Chapter 5: If I Had A Hammer

On the second day, he began work on his station. The first order of business was a jaunt to the cave underneath to clear out the mole rat den. He found choice bits of junk, bottles he could use, a fusion core with just over half charge, and even a collectible cowboy bobble head. Jon simply smirked at the note down there congratulating them for running a trash free operation.

There was radiation from a leaking reactor core, it’s fuel mostly spent, but Jon had taken Rad-X as soon a he entered the cave and felt the gamma heat. He was unsure if it would work, but his radiation resistance went up over 100, and that would be pulled directly from his vitals read by the Pip-Boy. It didn’t taste like an iodine tab, so who knew what it was.

The haul of rats represented a good amount of food. He would cook a bit for the day, and smoke dry the rest. As he did he took to setting up and configuring for what he needed. He didn’t need a gadget to dig a well and latrine, the station not actually having a bathroom, but he could use the monitoring functions to check water quality, and if his Augment shit was birthing some monstrosity he needed to be aware of. Thankfully his body was incredibly efficient and that wasn't too much of a concern.

He then set up a farm plot. Using wild mutfruit seeds, he planted them in the fresh turned ground. Overtime he would compost over the roots to increase the soil health, as the ASAM didn’t need to instruct him to do. Of course the crops would grow extremely fast due to their exposure to FEV and radiation. Most of farming was simply maintaining your crops. Plants were perennials, including food crop.

Any kind of annual that dies yearly and grows from dormant seed didn’t survive the wasteland. Once a plant actually grew so it could flower, about a month or two, he could pick it’s harvest once every couple of weeks at the fastest. It depended on the soil health, which wasn't great in the present area. It was a testament to the Abernathy’s skill and patience that they had crops the size of theirs, and could be picked as fast as theirs. Winters were mild, and growing seasons were year round, with sometimes a freak snap that could kill plants, and force you to start from scratch, so one always needed a stock.

Then he cleaned up the inside of the Red Rocket. The garage was a good size. It had to be to fit the ludicrous road boats that made up the average car. It was like everything in this world was made along the idea of what a 50 pulp mag would depict the future to look like. It had more than enough room for various work benches, the power armor stand, and a place picked out for the robot workbench. Having the shop here made sense if they were using it to manufacture parts for service, probably requiring a license fee for the template. Jon couldn’t fathom why most of the junk was down in the cave, when most of it could have just been scrapped with the workshop and used as base materials, and getting rid of it as well. It said something about the consumption driven culture. Things built to last the apocalypse, and still thrown away so casually.

The diner area had 5 booths, for four people each, and other 6 stools along the bar. There was a junk kitchen set up behind it that would certainly go in the workshop. Off to the side was the main office, and in it was a terminal, a desk, file cabinets, and full shelf with drawers. There was also a decent stash of caps in the desk, a couple hundred in all. This area would be good as his bunk, with it’s items moved into the garage.

Jon set up the ASAM for his bed, loaded the program into the shop, and got to work making it with the scrap he had around him as materials. The clothes of the dead in the booths for the mattress, and the steel from the cabinets and shelf worked for the frame and springs. They were ripped apart with his bare hands, lacking any other tools to do so. He also threw deadwood in for the night stand.

The shop was large, 10 foot long and 6 foot wide. Only about half of the front of the bench top was used for it’s tools, a drill, lathe, a couple clamps, with the back half encased for its processor and machinery, and a couple diagnostics screens on the top with buttons to navigate them. The materials were placed in the bottom, along with other bits of junk for their screws mostly. The press did it’s work, and foot long bars and bundles of the base materials were placed in it’s storage bin on the left side. On a small screen he activated his loaded program from the ASAM and the press punched out his frame, and then the mattress, and then the nightstand.

It wasn't long for him to assemble them, and not long after to use the terminal and ASAM holotape to program a plan for a table and chair, using basic shapes and joints coded in assembly, and compiling them in the shop firmware to check the preview screen. All he knew is that these computer systems would be a joke for him to crack, if this was a near eldritch program that only one man in the wasteland was capable of manipulating and researching. Two once Sturgis got some work with under his belt.

After a day of work the inside of the place was looking cleaner, he had some basic necessaries set up, happy with the quality of the clean well water. He sat at his new garage table with a smoke and a plate of food. There were some plates in a box under the counter that had never been opened, and thus in near pre-war condition. He also eyed the Nuka-Cola he had got from one of the vending machines to ponder over.

