Know When to Fold 'Em (Closed for Obuzeti)

[CurtailedAmbrosia]

“Me?” Muffles Kara against his chest, moving not to embrace at first but almost to tickle him-fingers dancing over his ribs before lacing together behind his back, the customary tight squeeze, almost as tight as she could hold-before a more relaxed, easier hug and an unbidden restful exhale. This. This is what matters. And she has it, she has him, and that’s all she wants or has to think about.

That’s all.

“Course! We got off scot free, so what’s there to worry about?” House was delusional. They weren’t ever coming back. No, they’re going to nix these bombs so sacking the Strip would be just slightly more difficult-and then bail. They’re bailing. It won’t be their problem anymore. It never really was-she doesn’t do responsibility all that well, and look what happened when she had one! Done got stolen away.

Her fingers tap against his back, and the empty headed cheerful mania slows into a slower, slightly probing drawl.

“...sure, the Legion’s sausage fest might be about to swell with buncha robomembers, but I hardly see how that’s our problem, us leavin’ and all.”

 

[Obuzeti]

"I really doubt they'll actually use the Securitrons. We already put down the only guy allowed to do all that technology shit," Jonah points out, and spins them a little so he can rest his shoulder against a wall without putting weight on her hands or arms. "Remember they don't even use medicine or chems. I definitely can't see them sprinting out to battle alongside the robots."

He's seen Centurions use any guns they can find, but they're terrible at repairing them, and refuse to pawn the job off on anyone else. In fact any kind of technology better than "hit it with something" seems to be an object of derision to the Legion, which is going to be a problem in the long run for them.

The bigger problem is that if Caesar manages to take New Vegas and the dam, the power it supplies to the NCR - and the water it backs up, giving him access to a strengthened agricultural base - are going to cause problems in the math of the war's duration. He's no general, but it's not a thought that makes him want to stay around the NCR long term.

"That said, starting to sound like a good idea to move out soon," Jonah says, releasing Kara, but not before pressing his lips against her brow. "Too many people looking for tools to use. I'm not anybody's fucking pawn, and neither are you."

 

[CurtailedAmbrosia]

Dog Hat.

No, Vulpes. She kept calling him the disparaging name, but it didn’t stick like it should have-every time she thinks of that creep, she hears his calm, metered voice over the crackle of flames.

”To walk into the jaws…”

Kara hugs the big man a little tighter, and purposely doesn’t remember what it felt like, turning around and seeing the two fighting on the ground like that. She’s glad she doesn’t have to argue against going to the Fort.

“We don’t owe anybody anything.” Kara murmurs, almost to herself. And then, stronger. “We paid plenty of dues, and now we’re free. So I’m not about to get suckered into a sour deal by someone who thinks otherwise, thinks they know me. Not this red head. Nope.” Not for all the sad goddamned stories in the world.

She almost says ‘mama didn’t raise no fool’, but Jonah knew that joke already. So she just lights up in a grin instead, putting the political nastiness aside, hopefully for good-she doesn’t have to think about this, so she won’t.

They’ve got stuff to do, after all.

“So, ya gonna show me how to disarm some bombs, or ya letting me wing it?” Kara wants to know, already producing a myriad of tools from the pockets of her coat. Pliers, good. Hammer, less good. Chinese finger trap?!

...well, maybe.

 

[Obuzeti]

Jonah shrugs as he releases Kara. "The issue is that they're basically canisters. The blasting cap matters a lot less than the fact they're pressurized canisters of chlorine, and a leak would be just as bad over time as the whole thing going off at once. So I'm going to deactivate the detonators and then mark down their locations, and House can send somebody down here in a hazmat suit to drag them out of here. Right now, I'm bare-skin, and I don't care to carry eighty pounds of pressurized chlorine up a ladder as many times as Clanden left bombs down here. I'm defusal, not disposal."

He really doubts Clanden would have left booby traps down here. This is the job, and whatever else he'd been competent at his work. One of this things going off early would have fucked him just as hard as anyone else. They'll be reliable explosives, nothing reactive or degradable, but anyone who thinks tinkering with detonators is every boring is a fucking moron.

It takes a bit of walking, but as his explanation winds down, they turn a corner and spot the first dispenser. It's leaned into a corner, a big, mean steel canister. The nose of it is capped, and if Moray remembers right, it's just enough explosive to split the can proper and propel the gas up. Any real fire will serve more to neutralize the gas than anything.

"First off," Moray murmurs, and pulls the steel rind off the top of the canister via the expedient method of jamming his knife in past the shroud and peeling it back. The detonator behind looks simple - an electronic signal, some putty linked by a wire, four separate caps linked to the edges of the canister. "Find the detonator - the thing that actually makes the spark to set the whole thing off. Then drown it, and detach it."

He demonstrates by pulling a pouch from inside his fatigues, and dumping a handful of dull black dust on top of the plastic explosive. Then he yanks the battery right out.

"Nonconductive dust, eats shock and fire in case there's backup det cord. Keeps the blasting charge from going off if there's a backup," Moray informs. He smears some of it on each of the parts of the explosive, and then sets it back. "I can't get the rest without opening the can up proper, and it's not worth my time. Let's go get the rest of them."

 

[CurtailedAmbrosia]

“That’s an important distinction.” Kara agrees, sheathing the hammer in favor of the finger trap. She sticks a handle of the pliers into the finger trap, then plays with that as they walk, nodding along.

She wonders if Clanden had done any of that heavy lifting, or if he’d just supervised goons. He hadn’t been the biggest of men, but he’d been tall, she supposed, stringy muscles-and if he could kill and carry bodies-yeah, actually, he probably could heft eighty pounds down a ladder, even with as thin as he’d been. Man, sometimes the differences between men and women just didn’t seem fair.

She wishes she’d gotten to fuck with him more than she had. What a tool.

The courier was more attentive as they arrived at the first one, abandoning her fidget toy to draw her flashlight proper, illuminate what her partner was doing, showing her. She’s never seen bomb defusal before!

