Alarms blared. Motors hummed. Heavy doors sealed. I couldn’t see them closing but, there’s no mistaking the sound of several tons of steel hitting several more tons of steel.
I stood still, unsure of what to do. Desi was outside, she had my equipment, but my equipment was garbage. If I hadn’t lost Feature, maybe I could be useful against an army of robots.
I should probably just hunker down and hide…
Three shuffled up to me, one of her leg joints clicking as she moved. “It is recommended that you do so. Stay mobile all the time. Usually Two units will search and destroy. They can go through the door.”
I triple blinked. “Um, what?”
130 slammed her hoof against the door panel, opening the workshop up to the hallway with a loud hiss of over-clocked hydraulics. “She means Two’s scrap-bots meticulously search each room, clear them, and move on. There’s no front line. They’ll come in from everywhere. They can breach doors and walls. Stay on the move, keep close to your companion and whatever you do, don’t try to take them on one on one!”
130 looked over her shoulder at Three. “Come on, old timer. I’ll cover your limping plot for ya!”
“Thank, 130.” Three replied with a worried little quaver.
“Wait!” I cried as the two began to slip through the door. “Shouldn’t we all stay together?”
“No,” 130 said firmly. “They prioritize large groups first via sonar. Pair up. It keeps them from forming what we call the “massive horrible collateral damage ball of hate”.”
Oh… Well, that sounds like a good reason then.
Desi poked her head around the corner, her horn lit to hold her book. “Are we under a pin?” she asked.
“You mean ‘attack’,” 130 corrected politely. “And yes. Stick with your friend. Don't worry, it should be over soon!”
Right! Desi the super-mage. It was okay that I wasn’t well armed, I had a smol wizard friend.
I zipped over to Desi’s side and nodded to the left, the opposite way Three and 130 were headed. “We should go that way, and keep walking. Apparently the enemy will prioritize groups larger than two.”
Desi nodded in understanding, put her book away, then quickly lashed my saddlebags and holster onto me with her magic then looked me dead in the eyes. “Shields up.”
“Oh, right. I have those!” I laughed nervously as I activated my Gale Shield.
The purple shimmer of light as the shield enveloped me reminded me of when I was much younger. Safety blankets and all that. Ironic how something named for someone trying to kill me was one of my best, if flimsy, defenses.
Desi trotted off without a word. I followed her, doing my best to remain calm as we walked down the lavender corridor.
Each blaring cry of the alarm brought a fresh shiver of fear to my core. I’d just been fixed! I’d only just been fixed, and now this… If only I hadn’t wanted to see my old hull again. I’d still be well armed with lightning and grenades, and Wander would be here with her nifty little blaster. We’d be able to handle some scrap-bots.
What did that mean? Obviously that meant robots made from scrap, but… Had 130 meant the robots were built from scratch using junk, or did she mean they were built from the parts of other robots in a horrifying kludge of—
The wall just in front of Desi exploded into shrapnel as a hulking metal monstrosity shoulder-checked through the reinforced concrete like it was tissue paper.
The world seemed to slow down for a few moments. The monster vaguely resembled a diamond dog, only with chicken-legs, a door stop for a head, one big arm ending in a mini gun with an underslung flamethrower-chainsaw combo, and the other ending in a big three fingered claw.
I suddenly missed Speed more than Wander.
Time resumed its normal speed. The monster’s minigun started to spin up.
"WE'RE NOT WITH THEM! JUST VISITING!" I yelped, my tail standing straight up right on its own.
The killbot's response was eloquent and insightful: A hail of bullets.
I dove to my left, hoping to dodge under the hail of death coming my way. Desi remained still, probably terrified.
I reached out to grab her plot and yanked her down with me.
Desi’s horn shone like a bonfire as she grabbed the monster-robot and shoved it back into the wall-hole just before the robot fired.
“No thank you.” she said with casual politeness.
My jaw dropped. D— Did she buck up Equish or was that a one liner?
I reached back and drew my pistol from its holster and twisted to aim at the wall. The robot came back through, because of course it did. I fired three shots. The metal needles poked three small holes in the robot’s barrel.
It didn’t even slow down. The robot barreled back through the hole, its flamer hissing then roaring as it unleashed a torrent of flame on the two of us. I screamed, remembering my last encounter with a flamer.
I hugged the floor and curled up in a ball, trying to minimize the parts of me which would burn.
My shields crackled and popped, the fire wasn't quite enough to overwhelm them, but any second now the robot would switch weapons, and my pistol wouldn’t cut it.
And my Gyrojet was in my bag. Great!
A loud magical-ish sizzle pierced the roar of the flames around me. The robot bellowed a metallic deathcry. The flames vanished as the robot toppled backwards, crashing into the floor with a thud.
Desi dropped a large cylinder of random robot-parts she’d core-sampled out of the robot to the floor.
I shook my head, ears and tail swill twitching with near-panic. “Heh… I uh… I wish I was a unicorn. I don't have anything for hardened targets right now.”
Desi nodded in agreement. “Unicorn platform onboard weapons very sufficient! Power generation is... poor.” she paused for a moment frowned, referenced her book, then pointed to the robot’s mini gun. “Salvage spin-cycle gun?”
That wasn’t a bad idea! At the very least, the sheer kinetic force of so many bullets hitting so close to one another would probably break the robots internally. The question was, could I fire it?
I hesitantly stepped towards the robot. It remained still. I crept towards its minigun and looked it over. While it didn’t have any handles or physical controls, it did look like it could integrate into my battle saddle fairly easily…
I followed the ammo belt with my eyes, fearing the robot used internal ammunition reservoirs. It thankfully did not. The ammo was still in its box, which was simply clipped to anchor points on the robot’s upper arm.
“Yeah, I can do that,” I agreed, frowning as I started to puzzle through the next part of the problem. “At least, I can if we can figure out how to get it off of the—”
Desi sliced the minigun free of the robot’s arm above the mounting bracket with a thin emerald ray of light. The weapon clunked to the floor.
I looked up at Desi and pointed to the weapon. “How many more times can you do that?”
“Seventeen,” Desi answered flatly.
Okay… She’s a 21 inch gun with a really terribly small magazine. Understood.
It took Desi and I about a minute to get the minigun hooked into my battle saddle. The weapon was nearly twice as heavy as Feature had been. I could feel it dragging me down on my right side. Putting the two ammo crates on my left saddle-mount had barely helped.
It also didn’t help that the weapon was… weird. It was a robot’s weapon, and I was really… not meant to use those. The weapon gave me a third eye. It had a targeting camera in the middle of the barrel assembly. I could see exactly where it was pointing from the moment Desi hooked in the optical cable.
But it was more than that. I could feel it, too. It was like having another leg just jammed onto my body.
I didn’t like it… But I knew exactly what I was aiming at, even more so than when I used a cannon. So, at least it wasn’t all bad.
Desi and I trotted down the halls, slowed by my new weapon. The lights flickered from time to time. Weapon and spell fire echoed through the halls every few moments. Sometimes a muffled ranting villain speech would rise above the sound. Other times the floor would shake.
Five minutes into our cautious meandering I began to wonder if we had gotten behind the enemy lines. The way 130 had described their tactics, it seemed like once a section was “clear” they left it alone and—
The ceiling above us crumbled. A huge tanky-robot with a Mark I robobrain tank mounted atop the huge square chassis fell through the floor, its four legs all scratching out in a murderous frenzy as it lashed out at us with a dozen buzzsaw tipped mechanical tentacles.
I fired by instinct, sending perhaps eight hundred 30-06 rounds ripping down the hallway. The recoil from firing slid me backwards along the floor, slamming my plot into the wall.
The shrieking blades stopped.
“Enemy down,” Desi reported calmly.
Ow! My butt… Okay, shorter bursts it is! Also… Probably should be watching the total ammo use. I had maybe 16,000 rounds left.
I nodded and started to get back into position at Desi’s side. A pair of heavily modified Miss Handies dropped from the breach in a flurry of laser fire. My shield took the first hit, and the second, then collapsed at the third. Desi teleported a big chunk out of the one on the left. I squeezed off a short burst which solidly hit the other one, and knocked myself on my plot.
The one I’d hit dropped onto the rubble, sparking.
Desi snickered and pointed to the minigun. “Weapon exceeds structural capacities.”
I gave her the best deadpan stare my Sweetie Eyes could articulate. Words were not needed.
Desi frowned suddenly, looked up into the dark hole, spread her wings and flew up into it. A moment later, she lifted me up into the next floor without saying a word and began to trot down the unlit hallway.
“Okay, sure, but why?” I asked her with a worried frown.
I mean, trotting into a dark hallway during the middle of an enemy attack seemed like a bad idea.
Desi made a frustrated sound, her ears twitched a little, then she slowly parsed out a sentence. “Enemies, unlikely, exist, here, still. Would have come… with others? No enemies here. Could be below.”
“Huh, that’s good think—”
A rocket wooshed out of the darkness, streaked past my head, and exploded some distance down the hall behind me. I braced my hind legs and squeeze off a few bursts into the dark hallway ahead. Desi joined me, flinging crackling green energy bolts down the hall. After a few seconds, something popped with a large electric-blue flash of light.
Desi cast a light spell, illuminating the hall with an eerie green light. Our nemesis had literally been three sprite bots welded to a rocket launcher, so as to provide enough thrust to lift it.
Clearly Two was the “everything and the kitchen sink” sort of engineer.
