Makin Plans
Cooper Howard was a stand up person, a beloved actor (until his divorce), a devoted father, and a routine volunteer at the local pound. The Ghoul was ruthless, had a terrifying presence, and was quick to fight and even quicker to shoot. He travelled the wastes, killing and hurting others, sometimes for caps and sometimes just because he didn’t like them. Even with this, he was still so confused. How in the hell was someone like him cuddled up with the nicest woman he had honestly ever met after the bombs (and possibly even before the war) and one of the most influential people in the Mojave? Even he, with all his ego, was a bit confused at that.
Cooper wasn’t going to look a gift horse in the mouth, no matter how much it left him scratching his head. If Sev and Lucy wanted his leathery hide next to them, who was he to stop them? Cooper had woken up a bit ago, deciding to not move for a bit. He was used to travelling, but even he still craved moments of quiet and calmness. And hey, if those moments of calm and quiet came bundled with two women, he certainly wouldn’t complain.
His calm and quiet was soon broken by Sev waking up. She moved a bit, trying to not disturb Lucy who was still sleeping, exhausted by her emotions. “Hey Coop,” Sev whispered, keeping her voice down to not wake up Lucy.
“Mornin’ honey,” Cooper whispered back, rubbing his knuckles against Sev’s scalp. He normally wasn’t so touchy with people, but he and Sev had slept together more than a few times and he had crashed here multiple times when bounties brought him here. Not really lovers, but definitely more than friends.
“How are you doing on vials?” Sev questioned, wanting to make sure he was good. She cared about him deeply. As much as she believed that she would never kneel for anyone, if the someone asking was Cooper, she’d be kneeling before he could blink.
“Gonna have to get more soon, any dealers?” Cooper asked, knowing that him running out of vials would not be great. He had about a two week supply left. If anyone would know where to get some, the woman who was dragged across the Mojave with Six would be the best person to ask.
“Jacobstown is a super mutant settlement, they’ll be your best bet. Be nice to them and they’ll be nice to you. Just don’t stare at the nightkin, they don’t like it,” Sev answered. She liked Jacobstown, and she really missed Lily.
Before Cooper could respond, Lucy finally was awake and speaking, “what’s a nightkin?”
“A super mutant that has used too many stealth boys, makes them lose their minds,” Sev explained, she was aware that nightkin were rare on the west coast and that the Mojave in particular has a high concentration of them.
“Cooper taught me what a super mutant was, but what’s a stealth boy?” Lucy asked, sitting up in bed and rubbing her eyes. Cooper’s little ‘Wasteland 101’ course had been helpful, but she knew that she still had much to learn.
“Pre-war tech, makes ya hard to see,” Cooper spoke, knowing that maybe he should have explained more about the wasteland to Lucy.
“So we can’t use them?” Lucy questioned, not wanting to become what Cooper had described super mutants as.
“Naw darlin’ we can use them, just can’t use them too much,” Cooper explained, huffing down one of his vials after.
Before anymore conversation could start up, barking startled everyone. Dogmeat woke up with a start, barking right back. “Well I guess that’s Rex, I’ll go get him,” Sev spoke, slipping out of the bed and leaving Cooper and Lucy alone.
Cooper whistled at Dogmeat, telling her to quiet down, which after a bit of whining, worked and she settled back down into her borrowed dog bed.
“So, darling?” Lucy asked, trying not to laugh a bit at Cooper’s name choice. She should have expected it, but it did catch her off guard.
“Would you prefer to be called an idiot or a dumbass?” Cooper asked with a sneer on his face.
“Nope, nope, darling works,” Lucy stuttered out, liking darling much more than anything else Cooper could come up with to call her. Her face was red, something that Cooper definitely noted and would be using that against her later. A pretty vaultie getting red in the face from a pet name given by a ghoul like him was something he did not really expect.
~~~~~
It took Sev a while to get Rex to calm down, but she did eventually manage to do so. Luckily Rex was smarter than the average dog, meaning she could give more complex commands. With that, she was able to get Rex to not attack Dogmeat, Cooper, or Lucy. Rex had clearly had a good hunt, as he came in smelling vaguely like the musk of radroaches. He trotted around Sev for a minute before setting onto the couch for a long rest. Sev let out a little huff knowing that now she had to clean the couch later. Hopefully Dogmeat wouldn’t be hostile, because Sev would put money on Rex winning that fight.
