Jason trudged along through the barren wastes. Agatha was right: dirt and rocks. The occasional bit of withered plant life was the only thing that broke the bleak scenery. The remnants of civilization were just as dilapidated as the earth itself.
Jason stopped short. He heard something. BANG! A bullet whizzed past his head. He dove behind a boulder. Two bloatflies were flying angrily at him as more bullets came from the opposite direction. The bloatflies launched globules of acidic spit at him. Some of it smacked into his neck. It burned. Jason growled and hurled his knife into one's head. He smashed the other into the boulder with his baseball bat.
He had to dive for cover again as more bullets flew toward him. This time they were much more rapid than before. He wondered at that as another bloatfly came from around the boulder at the same time a raider with a tire iron came from the other side. Jason ducked, and the raider crushed the bloatfly as he missed Jason. Jason took the opportunity to grab the raider's head and bash it against the boulder. He slammed the raider's head against the boulder four times until the raider's convulsing limbs went limb. Blood stained the side of the boulder and covered his right hand. The blood-caked baseball bat hung limp in his left hand.
Jason was breathing hard, hiding behind the boulder as the gunfire got closer. Jason still had several frag grenades. He pulled them out of his backpack. He pulled a pin and tossed it in the general direction of the gunfire. It exploded, and Jason heard a scream. The gunfire stopped when the grenade went off.
Jason peeked his head around the boulder to see if he had killed the ambushers. As soon as he saw a raider with an assault rifle, he ducked back behind cover. Bullets flew just as he got out of the way. He tossed another grenade, but this time the bullets kept coming after the explosion. Sighing, Jason pulled one of the strange-looking mines out of his backpack. He planted it on one side of the boulder and activated it. He crawled around to the other side of the rock. The raider was close enough now for Jason to hear his footsteps.
As the footsteps grew closer, Jason crawled further away from the boulder. He heard a beeping before… BAROOM! The explosion was deafening. Raider bits went flying in every direction, the boulder cracked into three chunks, and a crater was left in the ground.
"What kind of mine is that?" Jason exclaimed, his mouth hanging open. "There had better not be any of those in Minefield!"
Jason was relieved to find that the assault rifle was still in fair condition. The raider must have reloaded just before the explosion because it had a full clip. Jason checked to make sure there were no more raiders. When he was satisfied, he continued on his way to Minefield.
Like Springvale, Minefield was a mixture of houses mostly intact and ruins. The difference between the two was that Minefield had mines littering the ground. Everywhere he looked, Jason could see a frag mine. Jason approached the first mine. He just barely managed to disarm it as it began beeping. He picked it up and put it in his backpack to give to Moira later.
As he approached the next mine, bullets started peppering the landscape. He ducked behind a busted wall. A nearby car lit on fire, having been shot. The car exploded with a mini-mushroom cloud. Jason had covered his ears, but they were still ringing.
When the car had calmed down, Jason crept forward. He disarmed and appropriated mines as he moved. He got too close to another car. The sniper fire caught it on fire. He ran away from it as quickly as he could, but his mad dash caused him to activate another frag mine. He dove away from it, but his left arm and leg were caught in the blast.
Groaning, Jason used the last of his stimpaks to repair his wounded body. Being extra wary of the location of mines, he crawled toward the sniper's roost. He could see where the bullets were coming from now. It was the ruins of a concrete building with three crumbling floors. He pulled himself painstakingly carefully through the playground. Jason realized he had accomplished everything Moira had asked him to. He could leave now, but that sniper was shooting at him without even confirming whether he was hostile. That meant any poor fool who stumbled into this town was in danger. Jason could not allow such reckless, dangerous behavior.
So, he persevered. He ducked his head as yet another vehicle exploded in a fiery inferno. Scowling, Jason jumped up and made a mad dash toward the sniper's roost. That was a mistake. Now, the sniper knew exactly where he was. That much was apparent from the newfound accuracy of the attacks. A bullet nicked his shoulder. Another one sliced a gash in his thigh. Another pierced his side, punching all the way through. With that last one, he stumbled and faceplanted in the dirt. He tried to spit the dirt and blood out of his mouth, but it got caught in his beard instead, causing him to hack and cough.
That was when the sniper made a fatal mistake. He climbed down the stairs to get a better shot at Jason. Jason drew the assault rifle. From his position on the ground, he unloaded the clip into the sniper. The sniper, riddled with bullets, collapsed onto the stairs.
Jason cleared out the mines in the area. Then, he took the sniper rifle, a key, and the ammo off of the corpse. He climbed up the stairs and unloaded all of the sniper's ammo boxes. He found a bottle of water. Parched, Jason chugged the water. He climbed back down the stairs.
Desperate for first aid, Jason staggered over to the nearest house. Thankfully, the key unlocked the door. He searched the house. He found a first aid kit with a couple stimpaks. He used the stimpaks, and crawled up to the nearest bed. He shoved the charred skeleton out of the bed and collapsed into it. It hurt to breathe, but he finally managed to fall asleep. It was a fitful sleep, but he was too exhausted to wake up, so he slept through the night.
In the morning, he moaned and groaned as he pulled himself out of bed. Now that he had treated his wounds and gotten some sleep, Jason was more observant. He gagged when he fully comprehended that he had slept in a bed where a skeleton had lain for years. As he made his way to the house's front door, he saw a wastelander and a raider, both dead. They had probably come into this house for shelter because of the sniper. Based on their wounds, it looked like they had both been fatally wounded before they were able to get into shelter. They had locked the door, but it did them no good by that point.
Frustrated by the sniper, he exited the house and slammed the door. At least the sniper was dead now. He couldn't hurt anyone ever again. Keeping his eye out for mines, Jason left Minefield.
"I hope I never have to come back here," he said. "That place sucks. On to Arefu, I guess. Let's hope that place is a little less hostile than this one."