Minty Fresh & Powered Up!
Abigail checked the time on her PipBoy again and sighed. "The sun
went down quicker when we were riding in the cart."
"That's not something you want to be complaining about," Kyle said,
walking ahead of her. "If you want to camp early you'll be out here an
extra day."
From beneath her cloak, warding off the mid afternoon sun, Abigail
looked up to the mountainous horizon. There was an awful lot of nothing
between them and the mountains. Flat, dry, dusty nothing. It was enough
to make the vast majestic expanse of the surface boring. There could at
least have been the odd ruined city to break up the landscape. Or some
pre-war nutcase's shack. Or a rock. At least then she could have kicked
it for something to do.
"I know," she replied. "But when you said it was 'barren' up this
way I didn't realise that was compared to the rest of the *desert*. It's
depressing. I mean, I know there wasn't anything much around here even
before the war, but still..."
She left the sentence hanging, her point made.
"Actually, it's not as bad as I thought it would be," Sharn opined.
"It's peaceful out here. Once you don't have to worry about food and
water, it's a nice break from caravan runs and having to keep watch all
the time."
"You mean when it's your watch tonight we'll all be eaten by
mantises?"
Rathley was still in a bad mood, two days after losing his finger.
Nobody was humouring him about it, but they were giving him a bit more
space than they had before, as if they thought he might actually be
angry. Abigail wondered why, but kept those sarcastic thoughts firmly to
herself. To his credit Rathley did still seem as alert as ever as he led
them north-east, despite his lingering and justified resentment.
"Come on," Sharn shrugged. "There's nothing out here. Not even wild
brahmin. Hell, I bet Chopper's going to be stirring RadAway into our
first cup of morning coffee once we get to Micasa."
"So we get done in by floaters instead of bugs," Rathley said with a
snide tone. "Fuckin' great."
"Alright old man, we get the picture." Kyle quickly defused them
both. "We might still run into something up here, so we might as well
stay sharp."
"Something like what?" Abigail asked. "If there *are* any old towns
out here won't they have been found already?"
She checked her PipBoy's old map records, to see what might have
been around before the war. Not that there was much point, according to
Kyle.
"It's not towns we're looking for. They were mostly built out of
timber, and *nothing* like that survived for dozens of kilometres around
the Cobalt Line. We don't know what the hell kind of bombing could have
made the Line, but it must have been pretty obscene.
"What we're after is the small installations. Train yards, service
stations, bunkers... Isolated places that wouldn't have burned up or
been hit head on. You can get some good junk out of them."
Abigail still wasn't convinced. "By why wouldn't anyone else have
found them already? People haven't explored up here yet?"
"Nope. Back in the day everyone thought the founders were mad to
even think about building a town like Corva so close to the Cobalt Line.
They were scared, and they still are. There's the mantis swarms and
mutant freaks like floaters, but for the most part it's just because
there are safer routes to take. The caravan routes go the opposite way
out of Corva, east and *then* north, because it's a well known and well
guarded route. Sure, the raiders know about it too, but they can be
driven off more easily than up here, where you have to make your own
path and no-one would know where to find you if you went missing."
"That's why us Scavs exist," Sharn said. "No-one else wants to risk
exploring just for the sake of scavenging and mapping out routes no-one
wants, so we have to take advantage of that before another Scav does."
"So why *do* you bother?"
Chopper answered that. "Because when we do find something, it's all
ours. We can set the price for the information, and we own *everything*
we can carry out."
***
Night did fall many hours later, and it was with great relief that
Abigail dropped her travelling bag and helped them all erect the tent.
Evidently their caravan riding recently had spoiled them all, because
even Sharn - ever the outdoors girl - was massaging her calves when they
finally sat down to eat.
"Maybe Mayor Golway gave us an easy ride," she said while Abigail
tended the shish kebabs that hung over their fire.
To Sharn's delight Kyle took over the task of massaging her legs,
and she flopped back into the fine sand.
"A little luxury is good for us every now and then," her lover said.
"A proper bed, a bath tin, bar food... Let's face it, we needed to wind
down."
Chopper agreed wholeheartedly. "Surveying the edge of the Cobalt
Line is rough. Especially with the radiation we'd been soaking up. We
might as well make it easy on ourselves when we go out there. Call it
compensation."
"I'd call it dangerous," Abigail said, but she knew what her
companions were like, and she wasn't really worried. If they could
handle raiders and the super mutant, they could handle the worst the
desert could throw at them. And besides-
"Hey, don't knock it," Kyle grinned. "We found you out there, didn't
we? I don't know what the odds of that were, but *I* wouldn't have bet
on them."
"I know, I know." Abigail held out one of the skewers, set with
gecko meat and chunks from several varieties of what were supposed to
vegetables. Or was it fruit? Abigail couldn't tell. They were edible at
least and she didn't *think* they could be animal, what with the stalks
and seeds.
Regardless of what it was Kyle took it and passed it to his
girlfriend, who accepted the meal eagerly. Abigail passed the others
around to Kyle and Chopper, while Rathley took his with a silent nod
before resting back against the comfortably shaped rock he had picked to
camp beside. Quite how any rock could be comfortable she didn't ask. He
would be the one sleeping against it, not her.
Finally she bit into the knobbly fruit on the end of her own skewer,
and chewed thoughtfully. It was sort of soft but firm, like an over-
preserved tomato or an under-ripe pear, and tasted both vaguely sweet
and sour at the same time. Combined with the faint taste of the firewood
it was actually quite nice, though she was both tired and hungry enough
to have accepted Chopper's disgusting root paste without complaint.
She moaned slightly with satisfaction as she swallowed. "I thought
we were never going to get dinner. I'm so tired."
Chopper gave her an amused, questioning look. "Listen to you now.
You did better when you were half dead from radiation poisoning. At
least you had a reason to complain then!"
"Shut up, we've been walking all day. I'm tired, and I ache, and I
want a bath that I know I won't get."
