• Published 23rd May 2016
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Fallout Equestria: The Light Within - FireOfTheNorth



When Doc awakens in Stable 85 he has no memories. Soon he is thrust into the North Equestrian Wasteland, where danger waits to devour him at every turn. Can he find a path of light through the darkness, even when he learns the truth of his past?

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Chapter 51: Frost

Chapter Fifty-One: Frost

I stamped my hooves in applause. Or, rather, my host did. I was experiencing another of Lord Lamplight’s memories, the fourth in the set I’d recovered from the Vanhoover Spire. Unlike with the previous memories, where I’d known generally where I was (a Stable, somewhere in Vanhoover, the heart of the PRS), I had no idea where Lamplight was standing now. You’d think one ruined street would look more or less like another, and to a certain extent you’d be right. The War had gone a long way to squeezing every city in Equestria into a uniform architectural style, but there were still distinctions. The buildings here were sturdily built and didn’t rise more than a few stories, making them seem squat. The most distinctive feature that drew my eye, however, was the glowing emerald spire that rose in the middle distance, the light from it seeming to flicker almost like fire was contained within.

In my more immediate surroundings, Lamplight was standing on a train platform along with several other ponies. A crowd was assembled facing the platform, also applauding, half in military uniforms and half not, divided evenly in the middle. The applause seemed to be for two ponies nearer to the edge of the platform who’d just finished signing some document and were now shaking hooves. The one on the right was an earth pony stallion wearing a military uniform not unlike the one I’d seen Shining Armor wearing in the Flankorage simulation, albeit one that had seen well over a century of wear. The one on the left was a unicorn mare with a beehive hairdo wearing a parka over a dress.

“Thank you, everypony, for your support,” she addressed the assembled ponies, “I look forward to a prosperous alliance between the Hall of Wonders and the Frostpoint Garrison. Let us not forget the architect of this alliance between two of the most unlikely of bedfellows. Lamplight, come on up.”

My host trotted forward to more applause, a grin stretching his face. Lord Lamplight had forged an alliance between two … settlements? There were ponies with weapons guarding the ceremony, but there didn’t seem to be any raiders or slavers present. It appeared this event occurred in Frostpoint, which is where we were heading, so maybe we’d soon find out. As the applause ended and the crowd began to disperse, one of the uniformed ponies approached Lamplight.

“The Frostpoint Alliance. I never thought I’d see the day,” the unicorn commented, “Do you think it will last?”

“I hope so, Rivers,” Lamplight replied, “I really hope so.”

<-=======ooO Ooo=======->

I awoke in the back of the Clinic, lying in my cot as the truck rumbled along. We were well on our way by now, passing through Stalliongrad at the moment. I was able to get out of the MWT Hub surprisingly easily, though I was sure I was making too much noise in my new power armor trotting through the underground tunnels. I’d only gotten a crash course in using power armor in Operation: Flankorage, so Rare helped me out a bit to familiarize me with operating the armor before we left Vanhoover. Since then, we’d been on the road, following the course first to Stalliongrad. After that, we’d continue on to Northern Cross and Frostpoint; at least, that was the plan.

I considered what I’d seen in the memory orb. Besides Lamplight bringing settlements together (which was uncomfortably like what I’d imagined with places like The Strip and Burnside) there was one other important thing. He’d called the pony who’d approached him at the end “Rivers.” His appearance also matched what Sheriff Pumpernickel had described for Clear Rivers, Lord Lamplight’s lieutenant. It seemed a stretch for such similarities to be a coincidence.

The Clinic suddenly pulled to a halt. Rare switched off the radio playing Radio Free Wasteland and headed for the back of the trailer. Zherana and I headed toward the front of the trailer, for the door that led up to the cab where Roaring Thunder was piloting our mobile home. I briefly checked at the gun turrets we’d added but couldn’t see anything that would hold us up.

“Why’ve we stopped?” I asked as I stepped out, spotting Roaring Thunder also exiting the vehicle.

“Because of them,” he said, pointing ahead.

I readied my magical energy rifle as I moved aside a section of the railing on the path to the cab and climbed down off the Clinic. Ahead of us were eight ponies with rocket launchers pointed at the Clinic’s cab. It could probably shrug off a couple of hits (we’d armored it up well, after all), but they definitely had the ability to stop us in our tracks. They were all wearing the Ponies’ Republic of Stalliongrad’s colors, too. Another pony without a rocket launcher, the same PRS officer we’d met when they were looting Harmony Tower, trotted up from behind the others and approached me.

