The fact that I am writing about this again is astonishing. I was working out front on the support beams for the deck when I heard a motorcycle... I just couldn't believe it, almost didn't want to. Yet there he was running down the road making noises with his mouth. As he passed by he saluted me and then "shifted" into a higher gear and sprinted off... I heard him make screeching noises as though he made a sharp turn at high speed. Not even five minutes later a mob of wasters ran up armed with a wide array of weapons and some old guy asked me if I had seen a man making motorcycle noises pass by, he explained that he ran in on the 'scumbag' in bed with his daughter. So I pointed them down the direction the motorcycle man had run off in and the mob continued their chase... I don't understand how people like that can live this long... or who would choose to sleep with people like that. I'm going inside and I'm going to take a break.
01/21/2287
With help from Kyle, I was able to build a staircase up to the roof in the courtyard. Yes, an actual staircase, not a ladder. Tomorrow we will start working on the external vents. We should be able to test run the furnace by Monday, hope it works... it would help out a lot if I can remove 'wood collection' from the daily chores.
Not sure where Bethany ran off to though... she seems to do that a lot. Whenever I see her though she seems exhausted so she has to be keeping busy. I'm going to need to keep an eye on her though just in case. Aubrey has been pulling old wires out of the walls for the past few days and separating the good stuff from the bad. I'm glad she is attempting to replace it with string though, that'll make things easier for when we rewire the place.
01/22/2287
The four of us and the cow were able to pull a bathtub into the building, we set it up in the room next to the old bathrooms. Now we can get ourselves cleaned up easier as well as help clean laundry. I asked Beth if she could work on that tomorrow, she said she would but I could see she was disappointed by something.
Now Aubrey's out of string, we're going to need to buy more. She told me it was usually rather cheap and easy to acquire as long as we don't go for the good stuff, makes sense I guess. The caravan should be passing by in the next few days hopefully they will have something. Though food will be a priority.
01/25/2287
I never thought I would find myself in this kind of situation again, but I woke up this morning gun in my hand and behind cover. This was all because I heard something that shouldn't work, and looking out the window was stunned to see my mind wasn't playing tricks on me. Coming up the road was a blue armored personnel carrier followed by roughly forty men and women wearing blue uniforms similar to the ones I found a few weeks ago with the laser musket. Alongside them was the unforgettable shape of a T-51 D suit of power armor marching along with a minigun in hand. At the end of the line was a pair of T-45s both armed with missile launchers. I won't deny that I was scared by this, I didn't know if they were hostile or not. Aubrey informed me that they appeared to be the Minutemen based on their colors and the symbol on the side of the APC. As they had passed a small group broke off and moved towards the front door to the retirement home and knocked.
When I answered I will admit I wasn't expecting to see Nate standing there in the blue uniform, and he was surprised to see me. The moment he saw me his eyes widened and a massive smile spread across his face. The woman standing next to him took a step back and the other two Minutemen standing a few feet back even reacted the older veteran looking one raised an eyebrow and the other who looked to be a kid flinched. Then Nate told them that I was the one he told them about who broke his power armor, then he hugged me... I swear the only reason I didn't knock him down was that he had a literal army at his back... seriously we didn't necessarily split ways as friends last time so it seemed rather inappropriate. He then introduced me to the woman next to him as Nora who was in charge of recording all settlements they came across... and a list of other stuff that doesn't really matter, simple way to put it is that she's some sort of lawyer or bureaucrat. They explained what the Minutemen were and asked if I would like to join, I declined, after which they gave me a flare gun and ten flares and said that if I ever need them to just fire one flare off and any Minutemen in the area would come to assist. At first, I thought they were trying to press me into joining but Nora informed me that they give the flares to all recognized settlements whether they join or not.
Before they left I asked them where they were headed to and Nate explained that the 111th Minutemen were marching under the command of General Preston Garvey to the Castle with the intent of reclaiming it. They wanted to send a signal to the Commonwealth that the Minutemen were back and meant business.
As long as they leave me alone I don't really care what they do...
01/28/2287
Found out what Beth has been up to, she's been dragging dirt into the greenhouse area from outside. Found her attempting to pour a bucket of it into a nearly full drum. I asked her what she was doing, and ended up freaking her out. She thought I was mad and would kick them out for not asking to use the drums first. I calmed her down and explained I wouldn't kick them out for something as trivial as using a drum without permission. Seriously I don't care what she does with those things or how many of them she needs, they are literally everywhere in the wasteland! She told me that her need for the dirt was because she was trying to build planters so that she could start growing a garden but she needed dirt and everyone else was busy with other more important things. She even showed me what she had for the planters, which was a pile of large wooden boxes that she intended to fill up but needed some tables first. I'm going to see what I can do to help with that when I have some time.
