I do not own Fallout

It is owned by Bethesda

All that will change once Santa receives my letter.

Chapter 3: Nuclear

No stop signs, speed limit

Nobody's gonna slow me down

Like a wheel, gonna spin it

Nobodys gonna mess me round

Hey Satan, paid my dues

Playing in a rocking band

Hey momma, look at me

I'm on my way to the promised land

Imp on the highway to hell

-AC/DC

We filled the rest of that morning with small talk while we looked through the belongings of our dead hosts (May they rot in Hell). I found another pistol identical to my 9mm along with some rounds for it. Deciding that their leather armor (despite how It reeked) was better than a torn-up Vault suit, I took it and put the clothes on. Sig seemed to be picking up some seemingly random junk. Wrenches, duct tape, scraps of dead terminals, chunks of metal that wasn't rusted, tin cans, Abraxo Cleaner, Detergent, and other items like that. I decided to ask why.

"Hey, Sig. What's with all the random crap you're hoarding?" I asked, holding up a box of detergent as an example. He took the box and muttered his thanks. "Well if ya scavenge specific pieces of junk ya can make a buncha cool gadgets with 'em." He held up the detergent and Abraxo Cleaner "Fer' example; mix these with that special glowin' type of Nuka-Cola ya can make yerself a damn good bomb." He stuffed the boxes in his bag and pulled out a roll of tape. "Duct Tape and Wonderglue r' good fer holdin yer guns n' armor t'gether." He chuckled "Yer a Vault-guy ain'tcha?" I nodded "What gave me away? Was it the clothes? Or maybe it was the fact that I've had a shower more than once a year…" "Actually," he interrupted "It was the questions. Yall Vault-people ask questions NON-STOP. Guess I better tell ya the basics of the wastes so there ain't gonna be as many questions."

I nodded "Alright, what do I need to know?" Sig thought for a moment "Err…" He presented me with a stack of dollar bills and a stack of bottle caps with Nuka-Cola on them. "See this pre-war money? Useless. Money 'round these parts are bottle caps. Some factions tried to mint their own kuz they thought caps were 'barbaric'. Most of 'em failed."

"Bottle caps? You're kidding." I asked. Sig gave me another big grin "Nope." Sig filled me in on everything important that I needed to know about the wastes, I didn't get the details but I understood the big picture.

We left the store at midday, continuing down the cracked highway toward Austin. As we walked the remains of the city came into view, I was closer so I could see the sprawling suburbs surrounding the city. We'd have to trudge through that to get to the center of Austin. Sig spent most of the trek explaining the city's situation to me. The outer parts of the city are littered with fallen skyscrapers making it very difficult to pass; no one lived there except for the wild animals. The inner parts of Austin were inhabited by a friendly town called Haven. Haven was at war with a group of slave traders that lived on the other side of the city. We were headed to Haven after a stop at the local abandoned gun factory.

We stood outside the hulking three story gun factory; there was a large billboard on the top that read:

S & S Munitions

Helping America protect themselves since 2023!

"Now this place's been picked clean on the bottom floors, but the top two floors r' protected by robots that'll shoot ya on sight, so be careful." Sig said as he threw open the front doors. There was a robot behind the front desk that served as a greeter; he had a very bad, mechanical, British accent.

"Hello sirs! Marvelous day isn't it? Please remember that floors two, three, and the basement are off-limits. Have a wonderful time!" The robot was a 'Mister Handy' model. It consisted of a cyan sphere to serve as the body and three mechanical arms tipped with different tools. It didn't walk, but merely floated across the ground.

We both nodded at the robot as we walked into another room. There were several display cases that showed several different types of guns and ammo. Sig noticed my eyeing the cases, "Those guns r' fake, don't bother pickin' the lock."

There wasn't much to loot on the first floor so we found the stairs up, the door to the second floor looked like it was once locked, but the lock was blown off by buckshot. The second floor was somewhat cleaner than the first, probable the fact that anything human gets shot by the guard bots. "Hey," I said in a low voice "If most of the other scavengers met death by robot, why the hell are we up here?"

"Cuz!" Sig said loudly, making me wince "We know what we're doin'! And there ain't no need to whisper, the robots are damn-near deaf." We both drew our guns, I mentally noted how Sig's Lorraine was WAY more powerful than my 9mm pistol and my 5.56 bolt-action rifle (courtesy of a pair of dead raiders).

We moved down the hallway cautiously, I heard faint robotic chatter from another room "…No hostiles detected, continuing sweep…" I chuckled at the robots "Now, why do they just announce themselves like that? Their neither stealthy nor are they smart." Sig shrugged "Dunno, Probably just how they was made."

I cracked open the door to an office; among the cubicles I could see a patrolling robot. It was a Protectotrons model, the robots body looked like a large metal-plated pear with a glass dome on the top to serve as its eyes, ears, and laser weapon. Its arms and legs were stubby so it moved slowly and clumsily around the office.

