Back in the Wasteland 2

Begin Again

Two lone figures continued their march through the rust colored cloud that they had called home until recently. Leading from the front was a woman wearing a reinforced security uniform she had taken for herself months earlier and carrying an ancient sniper rifle which she was using to survey the area around her. She gave off an intimidating yet professional appearance, her steady survey of the shadows around her and scavenged clothes only adding to what others might think of her. If there had been anyone daring to comment on the uneven patches of hair covering her exposed scalp or scars covering her face they would have been greeted with a swift kick to the face, if not not a bullet to the head for their brazen stupidity. Much to her relief, she had not spotted anyone or anything willing to make what could possibly be the last mistake of their lives.

Not to the lives of what lurked somewhere out of sight, but those of her and her companion's. The things that she knew were lurking inside the depths of The Cloud did not have lives to lose. Not anymore, at any rate.

As she scanned the edge of The Cloud around her for any signs of movement, using the scope on her rifle to gain a precious few extra feet of warning against the horrors that roamed just out of sight, she stayed as calm now as when she was in the fortress she had taken shelter in the night before. While some might say that her familiarity with the abominations prowling through the crowded streets she had come accustomed to was what left her so calm, the few people who survived an encounter with The Cloud's inhabitants knew that it took a certain amount of insanity and courage to challenge them. She found holding back a laugh at the very thought of it, especially when recalled her unexpected company's reaction to those abominations that had convinced her to leave the prison she had been guarding behind.

Standing behind her, inspecting the map in his hands as best he could in the red tinted light surrounding them, was a man that looked to be her opposite in every way. She looked dangerous, dressed in dark colors to blend in with the endless darkness she had grown accustomed to, well equipped and prepared to face down any threat that showed itself, and far too familiar with the horrors of the world for her own liking, yet her companion was anything but.

Her companion looked fairly harmless, his body covered symbols she couldn't hope to understand and drawn with colorful paints that did nothing to help him to blend in with the crimson mist that surrounded them both. His dirty clothes were little more than rags from the Old World with a few feathers and bones added for reasons beyond her understanding, and he carried only a simple club and pistol for his defence. Both of his weapons looked as replaceable and adaptable as they were efficient and simplistic killing machines, much unlike the sniper which was her only means of defending herself. The greatest difference between the two had to be the smile on his face that was the exact opposite of her ever present scowl, the man eager to see wonders that she would have done anything to forget. Their first meeting in the streets of the Sierra Madre were more than enough to highlight their differences and show just how dangerous either of their outlooks on life could be.

But as unassuming as the man she had come to know in the past few weeks had been, he still managed to set foot within the streets surrounding the Sierra Madre on his own with little more than a pistol and a glorified stick. Not even she could claim a feat like that, nor would she ever want to be any closer to the abominations she watched over just to prove a point. It was this tendency of his to run head first into the unknown that had first caught her attention, especially when he ran straight into her while fleeing from the menaces she vowed to protect people like from.

Given how easily the two of them dispatched the pack of monstrosities that had been following him and many others in the weeks afterwards, that vow no longer seemed necessary.

Whatever skills the primitive looking man possessed had clearly served him well if it meant he had been able to stand against the abominations that had come close to killing her several dozen times over. Being what some would consider a 'savage' with all the skills that would entail, the tribal origins that others would ridicule her companion for were what allowed him to make it farther alone where most others faltered when working with a group of likeminded fortune seekers failed. Whether it was thanks to his years of experience evading the Yao Guai of Zion, the caution that laid quietly underneath his warm exterior, or his unbelievable luck, the fact of the matter was that he was still very much alive despite his apparent attempts to change that.

He was now one of only six people to walk out of the Sierra Madre and gates that hundreds if not thousands more had walked into, only to never be seen again. She could only hope that the both of them could also join the man they now sought after as they attempted to leave the grasp of The Cloud entirely.

"Any luck with the map, Chalk? I don't want to stay out here in the open any longer than we have to." She called out to him, never once letting her sight linger for too long on the shifting shadows within The Cloud.

Her companion, Follows-Chalk, looked up from the device attached to his wrist to answer her. His speech was slow, a sign that the common tongue of the wasteland wasn't one he was entirely familiar with, but he still spoke as fluently as anyone else she had known. More so, in fact, than a certain Courier now that she thought about it. She waited for his answer as patiently as always as he translated his native tongue to one she could understand.

