"Lower." I told her. "Just a little bit to the- Yep, right there."

"You got it, bub." Nora chirped.

Then she rammed her fist into my spine like a ten-pound hammer. Eliciting a sound more like I'd broken something than anything good.

But boy did it feel good. I'd had that particular crick in my back since landing in Vale.

After both breaking my personal best and my back at the squat rack, we muddled through in short order for the rest of the day. I gave Peach some minor help on the grounds despite that, then settled in for the night. Jaune and Pyrrha were on dinner detail this time, and I was eager to cash Nora's debt in. I hadn't gotten it in a way that I was particularly fond of, but a debt was a debt. She was willing to pay in spades as well.

Only a minute or so in, and I could see why Ren had his 'prize' be a back rub. Nora may have been as flighty as a cazador, and crazy as one too, but she had magic hands. There were knots in my back she'd worked out that had been there so long I'd completely forgotten they were there. Don't know where she learned to do it, or if she was just that good at hitting things the right way, but it was immaculate.

"You seem to be enjoying yourself," Ren said, arranging his and Nora's dinner on their plates while she worked.

"Like you wouldn't be-lieve." I said, as Nora pressed into a spot near my ribs. "-Know that spot, think that's where I got hit by a truck."

"Got hit by a what?" Weiss questioned.

"Happened the other night, don't worry about it." I told her, I looked back towards Nora, sitting on the bed behind me. "You should consider making a business out of this, you'd make a killing."

"I charge in pancakes." Nora chirped.

"Not-ed." I said, looking to Ren next to me "Sur-pri-sed you don't do this more."

"Pancakes are a sometimes food." Ren said, working to assemble tonight's dinner. "Lots of carbs and sugar."

"The best things." Nora twittered.

"Well tonight's dinner seems pretty enticing." I said. "What is it?"

"Just something my mother would make for me every once in a while." Pyrrha said. "Don't really know what the name for it is, neither does she, but she showed me how to make them."

It seemed like a simple enough meal to make, watching her and Jaune work. She'd prepped some meat beforehand, marinating it in a thick sauce before searing it. After the meat was done and set aside, she threw circles of flat bread into the skillet that puffed with the heat. They were cut open, and revealed a giant cavity in the bread. Which they then stuffed the meat into, along with what looked like cheese, greens, tomatoes, onion, and some sort of cream sauce.

The aroma was positively divine.

Unfortunately, I was on an all liquid diet.

There was a brief period, where everyone got settled and relaxed for the evening. Dinner was doled out, and everyone slowly set in, Zwei leaning up against Ruby's leg, begging for a piece. Yang tearing into hers, Blake picking at her own. Weiss going to take a bite, and causing the sauce to leak out the back, which she then raced to dab up before it stained her clothes. I noted that Ren had taken the time to make Nora's for her while she kneaded my back– No, kneaded is the wrong word. Hammered. She hammered my back like a blacksmith with a particularly tricky piece of steel.

Which she was working masterfully.

But all good things must come to an end eventually. A couple minutes of having her beat my back into shape, and she pulled back.

"I think that'll do for now, Bub." Nora chirped. "You're a tough one."

"Takes practice." I said, standing up and stretching, feeling nice and loose. "Something you've clearly had."

Nora chuckled, shuffling on the bed back to her spot next to Ren. As I settled back onto my cot, he handed her one of the… pocket sandwiches? Don't know what the correct word was, but it looked like some type of sandwich.

I reached a hand out for my moonshine and pulled the jar up. The last one, a little less than half full. Didn't quite understand how I'd run through it so quickly. Then I thought about the jar I wasted because of Weiss. Then the stuff I'd used to sterilize my surgery equipment. Then the amount I drank as a painkiller. Then the amount I drank just to drink.

Really, it was a miracle I had any left at all.

"Anyone want a tipple?" I asked, holding the jar out. "Last call, gonna be dry again after this."

JNPR looked at me like I had a screw loose. Jaune in particular looked like he wanted to retch. Last I checked, he had no memory of the last time he'd danced with the deathclaws on a pale summer's night. But he seemed to remember the morning after pretty well, the first hangover is always the worst. None of them are fun, but the first one's pretty raw. Suppose it just had to be Jaune's luck though, that he was a complete lightweight.

"I don't think any of us are planning to peel paint tonight." Weiss said.

"Or start a fire." Blake added.

"Or forget the last ten years." Yang added.

"Oh don't be so dramatic." I countered.

"… Or go blind." Ruby said.

"…" I turned to look at Ruby "Really, you too?"

"I like being able to see." She said.

"That's cold girl." I said, scanning over all of them. "Y'all need to loosen up a bit."

"That stuff can strip the grease out of a deep fryer." Ren said. "I don't think it's safe for anyone to be drinking."

I looked at Ren sternly, then stuck my straw in the jar and drained it. Yeah, it would rot my guts given enough time, but anything would. After that, I put my jar back and laid back on my cot, feeling more relaxed than recent memory could drudge up. Tomorrow would be back to the grind in earnest. But for the moment, I could at least take solace in the fact that I could rest.

"Ahem."

My head swiveled on my cot, looking back across the room.

Nora was looking at me intently. Holding her food just under her mouth.

"… So are you gonna-"

"No." I told her.

Nora's lips pinched into a pout. "You didn't even-"

"Ruby asked this morning, and I told her no too." I answered. "I'm done talking about Graham and his story, same goes for Zion."

Nora gave me a skeptical look, before letting her gaze slide over to Ruby. Who, for her part, gave a guilty nod. Wouldn't have mattered if she hadn't asked first or not. This was a closed topic as far as I was concerned.

"But Six-" Nora whined.

"No, Nora, we've been over this." I told her. "As far as anything else goes, I don't like talking about my own personal history. I've been willing to share parts of my life with you guys, but there are things that I don't want to reflect on. I've told you about Graham, and you've pieced together something from it. Good on you. But that's the end of it."

"The end of it!?" Nora squawked "But this is where the story starts getting good!"

"Nora." I cautioned. She caught it almost immediately.

"I mean, it is." She said, slowing down "You were there. There's so much you could tell us."

"And just as many reasons why I don't." I told her. "There are some stories better left untold. You heard what you needed to."

Nora's response to that was to give me a questioning smirk. I'd already been told her story. She knew what it meant for things to be uncomfortable.

"… You get one question." I said.

"Yay." She chirped, then pursed her lips and started visibly thinking. I could see the gears turning in her head like the machinery at quarry junction. Slowly and resolutely forcing themselves into motion. Funny considering how deceptively perceptive she'd proven herself to be. Seemed like she could put the pieces together, but didn't know which pieces to actually look for. After another moment, she nodded to herself and went to ask.