Furthermore, lighting her horn was a mistake. Down the hall, three doors darkened with the figures of uniquely cruel-looking deathbots, each screeching their wordless electronic warcry. A flood of laser bolts and bullets ripped through the air around me, several rounds hit my left barrel and knocked me over, pain flooding my mind too much to pay attention to the world around me.
No! No! I have to move. If I lay here I’m dead!
I pushed past the pain and opened my eyes. Desi was still standing, but bleeding badly. Her horn pulsed with emerald light as she cast Mana Torpedo. The scintillating ball of energy struck the floor between the three robots and exploded. My Sweetie Eyes refused to render the explosion. All I saw was a sphere of nothing replace something, then burst with a flash of plasma that I could see.
Plasma which washed over Desi, scorching the peach fur off her muzzle and making her shriek in pain. Plasma which also reduced the three robots to puddles of molten metal.
I picked myself up and crawled over to Desi. She appeared to be badly hurt. Blood stained her gray jumpsuit almost everywhere. Her face was burnt very badly, I could see the flesh bubbling. It even looked weird minty-green.
That wasn’t good. A pony’s skin matched their fur color under normal circumstances. The color change implied the burn was very, very bad. Though I thought it was supposed to turn yellow… Then again, I wasn’t a medic.
But Desi didn’t need a medic. Just some rads.
“D— Do you need me to open up my core?” I asked the poor with a hesitant stammer.
As much as she needed the rads, cutting open my barrel would really, really hurt.
But… Desi needed medical attention. So, I had to. Right?
Desi shook her head. Her horn glowed as she placed dozens of tiny shield spells over her wounds, using them as bandages. “Hull breaches sealed. Effect repairs after engagement.”
I pierced my lips and flicked my tail back and forth. “Will those hold for a long time?”
Desi nodded once.
I bit my lip heastently and rotated my foreleg to make sure I wasn’t too badly damaged. I could still move with 80% of my full range of motion. Good enough.
“Are you sure?” I asked to be clear. “How many more spells can you cast after that?”
Desi pulled her book out of her jumpsuit’s integrated bag and flipped through it quickly. “Will robots let me eat?” she asked hopefully.
I shook my head.
Her ears drooped. “Three.”
“Use one to cut a weapon off a robot for yourself, then,” I said, nodding to the still intact missile launcher the welded sprite bots had wielded.
Desi shook her head and sat down. I could see her intact facial muscles twitching. If she still had skin on her muzzle, she’d probably have been reflexively wincing.
Poor thing!
Desi scooped her hoof held computer out of her bag and started tapping at it. I decided to turn away to keep an eye on the halls and cover her. Desi wasn't stupid. She had to be doing something important.
But what?
My eyes darted left and right, checking each and every shadow for signs of the mechanical horde I could hear all around us.
Dessi hissed something. At first I thought it was a pained noise, then I realized it was her weird terminal-speak through an accent of “My face and tongue are burnt”.
A true modem beep-hissed back through her handheld. Desi responded to it, and a brief conversation of hisses and beeps ensued.
Something moved down the hall to my left, and I turned and fired instantly. A hundred rounds shrieked down the hall, my weapon’s muzzle flash lighting up the hall like a spotlight… giving me a perfect view of Rainbow’s body as I literally splattered her across the floor.
My eyes widened in horror, I froze up completely. I’d just killed her! Oh no, nononono, Celestia no!
Something else moved down the hallway. I couldn't react.
“Well… Good thing you regenerate,” A Twilight’s voice said loud enough for me to hear. “We’re friendly!”
Okay. Dash had been with 343. Okay.
“NO!” I snapped. “Not good! I’ve heard her regenerate before. It’s horrible!”
343 slowly moved back around the corner. “Um, how? She’s a med-spell ghoul. Doesn’t she, like, just rapid-cell growth back to full health?”
I had no idea why, perhaps it was the horror at what I’d just done to my friend, but the first thing out of my mouth was, “You not knowing the hell she’s going to go through because of me puts a huge hole in your claim of being the actual Twilight!”
“I never saw her die, and she didn’t exactly talk about it at parties,” 343 said calmly as she trotted into the light more.
She was damaged. I could see a few bullet holes in her fur, and severed polymer muscles beneath them, though she didn't seem hindered at all by her injuries. More practically for us, she was wearing a battle saddle with twin laser rifles mounted to each flank.
Good. At least there’s that. Desi picked the worst time to call home and I just shot Dash, but at least there’s laser support fire.
I sighed and nodded down the hall. “Just go. I’ll send her after you when she’s back.”
343 blinked and cocked her head to one side. “What? Why would we split up?”
“Um… 130 said they target groups?” I said with a frown.
343 facehooved immediately. “Was she with Three?”
“Um, yes. Why?”
343 snorted and flicked her tail with an amused grin on her face. “They’re a couple. 130 is probably trying to make sure Three gets disabled. We’ll be fine.”
It took me a moment to process all of that. “Excuse me, what? That uh… Non sequitur? Does not compute. Help!”
Couple. Trying to get her disabled. What? Oh, no! I can feel a system freeze coming on!
“Oh! Uh, yeah that sounds bad with no context. It’s very hard to kill any of us. If Three is disabled, and one of her eight memory crystals is still intact, or the fragments of those eight can produce one full working copy, she can then be transferred into a new body. A thing 130 has been desperately trying to get Three to do for years now,” 343 clarified. Her eyes suddenly widened. “Look out!”
She fired four shots down the hallway behind me before I had time to spin around to help. Our rear was being assaulted by what appeared to be a taxidermied grizzly bear covered in armor made from old license plates with random robotic parts protruding through the seams.
343’s third volley brought it down.
It had backup.
Just behind the robo-bear was some sort of cyber-gorilla. I braced myself as best I could and hosed it down with bullets. My shots dug into its hide, it screached a mechanical death-rattle, and released a swarm of miniature rockets as it collapsed. The ceiling above me and wall to my left exploded with a dozen fireballs as the tiny missiles punched head sized holes through everything they hit.
None of which was 343, Desi, or I.
“Huh,” 343 remarked. “Thanks, Faust.”
I looked over myself one last time to make sure I wasn’t hurt. “Well, this was highly implause—”
A bullet punched a hole through my head. Again. Just one side this time, I could feel it rattling around in there. I turned to my right and filled the appropriate doorway for it to have come from with as many bullets as I could before the pain started to radiate out from the hole, distracting me too much to keep focusing on firing.
343 added a few laser vollyes into the hole herself.
No further shots came out of it.
“Are you okay?” the Twilight-lookalike asked as she peered into my massive gaping head wound. “Wait, that’s empty space? Why?”
“That’s where my brain would go,” I said as I stepped aside to get a bit away from the mare in my personal space so I could see the hallway better. “If I had one.”
“Oh, right. Robobrain with a spirit. I forgot for a moment,” 343 said with an apologetic smile.
Something moved out of the corner of my eye. I spun on my rear hooves and scanned the hallway top to bottom.
For a moment, I thought I’d jumped at a shadow. Then I saw it. I saw it, and I wished I could vomit.
All of Rainbow’s blood was oozing back towards her body, carrying tiny fragments of fur, skin, bone and muscle with it. The larger chunks of her body twitched and slithered along the ground like undead worms. Sometimes they touched, squirmed around each other, wove into a single bigger piece, and continued their gory journey towards the largest intact piece… her head and left shoulder.
I winced and offered a silent apology, thankful that she was going to apparently be unconscious this ti—
Dash’s eyes snapped open, she screamed silently, probably because her lungs were still oozing across the floor like huge amoeba. I felt my face go pale. 343 noticed my expression and turned to look. Her face went pale.
Thank the fates Desi was too busy screeching at her computer to look…
One of Dash’s lungs squirmed into her splayed open ribcage. I heard a loud wet squelch. Dash's silent scream was suddenly very very loud.
343’s cheek began to turn green. “Oh, no, nononononono!” she said faster and faster.
Then she threw up.
The robot, threw up.
She threw up a mixture of what looked like actual food.
W— What?
Because I really, really, really didn’t want to see exactly how the severed leg hopping its way towards Dash would rejoin her uh, core mass, I decided to look at the vomit.
Oh. It’s mostly Sparkle Cola and coolant. That makes sen—
The leg connected with a loud scrape of bone on bone and a wet squish.
I wished I could throw up again.
Dash’s screams drowned out the alarms and most of the weapons fire. It sounded like somepony was slowly cutting her apart, surgically unraveling her one nerve fiber at a time.
I turned away. I couldn’t look.
A few moments after I turned my back, a hoof tapped me on the shoulder. I winced, gulped, then slowly turned around. Dash had tapped my shoulder. She didn’t look angry, just very, very serious. And also in extreme pain.
“Please don’t do that again,” Dash said with a long pained hissing breath as some of her left flank’s muscles climbed up her hind leg and knitted themselves back into place.
“D— Don’t worry. N— Never want to see that again,” I stammered, my ear flatness set to maximum.
Dash nodded once, staggered three steps down the hallway, met up with a flap of her skin which may or may not have had most of her cutie mark on it, and pressed it into place with a wingtip, and a muffled shriek.
343 stared at Dash with something beyond horror.
“I— I— D— Dash…” she stammered. “W— Why didn’t you tell me that... That ‘s how you… why?!”
Dash gave her a sidelong glance, then sighed. “Okay… So, I half believe you. Let’s pretend you’re really Twilight for a moment,” she took a deep breath then looked her dead in the eyes. “At the start of the war, you’d have dropped everything to help me and we would have lost the war. At the end, you hated me. During the middle, we fought too much for me to trust you. That’s partially my fault. So yeah.”
