Know When to Fold 'Em (Closed for Obuzeti)

CurtailedAmbrosia

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Tenderheart was an ironic name for a small, ramshackle scrap town like this one-from the brothel full of cynical whores to the bar where more Jet was sold than alcohol, it was no place for anyone who couldn't hold their own in a fight. It was an odd occurrence if a visitor wasn't mugged at least once during their stay, a protection racket offered at the gate if you wanted to get rid of the middle man.

You could get just about anything off one of the caravans coming through though, the only 'off limits' marks in town. Looking at one of their Brahmins sideways might get you knifed by one of 'Devon's'.

Devon ran this town. He was the undisputed boss, and he'd gotten there by being the meanest, most ruthless conniving son of a bitch there-which was saying something. But he wasn't a complete psychopath. He was reasonable when he could permit it, and that was probably what had let him live this long.

In his office in the gutted remains of what had once been a construction office, he lit a cigarette and watched the the little flame consume the match in the chipped ashtray on his desk. He didn't look like a man of means, didn't flaunt his wealth with too many extravagances-he was shrewd, responsible-used his money where it actually mattered. He paid his local men well, and his hired outsiders better.

"You get results, and that's why I wanted you for this one." He was saying, taking a long drag on his cigarette and holding it in a moment, opening a desk drawer and withdrawing a tattered wanted poster. Devon had gone to seed somewhat, no longer in throat cutting shape and balding. A scar ran across his face and over what used to be his left eye, a nastier one that snarled his lip-but he wasn't overly bothered by either.

"Gotta be alive, though. Ain't paying for corpses, pretty or not." Devon warns with a mouth full of smoke, flicking his cigarette. "Mind nobody else offs her either. She's got a bad habit of pissin' people off-this ain't even my poster."

Indeed-that particular reward was being offered by the NCR. He slid it across his desk, another plume of smoke. "Drawing's not bad-mostly looks like the little bitch, anyway."

She was a red head, looked like. Heart shaped face with a delicate, long bridged nose dividing her symmetrical features, a bit of an impish rounded end to it. Large blue eyes and full lips that, even on this poster, were curved into a smirk.

Judging by the reward being offered by the NCR, this 'Kara Walker' was small time. Devon must have had a bone to pick, something-he was paying much, much more.

"You snag her and bring her to me, and I might have a lucrative job for you when you get back."
 
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Moray is unsettling.

He's big, certainly, but in the normal realm of bigness, six foot something, a little broad, nothing unusual. But even in such a large frame no one else ever manages to look so fucking explosive. He moves careful, with the distinctive carefulness of big men and the courtesy of the truly violent, occupying spaces with care reminiscent of a viper parting the air with its tongue. There's so much hate packed into that big body that it vibrates under the pressure, pressure-cooked into trembling incoherence that only careful control can disarm. His hatred is titanic and baked into the foundation of his existence.

Currently, he's red-faced and staring at the photo Devon hands him. He sets down the picture and smooths it flat with his hands gently. His fingertips are trembling.

"Alive," he says, that eerie flatness like a bomb siren wail. "Would you care to quantify a certain level of 'alive'? Mobile, in good health? Or do you maybe mean limbless, in a box?"

He doesn't blink, either way. It probably doesn't matter to him. The money isn't enough, but -

"I know her," Moray answers, the question silent in the air. He slips his thumbs into his belt, which mostly stills the shaking of his hands, but his bare teeth slip and gleam in the air as his lips pull back instead. It's not a smile and would never be mistaken for one. It widens out instead of pulling up. "I'll go after her. It would just be useful to know if you expect a guest or a head for the mantle-place."

Those eyes are dead and green and pale. China eyes, pasted-on eyes. If there's a soul in this man you can see it a lot more clearly right before his hands close around your neck.
 
Devon laughs, crushing out his cigarette and eyeing the other man as if trying to determine if he was serious or not. And people thought he was a bastard!

"I know her,"

"Ah." Devon uttered as if that explained it. He retrieved another cigarette, watched another match burn up in the ashtray. He's glad to hear the big man accept the job. He also knows who to call next time he needs someone offed and with prejudice.

"Good. She owes a debt, and I've decided it's high time I collect." He billows smoke and considers. "So yes. Alive and preferably in whatever condition you found her in, so long as she's sitting across from me soon."
 
Moray nods. His eyes cool and his hands still as he slides into professional mode, soothing his omnipresent ire. He reaches into a pocket on his duster and pulls out a wide map of New Vegas, unrolling it and glancing across the surface. "Last I heard she was running face for the Kings in Freeside," the gunman says, reflective. "It's a crap town but they've got a lock on it, which tells me she's probably still in the area to bask for a bit. I'll check there and send word. If nothing shows, it'll take longer because she's scattered, but I'll have her trail at least."

He snaps the map back up in a wrist-flick, nods cordially, and moves straight from sitting down into a military stride for the door, no time wasted on standing up. His internal strife compresses into motion that bowls over a thug in his way and bounces him off the wall a foot away, which Moray barely even notices.

He only feels human with a purpose. Calm, with a target.

Time to go.

~*~

Freeside is garbage. The castoffs of New Vegas, but when you have more money than the entire West Coast combined, even your castoffs are something to be reckoned with. The Kings own Freeside from 26th Avenue to New Way, a broad swathe of territory, and even Moray isn't homicidal enough to pick a fight with an entire gang on their own territory.

Instead, he finds the nearest pack of kings and looks for the white crown, rather than the off-gold; that signifies the court leader, in the gang's parlance. His objective identified, Moray smoothly stalks forward. There's four of them, and the only one with an angle to see his face immediately pulls his piece out, a crappy hunk of steel that the troubleshooter doesn't even glance at properly.

