Quarry Junction Function

Time seemed to fly in the months after Mr. House's securitron army had decimated Caesar's Legion and exiled the NCR from Nevada, its passage as unstoppable as the explosive force of the detonation of an atomic warhead.  Whatever remained of Caesar's forces after the Second Battle of Hoover Dam was just nothing more than feuding rag-tag bands of raiders preying not only on misfortunate travellers in Colorado and Arizona, but also, and particularly, against each other.  It was rare to find one of the legionnaires wandering the I15, though the ones that did weren't wearing their old red-dyed uniforms, not wanting to draw the lethal attention of Mr. House's securitrons or vengeful former NCR vigilantes.  Not that the securitrons and vigilantes would be the only threats to former legionnaires who had renounced all base villainy for the sake of self-preservation in an environment that had a multitude of ways of killing anybody, from raider to merchant to even, almost completely, the Brotherhood of Steel.

Black Mountain was the home of a group of super mutants led by the radio personality Tabitha, the tyrannical leader of a group of second generation super mutants who ordered her followers to kill any humans that approached Black Mountain.  Black Mountain was dangerous, not only because of its super mutant inhabitants, but also due to the radiation that permeated on the mountain summit.  The amount of radiation at Black Mountain was at levels that were intolerable for humans, but bearable for super mutants and ghouls.  Mr. House's securitrons had never shown any inclination for aggression towards the inhabitants of Black Mountain.  This might be probably due to the steep and narrow terrain that would make any attempt for the securitrons to assault the mountain rather costly, despite their upgrades, for the super mutants were armed with heavy weaponry that could challenge the Securitron MkII's reinforced armour.  The most likely reason for Mr. House's disinterest in Black Mountain was because the super mutants had not shown any reason for Mr. House to perceive Tabitha of her followers as a threat to be eliminated, but rather a group to be monitored for the time being.

Not too far south of Black Mountain was the limestone quarry, Quarry Junction.  Once, before the Second Battle of Hoover Dam, the NCR were mining the limestone at Quarry Junction to produce cement that would be used by the New Californian Republic's numerous construction projects.  One day, escaped convicts had snuck into the quarry and stolen a huge cache of dynamite and drove the quarry workers away.  While the quarry workers waited in the nearby town of Sloan for the NCR military to respond, nearly two dozen deathclaws had moved in, making its nest in the limestone quarry, halting the work at the quarry.  For a couple months the quarry workers had been unable to approach the quarry due to the aggressive nature of deathclaws, and in that time the NCR had failed to deal with the deathclaws.  After the Second Battle of Hoover Dam, Mr. House's securitrons went to the quarry, where they were successful in killing the deathclaws that had made their nest there.  The miners were so grateful for what Mr. House had done for them that they were happy to continue their work at the quarry for him, where Mr. House and the Courier, who was employed by Mr. House, were currently undergoing some construction projects in and around New Vegas.  Construction work was being done along the Strip and Freeside, where the Courier was planning a gentrification of Freeside to attract more people to flock to New Vegas, hiring not only skilled labour from California but also locals looking for paid work.

The midday sun burned fierce on the I15, like it did everywhere else in the Mojave.  Wearing a wide-rimmed hat to shield her eyes, or rather eye, for she wore an eye patch over where her right eye was, having lost it to a deathclaw some years ago, the buxom redhead Katt travelled the hot, lonely road.  Travellers were always a highly uncommon sight, even on the cracked and pothole-marked roads where stationary automobiles occupied by their long-dead skeletal inhabitants rested, but travellers had been particularly scarce along the I15, and had been for less than a year.

Before they were nearly completely annihilated by Mr. House's securitron army several months ago, Caesar's legionnaires would harass the roads, attacking NCR caravans, either burning the cargo the NCR merchants that the legionnaires murdered in cold blood were transporting, or pilfered for the glory of Caesar, occasionally taking merchants captive to be sold as slaves.  A more common sight were marauding outlaws that preyed on travellers, mainly raiders but for a while the escaped convicts from the New Californian Republic Correctional Facility known as Powder Gangers had terrorised the roads, slaughtering those who travelled the roads south of New Vegas, even once harassing the town of Goodsprings, where Katt had rested the previous night in an abandoned caravan trailer just outside town.  Even the deathclaws had threatened travellers on the road, particularly along the I15.