"Sorry Christine. I am still trying to learn how to use this 'Pi-p-boy' you gave me yesterday." He said, tapping on the technological wonder she couldn't hope to use as he did so.

While some might consider it idiotic to let a tribal who hardly knew what technology was to be in charge of the device that was their only means of escaping The Cloud, Christine's past self included, due to their shared circumstances their current arrangement of guide and guardian was necessary.

Christine had lost a lot in her obsessive pursuit of the man that eventually led her to the place she was leaving, the place itself yet another testament to the greed that dwelled within humanity's heart before and after the Great War. Her ability to read and write had been one such casualty. As outrageous as it still seemed now, she still found herself thankful that she had been saved from an even stranger and crueler fate by a courier not too different from the one she was now determined to meet once more along with her current companion. If she had to go against the vows and beliefs she had instilled in her since childhood to thank her one time savior for everything he had done for her, then so be it. She had been willing to die for far less noble reasons in the past, sacrificing a few twisted morals was hardly anything in comparison.

Despite her willingness to give Follows-Chalk an almost sacred piece of technology, Christine Royce never believed that she would have ever found herself working with the tribals she and her family shunned for their very way of life. Being a former member of the Brotherhood of Steel with her death presumed and existence quickly forgotten when she failed to kill her target, Father Elijah, long before arriving at the Sierra Madre. It was only natural of her to think of Follows-Chalk as little more than a primitive fool with no right to use the technology she had given to him. If she hadn't been humbled by two Couriers as simple minded as Chalk that had saved her from certain death, she would have more than likely felt the same way about anyone outside of the Brotherhood.

Thanks to them she knew better now, yet the lessons and virtues instilled in her as a child would not go away without making themselves heard once more.

As the surge of memories, friends, and even a love that she had thrown away in exchange for what the Sierra Madre held for her, Christine found herself repeatedly repressing her past as it came back to haunt and help her in equal measure. While she always treasured the times she had with the people she once met, now was not the time for her to feel nostalgic. Maybe once she was able to meet those same people she found herself remembering she would allow herself a moment of weakness, but not now, not while the prospect of meeting them was still as uncertain as their own survival.

"Don't apologize." Christine told Follows-Chalk as she pushed away her past for the time being. "Do you know how much farther we have to go until we reach the Mojave Wasteland?" She then asked him.

"No, but even without the 'Pi-p-boy' I know that we haven't stopped travelling southeast since we left the Villa. It should only be a few more hours until we can finally see sunlight again and another day or two afterwards until we reach the Mojave." Chalk said with his ever present cheerfulness despite their destination being no closer in sight than it had been the previous day.

"I'll have to trust your word for it then. Keep your pistol ready, it's been too long since we've had any company." Christine replied.

She immediately regretted her choice of words before she even finished speaking. For as intelligent as her companion had proven himself to be, he was still a tribal and English was not his first language. Although he was familiar with a few common phrases and sayings, he still took most of them literally. She already knew this one would be no exception as she saw a light well up within his eyes as he cracked that dopey smile he had just little wider than it was before.

"I am glad to see you're excited as I am to finally meet a few new faces." He said. "It has been quite some time since I have been able to talk to some new people."

"I wasn't talking about humans." She said, before quickly adding, "Or ghouls, or super mutants, or robots."

"Oh." He muttered, his smile wilting for only a second before coming back bigger and brighter than before.

"Well, I hope we get to see a few of those once we make it to the Mojave. I have heard a lot of stories about them from the elders in my tribe. I have always wanted to meet one of these 'Soup-a Mut-ants' myself and see if they are as amazing as the elders said they were." He said.

Having had a few thoughts on the matter herself, Christine shuddered at just how naïve her young companion's words were. "Trust me when I say that you are better off not meeting any. There's no telling if they want to have you for lunch or if they want to have you for lunch." She said.

Chalk just shrugged and started leading the way for them once more, deeming their short break at and end. His eyes were glued to the device on his wrist as he pressed forward and remained completely oblivious to how Christine was glaring at him. Then again, maybe he did know and just didn't bother to react to her disapproval. She never could quite tell what he was thinking sometimes. The same could be said as to how willingness his obliviousness was too.

