That night, while Charon is bathing, Gal repacks all their gear, shifting everything she'll need for the trip to the Jefferson into her own and giving Charon the bulk of the rest and a decent bag of caps. She prepares herself for the explanation she'll have to give when Charon checks the bags, but for once he doesn't and so she's free for a little longer.
Gal, Charon, and Dogmeat meet her father and the team of scientists outside on the deck of the aircraft carrier early the next morning. A few of the scientists are holding the leads of pack Brahmin loaded down with supplies and instruments. Her father gives her a grin and a fierce hug when she stops in front of him, and to his credit gives Charon a friendly nod. Charon doesn't return it, but that's alright.
"I can't believe we're finally finishing this, lapushka. Are you ready to go? I think we'll leave in a couple minutes." he says. Gal smiles up and him and holds out a hand.
"Just one minute, Papa. Charon," she says, turning to him and digging an envelope out of her pack, "I missed this letter when I gave Carol that stack from Gob, and I feel bad keeping it. I need you to take it to Underworld for me. Stay there until I come pick you up, I imagine I'll be headed out there for a supply run not too long after we hit the Jefferson Memorial." she sticks the fat envelope into his hand and gives him a little wave.
He stands there uncertainly for a minute with his eyes on the envelope. Then he looks up at her, and there's a clear question in her eyes. She nearly cracks and gives the whole thing away, but remembering the look in his eyes when he'd first seen James at Vault 112 steels her resolve. After a minute, he grunts and turns.
"Got it." he says, unusually coldly, and disappears off into the Wasteland. There's no goodbye. Gal feels a little pang at watching him go, but it's only because she'll miss him. She's not worried about his safety; she knows he'll make it to Underworld just fine.
The errand is bogus. There is a letter in the envelope to Carol, that part is true, but it's not from Gob. It's from Gal, begging the ghoulette to front Charon room and board for the time Gal is gone, until she can return to pay. She sees no reason to drag Charon back to the Memorial when it will only bring up bad memories for him; in addition, there's no reason to scare the scientists with his presence. They've kept their distance so far, but she doesn't believe it'll last forever. Besides, other than providing some extra security, Charon won't have anything to do there anyway. Gal will be working on tech with her father and won't be in any danger.
It doesn't soften the loneliness in her chest when she sees his retreating back.
At her feet, Dogmeat whines low in his throat, staring out after Charon just as she'd done. He paws at the air and then drops to the ground, wiggling as if he's in pain. Gal crouches down and buries her hand in his ruff to calm him.
"It's okay, boy. We're going back to him, don't worry." she says. Even though she's the one that decided to keep him, Dogmeat has really always been Charon's dog, so she's not surprised by his distress. Dogmeat whines again and pushes his head into her hand to seek comfort. She gives it to him, as best she can, with headscratches and gentle words. Dogmeat doesn't stop staring until Charon's completely gone from view.
The trek to Jefferson, slow as it is with all the moving parts, gives her plenty of time to catch up with her dad. He tells her in detail about what he'd done since he left the Vault; she fills in the gaps for him for her own story. He's always told Gal that he's proud of her, but there's an extra twinkle in his eye now when he says it, and she thinks that it's because he's seeing himself in her thirst for wandering. She keeps back only the bare minimum of details – Moriarty's death at her hands, her own terrible experience with the trio of slavers, and Charon's contract. Her dad is just as aware as she is of the dangers of the Waste, but that doesn't mean he needs to know that her blood is on other's hands, or worse – that other people's blood is on hers.
When they finally reach Jefferson, a group of them does a sweep of the area to make sure it's clear, and then people are everywhere, setting up equipment, bickering over small details, and impatiently demanding to know where certain items are. Her father and Doctor Li are at the center of it, cautiously checking the water purifier for damage piece by piece. Even though it's nearly midnight, sleep doesn't appear to be on anyone's mind.
Gal assigns herself to tech detail and begins work on the security cameras that are still operable in the area. Once they're up and running, she resets the remaining turrets, posts clear warnings to make sure no one accidentally stumbles into their path, and begins creating accounts for the scientists so they can access the computer system. Most of the network is still intact; clearly, no one with any level of computer expertise has been through the area since Project Purity was abandoned the first time. It's a little bit of a relief because she's gotten rusty.
It's four AM when a heavy hand falls on her shoulder, interrupting her work. When she looks over her shoulder, her father gives her a tired smile and nods his head towards the designated sleeping quarters.
"Get some rest, milaya. We'll start again bright and early tomorrow."
Slowly, she levers herself out of the chair and gives him a wan smile. The bright light of the room hurts her sensitive eyes as she readjusts.
"Alright, Papa. Thanks for letting me tag along to help out." she replies as they make their way down the hallway.
Her father snorts in amusement at the statement.
