Partners
Synopsis: Charon follows his young employer as she remakes the wasteland's future; Sage reaches her journey's end.
The Capital Wasteland, 2277.
The subway tunnel lay still and silent, save for two rhythms of breath.
Charon had quickly learned three things about Aniss.
First, she was a child. This was what had thrown him off when he'd observed her in the Ninth Circle; he had never met a child so old. She was nineteen, she said. Legionaries were long considered adults by then — in his former life, Charon had already been married. Her health and demeanor proved she'd had a pampered upbringing, allowing her to cling to this dependent innocence she now held. That made Charon the babysitter.
They had cleared the area well and camped behind a chain link fence and an apparatus of machinery he couldn't name. She'd set an array of rusted cans in the path to alert them if they were approached in the night.
The second thing he'd learned was that Aniss was GNR's vault kid. He'd realized this once she'd mentioned that she was looking for her father — another function of her childishness. It wasn't just family loyalty spurring her on, but a complete lack of the self-authority to do anything without him. Of course, Charon had no room to criticize.
If Three Dog's reports were to be believed, which they usually were, that made Aniss some sort of hero. The beam of light from her wrist gave him little to go off of, but he could almost see it in her face. She was alert, diplomatic, well-meaning. Maybe the type to defuse a bomb or stop a kidnapping. Charon had enjoyed mercenary work before, but he fostered a healthy skepticism of the situation.
They had both finished eating awhile ago. She was still reading the contract. The marks it bore from the past made his tattered skin crawl. She was either memorizing the terms, struggling with the faded handwriting, or just waiting for him to go to bed. If it was the latter, they would both be disappointed; he was on duty until his employer either slept or ordered him to.
He hadn't gotten a wink of sleep last night. Resting horizontally was unfamiliar after so long, and it left him feeling exposed and defensive. He'd spent the night scanning the skyline and watching Aniss breathe. Maybe if she ordered him to bed first, it would help, but he wasn't sure how to broach the subject properly. Decorum would be important, a clean slate, and speaking out of turn felt weirdly inappropriate. So she carried on not looking at him.
The third piece of information Charon had learned was that Aniss was afraid of him. Any number of factors could have caused this: He was a ghoul and she was a sheltered, pristine vaultie. Despite their relatively small age difference, she was still a girl, and he was a grown man. She wasn't used to having a traveling companion, and certainly not to giving orders. Probably the most significant thing was that Charon had recently slaughtered her predecessor before her eyes.
While he hadn't necessarily meant to intimidate his new employer with the show he'd put on, it was an added bonus. Finally, a grasp of the leverage he'd always lacked — one step out of line, and she'd someday be just another mural on the wall. It wasn't true, of course; only a combination of happenstance and Ahzrukhal's carelessness had allowed Charon his vengeance, and any amount of precaution would prevent him from repeating it at the contract's next transfer. Anyway, he wasn't as vindictive as she seemed to imagine. A mountain of injustices had merited Ahzrukhal's death sentence. Childish as she was, he wasn't sure Aniss was even capable of arousing enough of his wrath for an execution. Maybe a firm smack on the head. Still... he'd been blindsided before.
Aniss looked up to see her bodyguard staring from the darkness. She jumped in alarm, then turned the light on him.
"You scared me."
"You have nothing to fear from me."
She forced a smile. "Thanks."
He hadn't done anything worth thanking, but if stating the obvious brought her comfort, then so be it. He had plenty to fear from her, but he didn't tell her that. She would know soon enough.
Three things still brought Charon happiness: Guns, dogs, and ending people who needed to die. This junkyard had afforded a rare opportunity for all three. Aniss and Charon were surrounded by several dead raiders and a frazzled, grieving, and very affectionate dog.
He was young and spry, about knee-height, with eyes in two different colors. He didn't seem like much, but the blood on his mouth suggested these raiders hadn't all been killed by his dead master. Aniss recognized another lost soul and was speaking softly to him, trying to calm him down.
"Want to come with me, boy?" she cooed, hands in the fur of his neck. "It's dangerous out here all alone." Her voice lingered on "alone," musically melancholy. Did she still consider herself abandoned?
Charon wouldn't blame her. He'd proven himself reliable, he hoped, but he was still little more than a weapon in terms of relatability. He'd politely rebuffed any attempt at conversation over the past few weeks. Aniss had had the grace not to push it.
"Dogmeat's gonna travel with us for awhile, Charon," she told him over her shoulder. Dogmeat — it didn't sound like a name she'd make up herself, but there was no discernible source for it — had his front paws propped up on her knees so he could sniff and lick her sweat-sheened face. "That okay?"
She had asked. He must answer. "He is small. Not a war dog. He will not be able to keep up with us."
Aniss shot him an alarmingly dark look, and he shut up. There was a little too much Meg in her, he noted — asking for input when she really wanted approval. Charon wasn't opposed to having a dog (actually, he wanted it a little more than he was comfortable wanting anything), but he didn't like the thought of getting Dogmeat killed out there.
But the decision was made for him, so he relaxed. "Will it fall to me to take care of him?" he asked mildly, hoping that in her high spirits she wouldn't find it impudent.
"No! No, no, I promise I'll do it all. There won't be any more responsibility on you."
So eager. Charon thought better of teasing her again, even though he knew how short-lived her promise would be. This would be one work detail he didn't mind.
Aniss was annoyingly true to her word, so Charon had little time to befriend their ball of fur and fury. The dog, like his owner, was cautious around him. He'd warm up to Charon given enough attention, but Charon didn't want to intrude on his employer's territory. So he was stuck on the fringe, but at least the atmosphere had become less icy.
The girl was strange. She was on a quest for her father but afraid of what she might find, so for some time she scoured every inch of the Capital Wasteland except the museum a quarter-mile from Underworld that held the next link in the chain. Eventually she pressed forward, and their hunt led to the name Stanislaus Braun, with no location attached, and all the exploration finally served a purpose.
And then, without explanation, Aniss decided to take off on a shady riverboat to some place called Point Lookout.
"If this man meant no harm, he would allow me to accompany you."
"Maybe. There could be a million other reasons."
Charon was agitated. "It is too dangerous to consider."
"I've gotta find Nadine. She's like me."
"We can force Tobar to tell us what he did with her and be done with it."
Aniss smiled slyly. "If this is jealousy, you'll always be my favorite ferryman."
His warnings were a joke to her, of course. His brain forced upon him the image of her bloodied corpse, and he already felt like a failure. His misplaced sense of duty, along with his deep-simmering rage, had grown with every additional signature on the contract. It roared now at the idiot child who looked out over the Potomac with him.
