"Barely worth the trouble." Boone said when the few bits worth grabbing from the dead legion members was brought to me.
"They killed my bug damnit let me have the satisfaction in knowing they also lost their shit." I hissed at him as I stuffed the loot into my inventory.
"Right, so now that that's done we continue this miserable trek of ours right?" Jess asked and I nodded.
We left the dead bodies where they lay as we continued on our way down the road. Soon we reached a spot that appeared to be empty road just past a long abandoned excavator with a billboard.
"Ambush!" Boone called as he dragged Jess behind me in a hurry as three small dark objects arced through the air towards us.
I swatted at them fearlessly and three waves of heat and pressure rolled across the armor as the grenades went off.
Three people hurried out from behind the billboard thinking they were at most going to be mopping up only to find three perfectly okay, pissed people waiting for them. You didn't need a very good imagination to understand that they died shortly afterward.-
"Fucking everyone and their mothers are on this damned road." I cursed after finding they had only a handful of caps on them and nothing else worth grabbing.
"It is the main route to Vegas. Prime raiding spot." Boone said calmly.
"Shouldn't the NCR being keeping this route safe?" Jess asked with a frown.
"With the second battle for Hoover dam in the works the NCR has their forces packed together as tightly as they can. This patch of land gets maybe a brief glance over each day at best before it's left unattended." I said flatly.
"Isn't the NCR a big group though? Surely they have more than enough soldiers right?" Jess asked confused.
"You forget they have to take care of all of their territory back west too. It's the problem all countries and groups have when they are trying to expand. You can't just push everything you have forward or you risk your foundation. It's the same reason the Legion also only has so many bodies it can throw at the problem. Commit too much and you become vulnerable, commit too little and you stall. A fine balance must be struck." Adam explained.
"Sound assessment." Boone said basically agreeing.
"What that means in simple terms is that they are greedy. New Vegas is a grand shiny jewel in what is otherwise an armpit of the wasteland. Legion or NCR it doesn't matter, whoever between them gets control of this place gets the perfect staging spot for future expansion." I said seriously.
"Okay but why would that make them greedy?" Jess asked confused.
"Because they are refusing to let go of this area temporarily which is the best option. Instead they are digging in their heels stubbornly even though the cost is far more." Adam explained.
"So the best option would be to let the legion temporarily take the area and then come back with crushing force later?" she asked and I nodded.
"Yep. Momentum is a lot more important than people think. That's what the Legion is playing for right now, momentum. That's where the terror campaign came from, it's why they are slowly creeping across the area. The moment they fully move it'll be a massive surge of momentum converging on Hoover dam." I say frankly.
We continued on the path and soon reached a Poseidon energy gas station that we chose to check out. It was boards across the windows but the door was still perfectly usable.
"Dusty but seems sturdy enough. Good amount of room to work with too. Wonder why no one has tried settling here?" I commented as we walked in.
"It's a target. Would take more effort to protect than it would be worth using as a settlement." Boone said seriously.
"I suppose I could see it. Still would be a good spot to serve as a midpoint along this route for a ranger station or at least a patrol garrison." I said feeling it a bit of a waste.
The place had long been looted dry so we found nothing worth anything there and left to continue our journey. Soon enough I checked the map and identified Boulder city.
"It's over that ridge there according to the map." I pointed at the grey and tan sandy covered stone ridge off the road a short ways.
Cresting the ridge was easy as there was a worn foot path to follow and the "city" came into sight. Calling it any kind of city was a massive overstatement. Calling it a town was far more accurate as it covered a space maybe twice the size of Goodsprings in an urban setting, well if most of it wasn't rubble that is.-
Yeah the place was clearly once an area with small modern-ish buildings closely grouped together that had NOT been treated well by time.
"This place looks like it doesn't have a single building left standing. Are we sure they came here?" Jess asked in disbelief.
"You are looking at the NCR's handiwork. During the first battle of Hoover dam the legion was originally winning. The NCR got clever however and lured Joshua Graham's forces into this place that was absolutely packed with explosives. I think the estimation was something like half of the force got blown to hell before the NCR pushed the legion back. For that failure Joshua was covered in pitch and set on fire before being thrown into the grand canyon." I said and she looked at the ruins differently.
"Somethings wrong. The scanners are detecting a closely grouped series of people trapped inside the ruins surrounded by NCR soldiers." Adam reported.
"Bet those are our people. The NCR REALLY doesn't like the Great Khans." I said with a grin.
"That's great! I can finally get some answers from that checkered suit wearing asshole." Jess said eagerly as she picked up the pace towards the "city".