Mortimer and the Craving.

Heck Gunderson's son went missing hours earlier.  He had to be somewhere inside the hotel, according to the father.  And Gunderson himself earned at least minuscule sympathy from Boone because the cowboy was certain the white-masked weirdos had something to do with the mysterious disappearance.  The Courier and her drunken date headed toward Mortimer for information, someone Boone knew only as a real stuffy bastard in a top hat.  While they were walking to his area, the girl's drunken intuition matched Boone's wariness.

"I just..I just think this has....you don't think the rumors are true..."

"I dunno," he sighed in his deep voice, pulling her forward when she tripped over a step.

"Dff--thanks--I just feel like...."  Mortimer stood at his desk, helping a customer.  The Courier put a hand on Boone's arm.

"Let me talk to him."  Her intuition, uncanny enough that had she lived pre-War one would call it "cop intuition" was enough for Boone to shrug and focus his attention on a fountain in the opposite direction, while she straightened her hair and smoothed her dress to make a good impression on Mortimer, no doubt probably about to flatter him, use her female powers to make hi---

Boone turned to glance after her--she was still standing in place, pushing up her chest. He ogled.

"What the hell are you doing?"

"They....adjusting them, if you must," she replied, as he turned eight shades of crimson.  

Now she pushed her breasts together happily and Boone snapped, "Stop it," glancing around to make sure no one had noticed the strangely arousing act.  

"They look much better," she decided merrily, ignoring his tone, and he was stony faced in reply as she surveyed the view from above. Extra cheeky thanks to the alcohol, the Courier shook her shoulders and said with no measure of intimacy, "Don't you think?"

It was a good thing his tan hid his blush, still the sniper was red.  He actually couldn't answer this one, not because he had no words, but the stern chastising words he'd intended on issuing were stuck in his throat, and he could only stutter, "I....you, I--"

"Yeah, you think so," she waved dismissively, and approached Mortimer's desk.  Now that she and those weren't in his line of sight, he stared at her back and shook his head dismally.  Without a doubt, underneath the pretty combed hair and immaculate dress with now adjusted cleavage, she was still a nut.  

Mortimer was indeed charmed by the Courier, and she was actually quite uncertain of her exact words that led him to speak so sadly about the missing Gunderson.  She chatted on with the same charismatic demeanor she'd grown famous for, and on a whim, decided to test her earlier theory.  

"I know of the Craving," she said seriously, referencing the cannibalism commonly practiced within the old Tribe.  This was something she knew she could be killed for, well maybe not killed because the White Gloves were pussies who carried around canes like a pack of grandpas, but still, she knew it was a risk to speak of.  Mortimer responded beautifully.

"Then you'll know," he said in desperate tones, "What an ordeal I'm facing."  When Mortimer confided to the woman with the comforting-looking bosom, she tried to put on what she hoped was a sympathetic face.  Though intoxicated, she knew the seriousness of the situation.  Mortimer's men had put Ted Gunderson in the freezer.  He was to be the White Gloves' dinner.  Either she made really excellent sympathetic faces while drunken, or Mortimer was staring blatantly at her chest and not her face, as he told her of Heck Gunderson's fearsome wrath.  How if he found out, everything was going to go so terribly. How they needed to have someone for dinner and return the young man safely back to his rifle-toting father.

The Courier was not a brash woman, typically; even when fraternizing with the enemy she retained a coolness unheard of and could cleverly lie and get away with it, a talent she'd taken advantage of on many occasions.  She didn't mind the lies themselves, for they were always used to help people in some way, but every now and again the woman grew disturbed with the advances and lack of limit her manipulative nature extended to. He was at the moment attempting to persuade her to kidnap a replacement for Ted, a young man whose name she didn't bother to listen to while Mortimer fussed.  Someone who lived outside the city limits.

She propped one elbow up, furthering the chest view.   The girl gestured towards Boone, who at the moment had dropped his glasses into the fountain.

"What about my friend over there?" she inquired coyly.

Mortimer glanced over her shoulder.  Boone had taken off his jacket and now rolled up one shirt sleeve, muttering curses, and fished in the glistening waters.  The Courier's eyes were on Mortimer, whose eyes were on Boone's rippling bicep.

"Hmmmmm....."

With a triumphant splash, Boone pulled his arm from the fountain, glasses in tow, then dropped them again.

"Fuck..."

"Little rugged..." Mortimer decided.  "Gamey even, but I suppose he'll do quite nicely."

Boone punched the water in frustration.

"His meat is of the finest quality," she said seriously, then as Mortimer ducked underneath his desk to unlatch the kitchen key and hand her a weapon, she stifled the biggest laughing fit of the decade. His meat was of the finest quality and the girl didn't recover in time for Mortimer to resurface, so she quickly turned her laughs into coughs.

"My goodness, are you all right?" Mortimer inquired as he slid the key over.  

"Yes.....yes, my apologies," she gasped, wiping away a tear.

From behind them, Boone had succeeded in withdrawing the shades and was now air-drying them by flinging them wildly to and fro--they slipped out of his hands and disappeared into the flora, the large indoor fake trees the casino boasted.  As they exited, an "ow!" was heard from a gambler on the other side.  Boone frowned.