The walk back to Goodneighbor was one of the more uncomfortable ones Rose had endured since waking up out of the vault. Hancock was still seething and had barely said two words during the trip, which was unusual for the normally talkative ghoul. Cara stayed between the two of them like a physical buffer, and Ichabod and Dogmeat trailed behind… both animals could sense the tension, and it seemed that neither of them were willing to get in the middle if a fight broke out.

For the time being, though, Rose was fine with the silence. She knew that she'd have to continue hashing things out with Hancock sooner or later. She understood his concerns- really, she did- but he couldn't understand the kind of love that drove her to push on despite the risks. She would easily put herself in harm's way for him… die for him, even, without a second thought. And she'd do it gladly. But for Shaun… she'd throw herself into the very depths of Hell if it meant getting her baby boy back.

Hancock broke away from them almost as soon as they passed through the gates into the town, muttering something about going to track down Fahrenheit. Rose wondered if he intended to talk to the intimidating mercenary about taking over his role as mayor. The thought lightened her spirits somewhat; if that's what he was really going to do, then he wasn't so mad that he was thinking of leaving.

"So this is Goodneighbor?" Cara asked, as she looked around the front courtyard. "That's the State House, isn't it? Didn't they used to do field trips there in grade school?"

Rose nodded. "Yeah. It's also the current mayoral residence… and occasionally the junkie boarding house." She tugged lightly on her sister's hand. "Come on… there's someone I want you to meet."

Rose led her sister up to Daisy's shop counter. The ghoul merchant was already standing there waiting, watching the two women with a warm smile.

"Ooh, I must've drank too much last night, because I swear I'm seein' double." Daisy grinned at the two sisters, dark eyes squinting a little as she gave Cara a once-over. "One of you's got the wrong color hair, though."

Rose smiled and briefly hugged the sassy trader. "Daisy, this is my sister Cara… the one we went to Albany to find? Cara, this is Daisy. She's from before the war too."

"No way?" Cara cocked her head. "But that would make you at least two centuries old!"

"Probably about 230, if you wanna get technical; but who's counting, right?" Daisy jumped as Ichabod emerged from behind Cara's legs to investigate the new person. "What in the… is that a deathclaw? Or did Dogmeat have a bad run with some rads while you were gone?"

Dogmeat huffed indignantly, pushing Ichabod aside with his nose so that he could situate himself between Rose and Cara. The young deathclaw hardly seemed to mind; he just latched onto Cara's opposite leg and watched the three women with yellow, slitted eyes.

"His name's Ichabod," Cara said fondly as she hoisted the mutated reptile up in her arms. "We found him out by the C.I.T."

"Well, you'd better tell Fahrenheit about him before she uses him for target practice." She tilted her head and glanced briefly around the courtyard. "And speaking of Goodneighbor's second-in-command… where's Mayor Hancock gone off to? That man's usually attached to your hip nowadays."

Rose grimaced. "He's… a little less than pleased with me, at the moment. It's a long story."

Daisy pursed her lips and nodded knowingly. "Well, if you two could handle that Brotherhood of Steel nonsense and his slip-up with Sinjin, I don't doubt that you'll recover from this little spat." Then she grinned, and pulled on Rose's arm. "Hey, why don't you come back and see what I've picked up in my latest shipment? I think you might be interested."

Daisy led them to the back of her shop, where she had a random assortment of boxes and goods organized into a sort of haphazard chaos. She rummaged around for a moment before dragging out a small cardboard box; she held it out to the sisters, grinning hugely.

"One of my boys found these locked in one of those big supply trucks… still in working condition, too. I was thinkin' about sending most of them to that boy Travis out in Diamond City, but figured you might want first dibs."

Rose peered into the box, and couldn't help but gasp. Inside the box was a collection of holotapes, all labeled with the names of different songs and artists from before the war. She took a handful out and read the names as she carefully dropped them back down.

"'Why Do Fools Fall in Love'… 'Stranger in Paradise'… 'Moonlight Serenade'… I remember all of these!" Rose felt emotion unexpectedly tighten in her chest. "Wow. I thought I was going to be doomed to listen to the same ten songs on Travis's station for the rest of my life."

"You and me both," Daisy agreed. "I was tempted to keep these for myself, but I figured I can't deprive the Commonwealth of a chance to experience some culture."

