"Son of a bitch!"
A headache and an overwhelming sense of nausea hit the man hard as he tried in vain to stand up. He had been caught in a fight between an NCR patrol and some Fiends. He had taken cover in one of the ruined buildings before a white flash sent him crashing to the ground unconscious. As he currently seemed unable to stand, he instead settled for a sitting position on a particularly large piece of rubble. Since the shooting stopped, he decided to take stock of his belongings and current condition. The Pip-boy (still in working order thankfully) gave a readout of his status: his left leg was hurt but it was nothing that new phoenix implant he shelled out caps for wouldn't heal with a little time. His trusty Hyperbreeder Alpha was still in its holster; a little worse for wear but most damage appeared superficial. The salvaged power armor he wore had several scorch marks from plasma fire.
Need to look into getting that fixed.
He reached for the duffel bag he usually slung to his back.
Not there. Shit.
He looked around the floor for his thermic lance. It wasn't anywhere to be seen either.
Sighing, he reached for the medical satchel on his belt and was relieved to find it there. Three stimpacks, a single syringe of med-x, a few doses of fixer, and a box of mentats all acounted for. A pair of frag grenades and his Vault-13 canteen were also still attached. He pulled off his helmet and took a drink from the canteen. He cracked a smile as he recalled that courier who thought he could get the drop on him-the one he had kept the pipboy and canteen from as souvenirs.
Guess all that fame was just a bunch of nonsense. You might be able to butcher the Legion and waltz into the Lucky 38 but all that fancy gear you had didn't mean shit to some well placed grenades. What an ass.
His thoughts were broken by shouting in one of the other rooms. Feeling much better after having some time to rest, he slipped his helmet on and walked towards the source of the noise.
"I'LL ASK YOU AGAIN: WHY ARE THERE FUCKING TREES OUTSIDE THE BUILDING?"
"I don't know!"
The man walked into the doorway pistol drawn, seeing as stealth wasn't much of an option what with all the clanging his armor made. Before him stood a Fiend and an NCR soldier pointing their weapons at him. Another fiend lay dead in the corner of the room. The most important thing however, was the giant hole in the wall that revealed what appeared to be a lush forest.
"Why are there trees outside the building?" asked the man.
"Join the fucking club," muttered the Fiend.
The man's attention was drawn back to the Fiend and the NCR soldier. The NCR soldier held his service rifle with bayonet affixed in close quarters fighting position. A red cross was crudely drawn across his helmet. The Fiend held the man's thermic lance. He wore one of the bone helmets distinctive to the fiends and had a dufflebag slung across his back.
"Hey buddy, that hunk of metal is mine and that duffelbag probably is too. So why don't you go ahead and fork them over so I can be on my way. I don't care what you two do afterwards, it's not my business." said the man.
"Don't think I will tin man, and even if I did, my good medic here would probably stick me with the pointy bit of his knife there and that would be the end of me. Not looking forward to that happening." said the Fiend.
"Hey uh, come on, I'm just doing my job, I don't have any sort of 'beef' with you and I got not reason to stab you. So uh, just let me get my stuff from your dead friend over there and I'll go," said the medic.
"Let me try that again. I have a gun and you don't. Drop the lance and the bag or I'll fry your ass." said the man.
"Gun's no good if it don't shoot. Why do you think I left it there? And as for this thing, I ain't stupid, this baby would probably cut right through that armor of yours." said the fiend. As if to emphasize his point, he held down the trigger of the lance, letting out a spark. "And as for you my medicine man, you're just going to have to make due with what you've got. I'm taking it all."
"Alright asshole, you asked for it." said the man. He pulled the trigger, the gun lit up for a moment but all that came out was a low whine. "Motherfucker," he muttered.
"Yeah that's right. So why don't you go ahead and fuck off outta here. While you're at it, drop the belt, can't have you fraggin' me and you've probably got chems I couldn't get to while your metal ass was knocked out," said the Fiend.
"Here's a better idea. I frag this room. You both die, and I pick up my shit." said the man.
"Now take it easy there, nobody needs to d-die, we're surrounded by trees, remember? We should be trying to figure out where we are-work together... things like that," said the medic.
The armored man and the Fiend stared at the medic and then at each other for a while.
