Disclaimer: All and any Fallout4 character names belong to Bethesda. No OC's are included within this work, indicating that nothing is claimed or owned by the author, Quarter 'till Class. No copyright infringement is intended. Plagiarism is theft so is prohibited. Do not copy or create a reproduction of this work in any language without express written authorization of the author, Quarter 'till Class. Thank you. Please enjoy.
Danse x Soul Survivor (Nora)
Warnings: Death, spite, regret, angst, and sexual implications.
He should have seen it. He should have seen it coming. The shaken ground. The veering forms. The snarls that echoed off the concrete of the shambled buildings. He could smell the blood and rot of their prey in the humidity of the air. Hear their claws rip at the stone of the street. Danse knew, despite their guns and their armor. He had a feeling of dread laying at the pit of his stomach, screaming something vile. But she claimed it was nothing. Not even a slight challenge compared to what they've conquered in the past. A brief conflict which held nothing to their quarrels in the Glowing Sea.
But here they are, wounded and waiting. Sitting in the daylight among the bodies of the wretched creatures. Bullet wounds steaming and the heated blood pouring past the edges.
She's idle. A hand over the red of her abdomen, another clutching for life on her shotgun. The injury is too much. The pain is violent. Her eyes relay the same controlled panic she'd display in the midst of uncertain battle. Her bruised back is curved up against the debris of the building, shoulders slouched against the support. Her good leg is relaxed in a casual bend and the damaged, bleeding opposite is stretched out over the ground.
She sports gashes and rips in her flesh and clothes. Streaks and splatters of red that belong to the beasts. The monstrosities. The deformities born of human error.
The tears that build in the slopes of her eyes distort the amber that he'd known the sun envied. The redness around her irises sets a discomfort in his own. The trembling of her chest and hands leaves him nauseous. The bleeding keeps on; like a river finally breaking the confines of an oppressive damn. Untrained blood staining the earth that would never deserve her.
His power armor is somewhere behind them, ripped at and damaged by claws. He can hear the low hum of the fusion core. The wind as it forces at the metal. He feels bare. He feels ache. He'd stopped breathing at the sight of the final Deathclaw gripping her chest and neck, hauling her into the air like a trophy, impaling her with its claws and a grotesque scream of achievement. It fell to its knees as it wounded her, blinded by its own blood and the endless burn of her shotgun. She'd have nothing less in defeat: Taking the damned beast with her.
She'd become too confident. Too complacent of her surroundings.
"Shaun. I need to-...Shaun." She tries to sit up. Tries to use her legs. Struggles against him as he sets a hand over her shoulder to hold her down. Mumbling things of her son. Needing him.
"Stop, Nora. I'll take you to him. I'm just waiting for the Stimpak to-"
"Danse." The Deathclaws. Chameleon. Four of them. He told her. He told her not to fight so many. That their numbers sounded greater than anticipated. He begged her not to return the fucking egg. The single survivor of a Gunner's foolish expedition. What devastated her enough to send them to the nest. But they were nowhere near the fucking nest. This has absolutely nothing to do with the nest. But he needed something to blame. Someone. Anything. So he'd blame himself. And the Deathclaws. The egg. The Gunners. The Brotherhood. The Commonwealth. All of it. Everything but her.
She breaths something nasty. The choked gurgle of blood. She cranes back her head and coughs bubbles and streams of red about her face and chin. He holds her. It's all he can do.
"Nora." He hovers over her, palms still pressuring the bleeding. His uniform is drenched in her blood. She sets her hands on his, urging them away. He adjusts one knee at her side, the other a foot to stable him. And he sets his forehead on hers, closed eyes refusing the reality of the situation. He won't accept it. He won't accept this wretched place. The Commonwealth. She called it Boston. He would never have it.
She looks distant, suddenly. Somewhere far. Still alive, but somewhere past him. And she looks back, a hazed cloudiness to her irises.
"Nate?" She asks him, lips pursed and bloodied and sad. And more tears that dribble over the dried red of her cheeks, forming pale streaks. She sets a firm, hastened hand driven by pain against his jaw. A desperation is there. A burden that is destroying the fight. A pain that's impeding her will to live.
"Nora." Danse waits. She opens her mouth and speaks, but the words don't leave. An empty silence as she barres red-stained teeth at the pain and dismay. She shakes her head, hand still against his jaw.
