Vault 101 Note from Leonard McLarey to Jeff Scanlin:

J – The escape is all set for tomorrow. Four of us will be leaving, including James, Don, C.B. and myself. You still have time to join us… Anyway, I need you to keep an eye on my daughter. I have a feeling she's privy to what's going down (James thinks his kid is, too). I even went so far as to give her map coordinates to Megaton to throw her off my trail. I don't want her making the journey West if she's able to escape the vault. Christ… I'm writing this as if she's already made up her mind. But I know Scarlett. She WILL try to escape. The minute you think she doesn't have a chance, please detain her (any way you see fit). Otherwise, let my little butterfly go free. Short of death, she needs to finally see the truth. I thank you, good friend. And if you do decide to join us, then you already know my plan and you know James' plan. I'll be in correspondence with the Brotherhood. Take care and Godspeed.
-L

The first night was rough. Not only had Scarlett started her "special lady time" the day before, but she had lost even more blood from the bullet graze she had sustained while ducking through the Vault's east wing scullery. She hadn't glimpsed her assailant, but she suspected it was that trigger-happy bastard, Johnny Mueller, who was only five years her senior and already killing oppressed citizens with the Overseer's impunity (and don't even get her started on that psychopath-Overseer Almodovar). Indeed, she'd love to see just how much authority Alphonse Almodovar would have out here amongst the fucking molerats. A fitting image, although Scarlett was pretty sure molerats weren't cannibals (the same could not be said for Almodovar).

Scarlett had to re-stitch her bleeding right triceps twice. Since a stimpak also worked as a sort-of local anesthetic, the stitch jobs were relatively painless. But Scarlett was never a fan of seeing (and in this case, playing around in) her own blood, and though she couldn't say exactly when, she was sure that she had passed out at least once during her half-ass performance as a combat medic. Add to that the intermittent scampers of radroaches in the surrounding darkness, hunger pangs (the rest of the Sugar Bombs had been dinner), slight-to-teetering-on moderate dehydration (her bottle already half down), and a bone-chilling desert bed without campfire, and the morning sun was never more welcome.

At least until it became the midday sun.

The temperature must have shot up forty degrees in four hours. By two o'clock in the afternoon, Scarlett was out of water, and them's weren't good tidings considering her present predicament. Irradiated or not, she had to find a source, even though according to her GPS, she was nearly halfway to Megaton. If she kept her pace, she might still have a shot at making it to the doorstep (provided there was a doorstep and not some impenetrable wall with a single booby-trapped hidden entrance). From what her Dad had told her, Megaton was civilized relative to most of the other smaller communities around D.C. (speaking of which the District itself would have been an option, but apparently the city's interior had fell victim to a local war between the so-called "super mutants" and a law-enforcing faction known as the Brotherhood of Steel). Being a virgin out the Vault, Scarlett figured she'd begin her wanderings in less hostile territory.

And so here she was, wandering like a bad eye. She figured she deserved a slow and pitiless death out here with her failed attempt at food and water rationing. And since she did apparently have sense enough not to draw attention to herself (she had neither combusted campfire nor bullet round since her emergence), then one could add "unnoticed" to "slow" and "pitiless." There was a slight irony to that, and the thought made her jerked lips turn a grin.

Then the smell hit her.

Dirt moistened with water (mud as it was known) was not a common resource in Vault 101. First of all, there were few areas throughout the whole of the Vault exposed to the surrounding Earth. Such would be a breach to the Vault's pressurized structure, and therefore any failing walls or supports were immediately seen to. Only the sewage system offered access to the encompassing crust, and not even the children wanted to venture near those putrid tunnels. So that left the horticulture wing. The privileged scientists who had access to that wing grew and maintained the wonderful fruits and vegetables that accounted for more than half of the Vault's year-round sustenance. The plants themselves grew in precious topsoil, some of which had been reserved since before the war. On three separate class field trips, Scarlett had received an opportunity to visit the mysterious greenhouses and take in the natural sights and smells of that which once flourished on the surface.

She'd never forget the smell of water mixed with soil. And that was what she smelled now, though a very different offshoot of it.

With a renewed energy, Scarlett began searching for the source. It had to be close. During her trek thus far, she had stayed close to the crumbled road, but not on it. Now she veered about five hundred yards east of the road, and upon walking around a large mesa and back-peddling down a small ridge, there it was: an old fluid tower with water dripping from its long trough spigot. But the oasis was not alone, and blinded by her thirsty mission, Scarlett had failed to see half-naked man huddled besides.

Scarlett pulled her pistol.

Official Post from Rivet City

From: Chalmers, K.
To: Simms, L.

