Fallout Shelter Fourteen

Fallout Shelter Fourteen
Chapter 6 - Restoration

Surely enough the following day, Engi was cleared for active duty by Cross. Much to the Overseer’s pleasure. Her first job for him was, predictably: repair the mane reactor.

We were down in the reactor room within 20 minutes of her ‘request’, I was still managing to keep my horn under control. Engi hadn’t asked about whether I had been able to break into the Overseer’s office yet, which was odd. It was probably because the Overseer was checking on us literally once every 10 minutes.

After the third time the Overseer came back, Engi approached her.

“Ma’am, to repair the damage, I am going to need to shut the reactor off fully and wait for it to cool so I can pull the damaged coupler out of the first core.” Engi explained.

“Look Engi, this reactor needs to be up and running A-sap. So do what you need to do, but if it doesn’t work. Your head, silver platter. Am I clear?”

Engi looked uncomfortable with that notion.

“*erhem* Yes ma’am.”

“Excellent, I will be back...”

“If you come back in ten minutes it’s gonna be in the exact same condition. So can you stop interrupting me and let me work? This is going to take, at least, bar minimum a three hours to fix. Longer if you keep interrupting, so tell me, how badly do you want the reactor fixed?” Engi was oddly confrontational, “I don’t want to see you back here for two hours. I’ll have a report for you then.”

Unwillingly, the Overseer left the reactor room. I think she was nervous about something. Not sure what, we already knew this reactor’s big secret, it was powering that suppression device on level 5. Not that she needed to know that we knew that... yet.

“Alright what’s first?” I asked.

Engi was pulling off a control panel plate off the other side of the reactor, “You know, I heard that Shade was suspended from active duty. You wouldn’t have had anything to do with that huh?”

I lowered my head a bit, I wasn’t proud of what I did. But it was necessary! I did what I had to!

“Well, what the hell did you do that for?” Engi looked at me with the how could you do that? expression.

“... So I could break into the Overseer’s office.” I mumbled.

Engi stopped what he was doing. He took in a deep breath through his nose and let it out through his mouth. I didn’t think he’d be too impressed.

“Did you make it count?”

I shook my head up and down, “I made it count. I got everything in her office. It’s bound to be in there somewhere.”

“And if it’s not?”

“Then I bust in again and find it. It could be on a slip of paper somewhere for all I know.”

“So how did breaking into her office end up in Shade’s suspension?”

“I threw his baton at her window just before she went to open it, using your throwing thingy. Then while she hauled him down to the Security Office, I jumped in through the window. Downloaded the entire contents of her five computers and escaped just before she got back.” In retrospect, I could have probably found a better way break in, but time was of the essence. Then that part of my brain that normally I screamed at popped up.

You’ll learn to live with yourself.

Yeah probably. It’s not like anypony died. But I don’t think I could look Shade in the eye again after what I did, not for awhile. I’d say sorry, eventually. Or not.

“You find the weirdest ways to do things.” Engi casually said.

Oddly he wasn’t upset.

“Have you sifted through any of it yet?” Engi inquired.

I shook my head, “No, I just got it all yesterday. I haven’t even had time to look at it.”

“Hmmm... Okay.” Engi said.

I was pretty sure he wasn’t even paying attention anymore, he had started powering down each core.

“Alright, last core. Please don’t break.” He sounded worried, he flicked the switch to the last core, core 7. The background whine of the reactor running faded to nothingness. It was strangely quiet.

Engi came around to me, his brow was tilted inwards. He was in Engineer mode.

“Now we need to wait until the coupler cools off.” He stated.

I interjected, “Or we could use a CO2 fire extinguisher on it?”

Engi turned to me, he smiled.

“I can’t believe I was in charge of this job when you weren’t around.”

I blushed.

“Not a word to the Overseer.” He said, pulling a fire extinguisher off the wall. Engi pulled the pin out and aimed at the open end of the reactor. Pulling the trigger was accompanied by that PTSCHHHHH, the ‘smoke’ dissipated into the room quickly. Engi used a piece of plastic from his kit to touch the end of the coupler, it didn’t melt or warp. He pressed the plastic to his face, he took it away after a few moments.

“Okay, I think we’re good.” He said, examining the coupler. “Yeah, it’s welded into the core. We’re going to have to break the weld pull it out, and put it back together with the other half in the second core.”

I approached the second core, I tapped the other half of the coupler, it was still warm, but not hot. (Engi had aimed that the first core) I pulled it out with my teeth.

“Murt doze de choupler do aniwegh?” I asked

Engi had the most puzzled expression on his face, “... What?”

I spat the coupler half out of my mouth, landing on the floor with a clatter. “What does the coupler do anyway?”

“Oh,” Engi smiled, “A number of things, it’s primary purpose is to stop the cores from vibrating too much, but also as a link to send energy through to the connected core, which sends energy to the next, and so on. If one breaks, the cores can fall out of sync during an output cycle and that flips the main breaker. Which is why a coupler failure is classed as a mechanical fault.”

