Mutatis Mutandis 6
The County Sewer Mainline was as horrid a place as Sarah had imagined. They had entered it through a small manhole inside a sewer waystation just west of Megaton. An unremarkable building which nearly all the wasteland inhabitants had ignored completely. But the newly discovered route was a golden gift.
The interior was a maze-like set of corridors with an enormous multi-level central chamber. Sarah's trip had been completely uneventful, due entirely to Jason. The moment darkness had fallen on them, he took his silenced assault rifle and vanished from sight, only reappearing whenever she became lost. She never heard noise of any kind, but came upon freshly killed feral ghouls every few minutes, all of them sporting gunshots to the head, or sometimes slit throats. The Wanderer was putting his skills to use.
While the route from Megaton to the citadel had become relatively safe in recent years, it was still a danger to the unwary traveler. It was not secure, and difficult to patrol as there were so many openings both to the wasteland, and to the deeper ruins of downtown D.C.. Yet this dark, dank sewer system which combined the unendurable stenches of ghoul flesh and human waste, dropped them right beside the citadel. Sarah wondered how many lives could have been saved if the Brotherhood had known about it earlier.
As they rounded the collapsed western end of the bridge, the citadel came into view, as did the power-armoured figures guarding it. Despite everything Jason had told her about the Brotherhood's upgrades, she still had to resist diving behind a nearby rock and readying her combat shotgun. Jason gave her a bemused, inquiring look.
"It's… not right." She murmured, staring at the unmistakable armour.
"Relax, Sarah." Jason replied, striding forward. Though he himself was keeping his assault rifle a little closer to hand than he normally did. She fell in behind him, trying to keep her finger off the trigger.
They approached a brotherhood soldier in hellfire armour, painted with streaks of grey and blue. He was carrying a minigun, but had the barrel down in a relaxed manner.
"Welcome back, Paladin." Paladin Bael saluted Jason.
"Paladin?" Jason frowned, reflecting Sarah's own confusion.
"You got promoted, Sir. For all the extra gear." Bael told them, his helmet's speakers lending his voice a strange electronic echo. "I still kept my minigun, though. Don't trust the new gear. Nothing beats a regular wall of lead." He looked beyond Jason and nodded cautiously at Sarah. When he spoke to her, his tone was demeaning, as if he were trying to calm an angry child. Obviously word had spread about her departure. "Good to see you again, Miss Lyons. How was your vacation?"
"She has a rank!" Jason snapped, noting the man's reaction.
"Don't, Jason." Sarah said, shaking her head. "You'll only make it worse."
She shot Bael a dirty look and stomped through the entranceway, ahead of Jason.
Sarah was not particularly happy with the Brotherhood. She could tell that Jason was nervous as well. Seeing Enclave-armoured troops strolling nonchalantly through the courtyard was disconcerting, to say the least. The armour had only ever been a target of hatred. Wearing it was sacrilegious, in a strange way. Brotherhood soldiers wore T-51b power armour. It was a central part of their identity. The enclave were the enemy. Seeing them walking around the citadel was a nightmare brought to life, though her fears were allayed somewhat by the fact that she recognized most of the soldiers.
Their hideous collection of brand new alien weaponry was equally as worrying. Strange, unwieldy pistols, and oddly shaped rifles with narrow barrels. They were energy weapons, very clearly. Though what type was still anyone's guess.
The Brotherhood soldiers who happened to cross their path as they made for the Citadel's A-Ring treated them with either careful politesse, or an awkward deferential awe. Any reaction shown was directed almost exclusively at the Wanderer, and it was clear that none of them wished to actually engage either of them in conversation.
Jason, having been long used to their attitude, easily brushed it off and strode across the courtyard, full of purpose. Sarah had a harder time of it. These were her people. Her allies and comrades. She had grown up around most of them, and to see them view her through the same lens as the Lone Wanderer was hurtful. The stares and the whispered conversations which stopped whenever she grew near, showed just how much damage her hasty departure had done. It was less than she had feared, but far, far worse than she'd hoped.
