War Never Changes

[Hayleyrose2323]

Just a short little gorey/horror/sad story i did for fallout 4. I'm not that good at writing or punctuation but yea. Here it is.

 

Spoiler

War Never Changes. A Fallout Short Story By Poet

War.
War never changes. Many times during my childhood I would hear my dad say that, I never truly understood what he meant. War does change.  One moment, soldiers are fighting over corpse ridden lands, hiding in trenches, rifles close to there chests ready to kill anyone that comes close to them. And now, men in machine suits, vehicles and weapons that you would swear came straight from a novel of futuristic wonders, the kind that made it easier to kill someone. 
So yes, War does change.

My father passed away when I was 17, one year before I became a man. I wish I could say I shed a tear for him, but I did not, not because I didn't care of course. No, I loved my father dearly, his death never truly felt real. Each night watching the television with my mother, it would often feel as though he would once again walk through the front door greeting both of us after a long  day of work, that feeling never went away. The most important thing a man could ever care about is his family, he would tell me. I kept that idea close to me and did my best to never forget it. 
My life is my family, just as my father. What does a man have without his family I wonder? I often thought of that in the coming days of nuclear warfare. Till this day I have no answer. You begin to think of these things when you realize death might be next door, waiting to introduce himself to you or maybe a loved one. I had many restless nights, these thoughts screaming in my mind. I would often try to drown them out with some whiskey.

Screaming, crying, panic and then silence. All in a matter of seconds. My son Henry shook me awake. Henry. My Henry. He was so much like me in every way. Or at least thats what I thought at the time. He looked a lot like me, pale skin, dark brown hair and green eyes, his hair combed back like mine. He had just turned 17 just last month. I'm going off track aren't I? I do that. I do that a lot now.
My wife wasn't at the house, she had left early to go get groceries. Looking out the window to my right, I could see people running down the street, vertibirds quickly flying past. It was here after all. Death sure knew how to make an entrance. I knew that if this was what I thought it was, we didn't have time to pack anything, we had to run. Our only chance was the vault. I must admit I don't remember what vault it was, it was so long ago. My wife Gloria had signed us up only two days ago.
  
 I yelled to Henry to follow me. We ran outside quickly, I tripped, still groggy from waking up. "Dad, come on!", Yelled Henry. I waved my hand "Go, go!".  He ran as I got to my feet. I followed behind, looking around the neighborhood for my Wife, hoping she was out here among all the rest of the people running to the vault. I didn't see her. I ran past the houses, to the backyards down a dirt path and over a small hill to where the soldiers were waiting for us all, where the vault was. Then I heard it. A voice I would never forget. 
Gloria. 
I looked back and she was past the houses on a driveway fighting with a man. He was rabbid, trying to rip her clothes off. I tried to get the attention of the soldiers but they began escorting themselves and the civilians to the vault. The ones left behind either tried to follow and was shot or just ran off. I knew what ever I did, I had to choose quick. I could hear Henry screaming behind me. I looked back at him.
When you come face to face with fate, a moment in you're life that would change everything, and it involves someone you love and you know you might never see them again, what do you say? Henry was 17. Like me when I had lost my father. He had died of cancer, it began to effect his mind and one day he just went to sleep and didn't wake up until it was time for him to leave me and my mother. I'm sure there was things he wanted to say to us, but never got the chance. What would he say to me? Did I make him proud? Did I dissapoint him in any way? 
So many things I wanted to say. The vaults we're safe, I thought. Safe. He would be safe. My Henry would be alright.
I looked back at him and smiled. There wasn't enough time to say all the things I wanted to say to him. I love you. I am so proud of the man you've become. You are my life.  I'm sorry.
He shook his head and began to cry, a soldier saw him and grabbed his arm and pulled him back as I turned and ran for Gloria. I could hear him behind me sobbing and screaming for me "Dad! Dad, no!".
Maybe I had made the wrong choice. Maybe I should have gone with him. So many things were happening at once and so quickly. Could I have lived if I had left my wife to that fate, and not just that, but to leave her to die like that, her last moments being forced apon by another man, screaming for her life. 
I ran over quickly, the man had my wife on the ground, ripping the back of her dress, muttering something about vault-tec, he must have been one of the people not accepted into the vault and had decided his last moments should be that of pleasure, forced or not. I swung my fist hard at his face and he fell to the ground. I stomped my foot down hard on his head not sure if I had killed him or just simply knocked him unconcious. Either way at this moment It didn't matter. I grabbed Gloria and pulled her up, she was sobbing violently. I had thought maybe we could make it back to the vault in time, but then, a loud noise could be heard echoing through out the area. It was time. 
I took her hand and lead her into the unconcious mans house, his door left open. I knew it was no use, something as deadly and powerful as that, surely we were doomed. But I still shut the door and we in the kitchen by counter on the floor and waited. Glass shattered, wood shards scattered all over, debree of all kinds flew across the kitchen. While all this was happening, I heard her screaming in pain. But for me, the pain never came.
 Am I alive?
Is this death?
How long have I been here?
I realized my eyes had been open and I was staring at a wall, for how long I don't know. I don't remember passing out, but I don't remember waking up either. I felt so peaceful. So relaxed. I felt..
I felt nothing. I could hear wind blowing from the outside, but the room was dark, I couldn't see outside. I tried moving my head to look around, strangely my head moved but only slightly. I heard a groan from my right, where my wife had been sitting on the floor next to me. I slowly turned my head, hearing strange noises coming from my neck. There beside me was a flesh covered thing fused to my body. Or at least something that resembled a body. I had thought my arm was moving, but I realized it was hers. Her body  had some how burst open and melted around my own. And some how she was still alive.
"Gloria?" I asked in a deep raspy voice, it sounded like I had smoked cigarettes since I was born. She didn't answer, she only groaned. I couldn't move, our bodies were fused to the floor and counter.
The first few days I screamed for someone to come help me, anyone. No one came. After a while I had lost my voice and was unable to scream any longer. I tried moving hands, I was able to move my right one, but it was fused inside Glorias body and only caused her more pain so I stopped. My other hand and figers were fused flat to the floor. The days went by quickly surprisingly, I was in and out of conciousness all the time, although I would never remember passing out or waking up, I would just be staring at the same wall. One day I came to when I heard Glorias raspy voice say something. I had a hard time hearing what she was saying. But I soon realized she was saying "Henry". For the next day that's all she would say until finally she went quiet. It was strange. Like when my father died, I had no idea how to react to the situation. I was just there in the moment. Sometimes I would cry, others I would panic and try and scream, sometimes I would find my self staring at the wall again when my thoughts got the best of me. Was this insanity? Was I losing my mind?

