Chapter 278 - Ego Clash

Afton gapes at the robot, looking down at his beaten and tattered state. His legs were clearly splinted up, displaying just how injured he actually was. "Slacking off? Are you stupid? My legs are broken you doddering two-hundred-year-old jar-head!" he shouts, jabbing his finger pointedly towards the robot.

"STUPID!? HOW DARE YOU! I AM THE CHIEF RESEARCHER OF THE THINK TANK, MOST MARVELOUS AND INTELLIGENTLY INTELLIGENT INSTITUTIONS EVER CREATED, OR EVER WILL BE CREATED! YOU ACCUSE ME OF BEING STUPID? WHY, WE SHOULD HAVE YOU PUT DOWN FOR MENTAL INSTABILITY!" Klein exclaims back, clearly offended at being called 'stupid'.​​

The Doctor's tirade isn't over just yet, however, "AND NO! WHY WOULD TAKE NOTICE OF YOUR FRAGILE HUMAN BODY'S CONDITION? IF YOU WANT SYMPATHY FOR YOUR FLESHY PENIS-TIPPED FORMS INADEQUACIES THEN GO SEE DALA! OTHERWISE, CONTINUE THE TASK WE HAVE SET FOR YOU."

The stubborn man and robot glare at one another, neither wishing to give ground... Afton furrows his brow, "Ignoring the technology... I need you to answer a question I have, and you will answer it truthfully, 'oh mighty chief researcher of the Think Tank'." he states sarcastically before continuing, "I heard that you have received some visits from some outsiders fairly recently, I need to know what happened to them."

"YOU WANT TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENED TO THE VISITORS?" he asks, almost sounded confounded. "GO ASK DR. O OR DR. 8, THEY WOULD KNOW MORE ABOUT THEM THEN I WOULD." he states, making a 'shooing' gesture with his manipulators.

"Are you pointing me in the right direction or just trying to get me to leave?" Afton asks, mirth and annoying interspersed within his voice.

"THAT DEPENDS, WHAT ANSWER WILL MAKE YOU LEAVE FASTER?"

Afton just shakes his head and limbs away, towards 'Dr. O'. He honestly didn't think he'd be able to get anything of worth out of 8, seeing as the robots voice modulator had been 'irreparably' damaged.

That wasn't saying that Afton couldn't fix it, because he probably could. He just wanted to hold off on that until he could gain something from it, fixing it too early would allow Dr. 8 and the others to slowly forget their debt towards him, better to wait until he needs something and then strike while the iron is hot.

That being said, he wondered why everyone referred to Dr. Zero as Dr. O... It was fairly obvious what was numerical and what was a letter... He'd seen sticky notes on and around Dr. Zero's work area, so it's pretty easy to figure out... Perhaps the robots were all going senile? Or perhaps they were all just mocking the robotics expert for some reason?

Afton walks up to Zero before greeting him with a small wave, "Dr. Zero?" he asks.

"For the last time, it's Zer-... Wait, what did you just call me?" the robot asks, disbelief apparent in his voice.

"Dr. Zero." Afton states, "Why? Do you like being called Dr. O instead?"

"Ah-No-no-no-no-NO! Dr. Zero is my name, don't let the other oxy-morons tell you otherwise!" he quickly says, "Youknow, lobotomite, you aren't all that bad. Even if you wear RobCo junk." he says, gesturing at Afton's Pipboy.

"Mhm." Afton hums, not bothering to mention the mystical properties it seems to have. "I was talking with Dr. Klein and heard about some intruders you guys had recently." he asks jovially, not letting his connection to Christine be known as of yet.

...

"I... Don't like to talk about it. 8 can't talk about it either after what they did to fry his voice module. It wasn't all the visitors though, only one of them got outta control. He's the one that took control of Little Yangtze, our old human farm."

...

"Human farm?" Afton asks after a moment, that didn't sound good AT ALL.

"Oh, yeah. During the great war, the American government had all Chinese-American citizens packed up and shipped off to various camps... Concentration camps they called it, don't know why they wanted to keep it so hush-hush." the robot lifts its manipulators, giving the best shrug it could manage. "Annoying meat-bags kept trying to break out, so be designed explosive collars to keep them put... Not that it mattered in the end, the great war happened and, well, ghouls don't make the best test subjects, especially if your experiments concern the brain."

If Afton wasn't already sure of the Think Tanks complete lack of morale boundaries before, then he definitely would now. Abducting people and lobotomizing them, concentration camps... What's next? Creating Frankenstein's monster or something?

He shook his head, he decides to pursue this later and ask about the 'troublesome' visitor, "What happened to the intruder?"

"You'll never believe it, this human... He broke out of the Think Tank. In seconds... Then he went of Yangtze, got our bomb collars, and start practising on the remaining ghouls there. No doubt trying to figure out the right frequencies to operate them.

We were sending robots to get him, but he kept slicing and cutting through their shells with some suped-up laser gun like they were cheese... Paper. When he hacked into the mainframe, 8 tried to stop him and got fried. Me? He rerouted my processors to take control of the train network here.

If you've seen the tunnels with the trains ploughed into them, you can thank our visitor for that. He wrecked the whole place... While we were trying to keep containment on the surface, he used one train to punch a hole through a tunnel and escape. Sealed now. But..."

Sounds like a certain mad-man Afton was somewhat familiar with... His obsession with technology would have no doubt lead him here, the skills he picked up from the Brotherhood allowing him to cause all that havoc, Elder Elijah. "What about the others?"