Chapter 9, The First Day, part 1
It was nighttime, the sun had long since set, but the separate camps were still very much awake. The Texans had somehow found enough wood to cook up a good old fashioned bonfire, and they took every advantage of it. Jack had the policy of letting his men have a good time while camp was made, he believed it raised morale, he was not mistaking. The cooks had got gotten their hands on a few brahmin that the Brotherhood had lost along the way to Abilene, and they were hosting a big old-fashioned barbecue with the meat. The men were singing old campfire songs, and the noise was incredible, but still quite merry at the same time. The Brotherhood of Steel people, however, were not enjoying the celebration. There were two main reasons for the barbecue and campfire songs, the first was obviously morale, but the second one was much less innocent, the second reason was to completely and thoroughly throw off the enemy's morale and keep them awake as late as possible. The TCCR was rotating men in and out of the singing and partying, the reason for this was to keep the Brotherhood from getting any sleep, pushing the morale down, but it was also to keep watch of the Brotherhood soldiers and make sure they didn't try to surprise attack.
The song they were going to sing first went all the way back to the 1800's, but was still a big hit among the soldiers. The group started singing, and were soon doing really well: "Let us pause in life's pleasures and count its many tears, while we all sup sorrow with the poor; There's a song that will linger forever in our ears; Oh! Hard times come again no more"i. Everybody joined in for the chorus; "Tis the song, the sigh of the weary, hard times, hard times, come again no more. Many days you have lingered around my cabin door; Oh! Hard times come again no more!" The men sang the next few verses, some people started piling on wood, making the bonfire bigger, at some times, even the Enclave soldiers joined in. They continued singing old campfire songs all through the night, some folks brought up such hits as 'Pat works on the railway,' 'old Zip Coon,' 'camptown races,' 'country roads,' and 'Ol Dan Tucker.' (Note, most of the songs on this list are from the 1800s, I don't know that many campfire songs from the 20th century, and I don't think they write them in the 21st century)
The next morning, the battle began again, and this was going slightly easier on the Enclave and TCCR, but people fighting for their lives will fight hard no matter how much sleep they get. The Brotherhood were giving it everything, they even took down Sgt. Sanderson, one of the TCCR's toughest men. Andrew got slightly injured in the shoulder, but he insisted he was fine and a stimpak seemed to heal it up pretty quickly. The firefight was getting long, so the TCCR got their band together and started playing old music, the Enclave station was getting old, and they started playing different tunes, which didn't do much, but it gave the men a chance to hear some fresh tunes.
Thomas Jackson charged the gate, he dodged all the fire, and made a single mark on the door, he was forced back very soon, but the mark remained. He decided to pull back and strategize, had he not, he would have been hit in the crossfire. The current plan was to charge the gate, but the best man for the job was dead, and dead men tell no tales. Thomas was bent in half over who to put in charge, he eventually settled for Jack Austin, but not until after breakfast. After eating, the men all got ready for the battle, no one was going to give them a rest more than what they had already been given. Jack was to lead his charge at noon, until then, it was straight fighting, with an occasional grenade or mini-nuke. The battle intensified at eleven, it was almost time to act.
The battle took a turn for the worse at around noon, the Brotherhood soldiers rained down fire on a group advancing on the gates, and completely stopped them. Jack started trying to come up with a more subtle approach, but he had to balance that with cheering up the soldiers. A second attempt was made, but this was with assaultrons, it failed just as horribly, but they were able to study the Brotherhood's tactics. About that time, Jack decided they should get sniper fire, so he did it himself, he had bad luck for the first few tries, but his aim gradually improved. On his thirty-fourth attempt he managed to shoot down the greatest enemy of the Enclave after only a few tries: Gerald Henderson. After the lone wanderer fell from the walls, Andrew and his team rushed him into the camp for trail.
The trial was fast, the military court ordered him executed, and Andrew was chosen as the man to do it. Andrew said "I would love to say anything else than this, but I don't know what to say, so I will repeat the court order, you are hereby executed for your crimes against the United States government." He swung the sabre, it did it's job effectively, but not effectively enough, and got caught u in Gerald's neck, so Andrew wrenched it out, and was just about to swing when words came out of the wanderer's mouth: "You are damaging valuable Institute property." Right about then, a figure, very thin and worn, but instantly recognizable appeared from a stealth boy, it was Gerald Henderson, the lone wanderer. "I don't care if you are the enemy, this is important, I must speak to the head officer at once!"
I am making shorter chapters because I have new limiters on time to work, namely school, but I still wish to continue putting out good material, this is the reason for the shorter chapter. Let me know what you think of the plot twists in this chapter below.