Chapter Text
The world trembled with the anticipation for the nearing dawn, the only sound in the silence the scrapping of her boots on the pavement. Madison, the Sole Survivor, with tears spilling from her eyes, made her way back to the Red Rocket truck stop she and her friends called home. She hadn’t seen them in weeks. But now, as eager as she was to see their smiling faces, to laugh at MacCready’s jokes, to smile sheepishly under Codsworth’s berating, to feel her cheeks burn with embarrassment at Cait’s flirtatious teasing, to feel her heart flutter at Nick Valentine’s subtle smile—a dread churned her stomach into knots and caused her feet to drag. She didn’t want to see them. Not after everything she had done. So many awful, horrible things.
“Is something wrong, ma’am?” X6-88 was heard from behind where he trailed her, aviators shielding his expressionless eyes.
“They’re going to hate me, X,” Madison managed to sob quietly.
“You did what you had to do to ensure the survival of the Institute, ma'am. Surely they will understand.”
There was no point discussing the matter further. She knew the Courser was programmed to have unfailing loyalty in the Institute. No matter of explaining would get him to realize that the Brotherhood and the Railroad were more than just threats. They were people. Good people. Friends even. The knot clenched tighter in the pit of her stomach. She had tried. She tried desperately to work things out civilly, convince Deacon and Desdemona and the rest to give the Institute a second chance, that they could change their ways, but they wouldn’t hear it. And she tried to leave, tried to back out of the dirty business she had gotten herself into trusting Shaun as blindly as she did. But X6-88 blocked the door, gave her a nod. There would be no backing out now. Madison shut her eyes, her feet fumbling beneath her. She could still hear the screams that mingled with the zapping of laser pistols. She could still see her friends, staring expressionlessly into space, shocked, disappointed, betrayed, blood everywhere. As much as she had seen in her days in the Commonwealth, Madison was never as horrified as she was at herself that day at the Railroad Headquarters.
And then she stopped dead in her tracks. There it was, rising into view: the Red Rocket truck stop. A part of her wanted to run, to turn around not even bother. But her heart ached for some condolence. After all, she had just lost Shaun, after searching so long as so relentlessly, after working so hard for his approval, for his time, for his love. With hands still bloodied by her friends that lay dead in the old church and the mass grave that was the airport, she cradled his head and said her goodbyes as his life, a parentless life spent dedicated a hundred and ten percent to the Institute, slipped away. He left the Institute in her hands, but they didn’t need her. She had gone and solved all of their problems already, rid them of all opposition. The people were courteous enough, but they did not like her, and they did not want her. So Madison headed on her way back home. And with home now peeking over the horizon, she wasn’t so sure what to do.
A bark stirred her from her thoughts, and before she had a moment to act, Madison was tackled in the furry embrace of Dogmeat, who smothered her with devoted licks of happiness. X6-88, having pulled his gun, relaxed to hear her laugh beneath what appeared to be the beast’s onslaught of mindless violence. She pushed the hairy canine from atop her and got back to her feet, smiling down at the dog that couldn’t stay still he was so overwhelmingly happy to see her. She looked back to the Red Rocket truck stop, suddenly convinced that a similar greeting awaited her from her companions, though with a lot less slobering. With a relieved sigh, she marched up the hill back home, her dog prancing about in front of her.
Seeing as though it wasn’t quite morning yet, most all of the people who called Red Rocket home were fast asleep in the metal bunker behind the truck stop, but a single person sat at the bar inside, puffing on a cigarette. She entered hesitantly, leaning in the doorway. She wondered what to say, whether to be cheery, putting the dreadful past few weeks behind her, to or confess it all, let it all out to her truest of friends. But before Madison had a chance, Nick spoke up, smoke wafting out his mouth and all other fissures in his artificial skin.
“Couple of sources saying that you were the one leading the Institute on The Prydwen. So, you wanna tell me why you did it? Why you sided with those boogymen?”
She was stung by the remark, and the words tumbled out of her mouth defensively before she had time to consider them. “Was there really any other option..? The Institute were the only ones trying to preserve humanity, Nick.”
“Preserving humanity?!” The anger shone in Nick’s glowing yellow eyes, the cigarette crumbling in his metal fist. “That’s what we’re calling taking out The Brotherhood!? The Railroad!? All those lives lost… for what?! So a group of mad scientists can keep plundering the Commonwealth to their heart’s content? Is that truly the world you want to live in?”
Taking the blow straight to her heart, she had no other option than to do what she had always done best: shut everyone out and put on an emotionless front. “This seems like it’s personal, Nick…”
“I ain’t thrilled to see the folks who gave me the boot coming out on top. But this!? This is bigger than that!” A frustrated sigh escaped him as he looked back out the window, disappointment written all over his defensive posture and tone. “You know, since the first time we met, I always got the sense that you were gonna change this place. I just never expected it’d be like this.”
There was a silence that followed, a silence in which Nick Valentine heard his own words and suddenly wondered… what was he doing? As mad as he was at all the terrible things Madison had done while with the Institute, he knew her better than that. He knew that she would never betray her friends, or kill unnecessarily, or especially treat any synths like how the Institute treated them. No, there was something else at work, some other factor manipulating the poor girl into being someone she wasn’t. Nick turned back to the doorway, an apology ready to stumble out of his lips, but there was no one there to apologize to. Feeling guilt replacing the anger that had taken a hold of him, Valentine lit himself a new cigarette as the sun began to peek shyly over the horizon, blessing the small settlement with one more day. The smoke rolled out of Valentine’s mouth as his eyes fell to the bar, desolate. The Sole Survivor was gone. And he had no reason to believe that she would ever return again.