He was still staring at the murky water when she waved goodbye from the starboard side. The riverboat disappeared from view as he watched the nothingness. Dogmeat lay obediently with his face between his paws, watching alongside him. A high-pitched whine barely escaped his throat. Charon patted his head.
When it became clear Aniss wasn't about to come back, Charon moved back to Underworld to wait for her. Dogmeat kept him company for about two weeks before running off into the wilderness. Charon wanted to hunt him down, but the contract held him in place.
Underworld was much the same as it had always been. Sydney had set up shop in the Ninth Circle, so the two were roommates of a sort. He was free to talk to whomever he wanted, but he had little to say.
Until he was once again confined to the underground, Charon hadn't realized how fulfilling his life had become with Aniss. It seemed she was always trying to help people. The odd part was how often she succeeded. Her idealism would come back and bite her someday.
Someday came sooner than later.
The bar's door opened like someone had fallen into it, and Aniss dragged herself through. She sat, and Charon slowly took her in.
Her head was shaven clean, and a fresh scar with horribly jagged stitches arced from temple to scalp to forehead. She showed signs of withdrawal and sleep deprivation. More than that, she was haunted.
Her hand found his arm and latched on like he was the only solid ground for miles. Her lips twitched, trying to come up with the words, and finally tugged into an unsure smile. "Point Lookout kicked my butt."
"I warned you," Charon said coldly. Just like he'd warned Master and Ahzrukhal and Meg and everyone else who had ignored him.
"I guess so," agreed Aniss thoughtfully. "Found Nadine, though."
She'd left Point Lookout after being drugged and operated on by a clan of tribals. She claimed they'd removed a piece of her brain, and the scar attested, but she seemed functional enough. Still, the experience must have stuck with her, because she didn't let anyone touch her after that.
Anyone, that was, except Charon. He became her medic for any issue she couldn't handle by herself, and she didn't hire any actual doctors unless she had no choice. She stopped going to Snowflake for haircuts, and flatly denied Pinkerton's offer of plastic surgery. When Dr. Lesko had mentioned implants, she'd left his subway without a word. Talk of anything that involved giving someone else access to her body made her skittish.
Idealism jaded over, she became a much easier traveling companion. She had no trouble making Tenpenny's fall look like an accident, and her fatal fight with Moriarty seemed a little too fortuitous to have been a pickpocket gone wrong. When she whispered sultry promises into a man's ear, she listened to Charon's warnings that he might come collecting.
She got results. With her bodyguard at her back, she became something to be feared. While her right hand lobbed plasma grenades at Talon's mercenaries, her left handed out water to beggars. Charon was pleased not to have to fight off a cringe every time he affirmed his loyalty to his employer. The criminal underworld Ahzrukhal had nurtured was burning, and he loved feeding the fire.
There were moments. They'd be engaging in a frontal assault, gun smoke filling their nostrils, and her eyes would blaze with righteous fury, lip bitten bloody in concentration, and he could barely recognize her as the girl who just months ago had fallen desperately under his protection. Was he really fulfilling his duty if, on his watch, a part of her had died?
Charon didn't much care about the abstract. His own innocence hadn't lasted half as long as hers, and she was making the most of losing it. He wondered, though, what James would think of what had become of his daughter.
They played a game of sorts, on long travels or sleepless nights. Aniss would poke and prod him for information without saying anything that would impose an obligation to answer.
"So, were you around when the bombs fell?"
"Which bombs?"
"The big ones."
"I have seen many big bombs."
"Alright, alright."
He wasn't strictly opposed to telling her anything, but he treasured this modicum of privacy, and he thought perhaps she enjoyed the mystery.
"I can't read all these signatures on your contract."
"Neither can I."
"But you know what they say."
"I cannot read them."
"Come on."
"Am I to take that as an order or an exclamation?"
"Up yours."
He wondered how his contract let him get away with it. It was disturbing to think how much power his subconscious had over its terms. He reasoned that if she'd wanted direct answers, she would ask direct questions.
"So... how does a guy like you end up as a ghoul?"
"Radiation."
"Ha. What if I asked about you specifically?"
"You are my employer, and I will answer your questions to the best of my ability."
"How does a guy, specifically you, get exposed to so much radiation?"
"Negligence."
"You? No way."
"Not my negligence."
"Sheesh."
And so it went. When she pushed too far, she would back off, until the games got fewer and farther between. Years later, he would wonder why he begrudged her the information for so long. By then, she never asked at all.
Charon didn't know if ghouls could die of exposure (the fact that he no longer sweated or shivered suggested no), but he wasn't eager to find out. The Capital Wasteland was going through an unusually cold snap, forcing raiders to ditch their armor for real clothes, sending mole rats and yao guai into their burrows, and calling a halt to the small team's wandering for the day. They tumbled into a small, weakly-lit corporate building somewhere west of Tenpenny Tower. Dogmeat, energized by the lobby's relative warmth, immediately started chasing his tail. Aniss moved to set the nearest disposable item on fire, stripping Charon's gloves off her hands. He kept close, if only because it was warmer on the side of the room with two other living things. The cold was painfully uncomfortable now that his skin no longer went numb with it.
The fire was reluctant to light, and Aniss and Charon crouched together over the small bucket of makeshift kindling to negotiate with it. Foolish, foolish mistake to assume Dogmeat would watch their backs for them, but the crouching made them smaller targets, and the first volley of bullets zipped into the wall behind them.
Raiders, three of them. Chemmed into frenzy, and unhappy to find that their intended shelter was occupied. Charon reacted first, half-standing to hide Aniss's smaller form from view, and reached behind him for his shotgun —
The shotgun leaning against a chair ten feet away. Foolish.
Aniss had started shooting, but so had the raiders, and Charon lunged at an angle to take the one with the assault rifle by surprise. The man's spray of bullets never ceased as the ghoul fought for a hold on his gun, and after peppering the dusty ceiling with bullet holes, he managed to turn its muzzle toward the attacker's companions, a wing-haired woman with a handgun, and a filthy brute wielding a golf club and slurring obscenities. The woman went down, the distracted golfer's head was separated from his body by Aniss's railgun, and the rifle announced its emptied magazine with a click.
The man finally regained his composure and dropped the weapon, stumbling out of Charon's range. Charon swung the gun like a bat, but the raider produced a pool cue from behind his back and managed a clumsy block, taking the blow to his shoulder and fingers instead of his head. His left hand loosened its grip as he hissed in pain, and Charon's knife found the opening, wrenching a well-aimed gash into his neck and chest. The serrated blade held its grip as he fell, spluttering briefly and messily into the floor.