"Bear in mind." I interrupted. "You only get the one. Whatever you're going to ask, make sure it's what you really want to know. Don't forget, I'll count any question as it."

Nora nodded, giving me a sharp look. Gently she began stroking her chin, like some ancient scholar pondering the existential questions of life. What came first: The gecko or the egg? If a building collapses and no one's around, does it make a sound? Does the light stay on in the fridge when you close the door? The deep unanswered riddles handed down through the ages of men. Truly, whatever question she would ask, she needed to make sure it was a good one.

She fell deep, deep into concentration. So deep I could practically see the steam coming out of her ears as the effort began to build pressure.

"… Ok, we probably have a few minutes before she has anything." I said, looking to Nora's teammates and mine. "You guys want to try and hash out the plan for tomorrow?"

"What about the rest of the weekend?" Jaune asked. "Shouldn't we try to figure out as much as we can?"

"Do you know how tomorrow is going to shake out?" I asked.

"Um… no?" he answered.

"Then we focus on getting through tomorrow first." I said, before looking at Blake. "You've got the rally tomorrow, right?"

Blake nodded. "It's in the industrial district, near the kingdom limits." She motioned towards the map, growing ever more cluttered on the table we'd placed it. "With how close it is to the agricultural district, they're probably planning to funnel out anyone they can recruit."

I nodded. "Make sense, can't have the fresh meat hanging around. Do us a favor and don't get hooked by them?"

"Not planning to." She said snidely.

"You never plan to get hooked, you think a fish ever plans to eat the hook?" I asked. "All it takes is the right bait and you could get stuck all the same."

Blake quirked an eyebrow at me.

"Don't give me that, you already know I'm speaking from experience." I said.

Blake rolled her eyes. "I'll be careful, don't worry."

"That's all I'm asking." I said.

"Ok, so what do the rest of us do?" Weiss asked.

"We're probably going to be doing what Six has been for the past few weeks." Ruby answered, looking to her partner, then to me. "Right?"

"That's the big plan, yeah." I said, waving over towards the map from my cot. "The way I'm thinking of it is this: We're going to start with hitting whatever places I haven't covered yet from Yang's list, and maybe double back over one or two. See if fresh eyes catch what I missed, so to speak."

"We'll do it with teams of two." Ruby interjected. "We won't be able to move as fast, but we can be safer and still cover it pretty quick."

I nodded. "A reasonable decision. We keep it in groups of two, we avoid making ourselves look super conspicuous but still make sure we've all got support. Likewise, we keep in contact over our Scrolls. If trouble crops up, reach out. We'll coordinate and move to help."

"But isn't Blake going to the Rally alone?" Jaune asked, looking towards her. "What happens if something goes wrong?"

Again, another reasonable question, and one Blake would need to answer. If she wanted to throw herself into the Nightstalker den, she'd better have some answers hammered out.

"I've been to a few smaller Rallies in the past." Blake said. "Security isn't heavy, only enough to keep whoever's speaking safe. Too much and we'd get the authorities' attention. It doesn't look good getting caught like that."

"Ok, but that doesn't answer Jaune's question." I said, tilting my head towards Blake. "I ran off without getting asked those questions, or having any clue what I'd do if they happened, I'd be remiss to let you do the same."

Blake rolled her eyes. "I'm planning to keep my head down long enough to see if they know anything important. If they don't I can slip out before they realize it. Anything else, I'd need to actually be in there first."

I nodded. "Better, and can't ask for much more than that."

Blake nodded, looking down at her food. "… I might have also asked Sun to come help us."

"… Oh." I said, before turning over slightly on my cot. "… Well, that'll even things out at least. Makes sure you're not going in alone, and we're evened out in terms of numbers."

Blake looked at me curiously. "…That's it? I was expecting more of a reaction."

"Why?" I asked. "Assuming no one else has a problem with it, we're already calling in outside help. Might as well make sure our bases are covered."

"Yuh-huh," Yang nodded.

"Quite," Weiss added.

"Does that actually make us even?" Ruby pondered. "… Huh, guess it does."

"That said, we're going to probably want to have words with him tomorrow before we do anything." I said. "Should have time while we're setting things up at Tukson's, which would also be our first order of business."

Blake nodded, seeming content with the answer, and likely the reaction. Her reaching out to Sun for extra help was, admittedly, a bit unexpected. She wasn't normally the type to do that, especially considering the arm twisting we'd needed to do to just get this far. However, that she was willing to do so meant she was taking this seriously, and not taking pointless risks. Good to try and avoid those. Was I thrilled that Sun was now involved? Not particularly, the kid had done some bad and some good. Most of the bad was admittedly unintentional on his part, but the good was more opportunistic.

He was a Wild Child. But he was also willing to be friendly with Blake.

Wild or not, extra numbers in a place we otherwise couldn't get them was welcome. We'd hammer him tomorrow.

"Ok, so we're splitting into teams of two." Ruby said, ticking things off on her fingers. "We'll be staying at Tukson's for the weekend, so we'll need to pack clothes and food for Zwei."

At hearing his name, Zwei yipped, tongue lolling out of his mouth.

Ruby finally caved and gave him a piece of dinner. He bounced and caught it as she tossed it lightly away. Little pup snapped it up and had it scarfed in a flash, licking his chops eagerly.

Sated by his meager tithe, he toddled across the room and sat next to my cot. I'd say he was looking up at me, but he was practically the same height as the cot. More he looked me in the eye than anything. Beady brown eyes like a pair of polished stones.

I reached an arm out and pulled him up onto the cot with me. Ignoring the snickering coos of my teammates.

"Once we're in Vale, we split up and look for clues." Ruby continued, smiling oddly at me. "… What do we do if we find something?"

"Same as if Blake hits a snag: reach out." I said, scratching Zwei. "Communication is key. Things change, we need to be ready to react. We'll probably want to meet up once or twice throughout the night too. Figure out what we've found, get our bearings."

"What do we do when we run out of places to look?" Jaune asked. "You've been doing this for over two weeks, right? There can't be too many places left."

"Feels like it's closer to three now, and you're right, there's not." I answered. "Once we finish up with Yang's leads, we'll need to reconvene and look over our findings. Whatever shakes out from that, we keep going with it, until either nothing else turns up, or we find what we're looking for."

"Does that mean we'll possibly be getting into fights with the White Fang too?" Pyrrha asked.

"More than likely, if the past few weeks have been any clue, yeah." I said, craning my head towards Pyrrha, as Zwei licked my mask. "Best case scenario: there'll only be one, and that's if we manage to track down where the Fang are operating out of. But I find that to be overly optimistic, and we're probably going to have more than a few nightly brawls over the weekend. My advice: pack water. You're going to get thirsty."

