Catgirl in the Mojave

by Modeus_The_Unbound

Summary:

Instead of turning into a new Vessel, or being drawn back into Shifting Mound's embrace. What if Witch got isekaid into Fallout New Vegas. Why? Cause both StP and New Vegas make my brain go brrrr. That's why.

Chapter 1: A familiar face to start the journey.

Witch could feel her teeth punch through that nasty birdman's feathers, followed by cutting lacerations into the flesh below. She had to be faster, each mouthful of flesh she tore off of his torso was met with the feel of a blade grinding against her spine as it went into her back. After a few seconds of this, which felt like hours, he curled his legs in and kicked her away. Witch slammed into the root covered wall and left a halo of her own blood on the impact site. Her vision was blurred, her head was swimming, and her grin was massive. He was just as bad off as she was...good. It's what he deserved, just the sight helped confirm in her mind, that her vengeance was more than worth dying down here. She stagger backwards, and felt her cooled blood on the wall mix with the fresh and hot blood her wounds weeped with. She felt roots wrapping around her and smiled. Her eyes drooped to a close, and then there was only darkness.

She awoke, laying down on her back, to the sight of several ceiling fans spinning away. Odd how they were orbiting eachother too...oh it's her vision. As her eyes focused, she realized there was only the one fan. Wait...where is she? She tries to rise from the bed, but a firm hand upon her shoulder stops her. "Woah easy there, easy...you've been out cold for a couple of days now. Why don't you just relax." The man holding her shoulder let go and sat down in a chair next to her bed. He looked middle aged at the youngest, with a bald head and greyed mustache. He wore blue overalls that looked as weathered as he did. "Get your bearings." While Witch was still highly on edge...something about his soft tone helped her be more at ease. She glances around the room, it looks like a spare room of this man's home that was repurposed long ago into a clinic. Medical supplies left laying on a table behind the man, and a shelf just around a corner of the wall.

From the foot of her bed was several wooden crates and some kind of...science lab? The numerous glass beakers and bottles looked complex and fragile. She looks back to the man and sat up in the bed. "Who are you? Why am I here?" Her tone drips with suspicion as she puts her hands on the edge of the bed and tenses her back. If this old timer tries anything, she refuses to be caught unprepared. If he notices her hostile posture, he ignores it. "My name is Doc Mitchell. But what about you, how about your name?" She doubts his first name is actually Doc, but she relents to answer him. "Witch. My name is Witch." Her answer comes out clipped and tense. "Huh. Can't say that's what I would have picked for ya, but if that's your name. That's your name." Witch almost pulled her hand back and slapped him. Who the hell does he think he is to make fun of her! "Welcome to Goodsprings." He extends both a greeting and his hand before she can fume on his sass any further. She warily takes his hand and shakes it. "You didn't answer my second question, why am I here?"

Doc Mitchell lets go of her hand and stiffly taps at his own back, the joints of his arm not wanting to cooperate fully. "I know you were already laying in a graveyard, but I reckoned you would want someone to stitch up those stab wounds ya had." He then thumbs towards one of the doorways behind him. "I also have a bathroom at the other end of the house. You can use the mirror in there to take a glance at how well I did. I take pride in my needlework afterall." Witch rolls her eyes, she didn't feel anything when she was laying down so everything probably healed just fine. She let out a huff and forced herself into a more relaxed stance. She needed info from this geezer, and being mean to him wouldn't help. She felt her tail flick back and forth out of mild irritation. "Where is Goodsprings?"

The Doc stood up, rubbed at his knee a little with a pained expression, and then pointedly ignored her question. "No sense keeping you in bed anymore. Let's see if we can get you on your feet." He reaches out his arm for her to help balance. Witch scoffs and hops out of the bed, and then immediately regrets it. Her vision swims and blurs, and she ended up holding onto his forearm for support all the same. After a few moments her eyes and legs were able to coordinate well enough with her brain to stand. Doc nods towards a carnival game looking device against the far wall, "Why don't you walk down to the end of the room, by that Vigor-Tester machine there?" Witch quickly takes her hand off him and immediately power walks to the indicated goal. Determined to get this entire experience over with quickly. This was a bad choice, as her vision blurred and swirled again. Not nearly to the extent as before...but it was enough to make her halt with a quick retching sound.

She could hear the Doc's patronizing tone from behind her. His voiced drawled as he spoke, "Take is slow now! It ain't a race." She made sure her back was too him as she rolled her eyes, and then staggered from how that made her head swim again. She held out an open palm towards him, just in case he tried to rush over and "Help". If she needed someone else just to walk across a room, she would rather have been left to die. She tried to take it a little slower this time, once she reached the machine she wondered why a doctor would have this in his house. Standing in front of it, she was even more convinced this was a scavenged Circus game. It was a wooden box taller than her by about a foot, at the top was the words Vit O Matic arranged to make the shape of a top hat, with "Vigor Tester" and "Trust Worthy" flanking it, to fill out the upper area of the machine. Behind a panel of dust covered glass was a chart saying, "Rate your... Strength, Perception, Endurance, Charisma, Intelligence, Agility, Luck."

