FALLOUT MARS

[Maharg67]

0120

FALLOUT MARS: THE MARSLANDS

MEGATON TROUBLES: CLEVER ODDIE AND BRAUN'S LABYRINTH OF HORROR AND DEATH (CONTINUED)

 

Clever Oddie leaped forward over a hivaca guard, bigger and more powerful than a hivaca soldier but smaller and less powerful than a hivaca warrior. A biometallic spinedart shot from a hivaca soldier, they could shoot small spinedarts from spinedarters on their heads that needed to regenerate new spinedarts but could store up to three of them. Clever Oddie's super power armour deflected them easily even as Clever Oddie smashed another hivaca soldier to one side. The hivaca guards had begun popping up as he got closer to the Queen's Chambers, especially the Egg Chambers and that of the larvae inside the bodies of victims that they were slowly consuming from inside out as they grew.

 

Yet the closer to the central part of the hub that he got, the more Clever Oddie came to consider that it was not the fake Professor Braun mentality that was trying to hide something from him, that had brought the hivaca to that place. Why? Because he found evidence of a great massacre of Braun's fabricant monsters, this time being of many kinds from shambling zombies to small razor spined dragons, fake killer robots, great crushing venomous serpents and many others. There was evidence that the massacre had been a two way spree of death and destruction. Many hivaca had perished in the mighty battle.

 

The 'sense' of some dark, manipulative power was getting stronger even as he darted across the chamber and found the platoon of what he somehow knew were called Solar Marines. These soldiers had the odd body-armour, the same range of weapons and flexible armoured combat fatigues as he had found before. They were falling back slowly in excellent order, were blasting away with projectiles and pulsebeams. He had heard fighting before but when he had gotten to the site of the firefight, the Solar Marines involved had gone.

 

Clever Oddie attacked the hivaca who were attacking the space soldiers. He struck the creatures with savage brutality, blasting them down, cutting them and smashing their skulls, along with their alien head-brains. Each hivaca had two brains but destroying the head-brains did kill them though their uncontrolled dying motions were often very dangerous to be too close too, even for other hivaca. He got out of the way of a head killed warrior but a smaller hivaca soldier failed to do so and was sliced in half, splashing acid-blood in many directions.

 

Then he was amongst the Solar Marines, was part of their fighting formation and they were soon fighting alongside him as if he was one of them. They kept retreating as his weapons destroyed many hivaca with enough firepower to equal all of that of his new comrades combined.

 

 

0121

FALLOUT MARS: THE MARSLANDS

MEGATON TROUBLES: CLEVER ODDIE AND BRAUN'S LABYRINTH OF HORROR AND DEATH (CONTINUED)

 

Sergeant Al Apone examined the expanded multiple-cube and the stuff stored in it for its doors were open. "That is one neat trick. I would take it as an illusion except the way those guns of yours blew apart from acid-bugs, well I am willing to believe. I do not know how we ended up here except that we were stranded on an area of one of our Terraformed worlds swarming with the hivaca. They came from some big 'U' shaped alien ship, crashed into the land, and organic looking but not dead, I think."

 

"Sounds like one of the great U-ships of the giant Galacticoya, one of the factions of the galactioya people. They use big bulking humanoid bodies called U-borgayo with one to three Galacticoya galactioyans inside each one." Clever Oddie wondered where the information was coming from but he did not let on to the Solar Marines any of his puzzlement. "I suppose you found a U-borgayo navigator-pilot in its organic chair or at least the skeletal remains of one devoured by the hivaca from inside out. Galactioyans are fairly small, weak humanoids but they made have tried to escape and even fight in power armour and with energy weapons. Still, what could they do against swarms of hivaca? Question is, how did the hivaca get there in the first place. Galacticoya Faction are adventurer-traders but though reckless in some ways, far too clever and cunning to bring hivaca on board."

 

Corporal Hicks spoke quietly and thoughtfully. "Solar Marine Scouts found big smashed open metallic organic pods in what could have been a cargo hold of some kind. That is before they were forced to flee from a swarm of hivaca nasties. Those pods looked smashed only from inside out."

 

Private Hudson grinned. "Not so clever or cunning then. Probably brought hivaca on board thinking the pods were some kind of rich salvage."

 

Corporal Hicks shrugged. "Those pods did not look like hivaca stuff so maybe a third party made sure hivaca got on board. But that ain't got anything to do with us being in this strange place. We want to go home for sure. Back to New Earth #3, also known as Homa, Terraformed to a nice quality if not a tropical paradise like New Earth #3 or as wealthy or as sophisticated as New Earth #1. New Earth #3 is Glave in the same solar system as Homa but New Earth #1 is Mars in the home solar system, Solsystem. It was on Mars, in an isolated area surrounded by huge mountain peaks, that we went to the rescue on a human outpost colony and where the long rotted U-ship was found, crashed."

 

Clever Oddie responded. "You are inside an ultimate virtual reality realm linked to another version of the planet called Mars that is also in the solar system called Solsystem."

 

Hudson snorted and looked around. "Seems real enough to me. Even our MRE rations taste just as awful in just the right way."

 

The sergeant groaned. "Enough Hudson, enough."

