Split Jack
Dec. 29th, 2012 07:58 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
aaaaaaaagh_skyUntil a man is twenty-five, he still thinks, every so often, that under the right circumstances he could be the baddest motherfucker in the world. If I moved into the yao guai tunnels and ran with the bears for ten years. If my gang was wiped out by the Regulators and I swore myself to revenge. If I got a fatal disease, had one year to live, and devoted it to wiping out Deathclaws. If I just dropped out and devoted my life to being bad.
Split Jack used to feel this way, too, but then he ran into 101. In a way, this was liberating. He no longer has to worry about being the baddest motherfucker in the world. The position is taken.
At least, that's what he tells the Pitt bosses when they come looking for him in the slave pens. When they say they're looking for anyone from the Capital. When the asshole he pissed off on his first day in the steelyard shoves him forward and tells them here, this guy, this is the one you want. The big one, O-dog, he's not impressed. It's easy for somebody who already lost to call someone else a badass, since it means they're not to blame for losing. But Jack didn't get as far as he did in the Capital by lying down and giving up. He's a talker and a damn good one, and so O-dog gets to hear the whole story. The Brotherhood's water plan. Rivet City's part in the deal. How he was going to drive them out of the business and take over protection himself, until 101 showed up with that kid and that Frankenstein in tow.
(The crowning touch, the one thing that really puts true world-class badmotherfuckerdom totally out of reach, of course, is the Frankenstein. If it wasn't for the goddamn mutant, a man could still aspire. Maybe find 101's Achilles' heel. Sneak up, get a drop, slip a mickey, pull a fast one. But 101's mutant umbrella kind of puts the world title out of reach.)
O-dog's never heard of a mutant like that, but the thing had a Gatling laser, and O-dog's seen what happens to guys on the wrong end of those. So he pulls Jack out of the pen and tells him they're going to have a long talk, and Jack's going to tell him everything he's ever heard about this 101 bitch. Not just what happened the day she dismantled everything Jack ever built and sent him and his gang into the Wastes with one gun for nine people, everything. Even if it's just rumor, Ashur wants to know. And Jack nods, and starts trying to remember everything Three Dog's ever said about 101. The man said a lot, and none of it makes Jack look all that great by comparison.
Which is okay. Sometimes it's all right just to be a little bad. To know your limitations. Make do with what you've got.
[OOC: thank you, Neal Stephenson.]
Split Jack used to feel this way, too, but then he ran into 101. In a way, this was liberating. He no longer has to worry about being the baddest motherfucker in the world. The position is taken.
At least, that's what he tells the Pitt bosses when they come looking for him in the slave pens. When they say they're looking for anyone from the Capital. When the asshole he pissed off on his first day in the steelyard shoves him forward and tells them here, this guy, this is the one you want. The big one, O-dog, he's not impressed. It's easy for somebody who already lost to call someone else a badass, since it means they're not to blame for losing. But Jack didn't get as far as he did in the Capital by lying down and giving up. He's a talker and a damn good one, and so O-dog gets to hear the whole story. The Brotherhood's water plan. Rivet City's part in the deal. How he was going to drive them out of the business and take over protection himself, until 101 showed up with that kid and that Frankenstein in tow.
(The crowning touch, the one thing that really puts true world-class badmotherfuckerdom totally out of reach, of course, is the Frankenstein. If it wasn't for the goddamn mutant, a man could still aspire. Maybe find 101's Achilles' heel. Sneak up, get a drop, slip a mickey, pull a fast one. But 101's mutant umbrella kind of puts the world title out of reach.)
O-dog's never heard of a mutant like that, but the thing had a Gatling laser, and O-dog's seen what happens to guys on the wrong end of those. So he pulls Jack out of the pen and tells him they're going to have a long talk, and Jack's going to tell him everything he's ever heard about this 101 bitch. Not just what happened the day she dismantled everything Jack ever built and sent him and his gang into the Wastes with one gun for nine people, everything. Even if it's just rumor, Ashur wants to know. And Jack nods, and starts trying to remember everything Three Dog's ever said about 101. The man said a lot, and none of it makes Jack look all that great by comparison.
Which is okay. Sometimes it's all right just to be a little bad. To know your limitations. Make do with what you've got.
[OOC: thank you, Neal Stephenson.]