Chapter Thirty-One
Precipice of War
I walked through the catacombs beneath Old North Church and hoped to any god that might be listening that I wasn't making a huge mistake. If I was, everything would go to hell. We wouldn't even need the Institute — we would kill each other all on our own without their help. I really didn't want things to come to that.
The sudden light of a reflector shining right into my face blinded me so much that I had to stop. Well. This wasn't exactly how I had planned it, but at least I knew I'd found the Railroad. Or... they'd found me, at least. I didn't want to show Danse the other entrance to HQ. I loved the man, but I didn't fully trust him with that knowledge — I hoped the Railroad would appreciate that.
"Hold on, Blue? Is that you?"
I hesitantly nodded as my eyes slowly adjusted to the light.
Desdemona wasn't here. This time it was just Glory pointing her minigun at me, and Deacon standing by her side with his hand on the handle of his gun. I breathed out. This was fine. We were friends. Just because I was coming here with the enemy didn't mean I wasn't their friend.
"What are you doing here? Wearing that?" Glory nodded at my Brotherhood uniform. "I almost blew your head off."
Damn it. This was going to be difficult.
"Don't shoot." I held my hands in front of me, showing that I was unarmed. "Please. You can't hurt him."
They exchanged glances and Glory hesitantly lowered her gun.
I motioned for Danse to join me in the reflector's light. This felt so familiar, just like the first time we'd met the Railroad... Then why did I feel more nervous now than I had back then? Just because I had more to lose?
He shot me a look. A look that said he didn't want to be here, didn't believe this was going to work, and hated that he had agreed.
Deacon beamed as soon as Danse stepped into the light — I'd never seen the man look happier, as a matter of fact. He managed to hide his glee within seconds, but I knew what I saw. That made me feel a bit more confident. At the very least, Deacon was definitely on my side.
"You asked me to find a way to make this work, with the Brotherhood of Steel. And I did." I swallowed. "I found a way. His name is Danse. He's..." I hesitated. "like you."
Glory's eyes widened.
"That's... I can't imagine you've had it easy." She offered to shake his hand. "I'm... happy to meet you, Danse."
"I..." Danse seemed dazed or overwhelmed for just about a fraction of a second, before he accepted the handshake. "Likewise, I'm certain." He cleared his throat. "I think we might benefit from a certain partnership between our organizations."
I took a few steps back, leaving them to it. I felt myself let out the breath I hadn't realized I was holding. I also hadn't realized my hand was on the handle of my gun until now.
Of course, I didn't think I would actually kill Glory or Deacon to defend Danse — they were my friends, after all. Of course I wouldn't shoot them. Of course I wouldn't.
"Will Dez let him in?" I asked.
Deacon breathed out. "She has to. She's not stupid. If there's even a chance to work things out with the Brotherhood, it's worth taking. They have the resources we need, desperately. They would have made a dangerous enemy and they would make a strong ally. So, yeah. Don't worry. And I promise I'll make sure no one hurts your boyfriend while he's here. He's a guest, see!" He smiled widely.
I shook my head at him. He was impossible sometimes, though in a good way.
"Deacon, how long have you known Danse was a synth?"
He looked at me. "I have no idea what you're talking about."
Fine. If he wanted to have it that way. I wasn't sure if I wanted to know, anyway.
I tensed up when I saw Glory introduce Danse to Desdemona on the other side of the room. One wrong move and everything could go to hell. I watched him show that he's unarmed and then hesitantly explain something to her. He pointed at me at one point, and she nodded along.
Crisis averted. So far, at least. If I managed to get the Brotherhood and the Railroad working together, others would surely follow. They had to, if today went well. This meeting was the most crucial part of the plan. Assuming Danse and Desdemona didn't declare war or murder each other, we were on the right path towards building a united front against the Institute. This was good. For the first time in far too long, there was hope.
"What now?" I whispered.
Deacon shrugged.
"Now we go to war," he muttered.
I looked at him. I hoped he was joking. He did that a lot, didn't he? This was... This was just another one of his jokes.
He looked dead serious.
oooOOO*OOOooo
I'd left Danse alone at Railroad HQ. Well, no. Not entirely alone. I left him with all of the Railroad.
I left the leader of the Brotherhood of Steel alone with the entirety of the organization who had just planned to decimate the Brotherhood of Steel barely a month ago.
I really hoped I hadn't made a huge mistake. I hoped that I was exactly as good a judge of character as I hoped I was. That Glory would make sure no one hurt Danse, and that Deacon would make sure something came out of this meeting. That it wouldn't just fuel the animosity between the two factions. I was putting all of my trust in the man who himself had admitted was a compulsive liar.
I had to trust him. For the plan to work, for any of us to stand a fighting chance against the Institute, I had to trust Deacon right now. I couldn't micromanage. I had my own allies to gather. I had to go to Diamond City and Goodneighbor and somehow talk them into cooperating — Goodneighbor into cooperating with the Brotherhood and Diamond City into cooperating with the Railroad. I honestly didn't know which would be more difficult.
I hated not having Danse beside me through this all. I hated that he'd had to stay.
But this needed to work. It needed to work and it needed to be him. He needed to be there.
It couldn't be me. It had to be him.