At least she was used to the smell now. Everything on the surface
smelled bad, and her nose had been forced to re-calibrate or else flee
in her sleep. Thankfully it had not chosen the latter.
Chopper uncurled her legs and brushed the tip of her boot up
Abigail's aching thigh. "Then we'll have to find some other way to
relax."
Abigail was too tired to suppress her blush. Not that she wanted to.
She was getting to enjoy the inappropriately timed flushes of heat in
her face, and what they tended to lead to.
"As long as you brush your teeth. I don't want to get bits of gecko
meat halfway through."
"Nice, Abby."
At the side of the fire Rathley finally let out a huff at the
various displays of affection around him. "Oh fuck this shit! If you're
all gonna start fuckin' again then keep it the fuck down!" He got up
with what looked like great effort and circled the large rock, taking
his half eaten kebab with him.
"Now I know what I'm gonna buy with all these fuckin' caps," he
grumbled, not quite out of earshot. "A fuckin' whore slave."
"No you fucking won't!" Sharn called back, but for some reason she
didn't look like she believed his threat.
"Actually," Abigail said, "I knew I'd forgotten to buy something
yesterday. I'm almost out of toothpaste. Can I borrow some of yours
tomorrow?"
Chopper blinked at her, before stifling a chuckle. "Sorry, heh, I'm
out."
Abigail turned to the other two, but Kyle shook his head, while
Sharn looked at her with even more surprise than the others had. "What-
paste?"
"... You're kidding, right?"
***
"You guys are mean."
Chopper smirked at her from where she lay under her coat. "If you'd
seen your face you'd have laughed as well! That was priceless."
"And it's not like we *have* any toothpaste anyway," Sharn added
from beneath her shared sheet with Kyle, but Abigail was having none of
it. "You really never noticed?"
"I'm not talking to you."
"Abby-girl! I was teasing!"
"Hmmph!"
Chopper had to laugh. "You made her mad, Sia."
Abigail stuffed her toothbrush and near empty tube of toothpaste
back into her wash bag before turning on her.
"So did you!" She frowned, unwilling to let the silly joke go. "So
I'm still dumb. Big joke." She stepped over Chopper, and already clad in
just her jumpsuit she pulled the edge of the heavy coat over herself,
pointedly facing away from her lover.
"You still have cola up here, even if it is mostly flat. I'm amazed
all your teeth don't fall out."
Sharn sighed, and ducked her head to try and meet Abigail's gaze.
"You know, most of us don't drink Nuka-Cola that much. I mean, it's
valuable in some places. It might not be rare yet, but it's pre-war
stuff, I think."
Kyle nodded from behind her. "Maybe there's an old factory somewhere
still making it - otherwise I'd be surprised it hasn't run out already -
but not around these parts. But why drink that crap when we can brew our
own booze?"
"Exactly." Chopper added. She laid a hand on Abigail's shoulder and
slid up beside her, beneath their makeshift blanket. "And brahmin powder
works well enough. That hot mint shit doesn't suit you."
"Ground up brahmin bone tastes better than peppermint?"
"You haven't complained yet."
Annoyingly, she was right. Kissing Chopper had never made her recoil
in disgust despite the fact that the highest form of dental hygiene on
the surface seemed to be baked and crushed cow bones and the humble
toothpick. Abigail frowned to herself again as Chopper's hand began to
wander.
"Stop it. I'm not in the mood."
It didn't help that Sharn looked nice and content with Kyle holding
her from behind, when Abigail herself was feeling so annoyed at being
embarrassed by them. Chopper was supposed to be a good seductress.
Couldn't she just take the hint and-
"How about this then?" Chopper asked, as she slid her arms around
her, spooning against her back and holding her protectively, but nothing
more. Just like Kyle did with Sharn.
"... That's okay."
Damn her for knowing just how to make it better, Abigail thought,
and she grudgingly let her annoyance go.
***
Kyle emerged from the tent the next morning and blinked owlishly as
the morning sun struck him full in the face. No wonder Abigail didn't
like mornings, he thought. It was bad enough for those of them who
*could* see in the sunlight.
"Sia? What's up? Has the old man put the coffee on?"
"Yes, he has," Rathley replied, not bothering to hide the bile in
his voice.
Kneeling by the small fire to the side of their camp Sharn held out
Kyle's battered tin cup. "Here. It's still warm."
"Still? You've been up with the insects old man?"
"You should've been and all, boy. Just as well 'Marie' was on watch
when I needed my stims."
True enough, Chopper was cleaning one of her stimpack needles with a
cloth, and turned to glower at him. "And if you want any more you'll
stop calling me that."
"Cry me a fuckin' river." Rathley clenched his bandaged hand into a
fist and gritted his teeth, but turned his attention back to Kyle. "Over
there, boy. Fancy a walk?"
He pointed to a darkened bit of rough ground in the distance,
blurred by the morning heat.
"You think it's something?"
"It's somethin' besides the bloody dirt."
Kyle knew that his lover had better eyes than him, and maybe better
than Rathley's, so he looked to her for an opinion.
Sharn shrugged. "It's not that far out, and it looks pretty big. I
don't think there's anything left standing though. It's probably just
rubble. We could ask Abby. She's got that map-boy."
As if on cue Abigail finally emerged from the tent, still blinking
the sleep from her eyes behind her shades. "My PipBoy? What? Can I have
some coffee before we start walking again please?"
Sharn handed her the last cup, which Abigail looked grateful for. To
Kyle she looked as though she'd run a marathon already. "It's a good
thing you bought it too. You only just got up and you look knackered."
Abigail just nodded. "I am. What time is it?"
Rathley snorted in something akin to disgust. "And *you're* on watch
duty tonight?"
"Oh shut up, Rathley. She'll be fine." Sharn dismissed him with a
middle finger. "Are you feeling better, Abby-girl?
Abigail nodded and sipped her coffee. "Yeah. But that was still
mean."