Cara peered curiously into the box, and plucked a holotape out. "Hey Rose, look at this one! Isn't it…?"

Rose took the tape from her and skimmed the title; she felt herself freeze, and was momentarily speechless.

"Daisy… how much for this one?" she asked after a long moment.

The female ghoul studied her, dark eyes marking Rose's expression with interest. "Consider it a gift, sweetheart. No charge today."


Glad that's fuckin' over, Hancock thought to himself, as he walked back towards the State House. Fahrenheit had taken his proposal about making her mayor surprisingly well… she'd only swung at him once, and hadn't threatened to kill him in his sleep, so he figured it had gone about as well as it could have. Truth was, she'd probably seen it coming from the moment he'd agree to let Rose drag him all across the Commonwealth. He toyed with the idea of making an announcement to the general public, but there wasn't much point in getting everyone riled up for no reason. Better to fade away, let Fahrenheit step into her new role more gradually.

He spotted Cara playing with her pet deathclaw out by entrance to the city; she'd say some command and make a gesture with her hand, and then reward the overgrown lizard with a chunk of meat when it obeyed. He had to admit, he was impressed with how well she'd been able to train the thing. It followed her around with as much devotion as Dogmeat had for Rose. He hadn't thought that deathclaws were smart enough to be trained like that… though he'd never been particularly interested in finding out, either.

"Hey, kid. Seen your sister around?" he asked, making her jump. They'd have to work on that awareness of hers… not many people were liable to mess with her considering her ties to him and her sister, but Goodneighbor still wasn't a good place to let your guard down.

"There you are!" she exclaimed. "Daisy was asking after you."

"Her and everyone else," he muttered, with a quick roll of his onyx eyes.

"Oh, the struggles of popularity. That must be so hard," Cara said in false sympathy. He gave her a look but she grinned, unbothered by his annoyance.

"You didn't answer my question." Ichabod crawled over to him, sniffing around for treats; he lightly shoved at the overgrown lizard with his boot and it scurried back to wrap itself around Cara's legs.

Cara nodded her head down towards the alley. "I heard her mention something about going to the Memory Lounge, wherever that is… asked if she wanted me to come with, but she said Daisy and KLEO would help keep me out of trouble." Cara glanced over his shoulder towards the assaultron's gun stand, and dropped her voice to a whisper. "Between you and me, KLEO's freaking terrifying. I feel like she'd blow my brains out just for saying hi to her."

Hancock lifted his shoulders in a shrug. "Not usually. She mostly gets touchy when you try to lift stuff from her inventory. She doesn't like to waste the bullets."

Cara raised her eyebrows. "Yeah, I'll stick with Daisy. She's more fun to talk to anyway… she actually understands references to our time when I make them. And she's a bookworm." She crouched down and scooped up Ichabod in her arms, tickling him under the chin and making him squeak happily. "So you going to talk to Rose, or what? I don't think I can stand much more of you two giving each other the silent treatment."

"Maybe later." He searched around in his pockets for some Jet to give himself an excuse not to meet her eyes. "I just spent a half hour gettin' chewed out by Fahre… not lookin' for a repeat performance tonight."

Cara nodded… a little sadly, he thought. "Yeah. Can't say I blame you, I guess."

He started in towards the Old State House, and then paused to turn back to the younger Alexander sister. "There's not usually a whole lotta spare room in the State House, but I put the word out to Clair over in Hotel Rexford that she's to give you your own room while we're here. There's a couple of couches you can snag if you'd rather stay a bit closer, but they ain't the most comfortable beds in the world. If you head down to the Third Rail just tell Charlie to put whatever you get on my tab."

"Thanks, Hancock. I'll do that."

He hesitated. "I'd show ya around, you know, but-"

She held up her palm and shook her blonde head. "Don't bother; I get it. You don't have to play host or mayor with me; I'll be just fine." She smiled. "I'll probably be turning in soon myself anyway. I don't know how you guys keep this up… I'm more physically tired than I've ever been in my entire life." She waved her hand towards the State House. "Go get some rest. I'm sure we'll all feel better after a decent night's sleep."

He gave her a quick nod. "Thanks, kid."


