Vault 59

**Vault 59** is a Vault-Tec experimental vault, located near the ruins of Seattle, Washington state. It was designed to test how residents would react and colonize the wastes after generations of brainwashing into reverence of an individual, and continued reverence even after that individuals death. The survivors of the vault went on to found the Disciples of Tom.

## The Experiment

Vault Tec was not picky when choosing the inhabitants of the vault, but had a preference for groups or individuals who had previously been in conflict. Ultimately, on October 23rd, 2077, the Vault held 639 residents, not including Security staff and Vault Tec personnel, when the door was sealed after the bombs began dropping above. Two days later, the Vault AI began to broadcast subliminal messages to the residents in their sleep, save for one who is only known in the post-war wastes as Tom. The messages started off as subtle suggestions saying that Tom was better than the other residents and that Tom should be treated better than everyone else. A week later and a sizable portion, 79%, of the residents had begun to react to the conditioning, with over 98.5% reacting favorably. As the years wore on, the suggestions became more and more extreme, conditioning the residents to revere Tom as not just a man, but a God in mortal form.

Ten years into the experiment, all of the residents had been completely brainwashed into revering this Tom. Their reverence had begun to irritate the security personnel, leading to them repeatedly belittling Tom, despite the Overseer's warnings, with reverence to the experiment and level of resident conditioning. But these warnings came too late. The non-Vault Tec residents rose up in a mutiny, seizing the Vault's armory and executing the majority of Vault Tec staff present. The Overseer was the last to be lynched, his death activating the Vault AI's emergency protocols for such an event. Fifty years later, Tom perished. The Vault AI acted quickly, claiming to be Tom, his soul having merged with the Vault itself. The AI had concluded the experiment a success, sending signals to the appropriate authorities while simultaneously warning said authorities to stay away from Vault 59. The AI, which now called itself T.O.M., set about caring for the residents until the Eighty year mark, at which time it was permitted to open the Vaults doors.

## Aftermath of the Experiment

After eighty additional years of conditioning after the intended eighty, which T.O.M.'s programming had forbidden it from ceasing, Vault 59 opened. It's residents began scouting the surface, finding that the Seattle Expanse to be very inhospitable, went on to found The Disciples of Tom, using Vault 59 both as their main base and head church, where they would attempt to spread reverence of Tom across the wastes. Mostly, the Disciples would interact with Metalburg, largely due to the settlements proximity to Vault 59. While mostly amiable in their dealings, whenever anyone ridiculed the name of Tom or spoke out too frequently/passionately/effectively against their teachings said person(s) would find themselves quickly subdued through a number of methods and taken back to Vault 59, where they were imprisoned within specially designated "Learning Cells" and conditioned to revere the teachings of T.O.M., much to AI's dismay.