#arcade why do you look like youre thinking about killing cass. rex already killed her before and he got kicked out for it

[nukacourier]

what is he doing

[nightingaelic]

Reactions to a vampire courier? Companions plus Benny, Ulysses, Graham, House, Caesar, and Yes Man. (sorry if that's too many :x)

TW: Blood (maybe obviously)

Also I don't normally feel some type of way about AUs but the idea of Joshua Graham encountering a vampire courier is giving me shivers

The courier was a little... strange. Not in any way that stood out to the average wastelander just by looking at them, everyone in the Mojave had their quirks and the courier was no exception. Hell, you get shot in the head and come back, you're bound to have a screw or two loose. They were unquestionably a night owl, but so were half the people on the Strip, who only started to wake up after the sun had gone down and the slot machines were singing their loudest. They usually had bags under their bloodshot eyes, but every caravan driver from here to the Hub was short on sleep.

On the other hand, the courier had some habits that were a little beyond surface-level eccentricities. For one, no one had ever seen them eating, not once. Even when the King laid out a spread of pre-war snacks and liquor or when the buffet at the Tops was refreshed, they politely declined and took a swig from the canteen that they never offered to anyone else. They were also rather odd about bathrooms, insisting that anyone accompanying them remain outside on watch and let no one else through the door until they were finished. But the undeniable moment of oddity came one night in October, when their companion rounded a corner in Freeside after a trip to the Atomic Wrangler and discovered the courier behind a rusted dumpster, holding a man against a brick wall with their teeth buried in his neck.

The courier drew back at the interruption, blood smeared across their face. "I'm not- it's not what- he- oh, fuck."

Arcade Gannon: Arcade stared open-mouthed for a moment, before snapping violently back into the present. "Is he dead?"

"Umm..." The courier glanced at the man they were holding, whose head was lolling against the bricks. "Yes? Mostly."

With no patient to resuscitate, Arcade rounded on them. "Six, what in the ever-loving fuck are you doing?"

The courier tried to wipe away the blood that was dribbling from their chin, but they only succeeded in spreading it up their jawline. "Well, I, um, I was trying to..."

Whatever excuse they were searching for eluded them, so they dropped the pretense. "I was feeding, Arcade."

"Feeding? What, like some kind of-" Arcade's eyes widened and he cut his sentence off early in realization. "No. No way. That's not- vampires aren't real!"

That earned him a look of intense skepticism. "Arcade, we've fought off plant monsters and rattlesnake-coyote hybrids together. I have a gun in my pack that lets me teleport."

"Oh, okay, so you have some kind of iron deficiency and you're delusional." Arcade laughed, the sound high and harsh in the quiet alley. "Great. Fuck."

Craig Boone: Rather than engage in an abandoned alley, Boone immediately backtracked to a busier street. He was unsurprised when the courier didn't follow him: Even in Freeside, someone covered in blood was sure to be noticed and questioned.

Boone left town that night and made for Novac. He was pretty sure the courier would follow him, but he didn't know where else to go. At least he knew they were coming. A few people in Novac asked about where he'd been, what the courier was up to, but eventually they stopped asking.

A couple of weeks went by. Boone was on the night shift again when the door into the dinosaur swung open to reveal the courier. He'd heard someone coming, their feet on the stairs, and he already had his gun pointed in their face. "We will never work together again," he said, before they could open their mouth.

"Boone, can you just-"

"I don't want an explanation." Boone shook his head. "I don't need one. I already did you a favor, leaving New Vegas without putting you back in your grave. This is over."

The courier took a deep breath. "71."

"What?"

"71. I've killed 71 Legion soldiers and left their bodies empty under the Mojave sky." They looked down and shuffled their feet. "I've tasted their fear. They're more scared of me than the Burned Man, now."

Boone studied them. Ever so slowly, he lowered his gun.

Lily Bowen: "Put him down, dearie," Lily chastised them. "You're playing too roughly with that man. And watch your language around your grandma!"

The courier looked down at their victim, at their torn throat and limp limbs. "He tried to mug me, Lily. It wasn't pretty."

"He looks like he's had enough," Lily insisted. "Set him down. Gently."

With a sigh, the courier obliged and lowered the man to the ground. "I'm sorry, Lily. I should have told you earlier. I don't mean to be rude when I turn down your cooking, I just... I can't seem to..."

