Krystal carried Cody out of the hospital. The doctors gave them strict orders to rest for at least a week. While she watched over him Fox Falco and Sturges sat out to retrieve the secret weapon. The cargo shuttle landed. The trio were now faced with an abandoned hangar.

Fox spoke. "Wait this might be the hangar Cody told us about before they freed Nuka World."

Sturges responded. "Well, we're about to find out help me with these stiff doors."

The doors let out their screeching fit. At their feet lay the skeletons of the Raiders along with blood stains. They looked inside as the sun tore away the darkness revealing four ancient fighters. For Fox and Falco the thing that struck them most was that they were not Starfighters or even jets but piston-driven with propellers. Three of the four aircraft were single engine while the odd one out was twin engine. Fox opened the envelope he pulled out a black and white photograph. In it, the plane had a striking shark mouth painted on it.

The trio went around waving and blowing dust off the aircraft. They found the shark mouth on one. Sturges wiped the dust away from the stand.

He read the name aloud. "Curtis P-40C Warhawk. We found what we were looking for but I'm going to bet all my caps that she's going to need more than a small clean."

Falco just huffed. "It's a piece of junk that old ghoul is going senile if he thinks shoving Cody in a flying wreck is going to do them any good."

He had a point they examined the ancient bird its paint cracked and peeling acrylic canopy was heavily yellowed the tires rotted and cracked.

Sturges shook his head. "Help me roll her into the shuttle."

With grunts and heaving they managed to get it into the shuttle and just as they finished the tires gave out, splitting into pieces. They landed back at the Great Fox and warped back to Corneria. Cody was blindfolded and led into the hangar. Krystal took the blindfold off and Cody was ecstatic. His own warbird sat before him in some bit of its former glory. As he got closer, he felt a pull to it. Like it was somehow a lost extension of himself.

"Um Fox, do you have a respirator I could use I'm no mechanic, but I can at least pitch in where I can?"

Fox smiled. "Here you go don't worry it auto adjusts using computers."

Once Cody put it on it shrunk taking account of his lack of a muzzle. Cody worked hard cleaning off centuries of dust and grime trying his best to preserve the frail paint. When he tired out, he took a break.

"Hey Sturges whats the glass cage called?"

Sturges answered. "Oh, that's called a canopy shields you from wind and weather. Let me open it for you."

With a light creak, the canopy opened, and Cody climbed in. He sat down and for the first time, he felt something he hadn't since Zion home. He took a small cloth paying extra attention to cleaning all the instruments as he saw more numbers and words on each gauge and instrument, he cleaned he realized he had a lot to learn he could do basic math but reading not so much now he started wishing he paid more attention in his father's classes rather than volunteering for guard and clean up duty to avoid it. He continued throughout the day when Krystal went to check on him, still in her hazmat suit cautious of all the irradiated dust, she noticed Cody lying back in the cockpit resting along with how clean the Warhawk was now.

"Come inside Cody get decontaminated it's time for bed but before we go to sleep, I want to talk to you."

He nodded and did as he was told walking through the decontamination chamber. Krystal bathed him and did her best to wash and wring out the dust and grime from his ruined clothes. She gave him a robe but to his surprise, it was his size, and it wasn't pink like hers but black and had the Minutemen emblem in white on the back. Krystal beamed.

"Katt suggested I get you one custom-made so you won't keep dirtying mine."

Cody was quiet for a moment. "How did you? Wait you pocked around in my head when I was busy weren't you?"

Krystal laughed a little. "Just trying to keep an eye on you."

Cody answered back. "Look the mind is supposed to be a safe escape to be to yourself. I don't like the idea of anyone just treading around in my own head."

Krystal frowned. "I wouldn't do it if it did not benefit you."

Cody had no energy left to argue he just wanted to sleep. The next morning, they both chatted. This time Krystal told how Fox saved her on Sauria and saved the planet from breaking apart from its own magical force. She laid out a pile of energy gems.

"These are what I use to recharge my staff's energy I can only get them on Sauria so I mainly use my blaster. They can be recharged but it's very draining on me."

Cody asked. "How many of these do you have?"

Krystal answered. "Crates of them I have yet to find a method on how to quickly and reliably recharge them. Here take this blue one."

Cody smiled and stashed it in his pocket. "Thanks well, I'm going to work on the Warhawk."

This time both Cody and Sturges were working on the machine guns. Cody did his best to be a good student following Sturges's instruction to the letter. When he was curious and asked about something Sturges did his best to teach him in a way he could understand. Once Sturges was done laying out all the parts neatly, he got to blueprinting every piece measurements included. The guns weren't completely deactivated, barrels and mechanisms were still good, all they needed were new firing pins.

