spacepirate
gͯͣ.̄͑̌ͨ̉͒̚uͪ͌̇̄̈mͫm̃͌͂ͨ̅͗̃ÿ́͐̄̔b̀̉͆͌3̚a̐͋͋̈r
War. War never changes.
The islands were no stranger to conflict- from the very first humans who set foot upon those white-and-green sand beaches, blood was shed. Spilled first by spears and arrows, then again from gunpowder, and still later from flames that burned so hot and so long that there was not a drop of blood for the earth and sea so much as taste. Rather than the crimson tides, the islands bore witness to the bubbling and mutations of change, of defiance, of life sprouting and persisting in ways so twisted and determined that no merciful god would have allowed. Such was the nature of war, one may suppose- a fistfight today could be a full-blown nuclear warhead tomorrow!
But today's conflict in the bar wasn't a fistfight, so much as it was a clear knife fight versus a rather naive gambler who had little more than the jumpsuit on his back. The assailant was a short and stocky woman of a leathery, sun-scorched complexion, and chalky hair that had seen a few hundred too many chem-bleachings. While the top portion of her face was concealed under a pair of heavy-set welding goggles, her cracked lips were strained in a bitter snarl, even as her arms, veins bulging and muscles twisting, continued to swipe at the fearful outsider. For his part, said outsider had run as fast and far as he could, but vault-folk weren't exactly known for their athleticism or ability to breathe in the outside air without coughing. On top of that, this was the outsider's very first time in the so-called city of Corsair, one of the largest of its kind on the island.
Or so he was told. It's not as if he'd actually gotten to survey the island for himself, counting the residents of each building as he passed. In fact, he'd done nearly the opposite- since emerging from his subterrenean home, the young man had done little but flit across the remains of the great Raised Highway, and made his way towards the most likely locations for radio stations, for... reasons. Entirely professional, technical reasons that a mechanic in-training such as him would want to know for... for the betterment of the entire vault! It wasn't at all about that rich, creamy, crooning baritone he heard every night through the comms room... Yes, that's why he took off during his graveyard shift, when most of the other residents were asleep, locking the upper hallways behind him so no one would be able to stop him from opening the great vault door and slipping out, mostly unnoticed.
It wasn't like he'd committed some great sin, really! Tons of residents had left the vault over the years, according to rumors, and none of them faced any consequences upon return! Well, then again, it wasn't like any of them actually returned, but what would the other residents do about it, exactly?
For all the caution he'd exerted in making his way into Corsair, it would be embarassing to meet his end right after riding so high. Who would have thought that surface wastelanders played the same card games they did back in the vault? Entering the city was such an ordeal- according to the bartender, Corsair was a massive cruise ship before the war that had beached into the shallows of the island during all the fighting. It took years to close enough of the holes to make it liveable, not to mention killing the mutated megamano who'd infested the submerged portions of the vessel. In his opinion, though, Corsair was the grandest city he'd ever seen! It glowed above the murky black sea like a military parade on one of the old holotapes, and had more people than he even thought possible! Unfortunately, it appeared that the guards let just about everyone in so long as they didn't have any major weapons, and his assailant's knife clearly made the cut, so to speak.
"No one cheats One-Eyed Mary!" The woman spat, sound raspy and saliva green. Apparently, she'd never lost a game before, at least not as badly as she'd lost against him, because he was knocked to the floor with a black eye and cut lip before he could even think of anything to say. Well, this never happened before! He was a prolific gambler, even back home, but back in the vault, people knew how to take their losses! Sure, they could talk big, but what would they do, steal his rations? It seemed as if this woman was willing to kill him over what was left of his Nuka-Cola and the useless tokens he'd taken from the table upon winning the game. "If you don't fork over all the shells you took- all of them, Mary'll be glad to carve them out of your stomach!"
"Well, it's not like I ate the damn things!" He shouted increduously, only to have the wind knocked out of him by a hard kick to the stomach, falling into a pile of what he hoped was merely water, but smelled otherwise. Wow, the old hag could really throw a real haymaker! If only he hadn't dropped his wrench on the highway whilst on the run from some terrible creatures with hard shells and spiked pincers.
