Gary Freeman's Story

Gambit's. The place brought back a flood of memories for Shitbird as he stared through their CCTV feeds. He wasn't even anywhere near the building, but he could smell it. The scent of every drop of grease, blood, and cheap Furisian Ale filled his lungs. It was probably one of the only places on Terra that truly never changed, which suited the hacker just fine.

Since they never changed their security, either.

He'd slipped his way into their systems nearly a decade ago, and slipped through all the cracks since. It gave him a perfect front row for all the carnage, mayhem, closings, and shady deals. What he enjoyed most was the people though, especially the staff. It was rare they hired anybody on these days, considering how slow business had got compared to the past, so when an attractive young woman showed up as a server Gary's curiosity was piqued.

Much to his chagrin that curiosity paid off in spades, too. The lass was something alright.

A few dozen holoscreens hovered around in his room, providing it with a soft orange glow. Each one had a different article, database, picture, or live-feed, and all of them revolved around this new server, "Athens", as she called herself. Now Gary was never a stalker, and he wasn't interested in this woman sexually, or to meet her, or any of that. She was just a new curiosity in Gambit's, and when he did a little digging she became downright interesting.

Even in Wing City few people use code names, you know? So he'd decided to make a bit of a game of it.

Today was the day it started in earnest, though. Shitbird had finally amassed enough information on his subject, one "Catherine [REDACTED]". It's not that he couldn't get the information on her full name, it's that the Garden was insanely far away, and the lag was unbearable. He settled for what he had, besides it'd be far more interesting to try, and get it from the woman herself. He watched through the Gambit's feed until somebody placed an order.

Much to his delight, she made her way to the joint's register. A modified Dataslate.

Instead of the usual menus, options, and Gambit's UI, it was just a black screen for a split second, before it flickered, slowly shifting to what looked like a webpage.

The URL was blank, the page was black, bordered in orange, and the text was of a similar color.

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I bet this is pretty trippy, huh Catherine? Or should I say "Agent Athens".

Below the line of text was a photo, a snapshot of Athens blasting away at some punks with the rest of Prima Donna in the Abandoned Slums.

Let me get right to the point. You see, this is what I don't get. You want to remain anonymous at large, right? You, and "Dusk", and all the others in Prima Donna. Hence the code names, and the helmets, and pretending you're Terrans instead of Gardenites, right?. But then you go, and get into a huge shootout in the middle of nowhere?

A video was embedded, more captured footage of the firefight playing, muted.

It just doesn't add up to me, it's so noisy, so visible...But you know what? I can't complain too much..

The Shanty Shake was now displayed.

It did lemme get the info on your pad..Oh, wait..

The picture morphed, now showing the new abandoned hovel Prima Donna held up in.

You moved, that's right. So here's the thing. We're gunna play a game, you and me. You're going to tell me everything about yourself, and your little organization, ooorrrrrr..

Black and white footage of the Prima Donna safehouse played, with a large red *LIVE symbol in the corner. It showed eight people in hoodies, sneaking up on it very quietly. One turned the to the CCTV camera that was apparently capturing it all, and held up a small bundle. It was a brick of C4.

All your little buddies become thick, soupy, red paste!

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"CLICK ON THE PIGEON TO CONTINUE!"

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Despite Dusk's protest, it was a necessary evil for Anubis to work at the Gambit's Bar. For one, vigilante style work wasn't going to bring food on the table and it gave Athens to get a feel for the city. They usually didn't get to do anything outside of their usual work which meant that the opinions of the public and other gossip shared among people was not something that Prima Donna could take into consideration, something that Athens valued all too much when giving Dusk reports on the current state of Wing City every two weeks. It also gave her an opportunity to be normal. Aside from the eavesdropping she did and the numerous mental notes, catering to the patrons of Gambit's and partaking in a few laughs with people outside of her ever dwindling circle of friends was refreshing. It helped her remember things like how people found her attractive (Hermes and Anubis see her as a sister, Dusk being the big sister). Overall it was all a breath of fresh air, a sort of small vacation from the usual seriousness of her day to day.

But someday...the dream would end.

Athens made her way to the register and with a touch, the UI greeted her except it was different. The URL was blank, the page was blank, and everything was bordered in orange. There was text of similar color and after a quick read, Athens was finally aware of what was going on...Is this guy...some kind of stalker?. She had faith that the three could handle 8 random street goons but she was more interested in who this person was...and what it was that they wanted with her. She clicked on the Pigeon and waited for things to progress, certain her leader Dusk would do something similar.

Just as the woman clicked the pigeon, a cellphone went off. Not an unusual sound for a bar, but this was especially loud, and the ring tone was, for some reason, playing the Greek national anthem. A rather large, sweaty man in a black suit about two sizes too small dug around in his pockets. He finished the little black smartphone out, and pressed it to his ear with a huff.

"Yeah," he grunted. "Who's thi-" Obviously cut off, the man froze, the color slowly draining from his face as he listened intently. "O-okay, just do-..Okay."

He waddled up to the register, his pudgy sausage-fingers gripping the phone tightly as he thrust it at Athens. "Guy says it's for you, and if you don't take it," he gulped, sweat beading on his forehead. "He's gunna kill my family..Sent a picture of them, and everything.."

