She showed up at the catacombs entrance with Nick Valentine, the synth detective, at her back. He'd been watching her, so he knew she was coming. Picking up hints about the Freedom Trail, and then following it through some of the most dangerous areas of Boston. She was fucking hardy - he'd watched her evade death and dish death out in equal part in all the time he'd spent following her, but never once did he see her lose the upper hand in battle. Just to get to Old North Church she carved a path through raiders, gunners, muties, and ferals - God help any creature who stood in her way. Or not, cause, you know, they were evil and she was good. She was good, right? When she reached the Railroad's doorstep she was covered in blood and chunks of gore, and absolutely dazzling. He'd been following for a long time, but this felt like the first time he'd ever laid eyes on her. Fresh perspective, and all that. He could've swore time slowed down and the theme from A Summer Place played as she raised her arm to shield her face from the floodlights. Figure curvy yet capable, wrapped in Vault-Tec cerulean and mismatched cobbled-together skin was sweet, rich caramel ornamented with freckles and battlescars and an ultra-saturated smudge of cherry red lips formed into a perfectly sculpted perma-smirk. When her eyes adjusted to the light, she brushed aside her panther-black bob and smiled up at his and Desdemona's drawn guns. He got the sense that she found herself in this position a lot, smiling up at hot steel. Nobody could shoot that smile. It was more than just beauty.

"Would you risk your life for a synth?" Dez asked.

"She has. Several times." Nick spoke from behind her.

"And I will again." She added.

Well, nobody had ever shown up with a synth to vouch for them before. Points for originality.

Dez was hard, and Dez was cautious, but Dez trusted the woman almost implicitly. As a new Railroad agent she was given a codename and he couldn't have picked a better one himself. Whisper. Cause that's how she was, soft and easy, a quiet suggestion right in your ear, slipping in real cool and making you think it was your idea all along. He watched her charm her way through first impressions at HQ. She met everyone where they were. Glory got roguish sarcasm and gun talk, Dez got respect, Doc Carrington got smoke blown up his ass, Drummer Boy got told he was important, and Tinker Tom got someone to stand and listen patiently. Deacon wasn't used to anyone being as wily as he was, and he liked her way too much to feel threatened by it.

He learned a lot about her, that first mission together at the Switchboard. The first thing he learned was that she was fucking deadly, and thank God for it. And not in a brutish way, either. She was subtle, careful, smart. Killer aim and shrewd battle sense, she fought like someone who had a lot to lose. A surgeon with a bobby pin, and adept at hacking terminals, she used every advantage presented to her. She preferred energy weapons, and she would never admit it, but it was mostly because it just made her feel good to reduce baddies into little piles of bone dust and viscera (or burnt wires and charred metal, in the case of the Gen 1s that had overtaken the Switchboard.) The second thing he learned was that she was fun, fun as hell. She could keep up with him, with his sarcasm and wit and constant jokes. She rolled with the punches, adapting when he let her take the lead with the tourist, never missing a beat. In battle, too. They worked as one unit better than anyone else he'd ever gone on missions with. They covered each other, they communicated without words when words could get them killed, she anticipated him in a way that made collaborative strategy a breeze and an absolute joy. They nabbed the Doc's prototype and dipped out, mission complete, and when they agreed to split up and meet back at HQ she couldn't suppress a grin.

"We made a good team."

"The best." And boy, did he mean it. He started missing her from the second she turned her back and walked away and oh, that ass. What was that saying? Hate to see you go, love to watch you walk away? Yep. That was it. He watched her hips sway, breath stuck in his chest with an oppressive tightness, until she faded into the Wasteland fog. Exhale, buddy. Exhale.

Dez was so impressed with her success, she saddled her with another mission right away. Bunker Hill, Old Man Stockton, H2-22, and Deacon right by her side. He couldn't deny his delight when Whisper slid right in to the covert language with Stockton - there was a package that she needed to facilitate the delivery of. Espionage came so naturally to her. Almost as naturally as killing, which was the next step. A dozen raiders, wasted outside of an old church that was to be the rendezvous point. Stockton would bring them H2, and another contact would meet them to take H2 to a safe house. But it was early afternoon, and Stockton said he would meet them after dark, and that's how Deacon found himself alone with Whisper in an old dilapidated church with a few hours to kill.

He sat down on one of the pews, laying his sniper rifle down and kicking his boots up on the back of the bench in front of him.

"Now this, this is my favorite part of the job. Excitement, danger, espionage, saving lives? Nah. I'm in it for the idle downtime."

Whisper chuckled. She held tight to her laser rifle, but he saw her shoulders relax ever so slightly.

"Yeah… nothing gets the adrenaline pumping quite like standing around doing shit all."

He grinned. Whisper stood with her chest puffed out, and a wary gaze fixed on the door. Her finger stayed close to the trigger of her laser rifle, and he could tell she was still on alert. For a moment, he thought about what she'd been through, and he felt a pang deep inside. The Wasteland was hell for people who were born into it. But she'd had a normal life, once. She lived in the world before the bombs - a cotton candy paradise in the eyes of most Wastelanders. He couldn't begin to imagine.

"At ease, sarge." His voice was soft and he was so glad for his sunglasses because he was sure his eyes betrayed his empathy. "We got all the raiders, and we'll hear anything else way before it comes. Relax."

