"Wherever you go, there you are."
Tuesday, August 28, 2277
The journey to the small plaza that held the entrance to the Galaxy News Radio station was simultaneously the scariest and the most boring thing Julia had ever endured. Just over a week of creeping along deserted, smelly metro tunnels, occasionally squashing radroaches, and hiding from what seemed to be an entire species of the Jolly Green Giant's far surlier cousins. Fortunately, they didn't seem to be a very perceptive lot, and she was able to evade them without too much difficulty.
The destination itself turned out to be a building rather less "blown up" than the others - a pre-War radio station with big brass letters on the front declaring itself to be G! N! R! bold as you please. The remains of a metro station staircase sat in the remains of a parking lot, and various bits of old conduit and cable were strewn about the ground, likely the remains of a network or power grid or some such decrepit "thing" from the old world. The remains of a large broadcasting antenna lay across the area like a fallen tree, blown over by the nuclear winds. The guys guarding the door, however, were clearly newer and much less broken-down. Each was wearing armor that seemed to be made of thick steel, or possibly something stronger. It vaguely resembled the type of armor medieval knights were supposed to have worn - it encased the wearer from head to toe, blurring any form of individuality and replacing it with a metallic, impersonal edifice. Each also was visibly armed with some sort of automatic weapon - Julia wasn't sufficiently conversant with small arms to be able to pick out the details at a glance.
I wonder where I get a suit of armor like that guard has? Bet I could win a war by myself in one of those.
"What is your business here, Outsider?" one of the guards asked. "This area is under the protection of the Brotherhood of Steel."
The what? Never mind, later. "I'm here to speak with Three Dog." Julia replied. "I've heard that someone I'm looking for passed this way not too long ago, and I wanted to ask him for information."
The guard nodded and keyed the intercom. "Outsider here to see Three Dog.. yes, she's armed... Yes, we should let her in." A pause. "What? Yes, probably. Okay."
The guard turned back to Julia. "Go on in. You'll have to leave your weapons with the security detachment." She stepped back with a shrug and motioned for Julia to go inside.
"Fair enough. Thank you!" Julia said, entering the lobby.
After she departed, the other guard turned to the first. "What the heck, Syd? Since when are you so accommodating with random wasters?"
"Oh come on." the first replied, invisibly rolling her eyes. "When's the last time we had anyone around here who wasn't a Brother or a mutie? Tiny waster girl with a baseball bat and a quest's the most interesting thing around here all month."
"You just want to find out where she got that suit of armor." the first said in a mock-accusing tone.
"Well did you see it? Looks durable. And classy as hell." Syd said, crossing her arms.
"Maybe you two could trade." he said, audibly smirking. "What's the penalty for selling Brotherhood equipment again?"
"Nobody likes a smartass, Stevens." she said, settling back into "guard" mode.
-0-
After a disconcertingly thorough security check and a stern talking-to about what was and was not acceptable inside a Brotherhood installation, Julia was finally permitted to head up to the recording studio. Banks of recording and mixing equipment lined the walls of the main room, and what looked like a kitchenette was off to one side. Before she could explore more of the space though, she was interrupted by an enthusiastic greeting.
"Well helloooo THERE!"
She turned to face the source of the voice, an enthusiastically grinning man dressed like a post-apocalyptic beatnik. As a response was forming in her brain, the man continued his spiel.
"The look on your face says it all - who is this handsome stranger before me, you ask! What does he do, how does he make it sounds so good - and why does it matter to me? Well - prepare to be enlightened. I am.. THREE DOG! Teller of truths and sasser of sinners. Lord and master over the finest radio station ever to grace these wastes." he said, leaning back smugly, "And you are here about your dad."
"Which you know, because he was here before and I look just like him." Julia said. Noting the DJ's crestfallen expression, she explained a bit. "You're not the only one who can put one and two together, Three Dog - and I am in a bit of a hurry to catch up to him."
"Fiiiine, I can dig it." he said, acquiescing. "I can understand a bit of thunder-stealing in the name of the Good Fight. Maybe even sympathize! Though I do want to have a proper sit-down at some point and swap Vault stories."
"Three Dog, if you tell me where my dad is, I'll write you an autobiography."
