Fallout Companions React (2024)

Gob- He doesn’t see them until after most of their smooth skin has become mottled. There’s still a recognizable face under the raw patches, enough left that he knows them instantly when they walk into the bar, head ducked. His heart goes out to them, really. It’s been so long, yet he still remembers every moment of his change. It doesn’t tickle, that’s for sure. They sit at the bar and he hands them their usual before they even ask. “I’d like to tell you it gets better. Don’t feel much like lying to you though.” Their head sinks lower, but he reaches forward and urges it back up by the chin. “Now don’t you go disappearing like that. You keep your head up, and don’t let any of those gawkers weigh you down. You’re worth a lot more than a clean complexion.” They smile with gratitude and he smiles tentatively back.

Butch- The slow change begins with what he assumes is a peeling sunburn. The first time he got baked under the DC sun, he panicked and thought he was turning, until Lone convinced him otherwise. It isn’t a big deal until they scratch at a patch of dry, flaking skin, and take a huge chunk of flesh away. He avoids them like the plague once they know what it is, using his shirt as a breathing mask whenever they turn to speak with him. To his credit, he doesn’t leave. He remains by their side through the unpleasant parts of the change (the vomiting up blood part usually leaves them both heaving on the roadside) and assures him they’re still a Tunnel Snake as far as he’s concerned. Just… shedding. They set ground rules. Lone is not allowed to pick off any skin when he’s watching. They are under no circ*mstances allowed to share or even touch his food. Also, if there are any hotties in a bar they occupy, Lone has to scram. “Your pepperoni face is a major turn off, I don’t want you throwing the game for me. Try to be a little considerate, will ya’?”

Clover- Good looks or not, 101 is hers, and she doesn’t relinquish her claim on them just because they look like they’ve been shot in the face. Honestly, she’s been with people a lot uglier on the inside and out. She shows them what she thinks of the new look by kissing them at every turn, snuggling up to them in the same sleeproll at night. She hugs their waist and breathes against their ear. Pets their hair even when clumps come out in her fingers. Sometimes things fall off at unfortunate times, so what? She’s handy with a needle.

Sarge- He doesn’t notice for awhile. Even then, it’s not like he really cares. His programming barely recognizes faces in the first place. “We’re in war times, private. The enemy doesn’t care if we wear our best dress and look pretty for them! The only thing they should see when they look at you is the hardened soldier that heralds their inevitable death, not some beauty pageant winner! Now quite your whining, pick up that weapon, and let’s go find us a couple screaming meemies to take your mind off it!”

Fawkes- Most of his own experience with mutation seems a far off fever dream, and he can’t really compare it to what Lone is feeling. He makes sure they stay hydrated when the sickness leaves them hurling their guts out every few hours, keeps a damp cloth for the fever, does everything he can to make sure they’re at least comfortable through the worst of it. And when they’re suffering from something more than just the illness, he pulls them up in his lap to read from a a mostly intact John Keats novel they found in a museum which sits, made very small in his hand. “I will give you the definition of a proud man: he is a man who has neither vanity nor wisdom. One filled with hatreds cannot be vain, neither can he be wise.” He finds his head leaning against theirs as he reads, spontaneously nuzzling against them with a tenderness he only vaguely remembers showing another person, in another life. Their transformation into a meta-human does little to affect how he sees them. If anything, it makes him respect them a little more for pressing on, even when the wastes seek to tear them down.

Charon- He awkwardly pats them on the back when they’re emptying their stomach for the third time that day. It isn’t his place to point out how god awful they look, which they do. He hands them a bottle of water (purified, irradiated, it hardly matters now) to them to swish around and get the taste out of their mouth. By now they’re at the tail end of it, and the worst is behind them. “It will be easier getting through the Metro now. We’ll conserve on ammo.” That is understandably the least of their concerns. He wants to give them some other form of encouragement, but there’s not much he can say. The biggest show of support he can give them is to stick by them, and he doesn’t really have a choice in that matter. And give anyone that looks at them funny the stoniest death glare in the Capitol Wastes.

Jericho- Their moping around just pisses him off eventually. He doesn’t try to spare their feelings, and cringes whenever they turn that ugly mug to him. “You look like absolute sh*t. I mean really, just awful.” He passes them a smoke, but they can light it themselves. “But hey, you’re pretty much immortal now. Even if you get hurt, all ya gotta do is roll around in a puddle until you’re healed up. Seems like good looks are an easy trade off.” He takes a breath through his cigarette and lets it plume in the air above him. “Not that you were a prize winner before or nothin’.”

Paladin Cross- The first Brotherhood soldier that takes a shot at Lone from afar, she shows an unprecedented form of ire and slaps them full force across the face. She strikes them again at their defense, that Lone should just wear power armor and a helmet if they don’t want to be mistaken for a zombie. “After everything they have done for the Brotherhood, they have more than earned your respect. Nothing’s changed. And if I catch you-” She stops to gesture broadly to the band of recruits and other soldiers gathered. “-Any of you, using sentient ghouls for target practice again, you will pay dearly for it.” They’re still the child she knew, and she refuses to treat them any differently after the radiation whittles them down.

Dogmeat- What does he care? Ghoul, human, he would follow his master to the ends of the earth and back again.