Jace dragged the huge sled step by step toward Red Rocket.
The power armor’s hydraulic system hissed, and every step landed with a dull thud against the ground.
The sled slid behind him, grinding over gravel and dead branches with a harsh scrape.
Codsworth floated beside him, all three mechanical arms loaded with supplies, like a moving shelf.
By the time they returned to the Red Rocket truck stop, the sun was already high.
Jace stopped the sled at the entrance and loosened the rope.
The power armor’s hydraulic system let out a long hiss, almost like a sigh of relief.
He stood there for a few seconds, getting used to the stillness, then began unloading.
Codsworth floated inside and found a few dirty rags to spread across the floor.
Food: crates of food, one after another.
Razorgrain, Mutfruit, Tato, piled into a small mountain.
Weapons: pipe rifles, pipe pistols, a combat rifle, a minigun, two 10mm pistols.
Ammo: several boxes of .308, several boxes of 10mm, and the remaining half box of minigun ammunition.
Mines: frag mines, a cryo mine, and that mini nuke.
Jewelry: the few pieces taken from the safe.
And the Sneak manual.
Jace took the necklace from his backpack and set it aside on its own.
“Razorgrain, twelve crates.” Codsworth hovered beside the food pile, counting with one mechanical arm.
“Mutfruit, nine crates.”
“Tato, fifteen crates.”
“Pipe rifles, four.
Pipe pistols, seven.
Minigun, one.”
“10mm pistols, two.”
“Ammunition: .308, four boxes.
10mm, six boxes.
Minigun ammunition, more than half a box.”
“Mines: one cryo mine.”
He floated in front of the mini nuke and paused for a second.
“Jewelry, five pieces.
Document, one.”
He floated back and settled in front of Jace.
“Inventory complete,” he said.
“You made more from this one trip than I scavenged in two hundred years at Red Rocket.”
“I’m going out for a bit,” Jace said.
He turned the release wheel on the back, and the armor plates opened behind him.
Click.
Click.
Click.
Jace stepped out, planted his feet on the concrete, and rolled his shoulders.
Abernathy Farm looked the same as before.
Blake came out of the house.
He still held that pipe rifle in his hands, but this time, when he saw Jace, he lowered it right away.
“You’re back?” he asked.
Jace nodded.
He walked up to Blake and took the necklace from his pocket.
The silver chain glinted in the sunlight, the pendant swaying gently.
Blake stared at it for two seconds.
Then he reached out and took it.
He opened the pendant and looked at the tiny photo inside.
“…It’s her,” he said, his voice a little hoarse.
He turned and called toward the house.
“Connie!”
Footsteps sounded from inside.
Another woman hurried out, and when she saw the necklace in Blake’s hand, she froze.
Blake handed it to her.
Connie took it and looked down at the pendant.
She opened it and looked at the photo inside.
Then she raised her head and looked at Jace.
Her mouth opened, but no words came out.
Jace stood there without moving.
“…Thank you,” she finally said, her voice shaking badly.
Jace nodded.
He turned and walked toward the edge of the farm.
“What’s your name?” Blake called after him.
Jace did not look back.
“Jace.”
Footsteps came from behind him.
Blake caught up and stopped a few steps away.
“Wait.”
Jace stopped but did not turn around.
“You’ve done us a huge favor,” Blake said quickly.
“At least let me thank you.
What do you want?
Food?
Caps?
Or…”
“I don’t need anything,” Jace said.
Blake was silent for a second.
“Then are you…
with the Minutemen?”
Jace froze.
He turned and looked at Blake.
Blake stood there, still clutching the necklace, with a strange look on his face.
As if he was expecting something, or trying to confirm it.
Jace took a step forward.
Then he stopped.
He thought of the Minutemen in the game.
Tattered uniforms, lousy gear, chased all the way from Quincy to Concord, hiding in a ruined museum and waiting to die.
Preston handed out quests the moment he saw the player, like he wanted to carve the words “rebuild the Commonwealth” into his own forehead.
Now, the Commonwealth held only scattered farms, wandering Raiders, and him.
Jace turned around.
Blake was still standing there, the necklace gripped in his hand.
That expression had not faded.
It was not expectation.
It was more like…
hope.
“The Minutemen?”
He thought of the Wasteland’s ruined state.
He thought of the feeling of crushing Ack-Ack’s head under his foot.
He thought of the grain store full of enough food to feed one person for five years, now piled on the floor at Red Rocket.
He thought of the T-45 Power Armor standing back at Red Rocket, half a metric ton of metal waiting for him.
Once he put it on, he could move through this Wasteland almost unhindered.
Few people could stop him.
He also thought of the storylines in his head.
The Institute, the Brotherhood of Steel, the Mechanist and her army of crazed robots, and that Nuka-World amusement park.
He knew what would happen next.
He knew who should die, who should live, when to hide, and when to charge.
He thought of all the people who should have been able to live.
He thought of the farm woman written about in that diary.
He thought of the countless NPCs who died in the game, gone the moment the screen went black, with no one giving them another glance.
Now he was on this side of the screen.
He took a step forward.
“I’m a recruit,” he said.
“A Minutemen recruit.”
Blake stared at him for a few seconds.
Then he smiled.
Not a loud laugh.
