It takes a couple hours to actually reach the area where the Medical District apparently sits. Due to them primarily using the rooftops, they almost never encountered Ghosts, the only time they did was when they had to scale over a Rooftop Villa Restaurant which was almost completely infested.
Fortunately, Afton easily cleared the area, collapsing the staircase leading to the roof with a few hard punches while tossing all the Ghosts off of the roof.
By now the sun had already set, bathing the entire place in further darkness than it already was under the Cloud. Usually, you'd be able to see somewhat in the night with the moonlight, but none of its light managed to breach the Cloud overhead...
In actuality, the Cloud overhead seems to become more erratic and tumultuous during the night, which was quite disturbing considering the effects it'd already had on Anja. Every now and then you could see orange lightning flashing overhead, providing a flash of sight before disappearing, this of course was followed by the loud crack of thunder.
Afton and Veronic had activated the lights on their Power armour to see where they were actually going. Anja would too, if not for the obvious... Dean seemed fine using the other's lights to navigate however.
Soon enough, they reached the Medical District... If Afton were honest, it looked less like a proper district and more like a collection of relatively large buildings. Of course, most of it was obscured by thick Cloud and shambling black figures, so perhaps he was missing something.
The only actual indication that they were where they were supposed to be was the flickering red and green medical sign...
Dean takes one look at the place and frowns, "This place is full of Ghosts... Are you sure you want to try this now? We can come back tomorrow when the Cloud has thinned and some of the Ghosts have migrated."
Afton shakes his head, "I'd rather not spend more time than we need to in this place, Anja still needs extensive medical treatment and I doubt this place will have the equipment we need for it. She needs to be taken back home, but first, we gotta find Christine." he states, hopping to the next roof.
Dean audibly lets out a long sigh, "Whatever you say..."
The group make their way towards the District, hopping across rooftops until they finally reach it. They climb through a hole in the roof to get inside, and are immediately attacked by a Ghost that spotted them from the hallway.
Afton immediately kicks it, and accidentally sends it through the wall and plummeting to the ground below... "Wah... I didn't even kick it that hard..." he says with surprise still present on his face.
Dean just chuckles, "Don't be too surprised, this whole place is barely held together with spit and glue... I dare say if it ever rained here, it'd melt like a sandcastle." he jokes.
Afton hums at Dean's words while looking around the hallway, quickly spotting a strange device in the far corner... It looked like a speaker mixed with a camera of sorts... Dean spots it too and unconsciously takes a step back, clearly avoiding it.
"Another 'detonation signal' huh?" Afton asks, already guessing its function.
Dean nods, "I have no idea what purpose they serve... Back in the day they were used for announcements and such, but now they only play that single signal that'll blow my head off." he says, making sure not to mention the fact that his collar was disarmed.
Afton shrugs and draws his revolver, firing a single shot that causing the speaker to explode. "Well, just try to keep your head, cool?" he chuckles before beginning to look around.
Veronica of course continues to assist Anja in moving around, they weren't about to risk leaving her alone in her current state. Not to mention the fact that Dean had never been in this part of the Medical District before, partly due to disinterest, and partly due to Elijah setting up shop and collaring him.
The group begins slowly exploring the place, occasionally finding medical supplies, but more often than not they had already passed their expiration date, that or the Cloud had rendered them useless or dangerous.
Afton does eventually stumble across something of interest... He pushes through a doorway that seemed to have some trash fallen behind it... Once inside he finds an operating room of sorts? Old black blood still stained the equipment around the place, but more importantly, there were some clothes presumably left by the last patient...
Afton gapes as soon as he sees it, and this feeling is mirrored by Nyx... He lifts it to straighten it out and is confused when he finds a suit looking remarkably like the Stealth Suit. The only difference was the fact it contained no electronic components, meaning there wasn't an AI contained within.
Aside from that, the materials looked almost identical... Well, it would have if Afton hadn't upgraded his own slightly. "Nyx, what is this? Why is it here?"
"Sir, that is a previous version of the Stealth Suit, one without the components that make me so valuable... It's from Big Mt." she states.
Obviously, this means Christine had been here... He doubted Elijah would try wearing this as it seemed to suit people with smaller frames...
He glances behind him at the others, "I found some of Christine's clothes, we must be getting close." he states, tossing Veronica the clothes so she could hold onto them, he doubted Christine would want to be walking around naked.
Veronica almost drops Anja as she catches it, her eyes still angrily scanning the various blood stains covering the operation room. If she found out Elijah was responsible for this she'd tear his damn heart out!
The group continues moving, the new discovering spurring them forwards at an accelerated pace. In all honesty, Afton and Veronica were slightly frightened by the amount of blood they'd discovered...
Hope you bois liked the chap, if I missed anything please let me know. Thanks!
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After three hours of searching the Medical District, slowly clearing out Ghosts, destroying speakers, and avoiding the ever-moving Cloud, the group eventually stumbles across a hallway with a peculiar sound being emitted from it...
