Random Encounter ================ So we rejoin the boys after the wilderness Gecko ambush. People are patched up and brought around...the shaman Josiah Sawbones looks down at the ruin of his right hand...his shooting hand... and then at the rather large plasma rifle at his side... ...a sob escapes the tribal... 'WHY GOD WHYYYYYY!' A long period of intense howling and auguish sunders the tranquility of the surrounding area...finally curtailed by the intervention of the tall green mutant. Vat69 stares down at kneeling figure of the heartbroken shaman before grabbing him by the scruff of his neck, hauling him up and then shaking him roughly. Josiah's lament subsides somewhat as the green giant gestures at the stump that was the mutant's left arm...and then articulates that crying like a yssup with girlie white teeth isn't gonna change the shaman's predictament one jot... ..Josiah is suitably chastened by the wise words of the mutant but still has difficultly letting go of his grief.... ..until finally, Vat69 demostrates the firing principle of the plasma rifle, indicating that it can still be fired even by someone without a thumb and missing a couple of fingers...the shaman's disposition is comforted by this revelation. But this act of mercy, is but the first of many labours performed by the green mutant this day. His mismatched eyes survey the remains of the Gecko lair as a memory surfaces from within the mutant's dark psyche...gecko pelts are worth a few bottle caps... Hmmmmm......... The mutant works his way around the reptilian carnage and eventually gathers 6 dead geckos that are still worthy of being skinned. Vat69 then sets about his grisly task with gusto and after but a few minutes of slashing, shredding and pounding, he looks down at the fruit of his labour....a shredded, slashed bloody mass of skin, bone, muscle and gecko pulp. Arse. The rest of the night passes peacefully and the Fallout warriors wake to continue their trek towards the "Den" in the cool of the morning. Unable to skin a gecko, Vat69 decides to drag the remaining 5 dead lizard carcasses the remaining distance to the Den. "But won't they smell?' inquires the tracker Jonah Travis. "No worse then me" answers the green giant as he hefts the ropes attached to the gecko corpses over his shoulder. Jonah Travis can't argue with that. So Team 'Certain Death for Vault 18' resume their trek across the radioactive, barren wilderness towards the Den....the landscape eventually begins to change into hues of green. The baked, dusty earth giving way to sheets of black asphalt and these make the going a lot easier...especially for stupid people dragging 5 dead geckos behind them. Several days pass quickly and without incident, the ever increasing vegatation lifting the spirits of the team members as they near the large settlement. As the team wind their way around a canyon system close to the town, the sound of their footfalls and the scrape scrape of dead, stinking geckos is blotted out by the sudden eruption of gunfire. The familiar forms of 6 raiders stare down (and fire down) on the strung out members of Team Certain Death for Vault 18 standing bewildered on the canyon floor below...only the shaman Josiah has the wits to notice that the canyon system might provide an almost perfect ambush location, as he stands at the rear of the canyon. Bullets richochet in all directions and several team members feel there sting. Josiah Sawbones moves behind a boulder and then brings his plasma rifle to bear against one of the assailants. "eeeeeeeeeeZEEEEEEEMMMM" "BOOOOOM!" A section of canyon slope explodes into a plume of dust and smoke. The raider near the impact point drops his weapon and falls back in shock. Vat69 releases his gecko burden and unsheathes his trusty machete. He quickly appraises the situation before loping up the right hand canyon slope at double quick time. The green mutant is followed by figure of Alex Mantilla, the female commander of Team Vault. She has her pistol drawn and is intent in keep the mutant's body between her and the raiders above. Jonah Travis unslings his hunting rifle and dives behind the pile of stinking gecko carcasses left by Vat69. He quickly steadies himself, before returning fire at the raiders on the left hand side of the canyon. Rocco the dog surveys the scene through canine eyes, his alert but simple doggy brain assesses the options available to him ...KILL...EAT...SHAG...SIT...ROLLOVER...PLAY..CRAP.. ..PLAY DEAD....PLAY CUTE...CONFUSED STARE... ...RUN AT TOP SPEED, IN A WIDE ARC TO THE RIGHT, THEN TO TURN AND TAKE THE OPPOSITION IN THE BACK UTILISING A CLASSIC PINCER MOVEMENT AS WRITTEN BY SUN TZU... ....after angling his head and giving a quick "CONFUSED STARE" the large mutt selects the last option. The dog's muscular form rapidly disappears past the Shaman at the rear of the canyon area, apparently the canine appears to be running like a bitch away from the combat. A vein throbs on the forehead of Jonah Travis as bullet impacts thunder all around him. 