The last thing Kyle wanted was to drag *that* up again. He liked to
think that he was good with women, but damn, they just didn't know how
to get over something. Come to think of it Rathley wasn't doing too well
in that department either.
"Abby, can you do us a favour?" he asked, before the girls had a
chance to go back to their circular apologies - or what he hoped would
have been apologies. "Can you look up where we are on your PipBoy? I'd
like to see if that thing used to be anywhere special."
Abigail peered into the distance where he pointed, as if squinting
behind her shades. "Uh, okay." She rolled back her sleeve and pressed a
few buttons.
"Right, we're... here. Not much around, except an old highway that
we should have seen already."
"It's probably buried under the dirt somewhere," Kyle speculated.
That wasn't what he needed to know though. "And that rubble?"
"Rubble?" Abigail peered at it again, before shrugging and looking
back to her arm mounted screen. "It's... a caravan park, I think. Or a
car showground maybe? The map just says there's a motor shop around
there somewhere, but there's something recreational behind it. It's not
labelled though."
Kyle had to grin. Pre-war cars might never run again, but they did
at least tend to leave scavengeable husks. And if the shop had survived,
or even if it hadn't, mechanical parts and tools could fetch a nice
price from the right buyer.
From their smiles Sharn and Chopper evidently shared his enthusiasm.
"Shall we, ladies?"
***
The showground, or whatever it had once been, had been further away
than even the eagle eyed Sharn had guessed. It had drawn them much
further north than they had wanted to be - closer to the Cobalt Line -
but for its distance it was a much larger prize once they reached it.
The cars' corpses stretched out like a twisted metal maze, and while
little remained to show why, none of Abigail's companions actually
cared.
"So, what are we going to be looking for here?" Abigail asked as she
sat with them for lunch on the edge of the metal graveyard. Kyle had
looked over one of the blasted cars before deeming it safe and promptly
setting light to what remained of its worryingly synthetic upholstery,
giving something for them all to cook their gecko shish kebabs in.
"You're a mechanic," Kyle said. "Look for something usable and in
decent condition. Anything."
Rathley rattled off a list. "Charged fusion cells, cell regulators,
fans, coolant bottles, radios, passenger junk..." He sounded almost
bored, but he was helping, which was a big enough improvement. Evidently
the size of the place had improved his mood. "You want to keep your eyes
out for signs of other people too. Don't want to get shot in the back
when you're goin' through a glove box."
"Does that mean you aren't on battery duty?" Sharn asked. When
Abigail looked at her cluelessly she explained. "He's usually the one
checking the fusions cells. He's more techie than us."
"I'll leave that to the new gal," Rathley said. "I want to check the
shop."
He jerked his thumb behind him. The workshop looked fairly big and
it was still standing, though only barely. Like the cars and trucks
around it its metal walls were buckled and bent, and the roof had either
been torn off or been burnt away entirely.
Kyle nodded. "Fair enough. Abigail, you Sia and me will split up and
start going through the vehicles. Honestly, except for the fuel cells
don't worry too much about the machinery unless it looks worth lugging
around for two more days. By the looks of it most of these girls' cells
blew back when the war hit. It's the trucks and trunks we need to check.
Usable *goods* are better than usable *parts*."
Abigail nodded in understanding. "And what will you be looking for?"
she asked Chopper.
"I won't. You can have fun scavenging, I have meds to make."
"She guards the camp," Kyle added, "and if we holler she comes
running."
Rathley gave Chopper a dark smirk. "That's the idea anyway."
Chopper just returned the evil smile with one of her own and
continued to eat, which was more effective than any reciprocal threat.
"Anyway," Sharn said, leaving them to their stare off, "It's going
to take more than an hour to search this place, so either way it would
be nice to have a camp and some dinner to come back to after hauling our
loot around all day."
"You're letting her cook?" Rathley asked, and blinked, leaving
Chopper to look smug as the winner of their impromptu evil-eye
competition.
Sharn nodded, dead serious. "It's about time she took her turn."
***
Sharn had been right about how long the junkyard would take to
explore. Abigail had elected to take the west side of it, while Sharn
took the east and Kyle went right up the middle. It was easy enough to
split up, since several huge lorries lay as rough dividers, inside which
was Kyle's territory.
Abigail hadn't expected it to be quite so monotonous though. The odd
cry of exultation gave her the impression that Sharn was doing well, but
the whole thing just came down to dull methodical routine. Check the
fusion cell (dead), examine for any working parts (few, if any), check
the trunk (junk). Rinse, repeat and enjoy - not.
It wasn't a waste of time, far from it, but Abigail had got the
impression there would be more exploration and adventure to real Scav
life. Exploration, it turned out, was just a matter of enduring the
desert, and adventure would probably amount to getting shot at by more
raiders.
But that was life, and as unpleasant as it was she knew now that it
could be a lot worse. Compared to her brief and naive stint as a Merc
this was the better option by a long way.
She slammed another rusted boot shut and hauled her Bag of Swag
(Trademark of Abigail Iseley, Anti-Vault-Tec exploratory corporation)
over to the next burnt out vehicle. It was a cute old bubble of a van,
and Abigail only had to pull to open the engine cover. Whatever latch
there had been was no longer around, but the contents were all present
and correct, as far as she could tell. She knew nothing of motor
vehicles, but she understood the basic power systems. Whether it was a
truck or a hydroponics regulation system, they all used the same power
relays and fusion cells. Those cells just had to be plugged into the
correct system of regulators and adaptors for whatever they were
powering. Whoever had made those fusion cells a standard must have had a
tidy little monopoly before the war, Abigail thought.
The van's relays and drive system were burnt out and seized solid,
but remarkably the fusion cell still sparked when she pulled it from its
socket - the proof that it still held a charge. She would have preferred
to use a voltmeter, but apparently they didn't have those on the
surface, and just plugging and unplugging the battery a few times
looking for a spark was the accepted method for testing one. Thank god
the heavy little things were stable enough to deal with such rough
handling, because when one blew the miniature nuclear explosion would
vaporise anyone within twenty feet, and produce the most adorable little
mushroom cloud to send them off with. Abigail had seen it in her vault
training films.
