Austin leads her towards one of the windowed rooms on the ground floor, babbling all the while. "Do you like your hair? I like mine. I hate combing it, though. Gran makes me comb it. I bet you don't have to comb your hair."
Horatio, the barber, looks up from his magazine when they enter. "Austin, your hair is a mole rat's nest— ah, I was hoping you'd stop by."
Kaelyn tenses. "'Scuse me?"
"I know from experience the Commonwealth shows no mercy when it comes to hair." His expression becomes pained as he looks her over. "Your hair is a disaster. You have to let me fix it."
His words register several moments later. "Wait, you've been outside the vault?"
"Quincy, born and raised."
That's what allows her to trust him handling scissors around her neck. Kaelyn hands over her caps and settles in the chair, all the while mulling over how a surfacer could have secured a place in the vault. Austin steals one of Horatio's comics and plops onto the stool next to her, spinning his seat around with his feet.
"You said you were from Quincy?"
Horatio secures the sheet around her shoulders. "Sure did. Looks like I was one of the lucky ones, too. Last I heard, Gunners had taken her over."
Ah. "A few people managed to get out. They're my new neighbors, in fact." If she neglects to mention that twenty survivors were whittled down to five, well, it wouldn't do any good for him to know. Her tone remains flat when she says, "The ones responsible are dead. I can promise you that much."
She doesn't remember their faces, only how they died. The three leaders in their power armor, modified to match the raiders' rusted and raw aesthetic. At first she hadn't even realized where she, Valentine and Dogmeat had wandered into. Only once she'd cracked open a terminal in a well-equipped garage and read Sturges' old entries had she known.
"Won't bring Quincy back, but that's something."
Horatio washes and combs out her hair, muttering about mole rat nests, and picks up a pair of slender scissors. While he attempts to trim her hair into something civilized, Kaelyn steers the conversation towards local happenings but Horatio only has mundane gossip: Holt Combes cheating on his wife, one of the maintenance boys apparently sneaking jet, and of course the mysterious fellow vault dwellers, one of whom is currently going through the clinic's supply of med-x.
His hands are quick, solicitous, touching her only where necessary, and soon enough he is crouching down to her eye level to check both sides of her hair are of equal length. "Isn't that better?"
Kaelyn cards her fingers through her hair, experimental, tugging at the neatened ends. It's now tamed and presentable, damp ends curling around her throat. It's a far cry from the elegant chestnut waves that once bobbed against her collarbones, and still too short to be secured in a functional bun. She might need to spare some bobby pins for their intended use.
Seeing that Horatio is finished, Austin all but drags Kaelyn out the door, and she calls a thank you over her shoulder. Only when they return to the cafeteria, Austin stops and pulls her into a hiding place behind the stairs. Kaelyn scans the room, alert for anything that dares to threaten this boy. At the cafeteria tables, a woman starts rounding up the kids to herd them down one of the corridors.
Austin sighs and scuffs his feet on the scratched tiles. "I bet you didn't have to go to school." Envy colors his tone a deep green.
Ah.
"I did, in fact, have to go to school. All kids had to." And when she was in grade school, she didn't appreciate fun-ruining adults telling her to be grateful, so she doesn't mention the children on the surface who grow up without education. "I don't want to make you late."
"But I can't go to class. Someone has to look out for you. You've got crutches and everything!"
Three guesses who put the boy up to it. "Nice try. What if I come with you? Will your teacher mind if I sit up back? Or I can head downstairs to the clinic."
Realizing there's no escape for him, Austin concedes with such grumpy reluctance Kaelyn's mouth twitches. He sets a slow pace—so she can keep up, he claims—and follows the teacher herding her students out of the atrium.
Kaelyn is struck by an idea that almost stops her mid-stride. "Hey, Austin. I forgot something at the diner. You go on ahead. I'll catch up."
He hesitates a moment, frowning up at her, but then his expression brightens into acceptance. "Okay. You know where the school is now, thanks to me."
