Sunny Smiles had thought something happened last night.
Usually hearing gunshots off of I15 means some powder gangers ambushed some caravan, like what happened with her friend hiding out in the gas Pete hollering about a group of men dragging a body up to the graveyard was the first hint something was different. Said men coming down to the saloon to get drunk to celebrate should've been the second. She'd thought anyone purposefully shot and buried would've definitely been dead as soon as the dirt covered them,but she wasn't , and the old doc made her pull through.
Watching the girl take aim at bottles showed that she was still capable of motor function, although her aim could use improvement. The girl's shots pinged around the old sarsaparilla bottles, jittering around. "Sorry, it's just a bit blurry for me," She told her. She aimed up the varmint rifle she'd been given and finally hit a bottle, shattering it.
As the stranger continued working on her aim, Sunny learned two things about her. The first was that she absolutely had poor eyesight. The poor thing was nearly as blind as a bat at anything farther than 5 feet. The only reason she was now hitting her shots was due to a large amount of guesswork.
The second was that she was weird.
Sure, ignoring the fact that she survived two bullets to the head. Ignoring the fact that her hair was dyed blue to look like your normal fiend. Ignoring the fact that she was currently mumbling in a language that definitely wasn't English nor Spanish. Even ignoring all that, She just seemed to be slightly "off". Not like Sunny seemed to be completely aware of why. Sure,while talking to her about possibly helping with the constant gecko problem, she seemed eager to help. But usually with drifters, Sunny could tell when they wanted something, and she didn't get that from the walking corpse.
The woman and the presumed teenager walked through the sandy ground towards where the town water supply was,Cheyenne in tow. Sunny noted that the girl had something in her hands. Not the rifle she'd handed her,which was held on her back in a sling, but a screwdriver from the workbench and a broken gun she'd had on her. She couldn't tell what the girl was muttering, but she watched as her tone went from frustration to excitement as a 'chk!' was heard from the bolt of the sub machine gun as the screwdriver came out of the exit tube, a small rock following. "Well, that was relatively easy." Her companion said, looking for a place to put the weapon. She looked at Sunny, before asking. "Could you hold onto this for the time being?"
Sunny sighed as she shoved the gun in the duffel she kept her rifle in.
As the duo (and dog) reached the well, the four geckos that were there immediately started running to claw at them, like a 3-foot werewolf baby. Sunny shot the closest to her. The bullet barely went through the scales. Chayenne kept it distracted as the hunter racked another bullet and shot it in the eye. The gecko went down as the girl-and-dog duo switched targets, Cheyenne running up to one the geckos chasing after the other girl as the stranger was swinging her rifle at the one in front. For Sunny, her focus shifted quickly, two shots going through the geckos head in record time, as she turned to the second-to-last gecko, turning its attention towards her…..
Until the gecko that was harassing her companion goes flying into it, turning into a bloody mess as they collide with such ferocity it breaks every bone in the small lizard's body on impact alone.
Sunny looks at her companion with unease, the slight cuts on the jeans and shirt combined with confused eyes looking back told her that the decimation wasn't expected by both parties. "That's… not what I intended." Was all her companion had to say before they both rested for a second.
As they stood by the well,Sunny could hear something in the distance, but she wasn't sure what it was. Whatever uncertainty Sunny had was clearly not shown by her companion, as she suddenly turned in a random direction and bolted. Chayenne followed wherever the hell the person that had been only conscious for a day had gotten to. Sunny tried to keep up as best she could, but settled into a walk, hoping the blue haired girl had kept her dog safe.
The first thing Sunny had noticed was about five gecko corpses covered in bruises and bites. The second thing was Mindy down on the ground, the stranger tending to her wounds. Mindy… was a difficult one, for practically all of goodsprings. She'd always stumble off and manage to get injured being chased by geckos. "Mindy got hurt again? Darn it,Mindy." Sunny said to the stranger while walking towards her. "Sunny, it's nothing." The goodsprings settler responded. "Your left leg hurts to even move, no to mention the bites on your thigh and calf. It isn't just nothing." The stranger piped up, a bit of cloth from her already-damaged shirt being wrapped around the worst wound. "If you don't walk on it and see if the doc has an x ray, you should be fine." The girl turned to face Sunny, her eyes looking up from her crouched position on the ground. "She tripped, and the geckos jumped her. Does doctor Mitchell have any painkillers? I don't think I can make something to carry her or a splint here." She asked, with an unusual confidence in her voice. Was she a doctor before being buried alive? Sunny couldn't know whatever way it went.
As the stranger sat up, the other thing she wanted to teach her came to mind. "I know a recipe some courier taught me." Sunny said to her. "If you can get some Xander root and broc flowers, I can teach you how to cook them into some powder that sure as hell works like a pain killer."
The stranger looked back at her, pondering something. "Something in both probably combines into medicine akin to an opioid when heated up…" Sunny didn't know what an 'opioid' was, but the other girl's response afterwards gave comfort that it was the right thing for this.
"Where can I find both?" She asked, standing up while grabbing the gun she was fiddling with earlier, ready to walk away. "There's some Xander root by the old schoolhouse, and there's some Broc plants in the graveyard. Both should have enough to make some." She looks at the stranger as she silently nods, walking off to the graveyard.
Sunny smiles watched as her companion walked over the hill and disappeared out of view, and then thought. That girl had turned those geckos into a bloody mess. How did anyone even get close to knocking her off? Whatever thoughts she had about it were immediately redirected by a groan from Mindy, who Sunny immediately berated, ignoring the extraneous circumstances of the stranger the doc revived.
AN: And, welcome back! This chapter I had stored after posting it on AO3, So I gave it a few days before adding it here. Once again, if you have an critisisms with the story, please leave a review!