A/N: Okay, so it's a week late and only seven(ish) pages instead of the 10+ like the last few, but... hey, it's here! Two things to look forward to: Amber gets a short scene. She'll be getting more and more as we close to the final chapter of this arc, where the two meet up again (well, where she's safe- that might take a chapter or two...).
As well, one of my favorite organizations makes their appearance- and it's not the first one hinted at (though they're all right). However, for anyone who can guess what that first hinted group is given the clues here, you can have an Internet-cookie. (Er, hinted at outside the title. That's a big hint for the second group...)
Enjoy!
Edit: As of 03/04/2012 9:12 PM (my time, which is Mountain Standard), I'm unable to log in to Ffnet. Well... I can log in, but when I go to my Publish section and hit 'Upload', it says I must be logged in to do it. So blame the late update (after that, at least) on them. Sorry all the same.
Chap. 8 Let Freedom Ring
Laying prone atop the peak of a small mountain, Duncan let out a low whistle. He was fairly certain this was the old Wheaton Armory, if his recollection of his dad's actual workplace (since he had been an accountant for the SatCom array, he wasn't actually on-site at any point, to Duncan's knowledge) was to be believed. However, any thoughts of raiding the armory for military hardware was put to rest by the sheer number of human animals parading below him. Despite not having any sort of magnification, he could spot movement well enough even from a couple of miles away, and there was a lot of it. The ant-sized people were moving in an almost-organized fashion between what appeared, from his position to the northeast, to be the main entrance to the storage bunker itself, and the crumbled remains that must have been the offices and barracks of the military installation. Those coming out were carrying things, those going in were empty-handed.
"Well, boy, looks like we're missing 'take your kid to work day' this year. Come on, we gotta go around."
The Deathclaw blinked twice at Duncan, twitching it's head sideways again, then rose from beside him as he stood in a half-crouch. It had imitated his position on the ground as well as it could, a fact which had amused the young man thoroughly. At least, that is, until he'd gotten a good look at the Raider camp below.
Because even at this range, he could make out the poorly-dressed humans- animals, he corrected himself- and the many mutilated corpses they'd left up to mark their territory as macabre decorations. At least, Duncan thought, the wind was blowing to the south. He wouldn't have to smell it since he was skirting north.
(O)(O)(O)
Despite that Scratches and he had both wanted to wipe out the three Raiders he'd spotted on patrol, Duncan had been forced to clamp his hand over the creature's toothed maw to restrain it from leaping out at them from their hiding spot.
It wasn't that he thought they wouldn't survive the ambush. The Deathclaw, alone, had taken out twice as many Raiders in seconds. But if the patrol never made it back, and whoever led this gang was smart enough to send patrols in the first place, more would come. Probably more than they could handle.
"Easy, boy," Duncan whispered as the last of the three passed around the hillside heading down toward the Armory, "let's give them a few more minutes to get further away, then we'll get going."
Scratches' stomach chose that moment to growl, Duncan's a moment later. With a sigh, the human reached into his backpack and pulled out the last of the pre-war food he'd brought with him when leaving Big Town, the questionably-safe baked beans he'd procured from the same dead scientist he'd gotten his laser rifle from.
Grimacing, Duncan handed it to the Deathclaw, "Food. Open."
While he doubted the monster was intelligent enough to get the words, it took a long glance at the faded, scratched picture, then looked up at Duncan as if to confirm that he really wanted it to, before shoving the whole can into it's maw with both hands and biting down sharply.
It's teeth, as Duncan could have guessed, punctured the aluminum can with ease, and crushed the only slightly-fermented beans out into it's mouth.
Slowly, the Deathclaw chewed twice, swallowed the beans, and spit out the can. When it looked up at him, tongue lolling, Duncan had to smile. It was acting just like a puppy, though, he was forced to remind himself, a puppy that wouldn't just bite off the hand that fed it if he made it angry. "All right, I guess that's my dinner, too. Let's go."
(O)(O)(O)
Amber frowned.
