New Vegas: Sheason's Story

Chapter 44: The Mute

"Well?" God asked, one massive hand on the door leading outside. "Are you coming?"

"Uh... yeah. You go on ahead. I wanted to poke around a bit more, see if there's anything here we can use. Supplies and the like, you know?" God just scoffed, and shook his head.

"Humans..." he muttered, just loud enough to hear. "Fine, suit yourself. But don't take too long, human." With that he left, slamming the door of the police station shut behind him.

Right. Time to look around. This was a police station, which means there's probably some supplies around - weapons, ammunition, maybe even some of that 'contraband' Elijah mentioned. Hell, if I was really lucky, I might be able to find some medical supplies.

I rubbed the makeshift bandage on my left shoulder. I could still move my arm, which was always a good sign, but it was really starting to hurt now... and when I pulled my hand away, I could see my palm was completely covered in blood. I didn't really know if that was just from the blood the cloth had soaked up, or if the wound on my shoulder was still bleeding. Fuck. Whatever. I'll figure it out later.

The first thing I decided to do was check upstairs. Just because the staircase was mostly collapsed didn't mean it was completely inaccessible. All it took was some clever rearranging of a few metal boxes, along with dragging a filing cabinet over to the stairwell, and I was up there in no time.

Beep.

Fuck. More radios. I had to be quick. I looked around the corner, and saw another maze of desks, and about six or seven radios in various places all around the second floor. The beeping around my neck got faster, so I backed off - back to the stairwell - and let out a sigh of relief when the beeping finally stopped.

It took me close to five minutes of back-and-forth, running to a radio, switching it off, and running away before it exploded, until finally every radio was turned off and I was left in silence. Glorious, magnificent silence.

There was something odd, though... the amount of dust all around meant nobody had been up here for at least several decades. Maybe more. So who'd switched the radios on? Not only that, but I looked at the placement of most of these radios; I'd been standing under most of them during my chat with God. I had definitely been in range when I was downstairs (the floors weren't that tall), and yet, somehow, they hadn't set my collar off. Maybe there was something in the floor blocking the signal...

Stop getting distracted, Sheason. You still have a job to do. You need to look around for supplies.

There were two places up here that looked promising: one room off to the side, locked behind a dusty RobCo terminal, and another far in the back that looked like a riot room or a locker room of some kind. I decided to check the computer terminal first; if the door was locked, chances are there's a good bet that something good - or valuable, at the very least - was behind said door.

It took me a few minutes to crack the security on the terminal... jackpot. This was the "contraband" room. I unlocked the door using the terminal, and then started scrolling through the entries still on the network. There was one labeled "dispenser report" that caught my eye:

Dispensers are up and running. Unlike most everything else, we've had few problems with them. I heard they'd been part of some World's Fair exhibit Sinclair had seen, so he contacted the researchers about the dispensers to see if he could use them here.

Turns out, the dispensers do more than supply convenience items: if there's an emergency or the threat of communist attack, codes can unlock ammo and repair kits for the dispensers. Stored back-ups of the codes in the contraband room. Just in case.

Dispensers... I'd have to look around, see if I could find what this entry was talking about. Whatever these dispensers were, they sounded useful. And I'd need all the help I could get here.

The door to the contraband room opened with a hiss, and I started looking around. Most of it was junk. Dirty magazines and liquor, that sort of thing... but the further back I got, the more useful stuff I found. Some brass knuckles, some chems like Med-X, Buffout, a few super stimpacks... there were even four frag grenades, and some ammo - a couple of boxes of .30-06 springfield rifle rounds. What really surprised me was the gun I found: an M1918 Browning Automatic Rifle. At least, that's what the engraving on the side of the rifle above the trigger said it was.

I grabbed everything useful I could carry, used the stimpack I was saving on my wounded arm, and I was just about to leave to check the other room when I saw a glint out of the corner of my eye. I followed the source and found two holotapes: they had pieces of duct tape on the side that had been written on, indicating one was a vending machine code for "steady," a kind of chem that would supposedly help your aim, and another was a vending machine code for .38 special rounds. I downloaded the code for the ammo into my Pip Boy - that revolver was definitely going to need more, eventually - and left the steady code where it was. As desperate as I was for help here, using something that addicting was definitely something I could do without.

I guess now, all I had to do was find one of those vending machines.

