It'd been a couple days after Christine had left, and most of the Brotherhood had heard of the incident. Due to Afton and Veronica having obviously been involved, they received many question and inquiries from the superiors about it, but both remained tight lipped... This was mainly due to the fact that Christine would be actively hunted down due to her "betraying the Chapter", she'd not decided to leave when given the choice, which by the Codex meant that her life belonged to the Brotherhood.
The constant attention on them had clearly been fraying Veronica, she was struggling to keep herself together as it is, but with never-ending questions concerning Christine Afton could see her breaking point in the distance.
Whether it was due to her no-longer spending time with Christine, or Veronica working to try and forget her, she spent significantly more time working with Elder Elijah on their "Project". Though, she still had no idea what it actually was.
Afton made it his personal duty to pull Veronica away from the Elder and have her relax for a while to prevent her overworking herself. These were the only times she actually had breaks anymore, which had Afton struggling to keep himself from walking up to the Elder and punching him as he was clearly taking advantage of her emotional state.
He was beginning to become even more disillusioned with the Brotherhood the more time he spent thinking about why Christine left, and why they were treating Veronica so poorly... There was a rumour going around that the two had been lovers, which only caused the more "devout" members to constantly pepper he with veiled insults.
Afton had been walking through the halls when he picked up on Veronica's voice, he stalked over and glanced down the hallway to see what was happening...
"Just leave, I don't have time to be dealing with you idiots again." Veronica states as she turns to walk away from the three men acousting her. Afton didn't know their names but knew they were all relatively knew Knights.
"Yeah, that's just like you isn't it Veronica? Following in your girlfriends footsteps and leaving, pathetic." one states, causing her to stop and grip her fists in anger.
They continue mocking her, ignoring the tell-tale signs of an incoming fight, "Yeah, It's a shame too, she was pretty good looking, I would've made her my woman if she didn't swing that way. Maybe if we catch her outside I'll still get the chance?" he says before laughing obnoxiously.
"She'd be good though wouldn't she? Never having had a coc-"
*PUCHI!*
Veronica whirls around and punches the one talking so hard in the face that teeth rocket out of his mouth like projectiles. They fall to the floor unconscious as the others jump into action, having expected her to retaliate.
One throws a kick at her which forces her to move, the other throwing a wide punch that misses completely, Veronica has her fists raised and her posture low in a kind of boxing stance. She blocks another punch and palm strikes one in the face before grabbing him and sweeping his feet out from under him.
His head collides heavily with the metal floor below, blood starting to pool out from the injury, Veronica is stunned momentarily at potentially killing a Brotherhood Knight, not being able to react as the last one attempts to attack her from behind.
Afton had already been moving when the attack started, and tackles the man before he hits her, struggling to hold the man against the wall due to their wide age disparity. He recieves a couple harsh uppercuts to his ribs before Veronica slams her own fist into the mans nose, breaking it and knocking them out completely.
Afton lets go of the unconscious man and falls backwards, sitting against the opposite wall while holding his ribs, "Are you already Veronica?" he asks through rough breathes, ignoring the pain reverberating throughout his body.
She glares at him, "Am I alright? Idiot! I should be asking you the same thing!"
"Who cares about me, you're the one who got attacked." he says, more worried about her mental state than his physical one.
Veronica bends down to examine him, applying pressure to his ribs which causes him to wince, "You've got a broken rib, come on, let's get you to the med-bay." she says as she helps him up.
"What should we do about these guys?" he asks, not liking how much blood is flowing from one man's head.
Veronica shrugs, "Someone will find them, I doubt they'll tell anyone about this... Getting beaten up by a woman and a twelve-year-old wouldn't be good for their pride." she says with a smirk.
Afton glances at her while they walk, "Do you get that a lot?" he asks tentatively.
Veronica sighs and nods, "I do... Don't worry about it though, they're just helping me get better at fighting." she says, not acknowledging how exhausted she was getting at having to deal with it.
"You know, if you're having trouble you could always talk to my dad, he'd be able to sort the problem out. I know he doesn't think the same way as those guys do."
Veronica shakes her head, "I don't want to bother him, its not serious enough to need him to intervene." she says, leaving out the obvious "Yet".
They arrive at the med-bay where Afton gets examined and treated, Veronica staying to make sure he's alright... Thirty minutes later the three men that'd attacked her were brought in on stretchers by other people.
It was kind of amusing to see them awaken and see the duo on the other side of the room, they tried to put up a tough front, but the man who'd lost most of his teeth was having a mini-breakdown at the fact he couldn't get them replaced. Serves the bastard right.
Hope you guys liked the chap, if I missed anything please let me know.
If you like my content or want to read ahead please go to https://www.p.atreon.com/Nagross, I'd appreciate it.
