Trade secrets
Act one: A Random Encounter
Every man has a bullet with a name etched on it.
No man knows whose bullet he carries, be it friend or foe, man, woman, elderly, child or even his own. No man knows when he shall face his bullet; some never meet it, not even in a hail of burning lead at the apex of their lives, others meet it without ever realizing what has transpired.
Every man has a bullet with a name etched on it, but what man holds only one bullet?
(S)
The twilight sun lit the area so it seemed to be ablaze, a gentle breeze uprooted a few grains of sand from the burning mound and threw them far away from where they once lay.
The print left in the sand faded with even the most gentle of winds even this one; the steps every man were wiped away from the surface of the wasteland no matter what were his deeds, hero or scoundrel, savior or oppressor, rich or poor, all stood equal in the eyes of the wasteland and all met the same fate.
The steps blown away by the wind were manmade, this particular man was right now standing at the top of the hill, a medium backpack rested against his leg along with several packages that were that were tightly tied to the pack.
Long pants made of thick unyielding fabric covered his legs partly hiding his makeshift shoes made of very rough animal skin, they didn't seem very comfortable, the sides of his pants held several large full pockets, looking like very lumpy packages.
His torso was covered by a thin long sleeved khaki t-shirt, many signs of wear and repair were present on its visible parts, it was covered by a plain brown shirt.
His head had a large cowboy hat rested on top of it; a thread ran under his jaw holding it in position, a red bandana peeked from under the headdress a knot visible at the back of his head, a pair of goggles were hanging off his neck.
The man's hands held a pair of large binoculars to his eyes as he surveyed the god forsaken desert that had spread before him for miles upon miles; sand upon sand, dunes upon dunes, some distance away from him he saw a cloud of dust rising behind one of the sandy hills to his right.
"A sandstorm picking up perhaps… or raiders like last time " he thought for a moment and considered his options, no matter the cause it would be in his best interest to stay clear of that area.
He continued surveying the landscape before him; about two hundred meters to his left he saw a few molerats burrowing around a thorny bush; their sharp prominent incisors were gnawing at the roots of the dried plant whilst their massive paws shot streams of sand all around their round thick hided bodies, one of the creatures raised his head out of the storm of sand aimed its snout at the sky and took a few whiffs of the desert air before returning to its compulsive burrowing.
"Good" he thought to himself, the trouble he had gone through to make molerat skin shoes was paying off, or else it would have been him they would have been biting but it would still be cautious not to come too close to them.
"Straight it is then" he told himself.
He sighed deeply, placed his binoculars into the pack before continuing to rummage through it pulling out various items; a compass, a leaflet, a box of sugarbombs and a map wrapped in plastic with abundance of markings scattered all over it.
He laid the map on the ground before him, placed the magnetic needle at its corner allowing it to point north, he read the leaflet again; a large sword with spread wings erupting from it with three cogwheels under it decorated the paper, neatly typed black writing was printed across the paper;
To all people of wasteland
The brotherhood of steel hereby invites you to come to the unveiling of its latest achievement of technological marvel.
With the hard work and sacrifice of the dedicated members of our brotherhood led by head scribe Rothchild, Sarah Lyons and the assistance of a diligent team of scientists from Rivet city the brotherhood has taken a monumental leap in allowing a better quality of life to all the people of the capital wasteland.
Samples of the produce of this creation will be given freely to all fair people attending this gathering to allow you to better understand that what once were scares and a matter of discord will now be given freely.
The unveiling will be held at the Rivet city at the twenty eighth of November.
Owyn Lyons
Elder of the brotherhood of steel
D.C. chapter
Note: all traders working in cooperation with Ernest "uncle" Roe are to bring with them any beast of burden they may posses, any other trading caravan group is recommended to follow in suite as trading rights and contracts will be signed on the spot with the head scribe.
Residential areas without regular caravan movement will be allowed to negotiate the use of nearby brotherhood patrols to delivering copious amounts of the product.
