Chapter 2: All I Have To Do Is Dream
She was imprisoned back into her cryogenic pod the moment she had tasted freedom from being locked away, the moment the child felt they were being released, her mind was brought into the unconscious state she could only vaguely remember. It was a blurring experience, feeling like a dream she couldn't remember the morning after.
Inside her mind for so long, she did not dream, create fantasies or a life for herself in her mind. Memories, things she remembers, is all that floated through her head on a constant repeat. So, she was frozen, where her memories continuously played, with no escape in sight.
The memories felt real; she thought she was still in Aunt Nora and Uncle Nate's house. She felt the hugs and kisses and playing with Louis. One memory she always seemed to gravitate to was the first time she had ever seen her birth mother. The memory was bitter-sweet, almost surreal moment in on itself. It was odd to her that was the point in time that seemed so important to her; it felt so minor to everything else.
Aunt Nora had sat her on the couch, showing her the family albums. Uncle Nate was still in the war, and she had found out some months back her father was dead. She didn't understand why the war was happening, but she hated it. She hated she had not seen Uncle Nate for almost six months, she lost her father to it, and now her Grandmother had refused rights of her.
Aunt Nora must have seen how upset she was, as Eva now sat with a Nuka cola in her hand as Aunt Nora lazily flipped through the pages.
She knew the usual pictures, the ones of her Aunt and Uncle's wedding, her first days of school, Aunt Nora in college, and even some of Uncle Nate and her father in their youth. She was used to these photos and seeing her father made her heart sink more.
Just as Eva was going to close the book, Nora had begun to turn past the pages she was so used to, adventuring to photographs she had never seen. Her Father and Uncle in college, of her Grandmother and Grandfather before they divorced- things Eva had yet to see. If she didn't feel so glump, she would have felt excitement.
"Do you know who this is?" Nora turned her head towards her, smiling warmly. Eva's eyes followed towards her long fingernail tapping on a photograph.
The photograph was a baby and a woman, and what looked to be her father. The baby had a wisp of jet black hair just as hers, with her icy blue eyes. Her father gripped the shoulders of the woman, so tightly the fabric had been wrinkled by the force.
The baby was hanging off the hip of a young woman; scrawny with straight-leg cigarette pants and a tight, black turtleneck. She had one arm holding the baby, with the other hand making a peace sign. She had her tongue out in a toothy smile.
The woman had a happy grin, an expression so bright it looked like a child's face. "No.. it's not you."
The woman's blonde hair was so long it went all the way to her back- she had never seen a woman have hair that long.
"It's your mother, Betty." Nora was rubbing up against the child's arm, as Eva tensed. She was never allowed to know who her mother was, the adults in her life avoided the question with either gentleness or simply changing the subject. Her father shut down on her once for asking, locking her in her room for thirty minutes but never said why she was in so much trouble.
She wasn't ever allowed to see her, her hesitant fingertips reached, and gently touched the flat picture. Her mother was holding a baby version of her- and Eva had a fistful of that long, shimmering blonde hair in one grime covered hand. The baby was only half interested in the photograph, sufficiently engrossed in the long mane of the woman.
"She looks different." She glanced back up at her Aunt, who chuckles, going to another page to show Betty sitting on a counter at some restaurant, hands up in an excessive shrug as she grinned, her hands flat at her shoulders on each side. Her legs were crossed, looking off to the corner with that same innocence from the first photo. Her father was in this one also, looking young and without the scars he had gotten from war.
He sat on a bar stool, facing the camera with a stiff posture. He didn't radiate the life or fun the woman did. Evangeline felt a ting of grief as she never got to know this woman.
"Oh, she was, a poetic activist... The only woman who told your father when he was a tight up meanie." She coos, making the child look back at the photo for the second peek- her father looked as he did in the photo albums from years ago. He had the same stern, stoic countenance he had when she knew him. A gloved hand was on the thigh of Betty. He wore his military attire- he always did in formal situations.
Vincint was always dignified; his short black hair had been combed in a precise, clean cut. His attire was always pressed; without wrinkles, without a stain. That uniform was his pride. It was hard thinking of his memory, now that he was gone.