"We'd be lost without you, Galichka. You're the only one that can navigate these piles of junk. I should have -" he stops and sighs, rubbing at his eyes. "I should have brought you with me when I left 101. I'm sorry for that."
"Don't be. I'm over it. Like I said before, you couldn't have known what the Overseer would do."
He smiles at her and wraps his arm around her shoulders, and for the first time, it's just like it was before, in the Vault. Her and her father, together, happy.
It takes three days to get the programming for the water purifier back up and running. A lot of it is just replacing old computers that were too worn out to work, and then networking them in. Though the work is repetitive, it's still what she loves to do best – programming is her favourite hobby, and one she doesn't get to do much of in the wasteland. While she's working, her father plans with Dr. Li and the others, outlining what they would need to do to continue the Project.
She finishes the code mid-afternoon with a rush of satisfaction that she hasn't felt in a long time. She isn't sure what time she'd gotten up this morning, but it had been early, and her only breaks had been for the bathroom or a hasty meal, so it feels good to get up and stretch out her aching joints.
"Papa. The code's done. You should be able to boot up the purifier now." she calls into the other room. Her father pokes his head around the corner and smiles as she pops the joints in her fingers one by one.
"That's great, Galya. We're just about ready to do that, just one more thing to take care of. Do you have some time to help out?"
She nods, so he wanders into the room and sits down across from her at another desk.
"We've been unsuccessful getting the pumps to drain. I know you're not an expert with those kinds of repairs, but could you take a look down there? I'd send someone else, but... they're too scared of getting their lab coats dirty."
Gal smiles at the familiar joke. He'd always been proud of how willing she was to get messy. Killing radroaches, shooting her BB gun, helping in the medical lab – Gal never had any of the hang-ups other girls her age did, and it delighted James.
"I'll see what I can do." She tells him, and gets up to do just that. Dogmeat, tired of drowsing in the corner of the room with nothing to do, follows her eagerly.
Daniel looks up from his workstation when she walks through the next room and gives her a dirty look. She's not exactly sure what his deal is, but considering she's here for her father and not for Project Purity, she doesn't have to care. She returns the look and keeps going before he can say anything. Dogmeat must give him a look of interest, because Daniel backs down and ignores her.
Everything's going well so far, according to her father and Dr. Li – they're just now getting to the point that they can actually start working again, instead of cleaning up the mess of 20 years of abandonment, but Dr. Li says that everything is in remarkably good shape. Gal doesn't really understand most of their long, technical scientific conversations, but her father looks – happy. Focused.
She thinks Charon must have figured out now that the whole thing was a ruse, if he didn't guess right away. She wouldn't really expect him to scare the information out of Carol, but Greta would tell him with glee, she bets. She doesn't know whether he'll be angry because she lied or relieved for some time to herself. Either is better than bringing him back here, though. Not now that she knows what it means.
The entrance to the pipe she's looking for is shut off in a small room. The grate's partially bent rusted as hell, and the smell coming from it is not inspiring. Still, it's not the worst she's ever smelled either, so she sighs and heaves the grate open.
"Looks like you're staying here, bud, unless you've grown some opposable thumbs recently." she tells Dogmeat, who's sniffing around the entrance to the pipe curiously. "Stand watch, will you?"
Dogmeat gives her a short bark in reply and she swings herself down onto the ladder. It's slick with something dark and unnameable, but she ignores it and starts down anyway.
The ladder leads down to a large, empty pipe that has dozens of wires flowing through it above her head. Thankfully, it's empty, which keeps her from slogging through anything questionable. Gal follows the pipe carefully down to another grate and finds an open space on the other side, covered over with wire. The grate on the other side is locked, but there's a knob set into the wall that looks like it might be part of the problem.
Gal's not really a master plumber so her plan here is just to turn things on until something works. She's cautiously hopeful that she can do it without killing anyone in the process.
She has to smash the knob a few times with her rifle to shake off some of the rust and get it to turn, but finally it begins rotating with a grating squeal. She's trying to turn it, inch by stubborn inch, when a strange sound draws her attention upwards.
It sounds mechanical, and it gets closer and closer, though nothing comes into view. She's got her rifle into her shoulder and is ducking behind the network of pipes when something swoops in from the sky, as if to perch on the landing in front of her.
Whatever it is, it's large, metallic, and the amount of dust it kicks up has her coughing and swearing as she struggles to keep it in her sight. The faint sounds of voices reach her, and when she can finally see again, the machine is taking back off into the sky and several large, hulking shadows are racing away from it.
"Shit. That can't be good." she curses, abandoning her task. The Jefferson isn't exactly a beacon of interest around the Capital Wasteland, so anyone random appearance of large, armoured people spells bad news. Especially ones that have giant, flying vehicles at their disposal. Gal knows that there used to be a lot of flying vehicles, planes and helicopters and the like, but she'd thought that kind of tech was lost. Apparently not.