Of course in his defense Gary had no intentions of hurting anyone, least of all this random dude's family. He just felt he needed a bit of a bargaining chip to make sure Catherine played along. You could only put so much trust in a stranger's curiosity, and the Prima Donna folks seemed to be the do-gooder type on the surface, so it seemed like an okay Gambit.

Heh. Behind a computer screen many, many miles away Gary Freeman snorted at his own pun. "A gambit in Gambit's."

He listened intently, waiting for the phone to be picked up by his new toy. The second he felt she was listening, he'd pipe up. "Hello there lovely lady, let's be brief. You have forty seconds to tell me your full name. Tick-tock."

Catherine took the phone. The man before her seemed rather scared and given his size it probably wasn't healthy for him to have such a fast beating heart. "Hey... what? My name? You don't remem_It's Catherine...you know...Catherine Auguste Von Friederike? Right...you hack a guy's phone to talk to me but you can't even remember my name...your a dork. Oh hold on."

Catherine put her hand to the speaker of the phone and spoke to the large gentlemen who had given her the phone. "I'm terribly sorry. My boyfriend can be a real asshole, he's seeing some people about stuff..you know...up there?" Catherine knocked on her own skull and the man nodded along, a bit calmer than earlier but not by much. "I'm sure he's not gonna do anything but if you want, You can call the Bulwark...it won't be the first time someone's called about his shenanigans."

With that she brushed aside some hair that had gotten in her face and continued playing her part though she did whisper. "Your a real shitbag doing that to that guy...So why are exactly are you calling sweetie? You know I can't leave for another few hours."

"Holy shit!" Gary couldn't help but chuckle through the receiver. His voice was distorted, pitch altered, speed slowed, and played twice, slightly overlapping, it was a good way to keep himself unknown. It also made his laugh sound like a mix between a horrible Demon from the Seventh circle, and an old dial-up modem making love to a fax machine.

Needless to say it wasn't pleasant, but he simply couldn't help it. It took him a second to recover.

"Oh man. I really think I might be crying. You're the last person I expected to play off something like this as a crazy boyfriend. I mean, knocking your head like that," The thing about Gary was that while being all fun and games, he made sure whoever he was messing with knew just how closely he was watching. "..That was fucking priceless." He finished his mocking with a snort, and then cleared his throat quite dramatically.

"Okay, Lady Von Friederike," he started to chuckle again. "Which by the way, I cannot fucking take seriously. I almost blew your little friends up because I figured you gave me a fake name, but..Nah. Nobody could make that shit up," he paused to wheeze a little, a cough welling up in his throat. "D-Did your parents hate you or something? Don't answer that, not yet. More important things first!"

A loud clapping sound came through the receiver, then clicking.

"So, here's the thing..While you and I play my little game, I'm going to be piggybacking my way off a lot of networks between Terra, and the Garden. You know, so I can do a full background check on you, and your friends, and possibly alert the authorities if you're..Ya know..Fugitives or some shit, but first a change of scenery would be nice, don't you think? What's your favorite spot here in Wing City?"

"...Remember, if you don't answer...Kaboom."

In a corner of the bar, asleep on a couch was Albert C. Breach. Once, he was a hero. The New Californian Republic (NCR) were under his command at the second battle of Hoover Dam. There, the final battle between the NCR & Caesar's Legion took place. Eventually, the Legion were defeated and they were eradicated from the Mojave Wasteland. Albert was given an medal for his part in defending Hoover Dam from the Legion.

However, peace wasn't to last. A new threat had emerged from the darkest corners of the Mojave. The Radio's & Business Roaches. They overran the Mojave. Not only were the NCR forced to retreat from the Mojave, but many people close to Albert were killed or declared MIA. The missing included his wife Janet, his son & daughter Aj & Sizzler, his friends Steven Radroach, Mister Cuddlesworth the Deathclaw, Jerry McGhoulBerry the Ghoul and Captain James Ballarms the Securitron. Albert remembered the day that the Mojave went to shit.

But he was lucky to have even survived. He was teleported to the year 2287, where he learned that he was still in the Mojave. But he knew that was a lie as that was his clone Crier Breach. And Crier Breach was aligned with the Radio's & Business Roaches in the Mojave. And then he woke up.

Falling off the couch woke Albert up. He had teleported back to a universe where the Great War never occurred. His mind was hazy as he tried to drink to forget his dark past. But he knew that the past won't go away. He searched his pockets for a GooGoo Bar to eat, only to find none.

God damn it. I'm out of GooGoo Bars. Fuck my life.

He said as he got up off the floor. He grabbed his bag of supplies. He knew that he was being hunted by the Radio's & Business Roaches. But that ended today. As he loaded & cocked his gun, Albert knew what time it was.

He got out a camera and started recording.

Day 2166: I've been drifting for far too long. But I'm not running no more. Now the hunt begins. I'll start with you Radio's. So you better say your fucking prayers if you can. Then I'm coming for you Business Roaches. Soon your stock market crap is going to plummet down harder then Santa when he couldn't ride his sleigh as he was too fat. So word of warning: Watch. Your. Fucking. Backs!!

He said as the camera recorded his message. With the recording done, he uploaded the video to TerraTube. The internet was slow & the uploading took long.

Really? This Bar has shittier internet then that Diner.

Albert remarked as he waited for the video to upload.