343 ran over to Dash and hugged her tightly. “I’m so sorry! I’ll start as soon as the attack’s over. We’ll have a cure as soon as possible!”
Dash snorted and gently pushed her away. “I don’t want a cure. Fix the regeneration to not hurt. I really don’t mind the rest of it… Well, a painkiller and a restoration of my flight would be ideal.”
343’s frown increased to something beyond the realm of possibility for organic lifeforms. “W— What? You can't fly anymore? That’s horrible!”
Dash shook her head. “I can fly… Just limited to the speed of sound. You know the thing about ghouls, how we’re an ironic twist of the megaspell that makes us? What’s more ironic than always healing but never getting better? I’m stuck at about half my old self…”
343 increased her hug’s potency, then blinked. “Wait, are you squishy? Or— d— did I just hurt you?”
“I’m kinda squishy too, but that’s fine. Actually makes laying on stuff more comfortable. ‘Cides, somepony’s bound to find it kinky… one day.”
“H— How can you just walk that off?!” I finally snapped, pointing to the spot where Dash had just been lying as a pile of mincemeat thanks to my sending about three hundred 30-06 rounds through her everything.
“Happens like twice a week,” Dash said with a shrug. “No big deal.”
I felt a small tug on my rear left flank and yelped. I spun, ready to shoot, but it was just Desi. The little mare held her computer out to me.
“Please confirm your existence, and the current threat.” Desi asked with an urgent and serious look in her eyes.
“Uh…” I said with the utmost intellect, then cleared my throat and said into her little computer's screen. “Hi. I’m Desi’s friend. We’re stuck underground with an army of murderous robots. Is that what you wanted me to say?”
“Confirmed,” Desi said.
The modem on the other end of the device screeched something. Desi screeched back and looked happy.
“Uh, never mind me,” Dash said, raising an eyebrow. “The buck are you doing, Desi?”
Desi frowned and looked up to Dash. “Mana low. Robots unlikely to allow snack break. Asked mom for permission to escalate conflict resolution to level three.”
"Firearms use permitted," Desi said, quite distracted as she fidgeted with the underside of her jumpsuit.
I dipped my head down to try and see if she had any kind of gun strapped on. I didn't remember her having one when we were flying, and I was pretty sure I’d seen her from below once or twice.
Desi's hoof brushed against a small silver belt buckle which looked to belong to a belt threaded into a hidden belt-loop within her jumpsuit. The buckle lit up, glowing emerald green for a moment before the air in front of Desi rippled with green energy ribbons, just like her teleport. The ribbons parted to reveal a long, slender, sleek, chrome colored rifle.
A very much non-pony rifle.
Dash sputtered, her eyes widened so much I was worried they might rip. 343 gasped and leaned forwards, demanding, "How did you teleport that all the way down here?"
"What she said!" I exclaimed in total agreement.
"Teleport storage circuit," Desi said like it was obvious while frowning at us, seemingly confused and also shouldering her magically materialized weapon.
"A what?" The three of us asked together.
Desi shrank in on herself, looking for all the world like a filly who just broke mom's newest gadget. She slowly set her rifle down and retrieved her book.
While she paged through it, Dash stared at the weapon, half in shock, half in fear. That gave away more than she thought it did. Whatever this thing was, it had to be an MoA weapon. Probably something she'd had made for minotaurs, given the grip and trigger.
343 simply waited patiently for the little mare to finish.
Desi put her book away and red shouldered her rifle. “Item is teleported. Teleport is interrupted halfway through. Teleport stopped. Belt picks up energy of in-progress teleport. Stores it. Belt can release later. Item materializes on demand. Belt can re-store item later if needed, and if teleported. Belt encrypted. Mom-unit unlocked rifle for one hour. Is that enough time?"
"That’s awesome, you'll have to show me how that works later!" 343 said with an excited smile before turning to Dash. "Pick your guns up from the hallway so we’re not covering you. We’ll keep moving towards the rendezvous point."
Dash nodded slowly and trotted towards where I’d accidentally mulched her with bullets...
I turned my attention to Desi. "I thought you were an adult. Why does your mom get to dictate when you can protect yourself?"
Desi shyly pawed at the floor. "Mom-unit owns gun. Not me. Doesn't want bad people get them. Addition: Very bad shot."
"Yeah, no shit!" Dash snapped. "The pistol totally disintegrates a pony. What’s the rifle version do? Blow up the whole building?"
Desi's ears perked in terror she turned her weapon to look at a little led readout on the top and sighed in relief. "Weapon not set to Oberth mode."
"W— wait. It... It can do that?" I stammered. "Uhhh, y— you have a point."
"Auto-destruct full charge is potent. Bolt-for-bolt less heavy," Desi said... Reassuringly?
343 looked sidelong at Dash. "Is that one of your old toys?"
Dash trotted back into my full view, having put on a battle saddle with a pair of plasma pistols mounted to it. "Nope. We only ever got to study the pistols. Come on! Look at it! That's the companion piece to a Star Blaster!"
Oh buck! She's right! I'd never seen the real thing, but Pip's description of them matched for this rifle too!
Dash bent down to look Desi in her eyes.
“Where did you get that?” Dash said, her eyes narrow and voice accusatory.
Twwwzzzzzzsh! said the bullet which ripped a hole in my left ear.
I dropped to my belly, scooted around as fast as I could, and double checked my target. What could only be described as a raider-inspired Miss Handy quad-wielding hunting rifles loomed at the edge of the hallway.
For about three milliseconds. Then everypony fired.
Streaks of red laserlight, bright gold muzzle flashes, and a single, crackling, blue bolt of light hit the poor hostile robot like the wrath of Faust herself. The floating steel orb and mechanical tendrils disintegrated, sizzling away to dust as blueish energy crawled over its surface.
For a moment, I thought our sheer amount of “nope!” was responsible. Then Desi murmured, “Energy output excessive…” and started to tap away at the little glowing panels on the back of her weapon with a hoof tip.
Desi stopped mid tap, squealed happily, and swished her tail, grinning from ear to ear like that was the first time she’d ever hit anything with a gun.
343 tilted her head. “Wait, you said bad shot… Was that your—”
“First hit!” Desi eed.
Oh… Oh, dear… “Okay, you’re on point,” I said with a very firm nod.
Not. Standing. In front. Of. That.
“EXPLAIN PLEASE!” Dash snapped, her left eye twitching dangerously. “Where the buck did you get that?!”
Desi looked up at Dash and with the sincerity of a foal who has yet to understand that lying is an option, gave her answer. “From mom-unit.”
“Where'd she get it?!” Dash pressed, stepping forward.
“The armory,” Desi said giving Dash a look like she was stupid.
“The armory where?!” Dash sputtered back.
“At home.”
“Home being where?!” Dash groaned as she ran the flat of the roof down her face. “Please this is important! I need to know which other nation was studying them.”
“Studying who?” 343 asked with a suspicious tilt of her head.
Desi’s ears perked as she spotted something over Dash’s shoulder. She raised her weapon and fired. I turned in time to see her shot miss a large farming-tractor bot somehow silently moving down the hallway at us.
Its front was essentially a big yellow wall covered in robotic arms wielding choppy things covered in clumps of synth fur and oil.
“NOOOOOOOOOPE!” I shrieked, sending a fire command to my Battle Saddle.
BRRRRRRRRT! Said my minigun.
The death-choppy-tractor-bot was undeterred. Its silent advance shattered as it blared what sounded like a train whistle.
Desi launched a flurry of bolts into the bot. The blue orbs flew past the nearly-hallway-filling death-wall of a robot. I almost reached over to take the gun from her. Only 343’s battle saddle firing her four rifles in sequence stopped me. Green plasma bolts from Dash’s weapons streaked through the air, leaving behind the scent of ozone and fresh toast.
The death bot’s choppy limbs began to disappear one by one as we eroded its front end. Then, suddenly, the thing rumbled, shrieked, shuddered, and stopped.
“Talk later, run now?” Desi suggested with a hopeful look in her eyes.
“Run and talk!” Dash countered. “Maybe-Twi, keep taking us to the surgical theater. Desi, explain where the flying buck your mom got a hold of an alien-bucking-weapon!”
I shook my head. “Wait, wah? You know for sure the Star Blaster is—”
“Yes!” Dash hissed while giving me an urgent look.
343’s eyes narrowed dangerously. “You had proof of extraterrestrial intelligence and you didn’t tell me?!”
Dash took a deep breath and huffed in irritation. “I wasn’t allowed too! Celestia had proof of it long before I did. Standing orders, okay?! We found a crash site decades before you and I were born, Twi. The Star Blasters and their batteries were recovered from the wreck, along with some other stuff. Not sure how the buck they got out of containment, but they did! And I'm really, really, really not sure how she has a type I’ve never seen before!”
343 looked at Desi and offered her a polite smile. “Could you please answer her question? She’ll be stuck angry and overly focused on this one thing all day otherwise.”
Desi’s ears drooped back. “Mom-unit would be angry at me…”
“Even if telling her keeps you safe, because you won't have a distracted teammate?” 343 pressed.
I looked around for more silent-but-nope death bots.
There were none.
So far.
Desi sighed and scuffed the floor with her hoof. I heard her start to page through her book. Then…
“Ultimate origin of weapon unknown. Likely purchased a long time ago by crew before abandoning ship. Was located in armory. Issued for away mission by mom-unit, to me, useage clearance heavily restricted. Potential local power-balance disruption if weapon lost / stolen. Also, am bad shot.” Desi summarized.
