Disclaimer: This story is written using the setting and the characters of Bethesada's Fallout franchise, and as such, they all belong to Bethesada. Original characters, fictional locations, and such are all entirely made up and any resemblance to other people/places is purely coincidental. If you find a reason to sue me, proceed. Just be warned, I'm virtually penniless and have a cute little puppy that relies on me for food and a warm place to sleep. A puppy, people. Don't be cruel.

A WAR WITHOUT END

A Companion Story to BRAVE NEW WORLD

"Where must we go... We who wander this Wasteland in search of our better selves?"
- The First History Man

"There are always people who are into the old way of doing things. I don't think it's a bad thing necessarily, but things change. Nothing stays the same. If you can stay true to yourself, you're always going to be legendary."

Symere Woods, American Singer and Songwriter

"The condition of man... is a condition of war of everyone against everyone."

Thomas Hobbes, English Philosopher

He swirled around the purified water in its glass, looking down at it as his mind drifted down memory lane, thinking back all those years ago. So many dangers. So many horrors. All those triumphs and defeats.

Even eighteen years later, the ghosts of the past still haunted him.

They would never truly leave him in peace. The man sighed before emptying the glass down his throat, feeling his senses weighted down by the water. He had saved the Wasteland, hadn't he? And yet, in the end, here he was. Abandoned and forgotten.

No. Not forgotten.

The Capital Wasteland would never forget him. The legend of the Lone Wanderer would endure forever, though distorted and exaggerated.

Ainsley let out a mirthless chuckle then. He hadn't been abandoned either. That wasn't true as well. No, it was different than just that. The list of people that had stood by his side, fought alongside him against a legion of foes, and had fallen… That list had grown too long for his liking.

His father had instilled the greatest of virtues in him. Compassion. Humility. Sacrifice. And though the cruel and inhospitable wasteland had done much to change him, he persisted in living by what his father taught him. Even then, there had to be compromises. There were times when these virtues were not enough. There had been times where cruelty had to be met with cruelty. Times where atrocities were punished with vengeful wrath. Times where senseless violence had to be silenced with even greater brutality.

He knew what the people thought of him. He might have been their savior once but these days people weren't sure whenever he was a saint or a monster. To some, he was the Last, Best Hope of Humanity. To others, the Scourge of Humanity.

But it didn't really matter.

What did was that Humanity survived. Despite the tyranny of the Raider, the terror of the Super Mutant, and the fascism of the Enclave, Humanity survived. The Capital Wasteland survived. Everyone survived.

But survival brought with it another problem. An insurmountable challenge. A struggle like no other. The struggle for survival was a war without end.

He groaned as he stood up. "Come on, Dogmeat." A bark answered him as his canine companion perked up, always ready to follow his master just as his father had before him, and surely just as his sons would after him. "Time to get back to roaming." He looked over at the proprietor of the rundown establishment, a portly man wiping down glasses.

The older man shook his head then. "Go on, mister. Your caps' no good here." He jabbed toward the door then. "Best get out before the folk round here start waking up." He knew just who he had served, after all. He had heard the stories. The legends.

Ainsley nodded before turning to leave. He swung the door open and stepped out into the morning sunlight, pulling on his tattered cape around his shoulders. The man looked around at the settlement around him. It was small but quietly prosperous. The people here were fortunate to have found a place secure enough from raiders and mutants, a place easily defended. He started walking down the street and brushed off some dirt off his leather armor before resecuring the band of cloth around his armband, a bit of some tough yet frayed fabric, colored sky-blue and bearing in bright yellow colors: 101.

It was all that was left of the Vault he had been exiled from.

All that was left of his memories before the Wasteland. Ainsley sighed again. There were so many times when he wished he could just come back home, crawl back into that Vault and just never leave again. Then he wouldn't have had to go through so much pain, endure so much suffering. He wouldn't have to see so many men and women, people he had come to know and care for and love, fall and die. He wouldn't have met Sarah Lyons. Wouldn't have fought alongside her. Wouldn't have fallen for her.

