Adam opened his eyes slowly, his head was pounding. He found himself sitting on the ground, his back slumped against a wall in the same building he last remembered.
All of his stuff seemed to be gone, he had no Bulletproof vest on, his backpack, and by extension, all of his loot gone, his tool belt and gun with holster was off and worse than all of that his head was spinning.
The good news in this whole endeavor is that his stuff was not far, just scattered about through the room. However the next bad news was the woman was in here too.
She was busy rummaging through Adam's backpack, casually tossing aside the collection of motors he had gathered while looking for anything good. It seemed like she had already found the gum judging by the empty wrapper on the floor nearby and the toilet paper too judging by the toilet paper thrown about throughout the room like a mischief night prank gone wrong. But she was digging through the backpack like a gremlin, hunched over, pawing at it like a creature, not a human. She had not yet noticed he had woken back up.
He looked around at the carnage of the room he found himself in. It was clearly where she slept. There was a, and he would hesitate to call it one, mattress on the floor next to a small broken lap with a cord that was connected to nothing. There was a stack of canned food and opened cans in the corner, and a pile of indescribable meat on a plate in the other. On the wall, near where she was crouching looking through his bag was a bookcase with a number of books and odds and ends on it, mostly junk, but a few curios too. Most notably there was a large wooden club sitting on the floor next to the woman, presumably the same one she had used to knock him out earlier. But most importantly above all of that his gun was nearby, still in his holster attached to the belt no longer on his pants. His head hurt but this woman was dangerous and if she got to that gun first, crazy or not, he might actually die this time.
So, with a pounding head, he crawled over to the gun, slowly, carefully, trying not to make too much noise.
However, just as he had gotten within reach of the gun the floorboard underneath him gave way and cracked. Not creaked, cracked. Showing the floor underneath him, or at least it would, if it wasn't hidden underneath his thigh. But luckily it was only one plank of wood.
Unluckily it was more than enough to alert the woman. She spun around with a crazed look in her eyes as she glared at Adam who was sprawled out on the ground, one arm outstretched and placed on the pistol just ever so slightly out of the holster now.
There was a pause that hung in the air as the two stared at each other before the woman moved. Adam did too.
The woman leaped into the air, brandishing the large wooden club as she did, screaming at the top of her lungs like a mad woman. For his sake Adam was quick to completely unholster the gun and then flip over to his back and take aim right at her.
A shot rang out through the chaos of the woman's screams as she landed on top of Adam unceremoniously.
For a moment Adam laid there on the ground, blood on his face, as the woman, still gripping the club, lay on top of him. Both were stunned. But very quickly Adam got up the energy to throw the now dead body off of him.
The woman was shot, right in the throat as she came down. Mostly a lucky hit from Adam as he was aiming center mass but he wasn't going to complain. The woman didn't even choke or writhe in pain, it was as if the bullet had robbed her of the last bit of her life, she just lay there, bleeding out, dead.
Adam stood up, shakily, holding his head as he did. Luckily there was no blood on his hand when he checked so his skull wasn't cracked it just hurt. He couldn't help but stare at the woman, now corpse, that lay on the floor of her own abode. It was a snap judgement and if he could go back in time he would shoot her all over again but he couldn't help but feel bad.
He was the one who walked into her house. He was the one who entered her room brandishing a weapon. He was the one who shot her. Certainly she had tried to kill him too, or… whatever she was planning, as she clearly didn't think things through too well after dragging his body back into her room with her, but he started this fight. And that didn't sit well with him.
Adam was a soldier. He was trained to fight and kill. If she was a damn red, a communist, a chink, or any other thing like that he wouldnt have even thought twice. But such divisions seemed meaningless now. Even his own hatred towards the commies felt… hollow… what use was there to such racism and hatred in a world where everything was over. Do people even remember why they were fighting in the first place? Do people even know what a communist is? He could only sigh. This woman died because out here it was survival of the fittest, and because he was not prepared to remain firm with his approach. He turned his back on her, gave her an opportunity to retaliate. He would make sure he doesn't do that again.
He took a long deep breath, still gripping onto his pistol like his life depended on it as it generally pointed at the floor. After catching his breath he began the process of re-collecting his things.
Everything, minus the gum and the toilet paper, went back into his backpack, his tool belt back onto his waist, his gun back in its holster. But he paused as he looked at the other things in the room, the woman's things. He considered, for a moment, if he would be no different than her, stealing from a random person who came along if he took it. But such moral uncertainties didn't last long.
Ultimately Adam decided that the woman was dead, The things in this room would wither and rot away with her, they were of no use to a corpse. But the food, especially, could be used to feed him and others for at least a bit. If he truly felt bad he could thank her for it afterwards.
So, with a slightly heavy heart, he began to scavenge throughout the room. He found less cans of food than he had hoped, much of the cans in the corner were opened but left next to the others. Only a few were still sealed. The curios on the shelf too as well as the books were largely worthless, at least by his approximation. Though he did take a few odds and ends, a Book called the "D.C. Journal of Internal Medicine" and a copy of Guns and Ammo, as well as an interesting music box. But left the rest behind.
As he was leaving, however, he noticed a one gallon jug of water sitting in the room across from the room he awoke in. it was next to many other similar jugs but the rest were empty. The jug was labeled "Purified Water" but he truly didn't know if that was true. But at the very least he was carrying nothing else heavy so he could afford to bring it back.
So, with one last look to the dead woman on the floor he left, carrying all his spoils and the jug of water as he made his way back down the stairs.
He was about to head through the front door again when he suddenly remembered the key he had picked up on the second floor, the "basement" key. He considered whether it was worth checking but figured he didn't have much to lose as he put the jug down in front of the door and then successfully unlocked it with the key. True enough a dark stairway down was laid out before him.
Turning on his Pip-Boy light he slowly made his way down the stairs until he was met with an unfinished basement with some mostly empty metal shelving. Though there were a few things on them, duct tape, a wrench, a paint gun, super glue, mostly maintenance stuff. But more than all of that was the thing that drew his attention first. The Fusion generator.
Right in front of him, at the center of the basement against one wall was a fusion generator. It seemed to still be running too as the light above it was on, but it didn't seem connected to anything, so it was just sitting in idle mode. It was strange though, why did this building have its own fusion generator? This was a lot for a small building's backup generator, but there was no indication it led to anywhere else, not unless it connected underground or something where he couldn't see. But ultimately it was a line of thought without an answer.
Adam approached, slowly, as he examined the Fusion core still inside the generator. It worked, miraculously. He could only hope the core was worth something. Who knows, these things could power a suit of power armor indefinitely or a neighborhood for a while if used right, hopefully it was worth something to the people back in Naper. If not it would be a heavy and expensive paper weight.
So finally, after he had put the various things from the shelf into his backpack, officially making it full, and had the Fusion core in hand, he set off back to the walls.