Archive of Our Own ^beta

They were standing inside the Crimson Caravan main office, old wooden boards creaking under boots while weary traders exchanged the same musty air. Boone wished they'd open a window or crack the door open; it was hard to breathe, nearly suffocating. “I’m gonna wait outside,” he muttered, half to himself and half to the courier talking to an old, uptight woman behind a desk. She spared him a fleeting glance and a nod before turning back to her negotiations.

He pushed through the office door, surprisingly well-oiled, before heading down the steps. Combat boots crunched on gravel as he leaned against the building and took a look around.

It was quieter outside, just a few guards milling around while they waited between jobs. A tradeoff between fresh air and brutal sun, but Boone would take it every time. He didn’t like being indoors. Preferred to spend his days out in the middle of the desert.

Ideally, with the courier by his side. Looking through binoculars and watching as one, two, ten red soldiers fell. They made a good team.

Anything more than that… it was something he tried not to think about. Thinking never got him anywhere good.

Boone noticed a pop of color out of the corner of his eye. He turned his head, welcoming any kind of distraction from his current train of thought, and saw a barrel cactus sitting amongst an array of plants. Ever since the courier had pointed them out, he’d started to appreciate the flora of the Mojave.

“That’s chicory,” she said, pointing at a shrub with pale blue blossoms. “You can make tea out of it. Coffee substitute, too.”

“I’ve had it before. Easier to come by on tour than coffee and usually tasted a hell of a lot better, too. Didn’t know it had flowers."

The courier leaned down and picked one, bringing it up to her eyes. Boone watched as she took her journal out, putting it between two pages and shutting the book. It was something he’d seen her do a dozen times before, but it continued to puzzle him.

The cactus was blooming, adorned with a crown of of pink flowers bright enough to appreciate even behind his sunglasses. He stared at it, a lump forming in his throat.

Cactus flower. Carla’s nickname in Novac. No one ever said it to her face, just whispered words behind turned backs. Gossip in a small town tended to travel quickly. Pretty to look at, but there was no getting close to her.

She was unhappy there. Missed her life back home. Boone had been torn between his wife and his best friend, and he was too selfish to give one up. Should've just let her go back west to her family, or told Manny to fuck off and gone with her. But he'd taken too long to make a decision, and then they got the news that she was pregnant. Too dangerous to travel then.

They were sitting in their room in Novac, the radio tuned to the NCR’s broadcast while he and Carla relaxed together. It was his day off. She was resting her head on his shoulder, reading a book on some subject that was too complex for him to understand, when she suddenly got up and switched the radio off.

“Can’t listen to this crap anymore. It seems like things get worse every day,” she sighed. “Craig?”

He looked up at her. “Yeah?”

The fear in her eyes startled him. “If the Legion overruns Novac, I want you to make sure they don’t take me alive.”

“Carla—“

“Let me finish,” she said, raising a hand. Boone fell silent. “I know what they do to women, Craig. It’s a fate worse than death.” She gripped the back of a chair. "So I want you to promise… promise me that you’ll—”

Boone got to his feet and walked over, wrapping his arms around her. She buried her face into his shoulder in return. “I don’t want it to come to that. But I promise. I won’t let them take you.”

She nodded against his chest. “I’ll do the same for you.”

Carla had never had to kill someone before. He didn’t want to put that pressure on her, even if he knew what was in store for an NCR soldier at the hands of the Legion. But he also knew that if he said so, she’d give him hell for underestimating her — for good reason. She could handle herself. Didn’t need him constantly trying to shelter her. “Okay,” he said softly. “I love you, Car.”

“I love you too.”

“It’s pretty.”

The courier’s voice snapped Boone back to the present. He hadn’t even heard her come down the stairs. “Yeah,” he said quietly, trying to push down the guilt that had started to eat at him. She looked at the flowers for a bit longer, tilting her head slightly. He wondered if she’d try to pick them, risk cutting herself on the spines.

She didn’t. “Ready to head out? Think we’d better check out Nelson, based on that radio report.” She shifted the strap of the rifle over her shoulder. Ringo. He’d started to learn her quirks — naming her guns was one of them. Boone just nodded, following her out of the walled commune.

Walking long stretches of hot, cracked asphalt had become a part of daily life for Boone. The courier always seemed right at home, humming along to the music that was softly playing from the Pip-Boy on her wrist while her eyebot floated behind her. She paused to fish a sarsaparilla out of her bag, popping the cap with her pocket knife. “You want one?”

“No thanks.”

“Suit yourself.” She turned the cap over and smiled when she saw a blue star on the underneath. “Hey, a star cap. Good luck, yeah?” The courier tossed it to Boone, who easily caught it.