Veronica wasn't the only one struggling with Christine leaving, Darian and Susan Royce were also feeling the aftereffects. They didn't get it as bad as Veronica due to the rumours of them being lovers, but as they were Christine's parents, many considered them responsible for Christine's "wrong" lifestyle.
Zachary and Verna tried their best to comfort them, by their daughters disappearance had clearly taken a toll on them. Afton didn't see them much anymore, but when he did he would always notice their previous happy attitudes had changed into more subdued ones.
His training continued, learning as much as possible and spending a great amount of time within the firing range in preparing for the looming conflict. He followed through on his promise and occasionally trained Miles and Melissa, the two were improving steadily, but not at the rate either would like.
One day everyone in the facility was alerted that the Elder would be giving a speech through the intercom system to let them know of the situation, and how they'd succeed regardless of the odds. It was obvious this was only to maintain morale as people was starting to get very tense and anxious from having the NCR constantly at their doorstep.
Afton saw this as an opportunity however, this'd mean that the Elder would be restrained to the intercom room for some time, potentially allowing him to find out what the fuck they were even doing here for.
He made his way to the underground half an hour before the speech was to be given, it was mostly empty aside from a few Scribes milling about to accomplish basic tasks. It was relatively easy to sneak by them as well, they weren't paying much attention to their surroundings and instead focussing on their work, that primarily being to repair the facility.
The other defences here were the turrets and robots, but as he was already a registered member of the Brotherhood, they didn't bother him at all.
He quickly made his way through, trying to get to the large room that the Elder had only allowed Veronica inside. The reason for this? Probably because it held the answers to what Elijah was looking for.
Eventually he reached the heavy metal door, pressing a button on it which causes it to loudly slide open, revealing a large room with many computer mainframes visible. It looked relatively well maintained, apart from the few damaged bits here and there... It seemed that Veronica was tasked with repairing the place alone, as the Elder seemed to only trust her.
He walked over to the mainframe and bent down to access the terminal attached to it, it wasn't locked surprisingly, and he was presented with three options to proceed... Power grid options, details about somesort of initial trials, and... ARCHIMEDES Testing...
He attempted to access the latter option, but found it was password protected... He'd learned much since last he attempted to access a locked computer, but was nowhere near competent enough to hack something like this. Shaking his head, he checked the others and found that the facility was running at 98% efficiency, all power was being being kept within however and not being distributed anywhere else.
Afton backed away from the terminal a little discouraged, the only thing he'd found of interest is this "Archimedes" thing, if he had to guess it was probably the weapon Elijah wanted to utilise...
He stepped onto the metal walk way and got to the second floor, immediately noticing the large holographic map set in the middle of the room... He wasn't sure what it was for, or even where it was meant to be displaying, so he ignored it for now.
There were a few robots held in stasis at the side, but they weren't really anything important... Instead he turned to the lone terminal sat up there... Judging by the papers scattered everywhere, he assumed this was where Elder Elijah worked. And that'd mean this was his terminal.
He tried to access it but found that it was locked... Damn, how was he going to find something out now?... He glanced around the room but found nothing else of notice, eventually slumping into the chair sat in-front of the terminal. Had he come here for nothing?
...
As he was thinking of ways to crack the terminal open, he noticed something yellow poking out from under the terminal... He tried to pull it out but found he actually needed to lift the terminal to retrieve it.
Once he got a better look at it, he realised what it was... It was a sticky note, with a password on it...
Afton can't stop himself from facepalming, he'd thought the wise Elder and genius Elijah wouldn't do something so stupid as to write down your password... That was something only simpletons and old people did, though, the Elder did match the latter discription.
Quickly he accessed the terminal and entered the password, "Power-Of-Knowledge".
[Accepted!]
A number of entries appeared on the screen, but he immediately selected the one speaking about ARCHIMEDES...
AN ORBITAL WEAPON!?!? He mentally screamed, his eyed threatening to bulge out of his skull. The world had already been destroyed by a nuclear Armageddon, and yet this man wanted to utilise an FUCKING orbital laser to destroy his enemies.
Wow. Everything made a lot more sense now... The reason the Elder refused to go to Hoover Dam, the reason they were stuck in this facility, the reason he refused to tell anyone what the purpose of them being here was... If someone from the Brotherhood got captured and spilled the beans about what was here, the NCR would likely abandon the Dam and send their entire army to reclaim the place.
Shit... Afton didn't know what to do with this information, it was incredibly dangerous, and if it spread everyone in the Mojave... Now, everyone in America would converge on the facility to take it for themselves.
The MC finds out the ARCHIMEDES project, a shame the C-Finder is lost somehwhere :P
As always, if I missed anything please let me know.
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