Chapter Text
She was going to die at the hands of a dead man. Sort of.
Mallory, Mal to her friends, could almost appreciate the sick joke in that. She’d survived stumbling out of the pre-war world into the lawless Commonwealth. Survived radiation twisted creatures that could have been pulled from the depths of a bad monster movie, learned to take shelter during storms that turned the sky a thousand angry shades of yellow and green, and founded a string of settlements across the land, replacing the broken and twisted structures of her time with ramshackle housing and farmland. She had never expected to do any of those things when she’d gone to sleep in a ‘decontamination pod,’ but then again, she hadn’t expected to be threatened by a dead mercenary, either. Especially not one hiding out in the body of her best friend.
Like many of the shitty situations in Mal’s life, the whole thing had started with good intentions. She’d tracked a detective named Nick Valentine to one of the old Vaults, rescued him from a mobster, and begged him for help finding her lost son. She’d been surprised to find that Nick wasn’t strictly human, but he’d been willing to help in a land filled with people who all seemed to want something, and that was more than enough for her. He had tracked Shaun and a man named Kellogg across miles of broken terrain, finally leading to Fort Hagen. Mal had thanked him for his help before going in to confront Kellogg, determined to find her son or die trying and not expecting the detective to follow. Nick surprised her again then, insisting on coming with her and never wavering, even when they’d been surrounded by blank Institute synths and the mercenary who’d been with her boy.
In the aftermath, she’d been desperate and furious, shaking with spent adrenaline and despair at the thought of never reaching Shaun. Ever the gentleman, Nick had stayed beside her as she huddled on the floor, trying to breathe through a panic attack. With one hand resting on the back of her neck, he’d whispered reassurance and encouragement, promising that they’d see things through. Mallory hadn’t expected the next step to involve pulling synth components out of Conrad Kellogg’s head, but she’d pulled herself together and done it.
Plugging those same components into Nick was a different matter. She’d balked at the plan, hating the very idea of using her friend in such a way. She’d helped to repair Nick several times, cleaning and replacing parts of his body under his watchful gaze. Mal found it oddly peaceful, intimate, even. Tampering with his mind was a step too far, one she wasn’t comfortable with. Beyond the intrusiveness of it, she’d been quietly worried that the memory transfer would go wrong, leaving her alone again in the Commonwealth. But with no other leads, Nick himself had argued for the procedure.
Mal had still hesitated, going so far as to seek out the leaders of the Railroad in the slim hope that they knew a way into the Institute. Once she’d understood the situation, Desdemona had seemed genuinely regretful, gently explaining that her organization had never found a way to breach the Institute. Even the Railroad’s resident spy, Deacon, had seemed sympathetic. The sunglasses-loving agent had offered to help her join the Railroad, letting her find a place within a group of people with similar goals. Through it all, Nick had been her constant companion, watching her run with compassion in his amber eyes. When she had finally turned to him and agreed to let him take on Kellogg’s memories, he’d nodded solemnly and led her to Goodneighbor without comment.
When she exited the memory lounger, Mal had immediately turned to look at the linked chair, eager for reassurance that Nick had made it through the process intact. Finding him gone, she hastily thanked Dr. Amari before taking the steps out of the basement two at a time to find him sitting by the door. There had been time to register the oddness of his posture as he smoked his cigarette before he’d spoken to her.
“I should have killed you when I had the chance.” Kellogg’s voice rolled out of Nick in a poisonous drawl.
Mal had stopped running so abruptly that she almost tripped on the uneven floor of the Memory Den, hand reaching for her pistol in what felt like slow motion. If it had been anyone other than Nick speaking to her in Kellogg’s voice, she would have drawn on them then and there, but Nick…
Then he’d shifted position and blinked at her before asking what was wrong in Nick’s usual warm voice, and the moment of chilly horror had passed. When Mal told him what he’d done, the synth shrugged it off as an echo, assuring her that he felt fine. Suddenly wary of her companion, she’d considered not taking him along for the trip to the Glowing Sea. The place sounded dangerous enough without the possibility of a mercenary taking control of Nick at an inopportune moment. But Nick sounded so disappointed at her gentle suggestion that she relented, agreeing to continue travelling with him.
