//------------------------------// // Chapter 4: Baccarat // Story: Fallout Equestria: Devil's Luck // by Chokfi //------------------------------// Chapter 4: Baccarat "A pack of cards is the devil's prayer-book.” The next morning I woke up in a stouper, hugging my teddy close to me. He smelled like booze and shit, and so did I. My mind seemed blanked from the previous night, and I could bearly remember where I was. I got up and unlatched the door only to see a stallion outside. Only vuegely did I recognize him, a tall NCA officer I had met before. Honestly, he was kind of good looking as I scanned his flanks. I couldn't remember his name, but I'd spent some time with him before. "Ah, devil!" He said in a cheery, far too loud, voice. "Tyrana told me you'd be up here. I was hoping to catch you at a good time." He grinned which seemed to flash with the power of the sun. Which was definitely not trying to blind me with nine inch iron spikes, nope. "Yeah, I'm here, what do you want?" I asked, taking my telekinesis and throwing a soft fluffy thing at him. It was only after it started to fall over the edge that I noticed it was the yaogui, and I ran over to try to catch it. "No, teddy!" I said with a yell, before catching it with my telekinesis and tossing it back into the room behind me. The stallion laughed, staring at me with a wide toothed grin. "So, you still play with toys devil? I wouldn't have taken that for someone as ruthless as you." He shrugged. "In any case, I have a job for you. I may not be a real member of the NCA anymore, but I have more than enough of a budget to pay you off. Which means, well, I've got a job for you." --- "There's a resurch facility up north, used to be a personal favorite of a few ponies, but it was mostly disregarded by Luna's government due to... personal issues with the mission statement. The porpoise was to launch ponies into space. To the moon, if you catch my drift. "Well, there are piles and piles of resurch in there. Along with lots of equipment, and roamers of magical energy weapons. It was one of a few dozen remote facilities that was funded by equestrian powers, specificaly the MAS and MWT. It was owned by their military, not by ours." The stallion stressed the word ours, drawing back from equestrian and trying to show his loyalty to Caledonia. "In any case, it was supposed to be safe here. And it was. It didn't get hit by any bombs, and it's funding didn't shut off until the end. There is alot of very useful information in there. "Now we get to what I want you to do. Frankly, I need an agent. Someone who can go in and remove a certain... obstruction to our taking control of the facilities. There are ghouls, and lots of them. We don't know what's calling them but, well, I know you can clear the fuckers out. Do that, and you get paid." "Well, OK, but a couple things first." I said, staring directly into his eyes with my own piercing red ones. "One, what makes you think I need to get paid. I have hit the jackpot enough times to have a large enough settlement in my coffers. And second, well, I don't like going out of my way." "Well, in addition to your payment, I've gotten conformation that this will get you enough friends here in Paleo that your room will be done and paid for. But if you don't care about that." I sighed. He knew that this was one place I was always sinking caps into. Plus, I had been lieing before, I did need money. For alot of things. I nodded pensively, I was in. --- I marched along the road from Paleo to the testing facility with an odd feeling in my heart. Now, I knew that these ghouls would be feral, so I didn't mind much about shooting them right in the head. Fortune had run out of ammo, so all I had was a single shotgun I had lying around my room. At least I would be able to try out some good old fashioned dragons-breath rounds. But first, I loaded it up with slugs. I had no qualms about killing feral ghouls, and from the moment I saw the first one I knew that's hat they would be. But I still attempted to sneak past them... to no avail. Instead, when I was noticed by one, I immediately cocked my gun and shot him between the eyes. The ironic thing was how easy it was. And how, somehow, I was no longer seen by the others once I dispatched the first. I had my eyes on my rhetorical, staring down at my EFS and saw each of them, red marks, but completely passive. So, I went up and shot them one by one. A slug blew one's brains out, Dragons-breath lit another on fire, and a third was ripped apart by buckshot. It was easy, it was fun. However, when I moved in through the front doors of the building I was cut off by a voice on the intercom. "Smoothcoat. Yes, you, numskull. You need to find your way to the metal staircase in the east wing." He seemed to cough slightly. "Oh, and