Fallout 3 - Beautiful Stranger

Chapter 27 Part 1

After scattering the Super Mutants in the initial attack, Vincent and the other members of the team from the Brotherhood of Steel now had to contend with a vicious counter-attack. They found themselves pushed back and many of the Wastelanders had followed instructions, falling back and retreating as the Super Mutants pressed forward.

In one way, Vincent felt glad that the additional humans had followed the orders given them, over the radio, by Three Dog. On the other hand, he knew that without their help, he and his fellow Brotherhood Knights would find it next to impossible to press forward towards the bunker and help Patience, Valrie and Gia. Right now, they were on their own.

"We have to fall back!" Knight Captain Hazel called as several bullets from Super Mutant guns pinged off her armour. Their power armour had taken too many hits. Before long, the bullets would begin penetrating their metal suits.

"Not yet!" Vincent crouched down to swap out the belt feed for the mini-gun, tossing the empty pack aside. "We have to give them more time."

He stood back up and pressed the fire button in the mini-gun, sending flashing, intermittent fire down into the trenches. The mini-gun barrel glowed a deep orange as it re-heated from overuse. To his left, Vincent saw Knight Kowalski take several hits of concentrated fire and soon his armour became pock marked, strained grinding and mechanical wheezing indicating the armour's usefulness reaching its end.

Vincent moved in front of Kowalski, to give his Knight Brother time to evacuate the suit, and poured fire towards the Super Mutants ahead. The strategy failed. Kowalski pulled himself from the armour only to find himself cut down by gunfire from another direction. He hadn't even managed to pick up his weapon.

"Brother Vincent! I am not willing to sacrifice any more of my people for a diversionary tactic!" Hazel poured gunfire ahead. "Knight Brothers! Fall back!"

The Brotherhood of Steel members began a leapfrog defensive retreat and Vincent cursed them. He cursed them and Patience, but most of all he cursed himself. He couldn't retreat. He'd failed Patience, Valrie and Gia once and that was once too many.

He kneeled down once more, hidden by the bodies of several Super Mutants, cut to shreds by his mini-gun and the other weaponry. The mini-gun needed time to cool down and he needed time to think. Time, in the tightest of situations, that he did not have. There were no more options. He heard a couple of straggling explosions to the right. The last grenades. And then the gunfire from that side silenced.

As his eyes turned, within the helmet of his armour, he caught sight of something. Dropped by a Super Mutant early in the battle, without even being fired. He popped his head above the wall of bodies. The approaching Super Mutants congregated at the mouth of a nearby trench, preparing for their final assault.

He ticked off the seconds that his indecision lost him. Every second he hesitated was a second closer to the Super Mutants overrunning him. He rocked the power armour back and forth, readying it to move. It would be too slow, he knew it. He wouldn't make it and he would get cut down by the bullets of over a dozen weapons. He had no choice.

He threw himself forwards and the onslaught of gunfire began almost immediately. He could almost feel the bullets ricochetting off the armour, like a million stones bouncing on a metal barrel. The power armour was not built to withstand this. Nor was it built for what he did next.

With all the power he could muster to the armour's legs, he threw himself and the armour forward, tucking and rolling, ending almost in the exact spot he wanted. They never taught that in basic. Reaching down, he grabbed the missile launcher, almost thanking a god he didn't believe in when he found a missile inserted, ready to fire. He threw the launcher over his shoulder, aimed towards the trench entrance, and the approaching horde of Super Mutants, and fired.

He didn't wait for the missile to hit, he bent down and rummaged through the belongings of the Super Mutant the missile launcher had belonged to, finding what he needed. Two more missiles. The smoke from the first launch lingered in the air and he hadn't even noticed that the missile had hit and exploded.

He looked up. The entrance to the trench was now a carpet of blood and Super Mutant body parts and still the Super Mutants came, stomping through the gore, the legs, the heads, the arms and the organs of their fallen comrades. Vincent almost dropped the next missile, inserting it into the launcher, preparing it to fire.

One Super Mutant ran faster than the others, too close for Vincent to fire at. He turned the launcher back towards the trench, fired towards the swarming Super Mutants there and dropped the launcher, preparing to receive the attacking Super Mutant.

The missile hit at the same time as the Super Mutant barrelled into him, great yellow fists pounding and battering at the armour. They rolled several times, falling into a ditch a little more shallow than a trench, and Vincent felt one of his legs land underneath the weight of him and the Super Mutant. He roared in pain as he felt bone and tendons stretch and break.

The Super Mutant didn't give Vincent any time, returning to kneel on the power armour's chest and pounding and pounding upon the chest and the helmet that Vincent wore, both protective coverings buckling. As the creature reached down to grasp both sides of the helmet, Vincent scrambled to reach his faithful .45, attached to the armour's hip.

The Super Mutant squeezed with both hands upon the helmet and Vincent could feel the pressure rising, the sides buckling in closer to his skull. He couldn't bring the .45 to bear on the creature's head. A few .45 bullets to the gut wouldn't kill it. And then he remembered what he still held in his other hand, the power armour's gauntlet not opening unless commanded.

"Stupid human die!" The Super Mutant's gurgling voice rang through the speakers in Vincent's helmet.

"Go to hell, you ugly mother fucker." Vincent pointed the .45 at the missile still held in his other hand and fired.

-+-

The Super Mutant slid down the wall, leaving a trail of blood, brain and fragments of skull embedded in the concrete. She looked at her hand, covered in the gore that had once been the Super Mutant's face. Growling, she clenched her fist again and turned towards the Super Mutant holding Gia. It bared its teeth, tossing the ex-raider aside, sending her flying against the opposite wall. Patience, the thing that used to be Patience, launched herself forward.

And found herself stopped. The hand of the King against her chest.

"Good! That instinct, to kill, that's what you are now. You killed the wrong target, but we'll work on that." With a flex of a powerful arm, the King pushed her backwards. "Now, kill the woman. Do as you're told."

"No." It had taken a few minutes, but she felt her mind clearing. "I'm not yours to order around."

The King turned its back on her. So confident in its strength, its power. It strode to its huge sword, picking it up as easy as picking up a pen. It spun the sword in its hand, in the enclosed space it whizzed past the face of Gia before the King controlled it to point at Gia's neck.

"I'm not going to threaten your friends to make you comply, I'm going to kill them anyway, but I can make their deaths very slow and very painful." The King bounced the tip of the sword in front of Gia's terrified eyes. "One way or another, I will bring you to heel."

"I'll make a counter-offer. Let them go and I'll do as you say. Their freedom for my obedience." She almost felt normal, now. Bigger, more powerful, angrier, but her mind was her own.

She looked down at Valrie with new eyes. Her friend seemed so small, so fragile. The older woman's eyes almost screamed 'no' to her, glancing down at a hand to her side. In the hand, she held the long dagger the Super Mutant had worn in its belt. Ever the opportunist. Patience made no sign that she saw it, unsure her new face would be able to express her thoughts with any subtlety.

"Interesting. You actually believe you have something to bargain with." The tip of the sword dropped, the King leaning upon the grip. "No. I think I'll kill them and beat the obedience into you instead."