Piper Wright is a resident of Diamond City in the Commonwealth in 2287, delivering the news of current events as the owner, publisher, and sole journalist of the Publick Occurrences newspaper. She is a possible companion of the Sole Survivor.

Early life

Born in a small settlement located "way out" in the Commonwealth, Piper grew up there with her younger sister Nat and their father, who served as a member of the local militia. She mentions a streak of childhood mischief wherein she would steal her father's pistol, find nearby functioning robots, then use the weapon to damage their combat inhibitors and lead them on a rampage through the town; Piper claims to look back on those moments with fondness.

Piper's "career" in journalism started when her father was found dead under suspicious circumstances. When she asked the militia captain, Mayburn, to investigate her father's death, his dismissive attitude caused her to feel like he was toying with her. After fruitless attempts to get the town mayor to look into Mayburn, Piper took the matter into her own hands. Using a Stealth Boy from her father's weapon stash, she snuck into Mayburn's office undetected and uncovered the evidence she was looking for: raiders were plotting to sack the town, and Mayburn was in league with them. He intended to secretly leave the main gate open and unguarded ahead of the attack in exchange for a cut of the loot; when Piper's father caught onto his scheme, the captain murdered him to prevent word of the plot from getting out.

When the local authorities refused to investigate or even believe her claims about Mayburn's corruption, Piper resorted to distributing flyers across the entire settlement calling out his crimes. The conspicuously public accusation got the attention of the town's mayor, who accepted Piper's evidence. Outraged by his dereliction of duty, the settlers exiled Mayburn, and when the raiders eventually showed up expecting the gate to be wide open, they instead encountered a well-prepared defense by the townsfolk and were driven away.

Diamond City reporter

With their parents gone and Nat too young to work, Piper relied mainly on kindness and charity to survive. Eventually, the sisters saved enough money to relocate to Diamond City by paying for passage on a caravan. However, life in the "big city" provided its own share of challenges; at the time of their arrival, Diamond City was plagued by corruption, lax security, and failing infrastructure (such as a gaping hole in the old stadium's protective walls that was "patched" by a bookcase furniture piece). Frustrated with this state of affairs and goaded by a desire to enact change, Piper founded and ran her own newspaper Publick Occurrences to raise awareness of the city's problems.

Despite her noble intentions, her career was fraught with danger and intrigue from the outset. Shortly after founding her newspaper, an article she wrote exposing the efforts of a caravan cartel to drive up food prices made her the target of their retribution. The cartel secretly arranged for an assassin to disguise as the bartender at the Dugout Inn and serve Piper a poisoned drink; once she realized, she immediately hopped the counter and chugged Vadim Bobrov's moonshine straight from the still to induce vomiting and remove the poison. The assassin was later apprehended by Diamond City security and the cartel members were arrested. In a later incident, an investigation into irradiated drinking water at Bunker Hill led her to be captured by the sect of the Church of the Children of Atom responsible. Before they could kill her as a human sacrifice, Piper claims she convincingly faked a vision from Atom, resulting in the Atomites sparing and subsequently initiating her into the cult. Piper says she also regularly fell afoul of DC security herself during her journalistic investigations, to the point that their lockup was unofficially known as the "Piper Suite" due to her frequent stays there for various reasons.

In spite of the risks taken, Piper's activism and investigative fervor ultimately bore fruit; whether they agreed with her or not, citizens read her newspaper in droves, and many of the issues she brought to light were addressed by DC authority. However, this success came at a cost to Piper's personal life. Following the release of the paper's first edition, many in the city who Piper had once considered friends and confidants became distant, and she gained a reputation both in Diamond City and across the Commonwealth as a “nosy snoop.” Public opinion of the paper slowly but surely soured, with many citizens writing in to complain about the negative tone of its reporting, and Piper began to feel deeply alienated from the community.

Exposing the synthetic truth

This alienation reached its peak with the publication of an article titled "The Synthetic Truth" in 2287. Though the article primarily consisted of a retrospective on the Broken Mask incident of 2229 and an interview with the event's last surviving eyewitness, Eustace Hawthorne, it also contained thinly-veiled accusations that the city's mayor, McDonough, was a synth infiltrator acting on behalf of the Institute.[12] Though privately confident in her accusations, Piper lacked any solid evidence for them. McDonough subsequently had Piper thrown out by security and banned from the city. Despite her temporary exile, Piper remains steadfast in her determination to protect the city and expose the mayor's wrongdoings.

