Fallout New Vegas: The Story Of The Courier
Chapter 1: What's Your name
Disclaimer: I do not own Fallout or any of the other games
A kid in a bed wakes up, trying to open his eyes but can't. His head feels like it just got shot, twice, and dumped in some grave. He knows that sounds insane.I mean come on, who could get shot in the head twice and still be alive. He believes he must've taken a fall on it.
"You're awake. How bout' that." He fully opens my eyes seeing a fan above his head. He tries to get up but his body feels sore. He finally was able to sit up straight a moment later.
"Woah, easy there, easy. You've been out cold a couple days now." A man with a mustache said. He was in a field hand outfit and he was bald. He was sitting in a chair his arm on his leg.
"Why don't you just relax a second. Get your bearings. Let's see what the damage is. How bout' your name? Can you tell me your name?" The man asked him. The kid looked at the man, blinking his eyes, seemingly trying to get an idea of who he was. At least it looked like that.
"Uh, preset 7 Asian?" The kid rambled, seemingly lost in confusion.
"No your name." The man said figuring that after what this kid went through, confusion was the best end result.
"Ain't that a kick in the head." The kid rambled on again, trying to find the answer.
"Looks like we might have some damage after all." The man stated. He looke the kid over when he was brought in and, besides the two bullets, he seemed fine. The only issue would've been death, or some brain damage. Seems like the latter.
"Well honestly sir, I think my brain would agree with you. He's been complaining alot lately." The kid joked around in hopes that it would lighten his mood. The man rubbed his nose.
"Do you remember you name at all?" The man asked in hopes that he'd get an answer.
"Is it mandatory?" The kid asked with a grin. The doc nodded his head. " Well just call me Smith A. Wesson."
"Huh, I can't say it's what I'd have picked for ya but if that's your name, that's your name. I'm Doc Mitchell. Welcome to Goodsprings." Doc said to the kid he knew as Smith.
"You can also call me James, Alphonse, Autumn or Butch if you'd like." The kid said, giving Doc more names.
"I'll stick with Smith. Now, I hope you don't mind but I had to go rooting around there in your noggin to pull all the bits of lead out. I take pride in my needlework, but you'd better tell me if I left anything out of place." Doc handed the kid a reflectron. "How'd I do?" The kid looked at his face and his bedraggled hair. He looked about twenty-one.
"I could've sworn I had a mole." The kid said poking his face.
"Well, I got most of it right, anyway. Stuff that mattered." Doc stood up. "Okay, no sense in keeping you in bed anymore. Let's see if we can get you on your feet." Doc pulled the kid up. "Good. Why don't you walk down to the end of the room? Over by that vigor tester machine there."
The kid started to walk. "Take it slow now. It ain't a race." Doc told him near the machine. The kid was able to get there with little difficulty.
On the machine were a series of screens, buttons, microphones, and levers. It was made of wood that was chipped and worn.
"Looking good so far. Go ahead and give the vigor tester machine a try. We'll learn right quick if you got back all your faculties." Doc told him. " It'll take a while so I'm going to get ready the next test while you do this."
"Sure." The kid told him. When Doc came back he saw the kid's score.
S - 3
P - 1
E - 1
C - 10
I - 10
A - 3
L - 10
"With Luck like yours I'm surprised them bullets didn't just turn right around and climb back into the gun." Doc said looking at the luck score.
"Guess I'm just lucky like that." The kid answered, his eyes closed.
"Well, we know your vitals are good." Doc walked into his living room, "But that don't mean them bullets didn't leave you nuttier than a bighorner dropping. What do you say you take a seat on my couch and we go through a couple questions? See if your dogs are still barking." The kid sat on the couch while Doc sat in front of him. "Alright I'm gonna say a word. I want you to say the first thing that comes to mind."
"Got it, Doctor Doc." The kid said.
