21
As soon as the system booted, Patience took the cable, that Moira gave them, from Valrie and attached it to her Pip-Boy and then to the relevant socket inside the terminal. Nothing happened for a few seconds and then the Pip-Boy screen began to flash in unison with the terminal screen. The same words ticker-taped onto both screens.
"Pip-Boy 3000. Vault Designation: X302. Resident Number: 1138. Accessing ..." Patience drummed her fingers on the side of the terminal as the blank, green cursor flashed in a steady rhythm. After a few seconds, the writing continued. "Data Transfer Complete. Proceed To Location Two."
They waited for almost a minute more, watching the cursor blink on the terminal screen, before looking at each other, confused. The Pip-Boy screen returned to its normal set of options and that was all that happened. Patience tapped the 'Return' key several times, to no avail.
"Is that fucking it?" Valrie reached over, turning Patience's wrist to look at her Pip-Boy. "So, this is what? Location one? The place you were supposed to go to is the place you just decided to go to to get answers. Am I the only one that thinks that's a little too fucking convenient?"
"I don't know. Maybe my memory is still there and when Vault-Tec HQ was mentioned, my mind connected to it?" Patience typed in several words into the keyboard with no response. "But I don't know where location two is and I still don't have any damned answers!"
"That's where I come in." Vincent stepped forward, pulling a holo-tape from one of his pouches. He held it in the air, shaking it like a penalty card in a sports game. "You're Pip-Boy broke the lock, this will open up the door. Crack the system wide open so I can grab the info I'm here for. Once the system is open, and I have what I came for, you can dig all you want into the files."
He placed the holo-tape into the slot on the computer bank and the entire system began to light up. All the cabinets on the level below began to whirr, a high-pitched buzz echoing around the entire area. Soon, the activity died down and the terminal screen showed the words 'Access Granted'.
"What's he doing?" Gia pushed her head in-between Valrie and Patience. "What are X-Vaults?"
"Four hidden vaults. Beyond top secret." Patience read the screen as Vincent worked. "He's copying all the locations, details about their experiments, inventories. Dear god! Weapons. Moriarty's after weapons!"
"Yes, he is." Vincent, concentrating upon the screen, couldn't see the horrified look on Patience's face. "I give a copy of this info to the Brotherhood of Steel, Moriarty calls up all his cronies to clear these vaults out and the Brotherhood takes out the biggest group of arms dealers in the Wasteland in one fell swoop."
"And what if Moriarty is lot fucking smarter than you and the Brotherhood think he is?" Valrie, knowing Moriarty better than any of them, echoed Patience's horrified look. "What if he gets away with this shit? How many people will die because of this information?"
"People die all the time!" Vincent turned towards Valrie, snapping at her. "This way, we get Moriarty and the Brotherhood get the most advanced weapons around. Think of what they could achieve with that. The Super Mutants? Gone. Boom."
"At what price?" Patience itched to place her hand on her sidearm. She cast the thought aside. Not now. "How many innocents will die once these new weapons are unleashed? By you, Moriarty, the Brotherhood. It doesn't matter who has these weapons, I guarantee innocents will die."
"Acceptable losses for the greater good." Vincent pointed at the screen as the terminal continued copying files to the holo-tape. "This will bring peace. The Brotherhood of Steel will finally bring peace to this ... this fucking shit-hole."
"Peace at the end of a fucking big gun." Valrie spat towards Vincent's feet and turned away. "I'm going for a cigarette. Gia?"
Patience and Vincent glared at each other. There was no middle ground as far as she felt concerned. These vaults and their contents should stay hidden and forgotten, including the one she had come from. Vault X302.
They hadn't come this close to all-out conflict since they first met. She could see Vincent's hand move, ever so slightly, towards his .45. She maintained greater control but knew she could reach her sidearm faster than him. She could almost taste the tension. Until the terminal beside them beeped as the files completed copying. Vincent turned away, reaching for the holo-tape.
