Origins

grew in size and complexity, the Alpha began to take on a more meaningful role. Typically, Alphas do not remain so for long — they are assassinated by rivals, who rise to take their place. In some years, there can be as many as four Alphas — though powerful Alphas, like Char, can reign for many years.

Batts: Batts, or batteries, are the currency of the Wasteland. It is unknown how batteries were first seen as currency, but it is likely because they are small, portable, and durable. Rechargeable batteries (called “chargers”) are even more prized, and solar batteries (called “solars,” or “sols,”) are the most useful and prized of all.

Behemoth: The Behemoth is a great monstrosity in the Wasteland — a giant creature, either humanoid or reptilian, or sometimes a mixture of the two, that can reach heights of ten feet or greater. They are bipedal, powerful, and can keep pace with a moving vehicle. All but the most powerful of guns are useless against the Behemoth’s armored hide.

Black Files, The: The Black Files are the mysterious collected research on the xenovirus, said to be located in Bunker One. They were authored principally by Dr. Cornelius Ashton, Chief Scientist of Bunker One.

Black Reapers, The: The Black Reapers are a powerful, violent gang, based in Los Angeles. They are led by Warlord Carin Black. They keep thousands of slaves, using them to serve their post- apocalyptic empire. They usurped the Lost Angels in 2055, and have been ruling Los Angeles ever since.

Blights: Blights are infestations of xenofungus and the xenolife they support. They are typically small, but the bigger ones can cover large tracts of land. As a general rule of thumb, the larger the Blight, the more complicated and dangerous the ecosystem it maintains. The largest Blight is the Great Blight — which covers a huge portion of the central United States.

Boundless, The: The Boundless is an incredibly dry part of the Wasteland, ravaged by canyons and dust storms, situated in what used to be Arizona and New Mexico. Very little can survive in the Boundless, and no one is known to have ever crossed it.

Bunker 108: Bunker 108 is located in the San Bernardino Mountains about one hundred miles east of Los Angeles. It is the birthplace of Alex Keener.

Bunker 114: A medical research installation built about fifty miles northwest of Bunker 108. Built beneath Cold Mountain, Bunker 114 is small. After the fall of Bunker One, Bunker 114, like Bunker 108 to the southeast, became a main center of xenoviral research. An outbreak of the human strain of the xenovirus caused the Bunker to fall in 2060.

Bunker One: The main headquarters of the Post-Ragnarok United States government. It fell in 2048 to a swarm of crawlers that overran its defenses. Bunker One had berths for ten thousand people, making it many times over the most populous Bunker. Its inhabitants included President Garland, the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives, essential government staff, and security forces, along with the skilled people needed to maintain it. There also were dozens of brilliant scientists and specialists, including engineers, doctors, and technicians. The very wealthy were also allowed berths for helping to finance the Bunker Program. Bunker One is reportedly the location of the Black Files, authored by Dr. Cornelius Ashton.

Bunker Program, The: The United States and Canadian governments pooled resources to establish 144 Bunkers in Twelve Sectors throughout their territory. The Bunkers were the back-up in case the Guardian Missions failed. When the Guardian Missions did fail, the Bunker Program kicked into full gear. The Bunkers were designed to save all critical government personnel and citizenry, along with anyone who could provide the finances to construct them. The Bunkers were designed to last indefinitely, using hydroponics to grow food. The Bunkers ran on fusion power, which had been made efficient by the early 2020s. The plan was that when the dust settled, Bunker residents could reemerge and rebuild. Most Bunkers fell, however, for various reasons — including critical systems failures, mutinies, and attacks by outsiders (see Wastelanders). By the year 2060, only four Bunkers were left.

Chaos Years, The: The Chaos Years are the ten years following the impact of Ragnarok. These dark years signified the great die-off of most forms of life, including humans. Most deaths occurred due to starvation. With mass global cooling, crops could not grow in climates too far from the tropics. What crops would grow produced a yield far too paltry to feed the population that existed. This led to a period of violence unknown in all of human history. The Chaos Years signify the complete breakdown of the Old World’s remaining infrastructures — including food production, the economy, power grids, and industry, all of which led to the deaths of billions of people.

