Chapter 248 - Sporiously?

After clearing a path to the staircase they wasted no time in walking down it, at the bottom they were greeted by a door that was slightly open... Thick roots stopped it from closing and looked as if they were trying to escape the floor and move upwards...

From the gap in the door Afton could also see small amounts of spores escaping into the staircase... No doubt he'd be swimming in it as soon as he opened this door. Readying his weapon and taking one last glance to Anja he smacks a fist on the control panel, causing the door to rattle and slowly lift out of their path.​​

Unfortunately, Afton hadn't spotted new movement from a source he hadn't expected in time. A root snaps around his leg like some sort of wooden rope, he shot a couple times at it as the limb tightened its grip.

*Slam!*

Afton gives a yelp as he's forcefully wrenched over and dragged into the room covered in a thick fog of spores. He stifles the oncoming coughing fit and continues to fire at the wooden limb, slowly blowing chunks out of its surprisingly strong flesh.

It still hadn't let go and he was on his last bullet, he couldn't see anything around him due to the thick fog, but he'd managed to recover from the surprise enough to activate VATS.

Time stops and Afton scowls at the fact he'd not immediately used this ability to figure out what was happening... Though, he could attribute his negligence to his head slamming against the metal floor of the Vault.

He takes a glance around himself and isn't able to see anything through the fog of spores... Fortunately, he doesn't have to be able to see as long as he has VATS. He activates the targeting function and his eyes immediately lock on to a glowing silhouette through the fog...

What he saw wasn't a Spore Carrier, but some kind of Venus fly-trap looking thing. Its body consists of a stem and a large head filled to the brim with teeth... Afton's initial assumption that the fungus could only reanimate human bodies was instantly blown away.

Frowning, he locks onto the root wrapping his leg and raises a brow when he sees the name of the enemy attacking him... Spore Carrier? Was this root connected to one of those plant zombies? He had thought it was another creature entirely...

His eyes travel across the glowing limb that led into the distance, eventually spotting the relatively large silhouette through the fog. From what he could see, it looked like a Spore Carrier, the only exceptions being its larger size and root-like arm...

Shaking his head, he checks everything else around him before making a gameplan. Once done he deactivates VATS and instantly presses the barrel of his gun to the root, shooting one last time and finally freeing himself.

He holsters That Gun and draws lucky, firing at the Spore Plant that looked as if it was going to spit something at him.

*Pang!*

He barely moves out of the way of the projectile that had indeed just been spat at him. It was incredibly difficult to shoot through the fog accurately, so instead, he threw himself backwards, accidentally colliding with something.

"OOFF!" a raspy, feminine voice exclaims.

Afton quickly recognises this as Anja, his companion having likely rushed into the fog to assist him. He grabs her wrist and drags her back towards the staircase they'd originally come down. Once there he slams his fist on the door control, causing it to slam shut, cutting through the root that had previously been keeping it open.

Finding himself in a relatively safe spot, Afton allows himself to finally start coughing, "*Cough! Cough!* T-those fucking plants have mutated down there! *Cough! Cough!*"

Anja herself still looks somewhat shaken from seeing him just get dragged into the fog without being able to do anything. She begins to apologise but Afton just shakes his head at her, not being able to rebuff her as he's unable to talk while coughing his lungs out.

After a while he finally sits back against the steps and sighs, "You ready to go back in there?" he asks, receiving a scathing look from his companion. He gives a weak chuckle and shrugs, "Unless you got any better ideas?"

...

"Yeah, I didn't think so... Hm, actually." he mutters to himself, reaching to his back, pulling his out Anti-Material rifle and shoving it into her hands. Anja is barely able to hold it up with all her strength, and gives him a confused look.

Afton doesn't stop there and holds out a handful of incendiary .50 calibre bullets. "I may not be able to use it anymore, but that doesn't mean you can't."

"S-sir, I can barely lift this..."

"Then place it on the floor and use its bipod to aim." he states in a manner questioning her intelligence.

Anja nods and places the weapon on the floor, there's just enough room for her to lay down and aim comfortably. He quickly goes through the way to operate the weapon, explaining on to reload, cock, and unjam it if needed.

"And remember, prepare yourself for the kick... Trust me, it's probably going to hurt." he says ominously.

With that he reloads his weapons and opens the door again, activating VATS to see where the enemies are. Once he's located them he points in their direction, all the while firing at the new whip-like root that tries to slam against Anja and the Anti-Material rifle... If he didn't know any better he'd say that it was intelligently targeting the biggest threats.

"Fire there!" Afton shouts, gesturing at the direction with his pistol after fighting off the root.

*BAANG!*

The Anti-Material rifle explodes and fires a bullet in the vague direction he was pointing. Once it hits a wave of heat washes over the duo as the incendiary round burns through a large portion of the airborne spores, not to mention utterly destroying the Spore Plant that'd luckily been hit.