The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Capital Wasteland

The Definitive Guide to Understanding, Evading and/or Annihilating any and all Dangers Hiding in the DC Hellhole

The following dedication appears in the book:

for Lucas and Moria
and all other Wastelanders for
water, bullets and a tin roof

Chapter One

Far out in the barely mapped backend of Brahman wastes of Maryland, lies a once beautiful, but unprotected green-tinted city. From this city, a child of the atom, once only known by a moniker given to him by one of many three-headed dogs of the oddly shaped Commonwealth, set out in search of his father. Within the first thirty days of his search, he realized how small his world truly was.

This child has, or rather had, a problem, which was this: most of his accomplishments and those of his fellows were so far in reverse of what he expected that he sought to go out and do something about that. But regardless of how many steps he took, someone or something was there to set him another step back.

He was increasingly of the opinion that he'd made a big mistake leaving the relative safety and isolation of the vast, underground Vault from whence he came. Yes, his eviction was rather sudden and the three men he murdered that day were certainly a mark against him, but the choice was still there: run or die.

And then, many weeks into his journey, more than ten years since a man had been set up near a microphone to tell people how nice it would be to chill the ever-loving fuck out, the young man finally lost. Every ideal was wrung out to dry, every iota of his former self blew away at ground zero of his own, personal nuclear detonation. At this point, a Vault Dweller died.

This is not his story.

But it is the story of the immediate fallout from that death and the Wanderer that arose from the ashes.

This is also the story of a book, a book called the Wasteland Survival Guide – not an American book, never published when there was such a nation as America, and until long after the Great War, never considered a necessity by Americans.

Nevertheless a piece of literature valued by all in the wastes. In fact, it was probably the most remarkable published work until almost three centuries later when the first publishing house of New New York City was established in the ruins of the once proud city-state.

More copies of the Wasteland Survival Guide have been made than any other book, written or duplicated – and the helpful nature and easy writing make the advice flow from page to Waster with no loss of knowledge.

But enough about the bloody book. This story revolved around that book's chief research editor and his terrible, tragic first year away from the Vault from which no one ever enters and from which no one ever leaves. Besides that, the story begins simply.

It begins with a house.

"You open this door right this minute, punk, or I'll break it down!"

Nearly the whole town, minus the self-proclaimed overseer and tavernman and the uncaring mercenaries who took up guard posts around town, was gathered on the porch of one particular tin and steel house.

This particular home had stood vacant for more than seven years until a young man came wandering into the small, but thriving, metropolis of metal walkways and social gatherings around the large, unexploded atomic bomb in the center of the crater than made up the geography. One of his first actions on coming into town, after meeting the town Sheriff and having a shouting match with the town loudmouth, disarmed the ever-present danger with little more than a pair of pliers and the A-OK from Lucas Simms.

Right now, that very Sheriff, Simms, was beating away at the young man's door, insisting that he come out. The robotic butler that once belonged to the former tenant could be heard along with the fierce barking of the young man's dog.

"I'm terribly sorry, Sheriff," the butler intoned in a crisp, foreign accent. "The master is not taking callers at this time."

"Tin can," Simms said, "if you don't open this door on the count of five, I'm breaking it down. You get that boy down here and tell him to bring a good explanation about what happened last night with him."

"Oh, for heaven's sake, I'll make the attempt."

The robot floated away from the thin door up toward the single bedroom. The door was closed, but unlocked. Inside, the single human occupant sat up in bed, tugging boots on over his altered Vault 101 jumpsuit.

"Wadsworth," the young man said.

"Sir, I'm afraid Mayor Simms is insisting on your presence."

"I can hear that," he said as he finished tying the laces and tugging them into a semi-permanent knot. "Tell Simms I'll be down in a minute."

