Nora - The Sole Survivor

The Meeting

* Note: Dialogue may differ from in-game, mostly for story reasons.

The Meeting

Nora had just said goodbye to Preston the morning as she set off on another journey through the Commonwealth. It had become her thing in the months since her Awakening. She sat staring into the fire as she barbequed some of her mole rat chunks, her memory took her back to that day.

It had been lonely at first as she took in the dead world around her. She had gone to their old house instinctively and found Codsworth there. Codsworth had gone a bit mad due to the isolation she grimaced in thought. Well, if a robot could go mad she guessed. Although with all she has found out in the months since about the Institute and Synths she guessed that there might be more in robots than they believed two hundred years ago.

After clearing out Sanctuary she had set off to Concorde the next day where she had met the Minute Men leader, or what remained of them apparently. And she had her first encounter with the something bigger she had surmised existed while still in the vault. A Deathclaw they called the monster. And a monster it was.

A mutated lizard that stood well over ten feet tall! She has no idea in hindsight how she had survived the battle with that thing. In clunky old series power armour and a machine gun with limited ammunition.

Top that off with still protesting and weak muscles and limited battle experience. She had only learned to shoot and do basic hand to hand combat with her husband. He had insisted that she be able to help herself if the need ever arose. True war veteran her Nate was. Well, she guessed weekends upon weekends spent at the shooting range and in their backyard was a bit more than basic knowledge. She had become quite an adept shot and could hold her own in most hand to hand combat situations. But, shooting in a range and fighting against your own husband still didn't equate actual battle experience.

Yet, she had managed. Somehow... Between shooting the Deathclaw and still ducking and shooting the raiders she had come out alive. Sheer dumb luck.

The Deathclaw steak they ate that night back at Sanctuary at least made up for her trembling nerves. It was better than the radiated cans of Cram she had eaten the previous night that Codsworth had gotten her. And she could actually feel some health and strength returning to her weakened muscles after eating the barbequed meat. And she had Dogmeat then. The dog she had found at the Red Rocket just outside Sanctuary.

After that, she had settled into an odd pattern. Stay a bit in Sanctuary and help Sturgis make the place habitable. He taught her how to work the old Workshop and use tools and scrap junk for reuse. Then she would set out in a lone journey to some new location in search of clues of Shaun. So far she had found Diamond City where she met quite a few people, including Piper and Detective Nick Valentine. The latter of which had helped a lot in her search for Shaun.

Thanks to him she knew her next location was the Glowing Sea. The only problem was that she couldn't go into the Glowing Sea without serious medical supplies and a decent set of Power Armour with extra fusion cores to spare. So, for now, she was stuck until a solution presented itself. And thus being here tonight, having just decided to follow a military broadcast signal on AF95 hoping for a few Caps at the end of this. She had become quite well known as a gun for hire in the Commonwealth. Any errand, big or small she would do for the right amount of Caps. She just drew the line at killing innocents though... Somehow Nate's voice still spoke to her conscience when she was so lost in the numbing darkness that she would kill everyone while in a moment. He would then remind her of who she could still be and that would make her lift her gun at the last second to let an innocent go.

She could only hope that his voice would always be there to stay her hand. She worried that these days his voice was becoming fainter and less frequent, what would she become if she lost his voice completely? Nora shuddered with the fear of that happening. For a person that already had darkness in her soul this world wasn't really the best conductor. This world was dark itself and she could so easily become completely one with it.