Goodnight – ruins of Weatherford, westernmost city: home of water caravaners
Redbud – ruins of Denton, northernmost city: Brahmin herding trail, Mormon trader outpost
New Dallas – ruins of DFW Airport, easternmost city: tribal scavengers
Mansfield – ruins of Mansfield and southwest Arlington: headquarters for raider faction
Wacko – ruins of Waco, southernmost city: Keeper headquarters
Cowtown – ruins of Fort Worth, central city: only large scale water purification plant; contains the Brahmin Stockyards; only known remaining branch of Texas Rangers
When the bombs fell in the Great War, every major city was leveled with only outlying regions escaping total annihilation. When the vaults began to open one by one, civilization attempted to rebuild itself: many tribes were formed in the husks of DWF International's terminals; Austin, San Antonio, and El Paso joined together in a triumvirate of government in attempts to rebuild; Houston's infrastructure fared best and remained an independent region, possibly due to the Texan Chapter of the Brotherhood of Steel taking residence. The technological saviors were unfortunately to be Houston's undoing, for the lavish rebuilding efforts were undone when an undetonated atomic bomb was set off once more during a clash between the Brotherhood of Steel and an unknown foe.
The Big Three became more important than ever before, that is, until, a ravenous force made its way across the range, calling itself Caesar's Legion. Before the Arizona Desert Rangers joined the NCR Rangers, Caesar's Legion was fighting a war on two fronts. El Paso fell with little warning, as they were wholly unprepared. By the time the Reformed Republic of Texas could scramble defensive militias, the Legion had already beset the San Antonio region. Unprepared for the influx of refugees, Austin stood alone, buckling under the weight of an unstoppable enemy and bleeding resources.
The proud yet feeble settlements surrounding the ruins of Austin took heavy casualties, with the remnant of the Texas Rangers being their only defense. When all seemed lost, one day the Legion was seen to simply pack up and leave, with only a few skirmishing parties left behind to mop up the survivors of the massacre that had claimed the three main strongholds of Texas. Seeing their chance, the Texas Rangers organized a mass exodus of refugees to flee Austin and seek safety to the east. With the heavy bulk of the highly organized and trained military of the NCR pressing against them to the West, the Legion did not pursue the Refugees long or far.
The survivors knew little of the events transpiring in the Mojave Wasteland around the mythical city of New Vegas; all they knew is that the western regions of Texas had fallen to the Legion. In their travels, irradiated bodies of water and the radioactive cyclones of the Midwest denied passage north, and so the Texas Rangers lead the survivors to their only remaining legacy: the Texas Ranger Museum in the ruins of Waco. It was here in the reconstructed settlement of Wacko where they met the mysterious Keepers who preserved the relics in not only the TRM, but the Confederate Air Force Museum and the Grand Lodge of Texas. When the Keepers pointed them north to the flourishing city of Cowtown, the Refugees made the final leg of their journey with gladness at finding a new home. With the knowledge of the wider world brought to the isolated city, the Refugees were made welcome, and the Rangers assumed their role as guardians of the last bastion of Texas – Cowtown.