"I'm sorry. I'm sorry, Danse." She's apologizing. As though she did something wrong. As if dying was a fault of her own. Like the blood would stain his uniform.
"I love you." She says past the blood staining her lips. Her agonized eyes are everywhere. Memorizing the lines of his face. The sun speckles over the bridge of his nose. The permanent crease in his brow. The way the edges of his mouth turn barely up as he burdens a sad smile to her slight laughter. The scar on his lip. The crinkled edges of his eyes. She's sees him.
"I never acted on it." He admits it. She'd told him she loved him. Admitted it despite knowing he was a synth. Looked to him with those amber eyes, seeking returned feelings. "I asked you for time. I thought we'd have more time. I thought we'd be alright."
He thought he would ease into their relationship. He thought that perhaps she'd change her mind. That she'd see their friendship as it was meant to be. Because she deserved more. More than what she hung around or what followed her tail. More than a liar, a thief, a raider, or a nosy snob. More than a synth...but now she'd have none of it.
"I can't. I can't, Danse I can't." He's losing her. Nonsense past her lips. Panic. Desperation. Her tears are unbound and she cries into her detriment. Her nails pierce the skin of his palms and draw blood. Her eyes close as she heaves sobs through clenched teeth, jaw tight.
"Nora. Nora, look at me. I love you. I love you, Nora." He loves her. A fake. Soulless. Without consciousness. Born of science and not of god. A three-dimensional print out of singular DNA, constructed by a machine which rewrites the structure of the human body down to the atom with organic material. But he feels it. He smooths back her hair from her face, sweat and blood and dirt and grime in the mix. His callouses are rugged on her skin, nearly alien in comparison. A smooth complexion pre-dating the war; only recently exposing signs of the elements of The Commonwealth. He feels her shaking. The chill of her body. The pain in his own. The ache. The hurt. The loss.
His heart strains. His chest burns like jagged rocks. A hollowness he's unable to explain. He feels sadness. The feeling of missing. Like a gaping pit is slowly being carved from his chest, yet adds weight to his being.
He loves her...he doesn't even know what that means.
"I can't. I can't. I-I." She's hyperventilating. Her chest slightly heaves with panic. Fear. The unknown. Amber pouring tears. Lips pursed into sudden silence. Eyes a stale, clouded nothingness. Like shallow water - expressionless. He dies inside. She takes him with her.
"Nora?" Her eyes are lidded. A dullness sets in. An escape of life as her neck slowly cranes forward and the blood begins to pour from her mouth.
Danse slouches back, shoulders flush against the crumbling remains of the wall. His bloody hands clutching each side of his head, swallowing at the consuming pain that lay in his heart and throat. He sits for hours; upon sunset, he cries silent.
He hauls her body in the brittle, broken arms of his Power Armor. A fleshy woman in the metal grip of a concealer. Armor. A way to hide.
He won't let her go. He hasn't stopped. He hasn't eaten or hydrated or slept. She said a mentat loosens her muscles. Calms her down and keeps her walking. And he's always disapproved. But who exists now to stop him? When he'd only ever stopped her? He stares at the little package, bare, bloody hands trembling. She'd want better for him. And so he tosses the few she'd brought into the closest body of water. Because he'd rather never consider it again.
Her body is decomposing quickly. The heat of the scorched earth ruins her. He cannot let them see what remains. Not in the rotted, dismal state of death and time. He spots a Brotherhood flag while passing through Concord. Likely left by knights that'd cleared the city. Her rips it down, enveloping her body to conceal the paled, ghastly skin of a lifeless corpse. He can't bring himself to cover her face. The rigor mortis. The open eyes. The stiffness of her being. He won't disgrace her. He folds a corner and conceals the amber. He won't let them stare.
He considered dropping her off at the front gates of Cambridge, awaiting Haylen's discovery and immediate grief. An honorable funeral service aboard the Prydwyn. One which would provide the respect and attention her life deserved. Salutes, blazing guns, drinks to her name...he knew better. Nora would prefer to be buried on the land she'd fought for. Her life pre-war, with the people she loved. Her only home, filled with the misfits of The Commonwealth that she'd dragged behind her, some screaming. She'd want Sanctuary.
So he stares at the vastness of the damaged bridge with red eyes, arms weighed by her concealed body despite the armor. And he wonders how this place will run without her leadership. How these ungrateful people could live without her. How he would survive, knowing she'd never stride down the dirt path from the truck stop, Dogmeat drooling at her heels.
