1935-1939

She agreed to meet Athena on the promontory overlooking the entrance to Strophades Corridor. The breeze from the west carried the noise of Hecate's faithful to her. For almost forty minutes, Julia stood alone on the weathered stone, staring at the temple's peak, listening to the incomprehensible bark of a drill instructor. Athena was completely exposed as she walked from Ouroboros to the promontory, but Julia kept her eyes fixated on the highest step, the room that had once been Hecate's but now she claimed for herself. It took Athena a long time and a lot of courage to march up to her, but she never once glanced down. She wasn't wearing her helmet, but otherwise was bedecked in full armor, even though it was sweaty and uncomfortable in the late afternoon sun, which slowly worked its way to Ouroboros. Soon it would engulf the village just as her own sun had. Caesar was a mere three weeks from being overwhelmed by his tumor, and then her son would rise in the east, just as assuredly as the earth's would tomorrow morning. Athena was dressed as she typically was, as well; the face paint that marked her as a Daughter of Hecate, a blouse and short skirt woven out of yucca fiber and dyed in a pattern like her face paint, and her broken slave collar. Julia's face was painted, too, in spirals instead of arrows like Athena, but Julia's paint was old and mostly rubbed off, while Athena's was freshly applied. Athena noticed.

"Do you know," Julia started after they stood in silence together for a long moment. The lugubrious effects of her regular opioid dosage made her thoughts drip like molasses, while Athena struggled to summon the courage to confront her, "How many years the United States of America wasn't engaged in a war or some other type of military operation, from 1900 to the day it ended?

"Four years," she didn't look away from the horizon, "From 1935 to 1939. Every other year, one-hundred and seventy-three years that ended abruptly in October of 2077, the United States was either fighting a war, deploying troops in defense of American interests overseas, or otherwise displaying force for the ostensible goal of peace and security. Sometimes they targeted their own citizens, like in Ohio, or Denver," her eyes flicked to the ground, then glanced back up right into Athena's own, "Not a lot of people knew about that back then, and even less know it now."

Athena stood spellbound by Julia's saucer eyes. Like most Twisted Hairs, they were the color of the badlands clay, the same color as Athena's. For a minute she was fooled into thinking she was staring into her mother's eyes, or her sister's eyes. In a sense they were sisters. Athena's maternal grandfather was an Aram, her aunt married one of Harpy's sons (one that was still alive by the time Julia betrayed the tribe), and her cousin had married one of Julia's cousins. They were family, just as Hecate had been their family. Knowing that didn't reassure her, in fact it only made her more scared of Julia.

"If you know enough, it starts to seem like a pattern. All of human history seems defined by conflict, writ in blood… sealed in ash," At the crack of rifle retort Julia's attention was drawn back to Ouroboros. The children of Hecate were engaged in target practice. The noise made Athena jump and words came tumbling out of her mouth, unbidden by her tongue.

"The... After the- after the war, surely- right, right after," she stammered, unsure who she was defending or why she was so compelled to defend them, "In, in the vaults."

Julia just shook her head slowly, numbly, "Because of the intentional flaw built into the door, radiation leaked into Vault 12 at a prodigious rate, and within weeks what vaulters weren't dead were in open revolt against the overseer. Vault 68 descended into violence within a few months, as nearly a thousand men fought over the lone woman… There are others, I'm sure," Julia turned to Athena again.

"Then not quite one hundred years later the master tried to conquer the wasteland, and the Brotherhood stopped him, and even before then the Twisted Hairs and the Blackfoots and the Kaibabs and the Fredonians were already fighting, before the tribes had names even they were fighting. Then the NCR was formed and immediately started a three-way war with two raider armies, a war that technically never ended, as the Khans are still fighting the NCR in the Mojave. Then they fought the Enclave. Around that time Caesar started his war against the tribes, which is ongoing in addition to his war with the NCR, who also are still at war with the Brotherhood.

"So, in a sense," Julia stared down at the spot where years ago she'd fired the shot that killed her brother, "the fighting didn't end in 2077, even though America did. And there's been Americans fighting every year since 1940. And I wonder, is that really how it's supposed to be? Is that all we are? I don't think so. I think there's a way to rise above it."

"It's not just us," Athena petulantly argued, when she realized she was defending herself, "It's everybody. It's human. If we aren't human, what are we?"

"Sometimes I wonder," Julia didn't seem to have heard her, "Did everyone realize? In those four years, that they were the last? What did they think? Did they appreciate it?"