And just like that-it’s done.

“Huh.” Kara notes, peering at the little pile of dust and the slight mess newly made, then stepping back with an appreciative nod. “Never thought I’d be interested in things NOT going boom, but that was pretty slick work right there! Snazzy.”

Kara whirled away to follow after and alongside him, squinting at the Omerta map and adopting an ‘deep’ radio announcer voice from one of the serials back east. “And so our hero prevented another Sierra-” And she then she laughs.

She’s happy to be preventing a terrible cataclysm even she wouldn’t have wanted to joke about, and entertained, as always, in his company.

 

[Obuzeti]

"It's pretty important as long as you're still holding the things that go boom," Jonah observes, a little dry, but the corner of his mouth quirks in response. "Come on, let's get the rest of this done."

~*~

There'd been six bomb stashes, which turned out to be a good hour of wandering around the maintenance tunnels, marking down the locations of the bombs to hand to House later, and defusing them proper. The stagnant air had started to give Jonah something of a headache, and when they finally finished the last alcove, he turned and headed for the nearest ladder without further ado.

"I need some fresh air, already," he complains, a petty behavior he'd never permit himself near anyone but Kara. "Can't tell if he's already poisoned the place or not. I mean, it's not green down here, but it still smells awful."

He climbs up the ladder and offers his partner a hand up to the street proper, and glances around to get his bearings. They're just outside the Tops, in point of fact, in a service alley behind the establishment. "Where to now?" he asks Kara, and starts to move out onto the main street, when someone else approaches him, clad in a sharp suit. Looks remarkably like an Omerta goon, in fact.

"Jonah Moray?" he asks.

"Speaking," Moray replies without much interest. He has clients enough, now.

The other man's eyes flick about - the alley is empty, except for them - and he steps closer. "The eyes of the mighty Caesar are upon you," he says, and this is where he almost dies, because Moray's pistol clears leather before the name finishes.

The messenger doesn't even look down at the gun. Doesn't look away. Whoever he is, he's Legion to the core, alright. Death is no impediment to duty.

 

[CurtailedAmbrosia]

Kara scribbles on the stolen map as they traverse the underground-there’s little to look at down here-and boasts about how much she’s ‘bettered’ the Omerta map in typical Kara fashion. ‘Better’ meaning-drawn a bunch of shit in the margins and in various tunnels, including a warning about inexistant deathclaws and an octopus from the depths.

She has a great time, and even gets to yank out a battery or two herself; which she promptly pockets, ever the magpie. By journey’s end she’s folding up the map with a flourish, the full bounce in her lazy saunter as she follows him to the ladder. “That’s just how undergrounds smell. There’s this subway back east though that tops the lot-it flooded out a bunch of R.O.U.S.’s once, drowned and slimed up the lot of ‘em-SO I SAID, to my buddy Lenny-hey, I saw a bunch of rats carrying a stash of Jet away down in E13, and booooy when he got back-”

Up into the light of day again, Kara pocketed her latest art project and glanced around at the alley expectantly. “We clock out for the day! I’ve done all the work I wanna do, an’-” Kara starts, no doubt about to suggest a laundry list of reasonable and unreasonable items of recreation-but the slickly dressed customer approaching-well, he gets her attention first, mostly because they’re in an alleyway, and now he’s blocking the exit.

He’s nobody she’s seen before, but the look of his gait was-

"The eyes of the mighty Caesar are upon you,"

“I knew he was a kinky bastard.” Kara remarks without missing a beat, two steps behind and to Moray’s left. It’s just another sunny day in Vegas to the courier-or so it seemed.

The frumentarii chose to ignore her, though his mouth and lips tightened slightly, eyes stared a little harder at his target. Slowly, as if waiting permission, he’d reach into his breast pocket, notably the outside one, not the inside. Kara seemed to be admiring his hat, a mysterious step closer. The man drew something metal from the pocket, a long trailing string-a coin of some kind.

“He admires your accomplishments, and bestows upon you the exceptional gift of his Mar-” He had no sooner drawn it fully out of his pocket and moved to hand it over when Kara moved.

Faster than the spy (and most anyone) would have expected the silly woman TO move, she had snatched it clean out of his hand and thrown it down the alley with a quick little side toss and a "No thanks!"

 

[Obuzeti]

The covert Legionnaire's lips twist furiously, and he steps forward, swinging a heavy backhand at Kara's head. "Profligate wh- "

Moray catches the other man's elbow with his hand. The other produces his sidearm, and he puts a round into the Legion dude's knee with absolutely zero fanfare. He yelps in shocked agony and starts to drop, a process only accelerated when Moray turns the pistol and puts another shot through the elbow that he'd caught too.

Their erstwhile messenger crumples to the ground, breathless with shock and agony, rolling to keep his wounded side off the ground and clutching at his ruined arm with the other. The only sounds out of him are choked whimpers.

Moray glances over at Kara and rolls his eyes, then holsters his pistol and crouches in front of the man and makes a rolling gesture with one wrist, inviting him to get on with it. "Go on," he says, dry as dust.

 

[CurtailedAmbrosia]

“It wouldn’t have matched your eyes.” Kara tells him with an open palmed shrug and a carefree smirk-but honestly, she has no idea why the fuck she had done that. She’d drawn an honest mental blank on ‘Ceasar’s eye’ being on him, and then well-fuck that noise, whatever it was and whatever it meant, she wanted it far far away from them both.

It’d made the guy mad, but she had expected it to. She’d been ready to duck, but Moray, well, he’d been readier for it. He’s quick on the draw, as always. But mostly-Fuck them and their great honors. Fuck them and their very mortal goddamned balding god, just-fuck them!

She flashes the downed man a rare scowl-he’s going back a lot messier than they’d found him-if he goes back at all-but Kara can’t find it in her to feel all that bad for him, specially not with what he tells Moray next.

