"Intuition"

Characters: Roland, Jericho, Dogmeat

Summary: Roland gets serv'd.

Roland mounted the low crest of the rock mound, carefully hauling his crippled right leg over a boulder before kneeling at the top and leaning back against a rock. He withdrew a stimpak from his pocket and jabbed it into his thigh, feeling the painkillers flow through his veins and making him ignore the blood coloring the leg of his Vault 101 jumpsuit.

Next came Jericho, holding his Chinese assault rifle in one hand and a half-burnt cigarette in the other. Finally there was Dogmeat, who loped over to Roland's side and sniffed at the wound.

"Jesus that hurt more than it should have…" Roland sighed, wiping his face with a dirty sleeve. He withdrew his looted Ripper from its belt loop and looked it over. "Motor's shot… Dammit, gonna have to go see Moira in the morning and get it fixed again. She should have enough money from repairing my stuff that she could open up a whole chain of Craterside Supplies by now."

Jericho knelt next to Roland, took another drag on his cigarette and tossed it off the ledge of the bluff. "Just remember, kid- if it's still hanging on, you can walk it off."

"Yeah," Roland said sarcastically. "But by now I've seen enough people shot in the torso to know when someone will and won't live." He twisted around to look down over the bluff. "How many more Talon Company are down there? I spotted five."

Jericho shook his head. "Seven; two more were by the base of the hill."

Roland coughed as he pulled a bottle of vodka out of his pack and pulled the cork out with his teeth. "Bullshit, there were five there."

Jericho turned towards Roland, a serious look on his face. "There were seven, and you fuckin' know it. Two guys were waiting for us at the base of the hill, plus the three that tracked us over from Hamilton's Hideaway, and the three that picked up the trail at Northwest Seneca."

"Those were ghouls in combat armor! They weren't even after us!" Roland shouted.

Then a shout answered- "Hey! There they are!" This shout was accompanied by bullets pouring through a gap in the rocks and narrowly missing the group. Roland stood, pulling the Missile Launcher off his back.

"One missile should be more than enough for five guys…" Roland mumbled as he loaded his first missile- which, as were all the rest, marked in magic marker, PROPERTY OF ROLAND J. ROCKFORT, ROCKFORT HOMESTEAD, MEGATON. DON'T F**KING TOUCH IT.

"Yeah," Jericho retorted, "but will it be enough for seven?"

"I'm fucking telling you there's only five!" Roland shouted as he leaned around the corner and leveled the missile launcher on the first group of five Talon Company soldiers and shot. The missile detonated the belt of frag mines slung over one mercenary's shoulder, which in turn caused an even larger explosion that left none of the five men standing. The shooting stopped.

Roland grinned as he loaded the next missile into the missile launcher. "I told you there were only five- JESUS H. CHRIST!" A burst of bullets narrowly missed his face, searing the hair swept over his forehead.

"I told you there were seven," Jericho shouted as he tossed a frag grenade over his shoulder into the group of two Talon Company soldiers at the base of the hill.