Ellen Park, the Lone Wanderer

The prevailing winds on Spectacle Island were consistent enough that the stench of racks and racks of drying mirelurk meat- and drying sea centaur meat- and drying GIANT MIRELURK OF BEHEMOTH SIZE meat- was largely confined to their immediate vicinity. The encampment they'd thrown together was by and large upwind. That was a small mercy- a very small one. Ellen was glad of her power armor's ability to filter the air, but she'd have to get out of it sometime.

Even that wouldn't have been so bad, except-

"Sorry, Paladin," called Knight Conklin from further up the island's half-visible solitary road. "Between our sweep and the bots, we've covered this whole land mass. There's no structures here more sophisticated than a wooden shack. Looks like there were farmers here a while back, but either the lurks killed them or raiders did. Nobody's made anything of this place in years."

Ellen sighed. "So the boat's still our best base of operations."

"Afraid so, ma'am." Conklin was as armored as Ellen, but still contrived to look marginally cheerful. "At least the Scribes'll be happy. There's a barge full of sealed Vault-Tec supply crates that ran aground on the northeast shore. We took out the mirelurks that'd been nesting in the vicinity, so they're free to start documenting everything on board."

"Thank you, Conklin," Ellen said. "That's something, at least. But unless those crates have prefabricated construction units in them, we're going to need to keep scouting. This place isn't suitable for our needs at all."

"You don't have to tell me twice, ma'am."

"Go get Jerald and the others and have them get their kit together. You and Kang will be escorting them to the barge," Ellen said. "But have Scribe Pabodie and Livesey meet me back at the boat. There's some visible structure on the shoreline that I'd like to have a robot scout out before we risk our necks with a second landing."

The pre-War maps and navigational charts of the waters around Boston indicated the presence of a number of islands of varying sizes. Neither the Bernard C. Webber's sensors nor the robots' could verify most of them; some were significantly larger than the maps indicated, others smaller or not even present any longer. How an island might disappear entirely over two hundred years Ellen did not like to think about.
There was one, though-

"The maps say this island was pretty big before the War," she said, tapping the map in front of her once before looking up at the blot on the horizon. "Livesey?"

"Yes, Madam?" asked the blue-and-white Mr. Handy.

"Am I reading this right? Did this Spectacle place have a navigable harbor?"


"It did indeed, Madam," said Livesey. "I believe I have more than enough fuel to venture in that direction far enough to verify its depth myself, if that's what you're asking."

"Please do," said Ellen. The Handy saluted with its snakelike sawblade arm and flared its thrusters, scooting away over the waves. Ellen shuddered and deliberately turned away.

"You're not the only one looking forward to being on solid ground," observed Knight Kang. He was perched on the edge of one of the boat's crew seats, examining another chart altogether- the best approximate map they had of the mainland Boston region. "I've had just about enough of the water to last me the rest of my life. If we have to evacuate to the Capital, I say we grab whatever we can carry and just walk back. Let the robots handle this thing without us."

"Oh, but sir," came Ervin's tinny voice from the direction of the helm, "we could never manage such a journey without human leadership-"

"He was joking, Ervin," Ellen called back. "Nobody's going anywhere without the rest of everybody. If I had to be miserable for five hundred miles in one direction, we all have to be miserable for five hundred more."

Kang rolled his eyes, but nevertheless murmured, "Yes, Paladin."

A crackle of static came from the boat's radio. "Madam," said Livesey's voice, weirdly dimmed by ongoing radio interference, "I believe the water approaching the island is deep enough for our ship to make port, and then some."

"Oh, good-"

"However," the Handy continued, "I really must urge extreme care in navigating this channel. I've observed the wreckage of at least one cargo vessel already. And may I suggest the ship's guns be manned as soon as possible? There appears to be a mirelurk presence of considerable size along the southernmost stretch of shoreline."

Ellen gestured hurriedly towards the stairs. "Kang, get the others on deck," she said. Turning to the radio she said, "How considerable, Livesey?"

"It does appear to be a breeding colony, Madam," said the Handy. "Of... more than one species, if I'm not mistaken."

"... more than one- Livesey, pull back at once," Ellen said. "Your systems are vulnerable to sonic attack and I'm not about to lose a good robot to mirelurk kings."

"Yes, Madam. It's not just kings, Madam," said Livesey. "I- I really do believe you ought to have a look for yourself. My powers of description aren't what they ought to be."

Uh-oh, Ellen thought. "Conklin!" she said aloud as the Knight emerged from belowdecks. "I need binoculars and I need them now."

"Right here, Paladin," said Conklin, and handed the instruments over.

Livesey, Ellen saw, had taken up a position over the end of a half-submerged boat some distance off the island's southeastern shore. The Handy's flamethrower arm pointed towards a spit of land jutting out into the water, on which there were not only the sort of mirelurks any Capital Wasteland surface dweller might have to face, but also- "Good Lord," Ellen said, "is that a mirelurk tongue monster?"

