Chapter 5 – Olivia

United States Air Force Station Olivia was a signals intercept post situated on some high ground between the settlements of Sanctuary and Tenpines Bluff. Before the war it was a key component of the military signal intercept effort against the Chinese. For the last few years, it had been the base of operations for a raider group. When Nate first visited the site, he was able to sneak into the main bunker complex and loot a number of valuable items from under the raider's noses. This time, returning in force, Nate and his team were looking to remove the raiders from the complex entirely.

The team left Diamond City early in the morning, the day before spent nursing some hangovers and preparing the remaining kit for the trip north. Cait had seemingly adopted Valkyrie and spent most of the day instructing her on all the little things that the team now did as habit. Things like the natural order that people took showers and used the washroom in the mornings, as there was only one in the whole of home plate. Where the kit was stowed that the team took with them when on the road. They even snuck a look at the spanking implements Nate tucked away in one of the cupboards in the armoury, giggling like a pair of naughty schoolgirls as they took each one out quietly in the hope Nate wouldn't hear. Nate smiled as he looked in on them, seeing them both crouching down by the cupboard, he decided to leave them to it. Despite the fact that he would have gladly shown them all the implements had they asked, he could see that they were having fun and didn't want to spoil that.

As Nate was keen to stop off at Sanctuary on their way back, he suggested the team take the Red Wave back to its birthplace at Mystic Pines and walk from there. They cast off at seven in the morning and were pulling up to their mooring point on Mystic Lake at one in the afternoon. Securing the boat the team spread out and began their patrol north. Their first checkpoint would be the old Starlight Drive-In cinema.

Nate and Valkyrie took point, Nate recommending to the team that Valkyrie be allowed to blow off the cobwebs and lead the patrol for the first part. 'No reason for hanging about as we need to get Valkyrie right back to what she did best before her kidnapping', was what he had argued with the team. They all agreed, and Valkyrie took point. Whilst she was feeling apprehensive, she was keen not to let the team down. Beginning at a military checkpoint, now long abandoned between Lexington and the Rotten Land Fill, Valkyrie and Nate headed up the hill to their first target. Piper and Curie were next with Cait covering the rear.

It wasn't long before Valkyrie held up a fist to signal stop and the patrol dropped to one knee, Nate scrambling up to join Valkyrie at point. Just over the crest of the hill there was the old train line that passed south of the cinema. There was a bridge under which the road ran, with and old nuclear-powered engine still resting on the rails above. It wasn't the bridge or the engine on it that Valkyrie was interested in, but a group of raiders removing items from a steamer trunk strapped to the back of a dead Brahmin. It was clear to the pair that this group had just attacked a caravan and was collecting their Loot.

Nate turned and gave the signal for the rest of the team to join him. Piper and Curie were soon next to the pair with Cait taking a little longer. "Not like you to be slow," Nate scolded Cait as she arrived. Piper and Curie exchanging a questioning look at that comment. "V, what do you think?" He asked, looking towards their target.

Valkyrie brought her sights up to her right eye and began scanning the ground ahead. She then lowered her rifle and turned to the rest of the team. "Cait and Curie, can you make it to that dead ground," she indicated to her left, "without being seen?" Both girls nodded. "Let's drop as many from here as we can and on my signal switch to covering fire, and we shall advance forward." Valkyrie indicated to herself and Nate. "Keep an eye on our six and move up behind Cait and Curie when we start to advance." Valkyrie looked at Piper who nodded.

"Ok, go." She ordered Cait and Curie, as the rest of the team took up prone positions, looking through their scopes and watching to see if any of the Raiders spotted the girls as they were moving. Thankfully this band of renegades were too busy celebrating their haul and were all too preoccupied looking in at the chest and dead Brahmin to concern themselves with what was going on behind them.