“What do you want?” I asked confrontationally. I wasn’t going to put up with the PRS’s usual shenanigans, not when I had somewhere to be.

“No need to be snippy,” the officer huffed, “I’m here to bring you a request from Chairmare Peach Cream. Though, why she doesn’t just have you thrown back in The Stacks or executed is beyond me.”

“Yeah, it seems kind of weird for her to have you bring me a request when she probably wants me dead,” I replied, “Unless this is all a trap.”

No enemies besides the ones I could see appeared on EFS, but they could have been out of range at the moment. Facing down eight ponies with rocket launchers, I suddenly wished I’d put Shining Armor’s power armor back on before leaving the Clinic.

“I assure you, it is not,” the mare said, and I could nearly hear the word ‘unfortunately,’ “You have been temporarily forgiven of all crimes against the Ponies’ Republic of Stalliongrad. This is what the chairmare wants.”

“Molds AM-905?” I asked, looking at the card that the officer had given me, “What’s that supposed to be?”

“How should I know? I’m just the messenger,” she said, “The chairmare said you would find them in the Frostpoint Munitions Factory. You will be well-rewarded upon bringing them back, including having all offenses against the Ponies’ Republic stripped from your record.”

Frostpoint? How did Chairmare Peach Cream know I was going to Frostpoint? Of course, it could have been just an amazing coincidence. Those did happen with surprising frequency in the Wasteland, but I had a hard time believing that was the case here. She had to have a source somewhere, or some way of observing me.

“I’ll take it under consideration, but no promises,” I said.

That seemed to satisfy the officer (as much as anything I could do short of dropping dead would satisfy her) and she trotted away. She motioned for the other PRS soldiers to leave with her, and they stopped training their rocket launchers on the Clinic. I considered Peach Cream’s offer. The last time I’d run an errand for her and retrieved the seeding megaspell from Stable 65, it had led to the destruction of Railyard. What terrible consequences could I inadvertently cause by retrieving these molds?

***

There was far more to Northern Cross than I’d expected, given Roaring Thunder’s brief explanation of the place. When he’d said it was a station town, I’d assumed we’d find a train station where the rail lines met surrounded by a few houses. That was not the case. The entirety of Northern Cross was one massive train station. The tracks we’d been following split again and again and again as we approached the station, and within the building itself they twisted and crossed in a gigantic mess. Platforms were scattered throughout the complex, always backed by buildings, some shops and some homes. It seemed a royal mess, but according to Roaring Thunder, Northern Cross had once efficiently connected north to south and east to west.

Roads did lead into Northern Cross, and the Clinic would be able to roll across the tracks without much trouble, but that wasn’t our plan. Frostpoint was our destination, not this train station in the middle of nowhere, so we intended to cut across the countryside and meet up with the tracks heading north, skirting Northern Cross entirely. That plan did not go as we’d hoped.

I was taking my turn driving and began to angle away from the station’s western entrances, when the Clinic bounced over something. I cast EFS and watched as it quickly filled with hostile contacts. From abandoned train cars and seemingly out of the earth itself, feral ghouls sprang up and charged toward the Clinic. They threw themselves against the vehicle, making the ride incredibly bumpy as they were ground under the wheels. They also made it difficult for me to turn, piling up on the sides and trying to latch on. I was still headed toward the entrances to Northern Cross, which were rapidly approaching.

“What’s going on up there?” Rare Sparks asked through the intercom in the cab, “Forget how to drive?”

“Feral ghouls, and a lot of them,” I replied, looking at the swarm that still seemed to be growing larger, “They’re making it hard to keep moving. I could sure use some help.”

The zombies continued to attack the Clinic, latching on whenever they could. I tried to swerve and throw them off, or scrape them off with abandoned train cars, but my ability to do so was extremely limited. Whether they intentionally did so or not, the zombies were boxing me in, not letting me make any drastic turns to the left or the right. Thankfully, a heavily armored plow had been installed on the front of the vehicle, so I had little trouble with keeping moving. However, I knew that if I stopped, the swarm would cover us in seconds. I’d never seen quite so many feral ghouls in one place before, not even around Tartarus.

We blew into the station under Northern Cross’s entry arches when the turrets mounted to the Clinic began to fire. Ghouls were blown away by machine gun fire, directed by Rare and Zherana. Roaring Thunder attacked them from the sky, zipping around pillars that held up notice boards and the massive span of skylights that passed for a roof. I regretted not installing some weapon on the truck’s tractor so that the pony in the cab could fight as well, but for now all I could do was drive.

