Fallout 3: Project Purity

 

CHAPTER TWO: KIMBLY’S NIGHTMARE

 

Her head swam and she sweat as she focused on the vision before her shut eyes. Unconsciously, her face contorted by seconds before returning to normal, and a muffled grunt came past her slightly parted lips as the beads of sweat grew on her brow. She shifted as her brain brought the images before her eyes once more, images of times long ago. 

 

She had been a happy child, born Melissa Opal Kimbly. She had grown up with loving, doting parents who were lucky enough to stick around as she grew, the wastes not stealing them away from her at an early age. 

 

Rockopolis wasn’t anyplace to write home about and Kimbly often found herself bored, but as her father Richard often stated, it was the safest place in the entire wasteland. On those nights as she tried to become comfortable enough for sleep, she would often think of home. 

 

Home to her was New Sydney, in Australia. Her fondest days were spent at the near-destroyed and decrepit opera house, that was refashioned into a sort of town that boasted high morale and was honored as a very successful settlement. She would catch the shows every night when she could scrape up her 10 caps from her allowance and sit enthralled at the likes of Bruce Isaac, Tommy Torini and the Rad Pack and other hometown talents who would play the grand stage to her fluttering heart. 

 

She remembered exploring the pier and staring out at the endless ocean for hours or playing with her many friends around a blown-out department store that they had made their clubhouse. That is, at least until a local raider gang calling themselves the Wallaby tribe made it their headquarters. She had known little strife beyond the norm of any  post-apocalyptic wasteland, and it was with these thoughts in her head that she drifted asleep even in the damp caves of Rockopolis. 

 

Kimbly saw before her unconscious eyes her teary departure after several slavers overran the former opera house and made it their own. Anyone able to flee holed themselves up in a down town warehouse. The slavers used the opera house as a base for years before a chapter of the Brotherhood of Steel cleansed the area in a four day war with the contingent, forcing them to retreat to America to a place called only the Pitt.

 

After this, her family and several others were fortunate enough to score a ride on a vessel known as the Duchess Gambit, a young Tobar Daniels leading the way. The fee was hefty but for a reason that she could not comprehend at the tender young age of 7, her family was able to score half the price of 200 caps. She had not known at the time, but she had an inkling as to why the rest of the families on the boat ride seemed to resent her mother more than usual. 

 

The Capitol Wasteland was harsher than New Sydney had been. They had little to their name and zero caps and therefore had to survive by wandering and constant vigilance, as well as emotionless killing of those who tried to threaten them. 

 

Kimbly’s father had taken a job with some hunters who were in the freelance hunting business, with scavenging on the side. he did poorly for the first couple of months, so bad in fact that he was forced to bring home most of the food he hunted in order to feed his beloved family as they hid out in a mostly collapsed car tunnel.

 

Things got better for them as time went on and Kimbly’s father continued on in his newfound business ventures. Things looked up completely after Richard had found an unopened safe and scored not only new armor and a powerful .55 caliber sniper rifle, but also loads of caps and a few bricks of gold as well as hundreds of chems, which he sold to various merchants for loads of caps.

 

He was able to go back to his poor family and tell them the good news and by morning they had packed up and moved away from their home underneath the over pass and he had managed to secure residency at Tenpenny Tower for the lot of them. Things had indeed become better. 

 

Kimbly saw herself as a young 10 year old girl staring in awe at the grand lobby and humungous chandelier that greeted her and her family on their arrival. She remembered being afraid of Mr. Burke and reserved about Mr. Tenpenny who seemed to stare in her direction longer than normal. Nothing ever came of it, to Kimbly’s later relief, but he chilled her just the same.

 

Rockopolis had been a hard decision for her father Richard and her mother Carolynn to come up to. The shelter was adequate at Tenpenny towers, but something could be said about the general atmosphere. 

 

The rest of the Tenpenny residents seemed to look on them with upturned noses most of the time, all except for a younger Margaret Primrose, Tiffany Cheng and Dr. Bannister. Melissa did not fit in at all around the tower, given the fact that there were no children around, only adults. Then there was the ultra-evil presence of Mr. Burke and the creepy stares of Allistair Tenpenny.

 

As good and luxurious as Tenpenny tower was, the family decided to check out and never return. They left with their now considerable fortunes and goods and set off until they found Rockopolis. 

 

The day had been very peaceful with only the odd molerat encounter to slow them as Kimbly’s family moved along the wasteland. all of the sudden, danger!