Down the stairs, a noted lack of the drum-like beating on the tin door caused the young man to speed his preparations. A modified, armored jumpsuit adorned the young man's body protecting him from much of what the weather could throw at him. He wore a nasty looking revolver on his hip and slung a rifle over each arm. From his belt hung a few radiation chems and stimpaks, as well as assorted bits of hardware for making repairs or assembling ammunition on the road. All in all, the man was armed for a small, out-of-the-way war.

"Wadsworth, I left money in the desk upstairs. Keep Dogmeat fed while I'm out, got it?"

"Certainly, sir! I shall maintain his current diet and walk as needed!"

"Thanks. I should be back some time…"

The young man took a fixed blade from his boot and etched into the handle of his revolver: R 21:6. Admiring his handiwork and pleased with the condition of both the knife and gun, he returned both to their places on his person and opened the door.

"Sheriff," he said simply.

"Kid," the Sheriff said sharply, "you have a lot of explaining to do."

You see, last night the "Kid from Vault 101" had a long visit to the town's saloon; one owned and operated by the most detestable man this side of the DC ruins. Colin Moriarty. The night began with a drink and a conversation with Gob, the bartender and effective slave to the tavern's owner.

The kid was slumped over the front of the bar, his back to the door near by, and droned on about this or that. "Gob, I don't even know what I'm doing anymore."

Gob, having taken a liking to the kid for the simple kindness of not being revolted on meeting a Ghoul for the first time, listened with long-earned patience and the empathy not to say anything unless invited to specifically. The whole affair was horribly tragic, but not unexpected out in the wastes.

Last week, barely a month into the kid's new life out in the wasteland, the kid found his dad after all that time searching. Long story short, the moment he and dear, old dad started working together on his dead mother's lifelong goal, some armored freaks calling themselves the Enclave show up and start shooting. How the kid described it, his father died of several gunshot wounds and radiation over eight hundred Roentgens (far above death level).

The kid had also been drinking tonight. Gob delivered what he asked for, but could tell it hadn't started in the saloon.

"God—Grod—G-Gob," the kid stuttered over his drink, "pour me another."

"Look, kid," Gob said. "You really don't need another. I think it's time you went home, alright?"

Which is when the owner walked in from the back room.

"What's this now about sending one our best customers of the night home, Mr. Gob," Moriarty said in his almost cultured tone.

"Sir, any more and the kid might not make it home," Gob pleaded.

"Nonsense. Pour the kid another and be sure to collect all fifteen Caps for the service."

Shots of the shit Moriarty made in the back room were barely worth one Cap a shot, and even then he should be paying the customers for drinking his filth.

"I can't serve him anymore," Gob said.

Moriarty leaned over the Ghoul, not caring about his personal space in the slightest. "You listen to me, zombie," he said in a low, dangerous voice. "I fucking own your rotting ass until you pay back my two hundred Caps. Until then, you pour this fucking degenerate alcohol until he dies and you take what he owes me off his cold, dead—"

A large chunk of Moriarty's right ear vanished with the puff of air moving through a steam pipe across the bartop. It took from the moment Moriarty let go of Gob to the pants shitting reaction he had when he saw the kid's obscene homemade rifle to realize that hole in his earlobe had been made by the railroad spike embedded in the back wall of the saloon.

The kid vaulted over the bar, taking a collection of glassware and varying volumes of alcohol with him right into the owner's torso. Both fell and the kid dragged Moriarty up screaming.

"Out," the kid demanded, dragging out the word to make his point.

The bar fell silent except for the sweet Jazz from Galaxy News Radio crackling away on the receiver that had been relocated to the corner for better signal. Of the few people there that night, Lucy West was staring from her usual corner table and dinner of Brahman steak and Nuka Cola. Nova, another of the owner's slaves, peered over the second floor landing to see what the noise was. Gob hadn't moved except to stand against the side wall away from the fight and the other patrons had stopped drinking.

"I said out!" The kid pushed his rifle into Moriarty's back and forced him toward the door. The door flew open and out he went right up to the safety railing where he fell over on the metal gangway. The kid screamed at him to get up and start walking to the center of town.

