The Lone Wanderer is thrown into a world where humans are dumber than rocks. This is going to be a loooong day.
(11/17/17 Featured!) (2/12/18 Featured again!)
The Lone Wanderer.
A young man who has seen so much in so little a time. He was only nineteen when he left his home, vault 101, in search of his missing father. He trekked the Capital Wasteland in search of him, gunning down raiders, super mutants and all other sorts of abominations to finish what his dad has started and bring back life giving water to the Capital Wasteland. Now, ten years later, he is thrown into a whole new world to explore. A world where humans are pets and horses can talk.
Large black and yellow metal boots pounded in sequence and side stepped an uprooted fire hydrant smashing into the ground with tremendous force. The impact sent bits of rock and irradiated dirt flying in all directions as the ground shook with the might of the giant who swung it. The small black and yellow armored figure on the ground continued to fire green beams of light from the rotating barrels of its weapon at the mutated colossus that had swung the red hydrant at him.
This colossus was known as a super mutant behemoth, a tall, hefty and much more feared variant of the standard super mutant. It carried a fire hydrant that it had ripped from the ground and used it as a rudimentary club to hit stuff with. This behemoth was recently agitated by a much smaller human in thick black armor.
That human was Alexander Meredith.
Or The Lone Wanderer, whatever you prefer is alright with him.
Mr. Meredith was a hardy man, capable of getting thrown by a deathclaw into a puddle of toxic waste and shaking it all off like it was nothing. Although, he always wore his bulky suit of power armor, an experimental X-03 'Hellfire' model that he had customized with a personal color scheme and worn decals to make it more... wearable for him.
The paint job consisted with a yellow lead based paint that transferred radioactive particles into extra power for his armor while also being flame retardant. On each of his arms was a yellow '101', a small reminder of where he came from, on his chestplate was a nuclear insignia on the left side and a black 'Lyons' Pride' sigil painted on the front next to it. All this was to remind him where his loyalty truly lies, not with the glorified hoarders that the Brotherhood turned into when Sarah Lyons died.
'Sarah...'
The armor was the best you could find in the wasteland, made from duraframe and created with many built in utilities, also some that Alex had made himself. On his power armored back was large metal backpack that he filled with all sorts of goodies and attached to his suit are multiple weapons that all had their uses. But he currently wasn't bothering with any of those, because he was using his beloved L30 gatling laser that he had dubbed Vengeance.
With his armor, weapons and faith in a mixture of karma, science and luck, Alexander always thought there was hope in the world, even in the darkest of hours. This ideal carried him through many situations.
The ruins of D.C.
The horrors of the vaults.
The invasion of the Enclave.
He had survived it all because he had hope. Nothing brought him down because he knew he would prevail, no matter how long it took. Not even this Behemoth that was being a bitch to kill.
Alex kept firing Vengeance's unusual green lasers at the behemoth, slowly wearing down its rock hard skin. Before long the behemoth got too tired to fight anymore and was being pushed to his limits with its charred flesh hanging on nothing more than a string. He raised his fire hydrant once more in retaliation and brought it crashing down, sending a shockwave that made Alex stumble for a second, only for him do recollect his composure a mere second later.
The behemoth fell to the ground face first, unable to fight any longer. Alex took this chance to walk up to the mutants head, set Vengeance down on the ground, and pull Bleak Days from the clamps on his back that held it in place. Bleak Days was a prototype gauss rifle that he had collected from the locked technology vault that he had reopened with the completion of the combat simulation with all safeties off. Alex charged up the electromagnets that made up the gun's mechanics with three cranks of the handle as he said his goodbyes to the behemoth.
"See you in the next life buddy." Alex said in his static roboticized voice.
He pulled the trigger of the gun, thus sending the charged and shrieking 2mm electromagnetic round through the skull of the mutant and leaving a large hole for which blood to dripped through. The leaned the rifle on his pauldron and breathed a sigh of exhaustion.
"Damn, that took longer than expected. How didn't you blast a hole through him the first time?" He asked his gauss rifle. He shrugged his shoulders and lifted Bleak Days over onto his back and felt the clamps that held it lock down the gauss rifle in place. He went over to the dead behemoth to search for items, but something caught his eye.