"Hey medic, you got any chems in your bag? Be honest." asked the man.
"J-just stimpacks," replied the medic.
The man turned to the Fiend. "And how many do you have between you and your dead friend there?"
"Nothin, why do you ask?" asked the Fiend.
"I've got one dose of med-x on me. Don't know how long it's been since your last fix but judging by all the trees and shit, we might not be getting much more any time soon. It's yours if you hand over my stuff. If not, I'll crush it and whatever happens you'll probably be shit out of luck because we're sure as hell not in Vegas anymore. Try anything and it'll be smashed before you can poke me with that lance." said the man.
The Fiend seemed deep in thought for a moment. "FUCK!" he finally shouted.
"Whelp, if I'm going to die, might as well be before withdrawal kicks in."
He tossed the duffel bag over to him. "You'll get the lance but give my med-x first."
The man tossed the med-x to the Fiend and slung the duffelbag over his back.
"All this shit for one med-x if it turns out there's med-x out here in greensville I swear I'll be the dumbest motherfucker to have ever walked the wastes," the Fiend muttered as he plunged the med-x into his arm.
"Alright go ahead and waste me or whatever," he said as slid the thermic lance across the room to the armored man.
"Medic go get your shit from the dead guy." said the man. He holstered his pistol and picked up the thermic lance, checking it for damage.
The medic went over to the dead Fiend and retrieved his belongings. He hastily slammed a new magazine into his service rifle and backed away from both of the room's other occupants.
"Fiend, do you have any other weapons?" asked the man.
"That shithead in the corner has a sawed off. I had a machete but I left it in the head of this guy's squad leader," the Fiend said as he gestured to the medic.
"Alright here's what's going to happen. I'm going to leave, since I don't know where we are, I'd feel better if I had some people to cover my ass; even if those people are some greenhorn meat shield fresh from california and a degenerate psycho junkie raider. From what I've seen of your junkie friends, I'm surprised you can still speak English so at least you have some semblance of reason left. As for Mr. NCR here, I hope you're better with medicine than you are with a gun," said the man.
"Sure, what the hell, maybe I'll get lucky and find some slasher," said the Fiend as he picked through the corpse to grab the shotgun and some shells.
"I, uh, don't feel comfortable going at it alone here, so uh, I'll tag along. Uh, are you sure we can't leave the Fiend behind?" asked the medic.
"Well fuck you too, buddy," said the Fiend.
"Come along or don't. Either way, make up your mind," said the man.
"Oh, alright then, I suppose," said the medic.
"Great, try not to kill each other before we find something to do," said the man.
"Uh, I'm Corporal Alan Clarke, by the way. Or uh, I guess just Clarke will do," said the medic.
"Main man Dan at your service," said the Fiend. "And what's your name tin man?"
"Cassius," said the man.
"Cassius? Wait does that mean that-"
"Yes, I was once a soldier in Caesar's Legion," said Cassius.
"Oh shit," said Clarke who went pale.
"One hell of a crew, we got going here. While we're at it, let's see if there's any Brotherhood boys or Enclave hiding around here to add into the mix," said Dan.
"You two search the building, though I doubt there's anything left now. I'm going to fix my gun with some of my spare parts. And find out where the hell we are," said Cassius.
"Hey lighten up medicine man, you ain't dead yet," spoke Dan to Clarke as they left the room.
Cassius spent the next half hour replacing the damaged components of his pistol with spares from his bag. Dan had found a few microfusion cells but Clarke had come up empty. They sat in the room and waited for Cassius to finish. When it could once again fire, he fired off a few shots at the ceiling for good measure (much to the dismay of Clarke) before holstering it. He opened up his Pipboy to see if he could get his bearings with the map. What suprised him was the lack of any 'World Map' data on screen.
Guess we'll just have to do this the old fashioned way.
"Alright, we're moving out," said Cassius.
He walked over to the Fiend and held out 2 doses of fixer for him.
"Take these when the shakes start getting really bad."
Dan eyed the fixers warily but pocketed them anyways.
"I'll take point. Dan can watch the rear. Clarke, try not to die," said Cassius.
"Y-you too," Clarke replied.
