CHAPTER 16
Bullets for Everybody.
It had been almost a decade for him personally- and, with the actual amount of passage to all but himself- it was two-hundred years, also easily explainable- as a very good amount of time to distance himself from the past.
It had been years and years and YEARS- but Sanford Tobs never forgot the sound of that explosion.
The hollow clack- the atmosphere shifting, the sky darkening, and then growing so bright that it was not possible to comprehend with mortal eyes. One of the largest man-made engines of destruction that did not even touch down anywhere near him, that influenced him so greatly.
The nuclear fires washed right over his head, sure- the destruction and the chaos that ensued also washed right over his head, yeah... But that explosion... It may not have burned itself into his retinas permanently, but it burned itself in his mind, and it would not leave until the day he died.
Only two times-
-Well... Now, in this moment... Only THREE times-
-Had Sanford been reminded and sent to flash backs on the horrible event that almost exterminated humanity, and rendered him fearful of the reality to atomic war.
The first nightmare Sanford had ever had of the event left him suffering insomnia for a week, and he had actually wet himself in his sleep- Hancock was not with him, and Sanford was up those nights alone, shivering, holding two or three guns in the sheets with him at all times.
That was number one- the nightmare, the first one. Sanford would never forget that either. It had felt real, and it terrified him.
Number two- the second to most recent.
The eyes of the Deathclaw he was now stuck in arms with, literally. The bright hue of them, the shine of the midday sun against their rounded girth- Sanford had never before been exposed to such a vibrant physical reconstruction of that explosion.
The dream was merely a vision to him by this point- the Deathclaw, and her eyes... Sanford couldn't stop thinking about it.
Finally, number three- the MOST recent.
The concentrated atomic blast that bloomed from the miniature warhead a pair of Super Mutants had dropped into the prison cellar they were hiding in.
-Oh yes, this was no lie, or fib, or tall tale.
Sanford would've laughed hysterically at his own facial expression- his reaction, if he had been able to see it, and the situation hadn't warranted his running as fast as humanly possible up the sketchiest flight of steps you could find in some old pre-War ruins.
"-RUUUNNN!" Sanford screamed at the top of his lungs. "HOLY FUUC-AGGGH!"
He hadn't been able to finish that tirade.
BBBBBMMMMMMMMMMMMM
-WSSSSSSSHHHHHH
-A blinding light plumed behind them- it eviscerated every shadow in the staircase, highlighted every tiny groove and nook in the stonework. Heat and wind flushed air and its presence over their backs and shoulders- even through Sanford's Power Armor- though, the same couldn't be exactly said to the shoulder-less Hancock.
Whatever the case for the robot was in turn- all Sanford heard next... Was nothing.
White noise.
A constant ring in his ears.
He saw white and then instantly switched to pitch black.
A gravitational force that he had never experienced, ever- even through all the times he had been tossed back by explosions, or thrown from his feet by some natural effect- swept him, the reptile he had wrapped in his arms, and the robot- forwards.
Sanford felt rough bucks and jerks- still deaf to it all -as he and his crew were thrown UP the stairs, instead of down them.
Pain flared in his left arm- rough, and like something was bent wrong. A weight was not compressed- but rather relieved from his chest, he felt his body rattle and move more fluently within the mobile tin-can he had been walking around in.
Time was unending.
As a sanctioned end to it all, to end the UN-end- Sanford's hearing came back, right as he heard a loud, echoing, thud of his armor meeting gravel and dirt.
PWFF-BMM
-"AGH!-OOF!"
PWMM
-"SONOF-"
PMM-
-"-A-"
PWMMBMM-BMM
-"BITCH!-OW!... Ow... Ugh..."
His head swam, there were tens of spots all over his body where an echo of pain combined with weightless numbing was overriding his normal senses- he draped on the frontal internals of his suit weakly, quivering.
The explosion had cleared out the inside of the underground structure- what rubble had been strewn about, was now added to with the crumbled remains of the stairwell they'd taken, the concrete walls and even chunks of the ceiling.
