I had died by falling.
A pretty lame death, just a trip and fall to crack my head open and pass on.
When I opened my eyes after hitting my head and seeing the light I could feel myself falling again. This fall however was much faster than my previous trip had been.
When I turned away from the blinding light I had a brief realization of what was happening to me. I was falling through the sky and had been going back first looking at the sun above me. This realization was terrifying and I admit I passed out for a bit out of fear, luckily I had strong bowels so I didn't shut and piss myself.
When I properly came to I quickly assessed what was going on. I was falling through the sky after dying and was approaching the desert dirt below. I had a bit of gear on me, a backpack with harness, baggy cargo pants, a normal shirt, and steel toe boots.
On one of my backpack straps was a strange handle that I felt like grabbing. When I grabbed it I made the realization that the harness and backpack were actually a parachute. When I pulled the handle a small chute launched out of the bag on my back and it pulled out the rest of my parachute.
I had never even read about parachutes or how they work and I certainly hadn't used one. I couldn't tell how high up I was but I knew it would take a bit to get down and do stuff. Now with a bit of time I could assess myself a bit more.
My pockets had stuff in them and I had what seemed to be a large caliber revolver on my hip. This revolver was massive and had a small wooden rifle body. As I was just floating I pulled out this large revolver rifle and flicked open the cylinder. Pulling out a shell and inspecting it revealed it was a 20 gauge shotgun revolver, which is why it was so large.
With the time I had in the air I found I didn't have much else in my pockets as I only had some more ammunition for my shotgun revolver, two small canteens of water, and hardtack with leather like jerky. I was getting close to landing on one of the bigger sand and rock mountains when I spotted a settlement of some sort in a valley near the river I had seen earlier.
I hadn't looked around very much other than for where I would be landing as most of what I could see up there was a blurry desert. Scouting the mountain I would likely hit I found a small ramshackle building looking over the valley settlement. I didn't know if I could steer the chute but I tried and got a bit of success after a bunch of wiggling swings.
Hitting the ground was very painful as I practically slammed into it and rolled down the mountain top slightly and got rapped in my chute. Crawling and shuffling out of the mess I shed the harness and shook as much sand off of me as I could. Anakin was very right to hate sand as I now had it everywhere on me as it clung to my sweaty skin and disappeared into places I couldn't find.
I stuffed the chute into the bag as best it could and slung the harness on like a backpack. I made my way to the peak and looked for the small building I had seen from the sky. On stable ground and having a 360° view the area I could see two other towns far in the distance with one having a road to the small settlement near me.
With a bit of looking done I found the small building climbed down to it. I seemed to be cursed to fall a lot today as I kept stumbling, slipping, and tripping all the way down. When I got to the building it was very small but was better built than I had thought, the walls were stacked stones with dirt in between them. The roof was metal sheets and even a car hood all welded ontop of metal bracing and bars.
Entering the shack I found some wood inside bracing the building up and allowing windows of cloth held down by rocks. The inside wasn't bad as it had a wooden chair at the biggest window which overlooked the valley, a wooden bed with dried plants and a cloth, and a metal shelf with some items on it.
I dropped my bag at the entrance and moved to the shelf. On the shelf I found something I was all to familiar with from my previous life which had never actually existed. It was a metal needle and injector with a dial on top and a leather strap at the needle.
The existence of this item meant I was in the world of fallout and judging by the desert I was in it was likely somewhere near New Vegas. With this knowledge I now knew was exactly I was, the snipers nest overlooking cottonwood cove. This place was special as it had the unique gun, the Gobi Campaign Scout rifle.
In game it was in a 100 lock pick footlocker near an ammo box but it wasn't there now. With a brief thought I found the only place it could be, under the bed. Removing the bed I found a hole in the dirt about 6 feet long with a large slab of metal on top. With a heave I set the metal cover against the wall and pulled out a 5 foot long metal box with a large lock on the lid.
It wasn't hard to open as a few hits with a hammer I found on the shelf popped the lock open. The locks in game were obviously a minigame meant to make lock picking useful. With the lock removed I opened the case to a gorgeous 4 foot long desert camo sniper rifle. Along side the beautiful rifle was 4 more magazines with 6 rounds in each, and an ammo sling for the chest.
In the hole in the ground where the gun case was I found it was also fake with a board over it covered in dirt. Under the board was multiple ammo boxes with ammo, some grenades, and ration supplies. After a bit of rummaging I grabbed my chute bag and cut the chute out of it–with a Bowie knife I found–to use as a backpack.
At the bottom of the bag I put the rations I had then a few boxes of ammo, on the top was the mags I had found. On top of it all was the bit of water I had from when I first fell here. I salvaged the rope and straps from the chute rigging and laid the chute out flat on the ground outside.
I had been the average working class person in my last life but I still had knowledge of how to do the basics of sewing and making stuff. The chute was a silk and Kevlar material I didn't recognize from my old world. The material was decently hard to cut but I eventually after a few hours cut out a sleeveless trench coat.
