Rook always looked up to Baron, he was the second most senior Venator and had looked out for him after his Venator trials when he was first put into service. Rook remembered being an overconfident kid who was terrified deep down inside. He couldn’t tell anyone that though and it had taken over a year of being under Baron’s command before he trusted him enough to admit it. He was surprised when Baron told him that he got scared sometimes too. Rook didn’t know what he’d do without Baron’s guidance, especially now when everything was changing so fast.
The drab wall outside Baron’s room looked like it used to be a floral pattern but long years of aging had effectively removed all color from the paint and left only a thin outline of what once was. Rook tapped his helmet against the wall he was leaning against and waited. It had been hours since Baron fell unconscious and the Militia decided to let them inside. They were being kept in a hotel inside the survivor city they referred to as ‘The Peak’. The hotel was a makeshift hospital that was better than most scav hideouts but still a pre-war dump compared to the Bastions elegant facilities. The Peak itself wasn’t as impressive as boot had assumed it would be given how long it resisted the Bastion ruthless search. It was a small prewar town built on the mountain top with a wall of cars and debris between the outlying buildings to give it a very unstable wall. Primitive, but it had kept them alive thus far.
As Rook impatiently tapped his head against the wall and waited. He saw Rachel coming back out of the corner of his eye. She had left earlier after they got to the hotel and this was the first he’d seen her since.
“Hey, how come no ones eaten any of the food they brought earlier?” Rachel asked Rook .
“We just...we aren’t hungry.” Rook replied awkwardly.
“Right, sure. You guys would rather drink recycled suit piss water than water from our aquifer, sure I get it.”
“No, it’s not*”
Rachel interrupted him before he could finish.
“Relax, I get it, we’re strangers. I know about some of the stuff the Bastion puts Venators through, I get the wary attitude and stuff. I mean, some people around here probably do want to poison you guys, but we don’t let them around the food obviously.” Rachel joked and smiled at Boot.
Something about the way her face lit up when she smiled, Rook didn’t want to look away. He silently thanked whoever designed his helmet that the thin visor wasn’t translucent so she couldn’t see him staring at her. He was always too afraid at the Bastion to look at girls there and didn’t have a helmet on to hide where his eyes strayed while at the Bastion.
“How’s he doing?” Rachel asked and nodded her head towards the door that lead into Baron’s room.
“He’s still unconscious but Mouse says he’ll be fine. Body is having to adapt after a cybernetic malfunctioned.”
Rachel nodded again and looked down at the ground, her orders were to escort them to the Militia HQ as soon as the Venator leader was well, however long that would be.
“So how...how are you doing?” Rook asked after a moment of silence that was antagonizing him as he stood alone in the hallway with Rachel.
“I’m... fine.” Rachel asked in a halfway puzzled voice.
“That’s good, I was afraid they’d be mad at you for driving us here.”
“Why would you care, you’ve known me for a day and the start of that day you were shooting at me?” Rachel asked in a tone that was more aggressive than she meant. He was trying to be nice and she didn’t mean to sound upset.
Rook didn’t answer but instead looked down at the ground shamefully.
Rachel rolled her eyes and mentally kicked herself.
“Hey, I didn’t mean it like that. I get you guys were just following orders. We’ve all heard about the stuff they do to you guys from the Bastion residents that escaped during the purge. They told us about Pale Horse.”
Rook smiled behind his helmet. He had always been proud to be a part of Pale Horse.
“Wait, what ‘purge’ does everyone keep talking about?” Rook asked, having never been told about the shaky history of the Bastions past since Venators were kept in the dark with little way of obtaining information.
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Sleeping on his side was never pleasant for Baron, his ear against the pillow let him hear the constant beating of his pulse through his head. An odd complaint for sure, having your own pulse annoy you to the point it wakes you up is almost insulting to evolution and how the human body developed.
Baron rolled over on his back and felt his stubble on his bare scalp scraping against the pillow he was lying on...My suit!?
He quickly realized he was lying in a bed with only his insulating jumpsuit on, the thin suit Venators wore underneath their armor.
Baron pushed himself up and swung his legs out of the bed. The cool concrete floor shocked his bare feet and his head started to throb with pain.
