//------------------------------// // Chapter 46 // Story: Fallout New Vegas: Unexpected Friends // by Sleepyted //------------------------------// Twilight made sure her pistols were fully loaded as she approached the concrete building ahead of her. She had been warned that the bug problem she had accepted to take care of wasn’t just using a can of bug killer like she had hoped but instead it was gun power eating ants that had killed two and sent three into the hospital that the Boomers had, and that if she used lasers it would detonate and that wouldn’t be wise in a place they kept all their excess artillery shells. She sighed sadly. ‘Wouldn’t be like I could use it anymore.’ She thought to herself. ‘I wouldn’t be able to fly to help aim anymore…’ Kicking an empty can along her path she shook it out of her mind. ‘Hopefully my eye’s swelling goes down soon, it’s getting hard with depth perception…’ She looked over the building she came to, seeing a heavy steel door with a large wheel lock in the middle with a key hole on it. After Slipping in the key and twisting it she heard a dull thud from inside the mechanism. Putting the key away again she took hold of the wheel on the front, and with a heavy twist of her magic the door retreated its way into the wall. No sooner had she done that she was surprised as a giant ant dove its way to her with a small chitinous screech. With quick thinking she quickly threw herself to the side, quickly clambering to her hooves as she whipped out her .357 revolver and quickly took aim for the ant as it turned to look at her. Pulling back the handle she let off a shot with a bang, the hard shell of the ant doing very little to stop the bullet as it cracked through the exoskeleton of its head before it collapsed in a heap. As she got to her hooves she could hear a faint clattering sound coming from inside the building, like a hundred tiny footprints crawling their way towards her. She looked at the large box attached to her back, tying to not look at her missing wing, along with the few speakers attached with it. “I’m a sane man, I don’t drink or do any of that kind of junk.” The grouchy man that had been called Loyal. “So why am I even seeing a colorful horse asking me about a Sonic Wave Emitter that I haven’t even finished yet?!” “Well, it wasn’t my choice to be here…” Twilight grumbled. “It doesn’t matter, you can’t have the emitter; I haven’t figured out the right frequency to input yet.” “Well, if they’re anything like ants where I’m from then any signal over 22,000 hertz at 150 or more decibels should do the trick.” Twilight said with a shrug. Loyal looked taken aback. “Hot damn, you're right! It's a matter of boosting across those thresholds, not exact amplitude. You're smarter than you look horse. Just so happens I was testing it at 24,000 hertz, so it should be good to go. Place it near their nest and cross your fingers or... uhh, whatever a horse would cross. Signal's too high for people to hear, don’t know about you though, but it might make you feel sick to your stomach.” With a sigh she looked forward again, greeted with the dark metal hallway of the underground power room. She could hear the hollow echoes every time she took a step, knowing that under her and the hall was just empty space, and for once she had no chance of being able to use her wings to slow or stop her fall. She could hear more scuttling around as she slowly walked along, her pistol at the ready if she saw any more oversized ants. She didn’t have to wait long before a pair of them came scuttling out from a doorway towards her, letting out small screeches as they went in for the kill. Twilight quickly took aim with Benny’s Pistol, pulling the trigger in rapid succession and peppering one of the ants with bullet holes before it collapsed in a bloody heap, its ichor seeping onto the rusty metal. Twilight didn’t have time to reload for the next one, just whipping out Lucky and sending a bullet at its head. She was surprised when that’s all it took, as it collapsed to the ground near its fellow. “The Changeling’s were never as creepy as you are…” Twilight muttered as she reloaded the 9mm first then the revolver. “At least they would normally go down in a strong buck…” She said as she moved forward. She froze when she heard another screech, but this one was different. It was louder, shaking her to her core as she shivered in place. “I don’t like the sound of that…” She muttered to herself as she slowly walked forward again. She heard screeching again but this time she yelped in fear and jumped back. The metal hall in front of her was sheared apart, a large mandible cutting through the steel like butter. A giant ant head shoved itself into the hall from below, black shiny eyes looking directly at Twilight before it spread its mandibles and shriek so booming that it knocked the pony off her hooves and stumbled her back. Twilight had her hooves slapped her hooves over her ears to try and block out the sound. The head fell back below the floor, only a gaping metal hole left in the floor. “NOPE!” Twilight yelled out, quickly taking the large metal box off her back and quickly started to try and set it up. “I AM NOT DEALING WITH THIS!” She yelled out, quickly scampering towards the door she had come from. Before she could make it through and out the door the head of the giant ant burst from the floor again, this time ahead of her. Stumbling back she soon found her hooves come from the floor as the chunk of the hall was torn from the rest. She was glad the fall wasn’t too large but it did cause her to slam against the rusty roof of the broken metal tube before crushing against the floor again as it hit the ground. She clutched her head, groaning as she looked through blurry eyes around at the