บท 496: Completely Bombed

It's been a day since Loyal's robots had taken apart the bomber and shipped it all back to the airfield. The attitude of the people towards outsiders had undergone a massive change once the bomber parts were spotted.

It was obvious from Tamia, Veronica, and Anja's absence that they were partly responsible for this. This had changed a number of 'bullheaded' minds, which was surprising to the trio, but to no one else.

Tamia hadn't properly understood the significance the 'Lady in the Lake' actually had to these people, though, she probably should have realised once she saw the literal paintings on the wall showing the bomber flying above the Mojave.

Once all the pieces were recovered, the entire place burst into celebrations. An entire day was dedicated to partying, and Pearl had even decided to make this a yearly event to honour the trio who'd helped the Boomers achieve their dream.

Adults danced, played music on makeshift instruments, and ate luxurious foods that'd been caught, dried, and prepared in advance, children were given toys and taught to sing and dance with everyone else.

The atmosphere was overall incredibly enjoyable... Tamia was hoping to be around for next years celebration if she could make it. Though, not everything was fun and games that day.

Due to the robots carrying bomber parts and their recent artillery warning shots, a few raiders had concluded that something big was going to happen. They waited until the sounds of music could be heard when they tried to make a move.

Unfortunately, the guards who usually watched the walls were drinking on the job, they weren't able to enjoy the celebration, so instead, they had their own party... This obviously included alcohol. Of course, the next day when Pearl heard about it, she kicked the shit out of them and banned them from next years celebration, making the guards cry tears of despair.

As for the raiders? The Boomers weren't stupid, so before the celebration, the group had set down an almost obnoxious amount of mines. Once half of the raiders had lost legs or exploded into red mist, the remaining few retreated and disappeared. Not willing to test how many mines the Boomers actually had.

After all the partying was finished, Pearl had pulled the group aside and accepted Mr House's proposition. Obviously, the Boomers had no reason to reject them any longer, especially after all the work Tamia and the others had put into building relations.

This wasn't really a problem though, as their work had basically just given Mr House's faction an air advantage with the Boomers bomber. The bomber was on their side now, so retrieving it couldn't be seen as 'work'.

Once everything was finalized, the trio left as the Boomers bid their farewells. Mr House would start up negotiations between the two groups with couriers or maybe even Securitrons, but now it was time for them to see what other jobs the boss wanted done.

While Tamia headed to the Lucky 38, Veronica and Anja return to Big Mt for a long-awaited break. Once she was back in the penthouse, she ignores Jane's greeting and approaches the screen that has Mr House's face displayed on it.

"Welcome back... I'm assuming your presence here means that you've made progress with the Boomers?" House asks.

Tamia nods, "You could say that, the Boomers are fully willing to cooperate and negotiate terms with you." she explains.

...

"That is... Unexpectedly good news." he states, likely not having expected this so quickly. "With the Boomers launching missiles in New Vegas's direct I had suspected you might have offended them somehow. Was there a reason for that? Or were they just testing out some new weaponry?" he asks.

"Well, it might surprise you to find out that those missiles were actually a distraction," she says with a small grin.

"A distraction? Well, might I say it worked. Both I and the NCR were scrambling to discover what had gone wrong, and whether or not we should be awaiting explosive annihilation... So, what was so important they had to antagonize most big players in the Mojave?"

"Well, you might not know this, but the Boomers have essentially deified anything that's explosive... This includes pre-war aeroplanes. So, when they discovered a news article describing an almost intact bomber at the bottom of Lake Mead, they were more than eager to fish it out. Veronica, Anja, and I helped raise it out of the water while robots took the plane apart and transported it back." she explains.

...

"So you're saying you helped a group of Pyromaniacs fish out a military issue pre-war bomber without feeling the need to let me know about it...?" House breaks the awkward silence, sounding incredibly tense in this moment.

"Err, yeah? You said use any means necessary to get their compliance, right?" she retorts.

House scoffs, "And if that order included jumping head-first into a mine, would you do it?... What you have done isn't just helping a potential ally get stronger, but arming a potentially dangerous group, ally or not, with a weapon capable of destroying most post-war settlements with ease. If the Boomers are able to fly it, New Vegas could be flattened in an instance." he slowly, agonizingly describes just how badly Tamia had fucked up in his eyes.

Tamia crosses her arms, "Well, stronger allies mean better allies, in my opinion, the Boomers are relatively peaceful when unprovoked... If you exclude their 'bomb outsiders out of our territory' policy."

"Hmm, sometimes I have to doubt your intelligence, Partner... But I suppose what's done is done. Admittedly even if we took the bomber for ourselves we'd have no one to fly it. Even robots have their limits after all, and I doubt we'd be able to program a robot to fly such a thing before it'd become redundant... Let's discuss your next mission then," he's about to continue but notices Tamia's dull look, "Now don't look at me like that, you'll have time to relax before doing this. I just want to confirm our options."