Sam Vimes, Commander of the Regulators, proceeded across the Capital Wasteland towards the Citadel. Four Regulators followed him, scanning nervously for any sign of trouble.
It wasn't that different a world, when you got down to it, he reflected. Sure, there were radroaches, deathclaws, and everything in between, but there were also no trolls—well, there were Super Mutants—right, there were no vampires—well, there was that report from Arefu, with considerably better spelling than he was used to—the point was, the job of a copper was the same, try to sniff out the crime and do something about it.
That last was the reason he, and not Sonora Cruz, was now leading the Regulators. Where he was from, coppers didn't shoot bandits just for being bandits. They'd beat 'em senseless with a club and haul 'em off to be hanged, given the chance, but it was somehow more civilized that way. It was all the gonnes in this world, he mused; they made killing too easy. If only this world had had someone with the sense to keep those hushed up, or better yet, the "atomic bombs"…
Vimes had, in the course of his work, become aware of the fact that some of the "raiders" were just ordinary people who got kidnapped, drugged until they didn't know a platter from the Discworld, and/or given the choice between cooperating and dying in various unpleasant ways. The last straw had come when Sonora Cruz had ordered him to shoot a thirteen-year-old boy they'd found in a raider encampment. He'd refused, a good portion of the Regulators had backed him up, and Sonora had left for Om only knew where. Since then, people like that had been treated for drug addiction, and many had been able to return home. Mesmetrons were used first on humans, guns only as a last resort.
"Harry?" he asked one of the nearer men. "Did the steel blokes tell you anything about my request? For the power armor and some guidance about what the law should be?"
"Not a word, sir, on either point," Harry answered.
Sam Vimes didn't like making his own law. People like Vetinari didn't always make better laws, but between their morals and yours you ended up doing what was right a lot more often. Maybe he'd swung too far the other way, with the deal with Paradise Falls…but, he reminded himself, they'd got the Mesmetrons now, innocent people were no longer enslaved, the real hardened criminals of the Wasteland could do something good for society instead of simply being shot…
He wished he had a cigarette. But they were a cap apiece at least, if there even were any for sale.
"DEATHCLAW!" someone bellowed at the Regulator headquarters.
Everyone looked at Fred Colon at his desk.
"Well, do something about it!" he said. "Form a line and shoot at it!"
A few meaningful glances were exchanged in the headquarters, but they followed his orders, scrambling outside and into positions to aim out the second-story windows. Fred nervously made his way across the building behind them.
The lookout who had originally given the warning lowered his binoculars, looking completely confused. "Sir?" he said in a small voice. "I think you'd better see this."
Fred took the binoculars and looked through them. He saw tungsten-titanium claws, massive teeth, a long swishing tail…and a person in a Regulator jacket riding on the back. There was a saddle and everything. He quickly looked at the other deathclaws; they were the same way.
"Hold fire until they get closer!" he shouted. "They've got, well, they've got people riding on them. No I have not gone mad, Regulator Finch! See for yourself."
The rider of the lead deathclaw looked singularly unimpressed as the snarling animals swept into the courtyard. One of them made a move toward the brahmins, but the lead rider shouted…and it stopped.
"I suppose I had better go see what this is about," Fred said, realizing he had no real alternative. "Cover me, eh?"
"Oh, we'll cover you all right, sir," said one of the others. Glaring at him suspiciously, Fred marched down the stairs. The key to things like this was to just do them, because if you stopped and thought you'd realize why they were very bad ideas.
He kicked the door open, walked across the courtyard, every muscle screaming to run, and then stopped dead.
Lady Sybil jumped down from the lead deathclaw, landing softly in the sand. She then began petting—petting!—it, murmuring something. It didn't curl up and purr, but it didn't cut her in half either, which is what Fred had been expecting.
Sam Vimes' wife noticed Fred, who gestured wordlessly at the deathclaws.
"Well, you just have to be firm with them," she explained.
A short distance behind the Regulator headquarters was a graveyard. One of the fresher graves had a crudely ingrained tombstone.
"Here lies Nobby Nodds," it read, "certuhfied human, a dedicated Watch officer, and a good freind. Shot to death after mistaken for ferale ghool."
At the Brotherhood of Steel headquarters, frantic activity was in progress. Final checks were being done on Liberty Prime, the Lone Wanderer was being briefed by Sarah Lyons, and the retaking of the Jefferson Memorial was about to begin.
Suddenly, one of the scribes came running into the radio room. "Elder Lyons, sir!" he shouted. "Turn on the Enclave frequency!"
A few moments later, a calm, slightly sardonic voice was emanating into the Citadel. "—would like, at the earliest convenience of the distinguished Elder Lyons, to discuss a truce between the Enclave and the Brotherhood of Steel. Repeating, this is President Vetinari…"