"This was their pregnancy photo, it's based off the first ever picture of them together."
Nora taps the photo on the next page, showing a much younger pair of the two, Betty was sitting on the same counter, holding a full glass of wine as Vincint had his hand on her knee instead of her thigh. Betty was wearing dungarees pants, a black and white striped shirt far too big for her, and a plain pair of white flatties. He wore a dark button-up cardigan and beige khakis. His posture was perfect- everything of him was neat and organized.
"Your mother loved poems. She named you after her favorite one." Aunt Nora pets her hair quietly as Evangeline continued through the pages of the album.
Eva began to have a big love for poems. It made her feel close to the woman in the pictures and stories. The laughing, happy woman who applied lipstick in the reflection of power armor and fought against the mistreatment of people in America. Aunt Nora fully embraced this new found love and gifted her a poem book on her seventh birthday.
Eva cherished the book full of poems, with an attached ribbon bookmark, the cover was thick, made of leather. She felt so adult when she read the lyrics or carried it around the school. It was her show-and-tell five times in a roll. Those memories, of her mother, seemed happy. Her mother left behind an idea of a perfect woman.
Memories of her father were more bitter. She has memories of being yelled at for not making her bed correctly or getting grounded for getting B's in schools. He wanted perfection from a five-year-old, and she could never provide that. He was so stoic until she did something he didn't enjoy, and then he would become so angry.
It sent a wave of sorrow across her family when he was officially dead- his stream of holotypes had dried, the usual reports, that felt like an official document, where he stated how many he had killed, what weapons used, and what he ate.
Only in passing did he ever mention he missed his daughter or his mother, but that was usually as a side note. He was an abrasive man, when not shipped off on the front of the war, Eva would dread his homecomings and stay with him. He had a strict schedule, which had to be followed precisely.
Even out of the battlefield, he wanted it, he had been raised as a military brat, and he wanted that childhood for her also. He expected high performance for everything she did, and she would feel drained by his visits. When shipped off somewhere, Grandmother Ethelyn or Aunt Nora would care for her. She rathered them much more.
Aunt Nora lived in Boston, and her Grandmother lived on the coast of Maryland. So the only times she would see Aunt Nora was if Grandmother Ethelyn was going for surgery, requiring someone else watching the child, or holidays when the family would all gather together. She hardly knew Aunt Honora at the time.
Grandmother Ethelyn was an acerbic woman, and she was not gentle or kind like other grandmothers in television or books she had read. She couldn't call her Granny or Grandma like other children; she was to be referred to as Grandmother Ethelyn, even before she could pronounce it correctly, she would have to attempt to say it- even if it was more gibberish at that point.
She was similar to her father but much more watered down on the strict expectations and the life she had to suffer through him. She expected Eva to be independent: Eva was taught to cook, clean, and care for herself once she could walk and form a sentence. She was no-nonsense and expected Eva to be a little lady always.
The rules, the chores, the studying that she had to do, she never felt unloved or not enough. Grandmother Ethelyn told her she was a brilliant child, that she would do amazing things as an adult. If anyone bullied Eva, Grandmother Ethelyn would wait outside the child's house more fired up than a guard dog on a trespasser. Unlike her father, she never felt she could lose her Grandmother's love.
Grandmother Ethelyn was the strongest woman she knew. She could intimate women and men alike. Eva would always feel so protected by her Grandmother. She was a strong woman, who did heavy lifting and labor even in her older years despite her relatives pleading for the old woman to slow down.
She was tough and said everyone needed to be tough in times of wars. She expected Evangeline to be so strong, even if Evangeline couldn't be like her Grandmother, who could lose so much and still be so strong, who could watch her sons go to war and always love her country.
She had never seen Grandmother Ethelyn cry before her Father's funeral, and if she didn't see it, she might not have believed it. She had seen the woman with a broken leg drive herself to the hospital, cursing and angrily shouting the entire way.