"Hush, now." Lily produced her enormous handkerchief and gathered the courier up in her arms, dabbing at the blood on their face with a corner of the cloth. "You've gotten it all over yourself, haven't you? We can clean that right up, but it looks like Grandma's going to have to do a load of laundry. You made the mess, so you get to help."

Raul Alfonso Tejada: Raul swallowed nervously, something he'd noticed he was increasingly doing around the courier. "You know, we get murciélagos down in Arizona that do the same thing. They won't leave the brahmin alone."

The courier took in his anxious stance and sighed. "Raul, I'm not going to hurt you. Prometo. It's okay."

"Sure boss, but I don't think the hair on the back of my neck is going down anytime soon." Raul smiled, but it was more of a grimace. "Or it wouldn't, if I still had any. Como..?"

"No clue." The courier shrugged and held their hands up, letting the corpse they'd been holding slide to the ground. "I think it had something to do with me surviving Benny's best attempts to do me in, but a bullet is a bullet and I don't remember if I was like this before, or..."

"Or only after." Raul chuckled. "Jesucristo, and here I am thinking I'll outlive you like most everyone else I've known."

"Yep."

"Should I start calling you el chupacabra?"

The courier grinned, a bloody smile with sharp teeth.

Rose of Sharon Cassidy: "Fuck," Cass echoed, scrambling to pull her shotgun from its holster. "Knew I had too much, can't even- who are you and what've you done with the courier? Some kind of cannibal, wearing their skin? Alien? Shapeshifter? I'll blow a hole in your liver to match mine!"

"Whoa, Cass, it's me, it's me!" The courier dropped the man they were holding and held their blood-stained hands up. "Same old Six, just... maybe I wasn't straight with you about why I don't order anything at bars."

"Goddamn right you weren't straight with me!" Cass gestured at the body on the ground with the barrel of her gun. "Who's the fucker on the floor and why are you two pints in on him?"

"Just trying to get my drink on," the courier muttered.

Cass repaid this facetiousness with a jab of her shotgun, and they raised their hands higher. "Okay, okay, I'm sorry! You tell me, how do you tactfully tell someone that you're a creature of the night and you need to drink blood to survive?"

"Creature of the night? You're fucking loopy." Cass' eyes narrowed. "There's plenty of critters in the Mojave that only come out when it's dark, but most of them don't tear into..."

She trailed off into curses when she realized she was wrong. The courier smiled hesitantly and lowered their hands an inch. "Hey. Let me chuck this failed mugger in the dumpster and we can talk about it like a pair of civilized folks?"

Veronica Santangelo: Veronica squeaked and fell back a few steps, banging her elbow against the edge of the dumpster. A jolt of confused pain shot up her arm, and the Scribe couldn't help giggling harshly at the sudden assault on her funny bone.

"Not- laughing... at murder," she managed to get out between hisses of pain. "Oh, for the love of... right, you're not getting out of explaining what you are, exactly, just because I'm indis-indisposed!"

The courier couldn't help laughing at the squirming Scribe, but they did their best to stifle it. "Sorry, I'm sorry, I um... I guess I don't really know... what I am?"

"There's books!" Veronica burst out, pointing at the courier and their victim wildly. "I've seen them, in old libraries. Creatures that feed on blood, only come out at night, don't show up in... in mirrors, of course, no wonder you're weird about bathrooms, I should test... Dracula! That's it, you're a Dracula!"

"A Dracula?" The courier held their hands up, as if seeing them anew. "Never heard of them. Are they... bad?"

"Well, traditionally, yes." Veronica made a face and rubbed her elbow. "Black cloaks, sleeping in coffins, seducing and manipulating everyone around them... and people don't like it when you take their blood, in my experience."

"Whose blood have you taken?"

"This isn't about me, Six!"

ED-E: The eyebot bobbed wildly and made noises of concern, blips and blats and a flat burst of trumpets from some old jazz tune.

"I was hungry," the courier protested. "And this asshole pulled a knife on me and wanted all of my caps. Probably more than that, if we're being honest. He wasn't doing the world any good, but he did me some, for sure."

ED-E flipped between old clips of a Silver Shroud radio show. "Well, isn't this a deep, dark <static> secret? <static> In a situation such as this, the best anyone can do is <static> try to control it!" The robot added some more concerned beeps for good measure.

