The last raider met an inglorious end at my hands as many did. I look around for any enemy survivors and only one is still moving, writhing on the ground. He's been shot through the chest by one of our beam weapons, red froth bubbling up from his dirty mouth. He tried to lift his pipe pistol as I knelt down beside him and I pushed it aside.

"Shhhh…." I planted my power fist on his forehead and caved it in. A mercy killing, as all raiders deaths are. I stood and looked for Curie but I didn't see her.

"Ma chérie?" I called out, a knot of worry forming.

"Here." her tiny voice rang out. I bounded over the dead to find her with a rusted raider blade through her quad.

"Oh shit." I cursed.

"I messed up." she panted.

"No no, that wasn't on you." I pulled off my glove and went down to her. "This is nothing a stimpak can't fix but it's going to have to come out. That's going to hurt."

In that moment she chose to smile. "I am readee, mon chéri."

I braced her leg with my foot and instead of tensing up Cherie relaxed herself. Gripping the handle I pulled the slick blade free and to her credit Curie hardly made a sound. I quickly jammed a stimpak into the wound and it burned, hissing as it purged deadly bacteria. The synth wore a smile the whole time, watching me closely.

"What are you looking at, weirdo? Doesn't that hurt?"

"Yes, ze pain iz...exqueezit." she beamed. "I like zis pain. I only know eet from texts, an abstract. To feel eet, eet iz...to feel alive."

I have to use another one to finish the process and helped her to her feet. She held onto me a little longer than necessary, still smiling. I smiled back.

"What?"

"You would make a good medic." she commented.

"Why is that funny?"

She only shook her head and broke from me to pick up her Institute rifle. "Let's go." she waved me on.

My shishkebab went straight down the Gunner's throat, singeing as it did so. His eyes almost popped out of his head and I certainly hoped his death was overly painful. He shot my dog.

I left the weapon in its skinvelope sheathe to run to Dogmeat. He'd taken several shots to the abdomen, not good in a human or any animal. He laid on his side, looking up at me with tortured eyes and mewling.

"You're going to be okay boy." I stroked his ears. "You're going to be...cuh...Curie! I need you!" I shouted.

She came running, kneeling down to the canine. Her synth eyes quickly calculated all the variables and solutions. "Ze wounds are deep. Caliber large. We can stimpak 'im, but he needs surgeree, mon amour. 'e will not survive ze trip."

My heart sank. "Where's the nearest medical center?"

"Sanctuary."

Too far. She saw me thinking. "Eet might...be better for 'im."

"What?"

"If we...euthanize."

My head snapped at her and the look on my face must have been terrible because she recoiled slightly. I administered the stimpak at the wound entries but she was right, he had major internal trauma. I stood and pulled the flare gun off my hip, tilting my eyes up to the sky and loosing the red rocket high into the air. It would summon both Brotherhood or Minutemen help and it would be Dogmeat's only hope of survival.

"Mon chéri..." she put her hand on my shoulder. "Eet could be hours before anyone comes."

"I know." I looked at the ground. "I have to try."

I sat on the ground, partly in early mourning. Maybe she was right. The odds were slim. I tried to think of something else.

"We should strip the bodies. I see of lot of caps laying-"

She cut me off by holding a hand up. "Do you 'ear zat?"

"No?"

"Listen."

I strained but nothing. Close to a minute passed before I perceived it. The unmistakable rotor action of a vertibird. My heart leapt into my throat and I was on my feet.

"Eet's your lucky day, pooch." Curie smiled as she prepped another needle. "I will give 'im a sedative, but eet cannot be too strong. 'e iz fading."

The bird came in quickly, circling the wooded area before coming down mercifully close. I gathered up Dogmeat who weakly protested as I moving through hardy thickets to his salvation. The knights jumped out some twenty feet in the air, slamming their actuators into the earth as I came up.

"Paladin!" the one in charge called out to me.

"My friend is dying." I pleaded. "I need a ride to Sanctuary."

"LZ hot?"

"Not anymore."

"Go sir!" she stepped aside as the bird touched down.

"Thank you knight, I won't forget this!" I promised as Curie helped me into the cabin.

"Sanctuary, Lancer, on the double! I've got wounded!" I yelled.

"Sir!" the pilot took off immediately. We climbed into the air just over the tree line with my legs dangling over the edge. "You've got the devil's own luck, sir! We were just about to head home!"

"You're going to be okay boy." I hugged Dogmeat tight, bracing against the wind. True to her orders the pilot accelerated as fast I had ever seen a bird go. We crossed hills and rugged terrain that would have cost Dogmeat his life but even as Sanctuary came into view I wondered if it would be enough.

We came down on the helipad towards the far end of the settlement and everyone below knew something was amiss. I rarely made unscheduled visits and almost never in a bird. Preston and most of his security team were waiting for me when my feet touched the ground.

"He's dying!" I cried over the chopper. "I need Doctor Page and Codsworth, now!"

Preston looked to his men before pointing and both went running in different directions. Curie and I hurried to the surgery center across from the helipad. It was not only sterile but up to Pre-War code as few places in the wasteland were, let alone medical facilities. I set Dogmeat down on the operating table as gently as I could. His head lolled. He was already ebbing.

Curie went to work without a word, taking out bottles and filling syringes. I could only pet his head until Doctor Page and the others arrived. The eminent physician at Sanctuary came storming in, a ghoul licensed as a medical doctor before the war. She was the best I had and likely one of the best in the Commonwealth.

