Ch13. Keres

"It's too quite, I don't like this.." looking through the scope of his new Gauss rifle, that cost way too much from the federal store, Alex contemplating where all the deathclaws were.

Slowly getting up from his cliff side perch, Alex slowly inched towards the opening of the quarry. He had waited till night fall after receiving the news of what was in here before deciding to scout alone.

Sunny and Cass were happy to stay back in Sloan, however, Ava and Sarah were two different stories, in that moment he would have rather the deathclaw matriarchs company.

Seriously, Alex didn't even know Sarah could yell that much, and where the hell did Ava learn such vulgarity?

Unfortunately for them, Alex is a stubborn man. Plus he had to agree to run if shit went sideways, first site of the matriarch being one such side ways Shit shows.

So, here he was. Scuttling from cliff to cliff, trying to spot the deathclaws in the quarry. Needing to know their numbers before he acts, else it's goodnight for him and his new companions.

"Huh?" Suddenly stopping, Alex noticed a shape moving in the quarry, yet this shape wasn't a deathclaw.

Settling down, Alex propped up his Gauss rifle and zoomed in on the shape, only to become even more confused. "A gunner? Out here in the west?" Alex mumbled to himself as he noticed a man in green combat armor with the gunner insignia on his breastplate.

The more he thought about it however, the more it made sense. The Gunners were an absolutely massive mercenary group, structured like the old military and battle lust crazed with weapons of mass destruction.

They could easily drown the Brotherhood with their numbers or even go toe to toe with the NCR.

So having the ability to reach the west coast is a given, but why are they here at Quarry Junction?

Alex wanted to find out, a morbid curiosity growing within him.

So slowly he put away his weaponry, opting for only his trench knife. Alex made his way steadily towards the Gunner who kept a sharp lookout. Unfortunately for said Gunner, Alex was quite adept at stealth.

Sneaking up behind the gunner was easy, Alex avoided the loose gravel and placed his steps on sand or dust, avoiding making the tell tale crunching of the loose gravel.

Step by step he inched closer to the unaware man.

"Urg." Suddenly the gunner was on his face in the sand with a heavy weight on his back between his shoulder blades, a sharp object buried millimeters into the flesh of his neck, right by his jugular.

"You'll die before you can shout, so keep quite and answer my questions, or else my knife may slip." Alex, managing to take down the gunner, kicked his laser rifle away, and bound the man's hands with handcuffs all while holding his knife to the man's throat.

However he heard a quite chuckle from the man, before the man's eyes rolled up into his head and a pink foam began to drop out of his mouth. The man began to shake and thrash as he choked to death on his own blood, as soon as it started it was over, the mans death throws quickly came to a stop and he died.

Alex looked on in shock, the gunners really were well trained it seemed, preferring suicide over capture and interrogation.

Quickly searching the body for info, Alex ended up storing it in his Evo, better then leaving the body around to be discovered.

Within just a few minutes after Alex was back up in the rocky cliffs headed deeper into the quarry, however he kept his eyes peeled for any more gunners.

Along the way he managed to sneakily kill 11 other gunners which put him on high alert. Seriously, the fuck were they doing out here? Why was their so many? More importantly, how didn't anyone from Sloan notice?

It took Alex 45 minutes to make it to the main area of the quarry, a massive hole nearly 30 meters deep and 900 meters across.

Large rusted excavators, also some newer looking ones, were dotted all around. Four massive rock crushing plants were set up around the perimeter with another fifth in the center.

But what caught Alex's attention was the massive and obviously dead deathclaw, with completely dark grey skin and three feet long claws.

Alex felt anger however at another site, about 20 gunners standing around with another much smaller and wounded matriarch chained up in incredibly shiny chains and sitting on a large trolly. The smaller matriarch was looking with obviously sorrowful eyes at the larger one as the gunners cut off its hands, hide and head with glee.

"Bastards!"

Aiming his Gauss rifle at the gunner with a chainsaw trying to cut off the dead matriarchs head, Alex took a breath and stopped himself. Looking closer, he realized that there were too many gunners.

On top of the 20 guards watching and laughing at the living matriarch, there were another 14 butchering the dead one. About ten others scattered around butchering the other dead deathclaws, nearly 100 dead gunners scattered about in the quarry, horribly mangled.

Obviously the gunners came here for a reason, willing to lose quite a few for what Alex could guess was one of the matriarchs.

Shame Alex decided to ruin that plan and instead looked at the saddened matriarch, taking aim at her head.