“My...my Lord requires your presence at his camp. For-Fortification Hill. His Mark will guaran-ah, guarantee your safety. All your crimes against the Legion...the death of the fearless Vulpes Inculta-forgiven. Extends...his…mercy.”

Kara cursed. She doesn’t make a joke, she doesn’t insult the man-just curses and turns away with a “of fucking course he does”.

A side door bursts open and out pops a pair of slick haired chairmen. Securitrons weren’t permitted inside the casinos without permission, and perhaps that extended to the side and back alleys around them-because none come rolling up.

Kara wouldn’t frankly care if they did. She wouldn’t care if the WHOLE DAMNED WORLD had waltzed up to hear this asshole extend ‘Kai-zaar’s’ mercy like a benevolent stupid god. She had just resolved to forget all about them! They were bailing! And now here it was again, a ‘good’ development in shit she doesn’t want to be involved in. Her perpetual good mood? It’s flat ruined.

She’s starting to feel cornered.

Her hand moves to the collection of pins and medals affixed to the lapel and chest of her jacket and starts-yanking them off, tossing them down after where the Mark went. By that point one of the Chairmen had disappeared back into the Tops, while the second stood and looked both confused-and a little concerned.

“Cottonwood Cove, south of Nelson. The Cursor Lucullus will be...will be waiting. Redde Caesari quae sunt Caesaris.”

Back at the side door, Swank had suddenly appeared-he looks the scene over, dismisses the man in the suit as either an Omerta or a Fink-and is mostly relieved to see the two in the light of day again, because for a second-he wasn’t sure he would be, not ever again.

He trotted down the concrete steps and closer to Kara, who was-inexplicably-tossing all them lucky trinkets she always wore on that dusty jacket of hers.

She looks mad. He’s never really seen that before.

“Kara?” A green and red enamel pin bounced and rolled down the concrete path a ways. Swank had no idea what she was doing, but her upset bothers him. “What’re you doing? You love that stuff-who’s the fink?”

“Too much luck.” The redhead explains impatiently, not even bothering to look at him as she tosses yet more metal baubles carelessly aside. “Too much luck, and it brought us this dipshit who rolled up on us to say the great KAI-ZAR-” A wild flail of her hand before she goes for the rusty blue pauldron and gives it a yank-but it’s firmly attached to the shoulder. “-likes to watch.”

What? Swank doesn’t quite make sense of that one, just gave a jerk of his head to the pair who’d come out with him, started them on gathering the objects back up. He’s confused, but hell-when wasn’t he when it came to the courier? When he turned back, she’s bent forward and pulling the whole damned jacket off over her head in a fluff of red hair.

Okay, he knows she loves that jacket, but down it went anyway, a heavy thump against the stones. All she’s left in now was a black vest buttoned up over a white bandeau top and those pants with the mismatched lengths, exposed leg sporting a blue fishnet stocking. She turned and headed back towards the mouth of the alleyway again, apparently set to abandon all of it. Her stomping around only lends to the appearance of her being crazy.

Swank picked the surprisingly heavy garment back up, but he doesn’t really know what to do with it.

 

[Obuzeti]

Jonah watches Kara toss her shit away with a mild expression, and lets her march off, though he notes the direction. Then he turns around, drops a round in the Legion spy's head, and turns to Swank as he holsters the pistol, shot still ringing in the air. "Caesar's playing political games, now," Jonah explains with a shrug. "Gave us - maybe just me - this mark thing. Wants me to come to the Fort and visit."

"I didn't know you did business with the sandals," Swank says, a little wary at the thought.

"Not since I found them burning Nipton, I don't," Jonah says, grim. "I did jobs for the local tribes on my way to the Mojave through the Midwest, but the Legion is a different animal altogether. They don't give a fuck."

"They don't," Swank says with a nod, though his brow furrows. "But what's this buzz about Nipton?"

Moray exhales, his brow furrowing. "It's gone. Look, shit's on the move. Get all of Kara's stuff and keep it together - I'll be back for it later tonight, when she's less out on a wire. I'm going after her right now instead. I'm probably going to have to go deal with Caesar, and that's got her claws out."

To his eternal credit, Swank doesn't ask the obvious question, and the one that had to be hurting the man, sweet as he was on Kara: why it bothered her so much. Instead, he gets it, and Jonah can see the way his shoulders roll out to bear the weight of that answer, and his suited form slouch. It takes the wind out of him, and that's something Jonah gets now more than he ever would have, before Kara.

"Yeah," he says eventually. "I see the split. You go get 'er, tiger."

It's not quite discomfort that Jonah feels as he nods to the other man and heads out of the alley, but it's not regret either. He's not giving up his Courier to fucking anybody.

~*~

Either Kara isn't really in a hurry or his stride's that much longer than hers, because it doesn't take a minute until Moray catches up with his partner. She's posted on a street corner down the block from a bar.

He doesn't say anything. He's not the one that needs to, because he already knows what's going down, much as he and definitely Kara doesn't like it. The rest is just bargaining and dealing with the fallout. Instead, he moves up until his arm brushes against Kara's shoulder, and he reaches up to link his fingers with hers.

 

[CurtailedAmbrosia]

Kara had stomped part of the way down the street, but her fuming temperament gave way to the more familiar lazy saunter as she slowed-and came to a stop, propping her hands on her hips and considering the buildings around her with a weighing eye.

The attractive courier draws her share of attention, but it’s more the passing appreciative eye than anything with intent. Her hair’s a little wild but it works for her, particularly in these late daylight hours; the sun brings sparks of fire to that deep red color, and bestows an appealing glow to the contrasting alabaster skin currently on display-her arms and a bit of chest, delicate collar bone and throat, the bit of thigh over the top of that blue stocking. For all her collecting tendencies she never wears any jewelry-just that little black, inky sun tattooed on her shoulder for non cloth adornment, the intricate, artistic little tendrils of tatted flame coming off of it.