Pyrrha nodded. "Yes, that would make sense… and we should contact everyone before or after fighting?"

I mulled it over for a moment, then shrugged. "Think that'll need to be based on context. If you think you can reasonably handle whatever you find yourself up against, you can probably get away with a post-fight announcement. On the other side, if it looks like it'll be too big to handle on your own, relay it and we'll figure it out… of course, if it also looks like trouble is imminent if you don't step in-"

"We'll make the call." Pyrrha said.

"Correct." I said, looking at Ruby and Jaune. "A lot of what's going to be happening will involve working in what's basically a constant gray zone. Sometimes it'll be obvious what the right call is, most of the time it won't. Remember that we all need to take this seriously. If fighting does break out, that means people's lives are officially on the line. I think you understand the significance of that, but I can't help but stress it: be smart."

Both Ruby and Jaune nodded. They got the point.

"Ok, so what are we doing specifically?" Weiss asked. "What teams are we dividing into, where are we each going?"

"Hm, dunno about the where yet." I said. "Vale's a big place, and even with the extra people we'd still have a lot of ground to cover. If there's places anyone's more familiar with than others, it'd probably be good to send ourselves there. Make sure everyone's working in familiar territory… Is anyone here familiar with Vale outside of the shopping districts?"

Ruby and Yang nodded, Blake did as well, but more minutely. Her experience was likely limited, as was Weiss's. They didn't have as much reason to be running around the more tucked away places in Vale. But at the very least, they'd explored the city somewhat. Blake after she'd run away for being outed as a faunus. Weiss when we'd had to track down Blake.

JNPR on the other hand, looked askance. Except for Nora, still pondering the existence of the appendix and navel.

"… Ok, wasn't expecting much, we don't all go romping in places we shouldn't." I said.

"Sorry." Pyrrha said. "Outside of a bit of shopping and entertainment, we don't normally go to Vale."

"I get it." I said. "Not much sense in going someplace if you don't have a reason to. Not everyone is an explorer. But that does make this more difficult, since we can't have everyone bunched in one area."

"Then we'll just have to make sure we're spread out properly, right?" Ruby said. "Yang and I know enough about Vale that we can find our way around on our own. So we can partner with either Six or Weiss to cover any part of the kingdom."

"Which means JNPR can cover the parts they know better. Or, if needed, we divide ourselves up with them to make sure everyone is more eve." I said, motioning to JNPR. "I've gotten a better understanding of Vale the past few weeks, I could help guide you around."

That would at least mean everyone's on their toes, not getting used to the same area and getting complacent.

"You guys can take the Commercial and Residential districts." Ruby decided. "If you're familiar with it, then it'll make it easier, and we can worry about changing things the next day. Yang, me, Six, and Weiss can take the Industrial and Northern parts of town."

"Heck yeah." Yang said, tossing up a piece of her dinner, before catching it in her mouth. "-ibs on -ix."

" Aw, what!?" Ruby whined "No fair! I wanted to pair with Six!"

"I suppose I'm just Pâté then?" Weiss asked, miffed.

"Dunno what that is, but I'm with Ruby on this." I said. "Better I go with her or Weiss than you, Yang. Unless you think either of them can interrogate someone worth a damn."

"Language." Weiss snipped. "-and I'll have you know I'm quite good at negotiations."

"Can you negotiate a man into selling his life without much in return?" I asked. "Because for some of them, that's what they'd be doing."

"Her family's been doing it for years, should be easy." Blake said.

"…"

I slowly turned to look at Blake.

Zwei turned to look at Blake, tilting his head.

Everyone else turned to look at Blake. Except Nora.

Blake paled, as she realized she'd said that out loud.

"… ow." Weiss said, face falling, looking like she'd swallowed something bitter.

"Damn Kitten." I said. "I've seen artillery that's less damaging than that, like, fuckin' hell girl."

"I meant it as a joke." Blake said, turning red. "I was trying to be funny."

"Blake I'm all for taking a shot at the rich, but really?" I asked.

"… Sorry." Blake said, looking like she wanted to curl up into a little yarn ball. It would've been cute and kinda funny if it wasn't for the fire she'd almost started.

Weiss simply nodded, her own cheeks reddening.

"… Well, if it's any consolation, at least we know you won't have any trouble fitting in at the Rally." I said. "Heck, say more things like that and they might promote you on the spot."

Blake gave me a sharp look. Helped cut through all that yarn she was tangled in.

"… I'll take Weiss with me. We'll take the upper half of town." Yang said, conceding, but firm. "But I call night two."

"That works." I said, shrugging. "Gives Weiss a chance to stretch her legs." I then turned to Ruby. "That means you and I take part of the Industrial and Commercial districts, Tiny."

"Cool." Ruby said, smiling.

"Aside from all this, I think that covers everything." I said. "Nora and Ren will partner with each other the first night, same with Jaune and Pyrrha. We can change it up the second night if need be, and if there's issues we can meet up part-way through the night and sort them out."

"Sounds good to me." Yang said, tossing another piece of food, this time for Zwei to catch.

"I agree." Pyrrha added. "Assuming nothing goes wrong, it should make for a good start."

"With luck, we'll get more done in one night than I could do in three." I said. "Most of you seem to have better luck than I do, so it shouldn't be a problem."

"Aside from that, where would we be looking specifically?" Ren asked. "Vale's a pretty big place."

"Well, we'd be starting with the bars and clubs." Yang said, flashing Ren a smirk. "Dark and shady places, the seedier the better."

"So any place you'd expect to get mugged outside a coffee shop?" Ren asked.

"Pretty much, and even then you'd have to pay attention to the coffee shops." I added. "You'd be surprised at the number of White Fang stash houses I found operating out of seemingly innocuous businesses. Either the owners were sympathizers or were being coerced into helping."

Ren nodded, furrowing his brow.

"That would explain the clothing store on Maple Street near the park." Jaune said. "Everyone in there had a shifty look to them."

"I think you're underestimating the world of retail." Blake said, slowly finding the nerve to speak again.

"No, seriously-" Jaune continued.

After that they began to talk about all the weird facets of Vale. Trying to think of any random business that could be a front for the Fang to work out of. It wasn't hard, given how blank and shadowy working some of those dead-end jobs could leave you. It felt like a lot of the random people I'd see in Vale at night were that way. Stumbling home from some place they'd rather not be. The ones stumbling back from the bars were easier to pick out. Most of them at least had some kind of smile on their face. Or some similarly disoriented guy or gal hanging off them.

