Republics of Dust | Fallout RP | Alt-Timeline | IC

[Alinora]

...

X6-88 looked extremely focused, and remained that way as he spoke. "I have established a secure uplink with Wade Station and am now going to begin searching for the Institute. This should only take a few moments." Meanwhile, T6-77 had been watching security, and a lot had been happening. Most of the power to the facility was shut off, but the power that allowed the satellite's to remain active was separate from the generator. However, security measures were down, and local forces were quickly working their way towards the command center. T6-77 turned to his fellow Courser.

"Local forces are getting closer - I am going to stall them." T6-77 left the room, crouching down and entering stealth mode as the blast door close behind him. He drew his weapon - an Institute rifle - and passed down a few halls and corridors before entering an area that resembled subway tunnels. He crawled up onto an old supply box, made of steel, where he was hidden - facing the door in which enemy forces were closing in from - and raised his weapon. When the door opened, a plasma grenade would land at their feet, though it was cooked, and a second later, would explode. T6-77 would lodge a few shots down at the enemy troops, and keep firing as he made a left down the corridor, and began to fall back to the next point.

[Waztaskio]

---

Area 51

CEP watched as the men seemingly began making their way to the entrance, but was not at all shocked by what happened after the general had left. The men had destroyed his protectron, and proceeded to the armory in an attempt to get it open. However, CEP had sealed it from all entry after the men had left and he soon came back on the intercom. "Gentlemen, I'm so sorry you picked this place to attempt to rob. Maybe the good lord will have mercy on our souls, because I won't." CEP soon shut off the intercom system, as he began to activate security protocols. Protocol 10-01 Outer Perimeter Security Mines, would activate first with the mines around the entire perimeter of Area 51 arming themselves. They were sparsely separated as to not set of other mines around when detonated, but numerous enough to be really careful when stepping around as they were all covered by the sand of the desert. Protocol 10-02 activated to electrify the entire wired perimeter fence, and Protocol 10-03 completely closed the gates of area fifty one and also ensured it was electrified. This was as far as CEP decided to go on the outer security defense protocols, but knew he had plenty more in store along that protocol.

In the lobby of the base, he activated Protocol 11-02 and 11-03. 11-02 ensured that all computers that were still functioning were fully locked down to prevent anyone from hacking. 11-03 activated the automated turrets within the lobby, and armed with 5mm rounds which began to bear down on the force attempting but absolutely failing to open the door to the armory. For now, he simply watched the reaction of these men. He knew that he hadn't even activated three percent of the defenses the base had, but wished to see how the men would proceed.

[Alinora]

- THE INSTITUTE -

---

The Institute | Commonwealth
Director Michael Hampton

"Sir!" one of the scientists shouted over the bustling sounds of the Advanced Systems Division, which was well-underway in waiting for the Coursers to establish their uplink with the proper satellite. Apparently, they'd been successful. "We've just received a transmission from Wade Station - the Satellite Relay Station in Washington is diverting control of it to us." The scientists began typing away, while the Director looked over his shoulder. "All I need to do is confirm, and control of Wade Station will be transferred to the Institute... one moment..." he paused - heavily involved in his work. "Alright... alright!" he clapped his hands together. "All data is currently being transferred here, and should download within... within about ten minutes. It's a lot of information to process."

Director Hampton stood straight and crossed his arms. "And once the data is secured, we will be in control of the station."

"Remotely, yes." the scientists answered. "We'll then have to take actions to cover our tracks so that nothing can be traced back to the Institute. The Coursers have, if I recall, been tasked with also clearing all data caches within the Relay Station and scuttling the facility."

"Yes" Hampton said. "Once the memory banks are erased at the Relay station, there will be no traces of it having established an uplink with Wade Station, and then the Institute."

"Then here's hoping the Coursers do their job." the scientist said.

[Tysklandia]

Sirso smiled at the border patrol men. At least thats what Sirso assumed they were, he couldn't really tell.

"My name is Sirso, from the Adirondackian Mountaineers, Lake Placid, we're passing through, going South, then West."

His eyes showed friendliness, and he hoped they didn't mistake his party for one here for warring purposes, which, considering how tense all the guards were, most of them were ready to shoot at anytime.

Luckily most of the party was at ease, John No-Bull was even trying to start a conversation with one of the guards.

The whole party knew that they couldn't let these guys be afraid of them.

"Mountaineers? The canadians? You are a long way from home, Reason for passing through?..."

The officer, shifted his weapon, loosening the straps and held the weapon fire-ready with one hand as he made a waving motion with his other.

"I will need to search your packs for contraband. If you chose not to comply you will have to leave Pact territory. Weapons are allowed on your own risk. raising arms, pointing weapons, theft, crime or acting in a threatening manner whilst in the position of firearms or explosives gives any officer of the military or the guard legal right to shoot in order to preserve the peace. Do understand that any officer may or may not request to temporarily relieve you of your firearms for any reason deemed viable to an officer of the law at any point in time. "

Four of the soldiers moves in closer to the caravan, hands still on their weapons, stopping a close distance and waiting for them to confirm that they where allowed to search their packs for contraband.

[Tysklandia]

...

X6-88 looked extremely focused, and remained that way as he spoke. "I have established a secure uplink with Wade Station and am now going to begin searching for the Institute. This should only take a few moments." Meanwhile, T6-77 had been watching security, and a lot had been happening. Most of the power to the facility was shut off, but the power that allowed the satellite's to remain active was separate from the generator. However, security measures were down, and local forces were quickly working their way towards the command center. T6-77 turned to his fellow Courser.

"Local forces are getting closer - I am going to stall them." T6-77 left the room, crouching down and entering stealth mode as the blast door close behind him. He drew his weapon - an Institute rifle - and passed down a few halls and corridors before entering an area that resembled subway tunnels. He crawled up onto an old supply box, made of steel, where he was hidden - facing the door in which enemy forces were closing in from - and raised his weapon. When the door opened, a plasma grenade would land at their feet, though it was cooked, and a second later, would explode. T6-77 would lodge a few shots down at the enemy troops, and keep firing as he made a left down the corridor, and began to fall back to the next point.

The First squad had stacked up by the door, guns at the ready when the pointman opened the door. Only a moment passed before a blinding flash of green erupted through the dark hallway and nearly evaporated the point-gunman. The man who stood next to him had his arm seared off and his armor had melted to his flesh. His screams where heard througout the facility. Laser bolts quickly followed through the opened door, met with rapid and eratic gunfire. Another man was hit with a laser bolt that seared straight through his shoulder, burning a miniscule hole through his vest, his flash, bone and out the other side. As the second squad moved up, They realised their advesary was using some form of stealth-tech.

"Jezus, fuck. What the hell is that gun..."

Gunfire was eratic as the second squad pelted the hallway with rithmic gunfire, deemed to supress, rather then be accurate.

"I don't know. Some kind of laser weapon, But I have never seen one so potent... Not one that burns straight through flesh atleast... Fucking Jerry though, What kind of damn bomb was that?"

The screaming and sobbing from behind them was suddenly erased by a single, merciful gunshot. The medic of the first squad mentioning that their was no way he could have ever survived his wounds. The captain of their little force suddenly heard his radio come to life, a screeching and sizzling noise. Their collegeaus from up above...

"Sir, the disc is still moving..."

Fuck... They must have brought another generator or some kind of battery system...

"Cut any powerline you can find to the disc, data, power, I don't give a fuck. We can re-attach some damn cables later, but whatever they are doing, it ain't in our best fucking interest, these guns are high tech and they want us bloody well dead. Do it quick or i'll have your heads!"

The captain checked the chamber of his Karlie rifle, releasing the bolt with a satifying "click".
Now what to do against a cloacked adversary... An idea...

"Alright, strobe lights boys. Even a stealth-boy can't deal with strobe-lights."

They devised a plan where 2 men in the rear would turn the flashlights attached to their Karlie-rifles on and off in a rapid manner. The rapid changing light-conditions would disturb any stealth-system to the point where they could atleast notice the shimmering of the stealth field adjusting to the complex and changing light conditions. The captain has used it before on some mercs a few years back, should work now.

"Alright, remember! We need to cut the fucking power. The secondary generator is our primary goal! Whatever they are doing, we need to stop it."

They moved up again, using fragmentation grenades to force the enemy to relocate whenever he had a decently entrenched position. Their progress was painstakingly low as they enemy had an advanced weapon and powerful stealth-tech that put them at a horrible disadvantage.

Up above, the four soldiers rushed to the shifting sattilite array, to find the thick, rusted and plated pipes that carried power and datalines up towards the array. The metal was to thick to crush or cut through, so they affixed a small explosive to the side and blew it.

