-You Have Selected [PALADIN TIMOTHY BECKWITH]
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Member: Senior Paladin Timothy Beckwith
Service Number: 10027462
Date of Birth: 09-18-2232
Date of Death: Presently Serving
Place of Death: Presently Serving
Chapter: West Coast
Duty Stations: Lost Hills (Current), Hub Watchpost 002, LA Watchpost 002, Navarro
Noted Engagements: I-15 Harassment Campaign, "Reign of Terror", Redding Sabotage, New Reno Raid Campaign
Tech Recovered: T-45 Atrocities "Salvaged PA"x18, Gateway "Portal" Component (Still under study), YK-147 Pulse Rifles
Archive Submission: Journal Entry
July 14, 2281
We've spent a long time out here on the I-15 to Mojave. Task was simple enough for us as of late since most of the NCR troop activity is coming down towards The Hub and then east until I-15 North. We got enough forces with us, but the amount of NCR boys coming this way is crazier than usual. A few months back, we were picking off relief units going north no problem, but lately we've been watching whole columns move into Nevada.
I really wish we had the unit radio systems linked with our guys in the Mojave, maybe they'd be able to tell us what was going on near Vegas. All the responses we get from the Scribes back home is how Hidden Valley observation reports are on a "Need to know basis." I can't believe they're still under lockdown. They've been that way since they made me an SP four years ago. Regardless, most of our scav teams are trailing the NCR Rangers down near Baja, so me and the other SPs running field Ops in Cali are focused on impeding the NCR forces eastbound.
Since the Mojave's on lockdown by NCR troops, raiders, creatures, and all other awfulness, my unit has to ransack troops and supply units with hopes of retrieving any potential UDTs NCR prospectors may have found. Secondary objective has us harassing NCR troops to let them know we're still a force to be reckoned with. Civilians remain not to be harmed, unless refusal to relinquish items listed in my orders. But, like I said, not much activity other than large groups of brownies headed to or from the Mojave. Nothing really worth retrieving for our primary objective, so instead we've been simply shortening the leave of brownies headed home. No notable tech for most of this Op until…
Three days ago, I took my squad to one of our better ambush spots near 35.424448, -475.733870. We'd been following a group of 7-8 NCR troops headed home on leave and my scout reported no large troop movements anywhere nearby. I knew they were drunk or at least hanging, having likely partied in the desert the night before, so I didn't initially intend to have them killed. Orders would've had me do that, but I'd been there myself and they appeared unarmed. I was going to have my guys jump them, maybe cripple a limb or two, or pulverize an appendage. Injured troops are the worst in NCR's eyes. NCR would much rather their guys be killed in the line of duty because the pension to the conscript's families are so meager. This was opposed to the expenses required to evac, feed, transport, give proper medical attention, ensure recuperation, and grant disability for the rest of the victims lives. In any event, we had to kill them.
Paladin Brown, Yaws, and Watson emerged from the rocks with miniguns spooling, and upon seeing them, the brownies freaked out and drew sidearms. Oh well, suppose we did the Shady Sands government a favor. However, that wasn't the strange part.
As we searched the troops for anything even potentially valuable, a noise came from a deep rocky alcove that I somehow hadn't seen before. This was news because I was very familiar with the Mountain Pass along the California/Nevada border. Out of the opening in the rocks came three NCR troops in bear graffitied T-45 power armor? A short firefight ensued as I rallied the rest of my team and met with my assaultmen. When I arrived, one of the power armored troopers laid dead, and the other two were shuffling away slowly while Yaws was scratching his helmet, obviously confused as the rest of us.
I walked towards them, wondering why they were going so slow as my team followed me. I stepped over their discarded weapons and two of my Paladins picked them up to study the issue. Watson strode ahead and the duo continued to limp forward. Watson then apparently engaged their joint locks and they began cursing up a storm. I walked around to the front of their paralyzed frames, and studied the battered T-45 helm. I twisted the helmet off to be met with a snarling face who shouted;
"Fuck you! Brotherhood of- What did you do to my armor!?"
I turned to Watson as the others gathered around me. Watson spoke in my stead, "I engaged your joint locks…"
The man shouted, "What the F-? Huh? Turn'em off…"
Alvarado took the helmet off the other paralyzed man to show a winded face with sweat pouring down it. I asked the first man, "Why did you discard your weapons?" That was the first thing that came to mind.
