Thirty-Seven Fires

Can you hear it through the ash? A bell under the thunder. Can you see it past the glass? A road that won't go under. From the ruins, from the wire, we are thirty-seven fires. Sanctuary woke with a hammer in its hand, Red Rocket burned like a star above the sand. Tenpines called out, Starlight answered clear, "Build the wall higher, but leave the gate here." From the Castle guns to the salt-black shore, we buried our dead, then we planted more. Tatos in the grave-dust, corn in the scars, children naming constellations through the rad-sick stars. We crawled out of the cellar. We climbed out of the smoke. No crown, no chain, no master's yoke. One flare in the black, then a thousand spoke. Hold the line, hold the dawn, we are broken, but we're marching on. Raise the flag where the old world fell, ring that bell, ring that bell. Not as conquerors, not as kings, but as hands that guard what freedom brings. Through the poison, through the fire, we are thirty-seven fires. The Prydwen - fell like an iron moon, and the sky stayed silent by the afternoon. The Railroad's lanterns faded under stone, no more whispered wars in the dark alone. Down in the white halls, cold and clean, we broke the Gen-Three dream-machine. No more faces printed, no more souls assigned, no more fathers playing god with borrowed minds. Isabel Cruz - laid the armor down, turned her robots back from the burning towns. Mercy had a harder voice than lead: "Fix what you made. Guard what you spared." We took the buried thunder. We opened every door. Turned the Institute from a wound to a forge. No slaves from below, no tyrants above - only steel for the plow, only light for love. Hold the line, hold the dawn, we are broken, but we're marching on. Raise the flag where the old world fell, ring that bell, ring that bell. Not as conquerors, not as kings, but as shields around all living things. Through the poison, through the fire, we are thirty-seven fires. Oh-oh, the Commonwealth - rises. Oh-oh, no more empty horizons. Oh-oh, from the brink we climb. One people. One road. One line. Far Harbor came in with the fog on its coat, old nets, old knives, old prayers in its throat. Longfellow's cabin put a lamp in the rain, Dalton fields grew green out of blood and pain. Nuka-World knelt where the raider crowns broke, neon washed clean in a blue dawn's smoke. No tribute wagons, no collars, no throne, just free hands building what they choose to own. From Bunker Hill to the island tide, from Vault Eighty-Eight to the fairground lights, eastward, willingly, town by town, they don't get taken - they lay roots down. KWIN-zee - is a scar we still name. Every oath has to answer for shame. The Glowing Sea still breathes in green. Deathclaws still walk where the roads have been. But mothers sleep when the sirens cry, because someone stands where the bullets fly. A minute is all that the lost may need; a minute to run, to live, to breathe. So give us one minute, and we will be there - boots in the mud, flare in the air. We do not march for borders. We do not march for gold. We march so the sick can be carried, so the hungry can be fed, so the young can grow old. Hold the line, hold the dawn, we were buried, but we're marching on. Raise the flag where the old world fell, ring that bell, ring that bell. No steel god in the burning sky. No shadow church where the secrets lie. No factory womb, no raider fire, only thirty-seven fires. Hold the line, hold the dawn, from Boston's bones to the roads beyond. If your town calls free, then your town belongs - not to our guns, but to our songs. Not as conquerors. Not as kings. We are the shield when the red flare sings. Through the poison, through the fire, we are thirty-seven fires. Can you hear it through the ash? A bell under the thunder. Tomorrow was not given. We built it from the hunger. From the ruins, from the wire, we are thirty-seven fires.