Fandom The End of the World (closed)

[Interstellar Bun]

She had left the house in a huff, though on the outside, she seemed as composed as ever. With Donald keeping the car keys from her, Victoria couldn't go on those long drives she loved and, instead, was left strolling down the sidewalk pretending like everything was okay. She was good at pretending, after all, she did it often enough.


She had married young, had married for money, and more than ever she now resented her husband.


And he resented her too.


But with coiffed black hair and lipstick as red as blood, she looked perfect. No one knew what happened inside of her house, the fights, the yelling, the strange men and women.


Like everyone else living the American Dream, Victoria Manson had a home filled with secrets and anger.


There was no real reason she had wandered down to the little cafe known as the Red Rocket Truck stop, but the walk had been nice even though she was chilly in the cool autumn air. She hadn't even had the time to grab a sweater before she left.


Well, that wasn't anything a nice bit of coffee couldn't fix up.


The place was quiet, and when she saw the slightly familiar face of the woman who lived there, she pulled on her friendliest smile, her dimples showing.


"Ruby my dear, how are you?"


They weren't friends, but Victoria was good with names and had lived in the suburbs long enough to know how to play the game. Her words were slow, smooth, like she had all the time in the world.

 

[HoneyedHopes]

Ruby Rosemary Esparzo's afternoon tasted bitter on her tongue, despite the warm sunlight streaming through the diner's Windows. She sat on a padded stool behind the counter with a automotive magazine in one hand while her other rubbed absently on the crooked dent of her lower back. Underneath the mutter of customers chatting in the booths around her, she could make out the faint scratch of metal against metal, the telltale hum of Nathaniel's presence. She pondered leaving to visit him, say hello, maybe poke fun at his messy man bun he wore. But the smell of milk pulled her thoughts back to the diner, and the small boy at her feet. The white substance leaked out of the bottle, onto the floor and all over his orange jumper.


Ruby clucked her tongue and hopped off her stool. "Ay, ay, Chico, why must you make your mama suffer?" Yet a grin tugged at her lips as she pulled him into her lap and took out a rag. Shaun looked up at his mother and, realizing he had caused trouble, began to fuss, tears welling up in his wide brown eyes. Ruby cooed at him, and bounced him up and down on her knee.


The door jangled, and Ruby stood up to greet her new customer, moving Shaun to her hip. "Hola, Mrs. Mason, I'm doing good. You looking for my husband? He's out back, working on the red pickup."

 

[Interstellar Bun]

Victoria rubbed her hands together to get the chill out of her fingers, her smile becoming , a little more genuine when she saw Shaun. Though not exactly the maternal sort, Shaun was a cute enough kid to melt even Victoria's cold, icy heart.


"I'll go see him in a bit, I was actually wondering if you have any of your lovely coffee made. It's a bit nippy out."


She glanced behind her as she said it. Donald had never followed her before, following her would imply he cared.


And yet, she was always worried that he would. Always just a little bit on edge about maybe things going a bit too far for once.


God that wouldn't end well for anyone.


Her gaze returned to Ruby's soon enough though, her hands moving to reach for the wallet in her purse.


"How have you been?"


It was a simple question, allowing for the simple answer of not much so they could go on living their simple lives.

 

[HoneyedHopes]

Ruby did not disappoint. As she rocked Shaun with one hand and poured coffee with the other, she responded with a grunt and, "Can't complain. How about yourself?"


She slid the coffee across the counter, and her eyes slid away from Victoria, washing over the other customers. It wasn't that she didn't care about her friendly neighbor. She just couldn't articulate the foreboding cloud that pressed against her bones, which left her feeling even more in amiable than usual.


Victoria might've responded, but a collective gasp erupted from the diner, as a dozen eyes trained on the television in the far corner. The usual news anchor stood hunched over a crumpled note, and every fourth or fifth word his knee jerked to the left. "Nuclear Detonation", Ruby caught amongst the stutters and mumbles. She pressed Shaun closer to her chest, and the sirens began to blare.


Without another glance at the diner, she rushed to find her husband. "Nate, Nate!" Miraculously, she found him fighting the crowd, pushing against the wave of motion to reach her. She rushed forward. "Take Shaun," she said, pushing the toddler into his arms. I'll run ahead to the Vault." He nodded, and She started forward, pressing against the other bodies as they made their way to the Vault.

