Chapter 8 – Ghoul
Monday morning and Home Plate was a hive of activity as the team readied themselves for an expedition south to West Roxbury. There was a large Fallon's Department store there as well as Milton General Hospital. Both places worth scavenging and a great place to begin the girls new training regime. Well new, old, regime Nate thought to himself. He was interested to see how much they had retained previous to their new arrangement, but he was full of hope. From the way the girls had approached and taken on their new roles, he was sure they wouldn't disappoint.
The team headed off just before midday and leaving the stadium they moved southwest past Hardware Town and out into the countryside. Walking past the pond that held the first clue outside of the stadium to Kellogg's whereabouts, they turned southeast to Fairline Estates and the road into West Roxbury.
Nate wasn't looking forward to passing the Estate as an ex-army friend used to live there, and he and Nora would visit them often. Sometimes Nate was able to forget how Boston looked before the bombs fell as so much had changed beyond recognition, but on the odd occasion he would round the corner of a street and be hit by memories.
A short whistle from Cait, who was on point, brought Nate's attention back to the present. They were approaching the houses at Fairline and Cait was looking concerned. She had crouched down and was waiting for Nate to join her.
"I don't like it." She said softly, signalling to the houses ahead. "No bird noise, it's got that creepy, somethings going on vibe."
Nate could feel what she meant. There was an eerie silence over the place, which was never good and Nate's 'somethings up' radar was working overtime. Nate turned to see Curie and Piper had taken up positions just behind him and Cait, covering the rear and side of their little huddle. Nate smiled as that was just as he had shown them.
"Creepsville ahead," Nate warned the others, "I'll take point. Bunch up and we'll go herring bone." He ordered as he stood up to set off. Just as Nate had instructed, the girls joined in a stack behind him, Cait covering one side, Piper the other with Curie looking back the way they had come. The team looking and now operating as one single unit.
Nate led them to their first house on the right and signalled that he was going up the steps to the porch. Cait drew up close behind Nate, covering the front window, the other two girls covering the area either side of the main house. Nate listened at the door and then signalled he was going to breach. On seeing his signal, Cait nodded and held back, pointing her weapon up and out of the way, ready to cover Nate's entry. Nate then kicked at the door and as he was expecting, it swung open crashing against the inside wall. The room he was entering must have been the living room with a broken coffee table and an old sofa the only remaining pieces of furniture. Nate continued in with Cait following, her rifle over his left shoulder covering the rest of the room and the hallway. As soon the team were joined by Piper, just as Nate had instructed, Cait switched her aim to the far corner of the living room, Piper now covering the stairs. Yes, Nate was constantly scanning for threats, but he was also delighted watching the drills the girls were using on entering this house.
Just then a throaty deep scream comes from the stairwell and a figure flew at Cait. Piper's reactions were fast and she fired a burst into the figure, it landing in a heap at Cait's feet.
"Thanks sweetie," Cait smiled at Piper.
"I can hear movement upstairs, that won't be the last one," Piper warned.
The dead assailant at Cait's feet was a Ghoul, a humanoid but with an extremely withered look and no soft cartilage left on their faces. These unfortunate creatures were irradiated humans whose brains had been so affected by the fallout that they had gone mad. These creatures stay in an almost dormant state until they hear or feel movement and then attack. They have a particular like of human flesh. From the noise coming from upstairs, it was clear there were more. A second low pitched scream and another Ghoul flung itself down the stairs, landing in a heap as the prepared Piper fired a short burst into it. Piper then looked over to Nate as if to ask if she can start clearing up the stairs and Nate nodded. Piper then looked at Cait who moved up to her side to offer cover, when in place, Cait tapped Piper on the shoulder. Piper moved forward, carefully looking around the wall at the base of the stairwell and up onto the first-floor landing. Nate also looked behind to see Curie moving into the house continuing to cover out through the front door. Turning his attention back to Piper, he watched as she carefully leant around the bottom of the stairs, her eyes following the direction of her weapons barrel. Another short burst told Nate that she had engaged a third target. She then paused and held up her hand, listening to any other noise. The house was eerily quiet.
