Oasis

There was a rickety rope bridge that led away north from the scene of the mutant carnage. It must've been strung long ago. Ellen couldn't picture the greenskins being patient enough to build it. She tugged at one of the ropes, shrugged, and picked her way slowly across the dry gully. It wasn't so bad if she kept her eyes on the remains of ancient highways in the distance... well, no, it was just as bad, but it was better than looking down. The other side was almost as disquieting, as the bridge was anchored at the lip of a rocky outcropping with sides steep enough to break an ankle at the slightest misplaced step. If it were up to her she'd've avoided it, but it wasn't. She was looking for Vault 112, after all, and you didn't put Vaults under gently rolling hills. You put them under mountains, or in rock formations, and you made damned sure that you had a lot of rock on top. If Vault 112 was anywhere nearby, it'd be here.

It took her and Dogmeat the better part of an hour to find the narrow, twisty defile that snaked its way into the rocks. The path angled upwards rather than down, but there wasn't anywhere else that suggested itself as the possible approach to a Vault. Maybe it would take a turn once she got ... partway... into...

There was a bush by the side of the path. The bush was green. Not dry yellowish-brown, green. With leaves, real true living green leaves. Ellen hadn't seen leaves like that since Milliways! She reached out to touch it- yes, they were real, not plastic...

She looked around for some sign of the Bar, but there was none. Only the green plant. With a sigh, she moved on.

A few yards later she encountered another green bush, this time surrounded by a few tufts of pale green grass. Just past that, by a twist in the path, she came upon a whole patch of grass, almost big enough for Dogmeat to lie down on. And beyond that there were more bushes on either side of the path, each fuller and more green than the last. She stared, shocked, at the largest of the bunch; it was nearly as tall as she was-

"Outsider!" came an echoing voice.

Ellen whipped around to face the depths of the defile, and in the distant shadows she thought she could make out a figure, waving. "Hello?" she called cautiously.

"Outsider!" the figure repeated. "You have arrived! Please, come closer... I have something of the utmost urgency to speak to you about! Do hurry, He doesn't like to be kept waiting."

It occurred to her that if there were a Vault buried here and it had opened some time ago, it might well be in the same situation as Sativa's or Weasel's Vault. There could be a community here that simply hadn't seen anyone in decades or more, like Vault 101. That sounded promising, so Ellen nodded and moved forward, Dogmeat at her heels. The plant life grew thicker and greener around her as she made her way down the path, culminating in-

Trees. Real trees. Tall, green, overarching trees, so thick she thought for a moment she'd stumbled onto the Milliways grounds again. Only for a moment, though. For one thing, these were the wrong sort of tree, and for another, she was separated from them by a wooden barricade and its two attendants. They wore brownish-grey robes and coarse, matching hoods, and twigs and sticks protruded from their shoulders. The one on the left, an elderly-looking man, smiled and stepped forward. ""I'm so glad you're here," he said. "It's been a while since anyone's visited us, and He's been waiting for someone like yourself to arrive. If you wouldn't mind following me, I'll bring you right to Him."

It might have been Ellen's imagination, but she thought she could hear the man using capital letters in his words. She tilted her head curiously. "Visited who?" she said. "What is this place?"

The man chuckled wryly. "I'm sorry. In my excitement, I got ahead of myself. I'm Tree Father Birch, and I have the great fortune of being leader of His people, the Treeminders. Beyond that gate is our home, Oasis."

Perhaps not a Vault after all, then. Damn. Well... given the plant life, maybe someone had used a GECK here once. Who knew- oh, the man was still looking at her. "All right," she said, "And 'He'?"

"Why, the one who gave us this place as our home. Please, come inside, and all will be explained."

Ellen nodded fractionally and moved to follow the man as the gate slid up. Beyond there lay more trees, spread outward in every direction that she could see. The ground underfoot felt soft and springy; she looked down and saw grass growing thick on the earth, both in and out of the shade. Again she turned to look for some sign of the Bar, but it wasn't there, only some sort of wooden structure with a lashed-together roof and no walls. Was this real, then? Part of her actual world- part of the Wasteland? She could hear birds!