The words were arranged vertically and with their first letter being a bright vibrant red. Making an anagram for the word, "Special". Witch wanted to roll her eyes again, but not willing to risk staggering yet again, she settled for scoffing at it. The only people who care about feeling special, are people who never will be. Doc Mitchell then entered her peripheral vision. He followed her line of sight to the ridiculous contraption. "Go ahead, give the Vigor-Tester a try. It'll help us learn right quick if you got back all your faculties." Really? If it weren't for the fact she was still breathing at the moment, Witch would be tempted to call this guy a quack. How the hell would a carnival quarter eater help anyone learn if they properly recovered from a surgery? She gave the Doctor a withering look. He smiled banaly back at her. Whatever. If it got him off her back, she would do it. She looked below the glass panel where a plastic handle rested. Presumably grabbing this helped the machine "Test" a person's "Vigor".

When she gripped the handle, she saw the machine light up. Odd condsidering the handle didn't feel like it had any buttons on it. She looked at the bulbs light up for each characteristic. To show how, "SPECIAL" she was. It said she had, 6 Strength, 8 Perception, 6 Endurance, 6 Charisma, 4 Intelligence (rude), 8 Agility, and 2 Luck...honestly the low luck felt accurate. She woke up in a basement chained to the wall, was literally stabbed in the back by some massive bird monster who said he would help her. Only for him to show up again after she woke up a second time, knife in hand, to finish the job! The memory made Witch shudder, both in anger...and a little in fear. Was that *Thing* out there now, approaching this place? Would the old man help him kill her? She gritted her teeth, while glancing at him with renewed paranoia. He seemed too focused on the Vigor-Tester to notice her expression. "Now that don't make a lick of sense. With how many times you were stabbed, the fact you survived long enough for Victor to drag you to me makes you the luckiest daughter of a gun in New Vegas."

Victor? New Vegas? Wha- None of those names mean anything to her. But would she look suspicious if she asked too many questions? Just one for now couldn't hurt, she still had the excuse of recovering from a near death experience, "Victor? Who is Victor, and why was he just wandering around a graveyard in order to find me?" The Doc scratched his chin and then his mustache (ew) before answering, "I can't say why he was where he needed to be, in order to save ya. But as for who, I only have so much info to give. He's some oddball protectron that rolled into town one day and made himself at home in an abandoned shack." Doc points towards a seemingly random direction before continuing, "It's right within spitting distance of my front door, to the right specifically." Witch made careful note of everything he said...even if she had no idea what exactly a "Protectron" is. Sounds like the name to some cheesy sci-fi comic book character.

"Now what do ya say you head into the next room and take a seat on my couch? I would prefer to ask ya a few questions before I say wether or not ya got all your dogs barking." Her...what? No. She isn't sticking around and allow him to psycho-analyze her just for his own amusement. She crosses her arms and lifts her chin to properly look down at him, "Well I can assure you that all my "dogs are barking" plentifully, so let's assume we already did your little questionnare. What would be the next step?" For once it seems Witch actually put a dent into the Doc's casual demeanor, as he gives her an unimpressed look. But after a few moments of this pseudo stare down, he relents. "I suppose it's like Pete says. You can lead a horse to water, but ya can't make her drink." He takes a step towards one of the wooden boxes near Witch's former hospital bed, while motioning for her to follow. "It wouldn't sit right to send ya out into the world without giving you the tools to survive out there. Come along and we'll see if anything suits you." Witch squints here eyes in suspicion...but she isn't in any position to turn down free stuff, considering all she has is the dress on her back.

Once Doc has opened one of the crates, she begins to cautiously approach. She see's a fair bit of things she can indentify in the crate, and a fair bit she cannot. Before she can try parsing what those strange objects are, she is handed one. "If you're heading out there, you ought to have this. It's a pip-boy, the 3000 series to be exact. I grew up with one strapped to my arm, from one of those vaults made before the war." Witch takes the object it looks like a wrist mounted computer, an ancient one at that. The thing even has nixie tubes in it. But...beggers can't be choosers. So she slips her arm through the Pip-Boy and feels the soft material inside the cuff pressurize and expand. It stops just before it can be uncomfortable, must be some way to ensure that "one size fits all". She glances at Doc still not sure how far she should allow herself to trust this man. Even if he saved her life. "And you're willing to depart with this thing just like that? How do I know you're not just pawning off your scrap onto me?"

Doc then frowns at her for the first time since she awoke in this place, surprisingly instead of angery, he looks dissapointed. "Madame. You look every gift horse in the mouth, don't be surprised if ya end up bit." He then takes a deep breath before continuing. "It ain't much use to me, I don't leave town or get into trouble enough for that. But I figured it might keep ya from winding up getting dragged through my door a second time." Damnit, he has her there. She doesn't have a clue what waits her outside that doorway, and just from what she glanced earlier this pip-boy seems to have a built in map, geiger counter, and more. Couldn't hurt to have any of those on her person, let alone have them be all in one. She looks to the side in shame, of her actions prior or for what she is about to say...even Witch doesn't fully know. "I'm sorry." The words come out low and fast, she hated how they tasted on her tounge. But having Doc be upset with her could make him hold out his best stuff, no need to burn a bridge before you can even cross it afterall.

The small smile that causes he eyes to crease shows he bought it. Hook, line, and sinker. "Now, I got something that's a mite more direct when it comes to keeping you safe." He then pulls up what looks like a, jumpsuit? It's a denim shade of blue, with some gold trim and the number 13 on the back. But most importantly it has some sections of leather armor incorporated into it, nice. While she doesn't plan on changing in front of him, something to help actually protect herself is exactly what she was hoping to get out of Doc's charity. She motions with her finger for him to turn around, and he obliges. She easily tosses off the loose fitting dress and keeps and eye on Doc as she steps into the jumpsuit. It's a loose fit, obviously meant for someone with a slightly larger frame than herself to fill it out. But all that means is she has the excess material to make an makeshift hole for her tail to stick out of. "Okay old man, I am fully changed. you can keep that worthless gown if you wish, or burn it, I have no more need of it." Doc doesn't turn to look at her, but he does go back to rummaging through his crate.