While it was nothing but the material cut in the shape I wanted it still worked great to block the sun and still give me some protection. With my coat finished I tied my scavenged rope and straps on to myself. With that done I made a head wrap with a large square of material and re-entered my shack to rest as the sun had gotten to the horizon.
With the good shelter and the remnants of my chute I was kept warm despite the cold of the desert night. The next day I woke up to the heat increasing from the rising sun and some shouts in the distance. Peeking through the windows I found a group of people on the road headed towards Cottonwood Cove. I took my rifle and left the shack to get a better vantage over the group and the cove.
Overlooking the group showed me it was perfect for an ambush. There were 20 slaves with only 8 light armor guards and their leader a decanus. My rifle would be perfect for the job as it's muzzle was also a flash hider. In the valley my shots would echo, preventing location via sound and the hider would reduce the chance of sight.
With a plan in mind I set my bag down and removed the mags for it and lined them up. I dropped the bipod and took aim. With a pull of the trigger the decanus hit the dirt and I racked another shell. The legionnaires were freaking out and running around like cockroaches when you turn on a light.
As soon as a man stood still I dropped him with a single shot weather it was a head or body shot. After my second mag I shot the Brahmin the slaves we're connected to with chains. I climbed down the mountain and went to the decanus and looted his body. I found a machete which I ignored as I took the 10mm msg he had along with the bit of ammo and a bottle of purified water.
After grabbing the useful stuff I found the key for the shackles and unlocked the slaves manacles as they seemed to only put them on at the cove. After unlocking the group I turned to the group that seemed to act as the leaders of them. "Loot the bodies and go back up the road, when you get to the town you may have to avoid it and go around as the legion may have already attacked it." I said while gesturing to the road we were on.
With that said I went back to the decanus and took his goggles and removed the football pads. While they wouldn't stop bullets they still offered some protection. Finished with the ambush I climbed back up to my bag and made my way to my shack. When I got to the shack I put my loot in and began strapping the pads together to make some armor.
When my armor was done I began setting up basic alert traps around my shack. It was past midday when I finished and I grabbed my gear to go scout the cove. An entire week had passed as I scouted the cove with the first day of scouting given me a look at Centurion Aurelius and other officers. I already planned to wipe our Cottonwood Cove but I needed to get the slaves out first.
At the end of my scouting I made my way to camp searchlight to get into the bunker basement thing in the destroyed building in town. Looking at the town I could see it had a large scattering of feral ghouls and a few laser turrets. I slung my rifle on my back and drew my shotgun revolver while slowly and stealthily approaching the turret terminal.
I got to the terminal but I couldn't hack it as I had no idea how to without a pip-boy. I drew my knife and pryed of a cover I found on the side and started messing with wires. I eventually found a panel of fuses of something that deactivated the turret so I began pulling and plugging them and, eventually the turret activated and began searching for targets that weren't human.
I sprinted to the large rock I had been on before and began sniping ghouls. When the ghouls came running the turret began burning holes in them at an extreme rate. After around an hour the pile of ghouls reached 73 and I made my way into town. The supplies I had found in the shack had stimpacks, radaway, and rad-x. After taking a few rad-x pills I went in and was met with a desolate and dead town.
While the real life searchlight was bigger than in game it still had the layout so I easily got to the building and made my way into the basement. Inside I could hear the 3 mercenaries talking about their mission. I pulled one of the grenades I had and tossed it in to them while slamming the door after the stairs shut. With a loud wimp and lots of pinging of shrapnel I opened the door and cleared the room. The lighter armored mercs were shredded and the metal armor guy had blood pouring from his head orifices. With a single shot from my shotgun his head splattered and I went to the safe at the back of the room.
In my last life I had learned to pick locks from videos due to interest in them from Bethesda games. I pulled out the makeshift picks I had and easily picked the lock. Inside the safe was a rad suit and multiple bottles of rad-x. Having gotten what I came for I looted the room itself and found, 1 Chinese spec ops manual, ammo of various types, and medical supplies.
I put on the rad suit and left the basement and made my way to the house with the ncr ghoul in it. I snuck in and found him sitting on his couch drinking with multiple empty bottles lying around. I waited for him to finish the bottle then put a bullet in his head, I knew this was horrible but if I were him I would have gotten revenge and died in the process. On his body I found the key to the police station and then made my way to the fire station.
I had activated multiple turrets already and when I opened the door I quickly shot one of the regular rad scorpions and ran. I got to another building and racked another bullet and killed another scorpion. A few minutes after killing the fifth scorpion the garage door was torn open and the rad scorpion queen burst out furiously. I hid behind the building from her sight as hundreds of lasers burnt her and made a light show as some bounced of her exoskeleton.
Eventually she destroyed the nearby turrets but was crippled in the process. I stepped out and put my entire mag in her face which was enough to kill her.