Oh the weather outside is frightful*
*But the fire is so delightful*
And since we've no place to go*
*Let it snow! Let it snow!*
The Vault was abuzz with the sound of Christmas music as the inhabitants went this way and that with the decorations. All around the cafeteria people came and went, a small group of maintenance workers were running Christmas lights all the way around the hall while others carried tinsel and small plastic Christmas trees to be set up along the walls.
In the middle of all that excitement a small group of men were huddled around a board.
"I hate Christmas music," said Carl before taking a drag from his cigarette.
"The fuck you mean you hate Christmas music?" Asked Chico who sat nearby. "Only a fucking commie hates Christmas music."
"Call me a fucking commie then, I still hate it." Carl said as he moved one of his pieces across the board. "Checkmate." He said triumphantly, leaning back and folding his hands behind his head.
"There's no checkmate in checkers." Said Lyle, his opponent.
"Ehh go fish then." Carl said with a dismissive wave of the hand.
"You don't know how this game's played at all do you?"
"Sure I do! I play checkers all the time. I check her out, I check her out, Definitely check her out."
"Yeah that's cute." Lyle said with a sigh.
"Could you fucking lighten up? I swear I don't even know why I hang out with you sometimes."
"Cause you're spoiled for choice Mr. Reese. Like all the rest of us." Lyle said dryly.
"Lyle, I swear to fuck you need to learn to show an emotion or two sometime. Fucking seriously. It's unnerving."
"Funny, that's just what your sister said last night after I dicked her down" Lyle said in his usual deadpan expression.
"Yeah now who's being cute huh? Can't be insulted though considering you put a fucking ring on her. You dumb fuck. So go on and make me an uncle, I'll make sure their first words are something endearing, like cunt, or smegma."
A sharp pain wracked the back of Carl's head causing him to cry out. "The fuck you do that for?" He hissed, looking over his shoulder at Chico.
"Babe alert." Said Chico under his breath. Motioning across the room with his dark eyes.
Glancing over in that direction Carl's jaw nearly dropped on the floor. Just entering the cafeteria was Patty Delaney, carrying a large box crammed full of decorations. It was a feature that could have been easily missed due to her choice of outfit that evening. Like some of the others in the Vault, she had opted to dress in a more festive manner as one of Santa's little helpers. Red and white stockings and a little green dress that showed off much more skin than the typical vault suit did, all the men at the table couldn't help but stare at her as she made her way across the room.
"Oh I'll be stuffing my stocking thinking of her tonight for sure." Carl said with a grin, rising up from his seat and pulling himself over the table, knocking the board over as he did. An act that earned him a chorus of grumbles and groans as he flipped them off as he dashed over to Patty.
"Patty Delaney I gotta say you always dress to impress," he said as he approached her.
"It's tradition Carl, not trying to impress anyone." She said irritably.
"Well you're doing it effortlessly. Here, let me help you with that." He said, reaching for the box with far from altruistic intentions.
"Knock yourself out." Patty said, handing the box off to him and getting herself a good chuckle in the process. Carl hadn't quite anticipated just how heavy the load was and was nearly sent to ground with it, his face turning bright red with the strain and the look of panic on his face made his annoying approach just that little bit more bearable.
"What.. in the .. holy fuck.. is in this?" Carl said with a strained voice as he followed behind Patty as she led him to the corner where it needed to be delivered.
"Just a few decorations, why? Is it too heavy for you?" She asked, shooting a knowing grin over her shoulder at him.
"Not.. at… all." Carl said as he struggled to stay upright.
"And just think, Albert's carrying three times that right now."
"Yeah good thing it's him out there and not me eh?
"Oh I'd have offered to euthanize us all if that were the case."
"Jeeezus you're a fucking savage you know that?"
"You can set those there." Patty directed by pointing at the floor near a bare spot by the wall.