 

[Interstellar Bun]

Victoria gave an empty respons e one assuring Ruby that she was fine as she took the black, unsweetened coffee. Sitting down, she took a long sip of the drink, listening to everyone talk a bit. And then the gasp happened.


A cold shiver danced down her spine as she turned to look at the television.


The man in the television looked like he was about to crumble.


Then she heard it. Those last two words. Nuclear Detonation. Her mouth ran dry and the world seemed to slow around her. Victoria dropped the mug of coffee, the crash silenced by the sirens going off.


The crowd went crazy and Victoria managed to squeeze her way out the door as she went sprinting back to Sanctuary Hills.


She didn't look back, not even once.


Shoving past anyone who got in her way, the tiny woman reached the gates.


"Victoria Mason! Victoria! I'm on the list!"


As the man looked at the list in question a hand grabbed her arm enough to bruise. The fear she felt right then dwarfed the fear of nuclear annihilation.


"Donald Mason."


The man looked up and nodded to Victoria. "You're in. Sorry sir you...you aren't on the list."


She could feel fingers digging into her flesh as she yanked away from Donald, struggling to break his grip. She was numb as she ran up the path, as she stood on the platform and stared. She was numb as the mushroom cloud bloomed in the sky and she realized that this was it. She felt nothing except the dull chill of fear in her heart and the burning in her lungs and legs from her run.


All she could hear was her name in the background, the raw voice of her husband screaming so loudly it cut the sound of the explosion, ringing in her ears and vibrating in her skull like angry hornets.


If she died, at least she'd be free.

 

[HoneyedHopes]

Ruby awoke again to the sounds of sirens, the breath rushing back into her lungs as her blood began to pound once again. Her first thoughts revolved around escape of her "decontamination pod", and she banged her fists against the door, searching with frantic hands for the switch. She found one, and with lukewarm fingers she cranked it open.


Her feet did not find purchase on her first try. She tumbled forward, landing hard on her knees, her nose jamming into the concrete floor tiles. Tears leaked from her eye as her mind rushed to recall all that had occurred; from the nuclear detonation to witnessing the murder of her husband.


Nathan.


With quivering limbs she lurched forward and up, towards the release beside his pod. Not fast enough, she cried, her features twisting as she tried once again to stand and yank open his door. A cold whoosh revealed her worst fears. The blood had frozen to his jumpsuit, not a drop of it reaching the space beneath his feet. His eyes stared back at her with lifeless accusation-and she could not meet his final gaze. She crumpled to the floor again and retched, but the twist of her stomach did not settle.


She sat alone for a time, unaware of the blaring sirens around her. But after a time a piercing headache began to form, reminding her of the dire situation before her. Was she alone? She had to check the the other pods.


The first three mirrored Nathan, each with shocked or otherwise petrified faces. The fourth pod held the familiar of Victoria Fisk, and Ruby feared she would face another corpse, but as the door released, she heard a gasp for air and the smaller woman fell into her arms.


"Victoria, Victoria. Can you hear me?" Ruby received labored breaths in return, and felt the blood from her wound begin to thaw and drip in think clumps between her fingers. But she's be damned if she watched Another person die.


She laid Victoria down on her back and examined the wound with careful fingers. Clearly, the kidnapping murderer had begun to run out of time, causing him to get sloppy with his shots. The bullet had entered the abdomen, not the chest. Thanks to her previously frozen state, Ruby could staunch the bleeding before it even started. She had nothing but her jumpsuit, so she stripped, leaving her in nothing but a white tank top and her boxer briefs.


With the wound packed and bandaged, she focused on rousing the young woman. She shook her shoulder.

 

[Interstellar Bun]

She could remember running for her life, flashes of fear and panic blinding her. She remembered seeing a monster of rage take the form of her husband, his fingers digging graves into the flesh of her arm as he yanked her backwards, away from the vault. She was screaming, fighting against him as cruel words cut into her.


And then someone ran by, decking the monster in the face without breaking stride and Victoria was free.


Her memories splintered there. Fisk, a new name. Decontamination pods that left her cold and all but dead.