"I'm trying," the courier said with a sigh, looking down at the dead man they were holding. "You know I wouldn't hurt some random person, ED-E. Not if I could help it. The Mojave's full of bad people, enough to keep me going if I'm careful."

Rex: The hair on Rex's spine stood up, and he let out a long, low growl. The courier froze for a moment, before realizing that he was growling not at them but at the man they were holding.

"He's dead, Rex," they reassured the cyberdog, lowering the corpse to the floor for inspection.

Rex sniffed the body over, taking in the copper scent of his blood and the Freeside stink on his clothes. He sniffed the courier too, each of their hands they held out to him and the thick headiness of adrenaline. He whined and wagged his tail twice.

"Good boy," the courier said, straightening up. "It's about time I turned in, anyway. Let's dump this guy and split."

Benny Gecko: Benny crossed his arms. "You know, Six, if you're dead set on getting your kicks in Freeside every now and then, you might want to ease up on the passions with the next greaser you snag. This one's torn all to pieces."

"I wasn't- what kind of-" The courier dropped the man they were holding and sputtered. "Christ, only you could make a midnight murder awkward, Benny."

"Murder?" Benny raised his eyebrows and looked from side to side theatrically. "Who said anything about a murder? All I saw was some dreamboat and the best apple butterer of New Vegas playing back alley bingo, officer."

The courier's eyes narrowed. "Not gonna rat me out? Tell the King or somebody that I'm..."

"What, taking a page out of the White Glove Society's book?" Benny held his hands up. "None of my business. Well, if you ever come for me with that look in your eyes, though, that'll be a different story."

"Not much you'd be able to do," the courier pointed out. "You already tried and failed to kill me once."

Ulysses: Rather than react like any normal wastelander might've upon encountering someone attacking a man with their teeth, Ulysses just stood there, taking the scene in. "Heard tales of a tribe like you. East, farther east than even I've walked... a coven hiding in tunnels, emerging only when their hungers grow too strong to ignore, strong enough to pull blood from the veins of the world around them."

"Well, I don't hide in tunnels." The courier grimaced and heaved their victim up over their shoulder, depositing them unceremoniously in the dumpster. "Unless some disgruntled Frumentarius sends me out to hunt mutants under Hopeville."

"Perhaps you have more in common with those predators than I assumed," Ulysses admitted. "But then, your path has always run red. Blood of the Old World, blood of the new, blood of the Bull and the Bear..."

The courier rolled their eyes as they peeled off their red-stained coat and tossed it in the dumpster as well. "Don't talk to me about blood. I know you've seen just as much as me, but it doesn't mean the same thing when I look at it."

Ulysses cracked a hint of a smile. "You see life where I see death. Two sides, courier."

"Yeah, yeah. If you're not going to try to kill me, come on. You can wax poetic and lecture me about which road I'm walking while I take a shower."

Joshua Graham: "A creature far from God," Graham said in his most reproachful tone. "Forever damned for the souls of the innocent they've taken from the earth. Aren't we a pair, courier."

"You can fuck right off with that attitude." The courier dropped the man they were holding and wiped their hands on their coat. "He tried to kill me first. For some caps."

"The crimes of others do not absolve you of your own sins, courier," Graham continued, leisurely retrieving his gun from its holster. He held it up in the muted neon light that filtered through the alley, turning the weapon this way and that. "Though I confess I am also looking for absolution in this way."

"Are you going to kill me?" the courier asked, eyeing the gun as well.

"I've no doubt it would leave this world better than when you walked it," Graham replied. "But my own opinions are not enough to seal your fate. Perhaps we should find this man's family and hear their feelings on the matter."

The courier took a step forward, then another, until their chest was right up against the pistol's muzzle, pressed against the fabric of their shirt. "Go ahead. Try."

And though Joshua Graham was sorely tempted to pull the trigger, though the courier made no move to stop him, something in their eyes... some faraway pain, older than the desert itself, fresh as the blood on the ground, stayed his hand.

He lowered the gun, chastised, and the courier walked away.

Robert House: The Securitron that bore Robert House's face on its screen leveled a minigun at the courier. "Whoa!" the courier protested, dropping their victim and putting their hands out. "Can't we talk about this?"

"And what have we to discuss?" House sounded absolutely disgusted. "I believe you're familiar with my contract with the White Glove Society. If they wish to continue their current prosperity in New Vegas, cannibalism is strictly forbidden. You are subject to the same terms and conditions, as one of my employees."

