> Fallout Equestria: Hightide
>  by BrightIdea
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> Alpha
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Fallout Equestria: Hightide
Chapter One
by King of Malta
Fallout Equestria: Hightide
"Alpha"
By King of Malta

“We are the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. To those who are thirsty We will give drink without cost from the spring of the water of life.”
--

Sunshine and Rainbows. 

My eyes opened to see sunshine and rainbows stretching above me across a blue sky only marred by the occasional puffy cloud. The blue sky stretched from every corner of my ceiling only hemmed in by the verdant green forest that grew from my walls. I lingered my gaze on this portion of my room’s painted mural for a time before I admired the rest of a one of a kind masterpiece.

One small corner of my room imitated a sudden drop from a painted cliff side. I could just make out the cascade of blue and white waves in the far distance conjured by the original artist. I completed my admiration looking down to the pale glory that was the moon itself. It occupied the vast majority of my floor. The white orb was set in a sea of its own, of the purple night and golden stars that sometimes I imagined smiled at me and invited me to join their marvelous company.

This view was my right and privilege. No pony in all of Stable 81 had this and I would die with my last breath to make sure they understood this fact. I brushed away the thoughts of any other pony and continued to admire my special mural. While I could have stared at the mural for hours I all too soon noticed a little fact. This fact was a little piece of reality that immediately sent cold fire through my bones and rage coursing through my blood. 

I was alone in my room. 

“MAITRE D'! I AM AWAKE! WHERE IS MY BREAKFEST? I DEMAND YOUR PRESCENCE! RIGHT! THIS! INSTANT!” 

That I had to raise my voice at all only furthered my own indignation! I was waiting like everypony else to receive their first meal of the day! I was Precious! I was daughter of the Overmare! I should not have to ever suffer through such hardship of this or any magnitude. I did not have to think if they knew who I was and how important I was! They had known it all their miserable lives so far and would know it until the day they died. 

That reminded me of how utterly boring the lives of the other Stable ponies were. Some attended the maintenance of the Stable itself, constantly staring at a single dial to make sure the reactors would not spike. Others did ghastly mundane things like maintain every PipBuck in Stable 81 or made sure the Stable did not starve by tending the food plots. One stallion in particular only cut manes and for him he would do the same thing until he passed on. Granted I would happily give THAT donkey’s flank eulogy and maybe even compose a new Stable Anthem around it!

A sudden sharp pain in my stomach made my eyebrow twitch slightly and reminded me that my first attempt to gain the attention of my personal pony servant had gone unanswered. I could feel my cheeks as they burned red with anger as I huffed and puffed. As time stretched on the indignity continued to rise and so did my anger. I was about to let the world know once again that I was by no means pleased when the door to my personal room burst open. A small colt, barely fitting into the rumpled and oversized black suit, wobbled into the room and balanced a silver tray on his backside.  The tray’s silver finery and porcelain containers clattered constantly as the young colt seemed to tremble. He sided up to my Princess size bed and his black fur and white mane covered face looked at me nervously as he began to mumble “S-s-sorryIwasl-late. Yourlady. Thisismyfirsttime. Ihopeyouwillbegoodto me.”

It took me a few moments to piece together the younger pony’s words. His lips trembled so bad it looked like he might cry any moment. I blinked at the colt and he blinked back. I took a breath of fresh, recycled air and-

“WHO ARE YOU? MORE IMPORTANTLY WHY WERE YOU LATE! WHERE IS MAITRE’D?”

The young colt staggered back, though in an admitting graceful move slid the tray onto my bedside rather than let it topple to the floor. If he had stained my beloved and priceless mural the consequences would not have been very pleasant. Not pleasant at all. 

“M-my name i-is S-s-steward. I received my-my cutie mark yesterday. M-my father w-was pro-promoted by the O-o-overmare to be th-the Ove-overmare’s assistant.” Steward stuttered on and turned to show his flank to me where a black bowtie on a silver platter cutie mark adorned his hide.  I could feel my temper rise already.

“You can’t possibly be serious.” I leveled him with a flat stare and watched as he shrank back to the floor with a slight nod. His eyes averted themselves toward the moon. I hoped he wished to Celestia and Luna that he could be banished to the moon! I rolled my eyes and facehoofed. Until things with Mother could be cleared up I would be forced to deal with what was given to me.  The little shrimp was quickly making my day worse and worse. I could feel it in my horn that this would be the least, worst possible thing to happen to me today.  The only possible answer for this would be to give as generously back and beat the hay out of this day. 

“Auuuuugh. Very well.” I used my horn magic to bring the hay toast to my mouth and bite into it. I spat it back out into the face of Steward just as he had begun to feel confident enough to approach my bedside. “Are you an idiot? Are you mad?”

“N-“

“YES! Your mouth should be saying ‘Yes I am mad for bringing the most important pony in my entire life this slop’” I interrupted and used my magic to push the tray of food with enough force to embed it into the metal wall. My magic may not be as elegant as my Mother’s or all that controllable I was remarkably gifted with a force of push in my basic telekinesis spell. I had learned this early on when I had slammed a classmate’s pet rock (was its name Tim or something like that) through the bulletproof glass of the Stable’s classroom. Public education had been an insufferable period of my life I was more than happy to have ended.

“I. Do. Not. Eat. Hay. Toast. Without. Applesauce.” I glared at Steward with the force of a thousand suns “You. Go. Now.” 

I was pleased at the way he turned tail before I had finished my sentence. Perhaps this commoner could learn. When Steward returned the meal he balanced on his head was better by an acceptable margin. Steward tried to say something but, I immediately cut him off with a glare. He squeaked then bowed then bowed again before he fled.  I smiled to myself and occupied myself with breakfast. Once I had finished I cantered over to the one section of my bedroom and opened the door to my closet. My closet was a room about the same size of my own bedroom but, contained no mirror and beauty desk, but row upon row of racks holding my dresses. True, every ‘common’ dweller in Stable 81 was by regulation and necessity of a lack of materials forced to wear the same jumpsuit that had been worn for nearly two hundred years, but then again being the Overmare’s daughter had its advantages in Stable 81. 
.
Supposedly, in the early days of the Stable the first Overmare had not seemed to care about what they wore or even mingling the commoners. That of course had eventually changed for the better and so did the perks of being Overmare or being related to the Overmare. Normally, when a pony died in Stable 81 their belongings and their jobs (such as being the Overmare) were passed onto surviving family. Whenever a pony died without family to claim their belongings their property became the property of the Stable-Tec and therefore property of the Overmare to do with as she wishes. I believed that my great-great-great grandmother had made that law after admiring a set of pearl earrings that had been in possession of a mare that no longer needed them.

I concentrated with my horn and wrapped with my magic one Stable barding that had been artistically transformed into a dress complete with sapphire jewels laced into the collar. The dress floated across the room to me on a rather…erratic…flight pattern as the magic field that surrounded it struggled to stay formed. The pain of concentration in my skull felt like my brains were trying to be scooped out. I should get a pony to do this for me. I pushed more magic at the dress which suddenly flew across the room like Steward had been running away and hit me in the face. I pulled the dress off my face and glared upward at my horn that poked through my blonde mane.

Why you little…I was the Overmare’s daughter! I did not need finesse or a repertoire of spells to make easy tasks easier. That was what the other unicorns were for! All I had was my telekinesis spell. So what if it was hard to control? I had a dress!  

I slipped on the dress then  looked at myself in the mirror. Teal eyes swept over me and approved of everything they saw…except for a stabbing glare at my covered flank. I ignored that and I spread the dress neatly over my sides and strode out towards the exit of my rooms. Beyond this were areas of the Stable that I normally rather did not prefer to go: everywhere but mine. Before I stepped through the door hatch I stopped to look down at a small indentation just to the left of the entrance. I stared at it for some time. It was barely noticeable to anypony who did not know what they were looking for. If only… no. I shook those thoughts from my head and I trotted out into Stable 81’s gray, dull, common, unappealing, terrible hallways. 

Immediately, I was hit by the stench of…averageness. 

-

The Stable, according to ancient maps posted along every stairwell, had in total nine levels. The first two levels were the entrance to the Stable as well as the Overmare’s office and living quarters for the Overmare’s family. This meant I literally lived above every other pony in Stable 81. The third and fourth levels contained the atrium, medical, security, the cafeteria, and other common areas. The Stable levels five through seven contained living quarters for the majority of the Stable’s residents, which I avoided like they were under quarantine. Finally, level eight through nine was where the reactors and the horticulture sections were housed. 

Was Stable 81 big for its size or was it small for its size?

It was not the first time I had pondered this, if only to distract myself from the ponies that inhabited the Stable itself. The population of Stable 81 had once been well over a thousand ponies but, over the last two centuries the number of inhabitants of Stable 81 had shrunk leading to entire sections of the Stable to be abandoned.  Once upon a time, in Stable 81 the Overmare had even lived in the lower levels with the common ponies! Such a thing was the stuff of my nightmares! This eccentric lifestyle had ceased since my great-etc. grandmother’s time when the Overmare had decided that some ponies in Stable 81 had to stand and live above the rest. One of the visible changes had been armed escorts for members of the Overmare’s family and posting of Security to every stairway entrance on every level in the Stable. Two such Security ponies bowed to greet me as I arrived at the stairwell.

“My dear lady, good morning.”

“Indeed, my lady.”

“Sir Bulletproof. Madam Brute Force.” I replied and gave a small curtsy in return for their respect of my station and person. The black and yellow stallion to my left and the red and blue mare to my right stood back to attention on their hooves. The only things in common between the two ponies included that they wore Stable Security barding and had batons holstered at their sides. Where Bulletproof seemed small for even a unicorn stallion it was Brute Force that seemed large for an Earth pony mare. Bulletproof had the tactical edge to get into the right spot for the best advantage while Brute Force simply ploughed on and battered so roughly she was known to cause collateral damage. At least that was what I heard about the two married ponies when they were in their living quarters. 

As guards on the second level of Stable 81 they did not see much action but, were perfect deterrents and I did not doubt they were more than capable at their special talents as Security ponies. I remembered fondly the time the two had left a trail of broken ponies in their wake to rescue me after I had fallen down the stairwell. Though, they tended to talk about what they would do to each other after they were relieved more often then I liked.

“Has Mother called for me at all today?” I looked past them down the hallway to the very end at a single hatch door that was sealed. Above it an electric sign read ‘Overmare’s Office’. I did not quench the hopeful look on my face.

“No, the Overmare has not sent any messages to you today, my lady.” Brute Force replied, furrowing her brow for some reason.  Why does she look so angry?  This was not something out of the ordinary for Mother. Being the Overmare was the most important position and right in all of Stable 81. She spent days in her office working for order and stability within the stable.  At least she had ever since…

“Though, my lady” Bulletproof interjected “Her standing wishes that you have a well and nice day remain unchanged as always” he gave me a broad smile of reassurance. 
I buried the small smile that crept onto my face. I shook my head in the negative and waved a hoof as if it was nothing. 

“Very well then, if that foolish little colt that is to be my new attendant arrives late with my lunch be sure to make sure he knows not to be late again. Ever.” I ordered and moved toward the stairwell.

“It would be my pleasure, my lady!” Brute Force replied with some glee in her voice. 

“Now dear, save some of that pent up energy for latter…”

I left the two to their conversation quickly and traveled down just one flight to the third level where I once again exchanged respectful conversation with the Security ponies. They knew who their better was. Once finished I walked to the railing overlooking the atrium.  I looked down over the entire atrium I could see dozens of the common ponies going about their daily lives. Some lounged on benches or tables, others appeared from one stairwell or hallway to disappear into another, one or two engineer ponies worked at panels in the walls.

“Look at them” I said to myself, my voice filled with contempt “So unappealingly…plain.”

What was it about any single pony below me that made them special or unique? Did any of them stand out from the ponies around them? 

The answer to both was a magnificent NO!

They lived every single moment of their lives in the Stable below me. From birth to death they went about themselves mingling among each other content at life in the Stable. When they received their cutie marks it laid out for them what they would do their entire lives and they all happily accepted it. To think if a pony below me received their cutie mark as a PipBuck technician they would all too happily spend every waking minute of their lives doing just that. Why? They would say it was their special talent! This was pure denial. It was because they had no ambition. They meekly followed the destiny that their cutie mark’s and the Overmare’s authority ordered them to. They were not worthy of any of my respect or courtesy or even the lives they lived! How every single other pony in everything I called existence accepted this irritated me to no end. I hated to think about cutie marks in general. Cutie marks were just…just big lies.

Of course I was nothing like them.  I was the Overmare’s daughter but, I had no destiny that could be ordained by a higher power! The Princesses were dust in the magical radiated winds no matter what the Stable’s teacher, Dull Lecture, said about them having transcended to watch over the remnants of all of pony civilization I was the only princess in the world. My destiny was not decided by anypony.

As Overmare I would…I would…what? I would one day succeed Mother as Overmare of Stable 81. Once I did so I would not be bound by the only rules that Mother commanded over me. The thought of Mother dying and Stable 81 placed in my hooves was an idea I did not like to contemplate. It filled me with fear. I was also sure it caused my hair to fall out of my mane.

“Tch” I spat and turned away from the atrium and its unending mediocrity. I had better business to attend to rather than waste my time bemoaning the state of Pony Civilization. I had long, long, long ago decided NO PONY  in Stable 81 was worth my time. I trotted down a metal encased hallway and I left them all to their slow, agonizing fates.

-

As much as I hated to interact with the regular pony population some of them were able to do necessary tasks that I admitted I could not do. Such as replace the padding on my PipBuck which had begun to ware down and chafe my delicate coat. The mousy PipBuck technician had practically drooled over my leg in praise and his own desire for me. I was Stable 81’s beauty-incarnate but, beauty had its faults. The entire time the PipBuck technician gave me a horrific, crooked grin while showering me with praise that while truthful was misplaced.  The image of me giving into his so called ‘charms’ was laughable and unsettling.  Even if he had been the only stallion left in the Stable. A princess such as I could only be courted by a prince, not the lowborn scum that made up the Stable. This went especially for any pony as common as a PipBuck technician. 

“A shower would do me good.” I muttered to myself as I walked back toward the Atrium. I could not remember the last time I had spent so much time among the majority of the Stable’s population. I could feel their stench on my Stable barding and the PipBuck technician’s drool had been the literal icing on the cupcake that was my disgust. 

I had just begun to turn a corner that would lead me straight back to the atrium when a manedo stepped from the other side and blocked my path. I rolled my eyes as I recognized the manedo’s owner and groaned “I did not even think this day could get any worse and yet it has…”

“Aw, come one Miss. Pretty, Pony Princess. Yah, don’t have’tah be all square like that. Where the Tunnel Stallions go, it gets 20% more awesome! Ain’t that right fellahs?” the Earth Pony stallion with a clashing green coat nickered, as did several more stallions that surrounded me.

“Got that right boss!”

“Tunnel Stallions rule!”

“She should know better than to come into our turf boss!”

“Tunnel Stallions rule! Tunnel Stallions rule! Tunnel Stallions ru-ow! I mean. She is pretty boss! ”

I did not need to look to tell that each and every pony of the so called ‘Tunnel Stallions’ resembled their pathetic leader almost down to a tee. It took a special kind of idiot to swagger about the Stable wearing leather studded with metal and the image of a rearing snake. It took a special kind of idiot to wear sunglasses underground. It took the biggest idiot of the Stable to lead these idiots in a ‘revolt’ against the Overmare’s rule. 

“Pompadour, I did not think you could ever be so bold.” I rolled my eyes and looking down on the mane-stylist as he produced a comb from his jacket and proceeded to run it through his black mane. 

“Shows what you know babe. The Tunnel Stallions rule here. Get with the picture already.” Pompadour sneered, returning his comb to his jacket while pacing back and forth in front of me. “Once the Overmare gets with the picture you’ll be ‘slumming’ it with the rest of us ponies in the Stable, breaking your manicured hooves in hard work and common labor to better the Stable.”

“Hard work? You are the Stable’s mane-stylist. Even I know that it doesn't you have never broken your hoof in your life.”

“I’M AH BARBER!” Pompadour shouted turning around to face me. He surprised me when I saw the barest hint of the whites of his eyes over the rim of his sunglasses. 

“Hmph. Applejack, Appletini. It is all the same.” I replied with a smile. I truly enjoyed watching Pompadour lose his self-inflated sense of ‘coolness’. “All you and your little 'Tunnel Worms' do is run around the Stable painting your names on the walls, pranking the Security Ponies, and bad mouthing Mother in the safety of your bed covers.” The more I talked about how pathetic the Tunnel Stallions were the more my anger at them grew and my words grew harsher. “You all think you are so important. That what you do matters towards some righteous cause that will actually overthrow the Overmare but, in reality you are all still stuck in the mud of your own mediocrity. In my eyes you all stand as the epitome of the Stable’s grandest losers.”

“W-what do yah mean by that? We're Tunnel Stallions we fight thah good fight!” Pompadour cried, taking a few steps away from me as if I was suddenly exposed to lethal doses of radiation. I could practically taste the resolve of the Tunnel Stallions crumble around me as they saw their leader talked down like he was just a little colt. 

“Everything you do is meaningless.” I answered stepping toward him until his flank was pressed against the wall. “You think too small. Your pranks are forgotten within a week, nothing you do ever will change how things work in the Stable.”  Turning my nose up and away from the Tunnel Stallions I trotted toward the atrium, the thought of that shower once again filled my head and pushed out even the existence of the Tunnel Stallions when something whooshed past my ear. Startled I turned back to Pompadour who had his hoof outstretched; I looked to see his comb lie against the Stable's metal wall. 

“I’ll show yah Miss Pretty Pony. I’ll show yah good! Thah Tunnel Stallions are gonna rule thah Stable and then I’ll wipe thah smirk off your face!” Pompadour growled, turned away from me and ran off down the opposite direction, soon followed by his Tunnel Stallions who even looked at their leader with nervous eyes. 

“HAH!” I shouted back at them down the hallway, “I did not know the Tunnel Worms were comedians!” I brushed off Pompadour’s childish temper tantrum as more bluster from the stallion that had the only mane filled with hot air in the entire Stable.  This was Stable 81 where nothing changed. Roles in this performance could not be changed. 

