Horrigan huffed as he allowed the Vertibird to lower him gently to the ground. He had wanted to just drop out of the hold for the sake of ease and speed, but the scientists had been worried about him damaging the crystals that covered the ground, so he had to put up with being winched down like an oversized piece of cargo. When he finally reached the ground, Horrigan quickly pulled the clamps from his armor and took his first proper look at Raven Rock and the surrounding area.

The mountain itself sparkled in the wan sunlight, as did the ever-growing carpet of crystal that spread out for several hundred yards from the mountain's base. Dozens of workers were chipping away at the crystal with various tools, under the supervision of a team of scientists and three squads of power-armored soldiers. The only point of concern that Horrigan could see was a collection of dark clouds slowly approaching from the East. It looked like a storm was coming.

After a quick glance around, Horrigan spotted a man in an officer's uniform who seemed to be directing the nearest workers. "What's the situation, Sir?" He called out as he approached.

The officer's eyes almost popped out of his head when he turned to see who was talking. "A-agent Horrigan!"

"Just Horrigan, Sir," Horrigan cut in.

"R-right." The officer swallowed and swept an arm out towards the workers. "As you can see, work is progressing smoothly for the moment. A band of raiders was present upon arrival but, after a suitable display of force, they decided to relocate without any fuss."

Horrigan nodded. "Do you have any workers inside the mountain?"

The officer winced. "We sent a surveyor team in a few hours ago, with a squad of soldiers as escort, but they haven't been heard from since."

"Are there hostiles inside?" Horrigan asked.

"I don't know," the officer replied nervously. "There's definitely something in there, but I have no idea what, and Command ordered me not to send in another team to look for them until you were here to guard the perimeter."

Horrigan turned to appraise the surrounding area. A few Vertibirds were close at hand, dropping off additional reinforcements. Beyond them, around two kilometres East, he could make out a small makeshift camp, probably belonging to the ousted raiders, and about a Kilometre South he could see a Yao Guai snuffling in the dirt. There was nothing in sight that posed a threat. "The perimeter is safe. I'll take a squad and look for the missing team myself. You've already lost one squad of weaklings, there's no point sending another in without my help."

The officer stammered out an agreement and pulled out a radio, issuing orders as Horrigan stomped over to the entrance to Raven Rock. He paused in front of the glittering tunnel that led into the mountain and crossed his arms. Aside from the crystal itself, Horrigan couldn't see anything out of the ordinary. Whatever was in there must be deep inside. Or just particularly stealthy.

"We're ready to go when you are, Sir." Horrigan glanced around and saw five soldiers, gathered around him. "Just give the word."

"How many personnel are we looking for?" Horrigan asked.

"Four soldiers, six surveyors," the squad leader replied instantly.

Horrigan nodded and uncrossed his arms. "Alright, follow me and keep your heads on a swivel." Without another word he strode purposefully into the tunnel.

The floor chimed loudly with every step Horrigan and the soldiers took, echoing off the walls until the tunnels rang like a crystal choir. Whenever they came to a side tunnel, markings on the wall left by the surveyor team indicated which direction to take. Strangely, the group didn't encounter any other signs of life at all while they searched.

"This is weird," one of the soldiers muttered.

"It's a magic crystal mountain, Private, of course it's fucking weird," the squad leader shot.

The Private shook his head. "I meant the layout. Most of the corridors are still in the right places, but there's some that have closed up and other new ones that have opened up instead."

Horrigan nodded, mentally referencing the map of Raven Rock stored on the chip in his brain. It looked like around 75% of the corridors were unchanged apart from their crystalline composition. "Where were the surveyor team headed?"

"Probably one of the armories," the squad leader replied. "There's bound to be a shitload of equipment that's been warped by all of this magic bullshit. If the brass wants the magic from the crystal, you can bet your ass they want any magic tech they can get their hands on, too." He gestured down a nearby side tunnel, with a cross scratched into the wall next to it indicating that the surveyors had checked it and found a dead end. "Wasn't that where they set up the projector so we could watch old movies?"

"Yeah, it was," the Private replied with a sigh. "When my sister was put into Assigned Procreation, the engineer she was matched with took her there for a date. They didn't end up married, but at least he put the effort in instead of just knocking her up and getting it over with like some of them do. He helps look after the kid, too."

"That's enough chatter," Horrigan cut in. The tunnel was approaching a crossroads, but there weren't any obvious signs scratched into the walls to indicate which way the surveyors had gone. As he stomped right into the middle of the crossroads, the squad carefully following behind him, the group spotted a man standing in the middle of the tunnel on the left. He was wearing a standard military dress uniform, and jerked his head back challengingly as he watched the squad.

"Is that one of the surveyors?" Horrigan asked skeptically.

"Nah, that's Jackson," one of the soldiers replied, pointing his laser rifle directly at Jackson's chest. "He didn't make it out of here before the place blew. How the hell is he still alive?"

