тнe vaυlт dweller . ѕaraн мarĸѕ (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
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abstracts2016-09-18 08:07 pm
shortstraw) wrote in abstracts2016-09-18 08:07 pm
the tower.
It started in Novac, in that lovely Dino Dee-Lite Motel by the dilapidated gas station.
He had told her they could be found in the upper corner room, living the Post-War American dream. If not there, they had others: cabins, bunkers, safehouses, and the like. He gave her all the map points, confident in their future whereabouts. And above all, he was certain they would never be in the New Vegas, beneath the bright lights of the Strip.
The motel room had been empty. The Brotherhood safehouse and the cabin by Jacobstown also held no occupants. After traveling nearly the entire width of the Mojave Wasteland, moving from town to fucking town, she finally caught a whiff of him in Freeside.
The crier for Mick & Ralph's had seen a man matching Alex Seattle Geer's description lately, headed directly into the heavily guarded gates of the New Vegas Strip.
Judas, Sarah had thought. Blood betrayer. She then walked the road back to the Dino Dee-Lite Motel, to that cozy little upper room in the corner, and left Alex a very nice surprise.
Three days later, after finding the presidential suite of the Tops woefully empty, Sarah corners a man in the streets. Their exchange proves short, and with his pockets noticeably heavier, the guy walks the short distance to the center of the road. There, with the Vault Dweller looking on, he straightens to attention and produces a piece of paper from his pockets.
"Ladies and gentleman of New Vegas, may I have your attention please?" he reads, voice clear to the nearby bystanders and vigilant Securitrons. "It is my absolute pleasure to introduce to you a Very Important Person--" The man looks over his shoulder briefly, a quizzical look on his face. "Why is it capitalized?" he asks.
"Go on," she mouths, waving lazily at the gathering crowd.
He shrugs and continues as directed. "Someone who has traveled a great distance and sacrificed a good deal of time, bullets, and money to be here with you fine folks. She is the Champion of the Holy Thirteen, the Swan Song of the Master and His Most Unholy Unity, the Keeper of All Your Dogs, a Sometimes Friend to You and I... I present to you: The Vault Dweller!"
He had told her they could be found in the upper corner room, living the Post-War American dream. If not there, they had others: cabins, bunkers, safehouses, and the like. He gave her all the map points, confident in their future whereabouts. And above all, he was certain they would never be in the New Vegas, beneath the bright lights of the Strip.
The motel room had been empty. The Brotherhood safehouse and the cabin by Jacobstown also held no occupants. After traveling nearly the entire width of the Mojave Wasteland, moving from town to fucking town, she finally caught a whiff of him in Freeside.
The crier for Mick & Ralph's had seen a man matching Alex Seattle Geer's description lately, headed directly into the heavily guarded gates of the New Vegas Strip.
Judas, Sarah had thought. Blood betrayer. She then walked the road back to the Dino Dee-Lite Motel, to that cozy little upper room in the corner, and left Alex a very nice surprise.
Three days later, after finding the presidential suite of the Tops woefully empty, Sarah corners a man in the streets. Their exchange proves short, and with his pockets noticeably heavier, the guy walks the short distance to the center of the road. There, with the Vault Dweller looking on, he straightens to attention and produces a piece of paper from his pockets.
"Ladies and gentleman of New Vegas, may I have your attention please?" he reads, voice clear to the nearby bystanders and vigilant Securitrons. "It is my absolute pleasure to introduce to you a Very Important Person--" The man looks over his shoulder briefly, a quizzical look on his face. "Why is it capitalized?" he asks.
"Go on," she mouths, waving lazily at the gathering crowd.
He shrugs and continues as directed. "Someone who has traveled a great distance and sacrificed a good deal of time, bullets, and money to be here with you fine folks. She is the Champion of the Holy Thirteen, the Swan Song of the Master and His Most Unholy Unity, the Keeper of All Your Dogs, a Sometimes Friend to You and I... I present to you: The Vault Dweller!"
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Finally, he pats the ground beside him, indicating an invitation.
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Then beeps out a quiet rhythm. You need to eat something.
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The man smiles, small and sad. "I know. I haven't been good," he answers. "Brought a mutfruit with me, but my stomach's not cooperating."
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It's dusty and has dried blood on a corner, but ED-E wasn't being picky. Neil isn't supposed to eat radiated food anymore, but Dogmeat isn't supposed to be dead.
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He takes the box carefully, eyes never leaving the kid. "Thanks, ED-E."
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And neither will Neil.
The man watches him and ED-E beeps in a firm pattern. He was my friend, too. You're my friend, too.
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He watches ED-E, the kid made of mechanical parts and a nuclear core. A Duraframe eyebot from good ol' D.C., living with a Mojave Express courier after a misadventure brought them together. Who became friends with a mutt who saw fit to adopt a wandering teen as his own.
They're both mourning over their friend. In different ways, but--
"Yeah," Neil says, his voice cracking. His fingers tighten over the box. "Yeah. You're absolutely right. Dogmeat...and I. We're your friends. And I'll continue to be your friend."
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The nutrition part is the simplest one to start with.
Dogmeat and I, ED-E gives in a mixture of sounds. Looked after you. Now I'm looking after you. And he wouldn't want you to get sick.
