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Maxson turned on his heel and began walking back toward the holotable. "Then let's stop talking and start planning. We don't have months. We don't even have weeks. The Institute will feel this alliance before sunrise."
The glow of the holotable cast long shadows across the steel plating beneath their boots. Somewhere beyond the armored bulkhead, the sound of a vertibird's turbines thrummed against the dawn-dark sky—an iron heartbeat to match the new alliance that had just been forged.
They didn't shake hands.
They didn't toast, or clasp arms, or sign papers with the flourish of diplomats.
Instead, they turned to the map.
Maxson leaned over the terminal console, fingers gliding across the interface like a man born to command—direct, firm, unhesitating. "We begin with intel. Danse, queue up all Brotherhood data on suspected Institute movement. I want overlays on every known synth infiltration, every blackout zone, every sensor anomaly from the last twelve months."
Danse moved with silent precision, the servos in his T-60 whirring softly as he connected his wrist-mounted interface with the Brotherhood's database. "On it. Uploading now."
Lines lit up on the map, snaking like veins across the cracked geography of the Commonwealth. Red zones for hostile activity. Green for secure sectors. Orange for "unknowns." There were a lot of orange.
Sico watched in silence for a moment, arms crossed. Sarah stepped closer beside him, eyes scanning the flickering grid. She already had her Pip-Boy out, syncing to the feed.
"I've seen these markers," she muttered, pointing at a cluster south of the Cambridge ruins. "Institute scouts, probably phase-shifting in and out. They don't linger, but they're watching."
Maxson glanced sideways. "What kind of numbers are you fielding in those areas?"
"Enough to hold the perimeter, not enough to hunt," Sarah replied. "We've been playing defense so far. That ends now."
Sico shifted forward. "We'll contribute more than boots and rifles. Line I said, I have someone inside."
Maxson's eyes narrowed, but it wasn't disbelief that hardened his face—it was intensity, focus. Like a hunter who'd just caught a scent he hadn't smelled in months.
"So like I ask previously, who is the name?"
"Like I told you, it's classified," Sico said.
"You're asking for an alliance and keeping secrets?"
"No," Sico said firmly. "I'm asking for trust. His identity isn't the point. The data is. He's already confirmed the existence of at least two additional synth sleeper cells—one near Jamaica Plain, another embedded in Diamond City security itself."
Danse's head snapped up. "Diamond City? Are you certain?"
Piper's breath caught, but she said nothing—yet.
Sico nodded grimly. "The mayor's inner circle, we believe. One of the guards. We're cross-referencing movements with Institute teleportation spikes now. My contact has to move slow. The Institute's monitoring is tight. One wrong message and she vanishes."
Maxson stared at him, unreadable. "And you're willing to put all this on the table?"
"I didn't come here to play games, Maxson," Sico said. "We agreed to go to war. This is how we start. You asked what kind of men we are." His eyes met Maxson's. "This is your answer."
A beat passed.
Then Maxson nodded, once. "We'll coordinate our data feeds. Danse, give them Scribe Neriah's tactical access code. Level four."
Danse blinked. "Elder, that gives them… full field sync."
"I know what it gives them," Maxson replied.
Danse paused, then nodded tightly and began the upload.
Sico's Pip-Boy chimed. Sarah glanced down as streams of encrypted code began appearing in real time. Their eyes met, just briefly—and in that glance, shared understanding. This was happening. For real.
Sico turned back to the map. "We'll share everything we get from the inside. Even the list of synths we uncover within our own ranks."
That made Maxson lift an eyebrow.
"Within your own ranks?" he repeated.
Sico nodded. "We've already started mandatory biofield scans. Out of over 3,000 people in the Republic, we found six anomalies. All are under surveillance. We're monitoring for synthetic neuro-resonance, heartbeat irregularities, memory loops. Anything."
Maxson was silent for a moment. "And if they're confirmed?"
"We decommission them," Sarah said coldly. "No second chances."
It wasn't bravado. It was cold policy. And it hit Maxson in a way that surprised even him. For once, someone else was willing to be as ruthless as the Brotherhood. That counted for more than empty oaths ever could.
"I want the names," Maxson said finally.
"You'll get them," Sico replied. "I want full transparency in return. If you've detained any synths alive, I want to interrogate them. My contact might be able to identify behavior patterns."
Danse gave a short nod. "We have two. One captured during an ambush near Medford. The other surrendered. Both are in lockdown."
"Start with the surrendered one," Sico said. "I'll send someone qualified. We don't just need their secrets. We need to know how they think."
