"Are you sure?"

Edward and Andy sneakily gather at the doorway of a room on Fort Maxson Level 2.

"Elder Dyson secretly gave the order, Quartermaster Devin may have some problems, we have to go in and investigate the contents of his room, you can do it without worry."

Edward crouched suspiciously beside the door.

He would pry with a screwdriver, stir up and down with wire, and even take out a fire-breathing spray gun from behind and bake part of the door red.

Andy looked around, and couldn't help but be nervous about these few movements, if anyone found out, it would still be very troublesome to say.

"Can the movement be smaller?"

Edward wiped the sweat from his head.

"Standard Shelter Door, Shelter Tech design, made of alloy, driven by a hydraulic motor, with a pressure of up to 3,300 pounds, and a specially constructed metal interlocking cone inside.... It's not easy to get in without a key, it's not a kick to fall down, you see this door has no lock hole to pry and no terminal to crack, I can only disassemble this electric switch box from the circuit to try to make some fuss. ”

Andy listened to this large number of jargons and understood that the gate was solid, and could only wander around, ready to beckon Edward to run away.

After about ten minutes, he finally stood up, and the door opened.

"Well, the quartermaster is very cautious, and he actually modified this door."

Andy hurried back to see that a switch box on the frame next to the door had been opened, and the circuitry inside had been messed up. He was just about to step in, when he suddenly felt that something was wrong, there was a little yellow light in the dark room.

Turn on the V mode, and find a mine under the table facing the door in the house.

His foot froze in mid-air, and as he slowly retracted his foot, the yellow light on the mine began to flicker slowly and began to calm down, believing that if Andy hadn't thought much about stepping into the door directly, he would have flown backwards into the corridor with an explosion at this moment, and then most of the people who arrived when they heard the sound would have found a body that had died badly.

“.......”

Andy stared at the room in front of him, and since he could place a mine at the door, the rest of the room didn't know what was hidden.

"It's really a unique decoration style, isn't he afraid of blowing himself up when he comes home?"

After questioning Andy, Edward also noticed the hidden mine and retreated in fright.

"God, that's a bit excessive, isn't it?"

Andy crossed his waist and looked at the mine, wondering what the hell was going on.

"Even if he were a quartermaster, he wouldn't be able to protect supplies like he is now, would he? Did he think there might be a thief in Fort Maxson? And.... It's not an armory or a storehouse, it's just his personal room, right? ”

Edward points to the east of Level 2.

"The main armory is over there, and now it can't be opened, because the scribe locked the terminal there when he left, his attainments are too high, no one here can break the lock he set, and the security level of that door is also quite high, it was a place where the bunker was used to store munitions before the war, so the door is so strong that it is impossible to force it open anyway."

"The storage is in the area near the gate in Level 1, far from here."

Andy nodded, thinking to himself that it was no wonder that many Brotherhood of Steel soldiers had lost their fighting spirit, and most of the stored weapons and equipment could not be taken out to fight again, and they could not be allowed to wear power armor and carry broadswords and spears to attack the Hoover Dam.

"Then something is wrong with him being so nervous, isn't it?"

Edward scratched his ear.

"Quartermasters do sometimes act suspicious, but.... Let's report this to the elders first..."

Andy stared at the mine, and after a few scans in V-mode, he found no other traps.

"I'll try to dismantle this mine, what are the precautions?"

Edward looked at him worriedly, and after a moment he told him how to do it.

"I've read in some books that if you want to defuse this most common military fragmentation mine before the war, you need to keep moving as fast as possible, once you get close enough then the yellow flashing light on the mine will flash quickly, the closer you get, the faster the frequency of flashing, it only takes 3-5 seconds to explode within reach, all you have to do is press the button on the yellow flashing light with your hand in this very short time."

"If you hadn't been in time, it would... You..."

Before he could finish speaking, Andy had already strode into the room, lifted the table, and pressed the button on the mine under the incessant shrill dripping sound, so that the flashing yellow light and the piercing dripping sound fell silent in an instant.