Nate is a pre-War resident of Sanctuary Hills in 2077 and one of the two possible player characters available during character creation in Fallout 4. Nate is a Caucasian male with short dark hair, hazel-brown eyes, and an athletic, military build his attire originally consisted of a Vault 111 jumpsuit but after his adventures in the wasteland, he's gained more clothing. Nate is a former soldier and decorated war hero who served in the 2nd Battalion, 108th Infantry Regiment of the U.S. Army during the Sino-American War. At some point before the war, he married Nora.[2] The two had intercourse in a park and several months later, they had a son, Shaun, in 2077. Nate and Nora once had a pet dog but it disappeared. On the morning of October 23, 2077, Nate was preparing for an event at the Veteran's Hall in Concord[4] when a Vault-Tec representative visited the family to inform them that they have pre-approved admittance into Vault 111. Mere moments later, a news bulletin warned the family of an imminent nuclear attack, which forced Nate, Nora and Shaun to rush to the Vault, leaving their personal Mister Handy, Codsworth, behind. After entering the Vault, the family, along with the other admitted residents are placed in cryogenic sleep by the Vault-Tec scientists, under the guise of decontamination prior to entering the main Vault. In 2227 he is disturbed from his cryogenic sleep by Conrad Kellogg and two unknown Institute scientists, whose intention was to acquire Shaun; as his DNA is the 'purest' source available to the Institute for their experiments.

Paladin Danse (registration DN-407P) is a member of the East Coast division of the Brotherhood of Steel, serving as the commanding officer of Recon Squad Gladius in the Commonwealth in 2287. He is a possible companion of the Sole Survivor. Paladin Danse has light brown eyes, warm black hair a tall and muscular, almost always seen wearing his signature T-60 power armor.

Early life

Danse's earliest memories are of growing up as an orphan in the Capital Wasteland around the 2270s. He made a living by scavenging the D.C. ruins, despite the danger, until he was older and eventually able to obtain residence in Rivet City. It was at that time he met a man named Cutler and the two became close friends, looking out for each other while operating a junk stand to get by. At some point after this, members of Lyons' Brotherhood of Steel came through the city on a recruiting run. Both signed on right away, feeling it was the best chance to escape their "nowhere" lives and make something proper of themselves.

Rising in the Brotherhood

In the Brotherhood, Danse's initiate training was sponsored by Paladin Krieg, but he quickly found he was being singled out and at the time did not understand why. In hindsight, Danse believes that Krieg had seen the spark of greatness in him, a prediction that seemingly came true, as by 2277, Danse had reached the rank of paladin himself and was given command of his own squad. Danse's whereabouts during the Brotherhood's conflict with the Enclave are unclear, but it is known that he did not participate in their assault on the Enclave stronghold of Adams Air Force Base in the latter half of the war. However, in the wake of that battle, Danse learned that Paladin Krieg had been among the casualties. Though he grieved the loss, he followed Krieg's example by pushing the people entrusted to him to become greater and realize their true potential. Among Danse's achievements as a paladin was earning a post on board the Prydwen that he got to share with Cutler, himself a ranking knight. Once it launched in 2282, the airship granted the Brotherhood an unparalleled ability to project their martial power along the East Coast. However, a year into the posting, Danse was informed that Cutler had disappeared on a routine scouting operation. After convincing his superiors to authorize a search, Danse headed a rescue team to track down the missing patrol and find his friend. They eventually discovered the squad had been ambushed and almost totally wiped out by a hive of super mutants, save for Cutler. Danse was the one to find him, only to discover his friend had been exposed to the Forced Evolutionary Virus and transformed into a super mutant as well. With no other recourse, Danse abided by the Brotherhood's protocol and delivered what he saw as a mercy kill. Cutler's death deeply affected Danse, and from then on, he preferred to keep others at a distance for fear of experiencing that same loss again. The experience also left him with a deep hatred of super mutants. Throughout his trials, Danse continued on to excel as a soldier. Though he had been brought up under the eldership of Owyn Lyons, the Brotherhood's reunification with the Outcasts and subsequent reformation by the young Arthur Maxson in 2283 led him to align with the cultural shift back to traditional Brotherhood orthodoxy and adopt the Outcast view of Lyons as an idealistic deviant that brought their order to near-destruction. Under the new Elder Maxson, Danse's experiences with the wasteland's worst and devotion to his duty led to him becoming one of the highest decorated officers in the newly formed East Coast Brotherhood.