Coughing in disgust, the young man was able to get a small glimpse of his own reflection in the puddle that now drenched his jumpsuit, turning the '2' in '26' a much darker shade of yellow. Ugh, maybe it wasn't water after all. His face wasn't the clean, pretty thing it used to be- normally, he fixed his hair everyday in a prewar-style pomp, but seeing as there being a lack of proper hair product, would just use grease from the machines. The style he'd fixed before he left still held a little bit, but there were also bits of ash and debris dirtying his hair and face, covering the tan skin in brown and grey grime. Shapely eyes that once held a certain edge of extermism now only looked pained- well, it was difficult to see through the swollen eye, but he'd definitely seen better days. This One-Eyed Mary person didn't seem physically a threat at all, either! While not the tallest, he was certainly one of the stronger members of the vault, given that he essentially moved parts and machines all day, but he was no match for the element of surprise and a real scrapper.
Damn! Now he wished he hadn't laughed in the face of one of the other players he'd cleaned out at that bar, a strange young man who looked to be around his age with the smugest shit-eating smirk he'd seen in his life. Upon discovering that he didn't even enough shells to meet the pot, the man had claimed he was some sort of mercenary, and pledged his services to the victor. Obivously, he could probably have used a bodyguard right now, but at the time it sounded like the opportunist was just trying to get a free drink, or worse, mug him later when he would be least expecting it. What did the man call himself? Stumps? Stubbles?
In the corner of his eye, the outsider saw the glint of his assailant's knife in the dimly-lit ship corridor. Her teeth, brown and rotting, reflected very little of the same light. "Alright, boy, you had your chance. Tell me, what do you want them to write on your bodybag when they toss you overboard to be megamano food?" Eyes already wet, the young gambler bit his togue so hard it bled. "No? Well, we can always put you down as a 'dumb fucker' anyways."
"It's Uriel," he groaned, blood slipping from his lips. Maybe if he was built for fighting, he'd get up and try to beat some sense into the old bat, but things looked pretty bleak as they were. Damn, he'd failed his family, himself, and most importantly, his soulmate. Now they'd never get to meet. "Name's... Uriel."
Fist Full of Frogs
The islands were no stranger to conflict- from the very first humans who set foot upon those white-and-green sand beaches, blood was shed. Spilled first by spears and arrows, then again from gunpowder, and still later from flames that burned so hot and so long that there was not a drop of blood for the earth and sea so much as taste. Rather than the crimson tides, the islands bore witness to the bubbling and mutations of change, of defiance, of life sprouting and persisting in ways so twisted and determined that no merciful god would have allowed. Such was the nature of war, one may suppose- a fistfight today could be a full-blown nuclear warhead tomorrow!
But today's conflict in the bar wasn't a fistfight, so much as it was a clear knife fight versus a rather naive gambler who had little more than the jumpsuit on his back. The assailant was a short and stocky woman of a leathery, sun-scorched complexion, and chalky hair that had seen a few hundred too many chem-bleachings. While the top portion of her face was concealed under a pair of heavy-set welding goggles, her cracked lips were strained in a bitter snarl, even as her arms, veins bulging and muscles twisting, continued to swipe at the fearful outsider. For his part, said outsider had run as fast and far as he could, but vault-folk weren't exactly known for their athleticism or ability to breathe in the outside air without coughing. On top of that, this was the outsider's very first time in the so-called city of Corsair, one of the largest of its kind on the island.
Or so he was told. It's not as if he'd actually gotten to survey the island for himself, counting the residents of each building as he passed. In fact, he'd done nearly the opposite- since emerging from his subterrenean home, the young man had done little but flit across the remains of the great Raised Highway, and made his way towards the most likely locations for radio stations, for... reasons. Entirely professional, technical reasons that a mechanic in-training such as him would want to know for... for the betterment of the entire vault! It wasn't at all about that rich, creamy, crooning baritone he heard every night through the comms room... Yes, that's why he took off during his graveyard shift, when most of the other residents were asleep, locking the upper hallways behind him so no one would be able to stop him from opening the great vault door and slipping out, mostly unnoticed.
