Well here's my take on Fallout 4 with a bit of a twist. Hope you like it. Oh and a certain citrus fruit will be present in later chapters.
Before we get into this I'd like to apologize. My old computer had a few... issues with this site and it was hard to get things done. The issue was with my computer not the website. But with my new one that's gone and I'm back... until the Christmas season which means business will pick up greatly and I won't have as much time to write. But I'll burn that bridge when I come to it.
'Thinking'
"Talking"
Edit: I added in the timestamps in the form of month/day/year so everyone knows where we are timewise. Came to me after doing some dialogue for a protectron.
War Never Changes
October 23rd 2077
War. War never changes.
In the year 1945, my great-great grandfather, serving in the army, wondered when he'd get to go home to his wife and the son he'd never seen. He got his wish when the US ended World War II by dropping atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
The World awaited Armageddon; instead, something miraculous happened. We began to use atomic energy not as a weapon, but as a nearly limitless source of power.
People enjoyed luxuries once thought the realm of science fiction. Domestic robots, fusion-powered cars, portable computers. But then, in the 21st century, people awoke from the American dream.
Years of consumption lead to shortages of every major resource. The entire world unraveled. Peace became a distant memory. It is now the year 2077. We stand on the brink of total war, and I am afraid. For myself, for my wife, for my two sons - because if my time in the army taught me one thing: it's that war, war never changes.
"War never changes," a man said looking in the mirror.
"You're going to knock them dead at the veterans hall tonight Hun," a female voice said.
"You really think so?"
"Absolutely dad," a new voice popped up from the bathroom doorway, "It's a great speech."
"He's right, now move over and stop hogging the mirror," the second voice asked.
The owner of the third voice then moved on to the living room & kitchen area of the house as a synthetic voice spoke up, "Ah, good morning young Master Jackson."
"Morning Codsworth," the now identified Jackson replied. He was a young man of about seventeen years of age with pale skin like his parents, though the two he lived with were his adopted parents as he was adopted after a visit to the doctors where they were given the news that their chances of conception were very, very low. Not long after they adopted him at the age of six and had been living with them ever since and almost a decade later he was given the very surprising news that he was going to be a big brother. Needless to say his father had a fainting spell at that news. He also had brown hair that always looked like he just got out of bed regardless of how much he tried to fix it, and blue eyes hidden behind a pair of glasses. He was also classified as the 'class geek' of his school due to his high marks, "Anything earthshaking I should know about?"
"You mean other than your friends from last night leaving some items behind?" Codsworth replied.
Jackson looked around and saw the object in question, or so he thought, "Oh yeah, I should return Allen's Grognak comic back to him."
"I was referring to this," Codsworth said pointing out a pack of cigarettes to Jackson's right, "Such an ugly habit. I do hope you're not picking up on it sir."
"Of course not Codsworth," Jackson replied.
"I believe those friends of yours are a bad influence on you," Codsworth pointed out, "You should be spending time with others that would be a good influence. Like that young Miss Cofran you seem so fond of."
"CODSWORTH!" Jackson yelled out while his face turned red. It wasn't entirely the fact that Codsworth hit that nail squarely on the head that got him embarrassed, in fact it was true that he was harboring a little crush on her. It was two other things that were the problem, so to speak. Firstly was that Cindy was the head cheerleader of his school so naturally she already had a boyfriend that as expected, or rather clichéd, was the star football player on the team (and probably one of if not the dumbest person in school) while he was the school bookworm. They'd never be together. Secondly her attitude and actions in the community were a complete one eighty from what they were in school. Around the community she helped out with whoever and whatever needed help, to a certain extent anyway, and she was the nice girl next door, but in school she was a bully to everyone that she could get away with. In fact she was the biggest reason that several of Jackson's friends started smoking to begin with to try and ease their anxiety without telling their parents since no one would believe Cindy was the cause.
"What's this about a girl?" Jackson's father Nate asked as he stepped into the kitchen to get to the coffee Codsworth had just prepared.
"NOTHING!" Jackson yelled out, but it didn't stop Codsworth.
"It seems the young master infatuated with one of the neighborhood girls," Codsworth replied making Jackson's face even more red.
Jackson groaned out of embarrassment as his father spoke, "Ah young love. Did I ever tell you how your mother and I met?"
"Unfortunetly. You also told me how I was conceived during 'The Talk'," Jackson deadpanned with the blush still on his face.
