How long have I been like this?
Days into weeks, weeks into months, months into... Something. It's all a blur.
Stuck as passenger to my own body. Well, it's not really mine anymore, in the conventional sense. I find myself receiving information in flashes – bits and pieces of what my body is doing without my consciousness. Guess I've sort of learned to think within the subconscious, as that's where these thoughts reside, or at least that's where my "self" is locked up. I often try to replay the past events that led up to where I am now, trying to scrape up an explanation or a solution.
The small amount of current events that are relayed to me are quite frightening, to say the least. Constant bloodshed, hunting, feasting. It would be quite the spectacle if it weren't the fact that I'm forced to witness these acts of ferocity and know that it's me doing it. Well, like I said, it's not really "me". Allow me to explain.
Some time ago, I became a deathclaw.
Yes, yes, I know. It seems ridiculous. That's what I thought, I just assumed I was tripping hard on Jet when the changes started to occur. It slowly turned into a nightmarish fever-dream of steadily changing and losing time, and not just a few minutes here and there. I was losing days and days at a time, until it became how it is now... Only small flashes of my body's actions, and not even through my own eyes. It's like watching one of those pre-war televisions.
Like all things, it began very simply. In this case it began in the form of a coinflip. Damn, do I wish I had lady luck on my side.
Allow me to take you back to my halcyon days of being a raider. Ah, what a time to be alive. The NCR hadn't fully established itself in California yet, being just a glorified police force for Shady Sands at that point. The Brotherhood kept out of people's hair for the most part as well, other than a couple of outposts here and there, like in the Den. The Enclave were a real pain in the ass, though. I can't tell you how many times I watched my fellow raiders get melted into a pile of goo, or zapped into ashes because of those freaks.
Hah, that's rich, me calling them freaks... At least they're still human. Mostly.
I was a member of the Khans, and quite a high-ranking member as well. I proved myself to be incredibly accurate and deadly with the standard-issue FN FAL they gave to recruits, and that's where I got my nickname Rec. To be honest, I can't even remember my birth name, and I don't know if that's because of my brain's new trend of bloodlust, or that I was a raider for over half my life.
Fair skinned and dark haired, I stood at a whopping five-foot five, and weighed an astounding one-hundred twenty pounds. And that was in my late twenties... I did get compliments from the ladies for my blue eyes, but not much else. It was probably pity, come to think of it.
I was abducted when I was just hitting puberty, and they used me as a moving target 'til the guy shooting at me got a rock to the face from fifty yards. It just took off from there, and I ended up adjusting fairly quickly to the life of a Khan. I still remember my first assignment: Go with a unit to a local farming settlement some miles away and come back with any guns, ammo, and meds we could find. What I found odd was that we were given specific orders not to kill anyone unprovoked. Anyways, that's beside the point.
After a decade of moving up the ranks and leading firefights, I got a bit more sedentary since my prowess allowed a bit of slacking. I took to hanging out at the bar more often, just shooting the shit with my fellow Khans. You know how that goes – fights break out, gambling happens, someone gets shot in the foot... The usual shit. Well, my buddy Bones and I wanted to make a bet, but we both had different ideas. So, we opted for the universal conflict-resolver: A coinflip.
I picked heads, and Bones picked tails. It landed on tails, of course. His bet was a lot more intense than mine was... Bones wanted to see who could get closest to a sleeping deathclaw without waking it up.
Now, I'm a pretty lithe guy. The only reason I've lived this long was because I'm such a small target to hit compared to my beefy, beer-gutted comrades. So, I was fairly confident that I could beat him in this bet and make an easy win. Pair that with the fact Bones wasn't classified outside the "beefy, beer-gutted" category I mentioned, and it seemed like a no-brainer. He has dark hair and fair skin like me, so people would joke that he was my dad. Even though he's younger by five years...
Ah, do keep in mind that my mind didn't only go through negative changes. Deathclaws are extremely intelligent and curious creatures, and I definitely received a lot of that benefit myself, so that's why I might describe my previous actions regrettably. It's kind of embarrassing to admit that I was likely dumber than a deathclaw. But come on, being a raider for that long would take its toll on anybody's psyche.
So, Bones "knew a place" about ten miles out from the base, so it was quite a hike. If anything went wrong, we were alone out there. But we went anyways. He mentioned it was some cave that he'd found when scouting for enemies around the base, and we both hoped the beast was sleeping when we got there. Bones did bring RadAway, stims, and a couple pairs of rubber boots, so I do have to give him credit for his preparedness there.
Nothing eventful came about during our hike. Contrary to popular belief, the Wasteland really isn't out to get you as much as people say, that's just a survival mechanism passed down the generations to keep humans safer. Like being afraid of the dark. What you need to be afraid of out there for the most part is your food and water supply dwindling.
A few hours later when we got to the cave, Bones immediately threw on the rubber boots over his combats.
Bones joked, "Rec, just be sure to give my dead body to my girlfriend, I'm sure she'd wanna kiss this mug one last time."
"Yeah yeah, not before I kiss 'er myself," I replied.
