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"You think that a wall as solid as the earth separates civilization from barbarism. I tell you the division is a thread, a sheet of glass."- James Buchan
..::..
The year was now 2080.
The full effects of the holocaust, by this time, were concluded to be irreversible and treated as the norm. The sandstorms hit the 115 and Outpost One with a surprisingly steady regularity, almost like a new kind of weather had entered the land following the bombs. These storms, aside from the more deadly radstorms, were carefully monitored by the scientists of 115 to properly prepare their activities on the surface. The introduction of better protective equipment helped, but Stern made it a priority to explore every exploitable resource, starting with the possibility of locating another vault.
The colonel had a listening post set up in Outpost One. Attempts at communicating with the outside world were made, and were repeated by the hour in spite of its apparent fruitlessness in the first few months. Task Force Alpha, in the mean time, was sent to scout out the origins of the mutants they killed on First Batch Day.
There were, however, plenty of other concerns that occupied the colonel's attention.
Structural integrities of the Vault's lower facilities gradually became compromised due to the mounting infestations of mutated rodents and the latest menace to emerge from the depths of the Wasteland- the Giant Radscorpions. While there were no fatalities suffered, due to the quick action of the Vault's security measures, there were many vault-dwellers who suffered serious injuries from the encounters. Preliminary evidence suggested that further excavations attracted more and more of these invading pests, resulting in more infestations than they could spare the resource to deal with.
Stern halted any attempts at construction of new facilities before the pests overwhelmed them, focusing the resources he had at the moment to keep the Vault running smoothly. Time breezed by quickly, but just as the Vault started to lax back into complacency, the listening post at Outpost One picked up something.
It was from Task Force Alpha, and they were taking fire.
The rattle of machine-guns drowned out the howl of the sandstorms above, sending another hail of hot lead down against the hybrids crouching behind a pile of car wrecks.
Fade took a bad hit when she stepped on a landmine, which disabled the servos on her armor's right leg. The team didn't have time to assess the extent of her injuries as the minelayers closed in on their location and started shooting. West ordered Riker and Hayes to drag their wounded sniper to safety while he and Kid returned fire, covering their withdrawal into the debris field.
Task Force Alpha had been investigating the ruins of what used to be Carlon, the closest city to 115 which was about 30 miles west of Outpost One, as they followed the trail left in the wake of the wandering mutants. Their primary objective at the time was to explore the region, but chancing upon another larger mutant horde, West radioed in their recent discovery and engaged the abominations. The majority of them fell to the task force's weapons. Some fled back into the ruins, with Task Force Alpha in hot pursuit.
Carlon had not fared the elements well in the last three years, which had dealt the city worse than the bombs themselves. The towering buildings of eroded stone and concrete, of shattered glass and warped steel, still stood like unyielding giants. The mono-rails and steel tracks had released their cars onto the cracked streets, where the unfortunate bystanders lay from the terrible heat of the resulting fallout, their bones now covered by the sands of the wandering twisters.
Through the maze of traffic-jammed cars and sand mounds, Task Force Alpha covered what ground they could reach. Then, they found it.
Vault 113, hidden behind another maze of makeshift metal beam barriers, rebar and car wrecks. Hidden from their eyes, until Fade stepped on one, was a large minefield scattered across the sandy streets. West couldn't see the shooters, but he knew from the sound of those guns that they were using high-caliber weapons. Taking a round to the armor torso that sent metal fragments digging into his chest confirmed it.
"Can you walk?" Riker, the team medic asked Fade.
"Flesh is willing, but the metal is weak." Fade replied, tapping at the armor's busted leg. With a bit of struggling, she got up into a crouch and readied her weapon for battle.
"Lucky for you, you don't need to move around much." West said, "I'll draw their fire, try to get a bead on 'em for me."
"Boss, you took one to the chest. You alright?" Hayes asked, drawing attention to the hole in West's armor.
"I dunno." West answered honestly, as he couldn't feel the sting of his wounds anymore. "We'll worry about that later. Sniper, you ready?"
Fade shattered the window of one of the cars and stuck her rifle barrel through the opening she made. She peered through the gauss rifle's scope and called out to West, "Yes sir."
West turned his heel and made a break for the barriers, in the direction of where the shots were coming from. He fired his auto-shotgun as he, power-armor and all, jogged down the street. The heavy footfalls of his armor made little vibrations on the ground, and the sight of the 8-foot tall man in steel seemed to intimidate the unseen shooters...for a while. Someone popped out of cover, showing itself on Fade's crosshairs.
It couldn't have been human, with the way its body had grown so obscenely. The skin that was exposed through the creature's tattered and cobbled-together armor was shown to be peeling off, revealing blood-red muscle that seemed to bleed with every breath the creature took. Its protective face-apparel, a simple respirator-mask, was shredded to the point of non-functionality. The mask revealed a gaping, snarling maw of cracked, frothing rows of yellow teeth. Its red, bleeding fingers closed tightly around the handle of an industrial ripper, which it then raised high as it bolted from cover to meet the charging hybrid. But what was most interesting to note about the mutant was the set of surgical tubes inserted into the back of its head, feeding the mutant a strange glowing green fluid being pumped from a tank hanging around its waist.
