Stories from RhyDin & The Rings

(Warning: It's dark in here, y'all)

A week had come and gone and for Coydog it had passed in one miserably long haze. She had barely moved from the couch in her shack, curled in a ball beneath a scratchy wool blanket with her back turned to the rest of the world. When she wasn't sleeping or crying, she simply stared at the back of the couch until her eyes became unfocused, her mind dragging her into her memories like quicksand.

Bart and Betty came by, but when she barely spoke or excused herself into another sadness nap, they would take their leave. She couldn't tell them about what had happened or about the tumultuous storm of dreary emotions that raged within her. Coydog desperately wanted to, but it was as if the words crumbled to bitter powder on her tongue.

Fennec had been intent on staying. He helped her with dinner and cleaning, but he was just a kid, and he wanted to know why his mother was so blue. She had no answer for his questions, and it took five days for her to send the boy home, much to his chagrin. He had a robot fighting competition to get to, and it struck her as a bit too much that he was playing parent while his mother melted into the couch.

She had not been so successful at getting Craig Boone to kick rocks. That she didn't mind, and she selfishly wallowed in the presence of her stone faced shadow. He was her link to home. They shared a history of bloody battles and desert dust. He simply sat by the couch in a chair he'd dragged in from the kitchen and held guard over the courier. He spoke infrequently, about the weather and little things that needed fixed around her shack. The sniper never poked or prodded or asked if she was okay. Sometimes he would pet her head, which he only ever did when shit had really hit the fan. A simple little affection that had kept them both grounded when times got tough.

One that seventh day, suddenly aware of the cloying scents of unwashed flesh and sour sweat, Coydog pushed herself up. She smacked her lips together, grimacing. The taste in her mouth reminded her of the bottom of Fennec's hamster's cage. She looked slowly over to where Boone sat in the chair, his legs out in front of him and head bowed in a way that tucked his chin against his chest. His eyes were still hidden behind those damned mirrored aviator shades. Coydog wondered, briefly, if he showered in them, but she already knew the answer.

The slow, soft cadence of his breathing assured her that he was asleep. Carefully she rose to her feet, her blanket falling away and her joints aching from inertia. She crept as quietly as possible towards the kitchen, only for an ancient floorboard to groan, surely giving her away. Coydog turned her head slowly, only to see the vodka bottle resting against the leg of Boone's chair. He was still out. She heaved a sigh, her shoulders slumping and her poor heart aching.

"Oh buddy," she softly, sadly muttered, "looks like we're both in rotten shape." Whoever had coined dark night of the human soul could get fucked as far as she was concerned.

She turned to face the darkness engulfing the kitchen, the room always cold no matter how much heat she pumped into it. "One thing at a time," she whispered into the void. A wide eyed cat clock ticked off ten minutes to three with a swish of its tail and a manic flick of its eyes. Not yet ready for any substantial light, Coydog reached for a small beer-bottle-turned-lamp sitting on a nearby packing crate. As a pathetic yellow glow filled the room, the woman gathered up her notebook and her pen from where they lay, and tucked herself into a chair by the table.

As time ticked by and before the cat-clock's grin could get to her, Coydog put her pen to a piece of college ruled paper and began to write.

Coyote,

I am so angry with you right now and just absolutely heartbroken. I've done nothing this week but cry and sleep and think of your sorry ass. I thought I was done crying over you years ago. Surprise, I guess.

First off there's something you should know about Mickey. I loved Mickey. Sarge didn't love me, not like she did April and May, so Mickey was the closest thing I had to a mom. One of my earliest memories is seeing Mickey out of costume, a pair of heels swinging from her fingers, her make-up smeared from sweat. Just this tiny, tired redhead that kissed my cheek when you told her my name.

She never made me feel weird for being her boyfriend's kid. She would parade me around and show me to the other acts, and she'd let me wear her costumes, even though I was little and I swam in them. She would hold me and tell me that I could be her little girl. You would tell her you loved her, that you were just saving up the money to get her out of New Reno. Mickey believed your bullshit and I remember wishing on stars, the moon, clouds, everything that you were telling the truth.

