Spare Me | Fallout 4 John Hancock x FSS

Guns Blazing

        After I got dressed and re-armed I started toward the steps of the Old Statehouse. Before I started my descent, I locked eyes with John and blew him a kiss. He subtly acted as if it hit him in the chest like a bullet and toppled over onto the couch he was sitting on. I laughed, shook my head, and made my way out. Fahrenheit was surely going to make fun of him for that one later.

Just outside of the Old Statehouse door, a hidden figure cleared their throat. I whipped around to see the very end of a trench coat covering the hidden figure. "Goddamnit Nicky, you scared me half to death!" Nick stepped out from the shadows chuckling.

"Sorry, Doll. Was just waitin' for ya to get outta bed." He walked toward me. "So I saw what went down with you and the mayor last night. Was standing in acid rain a last ditch effort to get his eyes on you or are ya just dumb for sport lately?"

I shot him a nasty look and started for Daisy's. "I suppose the latter. Id actually given up on winning his affections shortly before the whole acid rain ordeal." I paused just outside the entryway for the general store and turned to Nick. "So... Ya saw all that, huh, Valentine?"

Nick was always good at hiding expression. Maybe it was being a synth, maybe it was years of detective work. But it didn't get past me. Not that I was generally exceptional at reading people but more, I thought, because he didn't want to hide it all from me. At that moment, however, I couldn't tell what he was really thinking. He seemed entirely indifferent to the conversation.

"Yep. ya got your storybook happy ending, Doll. It's everything we've all wanted for ya."

I scoffed, "Nick, that's not everything you've ever wanted for me." I turned back toward Daisy's so I could fill back up on some supplies. It's gonna hurt to fill up after the caps lost last night.

My thoughts were interrupted by Nick's unexpected response, "You're right, Doll. I wanted it with me." I froze. That may have been the single most heartbreaking thing I'd ever heard.

"What?" I turned toward Nick only to see him walking toward the exit of Goodneighbor. I watched on as he left, I didn't know what else to do. What the fuck am I supposed to say to that?

"Oh, Dear," Irma's angelic voice sounded so entirely sincere, "So you just left that poor man leave?"

I'd ended up walking over to the Memory Den and 'spilling the tea' to Irma. Of course, Irma did not understand that expression. And explaining pre-war tea parties seemed like too much effort for a euphemism. "Well, yeah! What am I supposed to do, Irma? He knows I don't love him like that. I love him more than almost anyone else, just not like that."

"And why not?" she prodded.

"I just..." I trailed off, giving thought to her question. "He's my best friend, Irma. He's who I'd trust most, back against a wall, surrounded by Super Mutants. He'd save me, guns blazing. And if he couldn't, he's who I'd choose to go down with, you know?"

"Not John?" I've come to hate Irma's questions. She was too wise and it took the fun out of gossip... But I still come to her. Maybe it counts as a form of self-harm, I mused.

"I'd kill for John."

"Guns blazing? You'd take out a swarm of Super Mutants?" She crooked an eyebrow at me. That shot me through the heart.

"The way I love John," I started, "that's how Nick loves me? I mean. I always knew he had a crush on me. It wasn't exactly subtle. But-"

Irma cut me off, "Honey, don't ya see it in his eyes? He's just a little puppydog.; putty in your hands."

"Then-" tears closed my throat as I took a moment to live in his shoes. What if Hancock didn't love me like I love him? What if He loved someone else? I shook my head to clear the frog in my throat, "Then why would he try so hard to put me up with John?"

"Love seeks happiness, Dear. He wants your happiness more than anything else. But that doesn't mean it doesn't hurt." Another bullet to the chest. Irma was good at that.

After taking it all in, I pushed up from my seat. "I need to go find him, Irma. I can' leave it like this."

"No, Jo. You're not." I gave her a surprised and questioning look. "We've been talking all day, it's just about dark out. You're not gonna go back out there and try to get yourself killed again." Irma rolled her eyes, the first time I may have ever seen her annoyed.

"You're... No, you're right, Irma. I'm sorry. You're right." I looked at my feet, not sure what else to do with the feeling like I was being scolded by my mother.

Irma sighed and raised her eyebrows at me, "Just be more patient, Dear. Or you really are going to get yourself killed." She paused, as if contemplating her next words. "There's a lot of people who'd go to war for you now, Jo. And if you die, we might kill the planet for good this time." There was humor in her voice, but none in her statement. She was right. People cared about me now. And I needed to act as such.

We chatted for a few more hours about odds and ends before I hugged her goodbye. I grabbed some information about some Silver Shroud costume in the old Hubris building from Kent and gave my 'Goodbye' to him, as well, before stepping out the door and walking back to the Old Statehouse. It was certainly night now, probably around 10pm. Irma has a gift for eating up a day in conversation, not that I was complaining. She was quickly becoming as much of a friend as... As Nick. I shook my head, trying to get the hurt out my my heart.

Hancock was waiting for me in his bedroom, cigarette in hand and empty Jet on the side table. "So Nicky finally grew some balls, huh?" John retorted before I could even say 'hi'.

"How- Never mind, of course you heard. I should know by now that anything in Goodneighbor comes back to the Mayor," I chuckled softly and sat in the chair across from the bed. I flung my head over the back of the chair and sighed. "Why now, though?"

Hancock laughed, putting his cigarette out in the ashtray next to the empty jet. "Because it's real now, Sunshine. Ya came home with me while he waited for ya to come back to him. If it was me, I'd've been hopin' you'd come home to me, too." He sounded worried.

I brought my head up to look at him with the most sincerity I could muster, "John, I did come home to you. And I will for the rest of my life." He turned his head and chuckled, so I stood and walked over to the bed. I scooted in to lay next to him, laying my head on his chest. "John. I mean it. When I ran you off in the basement of the Memory Den, I regretted it before it even hit your ears."

He laid his head on mine and took a deep breath in. "I know ya mean it now. I'm just worried if you'll mean it forever."

"If I ever don't mean it, I'm a synth and ya gotta take me down," I laughed.

"Didn't'ya wipe those bastards off the map?"

I rolled my eyes, "That's the point, John." We both laughed and I looked up at him. He made me smile more than anything else in this godforsaken wasteland. I can't ever lose that, I thought. I rested my hand on his face as I stared into his easy, dark eyes.