#we hate dr pickman here too

[dark-drawssss]

Uh

Lame-ass shitpost instead of working or gayming.

[antiquechampagne]

Chapter 5

Upon entering Hancock’s room, his “office” mused Payne, Fahrenheit’s presence was joined by several more guards who stayed out in the hallway. Payne took a seat on one of the dusty sofas, making sure everyone saw her movements. She removed her hood and felt the tender red welts and a few small blisters forming across her face. Luckily her exposure was only for a few seconds, they would be fading soon, but not soon enough. The hours dragged on and the sun set. Payne started to feel like she was waiting outside the principal’s office while they called her parents. Her face started to burn from more than just singed sun.

Hancock strolled in, his scarred fingers pinching the bridge of his nose. “I gotta tell ya, what MacCready told me didn’t make a whole lot of sense. Would you mind bringing some light to the subject?”

Payne was on edge, her black hair pulled back into a tight bun giving her a fearsome visage. She stared directly back at Hancock, goading him to continue.

“You both took out the raiders, yes?” Payne nodded. “But after that things gets a little sketchy.” Hancock started to pace a bit.  “MacCready said things like one of them bashed your head pretty good and that your face looked like batch of bad brahmin chili. And that you chomped into another raider after that like a kid ripping into a pack of snack cakes. He said you didn’t have a single stimpak to heal yourself with. Looking at you now, it seems he must be lying to me.” He let the statement hand in the air.

“Here’s the thing, MacCready has always been straight with me. He’s never outright lied to me before.” He stopped and looked hard at Payne. “But none of that jives with what I am seeing in front of me.”

“We cleaned out the raiders, I saved his sorry ass from a raider with a fucking stealth boy AND I got us past a patrol of super mutants. I lost my damn rifle in this shit show, too.” Payne rose defensively. Fahrenheit shifted her weight, priming herself if she needed to spring to defend Hancock. “On top of that, I hauled his ass all the way back here for help! He is lucky his isn’t in some super mutant’s guts right now!” Payne blood was boiling.

“That’s not what I am asking, lady.” He pointed a finger at her. “What kind of merc doesn’t carry chems, can shrug off head wounds and can run faster than the fucking wind? What the fuck are you?”

“I don’t need this shit!” Payne turned to leave.

“Walk out that door, and you are no longer welcome in Goodneighbor.” Hancock’s voice was low and steady.

Shoulders squared, Payne continued to stride forward briskly before stopping in the doorway to the room. She had meant to go through it, but something stopped her. Her emotions raged. Up till now she had never stayed in one place for more than a few days since leaving Vegas. She was tired of always wandering the wastes without a space to herself, a home base. Goodneighbor, with its seedy residents, mobster mentality and gritty streets reminded her of Vegas. She didn’t want to leave but she was afraid to share her secret. She wrestled with her want to find an anchor and the need to protect herself.

Again, her fist shot out, this time the splintered wood of the door frame embedded between her knuckles. Instinctually, Fahrenheit started to raise her massive gun, but Hancock motion for her to hold.

Payne stood silently, arm out stretched as her blood began to run down the wood.

“What are you?” Hancock prompted again, this time taking some of the edge out of his tone.

“You said before that ‘we freaks have to stick together’.” Payne turned her head, her steady gaze landing on Hancock’s. “How much do you really mean that?” She turned away from the door to face him.

Hancock studied her reddened face and bleeding fist. “Every word of it, sister.” He purposefully walked to the couch and sat down, nonchalantly crossing his legs, and motioned for Payne to join him. She did, but as she sat, she eyed the open door. “Fehr, could you close that for us.”

Fehrenheit followed his orders, but her body language made it was clear she was not in agreement with his course of action. She stayed in the room, standing in front of the now closed exit. The only exit.

Payne swallowed. She had never even though of divulging this information freely about herself. Choosing her words carefully, she began.

“Radiation really is a bitch, changing things, people, in a lot of different ways.” She pursed her lips and thought. “I don’t carry chems because they don’t work on me. At best, they are ineffective, but some cause worse effects than what they are supposed to treat.  My face looks like shit because I am extremely sensitive to the sun.” She motioned to her current condition as evidence. “I burn almost instantly if I get exposed. I can be extremely quick, but it takes a lot out of me. I couldn’t even try to run like I did at least for a day or two.” She stopped, it was obvious she didn’t want to go any further.

“MacCready thinks I am a cannibal, doesn’t he?”

Hancock nodded. MacCready had damn near fallen off bed with his insistence of that fact.

“He’s wrong. I don’t eat people.” Payne spat out the words with pure disgust. She slowly reached into her back and drew out two empty blood bags, red dregs still caught in the corners of the collapsed plastic, tossing them on the table before Hancock. “I was badly hurt. I saw my chance to kill two birds with one stone, “she winced at her poor choice of words” so I took it. MacCready just happened to see me at a bad time.”

Everyone was still for a moment, the silence thundered in Payne’s ears.

“So,” started Hancock “You’re a… what did Kent call them, a vampire?” The word stung at Payne but Fahrenheit was clearly confused. “One of the Silver Shroud stories Kent goes on about… it involves these ruthless and cunning monsters that sleep during the day and feed on people’s blood at night. He called them ‘vampires’.” He turned to Payne.

“Yeah, well, you’re not the first one to call me a monster, but vampire? It’s been a while.” Though was very apt term, she thought. Even if they kicked her out of town or attacked her out right, she did feel a bit of relief telling someone.

“Well, sister, we all have our hang ups, me included. Chem addicted mayor and all that. You’ve had been in town for a while now and hadn’t attacked anyone you weren’t paid to. You even brought that pain-in-the-ass MacCready back. You didn’t have to. You could have left him for dead or… “ He stumbled for the right word. “eaten him?” His shrug and coy smirk were easy and relaxed, given the circumstances. “As long as you keep that track record, there is no reason for me to throw you out.”

Indifference was not the answer she expected. Payne was not sure how to reply. “What about MacCready. He pretty much hates my guts.”

“He’ll get over it. I might avoid him for a little while though. Especially if he gets drunk. He has a tendency to run his mouth.”

Payne rose to leave.

“You’re forgetting something.” Hancock tossed a bag of caps on the table before her. She scooped them up. “You still did the job. I’ll make sure Dr. Amari keeps some blood bags in stock.”

Payne shook her head. “Give’em to Daisy. I don’t do doctors.” With that, she left as Fahrenheit moved aside.

Watching her leave, Hancock turned to Fahrenheit and chuckled. “Glad I didn’t send her out to Pickman’s Gallery. Imagine what a shit show that would have been!? Better not tell her about that place, just in case they really hit it off. I don’t think downtown could handle that kind of… collaboration.”

[dark-drawssss]

Is that the blue butch lesbian flag I see? 👀👀

I'm sorry, it just makes me so happy to see other lesbians in the Manhunt fandom 😄😄

LET'S GO, LESBIANS!!!!

This is @manhuntingbonzanza, btw

It is, I just really prefer the blue and purple one over the orange and yellow one since 1: blue's my favorite color, 2: I think blue and purple more-or-less show the butch part better c: Though there's definitely more lesbians out there who are fans of the series as a whole, after all it's Manhunt....