» Mon Jan 17, 2011 1:08 am He stayed low, hidden in the scrub, his rifle next to him; he had a small tin box, it had a picture of some chubby looking cartoon kid and some writing on it, of course Callum was illiterate, being brought up in the kingdom of Tom. Apparently Rosie was much better at ruling than any other ruler of the kingdom of Tom. Inside the tin box was a collection of things that he needed for the time at hand, 8 rounds for his rifle, a couple painkillers wrapped in cloth and a kitchen knife. These were all he needed for now. Some stupid wastelander had surrounded his base camp with landmines, only he hadn’t even tried to hide them and one of them was right next to a tree, it was dry, perfect firewood. This base was obviously new. The wastelander was right in front of the tree, If Callum could get the tree down then he would have injured, if not outright killed the wastelander with one bullet, this was why his rifle was pointed towards, the landmine near the tree, it was a crazy idea, but it might work, if he missed he could always try again, he had seven chances, although he wasn’t sure if the wastelander would wake up. He wanted to wait for a sound that would mask his gunshot. Callum wasn’t happy about doing this, but he hadn’t eaten in 10 days and he was starting to feel the effects. Then he heard a sound, it was a clicking noise a pistol being cocked, Callum rolled over just as a bullet smashed into his left arm, it was lucky he rolled over because if he had stayed where he was the bullet would have pierced his chest. Callum howled in pain as his attacker kneeled down and pushed the pistol against his forehead, his attacker cackled and Callum got a full blast of his foul breath, Callum had never experienced such pain, he could see two exact clones of the attacker, Callum’s eyes drifted shut, there was a loud bang, louder than the sound of the vertibird crash, then silence, dark, warm, silence.
Callum dreamed of the crash, when he had seen it from afar, he was in a hazy dream-like state so he just got flashes of what he remembered most, the smoking wreck, now he was standing in front of it, the screams of it’s passengers echoed through his skull, he had pulled one of them out of the wreckage, he had tried to grab what seemed to be an arm, sticking out from the underside, he had pulled and it had come clean off, a severed arm, he had wretched at that point, the third passenger was screaming in the front “I can’t feel my [censored] legs” he had cried, he began sobbing, crying, whining like an injured dog. The one he had recued, mike his name was, said that there was a fire and that it could explode at any second, that they had to get away. Callum had silently obeyed. “Please no, you cowards help me” The third passenger began crying and coughing up blood, crying up blood was how Callum envisioned it, they ran a to safe distance, then they watched and waited, it took too long to explode, they would have had time to rescue him, only they never did, they agreed to head back, when BOOM the vertibird exploded, ironically they found the still intact head of the third man, a silent scream embedded on his face, this was the fullest part of him they could find, they found none of the other man. Mike had been from the NCR, travelling from, the west to the republic of Rosie, where they had contacts when they had been hit by some kind of electromagnetic-pulse. There vertibird had crashed, seven miles west of where it’s destination was. Callum had pointed him in the right direction then headed off, to Canterbury commons. I was now a year later, and the third pilot’s untimely demise, the screams, the insults, the begging, the crying, still echoed solemnly around his head.
