Shelton

Ellen crept back into Fort Constantine, fairly holding her breath. She hadn't meant to head to Milliways, and didn't look forward to explaining the accident. Fortunately, Cross was still asleep, and Fawkes-

Huh. Fawkes wasn't there.

It took Ellen a little searching to locate the meta-human. The room in which they'd decided to shelter for the night was a former office high on the building's topmost floor, well away from the bomb storage facility and the heaps of dead robots. One of the walls had partly collapsed long ago, offering a view of the southern sky- but also offering an awkward-though-viable path up to the roof. When Ellen clambered over the rubble, she found Fawkes there, sitting crosslegged with his face to the east. Something about his posture stilled her words; she made her way over to sit down beside him instead of speaking.

"My apologies for stepping out without comment," Fawkes said after a while, his voice deep but nonetheless hushed. "I estimated I'd be able to hear your return, or any trouble that might strike."

"It's all right," Ellen answered. "You weren't hard to find. Why'd you come up here, anyway?"

"I wanted to watch the horiizon for a while," Fawkes said. "I've never seen the dawn."

"Really?" said Ellen, a little startled. She'd never seen a sunrise herself before leaving Vault 101, but Fawkes... "Not even when you were still human?"

Fawkes shook his great green head. "If I did, then, I have no memory of it," he said. "I remember nothing of my time before- this." The massive fingers of one slab-like hand flexed briefly under the light from Ellen's helmet. "All of the Vault seemed familiar to me when you set me free, more than mere computer maps would account for, but I don't recall anything more than that."

Ellen considered that for a while. "So... you don't even remember your real name?" she said tentatively.

There was a quiet, rumbling chuckle at that. "Fawkes is my real name," he said. "I chose it. That doesn't make it any less 'real' than any other. At least it means something to me."

Ellen flushed in embarrassment, silently grateful for the full-face helmet she wore. "I'm sorry," she said. "I didn't mean..."

"You needn't apologize, friend," said Fawkes. "I took no offense."

"Oh, good."

"I can say this much, however," Fawkes went on. "There was a time when I wondered about my old identity myself. It was when I was first learning to search through the records my chamber's terminal could access. I found a record of individuals who had been isolated in that room before. The last one of note was a woman; her name was Lewella Yonkie."

Ellen mouthed the name silently behind her helmet, not quite knowing what to say.

"And when you and I parted ways, I found several things within the vault itself," Fawkes went on. "Among them were a set of holotapes- the diary recording of a man, a security officer. He spoke of discovering the awful truth behind the deaths of many Vault residents, and of being hunted down at the last. There was... something familiar... about his voice. His name was Shelton Delacroix."

"Shelton- do you think-"

The meta-human shrugged. "I don't know," he said. "Perhaps that was my name, once. Perhaps I only knew his voice from some experience before I became as I am now. Perhaps I was that woman whose name I found in the records. I doubt very much whether it matters. So far as I am concerned, it's as I told you: I was born in the FEV chambers."

Ellen nodded slowly. "I think I understand," she said, although she wasn't quite clear on it all yet. Maybe someday. "Thank you for telling me."

"You're quite welcome. Shall we watch the sun rise together now?"

The Road

There was a road. Gapped and cracked and half-fallen in places, the remains of civilization long gone, but still a road. Cross had spotted it hours ago when she'd come up to the roof and the three of them had gotten their bearings. It stretched eastward for miles before turning and vanishing into the south. Where it went beyond that none of them could say for certain, but it seemed as if it might be the elevated road that came to earth somewhere around the old Temple of the Union. If nothing else it offered a vantage, one that might be needed with the Enclave roaming the Wastes; and so they'd come down the escarpment from Fort Constantine, clambered up a collapsed section onto the elevated road-bed that remained, and started on their way.

---

They found a truck, once, or the remains of one, anyway. Ellen climbed into the back to search for supplies. She found them- first-aid kits, suitcases, bottles of water- and then she found the bones. They were nothing new, ancient and blackened as any she'd ever seen in the Wasteland, but she did what she could to straighten them out anyway. Some of them were missing, but there were seven skulls, all in all. Well, eight, if you counted the one among the even more charred pile she found when she prised open the driver's-side door and peered into the cab. Why people would be riding in the back of a truck instead of some bus or other more practical vehicle she didn't know; once she'd taken the driver's bones out to pray over him, she couldn't help but search through the remains of the cab for clues. All she found was a wisp of ancient paper in the glove compartment that nearly fell to pieces at her touch:

USMC Private Contract PRVMIL-3482b
Official orders from Department of Defense
Contractor's Eyes Only Under Penalty of Treason
In accordance with Executive Order 99066, transport specified civilians to WRA site PA-32. Use of non-lethal force is authorized only when required to enforce this contract. Transport Arrival is required by October 29th, 2077. Present these orders to Chief MP at WRA site perimeter for admission and unloading.

Y.Guo
A.He
H.X.Ming
M.Pang
M.Pang Jr.
R. Chong
H.K. Tsen

... oh.

---

There was a dark heap on the horizon, rising up from the ruins of the road. It had no guards along the top, nothing moving in its vicinity at all. On painstakingly careful approach, they found it to be a heap of ancient cars, dragged from this or that part of the highway and stacked one on top of another into the walls of a crude but impressive fort.

None of them, Fawkes reported, had any of their engine blocks or power plants left. That was fine as far as it went, but that many cars in one place still put Ellen on edge. If Fawkes and Cross wanted to search it for usable supplies that was their business. She'd go on ahead to check for impending trouble, just in case.

Cross found the corpses of the raiders who'd been living in the fort at roughly the moment Ellen's armor screamed "LET 'EM EAT LEAD!". Seconds later, the fire began- courtesy of two Enclave troopers with combat incinerators who'd been stationed behind the chunks of masonry just down the road.

By the time the fire stopped there wasn't much of a fort left. Then again, there wasn't much left of the Enclave troopers, either, so Ellen supposed they were probably about even.

---

Cross stumbled suddenly; Ellen and Fawkes darted to the Paladin's side at the same time. "Are you all right, friend?" Fawkes asked.

"I- no." Cross's breathing was ragged. "I don't think those stimpaks I used back at Fort Constantine did the trick, Ellen. Something's wrong."

Ellen winced. As far as she'd been able to tell at the time, the stimpaks had fixed up all of Cross's visible injuries, and the older woman hadn't indicated any kind of broken bones. That meant something considerably worse was going on than she'd imagined. "How long do you think you can keep going?" she asked.

"I need to sit down soon," said Cross, leaning on Fawkes as best she could. "It's my lower legs. It's been a long time since I've had this kind of pain for anything short of a bullet. Walking is... going to be a problem."

"Crud," said Ellen. "Can you make it to that ramp up ahead?"

"I think so," said Cross. "If Fawkes helps me. Why?"

"Because I don't know what I can do up here, but if we can get back to ground level I've at least got a chance of finding a building with a door."

Cross thought for a while, finally nodding. "It's better than nothing,' she said. "All right. Fawkes?"

"I can do it if you can."