Aunt Nora told her emotional pain was worse; saying she lost her family, and that hurt worse than any physical pain. Evangeline knew that was true, as when they lowered her father into the muddy ground, the senior woman sobbed and screamed, falling to her knees. Grandmother reached for the coffin, and one of her distant male relatives had to grab the poor, grieve stricken woman from jumping in after the coffin.
Her Grandmother screamed and wailed. She kept saying the coffin was empty; her son couldn't have been buried in the soil of the country he loved so much. Evangeline was never allowed to know how her father died, but reliving that memory, the memory of Aunt Nora squeezing her hand so tight it felt it would break, she realized how this is what broke the family, the close-knit community the Clawsons made across the states.
When the worst day of Eva's life was over, Grandmother Ethelyn refused to care for Evangeline. She declined to share a hotel room with the child, and she had to bunk with her Aunt. She left for Maryland soon after and told Nora to get the child's possessions, including her dog. Aunt Nora was happy to gain rights of the six-year-old. Grandmother Ethelyn hadn't looked at Evangeline the same anymore. She felt she did something wrong, but she never knew what.
Nora stopped going to the Holiday events and begun to refuse contact with Ethelyn after abandoning the child. Evangeline didn't know how to feel about it, but she was happy she got her dog back when Aunt Nora collected her things.
Those memories, the memories of her father's death, her dog running away and Grandmother Ethelyn's abandonment, it was the hard ones, she always seemed to cry harder each time. She wanted to remember only the happy, because still faintly, at the back of her mind, she recognized what was happening outside.
Her favorite memories were Uncle Nate's homecoming, her dog and the days they brought home Shaun, then Codsworth. She always wanted to relive those, the tight hugs she got from Uncle Nate when he scooped her up in his arms, the dinner was still Drumlin Diner. He would order a big burger and fries; because he says, that is what he misses the most.
The memory of when Shaun first came home, and she was allowed to hold him was always so peaceful. He was so little, soft. He wouldn't cry as much, and he would sleep all the time. He was like a baby doll, and Eva never stopped treating him like one.
The year where Shaun was born, when Uncle Nate returned from the war and Aunt Nora found work was the best memories of her life. She could vividly remember the taste of smoky burgers that Uncle cooked on his grill in the backyard, she could almost feel Louis' tight grip on her wrist when he dragged her off to play, the way Codsworth would lift her by the underarms with his grabbers when she kept running.
She remembered sitting in her Uncle's lap, listening so excitedly to the Silver Shroud stopping bad guys. She could remember her Aunt's tender hands holding her cheeks in her hands to plant a kiss on her forehead, she even remembered long drives through Boston with Shaun in his car seat hung over the seat, with her dog's head on her lap. She had never felt so calm and loved before that year.
In these memories, she was safe; she didn't have to remember her Uncle and cousin were stolen, how she was left behind. Maybe she was dead, and this was heaven. By the constant stream of dreams, she was never able to think upon this situation thoroughly. Her body was not her own. Her voice was not her own, it only acted out what she remembered. Like a corrupted recorder, she couldn't break from the cycle.
She couldn't change the past, and no matter how much she tried on that test, when she came home, she was still smacked and yelled at by her father.
She was reliving another numbing day of school when everything went black, it was sudden, without warning and she was drowned in darkness. She couldn't feel herself breathing, nor could she move, the panic set into her mind before her eyes shot open, snapping the daze of unconsciousness as all the memories fade, her mind drew blank of all the time she had spent reliving those memories.
Her lungs took heavy inhales, causing the poor girl to cough as the icy air poorly settled in her lungs. Her body felt weak and beaten, her fingers numb from the ice that surrounded her, that laced her jumpsuit and flesh. The pod releases the door, causing her body to slam against the hard flooring below.
What happened when she was refrozen was bleary, but she had stood and tried to bang on the door of the pod. Which caused her to fall over once the seal had been broken, lifting the metal flap of the clamber. She curled on the hard surface; She was so overwhelmed, her body ached and shivered, her heartbeat felt so slow. She couldn't think straight past how freezing everything felt, how soaked her jumpsuit was.
She curled, her knees pressed to her chest as she tried to regain her warmth, huffing her lukewarm breath on her redden knuckles. It was such a contrast her mind was blank, attempting to recover.