Hancock couldn't stop his brain from yapping at him as he wearily ascended the stairs up to the State House's third floor. Being pissed at Rose wasn't right, and he knew it. She'd been clear about her goals since the beginning. He knew damn well that she wasn't going to let him stop her now. He'd just been taken off guard when Tinker Tom had said that she'd be going it alone… he'd never liked the idea of the teleportation-relay-thing, but he'd soothed himself with the thought that at least they'd be facing the Institute together. Picturing her at the mercy of those whacked-out scientists with no one there to protect her was like the worst of any nightmare, or a severely bad drug trip. Just the mere thought of it was enough to make him want to dose himself into oblivion; he clenched his fists tightly inside his pockets, fighting the urge.

After a few seconds he became aware of music filtering down the stairs. His first thought was that it was coming up from the Third Rail, but he was on the second floor by now and there was no way their little jukebox could be cranked up that loud. It took him a moment to realize it was a tune he'd never heard before… which was a fucking rarity in and of itself.

The song became more distinct as he got closer to his room. He could just make out faint humming over it, and then singing in a low voice when the words started up.

"Darling, je vous aime beaucoup…"

He paused as he reached the doorway, watching. Rose was reclined on the bed, eyes closed and her hands resting over her heart. Dogmeat was curled at her feet, and fast asleep by the looks of it.

The music came from the old holotape player that she'd helped to repair during some down time on one of their previous visits. Her lips moved along with the words; she sang along lightly, almost absently, like she didn't realize she was doing it.

"Je ne sais pas what to do… you know you've completely stolen my heart…"

He watched her silently, afraid to move lest her startle her and break the spell. He'd never her sing before… which wasn't unusual, since he was pretty sure that only other person he'd actually heard sing anything in person was Magnolia. People didn't normally have a lot to sing about in the Commonwealth… especially when it could give away your position and get you shot, or eaten.

Rose's voice was low, tentative, but she matched every note of the song, even humming along to the instrumental bits. Clearly, this was something she had listened to many times before. Her face, which had carried the hard lines of a frown far too often these past weeks, was relaxed into an almost blissful expression.

The song quietly faded to a close, and the holotape shut off. Rose sighed, and then rolled to her side to push herself up off the bed. She nearly jumped out of her skin when she saw Hancock standing in the doorway; her cheeks blushed bright red, like she'd been caught doing something she shouldn't have.

"You scared the shit out of me!" she said admonishingly. "How long have you been standing there?"

"A while. You could put Mags out of a job," he said, which made her blush more. "Where'd you find that song? Haven't heard it before."

"Daisy. She had a box of holotapes that one of her suppliers managed to dig up. She let me have this one." Her fingers brushed over the wooden surface of the holotape player. "I didn't think I'd get to ever hear it again."

"Was it your and Nate's song?" He seemed to recall a reference to that sort of thing somewhere… maybe in one of the books that Daisy was so fond of collecting.

She shook her head. "No. He wasn't ever much for that. This song… when I was a little girl, before my father got sick, he would dance with me every time it came on. And when he had to go away with the military, he told me that he'd play it every night before he went to sleep so that he'd dream about being home." She smiled, and it had the same melancholy touch as when she spoke about Shaun. "After he died I listened to it so much that I burned through three separate holotapes."

"Sorry to hear that. About your old man, I mean."

"Don't be. It was a very, very long time ago."

They both stood there awkwardly for a few seconds, each trying to find the words to bridge the gap their argument had wrought. When he wasn't able to think of anything else to do, Hancock stepped over the holotape player and flicked it on again. The song started up after a beat or two. Rose's expression immediately softened as soon as the first notes came on; her eyes drifted out of focus as old memories swirled up into her thoughts.

On an impulse, Hancock took Rose's hand and tugged her against him, letting his other arm rest around her hips. She blinked at him with a bemused tilt playing around her lips.

"What are you doing?"

"I ain't much good at dancin'," he said by way of answering, "but I mighta taken the time to learn if there were more songs like this around."

Her smile turned into a full-blown grin. She nestled her head against his shoulder, nuzzling into his neck, and just like that all of his frustration from earlier was wiped away. It had to be some kind of witchcraft or something, the way she could change his entire mood with such a small gesture. He began to spin her in a slow circle- he wasn't kidding about having two left feet, but she didn't seem to mind. She melted against him, and he thought that he could stay there forever.

