Vol. ll Chapter 22 “Second?”

Chapter 22 "Second?"

"Can you help me with something?" Rosie slid the sketch across the bench. Matt nodded and added to the drawing. Then she fired up the induction forge.

Pleased with herself for waiting, and asking, Rosie smiled as she held the Cosmic knife in the coils of the forge. The Saturnite alloy, made for spacecraft, quickly went from shining grey to red, to bright orange. And stayed like that even out of the forge. The tongs Rosie held started to drip metal where it touched the blade.

"Now Brandon." Rosie's experiment had become a team effort. He squeezed the handle on the fire extinguisher brought up from below. The nozzle Rosie reshaped hissed directed vapours over the superheated knife, cooling it rapidly. "Now Janey." Rosie angled the tongs to hold the knife flat for Janey. A thin red beam of light traced the pattern Matt had drawn and Rosie programmed.

For a moment Rosie felt like the scientists of the old world, refreshingly unsure of the result. "Now Matt." Matt had to get close to the heat, wearing a mask from the riot gear helped. He struck down at the knife with a solid white rock. Rosie heard the sound of metal breaking and knew her experiment had worked, partially at least.

More hot metal pinged across the stone floor. Paul picked them up with two of the other knives. Scooping them onto the only thing they wouldn't melt through, then dropped them in a bucket of oil. Flames crowned the bucket, ignited from the heat within the broken pieces, and snuffed out each time by Charlie closing the lid.

"Done." Matt called out, shoving himself back along the floor to escape the heat. Rosie dropped the remaining spine and tang of the once broad chef's knife into the oil and followed by the tongs.

"What do you think?" Rosie asked Matt, he'd had the only real view.

"Honestly I don't know." Matt hinged the rounded helmet off, undoing the mask, oddly displeased at wearing it. "It felt like clean breaks." Rosie blinked to bring up her thermal imaging, ignoring the skull like faces and stared at the cold bucket. A blob of white heat swelling at the bottom.

The far more mundane task of working the long leather riot coat kept Rosie busy. She'd cut most of it away, leaving two halves. Short sleeves, holes in the back and shoulders from the removed armour plates.

"Are you sure you won't miss these?" Rosie asked Matt as he marked the riot helmets with chalk.

"I'd rather get shot in the head than look like a fucking Ranger." Matt and Brandon laughed, Rosie didn't get it.

With the strapping cut free, Janey made short work of segmenting the helmets like an orange. A little heat from a blowlamp and a lot of hammering turned the sections into overlapping sections. Joined with a flattened bolt, the curved brim angled up to deflect blows, they moved well.

The hand driven sewing machine and Matt's frequent instructions added a new seam along the back of the coat. The narrowed hole from the oxygen tanks covered with a loose flap of leather. Rosie went to stitch the flap down but Matt stopped her, she couldn't guess why which seemed to amuse him.

She paced to get a feel for the coat. High waisted and flared outwards, with the hem below the knee. "What did you call it again?"

"A duster." Matt stood, pulling at the lapels, setting the hinged shoulder plates right. "Put this on and turn around." Rosie pulled the belt around her waist, noticing the pride in Matt's work had replaced his awkwardness. She felt something heavy attach to her back.

"Can you reach it?" Matt asked as he stepped clear. Rosie felt the handle of her sword at the small of her back, angled, slightly off centre and pointed upwards. In one motion she cleared the flap and extended the blade with a metallic clunk as it locked in place.

"So that's what the flap is for." Rosie smiled and swung at the air.

"You'd be surprised what people miss during a poor frisk. And if they've got metal detectors." Matt gestured to the cutglass dagger.

"I didn't even think of that. Clever."

"You'll need a sheath for both, you can handle that. Add some straps inside for weapons and mags. Should work out well." Matt seemed happy with her work.

"What about the sleeves?" Rosie stretched out her arms, left uncovered from the elbow down.

"You'll think of something." Matt wanted to see the results of her experiment as much as she did. "Help me with this."

Rosie held the lid on the bucket as Matt poured the oil into a container. She slid the metal shapes across to the bench with a pencil, sorting the half dozen shards by size. The shining grey had turned dull black from the oil, the smoke like lines in the metal now the only grey remaining. The shapes she needed had come out well. Matt held it down for her to draw round, the slightest touch of the pencil against the alloy sliced clean through the wood.

