Chapter 22 — The End of All Things
The marble columns of the CIT building shook as Liberty Prime approached. Immediately, superheated red volleys of plasma and laser ammunition flew back and forth. Something exploded on the second floor which started a fire. Within minutes, air was thick with acrid smoke and the hazy discharge of gunpowder. The smell of ozone and blood filled Nora's nostrils as she ran through the CIT hallways with Nick close on her heels.
"FREEDOM IS THE SOVEREIGN RIGHT OF EVERY AMERICAN!" Liberty Prime waddled to a full stop.
The robot's leg joints creaked and sparks burst forth from one of the actuators as something internal failed causing the whole knee to explode.
Liberty Prime's voice seemed to take on a harsher tone as it crowed out, "AMERICA WILL NEVER FALL TO THE COMMUNIST INVASION."
"Doll!" Nick yelled. "Left!"
Nora saw three Brotherhood soldiers running towards her from a hole in the wall. She started shooting on instinct. Her red laser missiles and Nick's combat rifle rounds tore through the first soldier like tissue paper, but the other two hunkered down behind tipped over file cabinets and returned fire.
"MOVE!" Nora yelled.
Both of them dove through an open doorway. The room used to be a classroom, but now it was a storage room for desks, chairs, and rolling chalkboards. The other two Brotherhood soldiers were hot on their trail as they tore through the maze of junk. Nick's face was contorted into a fierce snarl and he kicked over a stack of desks which collapsed in a tangle of metal and wood. They both ran up a concert chunk of collapsed ceiling and made it to the 3rd floor just as Liberty Prime's voice boomed:
"RED COMMUNIST CHINESE HIDEOUT DETECTED. DEPTH OF CHINESE COMPOUND IS 6 METERS. INITIATING EXCAVATING SUBROUTINES. STAND BACK."
"Fuck!" Nora snarled. She shouted into her PipBoy. "Prepare for a breach in the top level! The robot is shooting through the goddamned ground! Secord! Send out the last contingent of Gen-1s topside. Maybe they can provide a dest—"
More gunfire cut off Nora's response and she shot back at the Brotherhood soldiers who pursued them up to the 3rd floor. Nick and Nora had entrenched themselves behind a stack of file cabinets and a heavy desk. The window behind them was open, but the drop to the ground was a straight thirty feet.
"Run, doll." Nick growled. "I'll distract them and you run. Hancock is down on the first floor with —"
— "I'm not leaving you Nick!" Nora snapped.
She ducked down to reload her gun as Nick's rifle responded like a tommy gun. If they weren't in such dire straits, Nora would've found the cliche image of Nick with an automatic rifle amusing.
The two Brotherhood soldiers had now acquired backup and six of them were spilling into the room. One of them raised a hulking mini gun and aimed it at the two of them. He or she wouldn't have to bother with accuracy once the gun started spitting out superheated death, and Nick realized what was about to happen a split second before Nora could react.
The barrel whirled and Nick tackled Nora down below their makeshift barricade. In that split second before the gun discharged, Nora saw the look on Nick's face. It was full horror and guilt, but it was also full of stubborn determination and fierce love. The floor beneath Nora slowly gave way and it took her several moments to realize that the area rug that Nick had tackled her onto was covering a hole in the floor. She slipped down past the soldiers' line of gunfire and then she felt a jerk as the ancient rug tore on exposed the rebar. Her stomach flew up and caught in her throat and her body slammed into the floor below.
The world slowed down and Nora tried to take several breaths. She heard a ringing in her ears and she tasted blood in her mouth. A group of Minutemen saw her fall through the hole in the ceiling and one of them grabbed her by the hand and pulled her out of the room and down the marble staircase. She stumbled down the stairs, lost her balance, and fell the rest of the way. Her gun flew out of her hands and she smacked her head on the floor so hard that she saw double.
The Minutemen soldier was yelling something at her but Nora couldn't think let alone hear him. His lips were moving and he was looking off towards his right. He waved someone down and two more people came running towards her.
"Nora! You okay?!" She heard Hancock's voice but it was slowed down and warped.