Abandoned train cars were becoming more common as we passed deeper into Northern Cross, and it became harder to dodge around them without flipping the trailer. At least it made it harder for the zombies to box me in, but that was no longer the primary concern. Now they could just wait for me to grind to a halt when I was unable to navigate through this ridiculously large train station.

My PipBuck’s radiation meter clicked faintly as I passed a set of military train cars that had a slight glow coming from them. The Clinic was well-shielded, so it would’ve had to have been a pretty powerful source of radiation for my PipBuck to detect it. At least it explained why so many feral ghouls were gathered here. Maybe if I put enough distance between us and the radiation, they’d leave us alone.

Some of the ghouls got smart and jumped to the top of the Clinic from the tops of train cars. I couldn’t see, but judging by the flashes and the sound of magical energy weapons, Roaring Thunder made short work of them. One ghoul managed to jump on the hood and lashed out at the window, its rotting hooves cracking on the reinforced glass. I couldn’t see where I was going! I had to do something, so I rolled down the window and levitated my submachine gun out of it, firing at the ghoul until it went tumbling off to the side, its body taking my weapon with it.

Now that I could see again, I realized we were headed straight for a pack of freight cars. I tried to turn, but it wouldn’t be enough, and I slammed on the brakes, slowing us to a halt just short of the last car in the line. The ghouls immediately swarmed the Clinic before I could get it moving again.

One snapped at me through the still-open window, and I fired my combat shotgun at it. As it fell, another took its place, and I reloaded before driving that one off as well. This continued until I was out of ammo for the shotgun and resorted to using my magical energy rifle, which was good when it incinerated them, but otherwise didn’t seem to faze them much.

Eventually, the ghouls gave up and the remaining few living ones slunk away, but not before they were piled deeply around the Clinic. I had to kick open the door to get out and survey the damage. We were surrounded by corpses, but the Clinic had suffered no lasting damage. Rare and Zherana emerged from the trailer, and all four of us set about the grisly task of moving the mutated corpses out of the way. I wondered if it bothered Zherana, and if she ever thought about what would happen when her brain rotted and she turned feral, but I didn’t ask, and as usual couldn’t read her expression.

We were nearly finished clearing the ghouls away when I noticed a few more red marks on my EFS, along with quite a few friendlies. Keeping my magical energy rifle at the ready, I snuck around the train cars we’d nearly plowed into and peeked around the corner. Not all that far away was a camp set up on one of the platforms. Next to it were several train cars with bars for siding, filled with miserable-looking ponies crammed in as tightly as could be. Slaves. A pair of slavers were trotting our way, no doubt coming to investigate what all the shooting had been about.

“Slavers ahead,” I called, drawing my friends’ attention to them.

They didn’t look very intimidating, though I wished I’d gotten into my power armor just in case. They were definitely NLC slavers, with the quality of the body armor they were wearing. Zherana climbed up onto one of the train cars with her sniper rifle and got a better look at the camp. The two slavers approaching us jumped as she fired, and I opened fire with bursts from my energy rifle.

One of them went down as a pile of glowing ash, but the other fired back with an assault rifle, and I ducked behind the train car. Roaring Thunder swooped in out of nowhere, an armored wing decapitating the slaver. Zherana took another shot, and shouting came from the slaver camp.

I charged in toward it, ducking under a train car filled with slaves and popping up at the edge of the platform. I cast SATS as the slavers became visible and carefully picked my targets. I counted thirteen clustered around the makeshift dwellings scattered under the protection of a fallen piece of the station’s roof. I fired three bursts with my magical energy rifle before the spell wore off, killing two of the slavers. The third I finished off with another burst before ducking back down. A metal apple fell near me, missing its stem, and I quickly tossed it back, erasing two more red marks from EFS.

Roaring Thunder and Zherana had trimmed the herd more by the time I joined back in, firing at any slaver I saw popping out of cover. Rare Sparks gave me a start by showing up near me, still without her power armor. Her magical energy pistol and my rifle sang out together as we fired on the slavers. Soon they were all gone, many of them now no more than piles of ash. Fortunately, and quite oddly, magical energy shots that incinerated a pony didn’t always destroy everything on them, and we were able to find the keys to the slave cars in one pile of glowing dust.