I had tried and failed doing it.

I dismissed the Tunnel Stallions from my mind and returned to my room to that long awaited shower. I spent the remaining day hours before curfew with Steward who I ordered around my living quarters. I needed to make sure he understood in the tiniest fiber of his being what was expected of him. It had been an enjoyable evening making him rearrange my room’s furniture, constantly I acted as if I changed my mind about where I wanted the furniture moved. When he tried to push a dresser I smacked him over the head and shouted at him. I threatened him that if he did not move my furniture more carefully and damaged the floor I would hang him upside down from the atrium ceiling. 

Of course he had to carry it on his back to do that. Once everything was moved around and then arranged back to their original places I dismissed the panting and sweating Steward. Reminding him to make sure my breakfast was on time and to my exact desire or else. I made sure he did not want to know what ‘or else’ entailed. I ate my dinner and retired my bed for sleep.

-

I dreamed I was a young filly again. Sitting in my room and I played with my little pony figurines on the floor. I laughed and giggled something but, while I felt my mouth I could not hear any of the words that were coming out. I could not hear any sounds being made except a humming noise that came from everywhere. I was half aware that this was a dream but, I was shackled to it. I struggled to wake up or at least control myself but, a sudden wailing noise from one corner of my room caught my attention. I looked over to the source and stared that at the single piece of furniture that occupied one corner of my room. It stood on four long legs, its body a series of teeth like metal bars that trembled at the wailing sound that came from within. 

A soft voice said my name.

The voice was so familiar but, I couldn’t remember where who it had been. I dropped my toys and drifted over to the crib. I balanced on my hind legs and peeked over the edge when the door to my room burst open and-

-a pair of hooves tightened around my mouth. A moment later several more wrapped around my body and pulled me off my bed. Before I could scream I was pulled off my bed to hit the metal floor and then kicked into a sack. Voices around me snickered.

“Serves her right.” 

“Oh, boy she is going to get it!”

“What is with this painting on the wall?”

“Who cares, give her the stuff.” 

Who did these ingrates think they were touching so rudely? Whose room did they think they were in? Whose flanks were going to be kicked by Brute Force and Bulletproof into cells in their near future? I knew I should have been mortified but, all I could feel was fury. I inhaled to use my most colorful language but, I soon realized that had been a mistake. Something wet had been pressed against my face and I just managed to inhale something that stung my throat. Moments later a mushroom cloud of pain erupted beneath my skull moment before blackness overtook me.

-

BANG! BANG! BANG!

“WHAT IS THAT NOISE?” I shouted, consciousness returned to me with a fury in the form of a throbbing pain in my skull. I snapped awake to find myself in a unfamiliar room, Stable-Tec terminals line the walls their screens emitting various colors at a blinding speed but, that was not what dominated my attention. I saw an all too familiar form of the gear shaped, metal, monstrosity dominated the room. I had seen it dozens of times in Stable-Tec educational videos informing all good little fillies and colts that it protected them against the dangers of the outside world. 
The Stable door.

A wave of panic  gripped me for a moment and I glanced to my flank. Relief flooded me as I saw the Stable 81 barding I had worn to bed had not been uncovered.  I soon noticed that I was not alone. 

“Was yah beauty sleep filled with cupcakes and cotton candy, Miss. Pretty Pony?” Pompadour asked, his voice brimmed with a sense of triumph. He leaned against what could only be the controls to the Stable door. He was also combing his hair. 

“You mane dresser!” I replied, horrified now that I knew his filthy hooves had laid themselves on my body! In my room no less! I was going to need a quarantine magnitude delousing after this. A question formed in my mind and brushed away concerns of hygiene “How did you get into my room? How did you get inside here without Brute Force turning you to a green smear on the wall?”

“I’m ah Barber! As for how yah got here…heh. Well yah challenged me to think bigger. So I did.” Pompadour said as the grin on his face widened. He gestured to the room around us. I noticed that unlike our last encounter his Tunnel Stallions were now armed with what appeared to be the tools of their life in Stable 81. A few had hammers or knives, while the majority had such things as scissors or broken broom handles as weapons. Most of them pressed up against the only other visible hatch entrance or exit from the room. I heard the sound of hooves banging from the other side. That had to be my rescue. 
“You’se see. My granpappy was a part of maintenance down below. One day while he was working he found this secret tunnel built into thah walls leading to every level in thah Stable.  He told me about it one day and one thing lead to another and thah Tunnel Stallions were born!”

Pompadour seemed crazy to me. I wondered if the fumes from the spray he used on his mane had finally rotted his brain. His story seemed ludicrous to me because, it eroded the very foundation of the Stable that the Overmares of the past and present knew every little thing that went on inside of the Stable. That it had escaped Mother tested the very limits of the reality I knew. Yet here I was. Standing in a room that no pony had stood in centuries since the Stable door had been sealed shut. The hatchway to the Stable entrance had been locked too. Though not all hope was lost to me. There was one factor that I could use to tear off Pompadour’s smugness like I was gelding him personally.

“Was this your entire plan? Foalnapp me then flee up here to be corned by Security? Sure you could flee down whatever rat tunnel you found to get here, but Mother will know about it now and you will be punished. Severely.” I said, gloating, but for the first time ever I saw another pony stand up to my words. Pompadour’s smug smile had not left his face as I expected and instead he shook his head at me as if I was the idiot! How dare-! My hair rose along my neck in anger as he spoke.

“That’s not all toots. You see? What yah said tah me about nothing ever changing in thah Stable got me thinkin.” He Pointed a hoof toward the imposing Stable door as he continued “Why does nothin change? Its cuz were all cooped up in thah Stable living under you’se family thah stinkin, shit suckin, Overmare. Outside thah Stable you’se have not ah drop of power. If ah let thah outside into thah inside your ma is finished!” 

Oh, no. He could not be that stupid could he? I never imagined he was actually serious about leaving the Stable. The outside was…the unknown and yet, filled with all the horrors of every young pony’s nightmares. Equestria was nothing. Even if it was not some empty void the penalty for opening the Stable door would be execution by the Overmare. As much as I detested these ponies the useless death they faced was just so very… uncouth. I realized how much trouble he and the rest of his Tunnel Stallions would be in but, the thought seemed to fly right over the stallion’s towering mane as he pressed the button to the Stable door controls. Immediately, lights and alarms began to sound as the gigantic drill that secured the door in place began to slowly unscrew one of the large door bolts. 

Just as Pompadour pushed the button the hatch door leading into the room finally ceased to bang for several moments before an even louder BAM from a much heavier impact sent the Tunnel Stallions tumbling across the room. Security ponies flooded into the room lead by Brute Force. The Security ponies lined up in a horizontal formation and only parted down the center to let a single, aged mare through. The mare stared at me and inwardly I cringed at Mother.  Instead of a warm feeling of relief a chill crept up my spine as the cold eyes of Diamond Sparkle disregarded my captors and went straight to me. The stared accusingly at me as if I was the one who was to be punished. The Overmare’s eyes only glanced at me for a moment, though it seemed like an eternity, before they turned to the Stable door as the first of the four gigantic metal screws were drilled loose. 

The metal screw hit the equally metallic floor with a clang that drowned out all other noise. As soon as it ended Mother spoke.

“Idiots, interrupting my work.” she looked back to me again as if the mare with the white coat and blue mane had tasted something horrible. Again she looked at me as if I had lead this whole idiotic incident. “You do realize that the cameras beyond the Stable door have been offline for generations? That we have no clue WHAT is on the other side of that door?  You are jeopardizing the lives of every pony in the Stable just because you want a little ‘freedom’.” 

“It doesn’t matter!” Pompadour shouted back.  He flinched a moment as the Overmare’s eyes turned on him for the first time. Her expression told that she regarded Pompadour as much as something she had stepped on. “Whatever is out there its better thah yah lookin down on ponies and telling us what we can and can’t do.”

“Please, enough with your idiotic rambling. I am the Overmare and by Stable-Tec mandate I am empowered with the right to deal with anypony that interferes with Stable-Tec rules and regulations.”

As the second metal screw came loose I almost admired Pompadour for standing up to Mother before I realized that even if he did it did not make a single difference. He was still an idiot and Mother would never agree to anything he said. I looked away from Mother to the Security ponies in their full security barding. Most of them only had security batons but, in the back I noticed a few pistols being levitated by the Unicorns. Was Mother really going to use this kind of force against the Tunnel Stallions? A part of me entertained the thought that Mother was worried about my safety with glee. Yet, the Tunnel Stallions were just fools lead around in a circle by their pompous King Fool. Even if they were commoners none of them deserved…death. I looked again at the levitated pistols and noticed the Security ponies aimed not at the Tunnel Stallions but, toward the Stable door. Was Mother that afraid of opening the Stable door?

Almost everypony looked between Mother and Pompadour in a ridiculous staring contest. Perhaps they were waiting to see who would make a move first?  I noticed that not every pony  was fixated on the two leaders. From the edge of my vision I could make out Brute Force and Bulletproof, as they inched closer in my direction. They seemed to be the only ponies worried about me. Mother was only interested in upholding her precious Stable-Tec laws. There was that feeling again that squeezed my chest painfully. Still, it did not matter.  Pompadour was too much of a coward to fight Mother and Mother would never-

“As Overmare  I have decided: No prisoners.”

“Tunnel Stallions Rule!”

The sound of the third screw hitting the floor seemed to start up the ponies as the Security ponies charged and the Tunnel Stallions did the same. The entire room dissolved into a ferocious melee in a matter of seconds. Now was my chance to get to safety. I scrambled and ducked toward the wall of terminals but, the two sides of ponies closed together over me like crashing waves. I dived down as a Security pony with a baton smashed it down over the head of a Tunnel Stallion who had been ready to whip a length of chain into the Security pony’s face. I heard the sound of bone crunching inside the stallion’s head and tried to scramble away as the Tunnel Stallion screamed in half-blind agony and whipped his length of metal chain wildly. He slashed the Security pony across the face and any pony close enough to him before another Security pony tackled him to the ground. 

I had almost made it past them but, the chain-wielding Tunnel Stallion tossed his chain which smacked into my hind legs. The sudden pain forced me down to the floor. In a matter of moment I already began to feel the bruises across my legs swell. I had never been struck this badly in my life. Until this point.

The pain was nothing like Mother had ever administered to me when I was a foal and as I struggled to get loose from the chains the sound of small booms filled the air. They were shortly followed by pinging metal or the worse sounds of pierced flesh. While Tunnel Stallions went down left and right they did not make it easy for the Security ponies as they charged into the Security ponies. They made use of their improvised weapons with surprising effectiveness as the close range fighting caused several Security ponies to switch to batons instead of risking firing on their own. I crawled on my front hooves slowly through the melee. My eyes glanced frantically for safety within the ferocious violence. I saw no sign of Mother or even Pompadour. I began to wonder where they had gone when I felt a pair of hooves grab me. I shrieked and kicked out with my hooves at the offender and was met by thick security barding. 

“Ouch. I guess you can start calling me ‘Hoofproof’, dear.” Bulletproof said, the form of Brute Force appeared in front of me. She smiled at me with affection before she turned and knocked aside two ponies that blocked a clear path to outside the fighting. 

“You know I like it when I’m the one beating you but, you’re definitely not death-proof, Hun. Now, get Precious out of this!” Brute Force replied and brought her hooves to buck against a Tunnel Stallion who charged at her with a wrench. The Tunnel Stallion soared over the heads of several ponies before he impacted against a computer with a crunch. 
Bulletproof apparently did not need to be told twice by his wife as he brought me  toward the metal hatchway. We joined Brute Force as she used her baton to keep away both Tunnel Stallions and Security ponies. One vein filled stare from her sent friend and foe backing away from us. 

“Mother?” I asked to no pony in particular. I was now free from immediate danger but,  as my eyes scanned the room I saw that the Overmare, my mother, was nowhere to be seen. The sound of grinding filled the room making my eyes dart back to the Stable door, I finally noticed that the last metal screw had been removed and the impenetrable, metal slab was sliding out of place. Whatever remained of Equestria it was about to enter Stable 81. In my wildest nightmares I had not expected a rolling, wall of water and filth. 

“Celestia fuc-“was all I heard one pony shout as we all watched the flooding wall of water as it swept ponies off their hooves. I stared petrified at the disgusting water, my stomach wanted to heave out but, instead my lungs pulled in air in a failed attempt to scream. I did not get the chance before the water hit me and I was swallowed by it. That some of it got in my mouth made me want to vomit even more but, I resisted the urge to do so and held on tight to my breath. I did not want to think what it had contained after hundreds of years of sitting against Stable 81’s door. Instead, I flailed my limbs blind in a watery void and  kicked out in panic. My lungs burned for air but, I held and waited for the water to stop moving so violently.

After an eternity of bobbing beneath the putrid water a series of alarms began to sound and though muffled by the water I heard a draining sound from somewhere. I kicked my way to the top of the water; my head broke the surface only a few inches from the ceiling.  The screams and shouts of other ponies that had bobbed their way to the surface echoed in my ears. Many ponies had also begun to realize they could not swim. I did not care about them though; I was the most important one in danger. I also could not swim of course. I thrashed in the water and looked around for anything I could latch onto when my desperate eyes spotted a security pony bobbing up next to me. Without thinking I latched onto the security pony only to realize the mare’s eyes were blank and a large, gaped wound on her head leaked blood and brain matter on me. 

“EEEEEEEEE!”

My scream actually managed to drown out the other panicked noises. I let go of the corpse and sank back down into the murky water. This time I did vomit, I choked on bile and water as one tried to exit and the other tried to enter my throat. I kicked my hooves to the surface and gasped for air while my own stomach acid stung my eyes. I was absolutely mortified! The Princess of Stable 81 covered in her own vomit. This day truly could not get any worse than it had. If it could there was no hope at all for myself or the entire Stable! 

After a few minutes the water gradually drained away. The ponies still alive stumbled to their hooves in mute horror at nearly drowning; a few followed my trend setting example by vomiting all over the floor. Picking myself up from the metal floor, covered in Goddesses knows what I glanced to the hatchway into the Stable realizing that the reason why the entrance way had flooded to the ceiling was because at some point in the fight it had been sealed shut. Realizing now that Mother was not in the Stable entrance I was left to wonder had Mother left me to die? 

Click-Click-Click-Click-Click!

The clicking noise filled the room and it seemed to be coming from every single PipBuck, even if the PipBuck’s owner was…dead. Almost immediately a migraine throbbed in my head. I glared down at my own offending PipBuck to see a meter I had never seen before appear on the screen. It showed a rainbow that went from green to yellow to red, and the small needle on the screen wobbled erratically between the green and yellow. I had no clue what the significance of this was but, the other ponies did. I had known this because; they had begun to panic around me.

“Rads! We’re all going to die!” one of the Security ponies shouted.

“Radiation sickness! I’ve got yellow. I need to get the Tartarus out of here!” a Tunnel Stallion raced toward the hatch.

“Medical better have Rad-Away.” Another Security pony shouted.  

A crowd of ponies that had been minutes before fighting each other to the death converged on the hatchway to the Stable. More shouts and cries of panic erupted from the huddled mass of ponies as they discovered that the hatchway had been locked. I now realized where Mother had disappeared to. She must have had leapt through and locked the hatchway sometime during the fighting. 

“My mane is going to fall out!” a mare cried from the door. 

Wait. I did not normally care for the moaning and groaning of commoners but, that got my attention. Radiation sickness made a pony’s mane fall out? I had been calm, if annoyed, until those words had been spoken. I clutched my hooves to my beautiful, blonde mane as panic burst inside of me. I could handle being Foalnapped, drowned  in my own vomit, be made to clutch onto a dead pony, and be seen in public with a simple,  Stable barding but, my mane falling out was one thing I could never deal with. The horror! The horror!

I needed a good, long shower. 

I had begun to rise to my knees when I heard a maniacal laugh echo through the room. A mare with a purple coat and a green mane wearing security barding looked at the open Stable door and her face cracked into a grin then she hiccupped. “The Stable is open! I-I’m –hic- free! No more –hic- looks for me!” she cried then charged off through the entrance into the pitch, black...outside. 

“Hiccup! No don’t!” a voice I recognized as Brute Force’s shouted from the opposite end of the room; the massive mare pulled Bulletproof from the wet floor. If I could just sneak over I could save my precious mane. Brute Force started to chase after the mare but, stopped in her hooves when the terrified and very, very painful scream of Hiccup’s cut through the air. Everypony and I slowly craned our heads back toward the Stable entrance. For a moment I thought that Hiccup had jumped back up into the Stable, terrified at something she had seen but, then I realized that her lower half was completely missing. The remains of Hiccup’s upper torso left a bloody trail across the floor. Everypony looked from Hiccup’s body to the Stable door as something massive shifted in the darkness.

"GUUUUUAAARRRGGGH" a roar echoed from the outside darkness as a creature from my little filly nightmares stepped into the Stable entranceway. It stood as tall as the open gap into the Stable and was just as wide, its dark green and brown discolored body shaped like a semi-round and semi-square box. It also looked to be entirely covered in overlapping, boney plates from the four legs tipped with claws that could easily disembowel a pony to its long careening neck and gaping head. Two red, beady eyes stared down as if looking right at me above a gaping jaw its leather hide there and underneath its neck didn’t have any boney armor, but it still had those jaws which snapped down between angry hisses. I noticed bits of purple pony flesh and green hair surrounding its jaws. It came from my darkest nightmares! It would devour them all! It was terrifying! It was monstrous! It was-

“It’s a tortoise!” one of the Tunnel Stallions said, gaping at the massive thing. 

“A tortoise? It looks more like a turtle to me.” One of his buddies said, while he slowly moved away from the Stable entrance.

“No, look at its shape and posture. It stands too upright to be a turtle. Was I the only one who paid attentions during biological lessons of (probably extinct) Equestrian wildlife?” 

