The worst part of a job where timing was important, was waiting for the job to actually start. Right after Hancock took Nick Valentine and Marian out of town through the tunnels, MacCready and Cait returned to Hancock’s office. They both became bored quickly with nothing to do to distract them. Fahrenheit brought a chess board to give them something to do, but MacCready hadn’t played since he left Little Lamplight, and Cait didn’t know how to play. Fahrenheit tried to teach them, but neither of them had the patience to learn, and she didn’t have the patience to keep them from worrying about Marian. She quickly gave up and went to the corner of the room to smoke.

When Hancock returned, he ignored everyone in the room and went straight to his terminal. MacCready could tell that he was doing little more than staring at the screen. Eventually the mayor gave up on pretending to work and started pacing his office. Everyone sat in an uneasy silence, waiting for Nick and Marian to come back and tell them where to go.

“She fucking named it,” Hancock finally muttered under his breath.

“What’s that?” Cait asked, giving everyone something to focus on other than the wait, and their own boredom.

Hancock stopped his rhythmic stomping and looked at the guests on his couches as if he forgot they were there. “Marian,” he said, “she named the brahmin I gave her.”

“What did she name it?” MacCready asked.

“Oh, uh, Ferdinando, I think.”

“What a load of shite,” Cait said. “Why would she want to name an animal like that anyway?”

“It’s how she is,” MacCready told her. “It’s how she always has been. She likes naming things.” He remembered how she used to name everything they owned. She even named a large mutfruit they found “Mr. Mutfruit”. The fact that she ate her share without any sense of compassion or regret for Mr. Mutfruit was how he figured out that it was just a game to her.

“And you want me to snog with her? I mean she may have a nice arse and all, but she seems more like a good girl. I’ve fucked some like her before, it never turns out well for them. I don’t want to hurt anyone, not if I can help it.”

“I’ve been there too,” Hancock admitted. “We’re not asking for you to use her and toss her out. Just flirt with her. Try to convince her that she wants to stay in the Commonwealth.”

“Please, Cait,” MacCready begged. “She needs someone to protect her from herself.”

“Then why don’t you two do it yourselves? You know I’m no babysitter.”

“Because Mac is her brother,” Hancock explained. “That leaves him out. If I try to sleep with her, she’ll interpret it as an order, and I’ve strained her trust almost to the breaking point already. I don’t want to sacrifice her friendship for a night with her in my arms. You’re not going to do this on your own, she has a lot of friends who are helping her, but we can’t force you to do this either.”

Cait let out a loud sigh and sat back on the couch. She laid her head back and looked up at the ceiling. “Fine, what do you want from me exactly?’

“Just keep doing what you’ve been doing. Make her feel wanted and welcomed,” Hancock explained.

“You don’t have to do this forever,” MacCready told her. “She normally doesn’t stay in relationships very long. She’ll decide she’s annoying you soon and stop swinging by.”

Cait raised her head and looked straight at MacCready. “You didn’t tell me she was like that. I know what it’s like to feel unwanted, it makes it hard to feel wanted when you are. At least, it did for me. Okay, I’ll do it, but she can decide how much of me she wants. I’m not out to break her.”

“We wouldn’t ask you to do this if we thought you were,” Hancock said. “If you need anything to help- “

“What I need is for you two to stay out of our relationship. She doesn’t kiss like a virgin, but she’s still skittish. She just does what she thinks I want. I’ll try to help her feel wanted, but I’m not going to waste my life if she’s not interested.”

“Thanks,” MacCready mumbled.

They continued to sit in silence. Hancock went back to his pacing. The whole room was tense. They would pick at some of the meals that Hancock had brought up, but no one had much of an appetite.

Finally, there was the knock at the door. As Fahrenheit opened the door, Nick pushed past her and into the room. MacCready did not like that. Nick was normally so stuck up on rules that he would never ignore one about waiting for permission to enter a room. This time, he risked being shot by Hancock’s personal bodyguard in order to get into the room as quickly as possible.

“We need to get her out of there, now!” Nick announced, taking control of the room away from Hancock.

“Whoa, hold up there, buddy,” Hancock responded moving to the synth. “I’m not disagreeing with you, but why the panic?”

“This,” Nick explained handing a piece of paper to Hancock. “By the time I found it, she had already sprung their trap. It looks like someone is trying to make a religion using Judge Zeller’s methods of recruitment.”

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MacCready felt the blood rushing from his face. He looked over at Cait to see she was just as pale as he felt. Neither of them was with Nate when he cleaned Zeller’s crew out on Kessler’s request, but Piper was happy to publish the story in the Publick Occurrences. Judge Zeller was a man who kidnapped caravans and recruited the members with both threats of torture, and real torture. Piper did spare the details, but Strong was too happy to talk about the tooth pullings and starvation cycles that Zeller’s victims experienced. Deacon had to point out that was not the way to find the Milk of Human Kindness to get the super mutant to finally shut up before Dogmeat was the only person left in the room who hadn’t lost their lunch.

“You’re right,” MacCready announced standing up. Now he had three friends who were being held by this asshole, and he wasn’t even sure if any of them was still alive. He had to do something. “Let’s go get them.”

“I need to know where they are first,” Fahrenheit pointed out.

All eyes moved to Nick, ready to know where to go and get Marian and any of the missing caravans who were still holding out.