Arranging her throat mic, Valkyrie gave the order. "Pick your targets. Cait, Curie the two sharing the water bottle. Nate the guy crouching down." Valkyrie looked over to Curie who gave a thumbs up. "Three, Two, …" A pause and then the team fired together, four raiders dropping immediately. The rest of the raiders turned and seeing the source of the shots began returning fire. "Shit." Valkyrie shouted as another group of raiders appeared from the other side of the bridge. Nate did a quick count and could now see fifteen raiders spreading out to engage them in their current position.

A number were walking and firing directly towards Nate and the team when Cait and Curie took out two each, which thinned the advancing group down but attracted some unwanted attention from some of those still by the bridge. Wanting to take over and begin to issue orders, Nate turned to look at Valkyrie. Before he had time to assume command, Valkyrie began to take control of the situation. "Cait, Curie stay put. Just concentrate on the group heading towards you. Piper, give them some support." She turned to Nate, "follow me," she instructed, and then headed off to her right at a crouch, running into a gully that ran east to west. As Nate followed, he could see that this ditch ran at an angle to the train line, meeting up with it about 100 yards ahead.

Nate smiled, clever girl, they were going to get up onto the railway tracks and then be able to attack the raiders from behind. That was as long as there were not more raiders the other side of the engine. They both broke into a sprint and reached the tracks in short time. Nate looked over and although he couldn't see the rest of his team, a gun fight was obviously taking place. By the sounds of it, the girls were still on single shots, so none of the raiders had got up close yet. Nate hugged the engine side, following Valkyrie as she made her way along towards the centre of the bridge. Valkyrie, using the radio, warned the girls that she and Nate were coming within range and that they should switch fire, no longer firing at any raiders near the bridge. As the pair got into position, they both changed magazines and switched their weapons to automatic. Nate watched as Valkyrie signalled with her fingers down from five to one.

"Now!" Valkyrie shouted and the two of them popped up from behind the solid metal side of the bridge and pointed down to the remaining raiders. Opening up on the gaggle of raiders, Nate and Valkyrie put a burst of automatic fire into each of the enemy figures congregating around the dead caravan. As the entire group of surviving raiders turned to engage the new enemy from above, Nate could see his girls stand and begin to advance on their location. It wasn't long before the noise of battle ended and only the groans of the injured could be heard. Curie was soon up and dealing with the three raiders who were still alive. Despite the fact that there was no way a critically injured person could be rushed to a hospital or any long-term aid be given, Curie preferred to stabilise the injured and then leave them, in the hope that they would be soon collected by their own. Removing their weapons she soon made the injured as stable as she could and was ready to join the rest of the team who were examining the caravan.

"This is an impressive collection of spare parts for something, but I have no idea what?" Piper exhaled lifting up some piece of circuitry. "What do you make of these?" she handed one of the pieces to Curie.

"Oh, this is a communication protocol handler," she stated handing it back to Piper.

Cait smiled and rolled her eyes, "And that is what in English?" she asked.

"It is an electric component for robot construction. Here," Curie went over to the trunk and picked up a bag full of small circuit boards, "There are op amps, logic gates and these are much more complicated chips, this is a digital RF receiver." She pointed to one board as she continued to sift through the trunk's contents.

"I wonder who would want all of this stuff," Piper expressed out loud the question they were all thinking.

"Ok, so what do we do, as I have no idea what this stuff could be worth?" Nate came up to stand next to Curie and look into the trunk.

"Well, you did say the Brotherhood liked this kind of stuff, right?" Valkyrie asked.

Nate nodded and then smiled at Valkyrie, "perfect, let's call a Vertibird and get them to collect this. Curie, can you quickly rummage through all of this and take some kind of stock check? We can then bargain with Danse when I next see him."

"Rummage?" Curie asked, not understanding that particular English word.

It was Nate's turn to roll his eyes, "You know," he smiled and then mimicked what looked like a dog digging through some dirt.

Piper shook her head at Nate's pantomime and moved up to stand next to Curie, "Come on missy, I'll help."

"Cait, can you go chuck one of those signal grenades, just over there," Nate pointed to a clearing that would be suitable for a Vertibird to land in.

"Sure," Cait responded as she headed off reaching into her rucksack.