In her haste to scramble back to the lab, she slips on the wet metal and slams her cheek right the corner of a pipe. Stars explode behind her eyelids, and she has to stay lying on the ground for a minute, waiting for the excruciating pain to dull before she can get up. The skin is already hot and swollen by the time she makes it back to her feet, but it's the least of her worries right now.
The knob has closed the grate she'd entered into and opened the one that was previously locked. She has no idea where's she's going. She has to navigate through another empty pipe and drop through a series of ledges before she reaches any type of open area.
Before she drops down from the pipe opening, though, she catches movement out of the corner of her eye and freezes. Someone in heavy, metallic armour is crossing in front of her, a laser rifle held loosely in his grasp. She doesn't recognize the armour or the weapon, but whoever it is, they don't look like they're here for a friendly conversation.
The armoured person spots her, and she ducks back into the safety of the pipe just in time to dodge a scarlet laser, which burns a hole into the steel to her right. She can see that the guy shooting at her is stuck behind a chain link fence, so she takes a few wild shots to throw him off his guard and then throws herself out of the pipe and skitters into a hallways, out of range. She can hear his boots clanging as he sprints back the way he came, probably to come find her.
Once she's able to take a breath, Gal realizes she recognizes the area around her and breathes a sigh of relief. The area around her is clear, for now, but she doesn't see any of Doctor Li's scientists either and that's worrying.
She's come out just down from the sleeping area, which is where her extra mags are stored, so she heads for it both to search and restock. When she peeks around the corner, though, another goon in heavy armour is already poking around the bunk beds, looking for prey.
The first shot of her assault rifle gets him right in the side of the head. It's enough to throw him off balance, but there's no hole. Swearing, she quickly takes aim again and this time he goes down like a sack of potatoes. The helmet comes loose when his head hits a footlocker and rolls to Gal's feet. She picks it up.
"Enclave?" she says to herself quietly, tracing a finger over the inscription on the inside. "Like the... radio station?"
The most she knows about the Enclave is that Nathaniel Vargas from Megaton thinks they hung the moon and their radio station is total shit. Everyone she knows has always assumed it's just an old recording, left somewhere to loop until the equipment fails. There's a man on the station that claims to be the president of the United States, but the Wasteland, or any other part of the country, hasn't had one of those in at least a century. Maybe more.
Whoever they are, though, there's only one thing they could be here for, and they don't seem keen on getting it the diplomatic way. Gal snatches the dead man's rifle and his mags and takes a moment to hurriedly don her mag belt before she heads for the rotunda, hoping she's not too late.
When she enters the gift shop area, she spots Dogmeat backed into a corner by another Enclave soldier. A well placed shot knocks his rifle out of his hands, and then Dogmeat's got him by the arm. While the soldier tries to fight him off, Gal closes the distance and jams her rifle up under the edge of his helmet. The laser rifle fares much better against this armour than her assault rifle did.
"Come on boy, we need to check on Dad and the others. Be careful."
Fighting through the gift shop is a slow and painful process. She has to be extra careful because she hadn't stopped to throw on her armour before setting out, and so she's completely exposed against a foe that looks sort of like a walking tank. More than once, she finds herself shouting to a presence that isn't there before she remembers that Charon is in Underworld, too far away to help. One shot manages to graze her on the forearm and she nearly drops her rifle when the searing pain from the burn hits her. She holds on and gets the owner through the hole between his chest plate and his shoulder plate.
Finally, Gal makes it to the rotunda and nearly throws the door open in her haste to make sure her father's safe. She can see Doctor Li up the steps, looking through the glass into the work area. No one's holding a gun to her head, which is good. Gal runs up the steps and joins her, Dogmeat at her heels.
"What's going on?" she asks breathlessly. Doctor Li glances at her and just jerks her head towards the glass wordlessly. Gal looks inside and her stomach drops.
James is standing inside, facing the glass with Dr. Li's aid to one side. They're flanked by more Enclave soldiers, and standing with his back to Gal is another man in a white leather trench coat. His rifle is holdstered at his side, but that doesn't make him any less dangerous-looking.
"Your claim has no authority here." James says quietly to the man. Gal tries the door switch, but it's locked from the inside and she can't override the locks from this side.
"I'm going to have to ask you to leave at once."
The man tilts his head, as if that's funny to him for some reason.
"Am I to assume that you are in charge?" he asks, with a hint of humour in his voice. When James confirms, he continues. "Then I repeat, sir, you are hereby instructed to immediately hand over all materials related to the purifier."
His voice has a weird twang to it, a strange accent that she's never heard before. She hates it. It and his stupid trenchcoat and his stupid soldiers and why can't she get through the door -
"I'm sorry, but that's -" the man cuts her father off before he finishes.
