Hi!
This is what happends when you mix drugs, alcohol, Fallout 1, 2, Tactics, Half Life:Wasteland and the idea you can write...
Good-bye Laura
By Wifi
I Miss my Laura. From the day she took off I feel empty inside. I still feel her distinctive fragrance in my head. God, do I miss her! I just wish things have gone better for us, that we never had to leave each other, that our world never disappeared...
I still remember how we got together in the first place. At 08:00 I had a meeting with the Lieutenant about my possible transfer to a new post. He said that after looking at my file he knew I was the man they were looking for. He talked about my knowledge of nuclear warfare, advanced psychology training, even my excellent service while I was in the NSM (Nuclear Silo Maintenance) during the Canadian "problem". I found that strange since I have never actually been in any combat, just sitting in a deep hole near Seattle looking at missiles. He mentioned the fact that I was in the military since I was seven years old, as a part of the Orphan Solution (some guys twisted idea of taking all homeless children and sticking them in army barracks to be trained to kill and obey orders, call them soldiers, so they can be a valuable asset to the nation’s cause instead of a problem). How that made me the man for the job I had no idea. Then I got the order: pack up your gear ASAP, get your ass to the landing zone and await transport to the USS Theory. That came as quite a shock to me since the USS Theory was rumored to be a converted stealth vertibird carrier that served as the main headquarters for the military intelligence, sailing around to keep its location unknown. What the hell do they want from me? Anyway, I got to the landing zone and started looking for the flight officer in charge, when I noticed a big black non-signed vertibird with two guys in cool black power armor in front of it. They even were armed with the latest German Gauss rifles, the kind of weapon an infantry soldier would sell his soul for. The whole scene just screamed "army intelligence". I approached them and identified myself, and before I could even blink they pulled me inside, got the ThreeMonkey on my head, started the engines and we were airborne.
I expected the flight to be quite nice, but instead I got the ThreeMonkey experience. It must have been for security reasons, to keep me from knowing where we are headed. The ThreeMonkey was a nickname for a specially designed helmet that made you act like those three monkeys: don’t hear, don’t talk, don’t see. This one even had the all-new "don`t-know-if-you`re-up-or-down-left-or-right-forward-or-backwards" effect which was "really" fun. These guys must have some really big secrets to use toys like this.
It felt like hours before they finally got it off my head. Even then it took me a minute or so to realize where the hell am I (and what the hell am I). While I was looking at the three guys sitting behind a table in front of me I realized that I was sitting too. The guy in the middle started talking first so I assumed he was the leader of the pack. To tell it short, the job was to be stationed in a nuclear silo on a unknown location. I thought to myself: what is so special about this type of assignment that needed this extreme measures of secrecy? However, the catch is there is no crew, no acting orders and no contact with the standard military forces. Just me, one nuke, bed, fridge, launch computer, message decoder, button to push and a deck of cards. No one would know I was there except them three and me. Basically some kind of ace in the sleeve when the shit hits the fan. It was because of the "lonely" nature of the assignment they picked me. No family, no real friends, trained psychologically to stay normal during long periods of solitude, loyal to the cause. I asked how long it would last, and all I got was raised shoulders, which meant a little less then forever. They didn't say it, but I figured refusal is not an option. No options at all. Immediately after my "Yes Sir" ,the ThreeMonkey was back on my head and another cheerful trip began.
This time I found myself on the cold floor of a small chamber, looking at a steel Vault-Tec door, first slowly closing in front of me, then finally slamming shut with some locking ding and dong sounds. It sounded more like a "good-bye to the World" to me. With the help of a neon light which didn't help with my headache, there were two more things to be seen. One was a small ladder leading down, probably to my last home ever. The other thing was about five mega-holodisks (black of course) in my lap with "Maintenance and launch procedures" written all over them. It didn't really seem like they had action or porn movies on them. Knowing how much you can put on a single holodisk of this caliber meant that there was pretty much three years of reading involved here. I slowly got up, cleaned my ass of dirt (like someone would see me and laugh) and decided to go down the ladder. Looking down the ladder tube I knew it was a one-way lane because there was no bottom to be seen. I bet if I spitt down it would dry up before reaching the bottom, and so I did. With the disks in every pocket I have found on me I started to go down. And down. And down again. Down...
After about half an hour I reached the bottom with a sense of relief. Soon as I stepped down, I realized I was standing on my gear from the base. Some joker had the brainstorm of throwing it down the tube. But that wasn't my main concern at the time. Remember that spitt we talked about? Guess where it landed. Anyway, here I was. At the start of a small corridor. I decided to start with the first door I got to. With a small "whoosh" the door slides up and the light automatically turned on. It was the food storage room, stuffed to the ceiling. Guess how much fun it would have been to find it completely empty because of a wrongly formatted order form or something. It had the usual stuff. Most of it was a ton of FieldMeals, a fully compact, quickly-edible lunch set for those outdoor picnics inside bunkers, trenches, neutron minefields and all-day firefights. Apart from that, the label didn't say that it tastes almost like cement, only harder. There was some canned beef, but knowing about the shortage of clean livestock in the World it could have been anything, soylent green included. The rest was more canned stuff, and even some fruit which looked more like it grew from the dirt on the shelf. On the opposite side there was another door. After opening it I saw the biggest water tank ever. There was a panel with a monitor on the tank on which you could read: "Water chip function: OK." God knows what to do if that one gives up the ghost. When I saw the urine converter in the corner, I quickly left the room.
