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buryustogether · 11 months

Note

plssss viktor vektor smut, maybe after female v got injured and had to be rushed to him?

mr doctor man

viktor vektor x f!reader (v)

wc: 5.2k

summary: an argument with your ripperdoc/friend with benefits leads to a distraction during an important street fight. luckily, he’s not going to hold it against you.

warnings/tags: friends with benefits, allusions to sex and hook ups, swearing, blood, reader gets the absolute shit beat out of them, fighting, angst, vomiting, gun violence, love confessions, allusions to smut

author’s note: ask and ye shall receive

partially inspired by mr doctor man by palaye royale

“ mr doctor man

questions his hands

lost his mind

clinically fine ”

Viktor was sure he was out of his mind.

When he’d become a ripperdoc, he did so with one goal, one job, in mind; helping the injured, making sure everyone in this city had a fair chance at facing whatever was waiting out there for them. He was supposed to protect his patients, make sure they were fit and safe from the very things he installed deep within their muscles and memories.

He was supposed to take care of his patients, not fuck them into oblivion.

You couldn’t help but admire the raised red scratches your nails had inflicted upon Viktor’s back as he sat tinkering with the new piece of chrome he was about to put into your open forearm. Sweat was still in the process of drying on the back of your neck, cooled by the hum of conditioning that eased out of the grates overhead. Sure, you’d come in this afternoon to grab some new tech - but you could have done that over in Kabuki. Corpo Plaza. Arroyo. Anywhere you passed on your way here. But those clinics didn’t have Vik, didn’t have the glint of his glasses when he glanced your way, didn’t have the ‘tats inked into his arm that you held onto for dear life when he was railing into you hard enough to make you see stars.

No, this was your favorite clinic by far. And it wasn’t just because you lived only five minutes away.

“So tell me, kid,” said Viktor as he gingerly placed the reinforced piece of chrome into the meat of your arm. You held your breath at the strange sensation as his expert hands slowly adjusted the metal. “You’ve never exactly expressed interest in physical combat gear. Thought you were more of a gun steel gray kind of girl.”

He talked to you like you weren’t a thing, like you weren’t a couple.

Because you weren’t. If you were being completely honest with yourself, you didn’t know exactly what you were. You’d been friends, of course, when Jackie had first brought you in with him to get his nose popped back into place after a bar fight tilted away from him. You would come over in the evenings with dinner after he closed the clinic and watch fights. You would help clean up when he needed the extra hands. And when friendly banter turned more and more flirtatious, you hadn’t been obliged to stop it.

When slaps on the shoulders turned into kisses, and those turned into finger fucks, and those turned into full-on poundings on his table or against the wall, you hadn’t protested one bit. You wanted there to be something more to it all, wanted him to think about you the same way you did him - when you were alone eating breakfast by yourself, when you were driving across town, when you were in bed at night, anywhere and everywhere all at once.

But you’d never said a word of it.

You didn’t want to cross a line you knew you couldn’t see, take whatever this was one step too far and lose one of your best friends. So you left everything where it was - don’t fix what’s not broken, right? Don’t meddle with things doing just fine on their own, right?

So you kept your mouth shut and your legs open.

“Oh, yeah,” you said and stared up at the ceiling above your head. Across the room, the low sounds of a match beginning to start murmured from the television. “I’ve got a fight in Heywood coming up in a couple of days. Guy’s known for being built like ‘Saka Tower, so I figured I’d steel myself up before going to get my ass handed to me.”

You expected Viktor to smile, for him to chuckle and for his bare abs to tense up like they did when he found something amusing. But he didn’t. Instead the corners of his mouth tilted downward as he pulled the machine that would hotwire your skin back together over to the table. “What’s this guy’s name?” he asked offhandedly.

His sudden change in tone irked you slightly. “I don’t know. Heard he goes by Decard. Big in the Badlands, apparently, and he came into town looking for competition that wasn’t walking on four legs or eating after the four-legs.”

“Hmm.”

Pursing your lips awkwardly, you drummed your fingers on your bare sternum - you were both still in the bare minimum after your little late afternoon romp - and pulled your focus back overhead. You took a breath and pushed it out. “Got a problem with me fighting or something?”

Viktor looked up at you over the rims of his glasses - fuck, that steely gray of his irises were something else - and fixed you with a warning stare. “Don’t bring your attitude now, kid,” he said and rotated the machine patching you up. Even as the conversation was going south, he was still intent on giving you the best treatment he was capable of.

“Well, I mean - sorry, but it suddenly seems like you’d rather be literally anywhere else than here.”

“I will be, if you keep running your tongue like that.”

Your stare turned into a glare as you looked up at the ceiling above your head. What the fuck was this? You and Viktor hardly ever fought - and if you did, it was over who was going to win the match you were streaming. Fuck all, you just sucked his dick until he whimpered, and now he was giving you some weird kind of cold shoulder?

You waited until the machine had done its job and your arm was back together before shoving off the table and gathering your clothes that had been scattered across the clinic floor. You could feel him - sitting in just his pants on his stool - watching your movements like a hawk. “You know what,” you said, bristling as you tugged your clothes back on, “if you’re going to go full blown hermit on me out of the blue for no fucking reason at all, I have no reason to be here.” You angrily yanked your shoes over your feet, not bothering to tie the laces. “Don’t bother showing up to the fight. I’ll have Jackie there if I get my spleen shot out.”

“Didn’t know there was an extended invite,” Viktor said as he pushed away from the table on his stool and rolled over to his desk.

“There would have been if your stage four terminal dickery hadn’t ruined the party.” Snatching up your holsters from his side table, you stopped for a moment while you clasped them over yourself. “What was that, anyway? What’s your deal? One minute we’re hot and heavy, and the next you’re acting like you want to be rid of me.”

Viktor rolled his eyes - you saw it in the reflection of the dirty mirror hung opposite his desk. He picked up that damned screwdriver he was always tinkering with and began to adjust the calibrations of his mechanical fingers. “Maybe if you got your head out of your ass for once, V, you’d see that it’s just the opposite. I don’t think you should be sticking your neck out more than you already do for a couple extra eddies. You and Jack already run around pulling enough shit. Street fighting when you should be resting isn’t exactly the move you’d pull if you’re playing with a full deck of cards.”

