64Chapter Thirty-Three
Bad News
I'd been supposed to go straight to Diamond City, but of course the Wasteland did what the Wasteland did best and ended up distracting me with random shit.
Preston Garvey invited everyone to stay at the Castle, which was not on my way at all and would actually require me to do a lot more legwork, but which I couldn't say no to. The looming threat of the Institute's next move being still unknown to us (other than that it would be something big and very likely something we would not be able to defend against) didn't seem to put as much of a damper on everyone else's mood as it had on mine. As a result, we all soon found ourselves in pretty much the same group as back in Cambridge, only celebrating our victory at the Castle.
In a way, I was glad. This was a rare occasion to get most of my friends together in one place, and once we took out the picnic tables and barbecues, the courtyard of the Castle started to feel like home again in a way it hadn't felt in months. The evening that fell over the Commonwealth was warm but still somewhat chilly, that best kind of summer night coolness.
I even found myself smiling.
I didn't know where to sit, exactly, when for once every single table was filled with people I knew. I could spot Piper and MacCready closer to one of the fires, but they were part of a large group and I didn't really feel like talking to a lot of people right now. I mostly still felt like everyone's joy was misplaced, but I didn't want to take it away from them just because I didn't feel it. Some joy, some celebration... We were long overdue for a real win like this. I just wanted to feel... something. I wasn't sure what. Comfort, maybe. Reassurance. Connection.
In the end, I decided to sit with Preston and Danse at the far end of the courtyard. I had a feeling both of them had chosen that spot in particular because it offered a good view of the whole area. I doubted either of those two could turn off their tactical brain. (Neither could I, apparently, considering I had also thought of it.) I wasn't going to lie to myself, I'd also chosen this particular table because Danse was there and I was hoping maybe at least having him close would help ease some of my anxiety and fears.
Danse moved closer to me inch by inch as the night went on, almost as if he instinctively knew what I needed, before eventually just cuddling into my side with clearly little consideration for how that gesture would be seen. I smiled, leaning against him in turn. The heat radiating off of his body was a stark contrast against the cool evening air, and I felt... strangely alive.
Preston took off his hat and placed it on the table between us. The smile on his face was kind and unassuming.
"How long have you two been together?" was all he asked.
I almost blushed. I'd been wondering how obvious we were, and the answer clearly was very obvious.
"You make a cute couple," he added after silence was his only answer, almost as if giving out a compliment would make his original question easier to answer.
"I think it's been almost two months now...?" Danse looked down at me in search of confirmation. I shrugged; I'd been trying my best to keep track of time in the Wasteland, but without the aid of a Pip-Boy or Piper Wright (both equally precise at keeping an accurate calendar) it had been more difficult. I knew that we'd first gotten together almost immediately after Danse had been made Elder, but how long ago had that been? It felt like a lifetime and at the same time like just a few weeks.
Time was funny in the Wasteland.
"I think it's closer to three months, actually." If Danse wanted to be open and honest about this instead of attempting to hide it, then I would follow his lead. I hadn't expected him to — he'd always preferred to keep our relationship separate from professional matters, so I'd been ready for him to dismiss Preston's questions here. Clearly, I had underestimated the power of the huge morale boost our victory at Cambridge had given us.
"Well, then I suppose congratulations are in order," Preston laughed good-heartedly.
mk
"For keeping a secret from Piper Wright for so long," Preston Garvey explained after seeing our confused faces.
This time, I laughed too.
When I woke up in the morning, Danse was still asleep. I found myself completely dumbfounded by that, and ended up just staring at him in shock for longer than I was comfortable admitting. For a moment, I even worried he might be dead. I also found myself wondering if I'd ever even seen him sleep.
Dammit, that victory really had gone a long way.
I hadn't really... considered the impact it would have on my companions. Yes, I had expected everyone as a group would be in higher spirits than usual, but I hadn't expected... this. I hadn't expected Preston feeling confident and validated in his hopes and beliefs. I hadn't expected Danse sleeping soundly for probably the first time in years. I hadn't expected MacCready ready to do something stupid and selfless only because his heart told him to.
I smiled softly, running my hand through Danse's hair as he slept. Maybe this was... Maybe this was what I was fighting for. Giving them this peace. If this one small victory had gone such a long way, then I could not wait to see what winning this war would do. This was it. This was my purpose. This was why fighting was worth it.
