They were greeted to the sight of Rafael aiming his gun on the Cowboys, with Burke holding a detonator in his hand, looking flustered and livid.
"You bastards. It was supposed to be quiet and simple, a small job that no one would have suffered from. And now you've gone and ruined everything." Burke snarled from several feet away from the entrance.
"Give it up Burke, you are surrounded. Better to come quietly than for us to put you down." Vincent spoke through labored breaths.
"My finger is on the trigger boy, it won't be quick or quiet. Simply nothing. Now throw your weapons down and you might walk away with your lives."
"And the people of Megaton?" Ginny quarreled.
"A job is a job girl, you should know better."
"I know that I'm this close to ending you Burke." Ginny hissed back.
"Ahh Haskel, you repugnant ladder climber. I will enjoy taking you with me. I'll see you all in hell."
Burke pressed the switch and the world froze.
Except that nothing happened. There was no bright light or thunderous boom, no flash of heat or agony. The world carried on as it had been. Burke pressed the button again.
Nothing.
"Rafael what di-"
*BANG*
Burke slumped to the ground, clutching his stomach. Coughing blood he tried to speak but was cut off by Rafael quietly putting another two rounds into his torso, effectively ending his life.
Rafael turned back towards his comrades, looking apologetic. "I'm sorry I didn't reveal myself immediately, I couldn't risk Burke trying anything else if he knew I had disarmed the bomb."
"We… look let's all go sit down and hash this out. We've been traveling all night to prevent this shit and I could really use a drink." Vincent commanded with the remaining Cowboys agreeing in their own fashions.
Two hours later…
"So let me get this straight: You didn't blow up Megaton because of your conscience but because you dreamed that you shouldn't and that it would be a poor move on your part?" Leon asked.
"Something like that. After Burke offered me the job I thought over everything and after I fell asleep I kept dreaming those words from the Log, and it just seemed right to not follow Burke's path."
The group had entered the city and met with a shell-shocked Lucas Simms, whose son Harden had been shot during the fighting. Harden was undergoing surgery at the clinic, where five other members of Megaton were currently recovering from their injuries. All fourteen Talons had been killed during the fighting, with Felix claiming two kills outside of the sniper he jumped and Stockholm claiming one before he was wounded.
As recompense for saving their entire town, Simms awarded the group with the keys to the house Lazarus had rented out for their first meeting almost a month prior. After receiving a cart of food from Andy Stahl as thanks for saving his sister's life, the group set about making a small breakfast before going over then events of that day.
"I don't get it, why did you think the answer to the book was Megaton?" Vincent asked with nothing but curiosity.
Rafael shook his head in disagreement. "The altar was Megaton, and ruin would have been if the bomb was activated. Since Atom is an inert warhead it would have taken a trigger of some kind to detonate it. A key if you will."
Vincent nodded, putting together the pieces of the puzzle.
Rafael reached into his duffel bag and pulled out a piece of technology. "This is what Burke gave me to activate the bomb. It's called a Fission Detonator."
Vincent frowned. "Interesting, but I don't see how that leads to the next piece of the puzzle."
Rafael shrugged. "I don't know what it does specifically, but I bet once we get back and analyze the rest of the log we will be able to figure out what it leads to next."
"Well, that solves one problem, but we've opened about twenty more." Haskel finished sourly.
"What do you mean Haskel? We stopped the bad guys and saved Megaton. I'd say that was a good day." Felix asked, perhaps somewhat naively.
Haskel scoffed at the notion. "What we did was kill the right hand of Alistair Tenpenny, over a dozen of his hired Mercenaries and foil his plans for the destruction of Megaton. Let me assure any of you who think otherwise that Alistair Tenpenny never forgets a slight against him. We will have to expect more and more Talon Company hit squads and independent bounty hunters coming after us. In fact, it wouldn't surprise me in the slightest if Tenpenny issues bounties on every one of our heads."
"Let that old bag come at us. He may be rich, and he may have an army, but he won't be able to follow us around the entire wasteland. Besides, with Burke gone he will scramble to find some asshole to kiss his feet and we all know how long that shit's gonna take. He'll be outta commission for at least a month." Jaxon finished coolly.
"Well, a rent free safe house, a couple hundred extra caps and appreciation from the town of Megaton is pretty nice." Leon supplied.
"All right, let's bag our supplies and get going, we left the camp in a state of disarray and I doubt they will react fondly to that at all." Vincent huffed. The Cowboys nodded in assent and began preparations for the road home.
And that finishes the first of several arcs. Now to address some items:
-Expect most of the "mission" based arcs to be fairly different from the game. They will retain a lot of the elements of the quests themselves, but I've played with their layouts in order to give them faster paces. Plot also gets moved around for some of the more repetitive quests (Nuka-Cola Challenge anyone?)
-Hold your questions about the Logs and the Widow for later. It's all part of the plot.
-In a few weeks I will be starting classes for the fall, which will ironically give me more time to write. I won't tell you guys to expect any fixed schedule, but I will do my best to sit down more and write more content. While I have a general story in place I would love to hear what you guys want to see more of, be that action or dialogue or romance or plot based interactions.
-The length of these arcs will really vary based on the quests themselves and how I feel they fit with the plot of the story. This is a very short in-game quest, while The Wasteland Survival Guide can be a very involved process for some players (Unless you cheat and utilize certain perks and skills to access every possible shortcut)
-The DLC's will come into play, and I've decided their lengths as well.
As always thank you guys for reading and please rate/review.
