Chapter 3: The Way Forward

"Get your f-..." Giselle despairingly made attempts at wrestling her arm free of her attacker's grasp, "Get the fuck off!"

"Settle down, bitch." The raider demanded, swiftly bringing the back side of his hand across Giselle's profile.

She buckled slightly, dropping her weight into the counter before her as the raider pulled her slumped figure over to his side of the bar. With an annoyed heave, the raider threw Giselle over his shoulder and turned on his heel, proceeding back down the hallway to the central hub of the mall.

Propped carelessly over the raider's shoulder, Giselle's shuddering eyes wander across the floor, vision blackening further by the second. She hoped to find something she could use to thwart the man dragging her away. This was her last chance to defend herself before she would be taken back to his group where they would perform ungodly atrocities against her. Swaying side to side on his back as the raider marched dutifully back to his men, Giselle's gaze moved along his beltline. She could barely make out the outline of the sheathed knife on his belt, as if conveniently placed there for her, as she outstretched her hand for it. Wrapping her shaking hand around the firm handle of the blade, she winced as she pulled it from its casing. Just as the raider turned to realize his blade had been removed, she drove the blade into the small of his back, erecting an agonizing scowl from the pitiless marauder.

The man crashed to his knees, blood spurting out of the wound on his back as Giselle cleanly ripped the knife back out, still slumped awkwardly over the man's shoulders. She positioned her weight into her upper body and flipped over the man's back, quickly jumping back to her feet as she hit the floor. She stumbled back, still not fully recovered from her brief episodes of losing consciousness, and caught herself against a stone pillar which once held up the second floor rotunda that was now only rubble at her feet. She looked up, not a moment too late, as a massive chunk of concrete fell from the caving roof above her. With a swift step to the side as the mass came plummeting to the floor and burst into a thousand fragments of distorted rock, she could feel her body strengthen and regain its composure. Eyes fixed on the cursing man before her; she clenched and rolled the handle of the stolen blade in her hands. The man's blood was now running down the length of the blade and into the palm of her hand. Scowling and clawing at his back, the man remained on his knees, blood forming a gloppy pool around him.

She cocked her arm back over her shoulder and whipped it forward, sending the whirling knife straight into the man's throat. He gasped for air as Giselle tore the blade back out, impetuously clawing at the gushing wound on his neck. With a last breath, the man fizzled to the floor and died with a twitch of his leg.

Giselle readied herself, unslinging her hunting rifle and aiming it further down the hallway leading back to the main circle of the mall. Standing, waiting, hoping a flurry of raiders came barreling down the corridor, she eagerly held her mark. After a few lengthy moments with no pursuing combatants, she hurried herself as she checked to make sure she still had her knapsack on her back. After finding it still in place, she darted back for the exit doors at the end of the hallway nearest the old food court.

Without looking back, and her hunting rifle in hands, she slams the butt of her weapon into the glass door. As it exploded into a razor-sharp jumble on the floor, she burst through the door frame, turning to again fix her aim into the mall and down the corridor to neutralize any pursuant. This time, she wasn't as fortunate. The remaining group of raiders she had encountered on her way into the mall surged forth from the hallway, discovering their dead friends and immediately convicting her of the crime. They scattered, each running into a different direction, but Giselle had managed to pick two of them off as they first approached. With the dwindling number of raiders, now only four, her confidence in overcoming this situation peaked. Reloading five more .308 rounds into the chamber, she searched the ravaged food court for the enduring four raiders. Two took cover in the Taco Bomb restaurant where she had first taken cover, ironic, one more leaning against a pillar near the hallway and rear of the food court, and the final one ducked low behind an overturned table in the middle of the chaotic array of dining furniture in the center of the court.

