Arcade held the stack of letters in his hands.

All he ever thought about lately were letters. Letters that had been passed to other couriers from the Courier's hands. Letters that had touched Legion hands. Letters that had touched NCR hands. Letters that had touched conflicted hands. Letters that had been in between things; had different allegiances, shifting with the promise of caps or moral superiority or power. Letters that didn’t know who they were yet. Letters that were still figuring things out.

The Courier’s handwriting was difficult to read (shaky, unreadable, as if writing on a rock or maybe the palm of his hand), but Arcade didn't mind. Usually, any defect was a problem; any errors meant deviation from absolute, true, logical perfection. Deviations were wrong. Unreasonable. Irrational. Outliers to be eliminated. Arcade hated thinking about other couriers delivering the Courier's letter; their dirty hands stained the envelope, but never the treasures inside. Inside were promises. Stories from across the Wasteland. Short blurbs of articles the Courier was thinking about jotting down one day. Packets with strange things in them. Strange people to meet and shake hands with. Objects. Rocks. Dead plants. Jewels. Caps (always a note attached: 'Won this. Remember when you dragged me away from the machines? Look who's laughing now.') or Star Caps. Chips. ('Still up for that act at the Tops?'). Treasures. Things, and intangible things. A legacy, written down, only for Arcade's eyes to witness. Yes, Arcade loved those letters with his heart.

It was something to look forward to. He never knew when they arrived, but he and the Courier had gotten onto a schedule. Every few weeks, a courier (not the Courier, no, but any ordinary courier) would come by with packages addressed to the Followers, or those they were currently looking after. They would stop by Arcade’s tent, reach into their pockets, or their bags, or procure them from their coats— one sweet letter, just for him. Arcade would thank them quietly and step back inside the half-empty room (usually half-empty. Sometimes he shared it, as it was the least he could do for the Followers). He would wait a few moments, then take a letter-opener to the top of it. Taking his index finger to the top and applying some torque, he’d slide the blade beneath the delicate paper skin of the envelope and open it up to his reward: the paper beneath, the writhing insides full of writing. He never let any of the letters get wrinkled, and all of them shared the same slit he’d practiced over time. As easy as applying a bandage; as quick as anesthesia, he went under and never came back up. He thumbed the gashes he’d collected over the years, gaping pulpy wounds he’d never patched.

The subject of the letters changed as much as their contents. He never addressed Arcade as Arcade. 'Dr. Gannon,' maybe. 'Beatrice,' once, followed by a strongly worded letter from Arcade. 'J,' another time (Arcade never really figured out what that meant, and it wasn't like he was going to ask the psychopath). 'A.G.,' Sunshine,' and 'My Good Dear Friend Pal Buddy Dr. A. Gannon’ were amongst his favorites, if he was feeling particularly sassy. Never Arcade's first name. Apparently, 'sweetheart' was fine, though.

The names weren't as annoying as the noises around here. Amongst regular gunfire was the occasional loud conversation or scuffle between those still capable of getting angry enough about petty things like eye contact or facial expression. It made life interesting, but recently, he'd made a schedule to try and predict when he could get a nap in between gunfights. It seemed to have worked relatively well, except now, there was some idiot carrying around a radio and walking around Freeside like they had their own personal soundtrack. This was around his usual naptime— well, his naptime ended in 3 minutes. Variation was supposed to keep life interesting, except when it interrupted his precious sleeping hours. If that damned radio continued, he briefly weighed the option of sleeping over the counter of his laboratory before shaking his head. His neck always got some weird crick in it afterwards.

Thinking of the crick made him correct his posture on the bed; he'd been leaning over, thumbing through the stack in his hands of all the letters. He tabulated each occurrence of each name; every mood, every swing in diction, every sign in symbols. Simple speech. Complex meanings. Melodies. Hidden things, things he had to turn the puzzle box of the Courier's mind for, shake upside down. How he wished he could shake him, get all those damned secrets out of him— hypocritical for an Enclave-affiliated scientist to be so condemning of secrets, but he didn't really care. It was Arcade's job to have all the secrets. Granted, he wasn’t very good at keeping them. Within 3 days of knowing the Courier, the Courier had tracked down his old Enclave allies and rounded them up, putting all Arcade’s ducks in a row for him. The only secret that drew Arcade to the far reaches of the country was in the Courier’s hands, and he’d done about as well as talked the poor mailman’s head off for the days they’d stuck together.

Among other things he tracked diligently were the dates. Dates and locations. Sometimes photographs were affixed, and Arcade would ask around until someone could identify the location. (God forbid the Courier wouldn't do it, he'd asked once and only gotten a sticky note with a stamp on it. On that sticky note was a drawing of a face. Winking at him.) Every campsite and every soil sample formed a crescent moon stretching over the darkness of the Mojave. A claw reaching towards Freeside. Things had their place. Arcade's place was at Freeside. The Courier didn't have a place, but maybe this constant displacement brought some curious sense of belonging; if things weren't always moving, there would be no physicists to track and understand them, down to their subatomic particles, down to their charms and ups and downs and strange, strange happenings (Silly Arcade, making silly physics jokes. The Courier would've gotten it after a day.) Things were moving. The Courier was moving. The Courier would not stay still for the life of him, just so that Arcade could talk to him, maybe about the last month, maybe over dinner, if they could find somewhere quiet, anywhere quiet in Freeside, a dinner table, a restaurant, no restaurants— a quiet place, Arcade would reserve it, and they'd talk— he'd take the Presidential Suite if he had to, he just wanted to get face-to-face with the Courier!—

Knock.

... Gripping the letters in his hand, Arcade looked to the door. One—

Knock.

two—

Knock.

— three. Three rhythmic knocks. (Well, a bit out of time, but he wasn't going to get pedantic about a knock.)

He cleared his throat. “Yes?”

"Package for Arcade Gannon,” rang the voice outside.

The couriers usually just said ‘letter.’ He never had any deliveries— real package deliveries. He never needed them. Any deliveries that weren't stopped by the distribution service here were probably just shams. Still, someone that had his location was likely a threat— he should lay low, maybe try to push them off. Maybe they'd leave. The music was louder than ever. Maybe he could deal with the resulting knot in his neck, if only to get away from that repetitive nonsense.

“Julie handles my mail. She’s at the front. Can’t miss her.”

"I'm sure I've got the right address, Doc."

Arcade shot up.

Doc. Music. The music from earlier, the music that had agitated him. It was coming from outside, right outside his door. It was coming from something, some radio that played the same five songs— by God, it was coming from the Courier. The Courier was here.

