Note: Edited on 04-02-17 with minor content.
The first time Jeanne'd gone into the Institute, she'd felt an odd nostalgia. Seeing the place in its perfect cleanliness, the air not filled with the stink of Brahmin effluent or unwashed bodies, even the people who walked about without guarding themselves―it reminded her so strongly of Pre-War hospitals that she'd had to sit down and soak it in, before continuing.
A blast from the past, as some might say.
Hearing Danse talk like he was, his voice unsure and his body language reserved but indicating discomfort, also gave her a sense of nostalgia. Not because of his obvious association―naturally, he would have been 'born' inside the place―but because she'd seen the same behavior before, in the past.
It was enough to start a slow singe of her heart. Memories scaled the wall and fell into place, her thoughts moving toward Nate and Jack. Painful thoughts, but needed to correlate the situation.
He reminded her of Nate, when he'd joined the army. He'd talked about it with her, sitting in the Cove and acting much the same as Danse had. It was a big decision, he knew. He wanted to hear what she'd say about it.
Jack had been gung-ho about military service. His enthusiasm for getting into all manner of shenanigans was legendary, going all the way back to when they roamed the wilds of the Island as pirates or cowboys or knights of olden. Jeanne had trailed along as an accessory, the token girl. It wasn't like she could pretend with them, not with Miss Nou trailing behind her and chiding her for even thinking about jumping in puddles or horsing around.
She'd had to be perfect.
Jack was fearless, strong, and always had a quick hand for protecting others. Mother hadn't put as much value on his behavior; maybe she thought Francis was the more important boy, the heir to the firm, or maybe she'd tried and Jeanne never noticed. Jack was too wild to capture, a Injun that whooped about the woods and painted himself with berries and always had a spot of poison ivy.
Nate... Nate had been a transplant to the Island, living down near Cromwell Cove with his aunt in a ramshackle cottage. The place became their kingdom by the sea, and... Nate prevailed as the sense of reason in their circle. Where Jack would have fought anyone for any reason―Old Jean once said he was Keats incarnate―Nate kept the peace. Sometimes he did so with rocks in his snowballs, but―
Jeanne wiped her face, surprised to find tears there. She hadn't meant to start thinking about him, it just―it just happened. The ache in her heart was terrible. It hurt. Dieu, did it ever hurt, but... it wasn't as terrible as it had been. Maybe she was getting better.
She pulled her knees up to her chest and surreptitiously cleaned her face, moving as if she was merely changing position. Changed her line of thought to the current situation.
Danse made a noise, and she pulled herself together. Looked up to him, and sighed internally. She was being selfish again―lost inside her own head―
" 'Not knowing who one is' ," she recalled. He'd said it to her, at Acadia.
"Yes," Danse said, his voice agitated. "I―I thought I knew. It doesn't make sense to me. I remember... everything. But not knowing if those memories are real or if they were planted―"
She watched his face. He looked stricken, but also angry. The same look he'd given DiMA, the same look she didn't like to see.
"The when of it is what bothers me the most." He made a fist and breathed out, loudly. "If I knew when I replaced―"
"When." Jeanne turned her gaze back to the sailboat. She'd not thought about that. Danse would want to know at what point he had been... well, when he was created, what had happened to him after. Why he was no longer inside the Institute. She mulled over the thought for a moment.
"If I could know how I was―at what point my memories were actually made by myself―even if they were made by a synth, knowing what to trust would be..." He closed his eyes and swallowed, hard. "I can trust that the ones I made after the revelation... are real. But what before that, is?" Danse opened his eyes and ground his teeth in his jaw. "All of this feels like a cruel joke."
Jeanne paused. No wonder he was so angry about her making jokes, laughing at him. That made her feel worse than she had before, even though she'd tried to explain. "Danse, I―" she said, keeping her face clear of any emotion, "―I really didn't mean to laugh at you."
He made a dismissive noise, but didn't speak. Jeanne tightened her arms around her knees. She'd taken a lot of liberty with him, from the very beginning. Saved his life even though he'd told her not to, talked down Elder Maxson and put Danse in even more danger for remaining alive... kept him on because she was being selfish and didn't want to have to remember that she would've been responsible for his death―
"I can't run away from what I am." Danse sighed in frustration. "To find peace, I need to face the fact that I'm my own worst enemy and live with the consequences."
Jeanne glanced at him, a new wave of ache in her heart. She'd been her own worst enemy for so many years―after she'd left home, and her mother disinherited her―much to Francis' delight. He'd crowed in joy the day that she'd left.
