Entry 12: The Quest for The Ancient Rangefinder

Hello mommy. Hello daddy.

I gave the reports to McNamara first thing, like I said I would. After he went through the reports he told me he trusted me enough to give me a confidential and urgent mission. Shit. He wanted parts from old vaults to keep the air on the bunker running. Two of the parts I had already, but hell - maybe you guessed this already -, I had to go on a biiig stroll to get the parts that were missing. Vault 22 was the place.

I had forgotten that the most direct road North was full of deathclaws. When we saw them I remembered I had a bunch of stealth boys and we got through all those ugly fuckers with no problems except the soiled pants. Speaking of soiled pants, when we thaught we were safely into the whole New Vegas area a motherfreaking deathclaw slashed Veronica and scared the hell out of me. I tell you, it's going to be one of my life's highlights, upercutting a deathclaw right in it's ugly jaw and killing him with ED-E. Veronica was ok afterwards, she had that tough power armor.

Wow we even found Fiends. Think after their fucking leader is killed they'd disappear but nooo! Damn.

We arrived in the Vault 22 and, aside from the Giant Mantises, the place was amazing. Green vegetation was coming out of the Vault like it was trying to escape and make it's way out to the brown wastes. Probably another crazy Vault-Tec experiment. But even being green and pretty, I had had nough of Vaults for a life time. So I wanted to get in and out.

The place was a freakin' labyrinth. Things fallen apart, tree logs, everything blocked ways. I eventualy found my way to the cave's door but it was locked, so I had to search the living quarters for a key card that would unlock the bastard. After I did so, I went back up to the cave door I had found. Once inside the caves I fought a bunch of mantises and quickly found my way to where I needed to go and found the filter components. Whew. Now to get off the damned Vault.

It felt so good to feel the fresh air of the Mojave. And I say that coming out of a place with lots of natural air purifiers, but whatever. We took advantage of the fact that we were near Westside to go to the pawnshop Veronica wanted to go, to find that mighty powerful weapon of hers. It was nightime, so we moved quick.

Well, talking to the dude in the Pawnshop was a waste. He only mocked me for trying to find such a thing. Fuck him. The only place we now had to look was the Vault 21, at The Strip. So yeah, was finally going to The Strip. I'm not even sure I'm old enough, at least Old World standards.

Yeaaaa, Freeside. I'm a high roller now, forget the wastes, I'm getting drunk and wagering all my caps! Or, you know, complete a mission for a guy just in the hopes of having a nice armor. Pretty much the same. I passed by the Old Mormon Fort because I knew them to be Followers of the Apocalipse, meaning they could heal my radiation sickness. I knew it because of ED-E, who I would deliver to whoever asked me to deliver him to retrieve the data.

I got to visit the Followers more often. I was told that ED-E was getting his weapons upgraded, though I had to give him away for a while, I got my radiation off the system AND got me a new snowglobe! Ain't life grand.

Freeside was kind of a mix. In a way, there seemed to be order, implemented by a gang called The Kings who didn't seem bad, but on the other hand there was so much poverty and filth... Kids chasing giant rats for dinner... Gosh.

A Securiton greeted me at The Strip's entrance. I had to submit to a credit check, which I passed and off I went into The Strip, wearing spiked armor to fit right in.

Inside I was approached by Victor, the robot who had been following me. He told me that Mr. House, the owner of New Vegas, was expecting to see me. I wasn't even going to see Benny so hell no, I wasn't going to see a dude who passed on his invitation through a robot! I told him to tell Mr. House I MIGHT stop by, but for now I was headed to Vault 21. Which was on the far ass of The Strip. It seems I am destined to walk, pure and simple.

I spat towards The Tops as I passed by. And then I arrived. Talked to the owner, first asking to rent a room and then asking if she knew of any antique rangefinders. She had actually sold one to a guy not long ago and she pointed him to Freeside, near a store named Mick and Ralph's, for him to have shelter! Good. She said that the guy who she sold the rangefinder had a collar on and Veronica didn't like that. She would just say "Elijah, what have you done..."

Before going to rest in my hard earned room, I found another snowglobe! Wow, if luck keeps going like this I may try some casinos. Now we're going to rest, probably for almost a day. The room has two beds, that's nice. I'm so tired of walking... And sleepy, too.

Love you, Bill.

Entry 11: Walk walk walk walk

Hello mommy. Hello daddy.

Veronica punched me in the head when she remembered that we were supposed to pass by the Brotherhood of Steel bunker before going back to Nellis. I sighted, laughed and then punched her back. Oh well, guess it has to be done later!

