CHAPTER 6.
The Things that draw us Together.
One time when Sanford had been a boy, a little child- he had ventured behind the fence that divided his family's properties from two other yards, and a small strip of woodland that extended just before the nearby freeway.
Trotting through mounds of unkempt leaves, twigs, forest-debris galore, he rounded trees and avoided the large patches of fern and thicket. The excitement granted to him was not only because of the strange new, not-organized environment around him- but the simplicity of the matter of him disobeying his father.
Being rebellious made him feel action-y, daring, it gave him a rush of adrenaline that felt just as detrimental as pride-inducing.
So back into the foliage he had gone- and a half-hour later, OUT he came, screaming and crying like a toddler when a raccoon had jumped out of a bush and hissed at him.
The experience stayed with him a long time, his 'First Duel with a Monster' he had comically come to coin it in his mid-teens.
The amazing thing that REALLY highlighted it for him though, wasn't just the fact his father had never found out WHY he ran back to the house hysterical-(Which, that too, was pretty astounding)- but on one of the first days that Sanford walked into the fallout-ridden new world, it repeated itself.
The first places that Sanford walked to after emerging from the Vault, were his ruined house, and the far outskirts of the farm fields literally next door to him.
In his shock and disbelief, he trailed into the backyard of his ash-blasted home, saw the shriveled, crumpled little line of wood chips that marked where his fence had been, stepped over it into the same woods.
The green oak trees were gone, replaced with burnt, gigantic and gnarled toothpicks that pinpricked out of the dead earth in droves- all the bushes and foliage had been erased from existence. Ironically, strolling into the emptied woods made him remember that stupid raccoon...
Then his childhood flashed back to him, when a hideous, pink, wrinkled, fleshy and scrawny animal hissed at him behind two razor-sharp teeth, bugged squinty, red eyes at him- and rushed him.
His first Molerat encounter- if documented - would have been the laughing stock of all wasteland tales.
Sanford backed up in retracting gallops on startled legs, so fast, that he rammed the rear of his head straight into a blackened tree's trunk.
Falling onto the dusty ground from the SECOND shock, he scrambled away from what he thought were multiple assailants, grabbed the metal pipe he had snatched up in the Vault- and was saved by sheer luck.
Swinging around onto his back down there, the pipe arced over his body, catching the Molerat right as it catapulted itself over his person.
A loud, hollow clunk resounded, a crack of bone- the mutated rodent curled and made a mewling noise next to him, twitching as its claws wrapped over its head.
Feeling bold, he stood up, almost tripped, reared back with the pipe and hit the animal two more times with it until it stopped moving.
In all-too-planned- it seemed -stages of his new struggle for survival, the radroaches in the Vault were his warm up, and now, he triumphed over an ANIMAL, small and insignificant albeit, but nonetheless, it was progress.
When the long road to his current state had began, Sanford thought he'd never make it.
Now it was years later, and here he was, fighting the good fight.
His family would've been proud of him, he believed. His dad probably would've patted him on the back, spoken some joke about the long gone raccoon- and congratulated him.
Too bad he was probably dead.
Too bad, everyone he had known was basically dead. Even IF they got out of the Vault before him, they weren't in his life anymore, so, their demise might as well have occurred for him.
Every now and then, he felt Hancock's company begin to stagnate at these considerations in his mind.
The robot was pretty human-like, and, probably a bit TOO human-like, than his original programming would have allowed. He made him feel brighter, despite the pyromaniac tendencies and desire for mayhem.
Hancock was a good guy- bot -or whatever you'd address him in abbreviation.
But sometimes the lack of other people bothered him.
-And that was bad, because he thought people sucked.
"Hey, Han'," He spoke aloud, suddenly. "I've got a question."
Hancock and he strolled, and the prior, LEVITATED- to the outskirts of the Green Estates, the rucksack over Sanford's back bulging with shiny new finds, and the Mr. Gutsy's containment module clanking a new store of goods.
The man raised a brow at his friend in seriousness when he narrowed his optics on all three robotic eye-stalks, scrutinizing the human.