Kaelyn doesn't look back, swinging on her crutches with the purposeful stride—if a little hindered—of someone who knows where she's going, so nobody gives her more than a cursory look. Security watches her with a wary eye and there's a muttered, "So you're the reason patrols are doubled."
Instead, she pokes around.
Austin's tour has already put most of the vault on display, along with the extensive repair work cluttering the corridors. Kaelyn passes two young mechanics repairing a burst pipe in the wall, and after a moment's struggle, she chooses not to disturb them. In the diner, one woman makes the mistake of remarking in hushed tones to Kaelyn, "I've never seen a synth before. It's kind of... creepy."
"He is one of the most kind-hearted people you'll ever meet. Plus he's a detective. Can't go wrong with that." She doesn't stop moving, unwilling to be bogged down by the same tired debate of personhood, not now, not when she's in the death spirals of her suspicion.
In the upper level of the atrium, success. The head mechanic, for one, is more than happy to procrastinate his work by responding to her probing.
"I've never seen a functioning vault before. But you've been living here for two hundred years—the place has to be in decline."
"In decline?" He snorts, incredulous, swiping a thick hand over his bald crown, and she thinks she made a misstep until he continues, "You must be one of those politically correct types. Old 81 here, she's a straight up wreck." He explains how the 'old gal' has been finding parts to break at the most inconvenient moments. Kaelyn listens, making the appropriate hums and nods to keep him talking, hoping he'll mention something substantial. But from his easy rambling—no suspicious pauses, no backtracking, no signs of internal editing—she learns only that the vault's deterioration has accelerated in the last few years. "Been going through tools like they were going outta style. If you've got any on you, I'll happily take 'em off your hands."
"My screwdriver is off the table," she answers without thinking. "But if I come across any tools on the surface, I can bring them your way."
Seeing as she's tarried long enough to stretch the plausibility of her excuse, Kaelyn finds the classroom and curses every step in the staircase along the way. Stepping into a classroom that's still intact offers a certain relief that somewhere the world still works as it should. Even if half the desks are empty.
"Do you mind if I visit for a bit? I won't distract your class, I promise."
"Oh! You're one of those new travelers." Miss Katy waves at the many vacant desks when Kaelyn asks if she can sit in. "Of course! Have a seat."
Kaelyn eases onto a nearby desk and balances her crutches against the chair. The kids stare and murmur until Miss Katy sets them a series of sums on the chalkboard. When the class is occupied, hunched over their desks, pencils scratching like the dry, rhythmless noise of swaying leaves, she skirts the room to stand next to Kaelyn.
"It's a good class you've got," Kaelyn murmurs.
"When they behave," she responds, but her tone is fond as she watches her students. "My kids would love to hear about anything you've done out in the Commonwealth. If you feel up to it, would you mind talking to my class about life on the surface?
Kaelyn is caught flat-footed. "That... depends. What kind of stories are you looking for?"
"Nothing too violent. I'm sure they'll have lots of questions, though. Thank you so much!"
She doesn't know if she has anything worth imparting to a new generation. By virtue of living in a vault, they probably know more about pre-war life than the average surfacer. But Austin will be thankful for a distraction from schoolwork.
After they've completed their sums, Miss Katy gathers their attention. "Children, listen up. We have a guest today, who is going to tell us stories about the Commonwealth." It's hard to tell who is more pleased: Miss Katy, thrilled to provide an outside perspective for her students, or Austin, relieved from schoolwork.
Kaelyn gives them what news passes through the 'appropriate for children' filter: that the Commonwealth has experienced some rough times recently, but things are looking up for the first time in decades. The kids pick up right away that she's doing some internal editing and fidget in their seats.
Of course, Austin has to ask: "Have you ever fought a deathclaw?"
Their bubbly eagerness is dissonant against adrenaline-soaked scraps of memory featuring slashing claws and a hideous roar.
Kaelyn flounders, her gaze flicking to the teacher. "Uh, wouldn't you rather hear about the time I fought a—" Come on, think, "—mole rat?"
