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Frank regrets using their brass knuckles. Blocking a baseball bat with your arm – armored or not – hurts like hell. It doesn’t help that this woman, this Cait, turns wood into steel with her swing. And she’s relentless. A freight train given human form.
This is not the best idea I’ve had, they think to themselves as they duck under a wild swing, countering with a right cross to Cait’s gut and left uppercut to her chin.
Cait stumbles back but recovers quick. She swings again when Frank steps in for a kick. It connects with satisfying thunk on their left shoulder – the blindside.
“Fuck!” Frank snarls. They’re unbalanced by the hit, barely staying on their feet.
Cait saunters toward them, spinning her bat around her hand. “What’s wrong, hot shot? Got an ouchie?”
Frank huffs, turns their head and spits. Then they charge. Cait’s not expecting it, can’t get into a defensive position. Frank grabs her behind the knees and pulls, shoves their right shoulder into Cait’s body, takes her to the ground. They scramble, both trying to keep the other off, but Frank manages to get Cait on her back and digs their knees into her ribs to keep her still. Frank starts punching.
She tries to block. The blows go through, metal on flesh and bone, over and over and over. Then they stop, and she opens her eyes to see why. Frank’s right fist is pulled back, shaking, ready to go. It drops. Their brows knit together.
Cait growls, hiding disappointment behind bared teeth. “Finish it already! The hell are you waiting for?!”
Frank shakes their head and stands, holding their hand out to help Cait up. “Tommy said no killing.”
Cait swats the offered hand away, standing up on her own. “It’s always what Tommy wants.”
Frank raises an eyebrow. Tommy calls them over and into his office. He does what he does best and talks, trying to get Frank to agree to stick around for more fights, more caps. Frank laughs at the idea. Tommy shrugs it off and offers Frank something else. Someone else.
“… What do you say? Help out an old man by keeping an eye on his pet?”
Cait slams her hands down on Tommy’s desk. “Dammit Tommy! I’m no man’s pet!”
“Doesn’t sound like she wants that,” Frank says.
“It sounds like it doesn’t matter what I want,” Cait snaps. She inhales deeply, exhales slowly. “You know what, fine. I’m done,” she turns to Frank, “I give Tommy a week before he starts missing my sweet arse. When are we leavin’, hot shot?”
Frank blinks, looks at Cait, then Tommy, and back to Cait. “Wait, hold on. What the hell is going on here?”
Cait rests a hand on her hip, “Tommy thinks he can hand me over to you but no one gets to do that. I decide where I go and who I go with.” She moves towards the door, pausing next to Frank. “One way or another, I’m leaving. I’ll be by the lifts if you want me.”
And then she’s gone.
“Listen friend, you’re doin’ me a favor here,” Tommy says. “But let me make this clear: Should any harm come to her, I will gut you from your belly to your eyeballs. Understand?”
Frank scoffs, “I understand that she wants out of this dump.” They turn to leave but stops, looking over their shoulder. “She was never your pet and you don’t get to threaten me on her behalf. She’s more than capable of doing that herself.”
They walk in silence until there’s some distance between them and the Combat Zone. Dogmeat trots ahead, sniffing out goodies and delivering them to Frank. Cait looks around, adjusting the small pack she brought her meager belongings in. She picks up the pace to catch up to Frank, making sure to stay on their right side.
“So, where are we goin’, anyway?”
“Hangman’s Alley. I’ve got a little set up there.”
Cait hums. “I thought that place was full of raiders.”
Frank flashes a grin to Cait, “Was. I cleared'em out. Now it’s mine.”
They reach Hangman’s Alley within two hours. Cait makes a mental map of the layout – just in case – as she follows Frank up the stairs to the house. She drops her pack on the floor and collapses onto the couch with a sigh. It’s a small place with only two rooms, one of which is a bedroom, the other both a living room and a kitchen. But the couch is soft, there aren’t any raiders, and she’s finally away from Tommy.
“Comfortable?”
“Would be more comfortable with a pint.”
Frank sits across from her in a chair, pulling their chest armor over their head and setting it on the floor. They dig in their pack until their fingers find the telltale ridges of a bottle cap and the smooth, long neck that tells them it’s not a Nuka-Cola.
“Here,” Frank says, holding the beer out to Cait. “Might not be exactly what you want but it’s booze and it’s cold. Ish.”
“It’ll do.” Cait grabs it, opens it, and takes a long swig.
Frank regards her for a moment, squinting their eye as they do. They shift in the chair a few times to get comfortable, eventually settling on leaning forward. “So. You can stay the night if you want, and anything you want to take with you in the morning you can.”
Cait lowers her bottle slowly, looking over to Frank with a glare that could make a super mutant feel small. “What?”
Frank swallows and tugs at their ear lobe, “I’m just saying you don’t have to stay. You weren’t wild about the whole thing.”
“Right,” Cait says, sitting up on the couch now, “you’re tryin’ to get rid of me, too.”
Frank holds up their hands and shakes their head, “I’m not! You’re more than welcome to stay, I just… you should do what you want. That’s all.”
“Well then, if it’s all the same to you, I want to stick around,” she takes another drink of her beer, “For now.”
Frank leans back, adjusting their position again. “Fine by me.”
The silence is heavy but not uncomfortable. Frank plays a game on their Pip-Boy, grumbling whenever something goes wrong; Cait flips through a few magazines and drinks a few more beers. They work out sleeping arrangements once it gets dark – Cait will sleep on the couch for the time being.
It’s the first good night of sleep Cait’s had in months.