It wasn't like he'd committed some great sin, really! Tons of residents had left the vault over the years, according to rumors, and none of them faced any consequences upon return! Well, then again, it wasn't like any of them actually returned, but what would the other residents do about it, exactly?
For all the caution he'd exerted in making his way into Corsair, it would be embarassing to meet his end right after riding so high. Who would have thought that surface wastelanders played the same card games they did back in the vault? Entering the city was such an ordeal- according to the bartender, Corsair was a massive cruise ship before the war that had beached into the shallows of the island during all the fighting. It took years to close enough of the holes to make it liveable, not to mention killing the mutated megamano who'd infested the submerged portions of the vessel. In his opinion, though, Corsair was the grandest city he'd ever seen! It glowed above the murky black sea like a military parade on one of the old holotapes, and had more people than he even thought possible! Unfortunately, it appeared that the guards let just about everyone in so long as they didn't have any major weapons, and his assailant's knife clearly made the cut, so to speak.
"No one cheats One-Eyed Mary!" The woman spat, sound raspy and saliva green. Apparently, she'd never lost a game before, at least not as badly as she'd lost against him, because he was knocked to the floor with a black eye and cut lip before he could even think of anything to say. Well, this never happened before! He was a prolific gambler, even back home, but back in the vault, people knew how to take their losses! Sure, they could talk big, but what would they do, steal his rations? It seemed as if this woman was willing to kill him over what was left of his Nuka-Cola and the useless tokens he'd taken from the table upon winning the game. "If you don't fork over all the shells you took- all of them, Mary'll be glad to carve them out of your stomach!"
"Well, it's not like I ate the damn things!" He shouted increduously, only to have the wind knocked out of him by a hard kick to the stomach, falling into a pile of what he hoped was merely water, but smelled otherwise. Wow, the old hag could really throw a real haymaker! If only he hadn't dropped his wrench on the highway whilst on the run from some terrible creatures with hard shells and spiked pincers.
Coughing in disgust, the young man was able to get a small glimpse of his own reflection in the puddle that now drenched his jumpsuit, turning the '2' in '26' a much darker shade of yellow. Ugh, maybe it wasn't water after all. His face wasn't the clean, pretty thing it used to be- normally, he fixed his hair everyday in a prewar-style pomp, but seeing as there being a lack of proper hair product, would just use grease from the machines. The style he'd fixed before he left still held a little bit, but there were also bits of ash and debris dirtying his hair and face, covering the tan skin in brown and grey grime. Shapely eyes that once held a certain edge of extermism now only looked pained- well, it was difficult to see through the swollen eye, but he'd definitely seen better days. This One-Eyed Mary person didn't seem physically a threat at all, either! While not the tallest, he was certainly one of the stronger members of the vault, given that he essentially moved parts and machines all day, but he was no match for the element of surprise and a real scrapper.
Damn! Now he wished he hadn't laughed in the face of one of the other players he'd cleaned out at that bar, a strange young man who looked to be around his age with the smugest shit-eating smirk he'd seen in his life. Upon discovering that he didn't even enough shells to meet the pot, the man had claimed he was some sort of mercenary, and pledged his services to the victor. Obivously, he could probably have used a bodyguard right now, but at the time it sounded like the opportunist was just trying to get a free drink, or worse, mug him later when he would be least expecting it. What did the man call himself? Stumps? Stubbles?
In the corner of his eye, the outsider saw the glint of his assailant's knife in the dimly-lit ship corridor. Her teeth, brown and rotting, reflected very little of the same light. "Alright, boy, you had your chance. Tell me, what do you want them to write on your bodybag when they toss you overboard to be megamano food?" Eyes already wet, the young gambler bit his togue so hard it bled. "No? Well, we can always put you down as a 'dumb fucker' anyways."
"It's Uriel," he groaned, blood slipping from his lips. Maybe if he was built for fighting, he'd get up and try to beat some sense into the old bat, but things looked pretty bleak as they were. Damn, he'd failed his family, himself, and most importantly, his soulmate. Now they'd never get to meet. "Name's... Uriel."
Fist Full of Frogs