And now here I am, in the middle of summer, in a desert, under a near-cloudless sky, with only loose robes and a two hundred year old fedora shielding me from the baking heat. And I'm.. actually
happy. I mean, I've sort of believed that the human brain wasn't really designed to copy with the society we'd built for ourselves for a while, but I'm still surprised by exactly how much happier I've become since…
Not exactly 'downshifting', but… Embracing a more 'simple' way of life.
It's easier to keep busy without modern distractions, and the whole 'scrabbling to stay alive' thing the Fallout Universe has going on.
There's no internet in post-apocalyptic Nevada. No television. Only two or three radio stations, and most of the time you're lucky if you can get good reception on
one. Consumer culture? When I arrived, the people here were happy that they could just about produce enough
food for everyone. As Moist von Lipwig said in
Making Money, you can't eat gold.
And now, things are going to get a little more complicated.
Oh, that's
never a good thing. When things 'get complicated' in Fallout, someone - or a lot of someones - end up dead.
I glance back at the perimeter wall protecting our 'capital'. Most of it predates the war which burned the world, something I find jolly impressive. The material we've used to patch the places where it's crumbled away is a good deal less resilient, but to a casual observer it makes it look continuous. Not that I think we'll need it, but…
The robe standing next to me flaps slightly. "They're coming."
And here comes that complication.
I don't respond out loud, but nod and begin walking through the open gate to greet our visitors. The robe appears to believe that is the correct course of action as well, and jerkily follows me. As I pass through I glance back at the fortified gatehouse and make momentary eye contact with Keanan. He isn't happy about me going out like this, and he's even less happy about leaving the gate open with a potentially hostile force in the area. We compromised on laying a mix of plasma and fragmentation mines just inside the entrance, but… If this goes badly I very much doubt that they'll be useful.
And it'll likely be too late for you as well.
Looking out across the shimmering salt flats, I can just about make out the plumes of dust being thrown up by the wheels of the oncoming vehicles. An obvious drawback of living in such a well-known pre-war site is that anyone with a map knows where it is. Around here, pre-war military bases are often treasure-troves of valuable weapons and other equipment, and with our nearest civilised neighbours being hard-pressed by one of their less pleasant neighbours it only makes sense for them to come and have a look.
The implied 'and threaten them into compliance' going unsaid, of course.
Hm. Let's see. Our wall-guns are in perfect working order. They probably won't expect that, but they will almost certainly assume that at least some of them will be working. We could hit them with lasers from here, and that's… Something they know. Which means that the two-. No, three trucks that I can see, are the advanced scouts. The officer in charge -and if we're lucky, the civilian government representative- will be back behind the ridgeline, out of sight and out of range.
Let's hope they're not a General Ripper type. This is tense enough without the guy in charge having a raging conflict-boner.
I pick up the pace a little, my left hand reaching for the small ring which hangs from a thong around my neck. An orange power ring. Fully functional when I arrived, I've long since expended all of its power. The tribe accepted me as one of them when I used it to open up the high security areas of the base which had remained inviolate for two hundred years, and… I'm grateful that its power allowed me to survive the fallout from that. But again, I don't miss it. It was useful while it lasted, but I simply didn't have it for long enough to get really attached.
Ah, no suitable charging devices in the Wasteland, eh?
The trucks are closer now, and from the way the dust plumes are getting smaller I'm going to guess that they're slowing down. I release my ring and hold out my hands to either side so that they can see that I'm if not unarmed then at least I'm not carrying a weapon in my hands right now. Then there's another plume as two of the trucks turn off, one moving to the north and the other to the south. The remaining truck accelerates once again, moving towards us at speed.
Moving to set up attack positions if things go ploin-shaped, no doubt.
Ah, yes. On the canvas sides of the two trucks which turned away I can just about make out the
two-headed bear symbol of the New California Republic. The fact that the New California Republic is sending an emissary here isn't surprising. If anything, it's odd that they've taken this long to get around to it. We're only about a hundred miles from their capital Shady Sands here, but without satellites or aircraft I suppose it's not all that easy for them to scout us out. And of course they've had their own, more urgent problems.
Making them likely to be on edge, expecting trouble...
Once we reach a decent distance from the gates I stop and patiently wait for them to reach us. And I make a point of not paying undue attention to the
grey-coated figure who jumps out of the back of the northern truck and sets up what I'm sure is a sniping gun of some sort. My tribe doesn't make much use of projectile weapons. Making gunpowder is awkward, let alone forging bullets for them. And since the pre-war garrison here was mostly armed with laser weapons anyway…
They outgun the visitors, if nothing else. And likely outrange them too.