"Furthermore, you are required to assist Enclave scientists in assuming control of the administration and operation of this facility at once."
James' shoulders slump a bit, but he goes on resolutely. His calm under pressure would be admirable if she wasn't busy freaking out.
"Colonel – is it Colonel? - I assure you that the facility is not operational." he explains. "It never has been. I'm afraid you're wasting your time."
The debate goes on and on and on. James never loses his cool, but the man in the trenchcoat only gets more frustrated. Gal punches buttons, and claws at the door, and even nearly tries to shoot through the glass, but no one pays any attention to her. Dr. Li just stands there dumbly, watching, doing nothing to help.
Then, right before their eyes, the men in the trenchcoat draws his weapon and shoots Janice Kaplinski right between the eyes. She doesn't even have time to make a sound before her body slumps to the floor. To her left, Dr. Li lets out a wail of shock.
"I suggest you comply immediately, sir, to prevent any further incidents. Are we clear?" the man says sternly, as if scolding a child. The gunshot freezes Gal right in her place.
"Yes, Colonel." James replies, acid in his voice. "Give me a few moments."
"Dad." Gal says despondently, watching him turn and cross to a panel. "Dad, what are you – Dad, no please, don't -" she reaches out to bang on the glass, but a thin arm stops her. Gal turns to see Dr. Li, her face wet with tears but her eyes stern.
"Don't. They'll shoot him. We can't help him, Galina." she says. Her grip on Gal's arm is tense but weak as a baby bird's, no match for the muscle that Gal's put on from roaming the Wasteland these past months.
"Don't tell me what to do, he's going to – he's going -" she's cut off by the sound of something exploding. Every person inside the glass flinches, and the man in the trenchcoat looks around wildly, before he starts coughing. The soldiers in the armour sway and fall, and the man clenches his throat, but it doesn't seem to help.
The effects of whatever James has done are just as potent on him as everyone else. Gal watches as her father staggers his way over to where she is, catching her gaze through the glass.
"Run." he says simply. He has to lean on the glass to keep himself upright. Her geiger counter starts ticking as the radiation seeps through the chamber.
"Dad – please, no, don't – I -"
"RUN."
"Papa, I – Ya tebya lyublyu, Papa nyet - pozhaluista -" she sobs, pounding on the glass in vain. Her father staggers, falls to his knees, but he lifts his head up again so he can look her in the eyes again.
"Ya tozhe, milaya. Always. Now ru..." his voice peters out, his eyes close. Slowly, his body sways to the right and then slumps to the floor over the legs of the man in the trenchcoat. He doesn't move after that.
Gal lets out a scream of desperation and launches herself at the door, but it doesn't even budge under her weight. Her geiger counter goes wild with the proximity to the dangerous radiation. She doesn't care. If she can just get the door open – if she can find a way to get him out – he'll be okay. She knows it.
He has to be.
That thin arm grabs her bicep again, and it's weak but somehow with the strength of her whole body Dr. Li manages to pull Gal back and away from the glass. Gal gives her a scathing look, her eyes full of tears, and Dr. Li's are red and swollen too but her mouth is set in a firm line.
"We have to get out of here. They'll be coming for us next. We have to evacuate!" Dr. Li tells her. She tries to tug Gal towards the entrance but Gal digs her feet in and refuses.
"No, my father – I have to save him, what are you doing he's dying in there -"
"He's already dead, Galina, there's nothing you can do. And you will be too if we don't leave right now." she says cruelly. "He told you to run, now run."
Gal takes one more look at her father, slumped over on the floor like any one of the corpses she's seen in the Wasteland, and it's enough to make her gorge rise. She doesn't want to vomit, it feels like the wrong thing to do, so she looks away and takes a deep, shaky breath.
"You're right. How do we get out of here?"
Her vision starts going hazy as they make their way back through the gift shop, and she has to remind herself to focus on what Doctor Li is saying or she just tunes her out. All she can think about his her father, gasping, coughing, collapsing slowly to the floor. It circles her head. It doesn't leave when she rounds a corner and nearly runs headfirst into an Enclave soldier, or when she trips and slams into a piece of equipment, or even when a stray bullet embeds itself into the wall inches from her right eye. And it only gets fuzzier.
Doctor Li, telling her about an escape tunnel. Her, being pulled off Daniel because of something he said, his eye swollen from her fist. There are more Enclave soldiers at one point, and ghouls at another, and she remembers running out of bullets and clocking one in the face with her rifle.
Then there's sunshine, and the sometimes-sweet, sometimes-sour smell of the Wasteland. She remembers a large courtyard, with more people in metallic armour, and a growing sense of rage, and then there's nothing.
