Fallout, Second Life

Adam turned around to look at Deccanus and saw that he had taken the stimpack like he had wanted him too, his head wound was healing. Eve looked dinged and there was one large dent in her chassis but she was otherwise fine. Rae's arms seemed to be malfunctioning as they didn't seem to be as capable of smooth movements like before. Salvatore looked perfectly fine, however.

"Everyone alright!?" Adam called out to the group as a whole.

"Yes, I am fine." Deccanus said as he wrapped part of his head, despite the stimpack healing it.

"Fine, kid." Salvatore said as he reloaded his rifle and shotgun.

"I report a small bit of damage, sir! I request repair at your earliest convenience!" Rae said, as chipper as ever.

"I'm fine~ Though I might need to buff out some of these new scars when I get back home~" Eve said as she jumped out of the third basement floor and back onto the second through the super mutant behemoth hole. Adam nodded and then walked over towards where he saw the lasers being fired from and found Buddy, slumped up against a shelf that had tipped over against the wall. His legs were completely bent the wrong way and there was a massive indent in his chassis, but he still seemed functional.

"Unit designated 'Buddy' is in need of repair. Requesting assistance." Buddy said as Adam approached. Adam gently patted Buddy's head and smiled.

"I know Buddy, I'll get you fixed up soon."

"I think that's it, kid." Salvatore said as he walked over smoking already. "If there were any more I think they would have swarmed with the rest."

"I agree~" Eve said as she walked over. "I think that's the last of them." She then looked at Adam.

"Congrats handsome, you led a team and successfully eliminated one of the notable thorns in Chicago's side~." Adam let out a sigh of relief and then nodded.

"Alright, now we have to see if coming here was worth it, and not just charity."

"Plenty of food on the floor above us." Salvatore said between puffs of smoke.

"Yeah, though I'm hoping there is more." Adam said as he looked down the hole that led to the third basement level seeing the huge numbers of once organized shelves thrown about chaotically.

"Lets search the area and see what we find, we can start bringing stuff up once we know what we are looking at." Adam said as the others nodded in confirmation. He then turned to Rae. "Rae, are you functional enough to carry Buddy up to the APC?" He asked.

"I believe so sir! I shall bring him to the APC and then return here!"

"Thank you Rae." Adam said with a smile to them.

"It's my pleasure sir!" Rae said back.

The group then split up to search the building, both to make sure there were no other super mutants in hiding. However it was Adam and Salvatore who stumbled upon something interesting.

In a cage, either a faraday cage or simply a security cage and behind a very clearly locked and barricaded door was one last mutant, huddled in a corner, curled into a ball, looking scared.

"Please no hurt Pearl." The super mutant almost begged as he peeked a bit at the two of them from his fetal position. Adam shot a confused look at Salvatore who was just staring at the super mutant, unmoving, while smoking a cigarette.

"Pearl no hurt human! Pearl swear!" The super mutant said again, almost pleading in its louder than average tone.

"Pearl… is that your name?" Adam asked, cautiously as he slowly approached the cage to get a little bit closer to the mutant. His guard was still very much up but he was not yet sure what to make of the situation so he was not ready to simply off this mutant.

"Yes!" The super mutant said, sitting up a bit straighter as she answered, looking a bit happy to have been recognized. "Pearl's name is Pearl!" She announced proudly. Despite proclaiming a female sounding name the super mutant looked no different than any of the others, heavily masculine in shape and form as well as a deep masculine voice.

"Uh huh…" Adam said back, not sure what to do with this information yet, he once more looked at Salvatore whose neutral and uninterested expression was not helping him form opinions on the matter. Maybe that was by design.

"Well Pearl… we killed all the other super mutants here… are you-" Adam began before Pearl spoke up.

"You killed all of Pearl's brothers? Even Big Brother?" Pearl said, more excited than angry, a smile on her face.

"Y-yes…" Adam said not expecting that response.

"Oh, you are strong humies. Pearl finds that hard to believe. Humies are weak and squishy, that is why Pearl is locked in this cell." Adam decided to take another approach. This was his first time conversing with a super mutant and he got an almost childish mentality from it, like talking to a kid, so he changed tactics. Adam got down on one knee, ironically putting him close to eye level with the still sitting super mutant, and spoke in a calmer, even voice.

"The other mutants locked you in the cell because humans were weak?" Adam asked, softly and smoothly, confused what she meant.

"Yes!" Pearl returned with sad eyes. "Humans are squishy, soft. Not big and strong like super mutant!" Pearl returned resolutely. "Brothers went out to get humans, came back with humans. But there was a tiny humie among them, little and weaker than the rest! Pearl remembered… having own tiny human… tiny human looked like Pearl's own tiny human… Pearl doesn't remember well… but Pearl not want brothers to kill tiny human, but brothers not listen to Pearl, lock Pearl away for wanting to help the tiny Human. Now tiny human is gone, Pearl still in cage." Adam sighed slowly and pierced together the story based on what he was hearing.

It sounded like at some point the super mutants left and came back with new captives however one of them was… a kid, or perhaps even younger, a baby maybe? And this super mutant remembered its own baby? And thus it tried to plead with the others to not harm the child but they didn't listen and locked her up? There were some leaps of faith in the logic here, he needed to confirm with Salvatore, he knew so little about super mutants.

"Can Super Mutants have children?" Adam asked, not even sure where to begin.

"No." Salvatore said bluntly. "They are all sterile, that's why The Master failed way back when, but fuck 'im anyway." Salvatore said, flicking his cigarette aside now. "But from what it's sounding like this guy here remembered something from when they were human and it made 'em self-conscious or some shit, which led to this." He generally gestured to the cage.

"Wait.. super mutants were once human?" Adam asked, even more confused now.

"No shit, how the hell did you not know?" Salvatore asked with a soft chuckle.

"I don't know. It never came up. Wasteland biology is Deccanus' field of specialty. I just shoot things." Adam shrugged, Salvatore grinned.

"I just shoot things." He smiled. "Well anyway FEV turns people into super mutants, don't ask me how it works, I don't fucking know, but all of them end up like this guy here, more or less. Of course there are variants like nightkin, or the first generation super mutants which are as smart as you or I but none of that is important right now." He said before he too approached the cage.

"What you gotta do now, kid, Is figure out what you are gonna do with this mutant. It's your mission, thus, it's your problem." He said with another grin, enjoying throwing this onto Adam's lap and taking it off his own hands.