A dull explosion ripped the pipe apart, severing the connections and blowing portions of the concrete away from one of the pillars that kept the array upright. The entire construction groaned and shifted, dust, rust and concrete rubble crumbling off the ancient structure as it slowly came to terms with its slightly shifted balance.

[Ulls]

Waudman nodded, leading the men throug h a 15 minute walk through the large univeristy campus, passing through hundreds of students and soldiers in fatigues, taking classes ranging from history, mathenatics to tactical and strategical theory. Waudman stopped here and their, allowing them to observe classes, on occation he stopped to briefly talk to another diplomat or soldier, exchanging words about steel shipments, work, family, friends...

Everyone in full military uniform stopped to salute Waudman as he walked through, a gesture he returned with a smile and an "At ease, soldier"

Soon enough they arrived at a wing of the building that had a sign "Council offices". They passed by the guards, and walked through the pristine building of timber, brick and a flair of ancient pre-war esthetics. He led them into an office which was richly decorated with a globe, maps of america and virginia, pre- and post-war trinkets and a Arlington-1 "Arlie" rifle mounted to the wall, before he himself went in, he signalled a secretary to bring them some refreshments and snacks.

He moved to seat himself behind the office, signalling the others to seat themselves in the few chairs on the other side of the desk, or the sofa's that hugged the wall.

"Please, sit. Frida will bring us something to drink and perhaps something small to eat. You have had a long journey I imagine. Boston? I heard. Quite a way's on foot. As I said, I am Friedrich Waudman, representative of the settlement in Arlington, not far from here. Please, if you will, introduce yourselves and tell me what I can do for you."

" Not on foot, we have a Brahmin wagon that we carry our goods and travel around. But where are my manners? My name is Andre, I serve a state diplomat and sanctioned trader of the Empire. My job is basically to go around and explore but also to trade wares with nations and settlements.

We came a long way from Boston to see if the pre-war capital had anyone still around. Now that I have perhaps we can do some first contact relationships. Do you have any questions about the Empire?"

[Alinora]

...

The structure shook as a detonation on the surface rippled through the wasteland - damaging the target Satellite, but not destroying it. T6-77, however, did not allow this to distract him - he had his own task to worry about. He stood against the wall while hostile forces pushed foreword, using strobe lights to disrupt his stealth systems while throwing frag grenades everywhere in an attempt to dislodge him.

By this point, T6-77 would have switched over to night vision, but the strobes prevent him from being able to do that. Instead, he used thermal to pick out the enemy soldiers around the corner. In the large walkway, just next to T6-77, was a military barricade that would likely serve to be some use. As the Courser made his way around the corner - revealing himself in his black combat gear and firing - he would slam his foot into the barricade. It would dent inward, and the force would send it sliding towards the enemy troops at tremendous speed, leaving a trail of sparks. His hope was to crush a few hostiles as he took cover on the opposite side of the hallway and began priming his second Plasma Grenade. He pressed in the button and turned the knob, waiting a few seconds before he tossed it backwards with one hand, and proceeding to fall back to another position as it exploded.

Though, he was surprised to see X6-88 running up to support him - drawing his weapon. "They cut the connection between the Relay and the Command Center - we'll need to eliminate all hostiles and re-establish the connection." T6-77 was frustrated - there was a considerable enemy force between them and the upstairs - and they'd need to wipe them out to reach it. Regardless, he nodded, and the two Coursers would rush into battle. They took position on either side of the hallway and began lodging fire down towards the hostile troopers with deadly efficiency.

[Tysklandia]

Washington Pact
Baltimore territory
2nd Battalion (1st regimental “Washington” is based out of DC, but had decentralized command of 1st and 2nd battalion’s station in Baltimore and Washington DC respectively.)

With the intense CIA and construction efforts in Washington DC, the ruins are practically safe from any overt and large hostile and criminal faction. After the ordeal and failure to reconcile with New York, the border region with the republic became one of the highest military concerns of the Pact.

While the 1st Battalion is reforming and training new troops after the bulk of its men were used to create the CIA’s military arm, the 2nd battalion was retracted from West-Virginia and sent to police Delaware and Maryland. Both relatively sparsely populated regions, mostly farms, cattle and horse pastures. But Baltimore itself was a prime site of interest with its advanced medical research facilities and a defensive line too close to Washington DC was not optimal. The 2nd Battalion was deployed from Baltimore and manned multiple FOB’s through Maryland and Delaware, requesting the deployement of the 1st Artillery battalion to ensure proper defensive power in case of a republican offensive.

A new Armory was planned in Cambridge, the largest Pact settlement in Delaware to ensure reservists and civilians could be armed and hold in case of a New York attack in the peninsula. At the very least until reinforcements arrived.

With the extra security deployed in the region, immigration to Delaware grew in a slow but steady manner. The region was largely undamaged by the great-war and prime real-estate for farmers, husbandry and people wishing to run from the bustling Georgetown and Arlington communities. The rising threat from the New York republic did scare off many, so numbers where rather low in comparison to the “gold” rush for work and new land to North-Carolina and West-Virginia.

The increase in population meant an increase in workforce and reconstruction efforts in Baltimore sped up, in particularly the general hospital of Baltimore and the stim-tech research facility, which were both pristine and relatively undamaged facilities.

Georgetown send doctors and medical officers to both facilities to increase its refurbishment in the hopes that it could become the first proper large scale hospital that could function and operate to pre-war standards. The stim-tech research facility was a treasure chest of medical innovation and supplies, but the knowledge and skill to utilize the bulk of the facility was missing, something that research and increasing efforts of the Washington Pact personnel in the facility was slowly fixing, one day at a time.

Washington Pact
West-Virginia - Ripley
6th and 7th Infantry Battalion under command of the 3rd regimental formation “Amerika”

The outskirts of Ripley were first approached by the 3rd company, 6th Battalion, 3rd Regiment. It was nearly noon and the 3rd company was marching point in a leisurely manner. Some horses pulled carts, carrying ammunition and heavy guns; the rest was carried by backpack and good old manpower.

As they approached the ruins of Ripley, they saw light plumes of smoke in Ripley, passing by a smoking watchtower the 2nd battalion had built in the outskirts of town. A man of the 2nd battalion had been hanged from its roof, already rotting and decomposing… The company removed the corpse and buried it, unable to identify him as his tags had been removed.

The Company’s morale was a mix of horror, disgust and hatred, as they met more scenes of horror and murder on their way into town. They split up into platoons and then into squads, ensuring a large net of troops converged from the south of the town slowly into its center. As they marched through, they found only a handful of survivors, they found more executions, people murdered and left in the streets. The worst were the buildings and the old pre-war church in its center. Most had been burnt to the ground and under its rubble where women and children, along with the charred corpses of some 2nd battalion soldiers, who had attempted to buy time for the settlements evacuation.

The troops moved in further, scouring the city for traps and clue’s until they encountered the raiders, silently trying to slip away to the north with their spoils of war. The few soldiers that had encountered them immediately opened fire, downing a dozen men in seconds as they had deployed an Arlington-2 machine-gun before being noticed by the slow moving caravan. The others, nearly a hundred of them, rushed to cover, returning fire with rusted pre-war guns and looted weapons. Before long the company converged on them, cutting of their retreat with a Carolina-2 .50cal machinegun they deployed outside of the town, overlooking the road to the north.

As the pressure of the company and its overlapping fields of fire increased, they shattered, rushing to the streets to flee or as a last ditch attempt to close into a melee fight. The machine guns and concentrated fire of the WSA soldiers ensured none managed to close in.

Ripley was taken in less than an hour and the enemy had nearly a hundred dead, the company only a few wounded from enemy gunfire. The enemy was wholly unprepared, untrained and horridly equipped. Most wore tattered clothes, barely any had shoes and most peculiar of all, each and every one of them has a black, coal imprint on their face in the shape of a hand.

The company commander surveyed the scene of the gunfight, stepping over corpses and ignoring the groans and moans of the dying. A few WSA soldiers with vengeance on their minds where shifting through the dead, putting a bullet in everyone that was not dead or attempting to fake it.

“I had hoped it wouldn’t be the black root tribe to be honest…”

The company commander stopped in the middle of the caravan, at a WSA cart that these tribes had obviously stolen and loaded with stolen rifles, food, water and whatever trinkets they found worth stealing. A few female slaves had been amongst their spoils, but one had died in the firefight, the others were being cared for in the small hospital the company had set up in town. A corporal nodded, dragging a corpse out of the cart’s driver’s seat before crawling on and shifting through the cart to see if there was anything worth mentioning amongst its contents.