The Wanderer cut off one such conversation between Paladin Gunny and a faceless knight. Both were outfitted in enclave armour, streaked with grey and blue. The Quartermaster had clearly not defined a standard paintjob for the new uniforms yet, but at least the ranks were displayed on the pauldrons, and the colors made it clear which faction the wearer belonged to. Jason walked up to them and asked, "Where is Elder Lyons?"
Gunny stared at Sarah curiously until she met his gaze, at which point he looked back at Jason. "Being briefed. There's a few Talon Company mercs there." He shook his head. "Been training knights how to use those new weapons. There's a lot of rumors flying around. Scuttlebutt says you got them from an alien ship, but the Scribes won't tell us anything. Could you maybe…?"
"No." Jason replied. He motioned to Sarah and they continued. She could feel the drill sergeant's gaze lingering on the back of her neck.
She followed Jason into the A-ring, to the door of the Lyons' Den. Her squad's barracks. Though it was Glade's squad now, she suspected.
Jason turned to her. "Here's your stop. I have to report to Rothchild." He sighed. "There's probably has a lot of questions, and I have a few of my own…"
Sarah nodded numbly, trying to overcome her own nerves, and laid her hand on the doorknob. It was strange to think that during her lifetime, she had faced down hordes of Supermutants, giant insects, robots, feral ghouls and all the other hazards of the wasteland, but still had trouble facing her own squad. Her own family. The same people who had decided she was unfit to command.
Poplar's warning of betrayal echoed through her mind again, and she withdrew her hand as if scorched. A thousand scenarios played out in her mind. She hadn't properly explained what had happened in Point Lookout. Not to anyone. Did they blame her for Colvin and Gallows? Would they trust her to lead? Would they even trust her to follow? Suddenly she was not on solid ground anymore. She had become a wildcard, she realized, just like Jason had been. An outsider. And she didn't want to talk to them yet. She wasn't ready.
"Perhaps you should talk to your father first." Jason suggested gently, sensing her hesitation. "I'm sure he'd be willing to find a place for you." She gave him a grateful look. Ibn reply he took back his combat shotgun and headed for the laboratories.
Elder Reginald Rothchild was happily overtaxed. This was a welcome improvement from his normal state: onerously overtaxed. Although on the less demanding days, he'd find himself only mildly overtaxed, enabling him enough time for a glass of cool water and perhaps something to read, like a manual, or report of some sort. Rothchild had never been one for fiction.
As it was, he was happily overtaxed. All text books, reports and manuals lay forgotten alongside a glass of water as he stared down at the disassembled alien rifle before him. He was flanked on both sides by two more desks, one piled high with additional samples, the other with a carefully arranged set of tools. Another two tables had been set up a short distance away with microscopes, vials, and the sort of chemical testing equipment which required that the glass blower be afflicted with hiccups.
The samples of alien technology his scribes had brought back were astonishing. The inherent ability of the power cells to regulate and store energy efficiently was of particular interest to him. If it could be adapted, it would potentially solve all of Liberty Prime's power fluctuation issues. He had locked himself in his private lab, intent on working with no distractions, and in the last few hours, he had made great strides forward in his understanding of the device, or so he hoped.
He had managed to gently pry the outer casing off of an alien disintegrator, and was in the process of disassembling and cataloging the pieces to see how they fit together when he felt the little hairs on the back of his neck begin to rise. Mildly annoyed at the interruption, he looked up, searching for the source of his discomfort, and flinched. The Lone Wanderer was watching him from the other side of the desk, silent as the grave, and staring at him with a cold, patient blue stare.
"Tell me," the scribe inquired, glancing at the door, which was apparently still locked. "Do you know how to knock, Mister Howlett?"
The Wanderer gazed down at Rothchild's half-built project. "How is the new tech?"
"Fascinating." Rothchild told him, his tone dismissive.
"You've got questions, I assume?" the young man asked.
