How to Hug a Deathclaw
-Notes-
Just wanted to say that MacCready is so adorable! He is just so funny I thought why not put him in ridiculous scenarios? Due to him being the little swearing shit from FO3, I'll be writing him so that he still thinks in profanities, but has to alter his words to make them fit his promise, which I believe would explain why he stumbles over his words. All SS's will be called Sole for Sole Survivor. This is my second fanfic, enjoy!
Isn't your name related to that one manga (How to Hug an Elephant) you may ask? Why yes, yes it is. I absolutely adored the name, but other than being eye catching, it did not do anything with the title which was an absolute shame. Also I love making references.
Chapter 1: A New Pet
"Can we keep him? Please?" Sole pleaded, biting her lower lip and batting her long eyelashes at MacCready, whose face contorted into a horrified expression at the scene unfolding in front of them.
"No" he replied incredulously "is this for real?"
The normally beautifully sunny day would have been a wonderful day to take a stroll together by the creek behind Sanctuary Hills. What he had thought was a cute invitation for a morning walk from a lovely lady quickly disintegrated into the most unbelievable scenario he could have ever imagined.
The ground shook thunderously as MacCready struggled to steady his balance. Dogmeat barked playfully and ran in circles around the young deathclaw as it jumped from bank to bank in a silly game of tag. Currently, he and Sole were standing at the back entrance to Sanctuary Hills, standing on the little bridge over the creek where the two animals just so happened to be playing. When the giant lizard had first came into the clearing, MacCready yanked the gun off his back so quickly that Sole had to physically jump in front of his rifle, waving her arms frantically, so that he wouldn't shoot it. The whole situation might have actually even been funny had they not almost been torn to bits and pieces by these things before.
"Please tell me you're not considering this Boss" He groaned, dreading the answer. "Please tell me that you did not steal that egg."
Sole wiggled her shoulders and widened her eyes at him as if he would fall for her wily charms. Ha! He already did that once today. "C'mon MacCready, he's just a baby. Imagine, we could be the first people to try to domesticate deathclaws. Imagine the possibilities!"
"Domesti-No way!" He crossed his arms in an obvious X.
"We could call it deathclaw farming."
"Noooo" He accentuated in disbelief. He admits he had done some crazy stunts back in the day but this, oh ho ho, this took the cake. MacCready kept shaking his head as he watched the young deathclaw grab Dogmeat in its hands and topple over into the brush, frolicking, like some damn romance novel. "This is crazy. I'm still not convinced that thing isn't gonna rip poor Dogmeat in half."
"You know you want to Mac" She begged, trying to wean him over with cute nicknames. She even tried to grab his hand, that minx.
"No."
"Try your hand at deathclaw imprinting?"
"No!"
There was a pause.
"I named him Cuddles"
"Oh, hell no!"
Sole spun around in front of him so that he was looking straight at her. "MacCready pleeease" she whined.
For the first time, he took his horror-stricken eyes off of and his attention away from the deathclaw that was starting to mirror Dogmeats behavior by crawling on all fours to Sole.
He grabbed her by the shoulders, blue eyes boring into hers.
"Cuddles?! You couldn't think of a better name for a giant lizard death-trap with sharp teeth and claws? Shoot, Danse would have been a better name!" He exasperatingly interrogated. They stared at each other wide eyed for a moment longer before Sole's mouth curled up and let out a snicker.
Something about her faltered expression melted his resolve. The playful gleam in her eyes sparkled in the morning sun. He sniggered back. Then they both broke into fits of laughter at the ridiculousness of it all.
"Ha ha heh, There-oh man- there's a deathclaw in our backyard. Freaking great!" MacCready threw his hands up in resignation, walking around Sole. "I have officially gone insane!"
"Hee hee" Sole giggled as she hunched up her shoulders and held her hands to her chest like a little girl, watching MacCready walk slow circles around her. He always knew how to make her laugh.
"C'mon, Cuddles isn't the official name yet right? I would like to throw Danse into the running. Look at him, an armored being who likes to kill everything in its path. It's perfect!"
"I dunno, I think he looks more like a Cuddles to me."
