Day 2

I'm awake
But that ain't so grand

I woke up the next day stiff and sore. It’s not hard to figure why this place is abandoned now. I expect whoever called the old shack home went off to find a new bed and she just stayed in the bed she found. Even in the early morning the Mojave is hot and that old shack was turning into an oven. I made a quick breakfast of the rest of my water and some scavenged Dandy Boys and then I was out on the revenge trail again.

Just down from the rocky hill I found the old abandoned shack was a beaten highway I hadn’t spotted at night that lead up and over the hills to those silver towers of New Vegas. I reckoned that if anyone had seen a man in a bad suit it would be there so I set out on my way. Just over the hill I found a little quarry camp called Sloane. The diggers there seemed to be in a foul mood. I lent a hand with their generator and met with their camp boss who was keeping watch. According to him they were digging gypsum for the New California Republic to build fortifications. I guess they run this whole valley from how he told it. However his men haven’t been resupplied in some time and a pack of deathclaws have settled in to the quarry and some gang of men had stolen their gunpowder so they were up the creek. The old man was camped out at the watch shelter keeping an eye out for them and suddenly I realized he was armed only with a sledgehammer. The old geezer must have atomic stones to figure he was going to standoff a Deathclaw with that thing.. I was half tempted to lure one of those mad bastards out of the quarry and run it right up the hill to see if the old man could deliver with that rockbreaker but if I was wrong I wouldn’t want to be on the bad side of this NCR. I thanked the old man and crossed off into the highlands.

Just over the other edge of the highway I found a couple of Bark Scorpions in the low brush and was hunting them in hopes of some food but there wasn’t much meat in their shells. As I was picking over the carcases I mean windstorm kicked up and I ran for cover. I found an old bunker and settled in until the storm passed. The place was huge and full of industrial parts so big they must have been built into the bunker but the passage in the back looked to be caved in. Once the storm passed I set out across the valley and found  3 more bunker entrances. Two were like the one I hid out in. The last one had a serious lock on the back door. I made a note in the old Pip Boy on my arm to come back around when I have something better to work that lock with. I suspect a place out of the way like this might have some treasure to offer.

Coming out of the valley I saw an old pre-war building patched and ratcheted. It looked nightmarish with barbicans and towers overlooking a gated compound. As I drew in I found some wastelanders in jumpsuits lazing under a shelter and more of them inside the encampment. I talked with a boy named Dawes at the main gate who told me the place used to be an NCR prison but that they used the demolitions gear that the chain gang was supposed to be working with and staged a jailbreak and they were now the powder gang that everyone seemed so up-in-arms about. The way I figured it I didn’t owe the NCR no nevermind and I don’t know from what laws put these men in the NCR correctional work camp so I minded my own business for now. They let me in the compound and I talked to a few folks around the jail. One of them was an old lawman surprisingly enough. I guess the NCR jails all kinds. I got to have a sit down with the Powder Gang’s leader Eddie. He looked real comfortable with his boots up on the dead warden’s desk. Maybe there wasn’t such a big difference between Prisoner and guard in this place. His second in command, Scrambler, kept eyeballing me something fierce, not like a man who’s been away from the curves of a woman too long but like a man who’s sick of the sight of them. I guess when in Rome you get it in the end or some such. Eddie didn’t much like dealing with outsiders but he was having trouble with one of his boys going off the reservation and he wanted to send me up to settle the situation. I took up the offer, did some trading and moved out to look for this Chavez.

Not but 100 meters from the gates of the old prison I ran into a guard post of the powder gangers. I was going to stop and see what they knew about this loose cannon Chavez, but they got spooked and started shooting me up. I was going to try to talk them down until they tossed a stick of dynamite at me and nearly blew me across the valley so I executed every one of the motherfuckers. I may not have won any favors with the Powder gangers but a gal has her limits. After the fight I was bloodied and hurting. I popped a few of the stim packs the doc gave me and broke open the Vodka I’d scavenged out in abandoned shack.

Off in the distance I saw a queer sight. It was grand rollercoaster off across the valley to the South. I reckoned  it was even odds that it was a mirage or the commie juice but with the sun coming down I didn’t want to check it out just now.

 I rounded the tall rock and headed up into the hills back to Good Springs. Amusingly enough I bumped into Sunny Smiles and her Dog fighting off a pack of Gecko’s like she had been waiting on me to save her. I put the balance of them down and came in to check on her. She wasn’t cross with me for taking off on her or even for forgetting to hand her back her old rifle. In fact she was damned helpful. She suggested I loot the old abandoned schoolhouse and talk with Trudy the bartender over at the pub in town for some clues about who would have wanted to put me in a grave. But then she was on about fetching her some flowers and roots. I mean a sweet smile and good graces go a long mile with me but this chick was pushin her luck. Did she think I was her chamber maid or some nonsense? I thanked her just the same, headed up the hill to get patched up by Doc Mitchell and headed up to the bar. I was starving and thirsty and tired.