blind spot
Dec. 15th, 2019 05:02 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sidewaysTitle: Blind Spot
Rating: G
Series: Fallout: New Vegas (original characters)
Wordcount: 664
Summary: Larkin/Vivian, whumptober prompt - friendly fire
Larkin likes the sawn-off.
She likes the repeater more, of course, because the repeater means distance. Means prepared. Means being crouched behind cover yards away from trouble that, all things playing to plan, doesn’t know the first thing about the weight of steel-eyed sighting settling into their vulnerable places.
But when things go cock-eyed instead - for example, the unwelcome eventuality that is a trio of Vipers stumbling straight into the camp she and her girlfriend have planted in the ruins of an pre-war factory - then there’s not much that turns a bad situation around as fast as the ability to punch the contents of a man’s belly out past his spine with the single pull of a trigger.
Vivian evens the odds on the clumsy ambush immediately, dropping one into the dirt choking on the hole in his throat, and after some short cat-and-mousing between a maze of conveyor belts Larkin claims a second with a well-timed snipe. She’s slinking back around to their camp when metal clanks close behind her, someone’s careless tread on the cluttered floor, and Larkin drops low, drawing the sawn-off from its holster at the curve of her back as she spins on her knees to take the shot she can’t miss.
Sees, in an eyeblink moment, coming from his left, the familiar shape of the Colt, the outstretched arm in familiar brown leather-
-and then the sawn-off booms, and the Viper goes flying, and Vivian spins away with a cry of surprised pain.
It's what she likes most about the sawn-off. Especially for the fights least wanted, the ones that get up in her space. What it lacks in range, it makes up in force and spread.
She sits on her knees, mouth open. A twist of smoke lifts from the barrel. “Viv?”
“Shit!” comes the response, too heated and indignant to be down and bleeding out at worrisome speed.
Larkin puffs her cheeks, blows the held breath out, and then she’s up and moving - away from the carnage, heading to the perimeter. A quick circle around the walls says any fourth Viper or more is long gone if they ever existed, no movement showing through windows or on the PipBoy.
She grabs her pack on the way back, loping through the tall, silent shadows of long-dead machinery.
Vivian’s got her back to a cracked concrete column when she gets there, easing the last of the jacket’s shredded sleeve off over her bloodied arm, lips pressed tight and brows drawn down. Her head pulls up sharp at the sound of Larkin’s footsteps, and for once there’s no slow smile to greet her, no brightening warmth in the eyes. Just an unimpressed look reminiscent of the time Larkin used the last of her toothpaste without asking, three days out from the nearest town.
Fair enough.
Larkin folds into a crouch next to her and delicately takes the wrist where the skin is still whole, turning the arm carefully to assess the damage. Clucks her tongue, pleased. “You’re alright.”
“Don’t you think that’s for me to decide?” Vivian says, grumpy.
She has been lucky, though. It’s only the edge of the blast she’s caught, losing leather and meat but leaving the bone intact. Larkin feels her shoulders relax further, even as she flips open the top of the pack to start digging out the needful supplies.
“You know it ain’t much good watching my back if you don’t go keeping a closer eye on your own,” she points out, fingers finding the slim tube of the stimpak.
Vivian closes her eyes with an expression of deepest forebearance, head thumping lightly back against the pillar. “Most people just settle for an apology, Larks.”
She slides an eye open again when Larkin touches her hand, though; feeling the tackiness of half-dried blood, the tense spasms of the muscle, and stopping short of the tearing that has marred what is usually smooth and dark and lovely.
“Course I’m sorry,” Larkin murmurs.
Rating: G
Series: Fallout: New Vegas (original characters)
Wordcount: 664
Summary: Larkin/Vivian, whumptober prompt - friendly fire
Larkin likes the sawn-off.
She likes the repeater more, of course, because the repeater means distance. Means prepared. Means being crouched behind cover yards away from trouble that, all things playing to plan, doesn’t know the first thing about the weight of steel-eyed sighting settling into their vulnerable places.
But when things go cock-eyed instead - for example, the unwelcome eventuality that is a trio of Vipers stumbling straight into the camp she and her girlfriend have planted in the ruins of an pre-war factory - then there’s not much that turns a bad situation around as fast as the ability to punch the contents of a man’s belly out past his spine with the single pull of a trigger.
Vivian evens the odds on the clumsy ambush immediately, dropping one into the dirt choking on the hole in his throat, and after some short cat-and-mousing between a maze of conveyor belts Larkin claims a second with a well-timed snipe. She’s slinking back around to their camp when metal clanks close behind her, someone’s careless tread on the cluttered floor, and Larkin drops low, drawing the sawn-off from its holster at the curve of her back as she spins on her knees to take the shot she can’t miss.
Sees, in an eyeblink moment, coming from his left, the familiar shape of the Colt, the outstretched arm in familiar brown leather-
-and then the sawn-off booms, and the Viper goes flying, and Vivian spins away with a cry of surprised pain.
It's what she likes most about the sawn-off. Especially for the fights least wanted, the ones that get up in her space. What it lacks in range, it makes up in force and spread.
She sits on her knees, mouth open. A twist of smoke lifts from the barrel. “Viv?”
“Shit!” comes the response, too heated and indignant to be down and bleeding out at worrisome speed.
Larkin puffs her cheeks, blows the held breath out, and then she’s up and moving - away from the carnage, heading to the perimeter. A quick circle around the walls says any fourth Viper or more is long gone if they ever existed, no movement showing through windows or on the PipBoy.
She grabs her pack on the way back, loping through the tall, silent shadows of long-dead machinery.
Vivian’s got her back to a cracked concrete column when she gets there, easing the last of the jacket’s shredded sleeve off over her bloodied arm, lips pressed tight and brows drawn down. Her head pulls up sharp at the sound of Larkin’s footsteps, and for once there’s no slow smile to greet her, no brightening warmth in the eyes. Just an unimpressed look reminiscent of the time Larkin used the last of her toothpaste without asking, three days out from the nearest town.
Fair enough.
Larkin folds into a crouch next to her and delicately takes the wrist where the skin is still whole, turning the arm carefully to assess the damage. Clucks her tongue, pleased. “You’re alright.”
“Don’t you think that’s for me to decide?” Vivian says, grumpy.
She has been lucky, though. It’s only the edge of the blast she’s caught, losing leather and meat but leaving the bone intact. Larkin feels her shoulders relax further, even as she flips open the top of the pack to start digging out the needful supplies.
“You know it ain’t much good watching my back if you don’t go keeping a closer eye on your own,” she points out, fingers finding the slim tube of the stimpak.
Vivian closes her eyes with an expression of deepest forebearance, head thumping lightly back against the pillar. “Most people just settle for an apology, Larks.”
She slides an eye open again when Larkin touches her hand, though; feeling the tackiness of half-dried blood, the tense spasms of the muscle, and stopping short of the tearing that has marred what is usually smooth and dark and lovely.
“Course I’m sorry,” Larkin murmurs.