"Dog" "Train"
"House" "Investment"
"Night" "Shroud"
"Bandit" "Reasonable"
"Light" "Dark"
"Mother" "Caretaker"
"Okay, Now I've got a few statements, I want you to tell me how much they sound like something you'd say. First one. Conflict just ain't in my nature." "Strongly Agree"
"I ain't given to relying on others for support." "Disagree."
"I'm always fixing to be the center of attention." "Strongly, very much agree."
"I'm slow to embrace new ideals." "Strongly disagree."
"I charge in to deal with my problems head-on." "Strongly disagree."
"Almost done here. What do you say you have a look at this? Tell me what you see."
"The first one looks like a dead elephant, or a kitten, something along those lines, maybe!" The kid answered with zeal and sarcasm. "Alright, then." Doc responded he flipped the projector on and an inkblot appeared. "A shadow in a doorframe." "Okay, How about this one?" "I'm too embarassed to say what it looks like." "Last one" "Huh, I want to say two-bears high-fiving but i'm gonna say a mushroom cloud."
"Well, that's all she wrote. I don't have nothing to compare it to, so maybe you'd better just have a look at the results. See if it all seems right to you." The Doc handed him a clipboard saying that he talked alot, seemed more of the type to hide rather than fight, and prefered to keep his distance in a scuffle. He agreed with the first and second statements. He believed he was more of the type to try and bribe his way out.
"Eh, this sounds kinda like me." The kid told him scratching his head.
"Before I turn you loose, I need one more thing from you. I got a form for you to fill out, so I can get a sense of your medical history. Just a formality. Ain't like I expect to find you got a family history of getting shot in the head." The Doc handed him a form with a couple of blank lines and a pencil with no eraser. The kid pondered with his head up. He wrote down a story of a boy who had an uncle who been murdered due to his constant rambling and delusions. He also then wrote about a man who had been able to get out of many skirmishes with the law by being generally good natured. Besides the times he would try to kill little children.
"All right, I guess that about does it. Come with me, I'll see you out." Doc stood up and began walking to the door. The kid got up and walked alongside him wearing only a pair of boxers. Doc stopped standing by his door. "Here, These are yours. Was all you had on you when you was brought in." Doc gave him among other things a note, 9-mm pistol, boxing gloves, a straight razor, 8 sticks of dynamite, and a laser pistol. He was also given some caps, 12 bobby pins, 4 stimpaks and a brown backpack to carry it. The Doc spoke again " I hope you don't mind but I gave note the a look. I thought it might help me find a next of kin. But it was something about a platinum chip." The Courier looked at the note, which detailed a request for a platinum chip, which was to be delivered to The Strip in New Vegas. He looked but couldn't find the chip.
Doc then handed him one final thing "Well, If you're heading back out there, you ought to have this. They call it a Pip-Boy. I grew up in one of them vaults they made before the war. We all got one. Ain't much use to me now, but you might want such a thing after what you been through. I know what it's like, having something taken from you." It was heavy and a bit dirty. The color of the screen which was usually green had been changed to amber. "And put this on, too, so the locals don't pick on you for lacking modesty. Never was much my style anyway." Doc handed him an old Vault 21 suit.
"Thanks for patching me up, Doc." The kid said.
"Don't mention it. You should talk to Sunny Smiles before you leave town. She can help you learn to defend yourself in the desert. She'll likely be at the saloon. I reckon some of the other folks at the saloon might be able to help you out, too. And the metal fella, Victor, who pulled you outta your grave. Anyway, you ever get hurt out there, you come right back. I'll fic you up. But try not to get killed anymore." The kid nodded at the the doctor and opened the door into the outside.
He looked around and saw the saloon and began to walk over, seemingly taking in the area. In front of the saloon sat an old man. "Howdy, What can Easy Pete do for you?"
The kid questioned the man "Why do they call you Easy Pete?"
Pete answered tiredly, as if he had been asked this before "Was a prospector until I decided to settle here to get away from the NCR. Now I just take it easy and help out with the Brahmin and Bighorners."