It was around that point that the moonshine finally started to kick in. The implants around my heart would begin filtering them out before long, but for a short while at least I'd have a relaxing buzz. So I just eased back and listened to the conversation roll on. Eventually it stopped being about the clothing store, and more a general question of what constitutes someone looking shifty. Then it devolved into a conversation about how realistic crime fiction was, which then turned into a conversation about movies.

Once we started down the path of how realistic the Story of Navy Hale was, I knew we'd gone off the rails.

But I didn't mind. It was nice, peaceful even. Doing this gave me a sense of nostalgia.

How long had it been, since I'd gotten to sit down with everyone in the Mojave and just relax? It hadn't been since before I took power. Sure, Boone and I would go hunting, Raul was around, and it wasn't like everyone else was hurrying to run off elsewhere.

It had been a long time though.

Almost without even thinking about it, I fished my picture of everyone out of my supply box, dog-earing the page in Huck-Finn for later. Needed to do some more reading. Blake's book was enjoyable. Maybe when I got a second I could go to the library, see if there were any more. Or even just find something new. Seditious or not, the written word was a seductive medium.

One of my hands wormed its way onto Zwei's head and began absently scratching at one of his ears. He leaned into appreciatively, as I looked at the picture. Funny how almost everyone was in it. Arcade would've been only a few blocks away from the 38 at the time. I'd even been on relatively good terms with the Followers. I'd just never run into him until after everything hit the fan. After…

It was funny. Looking at the picture. How happy it was.

How much it hurt now.

Things never were quite the same again. Never bad. Just not the same.

"… Do you miss them?" Ruby asked.

"Hm?" I grunted, tearing myself away from reminiscing.

I looked towards Ruby, and saw her looking at me with a soft smile and a knowing look. A look JNPR, Yang, Blake, and Weiss seemed to be mirroring. Something understanding about them. Had they stopped and I wasn't paying attention? Or had they asked me a question and I was too out of it to answer? Didn't matter.

"Your friends back home." Ruby answered. "Do you miss them? I know you've been here a few months now, and you don't really talk about-"

"It's fine." I said, sliding my photo back into the box. "Just a habit I had when I'd drink back home. We hadn't been together for a good while even before I came here. Barring the odd excursion to go meet with them. The picture was just from a time when most of us were together…" I chuckled as a realization hit me. "Y'know, saying it out loud, I realize how sad that sounds."

"Guess that's a yes." Weiss said, nodding.

"Hm." I grunted.

"When did you take it?" Ruby asked. "It doesn't seem like you have a lot of pictures, so it must've been important."

I shook my head. "Not really, it was just… I don't know, the right place and the right time?" I moved both of my hands under my head as I turned to look up at the ceiling "Cass and I had just finished taking care of some personal business, for the both of us. Just so happened that the day we got it done was a holiday for the founding of the NCR. When she said it usually involved barbeque and day drinking, I was all for it. We met up in the Lucky 38 with everyone, I cooked, we drank, partied, and just generally had a good time. Took the picture before the food was done… Just a really happy time is all."

"Definitely sounds fun." Yang said. "You got any other pictures?"

I shook my head. "Not many. I'd take them on occasion, if I thought the sight was pretty enough, or worth trying to capture. But I left most of them back in the Mojave. Only kept the one I felt I needed to where I could find it."

"D'aw." Yang cooed.

"Don't make it weird." I said. "It was a good time. I wanted to have something to remember it by in case I got shot in the head… again."

"I can picture it." Yang smirked.

I just shook my head.

"Did you have a lot of times like that one?" Ruby asked. "You don't talk about any of them, but if they mean a lot to you…"

For a moment, I thought about some of the adventures we'd all gone on together. Me and Lily, delving into the Devil's Throat to handle some of the local centaurs. Raul helping me fix up my old motorcycle, before I went and wrecked it again. Studying under and helping Arcade while we tended to the sick in Freeside. Returning to Vault 34 with Veronica, despite what had happened there. Finding the parts to help ED-E repair his systems, and pull back his recordings. Tracking down Legionnaires with Boone, and hanging around the Tops when we had time off. Said it was where he'd met Carla.

Then there was literally any trouble me and Cass got up to…

I sighed out through my nose. "More than a few, Tiny. They just tended to be stretched out over the course of a lot of different things… It was good while it lasted."

Ruby nodded, and I noted how somber the others became. I'd already made it clear multiple times, and not even more than a few minutes prior, this was a closed subject. There were just things I was never going to be comfortable talking about. All of my companions were like that. Sure, I got them to open up to me. But I didn't ask them to tell me everything. Sometimes, knowing felt better.

Sometimes, it just hurt.

I didn't see a reason why they needed to find out.

As they began to move on though Nora, in her usual fashion, came to a conclusion. Having apparently achieved enlightenment, looked at me and grinned manically.

"Alright, I know what my question is." She said, catching her and my teammates' attention.

"Do you now?" I asked dryly.

"Yep." She chirped. "And I think it's a good one."

"Mhmm." I nodded.

"It is." She chirped.

"Right."

"It is!"

"Of course."

"It's a great question!"

"Naturally."

"You better answer it!"

"We'll see."

"WE'LL SEE!?"

"Will you just ask already!?" Weiss snapped.

Nora paused, before turning to Weiss with a guilty smile. Weiss simply rolled her eyes, and Nora turned back to me. "You better answer it. It's an easy question, and if you don't answer it you're a butt!"

"So I've been told." Gesturing with a hand. "Hit me."

"…" Nora grinned manically.

I instinctively moved away from her, which amounted to me wriggling to the back of my cot. "Not like that- Don't you dare."

"I'm not doing anything." Nora chirped. "But you better answer, bub."

"Ok, and?" I said, gesturing again.

Nora smiled contentedly, and said: "It's a really easy question: are there any stories you can tell us?"

I paused and looked at Nora.

It was an unexpected question, if nothing else.

She quickly explained.

"I wanted to ask you about Joshua and his story." Nora chirped. "But you being a secret-y little butt means you won't tell us anything even if we ask nicely, which I was going to."

'Secreting butt?'

"But then I realized, there's all kinds of things you don't want to tell us!" Nora squawked, jabbing a finger at me. "You just don't want to tell them to us… and then there's the stuff you do want to tell us. And it's all random! All stuff you just 'happened to in the area for'- Don't give me that look mister man, you know I'm right!"

I was not giving her a look. Honest.

"You've got more stories than you've told us about." Nora chirped. "Maybe you don't want to tell all of them to us, and fine, be that way… But they can't all be like that, you just told us a story about that picture. You gotta have something, and I wanna hear it!"

She settled down again beside Ren and fixed me with a stern look. Which, for Nora, it surprisingly was. She took story-time very seriously. If there was something I hadn't told them, and there wasn't, she'd try to find out about it. I'd been on the receiving end of her persistence, and had managed to avoid the worst of it. Most of the time. Still had that dent in my head from her chasing me down.