Before I left the police station, I checked the locker room in the back. Honestly, there wasn't all that much in here. But there was enough. I found some armor: a Kevlar flak jacket with ceramic plates inside to protect the front and rear, and "SECURITY" stenciled in yellow across the back. I also found a couple of underarm holsters in one of the lockers. That was definitely good news: it meant I didn't have to keep that revolver tucked in the back of my pants anymore.

Right. Enough stalling... C'mon Sheason, you need to get back outside... into the air that will slowly kill you. Staying in here isn't going to get you out of this hellhole.

A few minutes later, I was outside. Warily, I shut the door behind me... and froze. Ahead of me, I saw the pieces of the villa inhabitant I'd killed earlier still lying on the ground - and about 30 or 40 yards distant was another one of the villa inhabitants. This one was wearing the same kind of chemical suit, except it had no hood. I could see now that the mask covered the entire head, not just the face. It was like some kind of strange metal skull... combined with the pall of green smoke leaking out of its face, and the glowing green lenses instead of eyes. I admit that I was more than a little creeped out.

I ducked behind a nearby pillar, and got out of sight as quickly as I could. I heard that same rasping-pulsing noise as before, and... a metal clunk. Cautiously, I peered around the pillar to see if I could get a better view from behind cover.

The way the creature was moving - the glowing green lenses on its face darting back and forth, carefully scanning the courtyard as it slowly and deliberately moved from darkened corner to darkened corner - I could tell that it was searching for something. Or someone. Probably me.

That was when I realized it wasn't carrying a spear like the one before - instead, it looked like it had a bear trap on its hand. I don't mean the trap was closed shut on its arm, like the bear trap on Dog's ... or God's... arm; it looked like it had been modified into a weapon that closed when the user punched someone. Like a power fist, but with a bear trap instead of a hydraulic piston.

"What the fuck?" I breathed involuntarily. Immediately, I pressed my back against the pillar and covered my mouth, hoping against hope that I hadn't been loud enough to hear. I reached behind me for the spear and - MOTHERFUCKER! I must have been so busy looting the police station that I lost the only thing I had that could reliably chop off limbs.

Right. Okay. This doesn't necessarily have to turn into a terrible situation. I'd snuck out easily enough without the thing out there noticing me, I'd just need to sneak back into the police station and -

Right as I reached for the door, I saw a blur of rusted metal fly past my eyes. A fist slammed into the door inches from my face, and the bear trap smashed into the cloud-stained door with a metal clank and a shower of sparks. A mask with two glowing green lenses and an air filter pumping out a cloud of green smoke just seemed to appear in front of me out of nowhere.

I staggered backwards and gripped at the nearby wall to try and keep my balance; it didn't really work, as my hands just slipped against the cloud slime, and I couldn't find grip. Instinct took over. I planted my back foot, and pulled the revolver out of the underarm holster, slipped into V.A.T.S., and emptied five shots point blank directly into the creature's face.

It wasn't even phased. The left lens exploded in a shower of glass and green smoke. The other four bullets just seemed to pass straight through the gas mask; white fluid started to leak out of the bullet holes in its face. I backed up but it kept slowly advancing on me, the bear trap on its fist resetting with a heavy metal clunk.

It made that same awful pulsing-rasping sound - gurgling slightly - and in a flash its bear-trap-fist was coming straight for me. I tried to back up, dodge out of the way, but it didn't break stride and slammed the bear trap into the middle of my chest. I'm just glad I was wearing that armor - the bear trap's metal teeth clamped down on the Kevlar with the force of a hammer, and I got the wind knocked out of me, but thankfully the metal teeth didn't go all the way through. Another hit like that, though...

The bear trap was completely latched onto my chest armor, so I did the only thing I could think to do. I grabbed its arm with both hands, like I was holding a vice... and then I twisted the vice. There was a loud, wet crunch, and I was sure by the way its arm was twisted that I'd broken it in at least two places. It howled through the filter on its gas mask, and its free hand reached up, grabbing me by the shoulder. It had a grip almost as strong as the bear trap, and it pulled at me so hard, I thought my arm was going to be wrenched out of its socket.

I twisted my right arm around, and smashed it in the face several times with my now empty pistol. When it didn't let go, I grabbed the back of its head, and swung us both around... With any luck, that pillar I had been hiding behind was still where I'd left it.

The creature was smashed face-first into the pillar. It let out a barely audible groan, and I could see the pillar was cracked beneath its face, and was stained with that white-yellow fluid leaking out of the bullet holes. I wrenched the bear trap off my chest, and its broken arm fell down limp at its side... but the rest of the creature didn't go limp. It kept trying to move, get back up...