Coming to the Commonwealth

Being highly capable and well-respected among his brothers-in-arms, Paladin Danse was a natural choice for the Brotherhood's latest reconnaissance expedition sent out north into the Commonwealth. Recon Squad Gladius was dispatched to the region in late 2286 for a tech recovery operation, with a secondary goal to uncover the fates of their missing predecessors, Recon Squad Artemis. No one expected that Danse's expedition would become another turning point in the Brotherhood's history. The squad crossed the border into the Commonwealth in January 2287 after traveling for several months, and suffered several equipment losses in skirmishes with raiders soon after, including Knight Keane's power armor. By February, they had established a forward operating base in the Cambridge Police Station. By April, Danse felt Gladius had a strong enough position to begin recovery and search operations. The Corvega assembly plant near Lexington was identified by Scribe Haylen as the first target. Initial recon by Knight-Sergeant Dawes revealed a large raider presence within, but Danse decided to risk breaching their defenses. The attempt was costly: the squad was spotted on approach and came under fire. When Knight Worwick was severely wounded, Danse ordered a general retreat. Knight Brach was killed upon return to Cambridge after stepping on a landmine. Two days later, Worwick's condition turned out to be unsalvageable: injuries from raider gunfire resulted in paralysis and internal bleeding. With less than a 5% chance of recovery, Danse instructed Haylen to euthanize the mortally wounded knight. Following these significant losses, Danse adopted a more cautious strategy by instead focusing on surveying Boston and its surrounding environs. No casualties were sustained between April and July until a reconnaissance operation at grid reference A113, near Boston International Airport and Fort Strong. The airport was abandoned, but Fort Strong was infested by super mutants. Danse had hoped for Gladius to resupply at the fort's armory, but Knight-Sergeant Dawes was killed on approach and the squad was forced to retreat. The numerous setbacks and casualties did not dissuade Danse's commitment to their mission, but he determined the best way to deal with such locations in the future was with artillery and extreme prejudice. Privately, he started to develop insomnia and frequent headaches. By October, Gladius happened on the most important discovery of their expedition: unusual energy readings on an extreme high-band spectrum frequency. He concluded they were unlikely to be pre-War and had his team triangulate the signal to identify its origin, all while completely unaware they were tracking the signal emanated by the Institute's usage of their molecular relay teleportation technology. At some point, the team learned about the Institute and their role in the creation of the artificial race of synths, with Danse particularly concerned about the potential threat of synthetic humans outnumbering and replacing humanity. The team was unable to establish contact with Scabbard to report their findings due to damage to the police station's antenna by a super mutant attack. With Haylen unsure of her ability to restore it without parts, Danse refocused his efforts on recovering technology to bolster it by retrieving the deep range transmitter from the nearby ArcJet Systems. However, even this has not gone to plan, as the Cambridge outpost has recently come under siege from the feral ghouls infesting the nearby ruins. The latest, ongoing attack killed Knight Keane and wounded Knight Rhys, leaving Danse to fight off the ghouls alone, while Scribe Haylen has sent out a distress call in the hopes that someone may arrive to lend their support.

Scribe Haylen, registration HN-118FS, is a field scribe of the Brotherhood of Steel, stationed at the Cambridge Police Station in 2287. Scribe Haylen has blue eyes and uses the "Young at Heart" hairstyle in [Fallout 4] Following the loss of Recon Squad Artemis, Recon Squad Gladius was formed, under the command of Paladin Danse, to investigate the Commonwealth. After several months of travel, the team of seven arrived in the region and was immediately attacked by raiders, who disabled Knight Keane's power armor and destroyed some of their supplies. Following this attack, the squad made its way to Cambridge and chose to use the local police station as their base of operations, due to the site's strong structure, abundance of supplies and ammunition, and a long range communication antenna; however, this antenna would be damaged in a super mutant attack before it could be used. After fortifying the position, the group located and attempted to attack the Corvega assembly plant in nearby Lexington. The attack was a failure. After being hit with gunfire, Danse was forced to call a retreat; Knight Brach was killed after stepping on a landmine, and Knight Worwick was mortally wounded, dying two days later. Following this failure, the squad attempted to resupply by investigating Boston Airport and Fort Strong, where they were surprised by super mutants and Knight-Sergeant Dawes was killed. Afterwards, Haylen detected odd energy readings, later determined to be coming from the Institute. Wishing to report this to the main chapter, Haylen began attempts to fully repair the police station's antenna, but was unable to with the parts available. Later, the police station came under assault by large numbers of feral ghouls. While Haylen used the communication gear to send out a short range distress call, the squad attempted to fight off the ghouls, resulting in the death of Knight Keane.

Preston Garvey is a member and officer of the Commonwealth Minutemen operating in the Commonwealth in 2287, defending refugees under his protection from an attack by raiders in Concord. He is a possible companion of the Sole Survivor. Preston Garvey is a human male in Fallout 4 who stands approximately 6'1" tall with a heavyweight build, with jet black hair, brown eyes a black human male with short dark hair and facial features showing a mature, weary expression fitting his background as a surviving Minuteman leader. His outfit consist of a signature brown duster jacket over a shirt, utility trousers, and boots with a colonial tricorn hat, he wields a laser musket.