“Yeah, I know. They are the biggest tribe in west-Virginia right? Living by the coal mines?”

The company commander nodded, taking a drag of his cigar as he observed one of his men putting a bullet into a tribal warrior’s head, who begged for his life.

“I don’t mind a decent fight, but if I have to march my troops to another town filled with burning and mutilated corpses, I fear I might have murderers under my command instead of soldiers.”

Another drag of his cigar was interrupted by an outcry of one of the men in front of the caravan, by a group of tribals who had been mowed down by the .50caliber gun attempting to flee. The company commander walked up and observed.

“Sir, loo-“

“I’m not blind son… This is… Peculiar…”

Only one of the 4 who had been ripped to shreds had the typical Black Hand on their faces, but they did hold a rather elaborately decorated pick-axe, the typical tool of a back-root war leader. Even worse, he had an X tattooed across his arm. The mark of a Virginian raider group, made out of malcontents and the occasional deserter. Why would a black-root war band be led by a Virginian raider group that had been destroyed years ago…?

The company commander sighed and finished his cigar. He already knew his rapport of this encounter was going to raise questions…


Washington Pact
North-Carolina
1st Special Forces Platoon mission statement

The 1st Red Berets had been in North-Carolina for months now, having mixed-leave in the new outposts being constructed by the new-southern borderline. Resupplying and enjoying some R&R before travelling south again in relatively uncharted territory.

What worried high command was the large tribal population beyond the new pact borderline. Civilization seemed to end here, just as much as it did in the edges of West-Virginia. It was one of the reasons why settlements had been agreeable to join the pact, because the pact where the only decent trading and security partners available in the area.

But the relatively untouched region of North-Carolina had been spared much of the great-war’s violence. Its death toll was primarily due to radiation ruining crops and water. Food shortages, famine, contaminated water and disease killed most in this state according to the scientists of Georgetown.

All of this was background noise to the 1st Red berets, tasked with scouting, contacting and documenting the complex web of tribes, alliances and feuds in the area. All in preparation for a later push or annexation of the rest of the north-Carolina state.

The vast tribal population required careful planning and understanding of the regional politics and the necessary infrastructure to assimilate such a large tribal group.

Settlements and farms would need to be prepared to allow the tribals to slowly shift from their archaic and backwards lifestyle into something more civilized. Those towns needed sheriff’s, doctors, teachers and magistrates, military outposts to enforce the peace, room in Arlington and Georgetown to deal with the influx of new recruits that would follow after the tribal assimilation. And last, but not least, the availability of troops to crack down on opposition and armed resistance to their plans.

All of this would take time and resources. And to avoid the waste of unnecessary resources and surprises, they needed accurate information and Intel.

Washington Pact
1st Special Forces Platoon
Encounter with the Asheboro tribe -

Asheboro was a mostly a ghost town, looted decades ago and left to rot. But a large tribe sat in its ruins and edges, migrating elsewhere when the “storms” came. At least that is what the spec-ops troops who had managed to befriend them had learned.

“I swear to god, I think he got married, wanna bet...?”

A slight celebration was arranged around a campfire, men and women, often scarcely dressed danced, laughed and sang songs, whilst the 3 men of the 1st Red Berets stood awkwardly at the side, in their full combat fatigues, flak jacket, combat armor and a mix of Karlie, Remington and Arlington rifles amongst them.

One of them was awkwardly standing in the center, dancing haphazardly with a voluptuous woman whose clothes barely covered her body. This seemed to happen more often than one would think. Tribes often had hierarchical societies and alliances where often cemented by marriage. So per accident, they might have agreed to a marriage. At least the 3 veterans where having a laugh at the poor new recruit who had freshly graduated from the Lexington Sniper School.

<><><><><>

In the old school Of Asheboro, the most sturdy and structurally intact building of the town, the tribe’s elders had brought 2 of the soldiers to show them their history. Across its walls, hundreds of drawings, in all kinds of paints, chalk and even blood where drawn. Apparently the Asheboro where terribly proud of it and said their history was the oldest and most glorious then that of any other men in the “world”.

The soldiers went along out of respect, believing it to be a few bad drawings which they could ooh and aah at, act impressed and be done with it. But what they didn’t expect was… This…

Hundreds of elaborate drawings, ranging from hunts, terrible storms, war, and disease covered the walls in an elaborate timetable, from one room to the next, up the stairs, down hallways and beyond. The drawings flowed into each other as if one was watching a storybook about the Asheboro tribe.

They walked through those halls for hours, deep into the night, drawing notes and taking pictures with the pre-war camera they had. Noting several interesting and some worrying things…
The story began with a story of apocalypse. Fathers and mothers dying of disease and hunger, children left alone in fear… Likely the great-war.
Then it went on and on, a story of ordeals, famine, disease even war, until halfway through the story, where things went worse and worse. Men with guns came and killed many, took others. This story repeated itself for many classrooms, slavers likely… Until something a strange drawing sparked their interest. A large grey god figure, with two metal wings appeared in the sky and destroyed the invaders with fire. His angels descended down from his body and took the tools of the evil men away, allowing the Asheboro to survive and thrive. From that day, until the last drawings, in the only half-empty room left in the entire building, the grey god’s appeared frequently. (Sometimes more of these grey-gods appeared in the same drawing) The god figures with the grand metal wings, which looked stubby and weird as time went on, started to less resemble men and more resemble a flying metal bird or fly.

His angels where sometimes depicted as shining angels, spitting fire, other times as giant black demons, with eyes of fire, spreading havoc and ruin amongst those who dared to touch the forbidden fruit.

This tribe had a vile fear of anything pre and post-war. Power-armor, energy weapons, generators, computers. The tribe stayed far away from it all, with near religious fear.

The two men cracked their heads about the drawings… There had been strange sightings on occasion in the north-Carolina outposts and colonies, but because north-Carolina was awash with legends about giant metal eagles burning and pillaging wrongdoers and evil men, nobody gave it a second thought.

Was this just an account of legends and superstition…? Or something more?

[Tysklandia]

...

The structure shook as a detonation on the surface rippled through the wasteland - damaging the target Satellite, but not destroying it. T6-77, however, did not allow this to distract him - he had his own task to worry about. He stood against the wall while hostile forces pushed foreword, using strobe lights to disrupt his stealth systems while throwing frag grenades everywhere in an attempt to dislodge him.

By this point, T6-77 would have switched over to night vision, but the strobes prevent him from being able to do that. Instead, he used thermal to pick out the enemy soldiers around the corner. In the large walkway, just next to T6-77, was a military barricade that would likely serve to be some use. As the Courser made his way around the corner - revealing himself in his black combat gear and firing - he would slam his foot into the barricade. It would dent inward, and the force would send it sliding towards the enemy troops at tremendous speed, leaving a trail of sparks. His hope was to crush a few hostiles as he took cover on the opposite side of the hallway and began priming his second Plasma Grenade. He pressed in the button and turned the knob, waiting a few seconds before he tossed it backwards with one hand, and proceeding to fall back to another position as it exploded.

Though, he was surprised to see X6-88 running up to support him - drawing his weapon. "They cut the connection between the Relay and the Command Center - we'll need to eliminate all hostiles and re-establish the connection." T6-77 was frustrated - there was a considerable enemy force between them and the upstairs - and they'd need to wipe them out to reach it. Regardless, he nodded, and the two Coursers would rush into battle. They took position on either side of the hallway and began lodging fire down towards the hostile troopers with deadly efficiency.

A laser blast cut through the head of another CIA agent, the bolt cutting through his helmet like it was made of paper. The man fell to the ground in a heap, the 4th to die. The enemy counter fire doubled, moments after the remaining soldiers, deep in cover and utilizing rippling fire to ensure a constant stream of fire would see the black human figure rippling through the air, his stealth momentarily disrupted. Seconds after a full metal military baricade slammed through the room, crushing one man, throwing him through the room and wedging him against the wall and the giant metal projectile. The captain gritted his teeth, radioing his top-side crew

"Fucking hell, We are being torn to schreds here. Call Georgetown for support. We need heavier guns! I'm pulling out, this entire place is a fucking death trap!"

The soldiers attempted a fighting retreat, but 3 more died as they rushed through the stairwells and tight corridors, running and shooting. only the captain and one of his men managed to rush out of the facility door, slamming it shut behind them. Bloodied and tired they ran across the field and slid behind the two humvees that stood a fair distance from the door itself.

"Man the fucking guns, did you radio for reinforcements?"

One of the four guys snapped to attention, confirming his request, two of the remaining soldiers grabbed the guns as the militiamen where wide eyed and held their guns tight. One of the older men, with a gruff beard and a 2nd Battalion veteran badge on his guard uniform was worried and barked questions at the bloodied commander, who was keeping vigil over the door and reloading his Karlie rifle.