It certainly had the general body plan of one- a long, low, heavy body parallel to the ground, with a forward-facing torso jutting upwards and at least two long wriggly elements poking out of the area near the top. And it had legs enough to hold it up, but the similarities ended there. For one thing, tongue monsters had only the four legs, and they each ended in hands. The things Ellen saw scrambling around on the beach had what looked like eight each. The Capital's tongue monsters had no arms, either, whereas the things on the beach had huge heavy claws like a scorpion's sticking forward from their lower torsos. And the tongue monsters' tongues, all three of them, protruded from the mouths of otherwise human-looking heads; this thing had nothing remotely recognizable as such. The wriggly bits might have been antennae rather than tongues if they hadn't come out of the center of the forward-facing part, and if they hadn't had two hooked, segmented arm-like bits just below them. The thing's eyes were only recognizable as such because they resembled the eyes of a bloatfly writ very large indeed.

Ellen lowered the binoculars carefully and passed them to Scribe Pabodie, who had come up behind her. "I have no idea what I'm looking at," she said.

"Neither do I," said the blonde, red-robed woman after a moment's observation. "It looks... sort of like a mirelurk? But it- whoa!"

"What whoa?"

Pabodie shook her head rapidly. "Sorry, Paladin," she said. "They spit, apparently. At each other, if nothing else."

"Well, that's not a surprise. So do tongue monsters."

"Centaurs don't have natural body armor," said Pabodie. "These things do. I suggest you look into landing further up the shoreline. I don't think coming ashore anywhere near those creatures is safe."

"Probably not," said Elle, "but unless we can find deep enough water we're a little stuck... Livesey? Can I get a count of how many of these things are out there?"

"Ah- Madam, I'm afraid there's been- get back, you filthy-"

Unceremoniously, Ellen grabbed the binoculars away from Scribe Pabodie. Livesey was backed up against what must have been the wrecked boat's radio antenna, facing down a pair of weirdly finny mirelurk kings. As the Handy opened the valves on its flamethrower arm she called out, "I want those things targeted! Take out the kings and any other lurks that enter the field of fire!"

"What do-" Pabodie began. Ellen all but tossed the binoculars at her.

"Keep an eye out for incoming. I have shooting to do."

Bernard C. Webber had been equipped with a number of automatic ballistic weapons in its day, and the crew in Philly had brought them up to full function, but the Knights were manning them already. That was all right. Even with the deck moving under her like some kind of a bad joke Ellen could brace herself against the rails well enough to line up a shot with her Gauss rifle. Livesey had successfully set one of the kings on fire, but the other one's gilled neck was flaring, a sure sign of imminent sonic blast-

( Aim for the body and you'll hit something, if you're lucky. Aim for the heart and you'll hit the body; aim for the eye and you'll hit the head. Aim for the pupil and you'll hit the eye... )

The thing screamed, and pawed at the air, and fell over backwards spewing the weirdly blue stuff that passed for blood among its kind.

"Thank you, Madam! Ho, there's more of this lot incoming!"

Sure enough the splash of the fallen king, and the thrashing of the burning one as it tried and failed to leap at Livesey, was drawing attention. The hump-like waves that marked a mirelurk shell just below the water's surface were converging rapidly on the half-sunken boat. A particularly large bluish 'lurk lunged out of the water, crashing against the remains of the hull. "Livesey!" Ellen called out. "Get back here at once! We'll cover you!"

"Yes, Madam-"

It all happened at once, as Ellen watched through the binoculars. The Handy spun its arm assembly about, spewing flames in an arc as the 'lurks fell back. The big blue 'lurk crashed against the sunken boat again, shaking the hull badly. The radio tower or mast or whatever it was that Livesey had been backed against sagged with the impact.

Livesey's sawblade arm jammed into the sagging mast. The Handy pulled it free. Something that looked like a large switch came with it.

And the water erupted in a fountain of foam and rage as more mirelurk than anyone knew even EXISTED broke the surface.

Three days in a row, it had been raining.

Ellen wasn't really used to rain even now. Nineteen years of indoor living had given way to topside life in which rain tended to fall in nasty, heavy, brief spasms, and about half of it was heavily acidic anyway. Things were different in Philly; a hundred and fifty miles of separation could work wonders. The rain here was almost all water, and it fell easily and steadily, and it left the sky gray as the inside of a badly-lit helmet, and it had been falling for days on end while the Scribes and the robots tested every single system on the Bernard C. Webber-

(That was the name on the front end of the ship, anyway. One of the Scribes had suggested giving it a name out of Brotherhood history, or knightly legend, or something suitably mythic. Ellen didn't know ships, or the naming of ships, but... the name had survived intact for at least two hundred years. It seemed like a bad idea to go changing it now.)

(Prydwen sounded weird anyway.)