The ice slowly melted off her, only causing her to become more cold, she held onto her soaked sweater, sniffling quietly. She shut her eyes tight, pretending her Uncle had scooped her up in his warm arms like that winter night when she had fallen in the snow.
She was only semi-conscious, drifting in and out of sleep, her body felt weak with exhaustion, but she didn't want to sleep, she had slept so long- why was she so tired? Her fisted hands were to her mouth, trying to soak in the warmth of her quiet whimpers and breath. Before her, she saw the doll she had been trapped with- laying right beside her. Her hands extend, slowly pulling the comfort item to her chest.
She recovered slowly, her head lifting to see the pod of her Uncle's- emptied. She stampers up, on her feeble knees and hurried across the room to the pod. She had tried to slam her fists against the window, but her eyes caught the lever.
She pulled it down, panicked and moving erratically. The door unsealed, slowly opening. She shoved her head inside once the door had opened wide. The icy water still dripped from the chair, where no one sat. The room was cold, so cold she couldn't stop her trembling. She stood, on sore feet towards the pod that was next to her. Aunt Nora was still inside, feeling a flicker of hope, she trudged towards the glass window of the shell.
Her arms were tightly wrapped around her, her thighs pressed together, panting as she looked to the lever, reaching a meek hand out and pulling it downward. It rang a noise of error, making the young girl released a choked cry of panic.
'Malfunction in Cryo Pod manual release override.' The child had no concept of what the voice meant, panic beginning to fill her senses as the door would not open. She kept slamming the lever handle upward, then down, trying to force it to work. The same error noise came, making her grip tighter against the switch.
She tried the other clambers, gaining the same response. "-Hello? Anyone!?" She yelled, hearing her voice bounce off the walls, her only answer was the humming of machines and the leaking icicles.
Eva couldn't stay calm, she was a child, alone, in a place she didn't know. She started to bunch her fists in her black bob, beginning to pull downward. It was a nervous habit, her doctor said, she missed the rough hands of her Uncle's who pulled her wrists so gently away from her hair, and how her Aunt would run her thin fingers through her hair, humming a calming tone to get her to untense.
But Evangeline didn't have this comfort now, she had to begin her breathing methods to calm herself down- she needed her Uncle, or a scientist, to get her Aunt out of the pod. That wouldn't be hard, she found adults all the time where she thought there were none. She removed her hands from her hair, gingerly, as she saw all the black strands on her palm. She narrowed her eyes as she realized what she had done.
She had pulled her hair again, that wasn't good- she hasn't done that since her father died. She waves the strands the best she could, but her clammy hands kept the strands glued to her skin. Frustrated, she just rubbed her hands against the skin-tight suit. She felt so constricted in the blue suit, wet and cold. It was like a constant hose of cold water sprayed over her.
Walking past the sleeves of chambers, the echoes of her footsteps reminded her of how alone she indeed was. When she breathed, soft wisps of clouds left her lips, the constant sound of dripping water followed her in these metal, blue walls. She hated it. She missed her warm house, where her stuffed toys and blanket were, where Codsworth was.
The bay door slides apart as she began towards it, letting out a soft noise of relief as she saw the emptied corridor. The hallway was once filled with people and scientists, but now all that laid was a scattered toolbox, and a few other miscellaneous possessions laid alone. She longed for the steady hand that guided her this far before, and the voices that echoed off the metal shell of the Vault.
Now all she heard was her heavy breathing and the spattering of the dripping water. Everything was cold and foggy, making everything even more uncomfortable. She felt as if a monster, maybe the rubber-skinned one that took her Uncle away- would be here any minute to snatch her up.
Clinging to her damp stuffed companion, she stood before the tall door, tilting her head when it wouldn't open. She placed a hand upon the chilled metal, feeling a shiver journey from her palm to her spine. Eva gulped, realizing the entrance would not open for her. She looked about the short hall, two doors stood opposite the wall of the other.