"Magic," Horrigan huffed, before calling out to Jackson, "A surveyor team passed through here earlier. Which way did they go?"

Jackson didn't answer. Instead, he slowly raised his arms until they were pointing at the squad, then he clenched his hands. At his gesture the crystal tunnels seemed to burst into life; thin crystalline tentacles sprouted from the wall, wrapping around Horrigan's limbs and body and reeling him in like a mirelurk caught in a net. The shouts of surprise and fear coupled with sporadic laser fire told him that the same thing was happening to the squad.

Caught by surprise, Horrigan watched the tentacles with mild interest for a few seconds, amused by the fact that they were actually able to shift his bulk. Unfortunately, the sight of his squad getting overpowered by the tentacles meant he couldn't enjoy this little farce too much.

Releasing the power stored inside himself, Horrigan rolled his shoulders as swirling symbols blazed into life all over his armor and acid-green flames leaked from its joints. He shattered most of the tentacles holding him with a simple flex and pointed a damning finger at Jackson. "THAT WAS A MISTAKE."

Naked terror flashed across Jackson's face. He made another grasping motion at Horrigan, who laughed as more tentacles shot out of the walls and grabbed him only to shatter as he lumbered forwards, their strength absolutely nothing compared to his.

Apparently realizing his predicament, Jackson tried to turn and run at the last second, but he had left it too late. Horrigan chuckled as he snatched Jackson up, wrapped his hands around the man's waist, ripped him in half like a piece of scrap paper and casually tossed the halves aside. The blood and gore that splattered the floor sparkled and glittered in the light, as if it too contained tiny crystals.

Satisfied that his enemy was dead, Horrigan turned to berate his squad for being weak, only to realize that they weren't there. Staring at the walls, he spotted black masses in the walls where the tentacles had somehow managed to drag them through the solid crystal and bury them alive. One of them had even been dragged beneath the floor. "DAMN."

Thankfully, a quick check of their suits radios revealed that they were all still alive, though if Horrigan still possessed eyes would have rolled them at their terrified screams for help. It was yet another reminder that Enclave soldiers may be the toughest ordinary people around, but they just couldn't hold a candle to him. "HANG ON, YOU WUSSES. I'LL GET YOU OUT."

Smashing the unfortunate soldiers out of their crystal tombs would be easy, but it would also more than likely end up destroying their armor and injuring or killing them, so Horrigan was forced to carefully chip away at the crystal until they were exposed enough that he could yank the men out without breaking them. When he had finally fished the last soldier out of the floor, Horrigan reigned his power in once again and crossed his arms as he waited for them to catch their breath.

"Th-thanks, man," the squad leader coughed out when he had regained his faculties.

Horrigan just grunted. Protocol dictated that a soldier should never undertake a mission alone unless there aren't any other options, but searching for the missing personnel would be a lot easier if he didn't have to act as a babysitter for his own squad. "Take your men and get back to the surface. I'll search the mountain myself."

The squad leader cocked his head in surprise. Horrigan thought he was going to try to refuse, but, to his surprise, after a brief pause the man nodded. "That's probably for the best. Hell, if everything in here is that dangerous, we'll only slow you down." He straightened up and snapped a salute. "Safe hunting, soldier."

Returning the salute, Horrigan waited for the squad to disappear back the way they had come before turning his attention back to the ravaged walls. There were no visible signs indicating which way the surveyor team had gone. It was possible that Jackson had killed them all, but Horrigan didn't think so; he'd be able to see shadows where they had been dragged inside the walls if they had been killed.

With a shrug, Horrigan referred to the map in his mind, selected a route that would most likely lead him towards one of the armories, and set off down the corridor, uncaging his magic again as he walked. That was another benefit of sending the squad away; he didn't have to hold back anymore.

Further down the corridor, at the very next intersection, the choice of direction was vindicated by the discovery of a marker on the wall pointing down a side corridor. Horrigan paused and called up the map again, suspicion blooming in his mind. The side corridor the surveyors had taken led away from the nearest armory. His suspicions grew as he followed the winding trail of markers deeper into the mountain. Instead of any armory, the path seemed to be leading towards Raven Rock's Bio Labs.

Damn it, what the hell are you idiots looking for?

As he turned down another corridor, Horrigan finally found one of the surveyors, or rather, what was left of them.

The corpse was so badly mauled it was unidentifiable, though the fact that the head was missing certainly didn't help in that regard. It looked like the body had been rent asunder by something with very large claws; most likely a deathclaw, going by the size of the wounds. Scorch marks on the walls indicated that the soldiers had put up a fight, and probably driven it off.

The fact that Deathclaws were apparently loose in the mountain didn't bother Horrigan in the slightest. He was currently much more concerned about what the surveyor team was doing, since the path beyond the corpse was clearly leading to the Bio Labs.

