Sergeant Will Boeker stood on a hill, giving him some height to the Institute positions in Sunshine. A pair of binoculars held up to his eyes as he scanned the settlement. Institute synths, the ones who looked like robotic skeletons, went about working on the machine gun turrets that had been set up in the main entrance, while the more normal looking ones, the ones with the plastic faces, were working on the single piece of artillery that had been deployed in the settlement. Overall the synth positions didn't look unbeatable, but they were dug in, it would be hell getting through their defenses. Based on the synth bodies and components that littered the ground, it looked like they had taken heavy casualties forcing their way into the settlement.
Sunshine had been built in an old communal living area, or at least thats what Boeker assumed it was, and it had grown to house around thirty or so people, larger than most of the farms, but far smaller than Sanctuary and Starlight were.
He looked back and saw two more Institute synths come out of the trading building, dragging an man by the look of it, toward the artillery piece. The synths must not have been able to get the thing working. He brought the binoculars down and sighed. They would have to make a move and quick.
"Whats the plan sir?" Corporal Jane Navan asked as she came up beside him. He had been watching the synth positions for the last ten minutes since they arrived. It had been a quiet trek from Starlight to Sunshine, with no one wanting to talk in the current crisis, and on top of that there was the Brotherhood soldiers.
They had unexpectedly helped them, and were continuing to, but it was odd. He wasn;t going to question it though, his team needed all the help they could get. "They're forcing our people to try to fix the artillery, must have taken damage when they took Sunshine" He sighed, he had a plan, one he had been thinking about since leaving Starlight, he just didn't know if it was going to work. It was good luck that the Institute had damaged the artillery, otherwise this would have been a lot harder.
Boeker turned and looked at the woman, she was wearing combat armor and the new blue fatigues that the Castle had issued to the Regulars. "If they're trying to get our artillery operational, then we need to move on them now!"
He nodded his head, slowly at first, then faster "I know" he let out a breath and then said "Get the men into forward position, but keep them quiet, I'll talk to the Brotherhood"
She nodded, and with a soured expression asked "Do you think it's wise to include the Brotherhood?"
"I don't see how we have a choice, they're here and want to help" he answered. He had thoughts on how the Brotherhood did things, especially in how they treated non-humans, but he couldn't very well say no to a powered armored soldier wanting to help. "Go on, let me talk to the Brotherhood"
She nodded this time, and thankfully walked off towards where his regulars and the Starlight militia. He watched them for a moment, and hoped that most of them would survive the coming fight, and then went further down the hill where the Brotherhood squad had set up. The combat armored ones were sitting down, while the one with the giant backpack was fiddling with a radio.
"I've ordered my soldiers to get into position" Boeker greeted the one with the more detailed rank insignia on his left arm plate. He couldn't be bothered to remember the Brotherhood's archaic and crazy rank system.
"Great, I'll order us to join, we should have myself and Knight Grayson lead the charge, we can take a lot more hits that you can" the leader replied. Boeker wondered if it had been meant as an insult. Brotherhood soldiers tended to be insulting and prickly about things.
He nodded at the Brotherhood soldier "Let me get into position, and then charge up the main entry way, it's the most defended, but it's the only way into the settlement. The Minutemen had taken to building walls around their larger settlements, and unfortunately, they had just recently finished building the walls around Sunshine.
"Understood" And he moved away to explain their plan to his squad.
Boeker walked back, and then crawled his way towards where the Minutemen had set up in preparation for the attack, in some heavy brush that kept them from the prying eyes of the synths that stood on guard. It had been lucky that the synths hadn't seen them, and as he crawled in between one of the Starlight militia and the Corporal. "The Brotherhood's going to provide a distraction, once the shooting starts, get up and don't let up until Sunshine is secured"
It took another few minutes, but he heard the familiar whine of powered armored steps walking up the trail towards the settlement's gates. He waited and waited, for what seemed like for ever as the whining of armor stopped, and then he heard the Brotherhood's leaders voice yell out, made louder by his helmet's speakers "Charge, for the Brotherhood!"
