the story in which Alex Seattle Geer is right for hating enclosed spaces,

[doubletap]

and Neil Park is blamed for his knowledge of vaults.

---

Terminal Entries:

1st Floor, Vault Entry-Room Computer:
- Data Entry 1: Year 20XX, Month XX; There's no escape.
- Holotape Entry 1: Y#4@ SDhig^8705 H98 [data corrupted]; This is hell and I want out of it.

1st Floor, Cafeteria Luncheon:
- Holotape Entry 2: Private Recording; I've had better?

1st Floor, Cafeteria Supply Room:
- Inventory List: Inventory List; A list of food....
- Data Entry 2: Shift Notes; Maybe I should tear the walls down.

1st Floor, Broken Cave:
- Data Entry 3: Preparations; Everything's fine.
- Data Entry 4: Near the End; I'll tell you the truth, but I won't give up my soul.
- Data Entry 5: Finally, the End is at Hand.; This is far enough.

1st Floor, Office:
- Data Entry 6: Vault-Wide Public Service Announcement; Get back to work everyone.
- Data Entry 7: Locked Administrative Reply; You're reaching for straws.

1st Floor, Administrative Secretary's Office:
- Data Entry 8: Drama Hoes; It is sort of funny that people aren't able to lie, though.
- Holotape Entry 3: Bill Self-Log; Byron's access still works everywhere.

Comments

[doubletap]

[ He twists his lips, shrugs under Neil's arms. ]

Think I was desperate. Trying to keep you, trying to keep you interested. Hadn't touched it in months, that or the mask I wanted so much at the time. Thought if you were leaving, you should take it. Liked long and sharp things, and it would get it away from me.

[ Something thick moves across his face; his expression evens out to something peaceful. ]

Call it a gift from the dead.

[goodfight]

[He watches, absorbing the reaction. Eating up the reply placed before his feet.]

...If it's a gift, I could do what I want with it, yeah?

[Whether wield it, sell it, or dismantle it.]

[doubletap]

Which is apparently to abandon it. As it's back in my closet by now.

[ He smiles wryly. ]

[goodfight]

More I couldn't find a use for it. It isn't much fun to wield something that will chase away your enemies and your allies.

[Very anticlimactic.]

If you're looking to get rid of it, I could take it back.

[doubletap]

[ He pulls a hand up to touch Neil's nose. ]

These aren't questions about the Dam.

[goodfight]

I'm getting to the damn...Dam.

[He sighs.]

How did you get the bulk of NCR to vacate the premises?

[doubletap]

[ His expression goes flat without his knowing, emotion draining to neutral. ]

I have control of House's Securitrons. Not just the ones in Vegas. There was a whole bunker, big as a Vault, filled with them. All Mark II's.

[ The soldier faces, full of missiles, instead of the cops. He swallows, finding something in this hard. ]

...And I had been good to the NCR. Especially the troops and the rangers. They knew me and took that into consideration. That they had trusted me and I had betrayed them.

[goodfight]

[That answers more questions than perhaps Alex wanted. Neil watches for a beat, dark eyes swallowing the emotion playing out before him. He slowly reaches to touch Alex's cheek.]

So us being in their territory is not good, right?

[doubletap]

[ Neil touches him, and Alex starts, like an animal, before relaxing-- And starting to grow hard again. Goddamn. ]

Pssh. I lived in Cali all my adult life. I'm not going to stop going there just because they don't--

[ His voice catches, chokes, and he thinks of his mother for the first time in nearly decades. ]

--Don't want me.

[goodfight]

[Noting the reaction and the response, Neil places his other hand against the opposite cheek.]

It was business. It was war. NCR would have dropped you like a hot radioactive potato if it would have benefited them. Besides--

[He thinks of that woman from 1st Recon, the one Alex referenced twice.]

--individual soldiers probably remember you more for your help than your one and only rendition of Benedict Arnold.

[doubletap]

[ It's sense, all of it, and nothing Alex disagrees with. No, nothing, but the last. It stings, he flinches, before shaking his head. Because he knows Neil didn't mean anything by it.