Edited August 3, 2011 by Maharg67

[Maharg67]

http://i592.photobucket.com/albums/tt9/Dragonpen61/Forum%20Additives/ForumAddit0024.jpg

 

HAVE CHANGED 'ETERNAL CHAMPION' TO 'ETERNAL GUARDIAN' TO STOP CLASHING WITH ANOTHER STORY

Edited August 3, 2011 by Maharg67

[Maharg67]

0122

FALLOUT MARS: THE MARSLANDS

MEGATON TROUBLES: CLEVER ODDIE AND BRAUN'S LABYRINTH OF HORROR AND DEATH (CONTINUED)

 

Private Jenette Vasquez, a smart-machinegun operator, picked up a long chain of 20mm bullets from the open multiple-cube and slipped it into her backpack with other stuff she had taken including hand-grenades, MREs, a medikit, anti-acid-blood substance in a spray-pack, some C4-5 plastic explosives, some datachips with information on the hivaca and instant-coffee syrup in a squeeze-tube. Solar Marines loved their rich, bitter black coffee with double strong caffeination.

 

She spoke even as she stood up with a look of satisfaction on her face. Her powerful smart-machinegun was back to full working with some adjustments and a nice load of ammo. "Bishop the android executive officer, Ripley the starship pilot-navigator, the child Newt, Lieutenant Gorman the newbie officer, Carter Burke the sleazy corporate field executive, they are out there along with the four Solar Marine Scouts, the Rapid Brothers, one of which is female, along with two combat androids named Scrapper Lee and Shredder Lee, they looking like bold headed twins, and four robots. Oh, yeh, Private Mark Drake, another smart-machinegun operator but he was wounded badly. One of the combat service-support robots is probably carrying him. Also dropship pilot Corporal Collette Ferro and dropship crew chief Private Daniel Spunkmeyer."

 

Sergeant Al Apone, a gen-engineered human as were all the Solar Marine humans, frowned hard at Private Vasquez. "Respect your officers, Vasquez, even if they are stupid, slippery handed fools." He turned to Clever Oddie. "We got all we can use from that multiple-cube of yours. I suggest you store it and keep the rest for us since only you can operate it. We need to find the others and get out of this ultimate virtual reality. Unless you ain't telling us something important."

 

Clever Oddie was looking lost in his thoughts. He looked up and around from the fanjet hover capacity combat service-support robot with its gun-turret and other abilities. It was armoured including with layers of anti-acid-blood materials. He had just finished fixing it, having come with the Solar Marines to where they had left a two damaged CSS-robots and a damaged medic android. The two robots and the android were now up and about.

 

Apart from the sergeant, Hicks, Hudson and Vasquez, there was Corporal Cynthia Dietrich the platoon corpsman, Private Tim Crowe, Private Ricco Frost and Private Ruparti, the last being a yellow humanoid alien of a kind known as a monkariman. The medic android bore the name of Private Caretom. The monkarimans came from the Martian Underworld of that other Mars that was part of that other Solsystem. Except that monkarimans also dwelt in the Martian Underworld of the Ancient Martians on that Mars of the Mars Doomsday which was a factor that Clever Oddie was not sure about the significance of.

 

Clever Oddie frowned. "Matters might be more complicated than you might assume. It seems that your original solar system, your worlds, are part of another ultimate virtual reality realm."

 

The Solar Marines did not look convinced except for the android who took the idea quite stoically and the monkariman who nodded her head as if finding the idea quite acceptable. If that other Solsystem was part of the UVR Realms, then just how big was the UVR Expanse? Was he and the Mars, the Solsystem he knew, also part of the UVR Expanse? It was not an easy idea to accept but it might explain at least some puzzles that confronted the Eternal Guardian in all of its aspects.

 

 

0123

FALLOUT MARS: THE MARSLANDS

MEGATON TROUBLES: CLEVER ODDIE AND BRAUN'S LABYRINTH OF HORROR AND DEATH (CONTINUED)

 

Clever Oddie was surprised, but not totally so, when he 'sensed' that his target of something important he had to find in the hivaca hive, was linked with what these Solar Marines wanted to find. That is an alien gateway found in ancient alien ruins found beneath the colonial main structure of the colony they had gone to rescue. They had found only Newt as a survivor, the other colonists having seemingly been devoured by the hivaca either directly or from inside out by larvae.

 

Apart from the various adult castes, from workers to warriors, drones to thinkers, there were subadults scuttling around. These smaller monsters were dangerous in swarms, the hive leaving them largely to fend for themselves until the survivors reached the age to cocoon and to be converted into a member of a caste that needed expanding. Subadults could spend a long time in cocoons, in a kind of hibernation, before being used. All of the acid-blood bugs could go into such hibernation when vital resources were in shortage.

 

Clever Oddie went with the enlarged platoon through more hive until they were in ancient alien ruins that were very much like those of the Ancient Martians of the Mars that he knew. Indeed these beings were called Ancient Martians. The acid blood of the hivaca had no apparent effect at all on the metallic stone or metallic appearing ancient structures and other features.

 

They were attacked by a swarm of subadults scuttling over the ground but unable to climb the walls of the ancient alien structures. The subadults were halted by a wall of firepower that blew them apart, melted and burned them. One of the marines now used a special pulseflamer designed, it seemed, against hivaca and other such acid-blooded biomechanical creatures. They were also used for other purposes.

