KP:

Fallout

6: Showdown

The Skum Pitt

Business was rather slow that night. His bar had been busy the past two nights with all the people who couldn't gamble now that Gizmo was dead. Instead, they had been coming to drown their sorrows with as much cheep booze as they could afford. Who would have known that Gizmo getting his fat ass shot would actually be a boom for his business? Not tonight. Maybe everyone was trying to sleep off their hangovers. Or worse, his influx of patrons might have decided to go to the Maltese Falcon down in the Hub to get their gambling fix instead. He was hoping that wasn't the case. After thinking about it for a moment or two, Neil realized his slow business might have had something to do with him blowing away that punk night before. Word of it had most likely reached all the way to Shady Sands by lunch time. That would mean that everyone was scared of the Skulz actually trying to do something out of revenge. Fat chance of that. Those lazy punks only liked to get wasted and screw around with anything that had a pair of tits on it. Neil wouldn't be surprised if a few of those tweekers were out trying to bed and bury their boners in a few wild Bramen right now.

"Neil" a voice whispered. Neil looked up and saw the young man from the other night as he tried to flag him over.

"You really must be thirsty." Neil said as he walked over.

"Neil, get your gun ready." The young blonde man said in a rush as two women flagged him over near the bar's entrance. "Just trust me." The young man said as he joined the two women.

Neil quickly moved himself to where he kept his gun stashed as he cleaned out a glass as best he could. The front door to his bar opened as Vinnie walked in. He was soon followed by every single member of the Skulz. Some of them had the majority of their faces pierced while several others had their heads shaved and most of them looked like they hadn't seen a bath in several years. The one thing that they all had in common was their gang logo that had either been tattooed or branded on their arms. Judging by some of the leers and smiles on their faces, it was obvious that some shit was fixing to go down. More so when Vinnie walked up to the bar with a shit eating grin on his face.

EARLIER

"I can't believe we're doing this." Kim said as she watched Shego teach Ron how to pick a door lock using inside Gizmo's now abandoned casino. After explaining to Killian their plan, he gave them permission to use the property in order to teach Ron what he needed to know. So far, the only thing Ron had successfully learned was how to curse properly.

"You want to save Neil? Then it looks like we're going to have to cause him a little pain first." Shego said as she kept an eye on Ron's progress. "Carefully. If you move the pick too fast or too hard, the pick will snap." Shego said as she slapped Ron upside his head.

"How can you have so much patience for this?" Ron asked her.

"It's all part of the trade." Shego said.

"What trade?"

"She's a thief, Ron." Kim said flatly.

"Say what?" Ron asked and looked up as Shego rolled her eyes.

"When you've had to live on your own out here, you do what you need in order to survive. And in the Hub, being a thief can be a very lucrative career choice." Shego said.

"Then why are you here in Junktown? Oh, that's right. You got caught." Kim said in a very sarcastic tone.

"I didn't get caught!" Shego protested, trying her best to control the volume and anger in her voice. It was late at night, and they didn't want to risk anyone finding out what they were doing or planning. They only had a few short hours before the sun rose and the Skum Pitt would be closed. Once Neil was asleep inside his room in the back of the bar, it would all be up to Ron to sneak in and steal the urn.

"I didn't get caught. Someone rated me out, and I had to make a quick exit. But the person I was trying to steal from happened to work for Gizmo. The next thing you know, I had to fight everything from people to Radscorpions just so my brothers and I can stay alive. Then my brothers wind up becoming hired muscle in the Skulz." Shego said.

"And if we get rid of the Skulz, your little brothers are free. Wait a minute." Ron said as something came to mind. "When we try to take down the Skulz, how are they going to stay out of it?"

"I'm their big sister and I do my best to keep an eye on them. So right now, I arranged it so that they are far from Junktown as they can be right now." Shego said before she heard a click inside the knob as Ron turned the picks. "Door's open." Shego said and slowly pushed it open. "Congrats, Stoppable. Now we just have to teach you how to steal like a thief." Shego said with a smile.

