The sun was setting over the crusted dilapidated husk of a town, bathing the decaying buildings in an orange hue. A barricade of junk connected to the outer buildings of the small town, effectively sealing it off. Crumbling car bodies, ply wood patch jobs, a broken down bus filled to the brim with concrete rubble, a hacked up piece of chain-link fence here and there and a plethora of garbage and scrap metal to fill in all the cracks.
I'd always hear talk of Old Olney from all around the wastes. Ghost stories, creepy tales, the kind of stuff city folk like to scare each other with in front of the fire at night. They said people who went there never came back. No one was ever clear on the specifics. Ghosts, some would say. Ghouls or Super-mutants was the opinion of others.
Inside, anything more than a story high was riddled with holes the size of meteors, caved in roofs and crumpled walls everywhere or just plain leveled. It was a rarity to see more than fragments of doors or windows on any of them. The road was all torn up like it was a carpet and someone had given it a good yank.
But you could always spot the few that had actually been there. There was a look in their eye, like they were still there and a fear that came along with it. Didn't glorify it. They didn't talk about it at all. Just waited for everyone to shut up and get along with it.
A man in a sleek black body suit laid on the only piece of the fourth floor left of the apartment building, hands clasped to a sniper rifle with its barrel poking over the buildings edge, the visor of his helmet glued to the scope, waiting. He could see the whole town from his perch, just under a dozen buildings remained, the walls and window frames of the apartment had crumbled away leaving nothing but skeletal rebar standing tall over him.
When I heard there was a job to do out there, I couldn't resist. Now I don't like talking about the place much, either.
Ked had watched the place for half a day from the other side of a nearby river. It'd been easy enough climbing over the barricade, hugging the wall of the nearest apartment, then sneaking upstairs. There'd even been enough floor on the two levels below for him to get up the stairs without any sort of improvised climbing. He'd taken care to avoid detection, he hadn't known what to expect. But for what? So far, there hadn't been a single demand on his expertise. He'd expected slavers, raiders, even Super-mutants, but there wasn't so much as the scuttle of a Rad-roach. With all the myth surrounding this place, the last thing he'd expected was a ghost town.
Within the hour the sun had sank below the horizon as he remained in position. Through the scope he zoomed in on the dust caked bus stop shelter, waiting for the time, waiting to take those three shots that would bank him his pay. Then back to Megaton to turn three grand in bottle caps into hookers and beer, hell yes. It was a simple enough gig. Three men were to show up, one with a suitcase, prepared to trade. At the first sign of a handshake, he was to shoot the three of them, Retrieve the suitcase and return it to the employer after the job.
He was getting antsy. Moonlight bathed the town making it well past the designated time. He'd wait half an hour more, then report the men were a no show. All the same to him, he'd already gotten half his pay up front, that'd be more than enough hookers and beer till the next job opened up. Something brought him out of his hedonistic daydream, something queer, but not altogether panicking. He zoomed the scope in to a pile of rubble past the bus stop, onto a long slender white object protruding from the pile, glowing under the moon.
What have we here?
It was a femur, alright, no mistaking it. A human femur. Impossible to mistake that ball joint for anything else. Not exactly out of place in the wastes, could have been something as simple as a pack of dogs finding some poor sap with a bum leg. He'd done a quick scan when he entered the place, no sign of the Mutants. They kept the remains of their kills chopped up in sticky net bags.
And this, is the start of a real bad feeling.
Next to the pile, the torn up road gave way to dirt, fine and settled. In it, he saw a massive footprint, three long toes, with sharp triangular claws. He'd seen similar, but it was one toe too many for a Mirelurk and one toe too few for one of their Kings. Thank God, The idea of this town being infested with a bunch of giant bipedal crab things that could smash through walls didn't sound like his idea of a good time. Still, these footprints were bigger than anything he'd ever seen before. There was something wrong with the whole thing. That's when he spotted the tail.
