"Fahrenheit— this is weird."

It was the next day, and Hancock was pacing in his office, his outfit somewhere halfway between the t-shirt and pants he'd changed into a couple hours before, and his normal frock coat get-up. His hat had been missing all day, but he wasn't particularly fussed with it. Fahrenheit watched him patiently from her seat on the couch, a cigarette balanced, unlit, between her fingers. Her hair was slicked back with sweat, a result of the sweltering August heat, and the bags under her eyes were especially dark. She hadn't been getting much sleep lately, which, as a result, made her far crankier than usual.

"Aren't you going to finish getting dressed?" she asked warily. "Or is this hangover of yours gonna make this yet another day of you being a drama queen?"

Hancock paused and looked at her dumbly, his American Flag sash hanging loosely from his fingers. "I'm… no!" His face twisted up into something confused and he looked away from her to take a quick hit of Jet from his other hand. "I'm—can't you just talk to me about something without making it a whole thing?"

Fahrenheit's eyebrows shot up in surprise. She pointed toward herself with the cigarette. "Me? I'm the one making a 'whole thing' right now?" She gestured back toward him, a wide sweeping motion to encompass his current state of full-body duress. "You seen yourself at all today? Me." She scoffed and dug a lighter out from her pants pocket, nodding as she placed the cigarette between her lips. "Me, uh-huh, sure." She lit it and took one long pull with her eyes shut, her head leaned back.

"I'm just tryin' to open up my heart here, Fahr, and you're all pissy with me from the get-go." He fell onto the couch across from her and kicked his bare feet up onto the coffee table, frowning. He looked worried, almost haunted, but Fahrenheit didn't seem to care. She rolled her eyes.

"Fine," she deadpanned. "What's wrong, Hancock? What can I do to help?" She leaned forward against her knees, a wicked smile zipping across her lips. "You want a foot rub, oh fabulous zombie mayor?"

He threw the empty Jet inhaler at her and she barked out a laugh, meeting his eyes rather intensely. "Okay," she said, raising her hands in surrender. "Seriously, what's up?" For a moment, she was understanding. The sharpness of her aura had dulled just a little.

Hancock sighed, his eyes fogging over all dreamy, and he sank back into the couch. The words were spilling from his mouth before he'd had the chance to think about whether or not it was a bad idea to admit it out loud. "I think I have a crush on the smoothskin."

Fahrenheit, though, merely shook her head and chuckled. "Yeah, and?"

"And what?" he snapped back, suddenly lucid and leaning toward her, his hands flat on the coffee table. She shook her head, still smiling.

"You have a crush on everyone, Hancock, this is no different." She took another exasperated pull from her cigarette and blew it right into his face, her smirk widening. He glared at her and sat back again.

"You're lucky my sense of smell is piss-poor, Fahr, or I'd kick your ass for that."

"Whatever. So, you have a crush on the new girl, big whoop, she'll be out of your hair soon enough anyways." When Hancock arched on eyebrow at Fahrenheit, she gave him another annoyed look. "Jesus, Hancock, you haven't even heard about her yet? You lose your iron grip on the grapevine or something? She's not sticking around here, she's looking for someone." She paused to ash her cigarette against the table. "She's here for the Memory Den, then she's outta town. Got some goings-on with Nicky and everything. Anyway, she's healed up regardless."

Hancock stared at Fahrenheit, as if not comprehending. "Nick?" he muttered faintly. If Nick was involved, it had to be something serious. Like, a kidnapping. Violence. Danger.

"Duh, Valentine?" Fahrenheit cocked her head at him, misinterpreting his disbelief as a lack of recognition. She scoffed, as if she were speaking to a clueless child. "He's been here for a day now. Followed her from Diamond City, if you wanna see him."

"No, I don't wanna see him!" Hancock sputtered. His hands tensed against his legs. "I wanna talk about this!"

"Oh, your crush, okay." She sat back and crossed her legs, eyes resting so lazily on his face he could tell she couldn't care to take him seriously, that it wasn't her intention from the start of this.

"It's different, Fahr," he said anyway, his voice quieting. Despite his every intention to keep his playful hackles up with her all business as usual, he realized he didn't have the energy. And this certainly wasn't business as usual. "There's something about her."

With this, Fahrenheit rolled her eyes again, this time so dramatically they could have popped right out of her head. "I get it, Hancock, I do, but she's… a beautiful, shiny vault dweller. A preoccupied one, at that." She shrugged. "She probably doesn't even know what a raider is yet, or how to kill a Mirelurk. She's probably scared of you, and every other ghoul here, she's just learned to have a real good poker face." She stared at him, as if this were something he ought to have known already, a caveat he should have been aware of enough to squash whatever feelings he had with it.