The inside of Skum Pitt was dark and quiet. The only light within the entire bar was the light of the morning sun that came pouring in through the cracks of the closed windows. On the floor was the place where the Skulz member had been killed the other night. There was an obvious attempt to try and mop up where blood had pooled on the ground. By now, the blood had dried to the point where the stain wouldn't come out unless you replaced the floor. If Kim and Shego knew Neil as well they thought they did, he wouldn't be replacing that floor until he absolutely had to. Which meant that stain would be there until the bar was torn down.

"Ladies first." Ron said.

"I don't think so, sport." Shego said. "You're the one that's got to do it."

"Why?" Ron asked as Rufus shot the pale woman a dirty look and started to give off a low growl.

"From what I've heard, you can handle yourself in a fire fight. But it's going to take a lot more than guts and a gun to survive out here. So think of this as a lesson in Wasteland Survival 101. There are going to be times when you're going to have to steal in order to survive. And I prefer for my students to learn by experience. So hop to it, tender foot." Shego said as she slapped Ron on the ass, making him jump to his feet and take his first few steps into the closed bar.

"You're really making him do this?!" Kim demanded in a whisper.

"We can't hold his hand forever, princess." Shego said.

"Would you stop calling me that?" Kim asked.

"Aw, but you look so cute when you're upset." Shego said in a mocking sarcastic tone. Shego smirked as she saw the glare on the young redhead's face until she heard one of the floorboard's groan slightly and spun her head back around to look at Ron. "Don't put all your weight on one foot! Try to distribute your weight evenly and look for the solid places on the floor." Shego said.

"Easy for you to say." Ron said as he tried to do as she said. So far, he felt like and idiot since he looked more like a scarecrow that was just learning how to walk.

Ron took a deep breath to try and calm his nerves and relax his muscles. He lifted his right leg in the air and proceeded to lightly press against the floorboards. If he couldn't feel any support underneath it, there was a good chance it would groan. After finally finding where the boards had proper support, he eased his weight down on it. Despite his efforts, the boards would still groan ever so slightly or begin to creak. This was what happened when you used old and rusted materials to try and build something. Each time he moved, Ron would start to bite his lower lip in fear. If he kept biting it any more, he was going to draw blood. Ron's heart was pounding so hard in his chest that he was sure Kim and Shego could hear it. Every time he thought about what might happen if Neil caught him trying to steal the urn, he kept seeing himself suffering the same fate as the Skulz ganger whose blood now stained the floor he was walking on.

Ron's mind was so busy replaying images of him suffering a graphic and unwanted painful death that he almost ran into the countertop of the bar itself. The shock of himself running into the bar's edge was so sudden that it almost made Ron scream in terror. How he had managed to stop himself, he didn't know nor did he even want to try and guess. He just thanked whatever higher power that had been looking after him at that moment as he focused his eyes on the prize ahead.

Ron smiled as he reached over and grasped the urn, glad that this ordeal was almost over with. He turned to start sneaking out as he pulled and made an unwanted discovery. He tried to lift the urn again and found that that it wouldn't move. As he mouthed a word that rhymed with vacuum, Shego could tell what was wrong.

"We've hit a snag." Shego said.

"Please tell me that Neil didn't catch him." Kim said, remembering the temper the old bartender had. She couldn't bare to watch and had decided to keep her attention focused on their surroundings and make sure no one was coming.

"It's the urn. It looks like it's attached to the bar top."

"Oh shit." Kim said. "How is he going to get it out of there now?"

"I don't know." Shego growled to herself as she looked around the room. "Give me a second. Ron, stay there." Shego said and slipped off around to the side of the building.

"Shego, you bitch!" Kim said as she did her best to suppress her urge to scream at the thief.

"What's wrong?" Ron asked.

"Shego just ditched us."

"She did what?!" Ron asked again, but kept himself from shouting.

"She ditched us! That bitch left us high and dry!" Kim said.

"Oh, the hell I did." Shego said, appearing at Ron's side like a ghost and almost making the boy cry out in surprise.

"What the – Where did you come from?"

"Side entrance." Shego said and pointing to the door that was at the side of the building and closer to the bar.

"That was there the whole time? What the fuck?!" Ron growled as his face turned red.

"You wanted to learn how to be a thief." She said and noticed how flush with anger Ron was becoming. "You know, you're a little sexy when you're angry. Like a boy band version of the Road Warrior." Shego said as she looked at the urn. She reached over across the bar and began to feel the underside. "Lady Luck is shinning down on us. This thing isn't glued to the bar. I can feel the bolt holding it in place." She said with a small smile. The smile soon turned into a small frown as she tried to give the bolt a small twist. "The stupid thing is stuck."