Baron rubbed the back of his neck and examined his surroundings; his face was a mixture of discomfort and confusion. He was in a pre-war building for sure, they all looked the same with flaking paint, stained floors, and artifacts from a time long past. This was a hotel; he had been in them before on scouting missions. The rooms had a distinct similarity with almost identical layouts, except this room looked like a make-shift hospital. Neatly folded towels, bandages, and IV bags were stacked on tables around the room, plastic boxes were organized in rows with different labels like “Sterile scalpels” and “Forceps”. It was surprisingly clean for a pre-war structure. Baron leaned forward and stood up slowly, testing his strength.
“It’s about time!” Mouse was sitting in a chair near the door to the room, he briefly startled Baron who hadn’t fully recovered from his confusion.
“What’s going on?” Baron demanded, despite being in a weakened state physically he had no time to waste.
“You passed out on us, we needed a clean room to get your suit off and check you out, Militia offered us their hospital. We were in a pretty vulnerable state, but they haven’t started shooting us yet.” Mouse walked over to Baron and flipped open his wrist-mounted computer before pulling out a scanner attached to a wire and running it over Baron’s skull.
The door to Baron’s room opened and he realized just how loud it was around them. He could hear what sounded like hundreds of people talking outside even after the door shut behind Boot and Rachel who walked over to the bed where Baron and Mouse were.
Mouse nodded towards the pair and kept scanning Barons’ bald head.
“How you doing, sir?” Rook asked.
“Where the hell is your weapon?” Baron asked aggressively, just now noticing that Mouse and Rook were unarmed.
Rook shifted his weight to one side and shrugged. “Well, funny thing is...”
Before Rook could finish Rachel interrupted him. “McBride wouldn’t let your men inside armed, don’t take it personally, no one carries guns inside except Militia.”
Baron’s temper flared for a moment but then he thought about it and saw the Militia’s perspective. Hard to trust men that had just slaughtered your expedition. He was honestly surprised they were alive, it must have meant the Militia was desperate.
“How long was I out?” Baron asked after he determined there was no point in arguing about his teams’ weapons since they had already been taken.
“Around 6 hours, just enough time for me to get some sleep, get yelled at, and be sent back here. I’m supposed to babysit you guys, Freeman wants to see you whenever you’re ready, he’s our leader.” Rachel said while she walked over to a chair and sat down.
“She’s kind of a bitch.” Mouse mumbled while typing on his wrist computer.
“Hey, I got them to bring you guys food and water, give me a little credit for trying.”
“Poisoned food.” Mouse mumbled again.
“I’m done trying with you.” Rachel rolled her eyes and leaned back in the chair while crossing her legs.
Baron noticed Rook’s helmet tilted to the side and he stood at just the right angle to look at Rachel. Seeing through the armor was a skill Baron had developed over a long life of living in it and he could tell when Rook was...curious.
Mouse interrupted Baron’s train of thought, “Same as when I scanned you before, one of the PC Grendel chips is overcooked, looks like you strained something, hard.”
“What’s that mean?” Rachel asked.
Mouse, Rook, and Baron all looked at her, puzzled before Mouse spoke up.
“How the hell should we know?”
Rachel scrunched up her face and opened her mouth, “ehhh, well.”
“Don’t you guys know what’s inside your own brain?”
“Well the PC is for Prefrontal Cortex which deals with memory and Grendel chips have been in use ever since I was a Venator so probably something to do with memory control, but they don’t tell us what anything in us “does”.” Mouse closed his wrist computer and went over to a wall locker where he started pulling out Baron’s suit and armor components.
“You guys are a little screwed up, I know you don’t realize that, but yeah...” Rachel raised her eyebrows in a stunned expression while staring at the ground and thinking about the prospect of having cybernetics but not knowing what they did. When she looked up, she caught the younger Venator eyeing her while the other two were busy getting gear out of the locker. He was the one they called ‘Rook ’ and he quickly looked away when she looked back at him. He was being nice to her outside the room in the hallway but maybe that was an act and he really didn’t trust her, she wondered.