And relax she did. It was like a switch flipped. She holstered her gun and sat down on the floor in front of him. As the sun set, that little dilapidated church was filled with the sounds of Diamond City Radio and laughter, and two little cigarette spots burning like bright stars. She pulled a surprisingly well-preserved pack of cards out of her pack, and they played crazy eights while chatting idly. She didn't seem eager to speak of anything before she woke up in the Vault, and he sure as hell wasn't going to press. She hadn't been long in the Wasteland, but she already had plenty of stories to tell. Her eyes lit up as she told him about how one of the very first things she'd done out of the vault was hop into a suit of power armor and fight a Deathclaw - and then animatedly reenacted the fight. She played the role of both herself and the Deathclaw with incredible acting skills - claw hands and ferocious roars as the Deathclaw, and metal hydraulics and minigun blasts as herself. She smiled fondly when she recounted how she'd teamed up with Diamond City's Bobrov brothers to fabricate a fake bar fight to boost the confidence of Travis, from the radio. Holy shit, that was you?! He's like a different man now! And she seemed to have no end of good things to say about Nick - he was a beloved friend, just by the way she talked about him.

For a brief moment, the conversation lulled into a comfortable silence, and she looked up at the pulpit. Rising from a pile of post-apocalyptic debris was a big wooden cross. The way her eyes snagged on it… just the smallest second's lingering gaze… yeah, he knew that.

"You a God-fearing woman, Whisper?"

She let out an abrasive, barking laugh.

"Hell no!" Ooh, nice blasphemy, doll. "Even if I had been, before the bombs… what kind of God would let this happen?" She made a sweeping gesture with her arm that he understood as and by this, I mean this general apocalyptic hellscape shithole of a Wasteland. "No. I never was religious, much to my parents' disappointment. Even though it was their fault I was so repulsed by religion in the first place. When will parents learn that the whole oppressive Puritan religious dictatorship thing just pushes their hormonal teenage kids further in to sin?" "Oh yeah. Tale as old as time. Guilt, manipulation, mind games, future psychological issues… good, wholesome family fun. Tough break, girl. Sorry 'bout it."

Whisper shrugged lightheartedly. "I'm glad for it, actually. Made it all easier… all this." There was pain in that last word. Oceans of it, dark and deep and scary. And then the sun came out and she was up again. "Besides, it's not all bleak. I may not believe in God, but I believe in people. Good people, trying to do good in this shit world. Like Nick. And you."

He knew she meant you as in the Railroad, not him personally Deacon, but she looked at him and smiled and he was so damn dazzled down to his core and was she an actual, real angel? Say something, man, be cool! He cleared his throat and rubbed the back of his head.

"Yeah, well, you're doing good too. Good of you to help us. And I hope we can help you, too. Ya know, with finding your son and all that."

Her smile was strained, but no colder, and she nodded in solemn acknowledgement. She was so young, and so vibrant. It was strange to think of her as a widow, as the vengeful mother. It was like a jacket that didn't quite fit, too tight in the shoulders and too short in the sleeves. There was much disconnect between what he knew about her, and what he saw in her, and it was delicious and endlessly intriguing. Aaaaand here's Old Man Stockton with H2-22. Let's get this package in the mail.

She was gentle and kind with H2-22, repeatedly reassuring him that they would keep him safe. He saw the mother in her, then, and it was sweet and tender and in such stark contrast to the way she went out and absolutely fucking massacred scores of raiders and muties on the route from the church to Ticonderoga… but if it was all to keep H2 safe, and get him to safety, well… that's pretty motherly, too. She got the job done, better than any agent he'd worked with, rookie or vet. After the mission they should've gone straight back to HQ, but she suggested a round of drinks at the Third Rail and he couldn't say no. Later that night, three-quarters of the way through a bottle of whiskey, she turned to him with hazy eyes. The bar was dark, crowded, and filled with smoke, and sweet Magnolia was crooning, and Whisper's shoulder was pressed against his, and there was something so very intimate about this moment. Before she even opened her mouth he could tell that her guard was down, just a little bit.

"I lied." Heh. He laughed inwardly. Her voice was low, words slurred slightly. "Earlier. In the church. About God." For a moment she gazed off past Whitechapel Charlie, eyes unfocused, brows furrowed. He nudged her slightly.

"Yeah? Spill, sister."

"I do believe in God. Well, not like, Santa Claus in the sky God. But I believe that there is some force… something bigger than us, something that controls us, something that rules us all." Her whiskey tumbler dangled from her fingers, and she gestured with it emphatically. "It's death! Deacon. Death. Death is God."

She was dead serious and it was actually really sad when he thought about the things she'd gone through to make her feel that way (and she wasn't wrong) but he couldn't help himself but burst out laughing. She's got it all figured out. She really does. He clapped an arm around her shoulder and grinned boisterously.

"You're right, you know? Death is God. And you're the fucking Grim Reaper. Come on now, miss Hand of God, I think you've had just about enough to drink. I'll get you a room at the Rexford. Rest up, cause in the morning we're going back to HQ and giving Dez a mission recap. I'm gonna make up some crazy story again - you'll play along, right?"

"Yeah," she smiled, tipsy. "I'll play along. I always will."

Oh, he liked her.