I crept up on the bot, shifting from cubicle to cubicle. I had nearly snuck within touching distance and the Protector hadn't noticed me yet. I raised my bolt-action rifle to its dome-head and fired a single round (no V.A.T.S. needed). The H.U.D. on my PIP-Boy informed me that it had been a critical hit. The robot stumbled forward for a second but it still stood. "Intruders detected, all law-abiding citizens please vacate the area." The robot cracked in an emotionless tone. I fired another shot into its metal body, my rifle was too low of a caliber to penetrate its armor and instead the bullet just made a small dent.

"Vin, duck!" Sig shouted. I did as instructed and dropped to the floor, Blam! Blam! two rounds sailed over my head and put two big-ass holes in the robot. The protector sputtered a bit before falling to the floor in a smoking heap. "Thank-"my thanks were cut off by an alarm blaring throughout the compound "Intruders detected on floor two, all S & S personnel vacate the building."

"Shit, alarm system!" Sig shouted. Three Protectotrons clambered into the room, one blocking each exit. We both slid into the thin cover of the cubicles, (Fun Fact: while lasers may be deadly to unarmored opponents their material penetration is crap) I shouted over the torrent of laser fire "Hey Sig, got anything bigger than my rifle?" "No!" he shouted back "I got a couple o' ger'nades fer ya though!" He tossed me a pair of olive green hand grenades (Good thing he decided not to pull the pins) and I grabbed them.

I pulled the pin on the first one and tossed it over the low wall. There was a resounding BOOM! and the whole room quaked for a second. I risked a peek over my cover; the grenade had taken out two of the three bots. The survivor countered my grenade by using his laser to dissolve the entire cubicle surrounding me (Fun Fact #2: While lasers may not have any penetration power it makes up for the fact that they have a small chance to cause a molecular chain reaction that can TURN YOU INTO DUST). I dove from the pile of ashes that now surrounded me to what looked like a pre-war copying machine, the bot had clipped me on the shoulder leaving burns on the armor I picked up from the raiders.

I slid out of cover and kicked on V.A.T.S., queuing two rounds directly into the robot's dome. Bang!...Bang! the first shot missed its head by mere centimeters and the second hit dead center. Like the last robot, this one survived a direct bullet to the head and continued firing its laser, lumbering closer to the spot I was dug in at. Sig stood up from his cover and took aim at the Protectotron Blam! His shot hit the bot in its dome an inch to the left from where I had shot it. The robot fell to the floor, like its friends.

There were now four smoking piles of scrap where robots once stood, patrolling the halls of this building for the last 200 years. I popped open a panel on the nearest scrap-heap and began salvaging some of the more valuable pieces of circuitry. Who knows? I could make my own Protectotron if I ever find a place to settle down in the wasteland. That idea got me thinking 'What are my plans for the future even going to be? For now it would be following Sig, but I hadn't even asked him what HIS long-term goals are.' I finished salvaging the scrap electronics from the dead robots. I decided to ask Sig about his plans later.

We continued sweeping through the second floor of the building, killing robots and looting anything valuable left. The alarm was still blaring, but we had killed all of the robots on the floor so it was pointless to keep the noise on. I came upon a locked door labeled President Finley's office. The lock was a tougher one to pick ;( The alarm breaking my concentration wasn't helping either) I had lost three bobby pins to it but it finally clicked and allowed us into the office.

The room was furnished with a large desk covered with decaying papers, a faded name plate that said President Charles Finley, and a rusted, but still operational terminal. There were a few old filing cabinets; one of them had a box of .357 magnum slugs inside of it. On the wall was a rectangular glass case; inside of it was a brass-plated cowboy style revolver in pristine condition with engravings on it similar to Sig's Lorraine, its grip was made of a dark oak with a few words carved into it, the case was so dusty on the outside that the word was unreadable. "Dibs." I called.

I tested the case 'Locked, duh.' "Here." Sig said as he rummaged through his large bag (I could swear that thing was bigger on the inside) and pulled out a heavy lead pipe which he tossed to me. I caught the blunt object and motioned for Sig to back away. I took a stance like I was a batter in a baseball game and swung full force into the glass case. The pipe bounced off of the glass harmlessly (And hurt my arm like hell). "Figures," Sig grumbled "S'probably bulletproof. " "Damn."

I decided that before I tried picking the lock on the case I should shut off the alarm. I check the terminal on the (former) president's desk. Locked too. I wasn't an administrator for S&S so I didn't know the password. But there was more than one way to hack a terminal. I typed in several commands that were meant to reset the password. I'm not going to bore you with the specific of how to hack a computer; most of it will go right over your head. But I will say that it involved a little bit of guesswork. After a few guesses I finally found the password (it was 'password1' in case anyone was wondering. Real original, Mr. Finley).

I rummaged through the computer's files and found three things; an emergency alarm shutoff (Thank god!), an audio log which I transferred to my PIP-Boy, and a command that electronically unlocks the gun case. After I activated the last command, the glass case next to me popped open with a 'hissss'. I could see the revolver clearly now and It. Was. Gorgeous. Even after two centuries it was still one of the shiniest things I've ever seen in the wastes. The gun stood out from the grey, decayed room like a diamond in a pile of coal. I picked it up, the inscription on the grip read 'The Screamer'. I loaded it with the .357 slugs from the filing cabinets. The Screamer was cowboy-style revolver, so the rounds had to be loaded one by one and the hammer had to be pulled back after each shot.

