Hello again, readers! Here with the second chapter. Get ready for a good dose of fluff. Also, heads up that the next chapter is the reason why this fic is rated M. I'll publish it soon enough.
Happy reading!
( Additionally, Chapter 16 of Halfmoon will be published between Jan 30 - Feb 5. )
After Butch left the vault, he was a stray to the wasteland for a long time, wandering aimlessly in search of some place where he belonged; or at the very least where he could live without threat of super mutants putting a bullet in his skull. Rivet City was where he eventually found that place, and was able to settle down and take up the career he was always destined to have: Barbering.
It'd been another three months now since he'd left the vault and last seen Jack, and, at the moment, it was 5AM and Butch sat outside on the deck overlooking the Capital with his arms on the railing and a lit cigarette between his fingers.
As he lifted his cigarette to take another drag, the large beached aircraft carrier settled under his feet and for just a moment he lost his grip, and he had to watch as he failed to snatch his cigarette back into his hand and saw its embers grow fainter as it fell lower and lower, till it hit the water below. Butch scoffed and sighed. "Well, fuck.." He grumbled, setting his arms back up neatly on the railing and slouching over it, brows low and irritable. He focused his cobalt eyes up ahead of him, toward the sunrise cresting over the capital, kissing the crumbling, war-stricken buildings with warm yellow light. Even if he didn't have a cigarette to calm his nerves, at least he had the view.
Too bad it was a pretty shitty view, and one Butch was too impatient to watch with just himself as company. He puffed out a frustrated breath and drew up off the railing. By now it'd be just shy of ten minutes before the sun was right up in its high place in the sky, anyway. Butch straightened out the collar of his jacket and fixed his tunnel snake with his fingers and started his way back into the ship. As he entered the stairwell, all he heard was the sound of his own boots against metal and quiet occasional creaking of the ship settling. Nobody else but him was up this early, and he liked it like that.
It'd become Butch's regular routine a while back to wake up before anybody else and enjoy the sunrise and the silence. He liked having a couple minutes of the day where he didn't have to hear Harkness or Bannon bitching until they were out of breath, usually with each other. Even if Butch wasn't inherently a person who favored serenity, he liked to have at least a couple minutes a day with just his own thoughts and the quiet of the wasteland.
Asked for every other minute of the day? Those could be chaotic as could be, ranging from brawls in the Muddy Rudder to flirting with every lady on ship 'till he got a slap to the side of his face, and he'd be content. Irony was all of that was just to keep Butch entertained aboard this big steel-scrap tub, not because he actually felt some legitimate, justified reason to be doing all the troublesome things he did. He could care less of the actual impact of his actions, so long as he wasn't bored nor feeling meaningless.
Butch stomped his way down the staircase to the lowest deck of the ship, which led to the Muddy Rudder, his place of work. He began to whistle a merry little tune to block out the silence as he went, pushing his weight against the heavy metal door as he shoved it open, entering the shabby little bar with the sound of loud metallic squealing. Belle Bonny, who was up by now and already sweeping the grimy floors, halted in her work and cast her eyes up at the Tunnel Snake as he carelessly entered and pushed the door closed with yet another obnoxious cry of its aging hinges.
"I swear, Butch, it's like you want me to hit you with the end'a this," she huffed and gestured the broom toward him, threatening smacking him with its wooden handle. "Not one morning do you walk in here nice and quiet.." Butch just chuckled and made his way down the staircase, patting Bonny on her head like a child as he walked by her.
"I ain't quiet cause I can't let you forget I'm here," he mused, that same old annoying smirk splayed across his cheeks. Belle, this time around, just rolled her eyes rather than trying to argue with the snake.
"Fine, whatever, Butch. Just make yourself useful as long as you're here and clean up the bar counter for me," she grumbled, then resuming her work at sweeping the floor and ignoring as Butch groaned at the mere thought of having to do work, and stomped off behind the bar muttering under his breath. As Butch made his way behind the counter and opened up an old cupboard stocked with cleaning supplies, Belle spoke up again, "Oh, and no smokin' on the job," she said.
Butch over-dramatized a groan. "Jeez, just put me back to work in the vault if I'm gonna be your maid, why don't'cha?" He retorted before snatching a wash rag and box of Abraxo. He stepped over to the sink and twisted the old, rusted nob that started the water running. Stuff was much cleaner and better to use now that Project Purity was up and running, and it was definitely healthier considering it wasn't irradiated to hell. Butch carelessly opened the box of cleaner and dumped a good quarter of the box into the water and watched as bubbles foamed up on top. He then dunked the old dish cloth into the soapy water, let it soak up some of the cleaner, and walked over to the counter, dripping water all along the floor as he went.
