Much about how gen-three synths work and what the Institute's plan for them was in this story will not match what's in the game, because the lore in the game is pretty scanty and doesn't always make sense. Even watching Oxhorn's meticulously researched videos didn't give me a useful canon! So I scrapped that and went with the rules that grew in my head as I played the game. Please accept this large lampshade with "well this is an AU" written on it.

Begin Recording

The Odd Troop

Recording by Scribe Ellison

Brother and sister scribes, I have met my first synth! The whole day was worth recording so I will edit in footage and commentary from the morning on.

Young Adam is in the habit of blessing his breakfast of sugar bombs and dried mutfruit flakes by making an elaborate gesture over his food and saying, "With this sign I take in the glow."

For whatever reason this morning the ritual annoys Shiloh who shoots back, "Taking in the glow just gives you the shits!"

"Shiloh, language."

"But Mom! It's so dumb!"

The General leans back from her table and reaches out to physically squelch her daughter by pushing down on her head. "Being mean to your friends at breakfast time is dumb too if you're hoping they'll help you with the waterwheel later."

Shiloh pouts, visibly does the math, and says, "Sorry Adam. Maybe I don't understand about the glow, want to tell me about it while we work on the waterwheel later?" and peace among the kids is restored.

Em rolls her eyes and smiles.

The whole population of Sanctuary eats more or less together, in their houses if the weather's bad but on fine mornings the outdoor tables are crammed with people planning the day's tasks while fueling up. Breakfast is cornbread, razorgrain bread, butter and mutfruit jam, cheese, or a cereal made of flakes of dried mutfruit. Occasionally a preserved box of Sugar Bombs makes an appearance but that's mostly for the children. I tried a bowl and found them disgustingly sweet.

The General is ostensibly in charge of work assignments but she doesn't usually need to bother. The morning conversation includes mention of anything that needs doing and plans will be made to address the problem. Most of the work is gardening and preserving the harvest but there are also many tasks keeping the buildings in good repair and caring for the local wild brahmin herd. Everyone also tries to get some kind of combat training in, either swinging a bat at a dummy or shooting at targets or skeet. Today the pitching machine that pitches balls of dried mud out over the river is broken and there's a call to fix it so everyone can practice.

The siren rings the all-clear to let us know a friendly visitor has been sighted. People who have finished eating amble over to see who it is. Em heads for the bridge to meet the visitors and I follow.

Shaun seems to have skipped breakfast to help Sturges take apart the pitching machine. We hear his piping voice talking excitedly about springs and gears as the two of them work.

The approaching visitors are a troop of Minutemen in drab uniforms and the official hat with the brim curved up for a sunny day in the Commonwealth. One of them pulls off her hat to reveal bright auburn hair.

The General passes me to hug the young woman. "You look great."

"I'm not sure about this uniform and I'm not calling you General."

"Never thought you would." Em says, laughing. "Is the job ok at least?"

Her friend has the strangest way of speaking, the words twist and rasp. "I get paid good caps to whip new recruits into shape. It's very ok. This's my troop! Percy ye know and that's Rueben and the ghoul is Luce. I brought a present for Mama Murphy!"

"Yeah? She's over by the food. Hi Percy!"

"General!" Percy is a dark skinned earnest young man with a strong resemblance to Preston Garvey. I wonder if they're brothers, or father and son.

The auburn-haired girl says, "Who's the skinny little nerd with the holorecorder?"

"That's Scribe Ellison, he's up from the Capital to learn from us and he's probably recording. Don't scare him. This is Cait, she teaches combat at the Castle."

The girl looks it, she's muscular under her uniform and carrying half a dozen weapons, none of them the traditional laser musket. I don't bother to protest that I am not in fact scared, because nobody else seems to be. She waves to settlers she passes and unwraps her gift for Mama Murphy.

The old woman smiles a watery smile. "Hello, Cait."

"Brought ye sumthin', picked it up at a bookstore. Has your picture on it."

It's a box with a picture of a woman dressed in a shawl and turban just like Mama Murphy, which turns out to be full of colorful cards. Mama Murphy is delighted. "Tarot cards! I've never seen a full deck. Thank you."

"Figgured you could use these and you wouldn't need the chems. I'm Irish, so I know all about the second sight."

"Child, you don't know anything about Ireland. But someday you will."

"What? When? Mama Murphy are ye just trying to distract me? Ye need a better plan than fryin' your brain every time you want to use the sight."

Em says, "I've tried, maybe you'll have better luck."

She leaves them to it, asking Percy what the troop has seen on the walk up from the Castle, as the newcomers unload their gear. They'd seen a dolphin wash up still alive and take out two mirelurks before four more descended on it.

"So they breathe air?" Em asks like that's important.

Percy answers, "Seems so. It was still fighting after it was out of the water. Does that matter?"