"Helloooooo," Piper called upstairs. Nate rolled his eyes, not quite what he had taught them but it will soon root out any other ghouls hiding in the house. After a few seconds Piper began her slow climb, edging up the stairs with Cait close behind covering the top of the landing. Nate and Curie stayed in the living room listening to their team members slowly make their way up to the first floor. Seconds, that seemed like minutes passed, and eventually Nate heard a call.
"All clear!" Shouted Piper, "but I have a safe up here."
At the sound of Pipers voice Nate and Curie relaxed and headed up the stairs, Nate dragging the body of the last ghoul out of their way. They arrived at the top landing and headed to the front bedroom. Piper was standing by the door whilst Cait was kneeling in-front of one of the ruined bedside tables in, what was once, the master bedroom.
"It's old but I think I can get it open," Cait announced, not looking away from her task. She was working the lock with a small pick and a bobby pin. "Come on you little…." She mumbled to herself. "Ha! Got it!" She declared as she swung open the lid of the small floor safe.
"What did you get?" Piper asked as Cait reached in to empty the contents.
"A pistol, 10 mil, a small bundle of old bank notes and a silver locket." With old habits dying hard she pocketed the silver necklace and turned to hand the pistol to Nate who walked towards her.
"That locket goes into party treasure," he smiled.
"I was going to give it to Curie," Cait lied and then sheepishly took the locket back out of her pocket.
"Any use for the bank notes?" Asked Piper.
"Myrna gives a few caps for each note, so we should keep them," observed Curie from the landing.
"Take a quick look round and then we should get on to the next house," Nate ordered and headed back out of the room.
As Nate headed downstairs the girls split up and searched the upstairs, calling out when they had found something of interest. Piper found some caps in a set of drawers and Cait found a full set of clothes hidden behind a wardrobe. Obviously someone had previously used this house as a base and stashed these things away to grab them later. This was a common occurrence, with many people hiding small stashes of cash and clothes. Sadly, many never get the opportunity to return to collect what they own.
Gathering together outside the house Nate pointed, "this next house was owned by a buddy of mine and he used to keep an old steamer trunk in the garage. If it's still there it may be worth a look."
At that, the girls formed back up into their tight stack, with Nate taking point and they headed across the road to their target. Nates friends house had been all but destroyed but thankfully the garage was still standing. A quick look around the rubble of the main house showed nothing of interest and so Nate turned towards the garage. The side door was closed, so Nate signalled to Cait to go have a listen. She crept up to the wooden door and after a few seconds of listening looked at Nate and shook her head. Nate signalled for her to enter, with Piper picking up the cue to provide cover. Cait gently took the handle and tried it, to see if it was locked. The door clicked and began to swing open, into the garage space. As Nate had taught them, Cait immediately flattened herself against the outside wall, Piper following suit a pace behind her. Thankfully no explosion or gunshot followed and deeming the door safe and not booby trapped, Cait took hold of her weapon and slowly entered. Seconds later Nate heard Cait call out the all clear, and they all headed inside.
The double garage space was dark, illuminated by a single light bulb swinging sadly in the centre of the roof. Even several hundred years after the war the electricity remained on, with many of the nuclear generators continuing to produce vast amounts of energy to power the commonwealth. A single car, in a reasonable state was in one of the bays but Nate's attention was drawn to the other side of the room where Piper and Cait stood.
"Checked it?" Asked Nate.
"Yup," answered Cait "can't see any wires."