"Aye sir. Is this about my new hat?" Hancock queried- raising a claw to adjust the chef hat still draped over the top of his cranial chassis.
"No."
"Well then, sod off."
"Seriously for a minute, Han'."
"You've BEEN too serious lately, sir! This is the grand ole' United States! It's all about freedom, bacon and eggs!"
Sanford stopped walking and gave him a blank stare. Snorting, he waved a hand around where they stood at the surrounding, dusty hills.
"Han', if you see bacon anywhere, then, PLEASE, go get it for me. I must be blind."
Hancock made a garbled huff, poking his hat with his claw to stand it upright.
"You're a conniving little thing, aren't you?"
"Yep. Proud of it. Now about my question..."
"Fine-FINE! Quit naggin' and start flappin' your gums! ...Sir."
"Do you ever wish for anything?"
Hancock's internals made a whining whir as his speech receptors- dusted with age -processed what the man had said.
The robot actually looked troubled with determining an answer. Like a computer failing to open a page for the waiting user.
Sanford tapped his foot, and spoke again.
"-If it's a question you don't wanna' answer, Hancock, I understand... You drop a lot of subjects for me."
"No-no-no... I'll answer."
"Alright?"
"I don't exactly, WISH for anything, sir. -Except for a new Flamer-nozzle! HA-HA!"
"On with it!"
"-Right, right... This is about contacting other people, isn't it?"
"Read me like a book. Is it that obvious?"
"Not at all, sir. I just know you... Unfortunately..."
"Jackass."
"That's CAPTAIN Jackass!"
"So what do you mean, you DON'T wish for anything, Han'?"
"... I mean, I have nothing else to wish FOR."
"You think your only purpose is to hang around me all day?"
"Yes."
Sanford was actually surprised he didn't get some sort of wise-crack, or horribly vulgar joke, you know, like normal.
Hancock's answer was a rigid snap of vocals, that was it.
"What is your view on that?"
"My view? That I'm lucky I didn't end up a heap of SCRAP, like half of my model-make DID after the war. I wouldn't change it. Not just because of that, sir. You and me are meant to go places, we're just in a rut at the moment."
"That's the most positive thing you have ever said to me."
In the wake of such opened eyes for him, Hancock's response was never initiated under the distant interruption of sudden volume.
PWK
An echoing, hollowed and far off bloom of noise- an explosion.
Sanford naturally hunched over, grabbing his gun off the sling on his back, holding it at his waist. Hancock stood there, and made an angered grunt.
"Someone stole my job!" He exclaimed.
"What the hell WAS that?!" Sanford snapped. "-And what are you blabbing on with now?!"
"I'M the one who blows shit up!"
"What exploded?"
"'Hell if I knew, sir!"
"Use your damned-"
"WAIT! Scanners detect heat-dissipation to the east!"
"-Scanners... Right."
"Weapons fire. Rocket-Propelled. THAT-WAY." Hancock jabbed a claw in the right angle of which they were.
Sanford followed his point, and, even though the robot's military sensors had indicated the direction of travel already, he could see a small wisp of blackened soot trailing in the dull gray sky in the backdrop.
Normally, people would try to veer AWAY from where there was shooting.
But Sanford and Hancock were a bit unique.
"Let's KICK ASS!" Hancock barked, chassis-thruster blooming orange in a full fly towards the sooty pillar.
Sanford smiled, pulled the bolt on his SMG back, and ran after him. Human company sucked anyway.
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Criss-crossing through a thin outskirt of foliage, scattered concrete road and metal side barriers- Sanford and Hancock traveled to the fringes of the actual city of Boston itself, the western town areas.
As they hurried to reach the sounds of battle, the resounding thud of rocket-shots rebounded through the hills twice more, and they started to hear shouting, cursing, and hollers.
Sanford had a good hunch of what they were traveling towards, because, as much as the ambience made it sound- there wasn't a single bit of a firefight going on here.
"Sir, sensors aren't picking up a FIGHT, per-say..." Hancock said, disappointed.