Dropping the rag on the wooden counter with a wet plop, he stopped to roll his sleeves up to his elbows, so his newer, shinier leather jacket wouldn't even risk getting dirty, then started getting to work. He held the rag with a firm hand and rubbed it along the counter, leaving it stained with water and soap as he went. He may as well at least do a good job cleaning, considering if he didn't Belle would just make him redo it over and over 'till he did anyway.
All though the process of cleaning the counter, eventually tossing the rag back into the sink and grabbing a different one to dry it off, Butch grumbled and bitched under his breath. Belle of course could hear him, though she decided to keep to herself rather than jumping down Butch's throat. She knew that wouldn't do either of them any good, considering the ego on that ex-vault kid. With the last swipe of a damp, previously dry cloth across the counter, Butch sighed with some content and tossed the rag lazily back into the cupboard, directing his eyes up at Bonny.
"Alright, Belle, all done," he announced.
She grinned at the vault dweller, "Yeah? Good for you, Butch. Now start stacking cups along the counter all nice 'n neat," she instructed meanwhile she went to put away her broom and just sit herself down in a chair at one of the tables around the bar, sighing and contently leaning back on its metal frame. She let herself stop working, and asked Butch to do more. It was her bar, after all, so she made the rules. Besides, Butch was usually lazy and good for nothing on a usual daily basis, it'd do him no harm to do some extra chores.
"Uuuuugh," he moaned, slumping off to grab two tall towers of stacked cups and move them over to the front counter, where he'd start to disassemble them and set them neatly side-by-side starting from one end of the counter, leading to the other. Each time he set down a cup, he made sure to do so with plenty of force so that a loud pop would echo around the bar. He watched as Bonny jolted with gathering irritation at each tap of glass to wood. He grinned as he watched her sigh with irritation and curl her fists into balls, resisting the urge to punish the Tunnel Snake.
As Butch worked, stacking cups and progressively making the tower of glasses grow shorter and shorter, he heard as the rust-tub of a city began to wake up and stir around him. Doors began to open, footsteps began to echo around the rooms and halls, and various voices mingled around, their sound traveling with the steel walls. Butch ignored it all, even as the door to the Muddy Rudder opened and he heard loud footsteps just above his head. He never payed mind to any of the moving city around him while he worked, he'd gotten used to it a while ago, and the sounds of the townspeople had lost their interest to him. Additionally, he would rather hurry up and finish his work before all else.
Out in front of him, he heard the sound of someone walking down the stairs into the bar while someone else pushed the door open and walked through. He glanced up briefly from his stacking to check who it was that'd made their way down, and was met with the face and deep, gruff voice of Sister as he said his good mornings to Belle. He sighed, uninterested entirely and having no care for the former slaver. He went back to lining cups, and soon after he began to whistle a tune under his breath similar to the one he'd been musing earlier that morning.
With his new merry tune to help him drown out the sound in front of him, Butch continued his work, and this time didn't bother looking up as the second pair of footsteps made their way downstairs. As this one came down, however, he heard a sudden increase in noise as Belle immediately parted from her small-talk with Sister to greet the second person. Butch grunted at the higher mount of noise, though managed to keep his eyes to what he was doing regardless. As far as he figured, it was just somebody Belle was overjoyed to see- probably hadn't seen in a while, either- and the noise would die down pretty soon.
Oh, but we was wrong. The sound of voices and footsteps only got louder as more people entered the room and seemed to be greeting the last person who'd walked down the stairs. Growing irritable with the sound however mustering the strength not to look up and rather just keep to his own business, Butch grumbled under his breath, brows furrowed, whistling brought to a halt, and started to smack the cups down on the table with even more force.
The noise in the bar began to fade into a blur of unfocused noise and commotion as Butch made an effort to fixate himself on his chore, which was nearly halfway done by this point. He was, however, hardly a moment later abruptly brought out of his state of focus as a voice came through and attracted the attention of his eyes from the counter to a person standing in front of it, who had distracted him by speaking to him and saying something that triggered particular, fragile memories in his mind;
"Hey, Nosebleed." There was only one stupid, reckless, gold-hearted blonde from Vault 101 that would be using that term so ironically with him, considering he was the one who used to be getting called that name. Jack. And when Butch looked up, that's just who he saw, smiling at him with one of the most genuinely happy expressions he'd ever seen in the wasteland. The only thing missing was those brilliant blue eyes, which were yet again covered by highly reflective sunglasses.
