Drew lay there in the small side room by the office and stared up at the ceiling high above him. He was thinking over the day’s events and it was strange to think about how much had happened in such a short time.

With Gemma and Neka needing a place to sleep, they had cleared out the majority of the two rooms downstairs and Drew had even swept the floors. It wasn’t perfect but Drew hoped it was good enough for the two to get a good night’s sleep.

He would be lying if he said he didn’t feel bad for them. They didn’t have a mattress, even a lumpy one that smelled bad like the one he was currently laying on. No, all they had was the cold hard floor. They had told him it was fine and they were used to it, but he wanted to figure something out that would increase their comfort.

Unable to sleep and with his throat starting to feel dry, Drew climbed out of bed and made his way down to the cafeteria to grab a cold drink from the water cooler.

With the purified water in hand, he started back towards the stairs, but instead of heading up, he decided to go down into the basement instead. He wanted to check on Gemma to make sure there weren’t any problems that had arisen.

The stairs seemed a lot longer and steeper than he remembered, as was the corridor that followed. He rubbed his eyes, putting it down to being tired. He knew he should be in bed, but he couldn’t keep Gemma out of his mind.

The truth was, while he knew she was probably asleep, he hoped she wasn’t. They had been apart for so long and now that she was here he felt like he had to be close to her, not sleeping upstairs so far away.

With apprehension, he made his way to Gemma’s room and lightly tapped on the double door that led to the old storage room. There was no response, which he had anticipated considering the time of night. As he turned to leave, though, the doors opened and he glanced back to see Gemma’s massive form standing there in the doorframe, though she seemed oddly smaller than he remembered. Or was it that the doorframe was larger? Something seemed off about the scale and he couldn’t place his finger on it.

“Oh, uh sorry for disturbing you,” he said, deciding that it was probably just his imagination.

She smiled down at him. “Come on in,” she said, stepping back away from the doors before sitting down in the middle of the room.

Drew made his way inside. “Sorry for not having anything for you to lay on.”

“I’ve told you, we’re used to sleeping on the floor.”

He grabbed a chair from the side and sat on it, resting his hands on his knees. That was when he realized he had misplaced his glass of water, though he couldn’t remember putting it down anywhere. He shrugged it off and once again put it down to being overly tired and focused back on Gemma.

“We haven’t really had time to talk,” Drew said as he leaned forward. “At least not just the two of us.”

“Want a heart-to-heart?”

“Yeah,” he said wistfully. “Things have been tough, really tough. I’ve thought about you often. I have dreams about you, about us. Dreams where we’re back together. Dreams where you were alive back before I knew you were alive. I dreamed about going on dates, stargazing, and even the stuff that came after.”

Gemma smiled at him. It was a pleasant smile, just like the one she used to have. “So have I,” she said. “Since seeing you I’ve been having these thoughts. These feelings. They’re strong feelings. Very strong feelings.”

“Things have been so complicated. I’ve really missed you, Gem. I really miss being together and I miss all those things we used to do.”

Tears started to swell in his eyes as he tried to hold back his emotions. He wasn’t the type to cry in front of others but it was so overwhelming he wasn’t sure he could stop it.

“I felt so lost,” he said, wiping his eyes before taking a sip from his glass of water. “I felt like I’d failed you.”

Gemma held out her arms wide, inviting him in for a hug. He took it and felt her strong arms as they wrapped around him, pressing him against her bountiful chest.

“I’m so sorry this happened to you,” he cried. “I wish it had happened to me instead.”

“Don’t be sorry,” she said softly, almost sounding like she used to when she was human. “This is who I am now. Am I really so grotesque.?”

“Never!” he yelled. “You’ll never be grotesque to me. No matter what.”

He looked up at her and she looked back down. She was still beautiful to him and he felt like he needed to prove that. With some effort, he pushed himself up onto his toes and kissed her on the mouth. For a moment, she seemed surprised before she returned it, pressing her lips against his.

“I love you,” he said. “I’ll always love you.”

Her obscenely long tongue rolled out of her mouth and she licked his face, covering it in saliva.

“You taste good.”

Drew licked her snout. “So do you,” he said back.