Before leaving Doc Argyll's clinic I looked around the patients. I had the abilities to heal at least one of them. I didn't try the others because I could very well kill them without wanting to. After I healed the guy, I thought I had done enough helping around for the Boomers to like me. So I went back to Mother Pearl by then.

She said that people accepted me and that I was ready to make them their most valuable job. Their dream. She told me to talk to Loyal, the old sir. He told me that he was going to tell me about the "Lady in the water". Of course, I thought he was crazy. Before I asked him about it, I told him I had repaired the solar arrays. But then I had to ask who that Lady was. Turns out it was a plane, a pre-war one, who crashed centuries ago on the Lake Mead. They had the parts to fully restore it, but needed someone with outside experience to get it out of the water. He intended for me to attach ballasts in which wing, detonate them and then the plane would float to the surface. It was clever but risky. But I'd do it. I just needed some way to get to the bottom of the lake. You didn't make me very good at holding my breath. He told me that Jack might have a rebreather for me. And he had one. And I looked sickly good in it.

Me, Veronica and ED-E headed South to the Hidden Valley. I took a shortcut north of HELIOS One, near what I knew to be Black Mountain. According to Mr. New Vegas, the place had some Super Mutants. And as so happens, I got to confirm that, as I ended up, not on purpose, on top of the mountain. I popped a Stealth Boy and tried to sneak my way in and try to see what I could do. Also had to take a Rad-X, the top of the mountain was slightly irradiated and I was feeling too good by then with radiation.

We infiltrated the top of the mountain and went directly for their base there. There were three buildings and I visited them all. First the big one, to have no surprises with more mutties. But I couldn't get in it's second floor, so I still had to keep my guard up. I went into another building which seemed like a prison, since the inside door was locked and inside was an old mexican ghoul. I told him to enjoy his freedom and he seemed reluctant to go out there alone. But I didn't have any choice. He said he had a shack, so I didn't worry too much. When I exited the building, though, there were three Nightkin waiting for us and one of them was extremely angry about me releasing Raul, the ghoul. Also, she (yes, I could tell it was a she) was totally ridiculous, she had a wig and heart shaped glasses. Damn. I still went into the remaining building and repaired a robot that was there. Apparently, the robot was Tabitha's (the weird muttie) pet. And he didn't like it very much when I told it she was dead. Cute robot, but I had to destroy it when it came to me with it's saw. Before I left I went back to the main building and went in the second floor, Tabitha's. It didn't have anything special, just a sheet with musical notes.

I jumped a fence to take a direct route from the mountain to the Valley. It was already noghtime and I didn't like hanging around there during nightime. That "didn't like" was intensified when I got to the Valley and a huge sandstorm rose.

I reported back to McNamara and he didn't even give himself time to mourn about his fallen comrades. He asked me to do another mission. He wanted me to check on some scouts he had sent around the Mojave. Sure. I'll be your errand boy! I sure hope that power armor is worth all this walking. Veronica wasn't really confortable going back there without her evidence, but she told me it was ok. We slept there and then left quickly, shaking our heads because of our next mission.

One of them was watching over NCRCF and was really near our position. I met the dude and he gave me a disk with his observations on the place. On my way to the scout in Nipton that NCR Ranger squad appeared again, to tell me I only had two more days. Man, are they a pain in my arse. I arrived to the other scout and he said almost exactly the same thing as the first one. Only one was left, and he was at Camp Forlorn Hope. Damn, that was far.

On my way I passed by a Legion Camp, with two tied Powder Gangers. Those were probably the ones that the crippled Powder Ganger told me about. I don't really like the Legion, but eh, suits 'em well.

I am going to kick McNamara's ass when I get back to the bunker. When I finally got to the last dude and I had to sit, take a few breaths and a whole bottle of water. He gave me his report, to hand to his Elder. And then I had to go all the way back to Hidden Valley again. God damn it.

I passed through HELIOS One. I was kind of surprised to see that The Legion had taken over the facility after I killed all the NCRs there. Oh well.

I went through the Radsorpion path that led HELIOS to the Hidden Valley. More Radscorpions had settled, so this time I hacked through them with my recently acquired Super Sledge. Mmmmhhh...

We arrived at the bunker. We are dead tired though. We are going to sleep in the common room here at the bunker and in the morning I'm reporting to McNamara. I'm getting tired of this Brotherhood thingy, I can't wait to pull their heads out of their asses with Veronica.

Love you,
Bill

Entry 10: I like me my snowglobes

Hello mommy. Hello daddy.

I went outside the HELIOS ONE building to the solar array area. That ARCHIMEDES thing was still on my mind but I focused on gathering all the solar array parts I could find first. The area was filled with NCR people, I almost felt bad for not wearing dull brown.

