Prologue: A Brief History Lesson
Prologue: A Brief History Lesson
If I’m going to tell this story, then I should probably start at the beginning. The very beginning. This will be old news for just about everyone out there, but it’s important, so they can just be patient and bear with it.
So, once upon a time, in the magical land of Equestria, there were ponies. Ponies were happy. There was sunshine and rainbows. There was friendship and flowers. If ever they had a problem, a smile and a hug probably fixed everything. Probably... I don't know. Sing a song? Throw a party? Point is, is that everypony was blissfully unaware of how to deal with real conflict. So much so in fact, that when they were finally introduced to the foreign concept of war, they all died.
Not immediately, of course. Over time, what began as a simple dispute over resources escalated into an all out war between two nations. Each side pushed their innovation and technology to its limits in a desperate bid to out do the other. Eventually, ethics and morality were cast aside as well; whatever the cost was justified so long as it helped to win the war. Unfortunately, neither side won. In the end everyone lost.
Long story short is, ponies and zebras were not friends and they blew each other to hell with balefire and megaspells some two hundred years ago and flooded most of the world with magical radiation. History’s not my strongest subject, so pardon my brevity.
The important thing is that there were actually some smart ponies back during the war who had been thinking ahead. While the warmongers spent their time coming up with more creative ways to kill one another, some of the more long-term thinkers were working to preserve life in the world after it was all over. They created many modern marvels, thanks to the accelerated technological progress that wartime had influenced. But among all their weapons and gadgets, their widest-reaching and longest-lasting project was the creation of the Stables. Their company was aptly named: Stable-Tec.
The Stables were designed to be emergency underground fallout shelters in case the worst of the worst happened and the world went to shit. It did indeed go to shit too, so good on them for thinking ahead and not letting us all go extinct. They were far more than simple shelters however. These Stables had been built to keep their inhabitants alive and well for many years after the initial fallout. While every Stable was built to different specifications and with different people in mind, they all had a common goal: to keep the survivors from repeating the mistakes of the past. Unfortunately, some of the more extreme methods employed to ensure this didn’t turn out so well for the Stable occupants in the long run. Added to that were potential hazardous leaks, resource shortages, malfunctioning security systems, and even simple accidents that could be turned deadly in such confined spaces. I’ve even heard that some Stable dwellers just went crazy from being locked up underground for too long. In short, while the inhabitants of the Stables would be relatively safe from magical radiation and outside threats, they were still very much at the mercy of their surroundings. Very few Stables actually functioned as they were intended to.
That said, almost everyone living in Equestria today can trace their heritage back to a Stable eventually. Most Stables with survivors have long since opened their doors and moved back out into the wasteland. Most Stables without survivors have long since been pried open and looted clean, either by scavengers or by raiders. Most of the time however, dead Stables tend to be death traps, with whatever having claimed the lives of its residents still waiting to add more to the count.
Some folks claim that there are still plenty of Stables yet left undiscovered, with ponies still living happy and oblivious to the world above them. Well, good for them. If they’ve survived this long, then they’re probably better off than the rest of us.
But you already knew most of this already. I’m here to tell you my story, not the things we’ve all already heard a hundred times before.
* * *
Fourteen Decades Ago:
My predecessors originally came from Stable Fourteen, which, as far as anyone knows, was a perfectly functional Stable with a very high survival rate. There were no major accidents, no rampant technology, and no quality-of-life 'improvements' set in motion by Stable-Tec. Having ample space, being well-stocked, and with working agricultural and purification systems, Stable life was, for the most part, very livable there.
Regardless, for one reason or another, they eventually left the safety of their home and expanded out into the wastes. At the time, only a few decades had passed since the initial bombs fell, so what they found wasn’t pretty.
Equestria had been utterly destroyed. The animal and plant life had been all but burned away by the zebra's balefire. What hadn’t been killed had been horribly changed and mutated by the magical radiation and the by the chemicals that had bled into and saturated the land in the absence of its caretakers. Without the earth ponies the ground had become infertile, and without the pegasi the weather beneath the cloud layer had become wild and untamed. Basically, Equestria as they knew it was dead.
Since even before the war, my people as a whole weren’t exactly the settling down and cultivating types. You could have probably guessed that if you’ve seen much of them around today. Many of them were mercenaries back during the war, so that’s what their descendants defaulted back to afterwards. They were well-suited to the new world that they had woken up to.
Slowly expanding, they encountered raiders, bandits, and other unsavoury denizens of the wastes. The majority of which, being unorganized and undisciplined, were routed with little difficulty. Any decent traders, settlers, or other travelers were dealt with fairly, often being offered protection in exchange for currency or a share of their wares.
Over time, they became known once again for their efficiency and lethality, but also for their dependability. So much so, that word spread to other groups of civilized people, who came to them in need of their expertise. Just like before the bombs dropped, my people were hired out as whatever they were needed for. It was a business very much in demand in such a dangerous world. Guards, soldiers, even couriers, so long as it didn’t conflict with their own personal rules, any job was fair game.
High quality work came with a high price tag though, and those that couldn’t pay were turned away. This gave rise to other mercenary groups, creating competition and rivalries. But, as the saying goes: you get what you pay for. Nopony wanted to hire someone that would just stab them in the back after a job was done. My people always honoured their contracts. Always.
All in all, they stayed very secure at the top of the mercenary game. They expanded greatly over the next hundred or so years that followed, constructing several compounds and bases across the land as civilization spread and the need arose for their services.
One of the oldest and more well-known installations became known as Compound Fourteen-Four. And no, before you ask, I don't know if there was ever a Fourteen-Two or Three. It's not the most creative name, I know, but it's what would eventually become my home many years later.
Whether you’ve heard of me or not isn’t important. This is the story of how I ended up where I did and why I did the things that I did. My name is Gale, and I was born, raised, and trained as a member of the Talon Mercenaries...