((Collab Post between shadowsaint007, Vulkan, and Letter Bee)) "You do realize," said Par to Dr. Jose Barre, "that now that I know about this secret tunnel, that the base's security has been compromised? Best to just kill me and be done with it." The 19-year old, back in his beloved old clothes - the glasses/shades were unecessary now - was questioning the Enclave Scientist. "I could and I should," was the reply. "But I'm smart enough to realize we're in a Catch-22; kill all Muties and there won't be enough of us to make a New America, do not kill all Muties and our New America won't resemble the old one at all." A sigh. "Look, just go before I change my mind." But Par had already left. Loping out of the tunnel, the boy rubbed his neck again, reveling in the joy of not being collared. Now armed with a laser pistol, he still made sure that he would not be detected by giant rats, radroaches, or any other unsavory denizens of the tunnel. Locating a rubble pile that led to a hole large enough to let him through, Par climbed up to see the light of a new day...and a Brotherhood ground transport heading towards him! Gabriel was riding on top of the APC as it rolled along, the terrain speeding by. Dogmeat had shown some distinct dislike of being inside a giant metal can along with several men in powered armor, and Gabriel wasn't much for it either. So they got the scenic view, sitting on top of the carrier, strapping themselves down with belts, and holding on. It wasn't bad at all, really; even the Wastelands had its charm. Suddenly, Dogmeat perked up, and started barking at something in the distance. Gabriel picked up his new rifle, and stared down the scope in the direction Dogmeat was barking. To his surprise, he saw Par in the scope, and even more surprisingly dressed since last time. He put down his rifle and banged on the roof of the APC a few times to catch the driver's attention to stop. Once the APC came to a stop, he jumped down from the roof with Dogmeat in his hands. "Well, I'll be," he joked to Par as the latter came closer. "Here we were, ready to pull your fat outta the Enclave fire, and you had to ruin it by breaking free. And you got your pants back. How the blazes did you manage that?" A smile, before Par followed up with: "It wasn't entirely me. There was a doctor who hated the fact that he had to 'prepare' me to be the Colonel's toy by restoring my eyesight, shaving me, and giving me my shots like a pet. Said doctor also wanted to get back to exterminating Muties instead of enslaving them, but that's not important. What's important is that he showed me a secret tunnel that we can use to get under the Enclave Base, as well as gave me...this." He showed Gabe the holotape, before turning towards the Brotherhood Knights, who were staring at him suspiciously through their visors. "But I have a suspicion that it's just family drama, so I'll shut up and lead you guys to the secret tunnel now." "Smart move," Gabriel said, looking over the tape. "We'll look this over when we have the time..." And he moved to lead Gabe and the Brotherhood Knights down to the secret tunnel; the Knights did have to widen the hole Par crawled through, though... ------ [b][i]Back at the Enclave Base[/i][/b] Dr. Jose Barre watched Par go free with renewed confidence, and sighed. If the boy had been 'genetically pure', he would have led the Enclave to new heights. But now was not the time to muse on what-might-have-been. Rather, time to get back to his duties. He turned back to the tunnel entrance, then opened the door back to the Enclave Base, then... Only to be hit in the chest by a power armoured fist, knocking him into a wall. Before he could see his attacker, he felt the fist grab his throat and lift him against the wall. Behind the fist, the corner of Alex's mouth twitched, as if he was about to smile. "You let a prisoner go, Doctor. You know what the penalty for that is." Dr. Jose Barre wheezed, as if about to say something. Finally, words managed to escape his throat: "You...have...a fetish for grabbing people by the throats, you know that?" Yes, he knew what Alex had done to Par before the latter's escape. ------ Alan, having returned to the Enclave Base after the fall of Old Man's Corner, headed for his apartments right away, a small cloud of suspcion gathering in his head as he drew closer to the building. On impulse, he, still in his power armor, put on his helmet before opening the door - - And heard a loud explosion that glowed green with light, blasting down his apartments and blowing the colonel back, blasting the bright purple plates of his armor out of his body, exposing the wiring and insulation below. However, he was still alive, and he knew who did it. As Alex strangled Dr. Jose Barre, both Enclave members' comlinks suddenly turned on...to hear Alan's roar of rage. "BARRE!" was the shout. Alex spoke into his comlink on the spot. "I've got him here sir. The bastard tricked me into leaving under pretense of a medical examination and set our prisoner free. Might I assume that he was the cause of the explosion earlier?" "Good work, Corporal Romiel," Alan was still angry. "You two! Come to the command centre at once!" Alex dropped the doctor on the floor and pointed a 10mm pistol at his head. "You heard him, get the hell up." [i]It didnt work.