"Oh my." she stopped short as she took stock of the situation, her creaky voice betraying the few times I've ever seen her surprised by anything.

"Doc-tor, ze patient iz in shock, multiple gunshot wounds and hemorrhaging." Curie reported.

"Right." Page rolled up her sleeves, brushing me out of the way. "Curie, anesthetic. Codsworth, attach medical arms for assisting me with the incisions."

"I'll need time to scrub up. All of you, out." she commanded. I lingered a moment, in a bit of a stupor, watching the activity.

"General, sir." Preston urged.

"Yes, sorry. I'm going." I was snapped out of it by his words. We shuffled out of the building and I didn't quite know what to do with myself.

"Never seen you like this before, general." Dominick noted.

"He's going to be all right." Preston shot a warning glare at his adjutant. "You've got the best people working on him."

"I've seen just about every creature in this hellscape die, Preston. I know a life hanging in the balance when I see one."

"Go home, general." he advised. "There's nothing more you can do."

"Fine. But I'm getting good and drunk."

"God have mercy on your liver, sir."

I went home in a fog, not realizing until I was in the kitchen that my hands were covered in blood. I scrubbed my fingers a little too hard and retired to the couch with a bottle of wine and no glass. About an hour and a half later, hard to tell in my state, Curie quietly entered my home uninvited. I offered her a sip of the bottle from where I lay sprawled out on the couch until I realized it was empty.

"Give it to me straight, no chaser."

"'e lives." she reported. "But mon amour...'e iz very weak. 'e lost of a lot of blood. We have nozhing to transfuse."

"Who keeps dog blood handy?" I yawned. I felt exhausted. "I should. I should have."

Curie adjusted her holster. "Zat gives me an idea. But cheri, you are in no condition to 'elp."

"No ragrats." I hiccuped.

She stood in the door a moment, watching me. "What?"

"I wonder. Would you be so despondent, if it were me on the operating table?" the synth asked.

"What? Of course I would."

"But I am a synth. Before, a robot. A tool. Zis pooch, 'e iz alive, always been."

"You're alive now." I closed my eyes. "I would mourn you like I would any friend."

When I opened my eyes, she was gone.

I woke up later, darkness long since falling. My head hurt and my arm was numb from sleeping on it.

"Cod...Codsworth?" I stumbled. The bot let himself in from outside.

"Sir?"

"Turn on the lights, fetch me aspirin and water, please."

"Sir!"

The lights were a bad idea. They burned my pulsing retina and I had to block my face. "Ugh. Update?"

"He's fine, sir. Shaky at first but the transfusions helped tremendously."

"Transfusion? From where?"

"Not sure, sir." he handed me the pills. "Ask miss Curie."

"Where is she?"

"The clinic, sir. Shall I retrieve her?"

"Yes, post haste."

I sat up, another mistake but it had to be done. I swallowed the painkillers and slapped my face a little before Curie came back in through the front door.

"Give me some good news." I asked with my head down.

"I have eet." she nodded. "Your transfusion idea worked."

"That was your idea. Where did you get dog blood?"

"Did you know pooches 'ave blood types like people?"

"I did not."

"Zere are many wild pooches outside the walls. I simply captured one. I would 'ave asked you to 'elp, but you were already drunk."

"I was festively sauced."

"I caught six before I found a good do-nor. Ze boost got Dogmeat through, and I did not kill ze other pooch to do so."

At the risk of falling over I stood and went to Curie. She was tiny compared to me and I engulfed her in a bear hug.

"Thank you, Curie. I know it's just a dog and people have lost so much more than that but he's my dog."

"I understand, mon cheri. 'e iz a part of the familee. I did not want to see 'im go either."

"Yeah. I should have helped. I-"

She kissed me. Right in the middle of my sentence. I let her go, as if that would undo the action, but she did not let me go.

"Um..." I blubbered, too stunned for words. "I uh..."

She kissed me again, harder, with more conviction and I had to force us apart.

"Uhhh…." I kept her at arm's length. "What...what was that all about?"

She bit her soft lip, staring longingly at mine, her bright eyes glittering. "Zat was...better than I thought it would be. You installed me in an advanced body capable of inspiration and emotions. Your inspiration has led to emotions."

"I'm with Piper." I tried to move her off me.

"Piper regards me as an inanimate object. To 'er, I am nozhing more than a toaster, no?"

"...she may have said something to that effect."

"You see?" she smiled. "I am not even 'uman to 'er. And I want to see if being 'uman iz...worth eet. To do zis 'uman act you two are always doing."

"You gotta be kidding me."

"My genitals tingle when you touch me, mon cheri." she bit her lip again. "Zere appears to be no other recourse. Do you not care for me?"

"Let me go woman!"

"Eet must be you, to show me what eet really means to be 'uman." she continued like I didn't say anything. "Did I not save your pooch today?"

"Are you extorting me!?"

"I will do whatever I must to get you inside me." she purred.

"Good god, where did you learn such filthiness!?"

"I will show you." she promised and took my hand, pulling me towards the back of the house. "Are you not curious?"

"No damn it, I mean yes, super curious but I'm with someone." I dug my heels in, literally.

"She doesn't need to know. Come, show me zis once, and I will be satisfied."

"Once?"

"Once." she promised.

"You must never tell anyone this happened, no one, got it?"

She grinned triumphantly and kissed me again. I would remember later, amongst other memories of the evening, how I'd never seen her smile so wide before.