After the dust began to settle and the body count began to rise there remained a lot of questions surrounding what happened that day. The Brotherhood of Steel officially closed the file to all but their most senior chapter members. And as far as the rest of the world was concerned, it may as well have never happened.  
This did not stop rumors from circulating.
 
The New California Republic centered around most of those, so did saboteurs form one of the outlying junk towns, Raiders, even the Enclave made an appearance in one or two.
 
One point all the stories seemed to agree on though, a single name repeated over and over again.
 
Lars.
 
Accounts vary wild leading up to what some in the Mojave Wastland started calling The Second Apocalypse.
 
One man claimed it was a group of three raider clans united under a powerful war chief that lead the assault, some long forgotten tribe that had once been called The Sorrows and the whispers of the burned man: Joshua Gram.
 
Others claim it had to an inside job, rouge members of the Brotherhood, who lead the assault in stolen vertibirds in a military take over from Elder Lions himself.
 
In another story, it was the Boomers in their flying fortress, raining destruction from the air.
 
Some have even gone as so far to imply in hushed whispers that the Enclave’s hand could still be seen at work, and that talking death claws were deployed onto the battle field along with super mutants! And at their head was the most vicious mutant hybrid of them all, standing twelve feet tall, immune to bullets, leading the charge right through the heart of the enemy with nothing but a torn jump suit and a twisted car bumper, ripping men’s heads from their shoulders, and crushing power armor under its hooves as though they were nothing more than tin cans!
 
Such claims were rightfully dismissed as drunken ramblings.
 
The Followers of the Apocalypse have even speculated that Lars, was in fact a group of highly trained individuals rather than a single entity, specializing in explosive, espionage, and psychological warfare the not seen sense the fall of the Old World.
 
Whatever the case, one question remains constant, and that question is what happened after?