This time filling a small backpack that was leant up against the boxes with a bunch of syringes, orange bags filled with fluid, and bottles. "Stimpacks, Radaway, and Rad-X. No sense sending you on your way without em." Witch hopes the pipboy in her possesion will explain what those are, as she has no clue what their purposes could be. But admitting that out loud feels to akin to weakness, so she would prefer to be silent in her ignorance. Doc then pulls out a Browning High Power, Witch is VERY aware of what that thing's purpose is. Her hair on her head, body, and tail, all poof out in fear. Why would he sho- "You seem to have a keen eye, so I think this might help keep any radroaches and geckos off your tail...uh, no pun intended." Doc wasn't even looking at her to see how she responded to the gun, still intent on sesrching through the crate with one hand as he holds the pistol by it's barrel and offers it to her. She takes it, and then presses the magazine eject button...only to realize the gun doesn't have one in it.

"Wait a moment and I'll scrounge up the ammo. Just don't care for passing around loaded firearms." Hmmm. He must have heard either the click of the mechanism, or her sounds of confusion. Either one shows she is getting too comfortable around him, having someone know what she is doing without even looking at her...sloppy. She was getting sloppy. She puts the gun into a holster built into the hip of her jumpsuit as she chastizes herself. Doc is true to his word as he hands her some ammo, not much though, only 35 rounds. She'll have to make her shots count. She awkwardly fidgets as she puts on the backpack, unsure if Doc will spring another act of charity on her or not. "Well, I seem to be geared up as plentifully as I can imagine. Any sage advice you wish to impart on me before I leave?" Doc smirks for a second before responding, "Aside from not getting into another knife fight?" She scowls darkly at him for that, it only causes him to let out a wheezing laugh. "Yes. Aside from that." He wipes a non-existant tear from his eye as he chuckles, Witch doesn't find him nesrly as funny as he does. "I would reccomend heading down to the saloon. Judy will be eager to meet ya, and I reckon Sunny Smiles will have some odd jobs. She pays decent, so it'll help ya get set on your feet if nothing else."

Fuck it, not like Witch has anything better to do. She gives him a small nod and makes her way to the front door. She opens the front door and steps out into the Mojave...the brightness of which promptly blinds her. Naturally her first moments in the wasteland would be spent uttering swears while rubbing at her eyes.

Chapter 2: Getting Jerked Around

Once Witch's vision cleared she looked out to...a shitty desert town. Broken down truck by the road included. Although something does feel, off. Several building are boarded up, while others are nothing more than the crumbling frames you would build a house around. Witch starts walking down to the shattered and grey bleached asphalt, fiddling with her new Pip-Boy. The first menu to pop up looked like a live readout of her health, with an admittedly cute diagram of a princess that had all four limbs, torso, and head, highlighted. Oddly there was also a "NaN/Error" limb indicated...oh right, her tail. Guess whoever designed these left the code open to detect extra limbs, even if the visuals don't know what to do about that. The next menu just informed her of her SPECIAL stats, already know those. The next one shows her a long list of skills and how she ranks in them from 1-100. She notices that the numbers for Sneak, Guns, and Unarmed are all higher than the rest. But she doesn't really know what to do with that information.

"Howdy Partner!" A southern voice with a synthetic quality to it practically screams in her ear. Making her lash out with her claws towards the source of the noise, a surprisingly big robot balacing itself on one wheel. Her claws come up short as the robot wheels itself back a few inches, just in time to avoid having that screen damaged. Witch then furrows her brow at that...for some reason the large blue and grey painted robot has a nearly steroetypical cartoon cowboy face displayed on it's black and white monitor. "Whoa there, amiga! I ain't looking for trouble." The robot's tone was right, but it's body language was...well it didn't even bother moving it's arms, it's body language was non-existant. Witch gives the machine a glare before returning to her Pip-Boy, speaking aloud as she looks through it's menus. "Then I would recommend not screaming in a woman's ear while she is busy."

The next menu shows her, her "perks". She isn't sure what those are, but so far she seems to have three. She is delighted to see they have little animations when she highlights them. The first one is Black Widow, where a multi-armed princess looms over the corpse of a...birdman. How does this thing know ab- "Ya know it's mighty rude to ignore someone after they save your life, miss." What? That would make this robot..."You're Victor?" The robot finally emotes, the art on the screen going from a friendly grin to a bashful blush. "Aw shucks, you already heard of me?" The face then returns to it's default state. "That's my name, don't wear it out." Witch drops her wrist with the Pipboy down by her waist. While saying that she dislikes someone has all the weight of saying the sun is shining...she REALLY dislikes this robot. But he is the only one who can help her understand how she got here. "What were you doing at a graveyard at night? From what I've been told, your pretty new here. So it's not like you were up there to mourn someone."