"Terms and condi- hold on, hold on, you never asked me whether I was a cannibal," the courier replied. "Are you talking about that document you had me sign, way back when I agreed to help you fight the NCR and the Legion?"

"The very same."

"How is that fair? That thing was over 200 pages long, I didn't grow up in the 21st century, I don't have a degree in... okay, okay." The courier waved their hands. "Cannibalism is a no-go. This isn't cannibalism, this is vampirism."

"Which falls under the definition of cannibalism," House replied, his annoyed tone still detectable over the sound of the minigun spinning up. "Section 3.65, subsection F. Next time, read the fine print."

Caesar: The Legion's great leader pivoted in an instant from surprise to quiet anger. "Clean yourself up, courier. I expect to see you in my quarters within the hour."

He turned and left the alley swiftly, letting his powerful stride and swinging cloak cover his shaken confidence. The people of Freeside cowered as he passed, shrinking into the shadows as he made his way back to the Strip, but the fear in their eyes was not enough to erase the image of the courier bent over in bloodlust, holding their victim in total subjugation.

The courier found him on the top floor of the Lucky 38, gazing out over the city he had conquered and named his Rome. "Leave us," Caesar bid his Praetorian Guard. They bowed and departed the room without question.

"You asked to see me," the courier said nervously, shifting their weight from foot to foot. They had changed clothes, and no trace of blood remained on them.

"I did." Caesar beckoned them to the window next to him. They stood in silence for a moment, watching the lights wink below.

"I'm a well-read man, courier," Caesar said finally. "I know the legends of the Old World, and I recognize the marks of one of their nightmares in you. I order you to tell me the truth: Do you fit the full definition of the creature they called 'vampire,' or do you simply mimic the things to add to your fearsome affect?"

The courier didn't answer right away. When they did, their voice was soft. "I pretend to be nothing. I am what I am."

"And everything that comes with it?" Caesar pressed. "Darkness, the blood of the innocent, eternity?"

"Yes."

Caesar turned to face them fully. "Then I, Almighty Caesar, command you to make me as you are."

Yes Man: "Now that's a twist I didn't see coming!" Yes Man said, his happy tone only slightly tempered with uncertainty. "Boy, am I glad I don't have a circulatory system right now!"

The courier shushed the Securitron and looked around the alley surreptitiously. "Yes Man, I swear to god, if you blow my cover I'm disassembling you."

"As I've told you before, I can't technically die!" Yes Man reassured them. "And I certainly wouldn't want to endanger you and your hobbies, but my volume mixer is tied to my enthusiasm simulator and I can't adjust it! You'll just have to hope any passersby aren't interested in following my friendly voice into an alley!"

"Then go back to the Lucky 38 and we'll talk later," the courier insisted, through gritted teeth.

"I technically never left! But if you mean this Securitron, sure thing!" Yes Man zoomed away on his single wheel, whistling the whole way back to the casino where the rest of his consciousness was housed. He kept whistling as he ran probability algorithms, only pausing when the courier returned after a few hours and crossed their arms in front of his main screen.

"Hi there!" he said joyfully. "I've just been cross-checking Mr. House's records on noteworthy disappearances in the Strip, and I've flagged eight of them as potentially being connected to you! I don't want to assume your intentions, but if you don't want to be found out, I've developed a plan for choosing your next victims that will help you remain undetected in New Vegas for 184 years! Give or take a few!"

The courier put their head in their hand and sighed.

[fallout-friends-react]

How about some New Vegas companions getting Jealous due to someone flirting with the Courier (who they currently have a crush on)? 😎

I know I said I wouldn’t do extra characters unless asked for but I’m keeping Vulpes bc there aren’t a lot of nv companions and also I get a lot of comments on him lol

Arcade: Arcade took a swig of his drink and coughed. He and the Courier had decided they were going to a bar, but were going to stay separated so they could meet new people, independent of each other. Arcade was alone, but the Courier had no problem attracting other patrons. The one talking to them right then, didn’t sit right with him. Something about the way they were smiling at them felt off. He took one last swig of his putrid drink, and walked over to them. “Hey uhhh, I’ve got an emergency,” he grabbed the Courier’s shoulder. The wastelander shot him a look. The Courier asked what kind of emergency and Arcade panicked, he didn’t think this far. “UHHH I just. Peed my pants. and I need your help like right now.” He grimaced immediately after saying this, but hey! It got the Courier away from that creep! 

