Archive of Our Own ^beta

The Fall happens so quickly that only a bare trickle of people manage to escape the cities to the relative safety of the deep countryside — so few, in fact, that many of the handful of those who live beyond the conflict and destruction of the following years think these tales of survival a myth.

But some tales are true. 

For Violet Larssen, along with her two-year-old, Ophelia, and against all the odds, somehow makes it to the mountains.

They find sanctuary and safety a small commune there in what had once been West Virginia, one willing to accept strangers in return for the extra labor their presence might provide — for life is hard here, always has been, and many hands make light work.

It is a struggle, but Violet, who has ever only looked to her daughter’s future — no matter how tenuous — has never been afraid of hard work, and she soon becomes a valued member of the community, her daughter fitting in along with the other youngsters to be treasured as she had always been there.

Despite the challenges, they two find a future here in this small town nestled among the valleys of the gently rounded mountains of Appalachia. They build a life among its people, and it is a fulfilling one, such that it almost becomes that their past in a now broken, far away city seems virtually a dream — especially for Ophelia.

Five years pass happily and Ophelia grows healthy, strong, in her secure little home.

Her mother takes comfort in that.

For her daughter has many friends and many members of the town to care for her just as they do for all the various, precious children of the little community, remote, forgotten and hidden deep in the mountains so often draped in blue fog.

Ophelia grows strong and brave as she finds her place in among those children of a new, post-atomic age, as if she had always belonged there, and it’s impossible not to notice how she so often toddles along behind a boy barely a year older than she, a sweet little lad from the Logan clan, one named Clyde.

The Elders, as with most others, think it sweet to see them playing together, reading together, running together — hand in hand as they wander through the meadows nearby — his head with its thick mop of dark hair a contrast to hers, equally rich and thick, of pale, delicate strawberry blonde.

Smiling, they reflect that despite the miasma of misfortune that has always all but hung over his family, no one can but think well of the boy, and of his clan.

Ophelia knows little of this, knows only that Clyde is her friend, that his hand is all too often in hers and that, going everywhere together, they fit. For these are the treasured memories to form the foundation of a healthy life she might have had, and as it would indeed have been, had not been for the fateful events of the days following closely on her seventh birthday.

Those days changed everything, including her fate.

Almost 20 years later, though, those memories have faded, and her days spent among that tiny community seem as unreal to Phee as had been her earliest — and as hazy as her memories of her mother.

Not that it matters — for her father tells her firmly that those memories are not real, but rather are the sweet, rich fruits of her expansive imaginings and should be treated as such. They are but expressive daydreams, he reminds her, as are the stories she tells him of playing in those bright meadows among the flowers and under the warmth of the bright, shining sun. 

Imagination: it’s a quality of hers not to be disdained, he reminds her, but also one not to be overly indulged.

For she knows well, he reminds her, as she has grown to adulthood in the Vault, she had enjoyed her childhood there equally — as she has never set foot outside the Vault. Indeed, he reminds her, as he speaks of things the truth of which she remembers all too well, she was born there, just as he was, just as was her mother, just as were their parents and grandparents before them.

Just as they have lived here, deep in the underground, safe from the terrors of the surface, for generations - ever since the Fall. 

Vault Forever; Surface Never.

She knows her father speaks truth, and that further he is right to remind her of those facts. For he has always done what’s best for her, her father, raised her well: he’s taught her skills necessary to forge a purposeful life and a heart to give, to help others, to do what’s right.

It’s the Vault Way.

And Phee Larssen is the ultimate Vault citizen, always smiling, eager to help out, careful with her health, her person and the shared resources of the nation, all meant to forward the purpose of her people, the stewardship and rebuilding of her community until it is safe enough for all to return and rebuild a surface devastated by conflict and atomic warfare.

As she is — her father reminds her — as was her mother before her, the perfect citizen, the perfect Vault dweller. Any other memories she has of her – he reminds her – are but the dreams of a child who had lost her mother far too young and looks to fill in her imaginings of her.

Phee trusts her father, loves him, trusts him, believes him – he knows best.

So it is that as she grows, she lets the ‘dreams’ that had seemed so real fade over time — as she lets those images and memories of her mother, of her time in the sun, meadows and mountains of West Virginia fall away as she grows to adulthood. 

She forgets of her years spent running through the sunny meadows, jumping into the big water hole, sharing birthdays, with her dear friend Clyde.

Delights only in her future alongside her father and her people.

Until, once again, fate intervenes.

***

Even though his childhood had been cut brutally short — it ended the day Vault-Tec mercenaries stormed his town, left it smoking, burnt and ravaged, a member of that community taken, many more dead — Clyde nevertheless has many happy memories from that time.

So many of them involve a tiny, redhead playmate; a girl named Ophelia.

He still thinks of her as his best friend.

They’re entwined – his memories of her and of the day that nearly ended them all.

