They passed through the railway cutting just past Nipton, where Ella had first met Vulpes and seen firsthand the horrors that the Legion was capable of and slipped behind the now empty NCRCF.
She led the Century up the road to Hidden Valley in the midmorning sunshine and through the gates to the bunker where the Brotherhood of Steel held its Mojave chapter. She stopped and indicated the doo to Vulpes.
"You first, my dear." He said, brandishing a 10mm SMG. Ella took a deep breath and opened the hydraulic door. The scraping noise that the old door made grated upon her ears as it opened. The corridor leading to the first open space was empty. The crates stacked against the wall were the same ones that she had seen when she first arrived.
Everything looked normal, until she approached the two shield barriers, two Mark VI turrets activated and began to track Ella and the legionaries. The heads of the deadly weapons lifting from their stand-down positions with the tell-tale mechanical whine of their hydraulic systems engaging.
"Get down!" Ella shouted, as the rest of the legion soldiers began to follow her into the open area. She threw herself onto the ground, just below the line of sight of the two turrets. She managed to get to the barrier and lay up against it, pressing herself against the cold metal and out of the range of the Brotherhood turrets.
She could feel her heart rate rising as she watched the two turrets deal deadly laser fire into the Century, twenty men had fallen or been turned to ash before her eyes, fortunately, Vulpes had managed to gain cover behind some of the heavy-duty crates.
Ella crawled behind the defences and pulled three cables from the first turret, the machine of death whined and powered down, while the other continued to fire, she moved quickly, deactivating the other turret, she made sure that it was offline before she called all clear.
Ella looked to the carnage before her as Vulpes got up from behind his cover. He moved to her side,
"Any more surprises?" he asked her, somewhat angrily.
She looked at him incredulously.
"You honestly think I know? I'm only an honorary Paladin. I may have excellent technical and scientific knowledge from my travels, but I don't know every little trick of their trade." She said spitefully.
"Watch your tone, woman." Vulpes snapped. He turned to the Centurion, "Form the men up, and let's get to the job at hand." The Centurion moved quickly getting his men in formation.
Vulpes grabbed Ella by the arm,
"Get going." He snarled at her. She scowled back at him.
'Asshat' she sent the thought in his direction, having remembered someone from the Big MT research facility having called another researcher that in an interoffice mail. It was appropriate she thought, to call Vulpes that, and she fought to keep the smile from her face he she moved before him.
The main corridor leading to Ramos' security office was empty, as were all the other areas of the first level of the bunker. The Firing range was eerily silent; the six Mark VI laser turrets were all deactivated and many of the lights were dimmed.
The quarters were empty, as was Schuler's medical office. Ella moved with Vulpes as they searched every room with groups of the Legionaries. The VR units were blackened, and there was a curious light blinking on the large computer terminal where the Self Destruct was housed. Ella had a sinking feeling in her gut, but left the thought in the back of her mind to fester.
"There is nothing here, sir." Reported a Legionary to Vulpes.
"Lead us to the command centre." He ordered Ella, pulling her by the arm, back the way they came.
They entered the Elder's command centre, there was a holographic projector set up, and a holographic image of him was being displayed.
"Greetings, and welcome to Hidden Valley, Soldiers of the Legion." The holo-recording began "I'm sure at this point in time, you are wondering where the Mojave Chapter of the Brotherhood of Steel has gone. We have taken the Courier's advice and departed the Mojave, temporarily. We will return, but in the meantime, we wish to offer you a parting gift: A tomb. This facility's self-destruct system was activated the moment this recording became active, you now have approximately forty-five seconds to get out, or be destroyed with this facility. Good luck and I hope you all burn in hell."
Ella looked to Vulpes, "If you value your skin and that stupid ass hat you wear, I'd start running right about now." She said.
Vulpes turned and shouted. "Fall back, everyone get out!" he turned and grabbed Ella and they sprinted towards the exit to the upper levels, the mass exodus began with the men starting to panic, as the overload of the Bunker's CANDLE fusion power generator became audible.
"Go, go, go!" Ella shouted as men stood around stupidly, not understanding that there wasn't much time left. She and Vulpes reached the outer doors with mere seconds to spare, a flood of Legionaries went before them, thought their numbers were now severely down from the 80 soldiers within the Century, they had left their 20 support slaves back at Nipton.