"My ears are burning," Jackson's mother Nora spoke as she came into the kitchen and grabbed the newspaper, "What are we talking about?"
Jackson was about to say something to alter the subject but Codsworth beat him to the punch, "We were just discussing the young master's new infatuation."
"CODSWORTH!"
As Jackson finished his yell Shaun's cries could be heard coming from his room. Codsworth was the first to speak up, "Ah sounds like someone made a stinky. I shall attend to young master Shaun," as he floated off.
"You know I wasn't sure at first," Nora said while reading the newspaper, "but Codsworth is great with Shaun."
"A great investment Mom," Jackson said grateful for the change in subject.
"So..." Nora began, "What was this about a crush you have?"
And with that Jackson was quickly back to embarrassed. His Dad then spoke up further adding to the embarrassment, "It seems our oldest has feelings for one of the neighborhood girls." Jackson groaned out of embarrassment and hid his head in his hands praying that something would help him out of this.
His prayers were answered when the doorbell rang. His mother ushered his father to get the door and when he opened it Jackson heard a voice say, "Good morning. Vault-Tec calling." He mostly tuned out the conversation between the man and his dad only catching a few bits like the salesman saying time was short and that the 'big kaboom' was inevitable and his dad asking whether there was enough room for everyone in his family. About a minute or so later his father asked him to come to the door. He got up off the couch and made his way there.
"Yeah?" he asked when he got to the door.
"Hello son," the Vault-Tec rep said, "Just need your name on this form here," he said pointing to a space underneath his fathers name and next to it was a series of letters and numbers that, on his fathers section, were in various combinations. Jackson took the Vault-Tec reps pen and put his name down, "Splendid," the man said taking his pen back, "Now just put your finger on here," he continued pointing at a device on top of his clipboard, "and it will read your S.P.E.C.I.A.L. stats."
"My what?" Jackson asked as he put his finger on the machine as requested.
"Your special stats," the salesman repeated as various words popped up on screen, "They'll help determine your role in the Vault as set up by the Overseer based on them. Let's see," he continued turning his clipboard back to himself, "Strength six, Perception four, Endurance three, Charisma six, Intelligence eight, Agility four, and Luck four," he finished writing down the stats.
After he did a cry could be heard from Shaun's room followed by Codsworth entering the kitchen/living room area saying, "Young Master Jackson, Shaun has been changed but absolutely refuses to settle down. I think he needs some of that "fraternal affection" you seem to be so good at."
"Go ahead," his father replied as his mother approached the door, "Your mother and I will finish up here and join you shortly."
Jackson nodded and headed over to Shaun's room while his mom did her turn for the Vault-Tec employee. Shaun's room used to be Jackson's until his parents decided to make some renovations and add another room to the house when they found out about Shaun. The deal being Shaun would have Jackson's old room and Jackson would get the new, bigger one. Upon reaching Shaun's room he walked over to the crib that housed his baby brother still wailing. Jackson reached the crib, put his hand in and said, "Who's that little noisemaker?" Shaun giggled at the silly voice Jackson made as he stroked Shaun's cheek.
"I fixed up his mobile," his fathers voice came from the doorway, "give it a spin to see if it works."
Jackson gave the object in question a quick push which spun the mobile making Shaun giggle further. "How're the three most important men in my life doing?" his mother asked as both she and his father stepped into the nursery room shutting the door behind them. "Hey I was thinking that if the weather holds up we can go to the park," she said to his father.
"Yeah sounds like fun," Nate replied.
"Can't," Jackson said, "I've got plans to hang out with my friends."
"Those plans wouldn't involve a certain young lady Codsworth was telling us about would it?" Nora asked her son with a sly smirk on her face.
"Seriously Mom?" Jackson asked with a light blush on his face, "You're really going down that road aga-" he was cut off by a worried sounding Codsworth.
"Sir! Mum! Young Master! You should come and see this!"
"Codsworth?" Nate asked, "What's wrong?" Jackson and his father headed out of Shaun's room while his mother stayed behind to gather up Shaun. When the two of them got to the living room they could hear the news anchor saying that there were confirmed reports of nuclear detonations in New York and Pennsylvania. Jackson's breath hitched in his throat at that news. It was only after the news station went offline and the warning sirens began blaring that he was knocked back into reality. "We- we need to get to the Vault! Now!" his father exclaimed.