Done. A glance told him Aniss was fine, and Dogmeat was back, busily ensuring the fallen woman was dead. Good. Then why did Charon still feel so...
All at once, he knew. It hadn't been a problem in so long. Meg had given him the gloves to help, but. They were on the chair with his shotgun and. And he knew, and he knew he shouldn't look, but then it was staring him in the face, black and shining in the dim office light, boring a hole into his brain.
His hands, his right hand the most, but they both — why didn't he have his gloves — the blood. His arms were trembling up to the elbow. His hands were stained by the blood.
"My hero!" Aniss singsonged, trying to get his attention. He barely registered her presence, almost cowered from it. He was two thousand miles away, a boy again, and all was lost.
Aniss was on him now, muttering quick and low, searching for the source of the blood, trying to find an injury she could fix. Couldn't she see it — blood in rivulets, torrents, oceans, and it rolled down the screen on her arm and covered her hands the way it was covering his.
"Hey, hey, look at me." An order stabbed through his consciousness, clearing the haze by a sliver as the contract forced his obedience. "You're not hurt, it's not your blood." Of course he knew that, he had just killed —
He forced air into his lungs and tried to escape her steadying hold. She was panicking too, unable to understand. Did she feel it pooling at their feet? Was it lapping at their ankles — no. That was the dog.
Aniss finally ended it, sacrificed precious water to rinse the blood from his hands. It washed off into the thin carpet, no more than a sheen of sticky liquid. The low light had played tricks on his eyes, bringing nightmares to life. She thumbed awkwardly at the residue, trying to wash it from the cracks and layers in his palm. He pulled away, returning to himself, and wiped his hands on his armor.
"You're okay..." Aniss whispered uncertainly. Dogmeat leaned against his leg, sniffing and searching for the source of the commotion. Charon stepped gently away from their assault, toward the overturned fire bucket and the desk chair that held his gloves. He pulled them on and sat, letting the memory of Meg squeeze his hands while his heart stopped racing.
Moments later, he found his voice. "Forgive my impropriety." Dogmeat stood his forepaws on the ghoul's knees, and Charon leaned to give him attention, happy to avoid having to look at his employer.
"No- no need." Her voice shook. Charon didn't quite have the energy to be mortified, especially with a thirty-pound dog trying to climb into his lap. The tightness in his chest hadn't quite subsided, but he was on planet earth again.
Twenty minutes, a warm fire, and two-and-a-half rations later, Aniss was still trying not to stare too hard at her bodyguard. He expected her to ask uncomfortable questions, but they went to sleep without fanfare, and disposed of the bodies in the morning.
It was hard to tell whether Charon or Dogmeat was the antsier of the two. Dogmeat would gnaw at his molerat bone one moment, sniff around for Aniss the next, run up and down the garage's hidden staircase, then come to rest at Charon's feet, attending to his bone once again. Charon stood stock-still, but his eyes roved unceasingly around the vault's threshold, and his nerves jangled.
He didn't exactly wish he were inside Vault 112. He wasn't needed, and Aniss had worried how any remaining vault residents might react to meeting a ghoul. But he didn't like losing track of her for so long. This place may have felt like home to her, but he was well aware of Vault-Tec's legacy. Even Caesar had spoken of their sins with a cringe. Vault technology had been his stay of execution as a legionary and his tormentor for nearly six years. He hated it for both.
His orders were to stay, so he stayed. Aniss should have told him to check on her after a certain amount of time. As it stood, he couldn't leave this spot unless his life or hers was in danger, and he had no way of knowing her status. So he stayed.
Dogmeat barked. In an instant, Charon heard it too: two voices, fast approaching. Dogmeat ran to greet them as soon as they rounded the corner into the vault entrance. Aniss was glued to the side of a man who could only be James. Grey, nondescript, and gentle. He looked like the type of person to think he could bring clean water to thousands of people, maybe even the type to actually attempt it. He walked with an arm around her shoulder, but let go when intercepted by the dog. Then his attention shifted to Charon, inquisitive and cautious.
"Dad, this is Charon, my bodyguard," she chirped to him. "Charon, this is... my dad." The Aniss who'd emerged from the vault, he noticed, was the child he'd met back in September. She was bubbly and shy, and he wanted his employer back.
"How did you manage to find a bodyguard?" James asked. He was in a vault suit, same as her, and he looked stressed and malnourished, but his body language broadcast both love and determination.
"I've managed a lot of things," Aniss said smugly. She wanted his approval.
"Charon? Am I pronouncing that right?" James approached then, and Charon wondered what he thought of his daughter traveling with a ghoul, but the man's eyes were warm. "Thank you for taking care of her."
Charon didn't explain that it wasn't exactly a sense of personal duty that had brought him here. But he supposed he had kept her alive, and that had to count for something.
Great, now he was looking for James's approval.
It was too good to last, and Charon had sensed it. Project Purity was a pipe dream, and if the wasteland didn't take it, it would take itself. What he hadn't expected was that trouble didn't come from inside or around — it came from above.
The Enclave descended on the Jefferson Memorial in an instant, all stars, stripes, and cold fire. Aniss, Charon, and Dogmeat fought their way into the rotunda and witnessed it go down. On the other side of sealed glass, James argued with the Enclave's commander. Aniss ran up the steps to join Dr. Li in watching, gaping openly at the sight of her father surrounded by armored soldiers.
"Colonel, I assure you that this facility will not function," James was explaining slowly. "We have never been able to successfully replicate test results..."
The Enclave officer ignored James's protests, opting instead to turn on his heel and murder the other scientist trapped with them. Aniss and Li both yelped in alarm, and James's eyes darted to them as he stepped back.
The officer relished their reactions, though he frowned at James's calm. "I suggest you comply immediately, sir, in order to prevent any more incidents. Are we clear?"
"Yes, Colonel," James submitted. Charon recognized his tone. Grim, and resigned, but not to the fate the Enclave had planned for him. "I'll do whatever you want; there's no need for more violence."
"Then you will immediately hand over all materials related to this project, and aid us in making it operational at once," the colonel snapped.
"Very well. Give me a few moments to bring the system online." He moved to the control panel. Aniss released a shaky breath when she saw him comply.
"Enough of these delays!"
"It'll only be a few more moments."
And a few moments it was. An explosion rocked the rotunda, and the room was filled with the sounds of howling Enclave soldiers and machinery gone wrong. Charon felt the spike of radiation even from his place at the railing, and knew that within the confines of the purifier, it must be deadly. As the colonel convulsed and fumbled with a needle, James dragged himself to the airlock door, leaning heavily against the glass where Aniss trembled in shock. "Dad, get out of—"
"Run," he begged her, but she shook like a bobblehead and refused to move. "Run!"