"FUCK YOU, YOU FUCKING... FUCK!" I shouted, practically frothing at the mouth as I grabbed it by the back of its head and started smashing it into the pillar again and again and again. "WHY! THE! FUCK! WON'T! YOU! FUCKING! DIE! ALREADY!" I pulled the Browning Automatic Rifle I'd grabbed from the contraband room off my back, and smashed the wooden stock of it against the back of its neck as hard as I could. I didn't have anything I could use to cut its head off, but maybe if I applied enough blunt force trauma...

Its head was practically concave now, and was completely twisted at an odd angle: it was upright, pressed against the pillar, while it's body was leaning limply at an obtuse angle. Eventually, it slid down, leaving a trail of that unnaturally white blood as its face scraped along the side of the pillar. I was already breathing heavily, and I stood over it for a minute or so before I finally started to move on... but not before giving it a decent kick in the side for good measure.

I was halfway across the small courtyard in front of the police station when I heard a noise from behind me that even the constantly ringing bell couldn't drown out. A loud, wheezing, pulsing gasp. I turned around, the automatic rifle still in hand, and watched as the broken form of the villa inhabitant - its head still twisted at an odd angle and its face still concave, but the arm with the bear trap fist somehow no longer twisted like it was broken - clutch at the wall and slowly start to pick itself up.

I didn't even have any words. I just hefted the automatic rifle up, took aim, and fired.

"Ah... there's your signal... Faint, but there..." I heard Elijah say over my Pip Boy's speaker. I was walking around the villa, trying to figure out my next move. Thankfully, I didn't run into any more of those undead inhabitants... but I was starting to think I was lost. The streets were so twisted, and the map making utility on my Pip Boy just looked like a random mass of lines, picking up every facet and crevice... even the maps of caves weren't this confusing.

"Lost sight of me, did ya?" I said, checking around a nearby corner.

"That same interference that cut me off from the FEV reject must have created a larger dark zone than I... yes... yes..." It almost sounded like he was muttering to himself. He cleared his throat. "I take it you found the animal?"

"Yeah, and as far as I know, he's back by the fountain. Now, since you seem to know, maybe you can tell me: where the fuck am I, and where should I go next?"

"Hmm..." Elijah coughed, and I involuntarily let out one of my own. The cloud must be getting to me again. I need to find some shelter soon. "It looks like you're close to the Medical District. Collar 12. I think she's... the collar is somewhere in the Clinic."

"This another super mutant, or what?" I asked, carefully making my way down the street. A flash of light caught my eye - but it wasn't reddish-orange, like all the other lights seemed to be in the Villa. This light was a sort of bright blue-green, a sort of glowing turquoise. Needless to say, it stood out.

"No, no... the FEV reject is unique... and obedient, collar or no. Though, the collar helps..." Okay, that I knew for a fact wasn't true. It suddenly struck me that Elijah's perception of the Dog/God super mutant didn't seem complete... maybe he'd only ever dealt with the muttering brute, and not the other voice? Did he even know about Nightkin, and how they were different from regular super mutants? I mean, I hadn't known the difference before going to Jacobstown, so it seemed plausible enough...

"So, who is it then?" I asked. For a solid minute, Elijah didn't say anything. I just heard him breathing in and out over the speaker.

"I don't know. You'll have to see what the traps caught." Again, it seemed to me that he wasn't telling the truth. Not the whole truth, at least. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw that same turquoise light again, and decided to follow it. Eventually, I came upon an odd looking machine. It was a rectangular box, decorated in a sort of pseudo art-deco style with a circular dish on the top that seemed to be emitting that turquoise light. There was a small tray at the bottom of the dish, seemingly to connect it to the rest of the machine. Underneath and to the side of the tray was a small slot, with a symbol of the Sierra Madre next to it.

Unlike the rest of the Villa, the outer metal shell of the machine looked completely untouched and unmarred... and as I got closer, tiny lines of holographic light began to appear on the tray... it almost looked like a list or a menu, and a three-dimensional wireframe creating... something. Whatever this thing was, it managed to look like it didn't belong and somehow perfectly blend in at the same time.

"Hey, you can see me, right?" I asked, looking around to see if I could see a CCTV camera anywhere. Elijah coughed.

"Yes, yes. Why? What else do you want?"

"What am I standing in front of?"