“Fuck it”

And he popped the cap to knock the drink back. He felt the radiation burn down his throat, but was still fizzy, and tasted like a coke from back home, if warm. It was good, sucker punched his sweet tooth, but there was no way the bombs gave it that radiation. It was brewed it. What the fuck were they thinking, Jon thought. Was selling irradiated soda just a marketing gimmick? Or another Government project.

He heard power armor walking up the road from Sanctuary though his open garage door. He picked up his rifle and started walking to meet the possible threat. It was obvious who and what it was, but he could never be too certain in the wastes. He forwent his vault-suit after the jaunt to the cave, and was just in his fatigue pants and undershirt, with Pip-Boy still firmly fixed to his wrist.

His hearing was good, and the power armor at a walk. He had time to check his map, and it was his power armor moving towards him, the location marked on his map. He eased his tense a bit. And simply leaned against the garage door frame with his rifle casually cradled as Sturgis walked up. Hemet in hand with a grin on his face.

Now that they were alone in the fresh air, alone, there was something underneath the power armor, grease, and heavily built man. Something like the polymer alloy of his armor plate. It was just a hint. He kept it to himself and hid it with a smile. It’s what he would expect a synth to smell like. He would withhold judgment until he had more information. Sturgis was a decent guy, synth or not.

“Heey, got your plate, bossman. Right as rad rain.”

“And the AI?”

“Oh she’s a real nice gal. Sheila. Thanks for making sure I was authorized. She threatened to detonate the core if I was a communist infiltrator, even after I was acknowledged.”

Jon scoffed, “Nice?”

Sturgis said, “A misunderstanding. Communists don’t use money, or drink Nuka-Cola. Ain’t it lucky I always keep some post war cheese on me.”

“I must remind you that communists would use money, and drink Nuka-Cola, if they were infiltrators, though I lack definitive data to calculate your likelihood of communist sympathies.”

Jon said, “Sheila, be nice.”

“Yes General Singh.”

Jon was happy to have his proper rank acknowledged. It was a closer to the truth. His previous rank was practically honorary, and he only claimed it with the suit to guarantee a successful hijacking. He saved that squad, and ran with them for the rest of the Eugenics Wars along the jungle rivers of Asia, a jaunt into his old haunts towards the end. He never went though the voodoo rituals of becoming a Marine like the others did, not that they didn’t call in every favor they had to get him the butter bars. Special forces always had favors in one place or another.

Sturgis locked the helmet back onto the frame, and hit the internal release. He got out and said, “Here you go boss. She needed a lot of love on her servos, but shes as smooth as an Atom Cat. I welded the cracks in the legs, and fixed the flaw just below the breast plate. Also cleaned the rust up. When I get some paint, I can paint it for yah. I’ll admit there are slicker sets out there, but nothing beats the ease of maintenance and upgrade potential of a set of T-45. You get me some premo trash, and we can talk coatings that can put you on par with the newer base models. Like silver-ceramo ploy-laminite composts on the F models. The T-51 is made of the stuff. The 60 somewhere in between.”

“Jesus that's a mouth full.”

“You know it boss. Those in the know just call it scapl.”

“Would it need reapplied?”

“After some abuse, sure. A hell of a lot less than the 51, and not as much as the 60. Takes less abuse though.”

“Trade offs.”

“Nailed it. It’s still a good set, boss.”

“Especially now that you got your hands on it. You the main guy in Quincy?” Jon decided to prod, to see what fell out.

Sturgis grimaced a bit, then smiled a some good memories. “Yeah boss. I was the guy, and I always had time for power armor. Atom Cats were across the way. They only been around for a couple years, but lets say just say Zeke saw a certain style he liked as a kid, and hey, I’m all for what they do with it.”

Jon said, “You think they’re okay? Jake said kids. I would guess not children.”

Sturgis pondered a second, “They’re alright. The do have some little ones with them, and they're on the young side, but there are a couple hard asses. Zeke recruited them specifically to protect his spot, and train the others. Red Rocket like this. One was former Brotherhood that decided he was too old to crawl though the waste for trash. They’ll defend what they got. Wouldn't be the Atom Cat way to cut and run from your home.”

Jon cut in, “You didn’t cut and run.”

“I did.”

“Were you supposed to die?”