Still she stood, clutching at the door as if she could tear through glass even as her Geiger counter complained. James dropped heavily to one knee, and Aniss could no longer refuse to understand.
Charon appeared at her back, arm around her chest, and eased her backwards. Her screams barely resolved themselves into words, which, at least, meant she couldn't order him to let her go. He didn't know whether more soldiers were arriving, or if the room was about to explode, only that James had said to run.
The man was quickly losing consciousness, but for a brief moment he locked urgent eyes with Charon. The words played out silently on his face. Get her out of here. Protect my daughter. Please. His head hit the floor.
Aniss threw herself forward, wailing, but Charon half-lifted her down the stairs and spurred her forward to escape alongside Dogmeat and Li. Li, shaken, was muttering an explanation that Charon didn't care to listen to.
"I'm not leaving my father in there!" Aniss flailed her legs to escape his grasp, hysterical.
"There's nothing anyone can do for him now," Li said curtly as they made it out of the rotunda. "The radiation levels in there are lethal. You'd die the same way he did."
Finally, Aniss stopped struggling. Charon pulled her into a defensible corner to get ahold of herself, not quite hugging, but not letting go of her either. A dead Enclave soldier lay a few paces away. The armor would probably fit him, he decided. Aniss keened, and he shushed her firmly. The noise would draw the Enclave right to them. Her head came to rest against his chest, and he took it to mean she was calming down, and let go.
Dr. Li started again to explain their escape plan. Aniss appeared to be listening, so Charon took the time to strip the corpse of its power armor and prepare for battle. Safe to assume he'd be leading the charge from here.
He assumed wrong.
Aniss and Li were both composed by the time they'd descended into the tunnel. Charon's employer stuck to the task at hand, but her cracks showed — she snapped at the scientists, refused to answer questions, and bickered with Li over who was in charge.
The Enclave met them in the tunnels. It was hard fighting, but the adrenaline rage kept her moving. She kept her head well, steady as ever, but she didn't fight to get the party through to safety. She fought to kill. Charon kept as close to her side as he could get without his shotgun deafening her.
He stayed at her side when they surfaced on the shore of the Potomac, and Li shouted their way into the Brotherhood's vast military base. The elder arrived to hear the situation. Aniss shrank from attention, clouding over.
He stayed at her side as she wandered through the halls of the Citadel, looking for who-knew-what. He glared away anyone who looked like they might try to strike up a conversation. The place was a treasure trove of information, but Aniss had none of her usual curiosity. All she wanted from it was a dark corner.
He stayed at her side in the barracks as she lay curled in a bunk, dead to the world. Every time she came up for oxygen, Dogmeat's tail thumped on the blanket, and he licked the tears from her cheeks. If anyone had a problem with a dog sitting on the Brotherhood's bed, they didn't approach the guard to complain about it.
Charon didn't relax when Aniss finally fell asleep. Confused-looking initiates hovered in the doorway periodically, wondering why a ghoul in Enclave armor was staring them out of their own living quarters. He wasn't quite sure, himself. Nothing in his orders demanded that he protect his employer's sleep schedule.
He felt... charged. A personal charge. That glance in the rotunda could have meant anything, but he'd already consented to its imagined implications.
Project Purity was dead once more, along with its mastermind. It was no surprise; in Charon's experience, everything truly good was either subdued under evil's boot, or crushed by it. But not Aniss. Aniss adapted. People believed in her, believed she might still make it. If she didn't pull a stunt like James had today. If her bodyguard never let that happen.
He wasn't going to let it happen.
Those were dark days. The Enclave spread across the wastes and rooted itself like a cancer. People started disappearing. Vertibirds puttered overhead more and more often. Everyone was on edge.
Well. Charon had always been on edge.
Aniss recovered, sort of. Her grief showed itself in odd ways, ways that often involved the Enclave and violence. She shot at their aircraft, sniped their soldiers in their camps, crippled their friendly little eyebots, and even attacked radios when she heard them spouting Eden's propaganda. Charon didn't like it.
Not that he was one to turn up his nose (or lack thereof) at violence. Killing Enclave was a good hobby, and a productive one at that. Just that he was a person of consistency, and he liked his employers to be the same way. Spontaneity was well and good when you were only making decisions for one person, but it wasn't as fun for those dragged along for the ride.
And... maybe he'd thought better of her.
"Two hostiles around the left corner. Don't get blindsided."
"Never."
She smiled, or he thought she did. The helmet didn't quite obscure the approving turn of her head. Fairfax was brimming with human vermin, and Aniss saw no reason to avoid bloodshed by skirting around it. The raiders had somehow managed to get ahold of a store of explosives, mostly grenades, but one had definitely been lugging a missile launcher on his shoulder, and they didn't know how many more were underground. Charon worried for a moment that he was about to run into some old friends, but these people had a few too many corpse decorations and a few too few card tables to be of concern.
The raiders around the corner attempted their paltry version of a suicide charge, one firing blind while the other lobbed grenades, screaming. Charon heard Dogmeat yelp and didn't stop to think before he rushed the second raider, shooting the grenade to blow up in her face.
The explosion's echo didn't quite conceal the warbling hum of Aniss's unfamiliar energy weapon. All was still, and Charon ran back to check on Dogmeat as Aniss dealt with the bodies.
Dogmeat's flank was a bit bloody but required no attention. Charon tousled his ears to encourage him onward, and the dog let out a soft whine of excitement. Their little friend might have had enough for one day, Charon thought, and he hoped they could make camp soon. But he knew Dogmeat would press on however long they asked him to. He was good like that.
That settled, something seemed off. He realized Aniss was talking. The raider he'd assumed dead was still standing, swaying on the spot as she spoke to him. Charon was at her side immediately, hackles raised.
The raider looked drugged, which wasn't unusual. The odder thing was the thick, heavy band around his neck — a slave collar. Had that been there before?
"Wake up, bud," Aniss said silkily, slapping the man's cheek with her fingers.
"Why... how's my..." the guy slurred. Suddenly, he snapped to attention, hand flying up to the collar. "How in the—"
"Settle down, now," she said, triumph in her voice. "That's a bomb collar. It'll blow your head off if you mess with it, or if its tracker doesn't like what you're doing, or if I just decide it should."
This... no. Aniss wouldn't. She was tough, but never cruel, not like this. Such an evil contraption was so far beneath her to use against someone, not a raider, not the Enclave, not even a deathclaw deserved this.
"Am I a slave?" The man's voice quavered, finger still hooked around the collar.
"You could be. Or you could be dead," she said pleasantly. Charon shuddered. "But I think we'd both prefer you be neither."
