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Sico gestured for her to walk with him, and together they moved through the rows of barrels and carts, the smell of metal and wet stone thick in the air. Guards and workers stepped aside as they passed, nodding respectfully. Magnolia kept talking, outlining numbers, trade routes, deals struck and deals broken.
They wound their way back through the rows of barrels, the ledger now tucked under Magnolia's arm. The clamor of the trading post was a steady tide—workers shouting over the grind of cart wheels, the creak of wood under heavy loads, the dull thud of boots marching to and fro. But beneath all that, Sico caught the rhythm of it. Order, not chaos. It was the sound of something alive and functioning, something worth defending.
When they reached the edge of the yard, Magnolia stopped. "I'll finish the rest of the ledgers tonight," she said, almost like an afterthought, though Sico knew it wasn't. "Try not to scare away the next merchant who comes crawling with a contract. Caps don't pile themselves, you know."
He gave her a short nod. "Keep the water flowing. We'll keep the guns steady."
Magnolia smirked, but her eyes softened for half a beat before she turned back to her work, already calling out orders to the nearest team.
Sico watched her for a moment longer, then shifted his weight and set his boots toward the eastern quarter.
The training yard was alive long before he reached it.
It had once been a pre-war parking lot, cracked asphalt overgrown with weeds, half a dozen rusted-out husks of cars shoved to the side to clear space. Now it stretched wide as a drill ground. Targets hammered together from scrap metal and wood lined one edge. Chalk marks on the ground traced out lanes for sprints. A circle of sand at the far end served for hand-to-hand bouts. The air thrummed with the sound of it—rifle cracks, barked orders, the grunts and shouts of recruits learning the rhythm of war.
And presiding over it all were Sarah and Preston.
Sarah moved like a storm—her arms crossed, her sharp voice cutting across the yard with commands that snapped recruits into motion. She stalked the firing line, adjusting a stance here, correcting a grip there, not sparing a second glance for excuses. Her presence was iron; the kind that burned itself into the backbone of anyone who trained under her.
Preston, by contrast, worked the recruits in the sand pit, his tone more measured but no less firm. He stood tall, musket strapped to his back, his voice steady as he demonstrated a defensive pivot, then called for the next man to step forward. His patience was the sort that coaxed rather than crushed, but it was anchored in steel. Where Sarah was the whetstone, Preston was the forge.
Sico stood at the edge for a while, watching. He always did before stepping into their rhythm.
The recruits were raw—some barely old enough to shave, others hardened by wasteland life but never drilled, never shaped. Their movements were clumsy, their shots uneven, but their eyes… their eyes carried something. Not just hunger. Not just desperation. It was more.
He saw one boy—a skinny thing with a patched coat too big for him—miss three shots in a row. Sarah stepped in close, corrected his stance with a sharp grip on his shoulder, then stepped back. The boy adjusted, tried again, and when the bullet cracked through the target, a grin lit his face. Sarah didn't smile back, but she gave the faintest nod, and the boy straightened as if the whole world had just put its hand on his shoulder.
That was morale. Raw, fragile, but growing.
Finally, Sico stepped forward. His boots crunched over the gravel and sand, the sound enough to draw heads. The murmurs started almost instantly—"Commander"—passing down the line in hushed tones. Rifles lowered slightly, conversations died.
Sarah turned first, sharp as ever, her brows lifting only a fraction before she dipped her chin in acknowledgment. Preston followed with a broader smile, raising his voice so the recruits heard it clear: "Commander on deck!"
The recruits snapped straighter, not polished enough to resemble a real formation but close enough to show they were learning.
Sico gave them one long, steady look, letting his silence do the work. Then he shifted his gaze to Sarah and Preston, his voice low but firm.
"How are they?"
Sarah blew out a breath, her hands settling on her hips. "Green," she said bluntly. "Some can barely tell which end of the rifle is which. But they're willing. That's something."
Preston gave a slow nod beside her. "Morale's… better than you might think. These folks don't complain, not much. They're proud to wear the colors. Even if their boots don't fit, even if their stomachs growl at night. Being here gives them something. A purpose."
Sico studied the recruits again—their sweat-soaked shirts, their blistered hands, their nervous but steadying eyes. He let the silence stretch before he asked the question straight.
