Chapter 29: It Only Gets Worse

"Riktar." The woman said the name aloud as he stared at her and walked forward. He looked at her face when they were inches apart and he could still see her old self in her eyes. It was her, but he was still shocked at what she had become. Her eyes were tearing; she realized she wasn't the same. Doc looked at her more; his eyes darted around her rotting face and peeling skin. This could have been prevented, he thought. He could have prevented this if he wasn't a coward. But the time for that was over. He had brought her in close and hugged her as he sniffled. She hugged back, like they used to, and for a moment, things were better. And then he realized he was in a firing line.

"L…Lower the weapons." Anna told them with a shaking, rattling voice, as if her real voice was put into a box and rattled around to make words. She turned back to him.

"What are you doing here, Riktar? It was too dangerous for you to come here. Are you all right?" The woman asked.

"I'm… I'm great." He told her with a smile.

Anna looked towards us. "Thank you for bringing him here."

"Just because Anna has your back doesn't mean you're welcome here. We've got our eyes on you, outsiders." The ghoul said as his men walked away.

"Don't mind Clip, he's just angry at the raiders around here. Are you guys actually here for what you said you are?" Anna asked with a small remnant of German in her voice, but that was fading with every year she spent away from home.

"Yes, we're here to get rid of them." I told her.

"Good, they have been a nuisance ever since they moved here." Anna said to us.

"What have they done, Anna?" Doc asked.

"They come in here every once and a while and steal our supplies and beat on anyone who tries to stop them, we've tried to do something, but there's too many of them, lately they've had better weaponry and armor, almost brand new it seemed." Anna explained.

"Don't worry, we'll handle them." Doc said with full confidence.

"You actually might be able to. Come with me, there's someone you should meet." Anna said as she took Doc by the hand.

We followed her through the building. The building was completely intact, yet worn away on the inside.

"What is this place?" I asked.

"This is the Museum of Natural History, or as we call it, Underworld. Any ghouls who survive outside and aren't feral come here. We've made it a growing town after people noticed everyone started coming in." Anna said.

"Wow. Must have been tough to get this place running." I said to her.

"From what I've heard, it was bad at a time. The town eventually prospered to a great place to live...until those raiders came here." Anna said sadly.

Anna looked at Manny with an inquisitive stare that Manny couldn't pinpoint as to why.

"You've come back I see." She smiled at him.

"What do you mean?" Manny asked her.

"You were here a few weeks ago. I remember you, almost ghoulified by the radiation."

"Were you… did you help me?"

"Yes." She smiled as they shook hands.

"Well… thank you."

"I see that what I've done hasn't gone to waste." She nodded at the boy.

She turned from Manny and opened a door where she showed us into an office. A ghoul with an intact moustache and perfect, brown, flowing toupee sat at a desk.

"What's this, Anna? Who are these guys?" The ghoul asked.

"They're people who came into the city. They say they're going to take care of the raiders." Anna said.

"Let's hope you can. I'm Paul, I take care of this town and these people, but recently, it's been hard with those raiders in the Museum of Technology." Paul said.

"Don't worry, we're here to help." I nodded.

"I doubt you five will be able to do anything with all those raiders. I've got a plan, if you're willing to hear it." Paul said as he stood back.

"I think we can handle it." I told him.

"Listen to him." Doc told me.

"Fine… I'll listen." I said to him, letting my hands fall down to my sides.

"To put it into simple terms, I have a bunch of pissed of people who want to rip the hearts out of those raiders, and in front of me, I have the five people who can lead them into battle. What do you say?" Paul proposed.

"Y—You think I wouldn't have been able to think of that? Yeah, ok, sure, fine." I nodded.

I sighed. "Do you guys have enough weapons? We're a little low on ammunition and firepower here." I asked him.

"We have an armory downstairs, but it's been hard keeping it stocked recently." Paul said.

"Then you have a deal, Paul." I said. We shook hands and nodded at each other.

"Good, Anna will show you to the armory. My men will be ready at the gates for you." Paul said.

"Yeah I forgot to mention, we kind of ran into some trouble with feral ghouls on the way here. They're all outside the doors" I informed him.

"Don't worry about it. Feral or not, we're practically brothers, well, a smart brother and a stupid, crazy, hungry, skinny brother that is. They won't bother us, so you guys can slip through with my men unnoticed as long as you're surrounded by us." Paul shrugged.

"Good." I said with a sigh of relief.