She held onto the doll tighter, brushing her cheek against the head of the thing as she attempted the next door beside her, watching it open before her. She exhaled a breath she had not realized when she saw the next room. Her chest heaved with sudden excitement, as she knew adults must be close. Someone who help children like her find her Uncle or get her Aunt out of those cold pods- any adult, who could fix what was happening to her.
That was what adults did. Uncle Nate had taught her to go to adults for problems, from scraped knees to feeling lost on a math problem. The sight before her came alive as the door slid upward into the wall, a long, blue staircase stood before her.
The stairsteps had minor aging, some of the yellow paint had chipped, as the metal beneath her had rusted from the constant moisture in the air. She felt she would slip and fall from the slick texture of the flooring beneath her feet. Her black boots squeak as she held onto the saturated railing, using it as support as her other hand pressed tightly against the doll on her chest.
Her steps echoed, intertwining with the other noises- she couldn't help but feel the isolation. As she entered the new area of the Vault, she noticed the fog was less dense here, in this small room, yet outside the window, she could still see the thick fog that lingered where the pods had been. Eva's eyes were unfocused, simply roaming as she strolled her way through before she saw a large, darkened spot on the window.
Tilting her head, she attempted to get a closer look- only for the spot to crawl down from the window, towards the metal floor. Her heart sank, beating against her ribcage to a painful degree. It was some giant bug! The biggest she had ever seen! Her free hand went to the collar of her sweater, taking a cautious step back as the bug seemed to take more interest in something else, flying off the window- she realized it had been on the other side of the window pane.
She stood there, struggling to recover- she swallowed thickly as she squeezed the comfort item, evening her breath. Her hands were holding tightly on her sweater so she would not pull her hair again- Uncle said it was a bad habit and she needed to learn to stop. She bit her lip, chewing at the inner flesh of her lower lip until she felt a calm wave over her once more. She inhaled, releasing all the tension in her body.
Moving forward, she took a moment to scan the layout of the lower section she had indentured to- the small place only had one sliding door, so, she began towards it. Her eyes glance back to the higher zone she had just departed from, she had no idea of how large this vault was so she may might get lost.
Eva made a mental note as she walked through, she wished she had some chalk, she had some in her room, but she was rushed out so fast, she couldn't have brought anything but Booboo. The next door was just as the others, unadorned with the yellow label of '111' upon it. The door opened for her when she stepped forward, allowing her to travel further inside the maze she had been stuck in.
The long, curling corridor had beige paint to it, perhaps she was near the end! The lights dimmed, this room had no fog, but the dust was flowing inside the room inside the rays of shining illuminations. Her pace quickened, finding yet, another door in front of her. She was becoming sick of the sight of doors and new rooms and then another door. She looked down to Booboo.
She tried to soothe her nerves humming a song, humming a quiet tone her Aunt would play while she read over a case. It was a song her mother used to love when she was younger, as she was told. She swayed her head to the tune in her mind, as the next sliding door released her from the room, revealing the next one.
Blue returned to this room, it was much larger with a table only a few feet from her, when she scanned over her surroundings, she saw an opened kitchen area and another door. Her hand grazes across her torso, feeling the sudden realization of how hungry she was. She had been dreaming of food she almost forgot she hasn't eaten for a while, maybe a week.
Her mind perked at the idea of food, she first went to the table, hoping for a clue to find an adult with. The surface had been barred of possessions other than a simple Beaton, the one with those guard used in those news footages she wasn't allowed to watch. She held it, it felt a bit wet, almost hard to use with such a lanky handle in her tiny hand.
She had only a moment to think, as she heard the slithering of something on the hard ground, rolling her heels to see another huge bug, and it was coming towards her! She tried to step back, newfound fear and panic slowing her speed to sluggish pace, as the roach lurched forward, it bit her ankle, and despite the thick layer of her boots, she felt the painful pinch of the bug bite.
The attack pierced the flesh, she screamed, swinging the new found weapon as she banged it over and over the now crushed corpse of the insect. She flopped backward on her backside, looking to her bloodied ankle- the fabric was torn as around the newly opened wound was becoming painted with red.