"It's all yours. Find what you came here for." He held up the holo-tape again. "This will benefit the whole Wasteland. If a few people get caught in the crossfire, that's too bad. There are no innocents anymore. Innocent people got killed a long time ago."
He returned the holo-tape to its pouch and walked away, crossing the walkway and out the door. Seconds after he left, Valrie and Gia reappeared at the door, hesitant to reenter. Patience resisted the urge to slam her fist into the terminal screen. Instead, she turned and typed in 'Vault X302'. Straight away, a list appeared on the screen. She selected 'Residents' and scrolled through, looking for 'Resident 1138'. The number her Pip-Boy had shown.
She hesitated. So many thoughts rushed through her mind. The thought of opening the file and finding someone she didn't recognise, or, worse, didn't like, worried her. She considered whether it was better not knowing. Whether she really needed to know anything about her past. It was, after all, long gone. She was here, now. For better or worse, the Capital Wasteland was her home. Valrie and Gia were her friends. She was Patience. Did she really need to know any more than that?
"Cold feet?" She looked over at Valrie, Gia stood slightly behind, and then looked back at the screen. The cursor waiting for her to click onto the file. "How about I read it and give you a basic summary?"
Patience didn't answer. With her friends at her side, she had all the help she needed. She pressed 'Return' and watched as a list of further files appeared, a series of videos among them. She selected the first video, labeled 'Orientation'.
"Oh, my god! You are so sexy!" Gia gasped as she looked at the first frame of the video waiting to play. "I love the hair! It's so wavy! And is that a different colour? I know the screen's green, but, you know. Why is your hair all, like, grey and flat now? I mean, still sexy, don't get me wrong, but you're not as stupid old as Valrie."
"Gia. Shut the fuck up." Valrie wasn't the kind of person that initiated hugs, or affection, but she put her arm around Patience's shoulder now. "Whatever you decide. I'm here. We're here."
She looked at the woman on the screen. She looked so young and happy. She sat, wearing the same jumpsuit that Patience had worn when Valrie found her. The woman didn't have a Pip-Boy on her arm.
Patience didn't recognise her. She couldn't rationalise the woman on the screen as being the same woman she was. She reached out and touched the screen and felt Valrie squeeze her shoulder. On the other side, Gia pushed her way around Valrie and grasped Patience's hand.
It was time.
"Hi. My name is Sara. Sara Porter-Ramirez. I'm 24 years old and I've lived in D.C. for the last five years. I'm an artist. I paint using oils, mostly, but some times I like to ..."
inaudible
"Oh. Okay. Uhm ... Okay, so, it is half past nine in the morning, October 28th, 2077. We've been in the vault for five days, now, and it's okay. I really like it, but we're going to be ..."
inaudible
"Right! Sorry. I have cancer. My wife, Diana, and I were preselected to enter the vault because we both have a very rare form of cancer that is untreatable. I know, right? What are the odds? Anyway, Vault-Tec chose us to be part of a very special program. Diana and I and a whole bunch of other cancer patients are in this vault to be cured ..."
inaudible
"Okay. Not cured! They can't guarantee that. The contract says so. Very specifically. Is that okay?"
inaudible
"Gotcha. So, anyway, this program, that is definitely not certain to cure us, involves chyro ... cryosteam ... cryostasis! That's it! Cryostasis! Yeah. We're going to be froz ... sorry ... Our bodies will be placed in a state of cryo-suspension."
inaudible
"I'm getting to that. God! While in cryostasis we will also be placed in a Reality Simulation (tee-emm, copyright, blah, blah, blah), where we will live out our 'lives' while they work on the not-a-cure. It'll be like, whole years can go by but only a week in the simulation, or, like, days go by in real life and years and years go by in the simulation. Apparently they can choose how time passes inside that ..."
inaudible
"Alright. Not relevant. So, in about an hour we'll be placed in the cryostasis tubes and that will be it. New life! Oh, and before I go, Diana Ramirez-Porter, Resident number 1492, I lov ..."
