Jacob Burns and the Order of the Algorithm #Wattys2017

Chapter 13: A Light in the Darkness (Current)

It wasn't long before we were over the bridge and back into Boston, but this time I had made sure Ilya knew to keep close and keep quiet. The Back Bay District was a known haven for raiders and Super Mutants alike, neither of which I had much of an answer for should we get caught. It was easy enough I supposed, Ilya was still moping over Valentine and hadn't spoken a word since we'd left, but none of that mattered now. A synth's a synth and I certainly wasn't about to risk my neck for the likes of him.

Even so, I looked back at Ilya, only to find her scowling off in the distance, refusing to so much as look me in the eye.

I sighed to myself. She could be such a child sometimes.

"Look, I know it doesn't feel like it right now, but we did the right thing ditching the synth. The last thing we need is an Institute spy sniffing around while we're off looking for this Conduit thing. Trust me, you can thank me later."

"Oh, can I? Can I really?" She snapped back with a glare, "Don't patronize me, Mr. Burns. You know perfectly well that I didn't want to leave him behind, but you insisted and you're the boss, so here I am. I mean, honestly... I finally meet someone from my past, someone that might actually be able to help us, and you won't even hear him out. And why? Just because he's taken on a few mechanical parts?"

"It's not as simple as that and you know it," I snapped back, "With the flip of a switch that "friend" of yours becomes the deadliest killing machine in all the Commonwealth. Besides, what's the likelihood that wasn't a trap, anyway? Out of all the personalities he could have had, he just so happens to be an old friend and the foremost expert on your father's murder? C'mon kid, wake the hell up."

"But that's just it! Don't you think the Institute would have put a little more effort into disguising a spy?" She said as she trotted along next to me, "Consider the fact that he's been living in Diamond City long before this Director ever took over, and that he managed to earn a strong reputation with the townspeople there. He might have been telling the truth the whole time, and for all we know, he could have been the best chance we had of finding the vault. At the very least, he could have been one of those Railroad synths I keep hearing about..."

"Seriously, you can't really think... Wait, what?" I stopped for a moment, not quite sure if I had heard correctly. "Did you say the Railroad? How do you know about the Railroad?"

"I heard some of the townspeople talking about it in the marketplace just before I got arrested. It's some sort of secret underground network that smuggles synths out of the Institute, right? They think of them as people, being treated as slaves. They liberate them and give them new identities out in the Wasteland. He could be one of them!"

"Who the hell have you been talking to?!" I said as I reeled around on her, hardly able to believe she overheard this in Diamond City of all places. The Railroad was nothing but a bunch of whacked-out nut jobs and synth-crazed terrorists whose blind altruism was going to get us all killed.

"Whoever told you that was not your friend Ilya, the Railroad is as dangerous as it gets, what's left of them are anyway. They may think the synths are people, but they're dead wrong. How human can you be if all your memories, all that makes you, you, can be replaced with a simple program?"

"You aren't being fair! The least you could have done was given the man a chance!"

"That's enough!" I snapped, thoroughly fed up with this nonsense, "I'm not taking any risks and that's final! I won't hear another word about it!" And with that I stomped ahead, leaving Ilya to return to her cold and stony silence.

Several hours later, we finally entered into the plaza of old Copley Square and the sound of gunfire and screaming seemed to fade away into the distance, our footsteps echoing off the ancient stone of crumbling ruins as the surrounding steel skyscrapers ached and groaned in the wind.