Date: 10.9.2224
Location: Lafayette Post Office
We entered with weapons drawn.
Not because we wanted a fight.
Because the wasteland teaches you that every closed door is a question.
The post office stood abandoned. Torn shelves. Broken counters. Letters scattered across the floor, carrying messages to people who would never receive them.
But then we saw it.
Light.
A single room still burning against the darkness.
We approached slowly.
Larry knocked.
“Sir?”
Silence.
Then a voice.
“Who is it?”
Clancy stepped forward.
“It’s your friends from Red Rocket.”
A pause.
Then the question that told me everything.
“Is the ghoul with you?”
The room went quiet.
Clancy answered.
“No. We left him home.”
The door opened.
Chuck stood there, wounded but alive.
Larry looked him over.
Chuck lowered his head.
“I was searching the area for scraps. Then those Mirelurks came out of nowhere. Tried climbing the fence. Cut myself getting away.”
Clancy nodded.
“We know. I was—”
Larry immediately interrupted.
“Thirty percent certain?”
Clancy turned.
“Shut up, Breaux.”
Chuck looked confused.
“Yes. I was attacked by Mirelurks.”
Larry grinned.
“What's with the thirty percent?”
Clancy sighed.
“It’s a system. Possible. Probable. You know...”
Pinball rotated.
“Observation: Lieutenant Clancy appears to have created a personal probability assessment system.”
Clancy ignored him.
Chuck explained that he survived.
The Mirelurks chased him.
The Brotherhood came through afterward.
And they took everything.
“My supplies. My equipment. My sealed supplements. Everything.”
Then I noticed it.
A chemistry station.
Bottles.
Equipment.
Ingredients.
“Is this how you survive?”
Chuck hesitated.
“I trade.”
Larry raised an eyebrow.
“You mean you sell chems.”
Chuck didn’t answer.
He didn’t need to.
The room answered for him.
Larry looked at me.
“Chief...”
I already knew where this was going.
I began.
“Now listen, there are consequences to—”
Larry pointed.
“You forgot about the Power Armor.”
I stopped.
He got me.
For once.
I looked back at Chuck.
“You need medical attention.”
Larry immediately said:
“Obviously.”
I looked at him.
“He has the right to refuse.”
Larry gestured around the room.
“Look around. This man has a whole chem lab.”
I approached Chuck carefully.
“Your choice.”
Chuck sighed.
“Fine.”
Then I asked the question that mattered.
“Where did the Brotherhood go?”
Chuck answered.
“Lafayette General Hospital.”
I looked down at my Pip-Boy.
The coordinates matched.
Everything pointed there.
I looked at Clancy.
“Clancy.”
“Chief...”
“This one’s on you.”
Clancy looked offended.
“I only suggested following the tracks.”
Pinball immediately chimed in.
“Correction: He suggested following the tracks. You insisted.”
I stared at him.
“Pinball.”
“Observation withdrawn.”
I looked at Larry.
Larry sighed.
Pulled them out.
For once, no argument.
He injected Chuck.
And then we watched.
The wound closed.
The bleeding stopped.
Everyone stared.
Larry blinked.
“...That was fast.”
Pinball beeped.
“Medical technology continues to amaze.”
While Chuck recovered, I searched the building.
Nothing.
No supplies.
No weapons.
No easy answers.
Then I found something.
Bones.
A body collapsed against the wall.
And in its hands...
A letter.
A final message from someone who never left.
The wasteland has a habit of hiding truth inside places people stopped looking.
Every ruin has a voice.
You just have to be willing to listen.
While I read, Chuck explained more.
The chems.
The trades.
The people he met.
The customers who changed.
Who became feral.
Clancy looked up.
“Those are the ones I subdued.”
Chuck stared.
“Ah.”
A small realization passed between them.
Not every monster was born a monster.
Some were people who lost a war inside themselves.
When everything settled, Chuck looked at us.
“Can I come with you?”
I looked toward the direction of Red Rocket.
The Dean family.
The station.
The place where even people who looked different still had a home.
“You can.”
Chuck nodded.
“I appreciate it.”
“You’ll find shelter.”
A pause.
“I understand.”
Another ruin logged.
Another survivor found.
Another piece of the wasteland revealed.
The Brotherhood was at Lafayette General.
The tracks were becoming clearer.
And every person we met carried a question:
Are they a burden to carry... or a station waiting to be built?
The answer is never found by looking at what someone was.
Only what they choose to become.
— The Big Chief
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