"What do you want me to do? I'll do it, anything."
"I need you to scrape some caps together, or take them from me. I need you to visit the nearest settlement with your weapon holstered and your hands up. I need you to go to the doctor and tell them you've got a chem addiction. I suggest Bigtown, maybe Megaton if you can't find it." Aniss was smiling, coldly maternal. "It might not be a party, but it'll beat withdrawal in the slave pens, that I can promise you."
"Okay. Can you please just take it off?"
"Tell me what you're going to do first."
"Gonna find a doctor. Gonna get clean. Gonna stop raiding, forever. Forever." He squirmed, giving no indication as to whether he meant it. "Please."
Aniss let the silence hang for a moment longer, then gently grabbed the back of the man's head and bent him to where she could work on the collar. "Okay, I'm taking it off now. You'd better start praying."
She was enjoying it. And the raider was so grateful, so awed by her mercy that he told them where the other raiders were holed up in the city, and what their armaments looked like. It was sickening, she was sick. He felt sick.
Pleased with her new tactic, she used the Mesmetron on more raiders as they tore through the Fairfax underground. Charon would cover her, and she would take aim directly at an attacker's head. Sometimes they would stop short with a sudden headache, and their cranium would burst open, splattering their companions with its contents. Most of the time, it worked correctly, and that was worse.
He obeyed, helped when she asked him to. He kept his face in stone; he wouldn't compromise the operation by showing emotion. But all the while, he felt the hot fist of sun-scorched metal clenched around his throat, the hitch of labored breaths, any one of which could have been his last. His father's blood, caked and dried on bound hands, and not enough water to wash it off, not even enough to drink. His mother craning her neck to look back at him every so often, trying not to draw attention, trying to push through exhaustion and not get left behind to the mercy of the desert. A line of dead eyes stretching a quarter mile long, the whole death march swallowed up in heat haze.
Charon couldn't remember setting up camp for the night, couldn't remember barring the abandoned apartment's door behind them, couldn't remember cleaning his weapon, but he must have, because it was all done. Aniss poked through drawers and cupboards, humming along with the radio. He was on the floor, Dogmeat sprawled in his lap. "Good boy," he whispered.
Aniss waltzed over after a few minutes. He felt a familiar revulsion spring to his chest, seeing her face-to-face. She smiled at the duo on the floor.
"There are chairs in here, you know."
"If you wish for me to sit in a chair, I will do it."
"Relax."
He let the tension out of his muscles at her casual order, but she couldn't force his mind to stop spinning.
She plopped down across from him, apparently content to forego chairs if he was. "You've been doing the rote act all day."
"If my employer is offended by my speech, I will modify it."
"I'm trying to have a conversation here." Dogmeat's head swiveled between them as they spoke.
"If conversation is your order to—"
"Stop it!"
He did. Better that way; he didn't want to talk to her. He was curious, though, what she would do. Her behavior was unpredictable lately, especially with this new betrayal.
"What's going on with you? Was it something I said?"
She didn't even suspect— how could she not know? "It was nothing you said." He agonized over what to say — there were no words to explain. He didn't think he could bear it if she ignored what he had to say, dismissed him like all the others. He shook his head as he fumbled for an answer. "You are a monster."
The corners of her mouth twitched up, as if she couldn't quite figure out whether he was joking. His blank stare answered her question. She leaned back, suddenly much less comfortable. "How am I a monster?"
Her empathy enraged him. "You tampered with people's minds and put them in chains. You thought nothing of it. You exultedin it."
"Did you miss the part where I let them go?!" She wasn't scared of him like she had used to be. She had learned her power. It was reason enough to be afraid. "Collaring someone isn't wrong as an alternative to killing them."
"Killing them is justified. They invited it when they attacked us. Nothing can justify... that."
"You don't think they prefer a second chance to death? I gave them a choice—"
"What does it matter what they prefer?" Charon was getting breathless. "An evil thing is still evil, even if it is done for a person's own good. It is evil."
"Morally gray, maybe. But nowhere close to evil." Flustered, she crossed her legs. "Do you think there's a chance you're overreacting?"
Dismissed. She didn't intend to hear him out. Not that he knew how to explain any further. "I am reacting. It is unacceptable to you, just as your behavior is unacceptable to me."
She turned her attention to the ceiling. "Look, if this is a matter of feelings, then that's one thing. Not that you've given any thought to my feelings, talking like that. But my conscience is clear."
Charon slid his hands across his face, stony but increasingly distressed. "It is wrong," he protested.
"We can discuss why you feel this way. Sometime, not tonight. I'm just... so upset at you right now." And she was. Her jaw was locked, and she was avoiding eye contact. He didn't want to know what he would find in those eyes if he could see them.
"You do not want to discuss anything. You want to shut me up and continue as you were."
"You jerk, you psychotic jerk!" Aniss cried. She stood up and turned fully away. This conversation was ending fast.
Aniss had never insulted him like that before. True, he'd never called her a monster either... For the first time in awhile, he felt the familiar sensation of abject powerlessness. "We are supposed to be..."
The silence hung. He didn't know what they were anymore.
They went to bed. They woke up. She didn't stop using the Mesmetron.
Ghouls experienced radiation as a peculiar sensation, not inherently unpleasant. Some chased the feeling, and many more might have, but there was a popular belief that indulging too far in it could make you feral.
Charon thought about that sometimes, going feral. It was entirely unpredictable, and perhaps inevitable, though ghouls like Carol called that into question. He didn't like the thought of losing what little control he had over his mind. Hopefully Aniss would be able to do the right thing if the time came. Even though they weren't speaking right now, the thought of hurting her felt like an egregious breach of duty.
Background radiation sparked at the base of his spine, not quite enough to set off the Geiger counter, but enough to be felt. Adrenaline thrummed alongside it; dead supermutants dotted their path through the gore-strewn vault's hallways.
Aniss hunched over a desk terminal, elbows on the table. She would pore over old records for hours just to find one scrap of data that might be useful. Much of it was duplicated into her Pip-Boy, especially in places like this.
The sterile functionality of the Vault 87's architecture had him more on-edge than the supermutants did. Vaults, they should both have known by now, were bad news. But Aniss felt obligated to finish her father's science project (which was currently inaccessible, guarded by enemy forces, and potentially unable to be completed without the three scientists lost in the attack). Besides that, there wasn't really an open line of communication between the Wanderer and her bodyguard at the moment. Otherwise, he might have told her how uncomfortable he was to be here, on the off chance she'd care.
"Bad news," she said, interrupting his thoughts. "Sounds like the G.E.C.K. chamber is going to be flooded with radiation. No telling how bad it'll be."
