MacCready jolted awake when he felt movement on his head and light was suddenly thrown in his face. He met Magnolia's smug smile—she had lifted his hat he had pulled over his eyes.

"Morning, handsome. It was a nice surprise finding you here in my work."

"I missed your show last night, so I wanted to get early seating," he said.

She gave her usual sultry laugh as she straightened. "You sure know what to say to a woman, don't you?" Magnolia's heels clicked as she walked off.

He swung his legs off the side and stretched to finish waking up, then he remembered why he was back in The Third Rail and looked up to check on Aurora.

Curled up on her side, she faced away from him. The damp rag he had given her for her head lay on the floor, now dry.

MacCready got up and bent to pick it up. He had a thought about throwing it in her face to wake her up, but decided to let her sleep a bit more. He headed toward Whitechapel Charlie to return the rag.

"Thanks for letting us crash here for the night," he said as he returned the rag.

"I would not throw Aurora out on the street. The lass is welcomed here anytime." All three eyestalks turned on him. "You, on the other hand, are still pending."

No matter how hard MacCready tried to distance himself from his past, it still hung over his shoulders. Even if his plan to rid himself of Winlock and Barnes worked, MacCready would probably still be viewed as how Whitechapel Charlie looked at him: with distrust and suspicion. But the Mr. Handy wasn't as high and mighty as he portrayed—he'd hire someone to go raid a warehouse for supplies in a heartbeat, not that he even had one.

Hypocritical robot, MacCready thought as he turned away to return to Aurora. Now in a sour mood, he poked her, not caring if it hurt. "Hey, it's time to wake up."

She grunted in displeasure and tried to get away from his poking. "No, it's not."

"Yeah, it is. Whitechapel Charlie's going to throw us out if you don't get up."

"No, he won't; he'd throw you out, not me."

MacCready frowned; she caught him in his lie. Whitechapel Charlie had a soft spot for women—he'd be quick to help his female customers and forget the males.

At the burned smell of coffee, he got an idea; he went back to the bar, got two cups, promised Aurora would pay for the drinks, and headed back over with steaming cups in hand. MacCready stopped behind her drinking his, thinking on how to wake her up. He had humorously thought to dump the drink on her, but he didn't want to burn her. With a plan in mind, he leaned over her.

He brought the cup of coffee close to her nose; it didn't take long for her to smell the fresh coffee and start to wake up. Her eyes flickered open, looked at the cup, then scowled up at him. "You couldn't let me sleep, could you?"

He felt smug as he straightened—she looked so irritated; all women became angry bears when woken. "Nope."

Aurora huffed as she swung her legs off the couch and accepted her cup of coffee as he sat on the edge of the end table between their sofas. She didn't look as pale as she did last night and seemed to be more lucid.

"How do you feel?" he asked.

"Like something's growing out the side of my head."

"Well, if something's supposed to be there, I don't see it; that's not good, right?"

She cut her eyes at him—she really wasn't a morning person.

"So, where are we headed next, boss? Another bar?" he asked.

She shook her head. "They usually go better. No; I'm hoping to avoid more situations like that. We'll just go around wiping out camps and maybe we'll get lucky."

MacCready didn't like that situation either; he could tell where it was headed at the lust in the bartender's eyes. The hard-headed woman across from him probably started to feel the effects of the whiskey not to notice. He knew better than to let her go with the bartender alone—he should've stepped in earlier. At least he got there before it was too late, but this just added to his growing list of regrets.

"Just point and I'll shoot; that was the deal, right? Oh, by the way, you have a tab you need to pay," he told her as he took a drink.

Aurora looked confused at first, but after figuring it out, glared at him.

***

In their trek from place to place, Aurora picked up some jobs in her drive to better the Commonwealth and to get more caps, like killing an infestation of Feral Ghouls or going into some place to get an item somebody wanted. Moe in Diamond City wanted a signed baseball glove, ball, and card she had to kill a bunch of mirelurks for—huge mutated crabs that liked flooded residences. MacCready didn't seem to like helping others—saying they just wasted their time—but his displeasure slowly lessened when Aurora split the reward with him.

After retrieving a stolen picture, they returned to Diamond City and went up to the Colonial Taphouse patio to return it to Eustace. Sitting on the patio were four people: a bald black man in a sharp black tuxedo sitting by himself, a blonde woman, Eustace, and a drunk. The Mr. Handy, serving the patrons, had derogatory remarks about her. The only ones who didn't look down on her as she passed were Eustace and the sleeping drunk.

She was thrilled to get the picture back, paid Aurora for a job well-done, then launched into telling her about the picture, as old people tend to do about personal items. Aurora listened politely, but could see MacCready getting impatient. She thought about asking Eustace to tell her more, just to further irritate him, but she didn't want to stay in this pompous air anymore.