“GUUURRRAAGH!” the thing answered, it did not seem  to care what it was as it slowly moved two steps into the entrance . It moved so slow I was amazed when its neck stretched forward and crashed down onto an unlucky security pony who realized the danger too late. He could not move before it brought its jaws down with one sickening crunch on top of the pony. I stared into the monster’s mouth and saw in detail the unfortunate pony become pulverized between two powerful jaws. His bones crunched as his organs burst. Blood and gore dripped down the sides of the monster’s face and the pony continued to scream until the pony’s head was crushed.

The monster swung its gaze across the room. It had certainly walked into an All-You-Can-Eat-Buffet.

His mangled screams snapped every pony out of their paralyzed states and sent them panicking around the room.  The surviving Tunnel Stallions that could still move raced toward a section of the wall of Terminals and began to push and pull them aside. Meanwhile those security ponies that still could move began to bang on the hatchway to be let out. Meanwhile those ponies that couldn’t move from their wounds could only scream as the behemoth’s head came down and crushed the life out of them in its jaws. 

The sickening scene before me had finally done it to me. I shouted at the mental demons of my mind but, they just laughed and swooped down. I could hear jabbering voices on the edge of my consciousness as I took events into account. The day had started with an imperfect breakfast and had ended with my coat drenched in sickening water, my mane drooping over my face, and sticky with my own vomit. Also, the Stable door had opened and a monster was about to eat me. What a day. I trembled as I sat down on the cold metal floor. I asked myself over and over, why did it have to be me? I began to curl into a fetal position when a similarly sopping, wet mane arrived in my view then pulled me from the floor as the eyes of the turtle-tortoise-monster-thing swept toward me. “Miss. Pretty Pony. Yah better start moving or you’re gonna get an even worse bad mane day then usual!”

Pompadour pulled me away as the jaws of the monster crashed down to where I had just been, making a large dent in the metal floor that shook the entire room. The monster lifted its head and roared! 

“Watch this, Miss. Pretty Pony” Pompadour grinned and swung his hoof up and down quickly, his comb twirled through the air at the monster, hitting the beast against the underside of its neck but, of course not causing the thing any damage. His comb had snapped in half on impact. “Damn, I thought that would’a worked!”

“Pompadour, now is not the time to be an idiot!” I shouted into his ear. I was going to die with this idiot? I was Precious of Stable 81! I deserved better company. The next moment I shrieked and we jumped to the side to avoid an attack by the monster, Pompadour fell toward his Tunnel Stallions and me toward the Stable door, over the separating railing and down right to the side of the beast! The thing’s head followed me, its massive legs lifted up as if to stomp me when a gunshot echoed through the entrance way. The beast to roar and stomp missing me completely, I looked up to see Bulletproof waving a smoking gun curled in yellow magical energy that shined from his horn, I looked to the monster and noticed a small red spot on the unarmored section of the monster’s neck. It was like a pinprick but, a pinprick was more than enough to enrage the beast. It roared again and like a falling anvil brought its jaws down crashing into Bulletproof. The monster’s jaw had only pulverized Bulletproof to the floor but, from where I stood Bulletproof did not appear to move at all. I had just enough time to see Brute Force look up from tearing the hidden doorway from the wall and scream the most emotionally pained sound I had ever heard from any pony. Brute Force pushed aside Tunnel Stallions and Security ponies as she charged over to her husband’s broken body. That was all I saw before the beast began to move its bulk and its legs reared up to stomp me into paste. 

I Shrieked as I concentrated my horn’s magic over my body and FLUNG myself through the Stable doorway barely escaping being crushed to death.  I landed in a pile of wet gravel just on the other side of the Stable door. For a moment I could not believe I had exited Stable 81 even if it was just by a few feet. I had escaped the bonds. The moment was soon lost on me as the monster turned around, blood soaking its jaw as its eyes once again locked onto me. Faced with its full attention I could only do one thing. No matter how un-ladylike it was.

I ran out into Equestria. 

Footnote: Level Up

New Perk: Rad-icalness--Your radical attitude or your exposure to Balefire Radiation has caused you to gain a +25 Radiation Resistance.  


> Dog Meat
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Fallout Equestria: Hightide
Chapter Two: Dog Meat
by King of Malta
“Second, he doesn't like hats, or wearing them. Don't ask, I don't know. Maybe because it rhymes with rats.”
---
“HIIIIIIII MOM!!!”

“Oh, uh, I mean. This is Stable-Tech ‘Project: PipBuck Compatible Self-Sustaining Audio Message Transmissions’. Otherwise known as ‘Project: Ghost In the Machine’ or ‘Project: PipBuck Sense’. This is Trial Run B4. The trial run will engage in…3…2…1…” 

“HI MOM! The train ride to Baltimare went just fine. I know you worry about how big and fast the trains have become over the last few years but, please don’t worry about me! I am doing just fine. It is just…a little busy here on the platform. So many ponies and that even looks like a…”

“BARK! Watch where you go you little pony! Wouldn’t want you to have an…accccident.”

“Hey! I’m sorry. I’ll move out of the way. By the Princesses you don’t need to be snippy!”

“Bah! Poniesss here and poniesss everywhere! Too many whiney poniesss!”

“Well, if you don’t like all the ponies, maybe you should go back to where you came from?” 

“Go back where I came from? Grrr….GO BACK WHERE I CAME FROM? YOU PONIESSS KICK ME FROM MY HOME LIKE I SSSTRAY DOG! ” 

“I-“

“FOR WHAT? FOR GEEEEMMMSSS? DIAMOND DOGSSS LOVE GEMS BUT, WE NEVER DESTROY PONIESSS HOMESSSESSS!!!” 

“Please-“

“Is there a problem here ma’am?” 

“Arf!”

“Is this little mongrel bothering you ma’am? If he is it would be grounds for termination by the guest worker bylaws two-

“Arf! Spot can’t lose clean job! Spot have litter of pups to feed!”

“No. No, he isn’t bothering me. I just was asking him some questions…and stuff. Everything is fine here.”

“Hmph. Wathc your step mongrel or I’ll send you to the pound to get neutered!”

“Umm. Really, I didn’t mean to start any trouble for you-“

“Bah! Ponies. Spot will not roll over on his belly just for this…”

“Ooookay. Well, I hope you get this message. If you don’t then I will just look weird walking around Baltimare and talking to myself while never finding out the longevity of the pipbuck message. Oh, well. I’m off to see Big Sis! Love, your-”

-

The water had probably been sitting underneath Baltimare for years, maybe even decades, now that I looked back on it. Every time it rained or a water pipe broke it would seep into the ground through the cracks and collected at least two hundred years’ worth of grime, muck, industrial waste, pony waste, animal waste, and who the buck knew what else! Before I had even made six steps into the wide, wide world of Equestria I had fallen into it. Yes, I had just minutes before been nearly drowned in the same mixture but, that had been inside of the Stable and had been without the massive, mutant monster. In moments my mind had outraced my will before I could tell myself to not think about the dark water I plunged into. My reaction was normal of course for a Stable Pony who had always lived to the highest standards of living and care for her image.

“EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEWWWWWWW!!!”

I vomited again. It joined the slimy water around me and seemed to be one of the least disgusting elements of the water. The stench burned my nostrils and made my eyes water. Never had I, or any pony in Stable 81 been subjected to this much filth!  They could not of had been! I was the Princess of Stable 81 and I was covered in more filth then even the lowliest of the Stable’s engineers working on the hygienic, purifier talismans. It was not just sickening but, also degrading for one such as myself who had stood so high in the social hierarchy of Stable 81! If I had had the time I would have very vocally bemoaned my fate to EVERYPONY in earshot, but I was also close enough to Stable 81’s entrance to see the monster’s bulk had begun to squeeze itself back out into the tunnel. I could see its beady eyes locked on me. 

“No. Oh, no. No you don’t you-stop that! No! Nonononono!” I babbled in panic. The poise and grace I was known for was stomped under basic animal instincts of panic and fear. Panic and fear had forced me out of Stable 81 then by me they would get me away from this monster. The water was not very deep, while it had undoubtedly filled the entire space outside of the Stable prior to the Stable door’s opening. I could feel my hooves touch the uneven ground beneath the slimy waters that reached to my neck. If the water had been any higher I may have drowned. No pony in the Stable knew how to swim. Even a foal could stand and keep its head above the water in the bathtubs in the Stable. At least, I knew I could, having never seen the no doubt filthy and dreary quarters of the peasants that made up the Stable’s population.

Besides.

All I had to do was stay away from that thing’s mouth long enough for Mother to send out the Security ponies to distract the monster long enough to slip around and back to Stable 81. I thought Mother would have killed anypony that had dared to do harm to the fruit of her labors. The Princess of Stable 81. The Best-Pony. The Most-Beautiful-And-Fashionable-Pony. She-Who-Stood-Above-All-The-Pathetic-Commoners. Her Precious. Her daughter. 

“The thing is through. Close it! Close it before it comes back!” my Mother’s voice echoed from within the Stable and out to the tunnel around me. I was shocked. I was amazed at how clearly I could hear her words over the sound of the monster’s throaty growls. Mother could not possibly abandon me like this. 

“NO!” I screamed and began to wade through the water toward the Stable entrance but, the way was blocked by the monster which thrust its scaly head at me. The water splashed over me as its head slammed down just bare inches away from me. Something I did not want to know hit me in the face and slid down to make a plop in the water. My disgust had reached heights I had never known. The monster reared its head back for another strike and I realized that I could not get past this thing alive. The way back to my life was only a few feet away but, it was literally blocked off to me by roaring, monstrous death. This had to be the most unfair thing in the world! How dare the world take me away from my life of superiority and luxury! Why wasn’t any other pony suffering besides me?  As these thoughts raged through my mind I realized something.

The Stable door was closing and the light from the electronic bulbs that were my only source of light had begun to fade. In a matter of moments I would be trapped in the dark with this thing in this place that revolted me and seemed would be the death of me. 

“GRRRRRAUGH!” the monster roared. 

“EEEEEEEEEEEH!” I screamed back and faster than I had ever been or wanted to, I waded through the muck and onto a small slope of solid dirt that I could still see lead away from the monster and from the Stable. My muscles protested at the effort as I pulled myself out of the water. I would have protested to if there had been anypony to complain to, to make it all better. The only being there was the monster as its leathery head once again slammed into the water where I had been moment ago. 

I did not need anypony to tell me to keep hoofing it.

“Unf…” I grunted as I climbed up the tunnel as with a loud THUMP the door to Stable 81 closed for the first time in over two hundred years. The darkness popped me like a candy into its mouth. I paused in the complete and total darkness as I listened. I could only hear the fast paced beating of my heart inside of my chest for several moments before, it was joined by the steady THUMP-THUMP, THUMP-THUMP of the monster’s limbs as moved toward me in the dark. 

Could it see me in the dark or could it smell me? Did it taste me on the tip of its tongue? Buck if I knew. All I knew was that it was coming for me and I had to keep moving otherwise my precious life would end with a sudden CRUNCH as the monster’s jaw snapped my body between its jaws. Images of the ponies it had already eaten flashed in my mind and gave me all the motivation I needed. So I stumbled forward in the dark, blindly I charged ahead and hoped that the tunnel would lead me somewhere safe and the monster was not getting any closer to me. 

Then I fell.

I had been so busy scrambling in panic I did not realize the ground below me had stopped completely until I had pitched forward and plunged several feet into more grimy water! This time though I felt a sudden pain in my side as something solid but thin cut through my side as I sank in the water.  I whined in pain in my throat but, I knew now not to open my mouth while under water. And my teacher had said I was a slow learner! The water was not very deep either and my legs jarred as I felt the ground under my hooves. On those unsteady hooves I pushed myself away from the wet ground and forward through the water. My limbs felt heavy but, I was not going to stop.

My side brushed into something metal and twisted again and then another something scrapped against body but, thankfully neither pierced my skin. It still hurt though. I stretched forward my hoof out as a guide to allow me to feel if there was any more metal in front of me. Despite this precaution I scrapped against several more pieces twisted metal that seemed to randomly litter this pool of water. After several meters and precious minutes of blind groping in the dark I stumbled forward and back onto dry, well, drier soil. 

I paused a moment to catch my breath when the tunnel was filled with a sudden THUD and splashing water as something very large dropped into the water behind me. The monster roared again as I heard rather then saw metal scrape and twist. Of course a little fall would not hurt its armored body. It lived in this tunnel. Even if it could see there was no way it could move around without bumping into something that would have easily cut right through me. I heard it move forward in my direction again, it seemed to push aside the like it was walking through a paper bag! 

Oh how I wanted this twisted nightmare to be over! If I could I would have switched  places with some other mare from Stable 81 if it got me out of this but, no the universe just laughed at me as the pain from my earlier fall seemed to pulse worse with pain. 

“Celestia horn buck this with her horn right through!” I mumbled, my cheeks grew red at such unlady like language but, it needed to be said to motivate me. If Pompadour or that new servant, Gets-My-Haytoast-Wrong, had been there I would have raised a hoof to them. Neither of them were though and I had to make due. I spat with disgust and hobbled forward into the tunnel. This tunnel had better had be leading me out and not to some dead end where the monster trailing me would corner me and-

No! No, no, no. Must not think about that.  No. Just, no. This place would not get to me. Did it not know who the Tartarus I was? I am Precious! I am Precious! I AM PRECIOUS! The anger of my poor situation boiled so abruptly inside of me I turned around in the tunnel and screamed it, my voice echoed in the tunnel “I AM PRECIOUS! DO YOU KNOW WHAT THAT MEANS? IT MEANS YOU ARE GOING TO BE SO VERY SOR-”

“GRRRRAAAAAUGHRH” the monster roared back, utterly crushing the sound of my voice underneath its bestial voice. The tunnel seemed to shake around me. I could not see but, I certainly heard as bits and pieces of the tunnel’s ceiling and sides fell to the ground at my hooves. 

“Right then… Ta, ta!” I did not care that it felt like the skin of my wound was tearing wider. I did not care that my frantic paced flight had me running into or tripping over strewn rubble. I scrapped my knees and chipped my perfect hoof job.  My once exquisite Stable barding had become torn in several places ruining the fabric. As much as a part of me wanted to faint on a small couch I would get out of here or I would get out of here! Death was not an option for someone as important as me! 
Perhaps it had been my words or my raw conviction or maybe even it was the fact that the world revolved around me but, the darkness had actually started to get lighter after that. It was like the dim glow of the Stable that I could see underneath my door when I shut off the lights. Finally, I was making progress. There was some sort of illumination. Rather than fill me with delight it filled me with disgust as I could finally make out the details of the tunnel I had been in.

It was even worse than the levels the peasants lived on. Before today I had not thought that possible but, here the walls while clearly they had been crafted by ponies were in utter ruin. The straight walls of concrete were cracked or overgrown with some sort of green plant or ended in jagged rubble. I had been thus far been climbing over centuries worth of eroded concrete from the tunnel itself. As I cantered farther I began to notice that while the ground was becoming even for some reason two straight lines of metal bisected by rotten wooden planks stretched off toward what I hoped was the entrance to this tunnel. Even as I questioned why some idiotic pony would lay two metal rails parallel to each other I nearly screamed out.

Why was there what appeared to be a large metal box in the middle of my path? I had nearly cantered straight into it. Going around the metal box I saw that it had what looked like worn out wheels on the sides. Why would anypony have this down here? What was it for? I did not know but, I did care that somepony had dared put it in my way!  If there had not been enough space to either side of it to continue down the tunnel then I probably would have it hit it or if she had been there had Brute Force hit it for me. 

I slipped around the metal box and then I immediately forgot my thoughts about how I would have the pony who had put the metal box there thrown into the cells for a week. That pony was more than likely dead anyway. No, what did matter was that as I moved around the metal box I saw that the tunnel finally ended. There a quick dash in front of me was a way out! From where I was it looked like it opened up into a much larger chamber but, as I raced toward it I did not care if it had brought me out to the communal cafeteria with the peasants and their open mouthed chewing! 

I felt like I had staggered from one end of the upper levels to the other a gazillion times. The pain from my earlier wound was a dull throb. That had to be a good sign, right? At every step I expected myself to just collapse or the monster to snap me in its jaws but, as I crossed out of the tunnel it never happened! I was out! The monster had not eaten me. I had come out on top like I always-

As my eyes adjusted to the new not-so-dark I looked up and for what seemed like the tenth time I vomited. Of course I had long since given up my dinner so all I had was stomach acid, spit, and the contents of the tunnel water I had swallowed before. I barely noticed as my eyes just kept looking up and up! Where was the ceiling? Was it covered in this dark mass of clouds? This I knew was the sky but, why did it have to be so…so high! Not only that. It was moving too.

This was nothing like my mural; it shifted like some living, ceiling carpet. Then I saw beyond it through small holes that appeared and disappeared into the mass above me. My brain tried to comprehend the sky but it panicked and dived for cover. I did the same and desperately clung to the ground as my senses screamed at me I would fall upward into the void beyond the clouds! As I tried to bury my head in the dirt with my hooves I peeked through and beyond I could see a blurry, grey structure and beyond that I could see the sky just went on and on in all directions. 

This was impossible.

As my mind came to terms with the real meaning of ‘outside’, I heard a loud crunch behind me followed by a familiar growl. By all my nightmares how could it possible look even more terrifying in this half-dark, half-light then it had in the illumination of the Stable or the void of the tunnel? I did not know but, it did! Oh it certainly did as it fixed me with its beady eyes and roared again before it charged me. It was then that I realized that I was in more danger then IO had been in the tunnel where in the tunnel it had been mostly cramped and unable to move properly. Out here in this…openness…I realized that it could take full lumbering steps which allowed it to move toward me much easier and quicker. 

“My horn is a strap-on…” I muttered words I had heard Bulletproof mumble to Brute Force before I screamed and kicked my body from the ground. I glued my eyes to the ground and just ran with all the energy I had in me but, for every several steps I took the monster could match me in two. I knew I had been running in the direction of the grey structure I had seen earlier but, running with my head down I only saw the broken pieces of concrete that littered the ground and only moments before I hit them. The first one bruised my ribs and knocked the air out of my chest. 