“Purchased?” Dash sputtered, her tail standing on end.
“As in, they bought it form a store?” I asked, cocking my head to one side.
Desi nodded. “It is probable, yes.”
“You’re an alien, aren't you?” Dash asked, giving Desi a suspicious look.
Desi shook her head. “We should not exist here. Bad robots… Recall?” She finished cocking her head to one side in confusion.
Something clicked in the back of my mind. Desi said she was 22. That was older than any natural born alicorn could be, and she was not green, purple, or blue.
She claimed to have been raised by machines. She had to have been, otherwise there was no way she could have learned to speak using modem sounds. That requires a foal’s very young brain to start picking up on and encoding as a language, because there’s no way you could ever learn it as anything but your native language.
I gasped. “She’s some kind of pony-clone made by alien robots!”
Desi triple blinked. “No?”
Dash nodded in satisfaction. “Yes! That explains everything!”
“Untrue,” Desi said with an irritated look in her eyes.
343 cleared her throat. “Well, if it’s not, then what are you? I uh, I know we're in a combat zone, but it’s not every day first contact happens.”
I gave the area another look for horrible silent murder bots.
None.
Desi flipped through her book, frowned, shifted her weight from hoof to hoof opened her mouth heastently. “A clone requires an original sample to rep—”
A horribly painful, ear-stabbing, alarm cut Desi off.
“WARNING! WARNING! WARNING!” A surprisingly non-Twilight voice shrieked. “ENEMY UNITS HAVE BREACHED SURGICAL THEATER OUTER DEFENSE PERIMETER! ALL FORCES ASSIST! REPEAT! ENEMY UNITS HAVE BREACHED SURGICAL THEATER OUTER DEFENSE PERIMETER! ALL FORCES ASSIST!”
“Nevermind!” 343 said as she began to sprint down the hallway. “This can absolutely wait!”
☢★★◯★★☢
You’d think running with your friends through crumbling, dimly lit at best, murder-bot filled corridors, stopping only to hose down the aforementioned death-bots with automatic weapons fire, would occupy the entirety of your attention.
Under normal circumstances, it probably would.
Thing was, was I doing that, or was I doing that while also running alongside an alien space mare?
Oh. My. Celestia!
She wore a gray jumpsuit and was little! Little. Gray. Mares. FOR BUCK’S SAKE! The ancient conspiracy theorists were right!
Wait, if they were right, why wasn’t she abducting ponies to probe them and do weird medical things?
How can I think about this while burning through a few hundred rounds to keep that evil-garden-sprinkler from flinging more acid at us?
Wait, who built it to look like that?
And… why?
It didn't use the sprinkler part to spray the acid, so—
An acid ball melted another chunk of my armoring away. I ducked back behind the tree I was using for cover. We were so close to the entrance to the medical wing! I could see the door, if we could just get past the sprinkler bot, we could breach the enemy line from the back and reinforce Moon’s guards.
Based on the sounds of things, she needed it.
I also needed repairs again. I was down a lower left hind leg… Dash had taped the hydro-line shut for me so I could keep my systems up to pressure. I had to sit down to shoot, everything hurt almost like I was on fire, and I could only advance at a limp… But I had no choice.
Dash and 343 had been separated from us. I could see them, but there were enemy robots between us and them. They were hunkered down behind some lunch tables made into a make-shift barricade.
I could also see into the medical wing. It was very small, with just a waiting room, and then presumably the surgical theater beyond it. Moon’s Hoof Maidens were inside the waiting room, out of ammo, behind a barricade made from destroyed robots, reduced to melee tools and improvised weapons to keep their mistress safe while only barely operational themselves.
We had to keep going. We had to advance. If we failed here, the world was doomed. Not only because we’d die in this hole underground and the Enclave would have their way, but because after the last half hour I was entirely certain Two would end the world herself if she couldn’t necomancer herself up her husbando.
I liked that term. Husbando. Dash had said it a while ago. I think? Whatever she'd yelled insultingly at the robots had sounded like that.
Desi was sitting next to me. Her magic was all drained away. Most of her “bandaid” shields had sputtered out. She was bleeding badly. But she kept fighting. She’d shifted her rifle form her TK to her forelegs just before her magic went dry. She was an even worse shot with them, but she kept firing away when she could.
Desi was also down an eye… Not sure how she was even conscious in that state. Must be her alien powers of awareness, or something. She wasn’t immune to damage or able to just completely ignore how bucked up her poor little body was. She didn't show it on her face, but her movements were slow, hesitant, and twitchy. She also had gone from a bad shot to a terrible shot the second the shrapnel had taken out her left eye.
She wasn’t shooting much anymore. Mostly, Desi would move under me to prop me up for better minigun shots. That was nice of my (possibly alien) friend.
I took a deep breath, poked my head out from behind cover, and fired another long burst to keep the enemy in cover. Or at least. I tried to.
Instead after a few moments my gun went click. I was out of ammo… and I’d lost my other weapons crossing the dome-park to this point.
“We’re probably going to die,” I remarked with more calm than I imagined I could.
Desi nodded. “Correct.”
I bit my lip and did my best to ignore the ripping, pulling, crumpling pain in my right shoulder. “So I can go without any regrets… What are you, exactly?”
“I am me,” Desi answered with a raised eyebrow.
I laughed. “I meant—” A bullet blasted a large chunk out of the tree just above my head.
I ducked down a bit more.
“I meant, are you a robot like me? From space? What are you?” I repeated.
Desi sighed, looked up at me with a sympathetic understanding in her eyes. “I am—”
THOOM!
The floor shook beneath me as something huge dropped from near the top of the dome and slammed into the floor in front of the surgical theater with enough force to dent the steel paneling, and rip up several large sections of metal.
Steam sprayed from the wound in the floor for several long seconds, obscuring the source of the impact.
I looked upwards, searching for where the thing had fallen from. A hole had been bored in the dome’s ceiling, directly above the surgical theater. Great… So that’s—
“Really?!” Dash’s distant voice called over the din of battle.
I blinked and looked down. The steam had cleared. The fallen object was… A walking throne.
There was no other way to describe it. A massive throne, made from formerly rusty metal, polished as much as it could be, and mounted on the top of a large six legged robot’s frame (probably some kind of trainyard loading robot) like a driver's torso. An array of energy weapons, auto-cannons, and flamers bristled around the combat-chair, providing a surprisingly good amount of defense for the “thing a first year welding student built”.
As awesome and silly as such a thing was, that wasn’t what had gotten Dash’s attention. No, that would be Two. Her old, rusting, battered form sat atop the throne, wrapped in an old purple cape which had definitely been salvaged from a foal’s magician’s play-set, a cheap plastic silver tiara (with a Hayburger logo on it) atop her head, propped up by her single ear and her circuitboard half mask… The very image of wasteland royalty. A visage you’d have to either take seriously, or die at the hooves of the mad mare who wore it.
Or at least, that’s how it would be if Two’s left foreleg wasn’t clutching a grimy, 200 year old pillow to her barrel. On which a very, very crudely drawn orange pony-ish-blob had been drawn.
I snickered.
So that’s how I’d looked when I’d pretend my pillow was a coltfriend… If only someone had told me.
…
That’s a very lame dying thought.
Two’s battle-chair fired a few lasers into the waiting room, missing the four ponies inside. A warning shot?
“Fools!” Two bellowed. “Your warriors are scattered. Your defences falter. I have won! But know that I am not without mercy. Surrender, join me before the altar of Flash, and you will not perish today.”
“Get Heartbleed, you glorified babbage engine!” Sunder snapped back.
I had no idea what that meant, but it sounded like a good insult.
343 and Dash fired at Two’s chair. They didn’t have a good angle on her, their shots hit the seat of her throne, crackled, and sparked off, heating up the metal but not managing to punch through it.
Why?
Ah, faint blue shimmer. Chair-bot has a shield. Of course it does. Nothing else about this battle had been remotely fair either.
The throne hummed, and some of its weapons rotated their way and began returning fire automatically.
Wait.
Wait.
We could see Two.
They couldn’t.
I was out of ammo… But Desi… She had ammo. She had ammo, and had said something about dangerous levels of energy discharge.
“Desi, you need to shoot her!”
“Bad shot. Will miss,” Desi said, staring at the floor in what looked to be shame.
I shook my head. “No. No you won't.”
I grabbed her rifle and rolled onto my left side so I could push myself up and use my stump as a pivot. I closed my eyes and focused all my attention on the camera built into my minigun. “Lay your gun along mine,” I ordered.
I heard the clink of metal on metal as Desi moved, layed her weapon along mine, and shuffled up onto my side to reach her weapon’s controls.
She understood! Good.
“You said that guns can do a lot of damage, right?”
“Confirmed.”
“We’re dead if this fails anyways, right?”
“Probably.”
“So… full power. We’ll put one right between her shoulders. Got it?”
“Understood,” Desi confirmed with a nod. “Stand by.”
I heard her weapon chirp a few times as she adjusted power settings. “Safety interlocks offline… Plasma capacitance, one-hundred-twenty percent normal level. Wave-Motion cycle… Maximum throughput. Weapon likely to explode on use. Ready to fire.”
Okay, Gears… You can do this. It’s just like firing a cannon, only not remotely.
Locking on target...
Target: Creepy Robo-mare.
