"Next time you get to sit in the Dugout for an hour," Fixer complained as she came through the door. "Why do you get to come to my…house…" She trailed off as she caught sight of Deacon, halfway into a Diamond City Security uniform.
"First?" she finished, stepping more fully into the room. "Picking up some side work? I didn't realize we were that badly off."
"It's a disguise," he sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose.
"You go undercover as DCS?" Dogmeat came trotting in the door behind her, barking joyfully upon seeing Deacon.
"People don't pay attention to Security," he explained. "They're like…lamp posts. They're just a feature of the city. And people tend to talk more freely around lamp posts than they do people with ears who can eavesdrop on them." He brandished the padded armor at her. "Now are you gonna stand there gawking or help me into this fucking thing?"
She rolled her eyes but stepped forward to help him fasten the straps around his torso, pulling them snug over the cloth uniform. "Wow, this wouldn't block shit in an actual fight, would it?"
Deacon knocked on his chest piece to let her hear the dull, muffled thump of metal under leather. "Mine's special."
"Of course it is." She stepped back and he turned around, arms spread wide.
"How do I look?"
"Like a dick," she said immediately, but upon actually looking at him frowned suddenly.
"What?" He looked down. "Is my fly open?"
"Deacon," she said carefully, eyes narrowing. "How long have you been doing this?"
"What, spying on people? Because that's a loaded question."
"This, specifically." She gestured at his current getup. "In Diamond City."
He winced internally. Lying was always an option, but they hadn't been apart long enough for him to have done any meaningful undercover work, and she knew it. This wasn't gonna be pretty.
"Few years," he sighed, giving in. As predicted, her eyes flew wide and she aimed an accusing finger at him.
"You! It was you!"
"You're going to have to be more specific."
"The guard who hassled me the first time I came to the city!"
"I don't recall that particular interaction," he lied. She threw an elbow pad at him. "Hey, watch it, those hurt when they connect."
"Good!" She lifted the other one as a threat, but didn't follow through. "Fucking lamp post - you practically stalked me around town until I found Nick's place."
That part was true, but she didn't need to know he'd been herding her in that direction.
"If I was stalking you, you'd never have seen me," he said. "Here, if you're gonna throw shit, help me put them on." She made no move to help him, instead crossing her arms over her chest, and he sighed. "What."
"Where else have you been?" She looked towards his bag. "Who else have you been?"
"Fixer…" He was starting to panic a little. "I really don't have time - "
She met his eyes, and there wasn't just curiosity in them now. It had been joined by distrust, and he sighed. He should tell her to fuck off, mind her business, give him his elbow pad and let him do his job. Old Deacon would have. But the sharp edges and common sense of Old Deacon had been sanded off by the months upon months he'd spent around Fixer. She hadn't quite reached the center - even he wasn't sure where he'd hidden that - but she'd worn him down enough that just that little spark of uncertainty on her face was enough to change the direction of his panic. No longer worried she'd figure him out, but worried she'd leave if she didn't. And not in the "lost the mark, fucked up the mission" way - that would at least be sensible. No, this was the gut-twisting fear of a person he didn't think he could survive without walking away from him forever. The kind he thought he'd hardened himself against years ago. Not enough, apparently.
"Fine, Jesus," he muttered, reaching for his bag. She stood back a little as he dug through it, as though now that she'd opened Pandora's box she was worried about what was going to come out.
The flannel from Goodneighbor. The padded jacket from Bunker Hill. The faded, patched jeans he used when he was trying to get hired on at a farm or settlement. She'd seen all of them before, in various contexts, but in this new light she was looking between each of them and then back at him with wide eyes.
"It was you," she finally said, looking up at him. "It was you, the whole time." She shook her head, laughing a little. "I owe Dogmeat an apology."
Deacon blinked; he hadn't been expecting that one. "What?"
"After that…'meeting' with Dez and Glory." She waggled her fingers in air quotes around the word "meeting". "I fussed at him for not growling or barking or anything to warn me y'all were up ahead. Turns out it's because he recognized one of you." She looked over at the sofa where Dogmeat was laying, though he'd perked up at the sound of his name. "Yeah, you're a good boy after all." She shoved Deacon's shoulder. "This guy's an asshole."
She didn't sound mad. Deacon had kind of assumed she'd be mad. If anything she sounded a little overwhelmed, which was fair. Deacon was, too.
But then Fixer looked up at him, tilting her head a little, and asked: "How long?"
"What?"
"How long were you following me? I'd been out of the ice for weeks before I even heard about the Railroad. But I saw you in all those places before that." She touched the flannel shirt with her fingertips. "So…how long?"
This was it. This was the make-or-break lie. Under no circumstances could he tell her he'd seen her come out of the Vault. That the little nest she'd found in the trees was not, in fact, a disused hunting stand, but was where he'd seen her stumble out into the light.
She could not find out that he'd watched through a sniper's scope as she'd led Preston's people through Concord, that he'd watched her build a settlement out of her broken home, and that the light coming off of her had illuminated a whole new path forward. For the Railroad, for the Commonwealth - for him, no matter how much he tried to deny it or squash it down. He'd been drawn to her from the start, and she could never, ever know.
"Heard scuttlebutt about the Vaultie headed for Diamond City," he said with a shrug. "Thought it sounded neat. Tracked you down and followed you around for a while."
She stared at him for a long moment. There was still suspicion there, but the kind born of dealing with a known bullshitter, not distrust of him as a person. That, he could live with. Hell, he was just happy she wasn't taking everything at face value anymore.
"That's creepy," she said finally, and the panic in his chest finally eased. "That's creep behavior. You're creepy."
"Guilty as charged," he said, flashing a grin to mask the relief in his voice. "Now give me my fucking elbow pad, I'm late for my shift."
She threw it at his chest and he juggled it for a second before he caught it, fastening it around his arm as she headed to the sofa. He watched her as she made the dog move to accomodate her, ending up with his head in her lap as she stared at the far wall.
"Hey, Deac?"
"What's up?" he asked, holding the ridiculous fucking helmet under one arm.
"Thanks." Fixer looked over at him with a little smile on her face. "For being honest with me."
Something in him twisted, blocking his throat and making his heart squeeze in his chest.
"You know me," he managed to get out. "Honest as the day is long, so long as I'm not talking."
She gave a little laugh, her smile growing a little, and he tried to remember how to breathe as he made his way out into the city.