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“I assume all this is your doing?” Danse asked and Savannah startled, dropped the tinsel she was halfway through draping over the Prydwen’s railings. The indoor railings. Christ, even she wasn’t insane enough to even think about trying to decorate the outside. No matter how nice a tree on the foredeck would look. Plus she was sure Kells would put her on cleaning duty for a week if he caught her.
So she’d settled for decorating the interior alone. Slipped one of the lancers a stash of caps to look the other way as she lugged a tree onto a vertibird and wrestled it up the stairs of the command deck. She hadn’t, in all her plans, accounted for Maxson catching her in the act. Of standing over her and waiting until she had finally shoved the bulk of the tree up on the main deck to clear his throat. She would’ve gone crashing back down the ladder if he hadn’t caught her wrist in time, hauled her (and the rest of the tree) safely up the last couple of rungs.
He hadn’t, surprisingly, reprimanded her. Just steadied the tree with his left hand and raised an eyebrow; asked her where exactly she was planning on putting it. Which is how the recreational area had gained its newest decoration.
It had taken Savannah the better part of an hour to wind lights across its branches, to hang all of the ornaments she had scrounged on the boughs. Longer still to find a suitable outlet she could tap the wires into, to link it all together until the lights sparked to life, cast a rainbow of shadowed reflections across the small area. It made it feel warmer, somehow. More lived in. Added a depth to the chairs, bounced reflective hues from the metal walls, the grating underfoot.
After that, the rest had been easy enough. Stringing a reel of lights here and there, draping tinsel across any railing where it wouldn’t be a safety hazard. And she could do it openly, now. Now that Maxson had all but green-lighted her little project, handed her a small Brotherhood flag to put on top of the tree. It wasn’t exactly what she’d had in mind, but she figured it was better than him ordering her to take it all down.
In response to Danse’s question, she ducked her head, turned her attention back to weaving the tinsel over the bannister. “Would you believe me if I told you you’re sleepwalking?”
He chuckled, low and deep, and leaned against the railing, arms crossed loosely against his chest. His hair was damp from his shower still. Glistened in the lights she’d already hung, a cacophony of reds and yellows and greens and blues catching in the water droplets clinging to the strands — cast long, stretching shadows down his face.
But God, he was beautiful. Relaxed and easy and pliant across from her. Sweatpants slung low on his hips and a plain, tattered shirt stretched tight across his chest. She lived for the nights when he slipped out of his uniform, tugged on old, worn clothes that made him look his age, soothed the creases from his forehead, sent a certain tranquil light across his face, down his shoulders, his arms.
“Not even you are that good of a liar, Anna — no matter how…charming I may find you.”
“Charming, huh?” she asked, smiling slow and lazily at him.
He grinned back, a small, quick flash of teeth and her stomach fluttered, chest tightening at the sight. “Among other things. What I would like to like to know though, Knight,” he pushed himself off of the railings, walked closer to her, close enough for her to smell the soap clinging to his skin, the sharp, clinical scent of his shampoo, “is how exactly you managed to decorate the interior of Proctor Teagan’s store.”
She pushed down the urge to kiss him, forced her hands to continue winding the tinsel instead of reaching for him. “I’ve told you before, sir, I have nimble fingers.”
He huffed behind her, stepping forward until he could place his hands either side of her waist, rest his cheek on the crown of her head. “I’m all too aware of what your hands are capable of, Anna.” He bent down to kiss her neck, stubble catching at her throat and she bit her lip, forced herself to behave; to not push back into his touch, to not give him a reminder of what exactly she could do with her hands right here in the hallway.
Somehow she didn’t think Maxson would appreciate the show.
“Exactly,” she breathed, tilted her head to give him more room, to coax him into pressing another lingering kiss over her pulse point. “A lock isn’t going to stop me, Danse.”
He hummed in agreement, low and amused. When he pulled back she bit back a whine, wrestled with the urge to chase after him. “So I assume the fact that you…miraculously gained entry to one of the largest munitions stockpiles on board the Prydwen has nothing to do with Arthur’s key?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about, sir.”
“Of course you don’t.”
He held her firm, supporting her as she stood on her tiptoes to start winding a new line of tinsel overhead, kept his chin propped against the crown of her head.
“You know you could help me with this instead of watching me struggle.”
“I could,” he agreed. “But I don’t recall hearing you ask, Knight.”
She laughed, breathless and light. “You’re an arse, Danse.”
“Is that insubordination I hear?”
“Depends — are you going to reprimand me, sir?”
His breath caught around a groan, low and deep and he exhaled heavily against her, breath ghosting across her hair. “Later.”
Heat coiled low in her abdomen at his tone — that definitive authority, a promise more than anything else.