The Lone Wanderer scoffed a chuckle as he took in Butch's nearly awestruck expression, watching as he drew a blank as to what to say. "Been a long time, hasn't it?" He asked the Tunnel Snake, speaking in a smooth and gentle tone, similar to how Butch remembered, only a bit gruffer and worn by the Wastes.
"I.. it.. Yeah. Yeah it has," he stuttered, then forcing himself to overcome his shock, which left him embarrassed, with a smirk and furrowed brows to retort with a little more of his usual facade, " n' who do you think you are calling Nosebleed, Butthead?" He prodded, talking like he did back in the vault when he was still top-dog and resident bully. While Butch spoke, he also slid around the counter to the side where Jack stood, effectively abandoning his work. Jack turned to face him and stood just mere inches from him. His smile got brighter as he watched Butch's quickly fade and his brows furrow. Jack immediately knew why. This close up, it'd just occurred to Butch that he now had to look slightly up for his eyes to meet the Lone Wanderer's.
Jack chuckled, "Looks like you can't pick on me for being too small anymore, eh?" He remarked. Butch huffed audibly at him, rolling his eyes.
"Yeah, whatever," he said, "Don't make you any stronger than me, kid," he retorted, watching Jack's brows perk from behind his sunglasses with pure amusement. Before he continued their banter and said something snarky in return to Butch, he made an efforts to change the topic for the better.
"Uh-huh, sure, Tunnel Snake." He snorted. "Anyway… Look, it.. It really has been too long. Y'wanna maybe share a drink with me?" He asked lightly, slipping a Nuka Quantum bottle out of his worn down Tunnel Snakes jacket. He must've been saving that drink in there for some special occasion, considering Quantum is some of the rarest stuff to find when it came to consumables in the Capital. Butch blinked with some surprise to even be seeing a bottle of the neon blue soda, which he'd always wanted to try for himself ever since childhood. Regardless of that, though, he was even more glad just to be invited to spend more time with Jack, and time alone with him, at that.
However, Butch had to keep up his careless, cool facade and evaded jumping at the opportunity like a Raider to a barrel of caps. He feinted a genuine shrug, "I mean.. It couldn't hurt.." He said, agreeing and glancing at Jack just to see his expression light up. He stuffed the glowing blue bottle back into his jacket and gestured for Butch to follow him before beginning to leave the bar.
"C'mon, we might as well step outside into the wasteland sunshine for a couple'a minutes," he said, glancing back at Butch over his shoulder as the greaser followed after him. Butch made a short moment of eye-contact with Belle as he started up the staircase, who seemed not to be angry nor really mind at all that he was leaving. Not that he would've cared either way.
As he walked behind Jack, Butch noticed that the man swayed with every thoughtfully placed step. Not in the sense he was harmed and limping in some way, but in that he had some constant merry tune in his head that he stepped along to at all times. Like he kept contained in his own world, playing his own songs, which was presumably a nicer one than the one he really lived in. Before having stepped up to Jack's side once they entered the hallway, Butch noticed just how beaten his old jacket was as he got to observe it. The black leather was faded to a grimy dark gray, the snake emblem was scratched and dirtied, and there were even patches and bandages in various places in an efforts to keep it held together. Seemed like Jack never took the thing off, and yet still cared enough about it to keep it on his back.
Butch was almost somehow flattered by that. A trip to the central staircase and a hallway or two later, Jack was pushing a thick steel door open that led onto the flight deck, a high-up and very rarely visited part of the ship that overlooked the entirely of post-apocalyptic Washington D.C. Jack walked right up to the railing and sighed at the sight, basking in the late noon sun above him. He'd grown to like the way this view looked; the way the sun kissed the top of crumbled buildings and corpses of a once flourishing civilization. It'd grown on him, and nowadays he found it some odd kind of beautiful. Butch, on the other hand, was still in the process of getting used to it. He never liked all the dull, dead colors.
After having his fill of the sight of the wasteland, Jack turned around and leaned his back against the railing, resting his arms on the rusted metal bars. He smiled at Butch and glanced at his side as to beckon him there. Butch, reluctantly only by nature, obliged, placing himself by the vault kid's side, facing the wasteland, and propping his own forearms up on the rails. Jack turned himself a bit to be facing the Tunnel Snake a bit more so, and reached a hand into his jacket to pull out that bottle of Quantum he was saving. Easily, he popped the cap off and flicked it over the edge. Butch was a bit surprised to see him so carelessly do away with it, but then again, he reminded himself Jack was never one to overly value material things, especially just a single cap.