Salaud. Jeanne couldn't care less what he thought.
She'd been her own enemy for so long, she'd forgotten how to be herself. She didn't want to see Danse go down that road.
"You know..." She moved her legs out and planted her feet on the sand, lowering her knees. "I wonder about the Nakano girl. Why she would think she was a synth. What could DiMA have said to her, to make her doubt her memories?"
Danse shot her a sharp look. She met his gaze, seeing him process the thought. An unpleasant expression came over his face, showing how disgusted with the idea he was. "He has sown doubt in the mind of a young person," he said, sounding furious, "using existential fear. We must remove that fear, and those who deliberately cause it."
"Wasn't my point," she murmured, turning her head away from the awful glare he was giving her. "Everything she remembers is corroborated by her parents, by the people she grew up with. She doubts them, but..." She leaned forward, her hands on her knees. "Your memories are backed up by the people who knew you, too. By Haylen, by me, by Maxson." She watched him from the corner of her eyes.
"Do they remember?" Danse's hands shook from the force with which he clenched his fists. "Was the person who became friends with Cutler in Rivet City―with Maxson, with the Scribes, the Knights in the Brotherhood―was that the synth that I am?"
"Yes," Jeanne answered, her voice firm. "Your memories with them must be real. Those people remember, just like you. Maxson wouldn't have let you go, as easily as he had, if he didn't remember the same."
"I've tried to come to terms with it." Danse shook his head. "But there's nothing I can justify as the truth. The memories I do have will always be suspect―"
"They make you who you are," she put in, calmly. "You said it yourself, Danse." Jeanne looked over to him again, noting the confusion on his face. "Without your memories, you can't accept that you are who you are."
"I don't know if I can embrace my memories―make them Real, like your Rabbit." Danse's voice grew even harder, and he clenched both hands into fists. "I don't know that I could ever accept that I may have replaced a living flesh-and-blood human being. I―"
Could he really have replaced―whoever the real Danse had been? Jeanne wondered about that for a moment. "I don't think you replaced someone," she said, quietly. "There wouldn't have been time. You told me that you had been under attack since the moment that you arrived in the Commonwealth. And... the Institute would need time―"
She stopped herself short of repeating what she'd read about the Warwick man. Interrogation. Forty-eight hours worth, she thought. Enough time to push him to the very edge, get the man to spill his guts about his life―
She seriously doubted that, if Danse had replaced someone, forty-eight hours would be enough time to break a Brotherhood Paladin.
"You also said hiding who you are isn't a solution to a problem. If they had put you in place of someone else, wouldn't Rhys and Haylen notice?" she settled, feeling slightly sick to her stomach. Danse's jaw worked furiously, turning his head to stare at the sailboat.
"You've been in the Brotherhood for years, Danse." She coughed. "Rhys and Haylen would have seen something. Known something. Haylen... when Maxson sent me to find you―" she paused and took a deep breath. "Haylen said, 'There are no secrets in the Brotherhood.' "
Danse was quiet for a long time, his face registering all manner of emotion. She stared at him, hoping her point would come across. That there was nothing he could do about his memories, yes, but that he had always been the Real Danse.
"I must be missing the point." Danse flattened his hands and leaned more weight onto his knees. "I have to accept that I am who I am. My life's starting over, and I need to appreciate that."
Mine started over too, Jeanne thought, sadly. When she stepped out of the Vault, when she'd lost Nate, when Shaun was taken―
But... plus ça change plus c'est la même chose. Old Jean used it to explain everything, in an flippant manner. Jeanne knew the world was always changing, even in the wastes, but it was all the same. She'd not changed and the world, while different in appearance, was still run by people, who were always the same...
Even though she could trust that her past was real, it had begun anew. What had happened, and what could happen, she couldn't run away from the Island, and give up on their mission. She needed to embrace and confront her own feelings, like Danse was. She had to see this through.
If Danse could continue existing even though his being a synth was incompatible with his ideals, then she could survive broadcasting her past to other people. She could... stop pretending that everything was 'alright' and let her true feelings show, and work through her problems in a more healthy manner. It would stop her from reacting in the way she had when she lost it outside of Acadia, and would―would make it easier to bring Kasumi home, which was why they'd come to the Island to begin with.
Jeanne couldn't even remember when she mastered the smile, she'd been putting on the show for so long. Well before Jack had joined the army, well before she married Nate. She sighed to herself, blinking tiredly at the mural on the wall. That would be the hardest part of this―letting herself show the truth―not fitting her face with a fake smile to show that she was 'alright'.