But that all had changed, and quite suddenly when Mr. House and his securitron army pulverised Caesar's Legion and expelled the NCR from Nevada.  It was not only Caesar's Legion that met a rapid and merciless end from the MkII securitrons, for the Powder Gangers, having previously been decimated by the Courier some time before the battle at Hoover Dam, had been nearly completely slaughtered by the militarised robots, where only a few powder gangers remained roaming the wasteland, usually hiding from the securitrons that were hunting them.  The deathclaws that had once plagued the I15 highway had also been wiped out, the robots spending weeks combing the entire area around the limestone quarry wiping out the wild inhabitants of the wasteland, not just deathclaws, but also nests of radscorpions and cazadores.

In the months since the Second Battle for Hoover Dam the town of Sloan, which was at least a half-hour walk south of Quarry Junction had grown in size.  The town was populated by a sizeable amount of miners from California, but in recent months there had been an influx of travellers stopping at Sloan, usually to rest their weary legs after a long day's walk, but more recently signing up to work the limestone quarry.  Men and women alike, mainly human, but an occasional ghoul as well would approach Sloan to sign on for employment at the nearby quarry.  Katt had heard back when she passed Goodsprings that the quarry was still operational despite the change in ownership from the NCR to the Courier.  Being very low on supplies and having no income, it seemed tempting to sign on for work at the quarry, at least temporarily until she could save enough money to continue.  Maybe she could earn enough of a stipend at the quarry to test her luck at the tables in the Strip.

Immediately after entering the small but growing town, the men would turn their gaze towards her, glazy eyes being directed towards her hugely exorbitant bosom that bounced effortlessly under her long-sleeved flannel shirt, the buttons of her shirt straining slightly, threatening to come undone without warning due to her huge bust.  The women in town glowered with some jealousy at the sight of the unnaturally attractive redhead, the wives especially cross at their husbands for drooling at the freakish sight of a woman with breasts that seemed to big to be natural.

Katt approached two men who were sitting outside one of the large buildings made of corrugated iron.  They were each smoking a cigarette when their attention was directed at the approaching redhead.  What those two men were fixated on were Katt's very huge breasts.  A cigarette fell out of the mouth of one of those men, the younger one, falling on his lap, causing the man to jump to his feet when the lit cigarette nearly burnt a hole through his pants.  The man patted his groin, moaning from the pain of hot ash mildly burning his groin and muttering about how lucky his pants didn't catch on fire.

Momentarily distracted by the little misfortune of the man who nearly burned his pants, Katt addressed the other, older-looking man.  'Excuse me, sir.'

The older, bearded man looked up at Katt, his eyes looking at, to Katt's surprise, her face.  'May I help?' he asked.

'Yeah, may we help?' chimed in the other, younger, scruffy-looking man who luckily didn't burn his crotch.  He too managed to not look directly at Katt's chest.

'I'm wondering where do I need to go to sign up for work,' said Katt.

'I'm sorry, miss.  We do not have any more vacancies.  We've had a huge influx of people coming into town wanting to work just recently and are at full capacity.  There are simply no jobs available,' the younger man said.

'Oh, I see,' Katt said, dropping her head, a deflated expression on her face at the news.

The older man stroked his grey beard.  'I think we might have a few positions available in the kitchen, but if you're hoping to find work digging in the quarry, I'm sorry but those positions have been filled out,' the older man told Katt.  'Unfortunate really, considering that the workers who dig the limestone are actually paid a decent wage, in caps too instead of that crappy toilet paper the NCR uses as currency.'