Baron fastened his boots on first, the only way to get suited up was to start low and work your way up. If you tried putting your boots on last, you’d feel like your waist was being cut in two by the waist armors heavy belt full of equipment cutting into you. Getting suited up was easier with Mouse helping him since the suit wasn’t designed to be taken off often. The chest plate had to be locked into the back plate so without a second person you’d have to lean against a wall to hold the back plate in place until the chest was secured.
“Any chance I’ll pass out again?” Baron asked Mouse as he stuffed the medical foam insulation back into place on his armored thigh guards.
“If you avoid using your Prefrontal Cortex, probably not. It’s the only defect in any of your cybernetics so I’m willing to bet the more you strain it the harder it’s gonna strain you back.”
Baron thought about it for a moment and it made sense. What better fail-safe for a Venator than literally breaking their mind when they think about the past too much. He pushed the thought aside and focused on the future, they had a lot ahead of them.
Baron finished getting suited up and checked his equipment to ensure it was fully integrated with his body. The cybernetics may have had some drawbacks but part of them helped the Venators essentially ‘feel’ what the suit felt. It made moving in the armor less awkward since instead of it being an added burden it felt like a part of their body, almost a second skin.
Once ready they exited the room and met with the rest of Pale Horse that had been waiting outside in a lobby area, at least it was a lobby area at some point in the past. Baron noticed the guards around the room. They all carried Gauss cannons, likely not a standard weapon for Militia soldiers and meant for the Venators if needed.
Rachel didn’t want this duty, but she had little choice. McBride told her that since she and Baron had the same locket from her mother, hopefully, he’d get along better with her. So, she was stuck trying to keep the Venators in line and the Militia from picking a fight with them. It was no secret that the Venators had killed hundreds if not more of the Militia and several soldiers wanted revenge, but they knew better than to pick a standing fight. Rachel expected a sniper or a random grenade to roll up next to them at any moment.
In response to this threat, she had acquired a box of over-sized robes to hide the Venators in. Not the best plan she’d admit but if they walked fast and didn’t stop, they could make it to the Militia HQ without incident. Getting into the hotel had been easy since it was early morning and no one had been out, but now the streets were filled with Peak residents going about their business. Mostly traders on this side of town, peddling food and scavenged trinkets from their travels. Having six over-sized armored trolls lumbering through the streets would likely cause a stir that even the Militia would have trouble quelling.
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Rachel hefted the box up and turned around towards the Venators who were interrogating Baron about why he fainted earlier. Except for one, she caught the younger one staring at her again. Was something wrong with what she was wearing? She put the box down on a table nearby and looked over her body to make sure she wasn’t walking around with a hole in her shirt or something. Brown denim pants she had looted from a department store in her last scavenging trip to Idaho Falls and a thick leather coat with fur trim around the neck.
The coat was something she was proud of, she had bought it for a month’s salary from a passing trader. She didn’t normally speak to traders since all they sold was garbage, but this coat had caught her eye and she loved it. Thankfully she had left it behind when they went on the expedition, so it was saved from too much trauma, unlike a lot of her friends that didn’t come back. Regardless, she didn’t see anything out of the ordinary that would explain him staring, unless...Rachel bit her lip and thought for a moment while still waiting on the Venators to finish catching up.
No, they don’t think like that. Everyone says there basically machines with a little bit of human flesh.
Even-so, Baron looked human with his armor off, he was the only one she’d seen without the suit. He was much older than she anticipated, likely around the same age as McBride in appearance but it was hard to say since everything about the Venators had a shroud of mystery. You could talk to a dozen different Militia soldiers and get two dozen theories about Venators and what they were. That didn’t help explain why the younger one was watching her, either he was suspicious of her or....something else.
She didn’t realize the Team had finished talking and were waiting on her. The room fell silent briefly before she looked up and saw them all waiting on her.
“Right, umm, yeah.” She stumbled over her words.
“I don’t plan on getting shot by someone trying to kill you guys, so you need to put these on.” She pulled out the over-sized brown robes and started handing them out to a less than excited crowd.
“Why’s it smell like that?” Rose asked while holding his robe out in front of him in a suspicious manner.
“Probably had a dead guy in it.” Rachel answered back while handing Baron his robe.