And then the shooting started. He waited an extra second and also began yelling "Come on! Come on!" he stood from the brush and moved forward. The Brotherhood squad was taking a lot of fire, they were giving it in turn, the blue and red lasers lit up the night sky.
Despite being a member of the Minutemen for six months, this was his first actual charge against a defensible position. The machine guns had yet to light up, so that must have meant that the Institute had yet to get them working. Still though, the main entrance of the settlement was full of Institute synths, and they had taken notice of his minutemen, and some had begun to fire on them. A militiamen fell to a laser, and the charge began to lost their momentum. He dived behind a tree base, it wasn't much cover, but it was better than nothing. He pulled a grenade out of his pack and took another look at the entrance gate, synths had poured into the area, and they were firing in two different directions, some at his Minutemen, and the others at the Brotherhood.
He threw the grenade, and watched with satisfaction that his throw was good, as it fell between the synths in the gate. He didn't wait for the explosion before he threw himself back up, running towards the gate, while yelling "Come on! Come on!"
His minutemen followed quickly behind him as he rushed forward, the Institute synths had turned most of their fire on their charge, but he kept going, and somehow he was lucky enough to not be hit by any of the laser fire. He fired as he ran, the .45 bullets from his combat rifle plunging into the synths, killing one, and he managed to blow the arm off of another. He jumped into the the main entryway, and continued firing, they had to continue pushing, before the synth could close the main gate.
Several other minutemen, both his regulars and the militia, had moved quickly and had joined him, the synths had fallen back, and to his dismay, had gotten the wooden gate closed. He stopped and caught his breath for a moment, as did the rest of the Minutemen. The Brotherhood squad also came up with their leader ordering "Get a charge on the gate"
The one with the large backpack moved forward, Jane came up beside him "Should we try to stop them? Sunshine will be left open to raiders or worse if we blow the gate"
Boeker stopped and thought for a moment and then shook his head "You're right that were leaving them open to more attacks, but -" the sudden boom of fire interrupted him, and he stopped in horror. The Institute had gotten their artillery working.
Elder Arthur Maxson's vertibird flew closely behind Liberty Prime, the newly rebuilt robot was pushing into the heart of Boston, having just passed the settlement of Bunker Hill. The Institute had relayed synths in there way, but the Brotherhood had simply pushed them aside. The rest of the Commonwealth had seemed to understand that something major was going on, as there had been no raider, or even the Gunners hadn't attacked the column of Brotherhood soldiers.
Once Maxson had returned from the Castle, he had been given the news that while Cambridge had been attacked, it had survived the Institute assault, and with it, Maxson had ordered the majority of his soldiers to rally around Liberty Prime and force their way to C.I.T. Even now, his forces in Cambridge were marching out to try to secure the ruins. He hoped that the Pershing and his Minutemen infiltrators were still in the running, if they failed it would make this job a lot harder.
"Snths relaying to the front, on the building, 10 a clock!" came the yell from Lance. Maxson put his head a bit more than was comfortable for his soldiers and saw the blue hue of Institute teleportation.
"Bring us around!" he pulled back, grabbed the mounted minigun on the vertibird and made sure the safety was off. The vertibird pulled right and brought the synth abominations in front of Maxson's minigun. A stream of 5mm bullets flew from the minigun, casings fall to the floor of the vertibird, or further onto the ground. Several synths fell in the stream of minigun fire. Maxson let off on the minigun as the last synth fell.
He looked down where Liberty Prime continued its rampage towards the west, while Brotherhood squads mopped up the resistance left behind. He allowed himself a moment to wonder if this was how it was for the Sentinel when the Brotherhood had deployed the robot against the Enclave. That had been a sight he had wished he had been allowed to see.
"Catch up to Prime!" he yelled, he didn't want to get left behind, this whole operation had been his idea, and he needed to show his soldiers, and the people and officers back home that he was capable of winning victories without the Sentinel. The vertibird sped up towards where Liberty Prime, where a behemoth had decided it was a good idea to pick a fight with the robot. Maxson watched with glee as Prime had grabbed the abomination by its head and squashed it like a bug.
