‘I’m still getting used to them.’  
Lars fingers drifted over the now familiar keys. Keys that she had long ago struggled with, their strange positioning that struck her as random, though the locals had made the case they were not.
 
Eyes lingering on the flickering green screen, she drank in the words again.
 
Still getting used to them.
 
A dozen thoughts came to mind, what she would have loved to say to that young pony who wrote those words out in a pain staking effort to learn the bazar pattern of the symbols before her.
 
Getting used to them.
 
That she had. And sense then they had only taken to growing, probably something to do with the radiation. Blowing out a snorting laugh, Lars let herself sink into the chair before the desk. The worn and corroded metal rusting in patches was beginning to show its ware, just like she was.
 
Drawing in a deep breath, Lars rolled her shoulders, the tight muscles bunched, rippled, and then relaxed. A hundred little scars covered her body, all neatly hidden under a coat of fur. Small puncture wounds from bullets of every size and shape, long slashing scars from claws, teeth, and blades. The burns took longer to heal, splashing star bursts of super-heated plasma or high powered lasers. The doctors or those medically inclined, often commented it was a miracle that Lars was still alive given how much led they had extracted from her.
 
Doc Morgan had tired to make a point out of it by presenting her with a gallon jug more than three quarters filled with assorted slugs for Christmas.
 
Lars had promptly smelted the lead back down and recast for her own use.
 
‘Giving it back to the Waste Land.’ She had said.
 
The thought made Lars smile. Those had been good times. Before all the crazy.
 
And there was plenty of crazy to go around. The Roundup Raiders, The New California republic incident with Water Station 009, Mad Marcus’s Circus of Freaks, Sparkle Party –
 
She stopped.
 
Sparkle Party. Stupid, optimistic, had to see the good in everyone, Sparkle Party. Sparkle Party who she had gone to war with the Brotherhood of Steel over. Sparkle Party who had helped her back, and, was there when she chose to return.
 
Looking into the glowing screen before her, Lars could almost see the glimmering lights drawing her away from the hell hole she had come to love so much.
 
A toxic wasteland, bathed in radioactive fire, crawling with mutants, ghouls, raiders, and far less savory critters. Fishing a hand into the desk draw Lars extracted a bottle of whisky and bit the cork off.
 
It burned going down, almost as much as it did coming up. Another fond memory, Lars could not help but smile, as she recalled her first taste of the distilled liquid fire. Like the Wasteland it was dirty, aged, and had something dead hovering near the bottom of the bottle.
 
Lars drank anyway, the burn filling her insides with a fiery warmth. Now if only she had some cigars – her hand moved to the empty ash tray that still sat beside the terminal and grit her teeth. Frustration welling within her, cigars were hard enough to come by, and the American cigarettes were like smoking asphalt wrapped in paper.
 
Compromises, Lars reminded herself, taking another swing from the bottle before blowing out a long breath. There was no point in putting off the task any longer, but despite her resolve, she still found it difficult.
 
Leaning back in the chair she cast her gaze to the bunkers only other occupant, still asleep on the weathered cot in the back of the room. Half covered in a threadbare blanket, chest slowly rising, only to fall again, the occupant could still be asleep.
 
Or trying to fake it.
 
‘No one is going to want to read this crap!’ Lars announced to the room at large and waited for a reply. None came. ‘Fine. Screw it.’
 
Hunching over the keyboard, she began to write.