The students are less than impressed.
"My dad says mole rats are nothing more than pests," Erin says from her spot in the front row, next to Austin.
Kaelyn holds out for all of ten seconds against a barrage of children begging, "Please? Please, will you tell us?"
At the front of the room, Miss Katy mouths, Not too violent.
"All right. Fine." She settles herself more firmly on the desk amidst cheers, drawing in a careful breath at the sharp twinge in her thigh. Taking a moment to sanitize those stained recollections. "I'll tell you about the first deathclaw I fought—"
"You mean you've fought more than one? Wow, that is so cool!"
Kaelyn fixes Austin with a look that remains a few steps too shy of stern. "If you keep interrupting me, I can't tell the story." After his quick apology, too excited to be properly contrite, she continues, "It started in Concord. My friend Preston is with the Minutemen—you know who they are, don't you?" At their bobbing nods, she proceeds to gloss over her terror, freshly thawed into the rotting bones of what used to be her world. Gloss over the first kills she ever made, that she did little more in that first fight than act as a distraction for Preston's devastating aim. That her throat had been raw and her hands shook before even reaching the survivors' nook in the museum. Having to walk through still-functioning displays honoring the USA's soldiers when her veteran husband was cold in the vault.
Instead she plays up Preston's heroism, plays up finding the suit of power armor, plays up the earth-shuddering boom when she jumped off the roof. "And then Preston and I kept shooting until the deathclaw was dead."
A wet nose brushes her fingers and she starts. Dogmeat peers up at her, ears slightly back. Stroking the wrinkles on his forehead, Kaelyn looks towards the door. Filling the space in the doorway are Nate and Valentine. But no matter the disgruntled bundle of gray fur trying to squirm out of Nate's hands, he only has eyes for Kaelyn.
She feels colder, all of a sudden.
If the sudden appearance of Dogmeat garners excited remarks of doggy! then Erin's shriek of delight at seeing Ashes shatters any notion of class time. Nate has to drop Ashes or have his knuckles bitten with all the frantic force of one furious cat who bolts straight for Erin.
The girl sweeps the bundle of purring gray fur into her arms. "Ashes! You found him! Thanks, sir! I didn't know if I'd ever see him again."
Impressively, Miss Katy regains control of her class with a few deft words. Once Dogmeat sits by Kaelyn's feet and Ashes at Erin's, both out of petting range, the students settle into something akin to good behavior.
Nate coughs once, awkward. "Sorry, miss, for distracting your class."
Miss Katy only smiles. "You're lucky. Today we've been listening to stories from the surface. The two of you are more than welcome to join us. We'd love to hear any stories you'd like to share."
Of course, the appearance of a rather unique synth captures immediate attention, without a drop of the fear that burdens so many adults. To Vault 81, the Institute is nothing more than a worrying rumor. Perhaps security believed the Institute couldn't breach a vault.
Valentine handles their questions with aplomb.
Are you a robot? "I'm a detective. As well as a synth, yeah."
My dad says synths are evil. "Not always so. Or even mostly so. The folks that worked for the Institute did some evil things, but plenty of us just want a normal life."
Do you have laser eyes? "Now that would have been a great feature. Sadly, no."
While Valentine leans against the wall, answering questions as quickly as the kids can fire them, Nate ambles through the rows of empty desks to lean beside Kaelyn. She grips the wooden edges of the desk, gouged from generations of bored children scratching their marks into the surface, and doesn't look up at him. For his part, he folds his arms across his chest and chuckles at some of the zanier questions thrown at Valentine. His presence is close enough to warm the air but not so close that she can't breathe, not so close that he would accidentally brush against her. His attention remains fixed on the class's antics as if nothing is wrong—it wears away her unease with more effectiveness than any manifest attempts at comfort.
Miss Katy offers Nate a chance to share his own stories, but he demurs with an apologetic look. "I'm afraid my wife here is the better storyteller."
