I stare at the fancy robot for an awkward moment, and he stares back. You’ll have to forgive an old gear-head for waxing poetic here but “fancy” doesn’t fully express the sight in front of me, I mean this bot is fa-an-cy. Detailed paint job, in cherry red, with some seriously formidable looking Teslatronic shoulder tubes that are thankfully not pointed at me right now. He keeps his gun-hands politely aimed at the floor as he jangles up to meet me. I appreciate it.
Having been bit by rats, coyotes and a war memorial tonight (not a hotel, it turns out), I’m relieved to see someone artificially intelligent, not gonna lie. They’re the nicest sentients you’re liable to meet, I swear. And this fella looks well-to-do (though I’ll admit the flaming barrel in the back of his shack concerns me a little). I’m admiring his old-school grill when I realize I’m just gawking, so I introduce myself. Hello. I’m Johnny Smash.
The robot responds in a mechanical voice with an accent I can’t place.
I’m telling you, man. Robot hospitality. Nothing against us meatheads but it’s just always such a relief to see a bot in charge of something, even if it’s a shack on the edge of town with- oh yeah, is that an old couch!? Score!
Unfortunately, as polite as this robot is, his conversation skills leave something to be desired. He can say “yes sir” and “affirmative sir” and mentions several times that he “keeps this position”, but no matter how much I try to change the conversation he seems stuck in a loop. Running out of things to say, I mention being a traveler on somewhat of a journey.
Well, first of all thank you! That’s very generous. But before I can explain that this is not what I meant, the conversation is back into a loop of “affirmative sir” and so on and so forth. The downside of robot manners I guess. I can’t get a word in edgewise about that comfy looking couch. At least he seems very agreeable, if not entirely all there upstairs.
I’m saved from the monotonous loop of confirmations by a message on my Pip Boy. Although this robot’s human interface is… not the smoothest, it turns out he and my computer gauntlet’s wireless command software get along like a house on fire.
Robots are funny that way, you know? It’s not until we get to the electronic kind of handshaking that I finally even catch this dude’s name: Wattsworth. Hello, Wattsworth.
Name: Wattsworth
Model: Teslatron with custom laser armament, derby hat
Features: Bitchin’ detailing
Wireless support
Weak conversation skills
Wattsworth shows me around the place, and as I kick aside a layer of old tin cans while working back to the subject of that couch, I turn around to see what I can only describe as a dream come true. To heck with the couch, this place has a king-sized bed in it!
Jackpot. Wattsworth generously offers to stand in a corner and enter a passive mode while I grab some badly needed Z’s, and sleep off all these gruesome coyote bites. God bless the inventor of the cowboy robot, I’d be dead several times over out here without ’em.
I get a few hours of shut eye and get up at almost noon for a little radioactive sink water. The barrel fire is still going strong- breached fission battery, maybe? Whatever. I flop back down on the mattress and do some light reading.
Now you might be surprised that a guy named Johnny Smash likes to hit the books now and then. Sometimes smashing stuff takes it out of me, so I put up my feet for a day, smoke a pack of cigs and read- magazines mostly, but also books, personal correspondence, blood-splattered journal pages, you know, the usual. I keep my ear to the ground, you know? All I have today are a few magazines from around Goodsprings: Lad’s Life, Meeting People, Locksmith Reader, plus the instructions for that junker Mr Handy robot I found in the garage. None of them really catch my interest though.
Instead today I decide to read the book on Feng Shui I printed out on Doc’s computer. It’s extremely informative! First off, turns out I’ve been pronouncing it all wrong- it’s spelled Feng with an E but pronounced with a U sound, like “Fung”. I had no idea!
Other than this surprise, Feng Shui seems like a fairly straightforward idea: arranging items in the home, nudging them around until they’re in harmonious arrangements with color coded coordinates, kind of a philisophical take on good housekeeping I guess.
I can’t help but think to myself Wattsworth could use a little Feng Shui in his simulated life- his place is a bit of a sty. And if a guy named Johnny Smash thinks your pad looks rough around the edges, that’s saying something. As far as I can tell, Wattsworth is a body-guard unit. In conversation he refers to “vaporating targets”, and proudly shows off the 21 energy cells he has in his inventory. Unfortunately they seem to be the only organized things he has, the poor slob. He was built to blow heads off, not tidy up the place.
