September, 2265 Day 10 Still no luck on finding the treasure . I do have an idea about this place more. This whole place was a casino in the pre-war days Or at least it was supposed to be. I don't think it ever opened for business before the bombs fell. I'm learning how to survive here. I'm experimenting with the vapors of the gas that build on the walls and I think I can use this stuff. I've got a camp of sorts inside a building that's intact. With a stove, a computer, a bed, even running water believe it or not. I've bobby trapped the immediate vicinity with mines and jury rigged explosives to keep the locals away so far its working. I'm not leaving without my treasure but I don't intend to stupidly die because I didn't plan and prepare. So, order of the day is survival first, treasure second. Mornings I usually scrounge for chips and food plus ammo or anything useful, afternoons I search for stuff about the treasure where it is and how I can get to it. Odds are its up in the casino but you never know so I'll check this place thoroughly.
On a side note I finally figured out who my silent protector in the square is. Her name is, or was, Vera. I think she was a pre-war movie star or something. I don't know much about her but I'm always happy whenever I find out something new about her, helps to know a bit about my guardian angel. I found a few posters from a movie about her plus the casino and put them up in my little camp on the walls to remind me who's protecting me when I sleep.
The daily struggle for survival began as Serenity's eyes opened from her sleep. Her green eyes looked up at the ceiling above her as her nostrils flared slightly breathing in the unique smell of the air tainted by the Cloud. Sitting up on her bed the blanket slipped from her naked body mid movement revealing the toned muscle of her flesh. Her arms stretched up above her head as she stretched her stiff muscles for the day ahead. Another deep breath followed before she slipped to her feet on the cool tile of her home. She walked down the stairs and into her kitchen where she grabbed a spoon and one of her carefully hoarded supplies of prewar food, in this case a can of Cram. Removing the lid of the can which she sets aside to be reused later she scoops the pre-war meat onto a frying pan and starts a hot plate and spends a few minutes cooking her meal for the very valuable luxury of having a hot, if overall unappetizing, meal.
She eats shortly after the affair a no nonsense thing in which she eats at a quick steady pace that quickly sees her meal gone as she devours it with regular full bites until it is gone. The now empty can of Cram joins the lid in a collection of other metal scrap to be reused later and the frying pan and spoon are set in the sink installed in the kitchen counter near to the now inactive hot plate. Heading back upstairs she begins grabbing what she needs for the day stopping at the end to carve a new tally mark into the wall next to the others already there to mark the passage of a new day.
Unlike the first few days of her time in the Villa where she barely had anything her home, a new building no longer located on the main square but instead in a remote part of the medical district is stocked with supplies that she has scavenged in the week plus time she has been there. Scavenged clothes and armor either hang from hangers in a wooden wardrobe she'd dragged from elsewhere in the Villa into her home even getting it up the stairs of her home. Inside two sets of the Villa security guard armors along with a much larger number of outfits are arranged with meticulous precision. Much like the clothes the number of weapons both intended and improvised has vastly increased. The automatic rifle lies in a state of disassembly atop a table along a wall where it had been left in that state after she had gotten too tired during her period of cleaning it late the previous night. Of course a revolver is located beneath her pillow as well but beyond that a number of other weapons are located. Of course the gleaming Cosmic knives are present of course and she has fashioned a spear with one for when guns are not an option, the spear stands propped against the wall near the stairs ready to be grabbed. But beyond that and a few other police pistols as well as a lone single barrel shotgun the less noticeable but more alarming additions lie stacked in a neat pile on a second table near the first one still filled with pieces of the disassembled rifle.
On the second table numerous explosives are arrayed. The largest number of these are crude powder charges, homemade explosives filled with gunpowder inside a tin can with a sensor affixed to the exterior to detect movement nearby and detonate the gunpowder inside. They are ineffectual compared to a genuine explosive such as the frag mine that much like the rifle lies in a state of disassembly with its guts strewn about in a seemingly chaotic but really a carefully controlled manner such that it can be reassembled with minimal difficulty.
Beyond all the weapons and clothing other items now fill the room. A stack of the casino chips lies stacked on the room's desk next to an inactive but powered computer that she had taken to writing down notes on her search of the Villa and for keeping her information she gathers regarding the treasure easily organized. There are other items of course. Prewar books and magazines, some technical in nature others purely of an entertainment value that she can read to pass the time if she wishes. And last but not least the last major notable addition to her bedroom/workshop is a trio of posters carefully hung from the walls. The first positioned on the wall above the stairs is a poster advertising the Sierra Madre Casino. The other two however are a pair of different posters each showing the same subject albiet in different appearances, Vera Keyes.