The truck pull to a stop about five metres away, whereupon it stops and the squad of lightly equipped soldiers in the back pile out. They don't point their weapons at us-. Well, most of them don't and the one who does gets glared at by his NCO until he stops.
I nod politely as the NCO walks closer, his gun at rest across his chest. "You drew the short straw, huh?"
Okay, he's not looking for a fight. I doubt he wants to commit too many forces trying to besiege a clearly well-defended compound.
I smile. "I volunteered, yes."
His brow twitches as he hears my accent. I suppose that he might never have heard one quite like it. It's not that strange, but most tribes in this region have a similar general sound, even if their specific modes of expression vary from tribe to tribe.
Hell, would he ever have heard an English accent before at all? I doubt there's much international travel, if any at all.
"My name is Sergeant Mitchell, and I'm part of the Second Infantry Company of the New California Republic. You know what the NCR is?"
Which isn't nearly as insulting a question as it sounds. News travels slowly around here, and we trade mostly with
tribes to the south, rather than the NCR proper to the west or the
Rangers to the north-west. There isn't a lot of traffic -none at all, actually- and our only real contact with the NCR comes via the occasional visit to New Vegas.
Let's hope no Platinum Chips get involved...
"Yes, I know the NCR. My name is Krono." Well. It isn't. But even now I can't say my actual name so why worry about it? Though maybe next time I won't ask a five year old to select my nom de guerre.
"Mm. And who's yer friend?"
"This-" I glance at him. "-is
Goris. He's a bit shy around new people."
Ah, a very simple naming scheme the locals have, eh?
"He armed?"
"He's not carrying any weapons." I smile. "How can I help the NCR?"
Note that wasn't a 'no'... That bodes even more poorly for the visitors.
"We've heard that there's a raider tribe livin' in this area, a nasty bunch callin' themselves the
Sky Reavers. You know anythin' about them?"
Ah, that's how they're going to play this. It's a little sad that even after the
Bitter Springs Massacre the NCR seems to have trouble telling tribals apart.
"I suppose you could say that I'm the tribe's leader. Now, anyway."
Oh, boy. I'm not sure whether that's a good sign or a bad one...
He nods in satisfaction. "Well that saves us a whole lot of time. You know what the NCR does to raiders?"
"The tribe's raiding behaviour was a result of an unfortunate mental illness that afflicted the tribe's then-leaders. Since I took over, we've been making amends with those among our neighbours who we've attacked. Feel free to confirm that with your contacts in Ashton."
He nods noncommittally. "Yeah, we'll do that. What kinda mental illness did they have?"
"Not a contagious one, obviously."
What
should I call it? The NCR doesn't use
mystics, and if you haven't seen that sort of thing in action there's an understandable tendency for people to be sceptical.
"They claimed they could hear whispers from the sky, ordering them to conquer and destroy the wasteland's other inhabitants. The whole tribe ended up praying to the 'Sky Lords' at their behest."
Hoo boy. Yeah, that sounds so pleasant.
Which is true, though a massive oversimplification. A more complete explanation would mention that the more sensitive settlers had been badly affected by the zetan neurotropic initiator that the pre-war researchers were playing with in the basement, developing minor psychic powers while becoming completely obsessed with getting into the high security areas. When I turned up with a power ring they glommed onto me at once, believing that I was the solution they'd been praying to their alien gods for. I didn't realise exactly how crazy they were until later. The fragmented alien computers might have been able to resist American researchers before the war, but they couldn't stop an orange power ring wielded by a desperate man.
Power Rings Are Awesome... until the battery runs out, anyway.
"But they don't do that no more?"
"I.. was forced to kill most of them. The survivors decided to see things my way. They still
believe in the Sky Lords, but they now think that they're evil."
"Heh." He nods. "Alright,
Ambassador Granger's gunna be negotiating a settlement on behalf of the NCR. You alright to meet him?"
Heh, a minor footnote in Fallout history. No doubt things might improve a little for him here.
"Certainly."
"Okay." He turns back to the truck. "Lenny! Signal forward base! Tell 'em we got someone to negotiate for the Sky Reavers!"
"Yes Sergeant!"
"Oh, ah, Sergeant? The tribe isn't called that any more."
Best way to break off with the past.
He turns back to me. "Oh yeah? What's it called now, then?"
"The Sky Walkers."
icard: You seriously went there? You devious troll.
