I never thought the day would end.
It got off to a weird start. We got up and started moving around at sunrise. I made coffee to get the day going. There is something about that wonderful bitter liquid that just warms the soul and bones. It was Heather that first brought the overnight change in the disposition of the "Caravan Trader" to my attention. She called me over to a spot where we could see the street through a nice gap in the boards covering a window. The Brahmin was still tethered nearby, but now instead of what appeared to be a trader and a few mercs, I saw Glory and five other people. The two that she was conversing with seemed to either be in charge, or at least leading this little expedition of theirs. The other three seemed to be pulling perimeter duty.
"Is that Glory?" Heather was still looking through the opening as I got my gear together. "You didn't tell me she was hot... Raawr."
"Heather..."
"Seriously, Cain... Do you see the pants she has on?"
"Oh for fuck sake... yes!" Til now, I though the last thing I needed was a Heather and Piper cabal... This new possibility was just something I didn't want to even consider. "Get your shit. We need to go out there and meet up with her and her crew."
Heather damn near skipped over to collect her gear.
"You are way to easy, bubba." Nice to see things were getting back to normal. "She is hot though..."
I just rolled my eyes and sighed heavy as I started towards the door. I may have kicked it open with a little too much enthusiasm, taking our friends by surprise. As soon as I stepped outside, I saw six weapons pointed at me.
Glory was the first to drop hers.
"That was smooth and a quick way to get yourself shot at!" Fantastic. Great way to make a first impression.
"Yeah, that's him, and the girl is Heather... I haven't heard about the ghoul..." The guy who was speaking looked oddly familiar, but I couldn't place him.
"Ok... Are you going to introduce your friends, Glory?" My turn.
"Oh! How rude of me!" She was hot, even being sarcastic... "In order from the right - Death Dancer, Killdozer, and Bob. Next to me are Deacon and Desdemona."
"Bob?" I couldn't help myself. "Seems kind of, well, out of place with the other two."
Bob just shrugged his shoulders.
"Deacon here is kind of our intelligence guy and Desdemona, well..."
"I run the Railroad." She stepped forward. Bold. I liked her. My response, however, left something to be desired..
"No shit?" I wanted to bite my tongue but it was too late. "I was going to look you guys up when I got back to DC."
"Well," she lit a cigarette and took a long drag, "You won't have to... Due to the insistence of these two, We came to you instead."
"How do you know me?" I looked at Deacon.
"Aw man, I have been following you since about 2 days after you killed Kellog and cleaned house at Ft. Hagen." He took his hat off to reveal a bald head and put on a pair of sunglasses.
"Son of a bitch... I saw you in Goodneighbor... Maybe DC as well."
"See Des... I told you he was good..." Glory winked at me. "Ask him about Parsons while you are at it..."
"Aw damn... How did I miss that... you did the parson's job as well?" Deacon's response took me a little off guard.
"Am I correct when I say that you apparently, singlehandedly, took out not just Kellog and his synths, but an entire recon squad?" Before I could respond, Desdemona had taken control of the conversation again.
"Partially... Heather and Nick Valentine helped clear Ft. Hagen, but the recon squad, yeah, I took them out."
"How did you do that, if I may ask?"
"Explosives, anticipated tactics, and luck?" My response got a chuckle out of Desdemona.
I, in turn, introduced them to Heather and Xao and we talked back and forth for a few minutes until Desdemona brought it right back to the business at hand.
"There was something that you were going to show Glory to try to convince her that your story about being over 200 years old was true? Was there not?"
"Yeah. There was. A couple of things actually." On that note, I turned and headed up the road north towards Sanctuary. I paused at the bridge, taking a deep breath. The last time I was here was only a few days after burying Nora. I put My head down and started walking towards my house. I was no more than 30 feet into Sanctuary when Preston popped out of nowhere.
"Glad to see you back." He glanced around at the other eight people I was with. "Are you doing ok?" I could tell by his tone that what he meant was, "Is there trouble?"
I told him I was doing fine and asked about how everything was going and got a thumbs up and a thanks for taking care of the settlement he sent me out to. I assured him it was no problem and confirmed that there were no more issues after I took care of the raiders. I didn't think there would be. He waved us on and I, again, headed for the house. It worked out perfect. Codsworth must have sensed me coming and greeted me about a foot from what used to be my driveway.
"How long has it been since I've seen you, buddy?"
"Ah, well, it has been 26 days, 7 hours, and 23 minutes sir. So good to see you!"
"Appreciate it Codsworth. Before that, how long was it since I saw you?"
"You mean before the war, sir? I would say 210 years, almost to the day! Funny how that happened! Haha!"
"It is. How is Mum doing?"
"I have remained vigilant sir." He took on a little more humble tone. "I have kept her place neat and tidy, chased away all vermin, and have managed to start a rose garden to make sure that there are always fresh flowers for her. I hope you are pleased, sir."
