Wow, it's been a bit since I've written for Fallout. I have ideas for several more stories, but I don't know just how many readers I have left. I found this one started in my files and decided to finish it as a sort of test to see how many Fallout readers are left.
Enjoy.
"Finally! I haven't been here in forever."
"Piper you were here when we squished the mirelurk nest." Nathaniel rolled his eyes as he led Diamond City's star, and only, reporter onto the sandy peninsula the Castle sat upon. "Wasn't that long ago."
"Well duh, but I keep hearing about all the new changes and haven't seen it for myself. Somebody has been neglecting to bring me." Piper shot her boyfriend a glare.
"I haven't been here either." Nathaniel shrugged. "Been busy with the Railroad and brotherhood. But I left it in Preston and Danse's hands."
"Danse? What's he doing here? Wasn't he living in a cave in the woods?" Last Piper heard, the man had been banished from the Brotherhood of Steel, to be shot on sight.
Piper truly felt sorry for him, the brotherhood had been his home and family. Danse had well and truly devoted everything that he had to the Brotherhood of Steel. Loyalty like that couldn't be bought, only earned.
"Yup." Nathaniel led the duo to the front gates. "Gave him an offer that he couldn't refuse."
"Which was?"
"A chance to make a difference." Nathaniel answered as the gates of the Castle opened to allow them entry. "Oh shoot, I almost forgot. When you meet GATEKEEPER, try not to freak out."
"Why would I..."
"WELCOME BACK GENERAL."
"What the hell?" Piper nearly screeched as she followed Nathaniel through the gates only for the robotic voice to come from seemingly nowhere at her side.
Whipping her head to find the source of the sound, Piper saw the hulking sentry bot standing beside the Castle wall. It was impossible to see until you were inside the courtyard, right in range of the heavy chainguns that made up two of the robot's limbs.
Nathaniel laughed as he moved to stand beside the robot. "Piper, meet GATEKEEPER. The new guardian of the Castle since SARGE got wasted. He's also good for scaring away pesky salesmen. Even if most of his parts don't work." The man gave the robot an affectionate pat of the robot's flank.
"What do you mean most?" Piper asked as she moved to stand in front of the huge figure. She'd never seen a functioning sentry bot this close before. At least not one that wasn't trying to turn her into meat paste.
When GATEKEEPER didn't respond, Nathaniel slapped himself in the forehead. "GATEKEEPER, scan her into your IFF database, name Piper Wright. She's an... unnofficial member of the Minutemen."
GATEKEEPER made a series of beeps and other noises before speaking again. "REGISTRATION CONFIRMED. WELCOME TO THE CASTLE PIPER WRIGHT. TO ANSWER YOUR PREVIOUS QUERY, MY SYSTEMS REGISTER ONLY 25 PERCENT FUNCTIONALITY."
"Why doesn't he sound like a sentry bot?" Piper noticed the voice was obviously mechanical, but was radically different from the customary gravely rough voice used by most sentry bots. Peering around the large robot, Piper saw several wires connecting into its back, where oddly enough the fusion core should have been. But the object was nowhere to be found.
"I wanted him to sound a little bit friendlier. And seeing as how the boys have to hang around him all day, I flipped on one of his alternate voices. Still working the bugs out though. Isabel and I are trying out a few other methods of power that don't need fusion cores. We can pop one in during an emergency, but the things aren't exactly common." Nathaniel explained. "Without one he can't move very far, and only his minigun works."
"And with one?"
"Dual chainguns, shoulder mounted mortars, heavily reinforced fore plating that could probably laugh off a mini nuke." Nathaniel rattled off. "Oh, and enhanced leg assembly with a speed booster, GATEKEEPER could knock a deathclaw, or two, flat on their asses."
Piper let out a low whistle. "Damn."
"Needless to say." Nathaniel leaned up against GATEKEEPER's arm with an all too pleased with himself grin. "I've been having a blast with the robot workbench."
"Might want to ease up with the experiments there, Dr. Frankenstein." Piper teased. "Next thing you know, you'll start playing a comic book character again."
"Oh, come on!" Nathaniel jumped away from GATEKEEPER as if Piper had just insulted his art. "Admit it, being the Silver Shroud was a fun couple of days."
"I plead the… uh… seventh?" Piper hesitated when she forgot the exact number.
"Fifth." Nathaniel finished for her, obviously enjoying her reference. "Come on, enough playing around. I promised my reporter girlfriend a firsthand look at our operations."
"General!" The duo had made it two steps past GATEKEEPER before one of the younger Minutemen came rushing up to Nathaniel to hand him what looked like a clipboard.
"Ah good." Nathaniel looked the contents of the paper over before nodding in approval. "Tell Ronnie she's got my approval, not that it matters." Handing the object back, the boy scurried away.
It never ceased it amaze Piper how Nathaniel could flip back and forth from warm and affectionate, to cold and all business. She'd half expected a fully guided tour of the place, but Piper was content to sit back and watch while taking notes.