Setting them down a bit harsher than he wanted to, Carl straightened himself back up with a groan. "So yeah. I uhh had a question for ya-"
"No."
"What?" Carl asked with a confused look.
"I'm not posing for a photo." Patty answered venomously, crossing her arms over her chest and keeping Carl's gaze away from the cleavage she had on display..
"Fuck… well okay but I got another one. Seriously though," he said before lowering his voice and leaning in slightly, a movement that caused Patty to back away quickly.
"Are you fuc- okay fine. It's about our boy Al. Bout' now he should be at the other vault, yeah?" Carl asked, deciding to keep o a natural tone since Patty didn't seem to be in the conspiratory mood.
"Just about. If everything went well," she admitted with a nod, her eyes shifting to something behind him.
"Good, good. You know, big if though yeah? Still think it was fucking stupid to just send one guy out. I mean fuck I know Jacoren's useless but really? You're gonna hedge all your bets on one…. oh fuck off." He ended with a groan.
Patty's stares had intensified as she drifted back and forth between him and whatever or whoever was behind him. The look on her face was urging him to stop talking and as he turned around he was met with the last thing he wanted to see.
"Useless am I?" Overseer Jacoren asked rather loudly with a wry smirk. Looking as though he just caught a child with their hand in the cookie jar.
Other than the music still playing over the speakers the cafeteria was now dead quiet and as all eyes and ears were turned their way. Standing there for a moment Carl let out a sigh, fished out his lighter and a cigarette, lit it, took in a deep breath of the smoke, and let it out in a long and low sigh. His mother always did say that his mouth would dig his own grave, no point in making a liar out of her now. "God damn right you are."
"I see. Well we can continue this conversation in my office then." Jacoren said as he started to make his way towards the door, expecting Carl to follow.
"Nah." Carl answered with a shake of his head. It was not what the Overseer had expected.
"Excuse me?"
"Said nah. We can do this right fucking here." Carl said, leaving the cigarette in his mouth and fishing out a notebook and pen from his back pocket. "Readers of the Vault Times are clamoring to know, why'd you wait so long to do anything about the waterchip?" He asked, putting pen to paper. As head of the Vault's only newspaper Carl wasn't often one to use it to get his way, but he had little reserve in using the freedom of the press to demand answers from those that needed to give them.
Jacoren was stunned by the brazen disrespect. He knew that Carl was a troublemaker but to corner him like this out in the open? It was a step too far. "No. We can discuss this in my office. Not out here. I won't be cornered like this for your amusement."
"Ah running scared? Yeah that tracks don't it? Overseer Jacoren ran his sorry little ass away from some simple questions." Carl said as he wrote down in his notebook.
"You will not put that in print! I've been too lenient with you Carl. From here on any articles you write have to be approved by me. I see one published without my say so you'll be removed from your duties, am I clear?" Jacoren's voice was raised and shaky. He never handled public confrontation well.
"Yeah you're clear alright." Carl said with a nod. "Clear that you hate the first amendment. Can see the headline now. Tyrant overseer shuts down the press! " His yell echoed through the cafeteria. If they weren't already, every head was now turned in their direction.
"Carl…stop." Patty said in a hushed tone.
"No." Carl growled. "My friend's out there alone, and I'm gonna get some fucking answers. Now why the fuck did you not send more people? Why only one?" He demanded, though his questions went unanswered as Jacoren stared daggers into him. "Yeah.. you're a fucking joke."
Patty's voice caught his attention. "Stop. No no!"
Turning to see who she was speaking to pain suddenly surged through his cheek across the rest of his body. His vision faded and his legs went limp as he tumbled to the ground. A boot struck into his ribs, cracking them and knocking the air from his lungs.
"We do not need this right now!" Yelled out the voice of Daryle Porter as he pulled his boot from Carl's curled up form and stepped away. "We are in a time of crisis, and the only thing that will get us through is by trusting each other, and our Overseer." He yelled out loud so that the rest in the cafeteria could hear him as he looked around the room. "If Albert fails, then another plan will be put in place. If we can't trust him to do the job, then we have to put our trust that the Overseer can do his." He said before turning to give Jacoren a nod.