Range: 12.2219 meters.
Wind: N/A
Compensate for target’s motion...
Compensate for drag…
Compensate for coriolis effect…
Compensate for shell drop…
Compensate for Equus’s rotation…
Compensate for weapon-sight misalignment of ~12 cm...
Target locked! Targeting time, 0.01 milliseconds.
“FIRE!” I bellowed.
THWEEE-PEW!
My left eye whited out entirely. My right eye tracked a crackling, blue-white energy bolt as long as two mares as it blasted away from me. Then my right eye whited out. Then something very much on top of me exploded.
The most intense heat of my life baked my side in an instant, and then…
☢★★◯★★☢
I couldn’t see anything.
I couldn’t feel anything.
It was like I was stuck in a void… nothing but me.
Nothing but me and some very very faint sound.
What was it?
“Opening her core now… Oh wow, those rads! Keep out of the beam, she’s a danger even to us.”
“What's happening?” I asked, my own voice sounding equally small and distant.
“Oh, shit! She’s online. Gears? Hang on, we’re going to fix you up again. We’re exposing your core to heal your little friend. She needs attention first.”
“Okay…”
“Just hold on… The tissue is responding… She’s regenerating.”
Oh yeah… We’d shot at Two. What happened after that?
“Did we win?” I asked.
“We did. Thanks to you two. As soon as you’re both on your hooves, you can name your reward… On top of my full help with the Enclave situation. Now hold tight. You’re as badly hurt as your little friend, uh, well, you were. She’s healing quickly.”
“Good,” I said as the void engulfed me again.
That was one epic fight but, above all, we thank you Gears and Desi for your exemplar service to the wasteland in killing Fujoshi Twiggles meets Wasteland Karamazov meets Discount Dr Doom
That mare needed some through dicking, HARD
I'd know that throne anywhere.
Wave Motion Rifle?
This is getting less 401 and more 40K all the time.
Has Mombot teleported returned the Wave Rifle back by the end then?
So far, two out of six aint bad. But they dont have time to pick up anyone else unless they happen to be on the way, or the next Star Shot is again minimum yield?
Could be either one really
So yeah, about that alien theory of mine
Oh, sounds like Moon Dancer has a body now
9910406
I can confirm one thing... She is at least one definition of the word alien :3
To be fair, the Herd was planning on betraying you regardless, Gears, there's no reason to believe that it happening in some other way would have gone particularly better or worse.
Well that's rude.
Nice.
You know, I'm becoming a bit less impressed with the Sparkle Cola operation considering that they managed to spawn rogue shipping war bots that occasionally attack.
Please don't plasma bomb yourself like that Desi.
Oops.
Oh now that's helpful. Except for that little "don't group up" advice.
Ahh.
Yikes.
It would be nice if robo-Twilight could do something about the pain in that regeneration.
...what's going to happen if Gears does?
Oh that's not bad.
Interesting.
I'm not saying it's aliens. But it's aliens
That poor robot.
Wow, Dash is really focused on this.
So they built her, but made the DNA?
LOL. They're probably not all little grey alicorns though, given the rifle design and Gears' observations about it being made for a minotaur.
Just use a normal shot, don't explode a wave motion gun just to kill normal, physical enemy.
Or do, I guess. At least everyone is apparently healable.
9910427
I think I get it then... but i'm gonna wait and see
Reminds me of Rose, the best Miss Nanny bot.
Enjoying every chapter!
Okay, finally caught up on this novel. I must say, it has been quite the ride, and one I've enjoyed immensely. Meep, you have quite the imagination there... keep it up! You've won yourself a fan here. And not just an 'ordinary' fan either. I used to write Star Trek Fan Fiction, and for a Writers Group loosely based upon Trek Tech. Both of which were published, along with several poems also published by Poetry.Com.
Now, on to more important things. I just adore Gears and Jasmine. I've always adored Vinyl, and RD (hehe, and I can JUST imagine her in an almost 'iron man' style suit based upon Mare Do Well). I wonder if RD gave up the Mare Do Well look after the whole smashing the Enclave thing in the skies? Is that why you have her wearing an old Shadow Bolts uniform instead? I think the addition of the Thestral is cool, since I like their looks and abilities (LUNA is BESTEST Princess!). The world you've painted post-Gardens is one that is still interesting and viable, and still the Wasteland, even if most of it is greening nicely these days.
My only bone to pick with you is spelling and editing. You REALLY need to get your hooves on an Editor. Someone to go over each story Chapter in depth to tweak it into being more readable. I cannot count the number of times that I stopped and had to re-read a passage due to a mis-spelling, or sentence error. (( I have considered editing what is written to date, but since I don't have your email, or any way to contact you other than this, I have forgone that pondering, for now)).
Other than those 'minor' points, I love the story so far, and like just about everyone else here, hope that you continue to whatever destiny that awaits the characters in the end. I usually don't bother to read incomplete works on this site, but yours drew me in, captured my attention, and dozens of hours later, leave me wanting more! That, is rare for me. So, keep on writing!!
The only other pair of 'incomplete' novels I am keeping up with, other than this, is the two 'Commonwealth' stories by Crazyperson: Fallout Equestria: Commonwealth, and Fallout Equestria: Fog Harbor. Which, if you look at it from my perspective, is very high praise indeed, since you are one of only two authors that I anticipate new chapters from, and pray you both will finish your novels in fullness of time.
Oh, addendum: If Gears is so squee'd by an automatic 40mm grenade launcher, what would she do with a portable 60mm Mortar? One that she could just buck off her back, have it self right and auto fire on targets designated by Gears' aiming sub-routines? Before you go all "that's not all that great"... let me clue you in here. With Equestrian Magic, one could design a multi-barreled, 60mm Mortar that fires... you got it, 60mm mortar rounds... But with the magic used for saddlebags, one could store a heck of a lot of rounds in there and have them accessible to the 'gun', almost like a belt fed weapon [Heck, you could even build one onto each barrel so each barrel is supplied from it's own 'ammo container']. Since we are talking 'multi-barreled', I'd think that three barrels would be enough, and that it would rotate somewhat like Gatling Gun on it's base plate, which could be designed to separate and fold up along the bases of the Mortar's barrels or in between them to make packing it along easier. Also, since it would not require the bulky sight now used for such things, it would be computer fired using target data squirted to it via comm laser (or, in this case, pulsed to it via Gears' eye laser on low beam setting, but compressed data link laser pulses, up to several hundred feet away from the piece's emplacement... yes, Gears would need 'line of sight', but such a weapon could be deployed while Gears was dodging around, and never be noticed [other than perhaps as equipment that fell off her back] and be ignored, until Gears pulsed target data to it). The actual 'targeting computer' part would reside in a cylinder that is surrounded by the three barrels of the weapon.
Oh, did I mention that I was a United States Marine Corps Enlisted Weapons Instructor? No? My bad.
Giving Gears a little 'death from above' out to 3 miles distance would come in handy. 60mm mortars have a 30 METER 'kill radius', which means anything standing inside a 60 meter wide circle dies (unless clad in Powered Armor, then a direct hit... meaning a hit within 4 or 5 feet would be required to pierce the armor). Yes, I know that the weapon would be nothing but 'dead weight' in a firefight at close ranges, or ranges out to 100 meters. But from that 100 meter range out to 3 miles, you can cover an area several city blocks wide and deep with enough fragmentation to literally turn any infantry force within said area into paste, and not fire more than, oh, 100 rounds or so?
More likely Gears would use it for raider groups and fire no more than 10 rounds at a time, covering an area about the size of two football fields side by side. The results would turn even modern infantry into 'blood soup' pretty damned fast. And that's only using 'impact' fuses, or timed detonation fuses. 'Contact fuses' would go off as soon as the tip touched anything even semi-solid. This would make trees, the infantry's friend, into lethal shrapnel to go along with the round's fragmentation effect, doubling or even tripling the effect.
Speaking Frank-ly, the Frank Pony
9910972 Glad you're having a blast!
9910514
MOst of the power went out of the barrel before it exploded.
9912005
Thanks! I'm glad you're enjoying things :3
I'm a sucker for the "nature retaking civilization" looking wastelands. It's more realistic for Fallout... less so for Fallout Equestria, but I think I made it work here. 14 years is enough time to start seeing a few new trees.
One thing that people forget, which is fair because novels, games, and movies, don't go into it much, is that clothing... has a life span. Sure, advanced textile science could produce fabrics which could last for 200 years without care in the elements... Buuut, wear and tear is still a thing. Yeah we can make fabric more resistant to friction and the like, but you can't make a set of clothing that will survive you being run over 12 times, shot repeatedly, stabbed, and lit on fire, in those clothes.
Okay, well, with magic you can, and ponies have magic. We even see they have repair talismans. But do you think RD could take a repair talisman and slap it onto her old costume? Maybe you find that plasuable. I don't. She's not a unicorn. But hey, if she could, would she? I think not. I'd much rather have something more important like my gun, or armor, or shelter, capable of self repair.
TLDR; she was in that costume for a long time. She wore it out. So she's in something else now. I'm sure you've had to replace pants you loved once or twice from were and tear, even if you did sew them up a lot before then.
Well... that's upsetting. I have two of those... If you want to help, drop me a PM. I don't give out my discord handle or email publicly.
Same here, so I can't really say I'm glad you did without being a bit of a hypocrite XD But... I'm glad you did!
Probably treat it like her filly, tbh.