I wanted to give them this. The peace this one victory had given my friends... I wasn't stupid, I knew that even if we completely destroyed the Institute and killed every single person who lived there, even if we wrought down the rage of the heavens down onto them, long-term peace wouldn't be guaranteed. There was no peace in the Wasteland. Killing everyone wasn't a long-term viable solution, but... If long-term peace wasn't attainable, wasn't this good enough? Shouldn't I try to give them as much as I could, even if it wasn't perfect? I'd known a kind of life like they never would, a kind of life that I had no way of returning to, and the shadow of that life still hung above me, taunting me, at every given moment reminding me that things used to be better. That a better life was possible, or had been possible at some point in the past, and that it was no longer within reach. That Piper, Danse, MacCready, Hancock, Preston, everyone I loved and cared about, would never get to experience the kinder, better reality that was still very much alive in my memory. That was my ultimate punishment, the price I had to pay for all the death and suffering I'd brought unto others.
I'd thought that losing everyone and everything had been worse than anything, but it hadn't. This hurt. This hurt more than loss ever had — maybe more than it ever could. I would always have to live with the memory of those better days, and that was my punishment. I would always want better for the people closest to me and I would always know they could not get it. That world was all gone now, buried under two centuries' worth of rubble, sand, and radiation. It wasn't fair. It wasn't fair because I believed that my friends, the people I had come to consider my family, were good people. I believed that even if I didn't, they at least deserved that long lost world or at least the memories I still had of it. Even if with every day that passed, every day in the dirty grey of the Commonwealth, those memories felt a tiny bit more distant. A tiny bit more blurry, a tiny bit less my own. A life that didn't exist anymore but a life that I wished I could give to those I loved. They deserved those memories more than I did, anyway.
And instead, I had to carry them. I had to mourn a world that didn't exist and people who had been dead for centuries. I had to look at the people I loved now and know that their future would never be certain. That every day could be our last. Losing Cait had been a painful, sobering moment for me. Nearly losing Preston had hit me almost as hard. It had been more than a year since I'd stepped out of Vault 111 and I still hadn't gotten entirely accustomed to thinking about death as a certainty. It still hit me as hard as it ever had, and I was all the more determined to keep it from taking my family from me again.
"Nora?" Danse shifted under my touch, slowly waking up, so I quickly took my hand away.
"I'm here." I forced myself to smile at him, forced myself to push the bad thoughts away for just a moment. "I'm still here."
For better or worse, I was still here. Live to fight another day. Fight to give them the life you no longer have. I knew what I had to do.
When I announced that I was going back to Diamond City, I had kind of expected maybe more people would want to accompany me. We were all together in one place for once and I had kind of let that go to my head, make me think that maybe if we were together, we would stay together. In the end, I only managed to convince Piper to go with me — and even that only because she had been planning to go home soon anyway. MacCready couldn't go with us. Whatever his deal with Hancock entailed, it clearly took some freedom away from him. Getting Preston, Danse, or Hancock to leave right now would probably require a miracle. Deacon had disappeared soon after the battle in spite of my best efforts not to let him out of my sight, which I probably should have expected but somehow hadn't.
Piper, though... Piper stayed. Whatever happened, Piper stayed. She always had. I still didn't understand what exactly had first made her want to stay by my side — if it had been curiosity, insight, or something else entirely that had told her to uproot her life and wander the Wasteland with me — but I was immensely grateful for it. It had given me the closest friendship, the strongest bond I'd ever had with someone, of my entire life. My first real friend in the Commonwealth had also become my closest friend in the world.
So, I supposed, if only one person was to come with me here, I wouldn't mind if it was Piper Wright.
As the two of us walked back to Diamond City, we ran into a group of raiders on the way. They immediately opened fire on us, of course. We were kind of out in the open, so there wasn't a lot of cover readily available and that worried me at first, but the fight thankfully lasted shorter than I initially expected it to. After a year in the Commonwealth, I was scarily proficient at killing.
"You okay, Blue?" Piper hesitantly approached me when she saw that even though all our enemies were dead, I still stood in place with my rifle drawn.
I looked at her.
"Yeah, I..." I hesitantly holstered my gun on my back. "I'm good. I just..."