"It worked then?" Matt asked.

"It did." Rosie felt pleased her idea worked.

"What do you have planned for the tailings?" Rosie didn't know the word, but Matt pointed to the different shaped flecks of alloy left over. Rosie hadn't even considered them.

"What do you with leftover obsid—" Rosie stopped herself from using the correct word. "Cutglass?" Matt grinned as an idea came to him. He went below and returned with what Rosie thought were black rods.

"We used to set them as arrowheads." Matt laid the arrows out, showing Rosie how to set the scraps at the right angle.

"But don't you need them?" Rosie had given Matt the hunting bow with a dozen of the carbon fibre arrows.

"Rosie, if you can't hit your dinner with six arrows you don't deserve to eat." Matt laughed to himself. "And you can make your own bow."

"From what?" Matt laughed louder, stretching his arm across the benched and stripped out parts.

"Whatever you think best. Goodnight Rosie."

"Goodnight Matt, thanks again." Rosie had no idea where to start.

"Take a step back Rosie." Brandon called over. She'd been pacing across the benches trying to lay out pieces. "Bring me that sword too." Rosie handed him the sword. He flicked the blade into place and wielded it with grace. Rigid stances that flowed into sideways cuts and backhanded blocks.

"Can you show me that again?" Rosie looked impressed, which seemed to amuse Brandon.

"I don't often hear you say that." Brandon grinned as he handed over the sword.

"It's not like the other stuff. I don't have a feel for it." Rosie had assumed it'd handle like a knife, it didn't. She took the sword and copied Brandon, this time it felt better, and more so after a few corrections.

"Needs a pommel, a counterweight on the bottom, but you've got potential. Damn sight more than I had at first."

"Who taught you?" The idea of someone teaching Brandon anything seemed odd.

"My husband Clarke. Second deadliest swordsman I ever saw." Brandon turned and poured himself another drink.

"Second?" Rosie tried to divert things with a joke.

"After our daughter Sara. But should you ever have occasion to meet a man named Grimm, don't tell him I said that." Brandon poured her a glass without asking. "Absent friends."

"What's she like?" Rosie knew a little about the woman that John had joined up with. She went back and forth on whether she liked it better that way.

"Funny." Rosie didn't expect that answer. "One year, on my birthday, she convinced me that I'd found a crashed alien spaceship!" Brandon started to laugh, creasing up as the memories returned.

"We were scouting some place. I was bitching about it being my birthday and wanting a lie in but I'm the senior officer so I have no choice. We walked for an hour and found this thing half buried in the ground, and it looked like…wait, do you know what I'm talking about?" Rosie thought she'd gotten better at pretending to understand.

"I think so, I've seen them in Matt's comics." Rosie remembered the cover of a little green monsters with oversized heads, coming out of a silver saucer shape.

"Our comics. Let's just make that plain." Brandon smirked and carried on.

"So it's half a 'flying saucer' that's crashed in this field. No tracks, no other way it could have got there, nothing. I take point and in this hole I see a little green arm and head poking out. I don't know what to think, so I reach out, and Sara says 'don't touch it!' Then her rad counter starts clicking. I try to call it in, and there's no signal."

"We walk back about halfway, and I'm thinking about impact marks, blood spatter, rads, signal interference. It all looked right. We stop and Sara tells me she's got a signal. I grab the radio from her and see what she's leaning on. The other half of the 'flying saucer'. Damn thing was a kid's climbing frame." Rosie joined in Brandon's laughter.

"They'd found some old rubber mask and stuck it to a toy, dressed it up with offal from kitchens. Then cut the climbing frame in half and dropped it from the air." He shook his head almost in disbelief still, years later. "First choice to have at my six."

"Second?" Rosie quipped.

"Well that's obvious...Janey." Brandon only half joked. "You learn to swing that sword faster than an old woman and we'll see about bumping you up." Rosie smiled at being insulted like everyone else.

