Deuces Are Wild

3

Grey rain swollen clouds hung over Goodneighbor the next morning. Zelling was already at the gate.

"Got everything you need?" She asked.

"Yep, let's move."

They picked through the ruins heading west. "You know Oberland Station? There's a couple farmers who settled there. The Brotherhood sometimes hits it up for food. Normally logistics is responsible for procurement of supplies but they're stretched too thin. They're too busy guarding what we do have from raiders."

Classic Brotherhood, MacCready thought. They were still an unknown entity here then flying in at full capacity they would not waste time doing nice things like setting up proper trade.

That could take weeks or months. Whoever this new Elder was, foresight wasn't one of his strong suits. Not everyone is looking to them as saviors. They were just regular people trying to get by not help fight a war. Well someone has to stand up to the Institute, Zelling argued.
MacCready never troubled himself with any of that.

"Of course not." Zelling said, poised to leap down from a heap of rubble."Everything is someone else's problem."

-

The sight of tatos growing in the sun made MacCready's heart ache for home. He wondered if he could manage a letter back to DC to check on everyone but letters from home were always novels, and the longer he read the more it eroded his resolve. His son was safer there.
Safe in the care of Lucy's friends. Lucy...she'd be furious if she knew what he was doing. Victoria said as much.

Victoria was an ex barkeep, deceptively frail but with a tongue like a guillotine and a mean right hook. She and her husband Teddy, a taciturn man with a talent for handyman work lived in a refurbished cottage a mile away from MacCready's farm. Early in their courtship he and Lucy had their first argument, he'd said...something...and the next time he saw Victoria she slugged him. They laughed about it later, but it didn't feel funny at the time.

Besides, neither Victoria nor Teddy nor Duncan for that matter could read. A passing trader might help but they seldom slowed down for a couple of illiterate wastelanders. The two women at Oberland greeted them coolly but the guns at their sides made the underlying message clear- 'try anything and your life is in your hands.'

Disinterested in the goings on MacCready opted to watch the road while Zelling conducted her business, smoking idly. The afternoon wasn't particularly hot, not enough to cast the shimmers across the pavement but it took his scope to confirm his suspicions. Raiders. Three of them.

"Trouble, boss."

Zelling and the two girls glanced toward him. The younger shouldered past MacCready up to the top of the tower then leaned out from the stairs holding a pair of binoculars to her eyes. "Shit. Steph, it's those assholes again. Let me get-"

"No, Jeannie. Get upstairs and stay put." Jeannie huffed but did as she was told. Steph laid her rifle across her shoulders. "These guys better not be with you."

"With us? No way." Zelling shook her head.

"Say the word and they're dead." MacCready said.

"No."

"No? Are you serious?"

"I want to ask them something."

Steph didn't seem concerned. "You wanna start the festivities I'll cover you." She cut a glance to Zelling. "I seriously doubt they know where your missing knight is."

Not wanting to see what the Raiders had in store for them MacCready set his sights on them. Three men, skinny but fit. Track marks galore. One man seemed to be leading the others and his arms were bigger around than MacCready's legs. On one hand he wore a power fist, an ugly yellow contraption maniacs used to punch things to death.

"That's close enough." Steph said. The three men stopped.

The big guy folded his arms. He was very tan and his giant meaty arms made MacCready think about brahmin steak and suddenly he remembered he was hungry. "We had a deal, Steph. It's been a week. Time to pay up."

"Hey assholes." Zelling pointed at them. "You take your circle jerk elsewhere, I'm talking to these ladies."

 

"Who the fuck are you?" grinned Mr. Meat Arms. His gaze swept over her in a way that made MacCready feel unclean. To his buddy Meat Arms muttered. "Is that the ugliest chick you ever saw? I think this is the ugliest chick I ever saw."

That was a low blow. But Zelling was unruffled. "Do you expect me to fly into a rage at that? But since your eyes work maybe you can deduce what this means."
She leveled a laser rifle at them. "I take oath that I'm faster than any of you junkies with your pipe pistols. If you so much as twitch, I will fire. So let's talk."

One of the men went for his gun but he was too slow. A bullet courtesy of MacCready's sniper rifle took him down.
Mr. Meat Arms froze, then realizing he had blood and bits of brain and skull on his person let out a yell. He drove the power fist toward Zelling but lead in too long- she saw him coming a mile away and stepped aside as casually as one might to not bump into someone walking down the street.
The second time she was not fast enough, the blow was hard enough to make MacCready wince in sympathy. Yet he couldn't get a clear shot. Steph grappled with the other man and kneed him in the groin- he let out a falsetto yelp and dropped the knife. Jeannie rushed in and picked it up,holding it to his crotch.

"One false move and I cut it off!" she said with evil glee.

Twisting the knife out of her hands so hard he surely broke her wrist the raider cut and run. "Man, fuck this!"

Zelling hadn't been face down in the dirt from that blow somehow and danced away from Meat Arms, took Steph by the elbow and jerked her forward.

Meat Arms glanced over at his dead associate then in the wake of the one that fled. "Well that doesn't matter. You done?"

"Say!" Zelling said cheerfully. "Can you count to three?"

The raider stared at her nonplussed. She held up something tiny that made Meat Arms say "Oh shit."

Without even thinking MacCready grabbed Jeannie by the shoulders and pushing her in front of him shouted "Take cover!"

Zelling barked a laugh and shoved Steph to run. They barely made it over the hill, the four of them tumbling over the side and crashing into a human pile up just as the grenade exploded.

Steph was still holding her hands over her ears when Zelling moved away from shielding her. She didn't want to open her eyes and take in the gory spectacle. But there it was, just a pair of boots with stumps of bone atop the scorched ground. The rest of him must have blown clear. She laughed. MacCready stared at her.

They didn't have much but Steph and Jeannie agreed that a little hospitality was warranted. Zelling cleaned up her own mess before sitting by the fire with the others. She studied the grenade pin.

"You do know that you're completely insane, right?" MacCready asked her. She only smiled and offered him a Nuka Cola.