It wasn't long before the team heard the recognisable thud thud of the Vertibird as it arrived over the lit flare. Once it landed, two knights in Brotherhood Power armour, and one scribe immediately jumped off the back of the aircraft, the scribe heading to Nate and the team and the knights moving off to secure a perimeter.

Soon the stash was counted, stored in Curie's memory and loaded on to the Vertibird. The pilot radioing back to a very excited Proctor Ingram, the Brotherhood's Head of engineering, a full description of the contents of the caravan. Apparently, these components were ordered by the Brotherhood for a new construction they were beginning at their Boston Airport base. Nate was a little disappointed, whilst listening to the two-way radio communication, as it didn't seem that Ingram had mentioned anything about them being paid for the find, but she did seem extremely grateful for the assistance. 'A favour for later then,' Nate thought to himself.

The team waved the Vertibird off which, as it was full of their rescued electronics, left the two Knights and the one scribe to head back to their base on foot. The team grabbed their kit and resumed their patrol north. It wasn't long before the team heard three shots back at the railway bridge as the Brotherhood dealt in their own particular way with the three surviving raiders.

Arriving at the old quarry, Thicket Excavations, as evening set in, the team soon had camp set up and were sat around the warmth of the fire. Nate told the story of the confrontation he and Piper had, just after they had met, with a guy called Sully and his band of raiders. Initially Nate had met Sully whilst making his way down from Concord to Lexington and had become something of friends. Nate helping him get the water pump back up and running for the waterlogged quarry. Little did Nate know that no sooner had Sully emptied the site of water, that he then moved in raider friends of his who began hassling the local communities. On hearing of this Piper and Nate returned to the quarry and had engaged in a sniping match, taking out the majority of the raiders before the remainder ran off. Nate had found Sully amongst the dead when the two of them had entered the quarry to clear out any remaining raiders. Thankfully, so far, no one had moved back in, and so the quarry was theirs for the night.

"Sorry for that," Valkyrie sat down next to Nate as soon as she had grabbed a bowl of trail stew from Curie. "I had no idea they would just take what you had recovered and steal it all." She blew out a breath, shaking her head.

"Well, I guess we are Brotherhood, well sort of." Nate answered, "it's fine, as having the Brotherhood owe us a favour is never a bad thing."

Cait and Piper also came to sit by the fire, Cait seeing the spot next to Nate had been taken, she sat herself down opposite him. "They are cheeky fuckers, though." She shook her head as she began to eat.

"Well, as I said, a favour from the Brotherhood is a valuable commodity." Nate answered and then turning back to Valkyrie, asked, "So how did you feel, your first day back at work?" his voice showing no judgement in its tone.

Valkyrie smiled, "it was good," she nodded, speaking with a mouthful of stew. Swallowing her food she continued, "It felt so good to be out and just breathing fresh air, but the fact that I was operating again." She indicated the rest of the team, "and you guys are great, very natural together."

"So, we do alright for a bunch of civilians then?" Piper asked, her tone light but she was obviously looking for some real feedback.

"You guys have the best of the military training, that I assume Mr Bossy here taught you, but you also have a flair and some balls which, I guess, is natural given where you guys grew up." Valkyrie sounded sincere in her comments which made Nate smile, his girls were pretty good weren't they. "But the thing I like the best," Valkyrie continued, taking another mouthful of stew, "Is that you knew what to do next." She mumbled, whilst chewing.

"You determined to choke yourself on your trail stew?" Nate gave Valkyrie a disapproving look. From across the other side of the fire, Cait smiled to herself at that reprimand.

Valkyrie paused, finishing her mouthful she blushed, "Sorry, my bad. Dean used to tell me off for that all the time. What was it he used to say?" She looked up as if thinking, "Good manners are just a way…"

"… of showing people that we have respect for them." Nate finished the quote. "Exactly, Dean sounded like a very sensible man." Nate stood and walking round to the other side of the fire, held his hand out to Cait. "Curie is on watch tonight, so I suggest everyone get their heads down as I want to put in a dawn attack on the station tomorrow." Cait paused for a split second and then looking up at Nate smiled and reached to take his hand. They headed off to their sleeping bags whilst the rest of the team sat and continued chatting for a while.