"What the fuck happened? Where the hell are the rest of you? Jezus f-*** christ..."

The captain spit out a blot of blood, opened the door of the humvee and kneeled behind it, pointing his karlie rifle towards the door.

"All dead, unless you want the join them, I suggest you join the firing line."

[Tysklandia]

" Not on foot, we have a Brahmin wagon that we carry our goods and travel around. But where are my manners? My name is Andre, I serve a state diplomat and sanctioned trader of the Empire. My job is basically to go around and explore but also to trade wares with nations and settlements.

We came a long way from Boston to see if the pre-war capital had anyone still around. Now that I have perhaps we can do some first contact relationships. Do you have any questions about the Empire?"

"A long way indeed, passing right through the New York republic, I hope your passing through was uneventful? I don't mean to sound crude, but we where deemed authoritarian by the republic and villified without a proper chance of defense or discource. Our relations with our northern neighbours are considered rather... chilly to be fair. If you mention yourself to be an empire, I would think the Republic's opinion about your people to be equally hostile?"

The door opened gently as Waudman finished his question, he sounded truly interested and suprised. The secretary entered, carying a plate filled with bottles, glasses (water, cola, juice) and beef jerky, nutts and berries. she placed it down, excused herself and left.

"Ah, please, help yourself. I ofcourse have many questions. ranging from your history, your culture, your government, the goods you can trade, I cancelled my appointments for this afternoon, so we can talk until you wish to retire for the evening. The washington Pact's prime purpose is the reconstruction of America and protecting our citizens, I do believe we can work on that together."

(You can skip discussing your government type and history or details I can skim from your factbook page.)

[Tysklandia]

Vault-tec HQ
CIA Task force Delta and WSA-engineering corps

Taking vault-tec HQ had been a delicate operation. Time, planning and resources ensured that no lives were lost in taking the upper floors, even with the intense robotic defenses of the upper floors.

Controlled explosions in the roof, collapsing hallways, crushed sentrybots under rubble and allowed controlled uses of armor piercing rockets to safely dispose of the machines. A verti-bird mission was launched to deploy military engineers on the roof, allowing them to trap the robots in several carefully prepared booby-traps and controlled explosives. The entire operation took weeks, both to plan and carefully execute, but in the end Vault-tech HQ was secure with only superficial damage to its immense computer network, databases and superstructure.

The VT-HQ was cordoned off, similar to the pentagon, but not as insane and filled with engineers and computer-technicians and a handful of scientists. Soon enough however, the secrets of Vault-techs horrifying actions and experiments before and after the war unraveled. The discussion was raised to turn the facility over to the CIA, but military high command didn’t want to turn everything over to the CIA, especially considering the news had already spread to the ranks.

Vault-tec was given to the military engineer corps for investigation and recovery of information and equipment.

Soon enough, the locations of all vault-tec construction sites and vaults where recovered as wel as their pre-war access codes. A handful of vaults where spread around Pact-territory, but most where sealed shut and the pact had not done the effort to breach them, but with the access codes, they had an easy way in.

In pact territory, there was one, very interesting vault to consider… Vault 101… A vault designed to remain closed indefinitely for the sake of social experimentation. A vault filled with nearly a thousand people, a thousand well-educated people could be put to terrific use around the Pact, the treasure throve of computers, generators and other items found in that vault would be an amazing boon.

Plans where immediately made for the WSA and diplomatic office to open vault 101 and extend an invitation to join the pact… Not that they had much choice…

Other control vault locations where marked, but the vast majority where in California or had already been opened, decades before. Several smaller vaults where mentioned in Pact territory of which there was no knowledge, investigation teams were dispatched immediately to discover their location

TL; DR: Vault-tec database has been recovered. Vault 101 will be opened and annexed; other vault locations will be excavated and reclaimed where possible.

[Zepplien]

Vault 14, Overseer's Meeting
"And with respects to the levy of new taxes for the production of additional howitzers for the defense of Shasta Dam." Called the chairman as he slammed his gavel down over and over again, a cry of "NAY" overwhelming the handful of voices that yelled "AYE!" the chairman shrugging again "The Nays have it! Next issue, the increase of Manpower tithes in response to the new isolationist policy?" this time the room was united in a cry of "NAY!" the gavel coming down again as angry murmurs spread through the room of the Vault. "The Nays have it unanimously. Next item on the docket, construction of border forts using tax tithes." Once more the room expoded in "NAY!" from the voices of the various overseers, a clear majority causing a repeat of the phrase that seemed to always sit on Overseer Kellog's tongue "The Nays have it..." he carried on "With the items on the agenda finished I open the floor to proposals from our Overseers." the Overseer of Vault 27, and the Over Group Leader of Vault 27 Security Forces. "Ladies and gentlemen of the Overseer Council I would like to put forth a proposal to your exulted personage." the Over Group Leader said with a bow to the council "We would like to propose that Vault 27 be allotted caps from our treasury to equip our soldiers with armour." there were bouts of laughing from the various Overseers, before the cries of "NAY" filled the chamber in moments, and the Chairman indicated the duo "Sit down, Measure struck down." the 27s taking their seat once more. A Vault 53 Engineer stood up fully, alongside a weaselly looking researcher "Overseers, I request funding for our newest research project." the Overseers leaned in, as opposed to before when everyone knew the answers, Vault 53 always had such ingenious projects to fund. "Project one, construction of an orbital super laser and accompanying power plant with plans provided for us by the Enclave of Navarro." there was the typical round of "NAY!" from the Overseers, but such was the game that Vault 53's Overseer knew she had to play, let them throw out at least one project before bringing in the ones she actually wanted "Project two, research into the Chinese Chimera Assault Derricks and reverse engineering to allow construction of new models which shall be distributed to both Cities and Vaults." this gave pause the middle age men and women of the Vaults. It was tempting, so tempting... The Overseer of Neo Fransisco was the first to stand and cry out "Aye!" joined by her fellow overseers who only needed that one push to vote "Aye!" the Chairman nodding slightly as he proclaimed "The Ayes have it, details shall be discussed by the Budgetary Sub-Dictorium as to the aqusitioning of funds." the Overseer of Vault 53 raised her voice for the third time, a grin on her face this time "Project Gustav request for funding to produce heavy and superheavy railway artillery for long range bombardment of... Foreign subversive nations. These railway artillery will likewise be distributed to our many Vaults and Cities." this one was enthusiastic with "Ayes!" from the various members of the UPVT, clapping for the idea of finally having their dream of long range guns.

[Alinora]

...

T6-77 and X6-88 didn't follow the local forces very far, but had managed to cut down a handful more before ultimately deciding to stop. Both Coursers lowered their weapons, looking around the blood-spattered room where multiple bodies had accumulated, and let it sink in. "I suggest you make your way back to the command center. I'll re-establish power to the relay." T6-77 said while he approached the corpse of a Washington soldier, who was face down in a pool of his own blood. He used his foot to flip him onto his back - revealing wide eyes, and a clean hole through his forehead. Blood oozed out of the wound as he stared blankly towards the ceiling. X6-88 spoke from behind his comrade.

"Affirmative." he said, turning and proceeding to jog back the way they came. For a few moments, T6-77 simply looked at the bodies of the men he'd killed. No doubt, he'd killed more people than any other Courser in the Institute - their best Synth - and it was something he always found to be... a necessary evil. It wasn't something he liked doing, but he put his own personal reservations aside for the good of the Institute. Only sometimes did he have a chance to really think about it, and his thoughts were never positive.

He moved on. T6-77 climbed the stairs back up towards the upper levels, to the surface level, and proceeded to the main - and only - entrance. He knew what was behind that door, but the hostiles had cut the cables, and the only way to re-establish power was to get his hands dirty and fix them. He slung his rifle around his back and stood still for a moment, accumulating the courage, and in a single motion, burst through the door. The sun was bright - exposing him to a wall of sheer firepower. Bullets, everything from 5.56 to 50 caliber rounds, smacked into the walls and ground around him, and while the small arms fire was nothing, he feared that the higher-caliber rounds would cause serious damage. He moved - faster and with more agility than any regular person - and darted to the left. Bullets hit all around him - he could feel larger ones pierce his skin, and synthetic blood begin pouring from the wounds. He made it onto one of the rocky cliffs, where the cables were lined next to the road. He felt himself losing energy - the physical ability to perform action - as he pushed foreword with all of his effort. In a split second, he felt a tremendous pressure on his right knee cap, which exploded with immense velocity and threw him off his balance. He found his chest, and head, facing the group of enemy soldiers, and like beer cans moving faster than sound, his chest was ripped apart. At least three 50 caliber rounds would tear through different parts of his torso, and he could hit the dirt in a bloody heap.

