Chapter Text
“So, ah, you ok over there?”
She looks up, though she doesn’t rise from her seat on the overturned bucket, to see Hancock making his way toward her, almost hopping over the body of a dead Super Mutant. Nasty bit of business, all of it; she sort of hates killing them, would avoid it if they would just leave her the fuck alone. She digs her knuckles into her leg with a bit more weight than she had been.
“Yeah,” she says, giving him a cursory up and down as he gets closer, making sure he’s ok. “Why?”
He tips his head toward her hand, the middle knuckles of her fingers still digging into her leg with a steady rhythm. “You been doin’ that a lot lately; wonderin’ if you’re hurt or somethin’.”
It’s become habit: kneading that quiet, hidden bruise. There’s something familiar, something almost sweet in the ache of it, in keeping the thing present. It’s not quite the kind of pain she usually relies on, but there’s something satisfying in it all the same. Particularly at times like this when her other methods aren’t readily available... or wise.
“Nah,” she says, finally rising and throwing her gun over her shoulder like an old bag. “I’m good. Let’s go.”
...
Before... well, before, drugs hadn’t been her bag. She’d not particularly liked the way most of them smelled, she’d not cared for the idea of not being fully in control of herself, and she’d not held any excitement for the possible botched results of laced or poorly made product. But Hancock wants her to take a hit with him and they’re relatively safe, locked up in the top floor of this gutted old gas station. So she finishes boarding them up and falls to the thin mattress with a heavy thunk and takes the inhaler he offers. Why the hell not?
He seems happy enough that after all his offers, she’s finally humouring him. Jet is one of his favourites; he always seems so calm, so light hearted, when he’s on it. It might be worth a try, if only one.
The inhale’s not unpleasant, exactly. Not the same smokey, gritty, raspy inhale of a 200 year old smoke. It almost reminds her of those old throat sprays—numbs her up like she’s had swollen tonsils for a week. She’d make a joke about a blowjob if she knew where he’d land on it, whichever way it was. As it is, though, she’s not sure where either of them stand in relation to... relationships. Not something she wants to throw into an already complicated mix of radiated monsters, dead family, and metal people.
At first, it doesn’t feel like much, but within the count of a minute, things have slowed down considerably. Hancock’s leaning comfortably against the wall beside her, his legs sprawled out in front of him, wearing a happy grin and lighting a smoke.
Things are slow and soft and she feels so calm—like she’s never had a problem in her life.
She doesn’t like it.
She shakes her head (too slowly) and struggles to find her words deep in the dark of her head.
I don’t like it. I want to get off.
Her mouth won’t open wide enough for her words to come out; her lips won’t move fast enough. It makes her panic.
“I want to get off,” she mutters.
Hancock turns his head toward her. “What’d you say?”
She shakes her head again and her hands grip the hem of her shirt. She yanks it over her head with as much force as she can (which isn’t much) and says again “I want to get off; I want to wake up.”
Hancock holds his cigarette between two fingers and chuckles. “Am I gettin’ a private show? ‘Cause I’m definitely down for that, sister.”
“I want to wake up,” she says again, loud as she can manage (and still barely anything). She reaches for his cigarette and he hands it to her without reluctance and she takes a deep, deep inhale before letting the smoke rise slow from her mouth.
“Beautiful,” Hancock says slowly, staring at the O of her lips, but she doesn’t think so. It’s all so, so goddamn slow.
So she takes another quick puff, then two, then three, making the cherry burn bright as she can before she shoves it into the soft skin just above the crook of her elbow. It actually sizzles, or maybe she imagines it, but she doesn’t imagine the little trail of smoke rising from her flesh and thank god she doesn’t imagine the sting, the burn, the blessed pain that stirs her from her Jet induced waking sleep.
“Whoa! Whoa! What are you doing?” Hancock, his high thoroughly ruined, tries to yank the smoke away from her, but she’s not having it, not going to pull it away until the smell of burning flesh reaches her nose and it hasn’t yet. “Stop! Stop it! What are you doing? Fuck.”
She finally lets him jerk it away from her. He throws it behind him and inspects the perfect, stinging O on her arm. His fingers are careful, slow around the edges and uncertain. “What the fuck were you doing?”
“Accident,” she says, unable to hide her grin. She’s awake again. She’s awake and it hurts and goddamn it’s so good to be awake.
“That wasn’t a fucking accident,” he says. And he is oh-so-pissed. “Why’d you do that?”
His hands are still on her and she thinks she could get used to that, but more important is the dulling pain—he’s slathering on some ointment and she jerks her arm away.
“I’ll take care of it later,” she says, a bit too venomous. But after that—after the Jet—she’s not letting anything take this away from her. Just a few more minutes and she’ll be fine. She can bandage it up then.