*Author's Note: Apologies in advance for dialogue rewriting from the game. Necessary plot tool. Though I did leave out the explanation of how to find a courser to get into the Institute, etc etc... I figure you all know the missions that need to happen, and I can safely gloss over it without having to explain everything. Yes?*
It almost would have been worth the extra danger to leave Danse back at the precinct. His power armor had been hugely helpful in fending off the abundance of ferals and radscorpions that inhabited the Glowing Sea, but the tension between him and Hancock was enough to make Rose want to skip the Rad-Away and let the atmosphere poison her to death. The two of them hadn't stopped taking shots at each other since they left; Rose felt like she was babysitting two young teenagers rather than traveling with adult men. She didn't even have Dogmeat with her to distract from their bickering; they had resupplied in Goodneighbor before departing (which Danse complained about the entire time), and then she had dropped the German Shepherd off in Diamond City with Piper and Nick. She couldn't afford to spend any medicine on detoxing both Dogmeat and herself; his frantic, confused barks as she left him behind wrung her heart, and put her in a decidedly terrible mood.
It was slow going, making their way through the Sea… which really wasn't a body of water at all, just a huge, hyper-irradiated area that had been ground zero for one of the bombs. They had to stop every couple of hours so that Rose could take another dose of Rad-Away. Danse had his armor rigged to automatically dose him whenever his levels got too high, but sadly Rose's Pip-boy had no such feature. It was time-consuming and made all of them antsy; the Sea was so full of hungry, angry creatures that staying in one place for more than a couple of minutes was a huge risk. But it was better than the alternative, which was for her to become so sick so rapidly that she would either go ghoul, go feral, or die.
To help protect against the radiation, Rose had traded her clothes out for a vault suit that she had grabbed from Deacon a while back; it had been no trouble for him to find one for her, once she had an idea of where they were going. She hated being back in the bright blue fabric; it made too easy of a target, standing out particularly well against the yellowed atmosphere of the Sea. But it was more insulated against radiation than jeans and a shirt, and was thin enough not to add any extra heat to the already warm rads that permeated the air.
Hancock, however, approved thoroughly of her change into the form-fitting suit, and took every opportunity to tell her so… especially when there was a chance of making Danse feel uncomfortable. For the paladin, Hancock was still somewhere between an animal and a criminal, and he struggled with understanding how a relationship between the ghoul mayor and a woman like Rose was possible.
"We have to be almost there," Rose said, shifting uncomfortably as she poured more Rad-Away into her veins. "Being out here is worse than having morning sickness."
"I wouldn't know," Danse replied humorlessly, head on a swivel as he kept an eye out for any oversized critters. "Do you have that okay?"
"Yeah, it's just easier when Hancock does it." She pulled the needle out of her arm and flexed, wincing as the sore muscles protested. Hancock was currently down in the crater beneath them, trying to get information out of some cultists who called themselves the Children of Atom. Rose had stayed behind- the rads were too intense for her to join him safely- and Danse had stayed with her to watch her back while she used the break to detox again. Her eyes were locked on Hancock's red coat, easily visible against the jaundiced landscape. It seemed that he was successful in getting the Children of Atom to talk to him – or not kill him, at least – but Rose was still wary, ready to jump in at the first sign of trouble.
"You shouldn't be throwing your life away with a junkie like that," Danse remarked. "From what I can tell, you seem like a smart, capable woman. Someone like that is only going to bring you down."
"Do you remember what happened the last time you insulted Hancock to my face?" she asked lightly.
Danse shifted, moving his weight from one foot to the other. "I'm just not someone who likes to see wasted potential, that's all."
Rose snorted. "Trust me, this wasteland is bringing out more of my 'potential' than I ever thought was possible. I'll be fine."
Danse was quiet for another moment, and then asked, "Do you mind if I ask you a personal question?"
Rose loosely threw her palm up. "So long as it's not another question about my relationship with Hancock, then shoot."
"Back at the precinct, when I first took my helmet off, you looked like you'd seen a ghost. Why is that?"
Rose chewed on her bottom lip, considering her words for a beat before answering. "You look a lot like my late husband," she confessed at length. "It took me by surprise, is all."
"You were married?" Danse hummed thoughtfully. "That's not an institution too many bother with nowadays."
"Yeah, I've noticed that." Her gaze flicked up to him. "Anyway, you two look a lot alike. And he was military too, so that doesn't help."