My role, I now realized, had never been to save anyone. That had just been a nice lie I had told myself — a lie that my self-centered view of the world after the war had been so easy to construct. A lie fed by the praise of my friends, of Nick and Piper and Danse and even, to some extent, of Preston and MacCready. It had been a convenient, comforting lie. After all, we all like to see ourselves as the hero in our own story. But I was no hero. I realized that now. Saving people had never been the role I was meant to play. My role had always been to find the right people and bring them together so they could save themselves.
I had brought Nick Valentine back to Ellie, to Diamond City, to where he belonged, to the people that loved him. I'd helped him and he helped me. Not surprising: he'd always been good at finding people, too.
We'd found Kellogg together. Kellogg had not been a good person, but he had been the right person. And I was good at finding the right people. I wished I hadn't killed him when I had. I wished things had gone differently. Knowing what I knew now, about Shaun, and the boy who had lived with him, and about the Institute... I wished we'd worked it out somehow. The Institute had played us both. Kellogg and me alike. We'd been nothing but pawns, thrown at each other with the hope we might rip each other's throats out like starved dogs in a cage fight.
I hated that the Institute had won. I hated that I still hated Kellogg even though I knew they were the ones responsible for everything. I hated that my hatred was so strong, and I really hated that I hadn't stopped hating them. Even after killing Kellogg. Even after finding Shaun. Even after killing him.
The more blood I spilled, the brighter my desire for vengeance burned. It wasn't even just about vengeance anymore, either. I hated the Institute and everything they stood for — I hated them for playing god and creating sentient, thinking people in their labs, and I hated them for treating those people as little more than slaves. I hated Shaun. I'd never mourned his death properly in the end. I'd mourned losing my son, but I'd never felt any remorse for killing the Director of the Institute.
It had been different with Shaun. It had been something I had never done before. I'd killed — I'd killed in self-defence, out of principle, because I was ordered to, or because it was the right thing to do. I'd killed more people than I could count, which was not a good thing, and it meant that the Wasteland won just a little bit, that I had lost myself just a little bit too much, but... Those had been bad people. Raiders. Bandits. Slavers. Shaun had been a bad person too. Not like a raider, but... just as bad in his own way. In a different way.
The difference was, Shaun had never attacked me. He had never ordered anyone to kill me. He hadn't done anything to start a fight.
Now that I thought about it... I was pretty sure he'd even had his back turned on me.
I hadn't thought about that day at the Institute since it'd happened. There was so much to focus on afterwards, anyway, and then the whole mess with Danse... I'd tried to push the memory out of my head. I'd done what I could to forget it. It... I'd gone down to the Institute and when I came back, he was dead, but I...
I hadn't murdered him.
...Had I?
He'd... He'd turned his back on me. He'd thought I was going to cooperate, or at least give out my opinion... I remembered taking out my revolver. It had been an easy shot. I remembered painful, sober clarity. It hadn't been in some fit of rage like the anger that overtook me so often when dealing with the Institute. No, my mind had been crystal clear. I even remembered thinking that it was good he was facing away from me. I would be able to catch him off-guard.
I'd killed people before, but that had been the first time I'd murdered someone.
I was not a hero. I was a murderer. A murderer who had some very good friends, who had somehow been so lucky as to find people who held her up and helped her along her way. People who cared. I owed them everything.
Finding the right people wasn't always easy. They weren't always good people. Shaun and Kellogg had been bad people, but they had been the right people. I'd needed to find them. I was glad I had.
Just as I was glad I'd found Preston and Danse. On my first day out of the Vault, my first day in the brutal reality of the Wasteland, I'd managed to help people. To get the Minutemen out of the bind they were in. I'd saved those people. It had, admittedly, come at a cost. I'd had to spill more blood to save them. But it had made me feel... good. It had made me feel like I was a good person.
I'd found Preston Garvey, the right person, at just the right time. I'd arrived when he needed help the most, and I would always cherish that. It hadn't been a conscious effort on my part, just a happy coincidence, but I'd managed to be exactly where I needed to be, exactly when I needed to be there.
I'd found the Brotherhood of Steel purely by accident. Again finding the right people proved to be my talent — or maybe my destiny — but I hadn't managed to find them in time. I'd found the bodies of the soldiers from Recon Squad Athena just days out of the Vault. It was curiosity that had driven me to investigate, to follow up, and eventually find Recon Squad Gladius. The right people. At the right time.
I'd found Danse as I had found Preston — at the eleventh hour, when all hope seemed lost. And like Preston before him, thanks to my timely rescue Danse now also found himself at the helm of the organization he'd been a part of. I'd managed to save both of them and somehow guide them to become leaders. Generals. I wasn't a leader — I just found the right people. The right people not just for me, but for the Wasteland. For the Commonwealth.
The Commonwealth needed Preston leading the Minutemen. The Commonwealth needed Danse leading the Brotherhood. In a different life, it might have been me in their place, but it simply wasn't my role. They were the right people. They could turn this hopeless situation around in a way I wouldn't have been able to were I in their place.
I'd found MacCready and Piper. They had been the right people too. But not in the same way Danse or Nick or Preston were the right people because they were what the Commonwealth needed; Piper and MacCready had been the right people for me. Perhaps they had even been the right people for each other, in a way that I didn't like thinking about.
I should have realized it sooner. I should have realized that I was meant to find the right people, because if I had understood it sooner, I might have spared myself a lot of heartache. I might have realized that I'd found Danse, the right person, and that I no longer needed to search. We could have had certain conversations much sooner, we could have done so much more. We would have been more prepared for what would eventually come. I should have known I was able to find him. That I wouldn't have trouble finding Nick Valentine when he went missing. That I would be able to run into not one, but three Institute Coursers in my search for a way down there. Or that I would be able to track down Virgil, the right person, and get him to help.
