Chapter 9 “Something quiet, something loud, and something sharp.”
The morning sun woke them through the glass at the top of the lighthouse. The day started with an exhilarating lesson in rappelling. Rosie loved it, zipping down the rope at speed.
Rosie thought she’d done well, till she watched Charlie do it. Leaping head first, rope held in an outstretched arm, almost falling. At the last moment her arm locked the rope behind her. Charlie slowed, flipped, disconnected and drew her pistol in one fluid motion.
“It’s a Recon thing.” Charlie casually walked by as Rosie felt an uncommon sense of jealousy.
Brandon left after breakfast, handing Charlie handwritten orders. Rosie watched from inside the hung sheets as Charlie flipped through them. At first she looked amused then her face began to drop. “Five minutes.” Charlie shouted.
Rosie ignored the choice of real clothes and changed into her black fatigues. Easier, she thought. Outside Charlie laid out two of the simple metal and canvas beds, softened with the furnishings of the Vault below.
“What?” Rosie thought Charlie must be joking.
“I’m serious. Strip to your underwear.” Charlie started doing the same.
“What if someone sees?” Rosie started unzipping her black top as slow as possible.
“First, you don’t have anything to be embarrassed about. And second, the only people that are around will be us. Brandon isn’t interested, Paul has all the woman he can handle,” She gestured along her toned and tanned body. “And Matt…” Charlie trailed off. Rosie knew why and took the chance to say it out loud.
“Matt’s afraid of me.” Rosie lifted her arm, as if the pipboy was contained to just the housing.
“He’s not afraid of you, he’s afraid for you.” Charlie explained, Rosie didn’t get it. “Whatever that thing did to you—”
“What it did for me.” Rosie sounded defensive, and felt oddly vulnerable as she noticed just how pale her skin looked in comparison. Charlie sat up and took her dark glasses off.
“Either way, you didn’t have a choice, and you were a child. You…you understand that’s not ok right?” Rosie didn’t have an answer, it never even occurred to her until now. She lay out in the warm sun, dark glasses on her face that hid tears in her eyes.
"Put that on you. It’ll stop you burning.” Charlie tossed her a cola bottle, refilled with pale liquid.
“Burning?!” Rosie's concern seemed to amuse Charlie.
“It’ll help. You do your front and I’ll get your back. Then one day, when you’re pleased with John, you can tell him all about it.” Rosie didn’t understand why John would want to hear about that.
Rosie spent the morning fussing and fidgeting, entirely unused to doing nothing. She went through several options, trying to convince Charlie to let her do something, most of which met with a solid no.
“Rosie.” Charlie sat up and took off her glasses. “We have a mission. That mission will mean all our lives are going to depend on you.” Rosie couldn’t look her in the eye. “You need your mind clear and calm. This is how you do that.” Charlie stretched out again, her point made. “Also you need to blend in, and right now you look whiter than a mole rat.”
“What’s a mole rat?” Rosie asked flippantly. She didn’t care about the answer. She threw herself back down, attempting to quiet her noisy mind.
The rustle of the leaves. The babbling of the stream that used to be a lake. The gentle breeze whistling around the lighthouse. Rosie became attuned to it all as the long day in the sun passed.
“Come on lazy bones, let’s get something done.” Rosie shot to her feet, ready to reject the accusation of laziness. For a moment she feared being reported to the Overseer at hearing the insult. “You won’t need those.” Rosie dropped her fatigues in frustration.
She followed Charlie round the lighthouse through a small, well kept group of plants. “See that.” Charlie pointed. Rosie looked at the small pile of rocks and the shaped earth around it. A modelled map of the surrounding area. “Now you build one. Focus on probable Vaults.” Rosie leapt at the opportunity to be useful.
With the overlaid wire frame map that John helped her get from Lady Luck, things progressed quickly. Rosie started by sticking a spade in the ground for the Tower, then used her hands to shape the earth around it. Still wearing only underwear and her boots, Rosie took a stroll towards the stream. Gathering rounded pebbles in a tin bucket. The pebbles became roads. Lengths of string showed the river, and a neat row of bullet casings to show the train she’d found. Charlie, now able to see the true scale of Rosie’s map, began to fill in the blanks.
Stolen novel; please report.
The problem became apparent to Rosie as she scrolled over to her Vault. She could make out the harsh green bar, straight lines set in the natural curves of the cave entrance. And she could see eight more locations that looked exactly like it. White ceramic mugs became the markers for the would be Vaults.
“That’s not a Vault.” Charlie picked up a mug from the far north west of the map, replacing it with submachine gun magazines arranged in a square. “That’s Excalibur Outpost. Where John is.” Rosie felt oddly relieved to see where John was. “A lot of it is underground. Maybe that is throwing off your scan.”
“The further out it goes the less accurate it gets.” Rosie strode around her map, proud of her work yet growing frustrated. “I need more data.”
“You’ll get chance, right now we need to focus on The Grand.” Charlie walked to a few small boxes east of Shadowtown. “Get a feel for the area, plot routes in and out.” Rosie felt Charlie’s worry without needing to look.
“The boys checked in, they’ll be back soon. I know you don’t like it down there, but Paul’s face when he sees that kitchen will be worth it.” Charlie smiled and headed back down into the private Vault. The thought of being down there sent a shiver through Rosie, even as she stood in warm sunlight.
Rosie plotted three routes in and out of the area around The Grand. One by road, another through the forest and a backup along the river to the south. Engrossed in the process of making the projected data real, Rosie didn’t notice Paul and Matt till they were close enough to see she still wasn’t dressed.
Charlie had been right about Paul’s reaction, he barely glanced at her, but she’d been wrong about Matt. He blushed as she caught him staring at her body. It felt like a normal, awkward moment until Rosie held her arms across her chest. Matt saw the pipboy. Then he couldn’t look at her.
“Nice map.” Paul dropped his heavy pack that landed with a metallic rattle. He stepped across the rows of pebbles and kicked a few aside, representing the impassable sections from memory. Charlie appeared and threw Rosie her blacks. She put them on quickly, relieved to be dressed like the others again.
“Rosie’s got a surprise for you.” Charlie announced after she’d embraced them both. She held Rosie’s hand as they headed back underground.
The glass window looking out onto a cave drew Matt right away. He shut off the lights in the lounge area and stood looking out as his eyes adjusted. They left him in his memories of how he’d lived and took Paul into the kitchen.
“Ok, open.” Charlie let him see. Paul, broad chested, tall, bald and bearded looked like an excited child as rummaged through the old world kitchen. He clicked on gas burners, dinged different shaped pans, and thumbed knives. Paul gasped as he opened a draw.
“This is a ‘Cosmic’ knife!” Rosie looked at the old world writing on the metal box. “Saturnite alloy, same stuff they made space rockets from.” Paul held the large kitchen knife up. The blade glinted in the harsh light, the sheen like smoke caught in sunlight.
With an amount of cation Paul pressed the blade down on the metal box. A tiny shearing sound echoed as the strange alloy cut straight through the box. Charlie let out a long whistle and bumped Rosie with her shoulder.
Paul strode over to her. “Whatever you want to eat Rosie, name it, I’ll make it.” Her mind went blank. She didn’t know what half the strange whirring contraptions in here did, she just wanted to go back outside. Charlie flashed Paul a hand signal. Rosie just managed to pick them up, her callsign and hazardous environment.
“Not tonight, she’s busy.”