Ked was sure of what he'd seen, skeptical, but now his heart was hammering and blood was pumping in his ears. He'd been focused on the footprint, but movement to the left caught his attention, he'd focused in long enough to watch the spiny reptilian tail slide along and disappear behind a building. The fear set in, gnawing at his insides. It had been half the length of a car, never mind how big the rest of it was.
Rest of what?
He had no idea. Mutation was something more common than most people liked these days. He scanned the area, training the scope from road to road. Then he found it, two blocks over, a giant lumbering beast encased in shadow making its way toward him down the street. He stifled a yell of shock at the thing that could not be.
He zoomed in the scope. It was massive, plodding along on two giant feet, reptilian body walking like a man, making a horrible metallic shriek as it dragging a torso sized hand across the side of a car, leaving a giant scratch behind in its wake. Its head had a large jutting jaw, incapable of keeping two giant fangs from stretching up past its snout, a pair of bright yellow eyes narrowed under the giant horns. The devil had birthed a reptile.
He almost took the shot, his breathing out of whack as it was, along with trembling trigger finger. Then another one creep out from behind a car.
Fuck!
He zoomed the scope back to the bus stop where two more of the beasts came into view, sauntering towards each other with slow steady paces. And in a moment, they passed each other, continuing forward, mechanically, as if they hadn't seen each other at all. He laid there watching them for over an hour, monitoring their autonomous prowling, heads straight forward, long stretched arms in tow. At last count, he'd seen six of them. In that time, he'd calmed down enough to do some puzzle piecing. His employer was informed enough to have given him the description of the bus stop, it smelt like Ked had been set up, expected to remain in Old Olney in several pieces. To become a ghost story. Could have been a relative of a previously accomplished hit, or a business rival he'd done wrong, lots of mercs were like that. Hell, this could be how he got his sick jollies. In the end, it didn't matter. There'd be plenty of time to ask questions after he got the hell outta there.
His scope came to rest on one standing dead still in the middle of the street, staring right at him. He felt frigid moonlight under his skin. His heart banged against his chest. He took a moment to rationalize with himself.
Staring into space. No way it can see all the way up here in the dark.
Even if it could, there was nothing to see save the barrel end of his rifle, anyhow. But the tilt of its head was suspect, he could feel its cold eyes watching him. Whatever stillness was before, Ked took it to a whole new level under the creatures empty gaze. What felt like hours passed. Neither of them moved a muscle.
Is it sleeping? Do they sleep with their eyes open?
This was a shit situation, a terrible time for guess work. It would be simple enough to leave right now. He was high enough and close enough to the barrier to grapple down past it and into the freedom of the outside wastes. Yet those eyes held him in place. They could hear him as he landed. There could be more outside the town. He could be dead already and not know it. He wasn't going to chance bolting till that thing fucked off. If it ever fucked off. More movement at the edge of his vision. He tilted his head ever so slightly to view the area by the bus stop again. Two more of the things were climbing up a distant building sinking claw after claw into the brittle concrete to pull themselves up almost effortlessly. They barely made a sound.
Fast climbers for their size.
He peered back into the scope and saw nothing but street scenery. The creature was gone. The terrible feeling returned to his gut, then something clicked inside his head. He dove to his feet, spinning around, holding the sniper rifle out horizontally. There was a flash of claw and the gun was knocked out of his hands, causing him to stumble backwards. The beast lunged again, those yellow eyes fixed on him, silent. Ked leapt back, the claws raked his armor, producing three long gashes peppered with electrical sparks. Then it got worse.
Another step back, but he'd run out of floor. He felt himself falling through the hole in the building, felt the impact as his back smashed into the debris of the next floor, and felt that floor give way leading to one more crash to the ground.
Gonna… Die here…
He tried to gulp in air but the wind had been knocked out of him. He tried engaging his suit's stealth cloak, but to no avail, the push of a button produced nothing but a few more sputters of sparks.