"Hold on..." There was a pause, followed by a metal clatter, like something dropping on the ground. "Damnit, get back here..." There was the sound of more distant and muffled shuffling over the radio, until finally Elijah came back. "Now, where were - oh, yes. Yes. The Vending Machines. They're assembly stations. Schematics are stored within... dispensers with unlock codes... They use the casino chips scattered around as batteries... alloys and raw material embedded in the shell... some hybrid form of fission and fusion... the cusp of unimaginable prosperity..."

As his words trailed off into incomprehensible mumblings, I took out one of the chips, and turned the small metal octagon over in my hands, examining it. If what he was saying was true... that this small chip could be used to make something useful with the aid of one of these machines... I guess it's a good thing I kept hold of these chips. Now, I just needed to find more.

"They resemble the vending machines of the Mojave," Elijah spoke up, no longer muttering to himself. "...but they are, in fact, crafting devices of tremendous versatility. Once, an Old World convenience, now... now they are a means of survival." His words seemed to echo my own thoughts. "Use the chips to power them. Use them correctly, and they will help you to survive the horrors you still have yet to face."

When Elijah said I was 'close' to the Clinic and Collar 12, I mistakenly assumed that I might have an easier time of it than getting to the police station.

The first real obstacle came in the form of one of the Villa's speakers. This was almost like the radios in the Police Station... except that I couldn't shut these off. On the plus side, at least the box the speaker was connected to had a light, which gave away its position. Unfortunately, I could already tell that whoever built this place wanted to hide the speakers in discrete, out of the way locations.

The first speaker, for instance, was located directly above the door to the Medical District - and didn't start to set my collar off until after I'd already walked across the threshold. At least I knew the signals could be blocked, but by what seemed way too inconsistent... or maybe there were rules about the frequency that I just didn't know. Either way...

I ended up destroying it with a well placed shot from the revolver. It might not be any good against the Villa inhabitants, but hey, at least it was good for something, right? The noise from the revolver, however, brought on the second obstacle: more of the Villa inhabitants.

Their approach was hardly discrete, which gave me time to hide properly - and this time, I was determined to keep my stinking mouth shut. There were two of them, with hoods like the first one I'd fought. One of them carried a spear in its hand, and several more on its back; the other also had several spears on its back, but I could see something else in its hand. It almost looked like a giant fire extinguisher... or maybe a giant gas bottle. Whatever it was, I could see a small sensor module and a series of wires on the end of it. No points for guessing what that was.

I remained as still and silent as I could behind the pillar as the two creatures shuffled along, their green lenses scanning the area. Their breathing - at least, that's what I was assuming was causing that awful noise - was so perfectly synced with one another that it almost sounded like a single creature.

As slowly as I could, I reached behind me, and pulled one of the frag grenades off my belt. The creatures continued to scan the area. I moved carefully as I could, acutely aware of every tiny sound I made - the brushing of fabric against Kevlar, my breathing, the sound of a fleshy finger brushing against metal - but if I made any sounds, they seemed oblivious...

Until I pulled the pin on the grenade. That unmistakable metal 'clink' made the two of them snap their attention directly toward me. Disregarding stealth, I lobbed the grenade at the creatures; as it flew toward them, their breathing finally de-synced, and a horrible Doppler-wheeze filled the air. The lenses on their masks followed the grenade perfectly as it arced through the air, and landed at their feet.

There was a loud bang - louder than a frag grenade could've created - and there was a massive cloud of brown-red dust kicked up, along with a billowing cloud of fire, consuming the spot where the two inhabitants had stood. My ears started ringing badly after the blast. I think the giant gas bottle the one had been carrying must have been set off, because when the smoke cleared, I didn't see anything except splatters of yellowish-white blood, and large irregular chunks of white meat slowly letting off small clouds of bright green gas.

I needed to make myself scarce, and fast. If a single gunshot breaking a speaker was enough to draw two of these things out of the woodwork, who know how many would be drawn to the sounds of a giant explosion. I still had no idea how these things hunted - I had a sneaking suspicion it was by sound and not sight, but I wasn't really looking forward to testing that theory.

A few minutes of alternating between running and sneaking through the shadows later, I found myself in a much smaller courtyard than the one in front of the police station. I saw a sign lit up over a door - a red cross, and the words "clnica" written in white block letters. Off in the distance, I could hear the faint sounds of the inhabitants getting closer. The sounds seemed to echo off the walls, so I couldn't quite tell where they were. Better not take any chances.