Anna walked us down some stairs and into a giant room. Giant fake animals were put up here for display. They looked unusual, even for the Wasteland. We stared at the various animals as Anna walked us through the room. She opened a door and we walked into a room with various weapons and ammunition. Dimitri's eyes opened wide as he walked in. Dimitri smiled, and then frowned as he walked around the room, basking in the ammunition amounts. He spotted all the firearms; the rifles, the shotguns, double barreled, cocked, safeties on, hollow points, laser sights. It made him disgusted. Most of all, he didn't know why. I took out my pack and got out the 9mm pistol. I grabbed another pistol holster and put it on the other side of my waist and stuck the weapon into it, where I took another pistol and its ammo. I pulled out a better bullet-proof vest and put it over my shirt, and then put my coat back on. Manny walked around and processed what his eyes were seeing, nodding at the weapons with a smile. He then clamored for every weapon in sight, struggling to pick them up. Tai kept her rifle, but grabbed some hollow point bullets. She grabbed a small machine gun and put it in her pistol holster. Doc grabbed a rifle holster and automatic rifle. He smiled as he reloaded it. Dimitri all watched us, happily supplying ourselves for another battle. He shook his head. Dimitri dropped his ammo box on the floor. It made a loud thump as it hit the ground. We all turned to him.

"I don't want to do this." He said to a quiet room.

"You're kidding me right?" I asked him.

"They deserve no mercy, those raiders… but not from me. I want to see them suffer, but I can't allow myself to force that. It's not who I am."

"It seems like that's what you were all about, maybe up until 15 seconds ago." I argued.

"I don't like being the one who hurts people, but I have no choice. This world is like a poison. It's either I kill and hurt or I am the one who is killed and hurt. I have a chance to stop that here."

"You agreed to do this mission, follow it to the end, you can't back away now, especially not now!" I shouted.

Dimitri turned to me and walked close to me. He looked down at my shorter head and exhaled through his nose. "I am." He told me.

I looked down at the ground in rage and looked up and punched him. He didn't flinch, he only sighed.

"Please don't do that." He told me as he walked away.

Manny looked at Dimitri as he left the armory and the last remnant of his sister behind on the ground, attached to an ammo backpack. I stared at the ground and sighed as Manny struggled to lift up the minigun. He grunted and only flipped the massive metal gun over. Manny paused to sigh. He wanted to bring it with him: either to battle, or to bring back Dimitri's identity.

Anna stared at Doc as he looked at the rifle he was holding.

"You're going with them?" She asked him.

"Yes. And Ich will come back. I promise."

"Well, you haven't broken one of those yet." She nodded and smiled.

The hugged and he breathed in the memory of her.

I sighed and walked further into the armory. I grabbed two more small gun holsters and put two small machine guns in them. Manny took a long time to decide what gun he needed. He settled for a bullet proof vest and two small machine guns, same as me. I then looked off to the side and saw a rifle resting in the corner. It was a golden lever action rifle with a black barrel and gold side loader, that looked spectacular, even when put into a dark corner. I picked it up and held its sleek metal and wooden stock in my hands.

"We found that thing here. It's a historical weapon given to a past president named Abraham Lincoln in hopes that it would influence the purchase of rifles like it. That's all we know about it. If it helps, I'll let you use it." Paul said to me.

"Hmmmm…."

"Nah." I said as I tossed it carelessly back into the glass case.

"Looks like it sucks anyway." I muttered as I walked away.

We headed out of the armory and towards the gates. About 30 ghouls, including the ones who met us at the gates were waiting for us. Paul went up to them.

"This is the day, my friends! The day we can finally push out those raiders that have tormented us for so long! These men have agreed to lead us into battle so that we may save our town from our unruly neighbors! We must do this! For our friends! For our families! For Underworld!" Paul shouted.

Dimitri stood at the top of the staircase, looking down at us. He sighed as I looked up at him, and turned my back to him.

Joe wheezed and coughed as he limped slowly to the wall of the D.C. ruins. He quickly ran over to an old ladder and removed rock from the metal safety casing around it. He grunted as he threw away stones the size of his head and let more of it that was cased inside the shaft fall down. It was rusted and about to break away, and at some points already were. Joe saw this as the only way in, so he climbed. The metal creaked and snapped from his feet and he had to jump to the bars above him to keep him from falling. Soon, he was over the wall and rubble and on the side of a collapsed building. He scrambled over the rubble and slipped at the top, tumbling down into the interior of the D.C. ruins. He coughed and felt his ribs as he had landed on them. He wheezed and coughed out post-war dust caked into the building's old dust. He got to his feet, holding his knee in pain as he moved forward towards the Washington Monument. He looked up at it, exposing his face to the sun. The new light shined a tired, aged face.