Edward didn't dare to come out, and after a few moments, Andy turned around and held up the mine that had returned to calm to show him.

"It's all right."

.............

Devon's room looked a little odd, the clutter was so well organized that it looked like a place for people with obsessive-compulsive disorder, but this behavior made him look completely devoid of daily life, and with the mine that had been placed in an inconspicuous place in the doorway, the quartermaster seemed to have a lot of problems hidden in him.

Turning the corner, I saw a few red rays of light coming out of the corner, aimed at the opposite wall.

"It seems to be an optical sensor."

Edward cautiously stepped in, took out a flashlight and lit it diagonally, Andy followed his movements and looked up, and on the side of the hallway in the room was a metal pot-like thing that looked like an insulator-like bulge and a rotating part on top of the wall.

"A Tesla trap."

Andy looked at it for a moment, not discerning what it was.

"Traps? Can this thing explode? ”

Edward pointed to the "lid" part of the "pot".

"Once the optical sensor below is triggered, that is, the receiver directly opposite the transmitter cannot receive the optical signal because of the obscuring of the red light, then the trap is activated. The internal mechanics will begin to spin, and the few miniature fusion cells inserted in the side slots will be instantly drained, and the device will create a powerful current that will release high-voltage electricity into the surroundings irregularly, powerful enough to electrocute a person instantly. ”

After hearing this, Andy took a few steps back in fear, if he had just turned around and walked inattentively, most of them would have been scorched by the electricity.

"How do you dismantle this?"

Eduardo hid from a distance of remote command.

"You buckle the yellow batteries off first, right... That's it, it won't start. ”

Andy took a few batteries away.

"This quartermaster is so versatile, I thought it was scary enough to plant mines."

They walked around the small room, which was not too large, and as the only quartermaster at Fort Maxson, the house assigned to him was almost the same as that of the elders, and under the cabinet next to the bedroom, due to seeing traces of dust that was not normal, Andy suspected that there might be something wrong under the cabinet, and when he opened the cabinet, he found a trap safe.

Edward took out a screwdriver and a hairpin and crouched there to try to pick the lock, and finally picked the lock after breaking the three hairpins in a row.

Andy reached out and took out some bottle caps from the safe and threw them on the bed next to him.... Then while Edward was not paying attention, he changed hands and deposited the beep boy, and then took out a laser pistol, and after looking at it twice, he concocted it again.

"This is..."

A small notebook was taken out of it.

After opening it, Andy found that it was a ledger, but this ledger did not seem to be particularly normal, and there were many things similar to ledgers in the cabinet next to it, but those were simply placed outside, and only this one was hidden in the safe under this cabinet.

When I opened the ledger, the entries were all records of trade with a caravan, and most of the items traded were food, and most of the items that were sold were all kinds of ammunition.

As for the trading side, it is clearly marked, and some bills are attached as evidence.

"Crimson Caravan...."

Andy knew in his heart that this would be a crucial piece of evidence, it was enough to confirm that the Crimson Caravan led by Alice McClofty was secretly trading with the Brotherhood of Steel branch in the Eastern District, no wonder they were able to provide a large amount of ammunition to the NcR army in a short period of time, not only because of their ties with some tribes, but more importantly, with the help of trade with Fort Maxson, they could exchange a small amount of food for a large amount of ammunition here, and then sell it to the NcR at Hoover Dam at a high price.

If the Brotherhood of Steel is running out of food or the Hoover Dam runs out of bullets, then the two sides will have to negotiate peace, as the war between them has become unsustainable over time. The Crimson Caravan's two-sided behavior ensured their best interests, Hoover Dam needed the Crimson Caravan's ammunition, and Fort Maxson needed the Crimson Caravan's food, and after their needs were met, the war would continue and the Crimson Caravan would continue to profit.

This began fairly early according to the ledger records, perhaps the quartermaster of the Brotherhood of Steel was linked to the Crimson caravans while trading with certain tribes, and the share of trade between the two sides was very sparse and intermittent at first, and the number on the ledger increased year after 2249.

