Terminal Log: Big Chief, Mike Marcel | Edith Garland Dupré Library Entry 002
Date: 11.05.2224 | Weather: Cool Night, Light Radiation Drift, Skies Partially Clear
We made it.
Edith Garland Dupré Library—standing like a monument that refused extinction.
The marble façade cracked, vines twisting through the letters, yet somehow… she still held her breath.
Larry “The Swindler” Breaux went full sledgehammer in that chrome power armor, goring the steel doors like a bull seeing red. The impact rang through the courtyard—BOOM—and the echo traveled the whole damn campus. The steel groaned, warped, and finally surrendered.
Pinball flickered his sensor light twice, like a blink of satisfaction.
“Nice job, Swindler. WE ARE IN.”
Clancy followed right after with that Enclave bark of his—
“ALL IN!”
We stepped inside pressing into two centuries of dust and silence. The air smelled of old paper, mold, and preservation—a strange holiness. Light from Larry’s armor beams cut through hanging cobwebs that shimmered like crystal threads.
It was a world asleep, but unbroken.
The shelves still stood, half-tilted but proud, books fossilized in place. Terminals hummed faintly in the corners, still running—still remembering.
Samson Reed was the first to speak. His tone had that quiet, reverent awe.
“You ever notice how the old world doesn’t die—it waits? It just… pauses. Like it wants someone to listen before it finally fades.”
Clancy, arms crossed, scanned the ceiling like a soldier clearing corners.
“Or it’s bait. Places like this attract squatters, ghouls, ferals, or worse. Keep your light steady.”
I moved past them both, drawn to the history section. Something was calling me. I could feel it pulling, like gravity tuned to my bloodline.
And then I saw it, a terminal still running at full capacity, glowing faint green. The Book Return System. The damn thing was whirring and blinking, like it had been checking in and out books for 200 years straight. Overclocked but alive.
“Chief,” Pinball muttered, “this terminal’s activity rate is… anomalous. Someone—or something—has been keeping this library alive.”
Before I could respond, a loud crash echoed through the chamber. Larry, of course. He’d just punched through the glass front of a Nuka-Cola machine, soda fizzing across the marble.
“Jackpot!” he yelled. “Still got juice in it!”
Pinball buzzed in exasperation.
“Chief, why does he have to be this way?”
“Because,” I said, “chaos likes a drinking buddy.”
We laughed—briefly. The kind of laugh that happens before the gravity of everything you’re standing in hits again.
Then the pull returned. My eyes landed on a cracked leather-bound volume sitting open on a display—“Legends of the Bayou: The Redwolf Chronicle.”
That’s where I found him.
The first of our name.
The records spoke of a boy who nearly drowned as a child—rescued by a red wolf. A bond formed that defied nature. He grew, became a man who could speak with wolves, lead them, and when cursed by the voodoo priestess Tanti, he became something more—not a monster, not prey, but the bridge between both.
He carried that curse like a covenant:
100 nights as the Rougarou if he broke Lent.
But he learned control. He wore the beast as armor, not affliction.
Redwolf—the protector, the builder, the one who founded Big Chief Soda not as a business, but as a promise: Legacy over luxury.
Darryl.
I froze.
“There it is… living myth, bleeding into man.”
Clancy’s jaw tightened.
“God almighty. Your family’s in the archives of history and horror at the same time.”
I kept reading. The lineage spilled forward—Ray Jr., Mike Sr, Myself and Darryl. All connected. The curse refined into chemistry. The serum—L:8M—Lithium-8: Magnesium. The notes were clear: meant to enhance immune strength, instead it warped DNA. Supercharged instincts. Heightened aggression. It didn’t cure—it catalyzed.
“Smells metallic, stings like fire, and leaves you twitching like you grabbed a live wire.” — Survivor Testimony
Battery acid in the veins. That’s what Darryl was running on.
Not just bloodline—battery line.
Pinball was scanning the terminal, his processors chirping in quick bursts.
“Chief… these entries reference a man named Jean Dean. Freetown trader, pre-war lineage, still operating post-collapse. Connection established: Dean Family—Red Rocket proprietors.”
Samson looked over.
“Jean Dean’s still alive?”
“Alive enough,” I said. “He warned us before. Feral-infested routes, raiders by the refinery. But he knew something. The Deans always do.”
Clancy grunted.
“Freetown’s crawling with ferals. You go there, you better bring that armor, bomb or not.”
I nodded. “We’ll handle that in time.”
We made camp inside the library. Or tried to. The floors were dusty but untouched, almost eerily preserved. Like someone had sealed the place in a vacuum of time. Pinball dimmed his lights, humming low—his version of a lullaby.
Larry eventually passed out near the vending machine, a Nuka-Cola bottle still in his hand. Clancy sat near the window, watching the courtyard for movement, rifle propped against his leg. Samson, quiet as ever, muttered scripture under his breath... something about inheritance and burden.
And me? I just sat going through the books.My Grandfathers, My Dad, Darryl and Myself...
All threads of the same curse, tied to the same flame.
The air vibrated faintly, maybe from Pinball’s diagnostics, maybe from something unseen..but the library felt awake.
“Chief,” Pinball murmured, sensors dimming, “this place recognizes you. You are home.”
I looked around one last time before rest.
Dust, books, faith, and legacy.
All still breathing.
“Maybe,” I said softly, “but home ain’t Lafayette for Me.”
Tomorrow, we head for Freetown.
Tonight, we let the ghosts keep watch.
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