Dr. Zimmer

"Flak!" called Ellen as she stepped into the cavernous room that housed Rivet City's marketplace. "Oh, wow, am I ever glad to see you!"

The big, broad-shouldered gun-seller looked up from his wares. "Hey, kid," he called back gruffly. "Didn't think I'd be seeing you again so soon. Need to do some killing, eh?"

Ellen winced, and did her best to unobtrusively brush some of the dried gore off her armor; she'd tried to clean herself up after the Talons ambushed her at the old Metro station, but it hadn't entirely worked. "Kind of the opposite, actually," she said. "I'm a little tired of having to run like a radroach to keep people from aiming for my head. You don't sell helmets by any chance, do you?"

"Naw. The only armor Shrapnel and I keep around, we use for proving our guns are good," Flak said. "Try Seagrave Holmes. He might've gotten something in."

"Thank you," said Ellen. "Oh, before I forget- do you have any room in your inventory for a flamer? I know one that needs a good home."

"Kid," said Flak solemnly, "I always have room. Bring it on."

One massive, reeking combat flamethrower later, the dead Talons had a little less stuff to accompany them into the afterlife, and Ellen had three hundred more caps to her name. Seagrave, alas, had no helmets to offer either, although he was more than happy to top off her stimpak supply. She made a mental note to talk to Crow the armor-seller the next time he stopped here; she had about enough caps on her now to stay a few nights at the Weatherley Hotel in the upper decks and still afford at least a basic helmet, if she was careful. "Thanks anyway, Seagrave," she said regretfully. "I'd better go find Dad now. You haven't seen him around, have you?"

"Middle-aged, gray hair, looks like you? Oh, he came in here a while ago," said Seagrave, turning back to straighten out his display of Nuka-Cola bottles. As he lined up the boxes of Abraxo and Suds-a-Lot Detergent beside them he added, "Far as I know, he's been with Dr. Li and her crew ever since. I've seen Angela head out of Gary's Galley a couple of times with trays of food and come back empty-handed, and Gary doesn't usually deliver food for anybody but Dr. Li, so whatever they're working on's probably got 'em real tied up."

Ellen nodded. "Good to know," she said. "Thanks."

"Come back any time!"

She rather liked Rivet City, when it came right down to it. Yes, it was old and rusty in places, and it needed a great deal of maintenance and pick-up before it was in any kind of really good condition, but there was something awfully comforting about the tunnels and cramped rooms compared to Megaton. Just because she'd been on the surface for a good long while now didn't mean nineteen years of Vault living were completely behind her. Admittedly, she'd never had to navigate the Vault's corridors with an eye to whether her armor would fit, or with a dog at her heels, but still, Rivet City felt more like her old home than anywhere else she'd been so far.

She was turning the thought over in her mind as she stepped into the science lab. She should've been paying attention. "Hey!" cried the jumpsuited man who'd been just inside the door. A clipboard and a toolbox went flying across the catwalk. "Watch where you're going!"

"Ack! I'm sorry," Ellen said, instantly contrite; Dogmeat skittered to one side. "I didn't-"

"No, I don't imagine you did," said the man. "Just come waltzing in here and expect everybody to drop everything they'd been working on- typical, really."

Ellen blinked, taken aback by the rancor in his tone. "Sir, I really didn't mean to bump into you," she said. "I'm sorry."

"Pff. Whatever. Why don't you try staying out of the way and letting people do some real work," the man muttered. He grabbed up his toolbox, scrambled for his clipboard, and stalked off.

Ellen watched him go, bewildered. "What did I say?" she wondered of no one in particular.

"Oh, don't worry about Daniel," came the unexpected answer from below. Ellen moved to peer over the railing; the speaker was a man not much older than herself, clad in a worn labcoat and suit. "He's never been a fan of your father's- you're James' daughter, aren't you?"

Ellen nodded mutely.

"I'm Alex Dargon. Pleased to meet you. Come on down, I hate shouting."

"All right." Ellen whistled to Dogmeat and started down the stairs. "He knew my father?"

"Sort of, from what I understand," said Alex. "He's an engineer. He was Dr. Li's assistant back when everyone was working at Project Purity. Daniel's been grouching about your father pulling out and leaving everybody high and dry ever since James came back here the other day. Not to mention how much of a disruption his showing up out of nowhere caused. Dr. Li hasn't been able to get any work done on our hydroponics projects since.."

"Oh," said Ellen, feeling very small. She hadn't actually thought of that.

"To tell you the truth-" Alex leaned in closer and lowered his voice conspiratorially. "To tell you the truth, we weren't getting that much done anyway. Your father's not the first disruption around here, he's just the easiest target."

"I... okay?" said Ellen hesitantly. "I'm sorry? What's the other problem, then?"

"Easier to show you. Come on." Alex led the way across the lab space Ellen had only visited once before, skirting a number of generators and pieces of humming equipment she didn't recognize. "He showed up a little bit after your father got here and he won't give up until somebody agrees to help him. If it comes right down to it I think Dr. Li could still get her work done even with your father here, but she's trying to avoid this guy..."