As much as his apparent disregard for danger bothered her, she knew that behind his optimistic attitude was the same caution that she herself possessed. She saw this side of him first hand after he had fended off a horde of ghost people using only a few gas canisters they had been gathering and his own pistol. He not only managed to sneak up on the seemingly omniscient abominations without any issues, but also managed to surprise her not long after when attempting to make his escape from the remainder of the horde that chased after him. It was then that she learned his talent for getting himself out of danger was most likely acquired from how frequently he found himself in danger. The following weeks taught her just how much of a magnet for trouble he was in case running into her from around a corner and attracting a street full of Ghost People to them both hadn't done it the first time.

Still, as often as she wished she had someone more serious by her side in the weeks before deciding to leave behind the Sierra Madre once and for all, Christine wouldn't have rather have spent that time with anyone else now that those days were behind her. The monotony of patrolling the streets surrounding the Sierra Madre casino for Ghost People had taken its toll on her, although it was only through talking with the Dead Horses tribesman that she found out how much of a toll her self imposed duty had taken on her. Had he not been so pathetic looking and in need of a good meal and a hot bath, she might have just killed him after attracting the attention of a third horde on the first day they met.

Even now, Christine still shuddered to think that she had almost succumbed to obsession once again and gone through with killing Follows-Chalk in the same way she nearly killed The Courier that saved her from herself. She was not afraid to die. If anything, death was almost an old friend of hers given how many times she had close to embracing it. There was no doubt in her mind that the abominations she kept watch over would have found her eventually, but that was not the same as dying.

Being captured by the Ghost People and dragged away to the deepest, thickest parts of The Cloud was not the same as death. She didn't know exactly what they did to their victims, or their own 'dead' for that matter, but she didn't have to know what they did to their victims to fear what they had in store for her more than death.

Her first brush with death was when she was trapped by the Old World madness that dwelled within Big Mountain. Her obsession with justice… no, revenge, against Father Elijah had taken her to a place that could only be described as unrestrained insanity given free reign. The only reason her obsession hadn't killed her, turned into a mindless drone, or worse was all thanks to a courier who had stumbled upon that forsaken place a few days after she did. Together they were barely able to escape that forsaken place, but even so she had not been willing to abandon her quest for Elijah after sacrificing yet another part of herself to only get a few steps closer to him.

Her next brush of death was not long after her escape from Big Mountain in pursuit of her target, a former Brotherhood of Steel Elder and family member she had been willing to track down and kill at all costs. Her obsession towards killing him hadn't faded after losing some of her mind that the first courier she met could not save in its entirety. Instead the memories and skills she had lost were no longer able to weigh her down and only hastened her search until it led her to the Sierra Madre where she had yet another brush with death and chance encounter with another Courier willing to do more than just save her life.

That Courier was not much different from the first she had met at Big Mountain, yet he did far more for her than the first could imagine was possible. Not only had he delivered a punishment worse than death onto the man she had been tracking, but he had also helped her reclaim some of what she sacrificed in pursuit of her obsession. He had given her hope, if not a second chance at life.

A chance to... begin again, some might say.

But rather than follow the message behind the broadcast that led her to Elijah and the Sierra Madre, she instead squandered The Courier's precious gift by choosing to stand guard over the death trap that had nearly claimed her life in order to protect the world from it. At least, that is what Christine had thought until she recently when she had met Follows-Chalk and he had shown her that the world she vowed to protect was more than capable of taking care of itself.

Sure, she had a lot to be said about Chalk's tribal ways, but even so they had been more than enough to carry him from Zion to the most inhospitable places in the wasteland. Once again, it seemed her quest had already been completed without her needing to do anything at all. This time, the feeling didn't leave her feeling empty inside. Quite the opposite, in fact.

If anything, it made Christine happy to know that the Ghost People were not the unstoppable terrors they-

A sudden flicker of movement caught Christine's eye only for a moment, but that moment was more than enough to draw her to draw attention to the sudden motion and notice what else it carried with it. In the distance, amongst the other shapes milling about in the depths of The Cloud that made travelling to and from the Sierra Madre almost impossible, were two glowing green eyes staring straight through her.

She didn't have to think twice about lining up the shot, not even to consider if there was anything else lurking in the depths of The Cloud. One of the Ghost People had seen her. They were never quiet unless they were hunting prey, and never travelled alone. This one appeared to be both which could only spell trouble for her and her companion.

