The Efficient Approach

Screams and howls clawed through the room, echoing off the blood slicked walls. Fangs – long as her hand and the colour of putrid flesh – fastened around Quinn, while heavy, scaly paws pressed against her chest. Bullets pinged off her metal shell with little effect, but the teeth dug their way into the weak joints of her armour, where only a reinforced lining protected her soft neck. The hound growled and pushed harder; Quinn's feet scrabbled and slipped on the red-soaked tiles as she bent over the railings. She barely noticed the meat netted above her, its contents dripping slowly onto her visor as she struggled. A pressured ache in her neck grew stronger as the creature's grip dominated her, its foul breath filtering into her helmet. It pushed forward, loosening its jaws to deliver the final clamp on her fragile flesh and bone, and the world spun out of control. She was flying, flickering fluorescent lights spinning like shooting stars, the gore smearing into a streak of scarlet that reminded her of a painting she had seen once as a teenager. All these scattered thoughts shot by in seconds, abruptly stopped by her body slamming hard into the ground.

Dull yells sang to her over the haze of gunfire, broken only by an interlude of snuffling whines. Quinn's vision focused, and she became aware that she was lying on a quivering mound. She rolled over with an unpleasant crunch, to see a mutated hound broken beneath her, its lower half crushed by her fall. Picking up her rifle, Quinn aimed and put it out of its misery. It had nearly ripped her throat out, but it was only an animal after all.

Sound was becoming clearer. With some difficulty, Quinn staggered to her feet and looked up. Paladin Danse was on the walkway above her, wrestling his gun from a super mutant, while another approached him from behind, a huge lead pipe in its hands. There was a click as she reloaded, and she peered down the sights and pulled the trigger. Crack. The super mutant's head snapped sideways as its arms dropped away from Danse's gun. Not wasting a moment, Danse whirled around and blasted away the approaching mutant, sending it skidding off the walkway and landing with a crunch on a large generator in the centre of the room.

"Nice one," Quinn called up, but Danse ignored her, pointing over her and firing. There was a scream as a mutant in a window above turned to ash, its remains raining down on her. Danse reloaded, swung his legs over the railings, and landed with a bang that sent the meat all over the floor flying everywhere.

"Disgusting," he muttered, wiping his boots on a nearby mutant body.

"There's a staircase right there."

"I prefer the efficient approach." He glanced around and raised his eyebrows. "Look at this place! You must hate these mutants as much as I do."

Quinn shrugged. "Why do you hate super mutants so much?"

"They're responsible for the death of a close friend. A Brotherhood knight named Cutler. So when you ask if I hate them, I say hate's too gentle a word." Danse looked at the super mutant at his feet and gave it a sharp kick to the head. "You saw what they did to Carson. These monstrosities are just another example of man blindly taking a step forward, only to wind up stumbling two steps back. I've been fighting for years, trying to put a stop to this madness, and just when I thought we were getting the upper hand, along come the synths."

A sense of uneasiness was creeping over Quinn. The venom in his voice overwhelming, so strong it was a wonder it hadn't consumed him and everyone around him. And the synths...would he be a threat to...? "What about the synths?"

"I've seen what these super mutants do to people. Can you imagine what the synths would do to us if they ever got the upper hand? It would be Armageddon repeated, and may be the end of everything we hold dear."

Quinn gulped. She would have to make sure to never introduce him to Nick. But the talk of synths destroying everything confused her. Someone like Valentine – one of the few truly good people she had encountered in this new shithole of a world – was not a destroyer. Bringers of annihilation and the eradication of mankind did not make beeping noises with their mouths to scare off raiders.

Danse studied her and her silence and sighed. "Look, I don't mean to bore you with my rhetoric. I just want you to understand how important these missions are. What's important here is that you got the job done."

He fired off a set of orders and then turned his back to her, walking off down the corridor to assess the mini-nukes. She was dismissed. Holding back a noise of annoyance, Quinn stomped off to the elevator, wondering how Carson was doing, and if there was a chance of him being awake. The sooner she got back, the sooner she would know.

From down the corridor, Danse watched her go.

"Nate!"

His wife's scream rang down the corridor; a stab of pain mingled with joy shot through his chest. Her voice. It was so good to hear her voice...

"I'm going to have to ask you to calm down. Your husband is right this way, Mrs-"

"Do you see this stomach?"

"I beg your pardon?"

"Do you see this stomach? Do you see this huge, fucking stomach?"

"Yes, I do, and there's no need for language like that."

"Well then, with all your fancy medical training, you might have guessed I'm pregnant, pissed off, and being stopped by some haughty snotrag from seeing my husband because I'm being too loud. Not a good idea! Now get the hell out of my-"

"Quinn," Nate called out, trying not to laugh. The strength of his voice surprised him; who needed medicine when he had his wife?

"Nate!" The cry again, but with the anger gone and replaced by pure anguish. There was a crash and a shriek, and Nate saw a nurse's hat skid past the door, followed by plastic syringes and pill bottles bouncing down the corridor. Seconds later, huffing and bright red in the face, Quinn entered the room. She took one look at him, wailed, and threw herself forward, stopping at the rails of his bed and clutching them so tightly her knuckles turned white. Nate was grateful for her restraint. His insides felt like fire. Quinn's eyes dripped tears, but nothing could diminish the blaze that raged behind them. God, he loved her for that.

