1
"Never mind me.", Piper instructed. "I'm just here for history's sake."
The woman (?) in the clean room suit nodded. She continued into the room along with her entourage.
"You can leave the level 2s outside.", the General ordered.
The Institute representative pointed at Hancock's bodyguard Fahrenheit and then McDonough's assistant Geneva.
She nodded. "Fine, you can keep a drone. Singular."
The clean suit turned to the synths escorting her. They looked to themselves and all but one left the room.
"Now come sit at my right.", the General finished.
The Minutemen had managed to fit another table flush against the one she was using. Hancock sat on her left with Fahrenheit leaning against a chair behind him. The Institute representative mirrored this with a Mark 2 synth standing behind her. Along the interior side sat Roxxy with Zeke behind her whispering into her ear constantly and her nodding her head in quick short bursts. Overseer McNamara sat farther away down the table than the Atom Cats and was feeling a bit alone without anyone behind her. Across from them on the door side was Mayor Kessler and Old Man Stockton, elbows on the table attempting to signal that they were here for the biggest piece they could get. Opposite of the General was Diamond City's Mayor McDonough and his assistant Geneva.
"Enough of the ritual.", Hancock declared. "Now we can get down to business."
The General gently put her hand on his leg under the table. "Remember when I told you that I you'd be a broken man after all of this? Here comes another crack.
"Everyone. I want everyone here to accept that the Institute has surrendered to the Minutemen. Institute external operations are under my direct control. In interest of that, I want to do something that will help show that Institute has changed its ways. In order to do so, you must all promise to accept this in stride. It won't cost any of you anything. And it's perfectly safe. Just make sure the table is still meeting after I do."
The people in the room looked amongst each other and slowly nodded.
"Alright then.", the General resigned. "M7-62, deactivation code alpha purple delta three three."
Mayor McDonough immediately stood and then slumped in place. The mood exploded.
"That...that was a robot?", McNamara exclaimed. "But he looked real!"
Geneva wouldn't stop screaming. Not in the way Piper was, a repeating chant of "I knew it! I knew he was up to something. I knew it! I just knew it!"
Kessler was already standing and pointing her finger at the General and the Institute rep. "What the hell are you two trying to pull? You can just hypnotize a person and then they're a synth? Is that's what you plan to do to us?"
Roxxy spun in her chair to Zeke. The two were quietly but very quickly suggesting alphanumeric deactivation codes to each other.
The clean room suit lent its impassivity in an already cool, calm and collected composure.
It's the mayor of Goodneighbor who concerned the General. He reminded everyone (and informed McNamara) how devastatingly strong a ghoul could be when he slammed his fist into the table. He was the only delegate to storm from the room.
"Get that thing out of here.", the General ordered the Institute representative. Then she rushed after Hancock.
2
"I told you.", she reminded.
"You told me spit.", Hancock whirled on her. Which was a small victory, as he wasn't going to tear into the surrounding Minutemen guarding the conference.
"I said I would leave you a broken man.", the General stated.
"I thought you were underselling yourself.", Hancock countered. "That you felt you couldn't contain the wilderness that the Commonwealth is. I trusted you to do that. Not this."
"This?", she responded. "This is me losing one of the most influential politicians of that Commonwealth. Your shock at seeing your brother revealed as a ruse has disrupted everything. The mood of the delegates that need to cooperate with each other, sometimes people they hate, to make this work. The expectation of us to stand together.
"Now every single person in that room is thinking about what they can get away with. McNamara putting her head in the ground again. Geneva is not having Diamond City looking for leadership and finding you, just panicking. And who knows what the Institute thinks it can get away with? What are they going to get away with the next time a person is revealed to be a synth?
"Or should I have hid this from you.", the General continued. "Do you want me to start being that person? The liar and manipulator is what you want me to be? I'm not planning on doing this by nesting lies within lies, Hancock."
The ghoul folded his arms on themselves and struggled mightily to keep his anger focused on her.
"For the people.", she finalized. "The people struggling to survive out there don't need us falling to our own whims. They need you. If you can't use Goodneighbor's standing for yourself, do it for the people."
The mayor turned his back on her. But he sighed. "All these years...and I was mad at him for the wrong reasons."
She put her hand on his shoulder. "We need you Hancock. We can't fracture the Commonwealth and put these people at each others' throats again. It's going to be somebody else' brother, some other down and out group that looks different, or something we can't even imagine."
"Yeah.", Hancock conceded.
"I can't give you a minute.", the General lamented. "I know you need one, as I've touched you and you haven't taken that as an invite to hit on me. But it's chaos in there and no one else is going to clean it up."
"Yeah."
1
"What were you plotting in the hall?", Kessler demanded to know.
"Oh, give it a rest.", Hancock decried as he returned to his seat.
The General held the double doors to her office open for a moment. Behind her were obviously a cadre of Minutemen. After giving everyone a chance to see that fact, she walked in, allowing her arms to drag the doors closed.
"I wanted that to make a point.", the lawyer began. "The Institute could have secretly had Diamond City say whatever they wanted Diamond City to say. Instead, they revealed a secret that doesn't put them in a good light.
"The Institute is trying it's best to not be what it was. If we don't do this, this right here and now, right...I don't want the world to be like that. And I don't think any of your people want that either."
"For the people?"