"Kara Walker in town?" he says, abrupt. The King with his gun out holds it steady, pointed at his chest, while White Crown turns about, all lazy-like, and blinks at him. Instantly, the mockery offered starts Moray's temper on a burn.

"Who the fuck are you?" he says, blinking one eye at a time with a sleazy grin. Wasting time. Looking for a target.

Moray raises one shoulder in an approximation of a shrug. "No one that plans to be here long. I've got an invitation for her. She in town?"

The King opens his mouth again, his tongue flickering over his chapped lips, and already Moray can tell he's going to just fuck around with him some more, maybe try to shake him down. It's all a waste of his time. He considers stealing the radio he can see obviously attached at the man's waist, or killing him, and decides ultimately that both would start more trouble than Devon seems inclined towards.

The King is talking. Moray doesn't listen.

He turns to the nearest thug instead, wearing a dark sweatshirt that has to be smothering him in the desert heat, instead of the standard black leather jacket. Has to be new, too new to know better than give a straight answer. "He high?" Moray asks, jerking his head towards the White King.

"So what?" Sweatshirt says, defensive and half challenging.

Moray turns back - the White King has stepped forward, challenging, his mouth making noises that fade into the white static burning on the edge of his mind. The troubleshooter places a hand on the druggy's chest and shoves him away, then strips the radio in the same motion with his other hand. "King," he says. There's only one worth the name. "Moray here. Need to talk to Kara. This is your town, so I'm keeping it on the level. I'll be in front of the old Narrows theater in the Southwest Quarter. Throw her my way if you can. Safe conduct for the duration of the meet."

He tosses the radio back and stalks towards the theater. None of the Kings follow.

As far as the Kings go, the best bet to match their code of conduct. At least they're usually professional enough, even if the ones he had just dealt with were more of the same trash he sees all over the Mojave.
 
Kara Walker was starting to wonder if she should just make this a full time gig.

Sitting at a scarred up, crappy table in the back corner of the Atomic Wrangler playing cards, she was making bank playing against the fresh faced newbies in town. They hadn't known any better than to play cards with her, poor bastards.

Occasionally a local would glance over and then shake their head, feeling bad even for squatters as she raked them over the coals. You know you're fucking up when whores and druggies are feeling bad for your losses.

She leaned back in her chair and grinned at the last man still in the game. "Well? We ain't got all day." She's bluffing. She's bluffing hard but he was visibly sweating, looking like he desperately wanted to believe she was full of shit, but was too afraid to risk it what little he still had on him. "C'mon, what's the worst that can happen?" She coaxed convincingly.

Kara Walker was a crass little spitfire that just utterly failed to take much of anything too seriously. She had been all over the wastes and in and out of all kinds of scrapes, but she always managed to come out mostly on top, or at least breaking even. She had more luck than anyone had any right to and it made her a little cocky, a little more arrogant than others found prudent. But more people liked Kara than disliked her, which was infuriating to those who couldn't stand her.

That shock of red hair made her stand out, damned near as loud as her mouth-but even without it, her gait was recognizable-a pop to her step that at the same time was almost a lazy saunter, a roll of her hips she wasn't entirely aware of but didn't bother trying to hide either. Contrasting with both of those were a set of bright blue eyes that were a smidgen too large for her face-giving a deceptively innocent appearance that jarred with the smirk she was constantly sporting.

Her only other visible trademark was that jacket of hers. The cropped dark denim jacket was worn and weathered, visible lighter wear spots in a perfect outline of her shoulders blades-evidence of her crawling and sidling through tight spots. Long strips of dark brown, reddish leather had been sewn in on either side of the front zipper to give it the jacket more structure and durability-and that was worn down too, particularly on the left side of her chest, over her heart-looked like there was a piece of curved metal sewn in on the underside. A matching leather pocket with a simple button enclosure was on her upper left arm, and the collar had some kind of dusty looking fur sewn into it, a common fashion statement in these parts.

A small rusty metal pauldron jutted off her right slender shoulder, the one time cobalt blue stripe down the center barely visible through the rough brown orange. Various decorative pins and buttons were attached on the same side as the pauldron, mostly emblazoned with pre war slogans and various symbols, as well as a medal or two for soldiers long gone. All found in the various holes she'd been in.

Beneath the jacket she wore a black tanktop, a leather holster strap cutting across the front of her decisively feminine chest, her side piece nestled in the curve of her small waist. Her pants had seen better days-one pantleg had gotten so torn up she'd cut it off, sporting half shorts, half proper pants, the remaining pantleg taped up at the upper thigh. The other leg was sporting a torn thigh high stocking and a knee pad. Her boots came up to mid calf and looked in good, solid condition-the amount of hoofing it she did required it.

There was a handle to a knife in the cuff of one boot, tight against the toned stocking'd calf, and an ace of diamonds caught behind the laces of the other.

For her size and profession, she sure stood out.

A greaser wandered in, scanning the rabble that was currently in the lobby of the cobbled together casino, flophouse, and drug den-saw her, and headed over. Kara ignores him, bright blue eyes zero'd in on her current 'prey'.

He couldn't take it-the man folded with a curse, dropping his head in his hands-and the immediate crowd whooped and hollared when Kara laid down a very clear losing hand. She laughed right along with them.

The young King sidled up, hands in his pockets.

"Guy named Moray's looking for you out there." He said casually.

Moray? Kara's grin dims a watt or two. "The hell for? Tell him I ain't here. And if I was here, I'd be busy." She says with dismissal, pulling her winnings towards her with a nod to the miserable looking man across from her. She's seen that expression more times than she could count, playing cards.

"Said safe conduct."

"That's nice. Still ain't here."

"The King was hoping you'd go talk to him. Y'know, as a favor."

