Chapter Text
The sentry outside of the Museum of History hadn’t moved in three hours. While Nil’s intentions were well-meaning, the Underworld was not renowned for welcoming smoothskinned tourists with open arms. She was rather nervous that she would be sent away at the gate, making future entry even more difficult-- and it was easier to ask forgiveness than permission. So she sat, waiting for the opportunity to sneak past.
She watched as the guard cupped her hand around the end of a cigarette and lit it. From this distance, the flame was no more than a pinpoint of light. Nil didn’t smoke, but she could hypothetically envision—and appreciate—the creature comfort of a cigarette to a smoker. It reminded her of the ache in her feet and the gritty discomfort of her dirty clothes and dried sweat. She wanted to take a shower and sleep in a bed.
With that thought in mind, she girded her loins and rose to her feet, brushing the dust from her clothes. Her stomach growled as she approached—probably loud enough to announce her arrival—but nevertheless, she decided to announce herself in order to prevent being shot to death in this burnt-out old plaza.
“Hello over there,” she called, feeling awkward.
“Was wonderin’ when you’d nut up and come over here,” the sentry said, gazing nonchalantly in the opposite direction. A wry smile crept over her face.
All at once, Nil felt somewhat foolish. “You could see me?”
“Come on, girl. Could have seen you from a mile out,” the sentry remarked laughingly. “Figured you didn’t look too dangerous, scrabbling around on your belly like a sad little snake woman.” Dragging her eyes up and down Nil’s outfit, the sentry asked, “Where did you stumble out of, and are they all as super stealthy as you?”
Funny you should ask, Nil thought to herself, keeping her eyes trained away from her Pip-Boy. “Hey, you’re a funny lady. You should go on the road with that act,” she replied, still slightly embarrassed.
The sentry’s smirk lingered. “Anyway. Name’s Willow. You looking for passage into Underworld, or you just a history buff?”
“The first one,” Nil conceded. “Is that… okay?”
Willow smiled at her reassuringly. “We don’t get too many of your kind in here, but you’re welcome to roam around long as you aren’t causing trouble. Or a bigot.” She punctuated this statement with another pointed look, as though questioning Nil's intentions.
“Yeah, nothing like that. I’m just here to deliver a message. Do you know where I might find a… Carol?” Nil asked. “And a bed, and a drink while I’m at it?”
“Carol’s up at her place, which is conveniently also where you might find a bed; behind the Ninth Circle, which is conveniently also where you might find a drink,” Willow advised, nodding toward the entrance. “Head on through, underneath the big skull. The Ninth Circle is up the stairs on the left.”
“Thanks,” Nil said with a grateful sigh, shifting the weight of her pack over onto the other shoulder before trudging toward the door.
“Later, smoothskin,” the sentry responded before giving her a last enigmatic smile and sidling off to the exterior of the plaza.
***
Compared to the sterile gray-blues of the Vault, the Underworld’s soft reds and golds seemed imposing, stately, even opulent. Even in her exhaustion, Nil felt much older than her twenty-two years as she climbed the steps toward the bar.
The Ninth Circle, Nil found, was aptly named-- truly a forgotten circle of hell. The bar was dimly lit and swamped with the scents of smoke and stale beer. The bartender was too friendly—bordering on licentious. Though the night was still young, an overwhelming majority of the patrons were already well on their way to a chem-induced stupor. Overall, the atmosphere was as seedy as the old pre-war films made bars out to be-- but it did nothing to dampen her desire for the effortless lull of alcohol. After placing her bag on the floor beneath the table, she nursed her vodka in the corner, watching the people come and go with tired eyes.
After some time, she took notice of the bouncer, who was posted up with his back against the wall to her left. The cold wariness of his stare contrasted sharply with the fuzzy drunkenness of the clientele. With his imposing stature—six-foot-four, Nil hypothesized—and the latent power of his lean musculature, he looked like he belonged out in the field with Willow the sentry. It made her contemplate how much trouble actually started in this bar.
As luck would have it, she did not have to wonder for long. A fellow patron of the establishment slid into the seat in front of her, obscuring her view of the bouncer. He leaned in, baring a set of chalky teeth in a ghoul’s parody of a smile.
“Never seen you around these parts,” he remarked. Nil thought his speech as a bit slurred, but given the condition of his ghoulified vocal cords she supposed she wasn’t sure.
Ever the diplomat, Nil nodded, hoping that her forced air of extroversion was convincing. “Yep. I’m, ah… kind of touring the area. Never been here before.” She offered him as cordial a smile as she could muster.
“Want some company?” His own grin deepened, and suddenly Nil’s personal space had shrunk again. She could smell beer on his breath.
It seemed that the bartender, whose name was something like Asriel or Aslan or Azazel (Nil thought), had been watching them. “Lay off my newest customer, Gourlav,” he said, a note of warning in his gravelly voice. “Bad for business.”
Grateful for the interruption, Nil gave her admirer a false apologetic smile. “I think I’m actually going to turn in, anyway. Long day, and all that.” She yawned, stretching.