"Thank you Mr. Porter." Jacoren said, beaming at the man. "Always good to see someone stepping up to keep the peace." He said as he took his leave of the cafeteria without further incident.
"So, lunch?" Daryle asked Patty as he turned to look at her with a toothy grin. A grin that died down when he saw her helping Carl.
"Are you alright?" She asked Carl as she gently pulled him up to a sitting position.
"Patty. What are you doing? He got what he deserved. Now come on," said Daryle as he waved her over.
"Doing my job, you dick. Gotta get him to medical." She said with venom in her voice as she scrolled through some of the menus on Carl's pip-boy. "You broke his ribs. Thanks for the extra work-load. Really appreciate it."
"Same here," wheezed Carl as he righted himself.
"Shame I didn't break his jaw. Woulda shut him up. You keep on with that shit and you won't see the outside of the jail cell for a long time." Daryle warned. "Or worse."
"Daryle you can either fuck off or help me get him to medical." Patty said as others started to come near to help her. Daryle's response was to simply cross his arms and watch her and a few others get Carl up to his feet and lead him out of the room.
"Bitch," he scoffed before stomping out Carl's still burning cigarette that had fallen to the floor.
"I don't want Frobisher, I want Delaney!" Yelled out the shrill voice of Erma, the vault's residential temperamental geriatric.
"Doctor Delaney is off duty today. But Doctor Frobisher will gladly-"
"I want a proper doctor."
The door hissed open as Patty, Chico, and Lyle helped Carl into the waiting room before shuffling him into one of the offices.
"Excuse me! Excuse me! I was here first!" Erma shouted as the group moved past.
"Dr. Frobisher's here and can see to you." Patty said in an exasperated tone.
"I don't want Dr. Frobisher I want-"
"Erma, with all due respect. I'm not on duty today." Patty said before stepping into the office and shutting the door behind her to see Dr Frobisher already looking over Carl as they laid him onto the examination table.
"So what do we got here?"
"Broken ribs. Got kicked, hard." Patty explained. "How long has Erma been out there?"
"Bout an hour." Frobisher said disinterested as he opened and looked through a couple drawers before withdrawing a stimpack from a clear pouch.
"What is she complaining about now?" Patty asked.
"Wants to talk to you about her water allowance. Alright Carl, you know the drill. Deep breath." He said before sticking the needle into Carl's shoulder. The effect was almost instant, the sound of bones cracking within his chest could be heard through the room, and then the adrenaline hit.
"Yeeaaahh that's good shit!" Carl yelled out as he jerked up from where he had been laid down on the examination table, causing the other to jump back and out of the way.
"Fuucking shit that'll wake you up in the morning, Why can't I ever get one of those?" Asked Chico with a grin.
"You're too good a cook. Get an injury worth one then we'll talk."
"Fuck talk I'ma go tear Daryle a cunt where his dick should be." Carl snarled as he rolled off the table. Almost immediately however his legs buckled and he nearly slammed into the cabinets as he fell to the floor.
"And that's why they call me the best in the vault." Frobisher said with a chuckle as he raised up a second and now empty autoinjector. "Hit em quick enough after the stim and they never feel the second needle." He said, sounding quite pleased with his work.
"Sha fook ya do?" Carl slurred against the floor. "An where ur my leegs?
"Just gave you something to take the edge off. You'll be alright in an hour or so. Can't risk you hurting yourself or anyone else," he said, disposing of the autoinjectors.
"Now how'd you know to do that?" Lyle asked, his arms crossed and with an impressed look on his face.
"Easy, I delivered that man and have been his doctor since. I've known he's a dumbass before his own mother did."
An hour passed before the numbing wore off. By then Carl had mostly calmed down enough to be talked out of a murder attempt. Though he wasn't entirely convinced.