After I gathered the solar array parts I decided to explore that ARCHIMEDES thingy and went to the Eastern and Western terminals to reset their connection to the mainframe, since it was the only way to get said mainframe to work. Then I went into the HELIOS ONE tower, which was filled with security robots... Just my luck! Those bastards are a bitch to kill.

On my way up I found lots of missiles and scrap metal, all things the Boomers wanted. I may have been dragged to their situation without wanting too, but since I'm on it, I'll do everything they ask. Right?

I also found a Poseidon Energy ID card, which I cought because it might have done me some good. And it did, later. After I took the elevator the generator that kept the mainframe running was out. But there was a robot in the room that, presented an ID card, fixed the generator. Kleptomania - 1, hum, Non-kleptomania - 0.

I accessed the mainframe and directed all the power to the ARCHIMEDES weapon, instead of McCarran and The Strip (AH, fuck you NCR pricks!). Then I armed the weapon. Syrenes started ringing and I knew I did something crappy. I got outside the tower to reconfigure the solar arrays targeting. When I did, I looked down from the tower and it was full of NCR runnin' around, because of the sounds. Then some beams started falling from the sky, burning the ground they touched. Then a female voice started counting down from 5 as three thin beams seemes to be ajusting aim on the far ground where the NCR was running around. When 0 came... KABOOM, a huge blue beam fell from the sky and blew them all to pieces! HA! It was awesome.

When I got off the tower the solar arrays were all reflecting the sun to the tower, making it hard to look at them. Then I entered the building that led me outside. That annoying guy, Fantastic, approached me and yelled "What the fuck, you killed my paycheck!". I'm sorry but I had to kill him.

Hooray, now I still had to go to the Brotherhood bunker before going AAAAAAALL the way back to Nellis!!! Ain't life grand. We took camp at the 188 trading post. Veronica joked about how romantic it was since it was the place we met. It was funny beacause she had already told me she was a lesbian.

Eventually I took a hell of a detour and ended up near Hoover Dam, so I decided to take a look. Hell, the place had more NCR than concrete! They were really holding on to the place. I went in the lobby, saw a biggie snowglobe, took it, looked around to the dozens NCR's just there on the lobby and went back out. Bah. Well, at least it seems I'm starting a collection of those damned globes!

I took the Lake shore line north. I found some lakelurks, nasty fucks. Then I passed by Camp Golf. From there, we were attacked by a huge gang of cazadores... Woopieee! But you think that was it? HA, you must be delusional! ED-E sensed danger ahead, so I grabbed my binoculars and advanced carefully to see... YOU GUESSED IT, DEATHCLAWS! So yeah, I took a cowardly route around, between deathclaws and cazadors. One of the young beasts from hell (the horned ones) saw us and attacked, but we punch-raped him. Still had to change my pants afterwards though.

Still heading north, I found other 2 young deathclaws which I gladly punched to death with my pneumatic fist. On a more laughable note, I was approached by a squad of NCR fucks who told me I'd better get my reputation with them better or else. Well fuck them.

It felt kind of good to be back at Nellis. It was the only place besides Goodsprings that I felt safe. In a warm way. Mother Pearl was very nice to me from the begining and now when I think about helping the Boomers I don't feel like I'm doing something I don't want to be doing.

By the time I finished fixing the solar arrays it was night and I was sleepy and tired. But I stopped by Raquel to give her the missiles I had gathered from the HELIOS One base.

I am now going to sleep. At a medical station. With three guys dying in nearby beds. Yay.

Love you, Bill.

Entry 9: Vault 11

Hello mommy. Hello daddy.

Well, killing the ants was easy. I just had to kill two of them before I got to their nest, where I placed the sonic ray emmiter, which did the rest. I was kind of disappointed, actually. As for the solar arrays... Damn it, I couldn't even begin to think of a way to fix those damned things, which only led me to the last choice... Going to HELIOS ONE, the only place I knew that could have spare solar array parts. NCR apart, I almost drowned in tears just thinking of how much I would have to walk.

I was starting to get worried that Veronica was getting tired of postponing the retrieval of her mega weapon. But when I talked to her she said it was ok, the more time we took the bigger the surprise for McNamara when we returned with the weapon. So we even decided to stop by and give the holotapes and continue my quest for Brotherhood acceptance, before having the weapon. Oh! And I stopped by that wager dude, just to get my doubled caps and rub them on his face.