She turned to hand Rook his robe and held onto it for a moment longer than needed. He looked away from her when she tried to look into his helmet’s visor, she knew it...He was attracted to her. She had been around enough Militia soldiers to know when someone liked her but was too shy to say anything.
“This isn’t going to fit.” Mouse mumbled while struggling to get the robe over his shoulders.
Rachel went around the room helping them get dressed as best she could, essentially, she was helping over-sized human tanks get dressed. Not how she expected to be spending her day. Normally she was going over data from computers they’d scavenged from military bases or trying to hack into Bastion files this, however, was not in her job description.
Besides the one called Rose ripping his robe in three different places, they were ready. She walked to the Hotel doors leading out into the street with her escort of Militia guards. She turned around one last time to make sure they looked disguised. She sighed disappointingly, they looked like Venators wearing over-sized robes...
“Maybe if you guys would hunch over a little to hide your height?” Rachel asked with one hand on the door, dreading the moment they walked outside.
The room was silent and only the one called Rook hunched over a little, the rest didn’t even move.
“This isn’t going to work...” Mouse yelled from behind Rose as they crowded around the door.
Rachel sighed and mentally agreed with whoever said that before pushing open the doors and walking outside.
Weak rays of sunlight made their way through the dense cloud cover that constantly blanketed the sky. Snow covered the streets which hid most of the garbage that the denizens of the Peak were quick to toss about. Keeping the public area’s clear of trash was a difficult task that no one had time to waste on. A pair of mercenaries walked past Rachel in a hurry, they like everyone else had to give up their weapons when they entered the Peak. The bandoleers and metal plates strapped to there chest made it obvious they were guns for hire outside the city walls.
The hotel they had been in was situated around a shopping center that housed most of the passing traders while permanent stores were further inside the city near the Militia HQ. They tried to take better care of permanent residents since the passing traders and mercenaries were starting to become an endangered species and they wanted them to make the Peak a permanent home. Having a warm apartment in the center of the city was a treat to anyone who would stay.
Before the Gray you only had to worry about hostile raiders or the Bastion occasionally. Now the Gray were a constant threat to everyone, and the Gray grew every passing week. The remaining traders were either the tough ones or the smart ones and once they left the city they’d be bristling with weapons.
The Peak was considerably colder than the lower altitudes which were normally freezing, to begin with. This was reflected in everyone’s choice of attire as each person walking down the city streets was a bundle of clothing trying to stay warm. Few people wore gas masks anymore as more and more children were being born naturally resistant to the radiation that lingered in the air. Walking down the streets in the Peak used to be filled with different gas masks and various artwork painted on them as people wanted to differentiate between each other but now you could see people’s natural faces. A small victory for humanity, one that was being talked about around the Peak and helped moral as it gave people hope for the future that offset the normal flow of bad news.
Her Militia escort waited at the doors for the Venators to all get outside before flanking them with two guards at the front and two at the rear of their small column formation. Rachel held her breath as the street continued to go about its normal activities, no one paying them any attention so far. They slowly started walking through the crowds that weren’t as busy as she had initially feared but when she turned around. She could see the Venators towering over everyone else around them.
Keep walking, keep walking.
Rachel told herself, she had instructed the guards to keep moving and if things got violent, they would start running if they had too. As they neared the heart of the city the crowds got thicker and the streets became small alleys that the first generation of survivors at the Peak had constructed themselves. The wide streets meant for vehicles stopped about 3 blocks from the Militia HQ. As the population of the Peak grew, they built more makeshift structures in the streets to make use of every inch of available space. The area of the peak was limited by the surrounding mountain ranges and area covered by the city defenses. Which no one wanted to live too far away from in this turbulent time.
Things were going good so far, they were more than half-way to the HQ. Except for the closer they got the more crowded the streets became and she could see Militia guards curiously eyeing them. They probably wouldn’t stop them since they could see they were being escorted by other Militia. Doesn’t mean they’d help if someone tried to ambush them though, it seemed lately that Rachel’s superiors were determined to get her killed.
