"I think we may have a foolproof plan to get you within striking range of a Courser." Deacon surprised us as we grabbed a quick bite at Power Noodles the next day. A night in a warm, safe room did wonders for our mental and physical equilibrium, but were perishing for good, cooked food.
I jumped in reaction, not having noticed the Railroad spy approach. The only reason I was able to recognize him as being Deacon was when he spoke. He was wearing a brown wig and dressed in an identical baseball uniform to the guards in Diamond City, down to the wire-wrapped bat.
"Oh?" I commented mildly, pretending I didn't just halfway jump out of my skin. "Do tell."
"Can we talk about this somewhere more private?" Deacon murmured, acting as if he was only making small talk. "Like maybe you can give me a tour of your regular room in the Dugout Inn?"
"At least let us finish our meal, huh Deacon?" MacCready grumbled, motioning to his nearly full second bowl. "We don't get the chance to eat real food very often when we're covering every inch of the Commonwealth on foot."
"Awww, and here I thought you were going to offer me lunch," Deacon bantered back, laughing a little as MacCready half-playfully growled like a starving dog, wrapping his arm around the second portion. "Gotcha. When you're finished here, go back to your room and I'll be along shortly."
Back in our room, Deacon elaborated further. "We have an issue that came up, forcing our hand. Normally, we sneak escaped Synths out of the Commonwealth one at a time, but with our forces so reduced, it's been taking too long, even with the Minutemen's help. More Synths escape the Institute before we can safely transport the ones we have on hand. Right now, we have a group of six we need to move, pronto."
"I'm with you so far. Where do we come in?"
"This is what I'm thinking. We leak information about a mass exodus heading out of Bunker Hill. Once the Institute finds out that's where the Synths are, they're bound to send a Courser with a whole bunch of Gen 1s as backup to retrieve their property. You alert the Brotherhood of Steel to the presence of Institute Synths and they'll be there like a shot." He clapped his hands together dramatically. "Boom! Brotherhood and Institute tear each other up while you and your sniper buddy there focus on taking out the Courser, whom you can track thanks to Tinker Tom. In the meantime, the Railroad sneaks our Synth friends out the back way under cover of all the confusion, sending them to the nearest Minutemen settlements for safekeeping."
I sat there, a little stunned. "That's a lot of moving parts, Deacon." Turning to MacCready, I asked, "Your thoughts?"
"I think it's our best chance at a Courser," he said seriously. "After all, we've been playing whack-a-mole-rat for months just trying to get close, and they disappear as soon as we close in. And there aren't all that many leads for us to follow in the first place."
I nodded. "All right, Deacon. Let's put this plan into action."
-0-
It took several days of encrypted communications between the leaders of the various factions, using the plan Deacon had presented, coordinated through me, to set up our trap. Paladin Danse was eager to take the fight to the Institute, though he was reluctant to commit troops unless we had solid information. I leaned heavily on my good reputation, earned in battle alongside other Brotherhood Knights in the Commonwealth, as well as the knowledge that I had more local resources for intel than Danse did. He was almost desperate to uncover my source, but reluctantly backed down when I gave him my word as a Soldier that my information was trustworthy.
General Garvey sent a platoon of Minutemen volunteers to the nearest settlement to Bunker Hill with orders to cooperate with the Railroad and set up safe escape routes leading away from the conflict. Privately, he wished me good luck in my personal mission, cautioning me to be careful. Desdemona sent one of her regular Railroad agents to meet with the Minutemen and mark the trail; not only for the escaped Synths, but also for any traders caught in the crossfire. Once the area was cleared of Institute presence, the traders could return if they so wished.
MacCready and I made our way to Bunker Hill armed to the teeth. We decided to arrive as soon as possible in order to reconnoiter the entire complex and set up an ambush point. While the Courser was going to be distracted by his mission to recapture the escaped Synths, we had to make sure we could take him out before he could disappear. We were relying heavily on the assumption that our target was going to be single-mindedly determined to complete his mission, no matter the cost.
Deacon met up with us shortly after our arrival. He brought us down through a cleverly disguised trap door in the main trading area to an underground bunker where the Railroad had set up shelter for the runaways. "Housing one, hell, even two Synths down here while waiting for transport isn't much of a problem," Deacon had explained as we were given a quick tour, "but with the recent loss of two of our safehouses, we've had to keep an entire group of six down here together, and that's way too many warm bodies to keep secure for long." He declined to show us the actual room where the runaway Synths were hiding, explaining that the fewer people who knew its exact location, the better. "Anyway, thanks for the distraction!"
"Don't mention it," I said, wryly, nervous about the upcoming battle. "No, really. Just don't." Craning my neck to look at the vaulted ceilings in the buried shelter, I asked, "Do you expect them to get this far? There are a couple of good defensive spots, but I don't envy a firefight in here."
Deacon shook his head emphatically. "If the Institute discovered this haven, we'd be dead in the water. We need them to stay on the surface. That's where the Brotherhood comes in, guns blazing in a rush of glory." He grinned. "Keep the Gen 1s busy outside the walls. You two distract that Courser from finding the basement entrance, eliminate him and get his chip for Tom. In the meantime, we have an alternate one-way exit to smuggle our, ah, cargo into Minutemen hands."
"Okay, Deacon, we get it, we're not amateurs." MacCready chimed in, making his way back up through the trap door. "Thanks for the tour, but we'll take it from here. C'mon Boss, I'll teach you how to build a proper sniper's nest."
