Chapter 28 “You know what Einstein said about coincidence."

Rosie swam further and further into the murky blackness. John ahead of her, his pipboy light on. As Rosie slipped through the water, she felt the urge to breathe, to claw her way up. But the O2 meter in her peripheral vision hadn’t dropped past ninety five percent.

She felt the pressure of the water shift as they reached the launch tube. She locked her panic away and chased the light in front of her. Suddenly the light turned to her, she returned the thumbs up. John disappeared into the vent without hesitation. Rosie followed.

The cramped conditions made her desire to breathe multiply, like an itch she couldn’t scratch. Her narrow shoulders scuffed and knocked the slimy vent walls. She felt turn after sickening turn, until being dumped into a relatively open space. Rosie steadied herself, finding John.

She felt three taps on her shoulder, then two, then one. Inky water hissed and bubbled as white hot heat erupted to her side. She could make out a triangle of orange fizzing away. Without warning the steel gave, draining the water and pulling her through. Instantly sound returned as she drew a breath of stale, rancid air. And felt grateful for it.

Rosie felt herself being dragged, John alongside her, as they gasped and spluttered. She heard Virgil grunting with effort as he pulled them both beyond the door. Sparks popped as Virgil smashed a fuse box with his metal arm. Old doors creaked then slammed shut, gurgling water sloshing against the other side.

“Cover your eyes.” Virgil yelled before flickering blue light filled the square room.

“You alright?” John asked.

“I’m good.” Rosie spoke through the suit, her voice muffled.

"That should hold.” Virgil stepped back, his claw smouldering. Rosie saw him realise where they were, and the pain it brought. “Come on.” He strode forward, his eyes on the floor. She took in the room around her. A spacious twin room, beds on opposite sides, books and trinkets on the shelf.

The sporadic lighting illuminated rooms as they walked. Pictures of smiling faces, drawings, shoes with wheels on. “This was a happy place.” Rosie lingered by a cluster of photos, boys and girls in blue suits.

“We tried to give them something close to what they lost.” Virgil had a sadness to his voice she’d never heard from a ghoul. “Come on, ain’t got all day.” The harsh rasp returned as he almost ran headlong into the dark to escape.

They exited into a corridor, ever so slightly warped. Walls weeping with trickling condensate. The corridor led them to a second floor balcony in the atrium. The same layout as the top level in the Vault they grew up in.

The warped floor had cracked the polished resin. Wall seams split and torn. The radiation bombarded anything in its path. A table and chairs on one side of the cafeteria looked fine. The one opposite eroded and decayed to almost nothing.

“Watch your step.” Virgil took the lead, heading down the stairs. They walked through the decaying Vault. Rosie’s eyes became drawn to the classrooms, computer lab, library. Everything needed for an education she had been denied. They followed Virgil as he walked through the dark sections and the lit.

“This is my, the lab.” Virgil brought them in. “Check that side.” He walked to the far corner, busying himself away from them. Rosie took in the banks of broken monitors, shelf after shelf a grime covered glassware. Her fear and anger sapped by the sorrow of this place.

“Anything?” Virgil asked. She shook her head, as did John. “We’ll check my quarters.”

More decaying corridors brought them to a room Rosie felt she’d been in before. The same layout as the penthouse in The Grand. Leather seats around a glass table, marble bar, art on the walls.

Rosie stepped closer to the four poster bed, decayed in the centre as if it were burned by fire. The iv bags still hung told her what happened to Virgil. Rosie’s mind flashed to the image of waking from a coma to see herself changed. It brought tears to her eyes.

“Rosie, come look at this.” John called her over, shining his light on the wall. Behind glass, pristine steel glinted. A finely shaped blade with a curve. Black and gold wrapped handle. It made the similar sword John had look like a child's toy.

“Seventeenth century katana.” Virgil stopped gulping down a bottle from the bar and came over. “Made from steel folded hundreds of times. Hand forged and precisely shaped by a man who dedicated his life to his craft.” Rosie saw how Virgil admired the perfection, the same way she did.

“That one’s even older.” Virgil stepped across to another artefact in the glass cabinet. A long, double edged sword hung vertically. Two handed grip and an ornate hilt. “Sixteenth century Claymore. Forged in the Scottish Highlands by Clan McBlaken. My, our, ancestors.” Immediately she looked to John, his eyes wide and mouth open. Stunned by the connection to the past hanging on the wall.

A sharp movement from Virgil put her on edge for a split second, until she saw the cracked glass. Again he struck with his metal claw, shattering the glass. He took the broadsword and handed it to John, then the katana to her. “Take ‘em. Call it an engagement present.” John looked speechless.

Rosie tilted the blade in the light, catching the glint along the wave like pattern. “Still sharp.” She whispered in awe. “Thank you.” Rosie put out her gloved hand trying to keep it from shaking.

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“This place has had them long enough.” Virgil shook her hand, and they both had the same idea.

The tomb like Vault filled with noise as Virgil cut paintings from frames. “John, rip me out a three foot length of pipe.” She yelled, hearing hammering from down the corridors. “What next?” She asked, eager to take back anything she could.

“Quarters next to mine.” Virgil couldn’t even look at the door. “Should be some gunsmith tools, probably some rifles. Get bed linens too, anything clean.”

“On it.” Rosie set to her task.

The quarters belonged to a military man. Everything in its place. Framed medals on the wall. Polished boots in a row by the door. Rosie found the tools, and a few guns. She rolled them up in bed sheets, tools in a pillow case. Still unsure how they’d get them out.