That memory left some bitterness on my tongue. Virgil. I hadn't managed to save him. That one had been a hard blow to survive for all of us, especially for Danse. I'd never asked him about it straight out — maybe I should have, maybe he was putting on a brave face, maybe it had affected him even more than he let on — but I'd seen that it had been difficult for him. Maybe it had felt like he was reliving his worst memories. Maybe it had been the final, definitive answer that there was no cure to the FEV, that there likely never would be, that had got him so down.
I'd killed Virgil.
I'd killed Virgil like I'd killed Shaun. He hadn't been an enemy. He hadn't been armed. He'd been just...
He'd asked me to. It was different. It wasn't— That hadn't been like with Shaun. That...
It wasn't the same.
I had to believe that it had not been the same. I wasn't a murderer, not— I wouldn't let the Wasteland win. Not yet. Not in that way. I had people who believed in me, who saw me as something better than what I was. As what I could be. I wanted to be better for them. They didn't know who I was, they didn't know what I'd done. They didn't know it was my fault that the Institute had turned on us all so quickly and so suddenly. The only person I'd told that I'd killed the Director had been Arthur Maxson.
And he'd taken that secret to the grave. My secret.
I hadn't told anyone about what I'd done. I'd mentioned that my son was gone, that he had been gone for a very long time, and I thought that I recalled telling Piper about the Director, but it was all fuzzy. The only clear memory in my mind was telling Maxson, and his anger with me over it. I had been scared at the time. Now I understood. He should have been angrier. He should have asked more. I wished he had. I wish he'd made me tell him, I wish that I had told at least that one person, even if this person was gone now, about what I'd really done.
No one knew I'd murdered him. And I didn't see myself telling any of them, either. These people believed in me, and I couldn't bring myself to crush that faith. Piper was so convinced that we were the good guys... She would be crushed. I couldn't do that to her. I doubted MacCready would understand, what with his situation with Duncan and everything. He'd always been a better person than me. Nick had never understood my drive for revenge. He'd said he doesn't go for blood money. He'd tried to focus me on finding Shaun instead of on killing Kellogg. He would never accept what I'd done. Danse was struggling already with his new role in the grand scheme of things, of being alienated and forced to look for answers himself. I wasn't blind; I knew he was looking to me for support. I knew he saw me as a better person than I knew I was. If I broke that trust now, I had no idea what would happen to him.
I was a murderer, and I couldn't tell anyone.
oooOOO*OOOooo
A week. A week since Danse and Desdemona first sat down and started discussing a possible truce and it seemed like nothing was coming out of it. Whenever I asked, Deacon said that things were delicate, but didn't they see we didn't have time for that? We needed to start doing something. Did they think the Institute were idly sitting by? They had to be plotting something down there and we weren't preparing properly!
Hancock, when I'd asked him, had listened in silence while I explained that probably, maybe, possibly, he might have to soon fight side by side with the Brotherhood of Steel and that it was what the Railroad was doing too, after which he'd just laughed in my face and walked away.
I wasn't doing so great with my gathering of allies.
"What am I doing wrong?" I groaned.
I felt completely hopeless. A week since the Railroad and the Brotherhood began peace talks, and that had taken me a few days to organize after Danse had asked me to, almost a week after we'd managed to get that beryllium agitator... I didn't like the math. It had been three weeks, almost a month, since the Institute had made their move. They'd taken over Diamond City Radio, which was now spewing their propaganda twenty four hours a day, and they'd made it clear that they were not planning to let anyone live after they got their little nuclear reactor working.
"Aw, Nora, don't beat yourself up." Nick nervously tapped the fingers of his metal hand against the table. He hadn't said anything when I let myself into his house and started complaining, but judging from his tone, I was in for a lecture soon. I wasn't sure if I wanted a lecture. I kind of just wanted to sulk. "The night's always darkest just before the dawn, you know. Things'll turn out. They always do."
I leaned forward in my chair.
"How can you be so sure?" I groaned. I was officially whining now. "Doesn't it ever get old? Always looking on the bright side? You're bound to get tired of it eventually."
Valentine chuckled and shook his head at me as if I'd said something incredibly stupid but that was also so endearing in its stupidity that it was impossible to be upset with me. (In other words, he looked at me like I was a child.)
"Nora, I've been around for... a while." He tipped his hat, as if getting ready to tell a story. Was this going to be a story? Or was I finally getting that lecture? "And in all that time, I've learned that people are good. Or that they want to be good, at least. Of course you don't see that. The way you live, you're only exposed to the worst and the most twisted the Wasteland has to offer on the daily. But that's not all there is. It's not tiring to have hope. You've just got to believe in people. All of us... we're stronger together, you know."
"And here's the lecture," I muttered. "I'm super happy that people are good, Nick, I am." I all but lay down on the table. "Woo hoo. Humanity's not inherently evil. But the Institute— They are. And I can't even get those good people you talk about to stand together against that!" I grabbed my head. "Ugh! If they won't unite against this, they never will! And you say people are good?!"
"Yes, actually." He gently but forcefully pulled me up. "But you've got to get off my table. If you get in that mindset, you're bound to lose. Look on the bright side. You already got the Brotherhood of Steel and the Railroad together, didn't you?"
