Upon arrival at the destination, the Courier stumbled from the uneven ground. Taking a look at his surroundings, the Courier found himself in a crater, likely caused by the removal of the Big MT probe. Climbing out of the pit, the Courier took a look at the rest of his surroundings and took note of the large amount of blood red vegetation surrounding his person. 'There being vegetation was unexpected. Hopefully I can find someone to tell me where I am.'
The Courier stored the Transportalponder in its case and spared a few seconds of thought as to whether to climb one of the trees to get a better view of his surroundings. The idea was shot down after he recalled the few times he had tried climbing in the past. With the exception of ladders, none of the attempts generally didn't ended too well for him. Considering his standard operating area was the Mojave Wasteland, such ineptitude was to be expected. Climbing up hills and cliffs only made you a target for snipers when you got to the top, and trees had a tendency to not exist.
Shaking his head to clear away his thoughts, the Courier glanced down at his Pipboy. Aligning himself with where it said east was, the Courier began to walk off in the direction. Prior experience had shown that he would run into something of interest eventually. After an hour of walking, he heard something rustling within the trees surrounding him. Drawing Lil' Devil, he looked around his position slowly and listened intently for any noise. For a second there was silence, then six creatures came out of the surrounding vegetation and surrounded him.
As he focused on each of them, waiting for the first to make their move, he absorbed as much detail of his assailants as he could. He noted the beasts were similar to the Yao Guai, but there were a few differences in their appearance. The Courier's mind skipped over the fur and eyes, as those were of little importance, to note the facial plating and several spiked protrusions across its body made of a substance that appeared to be bone. With the aid of his replacement right eye, he saw that below the upper, solid layer of the plating, there seemed to be a semipermeable structure that would be able to absorb strong impacts. Most of the Yao Guai variants had what would be a very weak layer, but one in particular had one to the point where it could potentially be bulletproof. As it had the greatest size, the Courier marked it as the main threat and put a majority of his attention upon it, not entirely leaving the rest though.
The largest of the variants shifted to a stance akin to that of a Deathclaw as the Courier drew his Sequoia. He might be able to be victorious without it, but unknown enemies always proved to be a pain to deal with. Of course, what occurred next was unexpected. The largest variant gave a small, almost imperceptible sniff of the air, and the Courier noted something seemed to change in its stance. While he wasn't entirely certain, the Courier could have sworn the former desire to hunt had been overwritten by surprise and curiosity.
The Courier noted variant's eyes seemed to bore into him for a second, seeming to, for lack of a better word, stare into his soul. It's next action perplexed the Courier even further. It was almost as if it bowed in submissiveness. 'What the fuck...'
Distracted as he was, the Courier missed that one of the creatures, likely a younger one, made the attempt to attack him. If it had managed to reach him, it likely would have dealt a large amount of damage to him. However, the large variant noticed the attempted attack and, rather than joining in on it, intercepted the young variant, knocking it back. The Courier rapidly regained his senses and cursed under his breath at loosing his focus of the current situation.
The large creature turned to face him for a second, before giving what could only really be described as an order. The pack was led off by the large Yao Guai-variant, leaving behind a quite confused Courier. 'So that was...something,' the Courier thought. 'Is that what sentients look like here or am I missing something critical? Or maybe I have something its prey doesn't? Not really going to be finding anything out here, though.'
Turning his attention to his Pipboy, the Courier realigned himself with its east and continued onwards, holstering the Sequoia but keeping himself armed with Lil' Devil. He made a slower pace after the incident, as he was continually focused on tracking if the pack would come back, or another would come along. Occasionally he would detect something at the edge of his perception, but when he paused to home in on it, it would be gone. It decreased as he went along, eventually fading to nothing, but the Courier never let down his guard. Roughly two hours after his contact with the pack, he came across another individual.
The individual in question was a black haired teenaged girl seated upon a rock within the center of a clearing. The Courier spoke up to get her attention, "Do you speak English?" 'Shot in the dark, but then anything I try would be.'
The female jumped at the interruption of her thoughts and went for her weapon. The Courier raised his hands away from his side to demonstrate non-hostile intent. "Don't speak English? Qué hay de español? Deutsche? Zhōngwén?"
The female looked at him confused, befor asking, "Do you mean Vytalian?"
"Sure let's go with that," he replied, both mentally thanking and cursing the universe for the language being the same. It would prove useful for communication, but the sheer odds against such an event occurring did not sit well with him. "Would you kindly tell me where I am?"
"How do you not know where you are?" she asked suspiciously.
"It is a very long, confusing explanation based upon several extremely long and complex equations and a high level of understanding of many scientific principles. At least, that's how it would be if the creators weren't insane and had just as high a chance of falling into something that worked as discovering the principles behind it," the Courier stated. "Shorthand, I was effectively randomly teleported here and have no idea where I ended up."
"Most people would say they got lost," the female replied.
"I've got four, four and a half years left to live," the Courier commented. "I don't care about hiding stuff anymore. As for the answer to my question..."
"You're in the Forever Fall forest, north of Vale."
"Never heard of either of those before, but I doubt you would have heard of the Mojave and New Vegas either. If you're staying out here, keep an eye out for some strange Yao Guai variant. The pack left me alone, but I don't know how they'll react to you," the Courier responded, to her strange shock. "We may meet later, may not. I really don't care. Farewell."
Leaving her behind, the Courier headed off in the indicated direction, leaving behind the thoroughly shocked individual. Over the next few hours of travel, the sounds from earlier returned at relatively arbitrary times. Eventually his southward travel brought him to a massive wall. Looking back and forth along the colossal structure that stretched far into the distance, he had one thought. 'How the fuck am I going to get past this?'
There is a particular reason why the Courier was ignored by the Grimm. Not going to mention it here as it cannot be hidden from those who want to not know it, but it the mystery confuses/pisses you off enough, then send me a private message and I will explain. For those who don't have an account here, I'm going to put it up in a spoiler on the Space Battles thread.