"And morale? Truly."
It wasn't just numbers he wanted. It was the marrow of it.
Sarah's sharp expression softened just slightly, her eyes flicking toward the firing line where the skinny boy was reloading with trembling hands. She exhaled through her nose. "They want to be here. Some of them don't even know why, not really. Just that they've been drifting too long. You give a drifter a banner to stand under, and suddenly he feels taller. That's morale, Commander. Fragile, but real."
Preston nodded again, his tone steady. "I've seen men fight on worse. They've got heart, and that counts for more than muscle."
Sico's jaw tightened, but his eyes held steady. He wasn't blind to their flaws, nor naïve about the cost of sending untested men into war. But he also knew what Sarah and Preston knew: sometimes, purpose outlived bullets.
He turned back to them, his voice dropping low, meant only for their ears. "Keep shaping them. Break them if you have to, then build them back stronger. But don't let their fire burn out. If their morale falters, the Republic falters."
Sarah gave a sharp nod. "Understood."
Preston smiled faintly, a quiet confidence in his tone. "Don't worry, Commander. We'll see them ready."
Sico stayed where he was for another beat, the sound of rifle fire and boots pounding the chalked lanes rolling over him like waves. Dust hung in the air, turning the afternoon light into a pale haze that made everything look a little older, a little more worn than it really was. He could almost see the future of these recruits stretched out before him—the ones who'd live, the ones who'd fall, the ones who'd never truly make it out of the yard.
But that was the burden he carried alone. For now, he kept his focus where it needed to be.
His eyes shifted back to Sarah and Preston. "And the food supply?" he asked, his voice pitched low enough that only they could hear. "Are they getting enough? Are we feeding them right?"
Preston's expression tightened almost imperceptibly. He rubbed a thumb across the strap of his musket as though buying himself a moment to weigh his words. "Not enough," he admitted finally. "We're pushing them hard—three meals a day, sometimes more if the drills are brutal. And it shows. Their bodies are holding out better than expected. Less fainting, less collapse on the training line. But we're eating through the stores quicker than we thought."
Sarah folded her arms, her gaze flicking over the recruits. A girl in the sparring pit stumbled, blood trickling from her nose after a solid strike, and Sarah's mouth pressed into a thin line. "We can't keep it up at this pace," she said bluntly. "We've got enough for now, but if you want them to last through winter drills, we're going to need more. Jenny's farms are holding steady, but steady won't cut it anymore. Not if you want an army worth the weight of its rifles."
Sico grunted, the sound low in his chest. "Jenny," he repeated, his tone thoughtful.
Sarah turned her sharp eyes on him. "You should talk to her. Ask her to expand the farms. Push out further, plant more. We can make do with fewer luxuries, but food? There's no training without it."
For a moment, Sico said nothing. His gaze drifted to the recruits again—sweat darkening their shirts, arms trembling from repetition, lips dry and cracked from shouting commands until their voices broke. Soldiers could fight hungry for a time, but not long. Hunger gnawed at more than the body; it hollowed out the spirit, left men brittle and prone to breaking at the first hard push.
He thought of Jenny—how she'd come to him months ago, mud streaking her boots, hands rough from planting seedlings in ruined soil, voice steady as she promised she could coax food from dirt that most had given up on. And she had. The farms had grown into something more than patches of green—they were lifelines, as vital as Magnolia's water.
Expanding them meant risk. More land to defend, more workers exposed, more mouths to feed before the first harvest came in. But Sarah was right. Without enough food, all the rifles and drills in the world wouldn't matter.
Finally, Sico nodded once, slow but certain. "You're right," he said. "I'll speak to Jenny. We'll expand the farms."
Sarah's shoulders eased, though she didn't smile. She rarely did. Preston, on the other hand, gave a quiet nod of approval, his eyes carrying that steady kind of faith that had carried him through so much already.
"You make sure they're fed," Preston said, "and we'll make sure they're ready."
Sico let the words settle. For a moment, the clamor of the yard seemed to fade, replaced by the sound of the Republic itself—hungry, growing, restless. He could almost feel it, like a living thing beneath his boots, demanding he hold it steady.
