fallout x reader one shots

•nick valentine x male reader•

tw: military flashbacks/combat trauma?
this will stray slightly from canon as i am leaving out the unlikely valentine quest. enjoy!

Nepenthe. 

A word that had stuck with me since I was sat in my twelfth grade English class. In a passage of the Odyssey, one of Zeus's daughters, Helen, laced a counsel's group of wine with the philter described as nepenthe. At first, it presented itself as a nightmare -- I mean, who wants their drink poisoned? However, the potion's description struck me as something that I yearned for: it makes you forget grief or suffering. It would forbid that a tear would fall unto the face of any man for a day. 

I walked out of the room that day, wishing I had something to call my nepenthe. I knew people used drugs, alcohol, or sex as a way to search for something to ease the grief that stained each human's walk of life. As I grew older, none of the traditional quells soothed my own pain, and I ended up finding myself a wife and son to act as my nepenthe. 

Up until the days the bombs fell, I still found my heart searching for its nepenthe, but nothing ever seemed to formulate into the idealized philter I had envisioned in my mind. Although the hunt had slowed as time progressed, and I eased into the natural flow of life, it still persisted. 

I awoke in Vault 111 to see my wife murdered and my son taken, only to fall back into the ether. Suspended in a state void of consciousness or feeling, my mind had no where to wander, no way to process what had happened. 

It felt as if I was a turtle forcefully torn from its shell as I was released from the cryogenic sleep once more. I heard an alarm blaring above my head, and the yellow lights that danced from the alert blinded my sensitive eyes. The floor was cold, reeking of dampness and death. I had fallen to my knees as the pod somehow released its own mechanism, and my foggy mind did remember Nora. 

As expected, I lost some of my nepenthe as I looked down at her lifeless body. She looked as if someone had poured a glass of water over her features, moisture dripping from the curls of her hair and her skin. It looked as if she were asleep, lashes peacefully brushing against her cheek, but something in me knew she was dead just by looking at her. 

I was able to stomach looking at her wound, feeling her pulse, and ultimately leaving her corpse behind, swearing to come back to her as soon as I could. Things hadn't made sense. Nora's body was in perfect condition, yet skeletons littered the ground. I knew that I was down here for a substantial of time, and my mind racing with adrenaline and possibilities. After a feverish dash through the seemingly abandoned Vault, collecting supplies and killing some new variant of roach, I found myself above ground again. 

A devoid Wasteland was before me, rendering any hope I had completely useless. My hands fell to my sides as I absorbed my new normal: barren trees, burnt grass, brackish water, crumbling homes, and loneliness. 

With my first step forward, I knew that if I didn't find my son, any and all nepenthe and love that I had gained would be lost forever. 

•time skip•

Months had slipped by me, and I had begun to make a new life for myself. I rebuilt Sanctuary to an agreeable enough degree, and I even housed an abandoned faction of the Commonwealth's Minutemen there. I had gained scars and learned what to eat and what not, and my world was beginning to feel a sense of normalcy again. 

However, a large obstacle was before me still. One of Mama Murphy's visions instructed me to reach Diamond City in order to find who took Shaun. The thought of finding him again was what kept me motivated, and I knew the time had come to begin the search. 

With my best equipment and my trusty dog by my side, I set off down the roads of the Wastes to find the next clue to my son. The roads weren't too bad, minus a couple Raiders that were straggling around. I opted to avoid them; even though I had been in this new world for a while and the military, killing people didn't just come easy to me.