As she said goodbye to Eustace, the blonde woman sitting at the table over sighed loudly. "You must be another one of the poor and stupid of Diamond City come begging for table scraps."

Aurora looked over; too much facial reconstruction surgery left her face terribly scarred and plastic-looking. If she went to the surgeon hoping to maintain beauty, he had butchered her. She wore makeup, but that improved nothing.

"Poor and stupid?" she repeated.

"Oh, don't act like you don't know! There are two types of people in this town: the ones living in the Stands, and everyone beneath us. I know everyone in the Stands and that doesn't include you. Now why don't you make yourself scarce?"

Her haughty attitude pissed her off. "And just who are you?"

"Ann Codman, of the Codman family? Of the Upper Stands? If you haven't heard of us, that just shows how unimportant you are. Now, were you leaving or not?"

"Bitch."

Ann Codman looked up at her in shock. "What did you say?"

"Oh, you didn't hear me call you a 'bitch'? Is your hearing as bad as your face?" MacCready tried to hide a grin behind a hand.

"How dare you! I'm... I'll..." She started to get up but took another look at her—specifically eyeing her armor and guns—and sat back down. She finally took notice of the dangerous and angry aura around Aurora. "Guards! There's a miscreant here that needs removal!"

Aurora scoffed. "Miscreant? Is that the best your plastic head can come up with?"

A Diamond City guard—in his catcher's padding as armor and baseball bat with rusted nails—ran up to them. "Ma'am, it's time to leave."

She looked over at him and smiled innocently. "Nothing's wrong here, sir; we're just having a girl-to-bitch talk."

MacCready let a chuckle loose.

"Both of you: out. Now. And don't come back. I will not tell you again."

Aurora complied. "You can do so much better than that Feral," she told him as she passed.

The plastic woman looked insulted—at least Aurora thought she did. Aurora gave Eustace a friendly wave as she and MacCready headed back down to the market. The man beside her was awfully quiet, and she felt his eyes glance at her every now and then.

She turned on him. "What?"

He smiled. "Nothing; I just hoped you would give her more."

"Oh, I plan on giving her more." She looked back up at the bar's patio. "I wonder what house she lives in..."

***

That night, she and MacCready broke into Ann Codman's house and stole everything they could carry: from food, clothes, and coffee cups to a hairbrush, gold-plated flip lighter, and packets of cigarettes. They went back to Goodneighbor to sell all of their loot; they kept the flip lighter and cigarettes for themselves. MacCready greatly approved of the breaking and entering.

"You're full of surprises, aren't you?" MacCready began as they sat in The Third Rail smoking and drinking. "You go from an excellent sharpshooter to a woman with a heart of gold, to a feisty one who'll break into homes and steal without a second thought."

She smiled as she pulled a drag on the cigarette. "Not without a second thought. How much I rob depends on how they treated me."

"So, you don't just go robbing everyone?"

"Not really, but if they have something I want, it's mine."

He shook his head as he took a drink of beer. "I haven't met one like you before."

She smiled. "I'm proud to say you probably won't find another."

MacCready laughed. "No, I probably won't. What—"

"MacCready," Whitechapel Charlie interrupted as he flew over to their table. He handed MacCready a folded piece of paper. "Winlock and Barnes came by and gave me this note to give you. Please inform those fellows that I am not a postman." He turned and flew back to the bar.

He opened the note and read what it said; Aurora watched the crease deepen between his eyes. He heaved unhappily as he crumpled up the paper and tossed it to the side.

"Everything alright?" she asked.

"No."

"What's going on?"

His eyes cut over to her, full of uncertainty and distrust.

She shrugged off the sting of his distrust. "If you're in trouble, I'd like to help, but if you think it's none of my business, don't tell me. That's fine."

MacCready looked at her for a while—she could see the machines working in his head. He sighed. "I don't usually go around sharing my business, but I'm gonna be straight-forward with you. It's those two assh—" He stopped and corrected himself. "Those two idiots: Winlock and Barnes. They've been hounding me for months and it's been driving off clients. No one wants to touch me once they learn I used to run with the Gunners."

He refraining from cursing was interesting; he didn't look offended at her cursing before but she would watch herself. She'd ask him about it later. "What was on that note?"

"A friendly reminder of where their territories are and what will happen if my jobs cross over them."

"What are you going to do about it?"

"Figured I could get enough caps together and buy them out."

Now she felt guilty about driving his price down when she hired him. "Sounds like a decent plan, but will it work?"

"I don't know; they could just take the money and kill me, anyway. There's no guarantee that they'd let me go, just chance."

At least he wasn't overly optimistic not to consider what can go wrong. "So, what's your Plan B?"

His eyes shot to her again. "Kill them before they kill me. Their camp is at Mass Pike Interchange, but they always have a small army with them."

"Sounds dangerous..." She let it trail off to make him wonder if she was daunted about it; instead, he had hooked her. "I'm in."