Code Name Veronica.
Chapter Two. Save yourself.
U.S Route 93, 68 miles from Phoenix Arizona. 5:35 PM.
In less than an hour, the sun will set over the Arizona desert. Daylight will fade and darkness will blanket the desert floor, all of the nocturnal nightmare creatures of the wasteland will awaken and scurry out of their subterranean burrows in search of fresh prey. It would be certain death to be caught outside alone in the darkness. And even though it's so close to nightfall, one lone and determined man walked a half mile from his Auto Garage home to pick up some supplies from a traveling merchant camped out on the lone and dusty Route 93 highway. The customer's name is Stephan, and little did Stephan know that the chain of events that would unfold after this night will change his, and the lives of hundreds of thousands across the west coast forever. For the worst...
A worn NCR flag secured on the top of a half-collapsed overpass gracefully dances in the late afternoon breeze. The hazy orange sun hangs over the western mountain peaks, painting them black as pitch. A long and twisted shadow hangs from the rebar exposed overpass wrapping itself around a traveling caravan encampment nestled just below. Staked down on the left side of a rusted-out Greyhound bus is an olive drab military tent adorned with mismatched rainbow-colored Christmas lights. Mounted above the entrance of the tent is a shabby wooden sign with bright red painted letters that reads, "Crafty Carlos's Traveling Caravan". To the right of the bus is a makeshift Brahmin corral made from concrete traffic barricades and a few rusty metal shells that used to be called cars. 3 diseased and malnourished pack Brahmin peacefully graze on dead tumbleweeds inside the confines of the crude pen.
Two very different men on the Karma spectrum stand facing each other separated by a titanium folding table. The solid metal table is nestled in-between the tent and the old bus and is chocked full of scavenged wasteland merchandise that almost overflows off the edges. A duct tape wrapped M1 Garand with "WELL THIS MACHINE KILLS COMMIES" carved into the soft oak stock takes center space. The custom M1 Garand lays on top of Veronicas Vault Boy leather jacket with an over bloated paper price tag of 22,000 caps hanging from the bygone era killing machines steel barrel. Two sets of spiked knuckles, a .500 Smith and Wesson Magnum, vault 13 Canteen and a custom Pimp-Boy 3 Billion are all carefully fanned out on display below.
Impatiently tapping his long-crooked fingers on a battered cash register is Crafty Carlos, a Hispanic traveling merchant who barely has two brain cells to rub together inside his twisted head. Carlos wears a black and purple pinstripe long sleeve shirt with suspenders and he has a habit of twiddling with his "Fu-Man-Chu" mustache like a smug asshole while he talks. All in all, Carlos looks, acts and talks like a generic villain from a low budget spaghetti western who sells used coffins to old people dying from the poisoned snake oil he sold them earlier that week. His pretend suave accent screams, I'm an omnipotent asshole with no real taste in anything at all and given the opportunity Id stab you in the back with a knife repeatedly.
"Either you buy the fucking junk, or you get the fuck, away from me and my caravan fuck boy. I could be in my fucking tent pounding some, serious pud right now. But no. I gotta be standing out here in the dirt, squabbling over the price of wonder glue with a fucking retard."
Opposite of Carlos is Stephen, a moderately overweight man too smart for his own good. Stephan is mostly bald from a chem cook gone horribly wrong. Or horribly right. Depending on your perspective. For Stephan, the cook was a revolutionary life changing Uber-breakthrough. One batch of the highly experimental pre-war "Crystal Meth" and "Super Jet" combination, (Juper Meth) turned out phenomenally well. While the other batch, being cooked in the next room over inside a bathtub exploded in Stephan's face. He lost most of his hair as a result of the process. And now he covers up his mutilated ghoul scalp with a dirty blonde mullet hair piece. Stephan wears a black duster with an Official Vault Tec™ Security flak jacket underneath. The man is an eccentric, insecure and highly egotistical inventor extraordinaire. Although mostly specializing in weapons and armor modifications, he also dabbles in everything from minor cybernetic surgery, handcrafted and painted action figures and home-brewed chemical compounds that will "fuck your brains inside and out" as he so rightfully claims.
Stephan puts his hands in his coat pockets then cocks his head to the side, successfully taking up a smug asshole stance of his own. Two can play that game. Stephen talks with a Texan drawl and tends to slur some of his words when speaking. Which is very strange considering he's not from Texas, nor has he ever even visited. It may have something to with his long and extensive drug history that started at the age of 9.