I got to where I imagined she would go on routes with us and I could see her everyday. I could show her around the desert, point our every plant and animal. I longed to show Mickey my world. What little girl doesn't long for a mother?

She saved me. You never cared where I went. It didn't matter to you that your daughter could just roam around New Reno, where every freak or slaver could just snatch me up. If it wasn't for Mickey I don't know what would have happened to me. I think about seeing her shows. She'd park me next to Piano Man while she went on stage. I remember the music swelling just as Mickey walked out, all five foot four of her stacked in worn, six inch heels with her red hair teased to heaven. The way her dress shined as she danced. She made each of those sequins out of cazador wings. Did you know that, Coyote?

I remember she'd open her mouth to sing and just this smokey voice would pour out, like it belonged to someone else. When she sang I Will Wait For You there was never a dry eye in the house. Even the freaks and slavers cried. Mickey made you feel whatever she sang.

There was no one in the world like Mickey Gibson.

I was ten years old when she died, and you blamed me from day one. You always thought that maybe I'd told her how you didn't actually give a shit about her. That she was just a place to stay and a convenient, pretty lay to you while you were in town. I mean, when you weren't getting drunk and sleeping with Sarge. No, I never told her, Coyote. I never had to.

Mickey knew. Mickey knew what she was to you. She knew when you screamed at her for being upset, or when you called her a whore and told her no man worth a damn would want her for a wife. Or when you'd call her stupid and useless. You took that bright, beautiful creature and you wrung every ounce of color out of her. You never had to lay a hand on her to do it. So, you told her, Coyote.

You just pushed her too far. I know you did. Do you wanna know how I know? Because while you were knocking boots with my mom, and your young daughter was staring at the window your girlfriend had just jumped out of, the pit boss found a note. Said pit boss, the tactless asshole, read it out loud. I don't remember all of what it said, and I'm grateful for that. I didn't deserve to hear it, no more than I deserved to walk in right as Mickey was checking out.

For a long time I believed it should have been you, but you never had to bear witness to the consequences of your fuckery. Part of me hopes Joshua's Hell is real, and you're down there burning while some demon reads Mickey's note over and over and over to you. In her voice. I'm sure they'd have a copy.

I know you'd throw this up in my face if you were here, but I don't have it anymore. I tore it up and burned the pieces not long after Mickey's death. I shouldn't have. I should have given it to you, but I was scared that you'd get so mad that you wouldn't be my dad anymore. It was one of those stupid childhood terrors. You were all that I had, Coyote.

She didn't hate you in the end. I think it's worse that she still loved you. She talked about how you'd broken her heart for the last time, She called herself stupid for ever believing you cared about her. She apologized to me and told me she loved me and that I was so smart. That it wasn't my fault. Some of the casino folk took Mickey out in the desert and buried her. You were busy using her death as an excuse do some Olympic level drinking. If you'd loved anyone as much as you loved fucking alcohol you would have been golden.

If it makes you feel better, I did blame myself for a long, long time. I used to imagine that I walked in just five minutes before she jumped and managed to stop her. In my head I saved her over and over and over again. You never talked about it. You used to get mad when I did, so I learned to keep Mickey to myself. Eventually I didn't talk about her at all. I was left there to sort through that on my own. I understand how awful the world is. For years I watched people die for some sociopath's power trip, and I watched good people suffer. I know.

But it is a particularly heinous cruelty to allow a child to carry that kinda weight alone. You were always telling me you were teaching me lessons, but tell me, Coyote, what was I supposed to learn from that?

You never would have humored this if you were here. You never liked hearing how you'd messed up. Accountability just wasn't your bag, was it, Dad? Well, now that you're six feet under, so you don't really have a choice anymore. I want this out of me. I don't want to drown in this. I won't.