"It's Raiders." Sanford replied. "Who else shoots at anything and EVERYTHING all day?"
"The Supermutants!"
"Well... These sound HUMAN."
"Bah! You and your theatrics!"
"Ssh!"
They moved over the first strips of intact concrete and sidewalk, past the foot of a shattered apartment complex. Sanford crouched behind a street-pole partially bent over by a snagged automobile with its rusty bumper imbedded.
He waved for Hancock to stay behind the corner of the building's brick wall, and peered over the car's hood.
A hole-ridden brick wall acted as the only blockage to a literal indent in the earth- a place where an entire building had imploded, and been reduced to a crater of debris in its own foundation. A wrecked military truck was long decaying on the street in front of it.
As he examined the contents through the man-sized gashes in the brick wall- Sanford saw a collection of people- humans carrying all manner of rifles, pistols, firearms in general, machetes. All were wearing scavenged armor and leather attire, some had converted military uniforms or parts of biker outfits.
"Raiders..."
"Called it!" Hancock hissed behind him.
"No, I did!"
"Can we kill them?! Please? Can I kill them?!"
"Stay down for a bit, I wanna' see what they're doing..."
"-But Clarice is CHAFING!"
"My SOUL is chafing..."
Sanford stood partially in a crouch by the car's rear trunk, raising his gun- he dashed in a quick arcing of his legs to the other side of the street when he saw less motion ahead.
His boots clogged against the street lowly- hissed when he slid behind a pile of rubble vomited forth from the hollowed wall of another building.
"Stay there! Cover me!" He hoarsely whispered.
Hancock raised a claw in annoyed affirmation- nearly lost his chef hat, and reclined to adjust it atop his chassis-head again.
Sanford rolled his eyes, and watched the Raiders.
"FIRE! C'mon, Boss!"
"-Crack it already!"
The Raiders were yelling to someone- there was a hiss of compressed release- another boom of impact from a RPG round, light and fire flickered in the crater, and there were groans of annoyance from what sounded like a small group.
It sounded like there were a lot of them... He and the Mr. Gutsy would have to take this smoothly.
Sanford hurried in another dash closer to the brick wall- this time pressing his back to a adjacent structure's corner.
The Raiders were occupied enough that there weren't spotters watching this street. He could catch them off guard at that rate.
Smiling, Sanford got an idea.
He slipped his SMG back in its sling- grabbed a waist-mounted sheathe, and yanked at another weapon's butt.
A bulky magnum slipped from its holding- a home-made suppressor acting like a large cylindrical cap on the gun's nose and barrel. He flicked the hammer, opened the chamber to check the six rounds- and flicked it shut before thumbing the safety.
Sanford checked around the corner of the wall he hid behind- and felt ironic at how luck was holding for him.
A pair of Raiders walked from around the decrepit remains of the wall ahead- each toting pipe-based rifles, one had a gas-mask over his head, and the other had a scavenged biker helmet.
Checking the iron-sight on his gun, Sanford inched the barrel around the corner of the wall- lined up the guy on the left with its girth- and pulled the trigger.
CLK
It sounded like someone flicked a rubber band.
But a deadly round flew out, and the Raider grabbed his mask's eye cap and dropped his weapon- body tumbling onto the street.
The second man went to yell- arms raising in a reel from his dead comrade.
Sanford fired a second shot, and any attempt at noise was thwarted when the Raider flung forwards with a thin bead of crimson flecking from the base of his neck.
Sanford pumped his fist from its extra grip on the gun- waved at Hancock -and ran out into the street towards the bodies.
The robot hovered out to meet him- together, they each took a leg from one corpse -and dragged them back towards where Sanford had shot them from.
"-Damn sir! You're good with that pee-shooter!"
"Kinda' like you with that Plasma gun."
"Aye-aye."
Carelessly, they tossed the cadavers to the ground, and idled back to the brick wall across the street.
"These things are worthless..." The human commented- holding both the Raiders' guns under his arm.
"-That's what we have power-tools for, TEAR 'EM UP!"
"Keep it down!"
"Stealth was never a strong suit-"
"HEY!"
