Traveler's Rest
It was a good 40 minutes of walking back to the Traveler's Rest, but about ten minutes in there was no doubt that the "Regulator" was telling the truth. Through the overgrowth a bright spotlight shown into the sky as the suns last rays turned the sky dark purple. The light was brightened by the fact the spotlight didn't point straight up but as nearly as straight as it could to bounce light back from the clouds, creating artificial moonlight and brightening the surroundings that much more. April remembered this from her histories of World War II, Battle of the Bulge, but like so many things downloaded into the mind, she was kind of surprised she knew them at all. It was as if a long forgotten fact was segwayed into by a different conversation, the way in romance novels how the scent of a perfume can conjure the image of a lover the protagonist was eager to forget.
Nothing was said on this walk of course, because while most raiders would have shown up on the trio's scanners, probability is not certainty. Being ten minutes out of the Vault and nearly being shot at by bandits has instilled in them caution. The Regulator Amy Wong, having no tech but long experience, was glad fresh meat had good sense and April could see this plainly from furtive and somewhat approving backwards glances. The face will tell you everything if you can read it. They had walked along the left side of the road, where a nearly filled in drainage ditch combined with the tilt of the road gave them half cover, something to dive into in case a sharpshooter decided their armors were worth the inconvenience of scooping death poo out of their headless drawers. There were no disturbances.
The Regulator Amy Wong climbed up to the road and the trio followed suit "Now, a couple of rules in a neutral location…"
Brisa: "Um, how do we know what a neutral location is?"
April: "And what exactly IS a neutral location?"
The Regulator Amy Wong looked back, said this one sentence, with no irritation and then looked ahead with eyes towards the ground: "I'll explain, so keep walking with me."
She continued, "See, in a few moments we're going to see an American flag. That's neutral ground, no fighting, no stealing; an unholstered gun is a death warrant. Generally, no drinking either, but Traveler's Rest is an exception. Now I'm not sure what you've been told in that Vault, but given we haven't seen a 101 in 20 years, I'll give you the rundown: FUSA's on its last legs, that's the last of government, the Brotherhood of Steel has split in two, one still lead by Lyons, the good guys in grey, then there's the Outcasts, in red, they're assholes but not the kind you need to shoot at. Lyons kicked FUSA out of the Pentagon, Free State Units from Baltimore aren't seen on this side of the Anacostia, Supermutants have overrun almost all of Blight, Arlington and DC both, the Mall is under siege and the only safe corridor to Rivet City, Port Reagan and Alexandria is on the west bank of the Potomac with ferries to Rivet City. Raiders are being pushed back by the supermutants in all directions, which means no road is truly safe for 40 miles in any direction, and you're smack in the middle of the quarantine zone those worthless shits from Baltimore call 'The Capital Exclusion Zone.' Also known as The Capital Wasteland. Any questions y'all?"
Brisa: "[Huff] That was way too much information. Actually we have a lot of questions…" She was stopped in her tracks as she saw a very menacing turret looking at her with red LED eyes and tracking her with its gun. "Uh, is that turret on auto-kill? I mean, does it need a human to open fire…on us? Cause….well…."
Amy: "Stun only. It hurts TERRIFICALLY, so I wouldn't advise getting close and making it feel threatened."
This turret was at the corner of a chain linked fence, and though the overgrowth was cleared around the encampment, it wasn't until now that April noticed the overwatch on the water tower; men in black armor looking down on them without visible eyes or faces. April wasn't sure of the make of their weapons until the passive VATS scan, aided by the focus of her eyes told her they were fielding a Ma Deuce with a large, dangerous looking scope. 50 cal and probably set for single shot sniping. Her gaming experience in VR games told her they were packing demolition rounds, ones that exploded on contact. Even with a miss, the concussion alone could kill or incapacitate.
That is, if they were smart. Then again, she thought, if they really knew what they were doing, they should have cleared the growth, trees and brush, out to half a mile. In her defense, she was a gamer and most games, even in from the late 21st century, were based around fighting and killing. Easy, sloppy, idealess game mechanics meant little risk and they were in all honesty less sadistic than simulations where one could starve one's settlers to death or burn them alive with an oven accident.
