It took Hawk's great strength to clear the rubble from in front of the door and shove it in. They checked the outside carefully to make sure they hadn't disturbed the landscape. They didn't want to leave any trace to show the vault was here. Satisfied it was still hidden they entered the tunnel. With the light from Calli's Pip-boy they navigated the silent tunnel the short distance to the vault door. It was firmly sealed.
Calli checked the computer console. It wasn't powered, which was unusual as these consoles were designed to maintain power for centuries.
"Hawk,", she said. "Can you do anything with this?" He pulled open the console and studied it in the light from her Pip-boy.
"I think the power cell was defective. It seems to be dead. Here, let me try replacing it with an energy cell from the plasma rifles. It won't last as long as they were designed to last, but it should be good for several weeks anyway." He took out a power cell, and after some jury rigging, managed to get it in place of the original cell which he dropped on the ground. The unit powered up.
Hawk was good at the mechanics but not so good with software. Calli took his place and hacked into the controls. The big vault door groaned into life. Rock and debris shook loose from the tunnel ceiling as the big gear shuddered back and ground slowly away.
The room was still and quiet, the air stale though breathable. The recirculation system still seemed functional and lights still blazed steadily in the entrance. This was a good indication the nuclear powered energy plants were still working as well. Two closed doors led off the entrance as well as the usual control room on the right.
They started with the control room but found little of interest. Holding her combat shotgun at the ready Calli activated the control to the middle door. There was no sound but the slight whoosh of the air recycling. Calli moved around the door and stared down the hall in both directions. Nothing. Motioning to Hawk they moved out.
After several hours they had searched the common rooms, bathrooms, and residential areas. The vault was neat though obviously it had been abandoned a long time ago. All systems still functioned. There was no indications here of the desperation or craziness that had infested other vaults they had searched.
They came to the kitchen area and found it still well stocked with canned, packaged, and preserved foods left behind. The equipment and technology to preserve meat and fresh foods in a nearly pristine state had long been lost, but the foods remained. It was well past lunch time so they put down their packs, keeping weapons close at hand just in case, and made a hot meal on a still functioning stove.
"This is weird.", Calli said. "They just left. They left so much stuff behind, but everything's so neat and clean. It doesn't look like they were fleeing. Why do you think they left so much if they weren't planning on coming back?"
"Don't know," Hawk said around a mouthful of some tasty meat labeled 'chicken'. "You haven't found anything in the computers?"
"I've only come across one that was working and it didn't have any information about the exodus. It had some personal messages.", she said.
"Well,", Hawk observed. "We still have a long way to go. We haven't even checked the Overseers office yet or the Security wing."
"True." Calli finished her chicken. "This is good. Too bad the creature it came from doesn't seem to have survived. It kinda tastes like black bird, only better."
It was getting late and they had already been up for over 16 hours so they opted to return to the residential areas for a good night's sleep. As was usual when in the field they stayed in the same room but there were four beds in this room, so Calli took one of them. Hawk tossed the remaining mattresses on the floor to make a comfortable bed for himself. They were happy to find they were clean. In fact the whole place seemed suspiciously clean.
This was explained the next morning when they were awakened by sounds in the hall. They came instantly awake and slipped to the door to investigate. A Mr. Handy robot was diligently cleaning in the room across the hall. They looked at each other and shrugged. Finding the bathroom fully functional they took turns showering before going to the kitchen for breakfast.
Over breakfast they decided to go to the overseer's office first. They didn't bother to clean up; it seemed a Mr. Handy had been programmed to do that. Leaving the machine to its task they took up their weapons and packs and followed the signs. The Overseer's office was laid out much like all the others. Calli had some trouble cracking into the computer and finally decided to give it a rest and check the overseer's room. It was here in a locked safe she found the little book of passwords. The safe hadn't been nearly as difficult to get into.
The Overseer's computer was brimming with interesting information. "Look at this, Hawk.", Calli said, reading a late entry. "It's a plan for the exodus. They were going to set up a camp at the base of the mountain. It talks about establishing a community to make sure outside conditions were acceptable and then opening the vaults. Look at these entries! Hawk, I think this vault is a storage unit. They refer to it as an 'Ark'. I wonder what that is. Anyway, they wanted to keep plants and animals safe to repopulate the world. The people here seem to be almost all caretakers and scientists."
She looked up at him, her eyes bright with excitement. "Do you think it's still here? The life they were trying to preserve?" Hawk was perusing the entries.
"Only one way to find out.", he said.