Oh God dammit.

"He's out in front of the theater." The greaser continued casually.

Kara scowled. She doesn't want to talk to Mister Stick-Up-His-Ass, she wants to drink and play cards. She's enjoying some damned R & R after a rough trip, and-what did he want anyway? Just thinking about her freelancing contemporary had ruined her card playing mood. "Fine. I'll see what he wants." She relented, looking over the hodgepodge of winnings before her. She picked out a few prewar bills and a can of beer, leaving the caps, cigarettes, and other random items.

"Guess it was your lucky day after all, boys." She said with a more genuine smile and a wink, indicating the pot.

And then she walked away.

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Kara sized him up as she approached, a glance to their surroundings. He looked as boring as ever, probably thinking about what color beige to paint his place with, if he had one. She stops short and props a hand on her hip, scrutinizing him a moment before extending the arm with the can of beer.

"Bought you a drink, Moray, figured you could use loosening up." She starts off. The brown leather glove she's wearing is fingerless except for the thumb and forefinger, a small metal plate on her fingerpads for shorting out delicate circuits. She would open the dialogue by borderline mocking him. She knows he's probably not going to throw one back on the street. If he did take it she'd light up with a grin no matter what he intended to do with it. If not, she popped it open herself because she figured that'd annoy him.

Everything's a joke to Kara, even his serious, no nonsense visage. She takes a drink, her blue eyes amused, curious-and a mite watchful. She's not entirely stupid, after all. And she does eventually like to cut to the chase. Time was money, and it wasn't worth wastin' if it wasn't funny.

"So. Whaddya want?"
 
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Moray lurks over the railing outside the defunct theater. He never sits or leans like a normal person - he perches, or looms, the expression on his face like a fucking portent of doom. Huge, curled inward, perpetually flat-faced or snarling. His attire matches his attitude: boring browns, tans, and greys mixed together into something a lot like camo but softer, a custom fabric that's tough as hell and with thick patches underneath that are reinforced. There's not even any stitches in it, which in the Mojave means it's fucking invincible. His trail carbine is hung over one shoulder in a back holster, worn and well-repaired, but it's the ugly and short weapon hung at his hip that gives him his terrible reputation. Moray had been bad news before he found it, but the sawed-off lever-action shotgun hung at his waist, with the stock sporting a wicked steel spike, had been instrumental to at least three house cleanings he'd been contracted to.

But for all that suggested violence, at Kara's teasing his right eye just closes and reopens slowly. Not a twitch, but something deeper than reflex. Like an animal's blink, below thought; Moray's id breaching the surface for a breath. He takes her in at a glance, and is annoyed that her hair is shiny today, with curls that loop over her ear.

"I don't drink on the job," he says, even. Professionalism is probably the only thing that keeps him from being a complete fucking waste of a human. He likes to preserve it. "Devon wants you brought in. He says healthy, though, mobile. He didn't say anything about your valuables, so it's not debt collection, and I really doubt he has anyone that does conflict resolution better than me, so not a hit job. You head there, I get paid, and then odds are he's going to want to throw a job at both of us, which is a terrible idea."

He contemplates the concept of working with Kara for extended periods of time. He reaches for the beer without thinking about it then aborts halfway. "Fuck," he summarizes, and turns towards the line of old movie posters instead. Lots of comedy romances. He looks at a picture of a couple falling off a cliff making silly faces: Head over Heels.

It irritates him, and there's a lot of things irritating him, so he wanders over and starts cutting the old poster off the wall with his pocket knife.
 
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Kara has the good sense to be alarmed when the job he couldn't drink on turned out to be a job for Devon involving her. But it betrays itself only slightly in a telltale freeze of her smirk and the fractional widening of her already large eyes.

Moray had a lot of hurt to go around on him, after all-not that he needed it. She's pretty sure he could crush her skull in his hands if he wanted to. She could try and fight him, but that'd be suicide and she knows it-but she'd still try if he was out for her head.

Then he moves on to talk business and her eyes narrow, briefly, very briefly serious as he lays it out. Huh. Her eyes flicker to the beer, a smaller smile curving her lips before he remembers himself, turns to start randomly cutting a poster down.

"What, that your favorite movie?" That damnable smirk again, everything always some kind of joke to her. She gave the can a slight shake before popping the top and tipping her head back to take a long drink, bright blue eyes peering at him over the top of it.

Maybe Devon's got a job, or maybe he just wanted to see Moray crush her skull. Either way, she's not dumb enough to straight up tell him no. Or to go off alone with him either, frankly. Maybe she could buy him off, or state some reason she had to stay in town another night-and leave while he's sleeping upside down in a closet somewhere.

...what if Devon did have a job, though? What the hell could it be if it required both of them on it? Kara, for once, agrees with Moray-that would be a terrible idea.

She wipes her mouth with the back of her hand, watching him. "Suppose I don't wanna go?" She inquires with a lifted brow. "Pretty busy, these days."
 
Moray doesn't immediately respond to her jibe. Instead, he exhales a long breath, then starts carefully carving the lead woman's picture apart. The legs come off first. "No."

He removes all the image's limbs, considers the sad-looking torso left, and then smears its face with a bit of gun oil from his hip satchel. Satisfied with his petty vandalism, he turns back around to his headache and stares at her with a gimlet eye. "I leave, tell Devon you don't want to come willingly. Tell King I'm contracted to deliver you, give him a day's courtesy. Find you, kill most everyone you've talked into dumb shit. Stab you some. Deliver you to Devon."

He rattles off this list, even and actually relaxing as he thinks it through. It would be a relief to just fucking shank her and be done with it. It's very hard to talk shit with six inches of steel through you like a fat butterfly. It'll be way more trouble than Kara is worth, but the dirt it'd pile on her name suits him just as well.