The folded leaflet was stuffed back into his backpack, the brotherhood had something, they were in a sharing mood and he wasn't about to look a gift horse in the mouth.
He turned back to his compass, the needle was pointing steadily at one direction, he changed the direction of the plastic gadget so the letter N was in line with the needle, he looked around for a landmark, directly west of him he saw the Springville school and he searched for it on the map drawing an imaginary straight vertical line from it as he did, next he moved the magnetic needle over to the town he left yesterday, "Big Town", another imaginary line was drawn from that location at a very specific angle which he had bothered checking every few minutes since he had set out, when he found were the two lines met he knew his exact location, somewhere between Springville and Super Duper Mart.
"If I continue heading southeast, I'll reach Wilhelm's raft, across the bridge and through the stations, shouldn't take more then a few days" he thought to himself, he had already been to the aircraft carrier more than a few times and knew the way there meant getting past super mutants, feral ghouls and god knows what else, but he always managed to get across with all of his luggage, and rumor had it that the path was now guarded by brotherhood paladins and knights so it might even be easier than usual.
He returned the map and the compass to his pack, shook the box of cereal; it was almost empty.
He poured the content into his hand before throwing away the box.
"Here Sid, Tom, come here kiddo" he called out.
A few seconds later a thick wet tongue licked his hand clean of the bomb shaped sugar coated corn-flakes, he patted the two headed bovine where its two necks converged, one of the heads mooed in joy, both turned and looked at him with their big black eyes, at the side of the ox's body a vertical eight and a large R were branded.
He checked that all of his cargo was secured to the beast's back; a few sacks containing an assortment of items left over from his latest venture, one sack contained what he knew to be stimpacks, syringes of morphine, and inhalers full of Jet, another sack which made a metallic clung every few steps the Brahmin took was filled to the brim with magazines, various bullets of different caliber and a miniature cloak field generator that would normally be attached one's wrist, the last vessel contained anything from ropes, chains, meat hooks, picture frames and toy cars to a lawn mower blade and a blue astronaut lunch box, there were many other bags on the beast but all were empty, an ammo box slung at its side and locked with an electric code lock was full of three thousand caps he had earned two days ago at big town, selling them robot parts, weapons, explosives and stealth boys. He had kept to himself one of the contraptions in case things would get too rough on him and a rifle to protect himself and his property.
"Kids, guess what?" he addressed the warm brown furred beast.
"We're heading towards the city by the river" both pairs of eyes looked away in protest of this statement, one of them even let out a very loud moo.
"I know you don't like it there but we've got to get supplies, in three weeks we could get some new thing that the brotherhood is giving away and I already promised uncle R that we'd be there" one head turned to the sky, looking at the partially visible moon, the other stared at the ground were one of its hoofed legs was kicking the dirt away.
"Come on" he tugged at one of the ropes on the beast's back, prompting it to move forward, he lifted his pack up and heaved it over onto his back.
He pulled a long metal rod that stuck out from between the bags exposing a wooden body, a bolt and a trigger, all the protection he had and needed for his travels in the wastes.
He slung the rifle over his shoulder, checking it had a full magazine in it and an extra round in the chamber, a trick Harith had taught him and had saved him more than a few times of unsuspecting raiders.
The trader and his pet finished going down the hill they were on, he checked his compass to see whether he was still on the right track, he looked forward at his compass and then forward again, right in front of him was a ravine created by two dunes, a perfect place for a raider ambush, but if he wanted to stay on track and not get lost he had to go through it. He un-slung his rifle holding it in both hands squeezing it as hard as he could, he followed the beast into the canyon.
Oh, saint Monica, hallow be thy name, blessed be all who conquer thy trials"
He kept shifting his eyes from one hill top to the other, expecting a raider to jump up and start spraying down the ravine he was walking in every second.
"I, your humble servant plead you, take me into your everlasting embrace and aid this lost boy reach his destination"
He was three quarters of the way through.