The days after that trip passed in a blur. With Deacon’s assistance, she was offered a place in the Railroad as one of their agents, a position that was upgraded to ‘heavy’ after she hunted down an Institute Courser for his components. She’d also gotten wound up in the Minutemen’s attempt to retake their old headquarters of the Castle and set up artillery stations in their settlements across the Commonwealth. As if that wasn’t enough, she insisted on making trips back to Sanctuary Hills every week, where she held a solitary vigil in front of Nate’s cryopod. Most of the time, Mal barely had time to think, although she kept a watchful eye on Nick, half-waiting for Kellogg to speak through him again. If he noticed her increased attention, he had the grace not to mention it.
After her early weeks of wandering the Commonwealth in a haze of confusion, the Railroad’s speed in researching and building the molecular relay was dizzying. The night before she was due to ride the relay, Nick had taken her hands and made her promise to come back, no matter what she found. Looking up into his eyes over their clasped hands, Mal had felt an unexpected flutter in her chest, one she never thought she’d feel again in her new life. Pushing it aside as infatuation, she’d pledged to return. No matter what she found. Crush aside, he’d been the best and closest partner she’d ever had, and damned if she’d leave him behind.
After the grim and grit of the Commonwealth, the glossy white walls and cleanliness of the Institute came as a shock. Finding Shaun was an even greater shock. She’d gone in expecting to find him held captive, as a scientist or as a subject. In the weeks she’d spent in the wasteland, she’d come to think of the Institute as the bogeyman just like everyone else. She’d dreamt of finding him, rescuing him, even thinking about how she was going to raise a child in the Commonwealth. Discovering that her baby boy was both an old man and the one holding the bogeyman’s leash left her numb, dumbly stumbling around the Institute while her thoughts tried to coalesce.
Whatever her mental state, she managed to secure a tentative position within the Institute and contact Patriot, the Railroad’s man on the inside. Mal could read suspicion in some of the scientist’s eyes, but her relationship to Shaun kept them silent. Once a Courser chip had been fitted to her Pip-Boy, allowing her to come and go at will, she made her excuses to leave. When Shaun asked her to cut ties with the surface and join the Institute as a permanent resident, she deflected, stammering that she needed time to consider. Shaun had acted disappointed but optimistic, saying that he knew she’d make the right choice. Somewhere under the numbness, the lawyer in her was quietly certain that she was being played, that Shaun cared more about securing his own position than her. Mal wanted to recoil from those thoughts, but couldn’t block them out when she could see the coolness in Shaun’s eyes. Confused and hurting, she relayed away from the Institute, reappearing at Mercer Safehouse in a crackle of blue light and ozone.
The first person she saw as she blinked away the dancing spots in her vision was Nick, standing in front of the platform as though she’d been gone for only minutes instead of days. On seeing the synth, the shock dampening her emotions broke, leaving Mal gasping and sobbing against his chest. When Desdemona marched over to them and demanded an immediate debriefing, Nick shot the woman such a fierce glare that Deacon had intervened, arguing that Mal needed some time. When she was finally able to string a sentence together, she told her friends about what she’d found. The entire time, Nick held her hand. Every time she stuttered, brought to a halt by the blunt pain of the memories, Nick would squeeze gently to bring her back to the present.