The scribe sat back and stared, a diluted sort of morbid curiosity overtaking him. he gestured at the half-disassembled weapon. "Do you understand how this weapon works?"
"Yes."
For a split second, Rothchild was pleasantly surprised. He often forgot that Jason Howlett was the son of an absolutely brilliant scientist. Then he remembered that Jason Howlett was also the Lone Wanderer, known for one thing, and one thing only: his almost supernatural ability to end lives with impunity. Rothchild grew suspicious. "When I say 'understand'…"
"I can kill with it." The Wanderer said confidently. "If you put it back together."
Rothchild nodded . He was not particularly intimidated by the Lone Wanderer anymore; the boy had shown a little too much heart in his dealings with Sarah for the scribe to be nervous. Also, the sheer weight of the revelations Jason Howlett had shared with the Brotherhood placed Rothchild squarely in his corner when it came to dealing with the world. A lot more about the young man's formerly enigmatic behavior had become clear since the unfolding of recent events, and the Wanderer's answer was exactly the reply he had expected. He picked up his tools and started back into the bowels of the weapon, saying, "Then I'm afraid you won't be able answer any of my questions."
"Well I have a few to ask."
Rothchild sighed and set down his tools. "Such as?"
"The purifier? Did you get the G.E.C.K. installed?"
"You'll have to ask Alex Dargon for the details, but we're well on our way."
"And the Cure?"
Now that was a topic Rothchild could make the time for! He rose and lead Jason over to the table with the microscope. A small cooler was sitting on the shelf above. Rothchild gingerly lifted it down and pulled from it a set of vials. One of them was glowing bright blue. The two others were red and a light purple.
"I assume you recognize this?" Rothchild asked, readying a glass dropper. He dipped it in the glowing blue liquid and withdrew a small, carefully measured amount.
"Nuka Cola Quantum?"
"Humorous. But wrong." Rothchild said. "This is the cure. Your cure. The PVP virus. A sample. Take a look along that rack. The purple vial is our own version. Backwards engineered."
"Does it work?"
"Ours? Not yet." The scribe told him, "the best we've been able it do is target and kill FEV affected DNA strands. We haven't yet been able to replicate the PVP virus' ability to discard the FEV sequences and bring the suppressed human counterparts forward. But it's a start…"
"Wait… how does it work?" the Wanderer frowned. "I thought the FEV virus sort of… trashed the human version and then replaced it."
"Not at all…" Rothchild readied a second dropper, taking a sample from a second vial, labeled as supermutant blood. "Not at all. It forms a separate DNA double-helix, bound to the normal strand, forming a quadruple helix." He readied a slide, cleaning it and placing a single drop of mutant blood on it. He carefully put the coverslip on top, making sure not to catch any air bubbles, and slipped the assembly under the microscope. He adjusted the dials, focusing the instrument until the image was well-defined.
"There!" the scribe stood back triumphantly. "Take a look!"
The Wanderer obeyed, peering into the microscope. "It's like little red candies… those are the red blood cells. My dad used to do this when I was a little kid."
"Yes, keep looking. "Rothchild told him smoothly. "And now…" the scribe picked up the PVP sample dropper and placed a single drop on the slide and waited patiently for it to mingle with the mutant sample, which it eventually did.
"All I saw was that it turned from red, to purple, and then back to red again…" the young man said.
Rothchild deflated slightly, aware that this did not look like the shining beacon of change he knew it was. He rallied. "Well yes, but that blood is now at the state it was in before the FEV cure as injected. The mutant double helix is gone. It's human blood now."
The Wanderer frowned, pulling away from the microscope lenses. He picked up the slide and held it up to the light, as if that would have shown him anything more. "And how much would it take to turn a full mutant?" he asked.
"I'm not even sure it would." Rothchild answered. "Even if we knew the proper dosage, we have no viable method of delivery. I can't exactly tell a supermutant to sit still while I inject it…"
They both fell silent, caught in the same creative spin.