"Synths relaying, three o clock!" Knight Hargrave yelled over the fighting, Maxson left the minigun, where a combat armored Initiate rushed forward and took a hold of it, and turned his attention to Knight Hargrave, who had started firing his laser rifle at the synths. He had only made a step when Hargrave yelled "Rockets!Rockets!" Maxson watched the trajectory of the first rocket as it completely missed the vertibird, and then as the same synth loaded and fired a second one.
This one found its mark, and hit the tail of the vertibird, sending the vertibird into a tailspin. His Maxson's time he had never actually been involved in a vertibird crash, despite his repeated use of the vechiles during his training and during the war with the Shepherd in the Capital. Time seemed to slow, which was something that everyone always said happened, and Maxson did three things, first he started to turn around, second he screamed out "Grab the lesser armored soldiers!" and third he grabbed the combat armored soldier and put his power armored arms around him.
Hopefully, his T-60 armor would keep the knight from being bounced around and turned into a human pancake, and Maxson didn't want that for anybody. He held the soldier close as the vertibird tumbled and then hit a building.
Preston Garvey, Danse, General Pershing, and four other Minutemen regulars, all heavily armed with combat armor and rifles. They had fought through the initial few rooms, passed mirelurks and the mole rats and now they were walking through the ancient Boston sewer system, careful not to step or fall in the water.
"I wonder if the Brotherhood has launched their assault?" One of the regulars, who taken up position in the rear, asked. Preston assumed that the regular had meant it to be a question aimed at the other, non officers, but he had said it loud enough for them to hear it as well.
They turned a corner and Danse answered "The General activated the pulse beacon right before we entered the sewers, I would assume that the Brotherhood has commenced its offensive"
Preston still didn't like working with the Brotherhood, but he had been convinced of the necessity to work with the Brotherhood on the matter of the Institute. In truth, he couldn't bring himself to trust the Brotherhood, there had been too many rumors, and the way the recon teams that the Brotherhood had sent before Danse, had acted had poisoned a lot of people's opinions toward the Brotherhood.
They stopped as the whole ground, ceiling and everything shook around them, dust and loose cement dust fell from the ceiling, everyone looked up and around. "I suppose that answers your question" another Minutemen replied.
Preston wondered if they way the Minutemen talked bothered the General, from what little he had shared with the others about his life before the war, he knew that he had been in the military, and from what he had read and heard, the old American military had been hard asses. He had always imagined them similar to the Brotherhood in a way.
A mole rat poked it's head up from the first, and a single shot from Preston's laser musket was all that it took to knock the animal off. They came to a large room, with a lot of electrical engineering and several off colored consoles. He and the others both stopped while Pershing looked around, he had the most experience with the Institute, so Preston hoped that he would be able to explain where they were.
"I think we're on the right track, these consoles and fusion generators are Institute" Pershing decided. A door slid open on the far side of the generator room, further into the complex, and two synths walked through.
"Danger detected" one of the synths said in it's robotic voice, and raised its rifle and fired. The Mintuemen ducked behind cover as a cascade of blue laser fire rained in the room. He poked his head out and fired, and one synth fell. Fire from the minutemen's rifles also erupted, and as soon as the fighting as started, it was over. As he looked around the room, he was surprised that the synths hadn't called for reinforcements, and he was relieved that the Minutemen hadn't lost anyone.
"Come on" Pershing ordered "according to the maps, were just a few rooms away from the back door" Pershing brought the rifle up in his hands held it towards the ground and moved towards the door where the Synths had come through. Preston followed, with Danse close behind him.
The shaking became worse and worse as the Minutemen pressed their way through the rest of the complex, they passed work areas, more generator rooms, and several more synths. The shaking continued, now nearly un abated. "I hope they're not destroying the Commonwealth out there" Preston muttered after a particularly hard explosion.
He could imagine coming out of the Institute, and seeing that all of Cambridge had been destroyed and leveled. What good would it do to destroy the Institute, if they were going to allow the Brotherhood to level the rest of it?
They had just finished another round of fighting when they came to a new, large, reddish pipe, large enough for a man to fit through comfortably. Preston found a latch and opened up an old maintenance passway. Disgusting water laid in the bottom "I guess this is it" Danse said.