01/29/2287
The caravan showed up, a few days late but I don't care really at least they are here now. Traded for food and some parts as well as had my tools cleaned and repaired. They weren't super enthusiastic by what I had to offer but I needed most of the good stuff so no surprise there. I pointed out I will have better stuff later on once the necessities were dealt with. They decided to take me up on the offer to spend the night in the room I cleaned up for them next to the kitchen, all I did was remove everything from it and cleaned the floors. Later I intend to add some beds but for now, they were happy to be out of the weather for an evening.
02/01/2287
Three Dog was talking about Vault 101 today... apparently, the vault opened up a few years back and started setting up an external settlement, today they finally made an agreement with a place called Megaton to form one large city. I know that vault... my little sister told me about how her husband was able to get them on the list. They lived just down the road from it too, I wonder if they had time to get to it before the door sealed shut?
I was deployed shortly after she turned seventeen, that was the last time I saw her in person too... I was on deployment for six years. Never got to see her graduate high school, never got to see her get married to her husband George Gomez, never got to see my niece or nephew, never got a chance to go to dad's funeral... I spent six d**n years fighting to protect them and what did that amount to? A nuclear war that destroyed everything, I wasted all that time, missed all those moments... killed all those people... for what? nothing. I was going to visit them when I got home, I was in the middle of an operation in France to assassinate the Minister of Armed Services... our f**king ally, when they decided to just shoot a missile and blame it on the French rebels then recalled me back to the States just out of the blue. I, of course, followed orders, and cleaned up shop, shut down my safe houses, terminated my contacts, ditched my gear, and got on a prepared navy ship back home. I was annoyed that they pulled me out like that but I was finally going to be on American soil. Ended up going to my bunk and falling asleep just to wake up in an underground bunker two hundred years later... and they didn't stop there, they also decided to take my eyes from me. I don't know why they did this, but I know who must have ordered it. Director of the United States Army Special Forces General John Henry f**king Eden, I hope you're burning in hell.
02/03/2287
Well, the Furnace works now. I have only one section of ducting open though as the rest need replacing or cleaning. The working vents are in the back hall and are for heating the greenhouse area... the glass makes it so the heat gets out faster but the ducting was easier to access there and it doesn't go into a bedroom so if anything goes wrong no one should get hurt. Got Kyle to start setting up a "sawmill" out back so we can make boards out of trees instead of ripping old stuff off the nearby houses. Going to look into finding a few old chain saws or a large hand saw to use as a blade... might find one at Bunker Hill. Kyle and I are going there tomorrow, we only have about a hundred caps altogether right now so today we went out into the Lexington ruins to search for stuff to sell. The place is a gold mine... but there are reasons for that, the place is filled with gulls gouals ghouls zombies, they are f**king zombies. They are difficult to kill but shooting out their legs seems to be a good way of slowing them down. With so little, in the way of ammunition, we just tried to stay low and avoid them when we can, they seem to be short-sighted as well. Several times we walked right into their line of sight and were ignored, though only when we were downwind.
Got a good amount of stuff on the trip, including things we can use here. We found several desk fans as well which will help in the fires, set up the fan in a large pipe and it will pull the smoke up through it. They won't work as well as a fan specifically built for the task but they will help for the purifier and reduce the amount of smoke that drifts in... hopefully.
02/04/2287
So before we set out a group of about twenty Minutemen came down the road and asked to rest out front. I said it was fine... I was mixed on it but really there was no reason to deny them even if I don't want to be associated with them. Anybody who wants to shoot at them at this point will shoot at me as well whether or not the Minutemen were there. Kyle though ended up offering to refill their canteens... d**n it Kyle... he apologized but it was too late, I can't say no after the offer was made. Water though isn't really something we're low on though so it shouldn't hurt too bad, but Kyle is going to be spending the rest of the week drawing water for the purifier to make up for it. At least he was smart enough to charge them for it...
We ended up leaving shortly after the Minutemen did as they were going to pass Bunker Hill. They took the short route to the Hill though... and whatever those mutant things were that inhabited the ruins before are quite dead now. Nate really trained the Minutemen himself because the whole battlefield had the look of the US army. There was some sort of construction site with a massive pile of rubble in the center, according to the Minutemen we were following, Generals Preston and Nate both decided to shoot out the support pillars and bring the building down instead of getting into a firefight with the 'muties' who held the high ground then swept through and cleaned out the rest. As we passed through the area a pair of Minutemen with flamethrowers were burning anything that looked like flesh or bone... I wonder why there was so much of it around?