Always love it when I make something vaguely military related that makes a soldier happy! I wanted to enlist myself (army brat) but, well, disabled :/ so... yeah... Anyways, I had a navy guy help me with depicting the interior of an aircraft carrier. I hope it felt authentic to you... Uh, not sure if you would have spent time on a carrier. I'm pretty sure not all marines do, but any marine can, you know?
It certainly would, but, well, gotta keep an eye on the power creep. (Also it would prove a ferry foolish weapon to fire in one of the more.. climatic encounters.)
Wherever Desi comes from, we know one thing: Desi is awesome!
I said it before and I'll say it again, shipping levels APACOLIPTIC!!!
Also shame on you twibot for making Gear think she had to go with one companion.
Desi's back story needs some explanations, can we plug into that computer of hers and ask "mom-unit" what is going on?
Was... was that a hoof held WAVE MOTION CANNON!!!! Why would you need such a thing? is all other Daka really that unimpressive?
9913250
I'll tell you why.
9913515
That's fair
Well, Gears, you did just grab her plot.
*wince* You're how old, and Mom still controls your access to the good toys? Oh, you poor, abused little mare...
Oh. Okay, that's better, then. We'll just have to get you your own toys!
I'm thinking a Bucking Freaky Gun 9000 for the left battlesaddle mount, and a micro black hole launcher for the right mount?
Neither one cares much about accuracy...
As an added bonus, the electromagnetic ammo container on the latter doubles as a portable garbage disposal with infinite capacity!
Tactical programming deficiency detected. Always make your first shot count when striking from stealth...
I guess copies of The Art of War are hard to come by in the Badlands.
Incoming probing joke in 3...2... oh, just two sentences.
*wince* That can be only one husbando... and it ain't Big Mac.
Good!
Jinx. You owe me a Sparkle-Cola Quantum, Gears.
...grapple ball?
Must keep tacos on standby.
EYES FOR THE EYE GOD! :P
The same space station you're planning to blow up?
...
Or not?
No kidding. At this rate, once this little conflict is over you'll need to stay here a LONG time while getting repairs while the twilibots build a teleport array to send you where you need to go.
...
Yeah. Pretty much.
Hm. All in all a very fun read! I really REALLY hope gears can get her much needed repairs without any more interruptions, she needs them!
The ending of this chapter with zero context:
9913936
That... is something I myself didnt' even think of XD 10/10
Surprisingly common, actually, but it's just a coffee table book of Equestrian war posters.
Gears shuddered. "You... You don't want one of those. Because you also do want one of those, and don't. Yet do. It's also good! But bad. At the same time I-- Look, just avoid quantum beverages."
9913939
If only they had the time...
9914339
Oh dear. I know I lose track of time pretty easily, but do they really have that little time left? They're surrounded by a bunch of twilibots and they have Desi, if they don't have enough time to work out a teleport...
Well it's gonna be a close thing for the planet.
Gee, I did joke a lot about this being project Waifu, but I did never expect a waifu war to happen!
9915376 If Fallout Tatics can have a Cyber Bramin that speaks exclusivly in Terminator 2 Puns, I can haz an institute parody that's its own worst enemy :P
9912093
Well, I did say it was deployable... just buck it off your back and it self deploys and fires from data sent via coded laser pulses from Gears' eye. So long as Gears had line of sight to it, she would have artillery support, and... little known fact, mortars have a higher 'kill ratio' than 'standard' artillery. That's because the large artillery rounds tend to make craters in the terrain, big ones. Mortars don't.
If power creep is an issue, I'll just keep my idea of a robot mounted 81mm or even 100 mm mortar to myself. The Marine Corps still uses 81mm mortars, and the army mounts 100mm mortars inside their older vehicles, or did until they were phased out in favor of other vehicles.
I wonder if the MoA explored the making of FAEs? Fuel Air Explosives? That would literally 'flatten' a horde of attackers.
I'd better stop here, before my fertile mind comes up with magical versions of all this.
the Frank Pony
9918261
It is. You can't give characters too much too quickly, nor can you ever let them be on par with their enemy if you're going for an underdog story. Gears, the adorable little fool she is, is deffently ment to be an underdog so I'm trying to careful manage her equipment and abilities.
9918429
Well, given what Steel Rangers can seem to do with their Armor mounted weapons, like: .50 cal rifles, 5mm mini-guns, and of course the auto-grenade launcher (which I've worked out is probably a modified 60 or 81mm mortar round fired like a 40mm grenade launcher's rounds).
Also, given how saddlebags work (ya know, the whole 'it's bigger on the inside' thing), I'd expect Ranger storage bays in the Armor work like battle saddles. I already know that Ranger Armor has repair talismans, chem injectors, etc. So, Rangers probably are taught NOT to put weapons and ammo into any regular storage bays in their armor, and ONLY into weapons bays. This would prevent weapons and ammo from being scavenged by the armor's repair talisman when it repairs damage to the Armor itself.
BTW: I adore Gears. Vinyl and Rainbow as companions? neat! As often as Gears seems to get hurt, she really needs to start her own 'herd'... starting with Vinyl, Rainbow, the Cyber-Doc, and a few others. She still has radios to pass out, and her Queen really needs to get a 'muzzle to muzzle' report, in detail, of Gears' adventures. Ultimately, Gears needs to get her mother down to the Midlands to 'repair' Pip, and perhaps get herself looked over by the cyber-doc. The Queen could really use Plasma Tech weaponry. The Hellhound mayor of Ponyville might know, or be able to find, a person to up-armor Gears a bit more. She's the daughter of Conan after all. :)
La Machina! (I am the Machine!) HAHAHAHA... Loved the Bert Kreisher skit reference! I about died laughing at the Griffin's reactions to her. Bert's skit is funny as hell, and mostly true. Gears might want to drop off a radio in the Griffin lands. The Queen could make a good contract with them as Mercs to bolster her forces, and they already seem to adore 'la machina'. :)
I don't know if Stalliongrad is off the map, but that's another radio destination possibility. I am forgetting right now, but there is a Vault the Applejack Rangers now run that might make another good location and ally for Gears' Queen as well. I seem to remember a farming location to the south that was struggling to grow vegetables from Pip's tale, after the 'day of rainbows', it should be prospering nicely, and be a good, cheap, source of food for the Queen. Possibly in exchange for helping them automate some of the farming processes, and get a cannery up and running. Goddesses know there's enough empty cans in the Wasteland to give 'em plenty of scrap to turn into cans to can their produce!
just a few thoughts,
the Frank Pony
9927883
That's why the story is in first person >.> This whole thing is ment to be revealed as one long rambling rant she's been on for about 2.4 days strait XD "Okay, what happened on your trip?" "Well! *ramblign begins...* "
9928663
Oh, okay... that makes more sense now.
da Frank Pony
Meep? That is something that most fail to pick up on... the fact that the wasteland is full of old tin cans, empty cans, and those filled with edibles. Somepony could make a business out of setting up collection bins (put a can in, get a cap) and then go around emptying and flattening them. Then cart them off to a forge for melting down and turning into new cans. New Cans get sold to growers to can their produce (Or, buy the produce, can it yourself) for sale to hungry ponies and others.
All that would be needed would be to find a cannery in half decent condition and put in some sweat equity. In Little Pip's tale, we know there are networks of Traders. Given those, one could easily have them collecting old and used cans for minimal cost. A cart load of empty cans would weight a heck of a lot less than a couple dozen firearms and ammo, and the Trader would probably enjoy moving a 'worthless' cart load of 'junk' for caps, regardless of the bulkiness of the item.
I mean, really... who's gonna raid a trader's cart obviously filled with nothing but old rusty cans? OH! That reminds me... arts and crafts would make a huge comeback. River reeds, processed for their fibers, would give craft ponies the resource needed to make twine, and various thicknesses of rope. Also, said twine and rope could be woven into mesh bags. These bags would then be sold to ponies, Traders, and others, needing to move objects larger than the mesh size. Colts and Fillies could be taught to weave finer meshed bags for the 'upscale' market, to be used for caps pouches, jewelry pouches, etc.
If you can make twine, you can weave coarse blankets. Such blankets soaked in a combination of wax, pitch, tar, and a few other ingredients, that would make good tarps and even cheap 'canvas' tent material.
Not to be morbid here, but long maned ponies, and all types of pony tails, would be a source of useful material. Since 'horse hair' makes pretty damned strong thread, and even ropes (Historical: During sieges of cities in the medieval period, it was not uncommon for a city to shear all women's hair to make ropes for catapults and such). So, the deceased would still have value, and a pony 'down on their luck' could sell their mane and tail hair for caps.
Empty Cola bottles could be collected and sold to the pony bots selling the various colas at markets... giving them a renewable resource for the bottling operation, and cutting their costs in the process, which should result in a savings to the customer.
Somepony, probably in the Prince's town, has Lead, Copper, and Antimony mines going. That's the components to making copper jacketed lead bullets. If that's true, and it must be, since bullets are still being produced, then in some of the larger towns one could see 'police' using 'glass' rounds... said 'bullets' would be fired from smooth bore shotguns, and the round would be bottle glass mixed with lead and antimony to make a dense 'leaded glass'. Shatters on impact with things like metal, stone, concrete, but would wound a pony nicely, and be dead easy for any medical pony to extract.