JESUS CHRIST ON A POGO STICK (to quote the wager dude), on the way motherfreakin' ED-E talked to me all of a sudden and I nearly crapped my pants. Well, it wasn't really ED-E talking, it was a Brotherhood dude through him. And right after the Brotherhood dude a Follower of The Apocalipse dude talked. They wanted some Poseidon Energy data that was stored on ED-E. Well, it was a no-brainer. The Brotherhood wanted it to keep it from anyone else and the Followers wanted it to try and help everyone, so I was gonna take ED-E to the Followers once I could. Yeah, I'm doing the right thing. I may be an asshole sometimes, but I really want what's best for the most, believe it or not.

When I was almost at HELIOS ONE I found Vault 11. I had no idea what it was. That has to be the most logical reason to go explore something right? First thing I found was a strange recording of some people who were kind of conflicted about doing something, which appeared to be murder. At first the Vault was only filled with giant mantises and rats. I found a computer which gave me some information about what went in there. Apparently the dudes had to elect the Overseer and I guessed the candidates were the guys on the tape that I found. But I would know better.

Further into the Vault I found a dead NCR guy. I was surprised, to say the least, since a trained guy shouldn't have any problem against mantises and rats. So I headed on to the living quarters, to see if I found out what the hell happened in that Vault. I found a voice recording of two guards discussing what to do with the new Overseer, who wanted to change something. I didn't figure out what exactly, but she wanted it bad, since she was even going to phorbid voting for other Overseers. They also talked about a computer random picking, though I didn't know what for.

There was a locked room that I couldn't hack open. I felt kind of dumb after that, since it could have good intel and I couldn't hack the damned computer. So I headed on to the lower levels, to the Overseer's Office. Once I got down the stairs a HUGE blast shook me up, but I couldn't figure out from where it came. I went to the Overseers office but the terminal there was locked and un-hackable.

The place was a God damn maze. I even had to swim underwater and almost drowned for God's sake! But then I found a cabinet absolutelly filled with food, which made it worth it. I found a weird note with the Overseer's speech, his password and something about a chamber beneath his office. His speech gave me all the answers too. It said that if they didn't sacrifice one of their people a year the Vault's mainframe would kill all the residents. Damn. And apparently, from the note I gathered that the Overseer offered himself for the sacrifice, like the first Vault Overseer.

So I went back to the Overseer's office and opened.the... "Ceremonial Chamber". I didn't like it one bit. It sounded like I was going to be one of the sacrifices and that didn't made me feel very confortable. It was a long hall or tunnel, that let out a sound and a pre-recorded voice that told me to walk into the light. I got to "the light" and it was a room that passed a film. The film basically told me I was great for giving up my life and that I should go. Next thing I know, lights out and two doors on the side of the room open, four murderous robots come out and six automated turrets start shooting at me. So yeah, how am I writting you know? Well, you may say I'm still numb because of all the numbness drug mixture I took while taking cover and the fuck-ton of stimpacks I took after I destroyed those bastards with a freaking fire axe.

I accessed the mainframe, which was behind one of the doors that opened to unleash the fucking robots, to know what happened. I almost puked. The survivors of the Vault, only five, sent a message saying that they were done with the sacrifices, so they could do whatever the extermination was supposed to be. You know what was the answer? They never intended to kill all the vault dwellers. The purpose of the Vault was just to say "fuck you, I won't kill anyone" and they'd walk, opening the Vault door.

Shit.

On my way back out I got kind of lost and ended up in one of the underwater paths that led to nowhere, but had a room with a single locker. I quicly opened it, to find a differential pressure controller. What the hell, might come in handy.

Before leaving I looked at the four skeletons at the entrance, where I got that first holotape and listened to it again. It turns out that one of the five survivors killed all the others because he didn't want to leave out into the open without what had happened being recorded.

I took a deep breath once I got off that shithole of a Vault. I ran into the fire ant infested dry lake and swung my axe. I may have even cried. The world is sick, in or outside the Wastes.

So I headed to HELIOS ONE again. When I got close I noticed the solar tower wasn't collecting the power it could collect. So I used that as an excuse to enter, when the NCR woman didn't let me go through. She let me in and told me to go meet her hired "expert". When I met him I had to guess what his expertise was, because scince wasn't it, for sure.

But before I met the guy, I had a hard time finding his room. And while lost I took notice of ARCHIMEDES, a weapon that was being prepared in the Old War and that was supposed to be a big deal. I'd have to look at it.

Back to the guy. Damn he is stupid. I am sleeping her to take a rest. If I can.

Love you...

Entry 8: Run Bill! Run!!

Hello mommy. Hello daddy.

I did something stupid. I bought a modification for my chainsaw but found out later that my chainsaw can't be modified. God damn it! I'll hang on to the mod in case I come across one that I can modify...