He helped her sit up but her eyes nearly exploded out of her skull due to the pressure. Her head felt swollen and it was pounding.
"Preston. Ham. Cover me while I take care of Nora!" Hancock snarled.
Both men nodded and took positions on either side of them. Hancock's dark eyes took inventory of Nora's injuries. She was bleeding from the back of her head and she might've broken another rib from the fall, but what concerned him more, was the large amounts of black coolant that stained her chest and face.
Hancock opened his coat and started administering Med-X and a round of stimpaks to the minor wounds. Unfortunately he didn't have any water on him to combat the dehydration she'd experience. Once the Med-X kicked in, Nora tried to struggle to her feet but she barely made it five steps before Hancock and Preston grabbed her by either arm and hauled her back down.
Just then, Liberty Prime's booming voice changed tone and it's voice had defaulted to something more akin to a Protectron.
"ERROR. ERROR. MAIN SYSTEMS ERROR. SYNTAX FOR COMMAND DOES NOT COMPUTE. LOOPING OVERRIDE A-A-A-A-A-CTIVATED. SELF DESTRUCT IN —"
"That a'boy kid." Hancock growled fiercely.
The wall quaked as the explosive force was strong enough to blow out whatever glass remained in the ground floor windows. Orange and red flames illuminated the small corner where they were sheltered and a chorus of horrified screams met Nora's ears. The air was acrid with burning electronics and melted polymer and plastic.
"Fuck!" Hancock snarled. The heat from the explosion licked at his already radiation burned skin. "Ham, get Nora over to the rally point we discussed earlier. Those eggheads will beam her back to the Institute."
The ghoul nodded and he picked Nora up and ran with her down the hallway and through the central atrium. Hancock looked at Preston and nodded back towards the action outside.
"If their fuckin' robot actually blasted through, we gotta help Nora get back to the Institute. There's a fuck-ton of nuclear power beneath our feet. If this shit goes up, none of us are gonna make it outta here. You feel me?"
Preston nodded and both men ran back into the smoky dawn.
Ham made it to the other side of the CIT building before Nora had gathered up enough oxygen to demand that he put her down. Before he could obey, his hot, wet blood exploded out from his forehead soaking Nora's face with gore. They both tumbled to the floor and Nora scrambled to her feet and reached for her secondary gun.
A Brotherhood soldier advanced towards her with his gun drawn. He was out of his Power Armor and his orange Brotherhood jumpsuit was torn in several places to reveal tanned skin and several fresh, bleeding wounds. Nora didn't recognize his face, but that didn't matter. The look of utter contempt was clear.
She heard a gunshot and flinched, but instead of feeling any pain, the soldier's eyes went wide and then he collapsed to his knees in front of her. Deacon stood behind the man with a look of stoic duty and cool indifference as he stepped over the man and walked towards Nora.
"You okay there Wanderer?"
Nora shook her head. She didn't know what to say, but 'no' was the first answer that came to her mind.
Deacon's lip twitched up at her answer and his eyebrows waggled mischievously. "Glad to hear that. I'd be a little concerned for your sanity if you said you were doing fine. Chin up, soldier. Remember, we —"
"Nora!" Dr. Filmore's voice came through her PipBoy so loudly that a shrill wine of feedback screeched out of the machine. "They've broken through to the relay room! We've got visuals on the Elder and three other Brotherhood soldiers entering the Institute. Cut them off if you can! No matter what happens, they cannot get to the reactor!"
Fear superseded grief and Nora looked at Deacon. Their eyes met and something unspoken passed between them. He nodded and handed Nora a small round device. It fit into the palm of her hand and it looked similarly to a garage door opener.
"Use that to bring you directly to the Institute's atrium." Deacon said.
"Wait — what? Why do you have this?"
More gunfire burst into the opposite end of the hallway and Deacon glanced back before giving her a mischievous smile.
"Oh, did I not tell you? I'm a synth. I stole that from those SRB folks when I escaped. Consider it my gift to you, Mother."