Victor showed no sign of offense at her words like she had hoped...but why would he? He is a machine with potentially perfect control of his body. Damnit, she really hates talking to someone she can't get a read on. "Well, normally I try to mind my own cattle if ya catch my meaning. But you and whatever else was up there with ya were having quite the scuffle." Thing up there with her, Witch could have sworn she passed out in the basement of the cabin. But she had lost a lot of blood, she might have ended up here before the actual end of her fight with h- "Wait! What else was up there with me?" She was practically screaming, no way. He couldn't have wound up here too. "I can't fully reckon what it was, it was rather dark out and my night vision setting has been on the fritz for months now. So all I could tell was that it was near the size of a deathclaw, and left behind a mess of feathers." FuckFuckFuckShitFuckDAMNITFUCK! She could feel herself heating up in anger, but beneath that...she felt far more exposed than she did only minutes prior.

If this desert looking landscape isn't just some small pocket, but stretched on for miles...where could she possibly hide? Deep breaths Witch, losing your shit won't help you. Just try and steady yourse- "You look a bit green around the gills, partner. Anything I can do to help?" Witch felt her face twitch in several places, out of barely contained anger. It would be easier to calm down if this obnoxious robot wasn't babbling in her ear at full volume. She gives the robot a withering look, "Unless you can think of somewhere I can go, with 4 foot thick walls, barbed wire, armed guards, and an automatic alarm system...then no! You can't help me, *Partner*." She practically spat the word partner back at him. She had a 7 foot tall feathered menace to deal with, and was NOT in the mood for Victor's Artificial condescension. "Well then, madame. You are in luck! Cause I know just the place."

It took Witch a few moments to process this, but...he did? "Where is it, how do I get in?" Witch wanted to not look desperate, anyone with two braincells to rub together would take advantage of someone desperate. "Well, my boss has been in one hell of a mess recently..." Victor then leaned down and actually lowered the volume of his speakers, "Now ya didn't hear this from me. But apparently someone managed to swipe a very important item from Mr.House, The Platinum Chip. If you were to head over to him and offer to get it back, in New Vegas, I would be inclined to get ya through the front door." This smells fishy, but it's the only option she has at the moment. So it will just have to do. "Fine, I will go to New Vegas and ask your boss if he needs some assistance finding his own belongings. But I may need some directions to get there. I would hate to get lost and keep him waiting." Witch holds out her Pipboy to Victor in order for him to indicate where on her map she should go.

Instead he surprises her. A small panel on his chest, just below the screen, pops open. Inside is a cable which Victor grabs and then plugs into Witch's Pipboy. "Allow me to charter ya a proper course, there are beasts and mutated monstrousities a-plenty out in the brush. So this path ought to be the safest for ya to travel on foot." After Victor removes the cable from her device, she looks at the screen. On her map is a highlighted path starting here in Goodsprings goes down south to a place called Primm, continues further south then hangs a right until it reaches a Nipton, then northeast to Novac, further north to the 188 Trading Post, and then it's a straight line north by northwest to the city of New Vegas. "This seems like a rather, winding path, to get to the city. Any particular reasons you avoided just sending me north from here?"

Witch thought to herself about how it had better be a damned good reason, if the alternative was navigating across almost the entirety of the mojave region. "I got several dozen particular reasons. Their all called Cazadores, vicious and territorial varmits. If their stingers don't rupture an organ, their venom is sure to dissolve em." Oh, those sound bad. Better get a full description, no need to play guessing games on what is and isn't a Cazadore. "Those sound quite awful, care to give me a better idea of what they look like?" Victor's face screen suddenly replaced his cowboy face with a picture of a blue-ish black wasp with bright orange wings. "This is a Cazadore, don't let the lack of scale trick ya now. These suckers range from 2 feet, to up to 5 feet long from the tip of their stinger to their heads." Hearing how big they are almost made Witch nauseous. "Not to mention they tend to live in hives of up to 15, not including the queen of course." And now she is officially sick to her stomach at the thought.

If this machine was telling the truth, his recommended route just saved her from a very painful way to die. She gulped nervously and then shook her head, hoping dislodge images of her being swarmed by wasps the size of herself. "Well if it's only certain death keeping me to such a winding path, I suppose I can take the safer route." She was about to march off and begin the journey...only for her stomach to growl loudly. When was the last time Witch ate anything, literally anything. In her entire life all she has really tasted was feathers and birdflesh, but she spat those out after to get another bite in sooner. Of course, this noise invited Victor to chime in again. "Well it sounds like you have a date with some grub. Afraid I won't be able to join ya, can't eat and I get the impression the barkeep doesn't appreciate my company." Not that Witch cared enough to ask what issues Victor and the bartender have with eachother. So when Victor spun around (how did he manage that with only one wheel?) and began to make his way down the ruined road, she didn't try stopping him.

Witch did a quick survey of the area and spotted the saloon quickly. The sign atop the building was half traditional with the word "Prospector" written on the left half, with the word "Saloon" made from some scavenged metal letters and neon lights. She almost cringed when she noticed a man even older looking than Doc Mitchell sat in a chair near the entrance. But thankfully he either took the hint she wasn't in the mood to meet yet another new person when she avoided eye contact, or he wasn't in a talkative mood either. All he did was silently tip his hat towards her as she passed him and went into the building. Thank the Shifting Mound for small favors. Witch was barely able to take in the sleepy atmosphere of the bar before she heard a sound so chilling, so vile, so malevolent, that she had no choice but to leap upon a nearby table. claws digging into the wood as she could feel her every hair stand on end. She let out a panicked sound that she assures you was NOT feline in any way, as her tail stuck out straight.

