Chapter 61 “It’s a fair deal.

“Left.” Rosie had been in the workshop for days. “More left. Perfect.” Janey moved the stainless steel pipe into position. Rosie blinked, darkening her vision before welding it in place. With the third barrel fitted, Rosie tested the break action. “Good.” She clamped the grenade launcher into a vise, and positioned the twin robotic arms.

“Alright Wizard, run it.” Wallace sat at a terminal, commands programmed. He tapped enter, bringing the spindly bot arms to life. One arm broke open the launcher, the other dropped dummy rounds into the tube and closed it. “Firing.” Rosie sent the command, triggering three clicks and a repeat of the loading.

“Great work Wizard.” Rosie held out her fist and Wallace bumped it.

“How are we going to aim it?” Wallace asked, then snapped his fingers. “Mount a laser designator. Add a Pythagorean algorithm to the arm’s mini os. We can sync it to airburst too.”

“Smart.” Rosie loved to see his mind work, lightning fast and free from constraint. “They must be teaching you well at that school.” She still had her doubts, but kept them to herself.

“I like it there. Momma says it’s more about making friends.” Wallace span back to his terminal.

“Are you, making friends?” Seeing Dutch had brought up a lot of old feelings, most of them unpleasant.

“Yeah, a few.” He smiled.

“Sometimes a few good friends is all you need.” Rosie felt pleased for him. “Do you want to start the induction forge?”

Wallace set about melting the lead she pulled off an old roof. Rosie started with the mould. She dragged a length of wire through the lump of clay, leaving two flat surfaces. Her mark two eyeball showed an overlay with the measurements, and she scored marks into the clay. She pressed the twenty sided die from one of their games in, then placed the other half on top. After a dozen times, Rosie carved neat channels and formed the mould.

They both stood watching the solid lead become liquid, admiring the science. “Remember, nice and steady.” Rosie let Wallace handle the crucible, hovering over his shoulder. “Don’t worry about making a mess, just keep pouring.”

Wallace kept a steady hand, filling the mould with molten lead. “Great job. Let that cool and help me with the vambraces.” His small hands made short work of detaching the forearm plates from John’s armour.

Rosie tacked on a spare rail from a broken carbine, allowing her to mount a grenade launcher. “What?” She asked, seeing Wallace underwhelmed by her idea.

“Sometimes the old ways are the best.” Wallace used the phrase Brandon taught her. He pointed to the Assaultron blade on the wall.

It took a couple of hours to design and fabricate a mount strong enough. Rosie found a simple solution, modelled after a light bulb.

“Alright, it’s connected.” Wallace called over. Rosie reached her hand inside the frame and squeezed the trigger. The blade extended, and locked with a pleasing clunk. The serrated edge facing up, like the blades on her Recon frame.

Knocking on the door broke them away from the benches. “Your dinner’s going cold.” Louisa stood in the doorway, hands on her hips.

“Sorry Momma.” Wallace tore himself away.

“Rosie, your dinner’s getting cold.” Louisa kept the same tone.

“Sorry Momma.” She quipped as Louisa shook her head.

They went next door, finding food on the table. “Is John doing any…” She trailed off, speaking low enough that Wallace didn’t hear from the bathroom.

“He’s about the same.” Rosie answered, her worry reflected back at her. John had been distant, withdrawn since the attack on the Vault. “He blames himself.” She hoped the improvements to his gear might buck him up.

“He has a big heart, like someone else we know.” She glanced to her son. Rosie had never seen it before now, but Wallace shared John’s capacity for boundless empathy. “This is the cost of that.”

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“Cost of what Momma?” The bright boy asked, seeing her worry.

“Well, you know Newton’s third law?” She indulged him with an easy question.

“When two objects interact, they apply forces to each other of equal magnitude and opposite direction.” He gave the textbook answer.

“John is sad because he thinks he let people down. He wouldn’t feel sad if he didn’t care.” Louisa spoke plainly. “You remember what I said about Daddy?” Rosie froze, the food still in her mouth. John had told her the truth about Wallace’s late father.

“It’s ok to be sad about it because grief is the price of love. And that grief doesn’t last long but love is forever, so it’s a fair deal.” Wallace beamed at seeing his mother smile. Rosie saw the pain in her eyes.

“John is grieving right now, in his own way. But grief doesn't last, not like love.” Louisa helped her understand something she’d missed.