He turned his gaze back to the recruits, and for the first time since stepping into the yard, he spoke not just to Sarah and Preston, but to the soldiers themselves.
"Eyes front!" he barked.
The effect was instant. Every rifle snapped up, every pair of eyes locked on him, a ripple of silence cutting through the yard until the only sound was the faint wind dragging dust across the cracked asphalt.
Sico let the quiet stretch before he spoke again, his voice carrying like iron through the air.
"You're hungry. Tired. Some of you have hands that blister after one round on the trigger, and feet that bleed after one march around the yard. That's truth." He paused, his gaze sweeping across their faces—some pale, some dark, all marked by the wasteland's cruel hand. "But hear this: you're still here. Still standing. And as long as you're standing, you're mine. My soldiers. My Republic. And I'll see to it you have what you need. Food in your stomachs. Water in your canteens. And steel in your hands. That's my promise."
For a heartbeat, the silence held. Then the recruits roared as one, voices raw but fierce, the kind of sound that carried in the bones. Sarah's sharp eyes softened, just barely, and Preston's lips curved into something that was almost pride.
The recruits' roar still echoed faintly behind him when Sico turned his boots toward the farms. Their voices chased him down the cracked avenues like a living tide, the kind of sound that could burn itself into the marrow if you let it. For a fleeting moment, he allowed himself to hold on to it—the raw promise of it, the defiance.
But as the sound thinned into silence, what replaced it was heavier. Hunger. Not his own, but theirs. The gnawing truth Sarah had named aloud and Preston had wrapped in patience. You could hear an army roar all you wanted, but if you couldn't hear the growl in their stomachs beneath it, then you weren't listening.
That was why he was heading east, past the skeletons of old storefronts and the rattling wagons of merchants hauling scrap, toward the patch of land Jenny had been carving back from the wasteland since the day she swore she could.
The farms weren't much to look at compared to the clean fields of the world before the bombs. But here, in this ash-stained century, they were miracles. Rows of green stretched out against the horizon like scars turned to something worth touching. Half-sunk irrigation pipes rattled as water pushed through them, dripping into the soil with the soft hiss of life coaxed back where death had ruled. Makeshift greenhouses—clear panels salvaged from pre-war buildings—glimmered under the late sun, their insides thick with vines and crops that still smelled faintly of damp earth.
It was a place that felt alive in a way most of the Commonwealth didn't. Alive and fragile.
Jenny was in the middle of it, of course. She always was.
Sico spotted her bent low over one of the rows, mud streaking her knees, her gloved hands working a stubborn stalk free of weeds. Her auburn hair was tied back in a rough knot, strands falling loose against her face, but her movements were sharp, certain. She didn't look up when he approached, but her voice carried over her shoulder, dry and edged with that no-nonsense tone she'd perfected over the months.
"Either you're here to get your boots dirty," she said, "or you're here because someone's complaining again. Which is it, Commander?"
Sico's mouth tugged faintly at the corner. Jenny had never been one to mince words. He stopped a few feet from her and let his eyes sweep the rows of green before answering.
"Both, maybe," he said.
That made her pause. She glanced up, brushing a smear of dirt across her cheek as she squinted at him. "Both? That's new."
Straightening, she stripped off one glove and wiped her forehead with the back of her hand. "Alright, out with it. I've got a whole field trying to choke itself with weeds, and unless you're here to help me pull, I'd rather you start talking before the sun goes down."
Sico stepped closer, his boots sinking slightly into the softer soil. He took a long breath, then let it out slow. "Sarah and Preston. I was with them just now. The recruits are holding, but it won't last unless we do more. They're getting three meals a day. Sometimes more. That means the stores are bleeding out faster than we thought."
Jenny's eyes narrowed, sharp as a knife edge. "And they told you to come here and ask for miracles."
"They told me to ask you to expand the farms."
There it was—plain, no softening, no embellishment.
Jenny let out a short, humorless laugh. She crouched again, pulling another weed free, tossing it aside like it had personally offended her. "Expand, huh? That's easy to say from behind a musket or a command chair. Out here, it means finding more ground that'll actually grow something, pulling more hands from other jobs, stretching our seed stores thinner. It means risk. You know that, right?"
