1
The Lone Wanderer tried to give the appearance of being more relaxed. She was showered and dressed in a VAULT 101 SUIT, with maybe some of the zipper and her boot laces undone. She leaned back in her bed with her back against the wall.
But preventing that was a red headed woman in a blue and more armored version of what the Colonel was wearing, sitting in the only chair of her small cabin. "NUKA QUANTUM or VIM GRAPE?", the other woman asked her while holding out two chilled bottles of the same.
"VIM?", the Lone Wanderer asked. "How...is that even possible?"
The red head chuckled. "It seems to take a while before someone from Rivet City believes the resources that the Commonwealth is willing to make available to its members. And now, that includes you.", she informed, pushing the VIM GRAPE into the other's hand.
"Me?", the Asian woman challenged.
The red head dismissed, "Everyone in the Capital Wastes, sentient enough to understand - ghouls, synth, the very unique supermutant or not."
"How's that?", the Lone Wanderer asked. She sat in a silence with the other woman for a breath. She pocketed the cap and took a sip of her soda.
"It doesn't spend like a Nuka's would.", the other woman warned.
The Lone Wanderer tried again. "How is it that you believe the Capital Wastes are under your control?"
"They're not.", the red head replied. She took a gulp of her own Quantum. "The Capital Wastes were annexed into the Commonwealth. The Commonwealth is ruled by its own civilian government. Given...coming up with a few solutions to existing issues, I expect Rivet City to help in guiding that government by sending its own representative."
The Lone Wanderer raised an eyebrow.
The other woman nodded. "But the how: The Brotherhood of Steel invaded the Commonwealth. They intimidated our local farmers and coerced them for their livelihoods while stripping the land for every bit of technology they could find. Eventually, I was able to sink their flagship...airship...the Prydwyn after laying waste to the base they had established under it and that pushed them out of the Commonwealth. Despite us having no interaction after that except perhaps a caravan making its way from one to the other, the Brotherhood of Steel decided to use a nuclear weapon from the Great War to destroy a settlement in the Commonwealth."
"Why would the Brotherhood do any of that?", the Lone Wander asked.
"To weaken us?", the red head supposed. "Spite? I'm through asking those questions. I started dealing with the results. When I found the force that was going to build the beach head for the second Brotherhood of Steel invasion, I forced it out of the sky."
The Lone Wanderer shook her head. "Elder Danse was on a rescue mission to find out what happened to/"
"An advance scout?", the red head surmised. She drunk a bit more of her soda, and motioned for her counterpart to do so as well.
"You know, I prefer the Quantum to this stuff.", the Lone Wanderer told her.
The red head switched with her. "I just thought since you hadn't had it before...", and took a swig. At the subtle flinch, she asked. "Are you a Vault dweller?"
"I live here.", the Lone Wanderer caught. "I grew up in a Vault."
"What number?"
"101. How could you tell? I thought the wasteland had caught up with me."
"That look when people drink and eat after each other despite the risk of disease.", the other woman answered. "I'm the same way as you. But fortunately, I've gotten the Commonwealth to the point where we have a back supply of ANTIBIOTICS. And bacteria really hates trying to grow in sugar and carbonic acid."
The Asian woman noted the education of the person she was talking with. "Who are you?"
"The General of the Minutemen.", was the short reply. "I'm actually a survivor of the Great War, cryogenically frozen in my Vault - 111. I was released a bit ago and eventually regrew the militia into the military that defends the Commonwealth - at the behest of its civilian government, of course - today."
"So, wait: how old are you?"
"How old are you?"
The Lone Wanderer nodded. "I left my vault at age nineteen in search of my father in 2277."
The General leaned forward conspiratorially. "Well, I don't think I looked a day older than two hundred and twenty-nine when I emerged from my vault in 2287.
"Anyway, back to your question. I mean, I don't want to think that I'm trying to fast talk you or anything. Elder Danse was caught at the beach head he was trying to establish. At the second attempt to invade, I forced him out of the sky and to surrender. After receiving the assurance that all Brotherhood controlled territory was conceded to the Commonwealth and that the Brotherhood of Steel was to be disbanded, I allowed every ex-member to go home to inform the other ex-members that their time oppressing people and killing others was over.
"Imagine my surprise when my people showed up here to restock Rivet City after Brotherhood pillaging and no one had informed the people of anything.", the General said dryly.
"The Brotherhood of Steel didn't rule the Capital Wastes.", the Lone Wanderer informed.
"Seeing the lack of infrastructure, concern for its citizenry, or anything beyond its own selfishness for technology and recruits, I can believe that it. The Brotherhood didn't even bother to govern let alone do so competently.", the General forced her words into the shape of an agreement.
"No.", the Lone Wanderer objected. "I mean, Scribe Rothschild never wanted the Brotherhood to control anything."
"Scribe Rothschild?", the General asked. "Does she live here as well?"
The younger woman shook her head. "She resides at the Citadel."
"Huh, where's that?"
"Um...well, you're pre-war. It was called the Pentagon back then."
The General spilled a bit of her half drunk soda. "The Pentagon is the headquarters for the Brotherhood of Steel? Not just Edwards Air Force Base?"