She wept there for some time, in frustration, in pain, in fear. She slammed her fist against the floor, having a fit as she couldn't take it anymore. It felt like a nightmare, big, scary bugs, all alone, and the creepy noises that followed her in this vault. She slammed her feet against the metal floor, crying heavily, yelling until her throat was sore. This continued until her cheeks were streaked with salty tears, her voice was rasped and her eyes were dried from crying them all out.
After a moment of rocking as she held her doll, she sat back up, going towards the kitchen area. Though, despite searching thoroughly, there was no food to be found. She felt so hungry, so thirsty, how could there be nothing? She went through the bedroom with the bunk beds, but it was bare. Everything was so bare.
The rooms were stripped, and without a sign of life but in the littering trash. She felt slighted, she just wanted to eat! She just wanted her Uncle and Cousin safe, or for her Aunt's pod to open! Why wouldn't anything work? She rubs her face in exasperation, letting out grumbles and murmurs. Leaving the room, she came to the next one. This one had some lighting shooting out from the large, box-like structures in the center of the room. This room was large but looked to the only house whatever these large, lightning boxes were.
Being soaking wet, she knew she didn't want to get a shock. She presses to the wall, sliding past before she heard the same crawling from before. She barely had time to smack the head of the thing with her Beaton before it flew up again. She hated that those terrible things could fling itself at her.
When she got to the next door, she found what looked to be an office of some sort, everything was muddled and messy, like the rest of the vault. The decay was still here, and she found something in the chair of the long desk. Her eyes fluttered at it; mind drew blank before she came to the sense it was a Halloween skeleton. It was October! She kneels before what she had presumed was a prop.
She stood back up, turning as she took a full look at the room.
"Hello? Anyone!" She shouts, she had wandered inside the Overseer's bedroom, finding yet, another emptied room. She looked through the locker, only to find a box of bullets and a single messager bag, thick blue leather with Vault-Tec's logo embedded on. She slid it over her shoulder, she promised to return it to the owner when she found them.
Eva grunts, trying to keep herself from boiling over again. Was she really all alone here? Vault-Tec was supposed to help her, keep her safe. She returned to the main office for the overseer, guns scattered alongside the surface with some needles-like weapons. Her eyebrows furrow, knowing what this was, a stimpack. She hated stimpacks! She had to take one when she broke her arm riding a bike, Uncle shoved it into her arm and pressed the button. Something foreign, wrong, entered her, going through her bloodstream.
But her broken arm healed on the way to the hospital, they were so fast and when she grew used to the feeling, painless. They came commonly in first aid kits and even Aunt Nora had some stored in the bathroom's mirror cabinet. She grabbed one, stabbing the needle into her shoulder as she pushed the chemicals into her bloodstream. She felt them course, making her fingers curl in reaction.
The wound on her ankle, the minor bruises of being tossed out of the pod and frostbite faded from her skin. She grabbed the next two, placing them inside the emptied bag as she continued around the room, anything that looked interesting she would take. For a child, anything shiny or unique to her world view.
She saw the gun on the counter; Uncle Nate would be so angry if he saw her with a gun without adult observation. He had taught her faintly how to hold one and aim, but she wasn't truly shown how to use one. She held the gun. It was so much more massive than one would think, the trigger didn't seem to have hesitation as she did; a quivering finger could kill a man without a thought.
The pistol laid a new weight in her palm, holding the handle tightly. The idea of shooting a roach up gave her more peace of mind than that Beaton that she had stashed away in her newly found bag- she would return it to whoever it belongs to when she found an adult. She tried to make her way out to the next door, seeing it not opening like the other one. Her hand presses to the door, but still, the metallic door would not budge.
"Dang it!" She shouts, stamping her feet as she was met with another locked door. She crosses her arms, taking the sight of the small room once more. The room but bare of everything but the terminal that still laid on the surface- she had taken everything else.
Moving the Halloween prop, She sat the comfy seat up. She seated herself as it creaked in old age. She attempted to start up the poor thing. The computer outer layer was full of decay of time and tears. Her caregivers had a family terminal so she could understand the general layout.
