Keono
First time out of the vault
WARNING: Strong language
NOTE: It's sort of an artistic column about the coolness/badassness of Fallout (in this case it's the setting of Fallout 2). It's meant to be understandable for non-Fallout players. And there's a non-canon NPC in it, but he was just too cool to leave out. This is my tribute to the Fallout franchise, and what I think of future releases. I hope it's enjoyable.
------
Awake… I’m in some crappy bedroom of a crappy whorehouse; the Cat’s Paw. A chick next to me. Not half bad, but I’m sure I was on Jet or some heavy duty booze last night, normally I would never let a sleazy whore like her touch me. But fuck it, I was bored, I needed some distraction.
“Hey baby, you were awesome.”
She doesn’t need to tell me, I know I’m good. Still, it’s a compliment.
“It’s easy with a girl like you.”
A smile, she buys it, dumb slut.
I get out of bed, put on some clothes and my armor, then grab my bag from the floor. To be sure, I check to see if I still got everything. All there. Then I notice the cheap thrill ride staring at me and my tattoo on my forehead.
“You know you can come over and do me anytime you want, I don’t mind you being a slaver. I just want the biggest and baddest men.”
Baddest men? Goddamn broad. Anyway, time to skip this joint.
“Sure hunny, see you in a while now.”
I walk out the Cat’s Paw and see Myron standing next to my car, he’s a scrawny little nerd that has an appetite for drugs, booze and sex. But he’s useful, he invented Jet, it’s the drug, it’s used through all layers of civilization… if you could call the wastelands a civilization. I turn my head to see my surroundings: New Reno. There’s nothing left in the wasteland but sand and torn buildings on top of it, but New Reno’s something different. The neon lights, the casino’s, the pimps, the crime, the porn… the drugs. It’s all here. The only town that at least has something to offer. Vault City still is high tech, sure, but it’s dictated by pretentious leaders who know nothing of the world and the inhabitants. They’re in the dark. They trade with ‘outworlders’ to remain their ignorant existence, but in the end we’ll all come marching in, demanding their technology and whatever they got in their vault. They’ll be cut off then, and die a slow death. Or so I hope.
“Can we go now?” Myron nags. “You’ve been in there for two hours. I finished in like, half an hour.”
“Don’t blame me for your premature orgasms.”
I have another look at the streets, now to see where my dog is.
“Dogmeat, here!”
A big black-haired dog comes running my way, thumping its heavy paws onto the wrecked pavement left by the pre-war generations. I open the driver’s seat door when a kid runs into me, grubbing his little hands into my pockets, taking a few coins. He runs off. I pull out my gun and shoot him in the back, flooring him.
“Fucking nerve…” I groan.
“Could you stop fooling around now? We need money” Myron complains.
“I’m the one earning it, so I’ll decide when I’m ready. You just whip up some Jet.”
I turn around to see Dogmeat chewing on the kid’s ear.
“Dogmeat, here! You don’t know where the little fucker’s been. Come on.”
Then I notice a poster on a wall, right above the child’s body. It’s a picture of me with the text “Wanted dead or alive for child killing.”
I smile. We leave town.
I inhale some Jet that Myron just made, while driving ourselves through the desert. Everything’s sand. Everything’s destroyed, ruined, torn apart by the Great War. Radiation still kills people every day. Creatures are getting more vile all the time. Towns are slowly degrading into war zones with all the raiders and the gangs. But I just need some money and some ammo to get through the fucking day.
I’ve driven I-don’t-know-how-many hours and miles, but we’re here at last, we’re at The Den. Having a car is a real luxury, I’m one of the few as far as I know. Still, travel’s a bitch, especially with horny ol’ Myron in the back, whining about the lack of hot women on the backseat.
I park my car and wander through town, on my way to Metzger. He’s the boss of the slave pen on the east-side of town. A real butcher. Always has work for me. He deals in slaves, and a lot of ‘em. He’s got a backyard that’s all fenced up, filled with slaves ready for sale, all weak and stupid, but just handy enough to do the work you don’t want to.
While wandering the streets, a longhaired punk with a leather jacket yells at me.
“Hey yo, get of my turf! … moron.”
His two friends laugh, they feel big with their spears, knives and submachine guns. But they should’ve known better. I draw my gun and shoot the one holding the SMG in his arm. The other two turn around, shocked, holding onto their useless weaponry. I take another shot, this time at the girl holding a spear, who drops to the floor, moaning. Just as the last guy charges at me, Dogmeat jumps and sinks his teeth into his face. After a minute of tearing and chewing, he looks like hell. The remaining punk is on his knees, trying to get away. A simple shot to the head solves that problem. I check their pockets for money and drugs, it would be a waste to leave it lying around here. People stare at me, in awe or fear, but they don’t step up. A wise decision.
