CHAPTER 51
Here we go again...
What had he been thinking?
Grabbing her up like that? Going all over her like that? He didn't even know who the hell she was, and she didn't even know who the hell he was.
He runs into some random girl who just happens to be appealing, charming, looking for a bit of companionship just as he was his whole life- and the next thing he knew, he had her in a lip-lock in the middle of some street in Diamond.
Sanford felt like he had blatantly tossed his standards out the figurative window- he didn't appreciate the way he had behaved, the way he had reacted, but... Would anyone else in his shoes do differently?
Well of course they would, but, HOW differently?
He had just gone with what his body was saying- and that was just insulting to his own intelligence, because he was smart enough to know that listening to purely instinct could lead to bad places, it was what separated human from animal.
Was he really that alien to romance that he just leapt on the opportunity like that? He felt gross.
Sanford probably circled the plaza two or three times as he wandered around Diamond's heart- nudging past groups of drunken people, nodding at guards who greeted him as they were now off duty- he found Mayor Jompson chatting with Liham by the side of Billet's shop.
"Either of you seen my Deathclaw?" Sanford called over the commotion- his voice laced with static as the amplifiers in his helment tried to compensate for the noise.
"No Tobs, I haven't seen her." Liham shook his head.
"As haven't I." Jompson added- looking concerned. "-Sanford, you didn't lose a Deathclaw in my city, did you?"
"I'm sure she just wandered off with Han', we're packing up, I wanted to find her so we could head out." Sanford reassured. "Parties were never my thing."
"Hold on, I'll see if the boys saw her." Liham nodded- the gruff man shouldered into the crowd- heading for the gates.
Sanford shifted closer to the Mayor and the seeming aura of emptiness that revolved in the immediate vicinity of Billet's store property- desperately trying to distance himself from the laughing, tumbling people as they drank themselves stupid.
"Where'd you get all the beer, Jom'?" Sanford asked- looking down at the shorter, older man.
"LOTs, and lots of foraging, Sanford!" Jompson smiled. "-Jerry Sims figured how to work that good brewing lab we set up in the basement sublevel, max production! Splendid, isn't it?"
"I guess so."
"People need to breathe."
"I understand."
"-Oh, excuse me, Sanford."
"Sure."
Jompson vanished too.
Sanford idled in his spot- he watched in flickering glances across the crowd as people partied, and were careless- he didn't feel any sensation of being left out while he observed, or from purposefully separating himself from the city.
Sanford had become very solitary after a decade- a little crazy too, but, that wasn't why he didn't want to be here, at least, it wasn't the only reason. He still had a pit of axiousness, guilt, in his belly, and it felt God-awful.
"-Watch wher' ya' steppin', Tobs."
"-WOAH!" -Sanford startled back from the edge of the wall of Billet's shop's flank- he looked down at the dirty ground, and, crouched there, leaned back against the building, wearing stained, torn jeans and a black hoody, was a Ghoul. "-Sorry Mill."
"Probleh' woulda' done me a good service steppin' on me anywah'."
"You're drunk aren't you?"
"Naw, naw man," The Ghoul blinked with hazy, gray eyes- looked up at Sanford's helmet, and smiled with what few yellowed teeth he had left- he fiddled with the crucifix hanging over his chest with one hand, lazed a beer bottle over his knee with the other. "-I can walk, jus' don't feel like it'."
"Right."
"-You lookin' fer yer' Deffhaw?"
"You're wasted."
"Naw, naw, man... Not wasted, just..."
"-You know, Robert told me you were an aethiest," -Why he tried to start a conversation with the drunkard, he didn't know, it just happened. "-What's with the cross?"
"...Jus' becuzz' I don't believe in no God, don't mea' I can't carry this little' thin'..."
"How so?"
"...I believe..." Mill, the sad, sad man that he was- or, perhaps ONCE was- tipped back his rotten looking head, took a swig of his bottle, smacked his chops. "-I believe in a higha' powa'."
"But not God?"
"God, Allah, The Lawd'... The shit's the differencccceeeee...?"
"I dunno'."