The next morning was bright and the sky clear. The sun had risen at five and it was nearly six by the time the team had arrived at the station and carried out their initial recce. Meeting back at their lying up point they swapped notes and Nate put together an assault plan.

Curie was to take up an overwatch position up in one of the large trees, to the south, across the other side of the highway to the station. At the same time, the team would make its way through some dead ground and breach the fence on the west side. Valkyrie was to lead the stack and enter the main bunker complex once Curie had taken out the two sentries.

"In position." Curie radioed to the team.

"Ready," Responded Valkyrie as she turned and signalled to the team to form up. Stealing a look around the fallen tree the team were behind, Valkyrie watched as the first raider dropped, a spray of blood exiting the back of his head before he crumpled to the ground.

"Hey," shouted the second raider as she appeared out of the command box, halfway up the satellite structure. She also died from a single shot to the head.

"All clear," Curie stated in a very calm and matter of fact tone.

Valkyrie signalled for the unit to move and as one they snaked up the bank and through a gap in the old wire fence. They reached the outside wall of the bunker and hugged it until they came to the corner, around which was the entrance way into the complex. Valkyrie signalled a halt and peaked around to see if there were any other raiders outside of the main building. Hearing someone just inside the entrance, she signalled for the team to advance, each team member placing their hand on the shoulder of the one in front and giving it a squeeze to signal that they were ready. Valkyrie then shouldered her weapon and began to move forward, still hugging the outside wall of the building. When she arrived at the open door she moved in without hesitation, killing the raider that was walking out through the same doorway. Stepping over the body, she continued inside with the remainder of the team following in behind, covering all arcs within the open space. It was Cait, who was third in the stack that saw the fourth raider as he came through the door in the back of the room, and she dropped him with two silenced shots from her weapon. The team paused to listen and then continued their trajectory, heading to the stairs which led down to the main part of the station.

Olivia's main bunker housed the majority of the equipment and staff in a sub terranean complex, several levels below their entry point. With the lifts non-operational, the team had to make their way down metal stairs, that creaked and banged in protest at the heavy weight being applied. It soon became apparent that the team would have to split in order to reach the bottom of the stairs silently. They quickly improvised with Piper volunteering to stay at the top, leaning over the top banister to try to give some cover from any potential attack that might come from below.

Valkyrie was the first to the bottom and was quickly joined by Cait. As soon as Valkyrie saw that Cait was behind her, she moved to open the door into the main complex. Before Cait could warn her to listen for any movement the other side, Valkyrie was already creeping through.

"Say goodbye, Bitch," came a growl from Valkyrie's right as a gun was placed against her head. Obviously at least one raider had heard the team descending the stairs and was planning a little welcome ambush for them the other side of the door. As Valkyrie froze, feeling the barrel of the pistol pressed forcefully into the side of her skull, Cait acted with almost superhuman speed. She dropped her weapon to her side and with one swift motion, drew out the ever-present knife she had attached to the front of her tactical vest, and the raider died as a shower of blood spurted from his neck.

Cait had her weapon back in her hands and was covering the corridor by the time Nate appeared at the door. Valkyrie was about to say something, but Cait threw her a warning glance, and so she moved up to take point once again. Nate carefully stepped over the body of the fallen raider and without saying anything reached up to Cait's shoulder and squeezed it to signal he was ready.

The complex was on two levels, with the team entering a reception area which had a viewing gallery down to the main control room the level below. There was a restricted area off to the right which was locked by a terminal. There seemed to be no other raiders on this level as far as the team could tell and so Valkyrie signalled for them to approach the viewing gallery. It wasn't quite like shooting fish in a barrel but from their raised position they were able to engage with most of the raiders in the main room, before heading down into the living quarters to complete the clearance. Once all the raiders were dead, the team made their way up to the restricted area, keen to get to a part of the complex Nate had not been in before.

They were soon all huddled around the main console, watching Curie attempt to override the security system.

