tell us abt young vitali's whole engagement thing hehe 👀
HEHE THANK YOU >:^) so in college vitali had an off-and-on relationship with nick vossler for the full four years they were there. it started out as just friends with benefits but they both wanted more out of the relationship, but at the same time they just really couldn't stand each other while also being the only people who could stomach each other in the first place. very complicated!
while they definitely loved each other, neither of them were able to properly express this. vitali was still heartbroken over losing contact with mikhail and he subconsciously treated nick as a mikhail replacement; nick could never live up to the image vitali had in his mind which is why he kept being frustrated with him. at the same time, nick was definitely not a great boyfriend either; he knew exactly how to press all of vitali's buttons and did so repeatedly just to piss him off on purpose, and he would make it up to him with sex which he knew would make vitali worse but that was the only thing he knew vitali would like because he never really bothered to understand him better than just the surface level
add to this all the times they broke up and vitali getting other boyfriends in the meantime and nick getting unbelievably jealous (or the opposite where vitali's other exes would get jealous of him getting back together with nick instead of with them) and you have a very explosive cocktail of an unhealthy relationship going on. vitali at some point got together with a guy just to spite nick which then resulted in vitali rightfully getting his ass kicked, but after that nick accused vitali of doing the same with every other relationship vitali tried to have (which at that point was not the case anymore) but that did stick with vitali which is why none of his other relationships ever worked out. nick made him believe he was just using everyone around him which is also why he kept crawling back to nick in the first place; both of them felt like they only deserved each other
now at some point in vitali's third year he fell down the stairs and the injury in his upper right leg which he'd always had reached critical levels. he was rushed to the hospital and forced into surgery where a metal pin was put in his leg to keep everything in place (this caused more problems further down the line but at that moment in time it was "fixed") and he was sent home with some painkillers and a huge medical bill. vitali naturally spiraled fast after all of that and nick (who he had sort of allowed back in his life again in the months leading up to it) insisted on sticking around vitali's apartment for a month to help him with things
during this month, the two of them actually grew a lot closer than at any other point in time (save for a year or so earlier after vitali's top surgery, where nick also helped him out with things). with sex, alcohol, and drugs entirely out of the question they had to find other ways to have fun as to not want to kill each other while sharing the same space for so long and for the first time they actually believed that maybe their relationship COULD in fact survive. somehow
which is what led to nick asking vitali to marry him. despite all the good things happening that month, both of them could already feel the cracks starting to take shape again and they knew that things would explode sooner than later like they had always done, and them getting engaged was basically the next step that would "lift them out of the rough patch", as they both believed. naturally it didn't take very long because vitali broke off the engagement about half a year later when nick vanished at the start of their fourth year because of an out-of-town internship that he had "forgotten" to tell vitali about <3
but i do really think that them being engaged for a while is an important part of the story. vitali WAS starting to mature around that time, focusing a lot more on school, finally being fully sober and wanting to stay sober, no longer going clubbing and all that. obviously he still had jackie because he has always had jackie, but every single other friend he'd made in college was now no longer with him and nick was the ONLY one he could see himself having a future with; he truly believed they could make it work somehow, he WANTED to believe they could make it work somehow because there was nobody else. he had lost mikhail and he didn't have his family to fall back on and nick WAS there for him now and what if vitali would never meet anyone else ever??? what would he do then???
luckily he breaks off the engagement because vitali and nick getting married would've been disastrous for the whole city. i'm talking a category 20 divorce event that leaves 3 districts in nothing but ashes. everybody say thank you vitali for not getting married and also everybody say thank you vincent for showing vitali what a regular relationship looks like
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1 or 31 for the prompts perhaps.. if ur doing some writing if not no pressure :-) whoever u want it to be abt !! adore ur writing
jay you have no idea what you've done to me. i've wanted to do this to sparrow for Days Now and now i have an opportunity?!?!? anyways. when does this take place? idk, not canon that's for sure! but its been in my head so bad. TW for violence
~
Everything happened so fast.
It's been days of being on their own- Nick is starting to grow tired of it. Admitting that they don't know where their dads are is frustrating, and besides, even with the growing abilities they've all manifested... well, it's dangerous here, isn't it?
Case in point: there is a man standing in front of them with a sword lit ablaze in a way that would be so fucking cool if he weren't pointing it threateningly at them, a group of five scared kids.
(Well, three scared kids and two very unimpressed twins. Nick doesn't know if he should admire their guts or be horrifically afraid for them).
"Listen, you seem like decent kids," the man says, the sword still pointed at them. His buddy is a giant of a man who sneers with teeth far too large to be fully human, hefting an equally-terrifying axe. "But you're not supposed to be here, and you've seen too much! Unfortunately, that means you gotta get axed, if you know what I mean."
