Siren's Voice
"Stop you. It. Dangerous." Her voice echoed through the pipboy ear-bud. "Please Mister, there are terribly monsters here."
"You don't happen to be my damsel in distress are you?" I calmly walked through the dark corridor. I needn't worry about the monsters she spoke of. "Super mutants are big and clumsy, but a well placed bullet will put an end to their lumbering."
"I've seen them do terrible things. Please, turn back and leave this place."
She certainly sounded the age of the lass I was supposed to be rescuing. "Miss Bright?"
"Yes, I mean, no. I don't know who that is."
Certainly a peculiar answer.
A mutated rat scurried away from a super mutant corpse. It squeezed it's fat ass into a tiny hole, its long tail whipped about before it disappeared. The wildlife here wasn't all that different from back home. A few new mutated animals, but in the end, the same old wasteland.
"You know, lying isn't going to make me leave. Your parents are paying good caps to bring you back." I stepped over the next dead corpse. The mutants must have had a rebellion, and turned on each other. The darkness hid their sprawled bodies leaving eerie shadows cast by the pipboy's glow. "But indulge me in some answers. Do you know what happened here?"
"They wanted the green stuff. But my masters didn't want to share."
"Masters?"
"I've been a slave for a long time."
"Well, help me through this maze and I can get you freed and back to your loved ones." I shook my head. How terrible it must have been for the girl to live as a slave to these brutes. She didn't reply right away, so I figured I should continue. "You're a brave girl. I don't think I could live long captured. But your nightmare is coming to an end tonight."
"Please, leave. There are monsters here. It. dangerous."
"Again with that?" Honestly, the mutants were already dead. But if the girl insisted. I readied my personal modified 10mm. "Don't tell me there's a behemoth ahead?"
"He's dead. I killed him." The girl's voice cracked and she hiccupped. "The weapon you have now should be enough."
"You killed him? How?" If the girl could kill a behemoth, then why hadn't she escaped?
"I invited the other mutants here, told them we had green stuff. Told them my masters wanted it all to themselves. Masters be strong, fought, and died."
"Huh." There was a strange noise and I crouched. It was sloshing mixed with a rasped breathing. The pipboy glow auto turned off.
"B-but I'm trapped! That's why I haven't run away yet. I. Trapped." She hiccuped again and her pretty voice faded into sobs.
I shook my head. The lass was emotionally compromised. I wouldn't be surprised if she would forever be trapped in this place, caged by a mental prison that wouldn't let her go. Trauma could do that to people. It's what drove some to join raider gangs, easy access to chems and dangerous thrills to keep deeper demons at bay.
The sloshing was closer. I readied the 10mm and activated the pipboy glow. For a moment I lost all breath, and so must have the monstrosity of a mutant feet from me. I jumped to my feet and emptied the 10mm into its tentacle filled mouth. Backing up I holstered the 10mm and retrieved my combat shotgun, erasing the horrifying mug from the world.
"Tiffany!" Miss Bright wailed, her voice piercing deep into my skull. I nearly threw the earbud into the dirt. "Tiffany..." she continued to sob.
"The hell?!" I turned the pipboy glow to max and scanned the surrounding tunnel. There were more of those monstrosities further down. Mutants were supposed to be loud and clumsy, not sneaky.
"They were girls, innocent, sweet, girls." Miss Bright's voice trembled. "The only monsters left are those of my former and fellow slaves."
I put a hand to my chest. "Fuck." I stared at the headless corpse. I remember hearing of these things before. Centaurs. They were often a chimera of humans fused together by FEV. This particular centaur was certainly made from women. Hair clung to what remained of the head and crawled down the creature's back to its long tail. There were legs and arms lining the sides of the bloated body of the putrid thing.
"Miss Bright, I'm going to put those girls out of their misery. You might want to turn the connection off. It'll be loud." I didn't need her screaming and shattering my eardrum every time I ended one of her friend's lives. Excuse me, former friends. That was the most horrifying part of a centaur, the main head retained enough awareness to be in a state of suffering. It made for highly aggressive enemies.
Miss Bright didn't answer me. One moment there was a sniffle and then the next was static. I prayed she wasn't so gone that saving her was for not. It'd be sad to return her home and she committed suicide. I stepped further into the tunnel and exterminated the abominations the dead super mutants created.
Some time later deep into the installation Miss Bright came back. "Hello Mister, have you taken care of the. Girls. Monsters."
"I did, and may their spirits go to a better place."
"You're close to where I am."
"Oh?" I did a little circle, and spotted a camera high on a wall. "It's a peculiar place. I think I entered into an old laboratory some time ago."
"Yes, we are currently in what once was a medical facility."
My pipboy beeped and I checked it to see that my map had been updated with blueprints of the facility and the location of the girl. Would have been handy near the start of this hellish mission. But the last thirty minutes of fighting were a straight path to this spot, so if I found my way and now only had a map, all was still well.
"You're a very intelligent young lady, hacking into my pipboy without any physical connection."
"Where I come from we didn't discriminate against synths. There was a friend of mine who taught me many things. Especially about pipboys."
"I would like to meet him once I get you out of here." She probably read through my personal files by now. My diary, the misdeeds I've done, the people I've helped, the place I come from. Who my parents were.
