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An original novel set in the Fallout universe, written to be accessible to all, featuring unique people and places Fallout: Vault X tells the story of John. A vault dweller, who spent every day of his twenty five years underground. Like his father, and his father before him. Proud to live in the last remaining bastion of humanity, all that survived The Great War of the atomic age. Hidden deep below the surface of the earth, toiling under brutal conditions. Year after year, decade upon decade. All to expand into the natural cave system the Vault occupied, building for the future. However, John knew what his forefathers did not, that everything he’d been taught was a lie. After finishing school at the age of ten, John received his standard issue pipboy. An arm mounted personal computer, worn by everyone in the Vault. Used to coordinate the relentless pace of expansion, needed to work as an apprentice. To learn the craft that would be his life’s work. A noble calling to ensure a future for all that remained of the human race. A quirk of fate saw John equipped not with the crude, clunky, pipboy model his father wore. That almost everyone around him wore. His looked smaller, sleeker, finished in a jet black sheen. And capable of doing far more than its drab counterparts. The world above had been ravaged by atomic flames, yet life clung to its bones. The Red Valley fared better than most in the century since the bombs fell. The clean water and rich soil protected by rolling hills. All spared from direct strikes, for the most part. Life survived here. Trees spawned from charred ground, misshapen, green leaves turned red. Along with simple crops, grown wild at first, then cultivated by the survivors. The scavengers of the old world were inventive, hardy people. All determined to rebuild in the ruins of a world they never knew. In the decades that passed settlements emerged. They grew, spreading along the valley floor. Reclaiming the pre-war remnants of the once industrialised heartland. Salvaging the robotic wonders of a bygone age to build their walls and work their fields. To protect them in the dark of the wasteland. But such things are uncommon in this world, and the rarer something is, the greater its value. And the worth of pre-war technology had not gone unnoticed. The last, real, power in this world rested in the mechanised hands of The Brotherhood of Steel. Forged from the mortally wounded old world military. The Brotherhood used its access to the weapons made for a conflict no one won to strike out into the wastes. Men and women were equipped with advanced armour, aerial transportation, high grade weaponry. Accompanied by the training, strength, and will, to put them to use. They established chapters and set up outputs far and wide. All dedicated to a single purpose. To ensure the technology left abandoned by its long dead creators didn’t fall into the wrong hands. Namely, any hands that were not their own. This is the world John escaped into. A place of horrors brought forth from atomic fire. A place where survival meant battling against the darkness. Fighting a war each day to get to the next. And war...war never changes
Prologue
War. War never changes. When humanity first mastered the power of the atom it had been to end war. And for a time it did, but you cannot quell the flames of conflict by inventing new fuel for the fire. In the years that followed the first towering mushroom cloud, each nation sought the power of the atom for themselves, and before long they had it. Humanity finally found the means to end all wars, by ensuring no one would be left to fight them.
What once required large vehicles to be transported became smaller, then smaller still. Until a single soldier could wield a power that no one person should have. While some only saw a way to vanquish their enemies, others saw the true potential of the awesome power of the atom. The power to free the world from want. From toil, from hunger, from the darkness that stalked humanity for millennia.
First came miniaturisation. Computers that needed entire buildings to house became so small they could fit on a desk, or even on your arm. This, in turn, led to revolutionary breakthroughs in artificial intelligence, robotics, automation. No longer would humanity work the fields, or build homes, or even serve others. The machines would do it, and do it without question.
Humanity entered a new age, the age of the atom. An age of relative peace, uneasy, fragile, but peace all the same. No longer were wars fought on the beaches and in the towns. They were fought in secret, behind closed doors. Clandestine operations, deniable actions, the theft of designs, in the shadows, yet it would not remain so for long. The fires of war cannot be contained, cannot be hidden, they spread, consuming all they touch.
New threats rose, old adversaries became new friends, old friends became new enemies. All with the knowledge that they could wipe each other from the face of the earth in a matter of minutes.
Fearing the worst some sought to survive the war to end all wars by moving underground. Safe from the radiation, that if unleashed would poison the air, the water, and the earth itself. These vast underground labyrinths became known as Vaults. A fitting name for something to keep safe the most precious thing humanity had, each other.
No one really knows how The Great War started, but when it did few were ready, fewer still survived it. Humanity went from billions, to millions, in mere minutes. Scattered, hidden, and relegated to a wasteland, the carcass of the old world. Fighting each and every day to survive. Humanity entered a new age, the age of survival. And survival means fighting a war without end, and war…war never changes.