And pain, so much pain shooting blindly through her that made her gasp for air.


Her eyes opened wide and she grabbed the wound. A mistake. Tears filling her eyes, she tried to force her lungs to work, her blurred vision clearing. She blinked rapidly and, slowly, she found herself staring at the face of Ruby. Victoria was trembling, her fingers numb and joints aching from the cold.


"What happened?" Her jaw was trembling, making it hard for her to even form a coherent sentence. She reached out, grasping Ruby's fist with fingers that felt like they had been carved of ice. She felt like she was slipping into another nightmare, like if she could just hold on long enough she might not slip away.

 

[HoneyedHopes]

The woman aroused, finally, and Ruby scooted back to give her some space to gather her thoughts. Once she was speaking coherent sentences and breathing at a reasonable pace, Ruby responded.


"I guess decontamination is code for 'deep freeze'." Her face did not change from its tight mask, but she did put a soft hand on Victoria's hunched shoulder. "You were shot, do you remember? I bandaged your wound for you."


Ruby began to stand up then, peering around. The sirens showed no sign of stopping. They needed to get out of the Vault, and fast. "Do you think you're ready to move?"

 

[Interstellar Bun]

"No, I-I don't." She swallowed, her throat tight and saliva thick. The only person that woudl ever want to shoot her as far as she knew was-. She stopped herself there as he blood chilled again. Squeezing her eyes shut, Victoria took in a sharp breath before moving on.


Moving on.


That was something Victoria had always been good at.


Slowly, Victoria nodded. "Yeah just, can you help me up?"


Once she was on her feet, they began moving. It was her wound that kept them slow, her vision splintering and hiccuping as they went along. The bodies, the slow drip of the vault eroding around them, it all felt like maybe she'd wake up. Only, as they stepped into the light, the nightmare never faded away. There was no waking up from reality.


The rocks under their feet skipped and skidded as they made their way down the incline back towards the suburbs that they once called their own. Victoria, who had been quiet, finally looked to Ruby.


"Is everyone else...?" She droned off, letting the silence fill in her question for her.

 

[HoneyedHopes]

Ruby did not answer-she could not with the scene laid out before them. Time had passed so slowly in Ruby's head. The dilapidated buildings before them whispered of years, if not decades, glancing by. How long had they been trapped in that vault, completely unaware? Were they truly the only ones left alive?


Shaun. She had seen him taken, and that was more than enough to motivate her into action. Slowly, painfully, Ruby moved forward, sliding down the rock-face towards Sanctuary Hills.


As a passing thought, she headed towards Victoria's house first;it had always been the biggest house in the neighborhood. They jogged down the cracked road towards the peeling aqua paint.


The distant sound of a perpetually concerned English accent greeted them. "As I live and breathe! Mrs. Victoria, you're alive!"


Well, Ruby thought, at least the robots survived nuclear fallout.

 

[Interstellar Bun]

The silence answered Victoria's question as well as any words might. She didn't even know why she had asked, she'd seen them all in there, their bodies frozen, eyes filled with horror. She had spent time with them, gossiping with the ladies at the monthly book club, making pies for various events, doing whatever she could to just keep out of the house. The gravity of the situation was pressing on her shoulders, making the weight hard to carry when she heard that familiar synthetic voice speak her name.


"Codsworth." She breathed the word, picking up her pace until she finally reached the robot in question. She had half a mind to hug him.


"I almost thought I'd never see you again. Oh how lovely, I think I'll help you make dinner this evening, doesn't a nice large roast sound nice? I'm sure Mr. Mason would enjoy that, he does so love his roasts. I think I last saw him around here somewhere." His eye swiveled looking about.


Victoria, eager to change the subject shook her head. "He's dead, Codsworth."


"But ma'am-."


"The bombs dropped, he didn't get in the vault. He's dead."


The robot seemed to recoil for a moment, an awkward silence hanging in the air until she continued.


"Codsworth," her voice was strained again, a hand lifting to rub her face. "How long has it been?"


"About two hundred years or so, give or take a decade or two." He paused as well. "It is good to see you again, ma'am."


"Yeah," she whispered, "good to...good to see you too. I think I need to sit down." And with that, she wandered in to the dilapidated house that she had once called her own, ignoring the smell of decay and death that seemed to follow them wherever they went.

