[center] [color=ed1c24][b]Servius Curius Proculus Vespillo[/b][/color] [/center]

Servius gave a small nod as he watched Finn work, listening to his explanation of his origins carefully.
"[color=ed1c24] That does explain the Linguistical similarities[/color]." Servius said, then smirked as Finn mentioned deathclaws steak "[color=ed1c24]We tried cooking deathclaw once... It did not go well, I hope yours fairs better[/color]." 

Finn seemed to be slightly zoned out however, as though he was lost in his own thought while the food was being prepared. Servius watched him with curiosity until eventually the man let out a little laugh and started doling out the food, pouring them glasses of whiskey and offering it to them

"[color=ed1c24]Ah, I can not drink the whiskey. Such drinks are forbidden by Caesar, to consume them is a sacrilege in the eyes of Mars. Someone else may consume that... Chem.[/color]" Servius said as he glanced at the glasses Finn had poured. Forbidden for good reason if one was to ask him; He felt slightly ill at ease with the idea of relying on comrades who had consumed a depressive chem. Especially if this was common behaviour for some of them; It would severely weaken the unit, and in a place as dangerous as this that was troublesome indeed. 

The liqour itself had a significance to the dissolute that was almost sacrosanct in nature, he had earned. He had heard of their traditions of 'drowning ones sorrows', where those who had endured hardship or misfortune would drink to forget and numb their pain. These men and women drank themselves into a stupor, slowly poisoning and destroying themselves to avoid facing the hard truths of their existence. Human weakness and the avoidance of responsibility, expressed through a culture of drugs and numbing that in the long term served as nothing more than a slow and drawn out self destruction. Suicide by bottle. Truly such a solace could only prevent one from truly facing their problems and dealing with the root cause of their suffering.  

It did no better for his confidence when he saw the cigar. What was it with dissolute and profligate sand a diehard commitment to their own slow and painful self destruction? Did they not see it? Or were they trapped by a alck of willpower? 

He managed to stop himself from grimacing when John said he'd skip dinner and take the drink. From what he understood of 'alcohol', that only made matters worse. And again too from the perspective of efficiency. You never knew when you were going to be able to eat again or whether you'd be wrapped up in battle and stuck on watch, it was better to take what you could when it came your way. He'd learnt that one the hard way when once he had skipped breakfast in Caliente to focus on drilling some recruits. An hour later, the NCR surrounded the camp and started taking pot shots at them. They had them hunkered down for the better part of the day, the two sides trading fire back and forth to little effect before the Legion finally drove the NCR back in the middle of the night. There'd been few casualties on both sides... But his stomach was definitely one of them. 

As Finn offered them the food and told them to dig in, Servius took his bowl and examined the stew in it for a moment, peering at the contents. Then he lowered himself down to sit, holding the food in his lap and setting his canteen of water down next to him. 

"[color=ed1c24]Mars, qui genus colis alisque hominem, per quem vivimus vitalem aevom, atque ego tibi ante alios deos gratias ago atque habeo summas. Ne invisas habeas neve idcirco nobis vitio, minus quod bene esse lautum tu arbitrare. Purga haec cibus impuritates, modo simile plumbo mutando ad aurum. Ita est.[/color]" Servius prayed quietly with a slightly bowed head. When he finished, he began to eat from it carefully; It tasted good, better than most of the meals he had eaten in his life. The threat of something 'not as good' didn't seem quite so intimidating when the food was good.

"[color=ed1c24]You cook well. Did you learn this back in this Carolina? It sounds like you had a good situation back in your homeland... Yet you're here with the Brotherhood in a place literally called the city of the dead. Why did you leave? It would sound as though you had a purpose with these Brahmin ranchers, what drew you away from it?[/color]" Servius asked between mouthfuls of soup. It was a curious question to him, one did not abandon their livelihoods for nothing. A sense of duty perhaps? That was in part what had brought him here after all, and perhaps the most easy answer for anyone to give. It allowed as well some level of obfuscation for any personal reasons - though ironically he had to practice the inverse. 