Still, loot was loot, and they were very stable batteries. It was
just a shame that she only had three of them to show for her four hours
of scavenging. What she *did* have though was luggage. The cars had all
been in use when Armageddon had hit, and while most had been destroyed
through and through a few had preserved the suitcases inside them. While
basic everyday clothing might not be valuable it was at least *useful*,
Abigail had decided.
Civilian cars also came with car toolkits, and she had long stopped
bothering to collect their contents. She had enough good tools to make
herself an entire new toolbox, which would be a valuable addition to her
own supplies, despite its weight. It would not replace her vault
multitool, but it would complement it perfectly.
More worryingly, several cars also had guns in their glove
compartments. Abigail had known that people had owned guns even before
the war, but it had still unnerved her to find the defunct pistols
there. She had taken the ones that looked like they still might work,
but she had made sure that any safety devices were locked the way Kyle
had shown her. He would have to decide whether they would still work,
but since weaponry was so valuable on the surface she couldn't simply
leave them there.
Not that any of them really needed the caps, she thought as she
opened up the back of the van. They were apparently very well off after
their mercenary work, enough to buy their gecko meat instead of hunting
up iguanas, and they were still searching for things to sell when they
got to the next town?
She shrugged, and put it down to natural desire for security. If
they didn't get it, someone else would. Abigail had always been provided
with what she needed until leaving Vault 42 behind her, and even she
already understood her friends' need to be a part of the material wealth
race. The more they had now, the longer they could live without needing
to risk their lives, and the more comfortable they could make themselves
between jobs. They would be fools to pass up the opportunity to further
themselves just because they were not in desperate need right now.
It felt wrong, but she had already convinced herself that it was
just the culture shock talking.
She buried the unease and peered into the van. Whatever was in
there, it hadn't survived. All that remained was ash and metal struts,
outlining where the crates has been before they had burned up, along
with their contents.
Then a soft, metallic thump made her freeze.
She had seen nothing to suggest anyone else had been here. The
tools, weapons and luggage had been hers for the taking, and she hadn't
seen any footprints in the dirt besides her own.
But that had definitely been something close, knocking into the side
of a car out there. Kyle and Sharn weren't anywhere near her, so it
couldn't have been them.
She whipped around to see nothing but the wrecks surrounding her.
She forced her breathing to slow. There was no need to be jumpy. If she
was calm, she would be able to hear it again. Maybe it was just some old
tire finally giving way to its rim after she had disturbed it.
And then came a soft pat against the open van door, followed by a
wet, shallow chittering sound. Abigail froze again and the van door
swung slowly against her arm. That hadn't been human, and surely no
person could have got so close to her without being heard. Even now the
only noise to betray the creature's movement was a gentle brushing of a
tail against the blasted ground.
Abigail slipped a hand into her jacket pocket, and wrapped her
fingers around the square metal handle of a knife. She could do this,
she told herself. It was only an animal, and she was armed. She had
taken down a *super mutant* with those knives.
With lightning reflexes she darted from behind the van, slamming the
door closed...
And what met her eyes was like no animal she had ever seen, vault
videos or not. The first image to flash to mind, bizarre as it was, was
of an upturned kitchen ladle. A foot of pink, fleshy handle rested on
the ground while another four feet rose up to meet the thing's ungainly,
car-tyre head. Two horns - or were they fangs? - rose up from a small,
contorting mouth set into the side of that discus-like head and giving
it a front while the tail joined its circumference from the rear. From
beneath that flat fleshy mass hung gently swaying sacs or polyps, with
no pattern or function Abigail could divine, while the top of the flat
'head' sank inwards in a huge second, coarsely toothed maw.
A maw to where? She had no idea. It took up most of the 'head', and
the creature's tail at its widest was only as thick as her thigh. Where
it could keep any organs was a mystery, and the complete lack of eyes
anywhere on its fleshy surface made it an even more alien sight.
While ungainly, the thing didn't wobble or stagger. Its upright tail
flowed back and forth to keep its disproportionate head steady, and when
that head had come around to 'look' blindly at her it had merely glided
in a short, graceful arc. There was something hypnotic about that
movement, as if the creature was entirely invertebrate. And yet that
couldn't have been all.
The creature lunged at her, and as she watched transfixed she
understood. The slender final foot of tail had arched and contracted
like a caterpillar, and pushed, but it had not supported the creature's
weight. The head sailed forward, faster than Abigail had thought
possible, and its tail merely trailed along behind it leaving a faint
line in the dust. Somehow it... floated.
Then it was atop her, and there was only one thing she could do.
***
When Abigail's scream came Chopper didn't even bother to set her
medicine making aside before she was up and running. The bowl was left
to fall where it wanted, and if anything was left in it when she got
back, that would be a bonus.
This was a rare case for her - it was unusual for anyone to get into
trouble while scavenging, and if they did it was for basic medical help
or assistance in unearthing something valuable, and not reported by the
scream of fear that Abigail had let out. That's what they got for not
scouting the area first, and for leaving Abigail alone. The stupid,
adorable girl must not have stayed alert enough.
Chopper just hoped that whatever had happened was fixable. She
hadn't heard the crash of falling debris, so she hadn't been crushed,
but if the girl had been ambushed...
That was the flaw in their strategy. Chopper could help, but only if
she had time to. She was not fast on her feet, and compared to the
others was woefully out of shape. Even Rathley, almost twenty years
older than her, could still match her speed on foot even in his armour.
She didn't *need* to be in shape - she was a doctor, not a fighter - but
right then she swore at herself for it. She *liked* Abigail, damn it.
The stupid girl should learn to be more careful! Didn't she know that
Chopper *couldn't* look after her at times like this?