***URGENT***

Dear Sheriff Simms,

I write in great haste to inform you of a potential danger to befall your good township. A tip to the Brotherhood of Steel's central newswire indicated that somebody is planning to re-arm the atomic device encompassed by your establishment. I understand such threats have materialized (and fizzled just as quick) in the past, but the current intelligence seems to hold water, especially since I happen to know of at least one Brotherhood spy placed at Tenpenny. Although this matter has been discussed with our own Councilman Danvers, a motion passed to grant enforcement assistance to Megaton could take up to three weeks. The Brotherhood, unfortunately, is spread to thin in other matters (as you could well imagine). I'm sending my most trusted courier, Jessie, to ensure this message gets to you stat and secure. Please standby for further information and assistance.

Long live the Brotherhood,

Keston Chalmers
Rivet City

"What a fucking mess," Jessie mumbled to herself as she flicked away another piece of Deathclaw brain matter from one of her hard leather pauldrons. Her campfire had quite a glow now. Jessie wasn't against a good campfire at night, especially when she was either on or close to a trade route. In her own experience, a warm fire usually drew good rather than bad company. And if she got it going early enough, often times a Guild caravan would join her allowing for some appreciated updates on the general gossip and welcomed merc protection for respite. But on this night she figured she already had somebody out there who wanted her alive, so at least Laser Angel would be able to monitor her position.

Dusk had settled by the time she safely descended the ridge and found her way back to the road. Half a mile had been backtracked due to her thrilling cave adventure, and such was a hard lesson learned simply for wanting a little bathroom privacy. It was her least favorite part of the job, having to find some obstacle off the road to squat and do her business; especially on a new route where she had not already staked out some private spots along the way. Jessie may have had a good streak of the "tomboy" in her (and maybe this was the one instance where she really did wish she had a penis), but she'd be goddamned for all eternity if she was going to allow the whole shittin' wasteland to witness her do, well, just that.

But with all that hilarity behind her (and half a day wasted), now Jessie just sat and stared into the dancing orange flames, her back to the empty wheel well of an old Nuka Cola truck. Upon her return to Rivet City, she wondered if she should renegotiate her wages for having to come so far west on this one. Obviously her boss put much more trust in her, which in turn made her a more valuable asset, which in turn deserved a hell of a lot more sharp. Caps

were not easy to come by these days, and Jessie began to understand why so many women (and men, for that matter) rented out their bodies just to maintain a decent quality of life. But for the unsightly scar on the nape of her neck (although lots of perverts were into that sort of thing), Jessie knew she could have tread that path as early as 15. Christ, those shitbag pimps wouldn't leave her alone until she started wearing a sidearm, and then most weren't convinced she could pull the fucking thing from its holster. Nevertheless, it was the first implement in Jessie's life that actually changed how others perceived her. Sure, it was a small change at first. But before long word started spreading about how that "leggy bitch with the tight ass and hard sass" could shoot the wings off a bloatfly, and then nail the little spitting bastard again before it hit the deck. Then when she had taken the courier job (previously reserved only for very athletic men who wanted to commit suicide), her new image was truly edified. "But why would such a hot bitch resort to the way of the gun?" they would ask, often times right in her presence. "She could be sitting pretty earning nothing but sharp… even run her own place." Well they could all go fuck themselves like the army of horny contortionists they were. There was good reason for "the way of the gun," and any woman who thought otherwise hadn't stepped a pedicured foot off the ship. The real world was beyond that security plank. And bad things happened to vulnerable women in the real world. But now wasn't the time or place to recall that uncertain period of downward spiral in Jessie's adolescence.

No. Not out here in the blackness.

And it was a quiet night, indeed. The kind of void where one could easily fall victim to one's own quagmire of truth and consequence; of pathos and regret. Jessie always did her best to remain apathetic to such haunts. If she was ever to become a true and formidable mercenary of the wasteland-asking price never countered and abilities never questioned-words like "pathos" and "regret" were not to be in her vocabulary. Not that she scared easily. She'd already killed once. A raider had come upon her in broad daylight during a routine courier run to The Citadel. After shooting the greasy sonuvabitch in the kneecap with her 10mm, she shot him square between the eyes, execution style. She left him right on the side of the road where he had come at her with a machete-his dick still hanging out when he hit the asphalt. Jessie had continued right on to her destination, made her delivery, and marched right back to the Navy yard. As was customary for all citizens of Rivet City, she had gone to the authorities, stated what she had done and why she had done it, and after a couple reports filed and an onsite verification of the heathen's remains, nothing else was ever said about it.

That was the cold justice of the wasteland, and for black and white and every shade of grey, it suited Jessie just fine.

Message sent from North Seneca Station via private courier:

For the eyes of Quentin Dollard:

I'd like you to accompany an old friend of mine to Megaton on your next northwestern run. Consider it payment for the narcotics. Her name is Norma Jean. If anything happens to her, I'll finally make use of my Enclave credit (yeah, they owe me, too) and they'll have your skin for a doormat at Raven Rock. Believe it, you slimy smoothskin bastard. It will only take a single transmission. Anyway, respond to this message with the time and place Norma Jean can meet you. If I don't hear from you within two weeks of the time this message leaves Post 9 at Meresti on this day, June 14, then consider the Enclave informed and so instructed.