Wouldn't have to watch helplessly as she died in her arms.

Especially so soon after Elder Lyons passed away. The Brotherhood of Steel had been his life. A new home for him. A new family. But with Sarah's death, all of that melted away. He understood it then, even in his grief and his pain, that he was cursed to walk the Earth. Forever alone. Of the companions that survived, there were only a precious few.

Charon had finally overcome his compulsion to his contract, tearing it up in the process. Then he swore on his honor to defend Underworld and his fellow ghouls against all their enemies. A silent guardian, a watchful protector, an eternal champion.

Fawkes, his debt to the Lone Wanderer repaid, secluded himself within the National Archives, content to protecting this repository of the old world's knowledge and history against scavengers, raiders, and mutants alike, while spending his solitude reading and pondering to himself.

Only Dogmeat wouldn't abandon his master, ever faithful and ever loyal.

And so with only Dogmeat, the Lone Wanderer had departed the Capital Wasteland, leaving for parts where his legend wouldn't be known. But he couldn't just ignore the plight of others nor the evils of those that beset them. There was always something deep within him. Something compelling him to act.

In all such instances, the Lone Wanderer acted. An angel of mercy to some. A spirit of vengeance to others.

Wherever he went, the Lone Wanderer brought comfort to the afflicted, justice to the victimized, and death to all those that dared prey on the weak and the helpless. And to all those who he helped, they knew him only as a savior that had come at the hour of their greatest need, dispensing wasteland justice with righteous fury. Though some would have thought his brutality toward his foes a tad bit excessive and his burning vengeance frightening to behold.

And so, the tales of the Lone Wanderer grew taller and taller with each telling, the man himself buried and obscured underneath legends and myths that formed in his wake.

Before he knew it, Ainsley had left the settlement far behind him, trudging against a vast wasteland that went on forever, the sun beating down on him. On his belt hung a Laser Pistol he had been given years ago by Elder Owyn Lyons. Smuggler's End, the Elder had named it. And true to its name, it had been the end of many smugglers, along with so many others. Around his shoulder hung a hunting rifle, polished and well-maintained, the scope finely tuned.

In many ways, this was his most faithful companion, his most loyal partner. It had never let him down. Had never failed him. The lives it had taken were many, almost as many as the Lone Wanderer had taken.

For hours, Ainsley wandered.

For days, he wandered. In the rain and in the snow, he wandered. Over countless broken roads and through countless broken cities, he wandered. How far had he gone? More than a thousand days, certainly. More than a thousand miles, perhaps. And how much more did he have to go? This, he couldn't help but wonder.

It was a long time before he finally came across other people.

"As per fucking usual." Ainsley sighed as he peered over the rocky outcropping, staring down at a camp. Crates and cages. Poles topped with skulls. Corpses hanging from a tree. A pair of sobbing hostages, both of them women. Along with six men and one woman, all of them in an assortment of leather and metal gear, all of them clearly raiders.

The Lone Wanderer lifted his rifle then, bringing the scope up to his eye in order to get a closer look.

They were more or less all focused on the hostages, chattering among themselves. The one female raider was off to the south, no doubt keeping a lookout herself. She had one of the men with her, and judging from the way she was smiling as he spoke, Ainsley guessed the two were a couple.

The other five, though…

He patted Dogmeat on the head then and looked at his canine companion. "Shhhh." He held up one finger to his lips, signaling the dog to what he wanted from him.

With the first Dogmeat, Ainsley soon realized there was some major advantages to training his companion to understand visual signals as well as verbal ones. Besides, he had read in a magazine once that a scientific study had determined that visual cues were often more effective in giving commands as verbal cues could complicate things, especially if you were shouting or trying to whisper.

And after that Dogmeat had passed on and he adopted another one from among the puppies, Ainsley made sure to train the second Dogmeat in understanding visual commands. It had served the pair well over the years.

Dogmeat sat down flat then, with not even the slightest whine.