April shook her head clear and saw they were already inside the compound. She remembered looking up, scanning, and a couple of minutes went by without her notice. Maybe she would make a poor sentry, but what worried her is that getting lost in the mind like that could prove fatal. Not every raider killed with a charge and a yell. That scared her. She'd never been scared of combat in a sim, even when the pain thresholds were on maximum. Dying in VR was never fun, but it was also never permanent. Fortunately for her, it was only the foreboding of foreignness she registered here.
The Traveler's Rest felt safe. It was, like the Vault, well lit and people were everywhere. Unlike the Vault, most of them looked dirty, wearing brown overjackets with lots of pockets on the vest and sides, many seemingly full of things. Helmets, old battered motorcycle helmets mostly, were not uncommon, though a lot of people were sitting in lawn chairs with the helmets at their feet and a beer in the hand. But the guys they were headed towards looked to be in the same uniform as Amy Wong: blue collared shirts, long pants, brown combat boots and green overcoats with…..cowboy hats. They looked like pre-war post-apocalypse costumers. April shuddered at the thought these were not real cops, but wannabe cops, Vigilantes with pretentions of glory and a law they didn't really understand. Still….
They walked between brick buildings that looked like they had been New Suburban small town storefronts and a wide, roughly filled-in parking lot full of trucks, but mostly four-wheelers and motorcycles and what looked like hardly, high wheeled autorickshaws. A note to the modern reader: an autorickshaw is a three wheeled small vehicle used mostly as public transportation or small cargo transports in the developing world in the early mid 20th to 21st century. The style April was seeing at this moment were the ones made famous in the years before 2077, when most of the world was destroyed, and the 2050s, when the Arab world was nuked to within an inch of their lives by Israel. The Israelis did not take an explosion of a 35 kiloton nuclear bomb in a Tel Aviv parking garage with any degree of humor; nor should any nation that loses 5% of its population and sees a quarter thoroughly irradiated in the course of morning rush hour. In the wake of the 'Sampson Option,' hardy, all-terrain versions of the autorikshaw, with large cleated wheels and high ground clearance were all the rage in the still inhabited Arab cities; the minor cities mostly being abandoned in favor of provincial and National Capitals where aid and rebuilding resources were centralized and distributed as efficiently as Arab kleptocracy would allow.
This localized case study was extensively studied by all Vault Dwellers of the post-apocalypse and all planners and survivalists of the pre-apocalypse.
The Regulators took no notice of the 101 trio at first. Though to close inspection their body armor was fresh, and well maintained, their blue jumpsuits were well padded and resembled the hardy blue pants of the people around them. Light body armor and riot helmets weren't uncommon either. But somewhere between the deep, unmarred blue of their jumpsuits and most probably their thick black gloves going back to almost the entire forearm, the Regulators seemed to perk up at seeing them.
"We-hell shit," one of them said, a male, obvious in tone a shitkicker, "I wish I could find Vault Dwellers on my smoke brakes."
Wong: "That's why you call me the Sly One youngster, Hey Randal!" she tossed a medium sized piece of equipment to a fatter man appearing in his fifties though his face was covered by the shadow of his hat "That's what I was getting. These three are a bonus." She took a polite bow.
The Regulator called Randal stepped forward, pocketing the device in large pockets on his pants. He was a large man for his size, though he wasn't any taller than 5'10 and probably came only to 5'8. But he was built something like a bulldozer and if he had ever been a football player, he would have been a natural on offensive line, what with his short legs and low center of gravity. "Good job…Sly One. Now take a walk and get a real cigarette." As the Regulator Amy Wong walked beyond and took a cigarette from his hand he came up to the three of them. "How's the evening treating you all?" He smiled with genuine completely good natured delight.
Brisa took his hand warmly "Hi. I'm Brisa, Dr. Brisa Almodovar, I'm the leader of this expedition. It's a pleasure to meet…."
April: "Sir, are you a real cop?"
