Divided We Stand
The sun beat down on Knight Owen as he trudged his way up a large dune. A gust of wind flew over the dune from the other side, causing sand to fly down, scraping at his face and going through the holes of his power frame, hitting his burned arm and leg. He cursed at the pain, but kept walking up the tall hill of sand.
In the midst of the battle, a mini nuke had hit near him and detonated on impact. The blast had totaled his armor's left arm and leg, as well as his helmet. His chestpiece was damaged, but not destroyed. His left arm and leg had been burned, but he felt lucky it was only first and second degree. He also felt lucky his laser rifle was still intact and that his armor was still functional. His entire left half felt baked because of the armor still covering it, even more so that his right side. T-45 power armor always did have trouble dissipating heat.
Owen had absolutely no idea where he was. One minute, he was fighting against the wave of Outcasts, the next minute he was surrounded by sand and everything looked the same. He didn't know what caused the light that engulfed him, but it happened.
After a few minutes of trying to comprehend what had happened to him, Owen started to walk. About half an hour later, he picked up a signal on the beacon emitter that all Brotherhood soldiers carried. The signal was weak and spotty, but it was clear that it was Brotherhood from its call sign. Owen turned around in a few circles, walked in a few directions to try and find which way to go to get the signal to be stronger. Eventually, he found the correct direction. He walked for an hour or more, cresting several dunes while the signal got stronger, but as the signal got stronger so did the sun.
Owen readied his laser scattergun as he crested the hill, expecting maybe an ambush or a group of scavengers. Many a time raiders have used such signals to try and lure people into traps. There were no raiders, but there were some sights for sore eyes.
Brotherhood soldiers stood on the small sandstone plateau, checking their armor, weapons and selves. In the middle of them stood Paladin Vaughn himself, his T-60 power armor's metal shining in the heat of the day. There were three people in T-51 armor and a bunch in T-45 like his own, some damaged more, some less.
When they had all gone into battle, all of their armors had the white Brotherhood sigil on their chestplates, but that was pretty much it. Their armor wasn't painted the pretty red and black like they usually would have been. All resources went to the Prydwen when it was being built and that included paint. Vaughn's shiningly intact T-60 armor had rust spots, the T-51 suits had their ugly yellow and grey factory look and T-45's were just plain grey with rust spots. Various weapons were around, either having been set down, holstered or were being tinkered with, like Knight-Captain Stacker was with his rocket launcher's targeting system.
A knight-sergeant turned to look at him and turned again, addressing Paladin Vaughn.
"Sir, another knight has arrived." The unhelmeted paladin turned to face Owen and gave him a salute, his metal fist placed against his chestplate that shimmered in the sun from the metals and composites that made up his armor.
"Welcome back, knight. You look terrible. State your designation and tell me what happened to your armor." He said as Owen returned the salute.
"Knight Owens, OW-112K." Owen replied. "Feel horrible too, sir. During the battle, I was glanced by a mini nuke. Torched my arm and ripped the armor off of it like a tin can."
"We're all tin soldiers here, knight." Said the paladin, inciting a small feeling of deja vu in Owen. He opened his armor and pushed himself out of it, sitting on a small boulder next to it. He kept his jumpsuit's hood up in an attempt to prevent sunburn on his neck.
More came while Owen waited in the hot sun. Another sergeant and a few more knights, but after that there were no more. In total, the team was now composed of 1 paladin, 1 knight-captain, 4 knight-sergeants, and 9 knights.
Was that it? When they had set out for Fort Constantine, they were 55 strong. Now they were something that can only be described as barely a platoon. A battered group of 15 men and women. One of the knights wasn't even in power armor due to his being disabled in the fight.
The heat of the sands began to retreat as the sun lowered itself from the sky. The sky lit up with an array of pinks, reds, oranges, and yellows. Vaughn called everyone around for a meeting.