Apparently they weren't professionals, because they had left themselves wide open for a full on frontal assault. She snickered to herself before firing two rounds on the first man ducked pointlessly behind a table. The .308 rounds ruptured the surface of the table and continued path directly into the man's form, one tearing through his leather armor and planting itself in his stomach, and the other blowing clean through his eye socket. He fell to the floor instantly, and she moved her aim towards the enemy leaning cautiously behind the stone pillar. Just as she fired her third round and dropped the peeking raider as he carelessly leaned his head out to monitor the situation, the lasting two raiders erupted from their cover behind the kitchen and front counter of Taco Bomb. Perfect.

Anticipating their moves, she had already turned her mark toward the emerging two raiders, dropping them each with a single bullet to the head promptly as they leapt from their cover.

"Fucking goons," She scoffed, wiping her forehead with the back of her head, and unknowingly smearing some of the first kill's blood across her forehead as she started back into the mall to loot her casualties.

All in all the situation had proved fruitful, Giselle having recovered three boxes of Instamash, two boxes of Fancy Lad Snack Cakes, two boxes of BlamCo Mac and Cheese, and five purified water bottles from the raiders, two bags of dried coffee beans from A Cuppa Joe, and a box of Sugar Bombs and two water bottles from the Atom Burger store. Satisfied with her findings, she again made her leave through the busted door frame and stood tall in the diminishing sunlight. It was becoming dusk and the sun had begun to set within the western horizon. Reaching around her back, she withdrew a bottle of purified water from her pack and twisted off the cap, swigging the warm liquid thoughtlessly. Between taking deep swigs and spitting out spurts of the water, she indulged herself in the room-temperature water: a luxury taken for granted so long ago.


I paced anxiously around the outskirts of my homemade prison, fingers dragging across the jagged walls as I circled endlessly. It felt like it had been weeks since I discovered my fate, and as time went on it only became more distorted. I needed to figure out an escape before it was too late. I had preserved enough food, water, and medicine to keep me alive for a hundred years, but it wasn't starvation, thirst, or sickness that I feared. It was the thought of spending eternity or dying cold and alone, in this tiny space. The notion of wasting away, day after day, slowly losing my sanity and resorting to the primal beast every human was beneath their core. I peered around my dimly lit cell, absorbing every small detail, every crack in the wall, and rummaged through the many possibilities in my mind.

What if I kept trying the door? Maybe something fell on top of it and I could work my way free. What if I waited? I have enough food to last me a life time, and for all I knew anyway I would reach the surface and have to turn back around due to unlivable conditions on the surface. The world was probably soaked to its core in radiation. Crops, water, everything had to have been infested with it. What if I was wrong, though? What if humans had prevailed? What if the world outside was persevering through nuclear holocaust while I was locked away under the ground on which they walked?

Thousands of different scenarios ran through my head, but none of them could reassure me enough to prevent me from devising an escape plan. I would either exit this prison or lose my mind trying, and at this point, neither outcome seemed undesirable. At least if I was mad I could flourish in these conditions. Mad men only need themselves to talk to. I could wait and ramble to myself, for infinity, until the day came where I exhaled my last breath. That didn't seem too bad, but the thought of a life above trumped it unquestionably. Nothing would stop me from trying.

Hours, or maybe days later, after all of my plans had failed unequivocally and the door remained unyielding, I gave up. My strength was lost, and if I wanted any hope of continuing my vain pursuit of freedom, I needed rest and nourishment. I moseyed back to my cot and fell into it, gritting my teeth as the creaking bed posts adjusted under my weight. There has to be a way out of here, I promised myself while nibbling on a Fancy Lad Snack Cake. Washing the snack cake down with a few chugs of water, I wiped my lips with the back of my wrist and released a rejuvenating sigh.