–
Gal wakes up with absolutely no recollection of where she is, or how she got there. Her head throbs, especially at the right temple, and her eyes are crusty and hard to open.
She's on a bed, fully clothed, in a room that she's never seen before. When she panics and swings out of the bed, there is a sharp yelp and Dogmeat jumps to his feet and out of her way.
"Oh, shit – sorry Dogmeat. Are you okay?" the dog shakes and then looks up at her, tongue wagging in a relaxed manner. He's the forgiving type. "Good. Sorry. Do you know where we are, boy? How'd we get here?"
"You're at the Citadel." someone says from the doorway. Gal jerks her head up, already reaching for the ammo belt that she's not even wearing, but the woman at the door holds her hands up in a gesture of peace. She looks familiar; it takes a moment for Gal to recognize her, but then images of super mutants and GNR come floating to the surface and she remembers her name.
"You came here with Doctor Li and her team. You were a little out of it, you jumped on one of the recruits and we had to knock you out. Is your head okay?"
Lyons strolls into the room and pulls a cabinet open. In it, she finds a bottle of water and twists the top off before handing it to Gal. Gal drains the whole thing and gives Lyons a grateful look.
"It's fine. I'm sorry, I was just a little shaken up. My… my dad…"
Lyons cuts her off before she can even begin to verbalize it.
"I know. I'm sorry. He was a great man. But because of him, you were able to save the lives of five people who can still do a lot of good for the world. He sacrificed himself for his cause. You'd do the same."
Gal gives Lyons a disbelieving look, but the blonde woman doesn't even falter.
"Don't look at me like that. You ran up to a behemoth and shot it in the face with a Fat Man. You're crazy and you know it."
It's enough to startle a laugh out of Gal, and it feels wrong but also eases the pain a little. She doesn't know Lyons very well, but she likes her.
"So what are they going to do? Will they be able to continue Project Purity?"
Lyons shrugs.
"Doctor Li said your father had some idea of how to get the purifier working. She said the Enclave doesn't know yet, but she wants you to meet with Scribe Rothchild about it. You know, when you're ready."
When she's ready.
Lyons doesn't mean anything by it probably, but the phrase angers her for some reason.
When she's ready? When she's ready?
When do you become ready to get over the death of a loved one? What, is she just supposed to decide to be okay?
It's like the image of her father, staring out from that deathtrap of a sealed room, is seared into her brain, because every time she closes her eyes she can see it, the concern in his face, the resolve in the set of his mouth, the way his shoulders shook as he coughed. You don't just get over that. Not in a day, not in a year, not in a lifetime.
Lyons must sense that she said something wrong, so she mutters something about having to go and backs out of the room quickly, leaving Gal angry and teary-eyed.
There's only been one constant person in her life in all her twenty years. Only one person that she could laugh with, cry on, talk to, even yell at on occasion, knowing that none of those things would drive him away. Gal doesn't make friends easily, and even less so out in the Wasteland, and that's why she needed her father. That's why she threw everything away and followed him for weeks, across a broken land filled with things just waiting to kill her.
And it's fucking cruel of the world to give him back for a month, just to snatch him away again. Permanently, this time.
She regrets wasting so much time in Megaton, after the events at Vault 112. She regrets not talking to him about this foolish dream, convincing him to stay somewhere safe like Rivet City so they could be together again and read to each other from old tattered books and putter around in the medical lab and speak in Russian just to make other people annoyed.
On some level, she regrets not being a good enough daughter to make her father want to stay.
She realizes that somewhere in the last few minutes she's picked up a lamp and thrown it against the wall. It's sitting on the ground, broken in half, the bulb shattered into a million pieces. If anyone heard the noise, they're not stupid enough to come bother her about it. When she reaches to clean up the mess, a piece slits the palm of her hand open. She sits down hard and cradles her bleeding palm to her chest. Holding back the sobbing is impossible.
She's not sure what time she woke up, but it's getting dark out when she finally finds her way back into the courtyard at the center of the Citadel. She stops someone and asks where to find Scribe Rothchild, and they point her to the Bailey, so she wanders in that direction. She has nothing with her but her rifle and empty mags, and she's sure her face is red and puffy, but she holds her head up anyway. It must work, because no one bothers her.
Unsurprisingly, the first thing Rothchild says to her is how sorry he is for her loss. She restrains herself just barely from punching him in the face. When she changes the subject for the third time, he finally gets the hint and guides her to a computer that he says will have the information she needs.
It's hard to remember what exactly it is she's looking for through the haze that's clouding her mind. She has to steel herself to focus, to forget what's making her so upset, and with enough force of will, it works. She finds a log of every Vault in the area and combs them, one by one, until she finds one that was issued a GECK. In fact, there's only one, one Vault out of dozens that could be their salvation.
