Silus and Maude only had a few days together before prep for The Battle of Hoover Dam had escalated to the point that nonessential personnel were being sent to the nearest remote base.
The two lovers parted ways on a dusty path heading towards the east. The wind had kicked up and stirred Maude's clothes and hair. Silus kissed her and asked her to promise to wait for him. She told him she'd never pass the Colorado River again without him.
Five days after she arrived soldiers began to fall into the base. The stories that began to spread around were not of a great victory, but rather a crushing defeat at the hands of the NCR. It seemed a Currier out of Goodsprings had assisted the New California Republic in turning on the generators the Legion had used to crawl into the dam, killing a large chunk of the Legion's forces. It also seemed the Currier had forged alliances with important people from the Mojave to crush what was left of the Legion.
A week after she had arrived, news came that Silus had been inside the turbines when they had been turned on. Maude sat up that night thinking about him, and how violently he had died. She thought of a story she heard as a girl about people who die violent death's not knowing they were deceased, and always inhabiting the place where they died.
In the morning the base began to pack up and shift southward, most people were following what was left of the Legat's troops to Flagstaff. Caesar had died of a brain tumor just days before the invasion, and Lanius had been defeated in battle against the Currier. It was apparent the legion was collapsing from within.
During the night Maude dressed herself, and slipped out of the tent past Savanna and began to walk west to the Colorado River. Dawn crept up, ending a night of walking through the moonless desert, and Maude reached the cliffs that lined the river near the Dam.
She looked across and saw NCR troops celebrating on the other side. The wind blew her dress and swept it up exposing her ankles, and she squinted her eyes to see the NCR troops waving their arms and trying to get her attention. She couldn't hear what they were shouting, but they seemed to be encouraging her to come across to freedom. Perhaps they thought she was a slave who'd run away?
Maude watched the people on the other side for a second, standing against the wind. She noticed their cheers getting louder, hope and victory stirring their voices. In that second she thought of Paul, and remembered getting the news that he had been ripped to part by desert monsters. She thought of Silus, and the few days of happiness she had stolen after so much time damned to servitude. She left the Legion base realizing future was uncertain at best on this side of the Colorado River, and ruined on the other.
She smiled at the Troopers in their brown uniforms, then lifted her foot up gracefully, and stepped forward into the chasm that ends in water rushing from the turbines of the dam. Her body hit the rocks a few times on the way down, breaking her before she was finally submerged under the current. The Troopers stopped cheering, and fell silent at the needless presence of death.