Chapter 2

"Serena, you said your detecting mild radiation correct?" Asked Captain Cutter.

"Aye captain." Replied Serena.

"I want you to find a spot with low enough radiation to land troops that close to us."

"Scanning now... There appears to be a blank spot in the radiation sites in the Nevada, America. More specifically it is focused around the area known as Vegas."

"Wonderful." Chipped in Anders sarcastically. "We have an entire planet to choose from and decide to settle on scummy old Vegas."

"Stow it Anders." Captain Cutter turned one of his deck crew members. "Ensign Hewert, get me in touch with captain Lewis."

"Patching now sir."

Captain Veronica Lewis was an ODST veteran of 19 years. She had fought all manner of battles from fighting insurrection forces on Arcadia to the covenant on Harvest and, later, the shield world. She hadn't been affected by the flood as others had. Many were terrified by the parasitic beings but she hadn't been. True, she had been...startled when they had shown up, but she had pushed that aside in favour of her 'tactical thinking mode'. Her first encounter had been when they had arrived on the dreaded shield world. She had been scouting the planet with the rest of her squad while the late John Forge had been pushing through Brute lines with several squads of marines and an Elephant. During her scouting she had heard the sounds of the other scouting parties being killed and had put her squad on high alert. She heard the parasites before she saw them, their strange clicking and moaning echoing around her. Then when the 'infection forms' had come over the hill, she opened fire immediately. After regrouping with Forge and the spartans, she had seen the rest of the flood capabilities.

Now though, she was away from that place and was gearing up to investigate the planet they were now orbiting. She had been briefed by the captain and told that this was apparently some past version of Earth and, as ludicrous as that sounded, she trusted her captain and believed him. The plan was simple, she and her squad of five others would take two pelicans loaded with warthogs down to the planet, land somewhere out of sight and head towards a nearby settlement to learn about the locals. She had completed her prep now and was heading towards the pelican for lift off now. Her armament consisted of a battle rifle and silenced pistol as a side arm. The silenced pistol was the standard side arm of her squad as they often had to do sneaky missions whilst deployed. When she stepped onto the pelican she inspected her team and wasn't surprised by what they had brought. Two were carrying assault rifles, one had a sniper rifle and smg in place of his pistol, and another was carrying a BR like her but had a rocket launcher in place of his pistol. She walked past her team and into the cockpit of the pelican. "We're ready to go." She said to the pilot, he gave a nod and clicked and held a button on his helmet.

"Spirit of Fire this is Zulu-220 requesting permission for take off." He spoke while Veronica headed into the back with her men.

"Zulu-220 this is Spirit of Fire we are moving you into position now." Came a smooth female voice. A claw latched onto the ship and moved it into a separate room where a rising airlock shut them in. A hissing was heard from outside the pelican as the air was sucked out of the room. "Drop bay opening." The floor beneath them opened up and exposed them to the vacuum of space. "Zulu-220 we are dropping you in 3...2...1..." The claw on the pelican let go and the pelican dropped out of the underbelly of the ship. "Spirit of Fire this is Zulu-220, drop successful, moving to entry position."

"Copy that Zulu-220, Bravo-004 is on route with your second warthog, proceed to the drop off point."

"Confirmed, Zulu-220 over and out."

The view from the pelican was a most disturbing one. The images captured by the Spirit of Fire didn't manage to completely capture the sickly brown earth this place had become. Readings from the pelican when it broke atmosphere picked up a breathable atmosphere with an alarming amount of radiation. Not a lethal amount or even dangerous amount, but it was there, all the time. There was the occasional spot of high radiation just like there was a blank spot every so often. It was disturbing to think what could have happened to the planet to cause such irradiation. It didn't fit the Covenant profile since there was still a planet left, nor was it UNSC or insurrection, their nuclear payloads produced far more power and the craters they had seen where small, though numerous.

After being dropped off with the two warthogs, Veronica wasted no time in having her team load up. "Alright, Smith, Watt, I want you two on that warthog, Smith drives Watt shoots." The two men nodded and loaded up. "Ackers, your driving ours and Corgey is on the gun, I'll take shotgun." The spaniard Corgey laid her sniper rifle down on the floor of the warthog and climbed up, as did the rest. "Spirit of Fire this is Captain Lewis reporting in, we have landed and awaiting orders."