Pershing nodded his head "It is" and jumped down, and then started moving further inwards. Preston and Danse shared a glance with one another, and then followed their General.
Elder Maxson took a second to gain his bearings, the vertibird had crashed into a building, and he need to make sure that it hadn't come down on top of them. The initiate he had grabbed moaned in pain, and Maxson released him and set him down on to the floor of the vertibird as easy as he could. Knight Hargrave's voice came over the wreckage "The building is still standing!" Maxson moved forward, out into what had once been the ground floor of an office building.
Some of the brothers who had been following Liberty Prime on foot had established a perimeter around the now destroyed entrance to the building, and we're locked in fighting with the synths as they swarmed the wreckage. He grabbed his forgotten gatling laser, and moved forward towards the perimeter. Footman, Knights, and Paladins stood, sat, and kneeled behind cover while the institute synths pushed. The amount of laser fire was intense.
He caught sight of his main commander "Paladin Brandis" he roared over the din of battle "Status report! Where's Prime?"
Brandis took a laser blast to the chest, with the T-60 armor simply brushing it off "Prime and the main column continued on! We stayed back to secure the crash!" Maxson nodded his approval.
A scribe ran up, this one being one of the ones who carried radios "I've called for vertibird evac for the injured" she said over the roar of fighting "ETA is thirty seconds!"
Maxson once again nodded his head "Once they're loaded up, we'll break out and continue on our way to the Institute!" He stood up and brought the gatling laser up and fired. Synths fell from his own barrage of lasers, and from the rest of the lasers from his brothers and sisters. The thirty seconds felt like hours in the middle of combat, and then he heard the spinning of rotary blades, this time with no rockets to knock them out of the sky" the lead one lands and it's minigun opens up on the remaining synths
It took another thirty seconds to load the wounded, both of the initiates and several others who had been injured in the defense of the wreckage. The Vertibirds took off and flew towards the Prydwen. The synths had fallen back, either from being needed somewhere else, or because they had destroyed so many in the battle around the perimeter. So the fighting had died down.
They were only a few blocks away from C.I.T, and now that the fighting had ended, Maxson could hear the amount of fire and destruction in the distance. He began moving to the west, towards C.I.T ordering the others to follow him. It was a short trek, and aside from the battle in the distance, it was oddly quiet.
Synths and some Brotherhood bodies littered the way, with far more synths than Brotherhood. He turned around a block, and saw C.I.T, with Liberty Prime, and several vertibirds spinning and strafing around. Blue and red lasers flew up in the air as the battle around Prime continued. Maxson took command as soon as he entered the combat area. Synths had relayed on top of the building, and many were on ground level, simply throwing themselves at the Brotherhood forces.
"Protect Prime at all costs!" he roared, hoping that some of his brothers and sisters would hear him over the battle. He turned and pointed the gatling laser at several synths who had just relayed in to the front. He let loose one stream of laser fire and brought the enemy down. The synths.
More and more synths were relaying in and being beaten down by the Brotherhood's lasers when Liberty Prime reared back and threw a nuke at the ground, revealing a large hole that Maxson assumed led to the Institute. The remaining synths were put down quickly, leaving the Brotherhood victorious. Elder Maxson moved towards the hole, looked down at it and yelled "Ad Victoriam!" and jumped down.
Knight Sergeant Wilks looked between both Boeker and Scribe Mathon, who worked furiously on the charge, going over the wires and everything. The boom of the second blast of artillery echoed around them. "Does anyone know where they are hitting?" Knight Grayson asked, she had been pacing around for the last few minutes.
"Based on my eyesight, I'd say Starlight" One of the minutemen answered, introductions had yet to be made, but he was glad to see the Minutemen answering their questions, rather than the awkward stares and having to hope Boeker decided to answer for them.
"Mathon, hurry it up, civilians are in danger" Wilks pressed his field scribe, a third boom indicated that the artillery was firing a third shot.
"Just got done" Mathon stepped away, and turned and jogged back behind Wilks, he pulled the laser pistol out of his holster and stood ready for their second charge.
