Hub City Wasteland

Intro On the morning of October 23, 2077, Lubbock, Texas was like any other city in the waning days of pre-war America. The headlines still talked about the oil riots in Houston, the refugee camps sprawling near Dallas, and the unrelenting heat waves that had turned the South Plains into dust. The citizens of “Hub City” lived with one eye on the crops that could barely grow, and the other on their Pip-Boys and terminals, always tuned in for the latest war update. No one expected Lubbock to be a target. Why would they? It wasn’t Washington D.C., or Los Angeles, or Boston. But Lubbock had something hidden beneath its quiet plains — something worth destroying. Years before the bombs, the U.S. military had built a secret weapons storage facility on the edge of the city, hidden beneath the flatlands. Officially, it was disguised as an agricultural research center tied to Texas Tech University. In reality, it was a vault for experimental warheads and prototype plasma weaponry shipped in from Fort Hood. The locals whispered rumors about the strange convoys that came and went at night, but no one asked questions. When the sirens began to wail on that October day, the people of Lubbock thought it was just another drill. They’d heard warnings before. They filed into basements, school shelters, and storm cellars. But this time, the sky burned. The first warhead detonated above Reese Air Force Base, vaporizing it in an instant. The shockwave tore across the cotton fields, flattening homes and ripping the very heart out of the city. Seconds later, another missile struck near downtown, incinerating the Buddy Holly Center and everything around it. The proud “Hub City” nickname, once a symbol of Lubbock’s place in West Texas life, became a cruel joke as the firestorm spread outward like a wheel hub throwing sparks in every direction. And in the wastes, they say the facility beneath Lubbock still sleeps. Be anyone you want. After all, you wanna be a Hub City Legend afterall.