He looked down at his leg to see the right one missing below the knee, and blood was pouring out from all over his body. Bullets still lodged themselves into the rock around him, but a large boulder shielded him from enemy fire, and he'd reached the severed part of the cable. He drug himself through the sand, bleeding, with various systems offline, but grabbed both ends and jammed them together. He twisted and turned, interlocking the massive threads, and success would be confirmed when the painful screech of moving satellites could be heard again. He pressed his finger to his ear and spoke.

"Power is re-established, but I've suffered substantial injuries, and enemy forces will be converging on my position at any moment." He pulled his rifle out from around him and pulled himself up on the rocks. He wasn't the best shot due to his injuries, but was accurate enough to get the point across. He slunk back down and continued to speak over comms. "Do not come to assist - finalize data transfer and clear the facility's caches. Mission comes first!" T6-77 stumbled up again and fired off a few shots, then slunk into cover. He'd die in the dirt and rocks if he had to, but he'd take as many hostiles with him as possible.

[Halium]

Sirso smiled at the border patrol men. At least thats what Sirso assumed they were, he couldn't really tell.

"My name is Sirso, from the Adirondackian Mountaineers, Lake Placid, we're passing through, going South, then West."

His eyes showed friendliness, and he hoped they didn't mistake his party for one here for warring purposes, which, considering how tense all the guards were, most of them were ready to shoot at anytime.

Luckily most of the party was at ease, John No-Bull was even trying to start a conversation with one of the guards.

The whole party knew that they couldn't let these guys be afraid of them.

"Mountaineers? The canadians? You are a long way from home, Reason for passing through?..."

The officer, shifted his weapon, loosening the straps and held the weapon fire-ready with one hand as he made a waving motion with his other.

"I will need to search your packs for contraband. If you chose not to comply you will have to leave Pact territory. Weapons are allowed on your own risk. raising arms, pointing weapons, theft, crime or acting in a threatening manner whilst in the position of firearms or explosives gives any officer of the military or the guard legal right to shoot in order to preserve the peace. Do understand that any officer may or may not request to temporarily relieve you of your firearms for any reason deemed viable to an officer of the law at any point in time. "

Four of the soldiers moves in closer to the caravan, hands still on their weapons, stopping a close distance and waiting for them to confirm that they where allowed to search their packs for contraband.

Sirso smiles a bit at him being a Canadian "Yeah, we're here to do something thats important to our people.

"We're going on a huge expedition across America. We're gonna chart every single faction on the East Coast, every mountain, every river."

Sirso looked at the men about to search their bags, John looks almost sad that his stuff was being searched.

"Sure, search us, the guns are for protection in the wasteland, not for threatening people."

[Ulls]

"A long way indeed, passing right through the New York republic, I hope your passing through was uneventful? I don't mean to sound crude, but we where deemed authoritarian by the republic and villified without a proper chance of defense or discource. Our relations with our northern neighbours are considered rather... chilly to be fair. If you mention yourself to be an empire, I would think the Republic's opinion about your people to be equally hostile?"

The door opened gently as Waudman finished his question, he sounded truly interested and suprised. The secretary entered, carying a plate filled with bottles, glasses (water, cola, juice) and beef jerky, nutts and berries. she placed it down, excused herself and left.

"Ah, please, help yourself. I ofcourse have many questions. ranging from your history, your culture, your government, the goods you can trade, I cancelled my appointments for this afternoon, so we can talk until you wish to retire for the evening. The washington Pact's prime purpose is the reconstruction of America and protecting our citizens, I do believe we can work on that together."

(You can skip discussing your government type and history or details I can skim from your factbook page.)

Andre took some of the nuts and berries as he spoke.

" Not really, we are a constitutional monarchy but we do have Senate that does most of the government stuff." He said as he eat another berry in his hand.

"As for our history, well I save you some of the long details. The short version is this, the Empire is around 15 years old. We were nothing but a bunch of pretty advance settlements. Hell, even the raiders knew how to use power armor. This came from the numerous military textbooks and bases that are around. Now, Boston was flattened but not so much, the very bomb that was supposed to explode didn't. Guess if it did, I wouldn't be here if it did its job."

He grabbed a soda and started to drink it.

" The chaos of the raiders and their dangers sprout up other factions, such as a mafia known as the Triggermen, a merc group known as the Gunners, and a organized militia known as the Minutemen. Out of three, the Minutemen became the people's champions when they protected Diamond City, our current capital, from a Super Mutant attack in the year 2180. They grew in size and power, eventually having His Highness, Luther Hightower, part of the group as he was looking for something to help his home of Far Harbor.

The Minutemen had a fallen out when the people of Boston were trying to come together under the name of the Commonwealth Provisional Government. A secret think tank by the name of the Institute, sent one of their androids to go and break it by killing the leaders. This made His Highness look to unification under him as more ideal than a republic. He gathered up an army and fought the Minutemen. His allies were criminals, raiders, and people who actually believed him.

He took heavy losses but he did it, the criminals and raiders were merged with the Minutemen and the General joined the Empire. Now His Highness saw the beauty in having the state ran by the people and drafted a constitution to bring back the CPG as a senate with him having some power. Everything was slow to accept but peace came. Hightower got a wife but the Institute did something to her and he declared war on them. He wiped them out and we use their tech to rebuild ourselves. "

He finished his soda before and wait a minute before he continued.

" It was when we started to expand out when we met New York, good people. We have an alliance with them, generally our people don't see much out of it except for trade and a strong arm. We mostly keep to ourselves but every now again we go explore. They rely on us because we have a big tech advantage over them. For our culture, we mostly are trying to bring back pre-war Boston. We have things like a bunch of mafia people, people who think baseball is a warrior sport, and greasers.

What we trade is some of the good stuff. We trade food, meat, medicine, refine steel, and lumber. I know very soon we will be selling Nuka Cola since we found the ingredients and have a soda factory working now."

[Tysklandia]

Sirso smiles a bit at him being a Canadian "Yeah, we're here to do something thats important to our people.

"We're going on a huge expedition across America. We're gonna chart every single faction on the East Coast, every mountain, every river."

Sirso looked at the men about to search their bags, John looks almost sad that his stuff was being searched.

"Sure, search us, the guns are for protection in the wasteland, not for threatening people."

The packs where searched, their party documented and their names written down, with a date stamped on it. A copy was given to them, if shown to other patrols, it would make passing through checkpoints less of a hassle, but the paper was not a requirement to continue.

The Captain looked strangely doubtful as he handed them the paper, sealed with some sort of border stamp.

"You will be a long way from home then, I wish you good luck on your journey. If you chose to swing by DC, I advise you to travel around it. With the construction projects ongoing, passing through the checkpoints will only lose you time."

With the last peace of advice, he motioned them through, beyond the gathering of caravaniers and pack animals who where undergoing the same treatment as themselves, as they passed the outpost, the road would be calm again, the large pre-war interstate still largely ruined and ancient as it had been for more then a century. Few settlements and farms would dot the fields and pastures next to the interstate, but not much of interest was to be seen untill Baltimore and beyond.

[Tysklandia]

Southern Expedition
North Carolina
4th and 5th battalion (redeployed), 3rd battalion detachment,forming the 2nd Regiment “Virginia” and WSP delegates
Annexation of Southern Virginia and North-Carolina

The expedition in Northern Carolina had encountered sufficient problems after which Norfolk send word to Arlington and Georgetown for reinforcements. Beyond the handful of civilized settlements the rangers had encountered close to virginia, Elizabethsville-Rocky Mount and Raleigh, the bulk of the territory seemed a no-man’s land. Tribes and seemed to take over the majority of North Carolina. Civilisation seemed to stop the further one travelled from Washington... And while tribals where often also assimilated into the pact, they were often violent and aggressive when attempts at assimilation were made.

This meant that tribes where not approached unless a large military formation was present to support the diplomats performing the negotiations.

To eleviate that danger high command deployed the 4th and 5th battalion to reinforce the small 3rd battalion formations that had been sent to the south of Virginia and North Carolinia. The 3rd, 4th and 5th battalion where assembled under the 2nd Regimental command “Virginia” for the purposes of the mission. It was the largest military formation ever assembled in an active combat role in the history of the Washington Pact, the 2nd Regiment “Virginia” being around 1500 infantrymen strong, attached with a few hundred logistical, support and command personel at regimental level. High command had contemplating attaching the 1st WSA artillery battalion to the regiment, but considering the tribal threat, artillery would likely not be of use. With the motorpool of the WSA depleted after being attached to Colonel Waudman’s personal guard and the 6th Battalion’s operation in West-virginia, the regiment was primarily on foot, with a light animal fleet for supply transport. After securing settlements in the south of pre-war Virginia, the troops moved south, with their initial command to pacify the territory of North-carolina, with the initial operational theatre ending in the Greenville-Wilson-Raleigh-Winston-Salem line.