"First of all, Carlos, what your trying to sell me isn't even wonder glue. It's "House" brand Goober Glue, which is absolute garbage. If I buy this crap I'm going to have to cut it with the small amount of remaining Wonder Glue I have left just to make it usable! All I'm asking is for you to give me a reasonable price. I mean look around Carlos! It's not like your bathing in bottle caps at the moment. It's just me, that creepy guy that looks like a syphilis monster, the odd traveler, and the NCR troopers who come down here every other week from Wickenburg. And they come here to see me! Not you Carlos! Me! And besides, I know you have a whole stash of Wonder Glue locked up in a special box inside your stupid tent. Everybody knows you use Wonder Glue for lubrication when you pound your little "pudding cake", or whatever the heck you call that shriveled up little thing in your pants. For Christmas sakes Carlos! Just look at your hands! Why else would they be so dry and cracked up? That can't be healthy man."
Red hot anger flashes over Carlos, the man grits his teeth then slams his extremely dried cracked up and callused hands on the table, propelling a few items onto the ground. Spittle fly's from Carlos's mouth as he speaks. "HEY! That's not funny fuck boy! Fuck you! I've heard stories of that shit rotting NCR recruits cocks off. I don't do that shit! You know what. There was just a spike in the lock market. The dow is down. Lock prices went up." Behind Carlos, off in the distance, a shadowy figure appears out from behind a thick outcropping of Cat Claw thorn buses. The phantom is dressed in a black hooded cloak that hangs down to the ground and is dragging a peasant's cart.
Carlos grabs a water damaged legal pad and a pen, then he starts scribbling something down. Which is probably complete and utter nonsense considering he doesn't know how to read or write and only knows the most basic of mathematics. "Let's just review your order here really quick you pig fucker. 1 bottle of "Goober glue", 6 rolls of duct tape, some random circuit boards and shitty computer components, two boxes of Sugar Bombs and one six-pack of Nuka Cola. That two century-year-old junk food is very, very bad for you, by the way, FATASS! Maybe you should take a look in the mirror every once in a while, go for a fucking walk once a day and in general, just lay off the fucking junk food before your clogged-up swine heart implodes on itself!"
Carlos flings the legal pad and pen with angry gibberish scribblings all over it back on the table. "Before you pissed me off that would be 200 caps even. Now that you pissed me off, your grand total comes to, 350 fucking bottle caps. 325 caps if you get down on your chubby fatass knees, RIGHT NOW, and suck my hairy ball sack you lard ass piece of shit!"
Stephen smiles, his prey is most definitely triggered. "First of all, it was called the STOCK MARKET, and that's not how it worked you dumb inbred son of a prostitute..." Stephen pauses after seeing movement behind Carlos's left shoulder, he squints his eyes to see past the dying sun and spots a dark figure approaching from the desert, dragging something heavy from behind. Stephan sighs when he realizes who it is. "Oh no… It looks like your favorite customer is on his way back. Maybe he learned basic math and figured out you've been jibbing him on every transaction he's ever made with you and now he's here to kill you."
Carlos furrows his eyebrows in surprise. The man looks over his shoulder and towards the horizon. "Ah shit. That son of a... No... I highly doubt that. Math and numbers make him very angry. I don't even give the crazy fuck prices, I just hand him a bag of caps every time he sells me shit, no questions asked. Besides. If he wanted to kill me he'd wait for me to go take a piss one day, then he'd sneak up on me and smack me over the head with a rock." Carlos turns all the way around and cups his hands to his mouth. Carlos's baby shit brown eyes shimmer in the waning afternoon sunlight. "HEY DICK CHEESE! GO HOME, WHERE CLOSED! ONCE A MONTH IS ENOUGH FOR ME!"
Stephen sighs again and rubs his temples, smearing some motor oil on his face. "Look Carlos. I've been working on this big project for months. The rich guy that originally ordered it, just sent a courier the other day to tell me he's backing out. I'm totally burned. And I'm stuck with a high priority order that only needs finishing touches to be ready for sale. I've got a lot of capital locked up into it and I'm gonna need to go to Phoenix soon to find a new buyer. If I don't make this sale I might have to close up shop and head back to the salt mines. It's a make or break situation. Now that's not good for either of us. Seeing as how mostly all your customers come up here for me. If I leave, so do they. Can we make a deal?"