I had no idea how to put my feelings into words. I'd been fighting almost exclusively synths for so long now that it felt strange to kill other humans. Not that they didn't deserve it — raiders were beyond being reasoned with — it was just that I was almost disappointed. I'd been under the impression that everyone was banding together against the Institute now, that everyone was putting their differences aside when faced with a common enemy. Clearly, the Wasteland was determined to once again prove I was being naive beyond reason when I put my faith in people. This wasn't something that would just go away if we destroyed the Institute. Raiders were always going to be a problem. As long as there were people to hurt, there would be those willing to hurt them. I couldn't fix that. I couldn't fix what was wrong with humanity, I couldn't singlehandedly put back together something that had been broken two centuries ago. Perhaps even broken beyond repair.
"Hey." Piper gently nudged me with her elbow. "I know that look, you know. You don't need to fix the whole world, Nora. No way that's on your shoulders."
I shook my head.
"You know me so well."
"I know you like to martyr yourself when things aren't going right, yeah." Piper put a hand on my forearm and gave a gentle, reassuring squeeze. "Which they aren't right now. Things are going good, Blue."
"Yeah. I know." I cleared my throat. "I know. Sorry. I just..." I had no idea how to finish my sentence. How to explain to her that I would not be able to rest until I knew for sure the Institute was no longer a threat. She was wrong: this was on my shoulders. I was connected to this fight, to this war... I wouldn't be able to just let this go. I needed to see it through. I would never know peace otherwise. "I'm good."
Piper hesitantly took her hand away.
"You just... You'll tell me if something's wrong, right?"
I took a deep breath.
"Of course I will," I said softly. "I promised you, didn't I? Anything happens, you'll be the first to know."
When Piper smiled, I found it in myself to return that smile. I didn't honestly believe things would just get better now, but I did believe I would be able to get through it with her by my side.
I genuinely hated how unaffected Diamond City always was by the situation outside its walls. You could barely tell there was an honest-to-god war brewing in the Commonwealth if you just looked around the market here. People were going about their business as usual. They didn't seem to share my fear of retaliation from the Institute. They didn't seem to know at all of the battle that had changed the status quo completely just a few days ago. Compared to the celebration both at Cambridge and at the Castle, this complete passiveness left a bad taste in my mouth. Those people didn't care. Not really. I understood wanting to keep to your own and I understood wanting to stay safe, but this was... not right.
"Ah, Diamond City. Home sweet home." Piper took a theatrically deep breath. "Gonna be a bit empty here without you or MacCready around. That's gonna be difficult to adjust to."
I didn't like that. Didn't like losing Piper and didn't like leaving her in a place that didn't care about much else than their own safety.
"Unless you don't stay," I said quietly.
She immediately looked at me.
"What?"
"I mean..." I nervously wrung my hands. I'd been the one to tell her to stay in Diamond City full-time in the first place, so I wasn't sure how she would take my request now. I wasn't sure how to tell her that the situation had changed and what that meant for us. For her. "I just... feel like we're so close here. This war is coming to an end soon, one way or another. And... I want you to be there, Piper. I want you to be there with me."
Piper smiled.
"Gee, Blue, that's..." She ran a hand through her hair. "Wow. That's a big ask, you know?"
I looked down.
"I know."
"I'm not saying no. I mean— Of course I'm saying yes. Of course I'm gonna be there. I'm right there with you, you just say the word. We'll bring the Institute to justice."
I looked up.
"Things will be rough," I said quietly. "Bringing them to justice... That's not really an option. It's probably gonna have to mean killing everyone in there, you know." I felt my eyes darken. I was hell bent on blowing the whole place to hell where they came from, but I recognized most of my friends probably wouldn't share that bloodlust. Danse and Deacon agreed with my reasons and I thought that MacCready at least understood, but none of them felt the same way. Not really. There was still so much anger in me... I had no idea what to do with it. I definitely didn't want Piper to have to see it. "I fully intend to deliver all hell to their doorstep."
Piper looked at me in silence.
"I know," she said eventually. "And I think you will. I think you're the first person who can actually put an end to this all."
I smiled weakly. Her unwavering faith in me was sometimes too much. I had no idea how I was going to do this and not let her down.
Neither did I know how the hell I was supposed to convince the mayor of Diamond City into lending some of their security and supplies towards the war effort. I had literally nothing to offer in return other than the promise of life without fear of the Institute in the (unlikely) event we won. Asking Diamond City to work together with Goodneighbor led by a ghoul and the Brotherhood of Steel led by a synth would also border on the impossible. Still, I had to try. We needed every bit of support we could get. Everyone was pitching in. Even now Desdemona and Hancock were pooling together their supplies to hire every mercenary group willing to join in the fighting for a reasonable price. If we were going to all band together, it felt right that Diamond City should also be part of it.