"Right, now show me what we're working with." She turned back to the benches with Brandon over her shoulder. He caught sight of the photograph of John and Sara. "You don't have to worry about him. Sara will keep him safe. She's a true knight." Rosie had heard that compliment before, she had an idea of what it meant.

"Am I?" Rosie asked, taking a chance and knowing she might not like the answer.

"No you're not." Brandon took a serious tone. "You're something far rarer. You're the reason true knights sleep soundly, because they know there's a shadow in the night, ready to visit death on those who've earned it. You're a Recon scout, like us." Rosie felt proud to counted as one of them, she'd never been like anyone her whole life. "Or you will be when you finish your Labours."

"Labours?" Rosie asked.

"Most chapters don't even have a Recon unit. We take the top one percent of knights who apply for selection. Most don't even make it through that. Each must pass five Labours. You must walk unarmed through enemy territory. You must save the life of a Brother. You must salvage a weapon from the wastes." Brandon nodded towards Janey, amused. "And you must kill a target with a knife. All of which you've done."

"That's four. What's the last one?" Rosie wanted to do whatever it may be right then.

"Track, observe, and execute a target. You'll get chance, don't worry." She believed him.

With her mind clear and eased, Rosie talked Brandon through her designs. Explaining them helped her understand. Brandon showed her how to improve the alloy knife design.

She made simple tapered groves inside the flat steel handle and a thumb pressed locking pin. The alloy section had been carved from the body of the knife, angled at the top but still sharp on both sides. A blast from Janey's laser heated the alloy enough to melt the tungsten mount to the bottom. It slotted into the handle and Rosie welded the cover on.

A simple flick extended the alloy blade out from the front of the flat handle. The blade locking in place and falling back with a press on the rubber grip.

"Show me the wastrel gear." Brandon helped Rosie pull on the upper chest armour and the duster coat.

"Still need sleeves to hide the pipboy." Rosie didn't know where to start.

"Good wastrel gear should say two things, don't look at me, and don't fuck with me." Brandon held out her arm and began holding things up to the pipboy. The shoulder plates from the riot gear were too big by half. Although Brandon immediately measured them against her thigh and then against her two tone sidearm.

"Had an idea for these too." Brandon paused to quickly draw round the pistol and wide plate, then went over to the stripped armour. "Help me with this."

Rosie hammered the edges of the forearm plates flat, drilling holes at an angle and attaching straps. It covered the pipboy well enough and hinged open like a lid. She reshaped shoulder plates, tuning them thigh plates that fit well. Holsters on the inside, throwing knives and axes mounted outside. And, as Brandon pointed out, useful for the quiet outfit too.

With the main goals of something quiet, something that would help her blend in, and an R frame of her own, Rosie took the time to tidy up. She took stock of everything left, and found the riot mask too useful to ignore.

Brandon watched as she broke it down, separating the wide goggles with a red tint. Pulling apart the segmented respirator. Then the casing that covered the ears and back of the head. The back came away first, leaving the ear protectors. They blocked too much sound to be left on permanently. And being strapped into the frame meant a simple headband wouldn't work. An idea took root.

Rosie started by getting Janey to hold the upper chest armour level against the R frame chest plate. She neatly welded an angled blast plate to the frame, matching the riot armour. This would protect her neck which seemed like a good idea to Rosie, given bulletproof bones were of little use if she bled out. It also served as a mounting.

A small gearing block, the actuators from the left ankle of the power armour, and some precise spot welds eliminated the need to touch the mask at all. The longer actuators pushed the ear protectors into place and held them tight. Then from the back of the blast plate the googles moved up on a hinged arm to attach magnetically to them. Finally the respirator slid straight up, locking and tightening everything up.

"Gotta say, I did not think that would work." Brandon looked impressed as he blew cigar smoke at her to check the rubber seals she'd added. It felt pretty simple to Rosie. Just like a remote door repair, she thought, then cursed the thought of the dull steel doors that governed her former life. The mask retracted and Rosie smelt the bitter smoke.

"And it'll work on both." Rosie smiled as she saw Brandon recognise his idea.

"See if you can speed it up and work in the infrared light, that's too useful to ignore."

"You know I don't need that right, I can see without it." Rosie didn't keep anything she could do from Brandon. Firstly because she thought he needed to know, but mostly because he never showed fear or shock. He never made her feel different, quite the opposite.

