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34.13% Steel Waste / Chapter 242: Soylent Green

Chapter 242: Soylent Green

The drive through the canyon path wasn't all the long, and after a couple of minutes, Afton and Anja were greeted with small bits of grass and other plants. Honestly, it was incredibly strange to see the colour green in the Mojave, obviously except for the blast from plasma weaponry.

It seems that Doctor Hildren was right to be interested in this Vault, here before them was proof of that. They continued driving towards the source of it, Afton noting that the area became more and more filled with plant life, despite the fact this area seemed a rather poor place for things to grow.

Eventually, they reached a completely green clearing that reminded Afton of national parks in his previous life... Aside from the big sign at the side that so helpfully claimed 'STAY OUT, THE PLANTS KILL!'...

"Well, that isn't foreboding at all." Afton snarks aloud, as he runs his hand over a bush, ruffling the leaves.

"Do we have to go inside?" Anja asks, clearly taking the sign's warning to heart.

Afton shakes his head, "We have a job to do, so let's-"*Rustle*

[Grit is in effect]

The rustling of leaves causes Afton to wrench his hand backwards, he isn't quick enough though and receives a small wound of his palm from a green scythe? No, now that it wasn't obscured by the bushes he could clearly see that his attacker was a giant mantis, it's bulbous green eyes were staring at him with no emotion as its mandibles slurped his blood from its blade.

"Little fucker!" he growls as he throws a hard kick at it, the mantis tries to move out of the way but is sent flying across the clearing. Both Afton and Anja were ready to start firing at it, but it seems that his kick was enough to permanently put it out of commission.

"God, I fucking hate insects." he spits, glancing around to see if there were any more in the area. He spots a smaller one hidden not too far away, but Anja had already locked onto it and fired a shot from her 10mm pistol, blowing its head clean off in a splatter of green blood.

"Good shot!" he calls out, happy that his lessons weren't going completely over her head... Unfortunately, it seems that the firing a gun out here might have been the worst thing they could've done.

Over at the end of the clearing Afton hadn't even noticed teh entrance of Vault 22 just sitting there... It was completely covered by plants and vines, concealing it from any cursory glance. Though, he'd noticed it now that a wave of green could be seen marching out.

Around twenty giant mantises escape the ajar Vault entrance and start rushing towards them, their wings occasionally flapping to give them a boost of speed. Afton, not wishing to deal with this entire situation just pulls out the Plasma mine from his bag and primes it before throwing it at the group.

He pulls Anja to the ground as a green shockwave of plasma erupts from the explosive, frying all of the insects, as well as a good portion of the plant life that'd been there. "You alright?" he asks his companion as he pulls her to her feet.

Anja nods slightly, "Yes... Are you sure we need to go inside? I've got a bad feeling about this."

Afton smirks and sends a thumbs up at her, "Eyyyy..." before realising she probably wouldn't recognise the reference, "*Ahem*, you're probably right, but we're going in no-matter-what." he states, taking one last glance at Dirt-Bird that's parked not far from their position before walking towards the entrance of the Vault, Anja reluctantly following him.

The gear-like entrance of the Vault was partially open with vines covering it, this is probably what allowed the plants to escape the Vault and start expanding outwards from there. Afton ducks under it and makes his way inside.

Once inside he almost immediately notices a peculiarity... The darkroom was completely covered is lush green foliage, which at first glance wouldn't raise suspicions... Until you realise that there isn't any sunlight for these plants to grow...

Taking a look around the room he finds a bed, some plant beds with specific herbs growing in them, and a terminal... Though, the plant life seems to have reclaimed the terminal for itself, vines and roots visibly burrowing into the terminal and rendering it inoperable.

Afton rubs his chin at the sight, it was strange indeed, especially since there's nothing inside the terminal to warrant such interest from the plants... From what he knew, roots would prioritise growing towards water and minerals.

He shakes his head and sweeps the room one last time, not finding anything of significance. He looks at the door leading deeper into the Vault and nods at Anja to follow him.

He opens the door but immediately regrets it as some sort of green dust floods out, washing both him and Anja in it. "The fuck is this?" he asks no one in particular before suddenly starting to cough.

The green dust irritates his throat and Afton shields himself from it by wrapping some cloth around his face as a makeshift filter. Slowly, the dust clears from behind the door, being picked up by the slight breeze and getting blown out of the Vault.

Afton leaves the door open for a couple minutes until all of the dust is gone, he didn't know what it was, but it didn't' seem to be radioactive, perhaps Doctor Hildern had made up a story about this place being radioactive to separate him from Boone and Karl? Yeah... That was likely.

He lowers the cloth protecting his face and takes a breath, nodding to himself as he isn't forced into another coughing fit. He glances at Anja who didn't seem to have any problem with it in the first place, "Did that stuff not affect you?"

Anja shakes her head, and Afton sighs, "Maybe I'm allergic to it or something? Whatever, we got a job to do." he says, walking down the stairs that laid before him.


CREATORS' THOUGHTS
Niggross Niggross

Hope you bois liked the chap, if I missed anything please let me know, thanks!