Jonah catches up in short order, thanks to much longer strides and the fact she’d been half waiting for him-and captures her hand. All the permission Kara needs, turning in towards him and smacking (lightly) a slap to his chest with her free one.

“Well my big friend-” She starts in a boastful manner, tightening her hold on their intertwined fingers. “-it’s really time I took you out, but for real this time. We gotta sow our wild oats, as they say!” Did anybody say that?

She made a sweeping gesture down the block and towards the hole in the wall bar, a conspiratorial bit of mischief in those bright blue eyes and a smirk on her lips.

“This here’s the dive-y-est place on the strip. Three caps will buy a fella two shots, assumin’ Vegas left him with even THAT to rub together, y’know what I mean?”

She’s standing close, nearly chest to chest with their joined hands up and between them, an inviting bit of a smile-clearly and obviously an item. She’s not his dirty secret, and frankly-not even really an ‘indulgence’. She helps bring in the caps, there’s a legit business partnership at play here. House recognized (even praised?) the fact, but the Legion missed the memo on it, apparently. And that was fucking fine by her at the end of the day, because they kept going like that, she just might be assed up enough to do something about it, eventually.

Mostly, everybody’s trying to make their moves, and they can all just fuck right off.

“AND they got a drink called a cherry cordial, where they put CHOCOLATE in with some grade a vodka and whatever passes for some kind o’ fruit. C’mon, c’mon!”

It’s hijinks, then. Because of course.

And down the street and into that very bar she’d lead them, and it’s much as she’s described-sheepish but good natured NCR soldiers on leave, broke tourists, and local wastelanders casually enjoying their drinks amid the general racket of a healthily chatty bar.

There were darts at one end and some other drinking game that involved stacking and removing large wooden blocks from a tower, a rougher section where an arm wrestling contest seemed to be going on, and then the bar proper, busy enough they couldn’t get a seat at it, but there would probably be a two person table emptying out soon enough.

Kara’s a lot smaller than Jonah, and she seems to maybe forget that as she ducks an elbow and finds a sliver of space between bodies at the bar counter. She slaps down an NCR bill to open her tab and obnoxiously swipes it around while her other hand hails the bartender.

“Two cherry cordials govner!, pip pip and pronto!”

 

[Obuzeti]

She's right. It's a complete dive bar, the sort which Jonah isn't even usually aware exists because he doesn't come to these parts of town, on account of no one willing to pay him and no services he cares to utilize. The clientele isn't quite shady - in fact, the place is packed - but the stink of bad alcohol wrinkles his nose for him. Kara's intent on heading there, though, so he squeezes her hand where they're linked and lets her pull him after her, into the veins of her favorite games.

Jonah doesn't regret anything, yet, but he's aware he's probably about to bear witness to an assload of crazy all tumbling loose at once, after the relative sanity of their courtship so far.

"They keep this grade A vodka separate from the three-cap-for-two-shots alcohol, yes?" Jonah drones, but follows nonetheless as his woman slips into a crevice at the bar and orders some fucking sugar-sweet drink she was all for, this cherry cordial. He's dubious of the quality of any chocolate to be found in the Mojave, and more so of anything bought with shitty NCR script, but whatever.

Lacking a seat, Jonah looms over the guy next to Kara until he turns around, some tourist from the NCR in a ratty suit looking morose, with his half-week shadow and droopy eyes. The woman edging in next to him brightens him up though, and he leans over the tiny amount of space separating him from Kara, going for her ear, probably to whisper in it but Jonah isn't in the mindset to find out. His hand clamps on the man's shoulder and around his belt, and he yanks the man bodily out and back from his stool, and then tosses him ass over teakettle.

He comes up red-faced and furious, but that indignation drains awful fast as Moray sits down in his place next to Kara, a good foot taller, broader at the shoulder, and loaded for bear besides. He makes a tiny noise in the back of his throat, whirls, and stomps out of the bar instead.

Not that Jonah notices any of this aside from the fact the dude leaves. Kara is smushed up against his side now worse than she'd been with the other chump. His right arm and her left elbow keep tangling, and there isn't quite room for their legs, so he turns and sticks the one on her side through the supports of her stool instead. That takes his elbow out of Kara's side, but has the side effect of jamming her against his chest instead, sort of half-slumping against him to get away from the laughing NCR soldier on her other side.

He doesn't mind that. Without her jacket and her poky medals, and down to her undershirt, Kara fits right into the curve of his arm naturally as his hand settles on her opposite hip, as clear a claim as he's ever made. She's always hot, but right now, grinning and underdressed and fire-haired, she's liquid gold, and it gives him a hot flare in his chest to watch every male eye in twenty feet first bounce to Kara's hair, trail down the arc of her back, and bounce right off the brawny breadth of his forearm before they get to their destination.

Fuck off, he doesn't have to say.

"Been here often?" he asks Kara. Rather than speak loud, he just leans down a little, so he's speaking right over her head instead. "Recognize any of your favorite marks?"

He doesn't recognize anyone at all, but the bartender does a double-take when he glances at Jonah.

 

[CurtailedAmbrosia]

“He don’t know it, but you just saved that guy from some serious embarrassment.” Kara notes, not casting the guy so much as a glance-those Caribbean blue eyes busy trawling over the shelved bottles over the mirror. “He woulda been victim number one in tonight’s grand festivities!”

But she’s left her jacket, and therefore almost her ENTIRE TOOLBOX! Hm...then tonight would also be CHALLENGE MODE!(™) What does she even still got on her? A few sprinklers and some dye powders, and just enough money to hustle into MORE money, if she felt like it. She’s also got a marker and a knife in her exposed boot, but she’s pretty sure the former was getting dried out.

The bartender takes the money, still eyeing them a little. “And some whiskey!” Kara calls after him-though whether it’ll be good enough for her partner or not, she’s not sure. He seemed to like the nicer amber stuff, and who could blame him? Mostly-he’s made more room by drawing her in close, and having the immense slab o’ man that was Jonah in tow cut down on like, seventy five percent of the trouble she’d normally find just by sitting there. It also settles her immense need for chaos-some.