Sanford was too dazed from the shellshock to determine where he was, or how the explosion had tossed him to this mysterious locale- he also didn't know how it was possible that he was lying on his belly, seeing as his scaly friend was supposed to be there, under him.
Two things snapped Sanford out of his stun.
-One, he was on his belly, on his face... Where was Ms. Deathclaw-angry-pants?
-Two, it was awfully quiet, and that meant that his robot wasn't ranting, so... Where was Hancock?
Where was HE?
"-F-Fwabaubub... Bul... OAGH..." -No, he wasn't drunk- but, Sanford sounded like he was when he tried to speak, to call out for either of his teammates.
He pressed his gauntlets into the flooring beneath him- started to rise off the chest of his suit with crinkling crumbs of plaster, dirt and pebbles- the metal groaned, and there were tiny alarms screaming in his HUD within the helm.
"-AWGh...Agh...-H-Han'... Han...! HANCOCK! YO!"
He heard nothing, and, as he sat up on his knees- Sanford realized he also had another bodily sensory problem besides the pains, in addition to not hearing his friends.
He couldn't see anything. All he saw was black.
The explosion, he realized, had blinded his retinas.
"-O-Oh, crap... Crap-crap-crap-CRAP..." He panicked, stupidly fumbling about his helmet's visor lenses with his fingers- he jabbed his gauntlets about his head, and slouched back with a defeated growl.
As he knelt on the floor, he reached about by where the Deathclaw's wrist was supposed to be- letting his mind wander, he paused before his gauntlet actually got close enough for contact when he considered what he would find down there.
...What if the reason she wasn't stuck to him anymore was because of tearing force? What if all that was down there was like her wrist or something? He'd throw up, no doubt- and that would mightily suck, seeing as he was wearing headgear.
"...Oh God..." He muttered- braving chance, and slapped his palm downwards.
There was a clank of steel, a hollow thrum- he made contact with nothing but the metal of his suit's abdomen. There was no blood, no mushy remains, nothing. He felt around with his fingers, feeling around the bent, and folded gashes that were dug into the suit.
Sanford jumped when one of his gauntlet's tapped against the shirt underneath his regular armor padding- the stuff he wore INSIDE the X-01 exoskeleton. The ragged welts where Ms. Deathclaw's nails had run him through were still there, still making a breach in his protective carapace.
Fumbling about himself- he started to bend to and fro, spiraled around in scrabbles on the ground- he tossed rocks away and chunks of rubble- searching for a gun, searching for anything.
"-Holy shit... Holy shit I can't see... I can't FUCKING see!" He ranted to himself- afraid to start calling out for Hancock or the Deathclaw- in fear of the Super Mutants, and wherever they were, and how much closer they'd get to him if he got loud.
He thought he found a weapon at some point- his gauntlet's wrapped over a long, rectangular object that made a plastic clatter on the stones around it.
He froze, slowly wrapped his fingers around it- trying to be careful to avoid parts like the trigger or the safety, or something that would cause the weapon to go off, potentially in his face- and armor or not, he had a breach in his abdomen, and the joints weren't resistant at close range.
Sanford smiled in hopes- felt down the long piece- and discovered with some feeling about, that it was nothing more than a board of plaster.
Plaster.
No gun.
No protection.
Bad luck, man.
"FFFFFUCK!"
He threw it away in anger.
If he stayed here, he was dead- and if he called out, he would either be dead, or one of his friends would hear him.
Either way, if he did nothing, he was dead anyway.
"-DEATHCLAW!" He called. "HAN'! ANYONE!"
"...-Monsieur'? W-Where are you?"
"-Oh, thank Christ... I-I'd never expected to find such... BEAUTIFUL solace in your weird Frenchness, Ms. Deathclaw!"
"Shut your mouth, freak," There was a crumbling of rocks, movement straight ahead from him- higher in level. "-There you are... Get up here, monsieur'."
