Valerie had been born into the Bakkers, a Nomadic Clan that was struggling to remain independent even before her birth.
Her parents had died during a skirmish with the Raffen Shiv when she was very young, and as a result, the clan took her in and raised her to be just one of them. She grew fond of machines, especially vehicles, and weapons. Like many other Nomad, the Bakkers would try to get jobs with whoever was offering which led them on bid wars: The nomads were looking to make as many eddies as possible, but the corporations were looking to save as many eddies too, and with so many nomads out there, the corporations would always win and the nomads to would permanently lose.
As Valerie continued to grow up, so did her passion for cars and trucks, but also did her lust. Like many other nomads, she had her first experience during an escort job for Petrochem, she was the gunner, and Charlie was the driver. Charlie was a free spirit and in spite of being so young, around sixteen or so he said, he already had several jobs under his belt. Much like Valerie and other young members of the Bakkers, he had lost his parents at a very young age. Not too tall and definitely not skinny, he was the fantasy of many of the young Bakkers around, including Valerie, even if she was one year younger than he was.
The job was easy, escort the gigantic transport until they arrived at a Petrochem facility in the middle of bumfuck nowhere, a long drive of several hundred miles under the scorching Badlands sun. Veteran Bakkers had taken point, while Valerie and Charlie had taken the rear. Charlie's car wasn't much to write home about, a Thornton Galena that had been crashed a few times, and patched to keep on running even if it wasn't the best looking. The massive Kaukaz Bratsk was carrying literal tons of materials to their destination, and it also was heavily armored, but as a result, the mechanical behemoth didn't pick up a lot of speed, and the escorts had to match it.
"Fuckin' hell choom" Valerie protested as she rested her foot on the dashboard while Charlie kept on driving "Hell of a time for the AC to crap on us" Valerie was sweating, and would fan herself to no avail, Charlie seemed cool as ever. He had the window rolled down just a little bit so they wouldn't be cooked alive. His dirty blond curls were softly resting on his shoulders. "Sorry about that, Val, I swear it was working before we started this run" the sun was particularly merciless that day, it was barely 1 in the afternoon. "Why do these chooms always pick the shittiest times for a run?" the heat was putting her in a foul mood, and her sweating was not helping, Charlie simply shrugged "My guess is the Raffen, hard to see the fuckers at night. It's the good thing with the Badlands choom, you can always see them comin'" Valerie groaned resting both her legs now on the dashboard, Charlie peered at the annoyed Valerie, she was wearing washed-down, low-cut jeans with so many holes in them that they could hardly be counted as pants. She had even gotten a serious talk by some of the veterans, scolding her for not getting something that was actually weaved with some protective nanofiber at least, but she was also wearing a knotted grey top. Not that it protected much more, but at least it was newer than her jeans. And finally, heavy boots that once had been black and now had that strange brown-yellow discoloration on them. However, Charlie's attention was not focused on what he could see a mile away, but rather, on what he had just next to him. A nomad's diet wasn't the most nutritious, and with corporations flooding the market with synthetic food and leaving the real food to top corpos living in their crystal towers, and with the number of physical jobs and contracts people like Valerie would take a good physique, it also helped that the Badlands had two weather settings: Hot as fuck, and fucked as shit. But Valerie's body was not just in good shape, it was in very good shape. Her skin had darkened due to all the time under the sun, her breasts had filled up, and in spite of her jeans being somewhat loose, anyone could tell her curves had turned her into quite the wet dream herself. "And now I have her for myself", Charlie thought as he grinned discreetly. Valerie protested again, this time folding her arms under her breasts, Charlie couldn't help but look a bit more than he should, enough for the car to steer slightly "What are you doing choom? Eyes on the road!".
Valerie wasn't blind, and she wasn't naive either. The second she heard that Charlie was looking for a partner to run an escort job with him, she found him personally and told him she wanted in. She even told him of the guns she had and the experience she had in such runs, it's not like she had to bargain much, Charlie wanted her with him for the job, and she had made the mistake of showing his cards too early.