It only took an hour to find the science wing. With the passcodes in the small book Calli was able to open the doors to the life vaults. She stopped, staring at the evidence of violence. The Mr. Handys couldn't get in here to clean up the debris and bodies. There were skeletons piled in the doorway, many still wearing a vault uniform. A few had on vault security attire. She shoved the bones out of the way and stepped into the room. Scattered amongst the bones were weapons, some rudimentary, some professional. It appeared an altercation had occurred here between the residents and security personnel.
They crossed the room to the door in the back, moving aside the skeletons piled there to open the door. This door didn't respond to any of the passwords in the book. It took Calli almost half an hour to finally crack the code and open the door. This room seemed to be a control room. A skeleton lay on a cot on one side of the room. A desk held a glowing computer. Large windows in the far wall looked out over a tremendous room. Calli stared through the grime at the room, then turned to check the computer.
It didn't take long to get into the computer. It told a story of residents going mad, storming the room, determined to get to the life vaults. Some of the security had defended the vaults, paying with their lives. This lone officer had locked himself in the vault control room, keeping it secure, but there was no way he could ever leave. For days he monitored the vault going increasingly insane. Even the Overseer was issuing incoherent orders. There was only one way to save the life vaults. The officer had locked the doors into the science wing; now he set the environmental controls to shut down the air circulating system in the entire vault for a period of one month. At the end, as he suffocated from lack of air, he wrote his final memo and then lay down on the cot. No one had ever left the vault.
Calli turned to Hawk. "That man was a true hero, Hawk. He saved the life vaults. Now it's up to us to protect them."
She opened the door to the life vaults and walked down the hall, staring in awe. There were vaults and enclosures in neat rows, hundreds and hundreds of them. The seeds of life.
Horses, cows, pigs, chickens, turkeys, sheep, many animals she hadn't heard of, all here, all labeled, many varieties of each animal. Corridors ran off to right and left, and those intersected other corridors. The vaults went on and on. Enclosures contained strange plants. Drawers harbored seeds of thousands of varieties. They had found the Vault of Life.
Hawk was glad Calli was so fascinated. Maybe she would forget about the Enclave. Calli turned to him, her eyes wide.
"Oh, Hawk, we can't open this up. We can't let anyone know about this. The world isn't ready yet. Most of them would die! We don't know what we're doing. Here, I'm just going to take a few of these seeds.", she said, opening a drawer with the picture of a red flower on it. " It seems to be just a flower, so it probably isn't all that important. I won't take them all anyway. Let's plant them in the valley. We'll see what happens."
They spent another day going through computers and wondering at the variety of creatures. They contained very explicit instructions on each plant, each animal, how to bring them to life and how to nurture them. There was way too much information for one person. Calli downloaded the information on the seeds she had taken, a flower called a rose.
Finally they took their leave, taking enough common salvage to add to their wealth, but not taking anything else from the life vaults.
"Are we going to the south cave?", Hawk asked as they secured the vault and left, making sure to leave no trace behind.
"Yeah, I want to plant these seeds and see if we can get something to grow.", Calli grinned. "But we can't stay long. The Tradewind's due in three days."
It took less than a day to get back to the southern cave they had decided to call Entrance Cave. After a night's rest Calli rode in the cart with her precious seeds and other items to take into the valley. Hawk pulled the wagon across the Valley of Death. His rads now too high, he wouldn't be able to walk back across the valley, but this wasn't a problem.
They planted the seeds beside the small home they had worked on over the months. It was taking shape. It took most of their time to craft an irrigation system so the seeds would stay damp without getting too wet. It was set to deliver a minimal amount of water. It would shut off in a few weeks when the temperature plummeted as winter set in.
The next day Calli pulled the wagon back and Hawk rode in the radiation proof cart. Her power armor was in top shape and took most of the weight or she wouldn't have been able to do it. It was still very stressful and she was exhausted by the time she reached the other side.
"Hawk," Calli addressed her partner wearily. "this just isn't going to work. I can't do this. We need a better way to get the cart across the valley."
"I've been thinking about that. You know, the Brotherhood owes us for helping them out at AFB. The least they can do is let us have some of the tech from the base. A couple of robots could be reprogrammed to haul the cart.", he said.
"Mmmm, yeah, maybe.", she agreed. "There's probably still some out in the wasteland that haven't been destroyed. We might be able to shut them down and reprogram them. Let's think about it tomorrow. I'm wiped."
She went to bed early. Tomorrow she would be with Jack. The days were getting shorter and colder and the nights longer. She would talk to Hawk and make plans to take care of their enterprises, but she was inclined to spend the winter sailing with Jack on the Tradewind in the warmer south. They had only been married a few months. But before heading to the south Jack had promised to spend the week with her in the wasteland.