"I guess." I didn't look at him. I hated that he was right. "And people said it couldn't be done."
"Look, Nora, just..." Nick stood up. "Get some rest. You look like you need it. You can stay here if you need a place. Take it easy for a few days. The world won't end if you relax for once."
"But the Institute—" I jumped to my feet too. Why didn't anyone understand we were on a clock here?! In the time they all wanted to spend on their delicate peace talks and their rest, we were all running out of time. I was the only person who fully understood how pressed for time we were, so it made sense that I had to push myself. The Institute sure as hell weren't resting, so why should I?
I presented my arguments to Nick, but he seemed tragically unimpressed. In fact, he looked almost amused.
So I listened to him. I got rest. I hated getting rest, but he was right: until the Railroad and the Brotherhood reached some sort of sustainable truce, there wasn't really anything I could do.
I even tried to sleep, not that it worked. It should have: I'd been more and more tired over the last few weeks, as if the entirety of the last two hundred years was catching up to me, and I should be able to get some sleep.
I stared at the ceiling, arms crossed over my chest, listening to the muffled sound of Nick writing something on a typewriter downstairs, and found myself angry that I couldn't fall asleep. I was tired; why couldn't I fall asleep, then? Ridiculous. I was also starting to notice, lying alone in Nick's not-so-comfortable bed, that I really missed Danse. I hated that I couldn't be with him. And, yes, I did hate having to sleep alone. I always had, long before I stepped foot in Vault 111.
All in all, I didn't end up getting much sleep that night. I woke up the next morning just as tired as I had been when I'd gone to sleep. If Valentine noticed, he decided not to comment. I was even kind of grateful. I suspected I looked like shit.
This whole thing, the Institute not making any clear move but obviously preparing for something... It was nerve-wracking. I desperately needed to do something, to feel like I'm doing something other than just waiting around for death.
"Hey. You ready to head out?"
I looked at the Diamond City Security guard who'd spoken to me.
"You do realize that those costume changes of yours are painfully easy to see through after the first time," I deadpanned, hand on my hip.
Deacon shrugged. "Not trying to fool you." He waved at another guard as they walked past. "Hi. Hey there." He waited until the guard had walked away to turn back to me. "I'm hearing good things from HQ. So, you ready to go, Nora?"
I didn't fail to notice that he'd used my name instead of my codename.
"I... actually am." I nodded. I'd been waiting for this for the last week. "I just need to grab Piper and MacCready." I stopped, realizing I'd never really travelled with Deacon and someone else at the same time. "It's... okay if they go with us, right?"
"I guess." He didn't seem as averse to the idea as I'd feared he might be. "I've got to get used to... working with other people, anyway. Might as well start." He forced a smile onto his face. "Big changes coming, Blue. Big changes."
I couldn't help but feel my heart flutter at that. Finally. "So it's going well?"
He looked around.
"Look, we can talk while we're on the road. Okay? I just... I feel a bit too exposed here."
I nodded. I knew Deacon didn't like open spaces. Even with the houses all around, the market in Diamond City had to be an unnerving place for him to be.
"Okay. I'll meet you at the gates." I paused, looking at his outfit. "...Wear anything but this. Please."
I managed to gather up Piper, whom I'd promised that I would take her along the next time something big happened, and MacCready, who gave me some half-hearted explanation about how he had to go somewhere anyway and that was why he was tagging along. I also managed to talk Piper into leaving Nat with Nick and Ellie while we were gone.
"Diamond City's doing good without a mayor," I noticed after an all-too-long silence had fallen over our party. Deacon didn't seem to want to talk too much, which struck me as odd considering everything I knew about him but which I didn't comment on.
"Yeah," Piper agreed slowly, drawing out the syllable in a way that made me think that maybe things weren't going as well in Diamond City as it seemed. "Well, folks aren't exactly in a very putting-trust-in-government-officials-y place right now. Might be a while before they can pick someone to call the shots."
I frowned. Part of my plan had included Diamond City Security playing a part in the Institute opposition alliance I'd been trying to build. I didn't like this; after failing to get Hancock's approval, this felt like another failure. At least the main core forces, the Brotherhood of Steel, the Minutemen, and the Railroad, were now more likely to cooperate than to fight each other. As Deacon was quick to assure me, things were now definitely on the right track. This was happening.
"Smart choice, holding those meetings at HQ." He glanced at me. "I have a feeling you played a part in that."
I smiled.
"It seemed... sensible," I said slowly. Maybe it was silly, but I felt proud of myself for that. "It seemed like a good show of mutual trust. The Railroad had to share the location of their secret headquarters and the Brotherhood of Steel had to send their leader there alone. Give and take." I looked down. I had made one hell of a gamble by assuming everyone would listen when I asked them not to fight, but it had, clearly, paid off. No one had killed anyone.
The Institute were the enemy. They always had been. Nothing else really mattered.
We ended up making camp for the night at what had once been a newspaper kiosk. Deacon quickly slipped out to take the first guard shift, which I didn't really blame him for. He wasn't exactly friends with the others and the atmosphere in our party had been tense and awkward for most of the day.
Eventually, I found myself following him outside. He was sitting on the curb and smoking a cigarette.
"Hey, Deacon..." I checked to see that Piper and MacCready were asleep. I didn't want to discuss this topic with people who weren't already involved. It was... private. I carefully sat down on the ground beside him. "Can I ask you something?"
