Mama Murphy

Mama Murphy is more terrifying than any of you might think.

My current house is in Sanctuary, and I just used a pre-fab building.  It more than served its purpose, and I was quite happy with it.  But lately, I've been inspired to create my own house from scratch, and last night I finally said, "Why not?"  I have all the materials I could need, since I've been scavenging quite a lot of stuff for a while now.  And, since I've finished all the main quests, most of the side quests that I could find, and my playtime these days is mostly spent looking for bobbleheads and magazines, I figured it'd be a nice change of pace.

So, on to the planning stage of my grand construction.  First things first:  Gotta pick a great spot for my new house.  My first decision was that I was going to stay in Sanctuary.  It holds sentimental value to me, since it was my character's old home, and that is where I have the majority of my followers stationed.  I like having them in the settlement, walking around or tending to the tasks that I've given them.  Also, it'll make it easier for me to move my items from the old house into the new one.  Great, first decision made.  Time to look around Sanctuary for a good spot.

Obviously, building the house on one of the empty cement foundations would be best, since those are flat, even, and symmetrical.  My current house is on one of them.  I built the SPOILER on another one.  That leaves three empty ones left.  Two of these have shrubs around them that cannot be removed and overlap slightly with the slabs, making it impossible to place all the walls that I need, so that leaves me with just one option.  Over there I go!  

Oh.  Right.  That's where I put Mama Murphy's chair.

For those of you unfamiliar with the game, or those who for some reason haven't done this very, very early game quest, Mama Murphy is a drug addicted old woman who travels with the Minutemen.  You can give her drugs and she'll tell you your future, because she claims that the drugs give her "THE SIGHT".  Once you arrive at Sanctuary, she asks you to put her chair somewhere so that she can sit down.  Because she's old and high on drugs.

Okay, so fine.  I'll just move her chair somewhere else.

I talk to Mama Murphy to see if I can ask her to move.  She asks me for more drugs and won't talk to me for any other reason.  You're an addict, woman.  I then try to sit in the chair myself, but she won't move her high-as-balls ass out of the chair.  Okay, fine.  So I go into Build Mode and try to delete her chair while she's sitting in it.  The chair has ceased to be a game object, and is now directly linked to Mama Murphy and her drug-addled ass.

By now, I'm starting to very much dislike Mama Murphy.  In fact, it was then that Marcy Long walked by and said something about never being friends, and I didn't even reply with my normal, "Go fuck yourself, Marcy." retort.  It seems there is only room in my Wastelander heart for the hatred of one person at a time.

Okay, it was time to some more drastic things.

The building in which Mama Murphy's stoned ass was sitting in her immovable chair was also a pre-fab, and it was still its own game object.  So I deleted it.  This dislodged Mama Murphy from her chair.  Hooray!  She then proceeded to sit down in mid-air, hovering like some acid trip gone wrong.  With the words, "There is no Dana, there is only Zul" echoing in my mind, I went into build mode.  To my chagrin, the chair was still linked to her hovering, stoned ass.

I quick-saved and re-loaded, and she was back in the chair, sitting defiantly right smack in the middle of the spot where I wanted to build my house.  Bitch.

It was time to get creative.

It was then that I remembered the item called the settlement bell.  It's a game object that you can place in your settlement, and upon ringing the bell, all of your settlers will gather to it.  It's sort of a way to rally them all together, or to find a settler that may have wandered off.  So, I plopped one of those babies down next to the area and rang it.  Every settler and follower in Sanctuary then strolled over to greet me.  I look over.

Mama Murphy's stoned ass is still glued to that fucking chair.

Now it was time for desperate measures.  I walked over to Mama Murphy, took out my 10MM pistol, and emptied a clip into the old hag's face.  With her bloody corpse laying dead at my feet, I'm about to enter build mode to delete her chair when I start taking damage.  I turn around, and the ENTIRE SETTLEMENT has turned against me.  They're all now hostile, even my followers, and are shooting at me.  Oh fuck.  I turn around, and Mama Murphy has RISEN FROM THE FUCKING DEAD.  She stands up like nothing's happened, and then sits her stoned ass back in that fucking chair.  Then, she says, "Oh, I'm not much of a fighter these days."  Then my settlers fucking kill me.

I re-loaded the game.  I took the bell and moved it way the fuck over to the other side of the settlement and rang that fucker, prompting all the Judas Iscariot bastards in Sanctuary to shuffle on over to what is HOPEFULLY out of gunshot hearing range.  Then, I left them there as I ran over to commit murder.  Again.

I walked up to Mama Murphy and shot her in the face again.  I looked over towards my settlers.  They were all behaving and staring at the bell all the way across the settlement.  I stepped over the bloody corpse and went into build mode, and deleted that fucking chair.  Success!  Mama Murphy stood up and then wandered off, undoubtedly looking for a new chair to plop down her stoned, and apparently INVINCIBLE, ass.

At last, I could build my house.  Perhaps I'll place a plaque where Mama Murphy's chair once sat.  Or maybe that's where I'll put my cooler that's filled to the brim with drugs that she won't be getting.