History
Vault 49 was unique in its design and function: The 1st vault door opened into a large reinforced cave, called the staging chamber, in this chamber was a 2nd vault door which led into an “airlock” chamber with a 3rd & final vault door leading to the Actual Vault’s main chambers. The “airlock” chamber & the Staging Chamber contained many turrets & gas vents to kill any hostile forces that made it through the vault doors.
The stated mission of the vault was also different from other vaults; instead of opening up completely when they received the all clear sign or at their set date, vault 49 was to open multiple times, using its 3 vault door system to send out exploration parties while allowing the vault to remain as a secure base in case of these parties failing.
The vault was heavily armed and had many scientists & engineers devoted to developing weapons & technology so that they could secure & pacify the region before other vaults were to open, in the event of any hostile powers establishing themselves in the area. They were given many Power Armor suits, military bots, heavy weaponry, & an experimental device called a shieldboy, which created a photonic resonance energy barrier around the wearer.
The Vault was populated mostly by members of the Cherokee Tribe from the Qualla boundary & Nearby communities, as well as Cherokee Scientists & other specialists desired by vault-tec brought in from further afield and rehoused nearby to the vault. The only non-cherokee brought into the vault were all male so that all females in the vault had a Cherokee clan. These clans are matrilineal, so all subsequent children, even those of mixed descent, were born into a clan. Dating/mating within your own clan was not allowed, as they were considered family regardless of degree of blood relation.
The Cherokee clan system was used by vault-tec as a form of caste system, with those chosen for the vault program representing vault-tec’s desired qualities & professions for their respective clan. Each clan was given different areas of expertise, children of each clan received specialized education for specific professions & everyone in the vault was given an experimental drug included in their “daily vitamins” pack that was specific to each clan.
The drugs caused physiological differences between the clans, especially in the children & subsequent generations, such as the wolf clan and bear clan being taller and stronger, the deer becoming faster, the bird clan becoming more perceptive, the long hair clan having more confidence and less anxiety, etc. these drugs eventually ran out a few generations after the bombs dropped, but these changes had already mutated their DNA so that subsequent generations continued to exhibit these changes. As the mutagen attached itself to mitochondrial DNA, they exhibited the traits correlating to their birth mother & clan.
Vault-tec had given them access to the technology to convert female egg cells into fertilizing agents, allowing them to impregnate women with the DNA of another woman. Males of all clans were unknowingly given an additional drug in the vitamin packs, which decreased male fertility, to pressure them to use this technology. Because this process only allows female children to be born, as there is no Y chromosome involved, this led to a larger female to male ratio, which increased with every generation. Children of female-female pairings were born into the clan of the mother that birthed them, not the fertilizer.
The Original overseer also promoted her own religious & cultural beliefs into the vault dwellers, which was a strange mix of cherokee traditional beliefs and her own unique blend of hellenic & egyptian polytheism. The tribe’s culture is a mix of southeastern native with ancient Greek & Egyptian inspiration along with their own unique innovations.
Instead of simply having 1 overseer, the Vault had a council of 3 leaders (The Overseer, the peace chief, & the war chief) & 7 clan leaders, called clan mothers.
While they are one of the most technologically advanced peoples in the post-war world, they have also become very spiritual & superstitious. They believe that science without spirituality created the energy imbalances that lead to the failing of the pre-war societies.
Cultural Practices & Beliefs
Paints & dyes are extremely important to their culture. They paint their pip-boys, and change these paint jobs every 2 months.They paint themselves & their robots for a wide variety of reasons, from war to celebrations.
They believe that people have 3 spiritual parts (soul, flesh, spirit) & 3 physical parts (mind, body, heart), as well as one universal force shared by all matter.
The soul is your consciousness, the flesh is your unconscious “bodily soul”, both interact with the mind to control the body, the flesh also controls the heart, which imbues spirit into your blood, and powers the body & mind. The universal force is the vibration of all atoms/matter.
They believe that robots, pip-boys, computers, & AI lack a soul, but have a “flesh” & that electricity contains spirit.
They believe that ghouls are less likely to become feral if more non-feral ghouls & non-ghouls remember their name.
Pantheon
They worship a Pantheon of 12 Major Deities (11 Goddesses, & 1 God)
• Iset, also called Hera, or Aphrodite
• Nebet-het Satet, also called Persephone, Artemis, Demeter, or Hekate
• Anatathena, also called Anatu or Athena
• Osiris-Ra, also called Dionysus, Atum-Ra, Zeus, or Hades
• Iris
• Maat, also called Astraea or Dike
• Chloris, also called Flora
• Serket
• Hestia, also called Harmonia
• Enyo, also called Eris
• Astrape, also called Nike
• Bronte, also called Nemesis
They believe in a group of eldritch beings they call “the outsiders”, and a group of evil spirits that worship the outsiders that they call “the mockers”, but they do not worship either of these beings.