The men and women cheered and pulled the poles out from the door. We rushed into the crowd of men and women as they walked outward. The men walked slowly beside the feral ghouls there. Dimitri had to duck his head so that they couldn't see them. The feral ghouls stared at the men as they walked out. The doors closed behind us as we walked into the sea of ferals. We all walked down the street towards their building. There was way more feral ghouls than I thought. They filled the streets, and were everywhere in sight. It was like they waited for us to come back out, every single one of them. The street was a sea of ghouls. I didn't want to think about what might have happened if we couldn't outrun them. As we walked, the feral ghouls stared into the crowd and began following. Manny's eyes widened.

"We could use this to our advantage. Stick with the plan." I whispered to them.

We walked down the street with all the feral ghouls towards the Museum of Technology. The building was larger than Underworld, yet damaged by the bombs. Wood planks covered the holes in the buildings. Raiders stood watch with weapons. They looked at us and turned around and ran away. The ghouls then charged into the building. The five of us kept quiet as we ran along with them. The feral ghouls poured into the building and started tearing the raiders to shreds with their bare, bony hands as our cover fanned out and diminished. Blood flew off the raiders as they screamed for them to get them off. The ferals all ran and attacked the raiders as the normal ghouls walked through a door. Over 60 raiders were outside the building alone, I didn't want to think about how many were inside. The ferals were too preoccupied with the raiders that they didn't follow. The men closed the doors behind us.

"We need to get the raiders outside. You guys continue up ahead, we'll be right behind you." Clip said to me, somewhat angrily.

We all took out our weapons and charged into the inner building. The museum had many pieces of metals displayed just like Underworld, except these weren't animals. An endlessly large group of raiders got up as they saw us and scrambled for their weapons. I pulled out my machine guns and popped a shot into one bandit's torso. Tai took out her rifle and finished off the wounded with a swift headshot that exited the skull, and sent blood onto the wall, that was not too much, but not too little, the exact precise amount that she was known for. Manny sprinted through the room and flanked them, firing at all the raiders from the side as he cried out a battle cry like Dimitri once did in battle before his heart changed. Doc smiled as he shot anything he could see, his eyes piercing through his enemies just as his bullets did. When he ran out of ammo, he swung his rifle like a baseball bat. Manny jumped atop a raider and fired into his head. He turned to his side and got kicked in the face by another raider. The boy flopped to the floor as the raider lifted up a sledgehammer at him. Manny's eyes shot open as he rolled out of the way from him and felt his bleeding lip. The raider slammed his sledgehammer down again on him and instead of rolling, Manny decided to try to catch the speeding hammer. The bones in his hand cracked as he shouted and tensed up on the head of the hammer. His thumbs were peeled back and broken, but the fingers that have survived grabbed tightly tot eh sledgehammer, refusing to return it to the owner. Manny grunted and shouted in pain as he tried for his life to wretch the weapon free. The raider just decided to kick the boy's head in again and rip the weapon from his broken, bleeding hands. Manny held his hands to his chest to keep them from being exposed to the painful air and from any even more painful attacks. Manny rolled to his side and tried to get up and run away, but the raider swung the hammer at his legs and took him down again as he was halfway up. Manny looked up as the raider lifted the sledgehammer above his head and brought it down on Manny's. A man emerged and grabbed the sledgehammer with all his might and threw it away from the raider. This same man beat down at the raider with a single, flying punch that took the attacker straight down into the floor like a missile. He then got on top of the raider and beat him until he couldn't see through his swollen eyes. Manny turned his head as he wheezed and lifted his unbroken hand towards his savior.

A large Russian man grabbed that hand and lifted him to his feet as they met eyes for a moment and nodded. Dimitri covered Manny with an assault rifle as they fended off the rest of the raiders. Tai turned to me as she fired off a shot at someone.

"Don't let the leader get away. We got this. Just keep going!" Tai shouted.

Dimitri and I ran through the battlefield. He charged through a door and we fired at the lessened group of raiders inside. One raider ran up to Dimitri. The Russian smacked his gun into the raider's head and fired into his torso. A raider jumped on me and I dropped my guns as my skull cracked against the ground.