“She’s in the HulliciGen facility,” Nick told them. “I watched them take her inside, and her brahmin around back.”

“I guess Ferdinando is gone,” Hancock said casually.

“Ferdinand,” Nick corrected.

“Oh shite!” Cait spoke up. “I helped Nate clear that place out last year after the Gunners tripped the gas line and went nuts. The place is a fucking maze. We had to start over three times before Nate figured out how to get us through that place. I lost him a few times as well.”

“Do you know where they may be keeping the hostages?” Nick asked Cait.

“Why would I know shite like that?” she asked.

“Were there any caged areas, like Zeller had,” Nick explained. “Or rooms that could only be locked on the outside, like when Skinny Malone had me captive.”

To her credit, Cait looked like she was thinking about the place. “There was an area, it looked like a display area for people who wanted to see what the place was for. People would be kept in these little rooms that you could look down on. When Nate would push a button, something would happen where the person in the room would get zapped or blown up or something else that would kill them.”

The whole room went quiet for a moment. As Cait talked, MacCready thought about the possibility of his friends being killed that way. He was sure that Nick and Hancock thought about that too.

“We will have to see to it that no one pushes any buttons then,” Nick finally said. “At least not until we find her.”

“Was there a back entrance?” Hancock asked Cait.

“Oh yeah,” she said. “It was how we got out. It was chained when we got there, but Nate undid that chain easily."

“The chain may have been replaced,” Nick said off handedly.

“We can still break up into two teams, one takes the front, the other the back until we find them,” Hancock strategized. “If the back is chained, then that team can rejoin the other team.”

“What do you want me to do, Boss?” Fahrenheit asked.

“Hold off with your guys, let the four of us go in and secure the hostages, but make sure no one else gets out until I give the signal. After that, have your guys come in and clean out anyone we miss. Keep a second group to help escort the hostages back here. Talk to Dr Amari and Chuck about medication and food for them respectively. They will be guests, but I want to keep them in this office until I can talk to each one personally.”

“On it,” the head of security confirmed before leaving the office.

“Let’s go!” MacCready demanded out of patience for talking. Every minute they talked was one less minute his friends had.

“Ok,” Hancock agreed. “Cait, I want you to show me where the back entrance is then take the front entrance with Nick. Mac, you’re with me. Be as quiet as you can as you make your way through the place. The farther we go before tripping an alarm, the better chance any of the hostages have of surviving.”

The other three companions nodded their agreement and all four of them hurried out the office. They hurried through the streets, Nick showing them the way he had come. It took them an hour to get there. Every minute was a painful reminder to MacCready that his friends were in trouble and every minute it took to get there could be their last one. Nick pulled MacCready aside without slowing the group down.

“We’ll find her,” Nick said to reassure him.

“She can handle torture,” MacCready said. “One of her brother’s was a shi…I mean one of her brothers was a jerk. I saw him do stuff to her even after she left her family. Apparently, no one stopped him from hurting her when she was in it. But Knick Knack and Knock Knock, they were as safe as any kid from Little Lamplight could be. I know it was dangerous compared to the outside, but they weren’t ever told that being physically attacked was a sign of affection.”

The synth looked shocked. He opened his mouth but closed it again. “We’ll find her,” Nick said again.

The two of them rejoined the group. MacCready knew Nick wanted to comfort him, but only managed to make his guilt worse. He hated the fact he was trying to force his sister to stay in the Commonwealth, but he couldn’t let her go back to the Capital Wasteland. Not with what was waiting there for her.

When they got to the HulluciGen building, the four of them managed to make short work of guards set up at the front door. Cait led them around to the back door. Hancock handed Nick a handful of stimpaks before walking up to the door.

“See you guys on the inside,” Hancock said quietly before testing to see if the door opened.

MacCready had his sniper rifle ready as the two of them entered the building together. He shot off the heads of several raiders, while Hancock used his shotgun to protect the younger man from approaching enemies. The two of them quietly moved inside, passing a brahmin corpse.

“I overheard what you said to Nick,” Hancock said. “I want you to be careful what you say to him about your sister. You know Nick is good at putting two and two together, and I think Marian wants her past to stay there.”

“She told you about her past,” MacCready responded, trying to excuse his thoughtless words.

“She needed me to trust her,” Hancock said. “She took a chance on me. I don’t think she feels the same about Nick.”

“I don’t get why they won’t get along,” MacCready complained. “They’re both smart. They both care about people, sometimes too much. They both like to read.” As they turned a corner, they saw three raiders in the hallway. MacCready shot one, Hancock another. “It just doesn’t make sense.” MacCready shot at the last gunner, he missed his mark and hit the guy in the chest, then shot again and hit him in the head, killing him.

“Neither of them are used to being around someone like themselves. It’s like looking in a mirror and it’s scaring them both. Instead of seeing the best of themselves in the other, they are seeing the worst. They will come around, but it will take time. They will need to fight it out, and we will need to referee those fights to make sure they don’t hurt one another.”

“So why am I with you and neither of us are with Nick?” MacCready asked as they moved through the halls.

“I don’t know how confused she’s going to be,” Hancock explained. “If she says the wrong things when she sees you, I want to be able to help keep her secrets. It wouldn’t be the same for Nick or Cait.”

MacCready had to admit that was a good reason. The two of them continued to sneak from one room to the next, cleaning out each room before moving on.