 

[HoneyedHopes]

Two centuries tasted like iron on her tongue and flooded her stomach with bitterness. Mere minutes in her mind had multiplied into a disaster. How could this happen? How could any of this happen? Ruby was tempted to put a bullet in her head now, and finish it. Instead, she walked over to the wall chipped blue paint and kicked it as hard as she could. Then she kicked it again. And again. A final kick seemed enough to break her vision of red, as she realized that she probably looked loco.


Think, chica, think. What did they know? They had been in the vault, sealed in freezers, and left there. At some point, someone had defrosted them, only to put a bullet in everyone and steal a baby. Which meant, at least they weren't the last humans on the planet. That held some hope. Enough to save Ruby from drowning.


"Codsworth, where is anyone? Have you seen any people... around?" Given the situation, she really didn't know how to ask 'Where's the nearest city?' People would have to do.

 

[Interstellar Bun]

Codsworth had watched as Victoria stumbled off before swiveling back to watch Ruby, his oculi shifting, adjusting as he observed her kick the door before, finally, addressing him.


"The last group of people I saw came from Concord, well, friendly group that is. They only shot at me a few times. Perhaps you and the Missus would do better at reasoning with them than I was able to, you two are quite charming." He hovered in place, a gentle breeze making him sway. "Though, if I may be so bold as to suggest something, perhaps you two should rest for a moment. Two hundred years is quite the time to go without eating of course and, well, I'm always happy to have a dinner guest."


There was something almost chipper in his automated words. He was happy to have anyone around him at all even if the two were so far out of sorts he was sure they were beyond what help he could have thought to offer them.

 

[HoneyedHopes]

When Codsworth invited them to rest for the night, Ruby took a step back and shook her head, and her arms laced across her chest tightened. Rather than sleep, she would choose to run straight to Concord without stopping. She would fight any manner of beast. But she didn't want to shut her eyes again.


But her gaze wandered to Victoria's poorly wrapped abodomen and the way her faced had scrunched up in stubborn panic at the mention of her late husband. Clearly, the woman needed her own time to rest and sort herself out.


"I'm going to the diner." She handed Victoria the 10mm they'd picked up earlier. It was better than nothing, in case some creatures popped up. Ruby knew she had a gun in her lockbox, and she doubted she'd find trouble going just down the street.


"I'll be back in an hour," she told Victoria, then took off jogging. The sun was taking its time crawling up towards noon, and it barely creeped over the city skyline. As the morning rays dissipated, they revealed to Ruby a vision strong enough to slow her pounding heart to a crawl. Her town, her city, everything she's ever known-reduced to dilapidated ruins. Even from this distance, Ruby could see the patchwork interstate, towering in fragile chunks over the skeletal ghosts of skyscrapers. In the silence of the morning, her first morning, Ruby allowed herself a moment to shed tears. No more than two rolled down her cheeks, and a short hiccup tagged along. She straightened her shoulders and face those ruins head on.


When Ruby rounded the last corner, her foot slipped a bit, and she felt the familiar tug she always felt when she returned home. Instantly her mind wandered to thoughts of a fresh coat of paint and new Windows-not the windows- though she knew none of these things were viable options. She didn't even know if her things were still there. More than likely, everything had been ransacked, at one time or another.


A bark startled her, and Ruby came to a stiff halt. From around the back, where Nathan worked on his cars, a wiry German Shepard came bounding towards her. Just when she thought it might leap and attack her, his hind legs dropped and he performed for her the prettiest sit she had ever seen.


"Lo guapo que tú eres! The handsomest pero I've seen in years," she reached out to scratch his ears, and he scooted closer, tail thumping with enthusiasm. She scratched him for a good couple minutes before her weakness got the better of her; she wrapped her arms around the hound and squeezed, taking in the feeling of something solid in her arms for as long as she could. Eventually, the poor creature began to whine and squirm, encouraging Ruby to release him.


"Que te parece? Want to tag along, pero?" The dog barked twice, and Ruby managed a passing grin.