Austin turns his big brown eyes to Kaelyn. "Aw, just one more story? Pretty please?"
Kaelyn is ready to defer to Miss Katy, who raises an eyebrow. "Remember your manners. They're our guests here."
"But he said please!"
Nate snickers and says, low enough that only Kaelyn can hear, "That's the magic word."
"Hush. Don't encourage them."
When Miss Katy grants her permission—and frankly, any hesitation on her part seems more out of consideration for her guests than any lack of eagerness on her own part—Kaelyn runs through her memory for child-appropriate stories. The list is frightfully small.
"What happened to your leg?" one of the girls asks.
Her hands clench around the edge of the desk, white-knuckled. Nothing more than the inevitable aftermath of violence. Nothing more than another clash with raiders. "That's not a good story."
While Miss Katy reigns in her class's disappointment with the reminder that injuries are not fun, Nate covers Kaelyn's hand with his own.
Clearing her throat, she says, "All right. You laughed at mole rats, but how about a mirelurk?"
Leaning against the wall, Valentine tries to hide his amusement.
At the class's groans and sighs, she has to smile. "Just wait. It's better than it sounds. If you know about the Minutemen, do you also know that they once had a castle? Fort Independence. The biggest castle in all the Commonwealth."
The children can't help but chatter: "that is so cool!" and "did it have a moat?"
"To a fashion. It's bordered by the sea, so they have this great ocean view." By chance, Kaelyn glances around and sees a map of Massachusetts pinned on the wall. "Hon, could you grab that—yes, thanks. The Castle is right over..." It takes her a moment to find it. Holding up the map so the kids can see, she points to Castle Island. "Here. Now, the Castle was abandoned a long time ago. There was a legend that a monster rose out of the sea and attacked the castle." By this point, she's starting to get into the retelling.
"I'll bet it was just mirelurks," a black-haired boy in the second row moans.
Oh, she's enjoying this story a lot more. It only takes a raised eyebrow to quell any further interruptions. "It was Preston's idea to retake the Castle so the Minutemen could have a base of their own. We stepped into the courtyard, and wall to wall was nothing but mirelurk nests. So we cleared up the mess as best we could. And then, Preston and I were standing on the battlements when we felt the whole world rumble. "
She pauses for effect.
"The ground shook and the sea churned. And then, out of the water rose a giant creature as tall as the walls. The mirelurk queen. We ran all around the courtyard that afternoon, and hid inside where she couldn't swipe at us with those claws of hers. But we won in the end. They're still eating seafood for every meal, last I heard."
"No way!"
"Come on. How is that less believable than me killing a deathclaw?" On my second night out of the vault, when I had never killed anything before that day. "It was a mirelurk queen the size of the atrium."
"Radiation exposure can cause animals to grow to extraordinary sizes," Miss Katy injects, commanding the class's attention, "as we can see with a number of bug species."
"No kidding," Nate mutters. No doubt he remembers being chased out of an abandoned shack by a pack of skittering radroaches.
"That's enough, everyone," Miss Katy says, and under her pastel-bright tone is a comfortable note of command. "Please thank all our guests for taking the time to share with us!"
They receive a chorus of thank yous from the children, along with a pleading look from Austin for one more story. Miss Katy presents Kaelyn and Valentine with a gift—a comic each—before they leave. Outside the classroom, Kaelyn halts and closes her eyes, poised between the two crutches. Suddenly tired, her breath comes out in one tumbling rush. How can anyone reconcile sitting in a room, spinning some idealized story, enjoying it, even, with the bloody reality?
Kaelyn looks down at the comic, its cover a mess of yellow and red. Grognak the Barbarian: Demon Slaves, Demon Sands. She presses it into Nate's chest. "All yours."
Knowing her distaste for Grognak, Nate smirks as he runs his thumb along the edge of the comic. It's in good condition, aside from a few dog-eared pages. "Not bad for a castaway. Thanks, hon." He ducks down to kiss her cheek.