“What are we supposed to do now?” one of the slaves asked after they’d been released.

Like most of the former slaves, he looked completely shocked and without any idea what to do with himself.

“Be free,” I suggested, “Take what these slavers had and build a new life for yourselves.”

“Where?” he asked, looking at me with vacant eyes, “We’ve all been dragged out here to the middle of nowhere, and there’s nopony around but more slavers and Waypoint, but the Waypointers will turn us over to the slavers in a heartbeat. They’re all NLC birds of a feather.”

“You could go to Stalliongrad,” I suggested, and the stallion’s eyes widened, “It’s a long journey, but these slavers must’ve had supplies for such a journey if they planned to take you away from here. The NLC is there too, but not everywhere. Just watch out. If everything goes according to plan, the NLC won’t be a threat for much longer.”

The former slave looked skeptical, but he did leave me be and talked to some of the others. Some of them set about gathering supplies and searching for the slavers’ stashes, so it looked like at least some would attempt the trip to Stalliongrad. I hoped they’d make it; I hadn’t considered the consequences of freeing them before doing so, it just always seemed the right thing to do. I had to remember that I was passing into places where the NLC was dominant, and sending ponies on to another settlement wasn’t always an option, since that could be a whole city away. Things would be so much simpler once Lord Lamplight was dealt with and the Northern Lights Coalition disbanded.

***

A couple more days of travel brought us to Frostpoint. It looked exactly as it had in the memory orb I’d watched several more times on the way here. The buildings were squat, almost bunker-like. Frostpoint had been a military town once, the eastern part of the village dominated by an Equestrian Army base. It had also secretly been a mining town, as I knew from Shining Armor’s recordings; they’d been mining crystals from the Crystal Empire itself.

The Crystal Empire, seen from a distance across Flankorage, was exactly like what I’d seen in the memory orb and nothing like what I’d imagined. From what I could see, at least, the entire city was made of crystal, though maybe it was just the tops of the towers reaching for the cloud ceiling. The largest of all was the one I’d seen in the memory orb, a spire with several towers alongside it. All the towers were the same burning emerald color I’d seen in the memory, though I had the feeling that they hadn’t always looked like that. It was the color of balefire.

Frostpoint was merely a stop on our journey to find Lord Lamplight, but it was the closest location to him that we knew. There was no clear plan on how to learn exactly where he was, but there had to be something. We couldn’t have come all this way just to come up short now. I knew there were NLC settlements here, thanks to the reports I’d downloaded at the NLC headquarters in the Luxurimane Factory and Vanhoover Spire, so maybe they’d have some information on where their great leader dwelled.

We parked the Clinic outside of town, near the rails leading in from the south, until we knew what we were up against. Roaring Thunder took off into the air to get the lay of things and soon reported in to us.

“You should see this,” his voice came from my PipBuck’s speakers, which Zherana and I listened to while Rare tuned in with her Steel Ranger armor, “They’ve got the whole town; they must. There’s evidence of settlement walls in the east, around the army camp, but there are power lines strung out far outside them and ponies walking around—a lot of ponies. It looks like there are some scattered raider camps to the west, but if the townsponies are this comfortable around them, they must all be NLC.”

“Anything that looks more important than the rest?” I asked, “Somewhere we might be able to gather information on the location of Sat-Con?”

“The camp command center, maybe,” Roaring Thunder said, “It’s surrounded by hundreds of NLC members, though, and none of us are very inconspicuous.”

My dreams of sneaking in and snatching the info we needed went up in smoke. Unless …

“Roaring Thunder, do you think we-” I started to share my plan before a very loud shot went off in Frostpoint and my head jerked around, spotting something streaking up into the sky where it exploded.

“Mother of Luna!” Roaring Thunder swore over the radio angrily, “They’ve got an anti-pegasus gun!”

“Are you okay?” Zherana asked stoically, though the fact she’d been the one to ask stunned Rare and me.

“They almost got me, but I’m okay, mostly. Just some scratches on the armor. I’ll-” he got out before another shot went off, “Horseapples, they’re good at this!”

“We’re going in,” I decided, announcing it to Roaring Thunder over the radio.

“No, no, I see where it is now,” the pegasus said, stopping momentarily as another shot went off to allow him to focus on dodging, “It’s deep in the base. Not that I don’t have faith in the three of you, but getting this deep is too much, even for you. If I wasn’t already in the thick of it, I wouldn’t take the risk. Meet me at the train station; it’s past the edge of the settlement. Princess Celestia’s Pleated Petticoats, stop shooting at me!”

