Memoirs of the Lone Wanderer

(I've had a recent surge of fandom for the Fallout series... so I wrote this. Basically, it's a 1st person retelling of FO3, with some changes. Enjoy!)

A very wise man once said “War never changes.” These three words held true for me throughout my entire adult life. Ever since the first weapon was invented, our disagreements and quarrels were bound to end in meaningless bloodshed, one man killing another until no more could be lost. The very essence of war itself is death, regardless of how higher powers try to sugar coat it. No matter what, war is never a good thing. War is never without loss.

War never changes.

It was October 23, 2077, when the human race destroyed its’ very home in the name of war. The day the sky rained fire, the ground charred, the air itself stood still as the world fell into the dark state that it would remain in for years to come. For two-hundred years, people holed up in vaults, labored on the surface for survival, or died.

It was in a vault I lived, and it was in a vault I would die. These were the most basic of principles that were pounded into our heads in Vault 101 on a daily basis. Life in the vault required constant knowledge that we were better off stuck down there, below the earth, than out on the surface, where our ancestors were born, where people roamed free of worry before the fateful day in October. I guess I never second guessed what they told us down there, because it was what I believed would be true my entire life.

My name is Frost. I was born on July 13th, 2258, to James and Catherine DeLuca, two scientists who had met in the field of study. My mother died of cardiac arrest shortly after I was born, leaving my father to care for me instead. I was all that mattered in the world to my father, and to be honest, he was all that mattered in the world to me as well. Without my mother around, we both needed each other to fill the void that my mother’s death left in our lives.

Down in the vault, your memories seem to mesh together. Every day seems to be the same. Same old steel walls, same old cold floors, same old food. The only memories you ever seem to recollect are the important ones, the ones that had huge impacts on your life. The first of those I can distinctly remember was my tenth birthday, the day I received my Pip-Boy 3000.

The Pip-Boy was a device that everyone in the vault got. It was like a wrist watch, only larger; about six inches long and four inches wide. It was sealed on the wearer’s arm with biomechanical locks that responded to the wearer’s nervous systems. The only things that could remove a Pip-Boy 3000 from its’ wearer was the Overseer of a vault, and the wearer itself. Since it was so important to daily life, the only people who ever removed Pip-Boys were the Overseers, usually from the recently deceased who had no use for the devices any longer. Their general purposes were to examine food, tell of sickness, injury, and overall body health, receive radio signals and transmit sound waves to the brain, and to provide light in the darkness. However, most kids in the vault, such as myself, put apps on them to give us something to do to pass the time.

I remember walking into a dark room and the lights suddenly blinking on, blinding me momentarily. Bright lights never did settle well with me. I was so worried about shielding my eyes that I barely heard the call of “Surprise!” from the people at the party. The first two people I was able to make out were my father, my friend, Amata, and my two best friends, Tia and Garret. “Happy birthday, son. I can’t believe you’re already ten years old… your mother would have been so proud of you.” My father said to me. He was an averagely sized man, not too big and not too skinny, and he had brown hair like me, though his hair had several silver streaks in it, a result of his extremely hard work ethic. He and I shared deep blue eyes as well.

My father’s values of politeness stuck with me, so naturally, I responded courteously. “Thanks, dad! This is great!”

“Don’t thank me. Thank Amata. She was the one that put all of this together.”

I turned to Amata and nodded. “Thanks, Amata.” I said, as she handed me my present.

“Don’t worry about it. Worry about your present! Here you go! One issue of Grognak the Barbarian!”

I happily took the present. I had read the comic book dozens of times already, but it didn’t matter. I was getting presents, which was every child’s dream at that age, especially in the vaults. Before I could say thanks to Amata once more, the Overseer, her father, walked in front of her and handed me my Pip-Boy 3000. “Here you go, young man. One Pip-Boy 3000. Get used to it.” He said.

I fastened the device to my right arm and clicked the power button to boot up the device. The screen displayed light green letters that spelled out ‘Name entry for new user?’ The Overseer tapped my shoulder. “Say your name.” He said.