West saw the thing and was also amazed at how bigger the mutant was than him. This didn't stop his advance at all, however, but increased his pace. Riker and Hayes, seeing their commander so dangerously close to the shooters' position, emerged from cover and retaliated.
Fade's rifle screamed as it let out a single high-velocity round that tore the mutant's right arm right off of its shoulder, and its weapon along with it. The wound it suffered didn't seem to register properly into the mutant's addled mind, and it swung an empty limb as though it were still attached to its body. West aimed his auto-shotgun pointblank into the mutant's chest and let five rounds pound a hole through its body and out the back.
Blood, guts and bone shot out in a spray of red and dark crimson. The mutant hunched over and collapsed face-first into the dust, soon after trampled by Riker and Hayes as they moved to assist their commander in storming the enemy position. Kid stayed behind to back Fade up, just in case something tried to flank them.
Other similarly flayed mutants were holding the barricade, armed with military-grade belt-fed heavy machine-guns and an assortment of lower-caliber weapons. The bigger ones, like the mutant West killed, forewent the guns for melee weapons.
There was no strategy in their defense, not even the simplest one. Task Force Alpha, possessing superior firepower and protective equipment, exploited this and cut down the mutants within minutes.
The team took a moment to inspect their enemy's corpses while they savored the respite. West tore off the mask off one of them, revealing a ghoulish face that looked like its skin was scraped off with a razor.
"That's a hell of a sunburn." Hayes commented.
West turned the mutant's head to the side to take a look at the tubes feeding the strange fluid into its head. He yanked the tubes out, sending a light spray of green to cover his gauntleted hand.
"...ask Force Alpha, this is Homebase 115. What's your status, over?"
West looked at Fade as she answered the radio, "Homebase, this is Task Force Alpha. Took enemy heavy fire, but we've neutralized the threat. We've found Vault 113. I say again, we've found Vault 113."
There was a pause on the other end, then the voice of Col. Stern answered. "We read you, Alpha. As you were, over."
Fade knew that 'as you were' meant that Stern wanted them to explore the vault, then relay whatever they discovered to him. "Yes sir, proceeding into the vault. Alpha out." She ejected the spent microfusion cell from her weapon and locked in a fresh one. "Leave the dead for the sampling teams, we're going in."
West nodded, pointing to the vault door. "Riker, get this thing open."
"Got it, boss." Riker acknowledged as he neared the massive vault entrance. He pried open the access panel, opened his gauntlet's external plate and hooked in his pip-boy through the semi-rusted port. After a few minutes, the door creaked open, but stopped as the power suddenly went out. The opening was just large enough for a single person to go through, "Okay, who's gonna take point?"
West reloaded his gun and entered without a word, signaling the team to follow close behind him.
Casper lowered his binoculars and blinked twice, still not believing what he just saw. He looked through the binoculars again, and saw the same thing, confirming the fact that he wasn't imagining things.
The vault entrance had been cleared of the rednecks, by soldiers in power-armor!
The former vault-dweller of 113, peering from atop his perch on a forty-story apartment building, called for the attention of his small band of fellow dwellers. They had placed Casper on watch, and mostly ignored the rattle of gunfire, having grown accustomed to the noise when the redneck mutants took over 113 two years ago. At first, they couldn't believe the watchman's tale and rushed to see the carnage left below.
Driven out of their home and forced to live atop the ruined buildings just to avoid the rednecks wandering the lower levels, the survivors of 113 struggled to eek out a living through the harsh environment of the Carlon ruins, and had given up on retaking the vault after losing so many friends trying to do so.
"Who could they be?" Casper asked their leader, Morrow, who was a former police officer. "From the old military?"
"Possibly." Morrow, already an old man of 65 but still strong like a man in his thirties, replied as he adjusted his mask.
"They've wiped out the rednecks guarding the door. Should we follow them in?"
"No, there's no telling whether or not these guys are friendly. They're more likely to shoot us than talk to us." Morrow said, "Best wait it out, see what happens."
More shots rang clear through the air, each one growing softer as the armored soldiers moved deeper and deeper into the vault. As the hours dragged on, the wait seemed to take forever. The sun began to set, and darkness crept into the ruins of Carlon. The vault-dwellers knew what that meant, and if night should arrive so too would the wandering hordes of rednecks.
"I don't think they're coming out any time soon, Morrow." Casper said.
"Then we wait some more until they do." The old man replied, opting to make use of their time by starting a fire. "Stay on watch."
"Well, not like I've got anything else to do." Casper muttered as he slumped down against the ledge.
West's boot came down and the mutant's head burst open like a rotten tomato, coating the whole foot in a nasty red smear. The hybrid walked away, leaving a bloody trail of red footprints on the floor as he approached the overseer's office. Behind him, his team was cleaning up after the last battle. They finished off any survivors, paused to reload their weapons, then proceeded to follow their commander into the office. There, West found the remains of the former director of 113's operations.