Dogmeat...
He's angry, suddenly. Enraged at her. Blaming only her, rather than everything else. He'd become lost and alone when The Brotherhood hunted him. He'd spent hours staring at his hands, pondering on his existence and its worth. If they'd killed a real man, only to replace him. If he'd grown, unknowing of his true origin. If what he felt was real. If the people he'd come to love had known him, or the original.
He had found himself discarded and without purpose in only a few meaningless hours. Running from the men and women that'd praised his actions. The man who'd named him Paladin. Within a day, he'd gone from admiring the way Nora's hair stuck to her smiling cheeks with sweat, to staring down the barrel of her gun. He wanted her to do it. Begged her to...because he had nothing left. He was alone. An abomination. The sins of man. But she'd told him he would always have somewhere to go. She'd always have her hand out, prepared to welcome him no matter the people. She said she'd fight The Brotherhood Maxon was dead. She'd kill blind innocence and vile minds if it meant protecting the people she loves. And now she's gone. She left. She allowed herself to die. Gave up in the process. She stopped fighting.
He was so angry.
Now he's staring across this broken bridge at the impending gates of Sanctuary, dreading his very existence. And he walks up, listening to the voices of the guards in the guard towers, eyes sharp with sadness and rage and disappointment. He could feel his fingers pressing aggressively to her skin. He recalls the day he'd gripped her arm out of agitation. She wasn't listening to him. She'd directly defied his commands. She traced the little round bruises he had unintentionally left behind. The way her eyes flared up with distrust and disbelief struck his chest with something awful. The way she slapped him; the inner surface of her hand was nearly as red as the mark on his face. And her smile as he apologized. As he realized that Nora was not a simple soldier.
He thinks of that instant as he forces his feet to the gate, listening to the banter above. Talking about The Castle and the radio beacon far north. Laughter as a perverted joke. He could hear her smiling.
Danse hears her. He hears Nora. A coarse voice of excessive politeness and good intentions. Rugged, still, by harsh calls and grey decisions. Coming from a guard tower, as Nora herself crosses her arms and scolds her belligerent, narcissistic Railroad agent.
His breath leaves him. He stares at the body, folded in the shitty, orange flag. Pressed solid against his chest without breath or life.
The air is stagnant. There is no wind in mid-day. Only a thick heat that settles like hot steel on the shoulders. A boiling humidity that sticks to his skin. She'd told him once that the air was lighter before the war. That it was crisp, like the subtle snap of a kernel of corn between the fingers. It felt as clean as purified water looked. It was light. Weightless. Wonderful.
He'd stared at her that day. Determining something. Asking himself where she came from. What vault she actually wandered out of. Why her lies appease her, and why she bothered telling them. But it was the white of her smile and the smoothness of her skin that convinced him. Staring at her told him she was genuine. Staring at her made him love her.
He looks up as Nora calls to him, brow pinched with concern and tone something hectic and worried. Lips pursed, eyes narrowed as she analyzed him with her favorite shotgun casually in hand. She stumbles down the tower stairs, Deacon on her heels, and demands they open the gates. They pull out, wide, rattling the chainlink. The sound of dragging dirt is coarse against his ears. The setting sun behind Sanctuary spills through like a sort of salvation, breaching the dusk that distorted his vision.
And there she was. Nora, clad in her BOS jacket and denims, walking swift in new boots. Stray strands of hair stuck to her cheeks and jaw, sweat holding them in place. Her hands clutched about her weapon, fueled by adrenaline. Eyes a sharp, lively amber, reflecting an unbridled ferocity. Caution, patience, duty, and concern. Lax legs and stiff arms, heavy boots that bring up dust with each step. A tiny figure, powering towards him as though the world could not stop her. Relentless.
An anxiety sets in. It stales his veins and muscles. Riddles him with confusion and desperation. He can feel the nausea. The back of his throat burns like acid. He sets the body at his feet, remembering her redundant collection of toys and junk. The way she'd continuously slap at his metal-plated arm when excited. How absolutely thrilled she was to finally have a carrot garden. The smile she gave him when she told him she loved him. Her sadness and rage when finally finding Shaun. The way her eyes lost life as she bled into his arms.
A sadness sets in. A hatred of self. Paranoia. Outrage. Memories that confused and overwhelmed him. Danse pulls out his rifle, knuckles white with frustration. He can't tell them apart. He can't tell which is really Nora.