Something in Hancock's chest sank, something that had before been light, careless, a small whimsy he'd barely thought about pursuing. Now it was heavy, and it hurt, and it felt like something monstrous and all-encompassing. Something he couldn't ignore. He looked away from Fahrenheit, to an unopened Jet inhaler resting on the table.

"Thanks a lot, Fahr," he said, leaning forward to scoop it up. "Really solved my heartache." He took a hit, hard and automatic, and the rush almost knocked him out right away. Vision swimming, he stood and stumbled off toward the bathroom before Fahrenheit could say anything to him, anything else to indicate that his own adopted daughter thought he was nothing more than a reanimated corpse. "'m gonna go shower," he said over his shoulder, and slammed the door behind him.


Amelia stirred, feeling lightheaded and fuzzy. She'd been dreaming of something pleasant, a field of green grass and wildflowers. Laying there with her eyes closed, she found herself wanting to shove fistfuls of the vivid meadow into her mouth. Absorb it somehow. Maybe it could send her back, if she consumed it. She peeked her eyes open and Hancock's room came into blurry focus. She closed them again. Something so simple as bright colors and lush grass, now limited only to the imagination. After a long moment, she opened her eyes fully and glanced toward the window. The sun wasn't pouring in like it usually did in the morning, and it took her a moment to realize that this was because it must not be morning. Shitshitshit.

She'd met up again with Nick on her way back to the State House the night before. "Whoa there, doll," he had called, grabbing her gently by the arm just as she'd rounded a corner. He'd been coming out of The Third Rail, his tie still undone and his step wavering and unsteady. He looked rather dazed, even cheerful. If she hadn't been so stressed at the time, she may have wondered how the hell a robot can get drunk in the first place. Maybe asked him then and there. As it turned out, she had just spun around to look at him blankly, her mind a flurry of unrelated thought. "What's the rush?"

"Nothing," she said, breathless. Nothing nothing nothing. It echoed in her head like a curse.

"Well," Nick released her, but he was still squinting at her, like he was suspicious, "we oughta get this ball rolling, huh? Tomorrow morning?"

She'd nodded desperately and dashed away before he could say anything else, before Hancock could resurface from the alley to catch her. She needed… something. She didn't know what, but it needed to be far from there. This new world was too real, now, after seeming so much like a distant fantasy throughout her entire journey.

As she stumbled into the State House and up the stairs, she couldn't help but think about her drunken night. The way Hancock had leaned into her, whispered openly about his past to her… it made her feel guilty. She had had no grasp of this world, no connections besides her nephew, but now something else was gripping her. It frightened her. The way he'd run his hands along her braid—or how he'd looked, for a wild second, like he'd wanted to kiss her—had scared her. But his eyes catching on moonlight, looking down at her like she was a treasure, had scared her the most. She was no treasure, but she didn't doubt that she was out of place in the Wasteland. Very out of place.

Amelia kicked the covers off her legs and laid there for a while, staring up at the ceiling, trying and failing to erase memories coming in an unbidden rush. Eventually, there were muffled yells, a shower squealing to life in the next room. She sighed. She would have to leave the room soon. She would have to see Hancock in the daylight, outside of the secret safety of darkness and the excuse of alcohol.

A knock sounded from the door, tight and sharp, and every muscle in her tensed. Amelia sat up, halfheartedly pulling the blankets back to cover her bare legs. "Come in," she called. Her voice was meek, hoarse. She wouldn't know what to say if Hancock came in now, and her thoughts grew frantic. What could she possibly say? Could she feign ignorance, pretend that she was too drunk to remember any of it? When the door swung open, however, she was not greeted by the anticipated swish of red fabric, but rather the frayed edges of a gray trench coat.

"Doll?" Nick peered into the room uncertainly. "Thought we were meeting in the AM? Nearly one in the afternoon, now." He stepped in and shut the door slowly behind him, watching her with the same cautious suspicion as the night before. "You alright?"

"I don't…" She groaned, laid her head in her hands. "I'm hungover. Don't wanna talk about it." Her voice caught a little and she knew he must have noticed. She was so transparent when she was upset. Nora always used to call her Baby Blue, because of how often she would burst into tears. It used to annoy her as a kid, but now she knew it was woefully true.