Both women let the question sit between them, as the wind rustled the long grass and the sound of rifles turned to the sound of automatics, chirping like vicious birds.

"I'd like to think they did," Julia said to Ouroboros, almost too softly for Athena to hear.

"You're insane."

Athena couldn't hold her anger at this woman any longer. "You're a monster. A psychotic monster," She scoffed, utterly disgusted by the audacity of her cousin, of the sheer ego, " You- you killed the Goddess. You usurped her throne, and now, now you say you're saving the wasteland? You aren't saving these people, you are enslaving them. You aren't rescuing the wasteland from that, that, that," She spat the word, "man, you're taking his place!"

Athena's shrieked every word after she almost didn't call Caesar a man, and for just a moment she was startled at how much like her mother she sounded. Her mother wailed and shrieked when the men returned with her daughter, bloodied and naked and battered, wearing strange and sinister jewelry. She unconsciously tugged at her collar as she confronted Julia.

"You don't want to free them," she sneered, "No, not really. You want slaves for yourself. A whole slave army. A whole nation of men, all of them for you.

"Just like you always wanted," Athena hissed.

In the silence the wind whistled. Target practice ended for the day. In Ouroboros the Golden Children obediently marched back to their dormitories, rifles slung over their shoulders. The twelve-year-olds practiced in the late afternoon. The ten-year-olds practiced in the early afternoon. Before she arrived at the promontory to talk to Athena, Julia supervised them on the range. She'd corrected a ten-year-old girl's posture.

"You're destroying Her vision. You don't love Her."

"How dare you. I loved her before anyone else did. And you know that."

"I'm going to tell them. I'm going to tell everyone what you did, who you are. I'm going to stop this," Athena was emboldened.

"Good," Julia snorted.

"Tell them," she said.

"Tell everyone. Write it on the walls in letters ten feet tall."

Her frank tone took Athena aback. She waited for a moment for Julia to threaten her, to grab her by the collar and snarl in her face and maybe, possibly just kill her right there. For the turn, when fire would shoot out of Julia's nostrils and she'd become ten feet tall and red like a devil on an old candy box. Instead, when Athena hesitated for a little too long, Julia merely gestured back to Ouroboros. When Athena stared dumbly back at her, she gestured more emphatically.

"What do you want from me?" Julia finally asked.

"What do I wa-" Athena goggled at her, so offended she had to pause to gather her thoughts.

"I want you dead!" she blurted, "I want to see you p-pay for your crimes! I want- I want to- I want to save them!"

Athena waved her arms in the direction of Ouroboros, then when Julia innocently copied her she waved them everywhere, emphatically in all directions, encompassing all peoples all over the wasteland. Julia couldn't help but chuckle.

"Honey, you can't save them," she shook her head, "From me?"

Athena, incredulous, nodded her head yes.

"You can kill me all you want, sis, but you can't save them," Julia was even more incredulous. Athena still didn't understand.

"They want this. Everyone wants this. The Daughters want it, the Legion wants it, the Golden Children want it because they don't know any better and we told them to want it," Julia said, "The only people who don't want it are Hecate, who's dead, and Caesar, who's about to be dead, and you."

"Every Daughter will be a goddess in her own right, to each her own Ouroboros, her own little fucking fiefdom where they'll lord over their brothers and fathers and uncles and sons," Julia sighed, "Somehow it'll be like everything was before but better. The perfect outcome to a scary, unknowable future. I'm sorry you don't get to join in on the fun, but we've all lost family to Caesar. The rest of the Daughters don't want to lose any more."

"They'll be your slaves, too," Athena angrily retorted.

"So tell them," Julia ushered her away again, "Let them know they're sheep. I'm evil and my plan is evil and everything they're doing, everything they've invested in is wrong. Tell them that it's wrong to enslave the Legion, that it makes us all. Just. Like. Caesar."

"They'll tear you apart. For blasphemy," Julia shrugged, "They might turn on me, too. But you can't stop my plan. You can't stop this," she gestured vaguely to the air around them, "This is what the Daughters want."

Athena had to think. Julia's speech, while absolutely soaked through with her own ego, wasn't dishonest.

"You're still a monster," Athena squinted at Julia with steely resolve. Julia only exhaled and shrugged her shoulders.

"Y'know, I always wanted to be a doctor so I could fix people. But you can't, you just can't," she shook her head sadly, "Not where it really counts."

"I'm going to stop you," Athena muttered darkly as she turned to leave.

"Been chance, mi-choo," Julia wished her good luck in the language of their tribe, "Been chance."