Briar Rose did as Shaun suggested, walking around the Institute to become familiar with it. On her trips around, she received many glances that made her self-conscious—compared to them, she was a dirty outlander that didn't belong. Most of the looks were just out of curiosity, but others she could feel them looking down on her. Patrolling synths politely greeted her as they went on their rounds; she tensed with alarm when she saw Coursers, but they only greeted her with 'Ma'am' and kept walking.

She also visited the Division Heads. Different colored lines led her to each department, so she didn't get lost. Dr. Fillmore was happy to answer any questions Briar Rose had; she did become suspicious though when she asked if Briar Rose had accepted Father's request for her to stay in the Institute, and she wasn't sure yet. Even though not talkative and didn't seem happy that she was there, Dr. Li gave her an ability on her Pip-Boy to teleport in and out of the Institute. Dr. Ayo in the SRB was more of a jerk. The SRB trained and dispatched the Coursers to bring in escaped synths. Ayo was interested in how she had managed to kill one of the deadly hunters. While giving him a watered-down explanation, she saw X6-88—thankfully, no one called her out on her recognition of him, mainly because of Ayo being self-conceited. Dr. Holdren in Bio-Science seemed thrilled to have her there.

Briar Rose went back to Shaun to tell him what she had done but then told him that she needed to go back to the Commonwealth to think; she had a lot to think about. He looked disappointed that she would leave so soon, but with her promise to return after she had some time, he let her go freely. She touched the icon of Sanctuary on her Pip-Boy's map and she teleported out with a roar and feeling cold again.

She felt hard floor under her feet and the outside breeze. Her vision hadn't yet cleared when she heard the multiple exclamations of her name. The patched-together homes of Sanctuary just began to clear when Briar Rose's knees gave out; she crumbled as the emotions that wanted to show with the synth Shaun and the real—old—Shaun overwhelmed her. Even when someone grabbed her arms when they dropped down beside her and she recognized the voices asking if she was alright, she couldn't respond—she just cried.

Nothing had worked out right when she stepped out of that Vault. It would've just been better if she had died in there with Nate. Briar Rose had planned to destroy the Institute for stealing Shaun, but finding Shaun as the leader of it made her firm decision shake. She now had two options, and she didn't like either of them: stay with Shaun and condemn the Commonwealth to more of the Institute's schemes, or save the Commonwealth by destroying the Institute, and furthermore, killing her son and all he has accomplished... Her world had been turned upside down and she didn't know if it could ever be fixed.

After finally letting out all the frustration, anger, heartbreak and utter despair at the dilemma before her, Briar Rose was exhausted; she sagged against the chest near her, feeling comforted by Nick's familiar scent.

"Flower, did they hurt you?" Nick asked.

She could only shake her head.

"What happened?"

It took her a moment to speak. "I made it into the Institute and found Shaun. But... it wasn't what I expected. He wasn't a young boy but an old man—he had been taken not ten, but sixty years ago. And now he... He's in charge of the Institute."

Gasps and sharp intakes of breaths sounded around her; Nick's form even stilled in shock. The air fell silent. Dogmeat nudged her arm for comfort, but Briar Rose didn't have the energy to pet him.

"Don't despair, mum; you've come this far, I'm sure something can be done," Codsworth encouraged. It felt forced; even her robot knew it had become hopeless.

Nick snapped out of his muteness. "Come on, Flower; it's late and you need to rest."

He helped her up to her feet and held onto her as they headed for her house; Briar Rose handed Sturges the holotape she had stolen information on, knowing very well what it meant. She thought about holding onto it—saying it hadn't had worked—but her giving the possible chink in the Institute's armor to him meant she already leaned toward one outcome.

***

Nick couldn't believe what Briar Rose had found. Most of the cases he took didn't have a happy ending, but none of them had this level of twist. After tossing and turning all night, she had gathered them all to elaborate on what the Institute looked like and what exactly had happened. The real Shaun using the synth-child Shaun for an experiment on his flower was sick. Everyone looked disgusted or horrified at her tale—even Codsworth had a denouncing remark for Shaun pulling that trick on his own mother.

He understood what kept her unable to sleep last night: keep Shaun alive or kill the person she had been so driven to find by destroying the Institute. Briar Rose was the only one with inside access, so this was the Commonwealth's opportunity to free themselves from its boogeyman. He hated that the decision of what to do had been forced onto her shoulders.

Before knowing about Shaun's position, Nick had the hopes that Briar Rose could possibly find information regarding his creation. He knew the Institute had answers, answers he longed to know. That place probably had so much technology that could help sustain the Commonwealth, help make life easier for everybody; maybe they could even transform him into more of a man...

Nick shook his head—he shouldn't be dreaming about 'what ifs'. Briar Rose just had her heart shattered at learning that her son was actually her enemy and now faced a horrible decision. No mother should have to decide the fate of her child. An idea popped into his head about her talking with Shaun about changing the way the Institute operates, but Nick brandished that thought away as quickly as it came—from Briar Rose describing him, Shaun believed in the goodness of the Institute, so he wouldn't change it just because she was now in his life.

He headed to her old house to see if she had settled enough from yesterday to talk things over with him. So many times he had dealt with bringing bad news to family that Nick had learned to give them space before approaching them later. Nick walked in and, after not immediately spotting her in the living room, headed for her room; she wasn't in there either.