"Copy that Lewis." Came Captain Cutters voice through her earpiece. "We've started scanning the area and highlighted a few possible settlements. Proceed to the one nearest your position designated Alpha-01, it should be appearing on your HUD now." Sure enough a diamond marker appeared in front of her with a distance hovering just above it. "When you get there, establish non hostile relations with the locals, get us a name of the settlement and their opinion on any factions in the area then move on. We'll be watching through your camera for anything of importance or if we need you to ask something, otherwise you're to make your on judgements. We'll have Alpha-02 marked on your HUD when your done, Cutter out."

Veronica turned to her driver. "Head north, 1.6 kilometres." She turned on her radio. "Eyes open people we're moving out." Ackers nodded and hit the accelerator.

When the ODST squad arrived they were greeted by the looks of some very confused locals. 'So they are human after all.' Veronica thought to herself. The villagers looked pretty damn nervous at their arrival of five heavily armed ODST's, granted they hadn't been subtle about their arrival. As a crowd began to form around them, Veronica decided it was best to get to the point. "I'm Captain Veronica Lewis of the UNSC, is there anyone here in charge whom I can speak to?" They villagers looked awkwardly at each other. Not getting any response, Veronica began repeating it in Russian before she was interrupted.

"We know what you said lady, we just don't know what you want with us." Came the voice of a middle aged woman stood by a tavern.

"And you are?"

"I'm Trudy, I guess you could say I'm the mayor of this town."

Veronica relaxed a little and depolarised her helmet, drawing many stares and points from the crowd. "Good. My men and I are travelling through and wanted information."

At this, Trudy grew more suspicious, the shotgun in her hands being held tighter. "Information huh?" She asked dubiously. "Not a lot of people come to Goodsprings for information."

'So that's what this place is called.' Veronica thought to herself. "Well ma'am I am acting as a representative of the UNSC and as such my duty is to establish connection with the locals and gather information on the surrounding areas." She took a look around at the crowd. "Would you like to talk inside somewhere?"

Trudy didn't like this stranger. She was too well armed and too formal to be the NCR, besides they would have no reason to lie about who they were. There was only one group of people who could have this kind of tech, attitude and a reason to lie about who they were. Brotherhood. Trudy was not a fan of the Brotherhood, with their high and mighty attitude, hoarding everything shiny for themselves whilst saying the normal people were beneath them. No, she was not a fan. Nor did she want to let a suspected Brotherhood spy into her bar. But...she had made a good point. The crowd around them were very curious and nervous, she didn't want anything to happen to her people. "Alright then, c'mon inside and we'll talk." She carefully turned around and walked towards the bar.

'Well that went well.' Thought Veronica. "Alright then, Smith, Watt and Corgey I want you watching the Warthogs. Ackers you and your SMG are coming with me." Her troops nodded in acknowledgement and too position to cover their transport. Ackers and Veronica headed inside to talk with the mayor.

The inside of the saloon was...a mess. A pool table with a broken pool cue was directly in front of them, barely visible with the poor lighting above them. Yellow and grimy windows let in a meagre amount of additional natural light while an old radio played music which Veronica couldn't place.

"That's...Frank Sinatra!" Exclaimed Cpl Ackers.

"What?"

"That's Blue Moon by Frank Sinatra!" At Veronica's clueless look the Cpl explained. "He was a famous singer from the mid 20th century I think."

Another person entered the bar, this time a young woman holding a rifle and followed by a ferocious looking dog. "What you've never heard Sinatra before?" She asked dubiously while the ODST's gripped the guns a little tighter.

"So...captain." Trudy started, drawing the soldiers attention. "This here is Sunny Smiles our...head of security I guess." She was deliberately trying to sound more official than things were and it showed. Veronica confirmed to herself that these people weren't anyone of significance in this area. "Now that she's here, what would you like to know?" Trudy took a seat in the adjoining room and motioned for Veronica to join her.

"Well first off, we'd like to know more about your town. A brief history and overview if you would."