Maxson gave a curt nod. "Approved. Now let's talk tactics."
He turned and tapped the holotable. The map zoomed in on the eastern half of the Commonwealth. Red icons flared up along the Charles River basin, MIT ruins, and an ominous black marker labeled "Unknown Signal Source."
"We believe the Institute has at least four major points of egress," Maxson said. "One likely beneath the original MIT campus. Another near the old Vault-Tec building. A third buried under the Charles. And a fourth… we can't pin it. That one moves."
Sico frowned. "Moves?"
"Teleport relay. Mobile. They've built some kind of phase anchor. It's on a vertibird scale, maybe smaller. But it lets them shift insertion points without fixed bases."
"That would explain why we lose their trail," Sarah said. "They're not coming from fixed doors."
"We hit those points first," Sico said.
Maxson's eyes flicked to him. "Too obvious. The Institute will be ready. They'll expect brute force."
"Then we give them finesse instead," Sico said. "Sabotage. Assassinations. Disinformation. We make them think we're coming one way—then hit from another."
Danse folded his arms. "That's not the Brotherhood's way."
"It's war," Sico said bluntly. "Your vertibirds and laser cannons will come in handy—but first we have to make sure the Institute's ears are ringing when they try to hear us."
Maxson didn't argue. He just nodded again, slowly. "You'll need someone to coordinate that."
Sico turned to Piper.
She looked startled. "Me?"
"You've been watching the Institute longer than any of us. You know how they think. You've mapped more of the underground tunnels and relay hotspots than even our scouts."
Piper swallowed. "I'm not a soldier."
"No," Maxson said unexpectedly, "you're better. You're the lens that focuses the shot. You see the patterns. You turn noise into clarity."
For a moment, Piper just stared at him. Then slowly, she nodded. "Alright. I'll help lead the intel cell. But I want access to the Brotherhood's sensor logs too."
"You'll get them," Maxson said. "And I want your people embedded with our scouts."
"Deal."
They shook—not for show, but for action.
Sico looked back to the map and gestured toward a sector near the Kendall ruins. "That's where we strike first."
Sarah nodded. "There's a power relay hub we've been monitoring. Minor anomalies, faint energy echoes—but repeating. The Institute might be using it as a backup node."
Maxson leaned in. "We'll send in a combined squad. One fireteam from the Brotherhood. One from your Freemason Growlers."
Danse looked at Sico. "Your Growlers—those new combat units you deployed near the northern river?"
The whine of the holotable faded into the background as Danse leaned forward, eyes narrowing on the sector map. His armored finger hovered over the flickering red zone near the Kendall ruins, tracing the jagged terrain like a cartographer sketching out a battlefield long before the first bullet flies.
"Your Growlers—those new combat units you deployed near the northern river?" he asked, tone neutral but curious.
Sico turned toward him and nodded. "Yeah. A motorcycle with a sidecar that mounts a machine gun. Built from the ground up by our chief scientist, Mel."
"A sidecar-mounted weapon system?" Maxson raised an eyebrow, the flicker of interest not quite hidden beneath his usual controlled demeanor.
Sico allowed himself a brief smile, more out of pride than bravado. "They're more than just fast-moving platforms. They're designed for patrol, strike, and retrieval. Light armor plating. Modular storage for medkits, spike strips, or EMP charges. That machine gun can rotate 180 degrees and lay down suppression fire even while on the move."
Danse let out a low whistle. "That's new. We've never had that kind of ground mobility. Just PA units and vertibird support."
"And that's why we're bringing them," Sico said. "You've got the skies. We've got the terrain. No Humvees, no Growlers, no quick ground response? You're blind when your birds aren't in the air."
"We've always relied on air superiority," Danse said.
"Which works—until it doesn't," Sarah chimed in. She nodded toward the map. "These sectors here—tight alleyways, collapsed subways, dense wreckage zones. Your vertibirds can't touch them. Our Growlers can maneuver in and out, drop smoke, extract bodies, deliver ordnance, and vanish before the Institute even knows what hit them."
Maxson stepped back from the table, arms crossed. His eyes were distant, calculating—pulling a hundred threads together at once.
"You'll send us Growler support?" he asked.
Sico nodded once. "We'll start with two full units. Riders trained for combat, extraction, and recon. Armed, armored, and coordinated with our own Humvee convoys. If this is a real alliance, then we don't hold anything back."
