I see you over there, Deathclaw, creeping around in the distance. You haven’t spotted me yet, but your unreasonably keen perception is bound to pick up on my presence soon. A Stealth Boy won’t help, nor will my silenced weapon. You just seem to…know. Like a douche.

It’s me, the Courier. I’m just here out of sheer curiosity, really. I was minding my own business the other day, hunting mole rats with an Anti-Material rifle and cajoling about the demise of the White Glove, when I happened upon a radio signal that directed me to a pile of old cars and junk with the words Lonesome Road scribbled on the front. Naturally I pushed them aside and entered – wouldn’t you? I mean, what else am I supposed to do? It’s not like I can lay on a dirty mattress in the Vegas sunshine, sipping irradiated water and lounging peacefully beneath the gentle hum of cazador wings. That shit gets you killed.

So I came in for a peek. Turns out this place is pretty messed up, huh? I’ve gotta admit, I’m sort of regretting my decision. There’s this crazy fellow with some sort of morally misaligned God complex who keeps posessing my eyebot and speaking in excessively slow riddles, and these zany glowing black creepy critters keep trying to jackal slap me in the tunnels. And what’s with all the ghouls? My God, the people here are ugly. I mean ug-ly. I haven’t seen one attractive woman yet, and believe me, I’ve been looking. You hear about a place called “The Divide,” and things start going through your head about ladies and… well, anyway… That’s not what’s going on here.

I guess there is something neat going on. I’ve got this cool laser pistol thing that I can use to blow up all these gumdrop-looking nuclear warheads that happen to be sitting ALL OVER the place like bent tin cans. Why hasn’t anyone seen to this yet? The detonator was literally just sitting out in the open. It’s sort of fun blowing them up, though I’m sure detonating dozens of nukes at this proximity has made me sterile. It’s OK, Cass is a bitch anyway.

None of that really poses a problem, though. Ultimately, I’m not having a good time. It’s you, Deathclaw. You’re like… completely out of control. I don’t know what you’re made out of, but I’m pretty sure nothing on earth, post-apocalypse or not, should need to be shot 18 times with a fully-automatic rocket launcher in order to fall down. For serious, just think about that for a second. It’s a lot. And quite frankly, I think it’s pretty rude. Especially since all I get to take when I kill one of you is one of your hands. How many of these do you think I need? They’re hands! I can’t carry all these! I’ve only got like 3 Buffouts left. Be reasonable. This little excursion through The Divide isn’t even fun to begin with, and you’re really not improving things. Your kind has never been this tough before, and at this point I’m not really in the mood.

Fortunately for me and my rapidly declining cache of Stimpacks, I’m on to you, Deathclaw. Turns out your ability to jump 40 feet and slash the holy hell out of me in one swing is significantly burdened if I take out your legs. Suddenly you’re not all that and a bag of irradiated InstaMash, are you Deathclaw? No, you’re not. You’re just silly. You’re pretty much a big slow-moving dinosaurish monster punchline to some joke about big slow-moving dinosaurish monsters.

I guess in your defense, there really isn’t a lot to do around here, so at least crushing your legs is providing me with something to pass the time. But honestly, the last thing I need in life is three of you sniffing me out from a mile away. I’m level 50 and so are you. We’ve made it. We’re at the cap. This is as tough as wastelanders get. Can’t we just bask in our awesomeness and be bros? I’ve got a dog with a cyber brain and my own pad at the Lucky 38. For real. I have that stuff. Doesn’t that impress you? You don’t look impressed. You’re still more or less charging at me. Really? Yeah, you’re attacking. Gracious. Well ok, we can figure all that out later. No rush I guess.

If you decline, I suppose I will understand. It’s not in your nature as a mutated being. Just know that even though you think you have the upper hand (get it?), your knees are in my sight, I’m pretty high on Jet and Med-X, and I just found a huge crate of ammo. And I’m not really as low on Stimpacks as I let on.

Or keep charging and pretend you don’t even hear me. You’ll figure it out soon enough.



This post likes Fallout: New Vegas. This post has six heads. This post canceled its Redbook subscription. This post swims in public pools.