#fguh

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dancingmantis said:

I do not know if you like Fallout, but I do know you like Mad Max, and therefore like wastelands, so this is for you! (Happy "love your artists" day!)

ALSO ALSO recommended listening is "Dead Flag Blues" by Godspeed You! Black Emperor. The whole song is brilliant, but the monologue at the beginning was the spark for the story. <3 <3

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The heat was silent, but for the static of wind over dead earth. Somewhere, a dog barked—something feral and frothing, no longer a mabari. Jagged metal sliced the sky beyond the haze of miles.

The sweat upon her brow was quick, evaporating as it formed. A hot and dusty puff of air bowed the braid behind her back. A lizard jittered across the baking soil, its four eyes seeking shade, two tongues tasting its way.

“We cannot stay,” his voice rumbled, calm and even. Not a judgment; a fact. A reminder for her own sake, she knew. Lyrium ghouls did not feel rads like the living. She wondered if he even felt the poisoned itch anymore, after it infected his blood.The scars still ached, but did his bones? His fevered dreaming and the muttered prayers it birthed were all so alien to her, even three years on.

A white-scarred hand brushed hair from his brow. “You will fall ill.” / She sighed and stood, slowly, savoring the last inches of shade. Green eyes fell as they always did to the scar across her nose, a token from a yao guai’s paw.  She felt the rads trickle, aching, into the shiny, taught skin, and knew he was right.

With a sigh, she pulled her helmet from her arm and nestled it snugly on her neck. She felt the seal click, and his green eyes turned outwards.

“Only a few days from here to the Glow,” she said with a cheer she did not feel.

He looked at her, sideways but silent. She smiled at him. Her face was lost beneath the helmet, but she imagined he heard it in her voice.

“Come on, Fenris,” she said, as her mabari came loping toward them. They stepped from the shade, and walked into the west.

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dancingmantis here is my heart sorry it seems it’s no good to me anymore, gotta give it to the person who deserves it

First of all the music is amazing? and the ficlet itself is so cool in that...hot-desert-wasteland sort of way, and while I’m not intimately familiar with the Fallout world the hype for the new game is admittedly sweeping me up, and I’m sure once I’ve gotten through it I’ll be able to appreciate all the extra nuances I’m missing here.

When people in my family call me to ask favors of other people in my family.