The winded man was still too exhausted to speak, so the angry man said, "Those pieces of junk were from the Crimson Caravan! Fucking things jammed after ten shots! Probably more worthless than this suit!"
I looked around and saw Yaws and Brown holding the discarded grenade machinegun and heavy incinerator. Turning my attention back to the angry man, I asked, "You didn't know your suits have joint locks?"
The man stared at me blankly before attempting to spit on me. However, his mouth was too dry for that, and instead just made a bubbly mess across the protruding chest plate. I stood there motionless for a second before turning to the winded man, "Those suits don't have any power do they?"
The winded man looked up to answer before the angry man shouted at his friend, "Don't tell'em anything Brian!"
"Brian" didn't need to say anything, I nodded at Watson, and he plugged his armor interface into the angry man's suit. Watson waited briefly while his Pip Boy downloaded the suit's diagnostics. Finally, Watson said, "Hyd fluid, depleted. Motivator oil, depleted. Motivator unit function, 10%. HUD, non-functioning. Optics, removed. Internal circuitry, fried. Waste recycling unit, non-functioning. Internal emergency reserve core power… 10%"
I was about to, but Yaws shouted what we were all thinking, "Jesus Christ! How are you guys still alive!?"
Brown shouted, "Doesn't it get hot in there!?... Oh look, a little fan's been jury rigged onto this back contraption... How cute. "
Alvarado laughed, "Hyd fluid depleted, AND no power!? How do you move in that thing?"
Watson laughingly corrected Alvarado, "Hey! His motivator unit is till functioning, granted at 10% but give credit where it's due! Haha!"
None of the humor registered with the paralyzed duo, so the angry man shouted, "Fuck you! You Brotherhood fucks are just terrorists!"
I corrected the man, "No... Though I'll admit I was when I helped play the market back in my prime…" His face was blank.
I continued, "That atrocity you call armor and the fact that you know absolutely nothing about the equipment you're using or wearing is the very proof of why we're still necessary…"
Yaws and Alvarado test fired the duo's discarded weapons, they functioned perfectly. Even the winded man looked up in bewilderment as I continued, "That's y'alls problem. NCR expands so fast and think they're advancing when they don't even stop to think about what's actually happening. NCR saw that armor and only thought 'that looks neat' before giving it to you; a man who had no idea how to use it properly… I mean, look at that? They removed the joint servos in the shoulders and knees in order to bypass the limited power locking system. You've been walking the desert in a nearly 300 pound piece of garbage…"
Everyone was silent before I asked my last question that needed a response, "Where did your nation get those… Things? Anyway?"
The angry man was deadly silent, so the winded man said, "No idea. Lieutenant said they were acquired a decade ago during the war against you guys..."
The angry man then turned towards the winded man with a face not of anger, but of dread. The man was ghostly white as I said to Watson, "Watson. Get the serial numbers on the frames and chest plates. Then scan them to Lost Hills, Scribe Trejo should be at the comms desk by now expecting a report from us."
Watson did so, and I sat on a nearby rock while the rest of my team joined me. Brown and Yaws taunted the two who were still locked in place. I figured they must have entered manually through the valve opened rear hatch until I noticed the valve was gone. Since they apparently didn't know about the exit display on the helmet's HUD, I was glad I removed their helmets. It wouldn't have been long before they figured out how to release themselves through that route (Oh wait? Their HUDs were non-functioning. How the Hell did they get out of those suits? Manual buddy system?).
Either way, Watson's reports came back from LH. The suits were registered as lost/stolen on 09-21-2256 when our guys found what was left of one of our squads near Dayglow. As things are obviously escalating with that Legion group, the NCR is sending out its elites armed with our tech that had been obliterated beyond functionality. As if I needed another example of their arrogance: NCR throws bodies at its problems, and those bodies are dressed in 'costumes' to disguise their misunderstanding of the old world.
So, my orders detail the elimination of thieves. My men segmented the suits after removing the bodies, loaded the T-45 "Atrocities" onto our supply brahmin, and we headed home. At least we saved the NCR some disability money.
Legacy: Continues to serve as the Lieutenant of Lost Hills Security under Rhombus IV.
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