What was the source of this awful sound? A foul and ugly looking Siberian Husky. It barked at her with hate in it's heart and murder on it's mind. "Cheyenne! Stay!" A woman's voice calls out, firm and authoritative, and thankfully it was enough to bring and end to that mangy beast's warcry. The woman who commanded the beast was wearing an armored outfit. It looked like a leather biker gang ensemble, down to the black studded jacket, but with numerous additional layers of protection added onto it. It didn't look half bad. "Don't worry, she won't bite unless I tell her to." The casual smile the woman wore made it clear the implied threat was meant to be a joke. Witch was not in a joking mood. She silently glared at both the woman and her slobbering mutt. "Okay. I can tell Cheyenne gave ya a spook. Let me put her in the bars bathroom for now. I can't imagine how Trudy would have my hide if I accidentally ran off the towns source of gossip."

The town's source gossip...oh for fuck's sake. Witch had assumed she wouldn't have long before word of her spread around, but she didn't consider that could have already happened. Just the idea of doing another dozen meet and greets like the two she's already suffered through was almost enough to make her willing to skip town without a meal. Almost. While the leatherbound lady contains her beast, Witch goes towards the bar and sits down to wait for the bartender. And she waits, then waits some more. Witch can feel her tail lash at the air behind her with irritation. Where the hell is the barkeep? "Trudy most have stepped out to go grab some more alcohol from the distillery out back." Witch in a moment of weakness, brought upon by her empty stomach, let her head fall onto the wooden counter. She couldn't even bring herself to be disgusted by the fact it was slightly sticky. The woman chuckled at Witch's display of defeat, before introducing herself. "Names Sunny Smiles, I don't suppose I could tempt ya into helping me out with a small errand?"

Witch refrained from dignifying that with any response. She is hungry, and bitchy. No, she isn't interested in helping incompitent people with their problems. Until..."Would tossing in the offer to share some of my big horner jerky improve the odds of you saying yes?" Witch's eyes snapped to the side. In Sunny's hand was a brown paper bag, and it looked quite full. Witch took a deep breath before pushing her stool away from the bar. "Alright, I suppose I could kill some time by helping you do...whatever it is you do." Witch tried to keep her nose in the air, to imply this was all beneath her. Her inability to take her gaze off the bag of jerky undercut her efforts, but Sunny Smiles was too polite to mention that.

Chapter 3: Let me eat and drink it all away

As the duo make their way out of the Prospector Saloon, Sunny Smiles takes a moment to offer Witch one of her spare Varmit Rifles. "Here, this should help you keep up with me." Witch was mildly perplexed about why the people in this town seemed so eager to hand her firearms. Must be a cultural thing. "I feel I should inquire about what you spend your days doing, that you think were both going to need one of these." Witch had been hoping that whatever task she just signed herself up for would be boring and monotonous. She was getting the sinking feeling that she had hoped wrong. "We are about to go chase some geckos away from our water supply. Darn critters get to territorial, and someone could end up hurt." Witch is getting very weary of being informed of creatures that she could have sworn were small and weak enough to be killed with a shoe, are actually much greater threats than she assumed.

Before Witch can make any sassy comments, Sunny Smiles takes off. She moves from the front porch of the Prospector Saloon down the road with Witch trailing frantically behind her. Unwilling to risk losing sight of her for even a moment. As Witch tries to get a comfortable hold of her new gun, she can tell it's in poor repair. The wood of the stock feels fuzzy due to the finish having long since worn off, and the metal of the barrel feels pock marked and slighty rusted. Witch may not know much about firearms in general...but she would hesitate to put her safety in this thing. She is silently thankful that if worst comes to worst, she still has the pistol she got from Doc. As they pass a pair of joshua trees, Sunny slows and then crouches down. "I can hear a pair of them right around that ridge. If we creep around slow, we'll have a better chance t-" Witch doesn't care. She keeps on moving towards the massive outcropping of rock. While stealth is nice, the element of surprise can't be underestimated.

As she passes by a rusting and unusable water storage container of some kind, she rushes forward, gun at the ready. Just as she see's the slowly spinning windmill that a pair of massive 2 foot tall, yellow, geckos have crouded around...she kicks a bucket left by the container she was running next to. Not only is there a sharp *CLANG* from the impact, but the bucket also ends up sailing through the air, drawing the gecko's attention as Witch let's out a strangled noise of pain. The two monsters snap their heads to Witch before sprinting mouths wide open as they run. It would be comical to see if she weren't trying to aim her rifle with vision blurred by her eyes welling up from the pain. She hasn't had time to line up her shot before the creature's exposed stomach explodes in crimson chunks. Sunny Smiles doing no doubt. Now Witch felt ashamed of herself, she NEEDED to take out the next one with her own shot. She fires, the creatures left leg explodes from underneath it, it is heavily wounded but doesn't seem to be stopped yet.

Sunny Smiles cracks off a shot, it misses and sends up a plume of dust and rock as the gecko is now upsettingly close to Witch. On pure instinct, instead of shooting, she curls up her tail akd shifts her hips. When she flexes the muscles the other other way, as hard as she can, the end of her tail connects with the gecko's head right at the point where the neck and jaw meet. There is a sickening snapping/crunching noise that occurs as the gecko's view gets forcibly aimed skywards. When it hits the ground, it stays there. A small trickle of blood flows from it's mouth onto the sand. "Wow, glad to see that tail isn't just for show. You okay?" No, Witch want's to say that only her pride had any damage done to it...but she is fairly confident she fractured something in her big toe. Doesn't matter, showing weakness is only asking to be taken advantage of. "I'm fine...who the fuck left that bucket there?" Sunny Smiles just shrugs. "Might have been left here out of kindess, might have been left behind after someone turned around and ran from those varmints. Speaking of, we got two more spots to clear out."

