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[calmhrtprevails]

The door opens on a vista of rocky landscape punctuated here and there by yellowed, rough-edged grass and low, scrubby brush. There's a hint of coolness on the breeze in the otherwise warming air, and a scent of distant rain. "We are," Fawkes rumbles, "some hours' distance from the Citadel. We're likely to stop at the town of Megaton first, and then make for the Arlington route the rest of the way."

Comments

[cantdiequiteyet]

Teresa would draw her sword, but there isn't room for it here, so instead she steps closer to the door to show willing about being ready.

[calmhrtprevails]

"Two," calls Kodiak as the Vertibird's forward flight slows, easing towards a hover again.

"I hope for your sake that the yoma powers you spoke of are ready," Fawkes says gravely. "The radiation levels below us are deadly to humans. They cease to be a hazard some distance inside the door. The only dangers after that are the sort we can kill."

"One," calls Kodiak, and the door opens. "Jump for it."

Fawkes leaps, and his high, half-mad cackle is swallowed up in the sound of engines.

[cantdiequiteyet]

Teresa turns her smile on him for that last second. Then she leaps out behind him, drawing her sword while in the air as she falls down.

She lands lightly, bending her knees so she's kneeling on one knee, and rises instantly.

"It tingles," she announces.

[calmhrtprevails]

"Then your senses are keener by far than a human's," says Fawkes, as the Vertibird rises and circles away. "All they would feel is-"

He never gets to say. One of the other mutants caught sight of the two of them and opened fire on their location- on Fawkes, primarily, but assault rifles are not always known for their precision.

[cantdiequiteyet]

Teresa didn't see that coming. She reacts fast, but not fast enough to stop a bullet going straight through her upper left arm, with an appropriate spray of dark blood.

Not that this slows her down. She just turns, her sword already drawn, and throws herself at their attackers.

And by 'throw,' we mean she races forward towards their assailants, her sword moving so fast it's a blur.

She stops ten feet behind them, still facing in the same direction, and it's only the arterial spray coming out of their shoulders that suggests that anything actually happened.

She looks over her shoulder, a faint smile on her face.

[calmhrtprevails]

The mutants blink. That doesn't usually happen.

Splud.

Also, their arms... generally stay on more than that.

What a mess.

[cantdiequiteyet]

With that smile still in place, Teresa swings her sowrd again and takes their heads.

"That's two."

[calmhrtprevails]

Fawkes stares a fraction of a second longer, then barks a great, thunderous laugh. "Well done!" he announces. "Well done indeed. Come now! There are others waiting in the dark!"

The door is frozen ajar, which is well; it's huge and thick and weighs who knows how many tons. Good thing the opening's enough to suit them both, eh?

[cantdiequiteyet]

Teresa slides her sword back into the sheath on her back and follows him through, pausing just in the door to let her eyes adjust.

The wound on her arm is already healed.

[calmhrtprevails]

There's light in the distance down the corridor, lurid and red, and steady despite its superficial resemblance to torchlight. The air stinks of blood and older, less pleasant things. Fawkes has to stoop here, the ceilings being built with human heights in mind, but it doesn't seem to slow him down.

"There are three rooms I must reach," he growls, "so that I can plant the explosive devices. Every door we find should be thrown open, if it moves at all. As we get closer, I'll show you the way to the Lamplight passages...."

[cantdiequiteyet]

"Alright," Teresa says calmly.

And for a moment there's just the tmp tmp tmp of her feet.

"It stinks in here," she remarks.

[calmhrtprevails]

"This Vault has been occupied for two hundred years," says Fawkes. "Most of my fellow meta-humans have no interest in hygiene."

Something moves in the shadows up ahead, and a quick eye will spot a blob of something thick and brownish and vile soaring towards them in an arc- projectile spittle the size of a man's fist.

[cantdiequiteyet]

"That is disgusting."

She says this even as she ducks under the arc of the spit, drawing her sword in the same smooth motion that becomes a blind swing - horizontally at her own eye level.

[calmhrtprevails]

"Indeed," says Fawkes, and opens fire with the Gatling laser on the things in the darkness. And none too soon; the spitter that Teresa strikes at is... not the worst thing that could happen to a human, but certainly it is up there.

Or it was, before that sword of hers came into play.

[cantdiequiteyet]

The first swing misses by being too high, but Teresa corrects immediately, slicing the thing neatly in two across its torso. She turns, looking for more, ,but with no intention of jumping into the fire of Fawkes' gun.

[calmhrtprevails]

There are others, yes. Another of the tongue things waddling its way down the hallway- and around the corner, howling in a voice not so different from Fawkes: "Come out, come out, wherever you are!"

Fawkes snarls and launches forward at a run as his lasers start ripping the darkness apart.

[cantdiequiteyet]

Teresa races forward. As she's using the light from his lasers as light to see by, she lets Fawkes go forward, then sprints faster, touching him lightly on his shoulder as she squeezes through the gap between his stooped head and the ceiling.

She'll have to trust him not to shoot her as her sword flashes again, cutting down the waddling creature before darting around the corner.

[calmhrtprevails]

Fawkes might nod, or not. Hard to say. He's concentrating on the Gatling laser, though, keeping it as steady as can be. Teresa has nothing to fear from him.

The mutants coming around the corner are armed with laser weapons themselves, though smaller ones- rifles. Fast, semi-automatic, firing three flame-red beams with each pull of the trigger. The larger of the mutants looks less human than Fawkes, its neck all muscle and gristle, its face twisted into something more monstrous. But it has enough wit to thunder, "I'm going to eat your arms when you're dead, human!" as it opens fire on Teresa's position.

That is probably going to turn out to be a mistake.

[cantdiequiteyet]

Taking the time to hurl insults was indeed a mistake, because by the time it opens fire, Teresa is no longer in that position. She bends low now, and rockets forward bringing up her sword at waist height to slice him in two.

"Wrong," she says. Whether this is about her arms or her status as a human is unclear.

[calmhrtprevails]

There is another-

Oh, there was another. Fawkes' lasers have already torn the other to shr-

No, not torn to shreds, reduced to ashes. The Gatling laser is very, very good at that.

"I win again!" Fawkes announces, watching the ashes fall. It... will be a moment or two before he calms enough to indicate the corridor ahead as it turns to the left.

[cantdiequiteyet]

Teresa regards him with blatant amusement at his announcement, and quietly wipes her sword clean as she waits for that indication.

She walks to his side if there's room - ahead if there isn't - and follows the turn.

[calmhrtprevails]

"My apologies," says Fawkes after a moment. "I spent a long time here, at their mercy. I take a certain personal pride in each one of them that falls."

That being said, the corridor ahead opens out quickly into a room full of machinery, some of it dead, some of it sparking. Fawkes notes, "This was a control room once for the internal security systems. Before she released me, my friend came here and blew as many of the locks as she could. We're not far from the place where the first of the explosives will have to be planted. I think we should push through first, and make sure the passages leading to Lamplight Caverns are barred."

[cantdiequiteyet]

"Don't apologize for cutting down the people that hurt you," Teresa says mildly. "Or for enjoying it."

On the plans, she nods. "Clear the way, then plant them. It makes sense."

[calmhrtprevails]

"It was more a case of losing my focus," says Fawkes. "Being too caught up in the moment to be mindful of our surroundings puts us both in danger. Shall we proceed? The rooms used as prisoner cells lie ahead. I only hope they're empty."

[cantdiequiteyet]

That's a good point - something that doesn't really occur to the woman who is only just learning to fight without anything other than the usual five senses. She never needs to be more alert than usual.

She nods. "Yes, let's see what else there is."