There was a bright gleaming amongst the rocks in the shopping cart on its back. He went over to it, opened the cage and pulled back several large rocks to reveal a small handful of gems. There were six and each gem was a different color, but there was a purple one that the shining was emanating from. It was as if they were covered in a layer of lightning, just like the shocksword that he had sheathed on his hip.
"How did you get your big green hands on these?" He asked the mutant behemoth as he looked down at its dead body, getting nothing but the stench of death and the harsh wind in response. "Right."
But really, how did these small multicolored crystals get in here? Did the behemoth pick them up by accident? It was all confusing and improbable, but Alexander's curiosity shone brighter than the gems themselves. He slowly and cautiously reached for them with his robotic hand, only for the shining to intensify a hundredfold, blinding him.
Then everything went black.
A fresh scent wafted over Alex. A scent he has only smelled in one place. The scent of... nature. He slowly opened his eyes, finding them to be as heavy as cinder blocks. Once he pried them open, he could see some obvious differences.
First off, his power armor HUD had gone from a yellow-orange to a deep flashing red, telling him that the armor was in emergency lockdown mode and had locked all joints into the resting position. Second off, he was looking down at... grass. Not the dead dried up grass of the wasteland, but actual living green grass that looked like it was tended to often. This raised a massive amount of questions as the only place that had grass was oasis and even they didn't cut it neatly like this. He tried moving, but he didn't budge. He remembered that he was still in emergency lockdown mode.
"Lockdown override code Omega-BC-121." He said and every joint in his body made a clunking sound as the magnetic locks were released. It had taken him weeks to find out how to create a lockdown code with an Enclave terminal and even then it was a pain to code it into the suit.
He stood straight up again and took in his surroundings. There were finely trimmed hedges, large trees, vibrant flowers, grass all around and a clear blue sky dotted with perfectly rounded white clouds. Vengeance was lying in the grass a few feet away from him, as if looking up and enjoying the lovely day. So, he decided he would too.
With a single thought, the back of the power armor opened up, fresh air replacing the stale. He folded his arms forward and pushed his broad form out of the armor and onto the grass, the armor closing. The air was warm and clean and the green surroundings just seemed to stretch on. He stretched his arms up, hearing several pops in his back and shoulders. He had been in that suit a while and it felt good to feel something other than metal against the suit he wore under it.
The suit that he was wearing inside his X-03 power armor was a suit of prewar chinese stealth armor that he had gotten along with Bleak Days in the technology vault. He had found great use in it and its ability to act as a reusable stealth boy, even if it did use the auxiliary power of power armor when he activated the stealth field inside a suit. It had helped him in many a sticky situation.
He pressed a small button situated on the side of his head, the golden visor and the black face mask of the armor sliding up and over his head, exposing his scarred face to the open world. There was a small patch of light brown hair poked out from the front of the hood and his blue eyes were taking in all the information they could. He took a deep breath in, filling his nose and lungs with new scents. He looked around with a bit of scrutiny, looking for all the slightest details.
"I don't think we're in Kansas anymore." He said to nobody. But that doesn't mean nobody heard it and he knew that very well because they weren't very good at sneaking around and eavesdropping.
Out of the corner of his right eye, he could see something looking through the shrubs at him with wide dish-like eyes. From what little he could tell about it, it looked like some small form of equine that was pastel green with an oversized head and rather vulnerable eyes. It was breathing so heavy and panicked he could shoot it in the dark.
He turned his head to look at it fully. As soon as he did that, it booked it out of the bush and ran- no, galloped- away over a hill and towards...
"Holy. Shit." Was all Alex could say as he crested the hill and looked at the gold lined purple and white spires of a massive castle that had a rock face running up its side. A waterfall cascaded down the wall of rock and ran in a river under a drawbridge and then kept going until it fell off the mountain. It was the most wondrous thing he had ever laid his eyes on. The sheer size and detail of it was immaculate.
He stood staring at the magnificent spectacle, but a sound gaining purchase of his attention was increasing. It sounded like the creature was coming back, but there was more than one set of thumping... no, clopping. This could only mean trouble. He pressed the button on the side of his head, resealing his face within the stealth armor while he ran towards his power armor. He grabbed the handle, turned it roughly and stepped black as it opened up. Hopping in and being resealed into the suit, he tromped over to Vengeance and picked up the large death machine with his metal hands.