When we got to the Hill the Minutemen paused outside and rested before moving on, apparently they aren't welcome there for some reason. Some lady named Kessler tried to keep me out assuming I was one of them, but Stockton told her off and got us in. The number of vendors was greatly reduced to only about seven, luckily two were selling food and others were more than happy to buy what we had. Some crazy woman though kept trying to push a d**n minigun on me, seriously I think she might be on something. I did buy some .38 rounds and a few .308s, but then I saw something in her literal pile of guns an ancient M1911A2 single action! The thing looked to be an old collectors model... though it looks to be in rough shape I know it would work fine, they were well known for easy repair and reliability. The woman 'Cricket' tried to sell it to me for two thousand caps... I was able to get it for sixty-two caps, after several minutes of arguing over the price too, didn't give me a reason either just dropped it out of nowhere. Something tells me she thought I was buying the minigun as the 1911 doesn't shoot a thousand rounds a minute, neither does the minigun for that matter...
Kyle and I actually got back today, it was late but the trip was only a few hours at best. Kyle ended up riding in the cart part of it though, his strength is coming back but clearly, he isn't there yet. I'm going to have him start doing the same workouts I do each morning, same for the other two if they are up for it.
02/06/2287
So the saw I found at the Hill yesterday will work for the mill. It will have to be a manual system but we will be able to saw boards rather effectively once Kyle gets done with it. I'll help him out when he needs it but he understands the basic idea so he should be fine without me. Beth got the plants transferred to the planter boxes, she says they should start growing better, and the heat from the furnace will help a lot as well. Now I just need to work on a new purifier, maybe I can get an electric heating system? I'm really going to have to look for a couple power cores just in case. The Super Duper Mart should have one or two...
02/07/2287
So today we hit up the SDM today, took Aubrey and Beth with us. Needed Aubrey to unlock the loading dock and Beth just came along to stick with her while Kyle and I go inside. Kyle and Aubrey both suggested the loading dock when I brought up my intent to search the store. I'll admit I was thinking the same thing, so we took the cow and cart with us just in case because honestly, the dock should have something we can use.
Well, I was right, once Aubrey got the doors open we got hit by six of the things. Once we dealt with them we went through the crates in the back storeroom, mostly just junk with no actual value but a few had spare parts and tools so we loaded those on the cart, and Kyle and I went inside. I'll admit that I hadn't expected to see a bunch of Minutemen corpses strewn about... Didn't find much on them though aside from a little ammunition and a couple caps. I took any form of tag, badge, patch, and insignia on each one as we passed... I'll give them to the next group of Minutemen I run into, maybe they have family out there still. Left the guns as well, felt wrong to take them.
The power room was actually the first one we found, they have two of the fusion generators as well one of which was a dual-core model. Supposedly it used less power by drawing smaller amounts from the two cells, in truth they used 60% more power than their predecessors... just a scam to get people buying more cores. Not that it matters really, I sent Kyle back outside to get Aubrey so she can pull them safely. Then I searched the rest of the back rooms, closed all of the doors to the store section while I was at it. Ran into a few of the creatures that inhabit the place but nowhere near as many as I had last time. Found some decent supplies including some computer parts for Aubrey in the main office, but the moment I got near the break room my eyes shut off on me... I took a step back and they came back on and worked like normal... I decided not to worry about it and went back to the generators and we returned to Bethany outside and we headed back. I don't know what's wrong with my eyes though... they kept turning on and off all the way back...
02/07/2287
Eyes are acting up again... I don't get it, they haven't done this in a long time. All the color is gone... except for the eyes... forever red...
02/08/2287
With the two new cores, we won't need to worry too much about power as long as we're careful. They should last about a year each at their current charges, we will need to find a means of recharging them though. For now, that isn't an issue we need to worry about. Kyles is almost done with the sawmill so we will be able to start cutting some boards out of trees in the next few days.
Another merchant came through today, apparently, they are using the new opening the Minutemen established to get in and out. He claimed to be a doctor, I asked what his certifications were and he laughed and asked me what I was talking about. Aubrey and Bethany seemed to believe in his skills, so I let him take a look at Aubrey's arm... according to him, it was getting pretty bad. Ended up cutting the wound open to try and clean it out and properly close it with stitches, he gave me a set of antibiotics and a few other bottles of medication along with a list of instructions on their use. After that, he told me that when the caravan comes back through he would take another look at the arm and see if it is doing better... the cost for that? a mere 560 caps, worth it I guess...