'I'll take it,' Katt said with enthusiasm, grateful for the opportunity to earn some money, no matter how much or how little her wage would be.  Ever since having all her caps stolen by some young thieving scoundrel some weeks back she had been looking for the first opportunity for her to earn some cash to spring up.  She couldn't find any in Goodsprings.  Without any money to purchase some goods, she had to trade in her black leather jacket, which was in relatively good quality to the general store owner Chet in exchange for some food and water.  The stingy merchant wouldn't agree to add in some 10mm bullets as well, for she did sorely need them as her 10mm pistol had less than half a clip of ammo left.

'OK, just head for the mess hall, which is the north-most building straight ahead,' said the older man, pointing towards a large, two storey building.

Katt saw the building that the older man was pointing at.  At that time, another man approached.  After briefly staring at Katt's humongous breasts, he addressed the older man.  'Foreman, we caught the scoundrel who has been stealing our dynamite.  A powder ganger, no doubt.'

'No doubt one of the last,' the foreman Chomps Lewis said, standing up.

'He's being kept under guard by some of the other miners at the quarry,' the man said.

'I guess it's time I met this scoundrel,' Chomps Lewis said.  The old foreman reached for his construction hat, which was resting atop a pile of scrap and rocks, putting it over his stubbly scalp.  'The lady in the mess hall you need to speak to is Jas Wilkins.  She'll be in the kitchen,' the foreman told Katt.  'Now, I'll have some words with this powder ganger,' he added to himself as he and the other two men walked off to the quarry.

Katt watched the three men walk off in the direction of the quarry where the foreman would punish the dynamite thief.  If the thief was a powder ganger, then it would mean one less powder ganger in the wasteland, not that they were a big concern anymore, not after they had been decimated, the prison where they had been holed up after seizing control of the facility from it NCR warders now a smouldering ruin thanks to Mr. House's securitrons.

The fate of the powder ganger was of no concern for Katt.  She speculated that the powder ganger would probably be shot or strung up.  The truth was she couldn't care less.  All she was interested in was work.

Katt walked to where the mess hall was.  She could see a handful of miners emerge from the building, some sipping water from their canteens, and at least two of them rubbing their fat bellies after eating a sumptuous meal.

As she approached the mess hall, she saw a fat middle-aged woman hovering over a generator.  She was barking at the generator, yelling at it for breaking down every so often, even giving it a good kick.  Katt approached the angry woman, who was really steamed at the generator, likely because it had broken down or was malfunctioning.  Katt had thought that kicking the generator had only damaged it further if it wasn't broken beyond repair.

'Excuse me, miss,' Katt said as she approached.  The middle-aged woman glowered when Katt called out to her.  She momentarily glanced at the redhead's huge bust, then turned away, looking at the broken generator.  'I can take a look at the generator if you like,' Katt offered.

The overweight middle-aged woman faced Katt.  'What, a bimbo like you can fix this broken thing?' she scoffed, immediately making an ignorant assumption based on Katt's sexy-looking body.

'I might not necessarily look it, but I am a decent mechanic,' Katt said, for it was true that she knew a few things about repairing electronics.  In the years since being forced to leave her home of Vault 101, she had learned a number of things in the wasteland of Washington DC.  Her father, despite being a doctor, had a knack for handiwork and had taught her some basic mechanical repair work.  The rest Katt had learned from various people she had met in the last four or so years.

The middle-aged woman stepped aside to let Katt take a look at the generator.  Katt knelt down next to the generator, running a hand over it.  She felt in indent on the metal casing where the woman had kicked the generator.  The redhead glanced at the toolbox next to the generator.  'May I use the tools in the toolbox?' she asked the fat woman.  Katt saw her shrug apathetically, sceptical of the younger, slimmer broad's ability to repair anything.

Katt opened the toolbox and took out a screwdriver.  She used the screwdriver to loosen the bolts on the metal casing that encased the delicate but fragile generator.  When the metal casing was removed Katt saw what the problem was immediately.  'Hmm...' she pondered at the conductor that had simply malfunctioned.  She guessed that the only way to repair the generator was to have the conductor replaced.