After her debriefing, Desdemona had been sympathetic but matter-of-fact, asking Mal to continue her espionage. Again, Mal found herself deflecting a request, wanting nothing more than to wash her hands of the whole messy business. Sitting on the shore behind Mercer Safehouse, she half expected Nick to come looking for her, but it was Deacon who came to sit beside her with a couple of bottles of Nuka Cola and a smile. The spy was gentle and supportive, telling her he could understand why she needed time to think and that she could always talk to him. Surprised by his generosity, she told him her dark suspicions about Shaun, her fear of being manipulated to harm innocent people. Deacon had regarded her solemnly for a moment before telling her that if she ever needed to figure out who to support, she only had to look at what sort of world they’d have her build and how she’d be asked to pay for it. She couldn’t find the words to answer him, but she was grateful. Deacon seemed to understand.
When she finally left Mercer Safehouse with Nick, she had no intention of returning to either the Institute or Railroad headquarters. After a quick trip back to the Glowing Sea to give Virgil his serum, she tagged along with Nick on his casework, happy to focus on tasks that didn’t ask so much of her. Between her intent on staying busy and the emotional turmoil she tried to ignore, she completely forgot to watch Nick for further signs of Kellogg’s lurking consciousness. Instead, she found herself watching him with a growing warmth, her eyes drawn to him with increasing frequency. When they made camp, she stayed up as long as she could to talk to him on any subject she could think of until sleep pulled her under, wondering what his lips felt like. Once he woke her up by speaking quietly into her ear, leaving her so flustered that she nearly walked into the raider ambush he’d been warning her about.
Mal knew she was obsessing, that fantasizing about her friend was unfair, but she didn’t seem to be able to stop herself. She was grateful that Nick had either not noticed or had chosen not to say anything, sparing her the embarrassment of rejection. If she heard an extra note of warmth in his tone when he spoke to her, it was surely her eager imagination. It wasn’t until after the death of Eddie Winter that she started to suspect that her feelings could be more than just a crush. The synth had sounded so grimly proud to avenge both Jenny Lands and the original Nick Valentine. The way he talked about the past, painfully longing to make things right, moved her. Mal reached out to him, gripping his shoulders as she told him that no matter who he had been, he was his own man now. That she was proud to know him and be part of his life. Nick’s smile thawed something in her, a block of ice she’d carried in her belly ever since coming face to face with her grown son. That night, she told him over a meal of Cram and whiskey that she was going back to the Railroad to see things through. Nick had just nodded and reminded her that he’d be with her whenever she needed him.
The trouble with Kellogg resurfaced unexpectedly, two days after her return Railroad HQ. Mal and Nick had been on the move, checking in on safehouses, when the sky darkened ominously. Deciding to take shelter for the night, the pair set themselves up in an abandoned house. Feeling grimy from their travels, Mal excused herself after dinner to sponge herself down with some purified water and an oven mitt. Unzipping her vault suit, she felt a chill in the air and found herself missing hot showers, not for the first time. With a sigh, she settled herself on the floor when she heard the door behind her creak open.
“Nick, wha—“
Before she could pull her suit back on, she felt his hands on her. One hand, the one that still had plating, yanked her right arm up behind the opposite shoulder. His skeletal hand found her neck, pulling her head back and squeezing until she could barely breathe. Confused and too surprised to be afraid, she struggled until she saw black spots blooming in her vision, forcing her to be still rather than pass out. Confusion gave way to fear as Kellogg’s voice sounded above her.
“Hello again, beautiful. Remember how I told you I should have killed you when I had the chance?” Mal’s eyes widened, rolling in their sockets as she tried to remember where she’d left her gun. She thought she’s laid it down on a broken table to her left, but she couldn’t be sure and she couldn’t see for shit with her head tipped back against his chest. Son of a bitch. She tried to slow her breathing and fight the rising panic, hoping being still would earn her a chance to lunge for her gun, or anything she could swing, really. Rolling her eyes upwards, she could see Kellogg/Nick looking down at her with a look she’d never seen the synth wear before. Catching her eyes, his lips quirked up in amusement.