I am decidedly surprised to not see Arbalests being used. An Arbalest is basically a large crossbow that is cocked via a lever device hung from the belt, called a 'foot', although in FOE stories, I'd expect it be called a 'claw'. Such weapons are nearly silent, and pretty much totally silent to the target if shot from 50 to 100 meter ranges. Arbalests CAN fire out to 150 meters or more, depending upon construction and bow material, and given the wasteland, I'd expect old Wagon 'leaf' springs to be common enough to provide a LOT of Arbalests. As for Arbalest ammo... well... you'd have the standard 3 bladed 'broad head', or elongated pyramidal shaped 'armor piercing' head, and then you'd have 'specialty' ammo... things like hoof grenades on the tip of the shaft. Just pull the pin, aim, fire... BANG!
I'd better stop here. My mind is racing with all the ideas coursing through it now.
the Frank Pony
*Looks at last update*
Well then
9963556 Not dead... just not inspired to do writing right now. Been doign a letsplay on youtube.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LeLxd-w-CQo
I do plan on getting back to this. I just need to wait for the idea of writing to be fun again.
Hey Meep... I did a bit of research and yes, 'Project Starfall' was mentioned in Project Horizons. I believe it was the Project to drop 'Tom' onto the Star Metal to mutually annihilate each other.
Your 'Operation Starfall' might be confusing, but it's not one of the Ministries Projects. If you are looking for alternate names, you might try Operation Meteor, or perhaps Operation Icarus. Icarus being the one who fell to earth to his doom. Then again, if you want to steal, steal from the best... how about Operation Skyfall?
Just a couple of thoughts,
the Frank Pony, Rhymer
9969975 Star has to be in the name because of its significance to the zebra religion and the intended use of the weapon. I've already changed the name once because of PH ( a story I do not like and is non-cannon to FO:E ) I'm not changing it again.
9970387
Okay, I understand. Although I dis-agree on Project Horizons. PH takes place in parallel with Pip's Tale, and in my considered opinion, can be considered as 'canon' for the FOE universe. Besides, as screwed up as Blackjack is, she had good friends, and kept trying, no matter the odds against her. Sound familiar? Because Gears is like that too. Only not as screwed up, and definitely not a fan of Wild Pegasus whiskey. Wait, she's La Machinea... ANY alcohol is a coolant. I take that back. Furry Gods, I laugh every time I think of that zebra singing out "I am the Machine!" like Bert Kreischer. :)
I understand not wanting to rename the story yet again. And I appreciate your reasons, although I don't agree about PH being 'non-cannon' to the FOE universe.
As for the name Skyfall... I had a weird thought when I thought of that name... A James Bond like pony in the Equestrian wilderness, foiling bad guy's plots, and seemingly escaping time and time again. But what really happens is that our pony 'Bond' is really many ponies who go out and do amazing things and die doing them, all to keep the 'image' of the Super Agent Bond alive as a symbol of hope to the ponies of the Wasteland. My vision is that it would be a series of short stories, every one a 'new' Bond... foiling some dastardly plot of some villain, and either escaping in the nick of time, or dying heroically, but adding to the mystique of the Bond legend. Cutie Mark tattoos are a 'thing' in FOE, so this could work. Also, many kinds of ponies could play the Bond character, and no one would really be certain who or what Bond really is. Unicorn? Earth Pony? Pegasus? Alicorn in disguise? Oh, the rumors would be running rampant all over the Wasteland... sort of like the ancient legends of Mare Do Well... A hero that depending upon which tale about her was told, was all of the above at one time or another.
Since you don't see Project Horizons as 'canon', I can now understand how in your story that Rainbow Dash wears the Shadowbolts uniform. In PH, she was a ghoul too, but was the 'batman-like' Mare Do Well, foiling plots of the Enclave's leaders in a suit of light power armor.
Our imagined 'Bond' would probably do the same. Looking like a well dressed, dapper stallion at all times, but able to take hits that would put any other pony down for the count... probably the suit he wears is actually a form of light powered armor under a formal suit, or the powered armor made to appear to be such a suit of formal attire. Thinking of this, I would be 'bond's' helper, known only as Q, that actually created the Bond persona, and is the one that trains and outfits every Bond to go out and fight the 'good fight' in the Wasteland.
Ah well... I doubt I'd be any good writing pony fiction, and someone will like this idea and be inspired enough to make it a real story. I'd be glad to work with anyone that would take up the challenge... hehe... I could be Q. :)
Rhymer, the Frank Pony.
Bond: "Bond, Mane Bond."
Q: "Remember, you are no longer Shane Webb. You are Mane Bond. Now get back into the simulator so we can perfect your hoof to hoof skills, and get you used to the Suit. Celestia knows you're going to need it!"
As for Mane Bond's Cutie Mark? Perhaps an automatic pistol shown pointed up at about 40 degrees elevation with a wisp of smoke coming from the barrel? The pistol would be seen pointed at the pony's rear and not towards his head. Or, for fun, it actually is pointed at the stallion's head, as a private joke of Q about the various Bond's penchant to get themselves killed keeping the 'Legend' he's created alive.
My heart hurts
I just caught up after 3 days of bingeing
Meep your still best author
poor mare
volleys
from
allowed to
Is that FNAF attacking?
Welp, alien theory confirmed. Maybe? If she was adopted by the crashed ship, or something... I'm trying to combine "only speaks computer" and "raised by aliens" and coming up with "confused."
That explains so much...
Dammit, why does everyone overpower their darn guns to "explode if used"? If the full blast could take out a building, and it's implied that their side may not have been shielded(?) why so much overkill?
I hope that they didn't explode everyone else with the blast for that matter. It helps less if they killed Moondancer while taking out #2...
For that matter, she now needs her EVERYTHING replaced again, and they still need to take out the station. How much time is left with all this going on?
I also wonder if they can get one of the robo-alicorns to go unlock the place. I imagine they are safer, faster, and better armed than Gears is, and pragmatically more replaceable, too... Then again it would be out of character for the rest of the story, and the theme.
I mean, Gears is an important prototype (with all the issues THAT entails) with friends and family, can't be as easily restored/repaired since she doesn't have tons of redundant memory crystals, several important world-saving agreements (Pip and Homage being one), and personal significance to a number of important figures...
I also hope that her many misplaced friends are okay and will make it back... And does she finally get all the tasty upgrades after she's got time to settle down after all the time constraints are solved?
9998705
Because it's a thing in this show:
And since Trek has inspired at least 23 real life versions of tech we saw on that show, AND ALSO PROVIDES US WITH THE ONLY METHOD OF FTL THAT REAL LIFE PHYSICS PREMITS TO EXIST, it gets to set tropes for scifi all it wants.
Hello Meep.
I found a video of 20mm grenade rifle fire you might find interesting. Please note, however, the person doing the shooting is a very experienced instructor, and not someone that just decided to use such a weapon. 20mm GLs fire more like a heavy rifle bullet, than a 40mm grenade launcher. The 20mm's effect is more focused in a tight cone directed at the target, and relatively little shrapnel effects other targets, even as close as 2 meters away. Whereas a 40mm GL has a 5 meter radius of effect, and is far better at firing through windows and clearing rooms of enemies.
Here is the video I mentioned. https://www.military.com/video/operations-and-strategy/battles/neopup-paw-20-grenade-launcher/1137576834001
Enjoy. the Frank Pony, Rhymer
10004640 I can't check that out. My net filters block the address and it's quite a pain to toggle them off (I set things up so I cant get any news ever since, ya know, news is just a fearmongering tool to sell ad space). I'll bet it's cool tho.
10007090
Meep, try a net search for Neopup 20mm Grenade Launcher.
9999895
There's also the real-life physics of batteries. Any sort of chemical battery stores energy in the form of a sustained reaction. In the case of a rechargeable battery, this is a reversible reaction such that you can push external energy into it to "pump" the reaction in reverse, then let it run down again. In all cases, greater energy density is achieved via making batteries that are built around higher-energy reactions, but such reactions inherently mean greater instability.
Modern lithium-ion and lithium-polymer batteries are already at "hand grenade" energy levels if they go into a worst-case failure; anything powering death rays would be that much higher energy, so yeah, EXPLODEY.
P.S.: Fun side fact, the fundamental chemistry behind modern lithium batteries has been understood for literally more than a hundred years. The first recorded efforts at practical lithium batteries began in 1912. However, it was not until the 1970s that lithium batteries reached the commercial market, and pretty much all of that time and research went into engineering lithium batteries that wouldn't explode horribly under everyday user abuse conditions.
Also, glorified babbage engine is totally the best robot/AI insult ever, and the fact that the basic motivation of this entire war is that creepy AI sexbots take shipping deadly seriously specifically because companionship is their core directive is simultaneously totally logical and totally facehoof-worthy.
Clocking forward towards your next story update and video update.
10018966 Thanks. I needed that. very bad day.
Soooo... Uhm, ok, I've a confession to make: I've started reading your story 4 days ago, and I fear that I've quite literally developed a severe addiction to your writing style. The amazing characterisation! The suberb storytelling! The unique concepts explored! There aren't many stories out there that captivated my attention this strongly in a long time, and I honestly forgot how intriguing fanfics centered around Fo:E can be. Thanks, now I gotta go on another binge reading of all my favorite Lil'Pip-inspired-megalothons-writings. This'll take weeks! Not that I'm complaining (come to think of it, I can't remember ever finishing Murky Number 7, or the one about the filly in a radsuit. PRIORITY TARGETS ACQUIRED).
I just wanted to thank you for all of your hard work and creativity you poured into this masterpiece, which you gave to us for free! I wasn't kidding when I said that this story is good, and that I blazed through it in 4 days. Verily, I skipped some physics courses just to read this (they were very boring anyways xD)!
