A Glorious Day In This Man's Wasteland: Chapter 3

Sorry for the extra long delay, this chapter is extra big to compensate. It's actually been done for well over a week, but I've been… busy. Especially in the last day or so with Old World Blues. Of which there is one minor reference in this chapter, but it will probably be referenced extensively in the next chapter or two – so play it if you haven't already.

Fun Fact: My New Vegas level 41 character has 10 in every stat except for perception – which is 9, and luck – which is 4. It's hilarious. She's also a freakin' cyborg. Much like Kat. All of her skills are also at 100, with the exception of unarmed and melee weapons. This is without having started on ANY of the main 'you must pick this side' storyline quests.

Tech Information, Abbreviations and other Misc. Information:

Standard Enclave Power Armor:

The power armor currently used in the Capitol wasteland area by the Enclave is an improved variant of the MK II Power Armor that was previously developed by the Enclave for use in the Core Region(California and the surrounding area) before the Poseidon Oil Rig was blown up and Navarro was overrun, forcing the Enclave to flee. While the suit boasts of giving both increased strength and agility to wearers, the matte black paint job and glowing orange eyes tend to have a slightly negative effect on one's charisma. (+2, +1, -1)

In addition, the suit is fitted with a voice regulator that effectively makes it impossible to tell the wearer's gender.

ICS -

Internal Communication System: An internal sophisticated radio system installed in every powered armor suit, with the exception of the old t-45d suits. Can be used to communicate with anyone wearing power armor, robots, and standard radios - while remaining completely silent to any outside observer who happens to be standing nearby. All Enclave robots are fitted with one of these as well. Standard robots can receive the transmissions as they would a normal radio communication, but cannot reply back silently as an Enclave robot would.

A classified function of this device, known only to a select few, is that it can also be used to listen in and/or record conversations of any individual in possession of the ICS.

Enclave Military Rankings(if you know where I'm getting some of the ranks from, good for you):

President/Commander in Chief - Archon

Chief of Staff - First Council

General - Arch-Strategos

Colonel - Commander

Lieutenant - Stays the same.

Major - Centurion

Sergeant - Stays the same.

Corporal - Monitor

Private - Citizen

Chapter 3: Uneasy Truce

The door slowly creaked open.

"Alright, don't shoot - we're coming out." came a voice from the other side of the door

*Kat switched over to her suit's ICS* "Remember Sarge, don't start shooting until I do."

"Affirmative, Sir!"

Kat winced, she really needed to get RL-3's chassis fitted with an Enclave ICS as soon as she could. Watching Sarge break cover to barrel after enemies while yelling anti-communalist pre-war slogans was bad enough, having him practically announce to everyone in the room that she was giving him covert orders was just plain embarrassing.

The sight of four still armed figures walking cautiously with weapons raised out from behind the set of double doors interrupted Kat's inner monologue.

"I didn't think that 'come out with your hands up' was particularly difficult to understand, even for raiders," quipped Kat, leveling her rifle at the group but not firing. Something was wrong, they didn't look like raiders, they were far too clean and well equipped for that. They didn't look chemmed up and she didn't recognize them from the group that had ambushed her earlier either . A quick visual survey of the corpses littering the ground on the floor below confirmed that every raider was accounted for. Merc backup? Not likely. Mercenaries hated raiders as much as anyone else, and the standard wasteland procedure for everyone when encountering raiders was 'shoot first, ask questions never, spit on corpse.'

Kat's mind was working furiously. Matching uniforms and similar weapons(aside from the big guy). Not raiders then, but the similar insignia on two of the three uniforms means that they're unlikely to be mercs either. The only reasonable explanation is that they belong to a military of some sort, and I don't recognize the symbols. This could be bad. At least most of those weapons look like they fire bullets instead of high energy plasma. Except for the one the large tribal's holding. She was about to demand their names and ranks when one of them, presumably the leader(who was quite the looker, Kat had to admit) stepped forward and volunteered the information.

A massive explosion rocked the building, shaking dust off the walls and causing tiny bits of the ceiling to fall to the ground. Sheppard and his team, aside from Ronon, who managed to brace himself against a wall, were knocked off his feet.

"What the hell was th-," Sheppard stopped in mid-sentence as screams came from the other side of the double doors, followed by what sounded like multiple discharges of an energy weapon.

"Sheppard." A clearly disturbed Rodney McKay was looking up from his life sign detector with a grimace on his face. "There's only one life sign left in that room."