Carlos stares at the figure in the distance. Why is he wearing clothes? "Carlos, you with me buddy?" Carlos turns around and immediately dismisses the thought. The man is completely unpredictable, maybe he found some clothes he liked from one of his victims and decided to roll with it.
"Alright fuck boy. You have a good point. As much as I despise you, Let's make a deal. 150 caps. I want to get back to fapping as soon as possible, Cheese Dick sold me a photo album with a bunch of hot lesbian pictures inside it. It's nothing hardcore, but that only makes me like it even more. I'll go get your fucking Wonder Glue, don't get your triple XL fat boy panties in a twist."
Carlos looks Stephan straight into his eyes and slowly mouths "pig fucker" as he slips into his dark tent. Stephen cringes, and wonders why he always does that. Stephans never seen the inside of Carlos's tent because the man always makes it a point to make sure no one sees in by awkwardly holding the flaps closed and carefully sliding in like an eel into a sea cucumbers asshole. That old grainy BBC Ocean documentary footage from grade school always replays in Stephans' head when he watch's Carlos "enter" his tent. A chill goes down Stephan's spine as he swings around a leather satchel from his back then spills its contents out onto the table. He starts counting out 150 bottle caps. Normally Stephan would have all his caps neatly stored in 20 count paper rolls, but this is Stephans emergency stash and times are dire.
Carlos swiftly returns and slams a bottle of wonder glue down on the table. Then Carlos retrieves the hot pink photo album tucked under his right arm for Stephan to see. "Check out the cover. Isn't that the gayest thing you've ever seen?" Stephan looks at the worn-out book and it immediately makes him feel even more uncomfortable than before. Just being in the presence of "Crafty Carlos" is enough to make someone feel unclean down to the core. Not for racist reasons, but because the man is a world class Creeper with a capital C. The book is, interesting to say the least. Stephan is just tired of seeing Carlos boast about items he acquired from murder victims and act as though he just picked up a steal from a yard sale.
Spelled out in bold, purple, gold glittered letters, at the top of the cover is the title of the book. "Veronica and Alice, Badass's at Large". Framed in the center of the cover is a photograph outlined with bright yellow squiggly line paper. Two women standing at the edge of the hoover dam hang a Ceaser's Legion Centurion over the edge by his ankles. Carlos opens the book to the first page. "Check this shit out." The next picture in the book is the same two women standing in the same positions at the edge of the dam. But now the soldier is gone, presumably falling to his death while the two women are bent over laughing like immature school girls just after seeing a picture of a penis for the first time in a middle school textbook. A line of cursive text wrapped inside an ornate text box beneath the photo reads, "memory lane". Only interested in buying his stuff then leaving as soon as fucking possible, Stephan tersely purses his lips and nods. Unsatisfied by the lackluster response, Carlos exaggeratingly rolls his eyes back inside his skull then tosses the book back into his tent with a loud thud.
"Whatever Fuck Boy, its hot as fuck. Id show you the rest, but your probably gay or something so it would just be a fucking waste." Stephen ignores Carlos completely and the pair stays silent while Stephan counts out his caps. Carlos drums his fingers on the table to the tune of "Aint that a kick in the head" by Frank Sinatra. After that gets old Carlos clears his throat and says. "Hey, Stephany-fish-between his legs. I can hear his stupid cart getting closer and I don't want to look back, is he close?" Stephen stops his count at 77 and clenches his fist around a small handful of caps, drawing blood, then he peaks his head around Carlos. The dark figure is very close indeed. The shopping cart is making a terrible noise as it scrapes against rocks and its contents bang around in the back of the cart. Stephan thinks to himself, play nice, make a joke, laugh, nod along then LEAVE! "Yeah. He's pretty close. What's his real name by the way? I've always wondered but I never cared enough to ask."
Carlos lets out a high-pitched laugh like that of a hyena. "I NEVER BOTHERED TO ASK EITHER!" Carlos and Stephen share a rare little laugh then they return to awkwardly standing around, waiting, dreading the screeching shopping cart to come to a full stop. After a long wait, the grinding sound of aluminum metal on rock Finally halts. The cloaked figure stands silently 10 feet away. Carlos bows his head and pretends to press buttons on his nonfunctional cash register that hasn't worked for over 200 years. Stephen already counted out all his caps but not knowing what to do, he awkwardly pretends to have lost count and so he starts all over.
