4. Just In Time
Just in time, I found you just in time
Before you came my time was running low
I was lost, the losing dice were tossed
My bridges all were crossed
She hadn't slept in two days, but that was okay. Well, no. It wasn't. She was exhausted. But she had to keep moving. Had to keep going.
Assuming she didn't run into any problems or trip over something she didn't see in the dark, she didn't have much further to go until she got back to Megaton. Her pack was heavy with what she'd scavenged but she walked at a steady pace as long as she didn't think. At her side padded the dog that had saved her life from one of those big, green things. Supermutant, maybe. She'd have to ask Billy Creel for a description.
Dogmeat, she'd read on his collar. He seemed to respond to it so that was probably his name.
Occasionally, he'd bump into her. She didn't know why.
She was so tired, tired enough that she wasn't exactly watching where she was going.
And she walked right into a raider camp. She stopped dead in her tracks as the one sitting around the fire looked up at her, eyes widening. Dogmeat began to growl.
For a moment, both she and the raider were frozen, staring at each other. Then he began shouting, rousing his fellows and she bolted. Adrenaline coursed through her, pushing her tiredness away. Dogmeat whined then followed.
Gunshots sounded behind her and she ducked her head, forcing herself to go faster. As luck would have it, she tripped over a rock, sprawling into the dust. Butch's jacket took the brunt of the fall but he'd taken such care with it that it only scratched a little. The sting in her palms only served to wake her up further.
She lifted her head as she felt more than heard the eruption from the ground behind her. B rested her forehead back on the ground, closing her eyes briefly before she rolled her pack off her back so she could get up, pulling her pack up with her. She had to get back.
It was one of those giant scorpions and it was now facing off against the raiders who kept missing. It seemed ridiculously hard to miss something that went up to your knee and she didn't understand how they were managing to do that. She turned to see a second scorpion rising out of the ground.
"Run!" she shrieked at Dogmeat. The scorpion struck out at her as she fled past.
Two days. She'd been gone for two days with no sign of her. Leo had absolutely no reason to be worried. None. The Vault-girl was a stranger and had managed to completely turn Megaton upside down. Good riddance.
It made absolutely no sense, then, why he was sitting next to the door to the Wasteland at two-fucking-thirty in the morning with his hands beginning to shake and head beginning to pound. He should be sleeping this off and he wanted nothing more than to have a hit of Jet but B had taken his stash, picked the lock to do it, and done who knew what with it.
But here he was, waiting. He didn't even know why, not really. Andy would probably be pissed in the
He wasn't sure how long he'd been sitting there but he must have fallen asleep because he jolted when the door creaked open, scrambling to his feet and nearly falling over.
He didn't recognize the dog whining at her heels but he recognized the person stumbling in beside it. Too bright Vault suit that glowed in the light of the near full moon and red hair washed with silver where it peaked out from underneath the ball cap. One hand pressed against her side.
Her foot caught on something. Both hands flashed out to catch herself as she fell, one gleaming darkly. She cried out at the impact, unable to stifle it as her pack clattered off her shoulder.
In a flash, Leo knew. Quickly, he stooped down behind her, one hand snaking around her belly to find and press against the slickness at her side and the other braced against her back. The sharp, metallic scent of blood hung in the air. The dog whined from its position at her side, nudging her with its nose.
"Gotta get you to Doc Church," Leo grunted as he hauled them both upright, head swimming and he had a moment of panic when he thought he'd drop her.
Feebly, she wiggled, protesting, whining. "House...right there...fine."
"No, you're not fine." What was wrong with this Vault girl?
Against his better judgement, he obeyed, managing to drag her with him into her house and up the stairs despite her whimpering. Somehow he got her onto her bed. In the dim glow of her lights, he could see the dark stains on her Vault suit and her paling skin, evidence of the toll this was taking on her. "Pack," she groaned, reaching out blindly. The dog pushed Leo aside and dropped her forgotten pack within reach. "Good boy."
She shuffled around in the pack until she withdrew an inhaler. Leo recoiled, baffled, thinking it was Jet she was offering him even though he wanted nothing better than to snatch it out of her hand. She made some sort of high-pitched noise, throwing her head back against the pillow. Again, more insistently, she flicked her wrist toward him. "Doc'll explain. Help addiction."
Conflicting emotions boiled inside Leo and he ran from them, and her, ignoring the worried whirs from the Mr. Handy on the main floor. He skidded to a halt in front of Doc's door, pounding on it.
