A/N: Originally titled How to be Free.
She might have just killed Cait.
The thought chases its way across Hazel's mind as Cait's pained cries pierce inches of concrete and steel. A single light in the clean room illuminates the scene, its stark white light as ominous as the blocky shadows it casts: Cait, bound to the chair as the toxins are filtered out of her blood. At least, that's what Hazel assumes those damn needles are for.
Years of chasing rumors. Weeks of dedicated searching as Cait had grown paler, coughing up blood and barely able to walk without a dose of psycho. Their hunt had led them to Vault 95 with its mythical treatment for chem dependency. And now, on the other side of that door, Cait might be dying.
Hazel will be damned if she's just going to stand here and watch.
She tries the door control again only for it to beep another negative, its light watching her like a malevolent red eye. The moment Hazel had activated the treatment process, the door to the clean room had sealed.
Why hadn't she even checked the damn chair is still fully functional before Cait sat down? As a former grease monkey, there isn't a machine she can't learn to operate. Speaking of machines, Hazel pries off the front panel of the door control to override the lock. With deft fingers she rewires the panel, and the door hisses open.
Instead of feeling victorious, a rush of dread curdles her stomach. Cait is slumped in the chair, silent and still. Maybe it's the harsh light, but she looks paler than ever.
Hazel rushes to her side as the needles retract from her neck. "Cait? Cait!"
Cait's faint groan is the world's most beautiful sound. Her throat bobs, drawing another grunt from her as the motion pulls the skin on her neck. Two bruises sit on either side of her neck, like coins the color of storm clouds, weeping blood. Her wrists also sport violet bracelets from her struggles against the bindings.
"Cait? Can you hear me?" Hazel smooths an unruly red lock out of Cait's face, and while she twitches at the contact, her eyes don't open.
Hazel loops Cait's arm around her neck and hauls her out of that bloody nightmare chair, staggering under her dead weight. Years in the Combat Zone have toned Cait's bulk to hard muscle, and normally Hazel has more appreciation for it than she does in this moment. Damn, but she's heavy.
Gritting her teeth, Hazel finds her balance and drags Cait to the nearest gurney. Her back almost pops when she tries to heave her onto the mattress. She scoops up Cait's legs to set them on the gurney, then checks her pulse. It's faint and flighty in her wrist, like the soft feet of a rabbit who's scented a fox, and Hazel kisses Cait's scarred knuckles.
Please, let her live. Let this have worked.
For lack of options, and needing to do something to help, Hazel administers a stimpak. Cait flinches at the injection, but doesn't wake.
Somewhere in the vault, there's a distant clatter. There might be more Gunners lying in wait in the vault's bowels, or another squad yet to return. If they turned this place into a base of operations, it sure isn't safe to assume that sealing the vault entrance with Hazel's pip-boy will keep them out. After barricading the door to the treatment facility, Hazel pulls up a chair and waits.
The vault groans around her, high and reedy, as if in commiseration of Cait's pain. The screech of shifting metal grates on Hazel's nerves, as her inner mechanic wants to take an oil can to every squeaky spot. This vault fared little better than 111, thanks to Vault-Tec's meddling. Oh, their engineering is decent, if not impressive, but without surviving humans to maintain it, this place is nothing more than a shell, a cave of concrete and steel. A coffin. When it comes to Vault 95's former residents, the exorbitant stash of chems is explanation enough. To Cait's credit, she had set her jaw and marched past scattered syringes of psycho, even if her fingers had tightened on her shotgun in a chokehold. It's fortunate, then, that metal and wood is not as weak as flesh.
The infirmary is just as creepy as the rest of the vault, if not more so. Dank air pervades the vault, the stench of stale water sharpened by the salty tang of rust. Darkened screens still hold patients' x-rays, and nearby there's a pile of bones on a wheelchair. The skull has skittered under a nearby shelf.
Underground, the passage of time is impossible to mark. It was true in Vault 111, where two hundred and ten years passed in the length of a sigh, and it's still true now. All that matters is the pulse in Cait's limp wrist, her vein fluttering under Hazel's fingers.
How many more loved ones can they take from her?