"Yes, but we can see it." Brandon corrected himself with a grin. "Well, with the goggles on."

"Don't make any permanent modifications to the frame, not till Charlie sees it." Brandon advised. Rosie hadn't even noticed that they'd gone below.

"I won't. I want to try and make things modular, removable and interchangeable."

"Smart. Fit the frame for the job at hand."

"Yeah, but I want to make it mine. Nothing was ever 'yours' in the...before." Rosie found the memory stressful, putting up with shoddy tools she didn't improve out of spite for the Vault.

"Well it's yours now. They'd have take my armour off my fucking corpse." Brandon threw back his drink and put out his cigar. Rosie saw how tired he looked, yet he stayed up with her.

Brandon had an encyclopaedic knowledge of the power armour, recognising each part by sight alone. He talked Rosie through her idea, showing her where to mount a piston from the hip, and how to cast quick release clamps.

"Still need to do the blades." After welding the pistons and clamps to the spine and shoulder plates, Rosie couldn't see much else to do.

"Charlie will handle that. And I'll find you something to forge them from. Something—"

"That reminds me I'm not 'bulletproof'." Rosie shook her head with amusement.

"You have been paying attention, although for you I think a different reminder is needed. Leave it with me." Brandon winked and went below to sleep.

The shards of alloy had retained their sharper than a razor's edge . The smaller sections broke easily following the heating and cooling. Before long Rosie had six rough triangles. She set them into tungsten, making a fitting to match the existing arrows. She tried not to think about the mounted heads of beasts killed with these very arrows as she unscrewed the broad, steel heads. The arrows weighed almost nothing, carbon fibre shafts tipped with shaped alloy, and useless without a bow.

Rosie picked and shuffled through the remnants strewn across the benches, trying to find what she needed. She gathered some parts together. A cast stainless steel cylinder, the plates from Janey's blade arm, and two elliptical cams from the power armour knee. Shaping the cylinder into a grip took no time, thanks to Janey.

Attaching the curved arm plates and cams took little effort, and gave the bow form, but it needed string. Rosie had no idea.

"Janey," Rosie asked, already feeling like she'd cheated. "Any ideas?" The red light blinked for a moment.

"Yes." With a robotic precision, Janey plucked a long scrap of leather from the bench. "Please tie this onto this." Janey held out the leather, offering Rosie an exposed yellow fibre from the lining. She pulled it as the clawed hands gripped the leather tight. Janey's wrist began to rotate as the fibre wound into a ball around an empty shotgun shell.

They repeated the process with two more shells, Rosie held them on rods as Janey pulled the strands into one.

"Ancient bows used horse sinew as string. This will be more efficient." Rosie wondered what a horse was as Janey seared the ends and handed her the line. Rosie strung the bow, looping the string around the cams like a block and tackle. She placed a power armour knee plate on the bench and stood against the wall.

She had no feel for the bow. Holding with her right arm and drawing with her left felt off, the pipboy meant she had no choice. After some shaky aiming and easing of the string, Rosie loosed an arrow. It cut through the air and pierced the power armour knee plate. The alloy bit clean through the steel, at one of the thicker places.

"A most efficient design." Rosie smiled for a moment at Janey's praise, but it didn't last.

"Yeah. Thanks Janey." Rosie yanked the arrow free, wondering what it'd do to the actual knee behind the armour.

Rosie enjoyed the quiet for a while, wondering what John might be doing, something she didn't allow herself to do often. Her thoughts quickly drifted to her plan.

With the modified R frame she could get into the Brotherhood outpost. The less than lethal rounds she'd tucked away would keep things clean. Rosie boiled it down to three questions.

Was Brandon's comment about Sara's skills cut with a fatherly love? No. He wouldn't exaggerate about an asset.

Will my friends forgive me? Yes. As long as no one got hurt too badly.

And the last question, the one that made her chest feel tight. Would John come with me? Rosie stared at the photo of John. He looked happier than she could ever remember him being. Rosie lingered on the picture a while longer as she tidied, it seemed to stay with her as she climbed the rope. And then, as Rosie flipped open her book and saw the other picture of John, she had her answer. Yes.