Just the kind of smile that comes from someone who has not smiled in a very long time, suddenly tugging at the corners of his mouth.
“All right, recruit.”
Back at Red Rocket.
Jace asked Codsworth, “Codsworth, do you know the Minutemen?”
“The Minutemen?” Codsworth repeated, with a trace of thought in his voice.
“You mean that militia group?”
Jace nodded.
“I know a little,” Codsworth said.
“Before the war, they were a historical organization.
A militia of sorts.
After the war, some people took up the name again and tried to protect settlements.
The Quincy area used to be their territory.”
He paused.
“I heard something happened over in Quincy.
The Gunners attacked, and the whole town was massacred.”
He drifted a little closer.
“Why do you ask?”
Jace did not answer right away.
He stood there, looking south.
The sky was gray and hazy, the same as every day in the Wasteland.
“I hate this place.”
Codsworth said nothing.
Jace turned to look at him.
The rusted robot hovered in midair, all three of his “eyes” fixed on Jace.
“I hate this damn place,” he said again.
“Too many people are dead.
The ones still alive won’t last long either.
A few drink and rot their lives away, and the rest can barely catch their breath.”
He thought of Connie’s face when she took the necklace.
The way her mouth opened, but no words came out.
Codsworth was silent for a second.
“What are you trying to say?”
Jace thought about it.
“I don’t know if I can make this disgusting place completely better.
But I want to try to make it…
less disgusting.”
Codsworth’s “eyes” flickered.
“So you want to find the Minutemen?”
Jace answered, “The Minutemen’s organization is rotten beyond belief.
Anyone who wants to rebuild it is an idiot.
Anyone who wants to rely on it to protect people is an even bigger idiot.”
He turned and looked south.
“But I’m an idiot.”
The game’s timeline ran quickly through his mind.
After the Quincy Massacre, Preston led more than twenty people north.
Their first stop was Jamaica Plain, where they rested briefly.
Then they kept going and ran into feral ghouls in Lexington, losing more than half their people.
In the end, they hid inside the Museum of Freedom in Concord and were surrounded by Raiders.
He looked down at the Pip-Boy on his wrist again.
The screen was lit.
A green dot marked his position, with gray terrain outlines around it.
Red Rocket, Sanctuary Hills, Concord, all clearly marked.
But farther south, toward Jamaica Plain, the map was blank.
Places he had never been did not show on the map.
“I’ll have to walk,” he murmured.
He raised his head and looked south.
There were no road signs in the Wasteland.
But he had his memories from the game.
Routes he had walked countless times.
South from Red Rocket, through an abandoned factory area, then turn east.
He glanced down at the Pip-Boy on his wrist.
Current Available Perk Points: 1
He opened the perk list and scrolled down.
Perception.
Demolition Expert.
His finger hovered above the screen for one second.
Then he tapped it.
The screen flashed.
Perk acquired: Demolition Expert [Beginner]
Knowledge transfer complete.
Hint: This perk requires hands-on practice for best results.
The structure of grenades.
How to make suitable explosives.
The formula ratios for Molotov cocktails.
The trigger range of frag mines.
He walked to the chemistry station behind Red Rocket.
Thirty minutes later, he had two grenades in his hand.
The bodies were a little crooked, but they looked usable.
There were also two Molotov cocktails, neater than the ones he had made at Red Rocket last time, with the bottle mouths sealed tight.
He stuffed them into the storage pouch on the side of the power armor and stood.
Jace stood at the entrance to Red Rocket, looking south.
The sky was gray and hazy, the same as every day in the Wasteland.
He had to leave immediately.
The remaining Minutemen were exceptionally good soldiers, physically and mentally.
He had to save them as soon as possible.
He turned and went inside, stopping in front of the pile of supplies.
“I’m not sleeping.”
Codsworth floated over.
“Where are you going?”
“To find them.
Now.”
He walked to the power armor and turned the release wheel on its back.
The armor plates opened behind him, inviting their owner in.
He climbed inside.
Click.
Click.
Click.
The armor plates closed, wrapping him firmly within.
He flexed his fingers, and the hydraulic system gave a faint hiss.
The minigun.
The one he had taken from Ack-Ack.
He slung it over his shoulder and topped off the ammo belt from the box.
The sniper hunting rifle.
He picked it up, glanced at it, and hung it on the other side.
The 10mm pistol.
Holstered at his waist.
Chems and meds.
Stimpaks, RadAway, plus the two bottles of Overdrive and Day Tripper he had picked up from the bar.
All packed away.
Codsworth floated to his side.
“Do you know where they are?”
“Roughly.
Somewhere on the road from Jamaica Plain to Lexington.
We’ll have to walk and search.”
Codsworth did not ask anything else.
He hovered behind Jace without moving.
Jace stopped and glanced back at him.
“You’re not coming?”
Codsworth’s optical lens rotated once.
“You…
are asking whether I wish to come with you?” There was something strange in his tone.
As if he could not quite believe it, and as if he were surprised.
Jace paused slightly.
“What else?”
Codsworth was silent for a moment.
“I never thought you would ask me.”
He drifted gently to Jace’s side.
At last, a small trace of brightness entered his voice.
“Sir, we depart at once.”
Jace stepped forward.
Every step of the power armor struck the ground with a heavy, muffled thud.