'I don't suppose you have a spare conductor on hand?' Katt asked the woman.

'So the problem is a busted conductor?' the woman asked incredulously.

'I've seen it before, back when I lived in a vault.  A friend of my father's showed me what to do should a conductor need to be replaced.  Without it, this town will be without electricity,' Katt explained.

'Wait, you're from one of them vaults that the survivors from the Great War barricaded themselves in?' the woman asked, more curious than incredulous.

'Yeah, I'm from a vault all the way back in DC,' Katt told the middle-aged woman.

'That's a long way.  I myself am from a vault,' the woman told Katt.

'You are?'

'There's a vault located in the Strip, across the street from where the NCR had their embassy.  It's entrance was disguised as a motel where the vault was situated underneath.  Most of its inhabitants had to move out when Mr. House won control of our vault after those who lived in the vault that supported Mr. House won a game of blackjack, though a few remained to operate the vault which Mr. House converted into a hotel-casino.  Since then, I have sworn to never play blackjack ever again,' the middle-aged woman said.

'It must be a change for you, no longer living in your vault,' Katt sympathised.

'I was fortunate to have studied engineering while I was growing up in the vault, back before Mr. House evicted us.  Otherwise, I wouldn't know what I would be doing with myself.

'Look, I want to apologise for my rudeness earlier.  I should know better than to judge a book by its cover,' the woman apologised.

'It's OK.  I'm used to people making ignorant assumptions about me.  It comes with these "fat men",' Katt said with candour, putting her hands under her incredibly large boobs and bouncing them in her hands.

The middle-aged woman boomed in laughter.  'You sure got some wit.'

'Yeah, I do.  Anyway, the only problem is the conductor.  You need to get a replacement one,' Katt said.

'We should have a couple spare ones lying about,' the middle-aged woman said.  'I should be able to take care of the repairs now that I know what the cause of the problem is.'

Katt placed the screwdriver back in the toolbox.  She rose to her feet.  'I should be on my way.  The foreman told me that I could find a job in the kitchen.'

'Why would you want to work in the mess hall when you know your way around a generator?' the middle-aged woman asked.

'Does the town need more mechanics?' Katt asked.

'Not particularly, not since another woman settled down here.  Dressed in wool rags covering every inch of her body except her face.  Likes to punch things,' the woman said.

'Sounds like an interesting woman,' Katt said.

'She's a mysterious one, I'll admit that.  That's the Brotherhood of Steel, after all.'

'This woman you mentioned is with the Brotherhood of Steel?' Katt asked, rather curious about this woman, considering her past affiliation with the Brotherhood of Steel, more specifically the East Coast Brotherhood.

'Last I checked, she was drowning her sorrows in the mess hall.  You can talk to her if you want.  Just don't expect her to be open to you.'

'Thanks.  I'll keep that in mind.'

Katt headed for the mess hall where she would find this woman, the one that was a part of the West Coast's Brotherhood of Steel.  Katt had heard that they had been driven into hiding in the Hidden Valley after the NCR had driven them out of HELIOS One solar power plant six years ago.  Since then the other Brotherhood chapters, such as the Texas Brotherhood had lost all contact with them and had no clue how they were faring after their defeat at HELIOS One.

Katt stepped inside the mess hall.  The door was left open, for it was sweltering hot inside, and there were no windows or air conditioning to cool the building interior.  It was dimly lit inside, the few lights that were operational being powered by the mess hall's emergency generator, which was responsible for supplying electricity to the kitchen where there were ovens, stoves and refrigerators that needed electricity to function.

There were only a handful of people inside.  Sitting in one corner were a few bearded men playing a game of cards.  Sitting on the table near them was a woman.  She was dressed in drab-looking clothing that covered every inch of her skin except for her face and hands.  The woman who sat alone wore a pneumatic gauntlet on her right hand.  There was one other person in the mess hall.  She stood behind the counter, bored and sweating in the hot, arid mess hall.  The woman behind the counter, whom Katt assumed was Jas Wilkins, downed a glass of water to keep hydrated within the mess hall, which was stifling hot inside, so hot that Katt thought that it was cooler outside.  With this summer heat, it was rather difficult to tell where it was hotter, inside or outside.