But it had been raining three days in a row, and looked like it would rain a fourth, when the Citadel made radio contact.

"Paladin 101, this is Senior Paladin Tristan... Star Paladin Tristan now. Your handling of the Philly operation to date has been evaluated and found outstanding, so I know this may come as something of a surprise to you. Allow me to be the first to congratulate you on your new assignment- I hope that ship in your last three reports is up to the task..."

The Blood Prince isn’t a man who sleeps much. He’s got an ice gang to train with and a city to run. Nobody gets shit done while they’re sleeping. Nap here, nap there, get up and get moving- but never waste a whole night sleeping in one solid block. And never do it anywhere predictable or someone’ll take advantage of you when you’re down.

Nevertheless there is a note waiting for him when he wakes up an hour before sunrise, and his defenseman can’t account for how it got there.

Prince-

I warned you when my people first arrived in the Philadelphia area that there were enemies coming. I know you don’t think a whole lot of a bunch of armed outsiders on your doorstep, and you probably don’t draw much distinction between the ones in plain armor versus the ones in red and black. History tends to lump outside powers together when it comes to stories of technologically advanced people who want things that locals have protected for a long time, after all. I think I can tell you a few things that may change your mind, at least a little bit.

His defenseman looks up at the sound of the Prince’s snort.

First of all- I’m willing to play by your rules. The Outcasts won’t. They’re here for the factory and they have nothing to lose. They’d be happy to sweep through Philly and put a plasma bolt through the head of anyone they see in Flyers colors, then wait for the other gangs to fight each other into exhaustion. I have no intention of doing that. I held them off from your city by stampeding those river monster things you have through their encampment, at least until my reinforcements could arrive. My people are keeping them off balance now, so they can’t join up with your rivals here in the city.

You can check on that if you want. The Royals would probably be only too happy to slip the Outcasts past your guards if they thought it would break your streak. I don’t think they’d understand that it would just get them a reputation as traitors once the gunfire started.

At any rate, the point is that the Outcasts and my people are temporarily at an impasse while they try to figure out how to fight their way into your city and take what they want by force. The Brotherhood of Steel has no desire to take over Philadelphia. We’re just interested in the suicide zone. I am prepared to do this the Philly way if I have to- I believe the standard procedure is to form a team and enter that annual tournament, yes? That's a few months from now, which neither you nor I have, but if you accept out of season challengers, then you’ve got one. Please see the last page of this letter for our roster and team pictures, plus our availability dates for a proper throw-down in the Arena.

Flip. Flip. “Fuckin’ hell. Chumpy, she’s got sponsors lined up.”

“She who?” says the bewildered defenseman.

The Prince rolls his eyes and flips back to where he’d left off.

Second- I’m prepared to make some offers in addition to the Arena throwdown that I think you may be interested in. I get the impression that you’re a man with one eye on the Hall of Fame, or whatever you have around here for gangers who fight well enough to merit a legacy. I’ve attached a list of those to the end of this letter as well.

And finally, considering what I’ve seen of you and your people and your interaction with the Pitt, I think you may appreciate the attached accounting of the Brotherhood’s dealings with Lord Ashur over the past several years. We have that much in common, if nothing else.

I await your reply on the matter of the out-of-season challenge. Painless Parker, our team physician, should be around in an hour or so to bring any messages you might want to send.

Thank you.

Sincerely,

Paladin 101
Capital Wasteland Brotherhood of Steel
Team Captain, DC Caps

“Fuckin’ hell. Well, this is gonna be interesting.”

It started when the cow got out. Well, it started a long time before that. But the important part is the cow.

Okay, no, the important part is what was chasing the cow. Since when did they have yao guai at Milliways? Let alone yao guai that big?

(They had bears that big in Zion. Not that Ellen knew this.)

It wasn’t a Deathclaw or a fire ant queen, just a bear, an oversized one. She didn’t need help for a bear. Not when her cow was in danger. Best to take what she was wearing- her Gauss rifle, her sword, her stealth suit- and go after it. Nobody at the Bar needed a monstrous yao guai surprise.

---

The cow got away. That was a good thing. There was a chase and a few tricks and a diversion of paths in the woods and the cow went down the left path while Ellen drove the bear down the right. So that was good.

The bear kept running.

(The Sorrows could have told her this would happen.)

---

She should’ve stopped, maybe. Should’ve let the bear go, gone back, warned the patrons. Let people who knew forests and trees find it. Maybe someone could chase it out of the world, back to where it came from. Someone who wouldn’t get lost.

There really were an awful lot of trees in every direction, and even with the goggles the bear’s trail was incredibly spotty.

… come to think of it, when she turned around, so was her own.

---

Go far enough into a forest and you are supposed to come out the other side. The mountains at Milliways only have one side- get to the top and you’re going down the same way you came up. The forest gave the impression of working the opposite way. Get to the middle, and the middle went on forever instead.