However, I also know that starting something is quite different from actually finishing it. I noticed that the last update was a few months back. While it could simply mean that you are writing the next part and a backlog (in which case ignore the next part), it could also mean that you've hit writer's block. Either way, know that your story already has a special place in my heart, and that I wouldn't mind (too too much ;) ) if this chapter is the last one for a while. It would be a good place to take a break, for it is not a cliffhanger (GOD how I HATE those!)and neatly wraps up this ark.
Sooo, yeah, thank you a lot for all of your work again! I do reallyhope to read more of this story, but if you need to take a break from this to refill your creativity-fueling-spirit, then I am more than glad to offer this here comment as a offering to Whirling Gears! XD
Have a nice day dude! ^^
10114055
Thank you very much. I needed this. My heart's just... broken right now in reguards to writing, the community, and how much effort it takes to see so little payoff for it. I want to continue this, but without more people like you, it's hard to want to do it.
Especialy when you're having car problems and will likly be towed in less than 6 hours :/
10115141
Oh. Yes, I absolutely see what you mean. I mean, to be quite honest, I didn't actually know you were such a prolific writer with quite the large following when I wrote my comment, and I felt like I slighted you through my 'finishing is hard' comment. I mean, who am I, a meager worm who contributed absolutely nothing to the fandom, to tell you, writer of hundred of stories, that finishing things is hard?! Perhaps you didn't see it this way, but I still would like to apologise for any affront this might have caused.
So, with this tangent out of the way, I just want to say that after all these years, I don't think anybody would dare say anything against you taking a break for a while, or even shifting priorities completely away from MLP. For example, I personnally am completely unable to play any game in a regular fashion for years on ends without taking months-long breaks. So it's always awe-inspiring to see people doing their hobbies for a good part of their lives.
However, I must also point out that maybe you're looking at this in the wrong way: instead of seeing your literary artworks as a huge sinkholes of effort barely anyone's interested, look at them more like training for when you might be interested in publishing a book (which is really good, as you can actively gauge your progress throughout the years and can get a little help whenever necessary this way), or simply as a way to have fun and unwind after a long and stressful day while at the same time sharing this fun with other people/avid fans/fellow writers. Tell me, or rather, ask yourself this; are you having fun doing this? Are you feeling proud of your work? Are you happy when reading comments saying that your writing is super fun, or having a laugh at your jokes, or simply pointing out slight errors in your work? That last one there is especially misunderstood in my opinion, as noone would put all the effort in telling you what is wrong with your work if they didn't care about it, you know? Hope this helps! ^^
Ow, hope the car is okay. Did it break down? Can I somehow help?
10117014
I already do. Thing is, I've been convinced that only a few hundred people will ever read that book. I did start some orgional fiction, and mabey 80 people bothered to look at it, so... :/
I don't have fun writing. I feel almost nothing writing. My enjoyment comes from seeing others enjoy my work.
Yes to all, except for that last one. To me, pointing out the error is a shriek of "YOU SUCK AND ARE BAD BECAUSE THE ONLY THING I CAN SEE ARE ERRORS!" Who gives a fuck about a typo? Have people never read properly published novels? There are spelling errors. There are typos. And instead of caring about the story or the characters or the world enough to talk about it all they give a shit about is expressing the fact that I used the wrong homophone with manic glee.
I *hate* that. I hate it so much.
It does not. People say this all the time. It sounds like a lie to me. If people like something they dont notice the flaws. See movies. People love the orgional Star Wars so much almost no one notices the extra bumping his head on the Death Star blast door, because they are paying attention to the STORY not to the story's container. Evey time someone points out an error in the technical side they are showing they do not care about the story, they care about it's container instead, meaning they think my story is not interesting. That, or they are reading to analize my story, not enjoy it.
I write for others to enjoy my work so I can see them enjoy it and drive enjoyment myself from that. Which means every
comment is an indicator that I have failed, and since that seems to be most comments, it's clear that I suck.
I dont know if it's okay, but the problem has been resolved. It didn't break down, I live in Alaska and it's so cold the metric and imperial temps are the same (-40). This is the point where car batteries can begin to / completely freeze solid.
10117126
Hmm. I don't want to sound like a haughty know-it-all, but I think that there might be a flaw in your reasoning there. I mean, yes, of course, a few people are absolute grammar nazis and are delighted whenever they can inflict as much pedantic pain as possible, but even so, I don't think that they are the majority of people pointing out typos. In fact, I believe they are the absolute minority, a fraction of a percent of commentators.
No, I am sure that most people simply want to help you improve, or make the story the greatest it can be. But how would this help? I mean, they are just typos. They do not, in any way shape or form, influence the story, the emotions and characters depicted therein, right? Well, you'd be absolutely right in this assumption if typos didn't ruin the flow of the story and immersion of the reader.
In my studies of the german language (Germanistik in University), my teacher always told me that he loved the ideas in my essays and how I worked with 'em, but couldn't think alongside my reasoning because every 2 sentences, I misspelled "because of that" (Deshalb, or how I loved to write it, Dessalb). The way he told it, everytime he got to an error, he would completely forget what I wrote last sentence and then had to start again 2 lines before that. In my case, it wasn't too bad, because well, it was an essay. But in this case, when you try to spin a multi-chapter story with characters, voices/dialects, landscapes, puzzles/mysteries... Breaking the flow of ideas and thoughts doesn't really seem like a good idea, y'know?
This here doesn't invalidate my previous comment about how good your story is, because fuck, it's really awesome! I personally just don't really care that much about typos, because most of the time I do not even realise they are there (yes, I am THAT unobservant xD ). However, I can see how people might not like having their immersion broken like a twig in the middle of a cool firefight, or an emotional scene. That's why, I think, they would look at the typo, and think "huh. Where that not there, then this scene would be, like, 20% cooler". They'd then go down to the comments, and politely tell the writer where the errors are, and how to fix it.
Everyone wins; the reader, for when he wants to reread the story, will be pleasantly surprised that his comment had been read and tgat the supposed error had been fixed; a new reader will be reading an objectively better organised story, and the writer will get less people moaning about typos! This does in no way, shape or form tell you that people don't appreciate a story for the story, just that there is potential for improving the way an already beautiful story conveys it's content. ^^
I also want to say that the star wars comparison isn't the best one, but I can't quite manage to put my thought into words, as they hurt a little and are quite frozen right now. I try to save a little bit of cash by shutting down the central heating somedays, but it gets really freaking cold the evening. Not quite as cold as in Alaska, I imagine, but still a bit chilling, eh? XD
-40F?! Damn, the poor car-battery! I imagine heating up the battery inside the house doesn't help it, does it? The freezing already broke the inside, I'd imagine? Damn that's rough. :/
P.S.: HAH! 1000st comment! WOOOOO!!! XD
10118525
I kinda get that? I don't experience it at all and don't even notice errors in text unless a computer underlines them because, you know, context exists for the written word and I learned to read and write phonetically. I also read much faster than a neurotypical (Thanks, autism! Why can't everything you do to me be cool?) so I may just kind of be merging a paragraph into a "block".
You're probably right, but it still feels hurtful to me when people do that. I have 2 editors, and we spend at least 6 hours per chapter ironing out everything we can. SO it feels like all that time, effort, and good will is wasted on top of that, you know? Especially for something so obviously futile as keeping errors out of a work. 3 dedicated people cannot make an error free document in spite of spending most of a workday on it. It's like... holy christ, people. Chill. Enjoy the damn story instead, please ><
At least, that's how it feels to me. Like I can't possibly achieve the perfection being demanded of me, even with help and spending about a part time job's worth of time per chapter and... It just feels very disrespectful to me regardless of intent. I"m mostly over the built up "STOP BULLYING ME PLEASE!" this caused me over the last 5 years, which was a major factor in my stopping writing. The other major factors were a sinus problem that's still not cleared up, and just... Starlight Glimmer's Face-Turn made me HATE MLP. I still do... It's hard to explain why if you dont already feel the moral outrage of someone who crossed the Moral Event Horision not being punished as they should be. IT just unraveled all likability in the show for me. The M6 all have to either be religious Zelots who dont acre who someone is if they follow the same "religion", or all be extremely Mentally Disabled to the point where it's not okay to laugh at their antics. So either they must be propel I hate, or people it's not okay to laugh at in order to accept Starlight as a friend. Furthermore, Statlight's lack of execution or imprisonment show's Celestia and Luna give no fucks about the safety of their people. She plotted and enacted Treason, Kidnapping, Torture and Mass Mutilation, and they give NO shits :/ For me, this snowballs into... I just hate the show, the setting, the character, it's like finding out an artist you loved is a pedophile. And in this case, that every one of your friends is AROUSED by them being a pedo... >:C
I do want to finish this story sometime though.
That's because you have these MASSIVE heat syncs on your house that suck heat right the hell out of them no matter how well "insulated" they claim t o be. They are called "windows", but don't worry! There's a fix for this. You can either get Thermal Curtains for them if working kinda okay and looking nice is critical for you> Otherwise, go to a hardware store or the camping section and buy some cardboard, ductape, and those camping pads with a reflective side and a dence foam body. Cut them to the sizes of your windows and make cardboard backed "incerts" to wedge into the space. Have the foil face outwards. In the summer this reflects heat away. In the winter, this keeps your house warm :3 It also rpevents strangers from looking into your house, stops the sun waking you up like a jerk, and looks nicer than the outdoors if you ask me.