Jackrum's Log 4

You know, I always thought that doing the right thing was a clear and simple choice, that those that did evil did so on purpose, out of a lack of empathy. Whenever a villain in a book I read when shout out “I was trying to make the world a better place!” I would laugh. What a ridiculous notion, that someone could ruin the lives of others without even realizin it.

Now, though, I know how it feels first hand. There’s a lot of blood on our hands now. I can’t deny it. But I’m not going to try an’ justify it. I know now what I have to do to make up for it. And I tell you what, I’m gonna get to it with a vengeance.

Startin’ with Mr. Canton.



Earlier-
The last time I wrote, everything was going good, and our town was lookin’ like it was growin’ strong. We thought we were developin’ stability in the area, that we were makin’ things better for everyone. That all changed on the mornin’ the Grim Reaper came to town.

I had just finished speakin’ with my friend Cameron about settin’ up a citizens organization to make policy decisions for the town. Sandra was there too of course, lendin’ her thoughts, and we were all set to break for lunch when we happened to notice a traveler approachin’, across the water. Somethin’ about him just felt wrong… He was a tall, huge man, ridin’ on a jet black horse, with some huge object strung over his back like a spear. There were a family across that way, buildin a farm near the entrance to the gulch, and as soon as he saw em he headed over to talk. Getting down off his horse, he seemed to embrace the farmer- and then the blood started sprayin’. The air filled with the screams of the farmer’s wife and daughters.

Our self-appointed sheriff Russell was nowhere to be seen, so we rushed for the boat to head across. Course’ that’s where we found Russell, dead drunk and lyin in filth. I’d of like to sacked em then and there, but there was an emergency goin’ on. We told him to get into town and get everyone to safety, to stay in they’re homes and get they’re weapons ready.
By the time we made it across the lake, the farmer’s wife and chillins were dead as well. It was a horrible sight- he’d cut em near in two, with that massive blade on his back. I was startin’ to get a really bad idea of who this fella might be…

We soon ran across more corpses- the remains of the loyal Briar Cats Leer had summoned up for us, killed tryin’ to defend the Oasis. When we found the assailant my fears were confirmed. It was Isaac Grims, a.k.a. the Grim Reaper of Vash. The man who killed half the town with a homemade scythe, who’d been hanged for his crimes, and had risen again from the grave unrepentant. When we met him and Vash and fought alongside him, I’d assumed the stories must have been mere rumor. Now, it was obvious they weren’t. Grims was here to do to Leer’s Canyon what he did to Vash, years and years ago.

Grim wasn’t in a talkin mood. He refused to stop, he was headed right for the middle of the canyon, where the main town had risen up around Leer’s grove. With no other choice, we opened fire. Now, I’ve never before fired a weapon at another man hopin’ to kill, and I still had hope that we could simply incapacitate him, but it was becoming obvious that Grims was gonna kill a lot more people if we didn’t stop him.

Me and Sandy had gotten very good at what we do. Everyone of our shots hit. Grims body was riddled with bullets…but he didn’t slow. He just kept walkin’ towards us, pullin’ that big scythe off his back as he went. And to my amazement, the bullet wounds just closed themselves up, the blood left behind on unmarked skin.

“Aim for the head!” Sandy shouted. I did, firin’ three rifle shots right in the head, takin’ out one eye. Didn’t matter. Just healed back up, kept on comin‘.

Sandy fired too, but Grims was suddenly chargin’ towards her, swingin’ that scythe. I put spurs to my horse and charged to meet him. Good ol’ Tornado ran him down, trampled under hooves, but Grims jumped right back up. We kept ridin’ round him in circles, pumpin’ em with lead. I emptied three rifles to no effect. Finally, Sandy had a plan.

“Maybe he can’t heal if the damage don’t stop. Jackrum, use the flamethrower!”

I had almost forgotten I even had it. We’d found it on Clutch’s horse, and I’d left it with Cloud ever since. I snatched it up fast and let loose with a huge stream of flame.