Hazel does what she can to make Cait more comfortable, taking off her boots and shaking out some musty blankets to drape over her legs. She wipes beads of blood off Cait's neck, leaving red smears like scarlet scarves fluttering in a breeze, then brushes her hair out of her face. Finding a reasonably clean bowl, she thinks praises at any listening deity that hot water still flows from the faucet. One of the few advantages of a vault is their easy supply of clean water. No rationing needed today. So Hazel makes the most of it.
Sitting on the gurney beside Cait, their hips knocking together as the mattress dips, she tests the water on her own wrist before soaking a washer. Hazel starts with Cait's arm, gently lifting her hand to wipe away days of accumulated grime from her fingers, then smoothing away dirt and dried blood from her arms. Some of it is caked on, and Hazel scrubs in firm circles until the water in the bowl is cloudy. The crooks of Cait's elbows are pitted and scarred, and as Hazel runs the washer over them she prays they no longer have a hold over her.
Hazel doesn't usually subscribe to miracle cures, but for Cait she wants to believe.
After changing the water, Hazel works up the nerve to wash the sweat from Cait's face. She starts at her cheek with the lightest contact, gentle over the yellowed bruise from a recent bar fight, and keeps stray droplets of water from running into the hollows of Cait's eyes. Dirt and sweat wash away, leaving only a dusting a freckles across her white cheeks. She then works the cloth over Cait's forehead, her nose, her chin. Hazel skips her neck for the moment, beyond cleaning the puncture marks, and runs the cloth across her shoulders. Water settles in the dip of Cait's collarbones and Hazel follows with the washer to soak it up.
"Little bit lower, love."
Hazel freezes. Her heart stutters in her chest, then swells with such a sudden relief it presses on her lungs. Oh, and her thoughts halt at the word love. "Cait?"
Cait cracks open an eye into a fine slit of green. Her lips are still upturned in that lewd smirk. "What, you thought you could give me a sponge bath without me noticin'?"
Throat too tight for words, Hazel grabs Cait's hand and kisses her callused palm.
Cait's fingers flutter against her cheek. "Where are... ngh." She shifts on the gurney and its joints creak, its metal knees old and rusted. "The vault, right? Last thing I remember is sittin' in that chair... me head feels like it's stuffed in a sack of razorgrain." A moment later Cait tenses. Her grip tightens, nails digging into Hazel's skin before she gentles. Her eyes are wide open now as she croaks, "Did it work?"
"It damn well better have. How are you feeling?"
"Aside from me head, my neck hurts, and I feel like I took a few good knocks in a fight. But…" She shifts on the mattress, flexing her fingers, experimental. "Even with all that, the poison's outta me system. I can feel it, yer know—it's not in me veins anymore. I can breathe again. For the first time in years, I can see with me own eyes. Thought this was going to be the end of me, but now it's a beginning." Her gaze softens. "And you... you look damn amazin' from this angle."
"Oh, so all it take for me to be beautiful is for you to have a near death experience?"
Cait snorts. "Naw. I always get this flutter in me belly, like I've drunk a glass of fine whiskey, when I look at you. I... I always feel better knowing you've got me back."
"I'll always guard your back, and more, if you'll let me."
Cait clicks her tongue as she closes her eyes and settles back on the gurney. "Should know better than to make offers like that. One day I might take you up on it."
Settling her forearm above Cait's head, Hazel leans over so their noses are scant inches apart and their hair mingles, Cait's shade of red deeper than her own ginger. Her eyes, already a soft green that reminds Hazel of maples in summer, back before the war, shine eerily in the light from the pip-boy. This close, she can see Cait's pupils expand as they adjust to her blocking the light. "I don't make offers I don't intend to keep."
Cait lifts her head to close the gap between them. Her lips are dry, tangy with the salt of sweat and fear, but warm. Drawing in a sharp breath, Hazel angles her mouth as Cait's hand fists in her collar. Hazel pulls away after a second, softer kiss, and strokes her hair. Cait's exhaustion is obvious, but her heart crashes in her chest all the same.
She glances to the barricaded door and decides they're safe enough for the moment. Even if she keeps their guns in easy reach. "Get some rest, okay?"
Cait lowers herself onto the mattress with a satisfied hum. "Thanks for havin' me back. And love? You missed a few spots with that washcloth."