something's gotta give
Apr. 27th, 2024 10:42 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sidewaysTitle: Something's Gotta Give
Rating: G
AO3: Link
Series: Fallout: New Vegas (Courier Six, Dean Domino)
Wordcount: 315
Summary: Hard times and slow resentments in the Sierra Madre.
Remarks: There is just something uniquely maddening about desperately scrounging in every trash can for enough cigarettes to trade in for stimpaks so you can continue dragging your small frame, low END ass through a toxic hellpit in hardcore mode, only to turn around and see your companion having a casual smoke. Sir. C'mon.
◘◘◘
The ghoul sat and smoked Larkin's survival in long, lazy draws.
She thought about killing him. Impossible thought. Their collars hummed a merry harmony; satisfaction in switching to a solo act wasn't worth her head blowing off ten seconds later.
Larkin dropped her forehead onto her knees instead, and it was only half theatre. The aching lungs, the sweat-fogged eyes, the chemical burn digging a hole through her gut - all real.
She tongued moisture into her mouth. "Hell. Cloud's really getting to me." A subtle glance between her arms found only a dispassionate gaze turned out over the grimy rooftops of Salida del Sol, rotting eyes hidden behind the bloatfly-black shades. "Look, if - if you wanna go on ahead-"
"Now, now. No need to go breaking up the band." Domino looked across at her then, balled up against the wall. Tapped his cigarette against the edge of his seat. "Take all the time you need."
"Just getting to me, is all.”
He sighed, raspy and discontented. "You'd think a few generations of rolling about in nuclear filth would have bred a little more stamina into you people. It won’t kill you, you know. Well. Not in these concentrations.” Another look, with the first ekings of a grudging consideration behind it. “But maybe if we find a place with fewer holes in the wall, I’ll fix you up a little something, hmm? My own recipe. Put the pep back into your two-step.”
She'd run the numbers. How many cigarettes it cost to buy a chip, how many chips to buy a stimpak, how much of her pain went ignored for his pleasure. "Appreciate it."
"Of course. We've been making such grand progress, after all. Would hate to lose our rhythm." He smiled thinly, smoke-wreathed. "Eh, partner?"
Rifle, Larkin thought, blinking through the sweat stinging her eyes, splitting her cracked lips on a return smile. Bear-trap. Switchblade.
Rating: G
AO3: Link
Series: Fallout: New Vegas (Courier Six, Dean Domino)
Wordcount: 315
Summary: Hard times and slow resentments in the Sierra Madre.
Remarks: There is just something uniquely maddening about desperately scrounging in every trash can for enough cigarettes to trade in for stimpaks so you can continue dragging your small frame, low END ass through a toxic hellpit in hardcore mode, only to turn around and see your companion having a casual smoke. Sir. C'mon.
◘◘◘
The ghoul sat and smoked Larkin's survival in long, lazy draws.
She thought about killing him. Impossible thought. Their collars hummed a merry harmony; satisfaction in switching to a solo act wasn't worth her head blowing off ten seconds later.
Larkin dropped her forehead onto her knees instead, and it was only half theatre. The aching lungs, the sweat-fogged eyes, the chemical burn digging a hole through her gut - all real.
She tongued moisture into her mouth. "Hell. Cloud's really getting to me." A subtle glance between her arms found only a dispassionate gaze turned out over the grimy rooftops of Salida del Sol, rotting eyes hidden behind the bloatfly-black shades. "Look, if - if you wanna go on ahead-"
"Now, now. No need to go breaking up the band." Domino looked across at her then, balled up against the wall. Tapped his cigarette against the edge of his seat. "Take all the time you need."
"Just getting to me, is all.”
He sighed, raspy and discontented. "You'd think a few generations of rolling about in nuclear filth would have bred a little more stamina into you people. It won’t kill you, you know. Well. Not in these concentrations.” Another look, with the first ekings of a grudging consideration behind it. “But maybe if we find a place with fewer holes in the wall, I’ll fix you up a little something, hmm? My own recipe. Put the pep back into your two-step.”
She'd run the numbers. How many cigarettes it cost to buy a chip, how many chips to buy a stimpak, how much of her pain went ignored for his pleasure. "Appreciate it."
"Of course. We've been making such grand progress, after all. Would hate to lose our rhythm." He smiled thinly, smoke-wreathed. "Eh, partner?"
Rifle, Larkin thought, blinking through the sweat stinging her eyes, splitting her cracked lips on a return smile. Bear-trap. Switchblade.
