August 18th, 2279

Zack traveled for a few hours, putting good distance away from him and the park. Along the way he checked his injury to his head, found dried blood, but otherwise it was not serious. He popped a couple of mentats to help clear his mind. The sun had been burning bright as it made its way to the horizon behind him and he took notice of the small mountain range to the north that had grown very close. He was angry with himself for wanting to explore the park. He did not remember seeing its location on his map, and was curious as what was there. Mistakes like that usually get one killed, which almost happened. During pre-war times, the lake would have been a wonderful place to go on a weekend with your family. Barbequing, swimming, and fishing would be fun activities to pass the time. The display that the campground had showed seemed like whoever had been there when the bombs dropped had decided beforehand to take their families there to try and survive the holocaust to come. Zack liked to hope that they were able to live at the park peacefully, for many years while the Earth changed to the godforsaken place it is today.

Zack came across a crumbling road which had several rusting cars resting upon it. He wondered if it was the same road that traveled through the park. Two of the cars had collided with each other, no telling how long ago it had happened. Twisted metal from each car had formed jutted upwards. The accident could have been when the bombs hit Phoenix, or sometime after when the exodus occurred. There was a decayed skeleton resting on the hood of one of the cars, with half of its body still in the vehicle. Zack glanced to the other car and saw another skeleton in the driver's seat behind the wheel. The passenger door on this vehicle was open though, so perhaps there was one survivor of this tragic accident. Zack made his way closer to the cars and quickly checked the interiors, but found nothing of use. He turned back to the east, and saw something glinting in the light. He pulled out his binoculars and focused on the object in the distance. He saw a red and silver sign atop a pole which read "Red Rocket Service Station" over some rolling hills about a mile and half from where he stood.

"Well, I've already gone this far, they might have some supplies there." He thought with optimism.

The wind picked up, and caused a small dust devil to appear that traveled across the road in front of him. Zack returned his binoculars to his pack, and walked along the side of the road towards the sign in the distance.

The place appeared to be void of life as Zack approached it. He had hoped there would be a good sized town here, but found only three buildings that made up the place. There was a traffic light at the end of the buildings which had a road going towards the north to the small mountain range, and the one continuing east that he had traveled to get here. On his left was a good sized building with one story composed of red bricks with green awnings, which looked to be some kind of general goods store. Most of its windows were broken, and from what Zack could tell, the place had long been emptied of supplies. There was a smaller building next to this one painted in yellows and blues with a strange small wooden statue near the door with one arm raised up a smile across its face. The head was distorted into some enlarged three layered object with some kind of swirl on the top. A sign above the door read "Mr. Tastee's Homemade Ice Cream", the letters were faded badly and Zack had a hard time reading it at first.

"I wonder if that stuff his head is made of is supposed to be this "ice cream" stuff."

To his right was the Red Rocket Service station. It had two gas pumps, a convenience store, and attached to the convenience store was a two car service garage with both of its doors pulled open. Zack heard soft music coming from the open garage consisting of what he thought was piano some sort of stringed instrument. The song was beautiful to his ears, but seemed out of place here in the wastes.

Zack not talking chances this time pulled out his revolver and held it at the ready. In a light jog he made his way past the gas pumps towards the convenience store. The windows were covered in grime and he could not see anything inside. Zack took his pack off and rested it on the sidewalk there, along with his canteen as well. He crouched low he made his way to the first opening of the garage. From the overhanging roof he noticed a sort of wind chime, shell casings of different calibers were hanging around the outside of empty rusted tin can. At the moment the air was still, and it was not moving. He swung around the corner with his revolver aimed, ready to fire.

"If you're gonna to kill me, I gotta tell you I ain't got any caps or much anything of value. Unless someone is paying you to do so, then I guess I'm just shit out of luck then." A voice said in front of Zack.

Inside the garage it was dim, the only light coming from a small oil lamp hanging from the ceiling. A man wearing blue jeans and a red plaid short sleeved shirt was sitting on a wooden chair with a glass in hand. The man had tanned skin, his face looked of Asian decent and he appeared to be in his late fifties or early sixties. Most nowadays do not get the pleasure of living past their forties with all the dangers present in this world. His hair was cut short and was graying along the sides. Next to him sat a make shift table made up of two wood crates, one stacked atop the other. On the top crate sat a sawed off shotgun and a bottle of what Zack thought was sure to be alcohol. Behind the man Zack could see a bed lengthwise against the wall. A wooden book case and work bench sat next to each other against the wall as well to the foot of the bed. The shelves held an assortment of items ranging from old pre-war relics to random pieces of junk as far as Zack could tell. On the top shelf sat a still, with a dark brown liquid dripping and collecting in the larger container. The work bench held some tools as well as an old pre-war hand-crank record player placed on top. There was a cone shaped speaker protruding from it. It was the source of that wonderful music.

Zack stood up slowly, putting the revolver back in its holster as he did so. He laughed inwardly at what the man had said before him.

"Sorry, not here to kill you sir. Just passing through."