"I've got Shaun!" his mother called out. The four of them began running as fast as they could towards the direction of the Vault passing by various neighbors panicking or gathering their belongings that fell on the ground. As they approached the gate to the Vault Jackson could hear an argument between a Military Policeman and the Vault-Tec salesman from before. An argument that culminated with a different military personnel in power armor spinning up his minigun to make their point. The salesman ran off yelling 'I'm reporting this!' as Jackson and his family pushed through the crowd to the MP.
"We need to get in," Nate said, "We're on the list."
The MP scanned over the list to check it before saying, "Infant... Teenage Male... Adult Male... Adult Female... All right, go ahead," he finished stepping aside to let them pass.
"Thank you," Nate said.
One of the guards beckoned them to follow him to the Vault as Nora asked, "What's going to happen to the people outside the gate?" The guard responded with a vague 'We're doing everything we can' response then told them to stand on the platform as he ran over to another guard in a guardhouse.
"Everything is going to be fine," Jackson's father reassured the rest of his family as they stood with the others, "I love you, all of you."
"Love you too Dad," Jackson replied a bit shakily.
"We love you too," his mother replied for both herself and Shaun.
As soon as she finished a loud noise in the distance made them look in that direction and their jaws hit the floor hard. A huge mushroom cloud began rising into the air with astounding speed indicating that a nuke had just been dropped south-southwest of the Vault. Jackson's brain was sent into a flurry of emotions , thoughts, and what ifs to the point he couldn't hear the two guards yelling while attempting to send the lift down. The shockwave from the blast rapidly approached them and Jackson felt a great amount of fear at the prospect of death. Fortunately for him the platform began descending and every person on it ducked down just in time for the shockwave to pass over their heads. As the platform doors shut above them they knew one thing for certain. They were safe.
…Or so they thought.
As the platform descended further Jackson noted an unusual drop in temperature close to the bottom. Granted he knew that most of the time underground areas were naturally cooler than the surface, he was an honor student after all. But this felt colder than it should have been. The temperature drop only lasted for a few seconds on the trip which only served to reinforce his theory that it wasn't natural. He was brought out of his musings when the platform hit the bottom and a gate opened up in front of them. The man who seemed to be in charge welcomed everyone to their new home but it pretty much fell flat on shellshocked ears. He next asked everyone to head up the stairs and into the vault and while Jackson's family weren't the first off the elevator they were the first into the Vault from this group of people when the first two stepped to the side instead.
As the foursome headed past the vault door a technician marked them off his checklist as they passed him. They approached a different employee handing out vault-suits as she asked them to, "Follow the doctor. He'll show you where you need to go." The group did as asked and as they followed him he prattled on about how great the vault was. Jackson only listened slightly to him until he caught sight of a familiar mop of warm black hair behind a window to another area of the Vault than they were going to. She seemed to be more shaken up than he was about what had transpired. His heart skipped a quick beat or two when he realized that his crush was here as well. He and the others passed through a doorway leading to several pods of some kind and when they did Jackson felt another drop in temperature. Looking up he noticed that there were numerous pipes along the ceiling and on them looked like ice crystals building up on the exterior. They headed towards the back of the room and the doctor spoke up, "After putting on your vault-suit you may step inside. The pods will depressurize gradually before heading deeper into the Vault." Jackson's parents moved to where there was a modest amount of privacy but Jackson wasn't entirely convinced of what the doctor was selling.
"Hey doc," Jackson said getting his attention, "Those aren't what you've said they are, are they?"
The doctor looked slightly nervous as he spoke, "I don't know what-"
"Doc," Jackson interrupted him, "I may not be the smartest person in this facility but even I noticed not only the multiple temperature decreases beyond the norm of traversing the subterranean but also I noticed that numerous pipes along the hallway and in this room are coated with ice. Add to it the lack of any moving parts on the floor underneath the pod itself which indicates it isn't meant to go any 'deeper' as you so claimed earlier." The doctor started to look nervous and Jackson wondered if he might do something drastic to stop him from asking too many questions so he backpedaled a bit, "Don't get me wrong," he continued, "I'm still going to go along with it, you guys did save my life after all, I just want to know one, what it is I'm getting myself into is all and two was this designed for infants. And based on the evidence observed for the first question at least, it's leaning towards cryogenics. What about the second?" The doctor said nothing as Jackson finished putting on his vault-suit and his father waved him over. "The silence is your answer," Jackson said to the doctor as he walked over to his father.