 

They reached a great domechamber that the Solar Marines had passed through earlier on. A vast crystal-stone stood vertical in a great brass appearing metallic base of leaning triangular struts and horizontal rings. Ancient symbols, still very clear and easy to read except for the problem of translation, ran in patterns over the base.

 

Clever Oddie studied the structure and knew, somehow, that he had found what had drawn him. Now all he had to do was to find out why he had been drawn too it and what it was. As for the 'gateway' that the Solar Marines had spoken of, it had been in that great chamber but was now gone. They were not generally happy about this situation except for the android and the monkariman who were quite calm about it.

Edited August 3, 2011 by Maharg67

[Maharg67]

0124

FALLOUT MARS: THE MARSLANDS

MEGATON TROUBLES: NEW MEGATON, MEGATON AND MEGATON-SPRINGVALE (CONTINUED)

 

"Holy Megaton?" Brazen Emmie was disturbed, was suspicious of that particular change to Megaton, but was far from the only one. "A whole new Megaton Sector given over just to the expanded number of the Children of Atom and their expanded temple complex, all of it embedded in history." She was standing in a guard-tower that overlooked the wall between part of Middle Megaton and part of Holy Megaton that took up some of the Megaton Crater. Not only that but now some fanatics of the Atom are spying on we Tyrone Triplets, on Jasmine and on Old Joe McDonald."

 

Mother Compassionate Sasha Tyrone shook her head and then sighed. "Sorry, as far as my mind is concerned there has always been a Holy Megaton since Megaton was first founded centuries ago. I take it that there are many changes that my mind is blind to."

 

Brazen Emmie nodded. "At least three powerful entities were behind the transformations that took place but, the question is, did they work together or were they at odds with each other? Oh yes, the Springvale School of High Achievement is now real and is no longer fake. The fake school has vanished off to somewhere."

 

Sasha nodded. "Our people have already gone to the school, which has always been real though experiments were carried out there in super virtual reality teaching and training. A young pair of women were there briefly who seemed quite like you and Sweet Ellie. They vanished before they could be asked any questioned but school staffers and students identified them as Sour Ellie and Amazon Essie. Megaton-Springvale.... has always been fairly empty and it is time we Megatonfolk began to use it properly."

 

Brazen Emmie nodded as if to her own thoughts. "Yes, the transformational time is being forgotten. Most minds are coming to think that the new changes were in fact not changes at all but have always been so. This is good for it means that reality is healing nicely. Playing around with reality can too easily lead to disastrous consequences, directly and indirectly."

 

A small electric bubblecopter buzzed overhead. The Greater Megaton Guard had three small scouting helicopters, lightly armed and armoured but quite fast and agile. The scout-bubblecopter had taken off from, yet another new sector, Fort Megaton. Fort Megaton was where the local Greater Megaton Guard garrison and the local Megaton Militia were both based along with elite United Citystates Guardsmen and paramilitary United Citystates Rangers. Rangers supported law enforcers and the military but also undertook such as special recon and search-rescue missions.

 

 

0125

FALLOUT MARS: THE MARSLANDS

MEGATON TROUBLES: NEW MEGATON, MEGATON AND MEGATON-SPRINGVALE (CONTINUED)

 

Suddenly a soft sparkling shimmer ran through not just the air but everything.

 

Brazen Emmie noticed it and gave a start but apparently her adoptive mother was oblivious to what happened. She cursed silently to herself because her earlier conclusion that the healing process of the local reality transformation was going smoothly, was now obviously wrong. She turned and looked around to see what else might have changed. Then she was staring in wonder at the big, low hulking block building, a mini-skyscraper, towering above Megaton and part of Megaton-Springvale.

 

She pointed to the tall, block building and Sasha gave her a puzzled look. "That is the Inner Megaton Tower above Inner Megaton Basements of the higher basement levels. At the bottom of that is the deeper basement levels and the bunker complex that make up Deep Megaton. We of the Orders of the Way of the Truth have had our administrative offices in Inner Megaton Tower. Why do I have the feeling that this is somehow new to you though you grew up in Megaton since your biological mother abandoned you here."

 

Brazen Emmie sighed. "Two sets, no more than two sets of data, of different Greater Megatons exist in my mind now. Reality adjustments are now the greater reality trying to even matters out and to mitigate against disaster. Matters are stabilizing now. Fort Megaton, Holy Megaton, Outer Megaton, Middle Megaton, Inner Megaton Tower, Inner Megaton Basements and Deep Megaton. Oh yes, Over Megaton of the battlements, the suspended aircraft and other structures along with the other high structures. Of course, the powered dome-roof that is now open to show the stars above along with the soft shimmering of the World-Bubble."

 

People moved along the structures of Megaton Crater and she recognized many of them, even those who had appeared with the changes. Middle Megaton was open to all Megaton Factions, including the Factionless, the faction that was larger than all of the others combined. The Atomicus Faction of the 'Faithful' were there and not just the majority who were Children of Atom. Some smaller sects and even a cult or two, had come to dwell in Middle Megaton. Only the Children of Atom were welcome in Holy Megaton. The other powerful factions of the 'Seculars' and the 'Orders' were represented by badge wearing citizens in one case and by OSE and OWL members in the other.