Her eyes perk at the option to open the tunnel door. She clicked it within seconds of reading it, before happily crawling off the chair and hurrying off towards the door. She lifted her shoulders, grinning with glee as she opened the door all on her own!
She ran towards the door, only to find the population of roaches that were on the wall. She moved slowly, lifting the pistol in her hand and aiming the barrel at the first.
She pulled the trigger, she felt the wind knocked out of her, the bones in her hand trembled. Evangeline cried out, stepping back and recoiling in sudden pain. Her ears rang as she used the hand holding her doll to grip against her earlobe.
She had only used a BB gun before; a real gun was so much worse. She barely had time to recover when the same creeping of insect feet filled the air. How in the world was there so many? With little time for thought, she had begun to bang the barrel of the gun as a weapon.
Each slam of the metal against bug made a disgusting crushing of guts and innards. She shivers at the sound, stepping back at the dead bugs she had just slaughtered.
The gun was now coated in bug remains, she gagged, tossing the dirty thing in her bag as she went for her Beaton again. Luckily enough, the gun did the job as a Beaton and got rid of the rest of the disgusting things. She stepped past the crushed spatters, going towards the next door.
Another beige room was what she was met with, she felt the tingle of hope drain from her form as she trudged forward, feeling near tears. She follows the curve of the room, holding the handle of her Beaton tight. She was going to get out, she would escape. She would find Vault-Tec workers and get her Aunt out, she would find Policeman who would get back her stolen loved ones. She felt so exhausted, so mentally and physically tired from running about the small Vault, she didn't know if she believed that anymore.
She couldn't go much longer, she wanted to go home. To see Codsworth, and if Ducky had been found yet. She came to the next door, releasing a breath she had not known she was keeping in her lungs and walked forward to the metallic pane to see if she was finally out.
The door slid apart, to display the room that seemed she was in only a moment prior with her Uncle. The room was cold, with a moist fog that lingered. The room smelled of stale water and something rotten, Evangeline couldn't put her finger on the odor. She moved forward, feeling the fatigue placing weight on her shoulders.
The roach came forward, barreling towards her before she swung the Beaton a single time, hearing the scream-like squash as it laid motionless, crushed to death in one smack. It was getting easier to kill those things, and she was happy for that, she couldn't handle another thing hurting her.
She sidestepped the props that littered in the floor and the sideways table.
She walked to the platform, and tried to remove the plastic cover of the button, grunting in another wave of frustration washed over her, she had begun to bang her fist on the plastic lid of the electric board. She stomped her foot once before she felt an object bounce off the blue, rusted floor. Evangeline glanced down, to find a Pip-Boy in the wrist of a decor skeleton.
Her Uncle wanted one so badly, but they could never afford one. Aunt Nora said he should have been gifted one for being a War Hero, she kneels, lifting the dusty thing to her face. She drew a smiley face in the dust covering the screen, she knew this would be a great present for her Uncle! She snapped it to her wrist, flicking a couple of the buttons until it came online.
She smiled at it functioning, wiping off the rest of the dust with her sweaty palm. The smeared screen still allowed her to see the Vault Boy holding a thumbs up at her, making her instinctively copy his gesture back at the screen. She copied the Vault Boy's thumb pose when she saw it- her Uncle would laugh when she did it. Her face fell as she tore her eyes from the screen, finding herself isolated with only the hums of the machine to be her friend.
Evangeline was happy for a new toy, but she still needed to get out of the metal cage. She felt the hanging cord from the Pip-Boy dangling and bumping against her stomach, she grabbed it and glanced over the metal piece meant to connect to something. So, she inserted it inside the hole of the board, joyous as it entered, and the plastic lid flew upward.
She nearly jumped in pure joy for how fast that was- she was almost out! Almost to adults! She slammed her palm against the button. Her reaction was cut short only seconds in her celebration by the sudden flashing of lights.
'Vault door cycling sequence initiated. Please stand back.'
The Vault suddenly became dim, with only flashing white lights being the source of electricity. An orange circling spotlight began to activate- so much happened at once that Evangeline covered her ears, whining at the surroundings becoming slurred and different.