It worked…kinda. You could clearly see Grim’s skin tryin to come back together, but the flames kept burnin’ it away. The fire had made a difference, but it wasn’t gonna kill em.

Enough of this, I thought. Come into our town and start killin folks?! This is all we got for your kind here!

I drew Storm, my sawed-off ancient shotgun that fires depleted uranium shells. I only had one left, but when it hit Grims in the face it exploded with a massive show of light. All of the fire went emerald, and I could see Grim’s bones through what was left of his skin. There was a sound like a clap of thunder… and then he dropped. Grim’s body fell away into dust, leavin behind a broken scythe, a burned journal, and a smallish red stone that had come out of his chest. When I picked it up, it flowed back and forth in my hand, almost like liquid.



Time passed. We put the dead to rest in Leer’s Grove. I felt it was a small consolation that they’re deaths were not in vain- from each body, there would come another Elemental Seed, and with it, another little piece of paradise somewhere in the region. Still, I couldn’t help but notice an odd stench around the base of Leer’s tree. I’d assumed that the ‘recycling’ process would be clean and efficient…but it smelled like some part of Clutch was still down there. I hoped it would be absorbed soon, it made me squeamish.
I found Sandy fightin’ with Virginia. Apparently, Virginia was demandin Grim’s journal, the red stone I’d found, and frankly, bein’ a bit of a bitch. Sandy was tryin’ to teach her some manners. Virginia just switched over to me, shoutin and carryin’ on about the stone bein’ a “Philosopher’s Stone” and a source of immortality or some such nonsense. Of course, I didn’t think it was that crazy after what I’d seen Grims survive… but I was shocked at Virginia’s insistence that we should use the stone. She wanted to do to herself what Grim did and bust into Canton, take Gust back by force. She refused to see reason- that we didn’t know exactly what the stones effects were and that injectin it into her was a really stupid idea. We were interrupted by Leer, who had come off her grove for he first time.

“What is that!?” She looked horrified, much less composed than usually. “Get it away… get it out of the valley, do it now!”

“Now, calm down Leer, we’re still tryin’ to figure out what it does-”

“Get. It. Out. Now. I won’t have it in my Oasis.” I noticed the last surviving Briar Cat had turned up… and was standin’ behind Leer. Like a threat. “Don’t let it touch the water.”

“If you know something about it Leer-”

“Memory Fractured.”

Apparently, this was not something Leer was willing to discuss. I was frankly getting a little tired of Leer’s “memory problems” but we had more important things to deal with at the time. After a long argument with Virginia, we decided to head back to Vash, to investigate the Winchester Manor. We were hopin’ to find some clue as to why Grims attacked us and how he had gotten a hold of such a powerful relic. We also hoped to find something alchemy-related. Since our entire town was founded on alchemy, we hoped to understand it better and try and perhaps reclaim it for society, to see if we could use it to make the wasteland a safer and more prosperous place. We also hoped we might find something that could be traded for Gust’s release. Virginia was getting more and more upset and anxious, as the day of Gust’s execution was only ten days away. We brought Luck with us; to be honest, I didn’t trust him to stay out of trouble without me around, and the thought of treasure was incentive enough for him to come.
We reached Vash in the middle of he night, and managed to convince Virginia to get some rest and go in once the sun came up. Fortunately, Virginia was a lot more reasonable after some rest. Near midday, we broke through the manor’s doors and found ourselves in a cavernous space. A massive symbol of alchemy- a 5 pointed star with a horse, star, sun, dagger, and tree engraved on it was embedded in the marble floor. Half a dozen doors led off the main room. Me and Sandy decided it would be best to take one floor at a time, so we ignored the stairs and opened one door at a time. We found:

A hallway that stretched on for nearly a hundred yards, sloping down the whole way, ending in a shadowy stairway going down.
A massive windowless room, filled with chairs.
A long hallway that zigzagged out of sight.
A blank wall behind a functional door.
We followed the zigzagging hallway and soon ran out of light. Though many windows could be seen from outside the manor, we had yet to run into a single one inside. Virginia and Luck carried lanterns while me and Sandy kept our hands on our guns. I don’t know then what we thought we’d run into in this old ruin, but the place was severely creepy and we weren’t about to lower our guards.
After narrowing so that we had to walk sideways, single file, the hall curved around so that we were coming almost the way we had come in. I did some quick map making in my head- if I was right, this hallway should have opened up into the huge chair filled room, but that was obviously wrong. It must have sloped down or up somehow, so that we were above or below that room now. Of course, I hadn’t noticed any slope whatsoever…
The hall ended abruptly, in a single square room. The room was empty but for a well, and a single chair. Virginia walked over to the well and dropped a brass casing into it. I was shocked at this casual disregard for wealth, but I quickly noticed something far more alarmin’. The shell never struck the bottom.
With no other option, he started back for the main hall. Then Luck shrieked and shouted for us to run- he’d heard, from behind us in the empty small room, the single chair had been knocked over. I shouted for everyone to get behind me, and I drew my shotgun, waiting at the halls end. Anything comin’ down that hall would have no room to dodge, so if we were gonna fight I was thinkin’ to do it here. I slipped on my night vision goggles, but I couldn’t see anything in the well-room, just a thick black shadow. After a lengthy stand-off, I fired a round into the room. No response.

When he returned to the Great Hall I was lookin’ forward to seein’ some sunlight. But when we opened the door, only darkness met us. Though we had returned by the same hall, we were now in a different room altogether, though it’s proportions were similar to the Great Hall. Where the main door should be though, a tall tower rose and disappeared into the ceiling. We searched this room for a time, and found numerous secret passages leading to an old stable, a tree growing in a sunlit room, an empty room that seemed to stretch on forever, and a pair of long hallways. We followed one at random, no longer able to rely on logic or common sense. We discovered a small parlor lit by a kerosene lamp, and at it’s end there was a glass door with a dagger drawn on it’s window. It was locked, so we broke through and found ourselves in a small library. Virginia and Luck rifled through the shelves, lookin’ for alchemy books, but I was much more interested in the open window at the east end of the room. I breathed a sigh of relief as I came to the window- then stared in astonishment at the sight. The window did not lead to Vash. There was indeed as sky overhead, gently raining, and trees and mountains in the distance- but the ground was covered in wooden floors as far as I could see, and the geography was completely alien and dissimilar to the area around Vash. I explored the outside of the window briefly, with Sandra providin’ cover from the window, but found only an old boot.
I started checkin’ the shelves as well- Virginia had collected quite a few valuable books- and found one that looked interesting. When I tried to pull it out though, I heard a click, and the staircase pulled aside to reveal a staircase leadin’ down. I honestly don’t know what I was thinkin’ but I headed down. I found some… interesting things down there… it was… um, I found a Seed, let’s leave it at that. But on the way back up, I found myself in a different part of the house, all alone.

After wanderin’ alone for a long time, I found myself an exit. Feelin’ much relieved to be back on Vash soil, I nonetheless was quite worried about the others, so I started makin’ my way from window to window, shoutin’ for em. Finally, I found a window where I could hear a faint noise, the sound of distant speaking… unfortunately, I was far from certain that the voices were any of my companions. Still, it was all I had to go on, so I hopped inside and headed for the door. Behind me, the sunlight suddenly died out…
I turned around to see some kind wall of black moss blocking out my view of the window. Before I could ponder this conundrum, it suddenly lunged forward. Something sharp stabbed into me in four places, piercing through my tough coat like it was baby. I unloaded the shotgun in the darkness, and heard an inhuman squeal of pain. I rushed around the mass in front of me and leapt through the window. I was bleedin’ badly, but was far more worried about the creature that was after me. I waited, watchin’.
From the window, a tall, hairy leg emerged, taller than me and jointed in several places. It was followed by 7 more, and then a bulbous, shaggy body squeezed through. It was a Plague, but worse than any I’d ever seen before- a massive spider made of interwoven strands of moss and vines. The fight was desperate and frantic, but once I’d made it on to my horse it had become clear that I could not handle this thing alone. I came up with a desperate last ditch plan. If this failed, I was a goner…
I fired my rifle, blastin’ two of it’s legs. I hoped that would slow it down. Then I turned my horse and rode at full speed down the long ramp that led up to the manor. We were goin’ too fast, the horse was fallin’ as much as runnin’-I was worried he’d break a leg-but I had no time to slow it. I drew out my ace in the hole- a uranium grenade. I threw it as hard as I could, and when we hit the bottom I leapt off the horse and scrambled for the nearest bit of cover I could find. The blast lit up the whole sky green, and when I came around there was a massive crater filled with bits of glowin’ green spider.