Valentine squirrels away his own comic into one of the considerable pockets of his trench coat. "Feel bad tracking my muck through this place. Gonna clean up a bit. I can take Dogmeat off your hands, if you kids want some time alone." With that, he whistles for Dogmeat and sets out for the lavatory.
Nate's green-eyed gaze traces a familiar, intimate pattern over her face. "Hon?"
She feels strange, weighed yet buoyant, brittle like a sharp breath will split her chest open. "I'm going to laugh or I'm going to cry, and I don't know which one it is yet."
His hands touch her chin, tilting her face up, and whatever he sees draws an almost-imperceptible sigh from him. His eyes shine in the bright lights, filled with recognition of all things. He brushes his thumb against her lower lip before dropping his hands. "How's the leg?"
"Manageable." When Nate raises an eyebrow at such a useless answer, she adds, "I question the need for so many stairs."
That, at least, draws a thin smile out of him. "I need to clean up. You coming with?" He holds out a hand. She does one better, sliding under his arm to lean against his side. Within a few moments she discovers that he is indeed in painful need of a shower.
The lavatories cap the end of the residential wing, one on both the ground floor and first floor. A plume of damp heat, smelling of soap and warm mold, welcomes them as they step over the threshold.
Kaelyn stares, awed by the row of showers with their silver heads and blue tiles and yellow stalls. "I never thought I would see one of these again." It had been the only luxury she ever took advantage of in the Institute. Although, come to think of it, she may have also stolen some coffee.
Nate remains silent, his expression shuttered, and guides her to a stall at the end of the row. He settles her down on a bench, balancing her crutches nearby within easy reach for her. "We can't get these bandages wet."
"You mean I can't go in myself?" But the dull ache in her armpits and the deep red throb in her thigh test the remnants of med-x spread thin in her blood. She eyes the shower with a dull weariness.
"Afraid so." But then Nate smirks, teasing, and his expression is at once achingly familiar and curiously alien. "Bu-ut, on the other hand, you get to watch me take a shower. I'd call that a pretty sweet deal."
Pursing her lips, she taps a nail against her mouth in consideration. Nate tosses his jacket at her head.
With a towel folded over her bandaged thigh, she can indeed lean back against the wall and watch the hissing spray hit his broad shoulders. Standing under the stream of scalding water, he runs his hands through his hair, the muscles in his back shifting as he scours away every last inch of grime. Steam clouds the blue tiles, running in thin trails while Kaelyn's hair curls. Her collar feels scratchy and damp.
When Nate at last steps out, his skin is flushed pink; water droplets bead on his skin, drip from his hair. Kaelyn has a towel ready for him, which he takes with murmured thanks. He helps her undress and wets a washer under a thin stream of hot water, then kneels in front of her. Under his deft care, all lingering traces of grime from battle, astringent from surgery, and sweat from fear are washed away.
He starts with her hands, picking dirt out from under her fingernails. Over her wrists and up her arms, smoothing away the tension in her shoulders with a warm touch that knows exactly where to press. Even with the balmy atmosphere, she shivers when he pulls away to rinse the washer. Then Nate runs the washer over her breasts, over the marks on her belly, over her good leg and even her feet. Finally, he peels away the towel covering her thigh.
Unwinding the bandages, Nate dabs at what clear skin he can, avoiding the stiff black threads that hold the holes in her leg together. Despite the precise knots, the stitches themselves are thick and rough, with loose threads sticking in all directions like the black fangs of an anglerfish.
"Are they supposed to look like that?"
Nate smooths his thumb over her knee. "It's all right. Better to get 'em sewn up fast than sewn up pretty. They're not permanent, anyway."
"How much longer?"
Nate sucks his lower lip between his teeth. "Another week, maybe."
Before pulling away, he presses a light kiss against her thigh. Kaelyn runs her hand through his wet hair, brushing her nails across his scalp, and he lets out a soft breath. He wraps her leg in a fresh dressing and helps her to her feet, ready with a towel to envelop her. A sharp throb of pain has her wobbling on the wet tiles, her hiss echoing in the quiet like a facsimile of water.