Fuck, he was good. He could roll five different insults into one and make it sound like he was actually worried about you.

“I’m sorry,” you said and cocked your head at him pointedly, “this coming from one of Night City’s greatest ring fighters?”

He shook his head in that way he did when he was getting ready to put something to rest - an argument, an idea, a patient… It made something in your gut twist. It made you feel small and childish - like you both knew he was right about this. Like he was talking to a little girl who refused to give up the fight just for the sake of fighting. “You’re stubborn, kid, and that’s a good thing most of the time. I’m not going to tell you what you can or can’t do. Go on. Kick some ass and prove me wrong.” He paused his tinkering for just a moment, and you thought he was going to rise and kiss you goodbye like he always did - but he just turned up the volume on the television. “I’ll be here either way.”

Overwhelmed with that sickening, roiling feeling in your belly, you threw up a hand and stalked toward the gates of the clinic. “Whatever, old man.”

As you stormed up the stairs leading into the alleyway between Viktor’s clinic and Misty’s shop, a coil of guilt turned itself about in the hollows of your chest. Maybe he was right - about your head being stuck up your ass. Your entire life you’d been fighting for your fair share in this city, being raised in the shadows of those who proved themselves time and time again to be bigger than you. From the time you knew how to properly hold a gun and throw a punch and speak your mind, you hadn’t let anything stop you - which hadn’t always been a good thing. A couple broken bones and black eyes had taught you that much.

But fighting - whether it was for your life or not - was all you knew. Arguing, and challenging, and defying… it felt as if it were in your blood like part of your DNA. The feeling of desperate survival never went away, no matter how much money you had or how full your belly was. Once it was there, it never went away.

This was what you told yourself two evenings later, when the stars and the moon were blocked out by the smog and the nighttime air was disrupted by thumping music and excited shouts and the wails of sirens in the distance. It was what you told yourself when you popped out the cricks in your neck and accepted pats on the back from those who had bet their monthly rents on you. And yet despite the fight about to happen in a few minutes’ time, despite the dozens of people surrounding the basketball court where it was to take place, your mind was stuck back in the clinic. Your ears still rang with the words both you and Viktor had hissed, your chest still stung with the venom laced between breaths. He had not called you, despite having a little get-together-date-night-come-over-and-let’s-fool-around-thing set up for last night. You had not called him, despite desperately needing encouragement for this fight, because you had caught a glimpse of Decard, and you’d almost choked on your own spit.

“Aye, V,” said a voice in your ear, and you were pulled back to the sidelines of the basketball court, where a crowd had gathered to watch the smackdown. You looked up at Jackie when he clasped your shoulder in a tight grip, forcing your attention up to his face. “You doin’ okay, choom? You nervous?”

Swallowing thick, you furrowed your brows and waved a feeble hand. Your knuckles had already been wrapped in bandages - something Viktor usually did before your fights, because he knew the best ways to keep them tight when you threw your punches. You had wrapped them yourself, and they were already falling loose. “M’fine,” you answered over the radio blaring across the lot. “Just… mind’s somewhere else.”

There came a look across Jackie’s face that told you he already knew exactly what you were talking about. You didn’t want to think about how he did. “Listen,” he said and grasped your other shoulder. “Worry all you want after, chica, but when you’re out there?” He used his knuckle to shove your chin in the direction of the court, where the fixer who had arranged the fight was arguing over bets with a corpo. “Your mind’s got’ta be out there, too. Otherwise you’re goin’ to get your ass handed to you and your brain won’t catch up ‘til you’re hurtin’ tomorrow.” When you looked back at him, mouth stretched into a taut line, his gaze softened a bit. He jostled you. “These kind’a things don’t last forever, choom. Trust me - Misty’s been on my ass enough times that she knows it better than I do, and we always come around. Just… let it go for a few minutes, yeah?”

Steeling your heart and sharpening your expression, you nodded your head slightly and took a breath. Just for a few minutes. Nothing but left hooks and dodges and roundhouses for just a few minutes. “Okay,” you said and shook yourself out. “Okay.”

“Atta’ girl.” Jackie clapped your hand in his own, then spun you around and shoved you in the direction of the court. “Now go and kick some ass. Drinks on you at the Afterlife to celebrate your victory, aye?”

Rounds of both cheers and taunts followed you as you walked onto the court to meet the fixer and your competition. Upon facing your opponent, you found your neck craning up. And up. And still up. Decard was fitted with an entire body of chrome and tech, more cyber than human in every sense of the word. Nearly seven feet tall. Fists of collapsable nanotech. Cybernetic eyes pixelated red that made his pupils look as though they were bleeding from the inside out. You’d be lying if you told yourself he didn’t intimidate you to the point that if you weren’t being watched by hundreds of eyes, you’d probably have pissed yourself just a little bit.

“Alright, people,” said the fixer as he tallied up a number of bets. A quick glance at the pad in his hand told you that the onlookers’ faith lay more at Decard’s steel-toed feet than yours. “Please don’t turn this into a crime scene. I’m already on a watchlist for these kinds of things, so let’s keep this quick and clean. Hopefully I don’t have to tell you both that no cybernetic advancements are allowed. Gorilla arms, thermal knuckles, mantis blades, the whole shebang. No killing - perioud. ‘Kay?”

“Sure,” you said.

Decard growled from low in his throat.

Once the fixer had left the court and motioned for the pair of you to get ready, you took a moment to assess your opponent. As you dug your toes into the dirty tarmac, you looked him over. His head, of course, was an option, throat exposed over the collar of his tank top. But you doubted you’d have much time to grab at it, even if you got past those mechanical arms of his. You were scrambling to find a weak spot, to find some way this didn’t end in you limping away with a broken arm and a shattered ego, when your gaze shifted slightly behind him and into the crowd after catching a subtle glare of glass.

Fuck - he’d shown up. There he was, standing with crossed arms and a wide stance amongst the young onlookers streaming on their phones and squealing with excitement. Viktor met your eyes across the distance.