"How are we going to get it off?" Ron asked her.

"With a little heat treatment." Shego said as she placed her hand back under the bar and the other hand around the base. Within moments, Ron could smell something foul within the air. It almost had a chemical smell but also reminded him of when they had to fix walls or control panels inside the Vault. The smell of burning or scorched metal. Ron's nose flared as his face crinkled from the foul assault on his nostrils when Shego slowly lifted the urn off of the bar.

"Simple." Shego said.

"How did you,"

"I'll tell you later. Come on. Princess, close that door." Shego said as she and Ron made their way out the side exit while Kim locked and slowly closed the front door of the Skum Pitt bar. Once everyone was together again outside, they quickly made their way toward the Crash House and as far away from the Skum Pit as possible.

"How did you do that?" Ron asked.

"You want to tell him, Glow Worm?" Kim asked.

"You don't know how much I want to kick you in that smug face of yours, Possible." Shego said while pointing the urn at her.

"Careful!" Ron said and gently took the urn from her. "Thanks for the help, but how did you do that?" Ron asked again.

"I burned the bolt off of the bar." Shego said as she raised her hand and ignited it with a green flame. That was when she noticed the clueless and dumbfounded look on Ron's face.

"Haven't you guessed? She's a mutant." Kim said. "Think about it, Ron. There's tons of nuclear fallout covering everything around here after the war. How the hell do you think the Brahman got two heads or the radscorpions got so big?" Kim asked.

"And it affected a bunch of people." Shego said, not wanting to get into it. "The way I see it, there are two sides to it. The people in Necropolis got the downside while my brothers and I got the upside."

"Gives new meaning to the phrase light my fire." Ron said.

"Were you making some wise crack at me?" Shego asked as she spun around to face him.

"Actually, I think it's pretty cool." Ron said.

"Oh." Shego said, taken back by his answer. It wasn't the first time Shego had heard someone compliment her abilities. It was just that she was used to people calling her a freak or something worst most of her life. So much so that she was ready for a knockdown fight whenever someone made any comment about her in general. "Then let's just hurry and get this thing to the Crash House. I don't want to be anywhere near Neil when he finds out his wife's missing."

"Holy Shit. You did it?" Vinnie asked as he saw Stoppable holding the urn in his hands.

"Does this mean I'm in?" Ron asked.

"Yeah. Hell yeah!" Vinnie said as a few of the gangers applauded Ron for his efforts. The rest were too busy either drinking or getting high from a strange drug that Ron didn't recognize. Judging by the glassy look in their eyes and the pigment of their skin, he didn't want to know or be anywhere near the crap.

"So what are you going to do with it?" Ron asked.

"We'll take it with us tonight when we pay ol' Neil a visit. That old fart has been giving us grief for too long. With Gizmo gone, this town is ours. We're going to let everyone know by blowing that old codgers nuts off tonight. Maybe I'll piss in it before we kill him."

Kim's eyes widened slightly and twitched as she heard Vinnie. It took a great deal of restraint for her not to draw her pistol right then and there.

"Is it okay if I meet you guys there? I've got some shit to take care of." Ron said.

"Fine with me." Vinnie said.

"I don't buy it. What shit are you talking about?" a bald lady ganger demanded as she stood from her seat and flicking her homemade cigarette onto the floor. Thankfully, that was when Shego stepped in.

"He's going to get his dick wet. After being out in the wasteland for a couple of days, we need a little pussy. Don't we sweetie?" Shego asked as her hand grabbed Kim by the cheek of her backside and gave it a firm squeeze and causing her to slightly squeak in surprise.

"Good idea." Vinnie said with a chuckle and a leering glance at Shego's chest. "I think that might be some advice I'm going to take myself." He said as he looked at the bald ganger. "As soon as the sun's down, we head to the Skum Pitt and stake our claim on this hole." Vinnie said and earned a cheer from the others.