Rose was walking at the tail of the column as they snaked through the crowded streets, he kept his mouth shut and head down, like always. He did manage to adjust the hood on his robe enough to where he could look around a bit. This was the only time in his life he’d seen relatively normal people going about their day. At the Bastion they rarely interacted with the residents and when they did it was only in passing through the halls. This place though was nothing like the Bastion. He could smell different spices and smoke from merchants trying to sell exotic meats and strange looking plants. Everywhere he looked he saw something foreign, then he felt something pull against his robe behind him. His robe had been barely resting on his shoulders as the seams tore getting it on. This made it all too easy for the unwary child playing behind him to pull the robe off when she ran into him on accident. Rose spun around to see the child laying in the dirt with the robe in front of her and her eyes fixated, on him.
“Ma’am!” One of Rachel’s guards yelled towards her and she whipped around. The market stalls went from a constant roaring of voices to a low murmur of whispers.
“Shit, come on, keep going.” Rachel ordered as she pushed Baron forward and made her way to Rose.
“Hey?” Rose awkwardly said towards the little girl still looking up at him in awe.
Rachel made her way to Rose and looked down at the girl still staring up at him. A moment passed where Rachel was praying the girl wouldn’t scream or cry.
“Awesome!” The little girl yelled as she jumped up and started grabbing at Rose’s belt, toying and fingering the different items lining it.
“Uhh, please, don’t touch that Ma’m?” Rose stammered while gently pushing the little girls’ hands away from his belt. His hands were the size of the girl’s torso and the way he gently pushed her away made Rachel smile involuntary.
“We have to keep going.” Rachel said while pushing Rose forward. She took a few coins out of her pocket and gave them to the little girl before pushing her away. She looked up and saw the crowds still staring, the word would spread like wildfire now and everyone would know they were here. It was inevitable though and Rachel shrugged, whatever would happen would probably happen now.
“Are you here to help us?” A woman asked through the silence in the street. Rachel’s column kept moving forward through the confused crowds.
“There the ones that hunt the Gray.” Another voice mumbled over the growing whispers.
“Is it true Venators helped people escape the Bastion once?” A man asked, which Rachel thought was very arrogant to ask given the circumstances.
“Yeah, they’re the ones that helped my dad get away back during the Purge!” Another voice yelled; the street was even louder than before now. People were starting to crowd in front of Baron at the front.
“Excuse me...” Baron growled as he fumbled through the crowds to get by, unsure how aggressive he needed to be but not wanting to make things worse.
“My mom said it was Venators that helped her get here!”
“Are you going to kill the Gray for us?”
“Is the Bastion coming to kill us?
“Why are you here?!”
“Captain Wright, what’s going on?”
Baron winced at the name.
Wright
He was reminded of Rachel’s last name again, she was Evelyn’s child. Probably fell in love with someone here at the Peak and had a baby with him. It was foolish of them to think they’d ever have a future together.
“There gonna save us!” Someone yelled in front of Baron and it startled him out of his thoughts.
“Thank God!” Rachel yelled as they got to the front door of the HQ.
“Captain, you ever come to work without a crowd?” The corporal that was always on guard duty in front of the HQ yelled over the crowd to Rachel who smiled back at him.
Once inside with the doors shut the crowds didn’t take long to go about their normal business with no more excitement to occupy them, but likely rumors were already floating around. Boot was more concerned about the guard out front that made Rachel smile and kept his eyes on him while everyone took the robes off.
Rachel lead the Team through the HQ and into President Freeman’s office. He was the democratically elected leader of The Peak and had been for well over a year, they were due for another election but given the circumstances going on with the Gray attacks, no one cared about that, yet.
“Captain Wright, I trust you got here without issue?” An older man with a shaved head and white mustache stood up from behind a large wooden desk and walked around to Rachel.
“Minor disturbance, people were actually happy to see them.” Rachel replied while shaking the man’s hand.
“Good news then, we could use more of that. You must be Captain Baron?” Freeman stood in front of Baron and looked him up and down.
“Bigger than I expected, are you feeling better, I’m told you had some problems outside the city?”
Baron wasn’t sure how to respond, this was technically the Bastions last true enemy and any other day Baron would have gutted him. Today was a different day though.
“Better, sir, I’m indebted to you letting us inside your city. I know that couldn’t have been an easy decision.”
