Prolouge
I could remember it as if it happened just yesterday, but in reality forty years have passed since my son died. Before I tell you that story, let me tell you this one. I'm what you call a ghoul as in: the skinless, hairless, bigoted rotting- zombie humanoid, and my name is Britannic Barrows or you can just call me Bri, everyone else does. Depending on your genes, radiation either killed or changed you. When the bombs dropped I was just a boy and a mirror wasn't considered essential in the last minute vaults. So I based my appearance by how people reacted when I met them for the first time. Believe it or not, I went ghoul so quick, I woke up one morning with my parents' trying to kill me.
Although life before the bombings wasn't a cakewalk, inflation was through the roof and nuclear war reared its head. The government was so paranoid that it selected random people to fill the infamous Vault-Tec vaults in case of an atomic exchange. My select vault was a total bust, since a nuclear warhead landed not but, fifty feet away, not to mention our vault door closing mechanism being busted, which I fixed a few years ago.
From the high exposure of radiation, half of us became normal ghouls and the rest went feral. Those who went feral had to be put down, on account of their brains getting melted by radiation. The good news aside, our vault would birth the ghoul haven of Necropolis. Our fair city could barely be called home to those not ghoulified or humans, armed to the teeth with Rad-Away. For years we were feared and few even came to Necropolis. Curiously we never seemed to age or die even after a hundred years of age and still, we don't know why. Daring scientists have taken a crack at it, but just end up becoming a ghoul themselves or dying of radiation sickness. However, someday the mystery may be unlocked by some bright soul….
Chapter 1: On to Bloody Pastures
Skipping my childhood, because it's just about as pretty as my face, let's begin from the day I left Necropolis to shape my future. Leaving wasn't easy because in recent years the citys'been overrun by FEV rejects otherwise known as Supermutants. And some trigger happy human comes in, thinking he can kill a few to fill his trophy room and ends up getting himself in theirs. If you're curious about the whole Supermutant back story, then you should put this journal down God knows where you found it.
My soul purpose of leaving was research into reversing ghoulification. I did this not for myself but, for all ghouls. I could care less about how I looked but, it pains me to see my fellow ghouls being bigoted by humans. Old school skin color racism may've been erased by the Great War and ghoul bigotry took its place. Hell I was a kid growing up in a Spanish ghetto, who happened to learned how to speak Spanish and some English. In which it saved my ass with run-ins with the Brotherhood of Steel to the Pittsburg Raiders. Along with this new prejudice, slavery worked its way back into society. This rekindled uprising, birthed the huge slave nations of the East Coast.
Thanks to my scientific curiosity at an early age, and due to my constant reading of Pre-War books, I know a few things about science and medicine. Always on the move with my independent studies, I became a traveling caravan doctor. Primarily the most money came from traveling to abandoned vaults and as I hopped caravan to caravan I got a cut of the spoils on each run.
On occasion, abandoned vaults contained scraps of medical notes. More importantly were medical supplies I tested on myself. I don't test that stuff on others unless they've done me wrong. Being educated, I provided basic medical services for free to my caravan companions. Since a civil currency had not been established at the time, people resorted to the one thing that was in a high commodity, the bottlecap. Many people at first didn't grasp the idea of using bottle caps as money but, all that remained of Pre-War money was worthless because stores no longer existed.
On my travels I'd have my good and bad days and sometimes really bad days. Like the one time on my tour with the caravans in southern Texas, the caravan I was planning a raid on a large shopping mall. All went according to plan until we reached for the door. In sudden burst, the caravan guards dropped dead in their tracks, and the caravan master barely missing a bullet to the brain. Luckily he pulled me down with him, as six raiders approached.
Slung over their shoulders were the sniper rifles that took out the caravan guards. They barked orders at us to drop our weapons, as if we'd listen. The caravan master began swearing and shit at the raiders until they plugged him with a shot to the dick. While I've always been a stubborn bastard, I knew when to play it smart and when not to, and now was one of those times. I may've come quietly but, I remained silent as they approached me. As they came closer I put my arms outs and waited as they shackled me up tight. Then the tallest of them, who seemed to be in charge, said "Well since you came quietly ya filthy ghoul, we won't give you the same greeting as your friend here. "Now tell me your name, so we can continue this civilly." I just glared at him and spit in his direction. One of his buddies got angry and said in fury. "Did you hear him dumbass?" "You are now our property. Comprende!" When I still didn't say anything the raider unlatched his machete from his holster cut off two of my fingers. I tried not to fall to my knees in pain I couldn't help myself. I sat their graspin my hand so I wouldn't bleed out while keeping in tears. He then said, "Now I think we understand each other." They must of knocked me out because the last thing I remember is the tall one saying "Let's get the hell out of here boys."
3 days later…
With a searing pain in my hand and a raging migraine, I tried to get back into reality. Just then I realized where my luck had landed me this time. Of course waking up in a raider jail and missing several fingers I'd found myself. So there was this one time with a Supermutant's sister …wait… never mind. Looking around my cell, I noticed right away it was an overturned police riot bus. A few feet away was two owl-eyed souls looking over at me? The first prisoner was a chained-up, severely scarred Nightkin (Cousin of the Supermutant mentioned early) with an axe handle in his back and the other a heavy-set white guy missing an arm and was wearing a makeshift prosthetic leg. I inched my way over to them to find out where the heck I was. Just then, one the idiots who nabbed me, stumbled over claiming he had us some grub. He fell against the bus door and hit his head. He was definitely drunk. He said, "Come over here young lady", and I decided to humor him. Besides, what will happen that hasn't already? I hadn't noticed he was blind until he turned his head toward me and said "I may be too drunk to actually be giving you some got eats but, don't think I'm like this when I'm sober." I ignored him as I reached to through the bars for the food and stepped back. "Also ghoul, this might be the best treatment you're gonna get, so Dutch wants me to try this one more time with the name again", said the guard. Whose Dutch I asked and he grabbed me by the shirt and screamed, "If you don't tell me your name I'll give you one miself." Fine my name is Britannic and in case you're not smart enough to say that, you can call me Bri. "That's better than our first meeting and by Jesus you should know your cellies too." "The fatty is Port and ugly, is Dixon. Now I'll leave you girls to get acquainted with each other and remember, play nice."
