Author's Note: Cantebury Commons is part of the spike of Minutemen held territory from the Republic of Rosie (ex-Republic of Dave) down through Underworld since Infiltration - 1. Hence, Old Man Stockton's operation in it as well as Causing Problems - 5.

1

"If you want to talk, MacCready, you're gonna have to do it in here.", Red warned. "I still have to keep an eye on Sticky Hands."

"Isn't it great to have a girl friend that loves you like this?", the man in bandages asked.

"It's been twenty years, I'm not your girl friend I'm your doctor.", Red said exasperated. "Just because I put you back together after you tried to steal a deathclaw's egg from it, doesn't change that."

"How was I know the dumb ole deathclaw would object?"

Red pointed at Sticky and glared at MacCready in desperation.

"That's fine, Red.", MacCready agreed. "Besides, you know what I want to ask about."

"Not this again.", Red lamented.

Lucia nodded as she cleaned up to take over from Red for her own shift in what passed as the Big Town hospital. "Yeah, this again. No wonder he didn't come back to me. He's in love with this general of his."

"I am not in l...", and then he noticed Lucia's smile. "Come here you."

"Stay away, Robert.", Lucia warned. "I'm washing for shift. Clean water is way too valuable to be wasted."

"That's another thing.", MacCready noticed. "I did tell you that the Minutemen have made sure that every community has water technology, right?"

Red huffed. "And plentiful food to trade for. And exterior protection from the Minutemen, but no internal policing. And civil rights, whatever the hell you mean by that, and a whole bunch of other stuff.

"But they aren't here. You are, for what? Another hour or two? We are. Lucy and Bittercup and Pappy and Knock Knock and Knick Knack and everyone. I'm not declaring sides in a fucking war on the other side of the wastes. And I'm certainly not stupid enough to tell the Brotherhood of Steel to go fuck they selves in that war when the town sits on their side of it.

"Like I told you nigh on a decade ago, you ain't mayor here. Unless there was some vote that I'm unaware of that took place when you and Lucy were shacking up."

Lucy scoffed. "He'd have to be staying for us to be shacking up. Right now, I'm just a fond memory."

MacCready rolled his eyes. "Mothe...oh, come on.

"Alright, I get it. I should have just come from Little Lamplight straight to Big Town. Then I wouldn't have met my wife and become a father, a widower, and a soldier. I disappointed everyone who came before me and a few who came after personally and everyone else in principle.

"But this opportunity can make up for it. The Commonwealth is an opportunity that it so great it is hard to describe. I'm convinced that the only reason you're holding out is that I'm not doing it justice."

Red folded her arms. "So I'm just stupid."

Lucia got between them. "Alright, none of that."

She turned to MacCready. "Look. I'm glad you've found something to believe in again. And don't give me that look - if you had believed in Big Town, you would have come here to me. But we haven't been to this Commonwealth because we are Big Town. Red has the right to keep us out of your trouble for as long as she can."

MacCready pleaded. "And what about Little Lamplight?"

The room grew quiet.

Red asked, very carefully. "What about Little Lamplight?"

MacCready let his voice grow softer. "You know, as well as me, now, that little kids shouldn't be living alone like that. Someone should be taking care of them."

"And a woman calling herself the General is just going to mother the entire population?", Lucia jested.

MacCready glared at her.

"We turned out alright.", Red reminded. "Hell, you let Duncan go live there."

"After you administered the cure to him.", MacCready countered. "That his father traveled half-way around the world for. They need some..."

"Oversight?", Red asked.

"Backup.", MacCready decided. "The Commonwealth has schools, Red. More than I've seen."

"And how many is that?"

"Alright, I've seen one. But there were more already on top of the ones being formed. And Little Lamplight has the chance at everything I've pointed out that Big Town has a chance at with the Commonwealth."

Red shrugged. "Then go take it up with Mayor/"

"You know Little Lamplight isn't going to accept something like that without Big Town in on it first.", MacCready scolded. "They're children."

Red let the silence grow. "We'll see in the future, MacCready. I remember when the Lone Wanderer came and taught us to defend ourselves against the supermutants. I don't want another war on our doorstep now that we've been able to keep survivors of Little Lamplight survivors of Big Town. Tell your General, and only your General, that if she keeps us out of the fighting and she can deliver and if we just so happen to look outside our walls and see nothing but Commonwealth instead of Capital Wastes then she won't get any trouble from us."

"Red/"

"It's what I got, MacCready.", Red told him. "You'll like it. Not even 'or lump it'. You'll take that with a smile on your face and nothing else. Even you aren't the Wasteland Savior coming in here and telling us what our next move should be. So don't act like you saved me from slavery and built up our ability to defend ourselves, when all you did was go have a family somewhere else and leave Lucy here to wonder what the hell happened to you until you brought Duncan to us."

"And then to find out you went and married that bitch."

"Lucy.", MacCready objected.

"No, I get to.", Lucy told him. "You kept all of us alive for five years in Little Lamplight. And another year when I had to leave to come here and wait for you. And then you didn't come. I'm happy you're here. But I get to be mad that you ditched me. And I get to worry that you aren't coming back unless you can super soldier your way through the Brotherhood of Steel. So I get to be mad that you're going to make me worry. Again.

"I'm not Bittercup, so I'm expecting you back. But if Red's re-election depends on her not signing up for the Commonwealth until they aren't just a pipe dream crossed with a war we aren't even fighting, then she's got my vote. And I don't think anyone else is going to vote against her."

MacCready rolled his eyes so hard he only saw the brim of his hat. This visit just caused more trouble than it solved.