A/N: Normally I would re-name my Fallout character when I do stories, but honestly I'm a sucker for the name Nora, and I simply couldn't find any name better than it.
The eerie silence of Lynn Wood sent cold shivers across her skin and down her spine.
Nora had always tried to avoid the small settlement when she could. The trigger-happy Raiders that hung around the area always forced her to take the longest path around so she could avoid the constant stream of gunfire; and she'd usually pray that none of them saw her sneaking about their territory.
But... there was no gunfire now.
No Raiders cursing, or yelling obscenities at one another.
...
She tried not to focus on the smell of blood and rotting carnage that lingered in the air around her. It turned heavy in her throat and lungs, as she tried to choke past the tickle of her gag reflex reacting to it.
Curiosity would not win this time.
She wasn't even going to go into the settlement to see what had happened; the smell alone was bad enough, and... she just didn't want to know.
Taking the widest path around the single rotting house, Nora found herself not the least bit interested by what might lie inside of it. Sure, there could be ammo, or another weapon she could desperately use, or just overall supplies she was in need of, but... she wasn't going to risk it. She saw the thick blood dripping through the floorboards of the house, and saw how it had turned the once solid, dirt foundation underneath it into sludge.
It was sickening to think that that much blood had been spilt in that one area alone.
She didn't want to think about the mess inside that lead to it.
... Nate had always said that the worst thing about being on the war front was the smell of blood. He said that after awhile it doesn't even smell like blood; it just smells like nightmares and you can never get the scent out of your nose. At least, until you just reach that point where... you've been around it for so long, you don't even notice it. It just becomes another piece of you.
The scent of gunpowder and blood was the fragrance of the war... and everyone wore it.
The smell still made her sick to her stomach though, which she figured was a good thing.
Shouldering on through the chilling breeze, Nora walked down the sloping hillside and nervously caught her footing on the loose rocks below.
Even the slightest hint of falling sent heart-stopping fear through her body.
It sent the smallest hint of bile up into her throat as she nervously clung to the loose bag in her arms.
...
She had been holding the bag steadily to her chest the entire trek across the Commonwealth.
Not tight enough to crush its contents, but not loose enough to have it accidentally tumble out of her hands either. She couldn't imagine how odd she must've looked from the outside- a stranger moving at a hesitant pace, clinging a loose bag to her chest like it contained her own heart.
If something were to happen to it though...
Nora froze as she caught the sound of foliage crunching off in the distance behind her, and held her breath until the sound dissipated into faint echoes. She had been hearing those kinds of sounds tracking her ever since she stepped foot outside of the museum... She figured she would've gotten used to them by now. It wasn't like they got any closer or any further away from her- they always stayed the same distance behind her.
It was like they were keeping in perfect step with her.
Stalking her for miles on end
She tried not to wonder if it was the entire pack after her, or maybe just a few members who had been scouting around the museum- still searching for their lost possession. It was easier to think that it was just one, really big creature following her, but... even she wasn't stupid enough to believe that. She knew there were more... she could see them moving around in the corners of her vision from time to time.
...
The only thing saving her from a brutal attack was the small bag in her arms.
When her nerves finally gave her leniency to move again, Nora continued down along the faded dirt path in front of her. She shivered and felt her body growing colder as the small, hilly landscape around her slowly transformed into a boneyard.
There were scattered stacks of still rotting carcasses, and piles of sun-bleached bones that littered the ground underfoot. Nora tried to go out of her way to avoid stepping on the smaller pieces; the last thing she wanted to do here was draw even more attention to herself- or accidentally set herself up to sound like a threat.
There was what looked to be the remains of a half-eaten Brahmin just to her left; one of its two heads was missing, chewed clean off from the neck.
...
Nora hesitated before she forced herself to step over the severed, clearly human leg that was in her way; and she tried not to notice the rest of the body half-propped up against the small hillside. The uniform told her that it was a Gunner... as well as the spent bullet casings that were littered across the ground around him.
In fact, she had failed to notice it before, but... there were bullet casings everywhere.
... The Gunners really shot this place up.
A heavy growl caused her to freeze in place as her eyes immediately shot to the sense of movement in front of her.
Just at the foot of a small cliffside was the single thing she had trekked this long to find.
...
A nest site.
But not just any nest site.
This was a Deathclaw one.
And the large formation she had mistaken to be part of the cliffside... was the mother Deathclaw who stood between her and the nest.
