Come on. Come on, you can do it diaphragm. Good little diaphragm. WORK, you flat Christing little FUCKER! Finally dragging in a massive whooping bellow of air, Cort coughed on her exhale and nearly vomited. Shit, I haven't had the air knocked out of me like this since Wally accidentally hit me in the chest with a fucking baseball bat. Thank God my pack took most it. Fuck this sucks, I don't even want to try moving my leg yet. Blinking to get the stars out of her eyes and waiting for her hearing to clear, she dragged herself up, pushing Dogmeat's wet head gently away. "Momma loves you very much but she has eaten enough slobber, and definitely enough of whatever's all over you, oh my Gag." Laughing at her lousy pun, she turned to look for Charon. "Did we get it? We got it right, or I'd be dead. Charon? Charon!"
The ghoul was lying a few feet from her, insensible and bleeding. Scrambling over to him, her slashed leg throbbing in complaint, Cort lifted the arm crossed over his belly after checking for his pulse and came close to throwing up again. His front was a gore-ridden mess, made of himself and parts of the Deathclaw buried in the garish slashes running from his chest down to one hip. Cort ran her bloody hands through her hair and sobbed. "Oh God Charon, I can see your guts. What did you do, try to hug the fucking thing?"
Deciding for the moment that being unconscious was a blessing for him she flailed her pack off, digging to her medical supplies, hearing the unholy mess they were in grind around before she found it. Landing heavily on her pack earlier had smashed nearly everything to pieces, broken glass and plastic everywhere, most of the Stimpaks gone and the glowing water soaked into the spare clothing its bottles had been protectively wrapped in. Compounding the loss, one of the packs of Rad Away had burst and rendered what had settled into the cloth completely useless, saturating through all of it.
Violently dumping everything out on the cracked earth, she found three remaining Stimpaks, two Med-X, a blood pack and a bottle each of dirty and purified water, plus a pile of currently useless Rad Away and Rad-X. Reaching carefully under Charon, she dug through the contents of his pack and added the same amount of water over again. Medicine being her particular specialty, Cort had started carrying all of the medical supplies, and at the moment she was regretting that choice bad enough to be hurt by it. Not hurt as bad as he is. Oh fuck, fuck what do I do first. Pain meds, then clean the junk out. Pausing to take a look at her own leg before proceeding, she decided while cripplingly painful it wasn't a priority. She pushed the two syringes of Med-X into the ghoul, then carefully stripped his armour from him and tore the shredded remains of his shirt off, looking up to her other companion as she did it. Pulling her combat knife out, she sawed through his belt and cut through the waistband of his pants to expose the long rents running down his hip as she spoke to the dog.
"Dogmeat, are you okay? I know you got hit too." The dog whuffed at her and shook himself, spraying clotting blood everywhere. "Okay, so fine at least for now then." Cort returned immediately to Charon, slicing his pack free and then rapidly and delicately plucking out the offal tainting his wounds, washing them clean when she was finished. The edges of the torn tissue knit slightly with the weak radiation from the dirty water, but not nearly enough to repair him. Quickly patting him all over to see if there was something she was missing and not finding anything, she grabbed a Stimpak in each hand and plunged them into either side of his ribs, flinging herself out of the way when he spasmed up and screamed.
"Oh fuck no, Cort, no!" Cort moved back and hovered over him, worry and apology painted on her face. She pushed down with both hands on his chest when he jerked again at the sight of her, chalky eyes wide and staring. She traced her fingers over the now smaller but still gaping wounds in his belly as blood continuing to dribble down his side.
"No, don't move, don't, you'll tear yourself up again. I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, there wasn't enough Med-X left and I'm sorry, it's my fault that hurt so much. There's only one more shot to go and then I can go find something irradiated for us both." Turning to pick up the last Stimpak, she frowned when he grabbed her wrist and caused it to skitter out of her grasp and across the ground. "I told you to stay still, damnit. There's only one of those left."
"Cort. You're alive." She patted his hand, then gently peeled his fingers loose and put his arm down at his side.
"I don't think it would hurt this damn much if I was dead, so yes, I'm alive. I just got the wind knocked out of me, that's all." Lurching up, Cort tried walking towards where the Stimpak had gone and fell heavily onto her elbows, coughing and spitting in the resulting dust that puffed up. Okay, and maybe a really fucked up leg. I can deal with that, I just need to make sure he'll last long enough for me to find something to bring back. Please God, make him last long enough. Pushing against the dirt, she crawled over and retrieved the item, the offending limb dragging behind her. Moving to inject Charon, she was forced to pause again when he reached up to recapture her wrist. "Look, you need to quit that. I know it hurts but you need it."
"No. You use it. Your leg is crippled." Cort stared at him incredulously.
"So what else is fucking new? Your guts are winking at me."
"It won't work as well on me as you, and you know it." He turned his head and winced. "What happened to the irradiated water and all the rest of that shit?"
"Everything else smashed when my pack hit the rock with me on top of it. This is all that's left aside from a shitload of fucking Rad Away and you're taking it. I can still crawl, you can't even fucking move and there's no way I'm strong enough to drag you the whole way, you fucking giant. First rule of triage, you're screwed up more, you get the goods." She looked up for a moment, searching for something, and spoke her next words absently. "Besides, once I find something irradiated, I can run back."