So, referring to the Feng Shui manual frequently, I clean Wattsworth’s shack up. It’s the least I can do for all his help. I pick up all the tin cans, empty bottles, several harmonicas, and even a bent-up old golf club that looks like it might come in handy. Scrap electronics, wonder glue, detergent and nettle seeds are just everywhere, it’s a real mess. I right the overturned table in the middle of the room, and start putting things away on top of it. It feels really good just be able to do so. Feng Shui!
A couple of old milk crates and a metal bucket make for some functional little shelves, and I line up the room’s various containers on the big counter: an old ammo case, a first aid kit and a small wardrobe with legs that snap off neatly to make it into a tabletop chest of drawers. It’s not much of an organization system but it’ll be enough to keep my weapons, food and clothes in order, for a while at least.
I turn the shell of an old fridge on its side at the end of the bed and put the broken TV on top (I doubt it’s salvageable but I’ll deal with it later) with my reading collection and an ash tray. Media center!
The old tires go in the corner, I pull out the ammo bench for more storage (though maybe I’ll come up with a use for it eventually despite giving two shits about bullets), and pretty soon the place is looking a lot better.
Since Wattsworth’s toilet makes the Geiger counter on my Pip Boy have fits I decide I’ll be using the great outdoors for the immediate future- instead the porcelein throne makes an excellent place to stage the broken Mr. Handy for repairs.
I lay out the tools I’ve scavenged thus far on the nearby card table, and line the twisted up old metal shelf with spare parts. There’s even a fire extinguisher, which I’m not sure would be sufficient to put out the never-ending trash fire but it’s a nice thought.
By the time I’m done cleaning up Wattsworth’s place it’s the middle of the afternoon, and my stomach is rumbling. I still have a little food in the first aid kit, cactus fruits and the like mostly, but only radioactive water to drink, so I’ll need to meander back to town before too long.
I grab a couple magazines for the road, and decide to have Wattsworth join me too. Thank goodness, as about two seconds after having walked out the front door, we’re ambushed by a scorpion the size of a go-kart.
Before I even know what’s happening the sound of laserfire fills the air. Wattsworth squeezes off two optical blasts before the radscorpion is on top of us- dang Watts, you’re just made o’ guns, aren’t ya? I manage to finish the beast off with a whack to the face from my trusty guitar, but I know who did the heavy lifting in this encounter. That’s three times now that bots have saved my bacon. I see Wattsworth save the 2 drained cells in his inventory. 19 left.
As confident as I am in my new companion’s firepower, I do my best to avoid more monstrous animals on the walk back to town. Energy cells don’t grow on trees, and even beyond that, I quickly notice that Wattsworth is not what you’d call a spry guy. It takes him quite a while to clank methodically through the desert, making an enormous amount of noise all the way, and I have to wait up for him several times while he struggles to get over rocks and past Joshua trees. I can see the coyotes on a nearby hill eye us carefully, but keep their distance. Good.
Back in town, while I wait for Wattsworth to catch up I dump his trash in the alley, drink a bottle of scotch and read an article in Salesman Weekly. What can I say, he’s not going to win any foot races. While he chills in the alley I head to Chet’s general store. I’m not really much of a shopper, honestly, but I do find that a snootful of something strong and a good article on bartering techniques help lubricate the wheels of commerce, so to speak. Or maybe I’m just reaching for a reason to get loaded, I dunno. Hic.
Chet seems like a nice enough fellow, though I knew that already from the free soda bonanza he puts on for passers-by. His inventory is indeed what you might call general: ammunition, booze, used robots, bubble gum, and a charmingly mysterious and oddly expensive thing simply called a “farming sack”. I try to skew healthy, trading some duct tape for more cactus, some ancient canned goods and a couple more drinks, but I can’t resist the allure of sack-farming and end up with only five caps to my name. But I won’t starve!
Chet has some theories about the guys who shot me but they mostly dissolve into him recalling times he went gambling in New Vegas and lost all his caps. Uh, thanks. When the conversation turns to the best discount ammunition types I excuse myself and take my last five caps elsewhere, having no use for gunfood. Bullets are just heavy money to me.
I fend off hunger with some instant mashed potatoes while Wattsworth and I meander to the other side of Goodsprings, and spend the rest of the afternoon window-shopping. Dean Stanton, a ghoul working the front at Edgecomb Repair, wants way too much to fix my guitar, but he seems to know what he’s doing at least. Got his own special dumpster and everything. While scavenging jalapenos growing behind the dumpster (food’s food, alright?) my Pip Boy alerts me to the old red building there. A school house.