It’s still coming, but she’s resolved to make sure it was a fun night for both of them, not just her. If Jonah was going for a night on the town with his lady, she wasn’t going to disappoint.

Kara taps her fingers in time with the music against his bird pin while they wait, one of her boots dangling between their two seats and casually swinging back and forth with a sway of lace and a flash of that white Ace of Hearts she’d recently decorated behind the laces.

”Been here often? Recognize any of your favorite marks?”

“Couple times!” Kara responds cheerfully. Her other boot’s hooked under her, not that she much needs balance scooped in close as she is. Her eyes flick from his reflection in the dirty mirror to the man proper with a turn of her head. “Best part about Vegas is it’s always bringing in new marks.”

There’s no card table here though, not like in the Wrangler, where she was happy to fleece squatters fool enough to sit down with her. Heck, that’s what she’d been doing when the Kings had mentioned Moray was looking for her. She’d have to get creative-and it’s more about what’s funny than any real lucrative purpose.

The bartender returns with two glasses of a reddish, dark brown drink and the requested whiskey-and Kara slides over one of the former, picking her own up with an excitement. “Okay, for real-this is a good drink. It’s a -great- drink. You gotta try it.” She’s turned into him more and might as well have been in his lap, briefly undistracted and absorbed only in his face and reaction to the concoction.

“Ready? 3, 2, 1-bottoms up!” A chink of glasses-and Kara tipped the heavy glass up to her lips, watching him over the top of it expectantly.

And...it was good. It was very good. Tartness coated in tangy sweet cocoa, possibly the real thing, and only a hint of the booze mixed throughout.

Kara lowered her glass, a swipe of her tongue over her upper lip.

 

[Obuzeti]

Kara's fingers tapping against his eagle pin send a faint thrill up Jonah's spine, something between the dark thrum of possessiveness and coy play. The way she's looking up at him, up against his chest, makes his blood hot as well, but this isn't the place for that, and instead he channels it into a lazy contentedness. Leaned against the bar and with Kara against him, Jonah looks - annoyingly satisfied with life.

It's enough to remove his normal wariness of the chocolate monstrosity that the bartender delivers, still giving Kara a befuddled look, though he's too busy to make conversation. Jonah takes a sip of it and can't help his lips pursing afterwards at the unrelenting sweetness of the taste - chocolate is rare enough that he's never bothered buying any of it before this. It works against the normally-coiled muscles in his shoulders and back, thighs and sides, and he exhales a long breath and tries to let the new experience work its way through him. It makes him uneasy, but this is Kara, uninhibited. She's happy. It's worth the effort, and a step outside his comfort zone.

"Can't say I've tried anything like it," Jonah notes with complete honesty. It's a hell of a difference from the hard burn of whiskey he's inclined to, himself. But he looks over at Kara, chocolate still smudged on her upper lip where her darting tongue had missed it - and he shrugs, then takes another sip.

Then he raises a finger, licks it, and daubs away the remainder of cocoa on her mouth before the temptation to kiss it away provokes him into unwise behavior.

"Figures you like drinks that are basically tongue bombs," Jonah says, amused. "That's a hell of a lot of taste."

Her attention is a warm balm on the bullshit of the rest of the day, and he automatically adjusts to her change in position by sliding his other leg out of the way, so she doesn't have to awkwardly lean over his hip. Instead, now, he's got one leg through the legs of her stool and one splayed to the side under the bar, leaving him spread like a bad movie poster. All he needs is a leather jacket.

 

[CurtailedAmbrosia]

Kara laughs.

“It’s my favoritest drink on the whole strip, real gem of a thing. And now, you TOO know the secret location of it.” She gives him a wink before taking another sip, curiously glancing to the dirty mirror when the spectators over at the arm wrestling table give a cheer.

She’s suddenly VERY attentive as the loser stands up, narrowly avoiding inhaling her drink when she draws in breath all of a sudden.

“Me next!” She calls out over the bar and at the mirror-downing another quarter of her drink before slamming it back down and abandoning it.

It shouldn’t have been possible to untangle as quickly as she does-but then again, Kara’s flexibility and ever readily shifted balance weren’t to be underestimated-she straightens up off of his chest and drops her weight down on her dangling boot, only to almost instantaneously pirouette on the ball of that foot in the opposite direction, effectively swinging one bent leg over his. Both of her hands briefly touch his thigh, and then she swings her other leg over and she’s off through the crowd like a shot before she’s even fully twisted around in that direction.

Seems she had an idea.

~*~

“Me next! Raise ya five dollars, even.” He had thought he’d heard somebody call out, but hadn’t imagined it’d be for him, not as high and female as it was. Randall glanced over at the diminutive redhead and arched a brow, looking at her arms rather than anything else-and finding them lacking. There’s a bit of toned muscle on them, sure-but not near enough brawn to best his sister, let alone him, what’s she thinking? Maybe that he’d let her win?

She was pretty, and pretty women could get ideas like that, sometimes. Well, not him-he’d take her money same as anybody’s. She’s lucky he’s not the sort to flat break a woman’s arm-his Mama had raised him that right, at least.

“Ten bucks?”

“Well sure! That’s what I said, ain’t it?” She’s so plucky about it, he finds himself shrugging his shoulders and gesturing to the chair opposite him. “Go for it.” He invites-disinterested eyes flicking back as another man came up behind her. Hang on-

“You can use champions, right? Cause I was going to use a champion.” There’s a wicked glint to those big blue eyes, and he cursed himself for falling prey to the rudimentary hustle. Because really? That guy had arms bigger than his, and was at least a decade younger. So instead of losing five dollars, he’d be losing ten-great. What a dirty trick.

Her entertainment with his dilemma-backing down or going forward with a losing bet-shifted into a rescue of a kind-and that’s where Randy loses track of the ball, a bit.