"Hah, I knew there was something about you I liked!" he exclaimed, slapping his knee. "Your dad headed off to an old Vault hiding underneath an even older repair shop wayyy out west of here. Wanted to know if I'd heard of the place - course I had, I hear everything. Smith Casey's Garage, just north of Girdershade. You'll want to avoid the old foundry along the way - it's almost literally crawling with raiders. Better to juke to the south a bit - you can't miss it."
"Wow, just like that?" Julia asked, a little gobsmacked. "I half expected you to have me fix your signal or something first."
"Just like that." he said, nodding. "Don't get me wrong, I know the signal's been shit lately - but I've already got someone on that, and no offense to you, but I bet she's a damn sight better at tinkering than you are. Means I can afford to be my usual genial self!"
"Well, thanks." she said, still a bit dumbfounded. "Did he happen to say what he was doing there?"
"He said he was looking for some old Pre-war science records or something." the enthusiastic DJ explained. "He went into more detail, but most of it went over my head, I'm sorry to say. I'm a DJ, not a physicist. Whatever it was though, he's clearly fighting the Good Fight - so I'm happy to help him out."
"Did he say anything else?" Julia asked. "Leave any messages, or anything else I should know?"
"He said that if you showed up, I should send you there." Noting her look of surprise, he continued. "What? The old man knew you wouldn't stay put in that Vault. If you made it all the way to me, you can make it over there too, with my info. Seems he was right on the money, too."
"Heh, that sounds like something Dad would do." she said, grinning despite herself. "Did he mention if he'd found the Vault door code somehow?"
"The code is 'kronach'. K-R-O-N-A-C-H. No, I don't know why." Three Dog said, holding up his hands. "And no, he didn't say how he'd figured it out either. But if he tells you, I'd appreciate you letting old Three Dog in on the secret."
"I'll keep it in mind." Julia said, turning to leave. "Thanks again, Three Dog!"
"Good luck, kid!" he called out after her. "And remember - you owe me an interview!"
-0-
Sunday, September 2, 2277
I realize it's called the "Wasteland" primarily because there's not much living out here, Julia thought to herself after another day of walking through largely empty, dried out landscape, between dead, dried-out trees, and past empty, bombed-out buildings, but this is ridiculous.
Well what did you expect? she responded mentally. "Wasteland"! Post-apocalyptic. Hello? It doesn't lend itself to vast sprawling settlements or busy trade networks.
She ducked inside the skeleton of what had probably been an office building in a previous life, and began to make camp. That phrase always seemed to imply something more formal than laying down in a sheltered spot and snacking before dozing off, but it wasn't like she had a better one. Besides, what was she going to do, stay awake for weeks at a time? That would be insane.
Still though, you'd expect something more after two hundred years. A lot can happen in two hundred years! Maybe there are a lot of other towns and I just haven't found them. It's not as if I've been looking all that hard, and Crow must trade with someone.
I've seen no real evidence that he's not just some sort of crazy person wandering the wastes, she countered to herself. Though the suit is very nice.
Says the girl wandering the wastes while literally talking to herself, she noted, snorting at the irony.
Bah. And touche. Still though, we've read all the post-apocalypse models in the Vault library - which given the source was probably literally all of them. There should be more plant life if nothing else. What gives?
It's too dry. Just because there's fallout in the air doesn't mean the water cycle stops - that's even a key part of the whole concept of 'fallout'! So where's all the water? Even the Potomac is barely a trickle - we saw those marooned boats on the old riverbanks.
Marooned boats and marooned boat landings, for that matter. Something's up with the H2O supply around here. It can't just be the radiation, either - water doesn't work like that. Even damming the Potomac wouldn't do it.
What, then? Venusian desiccation rays? Aliens stealing all our water? Tectonic shifting from massed nuclear bombardment?
There's no reason to get sarcastic, she chided herself with an eye-roll. Clearly SOMETHING'S up. We just don't know what yet. Until then all we can really do is speculate without data. And we may as well go with the UFO abductions then, because that makes about as much sense as anything else.
You're really annoying when you're right, you know. It's not one of my more charming qualities.
Ah, shut up and go to sleep, she said, rolling over. It was at that precise moment that the screaming started.
"People of the Capital Wasteland, you can HEAR MEEEE! Yeeeaa haaaa! You can't stop the signal, baby!"
Once her heart stopped doing jumping jacks, Julia remembered that she'd left her radio tuned to Galaxy News Radio so she would notice if the signal came back.
