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Living and working in Goodneigbor comes with the certainty that one can, and will, encounter people from all walks of life.
Ghouls, Humans, hell- even mutants and animals. Short and tall, wide or thin- irradiated or smoothskinned. The only thing everyone within the gates has in common is the fact that they’re all smelling the same pissed-on garbage in the alleyways.
But it’s home to most of them. Garbage or not.
The diversity is why most people in Goodneighbor even stay there. Setting up a home in the wastes isn’t exactly feasible, safe, or easy. And it’s not like Diamond City has welcoming arms to those of the Commonwealth with… radiated predispositions.
The Third Rail, on the end of state house, in the dilapidated subway- that’s the crown jewel of the city. Everyone who stays for more than a night ends up down there at least once- buys a beer, grabs a job from Whitechapel, wastes some caps on a good gamble. There are mercenaries and there are job recruiters, there are regulars and there are people who’ve never been seen before and will likely never be seen again.
That’s where everyone from every walk of life ends up sooner or later.
It’s not uncommon for groups to come in together, either. ‘From all walks’ includes people who’re all walking the same path, whether for a second on a crossing intersection, or people who’ve been on the straight and narrow together since birth. Parties of three, old buds met up for a drink- battalions of 5 or more, mercs or survivalists looking for a kickback while they resupply.
Tonight, the group that comes in is a little larger than the usual. The bar quiets down for a moment when the stampede of boots comes down the stairwell. Whitechapel actually looks twice at something for the first time in years, Deegan looks up from his newsstrip, and Magnolia nearly misses a beat.
(nearly. She’s just too good).
It’s roughly 6 of them. But the way they meander down the stairs sets them each apart. There are some side by side, some pull ahead, and others fall back. The quick thud thud thud of worn, leather boots beating on the subway concrete in a quick stride, followed by the low scuffing sound of rubber sole hiking shoes scraping in a slow, unhurried stride. They each differ just enough. And that’s goodneighbor, together but different.
Heading the group is the smallest, the one who managed to squeeze between the average-sized others and break free and forward to plow the way down into the bar. She slips between two of her companions and meets the bottom of the stairs, and beelines for the bar end where a line of empty stools awaits them.
A couple of standing drifters shuffle out of the way into the shadows to let the group pass. The short girl, with her dark hair pooling around her shoulders, hoists herself up into the stool seat, kicking her heels together as they dangle from the height she sits at.
Chiyome, one of the voices chides, and she laughs boisterously at their following comment and tucks some long hair back behind her neck.
Whitechapel has digested the group at this point, and, with a huff, sidles over to greet the group- praying to whatever the God of Mr. Handy’s is that they all order a beer and save him the trouble.
The tallest members sit side by side, the woman next to Chiyome, and the man just after her.
The lanky, blonde woman has her hair pinned to the top of her head and a jacket hanging loosely around thin shoulders. Her blue eyes are alert and observing, and it’s obvious to any drifter not yet drunk or high out of their minds that she’s sizing the place up, but none of them could quite say why. After a thorough look around, and a couple of ignored calls of her name, (“Frost, Frost! what- what do you want to drink?) She settles for a subtle grin and turns back to the barkeep.
She orders something heavy, shot glasses clink while Whitechapel hears her order out- the bar’s constant buzzing murmur of conversation has returned, the novelty of the group has worn off.
The man next to her is a ghoul, and to say he’s turning some heads is an understatement. Ghouls are common here, there’s more ghouls than humans in the underground city- the damn mayor is a ghoul- but Jeremiah, he’s called, isn’t the red and fleshy undertones of others like him- he’s darker, a cool, viridian tone to his skin. Sketching across the exposed parts of his skin are veins of glowing light green, curling and meandering in his skin.
Glowing Ghouls don’t show up very often, much less surrounded by about 7 human females. It makes a couple of the patrons grin to themselves, as they pretend they think they understand. But they don’t, and that’s part of the beauty of it. Nobody here knows why these people are here, nobody knows how they met or where they came from, or where they’ll go. That ambiguity is why they seem so aloft- like the protagonists of a comic, they steal the show.
Whitechapel doles out some shots to Frost, who nods her head in thanks, and sitting aside her, Jeremiah, who doesn’t miss a beat before downing his first two before Frost can even reach for hers.
Chiyome nurses a beer, and she complains to the girl on her other side about how bad it is.
“It just doesn’t taste good!”
The girl barks out laughter and shakes her head, yellow blond hair skewing her vision as it musses into her eyes. It’s short hair, up under her chin, and it’s streaked with mud in the back.
To be fair, all of them are a bit roughed up, it seems. Frost boasts a patch of purpling bruises on her arm, and Chiyo’s jacket is ripped along the side. It only adds to their charm. Where did they come from? What were they doing?
Rio, the shorter yellow-blonde, just bigger than Chiyo, but still smaller than her platinum blonde friend, Frost- orders a beer for herself and chugs from it, Chiyo wrinkles her nose in distaste.
She laughs at the face she’s being given and gives a playful tap on the arm, “c’mon. ‘S not that bad,” and they share a grin.
Frost strikes up conversation with Jeremiah and the woman seated to his other side- over his broad, tall shoulders-
She’s stout and blonde too, like Rio, but she’s less sharp edges and more long, golden tresses. She boasts an impressive set of marks across her cheek, scars from anyone’s-best-guess. More ambiguity for these comic book heros. Sara, and her mysterious scars. At least, to the drifter’s eyeing her from the corners.