Nate steadies her, his hands around her elbows. That bullet scar on his chest is still a fresh, angry red. Her stomach twists when she sees it, so she buries her head into his chest and closes her eyes. He pulls her flush against him, supporting her weight while she wraps her arms around his ribs.
Nate buries his face in her hair. "I was afraid."
She runs her fingers down his back. "I'm normally better at dodging, I promise."
He tightens his hold, his nose skimming the shell of her ear. They remain in place, unwilling to move. With each breath the tension unwinds from her chest in a thin black wire.
"How about food?" he murmurs into her hair.
"Clothes first."
"Killjoy," he teases, and sets to helping her dress. He responds to her offer to help him with one raised eyebrow, and she concedes the point. He's faster on his own without having to watch whether she's about to faint.
The Sunshine Diner is just starting to see late afternoon traffic and Nate meets Austin on the way to the cafeteria line. Valentine and Dogmeat find her at the table she's claimed, and she ducks down to give Dogmeat a good scratch. "What have you been up to?"
Valentine drops down onto the bench beside her. "Been putting the old handyman skills to work. This place isn't going downhill—it's caught in a landslide, careening towards a cliff."
Pressing her palms into the tabletop, Kaelyn murmurs, "That seems to be the consensus. With all the rationing and maintenance going on, I can't believe they were willing to waste resources on me."
"They weren't willing to let someone bleed out on their doorstep."
"Still, there's got to be something I can do. It's—only right, that they can live here safe in the vault."
The corner of Valentine's mouth kicks up, even as he watches her. "I'm sure the good folks here would appreciate a hand. Heard enough complaints about supplies people can't get their hands on."
Kaelyn nods, drawing slow circles on Dogmeat's fur. "That's the best way to pay them back. Go to the surface to get what they can't."
Nate and Austin have reached Maria, who's in control of the buffet. They pull her into a short conversation while she loads up three trays.
"Still worried there's some dark conspiracy going on down here?" Valentine's tone is soft and conversational, pitched quietly enough that it won't carry.
Kaelyn sighs. Against all expectations, Vault 81 is stable and operating like the Vault 111 she imagined when it was being excavated behind Sanctuary Hills. "No."
He bumps her shoulder with his. "Told ya it's the friendliest vault in the Commonwealth."
Nate returns victorious with an early dinner coaxed out of Maria. Austin and Erin sit with them, and their meal becomes a much louder affair than Kaelyn anticipated. The children chatter with all the twittering energy of birds in the spring, fresh and eager and so very young. Nate keeps them occupied, telling awful jokes and making them giggle by trying to balance a fork across his nose.
All the while, there's a misty sheen of wistfulness in his gaze, and his smile occasionally turns down at the corners. Kaelyn touches his wrist but he moves his arm out of reach. She doesn't pursue where she isn't wanted, and tries to focus on her meal—pie with an unfamiliar soft filling—but the throbbing in her thigh is changing from ignorable to savage.
"I can distract 'em if you want to make a break for it," Valentine murmurs. "You look like you need some shut-eye."
"Are you going to be okay by yourself?"
Valentine chuckles, warm and smooth and edged with a static burr. "Think I'll manage."
There's no way to sneak away unseen from a table in a cafeteria using crutches. Nate is ready to abandon the prospect of dessert to follow her, but she won't take this fun time away from him. After a final once-over from Rachel and a nightly dose of med-x, she's left to her own company behind the privacy screen that doesn't do nearly enough to block out the lights. Dogmeat curls up at her feet. The med-x in her veins smooths away enough of the pain and drags her heavy eyelids closed. Her body feels heavy and sluggish, and once she's half-curled, she doesn't move again.
She stirs at a foreign clang and a muttered curse.
"Sorry." A hand brushes her forehead. Nate.