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I mulled the question for a little bit. Maybe stalling for time, maybe thinking of an answer. Really, just trying to rationalize it to myself. There were a lot of reasons I didn't like telling them stories about my time in the Mojave. Lots of things I just didn't want to talk about. But they'd proven resilient to some of the more horrible, and outright heinous, things I'd told them. Which meant that it was only the personal things that were keeping me from telling them anything.

They already knew I killed people though, and had mostly moved past it. Seemed to understand that it was just part of life, well death technically, in the Wasteland.

Maybe they could handle a story? Not a terrible one, but something… good? No, good was the wrong word… hopeful? Nope, still not it.

Fuck it.

My head rolled back down to the box under my cot, and I thought back to those simpler times. When I was just running around the Mojave, trying to find Benny. If I could pull a story from then, before things got complicated, maybe that would work?

"… Well? We're waiting." Nora chirped, smirking deviously. "Haven't heard a no yet."

"I'm considering things." I answered.

"That sounds even less like a no." she said, a smirk blooming into a smile.

"What are you considering?" Ruby asked, starting to smile herself.

"What weighs more, a pound of feathers or a pound of lead." I said.

Nora blew a raspberry "Easy, a pound of lea- Wait…"

I chuckled as she rapped herself on the head. She could be a good sport.

"Is there anything you'd want to tell us about?" Ruby asked, then shook her head. "No, there isn't- but could you try?"

"Hm." I grunted, honestly trying to think of something. There were so many places, some things, I didn't know where to begin.

Except, then I did.

"… How about I start at the beginning?" I offered. "Feel like I've been in trouble since day one… come to think of it, if you count my getting shot in the head over a poker chip, I've technically been in trouble since day zero."

Nora's eyes began to sparkle. "You're going to tell us?"

"Not all of it, just… something I am proud I did." I said. "…One thing I know I did right."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Weiss asked.

"Don't worry about it." I said, looking back towards the ceiling. "Lot of stuff in the Mojave, things don't always turn out alright."

"We've kinda gotten that." Yang said.

I nodded. "Looking back… suppose that just makes how things turned out that much sweeter"

(…)

I don't remember much, about what was supposed to be my final moments. But I remember even less about everything else before them. Helps make them stand out.

Few things stick in your mind like being knelt over a shallow grave with a gun to your head. The guy with the gun, a checker-suit wearing yutz with a bigger ego than he deserved. Rambling on about how ending someone's life was just a game, one rigged for you to lose from the start. An 18 Karat run of bad luck.

Then: Bang.

Bang.

Into the ditch with you. A few scant shovelfuls of dirt as a consolation prize. Shuffle off to the afterlife and don't let the door hit your ass on the way out.

"Language," Weiss whispered.

That's how the story should've ended. How it did end, for whoever I used to be. Dropped in a ditch off one of the main roads to New Vegas. Package, life, and memories gone in a pair of strokes. Would've been the end of it.

Then, I came to. Just enough presence of mind to begin clawing out of my grave, so I'm told. I was found by someone who'd been sent to make sure the package, the Platinum Chip, was delivered properly. Only allowed to intervene once it was clear I was going to fail. Only to fail themselves in that charge, due to unforeseen complications.

This person, rather robot, was a Securitron dubbed Victor. One of many that patrolled the streets of New Vegas, but so far from home.

"One of the big wheeled ones?" Ruby asked, eyes sparkling. "With the grenade launchers and-"

Victor, having overcome his complications, dragged me from my grave and to the nearest doctor. Resulting in my being taken to the town of Goodsprings. A community not far from the Vegas limits, but separated by a long stretch of bad road and worse bugs. Cazadors, jittery little beasts.

"You mean buggers." Yang smirked.

It was a remote place, out of contact with a lot of the local politics. Secluded enough that any news of a wayward Courier surviving a brush with death would take a few days to travel. Enough time for me to be treated and recover. Made easy through the use of stimpacks, and being taken to someone who actually knew what they were doing. Doc Mitchell-

Weiss cleared her throat.

(…)

I turned my head towards her "Yes, Snowflake?"

"Stimpack." She said, speaking the word slowly, like it tasted odd in her mouth. "You've mentioned them in the past, but brushed it off. Can you please explain what they are now?"

I shrugged against my cot. "There's really not much point, you've already seen them in action. Remember when I had to pull the bullet out of my arm?"

"Unfortunately." Ruby muttered.

"You did what!?" Nora squawked.

"Remember that needle I stuck myself with?" I asked. "That was a stimpack. A cocktail of chemicals, nutrients, hormones, and other substances meant to boost one's healing abilities. It works well for basic wounds, and helps with more serious ones. It's not a perfect solution, but in a pinch it works where you need it to."

"… So it's a health potion?" Yang asked.

"A what?" I asked back.

"Nevermind." Yang said, shaking her head and smirking.

"..." I turned back towards the ceiling. "-anyway."

(…)

Doc Mitchell was the guy put in charge of patching me up. He was a good man, a former Vault resident who'd lived in Vault 21 for most of his life. Only being forced out when Mr. House evicted everyone. He'd landed in Goodsprings, and had been responsible for the surgery that'd likely saved my life. He pieced my brain back together, and allowed me to rest in his clinic for several days. Perfect chance to lie low without worrying about some checker-suited asshole coming back to undo all his hard work.

Unfortunately, not everything was so easily fixed.

Days after Victor had pulled me to safety, I woke up. The first few hours had been some of the most uncomfortable I can recall. Nothing felt right, nothing moved right. Like I was wearing clothes several sizes too large and struggling to keep from getting tangled in them. But they weren't the worst thing.

The worst thing, was that my memory was gone. Almost all of it. Doc Mitchell helped me work through the motions of everything, tried to reassure me it'd come back with time.

But nerve damage is one of the things Stimpacks struggle with fixing. And the brain is nothing but nerves.

Despite that personally disconcerting hiccup, Doc's bedside manner was flawless. He ran me through a battery of tests to make sure I was up to snuff. Made sure all my faculties were in order and I wouldn't have to worry about losing control of my bowels."

"Gross." Ruby grimaced.

Once all was said and done, Doc gave me his late wife's pip-boy, forever trapping the hunk of steel around my arm. But it was a thoughtful gift. Equipped with every function and monitor to survive in a world that I suddenly found myself lost in. He then returned what few personal effects I'd had on me at the time, what amounted to some leather armor, a hat, and a laser pistol of all things. Though it was broken, and I ultimately traded it for a 9mm not long after. My situation from there was not a pleasant experience either. I was effectively lost. Alone in an unfamiliar region, no memories, no acquaintances or contacts that I knew of, and without a cent to my name. Had I been any place else in the Mojave, I'd have been dead within the hour.