Ron turned to leave with Shego and Kim by his side. He stopped at the doorway for a moment and grabbed a large satchel and placed the urn in it. He placed it over his shoulder as he looked back and cringed slightly. Vinnie was necking the bald woman while she had already unzipped his pants and had one hand inside of them. Ron quickly left the building as he and his two companions kept a steady pace with Rufus following behind them.

"We can't let them kill Neil." Kim said.

"We're not going to." Shego said.

"Now we go to Lars for step two. Then we pray we don't get killed during step three." Ron said.

"You've got a lot of balls walking in here you piss ant." Neil said as he set down the glass he had been cleaning, making sure his hand was close to the gun that was hidden under the bar top. "Tara, time for your break." He said and signaled for her to get in the back room.

"I think the little lady stays. We're all friends, aren't we?" the Skulz leader asked as a woman with half of her head shaved with a fresh and most likely infected tribal tattoo grasped Tara firmly by both of her arms. The lady ganger snickered as she licked the back of Tara's neck from the base of her neck upward and placing a small kiss where her hairline was.

"This is between you and me. Let her go." Neil said.

"Sorry. You made this personal when you blew away one of my guys. Now I've got to make an example out of the both of you."

"But I wanted to have some fun." The woman complained as she nipped at Tara's ear.

"Oh, we will." Vinnie said as he popped his knuckles. "Hope they got some job openings for you in hell, Neil."

"You'll find out in a minute if you don't drop that firecracker." Killian said as he and Lars came into the bar.

Several other Junktown guards entered the Skum Pit from the main and side entrance with their own weapons drawn. Several of them had pistols, a few others had shotguns, and a few had spears. As the Skulz looked at the small army of guards, Ron, Shego, and Kim drew their own guns and immediately trained their sites on Vinnie. As he turned and saw the three barrels pointed at him, his eyes narrowed as he glared at the trio while a sneer formed on his lip.

"You fucking rat. I knew I should have shot you the minute you stepped through our door." He said.

"Stand down Vinnie or you're going to die." Shego said.

He took a glance at Shego's gun before glancing at the other weapons that were pointed at him and the rest of his gang. "You know what? Fuck it." The Vinnie said.

He raised his pistol level and fired; sending a bullet into Tara's forehead. It exited the back of her skull in a brief explosion of bone and tissue before it bore into the throat of the bald woman holding her and obliterated the interior of her throat and neck before exiting out the base of her skull in an exit wound that one could fit at least three fingers into. Both fell to the floor dead while the wall was coated in a combination of Tara's brain in thick crimson along with the lady ganger's blood, arteries, and bone as everyone else looked on in horror.

"No." Ron whispered to himself.

"Kimmie?" Shego asked as she glanced at the redhead.

"Duck." Kim said and nodded as she read Shego's mind. Grabbing Ron as she went down, the trio dropped to the floor as Neil's face contorted with white hot rage as he drew his gun from under the bar.

"YOU COCK SUCKING MOTHER FUCKER!" Neil screamed and fired several shots.

Vinnie dodged to the right and crashed into a crudely built table; causing it to break into splinters. The bullet that was meant for him punctured through the left eye of a Skulz Ganger and blew out the entire back of the man's head and showered several guards in chunks of bloody brains. The dead man collapsed to the floor as blood quickly pooled under him like spilt milk while another ganger took a bullet to the upper peck of his armor and an unfortunate Junktown guard took one of Neil's bullets to the right shoulder. Several Skulz spun around with weapons raised and were able to turn get a few shots off. Due to the fact that their body was flooded with various drugs, their aim was mostly off as they ended up shooting the walls and various bottles of soda and booze.

The entire mass of guards that were present unleashed a torrent of bullets and buckshot in self defense as Killian took out two gangers with fast and accurate shots to the head for each. The majority of the Skulz gang members were riddled with various sized holes from their heads to their hips. Various pieces of their anatomy were exploding in blasts and splashes of blood while close range buckshot tore entire chunks of flesh, muscle, and organs away while their bodies shook and jiggled like morbid gelatin molds. Ron could see various droplets of crimson shower all over himself and the women next to him like a grotesque biblical rain as his ears rung from the sounds of close range gunfire. Ron looked and saw several gang members fall and join those that were already dead while others grasped their limbs or torsos while they screamed in pain. That's when Ron saw the form that was slowly rolling off of what was left of a broken table.