"Maybe. If they breathe air then they don't have to breathe a certain kind of water so they can come up the river. So we'll have to keep an eye out. And I just want to learn more about them. Prewar dolphins were smart, smart enough to wreck our purifiers if they wanted to but maybe smart enough that we could learn from them what kinds of fish are safe to eat or where the sources of radiation underwater are, when our descendants start cleaning up the ocean."

I admire the General very much but there are moments when I believe her to be too optimistic. "Were prewar dolphins that smart?"

"Mmhm. I saw it on a documentary—that's like a movie but educational. I'm surprised you and the other scribes don't make them."

I confess, "Ah, the field scribes were only assigned to collect information about weapons until recently. Elder Robinson only started broadening our mission recently, and just for a few of us."

Percy leans over to look at me, "You're collecting information?"

"Yes. Ways to do things, history, and unique personal stories."

"Would you like to hear my story? I'm unique. I'm a synth."

I jump. I don't think anyone notices because Em's saying, "Percy, one of these days you're gonna say that to the wrong person."

My fellow scribes and errant readers, I must emphasize that Percy does not look in any way unusual. He is a young man of about my own age (twenty years) with brown skin, short hair and a bright smile. He could be an overenthusiastic initiate from home. None of you would find anything amiss about him.

This is somewhat disturbing. I had heard, of course, that synths are indistinguishable from humans but I'd assumed in spite of this that there would be some sort of tell. There isn't. Not when first meeting Percy and not now, several days later when I am updating the tape before sending.

The general just says, "As long as you're weeding while you're talking. These tomato sprouts won't have a chance if they get choked out."

All three of us look at the tomato bed with resignation. Pulling tiny sprouts one at a time is a very boring job.

Percy sighs, "Maybe talking will make this go faster. You tell him how we met, General."

We put on leather armor kneepads and get started on the awkward task. The easiest way is to kneel and clear every weed in reach and then scoot to a new spot. It's hell on the back and a great job to bribe the kids to do.

"All right. Hello, Arlington Library and Megaton, here is a story for you. I was trying to hunt down a yao guai around Walden pond and I stumbled upon an underground shelter untouched since the war. It was a good day but I still had to find the guai, it had been showing signs of rabies and needed to be removed. Instead of the guai, I found this guy."

"And I said 'I'm Preston Garvey and I'm collecting donations to rebuild the Minutemen!' Because I thought I was."

"And I'd seen Preston not five hours ago and he was up to his eyeballs in reports from settlements asking for free food. No way was he out here in strange clothes pretending he didn't know me. So this guy was either a very ballsy conman or a synth. So I gave him some caps and knocked him on the head and tied him up. Sorry about that."

Percy shrugs. "It would've been someone else if it hadn't been you. So Scribe, I woke up tied hand and foot down in a bunker with this woman I just met offering me a med-x and apologizing."

"I'd already called the Railroad come see if you were a synth. That was the scary guy in sunglasses. He got there quick but he did once claim to have a working motorcycle."

I ask, "Your friend has a-?"

"He also claimed to have a tame sentrybot he rides around the Commonwealth. I haven't seen that either. So Deacon turned up and zapped poor Percy."

I throw another sprout into the bucket. "Zapped?"

Percy shudders dramatically. "It was horrrrrible."

"It's a transmitter that unlocks a synth's memories and sends the synth into a frenzy. Usually it's a pretty ugly thing, but Percy barely freaked out."

Curious I ask Percy, "What was it like?"

"Well I didn't know much before, just that I was Preston Garvey the Minuteman and since I couldn't find any other Minutemen I had to rebuild the group! Not having any other memories I assumed I got hit on the head by whatever happened to the rest of the Minutemen. Made sense. Then suddenly I remembered being pulled out of a vat at the institute and having my head stuffed full of basic survival knowledge and then before I could ask if they were going to give me any clothes now that I knew what clothes were they dumped me! Said the Minutemen were no longer a threat and they'd lost track of the 'original' anyway. They didn't need me anymore so they threw me out to wander around thinking I was Preston Garvey. Now that I realized I wasn't, I still wanted to join the Minutemen so Sunglasses escorted me to the Castle and I joined up!"

He is so cheerful it's hard to believe. The General's smiling the same way she smiles at her children, affectionate and a little bit amused.

I can't help asking, "So is Percy… Garvey?"

"No. Percy doesn't have any implanted memories. If the Institute had finished programming him maybe, but as it is they just look alike, and not so alike now because only the real Preston got older these past years." Em gets up and stretches and moves to another spot.

"I'm a little half baked, as a synth. As a person, Colonel Shaw says she's seen recruits far less baked."

Brother and sister scribes… this synth is quite likeable. I am trying to work out whether this is because he was programmed to be, to make him more of a threat to humanity and civilization, or if this is simply his genuine personality. Can a synth have a personality? I had been expecting to meet a synth and yet now that I have I am still unsure what to think. I am thankful to have a scribe's standby to fall back on: I need more information.