Katt approached the lonely woman who sat near the men who were playing cards.  She was not in a rush to look for work, so she thought she would speak to the lonely woman wearing the rags and the pneumatic gauntlet.

'Is this seat taken?' Katt asked, gesturing to the chair that faced the woman with the pneumatic gauntlet.

The woman glanced up at Katt.  When her eyes fell on the redhead's chest, they widened in much the same was a person who had woken so suddenly would.  The woman's jaw gaped as her stupefied expression was fixated on Katt's hugely ample bust.  She would eventually snap out of her mindless stupor, gesturing to Katt that she could join her.  'Please, keep me company,' the ragged woman said overeagerly.

Katt paid no heed to the other woman's eagerness.  She sat down when the woman insisted.  'Thank you,' said Katt, grateful to at least rest her weary legs, taking her hat off to fan herself.  Katt was sweaty after long hours in the sun, her forehead absolutely soaked when she ran a hand across her forehead to wipe the sweat off her brow.

'You new here?' the woman asked Katt.

'I just arrived,' Katt told the woman.

'You must be here looking for work.'

'Do you work here?'  Katt asked.

'No, I just settled down here is all,' the woman answered.  'The people here are at least thankful for my expertise.  I swear that there isn't anyone here competent enough to fix anything.'

'I met a woman who was trying to fix one of the generators,' said Katt.

'Let me guess, middle-aged and overweight?'  Katt nodded and said, 'Yeah.'  The woman sitting across Katt stretched out her arms and fingers.  'I'm surprised someone like her could repair anything.'

'I was looking at the generator she was kicking and discovered that the conductor needed to be replaced,' Katt said.

'So that's what's wrong with the generator,' the woman said.  She seemed impressed.  'You wouldn't happen to be a mechanic by chance?'

'I've learned a lot of things in my travels,' Katt told the woman.

'So you've travelled far and wide?' the woman asked Katt.  She sat upright, appearing interested in hearing of Katt's experiences.

'It's been several long months since I had left DC,' Katt said.

'Wait...DC.  As in Washington DC?'

'That's where I was from,' Katt told the woman.

'That's a long way from the Mojave,' the woman said.

'A journey made lonelier after my faithful dog companion died,' Katt said, reflecting on the death of her faithful canine who had accompanied her in her adventures in the DC Wasteland several years ago.

'That must have been hard for you, losing your companion,' the woman said sympathetically.  'I myself have recently lost my family.'

'You have my condolences,' Katt empathised.  'You know, the woman that I mentioned...she told me that you were with the Brotherhood.'

'I hope you don't have a problem with that,' the woman said defensively, her pneumatic fist clenched.

'Actually, I came here to investigate why all contact with them had been lost.  You see, I was sent here by the Texas Brotherhood to find their brethren who had been forced to hide out in the Hidden Valley after their defeat by the NCR six years ago,' Katt explained.

'Wait, you mean you're with the Brotherhood?' the woman asked, surprised to have met another member of the Brotherhood, especially one from another state.

'I'm not a member of the Brotherhood, but I was sent by their elder to establish contact with the Brotherhood in the Mojave,' said Katt.  'Considering my dealings in the past with the East Coast Brotherhood, the Texas elder assumed that I was the best person for the job.'

'Well, I would not like to be the pallbearer of bad news but, if the Brotherhood from Texas had sent you, then you ought to know what had happened.'

'Don't tell me they were wiped out?' Katt asked, aghast at the thought that the remnants of Mojave's chapter of the Brotherhood of Steel was destroyed.

'The bunker where we were based in was destroyed.  Everyone inside the bunker was obliterated when someone had initiated the bunker's self-destruct sequence.  When I had heard what had happened to the Brotherhood in the Hidden Valley I immediately went to investigate.'