The kid deciding he'd had enough with this conversation, mainly due to being bored, decided to end it. "Good bye, Pete."
He opened the door to the saloon and had only walked 2 steps before he got backed into a corner by a big dog. "Cheyenne, stay." He looked up only to see a petite young girl with red hair and leather armor carrying a varmint rifle on her back. "Don't worry, she won't bite unless i tell her to. "
The kid stood up, dusted himself off, then held out his hand and, with a grin on his face, introduced himself "Hi, My name is Earl. Doc Mitchell said you could teach me how to survive in the desert."
The girl shook his hand and replied "My name is Sunny Smiles. I guess there's a thing or two I could show you. Sounds like you need all the help you can get after what they done to you. Meet me outside behind the saloon."
The kid did as told and walked outside with Sunny to see that there was a fence with sarsaparilla bottles on them. "Now, see those bottles on the fence there? Take this and try to hit a couple of 'em." Sunny handed him a varmint rifle which was in a decent condition.
The kid took aim at one of the bottles, he looked down his sight, took a deep breath and as soon as he exhaled, he shot a round and it missed. He tried again. Miss. Another still miss. It took him 5 tries until he finally got all 3. "Well, that's a start. But I don't reckon you came to me to learn to fight sarsaparilla bottles. Tell you what. I gotta go chase geckos away from our water supply anyway. Darn critters are attracted to it. Why don't you come along?"
"Okay, I'm in"
"Follow me. It's just down to the southeast a shortways." The kid followed Sunny to the area where she had stated. He had begun to heard growling and hissing close by him. "Hear that up on the ridge behind me there? We got some geckos to clear out. Bunch of little monsters they are. Seems Doc Mitchell treats Gecko bites more than anything else. If we move quietly , we can get the jump on them. More likely to hit something vital that way." The kid and Sunny moved quietly crouched down. The kid looked up to see 5 geckos, which looked like giant upright lizards .Sunny was the first to make a shot hitting a gecko in the eye and another in the chest killing both. The kid shot another 2 both in the chest but had to use a large number of bullets. Cheyenne killed the last one by biting into it's neck.
Sunny looked towards him with a smile "See? You're getting the hang of it. There's still two more wells that need clearing. You wanna come along? It'd be worth a few caps to me."
"Sure"
"It shouldn't take more than a few minutes, especially with two of us." Sunny then led the kid out to two more of the wells. The first one was simple with the kid simply shooting while Sunny did most of the work. Then they heard a woman screaming for help. She had been attacked by a couple geckos while out and, besides her rather dull knife, had nothing to defend herself. Problem was that she was at the bottom of the cliff the kid and Sunny were on.
"Hey Earl, you shoot at the geckos from up-" Sunny began to order but was interrupted
"Not enough time" The kid then jumped down the cliff which while not too hard a fall would've at least hurt. As he hit the ground he brought the blunt end of his rifle down on one of the geckos' heads, smashing it open. He then put his trigger on the handle and put the other end in the mouth of one of the gecko's who tried to growl at him. He kicked another gecko to the ground and shot it's head. All three were dead and the woman was still alive.
"Earl! How'd you do that?" Sunny yelled as she began to make her way down
"Sunny, Wanna know what I did before I got shot?" The kid yelled as she finally got down
"Were you a hitman or an assassin?" Sunny asked suprised at his sudden ability to use a gun
"Nope, It does explain why Cheyenne doesn't like me." The kid said helping the woman who was attacked up
"What then?" Sunny asked again
"I was a mailman" The kid, now the mailman, answered "Or you know, a courier, something like that" The the mailman, now the Courier, added
So this is my attempt at writing a NV story. The kid, by the way if it wasn't obvious, was the courier. I rewrote things differently from the game for 2 reasons. 1. To fit in my vision of the story 2. Because I want to keep my courier a bit different.