"Spread thy veil of protection over me, am.." A roaring thunder erupted to his right, small clouds of dust flew into the air all around him, he dropped to the ground and rolled onto his back; aiming his rifle to the hill the noise had come from, no one was there.
He was breathing rapidly; the Brahmin continued walking as though nothing had happened.
He rolled again, lying flat on his stomach, sat up to his knees until he finally managed to push himself up to a standing position, dropping his bag.
His heart was racing, threatening to burst out of his chest with every beat, his ears were flooded with the noise of the organ moving, he smelled the gunpowder in the air, his grip of the gun tightened, his finger rested of the trigger.
"Sid, danger!" he commanded. The mutated bovine stopped dead in its tracks and sat down, he heard a voice from over the hill shout.
" Die bitch, di.." the exclamation was cut short by another explosion, closely followed by a shout that was nothing short of an expression of sheer terror and agony, a woman's voice erupted from somewhere behind the sand.
"WILD FANG, NO! SHOOT THE SONOFA BITCH!" it ordered, a burst of a few bullets was clearly heard beyond his sight, he crept up along the side of the hill, his weapon at the ready. He saw a body torn in half by one of the explosions he had heard earlier, the man's insides were torn open by the force of the explosion, organs were spilling out of his abdomen freely, his intestines seemed to stretch for two meters away from their source, the man's arms were scooping his insides back, even under his tan skin it was easy to tell he was losing color, blood poured out of him like a fountain, then he was still and as white as a sheet of paper.
The trader continued circling the hill, he saw another man holding an R91 assault rifle, he was spraying bullets madly at one direction, though he was hardly aiming as the rifle bucked wildly under his grip, the merchant pointed his old rifle at the raider's head, drew a breath but before he could pull the trigger the outlaw's head was pushed back as though it had hit a solid object as he advanced only to fly back forward as though by an invisible rubber band, pulling the rest of his body along with it in a drop forward, the Raider didn't even hear the shot that had ended his life.
He ignored the death of the man and continued walking.
Another body was unveiled before him lying on its back, it was riddled full of bloody spots with metal imbedded into it; a rather large piece of shrapnel was lodged next to its eye and several others at the neck; the man seemed to be so peaceful as though he was asleep but the trails of blood gave his fate away.
"Missed, bitch!" it was the same woman's he had heard a few seconds prior to discovering the three dead bodies, she had let out a fierce battle cry, he could hear her charging through the thick sand.
"Your ass is mine!"
He took the corner, what he had seen before him was something he had never imagined he would encounter in his life; the female raider he had heard but not seen was flat on her back, she coughed loudly, thick blood erupted out of her mouth and covered her face. Hiding her midsection was a crouched figure, draped in what seemed to be a long black dress, covering it from the waist down, a roomy white shirt covered its torso and was stuffed into the other piece of garment, a matching headdress covered the back of its head with twin black circles holding the headwear in its place.
The figure seemed to be pressing something into the raider's chest, he made out a movement of its right shoulder from under the cloth and a loud snapping noise followed, the raider drew breath no more, her eyes glazed over and he heard something hit the sand heavily.
For a moment he stood there, his rifle pointed at the back of the black and white being before him, this man had just taken out four raiders head on.
"Don't move!" the trader ordered "Hands in the air!" the outlandish draped figure didn't budge.
"I said" he shouted at the character "hands in the fucking air!".
A calm calculated response came back at him "You also said not to move", it was a man's voice, rough, loud, almost primitive in a way, an odd moment passed, the trader thought for a second, this man had just brushed against death and didn't mind it enough to even panic when someone ordered him at gun point, behind his back.
"Just put your hands up" finally, the man raised his hands into the air, one of them had blood on it, but they were both empty as far as he could tell.
"Stand up" a moment later the man had gotten up on his feet, uncovering the female raider's body; a hunting knife was jammed all the way down to the hilt in the middle of her chest, her own hand held it in.
The man had stretched to his full height and the trader wish he hadn't; he could now see this person was at least twice his size and a foot and a half taller.
"May I turn around?"