They both wheeled towards the wall when a third voice cried out at them.
Standing there in one of the entrances through the bricks, was a skinny twig of a man hidden behind an overcoat with plates of armor tied over the arms and legs- a rotting human head was held via chain-wrap over his waist and across his thigh.
The meat-hook impaled trophy dangled as he raised a pistol at them-
"-FUCKERS-!"
CLAK!
-And then Hancock shot the freak dead.
The boy's head looked like it bloomed red when a green blob of plasma lashed out into his face. The body lurched backwards with the legs stuttering despite the lack of life.
Sanford slowly lowered his gun and stared at his robot.
The Raider's cheers and banter had stopped inside the crater.
Hancock looked at him, then the wall, and made a shrugging motion with his three arms.
"-What? He saw us."
"He HEARD us."
"Do you EVER shut up, you Commie?"
"WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU?!"
"Everything! That's what makes me BEAUTIFUL!"
Gawking at the robot, Sanford's head snapped back to the crater as an entire group of Raider thugs stomped past the fallen body of their comrade through the brick wall's hole- and stared right at them.
One of them raised a rifle and shot once.
"CRAP! GET DOWN-!"
"-BRING IT ON, PAAANNNSSSIIIIIEEEESSSSS!"
Rounds flicked off Hancock's chassis- his chef hat was tossed off with a single bullet passing through the front -his plasma weapon screamed thrice and dropped a Raider with green flashes on his torso.
Sanford reached over and grabbed the robot with his arms wrapping over his flank- threw himself backwards towards the wall corner they'd hid behind.
Rounds kicked up impact dust on the building corner as Sanford fell on his backside with the Mr. Gutsy supported in his lap.
"-Holy crap! H-Han' c'mon! We gotta' get a better angle!"
"I may be best buddies with you-! But if you don't tug my chassis away from your crotch this INSTANT, I'll VAPORIZE YOU!"
"-Damn it, man!"
Sanford practically kicked the robot off himself, grabbed his SMG from its sling, and slung back his pistol.
Hancock floated back to a full stance, looked upwards with his eye-stalks, and saw an open window on the third floor of the building they hid behind.
"Goin' up!"
"-Alright, I'll flank!"
"TALLY-HO!"
Hancock's central thruster roared to life- forming a static buzz in the air like a miniature rocket-ship launch.
The robot hurled an entire story into the air- arced into the window sill- and impacted somewhere inside with a horrific conglomerate of tumbling metal, wood, breaking glass, and the reverberating SPROING of a mechanical spring dislodging from its hold.
"-I'm okay! For LIBERTY!" Came distantly from above.
"-God help me..." Sanford muttered, raising his gun at the mouth of the corner's alley.
The group of Raiders rounded the bend up ahead- and Sanford drained half his clip at them, sending a pair of them flailing on the ground with rounds punching through their upper bodies and guts.
He ran for his life as their friends peppered the alley and corner with reaction fire- rounds ricocheting across the walls around him and concrete at his feet.
He went down the alley, past a pair of dumpsters, and down a leftwards curve.
Sanford ran with all his might- breath heaving, arms working to replace his gun's clip with a fresh one.
Right as he yanked the bolt back, he ran headfirst into someone.
"-OOF!"
The tumbling sound of two bodies, Sanford fell on his backside, raised his gun despite his aching legs- and saw a Raider standing there with a pistol aiming to him.
Sanford shot him with a trail of rounds going from his hip to shoulder with a series of dusty kicks- the man flung in the direction of the last impact, fell still on the concrete. The young man might have felt a tad lucky-ER, with that save-
-But as it turned out, the guy he just killed, WAS NOT, the guy he ran into.
The guy he ran into was rolling onto his feet on the ground in front of him- angry at being knocked over by someone he'd normally be robbing and murdering right now- and seeing his buddy behind him getting pegged.
Sanford cursed, raised his gun like a blocking element- and felt his arms double with stress when a nail-driven baseball bat clacked onto the side of his SMG- the Raider using both hands to ineffectively bring the implement down on him.