Then the shooting started, and Chopper was grateful for it. It made
her realise there had been no shooting *beforehand*. Whatever had caught
Abigail needed killing, but it hadn't been able to shoot her. She as an
athlete, she should have been able to stay away from mantises or
radscorpions. And she couldn't have let one of *them* take her down in a
single hit. Not someone as lithe as her.
The heavier report of a rifle didn't join them though, even by the
time Chopper made it to that side of the yard. Had Sia not reached them
yet?
No, Chopper saw Sharn dart into her field of view briefly. She'd
just taken up an improvised spear. Again. What was she playing at when
she had a rifle in her pack?
Then the rest of the battle appeared as she rounded the blasted van.
"Fuck me!"
Sharn was batting at the floater with the end of her steel pole,
drawing its attention while Kyle lined up another shot with his .44
pistol. Off to the side Abigail gripped one of her knives, but she
clutched at her left shoulder with that same hand. Her left arm hung
limp at her side, and even from that distance Chopper could see it was
dislocated, though probably not broken, thank god.
"Abby! Get back here!" she yelled as she took cover behind the same
car as Kyle, but Abigail paid no attention. Instead she dashed in
towards the floater the second it bent its head down to attack Sharn,
and slashed at the base of its tail.
The attack barely seemed to hurt the mutant creature, but when its
whip-like tongue shot out from within its maw it missed, allowing Sharn
to reclaim the distance she had been losing. Kyle added injury to the
insult, and his next magnum round hit it square in the side of its
'head', pushing it aside for a brief moment.
"What are you waiting for!" Chopper exclaimed. "Kill it!"
"I'm trying!" Kyle spat back. "Where the fuck's Rathley?"
He wasn't lying either. Floaters were notoriously difficult to shoot
at because of their strange, unearthly movements, and even when you did
hit them the things were so hardy it might only knock the creature off
balance for a few vital seconds. Mutants like that were the exception,
and tended to live in harsher environments like around the Cobalt Line,
but those environments made them horrifically resilient. That was why
Kyle was using his most potent pistol. He needed to inflict as much
trauma as possible, so that later shots might penetrate properly.
Abigail meanwhile kept moving, and vaulted up onto the roof of one
of the cars nearby. There was murder in her eyes again, mixed with the
pain from her shoulder no doubt. Chopper could barely believe her eyes
when, a second later, she leaped off, hurling her knife down and into
the floater's maw. It might not have done much damage to the beast, but
the floater gave a throaty scream and curled over on itself to try and
disgorge the blade, flicking its elastic, flower-tipped tongue at it.
The attack came too late though, and even as it hit Kyle shouted,
"Re-loading!"
Chopper's eyes darted around. This was the perfect chance to go for
the kill, but neither Sharn or Abigail was armed well enough to try.
Where the hell was Rathley when they needed him?
And then there he was, just standing at the side behind another car,
with his arms crossed. He was just *watching* them when they were trying
to fight off a *floater*?!
"Rathley, you bastard!"
Rathley just grinned.
Well, fuck that, Chopper decided. She reached for the sub-machine
gun at her hip. She might not be able to shoot for shit, but she'd damn
well try and perforate that thing. And if she survived, she'd perforate
Rathley too.
She flicked off the safety device and flicked on the switch for
fully automatic fire. Then as the floater reared back up she shouted at
Sharn to back away, before unloading her entire magazine at it.
Out of thirty bullets maybe eight or nine hit their target, but
those that did knocked the floater around in a screeching, chittering
mess, and like Kyle's shots several of hers drew sickly orange-red blood
where they hit already abused flesh.
It wasn't enough for a kill though, and the floater twisted its
head-body around to 'look' at her, even though it had no eyes in its
front, or anywhere else. Then, with a hard push of the tail, it leaped
towards her. Sharn hadn't been fast enough to try attacking it again,
and Abigail had been cheering in premature euphoria before she had
realised it hadn't been killed.
It didn't look fast, but Chopper didn't have time to run. The
floater's strange slide-hopping took it half the distance before Chopper
had taken her third step back, and Chopper knew her cover wouldn't be
worth shit. The floater would simply land on the car's bonnet like a
flying snake, which is exactly what it did.
And then, with a horrific bang of shotgun fire, the floater's head
literally exploded. Chopper had already raised her arms to war off the
creature, falling backwards to land flat on her backside, and those arms
were showered with orange ichor where the gas filled lower rim of the
floater had been torn apart like a ruptured balloon.
Chopper sat staring at the wet, shrivelled corpse on the bonnet for
a moment, before she turned to see Rathley with his shotgun smoking. The
asshole had the gall to look pleased with himself.
Sitting back against the same car Kyle looked equally perturbed.
"Thanks for not missing, you old fuck." He wiped the spatter of orange
goo from his shoulder. "And, if I may ask, what the *fuck* was that
about?!"
Rathley just smiled, clenching his bandaged fist in satisfaction.
"This ain't the first time. Up to you lot whether it's the last."
Chopper glared at him as he turned to head back to the camp. She was
rather grateful she had already emptied her gun, or she might have done
something very stupid just then.
Sharn offered her a hand, which Chopper took with grudging
gratitude.
Sharn didn't seem to share Chopper's anger though. Instead she
looked worried. "Maybe we fucked up with the rat."
"After this, I'm glad we did."
Kyle seemed to take the middle ground, as always. This time he
sounded bitter about it though. "The shame is, he's right. He does keep
covering our asses."
The three of them shook themselves out of their funk when Abigail
kicked at the dead floater's tail, which hung off the edge of the car
bonnet. "That'll teach you!"
Once again, the 'normal girl' was still riding her combat high, and
Chopper felt herself grin. Hypocrite to the end, but she couldn't fight
who she was. "Abby, are you okay? Take off your jacket and I'll have a
look."
Abigail winced, shaking a little, as Chopper helped ease her out of
the leather. "That bastard snuck up on me. It hit me with that tongue
thing, but that's it."
"They kiss like a stampeding brahmin, right?" Kyle said.
Abigail nodded. "It knocked me off my feet with its *tongue*!
