Maybe
You'll think of me, when you are all alone
Maybe, the one who is waiting for you
Will prove untrue -Then what will you do?
Five years. It has been five years since the Second Battle of Hoover Dam, an event in America's history as important and as bloody as the Battle of Antietam, or the fateful Battle of Anchorage, sealing Old America's fate once and forever, dooming the world to a nuclear devastation and a century of darkness.
The scene of the enigmatic Courier, shooting down the monstrous Legate Lanius, has become a legend carried on the four ends of the world, a tale to rival the Vault Dweller's descent into the Cathedral, where the Master resided, or when the brave Chosen One fought the Enclave on their off-coast Rig for the fate of the Wasteland. Much alike those mythological heroes, the Courier, too, disappeared into the Wastes, never to be seen by anyone in the West, although rumours whisper he is always there to help those in need, as he always was before Second Hoover Dam.
One would imagine NCR is a triumphant nation following this hard-fought victory. It was not. While now Vegas was in a position of subservience to the NCR, symbolised by the armed soldiers marching through the Strip, and Hoover Dam was serving its energy needs, situation wasn't good at the homefront. With the end of the war, Aaron Kimball's already-low popularity precipitously fell, as more and more people thought of the consequences of this brutal conflict, the resolution of which required so many casualties. Furthermore, away from the Mojave, inequality was rising, with the so-so called "Brahmin Barons" committing injustice after injustice, with the state doing nothing to prevent that. The feeling of dissent was palpable. An election was called in. One expected that, with the majority of the military establishment behind Aaron Kimball, it would be merely a symbolic gesture before moving into consolidating a military dictatorship under his rule, and maintained with General Oliver's troops. It is then that a new star from the Mojave grew. The Rose of Sharon Cassidy, a native of the Mojave, came to represent all of the unfortunate, mistreated, and those who wanted justice. What also helped was the fact that she had supposedly been a companion of the Courier, and that she carried forwards the lessons of kindness, humility and so forth, that she learnt during her travels...
All those things helped her, against all odds, to actually
win. This caused a shock within the political and military spheres. Word goes around that General Oliver wanted personally to coup Cassidy with his own troops, and the only reason he was stopped was because Aaron Kimball told him such an act would result in an open rebellion and revolution, destroying the already fragile fabric of the NCR. Today, Cassidy is doing her damndest to change and reform NCR, this meeting a lot of consternation from the elites...What matters, however, is the fact that the typical expansionist policy of NCR has been constrained to a certain degree. Not ceased, of course. Those lands won't reclaim themselves.
On the other side of the Colorado River, chaos reigns. Following Lanius' death, Caesar, or "Edward Sallow" as he is now properly known in NCR history books, has evidently fled the Fort, perhaps to regroup with the rest of the Legion. However, he was unsuccessful in that - we know that much - but his true fate remains unknown to this day. Stories around the campfire tell how he is lurking in the shadows, growing an army...or, a more ironic ending, that a wandering Follower of the Apocalypse found him all alone, shaking and holding his head in pain and bashing it into the ground, crying out for help. There, the Follower told him that he doesn't even have a week. But that's rumours. The truth is, with most of its higher-ups gone, the tribes compromising the Legion decided against uniting, but they certainly have not forgotten the Legion's lessons. Even on their own, they are a formidable force to be reckoned with.
Asides from the Big Two, there are all sorts of people. Mercenaries. Caravaneers. Drug dealers. Raiders. Self-made men. Sometimes all of the above, in one person. If you don't die in the Wasteland, you're bound to become
someone, somehow. It's all on you, right now.
But let's focus on the thing you've been all waiting for. Utah. Everyone knows by now. In 2282, a scouting expedition came back from there, and threw every man and woman into a frenzy. A green land, with pastures and space for everyone to do what their soul wills - whether agriculture or pasture, or just a desire to get out of NCR's land...And danger. Deadly danger. For that, the scouting expedition was 10 men strong, and only 1 returned. The survivor told of a tribe, called the White Legs. They were
good students of the Legion, managing to take over many other tribes in the region, and ruling over it. However, this was merely an illusion, so as to say. While many NCR citizens were expecting another rehash of the Mojave conflict, the White Legs turned out to be far more decentralized than the Legion. It soon became clear that the name "White Legs" is a misnomer for all the tribes in Utah. While nominally under the control of the warchief Salt-Upon-Wounds, that is far from the actual truth, and many of the tribes were more than happy to help the settlers and newcomers, whether due to hatred of the White Legs, or their own goals.
Alarmed by this, Salt-Upon-Wounds gathered a mighty army against the rather weak defence force that the NCR sent out, to crush those fools and show what happens to those who back up the NCR. It was an epic victory for all but warchief Salt-Upon-Wounds, as a sniper Ranger on the cliffs blew his brains up. This resulted into a fracture in the political union created by the war chief, and soon, what seemed to be a solid formation, turned into dozens of squabbling tribes. And the settlers kept trickling in...but only a fool would underestimate them. They would not be able to do it for long.
Today, Utah remains open for all who wish to seize it. Do you have what it takes?