Still wincing, he tries to smile. ]

More questions?

[goodfight]

[Yes, he meant nothing by it. The name is more a symbol than the actual act of betrayal. And yet, Alex looks like he just got bitchslapped.

Neil shakes his head.]

Not in this vault. Not like this. I'd rather you offer me details in the right time than being forced to bear facts that just fucking happened.

[doubletap]

[ There is actual surprise. ]

I thought that was the point. You wanted to ask questions upstairs. You should take advantage of this. Don't know if I'll be as truthful later on.

[goodfight]

Yeah, well, I also forgot this happened fairly recently, and you actually care about people and events. Unlike me.

[The Lone Wanderer who shrugged off the events of the Capital Wasteland without much heartache.]

More importantly, I don't like seeing you upset or in fucking pain.

[doubletap]

[ The last makes him reach for Neil, hold his head as he leans in to kiss him. He gets harder at the act, cock straining upward. Still.

Still.

He breaks from the kiss. Speaks gently. ]

...What BS. You care. You lost a part of yourself back in your home and I don't just mean your brain. Your dad destroyed you. Seeing nothing change or matter made you try to numb yourself. Sure, I think you're probably a sociopath who doesn't care about others' lives....

[ Well, Alex. ]

...But you cared. And you care. Or you wouldn't say you don't like me in pain.

[goodfight]

[The kiss has him reeling. The words rein him back in. Neil scowls, as though caught in his recollections.]

Sociopath or otherwise, I'm still a stellar example of what not to do. Just...

[He breathes.]

Tell me later. When you've processed it all yourself. Or let's discuss something else about the Dam--something you'd have an easier time talking about.

[doubletap]

It's not going to get easier.

[ And he doesn't know he had spoken for a moment. Then he realizes, and realizes what he said. He closes his eyes, almost imperceptibly bites his lip. Then uses that moment of darkness, of being inside himself, to do as he's always done: To come to terms with something. To accept something.

He nods, partly to himself. Opens his eyes to look at Neil and not withhold a thing. ]

I keep moving. Always will keep moving. But each and every thing that's happened to me I haven't healed from. Every single fucking thing. It's all in there, pushed to the side so I can keep walking. It's not going to get easier. There's never going to be a good time to talk. But I'll keep going either way.

[goodfight]

[A man who keeps going, who keeps moving despite the damage done, is a survivor. And a survivor is bound to meet his due at some point.

But Alex will keep going, and honest to god, Neil does not know what to think about that. He breathes in the stagnant air, for once wishing they were topside.]

Sometimes I forget we can be very different people.

[Sometimes.

Neil briefly glances up at the ceiling, wondering where to go. Finally, he looks back at Alex.]

Why do I make you feel safe?

[doubletap]

[ He breaks into a slow smile and says what he intends and the vault lets him. ]

It's not a simple thing. You love me and I'm yours, and you'll take care of me and not let anything happen. But it's more than that, too. I trust you to catch me. To rescue me.

[goodfight]

[Neil makes a face.]

I haven't done anything to earn that trust. I haven't taken care of you. I haven't protected you.

[He swallows, briefly fighting against the vault's influence before relenting.]

...I've been a liability since D.C. That doesn't make sense.

[doubletap]

[ There's some truth in that, but it's wrong as well. It's half and half, and Alex-- ]

...You kept me going, remember? You were my fresh air.

[ He lets that set and then continues. ]

And things have changed from all of this. You're already different toward me. You came and embraced me when I was breaking rather than shove me away.

[goodfight]

[Neil kept him going, but--]

You would have kept going anyway...

[It's a painful admittance, perhaps crueler than he meant it, but according to Alex, it's the god-given (vault-given) truth.]

It's true. I'm changing how I am with you. But it shouldn't instill trust. Not like that.

[doubletap]

Keep going in the way that I'm living, Neil. Not just continuing.

[ Don't you understand? ]

You're the only person that I've ever been close to. There's a reason for that.

[goodfight]

[No, he doesn't understand.]

What is the reason?

[A repeat, an echo.]

[doubletap]

What I said. You keep me living.