The "baby" deathclaw was still fairly large, measuring about 5 feet tall. Compared to other deathclaws, Cuddles was a lighter yellow in color and had much larger eyes than their darker, beady-eyed counterparts. Its claws weren't fully grown in either. They were still dull and short, which is why Dogmeat probably wasn't yelping in pain from the playful swats he was getting from Cuddles. Dogmeat actually looked like the ringleader in their play time actually, as Cuddles attempted to mimic his behavior.
MacCready folded his arms and thought back to that day where they walked that egg all the way back to the deathclaw nest.
This woman had to be absolutely insane! She was the boss, so he went with it, but this is definitely not how he expected his work to go. That day, a low fog covered the ground like a transparent blanket. It was difficult to walk through all the moss and swamp as they reached the nest. When Sole laid the egg gently back into the mess of a nest, they heard a rumble. Rubble began to fall. Suddenly, a large deathclaw came sliding down the mountain in front of them. They were dead for sure. As if one senile albino deathclaw in the creepy museum of torture wasn't enough.
"Boss!" He had shouted at her, readying his sniper towards the monster's soft abdomen warily. Legs bent and ready for action.
But Sole remained calm, or rather frozen like a radstag in the headlights, as she put her hands up between him and the deathclaw. It didn't seem to be attacking which was a good sign. Normally, it would have been fine at that point to just walk away after doing the good deed for the day but freaking boss just had to try and talk with the deathclaw. Freaking talk with it.
"Uh, good Deathclaw" she took a cautious step towards the creature with a shaky voice, keeping her hand out, like she wanted to pet the damn thing.
"Boss what-what are you doing?" MacCready hesitantly asked her.
She waved her hand frantically for him to lower his voice, "Shh I want to get that claw next to the nest" she hushed. "Go up to that ledge over there, I need you to cover me from a spotting location in case he decides to attack me" she explained through gritted teeth. She pointed to the opposite side of where they were standing at a high mound a few yards away.
MacCready cautiously retreated backwards until he was out of the deathclaws sight and ran up to the vantage point, positioning his rifle. Luckily he hadn't ignited the lizard's chasing instinct. But that still left Sole. His brow furrowed as his muscles tensed against the dirt and weeds he was laying on. Small beads of sweat rolled down the raised hairs on his neck. He watched Sole took a few steps closer out of his scope. No no no no.
"Good boy, stay." She commanded. Like a freaking dog.
Steadying his aim, MacCready grabbed a .308 out of his chest pocked to reload but it fumbled and fell to the ground, mixing in with the damp dirt.
"Shi-crap!" He swore under his breath, tearing his eyes away from the scope as he quickly grabbed the bullet from the ground, shoving it back into the chamber. He rapidly returned his gaze back through the scope. Oh no. Oh no. Sole was gone. But more importantly, so was the deathclaw.
MacCready began to panic as he jumped up onto the ledge to look for them. He was scanning the layout where they had been momentarily before when all of a sudden he heard a:
"GO GO GO!" rapidly approaching from his rear left side. He swiveled around to the sound of her voice as he found Sole making a mad dash past him, followed closely by the deathclaw that knocked him to the side with an Oomph, a few feet from his standing point and into some bushes, in hot pursuit of his partner. The beast roared.
MacCready winced in pain as he unwound himself from the strained position he was in on the ground. Groaning, he grabbed his green hat fastening it on his head when he heard a high pitched squeal.
Sole had the deathclaw chasing her around in circles a couple of yards ahead of him into the clearing, almost comically, as she frantically attempted to avoid its meaty swings by a hairs breadth. She had her pack in her hands which confused him at first, until he saw what she had grabbed. Pulling out a bottlecap mine, she twisted around just enough to toss it down on the ground between her and the death claw as she sprinted away from it. Oh crap….
MacCready jumped out of the way just milliseconds before he saw the deathclaw's foot land right on the mine, covering his ears.
BOOM!
The ground shook aggressively. He didn't dare move until everything had settled down. His ears rang loudly. Unfortunately, he hadn't cleared the blast radius enough to avoid temporary deafening. MacCready then realized that he had been squeezing his eyes shut so he popped them open as they began to focus on the settling dust. When he didn't hear any fighting going on he decided to stand. A hefty layer of dirt covered his tan and olive duster. Great. The chicks all dig grime. He suddenly remembered Sole.