"Yeah. Shoot." He gave me an encouraging nod.
I shimmied a bit closer until I was sitting right next to him.
"I just..." I took a deep breath. "I need you to answer me honestly, and I... Look, if you can't tell me the truth, then I just don't want to hear it." I looked down. I couldn't continue smiling anymore. "This is important to me," I said softly. "I need... the truth. Can you—"
He didn't answer. He just looked up at the sky. I followed his gaze, and we watched the stars in silence for a while.
"Why do you wear sunglasses at night?"
He laughed. I smiled at that: my change of subject, even if brief, had clearly done what it was supposed to: it had warmed the atmosphere I'd been worried might be cooling down.
"That's not what you wanted to ask about."
It wasn't. But at least it got him in a better mood, a mood where he was more likely to answer me.
"When we first met," I said slowly, carefully, "when Danse and I came to Railroad HQ for the first time... You recognized him."
Deacon didn't say anything. He didn't even look at me, gaze still fixed on the stars in the night sky above us.
The wind pulled at the trees across the street, making their shadows dance on the broken concrete below.
"Yeah," he said eventually, after what seemed like eternity had passed. "Why?"
"Because if he's a runaway Institute synth, then someone helped him out." I kept my tone casual, more conversational, for now laying out simple facts, things both of us knew. I didn't want to spook him. "I've been with the Railroad for a while now. I know how this works. An agent would have escorted synths to the Capital Wasteland, where the Institute didn't have as much of a presence, and then had people do facial reconstruction surgery and the memory wipe on them there."
Silence.
"Deacon, I..." I breathed out. "I was thinking maybe... you were... that agent."
Deacon, again, didn't say a word. He just silently, slowly, took out a cigarette pack and a lighter. I shook my head when he offered one to me. I'd been trying to cut back — and besides, I didn't want to be a part of whatever coping mechanisms he used to avoid talking about difficult things.
I pursed my lips.
Silence.
"...Yeah," I whispered. I'd asked him not to say anything instead of lying to me, after all. And if he couldn't bear to be honest, then... At least he cared about me enough to respect my wishes. I sighed. "Good talk, Deacon." I stood up and walked back inside. "Good talk."
oooOOO*OOOooo
Not like I'd expected everyone to magically become best friends, but I'd hoped for maybe a bit less animosity.
Glory stood next to Danse and spoke to him in a hushed voice, smiling a bit while he nodded along. Other than that, every single Railroad agent eyed him suspiciously. So much for a friendly alliance.
"Nora." Danse smiled widely once he saw me. I felt some of my foul mood from yesterday begin to disperse. "You're back."
"So you two are friends now?" I asked as I approached them. I didn't know why, but this somehow both surprised me and made perfect sense. For some reason, I had always felt the same way around Danse and Glory. There was something about them that I'd always found myself comforted by, a certain type of calm that only came from security. They made me feel... safe.
So, in some way, it made perfect sense they would be drawn to each other, or seek each other out. They were similar. And... I wanted Danse to have a friend in the Railroad. Especially another synth. Maybe my reasons for this were selfish, and maybe I was manipulating him just a bit, but I really needed the leader of the Brotherhood to see synths, to see people, to get attached. That's what had helped me and if it would help open Danse's eyes too, the future would look much brighter. He was in a position where he could make real, impactful change. And if I decided to play puppeteer and gently steer him in the right direction, then that was just... tactical thinking.
I didn't care. I had already accepted that I wasn't a good person. I was going to do my damnedest to make the Commonwealth a better place, and if I had to manipulate the people I loved to get there, if I had to murder and lie, then that was just the price. I was going to make absolutely fucking sure I would leave this world better off than I'd found it.
And right now, that meant destroying the Institute once and for all. It meant gathering as many allies as I possibly could and finally ending this. It had, at this point, been more than a year since I had stepped outside of Vault 111. It would soon be a year since I'd met Danse and Piper, the two most important people in my life. I could barely believe that I had only known them for a year. They'd made me who I was now, consciously or not. All my friends had. Piper remained my closest and dearest friend, my partner in crime and confidante, but there was room in my heart for others. For Nick, Deacon, Haylen, MacCready, Preston, Hancock — my friends. For Danse, who was my friend but also something else, something that I'd thought I had lost forever. I had people I loved, people I cared about, people I was willing to kill for and die for, and I couldn't afford to lose them. I'd already let them down too many times.
I'd fucked up and indirectly got Cait killed, a mistake because of which my relationship with Danse would forever be strained beyond what it could be. He would never forgive me, and I understood why he felt that way. I respected his feelings. I loved him and felt comfortable and confident in our relationship, but I also knew that a part of him would always hold me responsible for what'd happened.
I'd gotten Preston Garvey injured so badly it had left him permanently scarred and disabled. All because I hadn't had the good sense to leave a dangerous place. Because my curiosity had gotten the better of me. I blamed myself every time I saw him, every time I caught glimpse of the ugly slash scar underneath his eyepatch. This couldn't be fixed. He would always wear evidence of my mistakes, right on his face. I would never be able to look at him without being reminded of what I'd done wrong.
I had fucked up. I'd gotten people killed. Impossibly, I sometimes found myself wondering if it was my fault Arthur Maxson had died. My brain logically saw that there was no correlation, that there was nothing that could be interpreted as proof of my guilt, but I still felt guilty nonetheless. He hadn't deserved it. He'd been just twenty-one years old. I'd fucked up. Even if I wasn't responsible for his death, I still felt guilty about it. Maybe because, in some fucked up and twisted way, I'd ended up benefitting from his death. Might as well have pulled the trigger on him.