Nora's mouth fell slack and she gaped at Deacon as he took off running towards the action. His silenced pistol was kept low and out of sight. At first glance, he looked just like any other Brotherhood soldier. But Nora supposed that was his M.O. Master spy. Master liar.
She pressed the device that Deacon gave her and a flash of blue light briefly blinded her. Lo and behold, Nora was back inside the Institute and Nora watched as Elder Danse ran through the upper hallways inhibited. He was making his way around towards the Advanced Systems department.
Oh God… Nora thought. If he got to the reactor, the entire place would go up in a nuclear explosion. Danse was driven by enough pain and hatred that he'd not think twice about martyring himself if that meant he could take out the Institute in one fell swoop.
"Glory! Take out the tunnels leading to the reactor. Now!" Nora yelled into her PipBoy.
There was no response.
"Glory?! SHIT!"
Nora raced across the Atrium and entered the Advanced Systems laboratory. She used the keypad to lock down the perimeter and then she ran towards the storerooms which guarded the entrance to the reactor level.
However, Danse had made his way in through a conjoined hallway with the SRB division, and before Nora could think to do anything else, she tackled him. He was built like a linebacker but Nora had caught him off his guard. She landed on top of him, but her weight was negligible and he threw her from his shoulders like she was a child. Nora rolled when her body hit the ground and a shelf full of spare technological parts and weapons mods.
Still running on adrenaline, she launched herself up off the ground just as Danse's laser pistol shot off two superheated rounds.
"Stop!" Nora shrieked. "Please stop! This doesn't have to end this way!"
"I trusted you!" Danse snarled and he threw his gun down onto the ground. "And like a goddamn fool, I let myself be swayed by your words!"
He was panting and his bloody fists were clenched. He drew his shoulders up near his ears and he glowered down at Nora like a yao guai standing upright on its hind legs.
"I gave you a chance to surrender." he boomed. "Now I'm forced to subdue you or execute you myself."
Nora scrambled to her feet as Danse advanced in on her and caught her by the neck. Light exploded behind her eyes and she felt her feet leave the ground.
In a brief out-of-body moment, Nora saw herself being held against the wall. Her hands clutched Danse's meaty forearms like she was holding onto rebar for dear life. She saw Danse, his face contorted with rage and hysterical pain. Her heartbeat pounded in her head. Blood dripped down her nose and her tongue stuck out of her mouth like she could taste the molecules in the air.
She dangled there for what felt like minutes. Her mind was screaming at her to kick him. Do something! So Nora pushed all of her strength into her leg and kicked Danse in the knee. She heard cartilage and bone crack and snap like popcorn. He dropped her and then collapsed onto his back.
Nora rolled away from him as soon as she hit the floor. She tasted blood in her mouth and her eyes felt like they were going to explode out of her skull.
Danse struggled to his feet but the pain in his shattered knee was too great and he was forced back onto his side.
"Surrender — Elder." Nora gasps for air. "Surrender — and — nobody else — has to die."
Each word felt like agony and her oxygen deprived brain was starting to slow down which drew her attention to all of the other injuries she had sustained in the fighting.
Danse gritted his teeth and crawled over to Nora's prone form, his injured knee dragging uselessly beneath him. Blood leaked down his neck and stained his orange Brotherhood uniform.
Her thoughts swam lazily through her skull as he approached. She was so damn tired. Nora supposed that none of this would really matter soon. She was going to die right here and she couldn't do anything about it.
"Ad Victoriam Vault Dweller." Danse snarled as he crawled over her prone form and brought his hands around her neck.
In one last defiant act of rage and despair, Nora tried to push Danse's hands off of her but she failed. Danse's face blurred out of focus as her oxygen-deprived brain tried to make sense out of the chaos and the pain. The ringing in Nora's ears was back once again and she felt hot tears slide down her cheeks.
Everything after that faded away to white.
Nora awoke in her bed. She fingered the embroidery on the plum bedspread letting the pads of her fingers trail over the floral pattern. Sunlight streamed through the lone window; dust particles were suspended in the sunbeams and they slowly sank to the floor.