 

Yet Megaton was still generally rough and ready, even primitive in some ways, as it had been before. It was still a settlement of isolated existence out in the Rimlands relatively close to the Wastelands. Such as crossbows and 'Wild West' type weapons were still much more common that more modern automatic or energy weapons. Robots and androids, even roboremotes, were quite uncommon. Vehicles were mostly pedal driven or animal drawn or even human motivated. Power wind-cylinders were outnumbered by more basic wind-vanes driven pumps and mills. Many more people rode ponies or horses or bicycles than rode motorbikes or motortrikes. This same pattern was reflected right through the bigger Greater Megaton population, its technologies and other facets.

 

Brazen Emmie spoke again. "The United Citystate of the Rimlands Central Government wants to turn Megaton into one of its new regional capitals. The Eternal Guardian will try to stop them."

 

Sasha turned and smiled. "What is this Eternal Guardian that you speak of? It sounds like one of those foolish Marslands Myths that are so popular with the common peoples. I suggest that you focus on more important matters. I must go and attend duties with the orphans. I will see you at dinner, my love."

 

Then Sasha turned and slipped away with a serene smile on her face.

 

Brazen Emmie was stunned. Sasha Tyrone no longer knew about the Eternal Guardian, perhaps now had never done so. She turned and went off back to the hidden base of the Tyrone Triplets. It was soon evident that none except the Eternal Guardian knew about the existence of the Eternal Guardian, or so it seemed.

Edited August 3, 2011 by Maharg67

[Maharg67]

0126

FALLOUT MARS: THE MARSLANDS

MEGATON TROUBLES: ETERNAL GUARDIAN AFTER THE TRANSFORMATION

 

Lucky Eddie was in the huge elegant chamber of the secret base of the Tyrone Triplets. It was part of a TARDIS as it had once been part of something that was not actually a TARDIS but had some of the qualities and resources of one. He was sitting in a comfortable body conforming armchair that floated in the air. He was tired and annoyed. "So, none of the people who knew of the Eternal Guardian, do so now. Of course I mean those of us who are not of the Eternal Guardian."

 

Jasmine was examining a Predoomsday hitech device that she wished to take with her on her search for her father. "Notice that, despite all the changes, if anything the Rimlanders are even more primitive in their technologies, in their knowledge. New Megaton is larger, has more people, but has relatively fewer hitech and special-tech devices than it used... you know what I mean. It is as if the entities behind the transformation wanted to make Greater Megaton into a bigger but more vulnerable attack to a hitech attack."

 

Sweet Ellie finished cleaning a 12guage pump-action shotgun that was meant for Jasmine to take with her. "We have more androids, more roboremotes and more robots. We even have more of those claptraps and those dumb-bots. Problem is the resources are now divided up between the two bigger, more powerful factions and the eighteen smaller, weaker factions of Greater Megaton. Seculars, Order Followers and the Atomicus Faithfuls in the big factions and who in the smaller, weaker factions but the Yingyangs, the Druids, the Tech Glories, the Solar Children, the Children of the Sun, the Megaton Survivalists, the Megaton Cooperatives, the Megaton Communalists, the Megaton Puregeners, the Ghoulififiers, the Openly Hidden, the Collectors of Glory, the Christians, the Buddhists, the Jews, the Brotherhood of Islam, the Hindus and the Wiccans. Religious fanaticism, technical fetishism and political extremism all rolled in nice little parcels."

 

"Don't forget the Factionless." Brazen Emmie was also in a hovering armchair. "Bigger than all the Greater Megaton Factions put together are the Factionless."

 

Old Joe McDonald came through a nice looking wooden door that was not in fact wooden at all. He put his big old cowboy hat on a wooden hat-tree and then made his way over to the others as he talked. "What of the Secret Factions? The Children of the Shadow, the Followers of Purity, the Communists, the Seekers of Secrets, the Blooded of Atomicus and too many others. Where did all the extra people come from that have bulked out the population of not just Greater Megaton but all of the UCR and many populations beyond? Now that is a question truly worth asking but no easy answer is going to be forth coming."

 

He stopped at the big table and took out a small semitransparent globe with an object just visible inside. He placed it on the tabletop, there was a sparkling shimmer, and then there was a large armoured metallic travel-canister on the table. He spoke again. "Some very special special-tech for you, Jasmine, hidden amongst some nice hitech and as hitech. Jasmine needs Jademine and Jackblade. Triplets to be being sisters Jasmine and Jademine along with brother Jackblade."

 

"Why have we of the Eternal Guardian been forgotten by others who once knew of us?" Lucky Eddie spoke with a frown and a frown in his voice. "It is most odd."

 

"Three, or maybe four, powerful entities fought over the actual changes of the transformation that took place. I was one of them." Old Joe McDonald picked up a sandwich from a plate of them. "Too many had come to know about the existence of the Eternal Guardian. You, my children, had revealed too much to too many and they to too many others. I did the memory alterations with the assistance of another powerful Eternal Entity who I will not name for the moment. He was not involved directly in influencing the changes but he boosted my strength, fed me most valuable energies and confidence at the right moment."

