As they entered into the room on the other side of the store room door they were immediately met with the firefight Grant was engaged in. Two of the guardsmen seemed to be hit, one more mortally than the other as they took cover behind a rounded bar counter. Grant himself was hiding behind the ball return system of lane 3. His big body was only very barely being covered by the machine, he was slumped all the way down, the lower part of his back nearly touching the ground.
The last guardsman was, at the time they entered, laying down suppressing fire at 3 raiders who were taking cover behind some overturned tables. Another three raiders were scattered throughout the other half of the bowling floor, and another one seemed to be dead, shot in the head, right in the centermost lane, his head cracked open and bleeding profusely.
Both Salvatore and Deccanus moved to get into a position on the guardsman controlled side of the room but Adam had a different idea. Using the suppressing fire as cover, he hugged the leftmost wall and charged closer to the tables where the three raiders were pinned.
As the suppressing fire stopped Adam made a quick hard turn at a stone pillar right before he entered what looked to be a small kitchen area where patrons could order the greasiest fried food of their lives. And Adam knew that from experience, the pizza he got here during his date many years ago was more grease than cheese. But this was not important at the moment. What was important was that Adam was now in position to deal with all three raiders at once.
Pulling his grenade from his pouch he pulled the pin, cooked it for a few seconds, and then tossed it over the table cover the raiders were using.
There was a pause of silence from there as the raiders seemed to understand what they just saw, a grenade landing at their feet. One even had the wherewithal to speak:
"Its a fuckin' grena-" She yelled out before the boom drowned out her words. Blood splattered against the wall near where they were taking cover, Adam was sure the blood also painted the other side of the tables too, but he didn't have an angle to see. But it was safe to assume he got all three of them since even after a few seconds there was not a peep from the tables. If nothing else they were too wounded to fight, that was good enough.
Adam then turned his attention to the other raiders scattered throughout the floor. Most were in cover, however Adam had a good angle on one of them and it didn't seem like he was spotted, so, making use of the VATS feature on his Pip-Boy, adjusting his aim according to the percentage displayed, he fired a single round at the head of the raider, his head burst opened with the force of the bullet from the hunting rifle. He dropped like a rock not even a second later.
His shot was too effective though, as it drew the attention from the other two raiders. A bullet whizzed right by his head, close enough for him to feel the air of the blast move past him, way too close for comfort even with his helmet on. Adam was quick to scoot around to the otherside of the pillar so he was in cover from the remaining two raiders.
Salvatore noticed Adam in danger and popped out of cover and layed down rounds of his own from his assault rifle. Bullet after bullet ripped into the once clean floors as the raiders were once more forced to hide behind their cover. Deccanus took the opportunity to pop out of cover himself and chuck his spear hard.
The spear broke through the wood of the overturned bookshelf the one raider was using as cover and impaled his foot into the ground. Roaring with pain he stuck his head up involuntarily. Grant landed a clean blow on his head in this short window, killing him instantly.
Slavatore emptied his magazine into the area where the last raider was before a short few seconds of silence followed, then, from the spot where the raider was hiding a voice rang out as loud as he could muster.
"I give up!" The raider yelled at the top of his lungs. "I surrender!" He said again, loudly, though not as loud as the first time. There were a tense few moments as Adam's party processed the surrender. It was Adam who made the first move.
"Hands where I can see them!" He yelled back as he pointed his rifle at the spot the raider was hiding, slowly moving from his cover and in the raider's direction. Adam slowly crept forward inch by inch while no response was heard for a few seconds before two shaky hands slowly raised up in surrender.
"Kid, watch yourself." Salvatore called out from his cover as a sharp word of warning. Adam kept advancing though, slowly, towards the raider. Adam altered his path to swing behind the cover, keeping his distance, just to make sure the guy couldn't pull any tricks. Luckily, as he walked around and got a glimpse of the last remaining raider he seemed to have no explosive or any trap set, he was just sitting there on the ground, behind cover, his hands raised, fear in his eyes. There was a ramshackle machine pistol at his feet, but other than that he looked unarmed.
"Kick the gun towards me!" Adam yelled as he held position and pointed his rifle at the center mass of the raider.
"Y-yeah!" The raider said back, frightened as he did as instructed, kicking the pistol towards Adam. As soon as the pistol was well and clear of the raider Adam shot a glance around the room once, making sure there were no other enemies lying in wait nearby. After he was reasonably confident that there was nothing that could hurt anyone he called out:
"Clear!" Salvatore was the first one to make his move, walking slowly towards the place where the guy was taking cover. Then, slowly, everyone else began emerging from their cover and began to advance on the last raider, no one was dropping their guard, no one wanted to be the last to die in this battle.