The drink in his hand hissed with the familiar buzz of carbonation, and he took a good, long sip. "Mph- Strong stuff. Kinda stings the tongue, kinda tingles a little, but.. Ain't half bad," he said, shrugging as he offered the bottle over to Butch, who took it from him welcomingly.
As Butch put his own lips on the end of that bottle and tipped it back to take a sip, his eyes averted to Jack, who'd began speaking again, "So, I'm gonna assume you up and left the vault right as they cracked it open.." The blonde turned to face him, though the intensity of eye contact was worn down by those sunglasses he wore, "How's the wasteland been treatin' ya so far?" He asked.
Butch swallowed back the fizzy cyan liquid, flinching a little at its strong, interesting flavor. "Like shit," he spat bluntly, passing the bottle back as he spoke, at which Jack snorted and grinned, wrapping his fingers back around the neck of the bottle. "But I guess it's better than back in the vault. At least out here I have freedom to do whatever the hell I please. Gives a tunnel snake the room he needs to slither, y'know?" he said, snickering as he referred to himself by the name his teenage gang went by. Jack rolled his eyes and shook his head.
"Yeah, sure," he scoffed.
He paused. "But.. Really.." Butch sighed, "I shouldn't bitch about it much. I mean, it ain't always nice, that's for sure, but it ain't terrible. I got a roof over my head, food in my stomach, caps in my pocket.. I even got to be a barber," he explained, "Guess I shouldn't be complainin'," he said modestly, pausing and coming back with a more Butch-like, "But that don't mean I'm not still gonna." He smirked over at Jack, who just seemed happy to be seeing Butch still acting like himself, witty remarks and conceited attitude included. "But, hey, I'm sure you've had a hell of a whole lot more happenin' with you after you left the vault for good, huh?" He said, "and, hey!" He perked up a bit as a thought popped into his head, "Did you ever find your dad?"
Jack hesitated, drawing in a breath and glancing away, directing his shielded eyes to the sky. "Yeah. I found him," he began, tone softening out and smile dying down, "He.. ah.. He passed away, couple months ago," he explained lightly. Butch felt his blood run cold with absolute regret of having asked that. I fucked up ran through his head more than a few times. His smirk dissipated entirely and he swallowed back the embarrassed nervousness welling in his chest.
"Ah, shit, man, I'm.. I'm real sorry to hear that," He expressed, watching the lone wanderer closely as a new, short yet sweet and truthful smile perked at his cheeks.
"Don't be. He died for what he loved, and I finished what he started for him," he said, referring to Project Purity and its full completion. "And I know this is gonna sound stupid, but I feel like.. somewhere up there, he's happy now. I think he knows he changed the wasteland for the better, and I think, if anything, he's happy I was the one who finished the job for him," he explained with a soft, delicate tone as his eyes watched the wispy clouds creep across the skies above. As he concluded and spent a moment with his eyes to the sky, he looked back down to Butch, smile widening as his eyes met with those midnight blues. "Besides, it ain't like I lost everybody."
Butch felt an odd, strong push on his chest, and a warmth well deep within it, spreading from his heart out into every vein in his "cold-blooded" body. It gave him an indescribable sense of happiness to see Jack referring to him as somebody he couldn't live without, and valued as highly as people such as father. Even after all this time, all those days Jack must've spent out in the wasteland meeting new people and making new bonds, his heart never let go of the flame of his days in the vault. By now, it was most definitely an old flame, but perhaps it wasn't out just yet.
With a pause and a breath sucked down into his lungs, and eyes still starving to see those belonging to Jack which were beautiful as pre-war summer sky, Butch scooted closer and reached out for the sunglasses resting on the bridge of Jack's nose. He flinched a bit, thought he allowed Butch to take them off and hook them onto the collar of his shirt. The Lone Wanderer blinked and squinted his eyes a moment, adjusting to the new, higher amount of light, then let them settle and focus into Butch's set of cobalt orbs, opening wider for the Tunnel Snake to bore into them.