Crawlers: Crawlers are dangerous, highly mobile monsters spawned by Ragnarok. Their origin is unclear, but they share many characteristics of Earth animals — mostly those reptilian in nature. Crawlers are sleek and fast, and can leap through the air at very high speeds. Typically, crawlers attack in groups, and behave as if of one mind. One crawler will, without hesitation, sacrifice itself in order to reach its prey. Crawlers are especially dangerous when gathered in high numbers — at which point there is not much one can do but run. Crawlers can be killed, their weak points being their belly and their three eyes.

Dark Decade, The: The Dark Decade lasted from 2020-2030, from the time of the first discovery of Ragnarok, to the time of its impact. It is not called the Dark Decade because the world descended into madness immediately upon the discovery of Ragnarok by astronomer Neil Weinstein — that only happened in 2028, with the failure of Messiah, the third and last of the Guardian Missions. In the United States and other industrialized nations, life proceeded in an almost normal fashion. There was plenty of hope, and good reason to believe that Ragnarok could be stopped, especially given ten years. But as the Guardian Missions failed, one by one, the order of the world quickly disintegrated.

With the failure of the Guardian Mission Archangel in 2024, a series of wars engulfed the world. As what some were calling World War III embroiled the planet, the U.S., Canada, and various European nations worked to stop Ragnarok. When the second Guardian Mission, Reckoning, failed, an economic depression swept the world. But none of this compared to the madness that followed upon the failure of the third and final Guardian, Messiah, in 2028. As societies broke down, martial law was enforced. President Garland was appointed dictator of the United States with absolute authority. By 2029, several states had broken off from the Union.

In the last quarter of 2030, an odd silence hung over the world, as if it had grown weary of living. The President, all essential governmental staff and military, the Senate and House of Representatives, along with scientists, engineers, and the talented and the wealthy, entered the 144 Bunkers established by the Bunker Program. Outraged, the tens of millions of people who did not get an invitation found the Bunker locations, demanding to be let in. The military took action when necessary.

Then on December 3, 2030, Ragnarok fell, crashing into the border of Wyoming and Nebraska, forming a crater one hundred miles wide. The world left the Dark Decade, and entered the Chaos Years.

Great Blight, The: The Great Blight is the largest xenofungal infestation in the world, its point of origin being Ragnarok Crater on the Great Plains in eastern Wyoming and western Nebraska. Unlike other Blights, the Great Blight is massive. From 2040-2060, it began to rapidly expand outside Ragnarok Crater at an alarming rate, moving as much as a quarter mile each day (meaning the stretching of the xenofungus could actually be discerned with the naked eye). Any and all life was conquered, killed, or acquired into the Great Blight’s xenoparasitic network.

Guardian Missions: The Guardian Missions were humanity’s attempts to intercept and alter the course of Ragnarok during the Dark Decade. There were three, and in the order they were launched, they were called Archangel, Reckoning, and Messiah (all three of which were also the names of the ships launched). Each mission had a reason for failing. Archangel is reported to have crashed into Ragnarok, in 2024. In 2026, Reckoning somehow got off-course, losing contact with Earth in the process. In 2028 Messiah successfully landed and attached its payload of rockets to the surface of Ragnarok in order to alter its course from Earth. However, the rockets failed before they had time to do their work. The failure of the Guardian Missions kicked the Bunker Program into overdrive.

Howlers: Howlers are the newest known threat posed by the xenovirus. They are human xenolife, and they behave very much like zombies. They attack with sheer numbers, using their bodies as weapons. A bite from a Howler is enough to infect the victim with the human strain of the xenovirus. Post- infection, it takes anywhere from a few minutes to a few hours for a corpse to reanimate into the dreaded Howler.