He pulled the lever on the side of the large weapon, the claws that held its power source in place opening and ejected the fusion core within it and Alex caught it as it flew out. He would have to check its charge later so he placed it in a small leather loop on his hip and grabbed a fresh one. He placed the fully charged fusion core into the empty slot and pulled down the lever. The claws closing and pulling the powerful energy cell into the gun further, green energy began flowing through the gun like water through a pipe. He looked back up the hill and awaited the threat.
Over the hill came three of the equines, two fitted with all golden armor and carrying spears. The third was the same equine that had run off earlier. They all stopped dead in their tracks when they saw him.
Sergeant Bulwark was patrolling the Canterlot gardens along with another guard, a private, that he didn't know in the slightest. They were told to walk around and report stuff, like any patrol. But a gardener had ran up to them claiming that there was a big human in armor in the gardens. But the most absurd part of it is that she said it talked. So, as mandatory protocol, we went with her to see what ridiculous thing she though she saw. But now that he saw it...
...he was amazed and terrifed.
The human... minotaur... thing... was far taller than normal and was wearing weathered black and yellow armor, eyes glowing a bright orange. It carried a large silver, red and green device in its hands and had multiple other devices on its back and waist that looked like nothing he had ever seen, except for the sword in its scabbard. The large object it was holding had parts that were glowing green with life, almost pulsating.
In a bout of fright, the private he was accompanied by shot up a flare with his horn, alerting the rest of the Canterlot guards of threat. The flare that was only used if battles had started and we were outnumbered. Within seconds, more reinforcements arrived, including Princess Luna. She landed, glaring at the creature who was surrounded on all sides by guards from both divisions.
"Guards, what's the assessment of the threat?"
'Wait, did the blue horse with wings and a horn just talk?' Alexander thought. He might be able to salvage this meeting after all.
"It's just standing there, princess." Said one of the - as the big blue horse called them - guards. Well, it made sense, as they were all wearing armor and carried weapons. But it appeared that this nation has reverted to the medieval era that Alex had heard of in old prewar books. He could only guess that it was a nation on account of it having a princess.
Alex could see only one way to spur the conversation forward. He took his hand off the trigger of Vengeance and raised it up as if he was about to wave to them. The guards around him seemed to tense up at his movement and readied their spears and crossbows.
"We have more coming up on our right!" Knight Lucas yelled over the ringing of bullets and the shrieks of energy weapons. He was on the top floor on the left of the defensive formation, leaving him open to the Lyons' Outcasts bringing up on the right. Those forces fired upon them, joining their firepower with the one coming from the front.
Paladin Vaughn knew this situation wasn't something they could get out of. There were too many Outcast forces zeroed in on their location and they wouldn't let up the rain of fire on them. This mission wasn't supposed to be this bad. Lancer-Knight Mooris had already contacted the Citadel and given them their coordinates, but their signal was probably being jammed and even if it wasn't the reinforcements wouldn't arrive in time.
Vaughn leaned out from cover and laid down a barrage of lasers with his L30 gatling laser while several laser beams, bullets and shots of plasma pounded on his T-60 power armor and the area around him before he retreated back behind the tall concrete pillar he took cover behind. There had to be at least ten Outcast members coming from the front, the grey and blue paint scheme of their X-01 and X-02 power armor unmistakable. Vaughn was just glad a suit of X-03 wasn't on the field.
The Lyons' Outcasts were a large group of traitorous bastards who left when Elder Maxson put the Brotherhood back on the right tracks. Well, a small portion of them are. The rest were, in the words of Knight-Sergeant Donaver, pansy savages who have no knowledge or respect for the technology they posses and can't see that helping everyone would get them all killed.
Vaughn knew better than Donaver. Many of these so-called savages did have knowledge and respect for their technology and some knew how to use it pretty damn well, like the Outcast in X-02 armor that took out Knight Harris and Knight Saunya with a plasma rifle, a Knight-Commander as the rank that Vaughn could barely see on his chest depicted. That same Knight-Commander was leading the charge from the front, alongside several other troops and a fucking sentry bot.