Peeling her eyes open, she finds the clinic is only a few shades lighter than the insides of her eyelids. Kaelyn shuffles back and throws aside the blanket for him. Kicking off his boots and pants, Nate takes up the invitation. While the bed is wide enough to be comfortable for someone of her stature, any free space vanishes with her husband beside her. They both lie on their sides, facing each other.
"Love you," she whispers.
"I love you, too."
Nate lets out a heavy breath, shifting on the mattress. Looks up at the ceiling. "You know, this is more along the lines of what I was expecting for Vault 111."
"This is what we should have had. If Vault-Tec hadn't wanted their human test subjects."
The quiet pressing down on them is a few steps shy of oppressive. When Nate next speaks, his voice is mud-toned. "It would've been hard to live underground for the rest of our lives. Maybe without ever going to the surface again. But we could have… and Shaun would have…"
Kaelyn wants to curl up, to protect her belly, but there's no space. "The Institute would never have gotten their hands on him. We could have been a proper family."
"That Austin's a good kid," Nate says, slowly, as if each word holds a secret. "Makes me wonder..."
Kaelyn squeezes her eyes shut and buries her head in the crook of his neck.
"That synth copy of Shaun—"
"Don't." Her whisper borders on a hiss. "Don't open that door." There's too much to consider, and it's too confusing, too hurtful, for her to want to think about it let alone bring some kind of resolution to her scarred heart. That boy should be halfway out of the Commonwealth for now. And that's for the best.
"Just— I don't get why would he do that. Make a robot copy of himself." Nate goes quiet. She almost believes he's dropped the subject until he says, grief-hoarse: "I wish I could have seen him."
"Shh, shh, shh. Come here." Kaelyn tucks Nate's head under her chin. She's glad he never had to see what their son became. And lurking beneath the thought, twisting between the dark boughs of a dead woodland: the question of what he would have done, had he been in her stead.
She savors the warm press of Nate's skin against hers. He runs his fingers over her shoulder and down to her hip then circles back, his breath shuddering deep in his chest. She runs her cold toes down his shins, feeling the long, soft hairs. They remain together until sleep separates them.
When Dr Forsythe and Rachel clear Kaelyn to leave the vault—provided she not stand too close to any more exploding cars—she's relieved. Being able to walk without crutches has its perks. Dr Forsythe recommends Kaelyn return to Vault 81 to get the stitches removed; when she points out that there are doctors outside the vault who could do the procedure, he's aghast at the thought of surface conditions.
After some mulling, Kaelyn raises her idea with Nate. "Hey, hon. I was thinking we could grab some supplies for Vault 81. Things they need but can't get down here." She leans on the railing overlooking the atrium, shifting her weight off her bad leg. Despite jury rigs having jury rigs, the atrium's founding architecture of blocky chambers and faded pastel decor is undeniably that of a vault. Perhaps it's the last functioning vault in the Commonwealth. "If there's anything I can do to stop this place from falling into ruin like all the others…"
Nate holds her hand, entwining their fingers. "I hear you. And I agree. If this is what we can do to help, then I figure I owe Overseer McNamara for letting us in."
It's a simple matter to ask around for needed supplies that can only be found on the surface. Over breakfast, the three of them plan out their supply run, throwing around suggestions on where they might acquire the items on their list. While it may not be easier, finding supplies is cheaper than buying them.
Nate catches Kaelyn in the clinic, where she's packing her bags and checking the weapons that have finally been returned to her. "Here. I got something for you." He holds out an unmarked book with a pen balanced in its cover.
She used to scavenge pens and pencils whenever she could find them. Has a drawer full of them, some half used, some broken, some inlaid with hairline fractures and some smattered with dust. None pristine. None used. Kaelyn accepts the gifts, turning the book over in her hands as if she isn't sure how to hold it. It sits in her hands with its odd angles and strange flatness; it doesn't contour to her palm like the grip of a gun. A flip through the pages shows they are yellowed around the edges and occasionally mottled, but otherwise unmarked.
Kaelyn blinks.
"If you're not ready to talk now—maybe you never will be—that's all right. But you need to get whatever's knocking around in here—" Nate taps two fingers to her temple "—out of your head."