"Hey Boss!" MacCready shouted, although his voice sounded drained and muted in his ears, like he had merely whispered it. He coughed. Even though the dust hadn't fully settled down, he could still make out the silhouette of the downed deathclaw. Well there are better ways that could have gone. At least it was dead. He continued to look around the deathclaw calling out boss's name, but there was no answer. Shit. She was closer to the explosion than he was and probably couldn't hear him.
With knees a little more wobbly than normal, he tried to climb over the little hill the lay to the right of the clearning. Sure enough, there lay Sole, wide eyed and breathing heavily. She seemed to have taken notice of his presence because she turned her body just enough to face him as he approached. She corners of her panting mouth lifted into an open mouthed grin. She was still clutching her pack tightly to her chest. Well she seemed to be okay. This crazy lady.
"y'know boss, I haven't decided yet whether you're a mad genius or just mad." He joked, stifled a laugh as he planted his sniper on the ground as an extra means of support. Sole gave him a blank stare.
"WHAT?!" She yelled. He flinched. Yup, definitely couldn't hear a damn thing. He slung his rifle across his chest again and offered her his hand to get up. She panted a few more seconds before she registered that he was offering to help her up. Shifting her pack to rest in the crook of her other arm, she placed her hand in his as he helped pull her to her feet. Knowing she couldn't hear him, he jutted his chin toward her bag questioningly. Her eyes danced swimmingly, knowing exactly what he meant, as she pulled out the deathclaw's gauntlet thing she had found near the nest. Well that certainly looked like fun.
What he didn't know is that the deathclaw wasn't chasing her for the damn gauntlet. She stole its baby, which in retrospect, made a hell of a lot more sense.
Now as MacCready looked upon the stolen spawn of a deathclaw and the lovely large expectant eyes of Sole, he began to imagine the insane and chaotic trouble that lay ahead in their future. He was actually kind of impressed they had managed to pull it all off. She did the most questionable things but was always successful in the end. He let out a large and exaggerated groan.
"Fine, I suppose I can tolerate death incarnate, but don't expect me to like it!" He warned pointing a finger at her. Sole yanked her head back and gasped with a cheesy accused expression.
"Oh come now, you haven't even met him yet! He really is quite sweet, follow me!" Sole grabbed his arm and pulled him towards the bank where Cuddles and Dogmeat were now playing a game tug of war with a rather large branch. He noted the placement of her hands on his biceps and grinned cheekily.
"Cuddles!" Sole called out affectionately when they got closer. Cuddles the deathclaw perked its head up and immediately dropped the branch, much to Dogmeat's dismay. Upon seeing her, Cuddles bounded towards her with alarming speed. This gave MacCready quite the startle as he yelped and dove out of the way, toward the hilly side of the bank as Cuddles tackled Sole to the ground. This woman was so lax. She gave such a carefree laugh as her new "pet" looked like it was trying to rip her face off with its teeth. MacCready jumped up and brushed himself off, trying not to appear totally embarrassed.
'Phew. Okay MacCready, you can do this. Be cool. You got this. Baby deathclaw, you can handle it' MacCready thought psyching himself up, trying to convince himself that he wasn't completely terrified of Cuddles.
He gingerly and cautiously crept up to the side of the lizard and leaned his head down just a tad. Sole stopped laughing just enough to grab her pet by the head and squeak out an introduction.
"Cuddles, I want you to meet MacCready. He is a loveable teddy bear just like you!" She nuzzled noses with him.
He laughed nervously, "haha yeah… that's me. Fluffed with the good stuff." Jokes usually made him feel better. At least they cut the tension. Usually. As he leaned down he said, "Hey there Cuddles, how ya doin' buddy?"
As he reached a shaky hand towards Cuddles, the deathclaw stilled and started to emit a low growl. Before he had time to react, it reached out and slashed MacCready across the chest, pushing him backwards in effect. It wasn't enough to draw blood or anything, but it was definitely enough to tear his duster a bit.
MacCready stumbled backwards, obviously taken aback. Sole froze at the sudden attack, mouth dropping. They were more shocked than anything. Then he noticed his new attire.
"Aw this was my favorite jacket!" He complained, patting the torn fabric. Sole cast a concerned look towards him and then back at Cuddles. Her new pet was hunched protectively over her, and continued its low growl, leering at MacCready. It was definitely a warning. Something Sole had never seen him do before.
Before she could ask if he was okay, MacCready sheepishly shrugged his shoulders.
"Umm boss? I don't think Cuddles likes me."
(Edited)