"He died in the line of duty?"
"Would've been better if he had," Rose replied, her voice falling to a murmur. "No, he was murdered by the same bastard who took my son. We killed him, though."
She heard the creak of Danse's power armor moving beside her, and twitched in surprise when she felt the weight of his metal hand resting on her shoulder.
"I'm sorry for your loss," he said quietly. "I understand having anger like that. It isn't an easy burden to bear."
"Uh… thanks."
She stood there wordlessly for another couple of minutes, unsure of what to say. Danse showing a human side wasn't something she had expected, though it did make him much easier to tolerate. She was relieved when she saw Hancock head back up the hill, all limbs and extremities still fully intact.
"Charming bunch of folks, those Children of Atom," he said wryly upon his approach. "Tried to convince me that as a ghoul it was my responsibility to serve the great Atom in thanks for sparing my life."
He paused, black eyes flickering questioningly from Rose to Danse's hand, which was still on her shoulder. She raised her eyes briefly to the sky and shrugged herself free.
"Did they say anything about Virgil?"
"Said there's a cave not far from here where he's hiding out," Hancock said, drawing Rose possessively to his side as they began walking once more. "We just have to be able to spot it."
He took her arm as he spoke and inspected the crook of her elbow, gently rubbing the dark bruise that was forming there from all of the Rad-Away injections.
"You want a hit from a stimpak for that, doll?" he asked.
Rose shook her head. "No, we should save those for something more serious. I'll be fine." She smiled wanly. "We'll just use the other arm on the way back."
He nodded, and lifted her wrist to check the reading for her radiation levels on her Pip-boy. He had kept a careful eye on it during the entire trip; despite his jokes about her becoming a ghoul like him, Rose knew he was worried. Crunching on Rad-X like candies and putting more Rad-Away than actual blood through her veins had kept her levels close to nil, but all it would take was a few extra minutes for an overdose of rads to build up in her system, and then they would be in trouble.
"Making friends with the paladin, huh?" Hancock asked in a low voice as they walked. They were a few feet ahead of Danse, and safely out of earshot.
"Is that jealousy I hear?" Rose replied, a hint of a coy grin on her face.
A slightly sullen cast passed over his features. "I didn't say that."
She moved closer and rested her head against his shoulder. "I'm only teasing, John. He asked me about Nate and was expressing his condolences."
"Huh." His response was non-committal, but she felt his shoulders drop.
Men. Even after the apocalypse, they're all the same.
They reached the top of the hill they had been climbing, and Rose uttered an excited exclamation when she spotted the dark maw of a cave about two hundred yards down.
"That's got to be it!" she said. "God, I hope that's it."
Off in the distance, they could hear the telltale rumbling snarl that said at least one deathclaw was nearby. Danse readied his laser rifle, but Rose put a hand on the barrel and lowered it back to the ground.
"We are not going looking for that damn thing if we don't have to," she said.
"If it's close enough to pick up our scent and ambush us-"
"Danse, I have fought way too many deathclaws for one lifetime. If we're quiet and careful, we'll be fine." She looked him briefly up and down. "Though if it does come looking, you are more than welcome to have first dibs in that power armor. I've already crossed 'kill a deathclaw with no armor' off of my bucket list."
She started down the hill, and Danse glanced at Hancock, who was chuckling to himself.
"Is she serious?"
"Oh yeah." Hancock nodded. "I saw the whole thing. So do yourself a favor and try not to ever piss her off too bad."
They made it into the cave without incident, though Rose nearly had a heart attack when she found herself face-to-barrel with two machine gun turrets. For whatever reason they didn't seem programmed to shoot at any of them, though, so they continued to move forward with caution. Not wanting to startle the scientist, Rose purposefully jangled the tin cans he had rigged by the entrance.
"Hello?" she called out as they walked further into the cave. "Is there anyone here?"
"Hold it!" a gruff voice responded. "Take it nice and slow. No sudden moves."
A massive figure came around the corner, and with a jolt Rose realized it was a supermutant. The oddly patched equipment hanging around his shoulders and modified eyeglasses clued her in that this was Brian Virgil. Danse, however, wasted no time with being observant.
"Watch it!" he shouted to Rose, shoving her aside.
"Stop!" She lunged for him and knocked the barrel of his rifle upwards, so that the laser beams harmlessly hit the stone ceiling. "Cease fire, dammit! That's Virgil!"