Ainsley rested against the rock, keeping a low cover. He would have to wait for the appropriate time to strike. The man felt a surge of anger as one of the raiders slapped a hostage, shouting at her to stop crying. He would make sure to punish that one in particular. A gentleman did not strike a woman, no matter what. Silently, the Lone Wanderer kept an eye on the hostages while he patted Dogmeat's back. It would give him the time to learn these bastards' patterns, their movements, their habits. Every shred of information would be crucial.

After all, knowledge is power.

That was the key to the Lone Wanderer's survival, his ability to overcome everything. It was both a blessing and a curse, this photographic memory that allowed him to forget nothing. And over the six hours he stood watch, Ainsley missed nothing. A raider's addiction to Med-X. Another's tendency to overdrink. The couple working together on fashioning a bottlecap mine. The spot where they placed the mine, boobytrapping the path into the camp. One exhibited signs of PTSD and was constantly taking long walks away from camp.

The last raider among the bunch, however…

He was definitely the most dangerous out of them all. He demonstrated a discipline most raiders didn't have. The man was constantly holed up in his shack on the edge of the camp, his back to the wall as he cleaned his weapon, what looked to be a submachine gun, chambered for 10mm, along with four full clips just beside the weapon. And tucked in the corner by him, a riot shotgun.

Ainsley exhaled slowly. If he had one of his old friends with him, then it would have been easier. But no, that was absolutely out of the question.

He began putting together a plan in his head, determining how to best fit together all the pieces. He would have liked to take the last raider out first, but that would certainly alert the camp to his presence. Those few precious seconds would surely mean death, if not for him, then for the hostages. No, he would have to make use of every crucial second. Besides, as long as the hostages weren't in immediate danger, he had plenty of time.

Two more tense hours passed by before the Lone Wanderer was ready to put his plan into action. It was dark enough now. They would be blind now, thanks to their dependence on burning barrels to ward off the darkness.

He silently moved away from his position on the outcropping, gestured for Dogmeat to stay, before moving down the hill. Ainsley gave himself several minutes to stretch and massage out the soreness in his muscles before moving ahead with his plan. It took him ten minutes before he found one of the raiders, the one suffering from PTSD. The man had been sitting against a tree about three hundred paces away from the camp, no doubt his favorite location as there were beer bottles strewn around along with carvings on the dead tree's trunk.

Quietly, as if he were some ghost, Ainsley moved in closer and closer to the raider. The man was busy, whittling away on a piece of wood with a homemade blade. Likely a form of therapy, the Lone Wanderer noted to himself as he slid out his own blade, a combat knife that had been recently sharpened. For times like this, he preferred to rely on this weapon, one he had picked off the corpse of Commander Jabsco of the Talon Company. The man had named it Occam's Razor and the Lone Wanderer felt the name appropriate, as it was the simplest answer for this particular task.

He slid his hand over the man's mouth, silencing his surprised shout.

Then came the swift cut. Crimson poured down his throat and chest. After a brief struggle and a dying gurgle, the raider soon slumped against the Lone Wanderer who let him fall to the ground. He wiped Occam's Razor against the man's corpse, cleaning the blood off before sliding it back into its sheath on his belt.

One down. Six more.

Without word, the Lone Wanderer disappeared into the night. Patiently, he made his way back to the outcropping where Dogmeat perked up. He rubbed the dog's head and smiled down at him. Then that smile died. There was still work to do.

He hefted up his hunting rifle and brought his focus toward the shack. Mister Discipline was still there.

Good.

He lowered the rifle and pulled something out from his open backpack. Quietly, Ainsley began screwing on the silencer, securing it firmly. Then he lifted the rifle again and placed it against the rocks, taking aim at the raider in the shack. In the back of his head, he logged the fact that the man's submachine gun was whole once again, with a clip in it. His mind determined the detail to be irrelevant now. The man was dead already, after all.

Keeping his weapon steady, he picked up a rock and hurled it over his head. It soared to the side, clattering as it hit the ground. Three of the raiders went still then, suddenly alerted by the sound. In that same instant, Ainsley fired the rifle.