"You have no idea how overjoyed I am to see you!" said the older man as the gate dropped down behind them. "Normally outsiders are forbidden inside Oasis, but He has made an exception."

She shook her head rapidly to clear it. "I- this place is incredible," she murmured. "I can practically feel it teeming with life..."

"That's His power you feel, Outsider. With His outstretched limbs He shelters us and keeps us safe."

Uh huh. That remark brought her back to reality. It sounded a little bit too much like the Vault 101 propaganda about the Overseer being 'he who protects us from the harshness of the atomic wasteland'.

"As you approached Oasis," the man- Tree Father Birch- continued, "He said you were coming and I was sent out to meet you personally with a request. He wishes to meet with you. You'd be the first Outsider to do so in a very long time."

Ellen shook her head slightly. "Has he got a name?" she asked.

"He is the One Who Grows, He is the One Who Gives and He is the One Who Guides. No one speaks His name out of reverence for His majesty. Thanks to Him, the Treeminders have a home."

Ellen hesitated a moment. Birch must have noticed it; he added, "To meet Him, you must undergo the Ceremony of Purification. There's nothing to fear here. This is our tradition and our custom, as well as a measure of protection for Him. Once that's complete, you'll be able to speak to Him.If you need a bit of time to reflect, then please do so. All I ask is you return quickly."

"Thank you," said Ellen, relieved. She'd been wondering how to ask for exactly that. If it came down to it, she was starting to get uneasy- but the thought that there might be a GECK, or the remains of one, somewhere among all these living things kept her from looking to the exit. These people had life in the Wasteland, and if this 'He' was responsible for it, then she had to find out how.

As she moved a few paces away to examine one of the lower-hanging tree branches, another male voice reached her ears. "Tree Father," she heard it murmur, "I mean no disrespect, but I really have to question your decision to bring the Outsider here."

"It wasn't my decision, Linden," said the old man. Ellen kept her eyes firmly on the branch, not wanting to be caught eavesdropping. "It was His."

"Yes- about that-" The other voice hesitated. "Is He aware that she's with the Enclave?"

Ellen very nearly turned at that.

"How do you mean, Linden?"

"Look at her, Tree Father," said Linden's voice. "That's an Enclave officer uniform. And those guns of hers! That's nothing the Wasteland or the Brotherhood ever had! There's no possible way this can end well, not for Him, not for any of us."

"Perhaps," said Birch, "but I have faith in His judgment. He knows better than we-"

With an exaggerated carelessness, Ellen stepped on the nearest fallen twig, cracking it as she turned. Both voices went quiet. Linden, she saw, was a man of his late forties or early fifties, dressed much the same as Birch; his expression under the hood was a wary one. Birch, however, smiled. "Outsider," he said, "I'd like you to meet one of my fellow Treeminders. This is Branchtender Linden."

Linden nodded stiffly. "Ma'am," he said.

"It's good to meet you, sir," Ellen answered. "Is something wrong?"

"I hope not," said Linden, eyeing her patched, mended jacket. "Although- Tree Father, if you don't mind-"

"Linden wants to have a few words with you before anything's decided," said Birch. "I will be around the bend in the path as soon as you're done."

Ellen nodded; the old man left, his steps near-silent on the grassy soil. Linden watched him go, then turned to Ellen. "My apologies," he said. "I couldn't help but notice your uniform, there."

"It's not mine, exactly," Ellen said. She plucked at the left sleeve, folded under and back to disguise its fraying around the edge of the Pip-Boy. "I was robbed of most of my possessions a while ago. This was the only clothing I could find."

Linden raised an eyebrow at that. "Really," he said. "Where was this?"

Ellen turned and gestured in the direction she estimated she'd come from. "Half a day's travel that way," she said. "North of Minefield."

"Hmm." Linden didn't exactly sound convinced. "Was that where your weapons came from, too?"

"Not exactly," Ellen said. The thought of explaining little green men from space to this fellow wasn't particularly appealing, so she merely said, "They used to belong to the ones who kidnapped me. They're all gone now."

Linden's eyes traveled up to the black hat with its 'E' emblem. "Really," he said neutrally. "They weren't sent by President Richardson, by any chance?"