"Yeah.", the Lone Wanderer agreed if not exactly understanding the importance of the General's inflection. "Wait, how do you know about Edwards Air Force Base?"
"That was where the Brotherhood launched their nuclear attack against us.", the General replied without blinking. "Did Rothschild order it?"
"No, Rothschild wouldn't do anything like that."
"Who would?", the General pressed. "Are you close to anyone else in their command?"
And at that point something smelled wrong to the Lone Wanderer. "No. I mean, I know Rothschild because she pays for books and I needed caps back in they day. You know how hard it is to find an unburned book."
The General smiled. "You're right about that. Back home, I've got fourteen issues of Astounding Tales and I remember that being everywhere back...well, before.
"Anyway, you were telling me of where else the Brotherhood of Steel was based out of."
The younger woman shook her head. "No, I don't think I was."
The red-head shifted her head, allowing the Lone Wanderer's reflection to slide along her WRAPAROUND GOGGLES. "Then what were we talking about?"
The Lone Wanderer shrugged. "How are the people of Rivet City getting clean water now what you've cut them off?"
"Cut them off?", the General scoffed. "Our first project here was to build them a copy of a design a young man from Diamond City came up with (at a cost our budget had to incur) to get a purifier for a town this size. Rivet City didn't even have a clean water supply until we built it."
"Project Purity was the water supply.", the Lone Wanderer objected. "My father died to make clean water available to the Capital Wastes. It's at the Jefferson Memorial, which you can see since you have vertibirds. The Brotherhood of Steel distributed it freely."
The General sighed. "First, the Brotherhood of Steel is supposed to be disbanded. So even if they did have such, they should have handed it over to us. But as I told you, I had to disband the Brotherhood of Steel because it kept committing war crimes. Which leaves the Commonwealth to try to take on the responsibilities it never performed anyway. Now, I'm not doubting that the Brotherhood of Steel or its reactionaries or whomever have this Project Purity. But I swear, not one drop has been delivered to Rivet City since my people have gotten here.
"But that's what I have come to expect out of them. Holding onto something like fresh water just to be a bully and keeping the tech for themselves. The Commonwealth is bringing in foodstuffs from the farms that they tried to coerce, after all.
"Can I tell you something? Elder Danse...well, he was a machine. I know it's hard to believe, but have you ever heard of synths?"
The Lone Wanderer stared at the goggles of the General. After a moment, she nodded.
"You hesitated."
"Because I swore to someone not to tell how.", the Lone Wanderer replied.
The General sat back. "The Railroad. You've worked with them in the past."
The Lone Wanderer looked back at her.
The General shrugged. "Well, now they work for me.
"Anyway, the Brotherhood of Steel may be a truly intractable program. We don't know how many of its various ranks are made up of robots that just want to kill - innocents, other Brotherhood members, whoever. But with Elder Danse being one of them, we may have to accept that the Brotherhood of Steel is going to be much more dangerous to the Capital Wastes than we previously thought."
"And you believe you can take them out?", the Lone Wanderer asked.
"I'm currently protecting Rivet City with a nuclear submarine."
It was the Lone Wanderer's turn to spill her soda. "I mean, I have other land, sea and air forces at our disposal as well. But it always seems like mentioning one of our nuclear submarines makes an impression."
"One of?"
"So don't you worry. We'll protect Rivet City and supply it directly until we can build a working economy, free from oppression, here in the Capital Wastes. Eventually, we'll make the Brotherhood of Steel a threat no more, despite them already agreeing not to be.
"It's the civilian problems that are becoming something. If you have any idea of how I can assure Rivet City's council that the Commonwealth only means them well as fellow citizens, let me know."
The General stood, pointing at the empty soda bottle. When the Lone Wanderer shook her head to mean that she did not need it, the General took it on her way out of her quarters. She told the guard outside, "She's a citizen of Rivet City. She can come and go as she likes."
The guard nodded and then shut the bulkhead.
2
"You're letting little Ms. Bad Ass go?", Colonel Bridget asked the General as they watched planes being taken for retrofitting or parts from the flight deck of the half an aircraft carrier Rivet City was built into.
"It's the only way I can disrupt the Brotherhood of Steel's ranks from the inside. If she believes that I'm here to help, the new recruits will scatter. And with the reminder that anyone can be a synth in the Brotherhood (since they don't have the Institute on their side), that should help bust them up too.", the General explained.
"And if she doesn't believe that we're here to help?", Bridget continued.
"She will when she's sent back here for more information and infiltration and sees that we're just bringing food, water, healthcare and commerce to Rivet City."
"What about her mercenary team?", the Colonel of the Marine Corps added.
"They're sell swords.", the General reminded. "I lose how many people trying to kill, how did you say, Little Ms. Badass? Then I lose how many people when they seek revenge for one of their own - not out of any great sense of empathy, but to keep the threat of their gang alive."
"I understand.", the ex Gunner admitted.
"Don't worry. After they report back to the Brotherhood that we have a superior military force with the intent to destroy them to their last, and that we don't believe any one who stands against isn't a robot they'll be sent right back here again. And then we'll buy them if it becomes necessarry, and have them all die under our banner trying to take that."
"That?"
"Project Purity. Either the Brotherhood of Steel would be left without a resource or Reilly's Rangers will be dead in a fight they can't win."