The man called Randal: "Excuse me miss?" Brisa and Brian tried to shush her but April was having none of it.
April: "It's a fair question. Are you guys real cops? Or is this Regulator thing a self-proclaimed 'I am the law because I say so' but you don't actually answer to a government…." At his stunned silence, she continued, "Look, I read post-apocalyptic fiction, I grew up in a brutal dictatorship led by a total legalistic asshole, a thorough holier than thou bully who just exiled me and my brother after breaking my colleague's face over something my Dad didbutt no one but him knew about. Then he forces my mom to stay so we'd have to come back with my Dad, who has disappeared to God knows where. So I'm pretty particular at this point about 'duly constituted authority' and what constitutes police brutality. If you're going to hit me for talking back, then hit me hard and let me be on my way." All of this calm and even, with only the slightest twinge of the outrage April felt, indeed had felt her whole life in the Vault. After a moment, Randal answered back to her:
Randal: "Miss, that's a lot to lay down on a man at one go…" then he held up his hand in acceptance and bidding them to keep quiet, "…But that's OK, a lot of people in the Capital Region have questions like that. It's normal. My name is Randal King, I'm a Capital Regulator. That's a sheriff's office encompassing all of the Capital Exclusion Zone. Our chief is officially Sheriff of Fairfax County, and we do our best to keep basic Commonwealth of Virginia Law, even in Maryland, although functionally there is no state government. We don't shoot innocent people, or we try not to. We tend to be soldiers out in the countryside but operate more as police inside settlements. We do try to take prisoners, and there are elections every two years, although the city councils do the elections. We help people traveling through the Capital Exclusion Zone; we locate and eliminate raiders; we track Supermutants, we collect evidence when we find crime scenes and add them to our database, countryside or not."
He stuck out his hand, "And it's a pleasure to meet you…miss…"
April: "Doctor…."
Randal: "Doctor?"
April: "Yeah. Two doctors and a service tech…my brother Brian. Although, Brain is very skilled in repairing just about anything AND…" she went on as Randal clearly wanted to change the subject "he's crossed trained as an engineer…."
Randal [extending his hand a little further, making April's eyes widen as she realized she hadn't taken it]: "And you are? Doctor?"
April grabbed his hand with a little too much enthusiasm: "Dr. April St. Vincent" And she shook his hand with way too much enthusiasm "At your service. MD, autodoc certified, Surgeon qualified, in VR at least, and I dabble a bit in bio-tech and veterinarian duty as the need arises."
Randal let go and shook his hand as though April had shook something numb, and said "I'm happy to make your acquaintance Dr. St. Vincent." He looked at Brian and offered his hand, which was taken, "And you're Brian St. Vincent? Are you a doctor? Doctorate?" Brian looked crestfallen but didn't say anything. "Not much of a talker are you?"
His comrades were puzzled at this, until Brisa said "Brian, are you shy?"
Brian: "Uh….maybe. I guess so. I've, I've never met anyone new before. Who knew? Ha ha…uh….Mr. Regulator, to answer your question, there's no doctorate program in the Vault…"
Randall: "Wanna be a doctor of Repairing and Engineering? Round it out and you can all be doctors?"
Brian: [face brightening with incredulous smile] "Is…is that allowed?"
Randal laughed: Kid! This is the Capital Wasteland; you're practically a sage if you can read!
Brian thought out this for a long time, say two seconds: "I could teach it, yeah, so I guess it's close enough." He said this, as confidence and an almost smugness came into his voice with every word
Randal: "Well, then, Doctor," he nodded at Brisa, "Doctor," he nodded at April, "This is Dr. St. Vincent; I believe you three know each other already?"
They all had a laugh, a good mirthful laugh at this. It was like some tension was broken, not simply the anxiety of being in a lawless hellhole, but the exile from home, however oppressive. The trio's body language clearly showed this release of tension. Yes they were eating out of the Regulator's hand, but they were glad to do it. They needed to believe him. They even detached their large bulky backpacks, the ones that made movement so awkward but carried all they had left in the world.
Randal: "So, now that we're done with introductions, what can the Capital Regulators do for you?"