If you like my content or want to read ahead please go to https://www.p.atreon.com/Nagross, I'd appreciate it.

Chapter 243: Soylent Green is People!

Afton and Anja slowly make their way through the dilapidated hallways of the vault, a green hue infesting the place along with sporadic plantlife that seems to have erupted from the floor, walls, and other weaknesses in the Vault structure.

Obviously, there was more to meet the eye with these plants... Again there wasn't any sunlight to provide sustenance to them, but most importantly, the materials the Vault had been made out of should have made it impossible for roots, vines, and other organic material to break through it.

Vaults were designed to weather nuclear explosions, and yet the plants are easily able to tear it apart seemingly at their whim.

The duo come across another closed door and Afton protects his face with a rag as he opens it, sure enough, another wave of green miasma flows out from it... After thinking about it more closely, the green particles were likely being produced somewhere, Keely and the Dowager mercenary group had both been through here relatively recently.

It when then Afton figured it out, "Ah, that's what's happening... The plants don't act like actual plants, but instead like some sort of fungus... That'd explain their ability to grow without sunlight." he mutters to himself, his wariness rapidly increasing as that'd mean the green miasma were spores.

He'd seen more than a fair share of zombie movies involving fungus, but... If it was indeed infectious, then his earlier inhalation had doomed him already. Afton shakes his head, he'd complete the job, acquire the research for himself, save Keely and Dowager, before trying to fix this problem.

With renewed vigour Afton steps into the next room, finding it completely destroyed as if a hurricane had passed through here. Tables were overturned, machinery was infested with roots, and the lights occasionally flickered which meant something was likely wrong with its connection or the reactor itself.

The next few rooms looked to be observation areas, with windows peering into restricted sections of the Vault... Clearly their containment efforts had failed considering the plantlife had reached the outside of the Vault already.

Honestly, Afton was surprised to have not found any enemies yet... Perhaps he was wrong and the mantises were the only threat?... Pfft, yeah right!

He continued looking around the area, eventually finding a rucksack filled some grenades and other rations... Probably belonging to either Keely or Dowager, though why they would leave it here beats him.

Walking onwards, he and Anja find some sort of elevator system, of course it's broken and unlikely to be operable for some time... He could try to fix it but that'd probably take a couple of hours, something he was hesitant to attempt due to the likelihood that the fungus would try to infect him in some way.

Shaking his head he heads to the staircase leading to the lower floor called the Oxygen recycling floor. Once through the door, the duo were greeted by a dark hallway, one where the lights had apparently completely malfunctioned.

Using his Pipboy light as a torch, he illuminates the plantlife infested the path ahead, his eyes narrowing when he spots a figure amongst it. He readies That Gun which causes Anja to prepare for combat herself as he tries to speak to the figure, "Hey? I see you there, why're you hiding?" he asks in a clear, but calm tone.

...

Receiving no response he grabs some empty cartridges from his bag and tosses them at the creature, the metal loudly bouncing off of the Vaults metal floor. Both Afton and Anja are startled when a green arm shoots out from the foliage and slams onto the cartridge, slowly dragging the object into the plant life afterwards...

"What the fuck is that" Afton mutters dryly, "Anja, did we fall into a portal to the nightmare dimension or some shit? That's some silent hill, Lovecraft shit right there." he states, gesturing at the hidden monster with his pistol.

Anja doesn't answer, of course, her eyes not leaving the place where the arm had erupted. It seemed that while Afton had an idea about what was in there, Anja did not. She'd never seen the horror movies he had and had no inclination over what to expect. Not that Afton himself was in control of the situation mind you, he just had a vague idea over how this adventure was likely to go.

"Anja, relax, if you start spraying all of your bullets randomly then it won't be the monster we have to worry about." he says, trying to persuade her not to accidentally shot him in the back in a panic. At his words her breathing slows somewhat in the manner he had taught her.

"Alright, on my mark we'll blow the shit out of that thing hiding there, after that we'll keep an eye out in case the sound attracts anymore" he states before lining up his shot.

*BANG!* *Bang!Bang!Bang!Bang!*

The sound of gunfire echoes throughout the metal hallway, most likely alerting any sentient creatures. During the attack, the hidden creature launches itself out of its hiding place and start rapidly crawling towards the duo on all fours.

It was humanoid but had no eye's, only a huge fang-filled mouth that snapped at them voraciously. That is, until their bullets rendered it nothing but a pile of green flesh.

It stopped moving after a bullet penetrated its skull, but the duo wasn't willing to risk being sneak attacked by it. Not to mention the fact that more could be coming at any moment. They just stayed at the end of the hallway, waiting for the rest to arrive...

...

After a couple minutes of waiting, it appeared that either the creature didn't care about the sound, or merely didn't hear it... There could be other reasons however, ones that Afton hoped weren't true... For example, the fungus being a hivemind organism like the Flood from Halo, or Necramorphs from Deadspace... Truly, if the fungus operated anything like those two 'fictional' plagues then he, as well as the rest of the world was truly fucked.


CREATORS' THOUGHTS
Niggross Niggross

Hope you bois liked the chap, if I missed anything please let me know. Thanks!

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