I shut the door of the clinic behind me, and I immediately started breathing easier. As I leaned against the door, grateful I wasn't being slowly strangled by the Cloud, my Pip Boy's speaker crackled to life... but not all the way. I could tell Elijah was speaking, but the transmission was broken up by bursts of static.

"...lar 21? Ca...ou hea...ur signal is fa...king up...picking up an emit...nature - wat...sec...rams, danger...n't shoot them - attacking...useless."

There was a final crackle of static, and the speaker went silent.

"Well," I said aloud. "That wasn't ominous or anything."

I found myself in the waiting room of the clinic; there was a counter with a terminal right in front of me, about half a dozen chairs, and two doors leading deeper into the clinic on either side of the counter. There was a stimpack and a holotape on the counter... jackpot! This was a holotape that contained a schematic for making more stimpacks from the vending machines! That was going to be very useful later on.

Off in the corner, I saw another glowing handprint painted on the wall... and another suitcase, just like before. I approached it and was about to open it up to check what was inside... when I heard a noise from above me, and I froze. I tilted my ear towards the ceiling... and listened. It almost sounded like footsteps, but... there was something off about it. I couldn't quite place it...

Thud. Thud. Thud. Thud. Thud. Silence for a few seconds... and then it started up again.

Through the doorway to my left was a set of stairs, so I decided to sneak up and find out what was making the noise. It didn't sound like one of the villa inhabitants; they never seemed to stop. This did, for whatever reason.

There was another door at the top of the stairs, so I rounded the corner and peered through the doorway. There was a long hallway beyond the door, and walking the length of it was another figure like the holographic woman standing on top of the fountain. This one was blue like she was, but it looked like a man - wearing the same kind of armor that I was.

This must be one of the security holograms Elijah mentioned... and as I watched it walk along the hallway, I could finally tell why the sound was so odd. Every time it took a step, there was an echoing reverb to the footsteps, like the sound you'd get when you hit an empty propane tank with a hammer.

Abruptly, it came to a halt... and stared at me. At the same time, there was a sound like air being sucked into a vacuum, and the hologram's color shifted from blue to yellow. Okay, that's not good. It raised its holographic hands to its face, made the same noise as before... and the hologram shifted once again from yellow to red.

Suddenly, a flash of red light lanced through the air, splintering part of the doorframe I was hiding behind. Son of a bitch! It was shooting lasers now! Instinctively, I ducked as quickly as I could away from the door and back down the stairs; three or four more lasers cut through the air behind me.

I waited for a few minutes at the base of the stairs. It wasn't following me down... maybe the range of whatever emitter was projecting it was limited to the top floor? I started searching around, looking for something - anything. That terminal might be a good place to start...

Amazingly, it wasn't locked. A quick search through it, and I found the hologram protocols... let's see now... According to this, the hologram was currently set to patrol the second floor. There was an option to patrol the first floor, and it looked like the patrols were mutually exclusive. That meant there must be one of those hologram emitters down here somewhere... and that gave me an idea.

I looked up from the terminal, and into the nearby hallway - about halfway to the end of the hall was a small blue disk mounted on the wall. When I got a close look at it, I realized it looked almost exactly like the emitter on the end of the holorifle... and on the side of the casing was a small latch. I popped it open, grabbed two of the wires, and pulled them loose.

Thud. Thud. Thud. The hologram must have been right above me now. I rushed back to the terminal, and set the hologram's program to "Patrol first floor." There was a electric flicker down the hallway; the emitter seemed to explode in a shower of bright sparks and then it went completely dark. I listened carefully, and couldn't hear any more footsteps anywhere... but there was another sound coming from deeper inside the clinic. It wasn't footsteps...

Well, now that I didn't have holograms in here to worry about, I had plenty of time to look around. Maybe I could find that collar. The best bet was probably to follow the noise - it was like someone (or something) rapidly striking against something metal. The first floor hallway had a bend, and -

Beep.

Fuck. There was another radio or a speaker somewhere... My collar beeped again, and I looked down the end of the bend in the hall - there! At the far end of the hall, I could see another one of those speakers, like the one I shot when I first came into the medical district. My collar started beeping faster, so I pulled the pistol out of its holster, took aim and fired.