Moray doesn't have to worry about ruining his name so long as he still kills people, at least.

The big man glances her over once, gives her sidearm a single disdainful look, then turns his back on Kara again as he starts to scan the movie posters once more.
 
It's a little disturbing to watch, she has to admit. Probably how he preferred his women, Jesus.

"I leave, tell Devon you don't want to come willingly. Tell King I'm contracted to deliver you, give him a day's courtesy. Find you, kill most everyone you've talked into dumb shit. Stab you some. Deliver you to Devon."

Kara's eyes narrow, her smirk and all signs of amusement fleeing her face for a displeased frown, the bridge of her nose crinkling a little and no short amount of temper glittering in her eyes.

"Well I'd hate to give you something other than headless chicks to jerk off to, so maybe I'll make my way there after all." She bites off, going to take another drink of the beer-but then she catches his disdainful glance to her gun and he turns his back on her.

Kara seriously considers throwing the beer at his back. Maybe dumping it over his head. He just thought he had it all figured out, didn't he? Always planning his shit, never leaving any room for a bunch of good old improvisation, the life's breath in their line of work.

But she didn't want to test the 'safe conduct' promise, and she probably can't reach to dump it over his head anyway. She opts for hurling it at yet another poster, beer exploding out to slosh all over it and the wall.

She gives her jacket a forward tug and straightens while dusting off her hands, feeling a little better.

"Maybe we'll get lucky and Devon just wants to see you kill me, rather than send us both out on a job. One can only hope. Try not to get too excited over that, ladies present."

He was probably right. It probably was for a job. Devon mighta been hot at the time, but she's sure he's cooled down about her whole...absconding with one of his whores and leaving a wild ragstag, in drag, in her place. Had to be!

And no sense hiding out for God only knew how long from the likes of Moray. Couldn't make any money if she was trying to avoid somebody like him. She doesn't like to admit it, but he was about as good at finding things that didn't want to be found as she was-but he excelled in murdering the shit out them.

She'd go.

Kara slaps him on the back as if they were old friends. It's like smacking marble. Marble you had to watch out for hitting back, but she's good at ducking, and the massive height difference would only help with that.

"When we leavin'?" Looked like she intended on entertaining herself on this inconvenient trip by tormenting him as much as possible-she's got that smirk on her lips again.
 
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The beer hits a ratty-looking guy in a tuxedo who has a cigar in his mouth, making a smile that he probably intended to be friendly and instead comes off as in desperate need of a sledgehammer to the face. Monty Goes to Vegas. Moray considers this then grants Kara an approving nod at her choice of target.

Then she touches him. Moray can't stand being touched. It sets his nerves alive in a way that carves through the grey fog and makes him notice things again, instead of fading back into the static and the rage. As most things do, it immediately pisses him off, and his teeth bare as the big man bristles.

Instead of hitting back, he reaches back with a companionable arm and reels Kara in with it over her shoulders, friendly, kind of sleazy. Then his head turns and she gets a look at that porcelain-empty face, eyes wide, teeth out, rictus smile. At point-blank range, it's nothing short of horrifying. Even his breath can be felt this close; incongruously, it smells like peppermint.

"Don't fucking touch me. I will touch you back," he says, soft.

He releases Kara and flicks his arm, his face fading back into his usual disgusted grimace. "Besides, you have my word of safe conduct. I'd have to kill him."

Delivered in exactly the same monotone, but with a definite note of annoyance.

Professionalism sucks.
 
Moray snags her before she can duck him, the mouthy merc legitimately caught off guard by the 'friendly' gesture for her shoulders rather than an elbow aimed for her face. He'd feel her tense under that jacket, boots dragging a few inches in the dirt-but she just didn't weigh all that much, was easy to pull in. He'd see his own reflection in those eyes of hers.

"Don't fucking touch me. I will touch you back,"

Kara's seen scarier things before, but she really can't really remember when. His arm was just as hard as the rest of him-it's straight up unfair. He lets her go almost as quickly as he'd grabbed her, the woman staggering back a step, wide eyed. She read him alright. Loud and clear.

Which would make it that much more infuriating when she seemed to 'wake', those bright blue eyes narrowing with amusement and a grin blossoming on those damnable lips.

"Ya know, I don't think that'd be an equal trade, Moray."

She should have bopped his nose, his head would have exploded. That would have been hilarious-but she'd frozen up. Man...that was twice in ten minutes she'd lost her cool. It makes her that much more determined to fuck with him, but she's still a little stuck on Devon potentially wanting to kill her. She'd cross that bridge when she got there.

"Your word eh?" Yeah, that counted for much, out here. "Sure, sure. I'm still going to let my friends know I'm leaving with you, though." Freeside didn't have much to offer and she has no illusions about what good it'd do, but if she disappeared, maybe people would charge him more for drinks, she doesn't know.

She straightens her jacket again. "Meet you in twenty minutes, or you wanna come with, let me introduce you?" He'd note she was staying just out of arms reach of him-but still smirking that smirk.
 
"It wouldn't," Moray agrees. "I'd almost want to smile."

He blinks, then feels fucking disgusted with himself for the joke. This is how Kara wins, and it's easier for her than him; all he's got is an ocean of pent-up aggression and the veneer of a code of conduct. She can get under his skin and then makes him comfortable with it before he notices.

"Do that," he says dismissively. "I'll follow you around and fuck up all your conversations until you go. How's that for a fair trade?"

If he's going to fall into her rhythm he might as well be an asshole about it (not that he wouldn't have, anyways). Moray gives her the dead fish eyes and then falls into step beside her - a good distance away. He didn't really like touching her anymore than she liked being threatened.

