Request (Anonymous): I always imagine the poor courier having depression--they’re always getting swept up in other people's messes, having to fix their problems, and they're so tired of it. Maybe they confess to Joshua one night around the campfire they think Benny would have been doing them a favor if he had actually managed to kill them like he was supposed to?
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The words flow as freely from your lips as the water down Zion Valley.
“Sometimes I wish I could have actually died when Benny shot me.”
There’s no response, at least, not immediately. The crackling of the fire fills the air with warmth and light. The glow flickers across your body, the dirt, the low scrubs and even over your companion who was also sitting near the fire. He had been reading that old world book of his, probably focused on more of those stories that never made much sense to you.
You could feel Joshua’s intense focus from the moment you spoke, even if you couldn’t see his eyes or bandaged face. His attention was sharp, piercing but not painful--it was a sort of intense gaze that you knew so few people to naturally carry about their person, and it comforted you in that moment more than made you unnerved.
“Why do you feel that way?”
Joshua’s voice was so soft, barely cresting over the low crackle of the fire, but just as warm as the open flame that flickered on beside your body. The ground was cold, a stark difference from the fire’s heat, but it mattered so little when it afforded you a beautiful look at the night sky far above you both--so clear and crisp when compared to the night sky beneath New Vegas.
So beautiful. So perfect. So clean.
It made your stomach twist.
“...I...can’t remember anything before getting shot,” You start with a murmur. “I can’t remember my family, my place of birth--I don’t even know if I have friends waiting for me somewhere out there in the Mojave or, hell, somewhere else in the wasteland.”
You take in a slow, shuddering breath, half-expecting the man to find something to say, perhaps even a quote from that holy book of his.
But Joshua says nothing; he gives you the respect of silence while you find the words to say, the will to speak, the energy to confess the feelings bound up within your mind.
“Nothing ever seems to go right around me--It’s like....I’m cursed. I’m surrounded by death and violence and bloodshed--who was I to want this life? I’m.....I’m scared of ever learning who I was before this, especially since the only information I have about me--before everything--was The Divide. It--”
Emotions welled up in your throat, choking away the words and leaving you gasping for a new breath of air. It was hard to speak so openly, even if it was Graham you were confessing to--you fought hot tears in the corners of your eyes when you felt one of his hands press gently to the top of your head, something between a mere touch and a gentle caress over your hair in a motion that only meant to say ‘I’m here’ without actually saying it.
“I am familiar with the events of that place,” he said softly. “You need not recount it to me if you don’t wish to.”
It calmed you, his assurance, his soft words by the firelight. It helped you get yourself together again, cobbling thoughts and words once more to achieve a coherent voice.
“I just...” You weren’t sure how you could put it all together. “The wasteland, the Mojave...it....it makes me feel so hopeless sometimes. Like there’s nothing to live for, nothing to wake up and see--sometimes I wake up in the morning all alone in the desert after camping out and the realization--” Breath. Breathe slow. Breathe gently, that’s it.... The words whispered on the soft breeze, so soft that it took you a moment to realize it was Joshua saying them to you. “--the realization that I live in this shithole is too much to handle, you know? I can only get shot and nearly bleed-out so many times before I just--I just wish that Benny’s shot would have killed me months ago. It would have done me a favor.”
And then you were silent, so silent, but breathing gently and staring up to the wide, open night sky. You didn’t let your thoughts begin stewing again, so you quickly took up the impossible task of counting out the stars one by one. By the time you had gotten to the second dozen and lost count twice, your companion finally spoke.
His hand never left where it settled on the top of your head, his fingers gently rubbing into your scalp.
“We’re all put on this world for a purpose,” Joshua whispered, his voice so low and gentle that it worked like a lulling purr. You simply closed your eyes and listened to him, the calming tones of his words and wisdom in his thoughts. “We will never know what that purpose is--some of us may never know even after we pass on, but there is a purpose in our lives.”
His hand moves, gently cupping one of your cheeks so his fingertips gently brushed the underside of your jaw.
“You saved the Sorrows and Dead Horses from what could have been a force to wipe them out, and helped stayed my anger in a time that I needed a hand of kindness most of all. Though I cannot begin to speak of events and places beyond Zion, I know well enough that you are a person of great kindness and love beyond yourself--You are important, Courier. You mean a great deal to me, to everyone here.
I can’t heal your lost memories. I cannot bring back what family you may have somewhere across the wasteland, but know that you are always a friend and member of my family--I cannot change the cruelty of the wasteland, but I can offer the same hand of warmth and kindness that you had done for me.”
His words are raw and genuine. Whenever Joshua speaks, there is a level of power and meaning behind it--he doesn’t say something without meaning, doesn’t speak without consideration, so the soft words hit you deep in your chest. They’re so kind, so open--it’s more than you can say about a lot of what’s out there in the same world that’s ready to kick you down, steal your caps and leave you for dead.
Tears start to well up and trail down the sides of your face as you finally move, shifting into a fetal position but closer to Joshua’s sitting form, close enough so that the top of your head is almost nuzzling against his hip.
He comforts you all the while, a hand always on your face or brushing through your hair, a voice gently cooing and murmuring soft comforts and assurances as your emotions crack away at the lead wall you’d built up since waking up in Goodsprings. It feels good to let it out for once, even a little, in the comfort and protection of someone who feels as though they can just....protect you for once, keep your shattered pieces from falling apart long enough while you find the energy to glue them back together.
You’re not sure how long you spend the night like that, how long you cry, how long Joshua continues to murmur to you--all you know is that eventually the evening ends with the fire put out, the night sky bright, and your body laying next to him with his arms carefully wrapped around you.
The gesture, the man--it makes you feel safe, cared for, and genuinely wanted in the world.