The second spot was nearby, turning to the left they travel between another pair of rocky outcroppings taller then either of them. Once they see the geckos Witch crouches down (while trying not to put too much weight onto that toe) and uses her pistol this time to take shots at the creatures. Her aim with it was honestly atrocious, it took almost 7 shots for her to take out the duo that rushed her. "At least this time I didn't have to resort to slapping them with my tail." Sunny Smiles had already started to skin the third and final gecko when Witch heard grunting and panicked breathing from nearby. Without saying anything she moved to where the ground gave way to a 4 foot drop. At the bottom was the third and final well, with a woman desperately defending herself from a trio of geckos. It looked like she had been fighting them for some time, she had bite wounds bleeding freely, and she swung her cleaver sluggishly. The geckos jumped away when she swung, only to dive back into the fray after.

Witch realized if she didn't do something, now, this woman would die. So she grabbed at the varmint rifle she had been given, still slung on her back, aimed down the sights. Lined up a shot on the biggest gecko's broad head, pulled the trigger, and heard a loud metal click instead of a gunshot. Wha- Witch was dumbfounded and that was all it took. The poor woman tripped trying to back away. She finally let out a noise loud enough to get Sunny Smiles attention as the trio of beasts pounced onto her. Witch is struggling to get the worthless rifle out of her way, as she tries to draw out her pistol. Sunny ends up taking two lucky shots in a row, causing the remaining gecko to flee. Witch refuses to give it that chance. She empties the final 3 bullets in her clip. She thinks the first shot hit it on the spine, she also doesn't care. She feels terrible right now, and that thing is why. Or at least half of it. Witch goes to inspect the rifle and sees what the problem was.
Jammed in the bolt is the 5.56 round that never got the chance to be what saved the woman.

Witch can see from the corner of her eye that she hasn't moved since the geckos were killed. She doesn't want to look directly at her, so she keeps her eyes locked onto the spinning of the windmill next to the water source. Witch regrets coming out here with Sunny, she's too nauseous to even think about eating her reward of big horner jerky now. "Hell's bells! There ain't a day that passes by, that I tell people not to come here by themselves." Witch hears Sunny next to her, frustration evident in her voice. A hand is placed on her shoulder as she continues to stare at the windmill. "Hey, it ain't your fault. I should have been taking better care of that gun I gave ya. This is on me, alright?" Yeah, it's not Witch's fault the rifle jammed. She just got handed it 5 minutes ago. She blinks once, and then twice before turning away from the windmill. "Alright." She gives a slow nod of her head. "Can we head back to the saloon, I don't wanna be here anymore."

Sunny gives her a nod and then takes the hand she had on Witch's shoulder, and gives her back a firm smack. "Of course, I think we could both use a stiff drink after a hard days work." Witch can tell that while Sunny is trying not to sound different from earlier, she can't hide how her smile isn't reaching her eyes right now. The duo head back towards the Saloon, Witch is focused on trying to get the jammed round out of the bolt. Trying to fix a jam in her gun, while tears are still glistening in the corners of her eyes, as she walks with a minor limp. She is a pathetic sight, she knows it, but she needs it removed from her gun. Now. They are back onto the bleached grey asphalt when Witch finally managed it. The round bounces on the ground with a series of *pings*, Witch stops walking to stare at it for a few moments before pulling back her foot and kicking it away into the brush. She can feel her toe throb in pain, she doesn't care right now. She feels better having "punished" the bullet.

When Witch looks up, she sees someone new marching in their direction. Ugh. He looks almost as upset as Witch feels. He is a brown skinned man, with very short hair on his scalp, but a noticable chinbeard. He wearing a black set of pants, with a black bulletproof vest on top of a blue shirt. Oddly he glares at Sunny as they pass. "You better pack up your bags and ditch town, Sunny. Won't be much besides rubble when me and my boys are done with it tomorrow." What the hell? Witch feels her shoulder start to rise up. Who makes a threat like that? Witch is about to use this jackass as a punching bag for all her recently aquired trauma, but a firm hand between her shoulder blades keeps her walking. She looks back at Sunny, who just firmly shakes her head no. Witch gives her an incredulous look as they keep walking, but Sunny's un-sunny expression convinces her to keep quiet. For now. They pass by the sign and see the old man still in his chair, now smoking from the miniscule reamains of a cigar. "Howdy Sunny, see any excitement?"

His words, despite not being aimed towards her in any way, hit Witch in the gut. She struggles not to show it as Sunny responds. "Unfortunately, Easy Pete. Kuuvetli Amahk went out for water all by herself again...she, she didn't make it. She went down fighting though." The old man, Easy Pete, nods his head slowly. He lets out a long sigh before dropping what's left of his cigar to the floor and grinding it beneath the heel of his boot. "We both know that's how she would have preferred it. That girl was too headstrong and feisty to have the good sense to wanna pass away peacefully." He rises to his feet, he surprises Witch with how much taller he is than his sitting posture gives away. "I'll go inform her family, get things arranged to go retrieve the body before dark. You girls go and get yourselves something to drink, tell Trudy it's on my tab." Without waiting for any response, he walks down the steps of the saloon's porch and wanders off.