“Maybe, everyone else did, boss. You saved our asses, but you weren’t there. Didn't see it’s heyday just a fuckin month ago. You know what’s crazy? A couple folks were whispering about another CPG, while Diamond City was still living in fear and bein bigots to decent ghouls just tryin to get by like us, Goodneighbor full of junkies and crooks even if they ain’t bigots. Not in Quincy. We were going to make our own stand. They wanted me involved to work on any infrastructure. To give my opinion on the feasibility of it. If it was even worth it to try, past dodgin institute assassins. A week later the Gunners show up. I thought when the Minutemen showed up, that this was it. It was it.”

“Sorry Sturgis.”

“It’s alright boss. Shouldn't have snapped like that.”

Jon decided it truly didn’t matter if Sturgis was a Synth. He was so close to human it was indistinguishable, distinction meaningless. He was a human, just a different manufactured subspecies like Jon. He found kinship with Synths, and wondered why the fuck the Institute was making them. He doubted they were getting paid for the water the Institute was making them carry, and that was the definition of slavery. It would be unfortunate if the Institute activated some sleeper code, and forced Jon to act.

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Jon asked, “How would you like to keep being the guy.”

Sturgis smiled again, “Preston whispered to me a little, and asked about the same thing. I’m with yah, boss. Just don’t expect me to pick up a gun. I’ll defend myself, but I’m not a soldier. Guns and me just don’t agree.”

Jon nodded, happy with his 2IC’s initiative. And of course their programmed humans would hate guns and suck at security. He said, “The SCPG always has places for civilian contractors.”

Sturgis smiled. Civilian contractor sounded about right. And so did that Second Commonwealth Provisional Government. He said, “Than it’s a sealed deal. What’s the first order of business. With Old Paul there, I’m actually not that needed to get the place fixed up. Between him and the ASAMs we’re plugging along. I can see you are too.”

Jon looked around and nodded, “Yup. Even made a template from scratch to play around with it. That little table and chair. First order is to secure our position in the north west. That will include junking what needs junked, and getting that junk to were it needs to go.”

Sturgis said, “Sounds good, boss. I’ll be ready.”

Jon said, “Good. I’ll be clearing places out, and when I do I’ll let you know the locations. Don’t think you have to drop everything, I know you’ll be working with Jake, and that’s what I want. Just get to them as soon as you can get to them, as long as it’s soon. Also start thinking about how you would get a factory running again. At least partially.”

Sturgis smiled, “Corvega.”

Jon returned it, “Corvega. I know you'll need to see it, but I’ll get on that when I’m ready. I understand it wont be something you can do overnight. We probably wont be ready for a bit.”

Sturgis said, “I understand boss. A plant like that will have all kinds of lines, and they're all programmable. We’d really only need to get two running. One for what we need, and one to get the rest of the plant fixed up. Shouldn’t be that difficult. I’ll also need a team, and we’ll need more people in general for me to pull from.”

Jon said, “Yeah, it will be longer term. The workshops will have to suffice for now, and we’ll need at least one dedicated just to get started.”

“You know it. One as close as possible would be best. Just be careful boss. We all got some bad memories from that place. Jun and Marcy lost their little baby. Ripped apart by ferals. Two more Minutemen lost. The Super Duper mart. They rushed into their nest to get them off us.”

Jon nodded solemnly. He said, “We’ll get it cleared. Life will find it’s way there again.”

Sturgis smirked, “Hmm. I believe it boss. If we had Sanctuary, the farms, Concorde, and Lexington with the plant? All havin people move in, a real army behind it? Well, anyone that messes with us will get an express ticket to hell.”

Jon gave an evil smile, “That's the plan, friend.”

Sturgis nodded, “Well, I’ll let you get back to it boss. Jake said he’d be stopping by on the way back.”

“Thanks Sturgis.”

Jon went back to his food and dug in, even though it was now cold. That didn’t really matter, at least it was fresh and not a ration, or 200 years old. He threw his boots up on the table after he was done and picked though the magazines now he finally had a free moment to read. Mostly Popular Mechanics, the same as it’s counterpart, a couple Silver Shroud comics, and a pinup mag, all for course in stellar shape and no doubt worth caps. The centerfold was an ebony beauty, perfectly trim, the rest equally so though not spanning as many pages, and the articles actually engaging. There were even a few men in the issue, so apparently that wasn’t a problem pre-war, and he guessed not post-war either. It wouldn’t be if it was.

“Hey slick!”

Jon grimaced. He shouldn’t have picked up the mag when he knew he would have company. He was a home owner now, and had to make those types of considerations. All he wanted to do now was satisfy an augmented urge. It was more a curse really, than a blessing in that regard. He was always bothered when the though crossed his mind that his size and stamina was hand crafted by his father and grandfather, even before he defected.

