I don't own Fallout 3, etc. etc. Do I have to do this at the beginning of every chapter?

R&R appreciated. Seriously.

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Chapter Two

Stupid Dog.

Two months and four days since the events of Chapter One

I started to head down the steps towards the bomb, but Shift started around towards Moriarty's.

Shouting after him, "Shift! The hell you doing? We're going this way, remember?" Shift stopped, then sighed. "I'm heading over to Moira's." With that he patted his pack, then started walking again.

Sighing, I turned around and headed after him. We'd a lot of things to get rid of. The day before, we'd discovered a group of raiders holed up in Springvale.

I'd taken a shot to my right flank, but was otherwise alright.

Shift, on the other hand, had been smacked in the head with a lead pipe, then in the back. He konked out, and would've died, if I didn't shoot the raider before he could finish him off.

He'd needed a stimpack, but was up and shooting in a few minutes.

I caught up to him. "What'd you find?" Damnit, I should've asked that when we got back first, not head to Moriarty's.

"Not much....all I could carry was two N99s', some stimpacks, a few boxes of 36. ammo, a box of rounds for your assault rifle-"

"Chinese, assault rifle." I interrupted.

Shift sighed. "Right. Well I have a box of rounds for your chinese, assault rifle, and another combat knife. You?"

I grinned. 'Bout time. "Chinese assault rifle, two more frags, two combat knives, a N99, combat shotgun, and a screwdriver." I waited for Shift's reaction.

He raised an eyebrow behind his shades. "A screwdriver?"

"Yep." I was still waiting for his true reaction.

Ge reached into his coat, and handed me his two combat knives. "Then you can fix these up for me."

I groaned. "Bah."

Shift kept walking, a smirk across his face, and headed inside to confront the maniac waiting inside.

(Shift's POV)

"Moira! You have customers!" I shouted. I heard her hurrying down the stairs, and stopped in the doorway.

"Oh, hey! Long time no see! It's nice to see that you aren't dead!" She exclaimed.

"Yeah, well, we're here to sell." Fell said impatiently, drumming her fingers against the counter.

A few minutes later, we were considerably lighter, and around four-hundred caps richer. Fell decided to keep the combat shotgun and screwdriver, and sold his sawn-off.

I asked Fell to fix her two knives to the best of his ability, giving me another knife in fairly high condition. I strapped it to the underside of my right forearm.

Damn. Running low on medical braces. I'll have to search for more.

"Seeya Moira." I called. Fell and I stepped out onto the walk, and my stomach grumbled.

I turned towards Fell. "I'm going to get some food before we go. Meet me at the gate, huh?"

Fell rolled her eyes. "You're not the only one who's hungry, idiot."

I leaped off of the clinic's roof, and walked the remaining yards to the Stahl's restraunt.

Fell took the long way, walking down the ramp. When she sat down, she looked at me and rolled her eyes. "Show-off."

I shrugged away her scolding, and signaled to Jenny that we were hungry.

She walked up, and gave me a starry smile. "Well, hey there handsome. Good to see you back in one piece!"

I nodded. "Mmhm. I'd like a brahmin steak." I looked towards Fell.

"Noodles." She said simply, with no emotion in her voice.

Jenny was still looking at me. "Yeah, sure. You want anything else with that Shift?"

I sighed. "No Jenny. Thank you."

Her smile faded a little, and she walked over to the fridge to get our food. When she turned around, Fell started to convulse. I looked over at her in concern, and my concern turned to slight amusement and dissapointment.

Fell was doing her best to conceal her laughter from Jenny, after having failed picking me up. Hmph. I thought. How nice.

Jenny walked back with my steak and Fell's noodles. She looked at Fell, who was still shaking slightly, covering her hand with her face.

Jenny leaned in close to me, and whispered, concerned, "What's wrong with her?"

"Umm," I started, unsure of what to say. "You see, we lost a friend last time we went out. She's upset." I lied.

Jenny looked at Fell, eyebrows knit with concern, then turned back. "Poor dear. Well, that's the Wasteland for you. That'll be sixteen caps."

I reached into my pack, and fished out a small bag. I pulled out sixteen of the shiny little things, and handed them to Jenny. "Here you are."

After a minute, Fell stopped shaking, and could finish her noodles. I'd already finished my steak.

Once done with her meal, Fell stood up, and started towards the gate without so much as a sidelong glance at Jenny. Somebody's in a bad mood around here. I thought.

I stood and followed her to the gate. "The hell was that?" I asked as we stepped out of Megaton.

Fell looked at me confused. "The hell was what?"

I groaned. "The laughing fit. What was that about?"

Fell stopped for a moment, then her face looked like she'd start laughing all over again. "That was hilarious. She tried to pick you up, but you didn't even let her know that you knew that she was hitting on you. Funniest fuckin' thing I've ever seen."

"Oh yeah?" I challanged. "What about the time we saw that raider braiding the hair of a dead Yao Guai?"

