Hey everyone, I think that I'm going to give you guys a 'question of the day' at the end of each chapter just to keep it interactive. The question could be about the story, your character, the fallout series, or anything in between.
Section One: Arriving at the Vault
"You know," said Coltrane. "Did we think about how we'd have to open this door? Or?" The four were standing outside of vault 113, and Coltrane's hands were on his hips, and he was looking at the closed vault door in front of him.
David's hands were at his side, and he looked pensive. "Who ever started spreading the rumor that there was technology in this vault? For all I know right now, it could be full of ghouls and mentats."
"I mean, count me in then." Coltrane flashed a smile. "Name a single musician who's never snorted mentats."
"Can you snort mentats?" Camisha inquired.
"I've been alive way too long, Cam. I've snorted everything I could in my lifetime. Actually," he said. "After this I was going to go down to Mexico, if it's still around."
"What's in Mexico?" Sarah interjected.
David knew, and so he said, "Ghoul sympathizers, pre-war chems, and music."
"We called them drugs," offered Coltrane. "In Mexico they used to respect the dead, and now since ghouls are the closest thing they've got to dead men walking, they respect me."
"Clever," Camisha offered.
"I like to think so."
"Alright," said David. "So how do we get into this vault?"
"I'm going to try to rig the hinges," said Sarah. "Can you give me a second?"
"Take two," Coltrane offered. She laughed lightly and he gestured for her to step towards the door.
"Coltrane, are you really going to Mexico?" David asked him. "Don't want to stick around?"
"Sorry my man, I'm going to find myself a keyboard and split. Say Cam, were there keyboards when you grew up in a vault?"
Camisha thought about this, and then said, "To be honest, yes, surprisingly."
Sarah called from the door, "I think it will open once I pry open this panel and arrange the electronics inside."
"We could knock?" David offered.
"Knock?" Coltrane laughed. "By all means, knock."
David jogged up to the door and knocked. The ringing was hollow, and there was no response. He turned around and offered a shrug. "Worth a shot?" He turned around and the door began to creak and rumble. "Nice job!" he said to Sarah.
Sarah looked up from the door's hinge and shook her head quickly. "I didn't do it!" She got to her feet and scrambled to where David was standing. When the door was fully open, a bald man with dark skin walked out. He was in a vault jumpsuit under a lab coat.
"Yes?" His arms were crossed, and he looked demanding and stern.
Coltrane spoke first. "Do you have pianos?"
"You came all this way for a piano? You were about to blow yourselves up for a piano?" He guested to Sarah's handiwork. "It's a box rigged to resemble the door's opening mechanism. If you cut any wires, it blows."
"A keyboard," Coltrane corrected himself. "Also, don't blow up Sarah."
The man had a hearty, sympathetic laugh. "All of you can come in if you leave your weapons at the door."
"Not to be naïve," Coltrane said, "But I'll do it." He handed over his submachine gun and said, "I don't really know how to use this old thing anyhow."
"I'm not about to walk into a vault unarmed with a man I've never seen before," David informed Coltrane. "If you all go in there, you might get hurt."
"David," said Sarah. "I have less to lose than you and Cam. Coltrane I think knows what I mean. I want them to fix my synth component, and he wants to play music. You and Cam don't have to come with us any further."
"I'm a vault dweller Dave," Camisha smiled at him, and he unsurely smiled back. "I'll be okay too. You don't have to come."
David put a hand on Cam's shoulder and told her, "You three are part of my team right now. You three are my friends." He took the assault carbine off of his back and handed to the man inside of the vault, but he kept his silenced 10mm hidden in the back of his pants, and he kept his trench knife hidden too. "Lead the way," he said to the man.
"I'm looking for an electric keyboard. Something I can bring around," he explained. "You dig?"
"I dig," replied Clement. "I'm sure we have something in the back, but there aren't many musicians in this vault."
"I'm looking for something who knows about synths," said Sarah.
"I'm afraid the institute blew up three years ago," Clement told her. "Why don't we all go a to restaurant? I can tell you four about the vault, and then we can go over what we can do for each other."
They walked down a couple halls, and got a few odd looks from vault dwellers, until they were all sitting at a table in what seemed to be the restaurant-based area of the vault. Clement waved over a waiter and ordered himself a sandwich. "Can I get you something?"
"Nuka Cola," David requested.
"Do you have bananas? I haven't seen a banana since the war," Coltrane said.
"I'm okay," Sarah said, and Camisha requested water.
"A Nuka Cola, some water, and a… banana," Clement ordered for them. "So." He turned back around. "This is Vault 113. Vault Tec put two a few groups of people together. Vault 113 was originally scientists, politicians, clergy, and college drop outs."
"What happened?" Camisha asked.
A waiter came over, handed everybody his or her order, and smiled at Clement before he left.
"Well, the politicians tried to take over the vault with the help of the college dropouts. And eventually the politicians adapted religious ideals, leaving the scientists rather confused and alone," Clement said. "Eventually, people had their children and now we're just a community," he explained. "There is equipment here, but knowledge of science beyond basic wasn't passed down."
"Oh," Sarah sighed.
"We can help with your keyboard problem, though," he offered Coltrane. "But you need to do something for us first."
"Anything," Coltrane said.
"A group of mutants have been trying to get into this vault," he explained. "They don't knock," he added. "And frankly, we don't want them in here. If you four could rid us of our mutant problem, you can have your keyboard. And you can take a look around the electronics we have and take something else."
"Right," said Coltrane. "That can't be that hard. I mean, maybe it can be. Either way is it worth a shot?" he asked David.