Both humans' arms quaked, Sanford's teeth bugged from his curling lips- the Raider's expression hidden behind a biker helmet painted yellow with racial slurs written on its temples in red paint.
Lashing out with his foot- Sanford caught the thug in the groin, emitting a bark of pain from his target. He used the momentary leverage to kick upwards with both boots- planting them in the Raider's chest, and catapulting him off from atop.
The Raider landed on his heels, stumbled back, and went to come at him again, before Sanford emptied the last of his clip into the marauder's belly. Dust flecked from ten or so pocks that tore through the Raider's leathers and drew blood in quick tiny rivers.
His enemy fell to his knees- dropped the bat by his side, and fell face-first between Sanford's feet with a plastic THWACK of his biker helmet's visor hitting the concrete of the alleyway.
Sanford held his breath, nudged the corpse with his heel- and exhaled in a blast of relief.
Another close call to add to the laundry list.
Not too shabby.
Sanford changed the magazine for a third time, threw the used one over his shoulder, and stood up.
He checked the corner ahead of him with the barrel aimed forwards- then behind him -saw nothing, turned and jogged back towards the way he was originally going.
In the overhanging backdrop, he heard more Raiders yelling at each other to find and kill him.
This was NOT how he wanted to take them on.
But he was in the mess now. The longer he chastised himself over how what he wanted to happen, DIDN'T happen, the longer he drew out the chance of screwing up and getting killed. Or worse. It was Raiders he was dealing with.
Frowning, Sanford stumbled to an abrupt halt when the alleyway suddenly ended, and a dropping ramp of rubble cascaded before him.
"-Whoa!" He grunted, balancing on his feet for a moment. He looked at the massive crater before him, surrounded on all sides by caved-in buildings, and a single, thin and beaten brick wall...
Oh no.
"Not good." He muttered.
He'd run in a circle.
Right around the building him and Hancock hid behind. Into the crater they had been scoping. Filled with all the other Raiders.
As if on cue, maybe ten more of the freakish criminals stared him down with muzzles of rifles and pistols, two of them had shotguns bigger than his entire torso- and one of them, almost made him soil himself.
Their leader, obviously, the BOSS.
Clad in a scrap-patched, multi-pieced, mix-matched suit dabbed with mechanized servos on the knee plates, elbow joints, and by a set of armor plates on the hips- the Raider heaved ragged breath that was tinged with metallic overhang behind a mesh-like face plate.
The Raider leader was in something that was all but fable to most folks of the wasteland.
Power Armor.
"Oh Christ..." Sanford muttered.
Almost comically, the Raider leader cocked his head to the left, and raised his left arm- whining the servo joints of his suit as he did so- and curled the gauntlet back around the ignition pull of the rocket launcher toted over his shoulderplate.
"How are ya'?" The Raider chuckled in a rasp. "-Lemme' ask you, Scab- how many of my boys did you get before the end?"
Sanford swallowed, stood straighter, and stared at the man's helmet dead-on.
"Didn't count. Maybe four or five."
The leader nodded with an impressed grunt.
"Not bad."
"Not bad, huh?"
"Not bad at all." He poked the chin of the helmet forward. "Gotta' kill ya' though. See you in hell."
"NOT SO FAST, COMMUNIST SCUM!"
Right as Sanford thought his days of survival were done, an all-too-familiar voice barked from the second story overlooking the crater from the building at his side.
Hancock aimed his own claw-mounted RPG out of one of the window sills- lined the laser-bead with the chest of the Raider warlord- and fired.
SHHHSK!
A rocket cascaded in a fling to the Raider's below.
"GET DOWN, SIIIIRRRR!" Hancock called.
Sanford scrambled back down to the corner of the alley- tripping over himself -and crouched behind the wall there, next to the two Raiders he'd previously killed.
The Raider leader looked up once- spiraled around -and hunched lower to the ground when the missile smacked dead center his armor's hip-area.
PWWKK!
All at once, a massive plume of flame, sparks, dust, and flecks of body parts and masonry material belched from the center of the crater- all the Raider thugs vanishing in the attack's girth.
