THE CAPS AIN'T WORTH YOUR SOUL: BY DESERT RANGER CARACAL
LOCATION: KERN PEAK.
DATE: MAY 1ST 2278.
TIME: 1:12 PM.
TEMPERATURE: 87°F OR 31°C.
While the NCR had done its best to establish law in its land, that didn't mean that it didn't have its failures. Even after occupying most of California, Washington and Oregon, and killing off a grand majority of the raiders who lived in the territories beforehand, slavers were still a real and present problem. NCR Rangers did what they could to keep them down, especially after the destruction of the slaver's guild in Modoc by a tribal turned Ranger helped immensely.
Regardless, small time slaving groups were still a problem for the NCR, and one of them was hiding in Kern Peak in an attempt to keep themselves hidden from the NCR's finest. They had their backs up to a somewhat small cliff, only 10 meters tall, but still seemingly decent cover. The group was a bit richer than most of the others, having been at the soul selling gig for about nearly twenty or so years, selling lives for caps and evading the NCR as best they could.
Seven men in total made up the crew, a mix of human and wolf alike, all having been part of the crew for a minimum of ten years, with the oldest one being a wolf who helped found the group. Currently they were making stew out of various ingredients they'd purchased from traders. Bighorner meat, beer, a potato, onion, tomatoes and some Jalapeño were cooking on a fire. The mood was more relaxed, as they did indeed think nobody was watching. Unfortunately for them, they were quite wrong. Two parties were watching them, both working with each other with the same goal in mind.
The first party was a pair of former NCR soldiers who were men for hire. They were around 200 meters away and waiting for the right moment to initiate. The other party was Joseph, waiting on the top of the cliff for the correct moment to strike. The caracal's ears were tuned in, and he was ready to pounce at a moment's notice. While the slavers joked amongst themselves and watched the stew, what sounded like shrieking from distant ghosts came from the trees.
Shrieks, pleadings and begging, supposed to emulate the same terror that their victims had. They stood up, grabbing their guns and beginning to prepare for an assault as the caracal turned the safety of his Winchester Combat Shotgun off, and made his way to the cliff edge. While their eyes were aimed at the tree range where the noise came from, the wolf leader looked up in case of anyone potentially aiming to attack from above. He shrieked in fear as he saw what was speeding down at them, for only about a few seconds before he was killed.
Joseph landed right on his muzzle, crushing it from the force alone and destroying his brain as his skull broke apart from impact, mangling his head horrifically as the caracal made his presence known. The other slavers were horrified by his approach, especially when he began burst firing at the nearest slavers as he leapt to his left.
Two humans had their bodies mangled by buckshot as he emptied half of his magazine into them, tearing them in two with little issue. They barely had a chance to fire back, blindly shooting at him with their 10MM SMG's. A wolf slaver quickly killed one of the more experienced human slavers by accident, tearing a large hole in his torso. The wolf was briefly horrified by his cockup before being shot dead by Joseph, as two packed loads of Buckshot destroyed his lungs and heart.
With only two remaining, the remaining slavers tried to run away, soon ending up dead with buckshot riddling their corpses as Joseph unloaded the remaining four shells into them. The caracal panted gently as he reloaded, looking to the trees as the soldiers rushed over to the ranger. The humans were astounded by the massacre and how the caracal only took some shotgun shells from one of the chests. As he went to leave, one of them shouted at the ranger.
"Hey! Where's our pay? You can't leave without paying us!"
He shouted, as his partner nodded in return. Joseph turned around, shotgun at low ready as he turned the safety on with a thumb flick.
"The loot that this place has should do. All you did was provide a needed distraction. I thank you for that, besides the arms and ammo here should be worth more than any caps I can offer."
Joseph said, slinging his shotgun as he walked away. The mercs opened their mouths to retort, but conceded as they looted the corpses and got to eating some of the stew that was cooking.
The NCR would question them heavily over what happened, and even if their tale wasn't believed, it sure as hell was going to be remembered by those who heard it, and saw the scene of the brutality.