Nora swallowed hard as she watched the massive Matriarch rise up from her slumber- her sharp teeth already laid out bare for her to see. The creature wrangled its head from side to side, threatening Nora with the massive horns that curved out from its skull; horns that could easily spear, or gut her if she wasn't careful- or fast enough to avoid them.
...
She wasn't a religious person by any means, never really had been, but... she had no doubts that this creature before her was the Devil.
She could still hear the faint crunching sounds of things moving around her, and reluctantly caught sight of the rest of the pack moving closer. Nora wondered if the mother Deathclaw before her had woken to her approach, or had been alerted by the pack instead.
...
What the hell was she thinking?
She saw what these creatures could do- she had witnessed the massacre back at the museum.
Barely hiding underneath the broken staircase, the sounds and smells of the fresh carnage had left her dry heaving in a desperate attempt to not throw up and give her position away. Even now, she could still feel the floorboards shaking with the creature's every step; she could still hear its claws scraping against the floor as it dragged bodies off to devour. It seemed impossible for something that big to fit inside of a building- hell, it had to walk hunchback to keep its horns from dragging across the ceiling.
She heard the holotapes though.
She heard the sounds of pure, unadulterated fear in those people's voices- the horrific screams as they were torn apart.
And despite... despite wanting to destroy those tapes so she'd never have to hear them again, they told her exactly what she had to do.
...
There was no one making her do this, and God knows the Commonwealth didn't need more Deathclaws, but... she felt the need to finish this.
She had to right the wrongs, or no one else would.
"H-hey there, big, scary momma," Nora spoke, hearing her own voice shake with the words, "don't worry, I-I'm not here to hurt you."
As if she could even put a scratch on that thing.
With shaking hands, Nora carefully held the bag in the crook of one arm, before she reached into it. Her fingers brushed against the object inside, before she firmly gripped it and pulled it free- revealing the rather large, pale egg in her possession.
The Matriarch immediately reared onto her back legs at the sight of the egg- her nose sniffing high in the air for the scent.
The sight of it made Nora cringe, but she tried not to focus on the churning in her stomach.
Against all better judgement, she continued to move forward.
"I got what you've been looking for," Nora continued- unsure of why exactly she was trying to speak to this creature. Dropping the bag aside, she carefully held the egg out in front of her so that the Matriarch could see it better; and she flinched when the Deathclaw snarled at her once again. The massive mother shifted forward and flexed her long claws- reminding Nora that she could gut and kill in the blink of an eye.
... And yet, the Matriarch was seemingly choosing to show her mercy.
Edging herself steps closer to the nest, Nora tried to hold her breath to keep herself from taking in the near unbearable smell of rotting carnage around her once more; the smell alone made her want to pass out. Her eyes caught sight of different human bodies scattered around, mostly in pieces though; at best, she counted four semi-complete bodies, and they were all Gunners.
And relatively fresh as well.
The kills had to have been made at the nesting site- especially since the ground was still thickly slathered in blood.
Added in with the Gunner bodies though, and to her own surprise, were two Deathclaw carcasses.
...
The main pack must've been out hunting when the Gunners initially came through. She didn't know how many men they had with them, but there obviously enough to take down two Deathclaws, lose five men, and still get out with what they came for.
When the rest of the pack returned, and saw the destruction of their nests... they went berserk. They tore Lynn Wood apart, killing anyone and everyone living in the area, and then went searching out for what was theirs.
... The Gunners wouldn't have known that, when they passed the eggs off to Sergeant Lee's team, the Deathclaw pack would follow the scent of their stolen offspring. They wouldn't have known that the Deathclaws ultimately cornered and slaughtered Lee's team where they stood... making them pay for the Gunner's sins. Meanwhile, the ones who were actually responsible for all of this escaped death a second time.
"You and I... we're a lot alike, you know," Nora started, as she managed to get herself within feet of the nest without another instance of growling. She hesitantly looked down at the matted bedding and took note of the disordered look to it.
Asides from a few human skeletal remains, there was nothing else in the nest but broken eggs that had been crushed in the Gunner's haste to get everything they could. Such a disgusting greed... they should consider themselves lucky that justice didn't have its way with them.
...
Even though her other offspring had been killed before they could even live, the Matriarch refused to leave her nest.
Despite being paralyzingly terrified of the creature before her, Nora felt her heart tug in sympathy for it. The Matriarch wanted nothing more than to have its offspring back, safe and sound, in the comforts of its nest... Just like she wanted nothing more than to have Shaun back, safe and warm, in her arms again.