"-I-I... I can't!"
"Dieu Tout-Puissant'-! -There is NO. TIME!"
"-I can't see!"
"...W-What... What do you mean you can't see, monsieur'?!"
"-T-The blast-" He rapidly knocked his knuckles on the temple of his helmet. "-I-I'm fuckin' blind! I can't see!"
"Oh non, ce n'est pas bon... Non-non..."
The Deathclaw lost herself in a worried torrent of French as she slid down what Sanford presumed an incline in the land and rubble before him.
He shifted when a big, burly palm wrapped around his head, and jerked the helmet back.
Grunting in discomfort, he cried out in surprise when the helmet flew off his head- and cold breath washed off his forehead.
"-Non'... N-No no... You can't be blind, monsieur'... You can't be blind!"
"...I-I got news for you-" He stuttered. "-I can't even make out your pretty little face r-right now..."
As if the test the theory, she swung her claws right in front of his face- just to see if he would flinch- and the tri-set of metal-rending nails flew past his nose without any kind of reaction from him, she quivered in panic.
"Oh no, oh no..." She kept repeating the same mumbles to herself.
"...L-Look, it can't be permanent... I-I didn't look directly in-into the blast..."
"W-Will it go away? Will you see again? Recover?"
"...I-I don't know... Usually, y-you have to wait for stuff like this..."
"We can't WAIT, monsieur'!"
"...Where's H-Han'?"
"I don't know, I didn't see it."
"-HIM."
"Him- fine, HIM... I didn't see him!"
"...W-Where are we?"
"...Uhm..." The Deathclaw huffed, looking about. "-T-The blast kicked us out the stairwell... Uhm... Crater of rubble, uh... The entrance, the- what do you call it? B-Basement, doorway?"
"-Yeah?"
"It's right behind me, and I can see the Mutant's campsite above that... Distant, they're coming for us, I can hear them."
"...A-And... Are you free?"
The Deathclaw made a sigh- flexing her free claw, glancing to the tear in his suit.
"...Yes. Yes, monsieur', I am."
"...T-That's good..."
"I'll carry you."
"Why do... Why do you care, huh?" Even though he was joking hopefully- the Deathclaw still got very animated with him.
"-WHAT?! How could I NOT, you debile' merde?!"
"...Y-You can carry me...?"
"...Oh, for the love of heaven..." FWHM-BUMM-BM "-HMMF'-Can I carry him'- he asks..."
"-WOA!-H-Hey! C-CAREFUL!"
"Shut up and-MMF-hold ON!"
The Deathclaw tossed the armored human over her shoulder like a ragdoll- the big, bulky plates making the suit's construction thudding about with enough weight, that the awesome physical strength of her body actually felt decent resistance.
She bent down with a gruff bout of hisses- picked up his helmet, and shoved it loosely over his head, like placing a cap on a bottle half-heartedly.
Her shoulder was forced downwards under the armor's girth- she huffed a blast of air from her chops- her hearing picking up on the increasing volume of a collection of sounds, that had followed her in her seeking of her companion.
The explosion was like a giant wad of cheese being laid out for a swarm of rats- the Super Mutants were gathering out of the campsite in their direction.
She'd been hurled further down from the explosion than Sanford- and that partly had to do with her not wearing some bulky exoskeleton.
From the quick glances she'd gotten- there had to be twenty of them, at LEAST- and they were spearheaded by that partially mechanical freak they were calling their chieftain- and the boy looked awfully angry.
Readjusting finally under Sanford's weight- he started to blubber out some kind of apology, and she just planted the palm of her left claw into his helm with a tiny THWK- to shut him up.
One of the green colored hulking mutants was just stepping atop a raise in the terrain up ahead- he was holding a hunting rifle of some kind- pointing his finger at her direction, before leaning forwards with the iron sights of his weapon training.
"Merde'..." She cursed- her head rushing with the velocity of how fast her own legs started to carry her.
