After the Bombs Fell

1: The Exodus

"Beep! Beep! Beep!" Henry awoke to the sound of his alarm clock ringing in his ears, signaling to him that it was 7:00 and thus time to get up. As Henry got out of bed and put on his all black suit which was required by every resident of the shelter he had remembered the supervisor had wished to see him this morning at 8. Henry left his dorm and decided it was time to get breakfast and so he walked to the cafeteria.

The breakfast was what you'd typically expect in the shelter, eggs with a side of bacon, 3 small sausages and some vegetables on the side. Henry ate his food slowly, savouring his time before he had to meet the supervisor dearly as he knew the supervisor was not a nice person and was often times easily angered. After finishing breakfast Henry decided he would make his way to the supervisors office and arrive slightly early, after all he didn't want to put the supervisor in a bad mood.

"Come in Henry." a voice called from inside the room, Henry pressed the button and the door opened revealing the supervisor sitting at her desk in an unusually good mood.

 "Please have a seat Henry theres something I want to discuss." she says, calmly.

 Henry takes a seat in one of the chairs infront of her, "why did you call me here ms supervisor?" Henry asked curiously.

 "Well you see Henry as you know our shelter is experiencing a bit of a... overpopulation problem as of recent."

"Yes I have noticed food rations have been getting smaller and smaller but what do you need me for?"

"Henry, ill be frank I am giving you a choice here, you can stay in the safety of this shelter and waste away with whatever food you can get your hands on."

"Or for the second option, you can leave this shelter and try and survive out in the wastes yourself."

"W-what?! You can't be serious about this."

"I am sorry Henry this must be hard for you to hear but those are your only options."

Henry now had to make a choice, instead of starving to death in a hole in the ground: Henry decided he would have to leave the safety of the shelter and try and survive outside in whatever was left of the outside world. So many thoughts raced through his mind, what would the world on the outside be like? What creatures were on the outside? All questions which would soon be answered.

As Henry contemplated 2 guards came into the room and grabbed both of Henry's arms. Instead of resisting Henry allowed them to drag him to the shelters entrance where he told the guards of his final decision. As Henry stepped out of the shelter he couldn't help but notice how bright the sun was, Henry had never seen the sun before so this was new to him. As Henry stepped out of the shelter his shoes had stepped on something hard, as Henry looked down he saw what appeared to be a human skeleton wearing the tattered remains of a black jumpsuit, Henry was not the first nor would he be the last to be exiled.

Henry immediately scavenged his surrounding areas though he found little he did find an old switchblade in a car which might prove useful later so he pocketed it. Henry couldn't help but notice the lack of grass, while he knew this land was once called "New Mexico" or something similar he knew nothing about the terrain. As Henry walked he couldn't help but notice the emptiness and loneliness, the only signs of civilization were desert grass, the occasional road, and old broken cars he saw on those roads.

Up ahead in the distance Henry had seen something after walking for what felt like an eternity, could it be? Henry had picked up his pace in order to investigate further, as he got closer and closer it became more visible. Henry realized that what he had seen was walls, walls belonging to some kind of village. as Henry followed the walls to an entrance he was greeted by a young man.

"Howdy stranger! What brings you to ScrapHeap?"

"Uhh hello? What is this place?"

"Welcome to ScrapHeap partner, names Wild Bill pleasure to meet ya!" the man says extending a hand out to Henry.

Henry cautiously took the mans hand and shook it. "What is there to do around here?"

"Well to be honest not much, ever since the raids started we've been short on pretty much everything, but we still call this place home cuz its the only one we got."

"Do you know where I can find a market?"

"Pardon me but what's a market?" Bill asks.

"A market, you know the place you buy stuff at?"

"You mean the towns shop? Well the shops just over yonder near the big wooden house."

Henry couldn't help but notice just how backwards these people seemed to him.

Henry made his way over to the towns shop where he met the shopkeep Barcum, Barcum was a quiet type and didn't talk much, unfortunately since Henry had no money he had no way of getting anything from Barcum so he left. determined to make some money Henry went around town asking if anyone had any jobs that needed to be done, only one man had a job for Henry and it didn't ellicit much of a reward. Despite this Henry was perplexed, these people did not use paper money or ration coupons like in the shelter, instead they used systems of trade and bottle caps.

After trying to find work to no avail Henry decided it was time to leave Scrapheap and set out for a different town, however he had no way of knowing where to go so after trading what little money he had scrounged up for a map, he had set out for a peculiar town called Atom City. A peculiar name he thought but perhaps he could get some more information or history from the locals as to where he was and possibly more information.