The three go on like this for half a minute. Each second, feeling like an eternity to the two men. Finally, unable to bear the silence, Carlos spins around to face his customer with a new-found vigor. While wearing a bright and chipper, extremely fake on purpose smile Carlos greats the cloaked syphilis monster with his arms mockingly spread out like a Freak Show Circus Master. He gestures along with each word as if presenting something both fabulous and disgusting to a crowd. "Sorry, I didn't see you their buddy. Welcome back to my humble storefront. What can I do for you on this delightfully wonderful and beautiful day?" Complete and total ear-piercing silence. The dark figure doesn't respond or even move a muscle. Carlos catches a big whiff of rotting shit and burnt up death from the cloaked figure. He nervously gulps down a mouthful of spit then he anxiously fake scratches his right arm.
"I see you got a cloak there, it's very nice, suits you! Did you um, kill someone for that? Never mind, dumb question. I remember now. You told me about that girl you were going to rape to death and then slow roast over a spit. Sorry. So, did you already go thru all those chem's or did you forget something on your shopping list?" Stephen stops fake counting his caps, he hesitantly looks up at the imposing figure with curious eyes. The tattered black cloak kicks up with the wind. Stephen sees a pair of black military boots and bloodied up black and grey urban camouflage military fatigues underneath. He realizes instantly that this isn't the creepy little nudist man he despises so. No, this is someone far more demented and dangerous.
Stephen watch's the stranger drop the reins of the cart then take a wide side step revealing the entire thing for all to see. Carlos immediately vomits, Stephen just stares at the horrific sight and whispers to himself. "Jesus, holy, fucking, Christ on a motherfucking fuck stick." This is the first time Stephan has sworn since his mom made him eat a whole sun baked Giant Gecko turd as a child for mistakenly asking her what a clitoris was. He was 17 years old and didn't find out what the "true" definition was until the age of 27 and a half.
The shopping cart has been gooified into a gnarled mess of conjoined flesh, metal, melted jet inhalers, glass bottles and cartons of cigarettes. The melted contents of the cart, now hardened spill out of the sides from all angles like beef coming from the asshole end of a meat grinder. A big glob of rough, blackened and chipped sand-covered glass lays at the base of the cart connected to the mangled body. The trolls upper half hangs from the front of the shopping cart like some kind of fucked up mermaid mounted onto the mast of a pirate ship. And what remains of the man's head now slumps over to the side with his cooked brains dangling from his exposed cranium. His twisted, burnt and lipless mouth is now locked in an expression of pure unfiltered agony. Exposed misshapen yellow teeth and bone protruding out of the jaw, make the remnants of the skull look like a demonic creature from hell that is 10× more horrifying than a mature Death Claw.
Most of the left side of the torso was eviscerated, the charred right arm dangles from the side of the cart, the boney skinless fingers reach out, almost touching the ground. The whole thing looks like sociopathic child's experiment involving a cockroach, a plastic toy soldier, a red crayon, an M80 firecracker and a magnifying glass. Carlos finish's blowing chunks then wipes the vomit from his face with one arm and with the other he draws his Colt Army 45 from his gun belt. While aiming his gun at the stranger's center mass, he hesitantly asks. "Who the fuck are you? And what the fuck did you do to that creepy little Mole Rat fucker!"
Veronica reaches out towards the gore cart and snatches up a crooked cigarette from a half-burnt pack of cigarettes. She flips open her Zippo lighter with a loud "KLINK", then casually lights her smoke. The rusty antique lighter has a faded graphic of a yellow smiley face winking and sticking its bright red tongue out. Stephan will never forget the image plastered onto that cheap old rusty lighter, as it perfectly represents the personality of the most fucked up person he's ever met in his entire life. Veronica flips the lid of the lighter back and shoves it into her pocket. She ignores the gun pointed at her chest and acts as though what she just did was the coolest thing to ever happen in human history.