Brisa was all business again: "We need food, shelter, a place to stay, and we're looking for their father. His name is James St. Vincent. We're not supposed to come back until we find him. Ever."
April: "Yeah, the Overseer was real insistent on that point."
Randal: "Okay, what did he do?"
Brisa: "He opened the door"
Randal: "Wha? Door?"
Brisa: "Oh yes, the main/service door to the Complex. It used to the service entrance before the war but the parking lot entrance was sealed when the nukes went flying. Our Overseer believes that because Doc St. Vincent hacked the door terminal, the aftereffects included a cascade failure in the Vault's operation system, which caused a minor shockwave that cracked open part of Engineering, letting in a slew of rats and radroaches from the old drill tunnels from when the Vault was being built. They got into the ventilation shaft and caused a huge panic"
Randal [shaking his head]: "I'm not following how one follows from another."
Brisa: "That's the thing, no one does."
April: "Stop giving him the benefit of the doubt Brisa! He's an ASSHOLE. His support comes from the dimmest bulbs in the Complex: the garbage burners and the janitorial wetware. Simple Minds gah!….He needed someone to blame for something that was a long time coming so the simple minds would continue to follow his orders without question. That's what he does, nothing can ever be his fault, not because it's his fuckstick ego because and I quote 'It would be bad for morale.'"
Brisa looked at Brian: "You believe that?" Brian nodded. She looked at Randal "That's the most likely story." She nodded her head as she said this, coming to the conclusion it was safe to be this candid.
Randal: "So, you want me to find a man whose only crime was wanting to leave this Vault, and lead him back so some autocratic demagogue can put his head on a stick? So are we talking literally or figuratively? I've seen both in my time."
Brisa stiffened her posture with pride, "No sir!" This surprised Randal who backed his face away from instinct. "We need to find him because he's from the outside and he's got to know this place better than us…..Don't get us wrong Mr. Regulator, sir, but we need to figure out why he left, and given that he's always been a good guy, he could probably use out help on a good idea….He was our boss until this weekend. Head of the Medical department. Well, not Brian's boss, but me, and April, April and myself, excuse me, and Jonas. Jonas had his face bashed in for not helping the Overseer, and he had to say because he's the last fully qualified doctor in the Vault. And, as April already mentioned, he's holding the twin's mother as collateral so we wouldn't just walk away."
April: "But we're walking away anyway. Unless we can find proof that our dad didn't cause that breach, as in someone or something blew it open from the outside, it would be suicide to bring him back."
Brian finally spoke up after tapping his sister's shoulder to let her know he wanted to speak: "The fucker doesn't want us back anyway. If he did he would have let us talk to mom! Then we might know where he went! He just wants to punish dad, so he broke up his family, sequestered his wife and strung his children out to die in the wastes. That's the kind of authority we'd be facing if we came back. I'm a terrible person for saying this but even mom isn't worth that. Fuck the Overseer! Fuck him with a depleted core! The Complex is actually a nice place to live if you can ignore the prick, but he's in charge and we can't kill him. So until he dies, we'll take our chances here….apologies for the swearing."
And the Regulator stood, listening to all of this, shuffling his feet as they were starting to hurt. "Why don't we sit down a spell? You've got a lot on your minds. " He had his deputies draw up chairs for them by the side of the truck where they too were lounging. They were tense though, April could see that. It was the way they sipped their drinks. That wasn't a hard days drink, it was getting ready for a difficult all nighter. But April and her comrades tried to relax as they nestled into the lawn chair, dirty old things rebound with what looked like old curtains or tablecloth. Well, expect Brian's where a few of the green nylon pieces were still intact here and there. April took the lead as soon as they were seated.
April: You see, Officer King….Regulator King….?
Randal: "Officer Randal. It avoids the repeating R. Most people find it offputting."
April: "Thank you, Officer. You see, my brother and I were born in Springvale Complex, 101 is the code number, but my father and mother are from the outside. I know my father was born and trained in Baltimore, my mother is from somewhere off the Maryland coast, an Island settlement called Carnate. It sounds terrifying; the settlement is built around a 20th century maximum security prison and an even older insane asylum. But, apparently, good schools attract good people. They pray, a lot. God she creeps me the fuck out when she talks about it.
