POV Rio
I look over the vast fields of ice and snow through Macrobinoculars and see the same emptiness that I still find so odd. This planet has a breathable atmosphere, and yet so far I have yet to find any concrete evidence of a civilization. The best I found were some possible ruins, which is why we are here.
"Ugh, if we're immune to the cold, then why do we have to wear these damn stuffy getups?" Cait complains.
"For camouflage. Red hair is quite noticeable when everything around you is pure white. And even if you are pale, you will still be somewhat noticeable. That and while I am immune to snow blindness, you aren't," I respond to Cait.
The uniform in question was designed after the Rebel Hoth Trooper uniform I remember from my past life. With the exception of the pants, which were replaced with white materials as well.
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"Ugh, but did you have to make them so damn stuffy? It has no support," Cait complains.
"Support?" I ask with a raised eyebrow.
"Do I have to spell it out for ya? My tits!" Cait said with an annoyed tone.
I look at her chest and realize I may have forgotten to account for the female form.
"Huh... Oops. Give me the suit, I will fix it real quick," I say.
Cait, like all companions, can swap outfits instantly, so she goes back to her leisure wear. Which, in this case, is her old corset. I take the outfit and use a nearby Armor Workbench to alter it real quick. Cait and I were the only ones going on this expedition, as Quiet doesn't like constraining clothes. She doesn't need to wear skimpy outfits, but she does sometimes anyway. The most I can convince her to put on is more standard tactical gear.
'An odd one that.'
I didn't force it, so Cait was the only companion coming away. I didn't take Dogmeat due to similar issues to Quiet, but it's worse, as covering all of Dogmeat is much harder. I finish the modification and hand it back to Cait. She puts it on and breathes a sigh of relief.
"Much better," Cait says with a smile.
"Okay, well, now that's settled, let me give you the details of the mission. My probes have been exploring every last bit of the planet, and so far, I have found very little. Other than the fact that we are currently on a large continent. And a set of ruins. The ruins are our target. It is approximately 2000 km to the West of our current position. Normally, the trip would take several days by car. But we will be using speeders, which will massively lessen the time. We should only have to drive for around 3 hours," I say.
"Geez, that long?" Cait says, surprised.
"Yeah, and don't worry about getting lost, I had the probes map out the route ahead of time. All you should have to do is follow the pre-mapped route. We won't be using Autopilot as I have found it to be finicky, especially without a satellite helping. Oh, and the speeders will be scanning for things below and around you. If they pick something up, let me know," I reply.
"So am I driving or not?" Cait asks.
"Yes, you are driving. Just don't crash, as you will be going over 700 kph or around 440 mph. Crashing at that speed might not hurt too badly, but making these speeders was not easy," I warn.
"Ah, don't worry, I am clean, so there will be no drunk drivin'," Cait jokes.
"Sigh. I hope so. I don't want you crashing another vehicle," I reply.
"That was one time, and in my defense, the tank was really fun to drive," Cait said.
"Sigh. Let's go before I change my mind, and you sit in the sidecar," I say while walking towards the speeders.
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We get in our respective speeders and turn them on. I take a deep breath and speed off.
Sometime Later...
As we were about 3/4s of the way through our journey, I saw something that made me tell Cait to pull over. When we pulled over, I left the speeder and walked to where I saw the strange thing.
"What'd ya find?" Cait asks.
"A tomb? I think. It might be a temple or something, but it looks relatively intact, and it's deep underground. I can't say how deep it is for sure, but I would hazard to guess it to be around 1km deep," I reply.
"What are you gonna do?" Cait asks.
"I'll mark this location, and we can come back to excavate it later. First, the ruins," I reply.
I place down a beacon and make sure it is working before we get in our speeders and head onwards to the ruins. As we near it, I warn Cait over the comms.
"Heads up, we will reach the dead zone soon," I warn.
"Dead zone?" Cait asks.
"The Ruins give off a strange interference that messes with any electronics or scanners. It's why I couldn't just use probes. The speeder's navigation will start to fritz out. Don't panic and follow my lead," I reply.
"Aye, Aye, Captain," Cait responds.
"I can't hear you!" I reply with a smile.