I continue my stroll and move into the slaver’s pen, heavily guarded by twenty or thirty men, but they all know me.
“Metzger’s got a load of work for you, he was hoping you’d drop by” one of the guys says to me while lowering his rifle.
“Good, good, could use the money.”
“You’ve been visiting Reno again?” he asks me with a big grin.
“You know it.”
“If it wasn’t for the Jet fumes, I could still smell the ‘love stink’ all over you, right?”
“Right again Jeff” I answer as I walk in.
I open the door to Metzger’s office and there he stands. A big bald guy, tattoo smack-dab in the middle of his forehead, just like every one of us. A dozen of guards are with us in the room, staring at my weapon, a heavily modified pistol.
“There you are!” he welcomes me. “I got a job, two miles north-east of here. Some camp of travelers or… I don’t know, don’t care. Take Jeff and Henry with you.”
“Sure thing.”
Just as I turned around, he adds a side note to his story.
“Oh, keep that dog on a leash. Great fukken’ mutt, but he tears up the merchandise.”
The guards laugh. One of them points to the backyard filled with slaves and explains.
“Yeah, one of the poor bastards out there’s got an ear missing!” he laughs.
I take Jeff and Henry with me in the Highwayman, with Myron and Dogmeat as well. All the slavers want to work with me because of my car, they all love the rides.
We leave the car in the bushes and walk up to the camp. Jeff and Henry position themselves on the other side, to stop them if they plan on running. I jump out with my gun and my dog at the ready, they all know the deal. They fear me, they know what I am. They’ll cry many tears, bleed a load of blood if they don’t cooperate, but I don’t care really.
Hey, it’s a job.
I just have the feeling I could’ve led many other lives, as if this only one way. I’ve always had a choice, but this is who I am, and this is what I did with that freedom. The only thing I regret is the future, when things will change in the hands of incompetent fools, when my freedom is taken away from me… I’ll just linger in this world instead.
“OH NO!!”
“SLAVERS!!”
“We got a runner Jeff!”
Back to work…
NOTE: It's sort of an artistic column about the coolness/badassness of Fallout (in this case it's the setting of Fallout 2). It's meant to be understandable for non-Fallout players. And there's a non-canon NPC in it, but he was just too cool to leave out. This is my tribute to the Fallout franchise, and what I think of future releases. I hope it's enjoyable.
------
Awake… I’m in some crappy bedroom of a crappy whorehouse; the Cat’s Paw. A chick next to me. Not half bad, but I’m sure I was on Jet or some heavy duty booze last night, normally I would never let a sleazy whore like her touch me. But fuck it, I was bored, I needed some distraction.
“Hey baby, you were awesome.”
She doesn’t need to tell me, I know I’m good. Still, it’s a compliment.
“It’s easy with a girl like you.”
A smile, she buys it, dumb slut.
I get out of bed, put on some clothes and my armor, then grab my bag from the floor. To be sure, I check to see if I still got everything. All there. Then I notice the cheap thrill ride staring at me and my tattoo on my forehead.
“You know you can come over and do me anytime you want, I don’t mind you being a slaver. I just want the biggest and baddest men.”
Baddest men? Goddamn broad. Anyway, time to skip this joint.
“Sure hunny, see you in a while now.”
I walk out the Cat’s Paw and see Myron standing next to my car, he’s a scrawny little nerd that has an appetite for drugs, booze and sex. But he’s useful, he invented Jet, it’s the drug, it’s used through all layers of civilization… if you could call the wastelands a civilization. I turn my head to see my surroundings: New Reno. There’s nothing left in the wasteland but sand and torn buildings on top of it, but New Reno’s something different. The neon lights, the casino’s, the pimps, the crime, the porn… the drugs. It’s all here. The only town that at least has something to offer. Vault City still is high tech, sure, but it’s dictated by pretentious leaders who know nothing of the world and the inhabitants. They’re in the dark. They trade with ‘outworlders’ to remain their ignorant existence, but in the end we’ll all come marching in, demanding their technology and whatever they got in their vault. They’ll be cut off then, and die a slow death. Or so I hope.
“Can we go now?” Myron nags. “You’ve been in there for two hours. I finished in like, half an hour.”
“Don’t blame me for your premature orgasms.”
