//------------------------------// // Booted Part 1 // Story: Queen Of The Wasteland // by Jest //------------------------------// The beast stumbled forwards, only to be pushed back when the flames reached a canister of strange liquid and erupted. Fire licked at the deathclaw’s entire right side, causing another shriek to escape its lips. It tried to escape in another direction but was met by a sudden flare-up that cut it off. The creature struggled to breathe, its every exhale coming out as little more than a pained wheeze. It wanted to get out, to save itself and its mental passenger but every direction only yielded more pain. So with great reluctance, it submitted to its other half, giving over the mental controls to a being it knew was more intelligent than it. Twilight Sparkle looked around in confusion at the wall of fire that surrounded her on all sides. She vaguely remembered getting incredibly angry out of nowhere, but between then and now she had nothing. Her first instinct was to panic, but that was an urge easily pushed down by years of adventuring with her friends. Even with the presence of fire, which shook the former pony more then would have liked, she remained focused. The princess’s analytical mind immediately proved more effective than the barely focused rage of the beast. Twilight spotted artificial light emerging from the fire and concluded that there was a way out or at least a second room nearby. Putting her shoulder down, the deathclaw squeezed her eyes shut and charged forward, bowling straight through the wooden barrier as well as the wall of fire. The immense relief she felt to be out of the fire faded somewhat as she heard the flames consume something explosive. The dull boom rocked the building and pushed Twilight to search for an exit with even more haste. A glance around the room told her that there was at least some luck, as there were stairs up. Unfortunately, the fire had already reached them, though it had yet to consume the supports entirely. Twilight grit her teeth and sprinted up the stairs, silently uttering a prayer that they would be able to hold her weight. Be it the muttered invocation or pure luck, they held long enough for her to reach the door at their top. Though locked, a swift punch removed the aged, and slightly rotted thing straight from its hinges. She stepped out onto the main floor once more just as the stairs behind her began to collapse. By then he fire had surged up the walls and was rapidly making its way from the entrance to her left, to the rest of the building to her right. Across from her were a pair of bathrooms, so Twilight began moving in the sole remaining direction that promised a chance of salvation. Hurriedly jogging into the hallway, Twilight found herself almost immediately at another crossroads. Directly in front of her was a short hallway that ended in what seemed to be a storage room of some kind. To her left were a set of stairs going up, another hall, and two more rooms whose original purpose was not regularly apparent. To her right was another set of stairs going up, a longer hall, and two more rooms, one of which she couldn't see into it, while the one which lay at the end had been a meeting hall. “Where do I…” Twilight trailed off. The sudden harsh noise of what sounded like barking brought Twilight's attention toward the room directly before her. Taking off in that direction, Twilight hoped that her desire to save the semi-feral dogs would not come back to bite her either literally or figuratively. She was relieved to find the two hounds that had been sicked on her not long ago were barking at a door that presumably lead outside. Though boarded up, it was at least a start, and a fair bit better a more enticing option than the windows or walls she would have to destroy to escape. Twilight was certain it wouldn't take much effort to knock her way through either of those options but a door was optimal. All she needed to was subdue the panicked-looking pups that were now barking at her. Recalling some of the half-remembered lessons delivered by Fluttershy, Twilight held out her claws. Only to wince when the dogs took that as a sign of aggression and went to bite her. Twilight also remembered the danger that came with cornering a panic-strewn animal but decided to ignore that bit of useful info at the moment. “Screw it,” Twilight muttered to herself. As the first wild dog went to bite her, Twilight sidestepped and wrapped a clawed hand around its midsection. While hefting the first one clear off the ground, Twilight grabbed the tail of the second one which tried to flee further into the burning building. A firm yank caused the beast a bit of pain but allowed Twilight to grab it much like the first one. The pair continued their attempts to gnaw on Twilight's fingers, and escape her grasp but the deathclaw’s grip was secure. “Right, how were you supposed to do this again?” Twilight muttered to herself, her mind going back to the fire rescue course she had taken a few years ago. The sudden groan and subsequent collapse of a quarter of the building behind her somewhere spurred the deathclaw to action. “Whatever,” she muttered. The deathclaw took a half step forward and kicked with all her might a few inches from the door handle. For once her titanic strength didn't immediately pay off, though the door had noticeably weakened. Several boards had broken, as had one of the