As she pulled the trigger, she quickly took note of how many bullets she had left in her current magazine as she broke the silence around her with the sudden bark of her sniper rifle. Hopefully she carried enough for this one and the others that surely out there.

*BANG*

Follows-Chalk immediately drew his pistol and war club as he heard Christine's shot and scanned the area around him for any nearby threats, adopting a pose similar to the one shown to him by The Courier who convinced him to leave Zion. Whatever trail he had picked out for them was no longer what he was focusing on, instead he strained his eyes for anything that looked like it was coming at them and the malevolent green glow given off by the abominations they had been fortunate enough to avoid until now. He knew there was only one reason why Christine would risk exposing their presence while travelling within the crowd and he had no intentions of letting the abomination she had fired at sneak up on him with it's pack.

"Did they see us?" Follows-Chalk asked Christine, recalling the silence that had been broken by her sudden shot as he slowly backed up beside her.

"Yes, I would have heard it's wheezing long before we came close to it if it hadn't seen us." She told him.

"How many do you think are out there?" Follows-Chalk asked her.

"I don't know, but both of us are going to be up to our necks in Ghost People when they finally make their move." She told him, continuing to scan the twisting shadows within The Cloud as her companion covered her back as he did the same.

The two stood side by side, ready to fight whatever came at them as they waited for the Ghost People to come for them. Their unease grew with every second that passed as the deathly silence surrounding them continued, yet their resolve remained as strong as ever. Running away would only get them killed, whether it was by walking into a bear trap that had been placed on the ground to prevent their escape or by a well aimed spear thrown towards their back as they fled. Knowing that fighting back was their only chance of survival made it far easier to put the suicidal tactic into practice.

Their time in the Sierra Madre had taught them much about the abominations that called the forsaken casino and surrounding villa their home, the most important lesson regarding how these abominations hunted their prey. The Ghost People could ordinarily be heard before they could be seen due their damaged lungs which resulted from years, if not decades or centuries, of dwelling within dense concentrations of The Cloud that no other creature could survive for more than a few seconds. The only time they couldn't be found from the sound of their labored breathing alone was when they had found their prey, stalking them in complete silence along with any other nearby abominations as they prepared to ambush them. When they were ready to strike, the first one to strike would let out an unearthly wail as it rushed in to slaughter its prey alongside the others it had gathered while tracking its prey.

Although an onlooker might believe them to be as intelligent as the common Gecko as they ambled around aimlessly for prey, they were no less creative or lacking in ingenuity than the prey that they hunted down with feral bloodlust. The tools they crafted for themselves were often primitive compared to the firearms their usually short lived prey used to defend themselves, a testament to their deadly effectiveness. Spears fashioned from sticks or iron bars and fashioned with knives capable of cutting through solid stone like warm butter, bear traps carefully planted in order to block escape routes or grafted to their arms to enhance their unarmed capabilities, and gas canisters rigged to explode once thrown at whatever prey they had found were all fearsome tools used by the Ghost People.

Yet, it wasn't their weapons that made them so fearsome. While it was true that a single Ghost Person could endure more punishment than most creatures of comparable size could hope to inflict on it and were fully capable of pursuing their prey until exhaustion, their most fearsome feature was their pack mentality. One Ghost Person was a threat on its own, although one that could be slowed down long enough to escape if their bodies were effectively disabled to the point of immobility, but a pack of them were nigh unstoppable.

The Ghost People never travelled alone and always hunted in packs. They had no words to speak and lacked fine motor skills to gesture amongst each other, yet they were all more than capable of working together as a group to bring down whatever they pursued. Follows-Chalk and Christine knew this very well, and with every moment that the ambush they expected didn't arrive, the more worried they became.

A small pack of five or six of the abominations would have charged them the moment one of their members had been disabled, knowing that they had been exposed and any time they wasted could be used against them. A horde consisting upwards of a dozen or more was more than willing to let one of their own fall unavenged if it meant increasing the odds of a successful hunt as their prey either fled or allowed them to prepare an ambush from all possible angles.

After surviving six weeks together in the Sierra Madre, Christine possessing several more months of experience than the young man she stood back to back with, they knew the Ghost People better than anyone else alive. The Ghost People didn't count, of course. One look underneath their ancient clothing was all it took to see that they could hardly be considered living.

