Allen was unreasonably irritated. Nick and Curie both had valid reasons for coming with him, and they weren't exactly useless companions, but Allen wanted to run. He knew the Freedom trail like the back of his hand and every second he spent slowing down to answer Curie's questions or because Nick didn't have the same kind of training he did was a test of his patience. So, Allen did what he always did when his patience was tried, he started to mumble and hum. It was an old trick his dad had taught him. Singing under your breathe is easier than yelling at things you have little control over. Needless to say, he sang under his breath.
"One by land/two by sea/right here in front of me."
"Monsieur? Are you humming?" Curie asked.
"Yup," Allen answered, helping Nick over a large pile of rubble.
"How can you be humming," Nick demanded with a groan, "Aren't you out of breath?"
"Nope."
"What are you humming?" Curie asked again.
"An old song a buddy of mine liked. The guy listened to all sorts of anti-government stuff. The irony is that he was as dedicated of an agent as I was, maybe even more so."
"I do not understand, monsieur." Curie stated. Not for the first time, Allen wished Curie had a face for him to read; without one, Allen didn't know if Curie was confused or ignorant of the situation. "How can one both love and hate something?"
"In my experience, the people that are presented as 'unpatriotic' or 'traitors' often love their country more than most. They just love it to the point that they call it to a higher standard."
"How 'bout you, Allen?" Nick asked. "Were you a mindless drone, or whatever you just described?"
Allen paused for a second.
"Give me a minute." Allen requested.
"Too difficult for you?" Nick teased light heartedly.
"No, there are Raiders, ten o'clock." Allen said, sighting his rifle
Curie chirped, "But it is twelve thirty -"
"Dammit, Curie, get to cover!" Allen barked.
Allen knew that not everyone could be an ace operative like him, but when Curie hovered confused for a full thirty goddamn seconds and Nick used a revolver made out of piping, he started wishing Green Beret training was a grade school requirement. Luckily, Raiders were no Spetsnaz, and Allen had dispatched them in a few minutes.
"To answer your earlier question," Allen said as he turned over a Raider, patting down their pockets for ammo. "I was neither."
"How so?" Nick asked, doing the same with another Raider.
"The way I saw it, society was smart enough to heal itself if given the chance. The only problem is that the war was getting in the way of that."
Nick prodded further, "So, your thought process was…"
"Win the war, society heals. Don't get me wrong, I loved America and truly did think it deserved to win the war. But as far as individual things like 'medicare' or ' two party systems' or hell, even small things like charter schools were better left to people smarter than I."
"That seems to be a very limited point of view," Curie observed. "We must attempt to learn all we can."
"Well, seeing how the world took a nuke bath, I'm inclined to agree with you."
"That was fast," Nick said.
"Somebody fucked up, until I find out who, I'm assuming it was everyone." Allen stood up straight, stretched, and dusted off his pant legs.
Nick nodded, and Curie processed that neither of them knew how to respond.
"Let's move out, then." Allen said.
"Stop right there," the woman on the left with a minigun ordered.
Allen wished he could say this was the first time he'd been threatened by a woman with a minigun, but he couldn't. He even had a protocol for this type of situation.
"You went through a lot of effort to arrange this meeting," the leader, also a woman, observed, "But before we go any further I need you to answer my questions. To start, who the hell are you?"
"My name is Allen Marks."
As it was, the first part of that protocol was to do what was ordered as long as it doesn't offend his sensibilities. "These are my friends, Nick Valentine and Curie."
"Why are you here?"
"I heard that the Freedom Trail lead to the Railroad. I followed it and here I am."
"Why are you seeking the Railroad?"
Allen was going to lie, say something about 'helping synths' - a great byproduct regardless, especially since saying 'I want to hunt a Courser to Infiltrate the institute to find my son' was a telling a bit more than he wanted them to know.
Luckily, they were interrupted by a man, older and weirder than Allen, with a peculiar sense of humor to boot.
"So we're having a party," he said, adjusting his sunglasses, "If I had been given an invitation, I'd have brought cake."
"I prefer pie to be honest." Allen quipped. Part two of the protocol, defuse the situation; humor was good for that.