mangled metal around her. She had dropped her guns and she could not see them anywhere around. The Sonic Emitter looked in bad shape but she hoped it still worked. Reaching into one of her pockets she pulled out a stimpak, jabbing it into her leg to make sure that if the pain in her torso was in fact ruptured organs. Slowly she got to shaky hooves, quickly remembering the giant ant that could easily tear through metal. She couldn’t see it but it wasn’t hidden for long. The giant head was forced against one end of the broken hallway, its mandibles snapping together loudly as they tried to reach the horrified occupant inside as if she was the last bit of fake meat in the bottom of a Cram tin. She quickly ran out the other end of the hall, tripping over the corpse of a smaller half crushed ant. She was in a large concrete alcove, mold and cracks scattered along the surfaces around her; rust soaked machines lining the walls and stairways leading into the to the destroyed walkway above. The giant pest there with her was a lot bigger now she got a good look at it. It was huge, the head easily bigger than her with each leg longer than a normal human’s size. She knew that there was very little chance of killing the thing. The shell would easily be too thick to be able to do much damage to it, even with explosives that she was told not to use considering they had been eating gun-powder. And unlike others this one had large see through wings. Gripping a chunk of rubble in her magic she hurled it at the head of the ant, only getting rewarded with a small ‘tink’ sound as it bounced off its tough exoskeleton without any harm done to it, not even a scratch. “GO AWAY!” Twilight yelled at the ant before she started running in the opposite direction to the ant, hearing it start to follow after her soon after if the loud thumps were any indication. She didn’t know where she could run, hear whipping around as she tried to look for any weapon she could use against such a massive beast. But before she could there was a large impact against her rump, sending her flying through the air before slamming against one of the crumbling concrete walls. The wind was knocked out of her lungs as she fell to the ground, although it was softer than she thought it would be. Looking down she realized that she was currently on the corpse of a Boomer, one of his arms missing with a puddle of blood below him. Scratches were all over his body and tore up his clothes. Her head snapped towards the charging ant, going in for the kill. Twilight grabbed the closest thing she could find, a large rifle with a very thick barrel before she pointed it towards the ant. She saw the angry looking beaver on the stock of the gun with the words ‘Thump Thump’ carved into it with an arrow pointed forward. She didn’t really care about that much, just aiming it at the ant as it was reeling up to stomp her into paste before pulling the trigger. ‘THUD’ ‘BOOM’ Twilight had to cover her face with her hooves as the ant exploded into large bloody chunks, even though she just hit the head. Even though the gun had a bigger impact than she thought she guessed that it was the gun powder it had been eating but didn’t really care at that moment, just wanting to get out of here. Putting the grenade rifle onto her back next to her laser gun she carefully walked towards the metal husk that used to be a hallway, looking around and retrieving her pistols. Once they were found she was glad that they weren’t any worse for wear, keeping Benny’s pistol out just in case as she made her way to the sonic emitter. Plugging the speaker back into the main box of the emitter she turned the dial Loyal told her turned it on, hearing a faint high pitched screeching sound before wet meaty splats going off all around the place. “Is it finally done?” She asked herself softly, hearing no other sounds. “I just want to get out of here…” She grumbled, the sound making her slightly sick feeling. “I guess Mother Pearl was right about you, I don’t know how you managed to pull it off with no hands.” Raquel said adjusting the old pre-war helmet on her head. “We’ll send Loyal and some guys down to clear out the eggs but your work is done there. Speaking of Mother Pearl, she said that once you were done down there that she wanted to speak with you.” Twilight hoped that it wasn’t more ants or any other bugs as she made her way towards the cabin she first met the Boomers’ leader. Once inside she saw mother Pearl in a chair again, a bottle of Nuka-cola in her hand as she was relaxing. Another unopened bottle was on the small table in front of her. “Welcome child, I’ve heard good things about you around Nellis.” The old woman said, gesturing towards the seat in front of her which Twilight sat down in with a tired groan, taking the bottle when it was offered to her. “I’m just glad it wasn’t all done for nothing.” Twilight grumbled as she popped off the cap and put it into her pocket on the vest. “You’ve done good by a lot of people here. You listened to her our history, gave us medication to help our wounded and even killed those ants.” Twilight shivered as she remembered that massive queen underground. “When you said there was an ant problem I thought you meant just a dozen or so of the smaller ones, not the biggest one I’ve ever seen.” She said. “Why do you think we lost people trying to fight while others were badly wounded?” Pearl asked. Twilight took a long swig of her drink, feeling the warm sugar filled drink sooth her dry throat, enjoying the sugar in her mouth. “So, is everything done?” “Not quite.” The old woman said. “Since you’ve gained our trust I think it’s time we put your value to the last test. Seek out Loyal and ask him about our people’s fondest dream. He’ll know what to do next.”