But Goodsprings was a good place. It was in the name. Peaceful little farm town that it was. Most folks that lived there were retired, big horner ranchers, or both. The worst they had to worry about were the odd Gecko coming in to mess with the water supply. Or the odd Cazador that found its way down through the pass. I couldn't have asked for a better place to get my bearings. It started with simple movement exercises, and basic mental gymnastics. Enough to get everything running right. Once I was mostly down to rights, I set to work helping around the town to earn myself some cash. I didn't have a clear idea what my plan was, but I wouldn't get anywhere without some pocket change. In the course of this, I met Sunny Smiles. A hunter and resident peace keeper for the town.

"Sunny Smiles?" Blake said, almost giggling.

"Shh!" Nora shushed.

Sunny was a good woman, sweet as could be. Had a dog by the name of Cheyenne she kept with her. When I went to her, she already knew who I was. It was a small town, word traveled fast. Especially when you're the new guy and you run around calling yourself 'Courier Six'. But she was patient with me. She gave me a spare Varmint Rifle and helped me get my finer motor skills working. It would be a long time before I got good, if I ever had been before. But she gave me a safe space to sort myself out. Showed me some places around town that were abandoned, so I could practice my lock work. Let me try my hand at repair work, fixing the Radio at the local saloon. Taught me the basics for cooking and survival… In a way, I owe a lot of what I am today to her teaching me. She couldn't have taught me everything, but she taught me what I needed.

It was good.

But it couldn't last forever.

Week and a half, maybe two after I woke up, another traveler found their way to Goodsprings. A caravaner by the name of Ringo, worked for the Crimson Caravan company, a big trade outfit in the NCR. He was the sole survivor of a raider attack on his group, and had barely managed to escape with his life. Scared, he asked for a place to hunker down and hide. Do much like I did when Victor showed up. And, like they had with me, they gave Ringo a place to hide. An old fueling station, at the outermost edge of town, opposite way he'd came from.

Not long after he'd arrived, trouble followed.

The Raiders that had attacked his caravan weren't some small-time crooks. They were an organized group known as the Powder Gangers. A cabal of escaped convicts from the nearby NCRCF that had chased him-

"Hold it." Weiss ordered, raising a finger.

(…)

"Yes?" I asked

"The who?" Weiss asked. "You never mentioned anyone called the 'Powder Gangers' before. Yet now you make it sound like they were some massive problem."

"At the time they were. To me at least… relatively speaking." I said. "After a while, as tensions and bigger problems brewed in the wasteland, Darwinism resulted in them disappearing."

"Darwho?" Blake asked.

"Famous scientist from before the world. Developed a functioning theory on the evolution of life." I quickly explained, before turning back to Weiss. "Short hand, since they don't matter: The Powder Gangers were NCR convicts that had been shipped outside their territory. The NCR was going to use them as labor to help develop the Mojave, since the settlers they'd sent were expected to try and actually settle the land. The convicts were just expected to build infrastructure while serving their sentences. Build structures, make and maintain roads, general maintenance that's the backbone of any society. Of course, being violent criminals conscripted into hard labor they resented it."

"Then what changed?" Pyrrha asked.

"The guy in charge of the program had failed basic comprehension." I said. "They needed the Convicts to mine a quarry for stone, so they gave them the tools to do it… Including dynamite."

A look of confusion spread over everyone.

"Dyna-what?" Ruby asked.

"…Explosives." I simplified. "They gave the convicts access to mining explosives."

"… they what?" Weiss asked, looking ready to have an aneurysm.

"They gave the convicts access to explosives." I repeated. "The convicts then proceeded to smuggle it back into the prison and stage a jailbreak, killing all the guards. Hence calling themselves the Powder Gangers. Like a powder keg waiting to explode."

Another moment of silence passed. Everyone genuinely appalled at the lack of… just any intelligence.

Weiss buried her head in her hands, something I'm pretty sure Kimball did after hearing it too. "Oh my GODS."

"Yeah." I said. "After that, they used the prison as a base of operations and began raiding. Doing everything they could to keep the NCR from coming back. Which meant accosting anyone who happened to pass by. Which leads back to Ringo… and back to the story."

(…)

The Powder Gangers chased Ringo all the way to Goodsprings. Fully intent on finishing the job they'd started. Upon arriving however, they couldn't find him. The one in charge of the group, a man named Joe Cobb, began routinely harassing the Town's Matriarch and Saloon owner. A tough woman by the name of Trudy. He made it clear that they wanted Ringo, and as long as he was handed over, the gang would leave the town in peace. Trudy didn't buy it though, and the town protected Ringo. Though they knew they couldn't do so forever, and hoped he'd know when it was best for him to leave.

Not long after, I knew it was my own time as well.

I was as close to good as I was going to be, and I couldn't live off their good graces forever. The only thing to do was to head out into the Mojave, and try to find my own path. Whatever that would turn out to be. The only clue I had to follow was a contract for the Mojave Express delivery service. Signing me as the one delivering a 'Platinum Chip'. The nearest Delivery office was a couple miles down the road. Figured they'd be the place to start, maybe they knew more about me.

But, on the road there, I noticed a group of Powder Gangers hiding not far off the path. Worried they might try to stick me, a lone traveler, I took cover and waited for them to pass. They wound up hunkering there for a while, waiting for more of their number to show up. I got to hear them talk. Mostly nonsense and empty threats.

Then Joe Cobb showed up.

Said they'd be getting back up from the guys in the prison.

Thirty of them, on top of the ten that were already there.

The Powder Gangers were looking to expand their territory. Ringo escaping to Goodsprings had been a happy accident for them.

They were going to raze the town, then set up anew on the ashes.

"Oh no." Nora whispered. "What did you do?"

I wasn't sure what to do. Most of me just wanted to run away. I'd only just barely survived my own visit from the reaper. There was no way I was going to survive fighting off forty men in that state. I'd die, and then Goodsprings would be destroyed anyway. The smartest thing I could've done was collect my things and run when the sun went down. Just like Trudy had hoped Ringo would do…

But there was a part of me that wouldn't have it. A small, incessant part of me.

Those people had taken me in, no questions asked, and put me back together. They were honest and peaceful folk. Trying to survive in a place that was slowly becoming less honest and a whole lot less peaceful.

Despite it being the smart move, I knew if I walked away, I'd regret it.

I wouldn't let the new memories I was making be tainted by regret.

So I turned around and ran back to Goodsprings. I didn't know what I was going to do, Trudy and the towns folk had been adamant that they didn't want to fight. They wanted peace. But if they didn't, they'd die, as it was the odds were already against them. But I had to try, something, anything.