'DOG!...GET THE FECK BACK HERE! YOUR'RE TRAINED TO TAKE THE BULLET FOR YOUR MASTER! TAKE THE MUTHER-FECKING BULLETS DOG! .....DDDDDDDOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOGGGGGG!!!!!!!' Meanwhile the trusty trio of Buster(PhilM), Roc(NPC..played by PhilM) and B.o.X.(absent PC...also played by PhilM) unholster weapons (where appropriate) and return fire at the raiders on the left hand slope of the canyon. The NPC guard takes up a standing position behind Buster (thereby protecting Buster from shots from the rear), who himself is now crouching (as best he can) behind the 'red lights flashing at max' armoured plated sides of B.O.X. Missiles begin to glance and ping off the sides of the robot CPU. The red hue of it's LED lights rising ever brighter. Roc Ingersol, one of the original members of the Vault 18's security team (known simply as the "Redshirts"), draws a bead on one raider and fires...BANG!..his 10mm pistol explodes spraying the nearby area with hot schrapnel.... The weapon explosion leaves all vault members in the vicinity on the deck and in various degrees of pain (where appropriate). Roc Ingersol holds the remaining bit of his shredded hand and bellows in agony..he already knows this isn't gonna be his day (...doesn't he Kell? 8-)..) Bullets, bolts, arrows, small boulders are now raining into (and out of) the canyon. Thus would a director decides to film the ensuing battle in quick, jerky, arty action time. Guns explode with alarming regularity sending showers of schrapnel in all directions, weapons quite unexpectedly leap from their users hands and tumble up & down slopes, plasma wielding tribal shaman blow great chunks out of canyon slopes, steadily bringing the party's foes down to eye level. Meanwhile, Vat69 has reached melee range with only a few scratches on his person. He raises his large, heavy and incredibly sharp machete above the head of the closest raider. 'FERCHUNK!' One dead raider...body...one dead raider head. The green mutant angles the blood dripping machete at the next nearest raider punk and gives him the 'I'm coming to get you next baby!' look. Remarkably, the raider punk is undeterred as he calmly changes his aim, flips a switch on the pistol and then lets rip at the mutant in full automatic mode. Several things happen...all of them bad. The tough raider punk is disheartened when... a) he accidently shoots himself in the foot, before b) the gun jams, before c) the ammo clips falls to the floor, spilling rounds everwhere, before d) he slips on said rounds, falls down arse first and loses the grip on his pistol, before e) sliding down the canyon slope and away from the fight. Vat69's smile is wide for all to see, he starts to walk towards the last remaining raider on this side of the canyon...this punk knows where he stands and it don't smell too good. He decides correctly to drop his weapon and then do a runner. The green mutant gives chase, machete held aloft. Meanwhile on the other side of the canyon, the battle goes badly for the tracker known as Jonah Travis, pinned as he is behind 5 stinking gecko corpses. For reasons still unknown he has decided to throw his hunting rifle 10 metres in front of him, leaving him armed only with an ineffectual pistol, a desperate looking pipe rifle, a spear & a couple of rusty knifes of varying sharpness. His backup, the three Vault dudes are all down and bleeding and there are still 3 fairly ok raider bastads (fully armed) on the left hand slope firing down at him! And to make the situation *perfect* one of the raiders now decides to casually walking down the slope, towards his hunting rifle with the intention of using said weapon against him. Great. But Mr Over-Confident Raider has forgotton about the shaman Josiah Sawbones and his Plamsa Rifle of Power. The plasma rifle angles towards the walking raider on the slope and a green bolt leaves the muzzle of the weapon. KEEEEEEMMMMM! SQUELCH! The powerful emerald bolt strikes the prone figure of Roc Ingersol. The NPC guard's incessant wails of pain end abruptly as his body is turned instantly into black, charred ash. This smoking cadaver retains it's human form momentarily....before a breeze catches it and the fine ash disperses itself around the canyon. A period of shocked silence follows.... ..before battle is rejoined..Jonah unloads his pistol at the raider dude descending down the slope (this however doesn't means that said Raider falls to the ground, body peppered with bullets...no...the use of the word "unloads" refers to the magazine in the Tracker's gun falling to the floor and then spilling cartridges everywhere) Vat69 & Tactical Dog