He's annoyed, but at least he can share the misery. Kara certainly doesn't seem to hold back on that either. He's justified, right? Fair play.

Moray's toothy, savage grimace widens.
 
Kara was bad enough in a neutral state, but now she’d be just about unbearable, relishing that small victory. She got him, and it brings a thrill of amusement and triumph to her eyes, a cat eating canary grin. Maybe he wasn’t so boring after all! "It'll make me seem that much more charming in comparison." Kara says without missing a beat, winking at him. “C’mon, we’ll tell ‘em we’re besties.”

She starts back the way she came in that confident, pepped yet lazy saunter of hers, as if the world was hers for the taking...and that she wasn’t essentially a willing hostage. Hey, gotta take the smart options where you could get ‘em, right?

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Kara seemed to have a pretty good reputation around Freeside-people waved or tossed greetings here and there, taking note of the larger man following her around. But she was at ease and so were they, taking her cue.

She waltzed into the School of Impersonation and strolled through the lobby unconcernedly. She’s got friends here. She doesn’t really get their whole...modeling yourself on some dead guy you saw in some holotapes once, but she does dig their support for an independent New Vegas, a desire to let everyone be their own man. And they kept Freeside pretty nicely cleaned up...sorta. Much as anything run by a gang was, anyway.

A trio of men near her targeted door stop talking as a greaser in his mid thirties sees her and straightens off the wall, lifting a brow. He knows Moray. Of him, at least. And of course he knows Kara. He opens his mouth to speak, but she’s already handing him a handful of caps with a practiced familiarity.

“Yeah, think he was looking for you anyway.” Pacer says in a sort of petulant way as Kara took a step towards the door, the fingers of her right hand just barely brushing the knob. “But two guests…”

Kara stopped, sighed with an exaggerated shake of her head-and handed him another small handful of caps. He grinned at her. “Head right on in.”

The King himself sat inside at a little table, a cybernetic dog at his side coming to stand just as they entered. She’s never seen him -not- smile-she’s pretty sure he was the most easy going ganger in history.

“Kara.” He says with a nod. His eyes move to Moray, the same nod. “And Mr. Moray. Glad you all found each other.” And it sounds exactly as he said it-breezily pleased. Kara had dropped down to scratch Rex behind his ears, something about ‘a good boy’ murmured to him.

“Me not so much. We’re heading up to Tenderheart. Devon wants to see me about something or other. Also, Pacer made me pay him two ‘audience fees’.”

The King’s childhood friend was a near opposite to his boss, but you’d never hear a negative word out of him for it. “I’m sorry about that.” He gestured over to a side table. “You take anything you want outta that.”

“Thanks.”

He seemed to consider a moment, then leaned forward and said, as if Moray wasn’t right there- “You want a few of the boys, take 'em up there with you?”

“Nah. He’s promising safe conduct.”

The King leaned back in his chair with a genial nod, satisfied. “That’s good of him.” Another nod for Moray.

“I’m going to grab my stuff outta the Atomic Wrangler and be outta here. I’ll let ya know when I’m back around.”

“Sure thing. Rex’ll be waitin’, next time you need him.”
 
Moray gets it, and inclines his head to King in return. Protecting investments, allies - it's courtesy. It's professionalism. He can respect that. Even the King's gimmick doesn't annoy; that genial, absent-minded compassion he brings to most meets is a lot less grating than the majority of humanity. That said, thirty seconds is still about all Moray can take of him. So.

"Hippy," he denotes of King, taps his fist against his chest towards the man, then turns around and heads for the Wrangler.

King watches him go, bemused, then turns to Kara. "He's been doing that for five years and I still don't know what it means."

~*~

The Wrangler was another establishment Moray was discouraged from visiting, on account of having killed one of its employees previously. So instead, he loiters near the entrance as threateningly as possible and death-stares people who pass by and glance over the casino. It'll be a bit until Kara catches up with his long stride, he figures. That or she could panic and think he's out to rifle through her stuff. That would, unfortunately, be pitiful of him.

The doors swing open and a pair of cowboy boots click across the sidewalk to where Moray skulks. Beatrix gives him the side-eye, then leans against the wall nearby him, a bottle of whiskey held loose by the neck in one hand. Between Moray's basic serial-killer vibe and the dominatrix ghoul cowboy, the street empties within a minute.

"New bounty?" she says, idle.

"Kara," he replies. "Nonlethal. Setting up a meet."

"She'd fight you like a wildcat," The cowgirl notes, one withered corner of her mouth quirking up.

"That's fine," Moray comments, noncommittal.

A full smile curves Beatrix's mouth, and she glances at him with one desiccated eyebrow raised high, and then she offers him the bottle with a chuckle.

He hums in acknowledgement of the point, and takes a swig.
 
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Kara considered making him wait while she dicked around, but she doesn’t really want him having to come find her. Then again, if she did go start up a leisurely game of cards or some shit and that was where he found her, she imagines his head would turn red and then implode.

Nah. He’d probably just boringly say they had to get on with it. Wasn’t good enough of a joke.

She finds him waiting outside the Wrangler with Beatrix of all people, and catches the neck of the bottle just as the ghoul cowgirl was taking it back. Moray might note her side piece had suddenly gotten a lot less crappy looking. Perhaps she’d picked that up off The King’s side table in trade for her lost caps. Maybe she stopped in at Silver Rush...but doubtful.

The female proprietor of the gun shop despised Kara, and Kara, for her part, acted like they were just the closest of gal pals.

The red head takes a quick swig and nods approvingly. “Moray doesn’t drink on the job, you know.” She’s saying that more to annoy him than to make any grand statement to Beatrix-who was long used to watching Kara work people for her own amusement.