“You know what, that’s not really fair is it? Okay, YOU get a champion too.” She gasped, eyes flying wide. “Can I be your champion?!”

What kind of-Randy gave a darting glance around, as if expecting friends to be pranking him or something. He even cast a searching look to the burly ‘champion’ for the red head. She’d had him, now she was doing something else entirely.

“I can see you don’t trust my arm wrasslin’ skills.” The insane woman chattered, his lack of speech apparently not a hurdle to whatever scam she was trying to run.

“So tell ya what, we’ll do a practice round ‘fore money gets involved, your champion against my champion.” She yanks out the chair not opposite him but kiddy cornered-and sits down, plunking her elbow against the scratched up surface and waving her fingers at her friend. “You can even pick which one of us wrestles for you, after!”

“I pick him.” Randall says with a furrowed brow. No, he REALLY has no idea where the scam was now.

“No, AFTER we practice.” She huffs in apparent offense. “You just be the ref for now, okay?”

 

[Obuzeti]

Jonah follows after at a sedate stroll, raising an eyebrow as she takes a seat opposite her chosen mark and begins the Blitzkrieg, talking faster than he can think and throwing the terms of the game out of the window right off the bat.

"You think I'm in control of this?" he says with some amusement, when the guy glances at him hoping for some sense amid the mess. "Just be the ref. It's easier."

The burly armwrestler throws up his hands in exasperation. "I have no fucking idea what your game is, here. Fine. You're arm wrestling each other. Go."

Jonah grants the other man a nod and slides into the opposite seat, not bothering to square up like Kara is. He just slings an elbow onto the contestant table and clasps her hand, his eyes glittering, and the faint curve of a smile at the corner of his mouth.

"Alright, so you got me where you want me. What now?" he says, amused, waiting for the trick to come out. This is all setup. The real cards haven't even been dealt yet.

 

[CurtailedAmbrosia]

Kara puts on an expression for MAXIMUM DETERMINATION, making a show of working up her right bicep with her left hand, a warm up massage. “Of course, I’m at a disadvantage, bein’ left handed, an all.” That was...sorta true? Kara hadn’t really shown to have a dominant hand so far-but she held a bat like a lefty would, and Lil Devil was usually holstered for a left handed draw…

Her knife was in her right boot, though.

She wiggled her fingers in his loose grip, leaned forward across the table and-!

“Hang on, I jus’ remembered I left the oven on.”

And just like that Kara pulled her hand back, stood up-and went off into the bar someplace, maybe clear into the other side of it-hard to tell, she’s short and disappeared into crowds.

Randy stares. “Did she just...set all that up only to forfeit?” He grunts-but no, there she was again-Kara flounced back over to the table and plopped down again, a rusted power glove tight in her hands. Well, that’d even things out some he guesses-or maybe just make it harder for her, those things are heavy-evidenced by her dropping it on the table before starting to slip it on.

Her friend doesn’t protest, and she’s the picture of contented innocence-even humming a little to herself over there.

“I wanna represent the Ladies Arm Bot International (Wrasslin’) Association proper, you know. LABIA doesn’t let just anybody join! You gotta have a robot appendage-I found this one on some protectron at the Wrangler.”

The man’s eyes flew back down to it, brows furrowing further.

Kara doesn’t seem to notice, her eyes wide and innocent, chattering away. “I don’t know what the twins had him carrying it around for, but I thought-aha, my ticket into heaven! So I borrowed it, and then loaned it to a friend I just saw come in, earlier!”

The older man looked at her, looked at it-and resisted the urge to screech his chair back and away from the table. He had lost a lot of color-and yet his cheeks had ruddied even further, two splotchy bits of reddish pink, shiny. He was maintaining his composure, for now.

“Yessir, this baby’s lucky-you wouldn’t believe the shit it’s gotten me into. Maybe someday I’ll retire it and sell it to the Brotherhood of Steel-them guys could probably get some good use out of it.”
Out of the other side of the bar two men came looking for their missing property and the redhead who’d passed by close to it’s disappearance-and spotted the chatty, empty headed woman over trying to win an arm wrestling contest.

“Lady, that doesn’t belong to you.” Says the friend.

“What?” Kara has the gall to look genuinely confused. “Yes it does, I only LOANED it to you-you said you’d give it back, but it’s been all day!”

“C’mon-I pick my teeth with it, it’s nothing you wan-”

“YOU WHAT?!” That was too much for the arm wrestler. “YOU DO WHAT WITH THAT?!”

Kara, meanwhile, has removed the glove again-the thumb is sticking straight out. “Hang on hang on-it also does a trick!” And she stuck one end of her small fist on it, and her mouth to her hand.

Randy looks like he’s going to faint. His hands go to his thinning hair, and pull it straight up. “Oh honey, no-” Kara’s innocent ramblings were a little too convincing, and the poor man had bought them hook line and sinker.

Which is even funnier than she thought this’d be.

Kara’s cheeks puff out and she makes a show of blowing into her fist-her left doing something else against the palm-slowly, slowly-! Up popped the middle finger, and gone went the Glove owner’s patience.

“Listen, you hand that over-”

“No YOU LISTEN!” Kara declares, on her feet and coming to that side of the table, fist raised and ‘menacing’. “This is MY Power Glove, I stole it from that Fisto guy fair and square, and YOU CAN’T HAVE IT.”

Everyone in the bar had quieted to turn and stare at this spectacle-and the vehemence with which Kara made her declaration-and what that declaration WAS-has everyone staring-including the actual owner, who inexplicably-looks a little less sure.

There’s a beat of silence where he’s just staring down at her and her raised little fist-and then suddenly Kara grins, her fist turns sideways-and she blows into it proper, a cloud of brown dust spurting out of it and directly into his shocked face, while the glove gets bodily shoved into Randall the closet germaphobe.

Then she ducks and is somehow beneath and on the other side of the table, just as a glass bottle gets lobbed in their direction.

“Cheese it, it’s the cops!”