"I'm just saying.. I just wanna talk to the guy." He said casually.
"You wanna talk to him… after breaking into the armory and getting a gun," said Chico with a laugh. "I can get behind that."
"I just wanna talk. With a gun right up to his taint. As far as I can jam it. The fucking prick." Carl said with hand gestures to demonstrate.
"You're not talking to him. We're going to hold you here for the next 24 hours so you can cool off." Patty said in a final tone of voice.
"And he gets to walk free? After assaulting me he can just walk around like nothing happened?"
"We'll talk to security and have them decide what to do." Said Lyle in a matter of fact tone. "We're not gonna jump the guy for sucker punching you. It was low and so was the kick. But it wasn't anything worth jumping him over. Take the beating and move on."
"Thank you, Lyle. Glad one of you can be sensible here." Patty said as the door hissed open.
Standing there now was Melvin, looking over at Carl with a look of anger. His already wrinkled forehead looked doubly creased as he collected his breath. It seemed that he had ran from the other side of the vault to get there. "Daryle's telling everyone that he made you his bitch by beating you down in the caff."
"Fuck the gun, I can get us some wrenches and we'll beat the fucker with em." Lyle said as he snapped to his feet.
"You just said getting beat wasn't worth jumping the guy over!" Patty said, desperately trying to keep them from killing her boyfriend.
"Wasn't till he started bragging about it. One thing to hit a guy, whole nother to run your mouth about it."
"Oh now you care?" Carl asked angrily.
"A proper fight's done once it's done. And you respect each other better for it. Once you go talking smack about the other guy all bets are off. Now we gotta do to Daryle like what we did to J.D." Lyle said, his hands curled into fists at his side.
"Oh absolutely not. That was way overboard alright?" said Patty, standing from her chair. "Now I'm serious, I will go to security about this." She threatened them with a steely gaze.
"Hey J.D. deserved it after talking about you like that. Besides…. He's a couch fucker and thta's deserving of a beating on it's own." Chico said with a nod.
"Allegedly." Lyle corrected.
"Wait he fucked a couch?" Asked Carl.
"Allegedly." Repeated Lyle.
"Nah. He did it to the rec room couch." Nodded Melvin. "I trust the guy who saw him do it. He wouldn't lie about something like that."
"Who saw it?" Asked Carl.
"It was Max."
"Max Stone?" Came the chorus of questions.
"Yup. Walked in on J.D. with his dick between the cushions when they were about sixteen or so." Melvin explained.
"Holy fuck." Carl laughed. "Now that's… that's a sight that'd fuck me up for sure." Carl admitted before thinking for a moment. "Hey Patty…" he asked as he turned to look at her. "You think seeing J.D. fuck a couch made Max a retard?"
"He's not retarded!" Patty yelled out.
"Ehh he's a little retarded." Melvin said with a wiggle of his hand.
"No! He is not retarded, you are not going to jump my boyfriend, and J.D. didn't fuck a couch!" Patty hissed at them angrily, her face turning bright red with anger at the stupidity of them all. But then again, there was something she had to admit to after she collected herself. "He put rubber gloves in the cushions and was… fucking those."
A silence fell on the room before it was at last broken by Lyle.
"Boy! I sure could have gone my whole life without knowing that little factoid." He said flatly. "I sure wish Albert had let me take his place so I wouldn't have to know this."
"Honestly." Carl said with a light chuckle. "Up there in the wide open world? He's probably having the time of his life right now."
The buzzards flew far above the broken body, its bright blue jumpsuit a stark contrast to the dusty landscape around it. One buzzard had gotten brave and descended down towards it. It had seen the small movements but didn't understand them. Heard the click of something, but its hunger was more powerful a motivation than apprehension. It's beak pecked at some of the exposed flesh. Something was in the body's hand, something that was slowly pointed towards the buzzard.