When she goes back to Rothchild with her information, he shows her the location of the vault on a large holomap. Rothchild informs her that the Vault is surrounded by lethal levels of radiation. He tells her there may be another passageway through a place called Little Lamplight, and she knows where that is because she's talked about it with Red before, about how everyone in Bigtown is just a throwaway from Little Lamplight and she has no idea how she's going to convince them to let her but she has to find a way. Nothing matters right now but finding the GECK, and finishing what her…
...well. Finishing Project Purity. That's the goal.
Her head feels thick, like she has to swim through some strange mental haze before she can complete any thought, and the ache in her temple is starting to spread to her whole body. She thinks it must be fatigue, mixed with grief. She doesn't really care. It's not going to stop her from doing what she needs to do.
She turns and leaves Rothchild abruptly, and he stops talking in the middle of a sentence but just lets her go without a word.
She has no armour, no supplies, no bullets. Just an empty Chinese Assault rifle and her lucky knife strapped to her side and maybe two stimpacks that had been shoved into pockets. She nearly makes it out the gate before Doctor Li stops her to press a pouch full of caps into her hands. Gal accepts them numbly and buys herself a cheap chest plate and fifty rounds, then heads right back for the door, even though it's fully dark outside. The thought of trying to sleep is for some reason terrifying.
When she's safely out the front doors, she turns to head west, towards Megaton, towards Little Lamplight, but something grabs her pants leg and she stumbles. When she looks back, Dogmeat is gazing at her solemnly.
"Dogmeat? What's…?" she starts. Dogmeat lets go of the fabric and dances back a few steps in the opposite direction. When Gal turns back to continue heading west, he grabs her pants leg again, and again backs up a few steps when she turns to glare at him.
"Okay. Okay, boy, you lead the way. Why not." she sighs finally.
The mutt lets out a victory yip and trots off to the north, looking over his shoulder ever few minutes to make sure she's following.
If she'd ever doubted that Dogmeat was the smartest creature she'd ever met, that doubt is put to rest during this trip. Despite her stubborn commitment to her goal, it's all she can do to put one foot in front of the other, let alone watch out for danger. Dogmeat does all the watching for her; he leads her around nests of radscorpions, raider camps, and even a passing pack of feral ghouls. When she stumbles, he's there to stick his nose in her face, her hand, even her ear if she's not responsive enough, and that's enough to get her up and going again.
She vaguely notices that they cross a bridge, and she gets fuzzy idea that they're heading back to DC for some reason. What could Dogmeat want in DC? She senses that there's something missing, something she should be remembering, but it's not Little Lamplight and it's not Vault 87 and it's not a GECK, so it can't be that important.
After a while, she realizes she's shivering, and she's getting tireder and tireder. She supposes that being knocked out doesn't provide the same type of rest that real sleep does, and now that she thinks about it, she can sort of see the sun poking over the horizon so she's been up a while. Her throat is killing her, but she forgot to bring any water so there's not really anything she can do. She thinks she tries to drink some out of the river, but Dogmeat drags her away before she can get so much as a sip.
Gal comes back for a brief moment when she slams face-first into something hard and ungiving, and falls painfully onto her back. A shadow comes over her face, blocking the sunlight that's been straining her tired eyes. She's not able to focus enough to see what it is.
"-oothskin, you alright? You don't look so good. Hey. HEY."
Something slaps her across the face, and she tries to retaliate but raising her arms is suddenly difficult. Her rifle is tugged from her fingers, and she can't even muster the courage to fight it.
"Shit, this is not good. Hey dog, if you understand me, go get Charon. I'm gonna drag her inside."
No one has to put a finger on her to knock her unconscious this time. She does it of her own free will, silently thankful for the relief from her pounding temples and aching throat.
For the second time in as many days, she wakes up in a bed, with no recollection of how she got there. If anything, though, she feels even worse; her whole body aches, her throat feels like sandpaper, and she's cold, cold down to her bones. Her brain feels fuzzy still and she can't open her eyes against the blinding light streaming down.
"Kid? You awake?" someone asks quietly. She turns her head and cracks one eye the slightest bit, just enough to see. Charon is sitting in a chair a few feet away. Dogmeat is laying at his feet, but when he realizes Gal is awake he jumps to his feet and trots over so he can nose at her cheek.
"...where am I?" she mumbles. The three words grate on her throat and force a long, wet cough from her lungs.
"Underworld. You told me to stay here and wait for you, remember? Then you and Dogmeat came stumbling up yesterday and you collapsed right in front of Willow."
Oh. Gal remembers something about that, flashes of memory here and there, but most of the process is blank.
She opens her mouth to speak again and coughs instead. A moment later, the pillow under her head is rising, helping her to sit up a little, and a glass is being held to her lips.