"-insist on speaking with Dr. Li herself! Directly! You people should know this by now!" came the voice from the little cluster of people ahead of them. "Tell Li I refuse to leave until she stops playing with her chemistry set and starts talking real science!"

The speaker was a bald man of considerable years, dressed in a pre-war suit as clean and new as any Ellen had ever seen. He looked as if he meant to shove the haggard, lab-coated young woman who stood between him and the door to Dr. Li's conference room aside physically. As the woman drew breath to speak, Ellen leaned over and said, a little more loudly than necessary, "Sir? What's going on?"

He spun around to face her, blinking at her from behind thick, black-framed glasses. "You there! What are you, some kind of lab assistant?"

Ellen looked down at her still-spattered armor and then up again at the man.

"No," he continued, "you look a bit more... weathered. Are you by any chance for hire?"

The woman in the lab coat shot Ellen a grateful look as Ellen answered, "That depends. What exactly are we talking about here?"

"I need a local," the man said. "Someone with verve. I've misplaced some very sensitive property."

"And you think Dr. Li has it?"

"Not precisely," said the man. "How do I put this in a way you'll understand?"

Ellen suddenly became aware that he wasn't alone; a grim-faced, dark-haired man of indeterminate years was standing behind him, holding an assault rifle. She couldn't place how long he'd been standing there. It made the hairs on the back of her neck prickle uneasily.

"All you know of robots are those buckets of bolts- those Mr. Handshakers and whatnot," the old man continued. "Well, that's not all a robot can be. You see, in the Commonwealth- that's north of here, quite a long way north- we've made artificial persons. Synthetic humanoids! Programmed to think and feel and do whatever we need."

Ellen nodded, and stole a glance at the dark-haired man to see if he had anything to add. There wasn't the slightest change to his expression, though there might have been a momentary flicker of orange to his eyes. She really couldn't say.

"And... occasionally they get confused and wander off," the old man said.

"That... sounds like slavery to me," Ellen said carefully. "I know my Mr. Handy's pretty limited, but if these synthetic people-"

"Androids."

"If these androids can think and feel properly, are you sure they don't wander off on purpose?"

"Nonsense!" the old man said with a laugh. "This is a machine we're talking about. Can you enslave a generator, or a water purifier? Of course not. The same principle applies. But let's get back to your mission. Since Dr. Li won't assist me, I'm going to need you to find this missing android. I've tracked him to somewhere here in the Capital Wasteland. He must have done something drastic, like facial surgery and a mind wipe, or else I would have found him by now."

"Is it really surgery if it's on a robot?" Ellen said curiously.

"You have no idea of the sophistication of these androids," the old man said. "None whatsoever. I assure you, the procedure would be almost identical to something similar performed on a human. Androids have simulated skin, and blood, and are programmed to simulate human behavior like breathing. They can even eat and digest food realistically. Finding him will be no easy task, but corralling him would be even worse, so don't upset him by talking with him. Just come and report his position to me immediately, and I'll handle it myself."

"And if I do this," Ellen said, "you'll leave the scientists here to their work?"

"If you can call this science," the man muttered. "But yes. There's no point in bothering them if someone else is doing their job for them. And you'll be compensated- rather nicely, in fact. I have at my disposal advanced technology from the Commonwealth. I'd be willing to share some it with you. Just think, you'll be the envy of all your friends?"

Ellen thought of Tyler for a moment, and Alyx, and Paladin Hoss. She doubted any of them would be impressed with much about this whole situation, but nodded anyway. If it meant getting this man off Dr. Li's back so she and Dad could serve Rivet City and get the groundwork laid for reclaiming-

Oh crumbs. Oh blast it, even if she rounded up an army at Milliways she was going to have to come up with some kind of standing guard to keep the mutants from attacking the Memorial again, since the Brotherhood probably couldn't spare the men. She was going to have to hire someone like Reilly and her people, or Dad was. That was going to mean a lot of money... or a lot of tech she could turn over to the Brotherhood. If they couldn't guard the place, they'd at least pay her enough to get guards. On the other hand, she had no guarantee this man was telling the truth about anything- either the tech at his disposal, or the sophistication of the android..

Well, if she agreed to do this searching, at least he would leave Dad and Dr. Li alone. That would be worth it, whatever else happened.

"Sure," she said. "I'll locate your android for you."

"Excellent!" The man's face brightened considerably. "Do so, and you won't be disappointed. Here-" He handed her a holotape. "Listen to this message he sent me when you get the chance. He's mocking me. I swear I'll make him pay for that."

"All right," said Ellen. "Uh- who do I look for when I find him?"

"My name is Dr. Zimmer," said the man, "and this is my bodyguard, Armitage. I have a room at the Weatherly here. Look for either one of us when you've located my property."

Ellen nodded. "Dr. Zimmer," she repeated. "I'll remember that."