeping inside of those curls; fields of wheat flowing to the coastal waves. That burgundy dress he had torn to absolute shreds that one and only night was beautifully stitched whole; a drop of dark jeweled rubies kissing her skin so tightly he could see the curves of her breasts. Her feet were bare...she looked so very out of place.

"Baby, where'd ya go?" He walked over to her; he always wanted to run, in these dreams, to take her by the hand and just go; escape, live. Rather, he would just stand there, like a fool, and his voice would break. He couldn't help sounding so pathetic. "Why did you leave me?"

And she would just stare at him, those eyes- those ocean eyes- watching him, consuming him, drowning him. She looked just as every bit as he would feel; completely devastated. She would mime him, bringing her hands up to wipe away tears that did not wet her cheeks.

"Why did you go?" he sobbed. "I love you so much."

Then, a sound. A drip. He would look down; she was standing in water. A black, unseeable abyss. Her lips would move, but there was no voice. God, how he just wanted to hear her speak. Instead, all he would hear was a scream...and it wasn't human.

Knock knock knock!

There was a pounding on his door, and the grey ghoul snapped upright, his sheets tangled around his body like thick snakes. A rugged, thick hand rubbed brusquely at his eyes; he had not relived that nightmare for a couple of years now...in fact, he had not dreamed so much at all, anymore, for which he was entirely grateful for. For whatever reason that particular one decided to resurface, he only hoped it didn't decide to stay.

Knock knock knock!

"Fuck is it? Ya know what fuckin' time it is?" The merc growled after thrusting the hatch open, standing in his open doorway completely naked with an irritable expression.

"It's...it's...uh-" Their newest addition to the Black Cazadors couldn't find the appropriate response. Her head was tilted to the side, a bottle of liquor in one hand that she tapped at with her nervous tick. Those chocolate eyes were caught staring shamelessly at his dick; she had never seen a ghoul naked before, but her mentally filed curiosities were finally sated. She didn't raise her eyes. "It's two in the afternoon."

Cross was busily wiping the sleep from his face. When he widely blinked and refocused his gaze down at the small smoothskin so transfixed on his flaccid penis, he slammed the door shut, momentarily startled by her interest.

Her voice was muffled. "Sorry, I'll...come back later." It was more of a question than a statement, but neither really mattered to the ghoul.

He was more concerned with the fact that she had seen him in all his full, scarred, and decayed glory...and wasn't disgusted with what she saw. It was a hushed rule that the merc always answered his door in a reproachable manner- it kept Lydia's nagging at bay, and usually only his contracted companion would come knocking if the situation was dire.

If the newbie wasn't warned, or she was just more than likely pranked...then any future incidents were sure to be unlikely. Still, the situation was awkward enough he felt flush, and decided on getting dressed rather than try and fall back asleep. It was either facing an attractive woman and the judgment in her eyes, or potentially replaying the rest of that dream. He opened his locker and grabbed a pair of pants, for he knew what was in store for the sleep to come.

It always ended with Evelyn sinking down into deep waters, and no matter how far he dove after her, their fingertips would never touch.

Thunk

"Shit," Charon muttered under his breath. The amber bottle he had accidentally tipped over in reach for a tin can of grease poured generously to the floor; an uncalled-for tribute to those he saw fit to put six feet under it. The ghoul grumbled as he uprighted the now half-empty glass container; what a waste.

He rubbed at his eyes, and turned his head to the open doorway at the sound of footsteps; his employer walked by with a string of curses under his breath; shirtless, jeans half-buckled, and expression recognizably pissed-off. To anyone else, they would assume the bounty hunter was in a foul mood, (which wasn't unusual...it was odd if he was in a good mood), and they would give a wide berth. To his employee of the past decade, however, he instantly acknowledged the tight pull of his mouth, and the guarded glint to his hazy glare, all from the few seconds he had caught sight of him.

He was somewhat surprised. The merc hadn't had a nightmare in so long, now...the ferryman did not have to ask what horrors crept behind those seemingly blind eyes. It was always the same. Always.