For a moment, the room was silent save for the faint, rhythmic ping of data updating on the holomap. The shared net was syncing. Brotherhood scans flowing into Freemason archives, and vice versa. Bits of hard-won intelligence—names, locations, timestamps—crawled across both Pip-Boys and terminals like a living nervous system.
Maxson exhaled quietly. "My gut tells me we don't have time."
Sico looked at him. "Meaning?"
"I can't prove it," Maxson said. "But I can feel it—like a vibration in the hull before the storm hits. The Institute knows. About us. About this."
Piper stirred uneasily. "You think they're having a meeting right now?"
Maxson nodded. "I do. Maybe not formal. Maybe not in the way we hold council or command briefings. But somewhere inside their ivory tower, they're discussing us. Our alliance. They're not fools. And they're certainly not passive."
"They haven't even told the Commonwealth about us yet," Sarah muttered.
"Because they're deciding how to react," Maxson said. "How to spin it. How to control the narrative. That's their way—information is their battlefield."
He gestured toward the black marker labeled "Unknown Signal Source."
"I'll bet you anything that node is active. Right now. Listening. Watching."
"Then let's give them something to hear," Sico said quietly.
Danse's lips tightened into something close to a grin.
Maxson turned back to the holotable and tapped in a command. The map zoomed in on the relay zone at Kendall—a cluster of partially buried substructure, the remnants of a subway maintenance depot and a collapsed storm drain system. The perfect hideout for a stealth relay hub. The moment the image locked in, he drew a hard line around the perimeter.
"Operation Harpoon," Maxson declared. "We deploy a joint strike team. Two Growler units. One Brotherhood Paladin unit. No vertibird—ground insertion only."
Sarah nodded. "Stealth recon first. If we confirm the relay hub, we sabotage it from inside. If it's a decoy, we plant a virus beacon. Let them think we're watching something important."
"And if it's a trap?" Piper asked.
Sico answered without hesitation. "Then we make sure they regret setting it."
Maxson smirked. "Your people fight like you talk, Sico?"
"Worse," Sarah said with a smirk of her own. "You'll love it."
Danse leaned forward. "I want to be on that team."
Maxson raised an eyebrow.
"With respect, Elder," Danse added. "I know the terrain. I know the tactics. And if this really is our first joint op, I should be there to represent the Brotherhood."
Maxson's expression remained unreadable. But after a long beat, he nodded. "Approved. You leave at 0400. You'll rendezvous at Bunker Hill with Sico's Growlers. Sarah will brief you on-site."
The map flicked again. New lines drawn. New parameters marked. The op was now real.
Piper stepped back, still chewing the inside of her cheek.
"Maxson," she said slowly. "If they are watching… they'll try to spin us as aggressors. Especially in the public eye."
"Then beat them to the punch," Maxson replied.
She blinked. "You want me to run the story?"
"I want you to run the truth. Leak it, publish it, scream it from the top of Diamond City's damn walls. The Brotherhood and the Freemasons have united. Not to conquer. To protect. To end the Institute threat."
She hesitated, then nodded. "I'll need full disclosure. From both sides."
"You'll get it," Sico said.
Maxson turned to Sico again, the firelight from the edge of the holotable casting a crimson glow across both their faces.
"This alliance," he said slowly, "isn't just about winning a war. It's about defining what comes after. We destroy the Institute—fine. But then what? What replaces them?"
"Not tyranny," Sico replied. "Not secrecy. We build a Commonwealth that governs itself. The Freemasons Republic handles civic life. You handle tech oversight. We monitor each other."
Maxson grunted. "And when our visions clash?"
"Then we talk," Sico said. "Or we fight. But not today. Not while the enemy still breathes."
Maxson extended his hand.
This time, they did shake.
A heavy, quiet grasp. One born of steel, not sentiment.
"We begin," Maxson said.
Hours later, the concrete corridors beneath Boston Airport were abuzz with movement. Scribes rushed between terminals, uploading new sensor data. Knight engineers checked weapons, adjusted armor fittings, ran diagnostic sweeps over their power armor coils. Brotherhood banners stirred lightly in the stale air, crimson sigils flickering like embers.
In a makeshift command alcove near the lift doors, Sico stood next to Sarah as Growler Unit 4 rolled in.
The low growl of motorcycle engines echoed through the access shaft. One by one, the Growlers emerged—sleek black-chassis frames reinforced with angled armor plates. Their sidecars bristled with machine gun mounts, low-profile floodlights, and compact medkit compartments. The lead rider wore a dark-gray cloak with the Freemason emblem stitched into the back: the compass-and-square, wrapped in laurels.