I had no idea what Engi had just said, I simply nodded.

“Okay, I need a few things. Probably a saw to start a fault on this makeshift weld , and a hammer to break it afterwards.”

I pulled a Hoof-Saw out of a toolbox we brought with us, and gave it to Engi. He started extremely carefully, I wasn’t sure why we didn’t just bust the weld with a hammer right off the bat.

“So, what are we not just ripping it out of the socket by force?” I asked.

“Because it’s welded to the first core’s shielding, if that breaks then we’ve got a Mag-Rad leak, this Stable wouldn’t last long.” Engi bit his tongue a bit while he was sawing. Some sparks were coming off and hitting the floor. He didn’t saw for long, there was a fine line, maybe 5 millimetres deep engraved into the weld.

“And that’s gonna be enough?” I asked.

“Yes, and no.” Engi replied, “I need the mallet and two millimetre flathead screwdriver.”

I retrieved the screwdriver from his belt, and the mallet from the toolbox. I wasn’t sure why he didn’t want a chisel until I looked how large it was compared to the 2mm screwdriver.

“Thanks, Dakota.” Engi went back to work. His slight taps of the mallet getting progressively more pronounced until I heard a small metal *chink*.

“Perfect. Okay, now to remove the coupler.” He said, I took the tools off his hooves and returned them to the toolbox and his belt.

Engi started to pull the coupler half out of the first core, and came out about three quarters of the way before it got stuck, he gave a good yank and it popped out.

“Flashlight.” He ordered. I complied.

Engi switched on the tiny AAA ME-cell powered flashlight and held it in his mouth while he examined the port where the coupler was.

After a few moments of looking at it, he spat the flash light out.

“Okay, looks clean.” he said, “But we won’t know until after the cores are back on.”

I looked at the halves of the coupler, they went together pretty well. I couldn’t tell if there was any missing material on either half.

“How do we get these back together?” I asked.

“I was thinking an arc welder, but we don’t have any sticks for it anymore. Acetylene torch will have to do.”

I looked at my PipBuck’s time display. It was 11:30, almost right on cue the Overseer had returned exactly 2 hours later like Engi asked.

“Engi, report.” She ordered.

“Ma’am, I’m pleased to say we’ve successfully removed the coupler with no signs of visible damage to either of the cores.” Engi had the biggest grin on his face.

“Excellent, what’s next?” She demanded.

“We need to repair the coupler, it was broken prior to the repairs. Welding would be the best option.”

“I can take care of that.” She bossed, before walking over to me and saying, “The parts?”

What a bitch.

I picked both up and gave them to her.

“The connection is here?” She asked, making a gesture towards the snapped area between both.

“Turn it.” I said.

She glowered at me, flipping the half around rotationally around the long end. Then walked over to Engi.

“Like this?” She asked.

“Yes, she was right.” Engi responded.

She trotted up the stairs and out of the reactor room.

We both looked at each other. I can only imagine what Engi was thinking about her. Maybe something along the lines of, oh? What a stupid, arrogant, self-absorbed, stuck up...

Okay enough of that.

“... Now what?” We both said at the same time.

She returned a little over an hour later, with a perfectly welded coupler. I wanted to ask how she did it, but I was pretty sure I already knew: magic.

Engi and I had the coupler in within a few minutes.

“Okay, now we have to restart the cores individually.” He said.

This was the moment of truth. The reactor had never been FULLY shut down since before the war. Engi was at the control panel, he flicked the switch to prime the first core.

“Here goes nothing.” He said.

I replied, “Once more into the breach.”

He looked at me.

“Exactly.”

Engi pushed the button to ignite the core.

*click*

... ... ...

*vzzzzzrommm* That low pitch hum was music to my ears.

“Good start.” Engi repeated the process, surprisingly all 7 cores were still in the mood for restarting.

I looked at my PipBuck afterwards, my geiger counter remained unmoved.

“Zero rad detection.” I chirped.

“Nice!” Engi reactivated the particle fields keeping the reactor protected.

***

With manepower restored, I tried igniting my horn again. When I couldn’t, I was both relieved and disappointed at the same time. That was another reason why the Overseer wanted it back so badly. The suppression device wasn’t hooked into the secondaries for some reason. Probably because it was too taxing on the system.

Engi told me to get lost, as in, go work on finding the password. So, I did.

Booting up the manifest terminal gave me an odd screen.

Select Boot System

Pon. Co Industries QDOS 5.0 (Default)
VT Inc. Stable 14 OS GUI Enabled #2

I wasn’t sure what to pick. By Celestia, I didn’t even know what the hell those meant. I supposed QDOS 5.0 was just our run of the mill OS on every computer that I had ever accessed. But VT Inc. Hmm. And GUI Enabled. What was that?

I booted up the Library Archive Terminal and searched for GUI.

1 Item(s) found: SCP-0173 (SLF)

I trotted down to the Ess aisle; heading to the far end I found the small book with the identification number ‘SCP-0173’.