I groaned in such an un-lady like fashion and stumbled to the side and continued to run, a bit slower and less straight then I had been before. If I lived I would find a magic, time box and throttle the ponies that left these things in front of. I tilted my head up just enough so I could see in front of me without looking up at the sky. My eyes begged to look up into the sickening sky, why did they want to betray me? It was like eating something I knew would be bad for my figure. 

“THIS PLACE IS MAKING ME CRAZY!” I shouted and spared a glance behind me. That saved my life as I saw the open jaws of the monster slam down toward me. Without looking I jumped to the left and slammed into a small, stone wall or fence that sent me toppling over it. The monster’s head crashed into the ground past me, kicking up mounds of dirt before it too smashed into a different section of the stone wall. Whereas I had fallen over the wall to the other side, its head just kept going through the wall to the other side. 

“Gak…rrrgh…mugelfwips…” my mouth spewed when I tried to climb to my hooves. I had no clue Equestria could spin so fast. The buildings around me bowed to me and I bowed back as I accepted their invitation to dance. I climbed on all hooves and cantered two steps before I collapsed again on the ground in a heap of pain. Even talking hurt as I soon found out “This…is beneath…me…” 

As the world slowly came back into focus I wondered why in the minutes spent splayed out across the ground so scandalously, why had the monster not lumbered over and had itself what probably would have been the best meal of its life. I looked over and found out. The monster had kept on plowing forward until it hit the gray structure. Now that I had not been running for my life I could take stock of the world around me. I could make out that the structure was several dozen feet tall and was actually a sort of platform. To either side of it raised columns that burdened a bridge of concrete and metal that stretched out to be lost from my view by even more obstructing structures! The farther I looked the darker it was and it obscured any details. Was the sea from my mural on the other side of the buildings or dozens more of this monster? Not knowing everything was infuriating. I cursed the half-light of this place and jumped back a few feet when the monster roared! I looked over to the monster and what I saw made me laugh and smile for the first time in what seemed like ages.

“What is the matter? Stuck?” I teased after I realized that the monster’s head had become stuck within the platform.  Concrete and metal had fallen onto its neck as part of the wall where it had rammed through collapsed on top of it. The heavy plated armor of its back protected it from being decapitated but, It could not lift its head up. It could only move backward and its slow movement made it hard for it to properly pull itself out from the rubble. For now the more it moved the more the rubble buried its head.

“Muwahahahaeheheheee…” I could not help but, laugh at its predicament. Finally some measure of dominance had been made over this beast. Though, I doubted its puny brain could comprehend that being a princess I was blessed.  Still, even if it understood that it would not matter. It would get itself unstuck and soon. Of course by then I had to be long gone but, as I looked around I realized that it or some other horror would be able to run me down or find me if I tried to wander off in this alien ground. 

No, I had to not just be away from this monster but, out of reach. I looked up toward the platform. It certainly looked inaccessible to the monster’s bulk, I trotted to side to side around it to look for some way up but, it looked like it was equally inaccessible to me. To one side there was the crumbled, ruined shape of a stairway that at one point would have allowed dozens of ponies or even the monster to climb to the platform. One side of the platform had collapsed on top of it making it impossible to climb the boulders of rubble. There had to be some way to get up! The monster roared for what seemed like the hundredth time and immediately I felt my temper rise, “Oh, would you just be quiet you horrible-“ 

That was when I noticed right above the monster’s humped backside a metal ladder climbed straight up to the top of the platform. My jaw dropped. Damn, this half -light. Would the ponies that worked on the lighting of this place just turn the lights on already?  My eyes dropped back to the struggling form of the monster and I did not like how its clawed feet and large tail struck out at the ground and air violently as it worked to pull its body out.  I realized what I would have to do and in response my body disobediently began to rebel, the pains accumulated since leaving Stable 81 seemed to all protest this new insanity all at once. 

No, stop it. Stop it! I cantered back a few steps, my legs trembled but, I had no choice. I agreed with them all but, I would surely  be dead if I tried anything else. If I ran back to Stable 81 I would just get lost in the darkness. I told myself to just imagine that I was climbing the stairs back to my level…back to my room with all my nice, pretty dresses yes, I was leaving this commoner to rot below in its own mire…

I sucked in the putrid air, only then I realized that this was a bad idea as my bruised ribs shot pain through my body, but my legs had already begun to charge. I ignored the pain and screamed the whole way.

“EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEI!” 

I galloped forward and bent down on my knees as the monster’s tail whipped overhead, just brushing against my mane, and jumped to just above the base of its tail. My forehooves scrambled for some sort of steady purchase as my hind hooves planted themselves on the monsters thick, gnarled scales just above its tail. My forehooves found some purchase on the monster’s scarred, battered shell and I used that to lift my body up. I did not have the time to think or allow my body to freeze up so I continued to charge up the monster’s back. My heart hammered in my chest and all witty and intelligent thought ceased as I scrambled up the monster’s back for the ladder. The monster’s body bucked below me and made my ascent harder, but I was Precious and would not be defeated so easily. I nearly slipped off when one of my hooves failed to find purchase but, I managed to kick my body onto a section I could use. 

“EEEEEEE!”

I would have congratulated myself when I reached the top of the monster’s shell but, I had noticed the metal ladder start to move away. I realized the monster had finally been able to remove itself from the wall. I looked down to see its beady eyes swing in my direction. Without thinking or complaining or worrying or arguing I jumped from the monster’s back and flew through the air at the ladder. My body hit the metal ladder like I had hit a metal ladder. The rungs added new bruises to my already battered body but, I managed to wrap my hooves around them and hold on for dear life. 

I had made it! 

The adrenaline drained from me as I felt the rusted, cool metal and my heart beat slowed. I would worry about the possible tetanus and rust stains on my clothes later which shocked me. I did not care about how my clothes looked? Oh, how the outside had changed me!  I was pulled out of my shock by the monster as its jaw clamped on the end of my tail. “AH!” 
“Not the tail! Not my beautiful tail!” I shrieked as I felt myself being tugged back down. I struggled to hold onto the ladder as I screeched in pain as I felt every single fiber of the hair from the tip of my tail become pulled out all at once. The monster could choke on my hair as I whipped my freed tail up and found a second rush of adrenaline to climb the ladder. I cried and screamed the entire way. 

At the top my trembling hooves pulled my body onto the platform. I rolled over as far away as possible from the platform’s edge. So help me, Mother, Celestia, and Luna I swore I would never do that again. Even as I did the darkness of the tunnel began to return as my vision blurred. Before I slipped into unconsciousness I heard my PipBuck beep and some pony’s voice begin to speak.

“HIIIIIIII MOM!!!”

-

The eyes. They never stopped looking. I did not want to look at them. I never did. I looked away but, they were there too. Nevermore. They surrounded me. Nevermore. Weeping tears of blood. I screamed at them to stop but, they never listened. Nevermore. The eyes exploded in blood and I drowned in that blood. Nevermore. The blood had become black and something new. A voice. A new voice. Nevermore. I could not hear it. It was- 

Nevermore.

-

When I managed to regain consciousness the first thing I felt was a momentary numbness followed by a wave of pain that crashed over me. Every fiber of my body ached and ached. Why would it not stop?

“Hnnnngh…make it stop Maitre’D…Brute Force…Bulletproof…” I groaned. The recent events flooded my mind first with the sight of seeing a crushed Bulletproof then soon followed by the rest. Had that all happened to me? Was this a dream? I rolled onto my side but, a sharp searing pain from my side prompted me to roll onto my other side and look to it. My eyes were met by a gash that was every color I despised, red, black, and a Pompadour green. I remembered my fall from last night and now looking at my side I could see that not only could I see the vein and muscle underneath my skin but, also from laying down grit now covered the repugnant wound. Not my perfect coat, it was ruined! I pushed my hoof against the wound hoping to wipe it off and was immediately disappointed that it did not wipe away, disgusted by the raw feel of my flesh, and shocked with an intense bolt of pain. 

I gritted my teeth together and flopped onto my backside, kicking my hooves at the torment I was going through. This had never happened to me before. The closest I had come to it was when I was a foal and had tripped on my dress. I had screamed for Mother but, she never came. Bulletproof had picked me off and told me everything was going to be alright. His words seemed hollow now. Was he even alive? What good were his words now if he was dead? I looked up and stared into the sky and the endless blanket of grey fluff that stretched out in all directions. I felt my stomach tighten.

“It is so…so…high.” 

I cringed and rolled on my side. I could see eternity stretching in all directions. Wait. I sat up on my hooves. I could see. There was light everywhere. The light…the light…it was so…so…so bucking bright! I screamed and covered my eyes with my hooves “AURGH”.

It was too true. I just knew I could feel my perfect pupils sizzle. I hated the outside. First, it was too dark, then it was not light enough, and now there was too much light! I stamped my hoof to the ground. I hated the outside. Not only was it dangerous and did not seem to know what light setting was perfect for me it looked nothing like the mural in my bedroom! With this bright light I could make out every gritty, grimy, and disgusting detail of the landscape from my position. 

To either side of the platform there was empty space surrounded by decayed ruins of buildings of various sizes and shapes. On one side the space between the platform and the buildings was dominated by a concrete or stone square which was covered with dozens of metal carriages and carts. On the other side I had come from that direction and could make out in great detail the stone barrier I had tripped over, the dirt field I had been chased across and the tunnel which I had emerged from. The tunnel itself looked like a rectangular, concrete box that had been pushed into the ground. The entrance was surrounded by ancient machines that looked like they were made to dig in the ground. I noticed the same metal lines that I had seen toward the tunnel’s entrance were also here on the platform. They were lined up in the center of the platform bridge that stretched in opposite directions. 

There also seemed to be a large number of puddles surrounding the entrance to the tunnel.  I did not know or care why that was as much as I did not care about why there was a tunnel outside the entrance of Stable 81. I did not care for anything that had to do with this place outside of Stable 81. The more I spent outside of Stable 81 the more frustrating this place become; I suspected it was making me see flashing lights. 

No, on closer inspection the flashing lights had nothing to do with the outside but, my PipBuck. Naturally I did not have much use for my PipBuck at all and so while Stable 81’s teacher, Dull Lecture, had taught basic PipBuck functions the lessons had not stuck for me. Why would I ever have use for the programs Dull Lecture went on and on about? I don’t believe many of the commoners in Stable 81 had much use for the PipBuck either. They really only used it to tell the time or listen to Stable 81’s radio broadcast which featured announcements from Mother and the Stable’s limited music selections. The songs made my ears metaphorically bleed. 

I had at first been so eager to receive my PipBuck but, I protested to Mother against wearing it as the cold, dull reality of my…condition… settled in for me and I realized that wearing it would make me have something in common with the other ponies. She would hear none of my righteous pleas. She said rules were rules and that no pony was beyond them. I had felt betrayed by her hypocrisy. She was the Overmare. She was supposed to make the rules. The authority of Stable-Tec was long gone even in this…this wasteland.

I shook my head in frustration. I would deal with this place, as inconvenient as it was, later. The source of this flashing had to be dealt with first. I looked at the flashing light and realized that it was a neat square in the upper corner of my vision. Ah, did not Dull Lecture mention something about something appearing in my vision as the result of a spell or something when something updated in my PipBuck or something like that? I read the text:

>Stable-Tec Transmission Found…<
>P.S. Transmission Auto-Broadcast Set…<
>P.S Transmission B4 001: Downloaded…<
>P.S. Transmission B4 001: Activated…<

Stable-Tec?  P.S. Transmission? Before what? Why wasn’t any of this making any sense? Perhaps this place had fun in not making sense. While a few of my questions were answered when I finally managed to find the ‘Notes’ section amongst my PipBuck’s functions and listen to the downloaded message I still was left wondering. The garbled whine of electronic static left me with no clue who that the mare in the message had been. Perhaps she would have been proud and surprised to discover that her experiment had lasted through the destruction of Equestria and the following centuries.  The Diamond Dog despite his name sounded absolutely atrocious. 

As I listened I could not help myself but replay the message to listen to the bustling background noises. This place was dead and ruined now but, back then it seemed so alive and vibrant as hundreds of ponies went about their lives. I did not know why I spent several minutes replaying the message for this part. Maybe I wished I could be back then and there when it was beautiful rather than now and here where it was absolutely dreadful. 

I also wondered why it had been my PipBuck that had found the message. The only possible answer to that would have to be because I was the only pony wearing a PipBuck. I wondered if the mare had ever discovered that this form of message leaving could be awfully inconvenient since anypony with a PipBuck could download these messages.  Speaking of inconvenient, as I looked at my PipBuck screen I saw something that stopped my heart beat. 

My reflection.

I.

Looked.

Absolutely.

TERRIBLE!!!!

My bloodshot eyes stared back at me from a haggard looking face that was scratched and bruised. My blonde mane was disheveled and had bits of derbies and dirt. Dirt! Icky, nasty, dirt! I had just discovered it but, I hated it. Oh how I needed that shower. My mane had even practically been stained completely green by whatever the contents of the tunnel water had been. Which while of course I did not want to dwell on that it did make me remember the words of the panicking mare. Radiation would cause me to lose my hair! My eye twitched uncontrollably as I cantered back to the edge of the platform and looked down at the tunnel to Stable 81.

Maybe, I could sneak past the monster. It had to sleep sometime did it not? I could sneak past it and…and…bang on the Stable door and beg Mother to let me back in. Then I would run right back to my room and shower. I would buck Pompadour in the face and shower again and again until every last molecule of the outside was scrubbed from me. Mother would hug me and we would never speak of any of this ever again. Hehehe. Oh yes, this plan was perfect. Hehe. It would work without fail. Heheheha. I was the Princess of Stable 81 after all. Hehehehahahaha!  

I had to smack myself to stop mad laughter from continuing to escape my lips. Think Precious. Think. Think. Think. There is no way that thing would let you past it. No, the only solution has to come from Mother and Stable 81. There had to be weapons in the Stable capable of destroying that monster. Stable-Tec would of course have equipped the Stable with weapons capable of dealing with a monster tortoise…turtle…torturle, whatever it was!  They were in the apocalyptic survival business; they must have planned for this. Mother had to have had something up her sleeves.  I just knew underneath all that Overmare protocol she cared for me. 

She had to, right?

That would mean that a rescue had to be underway and that the best thing I could do was wait right here. So that is exactly what I did. Of course I was never one to sit still for long, I always had new dresses to try on or orders to give out. Of course my body was still bruised and it ached unbearably which made my movements stiff and painful.  As time passed I busied myself while I waited for Mother’s imminent arrival. I did my best to pick out the dirt from my mane and coat. While it pained me I ripped off a portion of my Vault barding to cover my side wound which looked nastier as time moved by. To banish the mental image of my bones still waiting for Mother two hundred more years from now I counted the number of windows, I grew bored with this after 5,356, and overcame my previous vertigo and planned Pompadour’s punishment.
As time stretched on and on so did my weariness. The sky had amazingly darkened on its own and the more I waited the more I found myself being able to move around or think. Waiting was exhausting work for me. I looked over to the tunnel entrance for the thousandth time and for the thousandth time my hope for rescue were crushed. I yawned and blinked, my eyes would not open all the way anymore. I just needed some beauty sleep, yea that was it. I needed to be refreshed to greet Mother. I climbed up onto the remains of a broken bench and laid my head down.  
Before I realized it I had fallen asleep again.

-

I was awoken from my empty dreams by a sound I had never heard before.  For a moment I seized up in fear thinking that it was the thudding movement of the monster but, then I realized the sound was completely different. This new sound was not the movement of leathery legs the size of ponies but, a sort of…ompha-ompha-ompha noise that moved in an ordered beat. It was music. I peered out into the now half-dark ‘night’, I surprisingly had remembered Dull Lecture’s term for when it was dark like this in Equestria. I was glad I was not staying around long enough to get used to that term. 

I peered out into the night but, I could not see where the music was coming from.  The sound echoed off all of these buildings. Argh how I hated buildings. Anyway, the sound echoed off the buildings so much I could not tell if the sound had been coming from somewhere away or right next-

“Don’t scream…” 

“EEEEEK!”

Just as the music suddenly stopped a tiny, metallic voice spoke right behind where I had laid down. I screamed and jumped away from the sound of the voice onto the platform. I looked and saw a round, metal ball-thing which hovered in the air on what looked like tiny wings. In instinct I concentrated my horn magic on a chunk of rubble the size of the ball-thing and heaved it at the creature. I imagined I was hurling a plate at Maitre’D’s or What-Was-His-Name’s head. The ball-thing just managed to dip aside as my impromptu missile continued to sail over the side of the platform to the ground below. I wrapped my magic around another piece of rubble and continued to scream as I hurled this one. The ball-thing continued to speak.

“Ah! Hold on I-“  it ducked aside again and continued to float toward me. I scrambled away from it down toward the bridge section of the platform. My head was already splitting into a pounding head ache from overuse of my magic. “Wait, stop! 
Don’t go that-“ 

I wrapped my telekinesis spell over one last chunk of concrete and hurled it with my last ounce of energy. The concrete sailed forward straight and true, the  ball-thing did not even try to duck. Instead a bright beam of red energy zapped from it and split my projectile in two. Unfortunately for it while the red beam did split the concrete in two the trajectory of one of the pieces smashed into the ball-thing’s side. It hovered for a moment longer before it sparked and fell to the ground. 

I…I could not believe I had just done that. I had actually saved myself from what seemed like certain death. I always let Brute Force or Bulletproof or some other Security pony deal with protecting me against harm. It felt somewhat good actually. This adrenaline was triumphant, not anything like the fear-fueled adrenaline I had used the previous night to run for my life. My body throbbed painfully from the overuse of magic and my other injuries but, I dismissed this as acceptable given my overwhelming victory.

“Danger…you…help…” the ball-thing sparked as the metallic voice spoke, “Behind…bad…are…out…”
I cantered to the ball-thing, which now I could see was some sort of  robot bug-thing. The bug-thing-robot said one more thing before it seemed shut down completely.

“…run.”

Run? Run to somewhere? No, maybe it had meant run to something or run to someone. Perhaps it had meant to say run from-

“Well, well, well. Aren’t you a fine piece of flank.” A voice rumbled from behind me. 

“Celestia blow me hard. I gotta agree with you for once, Uncle.” A second voice agreed. 