"We'd like to see you try," Lark sneers in return, and the fight begins.
Nick is... still woefully unused to fighting in actual combat scenarios. While the twins and eventually Grant and even Terry took to fighting pretty quickly, he'd rather use the magic he's found himself growing more and more fond of to protect himself and his teammates, acting on the sidelines instead of charging straight in.
This is the case here as he taps his drumsticks to his belt, humming a quick melody to boost Grant as he lunges with his own axe, stepping around Terry as he focuses intensely on his stupid spellbook, flipping through the pages.
Lark and Sparrow move in tangent, per the usual. Where Lark swings with his dagger in hand, Sparrow is ducking around, casting vines at the guy's feet and flinging drops of dark liquid in his face. They're always so fun to watch, if only because they always seem to know what the other is doing.
For a moment, Nick feels guilty for only watching them when Grant is taking on the axeman in one-on-one combat. "Terry," he starts to say, his own brows furrowing as he tries to recall something, anything that might help him in this fight. "Maybe you should-"
There's a horrid squelch that cuts him off. The leader is grinning smugly, and he pulls his sword back. "One down," he gloats, and Lark shrieks.
Nick watches in horror as Sparrow crumples to the ground.
No time for thinking. "Protect them!" he yells vaguely in Terry's direction, and then he's diving forwards, his hands glowing. He might not know what to do in combat, but Sparrow had been... had been helping him with healing spells. So that I'm not the only one who can help the others, he had said, and at the time they had laughed because they'd never get hurt enough that healing them all would drain Sparrow, would they?
Lark is still fighting, a dark look in his eyes as he roars in fury, shoves back against the leader. He hasn't had a moment to catch his breath, let alone drop to the ground to check on his twin: even he knew that would be suicide at this point, which would be pointless. Instead, he directs the fight to ten, fifteen, twenty feet away, giving Nick the space to drop next to Sparrow's crumpled form.
It's bad. Nick forces past the smell of burnt flesh, shrugs his own jacket off of his shoulders - it's the only thing he can think of to use, it can be washed later! - and gingerly places a hand on Sparrow's shoulder. "This is going to hurt," he says, "probably."
Sparrow's eyes are half-lidded, dazed. He doesn't even wince when Nick wraps the jacket around him, pressing it carefully against the wound. His breathing is short and jagged, and there are tears trailing down his face slowly- it's horrible.
"Hey, hey, Sparrow, look at me," Nick whispers, and he summons his magic to his hands again, pressing one gingerly to where his jacket has started to stain dark red on Sparrow's back, holding him in place. "You're okay, see? I've got you."
Sparrow inhales, and then exhales in a shuddering sigh, and he allows Nick to pull him into his arms entirely. "The fight," he says- his voice comes out no louder than a whisper. "The others..."
Nick spares a glance upwards. Terry has finally joined the fight, and Grant defeated the axeman so all three of them are focused on the leader now.
"Don't look at them," he finally says in return, and he forces a smile, gritting his teeth as the first healing spell ends and Sparrow looks no better than before, his chest and back both bleeding still, his face rapidly losing color. "Look at me. This is what you taught me for, right?"
Sparrow's breath is wheezing now, his inhales short and raspy, his eyes glazing over. Nick's own heart beats harder and harder in his chest, and he wills another healing spell to his fingers, pressing down harder. Work, he pleads, come on, work!
"You're not dying on me today," he whispers. "Lark would kill me, and then we're both dead and what for? So... so don't give up yet. Stay with me."
Slowly, miraculously, the bleeding slows to a stop. Nick's jacket is probably ruined, but he doesn't even care if it means Sparrow's not on the verge of death anymore. At least now he can be fixed.
The sound of combat, too, slows to a stop, and then Lark is crouching next to them, his face full of fear for the first time since Nick met him. "Sparrow," he gasps, his voice strangled and also so fearful.
"Careful, he's lost a lot of blood, but the wound is mostly healed, I think?" Nick carefully peels away the jacket, revealing burnt skin and half-cauterized flesh and an incision that has only barely healed over. "I don't have much juice left in me for another healing spell, but I can try."
Lark nods, but he's not focused on Nick at all, instead taking Sparrow's hand in his own and squeezing it. "This will not be your end, brother," he says, his voice wobbling dangerously. "Now that the enemies have been defeated, Terry and Grant can find stronger healing magic for you in their supplies."
It feels like ages pass in that moment. Sparrow curled up in his arms is something Nick has been stupidly dreaming about for too long now, but not like this- not when Sparrow's breathing is still wrong, and he's so pale, trembling from the blood loss, and Lark refuses to let go of his hand, and he has a couple of nasty cuts himself that he glares at Nick for mentioning.
