DISCLAIMER: yes we all know that sadly I don't own fallout 3 or any of its concepts/characters and that if I don't say all this that the government will come and burn me alive unpleasant barbequing aside I do clam this sub plot.
Content warning: I do hope you took note of the M ratting if you are under the age of 18 then please don't P.M me gabbing on about how I scared you for life or how your elders found you reading this and gave you an ear full.
Authors note: hello welcome one and all this little fanfic will like most of my work be a bit off of the well beaten plot track and in advance for the fallout extremist's YES I WILL BE TAKING A FEW LIBBERTYS WITH THE IN-GAME PERKS AND THE TIME LINE…. All that aside read, rate, review and most importantly enjoy.
Two years after the enclave's defeat.
Rivet city, it may not of been the most glamorous of settlements in the capital wasteland but the old ship had a soul to it, even here in the quiet of the Muddy rudder you could hear her groaning and creaking, not the stressed screeching of metal mind you but the gentle swaying of a benevolent titan.
The hooded man thought to himself as he filled his shot glass with whiskey, and downed the amber liquid in a vain attempt to yet again silence the ghosts of times best forgotten.
By the time the man had emptied half of the bottle, the thought occurred to him that he still barely felt tipsy.
He was in the process of pouring himself another glass when the door slammed open.
Scowling at the sudden noise, he did his best to ignore the newcomers but the clink of metallic boots caught his attention, he ran the sound through his mind again quickly, not heavy enough to be power armour so not brotherhood, guards don't wear metal, to over confident and stompey to be traders or waste landers leaving one thing, mercs his hand twitching towards his gun, he looked upwards, and counted three of them all sporting a white eagle talon on their armour.
Great, not just mercs but Talon compony, the hooded figure knew better then to make for the door, someone leaving in a hurry the moment after mercenary's came in would catch the mercs attention, so he sat still and observed them from his dark corner and put getting drunk on a back burner, he put the whiskey down but not out of reach it was amazing how many people reacted badly to being hit over the head with a bottle full of liquid that burns like a pack of glowing ones when it gets into an open wound.
He racked his mind for all that he knew about talon mercs and recalled that they always had an older merc in their teams, as to watch over the green and stupid ones.
The man inspected them and found the veteran easily; he had greying hair, a grizzled excerption like he'd been munching on rad roach meat for the like week, a tri beam laser slung over his back, but most importantly unlike the rest of his motely band he paused to look around at everyone in the bar which was rather empty for a Sunday at six PM.
As Carmichael's eyes scanned the rudders patrons his gaze caught on the hooded man in the darkest part of the room, dressed in a dark navy blue trench coat and matching hood which kept his face in shadows, the mercenaries gut told him it may be better if he got the hell out of dodge and left but excited green horns were dangerous if left alone for too long so he pushed the feeling back down and followed his team in but he kept the man in his line of sight at all times, the vibe he gave off felt like it was a death claw sitting in corner and he was the only one unlucky enough to see it.
The hooded man kept watching, waiting and when the older mercenary's eyes lingered upon him he kept the older man gaze, with unblinking eyes, not that the merc could see it beneath the hood, but he noted with small amount of satisfaction that afterwards the veteran refused to be in a position where his back was facing him, the satisfaction however was tainted with annoyance, he may have won the silent pissing match but in doing so he was noticed and he just wanted to be left alone.
His thoughts were again interrupted when a merc who he decided to call sniffles on account of his broken nose leaking shouted at Belle
"WOMAN bring me and these victorious bustards a drink, we just came out of DC unscathed not one of those green an yella fucks in sight guess them power armoured sons of bitchs are doing something right ay" sniffles hollered slapping the third merc on the back, who the man decided to called shorty.
The hooded man almost burst out laughing by going through DC they meant skirting around the edge and by "power armoured sons of bitchs" he meant guys with big guns far in the distance which they had to take extra care to avoid, Belle simply replied
"I don't give two shits if you've been too raven rock and back you cough up the caps before you get anything sunshine" at this sniffles sat blinking dumbfounded
Again the man had to beat down the urge to laugh and was slightly unsuccessful this time when a snort of amusement escaped his lips and in the silence of the ship, Sniffles heard it whipping around his beady eyes sought out the source of the noise, his eyes frantic search came to a rest on the hooded man, standing up Sniffles tromped over to that man trying to act menacing the hooded man was unimpressed.
"You wants to start something bitch ay, I've walked through DC, I've killed super mutants, what have you done huh why you think that you can laugh at me!" sniffles raved making big motions with his arms, the man didn't care he replied by raising his hands and gave sniffles a few meagre claps then picking up his whiskey he took a small drink ignoring the merc, waiting to see how far he would take it.
He may not have liked Brilt he was a snot nosed narcissist that loved to puff up his chest and tell everyone what a manly man he was but it was Carmichael's job to keep the green horns alive but at the same time he was meant to teach them how to survive which meant putting them in dangerous situations, but when the idiot took offence at someone snorting at him usually Carmichael would have left the new blood to his own devices and would step in before someone was killed but now with this man he wanted to pull the fool back and apologise before running far away the feeling put him on edge he was about to distract Brilt with a drink or something shiny when a sound coming from the door had his heart beating a hundred miles an hour in his chest.