The next thing they took apart was one of the 50 cals in the nose which were very similar to the 30 cals but of course much heavier and larger. The next day of resources exchange came. The Shuttle landed blueprints and resources traded this time Liberator gave them documents of the Warhawk including a flight manual. Sturges gave him the blueprints. Cody was still working in the hangar mopping up the floor. Krystal saw a glow from his pocket.

"Cody the gemstone it has power again."

He pulled it out sure enough it was fully recharged. Before he could say anything, Krystal sprinted to her room grabbing another energy gem, this time a green one. She placed it on the left wing its glow started faint but within two minutes it was back to its full glow. She went back again this time with a red one. It took ten minutes. Then she got a yellow one which took half an hour. The final time she grabbed another blue one which took two hours. Sturges check each gem with a Geiger counter, but they all read zero on radiation. He tested the counter on the Warhawk which now had two percent less radiation than it did.

Krystal was so happy. "Cody with the gems we can turn radiation into magical energy this is incredible."

Cody was confused. "Wait if so how come your staff didn't charge back on Earth?"

Krystal answered. "Before each mission, I always keep it topped up, so I didn't have any empty gems with me at that time. Still might be best to charge them with anything you bring if we try Earth itself the gems might explode."

She went back this time with whole armfuls of gems laying them near the Warhawk and throughout the hangar. Cody didn't mind, he just avoided damaging the gems and kept working on the Warhawk. Periodically Sturges would check his counter the radiation steadily declining over time. Whenever gems were recharged, Krystal took them back to her room, replacing them with depleted ones. She repeated this throughout the day. Eventually charging one crate worth. Sturges wrote down everything reporting the Warhawk had only forty percent of its radiation remaining.

She grabbed the next crate of gems this time stripping any radiation the Warhawk and anything else brought for it negating the need for special disposal of the grime. With the radiation now all gone the team could examine the old bird in person without any special protection. Falco cracked a small smile.

"Crazy runt actually helped put this wreck back together. He pulled ten times his own weight unlike the brats I've seen here who cry when they don't get the newest games or clothes, they wanted yet Cody is happy with a ruined warbird a battered helmet rotted clothes and a worn-out assault rifle. Still hurts what Andross did to my homeworld Zoness but its healing unlike his planet a nuked-out hell hole I would only wish upon a select few."

Back at Independence Jacqueline and Liberator were hard at work turning the tunnels into an ammunition production line. More steel was needed for the tools and parts. The scrap pile was now dangerously small and the Corvega Blitz was now almost gone and what little bits remained were being processed for melting already. Liberator went out and dragged another Blitz from the scrapyard into the courtyard. By the time he got back the scrap pile was already gone, the metalsmiths were still forging and hammering their apprentices got to work removing and cutting up the hood to make fresh tools and much-needed parts for the ammunition line. What they needed next were conveyor belts.

Liberator took several squads of Minutemen and went for the nearby General Atomics Factory. Mr Handys attacked them, but Liberator took the brunt of the blows using his armor and himself to shield his troops. They pushed on destroying droves of Mr Handys eventually coming across their leader a Lieutenant Gusty who spouted all sorts of colorful words at them as he went down blazing. They took apart some of the conveyor belts and got them into Independence's tunnels. Now the production line was complete, and Liberator did his briefing.

"Now I'm going teach you how to work this line each one of you has one job however we have two propellants black powder and smokeless. Black powder has many cons compared to smokeless its dirty corrosive and isn't as powerful and produces a lot of smoke, but it has a huge advantage it is very easy to produce. We can make two of the three ingredients ourselves charcoal is obvious as for saltpeter we can grow it in our own piss and the sulfur we can trade for. I've already cooked up a large batch of black powder."

He picked up four steel boxes one had 30 06 B painted on it, the other had 30 06 S and the other two had 45 B and S painted on them.

One of the soldiers snickered. "Permission to call them the B.S boxes sir?"

Liberator himself started to snicker and giggle like a little child. "Ok, that's their official designation now good job. Now the metalsmiths will produce the casings and you will put them together. For now, we use black powder and instead of brass we use steel."

Again, they worked in shifts except for Liberator who refused to rest. He helped and corrected when someone made a mistake and when the others were too tired, he kept working by himself. The next few days the metalsmiths produced the very first batch of Springfields and Colt New Service Revolvers. Liberator inspected them.

One of the metalsmiths was very nervous. "Anything to note General?"

Liberator patted him on the back. "I'm not mad just curious the crudeness of these Springfields y'all made reminds me of the VK-98 it was a last-ditch variant of the Mauser during the end of WW2. It's not pretty but for a first-time batch I'm impressed."