"Here. You need to drink this." Charon says. Gal complies and sips at the water weakly. Some of it slops past her lips and dribbles down her chin, but she's too grateful to care. It's the best water she's ever tasted.
Charon helps her finish the glass in a few gradual sessions, then lowers the pillow back onto the bed.
"You hungry?" he asks. Gal shakes her head.
"No. 'm cold though." she replies. The corner of Charon's mouth twists, and without warning, he brushes the hair from her forehead and holds the back of his hand to her skin. His touch is like a furnace. She wants to latch onto his arm and never let go.
"You've got a fever. I'll bring you another blanket." Too soon, his hand is retracted and Gal's forehead feels even colder than before, if possible. She dazes for a moment and then Charon is back with two more tattered blankets, which he spreads over her and tugs up to her chin.
"I think you may have the flu. Does your throat hurt? Any aches or pains?" he asks clinically, though his hand is still absently smoothing the blanket over her shoulder.
"Mmm. All of the above." she mumbles. He snorts and fiddles with the edge of the blanket again, tucking it under her arm.
"Well, I'd say whatever you were doing stumbling back here at six o'clock in the morning, it was probably enough to get you sick. Go back to sleep, I'll get Carol to bring you some soup later."
Charon goes to walk away from the bed, and Gal catches his arm without thinking before he can get too far. He turns back, surprised.
"Charon…" she says softly. "Charon, my dad… he…"
Her companion's eyes go soft at her unfinished sentence, and she thinks that somehow he already knows.
"Go to sleep, kid. We can talk later." he admonishes quietly. Gently, more gently than she can fathom, he separates her arm from his and tucks it back under the blanket, like a father putting a child to sleep.
Gal wants to protest, but even the last five minutes of just being awake has drained her. She falls asleep again immediately.
Over the next few days or so, she sleeps on and off, waking up mostly to eat and use the bathroom. Carol is almost always present as soon as or right after she opens her eyes, often with a bowl of soup or some tea for her to consume, and she stays and strokes Gal's hair or pats her hand until she slips under again. Charon is there too, but he mostly just sits in the chair a few feet away and quietly cleans his shotgun or armour. There's a length of time where he's gone completely, but she forgets to ask why every time she sees Carol.
When she wakes up on the fourth day of being bedridden, she opens her eyes and doesn't have to close them again against the glare of the lights. She's able to sit up mostly easily, and though she feels weak, she manages to totter to the bathroom and back without much effort.
"Hello, dear, how are you feeling?" Carol asks, popping her head around the screen divider just as Gal's sitting back down on the bed.
"Way better. Thank you so much for taking care of me, I would have been mutant meat without you and Willow." Gal says gratefully. Carol shrugs the comment off, but her cheeks flush a little bit with pleasure.
"I'm just glad you made it all the way to Underworld. Who knows what would have happened if you'd collapsed on the way here?" she says, handing Gal a glass of water. Gal gulps it down thirstily and, like magic, Carol produces another and switches it out for the empty glass.
"I'm pretty certain Dogmeat would have dragged me here himself. He half-did anyways." Gal assures her. Dogmeat, laying on the end of the bed, thumps his tail at the praise and crawls up to sprawl next to her so she can scratch his ears.
"Where's Charon?" she asks after she's halfway through the second glass of water. Carol stops and tilts her head in thought.
"He was running some errands this morning, but I think he stopped to have a drink at the bar a few hours ago. You'll probably find him at the Ninth Circle. I'm not so sure you should be walking around yet, though."
Gal stands up and bounces a little to see how she feels.
"I'm doing a lot better, thanks to you, Carol. I'll be fine. Besides, it's not that far." she stops and looks down at the clothes she's wearing, then sniffs at her sleeve and makes a face. "Maybe I'll take a shower first though. I don't want to kill anyone with this stench."
Carol laughs and leaves her to bathe. She balks at the thought that she'll have to put these dirty clothes on again, or wash them and wear them wet. However, when she reaches the bathroom, there's a pair of trousers and a long-sleeve shirt laid out on the sink, both in her size. Probably Carol, she decides, happy to accept the hospitality.
Even though she's feeling much better, the hot water feels great on her chilled skin. Her throat is still a little scratchy, but the steam seems to soothe it some as well. She's only been that sick once in her life - right after she'd left the Vault, when she'd spent a whole week curled in a corner in the communal housing in Megaton. Any type of infectious disease had been carefully controlled in the Vault, so no one could get sick, but out in the Wasteland germs were everywhere, and it had taken her body a long time to toughen up.
When she's finally wrinkled up like a prune and ready to get out, she dresses in the laid-out clothes and heads for the Ninth Circle to find her companion. Charon is exactly where Carol said - sitting in the corner at a table with a beer in one hand, a small book laid out flat on the table. He's writing in it with a nub of a pencil, but looks up when he hears the door creak.