The overseer's bones were still red, indicating that he died only recently. Bits of flesh still clung to them like grapevines, and looked like they'd been gnawed off. The remains were nailed and strung up just a few feet off the floor, with a large basin under them to collect the scraps falling off. All over the office, put on display over every counter, shelf and table, were glass jars of pickled organs.
Eyes, ears, teeth, tongues and even testicles.
"What the actual fuck..." West breathed, feeling sick to his stomach.
The rest of the team was silent. They've seen their fair share of ugliness from the war, but this was on a whole other level.
"I don't think I wanna know what's going on here." Fade said.
"Let's go, we still have the lower levels to cover." West declared, all too eager to get away from the awful sight. He noticed Kid's fascination and smacked his armor's right pauldron on the way out, "Kid, come on, there's nothing more to see there."
"Yes sir."
The team moved on, entering the third level which held the living quarters. As soon as they stepped out of the elevator doors, a horde of those flayed mutants jumped off of their beds, stormed out of their rooms and attacked. The flashes of Task Force Alpha's guns made the whole scene look like a stop-motion picture, every shot revealing one mutant snarling in their faces and ending up on the floor in a bloody pool the next.
Kid laughed as he emptied his clip into the mob, taunting the mutants to come get their share of bullets. "More where that came from, fuckers!"
"I think you're loving your job a little too much." Fade remarked.
"Alpha, move up." West announced, spearheading the approach into the next room.
One of the mutants, still riddled with holes from Kid's Reckoner, revved up its ripper and attacked West. The jagged metal teeth of the ripper rattled harmlessly against the protective plating covering West's body, and the hybrid stared at the mutant curiously for a minute before sending it flying back against the wall with his fist.
His auto-shotgun bellowed twice, chewing the abomination's face off and leaving a gruesome mess of twitching muscle, teeth and bone where its head should have been.
"I love this suit." West chuckled as he walked away.
"And I love my job." Kid said, watching their flank as they entered the next room. Fade was slowing them down with her armor's busted leg, but the team didn't complain much about it. Moving slow allowed them to anticipate ambushes and traps along the way.
Room by room, hall by hall, they reclaimed the vault from the mutants. A few hours later, they reached the end. They came upon a large production facility filled with chemical vats and water purifiers, which was guarded by a small group of flayed mutants- in power-armor.
West's eyes widened, "Oh shit..."
They saw the group of armored humans walk in, and stomped out of the observation tower which overlooked the entire facility. There were five of them in total, every one armed with either a 5mm minigun or a belt-fed machine-gun. Their leader, who didn't bother to hide its hideous face beneath a helmet, hefted its minigun and snarled out its commands in an incomprehensible tongue that only the other mutants could understand.
The mutants, growling and snapping like attack dogs, leapt off the tower. They brought their weapons to bear and let the hail of bullets fly.
Task Force Alpha fanned out to keep the mutants from concentrating their fire, with Fade suppressing each target for the team to close the distance. It was hard trying to get a good shot on one of the armored mutants, but Fade managed to kill two, relying heavily on the power of her gauss rifle. The high-velocity rounds penetrated through the thick plating and sent the mutants toppling over.
Riker and Hayes spent all their ammunition trying to take down the other two, and had to resort to using grenades to disable their enemies, just so they could get closer and put a shot pointblank through the helmet visor.
Kid drew the mutant leader's fire as West ascended the stairs up to the tower, and sent the thing staggering back when some of his shots grazed its face. West approached it from behind, but the mutant saw him first. It hurled its minigun at West, which struck his auto-shotgun with such force that the weapon broke in two.
West, not wishing to become the victim in that situation, barreled forward and sent both of them plummeting into the ground below.
The weight of two power-armored suits hitting the floor created a large crater where they fell. Shaking off the effects of the fall, the two grappled and struggled to gain the upper hand. The mutant possessed a savage strength that matched West's modified superhuman power, but was untrained in hand-to-hand combat.
Also, its armor didn't have a flamer installed on its gauntlet.
West, suffering beneath the weight of the mutant pounding on him, balled up his fist and shoved it close to his enemy's face. He activated the flamer, which sprayed the stinging jet into the mutant's face and coated its head with a flammable gel. The ensuing ignition set the mutant alight, and it stumbled back, howling in agony as the flames at its body.
Wearing power-armor and being set on fire was like wearing a cast iron suit into a furnace, especially with the type of armor the mutant was wearing, with little to no insulation. Good for withstanding bullets, bad against flamers.
The corpse of charred flesh and glowing metal slumped down a few minutes later, and West pulled himself up to sitting position.
"I guess that's the last of them." He said breathlessly.
Kid looked around at the vats surrounding them, "What do you suppose they've been making down here? It looks like a drug processing plant." Some of the vats had holes in them from the fight and were leaking the same glowing green fluid onto the floor.
"Yeah, I'm no doctor but I can guess whatever they were pumping into those things came from here." Fade observed.
"Another one of Vault-Tec's experiments gone wrong, I'm guessing." West said in disgust. He got up and picked one of the machine-guns from the fallen mutant corpses, "I'd like to leave the conclusions to the analysts. Right now, we need to report back to homebase. Let's go."
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I have no idea who the guest is who suggested it, but I'm grateful for the idea that inspired this chapter, nonetheless.