Survivor's Guilt (Fallout New Vegas Fanfiction)

Chapter Five

After about half an hour of walking, the family arrived at the small town of Novac.

Zack looked up at the giant green tyrannosaurus rex statue at the edge of the fenced-in motel about a hundred feet away, which hallmarked the settlement. In his steel-clawed hands he held a giant wooden thermometer with the top bitten off, the word "MOTEL" spelled down it vertically. For the eight long years that the Bennetts had lived at Wolfhorn Ranch this was the only town they ever visited, but visits were usually every couple of months at the most so it always remained somewhat novel to see Dinky the T-Rex, mascot of the Dino Dee-lite Motel, tower over all his surroundings at the edge of Novac. Like everything else he was old and rusty with bits falling off, but he in particular still managed to look impressive.

"Off, Debbie," Zack muttered, crouching low again as Sandra kept walking toward Dinky and the small lobby building beside him. With an annoyed whine the little girl obeyed, unhooking her hands from her brother's slim neck and sliding unceremoniously to the ruined, dusty road underneath them. He had cancelled the piggyback ride halfway through their trek to Novac, but had eventually let her back up.

For a second Zack switched his gaze to the long tent to his left containing tables and chairs and the small houses scattered behind it, then looked to the right and saw Peter staring at the abandoned gas station as he trudged along the road with their mom. The gas station was painted blue and gray, and the section where the pumps would have been had only shelves lined with rusty vehicle parts and other objects which Zack would refer to as "science-y crap" and Peter would give him a death stare for it.

"C'mon, let's go," Zack told Deborah, who was watching settlers walk between the houses that dotted the land to the left. He grabbed her hand and pulled her along despite more whiny complaints that tumbled from her mouth.

The teenage boy hurried along the half-destroyed road, gripping Deborah's sweaty hand in his own and listening to the sound his boots made on the dilapidated asphalt.

Clomp, clomp, clomp.

Birds cawed as they flew in the clear blue sky overhead.

Clomp, clomp, clomp.

A man shouted a greeting in the distance and started a bout of indistint chatter with someone.

Clomp, clomp, clomp.

They arrived at the gate between Dinky's tail and the lobby building, which led into a small run-down courtyard containing a two-story motel complex to the left and a row of tiny bungalows to the right, along with Dinky.

Still holding Deborah's hand, Zack took a moment to admire the fancy, low-standing sign to his right that had obviously originally read "NO VACANCY", but the only letters still attached to the half-broken, rusty sign were "NO VAC", giving the town its name.

"Zack?" came the yell from the courtyard, and Zack looked up quickly to see Peter and his mom standing together. "Come on!"

"Yep, sorry," Zack replied, and walked through the open gate with tall mesh fencing on either side, topped with rows of barbed wire. Deborah ripped her hand from his and ran ahead with shouts of "We're going in the dinosaur! We're going in the dinosaur!"

They walked around the curve of the dinosaur's tail - Debbie was only as tall as the very end of it, and she ran ahead, fueled by an amount of energy and enthusiasm that no one else in the family ever managed to muster.

As he followed his family Zack noticed a man sitting on a plastic lawn chair outside one of the decrepit old bungalows, wearing a stained flannel shirt and a fedora. He was smoking a cigarette, and as Zack watched him the man noticed and withdrew the cigar from his lips, exhaling a puff of smoke and grinning slightly with yellowed teeth. Zack quickly looked down at the sandy ground, a small bush tickling his leg as he walked. He swiftly followed Peter up the rickety wooden stairs to the red door in the side of the T-rex's pelvis and entered the Dino Bite Gift Shop.