That, or she was going in circles, following a scent trail that drifted over the ground like it was made of smoke.

---

The forest ended. There was rock. It went up.

It wasn’t the mountains. The mountains slanted. This was just rock and it went up. It went up to the left and up to the right and up and up and up and up.

(The rockface Evergreen Mills was carved into was her only point of reference for the concept of ‘cliffs’. It didn’t help.)

There was a hole in the rock, at least. A cave mouth. Looked bad, smelled worse.

But the trail led in, so that was something.

---

Bears are bad news. Giant bears are worse. Lots of giant bears are even worse than that.

Giant bears behind you are no good at all.

Giant bears made of fire-

---

A lot of things about the Brotherhood of Steel aren’t well known, even to its oldest members. Mostly they’re to do with the beginning. The Founder didn’t write that much down. Some things needed knowing, some didn’t, is how the Scribes see it these days. Maybe he thought things needed forgetting.

But he started with ordinary soldiers, and then the fire from heaven fell, and when the dust settled and the black rains were over he’d made knights and paladins of the fighters, and scribes of the others. And that was the end of anything expected, or even ordinary.

(It started, after all, a long time before the cow got out.)

---

The thing with Gauss rifles was that they were loud, and not really made for fighting for your life in close quarters. If you didn’t get kicked back into the enemy or the nearest wall by the recoil you’d get knocked deaf by the echo. Swords, now, those were something else. Especially the kind that crackled blue with electricity at the slightest provocation.

Like hitting an only partially real bear made of fire, and making it disappear.

Or like hitting a very real bear made of fire, and making it roar so loudly the cave walls shake.

Or running the aforementioned bear made of fire through. . .

---

Oh. Now there was a way out of the forest.

Who lives by the sword, dies by the sword; but who lives by compassion will one day see compassion shown them. This is how the Friends have survived the years since the seas boiled and the skies fell. Not in theory alone, either, but in practice. There's a reason for the mural painted in the Welcoming Hall, the one of the woman and the hairy yao guai and the one-headed Brahmin; the woman's name was Girolama, who became one of us not long after the War, and I want now to tell you why she's depicted with those animals.

At one time of her life, Girolama lived in a scav-town west of here, one that was trying with all its might to grow its own food and prosper. This was before she learned what it meant to be a Friend, when she still carried a gun and fought her fellow human beings like any other outsider. One day she and a man were standing evening guard against the raiders and slave-takers that roamed the wastes when a great, hairy beast- like a yao guai, but with black hair all over, if you can believe that- suddenly appeared walking up to them. They were both horribly frightened, and her companion ran, because the beast was too big and too tough for his ammunition to do any real harm to. But Girolama had noticed that as the yao guai walked, it limped like it was in terrible pain. And even though Girolama still carried a gun in those days, she still always tried to help anyone in trouble who offered her no harm. So she thought perhaps something might be happening here, and instead of running or shooting, waited to see what was wrong with the animal.

The yao guai came right up to the gate, grumbling and whimpering, and when it was very close Girolama saw that it couldn't even put the least little bit of weight on one paw. It looked at her, and lay down, and put its other paw over its muzzle.

Girolama fearlessly walked up to it and when it offered her no harm, reached for the injured paw. It let her do so. She saw as she took the paw on her lap that it was terribly wounded and festering, and she also saw marks around its neck, like the kind a slave-collar leaves on a human even after it's pried loose. Someone had chained up the yao guai and done it great harm, and somehow it had escaped, but it could not heal on its own. So Girolama took what little she had of medical supplies and bound the injured limb. The wound was rather a bad one, but Girolama kept the yao guai with her and nursed her carefully, giving the creature her own food and subsisting on next to nothing till the yao guai was quite well again.

The yao guai was so grateful, and became so much attached to her kind doctor, that she refused to leave. Now, this was a scav-town and there was very little to spare for anyone, so not one single soul from the highest to the lowest, man or beast, was allowed to lead an idle life. Girolama said she would teach the creature to earn its keep, and so she did. There were two Brahmin in the town, although you wouldn't recognize them; they had red fur above and white fur below, and stubby horns, and only one head each. They were nowhere near so big as the Brahmin are now, but they could still carry any load the scavvers bound on their backs. Girolama taught her yao guai companion to guard and watch over them both when the humans had to sleep. The yao guai and Brahmin became great friends, and no doubt the Brahmin felt much comfort in having such a powerful protector.

But it happened, on one very hot summer's day, that while the Brahmin were at pasture the yao guai fell asleep. Some raiders were passing that way and seeing the Brahmin grazing quietly, and apparently alone, they stole one of them and carried her off. The other, the bull, would not cooperate, but fled to wake the yao guai. She awoke; but when she went after the cow she was not to be seen. In vain the yao guai tried to follow her trail, but the raiders were clever enough to conceal themselves, and she had to go back to the scav-town alone, shuffling in shame with her head held low.