Then an earth-shaking, rib-crushing blow landed to your sternum, sending you tumbling over yourself in a heap of flailing limbs to the feet of the crowd. Pain like thunder blossoming violently across the sky expanded from your chest where Decard struck you, but you weren’t given much time to process what had just happened before the crowd was pulling you to your feet and pushing you back onto the court.

You had barely regained your breath before Decard came charging at you, steel teeth bared like some kind of animal as he barreled in your direction. Turning on your heel, you just barely managed to miss him - then took a running leap up onto his back and sat yourself on his hulking shoulders. The crowd erupted in surprise. Clenching your jaw and fighting with everything you had to stay on top of him while he bucked and pulled at your legs with a grip that would surely leave bruises in their wake, you locked an arm around his neck and began to squeeze. It wouldn’t take more than maybe twenty seconds for him to start getting lightheaded, even with all those implants. Maybe fifteen if you were lucky.

But it turned out you weren’t lucky. Very, very, very unlucky, in fact.

Decard backed up across the court as you tried to choke him out, heading straight for the rusted old hoop on a metal pole that creaked when a breeze blew it the wrong way. With a great roar and a heave, he slammed you back into the pole. Howling, searing, thundering pain overtook you, spreading from your spine to your shoulder blades to your hips, all throughout every nerve ending and fiber inside of you. Your vision whited out for just a moment as you slipped off the man’s shoulders and dropped to the warm tarmac. Goddammit, that hurt. That hurt like a bitch. That hurt like your vertebrae had cracked and one wrong move would put you six feet under.

With a low groan that you felt echoing in your very bones, you slowly propped yourself up on an elbow. You coughed and spat out a bit of saliva mixed with blood that pooled from where you’d bitten your tongue after being slammed into the pole. You knew after a blow like that you wouldn't be able to finish. As much as you fucking hated it, you were going to have to forfeit. All those cameras on you, all those eyes and bets… all fucking wasted.

And Viktor… fuck, he wouldn’t ever let you hear the end of this. If he spoke to you again outside of emergency clinic visits and checkups.

Sucking in a shallow breath, you stretched out a hand and patted the ground once, twice, three times. Those who saw it groaned at the fight having been so short. Eddies were being passed around, deposited into accounts as you began to make your way to your feet to slink off the court with your tail between your legs. But you didn’t quite make it.

Before you could find your footing, Decard’s large cybernetic hand snatched up the vulnerable skin of your throat and lifted you off the court into the air. Panic flooded your systems as your eyes widened and you gasped, trying to pull in air around the blockage on your neck. A few people cheered, thinking the fight was still on. No matter how much you kicked and flailed, they didn’t seem to get the hint that you had forfeited. You didn’t want to fight anymore.

They said you don’t always get what you want.

“Some shitshow for a merc I’ve heard so much fuss about,” Decard said, just inches from your face as he lifted you closer to him. Up close, you were able to see his cybernetic gaze flashing back and forth between your suddenly terrified eyes. “I was hoping I’d get a run for my money.”

You gasped around his iron-knuckled grip, uselessly kicking your feet against his chest plates. “M’done!” you wheezed out, listening to your heart pound wildly in your ears. “Y’win! Let me go!”

Decard grinned a sickening smile and brought his lips to the shell of your ear, so close you swore you felt his tongue brush against your lobe. “Come on and show me what you’re really made of, mercenary.” Then he turned and threw you across the court, sending you sprawling over yourself for the second time that evening. Another roar went up from the crowd as the cameras began filming again and new bets were placed.

Vision hazy and your spine screaming in protest, you scrambled out of the way just in time to miss Decard’s boot cracking the concrete where you just lay half a moment ago. You weren’t lucky enough to evade his next blow, a backhand that had you careening to the ground once more. Smack after punch, blow after kick, you were slowly losing the ability to raise your arms to even cover your face as he followed your pathetic little parade around the court.

The crowd seemed to be loving your beatdown. They cheered for more, for you to just give up, not knowing that you already had.

Upon coming to rest on your aching back from a roundhouse that had knocked you off your feet, you tilted your bloodied and bruised face to catch a glimpse of two figures arguing violently with the fixer who organized the whole event. Through the blur twinging the edges of your vision, you recognized Viktor and Jackie practically screaming at the man, gesturing wildly back and forth between you and the man approaching to possibly finish you off. Without your permission, your vision screen kicked in to read their lips and translate what they were saying.

“He’s fuckin’ killing her, idiota!” Jackie said and raised a hand to your form cowering on the ground.

“She tapped out fair and square,” snarled Viktor and poked a mechanical finger in the fixer’s chest. “Call it off before it goes any further.”

The fixer raised his hands in defense, shrugging a shoulder to prove his point. “Listen, chooms, just because you lost your bets doesn’t mean you’ve got to take it up with me.”

“She forfeited!” Viktor said. “Everyone with their eyes in their head saw her call for mercy.”

The fixer grinned sadistically. “I didn’t see anything.”

Snapping back to the court, you raised your gaze to the tall, sinewy mass of a man who towered over you with a heaving chest and a sick emotion of satisfaction sitting upon his stupid fat lips. For the second time, he raised you into the air by your throat and held you up like a trophy for all to see. You didn’t have the energy to fight back this time, couldn’t even if you thought it would do something. You simply gasped for air and gripped his forearm, hoping you’d black out sooner than later so you wouldn’t have to keep enduring this torture.

“Too bad no one’s going to remember your name,” Decard said to you over the noises of the onlookers. “V, was it?”

Through the blood spilling over your lips and the ache in every damn inch of your body, you snarled and spat, “Go fuck yourself.”

“Oh, I will,” he replied. “To the image of you begging for mercy like a fucking dog.”

The words had barely escaped his lips when a miracle graced the old basketball court. A deafening gunshot like a firecracker went off just feet from your ear and an instant later, you were dropped from being suspended in the air. Forcing yourself to look up from the dirt digging into your cheek, you watched as Viktor, now standing on the court before a kneeling Decard as he screamed and cradled the blown-apart junction of his knee, leveled his handgun with his opposite shoulder.