She peeled the covers off of her and sat up. There was a raw ache in her abdomen similar to painful menstrual cramps but she pushed the thought from her mind. After all, her body was still healing from the hysterectomy that she had to endure after Shaun's birth.
Speaking of Shaun, she opened the door and crossed the hallway into Shaun's room, but when she entered, she saw that the room was empty. Cardboard boxes sat stacked up against the wall and were labeled with black permanent marker. They had a variety of vaguely familiar terms labeled on their side. Nora read names like 'The Institute,' 'Father/Shaun' and 'Vault 111' but couldn't quite place her finger on why they were significant.
"Nora? You awake, babe?" Nate's voice called from the living room.
She closed the door to the room and walked down the hall. The box containing their new Mister Handy unit sat unopened in the laundry room. Nate had yet to set him up. She just hoped that the old bucket of bolts would be as helpful around the house as its pamphlet advertised.
When Nora walked into the living room, she saw her husband lounging against their red sofa with the TV remote in one hand and a Gwinnett Stout in the other. The baseball game was on TV but Nate didn't seem all too concerned with the Red Sox's game.
Nate smiled when he saw her and moved himself so Nora could sit down next to him.
"Good evening, babe. Did you have a nice nap?"
The question seemed alien to her ears, yet Nora still nodded. "How are the Sox doin'?"
"Dominating as always. You know we can't lose when we have a home game. Those Cubs don't stand a chance winning the World Series. They might have won back in 2017, but sixty years is another long ass dry streak."
Nora grinned at her husband's accurate assessment and she curled into his side to watch a bit of the game.
Donavon Martinez caught the ball, touched first and threw it to Anton Benintendi who threw it third base.
"OUT" called the umpire and two of the Chicago Cubs players walked back to the dugout.
Nate drank from his beer without taking his eyes off the television. The game cut to a commercial break where a dark haired woman wearing an odd newsboy press cap advertised Sugar Bombs cereal.
"It's a sugary delight in every bite!" She endorsed with a toothy smile.
Nora rose from the couch and grabbed Nate's two empty beer bottles to drop in the trash can. He remained seated, almost hypnotized by the television, while Nora grabbed a beer of her own.
She popped the bottle cap with the refrigerator magnet beer opener and pocketed the cap. After all, she never knew when she'd need a bottle cap. When Nora tipped the beer back into her mouth, the malty taste reminded her of the Shamrock Taphouse. She couldn't put her finger on why, per se, but she had this feeling like she had drank there before.
"Hey babe," She called out to Nate, "Have you ever been to the Shamrock Taphouse?"
He shrugged, "I can't say that I have. Why? D'you want to go there? We can try that place out this Saturday for our date night."
"But you promised that we could have a picnic down at Walden Pond." Nora interjected. Although most of the tourists were still crowding the place, Nora and Nate had found a spot among the thicket and the low shrubs that gave them some semblance of privacy.
"Right, right. Walden Pond it is." Nate replied. "And maybe this time we won't get caught by the park ranger. He only let us off with a warning because of my service to the country, you know."
"Well if you weren't such a screamer then maybe we wouldn't have gotten caught." Nora replied with a smug grin.
Nate shook his head, "Sometimes I wonder if you like the element of danger that comes with getting caught."
Nora grinned and stroked the side of his face, but as she did so, his skin felt strange beneath her hand. It felt less like human flesh and more like the rough and slightly waxy texture of touching a melted candle.
Nate pulled Nora's hands into his. "Hey, it's your choice since it's your birthday. You just let me know what you want to do and we'll do it."
"NORA!" a voice roared and someone pounded on a door.
She jumped and looked around the room for the source of the noise. "D - did you hear that?"
"Hear what?" Nate replied.
"C'MON NORA!" the pounding continued. "STAY WITH US!"
"Nate. You can't tell me that you didn't hear that." Nora said. "Someone's pounding at our door."
Nate looked over at her but he had changed. Now he was wearing a grey and black jumpsuit that said INSTITUTE COURSER on the back.