On the 188 trading post I found a Gun Runner, who supposely would sell weapons. But he was acting like an asshole and when I told him just that, he told me to fuck off. I didn't like that. Not. One. Bit. So I kicked his ass. ED-E thought he was a deadly threat though and things got out of hand. I don't mind, one less asshole around. There was another gun seller on the trading post though, who had the chainsaw I was looking for. I was pretty much broke after I bought but hey, dismembering bad folks is worth it.

We slept in the trading post and then headed to Repconn in the morning. We got there pretty quick and entered the place, which looked like it was haunted. By robots. I had to hack the computers to get my face in the system, so that they wouldn't attack me. On other hand, the place was a gold mine of ammunition I could sell. I couldn't find a password to the third floor though, which was supposely the tightly guarded. I didn't have any problems though, since once I opened the door I found the Brotherhood of Steel corpses. I quickly took the holotape and even a power armor, for Veronica. She appreciated it. Back in the second floor I got lost and found a locked door. I tried a key that I found near the Brotherhood of Steel corpses and it woked. It led to a devasted room, with the floor colapsed. I got down from there and got to a room which was like a treasure chamber. I found an unique plasma rifle, lots of ammo and caps. When I find a trader I'm going to be rich, for sure. Too bad the plasma rifle isn't my thing, it looked pretty sweet.

I talked to Veronica about what should we do first, find the Brotherhood of Steel guys at Nellis airforce base or go to Freeside and then the Strip. She said she was worried about the Brotherhood of Steel guys and that we could pass by Freeside on the way back to the bunker. So we headed next to Nellis.

On our way there we found a couple of NCR troopers. Apparently my name is getting around. One of them told me "Why don't you pick a side? We did." because I have been so unpredictable. Truth is I haven't had met anybody that I liked. And even if I spoke my mind people wouldn't like what they'd hear. I mean, the NCR are a bunch of democratic wannabes, which want by all means to bring back the Old World system back. Isn't the Old World called just that because of that said system?! They are corrupt and power hungry. The Legion, well, they have the right idea, one to rule them all, but they're doing it wrong. Ruling by fear won't get them anywhere, sooner or later there'd be some group that would overthrow them because they don't like whips and chains. The Brotherhood of Steel are a bunch of guys with their heads up their arses, don't even know where to go from their bunker. And from what I've seen from the Khans, they like to protect their honor and that crap but really are just a bunch of guns for hire and drug makers. How am I to pick a side like this? By whose shit stinks the better?

I found a travelling merchant and sold what I got from the Repconn headquarters. I told you I'd get rich just from that! More than 4000 caps rich!

When I was nearing Nellis I was approached by a smart-ass. He told me that the people of Nellis bombed anyone who would enter their perimeter. That was scary, yes. But then he tried to wager with me. He wanted 300 caps for some information for getting past the bombardments and if I returned he'd double it. He wanted to wager on my life. I accepted, of course!

I took a deep breath... And then ran for my life.

And so here I am, writting this letter from the afterlife, hoping I can meet you... You wish! I'm pretty much alive, but I was in dire need of a new set of underwear. I could never put into words how terrifying it is to have deafening ground-shaking explosions all around you, while you pray that they miss the wall you're hidden behind. Oh, right! And imagine having to retrieve an holotape from a Brotherhood corpse in the proccess!

At Nellis I was greeted by a guy who was purely terrifyed, but, then again, had a missile launcher pointed at me. Then came along another woman named Raquel who told me Mother Pearl wished to speak to me. Sounded like I was the first one there since they had established in the base. No wonder, since they bomb the hell out of anyone who comes close! Who is Mother Pearl you ask? It was an old woman, who apparently was the Boomers' boss. She wanted me to help with something, but didn't say what. So I had to ask my least favorite thing to ask... "How can I be of assistance?" Damn woman. Those damned people had more problems that I could count! They needed to kill some ants that disabled the generators, they needed to repair the solar energy thingies, they needed medical attention... Damn!

I talked to Raquel about the ants. She told me it would be hard and didn't think I could do it. Pff. She also told me that the old man of the group, Loyal, was working on something that would keep the ants away from the generator. So I talked to Loyal, who didn't even know which frequence should he put it his device in order to kill the ants. Thank God I'm smart. That old man also had something for me to do, he wanted me to repair the solar arrays. But he didn't have any spair parts! How awesome is that?

I'm spending the night at the museum, where Mother Pearl said there would be a kid who'd want to tell me the story of their people. I'm currently hearing their story from said kid and probably will fall asleep any moment now!

Love you, Bill.