 

[Interstellar Bun]

She wasn't sure how long she sat there in the old musty chair with a spring that awkwardly stuck into her spine, but it was long enough to leave her itching to move lest she become a ghost that haunted the broken skeleton of what had never really been a home no matter how hard she had worked at it.


"Codsworth, dear?"


"Yes, Miss Victoria?" He had made himself scarce, lingering in the hallway until she called out to him.


"Do you know first aid?"


"I do indeed, ma'am, standard programming. We, ah, should still have a first aid kit if you require assistance."


"Please."


The robot, with his odd hands, couldn't do much but with a bit of team work they had managed to clean and redress the wound. He had taken her temperature as well, informing her of the risk of infection and steps to take in order to avoid it before she was back up on her feet. Victoria moved slowly, lifting a pale, delicate hand to gently glide across the ruined walls as she wandered back to her old room. The bed was gone, no surprise there, but upon opening her wardrobe she found that some items had actually made it through the fallout.


Soon enough the jumpsuit was replaced with her late husband's jeans and one of the thick, plaid shirts he had worn for work. He had done nothing for her so she figured it was only right that, after his death, she should begin to make something out of his ruin. It was the best revenge, she thought, to succeed where he had failed.


With Ruby still gone, Victoria tied her quaffed curls back and began scavenging through her own home for a backpack and anything that might be useful in whatever world they were living in. It wasn't hers, not yet, but it could be.

 

[HoneyedHopes]

Most of the shop had been salvaged, but her safe remained mostly untouched behind the cabinet. The key had mercifully remained taped to the top of one of the shelves, allowing Ruby to grab the pistol and life savings without much effort. She was even more pleased to find that most of her clothes remained in her locked armoire. She pulled out her favorite jumpsuit, a fanny pack for her bullet cases, and she took off back towards Victoria's home.


When she'd returned, Victoria's wound was redressed, and the smaller woman was busy rummaging through her old drawers. Ruby cleared her throat to grab her attention.


"I think we should get to Concord while the day is still early." They needed supplies, directions, information... Ruby hated feeling so unprepared. "But if you need to rest, I understand." Either way, she had no intention of going on her own.


The hound shared a similar sentiment, as he bounded over to Victoria and gave her a good sniff.Just as he had with Ruby, he sat before her, cocking his head with equal amounts of cuteness and intelligence.

 

[Interstellar Bun]

It was Ruby's voice that made Victoria look up from what she'd been doing, two backpacks resting beside her feet and her vault suit half folded in her hands. They were limp, only partially stuffed with things that Victoria had found to be something of use: a single blanket, a first aid-kit, and a jacket that had moth holes in it. The backpacks were old as well, worn but large. Donald had kept them around the house, used them for those weekends when he'd go out backpacking with a friend and Victoria was given the blessing of a few days alone.


"I can make it, we just...have to go slow." She managed a smile at Ruby, managing to make her words sound almost charming, comfortable. The wound on her side still smarted but she wouldn't hold Ruby back, she couldn't just stay there.


She had never wanted to stay before.


The dog sniffed her and Victoria couldn't help but recoil a bit at first. Once she was sure the dog wasn't about to bite her, she slowly reached out, letting the dog sniff the back of her hand.


"Looks like you've made a friend already." And her smile shifted, something more genuine working its way in to the expression. "Does this little guy have a name?"

 

[HoneyedHopes]

"Dogmeat," Ruby responded, feeling a small spark of her old sense of humor. Not that humor suited her face very well. Still, they could use some lightheartedness, amongst friends facing a dead world. "Slow is fine. I'll look out for a walking stick for you, chica." Ruby gave Victoria a few more minutes to finish packing up her things, taking the opportunity to scavenge the other houses for similar necessities. Then they set off.


Concord was no more than an hour walk down the road, but it felt like an eternity. With no birds, no cars or robots, with no people, the silence buzzed in Ruby's ears, making her feel antsier than the day the bombs had dropped. When the distance sound of gunfire begin to filter in, she almost sighed in relief. When they got closer, Ruby motioned for Victoria to stand out of the way before making her way cautiously forward.


"Excuse me–" Her call was met with a spray of bullets and a few shouts that sounded akin to, "reinforcements". Ruby dodged, somehow, and followed Dogmeat's lead when he leaped at the closest one. She needed to work some of her anger out anyway. Too bad she had never been the best of shots.