"Oh that voice?" He asked with an odd tone of distaste to his voice. "That's just one of your boyfriends."
"One of m-my boyfriends?!" She stuttered.
"Yeah, you know. The handsy one who looks burned." Nate replied dismissively."I think he's trying to get your attention."
The pounding on the door continued and Nora clutched her head as a terrible migraine started to come on.
"Jesus Christ. It's that damn Vault Tec salesman again." Nate complained. "At least he'd have the decency to not stop by while the game is on."
Nora rose from the sofa and moved with unnatural slowness to the front door. Her feet felt like she was trudging through hip-high water.
The knocking continued once more and then the door blew open. The wooden pieces of their front door exploded into the living room in splinters. However, the man standing outside the door looked like no man Nora had ever seen before.
He wore a dirty grey trench coat and battered fedora. The man had glowing artificial yellow eyes and blue-grey skin; when he turned his head slightly, Nora could see that part of his jaw and his neck was torn revealing the metal gears, small wires, and sturdy tubing that held a viscous black substance.
"Good evening, doll. Vault Tec calling." His voice was like gravel and smoke and she felt a trickle of cold air tickle the nape of her neck.
"Vault Tec? What's that?" Nora asked. Her voice sounded like a child's, high pitched and without her normal self-assured poise.
The man lit a cigarette and exhaled the smoke out through this nose and the gaps in his neck.
"Vault Tec's your destiny, doll." he replied. "Because of your family's service to your country, you have been pre-selected for entrance into the local vault. Vault 111."
"Honey, tell him to go away. Come back and watch the game with me." Nate called over his shoulder.
"J-just a second." Nora called back. She couldn't take her eyes off this mysterious stranger. His skeletal metal hand clutched a blank clipboard while his intact hand held the cigarette between practiced fingers.
"So what d'you say?" He asked. "Can I put you, your husband, and your baby down as a 'yes'?"
"Baby? I don't have a -" Just then a shrill infant's cry cut out over the baseball game.
"MUM!" A robotic voice frantically called out. The Mister Handy that Nate still had to assemble floated into the living room. A baby's swaddling cloth was draped over one arm and a glass baby bottle was clenched in its claw.
"Oh Mum! I'm at a total loss. Shaun's nappy is changed, he's fed, and my scanners are saying that he's totally healthy, yet he wont stop crying! I - I - I don't know what to do. Mum, please!"
"Yes Nora. Please take care of our baby. Be a mother to the kid for once, otherwise who knows how he'll turn out." Nate scolded.
He looked directly at her and his blue eyes held nothing but disappointment. His unruly dark hair had been clipped into a military buzz cut and he was now wearing white and grey military winter fatigues.
She turned back to the door to tell the strange looking Vault Tec salesman to go away but she saw nothing except the eerie yellow sky. Her neighbors across the street were standing outside of their house with two suitcases. Their dead eyes locked onto hers and when Nora blinked again, their skin began sloughing off in whitish-pink sheets revealing the grotesque muscle beneath.
Nora slammed the door and rushed back down the hallway and went into Shaun's room. The cardboard boxes from earlier had multiplied and now they were stacked so high that they reached the ceiling.
"Mother..." a weak voice called out.
Nora entered Shaun's room and flicked on the light. Instead of her son's crib, a sterile hospital bed sat in the middle of the room and a gaunt, sickly, white-haired man rested beneath the covers.
"Shaun?" She asked in disbelief.
His liver spotted and knotted hand pressed on the remote which raised the head of the hospital bed up so he could look at her. His pale watery blue eyes looked sunken into his skull. Red blood painted his lower lips and tongue.
"Mother I am so disappointed in you." he said weakly.
Nora approached his bedside and sat in the cold metal chair next to the bed. She gently took one gnarled hand into hers feeling his paper thin skin.
"I'm sorry Shaun. I tried. You know I tried, right?"
Shaun smiled revealing blood-stained teeth. "You failed me Mother. You were supposed to take my place as leader. Now look what you've done. You've destroyed everything."