“Don’t bother showing your face to any ripper in this fucking city,” Viktor warned, then cracked off another bullet into Decard’s shoulder. The man howled over the sounds of the crowd stampeding for their vehicles and the streets, then collapsed in on himself. “They won’t have any mercy on you.”

It was the last thing you saw before you rolled onto your side and vomited, allowing yourself to fall into that everlasting darkness behind your eyelids.

The first thing that hit you when your senses returned was the faint smell of cleaning alcohol, the kind that docs used to sterilize equipment before they dug deep into your chest. The second thing was the familiar sound of a television playing the sounds of a boxing match; the ringing of the bell and the commentator’s voice would have lulled you back to sleep, had it not been for the ache that thrummed like fire beneath your skin all across your body. From your toes to your scalp it hurt, pulling a low moan from the back of your throat.

Your brow scrunched, you opened your eyes and blinked a few times before recognizing the ceiling overhead as the same one you had glared at while fighting with Viktor two days ago. You were in his clinic, propped up on the operating chair with an IV stuck in your arm and bandages wrapped around your torso. Your spine bitched at you as you sat up and swept your gaze across the clinic. Viktor was nowhere to be found.

Fuck, you wanted to go home. Go home and take the longest nap in the history of time. How long had it been since the fight - since you got your ass almost literally handed to you on the internet for thousands of people to see? Your vision screen told you it had been almost twelve hours.

With a grunt, you carefully pulled the IV from your arm and swung your legs over the side of the chair - only to crumple to the floor the moment you tried to stand on your own two feet. Just a few seconds later, you heard the sound of footsteps coming down the stairs, and you prayed it would be anyone except your doc. You couldn’t face him, not after he had to save your ass after telling you not to fight. Hell, you almost wished it would be Decard coming to finish you off.

But you recognized the bottoms of the shoes rushing toward you as Viktor’s, and you could do nothing but whimper and groan as he gingerly lifted you off the ground and back onto the chair.

“Jesus, kid,” he said as he carefully stuck the IV back into your skin. “Only just came to and you’re already trying to walk out like nothing happened.”

You said nothing as he sat back on his rolling stool beside you and brought up your vitals on his tablet. You couldn’t bare the thought of looking into those eyes of his as he chastised you for being so fucking stupid, for not heeding his advice. He probably thought you were an idiot, a naive kid so blinded by chasing glory she didn’t realize she was running straight into the sun.

But it seemed that Viktor didn’t get the this-is-supposed-to-be-awkward memo. “Hate to say it,” he said as he scrolled through his device, “but you had a close call, kid. Popped a vertebra out of place in your spine, fractured four of your ribs, dislocated a finger or two… I could go on, but I’d like to save time where I can. In other words, I’ve never had a patient come in quite as fucked up as you.”

“Gee, thanks.” You exhaled a painful breath, unable to push down the bubble forming in the bottom of your throat. Just when you thought you’d be able to ignore it, it ruptured. “Why don’t you just tell me off for being so stupid and send Misty to take me home?”

Viktor didn’t look at you. And that made you all the more furious. “I’m not doing this again, V,” he said and rolled away to deposit his tablet on his workbench. “Shut up and take a rest from it, will you? You’re fogging up the place with that hot head of yours.”

“In case you forgot,” you shot back, struggling to sit up straight in the curved operation chair, “you’re the one who started this shit. So don’t you try and pin it on me.”

He stood and remained there on his feet for a moment, hands placed firmly on his hips and nodding his head with pursed lips - like he was preparing himself to have this same spat again. A pang of guilt shot through you, but you beat it back.

“You know what?” he said and finally looked at you through his glasses. He threw out a hand and let it smack against his thigh. “Fine. I did start this. I’ll own that. But I only started it because - and this may come as a surprise to that thick skull of yours - but I actually care about you, kid. I do really give a shit if some shady bastard you decide to throw hands with over a few eddies manages to get the better of you and leave you bleeding out in a dumpster on the wrong side of Pacifica.” He ran his good hand through his hair - and over his temples, which were just beginning to show through his dark tresses with a few streaks of gray - and began to tread closer. “Maybe what we’ve got between us is a fun way to kick off a bit of stress for you, and I’ll keep myself in check if it is, but goddammit, V, I wouldn’t know what to do with myself if you got yourself gutted in a fucking streetfight!”

You realized he had gotten closer to your chair and raised his voice only when you flinched at his sudden outburst. He seemed to understand, too, just how close he had come, because he at once stood straight again and began to back off.

You reached out your hand and grabbed his wrist. “It’s not,” you found yourself whispering when he glanced at you over the rims of his glasses. You swallowed thick and forced the words up and out. “Just… just some outlet. I… I love you, Vik.” A wave of tears threatened to overtake your vision, turn your eyes watery and your voice wavering. “I know it doesn’t really seem like it a lot of the time, but I promise I do.”

There were a long, silent few moments in which neither of you moved. Neither of you spoke. You squeezed your eyes together, suddenly afraid you had gone too far. That’s what you always did. You either went so far the line wasn’t even a line anymore, or you fell short enough that you didn’t even know there was one to begin with. You started to release his wrist, feeling as though you had fucked up yet another one of the good things in your life, when you felt his fingers angling your chin up so that he could press his lips to yours.

It was just like the millions of other times he had kissed you, when you were both in a rush to get your clothes off and climb on top of the other, and yet it was different all at the same time. This kiss was deep and genuine, relieved and thrilled. Sweet. Loving. He tasted like a faint twinge of whiskey, and when you grabbed his shirt collar to pull him closer and he grunted, a fan of breath swept across you like a ghosting whisper.

When you finally pulled apart, Viktor rested his forehead against yours and gently kissed the slope of your nose. “You better rest up quick, kid,” he murmured against your lips. “Because when you do, I’m going to spread those legs of yours and show you just how much I fucking love you.”

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buryustogether · 11 months

Text

-> HEATSTROKES AND OTHER MEET CUTES

saul bright x f!reader (not v)

wc: 5.3k

summary: after suffering a severe heatstroke and the beatdown of your life, you stumble across a nomad camp in the badlands. their leader is willing to offer a helping hand.

warnings/tags: heatstrokes, getting mugged, guns, blood, swearing, vomiting, mentions of rape/noncon, undressing in front of a stranger, strangers to lovers, thigh riding, smut, use of good girl, running away

author’s note: come get y’all’s bullshit

You had heard the same phrase over and over again.

