Ten minutes after leaving the police station I found my first enemy, or rather, it found me. The first bark took me off my feet and sent me flopping into the air. The second caught me midair and put me through a shopfront. The third brought the shelving down around me. As a shelf board bounced off my head I began to stand. My hand was at my hip but before I could draw the enemy slammed into me. My backward sprawl put me in the shattered counter, old money raining down like leaves.
My dust covered visor almost immediately got a slathering of slime from my enemy as its paws pushed down on my shoulders. The loud growl, akin to a chainsaws scream, cut out as the slime slapped ont my helmet. A stunned second passed before I actually looked at my enemy. A truly terrifying specimen of cybernetic dog stood above me, its nose point ed directly at the badge on my chest. A loud sniffing sounded as its biological eye lit up in innocent curiosity and joy. Its glowing red eye beamed straight at my badge for a few more seconds before the dog gave a snort and looked at me. Through my dirtied invisible body, through my helmet, right into my eyes.
A second passed as it looked at me, right before my helmet began getting slathered in slime. Almost instinctually I reached up and began rubbing the dogs fur. Its spiked tail began to wag with lethal force as it danced around at my petting. The dog leapt off of me and circled, ignoring the debris and trash scattered around. As I sat up it began nudging at me for more petting. I obliged, thanking whatever gods ruled this world that the badge had actually worked.
I slowly stood using the dog for balance and checked myself over. Once again thanking whatever gods ruled this shithole that I had nothing but some sprains and bruises, my pipboy recommending a basic painkiller and icing sore spots. I ignored the dull aches and pains and made my way back to the street, the dog following me with circles and spiked tail. My clothing and armor was enough to stop the deadly whips but the tail still lashed me as I walked.
The moment I got to the street I dug out a bit of jerky and tossed it into the half steel maw of the dog. However, as the chainsaw revved up another sound echoed off the towering skyscrapers. The screeching of a building bending in the wind was followed by a whirring. At the end of the whir was a single click and the wall beside me melted in less than a second. The splashing molten stone and metal hit the ground and cooled in the acidic water with multiple harsh hisses.
I looked opposite of the wall to find a massive humanoid robot, bigger than a super mutant, menacing red eye staring me down. In its hands was a large cannon covered in sleek retro-futuristic tech. On the side facing the bot was the distinctive grey head of a fusion core, its red dot shining in the robots glare. The whirring sounded again and I broke into a sprint. Molten stone and metal slapped me in the face as I bolted, the rain of super heated building sizzling against me. A soft bark echoed behind me as the cyber dog gave chase behind the human that it believed was a police officer.
Two more times the rain of molten rock splashed at me and I simply ran through it. My armor and clothing had been designed for a balance against both guns and energy weapons. I ignored the splashes and finally took cover behind a building. Another explosion of molten stone hit the ground and I looked out at my attacker. Its massive form loomed in the street, tall enough to use the street lamps as golf clubs. Another blast from its weapon showed me that it truly had horrible aim. It had gotten close multiple times now but it simply had never hit me.
With a robot it normally went three ways after that. They either had bad aim from programming, purposefully or not; bad hardware from no maintenance, or it simply couldn't aim properly.
It stomped forward in a slow inevitable march as it blasted stone and metal from the buildings around me. I brought up my blaster and carefully took aim. A small burst was all I let loose. The heavy plasma bolts slammed into it and shattered its armor while melting internals. However as it staggered a switch seemed to click. It's eye flashed brighter and it raised its weapon. This time my pipboy immediately started beeping and I checked it with a glance.
[Warning Overheating of Clothing or Armor. Body Temperature at Threatening Levels in Approximately 1 Second. Cool down Immediately or Suffer Severe Burns and Heat Based Damage!]
I flinched back as I looked up, feeling the heat in my body. I threw myself to the ground and rolled, the acidic water of the street cooling me and getting through my outer layers to give me small chemical burns. That was nothing however as the wall I was behind began to sloth away as a super heated liquid instead of the burst of explosive melting that had previously happened. I quickly stood and looked around for new cover that might help me eliminate this threat. That ended in seconds as the wall I had moved to began melting and falling away.