Vinnie had hit himself in the head when he crashed and had knocked himself into a daze. He was regaining his senses as he saw the floor was now littered with the dying and wounded. Vinnie was reaching for his gun again when Ron's instincts once again took control as he raised his pistol and began to fire. He fired two, three, four shots in total. He was able to shoot Vinnie in close formation around his stomach and the underside of his ribcage while the fifth shot hit Vinnie in the face; right under the nose and above the upper lip and shattering his upper pallet. The gunfire had stopped as everyone surveyed the carnage while Vinnie started to gag and choke on the blood flowing down the back of his throat. Shego stood to her feet and walked to where Vinnie lay. His eyes were clenched tightly shut as he grimaced from the pain of his wounds and tried to clear his throat so he could properly breathe.

"Hello Vinnie" Shego said to him in a mocking tone as she pressed her boot onto Vinnie's throat. "Suck on this." She said and fired both barrels into Vinnie's face and making his head explode like an over ripe melon. "Are we done here?" Shego asked Killian.

"Yeah, we're done." The sheriff said as he glanced at Ron and Kim. She helped Ron to his feet as he saw Ron was rubbing his ears. "Kim, you might want to take him to Doc Morbid and get him checked out."

"Good idea." Kim said and tried to maneuver Ron to the door. As Ron noticed this, he shook his head no. He quickly walked over to Neil while removing large duffel bag he was wearing. Removing the urn that he had placed inside of it, he gently handed it back to Neil. Neil took it with tears filling his eyes. He cradled the urn gently in the crook of his arm while shaking Ron's hand.

"Thank you." He whispered. "From now on, any dink you want is on the house until the day you die."

Still holding the urn, Neil turned around and walked into the back of the bar that acted as his home.

LATER

"Is it anything permanent?" Kim asked the doctor as he finished examining Ron.

He removed the semi-white gown he had been wearing that was covered in various splotches of blood. The doctor had been treating the gunshot wounds of the Junktown guards and the few living gangers before he was able to get to Ron. Suffice to say, the majority of the wounded gang members were now down in the make shift morgue beneath the doctor's office with two gangers still breathing and on steady drips of pain killers while the guards were allowed to go back to the guard station. The rest of the guards could keep an eye on them for the next day or two before they could go home to make sure the wounds didn't get infected or weren't more serious than the doctor speculated. By the time Doc Morbid was done examining Ron, the young man's hearing was already starting to come back to him.

"I seriously doubt it. Just give it a few days and he should be right as rain." The doctor said as he washed his hands with soap.

"Is Tara here?" Ron asked.

"What was that?" the doctor asked, not really paying attention.

"Tara. She was the waitress that worked for Neil." Ron said, feeling both emotionally and physically drained from his recent ordeal.

"Oh, you mean the blonde woman. She's downstairs with the rest of them. Your other friend already went down there to say her good byes. If you want to do the same, don't disturb my assistant. He's slow in the head and gets confused real easily. It takes him forever to learn how to do things." The doctor said.

"Thanks, Doc." Kim said as she and Ron started to go down the stairs.

The morgue of the doctor's office was almost as cold as the interior of a meat locker as the finished walking down the steps. There were bodies that were lying side by side with bloody white sheets covering their bodies. A large patchwork curtain divided the room in half and prevented them from seeing what was on the other side. There were at least three tables and each had a body on it. They table on the far left and far right were covered but not the table in the middle. The sheet was pulled aside to reveal a very pale blue Tara as she lay on the metal slab. Shego stood by her side as Ron and Kim walked to her. They all took a moment of silence to themselves to say their own goodbyes.

"She was too good for this place. She deserved a life where she was happy and not – this." Shego whispered.

"That's life in the wasteland, Shego. It's hardly ever fair." Kim said.

"Damn it!" a voice said behind a curtain that separated the other half of the room from the rest.

Curiosity overtook the trio as the gently pushed back the curtain. There was a small man as he stood over one of the dead gangers with a knife in his hand. The ganger was stripped of their clothes and possessions which had been piled in a corner while a hose was hooked into an artery in the neck and allowed the blood to drain into a bucket under the table. The small man wore a stained smock and gloves as he removed a chunk of muscle from the corpse and began to cut it into small cubes. As they watched, they noticed that the corpse had been cut wide open from sternum to groin and all the organs removed. Part of the body had been skinned and large portions of muscle had already been removed. When the small man was done cutting up the chunk he had removed, he wrapped it in what looked like butcher's paper and placed it in a cooler.

