One More Tomorrow

Part 2

Some people say a man is made outta mud
a wastelander's made outta muscle and blood
muscle and blood and skin and bones
a mind that's a-weak and a back that's strong
you load sixteen tons, what do you get?
another day older and deeper in debt
saint peter don't you call me 'cause i can't go
i owe my soul to the company store
I was born one mornin' when the sun didn't shine
i picked up my steel saw and i walked to the mill
i smelted sixteen tons of dirty scrap steel
and the raider boss said "well, a-bless my soul"
you load sixteen tons, what do you get?
another day older and deeper in debt
saint peter don't you call me 'cause i can't go
i owe my soul to the company store

originally by Tennesse Ernie Ford

rewritten by an anonymous slave in the Pitt

"A Yao Guai actually, sorry, the toy emporium was closed due to radiation and ghoul infestation."

"My mother never said you were such a smart-alec. Or a ghoul."

"I wasn't...so, you're Marie. A bit bigger than when I last saw you."

"That happens after forty years." The woman motioned behind her. "Come back to Haven, we can talk more there. I need your help."

"Oh? And what makes you think I will help you?" asked Vault 101.

"Just hear what I have to say. Things have changed since you were here, mostly for the better." She turned and started walking away. "Josephine, I believe Margaret wanted to speak to you, down in the machine shop."

"Of course Lady Marie. I will head over as soon as I have seen to the 5th Scout Raiders." Josephine and most of the raiders left them, save for two, wearing metal armor, but not power armor, armed with assault rifles and SMGs, which appeared to Lady Marie's guards.

Vault 101 only vaguely recognized his surroundings. He was sure that more of the city had been reclaimed from the trogs and wildmen. The travelers looked up at the smoke and haze that drifted constantly overhead. Flaming barrels and electric lights were everywhere. Vault 101 did notice numerous places where there was fresh masonry and metal plates welded to frames.

The familiar entrance to Haven appeared shortly. Vault 101 noticed a group of laborers patching a hole in a crumbling wall. They were not wearing the skimpy and downgrading slave clothes of before, but ragged pre-war and leather clothing. As they passed, the workers stopped and acknowledged Lady Marie with short bows, and she nodded back.

"Not exactly Fat City," whispered Elliott to Sally.

"Nowheresville, with radiation and smog," she replied.

As they reached the gate, Vault 101 was surprised by several changes. Haven had a proper gate, not just scaffolding and debris, and it wasn't guarded by raiders. Two laser turrets sat above the gate, and a Mr. Gutsy and a Sentry Bot patrolled the top of the wall. As they approached, the two guards went and unlatched and swung the gate open. Inside, the same sculpture and burning fires was waiting, but it was not alone.

Multiple other sculptures of scrap metal dotted the area, of trogs, raiders, auto-ax armed slaves, soldiers in power armor, even a deathclaw. But the most shocking was a fenced in area with a playground, with swings, teeter-totters, slides, and a jungle gym. Several children ran about, of varied ages, watched over by two women. Both of them looked very similar to Josephine, though with varied hairstyles and dress. One was dressed like a raider, with strangely dyed hair and an erratic haircut. The other wore a pre-war dress, in pretty good condition, besides the multicolored patches that adorned it, and a very plain bun on her head.

"Are those ankle-biters yours?" asked Vault 101.

"No," answered Marie in a slightly bitter tone. "Hello, Amy, Beth," she called to the two women. The one with the bun nodded, and the other called back.

"Lady Marie, I need to speak with you."

"Shortly, I have guests."

"I have a report about Cutter's movements."

"Join us inside shortly then." The other woman nodded, and turned back to the children. "Let's go."

"Do you have some irradiated water? This smog is drying my throat," commented Vault 101.

"Purified water actually. Water condensers on the roof." Lady Marie led the small party into Haven. It was much the same as Vault 101 remembered. It did seem to be better lit and a little cleaner. It was near palatial compared to where he had been, which was any decrepit building he could find in the wasteland. She led them to a medium-sized room near where Lord Ashur's office had been, which was presumably now Lady Marie's.

It was furnished with old and worn furniture, but rather good condition, with patches of leather and scrap material covering holes in the upholstery. There was a bookshelf, which had a few books, which were readable at least, and some holotapes. Several operating electric lamps provided light, and a window overlooked the city.

Lady Marie walked to the window, and stared out. There was a slight hiss as she put her hands behind her back. "Please wait outside, and make sure to let Beth and Josephine in when they arrive." The two guards nodded, and exited the room, closing the door behind them. "Make yourselves comfortable. There is water over there." Marie motioned to a fridge, sitting in shadows in one corner. Vault 101 walked over, and retrieved a bottle of water, he then looked over at the other two, who nodded and declined. He took a long drink, and then turned to face Marie.