Fifteen minutes of firefight, and Ruby spent twice as many bullets as there were people in the area, including herself, and Victoria. She'd managed to take one man down with a lucky shot between the eyes, but for the most part, the stranger on the balcony of the old museum shot the guys in the backs.


"Quick," he called, "Get inside before they regroup!" Ruby did so without more than a passing thought of suspicion.

 

[Interstellar Bun]

It was odd how the smell of gunfire reminded Victoria of her father. He had never shown her to shoot, had never wanted her to do anything more than learn to be the perfect wife, a jewel that he could pawn off to the highest bidder. She had watched him sometimes from the windows of their various houses, practicing int he back yard with his friends, cigarettes hanging loosely from their lips. If he was feeling nice, some quiet nights he'd show her how to clean a rifle, but he was never feeling nice and her experience with firearms ended where it began.


Ruby seemed more comfortable and it was Victoria who hung back, keeping herself out of the way so she wasn't, at the very least, hindering anything.


When Ruby headed inside, Victoria followed, her finger lightly dancing on the trigger of her pistol. She checked behind them right before the doors closed, making sure their backs were covered.


They fought their way up to the top, Victoria letting Ruby carry the brunt of the force. It was only around corners, in spaces with cover and time to aim that Victoria pulled the trigger and marveled at the fact that it didn't feel like she was killing people. No, with masks on their faces and belts wrapped around them to contort their images they seemed more like animals, monsters, than humans.


She supposed that was for the better. She'd been facing monsters for most of her life.

 

[HoneyedHopes]

They reached the third floor with no more than a couple scratches. Ruby quickly found the art of looting the dead a useful trade. The first package of cigarettes she found, so coveted in the inside breast pocket of her jumper. Of course the stimpaks would be lifesaving at some point.


After the welcome they'd received outside, Ruby kept her pistol up and ready.


"Thanks for the help," a young man greeted them at the door, his gun hanging lower in his clasp so show his peaceful nature. Beside him another man hunched over a terminal, while three others crowded the couch behind them. "I don't know who you are, but you guys were real lifesavers out there." Ruby nodded, and glanced at Victoria.

 

[Interstellar Bun]

Victoria took the nod as her chance to speak and did so gladly. Words were her preferred weapon to pistols.


"We do our best, it'd be rude to not help a damsel in distress." And she smiled again, hoping the expression seemed charming as she strolled slowly into the room. Her hand went to her wound, pressing against it to keep it from shifting as she did so.


Her comment earned a chuckle from the man at the terminal. "Looks like our saviors are your kind of people, huh?"


"It's lucky for us." Preston looked the girls over again. "Preston Garvey of the Commonwealth Minutemen, pleased to meet you both. I'd spend more time with pleasantries but the fact is that we're still stuck up here and I don't suppose it'll matter if we don't last much longer."


"Last much longer? I suppose you at least have some sort of a plan if you're still fighting."


"Yeah, something like that." He looked over to the guy at the computer. "Sturges?"


"There's a crashed Vertibird up on the roof, old school, pre-war. Thing is there's a nice lil' present up there for us that could fix this situation. Power armor, a sweet set of military grade T-45. With something like that you could just rip the minigun right off of it and cut through the rest of those raiders like a knife through butter."


Power armor. Victoria looked to Ruby. "You up for it, darling?"

 

[HoneyedHopes]

Mierda, they wanted her to step into that thing?! The mechanic's housewife? What drugs were they smoking? Yet everyone looked at her with seriousness and desperation–except for Victoria, who just looked at her with curiosity. The chica certainly didn't look 'up for' anything, with dusty bandages seemingly holding her together. She seemed like she wanted to help these people, though. Ruby sighed.


"Just point me in the right direction, chicos," she turned to Victoria, a small downset to her mouth. "I'll be taking the dog." So, maybe she could be childish at times.


She made her way over splintered steps to the roof where, as they described, a suit of power armor stood, valiantly waiting to be donned by its next hero. Fusion core in hand, Ruby turned the machine on and stepped inside. Immediately, Ruby felt the shock of flashbacks, the frozen machines, the fading images of lab coats, her husband... She blacked out, her breathing cut short. A shout from the opposing rooftops jarred her back to reality.


