"DOGMEAT RUN!" Cort screamed, flinging herself back. The dog tore back down the hallway, whining. She had instructed him to do this after noting that the dog became extremely single-minded when she was threatened, and she couldn't afford to have him taken out entirely. He had free rein to attack in combat, but if she said beat it, he beat it.

You're my 9th inning miracle, okay honey? I say run, you run for Momma." He had fussed, but when it came down to it, he listened to his world. Right now, he held the opinion that his world was totally off her nutting axis.

He spun on his haunches the instant the explosion hit, claws digging into the rotting floor and regaining lost speed. That was his signal to return and rip the hell out of anything left. Too late, he noticed the bars across the doorway and slammed into them.


Cort came to by a clanging noise at the back of her head, followed by rapid sneezing interspersed with weak barks. She had a moment to register that the gate was closed behind her before a feral ghoul grabbed hold of her throat. Gagging on a shriek, she pulled out her pistol and unloaded into the thing's ribcage, caving it in. One of the Glowing Ones was paste against the far wall. The other was dragging a leg and making a beeline for where she was sprawled on the floor. Jumping up, Cort shrieked again.

" I just HEALED this leg up you fucking, shuffling ...nightlight!" She reached down and pulled a piece of shrapnel from her thigh, then launched herself at the feral. Something either approaching incredulity or ecstasy over a meal coming towards it passed over the ruined features before Cort slammed into it and started throttling. "I am tired of being fucking knocked out or crippled, do you hear me? I am DONE!"

Dogmeat sneezed a final time and snorted, looking up. If a dog could gape, what he saw through the bars would have done it. As it was, he was making a passable attempt. His world was gyrating around in some crazy tango with one of the bright things, both of them hopping on one leg. It was either trying to eat her or push her away, and she was trying to strangle it. Shaking himself out of it, he started to fling himself against the jammed gate.

Cort squeezed harder, snapping her elbows out to block the feral's arms every time it tried to claw at her head. "Stay the fuck out of my face." It froze and spread its arms as she pressed. Suddenly, a warm pulse hit her like a hammer, the green glow from the ghoul intensifying into brilliance. Cort put both her legs down and pushed, bringing the Glowing One to the floor as a vicious smile dawned over her face.

"Right. Barrows told me about this. Well guess what, you sonofabitch. That works for me too, and I've got the motherfucking advantage." She pressed both thumbs into the thing's windpipe and shoved, the tips digging into the rotted flesh. "Come on you bastard, hit me. HIT ME!" Cort pounded its head against the floor, screaming with laughter every time another radiation pulse shot out. After her leg stopped aching, she finally snapped the feral's neck, and slumped over panting, still straddling it. "Was it good for you, sunshine?"

Looking up, she finally noticed Dogmeat banging against the gate. She walked over and wrenched it open, hugging him quickly. She was irradiated to hell. "You are Momma's best ever boy. Come on, let's go back. I think we've gotten enough for the last of the caps we need for our new friend, plus a little to float on."

Cort used Rad-X and the last Rad Aways on Dogmeat and headed back to Underworld. Grimacing, she planned out how to get through to the clinic without turning too many heads. Pushing almost 800 Rads, she decided the quickest thing would be to just pay Barrows to flush her system out entirely. She was fairly certain there was still shrapnel in her leg as well. Seeing Patchwork stumbling around in the front of the concourse, Cort just gave it up and ran back to the Chop Shop. Poor guy will forget seeing me fairly quickly anyway. As long as I don't hang around for him to limpet onto my leg. She held the doors to the clinic open long enough for Dogmeat to tear through behind her and then turned around, pushing them shut. Graves wasn't in, but Barrows was against the near wall near one of the beds.

"Hey Doc, I'm going to need you to do me a quick fav...who is that woman and what. Are you doing to her."