After finishing my portioned rations, subsequently giving myself the energy I would need to persist in my task, I laid my head back into the pillow on my cot. I kicked my feet up onto the railing at the end of the small bed and crossed them, bouncing my left foot slightly under my right. I may as well read for a bit before picking back up where I had left off. Reading was always my way of passing the time, and I had a collection of literature that even the scholars of old would envy. I grabbed an old newspaper off of the stack on the floor beside my cot and folded it open, my eyes tracing each line methodically as I began reading through the first article. Nuclear Energy Is the Future was the title, and it explained the many different, practical uses for nuclear energy versus burning fossil fuels, as man had done since as long as anybody could remember. It was an interesting read, but I soon grew bored of it and switched to a novel I had brought and anxiously intended to read. I had brought enough to last me a year, and my only means for light was the battery operated lantern and enough batteries to last… a little over a year.

Just then, the lantern died, and the room plunged into a thick black.


After finding enough of what she lacked at the mall, Giselle was ready to continue her escapade towards Motown. She still had roughly a ten mile journey ahead of her until she reached her destination, but the sun was falling and the moon was rising, and the wasteland became an entirely different place under the cover of night. She knew she needed to seek shelter, and fast.

She followed the one road that remained, which was no longer pavement, but dirt packed flat and neatly under the boots of fellow travelers. After walking what she logged as two miles on her Pip-Boy, she stumbled across what she could only decipher as a settlement, and judging by the map she was following, it had to be The Heights.

From the outside, this particular colony seemed well off. The entire camp was surrounded by a chain link fence, and from the looks of it they had managed to electrify it. The surrounding fence only lead to one entrance, a sectioned off gate where two guards stood watch outside, assault rifles at the ready against their shoulders. This place seemed as good as any to settle down and rest for the night, especially because it was an easy choice between a protected town and another one room shack on the side of the road. It really seemed like a decision that made itself.

Giselle prudently neared closer to the gate, hands in clear view to avoid alerting any unwanted attention from the armed guards. With outstretched arms placed nonchalantly at her side, she sauntered up to the gate and stood merely inches away from it, shooting the guards a chipper smile.

"How's the weather in there, fellas? Any different from out here?" she chimed, lively.

"No different than out there. What do you want?" one of the guards answered in a male voice, slightly muffled beneath his protective face mask. Giselle could easily recognize that he was all business.

"A place to sleep for the night would be nice," she retorted, her facial expression turning grim. "There isn't much variety out here when it comes to places to sleep."

"You know how many people come through here looking for shelter, girl? What makes you so special?" the second guard piped up, her voice deep and burly.

"Well, I wouldn't say special, but I do have caps. Everybody takes caps, right?" she replied. "How's about a hundred for each of you and we call it a day?"

"If only it were that easy," the female guard countered. "We're both paid by the hour and have strict orders, so your caps are useless here."

"You think you're the first person to offer us caps, lady?" the other guard quipped, cocking his head back and cackling.

"Instead of borderline insulting me, why don't you tell me what I need to do to get in there?" she remarked dryly. Her demeanor had grown tired and annoyed, and she was blatantly fed up with the two's antics.

"I thought we already made this clear? Nobody gets in. Doesn't matter what your pathetic reason is, or how many caps you have: nobody gets through this gate," the male guard declared, hands noticeably taking a more firm hold on the butt of his weapon.

Just as the brawny male finished his sentence, a hideous creature erupted from the shadows, baring razor sharp teeth that protruded from its misaligned jaws while standing on its two hind legs. Its fur was mangy and only existed in oddly shaped clumps splotching the mid-sized canine-looking beast's gristly skin. It screeched, almost in a terrifying howl, and charged directly at Giselle standing idle in front of the gate, still confused and unprepared for the situation.

Stepping forward, the male guard aimed his automatic assault rifle at the assailing animal and emptied half of his thirty round magazine, barraging it with bullets and stopping it in its tracks. While the animal lay dying on the ground, wheezing slightly as its starved belly puffed in and out, the man stepped forward and withdrew a pistol from the holster on his side. Offering the expiring creature no time to make a final stand, the man put two finishing rounds into its head and holstered his sidearm. Wiping his gloved hands together, he returned his attention to Giselle, eyes forthright with irritation.

"As you can see, we have enough problems that need our attention. We don't need to worry about some lost Vaultie who clearly cannot fend for herself," the male asserted, sizing her up concurrently.