A half-blessing, and a half-curse, to be gifted with the virtue of a permanent insomniac. Although he could not escape from the daily dismays of the wasteland, he did not have to face them, either, un-consensual in a state of dreams...as much as he longed to see her face again, broken or not, he was sure he would grow mad at the sick images his tortured mind was sure to produce. He did not know how Cross lived with it.

Then again, he sometimes still worried that one day he wouldn't.

"Yeah, good morning to you too." There was only one person who spoke informally to the merc without fear of getting their head kicked in; Lydia rounded the doorway, an oil stain smeared across her forehead. "Hey, Charon, you still making that trip?"

The crimson ghoul rumbled his throat as a way of clearing it. "I am."

She didn't have to ask where he would be going; it was a customary voyage for the ferryman to take this time of month, if these five past consecutive years were anything to go by. He would be expected to be absent for a while; Braxton was quite the stone's throw from their base of operations in Kittery.

"You mind stopping at that robotics warehouse in Port Stein, on your way back? Only place I could find an L5 fuse."

Charon nodded. "I will."

A slap of her hand against the concrete column. "Cool, 'ppreciate it!" She then spun around, a lighter kick to her step.

Out of complete habit, the bottle of whiskey was clasped, and emptied before the ghoul even realized he had taken a sip. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, and stared down at his constant friend that had kept him grounded these past few years. He had half a mind to ask his employer if he wished to join him, even if it was a fruitless request to begin with.

Cross had not once, ever, set foot back in that hollowed-out city, after that night.

The passage of time was spent in quiet darkness.

The slow ebb into unconsciousness played her thoughts, her dreams, into nothing more than the lull of eternity; the ever-watchful abyss was at her doorstep...or, was it behind her shoulder? One never really knew. The stretch of her psyche was unparalleled...ever floating...so ever blind.

That first inhale felt like death himself had softly grazed her lips, and then breathed Hell's fire down her raw throat. An unwilling consent of life burst a dazzling array of stars behind the closed lids of her eyes, punctured a million thrusts of a hot blade into her lungs with unyielding fervor.

She gasped, and a cold blanket lay a chill over her entire being, crawling with gnarled fingers inside her bones, sucking at all warmth there was to be had. There was light- so bright- flooding the blackened veil enlaced over her. Another breath, and that darkened cave saw the first burst of sky in over ten years- her eyelids opened, and she recoiled harshly from the beam of light directed at her face.

"Holy shit," Vivien breathed, the grip of her fingers failing as her flashlight made a thunk to the dirt at her feet.

Jay held an arm out before her; an unnecessary, but precautionary stance in the event this floundering woman sought to inflict harm.

A painful, stabbing sensation nicked the underside of Evelyn's brain; voices, so many voices, were all around- screaming, crying, desperate. They were suffocating- why would they not stop?!

The snapping of nerve endings being electrified jolted the ends of her fingers and toes. Liquid sloshed like the angry churn of the ocean, crashing over the side of the pod like a high tide. The remnants of skeletal remains floated along with the sudden wave, carrying them a few feet before sinking back into the dirt they had become so familiar with.

"Jay, do something!" Neither Vivien nor her partner could wrestle their eyes from this wounded creature, howling like a banshee that curdled the blood in their veins.

It was hard for Jay to properly see this woman, that damn flashlight was bouncing all over the place! "Keep your fucking light on her, Viv!"

The woman was finally able to snap her gawking gaze away for just a moment. "That's yours!"

Jay gripped the hand holding his torch with the other; he had been violently shaking. "Hey!" His voice was quiet, and he licked his chapped lip and cleared his throat, throwing some gusto behind his words. "Hey, hey!"

For a moment, she stilled, fingers curling around the edges of the suspended animation pod, nostrils flaring and eyes narrowed in a fashion that screamed predatorily.

"Keep it cool, a'right? We're not here to hurt you." Slowly spoken words, calm enough to soothe the feral animal into sitting deathly quiet in its lulling sea state. "Can you, understand me? Can you talk?"

Those fingertips relaxed their iron grip, leaving a perfect mold of her palm, courtesy of her supernatural strength. That chin quivered, and her face screwed shut in distraught. When she spoke, her throat protested from the years of silence, and her words were etched into the air like broken glass.

"Cross...C-Charon?"