"Hey, hun," he whispered, placing his hand on hers.

"Don't you 'hey, hun' me," she sniffed, ignoring the water trickling down her cheeks. "You gave me such a fright." Her lip trembled as he gave her fingers a squeeze.

"Sian Crofts is dead," he said. Nate wasn't sure where this had come from, only that it was raw. He told her how she'd pulled him out of harm's way, and how she'd hit the explosive fate had left out for him. Quinn's free hand flew to her mouth.

"Oh Nate..." This time she did hug him, and he welcomed it, despite the pain. Crofts, the hardass boss who taught him everything he knew. Crofts, the one who gave him advice whenever he struggled with the distance between him and Quinn. Crofts, who had told him with a cheeky smirk that he should name his kid after her. Quinn looked down at him and smiled. She knew. She always knew. "I know we'd settled on Jake or Ellie, but without her..." Quinn pulled him as close as she dared and stroked the top of his head. "Sian for a girl, Shaun for a boy?"

Nate squeezed her arm, ignoring the thunderous looking nurse stood in the doorway. "I think that's perfect." He glanced at the agitated woman. "Now what did you do to Nurse Fiona?"

"Well..."

"...and that's pretty much what happened," Quinn finished. "My first time fighting super mutants up close. Not something I'm really going to forget, I think. At least Nate's shooting lessons were up to scratch." She stared at the still figure in the bed, their face bruised almost beyond recognition, the tight bandages around their body barely visible beneath the bedsheets pulled up to their collarbone. Quinn cleared her throat. "And Danse...well, Paladin Danse. He's a pretty angry guy. But he hides all that pissed off beneath metal and stubble and eyebrows. Still, it must come in handy. It saved your life. It'd probably save mine, if I was staying." She fidgeted with the small bag of vertibird signal grenades that Maxson had given her as a reward for their success. He'd given her another mission, too, but she hadn't really been listening. Her mind was already made up. Shaun was her priority, and getting him back lay somewhere else in the Commonwealth. Now it was time for her to make her goodbyes...just a pity Danse wouldn't be here before she went. Would the Brotherhood hunt her down for desertion? It was a risk she would take, and a price she would gladly pay another day. But for now...

Quinn stood up and moved over to Carson, brushing his hair out of his battered face. Footsteps sounded behind her and she withdrew her hand quickly as she turned. "Paladin Danse?"

Danse stood in the doorway, looking as awkward as he always did out of his armour. He raised his hands and stepped back. "Sorry, if I'm interrupting something...I'll come back later."

"No." Quinn's expression softened, making way for a smile. "There's another chair, and I don't think he's going to get many visitors. Please, come in."

Bowing his head slightly, Danse shuffled inside and lowered himself into the chair opposite Quinn's, near the foot of Carson's bed. He stared at his feet, an odd quiet falling over him while Quinn continued to fuss over the man in the bed. Eventually she could find nothing else to do, and returned to her own chair, beginning to regret her invitation to this uncomfortable encounter.

Danse coughed. "You were...you're close?"

"Close?" Quinn shook her head. "No. I only met him today."

Something flickered across Danse's face that she didn't quite catch, but his entire demeanour relaxed instantly. He looked at Carson, frowning. "Why are you here, then?"

"I could ask you the same question."

He seemed surprised by this. "Why wouldn't I be? He was under my command. My responsibility. I had to...I wanted to see he was alright myself. Not just read a report and forget about it."

Quinn considered this, a warmth growing in her chest. "I feel the same way. I froze up today, faced with those...things. If I hadn't hesitated, I could have killed more of them. I could have prevented it."

"Don't dwell on it, soldier," Danse said, shaking his head. "Just do better next time. For yourself. For Carson."

There was a brief pause. Quinn opened her mouth to say thank you. Instead, everything came pouring out. Her son, her anguish, her need to go. Her growing admiration for what the Brotherhood stood for, but also the mounting despair that their solution was a long-term goal. "I can't stay here," she whispered, arms folded over her chest, eyes squeezed shut. "I have to find Shaun. I have to find my little boy. If the Brotherhood could take me there now, I would stay. But there's another way in, a more dangerous way; something that could kill me if it goes wrong. I thought being here would offer a safer solution, but I was wrong. I need to get back to Sanctuary and finish what I started, with or without Elder Maxson's blessing."

The ringing silence was as loud as scream, but she didn't dare open her eyes. Why had she said that? Now they knew. Now they could stop her.

"Let me come with you."

Her eyes flew open, and Quinn looked up to see Danse's gaze locked on her with such an intensity she felt shivers run down her spine. "What?"

Danse's expression remained stony. "Getting you into the Institute will benefit the Brotherhood greatly. We could learn from them, find out where they are, map out their base for an attack. It's a perfect plan." His mouth spoke of loyalties and duty, steel and strategy; the gleam in his eyes gave a different message. I will help you, they whispered. Quinn bit her lip as she clenched her fists, trying to stay in control. Danse smiled at her. "Come on. Let's get suited up."