Forum:No Bark's Story

Harry Noonan sat at his desk in his run down shack on the further outskirts of Novac. The Mojave sun had been especially unforgiving that day, but seemed to be cooling off as evening crept in. Harry wiped his brow his graying brow with the back of his hand. He was currently tampering with his radio, the station wasn’t coming in. Another five minutes passed. Nothing but the annoyance of static. Grumbling to himself, he got up and went to the door. Maybe the caravan is in town, he thought to himself. He stepped outside his ugly little shack of a home and into the warm glow of the desert sun. Novac was a good town, for a post apocalyptia. Nice people. Usually enough food to get by, what with the flourishing caravans. If I wasn’t so damn old I’d be out there with the caravans myself. He walked down the road to the tent that served as the bar and a mess hall. It was on the right side of what used to be the towns main street, and ran perfectly parallel to the Big Highway. Outside the tent, there was usually a Brahmin or two waiting patiently for there owners to be done with whatever they were doing and continue there way on the road. Once inside the tent he sat down at the makeshift table made of a few cubes of concrete with a board lain across them. “Can I getcha somethin, Harry?” the bartender asked nicely enough. “Yeah a beer would be good. I don’t suppose you have em cold, huh?” the bartender chuckled. She was a nice woman, but Harry wouldn’t want to cross her. “No. The heat might as well kill the Brahmin we have outside, not to mention cook the hell outta the beer,” she replied. Harry made a face but went on drinking it anyway once she’d handed it to him. I bet they have nice cold beer on the New Vegas strip, he thought glumly to himself as he sipped it from the bottle. Once he was done, it was darker out. He stepped outside the tent and looked down the street at the old junkyard that used to serve as a gas station before the nuclear war some 200 years ago. Harry walked slowly back to his house slowly, staring off into the distance. He sighed at the sight of New Vegas twinkling in the distance. Even from here, he could see the Luck 38 casino towering over all the other casinos. He wondered what life would be like to live there, the twinkling lights of The Strip and the slums of Freeside. He sighed again kept walking along the road down to his house. Once inside he sat down on his grimy, sheetless bed and started to unlace his worn boots. He was had just gotten the first one off when he heard a staticky voice coming through the radio, “…. Station Charlie to Kimball…. Kimball… Copy?” one voice said. It was cut off by static at times. “Kimball here…. Proceed… plan?” “Affirmative…. Units in position…. Vault…. Sealed… Platinum Chip….” “….. Courier…. Massive army…. Securitrons…..” Harry was listening to all this in shock. This was an NCR channel that he’d accidently stumbled upon when he’d been tampering with that damn radio. This was a transmission from Ranger Station Charlie to Aaron Kimball, the President of the NCR itself! He scrambled from his bed to his desk, clumsily knocking the Mic that was connected to the radio. The radio made the muffled sound of the Mic being hit. The two people stopped talking. The voices were much clearer now, “Sir, did you hear that?” one voice asked. “Yes I did. Are you sure this line is clear?” “Comm Officer Stepinac did a check….” “That’s not good enough! Get the hell off this line, soldier!” There was a little click and the line went dead. “Oh s---, oh s---, oh s---!” Harry said to himself under his breath. What are they gonna do? That was obviously secret, and if they know I heard whatever the hell they were saying…. What were they saying anyways? Somethin bout a vault and a platinum chip? Oh yeah then the thing bout the massive army bull s---…. Harry sat back in his chair and thought all these things over. He hoped nothing would happen. The next day was normal. Nothing out of the ordinary happened. At the end of the day Harry was in his shack snoring like a chainsaw, when he heard a three sharp raps on his metal front door. “What?” he grumbled groggily as he sat up and went to the door. He barely had time to see the three NCR rangers in full clad NCR ranger combat armor wielding assault rifles standing in his door way. Before he could cry out, pain exploded above right above his left eye. The world quickly fell into darkness as he passed out. He awoke being dragged across cool sand, his face staring up into the bright moon; his vision doubled and very blurry. “Where am I?” he slurred incoherently. He looked up at the hulking figures that dragged him along. No answer to his question. “Why are you guys doin this?” “Kimballs’ orders,” one replied in a gruff tone, sounding kind of muffled through his filter mask. He blacked out again. He awoke the second time to the sound of gunshots going off and a raspy hissing noise completely surrounded him. There were creepy sounding clicks that sounded like pincers. “Where the hell are we?” Harry cried out again. The gunshots sounded two feet away. There was also a sort of slithering sound like little legs scuttling across the sand…. Harry tried to lift his head. He was still being dragged. His head felt like crap. Harry blinked a couple of times to try and see what was going on. Everything was pretty dark, but against the bright moon, he could see the slight glimmer of scorpion’s stingers. Fear coursed through Harry’s veins within half a second. Oh s--- where the hell am I?!!?!? Harry thought to himself extremely panicked. He looked around him. He seemed to be in some sort of narrow pass way in a mountain with rock walls four feet on either side. One