Five weeks, three days and counting. The dog has been eating the dead mirelurks laying around, rotting and stinking up the air. ED-E had squealed a series of nursemaiding beeps and whistles, insisting on at least frying it first. Alex stopped paying attention after that point. The dog would find food. The robot would be all right. And if Alex starting feeling faint, well--he had a bad Stimpack habit to go back to for nutrition. No fucking point in breaking that now.
ED-E had tread near to Alex at first, but closer than any other creature in any Wasteland, the eyebot understood where others would not. ED-E kept to recon after that, flying an invisible wall around the zone of the pier.
Alex spent much of the day staring at the dying water. And most of the time, the dog was beside him. They did not interact, and Alex didn't touch him, but they watched the water move sluggishly together. Silence was the language given, and if Alex thought about it, he had never heard the dog be this silent.
It was a lack, he supposed. Inside of both of them. The product of abandonment.
When the ferry returns, it's almost anti-climatic. Neither of the two at the base of the pier move from their normal positions as they watch the mother and child reunite. Dogmeat rises from his sitting position, tail moving hesitantly. For the first time since they'd gotten there, Alex drops a hand onto the back of the dog's neck.
The mutt shivers, then stills.
ED-E is the first to give them away, true to form. From one of his rounds, he races forward, whistling a loud welcome-- Only to stop at Alex and Dogmeat, beeping in confusion at their stillness. He doesn't understand, as much as he knows Alex. But Alex and Dogmeat know Neil.
And the kid is fucked up. In a way not just born of simple wounds and exhaustion.
Alex's hand drops from the dog and he moves in front of him, taking long-legged strides forward. He stops in front of Neil, expression shadowed. "...You look like shit, Wanderer."
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ED-E had tread near to Alex at first, but closer than any other creature in any Wasteland, the eyebot understood where others would not. ED-E kept to recon after that, flying an invisible wall around the zone of the pier.
Alex spent much of the day staring at the dying water. And most of the time, the dog was beside him. They did not interact, and Alex didn't touch him, but they watched the water move sluggishly together. Silence was the language given, and if Alex thought about it, he had never heard the dog be this silent.
It was a lack, he supposed. Inside of both of them. The product of abandonment.
When the ferry returns, it's almost anti-climatic. Neither of the two at the base of the pier move from their normal positions as they watch the mother and child reunite. Dogmeat rises from his sitting position, tail moving hesitantly. For the first time since they'd gotten there, Alex drops a hand onto the back of the dog's neck.
The mutt shivers, then stills.
ED-E is the first to give them away, true to form. From one of his rounds, he races forward, whistling a loud welcome-- Only to stop at Alex and Dogmeat, beeping in confusion at their stillness. He doesn't understand, as much as he knows Alex. But Alex and Dogmeat know Neil.
And the kid is fucked up. In a way not just born of simple wounds and exhaustion.
Alex's hand drops from the dog and he moves in front of him, taking long-legged strides forward. He stops in front of Neil, expression shadowed. "...You look like shit, Wanderer."