The caravan pressed on. The wasteland seemed emptier after the attack, the air heavy with Tanya's silence. She walked close to Ash, sometimes brushing his sleeve, though she never seemed to realize it.
At the first night's camp, Crow kept a hard eye on her, but didn't push. Too many had seen what ants left behind to doubt her story.
Ash sat apart, as he always did, revolvers across his knees while he polished the chambers. Tanya approached, clutching his coat tighter around her shoulders.
"You didn't even hesitate," she said quietly.
Ash looked up, one brow raised. "Didn't have time to."
"But you weren't scared."
He paused, then shook his head. "I was. Still am."
Tanya blinked, surprised. "Then… how?"
Ash held her gaze, his voice even. "Being scared and moving anyway. That's all it is."
For the first time since the wreck, Tanya smiled. It was small, fleeting, but real.
The Road
Over the next days, Tanya stuck close to him. She asked about Megaton, about his life, about the strange glow of his revolvers. Ash answered in short words at first, but soon stories slipped from him — old fragments of the Cinderfang ways, half-remembered songs of the road, things his tribe whispered when the fire burned low.
She listened with rapt attention, green eyes shining.
At night, when the caravan huddled near their fires, Tanya sat at Ash's side, sometimes leaning against his arm without meaning to. She laughed once — a sound sharp with youth — when he admitted he'd nearly shot a radroach his first night alone in the wastes because it startled him.
Each mile, her fear seemed to shrink, replaced by something warmer.
On the Edge of Canterbury
By the time Canterbury Commons came into sight, Tanya felt almost herself again. Almost. Her family was gone, and the ache of that loss never left her face, but when she looked at Ash, it softened.
Crow barked orders as the brahmin lumbered forward, but Tanya only glanced at Ash, holding his gaze for a long moment before speaking.
"Thank you," she whispered. "For saving me. For not leaving me."
Ash nodded once. "No one deserves to be left in the dirt."
She smiled again, shy but sure. The kind of smile that meant more than words.