Sev headed back to her room, immediately clocking Lucy’s blushing face, shooting a smirk at Cooper who responded with one of his own. Sev didn’t really get jealous, while sure, Cooper was ‘her man,’ and he was well aware of that, they weren’t actually together and even if they were, she didn’t really think she would care if Cooper was also Lucy’s man.
“Lucy, ya feeling any better?” Sev questioned, sitting down next to her.
“I feel a bit better, yeah, ready to get to planning so I can ask him why,” Lucy said, following with, “I at least want to know before we kill him.”
Cooper felt that it was fair enough, if it was Barb, he’d sure as hell want answers before someone blew a hole through her head.
~~~~~
They spent the next hour running through the plan, which was now as follows:
Step one: pick up quick jobs on the way to Jacobstown.
Step two: buy vials at Jacobstown.
Step three: get star bottle caps and see if Cooper can persuade Festus to let them in.
Step four: get the Sunset Sarsaparilla Headquarters up and running.
Step five: get caravans to buy large amounts of Sunset Sarsaparilla.
Step six: Throw caps at fixing up Primm, getting the hotel fixed up and a few market stands.
Step seven: throw caps at building up other local settlements with the agreements they point people to gamble at Primm.
Step eight: Tell House that they will only back off if House lets them see Hank.
Step nine: Kill Hank.
Step ten: Manage to kill House.
Okay so maybe this would be harder than they hoped. Maybe they could get this done in about six months, but it was better than being shot on sight, and six months was a hell of a lot less time than a full year, plus if they hustled, they could get their hands on Hank within two months. It sure as hell would be easy, but everyone involved in this plan had overcome significant struggles, what’s one more?
“We should head out tomorrow, it’ll take us about 6 hours to get to Jacobstown. We’ll stay there a night before walking to the Sunset Sarsaparilla Headquarters. We can work it out from there,” Sev simplified for everyone. Taking it one or two steps at a time would hopefully make it less overwhelming.
Lucy could do that, take it as it comes. Cooper was just ready to get his hands on Hank, no matter what it took. If it took Cooper ten years wading through shit to find out where his daughter is, he’d do it.
The rest of the day was dedicated to packing and getting everything together, even packing Six’s Pipboy and linking cord just in case. The only time they stopped was to introduce Rex and Dogmeat who both took an immediate liking to each other, almost immediately curling up with each other and going back to sleep. Cooper wanted to roll his eyes at the very lazy guard dog who had no issue travelling the desert but was now just lazing around all day.
While Sev and Cooper were focused on organizing, packing, and planning; Lucy’s mind, on the other hand, was a chaotic mess of thoughts. Firstly, her dad being a bad person and not the good dad she knew him as. Secondly, Vault-Tec being a lying, no good company. Thirdly, Maximus not really being someone that she was interested in being with, but conversely the way that the ghoul made her heart skip a beat. Fourthly, the weird feelings towards Sev she was developing. In the Vault, sex was natural, even between cousins (with protection of course) or with women, but marriage between women was strictly forbidden. So why did she find herself not just sexually attracted to Sev, but longing to know what her hand would feel like in Lucy’s?
Lucy shook her head, trying to clear all those thoughts from her head. She couldn’t be romantically interested in another woman, it was wrong, she had been told it was wrong her whole life, and yet she couldn’t beat down those feelings or thoughts in her mind. While it may not have been allowed in the vault, she wasn’t foolish enough to think that it wasn’t allowed in the wasteland. As Cooper had said, she was free, but Cooper and her feelings towards him were a whole other can of worms; one that she was not all that interested in cracking open right now.
Both Sev and Cooper noticed that Lucy was a bit distracted. Sev didn’t think much of it, not really knowing much about Lucy. Cooper did think a bit of it, all the time he had known Lucy, he had very rarely seen her so distracted. He wouldn’t pry though, whatever was running through her mind was her own business.
As the night rolled around, Lucy was a lot less uncomfortable sharing a bed with Sev and Cooper. She was also hoping that once again they would all wake up cuddled together like they had the last two nights, because as long as it was just cuddling, it wasn’t in morally wrong territory yet. Lucy’s brain and Vault-Tec teaching be damned, she liked being close to Cooper and Sev, that was all she knew about her feelings for certain.