She’s called Sara, and she narrows her green eyes over the ghoul’s shoulders when Frost says something about her being too “picky” with her alcohol. Rather than entertain her friend’s playful teasing, she just sips on her glass. Carefully selected from Whitechapel’s exasperated stock.
Rio mentions her, retelling some piece of a piece of a story to Chiyo and Frost, a half-forgotten event from several days ago as she finishes her first beer- she gestures to Sara and then continues rambling- and Sara lets the story about the wastes continue with a lighthearted eye roll.
Another dark haired patron and member of this unruly crew orders something with the question, “do you have anything, yknow? Fruity, or sweet?”
Whitechapel starts to make a comment about how he doesn’t serve girly drinks in his bar, but he takes a moment to look over the obviously roughed up and powerful group of mostly women that are entertaining his bar, and tells her he’ll whip something up.
She just nods with a smile and leans against the counter end, listening in on Frost’s animated joke telling as she finishes Rio’s story for her because the shorter woman, for the life of her, couldn’t remember the name of the warehouse they had been clearing out. Not after two beers, anyways.
Jeremiah calls for more shots and Gene, the dark haired woman, clears her throat and raises a friendly eyebrow at him when his dark eyes connect to hers for a moment and he looks away and back to his drinks. She just shakes her head and smiles and calls to him, her accent thick with the intoxicating feel of the ruddy, underground bar-
“Easy on yourself there, Jer’”
He turns towards the other girls and adds something he would call “punny” to the end of Frost’s joke- and Sara tilts her head to the fluorescent lights above and groans with the awfulness of the pun he’d unleashed.
Rio stands and stretches her thin frame with her arms above her head and mentions something about being on her feet all the time these days, and Chiyo takes the opportunity to swing her legs onto the other’s seat to kick back-
Rio stands by Gene for a moment, pats the taller, larger woman on the shoulder and shares a grin with her, and laughs at the drink that Whitechapel is handing to her- the liquid is a dark pink color, and there’s a plastic umbrella in it- but it looks as if it’s been stepped on. Gene can hardly contain a smile.
Frost catches up to Jeremiah in shot-number as she orders another- and as they fall into companionable silence, she complains about her bruises- and Rio joins in.
“Everything aches, I need like, Twelve more beers.”
Frost smiles at her and then looks to Sara when she adds,
“God. Gross. No way could I drink twelve beers. Especially not these ones.”
It keeps on like that, for a good while. Drifters and mercs watch and wait while the group of companions orders their rounds, complains about their day jobs, and tells their jokes and stories to one another.
There’s bouts of side splitting laughter, times where one of them almost tumbles off their stool in joy- times where they quiet down, listening as one of them mentions something serious, something heartfelt, and they offer their collective advices and nod to one another. Jokes told loud enough to make other patrons wheeze, and arms slung over shoulders as drinks settle warmly in the pits of stomachs.
It’s obvious they have a good dynamic. Rare in groups so large. Most groups larger than four are only in on business, and they talk business, some. About Minutemen and Brotherhoods and all of the things plaguing them with worries. But they talk mostly about themselves, and each other- and faces split with mirth.
It’s no one in the bar’s place to say where each of them came from, how they met, what they do, where they’ll go. Maybe they met an hour ago, maybe they’ve known each other for years. Maybe they’ll leave together and head to a new job, maybe not.
But it’s the ambiguity of it all- names spoken aloud attached to the faces the drifters can see blurred by alcohol or drug- the voices ringing out clear and expressive- they are there in the moment and that’s all. There is nothing more to it than friends, in the third rail, sharing a drink.
Or maybe there is, but the not knowing is what makes it so story-like. Hooded figures and masked heroines, that’s what it’s all about.
The night wears on, glasses run dry and they do not ask Whitechapel to refill them. They gather themselves, guide one another sleepily and drunkenly to the Rex- arms around shoulders, tipsy feet scuffing and stifling on the asphalt- Chiyo and Jeremiah have to be carried, or, eh- drug, both too drunk to walk, but at least Chiyo is conscious. They don’t mind having to lug the six-odd foot ghoul into the hotel- He’s family and sometimes you’ve gotta drag passed out family members out of bars.
the others, mostly sober, remember to leave a jar of purified water in his room for when he inevitably wakes-
They say their tipsy goodnights after dropping off the more indisposed members of their party- Sara gives a grin, Frost laughs and has to duck under her particularly low door frame, Gene waves them off playfully, and Rio accidentally hits herself in the face opening the door to her room the wrong way.
The others pretend not to see it so they can tease her for it later.
The drifter’s talk, later, the next day, about that group of misfits come down into their bar, ordering all their drinks and laughing up a storm and it’s the talk of the town for about a day before someone inevitably gets stabbed again and that’s the new hot topic.
But for the day, they get talked about like comic book characters
(“That tall, wise eyed blonde,” “The long-haired one with those green eyes and the guitar strapped to her back,” “the glowing ghoul with a leather coat,” “The dark haired woman, yea! the one with the accent,” “The Brotherhood girl, with the real long hair, very chipper,” “The short haired girl, blondie, wearing the old boots,”)
They’re talked about, for about 20 Goodneighbor hours, like cameos and stars, main characters each in their own right.