"I know." Sico's voice was even, but it carried weight. "But I also know what Sarah said—there's no training without food. I'd rather we have too much than too little."
Jenny yanked another stalk, harder than she needed to, and sat back on her heels. For a moment she just looked at him, her eyes steady and searching. Then she sighed, shoving dirt off her gloves.
"You always do this," she muttered.
"Do what?"
"Drop a truth on me like it's a brick, then expect me to carry it."
Sico didn't flinch. "You're the only one I trust to carry it."
That pulled a silence between them—not heavy, but weighted. Jenny's jaw worked, her gaze flicking over the green rows, the workers scattered among them, the steady hum of life they'd wrestled back from dead soil.
Finally, she stood, brushing dirt from her trousers. "Alright," she said, her tone shifting from sharp to steady, like stone settling into place. "We can expand. Push out past the southern edge, maybe claim that strip of land near the old overpass. Soil's rocky, but if we break it enough, it'll take. I'll need more hands, more seed, and more guards. Raiders see green, they see blood. You give me that, and I'll give you food enough to keep your recruits from eating their boots."
Sico gave a single nod. "You'll have it."
Jenny's lips curved, not quite into a smile, but close enough. "You always say that. Guess that's why I keep listening."
They started walking down the rows together, the smell of damp soil rising around them. Workers dipped their heads as they passed, some offering small smiles, others just tired nods. Every one of them had dirt ground into their fingernails, sweat streaking their necks. Every one of them was building the Republic with their bare hands.
As they walked, Jenny's voice softened. "You know, most of these people never thought they'd see green again. Not like this. They thought the world was nothing but ash and rust until you gave me the chance to prove otherwise."
Sico glanced at her. "You proved it. Not me."
Jenny shook her head. "No, Commander. You gave us space to breathe. That's what you do—you make space. The rest of us… we just fill it with something worth keeping."
They walked in silence for a while, the late sun catching the edges of the greenhouse glass, turning it into fire. Somewhere nearby, a child laughed as he carried a basket twice too big for him, spilling carrots as he ran. A woman chased after him, cursing half-heartedly. Life, fragile and stubborn, blooming where it had no right to.
Finally, Jenny stopped and faced him fully. "You want more food, you'll have it. But don't forget, Commander… food isn't just fuel. It's hope. You fill their stomachs, you fill their hearts. That's how you keep an army standing."
Sico met her eyes, steady as stone. "That's why I came here."
Jenny held his gaze a moment longer, then finally allowed herself a small, tired smile. "Good. Now, unless you're about to grab a hoe and help me break ground, you'd better get back to your soldiers before Sarah starts shouting your name across the yard."
For the first time in what felt like days, Sico's mouth curved into the faintest shadow of a smile. "I'll leave the weeds to you."
"Damn right you will," Jenny shot back, already pulling her gloves on again.
Sico turned, his boots carrying him back toward the heart of the Republic, but the sight of the green rows stayed with him. Sarah was right. Preston was right. Jenny was right. And it was his job to make sure every piece of it held together, because rifles and water were nothing without bread on the table.
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• Name: Sico
• Stats :
S: 8,44
P: 7,44
E: 8,44
C: 8,44
I: 9,44
A: 7,45
L: 7
• Skills: advance Mechanic, Science, and Shooting skills, intermediate Medical, Hand to Hand Combat, Lockpicking, Hacking, Persuasion, and Drawing Skills
• Inventory: 53.280 caps, 10mm Pistol, 1500 10mm rounds, 22 mole rats meat, 17 mole rats teeth, 1 fragmentation grenade, 6 stimpak, 1 rad x, 6 fusion core, computer blueprint, modern TV blueprint, camera recorder blueprint, 1 set of combat armor, Automatic Assault Rifle, 1.500 5.56mm rounds, power armor T51 blueprint, Electric Motorcycle blueprint, T-45 power armor, Minigun, 1.000 5mm rounds, Cryolator, 200 cryo cell, Machine Gun Turret Mk1 blueprint, electric car blueprint, Kellogg gun, Righteous Authority, Ashmaker, Furious Power Fist, Full set combat armor blueprint, M240 7.62mm machine guns blueprint, Automatic Assault Rifle blueprint, and Humvee blueprint.
• Active Quest:-