The Fear of the Grim

[Valdis]

PART 1(or chapter 1): The note and the Kids.
By Valdis
October 23rd, 2002

The last few minutes of the afternoon were flying past the unsuspecting world and its towards some distant existence, where time and place has no meaning or purpose. The now red sun was barely visible over the distant horizon, which was slowly turning from orange-yellow to blacky blue. From John's perch on top of a mountain plateau, the view was spectacular. Unmarred by the presence of the city scape, the horizon was once again, a beatiful sight. There hadn't been a beautiful sunset in over 98 years. John's home was a one-story cabin, with three windows, a tin roof and dark wood sides. The door to the cabin was like any old ordinary generic door. From here, it was only a short 10 mile walk to the big city of NCR. This somehow made John feel better about his life, but why he did wasn't entirely clear to him. John got up of a nearly-ruined sofa slowly, getting one last look at the masterpiece of light and color that was a post-apocalyptic sunset before walking to the door. His leather coat, leather armor and leather pants were as shabby as the house he was entering, if not worse. John hesitated before opening the door, straightening out his black hair, wondering wether or not he had forle walk to the big city of NCR. This somehow made John feel better about aªª¨¦¤]

The pitch black sky threw a shroud of utter darkness down upon the California plains as John struggled to see through it. It wasn't hard to find the NCR city gates from out there. It was hard to see what you had to run through to get there. Stumbling over small rocks and plants, John sprinted towards the gates. He slowed down when he went past a Newsrack and a Souveneir stand. The city gates were a very impressive thing to behold at that time in history. While the shimmering yellow waves of energy that made the barrier between the inner city and the courtyard amazed many people, John thought it reminded him too much of Vault City, and everyone at that time only went to Vault City if they worked there, had a caravan stop there, or were desperately poor wanderers, hoping to get a few scraps of food or a few coins from potentially gracious people. Those were people that John thought were innoncent bystanders. They were the reason why John bothered to make some change in the unsteady world that was his home. The gate guard, who was playing with his rifle out of utter boredom noticed that John had finally arrived. He looked back down at his rifle for a second, then looked up, remembering that John needed to get in. "Pretty good night, eh? Didn't hear too much about the killings today, so I guess they're finally giving up" said the guard. "The poor lad... he was only 9...Well, let's get that barrier down, shall we?"
The guard pressed a series of buttons, which after two seconds lit up and repeated the pattern that the Guard had pressed. The blinked twice, and the barrier slowly faded away. "Have a good night, mate" said the guard. He went back to playing with the rifle while John walked into the city. The barrier materialized again behind him, beeping twice. The sight ahead of him was impressive. The streets were spotless, there was a few patches of green grass growing, and flooded within the light of the lamposts were guards, each near their limits of boredom. John walked down a narrow street until he arrived at an intersection, where from the east lay the bar/pub and to the west was his post. His post, however was filled by someone who had made it on time. Instantly after noticing that, John went down to the pub, opened the door and walked in.
There was some western music being played by an ancient mechanism which was called a "jukebox". It was a cozy little place, with comfortable red leather bar stools, some interesting photos on the walls, a dartboard which had fallen to the floor, a trophy head of a radscorpion(which could or could not have been genuine or fake), some plaques displaying parts of the bar's history and a big glass mirror hanging on the back of the door, probably so that the barkeeper could see what all of his patrons were doing. Behind thebar was a big array of pipes(very clean and shiny-unusually rare for a wasteland bar, even in a high class place like NCR) which were labeled according to brand and type of beer, soda and other beverages. Also behind the bar was the barkeeper himself, a pudgy fellow named Grays, who was also a close friend of Johns. John ambled towards a stool, dropped his rifle and slouched down into the chair. "How have you been doing, old friend?" asked John. "Pretty good, you know, considering