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« on: September 01, 2017, 02:12:48 am »
Diary of Annabella, last survivor of The Last Light's Crisis Response Operators
Based on true events during the last hour before the wipe of Season Two
I saw myself die. Yet, there are worse fates than death. I was there when the madness took hold. I remember...what they call the "Wipe". Everyone knew it was coming. You could smell the fear. The dogs cowered under the wagons, the brahmin huddled in the pens. The skies darkened, I knew what was coming. I checked my Geiger counter. This wasn't any ordinary dust storm.
I was on my feet in an instant. I sprinted to the depot...my heart raced to the point of nearly bursting. I dusted off my Desert Combat Armor, andhefted my long stashed gatling laser, pocketed my pulse pistol, and grabbed the forbidden paramedic's bag. I swore to Lisa I'd never become that old me again, but where was that old me when she needed it the most? Haunting memories.
When I came back, some of the locals had started to rail against the containment the guards were imposing. I saw what was going to happen before it did. I had just enough time to slam down a Psycho...this madness was preferable to the other kind, the impending doom. One man tried to run the blockade...and that's when the shooting began. It all happened so fast. It always does.
I shoulder barged the nearest line and broke through, commandeering a local house outside the main city walls. I shot one guard through the chest, obliterating his torso. I hefted my gatling laser and tore through a line of them. I regret that their metal armor caused significant casualties among the civilians. It was already upon us, the screams, the howling. But they wouldn't relent. It had finally taken everyone. The madness was there.
They kept coming, all of them. People were dying, monstrosities and deathclaws were herded by the sour sweet winds of oblivion. All those caught out in it were beginning to suffer. It was upon us. I remember that the Knight was beside me...I don't know how he got there. All I knew is that he was White, and he was a Paladin. I remember an enclave trooper...he screamed his name was Pete and he wasn't going to let them take me without a fight.
We took two mother deathclaws at the door. By this point, my oldest comrade, Ermac, had showed up with Avenger in hand. We took them in pairs, I kept slamming super stims into his neck seals to keep him upright, while inhaling jet with crushed buffout in it. Then the tide of mutants came, we were being shot by both mutants and the crazed guards. It was then I had the awful epiphany that his presence heralded a death foretold.
The mutant, a visage of the master himself, shoulder barged the door, knocking us all down. His relentless charge shattered my visor and sent the knight and the trooper sprawling. It was then, Ermac suffered the worst end of the deal, dragged out by a monstrosity and gunned down by a crazed guard. All I could see was him spinning up the barrels of his Avenger, taking the guard with him as he was gored by the abomination's horns. The only thing I could hear in that horrific moment... was the Elite Nightkin laughing...his bellows shaking the ground. My tears tainted the soil with bitter rage.
I shuddered with anguish. It was like watching Lisa taken from me all over again. My hesitation...my weakness, cost him his life. I prepared to overload the battery in my pulse pistol...I wanted that Nightkin dead even if it cost me my arm. It was then, another paladin...I never knew his name, I just saw his plasma rifle firing until the barrel was nothing but slag. He burned a hole straight through the back of the mutie's head; that was right before the pressure wave came and obscured him from our vision.
And that's when the caravans came in droves...there must have been dozens of them. I knew this was the true end. Resistance was futile. Everything began to slow down. Pete was yelling to move, the Knight was gone, as we had lost him in the fight. I can only hope with my soul of souls that his fate was pleasant, and that his end was merciful.
They poured in by the dozens. I remember taking dozens of hits to my torso in the opening salvos, and returning it with a concentrated salvo, slamming the last of my mentats to concentrate further. I had to hold the line at all costs. They drove me in to the back room. Pete and I were cut off, he had retreated across the road. I could still hear his gatling going until the power core failed. Mine wasn't far behind. I checked my ammo reserves as I fell back to the final room. It wouldn't matter...I was out of stimpacks and my paramedic's bag was gone. I sipped the last Nuka Cola and readied my final salvo.
I was taken around a corner at point blank range by a laser rifle shot to the face. I was reeling on my knees, as I pressed the barrels into the weak points of his metal armor. He fell into pieces as I pushed myself onto my feet again. The kill squad was there. The lead pair of the dozen took me in the chest with two full mags from their FN FAL HPFA's. The seals of my armor began to fail under the withering 5mm and 7.62 fire. I took one of them out with a concentrated shot to the pauldron, ripping his arm off and incinerating his nearby friend. The arcs of lightning tore through their unprotected metal shells, causing several to convulse. I however, was nearly spent.
From the back of the room, a single, well aimed 5mm shot range out and pierced my elbow joint. I screamed in absolute pain; I watched the blood drip down my now crippled arm as I discarded my Gatling Laser. It's barrels were melted anyways...and I looked up with unrelenting determination, and met two 5mm AP rounds to the helmet. Driven back into the corner of the room, half slumped on a chair...all I could do was breathe one last gasp.
The last thing I whispered before I saw the feral guard's Ripper coming for the gap in my helment was..."Lisa..."
Darkness swallowed my world...it felt as if it lasted many years. How I ended up here, alive, I know not...there is an awful gash around the gorget seal of where my armor was...I'm sure I'll soon know the answer, and whether I'm saved...or another captive to a cruel master yet again. I will never yield.
I will not let this be the last light.
I will live.
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