Rocco plummel and pincer the two remaining raiders on the right hand side of the canyon. Their prize for a sucessful encounter?...4 horses & a pair of motorbikes. Yummy...Vat69 & the TDR approach the horses with jaws salivating.... The raider pinging crossbow quarrels off B.O.X's armoured (yet dented) sides casts his weapon aside and draws a knife. He peers over the lip of the slope and assesses his options... Down below Buster watches this action before bringing his pistol to bear....click...chunck....buggerit!...the watching Raider above smiles before rising and trudging purposely down the slope, knife at the ready. Josiah Sawbones observes this and once more brings the Plasma Rifle of Power to bear..... eeeeeeeeEEEEEEEEeeeee.....fizt... BUGGERIT! The green light on the weapon's power cell goes out...the shaman surveys the action in the canyon and then decides it might be safer to simply duck down quitely behind the boulder. Meanwhile, back in the action, the raider near Jonah has reached the hunting rifle. The mohican haired punk appraises the weapon before lining up his sights in Jonah Travis's direction. Jonah, the tracker who can do no right, sees this and ducks down again behind the stinking, festering gecko pile. The raider above waits a while but seeing that no amount of insults or wild shots are gonna prise the tracker out of decaying gecko arse decides to switch to standard Raider weapon 'B'. Jonah puzzled by the sudden lack of firing, risks a glance, and spies the raider lighting a rag stuffed into a bottle. 'YOU HAVE GOT TO BE YANKING MY CHAIN!' *cue slow motion and heartbeat sound* Raider's arm reaching back.. Jonah's eyes rising.. Raider arm swinging and launching lit bottle... Jonah rising to his feet... Bottle arcing thru clear blue sky.. Jonah..turning to make a heroic leap... Raider unslinging the hunting rifle... Bottle arcing down behind Jonah's head... *cue: slow motion off* BIG-BADDA-BOOOOM! Jonah is lifted and then smashed against an canyon wall just behind a large boulder. The wind is kicked outta the tracker's lungs as the sound of the explosion roars around the canyon and bits of dead(er?) gecko begin to rain down. Meanwhile, Buster leaps up from behind the B.O.X and charges at his knife wielding assailant. The pair tussle and quickly fall to the floor. The LED lights on the B.O.X. change from red to a bright green as it "watches" the action before it...you can almost hear... 'come on you raiders...come on you raiders' Alex Mantilla tanks up towards the pair, pistol in hand. The busty tech sergeant tries to draw a bead on the raider with the knife but the melee between him and Buster is too intense for such fine aiming.... ....so Alex decides to shoot anyway....=8-O The gun jams...cursing her ill luck the female commander draws her deadly combat knife and decides to enter the fray. Meanwhile, FER-CHUNK! A severed horse's head drops heavily to the desert floor, whilst the other end of the horse falls the other way. Bright equine blood pumps in copious quantities into the dry, baked sand. The remaining horses panic, rearing and pulling at their tethers...one horse manages to free itself and launches itself into the desert closely followed by Rocco, aka the Wonder Dog. The chase is long and arduous but champion horsey eventually outruns his pursuing hell hound after a couple of close shaves and nasty nicks. Meanwhile, the tussle in the dirt between Buster, Alex and the raider is drawing to a 'grab the raider's head and smash it into the floor until he stops struggling' kinda close...2 broken knives lie ..um..broken..on the floor as the victorious Vault Dwellers eventually rise to their feet. The pair watch the last remaining raider (the one with the hunting rifle) disappear over the crest of the canyon and outta the fight. They then turn at the sound of running footsteps from behind them and a voice shouting 'NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!... ...and then watch the figure of Josiah Sawbones tank pass and up the canyon slope after the remaining raider.... ..cries of 'Bring it back yer bastad!...it's mine!' drift down towards their ears as the shaman disappears over the lip. The fight has ended and nothing remains but to patch people up (or get out a dust pan and brush) and count weapons that still work. This doesn't take long. After a short time Josiah Sawbones returns cussing and cursing. The shaman kicks a stone before depositing himself down on the hard desert floor. An thin, weathered finger points accusingly in Jonah Travis's direction as the Shaman mumbles 'thats 1 hunting rifle you owe me fule...does the word "borrow" mean anything to you?' Rocco returns, tail wagging, back to where the party are licking their wounds and Vat69 has designated 'The Horse Barbeque Area'. The green mutant gives a loving turn to the metal spit roasting a large, decapitated horse over a larger fire. He then walks over to the two motorbikes and gives each a meticulous inspection. Unscrewing one petrol cap the green mutant leans down to have a sniff. The easily intrigued Rocco scampers over to the green giant to watch. The mutant straightens to look at the canine before bringing forth a pipe and his empty flamerthrower fuel cylinder.. 