I breathed out. I was a bad person. But that was fine. Good people could take over once I'd played my role. People like Nick, Piper or Preston, people better than me, would have their part to play too. Mine was to find them, to get them together, to connect. To do whatever it took to ensure the future of the Commonwealth was better.
I liked bringing people together. I always had. I had found joy in seeing Nick and Ellie as soon as I first saw them in the same room together. Haylen and Rhys, too. Piper and Nat... It meant a lot to me. Seeing families reunited, together. And now, Danse and Glory, a friendship as unlikely as it was obvious... It was good.
"You could say we're friends." Glory smiled softly like only she could. I wondered if the reason I had always felt drawn to her the most out of everyone in the Railroad was because she reminded me of Danse. "Bottom line is he's one of mine, and I look out for my people."
I wanted to hug her so much. She had no idea how important this was to me, how scared I had been for him this last week. How much her protection meant. I settled for a grateful look and a mouthed 'thank you'.
"Yes. Glory has been... understanding." Danse seemed awkward and formal around her — more than he normally was, at least. "She's proven a valuable advocate for our cause. If if weren't for her, we wouldn't even be discussing a united front."
Glory didn't seem to share his reservations — she threw an arm around him like they were old friends. Siblings. Danse immediately tensed up, but she didn't seem to notice or care.
"I'm just glad I could help." She smiled, very obviously smug. "I'm happy I got to meet this guy! It's heartwarming whenever a Courser makes it out. And it's ten times as much a blow to the Institute."
I blinked, not understanding at first. Danse was... a Courser? (Or had been, at least.) That was... It was strange. I was almost certain I'd heard this somewhere before, that this wasn't new information, but I'd never really thought about it. About the implications.
It... made sense. In that fucked up twisted evil way in which things make sense in the Wasteland. I didn't like it. I didn't like that it made sense, or that I was now finding yet another lens through which to look at my boyfriend. Yet another way to try and analyze him, to try and explain things that didn't need explaining.
Damn it, he deserved so much better than me.
"Well, we have good news and bad news," Desdemona announced once Deacon and I had officially checked in. "The good news is—" She glanced at Danse, as if searching for confirmation. "—the alliance is solid. This is happening. I even had Tinker Tom disassemble our airship-destroying device."
"Your what now?" I interjected, but was promptly ignored.
"The bad news is, the Institute is not idly sitting by. We've been monitoring their teleporter readings ever since you got that molecular relay machine working, and there's a... A problem."
"Of course. Because it can't just be sunshine and rainbows," Deacon muttered. "What happened now?"
"We caught a Courser signal near Bunker Hill last night, and another one this morning. Looks like the Institute is staking out the location."
Bunker Hill? But wasn't that where...
"Stockton's safehouse," I realized. "They know about the synths you're keeping there. They're gonna send a Courser after them."
"And there goes my chances of having a good day." Deacon groaned, rubbing his forehead. "What do we do? We should move them, right?"
"Move them where? Our safehouses are at maximum capacity — and we can't afford the Institute finding one of them, anyway."
I looked around. This was bad. This was exactly what I had been worried about: that the Institute were planning to make a move while we wasted our time on talking. And now what? Those people wouldn't survive against a Courser. Not many could.
And everyone else in Bunker Hill was in mortal danger, too. The Institute had never cared about collateral damage. They hadn't cared about Nate or Kellogg or any of the synths they'd sent to die. They definitely wouldn't care about the people of a small settlement in the Commonwealth. But then what to do? The Institute would attack as long as those synths stayed there, but if there wasn't anywhere else for them to go...
"I can take them," I realized. I looked up. "I can take them," I repeated, this time louder, more confidently. "To the Brotherhood."
Desdemona looked at me like I had lost all sense.
"You want us to hand those synths over to the Brotherhood of Steel?"
"Well, yeah!" I spread out my arms, not sure how else to show my exasperation. "You're kinda gonna have to start trusting them anyway! And this—" I gestured all around me. "This alliance? It won't hold if there's no trust!"
"Besides," Glory added, "the Brotherhood of Steel can protect them. They have a few fortified outposts in the Commonwealth. We just don't have the firepower right now!"
I looked at her, surprised but grateful for this new ally.
"I... Fine." Dez rubbed her forehead. "Not like we have much of an option right now."
"Deacon can go with them," Glory added. "He'll make sure this is all above board. Right?"
"I mean—" Deacon looked at me, then back at her. "Yeah. Sure. I can do that. Teamwork. Woo hoo."
He didn't sound very thrilled about that prospect. I wondered, not for the first time, how long he'd been working alone. Either way, I was glad he would be coming with me. I liked him, and there was no one in the Railroad I trusted more.
"Are you coming?" I smiled at Danse, who had been awkwardly hanging around in the back while this whole thing took place. If there was anyone I wanted to have beside me more than Deacon right now, it had to be Danse. I really missed him — and we still hadn't had the chance to tell Piper we were dating. It wasn't a conversation I wanted to have without him.
"No, I'm..." He hesitated. "Desdemona and I are going back to the airport. We need to discuss long-term strategy." They needed to discuss strategy? What the hell had they been doing so far?
Danse must have noticed my frown, because he quickly took my hand and led me to the end of the room, where we could have at least a semblance of privacy.
