Work Text:
Preston’s gin was just as he had promised – sweet, herby, and excellent served chilled. Oh, and powerful. Very, very powerful.
‘Come on come on, have another shot, vault dweller,’ he was saying, giggling with glee but seemingly unable to hold the bottle straight for long enough to pour any.
‘Honestly Preston, I’ve never seen you like this… you’re such a goody two shoes most of the time. This is… this is different…’
‘I’m offended!’ he replied, trying to be serious, but burst into laughter immediately. ‘And just for that, you can have a (hic!) double.’
‘Oh, go on then…’ Nate accepted the drink, clinking his glass against the neck of the bottle to assist with the pouring. ‘This stuff is great, Preston. It must have cost you… a fortune? Didn’t it? Did it cost you a fortune?’
‘Ah – but it’s not pre-war!’ he shouted. ‘It comes from… uh… what’s the word… jun-jipper berries grown in (hic!) New Arizona. Huge farms there. They make good business.’
‘Doesn’t that attract… um… raiders, and stuff?’
‘Yes! The place is run by raiders. A new gang takes over every (hic!) three years or so.’
Fascinating though the conversation was, Nate was feeling a powerful desire to be outside. He wanted the moonlight on his face, to see other people, and to hug them. Be around them. He clapped Preston on the shoulder. ‘I’ll be back in a minute, my friend… I think I need some fresh air,’ he mumbled, only slurring slightly.
What a beautiful night. And after such a difficult week! Super mutants, fish factories, hallucinogenic gas, a deathclaw nest and a mirelurk queen. Too much, too much. It’s a good idea to have fun, every now and again.
The courtyard of the Castle was teeming with festivity – settlers, traders and minutemen all drinking, dancing, talking, laughing. Nate’s recent redecoration was going down a treat, the open air sofas and campfires living up to their full potential in this warm evening weather. He decided to wander around, greeting people as he went. They were all happy to see him. Someone had gotten that broken jukebox to work, and even the pommel horse he’d built was attracting revellers and show-offs. He only felt sorry for those on guard duty, unable to let their hair down while everyone else partied. He made a mental note to buy them drinks later.
These were his people. He had helped all of them, and in turn they helped him and each other. This was a scary world, but the Castle was one of the places he truly belonged.
Although, there was one person in particular he was looking for in the crowd. And he couldn’t find him.
‘Say, uh… do you happen to know where MacCready is?’ he asked a passing minuteman.
‘That guy you’re always travelling with?’ she asked. ‘You tell me. I thought the pair of you were joined at the hip.’
‘Near enough,’ Nate said, and turned away from her confused expression to snicker.
Nope, MacCready wasn’t at the bar getting another drink. He wasn’t chatting on the sofas. He wasn’t even wandering the corridors looking for something to steal. Not for the first time, Nate resolved to find a way to reprogram his V.A.N.S. so that it could lead him to his boyfriend. Lord knew that would come in useful sometimes.
It was intuition that drew him outside, stepping through the archway to the exterior of the Castle’s walls. It was dark, but he could make out the black grass protruding from the grey sandbar that arced out south this way, and across the bay he saw the lights of Quincy and the imposing Poseidon Energy building. Looking immediately around him he at first saw no one – until the fleeting orange glow of a cigarette being drawn on gave MacCready away.
‘I was wondering where you’d… got to…’ Nate said, carefully feeling his way along the wall to approach his lover. Already it was so much quieter out here, much of the noise of the party quelled by the gentle lapping of waves on the eastern shore.
‘Looks like I can’t hide forever, huh?’ MacCready said, smoke rising from his mouth. Nate wasn’t sure how to interpret his tone.
‘Oh, I, uh… I’m sorry. Did you want me to leave you alone…?’ He stopped and made to turn back, but MacCready grabbed his arm.
‘No babe,’ he said. ‘Stay.’
Nate smiled. ‘It’s a pretty raucous party out there, huh?’
‘You said it,’ MacCready answered. He offered Nate a cigarette, which he accepted.
‘I have… really missed this,’ Nate said, struggling to articulate his thoughts as well as he might like. ‘The community. The fun. The not having to constantly worry about whether your life is in danger. You know it used to be more like this, before the war… but we thought things were bad then. And that was nothing, nothing compared to…’ he gestured vaguely west.
‘I never got on well at parties,’ MacCready offered after a silence. ‘Because you can’t relax. Even this is risky. Too much noise, too many people… it attracts danger.’
‘Oh, now look who’s suddenly being sensible!’ Nate laughed, projecting smoke. ‘The risks you take sometimes… One could be forgiven for assuming you had a death wish. But when I’m the one having a drink, when I’m the one having fun… all of a sudden it’s not okay?’