"...It a symbol, of a higha' powa'," Mill gripped the crucifix. "-Might not be the RIGHT higha' powa' to me... But it a symbol, and I don't know of no otha' symbols fo' a higha' powa' that I can git'."
"...Is that it?"
"Somone' giv' it to meh', long time ago. Not the reason' I carry it."
"Who gave it to you, Mill?"
The Ghoul drained his bottle- tossed it on the dirt by his waist, belched, and wiped his hoody sleeve across his mouth.
"Fuck yerself'."
"Huh." Sanford turned back around and watched for Liham, or the Mayor. "You should take a nap, Mill."
"...Waayyyy ahead of ya'."
-Silence from down there.
Sanford rolled his jaw, shifted on his heels.
Where the hell was Liham? Where the hell was his Deathclaw? And Han'?
Sanford was getting impatient- he wanted tonight to be over with already- and there was a combination of anger towards himself for the incident with Jess, trepidation for the journey they still had to get home, and most of all, a bit of awe at how today had turned out.
Here he was, assuming that the Deathclaw was just part of his daily life now- and out he and Hancock went to do their usual scavenging, and then, BOOM, one firefight, two firefights, THREE firefights... And here they were miles off original course in Diamond City.
There was stress too, over the consequences of his actions so far.
He'd most likely pissed off two of the most powerful brokers throughout post apocalyptic North America- the Enclave, and the Institute- and while the remoteness of his home and the places he frequented would help him evade them, and his skills would help him defend himself and his friends, they both were professional armies and professional armies hit hard.
Notably, the Institute's little 'First Impression'- hadn't been very stellar, but Sanford wasn't convinced. Hadn't there been a famous general he'd read about as a boy that underestimated his foes based on one engagement? That guy got fried, right?
Sanford didn't remember- all he remembered was that it was in a book his father had bought him.
Sanford had explained his pa' to more people tonight than he had across the entire Wasteland in the last twelve or so years... It was... Interesting, to discuss with Robert, a few words with Liham earlier, with Jess, even though the latter turned into a shitstorm.
As he thought about his dad a bit more- Sanford realized that he could barely remember what his father's face looked like, and the same with his mother's, he didn't like it.
"-My men are sayin' your 'Claw took a midnight stroll, Tobs." Liham came up to him from the crowd- suddenly, unannounced- Sanford looked down, quirked a brow.
"What?" He asked dumbly.
"Your friend left through the gates," Liham gestured for the gates down at the end of the plaza, up the ramp. "-Into the streets."
...That wasn't... That didn't make sense.
A stroll? A 'Stroll'? What the fuck was she doing? Where'd she go? What-
-Sanford glanced back at the street he had entered the plaza from- he looked at the ground, at the dirt- and clearly, right there, smack dab in front of his stupefied face- were taloned footprints, twice the size of the mixed shoe and boot marks across the dust.
They looped right around, vanished under the bustle of the crowd, right for the gate.
...He wondered, if, she saw what had happened with Jess.
Oh crap.
-Well, why else would she do that?
CLNK! -He slapped a gauntlet on the temple of his helm.
"-I'm a mother fuckin' moron." Sanford stated. "I'm a fuckin' moron- I gotta' go, Liham, open those gates for me."
"Did something happen?" Liham followed by Sanford's side as he stormed through the crowd- shoving and shouldering past mobs of blissfully unaware people. "-Tobs!"
"Get those gates open! NOW!" Sanford shouted, jabbed a finger up at the wrought iron towers on the top wall level by the gate.
The two plates of massive scrap metal rattled, shook, cast off dust- they started parting, and Liham didn't get through the crowd he'd been stuck in briefly, fast enough to ask more questions- he only saw the shadowed outline of Sanford Tobs as he strode out into the night beyond the gates.
-0-0-0-0-0-
This was all his fault, and now, this offense had been doubled.
First he'd mouthed off to her, and now, he sucked some girl's face in front of her- completely oblivious to how he KNEW she would take that.
The Power Armor was rattling, creaking, thudding against the pavement- Sanford ran straight ahead into the little intersection of streets just outside the gates- he heard them rattle shut behind him inside the stadium.