I got back to town and went straight to Sunny and Trudy. Told them everything I'd overheard, what was coming their way. Though Trudy didn't want a fight, she was convinced that Cobb was up to no good, and took my word. So we got planning, we wouldn't have long. The biggest issue would be convincing folks to pitch in. We were going to need munitions, ordinance, and medicine. First two for the actual fighting, and the third for patching up after the fact. Doc Mitchell was the easiest to convince, all I had to do was ask. He didn't want to fight, but he wasn't going to abandon Goodsprings. He'd built his life there after being removed from the Vault, and he wasn't going to abandon the memory of his wife. The trouble came with collecting the ammo and explosives. It took a lot of teeth and a lot of pulling to get the owner of the local general store, Chet, to lend a hand. Despite his life and livelihood being worth more than a couple bullets, he insisted that he be reimbursed somehow. Never mind if we lost he'd be killed to begin with.

"What an idiot." Weiss said, shaking her head.

The last person who needed convincing was a retired prospector by the name of Easy Pete. He had his own cache of dynamite from his scavving days, which would level the playing field more in our favor. Though Pete was more pliable than Chet, he wasn't easy like his name suggested. He knew better than to be putting explosives in the hands of people who had no clue how to safely use them. I had to give myself a crash course on whatever information I could find just to convince him I'd be responsible.

"You mean so you wouldn't blow it." Yang said.

Somehow we managed to prep ourselves in the nick of time. There were ten of us to their forty, literal four to one odds. But we knew the terrain better, and there was only one way they could come into town. We set up on the rooftops mere moments before they made it over the horizon.

It was show time.

…

I was crouched on the roof of The Prospector's Saloon, hiding behind the upper lip of the signage, desert wind blowing through my hair as I carefully held the dynamite in my hand, Varmint Rifle near my side. Peering over the edge of the signage, I could see Cobb's Powder Gangers coming up the road. They hyped themselves up for an easy job, came armed to the teeth with guns and dynamite. They knew they'd have us on numbers and surprise alone.

We'd taken one of those away from them, it'd have to be enough.

"Here they come." Sunny said, peering over the sign herself. "You ready?"

"Nope." I said, heart thundering in my chest. "On my signal."

Sunny nodded, then turned to look over at Chet's store. Easy Pete, Chet, and Ringo were hiding on top of it, better vantage point. Across the street, on an adjoining farm house, a few more residents were waiting. More than them, further up the hill just off the main drag. They'd give whatever cover fire they could. Trudy was with them, looking down through binoculars.

We waited as the Powder Gangers got closer, running up the road, firing their guns into the air. If we hadn't known they were coming, that would've gotten people's attention fast. Caused them to panic.

Instead, we watched them run their way into the town. Waited until they were as close as possible. If we attacked too early, and actually managed to win, they'd scatter. Have time to come up with a better plan. One we wouldn't be able to anticipate. If we were going to fight, we needed to win it the first time. No chance for repeats.

Cobb's gang funneled onto the main drag, still hollering and shooting their guns. I could hear glass shattering and bullets hitting the wood. Had to hope they weren't chucking dynamite into the buildings. Wouldn't make sense for them to do it if they actually wanted to keep the town afterwards. They kept at it for a minute or two, firing at the empty buildings beneath us. Hoping to kill everyone, or draw out anyone willing to fight.

After burning through a chunk of ammo, the shooting paused. Cobb's gang fell into a confused silence. They were realizing something was wrong.

Too late.

I lit the fuse of my dynamite.

"Now!" I shouted, pitching the red stick up over the barrier.

There were some confused shouts, for half a moment. Followed by deafening thunder and shockwave that rocked the saloon. Before my ears even had a chance to stop ringing more explosions followed it, as Easy Pete began lobbing his ordinance. The blasts that followed hitting harder and louder.

Somewhere around the second or third explosion a severed arm landed on the roof, next to my rifle. I grabbed it, my rifle not the arm, and came up over the side of the sign. Sunny, next to me, did the same. Almost immediately drawing a bead on someone and firing.

The scene in the street below was carnage. Pete's aim was either really good, or he was damn lucky. There were craters in the ground where his explosives had gone off, others peppered around them. Some even larger and deeper. A guess says they'd been carrying extra dynamite. Which explained the harder explosions.

There were nearly two dozen men on the ground. I didn't immediately count them, but I could tell by the way Cobb's men were scattered a good chunk had been caught in the blasts. Only a few of them were actually dead, but they were the lucky ones. The rest were writhing on the ground, maimed by the explosion. Force having ripped limbs and torn them to raw meat. Fire scorching their skin black.

I drew a bead on another, still trying to recover from the blasts, and fired.

Even if we'd cut their forces in half, that left twenty men left to fight, including Cobb.

We were still fighting an up-hill battle. We needed all the momentum we could build.

Sunny leapt up beside me, and we fired in tandem. I did my best to make sure I was nailing someone each time. I wasn't a bad shot, but with my finer motor skills still out of whack missing wasn't hard.

Chaos followed as Pete and Chet continued to toss dynamite, keeping Cobb's gang scattered and scrambled. They tried to recover, but between the efforts of Sunny, Me, and the farmers across the way, it was clear they'd made a mistake. In a blink, twenty turned to fifteen, as we caught a final few before they could recover. Only after that did they start trying to fight back.

The battle turned when Cobb lobbed a bundle of dynamite at the house across the way. I remember shouting for them to take cover. But I remember the blast being louder. The building caved in with a fiery crash. We pulled them from the wreckage later. I only hope it was as quick for them as it had been for us.

After the building fell I managed to take out two more of the gang before Cobb gave his act an encore. A stick of dynamite landed on the roof with me and Sunny, and we had to dive off it to avoid the blast. I must've fallen two stories before hitting the ground. Hurt like a sonnuvabitch. Should've been my first clue to avoid high places. Nearly broke my arm on the landing, but managed to scramble to my feet. Miraculously, the saloon didn't collapse from the explosion. Either I had more luck back then, or the saloon was just built better. I'd lost my rifle in the fall though, and the powder gangers weren't afraid to seize the moment. I had to bolt around the back of the building to lose them, then cut around the back of the general store. Took the corner back around to the main drag, grabbing the first thing I could for a weapon.

Which turned out to be a shovel Chet left out for grave digging. Ironic.

I'll admit after hitting the ground that what followed was mostly my trying to dodge bullets. Harder, in a world that doesn't have things like aura. Meant I had to spend more time running than standing my ground. Made worse by the fact that Pete and Chet had started getting very liberal with the dynamite. There were bodies everywhere, and I knew that even though Sunny and I had lost our position, there were still people shooting. Like all others, our battlefield had descended into chaos after the first shots were fired. The best I could do was try and avoid getting shot, while still trying to take out as many of Cobb's men as I could.