"I SAID AYE AYE, CAPTAIN!" Cait yells over the comms.
I laugh as I can tell Cait has no idea why I did that.
We enter the dead zone, and the navigation equipment freezes and starts giving me outlandish directions like in 'a quarter-mile turn up'. I ignore it and head to where I plan on going on foot. Once we get there, I slow my speeder and come to a stop. Cait does the same, and we get out, and I store the speeders. The ruins were a ways off still, but I could see some rubble underneath many layers of snow. But I still didn't see any signs of life.
We swept through what I was soon realizing was a large city. At the center of the ruins was our target. A small object sticking out of the snow. As we got closer, I realized that the small object was a massive spyre. Or what remained of it. It was designed in a similar manner to the Eiffel Tower. It was mostly buried under snow and ice, and the top half was snapped off and shattered. It was also at this point that I discovered that the materials they were using were very unusual.
'It's almost like it's made of a dark blue or obsidian crystal material.'
Clearing out the snow wasn't too difficult. It just took a while. However, we eventually cleared a passage to the interior of the structure. When we got inside, there was no light, so I turned on my Pip-Boy light. Cait turns on a flashlight.
We explore all over the structure and don't find much. The palace was filled with black crystals with shades of blue, purple, green, and red in various places. But I did have a rough idea of what this place might be. Especially when I discovered the Throne Room and sensed something was amiss.
'Hmm, I swear I have seen something like this before.'
We kept exploring and found just about all the rooms of that palace, but I still couldn't place what I was missing. The palace was as silent as the grave. And as dark as a crypt. There wasn't anything alive in the entire structure, and moreover, nothing of value.
"Ugh! What is up with this place! It's so empty!" Cait complains, causing her voice to echo through the entire structure.
We both freeze and wait to see if there is a response, but after waiting for a minute, nothing happens.
"Don't do that again. If this place wasn't empty or if some great evil was slumbering, you would have just woke it up," I say with an annoyed glare.
"Fine. But can we get outta here? We've been explorin' this place for hours and we got nothin to show for it," Cait complains.
"Hmm, let's head to the throne room. It's the only place I can feel something is off," I reply.
She grumbles but agrees, and we head to the throne room. When we arrive, I look around and try to figure out why it feels so off. Eventually, I find something that makes me stare for a minute. At the top of the throne was a very nice gem that was over a foot tall. It was magical, like everything else in the palace, but this one drew my attention partially for its position and partially because it was something I swore I had seen before. It also didn't help that the gem was different than the rest somehow. The entire palace reeked of fear magic and other rebuffing effects, but this gem was more mute than the rest.
"What are you staring at?" Cait asks while walking over to me.
I don't reply and close my eyes while charging a spell that I hadn't tried using before. Emotion Magic wasn't something I dabbled in, as it was a bit temperamental. As I am casting the magic purple mist covers my horn and leaks from my eyes. When I open my eyes, they are a dark green, and Cait steps away from me in shock. I shoot a beam of this magic at the crystal, and a shadow falls over the Throne Room. I create a massive hole with a staircase.
"AH OH GOD OW AH OUCH BLEEP BLEEP BLEEP BLEEP BLEEP BLEEP!" Cait screams as she falls down the stairs.
I look down the hole and see Cait's flashlight at the bottom of the long staircase.
"Are you alright?" I call down.
"No! I am not OKAY! Where the hell did these stairs come from!?" Cait yells angrily back.
I flew down and saw if she was fine, and I found her on the floor in the Yamcha death pose. I healed her, and we looked around the bottom of the stairs. All there was was a single door. Cait was angry, so she opened the door first and then just froze. I thought it was odd as there was only a wall behind the door.
"Uh, Cait? Are you good?" I ask.
Sniff Sniff
I hear the sounds of sniffling and then the sounds of tears falling to the ground.
"No! No! Rio, please don't leave me!" Cait screams and I realise something is really wrong.
I go to pull Cait away and find she is surprisingly hard to move. I needed to get her out, so I tried to think of something that would work. I cast a healing spell and felt her loosen, so I repeated it over and over again until I was able to release Cait from the enchantment. When she gave, I went flying with her, and the door slammed shut.