The biogenetically engineered muscles in her body were on overdrive- they worked flawlessly- and if humans were prone to being unable to keep up with her speed, she could only imagine the havoc it played with the feeble motor-skills of the Super Mutants.
With Sanford dangling and bouncing around over her shoulder- in single file, rounds flecked off every object or surface she ran past- ducking between rocks, behind the folding arch of a cragged piece of stone from the ruins.
The Super Mutant ran dry, and was still reloading by the time she was out of his weapons range, and his friends were closing in behind him.
The Deathclaw leapt clear over the folded, rusty remnants of a car chassis- landing with a stumble in her otherwise perfect clarity of grace- dust flew in belches from her heels eating into the dirt.
"-O-OW-ow-OW-!" Sanford's speech sounded cut with every hop or footfall she made. "-H-h-Hey-HEY!-I-I- c-C-can s-See-a-A-little!"
"Absolutely BRILLIANT!" She panted, side-stepping a broken tree stump. "-Now shut up, monsieur'! Running! Need to concentrate!"
"C-c-Concen-t-trate-o-ON-R-r-running?! W-Why?"
"Because I'm good at it!"
"-H-h-Hu-huh... W-wh-why?"
"BECAUSE IT'S ALL I DO! SHUT THE FUCK UP!"
BMM
-A blast of light bleached the air around them with a fleck of torn soil and cracked pebbles.
Some kind of controlled explosion ate a small crater right beside their position- missing the Deathclaw in such a proximity of closeness, that she felt heat wash over her ankles.
"-S-sh-SHIT-!" Sanford stumbled. "-W-What-W-WAS-T-T-that?!"
"DON'T KNOW!"
From the Super Mutants' perspectives- the two of them were getting smaller and smaller as the reptile continued her wild sprint, unmatched , and unparalleled in her speed still after all these years.
No one could catch her- not the technologically advanced soldiers of the Enclave, not any Raider or human marauder group- not the Super Mutants and their ability to tank massive guns around at will. -And in addition to all that angering the mutant chief- that last bit really ground his gears.
The Super Mutant chief had worked ahead of his fodder in a flanking maneuver- he rolled his wrinkled, green jaw from where he stood atop the bent, and cracked hood of an ancient eighteen-wheeler's front chassis.
Adjusting his stance with pressing boots- his mechanical arm whirred as the bionic fist curled over a grenade round by his belt- tugged it loose, and shoved it in a bulky, fat, and rounded weapon with faded drab paint and a white army star.
Once upon a time, it had been a standard issue United States Army infantry grenade launcher- but now, two hundred years later- there were so many bionic rib attachments, plates, and hull pieces bolted together all over it- that it was a shadow of its former sleekness and compact nature.
The Super Mutant chieftain shoved the new round in a foldable stock compartment- shut it, and aimed the elongated, copper barrel at his targets again.
"STUPID LIZARD!" He bellowed. "EAT THIS!"
FWM
-The hurled grenade popped from the barrel, and started to sail towards them.
The Deathclaw had just hopped down from another large rock- and looked up just in time to see the black blotch descending on them faster than she could track.
"MERDE'." She snapped. "Merde'-merde'-MERDE'!"
"-What the hell does that even mean?! -And... And why did we stop? W-What happened?!"
"My LIFE happened! My God-damned, LIFE-!"
BMMM
-The blast was pathetic in comparison to the detonation of the warhead from before, the reason Sanford was blind- but, the shrapnel flew, dirt was torn from the ground, rocks were dislodged- and a bubble of florescent, glowing fire bloomed right in her face.
The explosion knocked her off her feet- Sanford cried out and slid off her shoulder- she twisted sideways, and fell on her right arm and hip, fumbling about the ground, hissing from sudden pain.
It felt like a hundred stinging insects had flew directly into her like a wave- when she settled on the ground, shaking her head, spitting dust from her chops- she felt wet warmth veining from her legs and body.
She blinked dirt away, and drew her palm down her face to clear it.