 

Kimbly visibly shuddered in her sleep as she saw burned into her memory the enormous lizard running toward them and her mother and father’s frantic cries as they ran toward the meager shelter provided from a nearby valley of large rocks. 

 

While there was still time, Richard hoisted Carolynn and Melissa up on the tallest rock before fleeing once more. Even from the distance, she saw the sweat on his brow, his brown hair flopping in the wind, his panicked eyes as he fled away from the charging deathclaw. 

 

 

She could see vividly as she cried and called out for her father to join them on the safety of the rock. She could feel her horror as her father’s sleeve caught on a misplaced hat rack. She could hear her own incredulous thoughts as she wondered who would place a hat rack out there in the middle of nowhere for her father to catch himself on. She watched as her child-self closed her own eyes in anticipation for the loud snap of jaws and her father’s pained cry.

 

But the only sound her ears heard was the thunderous cracks of rifles firing and the dying growls of the defeated deathclaw around her. Her child avatar opened her eyes and in awe noticed a dozen men and women in leather clothes with their rifles raised. The deathclaw tried to saunter over, only to have a double barreled shotgun aimed at its head from behind, the pulling of the triggers resulting in a deafening crack of gunfire before the now headless deathclaw fell to the ground. 

 

“the area is now safe.” Came the cry of a tall balding man with fur clothing and a golden crown upon his head. He also had a bushy beard and tired but wary blue eyes

. 

“I am King Cragg! I and the citizens of Rockopolis bid you welcome to our territory. Now, who might you be?” called the ruler of Rockopolis at the family. Kimbly’s father approached the man, taking both of his bejeweled hands in his own and kissing them, thanking him with many words. 

 

“Rise, son. Please answer my question.” King Cragg said in a softer voice.

 

“I am Richard Kimbly. Over there on that rock are my wife, Carolynn and my daughter, Melissa.” He said, his throat dry, but happy to be alive along with his family. King Cragg nodded and closed his eyes briefly. 

 

“How is it that you are walking along here alone with your wife and young daughter. Do you not know that the wasteland is far too dangerous? Especially the area you are in, as it is rife with the deathclaw and yao guai.” King Cragg admonished with sympathy.

 

“We left Tenpenny tower. We have been wandering for three days now looking to find the safest place we can to make our home.” Richard said, looking away before continuing.

 

“I guess I didn’t know this area was so dangerous.” 

 

“this is why Rockopolis is the safest place in the wasteland. nobody can find it, and even if they did, they have these horrors to evade as well.” King Cragg spoke with conviction,  but also pride.

 

“Would you be willing to take my family and I in?” Richard asked after a few moments of silence. King Cragg crossed his arms over his fur-bound chest and looked to the ground before looking to the sky, deep in thought, his blue eyes crinkling in deep thought. 

 

“How can you help my people in return?” was King Cragg’s simple reply.

 

Richard took his pack off his shoulder and opened it, revealing the gleaming bricks of gold and hefty pile of bottlecaps that took up half the space in his pack. King Cragg whistled through his teeth. 

 

“I am also a veteran hunter as well as a charismatic man, I can help deal with caravans, and my wealth is to share, so we can make Rockopolis a wealthier port.” Richard bargained. 

 

“I am pleased with this answer,” Cragg said with a grin. He shook Richard’s hand and motioned for Carolynn and Melissa to come down from their rock and join them.

 

“So, Richard…I am looking to start a caravan, would you like to have a part in this?” King Cragg asked as he opened the hidden entrance to her family’s new home. 

 

She would stay until she was 16 years old.  Before she was forced to move on into a very different family. She swore she would find Herbert “Daring” Dashwood, the man who compromised her family to the slavers and killed all who resisted, including her parents, as Dashwood and his “stalwart ghoul manservant” fled to the hills, only Argyll took a shot to the back. The shot coming from Melissa Kimbly’s 10 mm pistol. 

 

Melissa awoke with a start. She breathed panicked breaths as the visions maddeningly replayed themselves before her now wide awake eyes. She calmed herself and took a drink as best she could from her canteen. Her hands were still bound but she was able to negotiate sitting up and drinking before forcing herself to breath slower. 

She would find Dashwood if it killed her in the process. 

--------------------------

Gem and Crow were sweaty. And stinky. And covered with super mutant blood. But the path to Rivet city had one more obstacle. The clan needed to deal with the super mutant stronghold filled with razor wire and steel beams as well as marauding mutants. Including one with a minigun.