Disgusting bastard." She winced as Chopper began to probe her arm, and
Chopper smiled.
"Did anyone ever tell you that you get vitriolic after a fight?"
Chopper asked, suppressing her amusement as Abigail gasped with the
twinge of pain. "This thing's a mutation, but god knows what of. Okay,
your shoulder's just dislocated after all. Hold still."
Then, with a scream and a satisfying pop, Abigail's shoulder was
back in its socket. Chopper allowed her inner sadist to enjoy it just
for a moment before letting her guilt squash it, and she lifted
Abigail's chin up. "All better."
Abigail grabbed her face and kissed her forcefully. That startled
Chopper, but she was all too happy to oblige. Abigail was getting more
pro-active but she rarely played aggressor, and the variety was nice. Or
it was until she actually realised what she was tasting on Abigail's
tongue.
Then, just as suddenly, it was gone, and Abigail was glaring at her.
"By the way: OW!"
But her manhandling of Abigail's shoulder was suddenly far from the
front of Chopper's mind, and she returned the kiss with equal
suddenness. But, as Abigail soon realised, it wasn't one of passion, but
one of concerned analysis. Whatever that taste was, it was unpleasantly
chemical and synthetic, with the same sharp edge as Abigail's nasty
toothpaste.
"Abby, what the hell did you take?"
***
The recriminations had been short and sharp, and left a bitter
aftertaste on an already sour victory. Chopper had not minced her words,
a fact made worse by the Buffout high that Abigail had been forced to
ride out for the next five hours.
In retrospect she could see what Chopper had meant, sort of. She'd
defended taking the drug with a blind zeal that she simply couldn't back
up, now that she was coming down from the artificial confidence and
physical power trip. She should have just admitted it and taken the
lecture, not started a screaming match over who was the idiot for using
or not using the drug. She hadn't been able to help it though. Who was
Chopper to lecture her, she'd thought. Why not take advantage of what
she had scavenged from the Hearts?
Now, with the effect of the chems fading, she was already beginning
to think the reverse. Why *had* she popped that pill? She'd taken it in
blind panic, and it had given her the will and the power to keep the
floater away until Kyle had shown up, but she could have run without it.
She might not have had the guts to help Sharn keep its attention away
from Kyle, but Sharn probably could have managed okay without her if
she'd had to. If Kyle's bullets had only been able to soften it up, why
had Abigail herself needed to fight with such crazy zeal?
She remembered this helplessness from the last time she had taken
Buffout, and stared at her roasted gecko stick feeling very small. There
would be no running off this time though. She'd made her decision when
she hid those tablets in her pockets, and now she had to deal with the
result. At least both she and Chopper had calmed down now. Although
Chopper thought she needed to be educated some more, because her lecture
had resumed at a much more calm level.
"Most of the steroid kicks in *after* the initial endorphin rush,"
she explained. She had already finished eating, and had adopted a
learned tone of voice that seemed most unlike her. "But even then the
actual steroid effect - some sort of hybrid androgen - is very small and
short lived in real terms. You're not actually any stronger or faster
than you were the hour before, the chem just allows you to push the
muscle beyond its natural comfort levels."
"I still don't understand half of what you're saying," Sharn said as
she ate.
Chopper gave her a wry glare. "*I'm* no chemist either. This comes
from lots of reading and checking the labels on the damn bottles. The
whole concoction's just nasty. The adrenaline and endorphin rush make
you reckless enough to use the extra power that you're wringing out of
your own body, and whatever short term benefits the steroid hybrid gives
come with more aggression as well. It was designed for soldiers, so no
wonder the raiders like it."
"Also, it can be addictive," she said, looking at Abigail pointedly,
"and I don't know what the long term effects are for weird hybrid shit
like this. I've never found a study on Buffout itself. But very
generally androgen steroids are bodybuilding drugs, and you aren't the
right shape for that, hon. Not to mention they'll fuck up your periods,
your heart, liver..."
As if coming down off the drug wasn't making Abigail feel bad enough
already. "Alright, I get it."
"Good."
It was information worth knowing, Abigail had to admit. She'd had no
idea that the little green tablets were steroids of all things, even if
they were odd and spliced up for short term use. If she had, she never
would have tried them against that Super Mutant to begin with. Then
again, if she hadn't they might all be dead right now. What the hell was
she supposed to think about that?
"Come on, Chopper, cut her some slack. It's not like you've never
taken anything either. Or us."
Abigail looked up in surprise to hear Kyle's words.
"Sometimes you need a kick-start," he said, sounding unconcerned,
"and we know a hell of a lot better than she does what they'll do."
Chopper sighed. "Oh, for fuck's sake."
Abigail felt the need to change the conversation, if only to stop
them fighting between themselves over what message they should be giving
her. "Look, I get it, okay. I fucked up. I'm sorry. I couldn't fight
that thing without... something."
She didn't know how to explain without sounding like a fool, so she
left it hanging. They knew what she meant anyway.
"Honey, you took on the Diamonds without it. You don't need it. You
know that."
Honestly, Abigail didn't. All she'd done against the Diamonds was
start a fire-fight from the safety of the shadows, cower while everyone
else got shot, and then beat an already wounded man to death out of
panic and anger. But she agreed anyway. Maybe she would understand it
more tomorrow, when she was feeling better. "I guess."
"Well, running into a floater was bad luck," Kyle said, now finished
with his food. "But even so, we've done pretty well out of this place."
"Really?"
The others had told her that considering what little she would get
for the clothes they weren't really worth lugging around, but Sharn had
helped her pick out what they might be able to haggle a good price for.
"Yep. One of those pistols you found, the revolver, will actually
work once I've cleaned it up, and between us we've got enough ten mil
ammo to refill the mag Chopper spent on the floater, and then some."
"Kyle got the real haul though," Sharn said, beaming in pride. She
held up a pair of Nuka-Cola bottles. "There was an old Nuka-Cola truck
here! Most of the bottles were smashed, but we still found a few, as
well as *all* the caps."