"Nora, I..." He took a deep breath. He brushed my hair off my face. "I do want to go with you. But we can't right now. There are more important things we both need to do. I miss you too, but being in love doesn't mean we can stop fighting for what we believe in."
"Alright," I whispered. Damn him, he knew how to get to me. I forced myself to smile. "Go, then. You've got a world to save, big guy."
It would be alright. He needed to do this. This was... fine. We would have plenty of time together after we'd dealt with the Institute. (Assuming neither of us died in the process, at least.)
Bunker Hill. I had a mission of my own too, and that's all that mattered right now. I needed to save those people before something terrible happened, something we might not be able to recover from.
After Deacon and I came back from HQ to meet up with Piper and MacCready and bring them up to speed (Deacon had been adamant about not letting Piper see the secret entrance to the Railroad HQ, and I'd tiredly agreed to those conditions. It hadn't been the first time I'd seen Piper turned away from entering somewhere.), I had one more surprise to deal with.
"Bunker Hill?" MacCready repeated.
"Yes. Why, is it not on your way?" I teased.
"Yeah, this..." He nervously rubbed the back of his neck. "This is where we go our separate ways, actually."
I looked at him, surprised. I had just been joking.
"What...? Where are you going?"
"I've got... my own part to play in this." He winced. "Okay, Piper made me say it like that. But it is important. Promise. I wouldn't lie to you."
I frowned. First Danse, now MacCready? I was running out of friends at an alarming rate now. I would see them again soon, I reminded myself. This wasn't permanent. It was just for a few days.
I looked at Piper, who just nodded. I breathed out. If she was alright with letting MacCready go, then I could bear not seeing Danse for a few days, too.
"Alright," I said hesitantly. I didn't like this, but I didn't really have a choice here. I put a hand on his shoulder. "Take care of yourself, MacCready."
oooOOO*OOOooo
Star Paladin Grimes, the officer Danse had put in charge of maintaining the Cambridge Police Station a few weeks ago, was less than happy with the idea of using the outpost as a safehouse for a group of synths, but he at least didn't argue. I did catch some of the looks he gave me and Deacon, but Danse trusted the man, and for now that was enough for me. We couldn't really afford to be picky, either. Bunker Hill wasn't safe anymore, and the police station was fortified. It was a position we could safely fall back to.
I watched as Piper and the four synths from Bunker Hill tried to make themselves at home in the military outpost. I doubted they would fit in. Those people weren't fighters. They were traders, farmers. They shouldn't have to be part of this, and I hated the Institute for the fact that they were.
At least Haylen seemed to be hospitable. I smiled at that. She'd always been a better person than me. Better than most people, actually.
Deacon cleared his throat.
"I'm just gonna..." He awkwardly pointed at the door behind himself. I frowned.
"You won't even stay for the night?" I asked.
"Yeah, I'm..." He rubbed his forearm nervously, averting his gaze. "I'm not... that great at this whole... working together thing. Honestly, it's just... not how I'm wired. Most of the time, I just wanna pop a StealthBoy and disappear, but when I've got other people around, I don't..." He let out a small groan, clearly frustrated with his inability to express himself. "I'm not like you. I don't know how to. Okay? I..." He sighed. "I'm in your corner. I promise. And when it comes to it, I'm right by your side against the Institute. But I gotta... do it my own way. You know?"
I breathed out.
"Yeah," I said softly. "I know."
Deacon smiled — a painfully sad smile, painfully easy to see right through. Without another word, he gave me a small nod and just pushed the door and disappeared into the Wasteland.
I slowly breathed out. This was alright. It wasn't like the Institute would attack us here, anyway. We just had to wait this out. I glanced back at Piper and Haylen moving furniture around to make space for a few more sleeping bags on the floor. I smiled. Yeah, this was... good.
Star Paladin Grimes approached me hesitantly.
"Paladin, can I speak with you outside?"
I didn't like this.
"Of course," I agreed even though I desperately wanted to say no.
We stepped outside and I took a deep breath. It was slowly getting dark. I closed my eyes, mentally preparing myself for questions about the synths and whether it was smart to keep them here.
"We have a problem," Grimes said instead.
My eyes shot open, immediately on edge.
"What problem?"
He took off the helmet of his power armor. I didn't like the troubled look in his eyes.
"We got one of those Institute signal trackers from Proctor Ingram a while back, and..."
I didn't need him to finish. I knew exactly where this was going.
"They're here," I whispered. "A Courser?"
Star Paladin Grimes shook his head. "Not as far as we can tell. But we've been getting—"
He didn't get to finish that thought — a beam of energy from some kind of laser weapon hit him in the throat, causing him to gurgle and choke on his own blood.
"Oh my god!" I exclaimed. "Oh my god! Haylen!" I screamed, already pressing down against the wound. "Haylen!"
My eyes widened when another energy beam flew right over my head. Fuck!
"Nora?!" Haylen threw the doors open, running out of the police station. She took roughly a second to look around and see me desperately trying to stop the bleeding from Star Paladin Grimes' artery. "Oh no."
"The Institute," I choked out. "Quick, help me get him inside!"
She nodded. In record speed, she pressed on the eject mechanism at the back of his power armor and helped me half-carry half-drag the injured soldier back inside. With the corner of my eye, I noticed a few of the Institute's old Gen-1 synths running onto the square. Fuck! Fuck fuck fuck!