"I made a dart gun." The Wanderer suggested thoughtfully. "The darts were tipped with radscorpion venom. Silent. Deadly."
"And dosage control?"
"Well that's up to you."
"It's academic anyway." Rothchild said, packing up the vials and putting them back in the cooler, "We don't have enough to weaponize it, and our backwards engineered version doesn't change the mutants. It kills them."
"And this is a problem?" The Wanderer asked, genuinely flummoxed.
Rothchild chuckled. "No. Just outside our intended scope."
"Either way, it's useful."
They lapsed into silence.
"I take it Sarah is back, then." The scribe said.
The Wanderer nodded.
"How is she?" he asked quietly. Rothchild himself had spent quite a few recent nights reading by lamplight, fearing the dark and the memories it brought back. He was not about to complain, though. Not when poor Sarah had suffered so much more.
"Better. She doesn't scream anymore." The corner of the Wanderer's mouth twitched slightly. "And she hasn't tried to shoot me again."
"I suppose that's an improvement. I had a talk with her, you know…?" Rothchild folded his arms and leaned against the nearby desk. "About resolving things between you and her father, and you and the Brotherhood… we were on board the Duchess Gambit at the time. On the way there."
"Those issues sorted themselves out."
"Indeed." Rothchild nodded mournfully. "Now she's going to be the issue. Nadine is dead, by the way."
The Wanderer frowned, surprised. "How?"
"Sarah killed her with a tire iron. Beat her to death right after we got back." Rothchild winced at the memory of the red-headed captain's tongue and teeth exploding out the side of her cheek, ripped open by the heavy implement. The Wanderer seemed relatively unconcerned. Rothchild was only just starting to learn how to read the man's body language and stone face, and right at that moment, he would have guessed that Mister Howlett was disappointed. Though whether the root of that emotion lay with Sarah's behavior, a feeling of loss over Nadine, or at being cut off from potentially useful resources was still unresolved. The Wanderer settled the issue with a telling question.
"Is Calvert dead?"
"I suppose so." Rothchild replied. "I had more pressing concerns. Why did you leave him in that deprived state?"
"He was an asset." The Wanderer replied coldly.
"That doesn't excuse torture." Rothchild made it clear through his tone that he wasn't reprimanding, but rather raising a point. "He wanted to die."
The Wanderer made it clear through his tone that either way he would have given the same answer. "The brain was an asset. Nothing more. I could have traded knowledge for death."
As he stalked away, Rothchild was reminded of something Sarah had once said: Anything that might benefit the Capital Wasteland, at any cost to anyone outside it. The whole 'friend to all' thing is Three-dog's creation.
Elder Owyn Lyons collapsed heavily onto his couch, a glass of wine in his hand. It was a foul drink, corked and sour with age, but he had found recently that having one or two a day helped to calm him. It helped him to put aside certain things so that he could operate efficiently. He knew what he needed more than anything else: a vacation. That wasn't an option, so he'd have to make do with wine.
He stared into the depths of the drink for a moment, and then rose. He crossed to the alcove behind the couches and pulled out a dust-covered recording. He brushed it off gently and made his way to the audio player in the corner of his room.
The player crackled to life and a man's voice sprung from the speakers. Young, strong and full of aspirations, it brought back many pleasant memories of a simpler time. It was accompanied by the gurgling of a small child.
"Megan, say something!" the man's voice requested.
A reply was heard, in the form of a light, tinkling laughter. Female. "What are you doing, Owyn?"
"Recording us. Megan, say something!"
"Rothchild got it to work?" the woman laughed again. In the background, the baby giggled.
"He did. Here, hold up Sarah!"
There was a pause, and the sounds of the child suddenly grew a lot its own terms, it wasn't a particularly pleasant sound, full of dribbling, raspberries and a little too much spittle. But to Elder Lyons, it was music.
"Hello Sarah! She looks so happy, Megan! Look at her smile!"
The baby giggled.
"You're going to be a knight." Lyons heard his younger self say. "A Paladin of the Brotherhood of Steel! I'm going to be so proud of you!"