I know it's bad luck to speak ill of the dead, but I never got waxing poetic about someone who was a raging asshole when they were alive. Dying doesn't make you a good person; it's what you do while you're living. It's what you leave behind. I wanna know why I'm taking your death this hard, Coyote, because you sucked so much. I want to know why I give a flying rat's ass that you're gone.

Besides, if I have to suffer through all of this, so do you.

Talk to you tomorrow, Dad.

Sincerely,

Coydog

On the eight day she awoke in the middle of the night, sweating and practically starving. Boone hadn't drunk himself into a coma yet so Coydog made eggs for them both and opened the box of donuts that Betty had left for them. They sat in silence and ate, Coydog's foot resting on the toe of Boone's boot beneath the table.

It was around the time their forks were scraping their plates that Boone decided finally spoke. "I read your letter to your dad," he said in that same deadpan way he used for most things.

Coydog's fork dropped from suddenly distracted fingers, clattering against the table. "You read my letter, huh?" It was then that she regretted teaching Craig Boone how to read. Swallowing a ball of righteous anger, she cracked her neck from side to side and sucked a bit of egg from between her teeth. Fighting with Boone, while fun sometimes, never really got either of them anywhere.

If he had known he had fucked up then it didn't show on his face. "Mmhm," he hummed and reached for another donut; the last one with the sprinkles. Coydog reached out and snatched it up, cramming the entire thing into her mouth. Boone's left eye twitched beneath his shades at this sudden betrayal; a movement that might have been lost on most people, but not the blonde.

Boone eyed her from behind his glasses and settled for a glazed donut.

It took Coydog a minute to get that pilfered baked good down, and by then she was gasping and guzzling down a glass of water. It was this display that drew the corner of Boone's wind-chafed lips into a smirk. "So I guess you're starting to feel better."

She leaned across the table, her frosting spotted face hovering inches from his own; so close that she could smell baked dough and vodka on his breath. "Fuck you, Craig Boone, reading my letter like that," she growled, but Boone simply brought the donut up between their faces and took a bite.

Glowering, Coydog reeled herself back into her seat, her crossed in a huff against her chest. "You're unbelievable."

Boone snickered, and Coydog could have sworn he was actually amused. Boone had three settings; super angry, super sad, and tree stump. It came as a shock when he went off script, when he seemed, however briefly, happy. It was in those moments that Coydog glimpsed the man that poor, doomed Carla had fallen in love with. They could never forget the bone deep bad things that had happened in their lives, no more than they could forget how they'd sent the NCR and Caesar's Legion running from the Mojave with their tails between their legs. But right then those things faded into the background. They didn't matter when the courier and the sniper were so mired in one another's orbits.

"Yeah, go on. Smile, ya jackass." Coydog rolled her eyes, her dry lips pulled into a cracking smile that left the flesh there stinging. It had been eight days since she had actually smiled. "So, did I go too easy on him?" She laced her fingers beneath her chin and watched him expectantly.

Boone seemed to think about it, kicked back the way he was in that old chair with his arms behind his head. Coydog didn't have to see his eyes to feel them on her. "No." The time for mirth had passed between them like a night time breeze. "Did you kill him, Six?"

Dropping her hands into her lap, Coydog leaned back. She stared at a knot marring the tables surface, unblinking; a thousand yard stare. It felt as if the air had been drained from the room and all she could hear was that fucking tick-tick-tocking of that creepy damned cat clock. "No. No Boone," she muttered softly. "I didn't kill him."

"You should have," came his brusque reply. She looked up to find him still watching her.

Coydog blinked. "Because some people deserve to die?" She remembered when Boone had thought that he deserved death for all the bad things he'd done. She wondered if he still believed that.

He nodded once. "Yeah."

They didn't speak another word to each other, not because they were angry but because there was nothing left to say. Boone helped her put the dishes in the sink, where they would likely sit until Betty or Bart came by and washed them, and then he retired to his chair. How he slept in that thing without hurting all over, Coydog had no clue.