After Barrows had gone over who Reilly was and explained the tests he was running were completely benign, along with why he was performing them, Cort leaned against the observation screen at the far end of the clinic, thinking. Barrow's Glowing Ones, Meat and Ethel, slobbered on the glass behind her, illuminating her profile. Barrows approached her after about thirty minutes.

"Cort, you really should let me treat you. It's not good for normal humans to stay irradiated."

"Normal." Cort huffed under her breath, then looked up at him. "Did you do this to me, too? While I was out?"

"Blood samples only. You were too badly injured to do anything more extensive, and I won't take living tissue without permission. Reilly has been here since the last time you left, and is only in some kind of coma at this point. Nothing I'm doing will affect her adversely." She looked at him and snapped sharply.

"What did you find?"

"Nothing useful. Either the drugs we had to put into you interfered, or the blood packs had been contaminated." He paused. "Cort I understand if you're angry with us, but-"

"I'm not angry at why you did it. A little hurt, maybe, but you didn't do anything you didn't think was right, or the best for everyone. I understand why you couldn't ask permission. And you took care of me." She sighed, coming to a decision. "So you want tissue samples, huh? Tell me, do ghouls regenerate missing tissue as well as damaged?"

"Of course, but I told you, I don't need more ghoulified tissue, it's...Cort, what are you doing with the knife." Barrows backed up when she pulled her combat knife out of her boot.

"Oh, it's not for you silly, you're my friend. It's just show and tell. I think you need to understand why I'm touchy on the subject." Barrows reached back for her as she held out her right arm and slashed it repeatedly.

"Cort, stop it!" Grabbing her arm, he started putting pressure on the cuts, dragging her towards one of the examination tables. Dropping the knife, she put a hand on his shoulder and shook him.

"Wait for it. Take your hand off and just wait for it." She pushed him away and slatted the blood off with her fingers, holding up her arm. Barrows gaped as he watched the slashes knit back together in front of him. Cort smiled. "Tada." Walking over to sit on her old bed, she held her arm back out and watched bemusedly as he sat down and traced his fingers over the new skin. He looked up at her, not letting go.

"Can you explain this?"

"Yeeeah well, notice how I like doing stupid things? One of the first stupid things I did after getting pushed out of 101 was get myself severely irradiated next to an undetonated warhead for caps. Don't look at me like that, there's worse things a girl could have done for payment." Cort shuddered and thought of Nova. "It was for some nutty researcher wanting to examine the effects of a radiation sickness treatment she cooked up. Her best guess was the rapid increase and decrease I had after not really having any exposure whatsoever caused the mutation. Maybe it was that, maybe it was the guck she injected me with, or both, I don't know. So now I'll regenerate, but higher than 1,000 Rads will still bake me to death, so I'm not a ghoul. I can't flush out the excess, so maybe that's the difference. Anyway, before I left she warned me not to let anyone know about it. She's crazy, but she's not a bad person. Something about not ending up with a preventative shot to the head, or unethical scientific exploitation." Cort flopped back onto the mattress and stared at the ceiling. "But I don't think you or Nurse Graves will tell anyone. So lock the door, set up and start cutting out what you want."

Barrows dropped her arm like he had been burnt by it. "What?" Cort propped up on an elbow and looked at him.

"You heard me. I mean, it's not exactly completely human tissue, more like something in between, but it has to be at least a little bit helpful. I'll bring back some of Moira's crap later, too."

"Cort, the implications are astounding, but you can't actually mean to do this." For all his protestations, Barrows was starting to look excited.

"Why the hell not? You already took blood out, just take more. You said I could grow it back, so take small portions from different spots. I'm pretty sure there's shrapnel in my leg and you'll have to dig it out anyway. Just take extra along with it. Besides, you're my friends." Cort grinned. He was already moving to set up a surgical tray.

"This is going to hurt, Cort. I can't afford to contaminate the tissue with Med-X."

"Can't be worse than anything else I've put myself through. Where do you want me to sit?"