He threw the letters on his bed— under the blankets? No, the Courier would be wont to sit on the bed, maybe he could shoo him away from it, maybe, okay, under the blankets— and under the blankets they went, Arcade tucking them in under his pillow too. He kept his living space relatively austere, but he was starting to doubt himself. Maybe the Courier would expose him for being a slob or something. The Courier would walk in, and there'd be a gigantic stain on the floor that would happen through some miraculous Rube Goldberg machine Arcade had been meticulously unintentionally setting up for the past few days, having unconsciously anticipated the Courier's arrival, reacting to his presence—

"Package." Knock. "Arcade." Knock. "Gannon."

"I just told you, he's not here right now," said Arcade Gannon, who was clearly there. He rearranged things on his desk to look a little more sensible. Whenever he got into the habit of throwing important items on the desk with no thought of organization whatsoever, he didn't know. What a terrible habit it was. Nobody could be perfect, it seems. Especially not him. How unbecoming. An Enclave scientist, living out of a tent, tossing his meager belongings all over the place. It was the Courier who suggested he unpack a little bit to begin with; teased him on his austerity over photographs by candlelight. Arcade had shown the Courier all those pictures he’d kept hidden at the bottom of his duffel, and now he had them tacked to the wall. Maybe the mess had character. He tried to make it look organized, still. It was the least he could do not to squirm under the immense pressure, toeing the line between ‘lived in’ and ‘downright pigsty.’

"I asked Julie. She said yes."

Outside was a laugh and a hearty snicker, not from the Courier; probably Julie and whatever unfortunate soul had stumbled into the Fort. Arcade rubbed the tension out of his face. He hadn't been setting anything up. The Arcade alter ego was unsuccessful, because it was only as smart and as observant as he was, and that was its major limitation. He needed to go get the Courier, or heaven forbid that damned man was gonna tear the fabric on the door down himself—

Arcade counted to three, found something witty within himself to say, and then opened the door.

There stood the Courier. It seems he’d been patching the plating of the Ranger armor the NCR happily supplied to him; it was hardly recognizable, pieces sewn on or melted together from other pieces from sets long shot away in the wind, bolts and staples and mesh crowding Theseus’s suit of armor. Even the numerical identifier on the collar was painted over with a ‘21’ (likely in honor of Vault 21 on the Strip) rather than the old ‘06.’ Arcade remembered a letter he'd sent, describing how easy it was getting to just maintain the old armor rather than try to acquire anything better. It was difficult to describe the Courier as a creature of comfort (it was often he changed his look, if not to appease whatever faction ruled the area he was travelling through) but he did seem to have some old habits to rely on; when he wanted to form some shape of an identity in the hazy space of his wandering, he could. Arcade wondered how many times he'd gotten told off by the NCR for that red poncho he adorned, or those hardy boots, or that damned helmet with the band, or that Pip-Boy: 'out of uniform,' 'breaking contract,' the usual citations. He wondered if the Courier got told off at all anymore, now that he was their little plaything. There had to be some way to keep him happy. Letting him play avoidant-attachment mailman seemed to sate his desire for adventure.

"Back to grace us with your presence?” He said, hands shaking as he held open the flap serving as a door. Damn his excitement.

“Just doing my duty, Doc,” the Courier drawled. “Another day, another— oh, what’s the saying? You know the saying. Tell me the saying.” He began flipping through the various compartments in a side-bag that lived amongst others on his hip.

“Another day, another dollar,” Arcade sighed.

“Yeah. That.”

“What are you doing, back in ‘Mormon City?’” (He had to stifle a laugh when the Courier first called it that. Even now, he struggled not to chuckle, instead opting for another straight-faced remark.) “Here to open Sodom down south from Gomorrah?”

“Mm, I’d love to. You know I would. Getting chewed out by you all the time sounds like my idea of fun.” The Courier thumbed through a bit more, then shut the bag and reached into the mysterious inner pockets of his coat, grabbing a… bottle of Sunset Sarsaparilla. “You’ve got a package.”

“Wow, a package? For me?” He hoped his voice dripped with as much faux-enthusiasm as he meant it to have.

“Yep. Just for you.” The Courier grabbed a packaging label from the inside of his bag, then scribbled something on it with a Sharpie. He then slapped it on the bottle and extended it to Arcade. "See?"

Arcade took it and squinted his eyes at the label. Damned glasses were getting smudgy. 'Arcade Gannon. 123 Somewhere Rd, Freeside, Middle of Nowhere.' “Wow. The handiwork on this is just… fantastic. I think you’ve outdone yourself with this one. What a harrowing journey you’ve undertaken to deliver me… such a masterpiece, for no reason whatsoever.”

"You’re so very welcome." The Courier continued. "Just a simple courier, doing my duty for the glory of the Republic. I require no thanks." A blatant lie, but Arcade could forgive it.

Arcade struggled to hold back a smile. "You know, I’m surprised you haven’t gotten more complaints with this kind of service. First, you almost die on the job. Second, you don’t even follow proper packaging protocols." He held up the bottle, packaging label facing outward. “Really, Courier, your streak of delinquency is getting concerning.”

"For certain deliveries, the protocols can be waived."

He tapped his fingernail rhythmically on the part of the label where his address was written. "Your attention to detail also astounds me. This isn't even where I live, but you managed to remember how to find me anyway."

"Consider it off-the-books."

"You don't—"

The Courier took the hand with the bottle in it and shoved it into Arcade’s chest. "Won’t you let me in, Doc? It’s awful hot out here. You might need to start treating for heatstroke.”

Arcade held it tight and stepped aside. "There was a law in the old American Constitution, you know. 'No forced quartering soldiers.' Technically, this is a violation of my rights."

"I'm not a Ranger right now, I'm a mailman. Technically, I can do whatever I want." The Courier stepped inside, taking his shoes off, just like he knew Arcade wanted him to.

"Oh, shut up." Once the door was tied up and closed, Arcade gave the Courier a pat on the shoulder. "Glad to see you back home, whatever you're doing all the way out here."

If the Courier noticed his usage of the word 'home,' he didn't comment on it. "Thanks. Glad to have someplace to go."

"Here, put your bag down on the desk—” he turned around, trying to find a suitable place— “well, anywhere, actually—"

Arcade moved back to give him space to get more comfortable. Although the tent was small, it had the benefit of being relatively out of the way of everything. Candles lit the fabric walls lined with diagrams and photographs of the old world, affixed with tape and sticky tack he’d found scavenging.

