following in his footsteps

chapter 1

Emily felt herself get practically blinded by the flash of white that hit her eyes as the opened the rickety wooden door that led to the cave with the massive vault door, behind her she heard the metal screeching as the door shut, the rusted metal screeching in protest as it was shoved into place by the opening mechanism. as her eye sight finally returned to her two things went through her mind

firstly, holy fucking shit, she just left the vault, she had just abandoned literally her entire life, everything she knew from the vault, her best friend amata, the relative peace and quiet of the vault, and yes, even butch and his annoying gang, and she'd probably never see any of that again. this was a new start...

secondly... the wasteland was kind of beautiful, in a way, everything was kind of grey or brown, from her position on the rocky ledge she could see a nearby neighborhood, most of the houses leveled, most likely by old age or the air burst of one of the detonated bombs, off to her right she saw some big metal wall like structure, all of this had a kind of odd beauty to it, she didn't know how exactly to describe it. but it was certainly not like the overseer and her teacher had said it would be like. realizing she had been holding her breath since leaving the cave she took her first deep breath of non recycled air for the first time 

the girl herself was only 19ish, her birthday was actually a few days ago, she had short red hair, which she usually kept combed when she could, her face had a few freckles on either cheek, she was about 5'9", she wore what everyone wears down in the vault, a faded blue jumpsuit with yellow highlights, a big 101 stitched on the back, the number of her vault, and a pipboy on her right arm, which as usual, felt kinda clunky there, but it was important, it had everything she would need out here.

she looked at the 10mm pistol in her hand, sighing, weighing her options on where to start the search for her father, before looking at the wasteland before here "ok... what would dad do... where would he go first..." he eyes once again landed on the metal wall, "there's no harm checking the obvious beacon, right?" 

she had found her way down from the scenic overlook rather easily, as there was a slope leading to the road, and from there she set out towards the metal structure, she looked around cautiously as she walked, not sure what she would find out here. eventually she reached the wall, and the very first thing she noticed was a brahmin loaded with supplies, and a few people were conversing next to it, looking like there were doing some kind of business deal, all well and good she thought, until she noticed the beast of burden had a second head, she almost gasped in surprise when she noticed, but managed to keep it in because she didn't want to look like a doofus in front of three heavily armed strangers, she turned back towards the metal wall, and noticed an old pre war robot, who just seemed to spout random phrases as she approached, suddenly one of the metal panels started to slide up, before revealing a door behind it, the protectron(she was pretty sure that was the model, if the robotics class she barely passed was right) said "welcome to megaton" in a robotic voice.

'megaton? is that this place's name?' Emily wondered, as she approached the doors, opening them she peeked inside, in there seemed to be a large crater, with a bunch of ramshackle looking buildings were built in and around it, she stepped inside and took a few steps in, when a man in a nice looking duster and hat approached her

"greetings... i'm lucas simms, i'm what might pass as a sheriff around here, mayor too when the need arises... your don't plan on causing any trouble do you?" Lucas asked

emily shook her head, feeling reaaal welcome "no? I don't want any trouble, I'm just here looking for my father, maybe you've seen him? goes by the name James, short brown hair, middle aged, beard, wearing a jumpsuit like mine?"

the man laughed a little "sorry kid, I don't have time to personally notice ever guy the waltzes in here" Emily saddened a little visibly and he noticed, frowning he spoke again "look kid, maybe I did see him, kind of sounds familiar, but i have to many problems to remember everyone you know? between the raiders, super mutants, the mole rats that occasionally break in here-"

"mole rats? super mutants? what-"

simms studied her for a moment "you seem pretty clueless, let me guess, you just stepped out of old vault 101 right?"

"uh... yes, it's that obvious?"

lucas smiled slightly "alright look, i don't have time to explain the wasteland to you, like i said I'm a busy man, if you need directions or something, let me know-"

"actually directions would be great"

Lucas nodded slightly "alright, well down in the crater is three places, the clinic, the brass lantern, where you can get food, and the church of atom, I recommend not going in there if you don't want to hear a bunch of stuff about their crackpot religion. then the upper levels are craterside supply, which you can reach by going up the ramp next to the clinic, and moriarty's saloon, if your father came through here he might have ended up there" said simms "just avoid those atom cooks around the nuke and keep to yourself and you should be left alone-"

"alr- wait, wait, what nuke-" said Emily,

Lucas gestured to  the crater with his head, which Emily promptly moved closer to, down there she saw an undetonated nuclear bomb

"why the fuck do you guys have an undetonated nuclear payload in the middle of your town"

"well... the bombs been there since before the town, but no one wanted to move it, and when they were building the walls, apparently they needed the children of atoms help, and they wouldn't move it, so it's just always... been there"

"and... you don't worry it will go off?"

"not really, hasn't yet, it seems harmless. still, I'd sleep easier it was disarmed, but i don't know anyone with the proper skill-"

"i- i could probably do it-" Emily internally screamed at herself 'what the fuck are you doing, you don't know the first thing about bombs let alone a nuke-'

Lucas nodded "whoa there, if you want to try you can, but try to at least just take a look first, make sure you know what you're doing, then if you're confident enough knock yourself out, now i really must go-" and with that Lucas walked away.

Emily stared down at the bomb "like less than 30 minutes out of the vault and already i'm in over my head" she groaned "why'd you have to leave the vault dad-"