He was slightly taken aback by the question, he noticed he was losing his control of the situation, and he had to keep that.
"No!" he barked at the man, but it seemed that he had only asked out of politeness as he had already turned around; a pleasant face looked back at him deep warm honey eyes looked back at him, a thick white beard obscured most of his jaw, the facial hair was only held back by two scars coming from the corners of his mouth to his ears; a Glasgow grin, an expression of utter amazement flashed on his face but only for a moment.
"Ah, so you're a merchant" the man lowered his hands to his sides, next to a belt which held a pistol, he could see the man was a bit fuller than he was; his belly protruded the spacious garment and there were strange bumps running down from his shoulders to his belly.
"Hands UP!" The man sighed and barely moved his elbows so his hands were hovering around his shoulders, slightly tilting his body to the left and to the right.
"What makes you say that?" he inquired.
"Say what? Oh, that you're a merchant?" he nodded.
"That's an easy one"
"Do tell"
"If you were a raider, you would have tried shooting me while I had my back turned" he pointed his thumb at the dead raider behind him "You hardly hold your weapon right so you're not a Steeler or a merc'" he pointed his finger at the butt end of the rifle "and if you were a.."
"What's wrong with the way I hold my gun?"
"The stock is in your armpit, not the shoulder socket, you're aiming from there and not of eye level, so I'm guessing you're having trouble hitting anything over thirty yards away, and neither of the two I mentioned would be caught dead with anything short of an assault rifle"
The trader's eyes stared at the man with amazement, he hadn't told anyone about the problem he had aiming.
"As I was saying, if you were a normal wastelander, you would have bolted out of here as soon as the first explosion hit, but being chased and losing some of your cargo along the way seemed too much to bear" the black and white figure ended.
"So you know what I'm not, but how did you know what I am?"
"Simple, you have the wears of a merchant and no offence" he pinched his own nose "but you smell like Brahmin" The trader was absolutely dumbstruck, he didn't know if he wanted to shoot the man or burst out laughing.
"And I kind of saw you at Roe's place three weeks ago" he looked at the oddly draped man for a few seconds, he vaguely remembered Roe telling him he had a guest that shouldn't be disturbed, which he found funny given the Mechanist and the Antagonizer were fighting each other outside as loudly as possible.
"Then you're a trader too?"
"Of a sort, I deal with" He paused for a second seemingly at a loss of words "high risk commodities"
The merchant motioned the barrel of his rifle to the man's abdomen, there was an obvious lie in his latest statement.
"Can you please move that thing away? It's making me nervous" he indicated at the rifle with his left hand and took a step with his right foot.
" I don't think so, 'cause no trader I know walks around with no cargo"
A blur of white flashed towards his gun, he pulled on the trigger of his weapon; sending the lead projectile, but its target was already gone.
He felt a sharp pain right under his sternum; an elbow had hit him square in the solar pollex, he fell to the ground gasping for air, his rifle was still in the air held by his assailant whom switched the ends of the rifle he was holding, one arm was all he needed to point the weapon at its owner, a thick finger was wrapped placed around the trigger, the long barrel was pointed at his head, only a few inches away from it; he desperately wanted to move his hands but they were frozen to his midsection, he closed his eyes.
" BANG!" the other shouted and jerked his arm as though the gun fired "You're dead"
"First thing" he spat at the trader of goods on the ground " Never state your intent before attempting to kill someone, you did that by changing your aim" the weapon was thrown on the sand next to him, his pretend murderer walked around him, bent over moving his hands under the trader's armpits, he could feel the man's breath on his cheek.
"Second thing" he whispered into his ear " I dropped my cargo so I could fight, take a deep breath when I stop moving you" the man was hoisted into the air; his arms were held high over his head stretching his body, he drew one long deep breath after another, his thoughts rested on his own pack just a few yards from where he was.
"Third thing, you just experienced high risk commodities being exchanged" he was slowly lowered to the ground and surprisingly enough felt that he could stand again.