Sheppard was about to reply when a loud, mechanical sounding voice boomed out from behind the doors and delivered an ultimatum.

"We're not really going to walk out there without our guns, are we Sheppard?" Ronon had a scowl plastered on his face. "Whoever's out there just killed ten or more people."

"I agree with Ronon, I believe that in this case relinquishing our weapons would be most unwise." Teyla looked more disturbed then annoyed.

"I vote we make a beeline for the Stargate and get off of this planet, who's with me?" said Rodney.

"Of course we're not giving up our guns, but we're not just running away either," said Sheppard who pointedly looked at Rodney while he talked. "We all go out together, but no one fires a shot unless I say so."

With a nod from both Ronon and Teyla and a mumbled curse from Rodney, Sheppard signaled his team to move out. Guns aimed forward, they pushed past the doors as a team and came face to face with a humanoid shaped metal suit and a flying, no make that hovering... something.

Whatever was in the suit had quickly leveled its gun at Sheppard. At least it hasn't fired yet, Sheppard thought to himself. That was when the mechanical sounding voice spoke up again, apparently just to insult them. Sheppard had no idea what a raider was, but one glance at the recently dismembered corpses on the floor below quickly made him realize that it was probably in his team's best interests to inform the metal suit wearing monster that he and his team were not 'raiders.'

"My name is Lt. Colonel John Sheppard. The big guy to my right is called Ronon, she's Teyla and the one hiding behind Ronon is Rodney," said Sheppard, gesturing towards each of his team members in turn. "We're explorers, not raiders - whatever that means."

"You don't know what raiders are? You're either lying or you aren't from around here, but ok, I'll humor you. Raiders are gangs of petty murderers and thieves that spend their days getting high, followed by killing, mutilating and then raping any innocent people they can get their filthy hands on - and not particularly in that order," replied the distorted voice. "Your rank sounds military, but doesn't match up with any group I've ever heard of , and you definitely aren't Enclave. Assuming you aren't lying, and you'd better not be - I hate liars - where are you from and what are you doing snooping around Enclave controlled territory?"

"First, we were exploring, not snooping," came a heated reply from Sheppard. "Secondly, we really aren't from around here. In fact, we're not even from this world."

The suit was silent for a few seconds before replying, "Funny, I don't remember seeing a spaceship on top of the building before I blasted my way inside."

"That's because we didn't come in a spaceship, we came through the Stargate," said Sheppard.

"My people and many others know it as the Ancestral Ring," added Teyla.

"Can't say that I've ever heard of either."

"Stone looking ring with strange symbols on it, about this high," cut in McKay, gesturing with his arms. "In one of your museum exhibits in west wing, near the antique space satellite."

"Ah. I wondered what that thing was for. Before the war broke out, all our scientists had managed to figure out with any degree of certainty was that it was somehow related to the Atlanteans. That's pretty much as far as they got with any of the relics, actually. Well, that's what the exhibit computers said anyways, don't much care for pre-war goodies that aren't body armor or weaponry myself."

Whoever was in the suit shrugged as much as a person wearing a metal suit could. Which was surprisingly a good deal.

"You know about the Ancients?" Rodney had a very excited look on his face. "And you said there were other relics? Say, you wouldn't happen to have an orange crys-"

"Atlanteans yes, 'Ancients,' no," Kat said, cutting the man called Rodney off. Definitely a scientist, they never knew when to shut their damn mouths. A standoff is not a good time for casual conversation about pre-war archeological finds. "Like I said, our scientists were studying the ring and other relics they left behind before the Great War broke out. After that, studying the past of a dead race wasn't exactly a top priority. The ring was the only thing left in the museum. The other relics were moved somewhere else before the bombs hit, apparently they left the ring for last because it was so damned big."

"Hold on a minute, Great War? Bombs? What are you talking about?" Sheppard seemed to be the one asking all the questions, which was fine with Kat. She had this nagging feeling that if she was forced to talk to one he called Rodney for more than five minutes she'd end up strangling him, which was never good when you're trying to make an excellent first impression.

"You must really be from another planet if you don't know about the War." Kat took a few seconds to once again contemplate the four individuals in front of her. The three wearing matching uniforms obviously belonged to some sort of organized military unit or mercenary group. The big one called Ronon, now that she had gotten a closer look at him, looked like an overdressed tribal with a facial expression that mirrored their typical attitude of twenty-four seven hostility.