It explained why Charon could feel the radiation's brilliant electricity even from here. He said nothing.
"The paper trail is alluding to some weird stuff, though. Some sort of experimental program, information getting covered up. If 87 was doing experiments on its own vault dwellers... the Brotherhood will want to know about this. It could be the answer to why they've never been able to find the supermutants' nest."
Since when was she marching to the Brotherhood's cadence?
"Are you even listening to me?"
"I am obligated to listen."
"Well then, say something."
"This place is not safe."
Undaunted, she dragged them further into the depths of the vault. Besides another army of supermutants and some more terminals to waste time on, they found the experimental wing, lined with testing cells. Aniss stared openmouthed at the horror entombed in one of the cells: a humanoid figure, warped beyond belief, with nearly a normal lower half but a head and torso swollen like that of a supermutant, bursting out of its blue jumpsuit. Its body twisted as if screaming in agony.
"Guess they were right about those experiments," she murmured. "You think the G.E.C.K. is on this level?"
"I can feel it."
"You can?" She pulled herself away from the test lab, unwilling to subject herself further to the memory. "Charon, you think you could retrieve the G.E.C.K. for me?" she asked brightly, eager to finish the job.
And Charon found himself very eager as well, because nothing in his mind compelled him to say yes. Simple fetch quests were beneath him, had been ever since the contract had been signed, and Aniss had neither Ahzrukhal's mind games nor Qavrok's threats to get him to do it. "The contract entitles you to my services in combat. I'm nobody's errand boy." It felt so good, after the tension of the past week, to tell her no. To be inconvenient. To have leverage, any sort of power, even the power of inaction. "I'm afraid you'll have to get it yourself."
She gawked at him. He wasn't sure if she noticed his glee, but he didn't try to hide it. "What is this about?" she asked weakly.
What was it about? About being here in the vault? About the Mesmetron? Or about the petty string of injustices he had to face without complaint every day? For all he knew, it was about Ahzrukhal, about Meg, about Joshua Graham, about the simple pleasure of the word no. Maybe he was avenging every innocent person who'd been hurt under his orders — but no, it was more selfish than that. It was about seeing her face fall as she realized her power was not absolute. This was a problem she could not face.
"It is about the terms of the contract."
"Charon..." she begged. "This is really important to me. The G.E.C.K. could help a lot of people."
"Then you had better find a solution. This one's all you."
Unable to formulate a response, Aniss turned slowly and continued down the hallway, calling Dogmeat to heel.
She didn't have much to say to him after that, but she found a new friend in the gigantic, friendly supermutant found imprisoned in one of the isolation rooms. This hulk liked to speak, and had been very short on conversational partners for the past 200 years. Charon just watched in confused wonder as they chattered pleasantly back and forth. He chalked it up to a vaultie thing.
Finally (and there was no telling why this hadn't been the first order of business), she managed to free Fawkes the mutant from his cell, with the agreement that he would be the one to retrieve the G.E.C.K.
Fawkes roared with joy as he escaped. He wasn't being aggressive at all, but his powerful lungs made Charon want to reach for his shotgun. It took him awhile to make his way to the G.E.C.K.'s chamber, stretching his legs for the first time in... ever, apparently. He helped fight his "brethren" along the way, and he was good, about as strong as an overlord if Charon had to guess. But he didn't seem to be any threat to Aniss, so her bodyguard relaxed.
It was when Fawkes came back with the G.E.C.K. that Charon felt the first twinge of guilt. Such a simple, monumental task, and he had been willing to risk Aniss's life over it. And the scary thing was that she probably would have done it, in a foolish imitation of her father's sacrifice. A part of Charon grumbled that he deserved to be selfish, after everything he'd unwillingly given. But casting a net through his memory, he couldn't think of a time Aniss had intentionally put her needs above his. Even clean water, which he didn't need, she was sure to apportion evenly. And now, when she still saw the faint glimmer of hope that no one else would, she was fighting to give water to everyone.
He crushed the guilt down eventually. It had worked out, hadn't it? She hadn't gotten hurt. He wouldn't have let her, anyway. They had the G.E.C.K., and they were f—
Charon woke with his ears ringing. Dogmeat lay splayed by his side, still unconscious. They'd been positioned against a wall by mysterious forces while they were knocked out, and an overturned shelf hid them from view in the corner. Aniss was notably absent.
So. Either whatever had knocked them out had missed her and she'd gone, or she had been taken. And he wished he could convince himself of the first option, but it didn't seem likely. She wouldn't have left them in enemy territory if she didn't have to, and whatever had hit them had to have been planned. It wasn't planned by supermutants, he could comfort himself with that, or none of them would be left alive. (Unless they'd only taken the one they could infect with FEV. But no, too terrible, not logical.)
That left the question of who'd moved them and the shelf. Aniss definitely couldn't have (maybe with the help of power armor?), and it was unlikely that their attackers would. Had to have been Fawkes, then. Yes, Fawkes would know.
And reality hit, because finding Fawkes would be no easier than finding Aniss. And finding Aniss was impossible. There was no telling how long he'd been out, or how quickly the enemy had been able to move. If (and the idea seemed more plausible the less he wanted to believe it) the Enclave had taken her, they could move by air, and their base was hidden and impenetrable.
And they had the G.E.C.K.
So. He had to... Okay.
He scooped Dogmeat up and held him to his chest. They were vulnerable to attack, so he moved quickly through the halls of Vault 87. He was at least able to rule out the FEV theory, because the test labs were just as they'd left them. Good. Not good. Whatever.
Murder Pass was still choked with the bodies of supermutants they'd killed on the way in. Nearing the exit, Charon heard a triumphant cry, and he had only a moment to react before bullets were coming at him. He dropped, spinning onto his back to cushion Dogmeat's fall. Must have been the psychotic little gate guard.
There was chatter from the gate, and then several heads peeked up over it. "Hey mungo! Are you dead?" shouted the mayor.
"You'll wish I was," Charon muttered. He checked his shotgun for injury and picked up the dog, who was whimpering into consciousness. He fixed his flattest death glare on the kids as he approached the gate. "Did Aniss come through here?"
"Maybe she did, maybe she didn't," said MacCready, being, per usual, as annoying as humanly possible.
"Is she lost? Did the monsters get her?" asked the younger guard, the one from Paradise Falls.
"Aw, Sammy, you gave it away!" complained Princess, apparently unconcerned about her terrible display of trigger discipline.
Charon growled to himself. "Open this gate."
"Magic word," MacCready reminded him nastily.
"Suffer."
