Fallout

[ForceFightWMe12]

"No, no, of course not!" Travis said with a grin, "But what can I say? I'm a curious person. Finding something that I haven't come across is exciting to me - part of the reason why I'm along on this trip."

[Corinthian]

"Yeah, I'm curious, too. Although my curiosity usually lands me in the lockup for a few days." It wasn't like his record wasn't public, and the Vault Security people with them would, no doubt, spill it at some point.

[Reclaimer]

Rev walked back to the meeting room, to regroup with the others. As he entered, he saw a group was in deep discussion. Not wanting to be rude, he didn't interrupt them. Rev pulled out a chair and sat down, waiting to get a move on out of here.

[Killwithhonor]

He looked at Peter as his dumbstruck expression was amusing.

 

"Who the hell are you? You the replacement for Hernandez? Oh, great. Roll, let's get out of here before they load on every moron in the Vault. We've got enough bad genes on the team as is, we don't need more idiots."

 

"I am Onjo Pizak and I have no idea who this Hernandez is...I'm guessing hes not someone that you like.."

 

He pulled the cigarette out of Onjo's mouth and threw it to the floor and stamped it out. “You know how much damage the smoke does to the ventilation systems in here. I’d rather not come back to a Vault were everyone died because the air recyclers started venting carbon monoxide into the habitation levels, I won’t be here to fix it.”

 

Onjo stared at Jason with a disrupted look.

 

"Well im so glad that we are getting along o so nicely!" Onjo said with a sarcastic smirk

 

He turned to Roll who seemed like the only one with a good attitude. Onjo shook her hand.

 

"No, i don't think you do, my name is Onjo Pizak, and yours?"

[Rogue Nine]

Ral strode back into the amphitheatre, a backpack thrown over his shoulder and a satchel in his hand. It had taken a bit longer than he'd expected, but he'd finally gotten everything together, as he was a bit of a scatterbrain when it came to getting things done on a deadline.

 

Finding a seat, he placed his luggage down and began fiddling with the locks on his satchel, idly listening to the conversation that was taking place in the center of the room.

[Corinthian]

The group assembled in front of the massive, gear shaped Vault Door. A technician was seated nearby at a control panel. "You leaving? Got everything packed? Toothbrush? Extra socks?"

 

Peter gave him a humorless smile. "Just open the door."

 

The technician shrugged and hit a large button on his console. "Watch your step out there, don't go anywhere you'd glow in the dark."

 

Alarms began ringing as the door began to hum. Steam shot out around it, mingling with the sounds of hydraulics. The door slid forward, then rolled to the side. A still, incredibly hot air greeted them as they stared out into the vastness of the desert. Endless dunes of charred sands and pillars of cracked rock below a gray sky greeted them to the Wasteland.

[Quist]

Roll looked outside into the foreign world a little apprehensively. This was the first time she'd ever seen what it was like outside and despite how much she had mentally prepared herself for the sight, it still shook her. Taking a few tentative steps forward, she hiked her jacket up around her neck and led her team into the sparseness of the Wasteland.

 

Casting a glance back, she looked over each person's face to gauge their reactions. She had divvied up responsibilities back in the meeting room, making sure each person had a job. They had all listened and responded well enough, and she just hoped that they would continue to once things got hairy. She was quite sure that things would get interesting, whether she wanted it to or not.

 

Taking a compass from her belt, she squinted at it and watched the arrow flip a few times before righting itself. "C'mon, ladies and lads," she said, adjusting her steps a few degrees. "We're going this way."

[Corinthian]

Peter's mouth had gone dry when he had seen the outside. It was magnificent, in a strange way, yet chilling that the world had been this damaged by just a single war.

 

"Holy..."

 

He swallowed, then turned to follow Roll.

[Killwithhonor]

Onjo waited for the vault door to complete its sequences and open. Steam shot out and the hydraulics started moving, the door started to swing open. He quickly closed his eyes , He walked out of the vault blindly feeling the hot air touch his face, he smiled.

 

Onjo waited until everything was serene and no one was talking. He opened his eyes and looked across the landscape that he had for so long begged to see. Another hot wind blew across his body. He was in shock from the war and how the world could still look as beautiful as it did but with an eerie feeling like it was empty ball.

 

He took a step forward,

 

"Well we've got a long way to go eh?"

[ForceFightWMe12]

Kat gulped as the vault door creaked and groaned, the ancient and rusted-over gears going to work for the first time in five generations. A strange mixture of excitement and nerves wracked her body as she watched the first natural light touched the soil just beneath the edge of the door. She couldn't help herself - she grabbed her brothers hand, squeezing it hard.

 

Travis would have looked at his sister like she was crazy if he hadn't been concentrating on the door. He coughed a bit with the first blast of the overwhelmingly warm 'fresh' air. For God's sake, the artificial air was better in the Vault...