Yaaaaay me. Good plan, she shought sarcastically at herself, still keyed-up from her enthusiastic awakening. The radio continued to blather on, cheerfully ignorant of her state of mind.
"That's right, from Megaton to Girdershade, Paradise Falls to the Republic of Dave, we are coming to you loud and proud, in a special live report! 'But Three Dog!' y'all say. 'How do YOU know we can hear you all the way out here in the ass end of nowhere?' Because of this superb scribey friend of mine, that's how! Ronnie here fixed up the antenna like it was brand new, which is all the more impressive since she did it with spare crap we had lying around! Oh, and a giant dish off of an old moon lander. Details! But as it happens, we have her right here in the studio. Say hello to the people!"
There was a brief sound of shuffling, and then a young woman's voice came on.
"Uh, hello wasteland! My name is Veronica, I'm the best at fixing stuff, and if anyone wants to thank me for doing this I accept pre-war pastries as a form of payment for minor services! Back to you, Three Dog!"
"Isn't she grand? You heard the lady, wasters - bring on the Fancy Lads! But for now, this is Three Dog, OWWWWWWWWW! And you're listening to Galaxy News Radio! Bringing you the truth, no matter how bad it hurts. And now, some music."
"I'm as corny as Kansas in August, high as a flag on-"
Julia switched off the radio. Not that one again. Not since we put on that production of "South Pacific" for Mr. Brotch's class. God, the screaming.. Suppressing an involuntary shudder, she drifted off to sleep. Still, maybe I should keep an eye out for snack cakes, just in case.
-0-
Thursday, September 6, 2277
Julia approached the front door of Smith Casey's garage tentatively. It was in surprisingly good shape for a 200 year old auto repair shop, with no visible structural damage on the outside beyond the usual weathering and grime. The letters on the sign out front bearing its late proprietor's name were still in place and intact, though the little bulbs in their sockets had long since broken. Unlimbering her baseball bat, she entered the shop.
Daylight filtered in through the empty window panes, illuminating the dust in the air and giving the area an almost ethereal quality. The interior was dim, but still lit well enough that she could more or less see everything. Nuka-Cola machine in the corner, counter for the receptionist, large door leading back to the workshop. As she took stock of her surroundings, a quiet rustling sound caught her attention. She turned and raised the bat just in time to intercept a giant mole rat which had leaped directly at her face - sending it back to the ground. A swift followup directly to its skull ended the encounter. Sweeping the shop, she dispatched another few rats before declaring the area "safe".
Heh, "sweeping the area" she thought to herself. Like I'm a professional or something. Let's see about vault access… ah.
There was a note on the counter written in her father's handwriting. She picked it up with a wry smile. I guess he really didn't think I would stay put. Not surprising, he knows what would have happened as well as anyone. He did work with the Overseer for almost 20 years, after all.
The note was brief, and had a thin layer of dust on it - it had been here a while, but not a long while.
Julia-
Since you undoubtedly left the Vault and came to find me, you may as well come in and help me look. I apologize for the circumspect nature of this note, but as you may have noticed, not everyone out here is as forthright as we might prefer. I understand that you hate blundering around in the dark, but I'm sure you'll figure out how to switch to the light of revelation soon enough. Just be sure you find a way that's righter than necessary, and you'll figure it out.
Dad
She made a face at the note and snorted. This is supposed to be a riddle? She immediately walked over to the bank of light switches and found one that wasn't wired to any of the fixtures on the ceiling, to the right of the other ones. Flipping it caused a section of the garage floor to flip open and reveal a hidden staircase. Descending it, she continued the line of thought. Then again, it's only obvious to me since I grew up in a Vault and around riddles. To someone without my specific background, it would read more like encouragement or something. That's rather clever, really. It's hardly hard encryption, but then if it was supposed to be a secret, he wouldn't have told Three Dog about it in the first place. Ah, here's the door. Allez-oup!
The heavy door mechanism made quite a bit of noise opening up, which echoed weirdly in the sunken concrete chamber that housed the entryway. Eventually, the giant gear-shaped steel door rolled away and revealed the interior of the vault. It was oddly quiet inside, and smelled faintly of antiseptic agents. Stepping cautiously inside, Julia was greeted almost immediately by an unfamiliar type of robot. Its body was roughly cylindrical, with caterpillar treads in lieu of feet or wheels, and prehensile grabby arms. Also, in a tank atop its body was what looked alarmingly like a human brain, suspended in some sort of solution.