 

 

0127

FALLOUT MARS: THE MARSLANDS

MEGATON TROUBLES: ETERNAL GUARDIAN AFTER THE TRANSFORMATION (CONTINUED)

 

So now the Springvale School of High Achievement was no more than an experimental school where students had experienced boosted education and training through specialized super virtual reality, SVR, programs. The very existence of the fake, and the ultimate virtual reality school realm, had been erased by the localized reality transformation. The Wonder Nine Chamber had vanished and with it other areas including the wardrobe-cube. The cable-teleport hub was gone. At least it all seemed to be gone because it all could have been shifted or just hidden more cleverly.

 

Old Joe McDonald pointed to the holographic map of the transformed Megaton-Springvale area. "The students in the SSHA are now quite normal, that is standard genetically engineered humans of Predoomsday standards. Of the now 600, 300 are natural borns, 100 are vat-clones, 100 are biowomb-clones and 100 are tube-clones. The human-zetan hybrid clones are gone as if they never existed. As for the students that had been part of the remote-android experiments, they have also vanished as if they never were. The staffers are now just androids and clones who serve the school. All databanks are altered, along with memories, to suit the transformed reality."

 

He frowned hard. "Clever Oddie is lost to us for the moment and I guesstimate that Sour Ellie and Amazon Essie have gone to find him, having 'sensed' that he would need their assistance. Last data gained from them spoke of fabricants in the form of fake monsters and hivaca bugs. Now they will need your assistance which will be both harder and easier now that other folks no longer know you are aspects of the Eternal Guardian, as I am."

 

Jasmine had moved her LifeVault0101/A3 friends into the TARDIS, an ancient Timespace Lord mechanism of many wonders, and others had also moved in. The Orders of the Way of the Light had changed in Greater Megaton but also elsewhere. They were now more focused on spiritual matters though they still did good works such as welfare services, healing, protection, teaching and such like.

 

The Orders of Steel in Exile no longer had any link with the Eternal Guardian except that Sarah Lyons was an aspect of the Eternal Guardian and knew what had taken place. Sarah Lyons spoke of a much larger taskforce coming from the Greenlands of New California. The first aeroship fleet had arrived and had dropped off the group that had come to Greater Megaton. The rest of that expeditionary fleet was already landed at the massive, low hulking, mostly underground DC Citadel.

 

After Doomsday many factions had tried to take over the DC Citadel, or even just to loot parts of it, but all had failed thanks to Field Marshal Rear Admiral and his exotic army of mixed units. The DC Citadel also had many roboremote and other defense security network-systems including decoy tunnels leading to traps, holographic tricks and swarms of roboremote attack-drones. None of this had changed because of the reality transformation and it seemed not all in the Rimlands, or beyond, was effected in any great way or at all. Field Marshal Rear Admiral had welcomed the Orders of Steel in Exile with some conditions which had been quite generous.

 

The old looking man sighed. "I will need to go traveling away from New Megaton for a while though I will still be inside Greater Megaton. There are special individuals and groups I need to make direct contact with."

 

Lucky Eddie frowned. "The other Megaton Crater is now surrounded by dangerous mutated vegetation infested with dangerous mutated animals. I could go that way and try to learn what I can."

 

The other 'Megaton Crater' that led down at the bottom to another bunker complex, was known generally, by the few who knew it existed, as the Lost Megaton Crater though the reason for the name was lost.

 

"Not for now!" Old Joe McDonald shook his head. "I need you three to focus your efforts here in New Megaton. You need to try to find what has been, hopefully, moved and hidden. I need you to find a way to get into the ultimate virtual realm where Sour Ellie, Clever Oddie and Amazon Essie are now trapped. That is I fear that they are trapped."

 

Alarms began to chime softly and a display lit up on a vertical cylinder based console. Another relatively shift, minor this time, was taking place but any such relatively shift was of concern.

Edited August 10, 2011 by Maharg67

[Maharg67]

http://i592.photobucket.com/albums/tt9/Dragonpen61/Forum%20Additives/ForumAddit0010.jpg

 

HAVE CHANGED 'ETERNAL CHAMPION' TO 'ETERNAL GUARDIAN' TO STOP CLASHING WITH ANOTHER STORY

Edited August 3, 2011 by Maharg67

[Maharg67]

0128

FALLOUT MARS: THE MARSLANDS

MEGATON TROUBLES: LIVING WITH AND DISCOVERING MORE CHANGES

 

Brazen Emmie found it mildly disturbing that she knew how Megaton had changed but that almost everybody else saw the changed Megaton as real. The BRASS LANTERN was now, had always been called, the BRASS LANTERN DINER. It was run by a much larger Stahl Family and was largely underground with a bigger internal diner and a big outer semi-enclosed area with a bar, chairs and tables. She found that she was long term friends with twins Karen and Keela Stahl, who were about her age. They were friends of all of the Tyrone Triplets and others that the triplets knew.

 

They sat at a corner table in the inside diner chamber and Brazen Emmie carved up the muttfruit pie they had bought together. She spoke in Esperanto even as she did so. "There is nothing wrong with me. I am just a little thoughtful lately."

