Disclaimer: Yes. Yes I secretly own the Fallout series and this is all just some scam to profit off of it. Clever you, figuring it out. (Note, angry lawyers, that was sarcasm. It come in handy sometimes.)

All poor jokes aside, I apologize for the delays in updating. To quote a great man, "$3%! happens" And meanwhile, while we're on that topic, coarse language and vulgarity ahead! Yay! Squeamish readers, you've been warned.

Progress out of Megaton was slow, Jonas noted with distaste. If it wasn't one thing, it was another. The guards seemed eager to let them go, hard glares given to both Jericho and Jean-Claude. The elderly Sheriff Simms was less easily swayed. It was only after ten minutes of intense questioning broken by the timely arrival of his son and very pregnant daughter-in-law that the stalwart old man permitted them to leave, his parting gift the evil eye to Jericho. Mikken hung back to whisper a message to the two.

"Thanks, Harden," he said, with Simms the elder out of earshot, before turning to face his wife. "And best of luck with the baby, Maggie. I'll be sure to come back with something special for the little tyke."

The caravan man returned to his companions with a wry smile on his face as they exited the town. He clapped Jonas on the back. "Learn a lesson my boy," he said, a swagger in his step as he took a sip from a canteen. "You'll catch more bloatflies with honey than vinegar."

The young man looked at is companion with utter confusion. "Why the hell would I want to catch a bloatfly?"

Mikken shrugged. "Beats me," he said cheerily. "Some old pre-war saying. You get the picture though, kid. A little sweetness to the right folks will get you far in life."

Jonas balked a bit. "How's kissing everyone's ass supposed to help me?"

"You wound me," the old caravaner answered, in mock pain. "I ain't telling you to be a suck up. People do business with people, kid. You build relationships and connections with good folks, like the Simms, or you Vaulties even, and you get yourself some friends." Mikken shrugged. "It's a lot easier to pull a favor from a friend than an enemy."

From behind them came a snicker, and turning Jonas found it to be Jericho, the old raider sucking on a cigarette. "Well ain't that a pile of Brahmin shit," he said with a chuckle. "Mikken, you left out the part where everyone sits around singing campfire songs and caps start falling from the sky."

Mikken shrugged. "You got something to add," he answered drily, "o font of wisdom?"

Jericho took a draw from his cigarette and spat. "Everything's cheaper at gunpoint."

The conversation died, and the group began the trek through the desolate hills surrounding Megaton. A quick scan of his Pip-Boy told Jonas they were heading southeast, and as they crested the latest hill, the ruins od Washington DC stretched out before him, a great grey mass of crumbling shells clustered around the murky waters of the Potomac. He admired it silently, the tales of the Vault's history books running through his head. The capital of the Untied States. The seat of power of the free world. The-

A sudden angry squeal broke his reverie, and whirling towards the source of the noise, Jonas saw a hideous, fleshy, hairless mass rushing towards him, yellowed teeth bared. Mole rat, he thought, as memories of the Vault's wasteland classes bubbled to the surface. Frantically, he reached to grab Old Glory, fingers fumbling and cold sweat on his brow. Too slow, he panicked. It's gonna get me!

A flurry of motion came from out the corner of his eye, and a half a second later the rat-a-tat of automatic weaponry reached is ears. Tiny geysers of blood erupted from the creature's mottled hide, and with a shudder it died, squealing.

Heart racing, Jonas turned to face his savior, only to find Jericho sheathing his weapon, a look of contempt on his face.

"Be quick or be dead, kid," he sneered, shouldering past the youth with a knife in hand, headed towards the animal's corpse.

"Wh-what are you doing?" Jonas asked, still shaken from the experience.

"A man's gotta eat," came the brusque reply, as the former raider began butchering the animal. Several minutes later, and with the addition of several plastic swaddled steaks, the men resumed their journey.

They walked in silence, trekking over barren hillsides and past ruined buildings, the glimmering dirty waters of the Potomac growing ever closer. A supermarket parking lot was a graveyard for the rusted out carcasses of cars. Blackened buildings with crumbling facades and faded shop fronts were still-lifes, moments frozen of a time and place long lost. It was late in the afternoon when they reached the waterfront. The dead hulls of speedboats and yachts sat mired in the muck not a stone's throw from rotting docks. Still they marched onwards, Mikken leading the way.

Night fell over the wasteland as the weary travellers reached the bridge. They broken back of a steel skeleton, it stretched across the waters proud, bitter, and strong, in the shadow of its own breaks and of the Citadel.

The Citadel. Jonas squinted to see over the last vestiges of the setting sun, the silhouette of the Brotherhood of Steel's legendary fortress stark against the horizon. Turrets and sniper nests studded the roof like the points of a crown, hulking figures in glinting power armor patrolling them, so close yet so distant.

"Don't get your hopes up, kid," Jericho scowled. "Those tin cans don't like dealing with us mere mortals." He took a draw of a cigarette and flicked it into a puddle, where it fizzed and sizzled into oblivion.