She heard Nick cross the room and, from the corner of her eye, saw him sit down beside her on the bed. "We don't have to start today, if you don't want to," he said quietly. She looked up at him and saw that he was smiling at her. "I know it's been hard for you. After—well—"

"Kellogg," Amelia gritted the name out without thinking, her face settling into a dull fury. She swallowed, and it almost instantly drained away. "No," she said softly. "We go today. I just need to get dressed first." She pushed herself to the edge of the bed and stood up shakily. Nick followed suit.

"Got some wobbly legs there, huh?" Nick remarked. Amelia turned to glare at him, only to see him grinning good-naturedly. "Fine, fine, put some pants on and we'll split." He turned away and walked pointedly toward the bookshelf in the corner, his back to her. She grabbed her jeans from the bedpost and wrestled them on, wondering with a distant panic what she would see in Kellogg's head.


She wasn't in the room. Why wasn't she in the room? "Fahrenheit, she's not in the room!" Hancock called out, his voice betraying panic. He stood stupidly in the doorway, eyes tracing the messy folds of the bedsheets, the soft indentation of her head against a pillow. She hadn't left, had she? But she wasn't there.

Footsteps came stomping from behind him and before he could turn, he was being forcefully shoved out of the way. "Did you look to see if—" Fahrenheit was in the room now, a flurry of irritated movement, looking for something. Very quickly, she spotted it: Amelia's knapsack tucked underneath the bed. She squatted down, pulled it partly out, and looked over at Hancock, her eyes heavy beneath the weight of complete and utter annoyance. "Think she would leave all her stuff here, huh?" She shoved the backpack under the bed again and stood up, huffing a tortured sigh. "You do have it bad."

Hancock backed out of the room to return to his office. His feet moved automatically. He heard Fahrenheit shutting the bedroom doors behind her. "Sorry for being a dick earlier," Fahrenheit continued, too casually for it to be a real apology. "She's probably just out getting a drink, it's late—"

"Shut up, Fahr," Hancock said softly as they crossed the threshold into his office. He fell to the couch and stared blankly at the coffee table. Scattered across it were empty and full Jet inhalers alike, Mentats tins splayed open to reveal their colorful tablets, some Holotapes from residents that he hadn't bothered to listen to yet. But he knew there was a syringe of Psycho in one of the drawers, and it pulled at him, at the threads holding him upright and steady. He frowned. He hadn't felt that in a long while.

Fahrenheit stood next to the couch and gazed down at him, her hand on her hip. "You've known her for all of a week, Hancock." Her voice had finally taken on something other than disdain: concern. "This isn't…"

"I know," he said. Without thinking, he shoved off his coat and threw it over the back of the couch. It slip almost immediately to the ground and landed with a delicate thump. "Too heavy," he murmured distantly.

Fahrenheit sighed again. "Fine. I'll go find her, you stay here and… wallow." With that, she departed, the scent of cigarette smoke and mint billowing out in her wake. She somehow always managed to scavenge toothpaste for them from somewhere, but it seemed to follow her like a perfume. He mused that she might actually rub the stuff on her skin to distract from the inevitable scent of the Wasteland. He wouldn't blame her but, then again, Fahrenheit was not the type of girl he'd pick to care about that sort of thing. He filed it away to think about later.

His thoughts quickly turned back to the night before, in the absence of his musings about Fahr's hygiene, and he leaned forward to snatch a tin of Grape Mentats off the table. He popped two into his mouth at once and leaned back into the couch, closing his eyes.

You're not a child's nightmare. When she'd said it, he hadn't believed her. For the whole of their conversation, even, he had seemed to shrivel further and further into himself. Full of doubt, suddenly insecure. And she'd noticed, and it'd spooked him. No one shook him up like that. And, normally, he didn't even mind his grisly visage. He thought he was damn good-looking, for a ghoul and all, and he had had his fair share of smooth-skinned ladies in his time. Not like her, though. No one that… untouched by this world. He found himself not wanting to poison her with his radiation, as if it were seeping out of his skin at all times. He'd been honest when he'd said she didn't seem real. She didn't. He was convinced if he touched her, she'd fall through his fingers like sand. And that was unhealthy.

He opened his eyes again and stared up at the ceiling. He had to get a grip of himself. Pining after someone who was as good as a stranger to him was… creepy. Leaning forward, he picked a holotape up off the table and looked at it. Pickman's Gallery was scrawled on the memo line. Maybe he'd turn his attention to something else, like getting someone to investigate whatever was going on over there. He stood up from the couch and tucked the tape into his pocket.