"Alright...well, when new vegas started to become popular for travellers, people began to spread out and give people places to stop on the way there. Goodsprings was one of those places, however trouble with raiders and Geckos meant we never really grew beyond anything more than a sleepy little town. Hell we'd be a ghost town if it weren't for the odd traveller coming through looking for somewhere to lay his head. We ain't got a proper place for them but people will open up their homes for some caps. Hell there's only really three reasons to come to Goodsprings, Chets store, my bar and Doc Mitchell's house."

"Who's Doc Mitchell?"

"He's the only doctor for miles that's what. He helps patch up any travellers that get nipped by Geckos or one of the Bark Scorpions from the cemetery."

"And Chet?"

"Like I said, he runs the store. Sells junk to whoever passes by. He's got some decent stock sometimes, but it's usually pretty basic. So that's Goodsprings what else did you want to know?"

"Who are the main factions around here? Anyone we should keep an eye out for?"

"You kidding? I could understand not knowing 'bout Goodspings but how could you not know about the NCR being here, they've been waging war over that dam with Caesers legion for years now."

Veronica raised an eyebrow. 'Waging a war for years means they've obviously got a lot of people. Could be an actual military.' "So who are they?" At Trudy's confused look who explained. "Like I said, we're not from around here."

Trudy didn't seem to believe her but she explained anyway. "The NCR own this place. They came in from California to the East, waving their flag and claiming our land. They're good people mostly but they don't let their propaganda fool you. They came for one thing and one thing only. The dam. I'm pretty sure the NCR wants to hold onto the Dam because it's one of the few places around that can make electricity. The Legion are a bunch of savages, though. No idea why they'd want the Dam. Probably plan on destroying it or something." Trudy realised she had lost the captain at that point. "Caesers legion are a bunch of slavers, rapists and monsters. They're all the conquered tribes united under one man, Caeser. They go around killing of the men, sick and the old, rape and enslave the women, then kidnap the children, they brainwash em into being their soldiers, real sick they are."

Veronica felt disgust at these people building up inside of her. Where she came from, everyone was suffering so they all banded together. There was the insurrection but they hadn't taken the opportunity to kick the UNSC while they were down like this legion would. People got by by helping each other not by taking advantage of the weak. She would have words with the Captain about this certainly, before they left this legion had to go. Her thoughts drew her to another key question though. "What happened here, to make this place...like this."

Trudy looked down as of preparing herself for the long history lesson. "Well it happened a little over 200 years ago..."

Meanwhile, John Ackers was standing guard near Sunny and her...big dog. John didn't like dogs. Not since he was attacked as a kid, giving himself a nasty scar across his cheek. He was incredibly nervous watching the dog, mostly since it was watching him. It just sat there, staring at him. "Don't like dogs huh?" Came a soft voice to his side.

He turned to see Sunny Smiles watching him, now more at ease than before. He looked at her briefly before turning back to the dog. "What? Oh uh...no, not really."

"Don't worry, she won't bite unless I tell her to."

He turned and stared at her. "Is that supposed to relax me?" He asked her incredulously.

She gave a chuckle. "I guess not." She stretched out her hand. "Sunny Smiles."

He looked at her outstretched hand, momentarily confused before shaking it. "Corporal Ackers, UNSC."

"No first name Corporal?" She teased.

"Oh uh, John. It's John." His nervousness from the dog distracting him.

"So, John, why don't you like dogs?"

"Got bit as a kid, never really been comfortable with them."

"Ah." She hung her head a little. "Cheyenne, go check on Trudy for me." The dog cocked her head questioningly before walking off.

John was more than a little taken aback. "Are you...sure you can do that?"

"She's my dog, besides she'll come if she's needed. So what are you doing here John?"

"Like we said, just passing through."

She didn't seem to believe him. "Uh huh, and your high tech equipment?"

"Standard issue for ODSTs." She looked confused and he elaborated. "Orbital Drop Shock Trooper."

She nodded in understanding before pausing. "Wait, orbital? Like space?"

"Yep, 'feet first into hell'."

Sunny was even more confused but was interrupted by the groaning of chairs being moved. Trudy and Veronica came back through. "We're done here corporal, let's move." Veronica walked towards the door and left.

John nodded and turned to follow but paused at the door. He turned to Sunny and removed his helmet. "It was nice meeting you Sunny." He slipped on his helmet and left.

"Uh yeah, you too."