However, during the period 2251-2252, the share suddenly plummeted, which Andy speculated was related to a series of upheavals at Fort McSon at the time, first with the exodus of the scribes, and then by the Ring of Steel after Elder Brixley ordered a total truce, and then defected after failure.

Fort McSon was experiencing significant attrition at the time, and it was understandable that the demand for food was reduced.

But what's the strange entry at the back of this ledger?

Andy looked at the vague records, which seemed to be a deal with the Crimson Caravan, but all of them were highly simplified, full of codewords, abbreviations, and symbols that only the writer could understand.

He put the ledger away, and there was always a very strong concern in his heart, where is Quartermaster Devin now? The reason why his ledger was so tightly hidden may have been to prevent the elders from learning that he was trading with the enemy, but why was the ledger still divided into two parts, clear and vague? He had set these deadly traps in his room to think about the aftermath, or... He hadn't thought about it in the first place, because what did the mere fact of someone breaking into his room mean to him?

Edward suddenly looked at the corner of the safe and exclaimed.

"Stealth Kid!"

Andy immediately looked down and saw that there was indeed an invisible boy in the corner of the safe, which reminded him a lot.

"What's so special about this thing?"

Edward picked up the Invisible Boy and observed it for a while, confirming that it was an intact Invisible Boy, and his face was full of surprise.

"Since the state of emergency in Lost Mountain, all the invisible boys have been taken away by the headquarters and managed in a unified manner, and it is said that they used those things that made people invisible when Fort Maxson had a previous defection from the Ring of Steel to seize power, but... Why does he have a stealth kid? This thing shouldn't be in his house unless..."

Andy took the stealth kid over and looked it up, and now he figured it all out.

"So Quartermaster Devin is an undercover agent who stayed here with a Ring of Steel, right? They did leave Fort Maxson, but not all of them, and they left someone here, who was still the quartermaster in charge of the inflow and exit of supplies. ”

Standing up and staring at the delicate high-tech trap behind him, Quartermaster Devon seemed to be hiding his past from everyone, since he had the ability to fiddle with Tesla's trap, then he probably also had the skill to run and manipulate the auto-doctor after the previous doctor left, and then secretly put the slow-acting toxin in the cans reserved for Elder Brixley.

Such a plan is extremely confusing, and the abnormality of Elder Brixley's body cannot be detected, even if it is found out and confirmed that someone used canned food to poison it, the more suspicious Elder Triciniels and Jon are more likely to be the perpetrators in the eyes of the members of Fort Maxson led by Elder Disson, and it is very difficult to find out the real culprit, and it is very likely to cause a series of chaos within Fort Maxson in the process.

If Andy hadn't come, Elder Brixley's death would have led to a high-level conflict in Fort Maxson, what would have happened if this happened? Maybe the Ring of Steel has a chance to take advantage of the Fort Maxson civil strife to return?

Then he suddenly remembered Alice McClofdie's big words at Hoover Dam, where she had said that she would defeat the Brotherhood of Steel in a week without the help of the NcR army.

Earlier, McClofty seemed to see the threat of the Brotherhood of Steel as a small problem that could be solved easily when he stated his dream of becoming mayor, and this confidence should not have been groundless, but now it seems that it was due to their knowledge of Fort Maxson during the trade between the Crimson Caravan and the Brotherhood of Steel, and they did not need to convince Pierre that they already knew the location of Fort Maxson, but it was in their interest that Fort Maxson's existence was in their interest at the time, so they remained silent about it.

At the same time, due to Elder Brixley's final orders and the departure of the Ring of Steel, the Brotherhood of Steel forces that continued to harass the Hoover Dam have also changed from Fort Maxson to the Ring of Steel, and the attack on the Caravan at the Hoover Dam is one-sided only against the three brothers of the Crimson Caravan, which means that the division of Fort Maxson is accompanied by the split. The tacit understanding between the Crimson Caravan and the Brotherhood of Steel has shifted.

What happens next?

Andy felt a chill run through his body, and he felt that there were things he hadn't seen clearly, and those things would probably be fatal, enough to cause a series of terrible events to happen in the future.