 

[Obuzeti]

Jonah reacts not at all to the carnage as it unfolds around him, waiting with his arm in place in case Kara needs a prop, but it turns out she's got all she needs in some robot prophylactic she steals from somewhere. It's not Fisto's - the piston is deactivated in that one, to prevent unfortunate accidents - but this is a close enough mimic that no one will spot it.

Then there's a thrown bottle, and Kara disappears in a cloud of dye, scuttling under the table, and Jonah is left facing Randall, pasty-faced and furious, as he hurls the Power Fist in question at the bigger man then takes a swing at him, correctly assuming they'd been in cahoots.

Giving him the weapon first hadn't been smart, then. Jonah takes the Power Fist and shoves it directly into Randall's mouth, which interrupts the other man's swing as he retches and begins to vomit all over the table. The mercenary scoots back, stands, and ambles out of the swiftly blossoming brawl that envelops the bar without much in the way of further obstruction, as a band of NCR soldiers happily start fisticuffs with a trio of caravan guards over in the corner.

Following Kara's path, Jonah heads out of the bar, and on instinct takes the first right into a dingy alley, searching for what he's pretty sure is Kara's next move, which is getting out of sight and giggling her head off. That or setting up something else for anyone following her, which could turn annoying for him. It'd been a trick of hers before they really knew each other.

 

[CurtailedAmbrosia]

"Pssst. Hey, kid."

Kara's face appears from behind some boxes as she peeks down the alleyway, confirms her 'mark'-and steps out into the alleyway again, her vest unbuttoned and her hands holding the garment closed over itself and the bandeau top she's wearing under it.

"Snrk-C'mere." She's trying not to laugh. "Looking for....A WATCH?". She throws open the vest to reveal a very crappily drawn "rack" of watches on a single piece of paper-one that promptly flutters ground ward.

Kara finally cracks up, releasing the sides of the vest and leaving it open, flat midriff exposed.

"Didja see, didja SEE that poor fuckers face?". She wants to know, reaching back behind the boxes for the bottle she'd nicked on her way out.

"He seriously thought-". Too much-Kara devolves into a fit of straight giggles before she can even get a sip of the liquor she'd stolen, a helpless wave of her hand as she delights in the trouble caused in a manner of minutes.

 

[Obuzeti]

Jonah looks at Kara, impassive.

"I don't believe anyone's called me kid ever," he reflects, then with a shrug closes in on Kara, pushing her forehead with an extended finger as he moves past Kara to pick up the loose sheet of paper. He busily begins to fold it. "If it makes you feel better, your arm wrestler friend didn't much like having the Sister Fister shoved in his mouth, either. I'm pretty sure he called it a night after that."

He glances back at the main street - nobody's paying attention to him yet - and swings around behind the boxes too, sliding to a seat against them as he cracks open his own bottle of whiskey and takes a mellow sip, allowing the harsh burn to settle in his throat. "I'll admit that even for you, hon, that was a hell of a joke."

Jonah hadn't even laughed, but then he's got a straight face, and seems to get as much fun out of worsening the situation as laughing at it. He holds the bottle up to clink against Kara's in a toast.

"Well played," he compliments, a crow's laugh flickering behind his eyes.

 

[CurtailedAmbrosia]

Kara’s cocky, self satisfied smirk shifts into a lazier, more genuine smile-and she taps bottles with him, dropping into an almost crouch, were it not for one leg remaining straight out. Resting an arm casually across on her bent knee, she lifts the stolen liquor to her lips and takes a thoughtful sip, watching him.

Here she figured she’d be setting off fireworks and blowing up at least ONE robot before the night was through-but that little bit of chaos had been steam enough, and that she’d amused even Jonah gave it dual purpose.

She lowers the bottle but leaves it against her bottom lip a moment, an idle tap against her teeth. “You wanna see someplace cool?” She asks, eyes widening just a little-the more genuine sort of wonder sometimes seen when she wasn’t bullshitting. Her voice lowers as she leans forward on that arm and knee, suddenly secretive.

“Best place inside the walls. Legit.”

And then she leans back, another swig of her booze as she smoothly rises to her feet. Kara sighed, capped off the bottle-she’s plenty buzzed, and didn’t feel like being drunk all of a sudden-and set it down on the ledge of a box. “And we can find something cool for our place, whaddya say?”

 

[Obuzeti]

"You lead and I follow," Jonah says simply, an adage that has held true thus far. Jonah never cares where he is. It's all just noise to him, people that are replaceable, places that are the same. Kara gives it meaning. "Show me the way."

He stands up and slings the bottle of whiskey into his rucksack, wrapping it in cloth to prevent it from breaking the first time it hits something solid, and then nods to Kara. "Which place are we talking about, by the way? The Vault or the room up at the Gomorrah?"

He's not comfortable anywhere on the Strip, honestly, but her secret hideaway by Goodsprings is perhaps the most at home he's felt since he was a child.

 

[CurtailedAmbrosia]

“Yessir~” Kara says cheerfully, a sharp tug on the vest in the absence of her jacket-before she buttons it back up like it had been, watch salesmen joke over.

“Home.” Kara says simply, a shrug as she starts towards the back alleyway, that lazy saunter of hers. With him, that’s what the vault was-home. Home was anywhere he was, but their little honey moon-she doesn’t know. His projects and stuff in it, the deciding on new souvenirs to take to it-sharing it had come so naturally.

Kara’s not sure if that had somehow blossomed out of the cuddles or not. He had needed touch, and she’d given him touch, gone all soft and wanted to touch him, comfort him, protect him. And while security was a slightly different animal for him than it was for her-he got that in the vault too, didn’t he? Not physical safety, exactly-but...

Kara’s mind was a little bubbled on her buzz, but she found the train of thought noteworthy somehow.

“Gomorrah’s always just been a place to be.” She notes. Not special. “Technically we own that whole damned place now, but I don’t really want that kind of weight around my neck, do you?” Kara didn’t think so.