Danse stood nearby, arms folded, watching with a mixture of curiosity and professional respect.
"Never thought I'd see a bike in a warzone," he muttered.
Sico grinned. "Wait till you see how fast they can turn."
As the Growlers formed a neat semi-circle near the staging area, Sarah stepped forward to brief them, her voice crisp but calm.
"You're rolling with Brotherhood fireteam Delta," she said. "Danse will be lead Paladin. Standard infiltration—silent approach, establish visual, confirm relay presence. If it's clean, we breach. If it's hot, we adapt. No heroics. We move as one."
The riders all nodded, visors glinting.
Danse approached the lead Growler and ran a hand across the sidecar's curved armor. "What kind of ammo does this thing take?"
"12.7mm tungsten-jacketed. Armor piercing," the rider said. "High-velocity feed. Barrel coolers are external. Doesn't jam easy."
Danse gave an approving nod. "Good."
A few minutes later, Piper emerged from the lift holding a battered holotape recorder in one hand and a stack of Brotherhood transcripts in the other.
"Got your sensor logs," she said, handing them to Sico. "And my first dispatch is ready. Headline: Rivals Yesterday. Allies Today. The Brotherhood and Freemasons Unite."
Sico arched a brow. "Catchy."
"I do my best," she said with a grin.
He leaned close, lowering his voice just enough so only she could hear. "Make sure to word it carefully. They'll try to paint us as warmongers. I want the world to see us for what we are."
"Which is?"
He looked back toward the map room. Toward Maxson. Toward the Brotherhood engineers prepping energy cells beside his own grease-stained Growler mechanics.
"Prepared," he said simply.
She nodded. "Got it."
As the final systems check was completed and the last fuel lines were topped off, Danse mounted the lead Growler sidecar and locked his T-60 armor into the saddle mount with a click and hiss of pressure.
"Ready?" he called.
Sico turned toward Sarah. She gave a crisp nod.
"Mount up," he ordered.
The engines roared to life.
And as the convoy peeled away from the base—Growlers in formation, Brotherhood troops close behind—it was more than a strike team rolling into a shadowed warzone.
The ceiling lights of the Institute's main council chamber glowed with sterile brilliance, a cold white sheen that made everything beneath it feel artificial. The clean, clinical hum of energy flowing through the Institute's core systems pulsed softly in the background, as ever-present and emotionless as the marble-toned walls that surrounded the room.
But the atmosphere inside the chamber—usually a realm of quiet certainty and confident calculation—was tense today.
Father sat at the head of the table, his white robes crisp, his face impassive save for a tight line drawn across his lips. The Directorial Board sat around him—Allie Fillmore of Advanced Systems, Clayton Holdren of Bioscience, Alan Binet of Robotics, Justin Ayo of Synth Retention, and several lesser department heads seated further down. Every one of them had received the same urgent summons no more than ten minutes ago.
Across from Father sat Nora.
Her expression, like all the others in the room, was composed and serious—but not quite the same. She leaned slightly back in her chair, eyes focused on Shaun but not cold. Calm. Steady. Attentive. Just as Sarah had instructed.
She had received the encrypted holotape Sarah smuggled to her through one of the surface scavenger caravans three days ago. The message had been short, coded, but unmistakable:
"Growlers deployed. Brotherhood alliance formed. Sico heading north. Target: relay hub. Stay calm. Stay ready. Don't blow cover."
And so, Nora had waited. Pretended. Played her part.
Now, the curtain was rising.
Shaun stood.
"The Freemasons Republic and the Brotherhood of Steel have formed a military alliance," he said, his voice even, almost detached. "Effective immediately. Their combined forces are now active across the northern and western quadrants of the Commonwealth."
The room froze.
Allie Fillmore blinked once, her stylus falling limp from her fingers onto the glossy surface of her datapad. Madison Li's mouth twisted in open concern, while Ayo scoffed audibly, folding his arms across his chest like a man already envisioning scorched battlefields.
Nora let her eyes widen just slightly. Just enough. Then furrowed her brow, tightening her jaw as if parsing the implications for the first time.
Shaun continued, projecting a holomap into the center of the chamber. "Four confirmed joint patrols have been sighted. Two near the Charles River, one in the Cambridge Ruins, and one—now—en route to the Kendall relay site."
Holdren leaned forward. "They've located Kendall?"
"They're moving on it," Shaun confirmed. "Which means they've either already identified it or strongly suspect it."
"This is an escalation," Madison muttered. "A direct threat."