"Traveler. He is. He was weak. He perished."
The walk to the girl in the facility wasn't far. And thankfully there were not any more monstrosities seeking to lick my face off. I came upon a hall filled with opened doors. Super mutant corpses littered the coridor, one behemoth's leg stuck through the ceiling. I stepped around the bodies, thankful for the gas mask otherwise I might be dead from the smell itself.
"119." The girl said, leading me around a corner to a windowed room. It was dark inside and I walked up to the glass, shining my pipboy glow inside. "You made it."
The room was empty. I squinted and leaned up to the glass, trying to see if I missed the girl curled up near a terminal somewhere or something. But beyond the glass there was nothing.
Sloshing. Suddenly there was sloshing all around.
The arms and tentacles grabbed me before I could react in time. I screamed and jerked against the monster's restraints. It was its body, the underside from above that captured me. Slowly, it lowered itself onto me from above. I jerked and kicked and screamed but the centaur's weight slowly overcame my strength and soon it took everything I had to simply breath. It tore the gas mask from my face and the smell of death and rot assaulted my sensed. Followed by further crushing weight until darkness took me.
For a moment. I came back with a gasp and struggled against the centaur's grasp.
"A woman? You sounded so very masculine. Manly. Strong."
There were reasons I didn't correct people on my gender when traveling. And I could feel it crawling across my skin now. It seemed even mutants were captured by the detail of physical sex. Suddenly I was reminded of horror stories shared by raider victims. But surely this centaur had other plans in mind, like eating me.
Fuck, I couldn't decide which was worse. Slow agonizing death or torturous rape. Maybe it would kill me then rape my body. I only hoped for that order.
"Please, calm yourself. You're shivering." A hand caressed my face.
I dared look up into the centaur's eyes. Much of her beauty was retained somehow through the process of being fused with other people, but there were distinct three long tongues exiting her broken mouth filled with sharp teeth. Suddenly all fears of dying were replaced with the desire to know how she could speak. It was said the mind acted strangely when faced with death. My answer came from the mouth on the side of her neck. "You've spoiled yourself. Please, I had to restrain you. I don't want to die. I am not weak."
If it were possible to scream I might have, but there was a tentacle, or perhaps a very long and thick finger across my mouth and nose.
"I will release you, but you needed to hear this before you go. For Bright's sake. My sake."
Was this thing really not going to kill me?
"I saw your history in that pipboy, you are a traveler, the child to glorious heroes. You yourself are not the most godly of people, but you share deep within yourself a kind heart. Good heart. Tender heart." I really couldn't stand looking up at the centaur's face. It was so close to mine now, her tongues licking my neck. Her saliva was green and likely radioactive. Did she even realize what she was doing? The mouth on the side of her neck continued to speak. "I am not just Bright, I am many, and I am one. But, they are gone, death taken them to better place."
Slowly the tentacle around my mouth loosened. There was a sudden scream and the tentacle wrapped around my mouth again.
Had I done that?
"You are surprised. I wished to have conversed more, but it seems you are too terrified."
Really, I didn't feel so scared now. I felt rather detached from myself actually.
"I will let you go. Return to Bright's parents and tell them she perished without pain."
The centaur lifted its body. Its long finger moved away and the smell of death wafted over me once again. Its thickness filled my senses. Lurching forward I emptied my stomach, bile mixing with the disgust around me. I saw my gas mask and scrambled for it. Once I breathed filtered air again, I shook at the terror that had captured me. My clothes and armor were ruined, weapons destroyed. I checked myself over again and again. It seemed though I looked terrible, I was physically fine and without a scratch. Not even my pipboy's geiger counter clicked. Looking up, there was a massive hole in the ceiling where the centaur escaped.
No, not escaped, but took its leave.
I slowly came to my feet, grabbing the wall for support. My traveling pack was nearby, left untouched by the monster. Searching through it, I gave myself a hearty dosage of med-X and a Stim to make sure I wasn't going to die on my way out. For insurance I took some Rad-X and a little Rad-away. Though not the best place to eat, I devoured the contents of a pack crumbs to make sure the meds stayed in me and I didn't puke the Rad-X and Rad-away up. Washing it with half a thing of dirty water and pouring the rest over my hair, I surveyed my surroundings again.
It seemed I was alone and the monstrosity wasn't returning. Taking a deep breath, I balled my hands into white knuckled fists. The fleeting compassion of a poor girl was what saved me. The monster had more mercy than many partners I had before. My stomach turned at the mix of meds and my heart burned, beating too fast for simply standing.
The mission was not a failure, to still be breathing was what truly counted. An old falconer friend told me once, that it was a good hunt if the bird returns. It was time to go back and break the Bright's hearts, to tell them the tragic news. And then, I'd demand my caps for the damage the ghost of their daughter had done.
Slinging my travel pack over my shoulder, I turned and began the tedious task of retracing my steps out of this ruined place. The few explosives that I kept would be my last course of defense, or method of suicide, before I returned home. Maybe I'd find me some raiders to pick off and get a half working firearm.
Mind calm again and filled with thoughtful plans, I took my leave.