Crashing metal rebounded from the receding explosion- Hancock pumping his claw out the window sill he floated behind.
"WOOOO! Spicy!"
As the smoke began to settle, and the last crumbling sounds of pebbles finished rolling about- Sanford sprinted back to stand over the crater from the cut off concrete of the alley, smiling in amazement.
A handful of mangled, bloody remains lay scattered in the scorched epicenter of the crater, a blackened hulk of metal and junk to its center right standing dominant.
"You got 'em, Han'!"
"U.S.A! U.S.A! U.S.A!"
"-No one, kills MY CREW, except, ME!"
Sanford's expression dropped.
The scorched hunch of scrap uncurled like some animal reemerged from its shell- the thick, robotic limbs of the Power Armor furling by the Warlord's sides, his legs spread in a combat stance.
Defiantly, the Raider Warlord did not even flinch at the obviously horrendous physical trauma wrought on his person- unknown to Sanford or his robot -shrapnel had imbedded in every limb on the man's body, and had torn into his stomach.
Soot drew all over his Power Armor like hundreds of giant black tendrils- the shoulder pad on his right flank had been blown off, both his arm-pieces were shredded enough to see the understructure beneath the plating, his ankle plates were in similar condition.
Yet what struck the two of them- mostly Sanford -the most, was that the mesh face-cover that had obscured the Raider's features was torn away, and revealed beneath it his burnt mug, upper lip and most of his nose burnt off in rubber-looking spreading wounds.
The Raider screamed at the top of his lungs- yanked back out his rocket launcher, and nailed the window that Hancock had hit him from.
The robot flung back inside the building- the entire sill and surrounding walls imploding in a burst of masonry dust and flicking flame with a deafening crash of stone and glass.
The Raider grinned at the descending cloud of rubble- ignored a brick that slacked off his armored arm- and grabbed a new missile from his waist.
"-I'll kill ya'... ALL of ya'..." He aimed at Sanford, still standing in the alley. "-I'LL KILL YA'!"
"Oh-BALLS!"
Sanford did the last thing he'd expect himself to do.
He leapt FORWARDS.
Rolling from the alley, he fell chest first into the sloping debris that gathered towards the bottom of the crater- now laden with dead Raiders.
Sanford grunted as he tumbled down the rocks and dirt- his hearing vanishing in a whining breeze when the Warlord fired his rocket into the alley seconds after he jumped. The entire pathway between the buildings belched dust and brief flame from all ends it exited from in a great roar.
"YOU LITTLE SHIT!" The Warlord cried, seeing the smaller man rolling down towards his feet. "-DIE ALREADY!"
Sanford threw his body to the side- the Power Armored boot of the Raider's left foot crashing in a smacking clack to the dirt he vacated.
Scrabbling on the ground, Sanford reached up, and held something hot, metal, and rough in texture.
He leaned up, and was greeted with a great, soot-marked surface of drab paint.
His hand unclenched from a rent door handle, and his eyes swept over two ruined, parting hatch pieces that had been bombarded by the same Raider trying to kill him.
Six wheels on both sides- rounded, thick armor plating on a fat, bulky chassis- a blazing Army Star painted on the sides and rear of the vehicle.
It was an APC. A military APC.
-And he had a feeling it was the same one he had failed to track down a mere day ago.
"-T-This is it..." He mumbled. "It IS real."
"I'm gonna' piss on the skidmark I make outta' you!" The Warlord bellowed. "Stay still!"
"Crap." Sanford turned to stare the Raider down as he raised his RPG again. Fully loaded. "CRAP!"
SHSSK!
Sanford felt time come to a slow.
Throwing his arms to his flank- he tossed his own weight for all its worth from the rear of the military vehicle.
He neared the ground for landing, when the missile impacted the back of the APC, and detonated.
A concussive force of a hundred winds blew into Sanford's airborne form- sending him flying to the edge of the crater, where he hit a mound of rocks and dirt roughly.
He couldn't hear, so all he got out of his impact was a dull thud, and the flaring pain.