There were a couple doors on either side of the hallway, which meant the sound could be coming from any one of them... Not to mention the few shambling steps Afton could hear coming down from the end of the hallway.
Afton picks up a rock and tosses it hard, grabbing the attention of the Ghosts who start slowly stumbling down the hallway towards them, both not having noticed the group yet. Afton thrusts his right hand forward, shooting a grappling hook of wood from his plant arm which smacks the closest ghost in the face.
Once grabbed, Afton pulls his arm back while retracting his limb which forces the Ghost towards them and launching it off of its feet. Afton catches it midair with his Ultra Chainsword, cutting its lower body off with ease.
It lands on the ground with a wet flop, "I have the high ground!" Afton shouts as he swings again as the half torso Ghost. His strike bisects it, and he kicks the pieces far from each other to prevent it from reforming.
For the next Ghost, he just draws his revolver and fires a couple shots through its head, its heart, and its knee caps. It falls to the ground squirming, quickly beginning to regenerate, but Afton quickly dismembers it.
He turns towards his group and sends a thumbs up at them, "Shall we check out that sound now?"
Dean who's still surprised by the sheer martial abilities Afton possesses just numbly nods.
Afton looks at Veronica with a smug smirk under his helmet, "Bet you're wishing you had one of these now?" he gestures with his Chainsword.
Veronica shakes her head, "I admit it's more effective with these kinds of enemies, but I'd rather some fist-type energy blades... I bet it'd be way easier to do that than whatever you did to create the swords." she states.
"Huh... Oh yeah, I was planning on doing that, wasn't I?... We'll talk about it when we get back, alright?" he says as he approaches the first door along the hallway. Trying the handle but finding it locked and then immediately forces his foot through it, smashing the door open.
Inside is another operating room... Kinda? Instead of the typical operating bed, there was simply an Auto-Doc on standby, awaiting a patient.
"Hey, couldn't this help Anja out?" Veronica immediately asks, but Afton shakes his head as he approaches the machine and starts opening its software and noticing a couple discrepancies.
"No way... The hardware on this thing is too damage to perform any difficult operation. Plus, I don't trust any of the old machinery around here, one wrong zero from a one and it'll cut your head clean off. As far as I'm concerned it's just a piece of junk." he says, tapping his gauntlet against it, causing a metallic sound to ring out.
The rest of the room doesn't contain anything of interest, aside from a few expired vitamins, Chems, and a couple Stimpacks that look sort of useable? Afton would save those for himself, as only he would be able to survive them if they were found defective... If a good Stimpack can save you from lethal wounds, a defective one could end you faster than a bullet. There's pros and cons to everything after all.
The next couple of rooms contains around the same thing, broken Auto-Docs not fit for purpose, and expired chems... However, the further they went the more pronounced the peculiar sound was becoming... It sounded strange, like the humming of mechanical components mixed with a hair trimmer, and the sound of a butchers shop... Perhaps a Ghost had accidentally stumbled into one of the defective Auto-Docs?
Eventually, the group reach the last door and enter inside, finding an Auto-Doc that was currently running... Its door was sealed tight while it operated on something, but Afton wasn't able to use the machines internal cameras to see who was caught inside.
He had a really bad feeling about this, and wanted to find out what was inside, regardless if it was a Ghost or some other unfortunate victim. Using his Maxed out Science Skill he attempts to hack it and take it under control... Unfortunately, it'd locked him out until it was finished with its operation...
This was actually a security measure to prevent assassination via this method... It'd be far too easy to modify the operation and have someone gutted while inside the Auto-Doc.
So, he tried the next, more effective method.
*BANG!*
He smashes his fist through the terminal, immediately causing the humming to halt. He pries his fist out of the electronic scrap while it sparks ineffectively, still attempting to conduct its operation. With that sorted, he gets a grip on the door, and using his Superhuman and Power armour enhanced strength, he slowly pulls it open.
*GRRRRRRRRRRIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII!*
*THUNK!*
He slams the door to the side, but is forced to catch something as it falls out of the machine... Looking down, he raises a brow at the thing he'd caught. It was a person, here was no doubt about that, but they were bald and completely covered in blood and wounds.
The Auto-Doc hadn't actually done anything to their body, instead focussing its brutal attack on the person's face and throat... Though, judging by the scratched and scuffed explosive collar, this was another of Elijah's victims.
He cautiously picks the person up and turns towards the group, "Er, I found...-" he glances at them and spots breasts, "This woman in the machine..." he mutters, the bad feeling punching him in the face with a particularly worrying idea... Was this Christine?
He couldn't really tell due to the thick slayer of fresh and old blood coating their face... The scarring was horrific, as if their head was an eggshell that'd been fractured all over. She even had a reverse joker smile, the scarring making her look like a permanent frown instead of a smile.
Hope you bois liked the chap, if I missed anything please let me know. Thanks!
Also, thanks to my patrons for their support :
ShinAmazake
Chris Lindsey
Kingsprovince
Michael Jarrett
Nazlican Erdem
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