The sounds of the crowd were but a faint whisper in the haunting darkness- all the buildings silently loomed over the cracked pavement, still strewn with some pieces of synths, spent shell casings and discarded power pack batteries.
The crater that the teleportation pod had made was still there- but... the pod... WASN'T.
Where had the pod gone?
Hadn't the guards said it was still there? And that they had torn some wires out?
Sanford ran around the bend of a building- his night vision filters allowing him leeway in the pitch blackness- he stood on the edge of the ruined maw torn into the pavement, and he noticed a pair of huddled shadows on the street ahead.
He stepped around the crater this time- knelt on one leg, and stared grimly at two men in umpire gear, with S.W.A.T helmets and body armor- blood had coursed briefly from tears in their stomachs- rather small looking incisions that cut straight through the armor.
Sanford nudged his head, and saw that these wounds went all the way through their bodies- they must have been stab wounds of some kind...
-...And... It smelled like something was burning.
It smelled like burnt flesh.
-Sanford knew that smell, the decade of seeing shit across the wastes was to thank for that.
He ran a retinal scan from the interior HUD of his helmet- and a second later, confirmation message blocks bleeped into his vision giving readouts of carbon residue from laser-based heat, dead cells killed by it.
...Holo-Blades.
These soldiers had been killed by synths.
Who ELSE could've done this so cleanly, so quietly?
The pod was gone because the Institute either found a way to covertly carry it off, or, more logically- found a way to beam it back from wherever it came from.
BEEP
BEEP
BEEP
-Sanford froze.
He stood to his full height, and he accessed a message block in the internal recognitions of his helmet's communication links.
He blink-accessed it, and read that it was an incoming signal- tuned to home on his suit.
...It was Hancock.
It was Hancock's signal, and it was coming from miles away.
Hadn't they talked about this in the past? At the Super Mutant camp? If something like this had ever happened again, if they ever were separated again, they could use the distress beacons to home in on each other...
Hancock was in trouble. This was a call for help, it had to be, the robot's deranged sense of pride wouldn't allow anything else.
"...Hancock where the hell are you...?" Sanford tried to pull up a link to his friend's communications mic'- and all he got was white noise. "Hancock? Come in, man, where are you? Where's the Deathclaw? Uhm- Nyx? Anything?"
"..."
"...Hancock, c'mon..."
"..."
"Fuck."
Sanford looked around the street more.
Like he had seen already, the only things still lying around were spent shells, battery packs from Institute guns...
There were a few synths that still were sprawled, dead, on the pavement- which struck Sanford as odd, seeing as the guards claimed they had piled and burned them.
Three corpses in total- pretty spaced out- one was strewn in the center of the street, the other was on its back, skeletal face looking up at the stars on the sidewalk- the third was slouched over in an alleyway nearby.
Sanford took the time to examine each corpse- he knelt, looked them over- he nudged them with his foot.
The one in the street had plasma burns on its chest, and half its head had been blown off- the other two had their chests torn open, and scattered electronic innards were cast out around them from where they had been skewered.
Eventually, Sanford was standing somewhere in a mid-point between all three of them- and he had an armored palm over the cranium of his helmet, and he was pacing, back and forth, back and forth- the suit whining with each step.
The beacon was still going off in his hearing from the HUD.
...He noticed a gun lying by one of the dead androids- it looked similar to one of the laser rifles the Institute forces had used.
Sanford stopped short- he advanced on the corpse, nudged away its limp arm with his boot, and picked up the rifle. It was two handed, and instead of a battery pack on the side, there was a rectangular clip jutting from the bottom- there was no carbon projector either, but a rounded, fat barrel.
Sanford first thought it was some kind of grenade launcher, or explosives launcher- however, when he clicked the little ejection pin on the gun's lower half, popped out the gray clip and looked inside of it- his suspicions were washed away for dread.
Inside the clip, were not bullets, nor grenades, nor any kind of small explosive.
They were darts.
Egg-shaped little things with silver needles on the end, and a single red dot painted on the midsection of each.
Sanford had his retinal scans work for a bit on the munitions.
The results came back.
Anaesthetic chemicals.