The wood was unfurnished, the metal was rough, and the sights were a non-adjustable v notch. He grabbed a box full of 30-06 black powder rounds. He examined one of the bullets. It had a steel case with the bullet itself naked. He loaded five rounds and fired. The white smoke was thick, and the velocity was lower than that of a normal 30 06 but it did its job and hit the target. Liberator racked the bolt. It was a bit coarse but gave little resistance and worked as intended. He racked and fired four more times. He smiled savoring the smell of burnt powder.

He switched to the Colt New Service. Loaded with six 45 ACP black powder. Again, the six shots belched out white clouds of smoke, but the action was smoother than he expected. He gave his conclusion.

"I want these Springfields in production at least four a day if possible."

One of them spoke up. "General it took us three days to make the ones you're testing now."

Liberator replied. "As I said if possible. Don't stress yourselves, we'll get the hang of it. Whatever materials you need whether its research documents steel wood name it you shall have it as for your next assignment I need tooling to make 50 cal rounds."

The metalsmith answered. "Yes, sir we'll need more steel, lots of it both to make the tooling and casings."

Liberator took four trips back and forth from the scrapyard and Independence bringing back four more Corvega Blitzs. He gave the status of the scrapyard. "Ok, I got three more Blitz wrecks I can get."

The metal smith replied. "It's okay we're stocked up real good on steel we'll get back to work oh we do need more acid solution see if you can get some of that along with oil."

Liberator answered acid solution and oil coming up I'll be away for a few hours ain't exactly the easiest to get but I'll trade and scavenge."

He marched on to Goodneighbor clad in his armor wielding the Springfield prototype. He tested it on a few Raiders the rounds being naked had an advantage with them being pure lead and no metal jacket they flattened on impact shattering bone into shrapnel. The Raiders were horrified at what happened to their friend. They tried to flee only for Liberator to shoot down each one with precision. He smirked under his helmet loading another five rounds. He went through the gate where Hancock greeted him.

"Well good to see our dear Liberator so what brings you to our little community."

Liberator took off his helmet. "Well, it's two-fold one to check on y'all two I need acid and oil."

Hancock crossed his arms. "I'd offer you some work but Cody and MacCready already took care of it for me, I believe Daisy can offer a discount. I do have something I can give you for free."

He snapped his fingers two Neighborhood Watchmen walked up one of them holding a crow in his hands. The crow cawed and screamed biting the Watchman's hand. Its cries for help were silenced when the Watchman crushed it. The other Watchman cut its head open with a scapple revealing a tiny synth component in its head.

"Institute sends these little bastards everywhere to spy on people you see them destroy them."

Liberator nodded. "Part of me was hoping it was a myth but if they can make synthetic people, I don't see how birds are out of the question also makes sense why they aren't covered in blisters and tumors like Radgulls I'll issue an order to have them killed whenever my troops come across them."

Hancock shook his hand. "Well before you go, I got a proposition for you I want to give you more materials, but I worry for your troops you're gathering strength and the Insitute is not going to like that, so I want a couple of my Watchmen among you."

Liberator bit his tongue normally he would love to have such veteran troops among his men, but he was very scared for Vera. He knew Hancock would not take no for an answer and he hated the idea of his medic being killed."

"Alright, but I need you to come back with me."

Hancock agreed.

They reached Independence supplies in tow. Liberator called Vera aside.

He closed the doors to his quarters. "Vera it's ok I want you to meet a friend of mine and he's the man who helped me take care of Cody."

The Wolfess hesitantly took off her mask and hood. The two Watchmen gasped but Hancock showed a warm smile. "Well, nice to see a newcomer to the Commonwealth I'd take you were a lab experiment of sorts?"

Vera stammered. "Um...no I'm well an alien I'm from the planet Corneria. I'm the one who helped operate on Cody when he was admitted. Had to pull out broken shards when that Deathclaw shook him off its back. Then he broke out of surgery and bit a tapeworm in half that burst out of Nathan."

Hancock chuckled. "Yep, that's my Cody. So, Liberator, you've been buddying up with aliens? Now Cody being sent away makes sense let me guess what happened this time?"

Liberator answered. "We went searching for a dialysis machine for Evan a Mutant Hound almost killed MacCready. Cody lunged against it and got his arm crushed in its maw. Some of my new friends are taking care of him."

Hancock ate a Mentat. "So, what's your next step in your war for the Commonwealth?"

Liberator grinned. "Machine gun belts for Cody that's all I'm saying."

He turned his attention to the Watchmen. "Now you two guard Vera with your lives any Insitute freaks try to inflict harm or kidnap her I want their brains painting the ground same goes for any predator or native threat understand?"

The Watchmen answered. "Yes sir."

Liberator continued. "I hate the idea of being a nosey bother on my troops but keep an eye on them I don't want any Institute filth among my ranks."

He lit a cigar. "By God, we'll have our home again."