The video stopped, leaving the woman on the screen, Sara, Patience, in the middle of blowing a kiss to the camera. Patience reached out to the flickering image and then pulled her hand back. Both Valrie and Gia remained silent while Patience tried to process what she had seen and heard. Then she heard a short, breathy whistle.
"Wow. That is a lot of information to take in. I mean, 'Sara'? I would never have thought of you as a 'Sara'. Come to think of it, I can't see you as a 'Patience'. I mean, you're really not. Patient, I mean." Gia would have continued talking if Valrie hadn't placed a hand over the girl's mouth.
"Are you okay?" Valrie turned Patience away from the screen and looked into her eyes. "If nothing else, the kid's right. That is a lot to take in. How are you feeling?"
"I'm not." She glanced at the screen, then looked back to Valrie. "I don't feel anything. I mean, that's me. Definitely me. Looks like me. Sounds like me. But there's nothing of her in me. Look at her! She's happy. She's funny and friendly and she's an artist! I doubt I could draw a stick-man!"
"I don't know what to say." Valrie leaned back against the rail. "Maybe it has something to do with your memory loss?"
"Maybe. But does memory loss explain how I know my way around weapons, guns and bullets, and fighting and war? Does she look like a soldier to you? Does she sound like someone who can look at someone and know, for a fact, several different ways she can kill them before they can even move?" She pointed towards the screen and the image of Sara, lips puckered, smiling with every part of her face.
"What's cancer?" Patience's head whipped around towards Gia. Angry, at first, she saw that the girl's question was genuine. She didn't know.
"It's a disease." Gia made a deliberate, long step back. "You can't catch it! Most types can be treated, if it's caught early enough, but some can't be treated at all and sometimes it just gets caught too late. I ... I have cancer."
Once more the world spun and swam around her. With a helping hand from Valrie, she slipped to the floor. She felt sick, her stomach twisting. Valrie reached into her coat and pulled out a bottle of water. It reminded Patience of when they first met. She took a couple of sips and wiped her mouth, her head beginning to clear.
She didn't know why that revelation affected her so much. If she thought about it, it made little difference here, now. With all the radiation still hanging around, it was probable that there were few people that didn't have cancer, here in the Capital Wasteland. She wondered how long she had left. Days? Weeks? Months? Did it matter?
"You were married, too." Again, Patience's head turned to look, annoyed, towards Gia. "Hey! I'm just saying! It seems like a pretty big thing that's just vwooshed over your head. Married, is all I'm saying. And you shamelessly flirting with me all this time."
"I've never flirted with you." Patience rubbed the bridge of her nose and took another drink of water.
"Heh. Whatever, 'Sweetie'." Gia made a short, snorting laugh.
"There are more videos. You could probably copy everything over to your Pip-Boy and go through it somewhere better than here." Valrie took back the bottle of water and hid it away in her coat. "And, I don't know, this might sound out of fucking place, but, what do we call you now? 'Sara'? 'Patience'? Resident 1138?"
"Patience. My name is Patience." She stood back up and returned to the terminal, scrolling through the videos. She reached one from the year 2100. "'Sara' died in the vault. I was born when you found me."
She selected the video.
"Happy New Year! Okay, so it's not New Year in here." Sara indicated her surroundings. A nice looking suburban home, sunlight streaming in through the window. "In the 'Reality Simulation' it's only been a year, or so, but out there it's been twenty-three years and it's the start of a new century! Twenty-three years!"
She adjusted the camera a little, then sat back into her chair.
"You know you don't have to use the camera, right?" Another voice, off to the side of the camera, chimed in. A woman's voice. "You could probably face the wall and the simulation will still record what you say."
"I like using the camera. It makes it feel real. Normal." Sara turned to the direction of the voice and stuck out her tongue before grinning and returning to the camera. She nodded towards the other voice. "That's my better half, Diana. She's more practical than I am. I like the ambience of using the camera. It's more intimate."