"That'll buy back *our* ammo then," Rathley said, sounding amused.
"A whole clip of those .44s'll be fuckin' pricy, boy."
"We still come out with a profit," Kyle justified. "And that's
before we sell the location."
"And you found some more toothpaste!" Sharn said to Abigail, looking
on the bright side. "Seriously, I've never found *any*, let alone a tube
that might be usable!"
Chopper grinned at her "Not that you'd have bothered using it."
"... True. But I bet we could have talked up a great price if
Abigail didn't want it!"
That was the biggest surprise of the whole trip. Among the more
useless luggage in the cars had been uncountable wash kits, and
amazingly one of them had a factory sealed tube of toothpaste in a
military issue ration box. A soldier must have packed up his family and
made a run for it when the real bomb warnings had come, alas too late
for him.
The box might have been almost a hundred years old, but in the last
few years before the war making supplies as long-life as possible had
become an art form. Stimpaks had been the pinnacle of that art -
essentially eternal, and several of them had been in the same sealed
supply box - but the toothpaste was only five years out of date and it
hadn't started crystallising. Because of that, and since it had still
been airtight, it would still be as safe to use as any old meds.
It wasn't a big tube - just a small, one-man ration - but it would
keep her going for a little while now that her own supply had almost run
out.
"What I want to know is where everyone went," Abigail said,
finishing her overcooked meat. "I didn't see a single body. They
couldn't have just vaporised if so much stuff like their luggage
survived, could they?"
"They ran when they saw the mushroom clouds," Rathley said. His face
was strangely devoid of humour for such a dramatic statement.
Kyle looked at him with a disbelieving smile. "You think?"
Rathley nodded. "They're in the basement, underneath the shop. Must
be over a hundred of the buggers. Or what's left of 'em. Wasn't much of
a bomb shelter by the looks of it. I didn't fancy climbing through the
bones to check it out."
Abigail was suddenly humbled by the revelation. Every driver and
their passengers or family, crammed into the room beneath that twisted
building, only to be burned to death seconds later when the nuclear
blasts reached them. It made all their own squabbles and recriminations
that afternoon seem very petty.
***
While Abigail might get tired of the empty open spaces and the dull
yellow-brown horizon that was forever out of reach, she doubted she
would ever grow tired of the night sky. It was so beautiful that no
other sight above ground - or below - could ever hope to compare. Lying
against her rock, looking up at that sky, she found herself grateful for
her secure and enclosed upbringing underground. If not for that she
might have taken that star studded cloth of space for granted, like her
companions did.
Even in the pathetic emotional after-chasm of the Buffout, feeling
small and insecure didn't bother her with all those stars looking down,
watching her. There was something gentle and pretty and delicate about
them, forever out of reach and yet forever there, waiting for night to
fall. Abigail could take comfort in the fact that they put the wasteland
into some kind of perspective. She *was* small and insignificant, but
they appeared for her just as they did for everyone else, and she
appreciated their unconditional display of beauty.
She smiled at her own whimsy. She'd been feeling emotional ever
since dinner, and she was glad of the calm night to bathe in. She was
supposed to be on watch, her first turn for the duty, but she found it
difficult to concentrate on the blackness around her when the sky
twinkled gently so far above. She kept her ears open, and cast her gaze
around the dark desert every now and then, but she wanted to enjoy the
soulful silence and the beauty of the night while she was still
depressed enough to appreciate it the way she did now.
The alternative to that stellar scene was sitting attached to the
PipBoy on her wrist. Finding out the truth about their camping ground
and what had happened to everyone there had sparked her more melancholy
mood, and it had reminded her just how much she did want to know about
the war. Up until then she had purposely ignored her own curiosity about
the holotape Celia had given her, but as evening fell she had plugged it
in and downloaded the data.
She had felt guilty about it almost as soon as it had been done. In
Vault 42 it would have been a gross invasion of privacy to access
another person's PipBoy, and even now she couldn't shake the feeling
that what she was doing was tantamount to a betrayal of trust. But Celia
had given her the 'tape. That was all the justification she should need.
However, it was only two hours later that she activated the PipBoy's
screen again, finally feeling brave enough to read any of it. She didn't
have to read the diaries. There was plenty of other stuff there. Celia
had travelled quite a bit before losing her PipBoy it seemed, and there
were plenty of notes and map references to view.
She had been to Micasa, their own current destination, for example.
'A small town. It seems to rely exclusively on trading and
entertainment for its income and sustenance, and as yet has made no
attempts at agriculture. They say it is too close to the 'Cobalt Line'
for that, though Corva manages despite being a day or so closer, as the
crow flies. Crime appears to be high, but largely petty, and the
establishment either does not care or is incompetent to stop it.
'The town has a reputation for being welcoming and hospitable to
newcomers, but I am not sure why. Superficially it appears that way, but
after staying any real length of time it seemed no more genuinely
welcoming than any other safe town. That worried me slightly.
'It has little to recommend it besides the prevalent gambling houses
and other dubious entertainments, but still remains well travelled. I
think most travellers would find better quality facilities and services
elsewhere, though probably not all in the same town, as they are here.'
What a charming place, Abigail thought dryly. Celia evidently had
more bite to her opinions before she became a ghoul. Abigail added the
entry to her own map, along with the many others that she did not bother
to read. At least all those little markers made her map look more
impressive, though Celia hadn't bothered to record her travelling routes
the way Abigail was doing.
Abigail looked more closely when she realised that Celia had even
recorded the location of her own vault! Vault 37 was many miles to the
north, and if the Cobalt Line stretched the entire length of the US then
Celia would have had to travel *through* it to reach places like Corva.
Was that how she had become a ghoul?
No, that was unlikely. Chopper apparently came from the west, so the
Cobalt Line did have a start point and an end point somewhere. Celia had
just travelled south or south-east over the top of it, making her notes
along the way.
So how had she become a ghoul? What must she have gone through?