Wilks turned and looked at Boeker, who had taken position behind some light cover that the entry way had, it wasn't a lot, but it was better than nothing. "You ready?" Wilks asked, he didn't want to blow this open if the Minutemen were not ready.
Boeker gave him a thumbs up and said "Ready, lets go" Wilks watched as he pulled a grenade out of his pack and readied it.
Mathon held out the switch, and pressed the button in. The gate exploded into a hundred pieces, and a grenade flew into the smoke. Wilks switched the safety off, and yelled "For Maxson, For the Brotherhood!" and rushed forward.
The grenade exploded just ahead of him, and he hoped it would take a few down. He rushed onto the scene, and saw as a synth in a dark, armored coat, a courser if Wilks remembered correctly, grabbing the string to launch the artillery. He took aim at the bastard and fired.
The string fell out of the courser's hands and the abomination turned and brought up it's laser rifle. It fired a few bursts, which hit Wilk's powered armored chest, and while there was a slight burn, the Brotherhood soldier moved and fired back. Knight Grayson took position right next to him, and was firing wildly at the courser, who had used a stealth boy and was backing up. With the courser disengaging, Wilks spared a moment to watch their forces progress, the Minutemen, had come up and were forcing their way into the trading building.
The two initiates came up alongside Wilks. "We need to find that course, spread out and find it!" Wilks ordered, and moved towards the central building of the settlement, what looked like it had once been a meeting area. Inside of it was a small meeting area, and some small containers in the corners. Wilks swept through the building at a snail's pace, he checked the four corners. He didn't see the distortion of a stealth boy.
Wilks was about to leave when he heard something hard and metal rolling, he shot his head towards the direction and saw a pulse grenade coming to a stop just behind him. He turned his body and brought his hands to try to shield himself. The electric blast from the grenade burned its way through the armor, but it absorbed most of the shocking power of the first round of the grenade. He forced his body, which was trying to lock up from shock, to back up, but his movements were slow.
The second pulse from the grenade hit his less armored back, and it cut through worse than the first pulse. Wilks forced himself to take another step, when he felt laser fire hitting his back. The courser had made it's move, and it had made a fine one. He turned slowly and fired blindly, back towards the synth. The stealth boy had worn off, as the courser was very plainly out in the open, for all to see.
He couldn't tell if any of his blind firing had made an impact. His body felt sluggish as Wilks moved forward, intent on ending this abomination once and for all. A blue laser his his left leg, and he stopped. His left leg wasn't moving, he could drag it, but he couldn't move very fast.
The courser seemed smug as it approached him, and Wilks forced himself to bring the laser rifle up to at least get a few more shots off. He did, but the courser, with some of it's flesh burning away, continued forward. He pressed the trigger on the laser rifle, and it clicked empty. Wilks threw the rifle at the courser, which hit him in the head but continued. At that moment, Wilks figured he was going to die here, just like he was supposed to eleven years earlier at Grayditch, half a continent away from his family.
Just as that thought occurred to him, several rifle shots slammed into the side of the courser. Apparently sensing the new threat, it turned from Wilks and faced the new attacker. It didn't even get a single shot off before the new attacker, a blue armored minutemen tackled the synth. He got a few good hits in on it, before the courser regained the initiative and forced the minutemen to the ground. The courser picked him up and threw the minutemen against the wall.
Wilks, realized in that moment that they had a chance, and forced himself forward, dragging the destroyed powered armored leg as he went. He had closed the very short distance in a matter of second, and being that his power armor was a lot heavier than the synth, tackled it to the floor. His eyes shot down to the emergency eject button, and clicked it.
For the first time since he had left the Prydwen, Bryan Wilks was thrown out of his T-60 armor and onto the ground. He in astonishment as the courser began to push up on the armor. How strong did the Institute make these abominations?
He turned himself over and forced himself to his feet, his body wailing in pain as he did. Byran forced himself towards the Boeker, the minuteman who saved him, and pulled him to his feet and limped their way out of the old meeting area. He hoped they had enough time to get out before his fusion core overloaded, he couldn't remember how long the countdown was. He got a a safe distance and fell to his knees, with Boeker going with him.