"I'm sorry about being a bitch earlier," she said.

"Don't worry about it," he replied, a little gruffly. He knew she wasn't conceding defeat or surrendering. For right now, though, it would be enough. "I could've been a little less of a jackass too."

"You were kind of entitled to be," she admitted.

They spun in lazy circles for another few seconds or so, and then Hancock dragged up the courage to ask something he'd been wondering about for a while. "So, what're ya gonna do? When you find Shaun, I mean."

Her head cocked; his heart began to knock against his ribcage as he practically felt her pick apart his reasons for asking in her mind.

"I guess I'll take him to Sanctuary," she answered after a beat. "So long as we don't end up having to hightail it out of the Commonwealth to escape the Institute, anyway. That's probably the safest place he could be… except maybe the Castle, but that's not really any place to raise a kid. The settlers can teach him about farming and providing for himself; Sturgis can show him all of that handyman stuff he knows how to do; and Cara will be there to mix some real education into all of that. And we can teach him to fight and defend himself…"

"We?" He paused, risking a glance down at her.

She lifted her head to better look at him. "Yeah, as in you and I. Unless you've got better plans?"

He fought for a moment to regain his power of speech; that hadn't been the answer he was expecting. "I… I mean… uh, yeah."

She arched an eyebrow. "'Uh, yeah'?"

He gave his head a little shake to clear it. "Sorry. I just thought… well, sorta thought you'd be tellin' me to take a hike once the kid was back in the picture." Her face began to shift into indignation and he scrambled to defend himself. "That ain't any sorta judgment against you, Sunshine. It's just that most people wouldn't trust a ghoul with their kid if their life depended on it… 'specially not one with my kinda history. And I ain't really the father type… my own old man wasn't the greatest role model on that front. Don't think I've even known any kids since I was one myself."

"Let me clear something up for you," she said, cupping his face in both her hands so that he had to look at her. "I'd be lying if I said there weren't things you've done in the past that I don't like, but you're fundamentally a good person, John... no matter how much you try to deny it. I don't expect you to become his dad; that would be a lot to ask of anyone. You could just be that guy who sleeps in Mom's room for all I care." At that, Hancock snorted in amusement. "I trust that you'd never raise a hand to him, or let him do anything stupid like falling in with raiders or get addicted to chems. I'd trust you to help me keep him safe. And that's really enough for me."

Hancock couldn't immediately respond. His heart was thudding so damn hard, just as hard as it had the first time she'd let him fuck her back at her little truck stop in Sanctuary. He must've been a goddamned saint in a previous life, because there was no fucking way he deserved this. Any of this.

Rose watched the emotions pass across his face, with one corner of her mouth hitched up. "That means that I want you along for the ride, if I wasn't being blunt enough," she said with a wink. "If that's what you want too, that is. I won't try to force you into anything you don't want to do."

He tried to come up with a witty response, or at least something affirmative and coherent, but instead what came out of his mouth was, "How the fuck are you even real, Sunshine?"

"Excuse me?"

"People like you just don't exist." He leaned his forehead against hers as he tried to wrestle his thoughts into order. "I swear to god, if this all ends up bein' some big Jet flashback, I'm gonna be so pissed."

"So that's a yes, then?"

He wrapped both arms around her to hug her tightly against him, until he was probably at risk of suffocating her just a little bit, and kissed her until she was laughing too hard to continue.

"What's so funny?"

"The song ended a long time ago," she said pointedly, and he stopped. He hadn't even realized that they were still spinning around, he'd been so focused on her.

"Oh." He grinned roguishly as a thought struck him. "You know, come to think of it, there is a dance I'm actually pretty good at. Not a lotta footwork at all… just gotta be horizontal to do it."

At that Dogmeat got up from the bed with a canine grumble and shake. Hancock had almost completely forgotten that the mutt was still there; Dogmeat slunk out of the room, sparing an exasperated glance at the pair that made him question- not for the first time- just how smart the hound really was. Rose laughed again at the shepherd's irritation, throwing back her head, and god he could get drunk just off of that sound alone.

"I guess I've got another dance or two in me tonight," she replied to him, and she pulled him along with her onto the bed, a wicked glint in her eye. "If you're lucky, I might even let you lead."