'Doggy...2 motorbikes to trade, a functioning flamer thrower and fresh roasting horse meat...what could be finer eh?' regales the green mutant with a sigh. Rocco angles his head and gives the mutant a "CONFUSED STARE". While the horse chef works his mojo on the outdoor cooking, Buster Sprocket also becomes interested in the two appropriated motorbikes. Following in the footsteps of Vat69 he gives each bike an inspection with his keen engineering eye. Finding everything to his satisfaction, the Vault Technician stuffs B.O.X. into a compartment at the rear of one bike, before mounting and starting it up. Vroom-Vroom-Vrooooooomm-VVVVROOOOMMM! Cool! The other members of the party watch the actions of Buster with a mixture of vague interest and derision. So, without further ado, Buster suddenly accelerates away doing a controlled wheelie and disappears down the potted road towards the settlement...leaving the rest of the team to sit silently and slowly gnaw away all the remaining flesh off the cooked horse. Vat69 tears off a haunch of horsemeat and proffers it the the dog Rocco. The hound accepts it gratefully and prepares to tuck in. Unfortunately before the big canine can get his big canines in, his meal is whipped away from him by his 7 day lord and master Jonah Travis. The dog rises to a sitting position before angling his head and staring at Jonah. 'It's time you learnt you place dog..' growls the tracker and then attempts to club Rocco across the face with the slab of meat. Obviously, a dog offerred a moving piece of meat to a static one with take the moving one every time. Rocco's massive adamantium jaws clamp around the meat like a vice as it whistles towards his head. 'CHUNK' 'eh?' 'Aaahhhhhhhh!' Jonah loses grip on the slab of horsemeat and then realises he can't now stop the momentum of his backhand. The tracker whirls around, trips and then falls heavily to the ground.....and knocks himself unconscious. Rocco lays down across the playful but sleeping form of his master and begins to chomp down his horsey meal. Meanwhile..further along the black asphalt, Easy Rider, otherwise known in the wilderness as Buster Spocket, spots a figure walking along the road before him.....as the Vault Dweller approaches he realises that it's the Raider with the hunting rifle from the recent fight. Buster guns the throttle on the bike and prepares for ramming speed! The raider punk looks over his shoulder as the noisy bike thunders towards him. He has just enough time to unsling his newly acquired hunting rifle and line up an easy shot before Buster loses control of the bike and falls off. The technician lands heavily on the asphalt and rolls for a considerable time, during which he watches the riderless bike tumble, crash, roll, ignite, roll some more and then explode.... all over Mr Raider with the New Hunting rifle. Back at the camp, the rest of the team hear the explosion and then watch the smoke rise slowly in the distance...after a few slow shakes of the head everyone returns to their equine feast. After a time..Buster levers himself off the warm tarmac and checks himself over. Diagnosis demands that he pull out a STIMPACK and jab it into his right leg. Body and brain fully functioning the technician then determines if all his equipment has survived the fall. Looks ok, so far so good. He then wanders over to the bike and accompanying, dismembered raider bits before suddenly realising something...and that something is now staring back at him in hot infra-red! Buster pulls out the smoking, blackened form of B.O.X from amongst the sorched and twisted bike wreckage. The AI's armoured sides are smashed up pretty good and a faint 'zrtz' sound can be heard from within it's innards... 'You Ok?' enquires Buster. No reply is forthcoming and the LEDs on B.O.X. remain vehemently on solid infra-red. 'OK, suit yourself...but it was an easy mistake to make' continues the Technican Third Class as he pushes the ravaged B.O.X. back into his backpack. Still the silent armoured facade with the air now quivering with pregnant cybernetic fury. Undeterred, Buster hefts his backpack before trudging back, painfully, to his horse eating xxfriendsxx xxcomrades in armsxx people he met in the wilderness. Back at the camp, the horse feast gorging is coming to a greasy fingered end. Just about everyone feels better after consuming the first decent meal they've had for the past couple of weeks. FIN