"No," Ayo snapped. "This is war."
"Calm," Shaun said, raising a hand. "Let's not jump to conclusions."
"Not jump?" Ayo spat. "They've joined forces. Ground units, air power, coordinated insertion teams. For all we know, they're already inside the perimeter."
"They're not," Shaun replied. "Yet."
Nora spoke now, her voice quiet but firm. "Why now? The Freemasons and Brotherhood hated each other. What changed?"
The room turned toward her, and Nora kept her gaze soft but searching, just enough concern in her tone to mask her awareness. Inside, her mind moved like a machine—replaying Sarah's message, calculating timelines, troop strength, countermeasures. But her face remained the perfect mask of a mother and scientist confused, unsettled.
Shaun nodded slightly at her question. "That's what we need to determine. But my guess? Sico."
Ayo sneered. "That mongrel doesn't have the tactical capacity to—"
"He's brilliant," Shaun cut in, sharper than usual. "Resourceful. Dangerous. And, worse, idealistic. That's a combination we haven't faced before—not from either faction."
Fillmore exhaled slowly, then leaned forward. "So what's the plan?"
Shaun moved to the edge of the holomap and tapped in a command. The screen zoomed in on the Kendall ruins—an old, half-collapsed subway hub overgrown with fungal moss and skeletal steel beams. Underneath it, hidden like a cyst in a healthy organ, pulsed a green beacon: the Institute relay node.
"If they breach Kendall," Shaun said, "they expose our access grid. That means potential cross-teleportation. Signal leaks. System manipulation."
"And they going to do what?" Ayo barked. "Hope they just wander off?"
"I'm going to reinforce the perimeter," Shaun said, ignoring the jab. "Robotics has already mobilized two dozen Gen 2s. And two courser units. We'll reprogram the outer sensor grid to broadcast Institute signal distortions—make it look like a dud node."
"And if they breach anyway?" Holdren asked.
Shaun turned back to the group. "Then we send them a message."
There was a silence in the room then. The kind that followed decisions, not debates.
Madison leaned forward. "What kind of message?"
Shaun's face darkened. "A retaliatory strike."
Even Nora had to look surprised at that—though in truth, her stomach clenched for real. This was not part of the plan. Sarah hadn't mentioned any hint of what might happen next. And Shaun… her boy… was shifting tone now. Not the detached, morally insulated leader. Not even the curious scientist. This was personal.
"How would we strike?" Fillmore asked.
"We have uplinks to major Brotherhood surface stations. Their communications run through shortwave junctions we've mapped for months. We overload the links, disable their remote support beacons, fry the frequencies. We cut them off from command."
"Sabotage," Ayo said approvingly.
"Only if they hit Kendall," Shaun repeated. "Until then, we maintain readiness. Mom, I want you to oversee Kendall's civilian disguise protocols. Have your team draft fallback escape routes and camouflage nodes."
"Understood," she said with a nod, masking her pulse now racing in her neck. "I'll get the archives and biosim units involved."
Shaun offered her a brief, warm look. "Thank you."
The room began to murmur again as each director started drafting orders, reaching for terminals, buzzing assistants through the comms. Shaun retreated to the side console, tapping into the system grid. Ayo marched toward the weapons logs. Alan began scribbling new robotic relay calibration notes.
________________________________________________
• Name: Sico
• Stats :
S: 8,44
P: 7,44
E: 8,44
C: 8,44
I: 9,44
A: 7,45
L: 7
• Skills: advance Mechanic, Science, and Shooting skills, intermediate Medical, Hand to Hand Combat, Lockpicking, Hacking, Persuasion, and Drawing Skills
• Inventory: 53.280 caps, 10mm Pistol, 1500 10mm rounds, 22 mole rats meat, 17 mole rats teeth, 1 fragmentation grenade, 6 stimpak, 1 rad x, 6 fusion core, computer blueprint, modern TV blueprint, camera recorder blueprint, 1 set of combat armor, Automatic Assault Rifle, 1.500 5.56mm rounds, power armor T51 blueprint, Electric Motorcycle blueprint, T-45 power armor, Minigun, 1.000 5mm rounds, Cryolator, 200 cryo cell, Machine Gun Turret Mk1 blueprint, electric car blueprint, Kellogg gun, Righteous Authority, Ashmaker, Furious Power Fist, Full set combat armor blueprint, M240 7.62mm machine guns blueprint, Automatic Assault Rifle blueprint, and Humvee blueprint.
• Active Quest:-