But Kara gives Beatrix a lot less shit, leaves her out of her games and jokes for the most part. She’s someone the otherwise hedonistic woman actually respects.

“Save me some good stories for when I get back, eh Bea?.” Kara says in way of a goodbye, less a smirk and more an actual smile on her lips before she heads inside. It wasn’t going to take her very long to pack up-she had just rolled back into town a few days ago. She liked to travel light-leave room in her pack for all the crap she was always finding.

She had a blanket rolled up on top that doubled as a flap, few days of supplies and some other necessities. On her way out she made sure to top off her canteen and pick up a some other necessities-she’s decently sure she wouldn’t get through the trip with Moray without some strong whiskey.

And so it was her light pack audibly sloshed a little, if you were listening.

She reemerges and glances at the sun’s position through the murk. “So you’re going to carry my luggage, right?”
 
"If you were pissing away less of my time, I'd be annoyed by that," Moray replies, at his basic level of passive annoyance. "But as it stands I foresee a great deal of my immediate future either being wasted or being spent wasted. Sobriety, compounded by you, is just too fucking awful."

It's hard to be angry around Beatrix. She gets the misfit thing. Moray is entirely sure that once he has no one around except Kara he's going to probably try to shave her ear off with a can opener within an hour, or something equally and hilariously gruesome. When Kara comes back outside, he glances over her gear - survival adequately supplied, her piece upgraded to a solid 10mm pistol instead of the dinky, decrepit 9mm she was wielding before. It had made him wonder why she hadn't been shanked yet.

"My pack's on the outskirts," Moray says, and turns around without further acknowledging either of the women, living or dead. "And I probably would carry it, but you would be very stupid to let me keep it until we ran across a caravan."

The outskirts he means is just a short walk away from the Wrangler, in a desolate industrial alley. There's an abandoned drainpipe nearby, a storm sewer long since run by, and a huge mongrel about as high as Kara's belly is currently sniffing at the denuded skeleton of a jackrabbit. It looks up as Moray approaches. Then it goes back to shoving around bones with its nose.

"This is Hrolf," Moray introduces. "Don't pet him."

He strides past to the storm drain, shoulders the military pack hidden behind the corner there, and then turns dead eyes on Kara. "Tenderheart's to the south. There's an NCR patrol sweeping that road on the search for a Deathclaw nest, which I would personally avoid, but I am equally aware that you're a greedy bitch and will want to get paid for it. I'm skipping the middleman and letting you know now instead of attempting to strangle you later when you volunteer us to do it then."

He mixes disgust and resignation so well it probably would make a decent martini.
 
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“Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do, Kara.”

“I don’t have near enough impulse control for that Bea.”

She doesn’t try to keep up with him as he blazes down the trail with those long strides of his, keeping to her usual pace...but turns out they didn’t have all that far to go.

You have a dog?” Oh that poor fur baby. She’s never wanted to pet an animal more in her life, but knowing Moray, it was probably trained to bite off arms or something....maybe. Seemed pretty chill, actually, for such a big dog.

She didn't follow when he moved to the storage drain, and he’d turn around to find her crouched down near the dried out animal bones next to the hulking mutt, her cheek resting against her fist, elbow against her bare thigh-looking like she really wanted to pet Hrolf, but knew better-the mutt had eyed her and gone stiff when she'd tried.

Hrolf was more interested in the bones than Kara, now that she was just sitting next to him. He’d let that fly, at least. Didn’t even seem like she was doing that to annoy him, she just really liked dogs

"Tenderheart's to the south. There's an NCR patrol sweeping that road on the search for a Deathclaw nest, which I would personally avoid, but I am equally aware that you're a greedy bitch and will want to get paid for it. I'm skipping the middleman and letting you know now instead of attempting to strangle you later when you volunteer us to do it then."

“I know where the hell Tenderheart is. I wasn’t that drunk when I left it in the first place.”

The first part of that statement is the truth. The second part-well…

She pops to her feet and grins, splaying her hands with a small bow. “Hey now, mama didn’t raise no fool-I don’t work for free. I definitely don’t work for free for the NCR.” Mama didn’t actually do ANY raising, but that’s beside the point. She also, when she felt like, absolutely worked for free-but she kept that under wraps. Give enough inches to enough people, and you’d end up six feet under.

Which was exactly why the NCR would have to pay for her services, thank you very much....and she guessed Moray’s. Maybe she could rent him out on the trip, ha.

“Glad to hear you’ve resigned to having some fun! That’s great. Here I thought I’d be sneaking away in the middle of the night, tipping Brahmin.”
 
"I don't," Moray answers, eyelids low with frustration. "He follows me around and eats things after they have ceased annoying me. I'm his fucking meal ticket and dinner show, apparently. I don't consider him worth a bullet unless and until he does something shitty. It's been two months and he hasn't. I gather that we understand our positions vis a vis each other by now."

Pack secured, he starts trudging towards the NCR checkpoint. It's a ways, but he imagines that listening to Kara prattle endlessly would make the time just crawl by.

It gives him time to think and Kara time to annoy him. The combination is a fine stew and he gets steadily more and more pissed with nothing else to distract him. Just a dog that won't go away and a woman that won't shut up. All he needs is a house with a white picket fence and a mortgage he can't afford to complete the Pre-War dystopian dream.

By the time they make it to the NCR checkpoint, stationed at one of the big overhead signs that give directions on the highway, Moray's eyes are actually starting to look a little bloodshot.

"Hold up, you two," the bearded lead man says, raising a hand. His rifle hangs loosely in the crook of his other arm, and he prods Moray in the chest with it when the bigger man doesn't stop moving. His name tag reads SERGEANT MILO. "There's a nest of 'Claws up ahead. I ain't letting anyone else in to get ate. You go ahead and take the long way around."