Tranquilizers. Heavy shit too, this stuff could knock out an elephant- it was a chemical cocktail not in the suit's data logs, which meant it was created entirely by whoever had shot it.
That meant the Institute had her.
They had Nyx, they had Han'.
"-Those fucks," Sanford grit his teeth- he tossed the gun and the clip away. "I'll kill every single one of them."
Sanford bent down again, and came back with the same synthetic's laser rifle- which had been laying by its hip.
"Let's see what these techie' bastards have in here."
Sanford gripped both ends of the gun's frame- and he pulled.
CLK! -The weapon cracked open like an egg under the increased strength from his suit's systems.
There was a shiny sheet of metal-like material in there- Sanford wanted to see what the amplification device in this gun was made of.
He tossed away half the frame-bundled the coppery wiring connecting the battery port and the still-loaded pack to the main fluctuation and dispersion rods- he tore it out, and he tossed it away, to prevent the battery from exploding- he pinched the sheet with two fingers, lightly worked it out from the copper moorings.
He scanned it, and the result frightened him.
It was a chemical combination of primarily adamantine and rutile- which meant the Institute had melted together these materials, or had coated one over the other- and THIS was what actually created the beam of carbon to shoot from the weapon.
No wonder the Institute rifles were so accurate, and, he could only imagine what would happen if some of the beams had actually HIT him.
Sanford got an idea.
He knelt down, dug into his rucksack- and came back with a screwdriver and pliers. He laid the Institute gun down, pulled out his own personal Laser rifle.
He went to work, quickly.
-0-0-0-0-0-
Dead end after dead end- it seemed to be the closest description he could find to a summarization of his time after attaining his rank. He ran into dead ends in Virginia and Maryland with the Mutants, he ran into dead ends with the NCR, he ran into dead ends in D.C. with the Brotherhood- and now he was running into dead ends in Boston.
The difference between these dead ends in New England, from those further east or on the West Coast- was that at least those dead ends wound up being for a greater purpose, or had eventually reaped some kind of benefit through the blood, sweat and tears.
Here Laslar Seduun was chasing shadows, and he had nothing to prove for it in the ways of fruit for the labor and manpower. A total of six soldiers had died for literally nothing- four from his former subject, the Deathclaw, and two from this wastelander it had allied with.
Enclave units of the 7th Division had been able to operate covertly across Massachusetts and around the city of Boston for weeks before Laslar took over the operation- which, even though he never voiced it, pissed off Commander Rime to an unspeakable degree -but now, that the operation was taking this long, there was some tension.
A few squads of armed locals had detected them quite a number of times- contact hadn't been extended or close enough for any kind of communication to be made- but research into the development of Boston had revealed these people were calling themselves the 'Minutemen'.
The Minutemen were a militia group- an army, more or less -that encompassed all of the Boston area in their zone of protection, and there were smaller sects that pledged fealty to the Minutemen as far as the ruined towns around the former Middlesex Fells Reserve up north.
Laslar wasn't very concerned about the militia- even though he had read about their armed resistence to Brotherhood incursion from both the Mideastern and Eastern Chapters- they had no idea that their field HQ was set up in the Braggman's Water Plant, and they hadn't tried to shoot yet.
The Minutemen weren't a priority here- and not only Laslar, but Eden, and pretty much all of the High Command had literally no desire to attempt and expand sovereignty over New England- as the only thing worth owning was possibly the Institute- and that required a military annexation, which Laslar was underequipped to perform.
Right now his only concern was grabbing the Deathclaw, killing the wastelander with it, so he could head back to Washington and attempt to enforce his new chain of command on the other units out East, before trying for the West.
The problem was, like he had said- he kept running into dead, damned, ENDS.
Ever since the wastelander had escaped them at the quarry, it had become increasingly difficult to use aerial patrols to locate the man's position, or that of the Deathclaw's- and Laslar was beginning to believe more and more, that he had some kind of portable jammer as suggested long ago by his fellows.
Rime said to start looking in major population centers- and the only examples of those that were present, were Fenway Park, an old military fortification down south that locals were calling 'Fort Freedom'- and a town called Bulwark- the latter two, were the primary sources of operations of the militiamen.