Butch couldn't have been more disappointed and crushed by what he was met with. Pale, clouded eyes the color of irradiated puddles of rain water, accented by red veins slithering through the whites of his eyes and dark, heavy under-eye circles. His eyes no long reflected the hope, joy, and emotion he remembered from back in the vault, but were now fogged over with a glassy layer of the painful memory of so many gruesome, hope-demolishing sights. Jack no longer had the eyes of a young man full of life and potential, a hero in the making, but those of a worn man beaten by the elements of the world time and time again. A hero who had already played his role. Jack had the eyes of someone who had lived their life to the fullest extent and then some, abusing their wholehearted selflessness 'till they were worn down to a shell of the greatness they used to be.
Butch wasn't entirely let down on his own behalf, despite how much he longed for the sight of the sky in those eyes, but on Jack's, just to've seen how much Jack had worn himself down in only a year's time. The boy looked like he'd already seen the world. His eyes had grown into those of a man. However, as Butch continued to hold eye contact, his cheeks perked with a true, bittersweet smile. As different and as damaging as those eyes were to see, they were still Jack's nonetheless, and they were still his sky, no matter how many clouds.
"I can't tell you how long I've wanted to see those," Butch told him with a subtle, warm chuckle, "I'd be lying if I said I hadn't missed 'em," he said. Jack's eyes grew warmer and as did his smile.
"I'd be lying if I said I hadn't missed you," he said smoothly, watching in joy as Butch's expression grew more surprised and his face faded to a warmer color as heat flooded into his cheeks. He seemed as if he hadn't quite expected Jack to say that. Which.. He may not've, but it would come as no surprise if he had fantasized it once upon a time.
He scoffed, yet again in an attempt to hold up his facade and neglect to show the extent of how much that simple comment meant to him, "You… Really?" He paused, "I guess a tunnel snake like me ain't something you can just forget," he said boastfully, glancing away and back briefly, and was met with no playful expression change in Jack's face- eyes especially- this time around. He wasn't complying with Butch's comedic, crude behavior and nor was he falling for that act he put up. With them seeing eyes-to-eyes, he could see right through him. Butch's grin faded a bit and he swallowed, glancing away again.
"No, I guess not," he said softly, "…And, uh, hey, by the way, for what it's worth.. I'm sorry I didn't take you out of the vault with me the last time. I was.. In a tight place, thought you would be safer on your own for a while," he blurting, confessing his past regrets, "Besides, I had some feeling that wouldn't be the last time I saw you." At that notion, Butch's eyes fixated back into his. "And, would'ya look at this.." he nudged his way closer to the tunnel snake, turning away from the railing a bit more so that their faces were mere inches from one another. "I wasn't wrong."
Before Butch could either react or say another word, his eyes instinctively closed before those familiar, broken-glass blues as the disorienting, light-headed sensation of a familiar set of lips pressed to his. He felt his entire exterior, his entire tough and boorish shell, his identity as a Tunnel Snake itself, melt off of him in that moment, taken right back to his days in the vault where he'd spend hours hiding in the back of his room with Jack, lips to lips and sharing in each other's body heat for hours. Or at least until they thought they might get caught.
Those lips, no matter how dry and cracked from their days facing the winds and the dust of the wasteland, didn't lose an ounce of their sense of closeness, of comfort, of feeling like home. Not in the sense of Vault 101, the place from which they both came from and first grew close, being home, no, but in the sense of Jack being it. He was the only person Butch would ever allow his facade to fall apart in front of. He was the closest thing to home.
Jack parted his lips away from the Tunnel Snake's, and his eyes eased up to meet the starstruck dark sapphire orbs in front of him, bright and dazed. He cleared his throat and darted his eyes away, "I.. Sorry, that was uncalled for. Guess I'm still stuck somewhere in the past. I just wanted that one more time, I-" Jack, in the midst of his hasty and nervous apology, was stopped and thus forgiven by two hands gabbing either side of his leather jacket collar and hauling him hard into the firm chest opposite him, meeting lips to lips and nearly teeth to teeth. This time, the contact between lips was significantly rougher and more unraveled, considering it was Butch who initiated this kiss.
This one lasted only a few moments before Butch pulled away and set his forehead to Jack's, a more in-character yet still warm and sweet smirk forming over his cheeks, "God, kid, you still say sorry too much," he teased quietly. He could practically feel the smile on Jack's face. It took only one more flicker of eyes meeting eyes, with pupils wide with obvious affection, that they'd tilt their heads just the slightest bit forward to meet each other's lips. The desire to kiss Jack was like a drug to Butch, he'd missed it for so long and now that he had it back he just wanted more and more of it.