Amelia was still crying when she entered the State House, Nick and Fahrenheit bolstering her on each side. "He… he…" she hiccuped, her knees buckling. Everything seemed to be spinning in on itself, twisting violently. She choked on a wave of vomit, forcing it back down into her throat. She was not about to barf again; Goodneighbor had seen enough of her bodily fluids already.

Nick hefted her back up, muttering something, and she got a sudden flash of memory and flinched away from him. He glanced up at the same time, golden eyes startled, and at first, she thought he'd noticed her reaction. Then she realized he was looking up, over her shoulder.

"Is she alright?" Hancock called from the top of the stairs, sounding hesitant. She turned to look up at him, her face streaked and blotchy. He was dressed in casual clothes again, and his hat was gone. It was bizarre to finally see, but when her eyes met his, she could only react to the whole situation by dropping her head and crying harder.

"Ah… no," Nick replied, patting her awkwardly on the back.

"Fuck no," Fahrenheit amended, adjusting her iron grip on Amelia's arm. "I went to find her, and she was collapsed on a chair in the Den bawling her damn eyes out. Ole' Nick here refuses to spill the beans, and you know that insufferable bitch Amari—"

"She can tell you, when she's ready," Nick snapped to Fahrenheit from behind Amelia's back. "It's not my place, or anyone else's."

"Well, get her up here," Hancock said. He sounded distant, even quiet. It only served to disconcert Amelia even further. This whole night felt like a bad fucking dream. All the emotions inside of her were brawling at once, and no one was winning.

She didn't remember being carried up the stairs, didn't remember returning to the room she'd unintentionally commandeered for so long. All she remembered was the face that appeared over hers once she was laying down, the blankets pillowy and safe beneath her. Hancock, his eyes kind, voice hushed and careful.

"Do you want any lights on?" he was asking, but Amelia's voice was too far away for her to grasp. She closed her eyes, willing herself to find any semblance of sanity to hold onto long enough to answer, but the only thing that came to her was Kellogg's desperate face, his baby in the crib, a long hallway. She felt like a storm was brewing up in her stomach, electric and mean and unrelenting.

"Sunshine?"

Amelia's eyes snapped open. She stared up at him, tears already forming. "I killed someone," she said quietly. Hancock's eyes widened imperceptibly, but he didn't move away from her, or indicate discomfort. She always expected a negative reaction; it's how it would have been in the past. She would be in prison, in the old world, but here, it was… normal. Expected. "I saw his memories tonight—name was Kellogg. And… I saw Shaun." She didn't know why she was talking, why she was telling him this. He didn't know about any of it. Perhaps it was to return a favor? "He stole my nephew, Kellogg did, but… I feel sorry for him." She sat up, wrapped her arms around her knees. Hancock straightened up, stood uncertainly beside the bed for a moment, then sat down next to her.

"His wife—his kid got killed. He lost himself, that's the only reason he ended up in my vault." She dug her fingernails into her wrist. She knew the story she was telling was disjointed and unfamiliar from any side other than hers, but it felt good to speak. To tell someone besides Nick. "It's the reason he stole Shaun, the reason he—" She choked, turning her head completely away from Hancock. She couldn't tell him that. She couldn't say it out loud, she couldn't make it real. Even though she had seen it herself, Nora's death existed as an abstract thought in her mind. It had to.

"That's why you were at the Den," Hancock said quietly. She could feel him staring at her, but she refused to look back at him. The white-hot hurt of what she'd already said was beginning to eat at her again and, for some reason, she didn't want him to have to see it in her eyes. She was about to tell him to leave, so she could bury herself beneath the covers and cry by herself, but something else came out instead.

"We used Nick, stuck Kellogg's cybernetic-whatever into his head, and afterward, when I woke up, I went to find him. And when I did, he opened his mouth and Kellogg's voice came out." Amelia swiped impatiently at her tear-streaked cheek. She shuddered. "Said, 'Hope you got what you were looking for inside my head'. F-Fucking… freaky." Anxiety was pulsing steadily through her, making her tremble so hard she bit her tongue.

Hancock let out a low whistle. "Yikes, sister."

Amelia laughed, finally turning back to look at him. He had one hand flat on the bed and he was watching her. Some of the tension in her body drained away, but she still shook. "Yeah, yikes." She was smiling broadly, suddenly cheered by his simple wording. "I lost my absolute fucking mind after that. I just collapsed on a chair next to him and started sobbing. Nick-without the leftover Kellogg-was back pretty quick, though, got all confused. 'Doll? Doll, what's wrong?'" She mimicked his deep voice, then chuckled. "Haven't told him he got all possessed yet, he's probably distraught." Her smile faded quickly at the thought.