It took another minute before everyone remaining was gathered in the center of the bowling alley main room. The raider was face down on the ground, arms behind his back, stripped bare of everything other than his underwear.
"Grant, what do you want to do with this guy?" Salvatore asked as he began smoking a cigarette now that the battle was officially over. Grant looked uncertain, contemplating how to handle this.
"Do you not have a jail or something?" Adam asked Grant quizzically.
"No, we do but…" Grant looked over at the raider, still face down on the floor. "I don't feel comfortable taking him back, besides what are we supposed to do with a prisoner? This isn't Midway, we don't have the resources to care for a waste of space like him, he'd just be living off the work of others…" Grant said dismissively about the man only a few feet from him.
"Allow me to make your choice easy then." Deccanus said as he walked over to the raider, knelt down next to his neck, and then planted his machete into the back of his head. Adam flinched, looking a bit horrified at Deccanus' actions. But he did not raise a fuss or say a word. Nor did anyone else.
"Well that settles that." Salvatore said with a shrug as he shouldered his rifle now.
"I suppose so." Grant returned. He then paused, seeming to either steel himself or think over his options. "Alright…" He then turned to look at Adam.
"Adam, can you do me a favor? As our resident Scavver can you gather whatever you think is worth something and bring it over? We will bring it back with us. No sense letting another Scavver take it if we can instead."
"Well, I haven't been one long but… sure, i'll take a look around." Adam nodded, turning his head to scope out the place.
Unlike the outside of the building, which looked ruined but still pretty clearly a bowling alley, the inside, now that he was looking, was a mess. It looked almost nothing like a bowling alley. Aside from a few of the bowling ball machines still standing, and the gutters creating separations between the lanes, it was difficult to tell it ever was anything other than a raider hideout. It had been pretty thoroughly converted into a base for these guys, with beds, booze, and bullets lying about haphazardly. There seemed to be a bit of thought put into where things went, but mostly it seemed like they slept and ate where they felt like without regard for efficient or organized use of space. Though there were a few areas of the bowling alley that were cordoned off with sheets and shower curtains, perhaps creating smaller rooms for people to have privacy? In either case it was clear it might take a minute to thoroughly search this place.
"Salvatore." Grant asked while Adam was lost in his thoughts looking around on where best to begin. "Do you believe these men were with War's camp?"
"Nah." Salvatore returned dismissively. "They were too unorganized, I don't see any emblems either, not that they all have them. But this ain't connected, likely just some punks who saw the opportunity and did their own thing." Grant nodded in agreement with Salvatore's assessment.
"Who is War?" Adam asked as he started to walk towards the bar to see if there was anything worth taking from there, from bottles of booze to a hidden safe.
"Local Raider boss." Salvatore said as he walked over to one of the dead raiders and kicked him over and began to rifle through his pockets. "Guy moved in a few months ago and began absorbing all the smaller raider gangs, cutting down the ones who said no and subjugating the ones who would listen." After patting the man down for a moment he found what he was looking for. A pack of cigarettes.
"Don't know much about 'im though." He said as he stood back up and pocketed the new pack into his back pocket. "The naming scheme came from the folk in Midway, they got real creative with the names for the folk around here." he said dismissively.
"What do you mean?" Adam asked as he slowly began to gather the few things he found from the bar worth taking, just putting them in sight for the moment, easy to grab later.
"The four horsemen, kid." Salvatore said with a soft sigh. "War, Pestilence, Famine, and Death." He shrugged.
"As I said, colorful descriptions."
"Sounds heavy." Adam said, trying to both process the information he was being told and scavenge. He noticed that one of the guardsmen who had still not moved from his spot was injecting himself with a stimpack to aid in healing his wounded gut shot. The stimpack, like always, seemed to do well to help both stem the bleeding and dull the pain. Stimpacks, unlike what the advertisements would have you to believe, were not cure-all miracle drugs that could heal any wound. But they were a hell of a drug, they had saved Adam's life back in the war more than once. It was always good to have a real doctor check you out when you get the chance but a stimpack could be relied on in a pinch, it was like having a medic on hand. He didn't have the first clue how it worked, but it did, and that was enough for him.
"So War's a raider boss? What about the others?"
"I dunno." Salvatore said with another shrug. "I just know enough to stay clear of anything sketchy. If you are curious, ask the folk at Midway, they are in the thick of it."
"Alright, I will." Adam returned, making a quick note in his Pip-Boy about the four horsemen to remind him later. "It's going to take me some time to get everything here, if anyone wants to help, it'd be appreciated." Adam said a bit snarkily and genuinely at the same time.
Salvatore grunts dismissively but Grant nods. "You are right, let's divy up the work, everyone who is still good, let's see what we can find." He said with a commanding tone. A moment later everyone split up and began to scavenge the building.