Not to mention, it gave her more focus to observe her surroundings.
To think that not long ago this place was a decrepit ruin overrun with nesting mirelurks. Now, it was a bustle of activity. All signs of the mirelurk nest were gone, and a lot of the broken-down structure had either been repaired, or replaced. What truly stood out, was the missing sections of wall that were no longer missing.
Piper had heard the loud thrum of power tools when she approached the place, but had filed the noise off to the side when she encountered GATEKEEPER. Now that she was inside the perimeter, Piper could see the work being done. Much of the stone debris had been cleared away form the holes, and men were busy welding and sawing a more metallic wall up in its place.
Piper may not know much about construction, but she knew a tough barricade when she saw one. It reminded her of the wall back in Diamond City.
"Preston!" Nathaniel greeted his second in command with light tap of the shoulder. "How goes work on the walls?"
Preston shouldered his weapon, oddly enough a more standard rifle instead of a laser musket. "All but finished, sir. Just installing some of the extra upgrades you requested."
"Time to completion?"
"We're hoping tomorrow." Preston at that moment noticed Piper. "Hello, Miss Wright."
"Preston." Piper nodded. "How's the new job?"
"Going quite well." Preston had been given command of the Castle as a reward for refusing to abandon the Minutemen even when all of his comrades had already done so. "Though we haven't had to endure a direct attack yet."
"And when that day comes, you and the regulars will be ready to kick their teeth in. Be they ghoul, super mutant, or worse." Nathaniel spent so little time there, he needed someone trustworthy to look after the Castle in his absence. He couldn't have picked a better candidate. Even some of the old guard like Ronnie Shaw didn't protest the promotion.
Wait a second… regulars? Who were they?
"Meeting in my office with the commanders, half an hour. Spread the word, will you?" Nathaniel ushered Preston away before turning back to face Piper. "Ask, I know you have several questions already."
Piper just happened to look down at her notepad to find she'd already written up over a dozen inquires. She would easily get an in-depth interview later, but a few right now couldn't hurt. "Who are the regulators you mentioned?"
Nathaniel said nothing, he simply pointed.
Piper followed the finger to a collection of men standing in formation nearby. They all stood at attention save one who was walking back and forth in front of the group. Even from a distance, it was easy to recognize the grizzled look of pala… ex-paladin, Danse. His outfit didn't help, it was probably the first time Piper had seen him out of his power armor and out of the orange jumpsuit he usually wore beneath it.
"That isn't all of them, but meet the regulars." Nathaniel came to stand beside Piper as the pair watched Danse give a speech to the assembled men. The words were impossible to hear over the construction tools nearby, though.
"Who are they supposed to be?" Piper noticed something… off about these Minutemen. The most obvious was their gear.
The usual Minutemen, the ones Piper was accustomed to at least, were usually settlers armed with laser muskets or some shoddy pipe firearms. Their 'armor' was often just a couple scraps of leather and their own jeans and ordinary clothes.
Not these Minutemen, they were something completely different. They each wore the same outfit, like it was some kind of uniform. A gray shirt and pants, with a loaded tactical vest over top. The rifles they carried varied between them, but there wasn't an energy musket to be seen.
If anything, the 'regulars' looked more like professional mercenaries than Minutemen.
"While I was helping Preston piece the Minutemen back together, I stated noticing a few problems." Nathaniel explained as the crowd dispersed among the castle. "One of which being a poorly made chain of command, and what the Minutemen actually were. A bunch of famers with guns in a posse."
"That was sorta the original point, I think."
"Maybe." Nathaniel agreed. "But that isn't going to work in the Commonwealth. Look at the place, feral ghoul nests, super mutants, heavily armed crazed raiders, synths. Farmers with guns isn't going to cut it. At best, it's a band-aid. Neither me, nor Danse, can be everywhere. And we don't have enough combat veterans on hand."
Piper's brain was already connecting the dots to the point Nathaniel was trying to make. "The Minutemen can fend the problem off, but they don't actually get rid of it."
"Yup!" Nathaniel wrapped an arm around Piper's shoulders to pull her close in a quick one arm hug. "That's where the regulars come in, these guys are not farmers and fighters when the need arises. Think of them more like career soldiers. Instead of going back to their farms, they continue to train, patrol, or just stand watch. Plus, a clear chain of command for everyone to follow. The regulars get to choose their own leaders from among their own, but they defer to me."
"And their guns? No laser muskets?"
"Those things were just plain stupid." Nathaniel scowled. "Yeah sure, they pack a punch, but they're slow to reload and heavy. How many people have knowledge of energy weapons anyway? They're more accustomed to regular firearms, so that's what we're equipping them with, along with the training to match. I'd take practical over showy any day."
"So, you're ditching the laser muskets entirely?" Piper scribed a few more notes on her pad.
"Actually, no." Nathaniel answered with a shake of the head. "We still use them, but more for our sharpshooters rather than our rank and file. The extra distance mitigates the reload time and weight. And we have to train fewer in their use."