 

Karen flicked back her blonde hair. She was fully aware that she was very attractive, was slimly voluptuous just as Brazen Emmie was slimly muscular. "No, you keep looking around as if.. well as if everything is new, is not as it should be somehow. Yet you know us well as we know you."

 

Brazen Emmie snorted. "You two are very observant. Things have changed but in a way that would be very hard to explain."

 

Keela smile-frowned. "We have been having strange dreams, the very same ones, disturbing dreams of being trapped drifting in some kind of limbo. It was like being awake, asleep and dreaming at the same time. We drifted in the vast grey fog with millions and millions of people, animals, plants and other things. Some of those things were... odd but others were monstrous. Aumans were there and also higher caste androids. True-AIs were there. We were somebody else. We lived in some place called Mars York, a huge city in the Predoomsday years. It was crowded but comfortable and our parents worked as roboremote operators while we went to collage to do the same work."

 

Roboremote operators used cyberlinkage or more basic ways of controlling the dumb-robots designed as roboremotes. Not all dumb-robots were roboremotes.

 

Karen then spoke even as Brazen Emmie served a third of the pie onto her small plate. "It is like we have two histories, two past lives, two lives."

 

Keela took over smoothly. "We are UnityNeo, on the edge of Unity. We 'sense' a special difference about you, Sweet Ellie, Lucky Eddie and Jasmine. We can not quite read Old Joe McDonald but there is something familiar between you lot and him."

 

Brazen Emmie frowned. "We are of the Eternal Guardian, are aspects of the Eternal Guardian. Changes were made that flowed through time, backwards, to alter history, and outwards to influence other areas. You did not, had never existed, here. The Stahl Family was much smaller and less happier than it is now. New people came with the reality transformation. Perhaps, like you, they all came from the 'limbo' that you spoke of."

 

She went on speaking. "The relationship between the Eternal Guardian and Unity has not always been a positive one."

 

Keela nodded. "We know. Unity tells us things but not in a way that is easy to explain. UnityMentality of instinctive feeling and UnityMind of logic and reasoning. UnityNetwork to link it and us all. Unity is stronger down in the Martian Underworld, as created by the Ancient Martians an incredibly long time ago, but weaker up here in the Martian Overworld. UnityMain is focusing its efforts in the Martian Underworld. UnityNeo operate everywhere in many ways but we remain semi-independent to various degrees. We can be of assistance to each other in a wide variety of ways and still remain friends."

 

"We will consider our options but the friendship is good and is worth hanging onto." Brazen Emmie responded. "We can make some kind of positive working alliance, I am sure of it."

 

 

0129

FALLOUT MARS: THE MARSLANDS

MEGATON TROUBLES: LIVING WITH AND DISCOVERING MORE CHANGES (CONTINUED)

 

The three turned as two Knights of Atom came into the inner diner in their fancy fleximetallic body-armour. They were a little drunken but not enough for them to be legally refused service or kicked out of the BRASS LANTERN DINER. The two were armed with basic laser-guns that were manufactured by the Atomicus Holy Corporation 'to fight the demonic' and the 'Shadow'. The box-lasers were as large as a standard pulselaser-rifle but only as powerful as a standard pulselaser-pistol. They also had a poor charge capacity which is why all Knights of Atom also carried other, more reliable weapons such as revolver-pistols, shotguns or even submachineguns. Others looked sharply at the newcomers who were not welcome in that establishment. Knights of Atom were arrogant, often aggressive and 'holier than though'. Too many of them liked to cause trouble with what they called the 'faithless' or the 'false faithfuls'. The former were atheists and the latter were those who followed other belief systems.

 

The three were elite soldiers, veterans of battles with bandits, marauders, enemy zealots, mutated creatures and others. They were against the growing presence of the OSE forces and resented the fact that the newcomers had power armour, pulselasers, pulseblasters, robots and other technologies that the Children of Atom did not have. They added the OSE to all the others in Greater Megaton that they were opposed to be they the Orders of the Way of the Light, the Greater Megaton Government or the United Citystates of the Rimlands Regional Government. To their credit they really did not like the United Citystate of the Rimlands Central Government.

 

Paladin of Atom Rasheri Highfaith stepped further into the chamber. He looked around with open disdain. He led the Chapter of the Knights of Atom in Greater Megaton but also commanded other units in the area including Guards of Atom, the cannon fodder of the Faith of Atom. Then he bellowed. "The Atomic Firelight burn you, heathens! The Son of Atom will return soon and he will stride the lands to burn the unfaithful and to lead the faithful to victory, to ascension over all."

 

Leo Stahl strode over and confronted the bigger man. "Enough! Nobody here wants to hear your rubbish. Either be quiet or leave."

 

For a moment it seemed that Highfaith might attack Leo but then realized that a lot of tough customers were scowling at him and many of them were armed. He grunted unpleasantly and departed from the residence with his two soldiers following him. There was something disturbing about the confrontation, something nagging at the back of her mind that was trying to get her attention. She went back to focusing on the, hopefully, delicious muttfruit pie.