Valkyrie looked down and spotting a new footprint cut off by the closed security door pointed to it. "Looks like one of these bunch had the codes to enter this place, these tracks are new."

Splitting up and searching the bodies, one of the female raiders, who was lying dead next to a mini gun, had a notebook on her that contained the codes. Armed with these, Curie made short work of getting the team inside the restricted area.

"This must have been the intel room." Valkyrie stated, looking around. The room contained four desks, two against each opposing wall with a large equipment table in the centre. To the rear of the room there was a large steamer style military trunk and a bank of filing cabinets and lockers, but what was of the most interest was the Mr Gutsy, a military robot, still operational hovering over by one of the far corners. So far it had not issued any warnings or taken any aggressive action towards the team, so they carefully entered further into the room.

"Detecting subjects, scanning…." The robot said in a soft female voice. "Accessing pre war records … record found … 108th infantry regiment. Second battalion. Status: retired."

"So, they made that as your cover regiment when you joined SF, huh?" Valkyrie smiled.

Nate laughed, "I had to have something to tell my civilian friends." He then turned to the robot, "sorry, who are you?"

"Scanning companion," the robot continued, "accessing facial recognition program… Match found… Code name: Valkyrie… Status… Last known survivor … United States Army… Active duty…"

"Back pay will be impressive if that's true," Nate chuckled.

"Running succession protocol… calculating rank… General… Commander of U.S. armed forces." The robot droned on. "Reassessing security clearance… Access to top secret database files granted… process complete. General, I am Heuristically programmed Algorithmic Localhost version Y… a.k.a HALLY… at your service."

"Good to know." Piper laughed from the doorway.

"Error … Access denied… I was not talking to you ma'am." HALLY responded.

"What the hell is going on here, shoot this thing already and let's take a look around." Cait stated, showing she was in no mood to humour this military antique any further.

"Referencing protocols … Ma'am, do I have authorisation to share your information with your assistant.?" HALLY turned to Valkyrie.

"Erm," Nate tried to speak to the machine. "I am so authorised."

"Computing… Access denied… Authorisation must come from the General… Ma'am do I have your permission to proceed?" The robot insisted.

Valkyrie rolled her eyes, "Of course, go ahead," she answered.

"Security clearance granted… enabling assistant access mode… how may I be of service?" HALLY turned to face Nate.

"I assume you will explain what you are talking about at some point," Nate sounded as if he too was losing patience with this conversation.

HALLY then proceeded to describe herself as a prototype military intelligence droid. A quick set of questions from Nate soon established that her intelligence was from the prewar era and she knew nothing of the world since the bombs fell. She even had record of the Brotherhood of Steel as a heavy metal band active between 1997 and 2002. One very interesting item that she did have was a holotape of the entire schematics of the Liberty Prime project, including the design for an override switch to control the machine.

"What was, or is Liberty Prime?" Curie asked as she examined one of the consoles in the room.

"Pre-war, top secret US military project that never saw action due to a power issue that wasn't ever solved before everything went nuclear. Shame, it would have really helped in Anchorage." Valkyrie stated.

"Did you know the Brotherhood found it in Washington, underneath the Pentagon." Piper jumped in, "they somehow got it up and running and used it to annihilate the Enclave." Valkyrie shot her a questioning glance, "Oh, they were the remnants of the US deep state government. Basically, the bastards that started all of this." She signalled around her.

"Cheeky little fuckers, so that's what the Brotherhood is up to," Cait exclaimed, "They are looking to build a new Liberty Prime!"

"Or repair the one they have already, I don't think it was ever destroyed." Piper responded, "Or not that anyone has written about."

"So that's nuts!" Laughs Valkyrie, "so I am in charge of the US military now."

"Well seeing as you may be the only member, sure why not." Nate smiled back.

"Does that intel the robot gave us still have any value?" Valkyrie asked.

"I am not sure, but I know someone who might be able to help," Nate responded looking at Piper.