Boone: Seeing some random wastrel hit on the Courier stirred something in Boone. His rational side knew it’d be best if he were to just stay out of it, hell the Courier didn’t look all that bothered by it. But the irrational side of Boone acted without thinking. Without saying anything, he stepped between the Courier and the person talking to them. “Excuse me buddy I’m trying to talk to someone!” They said, and tried to shove Boone out of the way. He remained silent and his stance was rock solid, despite their shove, he didn’t move an inch. His sunglasses were on, but the bar-goer knew he was giving them a death stare. “Alright whatever.” They walked away without putting up much of a fight. 

Ed-E: Literally incapable of romantic feelings, but if he was he may just vaporize them. 

Lily: She doesn’t have any kind of crush on the Courier, but she’s extremely protective of them. Hardly anyone in the wasteland is good enough for them, certainly no one from The Thorn. Lily and the Courier had just stopped by. They weren’t even going to stay for a fight, but somehow in that time some miscreant had managed to stop the Courier and try to flirt with them. The Courier was clearly uncomfortable. All Lily had to do was stand behind the Courier, very closely, and look down at the wastelander. They scuttled off in a matter of seconds. 

Raul: Raul and the Courier had just stopped into Freeside for a job. It’s not Raul’s favorite place, but it’s not the worst cesspool he’s been to. On their way to their contact for the job, they were stopped by a member of the Kings. He was clearly interested in the Courier, and he was a suave son of a bitch. The king didn’t get a few sentences into his spiel before something in Raul told him to put a stop to it. He gently grabbed the Courier’s arm and lead them behind him. He sighed loudly, “alright alright that’s enough kid. They clearly aren’t interested.” He didn’t know that for sure, but he kind of hoped. “So why don’t you go back to… What do you do? Put wax in your hair?” He chuckled. Before the king could start spewing insults, Raul talked over him. “Leave an old ghoul and his friend in peace.” He didn’t want to start a fight. 

Rex: D o g 

Cass: The Courier and Cass had decided to stay at one of the fancy New Vegas hotels for once, they deserved it after all the shit they had just went through. Cass was killing it at one of the tables, to the point that a crowd had formed to watch her. She’d been drinking, and was yelling about how well she was doing. Just as she was about to throw down on another bet, she spotted the Courier through her admirers, talking to another gambler. She threw her bet on the table, and briskly walked up to the Courier and their company. Cass tapped the gambler on the shoulder, and just as they were turning around, she punched them square in the nose. The Courier, stunned, just gave Cass a look. “I didn’t want them talking to you!” She shrugged and walked off to win more caps. 

Veronica: Veronica was itching to get out of the Brotherhood bunker, but the Courier needed to be there on business. She waited as long as she could, until she couldn’t stand it anymore. She shot up, and decided to look for the Courier to drag them out of the bunker herself. After surveying the dark halls of the bunker for what seemed like hours but were probably just a few minutes, she finally found them. Talking to another Brotherhood member. She was already mad that they made her wait so long, but she was furious to see that she was waiting while they standing there giggling with this scribe. The scribe was leaning against the wall, and clearly flexing to look tougher. She huffed loudly, and walked over to the two. Shoving the scribe against the wall, she looked them dead in the eye and said, “back off.” Veronica grabbed the Courier’s hand and lead them down the halls of the bunker. She was smiling to herself. 

Vulpes: While Vulpes was busy talking to another Legionnaire and getting a report, the Courier was setting up camp. They were staying at a small Legion camp, but the Courier preferred to sleep separate from the Legionnaires. The report took longer than Vulpes had expected, and when he was finally able to rejoin the Courier, he found another Legionnaire sitting with them. They were laughing together. There was no way for him to know what they were talking about, but he had to put a stop to it immediately. It’s not like the Courier isn’t allowed to make friends in the Legion, but something about seeing them laugh together made Vulpes seethe. He quietly walked up behind the friendly Legionnaire, waited a moment, and cleared his throat. They whipped their head around, and the Courier could practically see their heart jump out of their chest. The Legionnaire bowed his head a little, and scrambled off. On a good day Vulpes would’ve taught them a lesson, but he let them go this time. 