“Who-?” I turned around to face the voices. I had for those scant moments harbored a speck of hope that this was the rescue that Mother had sent for me. Of course that bit of hope was crushed just like I had crushed the bug-robot. 

“Front matches the back. Don’t it, Uncle Shackle?” a blue stallion knickered as his eyes moved over me.  

“Hah! For once in you’re right, Blue Balls” the beige Unicorn replied to the Earth pony as he licked his teeth. 

“My name’s Nut Cracker!” the first stallion growled at the other stallion and shot him an annoyed look. 

“I’ll call you like my sister named you. What’s the matter? Getting a little…choked up are we?” the Unicorn laughed before he cleared his throat and spit a wad of phlegm on the ground.

I had thought I was filthy. These two…two…could I even call them  Ponies? They both looked as filthy as I was and doubled each. Even in the dark I could see not only were they covered in dirt but, even the common ponies in Stable 81 had the sense to never wear the crudely sewn rags these two ponies wore as clothes. The stench of their unwashed bodies slammed into my nose just as I had the wall on the ground, I supposed it was too much to ask that one of them may have carried soap in their saddlebags. To complete their horrific looks both ponies wore identical brown, wide-brimmed hats that were patched and looked moldy.

Their language though sparked the first fire of anger I had felt in hours. Such profanity and it was being directed at me! I would never have stood for being ogled by any pony that was not at least a prince, and here these two flea-bitten strangers were. I pointed my nose up and glared at the two with a look that nopony could have missed that said ‘Listen you worthless piece if trash!’

“How dare you! Do you know who I am?” at that exact moment a small section of the cloud layer above me parted to let shine a patch of moon and starlight below. I could not have asked for more perfect timing. Though I was disheveled greatly even if these two shared a single brain they would recognize my importance and show me the respect I deserved.

Instead, they stared for several moments then pulled out what appeared to be weapons. The Unicorn floated what looked like a rusted, silver pistol with a revolving chamber while the Earth pony clutched from his back a sports bat in his teeth.

“Thh Schable Dwewellwah.”

“Hah. I can’t believe we cornered THE Stable Dweller.” Uncle Shackle laughed then paused. He moved closer and shined his horn light over me and looked closer. “Aren’t you supposed to be over by FIllydelphia or Manehatten?”

“Daths whabt Deejuahhpawnthwee sawid”

“Yea, and that’s what Bruisehilde said Stern said too. She has Stable barding but…”

“Whawth she dueinth ind Bawtihmawe?”

“Tartarus if I know. Hey, tell us girly. Are you THE Stable Dweller? You’d better answer quick or I’ll blow your brains out!” 
The Stable Dweller? I was not sure what these two morons were talking about. Yes, I supposed I was A Stable Dweller. I was certainly the most important pony dwelling in my Stable but, I did not think I was the specific pony these two had been going on about. The thought did cross my mind to tell them I was this pony they had been talking about but, I dismissed that idea. I was Precious. I would not stoop low to call myself some commoner pony.

“No, I do not know who this ‘Stable Dweller’ is or half the words that seemed to plop out of your mouths. I am Precious, the Princess of Stable 81 and as such-“

Uncle Shackled interrupted me by whipping his pistol across my face. I crumbled to the ground in a heap. Another pony had stuck me! A common, dirt pony had hurt me! I was paralyzed with shock despite the blinding pain across my face. 
“Well, I suppose if you’re not the Stable Dweller then we don’t have to blow your mouthy, bitchy face off. “ Uncle Shackle holstered his pistol and instead floated a pair of his namesake around my forehooves. My PipBuck made it so he had to shackle my left leg above the knee. 

“Dawhn…” Blue Ball paused to spit out his bat, “Don’t Red Eye pay big for finding Stables? We can get a huuuuge finder’s fee on top of all the other crap Bruisehilde wants us to map out for him.”

“Right you are my boy. Just as soon as the little ‘Princess’, hah, here tells us where her Stable is. I figure she will tell us after a little-”

“Down there! It is down there in the tunnel” I shouted and pointed over the platform toward the tunnel.  I did not want to imagine what he had been going to say. An insignificant part of me felt slightly guilty about what possibly could have been interpreted as betraying my home and Mother but, I reasoned that these two idiots would have the same big problem I had.  If they were competent just enough maybe they could have killed the monster for me!

“Wait a moment.” Blue Ball’s words worried me as he turned around and pulled out a piece of folded paper from his saddlebags which he proceeded to unfold. “It says here that right here is…that nasty, ass boglurk’s home territory!”

“What? Let me see that map.” Uncle Shackle floated the map over to him and peered at it. He let out a long whistle then laughed. “Well, damn. No wonder nopony else ever found that Stable. The Mother-of-All-Boglurks is squatting right over it!”

“Shit, that would explain why this little fucker is all messed up looking. When were you going to tell us about that Goddess-damned thing? Huh?” Blue Ball emphasized his words with a sharp kick to my ribs. I cried and curled myself into a trembling ball. I sobbed thick tears of pain and silently vowed I would make these two pay for treating me so low born. 
Blue Ball kicked me several more times before Uncle Shackle intervened and told him to ‘not damage the merchandise’. 

Before I could see the map Uncle Shackle put it in his own saddlebags and had Blue Ball nail my shackles to the ground with a large spike. The two stallions ordered me to go to sleep and then went to sleep themselves. I tried to disobey but after the 

last day’s events and injuries I was exhausted. The next morning I was kicked rudely awake and made to stand.
It was then that after so long Uncle Shackle forced down my throat a healing potion. While it did mend my open wounds and relieved my bruised body it left a jagged scar along my midsection where my wound from my fall in the tunnel had been. Equestria had thus far greatly tested my limits to curse it and I vowed I would not let a single insult or injury slip by without protest. I imagined a list in my mind where at the top there had been Pompadour but, now his spot was occupied by dirt, sunlight, and the two slavers.

“Uuuuhh…these shackles are too tight and their filthy. When was the last time you washed them? When was the last time you washed yourselves?” I whined as I was made to trot on top the bridge that I now knew was called ‘The Metro’, w hich was short for the ‘Metro Railway System. The Metro crossed the city of Baltimare, where I was, and once allowed ponies to travel on ‘train cars’ throughout the city and to other places in Equestria. Despite the destruction and ruin of Baltimare apparently most sections of the Metro still stood and it allowed safe if not conspicuous traffic throughout the city. As Uncle Shackle and Blue Ball forced me to walk since day break I had probed the two with questions, I allowed them the small satisfaction of grinning at me like I was an idiot but, I promised I would make them pay for that later. 

I had also discovered that Uncle Shackle and Blue Ball were not from Baltimare but, from a city called Fillydelphia which was ruled by somepony named Red Eye. They did not exactly outright say it but, I managed to piece together at least that they and a small army had come to Baltimare and taken over some place called ‘Oasis’ which was up the Metro. The way they derided the ponies of Oasis for not ‘joining up with Red Eye when they could have’ told me that this Oasis had and was still full of more uncouth slavers. Apparently they had been sent into Baltimare to spy for this Red Eye and verify the goods and dangers of Baltimare on the map they had taken from the Oasis ponies.  

“Oh, and I am terribly thirsty. I need some water or maybe even some cider.” I continued to whine as we passed into the shadow of a skyscraper that overlooked the Metro. 

“Celestia and Luna’s horns fuck my ear tubes! Would you fucking shut up already?” Blue Balls cried with a hoof over his ears. He raised a leg and I instinctively steadied myself as he kicked me again. I had soon discovered that of the two Blue Balls was most prone to lashing out at me when I annoyed him. Uncle Shackle though only muttered under his breath and told Blue Ball to not ‘damage the merchandise’.  They were going to sell me off or something but, would not hurt me too much which meant I was free with minor charge to take my little revenges against them until I could escape or something. 

“Well, it is true…” I coughed as I shuffled back onto my hooves and smiled wickedly, “You do smell quite awful.” 

“Cunt! I swear-“

“Shut up the both of you! We’re at the Midtown platform. We’re going to ground from here. I don’t want to attract any raiders or boglurks that may be wandering around, do you?” Uncle Shackle growled as he put away the map into his saddle bags again. That made Blue Balls and I quiet down. 

I noticed that we had come upon another platform like the one I had first sought refuge on. I had seen several similar ones after the hours of walking and while at first I had been skeptical of the Metro’s integrity it did not collapse once. What was the Midtown Platform had been most likely nearly identical to the platform I had hid on but, time had been merciful enough to the Midtown Platform to not knock over the flight of stone stairs that lead down to the ground. The buildings here crowded around the Metro here and until went down to the ground and around one of the buildings I had been unable to make much detail of where we were. Once we rounded the building though we cantered into an area of the city that was much more open and had small buildings. What kind of pony had designed this city? Why crowd the Metro with skyscrapers that blocked all view and hide these smaller buildings behind it? 

“Looks like map has been pretty right so far.” Uncle Shackle whinnied as we came up to a strange place. It was a field of some kind that had four little white squares set in a diamond like pattern. At the end of the field a cage like fence stood between what looked like two wooden shacks and behind each there were two sets of metal bleachers. Behind all of that stood a rusted and slightly leaning water tower that had the faded words ‘Midtown’ written across it. Blue Ball seemed to become excited as he drew out his sports bat in his mouth and trotted up to one of the little squares and proceeded to swing his bat at the air. Was he crazy hitting the air like that? A sharp taunt had begun to form on my lips but, I choked it back when I realized that there were bodies of ponies strapped to the metal fence. 

“Woohoo! A field!” Blue Ball said, or at least that was what I interpreted his tongue behind the shaft of his bat as having had said. On closer look I saw that the pony bodies were actually pony body parts and they were skeletons. They were bleached white and picked completely clean of living flesh so much so that the rags that had been their clothing had simply fallen off. I tried not to imagine any of the randomly placed remains as they had been with meat on their bones. 

“Short Round Field.” Uncle Shackle said as he cantered past me, as he did my PipBuck chirped. I looked to him to see if he had noticed but, he continued walking and talking. I brought my PipBuck up to see that the screen had switched itself to what looked like a map and on the map flashed a square icon that said the same words that Uncle Shackle had ‘Short Round Field’. What had happened to my PipBuck? Had it updated itself when Uncle Shackle had spoken or when I had moved closer to the location? I supposed the spell matrix within the PipBuck already had this location but, a quick glance at my map showed the rest of it was blank other than some odd outlines. Furthermore, why had I not noticed the map feature before when I could have used in in the tunnel or on the platform? I shook my head and listened to Uncle Shackle again “…pissants at Oasis said was true about the folks at Midtown giving the horseshoe to a bunch of raiders that had camped here.”

“True that. Of course once we get to Midtown, YOU will have to be a nice and quiet little cunt.” Blue Balls pointed a hoof at me as he placed his bat on his back. “If you aren’t and go blabbing to the ponies there then you won’t even make it before we get to the Steel Rangers outposts.”

Steel Rangers. I had heard them talk about the Steel Rangers with hate filled tones before looking at me and whispering to each other so I could not hear them. Maybe, now was the time to find out more about the Steel Rangers now that Blue Ball was in a ‘good mood’.

“Steel Rangers? They sound absolutely dreadful.” I said in the most disinterested tone I could summon.

“Hah. Right you are for once. Those high and mighty grave diggers are a pain in the flank in Fillydelphia but, it would seem that their leader in Baltimare is much more…practical. Once we get there we’re gonna sell your PipBuck for a nice little side profit before selling your flank to the highest bidding or meanest flank pounding-“ Blue Ball was interrupted by Uncle Shackle who trotted up to and smacked him over the face.

“Shut up, you darn big mouth. If you don’t learn to shut your trap it is going to cost you some day.” Uncle Shackle smacked Blue Ball again before he trotted toward the two shacks at the end of the field. 

“Not like she is gonna be able to talk to anypony…” Blue Ball muttered and grinned evilly at me. He stomped a hoof and pointed at my mouth. I felt a chill run down my spine. As we moved closer to the shacks I noticed something…odd. 
For one the shacks were not really shacks. They had metal roofs but, they looked only half built as the side facing the field just opened up to long pits with benches that just looked like they had been dug out. Second, the ground in front of the dugout on the left did not match the greyish-brownish dirt. It was coated red with what smelled like fresh blood. 

“Shit, don’t tell me those pukes at Midtown missed a raider.” Uncle Shackle growled as he lifted his pistol into the air and 
advanced on the dugout. 

“If one’s hiding around here we should be able to find it just fine.” Blue Ball turned to me and growled “Bitch! Use that E.F.S. that PipBucks have and see if there are any raiders nearby.”

I stared at Blue Ball like he had grown a second head. 

“What?” I scrunched my face. Something about what he said sounded familiar but, I could not quite place it. 

“Damn it you little fucker. Don’t play games with me. Use your PipBuck or I’ll come over there and shove this bat right up your-“

"GRRRRRRR."

Blue Ball’s words died in his mouth. His head turned slowly toward the dugout and so did mine as once more from the depths of this wasteland another horror arrived. 

To be more precise. All three of us looked to see as from within a shady corner of the dugout two long fur covered arms topped with two large claws caked in dried blood emerged. The claws gripped the end of the dugout and pulled out a twisted, beastial shape. From atop its large and powerful fur body a misshapen canine head stared out and it looked absolutely demonic! From its slavering jaws lined with rows of cracked, yellow teeth to the mass of badly healed scar tissue that made up the rest of its head. Looking closer I saw that a pair of red and blue wires only just poked out of one mass of black burned tissue. For a moment I thought it was completely naked but, I spied the thin band of a collar that looped around its neck.  It stood on two crooked, pawed legs that after they bent slightly propelled the beast forward to disembowel Uncle Shackle in one swipe of its oversized claws.

Oh, come on! 

I mentally screamed inside my head as Uncle Shackle’s blood from his missing head sprayed the ground in front of me. The beast at the moment did not pay any attention to Blue Ball and I as it plunged its claws into Uncle Shackle’s body and tore out still warm organs and meat that it greedily began to feast on. I watched as its tail thumped repeatedly into the ground so very happily. 

“W-we a-are so f-f-fucking bucked.” Blue Ball shuddered and slowly backed away from the gruesome scene. A thin line of urine trailed down his leg and faded into the dirt. 

I was inclined to agree with him except I knew that I still had so many things to do. I needed to get away from here alive. I needed to destroy the Mother-of-All-Boglurks that lurked outside of my Stable. I needed to get back into Stable 81. I needed to kick Pompadour in the face. I needed to take a long, hot shower. I needed to do my mane. I needed to sleep in my bed and wake up to my mural that showed to me a perfect Equestria. Then I needed to light a bomb and destroy this twisted place.

To do that I needed to not be fucking bucked. I needed to be like I was in Stable 81. I needed to be on top. I needed to be…on top of a water tower. 

The shackled prevented me from completely running away but, they allowed me to slowly sneak away from the dog-beast’s meal as it began to finish on the bones of Uncle Shackle. Step by step I cantered away and for the first time honestly prayed to Celestia and Luna that they would help this good little pony!  I expected at any moment to be turned into a feast but, the dog-beast seemed to like savoring its meals as I soon found myself in front of the water tower and it even had a ladder. A ladder I did not have to jump on the back of a monster creature to do! 

I had begun to climb several rungs when I felt a cold nose press against my flank. I nearly jumped off the ladder before I heard Blue Ball speak.

“Come on, come on, come on. It’s going to get us. Move that flank!” Blue Ball’s voice was a mix of freight and command as he shoved at me with his hooves. 

I wanted to say he smelled like piss but, the air filled with a hungry howl that sent me flying up the ladder. Near the top I looked down across the field and saw the black, white, and blood red blur that was the dog-beast as it ran toward the water tower on all fours kicking up clods of dirt. I cleared the ladder and fell onto the platform, underneath me I had fallen on some kind of round ball. I leaned over the side just as Blue Ball climbed over and watched as the beast stopped at the base of the water tower.

I really hoped this thing could not-FUCKING TARTARUS it was climbing the ladder after us. Eeeeee! Fuckfucfuckfuckfuck! Why did I think this was a good idea? What had I been thinking? Now I was trapped on top of a water tower with an idiot and a dog-beast was hungry for…me?

I stared at Blue Ball as he coughed and panted on the water tower’s platform. 

“Blue Ball. Quick. Look.” Time seemed to slow for me as I said those words. As he looked up at me with annoyance and fear then slowly picked himself up from the floor and moved to the edge. As he peered down I saw quite clearly the look of impending horror on his face. He did not notice my horn as it glowed and I used my magic to pull his bat from his back and hold it above his head.

I paused. 

Was I really going to do this? Could I even do it?

I had seen so much death in the last…how long had it been…two days? Right then and there I felt like it could have been an eternity and I still would have not been sure if I could kill another pony. It was so primitive and brutal but, even in Stable 81 until Mother had ordered the attack on the Tunnel Stallions I had never been close to the death of another pony. I had acted to save my own life so far only by running or technically destroying the bug-bot. Not taking the life of another pony!

I could not do it.

And yet, a voice inside my head seemed to say.

This pony had insulted me and showed the highest levels of disrespect.

I could do it. I could not do it. I could do it. I could not do it.

This pony had wrapped me in shackles and threatened to sell me as a slave.

I could do it. I could not do it. I could do it.

This pony had beaten me.

I could do it. I could not do it.

This pony had threatened to kill me.

I could do it.

All my anger at the Equestrian Wasteland just seemed to boil up inside of me and lash out. 

I heard a crack as the bat slammed into the back of Blue Ball’s head. I saw as his eyes widened in surprise and pain. I watched as he tumbled over the side of the platform and plumet to the ground below.

He did not get that far. 

The dog-beast did not let him reach the ground, instead it jumped in mid climb into the air and pounced onto Blue Ball. Blue Ball screamed as he hit the ground with a crunch and the dog-beast tore into his body and ripped him to shreds in moments. I had become good at puking by this point so I did over the platform edge. My eyes became glued to the lip-smacking scene below as the dog-beast took its time enjoying every last scrap of Blue Ball. The image seared into my brain. I only moved when I noticed that the dog-beast’s brown and blue eyes had turned from its meal to me and the bloody bat I held afloat. 