[/i] Dr. Barre smugly rubbed the dirt of his lab coat, and walked with Alex to the command centre, where Alan, having sent out a call for his 'Hedonists' to come to his side immidiately, was still in his damaged power armor, his blue eyes glinting with anger. "Barre, explain yourself," he said deeply. "You and I both know that if I wanted to kill you, I would have done it with poison," the doctor said smugly, causing the 'Hedonists' to turn their guns on him. "Of course I do," Alan said. "I'm not blind, if you wanted to kill me, I'll be dead by now. I'm talking about you letting my Naked Slave go free." "Please, he was obviously using his position as your prisoner to instill doubts in otherwise loyal personnel, and I don't mean me, I've never been loyal to you." He then looked at Alex. "Do tell your commander how [i]you[/i] almost went violent on his precious pet, because a mere mutie 'cannot understand your ideals'." That last part was mocking. "I apologise for that, sir." Said Alex without a shred of remorse in his voice. "I made sure not to leave any damage whatsoever beyond his fear of me." Then suddenly, gunshots can be heard from below...Brotherhood Ordnance. "Roniel, Barre, redeem yourselves in my eyes," said Alan, "take my 'Hedonists'," he gestured to the squad around him, "and finish off the interlopers - except for my Naked Slave if he's among them." A gaze at Barre. "You and I both know how we can harm each other." Then a look at both the doctor and Alex again. "Now go!" Alex nodded, his eyes boring into Alan's. "Yes sir." He gestured to the squad. "Follow me." He said, as he stalked out of the room, unslinging his sniper rifle from his shoulder as he moved towards the Brotherhood. ------ Par didn't like returning to the place where he had spent time as Alan's 'Naked Slave'. But that was a fairly minor thing, as he began guiding Gabe and the Brotherhood squad to the estimated direction of Alan's quarters, which were hopefully not far from the room where Par had been kept captive during his time at the base. However, once the group got to the quarters, they found a smoldering ruin reduced to green goop, including the beds, drawers, anything of importance. Cries and wails can also be heard from a set of nearby rooms. "Those would be the former raiders Alan turned into his harem," Par said. "On the one hand, they were raiders. On the other hand, what Alan subjected them to was wrong." The 19-year old clenched his fists. Gabriel felt sick. While he detested raiders and slavers, this sort of treatment was beyond the pale. This could have counted as ironic treatment, if it weren't for the fact that the Enclave was proving as bad if not worse than the raiders, mostly because the former were strictly small time in their plans. "So what should we do?" he replied. "Get the prisoners out with the rest? Where would we put them all?" "Of course we're getting them out!" said Par. "I saw some of the Enclave's own transports in the lobby; they were blurry hazes because my eyesight hadn't been repaired yet, and if I'm right and the Enclave has resorted to assassinating its own leader, things might be chaotic enough to allow us to get there." "Good enough," Gabriel said, cocking his rifle. "I think you better take a few of these armored gentlemen to cover your escape and get the hostages out as well. I'll cover your backs. Hope you know what you're doing." With that, Gabriel cocked his rifle and quickly made it to a vantage point, where he could snipe the Enclave troops more effectively. Par, meanwhile, directed one of the Brotherhood Knights escorting him to use a Radio Jammer to disable the collars on the former raiders' necks, before beginning the beeline for the Enclave's ground transports at the former Airport Lobby, putting himslef in the front of a wedge... Alex stepped out of the door, his rifle in hand as he looked over the lobby, watching the brotherhood knights get closer. Near them, was the former prisoner. Good. Two birds, one stone. He raised his rifle and fired a shot, catching one of the knights in the neck and burning most of his throat to ash in an instant. Before the knight even hit the ground, he turned slightly, and fired another shot in the direction of Par. Gabriel heard the shots, turned around, dropped, and took aim, firing right between the legs of a Paladin and straight at Alex' head. He winced as the recoil kicked like an enraged mule. Alex pulled his head to the side, feeling the heat of the shot pass just by his helmet. He unclipped a greande from his belt and spoke into his comlink. "Targets are a mixture of pre war power armor and other haphazard protection. Pulse and Plasma grenades are recommended." As