Vaughn was tasked with leading an assault squad of Brotherhood troops and seven vertibirds on a mission far north of the Citadel, towards an old prewar military facility known as Fort Constantine. From rumor and reports from recon groups, Fort Constantine was believed to be the Lyons' Outcasts' base of operation. The squad for this mission was composed of himself, Knight-Commander Gabriel, Knight-Captain Dells, Knight-Captain Stacker, some Knight-Sergeants, a load of knights and even a few initiates.
He and his squad found that Fort Constantine was indeed the base of operations, to their dismay. As soon as they were spotted, their vertibirds were fired upon. Bullets, lasers and plasma whizzed past or hit their vertibird as they returned fire with the mounted miniguns and the rest with their own weapons. Paladin Vaughn ordered a retreat and the Lancers were more than ready to carry out that order.
However, when they were almost out of range, missiles were fired at them. Mooris dodged the one heading for him easily enough, but he held his breath of relief as the missile turned around and came back at him. A homing missile. He tried to dodge it again and almost did, but the missile clipped the side of the propeller and exploded, rocking the vertibird and sending it spiralling out of control. They crashed with a tremendous shock of twisted metal and fire.
The crash had killed Knight-Sergeant Frectin, Knight Merton, Knight Jackson and Initiate Turst. Missiles collided with the other vertibirds, sending them crashing down, killing many. Luckily, there was a ruin of a tall blasted out mostly collapsed concrete building nearby that attracted the attention of them and any other survivors of the crashes. They all flooded the building, garrisoning the building as best as possible. Vaughn went up the crumbling steps to station himself on the second level and the Lyons' Outcasts sent troops over the hill and down towards them. The vertibirds that were not shot down turned around and gave supportive fire, until they were shot down as well.
Several of Vaughn's troops around him were missing pieces of their T-45 and T-51 power armor. Damn it all, why did Maxson have to take most of the T-60 suits with him when he traveled to Boston? Knight Lucas then died to the constant barrage of firepower concentrated on them, him and his broken T-45 power armor falling from the edge of the third floor and hitting the large amount of debris on the ground. Vaughn did not know the brave knight, but he would be remembered, if by him alone. Another knight was finally able to kill one of the numerous Outcasts in a suit of X-01 armor, only to be replaced by another.
The Outcast sentry bot began slowing down as more and more lasers and bullets struck its thick armor plating, but it didn't stop its constantly spinning minigun. On it's other hand was a missile launcher that had just fired a rocket towards Knight-Commander Gabriel. He was able to get out of the way before the missile hit, instead striking the wall behind him, spraying concrete in a wide array.
"Sir, we need to push out of here!" Knight-Captain Martison yelled to Vaughn over the firefight from the bottom floor. "If we don't, they'll just pick us off one by one!"
He had a point. They were confined to this one spot, easy for the enemy to funnel their fire. When it came down to it, their options were move or die. This battle had no way of being salvaged. They had to cut their losses and run, all the while not getting blasted apart by Outcast forces. He began looking around for any solution for retreat available.
There was only one option, but it was beyond risky. There was an open field behind their blasted out building that led to a cliff that he saw when he was in the vertibird. Down the rocky drop was a field filled with cover in the form of trees and boulders, with a town in the distance. If they could only...
A small sound pierced through the background of Vaughn's hearing. It was small, almost unnoticeable. It wasn't ringing in his ears, it was coming from somewhere. It was a very small high pitched shrieking noise, unlike any energy weapon. He turned to look at the source, a small pile of dust in the cover of the second floor. Sitting on that pile of dust was a set of multicolored crystals. When he looked at them, the noise stopped.
All noise stopped.
He took a step towards the crystals. They were so transfixing that he could not take his eyes off them. Vaughn was never a man for collecting shiny things, but these were different. He stepped closer to them and they seemed to glow with a strange light.
"Identify yourself, fiend." Said one of the guards, standing out from the rest. He wore purple and gold armor, opposed to the plain gold or blue around him. Alex supposed this meant that he was of a special rank.
"No need to be so damn rude about it. Name's Alexander Meredith, but most just call me the Lone Wanderer." He replied to the officer while putting his hand down. Alex was many things and had many titles, but he figured he should just start off with his most basic ones. Also, by the way the officer looked like he was about to explode, Alex could only guess he didn't particularly appreciate the 'so damn rude' comment.