Moriarty, to the surprise of many onlookers both did as he was told and was screaming for help. He was halfway down the ramps, the kid in tow still brandishing his gun, when Lucas Simms came out of his quiet home to see what was bothering his town.

It shocked him, the hardened former Regulator turned town protector, to find the silent, intelligent kid from the Vault threatening the self-proclaimed fiscal owner of Megaton and getting his way. His amusement and shock fell away and he ran over, Chinese Assault Rifle out and ready.

The kid kicked out, sending Moriarty right into the radioactive muck in the lowest pocked of the Megaton crater, right up against the now dead atomic bomb. In his drunken escapade, the kid was thankful that the nice older couple that run the creepy church in town weren't out at this hour. It would have been a shame to interrupt one of their fucking cultish sermons with such a violent act.

The workers and patrons of the saloon, along with many people still wandering around and socializing in Megaton at the late time gathered to watch the only real entertainment any of them had gotten in years of living there.

The kid had his foot on Moriarty's back, keeping the man from crawling out of the deadly hole he found himself in.

"Tell Gob you're sorry," he managed to say through a slightly broken, drunken voice.

"Fuck you," Moriarty yelled.

The kid picked up his boot and kicked down on the older man again. Something cracked and Moriarty screamed in pain.

"Not the right answer," he said more soberly than before.

"Pull your foot back," came the strong, deep voice of Lucas Simms.

The kid didn't answer, actually managing to dig his boot deeper into his enemy's back.

"Boy, I like you a hell of a lot for disarming that bomb, but in my town you listen to me. Now you get your foot off that man."

Almost tempted to ignore the modern cowboy Sheriff again, the kid did as he was told.

"Now lower that… gun and we can talk this out."

Again, the kid did as ordered. He dropped the gun, holding it by the strap level with the ground.

"Sheriff," the kid said, "if it's all the same to you, I'm going home for the night. Drank too much."

Simms almost didn't let it go with that, but the way the kid set down the haphazard firearm and by the tears streaming down his face, he let it go.

"Kid, you report to me at noon tomorrow or I'm coming for you. Got me?"

"Yes, sir."

Which leads us to the current situation.

"Sheriff, come in."

Simms did so, leaving the crowd to wonder what would be said within the house. Too bad for them.

"Son, you'd better have one hell of an explanation as to that little tantrum last night."

"Sheriff," the kid said slowly and reverently, "I didn't like the way Moriarty was treating his employees. He's lucky you stopped me from putting a bullet in his head."

"Way I heard it, it was a rail spike."

"That too. I'm leaving. Dogmeat and Wadsworth are here, so treat them well. I made arrangements with Jenny down at the Lantern to see that Dogmeat eats and Moria is going to watch my house for me."

"You plan on being gone long?"

"I need to get out of town for a while. Moria has some work for me, so I'll be out a while. Don't let Moriarty take his revenge on Gob or Nova. If he lays a finger on either of them, tell him I'm coming back eventually and I'll personally hang him from his fucking bar."

"After last night, that threat might hold. You took off most of his ear."

"Funny," the kid said, "I was aiming for his head."

Simms responded slowly. "Boy, you have issues."

"You don't know the half of it. Tell anyone who asks that I'm on vacation. And don't let anyone in my house who isn't Jenny or Moria. Dogmeat'll kill if he doesn't like who's in my house."

"What sort of work are you doing for Miss Brown?"

"She's been writing a book, but needed someone to do some research for her in the field. Figure it'll get my mind off… I've had a bad month. I need the time away from people to sort it out."

The kid clammed up at that point. Simms, knowing the sign opted to leave without anything else said. Once Simms was gone, the kid gathered the few items he still needed and went for the door.

"Hitchhiker's Guide to the Capital Wasteland? Have got to do something about that name."