“I understand. Have a nice night and all, miss,” the ghoul drawled, inclining his head to her as he rose and turned to leave.
Nil blinked. What a strange, courteous end to this conversation, she thought as she grasped for her possessions under the table—
Her hand came up empty. And as her rebuffed suitor headed to the exit, she noticed through the haze of smoke and dust that he had in his possession not one, but two rucksacks, one of which appeared strikingly familiar—
“My—that’s my—“ she stammered out, gesturing vaguely at his retreating form. With shrewd eyes, Possibly-Azazel glanced in that direction.
“Charon,” he barked, flicking two fingers off in that direction. Her thief let out a yip of fear as the bouncer lurched forward, but he still managed to beat his pursuer out the door.
There was a long, pregnant silence as the entire bar waited for the bouncer to return. All at once, Nil felt a sick sense of foreboding, as if the rest of these bar-goers waited in knowing expectation of some new spectacle.
“Third fuckin’ alkie to get robbed this week,” the bartender groused, wiping down the bar with a dingy rag. “Gonna be no caps left for boozin’.” The silence continued for long seconds.
The door burst open—the bouncer, dragging her thief back into the bar with one hand. In the other was her beloved pack, the vessel housing all her worldly possessions. Despite her unease, the sight of the pack was a relief.
“Well, Gour, I guess that solves the mystery of the bar pickpocket,” the bartender drawled.
“You caught me, Ahzrukhal,” the other man gritted out. The voice that had seemed slurred just moments ago was now starkly sober, and it occurred to Nil that the “lascivious drunk” act was just that—an act. “Let me go and I swear to you, I’m out, I’ll never come back here. To the Underworld.” He lifted his head, offering Ahzrukhal a weakly penitent smile.
The grin that stretched across Ahzrukhal’s face was now so vicious and feral that Nil could scarcely believe he was the same man who had poured her vodka just minutes earlier. “Charon,” he started, inclining his head toward Nil, “why don’t you hand our young guest here her belongings? Free up a hand.”
As if regarding her for the first time, Charon stiffly handed Nil her rucksack. “Thank you,” she said haltingly.
“Charon, seat Gourlav at the bar,” Ahzrukhal continued, watching their movements with an odd expression. Charon complied, pushing the pickpocket forward as though he were merely a bulky mannequin—big, awkward, but not heavy. Gourlav’s limbs were frozen with apprehension.
“Have a beer, Gour. On the house,” Ahzrukhal simpered. He pushed a chipped glass stein of lukewarm beer across the bar, keeping his expression carefully neutral.
Evidently, Gourlav was taken aback by this course of events—and suspicious. “I swear, Ahz. You ain’t gonna see hide nor tail of me. I’ll be out of Underworld in an hour, I swear.”
“Take the beer, Gour. I insist.”
Hesitantly, the pickpocket reached for the drink.
Blood sprayed forth in a wild, messy arc, and Ahzrukhal’s blade could only be perceived as it was jerked out of the bar beneath Gourlav’s severed wrist. The force with which the bartender had swung the knife had lodged it firmly in the wooden countertop.
“What did you think I meant,” Ahzrukhal thundered, deranged, “by freeing up a fucking hand?” His screams of laughter echoed in cacophony with Gourlav’s unintelligible shrieks. In some quiet, unfazed corner of Nil’s mind, she wondered whether the hand could be salvaged, reattached. The unstoppable spurting of arterial blood seemed at odds with that notion.
As luck would have it, the idea was shot down, both literally and figuratively, by two quick bursts from a shotgun, planted directly in Gourlav’s back. He slumped forward, then crumpled to the ground, and the bar was suddenly silent again. Charon’s expression was grim as he replaced his weapon at his back.
Clearly displeased with this small display of mercy, Ahzrukhal narrowed his eyes at his bouncer. Then, as if remembering his role as the gracious host, Ahzrukhal straightened. “Well, ladies and gents, it looks like we might have to close for the night,” he announced. “Or at least a few hours. Scoop up some of this goddamn blood, get this goddamn body out of here,” he groused again, shooting Charon an accusatory glance.
Nil sensed that the bouncer would pay for this small treason later on; whether in a garnish of pay or in some other treatment, she did not know.
“Calling it a night already? Sleep tight, smoothskin,” Ahzrukhal called after her merrily—another whiplash change of temper. “Don’t worry. I’ll have Charon stand guard tonight. Safe as kittens.”
She inclined her head stiffly, then rose and moved toward the door to Carol’s Place as quickly as she could. She desperately wanted her human interaction to be over for the night.
But she did not want to ignore the bouncer who had retrieved her only belongings in the world, and who brought about a swift and merciful end to the horror show.
“Thank you,” she whispered to him as she passed. His stare was trained on her, but otherwise impassive, stoic. She almost wondered if he had heard her.
The innkeeper, Carol, was blithely ignorant of the chaos that had just transpired, but she was overjoyed to hear news of Gob. She ushered Nil to a room with a clean bed, and the wanderer could have kissed her.
The last thought that registered before Nil slipped into oblivion: This place is completely fucked.