"Well let's see what we have in here then," Nate moved towards the trunk. Placing his hands on both the locks he paused as the girls all took cover behind the car. Whilst the trunk didn't seem to be visibly booby trapped that didn't mean it was safe. Seeing the girls a safe distance away Nate released each of the two latches on the trunk. Thankfully all Nate was greeted with was a set of clicks as each lock opened and so he swung the lid of the large green case open. This steamer trunk was around five feet in length and about three feet deep. Laid out in front of Nate was a row of neatly placed weapons as well as a collection of ammunition. Nate whistled and the girls, taking this as the all clear, joined him to have a look. On what looked like a large tray inside the trunk, a number of automatic shotguns and pistols were carefully placed, with boxes of various calibre of ammunition. A fantastic hoard and worth at least a thousand caps if not more. As Cait and Piper carefully removed the top tray this revealed several sets of combats and some body armour, alongside several more boxes of ammunition and grenades.
"Let's get this all outside and we can leave it by the end of the road." Nate stated as he grabbed a few of the shotguns. The team proceeded to empty the trunk and carry the booty to the entrance to the estate. Covering the weapons and ammo with leaves and brush close to the main road, Nate broke off a few small branches and began arranging them in the middle of the road in a particular pattern.
"Cricket will be by soon and she'll grab this lot and take it to Arturo in Diamond City." Nate explained as he finished setting out the twigs. "I don't know about you guys but I fancy a warm fire and a warm meal," Nate stated as dusk had begun to set it.
"Shall we use the garage," Curie asked
"Sounds perfect," answered Nate and they all headed back into Fairline Estates.
The team soon got a fire going and a brew on and settled down in their temporary home.
"Your drills today were superb," Nate announced whilst accepting a steaming coffee from Curie, "Thank you," he smiled. "The patrol and house entry was excellent, although what's with the 'hellooooo' Piper?" Nate laughed.
"Not very commando now, was it," Cait laughed along with Nate.
Piper blushed, "well, we would have soon found out if there had been more ghouls there, poor bastards." Piper finished.
"No, it was fine, Piper, you're right" said Nate, "any noise would have drawn them to us and you were in a good position to deal with them where you were." Nate knew Pipers actions in calling out were definitely a silly thing to do, but he didn't want to make a thing of it, especially with all of them having done so well.
Nate took a look around at the girls and he could see them all smiling. "You guys looked and felt like a single, well-oiled unit today, well done."
"I have to say, it felt great!" Piper grinned, "I got a real buzz from doing that."
"And you were safe," Nate pointed out, "you had each other's backs, which is the most important result of these drills you have been learning."
"Well," chimed in Cait, "don't tell Mr Bossy but he might be on to something with these lessons and drills," Cait smiled over at Nate.
"Well, I for one will be doing these drills and lessons in my sleep," sighed Curie rubbing her bottom in an exaggerated manner as she rose. "I'll take first watch," she stated as she grabbed her weapon and headed out through the door.
"Hang on Curie," called out Nate. "Give me a hand with this," as he reached into the front of the car and released the hand break. Nate then leaned into the door frame of the car and it started to roll ever so slowly forward. Catching on to what Nate wanted to do, Curie went to the back of the car and leant her strength to his and pushed. The car moved slowly and just as it was about to bump up against the side door Nate stood on the breaks and pulled the hand break on.
"If anyone wants to get in here tonight, they are going to have to get through that or try the main door," Nate pointed towards the rusted and bent front door to the garage. Clearly not in any state to be opened.
"Oh, then I can help with the washing up," said Curie sounding more cheerful than someone should who was about to wash and stash all the camp gear. Having been a Miss Nanny robot in her former life, Curie was programmed to help in a domestic setting and that conditioning hadn't been removed when she transferred into her synth body. She had a wonderful disposition when it came to house chores and Home Plate most definitely benefited from her keenness for a clean house. Nate did have to stop her from doing loud types of cleaning in the middle of the night, because as a synth, Curie needed very little sleep. This was a fantastic trait to have on the road, as Curie often took watch throughout the night, giving the remainder of the team a well needed rest. The problem arose when Curies enthusiasm for the vacuum cleaner woke the rest of the household in the early hours of the morning. Nate ended up insisting that Curie put herself into rest mode at night otherwise he would be facing a mutiny by Piper and Cait, who were, understandably at the end of their tether.
