Fallout 3 - Beautiful Stranger

Chapter 13 Part 1

Racing past broken down Metro carriages, Patience picked up Gia by the arm, dragging her forward. The young girl, stumbling over debris almost fell and if they stopped for even a second, the ghouls would overrun them. Gia caught her footing once more and Patience let the girl go to turn round, fall to one knee bringing her rifle to bear and fired back the way they came.

The eardrum shattering retort echoed a crazy, frantic drumbeat in the enclosed space as bullets ripped into the lead ghoul sending it spinning to the ground, tripping up several others as it fell. She'd bought them precious little time. Bounding to her feet, she returned to a breakneck pace, following the curve of the tunnel, careening off the side of one of the shattered carriages.

Up ahead, she saw Vincent taking cover in a hole, made from a broken section of the track wall, his laser-focus aimed behind her. Valrie and Gia stood behind him, like terrified statues, Gia gripping Valrie with white knuckles. Rushing past Vincent, Patience pushed the two women onwards.

"Keep fucking moving!" Their ashen faces stared at her, but they began to move.

As soon as Patience passed Vincent, he began unloading into the horde of ghouls chasing them, taking careful aim, loosing two shots at a time. Patience couldn't take the time to look back. She forced the other two forward until she saw another pile of rubble. A good size for cover.

"Falling back! Reloading!" Vincent had caught another couple of ghouls, but the others ignored their dead comrades, continuing to rush towards the four humans.

Patience dropped behind the rubble and spun to face back down the tunnel. Vincent, head down, barrelled towards her with a ghoul mere feet from his back. Patience took careful aim and fired. The bullet zinged over Vincent's shoulder, catching the ghoul almost dead centre in its forehead, dropping it like a stone.

It was all they could do to leap-frog each other, one laying down fire, the other beating a retreat. Vincent passed Patience's position taking over pushing the other two forward. The exit to this section of the tunnel was up a short climb and Patience hoped there were no more ghouls up on the next concourse to deal with.

She fired on automatic, now, sending hot metal flying into the bodies of the chasing, screeching, hissing creatures. Several fell in that burst, making a momentary blockage between the carriage and the tunnel walls. She took the opportunity, sprinting up the slight incline to join the others. Vincent leaned against the tunnel wall, breathing heavy, desperate eyes staring onto the concourse, swapping out a magazine and cycling the weapon. As soon as Patience reached them, he arced the rifle overhead and brought it down pointing back down the tunnel.

"Get them up the stairs!" He fired into the darkness of the tunnel, aiming at movement, green, glowing eyes, shadows. "Take the exit on the left, it leads out into the ruins."

"Go! Go!" Patience pointed towards the escalator stairs leading upwards, not twenty feet away.

Valrie reached the stairs first, her little legs pumping double-time as her boots hammered upon the metal, striated steps. Gia stayed close behind the older scavenger. Patience fired some more shots down the tunnel, giving Vincent time to reload once more. When he was ready, he tapped her leg once and she made an immediate turn to follow the other two women.

She was only half-way up the stairs when she heard the scream. Bounding up the remaining stairs, two at a time, she reached the top to see a ghoul crouching above the prone body of Valrie, laying face down on the floor. Before Patience could lift her rifle, an electronic screech pierced the air, a beam of light raced outwards and penetrated the back of the ghoul's skull, leaving a smouldering, cauterised hole.

It collapsed, limp, atop of Valrie. Patience ran to the immobile form, pushing the ghoul to the side, its skin feeling both dry and squishy at the same time. She turned Valrie over, revealing a long set of scratch marks on the football helmet.