So, along with his memories of Pops and MeMaw, his memories of days gallivanting into the woods to a hidden swimming hole with Jimmy and Mellie and so many others, he holds dear his remembrance of her. He keeps it, tucked safe alongside his treasured childhood recollections of his parents’ love, as a dear memory of a cherished friend, one untainted by how it had all ended.

For it ain’t her fault what her daddy’d done. 

Anyways, she’d lost as much as anyone, losing her mother. Anyways, Logans never forget a friend, for Logans are loyal above all — and Clyde L. (Logan) Logan is Logan through and through. 

He’d taken to wondering - sometimes, in the idle moments when he spies sun shining soft on a meadow, when he finds wild strawberries growing, when he'd but a spare moment - what might have happened to her. He had taken equally to hoping that wherever she’d ended up, she’d ended up okay. As in such a way, he sometimes thinks of her randomly, spares a thought or more of her at the ceremonies mourning those lost the day of the raid and celebrating the steps achieved since in the Rebuilding of what had once been.

Most of all, he thinks of her on his birthday.

It’d been one he’d been meant to share with her, for indeed, they’d shared it since the very same year Ophelia and her mother had found their way to them. By the time their respective birthdays, only two days apart, had rolled around ‘bout six months later, he and she had already become thick as thieves, so it had seemed appropriate to the occasion. Community resources being what they’d been – even in the more prosperous years – it had seemed irresponsible not to have the two children so close in friendship, age and birth dates share a fête to celebrate their day. Anyway, they’d have no reason to think that doing it that way hadn’t always been the norm, and one peach cobbler could most easily be shared between two children. 

Anyways, they’d always been happy enough to share as they’d shared all else.

Means though, that though Ophelia’s been gone for nearly two decades, she’s always top of Clyde’s mind as the turn of his year approaches. He can no longer go through the day without thinking on her and on where she might be — so even though the time for childish things like fêtes is long past, the specter of her lingers.

As the taste of peach lingers on his tongue, not only but especially on his birthday - he hopes for her.

Thus it is that he carries along the memory of Ophelia — like a comforting talisman, an indulgent reminder of a more innocent time long since gone — as he grows and grows, grows big and strong and tall and broad. Ain’t like she takes up much space, in any case, as she’d always been an itty bitty thing — so he figured he could well afford to carry the memory of her along.

Logans may be cursed, their neighbors say; but they certainly ain’t ever small, in height, breadth, personality – or memory.

Strong too.

And, after all, Clyde L. (Logan) Logan is Logan through and through.

Yes, he grows big and strong as he does his best to contribute both to the betterment of his community and its safety. He even tries a stint in the remnants of what had once been the American military, and sticks it out for two tours, though he finds it uncomfortable what it is they ask of him, even more than does he find his time there incalculably frustrating in its nonsensical rules and the hierarchies meant for a time and a place long past - even better left forgotten. 

That time, those two long tours of service; it leaves him only with a vague distrust of military institutions and a missing left forearm.

(Luckily, Joe Bang, trader and scoundrel at large and his second cousin on his momma’s side — if twice removed, he's family anyway — is adept at scavenging tech, procures him an advanced robotic arm.)

Returning home, Clyde finds a rhythm post service, a sense of purpose as the village’s resident librarian and, less poetically, its gatekeeper. Perched in the shade of the overhang of the porch of the old Duck Tape most days, an old book to keep him company, he keeps a wary eye out for strangers approaching through the narrow eastern mountain pass.

It is thus how he first spies her; for her copper hair shines bright against the horizon.

Thus it is that he first spies this girl with a disturbingly familiar face, dressed in the colors of the enemy as the blue and gold of the Vault-Tech jumper she wears stands out in unearned glory against the dull greens and brown of the spring foliage as she moves forward to greet him.

Her smile is like a sunbeam as she addresses him; it’s almost blinding in its intensity and genuine warmth.

“Howdy there neighbour!” she calls and approaches his post with careless enthusiasm, her hand out, even as Clyde’s trigger finger finds a familiar slot on his gun. 

For as much as he wants to trust the girl he knew, it’s apparent within minutes that that girl is gone for good. 

Probably.

“Just passing through, I assure you, but I’m hoping you can help me; I’m searching for my father.”

It is clear she recognizes him no more than the building on whose porch he sits, it is clear that she feels not the ghostly echo of connection he feels looking at her. More; it almost hurts, how cheery and bright she appears to be, and how unconflicted, untarnished, untouched, how whole.

“It’s so nice to meet you! My name’s Phee; Phee Larssen.”

A/N: please imagine the following conversation.

Phee: my dad, the bestest, most ethical man EVER has been kidnapped by dastardly raiders. Can you help me rescue him?

Clyde (internally): your dad is the worst man on the planet and he destroyed my entire world on a whim

Also, he killed your mother even while you screamed for her.

Clyde, slowly: all righty

Clyde (internally): so I can punch him in the face