Rachel Adams blinked herself awake, rubbing her green eyes blearily before groping for the Pip-Boy she had laid on the bedside table. Glancing at its glowing green display screen, she saw that it was almost nine in the morning, which was a little earlier than she'd hoped for considering that she had only gone to sleep a few hours beforehand, after returning home from an overly-long scavenger hunt which had only resulted in a few bags of stringy mole-rat meat and some spare scraps of metal. Not exactly worth the amount of effort she'd put into it, but she supposed she had to take what she could get.
"Wakey-wakey, Blue," came an amused voice. Standing in the doorway of the bedroom was the Commonwealth's most intrepid (and at this point possibly only) reporter, Piper Wright. "Got your morning pick-me-up ready and waiting right here, doll-face." She offered Rachel one of the two mugs she was carrying, and Rachel dragged herself off the bed and took the mug gladly. She knew exactly what it was - cheap, pungent coffee that tasted like it had been roasted in a crematorium - but she never began her day without it (or at least she did whenever they could find a stash of it, anyway). These days any kind of mundane ritual was something to be treasured.
"Thank you," she said gratefully before she took a sip and the ashen, bitter flavour crossed her tongue. "Just what the doctor ordered."
Piper smiled, and kissed Rachel on the lips. "You're welcome. Good morning to you too."
"So what do you feel like doing today?"
Piper sighed, suddenly looking a little disappointed. "Yeah… about that - I just ran into Preston, and he told me to tell you he needs to speak to you about something whenever you're up and about."
"Wow, you sure know how to make a girl feel special, Pipes," Rachel laughed. "Thanks anyway - I'll talk to him after I've washed up. Whatever it is, though, I'm sure I won't like it."
"Heavy is the head that wears the crown, huh?" Piper said. "Just remember, you agreed to all of this, so you have nobody to blame but yourself, Blue."
"I know, I know," Rachel replied, sensing defeat. "I made my bed and now I have to lie in it." She sighed. "It's just… sometimes I wish that those goddamn Super Mutants would take a day off once in a while, you know?"
"Well, you know what they say - time and Super Mutants wait for no man. Better get out there… General," Piper said with a lopsided smile.
"You know, it's weird enough when Preston calls me that," Rachel replied, pursing her lips. "When you say it, it's just uncomfortable."
"Mission accomplished," Piper said, before she pointed at the door. "Now finish your coffee, stop stalling, and be the leader I know you are."
"Okay, okay, I know when I'm beaten," Rachel said with a shrug. Getting up off the bed, she swigged the last of her coffee down in one gulp, quickly dressed herself in a t-shirt and jeans and clipped her Pip-Boy closed around her left forearm, then made her way into the bathroom and rubbed the condensation off the cracked mirror so she could make herself look at least presentable for the day. She rinsed her hands in the basin full of collected rain-water and then ran them through her short, jet-black hair so that it felt a little less chaotic, tucking most of it behind her ears and leaving two cheek-length bangs.
Time to put your game face on, she thought. Taking a deep breath, she opened the door of her house and headed out into the sunlight. It was harsher than she had initially thought, with only a sparse covering of cloud to obscure it. Squinting until her eyes had adjusted, she glanced over to where she heard Preston Garvey's voice as he directed some of his Minutemen towards the turret-ringed garrison posts at the edge of the settlement, and then headed towards him, calling out his name as she did so. When she had got close enough, Preston tipped his hat to her respectfully and greeted her with a simple "Good morning, General."
"Hey, Preston," Rachel replied, still trying to blink away the sunlight a little. "Piper tells me you have something to talk to me about?"
"Afraid so, General," Preston said, "and it's not good news. Some of our scouts found some pretty scary stuff in at least three ruined settlements to the north." He reached into his knapsack and then held out his hand. Clutched in it was a bloody, tattered pennant with a crudely-embroidered emblem on it, which Rachel recognised as the symbol of the Children of Atom.
"The Children of Atom? What could they have been doing there?" she asked.
"We're not sure," Preston said. "The settlements were picked clean of anything useful and we found a lot of melted radiation weapons, but we didn't see any bodies. Either the Children were really thorough in policing up the casualties, or they took those settlers alive." He shuddered. "Whatever they did, this can't be a coincidence - it seems like a coordinated attack, and the Children aren't exactly known for their coordination. This is uncharted territory, and I'm not sure I like it."
"Me neither," Rachel said, as an all-too-familiar ache settled triumphantly at the base of her skull, "but I think I need to speak with Elder Maxson about this."
"Maxson?" Preston raised an eyebrow. "What could he have to say?"
"It's not so much what he has to say as what he might do," Rachel explained. "If this is what I think it is, then I need to make sure Maxson doesn't deploy any Brotherhood soldiers just yet - or worse, let Liberty Prime loose again. The last thing the Commonwealth needs right now is another war." She paused. "I'll need some time to do some repairs on my power armour, though. Can't be visiting my commanding officer without looking my best, right?"
"I guess I can't argue with that," Preston admitted with a half-smile. "I know I always try to keep my jacket looking its best just to impress my general."