hinges, the entire thing bulging outward slightly. Twilight's second kick was sent slightly off course when one of the dogs bit her finger, but the third struck true. The door split in two, and fell open, leaving just enough room for Twilight to shoulder-check her way through the wreckage. Her momentum carried her out into the blistering desert air and didn't stop until her feet began to grow wobbly. Before she landed face-first on the ground, Twilight released her hold on the dogs, half-dropping them in the process. The beasts instantly took off, not once looking back to the scaled creature that had saved them from a fiery doom. Not like Twilight minded the lack of thanks, as she was too busy filling her lungs with as much oxygen as she could muster. Her entire body felt heavy, abnormally so, and pain bloomed in her chest each time her heart beat. As she lay on her back, staring up at the sky the deathclaw tried to piece together the events of the last few minutes. She recalled the initial few sentences the dog-headed man spoke, but after that, it was just rage, and then confusion. Shakily, Twilight lifted her claws from the ground and stared at her damaged limbs in horror. Blood caked them, only some of which was her own. Even now, just looking at them made a tiny shred of the anger she had felt begin to stir in her breast. Quashing that sensation wasn't difficult, but it was far harder to eliminate the aggravation she felt toward Janey. The woman hadn't made an appearance at all, nor had the human seemingly made any effort to save the wounded deathclaw. It took nearly a minute, but Twilight was able to ignore those nagging thoughts through cold logic. Twilight had, after all, taken off against Janey’s wishes so it wasn't that big of a surprise that the courier hadn't shown up. “I bet she’s still there, waiting,” Twilight muttered to herself. It took a bit to get the deathclaw back up to her feet, but Twilight managed to do so with only a bit of pain. The agonizing sensations remained constant, but they had become a dull throb that only flared up when her heart beat. The heavy thumps in her chest felt unnatural for some reason, but Twilight dismissed the feeling due to her own poor knowledge of her physiology. The deathclaw made her way around the town hall back to the front, where she saw a pair of legion soldiers standing. The duo stood far back from the burning building, bandanas pulled across their faces to ward against the billowing black smoke. Twilight had no such relief and simply avoided the building, giving the thing a wide berth so she could enjoy the crisp air. The deathclaw noticed that Janey was nowhere to be seen, as was the dog-headed man or the rest of his still-living underlings. “Hey, over there!” shouted one of the men. The pair turned towards Twilight and raised their weapons, a pistol, and a lever action rifle. The ensuing shots mostly went wide, but Twilight was too exhausted and injured to make much of an effort to dodge. There wasn't much cover either, and Twilight took a bullet to the leg, and three to the chest, though only the lower one actually pierced her hide. The sudden impact knocked Twilight down to one knee, leaving her open to the hail of gunfire launched her way. Twilight raised her hands in front of her face, and shielded herself as best as possible, but could do little else. Bullets continued to slam into her repeatedly before suddenly stopping after two rapid thuds unlike the others sounded. A second later and a duo of thumps impacted the ground a distance away. When no more gunfire was sent her way for a few seconds, Twilight looked up to find that Janey was standing over the bodies of the legionnaires. The courier flicked open the receiver of her revolver, stuck two more rounds inside, and with a jerk of her hand, closed it once more. “You better be able to stand, because I sure can't carry you,” Janey called. Twilight winced, but rose, limping towards the woman at a slow, sedentary pace. “Well, that's good to see,” Janey muttered. “And don't worry about the rest. Vulpes and his little cadre got away but the rest of the soldiers left behind to make sure your dead are lying in pools of their own blood.” Twilight couldn't help but feel a little happy at the news, and a little guilty that she felt so happy after hearing that people had recently died. “You look pretty banged up. Let's go back to the general store and lick our wounds,” Janey replied, jerking a thumb over her shoulder. “I doubt life’s gonna throw any more curve balls at us but we’ll be safer in there even if it does.” Twilight nodded, and followed after the human, limping weakly down the road. Head hung low in defeat, Twilight dared not meet the gaze of the powder gangers and citizens that remained lashed or nailed to crosses. Yet her guilt demanded her to look upon them, to inspect them, and to silently hope that there was someone who could be saved. “Don't bother. Pulling them down would likely kill them,” Janey exclaimed as if reading Twilight's mind. “Best we can do for them is rustle up what meds we can, and find out if any are a bit less bad than the others.” Twilight didn't like it, and her first instinct was to argue with the courier, but Twilight held back. The pair traveled the rest of the way down to the corner store, only to stop when they reached the entrance. Twilight held up a hand and pointed inside, prompting Janey to