"Well in that case," The man said smiling, "if you don't mind staying awhile to chat some. It has been quite some time since anyone has been through here. Most people avoid this area like a plague."

Zack undid his head garment, and pulled his goggles down. He stared curiously at the man. "Alright, you have my interest. What's wrong with the area?"

"Ha hah! Okay, okay, first things first. The name's Rex Donovan, the most elite scavenger in all the southwest! Let me grab you a chair and get us some food." Rex placed his glass down on the crate, almost leaping out of the chair, walked over to a door to the right, and went through it. It looked to lead to the convenience store.

Zack turned around and walked out of the garage to retrieve his pack and canteen that was left on the sidewalk. He reached down and picked up the canteen and placed it loosely on his shoulder. He grabbed his pack by the top part and held it by his side. He looked around the area, all was quiet and still. The sun was just starting to disappear between the border of the land and sky. It created intense colors of intertwined reds and oranges.

"I can see why he would settle down in a place like this."

Zack did not know how long he had been standing on the sidewalk watching the sun disappear. Some wind sped through the street making the casings of the wind chime to tap wildly at the tin can. The sound startled Zack causing him to jump a little. He made his way back to the inside of the garage. He placed his gear on the inside wall by one of the open doors. Rex came out at this moment from the door. He was carrying another wooden chair by the arms in front of him. On the seat of the chair rested a plate that had ears of corn on it, and a bowl with red items that Zack could not identify.

"Whew, sorry took so long, thought you might have left. I wanted to heat up this corn. Helps it go down easier."

"No worries." Zack responded.

Zack helped Rex by taking the plate and bowl off the chair and held them while Rex lined up the chair on the other side of the make shift table. Rex moved his sawed off shot gun to the floor by his chair, and took the food from Zack and placed them on the crate. They both sat down, staring at the empty good store across the street in front of them.

"What's your name and where you headed?" Rex picked up one of the ears of corn and took a couple of bites off of it.

"I'm Zack. I'm making my way to New Vegas." Zack picked one up as well, and had forgotten how hungry he had been. It was warm and had just a nice amount of salt on it. He finished his in less than a minute.

"Damn boy! What's the matter, they don't feed ya where you come from?" Rex asked while chuckling.

Zack shook his head a few times. "Sorry, just didn't realize I hadn't eaten much today."

"You think the corn is good, try one of these." Rex picked up the bowl of red things, and offered it to Zack.

Zack looked down at them, still not sure what they were or if they would kill him. They looked like some sort of fruit. They had small yellow specs covering its body. He picked up one of them by a leafy stem, and took a bite from the smaller end of it. The flavor from it surged in his mouth. It was very sweet, and seemed to be full of moisture at the same time. He quickly put the rest of it in his mouth to eat.

Rex let out a roar of laughter while he slapped his leg. "Pretty good huh? Won't find these just anywhere in the wastes."

"Their wonderful, what are they?" He asked as he went to grab another one.

"They're called strawberries. I have a small garden behind this garage growing all sorts of things. You see, quite a few years back I came across this shed in someone's back yard. I had to move some boxes, but found some doors under them with stairs leading down. I found a metal door, which was open, inside was a shelter of some kind, most likely to protect against the bombs. I'm guessing whoever it belonged too got trapped in some city when the bombs fell, and never got to use it. Inside was a treasure trove of items, food, water, weapons, and even a box of lots of these little packets full of seeds. There were a lot of different kinds of fruits and vegetables. On the package it said they'd be good for hundreds of years, and it's what I've been surviving on for a long time."

"Strawberries huh? Well, thank you for sharing them. Others wouldn't do the same thing in your position."

"Yeah, but most people are assholes. They'll get what is coming to them. Good old karma makes sure of that. So, you seem like an upright kind of guy. Why are you heading to a crazy place like New Vegas? I've been through there a couple of times for business, and have always come out worse than I went in!"

Zack sat for a moment before answering. "Well, I have business with someone that needs to be taken care of."

Rex studied his face as he said this. "Ah, you have that look of revenge in your eyes. I've seen that look all too often. You're more likely to get killed before you get the job done."

"If that's the way things are meant to be, so be it. But, I'm still going to try." Zack said coldly.

"Well alright, best of luck to ya Zack. Just watch your back in that place. Most people there are liars, thieves, killers, and just down right fucks."

"Yeah I know. I won't be able to live with myself till I go there though."

The music that had been playing softly had ceased. Zack looked back at the record player. "Think we can put that on again? It was quite comforting."

"Ah so you like Bach? You have good taste in music." Rex got up to attend to the record player.

"You lied you know." Zack called over his shoulder. "You do have something of value. That thing has to be worth its weight in caps to the right buyer."

Rex laughed loudly. "Yeah, I did, but even the smartest raider wouldn't figure that out. Most don't know their face from their ass."

The music started playing again, and Rex sat back down. They continued eating at the corn and strawberries. They ate in silence listening to the soothing music playing behind them, while watching the last bit of light dissolve into the coming night.