Back in the corridor, I decided to go for door number two. This one turned out to be the more interesting to my technical soul, the equipment storage. On the first shelf was the most important thing to any nuclear silo: light bulbs. I was once in this silo when a freak current overcharge that came from the Plasma missiles section blew all the light bulbs. You should have seen it (or better yet heard it). You had twelve guys with small lighters running around twenty live nukes, bumping into everyone and everything. Crazy Dan even started the countdown when he sat down to take a shit, not knowing it was the launch panel for the nukes. On the next shelf you had the standard measuring equipment: a voltage meter, Ohm meter, Geiger counter, plasma ring, Flourimeter, and even "The Nose", an instrument that "smelled" the room to analyze the contents of the air, such as natural gas, nerve gas, green gas, you get it. If you use it in the toilet (that’s the first thing I did with it after I got my hands on it), the monitor on it will read "You’re full of it!" , must be the inventors idea of a joke. Next stop - batteries: small wonders that give life to small things, ranging from the small 1,2V to the all-mighty micro fusion cells. The next thing I found was a micro fusion cell powered dildo, which looked like it belonged in the gun cabinet, why it was here will confuse me till the day I die. A little deeper in the room I dug up a silver suitcase, and I should have known it was even more useless than that dildo. What the hell do I need a GECK for? Creating a small Bonsai for my viewing pleasure? Maybe growing food? Then I noticed the "Vault 23" label on it and all was clear to me again, another screw-up, hope they got another one in store. I decided to stop for now, leave some exploration for later, and to get over that dildo thing.
The next door in line was the armory, everything a guntot'n redneck could want for Christmas under his decorated still. What do I need guns for? Rats? They tend to get a little big near radioactive things. I heard of one guy having one as a pet, until the rat ate him. I guess since then they officially banned pets in silos and installed armories. I was surprised to see they didn't go cheap on the stuff. Desert Eagle, FN-FAL, the Panzer Jackhammer, frag grenades and plasma ones too, maybe if I piss of Mister Handy while he's cleaning. There was even a Gatling Minigun. But the best part was when I opened the locker. Brand new, still in it's original wrapping and full garantee, free first fusion charge, the latest thing in armor fashion, the Advanced Power Armor MK2! With this one I was all dressed up and nowhere to go, literally speaking. Leaving the armory, I had a bet with myself that the next door is to my room. It was the toilet. Nevermind, it was the door after that one. Compared to the other rooms, this one looks like they went cheap on the budget. Three meters in length, three in width and three in height, typical bunk bed, small desk, smaller chair, the smallest lamp. I was better of in the toilet. I'll just move the bed to the control room. And I was right. The last door was the control room. It was almost three times bigger, and nothing in it except a busy looking panel with small buttons, red lights, medium size monitor, and a big 'ol red button that had "push me" written all over it. That reminded me, I haven't seen the main attraction, the reason for being here, the lady. It was pretty easy to find her, and when I did, lightning struck.
It was love at first sight. This wasn't just another one. I always had a weak spot for the heavy girls. This baby was the prom queen of her class. She was the LRA-B 5000, LRA-B standing for Long Range Atomic Bomb, also known as Launching Laura. She was a cold hearted bitch that rained fire wherever she go, which meant that she was powered by the latest FireIce technology, combustion without heat, which made her completely invisible to any Missile Launch Monitoring System that is out there. The explanation of how that works was surely in one of this holodisks I still had in my pockets. She also wasn't dumb like the others, oh no. She had more megatons in her pretty lead covered head then all the other ladies together. If you send her to Paris, she will send you back a postcard of the Eiffel Tower along with the other derbies and fallout from the area. They really mean business with this puppy. I knew then that if I ever let her go it would be either to start or to finish the nuclear holocaust. In other words, she will end up destroying my entire world. But that didn't matter right now, just as long as we have each other. Me to love her and take care of her, and her not to blow up in my face.