They probably wouldn't be able to harm her overly much if things got hostile, but she didn't recognize whatever energy weapon the tribal was holding in his hands - and that was never a good sign. Thinking you might be able to take a direct hit from an energy weapon was an excellent way to get yourself killed, and a common mistake among those new to wearing the improved Enclave power armor. A properly calibrated gauss rifle could kill a man wearing older power armor in one well placed shot, as long as it hit him anywhere above the waistline. The 2mm round wasn't enough do much more than dent MKII Power Armor where it was at its thickest, but the kinetic force of a shot was more than enough to snap a man's neck, or dislodge it entirely if it hit the neck area where the plating was weaker. Known energy weapons in general were just plain dangerous to be on the receiving end of, but taking a shot from an unknown energy weapon on purpose was just plain stupid. Kat doubted she could avoid getting hit more than once at this range if a fire fight broke out. Especially since the brute holding said energy weapon seemed to be the one most on his guard out of the four.

Kat carefully considered her options. She could risk getting torn into tiny bits and pieces by unknown hostiles in the middle of nowhere, or she could play along until she found out who they really were and what they were doing in Enclave territory. While Kat was no stranger to aliens(or spaceships for that matter), having slaughtered more than her fair share when she was abducted by a group of the buggers after responding to a fake distress beacon(hah, you'd think the whole vault situation would have taught her not to bother performing random acts of kindness, they always came back to bite you in the ass) - the individuals in front of her were nothing like the little gray... things she had butchered. There was no harm to be had in pretending to buy their story.. at least until she had a sizable amount of backup to dissuade any notions of violence on their part. Kat activated her ICS and sent out a short, encrypted double burst communication to the nearest Enclave comm relay, ordering both a vertibird extraction for her and four others, as well as two six-man quick insertion squads incase this little chat turned ugly and she needed backup. The other message was an audio log of the past few minutes of conversation sent directly to Eden's private line, she knew it would take mere seconds for the A.I. to go through it.

Kat silently chuckled, knowing that Commander Autumn would blow a fuse over her requisitioning three of the Enclave's valuable vertibirds. While Autumn was unofficially still in charge of the Enclave military, Kat was relegated to the role usually filled by multiple tactical nuclear warheads and she liked it that way, despite her higher official rank. Still, always getting what she wanted due to her pull with Eden and Autumn's sense of honor(her choosing to not mention his attempted coup at the water purifier before she had talked him out of it had no doubt spared his life - something she loved to remind Autumn of every chance she got) was very, very nice.. Though as much as she loved giving Autumn a hard time, she had no intentions of ever taking over his job despite the fact that Eden had abundantly made it clear that as his second in command, she could have any military posting she wanted. Desk jobs were simply too boring for her. Having the rank and not the responsibilities that typically came along with it suited her just fine. It was also better for the Enclave, as her role of Arch-Strategos came in handy when it came time for negotiations. There's nothing like threatening to send in the most well known killing machine on the continent to do the negotiating when things weren't going your way. Ah well, at least the Enclave's diplomats loved her.

Kat suddenly realized that she was being stared at - she really needed to stop reminiscing in the middle of potentially fatal situations.

She cleared her throat, "Ah, right. Long story short, two nations got into a spat about ideology over two centuries ago and decided that the best way to settle their argument on who was right by lobbing hundreds of nuclear weapons at one another. Now everyone today is paying the price for their stupidity. The Aurorans, that would be us, were(or are, if the Enclave had anything to say about it - and boy, did they ever) a militaristic bunch who took pride in our individualism and complete loyalty to the state. The Communalists took loyalty to the state to extreme levels, to the point of believing that individual rights were unimportant - and that the only thing that mattered was the well-being of the community as a whole. They were blasted hypocrites though, the sore losers launched the first nukes when it became apparent that they were losing the ground war to superior Auroran troops. I am of course simplifying things, but I'm not a historian and to be honest I don't really care all that much."

"Where does this Enclave of yours fit into it," asked Sheppard, not looking entirely convinced.

"The Enclave is made up of people directly descended from the government and our best and brightest who saw what was coming and managed to not only survive, but to thrive. We're currently in the process of unifying the continent under our rule, which includes purging vicious raider gangs like the one you just saw. The Enclave is the Auroran people, and through them we will all reclaim our former glory," replied Kat. Eden would no doubt have been proud of her oratory skills had he been there - not that he could be, what with being a computer and not even having emotions(some things Eden said often had her wondering if that was actually the case as fully self-aware, sentient AIs had only just been developed when the war broke out, and finding out whether or not they had emotions wasn't exactly a top priority when you were attempting to get them to determine the optimal places to detonate a nuclear warhead for the highest fatality rates). Though it occurred to Kat that he might just be listening in through her suit's ICS system. She decided to check.