The blisters on her feet had been short-lived, by the time the Brotherhood of Steel patrol she'd been escorted by- though they insisted she was only following them- had ensured that her Vault-tec issued boots had stayed in good repair, and that the blisters she did develop had been treated with, at the least, field-grade medicine. As a result, instead of the aches and pains of slowly-growing callouses her fellow Vault-One-Hundred survivor had been dealing with, Amber had only been growing more used to walking constantly as opposed to the more sedentary, scholarly life she'd led pre-War.
Because Amber Rickman, or as the Brotherhood had usually called her, 'Scrub', had had big plans for herself. At least, before the bombs had started to fall.
It wasn't every day that a young woman of her intelligence and thirst for knowledge showed up in lower-middle-class suburbia, but her parents and she had both seen the sheer potential she had for whatever field she chose. As it turned out, Amber chose history. Specifically, military history. She was no great tactician, but her analytical and insightful mind had led her to making a new discovery about the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln that had already, despite having just been published in a small history periodical, started to change the way authorities on the matter looked at it- and her.
Of course, that wasn't saying that Amber was a one-trick pony. While only adequate at maths (which, to her, meant she was working at a low-college level in high school), and the sciences outside of medicine had never really interested her, the brunette young woman knew more about more things than anyone else she'd ever personally known of her age. Arts (she favored sculpture and flute, but was a passable chellist and pianist as well), History, of course, and the debate team were just a few of the aspects of high school life she had excelled in.
"Not that it does me any good now," she muttered to herself, frowning again. She had left Canterbury Commons (which was what the Brotherhood called it, the proprietor/mayor of the settlement, Earnest "Uncle" Roe, had insisted it was now the Canterbury Trading Post, early that morning. It had taken her a while for the maps she'd studied as a child to align properly with the landscape she'd been walking for the last few weeks. Once it had, however, she'd made the decision to take what she had and leave the relative safety of the Brotherhood's patrol.
They had turned south-southeast after Canterbury, she had turned straight southwest, moved across a broad valley where several domesticated cows- Brahmin, she corrected- grazed in pens, and up over a ridge to descend into the Potomac River's flood plain.
It was there, as she stood atop the ridge, that she frowned for a third time while the gray sun beat down from the yellow-gray sky, while the wind whistled through the ancient, whithered husks of trees.
The town she'd been heading for was gone. Aspen Hill was gone. A few scattered buildings remained, but even the streets had been covered in blown sediment, rock, and the general debris of a two-century-old ruin. It would be impossible to tell where her family had lived.
The family hadn't been wealthy, per se, but they had been fairly comfortable, definitely in the upper-middle class, so with only two children, both girls around Amber's age, they had been her most frequent playmates growing up. At least, the most frequent human ones. One didn't get quite the same kind of dynamic flowing between a bright young girl and her books.
Amber sighed, ignored the tears in her emerald eyes, and started trudging downhill. She wouldn't, couldn't, give up... she had to make sure. Even if it'd been two hundred years, her cousins were long dead, she could, perhaps, find some clue, some tidbit of information that would let her find out what had happened... how they'd died. She knew, after all, that her uncle Samual (not Samuel, he would cheerfully correct) Newmont would not consign his family to die in a stinking hole in the ground as his sister had been convinced by her husband to do.
Amber sniffled a bit. It was understandable, she knew, to be a little upset and thinking about your dead family, crushed or asphyxiated inside said stinking hole in the ground. It was not okay, she had decided even before Duncan, the last link with her past, had woken, that she would not allow that upset or those thoughts to keep her from moving forward.
What are you doing right now, Duncan? Are you missing Taylor as much as I'm missing Cheryl and Cody? What about your mother? Did you ever understand why your dad went to prison? Understand that it was for you and Taylor?
"Heh heh, lookit here, boyos!"
The low, slow drawl made Amber jump. One hand went immediately for the grip of the laser pistol a kind young woman of the Brotherhood- Junior Scribe Allison, she'd said- had given her to protect herself when they'd parted ways.
Unfortunately, the blow from behind prevented her from completing the motion. As her vision went dark, Amber began to cry in earnest. Her last vision was of a half-dressed man, one grimy hand stroking his already-hard and even filthier member while leering at her.