Anyway, they were both scientists, my mom had some prenatal cardiac problems so they decided to try and get entrance to the Complex, and we were born in the decontamination levels. Again, good schools. They didn't talk much about what they did, but they did live in the Washington Naval Yard. We're thinking my dad is trying to revive some old contacts, although whether he's in Baltimore or Rivet City or anywhere else, your guess is as good as mine. Probably better. Can you do an APB? He is a scientist, and that could be valuable right?"
King was listening, but got a bottle of cola out of an old cooler (understand that there were here and there new looking things, clean things, shiny thing, but they were an exception), popping the top off and began drinking it affably. That is to say with less intensity and vigor than his deputies.
Randal: "Would you like something, any of you?"
Brisa: "Does is cost anything?"
Randal: "Good. You're not witless. And the answer is no, as long as it's beer."
Brian: "What about Nuka-Cola?"
Randal: "First lesson of economics out here. Beer is cheap, sells for two bucks, Nuka-Cola is fifteen."
Brain: [shocked] "How does beer cost seven times less than Nuka-Cola?"
Randal: "You ain't tasted it yet. Here, have a swig." He handed a beer to all of them, all took it. "Come'on now, it's safe."
Brian lifted his faceplate and took a gulp because he had been asked. He nearly gaged. After getting his breath, he said "I'm a bad person to ask, I hate the taste of alcohol. But this shit…."
Randal: "Lotsa reasons as you can taste. Beer can be made with shit water. DC's a swamp so all the water's bad without treatment."
April: Irradiated you mean?
Randal laughed: "Every time I talk to someone from a Vault, they're always concerned about the radiation. The whole water table's irradiated, but that's actually a good thing. No kid, pathogens. In three days or less, your head is gonna swell like bullfrog's throat and seal up like a Bullfrog's ass. No amount of that fancy medicine is gonna save you from getting sicker than a dog. City folks always come here and three days later they half wish they were dead. But getting back to cheap beer, it's because you can make it with shit water, the radiation helps cleanse it, the alcohol mostly sterilizes it, and it doesn't taste good because moonshiners tend to cut it with Rad-Away to even out the doses."
Brisa: "Officer," she stood to be polite "That makes no sense whatsoever." At his request she continued: "Pathogens can be sterilized alone by boiling the water, long term radiation would only produce radiation resistant pathogen strains, and what in God's name requires you to cut Rad-Away in beer? It's been a hundred years since the bombs fell, and it's obvious that the DC area was hit with neutron bombs because the cityscape is almost completely intact. Radiation is a short term threat."
Randal: "Yes Ma'am, however, are you familiar with what happens when a fission reactor melts down? Well, let me tell you, because you've got that Vault education and I'm just a country bumpkin who has to prove I…." Brisa tried to speak, even raising up one black-clad finger to say that's not what she meant but Randal wasn't having it "Oh, not country bumpkin, wasteland yokel because people on the outside obviously can't have the time while dodging ten foot tall insects and cannibal raiders to know the difference noun, a verb and an adverb. You Vault Dwellers tend to be all right once you get your heads out of your asses but you all come out making a LOT of assumptions about what a 'post-apocalypse' should look like. But as to my part, I know damn well apocalypses are overrated, and I deal with real problems, not the primordial fears and fantasies by people who are stuck in the visions of a future past. And you can sit down Dr. Almodo….var? Yeah, Almodovar."
Brisa sat down, looking somewhat ashamed but mostly flabbergasted. The twins looked at her then took off their helmets, a sign they were going to listen close and completely to the kind officer of the peace. They put their helmets in their laps (and Brian's beer was handed to the asphalt)
Randal: "May I continue?"
Brisa: "Yes, Yes of course; we have a lot to learn about the realities of the post-apocalypse in the greater DC metro area."