I put my face close to the device and said “Frost DeLuca”. The letter changed to another question. ‘Birth date?’ it said. “July 13th, 2258.” I responded to it. It changed once more, saying ‘Favorite color?’ I looked around the room. I had never really noticed many colors other than the steel blue that I was used to. “Blue.” I said, as the green letters changed to light blue. Finally, the letters faded away to show a cartoon boy in a vault suit, with six bars labeled ‘Left arm, left leg, right arm, right leg, torso, head.’

“Looks like you’ve already got the hang of it.” My father remarked. “Say hello to everyone at your party while me and Jonas prepare another surprise for you downstairs.”

“Yes sir!” I said excitedly. I loved it when my father and Jonas did things like this for me. Jonas was like an older brother to me, always advising me when my father couldn’t. Jonas taught me a lot about computers, and that led to me being one of the two kids in the vault able to use the terminals to develop simple apps for the rest of the kids. Tia could do it too, and she was a lot better at it than me. While I was developing simple word processors, she re-created the famous pre-war arcade game, Pac-Man.

While I turned to say hello to Old Lady Palmer, I was tackled from behind, falling to the floor with a good deal of weight on me. I didn’t have to turn around to know from the giggling that it was Tia. “Happy birthday, Frostie!” she said excitedly.

She got off of me, and I turned over to see Garret there next to her. He was a tad bit taller than me, with blonde hair and green hair, and a Pip-Boy on his wrist, since he turned ten the year before, in May. He always had a confident look on his face, and he excelled in his studies, usually taking time to help me and Tia with our grades. He was a silly one, but only to those he was comfortable with.

And then there was Tia. She was short, mostly because she was only 8 at the time, and her Asian decent was obvious in her brown eyes and jet black hair. She didn’t have a Pip-Boy yet, and she was eying mine with great interest. She was quiet, with a docile look to her.

Garret helped me up to my feet and shook my hand. “Happy birthday, man. Finally got a Pip-Boy, huh?” he asked, rhetorically.

“You know it!” I excitedly exclaimed, and then turned to Tia.

“Well, don’t just stand there. Gimme a hug, silly.” She insisted as she walked ahead and gave me a squeezing hug. She said “Happy Birthday!” as she pulled away, and then went with Garret to tell Andy, a robotic butler of the Mr. Handy series of Robots, to cut the cake. This, of course, left me to deal with the party guests.

I went around, with several helloes and goodbyes, attaining several presents like a baseball cap from Stanley the mechanic, a poem from Ms. Beatrice, and a sweet roll from Old Lady Palmer. Finally, I approached Butch, the vault’s bully, and his little ‘gang’ – Wally Mack, and Paul Hannon, all of whom dad insisted we invite. Paul was nice as always, but switched to insults as Wally and Butch made fun of him. Wally teased my party’s quality, insisting his party; one that I wasn’t invited to; was much better. Finally, I turned to Butch, only to hear a screeching noise behind me.

Andy had miscalculated his cut, and had torn the cake apart, sending bits of icing and cake all over the walls and tables. Amata groaned, remarking “Andy!” while putting a palm to her face. Butch was not pleased.

“I’m hungry, and that stupid robot destroyed the cake!” he said, angry. “Give me that sweet roll you got from Old Lady Palmer!”

I had been pushed around for years, and I was not about to let Butch ruin my party, damn it. I mustered up a bit of courage and spat back out at Butch, “What’s the matter, Butch? Your mom drank up all of the rationing coupons again?”

“No one talks about my mom!” he yelled as he got up, landing a square punch on my nose. Before I could retaliate, Officer Gomez intervened and pulled Butch to the side, scolding him, while my dad consoled me.

“Are you alright?” he asked. “Butch didn’t hurt you, did he?”

“No, dad. He tried to take my sweet roll, but I didn’t let him.” I replied, ignoring the blood coming from my nose and a tear welling up in one eye.

Dad gave me a tissue to soak up the little bit of blood, and smiled. “I’m glad to hear it. The moment you let bullies push you around, your life will become much, much harder. Trust me.”

The rest of the party was a blur, until dad told me that Jonas had just called on the intercom, saying that my surprise was ready. Excited, Dad led me down to the Reactor level to Jonas, and handed me my very own Red Ryder BB gun. Thanking the two, I hurried to the makeshift shooting range that Dad and Jonas had set up in the old, unused storage room, and began firing away at the three targets. I was good at it, too, hitting the target every time.