Another trait of hers that he was starting to get used to. A tendency to hand him things she picked up. Her ‘gifts’ ranged wildly in value, from used bullet cartridges she found on the ground to semiprecious stones. It baffled him at first, and he rarely kept the trinkets she gave him, but he’d noticed that she’d started giving him things she deemed rarer than others.

The courier opened the drawers of a desk and smiled before pulling something out and turning to Boone. “Look.” She held up a glass marble in front of her eye, the same amber color as her irises. “Neat, right?”

He made a noncommittal noise.

“Here, hold out your hand.”

Boone did so, and she placed the marble into his palm. He looked at it, clearly confused. “What’s it for?”

“It’s for you,” she replied simply, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

He’d kept that one, for reasons beyond him. The marble was still in one of the pockets of his cargo pants along with the few other ‘gifts’ he hadn’t tossed aside: a gecko claw and a $1 NCR bill folded into a butterfly. Boone slipped the bottle cap in with the rest of them.

The courier let out a groan when “Johnny Guitar” started to play, and she switched the radio off. He’d seen her do it before.

“Why don’t you like that song?” Boone asked, raising an eyebrow.

“No disrespect to Miss Peggy Lee, but that song just bums me out. Play it again, my Johnny,” she languished dramatically, putting the back of her hand on her forehead. “I’d prefer if you didn’t.” She dropped her hand back to her side with a laugh.

He shook his head, the ghost of a smile on his face.

They walked in comfortable silence for a while before she spoke again. “You ever dance, Boone?”

“No.” The question struck him as absurd, but most of her questions were. They tended to involve things he hadn’t thought about in a long time — his favorite color (green), what kind of weather he liked (sunny), if he preferred dogs over cats (yes). Nothing that mattered to anyone but her.

“Aw, c’mon. Never?” She looked over at him, and her eyebot made a few beeping noises. “ED-E wants to know too.”

He sighed. “…I used to. Carla showed me how. Was never any good at it, though.”

There was a pause while the courier seemed to think about that. “What was she like? Carla.” She asked it as if it was as mundane as her other questions, not a loaded subject that made Boone feel as if he was trying to defuse a bomb.

Still, it was better than the alternative. He was sick of being pitied.

But where did he even start?

“You never had to guess what she was thinking. She wasn’t afraid to tell you to your face. Smart, too. Bit of a hot-head.” Boone actually found himself smiling. “She talked a lot. Suited me fine — I never know what to say. And listening to her, it could…”

A lump formed in his throat as any kind of smile quickly died on his lips, crawling into a grave with all the other good things he'd put in the ground. “…make you forget. She stuck out, pretty much everywhere we went. Like she was from a different time. A better time.” He had to struggle not to choke on his own words. “I never met anyone like her.”

When he was with Carla, he felt like he was in a better time, too. One that wasn’t tainted by spilled blood and the horrors of war. Boone could be a different man — a good man.

He’d never met anyone like the courier, either. She, too, was a woman(?) from another time. While Carla came from glittering lights, silk dresses, and effortless smiles, the courier was from a world made of gunpowder, worn leather, and frontier towns. As if she rode in on a horse right out of an old holotape, a scar over her eye and revenge in her blood.

He didn’t like comparing them. It felt wrong, like a childish attempt to replace something that had been lost. The courier was not Carla. He’d have to be stupid to think anything other than that. She was something entirely new.

And the last thing he wanted was for them to share the same ending.

“How did you meet?”

It had been a while since Boone remembered that night. “I was at the Strip, on leave.”

He’d been at the Tops, seated at a table while he waited for Manny to get drinks for them. Boone didn’t want to be there. Manny had talked him into it, as usual, but the Strip wasn’t made for people like him. He was more comfortable in the middle of the Mojave with just the stars for company, rather than in a crowded casino with glaring neon lights and jangling slot machines. The smell of smoke and alcohol was nearly suffocating.

“You look lost.”

Boone stopped picking at the tablecloth and looked up. At first, he assumed that she was talking to someone else. She was so beautiful. Ethereal, like she’d walked out of a pre-war advertisement. Perfectly coiffed hair that cascaded down her shoulders in blonde curls. A red silk dress that matched her immaculate lipstick. Women like her didn’t waste their time with men like him.

He stared at her for a moment, dumbstruck. “Huh?”

“I said you look lost,” she smiled. “Let me guess: NCR?”

“Yeah.”

Taking that as an invitation, she took the seat across from him. Boone still wasn’t sure if this was really happening. “They give you a name in that military of yours, or should I try to guess?”