"Speaking of Rangers, I haven't seen any NCR officers out here so far. It's kind of a relief. I thought they'd be jumping at the chance to grab a bit more territory. I guess they know this is a Follower stronghold. They’re probably not relatively keen on confronting any of us again. Or maybe they’re celebrating their victory. I can never be sure.”

The Courier's hand paused as it was lowering his bag onto the ground. It gripped tighter; hide gloves squeaking as they wrapped around the cloth strap. Then, he continued. The pause was brief, but more than long enough for Arcade to notice, especially when the Courier didn't turn back around to face him.

"Is that a bad thing? Them staying away?"

Arcade narrowed his eyes. The pause. The question. The lack of eye contact. Coordination. Focus. Concentration.

... He sat down with a sigh. If the Courier wasn't going to address it directly, he certainly wasn't. He was more than happy to engage in a game of verbal Chicken, if it kept him happy. "Not necessarily. I'd be inclined to thank the person who's keeping them out of my hair, if I knew who did it." Arcade slipped that in as he took his own coat off, folding it neatly and letting the white cloth square rest over the edge of the bed.

"I'm sure they don't need to hear it to know it's appreciated." The Courier knelt down to rifle through their bag, reaching for something within the confines of the cloth it was cut from.

"I'm sure they did it for plenty of reasons, and not just because one person made an off-handed comment about staying away from the NCR. That’d just be foolish.”

"It’s a relatively common complaint: the NCR meddles too much in some places, and not enough elsewhere. I’m sure whoever did it heard enough news about the NCR and not enough about someone doing something about it." The Courier stood up and turned around, a mysterious object having disappeared into the confines of their coat. "We hear all sorts of things, us couriers."

"Speaking of hearing, please turn the radio down."

"Alright—" the Courier reached to their Pip-Boy and thumbed for the knob, hands barely grabbing it before wrenching the noise out of it. "Better?"

Relief flooded Arcade’s body. "Yes, thank you. I'm sorry, if I'd known you were here earlier—" Arcade buried his head in his hands— "really, I would've gotten you."

“It’s alright. Can’t be helped. I had some business with Julie, anyway. I dropped off some Stimpaks for her… some Med-Xs too.”

“Well, we do need all the help we can get.”

The Courier’s eyes looked curious. “No breakthroughs?”

“Oh, please—” Arcade scoffed, then lightly pressed an index finger to his own lips– a reminder of where he was, who surrounded him at all times. He lowered his voice. “No. Nothing yet.”

“I thought you had that experiment going with inflammation and agave.”

“Oh.” What a minuscule detail: the various experiments he conducted on a day-to-day basis. Something so insignificant could easily be lost in oceans of words and engineered handwriting. Arcade realized his mouth was moving without words, and quickly moved to put proper speech in his own mouth. “Well, agave has proven to have some anti-inflammatory effect, but it’s nothing strong enough to rival the medicine we already have.”

“Figured,” the Courier mumbled. “I thought I’d still ask to be polite.”

“It’s, uh—” it was getting awfully hot in here, he didn’t exactly know why, all the Courier did was just remember something entirely insignificant and not even that important and the temperature seemingly went up a hundred degrees, that was a phenomenon that needed to be studied in more depth— “it’s alright. Nothing exciting. There’s no shortage of patients.”

"Has there been more noise around here recently?" The Courier shifted his weight to one leg, towards the door.

"You know there always is. I couldn't identify them for you even if I tried. I only see the people Julie can't figure out, she really doesn't try to bother me otherwise."

"I'll look at getting some Securitrons down here, then, maybe get a system... figured... uh, out..." The Courier trailed off as he scanned the rest of Arcade's room. Still easily distracted. Still as impulsive as ever.

"While I don't personally condone violence, I'm sure if there was a decrease in the noise problem vis-à-vis someone's, no one in particular's, actions, remote or not, I wouldn't complain."

But the Courier's eyes were still fixed to the desk, like his head had been slammed against the table, pupils strung to something, heart pulled magnetically to Arcade's random gadgets, trinkets, and medical devices. Like taking a shot. Peering through the scope. Peering down the barrel, staring at an enemy. Drooling. Hungry. Ready for blood. Fixated on weak prey.

"... You didn't hear that, did you?" Arcade sighed.

The Courier shook his head and reached out for something on the desk. Arcade wanted to tell him not to touch anything, but it was too late— "What do we have here?"

"What on Earth are you—"

The Courier picked up a test tube in an identical row of many, resting on a wood rack. He turned to Arcade, eyes shining with smug joy, crows' feet trampling the corners of his visage.

"You got them after all. Doc, I’m really, truly flattered."

Arcade's heart dropped. What the Courier was holding was proof of his damnation; evidence he desired, he lusted. Evidence that he was greedy. That he hoarded. That he was ruthless and heretical against the very idea of unbiased, impersonal science.

Soil. Tubes full of soil. Each tube’s location corresponded to the map and the date received could be identified by their carefully-placed painters-tape labels on their infinite sides. The Courier's trail was marked in red string on a map of the Mojave; approximate locations, red Sharpie, circling concentrations next to a pinned soil triangle. Arcade only stared. "And you kept them." The Courier's hide gloves squeaked as he reached down and grabbed another tube right out of the socket. "Wow. These are your good ones, too. From the lab. Not the dirty ones. Which means you're using them for stuff that actually matters—"

"I boiled those to make them sterile, actually—" Arcade stood up and grabbed the tube out of the Courier's hands, fingers brushing as the Courier loosened his grip, as if on command. A jolt of electricity shot up his back. He would analyze whatever that meant about him later. "Thanks for noticing."

The Courier gave a disappointed look. "You won't even tell me what you're using them for?”

"I'm tracking your poor eating habits through waste traces in the soil." Arcade muttered, placing the test tube back into the rack.

"Really?"

"No." Arcade rolled his eyes. “Did you really believe that?”

“You’re the scientist here.” The Courier hummed in thought, placing a finger to the… rather large protrusion in the front of the mask. "Are you tracking where I'm going, maybe?"

Arcade crossed his arms. "Why would I care about that? You send me letters from wherever you're at, anyway."

"But those are only the addresses. Not the real locations." The Courier's eyes drifted to the map. "Do you have a marker?" The Courier's hand opened, knowing already the things Arcade always carried.

"You really shouldn't be doing this." Nevertheless, Arcade pulled out a blue Sharpie from his coat and placed it in the Courier's waiting hand.

"You're off about 25 miles. My camp was right here, but that wasn't where my real trail was." The Courier uncapped the Sharpie and began haphazardly scribbling on the map.