stop and draw her weapon. The courier slowly pushed open the door and revealed the poorly maintained interior of the Nipton general store. Shelves had tumbled over, their contents stripped clean, leaving behind only decades of dust and dirt. The long square room ended at a counter with a cash register on it and a busted display case behind it. The lights that hung overhead were mostly broken, but one near the back was lit, and hung down from a single chain, illuminating the place in an eerie light. “Great, just fucking great,” called the voice of a man seated on a chair near the middle of the room. “First I get my legs smashed then in walks a fucking deathclaw. What the fuck is my luck?” “Hey, she ain't gonna hurt anybody, not unless she needs to,” Janey retorted. The man blinked. “The fuck?” he uttered. “How the fuck are you not getting mauled right now?” “It's a long story, this is princess and I’m Janey,” Janey greeted, gesturing to the bleeding deathclaw standing next to her. “And we are here to help, I guess.” “Great, then you can either sic your pet deathclaw on me or give me fifteen med x and I’ll fucking OD for ya, okay? Fuck!” he shouted. Janey walked into the room and slipped her revolver back into its holster. She then took a moment to look the man up and down, noting that he wore the armor of a former prison guard. Dressed in the garb of a powder ganger, he seemed mostly okay, except for his pants which were covered in blood. “Lemme guess, your gonna ask some stupid fucking question like, what happened?” shouted the dark-skinned man. “Well don't bother, I’ll answer it right now.” “I got second place in the lottery see? I got to live but they beat my fucking legs with hammers. I’m fucking crippled get it? A lame duck, fucking dead weight, and now I’m going to die in this fucking shack whenever I end up pissing out the last of my fluids,” shouted the male. Twilight sighed and sat down next to the seated human. “I mean a bullet would be a lot faster,” Janey offered. “Fine, then just blow my head off already. I ain't got all day,” shouted the man. Twilight huffed and pointed at Janey in irritation. “I wasn't gonna,” Janey muttered. “Well, I was thinkin about it anyway.” “Fuck don't blue ball a guy,” exclaimed the man. “Look. I’m gonna go wrangle up some med-x, and whatever other meds this place has and I’ll be back in a bit,” Janey exclaimed. “We can talk about what to do about you after I’ve had a chance to bind princesses’ wounds.” “Don't think you need my fucking permission,” snapped the male. Twilight tried to ask for some water before Janey had a chance to leave but only managed to get out the first word before the door shut. Left with no other options, and barely the strength to stand, twilight lay on the floor, staring up at the ceiling. The room was silent for nearly a minute before the man suddenly spoke up. “Was that uh, morse code?” he inquired. Twilight looked over at him and nodded slightly. “Jesus fucking christ you are smart,” he muttered. Twilight huffed irritably. “Fuck I heard the radio same as everyone but didn't believe it. A fucking deathclaw that can think. We are so fucked as a species,” the man remarked. “I learned the tapping thing so I could help plan the escape without the guards getting wise, never thought I’d use it again.” “I don't mean you, or anyone any harm,” Twilight declared, pausing briefly. “Except maybe the legion.” The male chuckled darkly. “Fuck those guys. Crazy fucking wack jobs think they can just kill whoever they want and get away with it. Shit’s fucked.” Twilight could only nod her head in agreement. “So are you guys gonna kill me or what?” he demanded all of a sudden. Twilight shook her head. “Fuck,” he muttered. “Why do you want to die? I know it hurts but with proper medical treatment and-” Twilight began only to be interrupted. “That's a fucking good joke,” he spat. “I ain't gonna get no medical whatever. I’m a fucking powder ganger. I got nothing, and even if I managed to drag myself back to base the boss would just shoot my ass rather than waste the caps gettin me a doctor.” “We could pay for it,” Twilight declared, only to pause. “I would pay for it.” “Ha! You're a fucking comedian you know that. A grade A fucking joke teller,” he spat. “Ain't no one gonna shell out a few hundred caps on my account, and even if they did I’d probably never walk again anyway. Without my fucking legs I can't raid, I can't fucking do anything. I’d die eventually anyway.” “Not if you had a job,” Twilight pointed out. “You could be a doorman, or a bouncer, or a-” “Or a fucking fleshlight for some sick fuck up in Gommorah,” he retorted. “Noone’s gonna hire me knowing what I’ve done, ‘sept maybe the Omertas but I’d rather die than end up satisfying some weirdo’s cripple fetish.” Twilight bit her lip, and held back her initial response. “What if…” Twilight hesitated. “What if no one knew about your past?” The man turned and looked at Twilight. “What are you talking about?” “Well, did you grow up around here, is there anyone who would know your face?” Twilight asked. “I mean, not really,” he replied. “Picked the wrong pocket back in New Reno, and was shipped here on account of how the NCR wanted the railroad built but didn't wanna pay nobody to do it.” Twilight stuck out her tongue in disgust. “They use forced prison labor?” “Why do you look so shocked? ‘Course they do. Everyone uses slaves. Just depends on