 

But then it was open, and the grey, subdued light was pouring in. His eyes widened as he looked outside for the first time as the completely barren wasteland that spread before them. In all of his readings and studies...he had seen pictures of what the world ad looked like before the nuclear war...and the fact that it was all gone - every last scrap of living things...gone...

[starmark2k]

Whitman listened to the noises the 1000-year-old door made as it slid, twisted and released vents of steam from the opening gaps at the side.

 

“Anyone else think this is a little elaborate for a door opening.” He joked smiling to himself

 

Jason looked out as the door finally opened revealing the outside world and was hit by the still warm air flowing into the Vault, he coughed as a bit of dust went down his throat. Looking at the door it seemed to be almost completely covered in rust, he turned to look at the technician and smiled. “You should oil that door. It’s a bit rusty.”

[Rogue Nine]

As soon as the door swung open, Ral pulled out his Geiger counter. The familiar crackle-hum filled the air as the meter read the levels of radiation in the area. Ral squinted at the display, writing down the measurements in a small notebook. "Well, thank goodness it isn't a microwave," he muttered softly as he continued to study the readout.

 

"We're going this way."

 

Ral looked up from his instrument to see Roll beckoning the group over to follow her, so he followed suit. The ground was scorched and scored with marks, probably flashfried in the chaos. Shaking his head, he focused back on his readouts.

[Grace]

Charlie stood frozen just inside the doorway, staring wide-eyed out at the desert in awe. The Vault had its fair share of wide open spaces, but this... Charlie blinked. Until today, her world had been comfortable, but this... this was so massive it blew her mind. She vaguely heard Roll say something relating to the direction they would be heading, but she was so startled by the contrast between the Vault and the world outside that she didn't move.

 

"I-I-I," she stammered as the technician who'd opened the door approached her. The rest of the group was already moving. "It's... I..."

 

"Go on," the tech urged. "They'll need you." He gave her a light shove and she staggered out of the Vault after the group. A brief moment of fear nearly made her turn back, but she forced herself to take a deep breath and keep moving. The tech was right; if any technology still worked out here, Charlie was the one who could make it work.

 

That thought made Charlie grin a little. In the Vault, though she was in charge of keeping software updated, there were others who could do the job. Out here, there would be no others. For the first time in her life, Charlie felt needed. And that was good. Her stride grew a little bolder and she hurried to catch up with Jason.

[Corinthian]

The desert seemed to stretch on endlessly, but after three days of traveling across the Wastes, a ripple was seen on the horizon. A wall, wrapped around a tall rock with a flat top.

 

Peter squinted, then dropped his pack and pulled out his binoculars. "Some kind of town down there, boss. Looks a little primitive, but..."

 

Before he got out more, a massive pounding noise broke the silence. A massive creature, human-height even hunched, with long, razor-edged claws and long horns, with lizard-like features and scaly flesh, came over a dune. It let out a wailing roar, then charged at the party. Peter dropped his binoculars and unholstered his Jericho, firing three times at the creature. The first two bullets missed, making bursts of sand. The third pierced it's side, spraying a stream of blood onto the dunes. The creature didn't slow at all.

 

"Oh hell." Before he could get back, the creature raised it's claw, slashing across his face and flinging him across the sand, stunned. It turned to the rest of the party, now reaching for their sidearms, let out a bellow, and lunged.

[Killwithhonor]

Onjo was standing at the back of the pack fiddling with his gear, his watch suddenly stopped working.

 

"What the hell, its been running for years and now it decides to say goodbye and die on me?!?! Nothing ever works when you want it too, ahh o well"

 

He took out a screwdriver to start taking the watch apart as they walked across the hot desert landscape when a mirage like image appeared in the distance, he put his hand of his forehead to block the sun but it did no good.

 

The ground trembled before him along with a heavy noise that when you heard it, you knew it was trouble. A huge beast like creature launched itself over a sand dune to Onjo's right hand side.

 

The creature roared and pounded with its massive claws, the crew stood there jaw dropped by the ferocious beast. Peter stood out in front with his binoculars to his eyes when the beast came charging at him, Peter had taking his gun out and shot three times but only one hit.

 

Onjo was amazed by the creature and just wanted to stare at the enormous thing, he was fiddling to get his pistol out. The strap wouldn't open up but he kept trying, he ripped the gun at as soon as the strap broke loose.

 

Onjo ran to the side of the crew expedtion and kneeled down and tried to aim carefully for the beasts legs, he shot four times as the beast lunged forward towards his friends. His first shot missed, his second shot missed, his third shot ricocheted off the hard sand floor and hit the beast in the shin area. Onjo's fourth shot was dead on and hit the creature in the kneecap striking the beast down on one knee.