Heavily injured, with no options for medical support, I ate the strange Seed I found in beneath the house.

I drifted, strange sounds and images in my head. The Seed worked as I had hoped, bolstering my bodies natural healing and givin’ me the strength to keep going- but it was doin’ something’ else too. When I came too, I saw Sandy’s face leanin’ over me, but inside and behind her I could see something too- some kind of outline of light, like I could suddenly see into the very fabric of reality. Very mystical like. I reached out, and my hand disappeared into the fold in the air before me. I tried puttin’ something else inside- a single bullet- and found that I could store things within and draw them out at will. For some reason, Sandy and Virginia did not seem too impressed with my reality altering powers. They seemed to think it was some kind of trick.
Anyhey, while I was trippin’ out, Sandy had run into some trouble of her own. She killed some Plagues, but eventually found the place where ol’ Grims had been stayin’. They’d found some paintin’s that looked important- including one of Leer, and another of Grims, some creepy young lady covered in crows (whom I surmised was Old Lady Winchester at a younger age), and an older man who looked like he could have been Dale Canton’s grandpa. Well, we’d got what we came for, so we headed back to Leer’s Canyon.

And that’s when things went south. We arrived at sunset, and spotted a single figure standing silhouetted by the light, seemingly staring directly into the sun. At the entrance to the canyon, we approached cautiously, and to are surprise, found the familiar figure of Clutch Gallows standing alive and well. His skin had gone grayish, the veins livid against his skin. His body was filthy, covered in dirt from his grave. And his eyes were a curiously pale color, and seemed to move independently from each other, staring in separate directions at once. In his hand, he held the Elemental Seed created from his life-force.

“Hello again…” He said. “I’m back… good to see you again.” He grinned, as though he were in on some private joke. “I’ll be back to see you… Right now, there’s something I have to do. I think I’ll take this Seed. It’s only fair. It’s mine, after all.”

If only we had thought to stop him. At the time, we were torn, feeling guilty over his death and mistreatment of his body, and we had no idea what he was up too. We rushed quickly to Leer, to see if she could explain this. Unfortunately, Leer was not in a talkative mood. She had barricaded herself in the tree and was covered in vines, sleeping. All of the graves dug for Grims victims were empty, dug up. They must have set out in separate ways, each with a Seed, ready to plant a half a dozen more of Leer’s cursed Oasis. And then, of course, she’d want to spread more. And all she needed to create more Seeds was more dead bodies…
It got worse. Cameron came and told me how, just this morning, he’d found ten people dead in they’re beds, strangled by some dark growth coming out of the ground. The townsfolk had buried them in the Grove- ten more Seeds in the making.
Now the town is broken up, everyone going they’re own ways. What we thought was our paradise, a new hope for the wasteland, is the fortress of a monster. I’m not sure what we are going to do, but we have to do something. This was our doing; our fault. We’re the only ones to blame.
Virginia found some useful information in that book of hers. It seems that the Philosophers Stone, when applied to water, will cause a quick growth of glass that will cover everything, just like in the canyon where we found Leer’s Seed.
We’ll see how Leer likes that, but I cannot feel hopeful. Her minions are already out there, growing.