The kid laughed and ordered his lackeys to open the gate. Little children were crowded on the other side, eager to know what had happened in Murder Pass or to pet his dog. Charon tried to swim through the crowd without pushing any of them, and finally they decided he wasn't going to do anything interesting and let him through.
On the surface, the sun was setting. Wind hissed through the dead forest. He lingered there for a minute, having a meal and gathering himself. Dogmeat kept turning back to the cavern's entrance as if waiting for Aniss to come through.
No options presented themselves except to return to Underworld and wait. It was hardwired into Charon's mind not to go anywhere his employer wouldn't be able to find him, and with no leads, he couldn't compromise that requirement.
Protect my daughter. Please.
He didn't remember much of the journey home. Dogmeat broke off on his own again, and again there wasn't anything Charon could do about it.
When he got back to the Ninth Circle, the Enclave radio was off-air.
It was a musty, interminable day in Underworld, like the hundreds Charon had experienced before. Sitting still didn't suit him. He was reading one of Sydney's books out of sheer boredom, picking out random words he recognized rather than attempting to follow the plot (which, from what he could tell, was stupid). Suddenly, the sound of claws on stone, and Dogmeat was on him, yelping for attention.
Aniss was here. He'd known she was alive, but seeing her well (fully encased in power armor, but not visibly harmed) calmed the contract's persistent nagging at his mind. Fawkes loomed behind her, drawing unabashed staring from the ghouls in the bar.
Her leg bounced when she sat, the only clue to her feelings behind the armor. Charon realized he didn't quite know where things stood between them.
Interpersonal relations were such a waste of time.
"Time to go, bud," she said, a note of caution in her voice.
"I regret that I cannot join you at this time," he replied calmly. "You seem to already have someone in your employ."
"Are we doing this again?" Her voice from within the helmet was distorted and alien.
"I regret it," he repeated. He did. The contract didn't prohibit him from traveling as one of multiple employees, but it didn't force him to, either. In earlier years, he hadn't enforced it often, preferring to minimize conflict. But always, even in the Jackalopes, his needs had come last. If his own wife could neglect him when she had too many mouths to feed, so could Aniss. The radiation poisoning under Badaboom had been the final straw. He'd sworn to enforce that provision in the future, and now he was.
Aniss sighed heavily, slapping her hands on her knees. "Okay. Would you prefer to stay at home?"
"No." As much as this place was tainted with Ahzrukhal's memory, he liked Underworld.
Her neck rolled a bit at that. She dug in her pack for a few pouches. "Here's 500 caps. I'll probably be back before you run out of those."
"Thank you." Was she overestimating how many caps he could use, or did she intend to be gone for another six months?
"See you around, Charon." And she was gone.
She visited occasionally, mostly sitting in silence after a mutual status update. Fawkes just ambled around the room attempting friendly introductions to the ghouls, a few of whom would oblige. There was, at least, no awkwardness with Dogmeat.
One day, Fawkes came in alone, saying he wanted to spend some time in the Smithsonian and catch up with the holes in his knowledge. Aniss was doing fine, he said, a little reluctantly. They'd had a small disagreement. She needed some time.
Well, she took all the time she needed, because Underworld didn't see her for awhile after that. When she finally showed up, it was with a man about her age in a vault suit and leather jacket, whom she introduced as Butch. She'd mentioned this person, described him as some fierce rival, but he just struck Charon as an idiot. He smoked indoors, was openly uncomfortable being in Underworld, and carried an open switchblade as if that would intimidate anyone outside of a vault. It was hatred at first sight. Fawkes, Charon could understand — he was an intelligent wrecking ball with nowhere else to go — but choosing Butch over him was just insulting.
It had been months since they'd really talked. Maybe if he just explained himself. But that opened the door to some anecdotes he wasn't sure he felt like telling.
The next two times she visited, it was with Star Paladin Cross. The ghouls didn't like having Brotherhood on their home turf, so they were short visits. Liberty Prime was nearly working, and they were about to make a push for the purifier. It would be a brutal fight, but in the end, hopefully the Enclave would lose its grip on the area, and Project Purity would finally be active.
All of Underworld seemed to be huddled around the radio for updates. No one dared walk the streets; the whole wasteland held its breath. Three Dog gave them every scrap of information, every conflicting rumor he could find about the battle for the purifier. It was confusing for awhile, but it became clear that the Brotherhood was winning.
From there, it was hard to be certain of anything. Enclave fled the area, there was an explosion in the Jefferson Memorial, and... silence.
Then the silence gave way to rejoicing, because it quickly became apparent that Project Purity was functional, and active, cleaning thousands of gallons of water per minute and releasing them back into the tidal basin. From the sound of it, everyone was excited, even Underworld. Infrastructure sprang up immediately to try to start distributing the water, spearheaded by the Brotherhood.
Days later, Three Dog was able to confirm via his mysterious informants that the Lone Wanderer had started the purifier personally, but hadn't been heard from since. And things began to fall into place.
The purifier had been damaged when James sabotaged it. The radiation from the basin had to go somewhere, and unless the Enclave had fixed it, that somewhere was the control room. They'd seen what that looked like.
It could have been the explosion, or just an attacker. But her whereabouts were unknown, and the Brotherhood sure was keeping its mouth shut. Logic dictated...
Another week passed. Things were settling into a holding pattern. A ghoul moved into Underworld claiming he'd turned the clean water into a cure for ghoulism. And still nothing.
He finally brought up his concerns to Fawkes.
"Ah, my friend," the goliath said mournfully. They weren't friends, but Charon didn't correct him. "Thank you for informing me about this. If what you say is true, Aniss's destiny has culminated most beautifully. We may grieve momentarily, but we should be glad that the universe chose her in this way."
"I was asking if you think it's plausible," Charon growled.
"Aniss was a true hero. She would not have hesitated, if the situation was as you feared."
"Stop saying was!"
For the first time, an employer dead on his watch. Not just any employer. Aniss. Fawkes was convinced, at least. Charon needed confirmation before he could do anything about it, but denial increasingly gave way to dread.
And what would he do? Well, he would sit in this bar. Unless by some miracle he learned of a new legate with the rights to his loyalty, he had no one to give it to. Aniss had no known next-of-kin, and finding one from here would be impossible. And Ahzrukhal was dead — could the contract revert back to Badaboom? The rules were all in his head, and he didn't know.
He convinced himself it had been the radiation, just for the irony of it. If he'd been with her, he could have activated the purifier without trouble. He wasn't sure if the contract would have required him to — that was usually something that revealed itself in the moment. No matter how much thought he gave, he didn't know whether he would have gone in.
Two weeks.