"And this extra training for the regulars, you have Danse doing it?" Piper had been wondering what he was doing since Nathaniel's comments about the former paladin when they first arrived.
"He's putting his time with the brotherhood to good use, and it gives him purpose. A chance to again be part of something bigger than himself." Nathaniel's voice turned grim. "He deserved better, but this was the best I could do for him."
Piper hadn't been with him when he went to confront Danse about his synth identity, but Nathaniel had filled her in on all the details after the fact. It disgusted her to no end how quickly the brotherhood turned on their own. Synth or no, Danse was the very definition of loyal.
"So, sweetheart." Nathaniel used the arm around Piper to pull her close, his mood bringing back to its usual cheer. "Want to see a conference with the Minutemen bigwigs?"
"Still not so sure of this plan, sir." Preston looked over the map covering the table. "Is taking Sargus Ironworks really necessary?"
"It's a bit of a tall order, I know that. But it is worth the effort." Nathaniel countered. "Think about it, it's a fully intact steel mill. The last one in the Commonwealth, and a raider gang has control of it. We can take out a dangerous group, reopen the mill, and seize a fortified position, all in one swoop."
"Does anyone even know how a mill works?" One of the regulars, Troy, his name might have been, spoke up. Piper had actually gotten to meet a couple of them just before they started. If this one was here, he must be somebody important. "If we can't use it, it's pointless."
"I'm sure we can find someone who does." Nathaniel defended. "Worst case scenario, we figure out how. Even if raiders run the place, there must be something left behind."
Piper sat off to the side, silent save for the occasional scratching of her pencil on her trusty notepad. Nathaniel allowed her to sit in on the meeting, but he hadn't said anything about participating. She knew her boyfriend though, if she wanted to be a part, he wasn't going to stop her. At the same time, Piper knew when it was better to keep quiet.
The meeting started out simply enough, boringly so. Updates to the general about their current supplies, state of repairs to the Castle, new recruits, usual leadership fare.
What Piper hadn't been expecting, was a front row seat to the planning of an assault.
"Tall order nothin'." Ronnie spat. "The Forged might be tough up close, but they ain't worth shit at range."
"Which is why our biggest concern is going to be once we get inside." Nathaniel shifted the map on the table about. "If the blueprints are any indication, it's tight quarters and narrow spaces. Breaching the outer perimeter is the easy part, inside is where it gets interesting."
"Sir, I'm afraid we have to address the deathclaw in the room." He was another of the regulars, judging by the same uniform he and Troy wore. His name though, Piper couldn't remember. "What is she doing here?"
It took Piper way longer than it should have to realize he was talking about her. Just like that, Piper found herself on the receiving end of a number of stares. Ranging from Preston's welcoming, Danse's indifference, and this mystery regulars near hostility.
"Piper's here at my request." Nathaniel hadn't even looked up from the map.
"Why? She's not…"
"Back before the war, the army had a role just for members of the press." Nathaniel turned his gaze up, as if annoyed because of the interruption. "It was fairly commonplace for reporters and journalists to be embedded with a military company. Their job was not to fight, but to report back home their firsthand experience."
"Good idea." Troy nodded in agreement. "The more people hear about us coming along, the more support we can get."
"And Miss Wright has literally the only newspaper in the entire Commonwealth. Some good publicity about our rebuilding can only help our cause."
"Exactly, so can we get back to business, ladies and gentlemen?" Nathaniel motioned back to their marked-up map.
"The front entrance is heavily fortified." Danse spoke next. "The Forged use mostly incendiaries, some firearms. I recommend a frontal assault with our power armor."
"We only have yours and mine." Nathaniel tapped the table with his fingertips. "We'll grab a few fusion cores and bring GATEKEEPER along. That should be plenty of firepower to get us through. We'll need to watch the roof though, they might have guys up top."
"That's what my team's for." Troy indicated several spots around the edge. "We'll take up positions here, here, and here. At the very least, we can keep any roof shooters off your back."
While everyone else was distracted during the discussion, Nathaniel sent a tiny wink Piper's way. This whole situation was like a replay of Piper and Nathaniel's first visit to the Prydwen. He hadn't been able to get Piper and interview with Elder Maxon or Captain Kells, but he asked a number of questions in her stead. He played the part of the 'eager initiate' quite well.
Once again, Nathaniel was using his influence to get Piper exclusive information. It warmed Piper's heart to know her boyfriend trusted her with the juicy details of a dangerous battle plan.
Nathaniel wanted good publicity, did he? Well, Piper could easily arrange that.
I may have taken a few creative liberties with the Minutemen, but oh well.
I still have ideas for more Fallout stories, but I need to see how many, if any, readers I have left before I can do so. Reviews/comments would be greatly appreciated toward this.
One of these ideas is a crossover I came up with involving Nathaniel and my protagonist from Skyrim, Hastrel. How's that for a team up? I just have to figure out how to make it happen (story-line wise) and how to actually publish crossovers.
However, all of this depends on how many readers I have left.