"Remove thine helmet. From what our servant has reported, you are a being that should not be able to talk as you do." Said the large blue horse. Seems like they speak 'ye olde' too, to some extent. No sense in disobeying the goddamned princess of the kingdom. Alex didn't want to end up in a dungeon. He would probably break out in the first day, but still, impressions mattered.
"Well, lets see if that's true." He said as he set Vengeance down with a thump, causing the other guards around him to tense up even more at the sound. They seemed pretty jumpy, probably scared. Alex reached his metal hands up and grasped his power helmet, removing it from the magnetic locks that kept it in place and exposed the gleaming gold-orange visor and black plating of his stealth armor. The horses continued to look more and more perplexed as the unmasking continued.
Alex placed the duraframe helm under his arm and reached his hand to the side of his head, causing the guards to quickly break into a combat stance, shoving their spears in Alex's face threateningly. He held his hand back up to - hopefully - show that he was no initial threat.
Alex was no stranger to being wary of things that he did not recognize or understand, as he had also been that way for a while after leaving his home, Vault 101, where he had grown up without any knowledge of the outside. He could still remember his reaction to the wasteland before him, astonished beyond measure, yet uncertain and scared. That fear turned to acceptance quickly, though.
The guards seemed to back off slightly and Alex placed his hand back to the side of his head. He pressed the small switch there, the visor and face mask of the stealth armor sliding up and over his head, revealing his worn and weathered face. He pulled the stealth armor's hood off and let it lay around his neck, running one of his gauntlets through his messy brown hair.
Alex's face... has seen better days. His chiseled features were covered in a thin layer of sweat and dust and various small scars and burns were dotted around his face, the most noticeable being the long thick line of scar tissue that ran down his face from his right temple, over his right eye, over his lips, and down his neck to the collarbone.
His eyes were blue, his left one faded and almost grey. If you took the time to have a glancing look at his right eye - the eye the scar ran over - you could easily see that the eye wasn't actually natural. There was a small lining of metal around the eye socket and the iris seemed to dilate at random. The sclera was a light and polished grey and fibers of the iris were minuscule blue strands of fiber surrounding the glossy black lens that was the pupil. The right eye's color was unfaded, a perfect blue.
He had lost his eye in a fight against a deathclaw. Bastard got him good, but Alex had gotten him better.
"Well, here it is." He said with open arms, his helmet in his left hand. "This is me."
The 'thwack' of a crossbow was heard and a heavy metal bolt hit against Alex's left pauldron. The bolt barely did any damage -just a scratch to the paint - but another of the guards took it as a cue and shot one into Alex's back, somehow doing even less damage. Alex swiftly put his power helmet back on, leaving the stealth armor's hood lying around his neck. If one person in a mob does something, more were sure to do it. Mob mentality, Alex recalled it as.
He was right. As soon as he had his helmet secured, he was bombarded by more bolts all over my body. They all just collapsed and bounced off of his armor, but when they hit his helmet it rang in his ears. Blasts of energy slammed into his armor and spears were thrust at him. The energy shots left small scorch marks and the spears just glanced off. Alex was damn near invincible, but it would be sooner or later the guards would become calculated and try to search for one of the very few weak spots in his armor. A voice tried to make itself be heard, but it was soon drowned out by the varying sounds of weaponry and armor.
Alex didn't want it to come to this, but he had no choice. He reached down, grabbed Vengeance and began its warm-up. The barrels began spinning and after a second they began spitting green lasers. The lasers smacked into the golden armor of the guards, almost punching clean though it. The reason it didn't was probably because of the sheen and material of their armor deflected some or absorbed some, respectively. The guards didn't stop, so Alex had to keep going.
He went in a wide arc around me, throwing energy in every which way, always hitting something. The horses cried in agony as their flesh was scorched and their armor heated or melted onto them. Alex could only imagine the pain they must have been in. If they were within reach, he punched them in the face with my duraframe fist, being careful only to knock them out. It was a much better solution that just killing them outright.
After a few seconds, Vengeance just... shutdown. Alex shook it to try and get it to work, but he soon realized the problem. The small counter just above the fusion core slot in Vengeance read a big fat:
'000'
'Must not have put in a fully charge core.' He though as he braced myself and charged though the crowd around him, either running over or throwing guards out of my way, probably giving many concussions and broken bones.