"Eden, are you there?"

"I am. Very nice speech, by the way. You put me to shame."

"Thank you Sir, orders?"

"Your initial plan for bringing them to the nearest Enclave base was an excellent decision. However, I wish to see these individuals at once. Escort them to Phoenix Point, as my guests."

Kat understood the implications of that last statement at once. She didn't like it one damned bit.

"Sir, with all due respect, we have no idea if they can be trusted. For all we know this could be an elaborate NCR trick. and -"

"What do you think the chances of that are?"

"... Less than 10%, Sir."

A virtual chuckle(no doubt for her benefit) was heard. Kat rolled her eyes. "Right as always - as expected of my second in command, though it's 7.83% to be exact."

"Still, at the very least I'm going to have to strongly recommend that they be disarmed before being allowed anywhere near you. Unless you want Commander Autumn to blow a coronary. Which I'd love to see, by the way."

"Naturally, and don't be crude - it doesn't suit you. You will also escort the one called Sheppard to meet with me personally."

"Alright. The vertibirds should reach our location in less than ten minutes, at which point it will take us approximately fifteen minutes to reach Phoenix."

"Very well, I shall await your arrival. Eden out."

Sheppard stared at the suit, which had been silent for several minutes after delivering what sounded a lot like old Earth propaganda from the 30s and 40s. It didn't take a genius to figure out that whoever was in that suit was probably communicating with someone. Sheppard decided that now would be a good time to break the silence, and hopefully get his team off this irradiated rock without having to shoot their way through a museum. They could always come back with the USS Daedalus or even attempt radio contact through the gate with whatever government ran this world.

"That sounds great and all, but if you don't mind we'd really just like to be on our way. Without shooting each other, if at all possible."

"I'm afraid it's not. I've been ordered to escort you to our Capitol as guests by Archon Eden, our leader. Though I'd also like to do so without any shooting being involved. What do you say?"

"Well as much as I'd love to walk aro-"

"No walking, we'll be taking a vertibird. It's a machine that flies through the air. A very fast one at that, it shaves a 12 hour trip down to 15 minutes."

"Be that as it may, I'm not sure I'm entirely comfortable taking a ride anywhere with someone I just met who's covered in the blood of over half a dozen people that they just killed."

"We've been over that. Raiders bad, Enclave good. Regardless, I feel equally uncomfortable escorting a bunch of humans wearing military uniforms and carrying lots of weaponry while claiming not only to be explorers, but aliens as well, to where my people's leader is. If it were up to me, you'd have been stunned and taken back to a military base while unconscious, and would have woken up in a restraining field."

"Well I'm glad it's not up to you, then."

Whoever was in the suit made a snorting sound. "Look, I dislike long, drawn out negotiations so I'll make this short and simple for you. You have two choices. Option one, you surrender your weapons when our transportation and my backup arrive - and we all have a nice, uneventful flight back to our base where you'll get to meet our leader. Option two, we see whether your weapons are powerful enough to kill me and Sarge here before we kill you. These terms are not negotiable, but personally I'm really hoping you pick option one. I'd hate to put a hole in that pretty face of yours."

"You really are Kirk, you know that?"

"Shut up, Rodney." Sheppard wasn't really sure how to reply to that last bit, as he hadn't bit hit on by someone wearing a metal suit before. Human aliens? Check. Ascended energy being posing as a goddesses? Also check. Roughly human shaped armored metal suits? Not so much. "You're not going to take no for an answer, are you?"

"I don't know how they do things in this 'expedition' that you're supposedly from, but Enclave soldiers carry out their orders - or die trying. So no, I'm not."

Sheppard sighed, a firefight breaking out when they were so close to one another meant that there would be no avoiding casualties on either side, and that wasn't something he was prepared to accept. "Alright, we'll go with you." He started laying down his weapon when the person in the suit held up a metal gloved hand.

"No no, you can hold on to that for now. I have no intention of hauling around your antiques for you, so you can hold on to your weapons and other ordinance until my backup arrives to carry it for you. My days of lugging around several hundred pounds of junk are far behind me."

"That's rather trusting of you."