"Wait—"

Arcade really couldn't do anything but watch him scrawl his doom on the wall. By the time he had half the heart to move and maybe seize the marker from him, the Courier's work was done. He had drawn jagged, shaky blue lines... all across his map. Little stars formed constellations where he'd been. The Courier, a myth, was now splayed across his own personal sky. And no matter what season or month it was, Arcade was now terribly cursed with seeing the Courier's face in the night. It formed less of the half-crescent he thought and more of an ellipse; an eye, looking back at him.

They were standing side-by-side, now. The Courier looked on with satisfaction. Arcade's jaw was left cracked open, perfect teeth exposed to the world as evidence of his wrongdoing.

The Courier turned to him, face too close to his cheek. "Accuracy is important, isn't it?"

Arcade turned, but his nose brushed the muzzle of the mask. Damn the idiot's complete lack of depth perception: he likely had no idea just how close they were. His lower body jolted to back away, like a rabbit facing the metal saws of the killing floor, but his head remained still. This was the closest he'd ever seen the Courier's eyes. There was a hole where the left lens once was, so Arcade could see right through to his face. Still, the other one remained locked behind the confines of red that formed the right lens. There was a scar on his cheek from an incident where Arcade had to pull him out of a ditch after a group of Legionnaires had snuck up on them. The idiot was so full of adrenaline that after they'd handled the group, he'd tripped over a dry root and knocked himself unconscious— in the process, shattering the left lens of his mask. While the Courier was still coming back to consciousness, Arcade loosened the straps in order to get his fingers up underneath the mask. As the Courier laid in his lap, he let Arcade finish the task: sliding his fingers up against his face to get each glass shard, collecting them in a cup he'd formed in his palms. The Courier just looked up at him. He must’ve known that any small movement would’ve caused the glass to cut his face open. Still, the peace in those few minutes was unlike anything that existed in the wasteland— anything Arcade had ever felt. Pure tranquility.

"I had bad data at the time," Arcade followed up. He meant to say it in a snarky, biting way— a playful nibble. It came out like he'd been wounded by the very thought of being inattentive in any matters relating to the Courier, or maybe like he’d been punched in the stomach.

"Well, I'm happy we're peer reviewing it now, then."

“More like desecration. We’re comparing data sets.”

“Isn’t that a form of peer review?”

Arcade rubbed his temple. “You’re writing over my current data to see what you want. This is more like tyranny.”

“Good or bad?”

“I’m not really sure yet.”

The Courier looked at the data, then back at Arcade. “... Why track all of this, anyway?”

“Why not?”

“I’m just curious if there’s some big reason behind it.”

“I’m a scientist,” Arcade huffed. “It’s my job to keep around… massive swaths of useless data nobody will ever need until 1,000 years in the future when it’s finally useful for one niche topic 10 people care about.”

“Yes, but that’s usually because you care about that data.” The corners of the Courier’s eyes perked up. A smile. A big, toothy grin, Arcade guessed, just from seeing how far those crows stepped into their spotlights near the edges of the eyelids. “You care about where I’m going. Why?”

“... I think you’re expecting some big, entertaining answer out of this. It’s really not as exciting as you think.”

“It doesn’t mean I don’t want to know. You don’t think anything to do with you excites me?”

The blood rushed from Arcade’s stomach to his face— his mouth met the Mojave, drying up in the face of the heat of the Courier’s ‘passion,’ if one could even call it that. It was an oasis— an illusion, a mirage made from Arcade’s dehydration and starvation. He still reached for those scraps of reciprocity in comfort, though. It helped with the sweet-toothaches. “Stop trying to flatter me into giving you the right answer.” Accordingly, the Courier backed off, patiently observing for any sign he could pounce again. Arcade found it fit to keep going. “... It’s nice, hearing about someplace I’ve never been. It’s like… watching a tragedy. It’s cathartic.”

The Courier narrowed his eyes. “... Like a tragedy.”

“Not like a tragedy, it usually ends well for you, but— like a comedy. Except not really all that humorous—” He sighed. “God, you get my point. After our little escapade, it’s… it’s nice hearing you’re doing okay.” Arcade trailed off. After… all the excitement. Jumping into the heat of battle. Having someone’s back. Knowing someone had his. Knowing that no matter what, he wasn’t on his own anymore— stranded in the middle of nowhere.

“... Do you miss it?”

Even though the Courier didn’t specify what ‘it’ was, Arcade knew what ‘it’ was. ‘It’ was everything he tried not to think about. ‘It’ was all of his wants— all of his adventurous spirit, all of his travels into the great unknown. All of the cataloguing strange plants of the Mojave, mutated monsters swallowing radroaches and ghouls whole… all of the organisms, all evolving and surviving in the harsh heat of the desert. The Courier and him sleeping in shifts. Feeling the Courier’s residual warmth in the sleeping bag— the smell of leather and cigarettes and the crackling of that radio he so despised. ‘It.’ Having a purpose. Being by someone’s side. Being on the frontier of biological research. Arcade found it difficult to swallow. He tried, but he couldn’t force the build-up in his mouth back down anymore. It was warm against his tongue— heady, sweet saliva, almost tasting like—

The Courier watched his reaction closely and kept going. “I’ve asked you if you want to keep traveling with me. You said ‘not until your work is done here.’ What work?”

“I don’t think that it’s my work anymore.” Arcade looked at his hands. By anything unlike his will, they were gripping his slacks like even his clothes would escape him if given the chance. “I don’t know what my purpose really is. I think there’s more out there for me to do. The other Enclave members told me so.”

“What did they say?”

“Daisy, she, uh…” He swallowed. “Daisy told me she’s got some papers she wants me to look over if I visit Novac. About the vertibirds.” The Courier gave him a look, so he waved his hands— "Not related to any of that—" and by that, he usually tended to mean 'to the fascist organization that tore up pre and post-War America for years— "but for some added aerial support for the NCR to keep things on track."

“Why not?”

“The Followers are short enough of hands as is. It’s not like I can leave them behind. I like what I do here.”

“Ask Julie. Maybe see if you can take an excursion out there. You left to travel with me and she seemed okay with it. I’m sure she knows that you have no more reason to stay here now that the NCR isn’t putting Enclave heads on pikes.”

“I can’t just abandon these people—”

“—And I’m not asking you to. I’m asking you to try it. And if you like it, then have your moral tantrum. But the situation is more complicated than just abandoning them, isn’t it? This is your passion, Arcade.” The Courier gave a long look at him. “I can’t give you a right answer. There isn’t one here. There usually isn’t one anywhere.”

