Radiance Ch. 81

"I'm honoured you remembered Chief," Ven said and the chief turned and tapped the side of his head.

"Might be getting on a bit in years but I never forget a friend no matter who they are and after what you guys did yesterday that's the best word to describe you," he said and Ven gave him a polite and respectful bow.

"Then the sentiment is echoed," he said.

"Alright well you boys have fun socializing while we go in and meet our supposedly friendly synth detective," Wisp said.

"Oh, you talking about Valentine? He ain't back yet or at least he ain't been signed back in has he?" the chief said aiming the question at the guard who was manning the signing book.

The young woman quickly scanned through the pages and then shook her head, "No chief no sign in here," she said and Wisp's brow furrowed as she glanced at her comrades.

"Think we'll go and have a word with his sectary see if we can get his location out of her, he might need a little help me thinks," Wisp said and the chief nodded.

"Yeah good idea, I know a lot of people hate synths around here and I don't blame em one bit but Nick's a good guy, he has done a lot of good around here so if you guys can bring him back in one piece it would be well appreciated," he said.

"Roger that chief you can count on us," Wisp said and with that, she turned and headed inside the city with Shepherd and Gregory while leaving the non-human boys outside.

It didn't take Wisp and the others long to get Nick Valentine's last known location out of his now worried sectary, in fact, she was more than a little eager to give it out given that Wisp and her people were now something of local heroes give that pretty much the whole city was buzzing with stories of how an unusual team of mercs had saved them from a mass mutant attack.

Well, it turned out that Nick's sectary was every bit the amutar detective as her boss and she'd swiftly figured out who Wisp and her team were and that they were one and the same so she was only too happy to enlist their help in tracking him down.

As it turned out Nick had been working on a kidnapping case believed to be the work of a strange cult that had been operating in the area recently.

According to the case notes they had been kidnapping teenage boys from around a few of the more isolated settlements and even from caravans, in fact, it had been the Minutemen that had hired Nick as a lot of their settlements had come to them for help and they were clueless as to how to track these people down.

But it seemed that either it was either taking Nick longer than he'd anticipated or they had gotten wind of him as he had not only missed his check-in but had failed to return on time and according to his sectary he was incredibly punctual and fastidious about such things, so now it fell to Wisp and her people to solve the mystery and possibly help a load of innocent people out of a real jam.

So once they had a copy of Nick's case notes the trio headed back out of the city where they found their boys waiting for them but rather happily sharing a cup of coffee with the security team and chatting away like old friends.

It also appeared that Malakai had found some tailoring work to keep his mind occupied as he was happily sat stitching someone's armour back together as they approached, though its owner wasn't hard to spot as she was stood watching him as he put the finishing touches to her padding.

"There we go not only as good as new but better, those pads I stitched in are dual purpose, they'll help keep you warm in winter and they'd help stop projectiles, it'll only stop up to low-tier rifle bullets I might add as I don't have any of the high-density ones on me thanks to having to replace the ones in Ven and Passa's armour but as long as you don't go jumping in front of a machine gun you should be good," Malakai said happily as he handed the jacket back to the woman.

She put it on and looked amazed, "Holy shit this is incredible, this stuff is as light as a feather! How can it stop bullets?" she asked and Ven grinned at her.

"Incredibly well that's how, been using Malakai's homemade armour for a while now and it has saved my scaly arse on numerous occasions and yeah granted he does tend to kit us out with the thicker and heavier pads due to us being in his words 'living bullet magnets' but oh boy this stuff is worth its weight in gold, I once tanked an entire salvo from a load of angry feminist super mutants wearing this stuff and came out the other side without a scratch on me, won't wear anything else now," Ven said clapping the blushing spider boy on the back.

"There are feminist super mutants now?" the chief asked in surprise.

"Yeah don't ask pretty miserable time but all gone now thankfully," Ven said.

"Alright, you guys ready to go? We got a lead on Nick and we got a bit of a walk ahead of us," Wisp said running her hand over Malakai's fully rear end and to her delight, she saw his spinnerets twitch and wiggle in delight at her touch.

"Yup we're all ready to go here," Malakai said repacking his tools and placing his kit back in his saddle bags.

"Alright then let's move out, hopefully, we'll see you guys again soon," Ven said and with a last wave to the security team the team turned and headed off in the direction of the wastes beyond the city.

"So which way oh glorious leader?' Ven said with a toothy grin as they hit the outer edge of the old city and were faced with the wastes beyond.

"Now that is a very good question my esteemed Claw, now according to the files we got from Valentine's sectary he was headed for a settlement called Greentop Nursery and according to his files it used to be a greenhouse farm settlement that was run by robots but has recently started taking on human settlers, but that's where the last person to be snatched was recorded by the Minutemen, so I believe we should start there, he even had a map marked out," Wisp said pointing to the marker on the sheet of aged paper.

"Alright lead on then let's go," Ven said and with that Malakai set off with Wisp riding on his back in the direction the map indicated.