"Alright." He began in a strong commanding voice. "From what I can tell, absolutely none of us know where we are. Besides from the obvious, anyways. I have taken inventory of our supplies and rations. We have food for three days, water for nine days, and enough ammunition to last us if we're careful in choosing our fights. Tomorrow, we are going to move north. Knight Marla hid from a passing, and functional, train. When we find the tracks we will follow them. As we know, transportation leads to civilization.
"But..." He seemed to take a much more somber tone. "We can't tell if these civilians are friendly to Brotherhood soldiers. Marla didn't take the chance at meeting them. It might be a while before we can get more supplies. So, in light of this, I'm calling a ration on supplies until we can procure more."
A murmur hovered around the group of assembled troops. Murmurs of confidence that they would crush the civilians if they were hostile, murmurs of uncertainty of their situation, and murmurs of bullshit on the rationing. But, no matter what, people would follow the orders of Paladin Vaughn. Chain of command still exists when missing in action.
"Knight Cain and I will take first watch." Announced Vaughn. "The rest of you try and get some sleep. We have a long day ahead of us tomorrow."
"Jesus christ." Field Scribe Millner said as he knelt and felt bile working its way up the back of his throat. What laid before him was a set of humans, all of them ripped apart and strewn about. The grey bulked form of intestines leaked from abdomens and blood seeped from evulsions, bite marks, and missing chunks of flesh. Strangely, all of the civilians appeared to be naked.
There were seven bodies. Five native adults, a child, two Brotherhood knights and in the middle laid some sort of mutated creature. Across its body were deep 3rd and 4th degree burns as well as bullet holes. Millner had seen and read about many creatures, but this one's identity escaped him. It had the tail of a radscorpion, but the body of some sort of large cat and large webbed wings that extended from its back. This was an unusual mutation, but an undoubtedly capable one.
The hissing and clanking of armor turned his attention up towards Millner's commanding officer. Knight-Commander Gabriel looked at the scene, his helmet blocking all emotion to be seen. But, due to his uncomfortable posture of switching his weight from foot to foot, it would appear that he was also disturbed by the macabre theater before them. The battle was fresh, only having happened a minute ago.
Knight-Commander Gabriel was a very able commander. He was given many awards for his valor in battle and was in the vanguard in the invasion of Adam's Air Force Base. However, despite his valor, he had a thing against mutants and ghouls.
His armor was all T-51 except for two parts. His crestpiece and right arm were T-60.
"Search the perimeter. Look for survivors." He said as he pointed his plasma rifle at the mutant and fired three shots into its chest to make sure it was good and dead, each shot searing through dead flesh and flashing in a blast of green light. Knights spread about the area, stepping over parts of bodies and scanning the surrounding woods with their weapons. "Millner, help make a fire."
The clearing of green grass, now blotched with red, was circled by thick and dark barked trees. The canopy they made shadowed the woods and made it as if the warped bark of the trees had faces. The light of the day began to dim as the sun set beyond the trees and those in power armor who could activated their flashlights, their beams piercing through the darkness.
Soon after, they had made a bonfire and burned the bodies of the humans and the mutant alike. The pungent smell of charred meat would have been welcome if it wasn't human, that fact alone making it smell disgusting. Millner sat down on a fallen log and bit into an apple that was part of his supplies. Other knights sat around the fire and fiddled with their supplies as well.
Their group would have been a meager 16 people from the 55 that voyaged out to Fort Constantine. But now it was 14 people with two damaged power frames, plenty of spare parts, and extra guns with ammunition. Of course, they would have to sabotage the unused frames and leave what armor they didn't use in repairs. They would also take the guns and ammo.
Millner wondered what those two knights saw before they were killed. Did they have time to talk to the people before they were mauled? Why were the civilians naked and why do they look so... off? Their features were more pronounced, yet compact at the same time. Their bodies were also strange, being more slender and seeming malnourished. Who were these people?