The last thing she heard was a different, still male, voice remind his companions that she was too sweet for quick killing; she'd be much better savored... for the flavor of her sweet meats.
Fortunately for her later life, Amber would also not remember most of the nightmares those words conjured while she was unconscious.
(O)(O)(O)
"Stupid locked door... what the hell is this thing made out of, anyway?" Duncan gave the metallic door a final, half-hearted kick and glare, before turning to shuffle to the east once again. The baby Deathclaw was on his heels as usual about half the time. The rest usually found it either scampering off to or back from some small creature it would bring back in it's jaws. Often, half was offered to Duncan, who had decided he would have to stop turning green at the thought of eating half a giant scorpion, and instead, would just keep walking and ignore it.
He turned back to look at the heavily-fortified building, nestled in the dale between two arms of a small mountain for a moment. Unless you had approached directly from the east or, as he had done, climbed the mountain to spot it from above, the building would have been extremely easy to miss. At first, it had appeared just like any other ramshackle, board-and-corrugated-tin building in the wasteland. However, as the easier path had led down toward the dale, he'd gotten up close to the building, allowing him to see several details a casual traveller would not have noticed.
On each of the four even-length walls had been small slots, probably to allow gunfire while providing for cover. A similar door, barely large enough for his adult frame, had rested on the east side, straight in from the small ravine between the feet of the mountain. It, alone, had not been covered with rust and tin, allowing him to see that the building itself was actually only camoflaged that way. In reality, it seemed to be constructed entirely of some kind of dark-gray metal, just like the door itself. He'd seen it before, somewhere, but...
Still, any locking mechanism around the simple handle (he'd tried twisting, pulling, pushing, even sliding in all four directions to no avail) had also resisted gunfire, and "Scratches" hadn't seemed to understand him when he asked it to open the door.
Also, the people he wasn't quite sure he could hear inside over the wind hadn't responded to his calls, of course.
So here he was, giving up... not because it was in his nature to do so, but because he had more important things to do. That, and his gut told him that Amber wasn't here.
"Come on, Scratchy, might as well start looking for a place to camp."
The sun was still over the horizon, but wouldn't be for much longer, if his twelve-foot shadow was any indication.
The pair found a little nook high on a cliff-face he could just climb down to from above (the Deathclaw, he had found, would reach him no matter what if it was determined, and seemed to dislike having help). The Old Worlder was just about to set out his bedroll when the sound of combat started echoing from the canyon to the north.
The beast's head cocked in that direction just as Duncan's did. What had started as just a few reports had quickly frown to dozens. At least one of the weapons he was hearing was automatic, judging by the high-pitched and rapid noise.
"Not our problem, boy," Duncan said, shaking his head.
Of course, the Deathclaw, curious child that it was, was already moving up the canyon at a full sprint.
Duncan sighed, "Ugh... fine! Let's just go get ourselves killed, then!"
But, as luck would have it, he was able to keep up with his 'pet' well enough that he didn't have to charge in recklessly to save it... or have it save him, as the case may be.
In fact, it, having learned a bit from his own preferred tactics as they protected themselves while travelling the Wastes, had paused about twenty yards outside a rubble-strewn crossroads, which had been lit with a single portable-reactor powered floodlamp. The light itself was focused on several men and a couple of hard-looking women, mostly wearing leather, but some in painted armor made from scrap metal. They were discussing things loudly as a runner came up from the opposite direction. Duncan scooted a bit closer to overhear, the Deathclaw following in silent feet.
"Cap'n, them slaves is holed up in that Temple o' theirs somethin' tight. I don' be thinken' we's get'n 'em dis night."
The man, Duncan assumed the Captain, he'd been addressing grabbed the much smaller messenger, "I gots my own damned 'pinion on when we's getten' 'em slaves, scrub. Git back t'yer place, I gots a plan. Tell Rabid if'n he charges in and gets 'is boys kilt one more tahm, I'ma gon' kill 'im meself. He best wait for mah sig-nail." The large man threw the rather scrawny, younger man away. He landed heavily on his rear with a grunt, but scrambled up and hobbled away, massaging his buttocks as he did.
