CHAPTER 12
Taunter

Grey suppressed a moan as her suit released, body near tumbling out. She gripped the interior frame and pressed her eyes closed as a wave of gut-wrenching agony tore up her ribcage and across her shoulders.

She could feel eyes on her as she stepped out and onto the workshop floor. A nearby Scribe gaped at her, his blowtorch firing against nothing. She shot him a look and he quickly turned away, fumbling with his tools.

She limped around the front of her armour, gauging the extent of needed repairs. She ran a hand across the breastplate, Brotherhood insignia all but turned to a mess of textured steel and paint. At least two dozen shotgun pellets clung to the ruptured metal, more imbedded in the power armour frame beneath.

Grey gingerly traced her fingertips along her ribs. Hissing, she jerked her hand back. A thin, watery layer of blood stained her fingers, more fluid beading beneath chipped nails.

It was minor, she told herself. Only a few pellets had bypassed the armour, and they were all imbedded in the outer layer of her skin. Nothing a set of tweezers and a Stimpak couldn't fix.

She deduced her armour's left leg was shot and would need full replacement and rewiring. The back of her suit also needed some serious hammering out. The steel plating looked like someone had taken a battering ram to it, which wasn't a far cry from the truth.

Grey had no clue how to go about fixing any of it. She wasn't a mechanic or an engineer. That had been her husband. Car's engine needed tuning up? Ask Nate. Kitchen sink leaking again? Get Nate. HVAC on the fritz? Where the sweet fuck was Nate.

She'd never predicted a scenario where a mechanical skill set would have been useful to her. Then again, she imagined few pre-war lawyers ever had. Even with the Sino-American War and regular threats of nuclear Armageddon, few had actually thought it would happen. Hell, she'd even thought Vault-Tec had been nothing more than a strategic optics project designed to milk the American government's capitalistic teat. Fortunately or unfortunately for her—she hadn't made up her mind which—she'd been wrong about Vault-Tec. Then again, it seemed she'd been wrong about many things.

If there was any silver lining, it was that she at least knew weapon maintenance and modification. It was a skill she'd thought would be useless to her as a JAG officer, but, well, life hadn't exactly gone as she'd expected. Few things had, and she anticipated few things ever would.

With a sigh, she decided she'd figure out the repairs later. First she needed to report in to Maxson. Illustrate that she could get the job done, both efficiently and effectively. Something to edge herself into his good graces.

More faces stared as she limped through the mess hall.

"You, uh, okay there, chief?"

Grey glared at the boy who thought that was an intelligent question. Boy hadn't been an exaggeration either. He reminded her of a college freshman, baby-faced and naive but radiating an air of invulnerability. Even fixed by her stare, he grinned stupidly as he hunkered down into his meal, giggles escaping his and his lunchmate's tiny mouths.

If every movement hadn't been agony, she would have grasped the back of his hair and driven his face into his bowl of what she could only assume was dog-meat stew.

Instead she continued without comment, down the hall and past the archives, fixing her sights on the forward ladder by the officers' quarters. It was only as she endeavoured to climb down that an arm reached out and looped itself through hers, pulling her back.

"Yeah, no," a male voice said, hands guiding her back the way she came.

She stood her ground, painfully, and stifled a groan as her shoulder bent in a way she wished it hadn't. The man's touch had been light though, and he stopped with her resistance but continued to hold her arm. She glared.

"I don't need—"

"A puppy? Yeah, I know. Seen your dog. He's a charmer. But if that sentence was going to end with 'a doctor', then you're sadly mistaken, Face."

Her brain did a double take, and she looked—really looked—at the man holding her arm. The Lancer gave her a warm smile, a single dimple forming in his tanned skin. His blond hair was slightly unkempt and escaping from a loose bun. She barely recognized him without his flight helmet. His copper eyes held the same warmth as his smile, but they were also tainted with worry.

"I'm glad you made it back in one piece," she said.

"Yeah, unlike someone."

She tried to scoff, but even that stung, pain shooting from her shoulder, across her collarbone, and up her neck.

"Yeah, back we go," he said, guiding her toward Cade's office. He put an arm under her shoulder to support her weight. "I'd carry you, but well—"

She flicked his ear with her finger. "Hey."

"Don't hey me, Face. I'm a Lancer, not a goddamn Paladin. You want to be carried? Either shrink a few inches or start making friends with Behemoths."

She furrowed her brow.

"Too soon?"

"Too soon."

To Cade's credit, he was one of the few people in the last ten minutes that didn't look at her like one of her limbs was about to detach itself.

"Back so soon, Danvers?"

The Lancer smiled. "You know me, doc, can't keep away from a pretty face."

"I don't think the Knight will be so easily won over by your false flattery."

"Who said I was talking about Knight Grey?" He cast Cade a devious smile.

Grey unsuccessfully stifled a laugh as Cade rolled his eyes in response. Her ribs didn't appreciate the humour.

Cade laid her back on a gurney and rubbed something cold across her neck. She felt a quick prick and a familiar, tantalizing warmth. A moan escaped her throat as the Med-X flooded her system. The urge to lie back and sleep crossed her mind, but it was quickly silenced by the sound of fabric tearing. She managed to swivel her head to see Cade slicing through her flight suit with trauma shears.