On chance- she looked at her claws whilst she struggled to stand back onto her cloven, reptilian feet- seeing her fingers now marked with drawn tendrils of dark crimson.
A lancing heat on her brow flared painfully- she hissed from the sensation, and lumbered away from where the blast had hit her. Her hearing was just returning from a hellish omnipresence of 'White noise'- a little ring that had temporarily deafened her.
She found Sanford trying to stand up on the ground a few inches away- his eyes were narrowed, squinted- and he actually reacted with raised brows when she bent down to him.
"-H-Hey... I-I think I can... I can see you, Deathclaw!" He proudly stated. "-That's your face right there-!" He pointed. "-Right?"
"-T-That's my foot, you scab."
"-OH, sorry... H-Hey... You alright? You sound bad... Y-You get hit?"
"-NO." She lied. "Get up."
"-O-Okay-WOAH!"
SHM-BUM
-She hauled him over her shoulder again- hissed angrily at the terrible pain, and started to flee again like nothing had transpired.
The hide on her legs complained with each swing of her feet- she shook her head to flick away a droplet of blood getting in her left eye.
In the distance- the Super Mutants beside the chieftain had long given up in their hopeless attempt to keep pace with the astronomically faster Deathclaw- they were starting to lumber back to the camp, with their chieftain falling behind.
He had hopped down from the smashed truck, his height- he watched the reptile and the armored human over her shoulder vanish in another drop of the terrain- they were as small as ants.
"...AaaaaaAAARRRGHGHH!" The Super Mutant practically screamed at the top of his lungs- he turned around and threw his weapon in a dash to the grassy earth- the bulky launcher clattering across the ferns quietly.
"Lizard took canned-human!" He angrily screeched. "You all FAILURES!"
-None of his stupid companions had the attention span to even realize, that the screaming nutcase up on the hill- that was actually their leader- was yelling at THEM.
-0-0-0-0-0-
When had ever been the last time he had been... Alone?
Like, alone with no help? No other thing, man or otherwise, to keep him company?
It had been a long time ago- he had wandered, he'd seen a fraction of what the wastelands of the burned world had to offer, and he had broken that solitude by finding the very fleshy being that had been friends with him for years.
Hancock had always been programmed to destroy and seek nothing but the orders of those that designed him- that was the base programming, that was overrode by his own sense of 'Insanity'- he liked to dub.
Though really- to this day, he didn't exactly know what had caused that coding catastrophe that gave him the kind of 'Personality' he sported.
There had been nothing before he had briefly been alone in the wastes up until his current point- like humans could remember nothing before being born, because there WAS nothing before birth.
Hancock remembered, because he had photo-recognition software that made it impossible for him to forget- he had recorded every day of his 'Life' his active activation, from the time he had 'Woken', until now.
Not once in all those years did he ever find or scan evidence that lead to an answer of where he came from- of course, in a physical sense, he CAME from the U.S. Army and whatever factory floor had made his number line.
But he had never seen service when the United States Military was still around, and he had never been activated for another two hundred years before he, again- 'Woke' -in a world of ashes and ruins of the good ole' U.S.A.
With no military, no orders- he flew around and shot anything dead that tried to dismantle him- which, after a few days of literally flying anywhere he pleased- turned out to rack up quite the body count.
Hancock had killed a lot of living things- again, since his records were complete- he had confirmed in his recent memory dump files, that over 1,402 life forms had been terminated by any of the weapons mounted on his chassis- and the number was almost triple that when he read Sanford's sight-sig files.
They were veterans- they'd seen a lot, the horrors, the wonders and the amazing things and the challenges... But never once had Hancock seen the brunt of it all alone.
Those fights in his wanderings were child's play compared to the ones with Sanford- his greatest feats were by teamwork- it was how it rolled with them.
Thus, when his systems were reset, and his motor-sensor array regained power fluctuation after his battery pack was automatically put in safety stasis- the Mr. Gutsy's three ocu-lenses flickered open and with light- to see nothing but black.