David was sipping his Nuka Cola, thinking hard about everything that was happening. "Yeah. Worth a shot."
The mutant settlement was in an old café, and only five mutants still lived there, David counted. Coltrane pulled dynamite from inside of his jacket and let Cam strike it. He threw it through a window, and the four watched the glass blow out. Coltrane did it again, and soon two mutants ran out of the door.
David clicked his carbine, which Clement had given back on their way out, and shot down one of the two. Sarah pulled two throwing knives out and whipped them across the street, hitting the other mutant once in his left eye, and once in his forehead. Cam took this time to run at him and swing her baseball bat at his head. It connected with the knife in his eye and dug it further in, driving through his brain and killing him.
Sarah peeked through a window, and found that Coltrane's explosives had killed two, and knocked the last one out. Sarah walked in and dug her machete into its head, finishing the job.
"It's easier to fight in numbers," David commented. "I'd almost forgotten."
Clement was very pleased with the work that they did, and led them to a room they had filled with instruments. Coltrane bolted over to an upright bass, something he hadn't seen in years. "It's really something," he said. "Does anybody in this vault play?"
"No," said Clement.
Coltrane found a four octave electronic piano, which he asked Sarah if she could modify into a portable keyboard. She nodded quickly and walked over to Coltrane. "Easy," she said. "Can I have fifteen minutes?" she asked Clement.
"Sure thing."
While she tinkered with it, Coltrane played a jig on a grand piano. He wondered why this particular vault had such a wide array of instruments, but he didn't think much of it until Clement said, "Vault Tec wondered if anybody would try to rebel and become different than their parents by playing music. A few people did, but funny enough, most musicians left the vault. They took all of the 'how to' guides on music with them."
Coltrane was playing a slow, chord heavy pre-war song in a minor key. His voice was deep and scratchy, but he tried singing a few lyrics as he played. David thought that Coltrane was probably a very nice singer in his youth.
"I am done," Sarah said. "You can power it with cells from a laser rifle," she informed him, and he thanked her profusely.
"You're good at what you do," Coltrane told her.
"You too."
"Well, everybody." He gave Cam a firm pat on the shoulder. "I'm going to go South until I die or hit Mexico. I think this is where I leave you." Cam hugged him, and he was a little bit squishy, but she expected as much. "Sarah, you should take along an instrument. You're good at the theory," he said.
"I don't think I'm meant for it." She looked sad for a moment, but Coltrane's smile was infectious and she smiled back.
"A ghoul and a synth," he said. "We made one hell of a team there, didn't we?"
She nodded up and down vigorously, and he firmly shook David's hand. He slung the keyboard over his back, testing the weight.
"We'll stay back and look around," said David. "Will we ever see you again, Coltrane?"
"Maybe in another life. You know, my name was Eric," he told David. "Don't get too hurt."
They watched him leave, and Clement had a guard escort him out of the vault. "Want anything else?" Clement asked the three.
"No," Sarah decided after a moment.
"You ever want anything, you're welcome back."
Section Two: New York Enclave
"So, where are we?" Quasar asked Jack. "I mean, there are slaves here and all, but where are we?"
Jack shrugged. "I'm not sure. They had us looking for scrap electronics."
Elizabeth looked around the subway tunnel. "They want pre-war, malleable metals," she said.
"Why would they want that?" Jack asked.
She shrugged.
"Advanced sex toys," said Quasar.
"Nope!" Elizabeth replied. They noticed a locked room, and Jack blasted the lock with his shotgun. The door swung off of its hinges, and Jack pushed it to the side. He walked in and looked around the room until he found a terminal.
"I got it," Elizabeth said. She started to type on the terminal until it whirred and unlocked. "There are a few entries," she said. She skimmed through them and said, "One says, 'the slaves are getting restless. Two brands needed for two new slaves. One ghoul: 200s. One man: 20s.'"
The terminal had the Enclave's 'E' printed on the side in white, and Elizabeth ran a finger along the design.
"Now guys," Quasar said. "Are we going to dig deeper into this Enclave stuff, or go to 113?"
"I don't want an entire organization to murder me," Jack said. "So, I think we should leave the Enclave alone."
"Have some nationalism, Devich Devich!" Quasar said. "If we don't stop the Enclave from enslaving people, who will?"
"Somebody qualified," Jack replied.
"I have a masters degree in dicking down Enclave members, so I think I am very qualified, actually," Quasar said.
"There are organizations that are fighting against the enclave and people like that," Elizabeth said. She took a long pause before adding, "We could find the New York Railroad if we want to help."
"We could," said Quasar. "Is that what we're going to do?" he asked.
"The vault's not going anywhere," said Elizabeth. "Jack, do you want to be a marauder, or do you want to go make money?"
Jack sighed. "I'm going to keep going to the Vault," he said. "I heard about a bounty on a man going to Vault 113 when we were stopped at a hotel once."
"Ah, Devich, is it because my abs sexually frustrate you?" Quasar inquired.
"I don't think it's that," Elizabeth informed him.
"After I try to get this bounty, I'll follow you two to the New York Railroad," he told them. "I'll grab you two some electronics if I come across any soon."
Quasar pulled Jack into a hug. "If you die I'll kill you, Jack."
"Okay, right, I won't." Jack shuffled out of the hug. "I'll see you two."
So, Coltrane was just a character that I made up, and now that he has his keyboard, he's probably going to make his way to Mexico and out of the story from here. I did like writing him, though. I thought he embodied more of fallout's 'weirder' aspects.
So, as for the 'Question of the day', it is: besides your own character(s), which character in the story is your favorite?