Horrigan stepped over the corpse and picked up the pace, stomping along with a single-minded focus now that his objective was close. As he walked past another narrow side tunnel a crimson-skinned deathclaw burst out of the shadows, letting put an ear-splitting roar as it lunged at him. Horrigan didn't even bother glancing at it as he shattered its skull with a casual backhanded swipe.

"PATHETIC," Horrigan rumbled.

As he turned the last corner to the Bio Labs, Horrigan found himself facing a small predicament. The door to the labs should have been directly in front of him; however, instead of a door, a solid wall of crystal greeted him, a thick spiral shape carved or grown into it. Horrigan briefly debated whether or not he should smash through the wall or backtrack to see if the team had gone a different way.

Before he could come to a decision, the wall let out a loud chime and the spiral moved, opening up like an iris to allow Horrigan to pass.

On the other side of the wall the corridor opened up into a wide hall. Thick pillars of multicolored gemstone rose up from the ground and buried themselves in the ceiling high above, while thin crystalline stalactites pointed down from above. It would have been beautiful, if not for the bodies.

The remains of the surveyor team and their power-armored escorts were strewn about the room. The surveyors' bodies were actively rotting, leaking foul fluids onto the sparkling ground, while the soldiers' armor looked like it had been eaten through by some kind of acid. A soft squelching sound echoed around the room, coming from something on the far side of one of the pillars. Horrigan edged forward, readying his power just in case, then stopped in his tracks when he saw the source of the noise.

The creature was facing away from him, chewing on the corpse of one of the surveyors. It looked like the upper half of a human, blackened and dripping with brown filth, with lank hair that swayed in a non-existent breeze. Everything below the waist was missing, and its rotting intestines trailed on the floor behind it. A stomach-churning stench of burnt sewage wafted off the creature in overpowering waves.

Horrigan tensed as the creature finally seemed to sense his presence, pausing in its chewing and lifting itself up on its hands so it could look back at him over its shoulder. The monster was missing its nose, and its teeth were yellowed, but it was the eyes that sent a shiver down Horrigan's spine; bright and clear blue eyes that belonged on a movie star, not a hellish abomination. The two stared at each other in a tense standoff for several long seconds.

Horrigan was the one who broke it. He thrust his fists forwards and sent twin jets of emerald flame roaring at the filthy creature. He kept up the onslaught to the count of five, then reeled his power in and lowered his arms. The surveyor's body was burning with green fire, its rotted flesh sizzling as it melted, but there was no sign of the monster.

"WHAT THE HELL?" Horrigan spat.

"I… it's a corpse." Horrigan whirled around and spotted one of the prone soldiers staring at him, apparently not quite dead. "It must… must have been one of the people… killed by a deathclaw before… the place… exploded." He coughed wetly, his whole body heaving with the effort. "The magic mu… must have… done something to it."

Before Horrigan could reply, he felt an electric jolt run through his leg. He looked down to see the creature using his leg to pull itself out of the floor. His armor's magic flared and hissed where the creature grabbed him, as if the monster's mere touch was corrosive. Horrigan tried to kick it away, but the creature dragged itself up his body faster than he could react until it was hanging on to his chest. With a wet snarl, the creature punched his breastplate, sending a wave of nausea and revulsion through him.

Horrigan grabbed the creature and hurled it at the wall with a roar. To his horror, the crystal rippled like water as the creature disappeared into it. Horrigan looked around wildly, opening and clenching his fists as he tried to figure out where the next attack would come from. Every time he thought he spotted the creature in the wall he launched a wave of flames at it, flashes of acid-green light illuminating the room with each blast, but it didn't do any good.

"WHERE ARE YOU?!" Horrigan yelled in frustration.

A high-pitched screech answered him as the monster landed on his head. Burning pain ripped through his body as the creature snarled and clawed at his helmet. Horrigan bellowed with fury and pulled the creature away with both hands. Agony coursed through his arms as he held the creature tight, but he refused to let go as he unleashed his fire once again, his wrath fuelling a blazing ball of flame that set the nearest corpses alight from its heat.

The creature screamed and flailed desperately in his hands, but Horrigan was out for blood. Burning flesh sloughed away and fell to the floor, the creature's struggles slowing until, finally, with a gurgling moan, the creature crumbled to ashes in his hands.

Horrigan lowered his arms and stared at the pile of offal and embers at his feet. The undead monstrosity had been the toughest single being that he had ever fought, but he didn't find himself relishing the challenge of it. Horrigan didn't think of himself as superstitious, but that thing had been an abomination, a grievous crime against the very laws of nature itself.

Shaking his head to try and clear it, Horrigan turned to speak to the dying soldier, then stopped and sighed, feeling an unpleasant sinking feeling in his gut. More of the creatures were pulling themselves out of the walls, floor, and ceiling, all staring directly at him. Dozens of them.