He hovers, his internal buzzing filling the space. He repeats the simple beeping from before. You have to eat.
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Neil looks down at the Dandy Boy Apples box, at the faded lettering and graphics, before working it open. He mutters, hand reaching in to pull one candied apple, "Must be kinda shameful. You having to tell a grown man that he needs to eat. I really need to step up my game to keep you two from worrying."
Even as one of them is no longer present.
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But he isn't supposed to be the one hurting right now. He is here right now because Alex... and Dogmeat aren't able to be, and someone needs to take care of Neil.
And ED-E is here because of Neil, too. Because the one time that ED-E thought Alex was mad at him, enough to hate him and leave him, Neil pet him and told him it was okay.
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Another might question him. Wonder why the man's acting like this was ED-E's friend when Dogmeat was Neil's companion, best friend, and brother, but the truth remains that Dogmeat was all of those things. And more.
The artificial coloring shines bright beneath the dimming sun, and Neil takes a small bite. Sugar and sugar fill his mouth, but in between chews, he manages speech. "Have I ever mentioned that he used to have a master?" he asks.
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Dogmeat-- Canine-friend-person-family, is his word-name. Something only Alex breaks down into pieces. --said he had a person he belonged to. But then he found a person that belonged to him.
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"That's right," he says, swallowing the food. "He found me. Adopted me as his own. We met in the local scrapyard. Poor boy was fending off a bunch of raiders from his person's corpse. Bastards must have jumped them while they were scavenging."
He takes another bite, mind in another place. Another time. "When it was all over, him and I-- We talked. I told him he was the first dog I've met that didn't try to eat me, and even though he just lost his person, he gave such a friendly bark."
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He's always friendly, ED-E trills quietly, not correcting himself from is to was. He's always open and wanting to make friends. Except Rex, he adds, Cyber-canine-robotic-ally.
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"Kinda sad, that," he comments quietly. "But I guess you can't expect two male dogs to act friendly. Not for awhile, anyway." Territorial stuff, he supposes.
His sight moves over to the horizon, to the near blinding Strip. "Is Alex doing okay?" he asks quietly.
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Alex is quiet, he beep-trills. Hiding inside himself. He wanted to follow you instead. Thought he would hurt you more.
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"Together four years," he murmurs bitterly to himself, "and I'm still pushing him away." His free hand comes up to press a knuckle against one of his eyelids, agitation written in the act. "I'm the one hurting him."
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ED-E butts him again, more forcefully with the weight of a large eyebot. You're hurting, he replies sternly. And you're what Alex is thinking about. Your pain worries him, not his.
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He listens quietly, hand slipping down from his eye to rest on his knee. "...He is a good guy like that." Selfless. Thinking of another rather than himself. Still-- "I should have just talked to him from the beginning, instead of blowing up in his face."
Telling the other to leave him be.
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They went out to the south, and they hunted a few raiders and radscorpions, found some giant ants, and then when they were done, Alex sat on a rock, rifle across his legs, and told ED-E about ED-E's own past.
It's a strange thing, having another tell you about what you were supposed to know, but ED-E trusted Alex, more than anyone in the entire world, and everything Alex said--direct and exact, quiet but without pauses--made his circuits ring with something familiar. Alex had said that when he got shot, things got all fuzzy; there was a lot in the past he didn't remember anymore. And ED-E realized that they were the same.
Still, it was painful. That there were memories gone of his dad--Whitley--and that he couldn't remember the games he had played with the boy in Chicago. He could barely remember the family at all: He could hear their voices, but not envision their faces. All of this, and it had all slipped from him without a trace. He had mourned and fell to silence, and they had sat and watched the sun set.
Alex is good, he burbles and beeps, a quiet thoughtful melody. At listening to your silence when you hurt. He can understand what you can't say. You don't have to talk.
Just watch the day end. And let time pass.
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You see, the business up in the North had come with a few complications. The four had been separated from each other. ED-E had been dismantled and subsequently put back together, details Neil wisely chose not to ask for, and when the last bit came up on the to-do list, Neil had left Dogmeat back at camp. Dogmeat, somewhat stiff from age and yet seemingly energetic, had been still when they had returned. Still enough for them to think he'd fallen into deep sleep.
It wasn't until Neil had tried to rouse him that they found that he had fallen into something more permanent. And Dogmeat had been all alone when it happened, when Neil had promised to be his companion to the bitter end.
Here, ED-E tells Neil that he doesn't have to talk. That Alex can understand. Lack stagnates within him, threatening to consume, and the man simply nods. He continues to watch the dying light in silence, a hand gripping his shirt and the other holding a half-eaten candied apple.
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You have to eat, he reminds, gentler than before.
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Without smiling, without peeling his eyes away from the darkening horizon, the man lifts the apple to his mouth and gnaws off a decent chunk. He chews slowly, ignoring the absence in his chest and the churning in his stomach. It's still good, he thinks. Continues to think.
His thoughts run to Dogmeat and his favorite foods. They pass over ED-E frying up geckos and Nuka-Cola and Sunset Sarsaparilla. And how he wishes he had let Alex stay, if only to listen to the silence that hurt can bring.