She laughed, shaking her long, brown hair. "That was pretty funny too."

I had to ask. "But not funnier?"

"Not by a long shot." She said.

We walked for a while, heading vaguely North-East. Follow the wind. After about twenty minutes of silent walking, asides from the occasional mole rat, Fell spoke up.

"Shift."

"Yeah?"

"Is that a raider camp, up on the hill?"

I stopped walking immediately, and pulled up my hood. This was what I usually did before any kind of confrontation. "Let me check."

I unholstered my rifle, and looked through the telescopic scope. The sight I saw made me gasp.

"What?" Fell asked, paling.

"We have some serious trouble." I muttered. I reholstered my gun, and walked behind a nearby rock, Fell following.

"How bad is it?" She asked. She'd taken out her assault rifle.

"Seven raiders, and two dogs."

Fell's eyebrows narrowed, and she started checking and double-checking her clips and shotgun.

"Two raiders are holed up on the roof of the building, both with snipers. We're extremely lucky we weren't caught. Two on the bottom floor have the standard Assault rifle, the third has a rocket launcher, and I can see a flamer in the corner."

Fell loaded her shotgun, and got her frags onto the front of her belt. I decided that I should start making sure I'm battle-ready, and I cocked both of my pistols. I released the safety on both of them, and on my rifle.

"The other two are out front, with the dogs. One has a ripper, the other a hunting rifle."

Fell groaned. "Well, crap! We've got to take these guys down. First we run into the crazies in Springvale, and now this? Megaton's got to be a raider magnet."

I chuckled. "Yup. Usual plan, right?"

Fell nodded. "Yeah. You go in, all sneaky, take down a few, then I come in, guns blazing. I think we should have a different tactic this time though."

I raised an eyebrow. "Oh?"

"I'm going to start the attack, one frag, then a continous hail from my CAR. During the fight, you come an-"

"Your Car? None of the cars nowadays work." I interrupted, confused.

Fell rolled her eyes. "CAR. It's short for Chinese, Assault, Rifle. Get it?"

I nodded, seeing what she meant. "Ah. Go on."

"Right. Anyways, the Raiders and I are shooting at each other, and you come around the back, and silently pick off a punch of them. How about it?" She finished eagerly.

"It's got merit," I said, "but there's one problem. How am I supposed to know if you're in trouble, and who to go for when you need them down?"

"Well that should be easy. You sneak around now, and a couple seconds into the fight, take down the guy with the rocket launcher."

I sighed. "Obviously. After him?"

"The snipers. After the snipers, kill them off however the hell you want." She said.

I shrugged. It was worth a try. "Alright. I'll sneak around, then I'll wait for you to start the attack. Wait sixty seconds." With that I left. It took me forty-something seconds to get into position, and I took out my rifle, and laid down. I centered in on the heavy duty raider.

One of the snipers looked straight at me, and my heart stood still. Her eyes passed over me after a moment, not noticing me.

Gotta hand it to the Regulators. If they decided to be sneaky, they could be amazing assassins. I heard gunfire, and then started to focus.

It took me a second to find the rocket man again, he was running outside, after seeing one of the dogs, and the two raiders out front die.

I fired off a shot, barely hearing it, thanks to the silencer. He fell over, I loaded another bullet, and aimed at the two snipers.

I held my breath, and fired at the woman on the left. She dropped, and the other raider yelled in frustration. I shifted my aim to her, reloaded, and fired.

And I missed. She heard the bullet go by her ear, and turned around to look for me. While she was turning, I knew it was my only chance to get a shot off.

I dropped the rifle, and drew my pistols. I unleashed the two-dozen rounds towards her.

After around three seconds, I hit the raider, who lurched over, holding her stomach. She fell towards the ground, and I heard a crack as her head hit the ground.

I grabbed the rifle, reloaded, stood, and began shooting at the remaining dog and four raiders.

Or, that's what I thought I would do. Fell had taken down the other four raiders and dog. I walked over to her, pulling down my hood. "You okay Fell?" I asked, concerned.

She started, then put away her CAR. "What? Oh, yeah. I'm fine." She said.

"No you're not." I countered. "You've got a bite on your thigh."

Fell looked at me and stayed like that for a few seconds.

"What?" I asked.

"Why were you looking at my thigh?" She said.

"I..err...was looking you over for wounds."

"Hmph. Right. Let's see what these guys have."

"Hold up for a second." I said. I fished out a stimpack, and walked over to her. I crouched, and jabbed the needle near the dog bite.

Her muscles tightened, and I grimaced. I didn't like causing her pain. The wounds closed up, and healed slightly.

"There." I said. "All fixed."

"Now can we see what's on the raiders?" She whined.

"Yes."

Ten grisly minutes of looting, we walked off towards the Potomac to the North.

I broke the silence. "Find anything useful?"

Fell nodded. "Yup. Parts from the hunting rifle, assault rifle, and rocket launcher. I can probably fix up my CAR and your rifle now. I found four stimpacks, some mirelurk meat, a beer, and sixteen caps."

