//------------------------------// // Waste // Story: Try Not To Die! // by Regidar //------------------------------// The door to the Craterside General Store creaked open, and the sheriff himself sauntered in through the door. His hat dusty, his overcoat frayed, and his rifle at his side. Just as usual. Ok Zach. Act natural. Zach licked his lips to moisten them, as they had become dry from anticipation. “H-h-h-h-hey! Lucas Simms! My man, what brings you to the Craterside Supply?” Lucas arched an eyebrow. “Zach? Is that really you?” His eyelids narrowed. “You been doing drugs again?” Zach sighed. “Whatever. What do you want to buy, Simms?” Lucas took a look around. “Where’s Moira, Zach? Normally you’re out getting buzzed and blowing the heads off raiders, not shopkeeping. Did something happen to her?” Zach laughed rather loudly and uncharacteristically. “No, nothing’s wrong! Moira just went to... Rivet City! To get some... um... pieces for this new machine she’s working on!” “Moira usually sends someone else to go get things for her, Zach.” Zach began to sweat slightly. “Well, Moira works in mysterious ways, Simms.” “Look, Wanderer.” The sheriff walked to the counter and rested his arm there, staring Zach straight in the eyes. “I know you’re a charismatic fellow. I know you’re good at smooth talking, bargaining, convincing, and fooling people. But you just can’t lie to me. I know something is wrong. And if anything happened to Moira, I don’t care how many towns you’ve saved, bombs you’ve disarmed, or organizations you’ve taken down, you will find this entire town on your ass faster than a radroach on a Salisbury Steak. Understood?” The Lone Wanderer and the sheriff stared at each other, an odd sort of staring match that would definitely would have not ended any time soon if a rogue piece of dust had not landed in Zach’s eye. Rubbing his tearing seeing orb, which I could have easily described as an eye if I were a better author, Zach scowled at the sheriff. “What do you want to buy, Lucas?” “I need some stimpacks. I used the last one when Hadron fell running down the steps the other day.” “Why not get some from Doc Church?” Lucas Simms scoffed at the mere mention of this idea. “Zach, the guy’s an ass! As much as I appreciate how he keeps the people of Megaton not-dead, if I’m gonna be getting my pharmaceuticals from anywhere, it’s gonna be here. Moira deserves the business. That fuck...” Lucas looked around as if he were afraid that the medic would show up and castrate him sans-anesthetic right there and then. “Well, let’s just say the patients he pulls in are already enough for him.” Zach half-smiled. “Did something happen between you two?” Lucas sighed. “Zach, you’ve live in Megaton long enough to know that no one in this town likes him. And I still haven’t forgotten about Moira, just give me some stimpacks, I’ll pay you, and we can be done with it.” Zach shrugged, and accepted the caps. Reaching under the counter, he pulled up the stimpacks, and The Lone Wanderer delivered the healing drugs into the hands of the sheriff. Lucas Simms sighed, and adjusted his hat. “I’m giving you one week, Zach, and if Moira isn’t back by then, there will be hell to pay. And this will be unlike any other hell you’ve been through, Zach.” “Oh, you mean like the hell of losing a father?” There was no noise for a few moments, and then Simms turned his back on The Lone Wanderer. “We all lose people, Zach.” The sheriff left without another word. Zach stared at the closed door for few more moments, then exhaled heavily. “Man, that got depressing far too quickly for my tastes.” The irony of that statement sunk in for a few moments, and then Zach decided that he needed to take a little break. Heading out from behind the counter, he bent down and took a dusty Nuka-Cola from a plastic carton. Zach went up the stairs, through Moira’s room, and over to the ladder that went up to the roof. For a moment, he lingered on the alien technology that had zapped Moira away to... who even knows where. For the briefest of moments, he pondered turning it on, just to see what would happen. Shaking the feeling off, he ascended the ladder, and pushed over the metal sheet that acted as an ersatz trapdoor for the roof. Once outside, The Lone Wanderer took some time to appreciate the great view he got from here. To the east, there was D.C. He could see the Galaxy News Radio building, where Three Dog was no doubt sending out tunes and motivational messages out to whoever would turn their dial to the station. Not that there really was much else to listen to since Zach had taken down The Enclave. Twice. Cracking open his Nuka-Cola, Zach took a little sip as he looked out west, where Tenpenny Tower stood. Scowling as he remembered the vile man who once owned the tower, he was glad that he had shot the pretentious asshole that had been Tenpenny and then lead a group of wayward ghouls to slaughter the other inhabitants. That was the thing about Zach; Despite helping out for the greater good most of the time, and being a good friend to the many beneficial factions of the Capitol Wastes, he was no saint. He often lied, and constantly scoping the wasteland for slaves to send over to Paradise Falls. Well, he used to, before a guilty conscience caught up with him. He also killed when he felt someone was harmful to a community. For instance, just two weeks after coming to Megaton, and just a day before meeting his father at Project Purity, he had killed the bartender Colin Moriarty. Zach had felt that the ass wasn’t needed in Megaton, and Zach didn’t need him anymore anyway as Colin had already imparted all the information that concerned him anyway, and some that didn’t, unwittingly. Zach had broken into his computer terminal to get some information. Zach also had a bad habit of lock picking, terminal hacking, and stealing whenever he could. This didn’t exactly help his good karma. He wasn’t any good at computers, but he was amazingly skilled with the lock. Sure, Megaton had been pissed at the time when he had killed Moriarty, but after a few days of shooting at him and chasing away Zach whenever he got close, they let him back in, a far bit more wary than they had been of him before, but all worked out in the end. Gob ended up taking over the bar, and everyone on Colin’s shitlist could breath easy. Of course, now Zach knew what Colin had, but no one else knew or needed to know that. Zach did as he pleased, and went where he wanted. Zach was a smooth talked, but often lied and cheated his way through places, and he didn’t have the cleanest of track records. So in the end, despite all the good he had done, and some of the more atrocious crimes he had committed, Zach had reached a verdict: He didn’t want to be too good, for he did not need Talon Company breathing down his neck, and he didn’t want to be too evil, because apart from his mind giving him trouble on that, the Regulators were not people he needed to mess with. So Zach became neutral. He stayed right in the morally grey area, being neither good nor bad. He found that this disposition helped him in negotiations and smooth talkery quite immensely. It was just the way he liked it. Taking a huge swig of irradiated cola, Zach sighed. It was flatter than a Little Lamplight hooker, but the soda taste was still there. “One week, huh?” Zach looked down at Megaton from his little roof hideaway. He could see Lucas Simms playing with Hadron down near the deactivated bomb. “Dammit, Moira, I sure as hell hope you’re happy wherever you are, because I’m gonna be in some deep shit and it’d be a shame for your trip to have been a waste.”