Instead of going for cover I broke into a sprint for distance and obfuscation. The low radioactive fog of this place was thick in some parts and would likely function well against this bots sensors. With that and the urban landscape I could easily reposition and get a few more shots into the enemy. When I stopped my run to reassess I found the cyber dog still at my side. Instead of circling me or whatever, it was sitting and wagging its tail against the ground.
As it looked at me I looked back and it glanced away at a taller building in the distance. This building easily stood out, not for the height or opulence, but the large dull gold heads on the sides. Those things were a staple of the fallout world and were related to the weird eldritch and supernatural bullshit that sometimes plagued this place. A few thoughts popped up telling me to investigate it as those were usually on important places but the smarter thoughts said stay the hell away from that spooky shit.
I looked back to the dog and spoke. "I ain't going over there Scooby, none of that shit for me." I wagged my finger at it and it nipped, still happily wagging its tail. A small snort at it was all I gave and I began trekking backwards to get a blind spot on the bot. Ten minutes passed before I finally spotted it and properly circled.
My blaster was still the most reliable weapon in this place so I took aim after bracing against a wall. Once my sights were on my target I pulled the trigger and held it down till the blaster shut off for cooling. Unfortunately the bot was still standing. The metal colossus stood, its armor red hot and dripping form its frame. It's baleful red eye glared directly at me as it raised its cannon. The whirring of the laser weapon was all I needed as signal to draw two of my plasma defenders and start firing. My chest immediately heated up as I rained green globs of energy onto the bot.
As my chest burst into flames and my visor blurred I finally got a shot to the eye of the cyclopian and its final stagger sounded its death. In a fit of unluck I got a final shot to my chest, my armor exploding in a blast of super heated material. I jerked backwards and yanked at the armor and melted junk on my chest, already feeling heatstroke trying to get me. My not so thick gloves did little to protect from the burns but I got most of the hot stuff off my body and began peeling at my hands, doing my best not to deglove myself in the process.
An agonizing moment of pulling with burning and stiffening fingers passed before I got both gloves off. It was a good thing they were high quality, otherwise they'd have melted onto my hands in a way I'd have to have them removed by surgery. I certainly couldn't do surgery on myself and I definitely wasn't going to ask the legion or the dog beside me to do it. Though if I had to the dog would be my first choice.
I finally dug into my bag and pulled out a stimpack. It's rush of life giving goodness almost immediately eliminated the pain in my hands while the dose did its job with my chest. As I stood from the ground I peeled away the damaged parts of my clothing and armor while looking around. I found the dogs once again sitting like a good boy and my blaster melted into my calf armor plating. I ignored it and looked for a place to rest while approaching the large dead robot. It thankfully hadn't detonated like a mininuke and I really wanted to look at the big tough bastard.
When I finally got to it, standing in the middle of the street, I found it as mostly scrap metal and junk. A single shot from my freed blaster let me pull its head away. I grabbed it and the cannon it had attacked with and began making my way to a building to rest and look over this stuff. The cannon turned out to be a quality laser weapon. An actual laser weapon. The blasts of heat were from a single shot mode that flipped out multiple focusing heads and a middle head caught all of the projected lasers and directed them into a powerful blast of radioactive photonic energy. The beam that had been used to melt through my cover was the standard mode and took longer to do damage but the weapon could fire for much longer like that.
The robot itself had obviously been a prewar design as it was likely for riot suppression and rebel elimination. Those that protested or rioted got suppressed with the beam that burned crowds and ran them off. The blasts were a deterrent and elimination weapon. In the head I found some decent tech that I took and the holy grail of an assaultron circuit board. With that inside its head it was probably also a capable melee attacker as all I'd seen from it was protectron like attacking.
After scouring the loot I ate some food and took a nap, trusting the dog to watch over me and not kill me in my sleep. Once I woke I left the building, ripped of a shoulder plate from the robot, and strapped it up to replace my chestplate. Once that was down I began walking for the center of the city. There simply had to be something important there that I could take advantage of. And of course when I finally got my eyes on the capital building I found it swarming with cyber dogs and the big bots, all heavily armed and armored.
Breaking through these enemies would require power armor at the least as my stealth tech in hundred percent did not work on them. I turned around, intending to find a building to scout from but found something standing beside the cyber dog behind me. A single "Ah shit" escaped me and that was when my helmet cracked and my world went dark from a massive metal fist to the face.