Ella ran a few paces with Vulpes before the shockwave of the explosion threw them and the other men who had escaped to the dusty ground. Behind them clouds of smoke began to billow from the industrial fans that made up the DERVISH camouflage systems that kept the bunker hidden at night.
Men coughed and cursed, Ella propped herself up and looked around, her ears were ringing slightly from the noise of the explosion, Vulpes had a cut on his forehead, and she felt the sting of a small cut on her leg. There were other men who had worse injuries, nursing arms and fractured legs.
Vulpes got to his feet angrily and dusted himself down. He looked over the men, leaving Ella sitting in the dirt. She got up and staggered a little, her head spinning and ears still ringing. She moved over to an injured soldier, who was holding his arm.
"Let me take a look." She said, offering her help.
"Get away from me, profligate." He snarled.
"Fine, enjoy your pain." She snapped. Vulpes returned to her, "The Centurion didn't make, it, I am assuming command of the forces we have left." he turned to the array of men. "Any man who can stand do so." Several of the survivors arose shakily, sporting head wounds and broken arms. Those few who didn't arise, Vulpes walked over to each and shot them in the head.
Ella's hands went to her mouth in shock at Vulpes' butchery of his own men.
"Was that really necessary?" she asked him in shock when he returned to her side. He frowned at her.
"Each man was useless, how are they to get back to the Legion, Crawl? This is your fault for not doing Caesar's bidding when he asked you." He faced her, fury in his eyes. "You are fortunate that you are Caesar's slave, if you were mine, I would have had you lashed to a cross days ago." He turned and walked away from her.
She had no choice but to follow him as they moved out from Hidden Valley at a much slower pace than they had arrived. At Nipton, they re-joined the support crew and began to make their way back to the south, past the irradiated ruins of the town of Searchlight and back towards the Blue paradise shacks where the raft awaited them.
Caesar would not be too pleased to have lost almost a whole Century of men., and Ella was not looking forward to their return, despite the small victory of the destruction of the bunker, and the removal of the Brotherhood of Steel from the picture.
The raft ride back to the Fort was quiet; Vulpes sat across from her and looked as though he was deep in thought,
'Probably trying to put all the blame upon me.ยด Ella thought miserably. 'Well, that would be just about right, it's my fault, if I hadn't warned them, there might have been less casualties on the Legion side, but the Brotherhood has superior weaponry and technology on their side, how can that compare to sportswear armour and machetes?" she checked over the cut on her leg, it had stopped bleeding a few hours ago but still hurt, she supposed that there must be some grit in there for it to still be hurting.
She looked over to Vulpes, the cut on his head was weeping, and he wiped absently at it.
"Vulpes, would you like me to check that cut on your head?" she asked him.
He frowned at her, "Don't bother, I can take care of it myself." He snarled.
"All right, just so you know, I have medical training if you change your mind." She offered.
Vulpes snorted his disdain and turned his head away from her to look out at their destination in the distance.
The raft docked and Vulpes moved off without a look at her. She got to her feet, feeling the stiffness in her muscles from her not moving for the few hours that it took to get to the Fort.
Vulpes moved quickly to Caesar's tent, and waited impatiently for Ella to catch up. He held the door open for her to enter first. Caesar sat upon his throne, speaking to one of his Centurions. Vulpes waited for his Emperor to finish before he approached at Caesar's bidding.
"My lord, the Brotherhood of Steel has departed the Mojave, their bunker was destroyed by their own subterfuge, and we suffered heavy losses. Of the full complement of the Century, we returned with only twenty-three Soldiers, but the Centurion was killed." Vulpes handed Caesar a folder with reports that he had compiled during their journey back to the Fort.
"Your slave, however, was instrumental in advising us on the location and gaining entry to the bunker. She disabled two Mark VI laser turrets, while we were being fired upon by these defences at risk to her own life. For that, she is to be commended." Vulpes reported to Caesar.
"However, she failed to mention the possibility that the bunker would be booby-trapped."
Ella opened her mouth to protest, but Caesar held his hand up to silence her. she closed her mouth and lowered her head.
Caesar listened to the rest of the report from Vulpes,
"The end result was achieved, I am satisfied." He said, "Excellent work, as always Vulpes, promote the surviving Decanus from the Century to Centurion and give him a Century to command." He arose from his throne and dismissed Vulpes. He beckoned Ella to follow him to his quarters.
Ella took a deep breath and followed her Master.