Randal: "Well that's good, because we get all kinds of travelers through the Capital Region and there's a lot to know for all of them. Refugees, travelers, settlers, traders, we try and tell them all. It's the neighborly thing to do. At least that's what the Virginians do; the Marylanders tend not to give a hanking crap."
Brisa: [clasping hands] "And we're from Springvale Complex, which makes us a settlement in Virginia too, and that makes us all neighborly, right?"
April: "It depends."
Brisa: "April!"
April: "Brisa, I don't have to play nice with would be mutant Confederates singing songs about how the South Will Rise Again."
Randal: "Oh I like you miss, Miss Doctor St. Vincent. You will be happy to know that even topside, Virginia only made that mistake once. Never again."
April: "But Virginia isn't actually the South anymore is it? Cause before the war there were a lot of cultural fluctuations…."
Randal: "Virginia is as southern as it's people desire."
April: [crestfallen] "Damnit, I live in the South."
Brian [looking annoyed at her]: That's what' you're concerned out? Now? We're meeting new friends," he looked at Randal "I hope anyway" then faced back to April "And now you want to start bitching about the Civil War?"
April, without any shame or flustering: "Yes, because the things I don't like about the Old South are things I don't like about the post-apocalypse." She held out her finger and began counting on them "Number one: slavery is never cool. Ever. Number Two: Extreme poverty is never cool, especially when rich people live it up while poor people starve and live in tin shacks. Number Three: Racism, towards mutants or other people. And don't give me any crap about the Plebiscite, we won and we absorbed the Hispanics. And fourth: me hating on the Confederacy is equal opportunity. I mean that for any group that wants to build new kingdoms on American soil. I'm a Yankee Fucking Doodle on this one. The Overseer says America lives in us, but he doesn't want to do a damn thing about making sure America lives on the topside."
Randal [looking intrigued]: Do you want to become a Regulator? We could use a doctor, and we fight for America, we fight for America on the all-important lower levels. Fight raiders and bandits all over this territory…." He held this out in his words
April: "I dunno; can we subcontract? See if you're what we want to go with?"
Brisa and Brian: "We?!"
April: "Yeah, we! WE need a place to stay. WE need protection from those coked up Raiders that tried to beat Ms. Wong to death. They charged at her when she was pointing an AK-Series Assault rifle at them at point blank range. Doesn't matter if it jammed, that's a hell of a risk. For Christ's sake, they didn't even have armor! They had stinking, tattered clothes and a baseball bat and a switchblade. Against a trained lawman. That's psychotic. And then we stunned then, Ms. Wong got her gun unjammed and they were gone! Each one of those stun blasts should have put them down for half an hour or more! So yes, maybe WE can subcontract and get to know what exactly we've gotten ourselves into. I personally like info-dumps in real life, they happen BEORE I get myself into trouble, but I get the impression we're going to need a whole frickin field guide to survive out here. Something we can learn, ahem, on the job."
Randal blinked, then blinked again. This was happening fast, it was clearly going in his favor, and he very much gave the impression to April as though he had hit a jackpot and was trying to hide it. April could tell though. She was always good at reading people, telling them what they wanted to hear.
Randal finally shook his head and said: "Are you well rested?"
Brisa: "Why?"
Randal: "We're about to go on a mission and we could use doctors. We don't trust stun blasts, what we do trust is the power of loud shiny guns to get the enemy to surrender. But usually there's a firefight and we need to patch up their people and ours as quickly as possible.
Brian: "We're rested. We'd planned to head to the settlement called Megaton in the darkness, but we found Ms. Wong being chased down the street almost as soon as we got outside. But is there anything I can do?"
Randal's eyes nearly gleamed, giving them a menacing look, not from malevolence, but sheer intensity, "My boy, can you repair Robots? Not the mechanical stuff, I'm talking about the software end?"
Brian: "I can try. I might or might not, software malfunctions can have both physical and…"
Randal: "Come with me!" and he nearly swept the young man off of his feet and off his chair, nearly knocking his helmet off his lap (Brian caught it) and definitely knocking the beer off its center, causing its contents to flow out and slowly make their way to a small storm drain in the parking lot. "Never mind that. Not good beer anyway."