"Can it you crusty old man," Mikken answered. "They do goo d work, and you know it. You're just bitter they started putting a little law and order in place. "

Jericho glowered at him in silence, and Mikken called the party to a halt.

"We can camp here for the night," he called to them, jerking his thumb towards a crumbling overhang, where the bridge had once linked in to the main highway. Jonas could see the outline of a sheltered space beneath it. "Its nice and stable, and easy to defend."

Jericho scowled. "I don't like it," he said. "Too close to those Brotherhood pricks."

"You said it yourself, dickhead. Those guys don't bother with the likes of us. What's there to be afraid of?"

The raider had no answer, and the camp was accepted. Whoever the previous occupants of the overhang were, they had been fairly well equipped. A few ruined mattresses remained, along with enough rotten scrap and brittle wood to get a foul smelling fire going. Jericho roasted the mole rat meat over the oily flames, and there was enough for each man to have a fat steak of the oversized rodent.

Jonas nearly choked on it, while Mikken nodded in appreciation.

"Not a bad cut," he told the chef. "Bit stringier that usual, but not bad."

The raider shrugged. "Mirelurks hardly come this far up the river anymore. Woulda been better if little Johnny-shits-his-pants over there," he jerked a thumb at Jonas, "had looked appetizing to one of them instead. Still, better than roach meat."

"Amen to that," the caravaner answered.

Jonas said nothing, and let the insult pass. Soon enough it was time to sleep. Mikken drew the short straw, and took the first watch. As the young man settled down onto his stinking mattress, the pungent aromas of the wasteland and the river wafting up to meet him, he could only wonder if he had made the right choice. If coming one this expedition had been the right choice. And above all, what had he gotten himself into?

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The Lone Wanderer sighed as he sat his weary body down a crumbled piece of masonry, watching the bustle as freed slaves went about dismantling the operations of their former masters, their bodies bent and pained in their work, but their eyes beaming and proud. It had been a nightmare getting things organized. Though the majority of the slaves had scattered to the winds, a significant number had remained. The new freedmen, simple tribals many of them, had wanted him as their leader. He had not. Circumstance had forced his hand, however. With the Rajah gone, a power vacuum had been left, and a few cruel small-minded men had already tried to set things up as they had been before. The gallows that stood outside the Taj Mahal were a testament to their failures.

The would-be tyrants had convinced him of a need for a more stable government, and until one could be formed, he was it. That didn't mean he had to like it, though.

"Gweilo," came the call from his assistant who jogged up the hill, a bright eyed, energetic youth named Raj. He had cringed at the name at first, but now paid it no heed. The former slaves had heard Mei call him by it, and now there was nothing to be done to stop them. Inwardly, he laughed. It had been Mei's father's name for him, an antiquated Chinese term he learned meant 'white devil'. He doubted Mei even understood what it meant. The Indians called him it with reverence though, and for now, it would serve.

"Yes, Raj?" he answered in clumsy Hindi. He was progressing with the language, though it was still difficult for him. "What is it now?"

The youth seemed to fumble for his words. "A, a caravan, sir. You asked to be told if any more traders arrived. A group showed up at the gates, and the guards rounded them up in the square."

The Wanderer frowned, and stroked his chin, suddenly reminded by the blonde scruff that he needed to shave. Though word had spread of the Rajah's demise, Agra, he had come to understand, had been India's slave trade capital for centuries, and old habits died hard. Traders who had not heard of the change in management, or ones who did not care, still trickled in. Honest merchants were allowed to do their business and depart. Slavers were not so lucky.

"What kind of merchants are we talking about, Raj?" the man called Gweilo asked. The young man's face was grim, but the barest hint of vindication crept into his visage.

"The kind we keep rope for."

The answer was straight forward, and the Wanderer rose to follow his young aide. The trial would be on the steps of the Taj Mahal, as always. The several dozen slaves who had stayed were assembled on the steps, looking down at those who were to be judged. Seven ragged men, stripped of their weapons, sat kneeling in the center of the square, guarded by a group of armed slaves.

The Wanderer sighed. It would have all been so much easier if all of them had left, he thought to himself, looking out over the assembled freedmen. These were the locals, the people of Agra who had been born and raised slaves, lorded over by the false kings who sat in the Taj Mahal. This land, and that life were all they knew, so when the chance came to leave, far too many had stayed. And so here he was, teaching a people how to live. Teaching them to find their voice once more.

The chatter and rumble of voices that filled the courtyard of the white palace died was he entered.

"Gweilo," came the muttered, reverent greetings, and stocky older man with shots of grey in his beard detached himself from the group guarding the prisoners and passing his weapon to the youth who took his place.

The man stopped before the Wanderer, and bowed his head. The white man returned the gesture.

"Talan," the Gweilo asked, addressing the man before him. "Tell me what has happened here." The Lone Wanderer observed the greying man as he answered. Men and women of the caliber needed for leadership were few and far between in this place, he had found, but Talan, the stoic middle aged man who been one of the elders of the slaves when he freed them, showed promise. He had made the man the captain of the militia he was training, so that the freedmen might be able to defend themselves.