Now, this was a bright yao guai, but like any other, she could not speak. Girolama thought she might have fallen to temptation and attacked the cow, but there was no blood on her muzzle or claws. So she said to spare the yao guai's life, because no one ought to die unless there was clear proof, but she ordered that the yao guai do the Brahmin's work as far as she was able, since she had failed in her duty otherwise.

The yao guai meekly submitted, and allowed the daily loads of scrap metal and baskets of scavenged food to be tied on her back, and carried them safely home. As soon as she was unloaded she would run about for some time, still hoping to find the Brahmin.

One day, as she was hunting about in this fashion, she saw a band of raiders coming down the road. As was usual with them, they'd lashed the spoils of their last battle together to bring somewhere they could be sold; and to the yao guai's great joy, their beast of burden was her lost friend.

She instantly charged the company, who were unprepared for a great black beast and could not get their guns free quickly enough. The raiders scattered, and the yao guai had no difficulty in driving them towards the scav-town, where Girolama met them.

The raiders, much alarmed by anyone who could tame such a monster, confessed their theft, and Girolama forgave them, and was very kind to them; and confused by the fact that no one wanted to kill them, many of them gave up their violent ways and agreed to live like civilized people. The Brahmin, of course, returned to her former owners. And the yao guai was much petted and praised for her goodness and cleverness, and lived with Girolama till the end of her life.

So Girolama realized that it was a good thing to extend kindness to the dangerous, and offer forgiveness to the violent; but it was also a good thing to have powerful guardians. When she left that scav-town and joined us here in Philly, she brought the yao guai with her, and took to rescuing and taming the creatures the ice gangers round up and battle for their bloody amusements. They protected her, and her friends, out of loyalty and thanks for their compassion. To the day she died, she showed love to the most dangerous and violent of creatures, and they showed her love in return in the only ways they knew how. We continue her tradition to this day. We do not fight, and we do harm to no man, but we reach out our hands to the ones who need it most and give them such compassion as we can.

And we make very, very sure that everyone knows this, so nobody starts anything they're not prepared to have end in claws and blood.

The Blood Prince isn't the only power in the city of Philadelphia, according to Painless. Dr. D was kind enough to confirm the dentist's statement. There are other ice gangs and they all have their own leaders, and any one of them could probably take control of the city in the next year's tournament if they had a little assistance. The Royals are supposed to have the strongest membership and the best chance; they cost the Flyers an awful lot of good blood last year. Bring in some better equipment, maybe an outside team member or two-

Ellen put up a hand and stopped the discussion right there.

Philly's a city, and one that's working, at least as far as she can see. Its system of government isn't the most stable, but... it's working. It's a mess, but it's a more unified mess than the Capital, which is more of a super-loose confederation that more or less views the Brotherhood as a de facto government of sorts. It's got a food supply, and a water supply, and it's largely kept the raiders out. And while there's a hell of a lot of internecine violence in the areas where ice gangs demand tribute and payment from the residents, it's not nearly as bad as the Pitt. Not to mention that she's yet to see any slaves captured or bought or sold, which is a big thing. It's a mess- but it's a mess that works. They've been in the city less than a month. Everything they know about the place, they know from either Painless or Dr. D. Intervening now, on anyone's behalf, would be the equivalent of chucking a grenade down a fire ant tunnel. Mission or no mission, Outcasts coming or no, they don't interfere with anything until they have a better picture of the situation.

The next few days are going to be busy. Tomorrow they're going to make contact with the Friends, and find out how people with a reputation for never engaging in combat can walk the streets of a city like this without being slaughtered out of existence. There's supposed to be a Vault in the area, too, and a trade delegation from another Vault somewhere nearby; they're part of why the city can eat, apparently, so it's probably wise to meet with them and find out how they've managed all this time. There's a meatface- apparently that's what the locals call ghouls- who's supposed to have his finger on the city's pulse better than anyone else, but he doesn't much like outsiders, so it's going to be tricky getting to talk to him. There's an exhibition match coming up on the Arena's ice- not that Ellen particularly wants to spend Brotherhood time and resources watching grown men and women beat each others' heads in for sport, but Painless swears it's a good way to meet everyday Philly dwellers en masse, and Dr. D reluctantly agreed with him. Plus, well, it seldom hurts to get a look at potential enemies' or potential allies' fighting styles. There's a lot to do.

And the Outcasts are coming, somewhere in all of that, looking to blow past the Blood Prince and grab General Atomics for themselves before she can make her move.

And the reinforcements are coming from the Citadel, looking to her for orders.

This isn't RobCo. RobCo was easy, by comparison. RobCo was just- well, it was her idea to begin with, and then her pet project, and by the time it was her responsibility she'd already laid the foundations and then some. There was no sense of everyone breathing down her neck and every eye being on her. If she'd failed to get the RobCo plant working again- well, it would've been a waste of time and resources, but that would've been it. Nobody would've died for it. Nothing would change except her reputation.