I actually managed to take out three of them. Which was probably the biggest surprise of that whole mess.

In the span of maybe five minutes of fighting, we managed to decimate Cobb's entire gang. Cut their numbers from forty down to a number you could count on one hand. They tried to retreat around them, but Sunny and I weren't having it. Sunny and Cheyenne would chase the rest of Cobb's men into the hills, and ultimately came back from the incident in one piece. Said she left their bodies for the Geckos and crows to fight over.

Cobb wound up falling to me to deal with.

I chased him back down the road to prison. He spent the whole time trying to shoot me, but kept panicking and missing. We wound up going that way, the whole distance back to the camp I'd originally caught him and his boys at. He made his stand there. Made the smart choice of it too. It was more familiar ground to him than me. It very quickly turned into a game of cat and mouse. Who was which seemed to change with each exchange.

But I think the victor is obvious, given who's telling the story.

Cobb caught me as I was attempting to pull from behind cover, and hurled a stick of dynamite at my feet. No way in hell I was going to run before it blew.

But I still had Chet's shovel.

I caught the dynamite in the air and batted it back to Cobb. Funny thing about dynamite, it's incredibly finicky and unstable. Kinda like Dust. Handle it the wrong way, it'll explode for no reason. Part of the reason it was later phased out for a substance known as trinitrotoluene, or TNT. Though even that would explode if, say, a set amount of it went off in close proximity.

Cobb was carrying multiple sticks of dynamite on him.

What was left of him wouldn't fill a pill bottle. Much less a coffin.

…

It was only a short fight, way shorter than others I've been in. But it was the first big one I'd ever involved myself in. It hadn't been smooth. People died on both sides, and Goodsprings was still damaged in the crossfire. But compared to the mess it could've been, the outcome was preferable. The casualties were minor, and the buildings could be repaired and rebuilt. With Cobb gone, the Powder Gangers left Goodsprings alone. They learned from his mistake, the town was small, but absolutely vicious in a fight.

"I'm sure it was a blast." Yang smirked.

After burying the dead and cleaning the town up, we celebrated. Spent a night drinking and dancing in the saloon. I felt… good about what I'd done. These people had kept me safe when I'd need it. I managed to return the favor and then some.

It set the town for a lot of what I did after that. I took to covering my face for security's sake, after leaving Goodsprings. Just to make sure the man in the checkered suit, or any enterprising Powder Ganger, wouldn't be able to track me so easily. But I didn't forget about what I'd done in Goodsprings.

Neither did they.

(…)

"Goodsprings wouldn't be safe after that." I said, scratching Zwei's head. "Trouble would still find its way there from time to time, just the nature of things. Sunny and Cheyenne would eventually wind up falling to it, later on. But I never forgot about them, or what they did for me." I paused, thinking about the town, how it'd grown. "I've made some bad calls in the past. Ones that've gotten people killed. Sometimes it's simple and easy. It would've been easier not to go back. Lot of people in my situation wouldn't have. I did. I don't make the right call all the time. But I did on that one. I think I'm allowed to feel proud of that."

My head swiveled, so I could get a look at everyone. They were… well, they looked enthralled. My tale might've seemed tall, but they were hanging on every word. Especially Nora, Yang, Ruby, and Jaune. Weiss, Blake, Ren, and Pyrrha were still marveling at the story. They were just better at keeping their expressions composed and muted, especially Ren and Blake.

"You saved a whole town of people?" Ruby asked.

"Goes both ways." I told her. "I'd be dead if they hadn't taken me in."

"Then you led them in a fight against forty people?" Weiss asked.

"Didn't have a choice- well, actually I did, but no other option I'd have taken." I said. "What else was I supposed to do, Join Cobb and sack the place? No thanks."

"Did you really blow him up with his own dynamite?" Nora asked, practically shaking with excitement.

"Yeah, actually." I said, chuckling. "On a list of pretty wild things, it's low, but still on there."

"… You know, part of me thinks I should be upset that you killed him." Ruby said, pursing her lips thoughtfully. "But it's, like, how at the end of the movie the bad guy is offered the chance to surrender, and instead he just keeps fighting. Like it should be sad-"

"But he had it coming?" I offered. "Yeah. Except Cobb wasn't one of those sympathetic sorts. More than once I caught him threatening Trudy and the town. He got what was coming to him."

Ruby simply nodded at that.

"I'm not proud about having to kill those people." I said. "I'm proud that I managed to keep a bunch of folks who I knew were good, safe from a bunch who were bad. Like I said, things aren't always so cut and dry. They just were at that time."

"I have a question." Weiss said. "You said this was a long time ago, correct? Just after you recovered from being… shot in the head?..." Weiss grimaced. "That feels really weird to say out loud."

"It does, every time." I said. "And yes, it was."

"You made it sound like you were more... I don't know, organized?" She continued. "Given everything that we've been doing lately, it does sound possible. But when we first met you, you seemed… different. A bit more erratic."

"Part of landing in an alien world." I said. "I was struggling to get my footing, and maybe didn't make some of the smartest choices I could have… Though being honest, I'd been like that for a while."

"Really?" Pyrrha asked, curious.

I nodded. "For a good long while, I was a bit more like I am now, back in the Mojave. Things, I don't know, seemed more directed and straight forward. I trained regularly, did jobs for people, hunted animals and monsters. It made sense, I guess."

I paused, as memories came back that I'd rather be forgotten. Cold air in my lungs. Cramped wooden walls, the sting of torn sinew and tendon in my hands.

The stink of blood in the air.

I pushed that memory back down. Some things, some people, were better lost to the sands of time.

"… Then a few months before I came here, I went on a job." I said. "Had made a promise to someone that I'd help them. It went south, bad. Wasn't the first time I'd come out the other side of a deal worse for wear, but that one had done a number. In the months before I came here… I don't know, it all just seemed to be a blur. I stopped training, or taking anything seriously. Just sort of… fell apart, I guess."

"Six." Ruby said, I looked at her, and saw the soft look on her face. Pinched by concern, silver eyes warm.

I smiled.

"Don't worry, I'm alright now." I said. "The past couple of months have been a major wake-up call for me. I know who to thank for that."

"Really?" Yang smirked. "And who would that be?"

"Nora." I answered. "Her pile driving my head into the ground got everything moving again."

"Ah HA!" Nora squawked.

That got a chuckle out of everyone.

"Ok, be that way." Ruby said, sticking tongue out. "… Just know, we're here if you need us, ok?"

I nodded. "Of course."