Get up!
He did, clutching the wall, short pained breaths squeezing up past the sharp pain in his ribs. Up top, the beast stared down at him momentarily, then disappeared. There was rubble all around him, dust clouding, two adjacent doors in the corner of the room open to the world, but nothing stormed through them yet. The sound of movement all around. He had seconds. He moved precisely, like a surgeon saving a life and with the speed of a man fighting to save his own. He yanked four grey blocks the size of cigarette packs from his belt, plastered one on the bottom and top of the door frame, and then did the same to the adjacent door. He backed off in a nervous wreck, nearly dropping his hand gun as he drew it along with the detonator. One in each hand, he took slow steps away from the door, jerking his aim between them and the staircase that led above. He was on edge to the point of screaming. Everything had become silent.
A long clawed hand erupted out of the window, its impossible reach almost taking off his head. The creature reached again, bashing its shoulder into the frame. Ked backed off to the corner, as the room was filled with erratic shrieks and bashing sounds as the building shook. He fired off a few rounds into the arm. The beast didn't seem to notice. On the third attempt, the wall caved leaving the shrieking horror to dive at him in a shower of concrete.
He sank the rest of his clip into it. It did not relent. The creatures lunge had made the distance, and a heavy clawed hand was already on its way down, about to slice him in half at the waist. He chose a tactical loss and dove in close, missing the claws, feeling the blow of the heavy hand send him flying like a ragdoll, hard into the wall. Cracked ribs over a two piece divide any day. By the time he hit the ground he was already on his next move, wincing as he pulled the small metal marble from his belt pocket and tossed it at the creatures face. He shielded his eyes and the room was lit up with a bright white flash. The creature screeched, a dreadful wounded sound. But it wasn't stupid, it knew where he'd been a moment ago and was already diving with outstretched claws, swiping blindly for its prey.
Ked dived and rolled low out of the creature's way coming back up standing.
It's now or never, kid.
He saw the beasts rushing outside rushing for the doorway, no longer respectful of the explosives. Must have figured he was distracted. Charging up the stairs, he pushed the detonator. There was a loud boom and the building shook and as he ran. For a moment he thought it might fall but he never stopped running. He passed what was left of the second floor landing, granted a fresh burst of speed and adrenaline when a pair of jaws snapped at his legs from the crumpled side of the building. He saw a spiny back through the window frame racing him to the top.
Almost there…
Reaching the small patch of fourth floor, he yanked the small rounded gun from his belt, aimed down at the ground past the debris barrier and fired. A long thick metallic rope sped towards the ground and seeded into the dirt with a thump. He hooked the gun to a piece of protruding rebar above his head and dropped it. He dove, grabbing the rope, feeling the air from a swiping claw behind him, then the air rushing by as he picked up speed. Faster, faster, past a few short buildings, over the debris barrier. Then the rope went slack and he was falling to the ground. One of the creatures must have clued in and sliced it from the roof. But nothing would stop him now, he was out.
Fuck.
The fall was short, he hit the ground rolling and as he came to his feet shot out in a spring loaded dive over the small rock line and into the river with a splash.
This.
He swam with all he had, stroke after stroke, horrible visions of those demonic things swimming after him filling his head. A good distance away, he chanced a look back and saw the hulking reptilian shadows lining the river bank he'd left behind, silent glittering yellow eyes staring off at him.
Place.
The lock clicked and the door swung open, the silhouette of a spindly man in a top hat stepped into the house. He tossed the keys onto the counter with a clunk, flicked the lights on absently and started fumbling with something in the pockets of his suit. He shouted in shock when he noticed Ked sitting at his dining room table, looking ravaged and soaking wet.
"Ked!" the man's face was at a loss, then fearful when it noticed Ked's handgun aimed at his gut from under the table, "You're alive!"
"Glad you made it home safe," Ked smiled, "but enough about your day, there's some things I'd like to discuss with you about mine. Have a seat."