Again, this was not to say that Laslar was worried about his men's performance if they happened to get caught in a fight with the militia- it was just that there were A LOT of them, and the only presence the Enclave had were the fickle elements of the 7th- a quarter of an army against thousands of guys.
If reinforcements had been present, and weren't tied up in the West or in D.C.- Laslar would've fully supported tearing New England asunder, and leaving no building standing in his quest for the Deathclaw. However, it wasn't meant to be, not today.
Still the consistent air sweeps were becoming hellish.
It didn't help that Laslar was in a murderous mood- in fact, he was more angry today then he had been when he first showed up.
Eden, had ordered three of Laslar's fleet of six Vertibirds back to D.C.- including the VB-130.
"What the fuck do you mean, they're to return to Washington?" Laslar roared when Laureen- the condescending bootlicker that she was -told him sternly.
"You heard me, Superintendent."
"If Eden thinks this will stop me, he's WRONG, you make sure he hears that!"
"The President's intentions are tactical in nature, not personal."
"Yeah, and the fuckin' radiation cleared over New York." Laslar rolled his eyes.
-Days later, with those 'birds gone, his operation FURTHER diminished- Laslar only knew it was a matter of time before either Eden, or some other nutcase in the Enclave High Command took the opportunity to attempt and demote him, or even abandon him in New England.
Who knew, maybe someone would have Laureen or another Secret Service spook roll in and try to shoot him.
These were concerns overall, and over the last few months, all the anger, all the anxiousness to just ring someone's throat, the war in D.C.- had actually caused Laslar to develop a twitch in his right hand.
His left gauntlet was clenched over the support bar on the roof of the Vertibird's troop bay- his right was fiddling in the air by his hip, draped lazily- the fingers were scrunched together, and he kept bouncing his wrist over and over and over.
The aircraft roared as it angled slightly for a new direction in its flight- and outside, air was whizzing by the closed deployment flanks on either side of the bay- Laslar kind of missed the two custom 20'mil' mounts the 7th had bolted into the other Vertibird he had flown in.
Now it was his squad, four men, Luft, and him in the troop hold- they rocked with the 'bird's motions, looked quietly into space, not at each other.
Luft and three of the other guys were seated in the restraint chairs towards the back of the hold- Laslar had willed to stand- he was too on edge to sit out the flight, and the other man next to him just didn't grab a seat in time, only reason he was there.
"...Why are we landing here, sir?" Luft piped up from behind.
"Scans showed the wastelander and the 'Claw were here." Laslar muttered- outside, the Vertibird moaned, the rotary blades rotated back as the pilot slowed for a descent.
"They're probably gone." Luft noted.
"Astounding, thanks for the obvious." The Superintendent sneered. "All I need is a single God damned clue, a single one, and I can track them."
"Yes sir."
"-Landing zone compromized, Superintendent, your orders?" -Came the pilot's voice through the comm' link in Laslar's helmet.
"Compromised?" He tore away from the support grip on the ceiling- marched for the cabin ahead. "-What the fuck do you mean, COMPROMISED?"
"I count twenty guys."
"WHOSE' guys?"
"Militia."
"Son of a bitch."
Laslar ducked through the porthole- hunching in the cramped cockpit over the shoulders of the two operators- who glanced at him, and the pilot took a hand off the stick to point through the viewport of the Vertibird's bubble canopies.
The Museum of Science was down there, as expected- sprawling out with ruined grounds, and a gigantic structure that was damaged with age and wear.
However, gridded like ants in the front garden and walking section of the place- was a cluster of men and women, armed, mostly with two-handed rifles- wearing trifold hats, and colonial overcoats. The Minutemen spread out to find cover behind trees, fallen logs, or brick guard walls in the gardens- some hid in a dip behind the main flight of stone steps for the front doors of the museum.
They weren't shooting, and one of them was standing out of cover in the center of the pavement- he was waving his arm.
"I think they wanna' talk, sir." The pilot said.
"Are there any radio signals being emitted from that unit down there?"
"Scanning. Found one."
"Start patching through, they'll get the message."
"Sir."