There goes 50 caps, she thought before hissing with pain.

Cade tugged at the fabric, but it held fast to her skin, bound with dried blood and sweat. She grit her teeth as he worked, body craving another hit of Med-X with each probe and pinch.

A hand grasped hers, giving it a little squeeze.

"The Knight may appreciate some privacy, Lancer," Cade said calmly, hands working.

"It's fine," she replied through clenched teeth. "I'm sure it's nothing he hasn't seen before."

She winced as something rooted around in her skin. Cold tendrils danced across her ribs. Something metal clinked into a surgical tray.

"What, aren't worried about preserving your dignity, Face?" Danvers teased.

"No dignity left to preserve." She attempted to laugh but it came out as more of a yelp.

He squeezed her hand again.

Danvers talked as Cade worked, regaling her with stories from the Capital Wasteland. Nothing particularly useful or complex, but amusing anecdotes one might tell over a round of beers. Super Mutant wearing a dress, toting a Fat Man, and calling itself Darleen; an Initiate who spent a year living on Cram and whose pores excreted the smell of processed meat during firefights; one of the Lancer's getting so drunk on Moonshine the night before his final Vertibird evaluation that he saluted Lancer-Captain Kells in nothing more than his small clothes and a flight helmet.

"See, you say, 'one of the other Lancers', but I'm pretty sure that's just code for, 'I, Danvers, the closeted nudist'." Grey gave him a smirk.

He chuckled. "Anyone ever tell you you're too smart for your own good?"

"Once or twice."

Another needle prick from Cade and her throat began to rasp. The dehydration hit like a punch to the larynx. She hated the side effects of Rad-Away. The fact Cade knew to flush her system without her telling him she'd been exposed to radiation did have her wondering what physical symptoms she'd exhibited. For all she knew, she was glowing yellow.

"Lancer, the Knight will need some water. If you'd be so kind—"

"Yeah, yeah," he said, giving Cade a wink and a wave. "One purified water coming up." He headed toward the mess.

Cade helped Grey up into a sitting position as she wheezed. He injected a Stimpak into her abdomen, but the familiar burning and tightening of the skin was diminished by the Med-X. As he wrapped her mending wounds in gauze and tape, she caught herself wondering how many new scars she'd be touting by tomorrow.

A bright light shot into her left eye and she instantly recoiled.

"Knight, I need you to follow the light with your eyes."

She shielded her face with her hand. "If you're trying to see if I'm concussed, don't bother—I am."

The light flicked off.

"I see you have some medical training then. Was this standard procedure in your Vault?"

Grey met Cade's gaze. "I must really be concussed, because I don't remember telling you I was from a Vault."

"No," he said. "You didn't. Which was slightly neglectful noting the immunological differences between Vault dwellers and wastelanders. Luckily for you and I, 'neglect' isn't a word in Elder Maxson's vocabulary."

Grey also didn't remember telling Maxson she was from a Vault, but she did make her grand debut in a Vault 111 jumpsuit. She could forgive the faulty assumption. She could even use it to her advantage if she wanted. It was safer people thought she was a Vault dweller than a two-hundred-year-old popsicle. That's what Diamond City Radio kept referring to her as anyway: the Vault dweller. May as well embrace the title.

She straightened her posture, finally able to move without agony. The Stimpaks were working.

"Bit of a dangerous leap in logic to assume every person brave enough to wear blue and yellow spandex is from a Vault."

Cade lightly placed his fingertips behind her jaw, feeling along her lymph nodes. "I appreciate that you're new, Knight, but keeping secrets from us isn't a helpful way forward."

"And what makes you think I'm keeping secrets?"

A tired smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. "That's not the question you should be asking."

Her eyes glinted. She was enjoying this game. "And what question should I be asking?"

"Ask what's preventing you from placing your trust in us."

"Oh that's easy."

Cade cocked a brow.

"Because trust gets you killed," Danvers interjected, rounding the corner with a plastic bottle. "Or so the old world songs say."

He tossed the water to Grey and she greedily tore off the cap, gulping it down.

Hopping from the gurney, she gave Cade a coy smile and a salute. "This was fun," she purred. "We should do it again soon."

He eyed her suspiciously. "For your sake, Knight, I hope you're joking."

She was.

Danvers matched her stride as she left the clinic.

"Now that you're all patched up and only bloody on the outside, care to chase that drink with a meal?"

She slide her hands around the sides of the forward ladder and gave Danvers a glance over her shoulder. "Sorry, got a date with the boss. How do I look?"

"Like you took on a hoard of Super Mutants and survived."

She shot him a playful look. "I'm sure you say that to all the girls."

"Only the interesting ones."

Her body dropped, cool metal gliding past her palms. As her feet landed on the Command Deck below, she rid the fake smile from her face, cheeks stiff and strained. She hated laughter. Hated the sound, hated the feel. Danvers enjoyed it though, fancied himself witty and a smooth-talker. So that's what she'd nurture, convincing him she liked his jokes, that his ruse was worth her time.

As her father always said, it never hurt to have an extra pawn on the board. Or a pilot in her pocket.