Begin Recording
114
Recording by Scribe Ellison
I did go back to vault 114, a few years later. After seeing a few other vaults it became clear that Vault-tec was doing strange things in every vault, not just ours. Piper wanted to do an expose so we went back to see what we could find out. Took Nick along too, hired him in case raiders or something had moved into the vault. No one had so it was just a day out with my Diamond City friends. Piper even brought a picnic, squirrel bits and cornbread and some Nuka-colas she scrounged.
It was fun for a while, we went through the place laughing at the idea of a bunch of upper-deck types stuck in this place. The vault was pitched as the height of luxury but it didn't even have his and hers toilets, just one room.
Nick remembered seeing holotapes in the overseer's office where he'd been locked up so we all gathered around to listen to them. And laugh at that too, since the overseer they picked said he refused to wear pants on the job. No matter how old you are, someone refusing to wear pants is always funny.
Piper was making notes and Nick was just along for the ride. He was the first to get serious. "Putting people cheek by jowl, families crammed in with strangers, no personal space or possessions… sounds like this place was designed to destroy human dignity."
Piper's pencil slowed down in her notebook and she looked up. "Nick?"
"I may not be human but I understand having your own clothes and your own job. The folks on the upper tier may have a little too much dignity, but nobody deserves to have all of it taken away."
That's the thought that had been growing sickly in the back of my mind, this place was funny but it was calculated to produce misery. I found a list of names on the terminal, families, some of them with infants and one couple with a dog. Next to the dog's name was 'Do not allow.' They were going to make people leave their dog outside? And not tell the people beforehand? That seemed like such pointless cruelty.
Piper too looked a little nauseated by the idea. Just that morning we'd been playing with puppies, the main reason I'd come down to Diamond City was to deliver three of Dogmeat and Goliath's pups to their new owners.
I said, "This is sick. It isn't science. Freezing us, at least that makes sense, Doc Jenna says she wishes we could freeze people until we got better tools or found the cure for their disease. There's a use for freezing people. But what's the use in making people miserable?"
"It never happened, Blue. This vault wasn't completed remember?"
"Thin skin you got there, General."
I think I shot back something like, "Stuff it Valentine or I'll give you a puppy." And Piper laughed her head off and said we'd seen all the terminals so we might as well go home so she could type up her story. I think she titled it 'Prewar Hopes Betrayed' but it wasn't a big hit.