2 January, 122 days to go

It took another four days to reach the bustling little metropolis they call "the Hub." I was starting to get worried, because I've only got three months left to find that water purifier chip, and time was trickling away like water on the hot sand of the desert floor. I was beginning to hope, though, because I'd been hearing about people at the Hub called "Water Merchants." Maybe they would be able to help me with my quest. As soon as I hit town, I began looking around, making acquaintances, finding out who to talk to. Beth was the manager of a place called theWeapons Store, and she was full of gossip and rumors. She was also able to tell me a lot about the Water Merchants... who turned out to be the biggest of the big three trading caravans based at the Hub. All three caravans —— the Water Merchants, the Crimson Caravan, and the Far Go Traders—— were in a real whirl of worry at the moment, because someone or something had been making whole trading caravans simply disappear. Beth was convinced that it was a local monster known as the Deathclaw... or possibly the predations of some kind of religious cult called the Brotherhood of Steel. When I asked about the Deathclaw, she put me on to another interesting town character, an old mutant named Harold who lived in a shack in Old Town. Harold, apparently, had faced the Deathclaw once, so I went there to talk to him about it. I thought that if I could help the caravans out with their little Deathclaw problem, maybe they could help me track down the chip. I was in for a real shock, though. Harold looked human enough, except for what could have been a really nasty skin condition. I wondered what had happened to him. You see, I'd learned about mutations back in the Vault. Radiation causes mutations when it damages a person's eggs or sperm, or the organs that produce them... and then only in person's offspring. Those old trillervids and holoflics showing people zapped by radiation and getting turned into horrible monsters were all pure nonsense. But Harold seemed to be the proof that the books were wrong, that direct mutations could occur, and did. He claimed that he'd been a merchant —— a fully human merchant —— after he'd emerged from his vault decades and decades ago. He'd been exploring a place up in the mountains to the northwest, someplace, when something had happened to him... his expedition wiped out and him nearly killed. After that, it was almost as though he'd been subjected to some kind of cancer that slowly took hold as the cells of his body reproduced, changing him from a human into... this. Contamination. Something, radiation, possibly, or a bacteriological agent, existed out there in a form that could contaminate a person and change him into a mutant, despite everything the textbooks claimed was possible. I was not at all a pleasant thought.

Day 30

3 January, 121 days to go

I am all too aware of how many other lives are riding on my life. Each day's survival on the Outside is a victory, and I don't dare take unnecessary chances that will cost us everything. One thing I decided was necessary was a source of income. This was never something I had to worry about in the Vault, where everyone worked at their assigned task in exchange for food, clothing, and shelter. There, if you don't work, you don't eat, a simple and practical survival philosophy that I and all my fellow Vault dwellers were raised on from the cr che. Here on the Outside, survival is often a hardscrabble, hand-to-mouth affair. I've seen lots of people who manage a marginal existence by begging, living off the scraps and charity of passersby. That's not for me. I intend to earn my keep out here. At the center of the Hub's downtown area is a pole on which are posted job offerings. One posting in particular caught my attention. Butch Harris, head of the Far Go Traders, is determined to find out who or what is responsible for the disappearances of all those caravans. I remembered what several people had told me and considered trying to find the Deathclaw cave, but I didn't feel ready for that challenge yet, not by myself, at any rate. I decided to hire on with a Far Go caravan that is leaving next Tuesday for a place called the Brotherhood of Steel. In the meantime, I consider taking out a loan at the Friendly Loan Company, but the boss there, Lorenzo, struck me as a thoroughly oily slecker, bad news all around. The interest he charged on his loans would have put me in debt deeper than my Vault's sub-cellar. He did give me one useful tip, though, by telling me that a guy named Decker pays good for certain services. Decker, I gather, is a real power around here. He could be found at a local watering hole called the Maltese Falcon.

Day 31