Sniffles was fuming at being discarded so easily and on the verge of throwing punches he could see it, his grip on the bottle tightened slightly waiting his eyes went over to the veteran wondering what he would do when the man crooked his head slightly and stiffened wondering what had spooked him the hooded man listened carefully and knew what had gotten his attention.
The rhythmic thumps of heavy armoured foot falls, the clinking of steel and the subtle hiss of air filters, power armour, brotherhood knights, he needed to leave the rudder was getting too crowded.
So caught up in his thoughts that he barely dodged the swing that Sniffle threw his way, darting his head to side he sprang upwards throwing the whiskey at Shorty, who was moving to join in, and grabbed Sniffles still out stretched forearm with his left hand, and slammed his right hand into the outer side of the elbow joint which resisted for a fraction of a second before snapping with a sickening crunch, Sniffles began to scream when the hooded man still holding his now useless arm wrenched him forwards and smashed his head into the wall silencing him for the moment he then turned to shorty who had finished digging glass out of his face and had pulled out a combat knife, he began to circle Shorty, waiting, the little man made the first move charging with a string of curses and an insane grin, rushing forward at the last moment the man took the worst of the knife slash on his arm, Shorty's grin diminished when he noted that the knife had collided with something hard under the coat and washed away completely when the man's fist cracked into his face, taking advantage of the smaller man being disorientated he grabbed his wrist and gave it a savage twist wrenching the knife out of his hand, the man then still holding Shorty by the wrist flipped him onto the ground, keeping shorty immobile the man grabbed the knife and waved it in front of his face getting his attention, he then jammed the knife into the little man's dominant hand taking care to sever and damage the tendons and fine muscles to the point where reconstruction would be impossible, he then rise and left Shorty to howl in pain clutching his crippled right hand.
He walked over to the veteran who had turned slightly pale and whispered to in the man's ear
"leash your dog's better" with that said, the man walked over to the bar tossing Belle some caps to pay for the whiskey and paused for a moment and placed some more caps onto the bar to pay for the damages, then making his way to the door he heard Belle callout behind him,
"Vin you FUCKING WARN ME the next time you plan to do that shit in my bar" He could hear the anger in her voice so he turned again and pulled a packet of cigarettes out of his pocket and threw them to her, not waiting to see if she caught them he turned yet again to see two brotherhood of steel knights blocking the door after a few tense moments they moved out of his way.
With the night taking such an unexpected turn the hooded man made his way to the weatherly hotel on the upper deck he saw that bloody robot at the front desk and no sign of Vera, he let out an annoyed grunt and trudged over to the mister gusty unit, which sensing his presence floated over and in a chipper voice said
"Master Vincent what service may I offer to you?" the robot asked gritting his teeth and pushing down his personal hatred of its voice said
"Key" it quickly hovered over to the desk opened the safe and retrieved his room key he snatched the key as fast as he could and left before he had to listen to the droid any longer and swiftly made it to his room, taking a moment to see if anyone was in the hallway, he unlocked the door and made his way inside taking care not to step on the trip wire he had set up on the floor which connected to the grenade tapped to the roof, walking over to the supply pack which he kept in case he needed to leave rivet city in a hurry, he checked the continence to ensure everything was there six bottles of aqua pura check, two can of pork and beans check, packet Salisbury steak check ten vials of med-x check roll of bandages check, ten stim pack's check, 10mm sub machine gun check, grenades check, ammo check, satisfied that it hadn't been tampered with he moved away and paced the room waiting to see if the brotherhood knights had picked up on him.
By midnight Vincent decided it was safe to rest for an hour hoping that if the Brotherhood came knocking that they did come knocking that the do in fact knock or else they would get a face full of shrapnel, he didn't like sleeping that's when the dreams came to torrent him, faces of all the people that he had killed when he had been know as the lone wanderer.
Once again Sarah Lyons found herself in the citadel's archives reading through mission reports, looking for any hint, or sign of the lone wanderer, ever since he had vanished a year ago things had been slowly becoming worse in the brotherhood, the super mutants had been pushing harder ever since the wanderer had stopped his regular culling of mutants in vault 87, it seemed that he was the only one capable of surviving through the irradiated corridors of the vault and killing the green freaks, and as if that wasn't the worst of it raiders had been hitting water caravans more then ever, since the wanderer had put the fear of god into them and with meany settlements like Megaton, Big town, the new brotherhood base at Raven Rock, and even Rivet city for steels sake suffer water shortages, they were all turning to the Brotherhood of steel to fix it and they simpely couldn't spare any man from patrols in DC.
Sarah racked her hands through her blond hair in frustration, when the wanderer was here her and her father couldn't admit how much they had needed him and now that he was gone everything had gone to hell, defeated she put her head in her gloved hands and murmured
"Damn it Vincent where are you?"
Okay so what did you think please tell me bounce some ideas off me and I will do my best to incorporate them into the story until next time :)