After tossing my slop aside, I went over to Dixon and Port get to see if they had brains in their skulls. To end the awkward silence, I said, "You know my name and also worth mention is my scientific smarts" Deciding to play along Port said arrogantly, "First off, fuck yourself and before I got my ass stuck here, I was part of the Enclave and it was a great tour until our vertibird was hit by these damned raiders. The short version is I'm the only one survived and now I'm stuck in this shithole. Another thing, the big fella was made by my former bosses, so no matter what, DO NOT unlock his chains if our luck turns because he will be on me like ugly on an ape.
Bored with Port, I turned my attention toward Dixon to get the scoop on him. ¨ So big boy what got your sorry butt in here, because I'm sure you didn't come of your own free will.¨ From my upbringing at Mariposa, I've only been outside once, not sure that you've heard but, when the Enclave took over they cleaned out the originals and made us.'' "Another thing I will tell you though, is that if you say you got smarts, you best not let the big bosses catch wind of it or they'll move you up the ranks to the really hard stuff. Exhausted from talking Dexion fell backward and passed out. I'd had enough for one day, so I moved to an empty space and fell asleep too. That night I had no dreams, and with good reason because the next morning I'd wish I was in la-la land.
Chapter 2: A Squealer's Paradise
Now you know how said I wasn't looking forward to the next day, well I meant it. As it turns out I should've of gotten to know Port a little better because he's actually a raider whose job it is to sit in the cells to snuff out the skills of each prisoner and send word to the bosses when were all asleep. In coincidence Dixon was right that I shouldn't let my superior knowledge travel beyond my own brain because last night. Port immediately told the bosses and right now they're draggin me off to speak to the big boss whom I hadn't seen since our first meeting. The door opened from the inside and at the room's center sat the raider boss.
Deep in my gut I felt like taking a run back to my cell but, I knew I'd die without a proper will. He then looked me in the eyes and began to speak. "Well, Well, Well, if it ain't the sassy ghoul that I met what seemed like a lifetime ago" "I hear you got the brain of Einstein and the demeanor of my Granny, lucky for you she's dead." "So Bri, if you're as smart as Port says, show us what you got by fixing this here Plasma Rifle." While the guards that were holding me let him go, they kicked it toward me so I could get to work. I noticed a shitty tool box was at my feet and decided to get to work.
Not to brag, but I quickly jury-rigged the plasma rifle with spare parts, gave a little demo. They never did take it away, so I stowed it away. The raiders sat dumbfounded over yonder and they seemed very impressed to put it nicely. That's how I became their repairman for a spell. I carried out this job on one condition, if Dixon could be my assistant because he doesn't deserve to rot in the cells for the rest of his days. When I made this request the raider boss said, "Now why should I let that FEV reject, get a royal ass-kissing. Because I won't fix your shit if my request isn't filled, otherwise you can kill me now. "Fine you dumb bastard, but if he screws up, it's your head on a spike." Fuck you very much. Of course that little remark got me my light knocked out again, but I needed the muscle if I ever hoped to get out of here.
A few hours passed and no sign of Dixon. For some reason his absence has me on edge. Sure I've wanted to get out of here since minute one but, it's always good to have a body before you dig a grave. Like the plasma rifle before, I fix whatever they give me, then I show the guards and stash it away if they don't ask for it back. Now judging from this setup, this raiders must have IQ's lower than that of a feral ghoul, and that's pretty damned low. Soon I'd have enough firepower stashed away to outfit a small army and they're none the wiser.
It took about three weeks to build up steady supply of arms and still that was pushing it. The boss got wise and had people watching me except when I went to the toilet. It was pretty sad that I had to disassemble guns in there, but whatever works. Not to mention me having to flush each part one at a time and find out where it went. I'm not even getting into when I had to dig through sewage.
Dixon was pretty helpful because he managed to destroy the plumbing to help find the parts which led to everything in the pipes spilling onto the floor and me getting covered in shit. When I returned to my cell the guard asked what happened, I said Pre-war toilets tend to explode. That reminds me, I should make a few fragmentation bombs for later. What was I saying? Oh yeah, the guard just laughed his ass off and left for an hour. And the dolt forgot to put me in my cell so I can plant a few F-bombs in the toilet tank.
He returned when I started to dose off and he splashed a bucket of liquid on me. Before I could say anything he said, "How's that piss taste, I hear it a good sterilizer while making you smell worse than being drenched in shit." I held back my anger and just told him something was wrong with the toilet. Sure I knew how to fix it, but I pretended not to and that idiot didn't know it. "You're one solid sonofabitch aint ya? Anyways what's wrong with it, besides the fact that crap tends to explode from it from time to time. I just ignored him and stood against a nearby wall. He flipped me off and went over into the bathroom, cursing under his breath a few times. I said whatever was wrong with it must have been in the under the lid. As he lifted the bowl it exploded in shrapnel. He fell back in a pool of blood and jerked a bit until he went silent.