“Calm down, son. There’s a radroach coming. Think you can take care of it with your BB gun?” he asked me.

Indeed, a gigantic, mutated roach, a type of dangerous pest that showed up in the vault every once in a while, crawled into view.

Jonas tapped on my shoulder. “Try the V.A.T.S button on your Pip-Boy.” He advised me. I looked downwards at my Pip-Boy and found the button, pressing it.

Immediately a neural sensation shot through my body, directing my arms slightly to the radroach’s head. I took advantage of the Vault-Tec Assisted Targeting System, and fired. The BB flew at the roach, and to my great joy, the insect’s head exploded. Dad smiled at me. “Great job, son. Hey Jonas, take a picture of me with the big-game hunter.” He said. He and I stood together, and Jonas snapped the picture, the blinding light returning me to the blur of the redundancy of Vault Life.

_____

The next thing I remember was when I was 15. Garret had reached 16 a few months ago and took the G.O.A.T – Generalized Occupation Aptitude Test – ending up with the job of mechanic, under Stanley’s wing. Tia had turned 14, and the three of us were closer than ever. Butch’s gang, now named the ‘Tunnel Snakes’, hardly messed with us when we were in a group, but with Garret gone with work, me and Tia were alone far more often, vulnerable to the Tunnel Snakes’ harassment, but we still enjoyed each other’s company, no matter how wary we had to be.

I had recently installed one of Jonas’ apps to my Pip-Boy; one that gave it an advanced Auto-Intelligence, accompanied with a voice. Each Pip-Boy in the Vault with the app installed had a different voice and accent; mine had a male Englishman voice, akin to that of a stereotypical butler.

I had just finished class that day, and I was walking back to my apartment, when I heard Tia’s voice. I happily sped myself up to say hello, but then I heard another voice, and another, and another.

The Tunnel Snakes.

“Damn it!” I said to myself as I turned my happy walk into a sprint, turning around a corner to see that indeed, the Tunnel Snakes were hitting on Tia. Butch, Wally, and even Paul, who had hardened in personality from the nice kid he used to be, were standing around her, poking and prodding, teasing and laughing.

Without a second thought, I pressed the V.A.T.S button and felt my arm swinging at full velocity towards the back of Wally’s head. My blow connected and he fell to the ground, unconscious. Naturally, this didn’t go over well with Butch and Paul. “You’re gonna pay for that, you son of a bitch!” Butch yelled as he began punching me in the gut. Despite my best efforts to use my agility to use my agility to get out of the way, Paul and Butch hammered me and I ended up slumped against the wall with a broken nose and a few good bruises and Butch, Paul, and an awakened Wally walked away, their leader spitting out “Come on Tunnel Snakes. This bitch isn’t worth our time.”

Tia knelt down to me. “Frost! Are you alright?” she asked, a look of deep concern on her face. I’ll never forget that face, her eyes staring at me with miniscule tears forming, her hair perfectly fallen into place as always, and with that same concerned look.

I nodded as best as I could. “I’m alright… I’m just more worried about you.”

Tia blushed. “I-I’m okay. We better go bring you to your dad in the clinic.” She said, helping me to my feet and balancing me. I simply nodded.

What happened after that was, like most of my time in there, a blur. I remember a crush on Tia while she dated Freddie Gomez. I never really acted on it, even after they broke up a few months later. We still hung out, but nothing ever came out of it.

Then, finally, I turned 16, and the infamous G.O.A.T came.


My recollection of the G.O.A.T starts with trying to convince my dad that I was sick. The man was a doctor, so you can imagine how that went. So I grabbed a pencil and a notebook and headed to class.

I made my way into the classroom, sighting the usual; the Tunnel Snakes propped up against a wall, Tia and Freddie exchanging deadly looks at each other, and Mr. Brotch, our teacher, ushering us into class. The class had two columns of five seats each with a projector in this middle of the class. I took my seat in the middle chair of the right column, behind Tia.

“Alright, kids, prepare to take your G.O.A.T exams. Remember to take this seriously, because this test will determine your official Vault duties for the rest of your life. Also remember that cheating won’t help you, seeing as this is a free-answer test with no wrong answers.” Mr. Brotch explained, looking at Butch. “Yes, that means you, Mr. DeLoria.”