That robot has a brain that robot has a brain that ROBOT has a BRAIN what the HELL! Aaaaaaaack! Wait is it talking to me?
It was, as it turned out. The robot's voice was an oddly soothing feminine monotone coming from a vocoder somewhere inside the torso cylinder.
"Hello~" it warbled. "Welcome to Vault 112. You have arrived 204.3 years behind schedule. In the interests of time, please put on your official Vault 112 vault suit and take a seat in any unoccupied Tranquility Lounger. Have a nice day!"
It handed Julia a folded vault suit and trundled off, leaving her staring after it mutely.
That was the weirdest thing I've ever seen and I have seen a giant green man who eats people. Is Dad even here? Of course he's here, he left the note. I guess I'd better go looking for these.. "Tranquility loungers".
She declined to change out of her conveniently bullet-resistant suit jacket and headed deeper into the vault. The corridors were brightly lit and eerily silent - it was almost as if there was nobody actually in the vault.
Which doesn't make sense. Why would they leave a vault just empty? They clearly had time to finish it. Plus Dad came here looking for something and stayed here - if it was actually empty, he wouldn't be wasting his time.
She descended a staircase and kept thinking while absorbing the details of the environment. For that matter, where IS Dad? I've seen him engrossed in his work before, but you can hear that Vault door from half a mile away. There's no way he would have missed it. So where is he? I have a bad feeling about this.
That was when she entered the main room of Vault 112. The center of the room was dominated by a huge computer core, pulsing with lights and draped with cables like some sort of technological maypole. Clearly this was more than a regular mainframe. Surrounding the core in a ring was a series of what looked like a cross between a bed and an iron lung, 13 in cables from the core ran to and from each vaguely egg-shaped contraption, bringing huge amounts of data back and forth. As she got closer, she could see that there were people inside them. An old man slept in the closest one, seemingly completely disconnected from the world outside. His eyes darted around beneath his eyelids, and it looked like he was talking in his sleep. A quick inspection of the others nearby revealed men and women, all old, all seemingly dreaming intensely. Two of the pods were empty, and the last one held a very familiar looking man, also sound asleep.
"Dad!" Julia shouted, banging on the exterior frame of the Tranqulity Lounger. "Dad, wake up!" These efforts proved fruitless, and after a moment or so it occurred to her that forcibly waking these people up without finding out more of what was going on would be a very bad idea.
Right then - the computer core, she resolved, heading over to a terminal built into the exterior of the central pillar. Hmm.. looks like some kind of custom OS. It's not the usual RobCo nonsense here. Also, not password protected. That's good, my usual tricks wouldn't work here. I guess they were relying on physical security for the terminals. Dumb, but I'm not going to complain.
She spent some time sifting through the various control screens and data displays, realizing more every passing second how out of her depth she was with this system.
Yeah, I have no idea what this is doing. I'm as likely to kill someone as unhook them.. If only I knew what these were doing! Or if there was some sort of convenient option labeled "disengage pod".. Arrgh. I have no idea what to do here.
She paused, reflecting.
Wait, yes I do. I may not know how to work a bizarre pre-war proprietary computer system, but maybe someone else does. I'll bet Three Dog knows something, he hears everything. I'll get some backup and come back.
Heading back out, she saw a note on the floor, likely blown off of the processor core by one of the cooling fans. The handwriting was again familiar.
Julia-
I'm here looking for scientific data from a pre-war scientist named Doctor Stanislaus Braun. It's my understanding that this computer system sustains some sort of virtual interface for his files - though the room full of vegetables doesn't exactly inspire confidence. Still, they are alive, and seem to be unharmed - and I need this data. It's more important than I can properly explain, but you can have my word as a scientist. If you find this note before you find me, DO NOT ENTER THE SIMULATION. I'll be out within a day. If you find this note more than 48 hours after today's date, find help immediately, as things have gone rather far beyond my admittedly hasty planning.
Dad
August 27, 2277
Anno Domini
Julia ran.
Author's notes:
Still not dead yet! Also, fans of the series will notice one of our first main canon divergences here. Yes, it's on purpose. Yes, it's that one. No, I don't have anything more to say about it at the moment :)