Witch opens the door to the saloon and sees that the bartender is finally actually behind the bar now. Would have been fucking nice if she has been there an hour ago! Sunny entered first and raised up her hand while making a peace sign. "Hey Trudy, it's been a hell of a day. Give me and the new girl two shots of whiskey. On Pete's tab." The woman behind the bar's eyebrows shot up until they almost touched her dark red hair. "Sounds like trouble is in the mood for company, cause I just had to deal with Joe Cobb, again." Trudy turns around and grabs a bottle of amber liquid, from the middle shelf, with a flaming rooster on the label. She grabs a pair of small shot glasses and sets them on the counter, in front of two bar stools. That's all the invitation Witch needed. She sat down on the nearest seat and rested her head on her elbows. Today was awful. "Alright, as rough as my day was, you two look like someone died. What happened?" Sunny made a face like she had been slapped, while Witch pointed looked anywhere but at Trudy.

After a few tense moments Sunny answered, "It was Kuuvetli. She went out alone to get some water..." Trudy lowered her head and shook it slowly. "Damn fool of a girl, she knew better...always did act like she could pick a fight with a dozen radscorpions and come out clean." Trudy lifts her head and puts the whiskey bottle back on the shelf, what the hell! Oh, she is reaching up for one on a higher shelf...that's odd. Trudy turns back around and pours both girls up to the rim. "Forget Pete's tab, this one is on the house." Damn, if everyone in this town keeps wanting to be a free meal ticket for her...she might actually stick around this place. Witch requests something to eat, and Trudy writes down something before handing it off to another man behind the bar. As he runs off out of sight, Witch sips some of her drink. Then immediately starts coughing as it burns the hell out of her throat! She knew this was too good to be true, it's been poisoned! Sunny even has the audacity to laugh at her in her final moments, that two faced cunt!

Trudy chuckled a little before topping Witch back up, as most of what she tried to drink had been coughed back up either onto the floor or the countertop. "Sorry there darling. Forgot to ask if ya had ever tried the strong stuff before. Next time sip real slow, let the burn settle in first." Okay, so maybe she overreacted to how harsh the whiskey burn hits. But time Witch knew what to do, she raise the drink up to her lips and lapped at it. Letting her tongue scoop small amounts from the glass and into her mouth. This time the burn was more tolerable and she even closed her eyes to enjoy the flavor better. "Awww, you even drink like a kitten." Witch opens one eye after hearing Trudy, who somehow has the gall, fawn over her. Both Trudy and Sunny are looking at her with bemused smirks. Witch sits up straight, squares her shoulders, and drinks properly this time. No lapping up the alcohol in her tongue...it burns like hell, but not so badly that she coughs any of it back out. So at least she can have SOME dignity today.

As Witch finishes her drink, Sunny and Trudy speak to one another. Trudy wiping down a beer mug as she inquires,"Think he'll actually do it, blow up the whole town just to get at Ringo?" Sunny scowled at the varnished countertop. "Maybe, gangers like him have to do a lot to stay in charge. Letting someone who killed members of his gang go might be out of the question..." Great, just fucking perfect. Just when she finds a town full of people willing to just give her whatever she could need, a bunch of gangbangers wanna blow it up. She wonders if she could talk Trudy into another shot of top shelf whiskey...for free of course.

Chapter 4: Ghost towns and fistfights.

After spending a few hours drinking and eating her fill, Witch had been given a mattress to sleep in one of the spare area's connected to the bar. It had a safe built into the floor and a PC set on the table next to it. Normally the glow from the monitor would have kept her up, but a belly full of grilled mantis and whiskey let her pass out as soon as her head hit the pillow. Her rest was deep, dark, and quiet. For a few hours at least. The light of dawn also came with the sound of gunshots and explosions. Witch stumbled out of her makeshift bedroom, sprints out the door of the Saloon....to find chaos and carnage already in full swing.

One of the people she drank with last night, she never caught his name, was laying face up in the dirt just shy of the saloon's steps. One arm had been blown off, and the sand underneath him was soaked with blood. Witch starts to draw her pistol, but stops cold. There he is, in front of her, black as smoke. Massive, swirling, and the moment she sees the glint of steel, she KNOWS that damnable blade is in his hand. He is here, why is he here? Her mind is racing as she stares at the smoke rising from a dynamite created crater, unaware all she is doing is imagining her worst fears in her half-awake state. Until a something slashed at her forearm.

The pain, like a knife dragged across her skin, sends her from an internal panic to a total mental meltdown. The next thing Witch knows, she sprints past "Long Quiet" looming before her and is stumbling down the ruined road. Her foot catching on a gap in the ancient asphalt, damaging the same toe she slammed against that bucket yesterday. If it was fractured before, it is now fully broken. She doesn't care. Each time she brings down her right foot, searing pain shoots through her. She nearly sprints headfirst into the man who threatened her the other day...HE BROUGHT THE MONSTER HERE! She lets out a battlecry, something between a scream of hate and enrage feline yowl. Joe Cobb only has time to turn his head before her clawed slash takes away his sight for good.

Witch slams into him, pinning him to the ground and slashing away at his face as he struggles to get her off of him. She feels the butt of his revolver hit her shoulder hard enough to leave a bruise. She keeps going until he stops moving and all she can see is bone and mangled flesh. She hears someone scream "That psycho bitch just mauled him!" She lunges off the man she just made a corpse, in the nick of time too. Someone who decided arriving to a gunfight shirtless was a good idea had swung a bat at her. He had the drive to avenge his leader, but he was clumsy. Throwing himself off balance with each swing he took at her. His eyes covered in tears as he flails at her in rage.