He probably knew best, but I prayed he wouldn’t take any unnecessary risks. Before we ventured into Frostpoint, I headed back to the Clinic to retrieve my power armor. If these ponies had anti-pegasus guns, who knew what else they might be packing? The Northern Lights Coalition had provided raiders in Vanhoover and Stalliongrad with advanced weapons and armor, but as we got closer to the head of the organization, it was becoming apparent that those had really just been scraps. The slavers at Northern Cross had been nearly as well equipped as the Crimson Tide or the Black Skulls. The ponies here in Frostpoint probably were on par with mercenaries.

With my weapons slotted into the rack on my armor’s back, we headed up the tracks to Frostpoint. I kept my eyes on EFS as we entered the town but didn’t spot any hostile marks other than the occasional overlarge rat with crystalline tumors growing out of its body. Roaring Thunder had said to meet at the train station, so logically, following the tracks would take us to it sooner or later. Preferably sooner; the rows of nearly identical concrete buildings were growing old pretty fast.

After Northern Cross, every train station would look dinky, but this one was especially so, not much larger than the few we’d seen traveling between major cities and out-of-the-way hamlets. I recognized the platform from the latest memory orb. It was the place where Lord Lamplight had brought the Frostpoint Garrison and the Hall of Wonders together in the Frostpoint Alliance. Well, it seemed at least the garrison was still around.

“Doc, come look at this,” Rare Sparks called me over.

I trotted around to the warehouse attached to the station and stopped in my tracks. Painted incredibly large over the doors to let trucks in to load and unload was the symbol of the Northern Lights Coalition. It had been painted long ago, centuries at least. There were additional words underneath the three parallel waves: Shipping & Freight. Through the ajar doors, I could see familiar crates piled high, crates I’d seen all over the Wasteland, crates with the logo of the NLC on them.

“They were a shipping company,” I said, “Lord Lamplight just repurposed the name.”

“We have larger problems than ancient copyright infringement,” Zherana said, which sounded almost like a joke from her.

“That must be them! Over here!” somepony yelled, and bullets pelted the warehouse.

Ponies, some in military uniform, some not, were coming from the east. I levitated my magical energy rifle and fired in their direction. Where was Roaring Thunder? Rare’s minigun spun up and took out a few of them, but they were smart and fanned out, not letting her take out too many at one time without exposing herself to attack. A rocket nearly threw her off her hooves as it tore up the train track. I spotted the attacker, another pony in Steel Ranger armor, and fired back with a missile from my suit. I wasn’t expecting the bang that followed, which tore the pony apart and took some of the building they’d been standing on out as well. Shining Armor certainly hadn’t intended to mess around with this thing.

More and more ponies arrived, the front we were facing gradually expanding until we were surrounded on three sides. Where was Roaring Thunder? I turned a stallion with a grenade launcher to ash, and two ponies in Steel Ranger armor trotted over his glowing pile.

“Retreat!” I called.

It was obvious if we stayed where we were, we’d be surrounded. The three of us continued to fire at our attackers whenever we could but ran whenever we had the chance. They got ahead of us on the south and kept us from returning to the Clinic, though I doubt that was their specific objective. They were probably just trying to keep us in Frostpoint where they knew the terrain.

My PipBuck alerted me that I’d discovered a new location: Frostpoint Munitions Factory. The structure loomed ahead ominously, like every factory I’d encountered in the Wasteland. We hadn’t been shot at in several minutes, but I didn’t trust that the NLC ponies had given up on killing us. It was as good a place as any to hide until they thought we’d escaped.

Once within the factory, we barricaded the door and waited, weapons trained at the entrance. EFS was clear apart from a few specks that flitted about the edges. After a few minutes, it seemed they really had given up, and we could focus on other things.

“Roaring Thunder, are you there?” I asked over the radio, but got no reply.

I didn’t dare broadcast where we were in case the NLC ponies were listening in on the same frequency, so we just had to wait and trust that if he was still out there, he would find us. He would find us because he was still out there. I had to believe that. It would take more than an anti-pegasus gun in an old military base to kill a centuries-old supersoldier.

To take my mind off the worry, I searched the factory. Whether by chance or design, I was right where Chairmare Peach Cream wanted me. I got an idea of what I was looking for as I surveyed the lines for manufacturing ammunition. Some kind of mold was here that she desired. I wasn’t all that inclined to help her, given that I disagreed with the PRS pretty strongly now, but maybe I could use this to my advantage. The Ponies’ Republic of Stalliongrad would never permanently join the alliance of settlements I was forming against the NLC, but they could be a useful temporary ally.