You’d heard it at bars from truckers who had driven through the deserts all day and all night to avoid stopping out in the open. Their eyes were stamped with purple half-moons, expressions slack with exhaustion and fatigue they barely fought off. Their clothes were dusty despite never once stepping out of their cabs, and they spoke as if they’d seen the rapture itself out in those barren wastelands.

You’d heard it from ex-nomads who had sought to give up their lives in the deserts, too scarred from what they’d seen and endured to carry on out in the open. Their hands were calloused and their lips dry, always carrying around bits and traces of their old life, no matter how far they ran or how hard they tried to scrub all the dust off.

You’d heard it from mercenaries who’d had the misfortune of working jobs out there in the flat, dry banks and plains. They shook their heads when asked about it, said that some things just needed to lay down and fuckin’ die. Their gazes danced with ravens and scavenger birds picking at something unseen in the brush, and their footsteps were a little lighter than they once had been, as if they were scared of leaving footprints in sand that wasn’t even there.

You had heard the same phrase over and over again.

“If you think Night City is bad, wait until you get out to the Badlands.”

You had always thought they were being dramatic. Silly. Ridiculous. It was all just a bunch of desert, nothing but rocky mountain ridges and a brutal, unforgiving sun that found a way through the clouds even if the heavens themselves refused to part.

You had been wrong. So very, horribly, awfully wrong.

Sand clinging to your pants, your hair, your shoes - everything - weighed you down as you slowly trudged your way through the nothingness of the Badlands back toward the city. The tops of the skyscrapers and the holo-ads just barely prodded at the horizon, teasing you in a mirage of sorts. Miles. Miles upon miles left until you reached salvation, safety, relief.

You couldn’t help but pant with parted lips as you feebly stepped up a ridge and forced your legs to move along - one after the other. That’s all. That’s all that it was. And yet, the simple act of walking felt as though it were the most impossible thing you’d ever done.

Nothing in your parched, sun-fried brain could tell you what the hell you had even been thinking coming all the way out here. You’d struck up a deal with a wastelander over the net abour buying a bike that looked preem enough to have come straight from the dealer’s website. Now, you were sure that’s where it had been from.

By the time you’d parked your car in the middle of the abandoned lot you and the seller had agreed to meet at, it had been too late. You’d been met with a tap on your window from the end of a pistol barrel, and on the other side had been a man wearing a mask over his face and goggles over his eyes to shield himself from the sand blowing in the breeze.

The was a blur in the forefront of your mind, too fast and miserable and beige-tinted to remember much.

The scavengers had pulled you from your car and stripped you of anything useful you had - your pieces, the tools from your trunk, hell - they’d even taken your belt buckle, thinking it to be worth anything more than a few dozen eddies. You had cried out, screamed for help as they backed you against your car and beat the living sense out of you, but of course no one had come. Your yells had been noting more than a few whispers on the wind, as far as anyone else was concerned. They had left you in that lot, staring up at the blinding sky, feeling blood slip from your mouth and trickle down the side of your face. Gasping for air in your bruised lungs.

Wondering how you had been so fucking stupid.

You’d been walking for what felt like hours now - the sun was beginning to set over the jagged tops of the mountains, threatening to drench you in the everlasting darkness of the Badlands. If you could get scammed, jacked, and hacked in broad daylight, you were terrified to think of what could happen when not even the light was there to guide you.

Water was merely a dream, an illusion, as was any hope of making it back to the city in one piece. Your feet dragged behind you and your heart thundered in your ears. A migraine like you’d never felt before was pounding like a jackhammer at the front of your skull, blurring your vision at the edges, and for every five steps you took forward, you stumbled back three to keep your balance. You knew if you fell to the grainy, unforgiving ground now, you’d never be getting back up again.

A low, exhausted moan escaped your lips as you half-collapsed, rocks and sharp-edged pebbles digging into your palms as you fought to keep yourself upright. You had no one back home - no significant other, no family, hardly many people you knew well enough to call friends. If you died out here, no one would come looking for you. You’d become another statistic of the missing persons files, forever lost out here to the uneven dunes and hungry landscape.

Just when you were about to finally keel over and call it quits, finally acknowledge that you weren’t going to ever touch the paved tarmac of the Night City streets again, you created a small ridge and laid eyes upon light. A small, grouped number of glowing lights, illuminating the faint shapes of trucks, and bikes, and makeshift tents and lean-tos.

Nomads.

It was a nomad camp.

Your heart surged in your hollow chest and you picked up your pace, ignoring the aching in your legs and the dry, grainy feeling scratching at your lungs.

“Hey,” you said softly, then covered your mouth with a fist as you coughed and hacked. Each spasm was as painful as pins dancing along your throat. You stumbled forward, approaching the camp slowly, watching as the shapes grew more clear and the lights became brighter. You could see the silhouettes of people wandering about their business, gathered around campfires and discussing lazy topics over bottles of beer. You ached for just a sip - just a single drop to roll down your tongue.

You had just reached the perimeter of the nomad camp when, like a star falling from the sky, a miniature explosion detonated just inches from your feet. As you helped and tipped sideways, collapsing in the sand, you realized it had not been an explosion, but a bullet landing before you in a warning. Your ears rang like bells as you feebly rolled onto all fours, your head spinning. The nomads were blurs of motion as they moved, shouting and calling commands, racing to and fro. They were preparing - for what? It was only you here.

Only parched, fried, dying you.

A croaked gasp was pulled from your cracked lips when a boot shoved you over, sending you onto your back. Not a moment later, the barrel of a rifle was shoved against your throat. The metal was cool. You fought against the instinct to wrap your hand around the barrel and pull it closer.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” spat the young woman at the other end of the rifle. “Pretty stupid to try and sneak up on us all by yourself. Tell me how many of you there are, and I might think about letting you keep your head.”

You blinked tiredly, the world going in and out of focus like a video with bad resolution, as two more men skidded to a stop beside the woman to peer down at you.