Even with the entire Regiment in deployment, their numbers where painfully low to properly secure the territory in a swift manner. Negotiations where made with tribes and settlements, hostile tribes where pacified, either by destruction or forced relocation. But it was an effort that would take time. Time the Washington Pact was willing to invest. Rocky mount, Raleigh and other towns and pre-war cities in north-carolina had entire weapon factories and companies that would be vital for the Washington pacts strategical goals. The green belt around these cities, slowly recovering from the great-war and its nuclear winter, would ensure food supply for Virginia and DC for years to come. A bulk of other factories and industrial workshops across its territory would ensure that the Pact would have the capacity for vast construction and infrastructure projects.

Southern Expedition
North Carolina
4th and 5th battalion (redeployed), 3rd battalion detachment,forming the 2nd Regiment “Virginia” and WSP delegates
Annexation of East- North-Carolina

Hostilities inside the newly aquired zone was minimal. Most settlements had already settled down in the years-long project of assimilation and immigrants from Georgetown and arlington where shifting into cultural leaders and forming the beginning of a small, but formal guard unit in north-carolina, allowing them to, very akwardly and in a clumsy manner, take over policing the roads.
This freed the 4th and 5th battalion, the 3rd still deployed as peacekeeping forces, to continue south. Infrastructure and cities grew scarce in the south. Tribes and makeshift ranches and farms becomming far more prominent than settlements and organised communities. This allowed the large for of the 4th and 5th battalion to split up in multiple groups to cover ground quickly. They used route 75 as a eastern border, focussing on the vast area between them and the coast, mapped by the Red berrets to be a vast area of small settlements and the mentioned tribes and farmers. After A FOB was constructed in Rockingham,biscoe and Lumberton, the troops of the 4th Battalion manned the new fortifications and set to escort the small army of dignitaries and diplomats of the Pact that went on their way to "convince" the locals to join the Pact. The ranchers and farmers had little qualms, seeing no bad side to the deal in honest. The tribes where more difficult, because they where deemed nearly heretical for using firearms and radio's, their technology would "enrage the gods" or whatever nonsense. Never the less they pressed on, skipping tribes that would likely be pressured to join once the majority of the territory joined willingly... Or so they hoped ~

The 5th Battalion commenced from the coast, hugging the coastline and moving towards pre-war state lines, leaving a handful of men behind systematically to build supply outposts on their way down, escorting diplomats and represenatives to present the Pact to the state's inhabitants. Large sections of the 5th would move to the southern section of route 74, regimental command deciding on deploying it at a border point. FOB's where erected near Whilmington and Whitehall for the 5th Battalion to rest and supply and the diplomats did their work. The region had little organised resistance and few tribes turned hostile. Those few that did, where dealth with by carefully planned and organised force. The east of north-carolina was now properly occupied. Its assimilation would take longer.

[New Minahasa]

Area 51

"Shit. It's not working!," yelled Lieutenant Kent, failing to open the armoury door with the dead Protectron. "CEP must've locked the whole place down. If we want to get out of here, we need to find the control room and shut the fucking A.I," he explained. As he was busy talking and at the same time trying to open the armoury, the turret system was suddenly activated. The turrets in the lobby were online, and instantly opened fire at the men. "Turrets! Get cover!," shouted Jameson to his men. The turrets managed to mow down at least seven troops before they could find cover. Kent and his men, however, with their advanced power armours, absorbed the bulk of the shots easily, and proceeded to destroy the turrets.

"That sly motherfucker," remarked Kent. "Alright, men. If we want this to work, we need to split up. Me and Lieutenant Kent will each take a team; Lieutenant Dawson, Lieutenant Trevor, and Lieutenant Bard will take the rest. So it'll be five teams in total. Remember, if you're pinned or under heavy fire, do NOT proceed by yourself. Contact us through the radio, and we'll reach you ASAP. Same procedure would apply when you finaly found the control room. Understood?," Jameson briefed the men. "Affirmative, sir!," the men shouted in unison.

The army then broke into groups. Each contained about a hundred men, accompanied by five of Concord's power armoured soldiers at the front to act as their shields, taking the bulk of the shots from the turrets they encountered along the way. Two groups, each lead by Kent and Jameson, went north to the unknown buildings. The three rest headed to the southern unknown buildings. They prayed that this would be over soon.

---

Raven Rock

Three Vertibirds transporting the Concord squads arrived in front of the assumed Raven Rock installation. The men were startled when the metal door acting as the entrance of the installation unexpectedly opened. They were dubious, but hesitatingly entered the place. A mysterious voice from the intercom, audibly a man's, surprised the men. "Welcome to Raven Rock, gentlemen. I'm glad that you finally found your way in here. I've been watching you for some time now," stated the mysterious voice. The men instinctively raised their weapons, and scanned their surroundings, wondering where the voice came from. "No need to worry, soldiers. I assure you that I shall do you no harm. Please, follow my directions and head through the stairs until you reach the first level," spoke the voice.

The men followed his orders and continued upstairs, but were still wary of the place. They could see two active Sentry bots in front of the control room as they made their way inside. The room was very tall, with another set of stairs leading up. They were greeted by a giant computer as they arrived upstairs. "Ah. It's been so long since this place had visitors. I've been accompanied by nothing but my Sentry bots for the past hundred years. Now, you may be wondering who, or what I am, and why did I welcome you in here. Well, I am an advanced ZAX A.I programmed by the U.S government long before the war had even begun. I was tasked to monitor this whole base, and protect it from outside incursions in the case of a "national catastrophe". I wouldn't say it was "national" to begin with, but you get the point," explained the A.I.

"Since I was designed by the U.S government, your predecessors, I had access to your communications, and had been observing the Concord for the past years. I tried to contact your friends, but wasn't able to do so. I was alerted of your presence as soon as your Vertibirds landed in front of the base, and immediately opened the entrance for you. As far as my knowledge goes, you're the only hope for the restoration of the U.S. And for that, I shall be more than happy to assist you," said the A.I. "Now, I'm sure you intended to summon more of your colleagues in here. I will protect this base while you're at it. Believe me, this base has more than enough defenses to protect from a Chinese invasion. And, let me open the Vertibirds' bay for you, as well. You can safely place your Vertibirds in there," stated the A.I. The information of the place was soon directed to General O'Brien who was still stationed in Camp Grayling, and they would soon arrive with the rest of his men.

[Tysklandia]

"A long way indeed, passing right through the New York republic, I hope your passing through was uneventful? I don't mean to sound crude, but we where deemed authoritarian by the republic and villified without a proper chance of defense or discource. Our relations with our northern neighbours are considered rather... chilly to be fair. If you mention yourself to be an empire, I would think the Republic's opinion about your people to be equally hostile?"

The door opened gently as Waudman finished his question, he sounded truly interested and suprised. The secretary entered, carying a plate filled with bottles, glasses (water, cola, juice) and beef jerky, nutts and berries. she placed it down, excused herself and left.

"Ah, please, help yourself. I ofcourse have many questions. ranging from your history, your culture, your government, the goods you can trade, I cancelled my appointments for this afternoon, so we can talk until you wish to retire for the evening. The washington Pact's prime purpose is the reconstruction of America and protecting our citizens, I do believe we can work on that together."

(You can skip discussing your government type and history or details I can skim from your factbook page.)

Andre took some of the nuts and berries as he spoke.

" Not really, we are a constitutional monarchy but we do have Senate that does most of the government stuff." He said as he eat another berry in his hand.

"As for our history, well I save you some of the long details. The short version is this, the Empire is around 15 years old. We were nothing but a bunch of pretty advance settlements. Hell, even the raiders knew how to use power armor. This came from the numerous military textbooks and bases that are around. Now, Boston was flattened but not so much, the very bomb that was supposed to explode didn't. Guess if it did, I wouldn't be here if it did its job."

He grabbed a soda and started to drink it.

" The chaos of the raiders and their dangers sprout up other factions, such as a mafia known as the Triggermen, a merc group known as the Gunners, and a organized militia known as the Minutemen. Out of three, the Minutemen became the people's champions when they protected Diamond City, our current capital, from a Super Mutant attack in the year 2180. They grew in size and power, eventually having His Highness, Luther Hightower, part of the group as he was looking for something to help his home of Far Harbor.