Moray stares past Milo's eyes and straight into the other man's soul. "You have five seconds to put that rifle up before I feed it up your ass."
 
That sounded pretty typical of him, but Kara's not buying it. 'Not worth a bullet' was a pisspoor vote of confidence sure, but considering it was Moray she figures it was as good as a solid gold collar and a cashmere dog bed.

He likes the dog. She'd call him out on it but that might get the dog shot and...nobody should have to pretend to hate their own dog.

"I'd have a dog if I could, but I'm always crawling into spaces nobody ought to be in, let alone some poor puppy. I just borrow dogs here and there, when it's something safe for 'em."

Kara sounds too...genuinely happy. Lost all her grit for a quarter of a minute, her cocky arrogance. It was almost wholesome.

"It'd be hard to sneak around with a dog like Hrolf or Rex or Sadie anyway, when it's a space people don't -want- me in."

Aaaaand there it was again, the little sneak. She glanced away from Hrolf to the back of Moray's broad shoulders, a smirk reappearing on her lips.

"Didja name him?" It was totally a pet if he did.

After that, though, her incessent chatter quieted. If he glanced back, it looked like she was just enjoying the walk with 'his' dog, gazing out into the desert as if she didn't have a care in the world.

////////////////////////////////////////////////////

"A ha-" Kara had slipped up between the two men, a slight tap of metal on metal as her gloved, dainty index finger casually directed the rifle barrel away from Moray's chest. There's a faint floral scent of some kind, or maybe a fruit-something sweet with a spice to it clinging to either her skin or her bright red hair.

"We're actually here about that, Sargeant Milo. Good of you to warn us, though." An intuitive switch flipped that made her all charm, and didn't that just make people so terribly suggestable?

The trooper's eyes dropped the foot or so to look at Kara, slowly lifting his hand to hold the barrel of his weapon in a resting pose pointed away from all of them. He had been stunned and a little muscle locked im the face of the sheer intensity of Moray's hate, and now he's being soothed over by a pretty girl with large blue eyes that apparently wanted to help.

"For a job?" Milo ventures, eyes shifting between the odd companions.

"For a job." Kara confirms, that cocky smirk lighting on her lips again. She jerks a thumb back at Moray.

"My violent friend here's for rent and it doesn't look like anybody else is going to be here for a while... So. You boys offering a reward, we get rid of these things for you?"
 
Milo glances between the two, uneasy and confused as he attempts to put the two of them together and fails utterly to make sense of it.

"I'm going to kill something today," Moray says, idle. "If it's something you need dead, that's fine with me."

Milo throws up his hands. "I - shit. Alright, there's a bounty of two hundred caps apiece for the deathclaws. Nothing for the nest proper, no one at the main office thought anyone'd be crazy enough to go at the whole thing. Best we can tell there's four total: two adolescents and a mated pair."

The Sarge pulls a folded map out of his breast pocket and gestures over the map: there's a hill range down about six klicks from their position, with a small wellspring drawn and a red X drawn over it. "They settled here on the spring, and it's shut down trade along this whole route because it's the only water source until you hit Sloane. Top thinks its a splinter pack off the main nest at the Quarry."

Moray grunts, his eyes focused as he settles on thinking through the job proper. Whether attacking a person or a problem, aggression is his balm. "Four is doable, especially with the pups. They'll either be out learning to hunt or when the fighting starts they'll hide. Mated pair will be the main problem. Need to make a side run to pick up enough explosives to handle that."

Milo raises his eyebrows. "So you're not just a total psychopath."

Moray gives him a disgusted look, and gestures Kara at him. "Make mouth noises at him until he agrees to pay us."
 
“Moray here’s effective, but a greedy bitch.” She echoed his earlier insult on purpose, and even managed to keep a straight face as she did so, glib.

“200 caps a head ain’t much, ‘specially if we gotta go pick up ordinance. I can probably sweet talk him into accepting less than his usual, pricey Deathclaw de-nesting fee given it’s the NCR, but boom ain’t free.” She was talking out of her ass for the most part-she didn’t like the NCR, Moray didn’t have a deathclaw ‘de-nesting’ service that she knew of, and sweet talking Moray would probably get her stuffed in a bin somewhere and set on fire.

But Milo seemed to genuinely believe she wanted to do him a favor.

“Think you can subsidize any of those costs, at least?”

“Well...I guess so. You get this done, there’ll be 400 caps in it for you, extra.” He glanced around. “I’m kinda sick of this posting, to be honest.”

Kara lit a dazzling grin. “Deal!” She shook his hand before turning on her heel and walking away, retrieving a very crappy, hand drawn map out of an inner pocket of that jacket of hers.

Now-to figure out where to get the ordinance… “Enough mouth noises for you?” She asks in an unmistakably amused, jaunty fashion.
 
Moray shrugs, but even he can't be upset by the concept of another 400 caps - a 50% increase in pay rate. It was deeply annoying to realize that was as much as he'd made in the last two months, combined, and he was probably going to make that much once he carved the deathclaws for their bones and meat. The White Stripes Indians paid a premium for 'Claw steak that had been slain in battle. "You are acceptably noisy," he grants, and sidesteps so he can peer at Kara's map too.

It's crappy.

"Why not just use the Sergeant's?" he says, obnoxious, but notes the variety of things noted on the map that aren't on the official, and decides to let it go. "We could probably raid the Powder Gangers for enough explosives to collapse the whole cave if needed, let alone blow the deathclaws up. I'd also like to grab a pack brahmin if I can. We can load it with their meat after I kill them, and in the fight we can use it as a decoy that isn't us."