Alex finally pushed to the edge of the circle into a clear field and set Vengeance down. He knew there would be no time to reload it, so he grabbed at his waist and found the grip of his shocksword. He unsheathed it from its simple scabbard and flicked the switch on its hilt. The already prominent blue glow grew brighter and electricity arced across the blade.
There weren't many uninjured guards left standing. A horse with wings dive bombed Alex and he planted his sword across its right wing, causing it to veer off and hit the ground headfirst. More of the equines started to charge at him and he easily dispatched them. Arcs of electricity flew from one guard to another and damn near cooked them. They all either dropped or fled.
The last few guards ran or flew away, presumably to get reinforcements, while Alex stood amongst the bodies of at least forty guards, injured or otherwise. Cries and groans of pain could be heard every now and then. He breathed in a deep breathe and let it flow out of him as he recomposed myself.
Alex examined his armor and was disappointed. The power armor was dotted with a variety of scorch marks, scratches, and things that could only be described as shallow dents. He flicked the switch on his sword and put it back in its scabbard, then picked up vengeance and loaded a new fusion core, making sure it was a fully charged one.
A low groan came from a guard in the center of the crowd and Alex stepped over the other guards to go and get a good look at him. The guard was covered in the standard plates of gold armor, although the center of his breastplate was badly dented in and warped into a sheen of multiple colors. His breathes were labored as he tried to stand up as Alex walked closer, the servos of his armor whirring and the duraframe plates clanking together. The guard was barely balanced on his four hooves when Alex reached behind his head and grabbed him by the skin of his neck. A horn poked from his helmet and Alex recognized him.
He was the one who fired the first shot.
"Why?" Alex asked him as he looked at Alex with wide teary eyes. "WHY!?" Alex yelled.
Alex turned the guard to face his fallen comrades and shook him around for good effect. "LOOK AT WHAT YOU CAUSED! YOU DID THIS!!" Alex shouted at him at the top of his lungs. The guard had shot a crossbow at him, spurring the fight. An utterly unnecessary one, at that. Because of him so many of his fellow soldiers were dead or dying. Alex didn't want to kill anybody here. He just wanted relations to go smoothly and without complications, but the guard ruined that. He attacked and began a mob mentality.
Alex bashed him in the side of his head with his hand, causing him to go limp, and dropped him to the ground. Alex placed his hand back on Vengeance and chose his destination.
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.
The sound of heavy footsteps and the whirring of servos took their place against the silence as the sounds echoed down the vaulted ceilings of the hallway. The hallway was adequately wide and decently tall, as were many of the doors. Alex had no problem with catching his armor or bumping his head when he walked through them. That was an occasionally problem that happened with hallways in abandoned homes or offices back in the Capital Wasteland. He was a pretty big guy, even without his armor.
But mostly, over all things, everything was immaculately CLEAN. Besides the floor where Alex had tracked dirt in, anyways. The marble floors made his armor look absolutely filthy.
The walls were lined with carefully woven tapestries, brilliant oil paintings, smoothly cut statues, and the floor had a bright velvet carpet laid on the floor in the center of the hallway.
On his way to the castle he made sure to stay away from the city itself. When he got to what appeared to be the entrance to the castle - a thick wooden drawbridge over a moat that came from the waterfall coming off the mountain - there were no guards to meet him. The drawbridge was down, but the front gate was closed. It hadn't taken much effort to push it open in power armor, but it still raised questions.
The pegasi had flown away from the battle and back to the castle, but there were no reinforcements or resistance to meet Alex. Either it was very poorly planned, or - an immeasurably more likely plan - they wanted him to come in. So, with caution, he entered the looming pastel castle. There was nobody waiting for him in the spacious front hall and he hadn't been confronted since he started walking the castle's fancy halls, but he still kept his guard up.
Now, as he approached the large wooden door at the end of the hall, he checked his compass for any abnormalities. Of course, there was. Several markers had appeared on the compass, all pointing to possible hostiles behind the door. If Alex played his cards right, he would be able to do it right this time. It would be hard, but worth it.
The door was around twice his height - he would guess around 14 feet or so - and was fancily inlaid with gold trimmings and designs. However, the hinges appeared to be made of iron. With both his personal and amplified mechanical strength, Alex would have little trouble busting the door down if it would be called for.
