(no subject)

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

[Out of Milliways, in the Capital Wasteland:

Quiet
Range
The Dead. Could be Conversations With Dead People, if you squint.]

It's been a long night in the Capital. Ellen didn't get much sleep.

She can take care of that later, though. She somehow managed to tear her fatigues across the elbow when she wasn't looking, so she's changed into her old Vault 101 suit and settled at a well-lighted table to mend the damage first. Dogmeat feels no such compunction and thus the heeler has curled up to sleep at her feet.

Botherable, if you like.

Comments

[not_his_pa]

William went home for a bit as he had an idea about that money he was given and wanted to talk to the teacher.

When he comes in and sees Ellen, he's a little awkward but walks over, "Hey Ellen."

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

Ellen looks up from her needlework and smiles. "Hi, William," she says. "How're you doing? It's been a while, hasn't it?"

[not_his_pa]

"Yeah, have you moved those sheep yet?"

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"Not yet. Doc Scurlock's not ready to go," Ellen says. "I'm sorry. I'd like to take them soon but I don't want to move them without him."

[not_his_pa]

"No, its fine. I wanted to get back home to put something away and was worried that I might cause you trouble by bein' gone."

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"Not at all," Ellen says. "I appreciate your concern, though. Is everything all right at home?"

[not_his_pa]

"Oh yeah, someone from here, don't know who gave me some money and I've been tryin' to find a school for Mark. I haven't found one yet but I will. He won't have to spend his life as a rancher."

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"Really? Wow," says Ellen, blinking. "That's pretty impressive. How far would a school like that be?"

[not_his_pa]

"Pretty far and travelin' costs too and I don't know. Its odd to have someone give me money and not leave their name. I know whoever they are means well just ain't easy is all,"

He's thankful and confused.

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"Huh," Ellen says. "That's... definitely odd. Did you do something lately that might catch attention? Save somebody's life or something?"

[not_his_pa]

"No, nothin' like that. I mean I'm grateful and tryin' to make sure it does somethin' good but its odd."

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

Ellen nods. "Well, it's... hopefully it's okay," she says. "Maybe it'll turn out to be somebody from one of the fairy tales or something, and you'll have a mysterious godmother or something like that."

[not_his_pa]

"I guess. Sort of feels like that'd be odd too cause well if anyone was that, Katya would be,"

She's magic and made Mark better.

[damncompass]

Joshua limps into the Bar, claiming a large cup of coffee (he really needs to get some more coffee for his lab), and notices Ellen on the way back.

"Hey, Ellen. How've you been?"

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

Ellen looks up from the patching and smiles. "Hi, Joshua," she says. "I'm all right. Things've been quiet at home for a bit. How're you holding up?"

[damncompass]

"Not too bad. Ran away from the zombie apocolypse in here a while back, and uh, proved why I'm a scientist and not an action hero." He winces, plunking down in a chair. "Tried to vault the bar and landed on my ankle wrong."

Didn't really help that it was his bad ankle in the first place.

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"The what, now?" Ellen says. "Oh dear. That must have been what all the mess was about... I could try to help with the ankle's healing if that wouldn't cause problems for you at home. I've got a stimpak I can spare."

[damncompass]

"It probably wasn't that bad, but I was bartending, and all of a sudden there were a million zombies. I think they might've followed someone in. Claud and I just ran the fuck away. She's slightly better in a fight than I am, but we didn't really want to see what would happen if we Teslaed zombies. I think I might've fried one on my way out, but I didn't stop to look." He shrugs. "Milliways, man."

A moment's pause. "I might take you up on that. It'll confuse the hell out of Dr. Calder, but honestly, I'm tired of this stupid ankle." A beat. "Let me at least pay you for it somehow, though."

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"Ugh." Ellen wrinkles her nose. "I've been on the wrong end of feral ghoul rampages before. That's as close as I get to zombie anything. They're never appealing fights, and it takes me forever to get cleaned up afterwards, between the last rites and the extra washing I wind up having to do."

She nods. "That's fine, I can deal with that. A stimpak at home would cost around thirty bottlecaps- if you can get me, say, a three-gallon or five-gallon jerrycan of water, that should be just fine. I'd actually be making a profit on that, but I know water's a lot easier to come by around here."

[damncompass]

"Yeah, it really didn't seem like a fight we wanted to fight. If it was caused by something that we could have taken care of, then we would have been in the middle of it, but frankly, we just decided to have a 'not my division!' moment, and get out. I actually think that I heard that someone died from it. I don't know who, and I'm pretty sure it wasn't anyone that I actually knew, but still." A beat. "Those must be extra nasty back home. Ugh."

"Five gallons it is, then. Thanks. Sometimes it's damn useful that the Warehouse's funds have been gathering pretty good interest for two thousand years."

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"Well, they're not contagious at home," Ellen says. "They're just chronic radiation victims who took so many rads they should have died, only they didn't, and they lost their minds in the process. There's sane ghouls and they're like everybody else, they just look like they're made of rotting meat, but the ferals will attack and try to eat anything that moves."

She smiles. "Not a problem. Our currency's actually backed by water at home, so I'm kind of making a ridiculous profit here- it's about nine or ten caps for a pint. Five gallons is enough to get a respectable firearm or suit of protective gear from most traders."

[damncompass]

"Ew." Joshua winces. "Sorry, that just sounds terrible. I feel bad for the people in that situation. God, I just hope that the ones who are nuts don't realize how nuts they are." Because that sort of thing is just awful.

"Hey, take the profit where you can get it, and get yourself something helpful." Joshua firmly believes in trying to help or protect his friends in whatever tiny way possible.

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"I've never heard any of the feral ones manage actual language," Ellen says. "I get the feeling there's not really much of the person left there, so that's at least a small mercy. I do what I can to give them funerals, just in case."

She nods. "I've used the water thing to my advantage before. There was a time when some people from Milliways helped me take down a mercenary company that had a bounty out on my head. I sold most of their gear here for its weight in water, got a lot of clean water into the Capital Wasteland, took a lot of weapons out of it, and made enough caps of profit to finance a few things that badly needed funding. Clean water's more common these days but even with Project Purity as a source, it's still a commodity, so I might as well keep up the trade."

[damncompass]

"There was a person there at one point, so they definitely deserve that sort of respect." Joshua nods.

"I read a book a while back talking about salt being a very important commodity." Joshua shrugs. "It's odd to me considering we can get salt for like fifty cents in the store, and you can get absolutely nothing for fifty cents anymore. Thinking about water as that kind of commodity is odd, but I can see it. Just go ahead and ask the bar for it and tell her to put it on my tab."

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"I will, next time I go home," Ellen says. "Thanks. In the meantime, as long as you've got the ankle braced or strapped in a decent position, I can administer the stimpak- needles aren't a problem for you, are they?"