Blood splattered the wall behind the man as he slumped backward, his hand uselessly on the 10mm SMG in front of him.

Two down. Five more to go.

The three stood up and went over to investigate. They were careful to step over the bottlecap mine they had set up as a trap. One of the raiders barely moved, sighing in pleasure as the Med-X in his veins floated him out of his head. The other was struggling to get to his feet, stumbling around as he fought against his intoxication.

Ainsley inhaled then. There was a time when he had spent much of his existence inside a bottle. There were still moments when he wanted to crawl back into one. But he couldn't. That would have been an insult to Sarah. To Elder Lyons. To everyone who died for him. He exhaled and the drunk raider fell over, a hole in the side of his head.

He moved up to the next raider, the one enjoying his high. At least he would die happy. Another silent gunshot and the man floated away even higher. No drugs in hell, Ainsley hoped.

Three and four down. Only three more to go.

He gave it two minutes before the rest of them came back, talking angrily among themselves. One was yelling about it being nothing but a stray dog. The woman rolled her eyes. A loud gunshot rang out, the silencer on the ground now. There was no longer any need for stealth.

All three of them flinched, hit with the sudden realization that they were under attack. The one in the back was lucky, however. Or unlucky, depending on your perspective. The bottlecap mine exploded, set off by a .308 bullet. Screams followed as shrapnel pierced flesh.

Two down. Together in life, together in death. Only one left.

He set his rifle down, no longer needing it. "Come on, boy." The Lone Wanderer began making his way down the other side of the hill, Dogmeat following him close behind. He avoided the camp for now, too focused on finishing the task first. Ainsley stepped over the dead bodies, bottlecaps scattered all around on the ground and in their flesh.

He looked around then. The last one wasn't anywhere to be found. But he could see a trail of blood leading down the path. Footsteps in the dirt. One heavier than the other. A limp. He must have caught some of the shrapnel from the bottlecap mine in the leg. Ainsley snapped his fingers then, the signal for action. Dogmeat took off in pursuit, tracking the scent of the last raider.

Within moments, screams filled the air again.

The Lone Wanderer came upon the two, righteous vengeance filling him up. Dogmeat had his jaws tight around the man's arm, drawing blood. He was screaming and raining down blows on the dog in an attempt to pull him off. Angry, the Lone Wanderer rushed forward and kicked him in the face, stunning him momentarily. "Down." He ordered and Dogmeat released his hold on the man, backing away several paces. It didn't take long for the raider to crawl back into the world of consciousness. He should have gone unconscious instead, had he known better.

"P-please… Stop! I, I'm sorry! I didn't… I didn't know they were… Friends of yours!" The raider sobbed now, wincing with pain and holding out a hand against the Lone Wanderer. "Take t-them. Just… T-take them and go. L-let me live…"

Ainsley stared down at the man, this raider who had thought himself so strong and proud. Just a ruined shell of a man now. 'Just another piece of shit, the same as a thousand others.' He thought to himself. He approached closer and crouched in front of the man, who flinched at the closeness. "Listen to me carefully."

The man nodded his head, desperate to do anything just to survive. He looked up at his adversary, terror scrawled out on his face. He was listening harder than he ever had in his entire life.

"Fuck you."

The raider looked confused then. Ainsley grabbed the back of his head before stabbing Occam's Razor straight into his face, earning him a loud crunch. The raider tensed up for a moment before going limp, deader than dead. He forcibly pulled out the combat knife and stood up then.

Back in the camp, the two women were more frightened than they ever had been. It had been bad enough when these bastards killed their entire caravan and captured the two of them. But now, they were dropping dead all over and… There just wasn't anyone else. Then they saw him walk into the light of the campfire. He was covered in sweat and grime and blood.

"It's going to be okay, ladies." Ainsley spoke softly and in a reassuring tone, knowing from experience that it would help calm them down. "I'm here to free the two of you." He could see fear transform into relief on both of their faces. The first thing he did once he reached them, he pulled the gags out of their mouths. "Are you okay?"

