Remnants of Mire
It was just on dusk when Piper and Blue started walking up the rocky road to Kingsport. The lighthouse was a friendly beacon in the Commonwealth and the settlement was thriving. The wall around the perimeter made the settlers feel at ease, and the neighbouring Children of Atom dare not venture anywhere near their defences.
"Woof!"
"Hey! Dogmeat!" Nora propped her Gauss rifle against a tree just as her trusted furred companion jumped up and placed his huge front paws square on her shoulders. "Aww you're a good boy aren’t you? Keeping everybody safe boy?"
"Woof!" he replied. Licking her face and wagging his tail.
Piper smiled "Geez Blue, you are like a different person around animals." It was nice to see Blue relaxed and happy, she thought. Nora calmed the animal down and turned to face her. "I don’t know about you, but my body is aching, you ready for a shower and dinner? Piper sighed. The stars were starting to flicker in the darkened sky. "Nights like this a nice spot with a cold beer would be heaven." Nora nodded and picked up her gear. They headed past the fields of mutfruit and down the stairs towards the beach, where Nora’s base at this settlement had remarkably, been built over the water. “I’ll never figure out how they managed to do that.” Piper remarked. “Well,” a delicate, accented voice started behind them. I would guess that they used Brahmin and a large mass to drive the piles through the water and soil, ootilizing a mechanical device similar to that used in the construction of the city of Venice!”
“Curie!” Nora exclaimed. “How are you? Is everything okay? Adjusting to the new body?”
“Oh yes,” She replied. “It can be overwhelming, all these new feelings...they make me dizzy. It is difficult to adjust to only deux hands, but I am much ‘appier now.” Even though I am frightened because I am much more difficult to fix if I am injured..”
“Hey,” Nora lowered her voice and spoke softly, grasping the ‘French girl’ by the shoulders and looking her in the eyes. “It’s okay Curie, I’m going to keep you safe. That’s why you’re here behind these walls with Dogmeat and more heavy machinegun and laser turrets than you can poke a stick at.” “When you are ready and have learnt all you can from here, you can come back out with me on the road.”
Piper frowned and raised an inquisitive eyebrow without realizing, “Why would a robot know about Venice?” She butted in. She had come across an intact page once about places even more ancient than “Boston” and “America” and prided herself on her above-wasteland-average intelligence. Whenever Curie was around, she made her feel…dumb, it seemed even worse though now she was a synth, and a cute one at that. “Oui, most of my knowledge is in the biological sciences, ‘owever I have a lot of information on ‘istory for anthropological purposes, and construction methods in the event that I should leave the Vault and be of some assistance in rebuilding society.” “Perhaps, Piper, you could add some of my scientific articles to your paper?”
“Pfft. You haven’t met our readers have you?” The reporter retorted.
“Anyway, Curie, it’s good to see you. Piper and I should go get cleaned up.” Nora was desperate to get cleaned up and pick out all the bits of feral ghoul brains and mirelurk shell out of her hair. “Ah yes, and I ave more cataloguing to do perhaps I shall see you later. Au revoir mes amis!” Curie left the two weary travellers.
They approached the timber showerblock which used a steel drum of water on the roof which would be heated using the suns natural heat or fire and a second drum of cold water, allowing the user to have some control over the temperature. One of the women in the camp had started making soaps out of hubflower which were very popular. “Pretty luxury for the apocalypse”. Nora thought to herself. She started undoing the straps on her Railroad armour and was in her underwear in no time. “Ohh yeaah that’s good! She turned and saw Piper was already in her cubicle.
Nora heard the whoosh of steam and felt the hot water hit her skin. Though it was hot during the day the temperature had dropped significantly and the shower felt so good on her aching muscles. The fragrant soap foaming into a nice lather over her skin. She reach her hands up to her hair and tried to get out all the wasteland crud. She felt hard fragments of shell and gristle in her hair, which were painstakingly difficult to get out. “Hey Blue, need a hand?” Piper asked.
“Huh?” A startled Nora turned around to see Piper with her arms folded over the edge of the low timber wall that separated the 2 cubicles. Piper raised her open hands out to her and motioned for her to come closer. She acquiesced.
“Oh my god what the hell am I doing, is this weird? this is weird.” Piper was panicking. She had finished washing when her eyes had caught the wet, lathered up vault dweller through the steam. She didn’t meant to let her eyes linger but she had been staring for some time when she noticed Blue was having trouble picking a chunk of mirelurk shell out of her hair. She had fed and clothed her sister when she was younger and that part of her instinctively reached out to help. Only this wasn’t Nat, this was a strong, caring, trustworthy, drop dead gorgeous two hundred and 30(?) year old woman who’s ass she had been following around the Commonwealth for months. She hoped she wouldn’t notice her trembling hands as she helped her. She was increasingly away of the thin wall pressed against her breasts as she leaned toward her friend, the only thing keeping her from being pressed against her. As she removed the last piece from her hair she couldn’t help but take in the sight of her, not that she could really see much from her vantage point and through the steam. How she felt the overwhelming desire to brush the woman’s hair to one side and gently start kissing along her neck, just to have a small taste of her... she had never felt this way about anyone before…
“Alright! Good to go! Wow you have amazing hair! Must be from a lifetime of non-irradiated nutrition, and being frozen didn’t damage it either! (Brain to mouth filter on Piper, brain to mouth!).”
Nora stepped out of the shower, with her back to Piper dried off and put on her jeans and leather jacket she got from Zeke and the Atom Cats. Piper, blushing, turned around and put on her favourite jeans and shirt she usually wore under her red overcoat, which had been left there since they last visited. The two were both relieved to have a break from wearing the bloodied, heavy Railroad amour.
Piper pulled her press cap out of her pack, dusted it off and placed it firmly on her head.
“So, how about that beer?”
Let’s go.