She supposed that she'd already made progress. Danse being beside her, saying that it was alright to show her feelings and he his, made it easier. Probably the last person she would have expected to share like he was, or even show how weak he could truly be under all that Power Armor. Emotion swelled in her chest, seeing him in his vulnerable state. She wasn't sure what to make of it―
She leaned her head forward and placed her forehead onto her knees, closing her eyes and trying not to think about anything.
"Trust isn't something I can hand out easily, especially given the nature of my true identity." Danse was looking at her, now, but she didn't return the gaze. "I... realize I've pushed you to confront your memories, and I apologize for how forward I've been. I don't want you to think that I'm using you as a means to my own ends―"
"I couldn't possibly think that," Jeanne said, turning her head to him. She smiled, tiredly. "You aren't the selfish type."
"I..." He hesitated. "I know you can't fully understand what I am going through." His eyes bored into her head. "But you've made some points that I will think about, and you've listened to my troubles. Thank you for that."
"Telling someone your feelings isn't easy, either," she replied. "Thank you for trusting me. I haven't been... the best, about trust."
Danse paused, then shook his head slightly. "You are a sister in arms, Johnson. If I didn't stick by you, and you by me, then I would have no one to rely upon." He pushed himself up from the sand, patting his legs to remove the sand.
That emotion in her chest swelled like high tide, an imaginary moon pulling the feeling closer and closer to her head. She―
Remembered when Nate asked her to marry him. After telling her he was going to join up, after asking her if she thought that was a good idea. Jack had already left home, and she'd been so stressed―her mother taking every opportunity to criticize her, Francis blaming Nate, the daily fights―she'd run off to the Cove and cried her eyes out. It was the first time she'd managed to get away from Miss Nou for more than five minutes.
Nate found her, there. Said he was leaving, too. Nothing before had ever felt so crushing, to know that both of them would be gone and she'd be left behind to the mercy of her mother. No one left to protect her, nothing to look forward to―
Nate sat in the Cove with her until she stopped bawling, then promised he'd find a way to help. She'd waited for Nate for four years, wondering why he'd never written to her, wondering why Jack hadn't written home. Until―
Jeanne covered her face and stilled the tears that wanted to overtake her, trying to keep her head. That was why. She couldn't face being alone on this damnable Island. Because she had been left alone before―
And Jack never came back.
"Johnson." Danse's voice cut through her misery, almost annoyed in tone.
"Yes?" she asked, freeing her head of the thoughts. She looked up at him, seeing him standing there, his eyes intent on hers and a stringent look on his face.
"...I hadn't fully considered our situation, before. My opinion of your friendship was swayed by what I perceived as deceit. I know, now―" he looked away, his eyes darkening slightly "―that I was wrong to lose faith in your words. Will you accept my apology?"
"You don't need to apologize," she said, her voice weak.
"I still feel―"
"Let's compromise," Jeanne said, keeping her face as neutral as she could. "Neither one of us is all that good with... openly saying how we feel. It's exhausting." She tried to smile a little.
"What is the compromise?" Danse asked, raising an eyebrow at her as he turned back.
She closed her eyes and snorted. "I don't know. We can't keep saying sorry to each other, for a start."
Danse paused, briefly. "You're right," he said. "Very well, Johnson. I'll accept your apology for laughing at me, if you accept mine. We will leave it at that."
Jeanne watched him moving to his armor, re-entering it. She pushed herself up from the sand, finally, and rubbed her wrists. "Listen," Danse added, after he was settled, "I do appreciate that you've done what you can to meet my terms."
She nodded, thinking the same about him―that he'd been remarkable in his attempt to work with her through her what she felt was her losing her mind.
"And I wouldn't push, if this matter didn't affect the both of us." Danse turned and faced her, looking down at her from the armor.
Sort of expected it, now. Pushing was normal for Danse, she knew, though prying into her business was something she'd thought he'd let be. Actually, his attitude at the moment was more akin to when he'd been angry at her outside of Acadia. Maybe that was what he was referring to... she felt the strain of little sleep and stress weighing on her, heavily.
"I think you're right," she admitted, finally. "Talking about it. Trading concerns. At least..." She managed a weary half-smile. "Well, with blackmail like this on each other, neither of us will out the other."
"Let's get back to the matter at hand, shall we?" he stated, his voice once again guarded, ignoring her comment.
"Yes," she agreed, turning to lead the way back through the Vault. The emotion from before had simmered, but still... why? She couldn't make heads nor tails of it, why she'd suddenly had the rush of an indefinable tide to her brain.
Her thoughts were scrambled, as they made their way back through the Vault.