“I know, but it’s not the same without—” Arcade went to speak, but found his throat closing up.

All at once, his thoughts ground to a halt.

The answer was tantalizingly close to his face. He could spit out a lie, but it wouldn’t be what he truly wanted. Right now, according to the character he’d built to act as himself, he was satisfied. Old Mormon Fort and Freeside was the closest to helping anyone could get, save for the new frontier of war; but no matter how many people he seemingly revived with scraps, something nagged him. He could spend his entire life pulling people away from the brink and still be drawn towards it. Work was seemingly not everything. Ideology ruled the Mojave: the mirages of Republican ideas, fascist paramilitary organizations, malicious tyrannies run by the likes of Nero, autocratic regimes, technology-obsessed history junkies… dog eat dog, eyes for eyes, people threw their lives away for the smallest things. For ideas. He had ideas, but they sat festering deep in his stomach; ideas about the way people ought to be treated. Julie once recommended he try Marx out for a change. Take Baudrillard for a walk. Converse with Kierkegaard. Stroll with Euripides. Sit in a drawing room with Sartre. Get coffee with Camus. Climb a mountain with Nietzsche. He picked up these fragments of ideas, but the pieces still didn’t quite fit together. He had fundamentals of liberty from Locke and company, but still didn’t have the faintest of ideas how all of these things were supposed to interlock. People seemingly lived their entire lives doing horrible things, never questioning why or what motivated their ideas. He stood between two equally terrible futures: constantly questioning and reshaping himself so much he had nothing to call ‘himself,’ or never questioning a thing and never discovering what he really thought of the world. He lived with blood on his hands either way. He was missing something.

Someone to talk to, maybe. That’s how ideas spread: someone thought something was a good enough idea to bring up to someone else, and like a bacterial infection, it spread across the Mojave. Someone who could listen to him and not think he was a child or another nut, picking at the scraps of history, sickened with old world blues. Someone who understood that sense of not belonging anywhere, or not knowing what makes themselves up, or looking for answers everywhere. "Have you ever read The Divine Comedy?" Arcade wrung his hands together. Before the Courier could speak, he continued— "Forget it. This isn't about you. This is about me. I have a point here. It’s related to this, but you have to listen to me.”

The Courier clasped his hands together, head cocked to the side curiously. Arcade always found it hilarious how expressive he managed to be, even if his face wasn't visible. "Okay, what's—" He tried sitting on the bed, but Arcade put up a hand—

"Courier, the chair, please. Take your jacket off if you wanna sit on the bed. And that hat. No outside clothes."

The Courier paused, then obliged, but in a stiff manner, as if Arcade himself had uncovered an automaton pretending to be a human, sitting in his chair and moving in erratic jerks and twitches. When he was seated, he leaned forward, all eyes on Arcade. Even that made him sweat; he’d grown some rapport with the Courier, trusting he’d listen to whatever Arcade had to say (even when he’d gone on about his father’s suit and using it), but the feeling of being the subject of a terrifying presence had pillars of salt climbing up the outer walls of his body.

"Go on?"

Arcade looked away, sitting back. He couldn't hold eye contact with him for too long; he'd never be able to speak, knowing the Courier was likely already seeing straight through him. "I made a reference to Virgil leading Dante into the mouth of Hell as we were entering that Legion camp. I’ve been having these… thoughts, since you left.” The Courier looked amused, but let him continue. “My father felt like he belonged to something greater than him. Served some purpose. So did the rest of the members of the Enclave, to an extent. Whether that was freedom, the truth, or scientific advancement. No matter what anyone else tried to promote, they believed in reason and playing a part in their future. Ever since you came here and invited me with you, I got the feeling like I was part of something bigger than myself. Something I could follow. Something I could shape the future with. I think I placed us in the wrong roles.”

Although Arcade’s eyes were drawn to counting the individual threads and bobs and weaves in the walls of the tent, the Courier stared intently at him; first in confusion, then in deep thought. Finally, he produced that wise word that would soothe all of Arcade’s worries:

"... No."

If he'd been wrong about it, he was making a fuss about all this for nothing. Something like shame rose in his chest, and his arid throat filled with the tumbleweeds of dry wit that graced him occasionally. "Not like I would know anything about it, would I, not me, not Arcade Gannon, no—"

"I think it still stands. Virgil takes Dante on the journey of his soul, but he stays in Hell because he can’t change anymore. He’s lived his life and gotten his chances. Death takes away every characters’ ability to change… besides Dante. He’s alive. He can shape what they do because he’s telling the story. God made them virtue or vice, and there’s limits he’s set as to what the characters can do, but Dante made them human again. He records them, he makes them human for us to see. Through his eyes, they are human, because as the storyteller, his job is to love his subjects. Beatrice, on the other hand, loves Dante. She inspires him to change." The Courier turned his gaze to the desk and the maps above it. “Hope that’s, uh… correct. That’s how I read it, at least. Me and the guy who wrote the Latin annotations.”

Arcade, face as red as his sunburns, shook his head, erasing the thoughts that rose inside of it. “When did you find time to read the Divine Comedy, let alone form your own literary interpretation of it?"

"... I found it in a scrap heap.” Liar. The Courier wasn’t even making eye contact right now. He probably nicked it from a Legion stash, if the annotations were in Latin. “You were talking about it. I wanted to understand. So I found it, and I read." The Courier sheepishly took a book from the pack on his back, closer to the inside folds.

Arcade took the book in his hands and opened up the pages. It wasn’t of Legion origin, like he’d thought (maybe the frumentarii were keen on being well-read, but he didn’t really think the Legion would promote such ideas as a ‘higher power’): rather, one of the annotated editions that cleared up older references for modern readers. While Arcade was prone to finding these annoying, the Courier had seemingly stumbled on a gold mine of information. Within was that same illegible handwriting he spent days trying to decipher, covering each canto in crazed scribbles— even going over the typed annotations in Latin, overwriting contradictions or things that didn’t make sense. It smelled like the desert. It smelled like the Courier. Somewhere, in Arcade, it smelled like a resolution; like the two halves of himself were finally quieted by the tranquility of the Mojave, reflected in the Courier's eyes. In his smell. He was being weird right now, but the Courier didn't really catch it (if he did, he wasn’t saying anything). He just sat, leafing through the soft pages. He glanced up and the Courier's eyes were fixed on his hands; how they grasped each page between two fingers, feeling the paper between the minuscule ridges of fingerprints. Weighing each slice, cradling it. Handling with care; with the love of a researcher and all of the surgical precision in a dissection.

