"Alright kid what's your plan?" Salvatore said as he held on tightly to the bar on the interior roof of the Vertibird so he did not fall as it began to take off again. The Pilot needed nothing more than a moment's convincing to listen to Adam, perhaps they understood that Adam wouldn't give orders without permission? Or perhaps they had already communicated with the Colonel over the radio, in either case they were not arguing, taking off from the ground and heading East as Adam asked.
"Call it a hunch but at this point I have a strong suspicion that this horde of feral ghouls is not acting without a purpose, I think they are being controlled." He said as he shouted over the sound of the loud engines and the occasional spritz of fire from the mounted miniguns, still operated by the two gunners deployed on board. It was a little tight with all five of them in the back. But it was not at all over capacity, after all, the Vertibird could carry a much larger contingent. If anything it was the fact both miniguns were manned that was making the transport feel more cramped.
"What gives you that idea, kid?" Salvatore asked, incredulously.
"For one the fact they gathered in the first place. No one found a cause right?" Salvatore remained silent as Adam continued. "Furthermore that flanking maneuver, going around West, I think it was through the sewers, and if it was that's not a maneuver that a mindless feral ghoul can pull off, but if they had instructions…" Adam said. Salvatore was beginning to see Adam's vision as he laid it out for him. "And more than that, both you and Mira said the ghouls would take about a week or two before they arrived, right? Well it's not even been one, Salvatore. They sped up. That is the only explanation." He said with confidence. Salvatore remained silent for a moment and then nodded slowly.
"Alright, I see your line of thought, but that is still a big gamble, kid. You don't know for certain." He cautioned.
"But if I'm right, and there is an intelligence behind Famine's horde then taking it out would swing the battle drastically in our favor."
"And how do you plan to find them?" Salvatore asked again as he looked out the open door of the Vertibird and watched as the gunner next to him ripped through a line of feral ghouls as they flew over the ones who were just starting to crawl over the rubble of the destroyed building in the East and try to once more push towards the eastern wall, which had, thankfully, begun to reorganize as Jericho led a number of men, not just his own, to short up defenses and refocus fire on the most dangerous part of the battlefield.
"That is what Eve is here for." Adam said as he turned to look at her. "You have better eyes than anyone else here, you can pick out a needle in a haystack just from a visual scan. I need you to scan through the horde and find the outlier. It might be a super mutant, or a car, or a sentient computer, I don't know, but I'm trusting you to find something that might be in charge of this army." Eve nodded slowly as she began to understand her role here.
"I understand, you are lucky you are cute, this is putting a lot of pressure on me to perform~" She said with a teasing tone as she turned to look out the door she was standing next to as well. "Lucky for you I am always high performance, whether on a battlefield or in bed. Time to show you I'm not all talk. I am an experienced woman~" She said with a flirty tone, dripping her comment with innuendos as she began to scan through the crowd looking for something that might stand out to her.
Adam let off a single chuckle at her comment and then turned to Salvatore again.
"You are the best shot I know of, that's why you are here." Adam nodded confidently at him. "We find whatever is controlling all these ghouls and you take them out, simple as that."
"Assuming it is something I can shoot, for all we know it's a sentient toaster." Salvatore joked dryly.
"I trust you can hit a toaster in this crowd." Adam grinned. Salvatore shook his head but grinned slightly.
"Well I'll do my best not to disappoint." He said as he shouldered his rifle and looked out onto the crowd of feral ghouls. Adam then walked towards the cockpit to speak to the pilot again.
"Fly us out east, keep to a high altitude so my friend can scan through the crowd but not so high she is out of range, we need sightlines."
"Understood, moving out." The gunner said back professionally as the vertibird began to fly forward at a methodical pace, keeping even for Eve to be able to scan through the crowd.
This was all Adam could come up with on the drop of a hat. Certainly there were better strategies to employ, there was no doubt more sure fire ways to get this done. But he knew he had a vertibird, a robotic scanner, and a deadly shot, this was the best plan he could throw together in the spur of the moment. If he can't find whatever is controlling the horde then, even with the cult's reinforcements, they might still be overwhelmed. There was undoubtedly still a sea of feral ghouls laid out before them. They had made a dent, no doubt, he could actually see the end of the crowd now, it was not endless, but it was still an apocalyptic amount. If things went wrong it still could easily lead to them being overrun. Especially since they had no idea how many lay hiding below the ground in the sewers. The number of enemies was simply incalculable.
"Adam." Eve said slowly as she paused, still gazing out into the crowd. "I may have found something." She said with an uncharacteristically uncertain tone.
"What do you see, Eve?" He asked as he tapped the pilot on the shoulder to let him know to level out the vertibird for a moment. Curious, he looked out her door too, not expecting to see something immediately but hoping to see it after she pointed it out.
"There." She said, pointing to the crowd of ghouls, Adam looked to where she was pointing, even after looking for a few moments he could not see anything.
"What am I looking at?" He asked, confused.
"In there, that group, there is a ghoul." She said slowly still, gaining confidence as she continued to stare at the crowd below.
"Of course there are ghouls, I'm not sure what you-" Adam began, not sure what she was talking about before she cut him off.
"No, not a feral ghoul. A ghouI." She reiterated. "Someone down there hasn't gone feral." She said, with full confidence now.
"How can you be sure?" Adam asked, unable to see who she was referring to.
"Live as long as me, you begin to notice the subtle differences between people. Despite how they look, ghouls are still human, they act human, their body movements and facial expressions are still human. Feral ghouls are not human, they do not act, move, or think like a human. Down there, the one I found, that is a human. I am certain of it." Adam looked at her for a moment and then nodded slowly.
"Can you point him out to Salvatore?" She stared in silence for a moment and then let off a synthetic sigh. "If my targeting systems were still as good as they were back in the war I would be able to make this shot myself easily but as it is now…" She peters off. "Yes, I can point him out." She said. Adam then tapped Salvatore on the shoulder and then swapped places with him, giving him the room to share the door with Eve and the gunner.
Eve began to point from her position, explaining exactly where to aim in the crowd, Adam couldn't see where she was pointing now, but he was sure that she was doing it fine so he didn't need to back seat drive it. Hopefully this would end it. However a moment later he heard Eve yell as loudly as her synthetic voice would allow.
"Adam grab hold of something!" A moment later the entire Vertibird veered violently to the side followed by the entire aircraft rocking from an explosion a second after.