try to refrain from killing our breatheren? Another one dead is another one we can't save." That meant stealth. So I began to sneak across the floors. However, this building was massive, and I was easily lost. I think I made the first turn wrong, to the point where I was stepping through the halls and into a place that seemed to be half office and... classroom? I wasn't sure, I hadn't seen many places that were filled with chalkboards. But I supposed that it must just be how the scientist ponies did their work. My movement was temporarily hindered by the fact that every few feet I felt the search to loot or check something on a computer. So occasionally I did allow myself to easily slip into a computer and check their emails, noticing an odd trend. Half of the, mostly corrupted, emails came from management and displayed the logo of robronco: A hoofington manufacturer. This was odd seeing as we were litteraly on the other side of equestria from the Hoof. I should know, I had always intended to avoid it like the plague. Still, there wasn't a map anywhere, or any real useful information. The only thing I could really care about was apparently this facility had been used for a military supply chain through Caledonia. The breakthrough came in when I found a single, much more important office. This was the offices of the manager, and I closed the door behind me only to be assaulted by the smell of a rotting corpse. I walked around the desk and I saw it there, the manager, dead in his chair. And then he moved. I hadn't been watching my EFS, and the suddenness of the movement sent me into a shock. I immediately shot the ghoul right in the head, before even knowing if he was feral or not.. But he certainly looked the part in retrospect. Still, I brushed him aside, thankfully far enough away that the ghouls I could hear just outside didn't think to look into the office. I looked at the monitor on that desk and began to read alot of very interesting Ministry of Arcane Science dealings. They had been shipping Stealth-bucks to the front-lines right through here. I looked at the map, marking things down on my pip-buck before wandering over to the safe. Inside were a pair of the pip-bucks, which together were worth more than most of the things I had on me... this was fantastic. --- So, finally, I made my way to the metal staircase with minimal disturbance. I didn't even have to shoot any more of the ghouls. And, after a short and snippy conversation I made my way in through the door. Based on the voice I had been expecting a ghoul, and I wasn't disappointed, the entire massive two story room was filled with working ghouls. Each of them was doing something, and their equipment was extremely wonderful. I was astounded, no wonder my friend had wanted the place. "Right this way Smoothcoat." One of the ghouls said, frowning at me as he walked me up through a few groups. There, working at a massive chalkboard with tons of complicated queasiness was an extremely radioactive Earthpony Ghoul. "Dr Brightfur, the smooth-skin is here. He might be able to help with our problem..." "Problem?" I asked, pensive. "I'm here to try and get, well, you out. What exactly is this... problem?" "Oh, don't worry!" Brightfur said in an oddly echoy voice. "We will be leaving quite soon. We just have a couple preparations to make, which are being impeded by demons." It was hard to tell but he had a wild look in his eye, like a cult leader. "Well, what kinds of demons." For all I knew these could be anything from mutated monstrosities, to rad-roaches, to his imagination. You couldn't really take someone seriously who was on the point of raving mad and wearing a lab-coat that only had the second-half of a name tag on it left. "Invisible things. Killed our people. It's... hard to say honestly." He grinned with a gap-toothed ghoulish grin. "Once you take care of them, we can all leave to the moon. That's where we belong." "Wait, the moon?" I asked, looking him up and down as my pipbuck continued to click. "They don't like ghouls in Dice proper, at least not most of it. And you, well, I don't think you could make it close to the doors without being shot." "No no no, To the moon woman!" he said, grabbing me and making me uncomfortable with his squishy radioactive flesh. He pointed to the sky, obscured by several stories worth of other floors. "Bing bang boom! Right to the moon!" "Oh, well, whatever makes you happy..." I just backed up and tried to get the fuck out of there. "I'll, uh, try and get rid of the demons. Ok?" He just nodded and got back to his work, as I sighed and gratefully ran downstairs. I wasn't sure if these demons were real or not, but I wasn't going to take any chances. This place was freaking me out more and more every minute. Level Up! Skill milestone: Sneak 50