A memory rises, unbidden, of Nate half-curled in one of the armchairs at home, his back against one armrest and a foot dangling from the other. Bright light streaming through the front windows, silver-bright, gold-edged. His considerable biceps flexing as he scribbled in a notebook, sometimes frantic and sometimes stilted. Sometimes he would get that thousand-yard stare, pen tapping against his knee in an idle, rhythmless tempo. She remembers that stack of slender books in the bottom of the wardrobe, one for each year he'd served in the army.
And Nate stands before her now, his green eyes warm under the cool vault lights, lancing through her every defense. "Whatever you've faced," he says, "you don't have to be alone anymore."
Her chest feels simultaneously weighted down and weightless, sinking under shame and soaring under relief that he never witnessed the decisions she made. "Thanks, hon."
The only thing left is to say goodbye to Austin and Erin. Like antsy cats sensing rain, the two children are waiting in the atrium with reproachful gazes, toys abandoned on the steps. Austin bounds up to Kaelyn, his mouth tugging downward. "You're leaving? You can't leave. Gran says you haven't got the stitches taken out yet."
With some difficulty, Kaelyn crouches down to be eye level with the kids. "It's going to be all right. We're coming back, hopefully with some things that will help around here."
Austin gives her a serious look, one almost beyond his years, searching for any sign that she doesn't mean what she's saying. He heaves a disappointed sigh. "Fine."
Valentine hauls Kaelyn to her feet, and even with the two men carrying most of her gear, there's a warning twinge in her thigh where the stitches pull. Security halts Austin and Erin at the elevator, and no amount of puppy-dog-eyed pleading can convince the woman on duty to ignore policy and bring down the Overseer's wrath.
"I never get to go up to the surface," Austin mutters, folding his arms over his chest. "You better come back."
Nate ruffles Austin's hair. "Don't worry, my man. We will."
"Thanks again for Ashes. Be safe up there," Erin says.
"Will do," Valentine says. "You two behave yourselves now."
The officer manning the door controls hits the switch when he sees the visitors with their bags. The great door cycles open with a clank, and when the catwalk shudders into place they're free to leave. Nate offers Kaelyn a hand navigating both sets of stairs, and then they are in the tunnel where a thin breeze whistles dust and warm air down from the surface. Daylight guides them up, up, and then a gust of hot air welcomes them back to the Wasteland with its rust and radiation.
What was intended to be a brief detour to Oberland Station to report the dead raiders turns into a lunch of tato soup in lieu of caps. The settlers refuse to let them leave without some form of payment, no matter Kaelyn's insistence that it's unnecessary.
Nate watches lunch unfold, curious. "They seem very glad," he murmurs. "Let them show their gratitude. They won't feel so badly in debt this way."
The afternoon on the road crawls by after that, blessedly free of anything that wants to shoot at them. A ways up the road is the half-gnawed skeleton of a house, with one and a half walls still standing to cast deep shadows across the rubble piled on the floor. Two people sit on the porch steps.
Kaelyn reaches for Deliverer.
"Could be scavvers," Valentine says. "Don't have the look of raiders. Waiting for something, seems like."
One of the scavvers looks up, then, and they're spotted. The strangers duck their heads towards each other, then wave the travelers on.
After a moment's hesitation, Nate leads the way. "Afternoon."
One of the scavvers nods back. His gaze flits over Valentine, then Kaelyn. "Don't suppose any of you happen to have a Geiger counter?"
Kaelyn draws back half an inch, not quite a flinch. Relaxes her grip on her gun. Not a scavver at all, but a tourist or a new agent. After losing almost all of her heavies, Desdemona must be in sore need of new blood. Kaelyn doesn't recognize his features—mousy brown hair and plain brown eyes, with a farmer's tan. The best kind of forgettable. Nor does he recognize her, evidently.
Small blessings.
Kaelyn shakes her head. "No. Sorry. 'Scuse me."