When the doctor opened the door, grumbling, Leo just dragged him out.
Back at B's side, Doc Church glanced at the inhaler still held in her bloody, limp hand, eyes widening. "Addictol. Haven't seen any in years."
Guilt surged through him, now the strongest emotion as he finally took the offered inhaler. "Can you help her?"
"Should be able to."
Leo helped him pull the leather jacket off of her. "No, no, no, no, no." B thrashed her head from side to side, an agonized wail breaking free from her throat. The ball cap she kept on her head fell off in the movement and her hair seemed to fucking glow. Her hand caught hold of the sleeve as Leo tried to take it away and gripped tightly. Leo turned to Doc Church, uncertainty painted across his face and when the grizzled doctor shrugged, turning back to his patient, Leo stepped a little closer so the jacket hung between him and B. Doc unzipped her Vault suit, exposing reddened skin and a bloodstained white tank top.
A few quick snips of his scissors and he exposed her torso when he peeled the tanktop away to reveal her injuries and almost impossibly white skin dotted with faint, barely there freckles. She was also wearing a bra, something he knew not many women did anymore. He'd been with a couple who did, usually the ones who'd been well-fed enough since birth to think their breasts warranted them but out here, almost no one did. On those women, the bra looked out of place. On B? Even with her bloodstained and pale, her bra looked...good on her. A thin scar, older, stretched from her hip bone to disappear beneath her bra strap. Doc Church nudged him out of the way to wipe away the blood as Leo stared.
She'd been shot, not stabbed, Leo finally realized, and he noticed that his breathing was a little faster than usual. Made no sense. He wasn't the one who was hurt. "Are there exit wounds?" Doc Church asked, noticing a remarkably clean set of tweezers on the desk next to her bed.
"How the fuck would I know?"
"Don't mouth off at me, boy. Check the damn jacket."
Oh. That made sense. Leo quickly glanced over the back of the jacket, seeing the sewn snake and wondering about it for the first time but it was intact. "No holes."
Doc Church grunted. "Need whiskey and a lighter."
"Doc, I don't think she smokes. Or drinks."
"See what she has. Now."
"I believe ma'am keeps her liquor in the cupboard downstairs," the Mr. Handy helpfully informed them. He hovered just outside her bedroom door, heat from his repulsors blasting across the floor.
"Does she have a lighter too?" Leo dropped off the side of the stairs, ankle twinging when he landed a little awkwardly.
"I would check in the spare room. She keeps all of her little doodads and knickknacks there to fuss with in her spare time."
"How the fuck does she have spare time?" Finding a near full bottle of whiskey, he bounded back up the stairs and into the bedroom next to B's. He set the bottle down near the doorway and began rustling through the the dressers and various containers, more and more frantically until, in an small table drawer, he found a small collection of lighters. His shoulders relaxed just slightly.
The surgery to remove the bullets took the rest of the night. B had long since passed out; whether from pain or blood loss, Leo wasn't sure. But her heart continued to stubbornly beat and she continued to breathe, albeit rather shallowly.
After removing two bullets and a radscorpion stinger he would have missed had the area not started swelling after pulling the Vault suit away, Doc Church finally dumped the remainder of the whiskey into her wounds before stitching them up and heavily bandaging her. There was no visible reaction from the unconscious B but Leo, one hand resting on her throat at her pulse point, felt the twitch in her heartbeat. He also knew that it was likely the radscorpion sting had probably kept her alive. Their venom reduced blood loss, caused swelling, and with how much she'd been bleeding, she probably would have bled out without it. And her Vault suit had kept the sting from swelling and killing her.
The Vaultie had tremendously good bad luck, it seemed.
"I won't stimpack her until after I know if she's gotten them wounds infected. I'll come by this afternoon to check up on her." Doc Church paused as he turned back to his patient then shook his head. He grumbled something under his breath as he passed.
Leo remembered seeing a chair in the room next to hers and he dragged it in, wincing at the grating sound of the legs against the floor. He glanced down at her when he set it next to her bed before settling into the uncomfortable chair. She didn't respond. The inhaler in his pocket seemed to press against his leg, demanding his attention. She could still die and if she did, she'd gotten hurt to try to help him. People just didn't do that.
When she woke up shortly before noon, Leo was slumped in the chair, head on his chest. When he woke up, it was to her yelp as she tried to push herself up into a sitting position.
