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I don't want to set the world on fire... [Fallout. 4.]

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Vikarion:
1.
January 27th, 2077
Dear Nate,
Yes, I did get your last letter, only after I sent mine, of course. I know that the Postal Service is struggling, along with everyone else, so I try not to worry too hard when I miss one from you before I write again. And you shouldn't worry either - we're fine.

I'm glad you liked the photo of Shaun and I. It was a little rushed - I was busy trying to help your parents get to Boston Airport to fly back to California. They wanted to stay longer, but your brother's family is still getting Jim back into walking condition. If you haven't heard from him recently, he's up and around on crutches now - oh, you probably don't know, but the doctors out there managed to save the leg.

Your parents made it back ok, too. They gave me a call after they touched down. I was worrying about another long range Chinese fighter trying to rack up some easy kills on passenger jets, but apparently you decided to take care of that! Ha!

And now we come to the part of the letter you knew was coming. Anchorage is free! Well, just about. You finally did it! I know you'll say "we", but "we" haven't been on the front lines. You are. Your friends are. I wish I could be there with you, too. Well, I wish you could be here with me, I mean. But I think I'd take Anchorage and you over this crummy little apartment by myself.

Nevertheless, buddy, you have also a lot of questions to answer when you get back. I want to hear all about it - where you were, what happened, when, where. I'll take notes. It'll be history some day, along with your stories of Brown trying to cook rations with a microfusion cell and that other guy who tried to dry his boots over the fire with his feet still in them.

Oh, speaking of which, one of the neighbors nearly burned off his rear end with a model rocket engine. One of them with the name like the soup company..."C"-something - yeah, I know. Apparently he had it in his backpack along with some batteries and it went off somehow. Everyone is fine, except for the picket fence that got trampled.

I want to write more, but I'd better go. Have an appointment to keep.

Love,
-Erin

Vikarion:
February 3rd, 2077
Dear Nate,
Promised I'd write again soon, so here we are. I've been reluctant touch your enlistment pay or my savings, but I really do think we are going to have to buy a car. I'm sending you a few brochures. I know you just said to pick something, but it's not urgent. What do you think about just settling for a station wagon until you get back?

I know you don't like the whole '50s thing that's been hanging around, but I think we're going to have to bite the bullet on this one and just accept it for now. We can always get a new car later, once people stop wishing for the good old days, or at least wish for different ones. Besides, what else can we do? The fashion industry is pretty well shot with the war requirements and makeup is hard to find, though not as hard as it used to be.

The protests aren't as bad as they used to be in Boston. Mass Fusion is everywhere, setting up power stations, and we didn't have a brownout for a week, much less a blackout. The supermarkets are still pretty empty, though - mostly just the preserved crap that we're all used to eating.

I've heard that you are still cleaning out Chinese holdouts. Please stay safe. Any idea when you might make it back?

I am going to do naughty things to you. Many, many things.
-Erin

Vikarion:
March 10th, 2077
Nate,

I miss you. It was so good to get your letter. And so much better to hear that you are coming home, even if only by September. Shaun is two months old now.

Tired I am I mean , because I've been doing a bit of cleaning when not looking after Shaun. I'm looking for a job, now, but positions are tight. Until then, cleaning houses helps pay the bills.

There's been more news of food riots. Apparently even some of the preserved food isn't making it everywhere. Everyone is hoping that with the victory in Alaska, China will sue for peace, but no one in the government is talking about any sort of settlement. There's a rumor that our policy is "unconditional surrender", as in World War 2, but I don't know. I hope not - I don't think China will surrender any time soon.

News from the diversionary front (I guess it's the main front now?) is good. They've broken through many defenses with the new power armor and weapons the government was promising for so long, and at sea, our ships are destroying the Chinese merchant marine.

What else is new? Oh, there was some other news, but it'll have to wait until you get back, because the censor would get it.

Kisses, and a hug, too
-Erin

P.S. Someone across the street is moving, so I bought his TV. It's a Radiation King. I know, I know, but Shaun likes to watch morning cartoons while I get ready for the day. Well, hopefully he likes them. He's quiet for fifteen minutes, at least.

I know that you want at least two kids, but I think we should wait between trying for us to regain lost sleep. Four years, say, at least. Or we could get a dog.

To put it another way, when you get back (and I can say that without being presumptuous now, too!) from the military, your early mornings will have not yet ended. 

Much love and zzzzzs.
-Erin

Vikarion:
April 4th, 2077
Dear Nate,

If you don't write soon, I am going to call you "Nathan" from now on. I mean it.

Since you haven't written, I suppose I will use this opportunity to write down a few thoughts I had after listening to the radio the other day. It was some conservative old fuddy-duddy, started back from 2050 maybe, still running his talk show and his mouth with it. Only one of them I could ever really stand, as you know. And he was talking about how we're only in this situation because we "abandoned our capitalistic principles".