Sig whistled appreciatively at my new piece. "Real nice loot ya got there pardner." "Jealous?" I asked with a smirk "Naw, "he replied with a bigger smirk as he spun the cylinder on his Lorraine "mines bigger."

We swept through the rest of the gun factory, killing off the rest of the stray robots. I now owned a gun of much higher caliber; the holes that The Screamer put into the Protectotrons were marginally smaller than Sig's, but they were still pretty friggin' effective. We went about the process of looting the building, finding a good bit of caps and ammo. Sig decided to save the ground floor for last; he had heard there was a locked door that no one had been able blow open with explosives. (Am I the only one in the wasteland who knew how to pick a lock?).

The basement where the actual factory part of this place was eerily similar to my Vault, being underground and all. Everything of value was taken long ago, probably due to the fact that there had never been any guard bots stationed on that floor. We made our way to the end of the broken down factory, finding a large steel door, sealed shut with a series of inner gear mechanisms, but it was still opened by a key, making the lock on it still pick-able.

I wedged my bobby pin and screwdriver into the lock; it was a tough one (even without blaring sirens) tougher than the president's office. Within a minute I had lost half a dozen pins. "Damn you!" I shouted at the inanimate object as six pins became seven. (Unsurprisingly, it did not reply) I heard the telltale sounds of Sig digging through his big green pack, something I realized he did all too often. He tapped me on the shoulder with a roll of paper. I looked back to see him presenting me a magazine. "Try this." He said simply. I took the glossy book of paper and unrolled it. The title read 'Locksmiths Reader', I skimmed the various articles in the magazine until, lo and behold, I found a whole three paragraphs on the locking mechanisms for the model of door that I had been working on. I re-read the article twice before I attempted the lock once more.

Without any other resistance, the door gave way without as much as another broken pin. I could hear the rusty inner-working of the steel door shift and grind it finished unlocking. The door disappeared down into the floor, being the automated type. (It's amazing how these things still have electricity.) I stepped into the room that had been closed for two centuries and what I found was…indescribable.

GUNS! WONDERFUL GUNS! The walls were lined with dusty black assault rifles, high powered sniper rifles, pump-action shotguns, and an ominous black safe set on a pedestal in the center.

Both I and Sig were practically dancing at the sight of our good, no EXCELLENT fortune. Assault rifles were rare in the wastes, and there was at least fifteen in good condition along the wall. "Hot Damn!" Sig shouted as he grabbed a rifle to inspect it. He gave it a good once-over and turned to me "Almost perfect cn'dition." He said, unceremoniously shoving it into his backpack.

"Wonder what's in that safe…" I though aloud. "I don't rightly know, who dont'cha find out?" Sig replied. I checked the black safe, strangely it was unlocked. I slowly pulled it open and there was a subtle beep as it swung open fully. Inside was a motion sensor module wired into what looked like a large olive-green egg with a yellow symbol that meant 'radioactive, stay the fuck away!' (I was paraphrasing of course). Under the 'egg' was a digital timer that was…counting down from ten? 'What the hell?' I though, just as it reached 00:08 seconds. 'You idiot, IT'S A BOMB!' My mental self screamed at me.

"Shit, RUN!" I shouted at Sig and we began a mad dash for our lives in the opposite direction of the bomb. We stumbled out of the room and I turned around to the console behind the door, punching a few buttons causing the reinforced steel door to close behind us. We proceeded to dive behind a set of rusted conveyor belts, covering our heads.

There was an eardrum-splitting, earth-shattering, deafening explosion that seemed to shake the entire wasteland. It went on for a full five seconds before the sound receded. My PIP-Boy began clicking at a rate of +1R/Sec. We both got up from our prone positions, thankfully unharmed. I saw that the steel door had been blown open; it looked similar to putting a cherry bomb inside a tin can. "What in the ever-loving hell was THAT?!" I shouted "A bomb!" Sig shouted back sarcastically. "I know that, what makes an explosion that big?" I asked a little more calmly, gesturing to the remains of the door. "Was prob'bly a Mini-Nuke." Sig sighed, peering into the room. Everything inside was melted and warped into a pile of useless slag. "What a waste." I said sadly "What did we save?" He pulled the rifle out of his bag, along with a pair of cardboard ammo boxes. "One marksman rifle and two boxes a' 5.56 ammo…"

"Dammit." Sig moaned "Goddammit." I agreed

Footnote: Level up—Lv4

Quest Perk Added: Mr. Roboto

You've seen the inside of many a robot, you know how they operate and can now hit them harder +20% damage against machines.

New Perk Added: Gun Nut (1)

You are obsessed with using and maintaining a wide variety of conventional firearms. With each rank of the Gun Nut perk, you gain an additional 5 points to the Guns and Repair skills.

Authors note: Sorry for the extremely slow writing pace, I've been busy with an English project and various holiday-related tasks. Now that I have my Christmas Vacation I can hopefully post once a week. Also, did anyone catch all the references in here? Anyone? There are three of 'em.

Got any comments, questions, or cririsim?

Go ahead and PM me, I need feedback!