"Shut up, both of you." The leader ordered, "Deacon, I need intel, who is this man?"
"Wow, really, Des?" Deacon, as he was apparently called, exclaimed, "This guy is kind of a big deal, I've told you about him remember?"
"Remind me." Des snapped.
"Well," Deacon said counting off his fingers, "In no particular order, he's the general of the Minutemen, the Silver Shroud – love that one by the way, big fan"
"Thank you."
"A Knight of the Brotherhood," Deacon continued "and the guy whose praises we were singing a month ago for killing Kellogg."
"Quite the resume," Des deadpanned, Allen had to give her props on the poker face "I take it you're vouching for him."
"Yes, definitely."
"Well, then he's your responsibility." Des turned to leave, "Glory, stay here until Deacon gives the all clear."
"Got it." Des left and Glory (apparently) set down her minigun, all while Deacon walked up to Allen.
"Hope you don't mind the reception. When you tangle with the Institute, it pays to be careful."
"You all were just being cautious." Allen forgave with a wave of his hand.
"We all know we're on the same team." Nick quipped. The detective was starting to like this Railroad, but he wanted Allen to know that he was present and accounted for, and wouldn't be led around like a pet.
"Nice to meet you, Nick" Deacon sidetracked. He was back on topic soon after. "Still, probably wasn't the friendliest welcome."
"To be honest, Deacon, the only friendlier welcome I've ever had was from an organization I met in Amsterdam in 2071," Allen reassured the man.
"Well, it's all good now, I vouched for you and now you're in."
"It's not that simple though, right?" Allen guessed.
"There is a job that I'm planning on using as your application. You in?" Deacon offered his hand for a shake.
"What the hell," Allen shrugged and shook Deacon's hand, happy to play off the man's excitement. "I've got nothing better to do."
"Great! It's as suicide mission for most people. I hope that's not too much of a deterrent, but it's the only way I can get you doing the big jobs quickly."
"Deacon, we probably have very different definitions of 'suicide mission.'"
"Awesome, see there's this old freeway outside Lexington…."
This was going to be fun
As of this moment, Nick and Allen saw two different things when they looked at Deacon. Nick saw someone frighteningly similar to Allen, lies being told, disguises worn (literally, it seemed) and a sense of self wrapped up in the cause he fight for.
Allen saw an utter mystery. Deacon's disguises didn't fool him. But most of the time, Allen could see right through to the heart of someone. He didn't see Deacon's heart. Whatever he was hiding, he was good as burying his skeletons as Allen was his.
The duo were so focused on analyzing Deacon, they almost missed him telling them what the OP was.
"The Railroad's only recently been using the Old North Church, before that we had a base underneath a Slocum's Joe."
"Shall we order some donuts?" Curie suggested.
"They're all closed, Curie," Nick answered. "Besides, what's under Slocum's Joe that would make for a good base?" he asked incredulously. Deacon opened his mouth to answer but was interrupted by Allen.
"A DIA nexus, we called it the Switchboard."
Deacon glanced at Allen.
"So the rumors are true, you really are a Pre-war relic."
"That's me." Allen replied. "So, I'm assuming we're going to be using the escape tunnel as an entrance."
"I know, ironic isn't it?" Deacon joked.
"What I'm failing to understand is why we're going back. The location's been made, we can't reclaim it."
"I'll explain when we get there, I know it's a bum deal but it's safer this way."
"No big deal, Deacon," Allen dismissed, much to Nick's surprise, "It's operational security. The CIA was big on that kind of thing too."
"I do not understand." Curie stated.
"Neither do I, Curie." Sure, Nick understood in theory, but he was more or less trying to be nice.
"We're here to retrieve a prototype stealth boy that Carington developed." Deacon explained.
"So, what's our first step?" Nick asked.
"First we have to override the security lockdown," Deacon replied, "There's a terminal right over…" Deacon trailed off. Allen had gently pushed them aside and stepped up to the terminal.
"It's locked." Allen mumbled to himself.
"I have the password." Deacon said holding up a piece of paper. Allen just grunted in response.
Allen mumbled to himself. "It's a good encryption."
"Allen, he has the password." Nick said, holding back laughter.