As Three Dog helpfully reminded them, two weeks had passed since the battle. Two weeks into a world on the mend. The first signs of life began to flourish, yet life wasn't worth its own cost, because the Capital Wasteland had lost the greatest hero it would ever know, and he could have protected her but didn't. He'd been given his precious choice, and chosen wrong.
Silence broke in the Ninth Circle. Heads turned. Sydney's face broke into a grin. It wasn't until Charon heard the stomping of metal footsteps that he looked.
Through the door she came, knight in tarnished armor, head higher, eyes fiercer than ever before. He had once thought that good was destined to fall under evil's heel, and maybe that was true. But it didn't have to be crushed. Pressure had turned her not into dust, but a diamond. Faceted, razor-sharp, and unbreakable.
Radiant, she smiled.
Somewhere in the depths of Sage's memory was a vast mural of faded, chipping paint. Soldiers of old rode lithe horses into battle, reins flying, guns pointed at the sky. The horses reared and snarled at their bits, horses in every color. The younger Sage had stared at the horses, hand outstretched but stopped, unwilling to disturb the paint further. Their wild eyes had bulged with adrenaline, comically large in their heads, terrified of a violent world they had the experience but not the knowledge to understand.
Arcade's eyes looked exactly like that right now.
"You okay there?" she asked him, hand on his shoulder from the passenger seat beside him. He nodded, and couldn't quite seem to stop nodding. It was funny, but not really ha-ha funny. More like getting the wind knocked out of you in battle, laughing internally because the only alternative is panic.
"So," he said finally. "The Lone Wanderer. Proud destroyer of all that is, supports, or vaguely resembles the Enclave. Obtained Gabriel's contract six years ago, the contract which we are trying to get back. And I, junior member of the Enclave Remnants, am supposed to fly her across the continent in an Enclave vertibird, hoping she doesn't find my Enclave father's Enclave power armor hidden in the Enclave vertibird—"
"Arcade, calm down." He looked at her flatly, an improvement from panicky. "She's supposed to be a really nice person. Even if she figured it out, it wouldn't be the end of the world."
"'It's probably fine,' is no way to live life. I prefer 'It's definitely fine.' Maybe better than fine. Maybe..." He paused. "I don't really know how to ask you to do this without compromising the mission."
"I'm the mayor of New Vegas. I have a personal vertibird for diplomatic purposes. My medic flies it because he's the smart one. They won't be suspicious if we don't have anything to hide." She grinned cheekily, hoping to cheer him up.
He sighed. "Are you acting like you don't care just to calm me down, or do you really not care?"
Her hands flew up defensively. "Hey, I care! Keeping you safe is my first priority now. But the mission is a close second, and I think we can manage both."
Arcade's voice gentled a bit, but its tempo increased as he went on. "Sage, I don't think this is a fight you want to get into. I don't know what sort of performance boosters, or, or cybernetics this person is on, but she's supposed to be some sort of monster. I mean, the amount of stories that involve her and weapons of mass destruction is — well, it's too high for one person."
The corners of Sage's mouth tightened. "I think Veronica's heard different stories."
"And I'm not saying mine are all true! But do you see what I'm talking about?"
"Arcade." She repositioned herself so they were face-to-face in the vertibird's seats, uncomfortably close, but she didn't falter in eye contact. "I'm not going to let anything happen to you. I'd fight all the paladins, centurions, and rangers in the world. You know I would."
He ran a pale hand over his hair, calming himself. "So we're proceeding as planned?"
"If you'll agree to. Unless she decides to just give us the contract, we can't do this without you."
"Then I guess we're headed to... Megaton."
"A town built around an atomic bomb," Veronica shook her head. "I think they need to recheck their zoning."
"Keep an eye out for the saloon. That's where we need to go next," Sage said.
"Drinking on the job, Six," Boone chided her, half-smiling.
"You two sure are chipper," complained Arcade.
Sage was ignoring them and already making her way to the building with a poorly-painted sign that read GOB'S SALOON. Gob's name was painted over another person's, indicating a change in ownership. The winding streets, strangely empty for the number of buildings crowding the crater, took her to their front door. Its handle was broken.
She pushed forward only to be met with resistance. Something heavy barricaded the door. "Hello?"
"We're closed," came a woman's smooth voice from inside. "And we can wait you out as long as we need to, because you're not getting in here, okay?"
"Okay. That seems a little bit bad for business."
The woman snorted. "I don't recognize your voice, hon. What are you doing here?"
"Carol told me this is where Gob lived. And, you know, the sign."
"Carol sent you?" asked a ghoul's gravelly voice, getting closer. "What about? How is she?"
"Uh, she was fine. Business good and whatever. But the Brotherhood seems to be investigating Underworld for something."
An awkward moment of silence. "Yeah," Gob said. "So what did you need me for, friend?"
"I just need to find Aniss. Do you know where she is?"
"She went out to deal with... something. If she's back, her house is to the left of the city gate. Anyone you ask could tell you which one."
Finally, finally, finally. "Thank you, Gob!"
"Don't mention it."
After a bit more searching (this town was a maze), she was standing at the doorway. "Alright, guys, look polite."
"Is screaming polite?" asked Veronica.
"No. Get your screaming out now."
Veronica squealed girlishly, bouncing her knees. "Okay. Now I'm ready."
Sage knocked.
2262-
Protective Custody
2263-2265 -
2266-
January - Distance, No More
October - Power and Beauty
2267-
2268-
Ensnared
The Way Forward begins
2269-
2270-
The Way Forward ends
I Can't Help Falling in Love With You begins
2271-2273 -
2274-
I Can't Help Falling in Love With You ends
Tik Tik Boom begins
2275-
Tik Tik Boom ends
Treacherous begins
2276-
2277-
January - Sage destroys the Divide
February - First Battle of Hoover Dam
July - The Mummy Returns
August 17 - Aniss leaves Vault 101
The Prodigal Son
September - To Set the Record Straight
Dead Man Walking begins
Treacherous ends/Partners begins
November - The Burned Man Walks
2278-
March - Dead Man Walking ends
April - James dies (Purity War begins)
June - Guide Her Through the Night
Bitter Springs
September - Project Purity activates
October - Partners ends
November - Human Capital
2279-
Adams Air Force Base (Purity War ends)
2280-
May - Dogmeat's Vacation
August - Boones are married
2281-
New Canaan is destroyed
October 11 - Sage is shot in the head
October 19 - Sage wakes up
2282-
ED-E, My Bud
2283-
January - Second Battle of Hoover Dam
February - To Have and To Hold
April - Awake, O Sleeper
May - Worst-Case Scenario
July - Mercury's Messenger
August - Safe Haven
September - Power and Beauty (pt. 2)/East and West begins
October - East and West ends