Brahmin are a favorite prey of 'Claws, and personally being the lure for a pack of them doesn't appeal to him. Best it be something expendable.

"I think they've got a hideout off the south highway, don't they?"
 
“Because my map leads to adventures.” Kara said with a wink, making a show of waving the map before stuffing it back in its pocket. Really though, that was a nice way of saying it got her completely fucking lost, and often. But getting lost was a good way to find stuff, and she had always hand drawn crappy maps. It was goddamned tradition!

She knew a lot of things by heart anyway, at this point-she’d better, with mapmaking skills like hers.

Kara lights up as he mentions the Powder Gangers, turning on her heel to face him. “You always so bloodthirsty? We ain’t gotta make a mess.” She draws up to her full if diminutive height and jerks a thumb into her own puffed up chest. “I can talk just about anybody into anything, no mess required.” That cocky smirk was in full force, mirth in those bright blue eyes.

“Hell, I know the guy in charge there, he owes me a big favor. Good thing you’re with -me-. I’ll take care of ya.” She almost pats him on the shoulder to add to the bit of overly condescending ribbing-and then kind of remembers herself, those delicate fingers loosely curling inward as her hand drops. Better not to push it.

She grins at him instead, twirling right back around. “I’ll tell him you’re my bestie.”

///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

The jumpsuited gangers loitering around didn’t seem too fond of Kara. They exchanged glances as she approached, bold as brass. “I’m here to see the boss, boys.” When no one moved, she added. “He’s expecting me.”

Eyebrows raised.

“What about him?” Said the one on the left, indicating Moray. “Boss expectin’ him too?”

Kara glanced back at him, shrugged. “Guess not, but he’s with me.” It’s considerably more pushback than she was expecting; ie, none. “C’mon guys, I got a lucrative offer for him and I ain’t got all day.”

The place is dirtier than she remembered, but meh-she’s seen worse. What strikes her as more odd was the...sullenness of everyone in there. “Looks like your kind of place, Moray.” Kara mutters back over her shoulder. They reach a larger space with a large entryway ahead.

“Alright, you wait here, I’ll go see Lucas.”

She’s not going far-his office was straight ahead. She walked in, frowned, and walked back out a pace or two, still some distance away but in view. She was looking quizzically at a man in a green jumpsuit sitting near the office entry point, and he was watching her as he had been since she entered the room.

“...er, where IS Lucas?”

“Dead.” The man said heatedly, unfolding from his seat. “He tried to be -you-. He tried to talk through things with the Fiends, and they shot him dead.”

“Well...shit.” She doesn’t like any part of this now. “Can’t everyone be me. You got his job then, maybe you’d like to hear me out?"

“You in a lot of trouble, Kara. You shouldn’t have played both sides like that, you shoulda chosen us, and then you shoulda stayed."

“Hold up there, I-”

“And now you and that ass of yours is going to pay-” How she was going to pay wouldn’t become immediately apparent. His hand darted out with something glinting fisted in it-but she was faster, and surprisingly more prone to violence than anyone might’ve guessed. Kara’s left hand grabbed his wrist, jerked it across his body-while her right drew her pistol and shot him point blank in the chest.

She fired again as he was going down. There were some words, some actions that were just plumb unfriendly. Rude, even. She never liked the asshat anyway.

Everyone stared. Kara made a ‘tsk’ noise, almost absently thoughtful as she looked around the room. “So...do I get to be the boss now?”

And then the room exploded just as she ducked and rolled behind some cover.
 
The more they talk, the more Moray loses his perpetual edge - moving first into confused neutrality, and then as the threats came out, his lips curved upwards. And when the first shot rings out, he begins to laugh, a horrible, racking sounds that starts and stops low in his chest, ragged inhales that choke out in his throat one atop another, as he stares at the rest of the powder gangers.

"Diplomacy," he says, with relish. Then that short-barreled shotgun comes up off his belt and he unloads it into the face of the man behind them, blocking them into the ramshackle building, without even turning to look at him. Then he grabs Kara by the arm and bodily hauls them both outside in a diving combat roll, throwing her over him by dint of weight and momentum. He spins in the dirt and slams the door shut with a foot, then glances over at Kara. A handful of bullets richochet through the thin wall of the building, shouts echoing inside as the gang wakes to the sudden violence, scrambling for weapons and the entrance alike if the pounding footsteps are any indication.

His hair and face matted with dirt from the dive, Moray's mouth is open and his teeth are gleaming. His breath rasps in his throat, deep and easy, controlled. The lever of the shotgun racks in his hands.

"Hold the door," he says, soft, with that euphoric smile. Then he takes off, runs along the wall of the building for maybe thirty feet, and turns to ram right through it at a joint of the scrap. There's an alarmed shout that cuts off with a shotgun blast, then three more in short succession.

There's more screaming, now.
 
Kara's righting herself, scrambling out of the dirt with her eyes wide on him. He was lit up like Christmas, ALIVE. But when he speaks, it's soft.

"Hold the door."

And then he pumped the shotgun and bolted, a heavy wraith of death. Wasn't this the boring asshole dreaming in grey? Shit! Kara picked her jaw up off the ground and got her ass on the door, throwing what little weight she had into it. She also held tight to the knob in order to keep it from turning. What in the everloving fuck had she just unleashed on these suckers?

And the way he had laughed! She was never going to live this shit down. As it was, she's already trying to think of a spin that absolved her from responsibility. How was she supposed to know Lucas had gone and gotten himself killed?! And then shooting the guy after all that talk of not needing to make messes-dammit, the dead bastard had gone and made her look bad, and now Moray had something good on her.

Boy...he was reallt going to town in there.

"If you kill everybody-" Kara shouts over the din, "-what kind of gang am I going to have?!"
 
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