"I am sure I will be, Codsworth." Without another word, I led the group to the back of the house where I had buried Nora. The dirt had flattened down a bit, but you could still tell there was a grave. New, well trimmed grass was growing over and around it, and Codsworth had placed a fresh bunch of flowers on it recently. "This is Nora. My wife. Kellog blew her brains out and took my son." I turned and started walking towards the vault. I heard a few whispers and Desdemona, specifically, say - "Oh fuck..."
Everyone followed me in silence as I walked up the hill to vault 111. I made my way to the console, instructed them to get ready near the blast door, plugged in the pip boy and hit the switch. The creaking and groaning of the old metal was near deafening as the blast door opened to reveal the elevator platform. The Railroad crew were grabbing gear and weapons from the Brahmin as the blast door was opening. I walked out to the platform just before it started to sink into the ground. I could tell by their reactions that none of them had ever been in a Vaultec Vault before.
"Hey Cain.." Heather whispered quiet enough so only I could here. "Check Glory..."
I looked over and was surprised to see Glory carrying a mini-gun, and even more surprised because she wasn't even breaking a sweat.
"Admit it..." She whispered again, "...that is hot..."
I snickered. I couldn't help it. Everything was so wrong, but that was hilarious to me.
"That might be overkill, Glory." I had to say something. "I think I killed everything down here... all 11 radroaches..."
"What can I say? I am a cautious girl..." Then she flashed a smile. Damn it... She needed to stop doing that...
"Hot cautious girl..." Heather whispered.
"Shush.."
When we got to the bottom, I walked them through the overseer's office, barracks, and general living quarters. Finally after 30 or so minutes, I brought them to the place where I woke up.
"Holy shit... you weren't bullshitting." Glory turned to Desdemona. "Maybe we should make sure no one followed us, or if they did, give them a warm welcome?"
Nodding in agreement, Desdemona sent the three guards to the entrance. I knew that they wanted to talk without being heard. I had Heather and Xao stay. This affected all of us.
"We want you to consider coming to work for the Railroad." I liked Desdemona, straight to the point. "What do you know about us other than that we are enemies of the Institute?"
"Honestly, that is enough for me. I want to burn them to the ground..."
"Well, that isn't enough for me... How do you feel about synths?"
"I would say I have mixed feelings.." I had varying experiences with them after all. "Nick Valentine. I would consider as a friend... The Type 1 and Type 2 versions, not so much... I guess it depends upon how they feel about me."
"So you have no general animosity towards them... That is good." Desdemona looked at Heather and Xao. "How would you say your friends feel?"
"Heather is learning that not all synths are like the ones that killed everyone she loved..." I cut Heather off before she could respond for herself. "She gets along with Nick just fine after a bumpy start... Xao couldn't care one way or another.. He judges based upon the merit of the individual. He doesn't have a prejudiced bone in his body against anything but the pre-war Chinese government."
"Heather Casdin. Sole Survivor of the University point massacre. You are the wild card." Desdemona's response caught me off-guard. "The fact that you are willing to accept Nick Valentine is a good sign. I have heard about your vendetta."
"I am not blind, nor unappreciative of the difference between a synth like Nick and the things that took out my family, if that is what you mean." It was the coldest I had ever heard Heather's voice.
"It is." Desdemona, smiled and continued. "While one of our focuses is fighting the institute, our main focus is helping synths escape the control of it. There are those that have developed a sense of independence and realize, on a conscious, visceral, level that the Institute uses them as slaves. They want out... We help them."
"So Nick isn't an anomaly? There are other synths that aren't bound to the Institute?"
"Absolutely, in fact..." she was cut off by the sound of gunfire echoing through the vault.
"Shit..." Glory slapped down the cover of the receiver on the mini-gun. "I fucking hate being right."
"We have company!" The voice came from one of the guards.
The sound of lasers responded to the gunfire.
"Target eliminated. Tracking"
"Fucking synths!" Heather pulled out Kellog's gun and checked the chamber.
"Is there another way out?" Desdemona looked concerned for the first time since I had met her.
"No." I was very dry. "It's a fucking Vault..." I pulled the RSh. "You were fucking followed."
"Impossible..." She didn't sound very sure at all.
"Give me something Dozer!" Glory shouted down the hall as the sound of gunfire and lasers echoed down the halls.
"Nine left, three down. Dancer is gone. Falling back to your position."
"Fuck yeah... Bring those chrome assholes to me..." I heard her tapping the trigger to start spinning the barrel of her gun.
I started to move forward. When I got next to Heather, she tapped my arm.
"I like her!" She whispered.
I just rolled my eyes.
"Two coming your way!" Dozer yelled as he rounded the corner. Glory sped up the barrels.
As soon as the Dozer and Bob had passed through us the synths started to come around the corner.