Several of the other leaders laughed as he disappeared into the shadows.
"Slavers, huh boy? Damn... if Amber went to this Temple place, and it's got slaves there... we gotta save 'em, right? Hell... I know I'm gonna regret this..."
But while Duncan was silently (or at least quietly, knowing he was largely protected by the battle a hundred yards or so to the north) flipping the segments of his rocket launcher together and slipping one of the precious missiles inside, he heard another runner approach. He paused to listen.
"Cap'n Dick, that ex-merc sniper bitch in charge up at the Temple is givin' our boys hell again. Your sharpshooter about ready?"
Another of the officers scowled, "I'll take her out on my time, pendejo," in a frigid voice. The runner flinched, but didn't cower as the first had done before the Captain. Instead, he steeled himself, "'s your ass on the line if Boss Ricardo don't think we made enough on the new stock to make up for the boys we're losin'," then stalked back the way he'd come without reply.
As he did so, Duncan decided a bit more haste was in order. If the dark-skinned, tall man was indeed a sniper, he needed to be removed, and quickly, before the one protecting the slaves was taken out. Fortunately, he was almost done...
"All right," he whispered to the creature at his side, who's breathing was slowly picking up as it sensed not just near, but iminent, violence again, "I'm gonna fire, then toss a Frag. You stay right here. Stay. Okay? Watch my back. Guard."
Scratches gave a soft little whine, barely audible over the loud discussion, much less the still-increasing gunfire.
Duncan shouldered the weapon from behind his cover and rolled over onto a knee, barrel pointing toward them. With one handing holding it up and the other pulling a grenade from his belt and setting it nearby, he readied himself mentally for what was coming.
Raiders and slavers. Gave up their humanity, didn't they? Fuck 'em. Kill 'em all, world's a better place without them.
It's no worse than killing animals.
That's all they are, anyway, just animals that prey on humans.
Like Deathclaws... only weaker, and smarter. Some of them, anyway.
I'm not a murderer.
I'm not committing murder on those six people.
I'm...
I'm committing Justice.
Justice.
Yeah, that's it.
He wouldn't be able to make a clean hit, they were too far away- about two hundred feet was his limit for anything approaching accuracy with the ancient guidance systems- but the explosion, if he aimed at the table or ground nearby, would be enough to take them out.
Of course, he knew now that the best plans sometimes went awry, and that's why he had a grenade ready. As soon as he fired, he'd be behind cover, and lobbing, he hoped, the Frag before the missile even hit. Wait...
No, blast would carry the Frag back my way. Better wait for the shockwave, then throw.
He didn't hesitate once his plan was finalized.
A single squeeze of the trigger caused a spark to ignite inside the missile, and with a quiet hiss, it was away.
Duncan flung himself forward and down, pushing the 'launcher to the ground beside him as he did so, a moment before the dust and sand around him was kicked up in a powerful, but short-lived tempest.
The blast itself made his ears ring powerfully, the only sound he could hear was the sudden whine of Scratches next to him, who was pawing at the sides of it's head where the thin membranes he'd guessed it's ears were lay.
As Duncan rose to a crouch again, he imagined, through the dust and flames ahead, that there was screaming, that he'd thrown the slaver attack into chaos by taking out their leadership in one blow.
But no... even in the darkness and dust cloud he'd created, he could still see movement.
Snatch, yank, throw.
(O)(O)(O)
"It's the bottom of the fifth, bases loaded, and the Cougars are up by two, and there's two strikes. If number Seventeen, Maddox, can get one more strike on Sampson, the Hawks win. If Sampson, who's number five, can force a Ball or even a single base, the Cougars will clinch their playoff spot for the post-season in this year's all-District Youth League!
"And boy, is the crowd feeling it," another announcer called out, "I think I see Maddox' family out there in the bleachers, cheering him on. I'm sure he's feeling the pressure, but this kid's got some talent!"
No, Duncan thought, I'm not feeling pressure at all. Especially when you say things like that!