“Good shot, Panam,” said one.

“Mm,” agreed the other on her right. He brandished a slick pistol and aimed it at your middle, ignoring the way you gasped and cried silently for air, for water, for anything. “I wouldn’t have been so kind.”

You heaved in a dry breath, your tongue refusing to work. You would have cried out of pain, out of frustration and exasperation, but no tears were able to crawl into the corners of your eyes. You were sucked dry, with nothing left to give except the sweat rolling down your back and neck.

“How many of you are there?” the woman called Panam demanded again. She placed a heavy boot on your chest, restricting a bit of whatever airflow you had left, and your eyes widened. Scrabbling at her ankle, you kicked aimlessly as you battled to inhale. “Tell me!” The boot pressed further, and you sputtered out a dry squawk. You heard her pull the bolt of her rifle, felt the used cartridge bounce off your arm. “Last chance, you scav scum.”

“Panam!” There came a loud, booming voice that seemed to shake the ground beneath you, commanding respect and authority over all else surrounding you - even nature itself. The boot was lifted off your chest and you raised a trembling hand to your throat, taking a short, shaky breath in. Through the dizzying spinning of the world and the hammer-like thundering in your skull, you turned your head slightly and caught the hazy figure of a man striding toward the scene with broad, level shoulders and boots that were scuffed with years wear and tear. That was all you were able to catch before you covered your eyes with your hands and moaned for a breath, for a drink, for anything that would bring you from this dry hell.

“What was that shot?” asked the new man as he approached the others. “What’s going on here?”

“Stopped a scav from sneaking under our noses.” The toe of Panam’s boot nudged your leg. “Pretty lousy, scav, at that.”

You listened to that heavy pair of footsteps come closer until they were right beside your head. A hand, large and rough with calluses from hard work and manual labor, took your wrist and pulled it away from your face. Through your haze you could only just make out an arm lined with tattoos, a head full of hair like chestnut that draped over shoulders, and a well-kept beard. You opened your mouth to babble out an apology, to beg that they let you go, but all that came out was a raspy groan.

“Dammit, Panam, she’s not a scav.” The man released your arm, turned away from you. “She’s from the city. Look at her clothes. She’s not from out here.”

“Well, how was I supposed to know?” came the reply, almost childlike in its nature. “I see someone trying to get the jump on us, I take them out. Isn’t that what we’re supposed to do? Protect each other?”

“Go back to your hut. No more guard duty for the rest of the night.”

“Saul-“

“Now, Panam.”

You listened to a hiss of fury and the sound of fading footsteps before slowly attempting to roll over onto your hands and knees. That unreasonable, delusional part of you was beginning to take over. Maybe if you were quick, you could sneak away…

Your feeble escape attempt was halted when that same hand as before grabbed your shoulder and rolled you back around onto your backside. You weren’t able to put up much of a fight, only gasp and paw at clothes and skin, as those hands wrapped under your shoulders to lift you up off the rocky, sweltering ground.

“Mitch,” said the man above you. Saul? “Grab her feet. Help me bring her up.”

Another pair of hands wrapped around your calves and suddenly you were lifted off the desert floor, being carried through the nomad camp like a prize from the latest hunt. You couldn’t do much but moan and gasp in short breaths, watching with dazed eyes as the sun finally disappeared behind the range.

“Where to? The doc’s?” said the man at your feet.

“My space,” said the other at your head. “She’s dehydrated to all hell and back. I’ve got the keys to our reserves in my truck.”

What could have been either seconds or hours later - you’d all but lost track of all meaning of time - the men carried you up a set of stairs leading into a hollowed-out semi truck. You saw the shapes and frames of a couch and a tool bench, a bed and a little folding table in the corner. They set you down on the bed, carefully lifting your feet comfortably out in front of you.

Then Saul, who had saved you from the young woman with a rifle, who had carried you all the way up into this truck, pulled a ring of keys from a space beneath the table and tossed them to his partner. “Go and fetch a whole jug,” he instructed, and within just a moment, Mitch was gone.

Saul disappeared, too. You watched as he exited the truck, shouting to his people, and attempted to sit up in the bed. You’d heard things about nomads - that they kidnapped people from the city and held them for ransom, that they ran with the coyotes and ate what they left behind. You’d never seen any evidence of these claims, but you weren’t about to find out.

You had just managed to swing one leg over the edge of the bed before Saul, hulking and sinewy in the doorway of the semi, reappeared. He gently, but firmly, pushed you back down onto the mattress and lifted your leg to where it had been.

“Easy, girl,” he said and leaned over you. You shut your eyes when he draped a cold, wet cloth over your forehead. “Keep still, hear? Don’t need you collapsing again on us.”

Mitch entered the truck lugging a large, clear jug of water at his side. At the sight of it, of what you’d been thinking of for hours, you pushed against Saul and attempted to tumble out of the bed yourself.

“Good to see she’s still got some fight in her,” Mitch joked as he popped the tab of the jug and handed it to Saul. “At least she ain’t gone mad to the heat.”

“Not yet, anyway.” The muscles in his bare arms flexing beneath the ink of his tattoos, Saul lifted the jug’s tab to your lips and tipped it back. When you weren’t able to lift yourself to meet it, he nestled a hand beneath your sweaty head and raised it himself.

The moment the cool liquid hit your mouth, you almost moaned aloud at how sweet and wonderful it tasted. It felt even better going down your throat. You couldn’t ignore the fact that the hand cradling your head was sending butterflies through your veins at the same time, but your sole focus was on the water trickling down your chin and onto your shirt. Gulp after gulp, you drank, refusing to let the nomad pull the jug away, even when you felt your belly fill.

“Careful,” said Mitch as Saul again tried to pry the container from your lips. “Don’t drink it too fast or else -“

Before he could finish, you suddenly shoved the jug away and made to lean over the side of the bed. With the toe of his boot, Saul hooked a metal container beneath the bed and whisked it out onto the open floor. Not a moment later, you hung over the edge of the mattress and vomited water and bile into the pan. The retches heaved through your body in an uneven tempo, your systems overwhelmed from having been dry to the bone to suddenly flowing over with water.