 

Edited August 3, 2011 by Maharg67

[Maharg67]

0130

FALLOUT MARS: THE MARSLANDS

MEGATON TROUBLES: LIVING WITH AND DISCOVERING MORE CHANGES (CONTINUED)

 

Ronald Tyrone remembered that the Tyrone Triplets were part of the Eternal Guardian and came to glimpse two realities, the old and the new. He and Sweet Ellie made there way into the big confusing crazy labyrinth of hallway tunnels, chambers, rampway-tunnels and other features that spanned outward from the walls of the Megaton Crater. Though the name was not official, this sector was known as Maze Megaton. It was a wild mixture of different qualities and types of construction including a small mine, some former petty criminal hide-outs and some small bunker like constructions that seemed to have been built for reasons lost to history.

 

Megaton Mazefolk dwelt in the labyrinth being people who were social misfits, political extremists, religious fanatics, runaway criminals, former slaves hiding from bounty-slavers, the very poor, the ghoulified who could not hide their disfigurements and others. Tunnels from the Megaton Maze went out below Megaton-Springvale, which did not please the Greater Megaton Government for legal, security or defensive reasons.

 

Sweet Ellie had told Ronald of 'old' finds and how the local reality transformation, which still seemed to be going on at some low level, had 'changed' things. Now she kept on speaking. "We found the Gateway-Chamber in Little Megaton but when we went back to find it, it 'was gone'. We found a perfectly working cable-teleport hub but when we went back to it, it had 'become' unsalvageable wreckage. It is as if some hidden force is trying to stop us from finding certain resources that would lead us in turn to certain important discoveries. Of course it also could be just coincidental."

 

A radroach scuttled along the wide, dimly lit old mine tunnel that they were going through. It paused and Sweet Ellie threw to it a tidbit to eat. The radroach made a noise of appreciation and darted off again.

 

"Radroaches are only trying to survive." Sweet Ellie responded to his frown. "They had no choice in what they became. Their ancestors were mere cockroaches, remember." Then she stopped and signaled Ronald to do the same. He made no sounds as she went to the wall to the right of them and put her ear to the surface. After a moment she stood back from it and frowned in puzzlement. "In that direction lies a large enclosed area below Holy Megaton where the Children of Atom have storage rooms, punishment chambers, meditation retreats and some dungeons. We triples have infiltrated the place more than once to steal resources that they stole in the first place, to free people, to gain information and to do sabotage."

 

Ronald grinned. "I have snuck in there myself and have done some stealing. I also seduced a couple of young nuns doing solitary punishment."

 

Sweet Ellie gave him a sour look. "That does not surprise me. If you wish to be my boyfriend you had better stop that sort of thing."

 

At that he gave her a mild grin and his eyes sparkled. "Okay! What did you hear?"

 

"Some kind of chanting and some kind of humming noises of a kind I have not heard before. There were many voices chanting and not all were human." She started along the old mine tunnel again. "We left a hidden way of getting into the sealed off Holy Megaton Maze Zone."

 

"So, you were the ones who did that." Ronald nodded. "I used that entrance a couple of times."

 

 

0131

FALLOUT MARS: THE MARSLANDS

MEGATON TROUBLES: LIVING WITH AND DISCOVERING MORE CHANGES (CONTINUED)

 

While Brazen Emmie was in the BRASS LANTERN DINER and Sweet Ellie was with Ronald in Maze Megaton, Lucky Eddie was down in the Megaton-Springvale Subway Station. Except he was breaking into an area now officially used by the Greater Megaton Government, the Greater Megaton Guard and the UCR-RG.

 

The tensions had increased between the Regional Government and Central Government but also between the UCR Resistance Alliance and the Central Government. If anything the local reality alterations had made matters worse. UCR-RA freedom-fighters had struck against the dreaded paramilitary forces and secret police of the UCR-CG. Various military units, regulars and irregulars, had fought each other out in the Rimlands. Greater Megaton was seen as a major Citystate of the Regional United Citystates of the Rimlands, as it was being called, being the RUCR. In turn the Central United Citystates of the Rimlands, or the CUCR, saw it as a focus of enemy forces and a primary target. The United Citystates of the Rimlands was not very united any more.

 

Lucky Eddie crawled along a vent tunnel and then dropped lightly into a large storeroom. Crouched on some boxes, he studied other boxes. By the light dust layer covering everything, along with other clues, it was clear to him that the chamber had not been entered for centuries. Various canisters, crates and lidboxes had big plastic 3Dlabels and he easily read the official contents listing of each. Except he did not quite believe these manifests.

 

Carefully he began to check the containers and soon found there very advanced technologies, some more exotic than others, but they were spare parts for many different kinds of machines, including wonder-machines, or so he figured. Amongst the spare parts were some prototype energy weapons, energy tools, exotic power armours, small robots and other devices.

 

Yet the most important items he found were an advanced hand-computer and a handful of special datachips. It was the data in those datachips that he carefully read and which gave him an idea where he might find a Wonder Nine Chamber perhaps like the one that had been in Springvale but which had vanished or the one in the Megaton Bunkerplex that had also vanished. He carefully absorbed the data.

 

He used multiple-cubes to send many valuable items from the chamber into the Eternal-TARDIS.

