Chapter 10: So Long and Thanks for All the Stims

John watched the Behemoth stumble about, and it's pillar sized legs finally gave out. The beast didn't move after it fell, and it landed on some of it's kin. They didn't move either.

John fell to his knees, despite being in the middle of a killzone. He dropped his two kukri, and fell forward, not able to hold in the tears.

Gage is dead! Maria is dead! Most of my friends are dead! I'm in a fucking Wasteland after the fucking apocalypse! Civilization committed suicide and I'm left to survive in the destroyed and burnt remains!

After John finished grieving, he looked around. The mutants had mistakened him for dead, since he wasn't shooting, and was slumped over. The mutants were getting smarter, and had decided to retreat to the rocks and boulders, drawing some nearby raiders into the conflict. The raiders seemed to be waiting to kill the victorious faction, but the mutants noticed them and managed to overwhelm them. John saw a raider have his arms ripped from his body by a larger Super Mutant, who was wearing a leather cap with goggles, which John remembered seeing on a "pilot" or something in an old holotape.

The man screamed, but stopped whenever his arms were separated from his torso. The mutant, who acted like the Master of the other Brutes and Super Mutants, took a bite out of the raider's arm, and started beating a female raider to death with the disembodied arms. (I really had to make the "I'm going to eat your arms when you're dead, human!" reference. Don't judge me.)

A raider had broken away from the carnage as his friends were torn to pieces. He had a look of pure fear on his face, he was young, about John's age. He ran, tripped, fell and scrambled away, only to find himself staring into John's face. John had watched the raider run away from his "comrades" who were being torn apart, and had drawn one of his magnums, the left handed one. It was aimed right between the raider's eyes, the silencer touched his forehead. The man looked into John's eyes, and begged for his life.

"Please.. I need to feed myself.. I just joined today, they said they would feed me.. I haven't killed anything innocent.. Please.." The raider begged, tears in his eyes. John looked away, and pulled the trigger. His gun clicked, as he hadn't reloaded after killing the Behemoth.

John was just as surprised as the man, and simply said "Go."

The raider scrambled away, not being shot or even noticed in the carnage. John then turned his eyes to the mutants. They had destroyed the pack of raiders, minus the escapee, and were looking for something else to kill. They saw John first.

John looked at the pack of yellow demons, and whispered under his breath, "Coming soon, Gage. See you in Hell."

Just as the mutants took aim, a shot rang out. Surprisingly, John didn't have a hole in him. A mutant, now with no face, fell to the ground. The mutant with the pilot cap looked at his fallen brother/sister and roared in rage.

"I'll rip your eyes out hum-" He was stopped shortly when a bullet found it's way into the mutant's throat. The mutant reached to it's throat, and fell to the ground.

John watched wide eyed as the four remaining mutants were gunned down. He looked behind him to try to see his savior, and caught a glimpse of a tall man, in a long trenchcoat, wearing sunglasses and a fedora, which made it very hard to see his face from a distance, and he was holding an unscoped .44 magnum. John quickly looked at the pile of mutant corpses, then turned to look at the man. He was gone. John saw a mutant rushing toward him, a rotten plank of wood raised above his head. John tried to shoot him, but he still hadn't reloaded. Another shot rang out, and the mutant's blood splattered on John's breast plate.

John didn't bother to look.

Finally somebody who doesn't want to kill me.

John finally reloaded and scooped his two kukri from the ground. He scanned the surrounding area, and there were no mutants or raiders around, and the constant chatter of gunfire had stopped in the past to mutants. No angered screams or bloodcurdling shrieks rang out. John really hoped that this meant the battle was won for the mercs. He didn't want to be an avenger again. He looked over to where the battle had unfolded earlier, and saw a bunch of mercs celebrating and yelling and dancing. John could spot Cade and Josh among the crowd.

He ran over to join the crowd, and noticed that only Jackie, Franko, Daniel, Andy, Will, Ethan, Lizz, Nicole, Lauren, Cade, and Josh survived. 9 out of 20 died against the super mutant menace. The mercs decided to not focus on the sad, and rejoiced at how much money they made.

"We made it! We fucking made it!" Cade shouted.

"We almost died, but then six shots rang out, and all the super mutants were dead!" Lauren added.

The group was all happy that they won the battle, except for Nicole. She had allowed herself a single tear, which was a sign of weakness. John was wondering why she had allowed herself that tear, but then he looked over at the mess of organs and blood that was (past tense) Maria. John felt a slight pang of sadness, but ignored it. He was going to have enough money to go into the city and find Dad. But Nicole was left alone in the world.

In a way, they were counterparts of one another. Both had lost the only family they had, with one major difference. John was able to find Dad, Nicole had found Maria.. Or what was left.

John's thoughts turned to Gage, and he ran towards where Gage was laying. He rolled Gage over so his chest-side was up. He was pale and lifeless. In hysteria, John took one of the stimpaks he was carrying and injected it right where Gage's heart would be. Nothing happened. John gave up, shut Gage's eyes and walked away, a sick feeling in his gut. He stumbled behind a boulder and vomited the squirrel-on-a-stick he had eaten for breakfast.

3 HOURS LATER

As it was getting late, John swallowed his grief and got the group to stay in the grocer, and they had started a campfire. They used whatever they could find, taking trash, old pieces of wood, and the like and putting them into a pile, then Andy shot it with his laser rifle set on low. It started blazing in a few minutes, assisted by the fatal weapon on stun.

"Sooo... Where's everyone from?" John asked, desperate to get his mind off Gage and was scanning the horizon for any surviving mutants.

"I'm from The Pitt." Andy said, gathering some surprised looks.

"What!? Nobody's there who isn't a slave or a raider, and you don't have skin leisions!" Josh said, clearly surprised.

"Actually, I'm not from The Pitt directly, I was born about 40 miles away, in some small settlement whose name I can't remember, and I lived in a settlement called Old Brighton for most of my life. I came down here when the town was enslaved, and the raiders abandoned that place. I got lonely." Andy replied with a sly smile.

"Brighton.. Sounds familiar..." John muttered under his breath, remembering he had heard it somewhere.

"I'm from some place called Linsvile." Lauren said, bringing John back down from the thought cloud.

"I was born in Paradise Falls," Josh started, casting a dark mood, and some people muttered 'slavers', "I enslaved some people.. I wasn't proud of it. I left, the first chance I got. I took three of the bastards down with me." This revelation about Josh cast a shadow about the campfire, and they didn't notice the 5 dark armored figures creeping in the shadows.

Daddy's back!

Haha, sorry I didn't get a chapter up this past week, I was out of ideas and nobody except for two people reviewed Chapter 9.

Special Thanks

To Josh, RGillespie94, and Ethan for being the only people who reviewed Chapter 9!

Review Responses

RGillespie94- It does help.

Josh- I'll try to work on that.

Ethan- Thanks for the compliments!