“Boone.”

“Boone? What’s your first name?”

He’d always hated his first name. Preferred going by his last if he could. “A joke.”

That made her laugh. She had a laugh that could fill up a room, one that left you smiling too. Boone already found himself wanting to hear it again. “C’mon, Boone. I’m sure it can’t be that bad,” she urged, tilting her head slightly.

He frowned a little, though the corner of his lips was still turned up. “You’re awfully persistent.”

“Ooo, he can say more than two words at a time,” she teased playfully. “I’m on the edge of my seat here.”

“It’s Craig.”

“Oof.” She grimaced dramatically before turning it into a grin. “Kidding. I’ve heard worse, Craig.”

It sounded nice when she said it. Made him hate it a little less. “What’s your name?”

“Thought you’d never ask. I’m Carla.” Boone almost reached out to shake her hand, but thankfully realized how stupid that would’ve been. Carla got out of her chair, and for a moment he thought that was the end of things. Then she walked over to him and extended her hand. “Dance?”

He hesitated. “I… don’t know how.”

“So? I’ll teach you,” she smiled. 

And like a fool, he said yes.

Boone recalled the story, giving the barest of details. “We got married as soon as we could.” And then he readied himself for the inevitable questions, for the pointless sympathies that only made the spectator feel better about themselves. Never him. Like how a funeral was for the living rather than the dead. He just hadn’t learned how to die quite yet.

But instead the courier just nodded, eyes fixed on a point straight ahead. “Thanks. For telling me.”

He didn’t know how to respond to that. The rest of the trip was spent in silence.

Boone finally piped up once they were approaching a gap in the mountains where the road passed through. “We're getting close to Nelson.” The courier looked at him. “Any closer, I'm shooting any legionary I see. Hope that's not a problem.”

She gave him a confused look, as if there was nothing he could do that would make her ditch him. “That ain’t a problem, Boone. That's a solution.”

He smirked. “Damn right. You and I, we're just a couple of problem solvers.”

They walked a bit further until a ranger spotted them, raising his arm to flag them down. “Hold up there,” he called, walking towards them. “This area is locked down by the NCR military until we can dislodge some Legion snakes from Nelson.”

“That’s why we’re here,” the courier replied, extending her hand. “I’m Six. That’s Boone.”

“Milo.” The ranger shook both their hands, glancing at Boone’s beret. “First Recon, huh?”

“Used to be.”

Recognition dawned on Milo’s face. “Oh, heck, I've heard of you two. Courier Six, ain’t that right? You're just the kind of person I'm looking for. Not afraid of stepping on a few toes to get a job done. Think you can lend a hand?”

“Like I said. It’s why we’re here.” The courier shifted her weight from one leg to the other. “What needs to be done?”

The two of them listened while Milo explained the situation. Boone’s posture stiffened when he said that he wanted to take out the hostages, and the courier frowned. “Why don't you try to rescue them?”

“Back at ‘Ranger School’, they taught us not to run headlong into a battle when you're outnumbered ten to one,” Milo replied sarcastically. Her frown deepened. “You want to go down there and try to haul those crippled boys off those poles, you're dumber than you look.”

“Would you rather keep cracking jokes, or actually get shit done?” the courier spat. “Fine. I’m in. You take the west ridge, I’ll take the southern.” She didn’t wait for Milo’s response; just nodded at Boone, signaling for him to follow her.

Once they were out of the ranger’s earshot, Boone started protesting. “To hell with mercy killing. We're getting those guys out of there.”

“Obviously,” she muttered, much to his relief. He’d been ready for a fight.

They made their way up the ridge, dropping to their stomachs once they reached the top. The courier took a pair of binoculars out of her bag while Boone drew his rifle and looked through the scope.

“Three hostages in the center,” she mumbled. “Two guards at the front…”

He tried to listen, but a dull ringing had started to sound off in his ears, drowning her out. Boone squeezed his eyes shut, trying to focus. When he opened them, he wasn’t in Nelson anymore. He was at Cottonwood Cove.

And instead of a legionary, he saw Carla through his scope.

He spotted her immediately. Dressed in rags, a red “X” painted on her chest. Marking her as property. It didn’t feel real, couldn’t be real. But it was.

For the first time, Boone’s hands shook as he adjusted his grip on his rifle. He’d counted his shots. There was only one bullet left in the chamber.

He’d made a promise. It felt like his hands moved on their own, but suddenly he was choking on the smell of gunpowder and sweat and burning bodies. God, he needed to breathe, why couldn’t he breathe—

“Fuck, breathe, Boone. Please!”