"Huh?" Ellen blinked. "Who- the only president I've heard of is John Henry Eden, on those stupid flying robots. Who's Richardson?"

Linden seemed to relax at that. "Never mind," he said. "My apologies. I thought you were someone else, Outsider. You looked like people I never thought I'd hear of again."

"It's all right," Ellen said. "This is an Enclave uniform? I had no idea. I thought the robots were just playing recordings of people long dead."

"Oh, no," said Linden, "no, we're not that lucky... but it doesn't matter now. What's important is that you're not one of them. That would put Him in danger, and I don't want to see that happen."

"Yes, about that-" Ellen glanced over towards the way Birch had gone. "What's this about a purification ceremony? Do I have to take my clothes off? I don't see shower facilities."

Linden almost laughed at that. "No, nothing that complicated. We have a sap of purification that first-time visitors to His presence have to take, to purge their bodies of anything that might be harmful to Him. Then there's a prayer from each of us among the Treeminders. That's all."

It sounded like a decontamination procedure, almost. Ellen could understand that, in a community this isolated. "Well," she said, "I guess that makes sense. Will it take very long?"

"Probably not," said Linden. "I know it was over quickly when I first came here."

Ellen almost wanted to ask more about that, but she caught sight of Birch's returning form. "All right," she said. "Thank you, Linden."

Linden murmured his reply as Birch returned, all smiles. "Have you come to a decision, Outsider?"

"Oh yes," said Ellen. It couldn't be that hard, and if it paved the way to knowledge of the GECK, she and Sativa would both be better off for it. "I'll do it."

Birch's smile, if anything, grew wider. "Very good! Take your place in front of the basin, there, and let's begin."

The basin stood under the roof of the wall-less wooden structure. It was a carved wooden bowl mounted in a tree stump about as tall as Ellen's waist. Twisting, snaking tubes of some kind- vines, perhaps?- held it in place. As Ellen stepped up to it, other people in the gray Treeminder robes shuffled up to take evenly spaced positions around the edges of the roof's shelter. A woman of dark skin some years younger than Birch came forward and uncorked a crude clay jug. The smell of greenness and other things Ellen couldn't name assaulted her nostrils as the woman poured a double handful of something thick and runny into the bowl. "Don't mind the smell, dear," the woman murmured. "That just means it's working."

Dad's antiseptics, in the Vault, had always stunk to high heaven. This was a different stink, but it was the same principle, Ellen was sure. She nodded, and watched the woman take her place; when Birch gestured to her she picked up the bowl in both hands. The taste was ... well, not exactly vile,, but distinctly reminiscent of cough syrup. She gagged partway through, but somehow managed to choke the whole lot of it down. It couldn't be much worse than the day after she took a dose of Rad-Away, she figured...

As she put down the bowl Birch announced, "We will now recite the blessing to ward off any harm the Outsider may be carrying before she proceeds to the Grove."

The woman who had poured the sap stepped forward. "I bid you depart, agents of destruction, through the power of His divine will."

On the opposite side of the shady patch, a man some years younger than Linden said, "Leave our homes and bodies immediately; live no longer in them, but pass over into places where you can harm no one."

Ellen realized she was swaying a little on her feet. It occurred to her that possibly the stuff in the jug might not have been an internally taken antiseptic after all.

Linden, however, lifted his voice. "In the name of His Frondescence, I call His wrath upon you, so that, wherever you may go, you bear it with you..."

A woman of more years than the sap-pourer, wrinkled and lined, picked up from there. "...and, diminishing from day to day, you may disappear; except where you serve the health and good purposes of mankind, may no trace of you be found."

Ellen blinked a few times at that, and the last of the Treeminders, a child perhaps seven or eight years old, said, "All this may He be so good as to grant us, who is to come to judge the living and the dead, and the world by His verdure."

"....." was all Ellen could think to say, but the Treeminders chorused, "Amen."

Birch then said, "Soon you will pass peacefully into sleep, Outsider. And when you awake, you will witness His glory first hand."

This, Ellen decided, was definitely a mistake. But considering that she'd already hit the ground by the time she finished the thought, it was really too late to do anything about it.