Cassius looked out of the hole in the wall and saw a dirt path leading out of the trees and into the distance. Seeing not much else in the way of landmarks besides some snowy mountains, he decided that following the path would be the best option.
The group exited the building, Dan still more than a little unnerved at the sight of lush vegitation and snow mountains in comparison to the deserts of the Mojave Wasteland he was familiar with. Clarke being from the NCR wasn't unfamiliar with the sight of forests and snow, but he was bothered by the 'not in Vegas anymore' comment that Cassius had made.
The building they exited stood perched on top of a large rock formation. Around them were the remnants of a camp of some kind. Large chunks of rubble from the building had smashed much of the camp, almost as if they had fallen from high in the air before hitting the ground. Ruined tents and crushed corpses dotted the landscape. The group fanned out searching for things they could use. Dan found a knapsack full of various provisions. Cassius found several several bottles colored red, green, and blue. He grabbed whatever bottles that weren't smashed and stuffed them into his duffelbag. Clarke found some sort of chest, and decided to see if he could open it.
As he bent down to open the chest, he was met with a blood curdling scream. Turning to the source of the noise, he was both disgusted and horrified by the appearance of one very ugly bird mutant lady thing. Noticing the sharp claws that the mutant possessed and the look of rage it possessed, Clarke's NCR conditioning kicked in, forcing him to react in the only way that is appropriate when faced with a potentially hostile unknown.
He screamed and emptied half of his magazine into the Hagraven until he was sure it was dead.
"JESUS CHRIST! WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS THING?" Clarke shouted.
"Whatever it is medicine man, you killed it good," said Dan.
Cassius scanned the area for more of the creatures but found none that were alive. Only corpses buried under rubble from the building. He made his way over to the other two of the group.
When Clarke regained his composure he tried to open the chest. He was relieved that it was unlocked and took a look inside. The chest contained a very large amount of gold coins with the symbol of a dragon on them.
"That's a lot of gold right there," said Dan as he took a strange black knife from the Hagraven's corpse before putting it into his knapsack.
"If it's legitimate," remarked Clarke.
"I'll be taking most of it," said Cassius as he walked over to the group. "I probably have the best chance of hanging on to it in a fight than either of you."
Before either of the men could protest, Cassius said, "I'm not taking all of it. Here." Cassius then picked two handfuls of the gold and handed them to Dan and Clarke. Cassius then took a burlap sack from a nearby ruined tent and stuffed the rest of the gold in there before putting the sack into his duffelbag. "If we're going to work together, we need some semblance of trust. Violence will only get you so far. But profit? That's a much better motivation."
"Now let's get going, we don't know if there are any other things out here," said Cassius. The group then proceeded down the dirt path. They then reached a paved road. The road went in two directions, left towards the snowy mountains and right towards a pair of stone towers in the distance. Cassius decided that the towers were a better bet and so set off in that direction with his companions in tow. As they continued down the rode, the towers appeared much more clearly. They were connected to some stone walls.
'Some sort of fort perhaps?' thought Cassius.
The group approached the gate and were halted by two men who looked more than a little similar to the soldiers of Caesar's Legion. Clarke was on edge gripping his rifle hard, Dan was sizing them up noticing the lack of firearms between the two, and Cassius had his hand on his pistol.
"Halt, what brings you to Helgen?" asked one of the guards.
"Looking for a place to rest and resupply," replied Cassius calmly.
"Your armor in particular is unfamiliar," said the guard. "Where did you get it?"
"Found it in some ruins," said Cassius.
"Doesn't look Dwarven..." said the guard.
"I have no idea what it's made of and I don't really care. It keeps me alive and that's what counts."
The guard paused.
"You can come in, but know that we're keeping an eye on you," said the Guard.
"That's fine," said Cassius.
"And I'd try and finish your business quickly. We're expecting someone very important."
"Whatever," Cassius remarked.
The guard glared at Cassius before he moved aside to let the group pass.
"What a weird bunch. A two headed bear on that one with the strange club? A skull helmet like something the foreswarn would wear? I don't like this," Cassius heard the guard whisper to his comrade.
They don't appear to be Legion thankfully. Or know what firearms are for that matter. Helgen is what he called this place. Let's see if I can find out where we are.