he said so, he tossed another plasma grenade out the window, and waited for the inevitable explosion. By that time, however, the Paladins had gotten wise to the attack and had spread out to take cover, returning fire at the windows and tossing a few grenades of their own back in. Gabriel, meanwhile, took a better vantage point, and made it a sport of de-braining any Enclave troopers trying to rush in to help. Each shot caused his shoulder to hurt like a bastard, but the longer he kept this up, the more time he could buy for his teammates to finish up the rescue. He just hoped Par got the hostages to safety, nabbing a few Vertibirds on the way. "With me!" shouted Par to two Brotherhood Paladins and the former raiders, some of whom, though still naked, had picked up several pistols and rifles from the fallen Enclave and Brotherhood personnel. They moved faster than ever, throwing a wall of fire at any Enclave robot or soldier who were unlucky enough to confront them, and scavenging more arms that way. Par smiled; he can detect the disarray among the enemy a mile away - Alan's actions, and from what he can guess, Barre's, were lowering the group's morale. They made their way to the airfield as Gabriel and Romiel continued their sniper duel, and Par saw them: The Vertibirds. "Prepare to -" he said, before he saw Alan's power-armored form leaping in an arc from a nearby observation deck, and landing in front of the group. The naked former raiders instinctively shrank away in fear, but Par and the Brotherhood Paladins pointed their guns at the man, who was evidently in a new, plain-colored, suit of Hellfire Armor. "Uh, uh, ah, Naked Slave," Alan was tut-tutting, "you are not leaving here, not alive, anyway. That said, though, you have impressed me." "So here's an offer. Submit to DNA Testing, prove yourself pure to us, and you can be part of," he gestured with his right hand while his left drew a pistol, "all of this. Perhaps, if Corporal Roniel fails me again, you can take his position; I was attached to him for reasons not entirely related to his merit, but it seemed that he had too much of his murderous mother in him." The words were in a silken, familiar tone that implied many things, but most of all an intimate closeness to the subject matter. "Barre said that Alex was concieved when his parents were 15 or 16, and that you've been doing this since you were training, which was around that time," was all Par can say. "You've gone deeper than I would have done in pursuit of pleasure. And yes, that's an indirect no." "What a shame," said Alan, who, instead of shooting, [i]bullrushed[/i] Par's position, wading theough a wall of fire in order to slam against one of the Paladins, crunching the latter's Power Armor to uselessness, before getting shot by Par again, which didn't stop him one bit, even as the former raiders began trying to blast him to bits. The other Paladin drew a knife, and stabbed at Alan, who merely parried with his gun and headbutted the man so hard, the helmet caved in, crushing his head. That left just Par, the former raiders who had nowhere to go, and Alan himself... Alex moved away from the grenades, feeling a blast of heat on his back as they detonated behind him. He looked outside for a moment, and stopped. "I dont have time for cannon fodder." He said, as he moved down the stairs, speaking into his comlink. "Sir, what is your location? Enemy reinforcements have arrived and they are looking for you!" By this point the raid was going rather roughly. The Paladins had made a good show of combat, but they were slowly being overwhelmed by increasing reinforcements. The team leader hit the comm button. "Rodriguez, Matthews, we're being overrun out here! What's your status?!" "We've hacked the terminals, sir," came the reply. "Not much data, but certainly got some useful stuff here. It'll serve as good intel." "Richardson, how's the little gift coming along?!" "We've been a bit preoccupied, so it's not entirely complete. We still managed to set up quite a few demolitions charges; won't do as much damage as we'd hoped, but we can certainly give them one hell of a repair bill." "Good, cause we're leaving this party. Take any injured with you and head for the evacuation point. We need to get out." The Paladin leader turned to his team. "Fall back! We're ditching this joint. And someone call off the sniper. We're heading for the Vertibirds, hopefully Par made it there." "Roger, sir!" The Paladin found Gabriel lining up another shot, and waited till he fired it off, forcing an Enclave trooper to dive for cover. "Captain says we need to leave," she said. "We got what we came for, and if we don't move it, we'll get overrun." "Sounds like a plan," Gabriel said, grabbing the rifle and making a break for it, following the Paladin out. "So where to?" "The Vertibirds," she replied. "Maybe we can grab a couple to take the prisoners out of here. The APC won't be enough." Dogmeat kept close behind Gabriel, running to keep up with his pace.