His father sighed before speaking, "Well, time for a whole new life." However Shaun wasn't so happy about everything that had been happening and finally decided to make his opinion known as he started to cry.
"Shh... It'll be okay. Daddy and big brother are right here, See?" Nora said as she tried to calm Shaun down.
"Who's my little brother?" Jackson said as he placed his two fingers on Shaun's head as he'd seen Itachi do to Sasuke in the Naruto series. He figured why the hell not when he chose to use it to show affection to Shaun and the baby quickly picked up that it meant a show of affection, "Daddy and I are not going far. We'll just be over there."
"There, you see. They're not going far," Nora whispered to Shaun. The littlest one seemed to calm down at this and Jackson's father tussled his hair much to the boys embarrassment. The family of four stepped into their respective pods, Nora and Shaun in the second last pod to the right side on the end of the room from the door, Nate in the one across from them and Jackson in the pod directly to the left of his father. Before he fully stepped into the pod the doctor quickly said to him that Shaun would be perfectly fine and that he wouldn't have been allowed in if he wasn't. Once inside the pods closed and a synthetic voice was the last thing he heard, "Resident secure. Occupant vitals: normal. Procedure complete. In 5... 4... 3... 2..."
Date: Unknown...
Everything was fuzzy, disoriented and unclear to him. He could just make out the synthetic voice from before saying, "Manuel override initiated. Cryogenic stasis suspended." He slowly came to his senses as everything became clearer and once his vision cleared completely he moved his head and took a quick peek outside his window. The area wasn't illuminated very well but he could still see his mother and Shaun's pod. Then two people stepped up to the pod, one was dressed up in a radiation suit and was identified as female when she said 'This is the one' about his mother's pod. The second was a bald male that wasn't dressed in any kind of scientific gear, more like one of those gunslingers from the ancient westerns he watched with his dad. His mother's pod opened up and while Shaun cried she coughed and asked what was going on. The scientist lady, at least that's what Jackson hypothesized she was, tried to take Shaun under the guise of needing to look him over. His mother though wasn't buying it and refused to let go of him even when the man pointed a gun to her and warned her to let go. She refused and while struggling with the woman she was shot in the head with a revolver that made Dirty Harry's look small.
"MOM!" Jackson yelled out loud as he pounded on the door hoping to be able to do something, anything, to save his baby brother, who was now wailing from the loud noise, from being kidnapped.
"What do you mean?" the woman asked someone from the far right well out of view of Jackson's sight, "Define wrong." As soon as she finished that statement Jackson heard the pod next to his, his fathers pod, opening and him rushing out trying to get Shaun back.
"Damn it," the man said just before Nate was out of the pod, "get the kid out of here now!" He raised his gun up to Jackson's father but couldn't get a shot off before it was knocked out of his hands. The weapon landed in front of Jackson's pod as he increased his efforts to try and escape. The fighting meanwhile had moved out of his line of sight and after what seemed like an eternity, which in reality was about a minute at best, the form of his father comes flying from where the fight was onto the left of his pod near the one across from him. The other man walked up to the gun and picked it up just as Jackson's father rushed him again. Thankfully his father managed to get to the bald man once again before he got a shot off and grabbed both his wrists forcing both away from them. This was short lived however when the bald man headbutted his father causing him to stagger just enough for his grip to loosen up on his wrists. The man freed his wrists from Nate's grasp and grabbed him by the midsection, spun almost one hundred and eighty degrees and threw him back into his pod. The man pulled up his gun and fired and though Jackson could see the man and not his father he could tell by the mans now relaxed posture that it was an instant kill.
"DAD!" Jackson yelled out now a bit terrified that the man would kill him too.
"Textbook operation," the man sarcastically said as he approached Jackson's pod making his fear increase more. Jackson was able to get a good look at the man now as he spoke, "At least we still have a backup," looking into the window at Jackson before stepping out of view.
Jackson could hear the synthetic voice from before, "Cryogenic sequence reinitialized." He was being sent back to the land of unconsciousness and there was not a damn thing he could do! Just before the pod froze him completely he did manage to get out one last word.
"SHAUN!"
And that is that for chapter 1. Chapter 2 will be out right away since I originally had these two together as one chapter before deciding to split it.
And before I forget here's a Zoid
(V)_(;,;)_(V)
