Writer: strykemeister

Story id: 4917193

Original Title: She Doesn't Like It When You Call Her That

Basically just a rewrite of story above, but of course I am adding a few things. But these aren't huge changes so no worries. Same concept, same varied chapter lengths. All rights to the original story - plot, title, character and all - belong to random-uncannon (strykemeister). Iwill be posting the original stories link soon, to both my profile and a future chapter.

I hope you all enjoy this and do go read the original story because it's just great Cx and don't forget to review!

I :: Broken Town, Broken Friend ::

The sun is bright.

I'm a fucking poet.

I rub my watery eyes with the sleeve of my jumpsuit, clenching the handle of a bloody nightstick in my hand. I blink away the pain and look over the dry, brown, expanse of land in front of me. When they said there was nothing but a Wasteland out here, I didn't really think it would be this bad.

I sigh and put back on the shades - who the Hell needs shades in a Vault, anyway? - I swiped from a dead body onto my face, trying to look around better. Nothing but a broken town below me. Great. I sigh and begin to pick my way down to better leveled ground. I fell a couple times. . .ok, I fell a lot. But the adrenaline was giving way to vertigo and I was lucky I was still awake. So I just tried to steady myself on an uneven road and eventually made it to the middle of the broken town.

I stared at the sign in front of me for a moment, concerned by the flimsy writing in spray paint, the ugly yellow color reminding me of worse things. Then there was a gun shot. For a moment, I thought I was back in the Vault and whirled around, nightstick above my head.

I would rather Officer Mack, my conscious hisses.

There's a grubby man in shorts behind me, this weird strap across his chest. He's reloading a gun and I need to react. I charge, ready to swing the baton down on his head, but a hiss goes through the air and he and I freeze. He looks up, eyes bugging as his gun trembles in his hand. When he drops it I nudge him in the chest with the end of my baton. He lets out this pained whine and falls stiffly to the ground. I giggle, lowering the baton, then notice the weird floating ball. . .well, I guess it would be staring at me. The front of it is an obvious speaker but no words come out, no tune, just this belch of static.

"Um," I hesitate. "Hi there. . ."

It twirls around in front of me and I smile a little; I was good with robots.

"Hey, maybe if I find a town. . .I can fix you up a little."

It lets out a shrill whistle that I take as a yes, it makes me cringe. I think I've seen this model before, but I'd have to see a manual on it first. I look back at the sign with the gross yellow words, mutter 'Megaton' then look back to the robot.

"I guess Megaton is our best shot, little guy."

The robot hisses again and I bite my lip, smiling around my teeth. Ok, so maybe the outside wasn't so bad after all. But this Megaton place would really determine that for me.