Beyond the Beef

Beyond the Beef is a quest in Fallout: New Vegas in which a well-known rancher named Heck Gunderson asks the Courier to track down his son Ted Gunderson, who disappeared in the Ultra-Luxe Casino Hotel. Ted was accidentally kidnapped by the White Glove Society, who serve human meat from people who will not be missed as a delicacy.

If the Courier has a bad reputation, Mortimer will ask the Courier to help the White Glove Society by murdering Ted and framing Heck for the killing. If the Courier does as Mortimer asks, Mortimer reveals that the standard of luxury at the Ultra Luxe was threatened by Heck, who was driving down beef prices to the point where anyone might be able to afford it. In addition, Mortimer will ask the Courier to hunt down the original target, and to persuade Marjorie to allow the White Glove Society to resume the practice of cannibalism.

Quick walkthrough
Note before you begin: This quest involves a lot of getting attacked, so you may want to smuggle some weapons in. If your sneak isn't high enough, use a Stealth Boy. There are a few ways to skin this cat if you don't have the bad reputation to sign on with Mortimer. If you talk to Heck at the bar, he'll tell you that his son was kidnapped and ask for your help. Ask around until Marjorie gives you a key to go upstairs and speak to the investigator. Upon going to see the investigator, you will find him dead with an important matchbook on his person and a group of white gloves will attack you, and may knock your followers unconscious. Upon dispatching them, take their clothes and dress up like them. No one will seem to mind that you've killed them. Meet the investigator's contact in the steam room at 4pm in the bath house. From here, you will have three ways to complete the quest:

1) Sneak into the member's only area and drug the wine

The wine will be in the kitchen next to the stove where you would prepare the meal in the following walk through. Drug the wine with Med-X and have the head waiter bring it down. Once everyone falls asleep, sneak Ted out.

2) Sneak into the member's only area and take the head chef's place, preparing the "meal"

Have Boone with you and let him take out the attackers in the room with the dead investigator. Take the White Glove attire and wear it. Go meet with Chauncy and, again, let Boone take out the attacker. After meeting with Chauncy, pick pocket the Members Only Section key from the Gourmand food manager. Go into the Members Only Section and enter the kitchen through there. That way you don't need to lockpick any doors. From there you talk to the chef and prepare the meal and call the head waiter. After the head waiter takes the food up, go and get Ted from the freezer and bring him to the dining room. Speak to Mortimer and reveal what he was trying to do to the rest of the White Glove Society. He will then flee and you bring Ted back to Heck in the Casino. You will become idolized by the White Gloves. I did this and did not get attacked at all.

3) Lay waste and kill everyone in your way.

You may want to have backup such as Boone before considering this method. If your Alignment isn't evil enough to do this quest, it certainly will be by the time it's finished. First, do everything up until the you find the dead investigator. White Glove members will attack you and the best bet for this plan of attack is to flee the casino, wait a few days until they forget your crimes enough to allow you entrance to the casino again. Enter and the door guard will ask for your weapons, take the third option that mentions blowing his ass away, then choose the option with [Attack] preceding it. Continue to lay waste to everyone until you reach Mortimer. Try to talk with him to see if your Alignment is where it needs to be. If it's not there yet, kill him and take his keys, this will allow you entrance to the kitchen where you can rescue the son.

There is a lot of killing, but there are lots of Nuka-Cola and Sasperilla bottles to be stolen at the cost of your alignment. Some would consider this the spoils of war. Even with all of the White Glove society wasted you can peacefully return the son to Heck and receive the 500 caps and 500xp.

Note: With a high enough speech level (62), you may get Mortimer to admit that he is a cannibal, and the quest can be completed solely by talking.

Bugs
- If you fail the quest but manage to get Ted Gunderson out of the Ultra-Luxe casino, he will continue to follow you as a second companion. However, unlike proper companions, he can die during battle.

-This hasn't been confirmed yet, but I am not able to contact Marjorie as she and the rest of the White Glove Society are stuck in their nightly meetings. Waiting, leaving the casino, or sleeping haven't solved the problem so as of now, I'm not able to complete the quest.

- Ted Gunderson may become invisible during the quest, similar to the Powder ganger bug. This seems to have no effect as his name is still shown and you can still interact with him. It's a severe inconvenience though as he can get "lost" in the walls. Only known way to fix this is to somehow force Ted into another room and refreshing that room.

- Ted Gunderson wont follow you through area doors -- after rescuing him from the kitchen he will be unable to leave the Gourmand

-I had a problem where Mortimer would leave the room during his speech, thus leaving it uncompleted and making it impossible to reveal Ted at the right time. If you confront him on his way out of the room, he just attacks you.

-I recently enountered a bug with Ted. I sneaked him out before looking into the investigator's room. Now, he is with his father like normal, but there are still quest objectives reguarding him such as Mortimer wanting you to talk to him. This is exceedingly frustrating and I'd advise you to navigate around it.