The shed exploded, and collapsed in on itself. "Go and check on the Knight Sergeant!" He heard Grayson yelling, and then felt two hands grab him, he didn't know if it was Minutemen or Brotherhood, and in that moment, he didn't think it mattered.
General John Pershing stood beside Preston and the gas masked Danse as they watched Proctor Ingram type away on the relay terminal. The Brotherhood and Minutemen soldiers kept apart from one another as all eyes were on Proctor Ingram.
The Brotherhood had made a hell of a lot of noise in getting down to the Institute, and they all needed a bit more back up. Based on Pershing's time in the Institute, they had a lot of synths, who were all quite literally programmed to fight and die for the Institute. Right behind Ingram, stood the powered armored form of Elder Maxson, who was pacing around the room in his impatience. Maxson, like Pershing, was eager to get a move on, if they gave the Institute any more time to dig in, it would turn an already difficult operation into a near impossible one.
"Got it!" Ingram said as she stood up straight. Inside the teleporter room, the blue hue of teleportation saw minutemen and brotherhood soldiers teleport in.
As the reinforcements filed out of the room, Maxson said "Excellent, now we need to get a move on" he turned to where the Brotherhood soldiers had assembled "If anything gets in our way, destroy it, man or machine"
Pershing took a moment and left a soldier by the console "If anyone comes through and wants out, and let them through, send them to one of our settlements, and we'll decide what to do with them later.
Elder Maxson nodded his powered armored head "Thats's acceptable" he turned back and yelled "Move out!"
Pershing fell into the lead, having been the only one who had actually been in the Institute. The elevator was locked down, and the elevator itself wasn't there. Pershing had expected this, but he didn't actually know where else to go from here.
"A door's over here!" came the voice of Danse, who was struggling to pull the sliding door in the corner of the room open. Pershing moved towards the door, when a brotherhood knight got there first, and despite staring at Danse for a moment longer than necessary, he smashed the door with a single kick and allowed for them to move ahead.
This area of the Institute was nothing like the one that Pershing was used to, instead of clean white walls, the walls in this section were rust and dust covered. Red emergency lights were all that illuminated the area, and the Pershing soon found himself looking out a window, where synths and old robots milled about, either not knowing that the Institute was under attack, or not caring.
"So this is the Institute?" Maxson said as he looked around the rusted room. "I expected more from them" He almost sounded disappointed.
"This can't be how they've lived for two hundred years" Preston muttered in bewilderment.
"It's not, this must be an abandoned old part of the Institute" Pershing answered he pointed down towards "Garvey, take a couple and get on overwatch, once we the fighting starts, keep them forced down"
Garvey responded "Yes sir" and then said "Bricks, Gavin, with me" the only others armed with laser muskets followed Garvey. While they were getting set up, the others moved their way down towards the ground floor. The group fought through some synths on their way, these dressed in a black armor rather than the white plastic that he had been used to seeing synths wear.
The Brotherhood took point this time, their power armor and heavy weapons making them ideal to get out and fight up close with the synths and the sentry bots that had been set up. Pershing stayed behind cover and fired as the laser fire from the Brotherhood, and from the Minutemen back at the top. The synths were overwhelmed with some well time bursts from his minutemen and the Brotherhood dealt with the two sentry bots.
They continued at a breakneck pace, destroying the synths as needed and moving through the old part of the Institute. Not for the first time, John thought about why Shaun was doing this. They could've stayed below the surface, not bothered anyone and remained hidden and safe, but instead he decides to infiltrate the Commonwealth, go to war with the Minutemen and the Brotherhood, why?
They came to an door, which after opening, revealed the real Institute, the one that Pershing had become familiar with, finding themselves in the bio-science labs. Institute scientists and some synths, still no coursers, had prepared themselves. A single grenade thrown by Pershing destroyed their feeble defensive area, and then the synths went down.
The army had taken a moment to try to get the laser grid down, and one of the minutemen engineers had begun to type away on a terminal, while some of the Brotherhood soldiers approached the synth gorilla enclosure. "Why would they waste their time on this?" one asked. Another asking "What kind of animals are these?"