After a few weeks of adapting to the new environment, I had my daily routine up and running. First we have morning sickness, as a result of the home made booze I was able to make by converting the urine converter into a distillery (pretty simple, instead of putting piss in and getting water out, you put water in with some "spice" and you get piss out, but with a lot more punch in it). This I learned during basic training in the woods near Guantanamo Bay on the prison island Cuba. During my reconosance tour I stumbled upon a Cuban hick that was running his still deep in the woods. Instead of shooting him on sight as I was ordered, I decided to team up with him. The deal was: I get him the goods from the base that he needs to work, an in return I get a nice shipment of rare Cuban booze to sell. After the Tobacco Plague that destroyed 99% of all Cuban tobacco crops, therefore eradicating the Cuban cigar, the Cuban booze was the number one illegal commodity on the market, which made it the number one on the list of every soldier stationed on Cuba, and it was worth pure gold on the US mainland. To bad that after a few weeks he got blown away by a heat seeking missile that was aimed at a Chinese military shuttle in orbit, but instead decided his heat was a lot nicer than the shuttles. Anyhow, after the barfing, it's washing time. After the zero degree shower, I go to the missile bay and say good morning to my still sleeping beauty. First thing then is getting her to wake up easily, with the help of a small arming test. Then comes breakfast in bed, a nice and refreshing dose of new oil and coolant, followed by her morning discharge of build up methane gas due to the FireIce system. After that I got the whole day for myself. Cleaning up, dusting, poking through the equipment room, solving the crossword puzzle for the fifth time, contemplating about how that dildo got here, reading the holodisks, running around in the AP armor, stuff like that. I stopped target practicing with the guns since I nearly blew away my testicle while putting the Desert Eagle in my pants just to look cool. Not to mention the fire caused by that grenade... And then around 21:00 I go back to my girl and set her to standby mode and wish her a good night sleep. After that is just me and the booze. And so we lived happily ever on, or we would have, but the dream ended on that cursed day.
It was October 26, 2077. I was still a little booze blind when the show started. The receiver started screaming like a schoolgirl with a skinned knee, which made me jump up and hit my head on the toilet bowl, I was in the toilet. I ran to the control room and started to focus my eyes trying to read what was being typed on the monitor. First I thought I was still drunk and saw senseless words, but then I realized the decoder isn't on. A quick tap on the on button and the words I never wanted to see started to appear. It was all there. The coordinates, the confirmation of the coordinates, the confirmation of the confirmation, the standard mumbo yumbo. And then came the final message. "You are authorized and ordered to deploy the LRA-B 5000 using the coordinates received. Standard nuclear deployment procedure advised. Deployment should occur inside the time limit of five hours starting from the receiving of this message. Deviation from the orders will be marked as treason and will be punished accordingly. Good luck, and God help us all." Only the last sentence looked like it was written by a human being. The rest was as cold as a computers soul. But orders are orders, no matter how they look. There was no choice, and no time to lose. I started the main launch protocol, started refueling and took a deep breath. The preparations would take about an hour or so. I sure hate good-byes. When I entered the bay, it was already full of steam and sparks. Suddenly a breeze passed by, blowing away the steam, and there she was, cracking her electric wires and taking her last supper of hi-powered cryozine. The hour went by quickly. With the green light on the launch panel it was like she was saying: "Wake up, time to fly." I put my hand on her plate and said to her: "Giv'em hell, whoever they are." I entered the command room, sealing the two blast doors behind me. I approached the main panel. All the previously red lights were now bright green, except for the main button which was as red as New York's Hot Summer. I closed my eyes, said good-bye, and pushed the button. Everything went silent from there. The sixty seconds countdown began, giving the main bay door time to open and let my lady fly. When it was half way opened I was blinded by the sunlight I never thought to se again. And then she started leaving me. First slowly, then faster each moment, my Laura was eager to meet her destiny over some enemy territory, striking first, or arriving last to finish them all off. Because of her FireIce engine I could still watch her exit to the real world without being blinded by her propulsion flames. And so our story ends. She is gone forever, and I'm all alone.
What now? Leave? The three men never said nothing about after the launch, nor did the holodiscs, or the launch message. Was I to die here together with the rest of the world? I was about to give up all hope and head to the gun cabinet to end it all. Desert Eagle or dildo, I didn't care. But then I noticed the main bay doors are still open, giving me a chance to leave this tomb. Why not? I have the gear, I got the guts, I still had some booze left to keep me going, and I was curious. Who knows what will happen to the World now that we closed the final chapter of the human civilization? Maybe the ants are taking over, or the cockroaches? One thing for sure, I wasn't gonna find all that out sitting in this hole with my thumb up my ass. I got the gear, I got out and found myself in the middle of a desert, who knows which one. And so I left the silo and started searching for anything. But I still remembered my Laura, whom by leaving me took my hole world with her. Maybe that was her true beauty. While she was with me there was a world to return to, even a slim hope.
Anyway, I should stop bitching about it and start walking, the sun is killing me in this armor. Come on Mr. Dildo, we got a whole new world to fuck up. Again...
My before-the-war story...
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Wifi
- Scarf-wearing n00b
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- Joined: Fri May 31, 2002 3:49 am
- Location: Somewhere over the rainbow...
My before-the-war story...
If I were normal I would go crazy.
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avenger69ie
- Strider Elite
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