She sat at the table for a few hours, flipping through the channels of her memories, no more equipped to stop them than the Man in The Moon. When she finally snapped out of it, Boone was asleep and she had drooled down the front of her shirt. Without much thought, Coydog reached for her notebook and the ink pen she kept tucked into its spine.

Coyote,

Once upon a time you could do no wrong in my eyes. Back then when I was little and your were ten feet tall. Even now, thinking about that Coyote, I can just see you bathed in this soft light. It's the glow of sentimentality, all these sharp edges buffed by the passing of time. You were a bastard back then too, but hell if I could see it.

You taught me so much though. You laid the groundwork for what I am now. I don't know whether to thank you or have a necromancer bring you back so that I can punch you in the throat. Grief is wild.

I learned to shoot from you, Coyote. I learned to curse and scrap and roll dice. Thanks to you I know exactly how long it takes to get from Nelson to Goodspring on foot (14 hours and 45 minutes on a clear, boring day.) You taught me how to read and how to write because you thought any courier worth their weight in salt should know how. You made me read Shakespeare, because you believed if you could read ol' Willie Shakes, you could read anything. You made me talk to people so that I wouldn't be afraid of them; because civilization was something to visit, but never to linger in. I can make rope outta yucca and make shelter if I need it. I can survive because of you.

Those early days with you, when I'd toddle in your shadow and you'd hold my hand so that I didn't get lost, have played a lot in my head this past week. I followed you around like a puppy. I remember when you'd swing me around, or when you'd sing to me, because no one loved Bing Crosby like you did. I remember you telling me stories to calm me down or to pass the time, about the animals that existed before The War. Or when you'd tell me you'd been to space and fought dinosaurs and I just ate it the fuck up.

It didn't bother me that you drank then. I don't know why. Maybe I was too young to understand. You at least functioned back then. There were a lot of husbands around the Mojave that wanted your head for sleeping with their wives, but no one could take away the fact that you were a fucking amazing courier. Even after everyone thought you were dead, people still knew who you were, for good or bad. Be it through mischief or otherwise, you left a mark everywhere you went.

Hell, you'd been shot at, stabbed, beat up so much that I convinced my stupid kid brain that you weren't human. That maybe you were the Coyote from the stories you told me and couldn't really die.

But you can, and you did, and I'm left here still wading through it. It's hard for me to reconcile the Coyote of back then with the Coyote you became. I'm still sick with it. I always blamed Mickey's death for you losing the plot like you did, but you'd turned bad before then. At some point I wasn't your daughter anymore. I was that kid you felt guilty enough about to keep around, because the novelty of having a human dog had worn thin.

I was twelve when I started finishing your routes. By then I was this mean, surly little sour-faced thing. You remember. You used to tell me I was prettier when I smiled. You'd get so drunk that making your deliveries didn't matter to you. So what if the Dispatch was starting to think you were a thief and was ten seconds away from sending assassins after us? There were bottles to drain and women to screw. No matter what, you always did know how to party, didn't you, Coyote?

It's not like being a courier back there is an easy job, even for an adult. How many seasoned delivery folk have been taken down by the desert? You had a twelve year old girl do your job for you, because you just couldn't have been bothered. Most times I had to find our own food, get our water, make sure we had a warm place to sleep at night. I had to dodge creepy fuckers who thought the little girl playing mail-man would be an easy grab. Even then you were teaching me a lesson.

I learned that the only person I could depend on was me.

I always wonder what went on in your head back then. That's just another answer I'll never get now.

Now onto your favorite story, the one that had you throwing a bottle at my head the last time I actually talked to you.

Remember losing me to that slaver? I sure as fuck do. I tarred over every other awful thing you did, and, frankly, that's probably why I'm currently plowing into a box of donuts and hate writing you, but I've never been able to cover that up.

It was stupid of you to play caravan against that man. You knew it too, but you told me to shut up when I warned you. You had a shitty fucking deck. Even that blind ghoul that used to sing to himself in the corner knew it. You didn't intend on losing your ass, did you, you cocky piece of shit? Did it not occur to you that if you were gonna lose, that guy might want his fucking caps?