But the twelve-year-old had been training, practicing, even playing for moments like this for three years. His family, his coach, his team, they were all counting on him. Just one throw, one perfect throw, was all it would take.
He inhaled the grass, took in the roaring of the crowd (and exhaled the boos from the opposing fans), relished the fading sunlight on that glorious Saturday afternoon.
Duncan pulled back, lifted his left leg, and...
(O)(O)(O)
Unlike on that day two-hundred-and-two years previously (or something like that), the Frag seemed to follow it's arc and Duncan's will perfectly. Maybe, he mused in the moments before it exploded, all he'd needed to do back then to win the game was to aim at the batter's knee, rather than let it happen by accident. He'd been aiming toward the moving leg this time, and he'd hit it spot on. It bounced, the person- thing- it was attached to groaned, and another voice from nearby cried out, "Under Attack! We're under-"
Boom.
The second explosion was, if anything, weaker by half than the first.
But against the already-weakened, softened, or blown-apart slavers in the command post and it's small, apparently poorly-shielded nuclear reactor?
It was more than enough.
Duncan, unaware that the lamp's power supply had gone critical, and therefore that there was a cloud of radiation in the area, sprinted into the clearing with his shotgun in hand.
Nothing moved. A runner was approaching, though, he could hear it through the bells in his ears, pounding feet. Fortunately, he'd had the sense and time to cover them this time, and the second explosion had only made him wince, even with the secondary effect from the lamp's power.
Without hesitation, the shotgun, already up, swivelled toward the runner. As soon as he was close enough to identify as the scrawny one who'd first appeared, Duncan fired. He aimed low purposefully, scattering the lower half of both the slaver's legs with buckshot.
He had a real plan, now.
As the newcomer screamed in pain, surprise, and fear once he saw that not only was he under attack but that the leaders had largely been reduced to much smaller consituent parts, Duncan was already moving forward.
The man cowered, whimpered, begged. Duncan largely ignored him, only fixed the man with a dark gaze. Instead, he gestured with one hand- the other calmly aiming the shotgun at the man's torso this time- to his companion. "You see him?"
Reluctantly, the other man turned his head from the barrel of the shotgun. Once he saw the three-foot creature, he paled even further, and fell silent immediately.
In fact, Duncan was pleased to note, he actually froze like a deer in headlights. An understandable reaction, of course.
"What- what're- what's that thing doin', man?"
The former One-Hundred dweller was pleased the man- more a kid, really, about his age physically- was able to formulate a reply with a salivating Deathclaw two or three feet away, staring at him like he was food.
Which, Duncan noted, was probably what the man feared. Maybe he could use that.
"I'm debating something. Scratches likes live meat, you see. But, I can use you. You want to be useful, right? Not just 'Claw food?"
Immediately, the spark of hope made the man's eyes widen. He nodded vigorously, winced, and pulled one foot up to cradle it as close as possible to his chest. It was ripped to pieces, but likely it was only surface damage. He'd live... if he got it treated. "See, I need some info, then I need a favor. You're a runner, right? You do messages for your bosses?"
"Y- Yeah! I run real good, man! Maybe not so much right now, but I can get a message anywhere you want, man! Just don't let that thing get any closer!"
Duncan smiled, but didn't remove the shotgun from the other man's torso. "No, I'm not gonna let Scratches eat you unless you try somethin' funny. See, I do need a runner, and a good one. So I'm gonna offer you a deal. I'm gonna take all your ammo but one shot. You can save that for yourself, but if you try to shoot me, Scratchy's gonna tear your eyes out, see?"
The man nodded again, eyes now flickering back and forth between the two.
"Okay, so. First, you're gonna tell me where your base is. The big one, the one your band uses."
"It's Paradise Falls, man! I thought everyone knew that, man! Where you from?"
Duncan winced. Paradise Falls, a slaver base? It was... well, okay, it was pretty lame as amusement parks went, but it was the only one of any decent size within a hundred miles (or so it seemed to him) of home. That it was desecrated, used by slavers...