"Chain would sure like this one." He told me as he plunged a knife towards me. I quickdrew a machine gun and shot his head. I pushed him off of me with my foot and took out my other small machine gun and kept firing. I then ducked into cover and reloaded both of them. We sprinted through the room, firing at the raiders who rushed at us. I ran to a raider and punched him with my gun's barrel. He fell to the ground and I executed him with, until my firearms clicked. I threw them to my side and pulled out my two pistols, and continued to fire. We ran through the room, jumping over the tables and other objects the raiders set up to keep us away. I ran to cover and reloaded my weapons, popping back up. A raider turned to me and shot me in the chest. I fell to the ground and opened my eyes. The bullet hit my vest, and when I looked at the flattened bullet, I sighed. Dimitri pulled me to my feet and we kept shooting at the raiders.

Dimitri then charged through a double door and shot the few raiders inside. A man sat against a table. He had a messy greying mohawk and beard. We aimed our guns at him.

"Hello. You must be Jace." The man smiled at me.

"We're not talking, I'm killing you now." I told the man as I aimed at his head.

"I don't think so." He smiled as he got up.

"Hold on." I interrupted the intense cliché conversation. "We just killed, like, ALL your guys, how are you so confident still? Isn't that intimidating you, at least a little bit?"

"You see, we sent a messenger a while back to tell you that we've been watching you. When you left, we attacked your town. From what I saw, your daughter and wife would make good slaves."

"What?" I asked him.

Dimitri looked into the man's eyes and he walked closer towards him.

"You..." Dimitri said as he dropped his gun. He walked up to him and held him by the shirt. He lifted him to the air with his left arm effortlessly as his mouth opened in realization.

"You are the one that killed Sasha... Four-Leaf is your name..." Dimitri said as he breathed heavily and grinded his teeth.

"Oh! I remember you, the little chubby boy! You know, you still breathe as loudly now as you did before." Four-Leaf smiled.

Dimitri lifted him into the air and roared.

"I saw you in that closet when I killed her; I left you alone because I wanted you to live with seeing it." Four-Leaf said to him.

Dimitri threw him across the room into a wall. He then readied a punch.

"Tell your dog to keep off... or you won't see your family again." Four-Leaf smiled at me. Dimitri struck him across the face.

"I don't care about his family… I don't care about him, whether he lives or dies… all I care about is you." Dimitri grunted as he grabbed him by the throat and lifted him up.

"Dimitri…" I warned him as Four-Leaf began to choke and his face rushed with blood.

"Dimitri!" I shouted at him as Four-Leaf was cut off from air.

I lifted up a tire iron from a dead raider and brought it into Dimitri's leg and toppled him. Dimitri huffed in anger and grabbed towards me. I lifted my gun up and held it against the Russian's head with one hand as my eyes faced Four-Leaf.

"Where is Chain?!" I shouted to the leader.

"You don't want to know about him, you just want to see your precious widdle fam—" I smacked Four-Leaf with my pistol and held it close to his face.

"Don't you talk about them! DON'T YOU TALK ABOUT THEM!" I yelled hysterically, my voice cracking and my gun turned back to his face. Four-Leaf grabbed his jaw and wiped the blood from his face. Dimitri looked up at me and the gears in his head began to process my motives thus far. He didn't understand what I felt, until now. He sat on the ground and watched me, he could have taken me down then, but he didn't for whatever reason.

"Where are they?!" I ordered. He spit his blood into my face. I wiped it off slowly.

I sighed and got my composure.

"In a few seconds a gang of feral ghouls are going to come in here and pull you apart... if you're lucky." I said. I dropped my gun and signaled Dimitri to come over here. Dimitri stared at him with rage.

"Now... where are they?" I asked.

"It's already too late; he's going to kill them if you walk in. He's across the street, genius." Four-Leaf sighed.

"Thank you. You're a bad leader by the way." I said. I let Dimitri onto him. Dimitri beat him as he screamed and cursed at him. He broke his arms and legs with his bare hands and punched him repeatedly. Four-Leaf screamed in terror as he was beaten to death. Dimitri deserved this chance and I wasn't going to take it away from him. Something snapped inside that poor man that day, he knew this would happen eventually, and he indulged in his fury. I walked away, and didn't turn back, only saying quietly:

"Everyone's luck is bound to wear off some day."

Even mine.