He heard the other man walk behind him, by the time he turned around he only saw the end of his dress vanishing at the side of the hill, a few moments later a moment later he saw him once more, a pack that ran the full length of the individual's long back at both the top end the bottom rested heavy metal boxes with electric combination locks on then, he could see various colors of garment spilling out of the bag along with many barrels sticking out to the side; he recognized an R91 assault rifle, a DKS- 501 sniper rifle, a laser rifle and a plasma rifle.
His belt now held two more weapons; another much larger revolver was jammed into the garment mirroring the other pistol and a thin long sword was sheathed on the left, a Chinese assault rifle was held in both his hands.
"Cargo" the man pointed his thumb at his back.
"I can see that" he blinked and took the sight in once more; a man as large as a super mutant, carrying the weight of two Brahmin and the firepower of two brotherhood of steel patrols.
For a brief time both men just looked at one another, studying each other, slowly the shorter man squatted and picked up his rifle, never moving his eyes from the other man though he seemed to be more concerned with the sun.
"So…" started the miniature titan "where are you headed?" he kept looking at the sky.
"Rivet" the younger looking one shot back, the other man turned his attention to him with a wide smile.
"Really?"
"Yeah"
"Well, I'm headed there myself, so I hope you won't mind me tagging along" the young trader raised an eyebrow.
"I just tried to kill you and you want to come with me?" he inquired, the other man chuckled and slung the foreign rifle over his shoulder.
"If I ostracize every person whom tries to kill me, because they thought I was something I wasn't, I might as well move to vault seventy seven".
"What's wrong with living in a vault?" the merchant thought"So you get that a lot, huh?" the other man moved closer, resting a hand on the other's shoulder.
"You have no idea".
(S)
Night was soon approaching on the two traders and Brahmin, they had traveled for hours without any occurrences, a quick discussion led them to the decision to make camp overnight, though the older man refused three spots which seemed to be absolutely descent and only agreed to stop on the fourth; at the bottom of three dunes.
The younger member of the two pulled out his map and compass and began looking for landmarks but the darkness of the night was making it rather hard to spot anything.
"We're next to the Super-Duper mart, right here" the other man commented pointing somewhere slightly north of the raider position.
"What makes you say that?" the trader asked, he had already took notice of his companion's orientation skill as he navigated without a map, compass or any other type of geographical aid.
"Look over that hill" he gestured with his head to the right "or at that" he pointed at a tall post directly in front of him, at its top were the letters SDM and an arrow pointing at them.
"We should move" the merchant hastily folded his map back into the backpack along with the magnetic needle, he pushed the stock of his rifle into the ground to help him get up but found himself held down.
"It's ok, start a fire so we can get some shut-eye" he pushed the man's hand off his shoulder and sprung to his feet.
"You might think that a raider camp is a nice view, but I'm not as crazy or as brave as you" he pulled his pack on onto his back and started marching.
"Sid, Tom com.." he found himself being held back as he tried to keep walking, he felt the other man's grip on his packs handle, he stopped and turned around.
"What's wrong with you?" he shot at the other man "There" he pointed at the hill "is a camp of twenty raiders close enough for you to see, and you want to make camp right next to it!"
"You haven't heard the news lately, have you?" he thought for a moment, the last time he heard the news was in Big Town two days before he left.
"Not over the past few days, why?"
"I quote Three Dog on this one" the tall man cleared his throat, next came an emulation that he could have sworn he was standing next to a radio.
"Good evening boys and girls, this is your master of ceremony, Three Dog!" He howled loudly, mimicking the DJ "and now it's time for some news"
"Remember that cool cat from good old one o one, you know, the one looking for his dad and fighting the good fight, apparently some people haven't, like the raiders in the super duper mart, I mean how hard is it to recognize a man with three big numbers on his back? Anyway, that peacekeeper went down there, god knows why and cleared the place out of anything that had spikes, Mohawks, leather or IQ for that matter, nice going kid, keep it up" for a second he looked at the clean cut man
"get the picture?" he was answered with a nod "Good, now start a fire"
A few minutes later they were both sitting by a warm campfire on their packs, the Brahmin was a bit behind them, three large steaks were being cooked by the fire, some normal small talk ensued, both talked about various past trades they had, some good merchandise they'd like to get their hands on, fights they had and women.