‘I didn’t say it’s not okay,’ MacCready said calmly. ‘Just that… parties make me uncomfortable, alright? I know you’re not used to it. You’re from a different time. But this is just the way things are, now. If you don’t look out for yourself, if you ever slip up and let your guard down… that’s how people die. It’s normal.’
Nate nodded along, a paragon of understanding and empathy – until something clicked. ‘Hold up. You say it’s the new normal… but right now I see fifty or so people in there, and only you out here.’
An orange glow briefly illuminated the lower half of MacCready’s face again as he took another drag. ‘Too smart for me, huh? Even when you’re kinda drunk you’re still too smart for your own good.’
‘I think you just don’t like people.’
MacCready pushed him up against the wall, his stubbly face mere inches from his own. Nate could smell the smoke and beer on his breath, plus the smell of his clothes, his body… all so familiar. ‘I get on well enough with you, don’t I?’ he said.
Nate flicked some ash from his own cigarette. ‘And why is that, I wonder?’
‘Y’know I’ve often wondered that,’ MacCready replied, still achingly close. ‘I think it’s because you’re so different. You’re from another world, and I must have been able to sense that. You’re the only person who’s never tried to screw me over at some point or another.’ He inched even closer, throwing his own spent cigarette away and placing his hands around Nate’s waist. ‘Except in the way I like.’
The gin in Nate’s system made him grin boyishly. He now knew why he had felt so compelled to come and see his partner. ‘Those are pretty words, Mac,’ he giggled.
‘Allow me follow them up with some action,’ MacCready said, and dropped to his knees.
It was about five or six minutes later – or maybe ten or fifteen; it was difficult to keep track when your head was swimming as pleasantly as Nate’s was – that Nate’s gifted sense of perception tried to tell him something. It seemed that someone or something was trying to get his attention, and though he didn’t want to, he forced himself to listen.
It was Preston, standing at the Castle’s entrance. ‘There you are, vault dweller! I was wondering where you’d got to.’
Nate panicked. Could he see…? Oh, but he couldn’t. MacCready’s body, crouched as he was, was concealed by an oil drum. From where Preston was standing, it must have looked like Nate was alone. As long as he didn’t get too close…
‘Uh, yeah, here I am,’ Nate said dumbly. ‘Thought I’d… get some fresh air.’
‘But it’s an open (hic!) air courtyard!’ Preston protested. ‘The air’s just as fresh inside the walls.’
‘Sure, sure, but… this way I can see the ocean,’ he said, tangling his fingers in MacCready’s soft hair. He sort of wanted him to stop, but only sort of. And it was definitely too late for him to stand up and announce his presence now, so… he might as well make himself useful while he was down there.
‘Fair enough, fair enough,’ Preston said. ‘Oh, I heard you were looking for that merc you’re always travelling with. Did you find him?’
Nate felt MacCready tickle his balls, as a little private joke between the two of them. Dramatic irony. ‘Um, err, yeah, yes, I did. But he’s somewhere else now. He’s in a different part of the Castle, for sure. Not here.’
‘I see,’ Preston said shortly. But he didn’t leave, despite how strongly Nate was willing it. Then he asked: ‘Do you love him?’
Nate felt MacCready pause his oral endeavour, listening for Nate’s reply. Nate felt himself reddening; thank goodness it was dark. ‘We… I’ve never said it,’ Nate said carefully, hoping that would satisfy Preston.
‘That doesn’t (hic!) answer my question, though,’ he replied. The bastard. He couldn’t go through this now. It was a touchy area for the both of them.
‘It’s complicated,’ Nate said, acutely aware that the lips of the person in question were currently wrapped around his cock. No kidding it was complicated.
‘What complicated?’ Preston said dismissively. ‘It’s a yes or no question, it’s a –’
‘Yes thank you Preston that’ll do, you can go back inside now,’ Nate said, panicky. ‘I came out here because I was bursting for a piss and I’m not doing it with you watching. It’s that New Arizonan gin you plied me with; went right through me.’
‘Oh, haha, whoops!’ Preston giggled. ‘Sorry general. I’ll leave you to it.’ Finally, he left.
Nate breathed a sigh of relief. He felt his cock slide out of MacCready’s mouth; his partner rose to stand and inhaled as if to speak, but Nate cut him off. ‘Don’t even think about it.’
‘Do you love me, vault dweller? Did this merc’s low and wicked ways tug at your saintly heartstrings?’
‘Oh for God’s sake.’
‘But – I must know!’ MacCready said, feigning an aristocratic air of drama. ‘To know if thine lips do miss the touch of mine own just as mine miss the touch of thine –’
Nate grabbed him by the shoulders and forced him down to his knees again, his still-erect cock level with his annoying face. ‘Make me come and maybe I’ll tell you.’
‘Why sir, if I must,’ MacCready pouted, and got back to work.
But Nate knew the subject would not be brought up again.