1
A marine knocked on the things head like a door.
Natalie wanted to move her arm to swat the hand away like a fly, then remembered she had to pilot the power armor. The General had told her that there was an entire course on power armor training when she had served. And now she saw why. It wasn't like wearing clothes - it was literally piloting the thing. Unless she followed the Atom Cats model of power armor use - strutting. And considering who actually built the thing, she might have to no matter what message she wanted to project. It's not like this was hers anyway or that she wouldn't out grow it, so training for any real length of time was out of the question. Well, maybe when the war was over and she grew up she could try again. Publick Occurrences had been quite profitable with its ever growing readership...subscribers who may or may not have someone else read it to them.
The girl checked the internal mic to external speaker connection. "I'm listening.", Natalie told the marine.
The marine yelled in the cargo area of the vertibird. "Jets confirm the path is clear. Mission is go. We land. You got two Assaultrons, two type 2s. Do you understand?"
"I've been briefed. Repeatedly.", Natalie said with a tone in her voice She shook her head but the armor didn't move. "Sorry. I know you view this as a battlefield. So you're been real careful. But I'm going to talk to a bunch of kids. Just stick to the plan. I'll be fine."
"And what is that plan?", the marine asked.
Now, genuinely annoyed. "The three vertibirds hit the ground outside the cave entrance to Little Lamplight. One stays in the air to keep watch. One covers the cave in case I come out screaming. The last picks me out of there while the one covering holds whatever it is at bay. But that's only if it goes bad. If it goes good, I walk out of there with a plan to rescue those kids.
"I may be a child but I'm still an ambassador of the civilian government of the Commonwealth. Think before you treat me like a kid."
The marine did not respond to her but put up a thumbs up. She turned the suit's head to look in that direction and saw the copilot from Motorpool acknowledge.
Another knock on her suit. "We're two minutes from touch down. Button up."
Natalie ran through her power armor again, or at least what she could see from the inside. She guided the suit to give its own thumbs up.
Then she felt the hard thud of landing. The marine was pointing at the door and waving her hand.
Natalie had the suit stand up. That first step was clumsy. She started strutting and the suit moved much faster. She had to hop it off the vertibird, but strutting carried her past her robotic guard who fell in line behind her.
The billboard advertising the caves towered over everything. At least she was in the right spot.
Then she stopped. "Hold it.", she commanded. "Did any of you bring the CB radio."
"Yes, ma'am.", a synth told her.
"What about the food?"
"Right here.", the other informed.
"Alright. Sorry. I just can't see right in this thing.". Natalie guided the power armor around in a small circle and took in that every one of the robots was carrying what it was supposed to be carrying. Including its weapons.
"Give me your LASER MUSKET.", the girl ordered.
The synth reminded her. "Mother stated that you were to remain a civilian. That would mean that you remained unarmed in your duties and allow the military to protect you."
"Are you disobeying me in the field?", Natalie challenged.
The synth set down the CB radio and slipped off the LASER MUSKET. "No."
"Just checking.", Natalie admitted. "Keep your weapon and pick up the CB. Follow me."
2
How had it come to this.
Natalie did what she was supposed to. She came up to the gate of what must have been the town inside the cave. She had called out. "Hello? My name is Natalie Wright. I'm an ambassador from the Commonwealth. I've brought some food for you to make a good impression and let you know we can be friends. I even brought a CB radio so you could talk to my boss.
"Oh, yeah. I'm a kid just like you guys. So you don't have to worry about that."
The gate was silent. Did something happen to everyone already? Was the Commonwealth to late to save them?
A voice called out over the gate. "I don't see no kid. All I see is robots and power armor. Step on out so we can see this kid."
"I was told to stay in the armor.", Natalie replied. "It was one of the conditions they made me agree to before I could come and talk to you."
"We don't care what no mungos say in Little Lamplight.", the answer came back.
"That's fair.", Natalie admitted. "Alright. Get ready."
The synths and assaultrons looked behind them and then set themselves up in a line in front of the power armor. Then it popped open. Natalie slid out the back and presented her hands around the armor. She then moved into a better view but still behind the robots. She turned in a little circle. "See. Just me. A little girl like you guys."
When she was getting out of the power armor, Natalie hadn't noticed the jostle in the gate as if a weight had come off of its wooden structure. What she did notice was the electric sparks of a blade taking one of the synth's head clean off.
Natalie screamed and jumped back into the power armor in a single hop. She was too busy trying to close it to care about the shadow of a stealth suit on the cave wall as the assaultrons' lasers lit up the cave in a red glow searching for the Lone Wanderer. She had managed to turn the suit around by the time the fight had devolved into the woman going toe to toe in a blade fight with two pre-war military grade robots that just had to be stronger than her. Please be stronger than her.
"Keep moving!", her remaining synth yelled at her. The synth was right. No tears. No fear. Screw it. Fear...all the fear. But move this suit away from whatever changed the clanging of blades into a different sound of leaking lubricant. She had to strut.
Strut. Strut. Strut. Natalie pressed that suit as fast as it would go. The synth behind her did not sound like it was behind her. It sounded like it was shooting off the Institute upgrade it was armed with. That was not a good sign.
She kept strutting. Natalie had to tell herself that that was what those robots were for. To die to get her out of here. They were just robots, so it was not even really 'death'.
That was the marine's job.
The pink power armor strutted out of the cave. Its speakers blared. "It's her! It's fucking her! Little Miss Bad Ass is slicing them up."
The marines went from waiting around to getting behind cover and pointing everything they had at that cave entrance. Natalie had her job to do as well. She had to get back to the vertibird. She promised her sister that she would live through this. That she would leave all the violence to the military and just run. Thank goodness she promised that and did not have to stop and think through whether she should or not.
The power armor slammed into the door step of the vertibird. She was most of the way in. That was right. This one was the one that was supposed to hold off whatever came out of the cave. Natalie struggled the power armor into the vertibird and swung the gunner seat back into position with the marine in it. She had the power armor leap out the other side only to take a face first fall.
"I'm up, I'm up!", she screamed as she forced the power armor to pick itself back up. Natalie did not take the time to check if that went out over her speakers. She just strutted toward the second vertibird. This time she was able to lift the power armor into the craft and it pulled itself up.
Only now did she look back. The marines were obviously shooting at something. They kept trying to change positions instead of shooting at whatever was between them. But every lightning laced arc that came from what looked like mid-air at this distance took another life.
It was only then when Natalie felt ashamed of her decisions in this battle. "We have to blow up the other vertibird."
The copilot from Motorpool looked back at her and pointed at his ear. Natalie guided the power armor over to the copilot. She rested its helmet on the copilot's helmet. "We have to blow up the other vertibird. After she kills everyone there, she's going to use it to shoot us down. She doesn't even have to get it air born to just use the door weapon. If you're going to get me out of here, then you have to open fire on the other craft.
The copilot showed her viewport a thumbs up. The vertibird did not change orientation though. Just as Natalie had thought that they were thankfully ignoring her idea, she saw the patrolling vertibird come into view. It carried out the attack that she had just ordered.
Some diplomat she was.