Static blared from the headset of the pilot and copilot- and from the console of the Vertibird's control center.
Laslar bowed his helmet and waited.
He saw the militiaman down on the ground level stop waving his arms- he hurried over to another soldier emerging from the backdrop, holding out what looked like a walkie' talkie, or some microphone device.
The obvious officer took it, waved the other guy off- and held it up to his mouth.
"-This is Corporal Addace of the Minutemen, militia of the Commonwealth territory. This is not Brotherhood airspace and you know damned well that you aren't welcome here- Mannesk better have a good reason for this."
"We're not with Mannesk, militiaman," Laslar sneered into the link with a bit of disgust- he HATED conversing with natives.
"-What the hell is the Mideastern Chapter doing in New England? Who is this?"
"My name is Laslar Seduun of the Continuate of the United States, we are Enclave, not Brotherhood, and we have no interest in coming to blows with you." -Laslar wanted to add- 'At this TIME' -but he refrained.
"...Well Seduun of the Enclave, I don't know what you big smokes are doing this far east, but you are in violation of New Englad airspace just as much as Mannesk's Brotherhood has been."
"We understand this. We have a point insertion mission in the building you're entering- we're sweeping the interior and leaving."
"Let's be real, Seduun, you and I both know who and what was here. You and your planes have been sweeping Boston airspace for days. In the interest of Boston's security, I have to refuse to abandon my post, OR let you land."
"I am not on any directive to refrain from lethal force, Corporal," Laslar said blandly. "As stated, I have no interest in fighting the militia, but I have a goal that I am tracking, and right now you and your men are the only things standing between me and it. I'll give you two minutes to comply, or I'll order my Vertibird to start strafing."
"...You're certain about this, Seduun?"
"Two minutes."
"...I'm patching contact to the Admirals in Fort Freedom- they'll want to address you over this."
"I don't care. Two minutes." Laslar pumped his fist on the console- he shoved away from the pilots, ducking through the porthole. "If they don't disperse, strafe once, drop me off, strafe again, drop the squad off."
"Sir." The pilot nodded.
"Luft," Laslar was back in the troop bay- he stood by the closed ramp door to the right, nodded at the Sergeant. "Possible combat drop, all of you, get ready."
Clicks and clacks of safeties being unpinned, batteries being linked.
-0-0-0-0-0-
Addace didn't know what to do.
He'd told off the Brotherhood, both Chapters too, in the past- he'd told off envoys from the Talon Company AND the Gunners- but never had he told off an airplane with primed missiles aimed at him.
His radio operators were able to get in touch with the Admiral Command Staff located almost fifty miles south in Fort Freedom- and they didn't know what to do either.
The threat was enough that the Command Staff linked up a call with another Minuteman squad that happened to be passing through the outskirts of ruined Back Bay, by the Boston Public Library. The sergeant leading that squad had a towed weapon on him- and it wasn't one of the Minutemen's commonality of the 75'millimeter artillery cannons.
The sergeant recieved the news- ordered a preparation- and the cable links on the backs of four modified tugging Protectrons were slacked off, three men got at the controls, one started loading a shell, the other two rapidly spun the adjustment cranks.
Understand that preparations had been taken since the Enclave had first been spotted over Boston's airspace- and weapons that had been deployed in the wake of fear of a war with the Brotherhood, who also had flown in on Vertibirds in the past -were currently operational in small numbers across the Commonwealth.
Arguing for its ability as an anti-ground AND air turret- the militia had seen it fit to decrease some mobility for appropriate firepower.
As such, across the Charles River, the Minutemen manning the wheel-mounted 90'millimeter anti-aircraft cannon had a completely clear shot of the Vertibird hovering in the far, far backdrop.
The gunners lined up the sights, electronics homing the barrel on its victim.
They loaded the shell, shut the hammer- the sergeant raised his arm.
-0-0-0-0-0-
Laslar waited sixty seconds.
Then, at the moment of truth- Addace's voice grumbled through the radio in his helmet.
"-Get out of our airspace, or we shoot. Last chan-"
"-Strafe them, drop me off." Laslar cut the link.
"Yes sir." -Came the pilot's voice.
