((Chapter heading is taken from the song Cubert by System of a Down. I was listening to it on the tram and decided it needs to be in here.))

Chapter 2
Humans Everywhere

Nick heard the explosion and practically saw the building tremble. He upped his pace. By the time he got there, smoke was billowing out from every crack in the wall. Dogmeat came darting out, then Deacon emerged like a god of fire, a sheen about his head against the sunlight, and Strong following behind him, limping. Nick ran the rest of the way. 'Tell me she isn't in there,' he said.

'No.' Up close, the man looked horrible. His left cheek was torn, but he didn't seem to notice. The image of a fire god – or demon – was increased by half an inch of ginger hair he hadn't been able to shave on whatever job he had been doing for the Railroad. 'She's not. Take Strong to Curie, these are my demons.' He looked up at the large green creature. 'Get yourself patched up. You did good.'

'Strong not running like coward.'

Deacon's shoulders slumped. 'Have it your way.'

'This settles it. I'm coming with you. Since when do you leave fire and destruction in your wake?'

Deacon glared at Nick. 'Since I was little more than a kid. Though this wasn't my bomb.' He wiped over his face and stared at his hand that came away bloody. 'I need to go, Nick. I need to find her.' He didn't wait for an answer. There was no time. He heard Strong's lumbering steps behind him, heard Nick shouting after them, and knew that Nick would be in extreme danger if he followed. Swearing he ground to a halt. 'You two … Nick, you especially. Go away.'

'Do you think I'm some fragile little insect, Deacon?'

'I think that … Nick, you're a synth, and you're fucking obvious. That might help you in Diamond City, but now it's a death sentence. You're the one thing that could get them to shoot someone else before me.'

Nick folded his arms. 'And that is supposed to stop me.'

'Yes. I'm planning to survive.' He swallowed. 'Look. Both of you. I need to do this quietly. I took a horrible risk here already. Now they're waiting for me. They could be sitting there with a gun to Kalyna's head. If they hear me …'

'Got it. Strong, come on. He needs to do this alone.'

'Strong help Kala.'

'Deacon, I'm going to get help. In case this goes south.'

He nodded slowly. 'You do that. Strong, help Nick. Nick … if this does go south, all you'll be able to do is take care no-one gets hurt by them again. And to avenge Kalyna.'

'Make sure it doesn't come to that.'

Ϡ

Deacon had barely left the hut that was falling into a pile of rubble when he heard her. She was leading him. Any thought of stealth was moot and she had probably heard their exchange. If he failed, they'd run. Nick was probably planning to get the Minutemen. He followed her on a tiring wild goose chase through what felt like half the Commonwealth. Through dead woods and brambles; through deserted settlements where not even ghouls lived; into the fens. He tried leaving a trail for Nick and ended up scrawling railsigns here and there.

'Kristina!' Deacon shouted in the middle of the broken remnants of Boston. He was tired, he was starved, he was close to laying down and waiting for death. It wouldn't take long, predators were everywhere. 'What's the plan, huh? You want me dead, just shoot. Let her go. You want me, not her.' He heard her laughter and saw her shadow darting among the rubble ahead. There was an old shopping mall, broken down and all but inaccessible. Good place, he had to admit. 'This your hideout? I'm going to bring the whole thing down on you if I must,' he yelled. 'Before one of you gets out, I'll bury us all.' The worst part was, he was completely prepared to do just that if Kalyna was lost. This … wasn't a healthy attitude.

The corridors to the side were all blocked, driving Deacon deeper into the heart of the structure. He ended up in what might have been a back office. A large one. The moment he stepped inside, he heard it. One low note on a kettle drum. Four more. Then another ten or some such and a funeral march. 'What the hell?' he asked no-one in particular. 'This your great revenge? You're playing that bloody requiem at me?' He thought of the holotape Sturges had handed him. 'Thanks for holding on to the holotape for me. I kind of liked it.'

With a grin, three men and Kristina came out of cover. Deacon spread his arms. 'So. Hi. What's the deal? Where's Kalyna?'