"Things are different. It seems your father really did strive to make a better place." Marie just nodded, and let out a small sigh. Sally and Elliott gingerly took seats on a couch, and Dogmeat actually went and laid down, nuzzling Sally's feet.

"When I was young, my parents tried to keep me sheltered from everything. But, since I was going to take over, when I got older, I began to learn more of this city. To be honest, for a long time, I didn't think much of my father. But when he died, when I was 22, and I had to take that responsibility, I understood how hard it really was." She turned and faced the others. "You may not think much of it, but it is my home, and I have crossed far too many lines to give up on it yet. There may be far nicer places in the wasteland, but they haven't faced what we have."

"So, is there a cure then?" asked Vault 101 quietly.

"We have developed some of the best anti-radiation medication, and unlocked so many secrets of our genetic code, but a cure eludes us."

"But the children..."

"An end run, a temporary solution. You may have noticed the similarity between me and some of the woman around here...they are clones, and also immune, like me."

"Your parents...cloned you?"

"It didn't happen till after I took over. And it works. Most of the children born from my clones are also immune."

"Most...but not all?" questioned Sally.

"I said I had to cross a lot of lines..." Marie fell silent for a moment. "The tests performed on me, as careful and slow as they were, rendered me sterile."

"Your mother, Sandra, is she still alive?"

"Yes, she is in the lab, working herself to death trying to get a cure before she dies, with Margaret. She isn't doing well, wheel-chair bound, prone to emotional swings...you can meet her later. If you were wondering, the clones are as free as anyone here, more even, since they are immune, though they do age at twice the rate. The ones you met are only 12 years old, the second set. The first group are 18 years old, but are biologically around 36-40 years old."

"Cloning...there aren't many scientific accomplishments that can surprise me anymore. Why do you need my help."

"Well, it is related to the clones. I..." Marie was interrupted by the door opening, and Josephine and Marie entering. Josephine had removed her power armor, and wire leather armor instead. Her laser rifle still hung from her back, and a pistol on her hip. Amy was with her, and SMG hanging from her belt, and a bottle of Nuka-cola in her hand. "I was about to explain the problem to our guests. You had a report on Cutter, Amy?"

Amy flopped unceremoniously into a chair, and then propped her legs up on a nearby end table. "Yes. There was an attack earlier today, near the Forge."

"The Forge..." Lady Marie bit her lip. "They attacked through uncontrolled territory I assume?"

"Yes. But, it probably is safer than going the short way, with all the defenses we have. Not many trogs left."

"Casualties?"

"One worker was killed by a stray bullet, and several machines were damaged. Scott will have his work cut out for him, fixing some of the bots. Several of Cutter's raiders were hit."

"Yet another probe," commented Josephine. "He is wearing us down, and he knows he has time on his side. We need to take decisive action."

"We don't have the forces," Lady Marie snapped. It was apparent this was a conversation that had occurred previously. "Sorry...but I haven't changed my opinion."

"Maybe we could free some more slaves," suggested Josephine.

"The last raid cost us some of our best, and the slaves we freed were in such poor condition, some died anyway, and none can fight, and they can barely work, at least for the time being. It will just speed our demise, and Cutter will just capture or buy more," countered Amy.

"We can't just do nothing...that won't help morale or the fight," Josephine shot back. "How can you sit there non-nonchalantly and sip cola?

"Stop it, both of you." Lady Marie turned and faced the room. "As you can see, we have a problem."

"Cutter? And who would he be?" asked Vault 101.

"He was one of the last slaves to fight his way through the arena. As you know, very few survived, but he made it. My father stopped the fights several years before his death. After that, he began recruiting workers to become raiders, those that could fight well. Cutter was a skilled fighter, and a tactician. He was one of my trusted Captains."

"His views on the city's future didn't match yours," stated Cutter.

"Yes. As time went on, he became more and more antagonistic. Five years ago, it came to a breaking point. He wanted Lydia, one of the oldest of my clones. She was only somewhat interested, but turned him down, when she discovered he was only interested in having offspring, and didn't love her. When I refused to force her, for obvious reasons, he took it as the last straw, and left with a good number of the raiders, and kidnapped some workers. Since then, the Pitt has been at war."

"Well...that is hardly a big tickle." Vault 101 shifted position. "And you want my help stopping it. I understand why of course, I did nearly single-highhandedly stop the Enclave..."

"Why do you hesitate? We have made such progress. You aren't the type of person to let that all fall apart, after all you did to help the Pitt before."

"There is another problem, which is why we are here," interjected Sally. "There are aliens nearby, and it could be trouble, for the whole earth."