"…There's always a backdoor."
"Monsieur Marks, I believe Monsieur Deacon has the password."
"Gotcha, you little…" Allen trailed off as he realized everyone was staring at him. "What?"
"I had the password." Deacon laughed, biting back his laughter.
"Why didn't you tell me?" Allen asked, looking more offended than he felt.
"He did." Nick replied
"Well, clearly he wasn't loud enough" Allen said with a melodramatic huff. With that, the floodgates opened, and everyone started laughing, even Curie (Allen didn't even know Miss Nanny's were programed to laugh).
Allen only grumbled. "Sure, sure, let's waste time laughing during the suicide mission."
So far, 'suicide mission' would be the last term Allen would assign this OP. His and Deacon's respective crack shots, Nick's quick thinking, and Curie's (so far) unnecessary medical expertise, made it a walk in the park. Allen just couldn't take it seriously, much to everyone's surprise.
It wasn't until the main room that Allen sobered up.
"Hey, hold up!" He called as he approached an operational terminal.
"Don't waste your time," Deacon told him, "Not even our tech guy, Tinker Tom, could hack that."
"Not planning on hacking it." Allen said, not having sat down yet.
"You know the password?" Nick asked.
"Short answer, yes."
Allen approached the terminal with something near reverence, as if it were a shrine. There was more to it than that, he was afraid.
"The DIA was in charge of monitoring the nukes," Allen said aloud to no one in particular, yet all three of his companions listened closely. "If anyone knew who fired first, they did." Allen caressed the sides of the terminal. "Do I even want to know? What if it was us? I hoped we were better than that."
Curie made to answer, but Nick and Deacon waved her off.
"But…what, with Hiroshima and Nagasaki, maybe we were the only ones with the hubris…hmm."
Finally, Allen sat before the terminal, entered the password, and went through its files.
Nick watched Allen closely. He saw the emotions in his eyes, the uncertainty, the hope, the fear. Nick finally saw Allen's guard down, maybe Deacon and Curie saw something different, but Nick saw a man still clinging to something. Finally, Allen looked up.
"The files are corrupted," he said forlornly, "If they ever knew, it's gone now." Allen nodded, mostly to himself. "Probably for the best."
Finally, after weeks of hearing about Allen's good deeds, of seeing first hand that Allen was a good man when it counted, Nick was finally convinced. That bad gut feeling he once had about the man was finally gone.
They eventually got into the vault Deacon said held the prototype, but before they could look for it, Deacon was sidetracked by a corpse.
"So, Tommy Whispers didn't make it out. Call me a fool, but I had hope." Deacon rested his hand on Tommy's forehead, "He died protecting our secrets,"
"Rest now, noble warrior." Curie said.
"Thanks, Curie." Deacon picked up a gun that had been resting near Tommy and handed it to Allen. "Tommy would want you to have this."
"Thank you," Allen said with a nod. On the outside, he was solemn and respectful. On the inside, he was geeking out. "It's a Makarov! Say what you will, the Russians made great goddamn guns! A goddamn Makarov!" he would wait until he was an appropriate distance away from everyone, and then have his moment openly about this gun.
"Come on," Deacon said, "Let's grab the prototype. Desdemona is sure to let you in now."
Or not.
"Deacon, I'm not sure about bringing him into the HQ immediately." Desdemona said.
"Look, he led us through the switchboard. He may be modest but he really did do all the heavy lifting."
"Look," Allen interrupted. "Don't make a decision now. Hell, don't even make one tomorrow."
"What do you mean?" Desdemona asked.
"Like Deacon said earlier, I'm the General of the Minutemen," Allen explained. "I can't just up and leave my post. I've got commitments to fulfil."
"The Railroad isn't part time," Desdemona lectured, "I can't have your priorities split."
"I agree," Allen said simply. "So give me a month, let me take care of some things. Then I can devote myself fully to the Railroad…if you'll have me of course."
"We can do that," Deacon said, leadingly, "Right, Des?"
"Fine," Allen said before turning to go. "I'll be back in thirty days," he called back with a wave.
First things first, breaking the news to Preston. That was going to be rough.