He felt a tap on his shoulder and turned to see Lancer Johnathan. Johnathan was the one who piloted Millner's vertibird to Fort Constantine and was able to keep it steady enough so they didn't die in the crash. John's right bicep had a bandage around it, but only a little blood showed through it. In the fight, he was clipped by a shot from a minigun before he could fully get behind cover.
"Mind if I sit with you?" He asked. Millner patted the space next to him and John sat down. He reached up and clutched at something on his chest. Around his neck, along with his holotags, was a necklace. The necklace was a golden chain, no more no less. He said it belonged to a dear friend. He believed it to be a good luck charm and it might as well be, because it's worked so far.
"What do you think about all of this?" He asked.
"Hm?" Millner said through the apple in his mouth.
"About all of this. The sudden change of things, the dead bodies, all of that stuff."
"Well, I don't think anything about it." Millner lied. In truthm he couldn't stop thinking about it.
"Bullshit. You think a damn lot and you know it."
Millner sighed and looked at Johnathan's smooth face and long hair. A wisp of a beard was starting to appear on his shaven face. "Shit seems REALLY fucked. Two knights killed by a new form of mutant, our only current chance at some form of explanation torn apart, and it's only a matter of time before we run out of ammunition and fusion cores."
"Seems pretty accurate to me." John said as he stood up. "I'm going to sleep. Wake me when shit isn't so fucked."
Millner turned back to the fire. He had spoken the truth. If they didn't find civilization, they had nil hopes of finding the Brotherhood again. John seemed to have the right of it, going to sleep. Sleep usually helps reasoning.
Usually.
Bound to be some typos.
Also, just as a test of my own skills, I made two of my characters is SFM. What do you think?
Knight Owen
Knight-Commander Gabriel
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I love it when an author makes a picture of how their character looks, makes it so much easier to imagine them while reading.
Ooh, new chapter....
faces and poses could use some work, but for a beginner its pretty good
Holy shit my team kill bullet worked
It's getting more and more confusing by the chapter. You need to start focusing on one group of people at a time, or we'll end up with a tangle and nobody knowing who's actually in focus at the moment. Doesn't help that power armor wearers blur together in my mind, even with the descriptions you provided.
Okay, things are getting even more confused.
I hope there will be an explanation soon...
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I made Owen's face slightly sympathetic on purpose and I don't know what other poses I would put them in.
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I try to give them all unique attributes. The groups will usually be defined by their leader (a.k.a Vaughn and Gabriel).
Owen's armor is half destroyed. Vaughn is the only suit of full T-60. Gabriel has his T-60 chest and arm. Millner is the only scribe and Johnathan is the only lancer (Both in Gabriel's group).
Okay, now the confusion is REALLY mounting up. You need to start focusing in on one group for one or several chapters at a time.
Also, you have a tendency to instantly switch from 3rd person to 1st person without giving any warning whatsoever. Makes it a bit strange when people see 3rd person writing in one paragraph and then 1st person writing in another.
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My writing often gets split up by days.
This chapter is supposed to be in first person. Please tell me the typos.
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Right here:
It goes from third to first person without a warning
8795716
fixed
Great introduction of the new characters. Xd
Don't get me wrong, I like this story a lot! But I really want to see what's happening with our main character in canterlot.
By looking at your fo ocs, they for some reason give me a Fallout: Tactics vive
I like this and hope to god that there will be more.
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https://www.fimfiction.net/blog/810887/yhay-stwof-edits
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Five months shit
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*Chuckles* You mean to chaos emeralds?
i.imgur.com/f5UyJ57.png
MOAR!
YHaY? What's that mean?
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Your Human And You
I WANT MORE CHATPERS NOW!!!
*poke *poke * guys i think this ones dead
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BITCH I'M AWAKE ALREADY
9164035HOLEY SHIT THIS ONES ALIVE
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*in Austrian acent* ITS ANGRY!
Is this dead?
Please don't let it be dead.
I like this.
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i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/000/786/770/e6f.jpg
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Hooray!
9034231
this is true till what your level 58 when you have like a 1000 fusion cores