I drew my hunting rifle and quickly aimed and fired. One of the synths staggered, sparks flying from its head, but didn't stop. Fuck!
I looked back over my shoulder and, seeing that Haylen and Grimes were safely inside the building, I quickly followed them.
"Barricade the door!" I screamed once inside. I didn't even care for the shocked looks from everyone around. "There's no time! They're here, we need to defend ourselves!"
Piper, amazingly, was the first to snap out of the initial shock — though others followed within seconds. She helped me carry a desk to the door while the others went to the boarded-up windows to reinforce them.
I took a step back. Things were bad. This was bad! I looked around: Haylen was now finishing bandaging up Star Paladin Grimes, but it looked bad. They'd probably hit an artery. (I was scared that I'd spent enough time around injuries to recognize this.) The synths from Bunker Hill, Piper, and the Brotherhood soldiers were all looking at me, for some reason.
"...What are your orders, Paladin?" one of the Knights asked quietly.
I took a step back, my eyes widening in shock as I realized why they were looking at me.
I wasn't ready! Wasn't there anyone else who could take charge? With Star Paladin Grimes injured heavily as he was, I really remained the highest-ranked officer. But I was just a lawyer...! Hell, I was a housewife! I couldn't just give out orders! Who was even the idiot who had given me this promotion?! Arthur Maxson. Alright, so not an idiot. If he had believed in me so much... He must have had a reason. Whatever reason, Maxson must have thought I was fit to be an officer. He had seen something in me that made him give me a promotion over for whole ranks. Despite our disagreements, I still respected and trusted Arthur Maxson, even after his death. If he had trusted me, I wasn't going to let him down.
"My orders..." I gritted my teeth, looking at the soldiers and piper. "We need to hold the police station at all costs! The Institute will try to take over this outpost and deprive the Brotherhood—hell, the Commonwealth—of an important fallback point! We can't let that happen!" I clenched my fist on the holotags around my neck. Two pairs of holotags. My eyes widened. I had been wearing Danse's dogtags around my neck ever since Maxson died? I narrowed my brows, somehow finding motivation in the tiny items I was holding. "To arms! We won't go down without a fight! Haylen!"
"Yes, ma'am." She stood to attention.
"Organize a plan of defense. Barricade all the exits aside from the roof entrance. Find everything that you think may be useful and make use of it. I trust you on this."
She acknowledged my orders with a salute.
"Rhys."
"Paladin." He nodded.
"Gather all weapons and ammo we have. Shooting posts at the windows. Get to it!"
"Yes, ma'am!"
"And Piper."
"I'm not your soldier, Blue. I don't even have military training."
"I know," I said. "But I am gonna need your help."
I looked over my small squad. We were going to hold that post! We had to.
God damn it. Why did this have to happen now of all times? I didn't have Danse or Valentine or even Deacon with me right now, no one to ask for advice. I hated being in charge. Did the Institute know somehow? Did they know we were all separated right now, possibly unable to defend ourselves?
"Come on, Piper," I said quietly. I headed up for the first floor and found a still-working terminal. We needed allies. Fast.
I knew that close to no wireless networks worked in the Wasteland, but I was just hoping RobCo had made their internal systems integrated enough for me to send out a short message. I didn't waste time or space on overcomplicating things. I typed "danse need u asap institute attack police station take backup nora". I sent it and just prayed it would reach him. That someone from the Brotherhood was currently working on a RobCo terminal. Or a Pip-Boy. Piper watched me meddle with the device, biting on her lip a bit.
"Hey, um... Blue?"
"Yeah?" I didn't look up, my eyes fixed on the screen of the terminal. It remained dark.
"It's about Deacon. I know you trust him, but... How much?"
I abandoned my work to stare at her. "What are you even talking about?"
She looked down, at her feet.
"It's just that... I'm not saying he doesn't mean well. I'm not. I'm just saying... In my experience, if people won't tell you who they they really are, they have a reason. And that reason is rarely noble."
I wrinkled my forehead.
"Shit, Piper, I..." I stopped when the terminal lit up. "Yes!" I quickly read the message that appeared on the screen. "Thank god for the Railroad!"
"The Railroad?" Piper cocked her head. "I thought you were contacting the Brotherhood of Steel, not the Railroad."
I didn't stop grinning as I showed her the message: "nora you idiot. hold out. backup coming. tom."
"Who's Tom?" she asked.
I opened my mouth to answer, when the message disappeared, replaced by a new one: "sending people to cambridge now. hold on there. sturges."
Piper took a look at the terminal and whistled.
"Not the allies you were trying to get, but it seems we'll be getting some backup soon," she noticed. "You've got connections, don't you?"
I didn't answer, my eyes watering as I stared at the terminal's screen. I laughed out loud in pure joy.
"vertibird on the way. youre dead paladin. ingram."
Maximum level.
New Perk: Cloak & Dagger - you have reached maximum affinity with Deacon. Your sneak attacks now deal 20% more damage and StealthBoys last 40% longer.
A/N: In case anyone's interested, Nora's base SPECIAL is ST 3 PE 4 EN 2 CH 8 INT 4 AG 3 LCK 6. Tag skills speech and lockpick.
A/N 2: Since I've had more than four years of a break, I've realized that I did not know English nearly as well as I thought back then, so I'll be rewriting/reworking the earlier chapters too. This might affect posting speed in the future. (If you're curious, I'm currently done with everything up to Jewel of the Commonwealth.)