Eventually, though, Grant and Terry come into view, each holding vials. "We tested them," Terry explains, and he snorts, shaking his head. "I can't believe we got so lucky- the idea that they'd have healing potions on them was so far-fetched!"
"Give them here!" Lark demands, and he reaches up to snatch the vial right out of Terry's hands, immediately leaning over Sparrow to carefully let the potion drop into his mouth.
It... works. Sparrow's breathing evens out, and the wound fades a little more.
He still doesn't wake up, and his color is still too pale for Nick's liking, but he's alive and not in danger of dying anymore, and even Lark breathes a sigh of relief, still clutching his hand.
For the first time since he watched Sparrow get impaled by an actual flaming sword, Nick allows himself to slump forwards, holding Sparrow to his chest still, marveling in how he can feel each breath, each movement. I almost lost him, he realizes, his own breath sharpening into a violent inhale. Fuck.
When Sparrow wakes, Nick promises himself that he'll... confess feelings, or do something stupid, and maybe learn some actual combat spells so he's not so useless in the future.
For now? As Lark whispers reassurances to Sparrow quietly and Grant dutifully cleans up the area and Terry sets up the barest bones of a shelter... Nick sighs, and combs through Sparrow's hair, and thanks the stars and heavens that he had healing spells in the first place.
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The Language of Flowers WIP #1
She always looked his way. Nick could see it from the corner of his mechanical eye. Always passing him glances with an unreadable expression, something between anger and disgust, if he had to guess by her constantly furrowed brows. Nothing unusual for him, really. He had gotten used to it long ago, but something about that look in her grassy eyes sent a shiver down his titanium spine. It was like her eyes were glowing, too, like his. They were so full of life, yet so dead. Those scarred lips opened and told sweet lies, uncomfortable truths and spouted hypocrisy like psalms.
This case would be the end of him, he knew deep inside. In one way or the other, somewhere along the way. Torn to bits and pieces he would be, like his breathren, burned to ash and left for dead himself, like she was. His heart would break and she would be the reason, and the cure. He would kill, and kill, and kill, until he'd choke and suffocate on the blood.
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Nick didn’t exactly ‘dream’ like a human, or a 3rd gen Synth would. It was more so memories that his wires and circuits for brains replayed. Still, it was close enough for him. He didn’t exactly have another choice, having been stuck like that for over a century now, barely a decent copy of a long dead man from before the Great War. It felt like his very existence was mocking that man. An abomination of science. A disgrace to Mother Nature.
Those dreams haunted him still, even after all that time. It didn’t happen every time he ran a diagnostic, luckily, but whenever it did it sent him for a loop anew. Vague flashes of a life never his; childhood days spent in the sun, his first kiss behind a school dumpster, misty faces posing as parents, a fiancé not his own, cigarettes and bourbon that didn’t taste so stale yet. Never enough to really do anything with. Always taunting him.
This time it was Jenny again; she was resting on his naked chest, in the nude herself, arms draped lazily over his middle. A little snore would slips past her lips occasionally, and he’d chuckle every single time, the movement making her shake a little. The heady smell of sex was still thick in the air, now accompanied by her favourite soap and his cigarettes. The buzz of his orgasm was just wearing off as the sun started to go down, leaving the sky orange and pink. Nick sighed and brushed a few loose stands from Jenny’s face, a smile on his lips. The evening light always painted her face in such a beautiful way, like a maestro’s painting, like only the finest art. But, to him, no mortal man could capture such beauty with a mere brush and paint. Nobody could capture those high cheek bones, those rosy lips, that soft, shining hair and those big brown deer eyes, and those thin lines resting on their edges.
This was a pleasant dream, nothing like some of the others; heartbreak and workplace injuries, the day Jenny was taken from the world and from him. It was one he didn’t want to leave again. Nick was content to simply ‘sleep’ for a while longer, maybe just a few hours, and truly rest, in the embrace of someone he trusted. Or, rather, he thought he trusted her. It wasn’t like he actually ever knew Jenny, not really. He wasn’t Nick Valentine. So how could he even love someone he didn’t actually know?
“-ck… Nick…” a voice whispered, lulling him gently out of his synthetic sleep, but he didn’t stir. These memories were too pleasant.
“Nick…” firmer this time. Still, he didn’t react. Not yet.
“Nick. Nick!”
The synth detective startled awake, his diagnostics cut off immediately with a sharp stabbing pain in his head. His ‘brain’ sent him all sorts of errors and warning messages that he chose to ignore, for now, with a resounding groan, cupping his temple. His optics needed a moment to come back online, but he recognized Ellie by her voice.