Suddenly the rifle was torn out of his hands, and Boone reacted viscerally, like a part of him had been ripped away. He tried to take it back, but was instead grabbed by the shoulders and shoved against the rocks. It was then that he saw the desperate face of the courier, and confusion cut through the panic. Why was she here? This wasn’t how it was supposed to go—

“Listen to me, Boone,” she said urgently, face only a few inches away from his own. “You’re okay. You’re safe. You’re here with me, with Six, okay?”

He stared back at her, wild-eyed, but nodded slightly. It still felt like some invisible force had its hands around his throat, choking the life out of him. Boone unwittingly put his hand on her cheek. He needed to know if she was actually there.

She let go of one of his shoulders and covered his hand with her own. The touch was something real, something he could cling to. “That’s right. I'm here. It’s okay. Just breathe with me, alright? Deep breaths.” The courier inhaled, and Boone mirrored her, exhaling at the same time. With every breath, the tightness in his chest grew fainter.

Eventually Boone’s head grew clear enough for him to realize what he was doing, and he pulled his hand away from her face as if she’d burned him. The courier quickly let him go and leaned back to give him some space. Putting that barrier back up between them.

Everything went quiet for a few moments, the only thing cutting through the silence being the sound of their breathing. Shame had started to burn through him, and he couldn’t look her in the eye.

The courier spoke first. “That was the worst one yet,” she murmured. When he finally lifted his eyes off the ground to meet hers, she spoke again. “We need to talk about this, Boone.”

He swallowed roughly, removing his sunglasses and wiping the sweat off his brow. “I’m fine.”

“Bullshit.” She ignored the glare he shot her. “Look, I don’t mean to pry, but we can’t keep pretending this isn’t a problem.”

“I said I’m fine.” Boone reached for his rifle and was stopped by a hand on his wrist. He looked at her, trying not to let his temper get the best of him. “Let go of me.”

She did, but not before moving the rifle behind her. “Don’t you get it? This doesn’t just affect you, Boone. What happens when some legionary’s got his hands around my throat and you’re too frozen to stop him?”

The realization made his blood run cold. He hated that she was right. It was one thing to let himself burn — it was another when it meant that he’d take the courier down with him.

“I’m not sayin’ you gotta go to the Followers or anything.” 'Even though you should' was left unsaid. “But you gotta at least tell me your triggers, or how I can help.”

Silence descended upon them once more. “Okay,” he finally muttered. “I’ll tell you. After we’re finished here.”

The courier looked at him for a few moments before offering him the binoculars. “Can you spot for me?”

A nod. “Always.”

Night fell. They made camp far away from both Nelson and Novac, out in the wastes.

The courier was sitting in front of the campfire, writing something into her journal. Even if Boone cared to read it, he wouldn’t have been able to — her handwriting looked like if you taught a gecko to hold a pen. Eventually she closed the book and tucked it away.

“Well?” She looked expectantly at him.

He realized he was tapping his fingers on his knee, and stilled his hand. “Mercy killing is expected of NCR snipers. The Legion likes to torture their prisoners within sight of NCR positions. We get called on to end it. I've had my share.” Boone’s voice lowered. “Some of them, you think, maybe you could've gotten them out. Maybe it's not the Legion that got them killed. Maybe it's your orders and you following them.”

The fire crackled and sputtered. “Mercy killing, then. It’s a trigger?”

“Yeah.” He had mixed feelings about that. The fact that there was a word for what had happened was undeniable proof that he had a problem. One that wouldn’t go away by just shutting his eyes and pretending it wasn’t there. On the other hand, it felt validating to give it a name. Maybe he had a problem, but problems had solutions.

And they were problem solvers.

“But your work in the NCR. It’s not what triggered you earlier.”

It wasn’t a question. “No.”

“Boone.” He braced himself for what she said next. “How did Carla die?”

“I don’t see what this helps,” he muttered, unable to swallow his pride and just give her a straight answer. “She’s dead.”

The courier didn’t say anything. Just kept staring into the fire. That was worse, for some reason. He knew that they were both recalling what she’d said earlier. They were a team.

“Fine,” Boone finally said, giving in. “She..." He had to pause and take a shuddering breath. He’d never told someone what he’d seen that day. What he’d done. “I tracked her down, southeast, near the river. They were selling her." He felt like he was trying to swallow nails. "Saw it through my scope. Whole place swarming with Legion. Hundreds of them. Bidding for things no man has a right to. I—” The words bordered on painful as he felt tears well up in his eyes, and he got so choked up that he had to stop.