She let out a laugh and he joined in. He felt the sadness and sorrow melt away as they were replaced by a need and a want that he hadn’t felt since Gemma had been stolen away by the super mutants.

Gemma stuck out her tongue and probed it down his front towards his crotch. He let out a gasp as the strong muscle massaged his manhood through his pants. In response he grabbed her massive breasts in his palms before he went in with his mouth and tongue, sucking and licking her left nipple.

“I want you,” Gemma whispered huskily.

“And I want you, too,” Drew said right back.

“You’re growing hard,” she said before her tongue once more probed his crotch.

“It could be these massive tits of yours. They are incredible.

“So it has nothing to do with my tongue?”

“Oh, there’s that as well.”

“I want to see you naked.”

Eagerly, Drew stepped away and without missing a beat, he dropped his pants then took off his shirt, casting them aside. Gemma’s eyes stared down hungrily at his raging hard cock. His body was ready and waiting.

She grinned at him, licking her lips. “You want to see what this tongue can do?”

He nodded eagerly as she got down onto her hands and knees, her insanely long tongue once more rolling out of her mouth. Then she licked him from groin to neck, her powerful tongue almost lifting him off his feet.

“Like that?” she asked as she sat up and puffed out her chest, making her already huge tits look even bigger.

“I loved that and I love the view,” he said as he gawked at the incredible sight.

“I’m glad you’re enjoying the view,” she said. “Now show me just how much you like it.” Her eyes drifted down to his cock. “Cum on me.”

He gripped his dick in his hand and started to jerk himself off as he gazed at the incredible view. Pleasuring himself to a deathclaw even if it did have tits wasn’t something he thought he’d ever do, but this was Gemma, and no matter the form, she was still beautiful to him.

“Stop, I want to fuck you,” Gemma said, just as he was starting to feel a familiar rise in his loins.

“I want to fuck you, too,” he said as he stepped over to her.

She leaned back. “Fuck me!”

He grabbed her knees and moved in, only to stop when he gazed at her smooth featureless crotch.

“Fuck me, please!” she begged.

Drew felt the mood shift as he continued his search for her womanhood. He couldn’t see it, in fact, he couldn’t see anything.

“Why aren’t you fucking me?” she asked, sounding upset. “Fine, if you won’t fuck me, then I’ll fuck you.”

She stood up suddenly, knocking him to the floor in the process. He hit the floor hard, yet felt almost no pain. Things had gotten out of hand and yet he wasn't sure what to do to stop it. If she sat on him then it was likely she would kill him. She was ten feet of muscle fat and bone and there was no way his comparative puny body could hope to survive it.

"Gemma," he uttered after a few moments. "We need to stop. I can't take your weight."

She appeared to ignore him. "You could have been the one fucking me, but now I'm the one that's gonna fuck you!"

That was when she dropped. He gasped as what had to be a good few tons of flesh came rushing down towards him at lethal speeds.

She never made contact. instead, he found himself staring up at a dark ceiling.

He was back in the small side-room by the office laying on the old lumpy mattress.

“What the fuck was that?” he uttered out loud

He was covered in sweat and his heart was racing in his chest. He also had a raging boner, though it thankfully began to quickly grow soft.

After checking that he hadn’t made a mess of himself, he climbed out of bed and stepped into the dark office, sitting himself down on the old armchair. There he stared out of the large window out into the darkness beyond.

Drew couldn’t believe he’d had a sex dream about a Greenclaw, even if that Greenclaw happened to be Gemma. It felt strange, it felt wrong. She looked so bestial that it made him feel disgusted even thinking about it.

“Why?” he asked the void as he held his face in his hands.

Conflicted was how he felt. Loving an animal was wrong, but was she even an animal? She was a heavily mutated human that just happened to look like a deathclaw. Was it wrong to still love her?

Since first realizing that Ayma was Gemma, he’d gone back and forth as to whether there could still be something between them. He’d argued with himself to no end as to whether he wasn’t a freak for still having feelings for her.

“I can’t let her go,” he muttered to himself.