Regards,
Murphy

P.S. Barrett here says he will fold you in half backwards so's your ass is a pillow if he ever sees you again. He also says you're a jerked cunt (I told him he could relay a post script).

Norma Jean watched as the gangley man who called himself Dollard walked away from the wagon in no good sorts. She had just won a long-winded debate over her own insistance upon being allowed to sleep in one of the covered supply wagons. Bear was smokiing a cigarette over by the campfire and Gaston had already bed down for the night-Norma Jean figured he would have the less desirable graveyard watch, although maybe such a reserved individual would prefer the lonesome solace that offered. She knew she certainly would. Norma Jean loved the company of her own thoughts, and she thought it little to ask for a woman to have some privacy amongst strangers during bedtime. Dollard was obviously a man obsessed with being in control, and the fact that he had bupkis in that department here both infuriated and, undoubtedly, intrigued him. Indeed, he would probably spend the rest of his evening wading the squishy recesses of his mind to figure out how to gain the upper hand. She rather hoped he would drown there.

But with that childish business done for the moment, Norma Jean nestled herself into the three-by-five foot space between the food crates. A small sack of maize would serve well enough as her pillow. There was certainly no excess of comfort here, but a few hours of deep sleep is all Norma Jean would require to begin the coming day anew. In her two-hundred-plus years on this Earth-though a couple of those were spent beneath it-she had slept on everything from down feathered mattresses, to razor sharp rocks, to a pile of corpses, yet in every case had managed to wake up again in the morning. She never believed that she deserved to be so lucky, considering all those who had either died or gone worse throughout the years.

Her best friend, Lisa, had gone 'worse' just a few months ago. Norma Jean had called on her that unusually cool and breezy afternoon, finding the letter on Lisa's circular kitchen table at her house in the colony. There where they had played so many hands of Caravan and Gin Rummy together, talking about the latest pre-war literature book either had procured-Hemmingway, Dickens, Poe, Tolstoy, Wharton, Austin, Herbert, King, and hundreds more. Norma Jean and Lisa had read over a thousand books between them, and could easily had read a thousand more if such luxuries weren't so scarce. The veins of knowledge ran vast in human history, and a ghoul's mutations had allowed for each of them to mine rich deposits. Sometimes they would have debates lasting long into the evenings, always stopping for some Barrel Cactus tea and snack cakes, and never concluding without laughing to hysterics. Those were wonderful times, and Norma Jean had been able to relish them with her best friend for nearly fifty years.

And all good things come to an end, alas, Norma Jean now thought to herself. Whoever had first said that must have lived a good, long life to know it, though probably not quite so long as Norma Jean's. Of course, it was not just serendipity and a rare recessive gene that allowed her to have come this far. No, it was also her keen ability to be able to put all that book knowledge to work. She knew people, and more importantly, she knew the hows and whys as to their behavior. Men, unless touched with genius or autism, were far less complex than women, and her present company were none of them the exceptions. If she had not asserted her way into the confines of a wagon to sleep, Dollard's best plan would have been to desert her in the middle of the night, then monitor her from a good distance until she moved clear of the supply wagon. Then it would be just a matter of who was the better sniper between dumb and dumber. Norma Jean had only been able to Shanghai these men (or at least their double-crossing natures) based on proximity, and a well-placed bullet from three hundred yards would have ended her manipulation. Well, so then her own plan ensured that a wagon worth about five hundred caps and loaded with two weeks' rations would have to go with her. No businessman alive would cut such losses just for getting his own way, at least no businessman as penurious and predictable as Dollard.

Oh, if only her best friend were here now. They could spend all night entertaining strategies on how to deal with the base natures of willful men.

Norma Jean giggled, but like the child who exits a warm bathtub only to be seized by the ever cold grasp of condensation, she stopped just as fast as that beautifully handwritten sentence flashed in her mind: "I am prepared to die, but there is no cause for which I am prepared to kill." Those were the last words of sanity penned by Lisa in her four page letter to Norma Jean. Though the words had belonged first to one of Lisa's favorite pre-war philosophers, Mahatma Gandhi, they struck just as true (if not more so) with what Lisa was going through. The lapses in memory, the brief episodes of rage, and eventually the seizures all forecasted her final destination. Lisa would go to the mountain, high above the desert to the sheer plateau. There she would brave in solitude her transformation. And when her last tendrils of reason let go, she would be unable to negotiate the treacherous climb back down the jagged rocks. By fall or starvation, she would submit to her doom. It was the failsafe plan that Norma Jean and Lisa had discussed many times before over Barrel Cactus tea and snack cakes, and, just like most of the other sparring matches between a couple of old women, Norma Jean couldn't recall one time that it didn't end in laughter. Her sister, her confidant, her only equal; her darling Lisa would never be forgotten.

Even now, beneath her tears, Norma Jean Tuttlemocker was smiling.