The Vault door was unsealed by the box machine that hooked from the ceiling moving forward, connecting to the door and pulling it side, so she was quick to hurry and climb atop the gate platform. The machine shook to action, beginning to connect to the Vault door slowly. It squeaked and whined in protest as it was rusted and time withered, barely able to make the journey to get her to the other side.
There, she was met with the same steps she was forced up with her Uncle, the same water dripping and robotic hums she had grown used to. The paint was rusted and peeled, giving the place an abandoned, aged appearance. The metal husk of the bunker was silent other than what she did, how her footsteps echoed, how her voice traveled through the halls. The total isolation was bringing her closer to panic. The lack of adults and live made her so nervous, she couldn't wait to get out of the Vault, to see adults and Louis.
The adrenaline was fading, she could feel the weakness in her legs and the wear of her mind. She could imagine nights of falling asleep on her Uncle's lap while listening to the Silver Shroud, where she would be half awake as she was carried to her bedroom, then tucked in. She would be given a kiss on the forehead by him, his warm palm running over her cheek. She ran her petite hand over her cheek in the same fashion, hoping for the same effect- but her chilled flesh didn't give the same comfort.
Nights of being sung British nursery rhymes from Codsworth and Aunt Nora's silky voice filled her tired mind as she made her way down the steps. The echoes of her own feet almost mocked her by how loud it was, how the dripping water rang in her ears, it was silent, lifeless.
Where were the adults? They were everywhere before, filling the rooms to the brim but now, now it was so quiet. Quieter than waking up at night in her suburban home, quieter than locking herself in her room after school to read books and poems, the silence was numbing her brain.
She stepped onto the elevator, and without her having to so much as lift a finger, it began to close the metal barring, trapping her inside. The child chose then that she was freed and safe, it was time to allow herself to give in to all the overwhelming emotions she felt. She allowed her legs to give out on her, flopping down on the floor below her.
Eva rested her legs, rubbing her calf as she glanced around her new surrounding. The shaky machine was slowly lifting her upwards. She hugged her knees to her chest, taking a moment to breathe- no adults were in the vault, they were all frozen, but she couldn't get them out. Maybe the rubber-skinned monster and her Uncle were in the surface, up above. But, that big explosion… what would that mean for everyone?
She covered her face in her knees, beginning to sob lost in her thoughts, of the realization that maybe she was all welling of tears finally beginning to pour. She whined meekly, allowing her shoulders to quiver and slack against her frame. She just wanted her Uncle, she wipes her nose, maybe Codsworth was still there, he always knew what to do, when she scraped her knees, when her caregivers weren't home and she needed a permission slip signed and it was the day of the field trip.
The darkness swallowed her, this time, she wasn't encased in strong arms and a soothing hand on her head. She was alone, shivering quietly, as she saw the entrance of the vault slowly open, sliding apart as rays of light shined through. It burned her irises, making her cover them at first as she was brought face to face with the outside world once more.
The warm washes over her frozen skin, her hand lowers from her eyes so she could see the beauty- all she saw a barren wasteland of death. The grass was dead or gone, the trees were stripped of life, and the prop skeletons from inside scattered the world surrounding her. It was so much more warm but louder, less welcoming than the vault. As her eyes roam the new realm she found herself in.
Evangeline could only wonder what new monsters laid awake for her here. The cold wind hit her flesh, as she slowly steps off the hard floor. "Hello!?" She called out, to anyone to hear her. She walked towards the gate, "Louis?" She cried, walking past the gate's entrance towards the dirt path she knew so well.
The dirt path seemed more ominous than the last time she had been down this road, and the times she and Louis had been playing in the borderline of the forest. The way they could run from the curves of the trees, using leaves and sticks as ammo, and chasing each other from one side of the forest to another were some of her best memories.
Now, the leaves were gone from the bark; the wildlife she had loved was withered and gone. Leaving a pit of a feeling she could not describe, a lonely, isolated emotion. A feeling of being the only thing alive in such a place surrounded by death. On the new lonely road, she headed to the place where she thought Codsworth would be.
Her home, Sanctuary Hills.