Geneva, who had taken up the mantle of interim mayor until an official election could be held, was at least sympathetic enough of my cause to hear me out. It didn't seem like she was ready to actually commit to helping, even as I laid out all the arguments for why I believed they should, but it at least looked like she was genuinely sad she had to turn me down. That at least helped cushion the blow I had already kind of expected when I'd come here. No, with things as they were, Diamond City would not be a part of the fight against the Institute. Things were still too unstable here, she said. They wouldn't be able to keep the city safe while sending a part of their forces to fight someone else's fight. I didn't want to explain that it wasn't someone else's fight, that it was their fight too. I felt like she already knew and was just saying what she was supposed to say.
I met up with Piper rather disheartened. I reported to her how my meeting with Geneva had gone. She didn't seem surprised any more than me — I supposed that neither of us had really expected anyone in Diamond City to actually listen and lend a hand in the fight. We'd just come here because... I didn't know why I'd come. I'd just felt like I should. Like it was the right thing to do; like they deserved at least this one last chance. Everyone deserved a chance to help out. And we needed allies, any allies we could get at this point. That last battle with the Institute had taught us at least that much: if we were to win this war, we needed a much bigger army.
With the Minutemen and the Brotherhood of Steel combined, we were close to matching the Institute's numbers, but to actually outnumber an organization who could create more soldiers whenever they wanted to? We needed to recruit more people to our cause. The alliance was strong and solid for now, but that didn't mean we were going to win the war. It just meant we stood a chance.
I wished I could have helped make our chances look better.
"Hey. Hey. Chin up, Blue." Piper sent me a smile that was so forced it was almost sad to look at her. I promptly looked away. I had a feeling that if I continued eye contact, if I looked at that sad, sad smile of hers for a second longer, I might burst into tears. I couldn't do that. Not right now, not here, not in the middle of the market here in Diamond City, not in front of all those people. I couldn't cry. I just had to...
I stared into my bowl of noodles.
This was... Something was wrong here.
"Nora?"
I took a step back, away from the noodle stand, away from people, already feeling an already all too familiar pressure in my throat.
I threw up.
Piper was immediately by my side.
"Are you okay?"
"I'm good," I mumbled. I rubbed some sweat off my forehead with my sleeve. What was I even wearing? Oh, right. It was the Minuteman outfit I got at the Castle... After my Brotherhood uniform got messed up when I was helping that settlement with their raider problem. (I was not overworking myself.)
I quickly stood up straight. Whoa. Dizzy. I hadn't expected I would be.
I leaned on the nearest wall.
"Shit, Blue. Are you sure you're alright?" Piper asked, this time more urgently.
"I don't know..." I tried to stop the world from spinning. "Just feeling a bit woozy..."
"Maybe it's poison. Shit. Come on, let's take you to the doctor's." She grabbed my hand, but I protested.
"It's fine," I said. "I'll go to Cade on the Prydwen." Whatever else I thought about them, I still trusted the Brotherhood more than some random medic in the Wasteland.
"Do you have any idea how quick a poison can work?" Piper asked seriously. "Believe me, I have some experience with that. Doctor Sun's not scary, come on."
She dragged me to the doctor's office in Diamond City — by the time we got there, I was feeling completely alright — and paid from her own money for my medical examination.
I sat in the doctor's office feeling very upset and very weak all at the same time. I wasn't very nice to Doctor Sun once he started asking me how I felt, either. I wasn't very proud of that, but everyone had been so concerned about me lately I had no patience for these kinds of questions anymore. Thankfully, the doctor at least seemed to have patience for patients like me, and just silently accepted my attitude without commenting on it.
"Any other symptoms than that dizziness?"
"Just some nausea, but I haven't been throwing up that much." Technically not a lie. "Been feeling tired lately, too. That's all."
"Alright. Well, I can do some standard tests, but for now it seems like this is a textbook case of radiation sickness. How long have you been having these symptoms?"
Oh. Quite a while, I realized. I hadn't even thought to check my rad levels.
"Well. For now, I'll run your blood tests at the lab, but you take this RadAway while you wait for the results."
He made me sit down in the waiting room and injected an anti-radiation drip into my forearm while he left after taking a sample of my (probably slightly irradiated) blood. I didn't like this and still thought it was a waste of my time, but at least this was an explanation for how tired and nauseous I'd been lately. I felt stupid for not realizing earlier. I should have kept track of this sort of thing.