Charon frowned up at her. She wasn't making sense. Making herself even sicker for him was not a viable option, and certainly wouldn't make her faster; he wasn't going to watch her die again. He definitely wasn't going to lie here crippled and thinking about her dying out there alone trying to save him.
He stared over her shoulder, eyes widening as he released her wrist, holding his hand open and ready. "What, what, what is it!" Cort whipped her head around, then screeched when Charon grabbed the Stimpak from her and sank it into her thigh before collapsing again. "You fucking bastard!" Rounding back to him, she pulled the depleted syringe out of herself and flung it away, the flesh on her leg knitting partially together as the movements he had made pulled his own apart. "What did I just tell you?"
"You've got a better chance at survival. No chance of moving me. Now grab the rest of your shit and go. There'll be more scavengers eventually." The ghoul closed his eyes again. The girl would be safer once she left, and he was incredibly tired.
"Oh, I'll fucking go all right, and I suppose it's just as well I can move faster now since someone flushed the extra time I could've given them down the fucking toilet." Cort sobbed and ran her hands through her hair again, flaring it into a crest and adding Charon's blood to her own. What am I going to do, what, what. I don't have time now to fucking puddle hunt. Something irradiated, something radioactive... Eyes latching onto a derelict car and truck next to the power station, she brightened. That'll work, once it blows, that'll work fast, but too close.
Pushing herself to her feet, she ripped her battered armour off and threw it to the side, the ghoul blearily opening his eyes again at the sound. "What are you doing. Need that." Cort picked up her repeater and started reloading it from the shells scattered on the ground.
"For what I'm doing, no I don't. I'll be quicker with it off, and trust me I won't need it on the way back. Any fuckers out there won't be able to make a Goddamned dent in me once I'm done and I dare them to fucking try. Dogmeat, watch Charon." The dog trotted over from where he had been trying to clean his fur and stood attentively next to the figure on the ground as Cort grabbed the remaining blood pack and inserted the needle into the ghoul's arm. Absently holding it down in front of her, Dogmeat opened his mouth and carefully held onto it when she let go. "Good boy, Momma's best. Keep it high unless something comes, and then you rip whatever it is the fuck up." She smiled darkly when he snarled through the sides of his mouth, incongruously wagging his tail at the same time.
Charon was finding it harder and harder to focus on Cort, but it didn't matter. Nothing seemed to matter to him anymore except going to sleep after making sure she was leaving, and to somewhere safe. "Where you going."
"Where am I going? I'm going to rapidly turn myself into a walking particle farm since your selfless fucking act means I need to get creative!" She stomped her foot at this last effusion, then bellowed when she jarred her wounded leg. "Why is it always the fucking LEG! Charon, stay still and...Charon? Oh fuck." Dropping onto her belly next to him, she pushed her fingers against his neck until she found his pulse again, this time thready and weak. She didn't have much time left, even with the blood pack.
Getting up and hitching rapidly back to the main road, she found another car still containing its fusion reactor. Shouldering her repeater, Cort fired into the vehicle and then ducked behind an outcropping, waiting for it to explode. Once the resulting shrapnel stopped whizzing dangerously around her, she moved as close as she could to it, checking the rad level on her Pip-Boy. It petered out a few seconds later. "No, no, nonono!" Sobbing, she looked around for another vehicle, spotting a truck farther down the torn road. "Okay so exploding won't work. I'll just open it. I can open it, of course I can."
Making her way up to the truck she pulled at the edges of its reactor hatch, then scrambled around to the cab when it refused to budge, slithering into the rotted seats. "Where is it, where is it, where the FUCK is it." Digging around in the shimmering heat and finally seizing the crowbar she had been searching for with a triumphant snarl, Cort dropped back to the road, shrieking when she landed badly. After pulling herself up and socking the crowbar into place, she screamed in tandem with the rusted metal, slowly moving it up as she flung herself bodily against the tool. "Move you motherfucker, move!" When the edge of the hatch finally popped free, Cort felt a wave of radiation hit her and leaned into it greedily, listening to the clicking on her left wrist climb into a constant squeal. Rapidly backing up when she started to feel dizzy, her leg moving easily again, she rechecked her Pip-Boy and paled at what she saw.
"958 Rads, oh God that was close. That's enough. It has to be, I can't go higher than that." Grabbing up her repeater, Cort tore back towards where she had left Charon and Dogmeat, feet flying over the ground as fast as she could go, skidding to a halt next to them a minute later. She took the empty blood back away from the dog and removed the needle from the ghoul's limp arm, then slid under him, displacing his pack and shoving it behind her. Arms and shoulders rippling, Cort slowly dragged him into her and placed both legs on either side of his ruined torso, wrapping her arms around his neck and draping them over his chest. After leaning into the remains of Charon's pack she waved the dog away. "Dogmeat, you go over there and keep a lookout now. Momma's clicking hot." Watching the dog move back, Cort rested Charon's face against the side of her neck and prayed.
I know, I know, I'm evil. Cliffhanger before I went partying for the weekend, pure pure evil. Thanks for the fantastic reviews on it, I wasn't sure how it turned out. :)