“See, I can’t blame you for killing me. From one parent to another, you deserved some revenge. You did a hell of a thing, killing me and actually making it into the Institute,” he pulled her arm further up until she bit back a yelp. “But just because I understand doesn’t mean I’m not going to even some scores while I can. So we’re going to play a game.” Mal trembled as Kellogg’s voice shifted, moving close to her ear. “So now you know who the boss of the Institute is. Did you realize that he set me up? That he manipulated you into killing me? Well?” She could only muster a soft whimper in response. The mercenary chuckled in her ear, seeming to take it as assent.
“I’m going to ride along in your boyfriend’s head here until you get me in there to kill the old man myself,” Kellogg whispered. Mal’s heart sank; even if Shaun had become a monster, he was still her son. “Just so you don’t get any ideas, remember that I’m in control of the metal man,” he squeezed her neck and wrist for emphasis. “If I think you’re trying to play me, or get me out of his head, I’ll kill you, then I’ll destroy him and you’ll have to deal with the fact that you’ve killed someone else you love for the rest of your short life. And he loves you too, beautiful, don’t you worry about that. The sad bastard just doesn’t have the stones to tell you.” Mal choked on a sob of frustration. She didn’t even care where her gun was anymore; Kellogg must have known she wouldn’t be able to harm Nick after hearing that. The skeletal hand on her neck loosened, sliding down until the fingertips brushed the top of her breast. Mal failed to entirely suppress a shudder. “And to make sure you know I can do what I damn well please to your clockwork dick here--”
The hand holding her wrist abruptly let go, followed shortly by a thump behind her. Turning, she found Nick lying on the floor behind her, eyes closed. Panic rose in up the back of her throat as she scrambled to his side and thumbed an eyelid back. The amber ring of light that made up his iris was dark. She quickly laid her head on his chest and heard nothing, not even the soft whirring of his internal fans. She wasn’t even aware of the tears rolling down her cheeks.
“Nick, please wake up, wake up wake up!” Her hands fluttered over him as she tried to focus on troubleshooting his complex systems. She turned and grabbed her bag, dumping it out on the floor to look for her screwdriver. Tool in hand, she turned back to him just in time to see his irises light back up. For an awful moment, she feared that Kellogg would still be in control. He blinked at the ceiling twice, then glanced at her before quickly covering his eyes with one hand.
“Aw hell, doll, I didn’t mean to walk in on you like that,” he said in Nick’s voice. Mal sat back on her heels and breathed a sigh of relief before remembering that the top of her suit was around her waist. Blushing furiously, she jammed her arms down the sleeves and yanked the zipper up as Nick continued. “At least, I think I walked in on you. Didn’t I?” He sounded worried and embarrassed. Mal floundered, unsure of what she could say that wouldn’t worry him further. Or worse yet, bring Kellogg back to the forefront.
“I- I mean, don’t worry, Nick. You just startled me, that’s all,” she knew it wasn’t an answer at all, but what else could she say? “You, ah, walked in here to tell me something and scared me. I threw a clock at you. I must have hit you harder than I thought. I’m so, so sorry, Nick.” The words came out in a rush, her tongue nearly tangling in her haste to end the conversation. He lowered his hand and stared at her, weighing her words. She stared back, silently willing him to accept the story. She hated lying, to Nick in particular, but Mal tried to tell herself it was for the best. Certainly better than Nick getting suspicious and Kellogg murdering both of them. At least her trembling voice and tears might help sell him on the story.
“…If you say so.” Mal risked a quick glance at his face. He was frowning, eyes narrowed as he examined her. She stared down at her hands until she heard him get up and walk away. He paused at the door. “A clock, huh? You must have one hell of a throwing arm. And those cuts on your neck weren’t there earlier, either.” She could almost feel the weight of his gaze on her as he poked holes in her story, but could only clench her hands in her lap as the door closed behind him. Mal’s shoulders sagged as she choked back sobs, her fear and wasted adrenaline overflowing. Surely Kellogg wouldn’t kill him for being suspicious if she’d done her best to throw him off the trail. Right?