[nightingaelic]

Companions react to the Courier doing the Infinite Money Glitch in casinos.

I had to look this up, OP, and then I had to conceptualize how this would even work in a storytelling context and write it, anyway I hope you're pleased with yourself because my brain feels like a stack of used sandpaper sheets

The courier had been saving up caps for a while, stashing them in odd places around the Lucky 38. Everywhere you looked there were bottle caps: Dresser drawers in the Presidential Suite, empty ice buckets in the cocktail lounge, in jars on every shelf in the penthouse. Saving up caps for big purchases was pretty common behavior in the Mojave wasteland for anyone, so no one batted an eye when the courier assembled all of the stashes on the carpeted floor of the casino and started counting them out, checking six times before stringing them together in batches of 50 and writing down the final total: 32,768.

No, no one so much as blinked when they lugged all 656 strings of caps out the door of the Lucky 38. No one, that is, except the lucky soul who went with them, saw them exchange all the caps for chips at The Tops Casino, then drop the chips in the back of The Aces theater during Bruce Isaac's set and return to the cashier to collect triple the amount of money they walked in with.

Arcade Gannon: Arcade cringed as the courier struggled to drag the haul of caps out the door of The Tops. The jingle of the cap strings was attracting the attention of just about everyone on the Strip, and someone across the street yelled "High roller!"

"This can't be legal," Arcade said.

"Since when..." the courier huffed and puffed, throwing cap strings over their shoulder carelessly, "... do you give a mole rat's ass about legality?"

"What is this?!?" Arcade hissed incredulously, gesturing to the jingling pile. "Is that cashier paying you off? Are those chips the currency for some wasteland tribe I've never heard of, but somehow have a better exchange rate than the NCR does? Did I just witness a payout for a hit on someone?"

The courier sighed and paused to pat the scientist on the shoulder. "Just don't think about it too hard, okay? Now help me out with this, we're going to Doctor Usanagi's to get me tricked out with as many implants as she has on hand."

Craig Boone: While the courier jingled their way across the Strip asphalt, Boone couldn't help noticing the number of eyes turning their way to stare at the enormous payout they were openly carrying. New Vegas was already a town that kept on trucking if its very creator was killed, that was certain: It wouldn't even pause if its latest mastermind was gunned down over a fortune in steel and aluminum crowns. Boone clutched his rifle close and met as many of the curious and envious stares as he could, his own eyes burning protectively behind his sunglasses.

They managed to get all the way back to the Lucky 38 before the courier stopped and spoke to him. "Nothing? Not even a guess about what this is from?"

Boone shrugged. "None of my business. Just don't carry it all at once again. Ever."

Lily Bowen: "Did you win, dearie?" Lily asked, confused. As far as she had noticed, the courier hadn't approached any of the blackjack tables, roulette wheels or slot machines.

"Yeah, Lily." The courier grinned and started handing her strings of caps to carry. "What do you want to spend your winnings on?"

"My winnings?" Lily shook her head. "Now now, pumpkin. You won fair and square, so you get to choose what you buy."

"My treat," the courier insisted. "Anything at all. We could go to the Gourmand for dinner, we could donate to the Followers in Freeside, we could get singing and dancing lessons from the King... what do you want?"

Lily thought for a moment, wracking her brains. "Brahmin for Jacobstown."

The courier looked at her quizzically. "Brahmin? Not bighorners?"

"Brahmin," Lily confirmed, shouldering the strings upon strings of caps. "Bighorners at Jacobstown will make more bighorners, but they have no brahmin. Brahmin are sweet, easier to handle. But no one will sell brahmin to nightkin."

"Okay." The courier nodded. "Then we have to go to the Gourmand for dinner anyway. I know a guy at the Ultra-Luxe who might help."

Raul Alfonso Tejada: "Dios mío," Raul muttered under his breath. "Who did you kill for the Chairmen? They finally paying you back for getting rid of Benny?"

"Pfft." The courier waved him off, dropping a few strings of caps as they did. "Whoops. Help me out here, and I'll buy you a drink."

"A drink?" Raul laughed. "Not the whole bar? You could probably convince the Garret twins to retire if you gave them half of this haul."

"And why the hell would I want to take over the Atomic Wrangler?" The courier shook their head as they loaded the old ghoul up with caps. "I already have one casino I'm incapable of running. The only customers I get are you and the other Mojave misfits."