In light of the new situation, he did what he thought to be the best thing to do.
He politely knocked on the large door.
He waited for several seconds and watched the ticks on his compass move around as small bit. The markers remained a small to medium size, telling Alex that they either couldn't or did not want to get close to the door. After about 30 seconds he knocked again. The ticks on the compass got no bigger than they already were.
"Alright then, guess I have to intrude." Alex said as he placed his hands against the oak of both doors and gave them a heavy push. Considering their probable weight, the doors gave surprisingly little resistance to his efforts. They swung open on oiled hinges without a sound and opened to reveal what was on the other side.
Well, that would be what would have happened if what was on the other side of the door hadn't momentarily blinded him in a flash. Inside the mechanics of his helmet, two pieces of heavily shaded pieces of glass dropped down over the visor in time to prevent total blinding, but some still got through in the .05 seconds it took for the helmet to register the bright light. Small spots of changing color were still left in Alex's vision, but he was mostly able to see through the dark glass, although somewhat faintly.
The room he was in now was even taller and wider than the hallway, the walls were lined with massive marble statues and pillars of large extravagance. The red carpet that laid on the floor led down the length of the hall to a large golden...
Wait, what was that large lattice mass flying towards Alex? Ah yes, he believed it to be a big net made from iron chains.
Alex shifted his whole body to the right and launched himself with all the power his overclocked leg servos would allow him without ripping themselves apart. He catapulted out of the path of the iron net and rolled on impact with the ground, chipping, cracking, and breaking some of the marble. The net landed with a tremendous crash that reverberated through the whole chamber, reaching the ears of about... seventy or so.
A golden layer of equine creatures blocked any further view of the room. They looked like the ones from the confrontation in the gardens, just more, plus a few additions. Some unicorns in black and red armor stood on the frontlines and two soldiers in reinforced golden plate stood by another tall equine like the one he saw in the gardens. However, this one seemed to be slightly taller with opposite colors. Possibly a more powerful variant or another princess.
The situation was quickly degrading already and if he didn't do something quick it would be another bloodbath.
"STOP THIS!" Alex shouted as loud as he could, activating his power helmet's voice amplified module. He had made it, but rarely used it, so it was a little dusty and it warped a small bit.
'I need to fix that.' He thought as the heard it himself, but the current situation always came first.
"You know, maybe I DON'T want to be attacked." Alex said with intentional sass. It was useful once in a while. "Maybe I want to talk and try to avoid conflict, but NOOOO, you just want to throw guards at me seeing if they can make a dent in my armor. Seriously, DID YOU SEE WHAT HAPPENED OUT THERE IN THE GARDEN!? THAT WAS AN ABSOLUTE BLOODBATH!!" The warp was better now, but how long had it been since he had yelled that loud? Years? Jeez, the last time was...
"DAMN YOU MAXSON!!"
...The last time he had seen Maxson, that little bastard.
"Who are you and why are you here?" Said the tall white creature. Alex got a better look at her and saw she was dressed - if they can really dress - expensively. Gold and jewels all over. Alex took his power helmet off once more so he could talk more clearly that through the helm's amplifier.
"First of all, I would like to say the standards of hospitality here are terrible. I have yet to be offered a drink. Secondly, please keep your guards under control. I assume you know what happened when a few got a little too trigger-happy."
"You have yet to answer my question."
"Fine. I won't bother you with the full details at this moment, so just call me Alex. I am a human." Alex said with as much of a curtsy he could muster in the chunky suit while carrying a heavy weapon in one hand by the front handle and his helmet hanging in the other. Grace was not one of his strong suits.
"A human, you say." Said the tall white equine, her face having a thinking expression. She turned to a few of the others and talked in hushed voices.
Seriously, Alex knew what horses were, but can these even be classified as horses? Bodies too small with heads and eyes that were too big. What were they? Some form of mutation? Alex had already given up the notion that this was still the Capital Wasteland, so it's hard to believe such a beautiful place was filled to the brim with only mutants.
"Well... Alex... I hope you don't mind answering a few questions in a more... enclosed environment." Said the tall white horse thing.
"Like an interrogation room? I'm up for it." Alex said. He could tell the tall equine didn't expect him to be so blatant, but nonetheless she motioned some of the frontline unicorns over to Alex to lead him to wherever he was going.