"I hate it when knife stops being sharp." The small man said as he wiped off the blade on his smock.

"What are you doing?" Ron asked him.

"Getting prime cuts ready." The small man said.

"Prime cuts?" Ron asked either of his companions.

"Give me a minute, Cupcake." Shego said and approached the man while opening her shirt and allowing more than over half of her cleavage to be exposed. "Hey, shortie. Can you tell me what you're doing?"

"Doc wants me to get the shipment ready by tonight. He doesn't like it when shipments late."

"Can you at least tell me who this guy is?"

"Don't know. Doc says people on slabs were clean. So that means they get sent to iguana man." The man said.

"Who?" Ron asked.

"Iguana man. He lives in Hub. Doc send you to check on me, right?" The little man said.

"Yeah, he did. Sorry. We tend to be forgetful from time to time" Shego said.

"Me too. Doc said I was born with drain bramage."

"You can't tell." Shego said and quickly closed the curtain.

"I think I'm going to be sick." Kim quickly said.

"What is it?" Ron asked her.

"Just follow me." Shego said as she stormed upstairs at a fast pace. Once they were upstairs, the pale woman made a straight line toward Doc Morbid as he finished bandaging a minor shoulder wound on a guard. She firmly grasped the doctor by the front of his shirt before she threw him against the wall of the exam room.

"Let go of me or,"

"Or you'll what? Cut me up like those dead bodies down below?" Shego demanded.

"I-I don't know what you,"

"SAVE IT!" Shego shouted as she reached over and pulled a pistol from the guard's things that were on a nearby table. She pressed the barrel firmly to the underside of the doctor's chin as he began to blubber franticly.

"What are you waiting for? Get Lars!" the doctor shouted.

"Do that! I'm sure he'd love to hear about how you're selling the dead as food."

"Do what?" the guard asked.

"Your assistant was very informative. He was getting your shipment of fresh prime cuts ready to iguana man in the Hub. As in Bob's Iguana Bits?" Shego asked him.

"Oh dear God." The guard said as he began to feel sick while Kim began to turn green the more she listened.

"You mean to tell me that," the guard started to say.

"Bob's Iguana Bits. The food stand that sells kabobs on skewers is actually people." Kim explained.

"You sick son of a bitch. You're selling human meat as food?!" Ron demanded.

"I'm gonna throw up." The guard said as he rushed to a window and quickly threw it open with his good arm and began to empty his stomach the moment he leaned his head out.

"I make sure they're clean before I do anything." The doctor said.

"They're people you sick fuck!" Shego growled.

"The furnace to incinerate them has been broken for years and no one knows how to fix it. We can't bury them or it'll attract who knows what."

"Not to mention the caps you make on the side you demented asshole." Ron said.

"Why are you getting so mad? No one cares about most of the people down there anyway. They won't be missed."

"That girl down there with the hole in her head was my friend you asshole. I care! Maybe I should shoot your knees out and throw you to a pack of starving giant mole rats. Then we'll see how you like being eaten." Shego growled.

"Shego, don't!" Ron protested.

"Back off, Stoppable." Shego warned.

"There's no point in this. Kim and the guard will let Killian know what he's been doing. Killing him won't solve anything." Ron said.

"It'll make me feel better."

"Then you'll be no better than Vinnie. Do you want to be like that dick wad?" Ron asked her.

"That's low, Vault Dweller." Shego said as she turned and glared at him. Shego bit the inside of her cheek in frustration and clenched her eyes closed. With a growl of frustration, she threw the gun to the ground. She took a deep breath before looking at the doctor and bashed in the bridge of his nose with her forehead, breaking the man' nose before letting him drop.

"I need a fucking drink." Shego said as she stormed outside.

"How are you holding up? You don't look too good." Ron asked Kim.

"I'm not sure. I've lost count at how many times I've stopped at Bob's for a quick bite." Kim said.

"All the more to pay Bob a visit. It looks like you've got an excuse to go to the Hub now."