The Vertibird rumbled as ammunition batteries were chambered.
On the ground, the militiamen had already dug in- however, they couldn't anticipate the Vertibird's missile barrage.
SHMM-! SHMSHMSHMSHM! -A thin, contrailing wave of armor-piercing fragmentation warheads streamed from the Vertibird's launchers on its wings- a cluster sailed for the garden behind the staircase and plaza of the museum, and another cluster sailed for the plaza itself.
On the ground, Addace saw the warheads getting bigger in the air above right before his eyes.
He called out for cover- some of his men screamed out similar.
Then the missiles hit.
BMBM-bmbmb-BMMMMM! -Five separate blooms of pluming fire balled up into the sky from the gardens just to the plaza's flank- there was screaming, tearing soil, snapping wood- a cluster of dead trees fell in writhing flame into the developing bursts of soot that blinded and choked anyone in the zones not killed by the burst.
Then the other missiles hit the plaza.
CRK-BMMMMMM! -In four zones did the concrete split and peel apart like soft soil- soot and fire belched out- shrapnel flew everywhere- an entire group of Minutemen gathered by the side of the stairs were virtually atomized from thin air as one of the warheads belched out stone and fire from the stairs dead center.
They all vanished in flickers of crimson and tossed black- chunks of concrete rained everywhere- and Corporal Addace himself rolled on the grass- heat washing over his whole body.
-0-0-0-0-0-
A few miles away, the sergeant of the AA' gun squad thrust his arm down, and screamed at the top of his lungs-
"FIRE!"
CLMK!
-The hammer thundered, the gun barked deafeningly- casting a mushroom cloud of dust across the street around it, off of it- black smog clapped around the barrel in a brief flash of light.
-0-0-0-0-0-
He secured the moorings for his Tri-Archer's battery feed- kicked his legs to loosen his muscles- rolled his shoulders.
Laslar was practically quivering with anticipation for the kill- to be able to land among the midst of his foes, and to slaughter and butcher them- to rend life from people he deemed subhuman, beneath him, beneath the Enclave who were ALSO beneath him.
Might made right, might made right- Laslar had hammered that perversion into his brain since Texas and Mexico. He was RIGHT, and nothing else would raise a finger to it without risking their puny little life.
The ramp to the Vertibird's flank hissed, and light streamed in from the creases as the metal entryway lifted, and revealed a brief blinding flash of daylight from outside. The scream of the engines was now in full blast- whiplashing air rattled all the security clamps dangling from the ceiling of the hold behind him.
Laslar looked down at the single story drop- below, he saw the street that wound down right from the mouth of the Charles River Dam Road- the museum was a sprint away where he could begin suppressing the foolish militia who had dared to challenge him.
It was all going perfect.
Laslar was kind of hoping that idiot little Corporal in his idiot little coat and hat WOULD have given the order to shoot in the first place- he needed action.
The Superintendent managed one foot off the side of the bay-
-Then the pilot screamed into the comm' mic-
"-INCOMING FLAK!"
Laslar tensed up- his eyes went wild- he started to feel weightless as his right boot sailed past the rim of the Vertibird's bay floor- the Superintendent twisted his armored body painfully around- he threw his arms out, and made to tumble back inside the craft-
-And then the 90'millimeter shell, launched from nearly a mile away, detonated right beside the Vertibird's right rotary mounting.
CLAAMMM! -It was a loud popping noise- like a tin can exploding, and echoing down the streets below- Laslar had heard, felt, and seen a lot of crazy crap, but he NEVER forgot that sound. Ever.
"-FUCK-!" Laslar screamed at the top of his lungs as he sailed downwards a bit more- and then the Vertibird lurched from both the hit, and the pilot's late reaction timing to swerve away- the bottom rim of the troop bay smacked into his armor's gut.
His world rushed, and his head swam in an endless, vomit-inducing circle.
The Vertibird whined as it careened through the air-
wwwWWHHHmmmwwwhHHHHMmmmmmWWWWHHHmmmmm
-It spiraled clockwise, horizontally- the tail and cab passing each other over, and over, and over, and over- the aircraft spun through the sky, gradually losing altitude, heading west- smoke and licks of flame belched from blackened wounds torn in the right wing and the propellor engine.