Servius pondered the bizzare situation he found himself in,not for the first time. He was over two thousand miles from where he was born, judging from the road signs along the way. It had taken him a little less than 3 weeks of travelling (Had he not lost the bicycle to a grenade in Missouri, he would have made it in less than two. Fortunately, he still made it on time. He would need to find a faster way of getting home than walking, there had been only tribals in Pennsylvannia and he doubted he'd find much useful out of them for that purpose... Though this Virginia, while a little out of the way, apparently had prosperous people. They, surely, could sell him a bicycle or mount. Perhaps even something motorised, though he wasn't sure how he could raise the funds for that. Perhaps he'd find something valuable here in the city he could barter with, or else make some kind of agreement while there. Finn had mentioned robotic horses? He imagined those would be costly, but would be well suited to travelling the long distance in a short time provided it was I'm decent enough condition.). He was far, far from home and from Amicii of the Legion. And this city was about as cheerful as a graveyard and as dangerous as a Deathclaws den. In fact, it practically was one big deathclaw den. HIC SVNT LEONES.

Out of the corner of his vision, he noticed Prism say something to Bailey before she approached. The comment didn't seem to show much effect on her at any rate, so he dismissed it as inconsequential. Emil and Monika were speaking too, and from the body language it seemed it was heavy hearted. He could understand why, Monika was clearly not enthralled by the presence of a Legion Centurion, and one she knew at that. She'd made that much plain with the barging.

And then the Brotherhood had looked their way, between the two of them. Yes, a fear of disruption or incohesion within the ranks. Understandable as a fear, it had been creeping onto his own mind since the very moment he had joined the group, let alone when he realised the competing interests and the history between himself and Monika... There was clearly going to be a great deal of tension and hardship on the road ahead. Servius didn't intend to add anything to it through starting a fight with Monika. Curiosity as to her life since the Legion was resting lightly on his mind, and on another it was good to see *something* that reminded him of the east - even if it was not a particularly good memory. It was a strange thing, home sickness. 

Was home sickness the right word? That would imply he had a permenantly home. He never had. Even Flagstaff was little mroe than memories from his earliest years. But the Legion was itself a sort of home, wasn't it? A family? All its territory was his home, not a single town or city or building as seemed to sit on the minds of others. Perhaps it was rather... Isolation, that troubled him. He had felt the Spirit of the Bull flowing through him and following him ever since he had stepped out from the borders he still felt the eyes of Mars and Caesar upon him, judging him and exhorting him to greater deeds. He knew better than to question their existence, all he had seen and experienced in his life led him to the conclusion that the supernatural was very real and very tangible, and that counter for both the good and bad parts of it... But the lack of contact with a fellow flesh and blood legionary, with someone who understood him and their creed, took its toll on his mind all the same, despite the presence of the gods. 

But homesickness, isolation... All it was pointless semantics and philosophy either way. It didn't matter what words described what he felt towards his home, only that he felt it, and the sooner his job here was done the sooner he could return to the lands of the Bull. And to complete the mission here was to ensure that things when smoothly, that he and Monika did not end up trying to murder each other, that the group did not drink themselves onto a stupor and become useless, that group cohesion - or rather what little there was - could be maintained. 

Yet he struggled with the internal dilemma. These people were his unit, and so they were now his Contubernium. Yet they were not Legionaries. A few of them had the combat skills, but others did not. The discipline wasn't the same, evidentally. So he wasn't sure what to make of them, in what ways they could truly be relied in before they - or their will - broke. Perhaps it was well that Khaliya seemed to have become the groups de facto leader for that purpose. 

Servius would do his part to ensure that he fit the role well and avoid causing any conflict between himself and the other. Following orders, at least, he could do easily. 

After all, that was what Legionaries were for. Honestas, Industria, Prudentia, Firmitas, Pietas.