It bit into the flesh, it's first tasty meal in some time. The blood was still warm, and skin tender. It tore back and exploded in a puff of feathers and gore. The gunshot rang out through the empty waste as its body hit the ground and flopped helplessly for a second. Its brethren scattered in the winds, and what was supposed to have been its meal started to sit up.
"Fuck…. You.' Albert wheezed as his side bled from the beak. He needed another stimpak and more. His mouth was dry and his lips were cracked. Every bit of moisture in him had been evicted from him through one end or the other. It took him a moment to settle as he sat himself up with difficulty. For the first time in his life dehydration was no longer a hypothetical situation, it was a true thing. Across the way and on the other side of the overpass, the smoldering wreckage of Rocketon lay in the sand, the arms and eye stalks still moving about rapidly like the legs of some insect stuck on its back.
"Rocket… I need help." Albert said pitifully,coherent thought fleeting at best..
Despite the damage, Rocketon hadn't shut down just yet. There was still some life left in the old machine. "I'm s-s-s-sorry Sir. I can't can't can't feel my legs."
"You don't… have legs." Answered Albert as he swayed to the left and right.
"I d-d-d-don't? What happened to-to-to them?" Rocketon asked with a slight panic.
"Rocket I'm not… doing good. The thing.. Got me. Can't keep water down," Albert slumped forward and pulled himself upright. "I need some.. Something."
"Doc-Doc-Doc-Doctor Frobisher supplied me with some-some-some antivenoms he believed would be useful. But I can't re-re-reach them. My arms are not.. Cooperating."
"In your bag." Albert nodded. "I'll.. I'll get em." He said as he pushed himself up off the ground to stand on his wobbly legs. Each step was a challenge, his legs felt like jelly beneath him and his balance was worse than it had ever been even at his drunkest. But even so he knew he needed the meds, he stumbled and lurched all while his stomach heaved and did its best to empty itself of anything else left in his body. He felt the liquidy mess run down the back of his legs and into his shoes with every step. "I'm coming." He slurred as he nearly tripped and fell face first into the dust.
"I can see if I can see if I can… Fusion core at critical levels. Please service your mis-mis-mister handy immediately. Catastrophic failure imminent." Rocket's damaged voice said in a suddenly upbeat tone.
"Cata-what?"
"We here at General Atomics would-would-would like to remind you that we are not liable for any and all damages done to you or your household due to the eeeeefects of a damaged fusion core. Thank you for choosing General General General General….. Goodbye."
"What?" Albert managed as he stood back upright.
He didn't hear any answer. He didn't hear anything at all after that, nor could he see. The blinding white flash of light was all that filled his vision. He was falling for some reason. No, not yet. He was pushed back and up off his feet. A shockwave. A shockwave that came from an explosion ahead of him. The sandy wall that stood alongside the road caught him. His body flew back into its waiting embrace.
And then he fell.
The light was gone and all that surrounded him was darkness. He heard voices, faint whispers from below him, words too faint to pick up.
Ahead was a flash. And from the flash grew something great and terrible. Fire and smoke slowly rolled up, up, and up. Filling his field of vision with the great bringer of the end. The fire and smoke took on the terrible shape of doom. The great mushroom of fire that grew and grew. And then another flash, and another great tower of fire and death. Again and again he saw this, his eyes burning from the sheer intensity of the explosions. Shapes of great cities were illuminated by the fire that were quickly swallowed up as they rolled ever forward.
The voices soon made sense. Names. The countless tongues were crying out names. Names of gods and other things. Names of loved ones, of parents and children, of siblings, and friends. There were curses aimed at those that caused this, names that were spoken in other languages that he had no knowledge of, names that he recognized, and his own.