Hancock jolted in motion- startled -and dust flittered off his chassis in a thin cloud.
His arms moved, whining, clanking about- pebbles rolled off the metal in droves.
"-UGH... My... Aching sponson mount... What the hell just happened, sir?" Hancock shook himself vehemently upon rising from where had been tossed onto the rocky earth- his ocu-lenses scanned about curiously as his central thruster flared to life.
Hovering there- he popped open his circuitry lockbox with an electric-sounding patter of contacting metal- reached in with his claw and swept about to dislodge a small cloud of airborne particles gathered from the tumble.
Closing the hatch on the side of his round chassis- Hancock scanned a field of stone and dirt, littered with ferns and tall grass- in the distance, a receding hill of fire sprouted from the crumbled remains of a stone, blocky structure built into the ground.
Behind that, the towering bone-laden steel girders of the Super Mutant camp stood in shadow.
"Sir?" Hancock spiraled around, looking in all directions. "Sir? SIR?! Holy crap, Sanford! SAN-FORD!"
"-'Ey!"
"-WAH-?! WHOOSEE-WHATS?!" Hancock spun around when a deep, throaty voice interrupted his panicked rant.
A Super Mutant stood on a nearby rock raise- makeshift armor constructed of car parts layering his green, muscular torso- the beast raised a hunting rifle at him.
"-Yu pay' fer frend's ascape' metull-man-!"
CLAK CLK
-The Mutant's head popped like a cist under a needle's descent- the body flying back with his skull flapping around in two, crimson halves centered with misting, neon green.
"-Shut your fat-face, ooga-booga-bitch! I'm looking for my parasitic hobble I call a friend!" Hancock snapped, turning away from where the corpse had collapsed to. "SANFORD! SANFORD!"
He waited.
...
No response.
"Agh..." Hancock rolled his ocu-lenses. "-SAN-FORD! SANNY'! SANS-MANS! ANYBODY! I... I... Oh my God... H-Holy shit, I-I'm alone... I'm alone! In enemy territory! The Viet-Kong will throw me in a cage and torture me for the secret of western barbecue cuisine!"
The robot looked eastward- his thruster flaring- and, understand here, that outside of his knowledge- his friends had just fled in the opposite direction.
Hancock- clueless -zoomed off to the east over all the rocks in bounding jumps and zips- giving off faint, echoed cries of protecting America's burgers and hotdogs rattling out into the night atmosphere.
Where the Mutants didn't even comprehend their chieftain suffering an anuerism on the hilltop beside the camp- Hancock's distant shouts and cries were taken as a fluent commonality of gaseous indigestion from their fellows.
Perhaps, seeing Hancock's rants as flatulence was a sign from the greater powers of creation.
-0-0-0-0-0-
Her muscles finally tired out after a few more minutes of running- biogenetically engineered or not, she couldn't indefinitely sprint through the Commonwealth with a ton of metal-encased, smelly human over her shoulder.
She could ALMOST run with that indefinitely- her kind was designed for the impossible- but today, and with all the fighting and the traveling earlier before being kidnapped- she was exhausted.
Slumping to a lazy walk with a few more huffs of effort- she shook her arm to rouse Sanford who had been curled up and still in the armor.
"-I... I can't... I can't run anymore, monsieur'... I can't..."
"-Then put me the hell down already! I said I could walk!"
"...B-but," She breathed. "...I thought you... Can't see?"
"It's getting clearer, I mean-" He waved his gauntlet in front of his helmet's eye lenses. "-I can see my hand in front of my face."
"...Okay... Okay, fine..."
"I think the helmet's systems saved me from the brunt of it... And, hey, uh... Thanks for saving my-"
SSKL-WHM
BMMM
-"WOOA-OAH-OW! Ouch! God that hurts like hell-! Did ya' need to drop me like that-?"
PMM-BMMBM
-"-...Uh, hey... Iguana-Toes, you okay?"
