» Wed Aug 19, 2009 11:41 am well, its long, 5 pages in microsoft word long, but here it is if anyone would like to read it all the way through and still be able to provide comments. [I know, Im basically asking for free editorial work, but thats why theres fan fiction
]Husky Hunters (title pending)
Part 1
Calph looked down the sight of his rifle. The building looked deserted, but then again, everything looked deserted nowadays. No power anywhere meant that thermals should be able to pick up any body heat, but some of the fancier equipment from the prewar days are unreliable and breaking down.
Calph squinted down the lens. Nothing. The scanner was picking up residual heat as way hotter then they should be, so the screen looked all red. Calph slid the scanner back into its pocket. Three meters from him sat one of his squad-mates, Redson. Redson was a classic G.I. Joe from the comic books. Hell, the guy even threw out one-liners in battle. Annoying, maybe, but the guy could wait days in the field motionless just do get to those events. Calph made two quick hand signals. Red nodded and moved to the next window.
Red looked out towards the building. It was a gray, dreary building across a dark, brown landscape. Nothing about the building spoke of any significance. Intel however reported that the Vault Dweller was there not too long ago, and left a trail of broken robots and smoking husks. The building used to be a RobCo factory that had gone into shutdown mode and let all it's robots free. Now, the Huskies have been sent in to clean up and extract any prewar technology left behind.
Calph rechecked the lines on his laser rifle. Everything was falling apart, and it was getting harder and harder to keep everything together. Calph signaled to Red and together they left their cover. Crouched, they approached the building and made their way to the front door.
He looked back to their previous position and signaled forward. Two more figures crawled out and made their way to their position.
"Safeties off, Huskies. Tight maneuvers and room-to-room clearing. Don't expect much, but don't expect nothing. Eyes peeled for tech." Calph took a breath. He looked into the helmets of each of his men. "Breach and entry, on my mark."
The team paired off on either side of the door. Red locked a breaching charge around the handle and backed off to the side. The door exploded inwards, shattering debris and metal all over the inside of the hallway. Calph turned into the hall and raised his rifle. Everyone else followed suit and together they all marched down into the building.
Everything was pitch black. Night vision was a scarcity so only squad leaders were given the equipment in their power armor. Calph new this wouldn't help his team at all so turned on his flashlight, and everyone else took his cue and turned on theirs.
Everything was shattered. Signs of destruction and death were all around. Most everything was broken, and the stuff that was didn't stand upright. Plaster fell off the walls, leaving boards and debris open to the air. The floor was all rubble as the boots of Husky team marched towards the front desk. All the computers were shattered, the glass scattered about the desk and chairs. Calph noted that a person would be hard pressed to find a single windowpane or computer monitor that wasn't cracked or broken.
The building reeked of nuclear holocaust.
"Entranceway secured," Red whispered over the team radio frequency. Calph nodded to the other two squad mates, and they made their way down the next hall. The next couple of rooms were all in the exact same manner. Scattered debris and broken remnants of the past. Every few rooms sat a one or two broken down robots.
"Scorch marks and bullet holes, definitely 101's work here," remarked Red. Calph noted that. They checked all the husks too, but each one had their system array and ammo systems torn out already. "Yeah, definitely the Vault Dweller."
After fifteen minutes of room clearing, Husky team had descended down to the factory floor and made their way to the maintenance offices. The factory floor didn't spell much of a different story then the other parts of the factory. Scattered robot husks and broken machinery littered the place. Every once in a while a piece of technology was found and taken by one of the team members.
"Looks like this is turning into a waste, eh Calph?" asked Red. Calph didn't want to agree. He was team leader, and he had to keep composure. Every piece of technology recovered is worth it, Calph thought to himself. Yet Red was right. The other two nodded to each other in agreement. They though this was a waste two. Calph wanted them to think like he did, tat every piece of technology really could help return the capital wasteland to it's former days, but he saw what they were about. The entire brotherhood was slowly turning away from these efforts, and this was creating a rift in the brotherhood, between those who saw the long-term goal and those who believed in the short-term benefits.
"!@#$," he whispered to himself. Calph didn't want to think to deeply into this. He leaned against the bent remains of a desk and unclasped a canteen from his belt and took a sip. The irradiated [censored] tasted nasty, but was better then a dry mouth and dehydration.
Calph heard the radio click on his helmet. "Sir, check this out," one of the others said. Gecko was his nickname, and he was the team's technological expert. Any find of his was bound to be of technological concern. Calmly, Calph returned his canteen and strode down to where Gecko was crouched.
"What is it, we gotta move soon," was all Calph said as he stood behind Gecko.
Gecko turned towards Calph and pointed to a switch control to his right. "This switch still has soft dust on it, sir. 101 must have missed this thing on his way through." Calph nodded and then turned his head to simulate the expression he had on his face, "so?"
Gecko hesitated, excitement clearly puling through him, "well sir, this switch triggers a ground hatch, a hatch which is usually installed for bunkers or sewer access." Gecko turned back towards the switch, "basically reserved for things the installer would want cordoned off from everything else, so only he could get to it."
Calph didn't have the same excitement Gecko clearly had. Calph put a hand on Gecko's shoulder to keep him still, and then with his other hand slammed the green button on the switch. The floor opened up below them and two metal sheets slid back into the floor to reveal a staircase leading down.
Red immediately took point, followed by Calph, Gecko, and then finally, Charlie, the last man on the search team. The team immediately came upon a locked bunker door. A computer stood to the right of it.
"Gecko, crack it," Calph ordered. Gecko took out an old, brick sized device with two wires hanging out of it and plugged it into the computer. The brick was a Pip-man 4000, the less portable version of the wrist mounted Pip-boy from the prewar era. Calph and the rest of the team set up perimeter around the door, waiting for the thing to open and reveal any of the millions of creatures that nuclear radiation could spawn.
Gecko chuckled a little to himself, and Calph overheard him whisper, "the passcode was passcode." The humor was lost on Calph, but then again, he was ten years older then everyone else on the team.
With a creak and a grind, the door dragged open by itself. Calph panicked. The Geiger counters for everyone on the team shot up to 20 rads per second. "Lockdown!" Calph shouted. Lockdown was an emergency armor protocol that essentially shut the armor down completely and locked the wearer inside, totally immobile. This procedure locked the soldier in whatever position they were in, and proved useful when they needed to sit on their heels for extended periods of time. Another benefit is that it provided maximum shielding against radiation and could help a soldier survive a nuclear blast.
Unfortunately not all armor was perfect, especially during these postwar times. Calph still read low doses of rads seeping through his armor. Calph was still able to utilize his suit powered injection capabilities and shot 40ccs of Radaway through his system.
Calph assessed the situation. Gecko should still be hooked up to the door system and could still shut it. "Gecko! Assessment please!"
There was a short pause. Then Gecko came back over the radio, "sir, spike in radiation was only temporary. It was a unique trap system developed to kill attackers via advanced radiation poisoning. Residual radiation is down to 4rads."
Calph took this info as quite a delight. Radiation bombing is clearly prewar technology, as it fails to take into account the post war invention of Radaway, or the radiation resistant ghouls of the wasteland. This means that no one has been in here before. Calph smiled to himself.