-0-
When the Institute made their move, they did so decisively. MacCready and I were camouflaged in the scaffolding surrounding Bunker Hill's landmark obelisk, keeping alert for any movement. My Pip-Boy squealed suddenly as a slew of bright flashes and accompanying cracks heralded the arrival of a large contingent of Institute Gen 1 Synths, emerging from the surrounding buildings already firing on our location. As soon as the force appeared, the squad of Brotherhood Knights led by Paladin Danse, who had been stationed in concealed points around the immediate area just that morning, returned fire with their own show of force. A blaze of red Brotherhood and blue Institute laser beams crisscrossed the entire area, creating a deadly light show. Traders and caravan workers fled, ducking for cover or vacating the area entirely, one or two boldly daring to shoot at the Institute fighters as they escaped.
I watched the exchange of fire from our concealed sniper's position, the swirl of adversaries surging back and forth across the clearing around the ruined monument, silently rooting for the Brotherhood Knights to prevail. MacCready and I stayed hidden, scanning the area for one last blast of matter transmission. My Pip-Boy was quiet after the initial squeal, indicating the Courser was biding his time, waiting for any resistance to be cleared before making his move. Scan the route of travel, breathe slowly and steadily, keep your adrenaline in check, MacCready's advice for sniping ran through my head, save your energy and let your target come to you.
Aha!
Finally, the quiet radar ping from my Pip-Boy alerted us at the same time one last flash of light crackled nearby. Our target had arrived. He emerged from in between the row of buildings nearest the front gate, dressed in a long black leather overcoat, carrying a laser rifle. A string of oddly-shaped grenades crossed his chest on a bandoleer. Ignoring the chaos of battle around him, the Courser strode slowly but confidently through the main gate, heading for the trading center inside.
Without having to say a word, MacCready and I fired simultaneously, as if we were one person with two rifles. My shot hit the Courser in the leg, staggering him, while my partner's round shattered the laser rifle from his hand. A head shot could be potentially disastrous for our mission, damaging the very chip we were trying to procure. A second shot from MacCready paralyzed our target, centered on his lower spine. The Courser dropped to the ground, and we rushed down from our hidden position to finish the job. I switched from my sniper rifle to the more powerful combat shotgun as we closed in on our quarry.
Unfortunately, the Institute's elite hunters were tougher than we had expected and, even though he was badly wounded and unable to walk, the Courser rapidly threw several grenades towards us. We scattered, diving for cover as the grenades detonated in a familiar flash of blue-white light, spawning additional Gen 1 synths in between us and our target. This isn't good. There were four in all, and the Courser was pulling on his bandoleer to reach for more grenades.
Yelling to attract the attention of our new adversaries, I stood up from cover, invoking V.A.T.S. to secure head shots. I backed up towards the entrance of the building, the draw of my shout and the signal from my Pip-Boy too strong a lure for the primitive Gen 1s to ignore. After an infinitesimal pause, they turned to focus on me, leaving the Courser alone. With the power of my shotgun at close range, and my electronically enhanced aim, the four summoned Synths were hardly a challenge, though using V.A.T.S. for so many shots in a row left me tired and slightly out of breath.
The Courser himself had writhed around to face me when my Pip-Boy's assistance kicked in, a frighteningly intense expression on his face. "You." He clawed at the broken concrete floor, dragging himself forward in a determined effort to reach me, previous mission all but forgotten. On the other side of the open area, MacCready darted forward unseen, grabbing the intimidating Gen3 Synth by the hair, combat knife flashing in a vicious slash. The Courser collapsed in a spray of blood, his head nearly severed. Mac kneeled down to finish the job, using a discarded shirt left by one of the fleeing traders to wrap our grisly prize. Outside, the sounds of gunfire still sounded, the firefight far from over. I hope the runaways are able to get out safely. I focused on the plight of the fugitive Synths as a way to distract myself from the gory scene playing out in front of me. The Courser may have been synthetic, but he appeared all too human, and beheading him was causing a serious conflict in my soul.
"We did it," was all I said aloud, not quite believing the plan had actually worked. "We killed a Courser." Months of wandering, tracking down rumors, helping the factions to build trust... all culminating in a flash of MacCready's knife. So quick, but so consequential.
"Yaay." Deacon's half-enthusiastic cheer echoed from the corner where the hidden trapdoor lay. He emerged into the center of the trading area, dusty and scuffed, but smiling. "I love it when a plan comes together. Especially when it's my plan." Beating the dust off his arms and legs, he meandered over towards MacCready and the deceased Courser lying in a dark pool of blood. "Tom is going to be over the moon. Once the Brotherhood finishes mopping up the stragglers, we'll head back to HQ."
"That's not the only thing that needs mopping," my partner quipped, heading to the back of the trading stands, searching through the stalls until he found a basket. He placed it on the counter top with a pleased grunt, securing our prize within. "I hope your Railroad has a good cleanup crew, or this location is going to be compromised."
"No problemo!" Deacon assured us. "We did the hard part. I'll let the others worry about cleaning up. This place'll be back to its tumbledown splendor in a flash!" Simultaneous with Deacon's ostentatious arm flourish, my Pip-Boy squealed. There was a loud crack and a burst of blinding light stabbed the flagstones in front of the open doorway behind me. All three of us staggered, disorientated, unable to see what had transported in.