Horrigan chuckled grimly and cracked his knuckles. "WELL? DO YOU REALLY THINK THERE'S ENOUGH OF YOU TO BRING ME DOWN?"

The creatures didn't answer. They just kept staring at him, staying perfectly motionless. Horrigan raised his fists and prepared himself for a brutal showdown, when he was distracted by a truly unexpected sight.

A young woman, barely out of her teens at most, was shuffling awkwardly towards him. She had long black hair that reached to her waist, with gray eyes that peeked out from behind her bangs, but she wasn't wearing a stitch of clothing save for a pale blue necklace that dangled between her breasts.

"You're Horrigan," she stated in a quiet, gentle voice.

Horrigan didn't bother asking how she knew his name. Despite being surrounded by unholy nightmare creatures, every instinct he had practically screamed at him that this girl was dangerous. "WHAT DO YOU WANT?"

If the girl was bothered by the volume of his voice, she didn't show it. "I want one of two things," she said calmly. "Either join us, or leave us alone. Since I know you won't willingly join us, yet, I'll give you a gift." She held a hand out towards the dying soldier and the crystal floor beneath him flashed with a golden light. "There. He should live long enough for your doctors to save him. Take him and go. You will not be harmed."

Horrigan considered her words carefully. Under any other circumstances he would have killed her simply for having the temerity to attack Enclave personnel, or even just for being a mutant, but something told him that the Enclave would be better off just accepting her offer, for now. Still, he couldn't leave just yet. "WHAT ABOUT THE TROOPS ON THE SURFACE?"

"I have no interest in those," the girl replied. "Take as much of the magic from outside as you want, but stay out of Raven Rock. This mountain is my domain, now."

Horrigan nodded. He stepped over to the soldier and carefully picked him up, carrying him like a delicate little ragdoll, then walked back out of the room without bothering to look back. Horrigan didn't take kindly to being driven out of anywhere. As soon as the war against the Brotherhood of Steel was over, he intended to gather a proper strike force and come back to show that girl exactly what happened to people who ended up on his shit list.

Until then, though, he had other things to worry about. Satisfied that he wouldn't be attacked as he backtracked through the mountain, though he couldn't say why he believed the girl at all, Horrigan restrained his magic so he could question the soldier. "Are you awake?"

"Y-yeah," the soldier replied weakly.

"What the hell were you and the surveyors looking for down here?" Horrigan asked.

The soldier coughed and shook his head. "Not surveyors. Con… containment team. Acheson wants… biological specimens that have been exposed to… to magic."

"Acheson." Horrigan growled with irritation. Lieutenant Colonel Strong had told him that Acheson and Senator Lily were messing with things they didn't understand, but this was the first proof of it that he had seen for himself.

The two fell mostly silent for the rest of the trek back to the surface, only speaking every now and again so Horrigan could be sure that the soldier hadn't died yet.

When they finally reached the surface, Horrigan was surprised to see an officer waiting for him. It wasn't the same one that had met him earlier; this one was older and bore the insignia of a Major. He was also a lot angrier than the other one had been.

"Where the hell have you been?!" The Major snapped when he spotted Horrigan. "You disobeyed a direct order to secure the perimeter!"

"The Lieutenant Colonel's orders were to assist." Horrigan laid the soldier on the ground and waved a medic over. "I'm assisting."

The Major glanced down at the soldier, as if finally noticing him. "Where's the rest of the team?"

"Dead," Horrigan said flatly. "If you don't want to lose any more lives, I'd suggest you tell Acheson to stop sending teams in for specimens."

The Major stiffened, and Horrigan had to wonder if he was one of the officers that the Lieutenant Colonel had mentioned; the one's working for Acheson while doing what they could to undermine the Lieutenant Colonel's authority.

Wisely deciding not to push his luck, the Major cleared his throat and gestured back to a trio of Vertibirds that hadn't been there earlier. "Now that you're back, we can continue with your actual mission."

Horrigan stared down at him in confusion. "What do you mean, my actual mission?"

"I received a secret encoded command directly from Lieutenant Colonel Strong," the Major replied. "You're to be sent out on a top secret mission to assault and hold a fortified position until reinforcements arrive, bringing it back under Enclave control. Full details will be given to you en route."

Horrigan looked from the officer to the Vertibirds. Something wasn't adding up, but he didn't quite know what. "Why wasn't I informed of this earlier."

The Major shrugged. "Hell if I know, soldier. If it were up to me we'd be keeping you here in case any more lunatics show up after the magic in these crystals, but orders are orders."

That much was true, at least. Something still felt off, but Horrigan decided to let it go for now. He could always crack some skulls later if things went South. "Fine. What's our target?"

Next Chapter: Chapter 81 - Unmatched Might Estimated time remaining: 27 Hours, 41 Minutes