It was a pretty long walk across the wastes and Wisp began to wonder if they would run into any of the others on their travels to their objectives as they moved, but fortunately, the trip was as quiet as it was uneventful, having two Claws at your back really did have its advantages as most creatures had some measure of self-preservation that stretched to not taking on an alpha predator let alone two of them.

The Greentop Nursery itself was a large enclosed farm that seemed to be growing what looked like Mutfruits in two massive greenhouses that sat in the shadow of the destroyed and crumbling but somehow still standing overpass that crisscrossed the area linking the freeways that once fed traffic through the area.

As they approached Wisp already saw armed settlers and quite a few Mr Handy robots milling about all of which scrambled when they saw them approaching though Wisp had no doubt that was because of the sight of Ven and Passa simply walking along, Claws tended to do that to people.

"Easy there friends we mean you no harm, we are merely visitors seeking information nothing more," Ven called making his voice boom across the landscape to the armed humans that had scrambled to get themselves behind the concrete barriers they'd dragged to set up firing positions and cover around the greenhouses.

Even from here, Wisp could see the confusion on the faces of the humans as they saw what appeared to be a Deathclaw talking to them, "Stay here guys me and Malakai will handle the introductions, the last thing we want is one of them getting twitchy and shooting the scales off Ven's arse because then we're going to have to sit in Gregory to stop him throttling every one of them with his bare hands," Wisp said and Gregory grinned but still snarled.

"And with good fucking reason, no one touches my Claw boy's fine scaly arse but me!" he said defiantly.

"Got that right gorgeous," Ven said coiling his tail around his human and shifting him closer to him.

Malakai let Wisp jump down and the pair walked over, well she walked Malakai kinda scuttled and given she still managed to trip over her own feet every so often it still amassed her that he managed to walk around with eight and never faltered once.

As they drew to about thirty years someone behind one of the barriers yelled at them, "That's far enough stranger, now who the hell are you and what in the name of hell is that with you?" a distinctly human voice called from behind the barrier.

Wisp looked at Malakai and nodded, "My name is Malakai Yellow leg and I am an Arachnakai, this here is Wisp my beloved one, back there is Ven and Passa two sentient Claws of the proud Northen pack and with them are Gregory and Shepherd, we are not here to start a fight we merely came seeking information about a missing detective called Nick Valentine out of Diamond city, he has been listed as missing and his sectary pointed us towards you guys as apparently he was investigating an abduction for you?" Malakai said his soft voice still cutting clearly across the silence of the space between them.

Wisp could hear whispers from behind the barriers and eventually, a man and a woman emerged, both of them appeared to be in their mid-forties and they were armed with high-calibre assault rifles though they did look kinda old.

"No funny business now ya hear?" the woman said pointing her weapon first at Wisp then at Malakai.

"Easy now there friend we are not pointing weapons at you and we'd appreciate the same courtesy," Malakai said holding his hands out to the side to show he had no weapons though to be fair Wisp knew for a fact that he didn't need them either as she knew that if he wanted to he could have both those guns out of their hands and have crossed the distance between them before either of these two could blink.

The pair looked at Malakai in amazement but they did acquiesced and pointed their weapons at the floor, "Thank you kindly," Malakai said.

"Tell your friends back there to approach and to keep their weapons in their holsters," tha man said and Wisp let out a shrill whistle and waved the other up.

She could see every set of eyes tracking Ven and Passa as the pair strode up and looked them over, "Greetings," Ven said which made a whole lot of mouths fall open.

"Well I'll be a son of a fucking mole rat, I thought my fucking ears were playing tricks on me when I saw who addressed us before but you can talk!" The man said in shock looking at Ven.

"Indeed and so too can my cousin here, I an Ven and this is Passa, both of the proud Northern pack it is good to meet you," Ven said offering a large hand out to be shaken towards the farm who after glancing at what must have been his wife tentatively stepped forwards and actually took it.

"Never in my life would I have thought I'd shake hands with a Deathclaw in my wildest dreams," the man said.

"It's just Claw if you don't mind, the only death we seek is those that would harm us or our beloved ones," Ven said.

"Wow you have some seriously nice manners there," the wife said glancing between the pair.

"We have found a soft voice and kind manner gets you a lot further in life than a gruff outlook and claws alone," Passa said with a smile.

"Seems like a good attitude to have, now you said you were looking for the mechanical detective Nick Valentine yes?" the farmer said and Wisp nodded.

"Yes that's right can you help us?" she said and the farmer nodded.

"Aye that we can missy but I can tell you now you ain't gonna like what we got to say," he said.

Wisp sighed and nodded, "Yeah I had a feeling you were going to say something like that, umm it's been a long walk to get here so may we?" she said gesturing to a place nearby where the two groups could sit and talk.

The pair looked at one another again and nodded before gesturing for them to head over to the large fire pit area where the farmers obviously burnt the waste from the farm, the two groups walked over and then all pulled up some seats with the two big Claws and Malakai having to seat themselves on the ground, though Malakai did his whole legs tucked up fluffy load of bread spider bit as usual.

"Alright I'll take it from the top so strap yourselves in younguns it's gonna be a long ride," the farmer said pulling out a little hip flask and taking a swig before launching into their tale.