Something caught her eye on the way out. A series of photographs, the same men in each, a brass plaque beneath. She brushed the film of dust away, seeing a name she knew. Higgins, the Red Hand commander she’d executed. Somehow she recognised the hard features and cold eyes of a face she’d never seen.

Rosie found Virgil staring at a painting. Waves tossed a small boat violently. Everyone scared except for one man they all looked to. "Who's the guy in the boat?" Rosie asked

"Jesus Christ." Virgil answered.

"I was only asking." Rosie had heard the name used as a curse several times already today.

"No," He pointed at the man sat calmly, amused. "Jesus Christ."

"Oh. Who was he?" Rosie's question seemed to amuse him more.

"See there, the little fellow." He pointed at a short man holding an oar, his expression almost comically exasperated. "That's the painter. Rembrandt, circa 1633."

"He painted himself into his picture." Rosie saw the humour in it.

"It's stolen, that's why it's down here. Used to be in a gallery near where I went to school. One morning in 1990 two thieves dressed as police took this and twelve others. Largest art heist in American history and never solved." Virgil seemed to enjoy sharing the providence of the painting. Rosie wouldn't have looked twice at it.

"My kind of job." Rosie admired the brazen, long dead thieves.

"Here." He handed her his knife. "I'll be your lookout." They shared a smile, both enjoying the distraction.

Virgil led them to the lift, using his claw to pry the doors open. He yanked on a dangling cable, testing it with his weight. “Tie that gear off. We climb from here.” He didn’t wait.

“Go, I’ve got this.” John looked pale, and close to throwing up.

“No, you go.” Rosie’s suit had helped her. He forced a smile for her benefit and started climbing the service ladder.

The climb took the better part of an hour. By the time John helped pull her up, he looked worse. “Get this door shut and follow me.” Virgil walked into pitch dark. They followed, walking straight through the expansive stockroom.

Rosie swept the beam of her light along the shelves, casting long, repeated shadows. Practically every shelf laid bare. She reasoned that the literal tonnes of supplies had gone to Shadowtown. And that it must have taken years.

Soon they’d reached the other side and followed Virgil along the wall. She heard a breaker switch flip, an island of light appeared ahead. “We'll rest here, get your rads down. Then try the…” Virgil trailed off, dread in his face.

John slumped into the lone chair. Rosie took off the stealth suit hood, getting a breath of stale air. She opened the torso enough to get one arm free, and unstrap the iv bags from her stomach.

“Make a fist.” Rosie tied one of the straps round John’s arm to find a vein. She slid the needle in, tied the bag onto his arm and watched the orange liquid flow. She repeated the process for herself, sitting on the stool by the terminal.

Rosie heard the terminal behind her boot up. The temptation of answers she’d long sought proved too great. She turned, only to see smashed hard drives and a system error.

“Is there any data left?” She asked, failing to sound casual.

“I doubt it. Everything up here was from after. I couldn’t leave in tact.” She saw how it pained him. “What are you looking for?” Virgil asked, picking up on something. Rosie drew in a deep breath that almost made her wretch, and waited for John to make eye contact with her.

“The doct…” She couldn’t call them that. “The med tech’s in our Vault, they told me I couldn’t get pregnant.” John dragged himself up and stood by her. “Is this why?” She gazed at her slanted reflection in the dormant device.

“Yes.” Virgil answered directly. “Less effective in males, but probably both of you.” All these years Rosie had thought knowing for sure would give her perspective on how she felt. It didn’t.

“I should have told you sooner.” She started to apologise, John stopped her.

“I don’t care.” He lied. She’d known John wanted to be a father. Rosie always told him she wouldn’t bring a baby into the Vault. Not a lie, but not the whole truth. “Rosie I…” The radaway hit and John vomited. They got him to the simple washroom and gave him privacy.

“For what it’s worth, I am sorry.” Virgil couldn’t look at her.

“For what it’s worth, I get it.” Rosie thought about the things she’d done. The gunfire she ran towards. “A distracted soldier is a dead soldier.”

“It was never meant for soldiers. I wanted you to be explorers, colonists on new worlds. I willingly sold my soul to the devil himself to get this place built, and then it all went to shit.” Virgil’s rasping voice broke.

“This world is new to us. They told us it was all gone. We explored.” Rosie saw a glimmer of a dream in the full black eyes. “My first day, I used this to jam a, my slave collar and escape. Shit, I used to crack the Vault door in the first place.”

“That was impressive. If you’d have walked into my corner office with code like that, I’d’ve hired you on the spot.” He lit a cigarette, amused for a moment. It didn’t last. “It was the Red Hand wasn’t it.”

“The room downstairs…” She trailed off. “Did you know him?”

“Higgins.” Virgil bit the cigarette between his teeth, opening another bottle. “I met him twice. Once before. Once after. Both times a purebred psychopath. What happened to him?”

“I gave him his collar back.” Rosie snapped her fingers.

“Good.” Virgil offered her the bottle. To her surprise she took it, and threw back a swig.

“Funny thing is, he told us that he rescued civilians and took them to my Vault.” Rosie saw it meant something to him.

“He saved Clara. That’s why I never went after him.” Virgil smiled, seeing her face. “You know what Einstein said about coincidence. God’s way of remaining anonymous.”

“You really believe that?” Rosie couldn’t understand a scientist thinking that way.

“Took me a long time to figure out that it’s not about belief. It’s about faith. Choosing to trust that I don’t have to know.” Virgil gave an answer Rosie didn’t understand, but respected nonetheless. “You should get some rest. I’ll prep the gear.”