"Oh that. Yeah. Long story. Let's just say, you're welcome. I tried to think of a cool one-liner when I was walking up, but nothing good really came to mind. The best I came up with is, "He gave me a black eye, you should see what I did to him". But that doesn't really work well in this context, now does it? Or maybe it does, I don't know, I'm pretty sure half of my brain is swollen, you ever been hit in the head with a fucking shovel?." Veronica takes a long drag from her cigarette before continuing. "As for my name? My name is Veronica." She exhales a large cloud of smoke before dramatically lifting back her hood, exposing her bruised and swollen face. Veronica smiles, showcasing her bloodied, missing and chipped up pearly whites. "It's nice to fucking meet you, bitch."
Recognition sets in immediately. A cancerous pit of anxiety swells up inside Carlos's stomach. His hands begin to sweat and the hairs on his neck stand up. Carlos reluctantly peers into the tiny crack in his tents entrance and sees a corner of the bright pink colored photo album lying on the ground. "Wait. You're that chick from the photo album. But, nobody ever survives an encounter with the "Bagdad Troll". How did you kill him? How are you alive?" Veronica's right eye starts twitching sporadically. "You looked at my book." Something snaps deep down inside Veronica's psyche, she quickly slides the rusted fork hidden in her right-hand sleeve out. Then she flicks her lit cigarette into Carlos's face forcing the man to recoil back in shock.
"AW FUCK." Carlos flinches and tries to cover his face. A window of opportunity is opened. Stephen watches wide-eyed as Veronica springs at Carlos like a cheetah tweaked out on Rushing Water. Veronica slaps Carlos's gun out of his hands and with her right hand, she violently thrusts the rusty bent up fork towards Carlos's left eye. Before the fork even enters, he's already screaming bloody murder. Crafty Carlos knows he's going to die.
The fork penetrates the eyeball and the upper eyelid. A geyser of eyeball juice and blood gushes from the wound soon after. The two combatants roll onto the ground in a cartoonish blur as Veronica repeatedly stabs and twists the fork into Carlos's eye socket. Spirts of blood spray up with each sequential strike. Carlos screams for his life while he thrashes his arms about and kicks his snakeskin cowboy boots out uselessly, only managing to stir up a cloud of dust. Satisfied after the 7th blow Veronica dismounts Carlos. The merchant isn't dead. But his screams of agony have died down to short, quiet defeated whimpers of sadness and pain. Panting and out of breath Veronica wipes the sweat and blood spatter from her face. Then, she slowly tilts her head to face Stephen with a cold look that says, "Try something and I'll rip your fucking voice box out with this fork then I'll shove it up your ass..."
She stares at Stephen, sizing him up and wondering whether she should kill him or not. The fat 32-year-old man is in total shock. Veronica looks down under the table and sees a trail of urine flowing from Stephens pant leg onto the dirt. She makes up her mind and drops the bloody fork from her hand, she then scoops the Colt 45 up from the ground and walks toward Stephan. "Where. Is my, fucking book?" Stephan stands up straight and immediately points into the tent. Veronica smirks and heads for the tent. "Good boy, now sit. I have some questions for you when I'm done."
Veronica rips back the tent flaps and walks inside. She flips a switch on a jury-rigged car battery light system sitting on a wooden table next to the entrance. The tents lights buzz to life. Looking around the tent, Veronica is completely flabbergasted at what she sees. Frank Sinatra, James Dean, John. F. Kennedy and hundreds of various other pictures of male 1960's sex figures cover the walls of the tent. The eyes of the men in each and every picture are completely scratched out and their mouths were drawn over with red paint to signify lipstick. Veronica is the first human being to see the inside of "Crafty Carlos's" tent and live to tell the tail. Plenty of field rats have ventured inside here, most "survived" but you really don't want to know what Carlos did with them. Hint, he shoved them in his but, then when satisfied, he set them free knowing they would be running around the desert, confused, broken and never to be the same innocent little creatures ever again. Crafty Carlos, sick guy...
In the center of the tents back wall is a shrine dedicated to none other than, Mr. New Vegas. An antique silver mirror hung on the wall and a mini jukebox radio sitting on an ornate dresser functions as the shrines center focus. Various crayon colored drawings depicting the 60-year-old New Vegas entertainer nude and in the act of shaving his nasty old man balls, golfing and doing other "old person acts" cover the shrines circumference. Hawaiian luaus made from desert flowers and 200-year-old pieces of garbage wrap around the base of the mini neon light flashing jukebox. Little cone lights carefully positioned on the floor point yellow soft lighting up at the display. A lot of hard work went into the making of this shrine.