One day I heard Gloria groaning again. But this time it wasn't as though she was in pain, more like she was annoyed. In seconds she was growling and hissing, her body moving violently. Flesh began ripping from my body as she tried to free herself and then the sight in my right eye went dark. I could feel the blood gushing from the side of my face, all the way down. She tore the flesh, including my eye from the side of my face. "Gloria! Gloria no!" I tried to yell, my voice low and almost a whisper. She then jerked to the side, pulling herself free from me and landed voilently to the floor lifeless. Her organs were hanging off the side of my body, her heart still beating for only a few more seconds until it became still. 
My Gloria was gone. I don't even remember what she looked like before the bombs fell, as its been so long.  I don't remember recent days after her death either. I had some impossible hope I would be able to free myself and find help, but one day a mirror on the wall next to the front door fell after something crashed upstairs. I had finally gotten a good look at my face and I knew then there was no getting help for what ever had happened to me. My fleshy body, covered with burns, blisters and just red flesh was melted to the floor as I suspected, but it was worse than that. My nose and eye was gone, a good chunk of my head was missing. New flesh had started growing from my body, looking like veins, spreading across any surface it could find. The floor, the walls, the counters. Veins had spread the most from the open wound on my head. And now. Now I finally know what my father meant.
George looked up at the armored man and let out a chuckle. "All these years. And I finally got it. War never changes. Even if it evolves, the same things happen. People die. Families are torn apart. Love is destroyed."
"I'm sorry mister. If what you are saying is true, which honestly, at this point, I have no real reason to doubt you, you've been here for a while. You're situation seems to have gotten worse." He said looking around the abandoned house, it was covered in fleshy red veins. "Are you sure you want me to end it?"
George sighed "Look at me. Of course. It's our agreement, I tell you a story and you kill me."
The man nodded "I figured as much, I don't blame you of course, I just wanted to be absolutely sure. I'm sorry for everything that has happened to you."
George gave another chuckle "And here I thought kindness had died along with everything else."
"Not yet, at least. Any regrets?"
"Oh of course. Not that I would change what happened to me. I believe I ended up where I needed to be for what ever reason. I just wish I could have said something to my son. I remember what it was like, a year from becoming a man and not having a father. It left me so afraid to see what kind of person I would become, what kind of father I would be."
The man picked his rifle up from beside him and cocked it "What If I could tell you Henry lived a full and happy life?"
"How?"
"I visited the vault he had fled to, it had some weird stuff going on but for the most part people lived a long time in there even to this day. I met a woman who has a great grandfather named Henry. He married, had two kids and they had a child, the womans mother. He died in his sleep apparently at the age of 89."
"My Henry?"
"Yea. You're Henry. He lived. I promise you."
"Thank you. Thank you so much."
"You're welcome George. Goodbye."
"Goodbye."