[Corinthian]

The monster roared, but the bullet barely penetrated it's hard skin and bone, leaving a gash on it's leg and a lot of anger to work out. The beast leapt forward, shoving past his gun and landing on Onjo hard, the lust for his blood burning in it's eyes as it's maw opened, revealing two rows of razor-edged teeth...

[ForceFightWMe12]

The holster at Travis' hip was flipped open and empty within seconds. Safety sliding off, he laid out a four-shot diamond towards the monster's chest, two bullets clipping its shoulders and the other two finding home in the top and lower half of its chest.

 

"These things aren't going to hurt it." he shouted to Kat, "You gotta get something with a bit more firepower!"

[Corinthian]

The monster fell, onto it's back. It slid to it's feet fast, enraged, blood streaming over it's scaly flesh. It stared at Travis with rage in it's eyes. The shots had obviously wounded it, but it wasn't about to slow down. It reached down and picked up a large rock, turned, and hurled it at Travis.

[Quist]

Roll froze momentarily, staring agape at the enormous monstrosity as it lumbered towards her team. She hadn't expected to run into anything quite like it right off the bat. Time seemed to move in slow motion as she watched it approach, unfazed by the gunfire shot at it. Only when it had sprung forward onto Onjo did Roll finally snap out of her trance.

 

Quickly unholstering her sidearm with a fluidity that surprised even her, she leveled the SiG 226 at the monster just as it was hit by Travis's shots. Her eyes widened as it picked up a rock and threw it at the young man, then narrowed as she aimed her weapon. "Travis, watch out!" Roll yelled as she squeezed the trigger, sending round after round at the monster. Her first shot miraculously hit it in the elbow, while the subsequent shots whizzed past its head harmlessly.

[ForceFightWMe12]

"S***!!"

 

Travis jumped off to the side, colliding with his sister in such a way that it knocked her and him far enough away to avoid the giant boulder as it came crashing down.

 

"H-Hooooly crap!!" Kat squealed, "This is not what I signed up for!!"

 

"Just get a grenade out already!!" her brother hissed.

 

Obediantly, the twin scrambled to open the flap of her pack, knocking the explosives around until she found - ah! That's it!

 

Grabbing the baseball-sized explosive, she stood to her feet. "HEY! Lizard-head!!"

 

As the monster's gaping maw turned towards her, she armed the grenade, took aim...and threw it with all her strength.

[Corinthian]

The creature swatted the grenade out of midair. Not that it really helped.

 

The blast vaporized it's left arm, nearly up to the shoulder, and blasted a chunk out of it's side, throwing it to the ground with blood streaming out, having lost all of it's fight. It lay on the ground, breath coming in ragged gasps as it's life slowly spilled onto the sands.

[Killwithhonor]

Onjo looking up with a minor scrape across his chest, he had enough time to catch a glimpse of Travis throwing a grenade that took off the monsters left arm. It lay there senselessly as Onjo got off the sand floor to only stand and look at the monster as the blood just rolled out onto the sand.

 

He looked to his side and realized that his gun and a bunch of his tools fell out when the monster pounced on him. He went over and picked his tool out and put them pack in his pack and re holstered his gun.

[starmark2k]

The last three days across the desert were not the best few days of Jason’s life, He had already gotten sunburn and sand in every crevice of his body. So far all anyone seemed to do was walk in a single direction and this annoyed him greatly, if he were in the vault he would be doing something useful, there was always something that needed to be fixed.

 

Whitman had generally kept himself to himself only occasionally talking to either Roll or Charlie, he did however find time to optimise all his equipment in case they would ever be needed.

 

When the beast attack Jason stayed well out of the way but did take out his Dart gun just in case the fighters couldn’t handle it, He only approached the creature after it fell to the floor. “Soooo, I’m no expert but I don’t think things like this existed a thousand years ago.”

[ForceFightWMe12]

Travis nodded slowly, adjusting his glasses further onto the bridge of his nose as he watched the creature's body carefully, not quite sure if it was safe to approach. Sig Sauer held ready in hand, he slowly moved closer to the thing, the weapon pointed towards its head - just in case. When he was beside the giant lizard, he took a hesitant foot and nudged it, jumping back several feet in case it moved. It didn't react, however, and judging by the large pool of blood that was dripping into the sands, it was either quite incapacitated or killed. With gun still out, he approached it again.

 

"I don't know..." he said softly, "This doesn't look like any type of dinosaur. If anything, it seems to be just a basic lizard, that has been mutated horribly. But I can only imagine what had to happen that it grew to be of this size..."

[starmark2k]

Jason continued to stare at the apparently dead creature and listened to Travis’ analysis of it. “So you have no idea if there are more of these things.” He paused for a second and began to look around the surrounding terrain. “Or if there is anything bigger… and uglier around here just itching to get their teeth into us.”