Unlike most Augments he actually preferred slower love, didn’t have to be glacial, and would have been just as superior, if not more, if he didn’t feel like he had to kill when he went too long. Out of all his partners, only one actually wanted him to set the pace, let him more like. That was also the only one he stole Army property for. He began missing her about that moment. They weren't committed, and he hadn't seen her for months, but he would have certainly tracked her down in a friendly way. Called her at least when he debriefed from watching the bastards fly away.

In his most private thoughts he imagined a white picket fence, 2.5 kids, the statistical average, and a hot rod to drive to his NASA gig before he took to space to finish the Wars. It would be years before any fruit bore from it, needing fusion generation first, to have the energy required to experiment with anti-mater generation. A decade at least, two to fully raise some kids that were hopefully superior. That thought was always interrupted by the vivid foresight of watching her die, shrived and old, and him still mostly un-aged, living the rest of his unnatural life with that pain. His heart nearly tore itself out every time.

Jon smirked as he thought of home. They were probably scrambling right now to find the lost Augment, a global manhunt, and would sweat their asses off for years waiting for the other shoe to drop. For another Eugenics War to pop out of a mountain or jungle like it did previously. He was just using us to take out the competition, obviously. Brass did trust him, but only so long as he didn’t just mysteriously vanish. Another layer to the cosmic joke played by Q.

“Mon in!” He had picked up many American mannerisms and speech patterns. Both from violent movies they showed to desensitize growing up, and further time embedded with American forces.

Jake strolled into the garage, and gave it an approving look, especially the set up ASAMs, and the terminal now hardwired into the workshop. He said, “Nice mag collection. Mint condition like everything else you seem to find. I don’t remember this little set up programmed into the ASAM.”

Jake took a seat at Jon’s motion. Jon said, “Played around with it. You can see the basic shapes used, and there’s plenty of brush and deadwood around to use for it. Just assembly code, and while it was going out of style in favor of higher level languages, there were still things directly coded in it, and I took coding growing up. Khan moved heaven and Earth to get us computers in the mountains of Afghanistan, the infrastructure to actually make them work. He wasn't actually that bad of a father, if detached, and an asshole. Anyway, I discovered not only do you need a template program, but.”

“Another program to edit templates, or create new ones. While surviving templates are somewhat rare, and can be copied with some jail-breaking know how, that program is rare rare.”

“And what do you know, the ASAM in conjunction with the configuration holotape acts like a copy of that program. You just have to use the ASAM as a pass though to get the template to the workshop, because you cant save it outside the program, and even if you could it’s not in a format the workshop recognizes. If feels like exploiting a system architecture bug, but if this was meant to use after the war.” He intentionally left it open that time.

“It’s definitely a feature. Meant to do just what we’re doing. Use left behind workshops to rebuild without the hassle of patent law. Just supposed to be Vault-Tech doing it. Rob-Co was partnered with them or something, according the little jingle.”

“Can whatever is left of them monitor? I know you said you haven't gotten long range communications up.”

Jake huffed in thought, “I don’t know, and I am a little worried about that possibility, but the alternative is to keep living in the dirt, maybe build a scrap heap over time like Diamond City. We need real manufacturing, quality goods, and we cant even get started without the ASAMs. How the NCR cracked it I don’t know. Maybe they found their own ASAMs, and only used them to do that, instead of trying to build their towns. Get the factories up first and go from there. I don’t think I’ll know until I figure out the communications, and can actually monitor them. That’s what I wanted to talk to you about, but It’s another job, slick.”

“Hit me, cowpoke.”

“There’s something called a Com-Hub up at Olivia Sat Station, just North and a touch East of here. You saw it, I bet. Only one problem.”

“Raiders.”

“Our friends the raiders.”

Jon nodded, and decided to change the subject. This was certainly a man he needed involved. He was already involved. “They fill you in?”

Jake said, “About what?”

John smirked, “Oof, Preston doesn’t trust you just yet. Probably thinks you're a little to suave. I’m the General of the Minutemen, and Military Governor of the Second Commonwealth Provisional Government.”

Jake deadpanned for a few moments, scoffed and said, “That's s fucking mouthful there, slick. Of course you just picked all that up layin around. The Q fella dye your clothes too?”

Jon chucked, “He’s a chaos entity. He said, and I quote, even order squeezed from chaos is it’s own flavor of chaos. There was some other seemingly stable civilization out there he appeared to be fond of. It all makes sense, because making order from chaos is a violation of nature. Entropic laws. So basically yeah, I’m his proxy, his little blue man, and proxies get goodies from their benefactors.”