Beep. Beep. Beep. Nothing. This speaker didn't blow up like the other one. I started to feel beads of sweat on my forehead. I kept firing, emptying the last three shots in the revolver into the speaker, but the light didn't go out... the red light... shit. This must be one of the shielded speakers - the other one I shot had a white light. I ran back into the lobby as quick as I could, and let out a sigh of relief when my collar finally stopped beeping.

This day was just getting worse. Alright, c'mon Sheason. Think. Think. There's got to be something you can do...

And then it hit me. That speaker had to be powered by something. Cut the power, turn off the speaker. I just had to find what was powering it... I cycled through my eyes, past the night vision, past the thermal vision, and settled on what Veronica had called the "EM" (or electromagnetic) vision. The world turned black, and I could see pinpoints of white light all around me. There was a strong white line on the ceiling... That looked like it could be the cables that were powering the speaker. So I decided to follow it...

When I switched my eyes back to normal, I found myself in a dark and dingy basement. At the far end of the room was a generator, softly humming and obviously still powered up. It didn't take long to figure out how to turn it off. I searched the room... didn't find much. There were a few microfusion cells - which seemed uncharacteristically lucky, given what else had happened - but that was about it.

Right. Time to find out what was making that noise.

There were a few emergency lights in the hallways, but it was pretty dark now. And all I could hear was that pounding. It almost sounded like a rhythmic sort of noise... wait, no, that wasn't it. It was frantic. It sounded like someone pounding on a metal door... I looked into the rooms along the hallway - in each room, I saw large cylinders, with the same symbol on each of the doors: a staff, with two snakes intertwined around it, and a pair of wings at the top of the staff. A caduceus?

These must be some kind of Auto-Docs, but... I'd never seen any Auto Docs like these before. The ones at Usanagi's clinic east of Vegas that fixed me up after I got beaten half to death at The Fort were just metal boxes with half a dozen articulated metal arms coming off of it.

I rounded a corner, and saw the last room in the hallway - the sound was definitely coming from inside. There was another Auto-Doc in the center of the room, and I could definitely hear someone inside banging against the door.

"Hang on in there," I said, checking the terminal next to the big metal cylinder. "I'm gonna get you out of there, hold on." I cycled through the options as quickly as I could, until I found the door release. There was a hiss of escaping gas; the door must have been hermetically sealed. Fingers reached through the door as it started to slowly slide open... and then a girl practically fell out of the Auto Doc.

She was a little bit shorter than me, and wearing a pair of brown pants and a white bloodstained tank top. Just like me, she had a bomb collar around her neck, and that meant she was probably the person I was looking for.

However, her head... she was completely bald. And covered in scars. There was a large scar ringing the top of her head, and another one bisecting her skull- it almost looked like if you were to grab her head just right, her skull would simply pry apart. Not only that, but there was a pair of scars at the edge of her mouth, trailing down. It made her look like she was constantly frowning. Finally... there was one large scar on her neck, just barely visible beneath the bomb collar. Most of the scars looked fairly old, but that one... that was fresh. And still red.

The woman clutched at the Auto Doc door - she looked disoriented. She blinked a few times, and winced; it was almost like blinking caused her pain... and then she started to lose her balance.

"Whoa! Hey!" I rushed forward and caught her, keeping her from falling. "Are you alright?" She pushed me away, and staggered back to her feet. She looked right at me, blinked again, and opened her mouth... but nothing came out. She clutched at her throat right below the bomb collar, and her eyes went wide as her fingers traced the scar.

"Look, I don't know what's happened, but... I'm here to help. Can you speak?" She just kept clutching at her neck... and then she looked over to the Auto-Doc. She recoiled backward; her mouth was wide open, but no sound came out. She looked back at me, then to the Auto Doc... and then she looked at me, narrowing her eyes and clenching her fists. It didn't take a genius to figure out what she was thinking.

"This isn't what it looks like." I held out my hands in what I hoped was a disarming gesture. "Look, I got you out of that thing - I didn't put you in there. I'm here to help." Thankfully, she unclenched her fists... but she kept her feet planted in a pseudo-combat stance. She didn't look pained or confused now - she looked angry. She opened her mouth again, winced, and then frowned. She dragged a finger across her throat in a slow motion... until her hand gently brushed against her collar. Her frown deepened, and I saw her start to trace the edge of the collar.

"Hang on, you don't want to do that!" She didn't seem to listen. She traced the edge of the collar until she found the lock. She started to press it... "WHOA! Stop! Listen to me, that's a bomb collar! If you mess with it, it'll go off!" That got her attention. She looked surprised... but then her eyes drifted down, and settled on my collar. She looked back up at me, and raised an eyebrow.