When you finally returned to dry heaving, shaking as spit up ran down your chin and nose, Saul retrieved the wet cloth from where it had fallen on the bed and used it to gingerly wipe your face clean. Your chest, soaked through your shirt from the runoff water, heaved for breath as you let him settle you back down and offer a few chaser sips of water to your lips.

“You’re alright,” Mitch said as you felt your face heat upon the realization of what you’d just done - in front of strangers, no less. “We‘ve all been there. Can’t say you’re a nomad without suffering a few heatstrokes.” He picked up the pan as if it were nothing, then clambered down the steps into the open night. “I’ll get the air conditioning going,” he called back in, then heaved the semi’s door shut.

Slowly, as if you were surfacing from being held underwater, you began to regain your senses. Understand what was going on, where you were. You were in the middle of a nomad camp, in a truck, alone with a man called Saul. And he was pulling off your shoes. Blinking through tired eyes, you watched the ceiling of the truck as you felt him peel off your socks, as well. Then he began to fumble with the button of your pants.

Summoning every ounce of strength you had left to give, you thrashed like a cornered animal and cried out through your still-weary throat. Saul at once backed off, watching as you curled into yourself in the corner of the bed. Your eyelids were drooping, your arms and hands and fingers still shaking.

“Mmuh,” you mumbled over your dead tongue. You scooted further away when he took a step toward you. Fuck, the rumors had been true. They just wanted to use you and throw you back out into the desert when they were done. “Sta… sty’ back,” you warned, though you knew there was really nothing you would be able to do against him.

Saul raised a hand in a little surrender warning, keeping his short distance from your corner of the bed. “Easy, girl,” he said again. “Not going to hurt you.” He nodded with his head gingerly, a few strands of hair falling from his shoulder to his neck. “We need to get your clothes off. You’re not going to cool down any faster than spending a night out here in the Badlands. Your skin needs to breathe, get its bearings again.”

For a long while, you considered him. His eyes were dark and stormy, heavy with a thousand burdens and not enough solutions. His movements were authoritative and stern, yet mindful and careful all at once, like he knew the repercussions his very footsteps may leave behind.

He did not seem like the kind of man who would throw you to the jackals and vultures.

Slowly, tentatively, you unfurled yourself and eased across the bed. He took a few steps closer, gently easing you back onto your ass, and pulled your shirt over your head. He had been right, you found; the moment your shirt left your body, it felt as though you were able to breathe again. The sand prodding against your skin, the feeling of carrying around another ton - it all went away. Though your arms were shaking, you managed to lift up your hips so that he could slide your pants off your legs, leaving you in just your bra and panties.

It would have felt strange being practically naked in front of a man you’d never met before - in front of a man who was standing so close that you felt his breath on your shoulder - but something within you felt slightly at ease. This man was taking care of you, inspecting the bruises along your arms and middle with a touch that just only ghosted your skin, gave you tiny sips of water - just enough to keep you on the edge, leaning forward for more.

After Saul had helped you wrap up in a sheet and left a mug of water where you could reach it, he took a seat on the couch facing the bed. When he sat, he let out a deep sigh, and you noticed he let his left leg straighten and relax while his rig remained bent and stiff. A bad joint, perhaps?

For a while, a long, still silence filled the belly of the truck. You took little drinks from the mug, keeping it close to your chest, your eyes trained on Saul’s fingers. A couple of rings adorned his knuckles, glinting in the light from the lamp sat beside the couch. His fingers were long and thick, rough with scars and calluses, each with a story of their own. You shifted, slightly ashamed, when a short rush of arousal shot to your core.

What kinds of things, besides tune-ups, and feeding his people, and firing a gun could those hands do?

“Thank you,” you found yourself saying, finally able to gain control of your tongue again. You swallowed thick and hunched your shoulders. “For helping me. I’m… I’m sure you have lots of other people to keep well-taken care of.”

Saul released a groan from deep in his chest, sounding akin to some kind of agreement. “I do,” he said, rubbing at his temple. “But just because someone’s not my people doesn’t mean I turn them away when they’re in need.“

Outside, someone had begun to strum a melody on a guitar. A number of voices sang along to a song you didn’t know, a harmony of deep and light and wonderful and awful.

These people weren’t savages or plunderers. They were friends. They were a family.

Perhaps… perhaps the rumors had been wrong, after all.

You took another sip of water and reached up to wipe your lip with your thumb. You found him watching your movements. “Listen, I’ll be out of your hair in a while. I just… I just needed to rest a while.”

Saul hummed again. “No,” he said in such a commanding tone you were at once inclined to agree with him. “You’ll stay here for the night. If you’re feeling up to it tomorrow, we’ll take you back to town. We were heading there to stock up on supplies, anyhow.”

You said nothing at first. How incredibly scary this man had been at first, towering over you on the ground with those dark, broody eyes trained on your very soul. But now he was… rather charming. Dark and mysterious, sure, but no less attractive.

You realized you had been staring at him. And he had been staring at you.

Switching your gaze down to your mug of water, because you felt as though you’d blurt out all the filthy things you were thinking if you kept looking at him, you swallowed down the last few bits of sand sticking to your throat. “So, is that… Panam… is she your kid?”

The man before you gave a sort of scoff and a twitch of his lips - you’d hit a sore subject. “Something like that,” he answered shortly, then reached up and harrumphed as he flicked a piece of hair over his shoulder. “We picked her up years ago when she was young. Brought her up for a while. Recently, she’s started to push back. Question how things run around here.” He raised a hand and dropped it again, and it occurred to you that perhaps you were the first person he’d unloaded this burden on in a long time. “She doesn’t get that everything I do around here is for the best - for everyone. Even if it doesn’t align with her own morals.”

For a long while, silence enveloped the gutted belly of the truck. You set your mug down on the floor and hugged the sheet tighter around yourself. Outside, the song being played ended with a loud, overjoyed cheer from its singers. They all sounded so… happy. Content. At peace.