It surprised him when the courier got to her feet and walked over to him. “Can you face that way?” she asked, voice uncharacteristically soft. Boone shifted so that his back was facing her, and she sat down behind him and pressed her back against his. “Okay. You can keep going.”

He was confused for a moment before he realized what she was doing. She could tell that he didn’t want her to see him cry. Even though Boone knew he could be vulnerable around her, it was still hard. As a kid he was told that boys didn’t cry, and there was no time for emotion during war. He’d gotten used to bottling things up.

Even after Carla died, he hadn’t had the chance to mourn. The grief had swallowed him whole and left him too numb to feel anything other than bitterness. Suddenly it felt like every negative feeling he’d ever pushed down was threatening to drown him.

“I just had my rifle with me. Just me… against all of them.” His voice had never sounded so small, so fragile. Threatening to break at any moment.

He made a promise. Boone lined his rifle up, his thoughts clearing as he went through the well-practiced motion, something he’d done a hundred times.

She noticed the light reflect off his scope at the last second, just before he pulled the trigger. Held her head up high, eyes burning, and nodded ever so slightly.

“So… I took the shot.” Boone took his sunglasses off as he hung his head, tears finally falling from his eyes. He could feel the heat of the courier through her duster as she leaned against him, reminding him that she was still there.

He wasn’t sure how long he cried. Didn’t bother trying to quiet or control the sobs that wracked his body. The only things around to hear him were the courier, her robot, and the stars. All indifferent but one.

Once he’d calmed down somewhat, Boone felt a tap on his shoulder. “Give me your hand.”

It seemed like a strange time for one of her gifts, but he put his hand behind him anyways, unable to look at her. Instead of a rock or a tooth or some other useless trinket, she intertwined her fingers with his. A gift of a different kind. The courier squeezed his hand, and he returned the gesture. It was ridiculous, in a way. Like if they didn’t see it, didn’t address it, whatever force that had it out for him would look the other way.

“Do you think I did the right thing?” he asked brokenly.

“Doesn’t matter what I think, Boone.”

He considered that. “Is it what you would’ve done?”

“Doesn't matter either. It is what it is, cariño. Nothing’s gonna change that.”

Cariño. She’d only used the term a few times, and he still wasn’t quite sure what it meant. “I guess you’re right.” Boone could see that he was grasping for validation, any kind of encouragement or condemnation. Something other than uncertainty. “Didn’t feel like there was any choice in what I did. It was more like... being forced to watch something you can't stop.” He looked up at the night sky, at the stars that kept him alive whether he liked it or not. “All this was only ever going to play out one way. It still is. I don't have any say — all I can do is wait for it to be done with me.”

“You make it sound like her death was inevitable," she said quietly. “Like she was always gonna die.”

“It was gonna be something. If I'd never met Carla, it would've been something else. I should've never gotten close to her... I’ve got bad things coming to me.” He shut his eyes before he withdrew his hand from her grasp. Her fingers slipped through his easily, returning her hand to her lap. He wasn’t sure if that would’ve hurt more or less than if she refused to let go. “You'd better keep your distance, too.”

The courier was quiet for a while. “Why do you think you've got bad things coming?” 

He sighed. “Because fair is fair.”

She shook her head slightly. “I don't get it.”

“Better that you don’t, Six.”

The sky had just started to lighten when Boone woke up the next morning. He opened his eyes to the familiar sight of the courier’s back, her legs crossed and her rifle laid across her knees. She was tapping her fingers on the stock as she watched the horizon.

Then he realized that there was something sitting on the top of his bag. He pushed himself up with one arm and got a closer look.

It was a cactus flower. Bright yellow, larger than the one they’d seen a few days earlier. He glanced at the courier, but if she’d heard him move, she didn’t acknowledge it. She must’ve heard the rumors about Carla when she’d visited Novac that fateful night. Knew why he’d stared at that barrel cactus, and went out of her way to find something as minor as a flower in the middle of the night.

Boone was suddenly struck by the knowledge that there was someone who cared about him, as if it weren’t already obvious.

It scared the shit out of him.

He sat all the way up before gently picking the flower up, worried that it would bruise or tear the moment he touched it. That was the thing about cactus flowers — they wilted so fast. Even now, the edges of its petals had started to brown.

Remembering what he’d seen the courier do, he pulled out his journal and started flipping through the pages. He stopped to brush his fingers over the photograph inside. One of the only things he'd taken when he'd left Novac. Then, he carefully placed the blossom between two blank pages and shut the book.

He was scared, but the fear was eased by a warmth in his chest. Blooming like the flora of the Mojave.

Boone wouldn’t let this flower wilt.