of the Rangers popped a cap into another one of those huge radiation-mutated scorpions. Harry absent mindedly remembered a time where he was talking to a caravaner who was telling him about Radscorpions, “There’s three kinds of em, but you only have to worry bout two. Theres the regular grey ‘uns, those things go down with a slug ‘tween them eyes. Easy cake. The giant ‘uns tho…. They be a sonofab. You best get the hell outta there. But those little bark scorpions, the most poisonous. You don’t see em till they got their little stingers in your leg. Than you gotta worry. You don’t get treated soon, you go crazy. Most die.” Harry remembered these words and a new wave of panick hit him. He tried to wriggle free, but that only resulted in being hit across the face by one of the Rangers. Harry could see that they were coming up on a drop off in the tail that he couldn’t see beyond. But there was a mass hissing that was getting closer. It sounded like fifty scorpions, all collected down in one spot. It got closer. Soon, Harry could see over the edge of the drop off. He almost blacked out again. Below was the most Radscorpions he’d ever seen in his life. All congregated in one huge, pit. Instantly he tried to wriggle and kick and scream. He was beat across the face again and again and again. “Why? What did I do? I didn’t do anything! I accidentally stumbled onto the radio channel! It was—“he was hit again. Before he could say another, he was thrown off the edge of the drop off, six feet down to the mass of Radscorpions. “The Scorpion Pit,” he faintly heard one of the Rangers say to himself. As if some sick que from God, a rock broke loose from where one of the Rangers was standing and he tumbled down into the Scorpion Pit along with Harry. Instantly, all the scorpions sensed them and all charged at the two of them. At the same time, all three of the Rangers drew the assault rifles that were strapped to their backs and opened fire on the advancing scorpions. A continuous volley of bullets rained down on the scorpions. Then one of the Rangers said, “Stop! We still need these ugly things to kill the captive.” “You can’t leave me!” cried the unfortunate Ranger who was still firing at the oncoming wave. “We’re sorry soldier. We’ll tell Kimball that you did an exceptional job,” he motioned to his companion, “lets get the hell outta here.” Meanwhile, Harry had been trying to scramble backwards away from the terrifying monsters who were snapping there oversized pincers. The Ranger kept firing but with no avail. After a couple of moments, his back was on the wall and his mag ran empty. He hurriedly reached for another clip on his vest. But to late. Midway through the action, a Giant Radscorpion clamped its pincers around his chest and thrust its venomous stinger straight through his facemask, cracking the glass like nothing. The guy made a strangled yell and fell limp. Now they advanced on Harry. The biggest one made a grab for him but he was quick and rolled to his right towards the fallen soldier. He just had enough time to yank a 12.7mm from his belt and spun around and put three shots between the biggest ones eye. Now it was just a matter of running and gunning against the little ones. Subconsciously, Harry was glad for the extended magazine on this very fancy pistol. He scrambled away from the mass of arachnids and onto higher ground, taking down all the middle sized grey ones on the way. His dad had taught him to shoot and he was good in the first place, but with all this adrenaline he was an extremely efficient killer. He kept popping rounds off into the crowd until his back hit the wall of the pit. He swore under his breath. Then the gun made a dry click. The clip was empty. He swore again. His hand automatically dove to his belt but there was no extra clip. He hadn’t had time to grab one. He turned and tried to run along the wall but stumbled and fell on a rock that jutted from the ground. The scorpions were on him in a second. One scuttled right to his face and stung him right in the temple. He swatted at it and screamed at the top of his lungs. Another stung him right above his where he had the bruise the Rangers had given to him. Another in the back of the neck. He screeched again and scrambled to his feet, kicking and flailing at the assaulting creatures that must have purely come from hell itself. He remembered running back to the trail and the drop off and stumbling through the darkness. He half ran half stumbled back along the trail and once out of the little pass, collapsed as soon as he felt it was safe. He felt extremely nauseous and puked over the cool sand. Remembering to turn on his side before passing out, he lay mumbling to himself, “No more Bark Scorpions… no more Bark Scorpions… no Bark Scorpions…. No Bark….” He mumbled to himself and passed out for the third time that night.

He awoke with the harsh glare of the sun in his eyes. His lips were caked with dust and his throat felt like sand paper. A wave of nausea hit him and a headache pounded his skull. He rolled over and puked onto the hot, dusty sand. “Where am I?” he mumbled to himself, “Who am I?” He sat up. He was dizzy and his head spun and swerved, making the nausea more intense. “No Bark…. No Bark….” He mumbled to himself again. He had no idea what he was saying in his state of delusion. “They did this to me…. Those monsters…. They did this to me…. No Bark….”

He didn’t remember stumbling those miles trying to find his way back to Novac. But when he did, he wouldn’t have lasted another hour. They instantly took him to a makeshift hospital in a nearby town and when he regained consciousness, they asked him what his name was. “Why, my names’ No Bark.” He replied frankly.