If the Outcasts take General Atomics somehow, it'll restart the Brotherhood civil war in the Capital. If they fail, but she doesn't succeed in securing it, they'll just keep trying. Casdin might order them not to, but given that this bunch slipped out of Fort Independence without his okay, she doubts orders from him will slow anyone else down. They won't be likely to bother if General Atomics ends up in Citadel Brotherhood hands. Reclaiming the place is, after all, reclaiming pre-War tech, and not even the most reactionary Outcast could fault Elder Lyons for doing exactly what the Brotherhood was supposed to do.

Theoretically- theoretically- they could remove General Atomics from the equation. The area's a suicide zone; no one in the city would be particularly stricken if the plant were to be somehow wiped off the face of the Earth, either by orbital death ray or by some more conventional means. Given what Ellen's seen of the robobrain population in there, that would be a mass mercy kill- but it would also be sacrilege of the highest order. Lyons and Casdin might have different priorities, but they both hold to the same core Brotherhood belief that the technology of the ancients is both vital and necessary to the rebuilding of the human race. Destroying General Atomics to keep it out of Outcast hands might spare the Citadel Brotherhood the mess of a new civil war, but only because it would bring both the Citadel Brotherhood and the Outcasts together in arms against her. She's dead sure of that.

The other alternative- which the Outcasts may be considering, or not, she doesn't really know- is the polar opposite: remove the city from the equation. Take out the leadership and gut the power structure of all the major ice gangs and force the surrender of the survivors, then install a puppet leadership scheme in their place. The Blood Prince isn't the only one who knows history; Ellen's history texts talked about America's long-ago acquisition of Hawaii, and about power struggles in half a dozen South American nations. If the existing power structure isn't congenial to your liking, overwrite it all and cut down anyone who stands in your way until there's no choice left but to accept the outsiders- it's happened before, and it could probably be done again. The thing is that Ellen has a conscience, and while she's called down fire from heaven on her enemies to cleanse the world before, plain old slaughter and the breaking of backs doesn't sit well with her. She's all too aware of how close she stands to the Red Rider of the Apocalypse. She's not about to throw in her lot with the White.

So.

Convince the Blood Prince to give them permission to access the place on an ongoing basis, or come up with an alternative based on what works for the locals. And do it fast.

( "We believe in technology, in the triumph of the creations of the ancients over the horrors and evils of the Wasteland. We believe in trust. Trust in technology. Trust in our fellow Brothers. Trust in our elders. Ah, and we believe in victory. Our forces have dwindled, but still we fight on. Super mutant, Enclave, it matters not. Surrender is not an option." )

And believe, with all her heart, that it can be done. If nothing else, Elder Lyons believes she can do it. So... she'd better live up to his faith in her.

The Blood Prince leaned back in his chair. His knuckles were pressed together; he steepled his index fingers and the tips of his thumbs. "Lemme see if I've got this straight," he said. "A bunch of foreigners show up out of nowhere and start poking around my city, then come back here and tell me they want permanent access to a chunk of it that nobody survives visiting, and I'm supposed to think letting them go for it isn't supposed to come back and bite me in the ass?"

Ellen willed herself not to fidget. The Knights had warned her about the disclosure approach. "Sir," she said, "we're willing to trade-"

"No offense or nothing, Paladin, but 'trade' means you got something I want and I got something you want." He fixed her with a flat look. "I ain't all that sure you can make good on your end of that. You're a long way from home, you got two men in armor and one man in a dress-"

"It's robes. And they're armored."

The Prince ignored him. "-one of my own people keepin' you from walking into the river, a cow, and some kind of freak-ass robot. That's not a whole lot compared to what you want."

"Sir-"

"I'm not a stupid man, Paladin. You got in and out of GA and your man didn't die. I let you keep trying, I'm gonna wake up one morning and find out you got the robots to join your team. Next thing I know you start drafting my people out from under my nose, and I wind up having to round up everyone who's left and fall back to my auntie and uncle's compound in Bel Air."

"…. That's kind of an impressive series of leaps of logic," Ellen said after some stunned blinking. "Um."

"Hey, I may not be what you're used to dealing with, but I know what history looks like," said the Prince. "I got a season pass to the House of Franklin. I can read."

"I see," Ellen said. "In that case I should probably tell you that there's at least one group intending to force your hand on its way…"

---

He'd listened. He'd said some words Ellen didn't understand, although she probably didn't need to. He'd said he'd give it some thought, and then sent her away. It… wasn't what she had hoped, but was probably better than she could have expected. One of the Flyers, a tall, sallow man whose orange and black armor was held together with more straps than Ellen would've thought possible, led them back through the halls of the former prison. "We'll come find you when he decides," he said. "Don't do anything stupid in the meantime."