"Hey." she says, looking around the empty bar. Someone had clearly cleaned up after Azrukhal's unfortunate incident, but it feels as though it's been abandoned since then. Everything is dusty and stale-smelling.
Charon doesn't say anything, but he shuts the books and tucks it back into the front of his armour. Gal takes a seat across from him at the table.
"Where'd you get the beer?" she asks curiously. She can see there's several more bottles on the floor next to the wall, probably empty ones he'd drank earlier.
Charon shrugs. "Azrukhal had his own supply locked up in the back, better than the slop he served everyone else. I took the key after you bought my contract, so it's just been sitting here." He gives her a sideways look. "I'd advise you to drink water instead, if you're thirsty."
Gal laughs a little at that. "Okay, thanks for the advice, Mom. I don't think I could handle a beer right now even if I wanted one. My throat still hurts a little." she falters for a minute, and rubs the back of her neck awkwardly. "Thanks for, you know… taking care of me. I'd be pretty lost without you."
Charon takes a swig from his beer instead of replying and looks away. She's not offended; he's not very good with praise.
"Do you, uh…do you want to talk about it?" he asks stiltedly. Gal tries not to let it show, but her shoulders hunch up a little bit and she has to take a long, deep breath to keep her throat from closing up. She's not delirious anymore, but the wound is still raw.
"Do you know that radio station that always plays the patriotic music? Enclave radio?" Charon nods. "Well, I always thought it was just an old looped recording, but… it's not. They're real. And they came to take over the purifier. I was trying to fix a pipe for my dad, but when I came back…" she has to stop and take a breath. Tears threaten the corners of her eyes, but she pushes them back stubbornly.
"When I came back, they were holding him at gunpoint inside the rotunda. They shot Doctor Li's assistant in the head when he refused to help them. So he did something to the purifier, sabotaged it…and it killed him. Him and the Enclave soldiers both."
There's a long silence, interspersed with Gal's attempts to keep her breathing under control. Charon doesn't push or prod, just sits quietly and waits for her to continue, which she is endlessly thankful for.
"Doctor Li knew about an escape tunnel that we could take. She led us to the Brotherhood of Steel's stronghold and convinced them to let us in. They were able to help me figure out what we need to finish the purifier."
She remembers now, stumbling out of the Citadel with nothing but a shitty leather chestplate and a handful of bullets. She's lucky she didn't die, as unprotected as she was. It was an incredibly stupid move.
What she's going to do now, stranded in Underworld with absolutely no money to her name, she doesn't know. She's already living on Carol's hospitality, having promised her that she'd pay it all back, but now she doesn't have a way to. She'll never make it back to Megaton like this, even with Charon at her back. She can maybe scrap together a few caps doing odd jobs for Winthrop or something, but it's not going to be enough.
"All my stuff got left at the Memorial." she confesses finally. "All I have left is my rifle and my knife. I don't even think I have any bullets. I'm not sure how we're going to make it back home."
Charon gives her another sideways, unreadable look, and drains the last of his beer. He deposits the bottle next to the others, neatly lined up against the wall on the floor.
"I wouldn't worry about it." he says noncommittally. "We'll figure something out."
Then he gets up and heads for the door quickly, leaving her alone at the table.
"I told Willow I'd help her with some work. I'll be back later." he says cryptically. He disappears before she can question him any further.
Gal sits by herself in the bar for a few minutes longer, miserable, before finally shuffling to her feet. With nowhere else to go, she heads back to Carol's morosely, trying to think of anyone else she could beg in Underworld for a few caps or some work. She knows Carol would probably lend her the money, but she's not even sure Carol has the money to lend. Gal's pretty convinced that a bed and breakfast in a ghoul-run city doesn't make much profit.
When she slips back through the stands that surround her bed, there's a large mound of something laying on the bed that wasn't there when she left. When she reaches the bed, she finds a shiny new leather chest plate stacked neatly on top of a full pack, with matching leg and arm plates and her ammo belt laid out on either side. The pack is filled with food, more ammo, medical supplies, and a spare set of clothing that matches the ones she'd lost. The empty magazines in her ammo belt have been refilled, and there's a new set of grenade pouches attached to the front. She hadn't even noticed her belt had gone missing.
One of the empty pouches on the outside of her pack holds a folded up sheet of paper with something scribbled on the inside.
'You told me I could spend my pay on whatever I wanted. No whining.' it reads.
It's everything they need. Hell, the armour is even better than what she'd had before, and there's no duct tape on it anywhere, which is more of an improvement than she even could have asked for.
Gal sits down on the bed, stroking the chest plate for a little while and reading the note over and over again. She doesn't even try to keep the sill grin off her face. And, well, maybe she cries a little bit too, but there's no one around to see.