Did she go back to the Institute? Nick thought to find Codsworth to see if he knew where his mistress had gone. On his way out, the Mr. Handy instead found him by flying through the door.

"Mr. Valentine, I saw you enter, in what I presume, seeking Miss Rose, but she is not here. She has returned to Vault 111 to ponder in solitude."

Also to see her husband, he finished for the robot. Seeing him again might help her come to a decision. He wasn't sure what decision she might make, or what choice he hoped she would make. Nick thanked Codsworth and headed out to follow the path up to the Vault when the robot stopped him.

"Mr. Valentine... please tell me my thoughts have drifted wrong at hearing the news of young Shaun."

The Mr. Handy was too insightful. "I don't believe I can, Codsworth."

He sighed heavily and his eyes drifted downward—Nick could've sworn the robot's arms slumped. "As you know, Miss Rose is strong in spirit and very admirable in her determination, but I worry these next few days will break her. She has survived through so much, but I am not so confident she can survive this. I now truly fear for Miss Rose." His voice shook.

"I'm worried too, Codsworth, but don't worry; I'll be right beside her to make sure she comes out of this."

Codsworth flew out with him to the Vault's entrance—a gaping hole built into the overlook. The Mr. Handy flew into a nearby structure to press a button; after a while of scraping metal and grinding of gears, the hole filled with a platform rising out of the darkness. Nick stepped onto it, Codsworth hit the button again, and he descended.

Vault 111 lay deep underneath the earth, for he descended through darkness for a long time. At the lit bottom, the metal fencing lifted, and he ascended the metal stairs and crossed the all-too-familiar walkway across the gaping aisle between the gear-shaped door and the beginning of the actual Vault. It greatly resembled Vault 114 with white walls, silver machines, and Vault-Tec boxes and crates; what was new were the skeletons and shells of dead Radroaches.

Nick headed down the only hallway he could see, perturbed at how silent and still the place was—fitting for the tomb it had become, but no more comforting. An open doorway loomed ahead and, from recognizing the aisle between pods as those in Kellogg's memories, he continued straight.

He stopped in the doorway, eyes taking in the view before him. Eight steel pods and seven of them were occupied with a frozen corpse. The air was still awfully frigid and water somehow dripped out of sight. Only one pod was open and Briar Rose sat in front of it, knees pulled to her chest and chewing on her braid, as she stared at the pod opposite her—her husband's.

Nick headed down to her; reaching her, he hesitated for a second before sitting beside her. She didn't say anything, so he looked up at Nate's pod—he had been a handsome man with a strong chiseled face and jawline, and a head full of styled dark brown hair. He had thawed some since his pod had been left open when Briar Rose left, so she must've closed it to preserve him. The blood spray behind his head still stained the pod.

He sighed in a show of breaking the silence. "I haven't seen you do that before."

Briar Rose took her hair out of her mouth and looked down at it. "Nate used to get on to me about this..."

"I don't know what I can say to you, Flower, other than I'm sorry."

She fiddled with the braid as she thought for a long time. "This isn't the world I wanted to wake up in; I envisioned another life for Shaun: a happy, relatively safe life in the Vault. When Shaun was taken and I woke up, I had hoped I could find him and put my family back together again."

Tears welled in her eyes. "But things rarely turn out the way we want them to, huh? This is my world now, and I can't let it be destroyed again."

Briar Rose looked at him. "The Institute must stop... and Shaun with it."

***

True to her word, Briar Rose returned to the Institute, greatly pleasing Shaun and delighting him even more with her news that she might stay. She didn't feel as riddled with guilt lying to him as she thought. Even as much as he resembled his father, Shaun didn't act like the son he would've been if she had raised him. Viewing him not as her son but as a synth who had taken his place, made her deception easier.

She had spoken with Sturges before she left to check his progression on the holotape. He told her the encryption was proving difficult to break, so it might take a few days for him to get done. To give him time to discover a way in, Briar Rose sauntered through the Institute, learning its exact layout, memorizing synth patrols, and counting how many their opposition would be.

Also determined to find Virgil's serum, she returned to Bio-Science. Briar Rose pretended to be interested in the experimental plants or the synthetic gorillas in their enclosures to explain her visit. She thought about mentioning Virgil to see if they could help her, but she held her tongue—she had a feeling it would put Virgil in even more danger and she would be closely watched, not free to roam like now. So, Briar Rose took more time poking around in Bio-Science to find information about the FEV Lab—the experimental lab on Super Mutants Virgil presided over.

Every door she had come across in the Institute opened for her, so when she found one locked, her curiosity skyrocketed. Nick had taught her how to pick a lock using a bobby pin and a screwdriver; it didn't take a lot of effort to unlock the door.

Briar Rose cautiously crept through because of the trashed and abandoned look of the place. At the sight of a dead synth, she pulled out her 10mm—this off-limits place meant death to any who trespassed. She thanked Nick even more for teaching her how to hack terminals to shut down laser turrets; in one room, though, she had to fight a dangerous Assaultron—she couldn't power it down.

After hacking far more laser turrets needed for simple security, she finally came into the actual laboratory. Dead Super Mutants floated in some green liquid in tall cylinders. Briar Rose began searching the desks for the vial Virgil described that held the serum. She found it just lying on a desk, overlooked when the lab was abandoned. She hid it in a pocket, then left; as she walked through Bio-Science, she kept up an innocent aura so no one would get suspicious.