Ellen chose not to answer that.

When the Pen's gates closed behind them Ellen didn't say anything, but let Painless take the lead. As they started back towards the House of Franklin, Kang quietly said, "Permission to speak freely, ma'am?"

"Go ahead, Knight."

"This isn't Evergreen Mills, ma'am,' said Kang. "This is a whole city. You're not going to be able to sweep in here with a couple of extra Paladins and a couple of extra mole people and expect to take the factory and hold it. Factories need parts and resources, and if the city turns against us…"

"He doesn't have to fight us to get us out. I know," said Ellen. "All he has to do is choke off our supply lines. This place is in better shape than the old RobCo plant, but it'll still take us a long time to get it back up to full function, assuming we can secure it in the first place."

Kang nodded. "We're gonna have to get on his good side," he said, his helmet-muffled voice taking on a gloom-tinged tone. "Just to have a chance."

"I dunno, you guys," said Painless carefully. "There might be a couple other ways."

Ellen blinked, and glanced at their guide. "What do you mean?"

Painless shrugged. "Seems to me you need the city on your side, more than the Prince, specifically," he said. "Now, understand, I'm not saying anything against him, and frankly I think he's the best thing to happen to this city in a long time, but he's not the only force in this city. Not everybody loves the Flyers. You get some of the other ice gangs on your side, and you might not have to worry that much. Frankly, you probably want to do that anyway. The Flyers've won the City Cup fifteen years running, but streaks have to end sometime, and then you're gonna have this argument all over again."

Conklin, who had been silent the whole time, suddenly let out a low, hoarse laugh. "Unless we take this Cup ourselves," he said. "Didn't you win some kind of fight tournament in the Pitt, Paladin?"

"That wasn't on ice!" Ellen snapped. "And all Elder Lyons wants is secure access, not a whole city!"

"Didn't you just have orders to investigate Evergreen Mills, El?" Jerald said innocently. "Bring back an intel report? Something like that?"

"Shut up, Jerald," Ellen said. "Look, let's just- let's just get back to base, okay? I need to find out more about this city and everything going on here before I see the Prince again. Nothing good ever happens when you get caught flat footed."

Ellen closed the Milliways door behind her and stepped out of the ostensible 'ladies' room'. They'd fixed it up better than anywhere she'd seen in the Capital other than the Citadel, but they'd also repainted it, and they'd done their best to match the same décor and aesthetic style as the Franklin Girls' Dresses. It was a positive relief to return to Doctor D's office; while the colors were on the ridiculously vibrant side, there were no faked draperies or mythological figures trailing slogan-strewn ribbons. "Sorry about that," she said to the dark-haired man as she took her seat. "Necessity."

He nodded. "Whatever you say, Paladin," he said. "You've been extremely civil this whole time. I can forgive a momentary disruption."

Ellen considered the man a moment. Compared to the ladies who populated his establishment, his clothing was almost subtle. He wore a dark grey vest laced tightly over a deep red shirt with weirdly puffed sleeves, fastened at the cuffs with carved buttons made of a material she couldn't place. His magenta trousers stopped about halfway down his calves, from what she could see of them under the desk, and gave the impression of being attached to socks- at least, they also had buttons on the sides, and she couldn't figure out a reason for that otherwise. She had a feeling he didn't leave the House of Franklin often. His shoes weren't nearly worn enough to have treaded the Philly streets.

"Would it be pressing my luck to ask you why you dress like that?" she said. "I mean, obviously the ladies are wearing those- I don't even know- for advertising, but.... well, it all seems just a bit-"

"Ludicrous?" he suggested.

"I didn't want to come out and say it."

"No, no, Paladin, rest assured I've been thinking that every day since my merry little band was forced to set up operations here," said D. "Would you believe it was a survival decision?"

Ellen just looked at him.

"No, seriously," said D. "I would say it was complicated, but what it ultimately boils down to is that my colleague Shields and I found ourselves so far off course in our attempt to reach Chicago that we ran out of supplies, and then ran out of financial reserves."

"I'm surprised it wasn't the other way around, considering you were coming from California," murmured Ellen. "Who would accept paper money along the way?"

D held up a finger. "Ah, true, very true," he said. "Which is why we'd converted our dollars into bottlecaps long before. Any water merchant worth his or her salt recognizes a cap almost anywhere on the continent. Unfortunately, as we proceeded on our course we discovered to our horror that we'd been moving in a primarily eastward direction rather than a northeasterly one; we were so far off course that we'd never be able to turn back and make it to Chicago with what remained to us. Especially not given the presence of a den of iniquity and violence notorious among traders and fugitives to the west of here-"

"You avoided the Pitt?" said Ellen. "How?"