"...MMMMmmmm..."
"...You must be exhausted."
"...Mmm..."
The Deathclaw had fallen face first onto the ground after she dropped him like a sack of potatoes.
Having landed on his backside- Sanford slowly stood to his full height again with whirs of servos and whines of gears- he reached up and took his helmet off with a de-coupling hiss, tossing it on the ground, sweat matting his face.
Her back heaved shakily with each breath- she looked like a mound of scales down there, head sprawled out, chin in the dirt, tongue slipping out from her front fangs every other breath.
Sanford moved with aches in his back and his entire body- hissing in discomfort, he hobbled to stand a few feet beside her, and he shifted inside the suit of armor.
"...Aw, this shit's killing me..."
"...Mmmm..." She groaned.
"-Hold on, I'm coming..."
The X-01 suit opened for the first time in two or so days- unfolding like a flower of metal and synthetics- Sanford shakily stepped out the rear of the exoskeleton inside- stumbled back, and fell on his butt with a kick of dust.
Sitting down there in a stupor- he blinked at the ajar insides of his armor, cringing at the mangled gash that had been the cause of his entrapment- and noted how so much of the structure hadn't been damaged by the impalement.
It was more like things had just been dented and shoved aside- which was still a problem, but was more fixable than if parts of the suit had been totaled.
Laughing at his clumsiness- he slowly stood up, and stretched his back with both hands pressed to his spine to hear a disk satisfyingly snap.
"-OH-There's the ticket." He sighed. "Holy hell... T-That was... That was some ride, huh, Ms. Deathclaw?"
"...Stop... Talking..." She muttered, he almost didn't hear her.
"...Hey, are you... Alright? Besides being tired?"
"...I'm... I'm freakin'... Fine..."
"Are you bleeding?"
"...Just...A little..."
"W-What happened? H-How did- oh God..." Sanford went wide eyed.
She was bleeding A LOT.
There were tens of gashes all over her- a bunch on her legs, on her torso, none longer than his index finger...
There was a big one over her left eye- a ragged welt that a river of crimson flowing right past her upper eye, down her cheek bone, to dribble off her jaw.
Shrapnel.
It must have been shrapnel.
The explosion before...
"Oh no... That's... That's not-" He almost finished with- 'That's not good'- but he figured just stating the obvious made him look like a prick.
He bent down and started fiddling to get the sweaty, stinky rucksack that he used for his scavenging off his back- through all the padding.
"...No..." She shook her head weakly from down on the ground. "...No, don't... Don't help me..."
"-Look, Ms. Deathclaw- I dunno' why your life is so screwed up in your eyes, but I'm not going to sit here and let you, let YOURSELF die."
"...It's my choice..."
"Fuck independence of thought," Sanford barked, tearing free a cluster of syringes from the bag's interior. "Stay still or I'll force you to take these."
"...FORCE...me?!"
"Yeah."
"...YOU... You... YOU LITTLE... I-I'LL..." The Deathclaw tried to move- but it looked like someone had tried to nudge her and her massive weight- and that someone just happened to be something small, like a corgi dog, or a house cat.
Sanford hoped the chemicals would work on her- and while, he would've wanted a better more certain alternative- he didn't have anything else.
Stimulation injections saved lives every day in the wastes- they accelerated cellular regeneration, a medical marvel that survived the war unlike so many others- it had to work on her, even if she was a giant walking lizard.
"This'll sting." He muttered- aiming the needle for the gash above her eye.
"...N-No... Stop..." She pleaded- arm dragging and falling limp on the ground. "...I don't... I don't want..."
"I don't care."
"...Kill... KILL YOU... When... When wake up..."
"I don't care."
"...S-STOP..."
"No."
"...Sanford..."
"No."
"...SANFORD..."
"NO."
He drained the last of the syringe, flicked it away, and nudged down to her legs- he stuck and emptied a needle with each respectively.