I suppose he's right, in a way. I think this will probably get by the censor, because we've had congresspeople stand up and say as much. That we should have sold oil to China, and the world, even. That oil had been a poison that has blacked our lungs, clouded our skies, and melted the icecaps. That we should always be willing to make a deal. Or that, even though we had all the right to do as we did, "right" and "wise" are two different things.

And now we find ourselves on our eleventh year of war. All of that oil? What good did it do us to hoard what was rightfully ours? Now it's been used to power Chinese tanks and trucks, and when recaptured, every last precious drop used to energize and supply our own vast military machine. And all the microchips, and electronics, and nuclear cars and fusion power plants we were going to get? How we were going to boost ourselves into the next generation of technology? Well, that became explosives and jets and rockets and bullets.

You're right. We owe the Chinese a debt of blood for that, at least. What did they think would happen? Capture Anchorage and the last oil fields on the planet and we'd be all "oh, ok, sure, it's yours now"?

Isn't oil just a bit creepy, though? Like, two centuries ago - yes, a history lesson. Sorry. But in the Gold Rush, in California and - yeah! Alaska then too - people would kill each other for their claim, or their gold. With oil, nations kill each other.

Speaking of which, regarding the, uh, "virus news", there's been rioting in whatever is left of Germany over our "superman project". They aren't buying it as an anti-bio-weapon program. Of course, they haven't had to deal with New Plague, have they? No, they pretty well managed to destroy themselves without it, didn't they? Well, themselves and the Middle East over - yep, black gold. Who even knows what's going on in Africa or - shudder - Australia.

But shouldn't we have seen this coming? Shouldn't we have not made just EVERYTHING out of plastic? I mean, plastic silverware? Really? Throwaway plastic CUPS? And then it turns out, you need fossil fuels for nearly everything. You need them - haha, joke's on us - for alternative energy - solar, wind, even for the supporting structure for nuclear. So now the dwindling supply of oil and synthetic oil is drained away to support what we already have.

I know, preachy. And I know you don't entirely agree. But it's early in the evening, and Shaun is sick, and I have nothing to do but rock him in one hand and write with the other.

We, as a nation, really should have looked down the road to see what would happen when the oil ran out. It had too, eventually. But all the people predicting it had been wrong for so long, and it was so useful. So we kicked the can down the road and now here we are.

And it sucks.

Wow, I am really depressing this evening. I suppose it's because I was cleaning the house of a nice lady who lost two sons in Anchorage. That's...I don't know what it would be like to lose a child, let alone two.

I can't wait until you can see him. I know I'm not always as romantic as you. I look at little Shaun and I think "aw, how cute"...and then I notice he's soiled the diaper. But there is deep...something there. Hope for the future - his future. I don't just mean that he will grow up, but the future he'll belong in, that he'll help create, too. I want to protect him for that future, as you already have been. And teach him what we know, and don't know, and then let him see it through for himself.

That's our job, as i have to remind myself, especially just now, as he just spit up all over me.

Bye-bye!
-Erin

Vikarion:
May 28th, 2077
Dearest "NATE",

Wow, who did you piss off to get sent on a patrol up the Yukon River? Well, at any rate, no I really can't say that making such a dire threat was justified. I do apologize, and you will note, good sir, that I have carefully printed your name in beautiful capital letters.

RE your response to my "thoughts" -
You are right. I don't really see how the President could have survived, politically, either accepting Chinese offers or the later attempted strong-arming. And in a democracy, "politically viable acceptable to the electorate " is a necessary condition of political action. And democracy is still preferable to any alternatives.

Could things have been otherwise to how they are? Maybe, maybe not. The war with China looks inevitable, but if it hadn't happened, wouldn't that look inevitable?

Still, we're winning the war, at least defensively, and that gives us a chance, a hope for a bright future. Mass Fusion is putting up their power stations all over the place, and the food situation, while not good, is much brighter for next year. Heck, even Vault-Tec had to admit it, if you haven't heard. Something along the lines of "the chances of Total Atomic Annhihilation (yeah, like that, you could hear them as proper nouns) have been slightly reduced, but we must emphasize that the overall picture remains dire and yada yada yada". Vault-tec. Ever cheerily optimistic in their total negativity about the future, aren't they?

I get that it's a very popular project for out-of-work voters who elect the representatives who vote for ever-continuing Project Safehouse, and I suppose it also makes people feel more secure about the future, but you have to imagine that even their political pull will be fraying as the war stalemates or even draws to a close. I saw the other day that they have some exhibit - I'm looking at the paper - "Vault-Tec among the Stars:" So I guess they want to expand in a different direction.

Living in a Vault on Mars could be pretty interesting, don't you think? Maybe once the war is over we'll do that. As a nation, I mean. I want to stay on Earth, though I'd watch a movie about it. Maybe once the war is over, Hollywood will get back together and start making good movies again, maybe some color pictures once we can afford to make them again.

What a stupid war. I hope it's over soon.

Come home soon, darling.
-Erin

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