I have another look at the streets, now to see where my dog is.
“Dogmeat, here!”
A big black-haired dog comes running my way, thumping its heavy paws onto the wrecked pavement left by the pre-war generations. I open the driver’s seat door when a kid runs into me, grubbing his little hands into my pockets, taking a few coins. He runs off. I pull out my gun and shoot him in the back, flooring him.
“Fucking nerve…” I groan.
“Could you stop fooling around now? We need money” Myron complains.
“I’m the one earning it, so I’ll decide when I’m ready. You just whip up some Jet.”
I turn around to see Dogmeat chewing on the kid’s ear.
“Dogmeat, here! You don’t know where the little fucker’s been. Come on.”
Then I notice a poster on a wall, right above the child’s body. It’s a picture of me with the text “Wanted dead or alive for child killing.”
I smile. We leave town.
I inhale some Jet that Myron just made, while driving ourselves through the desert. Everything’s sand. Everything’s destroyed, ruined, torn apart by the Great War. Radiation still kills people every day. Creatures are getting more vile all the time. Towns are slowly degrading into war zones with all the raiders and the gangs. But I just need some money and some ammo to get through the fucking day.
I’ve driven I-don’t-know-how-many hours and miles, but we’re here at last, we’re at The Den. Having a car is a real luxury, I’m one of the few as far as I know. Still, travel’s a bitch, especially with horny ol’ Myron in the back, whining about the lack of hot women on the backseat.
I park my car and wander through town, on my way to Metzger. He’s the boss of the slave pen on the east-side of town. A real butcher. Always has work for me. He deals in slaves, and a lot of ‘em. He’s got a backyard that’s all fenced up, filled with slaves ready for sale, all weak and stupid, but just handy enough to do the work you don’t want to.
While wandering the streets, a longhaired punk with a leather jacket yells at me.
“Hey yo, get of my turf! … moron.”
His two friends laugh, they feel big with their spears, knives and submachine guns. But they should’ve known better. I draw my gun and shoot the one holding the SMG in his arm. The other two turn around, shocked, holding onto their useless weaponry. I take another shot, this time at the girl holding a spear, who drops to the floor, moaning. Just as the last guy charges at me, Dogmeat jumps and sinks his teeth into his face. After a minute of tearing and chewing, he looks like hell. The remaining punk is on his knees, trying to get away. A simple shot to the head solves that problem. I check their pockets for money and drugs, it would be a waste to leave it lying around here. People stare at me, in awe or fear, but they don’t step up. A wise decision.
I continue my stroll and move into the slaver’s pen, heavily guarded by twenty or thirty men, but they all know me.
“Metzger’s got a load of work for you, he was hoping you’d drop by” one of the guys says to me while lowering his rifle.
“Good, good, could use the money.”
“You’ve been visiting Reno again?” he asks me with a big grin.
“You know it.”
“If it wasn’t for the Jet fumes, I could still smell the ‘love stink’ all over you, right?”
“Right again Jeff” I answer as I walk in.
I open the door to Metzger’s office and there he stands. A big bald guy, tattoo smack-dab in the middle of his forehead, just like every one of us. A dozen of guards are with us in the room, staring at my weapon, a heavily modified pistol.
“There you are!” he welcomes me. “I got a job, two miles north-east of here. Some camp of travelers or… I don’t know, don’t care. Take Jeff and Henry with you.”
“Sure thing.”
Just as I turned around, he adds a side note to his story.
“Oh, keep that dog on a leash. Great fukken’ mutt, but he tears up the merchandise.”
The guards laugh. One of them points to the backyard filled with slaves and explains.
“Yeah, one of the poor bastards out there’s got an ear missing!” he laughs.
I take Jeff and Henry with me in the Highwayman, with Myron and Dogmeat as well. All the slavers want to work with me because of my car, they all love the rides.
We leave the car in the bushes and walk up to the camp. Jeff and Henry position themselves on the other side, to stop them if they plan on running. I jump out with my gun and my dog at the ready, they all know the deal. They fear me, they know what I am. They’ll cry many tears, bleed a load of blood if they don’t cooperate, but I don’t care really.
Hey, it’s a job.
I just have the feeling I could’ve led many other lives, as if this only one way. I’ve always had a choice, but this is who I am, and this is what I did with that freedom. The only thing I regret is the future, when things will change in the hands of incompetent fools, when my freedom is taken away from me… I’ll just linger in this world instead.
“OH NO!!”
“SLAVERS!!”
“We got a runner Jeff!”
Back to work…