The Future of Computer Systems

Written by: Scarlett Crown Pranceton

Published: 2045

I skimmed the table of contents, there was an entire chapter on ‘GUI’s’. Among other things, I noted that she said eventually we would be able to keep an entire record of our life in text. But she said it would take at least another 100 years before we could do that. And here I am, writing this out. Curiously, I checked the publication data of the QDOS 5.0, along with the computer’s manufacture date. Both were released in 2073, and the amount of storage it contained almost 100 gigabytes. I think she was off a bit.

I checked the systems remaining storage capacity, 6 gigs left. That would be my fault. Whoops.

A GUI, or Graphical User Interface, is the most likely candidate to succeed current prompt command systems. Instead using a simplified system that doesn’t use commands so it doesn’t continuously spit ‘invalid syntax’ errors at you.

Theoretically, it should be so easy a foal can use it.

That was old... 2045? Looks like we have moved past Command Prompt, sort of. I mean, from the pictures that were included, they looked similar to what the vault computers ran by default. But from the other photos, it looked like command prompt was incredibly difficult to use. Crown said it would be as easy as selecting an item in the list and pressing enter.

So, a GUI was a graphical user interface. She was right. They were so easy that a foal could use it. I had used a computer in here when I was nine when I first broke into the manifest terminal.

I left the archive terminal powered up and returned to the manifest terminal, I selected the default operating system. So, this was 5.0? I wonder what the older versions were like. I searched for the new files. It identified them under a container that I had made to put everything in prior to downloading the contents of my PipBuck to the manifest terminal.

Then I checked how much storage my PipBuck had. Nearly the same amount as a the standard computers. Interesting.

I did a file search for anything within the container that had the word ‘password’ in it. I got over 100 matches. I refined the search to include ‘Vault’ or ‘Stable’. That reduced it to a little over twenty. I could read all of it.

After an hour and a half of reading, I finally found it. In the 17th file I read through I had finally found the password to the Vault’s door terminal.

To: Overseer in charge of Stable 14

In the event you need to leave the Stable, you will require a password to access the door terminal. The Terminal has three passwords required to unlock it. In numerical order.

1) - Administrators
2) - Overwatch
3) - Offices

These passwords are not subject to change. They remain the passwords permanently, to ensure security, the QDOS 5.0 OS the door terminal runs has had the Backdoor Security Guards removed from it’s base code. This will prevent unauthorized access to the terminal. Keep these passwords secret.

Note: These merely give access to the terminal, not the command chain code to unlock the door itself. A preventive measure to stop anypony from leaving without permission. You can find those in the *Information Redacted* .

Are you shitting me? More omitted text. It was right there! Come on!!! In case you haven’t noticed, I am not very lucky. I have to plan in advance to have things work out. I get by on witts and planning. Not winging it and hoping for the best.

I ran a search for ‘Command Chain Code’ and got nothing. I returned to Engi in the maintenance office.

“I got good news and bad news.” I said.

Engi stopped, “Hmmm, what’s the bad... no good, no bad! What’s that bad news?”

“I ran a file search for the code to open the Vault door. I got nothing.”

“What’s the good news?”

“I’ve found the passwords we need to access the door terminal.”

“It’s a start.” He said, “See, we have the symbols to the door. There just on here somewhere.” Engi gestured to the door schematic I had recovered. I should probably hide that in the library before we get searched without knowing again.

Engi pushed the blueprint roll apart. The Vault’s door was huge. The ring running around it had each symbol engraved on it.

“60 factorial divided by 51 factorial” I said, “5 Quadrillion, 364 Trillion, 506 Billion, 808 Million, 460 Thousand, 8 Hundred possible combinations.”

“Is that for sure the way it works?” Engi asked.

“I have no idea at this point.” I said, I was depressed.

Yet again, if you have to enter all nine before it checks whether they’re right or not that’s how many tries we were looking at before it worked, and that was assuming you couldn’t use the same symbol multiple times. The Blueprint said it would only prime if given the correct symbol, but yet again that left some room for interpretation. If you had to put the symbols in the correct order, but if it didn’t give any hints towards whether you were right or not, we’d best just shoot ourselves now. We’d be guessing forever otherwise. I prayed to Celestia we would get some sort of Yes or No from the system when we went to use it, whenever that would be.

“I need to go monitor the reactor’s output and heat levels. You can take leave.” Engi said.

I smiled, “Thanks.” I trotted off.

I choose to call it an early night and go to bed at 20:00.

My brain couldn’t handle it all. All this was becoming a pain. Was it any surprise I was this worn out? I brushed my teeth and while I was looking in the mirror, it shimmered. Just for a moment. It caught my eye but when I inspected the mirror nothing changed. There was something else in it, just for a moment. Those things you see out of the corner of your eye, but disappear when you turn to look. I’m not entirely sure that’s it’s always me seeing things.

Have you ever gotten that feeling you’re being watched? Because I had no idea. Climbing into my bed, I tossed and turned trying to get comfortable. My early bed time didn’t help though, I couldn’t get to sleep until 2:30. And when I finally did, I really wished I hadn’t.