"Yeah... Let's just say we're in this together."

She just shook her head... and started walking out of the room.

"Hang on, what do you mean by that?" She glanced over her shoulder, but kept walking out of the room, down the hallway. I grabbed her by the shoulder and turned her around to look at me. "If your collar goes off, then mine goes off. We need to cooperate if we're going to get out of here, and it's better if we guard each other."

She shook her head again. She rolled her shoulder, shaking off my hand, and took a step back. She took a finger and started drawing a line between the two of us.

"That's not going to work for me." I said. She shook her head - once - and crossed her arms. I sighed. "Look, I'm not... I'm not trying to order you here. But your life is tied to mine. And I'm going to need your help if we're both going to get through this."

She frowned, glancing at my collar, and then stared back at me. She made a circle with her hands, and put them around her eyes - like she was holding binoculars - and squinted. She nodded at me, lowered her hands from her eyes, and shook her head. Then she drew a slow line between the two of us.

Fuck. I hate charades.

"Alright. You're looking for something else. Fine. I can help."

She studied me again, and her expression seemed to... soften? She shook her head slowly, and gave a silent sigh. She nodded at me, then motioned her head towards the hallway. Alright, I guess that was progress.

"So, does this mean we're going to work together?" I held out a hand; it hadn't worked with God, but maybe... She smiled grimly with the corner of her mouth, and reluctantly shook my hand. Fuck me, that's a hell of a grip.

"Alright. Works for me. Now, do you know a way out of here that isn't the front door?" She raised an eyebrow at that. "It's just those... things. The ones with the gas masks. They're probably gathered around the front by now." She sighed and shook her head again. She motioned with her thumb for me to follow her, and then she started walking back down the hall.

A few minutes later, she'd led me into one of the rooms in the first hallway. This one didn't have any Auto Docs... but I saw a few examining tables with bodies on them. They were wearing jumpsuits, like what I was wearing under the security armor... and they didn't have heads. Wonderful.

"Hey, are you sure there's a way ou- WHOA!" I turned around to take a look at the mute woman; against all probability, she had taken her shirt off. I turned around and faced the wall. A primeval part of my brain wanted to look, but... thankfully, my common decency won out.

"Okay, yeah, I'm just gonna... Yeah, I'll give you some... privacy. I guess. Right. I'm just going to look over at this wall. This seems like a nice wall." I don't know why, but I was babbling. Wait, no, I knew exactly why. Why the fuck was she getting naked at a time like this? She must be crazy.

I felt the back of a hand bat me across the side of my head after a few minutes of staring at the wall. I guess that was her way of telling me it was safe to turn around. I gotta say... I was in for a bit of a shock when I got a look at her. She was wearing a black bodysuit with combat boots, knee-pads, a web belt with at least four ammo pouches, and some kind of chest armor made out of a grey ceramic that I couldn't identify.

"Uh... okay then." I couldn't really think of anything to say. She motioned with her head towards the door, and started walking. Before she left, though, I spoke up. "Hey, hold up. Here. Might as well have a weapon if we're going out there." I handed her the automatic rifle. She looked down at it, and then up at me with a raised eyebrow... and then she smirked, taking it from me.

I started following her through the clinic. Up the stairs, through another hallway, and then... outside. As if on cue, a thunderclap boomed above us. The mute woman was looking around - apparently, this door led out onto a balcony. I didn't see any of the villa inhabitants... but I could hear them, off in the distance.

"What are you..." I watched as she shouldered the massive rifle, and started to climb. Before I knew it, she'd shimmied up the wall and was up on the overhanging parapet above the balcony. I heard two thumps, and then she peered over the edge back at me. Alright then...

"Fine, I'm coming," I said, trying to climb up the same way she did. How the hell did she find the grip? It took a while, but eventually, I found my way onto the roof... after the mute woman held out a hand to pull me up.

"Thanks..." I said, looking around the roof. She gave me a quick nod. "So, do you know how to get to the fountain in the center of town?" She looked down, pointed at my Pip Boy, and looked back up at me disapprovingly. "Yeah, the map on this is pretty much useless. I thought I'd have more luck asking directions from someone who actually knows where they're going."

The mute woman smirked and shook her head at me. She motioned with her head, and started walking along the roof - presumably, towards the fountain. I followed her, silent as she was.

What next?

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