It’s a surprisingly frank assessment. Two turns and a bit of a walk later, they’re a little further from the din of the casinos and on the ‘quieter’ side of town, still off the main road by a bit, though who she’s hiding from, who can tell.

The sun was going down but there’s still some daylight left, if yellow and fading when they reach the offwhite, chipped stone wall she stops them at, seven feet tall and with a naturally sloped top. The pep to Kara’s saunter becomes a bounce-and she’s visibly excited.

“There’s all KINDS of cool stuff over there-” She tells him, heading towards a large stone planter with some half dead, long forgotten tree planted in it-something she starts to push aside with effort, a visible track in the dirt. The crack in the wall is much too small for Jonah-and a tight fit for the courier, too.

“Hm. I ain’t got any rope, either-but you can probably get over just fine, huh? Give me a boost first? Then I don’t gotta scrape up my elbows.”

The other side of the wall was a treasure trove of old world looking signs-the flashy lights of New Vegas hadn't all been salvaged, some had been newly crafted-and here was some of that artisan's castoffs and inspirations, in a messy backyard to square warehouse.

Rusted metal was everywhere, in addition to the good stuff-but at least there was a lot to look at. "There's only one other place with this sorta thing in spades-" Kara says reverently. "And it's got loads of -neon- lights, there-but it's also suffering an infestation, so-only ventured the one time."

What that infestation was, Kara doesn't happen to mention-and she's far too distracted to go into detail now, in all likelihood.

 

[Obuzeti]

"Duly noted," Jonah replies. He supposes it was a stupid question. The Gomorrah wasn't anything he cared about, not the place there, not the people, not the money. It's all extraneous to anything that matters. "No, I don't care about the place. I have the money I need, and I wouldn't spend it on anything but guns anyway."

The Ma Deuce had been a heavy investment on his part, and the fucking robot asshole had melted it in seconds. Lesson learned - make your heavy artillery disposable. He carries more grenades now instead, and while he's not been tested on the new method yet, frag grenades should be plenty enough to disperse Legion squads.

Kara brings Jonah to a blank wall. He's nonplussed at first, then realizes, like always, Kara is least eager to use the front entrance if there's any possible way she can skulk in from another direction. He rolls his eyes and drops to a knee, offering Kara a boost up onto his shoulder and over the wall from there, and then easily grabs the top of the wall and hauls himself up and over after her without much effort.

The other side is a signage yard, and for a scavenger like Kara, it must seem like Paradise. "I'd bet Vegas and the NCR are the only places making anything new west of the Black Mountains," he says, glancing around. Everything here is brightly lit and garishly colored, which puts it right up Kara's alley, not his. "Granted, neon lights and poker chips aren't really the fertile soil for a new world that Kimball preaches, but fuck him anyways."

As ever, Jonah speaks of the most powerful men alive with a unique disdain.

Of all the things in the yard, the section with dark purple bulbs draws his attention. They're set in the wall of a little sectioned-off portion of the yard, and when he pokes his head inside, he discovers why: they're blacklights, and rather than the hedonistic gleam of neon the rest of the yard assaults him with, this is very nearly soothing. At the very least, it doesn't hurt his eyes, so he slips inside and glances around.

The flourescence here is in pools of very nearly radioactive-bright paint in sealed canisters, and he lifts one up to inspect it, the golden-yellow glow radiant right through the plastic top of the can.

 

[CurtailedAmbrosia]

"Nothin’ wrong with liking things that go boom.” Up and over the wall with a gleeful leap from the top-and Kara looks around the place expectantly, eyes darting from pile to pile as he hauls himself over the wall.


“They innovatin’?” Kara says about the NCR, curious. That’s where they plan to head, so she guesses she’d find out. There’s industry out that way for sure, it’s just-the NCR’s touting the same old world kind of ideas that had fucked the world in the first place. She wonders if that’s what House thought, too.

Hm.

She snickers at his dismissal of Kimball, the ‘best’ president as she’d claimed when playing patriot-and gets to snooping.

~*~

“Makes everything look like geiger counter music, huh?”

Kara’s slipped into the nook cheerfully, a shaped sign beneath her arm with the picture turned away. The blue fishnet stocking on her exposed leg glowed brightly along with the Ace of hearts tucked behind her boot laces, teeth a matching blazing white when they appeared behind her darkened lips.

In this lighting her hair was dark, and one could imagine Kara as a brunette. She was still very pretty, but it felt lacking somehow.

Kara pokes into the paints and considers decorating her vest. The small bit of scar tissue on her right shoulder glows a pale white in contrast to her darkened skin-what little the sun tattoo doesn’t overlap and cover, that was.

She glances up at a stylized exclamation point, and forgets all about her vest with a sharp intake of air. “Look!” The courier darts to it, whipping the metal sign out from under her arm and holding it beneath it. A daydreaming, cartoon dog looks back at him, apparently dreaming about the food being advertised below him-with the exclamation point over his head however, he suddenly looks excited.

“It’s perfect.” Kara decides, beaming at the result. Just...perfect. She's set to immigrate, and here was this super great combo to hang up in a vault she's set to abandon.

She pops on tiptoe to peer behind the lighted sign, trying to figure how to unhook it from the steel grating.

"...can't decide if I wanna argue for bolting now or not."* She doesn't look at him, just mulls the back of the sign over a moment. "Maybe Caesar's hoping to spring a trap...?"* Almost hopeful, but Kara doesn't really think so. Assassins would make more sense in that case-least an attempt or two.* No, the fuck probably really does want to talk to Jonah, and probably did have his stupid eye on him.

It's unsettling. What's worse, the joke had turned nasty and maybe even against her-RIGHT after deciding there was no fucking way she'd EVER venture into the Fort, the Fort done rolled out a red carpet to her partner. Ignoring a thing like that seemed dangerous, but going could hardly be considered safe.

She dislodges the sign and falls back on her trailing foot, hefting it up against her chest stubbornly. Well, if he does decide to go, she won't let it be alone.