It…smiled and licked its lips.

Why-hy-hy-hy-hy? Why me? I was Precious! 

I rolled back from the platform’s edge as the beast and looked around for something or anything that could help me. Anything else besides the bat I could throw at it. I looked at the white ball I had landed on before. It was not the kitchen sink but, why not? I wrapped my magic around the ball and looked back down at the best. 

“Hey! Hey ugly!”

“Aroo?” the dog-beast looked up at me from its climb on the ladder. It locked its eyes on the ball. I moved the ball around with my magic and its eyes continued to follow the ball in a figure eight in the air. 

“Take this!” I cried and threw the ball down at it. My aim had been terrible and the ball whizzed past the dog-beast but, it actually dropped from the ladder and chased after the ball. 

What?

It wagged its club like tail happily as it picked the ball up in its mouth and jerked it between its teeth. It was drooling saliva all over it. I tried not to gag or scream as the dog-beast turned back to climbing up the ladder. I scrambled back to the opposite edge of the platform and desperately looked for someway off of this thing that did not involve me crippling my legs. 

Of course there was none.

I curled into a ball as the dog-beast pulled its large body onto the platform which seemed to creak in protest. Its claws clacked along the metal surface as it reared up above me, both claws raised to rend me limb from limb. I closed my eyes and waited for my life to flash before my eyes. At least that way I could remember all the good times of getting a pony pedicure or wearing my dresses…or even the times when Mother had loved me. 

It never came.

Not to say I was disappointed I did not feel the blood soaked claws of this dog-beast tear into my flesh as its jaws ripped open my throat. I was just surprised. 

I felt a saliva and blood soaked round object fall into my hoof and I opened my eyes to stare into the panting face of the dog-beast. It actually whined when I did not move but, then it growled and I sent it flying over the railing. The dog-beast turned and chased after the ball, scrambling back down the ladder. I slowly picked myself up and walked to the platform ledge again, not believing that any of this was happening. It rolled around in the dirt as it leapt on the ball and then picked it up and loped back to me. I repeated my throw again and it chased the ball again, and again, and again. 

Was it just toying with me before it ate me or was it actually going to let me live? I did not even know if it actually could work out complex thought but, as I climbed down the ladder I came to the conclusion that I did not care. When I reached the bottom it once more placed the ragged, lump of leather that had been the ball at my hooves. I ignored it and stiffly began to walk away back toward the field. I dragged the bat in the crook of my foreleg and tried not to look at the bloody, red stain. It did not like that. It moved in front of me again and growled as it pushed the ball to me with its paw. 

So I hit it with the bat.

Well, I tapped it on the noise. I had done some things and now I needed to either just die right there or it could move out of my way. I had weakly surrendered to Uncle Shackle and Blue Ball but, now my patience had run out. I was Precious of Stable 81. I was the Pretty, Pony Princess. I sure did not feel like it but, I was definitely one.

“Bad. Bad, dog-beast.” I angrily chastised it. Letting some of the built up emotion I had acquired bleed out in my words.
To my complete and utter surprise the dog-beast actually whimpered and back away from me several steps. It rubbed its nose and hung its head low in the dirt. 

I was Princess! Hear me roar!

I advanced on the dog-beast and it continued to step away. Well, well, well. Finally something had recognized my importance. Even if it probably had the brain the size of an apple seed. I felt so good I decided to figuratively toss the dog a bone, I did not use the ones lashed to the fence. I picked up the remains of the ball and tossed it toward the field. It barked happily and chased after it. 

As I trotted back to the field a thought suddenly came to mind. I could not continue to call this or any other creature I met ‘the dog-beast’ or ‘the bug-thing’. Even if these things already had names for themselves I either needed to learn them or find something new. Considering the dog-beast I thought it over and I think the perfect name came to mind. It did after all combine the beast’s apparent nature and its favorite thing, besides the ball. 

“Come here now. Come here now, Dog Meat.”

-
Note: Level Up!
New Perk:
-League of Your Own: +5 Melee Weapons and better use of telekinesis in melee.
Companion Trait Gained:
-Ravaging Loyalty: When your HP drops below 50% Dogmeat's overall damage increases. 
 


> Intermission One
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Howdy ho there. Just a little intermission here of Author's Notes. To give an update on progress of the next chapter, "A Hellhound and a Pony Show" I have plotted the chapter out after some review of my original idea and I have started on the beginning. There will be one potentially controversial aspect I will include in the chapter in terms of FOE Canon but, I think how I use it will be acceptable. 

Oh and I have begun commissioning artists here and there to bring Hightide to a visual life. I have down the talented sw1tchbl4de who has done cover art for Project Horizons and other FOE story art http://sw1tchbl4de.deviantart.com/ but, that will be some time. Do you want to see a cover art depicting Precious and ALL of her companions now...or should I save it for later?
I am also playing around with the idea of Audiobooking it myself...well at least that is a idea...

From the wonderful artist, Valkyrie-girl. Precious and Dog Meat as they will be in the next chapter.
 
> A Hellhound and Pony Show
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Fallout Equestria: Hightide
Chapter Three: A Hellhound and Pony Show
by King of Malta
“Ah, mystery solved. It’s your breath.”
---
“Of course. Of course you ate the keys along with everything else! Stupid dog!”

Fear and glee of the knowledge that I was not going to die as some dog-beast’s after dinner snack had been quickly replaced by annoyance and anger. Not only could I not free myself from my bindings, but that dog dared trot away as I reprimanded it! Neither, Blue Ball’s or Uncle Shackle’s shredded and blooded saddlebags contained the keys to my shackles and I had looked through them both multiple times. The only glimmer of relief I had felt was that I was able to use my magic to search the heaps of flesh and stuff that no longer resembled ponies. If I had, had to stain my slightly-worn-and-not-chipped-but-still-perfect-hooves or my mouth sifting through scraps of blood covered bones, cloth, metal, and such I would have vomited into it. 

I hoped that all the vomiting I had done recently did not corrode the enamel of my teeth from stomach acids.

“Still…” I told myself, “Better than what had happened to those two buffoons.” I shuddered and stomped down on the quick succession of memories from the last hour that flooded my mind. Why had Dog Meat spared me? Did he recognize my superior nature and accept me as some sort of Alpha Pony? To me this seemed the most likely reason, but what if he had been just grateful for the meal I had provided for him? Did he plan to save me for later and for that matter did he plan anything at all? Was there a higher intelligence behind that scarred skull of his? I looked over to where Dog Meat had trotted over to and I returned my last thought while he rolled around in the dirt and barked happily.

No, no higher intelligence there. He was just a stupid dog and from the smell that wafted off his body he needed a bath. He could wait in line for that. While I had not committed murder yet, Blue Ball had been self-defense I reasoned, but I certainly felt like I could have killed for a shower at that point. Ugh. Here I was thinking of taking a shower when I should have been taking a shower! 

While I did not normally ‘take stock of the situation’ as Brute Force would have said, I had become surprisingly adept at doing so over the last few days. While I may have fooled myself before I had since come to realize that if I wanted to destroy the Mother-of-All-Boglurks and return to my life in Stable 81 I would have to do it myself. Mother had not sent a detail of ponies to secure me then that meant that my earlier hopes of the Stable having a Mutant-Tortoise-Turtle-Thing gun had been wrong. That had since signaled to me that I needed to find something to get me back into the Stable on my own.

What was this something though? It would have to be something that could kill that thing guarding the entrance to Stable 81. Surely, somewhere in Equestria, there had to be something to kill the living tank of destruction that had chased me. I glanced at Dog Meat and grimaced as he lifted his leg to relieve himself. What if I needed more than one gun? Further, I would need somepony or even other ponies to kill the Mother-of-All-Boglurks for me or anything that stood in my way. While I had thus far sullied my hooves it had…it had always…ALWAYS been to defend myself and Blue Ball deserved it! He did! No, I was not some barbarian that killed anything. I was a lady and as such I would need…acquaintances… to do the dirty work for me. I needed an army, a loyal following, or servants who could charge down the tunnel to the entrance of Stable 81 and if needed allow me to walk over their corpses to get back to what I deserved. 

Where could I start?

A chirp from my PipBuck focused my attention to the glowing screen. The last time I had looked at the screen had been right before Dog Meat had made mincemeat of Uncle Shackle. I looked on the screen and saw again what I had seen before. A small, square icon that read ‘Short Round Field’, but this time no longer rushed by the two slavers I now noticed that two more icons graced the green and black screen. To the north and east a gear-shaped icon read ‘Stable 81’ and now to the south a few blocks a square icon with windows and a door read ‘Midtown’. 

What kind of Stable was called Midtown? 

No, that did not seem quite right. It must be some sort of above ground Stable or not-Stable. The two slavers had said they had been going to Midtown to scout it out for some pony called ‘Red Eye’ had they not? If Dog Meat had not destroyed Uncle Shackle’s map in his feeding frenzy then I might have had some clue of where else I could go for help. Still, that the two had been going to Midtown in secret told me that at least this Midtown did not look well on slavers or whoever Red Eye was. Midtown did not seem very far if I understood my PipBuck’s map correctly and it even indicated which direction Midtown was. 
My, my these PipBucks were quite useful out of the Stable. 

I hoped soon enough I would never have to use it again.

I might even get lucky and Midtown would be civilized enough to have running hot water!

“Dog Meat! Come here, boy! Come here this instant Dog Meat!” I called as I slipped the sports bat out with my magic. When Dog Meat had caught Blue Ball in midair he had torn Blue Ball apart which had been good for me since Blue Ball’s bat holster had come off without being destroyed. When I had picked through Blue Ball’s remains in my search for the key I had noticed the strap of leather to the side. It was not a dress, but as an accessory it would do for now. The sooner I returned to Stable 81 the sooner I could spend days trying on my nice, clean dresses. I raised the bat to Dog Meat’s eye level as he trotted back to me. “Alright, Dog Meat. You WILL be a good boy and you WILL follow me. No eating ponies unless I tell you to. Do you understand?”

“Woof.” Dog Meat’s eyes followed the bat while I made it sway in the air. His tongue rolled out of his muzzle as he barked and jumped in place. He wanted my bat. Oh no, I had seen what he had done to the two slavers and the ball I had thrown him before. This outside was dangerous and I was still not sure of Dog Meat’s loyalty. While a sport bat would not be much against Dog Meat or another Boglurk it was still something. I had not found any trace of the pistol that Uncle Shackle had used to beat me and that meant I did not have the desire or time to wait for it to show up again.
It was for the best. What would ponies in Stable 81 say if they had found out I had done something as menial as fire a gun? My reputation would surely have been ruined. 

“Dog Meat. Follow, follow Dog Meat.” I backed off toward the direction of Midtown and slided the sports bat back into its holster. Dog Meat looked disappointed that he did not have something else to play with, but nevertheless he followed after me. Simple minds followed the examples of their betters after all. 

I spared a glance toward the two dugouts where Dog Meat had emerged from. The rank smell that wafted from them had since kept me from investigating either one, but for a moment I pondered if it would be a good idea to investigate. Maybe something useful had been dragged there by Dog Meat or some other pony? I dismissed the idea as foalish. Dog Meat was an animal and the only thing he would have dragged there was carcasses and who would ever hide something important in plain sight? No, the sooner I arrived in Midtown the sooner I would be back where I belong.

Midtown looked as the journey to find it had been. 

Boring, short, and unappealing to every one of my senses.

The only real annoyance that had occurred on the journey to Midtown had been Dog Meat. As we traveled he seemed to hear or sense something in the ruins and would disappear randomly into the surrounding decay. A few times my ears noticed the sound of a very familiar crunching sound where then I would immediately reassure myself that no pony, even a commoner, would sulk in ruins like this. When he returned I would discipline Dog Meat with a smack to the nose and firmly commanded the mongrel as he whimpered to not leave me so exposed.

Beyond Short Round Field had been row after row of ruined structures that were not as big as the far larger buildings closer to the Metro and all seemed to be made from the same model. Intersected by several streets each structure was surrounded by a patch of dead dirt that was surrounded by picket fences that ended at cracked slabs of concrete that separated the fence and the street. Every one of these structures had been completely ruined by age and past destruction, ceilings or walls had caved in and some were nothing more than the original foundation. 

I could not imagine Ponies had ever or even still did actually live in these things.

Midtown itself was actually little more than a half a dozen of these structures that had not collapsed onto themselves or at least had been repaired and the streets surrounding them had been excavated into a moat of spiked metal and wood. My side throbbed with phantom pain at the sight of the rusted pieces of metal that rose from the green-brownish water. I resisted the urge to vomit and approached the bridge of more wood and rusted metal that looked to be the only entrance to Midtown. 

As my hooves clacked against the bridge I was greeted by…

…nopony. 

“Commoners! They should show me the respect of greeting me! Don’t they know who I am?” I mentally berated myself for that. Of course nopony would know who I was. The first two ponies I had met had even mistaken me for a completely different pony that I had no clue who she was other than second hand exploits.  At the sheer amount of indignity I had already come face to face to it was a wonder I did not explode. I would just have to show these ponies who I was. 
I started to trot forward across the bridge when after several steps I noticed a beeping noise had started at my hooves. 

Beep. Beep. Beep. 

I looked down at the pie shaped object that was the source of the sound. In the center of the object a red light flashed at me and moved faster as the beeping noise also seemed to speed up in tempo. What was this thing? That noise had quickly started to give me a headache. I glared at it and raised an angry hoof “Quiet you!” 

Beep-beep. Beep-BEEP. 

Before I could demand it to stop once more a rush of air crashed down on me from behind and a familiar form overshadowed me. In one motion Dog Meat leaned over me and swatted the beeping object into the air with one swipe of his oversized paws. 

BEEP-BEEP-BEEP-BOOOM! 

The little object exploded in a much larger explosion that I cringed away from. I dived to the floor of the bridge as red, hot pieces of metal sprayed out in all directions, but none of it managed to strike me. I looked back up at Dog Meat who returned my look with his usual happy, idiotic grin. What had been that thing? Why had it exploded? Had Dog Meat actually recognized it and saved me? My earlier suspicions about Dog Meat emerged momentarily. No, that could not be. Dog Meat was just a stupid animal. He had probably just reacted to the noise as any animal would…then again how would I know how an animal would react, besides Dog Meat and the boglurk I had never actually encountered any other animal. 

My thoughts were interrupted by a loud whistle that came from the opposite side of the bridge.

“Boooooy howdy. I never seen anypony or anything smack a frag mine like that. It got some distance before it went off, didn’t it?”

I grunted as I realized how undignified I must have looked cowering on the dirty bridge and immediately jumped back to my hooves. I failed to wipe off the latest layer of grime that my Stable barding seemed to become a magnet for and looked to the source of the voice. I suppose it was a good thing that Uncle Shackle and Blue Ball had long since shattered any hopes I may have fostered toward finding a good looking Stallion. The stallion that stood in front of me looked the definition of ancient and weathered. Either his coat was actually the color of dry dirt or he was just covered in it given his grey mane was splotched with the same color. Over his shoulder he had slung what had to be a long, metal gun of some kind. Given that it was not pointed at me I did not particularly care what kind of gun it was. His cutie mark was obscured by a pair of worn saddlebags he carried.

“Shoot, I expected them raiders to come back for me not some mare and her…” he paused as he looked over to Dog Meat and squinted. Panic flared in me as I realized I had not thought out about how Dog Meat would react to other ponies. Even if I had a leash I doubt I could have restrained him with my own strength. I wrapped my magic around my bat and turned to order Dog Meat to stay and not maul the other pony, but my eyes had not expected to see that look on Dog Meat now. Instead of a hungry, snarl his face continued to wear the same idiotic grin of a happy Dog Meat. He appeared to not be in the process of making any move to tear this new pony limb from bloody limb. From in front of me the ancient pony finished his sentence, “…little dog, too.”

‘Little’ dog? I turned and gaped at the pony, but he did not seem to notice and instead trotted forward across the narrow bridge. “Unless, you’re all changelings or wanadingos from the moon…” he stopped and looked to me seriously “You’re not wanadingos sent to take my collection of teddy bears to the moon are you?”

“I..don’t even know what a wanadingo is…” I replied slowly. 

“Oh, good. Of course if you were changelings or wanadingos my magic horn would have detected your spells.” Before I could point out that he had no horn and was an Earth pony he continued on. “The name’s Marbles Shoot, but you can call me Lost Marbles. Everypony in Midtown calls me that ever since that radscorpian climbed under my hat. I don’t know why. I never lost my marbles their right here...” Marbles rummaged in his saddlebags, a look of confusion formed on his face “…hmm did I pack them? Maybe I left them back at the house…oh well, what brings you to Midtown, Miss?”
I stared at the crazy pony for several seconds before I once more slowly replied, “Is there…is there some other pony I could talk to? Please?”

“Nope!” Marbles shook his head as he seemed unoffended by my words. “There are no other ponies in Midtown. Raiders came the other night and hauled them off to Silver Screen Theater. Only reason I didn’t get caught with them was cuz I was out trading with the Ghoul ponies by the Graveyard.”

Seriously? Ghoul ponies? Why in all that is fair and right did I have to meet a pony that did not –seem- to want to enslave me or kill me, but was utterly insane? What had I done to deserve this? It was almost enough to make me think that Pompadour would have been better company out here. Almost. I certainly could have used his skill with a comb to pick out the dried dirt and grime that coated my mane. 

“Anyway. Why don’t you come back to my shack? You look for a little worse for the wear and I’m sure you and your doggy could use a good meal.” Marbles turned and pointed across Midtown to a shack on the very edge of the town that was so haphazardly made out of old wood and sheet metal it looked like it would collapse if anypony opened the door. 

EW.

“What? Oh, no, no, no. I could not possibly-.” I held up my hooves and backed away. I already knew that Dog Meat was quite full of ‘food’ at the moment.

“Don’t you worry. Now that I am Midtown’s mayor, vice-mayor, chairman of hygiene, director of security, head of the welcoming committee, and sole resident it is my duty to welcome a guest!” Marbles grabbed my leg with a hoof and dragged me across the bridge. 