Laslar, who was caught in the middle of it- thought he had fallen out of the plane whilst clenching a piece of debris.
In actuality, his legs were flung out before him- angled east, with his abdomen curled against the metal of the troop bay's bottom rim- his arms were extended, his gun and his other gauntlet strewn out on the floor inside the Vertibird's storage hold- behind him, a portal of swirling colors and black smoke curling to the left shown the outside of the craft as it spun out.
Laslar grit his teeth, he shut his eyes, holding on for dear life whilst his transport lost control- and he was the only slob that was being tossed like a ragdoll, half-outside the hold.
His squad buckled down and hunkered in their seats- the one other soldier who had been standing in the hold with Laslar was screaming- and his hollering intensified in Seduun's hearing, and then quickly faded away as the man was tossed clean off his boots, Power Armor and all, and hurled out the side of the Vertibird where he plummeted to street level.
-Down on the ground, there had to be only fifteen or twenty militiamen left after the missile barrage- and among them was Corporal Addace as he ran around trying to find able-bodied men.
"Get up! Get the fuck up! GET UP!" -It took Addace a moment to see he was yelling at a torso and head, and nothing else- there were stringing, crimson stumps in place of the arms and everything below the hip.
Addace sprinted from the corpse- he found another man tumbling on the ground- screaming his head off, crying for his mother- the Corporal didn't even get to yell for him to stand before he saw he was juggling his own intestines with grabbing hands and flailing arms.
"-MINUTEMEN! Muster on me! ON ME!" Addace desperately tried to regain control- there was smoke and dust still pluming everywhere across the plaza from the steaming gashes torn in the concrete- there was a small fire still brewing in the dead grass in the garden.
All of his men that had taken cover back there were either slaughtered, or convulsing on the ground from limbs being blown off, or bodies having been torn open from shrapnel or the sheer concussion of the blast.
Eventually, Addace had a small group of ten or so guys- all their uniforms were dirtied, burnt, or both- some of them had lost their hats, and some were picking up guns from the mangled corpses lying in the grass or the concrete of the plaza.
"Establish a firing line, God damn it! FIRING LINE!" Addace screamed at the top of his lungs- he ran over and started cuffing heads, knocking caps off of craniums- yelling in ears.
Men wielding projectile weapons organized on the sides, and a row of eight soldiers, armed with crank-charged militia-standard Laser Muskets, lined up at the behest of Addace.
BM-pmPLMpkppkpmp... -Dust and torn soil erupted from a NEW fissure just ahead of the stairs on the other side of the property, in the grass.
Addace spiraled around- he aimed his Musket at the younger dust cloud- and to his shock, he saw a lumbering, flailing, humanoid mound tossing on the ground where the impact had occurred.
Addace looked up, and saw the Vertibird spiral a few more times, trailing soot- and it vanished over the roof of a nearby building.
The poor fool had been tossed out of his own plane.
"TAKE AIM!" Addace cried.
"Take aim!"
"Take AIM!" -Repeated his Musket line of eight- the guns clacked, batteries primed- all the barrels lined up on the fumbling titan of steel on the ground ahead.
The Enclave soldier had just gotten himself upright to a kneel- his helmet had flung off, and he stared ahead- too disoriented to even realize what was happening- he hung his quivering arms on either side of his armored form.
Addace saw the pale face of the balled Enclave member for a brief second- before he cried out-
"-FIRE!"
PM-PM-PM
PMPMPMPM
PM
PM
-All eight Laser Muskets blasted out scything, inter-connecting beams of crimson carbon at once.
The Enclave soldier took six hits in the same portion of his abdomen plating- the laser energy pierced right on through- sparks and torn strips of blackened steel shot out the rear of his cuirass, and a bursting bubble of blood the size of his fist flecked out of his mouth and over his breastplate.
The soldier rumbled the earth as his armored form face-planted on the grass with a series of rattles and thuds.
First blood for the Enclave, second to the militia.
None of these men on either side realized they had just started a war that would last far, far beyond the Commonwealth for both factions.
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