Giselle had grown noticeably exasperated and the look of confusion still haunted her sweat-glistening face in the now prominent moonlight.

"I'm not going to sit here and explain to you the many fallacies in your judgement because you clearly," she mocked, grinning sarcastically while moving her weathered lips, "lack an education. I need a place to sleep, now, and it seems like you have a problem that you don't know how to take care of. Who's in charge here?"

Sneering, the female guard stepped forward, "Sterling."

"Take me to him," Giselle instructed, hands now on her slender hips with her weight shifted onto her left leg.

The two guards, slightly baffled at Giselle's tenacity, but more by her determination, stood for a moment, staring at each other almost in disbelief, before stepping aside and using a remote controlled button to open the gate. The chain-link doors swung open and Giselle stayed for a moment, watching the two guards and awaiting their next move.

"You gonna stand here all night?" the male probed, as if provoking her into another quarrel. "Or was that your entire plan? Get us to open the gates and then stand here like an idiot while all of the Wolvies invade our camp."

Promenading through the gate, Giselle turned as she reached the other side and as the gates swung back to a close. The guards turned back to their position, facing forward and eyes alert for any threats compromising the gate.

"Wolvies?" she inquired, eyes squinted into a dubious mien.

"Go talk to Sterling," the female guard rejoined, neglecting to turn to acknowledge Giselle. "He's at the police station."

She wouldn't question, instead spinning around heading for what could only be distinguished as a police station. Stopping momentarily, she shrugs off her knapsack and sets it down, reaching in and extracting a crumpled pack of cigarette. Pulling the last one from the small carton, she stuffs it loosely between her lips and lights it. Poking her arms back through the straps her sack she continues towards the station, cigarette dangling lazily from her mouth as she takes gradual draws. As she arrives at the front steps of the police station, a dapper gentleman in a wrinkled suit emerges from the double-doors to the building, arms erect above his head where a black top-hat sat.

"So you're the one Lotus informed me about?" he queried, an animated smile plastered across his rubbery, aged skin. "Do you have a name, my dear?"

"Gis- Elle. You can call me Elle," she ordained, deriving an amused semblance from Sterling. "And that must make you Sterling."

"Very right, my dear!" he exclaimed, causing Giselle to startle vaguely. "And I have a proposition for you."

"This must be related to those things outside," Giselle conveyed, finishing the last drag from her cigarette and carelessly tossing it aside. "Wolvies, I think one of yours called them?"

"Precisely! Wolvies, the aftermath of a mad doctor's experiments with the extinct Wolverine genome and the infamous FEV," he retorted, his face as energetic as ever.

"FEV? I'm not familiar with… that," Giselle uttered, seemingly disappointed with her lack of knowledge on the subject.

"The forced evolutionary virus, or FEV. It's a chemical that rapidly hastens the evolutionary process. There was a doctor here, one of our previous residents. His name was Dr. Merrigold. He was our resident doctor, and a very good one, but he had another agenda. He was ultimately obsessed with cloning and resurrecting a species of Wolverines," Sterling explained, his eternal beam fading to a concerned state. "We thought nothing of it, because it seemed harmless enough, but he had another plan that remained unspoken until he was successful. After successfully replicating the Wolverine DNA and RNA, he began trials with introducing the FEV virus to his clones in an abandoned laboratory outside of town. After a chemical accident, which most believe was caused by the Wolverines' increased intelligence and strength, Dr. Merrigold's lab was overrun by the beasts and we assume they maimed him alive, but nobody knows. His radio went silent a week or two ago and nobody has heard from him since."

She didn't need to hear any more, already concluding his request in her head.

"So you want me to go to his lab and find out?" she bantered, almost rolling her eyes in an act of displeasure.

"And don't forget to destroy all of the Wolvies," Sterling added, his veneer again reverting back to his vivacious grin.

Right. Kill all of the Wolvies. How could she forget?