He threatened to shoot you. I remember that in shiny technicolor. Just standing there, this tall, lanky fifteen year old, wide-eyed and unsure if I wanted him to pull the trigger or not. So, I guess, you did the only thing that you could think to do; you and your fucking lizard brain.

You handed me over to him, told him it was just long enough for you to scram to New Vegas and get the caps you owed him, plus interest. You'd just be gone for a few days, you promised me. The slaver was in town that long, so he told you he could wait. To his credit, he didn't try to fuck with me. He didn't even really talk to me, but I guess it doesn't do to talk to the cattle, does it? He wouldn't let me leave his sight though. I slept on the floor by his bed.

Then you came back and paid him and you bought me ice cream and we talked about our feelings. Except that really didn't fucking happen. I learned years later what you were doing. You'd won the money you owed that man alright, and then you promptly headed for the Gomorrah and spent those caps on hooch and working ladies. Man, must have been one hell of a time, because you forgot all about your fucking daughter, you dog's asshole.

I can't say that waiting on you lifted that slaver's mood. I think it might have pissed him right the fuck off, because midnight on that third day he jerked me up by my arm and practically drug me from the floor. He cursed you for everything you were worth, Coyote, but he seemed delighted by the prospect of recouping his losses by selling me. I have it on good authority that I would have fetched a pretty penny.

To be fair, I was probably a little tired of being treated like a thing and not a person, and I might not have reacted well to him grabbing my wrists. I headbutted him hard enough to break his nose. I remember making a run for the window when one of his guards grabbed. Big bastard too. He shook me so hard my jaw rattled.

The next thing I know I've got a split lip, a black eye, and a handful of this dude's hair in my fist, and I'm waking up marching in one of the most fucked up parades I'd ever been privy too. We were bound by our hands and our ankles, shoulder to shoulder with each other. There had to have been fifty women and girls. Some were crying, some were too numb to. A few were spitting nails like me. I didn't know if we were going straight to the auction block or if they were gonna store us somewhere. I didn't care to find out.

You'd taught me to play dead. Do you remember that? You said some animals don't fuck with food that's already dead. I brought the girl next to me down when I fell. A few of the ladies tripped over me. No one could go anywhere because we were bound together. The angry little slaver man screamed and kicked me a few times. His guard even shook me. I didn't so much as cry out. I'd tinkered with my breathing so much, and his guard was so stupid, that they couldn't catch a heartbeat from me.

I'm thankful they didn't bury me. I'm thankful that they just threw me to the side of the road for the buzzards to take care of. I'd like to say I hunted them down later and freed those girls, but not every story has a happy ever after ending. If I'd been ten years older, I'd have killed that slaver and his guards, and I'd have helped them. Intent isn't magical though, is it?

I waited until they were gone before I took off. It was night time then, and I remember being so sore and so cold. I had a few broken ribs, but that was the worst of it. I took some warmer clothes off of a dead raider and I found my way to Primm, bit by bit. Old Man Nash at the Mojave Dispatch took a gamble on giving me a contract that young. I never made them regret it.

I actually didn't hunt you down. How could I? You were a paranoid fucker, and even when you were three sheets to the wind you remembered to cover your tracks. I don't know if it was subconscious or what, but I never would have found you if I'd been looking. But two weeks later I'm carrying my load to Nipton and there you were. You were pissing off the edge of a cliff.

I didn't think twice, or make a sound when I sneaked up on you. You were so surprised when you saw who'd pushed you, but by then it was too late. I didn't feel bad for you. Rabid dogs need to die. I took your bag, and your boots and what caps and drugs you had on you and I left you there. I didn't know you weren't dead. At the end of the day I was still a pretty dumb kid. If I'd known you were alive, I'd have shot you right between the eyes and not thought twice about it.

You know, I'm really enjoying story time with you, Dad. I appreciate you listening, I really do. I feel better already.

I'll catch you tomorrow, okay?

Sincerely,

Coydog