"Well, there is Tinker Tom, but he's Railroad, oh no, hang on… you want to visit those Brotherhood outcasts up by Oberland Station?"

"They are the only people I know who would have seen Prime, as they did come from Washington." Nate responded. He then turned to the rest of the team. Let's take a look around and then head out. I want to see if we can make it to Sanctuary by nightfall."

The team split up and began searching the room. Valkyrie headed over to the large military chest and tried the catch. "It's locked, anything you can do Cait?" she asked.

"Hmm, Looks doable. I'll give it a try." Cait responded, pulling a bobby pin from her hair.

In the meantime, Piper began searching through the lockers that were in one corner of the room. "Well, I'll be …." She whistled as she spun around to face the room, holding up a Sirius suit of body armour up against her, as if trying on a new dress.

"You beautiful, beautiful lady, I could kiss you right now." Nate laughed as he moved up to where Piper was, reaching into the same locker.

"Hey!" exclaimed Cait from her position crouched in front of the trunk. "There you go, nothing to it." Cait then announced as she swung open the trunk.

"Nice to see you checked it for traps," Nate took on a more serious tone.

Cait blushed and was about to say something when Valkyrie jumped in. "So how many are here then?"

"We have …" Nate pulled out another set, "four in total, including the gloves. No helmet though." Nate frowned.

"Oh, they are here." Curie indicated to a duffle bag on the floor. She picked up the bag and opened it for Nate to pack the armour into it.

"Interested in what's in this big, not booby-trapped chest?" Cait asked with a sarcastic undertone. "Just a shit ton of weapons and ammo."

Nate leaned over and looked in, ignoring his girlfriend's anger at him scolding her. "That is a very pretty sight indeed." He smiled and turned to look at Cait, hoping she would catch his meaning. Unfortunately, at the same time she turned and walked over to another duffle bag that was over the other side of the room.

"We can use this as well." She stated holding the bag up.

Soon the team had the loot stashed and were on the road heading to Sanctuary. Nate had made a note to speak to Cait, as it was obvious she was unhappy at being reprimanded by him. However, as soon as they formed up to begin patrolling to Sanctuary, Cait and Valkyrie began speaking in hushed tones and so he thought he would leave them to it for the moment.

"I really thought I was dead back there." Valkyrie said quietly as she came to stand next to Cait, "you were incredible, thank you."

"You are welcome," Cait responded, "I was going to warn you, but I knew Nate would hear me if I had. Stupid really, worrying about you getting a hiding and you nearly get killed as a result."

"This is not on you." Valkyrie answered firmly, "I was the one who didn't check the door, I was the one who was not thinking, and I was the one that nearly got myself killed, not you." She reached out and put her hand on Cait's arm, "This is all me and my fuck up."

Cait looked at the blond girl next to her and smiled, "And to discover you are just as fallible as the rest of us." She squeezed Valkyrie's hand.

"Well, it was bound to happen sometime." Valkyrie smiled back.

Arriving at Sanctuary just as night fell, the team were shown to an empty but relatively intact house on the estate. The roof was almost completely undamaged, and the living room was comfortable and dry. The team soon had a fire going and the evening meal cooking on the small camping stove.

"This used to be the Carter's house. He owned the large wood mill over outside of Ayer. A nice guy and a big fan of Scottish Malt Whisky." Nate reminisced as he pulled a bottle of scotch out of his rucksack. "Well, ladies, today was a stunning success and for that I think we deserve a wee dram to celebrate." Nate opened the bottle and began pouring shots into the small metal cups Curie had produced from her own bag. Nate held his own, now full cup, in the air, "Here's to you all and to our newest member who was a perfect team lead for her first operation." Nate clinked his cup with the others but caught Cait giving Valkyrie a knowing glance, just for a second before it disappeared back into a smile. "What," he smiled at Cait, "What have you two been up to?" he then turned to look at Valkyrie who didn't return the smile but instead just looked down. With a much more serious tone he turned back to Cait, "What is it you are not saying?"

'Fuck, he doesn't miss a thing does he', thought Cait as she couldn't meet his gaze either.