He looked down and saw below a great field of skeletal arms and faces, reaching out for him. His own scream was drowned out by their own as he fell into their waiting arms. They clung to him and cursed him. He had no right to live while they didn't. They bit and clawed at him while some held him down, all the while the great fire grew and rushed towards him. The bones that lay in front of the vault held the tightest. "You killed my child! You killed us all! You should have died too! Why did you get to live?" They all demanded answers as he struggled and pulled to no avail. The fire came quicker and quicker. It lit the field aflame and the bones in the distance burst into ash from its heat.
From the field a figure arose. "It's okay Albert. You belong here."A woman had risen from the field of bone. A vision of beauty and flesh. The red haired woman from the magazine walked towards him. Nude as she was in the picture she cupped his face while skeleton hands held him in place. "You belong with us." She whispered as she drew near to him. "Die with us Albert."
He screamed in horror as the fire came closer and closer. "No no please. Let me go. I have to save my friends. I can still save them!"
"You can't save anyone. It's okay. They'll die too. Like everyone else. They'll be with you." The woman said.
He kicked at the hands that were grasping at his ankles, pulled against the arms that held him in place. Thrashing as the panic grew as the wall of flame drew closer and closer. "Let me go! Let me go!"
"You didn't deserve to live anyways. Hiding in that hole in the ground." The woman teased as her hands caressed his face. "You deserve this."
The heat was burning him now. Closer and closer came the fire till he could count the yards. The woman leaned forward and caught his lips with her own. A kiss that burned. The woman's hair smoked and blackened as the fire licked over her. Her skin bubbled and melted off her bones exposing the starched white skeleton below. Her tongue in his mouth bubbled and boiled against his own and. His own body was lit aflame, his tongue melting with hers as his own skin boiled and spilled from his bones. Yet still the woman stood, the flesh now gone from her face, her grinning skull stared into Albert's eyes as the heat burned them. "You deserve this."
The wall of fire passed over him, his body was lit aflame and every second was an agony he could never have dreamed of. His cries joined in the chorus of a thousand voices, their song that of pain and damnation.
A traveler sat down by the ragged body buried in the sand. His face and arm stuck out from the collapsed dirt wall he had been thrown into. The computer on his wrist was flashing warnings, the man would die soon.
The traveler sighed at the sight. "Is this it?" He asked, his voice a low rumble. "Is this all you have?"
The broken and buried body's face slowly turned to the traveler. The sun was high and bright, eclipsing the man's features. But he could make out the long dark hair, large and broad frame, and the heavily worn blue of his vault suit. "What?"
"Is this where you're going to die, Vault Dweller?" The man asked.
"Help.. me." Albert rasped, his throat was dry and speaking was a strain.
"No." Said the man. "I can't help you. Not if you've given up." He said, turning to look out into the desert. "Not if you die here."
"No.. Please." Pain wracked through his body as he tried to move. Even now outside of the dream, he still felt the flames burning his skin.
"Stop begging. It won't help you out here in these wastes. You have to stand on your own, by the strength of your own two feet. Now get up. You can't afford to die out here."
"My home. They'll die. Please."
"Then get up." The man repeated himself as if it was the simplest thing in the world.
Albert pushed, but his arms fell in on themselves. Unable to even straighten themselves beneath the dirt that had buried him. He felt its weight atop of him and was now feeling it press down onto him, onto his chest and making each breath a struggle. "I can't.. I can't. Help. Help!"
"Yes you can. You just don't want to." The man said with a dry tone. As if he were talking to a child who didn't want to finish his homework.
"I'll die. Please just.. Please." Tears started to run from his eyes. Breathing was becoming harder and harder. "I don't wanna die. I don't wanna-"
"THEN STAND UP!" The man's voice echoed across the empty waste as he stood up to his full height. Towering over Albert, he was a mass of muscle that strained against the skin-tight vault suit. "You're not going to let this wasteland best you, Albert. You've come too far now to be stopped. Now stop crying and get… up!"