"I - I don't underst -" Nora paused and then a chest-deep rumble vibrated within her and the acrid smell of smoke and blistering heat licked at her forearms.
"AH! What?!" Nora's forearms blistered red and clear liquid weeped from the wound. "What the hell?!"
Shaun gave her a sad smile. "Hell indeed. I knew that it would end this way Mother. Ever since I first saw you in the Institute, I knew you would be its destruction."
"I didn't destroy the Institute! I tried to save it!"
But as she said that, she could see the labels on the moving boxes. Each one had a person's name: Nick Valentine. N1-08. Elder Maxson. Nathan Pendleton. Glory. Drummer Boy. Liam Binet. All seven of them started smoking until they all caught fire and smoldered into a charred, ruined heap right in front of her.
"No. NO!" Nora tried to run into the hallway to grab the fire extinguisher but instead she found herself strapped to a high-backed wooden chair with armrests. Her wrists were bound to each armrest with thick leather straps. A stainless steel rolling medical cart sat next to the chair with electric nodes that ran to a small generator that sat humming in the corner.
"Mother, did you know that the Commonwealth reinstated the death penalty in 2075?" Father asked with wry amusement.
"For people convicted of treason or other war crimes." Nora pointed out.
"You destroyed a large chunk of the Brotherhood of Steel who sprang from the remnants of the United States Army. Is that not treasonous?"
"I did it to save the Institute. I did it to help everyone in the Commonwealth!" Nora argued.
"How could helping the Institute save the Commonwealth?" Father mocked. "We are the Commonwealth boogeyman. We are not the good guys."
The high-backed wooden chair morphed back into a metal folding chair. Her hands were free and she rubbed at her wrists where the straps had cut into her skin.
"Please..." Nora begged. "Yes, I destroyed the Brotherhood because I had to but I never meant for any of this to happen. I never meant to cause so much pain."
"Then let the record show that the accused is showing remorse. In that case, I think a more humane ending is appropriate for you."
Father opened up his palm and Nora saw two large circular pills sitting there. She recognized the pills immediately.
Buffout.
"You failed to do the right thing last time." Father replied and tipped the heavy pills into her hand. "Do the right thing Nora. End this. Accept your punishment. Many think you're a hero but we both know the truth don't we?"
Nora brought the pills up to her lips.
"I'm no hero." she mumbled.
"No you're not." Father agreed. "Go on. It will be easier this way."
Nora nodded and tipped both pills into her mouth and swallowed them down dry. She could feel each pill travel down her esophagus. It felt like she had swallowed razor blades as they cut her insides. Unlike last time, Nora didn't feel the Buffout's effects. She didn't feel supernaturally strong. In fact, she felt nothing except fear.
"No. No... NO." Nora choked. The cold realization of what she had done sent an electrical shock through her body and she got up from the chair and forced two fingers down her throat.
Her body retched but nothing came up. She tried again and painfully stuck her fingers down her throat until her teeth were biting her own hand. Tears welled to her eyes and drool dripped out of her mouth but still there was nothing.
"Don't fight it Mother." Father said weakly. He laid back onto his pillow and closed his eyes. "Death comes for us all in the end."
The heart rate monitor near his bedside flatlined and let out a long, droning sound
"I don't want to die." Nora muttered. "I don't want to die."
Yet, all the strength previously keeping her upright left her. Nora sank to the ground and rolled onto her back. The lights in Shaun's room swirled around her in a kaleidoscope of color until everything faded to black, all at once.
Pain rippled through her body. Her heart was beating dangerously fast; she could feel the heartbeat in her own ears thumping in an ever faster rhythm. The Buffout must've finally reached her system, she thought.
Her eyes became heavy and despite doing everything in her power to not shut her eyes, she felt an unbearable fatigue leech the life from her body.
"I don't want to die" she murmured one last time. Her tongue felt thick and heavy and her voice slurred.
The air smelled of chlorinated radiation and the sickening sweet scent of burning human flesh. A small pinprick of light caught her attention as her eyes closed. The beam was unbearably bright but she fell unconscious before she could register why the light was shining directly into her face.