"Aliens? Are you serious?" laughed Amy. "Like little green men, with ray guns?"

"Something like that," said Elliott, a little anger in his voice. He pulled out his Atomizer and fired at the ceiling. Josephine's mouth actually dropped open when the blue bolt of energy blasted a whole in the plaster. "They aren't friendly, and this could be a major threat."

"Well...Vault 101, you fought aliens too?"

"After I left the Pitt, yes. Sally and Elliott live on a mothership in orbit, and found another ship, which apparently is somewhere west of here, by around 200 miles."

"I understand that a threat to the planet is obviously more important than one city...how long has this ship been there?"

"Well..." Sally looked at her feet. "Like, 150 years...may have been in orbit longer than that."

"In that case, help us, end this war, and we can help you with the aliens."

"Intriguing..."

"Are you considering this seriously?" asked Elliott. "This doesn't seem like a very nice place."

"Oh, you don't like us? A shame, you have such a classy chassis..." said Amy, with a bit of a purr in her voice. Josephine cast her a disproving look, and Elliott looked a bit embarrassed.

"I am," continued Vault 101. "Not long ago, I said this was one part of my life I didn't want to discuss, but yet here we are. It is much better than it was, and I'm not letting Lady Marie refusing to cross one more line destroy this city. I guess I am just addicted to saving the day..."

Before Vault 101 could continue, there was a loud and close explosion. Nearly everyone in the room jumped to their feet. Dogmeat remained on the floor, as unperturbed as his master. The door flew open, and a raider rushed in, gasping for breath.

"Cutter's forces have attack near the gate to Haven. A missile hit one of the laser turrets."

"That explosion was rather close," commented Josephine. "Are the defenses holding?"

"Elizabeth and Jetfire said the defenses are holding, but this is a rather aggressive probe. It might be something more."

"Understood. Amy, rally as many fighters as you can find, and head over to support the front line. I'm going to the roof to observe, Josephine, come with me."

"We'll join you. If I'm going to save this city, I want to see what is going on." Marie just nodded, and the meeting broke up. Lady Marie and her ersatz entourage headed up a staircase that had once been elegant, but now had rotting carpet and decaying walls. Vault 101 had seen many views in his life. Some of them were very beautiful, despite the irradiated land and crumbling buildings. But this view was nothing like that. There were massive chimneys belching fire and smoke, and many ugly buildings. At least the buildings seemed to be sturdy and intact.

Not that far away, only about 100 yards or so from the gate of Haven, in a rather remodeled version of Uptown, was a makeshift wall, with multiple turrets, several Sentry Bots and Mr. Gutsies, interspersed with raiders in metal armor, and a few in power armor. To call it a wall was a bit of a stretch.

"Our defenses. Most of it wouldn't be possible without Scott, who you'll meet soon enough."

"How did you get so many robots?" asked Sally.

"That is Scott's doing, and years of salvage. Nowadays, age limits his direct work, but he has trained several workers, and a couple of my clones to help him."

Vault 101 walked a bit closer to the edge and scanned the area. Groups of raiders, some in metal armor, no doubt manufactured in the pit, but many in more standard raider armor, popped in and out of the rubble of the Pitt, and peppered the wall with gunfire. He recognized weapons of all types, SMGs, multiple styles of handgun and revolvers, and shotguns and a variety of rifles, mostly assault.

Any raider who stayed in the open for too long was ripped apart by laser fire from a sentry bot or turret. Down on the wall, Captain Elizabeth, one of the clones in charge of the wall defense, was getting frustrated. A Mr. Gutsy near her jerked back suddenly and let out a spray of sparks. She grumbled under her breath.

She popped up and fired her pistol, sending a projectile streaking out. It left a trail of smoke behind it, and actually gained speed before slamming into a wall, sending chunks of concrete flying. It didn't hit any of Cutter's raiders though.

"Give me your rifle," she called to a nearby raider, standing up.

"I don't think you should stand up Captain Elizabeth, especially without your helmet..."

"Your rifle," she said emphatically, taking it out of the raider's hands. She put it to her shoulder, and slowly and deliberately pulled the trigger. There was a loud deafening crack, and a raider across the way pitched over, a massive wound opening in his chest. A raider behind him went down as the round tore into his stomach. He doubled over in pain, trying to hold himself together. He didn't get to die mercifully like his compatriot.

Her second shot took off a raiders head, one who was not expecting to be shot. The bullet went through the wall behind him, but Elizabeth couldn't see if it hit anyone else. She handed the rifle back to the raider.

"It's out of ammo. Probably wasted your first two shots." She pulled out her pistol and emptied the rest of the magazine into the raiders. There weren't any more confirmed kills, but several went down. The attack petered out nearly as suddenly as it began. Besides the one rocket that took out a laser turret, it had little effect. There were a few wounded, and several bots had been taken down. Hopefully, they could be repaired. Many spare parts were hard to find, and difficult if not impossible to make.