However Alex suddenly felt a tug at his heart when the matriarchs large green eye suddenly snapped open and focused right at him… however she quickly went still and let out a low chuff, gently closing her eyes in acceptance of her end.

"Fuck it!"

*BANG!*

Suddenly one of the silver metal padlocks holding the chains together shattered and fell into a pile of hot metal slag.

The loud shot caused many of the gunners to duck for cover and reach for weapons.

However another loud shot rang out and the second padlock exploded, loosening the chains holding their prize.

Quickly a third rang out, but ricocheted off the padlock, the gunners saw the trace of the shot and now new where it had come from.

The gunner commander wearing Marine Combat armor and holding a minigun began to shout orders. "Amlo and Tores! Use your body's as shields to stop this fucker from destroying that padlock! If he succeeds we all die! Roma, pick up that Fatman! Let's send this cocksucker to hell!"

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"Tch." Seeing two gunners run up too the third padlock and stand in front of it after his last shot failed to destroy it, Alex quickly pulled his anti-materiel rifle from his inventory and put it beside his Gauss rifle.

Switching to the anti-materiel rifle, Alex took aim at the chest of the first gunner in front of the padlock and fired, without waiting to see if his hit landed, Alex quickly picked up his Gauss rifle and fired another shot.

However he was suddenly sent sprawling back nearly five feet into the dust as the weapon kicked and recoiled violently.

Laying on the ground moaning in pain, Alex quickly felt his shoulder, wincing in pain. It had definitely been shattered by the rifle, which Alex now looked at indignantly.

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While Alex was laying on his back being a bitch about it, the gunners were about to have a real bad day.

The gunner commander watched as Amlos chest exploded open and Tores was violently pushed back into the trolly with a large hole in his sternum. Just as Amlos hit the ground dead and Tores was slumping down a second shot was heard as Tores head immediately exploded in blood, bone and brain matter.

However what terrified the commander and his men was the sound of metal shattering, and chains slipping.

"ROOOOAAARRR!" (Translated from deathclaw, it roughly means "I'm going to murder you fuckers!")

"Fuck" (translated from gunners, it roughly means "fuck")

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After hearing a massive and very angry roar, Alex quickly got up and jabbed(gently) a stimpak into his shoulder. Feeling it quickly work it's magic, Alex was shocked at how miraculous the chem was.

Quickly getting over the miracle chem, Alex wearily picked up the Gauss rifle and took a peek through the scope.

What he saw made him terrified yet excited, as he watched the 15 foot matriarch rip and tear through the gunners around her.

Many screamed out orders before being ripped apart as she leapt around the quarry killing and maiming everyone in site with righteous fury.

When ever any of the big guns where aimed at her, Alex would hesitantly take them down with a single shot, praying that his rifle don't show him it's pimp hand again.

After about 5 minutes the quarry went quite, all the gunners lay dead. Yet the matriarch simply sniffed around until she found Alex, then gave his area a nod before looking at her dead mother.

Giving a sorrowful chuff and whine, the matriarch turn tail and sprinted away, leaving Alex to contemplate if he made the right choice.

Not one to contemplate for long, Alex waited for a few minutes till the coast was clear and silently but swiftly made his way down into the blood soaked quarry.

No way he was going to leave all that sweet, sweet gunner gear. Especially that badass looking desert camo Marine combat armor that the leader of these ruffians was wearing.

Quickly making his rounds, Alex grabbed anything that wasn't nailed down, dumping the body's of the scouts and outlooks from his inventory, he stripped them of gear as well.

Walking over to the chains, Alex took a look at the shiny silver metal and nearly fell on his ass when he realized what they were made of, Saturnite…

Jackpot!

Quickly adding it too his inventory, Alex went to check it out along side all his new toys but suddenly froze at a notification on his Evo…

"Oh no"

"kruuu? Chuff! Sniff? KRUUUU!!!❤️"

Suddenly a massive shadow loomed over Alex as two powerful appendages suddenly pulled him closer, a large rough snout rubbed against him as a very sad and lonely matriarch deathclaw found herself a new 'mate'.

—hidden quest completed—

—within the claws of death—

- save the young deathclaw matriarch 'Keres' from being captured and used to breed a deathclaw army!-

-rewards-

- Keres has recognized you as her mate and will follow you till the day you or she dies! -

-100,000 exp-

-gunner loot-

-perk/ violent death!-

-Violent death!

This perk grants you 150 percent more exp for every over the top violent death you give an enemy! Only active if Keres is in your party!

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Looking up at the massive snout and glowing eyes of Keres, Alex felt a bad premonition in his chest….

"You're not a Yandere?…..right?"