I remember the lady at the bar telling me there was an old safe in this place, and I did bring a locksmith magazine. I have Wattsworth hold the outside while I explore within.
I can’t help but think Dean’s estimate to fix my guitar is likely going to go up as I splatter it with the guts of several mantises that attack me inside the school. I scavenge several pencils, a toy truck, a baseball glove and a suspicious number of ash trays from the elementary school, as well as an intact mantis egg from one of their weird gray nests my Pip Boy calls an ootheca. It’s vocabulary word day I guess. With my luck it’ll turn out to be pronounced oothuca.
There is indeed a safe in here, and like the locks down in the sewers it is unfathomably complicated, though I could probably make sense of it with the help of the locksmith magazine. However, I notice the safe is also wired up to a nearby computer, and while old Johnny Smash might not know dick about lock picks, I do know a thing or two ’bout ‘pooters. With a little help from the Pip Boy it takes all of 10 seconds to figure out the password for the schoolhouse computer. I can’t help but laugh- it’s “reading”.
The safe swings open like a trick revealing medicine, old world money, caps and even a stealth-boy. I hear those things make you crazy, but I bet it’ll still sell for a fair amount.
All in all the schoolhouse produces some decent junk, nothing to write home about, although one of the few unruined books I’m able to nab does hold some promise. It’s on “cybernetic surgery” and while I can make neither head nor tails of it, it looks expensive.
And, of course, there’s a bloody journal page on the floor, written by somebody named Billy Wharton, who seems to have been having a rough go of things. I don’t know if torn journal pages make particularly good bandages or what, but they sure do get bloody a lot.
What’s important is that I manage to clear the place out without having to consult the locksmith magazine. I rejoin Wattsworth and we head towards Keep Out road on the North end of town, stopping only briefly to rifle through peoples’ mailboxes and talk about bottle caps with a guy named Malcolm who is wearing two pairs of goggles and five or six watches.
He’s weirdly excited about caps with blue stars on ’em, okay, whatever you say pal. I say goodbye and climb down into the sewer with a magazine clenched in my teeth, like a normal person.
Luckily the sewers are quiet, with the only giant rats I see being the decapitated corpses of former foes. It’s fairly gross, even for a sewer, but I’m able to focus on the locksmith magazine long enough to, along with a wide-brimmed hat and some quick footwork, open two locked doors and a secure gun cabinet. The submerged safe is unfortunately still too much for me, but I nonetheless manage to climb back up to the street with pockets full of mixed ammunition, more glue and duct tape, a hammer, another toy truck, and a nearly demolished laser pistol. Wattsworth is indeed quite good at holding positions, it seems. The tubes on his shoulders glow gently, neon cyan against the darkening sky, while his one glowing eye patiently gazes at the moon.
More trash in the alley, another drink with Chet as I sell him toy trucks and ootheca contents, and I walk out of town with 90 caps in my pocket, plenty of food and drink to my name, the farming sack and an official RobCo brand wrench. We avoid another pair of coyotes on the walk back to Wattsworth’s place, and are indoors before it’s totally dark. I put my new tools away, eat some Dandy Boy Apples and admire how the place is coming together. It’s honestly starting to look like a real home.
Wattsworth’s Pad
3 containers
2 water sources (irradiated)
1 bed, 1 seat
Ammo bench
Farming sack
The next morning as I check out the contents of the mysterious farming sack, I can’t help but think about all the challenges still out there to face in this wasteland. Wattsworth is no doubt a staunch ally, but he also moves with the speed and grace of an unbalanced washing machine and runs on expensive batteries, so I don’t want to over-rely on the guy. I feel I still owe him for letting me crash in his pad for a couple days, so I spend the morning extracting seeds from some of the fruits and vegetables I’ve collected, and planting a little garden by Wattsworth’s shack.
Jalapenos, agave, banana yucca, even a little corn and xander root. I discover the farming sack can be used not only to plant but also uproot plants- I move a couple nearby wild buffalo gourds into the garden, and it’s starting to look substantial. Hopefully it’ll be enough to produce some real food in the coming days, as I’ll need supplies to last any length of time out there. I can’t just hide at Wattsworth’s forever- somebody has to answer for that business in the graveyard the other night.
During a gardening break I absentmindedly flip one of my caps, another resource I’ll need more of before I can travel safely. But I’m doing okay for now. And wouldn’t you know it, Malcolm was right- on the underside of the cap is a star.