"That was an impressive rifle...I don't recognize the sound," commented Vault 101.

"A creation of our own, developed by some of our workers. With energy weapons in short supply," Lady Marie said, motioning to the Gauss rifle on the wanderer's back, "I wanted a rifle capable of easily piercing metal armor, powered, or not. That was the answer."

"Must be difficult for a normal person to fire," added Elliot. "Even the standard sniper rifle is difficult to use accurately without training and proper form."

"You can't use it without power armor, especially the way it is designed," said Josephine. "If we added a bipod, and a longer barrel, maybe more recoil dampers, it could be, but we wanted it to be small in size. It uses a .577 caliber round, but there is a lot of charge behind it. It only holds four rounds, the in the clip, and another in the chamber."

"What sort of recoil dampening are in effect?" the former medic asked.

"First of all is the slots in the end of the muzzle..." Josephine was interrupted by Lady Marie.

"You can talk about firearms later. Right now, I want to go to the Machine Shop and talk to Scott. See about fixing the laser turret. That lucky shot could be devastating."

"I'm going to go talk to Elizabeth, and then check with Beth." Amy then turned and headed over to some scaffolding along the side of Haven, and made her way to the courtyard below.

"Amy is a little...cranked, all the time. But she does care for her children. The Machine Shop is nearby." Lady Maire walked towards the door leading into Haven, and kept going without looking back. Vault 101 looked back at Sally and Elliott. He noticed Josephine was no longer with them.

"Shall we then?" asked Vault 101.

"No harm in checking it out. It is rather impressive they have such advanced defenses," Sally said, motioning to the laser turrets.

"More than you know. Clearly the doing of this Scott. I'm going to stay and help. You obviously don't have too, but let me know if the alien situation changes. I'll do whatever I can."

"I don't think there is any hurry. The spaceship will be there when we get back. What do you think Elliott?"

"I think these people can use all the help they can get." Vault 101 nodded to Elliott and Sally, and then turned towards the door.

"Come one Dogmeat." They hurried down the stairs, and found Lady Marie waiting for them. She led them wordlessly through a side door, and out of Haven. There was a sort of tunnel formed by welded pieces of fence and shipping containers, that disappeared into several more decrepit buildings. Lady Marie opened a panel on the wall, and threw a large switch. A secure metal door unlocked and opened, with a familiar hiss of hydraulics and whir of electric motors.

Inside appeared to be another maintenance room often found in subway tunnels. It opened up into what appeared to be an underground lab. It was a very familiar type of place, even though Vault 101 had never been there before. He looked up at the wall and noticed a faded painting of a familiar insignia.

"Robco...well, that explains the robots," he commented.

"It appears this was once a Robco facility, yes. The building above is pretty gutted, and looted clean. There actually wasn't much here, but there were some machines, too large to be carried off. The rest, we built up," explained Lady Marie. Sally and Elliott were not as impressed as most Wastelanders would have been. It didn't exactly compare to an alien spacecraft.

Vault 101 had seen far to much to be surprised, but he could appreciate the difficulty of getting such an operation running. There were multiple machines of all sorts, test stands, standard machinery, like lathes and drill presses, and a good many blue vises. There were several tables with the carcasses of robots of several varieties. The smell of solder and oil and greases of all sorts was ever-present.

"This is rather extensive." Vault 101 looked over and saw a woman with dark hair, very similar to Josephine except in styling, wearing a lab coat working standing over a table. She looked up, and began walking over when she saw them.

"We couldn't have done it without Scott." Lady Marie turned to the approaching woman. "And this is Margaret, Amy and Josephine's sister. Do you know where Scott is?"

"He is...right over there..." Margaret pointed to a man, hair graying, in the twilight years of life. He walked towards them easily though.

"Lady Marie...I hear there was another skirmish."

"Yes. One of the laser turrets was taken out. Missile shot. Can you repair it?"

"After taking a missile, doubtful, without scavenging three other turrets. I could replace it with a missile turret, or perhaps create a dummy turret, so they think we have replaced it."

"Alright..."

"If this war continues, and we don't get more salvage, I may not be able to keep all these robots operating much longer."

"Well, the last team salvaged something I think that will help." Lady Marie motioned over to the newcomers. Scott looked up and scanned them, his eyes resting on the power armored ghoul. He rubbed his temple.

"And who are they?"

"Vault 101, he tried to kidnap me once but lost the nerve...not that I am complaining, and his associates."

"Vault 101...the Vault 101..." Scott stopped for a moment. "I did not expect to see you again, especially not here."