Jake shrugged, “And we benefit. Fuck it. We have the favor of a god or some brahmin shit. Well, I was also going to pitch you on a partnership, to rebuild, but I would say I’m just tagging along.”

Jon shrugged too, “Sorry, I’m kind of a force. I was just expecting Preston to ask me to join. And I would have, and totally would have caught your pitch. But he said General, and I’m not doing half measures. And I don’t want to be General forever.”

Jake nodded thoughtfully, “You got smoke?”

Jon threw him a new pack, with a keep it hand. Both men lit up. Jake said, “I said my Pappy ran a town.”

Jon nodded. He continued, “He didn’t run run the town. He ran the water plant. It still had a working generator, and he dedicated his entire life to keeping it running. It gave him a lot of caps, and a lot of influence. A lot of people looked to him. And then he died. Old man, it happens. Then I take up the mantle. Not long before it broke down on me. Pappy left a lot of caps, and I spent most of them doing a full suite of maintenance first thing. To get the other generators up, my life's work. But they needed these very specific turbo bearings. That's what put them all out of action in the first place, and what did the last one in. No one would front the caps to get even the one back up. It was a fortune. Almost as much as all the maintenance combined, had to be sourced from a good way’s away, mercenary protection, the works.”

“The town died not long after.”

“Six months before people started flying away. Those with the caps left first. A couple of em towards the end still wondering were it all went wrong, why they had to leave their comfy life and station, near pre-war, sill with their caps clutched of course. Regular folks all around. Plant didn’t just keep the town watered, the whole damn region destabilized.”

“So you left too.”

“Only after my family left. My wife took my daughter. That’s why I’m here. I guess I don’t blame them. I was going to get them both killed trying to save the plant and town. They’d have starved if nothing else. I just want to find them again. They’re in the Commonwealth, came up with a caravan, and that’s all I know. I stumbled on ASAMs, and saw how I could use em to help me.”

“Secure your own position if nothing else.”

“Yup, I could keep some food for myself at least, make sure my water is clean. I am not a farmer. Then I dug into em and saw something even more. I could maybe give them to people, help them rebuild, and maybe they remember their friend Jake when he needs some help. Maybe his wife and daughter show up at one of the settlements to make a life for themselves. Maybe Jake makes a life with them. One that ain't just going to break and go to shit.”

“My life’s work would have been going to space. Maybe it still is. Decades of work needed. At least your people already cracked fusion generation. That’s the intermediate step I would need to work on first. But first I’m going to hunt. I’m going to do what an Augment does best. I’m going to kill and butcher, rip and tear, I’m going to mark the genetic memories of any out there that would fancy themselves the top dog of a dog eat dog world. So I may continue my work in peace. Without worrying shadow government thinking their rocket is better, or a junkie raider shooting down the first one I send up.”

Jake laughed, “Huston, we have liftoff. The raider says that as he shoots up.”

Jon returned the laugh, “Huston, we have a problem, as he shoots down.”

The men finished their revelry, and Jake said, “I believe you slick. A lot of assholes are going to rue the day you woke up in the wastes.”

Jon gave an evil grin, “Love of the game, Jake. You can love the game and still be a decent person, I think. I hope. I’ll hit up Olivia with you. As for joining the SCPG, I take it you’re in?”

“Oh, I’m in slick. What do you need.”

“For you to keep doing what your doing. My goal to pave the way for them to do for themselves, not just give a bunch of orders, though there will be an order or two. I’m going to spend tomorrow clearing out some local holes, get their junk for the cause. The next day we’ll hit Olivia up, maybe you ride with me to Tempine’s first, get them set up too if you haven't.”

Jake said, “It’s nearby, and I haven't been there. You got it, slick. I can still call you slick right?”

Jon smirked, “You’re not one of my Minutemen, and I don’t usually give a shit about that kind of bluster anyway, cowpoke.”

They both shook hands, and when Jake left Jon grabbed the mag and hit the latrine. After, he would think further on his long term designs. He still wanted to go to space, and he heard a low chuckle in the distance when he definitively concluded his musings.

He tuned his radio as he lay on his new bed. Not the worse he’s slept on. There were some twangs of a guitar. They said, “Howdy there partners. My name’s Dusty Dude, just up from down around the Mohave parts. Let me tell y'all the story bout how I got that name. You may just believe it.”