As he took away the last one from her rib section- he kept digging through all the old items and valuables he still had in the bag's main fold- came back with sanitized gauze, and started wiping off all the blood on her face.
He dabbed around her eye- the yellow, thin orb that was tightly shut and straining in a quiver as he delicately touched away the red staining her scales.
When he receded to toss the red gauze away- her eye opened, and with it, it released a small flood of moisture that dragged down her cheek bone to replace the little river of red from before with this salty newcomer.
Sanford saw that, and frowned deeply.
He didn't know she could... CRY.
But, she did, and, here it was.
Exhaling- Sanford came back after a few minutes down by her legs, trying to wipe away some of the matted blood wherever he saw it- he sat by her head.
"...I... I don't really know, if it's right to apologize to you... Like... I can't just, let you die."
"...Why...?" Was all she asked, simply, through her still and jagged teeth,
"...I haven't had someone to watch my back since I lost my old life," He smiled. "...And, me and Han' are the most ragtag group in the wasteland, so... Non-human, once-human or not, I can't judge Ghouls, so I can't judge you."
"...But... I'm... M-Monster..."
"Not to me."
"-M-Merde'..."
"What does that mean? You never answered me." He chuckled.
"...Fuck..."
"...Oh, okay, still caged up then, I under-"
"-MEANS... FUCK..." She grunted. "...Merde'... Translate... FUCK..."
"Merde' means 'Fuck' in French?"
"...Mmm..."
"Interesting, Ms. Deathclaw."
"...Mm..."
"...So, uhm..." He looked over her- scanning their surroundings.
They were still technically in the middle of nowhere.
No buildings, no roads... If they kept going west, they'd start to go into former Concord Massachusetts with how far they had strayed from the mainland Commonwealth.
It was getting darker- it worried him.
Looking back down at the Deathclaw- he saw her one eye still drained on his face, her breathing had calmed.
He did the unthinkable- even though, technically the last few days had been unthinkable too- and he rubbed his gloved hand into the crease behind her left horn, to the base of her skull- in the most continued contact he'd ever had with her in such a manner.
She didn't react to his touch all that much- her eye just trailed from him to lower towards the ground again- her chest rose and fell with a deep huff.
"...I gotta' figure out a way to keep you around," He mused. "You're not bad at all."
"...I... I don't understand you..."
How ironic, did she just directly quote the past?
Huh.
-Too bad Sanford didn't know the connection to that.
"That's okay, not many people do." He shrugged. "I guess we'll just sit here for awhile... Right?"
"...Mmhmm..."
"Alright."
Sanford sat back, and stared at the Deathclaw for a good amount of time- he waited until her eyes shut, and her breathing became slow, and deliberate, a tiny whistle leaving her nostrils.
He checked the gash over her eye with a closer glance- and saw that it had already scabbed over- in a few hours, it would be gone- which meant the stimpacks worked like a charm.
Relieved- he suddenly felt a chill when he looked about his person, and then when he looked back at the empty, open suit of Power Armor behind him.
He didn't have a gun.
He didn't have Hancock.
He was defenseless in the middle of nowhere with the Deathclaw napping.
Not so good.
Sanford ground his teeth as he dug back into the rucksack still on the ground next to him- hope hit him when his fingers wrapped around something hard and metal.
He pulled the object out from the main flap, past a few aluminum boltheads that flittered and fell back inside- and smiled fully.
It was his silenced pistol. The Mutants hadn't taken it like his shotgun, and his SMG.
Sanford ejected the magazine- and saw it fully loaded. He slipped it back inside, dug through the bag more- and came back with two spares.
At least, he felt a little safer.
He held the pistol one-handed- stood up and walked over to the X-01 suit idly waiting for his reentry- he walked round to the back, and carefully ejected the fusion core inside the activation swatch, underhand rolling it next to his rucksack on the ground.
He sat down in front of the still standing suit- watching the sleeping Deathclaw, pistol hung in his lap.
Some day this had been.
Night fell unhindered, like a great, dark blanket.
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