Fallout Shelter

I was hauling myself out of the area, trying to find somewhere to fruitlessly shelter from any radiation coming out of the recently erupted reactor. Any attempt I made to dive into the basement of a home was foiled by the bots in hot pursuit.

When I had a second to catch my breath, I unfolded a radiation blanket from my backpack and threw it over my body like a poncho and hood. I also covered my face with a gas mask. In the back of my mind I knew it meant jack all at this point, but it motivated me enough to keep pushing for a way out.

A faint fog spread around me, likely from the fires at the reactor. It seemed to be confusing the drones a little, causing them to lose sight of me.

In their confusion, I fired off a few rounds to open up a path to the lake, where I’d left a boat. Their red eyes were easy to spot in the growing fog, so hitting any in my way was easy.

Just as I’d squeezed out exactly eight rounds and heard that familiar ring of a clip ejecting from my gun, a humanoid form stepped forward from the fog. I assumed at first it was a person, but rapid laser fire lit up the clouds around in crimson hues.

“Great… A Juggernaut!”

Where the lousy little metal eyeballs lost track of me, he was well aware of my position. His targeting sensors were only the best, seeing as he was a machine made exclusively to kill in any environment.

“You’ve got to be kidding me!” Once my rifle was full of fresh ammo, I fired a few rounds, but turned around to find an alternative route.

While I was sprinting for my dear worthless life, a creaking sound caught my attention, forcing my gaze to turn toward the right.

“Girl, over here!”

A metal hatch in the dirt lifted slightly to reveal a guy with a russian looking hat. He was waving me toward him.

Unable to refuse, I desperately dove toward his bunker and crawled right into the slot like a scurrying rat. Dignity be damned.

Immediately the guy backed off after helping me to my feet, giving me space to catch my bearings. Through the crusty looking view of the gas mask, I saw this guy was bundled in a parka, patiently watching me with caution. Around him were seemingly endless strings of wires, probably enough to stretch out a few miles if it was all lined up. Many computers were hidden among them.

I wasn’t getting the vibe that he was a threat to me, otherwise I would have been held down and gagged. To be honest, he kinda had that hot nerd look going for him. But as a show of my authority here, and to prove I wasn’t going to trust him, I whipped out one of the pistols I took from before and aimed it at his head.

In this business, you never trust someone you just met, especially after they helped you. There’s always a catch. Random people like him were especially low on my willingness scale.

“Who are you?” I hovered my finger over the trigger, just in case things went south. I’d never shot a human being before, and I really didn’t want to. I wasn’t even sure I could, but the name of the game is to bluff how tough you are.

He didn’t raise up his hands like I expected. Instead he just glared at me, refusing to be fully submissive. I was impressed at the balls he had to stare down a gun and not shake. Those challenging eyes told me he had experience with this kind of situation.

“I know you can talk, so tell me who you are!” I ordered.

“Yuri Mendeleyev,” he answered in a faint russian accent. His head then tilted and his brow raised. “Now, you?”

“I don’t have to tell you shit,” I responded. “I’m the one with a gun here, so you answer my questions.”

A beeping sound started up in the corner of his bunker room. I couldn’t see what it was through the thick wires blocking my view.

Yuri took a breath and shook his head like he was embarrassed. His lip pursed as he looked at me.

“What is that?” I asked him.

“The coffee is done. Do you want some?”

Was he some kind of funny guy? Even if that was true, I wasn’t lifting up this mask for any reason. I gestured for him to prove it and slowly move back toward the supposed coffee maker. If his hand went anywhere out of line, I’d have no choice but to fire.

Turning the corner, I did see a simple little coffee maker with a fresh jug of joe in its glass dome. The mundane look of it almost hit me with nostalgia, like I’d just walked into some gas station.

“Guess you weren’t lying about that,” I said.

“Please, keep your voice down.” Yuri said, turning back to me. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

“Oh really?” I laughed. Believing anyone's word just like that is how so many dumb scavengers got weeded out. “Prove to me you weren’t the one that made that reactor go nuclear then, and maybe I’ll let up.”

“What?” he uttered in shock, glancing at one of his computers that had just booted up. “Nuclear?”

With a string of motions, he requested to check his computer. I let him sit down and lowered my gun, keeping it ready incase he pulled something on me.

He let out a soft grunt when he noticed I was still on edge. Finally his hands began typing away until two graphs came up on the screen. “For your information, those are thorium reactors. They can’t go nuclear.”

Now that I thought about it, I worked with thorium cores all day and never had any trouble with them blowing up. The excitement of the situation must have made me irrational.

“Then explain the explosions," I ordered.

He sighed, mumbling something under his breath in Russian. “Likely a result of a chemical accident. There’s a team of scientists there right now. Although, I doubt they’re still alive if you say something exploded…”

He started to break out into a nervous sweat, which oddly hadn’t happened yet, despite my intimidation.

“Didn’t you feel it?” I asked, not sure how he couldn’t have felt the earth shaking blast.

“I did. It woke me up. But for all I knew it could have been something you caused.”

He poked around the programs of his computer until he loaded up security camera feeds, at least ten of them. Two were offline, and another was full of static.

“What is this?” I asked, noticing the working feeds looked a lot like what I expected from a power plant interior.

“These are live videos from inside the plant.” He pointed to the two offline views. “See these? That was where the explosion likely happened. It was also where the scientists were working.”

Naturally I had to ask what they were working on. He didn’t have a clue.

“I know you don’t trust me, and I hate to ask, but we need to go there immediately and find out what happened.”

“Give me one reason I should go along with." This could have been him leading me into a trap.

“Please… The thorium reactors might not explode, but there are people in there… They need help!”

Hearing the desperation in his tone really gave me the feeling that he knew someone in there, even if he didn’t know what they were doing. This wasn’t my problem, but a part of me was starting to think he might not have been the bad guy here. Not that I was dropping my guard yet. Plus, I wasn’t confident a trip there would be worth it if everyone was already dead.

Although, there might have been some good stuff in that reactor I could turn around and sell… That could be a bit of insurance incase we missed any rescue opportunities.

Regardless, he was chipping away at my resolve. If there were people in there still alive, I didn't want to let them eat fumes and keel over.

“Dyadya, pochemu ty krichish?”

Accomponying a tiny voice from behind me was a pair of equally tiny footsteps.

Both our heads turned in shock to see a bright eyed little girl staring at us, fear consumed her face as she clung tightly to her teddy bear.

“Olga!” Announced Yuri. “Vozvrashchaytes' v svoyu komnatu!”

“Hey!” I shouted over him. “Enough of the Russian. Talk English, you hear me?” I jabbed him with my fist. “Who’s the girl?”

“She is my niece. Forgive her for not knowing English.”

“Gde papa?” she cried out to me, tearing up. “Gde papa? Ty zabral moyego papa?”

I couldn’t understand what she was saying, but I kept hearing the word “papa” come out of her mouth. Unless that was some weird Russian word for ‘kill the woman,’ she must have been saying something about her dad.

But Yuri was supposedly her uncle, so who was she referring to?

“What’s she saying?” I asked Yuri.

“I’ll tell you. But please, don’t hurt her.”

Not a chance in Hell I’d hurt a kid. The worst I’d ever do is take her hostage incase he got aggressive with me, but not a hair would be plucked.

“Then you better answer my question,” I replied.

“She’s looking for her father…” Yuri pointed to the screen. “He’s somewhere in that accident.”