'Dying,' the woman said. 'Hence the requiem.'

'Who're those?' Deacon asked, gesturing to her companions.

'My new friends, since you killed my old ones.'

'What, you're the only one who survived?' He grinned. 'I knew I'd killed most of you, but I didn't even know I was that thorough. How did you find me?'

'Because you're an idiot, Connor. As long as you were invisible, we thought you're dead. But then you come to the surface, and you spill the beans on your pretty little cunt in a building with breaking down walls. How could you abandon us?'

'Wait. Let me think.' Deacon looked to the ceiling. 'One, murder is wrong, and one of them is enough on my conscience. Two, if it walks like a person and talks like a person … you get my drift. Three, betraying people that would almost beat me to death for leaving sounds like a good idea. Four, betraying people that have it in them to murder my wife, forcing me to watch, and telling me that they'd done me a fucking favour is a goddamn honour.' He could feel his heart racing, his self-control reaching a very low level. He was hysterical, he knew it, and he couldn't do a thing against it. 'Where is Kalyna?'

'Oh, upstairs. She's having fun on her own after we had some with her,' one of the men said.

'Who're you?' Deacon asked him.

'Tristan.'

'Hi, Tristan.' He drew and fired from the hip. A bullet buried itself in Tristan's gut, leaving him squirming and helpless with agony. 'Bye, Tristan.' The others had drawn. Deacon darted to what cover he could find. He heard the whine of ricocheting bullets and shot blindly. A satisfying groan came. Digging in his pocket, he produced a grenade and flung it. The explosion left everything in a deathly silence except for the music that was still playing somewhere, the funeral march long over and replaced by the horribly off-topic cheerfulness of some parts of it.

Deacon got out of cover and held his arms before his mouth as he tried not to inhale too much dust. 'Kalyna?' he yelled. Deacon stumbled on for a bit until he found a flight of stairs. He had no idea if Kalyna was really alone. All he knew was that his arrival wasn't a surprise to begin with, so it mattered little that he revealed himself. Leaving a trail of blood behind him, Deacon made his way through the building. 'Калино, чуєш? Де ти? Відповідай мені!' Deacon listened hard, but all he heard was the music.

Scared beyond words, he barged through the next door. Behind it was another corridor, this one with four doors leading off it. He heard something from the one on his left. 'Пані й пани, ось ваш бог!' he positively screamed. At this point, he wanted to scare them, most of all. He flung the door open and fired at the first sign of movement he was sure was not Kalyna. One bullet found the chest of a woman, the other the leg of a man that promptly dropped his gun so clumsily it was out of reach for him, having crashed to the ground. Deacon fired again. It clicked. 'Oh,' Deacon said, unimpressed, and holstered his gun. He seemed to be in a storage room with various tools. 'I'll just take a leaf out of Strong's book then,' he informed the fallen raider who tried to crawl to his gun. Deacon grabbed a pipe wrench and grinned.

Ϡ

There had been a couple more raiders or whatever they considered themselves to be in the next room Deacon tried. The only reason he was still alive was the damn ballistic weave. He'd still be bruised all over, but bruised was definitely better than dead. He was stepping through the third door when he found her. She was lying on the floor, a man leaning over her. Kalyna saw him, but something was wrong with the way she looked at him. The man didn't notice. 'One more, little bird. He'll only find your corpse.' He was fingering a syringe of some type and even though Kalyna tried squirming away, he'd have no problem with her it seemed. Deacon stepped up to him and brought the wrench down on his skull hard. He caught him before he could land on Kalyna and knelt beside her, the bloody wrench slipping out of his hands.

'Whisper? Talk to me.'

'Панове.'

Deacon blinked. 'What?'

'Vocative plural. Панове. Ladies and gentlemen is пані й панове.'

'Voc … that's your … Hell, Whisper. What did they do to you?'

'Not even Шепоте?' She chuckled, then groaned. 'They gave me chems. No idea what, but I don't feel so hot, Deacon.'

'Nick's bringing backup. Come on, I' carry you.'