The man stood in front of Albert now, the sun no longer hiding his features. It was either sunstroke, brain damage, dehydration, or some combination of all three he thought. The man standing in front of him wasn't some abrasive stranger. Albert had seen this man many times before, and knew that he had gone mad.
"Vincent Cole?"
Had it not been for the dark hair, Albert would have thought it was Grognak himself speaking to him, but the resemblance was undeniable. The man that looked just like his great grandfather gave a laugh. "Get up Albert. Your people need you. You've the strength of the great barbarian within your blood. Use it, and make this land remember your name."
"Oh I'm fucked." Albert said wearily. "I'm seeing shit now. It's fucking… Fucking Grognak is yelling at me." He moaned pitifully, his head hitting the dirt with a thump.
"Get up Albert."
"I'm already dead."
"Get up Albert."
It wouldn't stop. Again and again he told the figure no, to go away, to let him die, and again and again the ghost or mirage or whatever it was yelled back at him. It just wouldn't let up.
"Shut up shut up shut up!" His throat felt like it would be sliced open at any moment, that he would be spitting blood from the yelling but even still the Grognak wannabe yelled on.
"Then get up and make me!"
Albert's palm slapped against the dirt. He gritted his teeth as he began to push. "Fucking... B-list… fucking shitty fucking fantasy movie bastard fuck BITCH!" The swears tumbled out without rhyme or reason. A week of bullshit all to end with a bug stabbing him, his robot exploding, and now his great grandfather calling him lazy. It was bullshit. Complete and total bullshit and the insanity of it all was finally just too much. His arms strained as he pushed. His own weight and the mound of dirt held him down all the while the vision of Vincent stared him down.
"Well? Is that all you got?"
One last push. His nerve endings flared with pain. He felt the fire again, burning his skin while his muscles sloughing off the bones as the flames licked over them. But still he pushed. With gritted teeth his hands dug into the sand and he pushed with all the strength he had left.
The sand atop him weighed him down, but trickled along his body. Grain by grain they fell from his shoulders but still the whole of it clung to his back. Still he pressed up, sucking in air into lungs that begged for mercy, that screamed in agony from being used he pushed again. Sand spilled down off his form. He saw them all, his family, his friends. Watched as their bones were added to the rest that were lost in the nuclear fire.
Sand and dirt poured off his body, its weight like fingers trying to bring him back down into the earth. He was held there till with the last of his breath he pushed himself upward, his scream of pain echoing all around them as he at last threw off the rock and sand that threatened to crush him and kicked out from beneath what would have been his tomb.
He fell to the ground, his breathing easier now that he was safe. A new pain made itself known. Two sharp pricks in his back right hip. He reached back and found the culprits. Gingerly he pulled them from his back. Stimpaks, two that last he remembered, would have been on the ground. Though as he looked ahead where he had been laying before the explosion, his medical pack was nowhere to be found."How the fuck?" He asked, but thought better than to dwell on the occasional miracle of being injected with a life saving medicine as a nuclear explosion goes off some yards away. And there Patty scoffed at the very idea of luck.
The man beside him said nothing, but looked down at him with a slight smile. "We can do it Albert. We can save our people. We just have to keep picking ourselves up." He said before turning and walking out into the waste. His vault suit was old and torn, a patchwork of repairs done over what looked to be ages and a half. But just as Albert started taking in all the details, the vision faded from sight, leaving him alone on the highway when darkness took him again.
Something wet hit his face, wet and slurping along him. The smell was horrid, and when Albert's eyes opened he couldn't believe what he was seeing.
It was a cow. Its skin was red and hairless. Sores and scabs marked its face and the horns weren't quite right but it was still a cow nonetheless. Two cows even, side by side each other, both looking worse for wear. But then Albert's eyes caught something that confused him even more. It wasn't two cows. Spreading from the scarred and leathery body were two necks, and on those necks were the two heads that stared down at him. "Oh… oh you're all kindsa fucked up." Albert slurred before his head hit the ground again.
"Speak for yourself there friend."