Freeman walked over to his desk and leaned against it while facing Baron. “It’s true, a lot of people around here aren’t going to be happy I let you inside, but you’re the same man that helped me escape the Bastion during the Purge so I already owe you my life.”
Baron and his team looked at each other confused, no one remembered the purge except for Barons fragmented memories and what Rachel had briefly told Boot earlier.
Freeman smiled as he could tell they were confused. “I know all about the Venator Program and the memory wipes, Rachel’s mother was a good friend of mine and helped us get here all those years ago. I’ll fill you all in on the memories that they’ve stolen from you. You know she never stopped holding out hope you’d come back, Adam.”
Baron could feel his head start to ache the same way it did earlier when he fainted.
“Sir, please, I’d rather not.” Baron spoke softly which made everyone in Pale Horse uncomfortable, they were accustomed to his strong tone and unwavering leadership.
“I understand, you’ve been through a lot and we’ll have time to catch up later if you want that is.” Freeman rubbed his palms together before turning around and grabbing a remote off his desk.
“At the moment we have more pressing concerns anyway since the past isn’t going anywhere.” Freeman pressed a button on the remote and a projector on the ceiling of his office spilled light over a blank canvas nailed to the opposite side of the room.
“This is a map my scouts make every day of Bastion drone sightings, red circles indicate a drone, this one is from a week ago...” He pushed another button and the map filled with red.
“This one is the report from this morning...” Freeman sat the remote down and turned back to face Baron.
“I don’t need to explain to you what this means, they’re hunting you now. Like us, you’re the enemy to them, no matter what you were to them yesterday.”
“Only because Baron killed our Commander.” Grinch shocked the room with his unexpected interruption. Rose standing behind him punched him in the side. Not hard but enough to get his point across to keep his mouth shut.
Baron glanced back around to his team before looking back at Freeman who was obviously concerned. The prospect of not every Venator being allied wasn’t comforting.
“We’ve spent countless lives and years fighting for the Bastion, I can’t say what I’ve done in previous lives where my memory wasn’t uploaded to my new body but today I understand what the Bastion is. You’re right, they’re going to hunt us no matter what we do. Maybe if we can make them hurt though, the way they’ve been hurting us, they’ll leave us both alone, Venators and your people.” Baron turned around to face his men. He needed to let them decide for themselves, he wanted nothing more than to keep them safe but that was never an option. No one was safe in this world.
“Pale Horse, you already know where my loyalty is, it’s with each of you. I don’t know I’m making the best decision here, but I know it’s the ‘right’ decision. We were meant for more than slaughtering innocent people trying to survive out here and I’m done following orders from leaders I never see while they play with our minds.”
Baron took a deep breath before continuing. “I can’t do this alone, so I need each of you to tell me you’re with me...or not.”
The room was silent as Rachel and Freeman moved over to one side of the Presidents desk to let the Venators have their space.
Rose was the first to speak, he walked up and stood in front of Baron.
“You’ve always been there for me, Cap’n, I’ll do the same for you. Never liked the Bastion anyway.” Rose grabbed Barons’ hand and pulled him into a half hug where the two men’s armored bodies clanked loud enough to sting Rachel’s ears.
“We walked past a lot of desperate people outside, can’t see myself running away from them when they don’t have anyone else.” Mouse spoke as he walked up to stand beside Rose and Baron near the desk at the front of the room.
Rook looked at Rachel affectionately and knew his place was here. Even if he wanted to leave, he didn’t know where he’d go, so he walked to the front of the room.
“You’re all I’ve got, sir, I’m with you.” Rook nodded at Baron who returned the gesture.
Moses looked over at Grinch who was standing beside him and shrugged. “Shit, kill’ens the same either way, might as well go after those bastards that have been screwing with me all these years.” And with that, he walked over to the rest of the Team and stood beside them. They all faced Grinch who was the only one left standing at the opposite end of the room.
Grinch had a burning hate inside him, he knew this was the wrong decision. This would be the end of Pale Horse. The family that he truly loved, this was how they’d die.
“If we’re all going to die, we might as well do it together.” Grinch mumbled as he walked over to stand beside Rose who jokingly slapped his shoulder pauldron.
Baron turned to Freeman and smiled behind his visor, “looks like we’re with you.”