Rachel laughed despite herself. "As you should, soldier. I'll see you later." With that, she turned on her heel and headed back to her and Piper's house, her mind bubbling over with ideas of what she could possibly say to Maxson that would avert disaster. After the way that the Brotherhood had cracked open the Institute and then disembowelled it so ruthlessly that nothing was left but a smoking crater, she had no doubts whatsoever that they would be equally merciless towards any military forces other than their own - even if that military force was composed simply of crazed, emaciated humans clad only in ragged, dirty robes and face-paint, wielding nothing but rusty blades and cobbled-together, poorly-maintained weaponry. Then again, having seen how the Children had terrorised Far Harbor just with their mere presence, she supposed they shouldn't be taken lightly either. One thing was for sure, though: she would need to speak with High Confessor Tektus too. DiMA's synth puppet or not, he had to know something about this.
This is going to be fun, she thought bitterly as she pushed open her house's rickety wooden front door.
The sight that greeted her when she walked through the doorway was oddly comforting in its familiarity. As often happened in the mornings, Nat and Shaun were fighting over the contents of the last jug of fresh brahmin milk.
"Mom! Nat won't let me have the milk!" Shaun cried. "She took it and now she won't give it back!"
"I need it more than you!" Nat snorted. "You haven't even poured out your breakfast yet! I have!" She pointed to her bowl, which was already full almost to the brim with Sugar Bombs. "See?" She looked up at Rachel, clearly hoping that she would side with her. Rachel shrugged.
"Nat's got a point, Shaun," she said. "You'll have to wait until Auntie Cait does some more milking - she shouldn't be too long now."
"But Mom -"
"No more arguments, please," Rachel snapped, cutting Shaun off mid-sentence. "Now say sorry to your sister."
"Sorry, Nat," Shaun mumbled, a sullen glower settling across his face in defeat.
"So she can hear you, Shaun," Rachel chided him sternly. Clearly stung by her scolding, Shaun repeated his apology, this time in a more audible voice. When he had done so Rachel continued "Good boy. Now I don't want to hear another word about this, is that clear?" Shaun opened his mouth as if he wanted to press the issue, but Rachel held up her hand to silence him. "Not. One. Word. Are we clear?" Shaun's mouth snapped shut and he sank down in his seat, his expression as dark as an overcast sky, while Nat happily began tucking into her breakfast. Rachel resolved to make it up to him later, perhaps by taking him fishing or hunting. She still had a few tricks up her sleeve that Nate had taught her when the rationing started to pinch - being able to catch their own food helped them survive - thrive, even - and kept their larder more stocked than their neighbours. She knew how to construct a sturdy snare and find the right bait for the right fish, she knew how to gut and clean a carcass, and she knew how to determine what the best parts of an animal were - and it was those things she wanted to pass on to her children more than just weapons training and hand-to-hand combat practice. She'd have plenty of opportunities for the latter two things, after all.
Heading back towards her and Piper's room, she knocked gently on the door. "Hey, Pipes? You decent in there?"
"As much as I can be," Piper replied. "Come on in." When Rachel had closed the door behind her, Piper finished pulling her t-shirt down over her pale stomach and continued "So what did Preston have to say?"
Rachel took a deep breath. "The Children of Atom are on the move," she said. "Preston thinks they're massing for war."
The colour drained from Piper's face almost instantly and she covered her mouth with her hands. "Oh, God."
"That's what I thought you might say. I need to go visit Elder Maxson at the airport - maybe we can shut this down before anybody gets seriously hurt."
"Still optimistic, even after all this time?" Piper said, one corner of her mouth tugging itself upwards in spite of the gravity of the situation. She brushed one hand briefly against Rachel's cheek, her almost imperceptibly-soft touch making Rachel's skin tingle. "That's my Blue." She paused suddenly, a flash of inspiration crossing her face. "Wait, what about High Confessor Tektus? Shouldn't he be the first person you talk to?"
"Confessor Tektus is next on the list," Rachel assured her. "I need to make sure the giant robot at Boston Airport doesn't go stomping across the Commonwealth again first."
Piper raised her eyebrows. "Good point." She aimed a thumb at the door. "I'll leave you to get ready. Come find me when you want to head out, okay?"
Rachel smiled. "I'll see you in a little while, Pipes. We'll save the day together, I promise."
Piper smiled briefly in response, then turned on her heel and walked out of the bedroom, closing the door behind her. When Rachel was sure Piper was gone, she crossed the room to the closet and unhooked her Brotherhood uniform from its hanger. Stripping down to her underwear she rubbed the Brotherhood tattoo on her shoulder briefly, like it was some kind of talisman, before she put on the uniform and zipped it closed. Reaching into the closet again she picked up her black military cap and placed it squarely on her head at just the right angle, and then she reached onto another shelf and closed her hand around a small box. She drew it out of the closet and opened it. Inside was a small engagement ring that she had managed to scavenge from the body of a dead raider months ago - luckily the raider had been vain enough to leave the jewels in place rather than pawning them for chems or alcohol, so the ring was still relatively intact. She'd been wanting to find the right moment to get down on one knee for Piper for a while, but she had never quite worked up the courage to make the moment happen. Often she wondered how Nate had managed to be brave enough to do the same for her back when he was barely out of his teens (or so it seemed at the time, considering how babyfaced he'd been before the war), and it confounded her every single time - but at the same time it gave her the incentive to keep trying, because Piper was the person she'd been waiting for ever since she had crawled out of her icebox two years beforehand.
Guess I'll have to wait a little longer, she thought bitterly, before she closed the box, put it in her pocket and walked out of her bedroom. Time to go to war.