“I’m sorry, Nick-” Ellie started, pity painting her face, clearly feeling some guilt for ripping him out of his ‘sleep”, “but Garvey called in on the HAM. He needs you at Sanctuary right away.”
Nick sighed, sitting up properly from the bed. The 3rd call this month alone, “another missing persons case?”
“Yeah. Kid this time, and his dad. Didn’t return from a trip to a nearby settlement. No trace of them,” Ellie informed him with a sombre expression. Raiders, Gunners, maybe even some wild animals, Nick guessed. Not a rare occurrence at all, but that didn’t make it any less tragic. One got get used to it, however.
“Not even Dogmeat?”
“He’s gone with Nate. In Goodneighbor, according to Garvey.”
Another sigh, “alright. Can you call Hancock and tell him to send Nate and Dogmeat to Sanctuary?”
Ellie nodded, heading back upstairs, “done.”
“Thank you, Ellie,” Nick said with a wave. The synth heard her call into Goodneighbor as he strolled back into the main room to grab his hat and coat. The dim light in the agency made him a little groggy, but at least he no longer had any stray boxes to stumble over or case files to slip on anymore, not since Ellie and Nate really hounded him to properly clean up his space and fix his furniture. He checked his coat pockets – a pack of cigarettes, his lighter, and another pack of ammo. Then he tapped at his ribs – his gun was holstered in place. As it always was – he never took it off. He was set. By sundown Nick would be at Sanctuary, and at daybreak he could start his search, hopefully with Dogmeat by his side.
“Alright Ellie, I’m going out. Don’t know when I’ll be back, but I’ll call when I’m at Sanctuary,” Nick yelled. Ellie bade him farewell and to stay safe, and he set off with an ache in his heart, feeling like he had just lost someone important again.
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Nick exhaled, shakily, ragged, put a hand over his mouth, fingers digging into his cheek and jaw, then bit his knuckles, mind and processors racing with a million unasked and unanswered questions, a million possibilities. He already knew he couldn’t say no. Not with so many lives on the line, not with people like that running around the Commonwealth and threatening the safety of the innocent. The look she was giving him burned, it itched, it stung, it hurt. Deep inside, on his skin, under his skin, everywhere at once. This was dangerous. This person was dangerous. The people she wanted to maim and hang were dangerous. And once again his sense of duty and conscience got the better of the soft-hearted detective.
“How many are there?”
“Plenty. A whole legion, maybe. They travel in small groups. Have a big one somewhere nearby.”
He wagged his finger as he eyed the notebook again, “how many did you already take out?”
“Each fingerprint is one.”
Counted, and counted, and counted, and counted, and counted again until he got dizzy and shut it again, “you’ve been busy.”
He got to twenty-two before stopping, inhaled deeply and closed his eyes.
“They always come back, like roaches. They’ve figured out someone is on their tail.”
A cigarette was lit and put between his lips, fingers crossed on his metal desk, “what’s your plan?”
Everything in him screamed and wailed; stop! This is wrong! Blood money is trouble!
Yet he couldn’t look away, ignore her words and the clear tone of her voice, “have the little roaches lead us back to the nest and take out the big guys.”
It would be the end of him, he knew deep inside. In one way or the other, somewhere along the way. Torn to bits and pieces he would be, burned to ash and left for dead himself. “How many caps?”
“As many as you want. I got plenty to spare.”
“This is going to cost you. A lot.”
“In that case,” Darcy started, rising up from her seat, “I can offer other services.”
There was something in her eyes, or maybe he was just imagining it, the way she looked at him. It was a wicked kind of expression. The detective cringed, his metal jaw creaking and face twisted so harshly he nearly dropped the burning cigarette between his lips. He pushed away from the desk, “I don’t take that kind of payment.”
“Not what I was implying,” the other said with a sour expression. Disgust. “You help me, I help you. Quid pro quo. One hand washes the other – we all need someone to watch our backs out in the wasteland. I can do that for you while you solve your cases.”
A sigh of relief, “you should have just said that. Maybe I could teach you some social cues, too.”
“Maybe you should get your mind out of the gutter. It’s slimy.”
His left eye twitched, just slightly. For a moment Nick regretted inviting her in.
“Do you want my help or not?” mild irritation laced his voice. Darcy frowned.
An outstretched hand, just like when they first met. No hesitation. When Nick grasped it it was just as warm and soft again, pliable in his own iron grip, “eight o’clock sharp. We just got another case in this evening. Ellie will fill you in.”
With a nod Darcy grabbed her coat and backpack, headed for the door but Nick stopped her, “oh, and one more thing – keep your caps for now.”
She turned to look at him, neutral expression, for a few seconds, then left. Moments later a groan ripped from his chest, face buried in his palms.
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