Then the glass windows slid open, and the gorillas charged, they knocked down one Brotherhood Knight, and smashed their hands onto his helmet, repeatedly, before the Knight's head was smashed in. The other charged a minutemen, and despite the laser to the face that the minuteman let out, the gorilla picked up him and ripped him in half.
Everyone had begun firing, bullets, lasers, and some green plasma slowly wore the gorillas down, until they were simple husks on the floor, holes and burnt fur all over their bodies. "Why would the Institute create such abominations?" Elder Maxson asked himself.
The laser grid blocking their progress finally came down, and with it, their pathway to the central Institute. They burst through the doors, grenades and missiles flying around them. Coursers and normals synths had set up a checkpoint to try to stop their progress. A minuteman to the right of Pershing caught a laser blast and went down. There was no cover on this side of the door, so they were forced to fight in the open.
Pershing found himself fighting a single courser, which was something that he had been used to doing, but not fond of doing. Despite the claims of the SRB to the contrary, the coursers weren't actually all that better than a normal human, sure they could take a lot more trauma and shots, but they could still be destroyed. Sio as Pershing shot the bastard with a 5.56 round in the head, it fell over and down on the ground. It was only as he was stepping over the body that he recognized the synth as the one that had helped him with the Libertalia Synth.
The fighting had died down, and Pershing was sad to see four more minutemen had gone down in the fighting. Preston and Danse came up on both of his sides "Looks like we have another locked door, we can't get through"
Pershing looked towards the advanced systems door. Where there was usually an open doorway, now revealed a emergency, sliding door that had come down. How many explosives would that take to bring down, and how much time would the Institute have to organize a counter attack if they had to break down every door they came across?
His thoughts turned to the terminal in Shaun's quarters, and despite not knowing what was on the terminal, he was betting that there was a way to lift the lockdown from there "Stay here" he ordered "I might know a way to bring the lockdown down" He began walking towards the central elevator, which unexpectedly opened and allowed him access. The followed the same route that he took when he had first infiltrated the Institute all of those months ago, entered the back way to the quarters, and found Shuan, lying on the his bed, sickness evident in his expression.
He had been looking out, through the glass and down to the central rotunda, where their massive battle had just taken place. His head rolled over as Pershing approached. The glaze in his eyes faded away and his expression turned sour "I didn't expect to see you again" he leaned back and coughed "Come to see the reactor, we got it working without you."
John was at a loss for words, this was his child, the one he and Nora had wanted for so long, that they had stayed up late in the nights talking about, that she had written to him in Alaska talking about, that Nora had died for, that he had risked life and limb to find, and now here he was, dying and the leader of one of the worst organizations John had come into contact with since the war.
Despite all that, all John could say was "I'm sorry it's come to this Shaun" How he wished he could look past all of the Institute's crimes, the kidnapping, the tortures, unleashing the Super Mutants on the Commonwealth, but he couldn't, not now and not when Shaun had practically begged him to on that rooftop.
Shaun rolled his eyes, in a gesture that was so much like Nora "Your sorry, you can't be that sorry if you're here, going through with it" another coughing fit "It's not enough that I lay here dying, now you plan on what? Destroying everything?" He paused, and he wheezed for some air "Tell me, under what righteous pretext do you plan on committing this atrocity?"
John had to fight the bile from coming up his throat, he had known that Shaun was sick, even dying, but he had hoped that there was more time, even with everything that was planned, and knowing what they had to do. "Really, after everything you've done to the Commonwealth, the kidnappings, the paranoia, attacking us and the Brotherhood, you can't imagine why I'm standing here now?"
"I had never hoped to count you among them" he answered, and then let out a long sigh "Well, I suppose none of it matters now, you'll accomplish your task, and ruin humanity's best hope for the future" he coughed again, this time with blood spilling onto the rag he had been coughing into "The only question now is why are you here, to gloat, or is it regret?"
He wouldn't gloat, this was nothing to celebrate. But maybe he could reach out, talk to the bit of Nora that was in him and try to make him see reason. "Shaun, if you help me, fewer people will die, help me please" he hoped that appealing to the human side of Shaun could help spare the people on all sides.
