Vault 14 – Year Unknown
Darkness.
A thump.
A distant echo—like a heart, or the slow churn of awakening systems.
A hiss.
Then a crack.
Juno's eyes snapped open.
Condensation streaked the fractured inner pod glass. His breath fogged with panic as one cold droplet slid down and hit his forehead.
Gasp.
His chest seized. Muscles cramped. He lurched forward, coughing violently. The pod let out a mechanical groan—hydraulics grinding against time-rusted gears.
It shuddered open.
He hit the floor hard.
Every nerve screamed. His skin was damp, his Vault-Tec undersuit clinging like frostbitten fabric.
He looked up.
Red emergency lights pulsed across a vast, silent cryo-chamber.
"Hello?"
His voice bounced into the void.
Nothing.
He pushed himself to his feet, legs shaking beneath him.
All around him, pods stood in states of ruin—cracked glass, broken seals. Some were shattered entirely. Others still held skeletons slumped inside, long gone.
A cracked terminal flickered nearby. Still functional—barely.
He approached, tapped through the ancient interface.
Vault 14 Status Log:
Year: 2296
Reactor: Offline
External Comms: None
Overseer: Deceased
Cryo Survivors: 0
Wake Trigger: Biometric spike — AR-Delta1
Juno froze.
"2296? That's... no. That's over two hundred goddamn years."
He stumbled backward, chest heaving.
"What the hell did they do to me?"
—
He found the Overseer's office.
It was dusty. Cold. The room smelled like burnt wiring and old air. A terminal groaned to life after several tries.
[Entry 198 – Date Corrupted]
Cryo failures climbing. Bio-sign monitoring shows cascading declines across Sector B.
We're out of time. Corporate still says "stay the course." Bastards.
The interns don't know.all subjects don't know.
If they ask, lie.
This was never just about diagnostics.
[End of File]
Juno's knuckles tightened on the edge of the desk.
"They lied to me. Vault-Tec lied to all of us."
—
In a nearby technician's station, he found a cracked holotape.
He jammed it into the reader.
AUDIO LOG:
"…This place was a Vault in name only. No food. No long-term power. Just test pods."
"They said we'd be safe, but they stopped answering our calls months ago. I saw the Director leave. Just left us behind."
[cutoff – tape ends]
—
Deeper into the chamber, he passed scratched writing on the metal surface of a cryo pod:
They said we'd wake up.
They said it was a test.
Help never came.
And beneath that, in shaky gouges:
If anyone finds this—find a way out.
—
Eventually, Juno found a sealed storage room. The door creaked open under his weight.
Inside: a skeleton in a technician's suit, slumped beside a burned-out holotape player. Dust coated everything.
A locker sat ajar nearby.
He opened it.
Inside:
A Vault 14 jumpsuit — reinforced. Folded neatly.
A 10mm pistol in a basic holster.
A slightly upgraded Pip-Boy 2000 unit.
He stared at the weapon. A symbol of control. Of survival.
"…Better to have it," he muttered, slipping it into the holster.
He stripped out of the damp, decaying undersuit and changed into the new one. The fabric was stiff but warm. He attached the Pip-Boy.
[PIP-BOY 2000 BIOS – BOOTING…]
INITIATE USER PROFILE – AR-Delta1
ENTER SYSTEM PARAMETERS
"These are pretty sweet"
He stared at the screen, then began typing.
SPECIAL STATS:
S: 4 – "Never the strongest, but I've held my own."
P: 5 – "Used to noticing small faults in big systems."
E: 4 – "Not a fighter. Just an engineer."
C: 6 – "Talking used to fix things. Doubt it still does."
I: 9 – "I built systems smarter than the men who stole my life."
A: 5 – "Fast enough to survive. Hopefully."
L: 3 – "I lived through this. Somehow."
This all seems rightThe screen flickered one last time—then stabilized.
The Pip-Boy clicked into standby.
Juno took a breath and looked at the cryo chamber one final time. Silent. Tomb-like.
"This wasn't an accident," he whispered.
"They stole my future… Vault-Tec took everything. I need to know why. And who let it happen."
He stepped toward the Vault's exit door.
His voice dropped to a vow.
"And if they're still out there, they're going to give me answers"