I grinned. "Nice. As for myself, I found a better scope on one of the snipers, parts for my rifle from the snipers, I'll just hand those to you now." I stopped, dug into my sack, and gave her the two guns.

"Gee, thanks." Fell said, her voice dripping with sarcasm.

"Along with that, I only found one stimpack, but I found some kind of recording on one of the corpses. Oh, and twenty caps. I think we should head to town to listen to the recording."

"Oh come on." Fell pleaded. "Let's listen now."

"Alright. Let's get away from this place though. Then we'll listen." We walked for a few minutes, then arrived at the Potomac. "Alright." I said. "We'll listen here."

I pulled out the recording, and set it to play.

~-~-~-~-~-~-~-Hello. This is the voice recording of Maura. I'm from Ridgefield. I escaped after it happened, goddamnit. Wherever the lookout was when it happened, I don't care. I just want to find him, or her, and wring their damned neck. They cost me my brother, and my left hand. I wandered around for a few days, until I found a nice settlement of people. Town's called Arefu. Nice folks. They fixed me up, and let me stay for a few days. They said that a big settlement called Megaton is down to the South-East. I'm going there, to find out if anybody else survived. If this is in the posession of anybody but me, then I'm probably dead, or wounded and near death in a ditch somewhere. All that I can hope for is that I don't run across a group of raiders. I'm going to have to make a run for it.........Oh, and if the lookout was Fell, Rdham, or sneaky little what's-his-face, then I forgive you. You guys have had a lot of shit going on, so It's okay if it was you. I understand.~-~-~-~-~-~-~-

The recording cut off, leaving Fell and I stunned.

"I think we should find the others." She said.

At first I was confused. Others? What others? Then I got what she meant. She meant the survivors of the Incident. Damned holotape, bringing back bad memories.

I hesitated, then answered. "Where'd this come from Fell? It's been, what, two months, and now this? Again? I thought we covered this already."

We had. A week after we'd met up, Fell had asked the exact same thing. I'd responded to her with cursing, angry questions, and a night of heavy drinking.

She sighed. "I want to find them Shift. Maura got killed by those raiders in trying to find us, and I want to honor her last wish. She was like my sister, and besides! Who knows if our friends, or goddamn neighbors are out there still. They might be in trouble Shift!"

I grunted. "And this is my problem, how?"

She stopped walking, and started glaring at me. "They might be out there, and I want to know the full extent of what happened." She shoved me back, and I stumbled over a rock. "You won't tell me, so I want to figure it out, damnit!"

I got up, dusted myself off, and made sure my rifle was okay. Once I was finished, I looked at fell straight in the eye. I needed to be clear on this. I thought.

"Look. I know what happened. I would tell you Fell. I really would. But I can't. Alright? I can't. The Incident was my fault. I don't want anybody to know what happened back then. It's the darkest thing in my past. You were lucky to be sleeping in your attic."

She locked her jaw in anger. "Fine. Fine. I just want to know why you won't fucking help me!" She shouted.

"Jesus Christ, Fell! Be quiet, or you'll attract everything around over here." I shook my head. "I can't. It's not that I won't, I don't think I can handle seeing them again." I froze, realizing what I said.

As I froze, Fell's head snapped up, and eyes became alert. "Them? Then we were attacked! By who! Or what?" She said excitedly.

I sighed. "No Fell. I won't tell you."

"Okay. I've already gotten something for now, we can stop talking about it for today." She said happily, a new bounce in her step.

We kept to the Western side of the Potomac, and enjoyed the veiw, always waiting for raiders.

"Hey Fell." I said.

"Yeah."

"I've made a realization. Want to hear it?" I asked.

"What?" She said.

"I've seen you angry a lot today, and I realized that you're really pretty when you're pissed."

Fell responded to my observation by, in one fluid movement, removing my duster, shades, and pack, then kicking me in the pack into the river.

"Aww, come on Fell. I compliment you and you chuck me into the Potomac." I complained.

"Shut up." She said hotly.

"Alright, alright." I said, raising my hands.

I stepped out of the river, and held out my hands for my gear.

She handed me my duster and shades, which I promptly stepped into. I then took the pack, and put that on. The rifle wasn't damaged at all, which was good.

"Well, where to now?" I asked.

Fell looked at me, still peeved, but curious. "Why should we change direction?"

"Dunno." I responded. "I think it's been along day, so we should head back to Megaton."

Fell groaned. "We've been gone for three hours."

"Yes." I said, "And in those three hours we've nearly died. Back to Megaton."

"Fine. C'mon Shift, back South."

We turned around, exhausted mentally and physically, towards the place we called home.

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There, I hoped you liked Chapter Two. School starts Monday, so I probably won't get as many chapters out as much. I've delved a little deeper into the Ridgefield Incident, so I'm hoping that this will keep you maggots on this rotten piece of fiction. R&R, thank you.

Special thanks to you Bot, for actually doing the aforementioned action.

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