Arcade closed and clutched the book in his hands.

"Do you know how long this thing is? How much— history is packed into these pages?" He murmured, running a hand through his own hair, trying to feel what the Courier must’ve seen. If the Courier saw his precision, he didn’t feel it. He was shaky; disheveled, worn out and set to dry. "You’re crazy, you know that?” Wherever his cleverness had gone, it was now spilling all over the floor. "It’s a wonder you didn’t rule the world sooner. Didn’t have your eyes on it?”

This seemed to amuse the Courier, or at least snap him out of his staring. “I was too busy delivering packages.”

"Maybe that was just a cover for your bigger operation of gathering intelligence on the Mojave.”

"Maybe it was.” Arcade hated that deference. He was sure that the Courier could devote himself wholly to knowing everything about the topic— and he was sure the Courier could deliver Enclave flyers with his face on it to every NCR outpost in the Mojave desert. But he relied only on the scraps Arcade dared dangle in front of the maw of his mind. It was like he held a dog on a leash. The dog agreed to stay on the leash, and he only had to tug minimally to keep it in line. Maybe he was the leashed one. (Okay, too weird, too far into ‘Arcade’s midnight fantasies’ territory). He tuned back in to listen to what the Courier was saying. "I was confused about the references to Beatrice though. I was hoping you could explain some of it to me.”

Arcade shifted forward, taking off his glasses and cleaning them. "You might find 'The New Life' helpful to understanding the themes of the piece, especially closer to Paradiso. That's a good start. I'm surprised you managed to get to the conclusion about love without any help, though."

"I picked up some books here and there. I haven't actually read the other books he alludes to, or the authors, so I'm sure I'm missing out on a lot.”

Arcade chuckled to himself, handing the book back to the Courier. “I’d be interested in seeing what else is in your collection. I just think it's funny that of all things, these ancient books are returning as we rebuild civilization. These old things. Right back to the start, all of it is. Everything. Dante admired the teachings of the poet Virgil, of Ovid, of Aquinas... of Horace, of Homer. God knows the Golden Age is over; it was over long before the war started. Two hundred years after the end of days, the world has witnessed the end of Pax Romana. I wonder if someone out there is writing a 'De Vita Caesarum,' maybe. Well, that's anachronistic, it would've already been published, but... you get my point. It’s like thousands of years of history are folding in on each other, like a… foul-tasting pastry."

The Courier squinted. "'De Vita Caesarum?'"

"The Lives of the Twelve Caesars, documenting the twelve emperors, including Julius Caesar himself."

"I doubt if it's actually been written at all. Caesar's Legion doesn't really care about any sort of artistic development."

"Hmm..." Arcade thought. "I think you're right." The Courier gave him a look that said 'of course I'm right, I'm the one who's actually spoken to Caesar, you pouted and waited outside’ but Arcade continued. "The Legion borrows from Roman tactics, but everything else seems like a hodgepodge of things someone would've learned in a history textbook about the 1940s. The only real things they know about Roman politics or history are the things Caesar tells them. They follow the mistakes of their forebears.”

"I’ll give some credit to the Legion—” (Arcade squinted at this—) “they do seem to actually know some Latin. Their laws are written in it. Couriers working with the Legion will speak phrases in their law to prove their allegiance to Caesar, I've used it to get around Legion camps—"

"Wait, wait, wait—" Arcade waved his hands in front of him to pause their conversation. As intellectually stimulating as it was, another question burned into Arcade's head, a searing bullet of uncertainty. "So you acknowledge there are other couriers."

The Courier squinted at him.

"... Yeah."

"I'm sorry, this has literally just been at the forefront of my mind for weeks— do you have a name besides 'the Courier,' or do you just not care? I could probably wax poetic about titles and affiliation, but literally everyone I know just calls you the Courier. Or Six. Or Courier Six. You sign your letters as 'Courier No. 6.' Which could really be any courier, not just you."

"I mean, that is my title, I'm literally Courier Six. The Sixth Courier, carrying the package, whatever, et cetera, so on, so forth. I told you the story."

"Yes, you did. I was part of the story. I was the idiot following you halfway across the desert." Arcade reached up and adjusted his glasses. "But what's your name?"

"It's—" the Courier stopped, and Arcade could hear his jaw clicking open and shut beneath the mask. "It's... uh..." His right hand opened and closed. "My name... is... god, what—"

Arcade squinted.

"It's— I was sure it was—"

The realization hit him as the Courier snapped his fingers through the gloves, trying to remember. "Oh my god."

"No, hold on, I have it—" The Courier held a hand up. "It's on the tip of my tongue."

"Please stop trying—" Arcade took his glasses off and buried his head in his hands.

"Doc, I swear, I have it—"

"You clearly don't remember your own name."

"I do! It's—" He gasped for air, but nothing came out.

"No you don't. Oh my god." He sighed, rubbing his face with both hands, releasing all that tension and stress.

"My name!—"

"Okay."

"Arcade, my name is—"

They sat silent, waiting for him to say it. Nothing came out except a brief whine of defeat.

"You don't remember it, don't try to. You'll hurt yourself, I swear." Arcade crossed his arms.

The Courier mimicked his pose, but with infinitely more gusto and all of the cocky arrogance of a patient with brain damage. "I have a name, I just don't really care about using it."

"Please don't get prideful at me, Courier, that's not going to get you anywhere."

"Flirting works but pride doesn't?"

"Stop trying to be clever." Arcade sighed.

They sat for a while, the Courier's mouth moving but nothing coming out. Arcade knew what to do when people were grieving what had been lost to the cruelty of the wasteland: shut up and let them think. The Courier took off his helmet, running hands through black ringlets, curling fingers over the bald spot populating the puckering bullet wound.

"Is everything—" he winced, seeing the wound— "is everything alright?"

"My head hurts," the Courier mumbled.

"I have acetaminophen, if it'll help—"

"It won't. I just need to concentrate, and then I can remember—"

Arcade went to say something, then pursed his lips. "Do you want the lights off?" He opted to say that instead, lest he let the Courier know what he was really thinking.

"The light really isn't making it any worse, and if you're going to do anything more important, you'll want to have it on."

"Don't think about me."

He got up and reached over to the desk lamp, but the Courier's hand wrapped around his wrist. A tight grip; firm, yielding to nothing but the slightest twist of discomfort in Arcade's face. Arcade knew the moment that he showed any true pain or hurt, the Courier would let go. This was a test bite. A snap of the jaws.

"Really, sit down, Doc."

Arcade did, in fact, sit, as he was told.