 

This would not be easy in any sense of the word. Katrina had the mutant master in her crosshairs, but the slight gap in the steel would be near impossible to bypass for a killing shot. Crow and Gem had out their respective assault rifles but they all knew that the fight would be uphill. Not to mention the two patrolling mutants to their right, walking the yellow scaffolding which surrounded the Jefferson Memorial.

 

“should this be our last fight, I need you both to know you are the two most important people on earth to me. Should we knock on heaven’s door even tonight, know that I love you.” Crow whispered, catching the two women’s eyes. 

 

He nodded to Katrina who nodded back, placing her eye to the sniper’s scope and lining up her crosshair as near to the mutant’s nose as she could, while Gem and Crow switched off their respective safeties.

 

The loud crack of sniper fire was the cue they needed as Gem aimed her gun toward the memorial while Crow helped fire on the uglies around their makeshift camp.

Katrina got lucky, she hit the mutant’s head critically, and right on the bridge of the nose. As the mutant’s head exploded, the others in the camp, three total, opened fire on the trio, who now took cover near a concrete abutment. 

 

“The two patrolling the scaffolds are dead.” Gem announced, turning her iron sights back to the uglies to provide covering fire on the rest of the mutants in the camp.

“stay here!” Crow ordered. Before either woman could protest, Crow moved from cover to cover until he was effectively in front of the entrance to the mutant stronghold. He stayed in cover before popping out to rain bullets on the mutants before him. 

 

Suddenly, Crow let out a shout of pain as he dropped to the ground, blood flowing from his belly.

 

“Crow!” Gem cried as she raised her Chinese rifle and screamed out into the night as her bullets pierced two mutants before her, both fell to the ground dead. 

Gem only ducked back behind cover after her rifle sounded a series of clicks. Bullets fell around the two women once again, and they realized that one had escaped death. Gem was nearly hysterical, crying into her arms.

 

Katrina nodded and waited. After a moment, there was a cease fire before she brought her sniper rifle up, her eye pressed against the scope. As soon as the mutant’s head came into the crosshairs, she pulled the trigger, showering the nearest pike with mutant brains.

 

Katrina allowed herself a tear to roll down as she lowered her rifle. She couldn’t lose her composure, but Gem on the other hand threw caution to the wind, and her gun to the ground, as she ran toward the fallen man before her. She fell down with a sob as she took one of Crow’s blood covered hands into her own. Her eyes were red with tears and her nose ran, but she strained to hear his voice after he called her name in a hoarse whisper. 

 

“Gem. Do not…throw…caution to…the wind.” Crow struggled. Gem sobbed again but continued to listen. Katrina joined her companion on her knees. 

 

“Gem…Martha…you are…my longest running…and closest friend. I love you…I hope…to see you…in the Great Beyond.” Crow whispered. Gem nodded and cried openly now, albeit as quietly as she could. 

 

“Katrina.” He whispered. Kat moved to her belly, her soft ear next to his lips. He kissed her slowly. She turned her head and took it on her red lips as her tears fell. 

“You are…my love. My wife. My confidante. My friend. You…were the most…important person…in the world to me. My…love for you...will never…die.”

 

With those words, the man known to most as Crow breathed his last, his chest rising and falling for the final time on earth, while Gem placed her pretty face to his chest and cried in great heaves, while Katrina rested her cheek on his and let her tears fall uninhibited, not even fifty feet from the entrance to their final destination, Rivet City.

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A/N: just a quick update. I don’t normally leave a chapter on a sad ending, but I will occasionally anytime I need to strike a particular emotion. In this case, I felt that the death of such a good man (at least that was my impression of him from his very short few lines in the game) needed to be very dramatic. My rendition is that he was a very good man who took care of his family and loved Gem as a longtime friend, a very spiritual man who believed his beliefs when most around him told him there could exist no God. In short, a loveable character and the last man on anyone’s mind who deserved to die. 

 

I also felt that Crow’s death needed to happen in front of his wife and best friend, both for clear emotional reasons and to enhance the future of my story later. Without any spoilers, I want to say that this gives Gem a nearly inhuman hate against mutants, while Katrina tries to move on and take over the caravan for her late husband, and all the emotions involved for the future of this story. 

 

I hope you all are liking the latest installment so far, as short as it is right now, and I would love to know what you all think so far in the form of reviews. Good evening for now ladies and gentlemen. 

 

KMAC