"Let's rock!" Glory yelled out as she unleashed the gun on the synths. Heather and I both opened up as well. We fired and watched the synths literally break apart as Glory unloaded 500 rounds of 5mm into them. Within seconds they were nothing more than fragments of metal. "Let's get the fuck out of here, I don't like being trapped!" She started to move forward.
"How many?" I turned to Dozer. "How many did you see transport in?!"
"We started to move after the first flash, man. We saw maybe three actually port in.. We killed them as we were falling back. We didn't see the others come in."
"Fuck... Glory!" I started off in a sprint towards her as she was moving down the hall. I body tackled her as a bolt of blue light came from seemingly nowhere. It missed her head by inches. A second shot hit her in the shoulder.
"FUCK!" She screamed as I got her to the floor. "What the fuck!?"
"Coursers..." I fired down the hall at where the shot came from as I dragged her back out. "Twelve chrome domes, 2 Coursers... Same thing they sent to Hagen."
"You really need to start carrying these things..." Deacon scolded her as he hit her with a Stimpack.
"Bite me." She snapped back. "Thanks..."
"Cain?" Heather sounded concerned.
"Recon patrol." I went through the scenarios in my head. "Four possibilities... One - They followed them, possible. Two - They followed us, unlikely. Three - They have been watching the vault. Four - any combination or all of the above."
"What now?"
"We get the hell out of here.." I reloaded my pistol.
"There are two Coursers out there... We have seen them clear an entire facility." Deacon had a real conflict avoidance issue...
"You know what Deacon... I haven't seen that... I've seen what bullets and explosives do to them..." I pulled out a frag grenade and threw it, bouncing it off the wall so it ricocheted down the hall where the Coursers were and started move forward.
"Surrender and death are your only options. Please come peacefully. Another squad is prepping to arrive soon." The Courser's voice was completely calm and emotionless.
I quickly looked around the corner and saw only the foot of one of the Courser's jutting out from behind a beam.
"You know... I have a better idea." I turned the corner, sighted it in, and blew its toes off, sprinting at it as soon as I saw it lurch forward. Just as it started to correct its path my face was inches from his. I wish I had a photograph of the look in his eyes. "How about you go fuck yourself?"
His brain splattered against the ceiling when I shot him straight up through the jaw.
"No comments or advice, mother fucker?!" I screamed down the hallway to his partner. "C'mon! Nothing to say all of the sudden? Your buddy here is going to make a nice fucking meat shield!" I moved forward down the hall, pumped with adrenaline, gripping the corpse by the neck of its collar, keeping it in front of me. "C'mon! The problem isn't that we were caught down here by you, asshole! The real problem is that you are caught down here with me!"
I heard the squeak of a rubber sole on the floor of the Vault not more then 3 feet behind me. I spun around and threw the body at the second Courser, catching him off guard and knocking the gun from his hand. I was on him before he could assume a defensive position and knocked him onto his back. I saw red, then white, and then everything went black.
I woke to find Glory and Heather holding me while Deacon was waving bitters under my nose. I hate those damn things. Jesus my hands hurt. I looked down and saw them covered with blood and torn flesh.
"What the fuck?!" I started move back, as if to get away from my own limbs..
"Calm down there big guy..." Deacon was talking while he hit each forearm with a Stimpack. "You know... Bone cuts skin right?"
"What are you talking ab..." Then I saw what was left of the Courser. The body was completely intact, except for the head from the lower jaw up. It looked like a truck had rolled over the rest of it. I blinked and looked down at myself. I was covered head to toe in blood. "What the fuck!? Did he..."
"Bro..." Deacon shook his head. "This is all you... By the time we pulled you off of him, the only thing he was doing was twitching."
"I don't remember..." For the first time in my life, I had lost complete control... I was, well, scared. "Did I say anything? What did I fucking say?!"
"Yeah... Heather?" Deacon waved for heather to come over. "You should tell him..."
"Tell me what?!"
"Cain..." Heather had tears in her eyes.
"Oh fuck... What did I say?!"
"When Glory and I pulled you off of him, you were repeating the same thing over and over..."
"Goddammit, Heather... What the fuck was I saying?"
"You're not taking my family again..." She said the words, choking emotion back.
So there is that...
We left the vault and moved in circles and zigzags for close to 10 hours until we were absolutely positive that we weren't being followed. So here I am again, at Heather's desk in her bunker. We are strewn about like refugees. Heather and Glory are in her room... I am not asking. Des is on the couch, Deacon is in the easy chair, and Xao, Dozer and Bob are just crashed out on the floor. I am taking the cot here next to the desk. Tomorrow we are going to just hold here to recover and assess. Tonight, after everyone else had gone to sleep, I did something I have not done since I was 13. I am sure the tears are some kind of post traumatic stress. They have to be, right?
