Head of State

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

Well. Reilly's been dealt with, and her people are happy with that. It's time to go back to the basics now. Ellen needs to get herself out to the Lincoln Memorial and check things over so that she can report to the slaves and get them set up before getting back to Rivet City. Of course, from what she remembers from Mr. Mills' world, the Memorial has decent lines of sight and a fairly strategic location. There are Brotherhood of Steel patrols around the base of the Washington Monument; that implies that if there are mutants holed up in the Memorial, they must be pretty well established, otherwise the Brotherhood would've gone after them. Too bad Tulip was out of Stealth Boys when Ellen stopped by her place in Underworld. Maybe she can get one from the bar....

Comments

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"So am I," says Ellen. "Dogmeat's upstairs with the biggest rawhide I could get for him. He'll be fine."

With that, she opens the door.

Beyond lies a reception area ground down by time, littered with the detritus of years- rusted bits of shopping cart, a forgotten baby carriage, discarded tin cans. There was an information desk here once, by the look of things, and a cloakroom or a bathroom or two.

It's not until the second set of doors is passed that the place takes on a veneer of respectability. In the second room the ceiling soars to thirty feet or more, though the upper reaches are lit only by such daylight as makes it through strategically placed slit-windows. A beam of dust-laden sunlight falls on the upright, stiffly posed skeleton of a predatory dinosaur, its skull and the upper part of its ribcage having crashed to the floor not far away quite some time ago. To the right a disheveled but mostly-intact stuffed, mounted mammoth rears its tusks at predators that no longer come. Corridors radiate away in all directions, their purposes spelled out in letters too high up to read in this light- but there's one that's far too obvious to miss. The doors to that corridor have been flanked by a huge facade of gray 'stone', carved into skulls and other garish features, and a tattered gold and black banner proclaims 'UNDERWORLD: The Mythology of Shadows'.

"Don't let the decor fool you. Or what the people look like. They're pretty nice, even if they do look like they're made from raw Brahmin meat," Ellen says. "Oh, and Cerberus, the guard robot? Is a liar. He hates his job, so he tries to make trouble."

[vance_prime]

"I think we can handle it," says Alyx, giving D0G a reassuring pat on the arm. D0G whurps in agreement.

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"All right," says Ellen, and opens the facade's central doors. Beyond the facade lies a room long enough to have housed the central part of a very large museum exhibit, with smaller galleries opening off to the sides and up the stairs that flank either side of the room. A black sign with white lettering near the foot of the right-hand staircase reads 'WELCOME TO UNDERWORLD'. The place certainly looks active enough; there are people wandering about everywhere, many of them dressed in clothes Alyx may remember seeing in Megaton- shirts and overalls, tanned Brahmin-hide dresses, cobbled-together getup scavenged from half a dozen sources. A few are in traveling clothes, and one, over by a central statue of souls struggling upwards, is wearing a faded blue RobCo jumpsuit. They're just... y'know, all looking like they're rotting on the hoof.

"Underworld Outfitters is right over there," Ellen says, nodding at the first gallery on the left. "Tulip doesn't get a lot of customers here, so her stock builds up pretty impressively."

[vance_prime]

Alyx does her best to keep her expression neutral as she looks around her, but she's not entirely successful. Usually, when she sees people who look like that, they have parasites attached to their skulls and are attempting to eviscerate her.

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"Atten-shun! Civilian on deck," announces a metallic voice from nearby. Half a beat later it adds, "Oh, it's you."

"Hello, Cerberus," Ellen says to the robot that's drifted up next to them.

[g00d_d0ggie]

Bwerp? inquires D0G, eying the other robot with a great deal of interest. He doesn't meet other machine intelligences very often.

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"My name is Cerberus. I'm a certified, qualified Mr. Gutsy unit, serial number WR0471, stationed in Underworld for the foreseeable future," says Cerberus in response. "What sort of prototype are you supposed to be?"

[vance_prime]

"His name is D0G," says Alyx, a touch defensively. "He's one of a kind, and I built him myself."

Bwoop! says D0G, in a tone that suggests 'damn right!'.

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"Bully for you, ma'am," replies Cerberus. "I don't get much news about ongoing developments in the Wasteland down here. Good to see American ingenuity's still in full swing, despite everything."

[vance_prime]

"Yeah, well, not everybody can rely on surviving pre-war technology. No offense."

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"None taken," says Cerberus. "Can I be of assistance today?"

The robot has no face, so it's a little hard to tell, but one gets the impression that it's rather pointedly ignoring Ellen and concentrating on Alyx and D0G.

[vance_prime]

"Possibly. Do you know anything about anyone holed up in the Lincoln Memorial?"

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"Negative. Unless it directly threatens the welfare of Underworld and its citizens, I don't get to hear about it."

[vance_prime]

Alyx nods. "Well, thanks anyway. I need to go stock up on ammunition."

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"Closing dialog system," says Cerberus, and drifts off.

Ellen shakes her head. "I'm surprised he didn't try to pull anything on you," she says. "The first time I was here, he implied Dr. Barrows was about to vivisect a wounded human to see what made her tick, just to get him in trouble."

[vance_prime]

"What? Why??"

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"He hates ghouls," Ellen says with a shrug. "They've fitted him with a combat inhibitor that prevents him from attacking them, and they've programmed him to be polite to their faces and generally polite to visitors, but he considers them rotting zombie maggot farms that he'd burn if he could. I guess they must be pretty hard up for security if they have to settle for a guardian like that."

[vance_prime]

Alyx shakes her head. "I might have to read up on pre-microchip computing and come back and reprogram that sucker."

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"Winthrop would love you for that," says Ellen. "He's the local maintenance man and engineer... ah, we're here."

The gallery they've headed into is comparatively small, but it holds a respectable stock of items, and the counter boasts both a cash register and a solid, one-piece, green-screen terminal. Behind the counter a scabrous-looking woman in a short black vest and long-sleeved faded red shirt is thumbing through a book. She looks up with misty blue eyes and gives an absolutely ghastly smile. "You came back!" she says; her enthusiasm sounds genuine, even if her voice sounds like it's being pushed through steel wool. "You really came back. Wow. And you brought another friend!"

"Hi, Tulip," says Ellen. "This is Alyx, and this is D0G."

[vance_prime]

Alyx gives Tulip an awkward little wave. "Hi. Um, I need to buy some ammo?"

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"Sure thing, honey, it all works," says Tulip, gesturing to the shelves behind her. "Name your size. I got everything in use in the Wasteland and a couple of things I don't think anybody uses any more."

[vance_prime]

Oh good! An excuse to look at the shelves rather than the woman with no nose, no ears, and most of her skin and hair gone.

"Twelve-gauge shotgun shells, and nine-millimeter bullets. In clips for a semi or submachine gun, if you've got 'em."

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"Hm. You know, I think- yeah, okay, here..." Tulip takes down a couple of positively ancient, dust-covered boxes. "Most of the guns around here use ten millimeter. A few years back, though, Quinn picked up a couple of cases of this stuff from some guy who said he'd come in from out west. Nobody's had any interest in it since. Lemme know if this is suitable. As far as the shells go..." She gestures at a small stack of green and red boxes. "Always in demand."

[vance_prime]

Alyx holds up the box and carefully blows the dust off. The printing underneath is faded, but still legible. She reads it and lets out a low whistle. "Armor-piercing. Nice."

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"It's all the same price as far as I'm concerned," says Tulip. "Not like anybody else's ever expressed an interest. Standard, armor piercing, hollow point, it all takes up shelf space just the same."