'Who would want to do something like that?' Katt asked.

'It wouldn't have been anyone in the Brotherhood.  There was only one outsider who would have had access to the bunker, and it was a man I had introduced to the Brotherhood.  I thought he was a friend who would help the Brotherhood, but he was just a minion of Mr. House,' the woman said bitterly.  'How I despise him for what he done.'

'And why would you let him destroy your people?'

'We had parted ways some time before the bunker's destruction.  It was, ironically, after Elder McNamara banished me from the Brotherhood forever.  I had approached the Followers of the Apocalypse to join them, seeing that I had nowhere else to go.  The Brotherhood had been following us, the man responsible and myself to the Followers outpost, and while we were away murdered all the members of the Followers at the Outpost and waited to ambush us.  After that, I just wanted to be alone, and that was when he and I parted ways,' the woman said.

'The man who destroyed the Brotherhood.  Was he the Courier?' asked Katt.

'The one and the same.  Now he's known as Mr. House's right-hand man.  In addition, he now owns the quarry here and is the unofficial mayor of Freeside.  Keep in mind, I said unofficial.  He doesn't go around making any decisions or bossing people around, but he is heavily involved in rebuilding Freeside and fixing the Strip and is widely admired by not only the people of Freeside but also the Followers of the Apocalypse.'

'And the purpose for fixing the Strip and Freeside would be?' Katt asked.

'To attract people to come to New Vegas and throw money away at its casinos.'

'I had hoped to do some gambling in New Vegas, but I was robbed on the way here.  Some punk had stolen my sack of caps while I was asleep in Arizona, and now I am here, looking for work,' said Katt.

'Maybe I should look for work as well,' the woman said.

'Thinking of going to New Vegas?' asked Katt.

'It's worth contemplating, if only to ask why he would destroy my people.'

'There isn't anyone in the Brotherhood left alive?'

'Only a few patrols who were outside the bunker at the time, but they have since moved on.  The ones who were outside were all paladins, and they were relatively few in number.  Our scribes were all killed when the bunker self-destructed,' the woman said.

'So you would want to avenge your friends, despite being kicked out of the Brotherhood?'

'I would want nothing less than to pummel the life out of that bastard,' the woman told Katt, pounding the table with her mechanised gauntlet.  'Even though I was kicked out of the Brotherhood, I would do anything for them.  I still think of them as family.  But I wonder what revenge would accomplish.  Should I ever see him again, I'll...oh I don't know.  If I decide to kill him, then I will.'

'I think that you should continue to live with your life.  You would be no good to the Brotherhood if you're dead,' Katt opined.

The woman sighed.  'Maybe.  I mean, the Brotherhood was in decline.  We were not taking interest in anything that would benefit us in the long-term.  We would forsake beneficial technology that would help us, like cybernetic augmentations and food production and only focus on developing and hoarding advanced weaponry.  From their behaviour they were asking for it.  Still, they didn't deserve to be destroyed.'

'Maybe you can take me to this bunker.  I would like to see what had happened to the Brotherhood,' Katt asked.

'You want to go to the bunker?'

'Like you said, it was destroyed.  If that were so, then there would be nothing of value left stealing because everything was destroyed.  Not that I would loot the place or anything like it was some abandoned factory.'

The woman raised her left arm.  'Hey, I'm not accusing you of anything.  And if there were anything left worth taking, I would reckon that scavengers would have made off with it.'

'So you would take me to your bunker?' asked Katt.

The woman shrugged.  'I don't see the harm now.  It's already wiped off the face of the earth.  I can't see how you would make things any worse considering that the worst had already happened.'

'Thank you.  I really appreciate it.'  Katt extended her left hand to the woman, not wanting her right hand to be crushed by the power fist the woman wore on her right hand.  'The name's Katt.'

The woman with the pneumatic gauntlet shook Katt's proffered hand.  'It's a pleasure to meet a lovely woman like yourself.  I'm Veronica Santangelo, former scribe of the Mojave Chapter of the Brotherhood of Steel.'