The first woman trembled for a moment before bursting into tears, suddenly happy that nothing was going to happen to her. She had spent all this time fully expecting them to drag her away and rape her and kill her. And now they were dead and she was alive and she hadn't been touched at all. Dogmeat licked at her hand and Ainsley smiled gently.

He looked at the second woman. She nodded. "Yeah, we're okay... Ar- Are they all dead?" She stared back at him, both hopeful and dreading the answer. She certainly wished death on all of the raiders. But what kind of man was this who could take out all of them in minutes and alone? There were men, after all, and there were monsters.

"Every single one of them." He answered. What else was there to say?

The first woman stopped her crying just long enough to look up at her hero. "Wh… Who are you?"

Ainsley said nothing for a moment. He sighed then, before smiling at her as well. "Just a good samaritan, ma'am. Happened across this camp and saw you both in trouble. They didn't look friendly at all, so I figured I'd lend a hand."

He undid their binds and helped the two up. They talked some more and he learned their names, Alice and Kenzie. He learned they had been travelling with a caravan when the raiders attacked them. They had been hoping to start a new life somewhere else.

He could understand the sentiment himself.

All they wanted to do now was just sleep, and so he offered to stand guard. Too tired and frightened by their entire ordeal, they took him up on his offer and drifted off to fitful sleep. While they slept, the Lone Wanderer busied himself with carrying the bodies out. Were it anyone else, he would have dug them graves. But as they were raiders, he didn't give a shit. Even being lumped into a pile was too good for them.

The Lone Wanderer made his way back into camp and began gathering everything that was worth something. In silence, Ainsley restocked his supply and refilled his packs. Food. Water. Medicine. Most important of all, ammunition. There was also the The 10mm SMG. That, he'd be taking with him. Ainsley also helped himself to some of the raiders' ill-gained stash of bottle caps. Everything else, though? He left in the middle of the camp, for the two women, along with the riot shotgun and a .32 pistol. It wasn't much but it was the lion's share of everything the raiders had. They would need it, he knew. He just hoped it would be enough.

Ainsley sat down then, with Dogmeat lying next to him. He would rest for now. He deserved it, after all.

Morning came far too soon for Alice. She stirred in her bedroll, slowly waking up and silently cursing the sunrise. She sat up then, looked around. Kenzie was in her bedroll still. She had cried a lot last night. Alice knew she had been troubled by nightmares in her sleep as well, given how much Kenzie had thrashed around.

Their savior, she didn't see.

She got up then and saw the small hoard the Lone Wanderer had pulled together. There was a folded piece of paper on top of an ammo box, held down by a small rock. She opened it. Scrawled on the aged parchment was…

Alice, Kenzie. It was my honor to rescue the two of you. Please take everything with you, they should help. I wish you both safe travels and good fortune.

Your Good Samaritan

This guy had done so much for them and he was gone without a word. They didn't even know his name. There was something else nagging at her, though. Alice had seen the armband on him last night, but she had been too tired to think on it. The woman thought back, recalling what had been on that piece of blue fabric, the numbers emblazoned in yellow.

'One hundred and one…' Alice thought to herself. Slowly, the realization came to her. She turned her gaze to stare out at the horizon, wondering if she would catch a glimpse of the stranger. Could that really have been him? "The Lone Wanderer…" She whispered softly to herself. She went through the pile then. There was so much here, enough to give them a small fortune.

Enough to start a new life with! She grinned as she turned to look at her friend. "Kenzie! Wake up! You're not going to believe this!"

Somewhere else, the Lone Wanderer trudged on. The horizon opened up endlessly before him. It was a beautiful day today, even for this post-apocalyptic crapsack of a world. But all he could think of was the fact that in his wake, yet another legend had been made.

The struggle for survival wasn't the only war he found himself trapped in. The struggle to escape himself, to escape the legacy of the Lone Wanderer. That was yet another war without end. He would never escape it, he knew. Just as well as he knew this...

War. War never changes.