"Sheer dumb luck," said D. "In that we encountered a young woman stricken with the most repulsively suppurating form of skin cancer I've seen outside Bakersfield, and scars of a nature I won't speak of here. We did our best to treat her, although by that point we didn't have the capacity to do more than basic symptomatic care, and in return she advised us on how best to avoid the roving raiders and slavers of the region. She left us not long after; I've wondered since then how much longer she survived, poor thing."

"Okay," said Ellen. "So you made it around the Pitt and got across Pennsylvania somehow. I take it you were out of medical supplies by the time you reached Philly?"

"Unfortunately so," said D. "Although we still had some of our equipment, which, frankly, was more difficult to replace than components and chemicals. Shields and I sat down for a real heart-to-heart and decided that the Chicago aspect of our mission was just going to have to be scrapped. Philadelphia had as much need as the city of the Broad Shoulders, so we'd put down roots and start our work over again here."

"I can understand that part, " said Ellen. "How did you get from a medical mission to this?"

"Medicine, my good Paladin, costs money," said D. "And requires moderately secure facilities in which to function. Shields and I found that the old schools and other buildings that might have offered us a haven in which to function had already been claimed by the worst sorts of organized ruffian, and that the city's ruler had no particular interest in driving them out. Our hired guards had long since left us for lack of pay. The only secure place either of us could find to spend the night was, frankly, a local brothel; the master of the house, an older fellow who called himself Uriah, had paid off one of the ice gangs to leave his business alone through the end of the month."

He leaned back in his chair and interlaced his fingers on his stomach. "Uriah, as it happened, had not invested much money in the health of his ladies. I don't know how much you know about venereal diseases-"

"My father was a physician, and the major radio broadcaster in the Wasteland regularly puts out public service announcements on the subject."

"Ah, good. Then you're aware that the fission is the kind of thing you don't want to live with for the rest of your days," said D. "The first stage can be concealed with the right clothing; the later stages... not so much, although they can be treated and the disease's progress at least arrested if not cured entirely. When we mentioned this to Uriah, he offered to let us stay on his grounds in exchange for whatever medical care we would provide. Even in a hole as wretched as this, given the givens, people will generally opt for a healthy whore over a visibly diseased one. We set up camp in an available room and set about scavenging the supplies and components necessary to synthesize some basic antimicrobial chems."

Ellen thought of Ashur, and of what he'd said of his own path to power. "There are worse ways to survive," she said.

"I'm glad you agree," said D. "As it happened, we were successful beyond our best expectations of the time; the disease organisms here haven't seen treatment chems in generations. Uriah was profoundly grateful, as were the ladies. Uriah's ladies became the companions of choice for a not insignificant portion of Philly's patronizers of prostitutes. Unfortunately, cutthroat capitalism is disturbingly literal in this town, and one of his competitors took matters into her own hands."

Ellen winced.

"Indeed. The ladies of the house, while enterprising to a fault, had few resources beyond the basics they'd managed to scrape together, and none of them were prepared to strike out on their own, particularly not with Uriah's murderer operating with impunity not far off. Unfortunately, the subsequent vote on how best to proceed ended in my being elected Uriah's successor and inheritor of his worldly goods, which I agreed to on the sole condition that we find a way to begin offering other services than merely venereal." He grimaced. "And while the existing clientele was willing to accept a few basic medical procedures on the premises, it was all but impossible to persuade them we were capable of anything better, at least the way things used to be run. When the woman who murdered Uriah started sending out feelers to determine just how much harder she'd have to work to put us out of business, I took what profits we'd accumulated and paid the Flyers enough to find us somewhere else to set up shop, preferably out of her reach. The Blood Prince used to use this place as a hunting ground- you wouldn't know it now, but it used to be infested with the kind of low-life scum who couldn't play well enough with others to make it in an ice gang. Once the Flyers rampaged through the place and wiped them all out, we were free to move in. I took the opportunity to match our image to the man it originally honored and to put the word out on the streets that we now offered a great deal more than merely- forgive the phrase- poontang."

Ellen whistled softly. "That's... kind of impressive, actually," she said. "And it's been working for you?"

"Surprisingly well," said D. "We're not at the point where we can phase out the prostitution angle just yet, alas, but it paid the protection and supply bills well enough to expand our medical and educational offerings- not to mention that Shields uncovered the secret of producing one of Philadelphia's legendary ancestral flavor sensations, a type of condiment called 'cheez'. If she can work out how to expand her cheez production facility enough to meet the city's demand for it this may not have to be a bordello much longer, especially since we've been able to educate our employees to the point where the majority of them could probably pass an NCR medical qualification exam."

"Congratulations, then," said Ellen. "I hope business picks up for you."

"Thank you, Paladin," said D. "Having said that, I hope you won't mind if I ask you a few questions myself. I'd like to think I'm entitled at this point. Assuming that prying into Brotherhood affairs doesn't get me denounced or worse, of course."

"Sir, you're more than entitled," Ellen said. "I think it's safe to say that you and your colleague aren't the only ones who've changed since leaving California...."