There had been nights where he’d laid awake wishing desperately that Gemma wasn’t dead. Hoping that one day she would turn up alive and well. He had never expected it to happen, let alone happen as it had.

Feeling parched, he decided to get up and head down to the cafeteria to grab a glass of water. This time, though, he gave himself a sharp pinch on the arm to make certain he was awake before he grabbed some purified water from the water cooler.

He sat down under the old humming strip lights and leaned on an old table as he nursed his drink. He wondered if he should go open the crate of wine they’d brought back from the Mega Stop and drink a bottle, but decided against it. Drinking had never helped in the past, it had only made him hurt more.

The main concern he had was how Amy and Jack would respond if they found out he was still madly in love with Gemma? Would they truly understand or would they be disgusted with him? He knew for a fact that if the roles were reversed he would be. He’d wonder what Jack or Amy could possibly be thinking, loving a wasteland monster.

They weren’t monsters, though. They were their friends and loved ones. It would be more monstrous to discard and abandon them after what they’d been through.

He lifted up the old cup and took a sip of water before resting it back on the table.

Did Gemma even still share his feelings? Back when Charlotte had been threatening to eat him, Kiki and Gemma had seemed to agree that there was room for him in their hearts, but had they meant that or was they just saying that in the hope that it would stop their leader from eating him? Even if they had meant it, he wasn’t sure he’d be happy sharing Gemma with Kiki. Even if he was, Kiki was so huge that he couldn’t see it working. There was also the fact that he found Kiki’s sheer size genuinely terrifying.

Kiki had always scared him, even back before the super mutants had attacked and dragged them away. Not because she was big, hostile, violent, or anything like that, but because of her advances towards him. Even though she knew he and Gemma were together, that didn’t stop her. In fact, she had suggested threesomes several times, and while he’d found the concept arousing, he’d been too scared to even consider it, let alone ask Gemma for her thoughts on it.

The truth was that if he had never met Gemma, then he and Kiki would have most certainly been a couple. Now it seemed that Kiki and Gemma were a couple and he honestly wished them well. As to whether he could be part of their relationship? Just the thought was enough to make his heart race.

Drew looked up from his cup as he heard the doors open. He saw Sarah step inside, only to stop when she noticed him.

“Oh, sorry,” she said. “I didn’t know anyone else was in here.”

“No need to be sorry,” he said, limply shrugging his shoulders.

“I came for some water,” she said.

“Same,” he said, holding up his mug.

She made her way over to the water cooler and grabbed a drink before sitting opposite him.

“Can’t sleep?” she asked.

“No,” he said.

“Same. Every sound I hear, I expect a green deathclaw to burst into my room and tear me to shreds.”

Despite knowing he shouldn’t, Drew couldn’t help but chuckle at that.

“How can you be comfortable with them here?” she asked.

“Because I know them,” he said. “They’re not violent, not really.”

His thoughts fell onto Charlotte and how she had wanted to eat him. He decided it was best not to mention it, not if he wanted any chance of Sarah warming up to their house guests.

“What were they like?” Sarah asked. “Before?”

“Normal,” he answered. “Gemma and I used to be together. She was kind, considerate.”

“Must be hard to see her like that.”

“Very hard,” he said. “She was the love of my life.”

“And now?”

Drew took a sip of his water before answering her question with another. “Is it messed up if I still love her?”

Sarah looked down at her own drink. “Yeah, I’d say it is. But I think I can understand. You knew her from before and love is a strong emotion. It’ll take time to get over her.”

“I’m not sure it’s gonna be that easy.”

“It’ll be tough.”

“You don’t understand,” he said, staring at the water in his mug. “I told her over and over that no matter what happened that I’d always be there for her and that I’d always love her. I promised her. Am I supposed to break that promise just because she’s a ten-foot green deathclaw?”

“You think you’re betraying her?” Sarah said.

“I don’t think I am, I know I am. That promise I made means nothing if I betray it.”

“You’re not betraying anything.”

“Yes, I am.” He drank the rest of his water and slammed the mug back down onto the table.

“I’m sorry,” Sarah offered. “This must be really difficult for you.”

