Chapter 450 - Regrouped And Recouped

Karl and the group of women follow Carlos as he leads them. He'd hoped that the Assassins would be attracted towards Afton who was still causing mayhem, but they instead continued to follow them.

He couldn't think of a single reason why they'd be so concerned about them when bigger threats were around, whatever it was, Karl disliked it.​​

The group ducked and weaved through the Legion tents, occasionally ducking and dodging to avoid gunfire from their enemies... Unfortunately, a few women and even children had gone down from a stray bullet. Of course, this only sped up the rest of them who were fearing for their lives.

Karl upon seeing a young boy's head explode from a high calibre bullet growls and whips around, ignoring the sharp pain from the injury under his arm and firing.

*BANGBANGBANGBANGBANGBANG!*

He sprays lead at the group of assassins through tents, thin cover, and other obstacles. His accuracy is pretty shit, but the sheer amount of bullets he fires is enough to hit a few of them.

*Bang!*

Karl has the air knocked out of him when a heavy bullet strikes him in his right shoulder. His grip weakens and he accidentally drops his LMG, all the while more bullets strike him in the front. There's only so much his Deathclaw Duster can take, it was looking quite ragged by now, but Karl was thankful that by whatever god's grace he'd avoided having his head blown off.

He falls backwards but follows the momentum and rolls into a crouch, he's about to attempt to grab his gun when someone else does it for him.

"DON'T TOUCH MY DAD YOU PIECES OF SHIT!" Caroline roars as she barely manages to heft up the LMG and starts firing. Her aim is worse than even Karl's was, but the random shots somehow manage to hit a few Assassins.

Of course, this doesn't last long before the enemy retaliates...

*Bangbangbang!*

Karl throws himself at her as bullets start flying in her direction... A couple actually manages to hit her, however... Karl panics as he spots blood pools from her stomach, arms and shoulders. "No, baby are you okay?" he quickly asks while checking her wounds.

"I-I'm fine, j-lets keep moving." she coughs out, stumbling as she gets up by doing so nonetheless. The injured duo leaves the LMG behind as it's too heavy to carry in their current states and follow Carlos who had been waiting for them with worried eyes.

Their low, climbing posture protects them slightly from further fire from the enemy, but their speed was lacklustre... They would have never made it if it weren't for their unexpected saviour.

*Beepbeeep!*

*Pewpewpewpew!*

ED-E floats towards them while firing its laser at the Assassins, the projectiles actually managing to ignite a couple of the tents they were hiding behind.

"Eddie, you magnificent bastard!" Karl exclaims as he spots the robot, "Quick, get to the bunker!" he urges everyone as they continue, eventually spotting a rundown-looking shack in the corner of the Fort. It looked hastily constructed and functionless, not even worthy of storing garden tools...

Yet, it looked like the perfect place you'd want to hide something. The doors of the shack were already wide open, meaning Tamia and the rest of the group had already found it. Karl only hoped shit wasn't looking as dire as it was up here.

Inside the shack the group is greeted by numerous deactivated boobytraps. Some seem to have activated, but the rest were disarmed by a relatively skilful hand, in Karl's honest opinion... The room was almost empty aside from the traps, but in the corner, the floor seems to have opened up to reveal a metal staircase, one reminiscent of the bunker the Brotherhood of Steel had been hiding in or the Vaults he'd been inside.

At the bottom they're greeted by metal double doors with the Lucky 38 logo printed on them... Karl stumbles forwards with Caroline and tries to open it but hears shuffling from the other side. "It's Karl, don't shoot me you bastards!" he shouts as the doors open, revealing Tamia, Josie, Boone, Anja, and Dogmeat... With the addition of the tied up Caesar in the corner.

"Karl?" Tamia asks, walking over and helping support the man, "You're injured!"

"No shit!" he grunts out, forcing himself forwards before resting against the wall. Boone walks over and starts tending to his wounds, "Guessing you found what you were looking for?" he asks, glancing over at the group of women and children that were fearfully shuffling into the room.

Karl nods and smiles despite the pain he was in, "Fix me up after looking at my kid," he gestures at Caroline, "She took more shots than I did." says.

Boone nods and starts looking over Caroline. He frowns when he sees just how bad her injuries are, she'd been shot in the gut, and was bleeding pretty heavily from her arms. She'd probably need surgery to live through this.

"Will Ma be okay?" a young boy asks him from the side, he raises a brow and sends a glance to Karl who just solemnly nods. Boone gives a sigh, and looks at the boy, "If we can get her to safety soon, then yeah." he states, not willing to sugarcoat it. That said, he wasn't a doctor, maybe Afton could do something without needing invasive surgery.

"Traitor's, the lot of you." Caesar spits from the corner, but almost immediately receives a boot to the face courtesy of Anja.

"Be quiet, prisoner." she states in her usual dull tone.

Caesar just growls at them, he was already black and blue from interrogating him on the location of the bunker. The only threats he seemed to respond to were the ones threatening his manhood... It seems that even the most wilful people would bend over backwards to save that part. Tamia took great joy making the man sweat though.