Abigail couldn't ignore the question as easily as that. She could just
check the personal entry that talked about that single time in Celia's
life. Its heading should be easy to spot, she thought grimly.
As she had expected, they were all simple dated entries to start
with, probably of life in the vault. There was nothing to suggest that
the war had started at any point, so she had probably been born in her
vault like Abigail had, or had been very young when she had gone in.
She'd know for sure if she ever read them properly, but she wasn't going
to do that. Not until she felt better about it.
Then, after several hundred entries, the headings changed
dramatically, both in wording and frequency. Just like Abigail's were
doing now. One heading just read, "FUCK!!!" and showed no entry contents
at all.
Then, a little later, they started getting really dark.
'244: Jan 13, 2100 "New Year Binge, and bad water. Again."
'245: Feb 25, 2100 "My life is over."
'246: Mar 01, 2100 "If they touch me again..."
'247: Mar 14, 2100 "someone help me"
'248: Jun 23, 2100 "there is no escape . goodbye"
'249: Jun 25, 2100 "WHYWHYWHYWHYWHYWHYWHYWYWHWYWHWWYHYYYY!!!!!!!"
'250: Jul 16, 2100 "i have realised something"
Abigail switched the PipBoy off. She didn't want to read that. Not
now, and not ever. And that was *before* Calia had mutated into a ghoul?
Abigail was glad that she had lost her faith, because if she hadn't she
would have cursed God in every way she knew for making her see those
words written on the PipBoy's pale green screen.
And she was grateful that she had been spared a similar fate.
"Hey, Sugar. You still watchin', right? What're you cryin' over
now?"
Rathley's voice broke the silence like a sledgehammer through a pane
of glass.
"W-what?" Abigail blinked back the sympathetic dampness in her eyes.
"Yes, I'm still on lookout! Why are you still awake? And I'm not
crying."
Amazingly, that was the truth. Her breaths were shallow and ragged
and her eyes watered in sympathy, but real tears hadn't come. They would
have done, if only she'd kept reading, but she hadn't. She was learning
her limits, and they were being stretched; She was hardening to the
surface and its horrors. Even Rathley had mentioned buying slaves
already, so it wasn't as though she hadn't known. She just hadn't been
ready to read about it - even so briefly - from someone she had become
friends with.
"I can see that light turnin' off and on, Sugar. You're foolin'
around with that computer again."
"And I'm *also* keeping watch. There's nothing out there, Rathley."
"Good."
Abigail frowned. She had known Rathley had been lying against the
other side of the rock, but she should have realised that he hadn't
actually been sleeping. "You didn't answer my question. Why aren't you
asleep? You're taking over at one thirty. Are you planning to stay up
all night?"
"Don't have much choice. Been a wild day. I'll try and catch a
couple of hours before then."
A wild day? That was one way of putting it, Abigail thought.
"What if you hadn't killed it with that shot? Kyle and Chopper both
used a full clip against that thing, and it didn't die."
Rathley didn't reply for a moment, as if shifting where he lay. Or
shrugging. "Then I'd have shot it again. They'd both fucked up its right
side pretty well - I was surprised your girlfriend didn't manage to take
it out."
This time it was Abigail's turn to remain quiet a moment. "... And
you pissed everyone off just to teach them a lesson? There's something
wrong with you, Rathley."
"Probably, but as long as it keeps me alive I don't give a shit. You
need me, Sugar. I've been buyin' those three their extra lives for the
last six years. Thankfully, they don't forget too often."
"Does that mean I have to thank you for not letting her die? For
being more useful than me?"
"This ain't a power trip, girl. Just a reminder to 'em. Life ain't
expensive, but I can't grow this finger back." He chuckled. "Here's some
free advice, Sugar, since you're the reckless type. Don't take risks you
can't talk, fight or buy your way out of if you screw 'em up."
"You put me in that pen too. I almost didn't fight my way out of
that."
"Bullshit. You weren't missin' anythin' when you came out. It got
you fightin', it got you wise, and it got you respect out of thin air.
Out of that, all I got was the respect, except I already got my
reputation. They know what they want to think about me, and I *had* to
stay in to keep it decent."
"It got you money."
"Cash ain't what any of us are worried about right now, Sugar. Not
worth losing a digit over unless you're down to scratch."
That was fair enough. Abigail wouldn't have wanted to lose a finger
- or more likely a toe - against her pigrat either.
But it was evident that Rathley wasn't going to be getting his sleep
any time soon. "Don't be thinkin' I got anythin' against 'em though. Or
you. That stuff ain't personal unless they want it to be, like the rat.
And don't worry about the chems either," he added, sounding amused. "If
you need 'em, you take 'em. No-one's gonna choose to die when a pill or
a shot'll help get 'em out of it. Not even your hypocrite girlfriend.
You just take your shakes and get over it, if you have to."
Abigail sighed, and yawned for the n-th time that night. "I don't
know. I don't want to need them."
"Then there you go. Tell you what, you go crawl into your
girlfriend's bed and I'll take watch. I'll wake you early and have a kip
before sun up. I ain't gettin' any sleep like this, and she's probably
starin' at the roof of the tent without you."
If only that was true, Abigail thought. She wasn't about to turn
down the offer though. She was exhausted, emotionally and physically,
and she would gladly suffer an early morning for it. Maybe it would mean
she was actually awake and alert when they decided to pack up and move
on again. "Alright, that's a deal. Thanks."
She climbed unsteadily to her feet and made her way to the tent,
stripping off her jacket as she went. Inside Kyle and Sharn slumbered
together, while Chopper slept beneath her coat as ever. It might have
been a little disappointing that Rathley hadn't been right, but Chopper
wasn't the type to lose sleep over anyone.
At least she'd left some of the coat for Abigail, and as she slipped
beneath it Abigail was grateful to have the warmth of Chopper's body
next to her, even if it was only her sleeping one.
Back to After the Vault Index - Back to Non-Anime Fanfiction Shoujo-Ai Fanfiction