Sara reached down and picked up a book, showing the cover to the camera. With a picture of a stylised boy, blond haired, wearing a Vault-Tec jumpsuit, holding up his thumb and winking, the book stated in big letters 'The Vault-Tec Big Book Of Everything'.
"So, I've read through this, like, a million times and I still don't really get it." She turned the book cover to face her and scrunched her face. "I mean, it's weird, right? I was twenty-four when I entered the vault and I'm still twenty-four now, twenty-three years later. It's crazy!"
"That's because the cryo-stasis halts all your biological ageing." The other woman leaned into the view of the camera, placing a steaming mug of coffee before Sara. She was beautiful. Dark, curly hair and the biggest smile lighting up the screen. She kissed Sara before moving away from the view of the camera. "You know this, Sweetie. It's basic stuff!"
"Oh, hush. With your with logic and your reasoning." She reached for the mug, trying to pick it up without using the handle. It was too hot. She made a sharp intake of breath and blew on her fingers. "So, anyway, I just wanted to wish every one a happy New Year. Meanwhile, I'm going to the Mall to paint the Washington Monument in these incredible blue skies."
Sara reached towards the camera and the video turned to static.
Patience didn't know what to make of her previous self. She seemed sweet, kind and caring. And fun. Patience, although she had made the occasional snide joke, would not describe herself as fun. In fact, over the past days since Valrie found her, she could count on the fingers of one hand how many times she had smiled a genuine, happy smile. Smiling, to Sara, seemed to be her natural state.
"We need to get moving soon if we're going to get out of the city before it gets too dark." Vincent had returned, breaking up her thoughts. "You've copied the files, right? Look at them later, when we're safe."
She turned her head, looking over her shoulder and gave him a dark look. He seemed nervous. More nervous than he had appeared when attacked by ghouls. More nervous than when they were trying to slip past the Super Mutants. That clicked in Patience's mind as something wrong and out of place.
"Give me a second." He seemed to be about to say something, but her intense stare made him turn and exit the room.
Returning her attention to the terminal, she scrolled through more of the videos, the years passing by in the blink of an eye. She reached one section where a significant gap between the dates appeared. Curious, she tapped 'return' to play the video after the gap.
Sara looked different. Instead of the giddy, excited woman from the previous videos, she appeared dishevelled. Her hair hadn't seen a brush in some time. Her face showed none of the fun and verve of before. She looked tired. Angry. Tearful. She sat, slumped in the chair, hugging herself in a sweater too big for her. The room around her a hive of untidiness.
"The date is August 24th, 2278. At least, out there." She raised her eyebrows, looking upwards, but moved little else. "Diana is dead."
Sara stared at the camera for a few seconds, then looked away, dabbing at the corner of her eye with her fingers, the sweater cuff tugged down, covering the back of her wrist. She took a few seconds, staring away to the side, the occasional sniff breaking the silence. After a while, she turned back to the camera.
"One second, she was there. The next, gone. I mean, literally, gone. Right before my eyes." She dabbed the corner of her eye again and rubbed her nose with the cuff of her sleeve. "They say ... they say there was an ... incursion. Someone, or something, from outside got in and just destroyed everything they, it, saw. For no reason! How they, it, got in, they won't say. But she's gone. My baby is gone!"
The video turned to static as Sara jumped from her seat, reaching for the camera, her hand covering her mouth. That wasn't the end of the video, after a few seconds, the camera switched on again. Sara sat on the edge of her seat, an intense glare in her eyes.
"They say if you practice something for ten thousand hours, you can become an expert in anything. When we ... when we first entered the vault, we were told they could make time move differently in here." Sara's face tightened, her jaw jutting forward, her forehead furrowing. "So, I'm going to train. Those left out there, they're going to speed up time, put me in a war program. For every hour out there, a year will go by in here. I'm going to train, and learn until I'm perfect. Until I can go out there and find who killed my baby. I'm going to find them and I'm going to make them pay. Make. Them. Pay!"
With a vicious snarl, Sara picked up the camera, throwing it against the wall and turning the video to static once more.