Kalyna swatted his hands away. 'You've got blood everywhere and your face looks like you tried to kiss a d… a feral. Deacon, are you all right?'

He knew what she'd wanted to say but decided to pretend he hadn't noticed. 'It's not mine. I emptied my gun. Went for a wrench. And the rest's healing.'

'No spare bullets?'

Deacon made a face. 'I had them all right. I … God … I … Don't ask. We need to get out of here.'

'Yes. Yes. But I'm going to walk. It's not that bad. Yet.' She got to her knees and started fumbling with the dead guy, taking a gun from him before examining his head. 'Oh boy. You don't do things halfway, do you?'

'Nope.'

She giggled and ran a hand over the top of his head. 'And you're sprouting ginger fluff.'

Deacon stood and offered a hand, and Kalyna reached up to let him help her stand. 'Fluff,' he said indignantly. 'That is coarse, manly hair growth. Admire it while you can and show some respect, woman.'

'You could let it grow. I like ginger.'

He ran a hand over his head and found that fluff wasn't so wrong. Not that he'd ever admit it. 'I don't think so,' he said in the drawn out voice he knew cracked her up every damn time. Now was no different. He was about to reload his pistol when the door flew open.

'Not so fast,' a voice barked.

Deacon swore. Or he would have, if the world hadn't gone dark instantly.

Ϡ

Deacon came to still in the same room. He sat up abruptly and reached for a gun that wasn't there. 'Hey, hey, relax, hero.'

Deacon couldn't have followed that order if he tried. 'Glory! I'm … oh.' He'd tried to stand and felt his left leg give under him. 'Whisper? Is she …'

'The reason why you're alive? Yes.'

'Damn it, Glory! Is she all right?'

'A right sight better than you.'

'Where's she?'

'Yelling at Carrington. He gave you a couple of stimpacks after he cleaned up her system, so you should be ready to move in a bit. Tom and I started going through the terminals when we were sure everyone was dead. You took them all out, but somehow you still managed to get shot in the shoulder and hit your head and you knee pretty hard. How d'you do that?'

'I … didn't check the last room yet. Found Whisper and that guy, knocked him out and … yeah.'

'Knocked him out, Deacon? You knocked his brain out of his ears if anything. I must say, I'm impressed.'

'Anyway. We were on our way out, and there he came. And yes, I know that's stupid and why others have rules against fraternisation.' He narrowed his eyes, allowing himself to calm down somewhat. 'Why's Whisper yelling at Carrington? Can I join?'

'I did mention the terminals? I read them, you know. Tom cannot keep his stupid mouth shut, so Carrington saw some if it before Dez wiped it all clean. Quite the history there.'

Deacon thought his life falling apart at the seams would make more of an emotional impact. But he felt nothing at the realisation. 'Well. It was too good to be true.'

'What?' Glory glared at him. 'Oh, no. You're not getting out that easily. Dez threatened the two to strangle them personally if they let word of your past get out. And I'm with her.'

'You don't hate me?'

Glory tutted. 'You're an idiot, Deacon. You should have told us. At least those of us who think we're your friends. But you keep everyone at arm's length. Does Whisper know, at least?'

'She knows everything.'

'Good.' Glory clapped his shoulder, and he dedicated a few choice swearwords to her. 'Oh. So sorry.'

Despite himself, Deacon snorted and tried picking himself up again. This time, he succeeded. 'Yeah. I can see the regret in your smirk.'

((I'm trying to catch all Ukrainian bits.

Калино, чуєш? Де ти? Відповідай мені! /Kalyno, chuyesh? De ty? Vidpoviday meni!/ – Kalyna (vocative), do you hear? Where are you? Answer me?

Пані й пани, ось ваш бог! (!) /Pani y pany, osʹ vash boh!/ – Ladies and gentlemen, behold your God! Correct grammar is, as is pointed out, пані й панове/pani y panove/.

Шепоте /shepote/ would be the vocative of шепіт/shepit/, which means whisper. And then people say that the vocative of inanimate nouns doesn't matter. Hah!))