Early life

During Preston's childhood, the Minutemen were his personal heroes, as he believed them to be the "only good guys around." He enlisted with a company of Minutemen under Colonel Ezra Hollis as soon as he could at the age of seventeen, growing to be an avid believer in the Minutemen's ideals of fellowship and justice, feeling like he was truly making a difference. He says that he had "a few good years there," relishing the chance to fight for a cause bigger than just himself.

Despite his idealism, even Preston noticed when things began to change for the worse by 2282, when the Minutemen's then-leader, General Joe Becker died; without his stable leadership, the disparate militia groups began to fragment within the faction, with their former camaraderie devolving into infighting and personal vendettas. By 2287, Hollis' company, including Preston, was one of the last known active groups of Minutemen that still did their duty of protecting settlements and answering calls for help put out by citizens in the Commonwealth.

Quincy Massacre

A short time before the Sole Survivor woke up in Vault 111 on October 23, 2287, Sturges, an inhabitant of the influential trading hub at Quincy, convinced its mayor to make a request for Minutemen aid after another local, Mama Murphy had a prophetic vision of the town being overtaken and massacred. Although the majority of Quincy's residents, including Marcy and Jun Long saw Murphy as a burned-out chem addict spouting nonsense, Sturges believed in the truth of her visions from past experience, enough to go behind his fellow citizens and get the Minutemen involved. Around this time, Preston was still with Colonel Hollis' company when they were the ones to receive the mission to rescue Quincy. Upon arrival, the militia found out the threat Murphy foresaw was a company of Gunners mercenaries besieging the town. The Minutemen's surprise counterattack dispersed the Gunner lines temporarily into retreat, and they were welcomed by the citizens of Quincy. In preparing for the Gunners' return, Preston was involved with helping the settlers build up more proper defenses for the town. Despite the Minutemen's presence, the Gunners continued acting brazenly against the defenders, including carrying out small-scale ambushes on their defensive patrols that resulted in some injuries to civilians such as the Longs' son, Kyle getting injured after a stray bullet hit his leg. A short time after the Minutemen's arrival, a group of Gunners came to town to negotiate, where it was discovered they were being led by an ex-veteran of the Minutemen named Clint, who Colonel Hollis recognized. In a private meeting with Hollis and the mayor, Clint laid out terms of surrender for Quincy and its defenders; these terms were summarily rejected by Hollis as he scolded Clint for his defection from the Minutemen, but ultimately had to allow the mercenaries to leave without reprisal, with Clint leaving a final warning for the Minutemen to abandon the town or be destroyed with it. While the subsequent events are not definitively recorded in text, the outcome for the Minutemen is broadly established by dialogue with Preston and various other wastelanders; the Minutemen requested further support from other groups, but it was either that they never arrived in time, or they never came at all. By the end of it, the Gunners had overwhelmed the defenders and murdered nearly all of the civilians; Colonel Hollis himself, the linchpin of what was likely the last true group of Minutemen, was captured and died being executed by the traitorous Clint. The event became known as the Quincy Massacre and it catalyzed the disintegration of the protective bubble around the innocent settlers that the Minutemen had championed.

Post-Quincy

When Quincy fell to the Gunners, Preston managed to survive and gathered the few remaining Quincy civilians and members of Hollis' company and fled, pursued by Clint's mercenaries. Several of the refugees lost their lives at the hands of the Gunners before the group shook their pursuit at Jamaica Plain.[11] The survivors escaped pursuit from Quincy and continued moving across the Commonwealth until they reached Lexington. As Preston testifies, however, Lexington too proved a disastrous point on their journey as they were nearly overrun by the heavy infestation of feral ghouls, ultimately leaving only eight survivors making it out. Eventually, the group reached the opposite corner of the region from Quincy and entered Concord, where they took shelter in the Museum of Freedom. However, their troubles still did not end as they soon after came under attack again, this time by raiders. Unbeknownst to the group, the attack was not random as the raiders' commander Gristle were under orders from their leader, Jared, to capture Mama Murphy and bring her to the Corvega assembly plant so he could exploit her prophetic powers for himself; Gristle took to the mission eagerly because he coveted acquiring Preston's hat. By October 23, the Quincy refugee group numbered only five: Preston himself, Mama Murphy, Sturges and Jun and Marcy Long, a mere fraction of the original twenty who escaped under Preston's guidance. As he can later admit if helped out by the Sole Survivor, at that point, Preston believed he had failed everyone who had ever relied on him and found everything he thought he knew about the Minutemen was a lie, leading him to the proverbial end of his rope. It was only because of the four people still under his protection that he put on a brave face; in reality, he was not completely sure if they were going to get out of Concord alive, but that was acceptable to him. He had come to the conclusion death was what he deserved and what he actually wanted. Deep down, although not actively suicidal, Preston says he simply had given up hope for himself and the Minutemen and did not care if he lived or died; if he was going to meet his end, he would do it fighting as the last true believer in the Minutemen's justice.