“No!” I squirmed under his filthy touch. “I could not!” I really could not. Who knows what kind of food he ate would do to my delicate stomach. His shack might have had more parasites then sleeping outside would give me. I turned to Dog Meat for help, but that stupid, traitorous dog just followed behind and wagged his tail excitedly. Argh! That idiotic, bestial mongrel! Betrayal would have seen him locked away in Security forever!

Against my will I found myself forced to sit on a sofa that I swore made my flank itch. Dog Meat seemed happy curled up in one of the few clutter free corners of the shack, but what did I care about his leisure. The Marbles’ shack looked on the inside as much as I expected its owner’s brain to look on the inside. It contained a jumble mess of junk and odds and ends that had been picked up from who knows where. One corner was dominated by empty, glass bottles while the other had a mound of thousands of stacked bottlecaps. Only a crazy pony would collect bottlecaps. 

The ‘meal’ he had promised at first looked horrible due to the fact Marbles had pulled it from a two hundred year old box that said ‘MmmMmm Royal Eggs’, but after my hunger got the better of me and I took a bite into the oval shaped…something…I was taken aback by the flavor of the preserved food. My momentary delight was crumpled slightly as my PipBuck clicked and indicated the food was irradiated. Though, the décor was tacky and the food toxic I had to admit to myself that I did like the feeling of being waited on by another pony. 

Who chattered up a storm of insane and idiotic topics that I only half-listened to, I told him who I was and what had happened to me over the last few days and I was honestly surprised by the look he gave me as I told my story. 

Pity.

He pitied me for all the hardships I had gone through. I had seen the look many times when directed at unruly Stable ponies by some of the Security ponies, but I had never given or received pity myself. At least I had never noticed any pony giving it to me. I sometimes suspected Brute Force and Bulletproof gave me looks behind the visors of their Security helmets, but I never found any reason why they would.  The emotions that now rolled within me were both alien and familiar. The former pulled at my stomach and inside of my chest, while the latter burned with anger as I was subjugated to pity from a commoner.

“Now, Miss Precious I was wondering if I could ask you a little favor…”

I ignored my maelstrom of emotions and stared at Marbles. A little favor?

“What do you mean?” I asked confused about what he had to be thinking.

“Well, you see as Mayor, Vice-Mayor, and Director of Security I am obligated by my constituents to see to their welfare.  Being killed, raped, and tortured by raiders is not in their best welfare. So, given that the assemblage of Midtown has given you food and shelter…”

“No.” I interrupted him and shook my head. 

“What?” Marbles seemed taken aback by my blunt reply. He put down his own meal of ‘Fancy Pony Cake Snacks’ and put his hooves together in a plea. “Well, I gave you-“

“A meal and shelter out of the hospitality of Midtown” I countered shrewdly and continued with a smirk “You did not say anything obligating me to return ANY service to you. What is the term ponies’ use…ah. You gave me these things out of the, heh, ‘goodness of your heart’”. 

“Well, you are right about that. I was just being generous I suppose…” he frowned still and pressed his hooves together. I noticed now that the way he clutched them together it had not been a plea gesture at all. It was an involuntary gesture, like how Pomadour would run his comb through his mane when nervous, but whatever Marbles used to clutch he did not seem to have it anymore.

“Though, I suppose with the right reward I could do what you had in mind.” I offered, but when I said ‘I’ I really meant Dog Meat. I was still unsure of just how tame he was, but I figured I could still point for him and let him loose. I would have absolutely nothing to do with ponies that killed, tortured, and raped in whatever order. That was what the help was for. Still, I needed a clue to something or someone in Baltimare that could get me back into Stable 81. All I needed was for one, just one of the other ponies of Midtown to be at least as half as crazy as Lost Marbles. 

“Alright.” Marbles seemed to brighten up at my words. “I’ll give you a hundred bottlecaps for helping me rescue the captured ponies.”

“What? I don’t want bottlecaps.” I groaned. Again this pony was with the crazy. 

“Really now? Are you sure?” he seemed honestly surprised. I waved that off as the crazy.

“Yes, I am sure. I do not need to carry around a hundred bottle caps with me everywhere I go.” By the Princesses who were dead and dust what would I ever need bottlecaps for?

“Well, then how about this if you won’t take bottlecaps for rescuing the town ponies…I’ll give you supplies for surviving in Baltimare if you…you find something the raiders stole from me…I’ll sweeten the deal…” Marbles’ voice strained to speak the last few words. He pressed his hooves together tightly.

“Hmmm…I’ll think about it. What exactly did they steal from you?”

“Those bastards…look what they did to the Scotch family.” Lost Marbles whispered and motioned for me to peek around the corner he, Dog Meat, and I hid behind. I peeked around the corner and at first I wondered what he had meant. At first nothing appeared out of the ordinary of the insane Wasteland by the cloud filtered light of the sun that remained in the ‘day’. Time had passed and Marbles had said something about only having a few hours left before dark. I still was unable to make any sense of ‘night’ and ‘day’ and the gradual shift of light as it felled into darkness disoriented my senses. 

The Silver Screen Theater was a large building that dominated the street not far off from Midtown. The ‘neighborhood of houses’ as Marbles had referred to the area in pre-war-tense had ended a few streets back and we had drawn close to the local center of the ‘sub-urban sprawl’ that had been the original Midtown of Baltimare. The Silver Screen looked like it had once been the smallest building on the street. The streets though were now filled with rubble from collapsed buildings, but the Silver Screen had weathered apocalypse and collapse that had felled its neighbors.

The Silver Screen Theater was a large square building that looked to have only around three floors. Faded posters lined the walls to either side of the entrance and I noticed graffiti scrawled on the tattered posters, but it was too far away to make out. The entrance to the Silver Screen was two sets of blown out glass doors that sat to either side of a booth that similarly had its glass window broken. In front of the ticket booth five ponies stood lined up as if they were waiting in line. Wait, why were they waiting in line? I looked closer at the ponies and felt my stomach turn over.

All five ponies were dead, three adult ponies and two foals. They looked from a distance like they had been standing, but their bodies were slumped and the ground below them covered in dried blood. Their hooves had been nailed to the ground with large iron spikes and each pony had been propped up by boards of wood studded with glass. Once they had become tired from standing they must have…they must have fallen onto the glass and…the boards had been propped underneath their hind legs and…and…bleah! I stumbled back from the corner. 

“W-what? What was that? A-are these raiders even ponies?” that was just…beyond words. Even for a regular pony this was something else completely. My mind flashed back to Short Round Field with its sun bleached bones wrapped in the chain link fence and I imagined what they had looked like with flesh on them. 

“Someponies…someponies just lose themselves in the Equestrian Wasteland.” Lost Marbles looked at me sadly, “…and raiders are what happen to the ponies that come back.”

Murder, rape, and torture. They were just words to me. I had been threatened with rape and murder by Blue Ball, but here I had seen all three in action or at least the after of each. This was unimaginable in Stable 81. It made me want to run straight back to Stable 81 before I could actually witness anymore,  but that was impossible. I had a terrible feeling that I would soon be face to face with it. It made me want to push somepony else off a water tower to deny a terrible fate that I seemed destined for.

“Don’t you worry.” Marbles leaned forward and patted my shoulder with a smile. “I’ll go first. Just stick behind me.”
Before I could call him a fool he disappeared around the corner. That idiot. Why was he risking his life for these ponies? They were probably dead anyway. Ugh, if he died then I would be alone with Dog Meat again. I chased after him and Dog Meat followed behind me. He was the great big monster, why did he follow me instead of being a meat shield?  Why did I have to do everything myself? 

I glanced between Marbles and the Silver Screen as I scurried across the street. Marbles had reached the dead ponies and had begun to carefully slide each corpse to the ground and close their eyes. The Silver Screen looked almost completely unscathed except for the hole in the masonry that gaped between the second and third floor. The back of my neck itched as I looked at the dark hole and I feared twisted abominations of ponies would pour out from it. The moment I reached the opposite end of the street I opened my mouth to whisper an order to Marbles when my PipBuck chirped. Several boxes flashed in my vision as voices spoke out loud from my PipBuck.

>Stable-Tec Transmission Found…<
>P.S Transmission B4 003: Downloaded…<
>P.S. Transmission B4 003: Activated…<

“Come on, sis. It will be fun!”

“Your idea of fun is preeetty different than mine.” 

No. Nonononono! Not now! Oh, damn you little tacky leg bracelet! If I would chew you off if I could. I looked up in panic as Marbles returned my panicked expression. We both turned out heads toward the hole in the Silver Screen as a voice from within yelled an obscenity. 

“Don’t you want to be a part of history?” 

“I’ll be fine if my son grows up safe and is able to run through fields of grass under a blue sky.”

“Sigh…sis don’t be like that. Stable-Tec-“
“
Stable-Tec TALKS a lot about saving ponies.” 

“Shut it off! Shut it off!” Marbles half-whispered, half-screamed at me as he trotted over to shake my PipBuck. He had to raise his voice higher due to the sound of the two voices and the voices of a multitude of ponies that chattered in their own conversations within the background of the recording. While the recording did recreate a point in time that the empty and vacant street had not heard for over two hundred years it was imperfect. The sound of more angry voices from within the Silver Screen joined the ones of old.

“I don’t know how! Don’t touch me I can do it!” I replied my voice filled with no small amount of panic as I flipped through random screens on my PipBuck. An inventory screen I had never seen before listed my only possessions as my Stable barding and my sports bat. I could use that one later. The map screen appeared one moment and was replaced by the image of a tired looking Stable pony. The voices from the recording continued to talk, but all I could hear was the sound of my blood as it boiled. I snarled and smashed my PipBuck into the ground, “Shut up! Shut up! Shut up, you stupid, tacky thing!”

Remarkably that seemed to do the trick. 

“FINALLY!”  I yelled in triumph as the recording stopped playing. One such as me could fix anything after giving it a few well-placed smacks. I looked up from my PipBuck just in time to see a head of an Earth pony mare as it emerged from the darkness of the whole in the wall. The head was soon followed by a rather large metal tube that as I squinted I could see was carried by the head’s body by some sort of saddle.

The mare smiled and I noticed that her teeth had for the most part rotted away. 

From behind me the sound of fast paced digging filled my ears and as I glanced back I saw that the sound originated from Dog Meat. He easily used his massive claws to tear past the concrete of the street and in the time that I blinked he had disappeared down a hole. From within the hole the sound of a splashed echoed upward and that had told me that he must have fallen into some sort of wet tunnel. I was honestly surprised he used his paws for something other than ripping the limbs off of ponies. Why had he been so docile lately? 

My mind rolled over this for a moment when I realized that Dog Meat had abandoned me! Oh, that ungrateful mongrel. How I wanted to roll up a magazine and swat him over the nose. I obviously had not disciplined him enough. Granted, with him gone I would no longer have to be afraid of him turning around and eating me. On the other hoof…who was going to protect me from these raiders?

I recoiled as Lost Marbles grabbed my foreleg and urged me forward. Memories of Uncle Shackle and Blue Ball as they enslaved me and Pompadour and his Tunnel Snakes as they foalnapped me flashed in my mind’s eye. All these commoners with their filthy hooves and demands touching me and defiling my perfect coat! How dare they insult me! I pushed Marbles away and backed up several steps. I had just begun to shout at him to never lay a hoof on me when from above something beeped and was followed by a fizzling sound. 

I looked up with enough time to witness a single moment. The rancid-mouthed mare somehow smiled even wider then she had before. Eugh, she licked at one of her yellow, cracked teeth with a purple tongue as she stared down with bloodshot eyes. What had probably been more important was the trail of smoke from her metal tube thing which had been made by a metal rocket that zoomed toward the ground in front of me.  Marbles ducked through a doorway into the Silver Screen while I continued to back away. Just as the metal rocket exploded upon impact with the ground my back hooves failed to step on ground and I plunged into the hole that Dog Meat had made earlier. 

I landed in a heap and counted myself lucky as hot metal and flame washed over the entrance several feet above me. Unlike the tunnel to Stable 81 this one was dry except for a tiny stream, but I was still surrounded by an impenetrable darkness.  What if…what if one of those boglurks lived down here? What if it saw me and I could not see it? What if something even more horrible sneaked up behind me and dragged me into the darkness? It was the tunnel out of Stable 81 all over again.

I felt my heart as it hammered in my chest; I encircled the bat in my magic and swiped at the surrounding darkness around me. A noise like a stone hitting the floor echoed through the tunnel. What if something would use the sound to mask their attack on me? I circled my pool of light and screamed as I hit and thrust at the nothing around me. I was not crazy. I could feel something watching me. It was just in the corner of my eye as it creped out of my field of vision. Something had to be watching me. I could not let it get me here! I had to get out of here. I was too important to die here. 

“Come already you…you...bucker! Show yourself. I-I am Precious! I am not going to die curled up in a ball! If you want some of this flank then you will receive several broken teeth!” 

I screamed again as I charged into the darkness at something I thought I saw in the corner of my eye.  My magic slightly illuminated the sewer as I poured more magic into the telekinesis spell, but the more magic I used the more erratic my hold on the bat had become. The bat swung in larger and larger arcs until it finally slipped from my hold and sailed toward a wall. As my magic light died I just managed to make out the hole in the side wall of the sewer which looked rather similar to the one above. I could have kissed that flea-bitten beast’s mouth as I scrambled through the hole and into some sort of basement.

The basement must have been directly underneath the Silver Screen as I could see by way of a thin strip of light that filtered in from atop a flight of stairs and under a door that the basement was not empty but, filled with boxes and stacks of round film cans. Once through I slipped my bat into its holster and did not stop as I was determined to put as much distance between me and whatever things lurked in the sewer as possible. 

As I charged up the stairs I could not shake the feeling that a specter hovered over me ready to strike as it waited for me to reach the door to freedom so it could take my hope away at the very last moment. I reached the top of the stairs and still expected something to grab my hind legs and drag me kicking and screaming back into the darkness. 

I held my breath and pounced for the metal door.

Nothing happened as I pushed open the door and slammed it shut behind me. 
I slowly sided down to my hooves with my back pressed against the door. I was half relieved to be out of the darkness and half confused why I had not just died. I pressed one ear to the cool metal of the door and listened for anything beyond.

Nothing.

No, no, no. There had to be something! Something had been down there. It was impossible for me to be wrong or delusional and certainly impossible to be wrong about being delusional. I listened harder for sound; I squeezed my head against the metal door. After several moments I heard sounds, but they were sounds that did not come the other side of the door. The sounds echoed from down the hallway I had slumped in.

They were many different sounds.

Groans and moans. Cries of pain and anguish. Pleas for help or for the end to come and take them.  Those sorts of sounds.
I did not particularly like those sounds. I told myself I should leave, but I was compelled by a curious urge to see the sources of the sounds. 

I tried to use my magic to lift my bat from it holster, but instead pain lanced through my horn. I needed some time before I could properly use my magic. I fought with myself for a minute as I cringed at the thought of putting the old, splintery bat handle into my mouth but, self-preservation won in the end. I gagged as my teeth clenched the wood and I added hydro-teeth scrubbing to my list of things-I-would-do-once-back-in-Stable 81.

The crusted and faded rug that lined the floor of the hallway muffled the sound of my hooves as I approached one of the half dozen open doorways. I peeked my head around the corner and beheld a room that was filled with cushioned seats. The seats had ponies in them. I gripped my bat tighter in my mouth and tried not to spit it out as my tongue touched the handle. The only light in the room were several dim light bulbs that flickered along the ceiling. I stepped into the room confident that I would not be spotted. The ponies all seemed to have their attention riveted to the faded, white screen that dominated the far wall.

As I approached one of the ponies I realized that the sounds from outside of the room had become muffled to the point of silence, possibly a muting spell that seemed to work one way, and I realized why the ponies were so…captivated by the blank screen. The ponies were dead. At least this pony was. I poked my bat into the face of a dead pony and shuddered as its dead eyes stared back at me. Like the ponies at the ticket booth it seemed that all these ponies had spikes driven into their legs that prevented them from leaving and probably explained the large pools of blood that coated the floor. 

I REALLY needed to go now. I mean this was someplace I should not even be near. I did not want to come face to face with the monsters that had done this. I urged my eyes to turn away from the corpse and after some effort I gazed away in control of my body again. It was time to make a graceful, dignified exit.

As I turned to leave a light turned on from a small window set above and behind the rows of seats and without thinking I pushed past the dead pony and climbed into the seat next to it. The body was still warm. I dropped my bat into my lap and squeezed my hooves to the chair rests as the light projected black and white images onto the screen. There was no sound but I could make out the words that flashed on the screen.

‘THESE MESSAGES ARE BROUGHT TO YOU BY THE BALTIMARE SUN NEWS COMPANY IN PARTICIPATION WITH THE MINISTRY OF IMAGE! ‘  The image of two cartoon alicorns, one of white coat and the other of a much darker coat, stood facing each other with their hooves pressed to each other as they smiled into each other’s faces. The alicorns image slided into another image of three sparkling diamonds then both images transformed into a rather majestic looking bird that spread its wings out inside the image of a round object that erupted with fire. Whatever could that be? Though, I rather liked the bird’s feathers. So fetching to the eye! I wondered what they would look like sewn into one of my dresses as the next images played out. 

An overly energetic mare with a rather annoying smile appeared on the screen and waved to the audience. Even without sound I could tell she rattled off words at an alarming rate especially after she paused to inhale an exaggerated breath. Even though the image was colorless I could not help but feel as I watched her that she had been colored something garish and bright…like a blinding pink. She pointed a hoof above me and waggled it as if she knew somepony had been naughty and what she did next caused me to jump in my seat. She looked directly at me. I knew she was just a pre-recorded image from over two hundred years ago and she could not have had looked at me in particular never mind knew who I was and she had to be just addressing the entire audience. Still, her eyes seemed to bore into me in particular. What was worse was just before her image disappeared she winked…at me… and said something that I felt in my spine was something along the lines of ‘I’ll be watching you…forever!’ 