all of those murders. Have you heard of the kid that was killed? Damn shame, that was. Pretty good kid, too" said Grays. "How come everyone says 'what a shame' or, 'he was such a good boy'? you know that's all bullshit, dont you? He was a spoiled brat and everyone knows it" said John, grimacing. "Well, I guess he was a little...er...'obscenely pampered', but that still doesn't make what that criminal did. He was still a child! Who knows what he could've been?" said Grays with a worried expression. "It doesn't matter what he 'could've been'! It's what he was, and what he didn't do that matters know. Could I have a scotch and nuka?" said John. Grays went and got a beer bottle from unde the counter, put it up to the spout. He pressed a button, which made the scotch come out. He did the same thing with another spout and came back to John, putting the drink on the table. "What exactly do you mean by 'it was what he was?" John grabbed the bottle and put it to his mouth, sipping the cocktail. "He never listened to anybody, you know? And don't tell me that no kids listen. This kid NEVER listened. He only listened if he wanted to, wich was...about 4% of the time. And when he did listen it was like you were some..some...you know, inferior 'creature'! It was like you were'nt worth his shit time.
"and he never pulled his weight around(which was a lot of weight, by the way). He'd sit on his flab ass and order YOU what to do. Then his pop came in and beat the helloutta him. Deserved it, he did. Then he'd whine and whine and bitch until you did something. And that kid NEVER STOPPED BITCHING!" yelled John. He took another gulp of the 'magical elixer of life-flowing energy stuff' as he called it. Grays shook his head and said, "I guess you're right, yeah. But what about that other kid, the...teen? Yeah, the teen. That guy was okay. What about him?". John closed his eyes, and sighed, taking another swig of the MELFES, then opened his eyes again. "that..That kid expected too much. He was always way up...in the clouds, ya know? He was always going on about how he'd be 'the best ranger ever', or how he'd 'overcome impossible odds to get what he wan..*HIC*..wanted in..*burp*.. in life. He was a good kid, Melvin. I used to tell him about my mother, Daise, and how...*buuurp*...an' how I'd always say the same damned thing". John hiccuped again, took another drink of ale. Grays said, "Yeah, that Melvin was a thinker alright. You know, you never told me about Melvin much. (*BUURP**HIC*) Wait a second...You said that that pudgo kid, what was he called?(*hic* Maynard?) Yeah, Maynard. You said that what mattered was what he 'didn't do'. What didn't the fatso do?"
John looked around, then leaned in his chair towards Gray. John was obviously very drunk, but he was known to "slip out" a bit when under the powerful and hypnotic effects of alcohol(or Magical Elixer of Life Flowing Energy stuff). He burped again, then whispered, "He got a letter from *hic* some raider, or some..some..Slaver asshole. Now *hic* I didn't read teh thing, but his mother said *burrp*, said that this letter...from this slaver maniac said:"fear the reaper or die". A couple a' days later, he was sent a'nutter *hic* letter that had a...scythe on it. And you know that the..scy*hic*scythe is like, the Grim Reaper's weapon, right? So the next day the kid goes out, and then...boom. Damned hick*hic*". Grays somehow seemed to understand John's tyrade. "And you say this...letter is from a Slaver?" John nodded."Either tha*hic*that or a raider. Or some other damned thing". John then got up, putting down both the beer bottle and a coin that was in his pocket. "'Ave a good*hic hicc* night, Grays old buddy". Grays shook his head, took the bottle and turned around to put the bottle away. He noticed that he left one extra coin under his seat. John noticed at the same time that he had forgotten his rifle. It was quite an innocent night, thought John. He bent down, took the coin that Grays held out to him, then examined his face in the mirror. Everything was fine except for a spot of the nuka-scotch on his shoulder, and a figure of a man holding a rifle outside. Everything was fine.
Until a gunshot blast pierced the perfectly calm night straight through, breaking the peace. The cops outside started running towards the noise, yelling at a few of them to stay back. Two more gunshots echoed throughout the city, but this time they were accompanied with screaming and sobbing of nearby pedestrians.

(BTW any comments, suggestions, critique or non-spam about the story would be appreciated)
(2nd edit-my future stories won't be full of drunk people, if you don't mind that)