The night passed without any trouble and the girls were up and ready to move after having had a good night's rest. Four days had passed since Nate had taken the hairbrush to his girls and so far the change in their demeanour, whilst in the field, had been incredible. They were still themselves, cracking jokes and being normal in their characters, but their patrol drills were slick and verging on professional. Nate wondered how much of this change was down to the perceived threat of the team breaking up and how much of it was their still slightly marked bottoms.
"I expect we will reach West Roxbury by midday so heads on a swivel and remember those drills," Nate stated as they made their way down to the main road. Nate had selected Curie to take point and Piper to stay at the teams rear to watch any threats from behind. Thankfully nothing happened until they approached the centre of the town, where suddenly a number of shots rang out followed by what sounded like a Mutant Hound howl. Mutant Hounds were the horribly mutated pets of the Super Mutants, the large green oversized humanoids that now plagued the commonwealth. If there were mutant hounds around then there were Super Mutants.
The gun shots increased, and it wasn't long before the team could hear a full-scale battle raging a few blocks from their current location. On hearing the first shots, Curie had signalled for the group to stop and had taken up a position, kneeling on one knee against the wall of a half-destroyed shop. As she was approximately twenty yards ahead of him, Nate could see her scanning ahead using the sights on her rifle. She turned to Nate and signalled that she couldn't see any immediate threats and that the group should keep moving. As the patrol approached the centre of town the battle grew louder. Soon the team began to catch their first glimpse of the combatants as they approached a gap between Medford Memorial Hospital and a large multi storey car park. Curie spotted the enemy first and gave a quick flurry of hand signals to indicate numbers and positions of visible enemy. Nate signalled for Cait to head over to the side of the carpark and join Curie, whilst he indicated that Piper should follow him.
As Nate crept forward, he could see a dozen or so Super Mutants engaged in a chaotic gun battle with some rough looking raiders who had come into the town from the east. Nate could see at least two of the raiders in their heath robinson power armour, a collection of pieces of the pre war military power armour with tatty bits of scrap metal to make up for missing parts. Power Armour was an infantry suit of armour with its own power plant lending the wearer increases in most physical abilities. Whilst they were often found littering the commonwealth, spare parts were rare and so often the raider gangs were forced to improvise. The armour still did its job but they were notoriously unreliable. Nate watched as one such armour exploded as it was hit by a missile being fired by a Super Mutant. The green abomination that fired the shot howled in delight and stood at full height holding his missile launcher above his head in victory. This was until his head was snapped back as a large calibre bullet tore into him, fired by one of the raiders. Happy for these two groups of undesirables to continue to kill each other, Nate signalled over to Cait and Curie to sit tight and observe. Sadly, the Super Mutants soon had the raiders on the run, and it wasn't long before one of the more observant of the green skinned monsters spotted Curie taking cover by the side of the multi-story car park.
"More humans," cried the nearest Super Mutant as he ran towards Curie and Cait firing his laser rifle. As this Super Mutant reached into his ammo belt to pull out a grenade, Piper coolly stood, took aim and shot the charging enemy in the middle of its forehead. It fell and then exploded as it landed on its own grenade it was readying to throw. At that, the battle was joined.
Super Mutants do not employ any tactics and they usually just run at their targets, liberally throwing grenades whenever they can. Nate had once compared their tactics to the ones previously employed by his team during a particularly difficult training exercise. Whilst the girls had taken umbrage to this comparison, Nate was watching the Super Mutants now and drawing many similarities. Thankfully he thought, at least for his team, those days were over.
As if hearing his thoughts, the gods defined that at that moment Cait would show a little of her former self. She did this by stepping out of cover to take an aimed shot at a Super Mutant who was about to fire his mini gun at her and Curie. Just as she broke cover, another Super Mutant popped up from behind a low stone wall and shot Cait with his automatic shotgun. Hitting her square in the chest, Cait flew back a few feet and lay motionless on the road.
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