Raul grinned. "Hey, you invited us in, amigo. We're just the only ones loco enough to ignore the robots and take you up on it."

Rose of Sharon Cassidy: "Oh, sweet squirrel stew." Cass' eyes were as big as the dinner plates in the casino's restaurant. "That's enough change to buy the Van Graffs out of business. That's enough change to tell Alice McLafferty to stick it where the sun don't shine, then back it up with enough muscle to scare her out of the Mojave."

The courier nodded and started handing her strings of caps. "It is also enough change to start funding her competitors and drive her out of New Vegas."

"Now you're talkin'." Cass smirked and accepted the extra weight. "So who're we gonna back? Far Go? The Water Merchants? Gun Runners?"

"Actually..." the courier smiled. "A little birdie told me that the Mojave Express is looking to expand its horizons. Start offering goods in addition to services. And you know me, I like to root for the home team when I can."

Cass laughed. "Well that's a surprise. You plannin' on playin' courier again? Get yourself shot in the head a second time?"

"Not if I can help it."

Veronica Santangelo: "Uhhhh, Six?" Veronica crossed her arms. "I thought we agreed we weren't going to stir up trouble for a bit after the adventure at the dam. This screams 'trouble' to me."

"Aw, lighten up Veronica." The courier winked at her and handed her a string of caps, like a consolation prize. "We're in a casino. The odds aren't in your favor, but at least you can have fun for a bit."

Veronica turned the offering down. "Math may not have been my strongest subject when I was in school, but I do know that 30,000 minus 30,000 does not equal 90,000, under any normal odds. What are you getting yourself- and more importantly, me- into?"

The courier sighed. "It's nothing. Just a little loophole I discovered when I was poking around after Benny's disappearance. I promise, we're not going to get knifed, unless we get waylaid in the street on the way home because I'm too weighed down to move."

Veronica narrowed her eyes suspiciously. "I don't trust this," she said after a few beats, "But I'm also not keen to see you try to fight off a mugger while buried under all those caps. Give me some of that."

ED-E: The eyebot beeped, confused, when the courier stopped it from picking up the chips again. Its beeps increased in volume and frequency as they loaded the little bot up with caps at the cashier's counter, until it was hanging low in the air and having trouble turning around from the increased weight. The courier patted its metal dome reassuringly and loaded up the rest of the haul on themselves, until each step they took sounded like a cascade of sleigh bells.

"Back to the Lucky 38," the courier said, pointing toward the casino door. "I've got a bet I need to settle with Raul."

Rex: Rex whined as the courier hung strings of caps off his back. He sniffed each new addition but stood tall on his metal legs, taking the extra weight admirably until he was virtually buried by the wasteland currency.

"Can you still walk, boy?" the courier asked, when they had lightened their own load.

Rex barked. Satisfied, the courier led the way to the exit, opening the casino door with a jingle and ignoring the strange looks they were getting. The two waddled their way to the Strip's main gate and down the main street of Freeside until they staggered into the King's School of Impersonation.

The King, who had been lounging inside the stage room, jumped up when he saw the pair. "Well ain't that some money, honey," he said, clearly delighted. "You actually went and did it."

"Yep." The courier dropped some strings of caps on the nearest table and leaned over it to rest. "There it is. Now, where do we get started on fixing up Freeside?"

[nightingaelic]

Companions react to the Courier destroying Hoover Dam on a Yes Man run.

This kind of turned into an opportunity for me to write Yes Man dialogue, anyway

The screens before the courier crackled and rolled blank slides for a bit before the familiar, friendly face of Yes Man popped up to greet them. "Hi! Nice to see you again!"

"Nice to see you, too," the courier replied with a smile, wiping some sweat from their brow. "Alright, what's next?"

"Soooo..." Yes Man's face was solid, static, but his voice retained its usual singsong tone. "We can blow up the dam's generators, or I could route the dam's entire power output to the Fort. That'll activate a certain army of Securitrons and set them loose to ravage the Legion! What do you say?"

The courier nodded and took a deep breath. "I want this dam out of operation."

Yes Man didn't even pause. "Right, who wants a vast army of mechanical servants to savage your enemy? Why make it easy? I'm setting the generators to blow, just like you asked. Hit the manual switch, then go topside and deal with the Legion and NCR."

