Jacob Carter's Arc

Chapter 2 of 3

Jacob needed boots first—the kind that wouldn't fall apart in desert heat. He walked through Broken Hills until he found a trader with a pair of reinforced hiking boots, tan leather with thick rubber soles. He tested the ankle support, checked the tread pattern, and counted out caps. Next came water—six canteens, enough for three days if he rationed. He filled each one and lined them up on his desk at the Trade Guild Office. Then he pulled out his notebook and wrote down everything he knew about Vault 116's location: coordinates, depth estimates, possible entry points. Seventeen caravan logs had led him here. Now he had to walk three miles northeast and start looking for a door buried in sand. But walking blind into the wasteland was stupid. Jacob needed scouts—people who could search grid patterns while he tracked their reports. He climbed onto the Trade Guild Office roof and installed a radio transmission tower, bolting the metal framework to the concrete. The KRS1 Radio Broadcast Station would let him receive signals from anyone he sent out to search distant regions. He tested the frequency range twice, then wrote down the coordinates where reception dropped off. If someone found a vault entrance, they could call it in before nightfall. Power failures would kill everything. Jacob walked outside and found a generator rusting behind a storage shed. The DuroMax XP11000iH still had fuel in its tank. He cleaned the spark plugs, replaced a cracked fuel line, and pulled the starter cord. The engine coughed, then caught. He ran a cable through the wall to his computer setup inside. If the main grid failed, his vault-tracking data wouldn't disappear with it. He needed one more thing—official records. Jacob found the South Western Regional Land Management Office at the edge of the settlement, a one-story building with wood, brick, and concrete walls that looked like they'd survived the bombs. Inside, metal filing cabinets lined the walls. He pulled drawers open until he found pre-war government documents: land surveys, construction permits, geological reports. Vault 116 appeared on a permit dated 2076, with depth specifications and foundation blueprints. Jacob photographed every page with his Pip-Boy, cross-referenced the coordinates with his caravan logs, and marked the exact search zone on his map. Everything pointed to the same spot. Tomorrow, he'd start digging.