“Why don’t you tell me about those papers?” The Courier asked, eyes squeezed shut.

“What papers?”

“The papers Daisy told you about.”

“The—” Arcade went to snap his fingers, but found his hand immobilized, as if even the dark, primal forces in his mind couldn’t bring themselves to inflict worse suffering onto the Courier. “Right. The papers.”

So, he talked about the papers.

After he was finished talking about the papers, he talked about the patients he’d had. He talked about breakthroughs and inflammation and agave— he talked about its sweet taste, about the placebo effect, about healing touches and Jesus and underground hospitals and how everything in the world was dying and birthing itself over and over again. He talked about his readings of Marx and Marcuse, and how everyone was wrong about everything, and then sheepishly admitted the more he learned about everything the more he realized he knew nothing, including about himself. He talked about trying to be a communist, then trying to be a left-libertarian, then trying out everything and just deciding to do nothing at all. He talked about the Followers, and about the people he’d met, and all of their hands and everything they carried with them. He talked about how terrified some of their patients were; how nobody remembered the old world anymore, but everyone wanted to. The Courier listened; not because he didn’t have an option, but because he wanted to. He moved the chair perpendicular to Arcade’s line of sight, just against the short edge of the desk, and laid his head on the surface of it, right over his crucifix-crossed arms, a trust-fall on sheet metal. The Courier was certainly smart enough to find the papers Arcade was talking about. He was certainly intelligent and witty enough to produce Arcade’s own biting remarks about politics; he had listened to enough of Arcade’s rambles to prattle on about pre-War policy and economic failures. But he listened, nonetheless. He did not copy. He did not bitch. He did not complain. He understood, because Arcade was speaking, and to him, Arcade was seemingly the only voice in the world. All at once, Arcade understood Dante, and he understood Beatrice. He understood that love moved the universe, because the Courier had moved the Mojave to keep Arcade in his idyllic world of quiet, predictable schedules. He understood the disciples, staring up in adoration at Christ. He understood how the angels buzzed busily around the open flower of the Primum Mobile, all because they understood they were love itself and their purpose was to love, endlessly and mindlessly. All he saw when he looked into the Courier’s eyes was that mindless acceptance that moved the gates from the city of Dis. He saw his judgment— he saw a man that knew every corrupted inch of his history, who could count all of the coals Arcade rightfully deserved to crawl on. He saw a man who knew Arcade would writhe on shards on glass for the opportunity to feel a shred of mercy or reciprocation. He saw all of his sins. He saw infinite tolerance; an ocean of it, an observant ocean, silent and unmoving, undisturbed by his faction. He saw a hand that could command him to die. He saw his corpse willingly moving towards its death. He saw arms and a mouth that spared him from oblivion. He saw his blood. He saw his cleansing. In that gaze, he was baptised, made anew. A new man with a new purpose, following in massive footsteps. There were people there to help him. Science was never done alone; only bad science was, and Arcade was not a bad scientist.

When the Courier felt well enough to carry on conversation, Arcade spoke once more.

"I don't want any more letters from you, Courier."

"You don't like them?" There was a faint whine at the end of that, as if the news that Arcade wanted him to stop sending letters was that loathsome.

"I mean it."

The Courier looked on, amused. "Why?"

Whatever he was supposed to say to that, he didn’t know. Something about judgment came to mind; sin and suffering, hellfire and brimstone. Arcade didn't say that. His mouth opened. It closed. His jaw flapped uselessly, then ached. He was getting older. Everyone was. He was looking at the Courier, but the Courier was looking at him. Reading his mind. Weighing his soul in those strange, unreadable eyes; writing his sentencing in that illegible handwriting.

"Whatever you have for me, come back and bring it yourself."

The Courier looked on in disbelief. Then, the face under that mask morphed into something... delighted. Amused. Domesticated, repressed instinct. Barely restrained drive.

"No postcards?"

"... How many postcards do you have?"

The Courier reached into his bag, pulling out a stack of thin, flimsy, plastic paper postcards kept with a rubber band.

"There's more in Ziploc bags, because if I jostle them too hard, they disintegrate. But these are the ones I have."

"Can I see them?"

The Courier nodded, crawling over to Arcade and handing them over. Arcade undid the rubber band and flipped through the stack. The Courier rested his head beside Arcade’s lap, on the bed, deliciously close to the stack of letters. Maybe he knew. Arcade didn’t care enough anymore if he did.

"Mojave National Preserve... Death Valley National Park, Arches National Park... Goodsprings... oh—" Arcade pointed to the REPCONN one. "I told you about that. The Aerospace Museum they have out there... Lucky 38... lots of ones from the Strip… How did you get all of these?”

"Every time I pick up a package or drop it off, just from a new location, I try to pick up a postcard."

"... Can you draw any?"

"I'm terrible at it."

Arcade clicked his tongue. "A shame. Okay. Then... send me postcards. And bring me back the things you have, in person."

"You wanna see me that bad?" The Courier smiled, raising his head. Arcade couldn't see it, but he could tell by the wrinkling in those eyes that lived behind the mask. The things they left unsaid were more powerful than any idea that lived; mostly because it was a language they spoke only to each other, and only they knew what it meant.

“You.” Arcade leaned down to meet him where he was at, reaching beneath the mask to hold his face with a pinch of his cheek. They were almost close enough to taste each other. Still not close enough. "I told you to stop being so clever.”

The Courier looked up, far too venerating, far too reverent. “Whatever you say, Doc.”

Still too close. Hot enough to burn. Hot enough to sear his lips, skin sloughing off, boiling veins beneath. Arcade leaned back, thoughts reeling in the recoil of flash-grenades. Whatever he was thinking, he didn’t know. He was losing himself. He was starting to go mad, cooped up in this place. The Courier chased, a hand making its way to propel himself up from the bed, but he kept still. All they did was look at each other.