The Minutemen had a fallen out when the people of Boston were trying to come together under the name of the Commonwealth Provisional Government. A secret think tank by the name of the Institute, sent one of their androids to go and break it by killing the leaders. This made His Highness look to unification under him as more ideal than a republic. He gathered up an army and fought the Minutemen. His allies were criminals, raiders, and people who actually believed him.

He took heavy losses but he did it, the criminals and raiders were merged with the Minutemen and the General joined the Empire. Now His Highness saw the beauty in having the state ran by the people and drafted a constitution to bring back the CPG as a senate with him having some power. Everything was slow to accept but peace came. Hightower got a wife but the Institute did something to her and he declared war on them. He wiped them out and we use their tech to rebuild ourselves. "

He finished his soda before and wait a minute before he continued.

" It was when we started to expand out when we met New York, good people. We have an alliance with them, generally our people don't see much out of it except for trade and a strong arm. We mostly keep to ourselves but every now again we go explore. They rely on us because we have a big tech advantage over them. For our culture, we mostly are trying to bring back pre-war Boston. We have things like a bunch of mafia people, people who think baseball is a warrior sport, and greasers.

What we trade is some of the good stuff. We trade food, meat, medicine, refine steel, and lumber. I know very soon we will be selling Nuka Cola since we found the ingredients and have a soda factory working now."

Waudman has a neutral look on his face that hardly changed during his counterparts story, a slight smile was present and he did portray interest in the history of his nation.

"Interesting, Boston has had its fair share of turbulence indeed, it must have bred a resilient populace."

Durin his speech and story an aide had entered and brought in a folder and gave it silently to waudman, who kept it shut during the story. Only after he finished, did he open it, pulling up the map that his visitors had drawn and stapped with the boston sigil. He overlooked the extent of its territory and made some small notes.

"I see your territory does not span far, the pact's territory stretches from baltimore to south-carolina, so our needs for resources is allways high. we can discuss trade, cruncing the numbers you can provide the pact with, steel and lumber is allways in high demand across the pact, my steel mills in Arlington have long since stopped being able to supply the demand across our territory to be fair. "

(TL me, or contact via the chat. We can discuss what things would flow through trade and whatnot)

[Tysklandia]

...

T6-77 and X6-88 didn't follow the local forces very far, but had managed to cut down a handful more before ultimately deciding to stop. Both Coursers lowered their weapons, looking around the blood-spattered room where multiple bodies had accumulated, and let it sink in. "I suggest you make your way back to the command center. I'll re-establish power to the relay." T6-77 said while he approached the corpse of a Washington soldier, who was face down in a pool of his own blood. He used his foot to flip him onto his back - revealing wide eyes, and a clean hole through his forehead. Blood oozed out of the wound as he stared blankly towards the ceiling. X6-88 spoke from behind his comrade.

"Affirmative." he said, turning and proceeding to jog back the way they came. For a few moments, T6-77 simply looked at the bodies of the men he'd killed. No doubt, he'd killed more people than any other Courser in the Institute - their best Synth - and it was something he always found to be... a necessary evil. It wasn't something he liked doing, but he put his own personal reservations aside for the good of the Institute. Only sometimes did he have a chance to really think about it, and his thoughts were never positive.

He moved on. T6-77 climbed the stairs back up towards the upper levels, to the surface level, and proceeded to the main - and only - entrance. He knew what was behind that door, but the hostiles had cut the cables, and the only way to re-establish power was to get his hands dirty and fix them. He slung his rifle around his back and stood still for a moment, accumulating the courage, and in a single motion, burst through the door. The sun was bright - exposing him to a wall of sheer firepower. Bullets, everything from 5.56 to 50 caliber rounds, smacked into the walls and ground around him, and while the small arms fire was nothing, he feared that the higher-caliber rounds would cause serious damage. He moved - faster and with more agility than any regular person - and darted to the left. Bullets hit all around him - he could feel larger ones pierce his skin, and synthetic blood begin pouring from the wounds. He made it onto one of the rocky cliffs, where the cables were lined next to the road. He felt himself losing energy - the physical ability to perform action - as he pushed foreword with all of his effort. In a split second, he felt a tremendous pressure on his right knee cap, which exploded with immense velocity and threw him off his balance. He found his chest, and head, facing the group of enemy soldiers, and like beer cans moving faster than sound, his chest was ripped apart. At least three 50 caliber rounds would tear through different parts of his torso, and he could hit the dirt in a bloody heap.

He looked down at his leg to see the right one missing below the knee, and blood was pouring out from all over his body. Bullets still lodged themselves into the rock around him, but a large boulder shielded him from enemy fire, and he'd reached the severed part of the cable. He drug himself through the sand, bleeding, with various systems offline, but grabbed both ends and jammed them together. He twisted and turned, interlocking the massive threads, and success would be confirmed when the painful screech of moving satellites could be heard again. He pressed his finger to his ear and spoke.

"Power is re-established, but I've suffered substantial injuries, and enemy forces will be converging on my position at any moment." He pulled his rifle out from around him and pulled himself up on the rocks. He wasn't the best shot due to his injuries, but was accurate enough to get the point across. He slunk back down and continued to speak over comms. "Do not come to assist - finalize data transfer and clear the facility's caches. Mission comes first!" T6-77 stumbled up again and fired off a few shots, then slunk into cover. He'd die in the dirt and rocks if he had to, but he'd take as many hostiles with him as possible.

The ripple of fire from the .50 calls had torn the man apart, revealing sickly,unnatural colored blood splattering against the concrete walls of the bunker. Bullets flooded over the humvee roof as they sprayed their entire belts into the enemy. After the... thing... dissapeared across the rock, leaving behind a severed leg, both machine guns CLICKED loudly, their ammunition belts expended. The other CIA soldiers had not fired, conserving ammunition, but the militia behind them has emptied their clips and where also furiously reloading and the humvee gunners fiddled to fit a new belt to their gun.

The captain narrowed his eye and signalled his left hand, 2 of his fellow soldiers followed him as they crept up to the boulder silently, as they prepared to leap over and around, they where suprised by an approaching noise and dark shadow in the sky...

The soft WHOOSHING noise appeared quickly, a pitch black vertibird gunship swooping low over the ground, kicking up dust all around. It's rotors shifted and groaned as the VTOL aircraft slowed down, comming to a halt in the air between the humvees and the bunker, it's array of guns swivling and turning. It didn't take long before the frontal gatling laser locked onto the bleeding synth and spooled its laser coils. But right as the first laser bolt left the barrel, a blinding flash whisked away the thing, leaving sickly synthetic blood and strangly twisting bodyparts and limbs behind. The laser bolt impact the sand that moments before had held the robot, sizzling in the sand and leaving a tiny piece of glass in its wake.

Moments after, the verti-bird moved to land, its landing gear shifting out and the blades reducing power to allow gravity to land the bulking machine with a loud THUD. 6 large, bulking giants of armor walked out, their pitch black power-armor emblazoned with ensigna's reminding of pre-war america. One stayed behind as the rest of the verti-bird soldiers rushed inside, plasma and laser rifles blazing. They moved in perfect tandem and synchronisity, even in their power armor, they executed team tactics and fields of fire as they rushed to clear the dark facility, their thermal vision giving them near-perfect visibility in the shady halls of the facility.

Back above ground, the CIA captain quickly checked what remained of his enemy behind the rock, only to find no one their... He cursed loudly, spitting on the severed limb that he had left behind. As he turned around, a hulking black figure in black MK III Advanced power armor stood next to him, speaking through his helmet in a rather mechanical, filtered voice.

"Captain Rauber? Sitrep."

His voice was gruff and no-nonsense. As one of the prime officers in the CIA Task force teams, he had learned not to trifle with these men. He spat again, observing the light red fluid he produced. Atleast their was less blood this time. His shoulder still burned and hurt like nothing else.

"We arrived 5 minutes earlier than expected, recalibrated security and deactivated the generator. The sat remained active so we blew the wires. That... Thing... took out 8 of my men, we fell back to topside, the sat wasn't active, so we created a killzone with our heavy guns. Whatever that thing was, it had better armor then a damn tank... He rewired the datalink just before you arrived."

[Alinora]

- THE INSTITUTE -

---

Satellite Relay Station | Washington Pact Territory
X6-88

Communications were coming through - they'd accomplished their mission.