I felt so relieved when she had disappeared that not even the next images of some sort of makeshift war hospital could jolt me. Ponies with all sorts of wounds appeared on the screen. Some ponies just looked like they had received minor wounds while others displayed far more serious injuries such as missing limbs or blood soaked bandages. The wounded ponies were attended by ponies that looked to be nurses and doctors; they all wore the similar symbol of three pink butterflies on their uniforms. I was surprised when the images of a screaming soldier mare who had looked like she had received extremely fresh wounds was accompanied by loud, painful screams that I could hear.

The shadows of two ponies thrashed together on the screen which soon made watching the film impossible. The shouts continued to come from a mare and were soon joined by the grunts and curses of a stallion’s voice. The mare pleaded with the stallion for something as I heard a loud thump against the wall and the mare’s voice screamed louder as something smacked hard over flesh again and again. For several seconds I remained in my seat and listened to the two voices and wondered how a pony could withstand torture like tha-

“Oh yea! Fuck me Buzz Saw! Do me over this dead-fucker’s bones!” the mare’s voice cried in ecstasy, not pain. 

“Bones Jumper, damn you are one kinky piece of flank…” the stallion snickered and continued with his…work.

What. She wasn’t…and he was…they were both up there…with all these corpses here…and…what…the…FUCK!!
I wanted to scream out the word, but I kept my lips sealed shut. I slowly slipped from chair and crawled on my hooves through the pool of blood and through the door I had entered. I ignored the feeling of my face going red and decided that it had to be from anger and not some other emotion that could be related to a blush. I was so disgusted I ignored the fact that the mare from the film had seemed to have known about the two ‘naughty ponies’ in the projector box.

The moment I slipped past the threshold though I once more was bombarded by the sound of ponies in agony or weeping. There was a new sound though. It took me several moments for my mind to recognize the sound as it sifted through my memories back to the Stable entrance moments after Mother had ordered the execution of the Tunnel Stallions. 

Gunfire.

Nope. Not that way.

I turned away from the sound and galloped down the hall in the opposite direction.  Anypony that would have charged toward the sound of gunfire had to be crazy or a stupid pony. Whoever the raiders were firing at they had my wishes that they would be able to beat the raiders but that was all they would get. Unless of course the raiders were just executing their prisoners…no, I would be no use! These scums would not recognize my authority and besides all I had was my bat. What could I do with just that?

Hopefully the hallway would lead me to the entrance where I could get out of this mad house. If this hallway was parallel to the street where I had appeared then this hallway should end where the entrance was. 

I emerged from the hall way into…where the ticket booth and entrance should have been. Instead, there was just a large gaping hole surrounded by recent rubble, the last few days of staring at ruins had surprisingly given me perspective on what could be considered ‘old ruins’ and ‘new ruins’.  The blown out hole had seemed to have been caused by some sort of explosion given the black scorched rubble and small fires that clung to the carpet. The hole extended to the floor above and even as I looked up a solid length of rebar and concrete slightly longer than my bat fell down from part of a wall on the floor above that had been blown off. This was where the entrance should have been but, technically this rather large hole was more than enough exit then I needed.

I had been about to gallop off to freedom when I was stopped by the boom of a gunshot and the sudden explosion of a piece of masonry in front of me. I turned and looked as three raider ponies emerged from the shadows from behind the concession stand. 

“Looks like someone wiggled out of their spikes” one of the raider ponies laughed as they advanced on me. 

“Naw, look at her legs. No blood! No holey-moleys!  She ain’t one of those MidTownies.” The shortest of the raider ponies said between mouthfuls of lead pipe.

“Lemme guess cunt…you came in with that old ass hat didn’t you? He shot Frag Hag right after she pulled the pin on a frag apple. I was there when that gawddess cunt licking, whore dropped it into the missile pile.” The third raider pony floated a long shaped gun and growled through his teeth, “I told Frag Hag not to pile her gawddess damn missiles like that. She got Cut Throat and some of the newbies blown up. I barely got out before the place went to shit!”

What was I supposed to do now? Was this not the part in my plan where Dog Meat was supposed to show up and rip these raiders limb from limb while I sipped recycled apple cider in the corner? 

“What are we gonna do with her? Spike her?” the second raider pony, a stallion with a crazed look in his eye, asked while he licked his cracked lips. 

“Nah, look at her. Just standing there. Don’t need to bleed her out or teach her what.” The first raider pony, a mare with a cracked skull for a cutie mark, trotted behind me and smacked my flank with her lead pipe.
“She does look like she could take it…for hours.” The raider pony with the gun agreed and moved his gun back on his shoulder. I was no threat to him. 

These ponies were monsters. They were responsible for the murder and torture of so many other ponies in ways I did not want to think about. These ponies were not ponies, at least not anymore. They might as well have been radroaches. Yet, no matter how much I mentally screamed at my body to do something, anything, I could not move. 

My mind struggled to decide on what to do next. What I would have to do would to kill these ponies with my own hooves, not give them a tap on the head and see them fall off a water tower.  They would of course see my magic as I wrapped it around the bat. They had me surrounded and outnumbered and would be on me in a matter of moments. The first two would probably hold me down while the third took his gun and placed it against my head or worse it would not be his gun that he used.  

Could I even kill these ponies if I received the chance? I had just agreed that they were monsters, but to do that I would still have to actually kill them. I would have to take my bat and…and…take it and smash it into their heads or…necks. I would have to smash it into them over and over and over until their heads had become chunks of meat as their blood splashed over my hooves and mane. Would I feel their lives slip away as I took it from them? What would I smell as their entrails rotted in the air and the flies buzzed around to feed on their corpses?

What would I do then? Would I bathe in their deaths and wash out the anguish of this wasteland with not just their lives but others? What sort of Princess would I be then?

Yes, a voice inside of me said as it seemed to be all too excited over the prospect of endless bloodshed.

“Maybe we could get a few pound of meat off her. She looks pretty healthy and well rounded.” The crazed raider laughed out as he swatted my flank.

WHAT DID HE SAY? WHAT DID HE JUST SAY?!? 

My eyes swelled open to the size of dinner plates.

“Haha, you cannibal don’t you know that would be a waste? You know what they say about heavy mares?  More comfort for the pushing.” The raider mare snickered.

Oh, no. Oh, no she did not just say that. I felt my eye twitch as a blood vein throbbed just above it. I bit down on my lip hard enough to draw blood as something welled up inside of me.

“Heh, no way do I want to get stuck in her. Besides, I’d bet you ten caps that she has been passed around before.” The third raider joined in as he leaned forward and continued to speak directly into my stunned face. “Nah, I like a mare with a flank I can reach around to…” 

Oh, Princesses what was that high pitched noise that drowned out his words? Was it an explosion? Was some pony making tea?  Oh. It was the sound of my hesitations shattering.  I sucked in a good, deep breath and-
-slowly let it out. I shook my head and smiled at the third raider pony and asked sweetly.

“Do you know who I am?” 

As I did so I concentrated my magic in my horn and wrapped it around an object that I spied out of the corner of my vision. The third raider pony took a step forward and floated his gun to point at my face.  “Hey, hey, hey. No funny business you fu-“
“MY NAME IS…” I shouted over his voice and with a flick of my magic I smashed the chunk of concrete and rebar like a club into his flank. He cried out through the sound of crunching bone and collapsed to the floor, his gun clattered to the ground next to him. As the raider mare and the crazy raider charged for me I took several steps back and unsheathed my bat with my magic. I swung the bat across the face of the crazy raider so hard I noticed several of his rotten teeth, along with blood, fly from his mouth. As the crazy raider crumpled to the floor I simply hurled the rebar club at the raider mare as she prepared to smash me with her lead pipe. The rebar club impacted squarely in her rib cage, my aim had improved, and as she coughed up her lead pipe I smashed her across the face with the rebar club which pulped her head into a chunky paste. The crazy raider groaned and began to rise so I thumped him again in the head and was satisfied that he would not get up again. “…Precious. My name is Precious.”

BANG!

“Fuck you, Precious.” The raider with the gun hissed through his teeth as he climbed back on his hooves. His magic faltered again and dropped his gun but, it had done its job judging from the sudden bloom of pain that erupted in my shoulder. AHHHH! Getting shot hurt! I dropped to my knees and let both my weapons slip from my grip as blood spilled out from the sharp wound in my shoulder. All sense of victory vanished as my vision blurred momentarily. Oh, I did not like getting shot at all! 

“You…!” I glared at the raider pony and though it made me my head feel like it was being cleaved in two I wrapped my magic around his rifle and aimed it at his head. The raider pony had not counted on that and gasped and started to scramble back, but his wounded flank caused him to topple on his side equally in pain as me. 

“No, stop! I surrender!” he pleaded with me. For once I was not in a groveling mood.

“You just tried to rape and kill me…you…you called me fat!  Why on Equestria would I spare you? You worm! You worm food! You worm food’s food!”  He killed, raped, and looted and he asked me for mercy? I had not received one bit of mercy since I had entered this wasteland. I certainly was not about to give it to him!

“Aw, damnit. You crazy, fucking bitch! Go die in Tartarus!” he spat in my direction.

“You first!” I replied and with all my magic I had left I hurled the gun at him and smashed it across his side. 

“Damnit, did you just fucking throw a gun at me? You crazy, retarded cunt!” he cried in pain and wrapped his magic once more around the gun.

…right. I probably should have shot him with the gun not throw it at him. It was not my fault I had no clue how to shoot a gun never the less use one when I had one. I had begun to panic again and tried to rise to my hooves to run but, the pain from my wound was too much. I cried out and slumped back to the floor as the raider pony cocked a bullet into the gun and aimed at me. 

I was dead! I was so very dead. Oh, dear me. I would never see any of my dresses in Stable 81 again! 

The raider pony never received the chance to fire as two familiar, blood soaked claws ripped through the ground below him and pulled him into a newly made hole. He screamed for several more moments before it cut off into a stomach churning gurgle followed by a loud crunch sound that churned my stomach even more.  Dog Meat emerged from the hole a minute or so later and he looked…well fed. 

“Bark!”

“Eeeew! Do not touch me, mongrel!” I protested as he lumbered over to me and proceeded to lick my face with his sticky, slobbering tongue. I practically smelled the blood and carnage on his breath.  He had been a busy. Not that I cared. Dead raiders were good raiders. Though, the possibility that he had also devoured the Midtown survivors existed as well.  I still could have cared less, now that the adrenaline of the unsophisticated, if favorable, fight for my life had drained from my veins the gunshot wound in my shoulder pained me worse. 

“Ugh…make yourself useful…find me a healing potion...” I sighed immediately after I said those words. I had just wasted what could have been my last few breaths on this flea bitten, mangy, foul odor mongrel. I was quite surprised when Dog Meat barked as if answering my command and scooped me up in his arms. “The shoulder! Watch the shoulder and my face, my beautiful face!” 

Dog Meat continued toward a door past the concession stands as if he had not heard a thing I had said. If I was going to die then why did I have to die such an ignoble death in this idiotic mutt’s arms? As died would the wasteland not afford me a shred of decency and dignity? My answer was for Dog Meat to rip the door behind the concession stand off its frame and for me be immediately dropped onto the dirt covered ground.  If I had any ounce of magic left in me I swore I would have used it to bring the roof down on his head, but as I looked around the room I had been so unceremoniously deposited in I realized that Dog Meat had actually heeded my orders. 

It looked like he had brought me to what appeared to be a pre-war storeroom, but had since been used by the raider ponies to store the loot of their past victims. Dog Meat had even dropped me not three feet from a box full of healing potions. 

Shocked, I looked up at Dog Meat who grinned down at me with his blood covered lips. 

“Err…good boy, Dog Meat. That is a good dog.” I praised awkwardly, but Dog Meat seemed to have enjoyed my words. He barked again and disappeared back through the storeroom door, my last view of him before he dropped back down his hole was his tail as it wagged. The sight may have been almost endearing to me if he had not paused to drag the other two raider corpses down with him.

“Now…what was it that crazy, old coot wanted me to find again?” I mumbled to myself after I had drowned a healing potion and felt my wound heal as well as my strength to stand return to me. Lost Marbles probably was dead by now, but still what he had, had stolen to him intrigued me the moment he described the object. Perhaps, it had been the way he had described it, how his words seemed to echo some sort of deep passion or care for his lost property. How he longed for it had infected me to a degree. 

I should not have been surprised that it had not taken me long to find it. It shined like a diamond amongst the trash and junk heaped on every shelf or left strewn across the floor. 

“Oh...my…goodness…” my mouth dropped as I laid my eyes on the small statuette of the unicorn mare with a cutie mark of three diamonds. Her clean white coat and beautifully styled mane and tail seemed free of the dust and grime that had become so ever present to me since I had left Stable 81. The small statuette practically shined, its glow seemed to make the room around it more appealing. I did from time to time imagine my white knight would kick down the Stable’s door and whisk me away to a beautiful castle full of dresses and servants, but as I stared and closely examined every detail of the little statuette I felt that if the mare had been there I would have happily been whisked away in her hooves!

Get a hold of yourself, Precious! I laughed nervously and fanned my face with a hoof. Where had this blush appeared?  

True, this object was a thing of grace and beauty. It seemed to radiate a sense of refinement that the Equestrian Wasteland had not seen for two hundred years or so. 

I knew in that moment I HAD to have it. Even if Marbles was alive he did not deserve this vision of class. No, it would be much better in my hooves. 

“Come here my precious!” I giggled and reached forward with my hoof. The moment I picked up the statuette I felt a jolt of energy pass from it to me. It was a strange sensation. It was…it was…

…rejection.

It was as if a small pony in my head turned her nose up at me, as if the small pony had decided I not worthy of her attention or presence. I was mentally and physically taken back by the sensation and stumbled back several steps with the statuette pressed in my hooves. That would have been impossible of course since I was Precious of Stable 81, no pony looked down on me like that, yet the pony inside my head seemed to disagree quite indeed and I felt…guilty for my… greed. I would have argued more, but a familiar voice interrupted my thoughts as it called out to me from the entrance-hole. 

“Little miss are you in there? If you’re a raider or a wanadingo then I hope you like metal apples…” Lost Marbles’ voice caused me to panic as I looked between the door and the statuette. I looked frantically around the storage room for some sort of answer and I found it in the form of a set of worn out saddlebags. I stuffed the statuette inside the saddlebags that little pony inside my head seemed to collapse on a sofa which was good as she quieted down long enough for me to scoop several random items into the saddlebags to cover up the statuette. “It is me! I do not know what a metal apple is, but do not do it! Anything but that!” 

I raced out of the storage room; I placed the saddlebags over my back as I did, and nearly impacted with Lost Marbles as he paused in putting the stem of a strange, metallic apple to his lips. 

“Oh, good. It was you and not a wanadingo! I tell you that dog of yours gave the folks from Midtown a scare, but I told them he was a good dog. ” One moment he smiled quite broadly then the next his smile seemed to jump off a cliff as he looked at me with worry and concern. “Miss Precious, did you by chance…did you by chance see my little lady in there? I’ve been looking all over this place for it…can’t seem to find it or my marbles.”

“Oh, what did it look like again?” I bluffed and tilted my head to the side in mock puzzlement. 

“Oh, it is a small statuette about…yay big and yay wide. It is something very precious to me you see, my late wife she was so generous…she found that thing and…well it is all I have to remember her by.” The more he talked the more strained Marbles’ voice became. 
“Ah, that thing. No, cannot say I have seen it…uhm…what, uh, what happened to your wife?” I tried to change the subject. Why did it seem like the statuette’s horn was poking me through the material of the saddlebags?
“Oh, my wife was such a nice, little lady. We traveled the Wasteland together and everywhere she went she always went out on a limb to help a pony in need…one day we were traveling up from Hoofington and we heard a cry for help. We came up to a quarry filled with radscorpians and a little filly was trapped on a boulder. Before I could stop her she charged right in and managed to kill all those critters.” Marbles seemed to have aged over a decade since he had begun talking.

“Oh? She sounds…nice.” I offered. 

“Yes…she was…” he sniffed and continued, “Like I was saying. We charged in and killed the radscorpians and we all had been stung by their damn tails at least twice each, but we only had anti-venom for two of us…so she gave one to me and another to the filly. We tried to get out of these as soon as we could…to get her some help, but…there were more radscorpians…they just…they just popped out of the ground and were on her so very fast. Before I could help her I felt something strike me in the back of my head and I was out of it. I woke up a week later, the little filly had actually managed to drag me to a nearby settlement and cure me…”

“That sounds…um…bad.” I tried not to meet his gaze and instead looked at the fine detail of the ruined ceiling, “Maybe it is somewhere still in here…I bet if you look hard it will be…somewhere”

“Heh, you’re, right. Thank you, Miss Precious” Lost Marbles smiled weakly, and I smiled back “I know it is just me getting old, but I live all alone and though I could not understand some of the words she said half the time I really enjoyed the conversations I would have with that little lady. Heh. I don’t suppose you could lend this old hide a hoof?”

“Oh, um…suuuure.” I smiled what had to be the most fake and backstabbing smile in all of Equestria. “I’ll look this way and you look that way.”
-
Note: Level Up!
New Perk:
-Secrets and Lies: You have mastered the art of the fib. 10+ Speech and unique dialogue choices are now available.

> Bronycon Art: Little Miss Precious
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

WARNING! ANTHRO ART AHEAD
"I better have not chipped a nail on your jaw!"
















Drawn by the artist behind the creepy and sadistic Little Miss Rarity tumblr! http://lilmissrarity.com/
Precious has hands?!? Nothing can stop her rampage now!

> Bronycon Art: Flavin Up To Bat
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Ohohoho. I do not think you know WHO I am." 
A quick sketch drawn by Flavin Bagel, the Artist behind Choclate Pony Tumblr! 
http://flavinbagel.deviantart.com/
I think he got Precious' sadistic "Oh-I-Am-Going-To-Enjoy-Hitting-You" face.

> Art: Pompadour Revisted
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------






“Aw, come on Miss. Pretty, Pony Princess. Yah, don’t have’tah be all square like that. Where the Tunnel Stallions go, it gets 20% more awesome! Ain’t that right fellas?”

Pompadour: Stable 81 dweller and self proclaimed leader of the "Tunnel Stallions"