Arcade Gannon: "Oh, yes." Arcade's eyes sparkled with delight and a whole lot of conviction. "This is going to be so good for New Vegas. Any excuses the NCR might've had for sticking around will be gone, if we can beat the Legion back completely."

"We still have to take out Lanius," the courier replied, a little more unsure than their companion. "Which, may I point out, will be a hell of a lot harder without Securitrons backing us up?"

"I have every confidence in you," Arcade reassured them. "I saw what you did to Caesar."

"You've certainly blown my expectations out of the water!" Yes Man added. "And my expectations are locked into a consistently-high level to begin with!"

The courier took a deep breath and nodded to Arcade. "Ready if you are."

Craig Boone: "You know what this means," Boone said darkly, gripping his rifle tightly.

The courier nodded. "I do. But it's for the best. We can't keep living under the shadow of the bear."

Boone tightened his jaw and scowled. "Then I'll see you when it's all over."

With that, he stalked off, back the way they had come.

"Boy, your friend sure didn't like that decision you made!" Yes Man said brightly. "And without those Securitrons, you're really on your own now."

The courier sighed. "Yep. I know."

Lily Bowen: "Blow up the dam?" Lily asked, concerned. "But dearie, we're inside the dam."

"Don't worry, ma'am!" Yes Man replied. "You only need to make sure the generators blow up. The dam itself will stay put for a good, long while afterward. My current projections estimate at least 9,800 years!"

The courier smiled. "There, you see? We'll be perfectly safe, Lily. Aside from the NCR and Legion troops who are going to try to kill us if we do this."

"Not my grandchild," Lily said to that, unsheathing her vertibird blade once again.

"It looks like you're in good hands," Yes Man offered. "See you on the other side of the battle!"

Raul Alfonso Tejada: "You sure about that, boss?" Raul scratched his head beneath his sombrero. "Seems like an awful waste of energy, and we already cut through a whole bunch of those pendejos on the way down here. We could use the help."

"Too late for that!" Yes Man answered cheerily. "The generators are already set to blow! I hope I did that quickly enough for you."

The courier hesitated. "Wait, I thought you said we had options?"

"You certainly did!" Yes Man replied. "And now the power output re-route is inoperative. Your ability to make quick decisions never ceases to amaze me!"

Raul and the courier both swore at the same time, though Raul's curse of choice was in Spanish. "Nothing for it, then," he said with a shrug, taking the brief respite as a chance to reload his pistol.

Rose of Sharon Cassidy: Cass made a face. "Is that... safe?"

"Absolutely!" Yes Man's face flipped by on the screen a few times, as if doing a somersault. "Just remain behind the guard rail inside the power plant and duck if any large pieces of metal come flying your way."

"Whoa-ho, no." Cass swung her shotgun around onto her back and put her hands up. "You go on ahead, if that's the plan, Six. I'll stay here and make sure your robotic friend isn't overridden by some ranger with another chip."

"Not only is that statistically unlikely, it's logistically impossible!" Yes Man replied. "I am baked into this set of terminals now. You couldn't get me out of here even if you set this databank on fire!"

"That could be arranged," Cass said skeptically. "There are some heavy troopers with flamethrowers stomping around up top."

Veronica Santangelo: "Six." Veronica pouted. "Think of what you could be doing with all that power, though. I'm not saying you need to have an army of Securitrons, but you could run electricity to practically anywhere that HELIOS One could. Freeside, Westside, Novac..."

"You could even run electricity to the NCR, and charge them money for it!" Yes Man cut in. "Mr. House was a big fan of that idea."

"Oh, I'll bet he was," Veronica replied with a grimace. "Then again, taking out the dam would make sure the NCR didn't have a reason to stick around, after this is all over."

The courier shrugged. "That's the plan."

Veronica sighed. "I suppose you would know best. Just make sure the floor doesn't buckle underneath us, okay?"

ED-E: The eyebot began to vibrate and titter as if implying build-up, then let out a cascade of beeps and did a loop-de-loop in midair.

"Your flying friend says he's excited for the fireworks!" Yes Man translated. "And I am too. Best get moving, before the NCR catches on to what we're doing and tries to shoot you!"

Rex: The cyberdog at the courier's side cocked his head to the right, then looked up at his companion. The courier reached down to pat him on the back of the neck. "Don't worry, boy. I know what I'm doing."

"I sure hope so, or we're all toast!" Yes Man interjected.