"And then she said 'don't worry, that's just my dad and brothers, you know the big game hunters'" he mimicked a teen's voice perfectly, both of them laughed loudly, the older man had finished both his portions of meat and the other was done with his, though it was only half eaten.
"Needless to say, the wasteland was graced by the sight of my bare ass jogging that night"
"And how old were you when this happen?" the younger one of the two asked.
"Let's see, I recon it was seven years ago so no more than sweet sixteen" the other replied.
"Wait, you're twenty three! But the beard, the white hair"
"Bah, genetics and four weeks without a razor"
"Amazing" he stared into the flames recounting the tale "And you really wrestled a giant molerat?"
"That I did, got the scars to prove it too" he looked at him for a few seconds, and came to a startling realization.
"Man, all this and I don't even know your name" he chuckled at the discovery.
"Hawiya, Bethaka Hawiya"
"Hawaii?" he wondered what kind of a loon named his son like that.
"No, Ha- wi-ya" the man spelled his name in the sand.
"Crazy name for a crazy guy " he thought "What does it mean?"
"Wind blower, you?"
"Tobias Richards, trader extraordinaire, no product too rare, no place too far and future trader king" Hawiya smiled widely at him, the sight was a bit odd as he constantly seemed to be grinning courtesy his scars.
"Hmm.." the scared man sounded.
"What, you don't think I'm kidding do you?"
"Are you really aiming for that, the king of all traders?"
"You bet your sweet ass I am"
"Tell you what, I happen to know a few people that require an honest trader, someone they can count on to be punctual, discreet and most importantly wouldn't sell them cheap products, if you can prove yourself by the time we reach Rivet tomorrow I'll connect you with 'em"
Tobias looked at the other man's face and could tell he was dead serious yet he laughed himself into a fit, he couldn't stop himself , this man was just too much of a joker to put into word he continued laughing for a few minutes.
"You.." he let out between one gasp and exhalation, holding his ribs as hard as he could, tears rolled down his face "think..that" he chuckled once more "we can get" he let out another huge burst of air "by tomorrow" he finally managed to stop his giggling.
"I admit you're amazing, navigating without aids, do great imitations, and how you knocked me down god knows, but how are we going to get through D.C in a day? Fly over it?"
"I mean, maybe I haven't heard the news lately but the tunnels take time to navigate, and muties need dodging" the other man seemed insulted.
"Get your map out!" he was ordered, the clean shaved man complied, and spread the piece of paper over the sand, this he had to see.
"You want to go like this" he pointed at their destination; Wilhelm's Wharf his finger then dragged itself over the bridge through the various metro stations and finally to the aircraft carrier "right?" he was answered with a nod.
"A week's worth of travel"
"but what we're going to go like this" he pointed at the same point of origin but this time, dragged his finger along the length of the river, stopping on land next to the Jefferson Memorial and straight to the city.
"You're forgetting something"
"What?"
"You can't swim in that river for that long, not unless you want an extra arm to scratch you back with"
"The solution to that obstacle, you'll see tomorrow" the paper was folded and handed back to him, he laid back and gazed at the stars
"There's no way across the Potomac without the bridges" he assured himself in his own mind "Just no way" he heard his companion opening his pack and rummage through it.
"Say, got some soft and green?" the older man asked, he reached down into his own pocket, felt the two stacks of bills, pulled a stack of green papers clasped together by a rubber band and threw it to the other man's waiting palm.
"Thanks, see you in a bit" the other man got holding the papers in one hand, a glass nuka-cola bottle in the other and walked over one of the hills surrounding the camp, though he could hardly make out his shape long before he vanished behind the sand.
"When she calls…" he thought to himself.