The drawings of Mr. New Vegas are the only pictures in the tent not wearing lipstick with the eyes scratched out. Veronica takes note of that fact and stares at the psychopathic shrine in disbelief for a long while, wondering what happened in Carlos's life to turn him into a such a weird fucking freak. Then Veronica recalls her ever-growing hatred of that reptilian fucker formally known as Mr. New Vegas and averts her eyes to continue her search of the book. "Fucking gross, this day just gets weirder and weirder." Veronica sees a curtain partitioning off a large portion of the tent. The sounds of little feet pitter-pattering around on glass echoes from the blocked off area. Knowing she's already seen way too much she ignores it and continues her search. After attempting to shake the shock of her current surroundings Veronica spots her most valuable and beloved possession lying on the floor under a makeshift writing desk.
The book is spread open with the pages lying face down and the book's spine pointing up. When Carlos threw the book into his tent a few of the pictures and keepsakes were knocked out. One memento in particular, Veronicas most bestist favorite was dislodged and shattered to pieces. "No." Veronica quickly walks over and picks up the book. She frantically folds back the crooked and creased pages, dusts off the cover and scoops up the parts of her favorite souvenir in her hand. She then starts picking up all the pictures and mementos from the floor and begins stuffing them back into her book.
The book holds all the memories of Veronica's good life. She feels like two people split in two. One is happy, living in the days of the distant past and the other lives in the present, waking up screaming to a never-ending nightmare every day. Veronica looks down at her most valued and now broken reminder of Alice. She cusps the precious item in her hands then tries to neatly put it all back together, but the pieces don't fit anymore. It's too broken. Veronica sits down on Carlos's bed. She cradles the book tightly in her arms then, for the first time today, Veronica cries.
Outside the tent, Carlos props himself up on his side, wipes the blood from his good eye then looks up at Stephan like a lost and confused child. A mashed up, gooey looking thing that used to be an eyeball hangs from Carlos's eye socket. It swings around with Carlos's every little move. "St… Stephan! Help! Steph… Buddy, please... SAVE ME…" Stephan wakes up from his catatonic state to the sad winey death cries of Crafty Carlos. the first thing he does is presses a big red button on his custom mini-Pip-Boy smartwatch. A funny little robotic voice plays a prerecorded message. "Good evening sir, your Med-Ex is now being dispensed. Have a nice day." The device immediately digs a needle into Stephens' arm to administer a cocktail of stimulants into his bloodstream to ward off the effects of his shock. "PATCHOOSSH." Stephan takes in a deep breath, cracks his neck then walks around the table and over to Carlos. He takes a knee and puts his left hand on Carlos's bloodied up shoulder.
"Carlos. Over the past few years, you've constantly called me names. Belittled me in front of others. Mocked me behind my back and you also overcharged me on all the purchases I've made from your little store. You profit off the death and misery of others and you have no idea how long I've been waiting for that young woman there to show up out of nowhere and give you a taste of your own medicine. I'm just glad I got to see it for myself. And by the way, Regarding your comment 10 minutes ago about sucking your hairy balls for a 25 cap discount. I wouldn't let you lick the sweat off my balls if you were dying of thirst."
Carlos grabs Stephans hand and tightly grasps it. "Steph... Stephan, nooo." Stephan swats Carlos's hand away then stands up. "You can save yourself." Stephan spits into Carlos's face then walks back towards the table. Carlos reflexively swipes his hand to wipe off the spit from his face and accidentally severs his optic nerve. The mashed up eyeball falls into the dirt. Carlos panics. He scoops up his eyeball and tries to dust off some of the dirt to no avail. Now with his eyeball tightly held in his hand, and crying like a complete and total little bitch, Carlos slowly scuttles away towards the beautiful Arizona sunset. Tidal waves of bright vibrant colors including red, green and purple swirl around and dance up in the near dusk sky. The puffy clouds floating above look like delicious pieces of cotton candy and seem so out of place given the radiated murder world of death and sorrow lurking below. Stephan soaks up the sunset and smiles like some kind of sentimental city dick wad on vacation to the country. "This day is getting better and better." Stephan starts shoving all his things into his satchel. Along with some extra spoils for services rendered. Today marks the beginning of a new era. Stories will be told for hundreds of years detailing the events of the next following weeks. Nothing can stop the machine now. It has already begun.