The molds were lying in a crate that I conveniently nearly tripped over. “AM-905” it read on the crate and on the molds. They were for some kind of bullet, which seemed innocuous enough until Rare Sparks approached.

“Anti-machine bullets,” she said, with a certain level of revulsion in her voice, “There’s only one thing those are used for: piercing Steel Ranger armor.”

So, that’s what Peach Cream was planning. With these molds and the munitions factory in The Stacks I’d cleared for her during my time there, she could manufacture bullets capable of killing Steel Rangers. She was planning to wipe out the Stalliongrad contingent; one more step on the path to make the Ponies’ Republic the only force left standing in Stalliongrad.

“That settles it, then,” I said as I put the mold I’d been levitating back into the crate, “I won’t bring these to her. I’m already implicated in the destruction of Railyard because of a favor I did for her. I won’t help her commit another atrocity.” Even if I wasn’t the Stalliongrad Steel Rangers’ biggest fan.

A window shattered somewhere in the factory, bringing us all to attention. There were hostile marks on EFS, but it was hard to tell whether they were inside or outside the building. We swept around the factory, searching for the source of the sound until it presented itself.

“Roaring Thunder!” Rare proclaimed.

“That AP gun won’t be a problem any more, but that’s not all,” Roaring Thunder said as he produced a set of files.

“What are these?” I asked as I took them.

“I snatched them from the commander’s office as I crashed through,” he said proudly, “Hopefully what we need is in there somewhere.”

“That’s amazing,” I said, then nearly dropped the files as an explosion came from where we’d entered the factory.

We surveyed the damage, but pieces of the barrier we’d erected were still in place. I spun slowly, watching EFS. We were surrounded.

“There has to be some way out of here,” I said, looking for an exit.

The barrier was blown away by another explosion, and a pony in Steel Ranger armor trotted in, flanked by more NLC ponies. I fired another missile from the pod at my side and temporarily cleared out the building’s entrance. A magical energy minigun had been set up outside the doors, and pieces of equipment were turned to slag as it fired through the entrance. My friends and I split up, trying to escape the attacks. I threw a metal apple out the doors, but that only stopped the fire momentarily. I headed down some stairs as the back door was blown open as well, and spotted an escape.

“Over here, everypony!” I yelled as I galloped toward the massive gear-shaped door with 103 painted on it.

Lights came on in the Stable entryway as I ran inside, and I headed for the controls. Zherana was the first to join me in the Stable. She took up a position just within the doorway and pointed her sniper rifle out, firing whenever an NLC pony showed themselves. When a metal pear bounced down into the Stable, she picked it up in her teeth and threw it back. Rare Sparks appeared next, backing into the Stable as she fired her minigun and grenade launcher simultaneously. When I spotted Roaring Thunder, I hit the controls and joined my friends in firing out of the door. Roaring Thunder glided in as the door rolled shut and loudly locked.

A terminal booted up nearby and resolved into a view of what was going on outside the Stable door. Ponies wearing NLC barding and power armor were swarming the door, a few of them firing at it but most sensible enough to know it was no use. That door would withstand a megaspell, at least theoretically.

“What do we do now?” one of them asked, a mare that looked an awful lot like a raider. Apparently, they’d enlisted the entire town’s help in hunting us down.

“We keep ‘em closed in here, until we come up with a better plan,” another mare replied, this one wearing a uniform.

“You know the legends. This Stable’s got another entrance,” the first complained.

“We can’t let ‘em escape,” the military mare said, “Sweep Frostpoint to make sure we find them if they get out. Constant patrols. Get in touch with the Emerald City, too. Make sure they don’t escape through the Crystal Empire.”

“Aw, the ghouls?” the raider complained, “They give me the creeps.”

“Then send somepony else to talk to them,” the military mare said coldly, “They cannot be allowed to escape. They’ve caused enough trouble for Lord Lamplight. That ends here.”

[Max Level Reached]
New Quest Perk: Power Armor Training (2) – After training with Rare Sparks, you can operate a set of power armor naturally, as if it weren’t even there.
Lord Lamplight Memory Orb (Together): +1 to Charisma.
New Quest: A Way Out – Find Stable 103’s other entrance and escape.
Charisma +1 (6)

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