"These dogs came here looking to sell us children," Talan spat, a quivering rage leaking into his voice.

The Wanderer's nostrils flared slightly; he would suffer no slaver, least of all the slaver of children. Ten years in bondage had instilled that steel resolve in him. "Where are the children now?" he asked, and Talan pointed over to a corner where a number of the freedmen were tending to a quintet of children, the oldest Mei's age and the youngest no more than five. The Gweilo felt his blood boil, but the image of peace and calm, he walked over to the young captives. He squatted down next to the oldest, a pitifully thin Indian boy, his face gaunt and hollow, his wrists chafed raw from the chains they had held him in. Haunted eyes looked out at the Gweilo

"What is your name?" the Wanderer asked softly.

The boy only stared at him, as if in disbelief. The Wanderer gave him time. Even before the Great War, a white man in rural India was a rare sight indeed. Now it was unheard of.

"A-Anuj," the boy stuttered.

"Anuj, is there anyone among those men who is innocent? Anyone who showed you mercy?"

The boy was silent for a long time, but then raised one bony finger and pointed it towards the youngest of the slavers, a teenager who would have barely begun shaving.

"He, he was kind." Anuj said. "H wanted them to let us go, but the others would not listen."

The Wanderer nodded, and thanked him before walking over to where the slavers sat, kneeling, their hands on their heads. He pointed to the youth that Anuj had singled out.

"You," he barked, and the young man seemed to jump. "On your feet, now." The slaver scrambled to obey, and the Wanderer stopped before him.

"Whatever shred of a conscience that you have left has saved you. Go. Leave this place, and remember this lesson."

His words hung heavy in the air, and for a moment it seemed the youth did not know what to do. His eyes flicked between the furious, indignant glares of his fellows, and the steely gaze of the guards. Tears swept through his eyes as he blubbered his thanks and ran off.

"Coward!"

The words were spat by the man the Wanderer took to be the slavers' leader. He was thick set, and powerfully built, with a necklace of knuckle bones around his beefy neck. The Wanderer turned to face him, and the slaver scowled.

"You don't scare me, ghost man," the big man spat. "I 'm not afraid of the likes of you."

The Gweilo raised a brow at him. "You should be." Quick as a flash, Mei's family blade was in his hand, and in the blink of an eye, the slaver's necklace clattered to the floor, and a thin line of blood trickled from his throat. The man gulped.

The Wanderer stepped back, wiping the blood from the tip of his sword, and tapping his foot against the stone floor.

"Hang them," he called out to Talan. "Show the world how we deal with slavers."

Screams of mercy from the condemned men fell upon deaf ears. One tried to run, only to receive the butt of a rifle to the back, instead of a bullet. Ammo was expensive. Rope was cheap.

The crowd began to disperse, and the Gweilo returned to his chambers. Suffer no slaver to live.

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When it was his turn to take the watch, Jonas tried not to look too disappointed. With five of them here, the shifts weren't too unbearable. Still, it was time he wasn't getting to sleep. Nights in the wastes were cold, and the winds frigid winds bit through even the toughest of clothing. The walls of the bridge overhang helped to block out most of the chills, but time and again, some intrepid breeze would worm its way through to the occupants and swirl about in victory. His covers were a threadbare blanket left by the camp's previous occupant, and the young man wrapped the moth and flea bitten bit of cloth around himself like a cloak as he huddled near the fire, feeding it chunks of moldering, rotten wood and trash to keep it going. The smoke was foul, but the heat divine.

The young man found himself gloweringly envious of Jean-Claude's thick coat of furs, and turned to look at the foul smelling man, only to find and empty bedroll. His breath caught in his throat. I didn't even hear him leave, Jonas thought in horror. What else could I have missed?

His heart began to race. He, he probably just went to take a piss or something. Yah, that's it. A flick of movement out the corner of his eye caught his attention, and the young man whirled about to see Jean-Claude's massive frame step into the doorway, a wolfish grin on his bearded face.

"Did I frighten you, little boy?" he asked with a cruel chuckle that sounded like boulders grating against each other.

"N-no, just, surprised me a little," Jonas offered lamely. He swore he could see something, or someone, moving in the shadows behind the bigger man, but in a heartbeat it was gone, and he dismissed it as nothing, returning his attentions to the now scowling foreigner.

"You do not seem to be a very good watchman, mon ami," Jean-Claude growled. "Perhaps you should focus more upon the night, and less on men going to answer the call of nature. Comprendre?"

Mute, Jonas nodded, and swallowed hard. The mountain of a man's wolfish smile returned.

"Good," he said, settling back down to sleep, a malevolent glint in his eye. "Watch well, boy."

Jonas felt a shudder go down his spine. Pulling out Old Glory, he laid it across his lap and loaded in a cartridge. The night was cold, and full of horrors. He refused to face them unarmed.

End Chapter. Please review, even if you hate it. Every bit of feedback helps me improve this for you, folks