Chap 1: History and a new partner
Yay! The first chapter of my first story has been finally completed. I hope you all enjoy it.
The day was April 26, 1986, in Chernobyl, Russia. That was when it all began. During a simple maintenance test, Reactor 4, at the VI Lenin Memorial Nuclear Power Station, caused a nuclear meltdown. The meltdown was devastating. Everyone at the power plant perished from the explosion. Radioactive material was spread over a 30KM area. The area was evacuated immediately. After the evacuations, the government simply poured concrete into Reactor 4 to try and stop the radiation from spreading any further.
Nearly 20 years later, on the 13 of April, 2006, there was a second explosion at the power plant. Nobody expected there to be another explosion. The second explosion signaled a new era for that area. For the explosion had created the Zone. The Zone was a very dangerous place. Inside of it were animals that had mutated and radioative anomalies that distorted time and space.
In 2012, people called S.T.A.L.K.E.R.s, just simple adventurers who wanted a new place to explore, started to explore the Zone. The military didn't approve of them trespassing and were ordered to shot on sight. This didn't deter the Stalkers though. They explored the Zone seeking artifacts to sell, and for things to discover.
A genetic disease was discovered in 2013 that would somehow alter a Stalker's genetic code. Scales would start to replace their skin, their bone structure would change, they would have a reptilian face and body, and heightened sences. The disease was hereditary and would pass on to newborn infants while they were still in there mother's womb. Humans would simply call them "Drache(s)", the German word for dragon.
There were fights between the humans and draches in the Zone. The humans and draches finally make a truce with one another, putting a stop to all the fights in the Zone. The draches were accepted as a culture and as a separate race in the Zone once some racial disputes between some reluctant humans and draches had been settled.
Sometime during the year 2017, a female drache and a male human fell in love with one another. They gave birth to a male half-breed drache. They named their child Ja-Daar. Ja-Daar grew up having the same physical and mental makeup as any other drache. The only difference was that he had lighter scales compared to other draches. His scales were a cream color like toffee instead of the usual shades of green, brown, or yellow.
Ja-Daar never knew what the world outside the Zone was like. Draches weren't allowed outside the Zone in fear of spreading radiation. Ja-Daar's parents had been outside the Zone before. They told him how it was easy to get into the Zone but it was impossible to get back out of it.
Once Ja-Daar became an adult, he went off on his own. He had always wanted to explore the Zone. When he was little, his parents would tell him stories about what it was like to be a Stalker. He always loved hearing the stories about his father fighting bloodsuckers and his mother sneaking into mititary compounds and stealing supplies from them.
Ja-Daar was able to earn a stable income by finding artifacts and selling them for rubles to scientist. Ja-Daar always worked alone. He never knew what it was like to work with a partner. He sometimes thought about having a partner, a fellew drache to explore alongside with. The only thing was, he was never able to find a drache that was interested in partnering up with him. He was soon about to meet someone that might agree to partnering up with him.
In the 100 Rads Bar the the Duty encampment, Ja-Daar was sitting on a stool sipping at a small glass of Cossacks vodka the barkeep, Barkeep, had given to him to try.
"Barkeep?" asked Ja-Daar.
"Yes Ja-Daar."
"How can you drink this crap?"
"I don't drink it. I just use it to clean my guns. Besides using it for that, it's only good for getting you piss-faced drunk and rotgut" said Barkeep.
Ja-Daar just had a wry look on his face from Barkeep's reply. "Could you just get me a glass of water instead?"
"Sure thing Ja-Daar. A nice cold glass of water coming right up."
Ja-Daar hadn't noticed that a female drache had walked into the bar and sat down on the stool next to him until she spoke. "Barkeep, could I have some cola?" asked the stranger.
"Alright. One cola coming right up Miss. . ."
"Du-Ja" she replied.
Du-ja had nicely shaded emerald scales. She was a bit smaller that Ja-Daar. Roughly three inches shorter than Ja-Daar who stood at 6'2".
"That's a nice name. Mine's Ja-Daar. Always nice to see a fellow drache around here" he said to Du-Ja.
"Thanks" she said back.
Du-Ja had many nicks and cuts on the exsposed parts of her body that weren't covered in thin Kevlar.
"So. . . where'd you just come from?" he couldn't help but ask.
"I just came back from doing some cave exploring for a scientist. I took a couple spills while crawling through the caves."
"Sounded rough. Was it worth it?"
"Not really. All for some stupid water samples and an artifact. The pay was small too."
"It doesn't look like you have a partner Du-Ja. Do you?" he asked as he looked around the bar.
"No. Why do you ask?"
"I was just wondering if you were interested in doing some traveling with me."
"I don't know. I would have to think about it" she replied.
She quickly drank the rest of her cola. "Well, I'm gonna go now. A member of Duty wants me to take care of something" she told Ja-Daar.
"I guess I'll see you later then. That's if you live of course" said Ja-Daar.
Du-Ja put down her empty glass and got off her stool. Ja-Daar couldn't help but watch her walk out the bar. He also wondered if he would ever see her again.
Ja-Daar sat for a half hour sipping at his water just watching the small T.V. in the bar. Ja-Daar finished drinking the rest of his water. "Well Barkeep, I'm gonna see if I can find something to do. I might see you later."
"Alright Ja-Daar. Good luck on your travels and don't get you head shot off" Barkeep said with a grin on his face.
Ja-Daar just smiled back at him, got off his stool and walked out of the bar. He had heard of a bandit camp a few clicks north-west of the encampment. He decided to go check it out and see if he could find anything interesting.
End Chap 1
I'm not very good a formatting but I feel pretty strong on grammer. I don't mind strong criticism unless you're trying to put me down as a writer. The next chapter should be up sometime next week. (Rubs finger) Hell, just typing all of this out on a USB keyboard on the PS3 took me 2 and a half hours. Thank god I'm done. I hate doing this on the PS3. One big problem is that Shift+Backspace deletes everything that has been typed. That a pain in the ass when you try making a +, _, ), or an (.