"Not really," the suit made a shrugging motion again, "when my backup arrives you'll be both outgunned and outnumbered, I'm not terribly worried that you'll try to start anything at that point. No, if you were going to attempt to blast your way out of this you'd do it now, or else none of you are as smart as you look. Even the balding one."

"Hey, I take offense to that!" Rodney exclaimed.

"Now isn't the time McKay." Sheppard gave him the look he reserved for when things were serious.

McKay went silent after grumbling a few times under his breath and subsequently getting glared again at by Sheppard. After which everyone became aware of what sounded almost exactly like a helicopter rotor. Several of them, in fact.

"That would be our ride."

Finally, thought Kat, it's about time. I've been been out here for well over a day, I hope they brought coffee. Though given my horrible luck, it's infinitely more likely that Autumn himself decided to hop on a vertibird to personally bitch at me for "misuse of Enclave resources," or whatever.

Twelve heavily armed power armor wearing Enclave troops quickly and efficiently filtered into the museum and surrounded Sheppard and his team. A familiar and rather agitated looking blond haired woman wearing an Enclave officer uniform complete with trench coat and permanent scowl followed them in and walked straight up to Kat.

"What do you think you're doing?"

"Why Lt. Veric, how nice to see you." Ha! I was close. Not Autumn, but his favorite lackey of the week instead. Ah well, at least she's easier on the eyes than he is. I also don't have to pretend like I care.

"Drop the act, Greene. You know why I'm here."

"Because vertibirds give poor Commander Autumn a tummy ache, no doubt. Oh, and that's Arch-Strategos Greene to you, by the way. You can keep what was obviously going to be an insubordinate rant to yourself, and I'll pretend like I didn't know you were about to perform a court martial-able offense."

Veric's face went from slightly red tinged to full blown crimson. Hmmm, not bad. If she wasn't Autumn's pet I wouldn't mind having a go at th- Kat's libidinous thoughts were quickly interrupted by a loud crashing sound followed by a yell from one of her troopers.

Apparently the big one named Ronon hadn't taken kindly to an Enclave trooper grabbing his weapon, and had responded by kicking him square in the chest hard enough to knock him over. Impressive that he could do that to someone wearing power armor, he must be one strong son of a bitch. The others had quickly leveled their guns at Ronon and Sheppard's team, though most of them were pointed in Ronon's direction.

Kat brushed past a sputtering Veric and held her hand up. "Sheppard, I thought we had an agreement. Do you really want to start something now?"

"No, we don't. Ronon was just about to hand over his weapon to the nice man. Isn't that right Ronon?"

"No." The tribal had a look on his face which stated that he was clearly unwilling to hand over his weapon peacefully far more than any words ever would have.

Kat looked over the rest of Sheppard's team to make sure they were already disarmed. Seeing that they were, she gave herself an injection of turbo from one of her many sub-dermal implants. Feeling the effects of the drug kick in she immediately decided the best way to take the tribal down, after which she promptly jumped forward quicker than anyone's eyes could follow and sent the big guy flying into the nearest wall before he could react, where he quickly slumped to the ground unconscious. This all took place in the space of less than three seconds. Thank god for strength enhancing power armor and extensive cybernetic implants. She looked at the trooper who was just picking himself up off the ground. "Citizen, you may relieve the tribal of his weapon now."

Before said trooper could utter an affirmative the woman called Teyla had already run over to Ronon and was apparently checking his vitals for signs of life. "He's still breathing," she called out to the others.

Sheppard, meanwhile, was giving Kat one hell of a hate filled glare. "What the hell was that?"

Kat shrugged again. "Don't worry, I'm sure he's fine. I didn't feel anything crack and if I meant to kill him he'd be dead. The alternative was shooting him, so don't get mad at me because he wouldn't follow your orders."

"Fair enough," he replied brusquely. Bah, men are so emotional.

"Sheppard and McKay you're riding back with me. Teyla and Ronon will each be on one of the other vertibirds." Kat turned back to Veric with a malicious grin hidden behind her helmet. "Lt. Veric, you get to go back on the bird carrying the over-sized tribal, and if he suffers any undue harm on the way to Phoenix Point, so will you."

Veric walked away with several troopers who were attempting to carry Ronon's body without actually touching it, something that was proving quite difficult. Kat heard the woman mumble "vault dweller trash" under her breath as she stomped away, just loud enough for Kat and those standing nearby to hear. Kat responded by turning up her helmet's speakers over several notches and belching loudly.

She turned around and walked out of the building, letting Sheppard and McKay follow behind her.