X6-88 watched the last files on the facility's central computer get wiped - leaving nothing but a blank screen. Now, it was only a matter of finishing up. From his belt, he pulled two plasma grenades out, holding them both with one hand. He slammed his fist against one of the giant computers, bending the metal inward up to his forearm, and placing the grenade inside. He twisted a knob on the top, setting a timer. He then punched a hole in another computer, and while electricity shot out, the grenades wouldn't detonate due to the shielding. He did this to all of the four main computers, setting them all for one minute, and once they were in place, he initiated the timer. He began climbing the stairs opposite of where they'd entered from, knowing that the hostile forces were right behind. At the top, he came to a door, which swung open and revealed a side entrance that dropped him on a ledge, outside the compound. In the distance, the Washington Monument rose into the sky.

"Has T6-77 been exfiltrated?" he said.

"Affirmative." a synth voice said on the other end.

In a bright flash of light, he would vanish.

A few seconds later, the plasma grenades would detonate - turning the central computers to superheated goo and rendering them destroyed.

[Pacific Brotherhood of Steel]

---

Hopeville
New Columbia Capital Building
New Columbia

---

Matthias Warwick , President of New Columbia

---

Matthias straightened his tie up in the mirror one last time before he headed out. Today was the day. By now it had already happened. He was just going to announce it to the public later today. The communists had been a thorn in their side for long enough andx using a but of subterfuge, they had taken their only ally out of their ring and into theirs.

The UPVT wouldn't be assisting them but they wouldn't be assisting the communists either. A deal with them had been struck. A mixture of trade deals and other stuff including the transfer of a 'war criminal.' A big win for us and our allies, The Concord no doubt. Without the possibility of Vault Tec coming after them they were able to divert more of their armies from the northern areas to the south to help assist in the invasion of the USSS.

Matthias was prepared to give a speech to the populace outside of the capitol building to address what had already happened in the south. He checked the time, 12:25. Time to do this then.

President Matthias walked out the double doors into the courtyard where a dais with a podium had been setup for him to speak. Already there was a massive crowd forming around the dais, held back by local police with Rattlesnakes sprinkled in. Just in case. Around them was several groups of protesters. The same one who denounced New Columbia's so called imperialism in the wasteland. Matthias couldn't exactly see why they thought taming the wasteland and bringing betterment to the lives of his fellow human beings was seen as imperialist but the sure wouldn't like this news.

Matthias made it to the podium with issue, stopping a few times to allow the press to take photos and to wave to the crowds a bit but the time was now and he had to inform the people of what had occured. "My fellow Columbians, I come to you with news. Bad news as many would say, but I do not see this as bad or evil. This is our duty to our fellow man to help those around us and free them from their shackles of captivity. At approximately 12:00 'o'clock today, our soldiers, your fellow citizens, commenced strikes into the illegitimate nations known as the USSS. We seek to push these so called communists out of California to secure New Coumbia from all threats, foreign and domestic. By now heavy fighting has commenced and, without revealing military secrets, we have pushed into several areas of the USSS. Soon we shall stand the victor, side by side with our allies The Concord as we preform the duty owed to our forefathers, our benefactors. The ones who bestowed us with freedom so long ago and fought to keep this to us. We shall moved ever onward but to secure the peace, we must prepare for war. I ask you to pray. Pray for out nation. Pray for our people. And pray for the godless USSS for they shall find no salvation in this life from us."

30 minutes earlier...

---

General James Hsu had finally recieved the order from high command. For nearly a week he and his combined forces had sat near the border town of Bakersfield under the pretense of "evacuating civilians" for a treaty that had been hammered out with the USSS. Likewise the city of Yuma had received the same treatment as the bait was given to the communists. They believe that this was all true and in their apparent relaxation at finally having some breathing room, had pulled troops from the border and further back to seemingly be relegated to patrol duties instead of the heavy border protection usually found anticipating a moving of said borders. They were in for a rude awakening.

Only a few of the army groups had stayed within the immediate area of Bakersfield to hide suspicion of that many army groups being concentrated in one area. Along with that there were four out of five battalions of Rattlesnakes that had been committed to this invasion. They would likely be used to terrorize and demoralize the Soviet soldiers while the army did the grunt work. The Concord had their own special job but that was kept from him until the last moments in case of there being a leak in his upper staff, however unlikely that may be.

Hsu reached down to the radio and activated it, every army Group participating in the assault was waiting on his order to assault and today would be the day. "Green light. I repeat green light. General James Hsu out." A simple combination of words but they carried much power with them.

The first thing James heard was the great thunder of the artillery that had been amassed for such a ambitious undertaking. Many were aimed at supposed places of Military importance to the USSS including a small fort that was situated for the defense of their part of Bakersfield.

Pre-war buildings that had stood for generations now buckled under the combined might of their own weight and the destructive power of the artillery that was layed upon them. The initial artillery strike had by now gotten the attention of the local military and soon the USSS government, if you could call it that, could know of Columbia's supposed treachery. The artillery slowly became what could be best described as a rolling thunder as they swept through the USSS part of Bakersfield.

Then the cannons were silenced. The reinforcements from the north were here then. Now it was time for the entire to get moving in. "All units, proceed into Bakersfield and secure the enemy." Hsu watched from his camp as the myriad of soldiers stationed in the city started to move into the freshly destroyed USSS half of Bakersfield.

[Halium]

Washington Pact

Sirso looked over the whole party, they had stopped for the night to rest and get back up in the morning. Sirso had to admit, a guy on a motorcycle pretending to be a Private was very suspicious, he thought they were gonna get caught. Luckily they didn't and they could continue their trek across America.

He looked back at the camp, the horses were tied up to a couple trees, and most of the guys were sitting by a fire.

Mane and Daho were discussing the return of the Boaters, and how they might be hiding in the havens on the other side of Lake George, while not a very realistic theory, it was very popular within the regular soldiers, and many wanted to just take over New Hampshire and Vermont to finish off the Boaters.

Dunn was trying to finish up the map before he settled down for the night and went to sleep. He was a little bit shaken by being so far from the Adirondacks, but it seemed like he'd make it through.

Sergeant Billow had volunteered for first watch, they couldn't be too safe, even within a relatively stable country.

John No-Bull was already asleep, he went to sleep fast that one, but always seemed to wake up when there were things going on.

Sirso sat down next to the Jim Bridger guy, and asked "So why did you decide to come with us Mountaineers?"

[The Traansval]

Washington Pact

Sirso looked over the whole party, they had stopped for the night to rest and get back up in the morning. Sirso had to admit, a guy on a motorcycle pretending to be a Private was very suspicious, he thought they were gonna get caught. Luckily they didn't and they could continue their trek across America.

He looked back at the camp, the horses were tied up to a couple trees, and most of the guys were sitting by a fire.

Mane and Daho were discussing the return of the Boaters, and how they might be hiding in the havens on the other side of Lake George, while not a very realistic theory, it was very popular within the regular soldiers, and many wanted to just take over New Hampshire and Vermont to finish off the Boaters.

Dunn was trying to finish up the map before he settled down for the night and went to sleep. He was a little bit shaken by being so far from the Adirondacks, but it seemed like he'd make it through.

Sergeant Billow had volunteered for first watch, they couldn't be too safe, even within a relatively stable country.

John No-Bull was already asleep, he went to sleep fast that one, but always seemed to wake up when there were things going on.

Sirso sat down next to the Jim Bridger guy, and asked "So why did you decide to come with us Mountaineers?"

Jim Bridger: I travel, thats what i do. Nothing for me in a city or town, settled down with a huge family. Nah, my true calling is to be forever on the move, out here in the wilderness.

[Halium]

Washington Pact

Sirso looked over the whole party, they had stopped for the night to rest and get back up in the morning. Sirso had to admit, a guy on a motorcycle pretending to be a Private was very suspicious, he thought they were gonna get caught. Luckily they didn't and they could continue their trek across America.

He looked back at the camp, the horses were tied up to a couple trees, and most of the guys were sitting by a fire.

Mane and Daho were discussing the return of the Boaters, and how they might be hiding in the havens on the other side of Lake George, while not a very realistic theory, it was very popular within the regular soldiers, and many wanted to just take over New Hampshire and Vermont to finish off the Boaters.

Dunn was trying to finish up the map before he settled down for the night and went to sleep. He was a little bit shaken by being so far from the Adirondacks, but it seemed like he'd make it through.

Sergeant Billow had volunteered for first watch, they couldn't be too safe, even within a relatively stable country.

John No-Bull was already asleep, he went to sleep fast that one, but always seemed to wake up when there were things going on.

Sirso sat down next to the Jim Bridger guy, and asked "So why did you decide to come with us Mountaineers?"

Jim Bridger: I travel, thats what i do. Nothing for me in a city or town, settled down with a huge family. Nah, my true calling is to be forever on the move, out here in the wilderness.

Sirso chuckled a little "So you decided to come with random people you didn't know?"