Since she had learned the pre-war Starlet's name Serenity's fixation with Vera had only been slowly growing as a procut of her lonliness. She hadn't broken down and began conversing with things that weren't there but in the idle portions of the day and in her dreams at night as a way of coping the pre-war starlet in all her beauty had begun to occupy Serenity's thoughts.
Still regardless of what the thoughts of a long dead woman might mean for Serenity's future sanity she was clearly still quite coherant given that the gaze of her piercing green eyes lingered on the posters for only the briefest of moments. Taking pistol, knife, spear, and powder charges she proceeded back down to the ground floor of her home and stepping outside and taking ginger steps through the minefield of carefully positioned explosives and beartraps she headed out into the villa for a morning of scavenging.
By the time her morning of scavenging came to an end around what she judged as noon Serenity had acquired a small and modest haul of supplies. Most of it was useless to her as of now and had been gathered with the intent of dismantling it for parts that could be of greater use in her endeavours. Mostly scrap metal and plastic she had a small amount of more valuable items and so she proceeded home. Lunch was a light affair much like the breakfast, once more cooked on the precious working hotplate located upstairs. She had water, miraculously produced from the working sink where she washed her dishes to clean them for future use and rehydrated for the second part of her day before she spent the second half of her day in her home. On other days she might proceed out to gather information but she'd swept large parts of the central Villa and wasn't yet ready to venture into the areas of the Villa where the presence of Ghost People was thicker. Remaining inside the house she spent the day carefully sorting through her new harvest of scavenge and figuring out what she had.
She made frequent use of the computer as she had started taking meticulous records of what she gathered and what she used it for. In her first few days she had come to realize the scarcity of supplies such that here in the Sierra Madre she could not afford to waste anything. So everything was categorized, everything was tallied. Whenever anything was dismantled a notation was made along with new entries created or updated as she accounted for the scavenged pieces of the cannibalized parts she had produced with her actions. She even spent an entire hour simply working with the sensors her explosives used. While she knew the distance they were deadly in and a rough estimate of their area such that they could be safely positioned, but there was a difference between casual knowledge and intimate knowledge. This was what she sought as she worked her way through her salvage. Last but not least of course she made fresh powder charges carefully extracting gunpowder from some of her precious ammunition. She had deployed two of the powder charges farther out from her base camp each in key spots where she had set up a trap, not for the Ghost People on whom no trickery seemed to work, but instead for any new arrivals. They like her would realize quickly how rare things were so she had carefully created caches that anyone could easily find but without knowledge of the trap she worked in any that sought to take her supplies would quickly die.
The hours passed away in silence with no sound of wind or Ghost People only the faint distant sounds of the static infested radios of the villa looping the sounds of the Sierra Madre Gala invitation as always on loop. In the end the day came to an end and she ate dinner but she didn't yet retire for the night instead electing to spend half an hour outside of the safety of her home in the central square sitting quietly on the ground off to the side, where she wouldn't immediately be spotted by another or by the local Ghost People, through it all her eyes steadily on Vera. She knew now that Vera had been an actress in the pre-war days as both of the posters featuring Vera were advertisements for different movies that she had famously starred in. One the name unreadable as the poster was incomplete to the point that the name was missing completely although Vera's name was quite clear and intact as was her appearance. Luckily the other declared the title to be 'Love Sets Sail' a movie that before she had seen the poster she had never even knew existed, still she had already made herself a promise that if at any point in her future that she had a chance to get a holotape containing the film she would acquire it regardless of the cost.
She wanted more of Vera than just the same words repeated on loop over and over. In fact the voice of the Gala invitation she didn't even know if it was Vera but her mind had made the jump and that had become Vera's voice when she saw her in her dreams at night. Still all good things had to come to an end and after what was close to a half hour though in truth she had no way to tell time but by her desire for sleep and how frequently she felt hungry. Heading back to the Medical District she made her way to her home once more passing by many degrading speakers on the way their sounds at worst a simple annoyance that she already was growing used to. Once more she repeated the process of placing her weapons in the same spots as before before stripping naked for the night and slipping into her bed as she pulled the blanket over her settling in at the end of another day to begin another day when she awoke once more beneath the ever present Cloud high above.