She waited for him to stumble, then lashed out with her claws again. From left to right, aiming to open his throat. He fell back to avoid her lunge managing to have only one half of his neck spurting blood with each frantic beat of his heart. His eyes that were once filled with outrage, now lock onto hers in terror. She has him. It's only a matter of time. She glances around, big mistake. She spies the Long Quiet again, ominously billowing on the spot like before. Her vision tunnels in on him as she shakes, her stomach feels like she swallowed a block of ice, h- GOD DAMNIT! The man she put upon death's door wasn't on the other side yet, and had put all his weight into one final swing. Breaking several of her ribs. She retaliated by grabbing the left side of his face, digging her claws into his flesh, pulling him close. And biting the right side as hard as she could.

He screamed and weakly struggled to push her back she could feel the faint sensation of tearing through her teeth. She thrashed her head back and forth until she felt him start to go limp. The flesh of his face was peeling off like the rind of an orange. Unclenching her jaw, she watched as a massive flap of facial skin and muscles flopped down to his collar. He fell back onto the "GoodSprings Welcome" sign, then died with a faint gurgle. Witch let out a scream at the freshly made corpse. Of pain, fear, anger, triumph....Witch honestly doesn't know. She just has too much inside and needs. It. Out. NOW. When her voice broke and throat felt like she swallowed barbed wire, she finally stopped. When she turns back towards where she last saw Long Quiet, ready to fight him next claws out, teeth bared....all she see's are the townsfolk looking at her with a mix of shock and concern.

No billowing form of Long Quiet come to reap her, almost like he w...was never there. "Now I think we all need to take a moment and calm down." Doc Mitchell's patronizing tone cuts the tension. "This poor lady just woke up from a traumatic experience yesterday morning." The few people who still had their guns at their sides nod and let them fall. The ones who look afraid of her, simply back up. Doc Mitchell slowly approaches Witch, hands up and palms facing out. "Ya still know where you are, right miss?" Witch bites back the bitter words she wants to say, and nods while saying, "Yeah, you patched me up...and gave me you old jumpsuit and pipboy." Her voice sounds ragged and small as she answers. She hates it.

Doc offers her a stimpack from a bag he brought with him, to help patch people up after the fight. "Here ya go then, just jab this into the muscley part of your thigh, and it'll do the rest." She silently takes it, and does as instructed. She expected it to hurt, it's a needle the size of her damned pinky, the audible *Hissss* caught her off gaurd. As did the way her pinky toe and ribs burned like she jammed a hot iron into the bones with her ragged throat itched like she swallowed salt water...and then the pains were gone. Huh, Witch realizes with surprise that she must have woken up with a mild hangover as her head feels better now too. Unfortunately for everyone, Witch is entirely unaware of the post-usage euphoria that Stimpacks can cause. And everyone else is unaware of Witch being unaware of this.

"I'm gone. Fuck this place. Fuck all of you." She makes her declaration with little fanfare or pomp. Marching to where she had spent the night in the bar, through the now dispersing crowd. She flings the front door open and goes to gather her things. Grabbing her bags, strapping her Browning Hi-Power to her hip, slinging the Varmit rifle onto her back, and taking a celebratory sip from her trusty Vault 13 canteen. As she spun on her heels, she spotted the other old timer in town. Easy Pete. "Howdy there, youngster. We never got properly introduced. Names Pete, folks call me Easy Pete." Witch smirked, finally someone who she can rattle, nothing pisses off a geriatric like some good old disrespect. "Easy, Pete. You use to be a stripper or something?" She crossed her arms, eager to see someone else be unhappy today. But if that Robot from yesterday was stoic, Easy Pete was a statue.

He let out a small grunt to acknowledge he heard her, but not a single wrinkle on his weathered face even twitched. "Not in this lifetime. Never had the hips for it. But I was a prospector, so here-" He places a small box full of bobby pins into her hand. "-You'll need these if your heading out. Might reccomend you take a crack at the safe I couldn't get into, in the old schoolhouse. Watch the Mantis...and the ghost everyone keeps saying just moved in." She wanted to scowl, maybe roll her eyes...but she just couldn't seem to muster it. So she just shrugs, curls her fingers around the box, and gives out one last barb before leaving. "Huh, you guys really just leave unclaimed treasure lying around? How pathetic." ...not her best, she'll admit. But she just wanted to express her disdain for this place. At these people. Looking at her like that, after everything she's been through...

She shakes those thoughts from her mind as she heads to the old schoolhouse a short ways past Victor's shack. The place certainly looked abandoned...but so do half the houses that have people living in them. She pulled out her pistol as she slipped inside. Carefully stepping into the building, aware that a single creaking floorboard could give her away. She spied a classroom full of Praying Mantis the size of rats....ugh! They scittered amongst the dust coated schooldesks. With a deep breath to push down the goosebumps their giving her, then aimed down the ironsights of her sidearm. She fired more rounds than she probably needed to, but the important part is they were all dead before any could touch her. Thankfully. As she replaced the magazine, she felt...oddly watched.

She surveyed the room, some lockers on each wall, a table with a magazine, toolbox, and terminal on it. A safe on the ground nearby. And no one to be seen. Glancing over one shoulder, then another didn't reveal any reason for this sensation either. "Psst. Down here." Witch's blood went ice cold as her head snapped down to between her feet. Halfway embeded into the floorboards was a woman's face. Half rotted skin warped and twisted it's way across her oddly pale skin. With no nose, and a placid smile decorated by an odd pattern of scars, resembling stiching to seal it shut. "Hiya, Killer..."