"Sloppy seconds, Rec. Careful with that shit," Bones said, with a smirk.
And off he went.
I gotta hand it to him, he was so quiet I don't think a mouse would've noticed him. He was like, breaking the laws of physics or something... I watched him disappear into the mouth of the cave, and I took a seat on a nearby rock. Must have been at least half an hour before he came back out. And when he did, I almost shit my pants right then and there.
What looked like an alpha-male deathclaw was chasing the poor bastard out of the cave into the desert. Out of the freezer, and into the frying pan... I immediately I got my rifle ready to fire, and started shooting to distract the thing from my friend.
"You ain't leavin' here in pieces, Bones! Keep runnin'!" I yelled.
I kept taking careful aim at this thing, but its hide was just too tough and it was moving too fast to hit its vitals that well. My goal worked, though. It was definitely distracted... The angle of its movement changed quite quickly toward my direction, and I had to reload. This wasn't good. As it got closer to me by the second, I tried to look for Bones, but he was nowhere to be seen. Fuck, this really wasn't good. I don't blame him for hiding, one survivor is better than zero.
This deathclaw got within ten yards from me and let out the most blood-curdling roar I had ever heard. Anxiety set in, and I ended up playing ring-around-the-rosie with this deathclaw between the large rock I had been sitting on. It got increasingly frustrated, and just heaved the rock aside after about ten seconds of this.
"Shit," I muttered to myself.
As if to reply to me, the deathclaw roared again, albeit less ferocious than last time.
The next events happened within seconds, but it felt like minutes. I knew it would try to strike me with its claws, so I stepped toward the deathclaw to avoid that. Instead, its palm hit me, which still crushed my right bicep and the ribs behind it, but it didn't kill me. The next swing came from below, and the deathclaw was still too close to hit me full-force, so I basically got drop-kicked by a five-foot long arm with claws, and was thrown into the air.
Flip, flip, flip... I got dizzy mid-flight.
And a loud thwack signified my landing.
I landed on heads this time.. The deafening ringing in my skull let me know that one.
Groaning and rolling my eyes uncontrollably, I tried to get up but just kept falling down. My vision was blurry, and my legs felt very weak. I had a concussion, and my neck was probably severely injured as well, in addition to the gashes on my inner thighs from the last hit I took.
With each failed attempt to raise myself, the deathclaw stepped closer, and my anxiety doubled. I was freaking the fuck out, trying to plead with the beast due to my concussion. I had no idea what was going on. It grabbed my legs and dragged me toward the cave, with me babbling the whole way.
When I reached the cave, my vision was starting to come back to me, and I realized what was going on.
"How am I gonna get out of this," I wondered to myself.
Suddenly, my arms and torso started to burn, and horribly. I caught the deathclaw off-guard with my screams and it got a bit startled, but kept dragging me deeper into the cave. I realized this burning was because the deathclaw was dragging me through puddles of toxic waste. It took an indomitable amount of will to stay awake during this torture, but I needed to remember the layout of this cave if I, no, when I escape.
The deathclaw stopped, and then threw me aside into what looked like a nest, with bones strewn everywhere within this little alcove. It was at this point that I had any sort of freedom after being ragdolled by this thing, and I took that time to check my wounds.
That toxic waste had gotten into my leg wounds, and I was sitting in a nest of old shells and bones. This was going to be an infection, and there was no question about it. The question was, would I be able to make it back to base on pure adrenaline and willpower alone? The answer was no, but I didn't know that at the time.
After what felt like hours, the deathclaw came back to the nest, and approached me with an aggressive stance. I no longer had the tools or stamina to fight this thing, so I just sat there eyeing this thing. Wasn't this creature created, and not mutated? I remember reading a pre-war magazine about some kind of lizard that was being experimented on.
My thoughts were cut short by an immediate loss of breath, and a realization that the deathclaw had just slashed me across the chest with its claws. Blood poured out onto the ground, and I was left in disbelief. This many years alive, wasted... My life, wasted, pouring out of my body before me. It was unfair. Looks like I wasn't escaping, after all.
Instead of screaming in pain, I just started to break down and cry as I bled out. In hindsight, it was definitely because of the insane amount of adrenaline pulsing through my bloodstream. But that was fading quickly. I felt more pain, and more cloudy as time passed, due to losing adrenaline and oxygen from my blood spilling on the floor.
The deathclaw got within inches of me, and I was praying for it to end my life.
Instead it sniffed and snorted, inspecting me as my pain shot through the roof.
"Kill me already..."
"Kill... me..." My voice trailed, its face still inches from mine.
I lost consciousness, fading into a comfortable dream I can no longer remember.
/
Notes: Originally this was supposed to be a goofy story where a merchant gets turned into a mirelurk and continues his business, but I took the basic plot points and made something more serious instead. There's also some references to character builds too (Rec uses small guns, throwing, and first aid, and some very light references to SPECIAL)
Please leave a review on what I can do better or anything you can think of, like plot holes or incorrect lore! It's my first fanfic and I'm looking forward to learning from this.