Butch stifled a laugh and sarcastically said “Sure thing, Mr. Brotch.”

Mr. Brotch sighed and began to hand out or G.O.A.T’s. It was a single paper, with answer spaces and a space to write our names. I signed “Frost DeLuca” at the top and waited for Mr. Brotch to activate the projector.

“Alright, question number one. You are approached by a frenzied vault scientist, who yells, ‘I'm going to put my quantum harmonizer in your photonic resonation chamber!’ What's your response?”

I thought for a moment, and decided I would just quietly sneak away and alert Vault authorities, writing down my answer quickly.

“Question number two. While working as an intern in the clinic, a patient with a strange infection on his foot stumbles through the door. The infection is spreading at an alarming rate, but the doctor has stepped out for a while. What do you do?”

I remembered helping my dad with all kinds of medicinal work, and even though I was never great at it, I knew that if something couldn’t be saved, the best choice was to amputate. So, I wrote “Amputate before the infection spreads.”

“Question number three. You discover a young boy lost in the lower levels of the vault. He's hungry and frightened, but also appears to be in possession of stolen property. What do you do?”

I would never let a kid stay hungry and frightened in a big place like the vault. Despite his stolen property, I wrote “Tell him everything will be okay, and lead him to safety.”

“Question four. Congratulations! You made one of the Vault 101 baseball teams! Which position do you prefer?”

I never played baseball and I was never much of a sport person. So, I wrote down “None, I wish the vault had a decent shooting range.”

“Question five. Your Grandmother invites you to tea, but you're surprised when she gives you a pistol and orders you to kill another vault resident. What do you do?”

I never knew of my grandmother, and killing other humans wouldn’t sit well with my stomach at the very least. So, I just wrote “Refuse and warn the resident.”

“Question six. Old Mr. Abernathy has locked himself in his quarters again, and you've been ordered to get him out. How do you proceed?”

I knew my way around a laser pistol, so I wrote down “Retrieve a laser pistol and shoot the lock off.”

“Question seven. Oh no! You've been exposed to radiation, and a mutated hand has grown out of your stomach! What's the best course of treatment?”

I’m pretty sure that I wouldn’t be happy at all with a hand growing out of me. I also figured it would be rather painful. So, I wrote down “A bullet to the brain.”

“Question eight. A fellow Vault 101 resident is in possession of a Grognak the Barbarian comic book, issue number 1. You want it. What's the best way to obtain it?”

I did love my Grognak books, but I didn’t really condone stealing. However, if I had to, I’d use my gun skills and take the comic book at gunpoint.

“Question nine. You decide it would be fun to play a prank on your father. You enter his private restroom when no one is looking, and.... “

I could never play a prank on my father, so I imagined playing a prank on Butch to ease my mind a bit. I wrote “Loosen some bolts on some pipes. When the sink is turned on, the room will flood.”

Mr. Brotch sighed as he read the tenth question. “Finally, who is indisputably the most important person in Vault 101: He who shelters us from the harshness of the atomic wasteland, and to whom we owe everything we have, including our lives?”

I hated the propaganda the Vault forced on us, but I figured there would be some repercussions if I didn’t write down what they wanted me to, so I jotted down ‘The Overseer’.

“Alright kiddos, that’s it. The infamous G.O.A.T. Turn in your tests one-at-a-time, and I’ll get to scoring them.”

I turned my test in behind Tia, whose result was ‘Doctor’, which meant she would be taking my dad’s place in a few years. Mr. Brotch eyed my test closely with his extensive answer key, and then put it down on the desk. “Well, Mr. DeLuca, looks like you’ll be the first person outside of the Brotch family to be the vault’s teacher in three generations. Congratulations!” he said.

I had no idea how my various answers describing my skill with firearms would dictate me getting put into a teaching position, but I figured that getting ‘Teacher’ was better than getting ‘Garbage Burner’. I thanked Mr. Brotch, and then proceeded out of the classroom; not fast enough to miss hearing Butch getting assigned as the Vault’s next ‘Hairdresser’. Laughing, I returned to me and dad’s quarters.

That was the end of my last happy memory in the Vault.