“Well,” you said slowly, hoping you weren’t crossing any lines, “I, uhm… I haven’t really been here lucid enough to think straight long, but… it seems like you’re doing something right.” When he settled his gaze upon you, you nodded to the door leading out into the night illuminated by song and campfire glow. “I can’t say I’ve ever seen so much… camaraderie before. This day and age, it’s kill or be killed, but you all…” You trailed off, shrugging your bare shoulders beneath the sheet. “You have each other. I can’t really talk much, but that seems like something to be proud of.”

Saul, for once in the short while you’d been sitting with him, seemed to be short of answers to your words.

Perhaps it was the adrenaline high that had been fueling your brain not too long ago, or maybe it was the feeling that spread throughout your abdomen when he looked at you, but something propelled you to scoot forward on the bed and try to rise to your feet.

Saul stood just as you climbed into a stand, reaching out to keep you down on the bed, but you reacted first. You stumbled forward on your still-wobbly feet and tumbled right into his broad chest. He exhaled a surprised grunt. You both landed back on the couch, only now you were straddling his thick, muscular thigh and your front was pressed against his without a sliver of space between you.

Your breaths each came out in puffs and pants, startled by the sudden fall. It wasn’t long before you each sprung into action.

He leaned forward to meet you halfway when you brought your lips toward his, locking your mouths together with the same kind of fervor you gave. His hands were firm but gentle all at once, mindful of the sore spots along your arms and middle, as if he’d memorized each and every place where a bruise blossomed. They eventually landed on your barely-clothed hips. While he busied himself, like an explorer mapping out new, unfamiliar terrain, you licked your tongue into his mouth and pulled him by his hair closer. He tasted of some musky liquor and a dense air you could not place. Rough and demanding, yet protective and heavy and like home - the way a leader should be.

When you finally pulled away from him to catch your breath, your chest now heaving and caving rapidly, Saul hummed lowly and nudged your forehead with his nose. “Ballsy, aren’t you, girl?” he said, and you shivered as you felt his hot breath fanning across your face. “Not a lot of people would shove their tongues down the throat of the leader of the Aldecados.” He took the point of your chin between his thumb and forefinger so that you peered up at him. “You’ve got courage. I admire that.”

By now, arousal had began to pool in the bottom of your belly like a coiled serpent, snapping and hissing to be set free. Your cunt ached, clenching around nothing, and you nearly moaned in relief when Saul shifted you over his thigh so that the rough material of his pants rubbed your clit through your panties just right. He noticed your reaction and hitched his leg slightly, causing you to bounce gently on his thigh. This time, a soft, quiet mewl did escape your throat.

Saul hummed and leaned forward to begin nipping and sucking love spots into the delicate skin of your neck. “Pretty girl likes getting off on my leg, doesn’t she?” he growled against the column of your throat. You gasped when he hitched his leg again, and a wonderful, delightful flood of leaden pleasure spread through your systems. “Do it, then. Show me just how tough you really are, baby.”

Who were you to object?

Clinging onto his muscular shoulders for support, you began rocking yourself against his clothed thigh, shifting and grinding so that your clit was stimulated in just the right way. Practically humping his hip, you let out soft, panting sighs and moans and mewls as you moved.

Saul’s hand moved around your back to unclasp your bra, moving you arms for just a fraction of a second so that he could pull it off and drop it to the floor. He pulled a long, high-pitched whimper from the bottom of your throat when he attached his lips to your nippe, beard scratching against the vulnerable skin of your chest. Pleasure like you weren’t sure you’d ever experienced coursed through you like fine whiskey or a static-infused drink from an overpriced club.

Fuck, this shouldn’t have felt this good.

But it did. It fucking did.

“Atta’ girl,” Saul muttered into the valley between your breasts when the rolls of your hips began to grow faster. He felt your arousal soaking through his pant leg, your panties completely ruined. You were chasing that high as your cunt clenched and you whined every time his lips pressed wet, open-mouthed kisses against your sternum. “Ride, cowgirl.”

Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck.

“Saul,” you said, and repeated his name, that one word, that sounded like a chanted prayer now as you neared your end. That coil within you was tightening, that abused power source about to implode and take out everything with it. “Saul, Saul, Saul…!”

He pressed his lips flush against yours, hands splayed across the skin of your back, like he was shielding you from the rest of the world, claiming you. “Come on,” he breathed against your mouth. “Cum for me.”

You found you could not go against anything this man said.

With a shattered cry muffled by his shoulder, your hips stuttered and you hit your peak like a lone wanderer who never wanted to come down. You shoved your hips, your oversensitive clit, against his thigh, attempting to remain up in those clouds that felt you during your orgasm.

When you eventually came back around, you found Saul was pulling your hair from your sweaty face, whispering praise against the shell of your ear.

“Good girl,” he said in that low, husky tone of his that sent your stomach flipping. “My good girl. Tamed already, aren’t you?”

You gave a weak, half-hearted agreement. He shifted his weight so that he now lay across the couch with his feet propped against the opposite armrest and your limp form sprawled across his front. He squeezed your hips, fingertips playing with the hem of your soaked panties.

It seemed an eternity of still, peaceful quiet had passed when Saul spoke again. “You got anyone back home waiting for you?”

“No,” you answered at once. Perhaps too quickly, too eagerly. “It’s just me.”

“Hmm.” For a moment, he seemed to consider, his gaze - now simmering down from their previous state of lust-fueled frenzy - stuck to your head as he carded through your hair. “Didn’t make what I’d call a good first impression,” he said, “but I could convince the others to clear a seat for you around the fire. Scrounge up a spare motor. You know how to ride?”

It took your short-circuited brain a long minute to comprehend what he was saying. He was inviting you to join his family - the Aldecados.

You thought. You had nothing back in the city - just a cheap, shitty apartment, a dead end job, and a stack of bills only growing by the day. Chaos. Havoc. But out here… there was everything you didn’t know. The unknown of what might come the next day. Sandstorms, and bandits, and everything else in between… but a family. People willing to watch your back without expecting anything in return. Friends and cousins and brothers and sisters.

A man who had just fucked you senseless, and even still now, saw something within you he thought worthy enough to travel with him and his nomads.

The answer came out easier than expected. “Yeah,” you said and smiled up at him. “I can ride.”

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