how much bullshit they use to cover up this fact,” the man replied. Twilight sighed. “Nevermind. So no one around here would know your name then, right?” “I went by Boxcars for a while, but I never really cared for it,” he murmured, pausing to wince and grasp his right leg. “Suppose something more fitting is in order, like Bum legs, or Cripplo.” “Choose something dignified, something respectful,” Twilight urged. “Then just come up with a story, and don't tell anyone the truth.” “That's downright devious,” Boxcars exclaimed. Twilight snorted, and jabbed a clawed finger at him. “Right, right,” Boxcars replied, raising his hands. “I ain't gonna go back to raiding or anything. Especially considering where that bright idea landed me in the first place.” “See, that's a start,” Twilight urged. “Still need a job though,” Boxcars pointed out. Twilight thought about it for a moment before responding. “I know someone in Primm. I bet they could take you on as a guard while you heal up.” “I don't see how getting my shit beat by a drunk gambler will help me heal but it sure beats dyin in this shit hole,” Boxcars exclaimed. “I mean you probably wouldn't have to worry about much. Just look over tables, and make sure no one cheats. That kind of thing,” Twilight replied. Boxcars fell silent and stared off into space for several minutes. “I guess… I guess if your gonna do all that for me then I should at least give it a shot,” Boxcars muttered half-heartedly. “I was a pretty good card shark back in the day so I know the tricks.” “That's the spirit,” Twilight excitedly declared, tapping out a quick response. “But what name will you take?” “Uh, I think I’ll take Rick,” Boxcars declared. “He was a good man, saved my ass during the riot. Took a damn bullet for me, the fucking idiot.” Twilight winced, and leaned over, gently patting the man on the back. Though he flinched away from the contact, Rick slowly relaxed. Eventually, Twilight pulled her hand back and laid down on the floor once more, too exhausted and injured to move. She wondered if her injuries were severe and if they might kill her, only to brush aside that thought. She wasn't going to start panicking, not before she knew how bad it was at least. An hour later Janey returned, the courier’s backpack overloaded with supplies and a pile of guns clasped against her chest. She dumped the weapons in a heap near the door, and walked over to Twilight and Rick, taking off her pack as she did so. “Good news, I found a good amount of supplies, bad news, a fucking radroach nearly bit my tit off,” Janey exclaimed. “Boo hoo, cry me a fucking river, bitch,” Rick spat. “I’m sorry that happened,” Twilight tapped out. “Whatever. I found enough med-x to get you to the outpost,” Janey exclaimed. “Should also have enough stimpacks, bandages, and meds to get Princess back to a hundred percent, but the others out there are beyond my help.” “What if you just used some on me and the rest on them?” Twilight asked, gesturing to the crosses just outside. “I mean, there's only one of ‘em that would even survive the journey but taking them down would likely kill her,” Janey winced. “Sick fucks nailed some of their hands in place and I don't have enough meds to get everyone back to a hundred percent.” “Wait, her? Don't tell me Angela survived,” Rick remarked. “You know her?” Janey inquired. “Yeah, but I ain't saying nothing till you stick me with some med-x,” Rick spat. “Fine, whatever,” Janey muttered, pulling out a syringe and sticking it in the male’s upper arm. “Better?” “Getting there,” Rick murmured. “And the chick, if she's got red hair then that's Angela. Ended up in correctional for gambling debts, and drunken disorderly if I remember correctly. Decked the wrong cop, and ended up with the rest of us.” “We gotta save her,” Twilight implored, tapping out her response. “Fine, fine. But its your ass on the line,” Janey replied. “I think I found a wheelchair for uh, who are you again?” “Box-I mean, Rick,” the lone male answered. “Whatever. Now hold still, I’m gonna doctor as best as I can but I am gonna tell you already that were going to have to get another look at ya before we head out on the road again,” Janey declared, walking over to Twilight. “That's okay. We’ll find a doctor either at the outpost or at Primm, which is where we’ll be dropping off Rick,” Twilight replied, tapping out her response on a fallen shelving unit. “Fine, I suppose we’d get the best deal for our loot there anyway,” Janey reluctantly agreed. The courier then knelt down and began unfolding a good number of medical supplies and other drugs. “Now, other than the obvious, is there anything other than pain that I should know about?” Janey asked. “Not really,” Twilight paused. “Well actually I was feeling weirdly irritable, and I still have some lingering chest pain.” “Anything else?” Janey asked, the girl looking down and avoiding the deathclaw’s gaze. “Memory loss and I guess I was really angry for some reason but I don't know if that's related,” Twilight answered. “That was justified,” Rick pointed out. “I suppose, but it still felt like it came out of nowhere,” Twilight stated. “Sounds almost like psycho withdrawal, but I don't know much about chems,” Janey answered. “Now hold onto something, cus I gotta dig all this shrapnel out of ya and I only got enough med-x for about a half hour so I’m gonna have to move quick.” Twilight grit her teeth. “Do it.”