บท 136: The end is Nigh-t-kin

After finding out that Ada had accidentally killed quite a few people by selling them a deadly fungus, Ranger Andy had apparently had enough. Despite the fact the man's leg was still injured, he marched straight over to her and demanded she "Get the fuck outta my town", she sent puppy dog eyes to Afton and the ranger, but neither wanted to associate with the psychopath any longer.

As such, she and her bodyguards left town, leaving Afton as the only medical practitioner. The medical tent was scrapped and any patients would have to go directly to him for treatment, the was an issue as he'd hide in Daisy's garage most of the time. So, to make sure no one died from not getting treatment, he had a fixed time where he'd check to see if anyone was there before returning to what he was doing.

Another week had passed and Karl had been getting antsy the entire time. The man was fine in the Powder Gangers as they'd do raids quite regularly, but here, sitting in a town just waiting for stuff to happen didn't agree with him.

So, to alleviate his boredom he started looking around the place for jobs. Manny already had one for him and asked him to clear out some ghouls at the REPCONN test site. Afton couldn't really go with him as he needed to repair the bike.

Karl was more than willing to accept the job though, and soon after left to complete it. It was only a day later than the man returned looking rather scuffed.

"What happened to you?" Afton asked jokingly after Karl threw himself into a nearby chair.

"What happened? Fuckin' super mutants is what happened! I need to go and kick Manny's ass for sending me down there... Fuck!"

"Whaddya mean?" Afton asks, never having seen Karl act like this before.

"Kid, it wasn't just ghouls down there. There's a fuckin' army of Nightkin waiting in that place's basement... There was a group of non-feral ghouls there called the Bright-Brotherhood, they wanted me to clear out the 'Demons' so they could reach some kind of launch control." he shrugs, "To be honest I wasn't really listening and assumed the 'demons' were just Gecko's or Radscorpions. Almost had my head taken off by a Nightkin as soon as I entered!"

"Think the ghouls will be alright?" Afton asks, if the Nightkin wanted to they'd probably be able to easily kill all the ghouls... In Fallout 3 the Nightkin were probably one of the most annoying enemies, being able to go invisible at will and dealing a shit ton of damage, while also being immune to being targeted in VATS? He didn't know whether he wanted to try fighting them in real life.

Karl shrugs, "I managed to lock the basement door before I hightailed it outta there. It might hold, it might not... Whatever the case I'm not going back there without a Fatman on my shoulder and an Anti-Material rifle in each hand." he states.

"Surely they aren't that bad?" Afton asks, vaguely remembering that Nightkin were relatively squishy enemies.

"Kid, you need to understand that giving a tank with legs the ability to turn invisible will never lead to a good outcome. They are almost as durable as deathclaws, with the ability to use guns and go invisible. Not to mention how strong they are... Only reason they haven't taken over the world is their inability to produce offspring. The only thing we human's actually beat them on is intelligence, which means fuck all when they can cut you in half." he says.

"Hm, guess we're ditching that job them, you better go tell Manny what you found... Maybe when we're better geared we can come back and sort it out for them."

Karl nods and quickly leaves to report his finding to Manny. He wouldn't be getting any caps for it, but they could really leave the threat of a large group of Nightkin to go unreported.

To be honest, this reminded Afton of another job he'd accepted and hadn't been able to complete yet. A couple living in Novac was having trouble with some creature entering their property and killing their livestock in the night. They'd not been able to spot what it was, and it always disappeared before they managed to get their guns ready.

That night he grabbed Karl and hid inside the couples house to wait for the creature to appear. Everyone had their weapons ready as they waited for it to come... There was only a few Brahmin left due to the creature butchering a few every night, it'd no doubt return to finish the job.

An hour after midnight the Brahmin started going nuts, stamping their hoofs and making as much noise as possible. The group just waited, and watched as an almost impossible to spot spacial distortion crept into the pen. Once it reached the Brahmin one of the poor animal's head were immediately cut off, the thing responsible appearing out of thin air and revealing its dark blue skin, vicious face and large bumper sword.

It turned to charge at the other Brahmin but was stopped when a bullet flew through the air and struck it in the chest, causing it to halt and look around for whoever was responsible. Everyone started firing, the couples varmint rifles doing almost no damage other than scraping the things skin.

Afton and Karl were having more luck though, as the Nightkin was talking to itself about tearing them apart and wearing their intestines as a scarf they opened fire. That Gun and Lucky's bullets penetrated the creatures face, though its skull seemed tough enough to stop it instantly dying. Fortunately Karl's .44 Revovler didn't have such trouble, the bullets streaking through the air and tearing its jaw off.

His shot had strayed off target due to the Nightkins erratic movements, but losing the lower half of its face was more than enough to cripple it, allowing the group to pepper it with ammunition until it eventually died.

Afton could see why Karl was so hesitant to fight them now, unlike the game, you couldn't just keep dealing damage until something died... If you shot someone's foot one hundred times they wouldn't die, just lose a foot. Afton was sure they'd need the best equipment around to be able to handle a large group of these creatures.