Edited August 4, 2011 by Maharg67

[Maharg67]

0132

FALLOUT MARS: THE MARSLANDS

MEGATON TROUBLES: CLEVER ODDIE, SOUR ELLIE, AMAZON ESSIE AND THE ANCIENT ARTIFACT

 

Clever Oddie 'sensed' Sour Ellie and Amazon Essie even as they approached the chamber with the great crystal-stone. They came fast but quickly but were not alone. Security-Troopers came with better arms, armour and other equipment. They and the two female aspects of the Eternal Guardian wore assault power armour and carried 3B1rifles or pulselaser-rifles or shortlong missile-launchers. Twice they had killed a swarm of hivaca subadults and some hivaca hunters. Hivaca workers were tough but had backed off as instinct told them not to waste their lives doing what fighting hivaca could do much better. If the intruders had been closer to the Queen, her eggs and larvae, they would have attacked anyway.

 

Clever Oddie hugged his newly arisen sisters and then looked up at the great artifact. "From what I can tell it is a product of the Ancient Martians and is itself ancient. I would say that it... somehow transcends the ultimate virtual reality itself as if it is more real than anything else. This does not make any logical sense as far as current scientific knowledge is concerned but it 'feels' right somehow in a way I can not explain in any logical fashion. This is some kind of reality alteration tool but how one is supposed to use it, I do not know."

 

Amazon Essie shook her head in wonder. "We are trapped in this ultimate virtual reality realm. The Springvale School of High Achievement has become a school where students were found in special capsulechairs and in super virtual reality. They were all found in surprising health and fitness thanks to the sophisticated network-systems of the School Project. There were 500 of them found but none were zetan-human hybrid clones. Also the remote-android students were not found. The school staffers are androids who can act as AI-characters inside SVR and be androids outside of it. There are the clones as well, both humans and guard dogs. Everything that Lucky Eddie, Jasmine, Sarah Lyons and the others found has been reality altered. It is most frustrating."

 

"I got the gist of it already." Clever Oddie frowned. "It was a reality battle between at least two or three forces. One was our father, Old Joe McDonald. Well, we can take him as our father; I 'sense' he would expect us to do so." He turned and looked at the Solar Marines. "These fine soldiers wish to find their comrades and to go home. Home is another version of Mars, an isolated colony on that Alternate Mars, where they hoped to find something called a dropship waiting to take them away. They would go to a defense-security orbital-base in geostationary orbit around Mars. I am trying to reopen the gateway that they came through in order to escape from the hivaca on their version of Mars. Their hivaca seemed to have come from their version of Venus that, like our Venus, is the home world of the hivaca bugs. The hivaca seem to have gotten to their Mars in an alien U-ship."

 

Amazon Essie looked puzzled. "Science fiction horror movies known as the PREDATOR PREY WARS were produced before Doomsday. Holomovies, 3Dmovies, 3DTV, toonbooks, toys, lots of profit making franchise products. What is fiction in this.... not so real reality... in our reality is reality for them. Kind of makes sense, I think. Tangles up my mind trying to work it all out."

 

Suddenly there were explosions muffled by internal structures, including hivaca substances, and distance. Then there was the sound of Solar Marine type weapons firing. Soon they were joined by the rushing figures of those who were the comrades of the platoon of the Solar Marines.

 

 

0133

FALLOUT MARS: THE MARSLANDS

MEGATON TROUBLES: CLEVER ODDIE, SOUR ELLIE, AMAZON ESSIE AND THE ANCIENT ARTIFACT (CONTINUED)

 

Bishop, Ripley, Newt, Lieutenant Gorman, Carter Burke, the Rapid Brothers, one of which was a woman, Scrapper Lee, Shredder Lee, a wounded Private Mark Drake and four combat service-support robots. One of the combat service-support robots carried Mark. Pilot Corporal Collette Ferro and crew chief Private Daniel Spunkmeyer had died when a strange UFO had attacked the dropship even as they were flying it into pick up the other group and to return to the orbital-base. The group had escaped through another strange gateway that had appeared to them just as another like it had appeared for the platoon running from a swarm of hivaca on their version of Mars.

 

Carter Burke was distant from the others, was 'cold' in a fashion that was reflective of the Iceminds. That Carter tried to be warm and welcoming but failed, made matters worse.

 

Lieutenant Gorman had failed badly in leading the mission, had given into panic, and was now largely ignored even by Carter Burke who was the one who had made sure that he was pt in military command of the mission.

 

Bishop, the android, was an exact copy of one of the heads of the huge Weyland-Yutani Corporation. He was calm, efficient and was forced to follow his programming. He was not a replicant type android.

 

Newt was a survivor of the colony that was formed in that more desolate part of Mars, the world where Terraforming had largely failed with some strange results. New a new Terraforming effort, with improved technologies and a more patient, efficient approach, was being undertaken. Newt's people had become food and larvae bodies for the hivaca except for those killed in the fighting with the hivaca or those not accounted for.

 

The Rapid Brothers and the combat androids were quietly efficient in a deadly manner.

 

The other smart-machinegunner was unconscious on one of the special robots where he was drugged and safety secured.

 

Then there was Ripley; she was tough, alert, a little damaged but with something special at her core. There was also something 'different' about her that marked her out from the other humans in her group or in the Solar Marine platoon that was also there.

Edited August 8, 2011 by Maharg67

[Maharg67]

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