"Not your problem, is it, 'man'? Okay, so Paradise Falls. Good enough. Now, you up for a run? I got a real simple message, that's it."
"Yeah, yeah, I can take your message, man! Just don' let that thing eat me!"
Duncan, this time, actually gestured Scratches back, "Down, boy. Go eat one of the other ones. We'll get you more meat later," while trying to ignore the fact that he'd just ordered his 'pet' to feast on human flesh. "All right. Here's the message: 'I'm coming for you'."
"What? You're coming for... huh?"
Duncan's eyes rolled. "That's it. Tell your bosses, the ones at Paradise Falls, that I'm coming for them. See, I've decided I don't like slavers. So I'm gonna head that way when I get a chance, and I'm gonna kill ever last one of you."
The man didn't snort. Instead, he nodded. At the moment, it probably seemed like this young man and his pet Deathclaw could take out the entire camp alone.
So the runner agreed, dumped his clip- he only had one- and showed Duncan just the one shell in his 10mm, and took off running (limping rapidly) to the west.
When the young man had watched him go, reloaded the emtpy barrel of his shotgun with another shell, and turned toward the battle, he was surprised to hear the gunfire mostly gone.
Only intermittent stattaco bursts remained.
However, he could see, in the darkness, several figures dressed in black standing out against the concrete in the moonlight.
"You let that slaver go, but killed all the rest. Who are you, stranger?"
The speaker was a woman, sounded a few years older than he, but more curious than judgemental. Duncan turned toward the one he thought had spoken, noting about seven people surrounding him. Each was armed, half with swords or baseball bats, one with a sledgehammer, and the rest with rifles or pistols. No way he'd make it out without getting fatally shot, even with Scratches at his side.
"What's more," another, older and male, voice asked, "how did you tame a fuckin' Deathclaw?"
Smirking, Duncan reached down to pat Scratches' bloody head, "Just gotta know what to feed 'em and when, I guess. Had him since he was a pup."
The woman again, "Okay, but that don't explain the Slavers. What's your game?"
Duncan spat, scowling, on the severed foot of one of the nearby female slavers. "My game? I don't have a game when it comes to that scum. I'm dead-fuckin'-serious. They're all gonna die."
Several of the gathered fighters laughed, but the woman and the man, who had been next to her, did not. "Come on, then," the man said, "We're taking you to see Torres, she'll know what to do with ya. You ever heard of the Temple of the Union, kid?"
Duncan shrugged, but holstered his shotgun when the ones surrounding him did the same with their own weapons. "I'm guessing it's what this scum," gesturing toward the littered body parts, "meant by 'the Temple'."
The woman responded this time, stepping up next to him on the opposite side of Scratches, eyeing it warily as she pulled down her black hood to reveal a blonde, pretty young face, "Temple of the Union, that's us. Well, the Temple's where we're going, but we're the Union. We're all ex-slaves who bought or fought for our freedom. Well, we used to be. Some of us are just people who've proven themselves loyal, like Brighton."
"Oh."
The girl smiled, "Don't say much, do you? Don't worry, I talk enough for the whole group. I'm Nikki. I bet you can guess what a pretty young thing like me did as a slave."
Duncan only scowled and clenched his jaw.
He could guess, all right.
It was the same fate that would have awaited Taylor, probably. Would await Amber if these... people... got a hold of her.
"I'll join," he said.
None of them doubted him given the tone he'd used, or the help he'd been in fending off the large-scale attack, no matter how much that had been based on luck.
Because, as the big man, Brighton, said, sometimes luck was a skill all it's own.
A/N2: You like? Let me know!
Not too much to say aside from an apology about the wait. It's been two weeks (making me a week and most of a day behind my schedule, since I'd prefer to post early Sunday mornings and this was supposed to be last week's) since I posted. It's several things, most of which are dying down finally. Time will tell, of course, but hopefully I'll be able to get back to weekly updates soon.
Questions? Comments? Concerns? Hate me for writing this story and ruining Fallout forever for you? Let me know! Reviewing is good for your soul. +Karma -Karma! And EVERYONE loves good karma! (Don't they?)