All of a sudden, there was no 'terror, chaos-bringing harbinger of the Mojave' in the room with him. There was a man. Sometimes, a woman. Someone who decided to track dirt into his room, whose footprints he'd sweep away after. Someone with a pack who fiddled with an old radio attached to their Pip-Boy. Someone who liked listening to those old Westerns— the same five songs that repeated on the stations, every single day, every single night. Someone who was sitting in front of him now, who read one of his favorite poems off of some niche reference he'd made. A machinist who had an eye for systems. A man who listened so much he forgot he shaped the future of the Mojave desert. A mailman. A courier. A courier with crappy handwriting. The worst part about the letters was that on the outside, the handwriting was neat. Arcade could see all of the little shaky lines between the neat points, where the Courier had tried to stabilize his own hands. He'd made it legible, just to make sure it'd get through. The envelope hid under the guise of perfection, but only Arcade could see those minuscule differences; each margin of error wide as he cradled the papers in his hands. He loved it anyway. The sweet scent of the Mojave. The smell of the Courier's hide gloves. Leather, well taken care of. The sound of his spurs across the floor, painting jagged lines in the sand behind him. That Courier was in front of him. A Courier that wanted to be his friend. Here he was, biting his own shame. Arcade could never just restrict himself to scraps. He was too greedy for that. He wanted too much; too ambitious, too needy. Too clingy to the past, too forward towards the future. In them lived the same intensity. Something unrecognizable shone in the Courier’s eyes when Arcade moved away: maybe that’s why he couldn’t quite place what that feeling was supposed to be. It terrified Arcade to look in the mirror. All of the information he’d ever owned for himself was normally his own burden to carry. Carrying it was enough for both of them: he didn’t need to ruin something perfectly good with the Courier for his own personal desires.

“I need a favor, Courier.” The Courier went to open his mouth, but Arcade pressed a finger to his lips. “I know I owe you plenty, especially for helping out with the Enclave. But I can’t make this journey alone. I need you to deliver me to Novac. Not now. Whenever you have time. I still need to pack and say my goodbyes. I need to get this cleared. But I think… you helped me make up my mind. So thank you.” Slowly, surely, he took a finger off the Courier’s mouth. “Alright. Name your price.”

“The way you said that made me think I was going to pack you in some little box and wheel you halfway across the Mojave.”

“Clearly, we’re not doing that,” Arcade scoffed, rolling his eyes. “How much for safe transportation?”

“1,000 for anyone else, and a 500 cap heavy object fee. For you, free.”

“You’re expensive, aren’t you? 2,000 caps.”

“I know the value of the service I’m charging for. 1,000.”

“1,500.”

The Courier snickered. “That’s the base rate. You’re not fooling anyone. 500.”

Damn it. The Courier saw right through him, didn’t he? “1,000.”

“750.”

Arcade narrowed his eyes. “I really feel like this should be the other way around. The provider of the service usually barters to raise the price, and the receiver barters to lower the price.”

“You are just too generous to me. I’m assuming that’s 750. Half when we leave, half when we get there.”

“750 is just fine with me.”

They shook hands— the Courier’s grip suffocated his fingers, squeezing air out between his joints. He winced, and the Courier seemed to ease up, the thick fog of regret clouding his gaze. Still, he seemed to take after Arcade, and quickly moved the conversation along:

“Why me?”

“‘Why you?’” Arcade averted his gaze. “You know the Mojave better than I do, it’s the only rational choice for me right now and the, uh… most available, obviously…” He trailed off, much to the Courier’s delight.

All the Courier could do was smile; the only smile a man who knew everything he needed to could.

“Alright. We have a deal.”

...

In the shadow of the Hidden Valley rang true the spirits of the Mojave, restless and uncertain. The Courier sat against a rock, fire speaking in forked tongues the sparks of many who’d burnt in the flames erupting in the end of the world. From the town of Primm, the Courier had nicked a postcard from the director; all of his mail was sent there, anyway. No matter where Arcade addressed it, it all ended up in Primm. He always tended back there, no matter what he was doing. Maybe it was the memories. He redirected his gaze from the sky to the postcard:

"Courier,

Hello from sunny Novac. I've been spending the last week getting established. Meeting people. I saw Boone, nice fellow. Red beret. He remembers you, because he remembers me. He’s NCR, but I don’t think he knows anything about my affiliation. He works the nights. I rarely see him, besides short glimpses early in the morning.

The locals are awfully fond of you. They talk about you a lot. People are kind; a lot nicer than they were in Freeside. Things are calm. Maybe it’s the snipers constantly looking over the land, but the sun is nice. I’m even working up a bit of a tan, if you couldn’t believe it.

It’s strange, being somewhere so calm.

Besides that, business has been good. Stop in sometime. You're overdue for a check-up.

A.G."

The Courier breathed out a sigh. With practiced precision, he slipped this postcard into the breast pocket of his coat, snug against his chest. Safe. Close.

A few weeks after the Courier received Arcade's postcard, Arcade received his first postcard at Novac.

"Doc,

I think I get it. I’m happy you’re someplace different now. New sights to see. As for your problem…

I've been many places, Arcade. I've been as far as Utah, maybe, dropping off something for those tall compounds out there. Eerie things. Hollow, creaking. Big wooden structures. Longhouses; windows, hand-spun glass. You should see the people who live there. They come out in white skirts and black slacks, pink blouses and blue button-downs. Pleather suspenders and cufflinks. Peter Pan collars. Clothes chewed up and spit out by the moths and starving ghouls. Clothes from before the war. Clothes as the war was happening. Clothes as it ended.

I think they're strange. But the truth is, they are some of the only people who invite me to stay. They don't know anything about the horrors I've seen crawl out of the Mojave. The NCR is thousands of miles away. The Legion is a speck to them. Gomorrah and the Strip is a distant star, flickering then blowing out in the sky.

Their house faces east. I like staring at the open plain. Tall rows of grasses, wheat... they're even starting to grow corn. Real corn. The food isn't much, but it means everything to both of us that they can give me some. (I don't really know what I do with the caps I get from this job. They used to disappear or go somewhere else, but I ran out of things to spend my caps on. They just sit. They don't mean anything anymore. It's enough to have something to do.) While I love staring at the prairie, who could do it everyday?

The fear sometimes, when exploring those old factories; they'll jolt to life, catch on a loose piece of clothing, and spit you up, bones and gristle caught in gnarled, rusting teeth. I mind my sleeves now. I keep my boots clean, after others have followed them. The forge towards the future and the march into the past are foils of each other: determined to follow one path, missing all of the details. I wonder: did the people who wore those clothes know anything about the war?

The past has a way of catching up to us, but the future's grip is just as tight.

I wish I could bring you here. I couldn't make you see what I see, but we'd at least talk out our differences instead of lobbing nukes at each other. Haha. Not funny. Okay. Hope you're doing well. Say hi to Boone and Daisy for me. Make sure he's okay. Make sure you're okay. I know you’re both familiar with each other, but no biting. Please keep the NCR relations kind of friendly for now while I’m gone.”

(well, something was scratched out here that Arcade couldn't quite read, but it was about as long as 'miss,' so maybe the Courier just didn't like the way it looked, but maybe, just maybe, it said something else)— "Miss you.

- Dante ‘Courier’ A."