His presence at her back was gone a moment later and she shivered at the loss, at the cold that wrapped around her in his absence. But his hands took the tinsel from her, easily wound it around the rungs above the doors, made quick work of weaving it down the corridor, over the med bay, all the way along to the mess hall.
“Keep that up and I’m gonna be out of a job!” she called, watching him start-up on the other side.
“Don’t you have your own work to be tending to, Knight? The squires, in particular, are eagerly awaiting an arrival from a certain someone.”
She smiled, giddy. “They got their stockings?”
“Right on time, I’m happy to report. I’m not even going to ask where you found them. Gods, Anna, I don’t know how you managed an operation this big. It’s…outstanding.”
“I had help,” she replied, picking up the string lights at her feet. “Preston talked to a few of the settlers. Turns out they were making stockings for the local children anyway, and what’s a few more? Plus Mac spotted a flyer in Diamond City talking about a toy stash. Paid well, too, but that’s not the point.”
It had taken days of work to track down the exact location of the stash. They’d taken enough ammo to sink a small boat in case of a trap. But Deacon had drawn up a map of the area, circled the entrances and Mac stood guard while they went in, swept the place for any sign of presents. A few hours and a couple of dozen bullets later they’d secured a stash of mostly undamaged toys, everything ranging from giddyup buttercups to soft, plush toys that Savannah only had memories of pre-war.
And with Tom’s help, it wasn’t difficult to modify some laser pistols, turn them from active weaponry to nothing but props. Deacon had kept a close eye, made sure that none of his…improvements ended up making it into the finished product.
They now sat in a bag at her feet. It wasn’t as full as she would’ve liked; by the time she’d dropped off gifts at every settlement she knew had children she’d already been halfway through her stock. But there was enough, just, to fill each squire’s stocking with a decent assortment of snacks and toys. Enough, anyway, to bring a smile to their face.
Danse followed her gaze, his lips tugging downward. “I would have helped if you had briefed me.”
His tone was hard, the lightness from his voice just moments prior gone. Vanished as quickly as it had arrived. She heard, beneath his inflection, the barest hint of jealousy, saw the tension in his jaw, his shoulders.
She set down the lights, padded across the grating to stand in front of him. Stilled his hands a moment later and reached up to cup his face, ran her thumb across the slope of his cheek. “You were the first person I thought of. I just wanted to surprise you, big guy. Give you a chance to enjoy something without you having to work for it every step of the way.”
A flush bloomed across his face, red as a bloodleaf as it unfurled over his nose, trailed down his neck. “I…apologise for ruining your plans.”
“You haven’t ruined anything. It was getting lonely out here by myself. And the patrols aren’t half as good company as you are.”
He leant down, knocked his brows against hers gently as he brought a hand to the back of her neck, thumbed across her nape. “I feel the present I have for you is inadequate in comparison to all of this, Anna.”
Her cheeks warmed, love curling around her ribs, tugging at her heart. “You got me something?”
“Of course,” he said, frowning. “You didn’t think I’d forget, did you?”
“No, I just—it doesn’t seem like anyone really celebrates Christmas around here. Not—not like they used to.”
“You should’ve seen Christmas at the Citadel. It used to be a spectacle, back when we had time and resources — not that Arthur doesn’t do his best here. But between you and me? he’s very impressed with your work, Knight.”
She groaned and buried her face against his shoulder. “He told you about the tree.”
“He told me about the tree,” he confirmed and she laughed, closing her eyes.
“In hindsight, it wasn’t one of my best ideas. But then again I was hardly expecting him to just be there. Christ, he scared me to death.”
“You should’ve asked for help,” Danse murmured, pressing a kiss to the crown of her head. His breath was warm, fanned across her scalp in a way that sent gooseflesh blooming down her neck.
“That would’ve gone down well. ‘Hi, Elder, sorry to disturb your very important battle plans, but any chance you’d help me lug a tree onboard?’”
He laughed. She felt it reverberate in his chest, rumble warmly against her. “He’s more understanding than you give him credit for, Anna.”
“Uh-huh. I’ll believe that when I see it.”
“Give him time,” Danse replied, kissing her head once, twice, before pulling back. “Speaking of time, I believe we are operating under rather tight deadlines, are we not?”
She checked the clock on her pip-boy, saw the blinking green digits. 04:43. Fuck. “You finish up down here and I’ll run the presents up to the squires?”
“Roger that. Oh, and Knight?” he called as she started to climb the stairs, the bag of presents slung loosely over her shoulder. “Meet me in my quarters when you’re finished. I haven’t forgotten your earlier attitude.”
She saluted lazily at him — an old-world salute, one that made his brow furrow — and grinned. “I’ll try not to keep you waiting, sir.”