"No, I will not help you destroy the Institute" Shaun said, with anger in his weak voice "Get out of here" he turned away and went back to looking out of the window.
John Pershing stared at Shaun for another moment, and then without a word, approached the terminal, which was luckily unlocked, started the evacuation order, hopefully any survivors would be found and then they could be dealt with later, and then ended the emergency override. He stood from the desk, and took another, last look at Shaun, and then with a heaviness that he hadn't felt since leaving Vault 111, he turned and walked away.
Pershing fought his way through the synth forces that had rushed towards the director's quarters with ease. The Institute must have been running low with the amount of losses that they had suffered. He pushed down on the spiral stairway, with the sound of lasers and gunshots echoing through the Institute. When he emerged from the stairway, he saw what the commotion was, the synths, and some coursers had attacked from the Advanced Division. Maxson had taken point in the fighting, had had just finished literally cutting a courser in half with his gatling laser when he caught sight of Pershing.
Danse had jogged over with the fighting over "They came through just as soon as the lockdown came down."
Maxson approached "With the lockdown suspended, we've got a straight shot towards their reactor."
Pershing was thankful that the Elder didn't ask how he had lifted the lockdown, and with Maxson's eagerness to finish this, he ordered the minutemen to fall out and continue the attack. They pushed through the advanced division's main room without a problem, cutting down synth and courser, and the occasional scientist as they did.
Turrets lining the walls were destroyed, as they entered a new, more dilapidated part of the Institute, one that Pershing hadn't been allowed to enter during his time here. Synth and Courser were thrown against the combined might of the Minutemen and the Brotherhood of Steel, and yet nothing seemed to stop their momentum. Even when they found the reactor, which was protected by synth, coursers, and what remained of the Institute scientists who were brave enough to hold a rifle, defending it. Easily the most defended position that they had stormed in the Institute. They forced their way through the side entrance, and despite missiles, grenades and lasers, they cut through this final line of defense with ease. Pershing barely remembered the fighting, one moment they were charging in towards the reactor, and then in the next he was standing beside Maxson, whose power armor looked significantly worse for wear, and the defenders had either been destroyed or killed. Maxson held out something "This is a fusion pulse charge, attach it to the reactor, and then we can detonate it remotely. This will be more than enough to annihilate the Institute in its entirety.
Pershing grabbed it, opened the sliding door, and attached the charge to the reactor. Maxson's voice came over "I think its time to leave this place to it's fate, Proctor Ingram, do you copy, I need you to transport us out of here immediately!"
Then there was feeling of dematerialization, then rematerialization as he found himself back in the main teleporter hub. "I'm sorry sir" Ingram's voice came from behind the console "but this child claims to be the General's son."
John felt something twist in his stomach, and then something felt like it was lodged in his throat as he approached the child, one he now recognized was the same child that Shaun had used to trick him when he had first arrived. "Please Dad! Don't leave me here!"
John Pershing stopped and thought for a moment, did he want to take this kid above ground? Where he would be locked in a child's body for ever? But he shook his head of that thought, whether or not synths were people, he didn't know, but he did know that if there was a question about it, then they should be treated as such, and maybe they could have their own family. "All right Shaun, you can come with me"
The boys eyes lit up and he turned away from the ki- no he would be Shaun now "Alright Ingram, fire it up"
"Understood, I've gotten most of the Minutemen teleported back to the Castle, and our forces back to the airport. I'll send you and Elder Maxson to the detonation sight" her eyes darted down to Shaun "and i'll make sure your son gets back to the Castle, General"
He turned back "Follow whatever, Proctor Ingram tells you to do Shaun, I'll see you soon"
Shaun let out an "Okay" while Pershing returned to the others in the teleportation room. They were teleported to the old Mass Fusion building.
Facing C.I.T. Maxson for his part had launched into a small speech about restoring peace and decency to the Commonwealth, but Pershing didn't think of any of that as he flipped all of the switches, and then waited to press the button, and thought for a final time of Nora, and Shaun, of the family that he had lost, and then pressed the button.