The supermutant scientist was understandably alarmed and had reached for what looked like a plasma grenade. Rose hastily put up her hands in a peace-making gesture, stepping in between him and the paladin.
"Sorry, sorry!" she said quickly. "No harm meant, Virgil, I swear. My friend here is just an overzealous idiot."
"You can say that again," Hancock muttered.
"That thing will rip you to shreds!" Danse objected.
"Does it look like he's trying to tear my arms off?" she demanded through clenched teeth. She looked at Virgil, who was clearly torn between attacking them and trusting her. "You're Brian Virgil, right? Can we trust you not to do anything that will get us all killed?"
"That depends," he replied warily. "I know you're with the Institute. Where's Kellogg, huh? Trying to sneak up on me while you have me distracted? I'm not stupid; I knew they'd send him after me!"
"Not unless the Institute can bring people back to life… which hopefully they haven't mastered at this point," Hancock replied sardonically.
"What?" Virgil's brow furrowed. "Kellogg's dead? How is that possible?"
"You shot anyone in the head with a shotgun enough times, eventually they're not going to get back up again," Rose explained, her tone wry. "The Institute is no more a friend to me than they are to you. We're just here to talk."
Virgil's expression remained skeptical, but Rose saw his shoulders relax a bit. "Fine. Then talk, fast."
"We're looking for information on the Institute," Rose said. "Why did you leave? I know you came from there."
Virgil looked taken aback. "You know about the escape?! But how?" Then he shook his head. "No, it doesn't matter. I'm not going back… I can't go back. Look at me!"
"Kinda hard not to." Rose not-so-discreetly stomped on Hancock's boot at the comment.
"Can you not?" she growled, her voice low through clenched teeth.
"Why are you even here?" Virgil demanded. "What do you want?"
"I want to get inside the Institute," Rose replied, turning back to the supermutant scientist.
"You want to get inside the Institute? Are you insane?" Virgil rolled his beady eyes. "Never mind how nearly impossible that is; even if you were to succeed it'd almost certainly end in your immediate death." His tone turned condescending. "What reason could you possibly have for taking that kind of risk?"
"I'm trying to find my son. The Institute kidnapped him."
"Oh. Oh, no." Virgil's condescension was replaced by a very human sympathy that didn't seem natural on a supermutant's features. "I had no idea. I'm sorry."
"Don't worry about it." She had said those lines so often that they were starting to lose their emotional significance… she barely felt a twinge of anger. Instead, she found herself simply anxious to move forward.
"The Institute has taken people from the Commonwealth in the past… if your son is one of them, I can see why you'd want to get in there." Virgil thought for a moment. "I can help… but I'm going to need something in return."
"I could have guessed as much," Rose said resignedly. "You help me, and I'll help you. I swear it."
"Alright." Virgil walked over to a battered table and began shuffling through some papers. "Before I was forced to leave, I was working on a serum to reverse this mutation. It could return me to normal, you understand? So if you can get in there, I need you to find this serum and bring it back to me."
"You can reverse the supermutant virus?" Danse asked doubtfully.
Virgil turned to him. "You… you're with the Brotherhood of Steel, aren't you? I recognize that insignia on your armor."
Danse shifted, drawing back his shoulders proudly. "That's correct."
"From what I hear, the Brotherhood is focused on helping humanity and killing pretty much anything else that gets in their way."
"They're not overly fond of anyone too green or too scarred," Hancock said acidly. Danse didn't bother contradicting him; it was true, after all.
"I don't need a battalion of soldiers knocking down my door to try and force me to work with them," Virgil said sternly. "My serum can cure my specific strain of the virus, for now. In time I can develop a generalized formula. If you can give me your word that you won't report my location to your superiors and leave me to work in peace, I promise I will deliver the cure to your people, once it is finished."
"Why would you do that?" Danse asked suspiciously.
"The Brotherhood would have the mobility and the manpower to distribute the cure on a widespread scale," Virgil explained. "I don't want supermutants to keep infesting the Commonwealth any more than anyone else. Since I no longer have the resources of the Institute at my back, your organization would be the next best thing to ensure my cure reaches as far as possible."
Danse thought about it for a long moment, but ultimately agreed. "Fair enough."
"Great, now that we've all agreed that we're friends and no one's out to kill anyone else," Rose said, fingertips massaging her temples. "How do I find the Institute?"