There was a faint knock, barely audible over the sound of the crooning child. A door slid open, and a new, harsh voice was heard. Full of purpose. "Sir, Elder Jeremy Maxson requests your presence."
"What's the problem, Paladin?"
"He wants to talk with you about sending an expedition east."
"East?" That was Megan's voice. Young baby Sarah was removed from the microphone "What on earth is out east?"
"The Pentagon. Apparently it's still around..."
"And he wants to send out an expedition now?" Lyons' voice was laced with incredulity. In the background, the baby had gone quiet, sensing the sudden change in atmosphere.
"You barely survived Richardson!" Megan argued. "If it wasn't for the Chosen One-"
"And he's ran off again, hasn't he? Look, I don't give the orders, I'm just carrying the message." The nameless soldier replied, sounding harassed. "Elder Maxson told me to invite Owyn Lyons to the briefing room at his earliest convenience. That's it."
"At his 'earliest convenience'…?"
"Except less polite." The soldier affirmed. "Just get there, sir. Now."
Elder Lyons heard a soft knock at the door, and it took him a moment to realize it wasn't part of the recording. He reached forward and stopped it, listening carefully. Sure enough, there was a second knock, more hesitant than the first.
"Come in." He said.
The door creaked open and Sarah walked through, dressed in recon armour. She look nervous, but not in the caged, animalistic way she had been after she'd arrived back the first time. At least this time, he knew he was staring into his own daughter's eyes, instead of the feral, half-crazed monster which Point Lookout had turned her into.
The wounds on her face were healed. Her blonde hair looked slightly lopsided now, by reason of an enormous, pale scar which cut across the right side of her head, starting at her hairline and ending above her ear. She'd been grazed by a gunshot wound during her nightmarish adventure, and it was the most obvious physical difference.
The last he'd seen of her, she'd been beyond saving, raving, ranting, and screaming at him, her words tearing his battered heart to shreds. It was hell, dad. You sent me into Hell! Do you have any idea how much I suffered there? Sorry is not good enough!
He'd tried to apologize, but it had only made her more furious. Eventually a member of her own squad had dragged him away before she actually had a chance to strike at him. There were rumors of horrible screaming in the nighttime, and a mysterious book brought by the Wanderer. Worse, that she'd tried to kill someone.
Then she'd disappeared again. He hadn't even been sure she'd return, unable to face that possibility. The only faint hope he'd been able to grasp was a quiet assurance from Star-Paladin Glade that she'd gone with the Wanderer. Perhaps the son of James Howlett was capable of pulling off yet another miracle.
The way she was watching Owyn now, it looked as if the Wanderer had managed it again.
"Sarah…" Owyn rose to his feet.
She licked her lips nervously and hugged herself, hunching up as if caught by a sudden chill. Her gaze shifting to the recording device. Lyons found himself tensing up when she opened her mouth to speak. She didn't look angry, but he was still afraid.
"I heard mom's voice." She said quietly.
"I was just…" he motioned silently at the machine.
She nodded, and closed the door behind her, then moved to sit down beside him. When she met his eyes, her expression said everything a thousand words couldn't: A thousand apologies. A thousand messages of forgiveness, and a thousand reassurances that she wanted everything to be okay between them. That she loved her father.
She said, "Play it again, please."
So those of you unfamiliar with the Cure, its origins are explained in Aqua Vitae.
Lyons' recording was Krow Blood's idea, and damn, but it was a good one!
These updates are taking a while, but it's for a very specific reason: I'm trying to make this story a cut above my regular stuff. It is the end of the trilogy, afterall. I could write it kinda O.K. and get across everything I intend to, like I did in Modus Operandi. or I could do the very best job possible, which is what I figure this series deserves at this point. I don't plan on accepting less from myself.
Late Night Side-thought: Hey, if the NCR's flag is a double-headed bear, is there some tribe up in Canada which has a double-headed beaver? The dorkiest tribe ever would have a double-headed platypus.