“That is a gigantic fucking understatement!” he snapped. “I’m still in love with her and I don’t know if it’s even possible for us to be together.”

“It’s not,” Sarah put frankly. “She’s a ten-foot monster and you’re a human.”

He rested his hand on his heart. “She’s still human in here.”

“Maybe. But…” She paused as she shook her head. “I don’t know. I guess if you still love her… I don’t know. This is complicated.” She took a sip of water. “I don’t have any advice other than it would probably be best to forget what you had with her and move on. Anything else is immoral.”

Drew had no intention of doing any of that. He wasn’t going to betray his promise. If he did, then it had meant nothing when he had made it.

He shook his head as he focused back on Sarah. “How are you doing?”

“Not well,” she answered. “They scare the shit out of me.”

“It’s not their fault, you know. They were taken and changed against their will. It’s my duty to show them that they haven’t been abandoned. Like I did with Zachary.”

“Whose that?” Sarah asked.

Drew smiled wistfully. “A ghoul I used to know. Good man. Died when the Greenskins attacked Paulson. Others wanted him out of there, but I defended him. We needed him and he needed us.”

“I’ve heard about ghouls.”

That surprised him. Not the fact that she’d heard about them, but that she’d only heard about them. “You’ve never met a ghoul?”

“No. Not one that didn’t want to tear my skin off at least.”

“Well, they’re people who have been mutated by the radiation. Instead of dying, they become almost like rotting walking corpses, only they’re not actually rotting. Not in the usual sense. Then again, maybe they are. I don’t actually know. What I do know is that their skin flakes off in large chunks and they can be disgusting to look at, but they’re still people. Unless they turn feral that is. But you can usually tell when that’s gonna happen because they start to get really paranoid and they start losing their ability to speak coherently.”

Sarah looked saddened. “That sounds awful.”

“Yeah. Don’t get many ghouls out this way. Other than the Canadian town up north, but they’re all feral.”

“You sound like a good man,” she said. “Not many like you around these days. Gemma’s lucky to have known you.”

“Is she?”

She frowned. “Is she what?” she asked, sounding confused.

“Lucky?” he answered. “If it wasn’t for me, she, Jack, and Amy might have never ended up at Paulson. Gemma might still be human.”

“You can’t beat yourself up over it. It’s tragic, I get that, but it happened.”

“Why can’t I?”

Sarah looked at him with genuine sympathy. “If you still love her, then you have to tell her that.”

“I think she already knows.”

“You need to discuss it, just the two of you. You need to come to a conclusion of where you both want to go.”

“I thought you were against it?”

“Against you and Gemma resuming where you left off? Yeah, it’s disgusting if I’m honest.” She drank down the rest of her water. “But at the end of the day, it’s up to you and her. You’re both consenting adults and whether it makes me feel sick thinking about it is irrelevant.”

Drew stared at her for a moment. “That’s kinda open-minded in a completely closed-minded kinda way.”

“Just being honest. She could tear you to pieces completely by accident. They are powerful, fast and, deadly. Just remember that.”

“And you remember that they are friends and loved ones. You might see them as monsters, but I see them for what they were.”

Sarah didn’t seem convinced and she had every right not to be. It was difficult to look at Gemma’s reptilian face and see anything human. But her eyes told a different story. They were full of emotion and intelligence.

“They need protecting,” he said standing up. “And I plan on protecting them.”

“I doubt they need protecting from anything.”

He shook his head. “They are not invincible, especially not when it comes to their emotions. They’re still people and they’ve gone through unimaginable trauma. It’s up to me to help them.”

“Us,” Sarah said, her eyes full of sadness. “You’re right. They have been through a lot of trauma and while I’m still terrified of them, I’ll try to help if I can.”

He smiled. “Maybe you can get past your prejudices after all.”

“It’s not a prejudice to fear a predator.”

“Maybe,” he accepted. “Thanks for listening.”

“Always, Drew.”

He made his way out of the cafeteria and briefly considered going down to see Gemma but decided against it. He would have plenty of opportunity tomorrow and he was going to make the most of it.

She deserved better and he planned on helping her in any and every way he could. In his mind, there was no other choice. At least none that he could live with.