Fallout 4: AR

41. Earning Trust

Our departure from Sanctuary late the next morning was the start of several weeks of constant movement. We initially returned to Cambridge with Paladin Danse aboard a vertibird, but soon left to traverse the Commonwealth's northern borders, aiding settlements in the name of the Minutemen, and bringing them into the growing network. On assignment for the Brotherhood of Steel, we cleared out a couple of buildings infested with feral Ghouls in order to locate technological artifacts for the Scribes.

As part of our arrangement with Paladin Danse, Knight Rhys tasked us with hunting down a nest of Super Mutants located in a hospital not far from the Brotherhood outpost, a mission I was certain he thought was probably too difficult for our abilities. MacCready had ground his teeth audibly when the scant details were given to us and he nearly punched the cocky (pot, meet kettle) Knight in the face. It took all of the rapport we had developed between us for me to calm Mac down. Once I had pointed out that the best way to annoy Rhys was to complete the mission despite the overwhelming odds, MacCready practically dragged me off into the frigid Commonwealth to clear out the target in record time.

Super Mutants were tough in small numbers, and we were extremely hard pressed to take out an entire entrenched contingent inside a fortified building, especially when they were supported by robotic machine gun turrets. The only good thing about this assignment was that we were in a hospital, able to stock up on stimpaks, Med-X, and bandages. The scattered caches of healing drugs were the only things that kept us alive as we cleared the building floor by floor. Neither of us remained unscathed by the time we had finished dispatching the last Super Mutant. I was sporting a hastily wrapped leg and some deep wounds on my back from a lucky strike with a nail-studded board. Had MacCready not been right there with a stimpak, I doubt I would have survived. My companion was no better off, his left wrist was unusable, probably fractured, and I had had to wrap his abdomen after a particularly difficult firefight which left him with a few new bullet wounds.

"I'm gonna kill Rhys, I swear," MacCready growled as we carefully limped our way back to the Cambridge outpost. "He just so happened to forget to mention the turrets those green lunatics had set up."

"Not if I get to him first," I snarled in accord with his mood. "I can understand assigning us a difficult mission to test our skills, but that was intentionally setting us up for failure. Civilians or not, we deserve to know the full picture when we perform missions for the Brotherhood." And it makes it that much harder for me to get home. What an asshole.

Indeed, when we returned to the outpost to report our success, we made sure to fully debrief Knight Rhys and Paladin Danse in a private meeting. Rhys stood stiffly at attention, his whole demeanor one of unpleasantly shocked surprise that we had not only returned, but had been successful. Danse listened gravely to our report, pleased we had liberated the hospital from the Super Mutants, but distressed at our battered condition. We were dismissed to Scribe Haylen's healing ministrations, while Rhys was ordered to stay.

By the time we were ready to depart, accepting another mission from Knight Rhys, his attitude was initially just as obnoxious, but definitely subdued and restrained. The report he gave us was much more detailed than the last one had been, and I received it solemnly. As long as he acts like a professional and gives us the proper information, I don't care what his private opinion is. MacCready, taking his cue from me, adopted a cool, detached demeanor very similar to the one he showed me when we first met. We took a couple of different mission briefs with us when we left Cambridge, with the understanding that we would complete them if and when we were able.

-0-

The days and weeks started to blend in to one another as we traversed across the Wasteland. Most of the Minutemen settlements we visited only needed minor help compared to the Brotherhood missions. Tracking down resources was usually not a dangerous endeavor, though MacCready complained indignantly about being used as a pack mule. Once or twice, we were asked to stay a day or two to help defend the proposed settlement against raiders or feral Ghouls. Since the weather remained quite cold, I didn't mind sleeping in a cot by the fire. No one batted an eye when MacCready joined me. Beds were scarce in most settlements, and it only made sense to cuddle close to share warmth during the bitterly cold nights. Those evenings were like a soothing balm against the constant drive to keep moving, earn the trust of the various factions, try to find any trace of the Institute, get back home.