"Joder," she cursed, grabbed the minigun from the vertibird, and leapt to the streets.

 

[Interstellar Bun]

Ruby went to the roof and Victoria looked at the pistol in her hand. She wasn't much of a shot with it, but she didn't have anything bigger, didn't have anything meant for a distance. If she did, she would have taken position on the balcony and picked them off for Ruby, however, as that wasn't much of an option, she headed for the door to go back down.


"You aren't thinking of going back out there are you?" Preston sounded surprised, taking a half step forward. "You're wounded."


"I'm touched that you care but I think I can handle myself." And she gave one last smile before making her way down the wooden stairs that creaked with every step she took.


She couldn't make Ruby do this alone. They had never been friends, hell, they still weren't, but she was the only one left in the world who knew how she felt and if Ruby was putting her life on the line, then Victoria would follow right along side her.


The setting sun painted the sky bright colors of red and orange, making her squint as it hit her eyes. The machine was already on the ground and the men with guns, raiders, were starting to appear once more. Looking around for cover Victoria spotted something more interesting instead. Shoving her pistol in the back of her jeans she made a dash and grabbed the rifle that had been abandoned, the one that matched Preston's. Feeling a little more confident, she cranked it to life and ran for cover as gunshots sounded once more.

 

[HoneyedHopes]

At least everything seemed smaller to her in the suit. Raiders–As Preston called them–ran at her wildly but their tire irons and machetes did little more than knick the painted metal encasing her. Earlier, these men had shot at her first, and with no other means of protection, Ruby had to shoot back. It was her husband, in response to the growing nuclear tension, who had drilled that way of thinking into her head. It's killed or be killed, He used to always say. He was so much more prepared this world than she. Now, as she looked down on men and women no older than herself, she only felt remorse. She was a murderer when wearing armor like this.


But Dogmeat attacked without remorse, and Ruby followed his lead. She gunned down any raiders that ran towards her, and made her way down the street.


A roared stopped her.


"Hijo de puta!" Ruby yelped as a street vent burst into the sky followed by an obsidian colored creature with horns like a sheep the maw of a dragon. By jesus, it looked like the Devil himself. Ruby scrambled away as fast as her iron leg could carry her, but it wasn't enough. The creature–the word 'deathclaw caught her ears;accurate–sliced through the remaining raiders with a sickening speed, then turned on her. As she clamored backward towards the museum, she struggled to aim the minigun. Though the bullets seemed to pierce flesh, it did little more frustrate the creature more.


Then, it charged.


Ruby had never experienced a car accident in her life, but she imagined that it felt better than being beaten with a 400 pound deathclaw. It wrapped its claws around Ruby's helmet, crushing the metal inwards. The weight of its body had forced her minigun towards the ground, leaving her unable to make a shot. Her only option left was to thrash, and pray to God it set her free.

 

[Interstellar Bun]

She had learned quickly how to reload the strange gun in her hands. With a pack of power cells strapped to her hip, Victoria had made her way up into the second floor of one of the buildings. She shot out of the window, taking cover as she cranked the gun to life again and again. The raiders focused on Ruby, allowing Victoria to pick them off without drawing too much attention.


And then the ground shook.


There was a roar, screaming, and Victoria couldn't process what she was seeing. Fear rushed over her, chilling her blood for the second time that day as her heart seemed to stop beating. This couldn't be real. This monster couldn't exist.


It grabbed Ruby and Victoria froze, her hands gripping the gun so tightly it seemed like her muscles might snap. Arms shaking, she gathered something of a plan and fired. The beast didn't let go of Ruby. She cranked the gun again, hand slipping and fired once more to hit the side of its face, clipping its eye. It roared so loudly she felt her bones shaking and like she might die right then from fear.


Tossing Ruby to the side the beast, instead, charged at Victoria and she managed to get off just one more shot.


The cars before the war ran on a volatile mix of nuclear fusion and gasoline, something that, even after two hundred years, sparked well when shot. The car resting on the side of the street just below Victoria's window exploded as the deathclaw reached it and fire blew her hair back, the force of the shock and hot air making her hit the wooden floor and slide back to the far wall.


She blacked out.