His teeth clenched, heat washed over him, something flared on his leg- and with rapidly blinking eyes, he saw a gash drawing red down his ankle, through the pants he wore.
Dust obscured everything.
He tried to call out for Hancock, and heard nothing. So he wobbled on his back, kicking like a child unable to stand- until he rolled back down the crater's side, and weakly pressed against the drab hubcap of one of the APC's wheels.
Hissing through his teeth, Sanford hugged the rubber of the tire, and forced himself to support on it as he stood. His leg protested, but he started inching down the side of the vehicle anyway.
His hearing was returning slowly, it was beginning to clear the fog matting his very mind- and then, before it was complete, he tumbled forwards when he lost grip on the metal hull.
He lightly bumped against a metal floor.
Darkness shaded a white, blocky chamber surrounding him.
Sanford had stumbled inside the APC's rear compartment.
He blubbered on his own voice, spat, and shakily spun his head about to examine everything inside.
Large, ammunition cases held unknown contents, stacked on storage shelves by the top rims of the hold- a shadowy humanoid shape obscured the entrance to the driver's cab, suspended on metallic clamp-like additions.
He startled- thinking it the Warlord outside - and then calmed when he saw that this humanoid visage wasn't moving... In fact, it looked like it was hanging from restraints. Magnetic restraints.
Sanford's shellshock was wearing off as he fumbled to lean on the chamber's wall, reached up, and ripped off a cap on one of the cases in the shelves.
Inside, there was no ammunition, no missiles, or explosives.
Inside there was a cylindrical, power-plug capped device painted yellow and black. He grabbed one, held it to his face, and smiled at the HAZARD warning label on the side. Sanford giggled in excitement.
He shuffled over to the shadowy shape, found a metal crank protruding.
Slamming his fist in its center, steam hissed, a nozzle flicked ajar, and he slid the device inside, before reapplying another punch. Gears whirred, systems gave off charged bleeps of confirmation- the shadowy figure opened like a flower before him.
Sanford snaked his legs into its legs, arms into its arms, head into a padded hold.
Then the shadow encased him in a filtered, cool environment. His vision lit up with dials, status readings, and most of all- a confirmation message of the fully powered state of his new find.
Outside the APC, the Raider Warlord had just slid a new missile into his launcher, and was aiming it inside the vehicle.
"-Get out of there, you little shit! COME ON!" When no immediate response was evident, he continued ranting. "-FIGHT ME!"
CLM CLM CLM
PWK!
Three hollow thuds of polished, metal heels- and a fist with ridged, servo-supported knuckles, flew out from a towering figure that matched the Warlord's height exactly.
The balled gauntlet crashed through the remains of his helmet- shattered his skull in a hit that could penetrate several inches of titanium.
The massive, armored body of the Warlord stumbled back- dropping the launcher, arms flailing with whining gears -crimson spurting from the gaping hole in the helmet's ruined center.
He collapsed with a great, thundering thud onto the rubble-littered ground.
Dust flew up around the edges of impact, then settled. All was still.
Sanford breathed heavily underneath a breastplate of synthetic alloy, and held up his bloodied gauntlet to the eyes of his helmet.
In shock and awe, he watched as Hancock flew out from the receding smoke on the edges of the crater, by the ruined brick wall- his Plasma gun brandished at first, and gradually lowered as he saw the dead Raider lord.
The Mr. Gutsy examined the new being before him- scanned him -and flinched back in disbelief.
"-W-Who...?"
"H-Han'?"
"S-Sir?"
"I... I found-"
"-You found-
"-POWER ARMOR." They both finished at the same time.
There was a long dragging silence between the two.
Then Sanford wheezed laughter, and the suit keeled over in hysterics.
Hancock made a staticy garble, and laughed too.
"That's not just ANY armor, Sir!" He choked.
"I know!"
"It's considered experimental!"
"I know!"
"We're going to GO places now!"
"I KNOW!"
"You know?!"
"I know! Because we've got X-01, baby!"
"Now- We're TALKIN'! U.S.A! U.S.A!"
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