Just as the two were getting ready to venture out into the darkness together in the grim hopes of escaping The Cloud before they were surrounded, a lone wail assaulted them from the depths of The Cloud as its owner finally appeared as a green glow within the crimson darkness surrounding them. It's roar was low, deep, and sent a chill down both of their spine before it fully came into view, although that did nothing to deter the two travelers from shooting at it as it charged at them in an inhuman gait.

When the humanoid abomination finally came close enough for them to see its monstrous form in full, Christine and Chalk had already left their mark on it. Despite the damage to its body it continued its suicidal charge under their combined firepower as if it didn't care about anything other than subduing its prey. It's right arm had been torn off at the elbow by one of Christine's rounds, it's knees buckling from the .45 rounds buried in its legs and causing the yellow-green ooze pouring out of the holes blown opened in its chest that left its spine exposed and a small patch of The Cloud visible behind it. Looking less like a man and more like a ragdoll full of holes, it ran towards them with a fury that no wound could restrain.

It was only with a lucky shot to the head with Christine's sniper that finally caused the abomination to falter. Even then, with its head blow completely off of its shoulders, it still was able to take another few steps before collapsing to the ground a few feet away from the duo. It only laid still for a fleeting moment before flailing it's bear trap clad fists wildly in a desperate attempt to slaughter its prey, knowing the two travelers were nearby despite lacking any visible means of sensing them.

Even though they had seen this sight countless times before, both Christine and Chalk were horrified at how much it had taken to end the abomination's charge. It was only when finally Follows-Chalk drove his axe through its fully exposed spine that it stopped flailing its arms. Despite lacking any noticeable means of movement or ability to control its body, both the tribal and former Brotherhood of Steel member found themselves staring at its fingers as they clawed at the ground underneath them.

As broken as its body was now, the Ghost Person was still 'alive' as it had been when it first charged them only a few seconds ago. The only difference now was that it no longer had the means to act upon its insatiable bloodlust. Not unless its packmates or another one knew of a way to salvage the abomination's ruined body. Neither Christine nor Chalk knew if it could be rebuilt. They were always too scared to see what the Ghost People did with their 'dead' to find out, and neither one of them wanted their worst fears to be proven right in front of their eyes.

But for now, their attacker lay mostly motionless. Two of the abominations were now taken care of while an unknown amount still remained somewhere out in The Cloud.

"Do you think that was the last of them?" Follows-Chalk asked his companion with a hint of desperation lurking behind his smile.

Before Christine could answer him or berate him for tempting fate, the same roar that had announced their first attacker's presence rang out from several places all around them. The roar of one of the abominations was almost enough to make their ears bleed, the cries of more than a dozen was deafening.

The two travelers looked out in horror as The Cloud around them lost it's rusty, crimson hue and a faint wall of green quickly closed in on them, as did the human shaped figures that had finally revealed themselves. Christine and Chalk didn't waste time discussing what to do next, instead they started firing into the horde of Ghost People that ran at them with inhuman speed and hoped that they would either live to see the end of the battle or die before the abominations could do whatever it was that they did with any prey they managed to capture alive. Regardless of what their fate would be, they stood their ground and continued to fire into the countless number of monsters that finally moved in for the kill.

Little did these Ghost People know that their prey wouldn't go down as easily as the hundreds of others they had hunted in the past…

Author's Corner:

So yeah… my take on the Ghost People is a little different on the ones I met in my first playthrough. They were fairly disappointing enemies that were hardly a threat when I dealt with them in Dead Money despite how freaking cool they were, although that was more than likely due to a build that excelled at close ranged combat and sustainability on my virgin playthrough. Aside from getting my ass handed to me by the various speakers spread throughout the Sierra Madre, it was overall one of the easiest yet most entertaining parts of New Vegas in my personal opinion.

Not a popular opinion as it turns out, but it's still mine dammit!

Anyways, ED-E and Raul are not the only companions about to get involved in the Mojave while Six is temporarily 'unavailable' to deal with the threats that are resurging in his absence. As odd of a duo as Christine and Follows-Chalk are, all it took was one wild idea to know that they would be perfect for the direction I intend to take things.

I hope you all enjoyed this little bonus chapter.