After a fine meal of pan seared pork cutlets, they hurried back to the workshop. Rosie cracked open the mould, and began drilling the angled orbs. Wallace did his trick of positioning the magnifying lens over his mouth while he pulled faces and did voices. It made her laugh every time. Then he got the tiny receivers soldered.

“Catch.” Rosie tossed him a rolled ball of what looked like clay.

“What is this stuff?” Wallace prodded and squeezed the putty like substance.

“High explosive composite.” Rosie laughed as Wallace gasped and dropped the explosives, then gasped again and picked it up. “Relax.” Brandon had done the same thing to her once. “If it did go off, I’m pretty sure I could outrun it.”

“Well that’s a relief.” Wallace answered, handing her the ball back gingerly.

“Yeah, I said I can outrun it, you’re screwed.” Rosie held her deadpan expression.

“That’s not funny.” Wallace blurted out while laughing.

Wallace used his mother’s rolling pin to flatten the explosives. Rosie cut off strips, wrapping them round the micro receivers and sliding them into the angled orbs. With that done, she sealed the hole with finely cut triangles of lead, and started pressing them into shells.

Rosie took the tactical shotgun Charlie gave her as a wedding present. Pre-war, army issue, semi automatic. Sprayed black with a collapsing stock. “Want to see something neat?” She asked as the gates of the Rest hinged open. Wallace looked at her and heard nothing, until Fenris came running.

“Wait, did you just dog whistle without a whistle?” He worked out faster than anyone else.

“Virgil showed me how to shift my vocal range into an ultrasonic frequency. I can hear it too.” Rosie loved to impress Wallace most of all.

“So cool.”

Fenris shot after the ball Rosie hurled as they walked through the darkening woods. “Is this far enough?” He asked for the fifth time.

“Yeah.” Rosie made sure the dog stayed behind her, and picked out a tree. “Firing.” The shotgun spat out six shells like it hated trees. Each angled orb found its mark, embedding in the trunk. “Firing.” Rosie snapped her fingers.

Wood splintered as the explosive shells detonated. The tree shifted, gradually at first, before its own weight pulled it down.

“Well that definitely made a sound.” Wallace made a joke she didn’t get as they walked back. “You know that saying, if a tree falls in the forest and no one is around, does it make a sound?”

“That’s stupid, of course it does. Sound is air moving, a tree falling moves a lot of air.” Rosie felt confident in her answer.

“Yeah, I don’t think it’s a literal question.” Wallace grasped something she didn’t. He stopped walking suddenly, the look of having missed something obvious on his face. “All this, it’s because you’re going after those things, right?”

“I promised I’d never lie to you, Wallace. You’re smart enough to know the truth.” Rosie took her promise seriously. Her own childhood filled with so many lies the damage may never be undone. “Yes we are.”

“Because of what they did to your people?” He asked. Rosie still didn’t think of them as her people, that was a much smaller group.

“I’m supposed to say yes. To tell you that those things need to be put down, and because I have the power to do something, I have a duty to do so. Which is all true.” Rosie answered honestly.

“But.” He followed up.

“You remember when me and Paul took you rock climbing for your birthday?” Rosie counted that amongst one the best days of her life.

“Of course, I don’t think I’ll ever forget that.” Wallace had conquered his fear masterfully that day.

“You remember how you felt at the top, after you’d beaten something that frightened you?” He nodded, his expression concerned. “That’s how combat feels. Like I’m really alive, not like all those years trapped, shuffling from place to place like a damn feral. I love that feeling, Wallace.”

“What does it cost?” Wallace hit upon something neither of them quite understood.

“It’s a fair deal.”

Wallace headed home, as did Rosie. She found John sitting at the table, the first time he’d been home that week. “How was the job?” She asked. John had been taking anything Styx had, mostly security for caravans.

“Smooth, no problems.” He sounded disappointed. “Gave me time to think.”

“About?” She thought time to think would be the last thing John needed.

“I’m going back to the outpost. I need to be in the fight.” John seemed unsure.

“We’re closer to Jones than anyone at the outpost.” She reached out and took his hand. “You don’t need to punish yourself.” She tried to keep from crying as he looked back at her, lost. Like he’d finally figured a way through and she’d taken it away. “You should shower, try and get some rest. We’ll talk tomorrow.”