Just one more reality of life in the Wasteland I still hadn't quite grown used to. I didn't like this. I didn't like how much I still sometimes longed for the life that was long gone, I didn't like how I still sometimes felt like I was part of that world and not this one.
I nervously picked at my fingernails. I did feel a bit better now that my probably not-great radiation level had gone down. (Which I also hated, because it meant Piper had been right to make me see a doctor.)
"Nora?"
I looked up. Doctor Sun had come back now, filing through a few pages he held on a clipboard. Probably the results of my blood test.
"I was going to go easy on you, but..." The doctor looked at me seriously and, although he hadn't said anything yet, I already felt judged. I'd been on the receiving end of this look far too many times lately. "I'm going to be blunt here: this is not good for you. You're exhausted. I've done what I could, but stimulants and chems won't replace a good quality rest in the long run. Try getting more sleep. Your body will thank you."
I sighed.
"You're not the first person to say that to me," I muttered. It seemed like everyone in the world thought I was overworking myself recently. "I'm fully aware of my own limits, thank you very much."
"Aware or not, I would still recommend you take things easy — avoid exerting yourself, at least until the baby comes."
I blinked. "...Until the what now?"
"The baby?" Doctor Sun raised an eyebrow. "Did you not know you're pregnant?"
I stared at him, not understanding.
"I'm... what?" My throat was very dry all of a sudden.
"You're pregnant. Almost five weeks now." The doctor managed to somehow deliver this news as if it wasn't earth-shattering. As if I wasn't close to choking on the air I was breathing.
I felt like I was about to fall, the ground sinking away from under me. This wasn't...
This wasn't possible.
"I don't... understand. This can't be right," I whispered. I looked up. "This can't be right! This is... some sort of mistake. I can't— We weren't supposed to be able to— This isn't—" I grabbed my head. "Oh my god. I can't... do this," I realized. "I can't do this." I couldn't do this. I just couldn't. This was... "Why now? I can't do this now."
The doctor just looked at me silently — sympathetically and awkwardly all at once. He didn't seem to know what to say anymore.
A minute later, I walked out of the clinic. I felt weak, weaker than ever before. Why?
"Hey, Blue." Piper held me up when she saw that I had trouble standing upright. "What is it? It can't be that bad..." She noticed my expression. "Oh... no. How bad is it? Cancer? Bloatfly fever? You're... going to live, right?" She frowned when I didn't say anything. "...Blue?"
She kept on asking stuff, but it was as though I couldn't hear it. I wanted to throw up.
"Oh, God," I whispered, clutching at my stomach. "Dear and loving god, no... Why? How? Not now, no, I won't— I can't... go through this again. Oh... Oh, fuck..."
"Blue?" Piper's voice came to me as if through haze. "Nora!"
I shook my head to snap out of it.
"Piper, please... Help," I said quietly as I slumped down the wall to sit on the ground. "Help me." She sat down next to me without a word, waiting for me to say something. But I didn't know how to cope with this, how to even accept it. I looked her in the eyes and saw nothing but care. "Piper, I'm pregnant."
I covered my mouth when I felt tears build up in my eyes, but I couldn't keep them from falling.
"Oh..." Her eyes widened. "Oh boy. Oh. I..."
"What do I do?" I whispered.
I had never wanted to bring a child into a world like this, I had never wanted it for ten-year-old Shaun... How could I let a baby...? I imagined a newborn baby in this terrible reality, but it was too terrible to even think of. I wasn't prepared for something like this... How could I even think I was fit to be a mother after what had happened to Shaun? After what I'd done? The locked safe in the back of my head burst open like it was nothing, all the horrible things I'd done spilling out and overwhelming what remained of my sanity.
I burst into tears.
"What do I do?" I cried.
Piper shook her head lightly.
"I don't know, Blue. I just don't know."
There was a long moment of silence broken only by my scattered sobs as she sat there by my side, letting me let all my emotions out without interfering. She glanced at me as I cried every now and then, but I couldn't even bear to acknowledge it. I just cried. And she just sat there.
"Piper... Can you hug me?" I asked quietly. She embraced me tightly and we stayed like that together, holding each other on the ground in some dirty alley in Diamond City. I was crying, but not only from sadness anymore. "You're the best friend I could ever ask for."
Maximum level.
New Perk: Cold-blooded (3) - your metabolism is slowed as an effect of prolonged exposure to experimental cryotechnology. You take longer to heal, but any status effects last twice as long.