She was about to go effortlessly on, to tell Hancock that Nick reminded her of her grandfather. That, ever since she'd rescued him a month ago, he held this warm affection for her, and she couldn't understand it. Even now, in a whole new world with new rules, she couldn't see someone caring for her. But she didn't say that. Instead, she shrugged. "Sorry," she said, forcing another sheepish smile.

Hancock frowned at her. "Sorry?" he repeated. He reached out and touched her arm. He was warm. "Ain't no sorry's here, sister. Don't apologize." His eyes were kind, then, and real, and he didn't seem like the same person she'd talked to the night before at all. Right at that moment, she thought he was as true to himself as he had been before she ever arrived in Goodneighbor. A leader, someone to listen and reassure, someone who conquered. She almost cursed herself, then, for her fresh vault-dweller appearance; most of the time it sure made it hard to exist in the world. It changed people, distracted them. Sometimes she wanted to lay down in mud and rub it all over her face, but she imagined it wasn't as simple as that. Her mind was drifting, then, to ideas of how to appear more 'normal', to dirty herself up, when Hancock shifted on the bed, bringing her back to reality. She met his eye.

It was dark in the room, save for a large candle burning away on the bedside table. It was cozy. Hancock's face had that weird glow it had had the night before, in the moonlit alleyway, and his hand was still laid atop her arm, emanating its bizarre heat. She could see, then, really see that he had been handsome, before. He was still handsome, even past the self-induced agony of the drug he had taken, and aside from the ravaged skin that resulted from it. It was strange and moving, to see that someone's boisterous personality couldn't be squashed, not even by the devastating after-effects of nuclear war, nor even by such self-hatred.

Amelia never wanted to leave the room, in that moment. It was so removed from the destruction, lulling her into a false comfort, as if the world outside were only a mirage. She could exist there for the rest of her life, in delusion. Hancock was no different than anyone else she had known before the bombs dropped. If anything, he was better than them.

In the softly flickering light, they stared at each other. It felt raw, stripped down. It was a moment before he said faintly, "I hope you find your boy, wherever he is. You said you saw him?" Hancock lifted his hand gingerly away from her and laid it in his lap. He was still watching her, though, with a ghost of a smile on his lips.

Amelia felt a wave of happiness swoop through her chest. She was distracted by the joy, the idea of seeing Shaun again. "Yeah," she said, and she was really grinning. "Yeah, I saw him. Must have been around six years old, but… but just as I imagined he would be, when he was older. He was a baby, when…" It hung there, and she didn't finish the sentence. Her eyes clung onto Hancock's stare, as if it were an anchor keeping her just above the surface in that pleasantly dim room. "I miss him. I need to get him back, for… for Nora." She said the name without sighing, without her eyes welling up. It was hopeful, the way she said it. She would find him, for Nora. She'd bring him to the vault, too, when he was ready, and maybe they'd both be able to confront it, together. They could bury her behind the old house.

"Nora?" Hancock said. His voice was uncharacteristically quiet, even quieter than before. It was like he knew all about it already, with all the gentle patience he gave her.

"My sister," Amelia replied. She unraveled from her stiff sitting position, stretched out her legs in front of her and leaned back onto her elbows, against the pillows. Her leg settled against Hancock, but she didn't move it away, didn't even think about it. "My best friend." Her eyes finally drifted away from him, to the ceiling. "You know," she said, the thought dawning abruptly, though not unpleasantly, "she would sing a song to me when I couldn't fall asleep." She looked over at him, a fondness swelling away inside of her. "You are my sunshine, my only sunshine," she sang softly, searching his face. "Really did the trick, back then. It's what you call me—Sunshine."

Something passed between them, then, something stirred, really awakened. "It reminds me of her," Amelia continued, when Hancock said nothing. He was staring at her in that way again, almost, but this time it didn't seem to startle her. "I think that's why I like you so much. I mean, everything about you, really, is a reminder of my life before. The books, the fuckin' presidential get-up." She laughed a rich and relentless laugh before her face settled back into calm sincerity. Exhaustion took her, and she laid down, curled up against a pillow. "It helps."

She hadn't expected him to really say anything back. The whole thing had been one long one-sided venting session for her, after all. But then, he crawled over onto the bed, and she knew to scoot to the side to give him room, and he laid down right beside her, pillowing his head in his arms. "You help, too," he whispered, and then they fell asleep, and she dreamt of bright blue sky.