"What the hell are you doing?" He stood too quickly, clambering to his feet, and his head swam. She reached out and gripped his outstretched arm, nails lightly digging into his skin. The pain shocked him out of the pounding in his head.
"You okay?" Her voice was quiet, but strong and the clear concern in her bottle green eyes completely belied the fact that hours earlier, she'd been in surgery and fighting for her life.
"Jet," he grunted before narrowing his bloodshot eyes. "And you shouldn't be sitting up. What the fuck's wrong with you?" He placed one hand next to her on the bed and she released his other arm.
"I need to talk to Moira."
Leo gaped at her. "You've got to be fucking kidding me. You are in no fucking state to be fucking going anywhere. Why the fuck do you think you need to go see Moira?"
B scowled at him. "She asked me to, well, injure myself. I wasn't going to do it on purpose and I figured it would happen eventually. I just wasn't expecting this to happen." Again, she tried to sit up but her nostrils flared and an agonized, breathy whimper left her. Enough. Leo pushed her back down into the bed. She didn't have the strength to fight him and he saw it in the panic in her eyes and the blood draining from her face. He pulled his hand away and though she didn't try again, the frightened Radstag look didn't leave. A sick feeling sank in his stomach as a thought entered his head.
He sighed, anger deflating. "Look, I can go grab her. You just stay here, alright?"
"Don't you need work? I can get there. It's not far." Her words were beginning to slur a little and that worried him more than he wanted to admit.
"Andy and Jenny won't care much. 'Sides, Doc Church would have my hide if you tear your stitches and I have to wake him up."
A mulish gleam entered her eyes but she didn't try to sit up again. "Fine. Go get her."
Despite his misgivings, and he had plenty given that Moira seemed to be using the Vault dweller for whatever little project she was currently on, Leo left her alone and retrieved the eccentric woman.
Upon seeing the bloodsoaked young woman, Moira's eyes widened and then an awful glee entered them that Leo didn't like one bit. "Look at you! Tell me, how do you feel?"
B closed her eyes and made some sort of noise he couldn't put a word to. "Peachy keen," she croaked. "Adrenaline blocked out some of the pain and focusing on what I had to do kept me going. But I don't recommend getting caught in the crossfire between raiders and those giant scorpions."
"Interesting. I don't know if many people will be able to think like that but that is some good advice." Leo stared at Moira in disbelief as she scribbled something down on the clipboard she was carrying. And then she unhooked a small sack from her belt, laying it down on the bed. "Here's some supplies and I doubt Doc Church gave you any so have a Med-X on me."
She handed the thin syringe to Leo before patting B on the shoulder and leaving. B exhaled, closing her eyes and laying back. "Is she insane? I'm pretty sure she's insane."
"You're the one working with her."
B made a laughing noise through her nose that could have been one of pain. Then she turned her head and studied him with sort of glazed green eyes. Almost like heat warped bottle glass. "You haven't taken the Addictol. Why?"
Leo blinked, feeling the presence of the inhaler in his pocket burn into his skin. Guilt. He was surprised to feel it and if he didn't know better, it was stronger than when he'd had to tell his siblings about both his drug problem and the thefts. "You actually got that for me?"
"I was the one who convinced you to go off the chems. We had it in the Vault so I figured there had to be some out here somewhere. Figured it was the least I could do and I just got lucky finding it. Still a bitch to find though." She shifted her weight on the bed, face twisting in a grimace and breath coming out in soft pants. "Can I have the Med-X now?"
He gently pressed the needle into the crook of her arm, almost embarrassed by how well he knew how. As the drug flooded her system and he pulled the needle away, she laid her hand on his, thumb gently stroking his rough skin.
"Pretty face," she slurred, barely able to keep her slow blinking eyes open. "Glad be okay." She went limp again, breaths evening out, and Leo just stared at her. He looked over her bloodstained clothes and body, the way her muscles were just starting to show real definition. The Vault suit was starting to look a little loose on her too. She didn't belong out here.
He didn't know why she'd left but he found himself wishing she'd stayed where she'd been safe.
You wouldn't have nearly died in there.
AN: Longest one yet, which I'm kinda psyched about. Go me. Still not super long but I don't think I fluffed it. Well, it's not full of unnecessary stuff to increase the word count. I did make it a little fluffy. Well, as fluffy as it can be considering it's about injury and near death experiences.
Anyway, let me know what y'all think.