Author's Note:

Welcome to my story! I realize that there are quite a few Female Soul Survivor/MacCready pairing stories floating around out there but I do hope you enjoy mine. This is loosely based on a combination of my various Fallout 4 play-throughs (with minor canon-divergence). This is my first time ever uploading anything I've written for public viewing, so I'm anxious to hear what you guys think! Praise and constructive criticism are welcomed and appreciated! Some of the dialogue is taken from game and does not belong to me. Thanks and I'll leave you to it...

Preface

"I'm a phallus in pigtails

And there's blood on my nose

And my tissue is rotting

Where the rats chew my bones

And my eye sockets empty

See nothing but pain

I keep having this brainstorm

About twelve times a day

So now you could spend the morning walking with me

Quite amazed

As I'm unwashed

And somewhat slightly dazed"

Unwashed and Somewhat Slightly Dazed– David Bowie

Chapter 1

Running Gun Blues

"I count the corpses on my left

I find I'm not so tidy

So I better get away

Better make it today

I've cut twenty-three down since Friday

But I can't control it

My face is drawn

My instinct still emotes it"

Running Gun Blues-David Bowie

Lydia inhaled another drag of her cigarette. She was mostly getting filter at this point, but it wouldn't do to be wasteful. Cigarettes, along with everything else, were a rare luxury in the apocalypse. The smoke spent, she dropped the butt on the ground and stubbed it out with the toe of her boot.

Dusk was falling over Diamond City. Lydia pushed herself away from the wall of the Dugout Inn and slowly made her way through the city toward its gate. The merchants were all beginning to close up shop for the night. She quickened her pace as she neared the newspaper stand, hoping to avoid another conversation with the nosy reporter.

Lydia was halfway up the ramp out of the city when she heard hurried steps on the metal behind her.

"Hey, Blue! Wait up!"

Shit. Lydia cursed internally and rolled her eyes. She turned to face Piper, displeasure evident on her face. "I asked you not to call me that," Lydia hissed, glancing around to make sure nobody had overheard. She wasn't keen on the idea of people finding out that she'd just crawled out of a vault. Being a "vaultie" was generally seen as being weak out in the Commonwealth and not something you'd want to brag about openly.

Piper held up her hands in a show of surrender. "Sorry," she began, "I'm just-"

"Still not interested in an interview, Piper," Lydia snapped at the other woman.

"Hey, I was just coming to offer you some advice before you go waltzing out into the dark on a suicide mission," she retorted.

Lydia ran a hand through her dark hair and let out an exasperated sigh. "Alright, what is it?"

"I've heard, through the grapevine, that you're going out to rescue Nick Valentine. I've also heard that he's being kept in that old subway station that's filled to the brim with Triggermen."

"And?" Lydia raised an eyebrow, growing increasingly impatient with the reporter.

Piper adjusted the press cap on her head and continued. "It's just, that's probably not a situation you'd want to go into alone, you know? Might be helpful to have someone to watch your back? I could come along, if you're interested."

Lydia didn't necessarily dislike the reporter, and while she could admit to herself that it would be helpful to have another gun along, she definitely didn't want Piper around absorbing everything that was said once she did manage to find the detective.

"I appreciate the offer, but I'd rather do this alone, Piper."

The reporter nodded her understanding. Lydia turned to go but Piper caught her arm. "I get it, you don't want me nosing around. But you really shouldn't do this alone," she protested. "There's a rumor going around Goodneighbor that a merc for hire has set up shop down in the bar over there. The Third Rail. Might be worth checking into. If you want to live, you know," Piper shrugged. She turned and made her way back down the ramp towards the building that served as her home and office.

"I'll think about it!" Lydia called after her. The reporter raised her hand in acknowledgement and disappeared into Publick Occurrences.

Lydia turned and continued her path toward the city's exit.

The guard on gate duty eyed her as she approached, his hand hovering over the button that would open the door to the ruins of Boston. "Sure you want to go out there after dark?" he asked.

"Just open the gate, please," Lydia replied.

The guard punched the button and the gate began to rise with a groan. "Your funeral," he muttered.

Lydia ignored him, ducking out under the large gate before it had opened completely.

A few moments later she heard the gears turning, closing her out in the darkness as the gate made its descent.

As Lydia crept through the rubble that was downtown Boston (now known simply as "The Commonwealth") she was grateful for the silence. Well, relative silence, anyway. There were always the random sounds of gunshots that rang out through the broken buildings, sometimes distant, sometimes not. While it may not have been considered "safe" to be out wandering in the dark, there really was no place that was safe. Not anymore.

Lydia had emerged from Vault 111 just a month earlier, into a world where chaos reigned. Every day was a battle. A battle for resources. A battle for food. A battle for survival in general. This new life was hard.

And Lydia loved it.

Growing up, Lydia had always been a withdrawn child. She preferred her own company and a good book. She'd always been fascinated by end-of-the-world thrillers, so waking up from a two-hundred year cryo sleep into the apocalypse was an extreme thrill. In spite of the fact that she was on a mission to find her kidnapped son, she was secretly having a great time.

In addition to the knowledge she'd gained from reading, Lydia's father had been what they'd called a "prepper" and he'd schooled his daughter well. From a young age, Lydia had been taught how to survive in many different situations. In her time that wasn't spent reading, she was on the gun range learning to shoot, in the woods learning to build a shelter, at the river learning to catch and clean fish. Lydia had often thought her father quite paranoid, especially after the multiple times he had run his daughter through training exercises. Making her dress fake wounds over and over until she got it right, making her take apart and clean her guns in record time, making her memorize and recall different plants and what their useful properties were. He'd been relentless. Waking up to the apocalypse, however, had made her increasingly grateful for the rigorous training she'd been forced through.

Lydia was brought back to the present by a low moan coming from her left. She ducked behind a rusted mailbox and un-holstered her pistol. Peering out of her hiding place, her suspicions were confirmed.

Ferals. Great.

Three that she could see, shambling along in an old cemetery across the street from where she hid. Her view of the cemetery was limited though, as a large city bus sat in the middle of the street in front of her. She sat hunched behind the mailbox for a few more minutes, watching for more to emerge. She knew that often there would be a few live ones lying in wait.

Lydia debated throwing a grenade over the top of the bus into the cemetery to try taking them all out at once, but ultimately decided against it. Even if she did manage to take them all out with an explosion, she'd likely end up alerting other unwanted parties to her presence. No, the best bet was to stay low and move quietly, try to sneak by them. Lydia took a deep breath and slowly snuck out from her hiding place. Keeping one eye on the ground in front of her and the other on the roaming ghouls, she crept down the street.

This was the reason that Lydia preferred the darkness for traveling. Darkness provided shadows. While Lydia wasn't necessarily afraid of a fight, and had excellent combat and weapon skills, she preferred to avoid it when she could. Not fighting was the best way to stay alive.

Lydia made it past the ghouls with ease, but realized a few blocks later that she was heading in the opposite direction from the subway station that would take her to where Detective Valentine was being held captive.

Fuck, she silently cursed, ducking into a boarded-up doorway and bringing up the map on her Pip-boy. She had taken a wrong turn somewhere. She fiddled with the dials and moved the map picture around on the little screen. The coordinates that marked Goodneighbor on the map were only another few blocks from where she was. Remembering Piper's suggestion about the mercenary for hire, Lydia decided that she may as well go check him out while she was so close. Might be good to have another gun with her when she confronted the Triggermen. Or someone to draw the gunfire away from her, at the very least.

Mind made up, Lydia headed down the road that would take her to Goodneighbor.