"I know what it's like to have someone snatch your child away from you," Nora whispered, hearing her voice crack just slightly with the words. Swallowing hard, she tried to push down on her fear and closed in on the nest- watching as the mother Deathclaw dropped back down onto all fours. She made eye contact with the creature, watching as its hardened, yellow eyes glared down on her, almost as though testing her. And as scared as she was, she didn't break contact as she slowly knelt down in front of it.
But her breath caught hard in her throat as the Matriarch leaned in towards her.
...
Its massive jaw could crush her head like a milk carton with no effort needed.
But at such close range, Nora could see the bloodied patches on the mother's face and chest; she could see where bullets had struck scales, and barely managed to blow them off of its body. She noticed the heavy wound on the creature's left arm, and noticed how it seemed to favor it slightly. Someone must've put some hurt on her in an attempt to slow her down and make her back off... but Nora had no doubts that the attempt had failed.
This Matriarch was a force to be reckoned with.
Nora could feel its hot breath on her face and heard the slight snort of it sniffing at her; she could even feel its damp nose brushing through her hair. It lowered its nose to her shoulder, and sniffed once more, before it moved down to the large egg she kept held out in her hands. With gentleness that seemed unnatural, it nudged the egg in her palms and released a low... almost chirp-like noise from its throat- seemingly trying for a response from her unhatched offspring.
"And I know what it's like to want to kill everyone involved with it," Nora continued, watching as the Matriarch drew away- allowing her to gently lower the egg into the nest below. She briefly questioned why the mother didn't just take the egg from her hands, but... maybe its jaws were too powerful to hold such a delicate thing; or maybe the Deathclaw didn't wish to accidentally hurt her with the gesture.
... Okay, maybe that last one was a bit of a stretch, but it made her feel slightly better.
Her hands were shaking and she was terrified that she would drop and break the egg right then.
She would probably be dead before the accident even registered to her though- which would be a merciful death in this case.
Thankfully, instead, Nora laid the egg down onto the cushioned bedding, and slowly backed away from it; she tried to avoid making any sudden movements that might turn this peaceful encounter hostile.
The Matriarch let out a low growl at her, before it crawled back forward and covered the nest with its massive body.
Nora watched as the creature gently nudged the egg once more, before it used its massive claws to cover it with the warm bedding- using the dirt nearby to hide its scent as well. It felt... odd to watch- to witness this massive, man-devouring creature gently nurture such a fragile thing.
To witness the Devil in such an... intimate interaction.
"I just hope that I'm as lucky as you are," Nora spoke, "and I hope that I'll be as strong as you are when I track these people down. I hope I'll give them the same kind of force to be reckoned with... I hope they come to see me as the Devil in disguise."
Slowly working her way back along the path, she kept her eyes focused on the nest- knowing that at any moment the mother Deathclaw could choose not to grant her mercy; it could choose to use her body to feed its soon to hatch offspring instead.
In the corners of her eyes, Nora could see the rest of the pack slowly emerging from where they had been stalking her, before they gathered down at the nest site. There were too many to count as far as she was concerned, but again... it was odd to witness them one by one sniff and nudge at their remaining egg.
The sole survivor of an once massive brood.
...
Once Nora was certain she was out of range for them to see, or care about her, she turned away and ran.
She didn't know how long she ran for, or really how far she went.
She just kept running until Lynn Wood was far behind her, until her legs went numb and threatened to collapse underneath her.
Stumbling, Nora stopped to catch her breath at first, before she felt her her stomach twist and knot up inside of her. Despite all that running, she couldn't get away from her wound up, shell-shocked nerves, and ended up emptying the contents of her stomach into the nearest dead bush. Everything from the museum to Lynn Wood came up out of her, until her stomach cramped and all that eventually came out was dry heaves.
Her body felt sick and she could feel herself shivering despite the sweat that was beading against her brow and neck.
She felt cold- colder than she had ever felt locked up in cryosleep.
...
Some part of her still wished that... just like with that mother Deathclaw, someone would come along and give her her baby back- that someone would just bring Shaun back to her, safe and sound.
That someone would go out of their way to right someone else's wrong.
But she knew...
She knew no one would, which meant that she would have to force her own hand and do it herself. And she would... God knows she would- even if she had to personally hunt down every person involved in Shaun's disappearance and kill them one by one.
...
Kellogg had been her first victim.
And there would be plenty more after him- she would guarantee it.