Steel Waste

Karl unloads his .44 Revolver towards its head, the bullets blasting pieces of the exoskeleton away but not managing to pierce it... Its defences seemed to be significantly stronger than its lesser brethren.

Afton had also started firing, shooting all six bullets from both his weapons, only achieving a similar effect as Karls. Fortunately the exo-skeleton on the Queen's head seemed to be flaking away from the force subjected to it... With enough persistence they'd eventually penetrate it.​​

The ant queen dashes towards them with surprising speed, the tiny wings on its back buzzing to life uselessly. The duo had reloaded their arms and began firing another barrage at it, the impacts not dissuading its charge in the slightest.

They start slowly backing away while firing at it, but aren't able to kill it before it reaches them. Afton was forced to leap away as it jumps on his previous position, madibles almost burying themselves in the concrete he was standing on.

Reloading while dual wielding is pretty difficult, but his [Rapid Reload] Perk and maxed out Guns skill made him able to reload quicker than most could manage with a single gun. He fired a couple shots as it but is caught off-guard when it feints as if it's going for Karl only to turn and strike him in the chest with its head.

[Stonewall is in effect]

The force behind it winds him and pushes him a couple meters away, he doesn't fall to the floor though as his Perk prevents him from being knocked down. Karl runs forwards and fires a couple shots into one of its back legs, crippling it completely and forcing the queen to turn to retaliate.

This brief reprieve gives Afton the time to get his breath back. He notices that the queen's legs were as armoured as the rest of its body, but thin and rather frail. Instead of targeting the creatures head, he aims at its legs, more specifically the joints were the exoskeleton seems lightest.

Karl was struggling to retreat while firing shots at it, and so Afton used VATS to stop time in order to form a plan. Without the Adrenaline rushing through his veins he realised that he had a relatively easy way of dealing with the creature...

Releasing VATS he pulls out something and lays it on the floor before running close to the ant queen and firing a couple close range shots into its swollen abdomen. It releases a spurt of orange blood as the bullets pierce it, but it likely did no damage do it that just being the egg-sack.

He sprints away as the queen turns towards him, circling around a device he'd previously placed and taunting the queen to "Come fuckin' get me".

Like a bull to seeing red, the queen charged without hesitation, not even bothering to note the rapid beeping it could hear as it ran over some metal thing.

*BOOM!*

An explosion occurs as the proximity mine goes off. The force blasting off all of the queen's right side legs. The ant falls to its side, releasing a sick-sounding squeal at the loss of its appendages.

With it now rendered immobile the duo walk up towards its head, the creature still angrily clicking its mandibles at them, threaten to tear them apart should they get close enough.

"Good job kid, lets finish this thing and head over to Nipton... I need a lie down after all this excitement." he states, raising his gun at the ant's head and firing a few close-range shots as the damaged and fractured exoskeleton.

It took seven shots, but the creatures head was pierced eventually, the exoskeleton caved in and dripping with orange fluids... Afterwards Karl went off to harvest all the Nectar from the corpses, leaving Afton to somehow behead the Queen...

It took thirty minutes to finally figure out that a knife simply wasn't going to get through its carapace encased neck. Using lucky to blast a line through it and pulling it from the body while holding its mandibles.

The sinew and other gross connective tissue tore away and he was left with the rather heavy head of the queen. He got some rope out and tied it around the head before hanging it from the backpack Karl had handed him... No way was he going to get everything covered in orange blood.

[Bug Stomper gained!]

[Bug Stomper] : +10% to all insects.

[Lord Death gained!]

[Lord Death v1] : +1% damage to everything.

An hour later Karl returned with a huge pile of nectar, they must've had over a hundred doses of it, not to mention to special Nectar produced by the Queen... They'd need to sell it off as soon as they could, as neither was going to use it... He hoped.

He looked at the Pipboy to see what the Nectar actually did...

[Ant Nectar] : -2 Intelligence for 4 minutes, -2 Charisma for 4 minutes, +4 Strength for 4 minutes.

[Ant Queen Pheromones] : +3 Charisma for 4 minutes, -3 Intelligence for 4 minutes, -3 Perception for 4 minutes.

Yeah, he wasn't going to use these anytime soon... More strength is great and all, but not that helpful for his form of combat.

With that, the duo turned their eyes towards the town a few miles away. The black smoke was still rising, with more intensity than before actually... This meant that it was either completely burning to the ground, or the attackers were still present.

This put them in a pretty bad situation as they'd used a huge amount of ammunition to deal with the ants... They'd need to restock soon or they'd run out. But, both were confident that if they did enter a gun-fight they could scavenge some ammunition from their fallen foes.

Karl hefts the backpack with the queen's head hanging from it and starts walking towards the town, "Let's check it out and head back to the Outpost, hopefully its just raiders... Otherwise I don't want to think about the NCR's chances at dealing with the Legion.